#I am trying to imagine the scenes without envisioning the film too...

[ayumunoya]

This came into mail today! I've read only few scenes but I am already excited. The script includes cutted out scenes or completely lost scenes, so I will post some here too. 💙❤️💙

[uomo-accattivante]

Great article about Paul Schrader’s The Card Counter - a poker movie that’s not really a poker movie...

Some filmmakers write a hit movie and spend the ensuing years trying to escape its shadow. Paul Schrader never flinched. Forty-five years after his “Taxi Driver” script put him on the map, the writer-director has developed a body of work loaded with alienated anti-heroes compelled to violent and reckless extremes for the sake of a higher calling.

That includes “The Card Counter,” in which Oscar Isaac plays guilt-stricken Abu Ghraib vet William Tell, a man with a gambling addiction compelled to help the revenge-seeking son (Tye Sheridan) of a former colleague. Taking justice into his own hands, Isaac’s William Tell slithers through the Vegas strip in search of questionable salvation, not unlike a certain Vietnam vet named Travis Bickle did from the driver’s seat. As if to cement the comparisons, “The Card Counter” features Martin Scorsese as an executive producer, marking the first time the two men share a credit since 1999’s “Bringing Out the Dead.”

For Schrader, “Taxi Driver” comparisons are inevitable in all his work. “My tendency is to look for interesting occupational metaphors,” Schrader said in a recent interview. “‘Taxi Driver’ hit the bull’s eye of the zeitgeist and it doesn’t die. There’s no way I could’ve planned for that, but it does inform the stories I tell.”

At 75, Schrader continues to churn out movies much like his compatriot Scorsese, albeit on a much smaller scale. “The Card Counter” is the latest illustration of the secularized Christian dogma percolating through his work. “Our society doesn’t like to take responsibility for anything,” he said. “But I come from a culture where you’re responsible for everything. You come into the world soaked with guilt and you just get guiltier.” In his own prickly fashion, Schrader makes movies steeped in empathy for lost souls in search of redemption despite the daunting odds. “We’re all certainly capable of forgiveness,” he said, and chuckled. “Anyone who says otherwise is wrong.”

The “Taxi Driver” dilemma looms large in nearly all of Schrader’s work, from the dazzling high-stakes activism of “Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters” all the way through Ethan Hawke’s eco-conscious priest in “First Reformed.” While the latter, Oscar-nominated effort brought Schrader new fans, “The Card Counter” is an even more precise distillation of his aesthetic — a moody, philosophical drama about the vanity of the personal crusade.

Schrader, who has labeled his homegrown character studies as “man in the room” dramas, embraces the parallels as usual. “There is this kind of myth that the taxi driver was this friendly, joking kind of guy who was a character actor in movies,” he said. “But the reality is that it’s a very lonely job, and you’re trapped in a box for 60 hours a week.” He saw the same logic with gambling, a wayward profession generally depicted in the movies in the context of escapist romps, rather than the somber rituals that afflict most players. “I thought about the essence of playing cards every day, or sitting in front of a slot machine. It’s kind of zombie-like,” Schrader said. “You see commercials of people in casinos laughing. But it’s a pretty glum place. Today with slots you don’t even have to pull the lever. You just sit there and let the numbers roll.”

The gambling figure led Schrader to the bigger picture of his character’s conundrum. “I was wondering why someone would choose to live in that sort of purgatory,” he said. “He doesn’t want to be alive, but he can’t really be dead, either. What could cause that? It can’t be a simple crime, murder, or a family dispute. It has to be something unforgivable. And that was Abu Ghraib.”

After the fallout of that debacle, William did time in a military prison, and reenters society before the movie begins. That was a world the filmmaker wanted to understand in clearer terms. Though Schrader has received blowback for his controversial Facebook posts in the past, in this case, the platform was an asset: He used it to track down soldiers who had done time in the United States Penitentiary in Leavenworth, the only military prison in the U.S., to better understand the initial claustrophobic world that Tell endures, as well as the conflict between the justice he’s received and what he deserves. “This man has been punished by his government, set free, and paid his due, but he doesn’t feel that,” Schrader said. “What does he do then? How does he fill his time? That’s how it all began.”

Schrader himself toyed with gambling when he lived in Los Angeles early in his career, but soon gave it up. “I very quickly realized I was only interested in gambling if it was really dangerous and I didn’t want to expose myself to that kind of danger,” he said. Years later, though, the experience helped inform his story. “There is this whole fantasy of gambling movies from ‘The Cincinnati Kid’ to ‘California Split,’” Schrader said. “But poker is all about waiting. People will play 10 to 12 hours a day and two to three times a day, a hand will happen where two players both have chips. Now you’ve got a face-off. But that doesn’t happen very often. Most guys who are there are running the numbers, the probability.”

He envisioned “The Card Counter” as a repudiation of the traditional poker movie, which builds to the giddy release of a final tournament. When that moment arrives in the movie, Schrader takes the movie in a bleak, shocking new direction. “It’s not really a poker movie — that’s a red herring,” he said.

William is immersed in his casino journey when he encounters Cirk (Sheridan), the crazy-eyed son of another Abu Ghraib soldier who committed suicide. Cirk blames the soldiers’ former commander (Willem Dafoe), and hopes to loop William into the plan. Instead, the older man decides to take Cirk under his wing to talk him out of the act, which doesn’t prove so easy. In the process, the gambler forms a curious bond with La Linda (Tiffany Haddish), a gambling agent and pimp whose icy, relentless drive to make the most out of the poker circuit brings William some measure of companionship on his wayward journey.

It should come as no surprise that the “Girls Trip” breakout is nearly unrecognizable in the role of the calculated La Linda, which is also a distinctly Schraderish touch: From his work with Richard Pryor in 1978’s “Blue Collar” all the way through Cedric the Entertainer’s supporting turn in “First Reformed,” Schrader has made a habit of seeking out comedic actors willing to play against type. That’s partly opportunistic on his part. “They’re eager to do it because they want to expand their palette, so you can get them for a price,” Schrader said, chuckling again. “That’s necessary, given the kind of films I make.” But that’s not all: “They will always find a way to be interesting, even when they’re not getting a laugh.”

Which is not to say that the process comes easily to them. Haddish recently told the New York Times that Schrader had to coach her out of speaking in a comedic sing-song. The filmmaker put it in blunter terms. “On the first reading of the script we had, frankly, she wasn’t very good,” he said. “I told her to go back and read every single line without emotion. Then I said, ‘You’re not going to do that in front of the camera, but you can’t hit every line either. So let’s pick five or six lines you can hit where you get a smile or reaction.’ Quickly she got that it was a different rhythm.”

As for Isaac, whose disquieting turn suggests a maniac lingering just beneath the surface, Schrader once again turned to metaphor. “I told him to imagine himself on a rocky coast in the ocean,” Schrader said. “Waves are going to come up and get you all day every day. They’re going to try to batter you. Let them. The waves will go away. You’ll still be there. Don’t compete. In the end, the rocks will win. You have to learn to trust that the way these things are put together has more power than the individual movement.”

William’s routine includes an odd ritual in which he covers all the furniture in his various Vegas hotel rooms with white paper. While the motivation is never explained, Schrader said it stemmed from an experience with production designer Ferdinando Scarfiotti on the set of 1982’s ���Cat People,” when Schrader realized the man was doing the same thing. “He said, quite simply, ‘I have to live here surrounded by these ugly hotel furnishings,’” Schrader recalled. The concept inspired the new movie’s most compelling visual motif. “Casinos are very ugly places. There are no exceptions,” Schrader said. “Often you aspire to finding pockets of beauty and there weren’t really any here except the only place he could control, which was his hotel rooms, where he could privatize his visions. I came up with this ritual for him to control those visuals.”

At a certain point, Schrader himself couldn’t control the visuals of “The Card Counter” for more prosaic reasons: After an extra tested positive for COVID-19, the production shut down last March, with five days of shooting left, and couldn’t resume until July. Though Schrader initially took to Facebook to fume at his producers, the pause eventually opened up an opportunity to tweak his vision. “I edited the film and put in placeholders for the five or six scenes of consequence that I hadn’t shot,” he said. “I didn’t have a fully finished film but I could screen it for people. Normally you only get that privilege if you have a big-budget film and you’re allowed reshoots.” The early audience included Scorsese, who provided a crucial note. “I asked Marty, ‘What am I missing?’ He said to me that the relationship with Tiffany and Oscar was too thin. So I rewrote those scenes.”

Schrader asked Scorsese to take on the executive producer credit as a favor. “I said, ‘Marty, wouldn’t it be nice to share a card again? I thought it would help sell the film but it would also be a cool thing to do after all these years,’” Schrader said. “Then a couple of weeks later his agent called wanting to work out a deal. What deal? I asked Marty and he said yes. That’s the deal!” Now, the pair are trying to collaborate on a new long-form TV series based on the Bible, though the timing has been delayed by production on Scorsese’s upcoming “Killers of the Flower Moon.”

In the meantime, Schrader has been mulling over the way “Taxi Driver” not only continues to inform his storytelling but the world at large. “Hardly a week goes by that I don’t notice or hear some reference to it,” he said. “But I don’t know how you’d tell such a story today. A number of writers have tried and I don’t think they’ve succeeded because it has to come out of a certain place and time. We have plenty of these incels around, but they’re not as original or revealing as they were 45 years ago when that character came on the scene. I wouldn’t know how to write about it.”

Instead, his next project is a love triangle called “Master Gardener,” which he hopes to shoot in Louisiana before the end of the year. He has several other potential scripts ready to go after that. And while he has expressed trepidation about the future of cinema in the past, he’s not convinced that audiences have given up on it yet. He recalled a conversation he had with Cedric the Entertainer when “First Reformed” made the rounds. “He said off-handedly to me, ‘You know, I didn’t realize there were so many people who liked serious movies,’” Schrader said, and chuckled once more. “Well, yeah, there are.”

“The Card Counter” premieres next week at the Venice Film Festival. Focus Features releases on September 10, 2021.

###

[putschki1969]

Wakana e-onkyo Interview English Translation

Note: The first interview with Wakana regarding her cover album. Some juicy details so be sure to check it out!! A little highlight: Hitoshi Konno provided his violin playing for the album!! As always, take everything you read with a grain of salt, my Japanese is by no means perfect. If you want to use this translation or parts of it, be sure to CREDIT me and LINK to this post.

■ SPECIAL INTERVIEW ー with Wakana

Wakana debuted in 2008 as a member of Kalafina. In February 2019 she made her debut as solo singer. Her cover album "Wakana Covers ~ Anime Classics ~" has just been released. It features anime songs in a classic arrangement. Be smitten by Wakana’s charming and expressive vocals, she adjusts her voice to fit the mood of each song. Also pay attention to the unique sound which perfectly conveys the image the different arrangers envisioned. We talked about the songs, her singing,  the arrangements and the overall sound.

── I think everyone has long been hoping for you to release an album with the concept of covering anime songs with a classical arrangment. What inspired you to pick this particular timing?

Wakana: It was partly because I appeared in my producer’s event "Satoshi Takebe Premium Duo Session Special Vol.9 Satoshi Takebe x Wakana" last November. Takebe-san suggested we should do some covers and I told him I would love to sing some Ghibli songs. That’s how we ended up performing a Ghibli medley which was a lot of fun. Having had that amazing experience, I was planning to do a series of live performances starting this spring where I would cover anime songs in collaboration with a female group called 1966Quartet.

── Unfortunately all plans for spring this year were ...

Wakana: Yes, the live was cancelled before it even got announced. However, I had planned to hold the second instalment of that concert series in December anyway so we decided to just start from there.

── So were you planning to announce the release of the album during the spring live and then accompany the release with the winter live! Was it supposed to be like that?

Wakana: Actually, at the beginning, it was only a live project, I had no plans to release an album. However, during the stayhome period while I was filming videos for my fan club, I asked the fans, "are there any songs you want me to sing?" There were many people who mentioned anime songs, especially Ghibli songs. Needless to say, I loved all the suggetions and I realised that fans would probably be very happy if I released an album in advance of the live. So, while secretly starting the album production, I uploaded some covers on YouTube to get everyone excited. Eventually I was able to announce that, “yes, I am actually working on an album!”

── When it comes to the production of an album like that, the most difficult thing is selecting songs.

Wakana: If the choice had been up to me only the album would be full of Ghibli *laughs*, in order to prevent that I gathered the opinions of everyone around me and this is how we ended up with the final tracklist. For example, I came up with the idea to include a "Doraemon" song and some newer pieces from Makoto Shinkai movies but "Yatsura No Ashioto No Ballade" and "Get Wild" are songs that I wouldn't have suggested myself. I didn't think I would ever cover a song like "Get Wild".

── With so many Ghibli songs to choose from wasn't it particularly difficult to decide which songs to include in and which songs to give a pass?

Wakana: It was!! For example, I was adamant about having “Kaze no Toorimichi” on the album but that forced be to remove “Teru no Uta” from my list because both songs have a similar atmosphere. Then there were songs like “Kimi wo Nosete”. When I performed it together with Takebe-san at this live it left such a strong impression on me. Plus, I have always liked it so I KNEW I had to have it on the album. In fact, this song came to my mind first when thinking about the selection of songs for this album, I was literally crying removing song after song from my list of candidates but I comforted myself with the thought that I would eventually use all those songs for my live performance in December!

── How did you arrange each of the songs once you managed to select them?

Wakana: I asked three arrangers to help me this time, Shin Hashimoto, Miki Sakurai and Shu Kanematsu. According to the image I wanted to convey with each song, I gave it to one of my three arrangers. We held many remote meetings where I first talked about the image I had in mind for the individual songs and in response to that, the arrangers sent me their suggestions... Everyone came up with absolutely wonderful arrangements that go far beyond anything I could have ever imagined!

── I think that deciding on the key is also a problem for a cover song. Did you decide that after consulting with your arrangers?

Wakana: It's not as simple as to just change a male singer's song into a key that is easy for women to sing, after all, you don’t want to ruin the atmosphere of the song by changing the key too much. To begin with I sent sample recordings of me singing certain patterns for each song to the arranger and then arranger would suggest a key they found fitting. I asked them to send me accompaniment that matched their preferred key and then I re-recorded my singing with their accompaniment to get a feel for the overall atmosphere. So with that sort of exchange between myself and the arrangers we selected the perfect key that would suit each song.

── When you say that you don’t want to ruin the atmosphere of a song by changing the key, what exactly do you mean by that and could you name a song where this applies?

Wakana: Take "Rain" for example, the key is a little too low for me which doesn’t exactly make it easy for me to sing but I think that singing it with this key will bring you closer to the world created by Senri Oe and Motohiro Hata. A world that’s filled with tears, tears by men.

── "Rain" is a song with particularly strong emotions from a male perspective.

Wakana: It took a while to get into the lyrics. Kanematsu-san who was in charge of the arrangement helped me interpret the song from a male perspective. Towards the end of the lyrics there is a line that says "Whistling, I follow". Why does he whistle in this moment? I didn't understand. So when I asked Kanematsu-san, he said, "I think the man in this song is trying to appear cool." And indeed, when I read other phrases such as "incapable of words" or "in front of the eyes of the world" at the beginning it suddenly made sense. Once I had challenged myself with this song I came to the conclusion that I want to sing more manly songs from now on. This song truly taught me the pleasures of reading and singing certain lyrics.

── And then on the contrary, we have a song like “Yasashisa ni Tsutsumareta Nara” which is sung from the point of view of a little girl.

Wakana: I knew I had to give this song to Sakurai-san to arrange, it needed a woman’s touch. That image of Kiki flying though the sky and that final scene where Tombo finally flies on his very own machine. This song has such a refreshing vibe and a sense of speed, it’s transporting you right into the future. It was not my intention to change those images, I wanted to stay very faithful to the original atmosphere. That’s why I asked Sakurai-san to keep the refreshing vibe and only make some other slight changes.

── Being overwhelmed with love for a song like this, did you have trouble approaching it as a singer?

Wakana: When I went to see one of Yumin-san's live performance, Yumin-san said, "I'm so happy that I am still in love with the world I envisioned as a girl." This brought tears to my eyes. There is still so much love. You have believed in God since you were little and you want to do your very best without ever giving up just like Kiki! That’s it!! That's why this song has such a girlish cuteness and innocence! But how to best express it through my own singing? I worried quite a lot about this. I consulted with Sakurai-san and Shin Hashimoto-san, who was in charge of the direction of all the songs, and somehow we decided on a singing style that all of us liked.

── Although it is faithful to the world of the song, it does not really resemble Yumin's singing style. For example, Yumin is applying a lot of vibrato starting from the first few lines but you are stretching out your notes in a calm manner followed by a bit of vibrato.

Wakana: That way of singing is unique to Yumin. I was not trying to simply copy the original songs, nor was it my intention to surpass them. I just love these songs so much which is why I tried singing them with as much joy and carefreeness as possible. I think I was able to do that because I had lots of time to face each song during the stay home period.

── So you were able to sing these songs you love so much without putting too much effort into it?

Wakana: In terms of singing, I was working a lot on my breathing technique this spring, so I guess the results of that came out while I was working on the album. My vocal coach said, "humans do not consciously inhale or exhale. If you exhale naturally, you will inhale naturally so there is no need to overthink it. This was especially true for “Toki ni wa Mukashi no Hanashi wo”, when I want to sing as if I'm talking, I don't want to put consciously add a breath. After all, I don't think about breathing when I'm talking. So I just let it happen naturally. 

── Is there anything we should pay attention to in terms of the sound of the arrangement?

Wakana: Everything really. But there is maybe one thing I would like to point out ... I was surprised that Kanematsu-san suggested we arrange "Inochi no Namae" with only strings and no other instruments. Listening to this song by itself is amazing but hearing it alongside the other tracks is quite fascinating because there is an audible change due to the lack of other instruments. In addition, the beautiful atmosphere from the recording studio is conveyed wonderfully through the music. When we were recording it felt like time had stood still.

── Are there any other things that impressed you when you were present at the recordings?

Wakana: “Ai ni dekiru koto wa mada aru kai” was arranged for piano, violin, and cello but we used the main area of Victor Entertainment’s largest studio to have Okuizumi-san play all by himself on the cello while Shin-san on the piano and Konno-san on the violin were recording in adjacent booths. We wanted the sound of the cello to be heard clearly since it takes up such a big portion of the song. Speaking of sound, “Yatsura No Ashioto No Ballade” is rather simple and only consists of my singing and a piano accompaniment.  We did a very basic racording and kept it quite raw without adding too much sound components to the song. I wanted to create a special atmosphere for the recording so we darkened the room, and I sat in a chair. All of a sudden I was becoming aware of sounds I had never noticed before, the creaking of the chair, my clothes rustling. I didn’t want these noises to be included in the recording because I feared it would end up being too raw so I made a lot of effort to record it while making as little noise as possible *laughs*.

── I was surprised by the arrangement towards the end of “Get Wild”  since you didn’t add a semitone-upward key change.

Wakana: …… Ahh! Now that you mention it.

── But it didn’t take away from the enjoyment since the tension was still incredibly high from the interlude, I didn't even realise at first that there was no modulation *laughs*. Besides, if you had transposes it up a semitone according to the original song, it would have sounded too pop-like and the classical atmosphere would have diminished.

Wakana: Regarding "Get Wild", I was particularly worried that the charm of the song would be lost by using a key more suited for a female singer. So I was adamant to make this song the most powerful out of all tracks. I asked the members of 1966 Quartet to record it because I wanted this song to have a sprinting vibe reminiscent of their Beatles and other UK rock covers. As for my singing style, unlike "Rain" which I sang in the early stages of production with gradually strenghtening, I sang this song with a lot of strength from the get-go both in the verses as well as in the choruses.In the original sample I sent my singing was still quite soft but then I realised that wouldn’t work, I needed something different so I decided to sing in a fierce manner from the first note onwards. The arrangement is also based on that.

