#I know the show's actual premise was crap but man I would have watched so much of her ridiculous personal life

[internerdionality]

Okay, I know that Conviction lasted for only, what, half a season, but seriously, there was a show that starred Hayley Atwell as a disaster bisexual who has insane sexual chemistry with her two exes, who also canonically dated each other (at different times from when she was cheating on each of them with the other), and there isn't ONE SINGLE FIC on AO3 that features her having a messy threesome with both of them?

[starshipsofstarlord]

All This Hassle, and What For?

Pairing | Loki Laufeyson x reader

Summary | getting taken hostage, along with Loki, is far more amusing than ever intended to be, despite it leaving your captors anything but impressed.

Warnings | kidnapping, mentions of depression, swearing, implied smut, innuendos

Based off this tiktok. All original rights to the plot go back to the creator.

Quick link to my masterlist, if you’re interested in reading more of my crap 😬

Opening your aching eyes, you found yourself to be in a large room, there were plenty of feet stood at your eye level, and such a sight made you frown. You certainly didn’t remember being knocked out, but who would, the exposure to unconsciousness was most likely sudden.

But nevertheless, you raised your head, glaring up at those whom had captured you. As your eyes scoured the room, your eyes landed promptly on the god of mischief, who had his hands bound and shackled in chains, and by Odin, did he look good.

However, your attraction the man who once reigned terror down upon New York wasn’t the focus now, and so you licked your lips, and kicked the nearest guard in the leg. He stumbled, the noise loud enough to draw the attention of all others, and you were pleased to stifle a laugh. Loki frowned at your behaviour, knowing that this was not the way that you were trained to be an avenger, but it was clear that you were no longer on earth, so human pleasantries did not apply here.

“And by the gods, who in the galactic council’s name do you think you are?” The closest asked, wrapping his large hand through your hair, and tugging your face up to stare up at him, wanting you to be treated as the lesser being he thought you as.

“Actually, he’s the god.” Tilting your head, you diverted it towards Loki, who squinted feebly at your answer. “But I think you already knew that, since you have him rattled in metal. Just a word of advice, rumour has it that he likes to be restrained in such ways; really, you’re doing him a favour, and you may just earn yourself a big tip.”

You sent a wink up at the commander, watching with inward joy as he grimaced at your development within your speech. “Quite a nice sight, to see him so vulnerable and at someone’s mercy, so thank you general.”

Sending him a smile, he huffed, whilst Loki tried his darnedest to contain an amused grin. It wouldn’t be the first occasion that you had made suggestions regarding the new troop of the avengers; even when he was around causing mischief, (which he still tended to do), there were always words said that gained the god’s intrigue.

Tony at the time, and to this day, despite him being a part of the heroic team, which Thor was ‘inclined’ to drag him into, thought nothing more than disgust at your meaningful jokes. In his words, ‘you two may as well screw so we don’t have to listen to anymore of this dirty banter, you in regards to reindeer games’.

How you wished right now, preached silently even, that Tony could bare to listen again, so that he could send in the team whom could deal with these aliens that were keeping your imprisoned. But all communications were cut, and that just left you and Loki.

By no means did you doubt if Loki got the chance to escape, he would leave you. It was in his nature to do so, but if you could pose a lack of threat, they may loosen up on their efficiency in guarding you. After all, Loki was the one they wanted, not you. And then, both of you could get away from this galactic nonsense.

“Humans.” The general huffed, causing you to grimace as the stench of his breath wafted through the air, and hit your nose. “You all think that you are so special, but when it comes down to it, those who are not from your planet do not care. Loki here, this god, does not care about you little one. And he never will.”

“That’s okay with me, because I don’t care about him either. It’d called self preservation.” You informed your captor, noticing Loki staring across at you with an icy gaze. Who were you kidding? Of course you cared about the god, but right now, you would do anything to get out of this predicament.

“Aw would you look at that.” The feet moved back towards the main reward of their capture, staring down at the green eyed trickster with mocking eyes. “This woman has attitude just like yours, if either of you cared, I’d call it a match made in Asgard.” A laugh bellowed from the wide chest of the being, finding his own comedy quite humorous.

“Excuse me, I’m way out of his league!” You pretended to be offended, bringing your hands that were free of restraint to your chest. They thought not to tie you down as they did to him, after all, you were nothing but a midguardian. That was their mistake. “What’d you want with old horse shagger over there anyways? Don’t be alarmed, but he actually does some kind of good now, even if it be out of his own self interest.”

A heavy sigh fell on deaf ears, as the protector of space glanced unsurely between the pair of you. “He has the tesseract, and I wish to take it from his slippery hands, he cannot be trusted with such a powerful source of energy.” His words bellowed a laugh of absolute surprise from your mouth, earning a frown from those keeping you hear, and a cock of the head from the god of mischief.

It was clear that not only was he confused by your supple, yet somewhat pleasant burst of amusement, but he was also in the dark about what in the Hela this predominant being was speaking of. Yes, he had had the tesseract at one point , however, no longer was it in his untrustworthy grasp.

Thanos had taken ownership over it, after killing many of the people that he had saved from the events of Ragnarok. It was not just some energy source, it had been an infinity stone all along, tricking the eyes of elders and the young to believe that it was nothing more than a harbouring of power. But it had indeed been the space stone, and it was taken from him, in exchange for saving Thor’s life.

The Guardians of the Galaxy had found the pair of them upon the aftermath of the wreckage, taking them in, amongst plans of taking Thanos down. It had been a failure, up until the avengers went back in time, going to their past that would not affect their future, so that they could reverse the affects the Titan had brought upon earth and everywhere else.

During that time, Loki had nurtured his brother, watching as he fell apart with the responsibility of their people, and collapsed into a spiral of depression. You had also been there for Thor, doing your best to take the drink away from the bulky god, but to no avail did you manage to succeed. And so, during those tormenting five years, you and Loki would sit side by side, both basking silently in your failures.

“I thought you guys’d know everything, but I guess that you and your highness are stuck in one time line; all of them. But for us humans and every lesser being, there are multiple, and that Loki that stole the tesseract, yet I say again, is one much different. And we are on the search for him, to stop his disruption and crossing over of the times!” An exonerated, and audible exhale of air left you after your little speech.

Loki smirked, at the premise of you protecting him with the admission of the truth. But he couldn’t help but feel a feeling of warmth flutter within his immortal insides, it was rather a nice feeling he realised. “He is quite difficult to catch, we have been tracking him since the time heist went sideways.”

“That’s because he’s you!” You pointedly exclaimed, unable to pin some of the blame upon the god himself. Sure, in recent times he had changed, and was much different from back when he wanted all mortals to kneel before him (which you’d willingly do if it ever came to that, though you’d never tell him under which circumstances that would be), but at the end of the day, that had been him once!

The tricks and the lies still remained, but he had found a reason to thrive, and a long and enduring career that he was well at tackling. Often, he made out being an avenger, despite the government’s rouse of concern, to be a bore, and that he had far better things to do. But he stayed, with a light in his eyes, and continued following along with the heroic traditions, breaking a few rules here and there.

“Dear, why do you always have to put the blame upon me? I was not the one who decided to put that green dye within your shampoo, but I’ll have to admit, did you look so enrapturing.” He was running a ploy, dragging out the time that you spent bantering in hopes of something happening.

Unlike Heimdall, he did not have foresight, but it was a requirement whilst the pair of you were on your expediting mission, that you check in with the base, via the comms that had cracked under brutal feet. And so, he spoke, with the promise that you’d return the conversation and leave all others in the room confused with your meaningless discussion.

“I did, didn’t I?” You asked, to which he hummed in reply, lightly nodding his head, as his feline eyes ran up your body, paying ample attention to how your limbs were free, unlike his own. “But I’d say fine sir, that the blame is down to Clint, and if I’m correct, may we kick his ass as soon as we get back home?”

“Of course we can my beloved-“ you froze at his choice of words, and it appears that he did too, suddenly realising his mistake. Gulping for a second he went to speak again, but the commander felt much inclined to but in, and stop the headache that was bubbling in his large head.

“Shut up; the pair of you!” His scolding made you feel as though you were in school over again, it was impossible not to drop your head down and try to contain your laughter. Loki too found such enjoyment in this predicament, sporting a cheshire grin to emit his emotions.

“I’m sorry, can you say that again? Maybe a just a tad louder?” You pinched your thumb and forefinger together to show how much, and it was clear that you were pissing this primal being off. He began towards you, and you were prepared to fight him, you were never one to back down, which was one feature upon the various reasons that Fury had initially recruited you.

Awaiting the first strike, you stood despite the others around you, your eyes wide open as you bravely stared up at your opponent. But before the fight could begin, a distant crash assumed preference in your ears, causing you to turn your head in the direction it had came from. And then, all of a sudden, a ship crashed through the dock, guns blazing from its side.

“What are you waiting for?” The distinct voice of Rocket asked, and obediently you ran through the terror, finding Loki already upon the ship, but then, he appeared behind you also. “Quill, get ready to go!”

Taking glances, you stared between the two practically identical copies, a light frown on your face. Both were restrained, yet the one that was seated beside Groot, whom was playing a game on some nineties device, was glaring up at the pair of you.

“An avenger, really?” The seated one laughed, mocking his once future self, as you felt the ship steer clear away from the scene. Your Loki quirked his brow, smirking at his self that had avoided the wars that he had chosen to fight upon earth.

“Yes, an avenger.” He responded, causing his other to languidly scoff. An ‘I am groot’ came from the tree, and it was uncertain in your spoken languages of what he had said, but either way, you were more intrigued by the conversation that was happening between the Loki’s. “And I’ll have you know, that she is infinitely more brave than you, you cower-some fool.”

“Oh, so we’re going there?” You asked, causing the pair to snap out of their mutual rivalry, and stare haphazardly at you. “No, don’t mind me, feel free to continue.”

“We’re not going to be unable to unbind your until we reach earth.” Gamora cut in, speaking to the Loki that you knew to be the original.

“That’s fine.” He nodded humbly, before casting his attention back at his alternate reflection. “And this woman, is not only an avenger. She was there for your brother when you were not.”

“Aw.” The other Loki smirked, almost cruelly. “So she’s your beloved?” He remarked rudely, and it seemed to break something within Loki, him wishing not to listen to the other version of himself. He decided he did not like him, and understand how you must have felt upon your initial meeting.

