#I feel like Sua is more popular than him because she already had a good size fanbase before going into Alien Stage

[geospiral]

Genuine question, but does the fandom portray Ivan as being more popular and/or skilled than he actually is considered to be in canon, or am I missing something? Because I feel like if you were to rank our cast of six based on in-universe popularity, he would be in the bottom two, and if you rank by skill, then at most bottom three. Also, when it comes to popularity, I don’t just mean during the actual Alien Stage competition because Ivan obviously got a major boost considering he made it to the semi-finals.

[ottomanladies]

Review: Kösem Sultan (İktidar Hırs ve Entrika) by Özlem Kumrular

my Goodreads rating: ★★☆☆☆ Positive parts: the extensive bibliography which made me discover more books that I now want to read Negative parts: her way of presenting information, the almost total absence of historiography reasoning and if present its weakness, the lack of more information in the notes section.

I am often asked what I think about this book, so I have finally picked it up. I'll admit I have not read it all: I have skipped paragraphs or even whole pages. I did not read chapter 3, “Valide Sultan in the Old Palace: Mustafa I, Osman II and again the reign of Mustafa I”, because I have read in a review that it is not really about Kösem... and I was not interested.

I must say I am very disappointed. I don’t know if I had high standards or what, but it really wasn’t what I expected. I thought it was academia but it may have actually been popular history. I hope it’s popular history at this point, because it doesn’t seem like academia at all. Information is just presented like that, there are no explanations about how the author reached her conclusions-- which is something that I love reading about in historiography books, as someone who wants to do this job.

On the other hand, I deeply appreciated the research she did for this book: she drew from Spanish, Turkish and Italian archives, and books in english are listed in the bibliography as well. I particularly liked that she used Pedani as one of her sources in harem matters, it made me very happy as an Italian. Unfortunately, she did not transcribe the quotes she got from ambassadorial reports; this doesn’t allow you to check her translation, which is something that is very dear to me. 

[very long rambling ahead-- I am so sorry]

As for her more unconventional claims: that Ahmed I had married Kösem and that şehzades Selim and Orhan were two of Kösem’s children, I was not satisfied with her reasoning. Her claims rest on a letter that - apparently - was sent to Venice on Kösem’s orders when Murad IV ascended the throne; it was found in the archives of Venice and it was in Ottoman Turkish. Kumrular included a translation in Latin Alphabet in her book of the important passages. [you can look at it here: x]:

“His generous mother Kösem, for the dead Sultan Ahmed, whom Allah took with him, was a very important person and the Sultan loved her so much that he honoured her by marrying her. In addition to the ruling sultan, she has two younger sons named Sultan Selim and Sultan Orhan.”

Now, Kumrular claims that the prince Selim who was born in 1611 to Ahmed was the son of another concubine, and that this is another Prince Selim. She explains the absence of Kasim and Ibrahim (who were clearly very much alive) saying that Venice probably already knew that they existed... it’s a little weird. Historian Erhan Afyoncu says that Selim and Orhan may have been Kasim and Ibrahim’s other names, but Kumrular answers this by saying that no source mentions that they had more than one name. Which is true but I remembered when I read some Venetian ambassadorial reports back in November, and Giovanni Cappello in 1634 clearly calls Murad IV’s younger brother “Orcan”:

“Tiene Sua Maestà due figliuoli nell'infanzia, d'incerta riuscita. Ha due fratelli, li quali, non ostante l'uso contrario della morte nell'assunzione degli Imperatori, vivono tuttavia; il maggiore di nome Orcan è in età di anni 19 con concetto di buon talento. Il Re sovente seco tratta con umanità, permettendogli la barba, privilegio riserbato alla sola persona del Re in serraglio...”  “His Majesty has two sons in infancy, uncertain in survival. He has two brothers who - contrary to the tradition of putting them to death on the emperors’ ascension - nevertheless live; the eldest named Orcan is 19 years old with a good intellect. The King often treats him with kindness, allowing him to grow a beard, a privilege reserved to the only person of the King in the Serraglio...”