── In your YouTube videos - including a recording of “Get Wild”- you are using Victor's new model "HA-MX100V" as monitor headphones.

Wakana: Those headphones have a really clear sound and I am not only using them for vocal recording but also for track down, mastering check, home recording and video editing. Also, in the latter half of the recording, I started using Shure headphones recommended by Kanematsu-san and my engineer. When using them, you hear the exact same thing in the recording booth and control room !

── You use Victor and Shure for your work. What about headphones outside of work?

Wakana: When I am travelling by train or car I like to listen to music. So Sony's noise cancelling headphones are my favourite. Even when I am  travelling on a heavy rainy highway, the sound of the rain and the roaring noise in the tunnel are all cancelled out! I also have wireless earphones and use them quite a lot.

── Good headphones are becoming more appealing than ever for music fans especially now with the ever-increasing number of live streams.

Wakana: That’s true! If you are using wireless headphones, you may be worried about the synch-gap between the video and audio so I think that a pair of high-quality wired headphones is perfect for a live stream. For my upcoming live "Wakana Anime Classic 2020" the audience capacity has been halved so we also decided to offer a live stream option.

── That’sgreat news!

Wakana: I think that some people find it difficult to attend the live because of the distance to Tokyo and the fact that they do not want to worry about getting sick in the current situation. So I'm very happy that everyone can enjoy it in the form of live stream. Since this is my first attempt there is still a lot to learn but with the help of many people around me we are trying to think of various things to make this experience enjoyable for everyone. There a re a lot of things to consider after all, things such as stage sets and video production.

── You mentioned that you would be singing songs that didn’t make it to the album?

Wakana: Definitely! And of course the songs from the album but I would like to sing them with a unique arrangement that can only be heard during the live performances. Please look forward to all of it!

── I'm looking forward to it!

Wakana: And there is something that’s actually still a secret ...

── What is it?

Wakana: Four Hippos will be the appointed image characters for my live! Since I am only doing covers I thought it would be fitting to use hippos as motif. [Note: “hippo” in Japanese is read the same way as “cover”]

── Thank you.

[ohnobjyx]

you answer about celebrities being prudent with dating got me curious as western boys in bands, especially in the rock/alternative/rap scene, seem to have a reputation for dating/sleeping around a lot, do asian idols just not date/sleep around a lot or are they just better at hiding it because they are expected to?

Hi, anon! I’m slowly working through all the asks, but I remembered yours when I was watching this week hotpot episode from SDoC S3 (I’m wondering if I should write a post compiling all the candies, but I have so many asks pending).

To start with the answer, let’s put the disclaimer first: I don’t know celebrities, I’m a simple fan just like all of us. Whatever they do in their private life it’s their own thing, and I just simply try to place an objective view of their situation here.

Just a clarification: when we talk about idol or celebrity, I’m talking about those that are pretty successful in the industry (with their number of fans ranking in the millions). These are the tip of the iceberg in the industry however. The bulk of them have less fans, but are also less subjected to scrutiny by the public.

1. First of all they are prudent because it isn’t widely accepted as “good” that people date/sleep around a lot, especially among the older generations. However, many young people also feel that it’s unacceptable, and their opinions may vary from “they must be very promiscuous or they flicker a lot” to “if they haven’t been able to keep a relationship for long, there must be a problem with this person”.

2. We’ve already talked about the fact that celebrities are expected to uphold a clear and good moral example for their fans. They’ll be heavily criticized if they do things that aren’t socially approved, and it’ll impact negatively on their work prospects. So, I suppose that in the case any celebrity did date/sleep around, they’d have to be masters at hiding their “affairs”.

Let’s just imagine how a male idol’s gf fans (the type of fans that fantasize being their idol’s gf) would react if their idol publicly dated around with many girls. I don’t think that would end well.

3. Like I said at the beginning, I’m going to talk about those idols and celebrities that have more success in the industry.

So, when we talk about dating/sleeping around, there’s something that we can’t ignore: time.

I don’t know about the workload of the boy bands (especially, as you said, in the rock/alternative/rap scene) but the workload of an Asian idol is terrifying.

Let me show you a few examples:

a. Even before he debuted in the boy band, dd spent almost everyday hours dancing, no free weekends and barely vacations, since he was 13 and entered the company. As a child, he got myocarditis when he was learning to dance. As soon as he got discharged, he went back to dancing, and spent his summer vacations (just a month in China, btw, August) dancing from 1 pm to 9 pm everyday, to recover the lost ground (this really was a test for his love for dancing, but just imagine it: he could do 8 hours a day just because he liked it, how many hours would he pull when pressed by the company?)

b. To anyone unfamiliar with Asian culture, the Lunar New Year’s Eve is the most important celebration in Asian culture, a night when family gathers together to celebrate the arrival of the new year. Asian idols usually are full of work, even that same night, so they almost never spend the New Year’s Eve with their families. A famed actress (in her fifties), once said in a program: “my father died last year... and one of the things I regret the most is that I haven’t spent a single New Year’s Eve with him in the last 20 years”.

c. In 2015, a year after his debut with Uniq, dd posted on w/ibo: “Just another year that I can’t be with my parents on New Year’s Eve... just a little sad” (and from what I know, he hadn’t spent a single New Year’s Eve at home since his debut).

d. I don’t know if any of you are familiar with Running Man, another c-variety show that’s very popular in China (I recommended it, btw). They did a night-life special last year, and when the director announced the theme (that they’d start filming by 4 pm and continue through the night), the host were like “just that?”:

“Then like our usual jobs”, “I can stay awake longer than an owl”, “I’m also good at spending all-nighters”.

One of them actually said: it seems that they don’t really get what an actor’s job is... everyone say how many days and nights have you gone by without sleeping in you busiest times? Angelababy (that’s her stage name, yes): “When I was a model... I really spent  three days and three nights   without a single moment of sleep.” Li Chen: “Before I came here to film yesterday, I spent 4 days filming night scenes for my drama, so 4 nights without sleep.”

Song Yuqi: “If we count sleeping an hour a day... I went a full week without a full night of sleep. Yesterday was the longest I’ve been sleeping in the last month”.

Their attitude is what surprises me the most, to be honest... It’s like, “of course we would spend a whole night awake, no problem!”

e. One of the previous hosts from this show once said that from his daughter’s birth to her first birthday the amount of time he spent with her totalled to three months.

4. I actually remembered your ask yesterday when I was watching the hotpot episode because of this:

The hosts mentioned getting back at their hotels after filming at 6 am (I think they had been filming the episode during the day and most of the night, and wanted to film a part of the dance using the first daylight). Actually, dd was talking about ZYX making noise in his room practicing dance moves at 6 am (wtf dude, you just pulled an all-nighter, please sleep).

There was a stalker photo of dd taken at 3 am when dd was coming out of the filming site for SDoC S3, one of the other day (just imagine it: you’re leaving the workplace, after a hard day of work, and instead of getting into the car peacefully you have to escape from these people). 

This kind of workload is insane. When they aren’t filming, they are travelling to filming sites, filming tv shows episodes, filming commercials, doing interviews, photoshoots, practicing whatever show is coming up next, reading scripts, and a long list of things they do. Almost without a single moment to rest.

I remember an interview of another actor, in which he said that if he had a free moment in his schedule or a free day, he spent it sleeping and talking with his family.

I’m not saying that with this kind of schedule keeping a relationship is absolutely impossible, but it resembles greatly a long distance relationship, no matter where your home actually is. So dating around a lot is quite of... difficult? (at least in my opinion). And about sleeping around... maybe it’s just me, but if I had a free night with their workload... I’d pass out as soon as I was in my room, and that’s all the sleeping I can envision.

(Btw, this kind of work pace is a trend in China. I've been told that it’s actually common to have surgeons doing 36-hour shifts... here I was thinking that 24h shifts were outrageous).

5. However, it’s not impossible. It wasn’t so long ago that a scandal got out about an actor who was married and with an adult son AND still had time to keep a mistress.

I hope I haven’t rambled too much, anon, and that you find my answer useful!

Edit (thanks to @gremlin-02!): “you're missing the part about propaganda. chinese idols have to hold up "chinese culture/good morals/examples of good citizens" they are not gonna be promoting a play boy idol since it "corrupts" the family values and state system.”

You are absolutely right, and it’s also a point that supports the second part of this post. We tend to forget about it, but the national propaganda has shaped the country from its core. Without it, the country would be very different today. Not better or worse, just... different, since propaganda, for all its bad reputation, has played a large part in their economic growth and their position in the world economy today.

[angelfishreveal]

FRANKFURT UPDATE / DISORGANIZED RANT ABOUT TRUTH AND ART AND FASSBINDER

by Camille Clair

I spent the strict quarantine following my arrival in Frankfurt studying German in the mornings, and watching Fassbinder in the evenings. The time between morning and evening was spent...nervously. 

I watched so many Fassbinder films during my quarantine that I began to feel his cabinet of actors were my companions (quarpanions). We were all crying and grinning and swallowing our pills together. 

I am one of those people that believes that pain/discomfort/anxiety is necessary, important, a catalyst. That is one of the reasons I left, have left in the past, will leave again. Sometimes the next best life move involves ripping your heart out! Sometimes it isn’t quite so abrupt, and your heart will sizzle in the pan for months. You may even grow to cherish the sensation because it means you are working toward something. You may recognize your true self in that pain. And in that truth, your mission, which may, or may not be, your art. 

I do believe that, as an artist, you have to be a bit of a masochist. Your life is sustained via chopping yourself into bits, and, if you’re lucky, stowing those bits in the pockets of the wealthy, the devious. And though you may consider yourself an orthodox Marxist, this seems to be the only way to keep the axe swinging. I would never say aloud that I believe suffering produces great art, but I also must admit I understand the desire to drag oneself across shards of glass a la Chris Burden in Through The Night Softly. I relate to the impulse to bear it all. I want to be torn apart! For art. 

I don’t always want this, but fresh out of my Frankfurt quarantine - following a confounding summer in Los Angeles - I want this. I really, truly want to exhaust myself. 

Though Fassbinder himself may have been a bit amoral, he was, at the same time, so undeniably invested in all that is human. Many of Fassbinder’s characters seem to cave inward, unable to stand erect under the weight of the social, the political, the bureaucratic: the simultaneity, and responsibility of it all. Fassbinder’s characters give into their truth, or they parish. No time is wasted on the performance of goodness, because salvation was never in their cards to begin with. 

What I desire and revere most in art is truth. I want my “self” and my “art” to be inseparable, the same. I want my body to vanish in the company of my art. I don’t really want to exist. I repeat variations of a line from Reena Spaulings in my head all day long: Where does my (boyish, jaunty, smooth, freckle-dusted, foxy, stiff, screen-like) body end and a real event begin, for once? I do a little dance in the mirror. I have never been this alone. Some days I feel stiff with sorrow, so I remind myself that I am a character, and the director expects a performance, and then I stretch. 

Walking home in the rain, I envision Margit Carstensen waiting for me in my flat. I am her aloof lover. Or she is mine. I’ll fall through the door with a sigh, she’ll pour me a little glass of schnapps, and we’ll heartfully console one another. I sometimes play The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (1972), which starts Carstensen, in the background while I go about my tasks. I speak my favorite of Petra’s lines back to her as part of my daily Deutsche practice. Maybe by Spring, I’ll have the entirety of her central monologue memorized. I love to fantasize about the spring, it’s become one of my favorite pastimes. It is possible to imagine nearly anything happening in the spring because real life has become so severely abstracted. 

I lament…

What is real? Now? And in hindsight, what was ever real? Is it, or was it, ever recognizable or is it just whatever you put into your head on a given day? I scroll through Contemporary Art Daily on acid and feel confused about what it is I am supposed to want. My eyes linger on words that used to resonate, and it stirs some sort of longing. I want it to be physical, I want to get dirty and injured in the process. I want to be so involved it’s disgusting. But for now, nearly everything I want is impossible. Maybe it's a symptom of the current situation, but I want to be overinvolved. I generally find most performance excruciating, but now I feel I would do anything for an audience. I desire an audience. 

I envy Fassbinder’s overinvolvement. In Beware of a Holy Whore (1971), a film about making a film, Fassbinder seems to play himself. He doesn’t play the director, he plays Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Often fussing around or yelling in the background, it’s unclear exactly what his role is in the production, but as a viewer one is intensely aware of him at all times. Upon first watch, I felt envious. I want to be present in that way, shrieking for the sake of, and within, my art. The ringleader, and also, the eager participant. In the opening scene of Germany in Autumn (1978), Fassbinder, dials a call, and says “Ich bin es Fassbinder” into the receiver. We know of course, who the man on the screen is, though we aren’t immediately sure who we are meant to recognize him as. 

In a 1997 eulogy for ArtForum, Gary Indiana writes, “what can you say about a fat, ugly sadomasochist who terrorized everyone around him, drove his lovers to suicide, drank two bottles of Rémy daily, popped innumerable pills while stuffing himself like a pig and died from an overdose at 37? [Fassbinder was]  a faithful mirror of an uglier world that has grown uglier since his death”. Fassbinder knew truth, and truth is as beautiful and precious, as it is vile. 

My sister, who is 17 and only just got drunk for the first time last week, told me she could never watch The Shining (1980)  knowing how much Shelly Duval was tormented in the making of it. I felt I couldn’t argue with her but I also wanted to argue with her. “So you will never watch what is widely considered one of the greatest films of all time?” 

“No,” she said. 

“Okay,” I said. 

Perhaps we are reaching an age in which you really cannot separate the art from the artist. Maybe it’s never actually been possible. But then again, there are so many things that seem to be art by mistake, and so many artists who die without recognition.

In the eulogy, Indiana goes on to say, “there is nothing you can say about Fassbinder that he hasn’t already said about himself”. This line again brings to mind Fassbinder in Beware of a Holy Whore, berating everyone in the vicinity, utterly repulsed by a multitude of things never made explicitly clear. Fassbinder lying dead in the train station after an overdose in Fox and his Friends (1975). Fassbinder lying dead, with a cigarette between his lips and notes for an upcoming film lying next to him, from an actual overdose. A parallel that reveals art is just as intertwined with death, as it is with life.

I realized this year that many of the artists I respect care a great deal about film, about drama. I have found solace in films, because I am alone nearly all of the time, and I don't know when I will see any of my cherished ones again. I am living vicariously through characters, beginning to think of myself as a character, which is admittedly therapeutic. I am the director. And I chose myself from a lineup of nervous red haired girls. I recognised myself at once, and thus, here I am. 

Some artists, or people!, are overly concerned with their own narrative. It can be irritating, indulgent, abject, but it’s convenient, and it may save your life. Though you’re never really alone you may feel really alone. Allein. Alleine... Sometimes there is nowhere to turn but toward yourself. And, once you begin to think of yourself as a character, you no longer bear the full responsibility of your being. You have been put in place to carry out the artistic vision. So, in a sense, all characters are artists, just as they are products of art. It’s reflexive, and Frankensteinian, in that way. 

Maybe as an experiment, try referring to your dismal flat as “the set”. 

Are you at home? 

I’m on set. 

Complain aloud, but to no one, about the uninspired refreshments. 

Stare longingly at everything. 

There is a misanthropic edge to many of Fassbinder’s films. A bleakness. It is often said that his work is about the fascism at play in interpersonal relationships. The fascism that blooms in all of our hearts.There are instances across Fassbinder’s filmography of, not only an awareness, but a patience, for all that is despicable. Human beings are weak, impressionable, they want to be liked but if it doesn’t work out, they’ll settle for being hated or feared. Often, Fassbinder will have a character do or say something that completely skews, if not, obliterates your previous impression of them. For example, in Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974), Emmi who is, up until this point, mostly redeemable, chooses Hitler’s favorite restaurant to celebrate her and Ali’s wedding, stating upon entry that she has “always wanted to go”.  In the scene that follows, she mispronounces the names of menu items, the server scoffs, and one can't help but feel a bit bad for her. Is her desire to eat at Hitler’s favorite spot purely aspirational, a misguided highbrow charade? Or is she a sympathetic fascist? This is another fault of the character, any character, their world view is often contrived, never holistic. 

Fassbinder is the Postwar German filmmaker - generally considered the “catalyst of the New German Cinema movement”. In his films, World War II is often alluded to / background / partial context / a shadow, but it is never the subject, or the main event. A character’s idiosyncrasies, or disturbances, could be attributed to the wartimes, but often, their faults seem too deeply intertwined with their truths. But of course they’ve always had a tremor, a temper. Many of Fassbinder’s characters have a hard edge, or have suffered immense loss. They are either in, or narrowly escaping, crisis. 

In Fassbinder’s Berlin Alexanderplatz (1980), Franz Bieberkopf, a rampant dilettante, oscillates between political affiliations. When we first meet Bieberkopf, fresh out of prison, he is a bit of an anarchist, sympathizing with soldiers and workers above all. As the series progresses, Bieberkopf is revealed to be immensely impressionable, confused, vindictive. He exhibits symptoms of several political philosophies, albeit meekly. Bieberkopf even briefly wears a Nazi armband, which, when questioned about, he is unable to defend, and from thereon, is never seen wearing it again. Franz Bieberkopf is similar to Tony Soprano in that way. Selfish, gruff, deeply flawed, indubitably human. Tony Soprano bites into a meatball sub and sauce dribbles onto his shirt and you forget, momentarily, that he's a bigot, because he’s the protagonist. And it is the job of the protagonist to represent a spectrum of human strength, and fallibility. It is arguably better, or more redeemable, to be overtly, rather than covertly, self-serving because then at least one is operating in defense of their own truth.

Truth is constructed daily and could easily be mistaken for anything but. Truth is nearly impossible to represent, and harder still to recognize. Truth is a fallacy, and thus, very lonely. Still, it must be guarded, I have been listening to The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe as I walk around Frankfurt which, in all honesty, fertilizes the melodrama blooming in my heart. Werther is bitterly alone, consoling himself via drawn out descriptions of his loneliness. “I am proud of my heart alone”, he says, “it is the sole source of everything, all our strength, happiness and misery. All the knowledge I possess everyone else can acquire, but my heart is all my own”. 

I am alone in Frankfurt, but I have my heart.  

[nbbkatherine]

Connecting the Dots

Homeland by Cory Doctorow; Charlie’s Angels, 2019 Elizabeth Banks film; Numb3rs tv show; You Look Like a Thing and I Love You by Janelle Shane; Parasite, 2019 Bong Joon-ho film; the chilliad by Molly Of Geography webserial; Westworld tv show; Future Friends album by Superfruit; Dickinson tv show; after-words bookstore in Chicago, IL; webcomic name by Alex Norris; American Gods by Neil Gaiman; GINGER by BROCKHAMPTON; Russian Doll tv show.

Woohoo it’s been two years of Never Be Bored! This blog is all about relating different types of media together, and in the twenty-five posts so far, I’ve written about over one hundred books, movies, tv shows, and more. We could plot out each of these posts on a graph—nodes for individual recommendations and edges connecting recs in the same post. So buckle up folks, today we’re going to connect those dots so that we get one, big, beautiful connected graph.

Already some of the work is done. Too Like the Lightning is featured in Really Big Worms and The R Smith Edition. Worm is featured in The R Smith Edition, All Superheroes Need Therapy, and It’s the End of the World as We Know It and I Feel Fine. The first twelve posts all got a bonus recommendation from A Year In Review. Kurt Vonnegut wrote both Slaughterhouse Five from Nonlinearity and Galápagos in And So On. Elsewhere University from Strange and Yet Familiar got a shoutout in A+ in Applied Magics.