“Yes.” You went to speak, but instead, Loki stood before you, powerlessly pulling your face to his own, and colliding his lips upon yours. On impulse, you ravenously replied with much affection, clasping his jaw and allowing him entrance into your mouth. It earned a disgusted groan out of the Loki that had caused all this hassle.

“I hate to interrupt...” Rocket returned, after putting his gun down and having gone to the front of the ship with Quill, so that he could contact Stark. “But these may get those off.” He held a pair of golden pliers, that were far larger than his body. At the sight , you pulled away from Loki’s face for a moment, raising a brow.

“It’s fine, I think I want to keep them on.” You smirked, earning another sound of disapproval from Loki’s identical rival, pulling him back to your face. Wildly, he hummed into the cavern of your mouth, as the pair of you stumbled around on the spaceship.

“Bedrooms are down the hall to the right.” Nebula informed you, her voice monotone, and in turn, you dragged the god towards said direction, finally releasing all the tension that had been pent up through the years.

Tags

@nickkie1129

[discrunkled-twog]

📖 for your oldest oc. Thanks!

📖 What inspired you to make that character? Songs, other characters, vibes?

Oldest OC, huh...

Oldest from the ones I take seriously would be Oliver.

So actually, me and my family were in the living room, watching something of Marvel, though I don't remember what it was, exactly... This was about 2-3 months ago, and I was half watching it, and I thought, "Huh. Those superhero costumes look super annoying. Annoying to design, to wear, to come up with, and probably expensive, too."

I started thinking, like, what if there was a superhero, and he was literally... just some guy...?

But not comedically average or anything, really. He's a guy, he has superpowers, and he sees it as that and only that.

My original idea was that he'd wear basic workout clothes instead of a costume, and that he'd be mistaken for a civilian until he literally starts flying or something.

Also, he doesn't feel the need to hide his identity, since he purposefully moved several hours away from his family, and also has no actual superhero name.

Just, this guy, about to fight some sort of mutant supervillian, like:

"Aha! So you're the one I have to fight, is it? Tell me, puny creature, what is your name?"

*in between cliche evil laughs*

"Oliver."

...

"Okay... But your superhero name...?"

"Don't have one."

And now evil supervillian guy is confused.

"Okay, then... Oliver!" he calls out. "I have come to rain death and destruction upon you and your people! The Oliver that the people know will be- You really don't have some sort of name? Because this isn't striking fear into the hearts of citizens if your name is just 'Oliver.'"

And he shakes his head.

I imagined this argument, and several other similar encounters. Albeit, this was a few months ago, and this has been a bit more developed since then. Instead of just a few comedic scenes living in my head, I came up with a sort of premise.

There's a superhero formula-- Dark Backstory, Costume, Hardship, and if they start young (which Oliver did), then there's a sort of apprenticeship. But Oliver has no tragic backstory, and the usual cartoon logic of the fantasy sci-fi universes doesn't apply to him. This shows more when it comes to his powers and schedule, but basically, while other superheroes are more... omnipotent? I suppose? He has more realistic limitations.

The more I develop this, the more like a cartoon it's seeming, though that was the original goal. Unfortunately, I don't know how to animate and suck at drawing, so I'm just writing it out. At least for now.

The inspiration for this stemmed form Marvel, DC, My Hero Academia, Saiki K, One Punch Man, and things of that sort. Tropes and meta crap galore, because that's what I enjoy.

Thanks for the asks, and sorry for rambling!

[adultswim2021]

Ephemera Week (2002)

Mission Hill (originally aired on WB, 1999-2000)

Mission Hill was a perfectly good animated series from former Simpsons show-runners Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein. It was a sitcom about cool young people in a cool young people city. Andy French is an aspiring cartoonist, intended to be a Matt Groening type who would (over the course of many many seasons) eventually find success and get his own super-successful animated series called THE SIMPSONS: SEASONS 1-8.

The premise of the show was that Andy’s parents retire and sell the childhood home, displacing his nerdy high-school aged younger brother Kevin. Kevin moves in with Andy and learns how to be a cool city style guy, you know, the kind that’s always “walkin here!” and sucking off Bob Balaban in the men’s room and whatnot.

The show is at least better than the bad seasons of the Simpsons, and has a cool alt-comics style that suits the show really well. Not to damn it with faint praise, it’s a good show. There are a handful of GREAT episodes and plenty of strong jokes. There's news of a revival in the works focusing on Gus and Wally, the older gay couple in the show. It's supposed to take place in the same era the show originally aired in, which is just great.

Like Baby Blues and Home Movies before it, I did catch this show randomly on it's network of origin. I saw one or two of the final episodes to air on WB. I liked it! I was glad to see it get revived for a run on Adult Swim. I've wanted more episodes ever since.

I don't think the show is available for streaming anywhere, which is too bad. It came out on DVD with special features. That DVD set was reissued on DVD-R without special features, so... buyer? be wary. There's also a number of music replacements that ruin some of the scenes. At one point I had a bootleg set where somebody took the DVD video and replaced the audio with the as-broadcast version of of the show. Good luck finding it.

Here's an episode guide showing their debuts on Adult Swim. Bold episodes were originally unaired, making their debut on the channel. Also note: episodes had an innocuous title and a spicier in-house title in parentheses. It’s real Police Squad! shit.

12AM Monday Morning:

May 20: Pilot (or The Douchebag Aspect) May 27: Andy Joins the PTA (or Great Sexpectations) June 3: Kevin's Problem (or Porno for Pyro) June 10: Andy vs. The Real World (or The Big-Ass Viacom Lawsuit) June 17: Andy and Kevin Make a Friend (or One Bang for Two Brothers) June 24: Andy Gets a Promotion (or How to Get Head in Business Without Really Trying) July 1: Kevin vs. the SAT (or Nocturnal Admissions) July 8: Unemployment Part 1 (or Brother's Big Boner) July 15: Unemployment Part 2 (or Theory of the Leisure Ass) July 22: Kevin Finds Love (or Hot for Weirdie) July 29: Stories of Hope and Forgiveness (or Day of the Jackass)

11PM Sunday Night:

August 4: Happy Birthday, Kevin (or Happy Birthday, Douchebag) August 11: Plan 9 from Mission Hill (or I Married a Gay Man from Outer Space)

ALSO NOTE: There are about five episodes that were in early-stages of production and if you poke around you can find scripts for these episodes ( here as of this writing). A full animatic and table read for “Crap Gets In Your Eyes” exists if you search for it. 

MAIL BAG

London Arbuckle ASKS! or, states! sorry I’m writing this lead-in without having read the whole message yet.

Another confusing Baffler Meal thing: the deleted cold open that's on the DVD. It gets called back to in the actual episode ("Between two steamed buns", "Nine dollars!? For what?") and provides crucial context, BUT it also gets contradicted in the actual episode (SG sells out for "one serious speaker" instead of owing a restaurant money). Also I remember all the ads for this episode used a clip from the cold open! It always kinda bothered me that they cut it but boys (matt & dave) will be boys!

I do think the cold open is nice and I always make a point to watch it with the episode. In my mind they are as essential as watching that boring Terry Gilliam short before Meaning of Life. The next step is pointlessly editing them together using Nero. Yeah, that’s the ticket

Here’s ANONYMOUS, baby!

It's summertime and we are talking about Adult Swim and I gotta ask when's the last time you've been to a pool. Have you ever in your adult life enjoyed the benefits of an adult swim. Tell us just how much you like splash around. Yes, that would be quite illuminating I'm sure (rolleyes).

Man, when was the last time I went into a pool? It’s been literally years. I think the last time I swam I did a bad job. I am definitely am getting “bad job” vibes off my hazy memories. Man, my memories used to be precious. Damn!

do you think theyll ever work with george lowe again in any major capacity or do you think he's just bad news.

I was about to say “isn’t he on American Dad” based on him name-checking American Dad as one of his many credits but I just looked it up and he was only in one episode. Damn. Somebody give George work he seems nice.

beakman's world, anyone? The wild and wacky world of Paul Zaloom? Hmm? Anyone?

lol you wish...

Baby Blues really was my everything back in the early 2000s, it may not have head the punk rock cred you clearly seem to crave it was a soothing balm for myself as a new father in a scary world (9/11 and all that, terrible stuff).

you raise a good point, that you’re a huge dork “with child” and I’m cool and laughed at 9/11 because it was funny to me, actually

Just read your Baby Blues "take down" and I gotta say: In the immortal words of Mike Francesca, "You're a fool. ho-kay? A total fool."

Uh huh. Yeah okay. Mike Francesca hordes pot bellied pigs in his apartment and lives in filth. He stinks, and so do youd

Baby Blue is like every animation nerd's wet dream. What if they made the rugrats with only the parents part. And here it is. Be careful what you wish for, chunky.

Yeah and it’s too bad because judging from the previous mail bags my audience is primarily made up of BABIES.

[waystobuild-blog]

Top 7 CN Shows That Would Work Better in Live Action than PPG

So I think everybody’s talked about why CW Powerpuff Girls doesn’t work, whether or not it’s a real thing or not? Who even knows. But while thinking about how this:

is kinda awful for Powerpuff Girls, I got thinking what shows that this style of a reboot would work for. In which it’s live action, the character is depressed and has sort of resentment towards their childhood now and that sort of thing. 

So what are the top 7 shows that I think this

Number 7:

Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends

At Number 7 we have Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends. Seems fitting that we’d start the list with another one of Craig McCracken’s biggest hits. Why do I think the premise of “Oh, life sucks now and I kinda wasted my childhood” would work for Foster’s? For the plain and simple fact that for a few episodes of the show, there was a focus on Mac growing up and whether or not he should leave his friends at Foster’s behind him. You could play a lot with that concept combined with the live action reboot thing. Maybe an older version of the character is dealing with whether or not to let go of both Bloo and the past and move on with his life. Frankie being a young adult during the time of the original show could also be a pretty instrumental character since it was a matter of living there, caring for the friends, having that job and balancing this life with the life that she had outside of the house.

Not quite a coming of age story but a sort of “Hey, my life has gone nowhere and where could I go with this now? Do I keep the friends I loved and cherished as a child or move onto other things? Is there a way to do both?”

Only thing I wouldn’t want though is CGI monstrosity friends. Those would be kinda the worst…

Number 6: 

Okay, let’s actually talk about a real superhero show this time around. Or would this count as a superhero show? Well, they certainly do a lot of cool time travelling so I’m gonna say it’s a superhero show. Of course, I mean Time Squad.