At the time I thought that it was a simple mistake of Cappello’s, who misunderstood “Kasim�� (I mean, Mihrimah was called Cameria in Italy so everything is possible at this point), but maybe he did not and he was right? Maybe Kasim was truly called Orhan Kasim or Kasim Orhan? Cappello says that in 1634 he was 19 years old, which means that he was born in 1615-- a date often attributed to Kasim’s birth. 

While he mistakes Orcan for the eldest of Murad IV’s brothers (Bayezid was in fact the eldest, being born only a couple of months after Murad IV), we cannot simply distrust his whole testimony. 

It is sad that Kumrular did not read this relazione (or did not find it useful to her book) because I would have liked to see her conclusions. 

About Kösem’s marriage, her reasoning is... pretty weak, in my opinion: she first says that the letter must have been written on Kösem’s orders, who knew that official wives had a great importance in Europe so she could have said that just to enhance her status.... but then says that it is unlikely that she outright lied in a state document:

“It is obvious that Kösem, in front of a country as important as Venice, wanted to mark the legality of her position. Emphasizing that she is the wife of the deceased ruler and the praises directed at her were aimed at raising her relationship with the Venetian state, gaining respect for her and therefore listening to her words.” 

To be honest, the claim that Venetians would have looked down a non-married consort is out of the world; they had entertained relations with the Ottomans for two centuries at that point and they very much knew that Ottoman sultans did not frequently get married. 

Moreover, there is no proof that this letter was sanctioned by Kösem herself. It was written by one Mustafa çavuş in 1624 (dated by Pedani), who says that it is the second time he is sent to Venice as an Ottoman emissary. It is certainly strange that in it he claims that Murad IV is fifteen years old, which he definitely was not. At the end of the letter he says that the rest will be included in the letters penned by the Sultan and the Grand Vizier. Unfortunately, either these letters did not surive or Kumrular did not read them... she did not explain it in the book. 

In any case, she attributes mistakes to the person who actually wrote the letter (high-ranking women dictated their letters) which is... rather convenient, I guess.

The rest of the book is just a narration of Kösem’s life. There is so much she doesn’t look at in depth and at the end of every section I was not satisfied with the amount of information given. There was always something lacking, I felt like there was more she could have said but for some reason didn’t. 

The book is 336 pages long and at the end you’re left with only the surface of Kösem’s life. It was more like reading an - admittedly long - Wikipedia article than a biography. 

Unfortunately this book was not very reviewed by her peers, which is a shame. I could only find one review, by Hüseyin Çalış (who is apparently a member of the Izmir Katip Celebi University), who says that the book sometimes seems like a novel and that there are deficiencies in it but that all in all is a good contribution to Ottoman historiography, considered that it was written in just one year.

I am not sure I agree with his positive view of this book. I didn’t feel satisfied when each topic was over, it felt like she was just listing events happening - most of them not about Kösem - with no reasoning behind. I am also disappointed that the notes section is very poor of information; she did not add anything in it except the titles of the books she had drawn her info from-- often they were books which contradicted her own claims but she did not explain that. 

The bibliography part was very rich, though, and this is what I most appreciated about this book. I have written down a couple of books I want to read, among them: Murat Kocaaslan - Kösem Sultan. Hayatı, vakıfları, hayır işleri ve Üsküdar’daki külliyesi, which I think may be better than this book altogether. I had the chance of reading a chapter of his book about Mehmed IV and it’s more academia than Kumrular’s: better written, better researched, better noted as well. 

In conclusion (I am so sorry this got way too long, I was supposed to write just a couple of things about this book), maybe it’s my fault but it truly was not what I thought it would be and I am not sure I will buy her book about Nurbanu and Safiye after all. I personally prefer pure academia compared to... whatever this was (half and half? who knows)

If you can’t stand academia, though, and want something... lighter? maybe this book will be for you. It certainly looked like popular history sometimes.

[artlaisaerhard-blog]

How To Get Away With Murder (Review)

HTGAWM came back with everything. As expected, is not it? This series can't disappoint us at all.