Let’s start off easy, making connections with what we’ve already got.

Do you hear that? Arrival, from Nonlinearity, and The Vast of Night, featured in Something in the sky, are two sci-fi movies about listening to aliens. For a modern take, with lots of scenes about trying to figure out xenolinguistics, go for Arrival, but if you’d rather something creepy and retro with dramatic monologues, give The Vast of Night a try.

Takeshi Kovacs is one bad ass mother fucker who is just over this shit, but still somehow gets roped into flashy fight scenes. If you liked that character in Altered Carbon, from To Whom Am I Speaking?, you’ll like the story of Duncan Vizla, aka the Black Kaiser, an almost-retired hitman in Polar, a Year in Review bonus rec to Floor It.

Bright Star (featured in The Northwestern Edition) and Hadestown (featured in It’s an old song) are both blues/jazz/folk musicals about a double love story. Bright Star is loosely based on a Missouri folk tale, Hadetown is inspired by Greek mythology. Both are excellent.

Cosmo Sheldrake (The How How Much Much and I from Strange and Yet Familiar) and Hozier (Hozier and Wasteland, Baby! from Daisies & Death) both create music that makes you imagine old fairy magic in the forest. Cosmo Sheldrake’s “Hocking” is like what I’d envision playing at a fae celebration of summer solstice, while Hozier’s “Wasteland, Baby!” is the sad love song from after the party’s over.

And now, let’s add entirely new nodes to our graph with new recommendations to connect posts.

Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer (Really Big Worms, The R Smith Edition) is a very idea-forward book, and (one of) the catalysts that kicks off the story is a stolen newspaper article draft. Ada Palmer is a professor who researches intellectual history, and it absolutely shows in her writing as her books explore the implications of a society based on certain ideas. Cory Doctorow is another favorite author of mine who also writes idea-forward fiction—if you liked Too Like the Lightning, try his Homeland, in which Marcus Yallow is entrusted with an archive documenting government and corporate crime, and has to figure out how to publish it without getting arrested. I would also highly recommend this book, available to download for free from Doctorow’s website, if you liked The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood by James Gleick (Something in the sky). Although Homeland is fictional, as you read you’ll learn things too—about information security, the darkweb, evading surveillance, and protesting tips.

I want more action movies starring women, because I love a good fight sequence and watching things go boom, but I’m tired of watching men with big guns in movies with, like, one named woman character. Kingsman: The Secret Service (A Year in Review bonus rec to Non je ne regrette rien) just barely passes the Bechdel test, but I will give it a bonus point for having two badass women main characters who aren’t love interests (ugh, the bar is so low). And if you liked the aesthetic of Kingmen’s gentlemen spies, then you might like Elizabeth Bank’s 2019 reboot movie Charlie’s Angels. Naomi Scott, Ella Balinska and Kristen Stweart all kicking ass on screen? Yes, please! Continuing in that vein, see also Ocean’s 8 (Floor It) for an all-women heist crew, set on stealing diamonds from the Met Gala.

My favorite episodes of Hannibal (Daisies & Death) are the one-off monster-of-the-week type episodes, where the FBI is investigating a murder and Will Graham, profiler extraordinaire, is called in for help. If you’re into crime shows like that, try Numb3rs, streaming on Hulu, a tv show about two brothers—one, Alan, an FBI agent and the other, Charlie, a mathematician. Together they solve crimes, using fluid dynamics, disease spread modeling, wavelet analysis, and many more areas of applied math. (I learned a little about sabermetrics, the statistical analysis of baseball, from one episode, so I dropped that term in conversation with a sports-obsessed acquaintance freshman year in college. We became good friends, and I’m pretty sure that conversation was part of why.) For more on applications of mathematics to real world problems, read The Code Book by Simon Singh, featured in On Computability, which details the math theory behind creating and cracking encryption over the centuries.

The Imitation Game, a Year in Review bonus rec to On Computability, is named for an artificial intelligence thought experiment proposed by Alan Turing in 1950, before anything resembling modern computers even existed. In Robopocalypse by Daniel H. Wilson, robots across the globe gain sentience and begin to turn against their human makers—hilariously in retrospect, I recommended this book in It’s the End of the World as We Know It and I Feel Fine back in March. Anyway, between those two extremes, where is the field of artificial intelligence today? To learn more, try You Look Like a Thing and I Love You by Janelle Shane, a truly delightful book that will both show you how far research has come and will reassure you that the robot uprising won’t be happening anytime soon.

Bad Times at the El Royale (Just you, and me, and this gun) unsurprisingly takes place at the El Royale hotel. For reasons that would be spoilers to name, the setting is essential to the plot of the film—the story could not have unfolded in the way that it did anywhere else. This is also true of Parasite, 2019 Bong Joon-ho film currently streaming on Hulu, where many scenes take place in a rich family’s house—which was actually designed and built in pieces for the movie. An absolutely incredible dark comedy/thriller, Parasite explores the things a person might just do to get ahead. For another thriller with characters willing to go to extreme lengths for their own personal reasons, try Thoroughbreds, from Non je ne regrette rien.

Lore Olympus by Rachel Smythe, featured in It’s an old song, retells the story of Persephone and Hades but in a vaguely modern setting—where the two first meet in a crowded bar. For more modernized Greek myths, check out the chilliad by Molly Of Geography, a wildly funny adaptation of the Illiad. Follow along with Homer Bard, undeclared freshman Alpha Sigma Phi pledge, as he recounts the story of the epic prank war against the Trojan House. If your favorite characters from this ongoing webserial are Achilles “AC” Myrmidon and Pedro Klaus “PK” Liebling but were looking for something a little more traditional, then you might like Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles, a retelling of Illiad from the point of view of Patroclus, recommended in Is it better to speak or die?.

Firefly (The Family We Made Along the Way) is a tv show with an interesting blend of aesthetics—some people wear dusty cowboy hats and some people live in floating mansions and there’s a scene where the crew get a job to transport cattle from between planets. If you’re into that, try the tv show Westworld, streaming on HBO, about a Western-themed amusement park, populated by android hosts—who talk and dress and live as if it’s the 1800s, looking exactly like humans, with no idea that their entire world is a vacation destination for the wealthy. As the series continues and secrets are revealed, plot twists will keep you glued to the screen. See also Sense8 (To Whom Am I Speaking?), which likewise features lots of action and a cast of characters who keep secrets and deals with the question—what makes us different from each other?

In The Northwestern Edition I wrote about the different a cappella groups on campus; if you like that style of music then you might have heard of the group Pentatonix, the first a cappella group to win the Grammy for Best Instrumental Arrangement. Two members of the group, Mitch Grassi and Scott Hoying, also make up the duo Superfruit, and I adore their (synth-pop, not a cappella) album Future Friends. “Imaginary Parties” (which has an excellent music video) and “Bad 4 Us” are my song recs for Freckle and Caleb respectively, characters from The Gay and Wondrous Life of Caleb Gallo, the five-episode series from Baby if you love me, won’t you please just give me a smile?.

If you’re interested in queer art history, consider following Dan Vo on Instagram, one of the tour guides of the V&A’s LGBTQ tours, recommended in The Eye of the Beholder. You might also like Dickinson, an Apple TV show about Emily Dickinson growing up, writing poetry, getting into trouble with her parents, and falling in love with her friend Susan. Although it’s set in 19th century Massachusetts, the dialogue and music are thoroughly modern, which makes for a fun juxtaposition—in the first episode, Emily imagines going on a carriage ride with Death while “bury a friend” by Billie Eilish plays in the background. For more stories about the life of a queer poet, try Zami: A New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde, featured in Looking Forward, Looking Back, about her experiences growing up, writing poetry, getting into trouble with her parents, and falling in love with lots of people, in 1940s and 50s New York City. 

Here’s how you spend one perfect day in Chicago: you wake up late one November Saturday. Down in the Loop, you visit the beautiful Chicago Athletic Association, which despite the name is actually a hotel, for Chicago Art Book Fair (A Year in Review bonus rec to The Northwestern Edition). You browse brightly colored lithographs and maybe pick up a zine or two. Then you take a walk north, across the river, to E Illinois and Wabash, to after-words bookstore. Down in the basement, you look through the new and used books in search of something interesting. Take your time in River North, find something good to eat, because you have plenty of time before taking the Red Line up to Argyle, to catch a performance of the The Infinite Wrench by the Neo-Futurists, featured in Next!. 

In My Favorite Shapes (This Might As Well Happen), we get to hear Julio Torres talk about, for example, an oval looking at his reflection in a pond and wishing he were a circle. Some of my favorite shapes are the pink blobs from Alex Norris’s webcomic name, three-panel comics with a repeated punchline—an excellent of example of how sometimes you don’t need a lot of fancy detail to convey emotion. For another webcomic about the absurdities of life, check out Poorly Drawn Lines by Reza Farazmand (And So On).

Forgotten gods and old magic tied to old places. In Digger (webcomic featured in The Family We Made Along the Way), a perfectly respectable wombat finds herself traveling strange lands and meeting a couple of gods (well, sort of). For another story of an ordinary person who gets caught up in the affairs of gods, try American Gods by Neil Gaiman, about an ex-convict who meets Mr. Wednesday, an American incarnation of the Norse deity Odin the All-Father. The things we are allowed to forget shape us—at one time, Odin had power because many people knew that he was real, but in this book, Mr. Wednesday is weakened because so many people have forgotten him. One of my favorite moments—in just about any written work I’ve ever read— is the line of dialogue in The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin (A+ in Applied Magics) that Revealed a Thing Forgotten. You’ll know it when you see it, and any further description would be a major spoiler.

On the scale of how much singing is involved in rap albums, on one side you have something like neo-soul Overgrown (Looking Forward, Looking Back), where Ivy Sole shows off her vocals, and on the other you have R.A.P. Ferreira’s purple moonlight pages (Something in the sky), which has more of a jazz-rap feel. Somewhere in between is GINGER by BROCKHAMPTON, which has both catchy sung hooks and rapid-fire bars; two of my favorite songs off this album are “SUGAR” and “IF YOU PRAY RIGHT.” I’ve seen them in concert twice and I look forward to being able to again, someday.

Lastly, if you liked Palm Springs, from This Might As Well Happen, a rom-com in which Nyles and Sarah fall asleep and wake up on the day of Sarah’s sister’s wedding over and over again, but were looking for something a bit darker, then you might like Russian Doll, a black comedy tv series that begins when two people keep dying and reliving the same night. For another duo of characters with great dialogue bumbling through life and death together, try Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard, featured in It’s an old song. 

Here’s a visualization of this blog, with and without labels:

[as-write-as-rain]

Once Upon A Dream (remix) - Chapter 3

Pairing: Bucky x Reader

Summary: A Sleeping Beauty/Winter Soldier remix, featuring the reader as a SHIELD agent who might have powers (or just a really finely tuned intuition)

Warnings: None. If you’ve seen and enjoyed the Captain America films, you shouldn’t find anything troubling here.

The third chapter of my Fairy Tale AU for @moonbeambucky’s 5k Writing Challenge! Life seems to be keeping me pretty consistent at publishing a chapter every two weeks, despite my attempts to go faster. That bug I picked up laid me low for longer than I would have liked -- that’s an unfortunate side effect of fibromyalgia, stuff hits me harder and lasts longer than it would for regular people. I promise I am working hard and hopefully will be able to publish more frequently in the near future ❤️

Chapter 3

Less than 24 hours later, you were rendezvousing at Pentagon City mall with Steve and Natasha, and trying to come up with a plan on the fly. While they headed to the Apple Store in an attempt to decode the contents of the zip drive, you were tasked with finding a getaway car. As you scoured the parking structure for the perfect vehicle, your mind was racing with the events of the last 12 hours – Director Fury was dead, and the three of you were now on the run from the organization you’d once considered your safe haven.

I still can’t believe he’s dead, you thought, shaking your head. Your thoughts kept drifting to those final moments, watching helplessly as the doctors struggled vainly to save him. If you hadn’t seen it with your own eyes, you wouldn’t have believed it. If only I’d gotten in touch with Maria sooner, or been able to really make her understand.

Yet, even as these thoughts floated through your head, the rational part of your mind reminded you that you had contacted her with plenty of time to initiate a contingency plan. You’d definitely done everything you could.

Unfortunately, sometimes that’s still not enough.

You sighed and tried to refocus. You hadn’t even slept well, because of course you hadn’t had one of those nice dreams where you and Bucky cuddled in hammocks on the beach. No, instead you had to dream that you were wandering the dimly-lit hallways of a creepy old building, searching for someone, becoming more and more desperate to find them. You always woke up from those kinds of dreams feeling disoriented and horribly, terribly alone.

Which was definitely not helping things right now.

You finally targeted the perfect truck – a Chevy Silverado Z71 that would be able to handle whatever terrain or road conditions lay before you, all without calling attention to itself or its passengers – and were in the middle of hotwiring it when your phone beeped with a text from Nat.

Hope ur rdy 4 us, company’s here [kissy face]

You chuckled. Of course, even when she was in mortal danger, Nat always had time to send an emoji.

You hurried to finish your task, praying that whoever had been dispatched to bring the three of you in would stay busy inside the mall instead of wandering out here. At the very least, you were confident that your intuition would let you know if you were in immediate danger. Finally, the engine roared to life, and you dove into the driver’s seat.

You pulled up to the 1st floor mall exit, the squeal of the tires echoing throughout the garage, just as your friends came barreling through the door.

“Howdy, Strangers. Need a lift?”

Steve didn’t even react to your pithy greeting; instead, he opened your door, taking you by surprise for once. “Hop in the back, I’ll drive.” When you didn’t move immediately, he clarified, “I know where we’re going and how to get there; we’ll fill you in on the road.” With a nod, you clambered into the backseat, and in minutes you were on 395 headed (roughly) north.

“So…” You leaned forward between the seats and blew a bubble with the gum you’d stolen from Nat’s pocket. When it popped, you prodded, “What’s the plan?”

Nat stretched a leg up on the dashboard and smirked, her eyes on Steve. “We’re taking a little trip down memory lane.”

“What, like Brooklyn? That’s like…” You tried to calculate the distance, but quickly gave up. “…a million hour drive.”

Steve rolled his eyes at both of you, but the split-second twitch of his lips told you he wasn’t really mad about your teasing. “We couldn’t crack the zip drive, but we were able to trace where it came from: Camp Lehigh.”

At the blank look on your face, Nat took pity on you. “New Jersey.”

You sat back with a huff.

“I think I would have preferred Brooklyn.”

Steve shook his head and glanced at you in the rearview mirror. “Me too, to be honest.”

You sagged against the window, watching trees and cars speed past. At least the drive would be somewhat scenic; that’s something, right? You were just about to ask Nat to turn on the radio, hoping to find some good road trip tunes, when she spoke up again.

“I have a question for you, Rogers.” She studied him for a second before quickly adding, “Which you do not have to answer. I feel like if you don't answer it though, you're kind of answering it, you know?”

He cut off her rambling. “What?” His tone, while exasperated, didn’t sound annoyed so much as amused.

“Was that your first kiss since 1945?”

You almost swallowed your gum. “WHAT?!”

Grabbing her arm, you practically yelled in her ear, “Did you kiss Steve???” You turned to the now bright-red super soldier. “Did you kiss Nat?????”

“No! I mean, yes, technically, but – ugh! It was a diversionary tactic!!” Flustered Steve was always your favorite, and you fought to hide your grin.

“Aww come on, no need to be coy. I know you felt something,” Nat cooed flirtatiously, fluttering her eyelashes, and he looked like he might combust. You would have started cracking up if you weren’t so eager to hear more details.

Your grip on Nat’s arm tightened and you shook her a little, and you couldn’t resist adding a little teasing of your own. “All this time we’ve been wondering why he won’t go out with any of the girls we try to set him up with. Now we know, it’s because he’s been sweet on you!”

Steve squawked, turning even redder and clenching the wheel so hard you were afraid he might wrench it off. “It – it’s not like that!! We saw the Strike Team, they were searching the mall for us, and we needed to avoid them so the civilians would be safe….. And then we were about to pass Rumlow on the escalator, and then Natasha here said that public displays of affection make people uncomfortable and…” He trailed off, and the whole thing was so funny, you couldn’t hold your laughter in anymore.

Camp Lehigh was abandoned and overgrown, and definitely far from welcoming. You tried to squint your eyes and visualize a skinny pre-serum Steve running laps or striving to complete an obstacle course, using pictures and footage you’d seen in the Smithsonian exhibit to help anchor the scene. The image never quite crystallized, though; you always had trouble truly envisioning Steve as that small, scrawny figure in the photos. He’d been such a solid, powerful figure for as long as you’d known him.

Plus, from the minute you entered the camp, your senses had been on high alert, which really didn’t help your imagination either. You were overwhelmed with a really bad feeling, and knew danger was lurking somewhere nearby. You couldn’t identify the source, though, because it didn’t seem to be coming from a specific direction.

Except maybe…down? But that didn’t make any sense.

“What is it?” Nat had been in the middle of announcing that this was a dead end, when suddenly her tone changed. You turned to see Steve stalking towards a bunker, Nat trailing behind him.

“Army regulations forbid storing ammunition within five hundred yards of the barracks. This building is in the wrong place.” Thank goodness Steve knew rules and regulations like the back of his hand, or you might not even have noticed anything was out of place.

He smashed the lock with his handy shield, and the three of you entered the cold, musty building. Shivering, you brought up the rear, severely disliking the way it felt like a mausoleum.

Steve flicked a switch, and ancient fluorescent lights flickered aglow, illuminating an unassuming office space of some sort. Clunky old desks, filing cabinets, and office chairs were arrayed throughout the room; thick dust and cobwebs coated every surface, making it clear that no living being had been in here in a very long time.

And, inevitably, your feeling of impending doom increased.

Glancing around, you spied a large symbol on the wall just as Nat did, and realized that this must have been where SHIELD began, all those years ago. You supposed it made sense; Captain America began here too, and this had been their homebase of sorts. Of course when they came back from overseas, they would have chosen somewhere familiar, somewhere the seeds of SHIELD had already begun to sprout.

You followed your partners into a library or storage room of some sort, where a trio of prominently displayed photographs confirmed your hunch. You recognized all three people from the Smithsonian exhibit; but apparently Nat had never been, because her next question made you cringe.

“Who's the girl?”

You purposely avoided making eye contact with Steve, because you already knew how he must be feeling. This camp, the place where they first met and got to know each other, was already brimming with memories of her – and now her face was on the wall. Young. Vibrant. Fierce. Just the way he probably remembered her. He’d been to see her just yesterday, confronted yet again with the fact that a lifetime had passed him by in the blink of an eye; and he was left with an obsolete snapshot of a moment in time, and an ache for what could have been.

There was a long, awkward pause, and then Steve literally sidestepped the question by striding deeper into the room.

You’d just opened your mouth to whisper a quick-but-vague explanation to Nat, when he pointed to a cobwebbed bookshelf and pondered aloud, “If you're already working in a secret office...” He paused to insert his hand into the space between the bookcases, and then, with surprising ease, slid them apart, revealing a hidden alcove. “…why do you need to hide the elevator?”

A sudden spike of anxiety shot through you, and you knew that only danger waited below. But the feeling was different than the one you usually got when you were about to be physically attacked – and before you could pinpoint what was different about it, the elevator ride had ended and the doors were already opening into a cavernous basement filled with ancient computer relics.