Now if you haven’t guessed, I don’t have the most experience with this show but I know enough to think that this is something that could actually work well. I mean, Otto was a kid who was basically running around all over history protecting the balance of time with a stuck up robot and a dude who is a little too into all of this. Imagine if he just sorta did this for all of his childhood and realizing as a young adult that “Crap, I didn’t really have a childhood.” With the dynamic of the squad, the potential to expand the greater organization as a whole and just all the time travel shenanigans that could happen, I don’t see a reason not to do it.

Plus, CW already has Legends of Tomorrow and that’s awesome so even less likely to screw it up if they’ve already got a model to do it off of right?

Number 5: 

The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack

Yo ho ho, it is a sailor’s life for me. And in this sailor’s life we’re coming in with Number 5: The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack. Now this is a bit of an odd choice, right? But hear me out.

Flapjack as a child kinda had only Bubbie and K’nuckles as guides for his life. While they mostly spent their lives at Stormalong Harbor, they also constantly spent their lives looking for Candied Island. What if they never stopped looking and eventually, little kid Flapjack is a grown up now and he’s like “Oh wow. I wanted adventure but I was kinda manipulated to follow this creepy old man’s dreams of candy.” I think going heavy and hard on this sort of found family between them would be kinda fun. How K’nuckles wasn’t the best role model and how they’ve still only got each other in this world, that sort of thing.

Plus, a live action Stormalong would be sooooooo cool.

Number 4:

Ben 10

As the old saying goes, it started when an alien device did what it did, stuck itself upon his wrist with secrets that it hid, now he’s got superpowers he’s no ordinary kid, it’s Ben 10.

And unfortunately in CW’s Ben 10, he’s not a kid who just wants to have fun. Nah, he’s got a lot of emotional stuff to deal with and all of that depressing stuff. Isn’t it great? Now I do think that this could work especially if you work it in where maybe Ben enlisted into the plumbers after his summer vacation and it just kinda escalated from there to the point where here he is now.

Say what you will, but at least with Ben 10, we’ve seen it hit a more grounded and emotional place with Ben 10 Alien Force and Ultimate Alien so I don’t believe that this would be too far of a stretch with how that show worked and a lot of people happened to really like those iterations of the show.

Granted, I actually do want a CW styled Ben 10, but less edgy Arrow style and more along the lines of The Flash, but I’d still take this too.

And now before we get into the top 3, let’s get into a few honorable mentions.

First up, we’ve got Steven Universe. Now honestly, this could work really well, the only issue with that is that we’ve kinda already seen this story told and that was with Steven Universe Future. Good stuff and a lot of potential, but we’ve seen it and I don’t think we need to see it again with a live action coat of paint.

Next up there’s Codename Kids Next Door. Honestly, I think the only real spinoff we need for Kids Next Door is Galactic. That’s it. Anything else is unnecessary. Still, with this sort of concept an older KND who has been decommissioned and feels like there’s something missing in their lives that they just don’t understand would be really cool. Although maybe that would work as like a movie or special or somethin’ I don’t know.

And finally for the last of the honorable mentions we’ve got Teen Titans. While I am trying to keep this list to CN Originals, I couldn’t help but bring this one up. How Long is Forever is one of my all-time favorite episodes of the 2003 series so I think seeing a series taking place in that timeline or something similar would be a lot of fun maybe for like a miniseries or something. And honestly, anything’s better than Titans.

With those three out of the way, back to the list.

Number 3: 

The Life and Times of Juniper Lee

In a world full of monsters and demons, June is the only one who sees them. This is the Life and Times of Juniper Lee and it makes number three on my list.

Now, like Time Squad, I didn’t watch much of this show. But what I do know about this show is that June is cool and she’s got this whole legacy and destiny by being the newest Te Xaun Ze, which are basically the magical protectors of her town. Only problem, and why I think that this direction for this show would actually be kinda cool, is the whole thing that the Te Xaun Ze is never allowed to leave the town at any point in their lives and oh boy, you could actually go really hard on that with this format since it’s literally built into the show.

Juniper Lee all grown up and just straight up depressed because she’s got the cool powers and grabs all the monsters but everyone around her has moved on in their lives. Friends have gone off to college and started all their lives and she’s got nothing but her family in Orchid Bay. You’d have a story of someone who once was big on their destiny who has accepted it but wishes that it wasn’t theirs anymore. I do know the show dealt with this a bit but with a new continuity and an older version of the character you really could just go in and deep on this.

I stand by that this would actually be pretty cool and kinda want it. Honestly, I like this idea so much that I wasn’t sure whether to put this in the number three or the number two spot, but y’know what? The next show told me a little secret that gave it the edge.

Number 2: 

The Secret Saturdays

That’s right, it’s the Secret Saturdays. 

Zak Saturday went all around the world with his parents discovering ancient cryptids, protecting the world and everything. He got some cool siblings in Fiskerton, Komodo and Zon. And then to add on top of that that he’s also the reincarnation of an ancient cryptid set to rule and control all the cryptids in the world? Yeah, that’ll do it. Definitely not the type of life he asked for and kid went through a lot because of it especially after losing those powers and apparently getting them back if we’re to count the Omniverse crossover TGIS to be canon.

But having parents like Zak’s, everything with the community of Secret Scientists and not really having many friends his own age or well, his own species will do that.

Exploring Zak and maybe Argost coming back for powers he might not want anymore and learning to embrace his destiny while also trying to patch up the Saturday family would be awesome.

Number 1:

Dexter’s Laboratory

Now while I know we already have a live action Dexter and it was an incredible hit, I- Wait, not the same show.

Ahem, Dexter’s Laboratory makes the top of this list. Partially because of it being PPG’s sister series but also partially because of the whole thing of there’s a lot you could do with Dexter’s character in terms of depression. If someone with such a high intellect were to somehow lose it all or just in some way, never really got forward in life, that would do it. Dexter could be a type of character that’s too stuck inside his own head in order to move forward. Alternatively, maybe Dexter is highly successful but has found there’s something missing in life or something. I dunno.

But whichever way you decide to go with Dexter’s character, you could have Dee Dee be pretty much the opposite of that. Maybe she’s found herself a place in life that she’s content with and Dex doesn’t understand why but wants it. I think going deep on this sort of emotional aspect of his life while also having all sorts of fun crazy science stuff would be a good watch.

All in all, gimme a Dexter’s lab show but we gotta make sure he keeps some form of an accent. No accent is a dealbreaker.

Although, I think that at the end of the day, animation should really just stay animated and that we don’t need to go live action for anything. All of these ideas I’ve presented, I’d of course rather prefer as cartoons with a more balanced tone more than anything but I figured with the announcement of a PPG show, this would be a silly but fun idea to talk about rather than ranting about it like most have. Granted, I’ve got some rants of my own since I still think it’s a bad idea. Haha. But you know how it goes.

At any rate those are all the shows I think would make better CW PPG style reboots than CW PPG. When it comes to the edginess and potential for drama, I feel these shows fit the bill better than the innocent, buttkicking action that was the Powerpuff Girls.

But what do you all think? Do you have any shows in mind that I haven’t mentioned? Do you think I’ve opened Pandora’s Box and given The CW more awful ideas? 

Now, this was originally a YouTube video so you can probably see that in the way that this post, especially the ending was written, but I just still don’t really have the energy to edit stuff so have this post instead. It’s something I really wanted to discuss and just decided, hey, why not make it a Tumblr post?

[hunnyuwu]

Muse || NCT Johnny

“Beauty does not fit one mold.”

Premise: Bruttish, non-ladylike, manly were only a few ways that your best friend Jaehyun described you. While you wanted to disagree, he definitely did have a point at times. You sat with your legs open, stretched like a feral cat, and yawned like a caveman while dumbly scratching your back. Should you you cave in to the societal standards of being ladylike?