We had an episode full of Wes's memories. "I havent yet overcome this death" It is hard to believe that one of the kids died. And wes was one of my favorites, even more so because he was so close to Annalise.

And  Annalize is in jail! They managed to get the queen to jail. But the fight is not over yet. I am sure that the powerful, supreme diva will return, however, raising all who have harmed her to hell.

Now I want to take a minute to talk about Karla. What is this gig, girl? She's surprising me. Not that I didn't think her acting good before, it's nothing like that. It's just that her character has evolved so much. If you think of the first season as far as Laurel was boring and even sleepy, and now see the strong woman she has become, it is a huge breakthrough. Of all the young characters, she and Asher are the ones who have had interesting twists in the plot. I used to hate Asher. Today it has become one of my favorites. I don't know what it's going to be like for Laurel, after having lost the love of her life. I hope she's well. She and the baby.

We're talking about character evolution, but what about Connor in this story? I don’t know what's happening to this boy. Since Connor split from Oliver, the character has been coming downhill. It is sinking more and more. Connor used to be that smiling and fun person, but those events are changing him. There must always be a problem person in this kind of situation, and they chose Connor. I really don’t know why the writers decided to do this with one of the - or perhaps the most - popular of the series. I'm not supporting Connor. And he talking those horrible things to Laurel was the last straw. He really deserved the punch he took from Asher.

Micaela didn't liked her boyfriend's attitude. Did she have a violent past? Her reaction made it clear that she doesn’t like this kind of attitude and may have something to do with her past with the foster mother.

At the end of the episode Frank turned himself in to the police. Do you really believe he killed Wes? First; The series wouldn’t deliver like that. Second; I think Frank's doing it because of Laurel. He may feel guilty, even more so after all he's done, not just to her, but it seems that it's his talent to screw up everyone's life. We have seen in past episodes how Frank is vunerable. He's already been arrested, he's already done a lot of shit in his life, but his heart just wants to be loved by somebody. I think that hear Laurel talking all that; "Who loved Wes more than him" broke him off. That's why he gave himself up. That way, he would solve two things at the same time, taking Annalize from jail too.

___________

HTGAWM voltou com tudo. Como o esperado, não é? Essa série não consegue decepcionar a gente nem um pouquinho.

Tivemos um episódio repleto de memórias de Wes. “Ainda não superei essa morte” É difícil acreditar que um dos meninos morreram. E wes era um dos meus preferidos, ainda mais por ele são tão próximo da Annalise.

E a Annalise foi encana mesmo! Conseguiram levar a rainha para a cadeia. Mas a luta ainda não acabou. Tenho certeza que a diva, poderosa, suprema retornará contudo, levanto todos os que a prejudicaram para o inferno.

Agora quero reservar um minuto para falar sobre Karla. Que atuação é essa, menina? Ela está me surpreendendo. Não que eu não achasse sua atuação boa antes, não é nada disso. É só que a personagem dela evoluiu tanto. Se você pensar na primeira temporada no quanto a Laurel era mesquinha e até sonsa, e ver agora a mulher forte que ela se tornou, é um avanço enorme. De todos os personagens jovens ela e o Asher são o que tiveram reviravoltas interessantes na trama. Eu costumava odiar Asher. Hoje ele se tornou um dos meus preferidos. Eu não sei como vai ser daqui para frente para a Laurel, depois de ter perdido o amor da sua vida. Espero que ela fique bem. Ela e o bebê.

Estamos falando de evolução dos personagens, mas e o Connor nessa história? Eu não sei o que está acontecendo com esse menino. Desde que o Connor se separou do Oliver, o personagem vem descendo ladeira a baixo. Está afundando cada vez mais. Connor costumava ser aquele cara sorridente e divertido, mas esses acontecimentos estão mudando ele. Sempre tem que existir um problemático nesse tipo de situação, e escolheram o Connor. Realmente não sei por que os roteiristas decidiram fazer isso com um dos - ou talvez o mais - popular da série. Eu não estou suportando o Connor. E ele falando aquelas coisas horríveis para a Laurel foi a gota d’agua. Mereceu mesmo o soco que levou do Asher.