[smilingformoney]

America’s Most Eligible Diamond Scene: Bond with your Friends

You: If it’s cool with Jen, it’s cool with me! Fatima: Wonderful! I’ve been dying to spend some QT with you cuties. Fiancée: Let’s sneak up to the roof before Omar can catch us.

A short while later, the six of you are gathered up on the roof. Fatima breathes a deep sigh of relief. Fatima: After being cooped up in the mansion all day, it’s so nice to get some fresh air! You: I’m glad, but… I don’t get it, Derek. Why bring us here of all places? Derek: Gimme a second. You watch as Derek rummages around under the table, until… Derek: Aha! Found it. With a flourish, Derek pulls a bottle out from under the table.

-Bottle of port

Mackenzie: You’ve got a secret stash of booze? Nice. Jen: Do I even want to know why you hid this on the roof? Derek: I swiped it from the kitchen at the end of last season. I guess somehow I knew we’d make it back to the mansion… Derek: So I hid this here in case of an emergency. Adam: Well, considering we’re gonna be locked in with Vince and Ivy for the next few weeks… Adam pours six glasses of port, raising his in a toast. Adam: I think this definitely counts as an emergency. You: Are you kidding? This is Vince and Ivy we’re dealing with.

You: We need… -A much stronger drink.

You: No offence, Derek, but I don’t think port is gonna cut it. Mackenzie: She’s right. We need, like a dozen tequila shots. Adam: Plus a bottle of rum. Fatima: And a bottle of champagne! Derek: And a round of sake bombs! You: Now we’re talking. Jen: It’s times like these I’m glad we’ve got the liquor cabinet under lock and key.

-To look on the bright side!

You: We’ve handled Vince and Ivy before. We know all their dirty, underhanded tricks. Adam: You’d be surprised. Vince always manages to pull something unexpected out of his sleeve at the last second… Derek: And who knows what Ivy’s been scheming up since last season? Mackenzie: You guys need to relax. There’s no way Vince and Ivy are gonna throw the wedding of the century. Fatima: I’ll drink to that! Jen: I wouldn’t count them out just yet. After all, America did vote for them to compete against you.

Fiancée/You: You worry too much, Jen. Having Vince and Ivy back is a little stressful, but it’s nothing we can’t handle. Jen: I’m glad you’ve got a good attitude about this, but you’re still gonna need all the support you can get… You: That’s why I have you guys! We’re all here together, just like old times… Best Man: Except some of us are getting married. Officiant: And none of us are getting Eliminated… Maid of Honour: And the finale is the wedding of your dreams! Which, by the way, we should probably start planning. Fiancée: Already? We haven’t even started filming yet! Fatima: All the more reason to get a head start! You: Hang on, Fatima. I thought you were gonna give us the scoop on your secret marriage! Fatima: We’ll get to that, I promise. Right now, I want to daydream about your wedding! Officiant: Be real with us, Jamie. Are you the type of person who’s been dreaming of her wedding since she was little?

You: Honestly? -I’ve been planning it for years!

You: When I was six, my teacher asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I told her, ‘a bride’. You: Not the most ambitious choice, I’ll admit. But I was always a hopeless romantic! Fiancée: I hope our wedding measures up to your expectations. You: I’m marrying you. How could it not measure up?

-I never thought I’d get married.

You: I was one of those people who thought marriage was a total scam… You: If you’d told me five years ago that I’d be getting married on TV, I’d laugh in your face. Fiancée: Well, then. I’m glad I changed your mind. You: You changed everything, Fiancée.

-I always dreamed of what comes after.

You: Don’t get me wrong, weddings are great. But when I was little, I used to imagine what my marriage would be like. You: Having someone who loves me? Being with them every day for the rest of my life? I couldn’t imagine anything better. Fiancée: Jamie… I promise, I’ll help you make that dream come true. You: I’m gonna hold you to that.

Fatima: What about you, Fiancée? Did you have wedding fever when you were young?

-If you’re marrying Jen

Jen: Oh, I don’t know. I was so busy looking forward to my future career, I hardly ever considered getting married. Jen: Though, okay. I did go as a bride for Halloween one year… Jen: And the next year… and the year after that… Adam: You call that ‘hardly considering’?

-If you’re marrying Derek

Derek: Hell yeah, I wanted to get married! I was a sharp-dressed kid. I couldn’t wait for an excuse to wear a tux. Derek: I even had a wedding theme in mind… An Extremely Goofy Movie. Jen: Tell me you’re not serious. Derek: It was the ‘90s! And that movie is a classic.

-If you’re marrying Mackenzie

Mackenzie: Of course. I used to dream about getting married to a prince, on this gigantic sailboat. Mackenzie: There’d be talking dolphins there, and my dad would be swimming in the water, waving his trident… smiling proudly… Derek: Isn’t that the wedding from The Little Mermaid? Mackenzie: Yeah. What’s your point?

You: My fiancée, everyone. Fiancée: Okay. I’ll admit my wedding fantasies were a little out there. Fatima: But that’s exactly my point! When it’s all in your head, your wedding can be as ‘out there’ as you want. Maid of Honour: Exactly! Like, okay… Jamie, in your dream wedding, would you ride in on a dragon, a unicorn, or a centaur? Fiancée: Talk about ‘out there.’ But I have to admit, I’m curious to know Jamie’s answer…

You: I’d ride in on a… -Dragon!

You: Just imagine me soaring through the air on my mighty dragon, blowing kisses at my adoring public… You: And raining fire upon my enemies! Best Man: When did this become a page out of The Crown and the Flame? You: It’s my fantasy, not yours.

-Unicorn!

You: Imagine how regal I’d look in my wedding attire, prancing in on a gorgeous steed… Jen: Help me envision this. Is it a rainbow unicorn? You: Duh. Why would I settle for anything less? Jen: That’s the spirit!

-Centaur!

You: Dragons and unicorns are cool and all, but a centaur would make for better conversation. Officiant: You’d have to offer him a seat at the wedding, though. Maybe even make him a part of your wedding party. You: Two words, my friend. Centaur. Bowtie. Officiant: Your imagination is an incredible place.

Fatima: Jamie’s certainly got a colourful outlook on her wedding, but we’re forgetting the most important thing. Fatima: After all, what’s the point in daydreaming if we’re not talking about the bride’s outfit? Officiant: Yeah, Jamie! What do you imagine yourself wearing as you walk down the aisle? You: If I had my way…

You: I’d walk down the aisle in… -Romantic vintage!

You: In my opinion, wedding attire should be classic. Even better if it’s handed down through the family. Fatima: I love this for you. I can just picture you in delicate white lace and vintage Chanel accessories…

-Cutting-edge couture!

You: I’m talking wedding chic. When I’m walking down the aisle, I wanna make a statement! Fatima: I wholeheartedly agree. Your wedding should be a mini runway show!

-Jeans and a T-shirt…

You: If I’m being honest, I’d rather be comfortable than look good. Fatima: I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that.

Fiancée: I’d be on board with that. You look great in whatever you wear, Jamie. Maid of Honour: Honestly, I’ll just be thankful if you don’t force me to wear a hideous bridesmaid dress. Fatima: I didn’t even have bridesmaids at my wedding. Between all my cousins and gal pals, it would’ve been a headache to choose! You: Finally opening up about your wedding, huh? Now’s my turn to ask the questions.

You: I wanna know… -What you wore down the aisle!

You: You’re AME’s maven of style. How could I not be curious about your dress? Fatima: Hon, it was beautiful. Sexy, but tasteful. White satin with baby blue detailing… Fatima: And the tiara I wore has been passed down in my family for generations! You: You must’ve looked gorgeous. Though, to be fair, I’d expect nothing less from you.

-When you got married!

You: All this time I’ve known you, I had no idea you were even married! How long have you been keeping this under wraps? Fatima: We were both twenty-two when we got married! Right out of art school. He was one of the only men in my program. You: So, you’ve been married for how long, exactly? Fatima: Nice try. A lady never reveals her age!

-Who you’re married to!

You: I need to know what kind of person could get you to settle down! Fatima: Well, his name is Ramin. He moved to New York from London to learn to do practical effects for movies… Fatima: He’s devastatingly handsome, but more importantly, he keeps me grounded. And he appreciates my eclectic style. You: Sounds like a perfect match to me.

Fatima smiles wistfully, gazing across the horizon. Fatima: I’ve been happily married for what feels like forever now. I wish you two the same kind of future. You: Fatima… thank you. Having your blessing means a lot. Fiancée: Yeah, you’re part of the AME family. It wouldn’t feel like our wedding without you. Fatima: You have me, one hundred percent. And, more importantly, you have a wedding party that would do anything for you! Officiant: She’s right, Jamie. No matter what this competition throws at you, we’ll be there. Maid of Honour: And we’ll do whatever we can to help you win that grand prize! Officiant: We’ve got this, Jamie. There’s no way Vince and Ivy will beat you while we’re on your side. +50 You: Thanks, guys. You’re the best friends a woman could ask for. Derek takes a long, slow sip of port, his eyes twinkling as he gazes around the rooftop. You: Penny for your thoughts? Derek: It’s nothing. I just can’t believe this is our last season on AME. Mackenzie: Frankly, I can’t believe it’s Adam’s last season. What is this, number three? Adam: This is season number four for me, actually. Pretty sure they won’t let me come back for a fifth. Jen: Speak for yourselves. I don’t plan on leaving this place for a long time. Fatima: You can count on Jen and me to be here for as long as they’ll have us! You: And we wouldn’t have it any other way. The six of you smile at each other, then gather your things and head downstairs for filming.

[valentinaforerocreativeblog]

Brief 1 - UFlix

The Beginning

We were asked to develop a concept for a brand, product, service, event for a clearly defined target audience. we had the option to choose any target audience we wanted, due to that I decided to choose something that I was passionate about, films. I have always been interested in films, I love the whole idea of being immersed in a whole other universe, it is the perfect example of how strong humans imagination is.  I started researching about the film industry to see what type of apps and website there were already, how they were used and by what target audience they attracted. What I started noticing is that there weren’t any websites in which users could watch a movie and at the same time review it. It was such a simple idea, since we as humans try to create the easiest route to do anything, we want everything to be there at the tips of our fingers.   I feel like the concept that I have created opens the door of opportunity to users that Netflix might have not yet considered, the type of customer that I am interested in reaching is somewhat an extension to Netflix customers today, however, they will be customers that would be more interested in the making of the film, for an example, the cinematography and framing of the shots.

Brief

I started off my project with focusing on the brief since it was the first time I ever made a brief I thought the best option for me was to look at other briefs to learn the structure in which it should be made in. Since Scribershive project was given at the same time as this project I simply looked at the structure of that specific brief to identified the key concepts to include for my Brief 1.  With a brief you must have these key concepts:  - Problem: identifying the issue in which your concept was influenced by  - Solution: how you would be able to fix that issue with your idea  - Target Audience: defining my target audience by market research  By having these key concepts it gave me a clear understanding of how to plan and create my project, along with giving the viewer a clear understanding of my product. 

Research

With the research, I wanted to see how other apps and websites had structured their content. What I noticed they had: - profile page  - review page  - news page  - rating system  - activity page  - watched list

- Flixster Video App 

- Letterbox App 

- IMD.d App 

- Netflix App 

All these apps gave me key ideas in which I should have for my website, however, none of them had the feature of being able to critique a film while simultaneously watching it. In addition, none of the apps I research had a social media feature which I believe is a key concept which this market is missing. 

Target Audience 

Since I decided to create my website for film critics and ‘film industry lovers’, I have always included myself as the type of target audience in which my website should be aiming for. Due to that, I was able to identify the key concepts and features that were missing on the pre-existing film apps and create a website in which I was able to include the additional features I as a target audience would want. 

In addition of being a target audience, I wanted to do a target audience questionnaire my close friend Basim Kadhim to get a better understanding of what is missing in pre-existing film apps to have a clearer vision of what I should include on my website. 

Basim Kadhim: 

- Studies BA The Art of Visual Effects at Escape Studios (High Holborn, London)  - 22 years old  - Cinephile

Target Audience Questionnaire:

Basim Kadhim Social Media : 

What will my website do 

- Provide the ability to critique a film while simultaneously watching it  - Allow users to communicate with other users to create a sense of community  - Create a platform for cinephiles to be able to connect with their favorite icons in the film industry  - Allow users to create lists (just like playlists) of films to recommend other users  - To saved star scenes of films onto a ‘watchlist’ to view in the future  - Repost other user’s critiques onto their profile - See a live feed of what the user’s followers are watching or have watched (Friend Activity) - ‘Popular This Week’ section  - Trend section with film news with the user would be interested in 

Logo Design

While deciding how I wanted my website to function, I was noticing that for my website to function exactly how I envisioned it I needed an existing platform which users are already using to watch films. Due to my own experience, I choose Netflix, since it’s already an internationally well-known platform.  Deciding a name, font logo, and color scheme  Since I decided that my website should be a branch of Netflix to be able to use their film rights. I wanted Netflix users to recognize my website logo which is why I decided to create my website font using Graphique. Staying along with the whole idea of being a branch of Netflix, I wanted a color scheme which complemented Netflix’s color scheme. Which is why I decided to go for a light turquoise (color code: #16b1b5) to be the main color since when it comes to complementary colors, red is complemented by blue and I wanted to use white ( color code: #ffffff) as a fill-in color since white represents beauty and minimalism.  When it came down to the name I was simply brainstorming several words such as Netflix, film, screening, watching, theater, movies, youtube, and cine.  Prototype Names:  - YouCine -FlixThru -YouPic -UView  Final Name: UFlix

Old Netflix Logo: 

New/Recent Logo: 

Final Logo Layout: 

Subtitles Logo Layouts:

Final Icon Layouts: 

Learning Adobe XD and Photoshop

When it came to creating my website I researched different programs to see which one was best to design on. I came to the decision to use Adobe XD since I noticed it was a practical program to design since it had several similarities to Photoshop. I started by looking up tutorials on how XD works and even read up on some short cuts so I could get familiar with the program. Once I learned the basics of XD I was able to start on the basic layouts of my website and even proceed to create the details within the pages.  This project was an opportunity for me to learn photoshop again, I always knew the basics of Photoshop but I found myself some moments during this project stuck on some aspects of photoshop. I retaught myself with Youtube tutorials and can now say I am 100% comfortable working with Adobe XD along Photoshop. 

Website Design Development

Home Page:

With the home page, I was influenced by several different social media layouts. 

Twitter: The whole scrolling through a home page is a major concept that I wanted for my home page. I thought it was the clearest way for the user to view their follower’s reposts, along with being about to repost and comment. 

Spotify: The idea of ‘Friend Activity’ was created when one day I was listening to my Spotify on my laptop and it gave me the ability to see what were the lastest song which my friends were listening to. Since the whole concept of social media is to communicate to the world, everyone wants to see what everyone else is doing. Which is why I believe is concept is one of the strongest features on my home page.

Letterbox: The ‘Popular This Week’ feature was inspired when I was on my letterbox app and saw the ‘popular films’ section. This is such a convenient feature for the user when they need some suggestions. This feature can also be found on Netflix at ‘Popular on Netflix’ section. 

By finding the pros and cons during my research I was able to create an interactive home page which has the best and missing features from popular social medias, to be the ideal website to go to.

For You Page: 

The For You page was design based on the ‘For You’ page on Twitter in which you can find several twitter hashtag trends which the app knows that you would be interested in following from what you have liked and reposted. I wanted to have the same feature on my website since I believe it’s the best part on Twitter because you get to be updated on news that customized for the user. 

Profile Page: 

I was heavily influenced by Twitter when it came to the profile page, what I noticed was the several social media profile pages have the same layouts. I believed that the Twitter website profile page layout was the best design for UFlix, it keeps the same scrolling design from the home page which still makes it simple and easy to read for the user. Along with having a ‘Favorite Moves’ and ‘Trends for You’ section for the users to get to know other users interests. 

Screening Page:

With the screening page, I was influenced by this Youtube channel called, Script to Screen. Which is a channel that shows you scenes from a movie while showing the script right under it. From there I got the idea of why not change the script to a messaging/writing platform so the viewer can chat or critique at the same time. It was a simple idea which I couldn’t believe didn’t exist yet.

Login Page: 

On the idea of the login page, I didn’t go too far on the design concept since I wanted my login page to be part of Netflix. I took the design and created the login page with UFlix’ s color scheme (color code: #16b1b5). 

This was a prototype version of the side image on the login page. I was not satisfied with how it was difficult it was to read the titles of the films.

I wanted to add a bit of me within my designing of UFlix, which is why I created this collage of movies to be a side image on the login page. All the movies that are in the college are movies which I have already seen. 

Improvements

Halfway through designing my webpages I started looking through the slides and noticed that the bold border around the sections on the website made UFlix unprofessional, almost childish. Which is why I redesigned it without the border to give it a clear look.  

Final Outcome 

Login Page

Home Page

Screening Page

For You Page

Profile Page

Preparing for Exhibition 

For the preparation of the exhibition on the 20th of March, I decided that the best way for me to present my project was to use the XD feature using the wireframing that I created to project how the website would work by clicking through.  I also printed out slides of my website so the audience can have a clearer view of pages. 

Conclusion

Ove all this project has given me a clearer understanding of identifying the target audience. Especially since this was an independent project I found myself having a better understanding of this course and of my future career. 

[abrunettefangirlnerd]

Long Nights, Hidden Thoughts

Original prompt: can you do tom and a cast mate (reader) on spider man 2 and falling in love slowly? I WOULD DIE FOR THAT!

Part: 5/6

Pairing: Tom Holland x reader

Word Count: 2012

Warnings: None

Part 1    Part 2    Part 3    Part 4

Starting the scene over, the director decides to try the new version one more time before going back to the original outline in the script. Either way you’ll have to see Tom kiss Zendaya, but after your kiss you don’t care as much. You can still feel Tom’s lips on yours and that’s all you need to remind yourself that the scene means nothing.

The scene starts the same as before. Peter takes MJ out first and you can feel the warmth of the fire against your skin. Time ticks by and Tom hasn’t come back. You start to grow worried but you try to tell yourself that he just messed up so they are trying to restart the scene.

You hear people yelling outside and you move to the closest window to get a better look. The director looks as though he is shouting at you while waving his arms sporadically. Finding Tom you see three people holding him back as he fights to break free. What the hell is going on? You think to yourself.

             Just then you feel the ground beneath you start to shake as shards from the rooms beneath you spill out on the ground below you. Panic rises in your throat as you realize that someone detonated the explosion. They were supposed to wait till we had a good cut, you actually found it insane that they went ahead and planted it.

             A rush of warm air blows you from the platform as you scream. Your body is flown above everyone else taking shelter as pieces of the building are soaring next to you. Something hard hits your head making everything blur before it all goes black.

 ***

“I.. I don’t understand what you are saying.” A familiar British voice fills your ears. “When will she wake up? It has been three days!”

“We aren’t sure.” You’re guessing it’s the doctor. “We believe she can hear you and possibly feel your touch, but we just have to wait for her to open her eyes.”

             You hear footsteps heading out of the room as you feel a warm hand take yours. Silence seals the air once a female, that you can only guess is Zendaya, excuses herself to the café. A soft pair of lips press lightly against your forehead as warm salty water falls from the air.

“So umm, doc says you can hear me.” Tom’s raspy voice fills your ears. “I hope that’s true because if you can hear me then maybe you’ll wake up.”

A forced chuckle escapes from him. “Kind of hard to believe that just three days ago I caught you running around your apartment naked.” If you could roll your eyes right now you would. “Don’t worry I didn’t see much, but umm… you looked good.”