Pairing: fem! reader x Johnny

Genre: fluff, romance, a little angst, self-love

Word count: 3.5k

~~~

(๑╹ω╹๑ )

Sleepy.

You were so drowsy to the point that you so elegantly slammed your poor forehead on your desk after dozing off to the gentle, monotonous voice of your economics professor. As you shot up upon impact, you didn’t miss the snickers and whispers surrounding your little mishap. You were embarrassed, and it clearly showed on your cheeks.

You shot a look at your professor, hoping to the heavens that his hearing has disintegrated as much as his eyesight. And to your luck, your professor just continued on with his lecture without skipping a beat.

You sighed with relief, picking up your pen so that you could actually resume your note taking, though you couldn’t give two damns about economics. You felt a little nudge at your shoulder, causing you to tilt your chin to the side, watching as your best friend gave you a little smirk. The damn smile on his lips lit a fire within your soul, causing you to, as any mature adult should, childishly stick your tongue out at him.

Yeah, it was childish, but so was he, therefore you couldn’t give two craps.

“Piss off, Jaehyun.” You hissed as he mimicked the exact moments where your head made impact with the table in front of the two of you.

“You have a nice little mark on your forehead, too. It suits the redness of your cheeks right now.”

“I can give you a matching mark if you think it looks so nice.”

You two bickered for awhile longer until you noticed that everyone started to get up and leave the large lecture hall. The two of you mutually agreed to continue the bickering for later as the both of you had a nice little date with the university cafeteria now.

The two of you sat down at an open table in the corner, setting your lunches in front of you. You yawned widely, stretching out your limbs like you were trying to dislocate your tendons and ligaments. Jaehyun eyed you up and down before the corner of his lips curled up.

“How lady like.”

“Ugh, don’t feed to the toxic masculinity agenda today, Sir.” You rolled your eyes, finally satisfied with the stretching routine that you just performed. You settle down and started chowing down on your lunch. You and Jaehyun joked around, shoving at one another while cackling like a pair of witches. Your table neighbors were even tempted to go find another table as you two were just being so loud.

At least you weren’t in the library.

“Hey, Jaehyun.”

You and Jaehyun snapped your heads at the new voice that entered your conversation. You saw a familiar face, though not too familiar.

“Ah, hey Johnny. How are you man?” Jaehyun got up, doing that ‘slap up’ that boys loved doing when they greeted one another. You didn’t understand it, but guys don’t understand girls, so you just shrugged it off with a little bit of an awkward smile. You nodded your head when Johnny directed his attention your way.

You unconsciously looked him up and down, surveying his figure. You had only seen the tall male a couple times when you saw Jaehyun and him walking together at different locations on campus, but this was your first time seeing him up so close. You had to admit, the man was certainly candy for the eyes.

Your eyes latched on his sharp jaw, wishing more than anything for it to cut-

“Y/N?”

You shook your head, seeing that Jaehyun and Johnny had now taken a seat at your table. You blushed furiously as you were now the only one who was standing. You lightly coughed into your fist as you quickly plopped back down into your spot, avoiding Jaehyun devilish gaze. He knew what happened and you knew he was going to tease the hell out of you later. You would have chewed your friend out by now, but his extremely handsome friend was sitting right next to him, so that was obviously out of the question for the time being.

“So, what’s your major, Y/N?” Johnny questioned lightly, trying to ease the tense atmosphere that quickly settled over the three of you.

“A-Ah, I’m actually undecided right now.” You choked, embarrassed by the fact that you were in your sophomore year and still hadn’t decided your fate yet. It wasn’t your fault though, you were a dreamer. You dreams and aspirations were usually up in the clouds and whimsical, but you knew you had to decide on it sometime soon. Your counselor had been lighting a flame under your bum to hurry your decision up.

Johnny gave you a sympathetic look, nodding along, “That’s cool! Tons of people are undecided. I bet you will find your passion sometime soon, Y/N.” He said sweetly, causing your heart to thrum against your ribcage harshly. You couldn’t help but feel like the male had that classic anime filter where the rose petals floated across love interest’s face.

“Hah! Doubtful, all she does is surf the internet all night long and eat like the world is ending tomorrow.” Jaehyun snorted. You couldn’t help but slap the boy’s shoulder with fire in your eyes. You realized what you did when you heard Johnny’s beautiful laugh erupt by the two of you. You hadn’t meant to show your brutishness in front of him, hoping that you could leave a good impression on him, but that was apparently out of the window now.

“You’re harsh with her, Jaehyun. I’ve never seen you talk like that before.” Johnny said, hinting at something that you didn't quite catch on to. You lightly rolled your eyes, commenting in your mind that Jaehyun was not harsh with you, he was ruthless.

“Nevermind you, Jaehyun. What’s your major, Johnny?” You said sweetly, unconsciously leaning a little towards Johnny. You couldn’t help yourself, the heart wants what it wants.

“I’m in photography! I’m not quite sure how I’m actually going to make a living, but I’ll figure something out.” Johnny smiled brightly, albeit wary. He rubbed the back of his neck... you didn’t miss the way his bicep and shoulder flexed nicely underneath his long-sleeved shirt. You couldn’t help but whisper a little ‘damn’ to yourself as you just completely ate up his appearance, though that wasn’t everything to you in a man. You just appreciated a nice appearance when you saw one.

“Shouldn’t you be in front of the camera, instead of like... behind it?” You muttered dumbly, Jaehyun hollering immediately. Johnny blushed at your indirect compliment, slightly biting down on his bottom lip like a blushing high school girl.

“I’m proud of you, Y/N. You have never so blatantly flirted with someone, ever.” Jaehyun stifled out, wiping a finger over his nonexistent tears. You gave him a sour look, not appreciating that he was doing this IN FRONT OF JOHNNY. You definitely had no chance with the beautiful man now.

“Haha, thank you, Y/N! I’ve never heard that before, so that was a first.”

You felt a little bold now, so you threw him a little wink, immediately regretting it afterwards, “I speak the truth and only the truth.”

You stuck with the confident look, even though you literally wanted to go hide yourself in a ditch more than anything.

“That’s it, she’s another human right now.” Jaehyun grimaced, hiding his face behind his hands. You wished your could physically cringe alongside Jaehyun at this moment.

Is now the right time to say that you never had romantic experience?

~~~

( ´ ▽ ` )

“Hey, Loser.”

You looked up from your thick textbook, seeing your bestie once again.

“Sup, Ugly.”

Jaehyun threw his bag down onto the library floor, earning himself some glares from other students. He obviously didn’t care any less though.

You drew your nose back into your book, resuming the awful reading about god know’s what. You continued for a little over a minute before you had a bubbling feeling that someone was looking at you, intensely.

You slowly looked up from your page, met with Jaehyun’s burning gaze. You swallowed thickly, an unusual feeling bubbling up within you. You observed him a little longer, waiting for him to say something, but he just continued staring at you without a word.

“What do you want?” You hissed, getting slightly annoyed with his odd antics.

Just when you thought he would never answer, a small smirk finally blossomed on his lips, leaving you absolutely speechless.

“Maybe he’s right, you look alright when you’re not doing anything.”

You scoffed, some hushes making you duck your head. You scrunched up your features, wondering what the hell he was even talking about.

“Anyways, Johnny-”

“Johnny?” You blurted, ducking your head once again as other students were ready to decapitate you at this rate.

“Yes, Johnny. He was telling me about his upcoming project for his class. He needs a ‘muse.’” 

“A muse?”

“Someone that is the source of inspiration for an artist. Basically, the artist’s work is heavily influenced by a thing or an individual.”

“Hmm, and why are you telling me about this?”

“Well, he needs to find his muse.” Jaehyun was about to continue, but you knew where this was going.

“Jaehyun, you know I have no other friends that you.”

“What?”

“What do you mean, ‘what?’ I don’t know why you’re asking me to find a muse for Johnny, when I know literally no one.”

Jaehyun gave you an exasperated eye roll, leaning a little closer to you.

“I know you’re a loner already, Y/N. Will you let me continue, though? Or will you interrupt me again?” You huffed while puffing your cheeks out.

“Fine, what is it?”

“Johnny asked me if you could be his muse.”

“WHAT?!” You screamed, everyone around you jolting up in their seats. You panicked as you realized that you messed up big time. You looked over towards the librarian’s desk, already seeing her stomp in your direction.

“Alrighty, time to go, Jae!” You sing-songed, throwing your textbook into your backpack at a sonic speed.

“Right on your tail!”

You two giggled as you ran a little faster than the librarian out of the library, saving your asses from getting chewed out.

You two were out of breath by the time that you created enough distance from the place that you two absolutely hated, as you two were literally the loudest when you were with one another.

“Anyways,” Jaehyun breathed out some air, regaining some of the seriousness in his face, “I’m not joking, even though this would have been a hell of a prank. You as a model, even more a muse? You’re basically a dude like me” He said light-heartedly, but it strikes your chest like a lightning bolt.

You sighed, biting the inside of your cheek as you side-eyed him.

“Okay, I may be guy-ish, but I’m still a girl, Jaehyun.” You crossed your arms over your chest, trying to compress the ache swelling in your chest. Yeah, you didn’t wear skirts everyday, you didn’t flaunt your curves, you didn't style your hair or apply makeup often, heck you didn’t even look like a girl at times. Though you would think that you didn’t mind being guy-ish, it hurt that you weren’t seen as a girl at times, because you loved being one despite not being stereotypically girly. Why did you have to be like other girls to be considered one? 

Not to mention that your own friend poked at that insecurity with a stick like a child. Jaehyun’s playful gripes really didn’t help your confidence issues, even if the intention was pure. You never made it publicly known to him that you felt this way, so you didn’t place any blame on him, though.

But sometimes, you just wished that you did conform to the typical feminine standards. Maybe you would find a boyfriend that way too.

Jaehyun’s face contorted, stopping in his tracks abruptly leaving you slightly confused when you finally noticed that no one was beside you anymore. You peered over your shoulder to see Jaehyun looking down in thought. You backtracked a little, confused as to why he stopped.

“I’m sorry.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry. I really don’t believe those things I said. You’re-”

You wanted to look into his eyes, you really did, but you knew damn well that you were going to shed at least one tear. You cursed yourself for being so dramatic over nothing.

“It’s fine, Jaehyun. Just give me Johnny’s number so I can refuse his offer.”

~~~

(´；Д ；`)

“I don’t know...”

“Y/N, look at me.”

You paused, creeping your eyes to the side to see Johnny staring at you intently. You really, really did not want to look at him in this given moment.

At this very moment, you were sat with Johnny at your campus cafe where he was desperately trying to persuade you to be his so-called ‘muse.’ And if you were going to be honest, the cards were not in his favor.

“I’ll repay you, anything.”

You scoffed a little to yourself, finally plucking up your dignity by training your face his way. You felt a little wary as you felt yourself melt a little at the soft smile he was sending your way.

“I don’t want to be repaid. I’m just doing this for your sake. You really don’t want me as your muse, Johnny. I don’t even look like a girl...”

You felt large, slightly calloused hands gently slide over your folded hands. You gulped at the dome he created with ease, his warmth spreading from his hands to your heart.

“Don’t ever say that again, Y/N. Actually, can I show you something?”

You nodded, allowing him to retract to reach for something in his beat-up backpack, eventually pulling out a blue folder. He opened it, pulling out two sheets of what seemed to be laminated paper. He placed them down carefully in front of you, allowing you to absorb what he was showing you. On the sheet to your left displayed a photo of red roses and the photo to your right showed a flower that you didn’t recognize, it was beautiful nonetheless.

“Why am I showing you these?”

You bit down your bottom lip in thought, trying to ingest every single inch of the photos. You gave up with a pucker of your lips. Johnny giggled at your cute gesture before looking down at the two photos himself.

“Well, I’m not here to quiz you after all. So, just tell me about this photo. What does it mean?” Johnny gestured to the picture of the red roses.

You nodded, knowing about the red roses, “Well, it’s a photo of red roses. Red roses mean passion, true love, romance, love, the likes.”

The male in front of you gave a satisfied nod, “Then what about this photo?”

You nodded more warily this time, not even knowing what this flower was called, “Um, they’re very pretty?”

You looked up at Johnny, a vague smile on his lips, as if he was reminiscing over something.

“Which one do you like better?”

You hummed, not really sure how to answer. While you loved roses and all, they were so boring to you. The composition and color of the unknown flowers drew you in a little more in the end.

“I like this one.”

“I thought as much.”

You shot him a suspicious look as he settled a little further into his seat.

“Y/N, our society’s standards of beauty are comparable to red roses. We love red roses, we all know and love what they look like, we love what they mean, and they are literally everywhere. A most importantly, red roses are consistent, always carrying the same, beautiful shape that everyone recognizes.”

You nodded, sort of catching his drift.

“Red roses are gorgeous, and I couldn’t say that they aren’t. But if I’m going to be honest, these flowers over here are so much more beautiful to me. These over here are called gladiolus, also referred to as the sword lily. While red roses represent passion and romance, the gladiolus represents strength of character. Isn’t that so much more meaningful?”

You couldn’t even function for a second, unknown emotions overwhelming your system. You couldn’t understand if it was you, him, or the meaning that made you feel this way, but all you knew was that your throat constricted with what you identified as melancholy, at least you thought. You blinked down at the gladiolus, feeling connected to it hardy beauty. An underrated flower with beautiful meaning.

“So, what I’m trying to tell you, Y/N, is that for my muse, I’m not looking for our society’s conventional beauty because what does that even say? Beauty, at least in my opinion, is more beautiful when it breaks the conventional mold, speaking louder that what we systemically define as beautiful. I’m going to be bold here and admit that I find you absolutely stunning, not only visually, but more importantly, internally. You are the perfect muse for me and I don’t really plan on giving up on you.”

You blushed, feeling like you were slapped in the face, but in a good way... A very, very good way.

Your mouth opened and closed, looking like the fish you watched at your dentist’s office before you were called in. You have literally never felt more flattered in your entire life combined.

Johnny laughed at your dumb stupor, knowing what your answer was going to be. That sweet smile that you were growing to love more minute by minute blossomed over his sweet-talking lips.

“So, what do you say, Y/N?”