Micaela que não gostou da atitude do namorado. Teria ela um passado violento? Sua reação deixou claro que ela não gosta desse tipo de atitude e talvez tenha algo a ver com seu passado com a mãe adotiva.

No final do episódio Frank se entregou para a polícia. Vocês acreditam mesmo que ele tenha matado o Wes? Primeiro; a série não entregaria isso assim de cara. Segundo; creio que o Frank está fazendo isso por causa da Laurel. Ele talvez sinta culpa, ainda mais depois de tudo o que ele fez, não só para ela, mas parece que é o talento dele ferrar com a vida de todo mundo.  Vimos nos episódios passados como Frank é vunerável. Ele já foi preso, já fez muita merda na vida, mas o coração só quer ser amado por alguém.Acho que escutar a Laurel falando tudo aquilo; “Que amou o Wes mais do que ele” acabou com ele. Por isso ele se entregou. Assim resolveria duas coisas ao mesmo tempo, tirando a Annalise da cadeia também.

Link Video: Youtube

[katherinedoeskpop]

Dreamcatcher Comeback Review: “Good Night”

Dreamcatcher has definitely gotten a lot of interest from the international community in the past few months.  The girls are clearly going all in on the dark horror aesthetic, and so far it looks like it’s paying off.  While “Chase Me” already ventured into the supernatural, “Good Night” goes full-on occult – and I’m happy to go along for the ride.

If you’d like to know more about what I look at in my reviews, click here.

*WARNING!* This review assumes the reader has listened to the music and/or seen the music video!

Concept: Dark/edgy, horror

SONG:

“Good Night” has a lullaby for an intro (how appropriately creepy!), but it gets real intense real quick. It’s largely influenced by heavy rock and metal, with electric guitar and percussion as the key elements. They’re more noticeable during the fast and frantic chorus, but they make themselves heard even if they’re providing the background. “Good Night” definitely has darker undertones built into the melody and the instrumentals.  The most obvious example is the rapping in the second verse, where both SuA and Dami use a very low tone.  It’s very attention-grabbing and sounds almost sinister.

Dreamcatcher has gotten a lot of their attention for their “anime sound.”  My otaku heyday was in the early 2000’s (!!!!), so I’m only really familiar with the super popular series.  But to me, “Chase Me” sounds like it could easily be an anime opening.  When I heard “Good Night,” I could have sworn that I’d actually heard it before.  (It turned out that I was thinking of “Ichirin no Hana” from Bleach, which isn’t exactly the same but shares a lot of elements). There’s something very compelling about the contrast between women singing and an electric guitar wailing – which perhaps explains why it’s featured in many anime themes.

I really like “Good Night,” perhaps even more than “Chase Me.”  My only problem is that it needs several listens to like it.  The first three times I heard it, I couldn’t remember the melody to save my life.  Repeat value is quite common in K-pop, but the problem with Dreamcatcher is that they’re very niche.  There are quite a lot of international K-pop fans like that also like anime; within Korea, I’m not so sure.  “Good Night” is a great song for those who love this kind of thing, but I don’t think it will draw in people that are unfamiliar with its style and genre.

SCORE: 17/20

LYRICS:

The girls double down on their horror theme by entering someone’s nightmares and essentially terrorizing them.  While I do like that a lot of K-pop songs revolve around romance, it’s refreshing to find a song that’s basically the complete opposite. I suppose it could have some hints of romance, depending on how you interpret certain phrases. But there are no explicit references to love, nor any declarations of it.  Not once do they mention how this person makes them feel, only the effect they know they have on him or her.  The key part is they seem perversely delighted about the power they’re wielding:

“Oh baby, run run run it, to get far away Run run run it, to a place you can’t see You can’t escape no matter how much you try, oh In the endlessly repeating nightmare, stay trapped like this forever Like my very own doll, baby Good Night”

A lot of the badass or girl crush use “confident” songs, but “Good Night” goes right past that into “controlling” territory.  (“I’ll be conducting your dreams without change, without even moving a finger / I’m making you drenched in sweat, you can’t wake up”) The lyrics are unsettling, but downright delectable.  The whole fun of the song is reveling in the control they have, and it’s not taking itself seriously. Boy groups often sing about these devastating effects that women have on them (see: Monsta X’s “Beautiful”), so it’s super interesting to hear a girl group describes how they make the object of their affections (or obsessions) go crazy.