             Unable to move you wish you could thump Tom on the head. You wish you could see that stupid grin you hear in his voice. The air thickens as more silence settles in. Has it been like this the last three days?

“Then we kissed…” You can sense the strain in his voice, “ and now here you are. Which is really the last place you should be.”

             You just want to wake up and engulf Tom in a hug. Tell him that you’re okay, that you’re not going anywhere. You wish he would go home, he shouldn’t see you like this. It’s not fair. He’s your best friend, with the opportunity to be something more, but instead of figuring that out you are hooked up to a bunch of tubes in a hospital bed.

“Hey Tom, honey you need to go home.” A strange woman’s voice appears in the doorway. It’s soft, sweet even. “You know like take a shower, eat something.”

“Mom, I’m fine here.” Tom protests. Holy crap! This is how I finally get to meet his mom? You internally kick yourself. This could have went a lot better, you know at the very least you should have the capability to talk.

“Thomas Holland you need to take care of yourself.” She scolds him. “If not for yourself or me, go for (Y/N). She’s probably tired of smelling you anyway. I’ll stay here till you get back, okay?”

             Tom must have agreed because he slips his hand out of yours. He places a kiss on the top of your forehead and promises that he’ll be back as soon as possible. Hearing him leave you notice the faint sound of his mom taking the seat next to you.

“Probably not the way you envisioned meeting me.” You can hear the slight smile in her voice. “I pictured Thomas bringing you for a dinner, maybe for Christmas.” She pauses. “Well we still can. Tom hasn’t stopped talking about you since the moment you walked on set that first day. I haven’t seen him like this since he was twelve and Mackenzie moved next door.”

“Hey Tom – Oh sorry I thought Tom was still here.” Zendaya awkwardly comes into the room.

             Her and Mrs. Holland talk for a little for a while to catch up on life. Obviously they’ve met each other on numerous occasions, they converse like old friends meeting for coffee.

“So Zendaya, could you tell me a little bit about (Y/N)?” Tom’s mom asks uncomfortably.

“Honestly she’s great.” Someone lightly claps their hands together, you guess Zendaya. “Tom knows her best so you should really be asking him, but she has this air about her that makes the room so much lighter. It definitely shows on your son’s face, constantly smiling. I’ve been wanting them together since the first reading of the script.”

“I saw the way he was looking at her when I came it.” Her voice drops to a whisper. “I think the boy may be in love already.”

             In love already. Love already. Those words repeat in your head for what seems like forever. You miss the rest of their conversation, only to snap out of it once you hear a familiar male voice enter the room. Tom makes his normal awkward entrance that you can only imagine is exploding with unbelievable cuteness. Honestly you can’t wait to wake up.

“What did I miss?” His refreshed voice sheepishly asks. “Is there any change with (Y/N)?”

“No honey,” his mother answers. “There has been no change. Zendaya and I have been catching up, you know girl talk.”

“Now I’m worried,” Tom’s voice gets closer. “When you say ‘girl talk’ it usually means you are investigating something. So what are you trying to figure out?”

             Mrs. Holland and Zendaya try to make up some sort of story. You suppose the last thing they want him to know is that they were talking about you, or rather you and him. You don’t know if it’s because you’re not completely conscious, but you’re not really worried about it. Every mother must wonder if the woman their son may or may not be with is good enough for him. Silently you pray that you are, or at least can get on the road to be.

 A Week Later

             So much can happen in a week. When you work for a movie franchise they have deadlines to meet. As someone who has a great deal amount of lines, there’s only so much they film without you. And that’s the problem you are facing, if you don’t wake up then they will have no choice but to recast you in a few weeks.

“Come on (Y/N) please wake up,” Tom whines. “I’m doing everything I can to stall your scenes. Please – babe please wake up we need you. I need you.” He takes your hand in his as kisses the back of it. “I need you.”

             You push to have even just your fingers move. Scared you will be replaced in a few days you give it everything you have. It’s an interesting experience, it feels like you’re trying to push a basketball through a golf-ball sized hole but with your mind and muscles. Nothing happens. There is no big explosion in to waking up or fuzzy feeling when your fingers move. Or maybe there is, you haven’t been able to do anything yet. What is taking so long?

“I’m going to get a banana split,” he lets go of your hand and places it gently on the your abdomen. “and I am going to get one for you too.”

             Tom has been trying to do stuff all week in attempt to get you to wake up. It’s honestly adorable and you wish it was working. The doctors say that it could work but that he shouldn’t get his hopes up. Usually it just happens when you’re ready, whenever that is supposed to be. You have no idea. If you knew how to you’d wrap your arms around him instead of laying here almost as lifeless as a corpse.

             After a few minutes footsteps appear leading next to you. Tom smears some whip cream on your bottom lip. The coolness of the dessert is irritating because all you want to do is simply wipe it with your tongue. He has done this with chocolate ice cream and has waved so many cookies under your nose it’s almost comical.

             Suddenly you feel the cool air seep into the inside walls of your mouth. The sensation of whip cream rests on your tongue as a blurry outline of shapes come into view. You can finally see the tear stained eyes on Tom and you do everything you can to keep yours from tearing up as well. You want to see everything clearly.

“Can you pass the bowl and a spoon, please?” You try to ask nonchalant, like you have only just awoken from a two hour nap.

             Trying to adjust yourself, you situated the top part of your body to sit up slightly. Tom just stares at you in shock, he probably thinks he’s just dreaming. What if you’re dreaming? But you know you’re not, it’s too real to be a dream.

             Tom runs out and grabs the nearest nurse to page the doctor. You know he wants to make sure you are okay and know what should happen next, but you sort of wished he waited so you could have some alone time. You know hospitals love to run tests. When you’re dad was in his that accident, that ended up taking his life, they put him in any machine you could think of.

“(Y/N) we want to set you up for an MRI,” the doctor flashes the light in your eyes once more before putting it away in his coat pocket. “I’ll have a nurse come and get you when we are ready, and in the mean time try not to fall asleep.”

             You and Tom watch him go. Once he’s out of view you turn to look at Tom but instead find your lips meet his. Instantly you melt into the kiss as you tangle your hands in his soft hair. His warm hands press against your back bringing you in closer but you’re are not close enough. You want to be so close, no air can pass between the two of you. Is it possible to be this hungry for someone?

“You’re here.” Tom gasps, breaking the kiss. “You’re here.”

“Yeah,” is all you manage to get out. “And I heard everything.”

“You did? You – You umm, you heard everything?” He stammers out.

“Yes and for the love of God never wave another cookie under my nose!”

             The two of you just laugh and you explain what his mom was talking to Zendaya about. You had to convince him not to let them know that he knows now, you do want to be on her good side. Tom fills you in about how the movie is going and how everyone will be so excited about you being able to come back to work. There’s not a silent moment between the two of you until the nurse comes in and takes you to your MRI scan.

<---Previous  Next--->

Tag List: @racewife2004  @fijiangecko @world-moon @meyrapp @kwalshh @evans-against-the-wall @memyselfandandrea @maybesomday @stevieboyharrington @tacohead13 @anini71 iske

[xerxia31]

I wish you would write a fic where peeta has a failing bakery because he isn't able to implement anything new and exciting due to parents etc, and katniss is like gordon ramsay in kitchen nightmare trying to convince peeta that he's not an idiot sandwich. Is that too specific? sorry if it is, i've just been thinking about this for a while...

This took an incredibly long time to write, anon, if you’re still around, I’m sorry for that! But this idea gripped me, and wouldn’t be satisfied with a hundred word drabble…

The B Word

rated T

He had watched her all through middle school, and high school too, had spent years of his life imagining her walking into the bakery his parents owned where he could woo her with artisanal breads and fancy cakes.

But this was definitely not part of his fantasy.

“You are an idiot sandwich!” Katniss Everdeen hollered as she pressed two pieces of bread to the sides of his head. It was the good hearty bread too, filled with raisins and nuts, a bestseller at the bakery and one of his favourites. A myriad of emotions played through his mind; horror and humiliation, a feeling that he just might cry, but beneath was that familiar quickening of his heart rate at the way her white chef’s coat strained to cover her pert breasts. Thump thump thump his heart pounded, and she smirked, even as she pressed the bread more firmly to his ears.

Thump thump thump. “Peeta! Get your ass out of bed!” Peeta Mellark groaned as he pried his eyes open in the darkness and glanced at the clock on his bedside table. 3:45 am. The alarm wasn’t set to go off for another fifteen minutes.

“Dammit, Rye, it’s not even four,” he grumbled, dislodging the pillow - flat and slightly drool-dampened - from over his ear.

“That TV show chick is coming today,” the voice hollered through the door. “It’s going to be a big, big, big day!” Rye was far too perky for a quarter to four in the morning. But despite his pique at being awoken early, Peeta couldn’t blame his brother for being excited. Their little bakery was going to be featured on a brand new show from one of the hottest television personalities in Panem.

Kat Flickerman was a household name, her sarcastic and expletive-filled television show, Kitchen Nightmares, was must-watch TV. And her new show, The B Word, featuring small-town bakeries, was promising to be even better. Mellark’s, a staple in District Twelve for over seventy-five years, would be the first establishment showcased. The publicity and sales uptick that came from being featured on the program more than made up for the embarrassment of having a five-foot-nothing firebrand rip apart every aspect of your business. Or so the producers that contacted his brother said.

Peeta wasn’t convinced. After all, he’d been making a fool of himself in front of the former Katniss Everdeen his whole life, and it hadn’t gotten him anywhere.

Neither Rye nor their father seemed to remember that world-famous Kat Flickerman had once been Katniss Everdeen, from the poor part of Twelve. But Peeta remembered. He remembered everything about her, though she’d never paid him any attention.

He remembered her sparkling silver eyes as she skipped through the halls of their elementary school, singing to herself. Eyes that dimmed and hardened after her father’s death. He remembered how hollow her cheeks were in the months after that, when he’d leave part of his lunch in her cubby each morning. He remembered how she’d grown into a solitary, sometimes sullen but always striking young woman who worked and studied and never participated in any of the meagre social activities District Twelve offered.

He even knew how a quiet, shy girl from the wrong side of the tracks parlayed a gig reviewing restaurants for her college’s newspaper into fame and fortune, though that part he’d read on her Wikipedia page. He wasn’t sure he understood it though. The Katniss who’d stolen his heart when he was only a boy wasn’t a lot like the girl on fire he saw on television. Not that he watched her shows.

(He definitely watched her shows.)

But none of that mattered anymore, not really. Because Katniss Everdeen left District Twelve five years ago and had never, as far as Peeta knew, come back. There was no mention of District Twelve in any of her bios or interviews. Katniss Everdeen had essentially disappeared. Kat Flickerman - foul-mouthed, foul-tempered, fire and fury Kat Flickerman - was the woman he was going to meet today. And he was fairly sure she wouldn’t remember him anyway. Probably wouldn’t even notice him, unless it was to berate some mistake he’d made or pick apart the menu items.

o-o-o

Peeta had the display cases full of glossy frosted cookies and perfect cupcakes long before the production crew showed up. He knew that there wouldn’t be any filming that morning, save for some generic ‘before’ shots, but still he wanted to put his best foot forward. Mellark’s might not be world-class, but it had been in his family for generations, it was a part of him. Rye, too, was beaming, polishing the countertops until they gleamed in the shafts of sunlight that came through windows so clean they looked devoid of glass. Their father spent an hour on a ladder, writing the day’s wares on the menu board in practiced chalk strokes. Though District Twelve was nothing more than a tiny backwater village, the Mellark men had their pride.

The group that descended on their small shop was definitely not from around there. Loud voices and loud colours shattered the sleepy District Twelve ambiance. The TV crew consisted of a pair of burly cameramen with heavy mobile cameras encasing their bodies like insect shells, a woman director named Cressida who had a shaved head tattooed with green vines, and her assistant, Messalla, a slim young man with several sets of earrings. On careful observation, it appeared his tongue had been pierced, too, and he was wearing a stud with a silver ball the size of a marble. Peeta shuddered slightly. But missing from the crew was the one woman he’d been longing to see.

He shouldn’t have been surprised. She was the star after all, doubtless she’d breeze in only for her own scenes. But his disappointment was almost tangible.

Peeta opened the front shop and kept it running while Rye and their father walked the crew through the back, mapping out electrical outlets and places where spotlighting could be temporarily installed. Occasionally, the sound of laughter floated forward, but for the most part it was a typical Tuesday morning. The regulars wandered in and out, and he chatted with everyone, the comfort of familiarity soothing him.

He had just packed up some cookies for old Sae’s granddaughter when the hair on the back of his neck stood up. Standing in the doorway of the shop was a ghost. Katniss Everdeen.

She wasn’t dressed like Kat Flickerman. Instead of a chef’s coat and crisp black pants, she was wearing jeans and a muted orange sweater. Her black hair was in the braid he remembered from their school days, long and thick, glinting blue in the morning sun. She was stunning.

She’d been glancing around the front shop but then froze, lifting her eyes to Peeta’s, as if feeling the weight of his stare. So many times in school she’d caught him staring, and each time he’d looked away quickly, blushing. But not today. Today he held her silver gaze. And then she smiled. “Katniss,” he whispered, or maybe he just thought it. Either way, her smile widened.

“Hello, Peeta,” she said, and his name in her mouth evoked a rush of arousal so potent he was certain she could see it stealing across his face. “It’s been a long time.”

“Five years,” he said without even realizing. He was stunned she even knew his name. Her eyes widened a little, but her soft smile didn’t fall.

“It looks exactly the same in here,” she said, and Peeta stiffened. It was true that the decor hadn’t changed in a long time, except for the addition of some of his paintings, and the fancy European coffeemaker he’d insisted on when he became a partner after college. He’d always thought that was part of the charm of Mellark’s, it’s dependability. He viewed the warm wood and twinkling glass as classic, elegant. But he’d watched enough of Kat Flickerman’s shows to know that she was seeing only tired and shabby. It hurt to envision what her team might do.

“Well,” he drawled. “Not much ever changes in Twelve.”

“You have,” she said, her eyes sweeping over him and he felt the heat rising in his cheeks. She was right, though it felt kind of shitty to be reminded. In high school, he’d been all state in wrestling, had worked out every day and watched his diet carefully to make weight. Had been even more serious about his sport in college, until a torn ACL killed that. Nowadays, he stayed fit running and playing pick-up football with the guys. He was in good shape, but he knew he wasn’t lean like before. “Yeah,” she said, distracted, her pink tongue snaking out to sweep over her lower lip. He had the distinct impression that she was checking him out. But that couldn’t be. “You look good,” she murmured.

He crooked an eyebrow. “Thanks?”

Her eyes widened. “I just, uh. I mean. Working here. If, uh. If I worked here I’d weigh a ton for sure.”

Peeta laughed; Katniss couldn’t weigh a hundred pounds soaking wet. She’d always been tiny. “You’re around food every day,” he said. She shrugged.

“But everything you make is fantastic.”

A small, pleased smile teased his lips. But before he could respond, one of the Capitol people came through the swinging doors that separated the front shop. “Kat,” she practically yelled. “We weren’t expecting you for a few hours yet, we haven’t started assembling the tasting.”

Katniss stiffened, seeming to grow taller and more menacing before Peeta’s eyes. Her expression darkened and shuttered, a mask sliding into place. It was a fascinating and frightening process. The woman who acknowledged Cressida with a scowl bore only a superficial resemblance to the woman Peeta had been chatting with.

“I told you I would be choosing the menu items to feature,” Katniss said, and the frostiness of her tone made Peeta shiver.

“Of course,” the other woman said. “We could start now?” All of Cressida’s brashness faded into supplication.

Rye and their father had come into the frontshop and were watching the exchange warily. Peeta stood back as Cressida introduced the rest of his family to Kat. “We can set up in the office,” Mr. Mellark said.

Katniss nodded and followed the others through the swinging doors. His father turned back to Peeta. “Could you bring back some coffee?” he asked, and Peeta’s heart sank. Twenty-six years old, and still low man on the totem pole, still the one who was given the grunt jobs, relegated to the wings, or just dismissed outright. As much as he loved the family business, he hated the family dynamic.

Stuck in the shadows or not, Peeta remembered a few things about Katniss that the rest of his family didn’t know, and one of those was her hatred of coffee. Oh, it was likely that she’d learned to tolerate it over the years, as he’d done himself. Still, he thought as he steamed milk; coffee drinkers are born, not made.

He carried a tray ladened with hot beverages back to the room that acted as staff lounge and office for the Mellark men and the handful of part-timers they employed. Already, half-filled plates littered the table top, various bakery items cut open, then abandoned. And at the head of the table like a queen commanding her court was Katniss, still wearing her Kat Flickerman expression, sheafs of yellow notebook paper scattered around her. Peeta set the tray of coffee in the middle of the table, but he grabbed the lone different cup and placed it wordlessly beside Katniss, then backed away, unwilling to disrupt her.

He couldn’t resist glancing back as he exited the room, and he found Katniss watching his retreat, surprise in her silver eyes and the barest hint of a smile stealing across her lush lips as she traced the rim of the mug of hot chocolate he’d brought her with a single slender finger.

o-o-o

Peeta was busy the rest of the day, manning the ovens, covering the phones, serving the lunch rush. His father reappeared a few times to make more coffee or grab something specific from the display cases, but there wasn’t an opportunity to talk. And with Rye occupied in the back, catering to the Capitolites, there wasn’t time for Peeta to take a break either. By the time the rush was over, and Peeta staggered to the back full-bladdered and empty-stomached, the film crew - and Kat Flickerman - were gone. His father was cleaning up the mess they’d left behind in the office, and Rye was staring at a sheet of yellow paper with a particularly sour expression on his face.

“What’s going on?” Peeta asked as he stuffed half a day-old scone in his mouth. Rye grunted, and tossed the paper his way.

“They want all of this ready and plated for that woman tomorrow evening.”

Peeta scanned the list. There were only six items, and all were things they’d typically make anyway. All except the goat cheese and apple tart - they hadn’t made that particular recipe in years. “I don’t understand–” he started, but Rye cut him off.

“She hated everything, she’s going to rip us to shit.” Peeta rolled his eyes, but held his tongue. There was no point in reminding Rye that this had all been his idea.

“It’s going to be fine,” their father’s tired voice broke the silence. “She never said she hated anything, Rye.”

“You saw her,” he barked. “Cutting everything up, barely picking at it before tossing it aside. Big city bitch, probably never tasted real bakery bread in her life.” It was on the tip of Peeta’s tongue to tell his brother that not only was Katniss not a big city girl, but he knew for certain she’d had Mellark’s cheese buns before. But before he could defend Katniss, Rye turned back to him and smirked. “She wants you to be the one on camera with her.”

Peeta nearly choked on his scone. “What?”

“Yeah,” he sneered. “Guess she can tell you’re easy to push around. Bet she makes you cry.” Rye had inherited their late mother’s cruel streak, though he hadn’t aimed it in Peeta’s direction much since her death.

“Fuck you, Rye,” Peeta spat. Rye only laughed.

“Save the backbone for the camera.”

“Boys,” their father groaned, but Peeta had had enough.

“You can close up alone, asshole,” he snipped at Rye, tossing his apron on the table and heading out the back door.

o-o-o

Filming would take place after normal working hours, when the bakery was closed, both to keep compliant with health codes, and to keep small-town busybodies from trying to usurp the spotlight. But that didn’t change the fact that it was a Wednesday. There were customers to serve and orders to fulfil on top of the list of bakery items the show producers wanted ready for closing.

Apparently, Rye’s bad mood persisted. He stormed into the kitchen hours late, after Peeta had done the entire morning prep himself and had been forced to call in frontshop reinforcements - his father and one of the summer students. Rye bashed around the kitchen and snapped at the customers for an hour until their father simply sent him home again.