~~~

(* ´ω｀*)

“Are you comfortable in that?”

You looked down to the outfit you wore, while it was definitely outside what you would normally wear, you actually loved every aspect of it.

A giddy smile rose to your face, almost to the point that your cheeks hurt. Your hands unconsciously balled into fists due to the pure delight of how you felt in your outfit.

“Yeah, I love this so much!” You squealed, looking over your appearance once more in the full-length mirror. Johnny had taken you shopping to choose a few outfits for the photoshoot that he scheduled.

Moreover, you felt so safe and secure with the fact that Johnny let you choose, with some of his guidance of course, whatever you wanted to wear and he would adjust to the mood of your appearance.

“I’m glad, I’ll go pay for everything now, okay?” He said, causing a frown to paint your minimally touched up face.

“You’re only paying if you plan on owning these clothes, Johnny. And you have a great body and all, but I’m not sure if you could fit in these.”

He gasped, placing a hand over his heart dramatically, “My word, Y/N! I never thought you would shame my body like that!”

You rolled your eyes with a stupid smile threatening your exasperation.

“I’m paying for them, and that’s final, Princess.” You winked, heading back towards the dressing room to change into your original clothes.

“Not if I get to the register first!”

“You wouldn’t dare, Johnny Suh!”

~~~

╰(*´ ︶ `*)╯♡

“Well, I guess that’s it.” You said, scrolling through the hundreds of photos of you. A sight you never thought you would see. And even more dumbfounding is the fact that the photos made you look stunning. Though you most definitely did not look like the popular pretty girls at school or on social media, you finally saw something there that you had never seen before, you had to thank it all to Johnny for starting this journey of self love and appreciation.

Yeah, you had to be the one to accept yourself in the end, but Johnny enabled the movement and life-long process of seeing beauty as a means of subjectivity and as something that may not be so external.

“What do you mean, ‘that’s it?’”

You nudged him playfully hearing his high-pitched mock of your very words. You two peered over into one another’s eyes, you heart suddenly stammering harshly within the constraints of your body, as it always did when you were around Johnny.

Not only did you learn to love yourself the way you are, but you somewhere along the way fell in love with the man himself, a love way past initial infatuation. Yeah, he was hot, but his heart and mind were even more attractive. You didn’t go a day without remembering the fact that you two will eventually separate ways once his semester long project was over.

You sighed, that thought now stuck in your head.

“What’s wrong, Y/N?” Johnny cooed, tucking a stray piece of your hair behind the shell of you ear.

“I... I’ll miss this.” You said boldly, something you aren’t very often.

“Being with me?”

“No, getting photos taken of me.” You rolled your eyes, training your vision back to his laptop screen.

“Of course being with you, you loser.”

“This doesn’t have to stop, you know.”

You neck snapped immediately, directing your widened eyes to his adorable hooded gaze. His face was so close to yours, and you only realized it now.

“I don’t know why I’ve waited this long, but,”

Johnny moved away from you. You instantly missed the close proximity of his face to yours, but your curiosity got the better of you as he rustled something that wasn’t in your vision.

Not but a second later did he pull out a large bouquet of gorgeous purple and reddish flowers, lilac and chrysanthemums being the two you recognized. He handed them to you, the warmest, softest gaze you had ever seen peering down into yours like it was the last thing he would ever do.

“And what do these mean, Johnny?” You whispered, knowing more than anyone that these flowers you held conveyed a message.

“Well, the stock flowers mean that ‘you will always be beautiful to me.’” Your cheeks flamed, a recurring theme every time you were in this man’s presence.

“What do the lilacs mean?”

“A pure love.”

“And the red chrysanthemums?”

“I love you.”

~~~

[colonel-kira-nerys]

More Thoughts on “A Matter of Perspective”

Content Warning: Discussion of Attempted Rape and Domestic Violence

Since my list of episodes with themes of sexual assault and other upsetting content has been making the rounds again, “A Matter of Perspective” has been weighing on my mind. 

Even all these years after watching this episode for the first time, it still upsets me more than almost any other episode in the Star Trek canon, so I just wanted to expand a little bit more on why it’s so distressing, while there are still people possibly interested in hearing my thoughts.

The following is an in-depth look at “A Matter of Perspective,” which may be upsetting to some people, so I’m putting my analysis beneath the cut. Please let me know what you think, because I still feel the need to scream into the void about this 30 years after it aired.

“A Matter of Perspective” (TNG: Season 3, Episode 14), at first glance, has an incredibly intriguing premise. The opener is Data critiquing Picard’s sub-par painting skills (talk about tone problems... Jesus) and then Riker beams back to the Enterprise after spending the night at an alien space station, where he was supposed to be checking up on the progress of a scientist named Dr. Apgar. 

But upon beaming back, the entire space station explodes. Riker acts surprised and clueless as to how this would’ve happened. Whenever he’s asked about what happened on the station, he gets cagey, even before the trial starts.

It’s clear he’s hiding something, so when an alien Inspector beams aboard asking for Riker’s arrest and extradition, the audience is prepared for it, because we know that something must’ve happened.

Then, when he’s accused of murdering the scientist and blowing up the station, there becomes the issue of who has jurisdiction over the crime. Does the Enterprise have the right to hold the trial on board, or should Riker be released into the custody of the Tenugan Investigator, Crag? 

It’s important to note that I’m not coming at this from a place of hatred, in the sense that I wasn’t looking for something wrong. I thoroughly believed this was about to be a BRILLIANT episode, with lots of moral ambiguity and intrigue.

Boy, was I wrong.

The two sides (Starfleet vs. Tenugan) eventually settle on recreating the events of Riker’s time on the station via the Holodeck. THIS WAS SO COOL. I wish all crimes were able to be recreated, down to the tiniest detail, through a simulation. I thoroughly looked forward to seeing the detective work being conducted through simulations, but only because I had no idea that Riker was also going to be accused of attempted rape. I went into this completely blind. 

Riker gets the first word in the trial, which I think was a gross miscarriage of justice, because he is the one being accused of the crime--of course he’s going to deny it!!! Why would you let the Defense make their case first...?! 

It prejudices Captain Picard to see Riker’s story first, because he’s already more likely to be believed and protected by his own captain. It also prejudices Deanna Troi--whose presence/function during the trial, by the way, is never explained. As far as I can tell, she’s there to be a lie-detector, which is hilarious in its absurdity, because she can “sense no deception” from either Will or Dr. Apgar’s wife, Manua.

I guarantee you if the attempted rape had been shown first, this episode would’ve had a completely different tone, and that is part of the problem.

Manua, after all, is the one who requires justice, not only for her husband, but also for herself. Although, at this point in the episode, we don’t even know that she’s accusing him of sexual assault, because the Inspector didn’t charge him with that crime from the beginning.

In a way, this was a great tactic to get Riker to hang himself with his own words---with his own testimony---but because every Starfleet officer in the room is already prejudiced, that’s not how the episode plays out. 

In Riker’s version of events, he is cold, robotic, and professional to a fault (as in, he seems completely uninterested in pleasantries, or, you know, doing his job with any sense of diplomacy). He makes it very clear from the beginning that he’s uninterested in Mrs. Apgar’s hospitality and just wants to get to work. 

Note: why would it be important for Riker to assert with his whole heart from the very beginning that he wasn’t interested in Manua, unless he knew that Manua was going to make a claim that in his view ‘wasn’t true’?! He acts SO SURPRISED that Manua would view his advances as attempted rape, and yet, here’s the thing: we know that Riker is a fan of the ladies, so what some might see as  “innocent” sexual banter could’ve been attributed to his personality, if he’d shown us his usual charm in his version of events. We expect this of him--to be a bit cocky and sensual. We might not like it, but we know that he’s a playboy, in the kindest interpretation of the word. So, as you’re watching his version of events, most people would find it strange that he would refuse hospitality from someone, because Riker has always been “up for anything” as they say. 

Instead of admitting that he might have given Manua the wrong impression by flirting with her, he makes himself out to be cold and unfeeling, in order to preserve an image of cool professionalism that we as the audience know isn’t true to his character.

So, any attempts at hospitality on the part of Manua are immediately spurned by Riker, even those that seem to be genuinely a part of social graces that are indigenous to populations everywhere, not just this alien one. “Can I get you a drink?” isn’t meant to be sexual, in most cultures. This is the bare minimum requirement of a hostess, to ask if anyone needs a refreshment, and yet, Riker makes it clear that this was the start of her sexual overtures... because he needs to cover his tracks. Manua explains later, in her own version of events, that she was worried her husband’s antisocial behavior might negatively impact Riker’s report, and so it was important to make him feel welcome--hence, the drink.

According to Riker, he made hotel arrangements down on the planet for Geordi and himself, but Manua insists that they stay in the guest bedrooms instead. I know Geordi is needed for the science fiction subplot, but why isn’t he in the room to confirm or deny at least this part of Riker’s story? Can’t this specific assertion be easily fact-checked? Even alien hotels presumably have a record of reservations. Like, if Riker was telling the truth, this bit is easily provable, though I would argue that just because he made other arrangements doesn’t mean he didn’t change his mind when he saw the opportunity to have sex. My point is, why is no actual detective work done to confirm the facts of Riker’s story...? 

Anyway, according to Riker, Manua then tries to seduce him once they’re alone in his guest quarters. Mr. Apgar walks in on them in a compromising position, and here’s something I failed to address in my earlier breakdown of the episode: At first, Apgar isn’t angry at Riker; he’s angry at his wife. 