SCORE: 10/10

LINE DISTRIBUTION:

The line distribution hasn’t changed much from “Chase Me” – in fact, it’s hardly changed at all.  The actual percentages of who gets what may have flipped around a bit, but the hierarchy remains the same.  Siyeon, Yoohyeon and JiU (a.k.a. the vocal line) still take care of most of the song.  Dami and SuA don’t have a lot because they’re more rap, and there’s not that much of that in “Good Night.”  They did a slightly better job with Handong, because they gave her some pretty standout (albeit short) lines like “I don’t wanna tick tock.” But Gahyeon only has one line and then essentially disappears.  So while the line distribution is pretty good, I still think they need to spend a bit more time highlighting the newer members.

SCORE: 8/10

CHOREOGRAPHY:

The best thing by far about this dance is the opening with the tutting. It’s so precise and difficult.  Not only are they isolating very specific parts of their bodies – like hands and feet specific – they’re also moving different parts in different directions.  It takes an immense amount of coordination and concentration to pull something like that off, and the payoff is huge. To put it simply, it looks cool, horror-inspired, and downright awesome.

Unfortunately, the rest of the dance never hits that high level.  It’s definitely hard and requires a lot of energy, but I don’t find it interesting.  It’s good, but not great.  To me, it basically looks like a darker version of Gfriend’s “Rough.” I don’t mean that they copied it, but there are many technical similarities between their styles: the difficulty level, the sharp and clean arm movements, the constantly switching spots.  Plus, there’s only so many ways you can express ideas of time and running through dance. (Actually, the running key point looks more like Lovelyz and “Wow,” but you get what I mean)

Dreamcatcher has proven that they’re more than capable of doing complex choreography.  They have like seven or eight dance practices on Youtube at this point.  So now they need to kick it up a notch.  I don’t need them to be tutting their way through an entire song (although that would be wild).  But most of their choreography blends together after a while, and it should be more memorable. The reason that the dance for “Rough” is so iconic is because it holds our attention from beginning to end.  Each section stands out on it’s own, like they’re dancing out a story.   So Dreamcatcher has definitely impressed us, but now they have to engage us.

SCORE: 17/20

CENTER AND FORMATIONS:

One reason I loved the dance for “Chase Me” was because there were so many interesting visual elements.  There were all sorts of formations, shapes, directions, levels, etc.  “Good Night” is somewhat lacking in this, but they do have some strong points.  My favorite part is when they build the hands of a clock, which is an often-used but fun classic.  Again, it’s just a matter of keeping things entertaining and making more distinctive shapes and movements.  Once they get that down, they’ll be unstoppable.

The center position generally goes to the vocals: Siyeon, Yoohyeon, and JiU. I’m still confused as to why SuA – the main dancer – is not in the center for any dance points. But at least they have JiU, who is beautiful and fierce and (most importantly) has the skills to center that tutting section.  I personally think that Siyeon captivates with her voice rather than her dancing, so she doesn’t always catch my eye.  But Yoohyeon is a very good choice because her performance is very charismatic and easily draws attention.

SCORE: 8/10

MUSIC VIDEO:

 In a rare move for idols, Yoohyeon actually explained their music video on 

After School Club. 

(Huzzah!!! Now I don’t have to spend paragraphs making things up guessing!) Here’s what I put together from her summary and re-watching the video: The actor that we previously saw in “Chase Me” is a “nightmare hunter.” He’s trying to chase down and capture the girls with what seems to be a spell book that. He’s already captured Gahyeon and SuA (the book illustrates their predicaments).  Yoohyeon and Siyeon are chased through the forest, presumably by him.  But JiU, Handong, and Dami are safely squared away in an alternate mirror dimension.  They eventually rescue the others by grabbing the spell book, and then they beat him at his own game by trapping him in the mirror.