“He’s just jealous,” Mr. Mellark told his younger son, “Because Katniss asked for you specifically.”

Peeta looked up from the cookie he was painting with delicate white blossoms and arrow-shaped leaves. “You remember her?” he asked, though it was clear his father did. The older man laughed.

“I’m not yet senile, Peet,” he smiled. “She looks different on television, but seeing her in person yesterday, she hasn’t changed much from that little girl who used to come in here with her daddy way back when.”

Peeta chuckled. “I’d say she’s changed a whole lot, Dad. She used to be so reserved.”

“I have a feeling she still is,” he said cryptically. “She certainly wasn’t having any of your brother’s flirting.” Peeta huffed out a laugh; after the way Rye had treated him over the previous twenty-four hours, he couldn’t help feeling a little bit of pleasure in the idea that Rye had struck out.

His own crush on Katniss had nothing to do with that satisfaction.

“She’s a big celebrity now, Dad. She wouldn’t have time for a small-town baker.”

“Not so sure about that either, but Rye wasn’t the baker she was watching,” he muttered before wandering out to the front shop to help the lone part-timer clean up.

Peeta didn’t have time to ponder what his father meant. There were still cupcakes to frost and cheese buns to bake, and the film crew was due within the hour.

o-o-o

A prep team came twenty minutes before closing to get him ready, parking their small trailer in the lot out back. They clipped and tousled and gelled his hair, then powdered his face. Peeta had dressed in a nice blue button down shirt, but that was nixed in favour of a soft red Henley the crew brought along with them, surprisingly in the right size. They even let him push the sleeves up, the way he was most comfortable.

The woman who arrived later with the film crew was the one he knew from television. In a starched white chef’s jacket, and with hair and makeup done, she was gorgeous, fierce, unforgettable.

Peeta was a goner.

He barely saw her, though, as the director demanded his attention, coaching him on what to expect. “Kat doesn’t work well with being told what to say,” she admitted. “So all of the questions tonight will be unscripted.” Peeta nodded. “Think of it as a laid-back chat with a friend,” Cressida smiled, and Peeta barely bit back a snort. Twelve years in the same schools and they’d barely exchanged ten words; a conversation with Katniss Everdeen would be anything but relaxed.

Another half hour of explaining camera blocking and marks, and finally Cressida led him to the front shop, which had been transformed into a stage. Hot lights blinded him, microphones dangled over his head and it felt like a thousand people were crammed into the space.

Then she was there, Katniss. But no, not Katniss, Kat Flickerman. Aloof and business-like, gorgeous but cold. Untouchable.

Everything went exactly as Cressida had explained. Kat asked him questions, about the history of the shop, about the recipes, about the little town where they’d both grown up (though she didn’t mention that part).

Though Peeta was gregarious by nature, this was so far out of his comfort zone, the cameras, the crowd, all of them fixated on him, watching him interact stiffly with the woman he’d had a crush on since before he even knew what that meant. Sweat beaded on his upper lip and more than once he stammered, fell over his own tongue or outright blanked on an answer. He could feel Katniss’s frustration mounting. The fourth (fifth? thirtieth?) time it happened, Katniss cringed and turned away. “Clear the set,” she bellowed.

The crew leapt to attention; within moments, they were alone. Peeta stared at his shoes while he waited for Katniss to dismiss him too. His father was back in the office, perhaps he could take over and save the show.

Then a small, cool hand landed on his forearm, startling him from his misery. “Take a deep breath,” she said. Her voice was gentle, not Kat Flickerman anymore, but Katniss, the woman he often thought of as his Katniss, though she wasn’t that either. But she smiled at him, the barest quirk of her perfect peach lips. And a deep, guttural sigh escaped him as he started to relax. “Good,” she murmured, her hand on his arm squeezing lightly. “Feeling better?” He could only nod.

She pulled over the plate with the delicate painted cookies, smiling softly at the flowers she clearly recognized. “These were always my favourite when I was a kid,” she murmured.

Peeta looked up in confusion. He knew how much Katniss liked Mellark’s cheese buns, but he couldn’t remember a single time she’d bought the cookies. As if reading his mind, she shrugged. “I’ve never eaten one,” she admitted, softly. “They’re far too pretty to eat. But I used to come by with my sister and look at them in the display window.

He could see it in his mind’s eye; Katniss, her hair in two glossy braids, holding the hand of a smaller blonde girl, both peeking through the window. “Not very often,” she whispered. “Your mom was kind of scary, she’d chase us off if we got too close to the glass.”

Peeta cringed, and started to apologize, but Katniss waved him off. “It wasn’t your fault,” she said, still speaking softly, intimately. “You’ve never been anything but kind, always.” She looked away, laughing just lightly under her breath. “I always wondered how you could be so nice, having grown up with her.”

He shrugged, and deflected. “You should try a cookie now. Better late than never.”

Her smile widened, and it transformed her face, elevating her from beautiful to radiant. “Better late than never,” she murmured.

She didn’t eat the cookie, but they continued to talk, and Peeta got more and more comfortable. They talked about recipes - the age-old traditional wares that Mellark’s had been making for generations and the newer flavours and he and Rye enjoyed experimenting with. She admitted that she’d asked for the apple and goat cheese tart because it was one she remembered fondly, something her father had loved all of those years ago.

He filled her in on the things that had happened in Twelve since she moved away, their classmates, who had gotten married, who had children now. She was engrossed and engaged, reminiscing about people Peeta hadn’t even been sure she knew. She laughed at his anecdotes, and it was like bells ringing, clear and bright.

He even found himself telling her how much he loved the bakery, but how he longed to make it more, how he wanted Mellark’s to be a gathering spot, in tradition of the great Parisian cafés. “Have you been to Paris, Peeta?” she asked, and his smile faltered a little. Here he was talking about big cosmopolitan ideas when he’d never even left the district. Katniss, he knew, had been everywhere, had reviewed restaurants not just in Paris, but in Milan and Amsterdam and Vienna… what a fool she must think him, backward, small-town boy with grandiose ideas. He shook his head, embarrassed.

Katniss didn’t seem to notice his discomfort. “Paris is awful,” she whispered conspiratorially. “Crowded and loud and it smells like cigarettes and pee.” Peeta laughed lightly and she grinned at him, disarming him completely. “But Twelve isn’t any of those things,” she murmured. “I think this is a perfect spot for a café. People are already drawn here, they already gather at Mellarks. It’s always been so warm and inviting here.” Her words tugged at his heart. That’s exactly how he’d always felt about the family business too, how he’d always hoped others would see it. “I know I’d love to sit here and watch the world go by.”

“With a hot chocolate?” Peeta teased lightly, and she looked away, shyly.

“And a cheese bun,” she murmured.

“I wish you would,” he said, barely breathing. “Come back sometime, I mean.” She met his eyes then, and a myriad of emotions played across her expressive face. He just couldn’t understand what they meant.

She took his hand, shocking him with how good, how intensely right it felt. She guided him over to where the largest of his paintings hung, a spring landscape of the meadow that was on the edge of town, dotted with clover and dandelions. “This is yours, isn’t it?” He nodded. “It’s gorgeous,” she breathed reverently. She paused, and Peeta could see her weighing her words. “I always thought you’d make a career in art, open a gallery maybe.”

Peeta sighed, looking down at where their hands were still linked. He knew she wasn’t intentionally trying to pick at the barely-healed wound of his dead dreams, but it stung.

“You were always drawing in school,” Katniss continued, oblivious to his turmoil. “You designed the yearbook cover one year, and you won that award when we were seniors.” She trailed off, and they stood silently for several long moments. Finally, Peeta blew out a forceful breath.

“My eldest brother was supposed to take over the bakery. He and my mom, they, uh. There was a car accident,” he whispered, voice cracking. He’d been offered a job right out of college, with a studio in the Capitol, but the accident that took his mother and brother forced him home. Katniss squeezed his hand, hard.

“I heard,” she admitted, and it surprised Peeta. The accident was almost four years ago, well after she moved her mother and sister out of this dumpy town, never to return. “I’m sorry.”

Peeta cleared his throat. “Anyway, my dad was all alone here after that, trying to run this place. So Rye and I agreed to become partners.”

They stood silently, looking over the meadow painting, lost in their thoughts. “Are you happy, Peeta?” she asked, barely a whisper.

“Sometimes,” he said. He was happy in that moment, talking with the girl of his dreams, holding her hand, feeling the warmth of her body just inches away. He was happy right then, and that was something at least.

There was a scuffling sound behind them and they sprang apart. It was the red-headed cameraman, tucked unobtrusively to the side. Peeta hadn’t noticed his return until that moment, so focussed was he on Katniss, on talking and connecting with her, something he had never imagined possible.

But all good things must come to an end. “Do you think you can go on? Just the three of us?” Katniss asked. And Peeta nodded.

o-o-o

It was late when Peeta finally staggered home to the apartment he shared, often reluctantly, with Rye. The set tear-down had been pandemonium, people and equipment flying like a tempest, a whirlwind of follow up questions and paperwork and releases and by the time he could take a deep breath, Katniss was gone, slipped away like a thief in the night without even a farewell, before he could ask her if she’d like to go out with him sometime. And while he was trying not to be disappointed, the fact that after they’d shared what he had thought was a real connection she’d simply vanished without a word hurt more than he wanted to admit.

“How did it go?” Rye’s voice drifted from their shared living room. Peeta popped his head in. Rye was slumped on the couch, a tumbler of what could only be whiskey balanced on his thigh.

“Seemed okay,” Peeta said, carefully. It was hard enough to gauge Rye’s mood when he wasn’t drinking, with the addition of alcohol he wasn’t sure which version of his brother he’d find.

Rye smirked, then lifted his other hand, tipping the bottle in Peeta’s direction. “Have a drink with me,” he said. Still, Peeta hesitated. Rye shook his head. “I’m not going to rip your head off, little brother.”

Peeta grabbed a glass from the sideboard and Rye filled it with a couple of fingers of liquid fire. For a while, they simply sipped in silence. “I’m sorry I was a dick earlier,” Rye said quietly.

Knowing how much it cost his brother to apologize, Peeta nodded. He wasn’t really a grudge holder anyway. “It’s fine,” he said.

“It’s not though.” Rye sighed, rubbing a hand across his face. “I was really hoping this show would be the wake-up call Dad needed to let us make real changes at the bakery. It was supposed to be him in front of the camera, getting dressed down by that woman. When she insisted on you, I saw red.” Rye sighed, and downed the remainder of his glass. “You know he’s going to blame us now for every shitty thing she says.” Rye’s bleary eyes met Peeta’s. “If we’re going to be stuck here forever, we should at least be able to drag this place into the modern era.”

Peeta felt a pang of sympathy for his brother. He wasn’t the only one who’d had to give up his dreams for the future to come help their father run the business that neither of them had ever planned on inheriting. Rye’d had big city plans and a big city girlfriend who dumped him when he moved back home to sleepy District Twelve. He had every right to be bitter, even if he sometimes chose inappropriate targets to lash out at.

“She didn’t say anything mean, anyway,” Peeta said. “The whole thing was pretty tame. Not at all what I was expecting.” The beginning had been rough, but he felt good about what they’d filmed after he’d calmed down. He thought he’d presented Mellark’s in a pretty good light, all things told.

“Naw,” Rye said with a sigh. “They’ll add all of that in later. It’s always voiceovers.” That idea shocked Peeta. Was that possible? Would the screaming, nasty Kat Flickerman only make an appearance in the finished version? Surely not?

o-o-o

Days, and then weeks, passed, and while Peeta thought about Katniss often, there wasn’t a peep from her. Not an email, not a phone call, nothing. A cameraman returned to film some exterior and kitchen shots, and though Peeta tried to ask him about Katniss, he was all but mute on the subject.

There had been something between them, that evening in the bakery, he was sure of it, sure she’d felt it too. He couldn’t understand why she’d disappeared. She hadn’t even said goodbye. As if he hadn’t mattered at all.

Rye’s words rolled around his head, festered, made him doubt everything from that day. He compulsively rewatched old episodes of Kitchen Nightmares, looking for any hint that the screaming and cursing was added in after the fact. It was impossible to tell. But with every installment, his memories of sweet Katniss faded, replaced by the snarling mutt.

With every day that passed, his mood plummeted further. Because Rye was right: the majority of the screaming and vitriol could well have been voiced over. He just couldn’t tell what was real and what was not real

A message on the bakery phone almost two months after the filming convinced him. One of the producers wanted to give them a ‘heads up’ on what to expect for the broadcast, scheduled for the next week. It could only have been a warning. He was about to appear on national television looking like a chump, as useless and pathetic as his mother had always told him he was. Peeta deleted the message without even telling his father or brother about it.

There were two more calls after that. Peeta deleted both of those messages too, unheard. The only thing he couldn’t delete was the ache in his heart.

Every gentle thing she’d said to relax him, to ease him back in front of the camera, it had all been lies. Katniss, no, Kat, had used their past, their tenuous connection, just to manipulate him. Just to make him look like the idiot he was.

o-o-o

“I booked the lodge for our viewing party.”

Peeta glanced up from the wedding cake he was working on to stare at his father in confusion. “What?”

“With how many people want to watch the show, I can’t fit them all in at the house.” Peeta’s father still stubbornly lived alone in the bungalow where Peeta had grown up. It was large enough to host two dozen or so, at least.

“They all have televisions, they can watch at home,” Peeta grumbled. Despite his best efforts to ignore the existence of Kat Flickerman’s show entirely, the local station had been aggressively promoting the upcoming episode. Someone from the morning news had been in the week before, interviewing Rye and their father. Peeta had refused to take part.

“My boy,” his father laughed, steadfastly ignoring Peeta’s pique, as he had for weeks. As they’d all done for weeks. His mood had gotten progressively worse the more he thought about Katniss and how she’d used him, and he knew everyone around him could tell. “This is a great occasion! Our little bakery on national television. Of course we’re going to celebrate with all of our friends and customers.” Peeta cringed, but his father continued, undeterred. “I wish my own father was here to see it.”

The reminder of how much this meant to his father had Peeta feeling even worse. “Dad, it’ll be embarrassing, for all of us. I’m going to look like an idiot. People are going to stay away from Mellark’s after that.” He knew he sounded petulant but he didn’t care.

His father smiled. “I spoke with that director, Peet, the one with the strange tattoos? She called the house the other night.” Peeta groaned inwardly; he’d underestimated that woman’s tenacity. “She says the show looks great, that you were a natural.” Peeta knew there was no point arguing with his father. Once the elder Mellark had his mind set, he was intractable.

“How many people did you invite?” Peeta groused.

“Oh sixty, maybe. Plus the guys from the bowling league.” Peeta’s heart sank; at this rate, the entire town was going to be witness to his humiliation. “But don’t worry, I’m having Rooba cater it.”

“Geez, Dad, don’t you think that’s too much?” The elder Mellark set down his own piping bag and grasped his son’s shoulders, turning him until they were face to face.

“What’s gotten into you, son? You’re not usually this pessimistic,” he said, his hands squeezing soothingly. It took every bit of Peeta’s strength to hold his tongue. As much as he loved his father, the shame was his alone to bear.

“Nothing,” he muttered. “I just don’t think it went very well.” The two men stared at each other, and Peeta knew without a doubt that his father hadn’t bought his explanation. But he wasn’t ready to share his heartbreak, his stupidity. He’d been so caught up in that long-held crush he’d almost willfully ignored reality. Mr. Mellark simply sighed.

“I wish you’d talk to me Peeta. But okay.” He clapped Peeta on the shoulder, and turned back to his work.

o-o-o

Three days before the show was to air, there was a call on Peeta’s cell from an unfamiliar number. He let it go to voicemail. The bakery phone had been ringing non-stop it seemed with calls from media outlets, wanting interviews in advance of the airing. He assumed one of his well-meaning friends had given his number to someone at the D12 Gazette.

But when he picked up the message later, he nearly dropped his phone in the sink.

It was Katniss.

The message was brief, simply a request for him to return her call and a number, her number.

Peeta had no intention of calling her back. But it didn’t stop him from listening to the message five, ten, fifteen times.

There were two more messages the next day. He wanted to delete them unheard, but he couldn’t. Even wounded and wary, the bone-deep need to hear her voice prevailed. The content of each was the same, but her tone seemed progressively more urgent. The sound of her voice, the way she called herself Katniss instead of Kat, all of it pulled at his heartstrings, confused him even more.

The same cowardice and insecurity that had kept him from seeking her out their whole childhood silenced him now. Though his fingers twitched to redial her number, he did nothing.

o-o-o

“I said no, Dad.” Peeta knew he was being petulant but on this point he was firm: he was not going to his father’s viewing party. He’d capitulated to helping his father set up, he wasn’t a complete dick. But he’d decided the best thing for him to do would be to hole up in his apartment during the actual airing.

If only because he couldn’t get a last minute flight out of the country.

Rye, ironically, had been the most understanding about Peeta’s desire to avoid the show and all of the insanity their father was planning around it. “I’ll text you,” he said the evening before, when Peeta told him he wasn’t even intending on watching. “Let you know how bad it is.”

“I just don’t understand what you’re afraid of,” Mr. Mellark said with a shake of his head. “You’re going to be on national television, it’s exciting. The promos look terrific.” Those, Peeta had been unable to avoid. And while they hadn’t looked scathing, he no longer trusted his instincts.

“You’ve watched her other shows,” he groaned, the thousandth time he’d made the same argument, but his father was having none of it.

“This was different and you know it. You had a connection with Katniss, we could all see it.”

“Stop,” Peeta barked, and his father’s eyes widened. Peeta cringed, sad and ashamed of himself for taking his foul mood out on his father. “That was just for the cameras,” he said softly, giving voice to what his head had been telling him for weeks. “None of that was real.”

“You’re wrong, Peet. I know what I saw.”

“You know I had a crush on her, that’s all,” Peeta groaned, but his father cut him off.

“No,” has said firmly. “I saw how she looked at you.”

“Then why did she disappear? Two months, Dad, and not a word.” It wasn’t completely accurate, but Peeta wasn’t going to mention the messages to his father, who would surely read more into them than was there.

“I don’t know, son. Maybe for the same reason you’re avoiding her now.” Peeta shot a startled look at his father, who simply shook his head.

o-o-o

Peeta paced his apartment like a caged tiger, the dark television taunting him. The broadcast was scheduled to start any minute, his father’s party was more than an hour old, and he was alone with only a six pack of microbrew and his demons to keep him company.

One last message had come to his phone just a couple of hours earlier, a text message this time. Please talk to me, Peeta, was all it read. He’d been so tempted, so damned tempted to reply. Had started typing a dozen times, but erased every word. What could they possibly have to say to each other now? Too much time had passed.

The television called to him though, a siren song he was powerless to resist. He told himself he’d only watch the beginning, would shut it off as soon as she started yelling. But the moment Katniss appeared onscreen in the opening credits, beautiful face larger than life with glossed lips smirking, he knew he wouldn’t be able to look away.

The tone of the program was markedly different from her Kitchen Nightmares shows. The camera showed flattering pictures of the exterior and interior of the bakery while his own voice spoke overtop, recounting the history, the generations of Mellarks who had lovingly built the bakery into the the hub of District Twelve that it was.

But that was only the beginning.

The video unfurled almost like a love letter. But not to the bakery, or not exactly anyway. Instead, it showed Peeta himself, over and over. Peeta painstakingly frosting gorgeous cupcakes. Peeta laughing with a customer. Peeta kneeling before one of the small children that frequented the shop, handing her a cookie from the jar he kept behind the counter. Typical scenes from his everyday work, scenes he hadn’t even realized he’d been filmed in. Over and over he was shown smiling, laughing, creating.