He says: “I knew I’d find you with him. Did you think I didn’t notice how you looked at him? I’m not the fool you take me for.” AND THEN HE BACKHANDS HER, HARD, ACROSS THE FACE.

Her husband attacks her, by Riker’s own admission, and then, only after doing that, does Mr. Apgar try (and fail) to hit Riker, too. But it’s clear his wife was the person he wanted to spend his anger on.

In all versions of this story, Mr. Apgar tries to hit Riker. That’s 100% consistent. But in Riker’s version, Apgar makes a point to “punish” his wife first. Why? This is important, because no matter which of the three versions is true, Manua is either a victim of domestic violence or of sexual assault. 

Now, you can argue that Tayna wouldn’t have included Apgar hitting his wife in her statement, because Mr. Apgar is her boss, and you can also argue that Manua excluded the fact that her husband hit her from her own testimony in order to appear as though their marriage was better than it was, but why on earth would Riker feel the need to add this, if it weren’t true? Why add the assault of a woman by her husband, unless to show that this man was a “bad guy” compared to his much more “honorable” actions...?

Why isn’t this addressed? In all versions of events, Manua is physically assaulted, but only in Riker’s version does her husband slap her hard enough to nearly make her fall. I believe Riker over Tayna (the Assistant) on this specific count, because, frankly, her version is hearsay, told to her by her boss, and it’s very clear that Mr. Apgar was lying to Tayna when he claimed to beat the crap out of Riker. 

So, it’s more than likely that Mr. Apgar did indeed hit his wife, if we look at it from the lens of what it makes sense for Riker to lie about, and what it doesn’t. The “beating” was taken by Manua, and not Riker, in the truest version of this story, which has to be somewhere in the middle of all of the versions, apparently.

Apgar might’ve changed this part of the story when telling it to Tayna to save face with her. Also, I don’t know who, besides her, could possibly believe that Apgar won a fistfight against Riker. 

Regardless, why would he insist his wife and assistant be transported off the space station unless 1) he believed Riker was a sexual predator and/or 2) he wanted no witnesses to what he was about to do next.

[Note: This episode was heavily inspired by Rashomon, a Japanese film which explores the retelling of the same events by multiple characters, in which everyone shows their “ideal self” by lying. In that story, however, the wife is actually raped. Like, there’s no “matter of perspective” claiming she didn’t get raped. The “perspective” change only offers different ways the rape could’ve happened, and how the characters involved all acted after the rape changes from person to person. The murder is treated as the more important issue in that movie, too, because misogyny.]

Why bring up Rashomon? Because the writers should never have changed this part of the story to imply the attempted rape didn’t happen. They shouldn’t have adapted it in such a way that the main goal is to cast doubt on the assault of the woman; they should’ve committed to the assault happening, but three people telling it three different ways, so that at no point is the story trying to tell us that rape is “a matter of perspective,” but rather that the undeniable rape itself was seen by three different people in three different lights.  

I think this episode could’ve been a meaningful exploration of the issue that men often don’t perceive their dogged pursuit of women as predatory, especially when the woman in question eventually “submits.” This could’ve been a story about how Riker didn’t realize he had as much power over Mr. Apgar’s scientific research (and by extension, Manua’s life) as he did. Manua and Apgar were completely dependent on Riker’s glowing report, and it’s made very clear in Manua’s version of events that she felt she couldn’t just excuse herself from the situation entirely, because her husband’s research was at stake.

This episode could’ve shown us how a “good” man, with a somewhat oblivious understanding of his power, could still abuse his power over a woman with regard to her ability to consent... but no. They immediately try to paint Manua as a lying seductress rather than a rape victim.

Here’s the thing: Manua’s version is the only one where her character has a clear motivation to testify against Riker. If this were only about her husband’s death, her testimony would be mostly irrelevant, because she obviously wasn’t there when it happened. And, if she had tried to seduce Riker, she wouldn’t need to “cry rape” to solidify Riker’s motive to kill her husband--he already had motive, which was Apgar’s threat to report his promiscuous conduct to Starfleet. Making a false accusation of rape doesn’t benefit her in any way. Not to mention it clearly traumatized her to recount it. She had to excuse herself by the end of it.

Another reason it doesn’t make sense for Manua to lie about the attempted rape is simply that she didn’t know the true nature of her husband’s research. The show missteps here, too, by making it so clear that she was in the dark about it, because if they hadn’t done that, they could’ve argued that she lied as a red herring to distract the Starfleet officers from discovering that her husband was making a weapon. But no!! Both she and Tayna had no idea that Dr. Apgar was making a weapon, and therefore that had no bearing on the rape accusation. So, the writers make absolutely no effort to explain what possible motivation Manua could’ve had for lying---because there isn’t one!!

Even in the original script, it says that Manua’s version of events characterizes Riker in a much more believable way:

(And it’s important to note that in this take on the story, Riker’s attitude is less aloof and formal. He's relaxed and charming. In fact, in some ways he is more like the Riker we know and love.)

Moreover, Deanna Troi, who canonically is supposed to be able to tell when people are lying, can sense no deception from Manua. Not that you should need an empath in the room to believe a woman when she says that someone tried to rape her. But putting that aside, the fact that there is an empath–who is compromised to begin with because of her relationship with Riker–and she believes Manua’s presentation of the events... that alone is some pretty damning evidence. 

If Manua feels as though Riker tried to harm her–feels it so strongly that Deanna empathically senses that she is telling the truth–it shouldn’t matter what Riker thinks of the accusation. Assuming Riker really does believe his version of events, and Manua believes hers, why are the writers making such an effort to both discredit and support the truth of Manua’s testimony at the same time...?

And, just in case your blood isn’t boiling yet, there’s this: 

Michael Piller recalled that the episode was "probably the hardest story to break. It was a technical nightmare for the director. I was very, very, happy with the script and I thought the show was disappointing. I guess it didn't translate properly. It was very ambitious, but the casting was off. If you had put Lana Turner in the role of the woman in that show, you would have understood it all – but I don't think it played as it was intended. 

Y’all... this FUCKING ASSHOLE claims that the real reason the episode didn’t work was because of the casting of the wife. He believes that people would’ve “understood it all” if Lana Turner, a sex symbol and famous pin-up model, had played the role. 

What he’s saying is: if the wife had been sexier, a walking pin-up, the audience would’ve understood the episode better, but because the actress playing her was... what? too average-looking? too demure? people “didn’t get it?”

This has the terrible implication that he thinks the rape story wasn’t as believable because the actress playing Manua wasn’t hot enough. Think about that for two seconds and tell me you don’t want to shoot this guy in the balls. 

This could’ve been a meaningful exploration of how Riker didn’t realize he took advantage of Manua; in his mind, she was willing, but in hers, she thought she had to have sex with him or else it would negatively effect his report on her husband’s research. It could’ve been a commentary on how a man can abuse his power without meaning to--without even realizing he has it--and that, if the woman then feels violated, it’s still an assault, even if she eventually gave in and appeared to “consent.”

This episode should’ve been about Riker not realizing he’d coerced a woman, and so he truly believes he’s innocent. But no, instead it becomes a situation in which there is no possible way there was a middle ground between the two accounts. Manua’s testimony is so clearly an assault, there could be no way Riker interpreted her begging him to stop as seduction.

In conclusion, this episode goes out of its way to make it seem like rape victims are liars who can’t be trusted. Keeping in mind this was 30 years ago, I just want to end by saying: according to the United States Justice Department, only approximately 2% of all rape complaints are false, while almost three out of every four rapes go unreported. We need to stop perpetuating the lie that women often “cry rape.” Statistically speaking, they don’t. 

If you made it through all of this, I would love to know your thoughts on my analysis, if you have a moment to spare to share them.

[popculturebuffet]

The Critic Valentine’s Day Double Feature (Pilot/Sherman, Woman and Child)

Vivia Jay Sherman! Viva Quebec! Viva Valentine’s Day! And Viva WeirdKev who as happens for a good chunk of my content payed for this wonderful double feature for one of my favorite shows.  The Critic was created by Al Jean and Mike Reis of The Simpsons fame, a comedy team supreme. While I knew the two wrote for the simpsons, more on that iin a minute, I had no idea just how many classics the two churned out: There’s No Disgrace Like Home, Moaning LIsa, The Telltale Head, The Way We Was, Stark Raving Dad (Sadly tainted by it’s guest star being a horirble monster but that’s not their fault), Mr. Lisa Goes to Washington, the treehouse of horror segments The Bart Zone and Clown Without Pity (The second of which may be my favorite treehouse of horror segment), and later coming back to write the story for one of my all time favorites Round Springfield and to outright write the classic “SupercalfragalisticexpalliDOHcious”.  And to his credit Jean would later go on to write some classic post-golden age simpsons episodes during his tenure as producer: Lisa’s Sax, Mom and Pop Art, and Children of a Lesser Clod, which is notable if nothing else for this gag. 

So yeah the guys are legends and were right to start their own show under Simpsons producer James L Brooks over at ABC. The show followed the adventures of film Critic, Jay Sherman, a parody of film critics with high brow tastes, impossibly high standards, and a huge opinon of himself, having won the pultizer at least once.  Despite this he was also constnatly spat and shat on by society, divorced, lonely, depressed and eats like a thousand pigs combined in some horrific science accident. And given the last three parts describe me, as well as my profession of b eing a critic, naturally I love the guy and this show. I’ll get into his cast as we go as the first episode does an excellent job of introducing the entire cast so there’s no sense repeating myself.  But the show’s style I can and will talk about: It’s basically Golden Age, i.e. season’s 1-10, simpsons, but with more pop culture refrences and movie parodies, since the show would often feature multiple on Jay’s show coming Attractions and took place in the celebrity hot spot of new york and was a love letter to the city.. and sometimes a hate letter but only when those digs at the city would be funny, which to be fair depsite never having been to or lived in new york most really are. That’s the series key asset: while a LOT of the jokes haven’t aged well as a lot of the celbreity refrences are dated as are some of the movie parodies, most are hilarious wether you get what their making fun of or not and to me tha’ts a good parody: where knowing what their making fun of HELPS, but you can laugh regardless. The show had the charm and pace of the Simpsons while having it’s own unique style and cast that was just as charming and I love it dearly.  The show sadly only lasted two seasons, with ABC canceling it after one, and Brooks having it moved over to FOX, which was a good idea and lead to what’s probably my faviorite simpsons episode, a Star is Burns. Ironically despite you know, the show being created by two simpsons writers, backed by one of their producers and perfectly in line, creator Matt Groening was against the idea, publicly ranted about it to the press, and generally was an ass about it. Look I love the guy and even Brooks, Jean and Reiss were all nice enough in thier criticsim of the guy, but sitll very much understandably pissed off. .and i’m with them. 