When I re-watched the music video with that information in hand, I could see it. However, before that I had a pretty different interpretation. I thought that it was actually all flashbacks showing us how the girls died. I figured that the book actually belonged to them, and they were punishing the hunter for getting too involved in their stories.  Don’t get me wrong – I’m happy that there’s an explanation to the story. But I have so many more questions now!  Who are these girls really?  How does all of this supernatural magic stuff fit in?  What’s this mirror dimension? And how did they die????

I think the main reason for this confusion is the passivity of the hunter.  A hunter by definition should be a pretty active character, yet we mostly just see him standing around observing and/or reading.  If he’s the one chasing Yoohyeon and Siyeon, it’s pretty unclear.  This could easily have been avoided by giving him some clear actions.  However, this editing flaw doesn’t derail the story, it just muddles it. If we want the story, we have to work to lookfor it.  Normally I’m not a fan of that because I believe it’s the director’s duty to be clear.  But I’m being lenient here because I see the fundamentals are there, which is more than what I can say for some story videos.

The music video’s true strength is its aesthetics, which are killer.  “Chase Me” was pretty much a ghost story, which is paranormal in itself.  But I loved how they added on to it by bringing in a lot of occult elements this time.  There’s the spell book, mirror dimensions, witchcraft, voodoo dolls, hints of a secret society or sorcery (with the black capes), and of course their namesake with the dream catcher.  Whoever did the production design should be commended, because his or her efforts really paid off.  The whole music video has an unsettling feel, but at the same time it just looks so cool. It really makes me excited to see what other worlds they come up with in the future.

SCORE: 18/20

STYLING:

The fashion in the music video is very interesting.  The girls are mostly wearing long pale-colored dresses.  I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s period clothing, but it certainly evokes a different time.  Because the dresses are long and flowing, they look very ghostlike.  I also like how older members like JiU look more grown up, while the younger ones like Dami look more childish in big nightgowns. It’s a small but intriguing detail.

I’m not quite as sold on the performance outfits.  I like the jacket because it gives off a rocker feel, but I don’t like that it’s used as a dress.  I personally think it would look better if they had worn leggings or leather pants to make the look more badass.

STYLING MVP: Yoohyeon

SCORE: 8/10

FINAL TALLY:

Song – 17

Lyrics – 10

Line Distribution – 17

Choreography – 8

Center and Formations – 8

Music Video – 18

Styling – 8

TOTAL: 86

CONCLUSION:

I gave “Chase Me” an 88, so it’s good that the score for “Good Night” is very close.  They’ve done the best thing that a rookie group can do with their first comeback: build on their established concept while making it interesting.  The three cornerstones of a promotion (song, dance, and music video) are all quite solid. Consistency is very important for rookie groups.  Many spend months or years trying to find the image that fits them and will bring them recognition. Dreamcatcher is already a step ahead, and now they have to sustain it.

Concepts are so tricky: they help establish a group, but they can also undo one. You have to keep it fresh so that you don’t end up doing the same thing every time, and you have to show enough versatility so that you don’t get boxed into a concept forever.  “Good Night” definitely expanded on “Chase Me” and built an intriguing world.  I’m very satisfied. But it also made me really want to see what else they had to offer.  There are so many directions that Dreamcatcher could go from here –  twisted fairy tales, more occult stuff like tarot or fortunetelling, any manner of supernatural creature, and perhaps even the badass concept.  I really hope they go in a different “dark” direction for the next time.  But they’re very good with what they have already, so for now I don’t mind if they keep playing it safe.

Sources: Youtube, Happy Face Entertainment, M! Countdown (MNET/M2), After School Club Episode 260 (Arirang)

Dreamcatcher Comeback Review: “Good Night”

Dreamcatcher has definitely gotten a lot of interest from the international community in the past few months.