Finally, Kat Flickerman began to speak. Rye was right that her part would be voiceovers, would be words she hadn’t spoken during the interview. But there was no swearing, no cursing. No yelling about the quality of the food or the shabbiness of the surroundings. No idiot sandwiches.

Kat Flickerman, Katniss, talked about the warm, welcoming atmosphere at Mellark’s, the three kind bakers who treated every customer like a friend. She paraphrased Peeta’s own hushed confessions about the improvements he wanted to make, and presented them as if they were things already planned to be implemented. Peeta, sitting on the couch in his apartment, laughed out loud. Somehow, Katniss had managed to manipulate the entire show in a way that would force his father to bring Mellark’s into the modern era after all. As if she knew exactly what he wanted.

Of course, she had known. He’d told her, when they’d spoken so intimately, about his hopes. He hadn’t realized how closely she was listening. But now, as he thought back, he understood that she’d directed their discussion back to his dreams for the future, time and again, and then worked all of those things into the show.

All but the one he hadn’t confessed. How he felt about her. How he thought she was gorgeous, more radiant than the sun. And now, because he’d wasted so long being wounded, he’d never get the chance.

His phone buzzed near continuously on the table beside him, but he didn’t spare it a glance.

As the ending credits rolled, there was a gentle tap-tap-tap at the apartment door. It could have been any number of people, friends or neighbours who knew he was home. But as he stood to answer, he was struck with the certainty that it was Katniss standing on the other side.

His hands shook as he unbolted the door and pulled it open. She wore a dress the colour of candlelight, her hair was loose and she had just a hint of makeup. “You didn’t come to the party,” she said, a glint of accusation in her silver eyes.

“I didn’t know you’d be there,” he said honestly, unblinking as he took her in. As if he could have forgotten how beautiful she was, watching her shows compulsively over the past few weeks. But the camera never captured her luminosity, the way she lit up a room, commanded the attention of everyone within it. He was awestruck.

“Your father invited me,” she murmured. “Can I come in?” Peeta shook off his stupor and ushered her into his space with a muttered apology.

The television still blared, playing a Food Network promo, and Peeta quickly muted it. “Did, you, uh. Did you want a drink? Beer?” Peeta asked, not meeting her eyes. She nodded.

Only when they were settled side by side on his couch did Katniss speak again. “You watched?” It wasn’t a question, not really. Peeta nodded. She raised a single eyebrow at him, and he couldn’t help but smile.

“It wasn’t what I expected,” he said quietly. She frowned.

“You were waiting for me to scream, rip apart your family business, destroy your reputation?” There was no amusement in her tone. Peeta felt the heat rising in his cheeks.

“Kind of,” he admitted.

She’s silent for a long time, picking at the edge of the label on her bottle. “Did you really think I’d do that to you?” she asked, and there was a fragility, a vulnerability to the words.

Peeta sighed. “I didn’t know what to think,” he said.

“I thought…” She sighed. “The way we… connected,” she whispered. “I guess I thought you’d know.”

Peeta battled with himself briefly, whether to be honest with her or not. The warm room, the beer and the uncertainty in her eyes convinced him. “I couldn’t tell what was real,” he said, “and what was for the camera.”

“You really thought I’d manipulate you like that?” Katniss stared at the bottle in her hands, shoulders slumped in defeat. “I know my reputation, I know that people think I’m a bitch,” she said softly. “But we’ve known each other since we were children. I thought you knew me. The real me, at least a little.” She glanced up at him and his breath caught. She was so open, so guileless. But he still wasn’t certain what to believe.

“We never really spoke, back then,” he said. “And I know that was my fault. I was a coward.”

Katniss shook her head. “You were always kind, even when no one else noticed I existed. You saved me back then, you know. When my mom lost herself.” Those stunning silver eyes searched his own. “I owe you.”

“You’ve never owed me anything,” Peeta said, but Katniss wasn’t done talking. She set her bottle on the table and turned slightly to face him.

“That’s why I did this show. To pay you back.” Peeta was more confused than ever. “I had a plan,” she continued. “When I heard that you were here, instead of in the Capitol, I started lobbying the network to create this show.”

“What?”

“Delly Cartwright,” she said. “My sister keeps in touch with her brother. She said that you were back home, running the bakery. It took awhile to get the go-ahead for this show.” He’d been at the bakery more than three years, surely she didn’t mean that long? “I’ve always kept track of you,” she said, answering his unasked question.

“Why?” His voice was hoarse. She shrugged helplessly. “You disappeared, after the taping,” he blurted. “You didn’t even say goodbye.”

“I know,” she said. “I’m sorry. I was really confused. And afraid.”

“Of me?” Peeta was incredulous.

“I’ve never been able to forget you, Peeta. I only intended on breezing in, giving you some publicity, then leaving again.” She brushed her hands together, as if wiping him away. “I thought paying you back would get you out of my mind.” Peeta flinched; that hurt to hear. He dropped his gaze to the bottle in his hands and swallowed back his disappointment.

“But then I got here,” she continued. “And you were even nicer than I remembered. And…” He glanced up at the pause. She was biting her bottom lip, her cheeks were flaming. “And even more handsome. I didn’t expect to be so attracted to you,” she whispered.

They stared at each other, the air between them charged. Then Katniss began to squirm, as if embarrassed.

“I’ve had a crush on you for as long as I can remember,” Peeta said, and Katniss’s eyes widened.

“Me?” she squeaked.

“You really don’t understand the effect you have on me. That’s why I was such a doofus when you were at the bakery. I’ve never known how to talk to you.”

“You did just fine,” she smiled, tiny and tentative, but real. “I didn’t want to leave. It, uh. Well, it scared the crap out of me. I’m not very good with people.”

“You’re here now,” he said. “What does that mean?”

“I don’t know,” Katniss said. “But I want to find out.”

She shuffled just a tiny bit closer to him, and he reached out a tentative hand to cup her face. Her eyes fluttered shut, thick black lashes brushing her cheek. When he finally pressed his lips against hers, she sighed, and in that tiny, involuntary noise he found certainty.

The kiss was slow, almost chaste, a teaser of what could be possible.

A slow smile spread across his face as he pulled back, staring into her hazy silver eyes. Was it possible, that they could be on the same page? But as quickly as the hope flared it his chest, it was extinguished. Katniss, Kat, had a life, a busy life full of travel and tapings and all of it far from sleepy District Twelve. What they shared at the bakery, what they were sharing now, that was all they’d ever get. His hand dropped into his lap, his eyes followed suit.

“I, um. I’m going to be producing the new show out of a little studio in Victor’s Village,” she said. “I signed the lease on the studio space three weeks ago.” They were still so close that he could feel the words on his skin, a caress. A promise.

Victor’s Village was only a twenty minute drive away. Peeta shook his head, certain he’d heard wrong. “I thought you lived in the Capitol?”

“I do, or, well, I did anyway,” Katniss said. “I moved my mother there as soon as I could afford to. It was too hard for her, being in Twelve, surrounded by all of her memories.” Katniss pursed her lips, and Peeta’s eyes were drawn to them, plump and perfectly kissable. Lips he’d now tasted, after so many years of imagining. “But it’s the opposite for me,” she continued. “I hate the Capitol, I hate the noise and the crowds and the smell. Being back here, it made me realize how much I missed it. Missed home.”

“You’re going to be living in Victor’s Village?” Peeta asked, still struggling to understand what was happening. Katniss shrugged.

“I was thinking twenty minutes isn’t such a bad commute. Maybe…” she trailed off, then sighed. “Maybe it’s time for me to come home, where I belong.”

“To Twelve?” He could hardly breathe.

“I’d still have to travel a lot, for filmings. But yeah.” She laughed. “The people here, they don’t care about Kat Flickerman. To them, I’m Russ Everdeen’s kid, not some hot shot television personality. I walked here, from your dad’s party, and there was no paparazzi, no TMZ following my every move. There was just old Mr. Mitchell waving at me from his porch and asking after my mother.”

This time, Katniss reached for him, her small hand cool against his feverish skin. “And you’re here,” she whispered, just before she kissed him. This time, he was the one moaning as her tongue curled around his own.

With a little tug, she was in his lap, and he marvelled at how perfectly her body fit against his, how right she felt in his arms. Kissing Katniss Everdeen was incredible, something he was certain he’d never get enough of.

“Peeta,” she whispered against his lips. “I want–”

The door to the apartment crashed open, startling Peeta, pulling them apart. “Peet, why aren’t you answering your phone? You’ll never– oh.” Rye stood before them, slack-jawed. Katniss buried her face in Peeta’s shoulder, but he could feel her smile.  

“Okay,” Rye chuckled. “Yeah. This uh. This makes a lot of sense. I’ll just…” He turned back towards the door.

“Rye,” Peeta called before his brother could leave. “Is Dad okay?”

Rye glanced back over his shoulder and smiled. “Yeah, man. He really is. I’ll tell you more later. Or tomorrow.” And with one last laugh, he was gone.

“Cockblocked,” Peeta groaned, and Katniss laughed, hugging him tightly. He stroked her hair as his heart rate slowed.

Peeta smiled down at the woman in his arms, who was still laughing softly. He kissed the tip of her nose. Though he longed to go right back to making out with her, he was grateful for the interruption. After waiting so long, they both deserved to do things right. “Have you eaten?” he asked. She shook her head. “Let me take you out for dinner,” he said, the words he’d wanted to say all of those weeks ago.

“I’d like that,” Katniss smiled.

————–

I wish you would write a fic where...

[shannon-jeanna]

2017’s Get Out is uniquely about the Black experience in America. Everything from stand-your-ground, to backyard auctions, to the performances of white liberal guilt by Rose’s family and friends are authored from real life experience; this is no more true than with the construction of the Sunken Place, which serves as a metaphor for Black helplessness in the face of white supremacy.

As an Indian-American watching Get Out, I knew there was something about the Sunken Place that felt analogous to my own experiences growing up in America. I recalled a similar “expectation” to acquiesce to whiteness, and the tool used to keep people like me subservient: The Model Minority Myth.

Like the Sunken Place, the Myth is about white control over Asian Americans. As with racism of any kind, it is about shifting goal posts and double standards.

For me, the conditioning of the Myth began in grade school: teachers offering unsolicited opinions about spices and the cleanliness of India; and, white students performing their best Apu Nahasapeemapetilon impression as a facsimile for all South Asian culture — all this, while kids like me are expected to remain quiet, to absorb these microaggressions, and to not raise a fuss. Kids will be kids, after all.

The Myth was reinforced at home, too, where the expectation was to focus only on homework, placing into AP classes, and getting into a good college. I was to do all of this, of course, while never spouting a cuss word, never getting into a fight, and never creating a scene. I remember the whistling of the pressure cooker when my mom would simmer a lamb curry; unlike that pressure cooker though, I never got a chance to release that anxiety.

In undergrad, I remember going on a date with a gora who remarked, “I’ve never kissed an Indian guy before,” and later in life, finding so many men on the grid of every dating app who called for “whites only.” I remember the magazines that didn’t hire me because of my name or because I looked that much more different than the sea of faces in their cube farms. I remember watching white coworkers coast by on mediocrity and get rewarded. I remember being told to try harder, only to reap similar rewards even when I outperformed them.

As I write these words, I smirk. Of course, for folks like me, all it takes is one white person to pull the lever to activate the trapdoor beneath our feet, and lo! we are suspended in space, our velocity mercy to the agenda of a diminishing status quo, struggling to regain momentum. It is certainly not the Sunken Place, but it is a place akin to such a place.

I was told by my parents to remain quiet, study hard, do well in school, and get a job that lets us continue the tradition of upper-middle class privilege into which we were born. It’s a wonderful trap that promises the illusion of reward: Work super-hard and get a respectable amount of money. I get why the generation before mine played by these rules. Immigrating to the U.S. meant tolerating systematic abuse and shrugging off microaggressions from white people.

After all, being new to a country that is already predisposed to hating outsiders who don’t look or sound like the status quo means quickly learning how to best toe the party line and how to minimize the ripples created. This cycle, unfortunately, doesn’t leave room to interrogate inequities. Fundamentally, people like me are expected to anglicize our names, adopt American attitudes, and deliver a work ethic inconsistent with the status quo, for a fraction of the pay.

I don’t begrudge immigrants who followed this paradigm in order to build a better life for their family and raise kids in a society that’s just a little less disjointed than the motherland’s. They saw that they had two options: Stay in a land where opportunities for future generations seemed finite if unstable; or, roll the dice and gamble on the so-called promised land.

Yet, I challenge these parents’ desire for their children, born as American citizens, to comply with this rubric of subservience. If you raise us with the intention of leading lives better than yours, you should expect — no, demand — that we will grow up to fight for equitable and fair treatment at all costs, so that the generation after us is playing a less rigged version of the game that us and you had to.

I was taught to be quiet and play by the rules. Speaking up could cause trouble and trouble would be inconvenient. As a meek Indian-American kid, I would grow up to be a meek Indian-American teenager, which would obviously lead me being to the kind of university student who would be quick to find the boundaries of acceptable and be eager to please; this then led to me being the kind of entry-level employee who would be quiet about workplace abuses, racist language, and negotiating for higher pay. A rallying cry left over from the generation before mine: Always remember to please the sahibs, and don’t do anything to upset them!

Placating the sahibs means tolerating and getting used to microaggressions and abuse in common settings and doing what you need to in order to preserve yourself and your livelihood — all without rocking the boat.

I see so many of my beautiful South Asian American peers resisting the model minority trap: They see the shiny lure, the trigger, and they steer clear of it. Instead, they make noise about it, and about the possible perpetrators trying to pull in one of ours.

I therefore light a votive candle and offer a moment of silence, for Piyush Jindal, Nimrata Randhawa, Ajit Pai, Raj Shah, and so many others we have seen fall into the Model Minority trap. They saw the shiny lure — political power — and continue to sink. I don’t know if I would use the word embarrassment to describe how I feel seeing them kowtow to a political party that is proud about its racist and xenophobic hopes; if anything, I am sad.

I am sad because just as the next generation of South Asian Americans are out there advocating for immigration and openness, we have lost a few of our own — and they’re so far down there, they can’t even hear us screaming out to them, asking them to find their ways back to us.

I get it. Appease the sahib and you’ll find power. The premise that non-white men and women like us are not capable of deriving power from our own greatness feels foolish. More foolish, though, is the suggestion that we must lean on proximity to whiteness to create power. This kind of power is fickle. This kind of power comes with footnotes and conditions. This kind of power can be taken away at any moment.

Feel pity for people like Pai, Shah, and Randhawa: they may not have understood the terms and conditions of their power completely. They are, ultimately, nothing but modern-day equivalents of the Indians who served at the leisure of British colonialists in pre-Partition India.

My mom and I were watching the Oscars this year and Taraji P. Henson appeared on stage to introduce Mary J. Blige; it was a loving introduction, and you could see Henson exuding pride for Blige’s appearance on the Oscar stage. I turned to my mom and I asked, “Why are Indians not this good at lifting one another up and celebrating each other’s successes in front of white people?”

This act of uplifting is what earned, self-contained power looks like. It is unencumbered by whiteness. It is why when we consider the Sunken Place, we must consider Wakanda, too. Black Panther — the film that spawned the wonderful world of Wakanda — offers lessons for South Asians.

Wakanda envisions what a world for Black people would look like without colonial poaching. For this reason, the make-believe nation is beautiful; it imagines a world where the law leads with love and equality. The construct of Wakanda is only threatened when external American influence comes to exploit its resources for increased global power and revenge.

I consider what this means for people in my community. The allegory of colonialism is not subtle in the film — and the scars of colonization are felt not only by those living in the motherland, but by all members of the diaspora. This hits a nerve close to me. I sometimes wonder what an India that never ended up under British rule would look like.

Our proximity to the Sunken Place is a curious thing: Every generation since the Partition still wears the scars of British colonial rule. These scars have trained us to exalt whiteness above brownness and to encourage the mimicry of Western culture. Every new generation inherits these scars, even as I hope that someday that might fade from our skin.

The allure of the Model Minority Myth remains far too strong. We all hear its twisted siren song. Some of us are even so captivated by its call that we slip and fall and disappear away. While we might light candles for those who are lost, we know there won’t be any bringing them back.

For the rest of us, it’s time to turn away from siren song. I believe we must learn to celebrate one another and to start reclaiming our identity. We must keep the so-difficult-to-pronounce-them-your-white-colleagues-struggle-to-say-it names our parents gave us. We must be aggressive when we lobby for that promotion. We must demand the best; then we must pull out a seat out at that damned table for the next person who reminds us of what we have just endured.

[scannain]

The New Music is a new Irish feature film currently in post-production. The film aims to shine a light on Young Onset Parkinson’s Disease, a rare and little known condition which affects people under fifty.

Young Parkinson’s Ireland, which was set up in 2016, suspect that there may be at least 500 undiagnosed sufferers of Young Onset Parkinson’s in the country. Sufferers who may be reluctant to come forward due to a self or socially imposed stigma as Parkinson’s Disease has been traditionally seen as a “old person’s” disease.

The film, which is written and directed by Italian native Chiara Viale, follows the struggles of Adrian, a young gifted musician , who leaves home and heads to Dublin in an attempt to deal with the news of his diagnosis. Despite this debilitating condition, Adrian (played by Dublin-born actor Cilléin McEvoy) joins a punk band as a keyboard player and rediscovers his life through music and friendship.

Filming was completed at the end of 2017 and the production team have launched a crowd-funding campaign to reach out to the public to help them fund the post-production expenses of the film – editing, sound, music, marketing and festival entries. 20% of all funds raised will go directly to Young Parkinson’s Ireland in addition to all future income from the film.

Scannain caught up with Viale to talk about about her background in film and her motivations for making The New Music

Chiara Viale- Writer/Director of The New Music

How did you originally get involved in Filmmaking? I started writing when I was very young and I have always been passionate about cinema. After finishing my BA in English in foreign language and literature I moved to Ireland and joined the Dublin Filmmakers Collective where I developed my first scripts and had my first on-set experiences. At the same time, I started developing my own independent projects: in 2016 I produced, wrote and directed my first short film Be Frank which was nominated for the Rising Star award at the Underground Cinema Awards in 2017. Also in 2017 I produced, wrote and directed the short Clown and produced the short Clear The Air  which are currently in post production.

And what brought you to Ireland? I’ve been in love with Ireland since I first visited as a teenager. After secondary school I spent a year in Dublin working as an au-pair to improve my English. I had always entertained the thought of coming back to Ireland and I finally moved to Dublin in 2015. I am in love with the creative atmosphere that can breath in this country and the extraordinary people I met along the way. I don’t believe my dreams and aspirations could find a better place than Ireland to become a reality.

Where did the core idea for The New Music originate? My approach to writing is strongly related to feelings and emotions and more often than not the concepts of my stories are born through an image, which conveys a certain feeling. The New Music is no exception: I imagined a character who is lying to himself and the people he cares about and although he knows that these lies can ruin everything he has and loves, he can’t stop. Telling the truth is simply too hard for him to handle, because it would force him to face his own fear.

I envisioned a character with an incurable illness which he hides from everyone and that is eating away at him from the inside. Then I created a starting environment for him that would completely clash with the situation he finds himself in and I imagined something to cure his fear and give him a new prospective on life. This is a film about friendship and it shows that help can often come from people who are not necessarily trying to understand, but who show a way out of suffering by simply being a good, reliable influence.