It gave what’s again, my faviorite episode and what is not a “30 minute add” but an episode that easily stands on it’s own and also you know, pokes fun at itself for being a crossover a few times. You don’t need to see the critic to enjoy it, and episodes most iconic gags, Boo-Urns, Man Getting HIt by a Football, Senior Speilbergo, all don’t involve jay. And again the shows were not at all dismilar: While the critic was it’s own thing it still had the simpsons sense of humor and pacing so I saw it more as a petty rant against having a crossover in general more than a legit critcisim. Especially since Groening had no such complaints decades later with the family guy crossover after both shows had all tehir talent surgically removed and had the gall to NOT remove a cheap shot at Bob’s Burgers. And yes i’m still bitter about seeing that in a promo for the special, Bob’s Burgers is fantastic, to the point that now, in a fabulous case of history repeating itself, it’s got it’s OWN show like the critic made by talented former crew members using a similar but sitll throughly unique comedy style , The Great North. My point is that controversy pisses me off, and The Great North is spectacular go watch it while you read this. 

So yeah the Critic is awesome, me and Kev are both fans, and there are plenty of romantic episodes abound as the show digs into Jay’s love life quite a few times and has episodes about his son’s first love, his boss finding a wife towards the end of the series, his parents rekindling their spark and in what’s easily my faviorite episode, his sister dating a grunge rocker. So there was no shortage of choices but the choice made was brilliant.. and i’m not saying that because i’m being paid to, as my review of splatter phoenix’s first episode in darkwing duck and woops should show, paying me does not guarantee that I have to LIKE what your paying me to review. But here I did and he pointed out the first episode of each season, with season two being a soft reboot that while keeping the premise and supporting cast changed a few things around and added two new main characters, and both involve jay finding a new love intrest and intorduce a lot of the cast. I found him to be right, so where we are and after the cut i’ll dive into the good and bad of both episodes and see what changed inbetween seasons. 

That gag will make sense.. later. Right now it’s time for our very first episode, the show’s very first episode as you could probably tell by the title. 

Pilot:  The pilot starts with Jay getting touched up by his Makeup Person Doris. Jay is played by legendary comedian John Lovitz, who this show gave me a deep and lasting appreciation for. Lovitz was at the time best known for his 5 year long stint on SNL, and film wise is best known for Three Amigos, the Brave Little Toaster, The Wedding Singer and Rat Race. Sadly while I do geninely love the guy.. he has been in enough crap to destroy the New York Sewer system, as everyone needs money and sadly not everyone appricates the talents of John Lovitz like I do. 

So naturally he’s also been in The Stepford Wives remake, Grown Ups 2, The Ridiculous 6, Eight Crazy Nights, North, Benchwarmers and Benchwarmers 2: Breaking Balls. Yes that’s an actual movie, though it’s already better than the first one for virtue of not having Rob Schnider and David Spade starring in it despite.. that title. The irony is not lost on me that Lovitz has essentially made his money starring in the kinds of films Jay was forced to see for his job.  Still a VERY talented, very lovely man.

Before we get to our next voice actor up, no profile of Jon would be complete without mentioning that time he slammed Andy Dick’s face into a bar. To make a very long story short, Lovitz was friends with the late great Phil Hartman, who even did some voice work for this very show, whose wife who had severe drug and mental ilness killed them both. Phil had told Lovitz he saw Dick give his wife cocaine, so after Phil’s tragic murder when Lovitz and Dick ended up on the same show, Lovitz ended up exploding at the guy out of grief and blamed him for her death, but later apologized like a gentleman.  Living up to his name though Dick later went up to Lovitz at a restraunt Lovitz owned and said “I’m giving you the Phil Hartman curse, you die next”. Granted he was drunk but still...

Naturally Lovitz banned the guy and Lovitz later demanded an apology when the two ran into each other when they ran into each other at Lovitz regular gig at the comed store. Dick not only refused to apologize even when Lovitz put him against a wall, but said it was because “you blamed me for her death”... which was a decade ago with change by this point, the actions of a man GREIVING for his best friend whose wife’s relapse you caused which inadveradntly lead to her and her husband’s death, and something HE APOLOGIZED FOR. Naturally Lovitz took this how you would and did what we’d all like to do in general and broke the shit out of his face and only didn’t do more because they were seperated. IN short this man is a hero and I wil lbring up this story at every opportunity.  Doris was played by the late voice actress Doris Grau, a script supervisor who worked on a LOT of films as one , the most notable I could find on wikipedia being Clue. This is a fact I just learned today but boy if it isn’t neat. Grau mostly did aditional voices for shows, most notably Ducktales and the Simpsons, where she played Lunchlady Doris, and of course this show. Still she seemed like a very funny and talented woman and it’s sad she’s gone.  The two start the series mostly sniping at each other and while that never ENTIRELY goes away, Doris gets more supportive after a spotlight episode where she and Jay bond and Jay thinks she might be his mom. And while she’s not this surprisingly sticks and for the rest of the series while still not above making potshots at him on occasion, she’s far more supportive. She also informs him she’s out of spray on hair “I’m bald and ugly, get more!”. This show is naturally comedy gold and a lot of it relies on Lovitz sense of timing, though the rest of the cast aren’t slouches but we’ll get to them as we go.  She ends up putting a hat over him and we get our first film parody, Rabbi PI starring Anuld, which is alright. Not one of the series best but passable and gets the gimmick of having film parodies on jay’s show across, which was a nice way to set it apart from the Simpsons. Jay reviews it on the Shermometor, a gimmick jay hates and that disappeared by season 2, giving it a bellow zero to the ire of his boss Duke Phillips.  Duke is one of the best parts of the show, an unhinged southren billlonare who was a modeled after Ted Turner, down to the mustache, who built up his fried chicken franchise into a multimedia congrlomorate and is also mildly nuts, though that part would be more of a thing in season 2. In season 1, he’s mostly there to make Jay’s life hell, with about half of the seasons episodes having him either fire jay or put his job in jeapordy versus 2 the next season. He’s still not unfunny, but most of his best stuff is in season 2 when Charles Napier’s allowed to cut loose a little more and the character wasn’t shoehorned into just being a clueless executive.  Charles Napier is a longtime character actor who showed up in TONS of films and tv shows too many to list.. and trust me with some of the lists of credits before and after this that’s saying something, his biggest voice rolls being in this series and Men and Black the Series as Zed. But needless to say he was ALWAYS this awesome and sadly passed in 2011.  Jay’s guest for the day is Valerie Fox, an up and coming actress whose first film kiss of death is coming out soon.. and whose age is an engima and it’s only a problem because if she’s 20, like the episode mildly suggests giving her starting career and her voice actress being that age, then this gets really gross as jay is 17 years older than her then. But given she looks older than that and sounds certainly older than that, i’m going more with 30, since she looks more like it, and sharon stone, who she’s mildly based on given she stars in a basic instinct knockoff and does the leg thing, was 32 at the time of basic instinct.  Valerie is voiced by Jennifer Lien, aka Kes from star trek voyager who I only know about because of reviews done by SF Debris and Allison Pregler. She was the childlike love intrest of Nelix, the ship’s resident pain in the audience asses who made them BEG for early seasons wesley crusher and who once, and I saw footage this wasn’t SF Debris exagreated, lunged at a crewmate in a jealous rage, unfounded by the way since Tom was AVOIDING kes depsite being attracted to her as he just wnated her to be happy and to not mess up her relationshpi, and screamed “i’ll kill you!”. Point is she hasn’t had a huge career, but was still worth noting and does a fantastic job here. Again I did not realize she was that young at the time by her voice, and that means she did a great job. 

So Jay’s smitten with her, finds her super attractive and she asks him out.. but to the show’s credit, and Jay’s he does try to rebuff her because he knows ther’es a conflict of intrest there.. but ends up giving in. However at least the show not only is upfront that there’s an issue here but that ends up being the thrust of the last act. Granted there’s still some.. questionable stuff like when she does the basic instinct leg cross and he says “can we get a shot of that”, which no.. Jay.. no you can’t. Ewwww. Seen far worse, like It’s Pat, which was a VERY real SNL sketch about people trying to guess the titular pat’s gender because that’s not creepy or invasive even for the time. And they made a movie out of it because Wayne’s World was popular forgetting that Wayne’s World, one of my faviorite movies by the way and one I need to cover here sometime this year now the thought’s occured to me, was a labor of love, with a talented director and actual ideas from it’s two leads who actually fleshed out the character versus a concept that was NEVER funny to begin with and has gotten down right horrifying with age. And wasn’t I talking about the Critic? Not the abusive jackass mind you, Jay Sherman. 

Ah yes so Jay takes Valerie to a date at Lane Riche, the rich jackass where we meet Vlada, a vaugely european man whose your typical hollywood suckup. As Jay puts it in a later episode  Vlada: I love you too Jay: You only love my money Vlada: That’s true but it is a love that will never die.  He also naturally scoots Jay to a less nice table in the Critic’s section once Conan O��Brian shows up... which WAS supposed to be a different kind of joke, as at the time Conan was just a writer on the simpsons and SNL, but now given he has a decades long career in late night and famously said fuck you to NBC during that whole Tonight Show debacle, which netted him his own show on TBS, it comes off more as the kind of self deprciating gag Conan makes about himself. So in other words it’s actually funnier now? 

As for the critic’s section that’s a part of the series I’ve neglected to talk about so let’s do that: The kind of critic Jay is, one who plays clips of the movie and reviews them.. on television. And were usually academics who looked down on popular film, the kind Siskel and Ebert popularized, and both suprisingly had a huge guest apperance in season 2 and even reviewed the show on their show. This kind of film criticism just dosen’t exist on tv that i’m aware of anymore, and mostly lives on with internet reviewers , many of whom were inspiried by critics like this, and who range from acadmeics to average joes to some mixture of both. It never went away just simply went to a younger generation. Some of which squandred it and somehow still have a career like certain abusuive jackasses i’ve mentioned enough with that one gag a few paragraphs ago. Point is it’s a much more varied and different game now so the critic ended up as one of those shows or movies where the main characters very job feels like an artifact of it’s time, like our heroes in Wayne’s World hosting a public acess show, when nowadays they’d just put it up on youtube or the entire idea of a UHF station in well.. UHF. It’s not a BAD thing, just something to note. 