I wanted to create a story with believable characters dealing with issues that everyone experiences sooner or later in life. I wanted to paint a picture of Dublin exactly as it is right now, and how it is to live in a shared house where everyone forgets to buy toilet paper or to get lost using the Dublin map. I wanted to tell the story of all the people who are trying to make art and music here while coping with our money-controlled society.

What is your connection to Young Parkinson’s , why did you choose this particular condition? Adrian is a pianist and his talent is expressed through the use of his hands. I wanted his illness to target his ability to play and after a short research, I discovered Young Onset Parkinson’s, a rare form of Parkinson’s that affects people under the age of 50. Parkinson’s is widely considered a disease that affects the elderly, and I was surprised to learn that lots of young people all over the word are suffering from it.

At this early stage I decided that The New Music had to be about this illness and it could contribute to raise awareness and shine a light on this condition.

Together with Philip Kidd (Producer, Director of Photography, Editor) we decided to contact the Parkinson’s Association of Ireland, who put us in touch with Young Parkinson’s Ireland, with whom we’ve been working with ever since. Representatives of Young Parkinson’s Ireland read and approved the script at pre-production stage and we are currently developing the film in association and close contact with them. At the end of 2017 we started a crowdfunding campaign to cover the post-production expenses of The New Music, 20% of which is being donated to Young Parkinson’s Ireland. Furthermore, we will donate any future income of the film to this association and use the film for charity purposes.

I also have a very close personal experience with rare diseases as my father passed away in 2013 after having MSA (Multiple System Atrophy) a rare neurological disease for which, like Parkinson’s, there is no ultimate cure. In this script I dealt with feelings that my family and I experienced first hand. I also attempted to give my interpretation of what someone afflicted by an incurable disease might feel, and how the ensuing feelings and behaviours impact everyone around them. I hope that The New Music will have the power to bring people together and create a space where these issues can be discussed, as well encourage a conversation around both living and dealing with rare diseases.

Munky- Irish Punk Band

So obviously music plays a huge part in the film, can you tell me more about that? The second constitutive element of my writing has always been music. I consider it a huge source of inspiration and The New Music is fulfilling my dream of writing a story that revolves around music from beginning to end.

In the last few years I’ve been influenced a lot by punk music as a genre but mostly in terms of lifestyle and attitude. The film itself was produced with a strong DIY mindset and the narrative arc of the main character freely represents my own discovery of punk music as a form of liberation and a way to fully express myself artistically. During the writing process I’ve been influenced by bands such as Bomb The Music Industry! , The Smith Street Band, Fugazi, Black Flag, Bad Brains, The Menzingers and Bangers.

Music is the passion shared by all the main characters of the story and it permeates every scene. It firstly represents the desperation felt by Adrian, then it slowly becomes what carries him through the darkness towards the light and a new version of himself. The film shows two types of music that are usually considered opposites: classical and punk. Both play a huge roles in the film and find a way to merge together as the two diametrically different spheres of Adrian’s life find a meeting point. Grand pianos, dusty rehearsal rooms, microphones and wires, music shops and gigs; everything in this film is about music and the love that each character has for it in their own way.

The film features two original songs composed by Zachary Stephenson of Munky and we are currently putting together a soundtrack made of both classical and punk music, featuring mostly unsigned independent artists such as Bangers, Müg (UK) , Antillectual( Netherlands) and Checkpoint, Forgotten Soldier and Declan Byrne who are all from Ireland. Shit Present ( UK) and Irish act Givamanakick are in talks about coming on board.

What are your cinematic influences? I’d imagine Italian cinema plays a big part? I grew up without a TV because my parents were against having one in the house, but we used to have a VHS player attached to a monitor, strictly used to watch films together. Both my parents loved cinema, and I remember watching italian classics of directors such as De Sica, Rossellini, Scola and Tornatore. I also watched cinema classics with my grandparents. I became an avid reader at a young age and soon I started writing my own stories for my friends to read. I took inspiration from books, comics, Japanese cartoons that I would watch with my friends and music. One of my first dream jobs was to write for music videos.

It took a few more years for me to develop a proper taste for cinema, but to this day the vital element of a film to me is still storytelling. I love those films that tell a story the same way as I wish I did, that put an accent on the psychological development of characters and can capture me emotionally. Directors such as Krzysztof Kieślowski, Anton Corbijn, Gus Van Sant, Nicolas Winding Refn, Tony Richardson, Jeff Nichols and Ben Wheatley have been a major influence on me both narratively and aesthetically.

Are there any Irish filmmakers at the moment that you are interested in? I love Jim Sheridan’s films and Martin McDonagh as a filmmaker (and playwright). I also really enjoyed the productions made by Cartoon Saloon. There are a good number of Irish films that I watched through the years and that really stuck with me, such as: Inside I’m Dancing, I Went Down, The Commitments, The Wind That Shakes The Barley, Breakfast On Pluto and Once. I am looking forward to Mark O’Rowe’s The Delinquent Season.

Look out for the trailer for The New Music which is out in the coming weeks. You can follow the cast and crew on their social media channels below and most importantly if you want to donate to the cause just click here.

Follow the film’s progress on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.

Cilléin McEvoy – lead

Chiara Viale- director

    The New Music- Upcoming Irish Feature shines a light on Young Onset Parkinson's Disease The New Music is a new Irish feature film currently in post-production. The film aims to shine a light on Young Onset Parkinson's Disease, a rare and little known condition which affects people under fifty.

[amyenticknapp]

Shoot 1- Warwick Mount

The first shoot was mainly an exploration of locations near my where I am from in Brighton. This shoot was technically a preliminary test to see what caught my eye and what photographed well, as well as seeing what aesthetic qualities I was drawn too. This endeavour for material considered my previous concept of fashion within urban locations in mind, trying to get a feel for the environment and how I would position my models. I had initially envisioned taking more of a documentary, photographic approach to these concrete locations, trying to make the scenery look more the architecture is a set or from a film still. However, due to the lack of models on set to shoot, it caused for my attention to shift quite rapidly from photographing scenes that I am imagining a subject to be posing within, to then focusing on the major details of the architecture’s design, such as the repetition of shape, geometry and line.

This had provided me with some aesthetically powerful images, especially in regards to how the compositional elements were applied and considered in the frame. The images from this shoot produced a rather graphic, futuristic reflection of the banal buildings, which is a peculiar way to perceive brutalist architecture and the materials being used. I will continue producing work that emphasises the dynamic architectural qualities of brutalism and show consideration for its distinctive components by amplifying the detailing that forms the style, particularly by heightening the contrast, adding dimension to the images.

Yet, despite all of this I ended up being fixated with the minor details and features that formed the structures. I started capturing the patterns of balconies, windows and satellites that scale up the buildings. This provoked a curiosity of the who the building’s apartments are inhabited by and how they are accessorised these attributes to show personal taste and more importantly showing evidence of life. This shoot was responsible for triggering voyeuristic themes, from the intrigue surrounding the residents identity and the proximity I had gained caused for an invasive feeling, as though I was too close or that I was able to see too much through a zoomed in lens.

This is from not normally experiencing such visions and not usually caring to look deeper into the tower blocks. This shoot revealed things I usually wouldn’t of recognised, or thought to of acknowledged, from the symmetry to the use of line, to the little quirks of the architecture that showed for there to be human life occupying the residence. This voyeuristic approach made me feel as though I was a stranger that was wandering too close the homes on the estate and was neglectful of home owners privacy; instead of simply being a photographer documenting the compositional elements of the buildings like I usually do. This then encouraged further intrusion by experimenting with cropping and zooming in within the frame, playing with compositions and enhancing the textural qualities of rust, chipping paint and leaky pipes.

In concern to editing the images it was a cloudy, overcast day, so this meant I needed to create the skies myself to go in my image, otherwise it appeared as white negative space. This wasn’t providing the vibrancy or life that I was intending to show, so I decided to manipulate the images within photoshop. By using the selection tool to highlight the area I wished to edit, I then inked in a pale blue colour which I adjusted with the sponge and burn tools. This helped with brightening and darkening areas of the colour to appear as natural as possible, otherwise it would look artificial and too graphic from not blending or having any variation in tone. The sky replacement seemed to work without appearing so obviously edited, however I do prefer the dimension and contrast that the light and shadow provides when occurring naturally, yet this is only really obtainable on a sunny day. From the sky not being blue and there being a lack of light and shadow, it caused for a focus on different elements of the architecture that I don’t usually tend to focus on. This included attention to the angle and viewpoint, exploring perspective and composition when locating myself around the structures, finding different ways to see the buildings. This approach will be continued on further shoots as I feel I already have various ideas for capturing more images and for their presentation.

[quirkydesertprincess]

Laments of a former “Pirates” fan

WARNING: EXTREMELY LONG POST Also, only those familiar with the "Pirates Of The Caribbean" series are likely to get any of this. There's something I've needed to get off my chest for some time now. It's a long story, so get ready. Let me start off by saying I really really loathe and resent "On Stranger Tides" on a personal level, and I will try to explain why. Years ago, when "Dead Man's Chest" came out, I found myself truly becoming an avid fan of the series for the first time. The reason? I became one of a number of female fans who fell in love with the character of Davy Jones. (I think it had something to do with the fact that at the time I was going through of obsession with Cthulhu-esque-looking villains) But for one reason or another, I loved him. So, what was the next logical step for any fangirl of my age but to ship him with an OC? And being the person with seemingly unlimited imagination that I am, creating OCs for this very purpose was something I took much pride in. (Pathetic as that may sound, please understand that my real life was also pretty pathetic at the time, hence how I suspect this curious hobby of mine was born) And learning that Davy was said to have had a past love interest (even if she did somehow break his heart) certainly didn't stop me. In fact, my brain already started coming up with ways how that could work with my plans. Of course, I did my best to ignore all evidence that pointed to his lover being Tia Dalma. (A grave mistake on my part, but I didn't know it at the time) Over the course of time between the 2nd and 3rd films I spent much of my spare time (and believe me, I had plenty of it) developing this OC and the story between them. It didn't take me long to come up with her design: Something like a mermaid with a long, coiled serpentine fish tail, long flowing Aphroditeesque red hair, and clad in a golden bra and jewelry. Y'know, a goddesslike hybrid of sea creature and human, combining all the best womanly features desired by many a lonely sailor. She went through a number of different names until I saw in a leak in a review on Fanfiction.net that Davy's mysterious ladyfriend was supposed to have been the sea nymph Calypso. And thus, I chose that name. And it was all the more perfect that the name "Calypso" came to describe a number of beautiful things that I found beautiful and stimmy (Yeah, I'm autistic), the most notable of which was the genre of music, which I had never noticed until then how fond of I was, and I now had something fun to associate it with every time I heard it. This OC and this ship were something I was proud of and for the shitty time my life was going through, it made me happy. And I never saw any danger. I just went with the assumption that Davy's lover would remain a permanantly background character whom we would never actually meet, and thus, was fair game for the kind of fangirl that I was. ..Then, the 3rd film came out. Well, you know how it goes; Davy's lover is revealed (as was the whole backstory between them). And although her name is Calypso, she's not my character. And she never will be. She's not even a new character. She's just Tia Dalma from the 2nd movie, albeit with an extra secret identity added on. Not even her supposed "true form" is anything close to what I had envisioned. (Just a towering giant woman who desolves into crabs) The thing is, I probably wouldn't even care. Except that I had my vision of Calypso first. No offense to Tia Dalma fans, but this is just how I feel. You see, after AWE came out, I didn't just lose an imaginary boyfriend; I also lost a beloved OC. An extension of myself. One that had become a work of art that I was proud of and thought of everytime I was reminded of anything to do with the sea and/or Calypso music. Something that kept me going. The only way I could think of to keep from losing her was to imagine my own alternate version of the 3rd movie, one in which Tia Dalma and Calypso were not the same person, but instead were closely tied with each other in some way. Perhaps Tia, being a shaman, was a loyal worsshipper of Calypso and agreed to let her body play host to Calypso's soul upon the goddess's capture, and would occasionally possess her for short periods of time when Calypso needed to speak? Maybe it was Tia, the powerful mystic, who helpd Davy carve his heart out, and he gave her Calypso's music locket as payment for the favor? (Or maybe that locket was where Calypso's spirit had been confined to in the first place?) And in the scene where she is released, instead of that giant-ass Tia Dalma, I could picture my character, the long-tailed jewelry-clad mermaid being that I created magically appearing on deck and/or taking over Tia's body and turning into herself? Even to this day this idea has never truly left me. Even though it was years ago and my interests have rearranged many times, and POTC and/or Davy Jones are no longer first and foremost on my list, the idea is still there in the back of my mind. Always. And lately, it has been coming back to haunt me. Yet, idealistic a person as I am, even I am not fully able to blind myself to the bitter reality of it all; IT. WILL. NEVER. BE. CANON. I am reminded of the ugly every time I google "Davy Jones" and/or "Calypso", sometimes just to see if I am truly alone out there in my way of thinking. And the result is always the same. Everyone else in the fandom considers Tia Dalma the only Calypso they'll ever get, and they seem to handle it just fine without ever questioning it. So why can't I? Maybe I just made the mistake of, as the saying goes, "counting ones chickens before they hatch"? Maybe I was too hasty in coming up with my own headcanons before the movies' actual canon was finished? I know I obviously fucked up big time, and if I could go back in time and stop myself from creating this beautiful OC I would. Because whenever I think about it, I feel like such a fool. I was not only disappointed, I was humiliated. Perhaps privately, but private humiliation is still humiiation. But what else could I have done? I was young, only about like 20, 21 or so. I couldn't have seen the future. Whatever I should have done or not done. I did what I did I bet whoever reads this is probably thinking "Wow, what a pathetic-sounding fangirl! This person obviously has no life! Get over it! Find a RL boyfriend you big baby, blah blah blah" And putting this all out there in print makes it all look pretty laughable, indeed. But, I've had this bugging me for years, and felt it was finally time to talk about it. Even now, I still am in love with the whole concept I've created. And I really don't wish to part with it. Yet I doubt that other members of the fandom would welcome it so warmly, it being a breach on what every POTC fan knows is official. Thus I would be but the lone nut I've always been. But I don't like the idea of destroying this OC or removing her from the POTC universe entirely, leaving her to wander about homelessly. Srsly, what would I do with her? And I've a feeling that whatever option I came up with would be just a second-guess and thus, would be just not the same. What would YOU do?

[badkatandafish]

Why on earth would an already busy wife and mother want to become a full-time student at the age of 40?

It was 6 and a half years ago, and I was working as a customer service rep at a winery in Sonoma, California. I had been in customer service since I was 15. I was looking back at 25 years of soul-sucking work, and I really had nothing to show and nowhere to go with it. I suddenly felt very defeated. I began to envision my children growing up and leaving me without any purpose to my life. I thought often about those experts that touted, “Find your passion and the money will follow.” Customer Service was not my passion. I decided I needed to make a change to my life by finding my passion and figuring out how to make a career out of it.

I began by making lists of things that made me happy and fulfilled. I researched popular careers along with the fastest and best paths to those careers. I consider becoming a teacher, a phlebotomist, and even a realtor, but nothing really seemed to be the answer. During this time, when I wasn’t at work, I was attending or coaching my daughters at softball, they were on 2 different teams due to the 3 years between them, or I was attending my son’s high school football teams and team functions. I think back at this time, and remember that we did not even have cable TV because we were never home long enough to sit down and watch it.

It was at this time that I was spending time with another woman whose son played football with mine. She had this really nice camera, and she photographed each game from the sidelines and shared the images with the team and their families. We talked about how I used to love taking pictures with my dad’s old Canon film camera, and how “Photographer” was on the list of jobs I wanted to pursue when I graduated high school. We laughed about how the cost of going to school and becoming a photographer back then was so much less than the cost today, but it was still the main thing that kept me from following that dream. She convinced me that I should get back into it, and in 6 months, I had saved enough to purchase my first “real” camera, a Canon EOS Rebel.

As soon as I started to experiment, I began seeing things differently. Everything thing became a photo. I would see scenes as I drove to work that I would make mental notes of so I could come back to photograph it. I even began to dream about photographs. I was taking lots of pictures of my kids playing sports, and having a blast. Then I had a dream one night that I caught this amazing shot of my oldest daughter. She is a homerun hitter, and I wanted a photo that captured her at the plate. I kept having the same dream, and I would try each game she had to capture that shot. Then, it happened. I actually got the shot that I had dreamt about. 

When I look at this finished image, even to this day, I question if I actually took that photo. That is what flicked a switch in my head, and I suddenly knew what I had to do. More than anything, I needed to become a photographer. That was the path that was going to make me happy. Photography suddenly and un arguably became my passion.

Every spare moment I had was then spent on mapping out my path to get where I needed to go. I would do research online during my breaks at work, looking for schools, researching financial aid. I came across an ad for the Academy of Art University, and that was when the decision was made. At the time of my high school graduation, that was the school I had wanted to attend. They now  offered a complete degree program online, so I could still work full time while working towards pursuing my passion at the same time. I sat down and talked to my husband and children, hoping to make them understand how important it was to me, and how much of their help I would need to accomplish my goal, and thankfully they all gave me their support.

Since my first semester 4 years ago, it has been quite a struggle, whether its time management, financial issues, or just plain exhaustion, it is not an easy road. But, I have found my balance and a good pace to work at. I take my summers off to make sure I still have time for my kids, even though most days we can be found working on homework together. Everyone chips in at home to get things done, not always, but enough. I have learned to let the unimportant things go, for now. I try to balance my photographic classes with my liberal arts, such as physics, art history and writing. I have at least 2 more years until I finish my degree, but I can truthfully say I still love going to school. I love learning how to do what I love to do. And I know, however hard it gets, it will all be worth it in the end. And I still learn things that amaze me. I still dream of photographs I want to take, and I leave my self open to try new things all the time. I photographed a wedding for one of my best friends, and although it was a fun and amazing experience, I pretty much learned that I am not cut out to photograph weddings.

I think that as a teenager, fresh out of High School, I might not have had the appreciation for the opportunity to learn that I have now. It’s great to be able to share the college experience with my own children, 2 of which are in college, with my youngest still in High School. I am able to share my joy of learning with them, and remind them how lucky they are to have the opportunity at this point in their lives, so they will not have to do when they are my age.

So, if you are at the point where you are wondering, should I or shouldn’t I? Am I too old? Do I have too much going on in my life? I say, if you are truly passionate about following a path that may lead to more work now, but make your life better in the future, then take that chance. You will not only have a chance to learn how to follow your career dreams, but you will learn more about yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, and what is truly important to you, than you ever imagined possible. You will surprise yourself, amaze yourself even. I know, I’ve done it.

My first semester, I was given an assignment to create an image that emulates my favorite photographer, and I chose Ansel Adams. I cried a lot that week. I was convinced I was going to fail that class. I culled through so many of his images trying to find even one that I thought I might possibly be able to work with. I actually considered taking the 3 1/2 drive to Yosemite to attempt to copy his work from there, but then I came to my senses. I found a simple image he had done of a rose on a piece of driftwood. And I stared at it for a day or two, and then I went to work. This I what I came up with.

I knew nothing of how to light it, didn’t even own a light to use, but somehow, I figured out how to utilize the sunlight in my kitchen and some pieces of cardboard to block the light in some areas but not others. I got an A on the project, and I created another image that reminds me, just like the one above of my daughter, that if you set your mind to something, and work at it, you can accomplish it.

I will not sugar coat it. You are going to struggle. You are going to question whether you are doing the right thing or not. Your are going to lose sleep and be stressed. But you just have to look towards that light at the end of the tunnel, believe in yourself and your passion, and do whatever you can to get where you need to be. Follow your passion, that’s what they said right? Now I just have to wait for the money to follow.

 Shg