But the date goes well as Valerie shows she’s really into jay and even takes him oggling her in stride, though we do get an utter classic of a gag when Jay says something about women being drawn to him.. and cue an old woman asking to rub his nonexistant hump for luck “You hunchbacks are all alike”. She does so anyway to his understandable annoyance. 

But the two go back to Jay’s place, talk about his acomplishments including a pulitzer and then well.. the obvious happens they go to bed together and the next day after Valerie is horrified at his just woke up fac,e he gives her an easy out but she’s fine with it. It honestly shows just how low the poor guy’s self esteem is that he just.. assumes a woman will regret having slept with hima nd walk out and while played for laughs it really gives a clear look into Jay’s mental state: He’s so full of self loathing, not helped by the world being out to get him, that it’s really oddly endearing. And VERY releatable.  The two are interupted by Jay’s son Marty. Marty is played by the very recognizable and very wonderful Christine Cavanagh, who sadly passed away in 2014. She voiced Chuckie Finster, Gosalyn Mallard, Oblina, Dexter from Dexter’s Lab and the titular pig from Babe. She decided to retire in 2001, so while her career was only about a decade she made quite the impact and is sorely missed. Unsuprisingly her usual voice is perfect for the very awkward Marty, who Jay asks to tell eveyrone about the beautiful woman in his bed especially his unfaithful and utterly loathsome ex wife ardith. 

This scene demonstrates two problems. The first is just the pilot as Jay’s kind of sleazy. While Jay being thirsty wouldn’t go away, especially in the episode Lady Hawke, it’d be made more awkwardly endearing. Here there are moments of him just plain being creepy like the aformentioned oggling, which while not bad in itself, if a bit awkawrd, also has him creepily muttering to himself while doing so which removes any charm or relatability and just sends it straight into needing 10 showers just to wash this scene off. The rest of the series would just turn him into a bit desperate at worst.  It also explains why the only other romantic story the guy has in the season is a pastiche of misery. Thanfully this would be GREATLY adjusted next season but we’ll get to that. 

The other problem is just the tone... we get a good half a minute of Marty talking about how he calls Ardith’s boyfriend “Uncle Al” because he likes him a lot.. to his dad’s face. And granted his dad is being creeptastic this episode but the early episodes just pile on the Jay hatred by the world a bit thick, to the point one episode puts him as “worse than hitler”. Granted the audience is full of idiot teens who have no idea who hitler is, and the gag is kinda funny, but it makes my point: Jay is just utterly shat on by the world, and while he does get a few wins, most are undercut by something awful and it gets taxing sometimes. The guy is just too loveably pathetic to hate, too relatable even as a teen and not snobish enough to be really loathsome or WANT to see him knocked down by the world. It’s not overwhelming enough to ruin the first season, it still has good episodes but this episode does highlight a LOT of these problems.  He does get to spend the day with val though, dancing outside the trump buliding, seriously even back then he was a joke and his lack of money half the time was well known.. how did the last four years happen, and they tell each other they love each other. I’d aww if I didn’t know how this ended.  So jay relates the good news of how he feels to his best friend, Jeremy Hawke, played by Maurice LaMarche. LaMarche is one of the most talented voice actors alive, a master of impersonations paticuarlly orson welles, who was naturally brought on board because they knew they were going to need a lot of celebrity voices for the film parodies and needed one or two guys to do them to keep it cheap. The guy is like most of this cast a legend in the industry, having voiced the Brain, Squit, Dizzy Devil, the Human Ton, Big Bob Pataki, Egon Spengler, Sleet,  Kiff Kroker, Headless Body of Agnew, Morbo, Various other Futurama characters because that list is long, Mortimer Mouse, Blue Falcone, Father, Yosemite Sam, Vincent Van Ghoul, Doctor Doom, Abradolf Lincler, and Odval. Point is the guy has been engranged in my childhood and adulthood and will probably even after he’s gone come back from the grave to do some voices. He even got the part of Jeremy Hawke here because he happened to do a REALLY good australian accent depsite not being australian. Jeremey was a combination of paul hogan, the star of the Crocodile Dundee movies and at the time sex symbol and at this time known anti semite Mel Gibson. Obviously neither of those refrences has aged paticuarlly well, but since hollywood ALWAYS has room for a super hunk from australia, just ask Chris Hemsworth or before him Hugh Jackman, the character still works and his breakout role, Crocodile Ghandi is so ludcrious it works. I.e. a white australian man playing the mahtma and saying before he brings peace “First a tasteful shot of my bum for the ladies. Jeremy, while sometimes increidbly oblvious, is still a fairly nice easygoing guy and an extremley loveable character. And whie Jay worries about Valrie meeting him because he’s sex on a cracker she ignores him and jay gloats for a bit, paticuarlly with the great bit “take your genatalia right back to australia”. And while Jeremy’s happy for him he tries to reign Jay in when Jay talks asking her to marry him.  As Jeremy later relates on Jay’s fire escape “Bubala, i’ve learned there’s two things you should never do: Marry an actress and wear blackface to the naacp image awards. Two things I found out the hard way. “

So Jay takes her to meet his parents and finds out he’s adopted.. and their also rich. Jay’s waspy parents are his cold and overly honest mother Elanor, played by  Judith Ivey, his kooky dad and THE best part of the series Franklin played by Gerrit Grahm and his loving and free spirited teenager sister Margo played by Nancy Cartwright.  Okay (cracks knuckles) here. we. go. Judith Ivey is a tony wining stage actress and has also directed numerous plays and is mostly known for her stage work but I know her from Designing Women where she played BJ in the last season. Garret Grahm apparently shows up in a lot of brian depalma movies, including Beef in phantom of the paradise, a lot of tv work and to my shock the asshole dad from Child’s Play 2. Another thing I genuinely love I wasn’t aware an actor or actress from this series had a part in.  Finally there’s Nancy Cartwright, who you DEFINTELY know from the Simpsons, where she plays Bart, along with Nelson, Ralph, Kearny, Database, and Maggie, and Kearny. Other credits include Pistol Pete, Mindy from Animaniacs, Chuckie Finster picking up for Christine Cavanagh ironically enough, Lu and Rufus from Kim Possible. She’s a talented lady and i’m glad sh’es still around. Whew. 

Okay so yeah I do love the shermans and fraknlin is again easily the best part of an already excellent series and unlike Duke that’s in full display here, with him saying, when his wife mentions they were going to give jay back at one time, “Son if I’ve said it once I said it a thousand times.. who are all you people. “ and he’d only get better. Sadly he’s NOT in sherman woman and child. Our loss really. But he’s in pretty much every other episode of season 2 thankfully and most of this season so eh, fair trade off. Also we get the classic line, after Jay says he’ll love valrie even when he’s decaying in the ground, his mom quips “Cna’t we go one meal without talking about your rotting corpse?” Though Eleanor understandably thinks Valarie is using jay for a good review. Margo suspects her of the same and takes her on a horse ride, though all she can gleam is that Val genuielly loves jay and welcomes her to the family.  Jay however does decide to duck out of the inteview by faking sick, which leads to a really sweet moment where Valerie visits him and they dance, in a hilaroius but oddly sweet parody of Beauty and the Beast, Beauty and King Dork. Despite the title and the song insluting him a LOT it’s still just endearing. This is a problem but we’ll get to in just a moment WHY all these touching moments are a problem.  So naturally things don’t go that well for Jay as Duke has a tape of the film sent to him “My shrink was right: GOd does hate me!”

Naturally kiss of death is bad and valrie is bad in it and Jay is left uncertain what to do, but eventually decides he has to do what he feels is right,.. though he does take a picture of her while she’s sleeping. “In case you do leave”

So in a tender and heartbreaking moment Jay is honest, the movie does suck and she’s not good but he does compliment her, for her personality not her body despite his skeevy behavior and say she could get better. Instead when he arrives home.. she dumps him to his face and leaves never to be seeen again while he assumes she’ll come back. And that’s the issue it’s GENUINELY hard to tell if we’re supposed to side with Jay. On one hand he genuinely loves her and does the right thing and on the oth er he’s kinda creepy. It’s a mixed tone that just sorta hurts thing and something the series DID fix after this, as it found a better ballance of the guy being pitable while also still being an ass and ONLY usually being punished when he does something actually wrong, the only exception being Dial M for MOther which is easily the weakest episode of the series. The episode does close on a really funny moment as Jay’s dispondent because “I’m sitting on top of a volcano of rage and I don’t knwo where to direct it”. Marty mentions a new Sylvester Stallone movie where “He plays a concert pianst who” And jay dosen’t even need the rest of that to shout “To the multiplex!” The man is back

Final Thoughts for Pilot: This episode is not bad. It has it’s flaws as I said, mostly in tone, but the series would iron that out and it’s still a great pilot that organically introduces the entire main cast in one episode and really gives us the full idea of who Jay Sherman is. It’s also REALLY funny, as the series should be and it would get better, but i’d still put it over some more awkward first episode like Letterkenny’s “No Reaosn to Get Excited”, even with it’s brilliant ending or Bojack Horseman’s first episode  whose title is way too long to put here in an article that’s already long as hell about about to get longer. But like those series this pilot worked pass the awkwardness and the result is a damn good series. but if you want a better idea of what it became.. wellllllll

Sherman, Woman and Child: So yeah as you can tell JSUT by contrasting images a few things were changed up between seasons, part of it at network instance. The designs were softened , the color palette was brightened with jay being the most noticably alterted between seasons. 

The execs wanted jay a bit warmer, so his face was given wider more expressive eyes and was also scrucnehd down a bit. He was also made slightly less of a jackass, with his elitisim toned down a bit and his creepeir moments gone. For instance he no longer had a split personality/imaginary secretary named ethel. That was actually a thing. It didn’t even really change Jay as a person, this very episode mentions him not liking the Lion King, and he’s still snooty, he’s jusst not as punchable about it and that was for the best.  But the cringe comedy in general was taken down a peg and replaced with more fun weirdness, which wihle present in season 1 really pops more here, especially with Jay’s dad who sadly dosen’t show up in this episode, but at various points dresses up like El Kabong, puts on the mask from the mask (”He did the same thing at Nixon’s funeral”), and blows up famous works of art while babysitting. But yeah things get a bit more surreal like the simpsons from season 4 onward, ironically enough given these guys left to make their own show, and it’s to the show’s benefit. 

But besides a lighter tone, they also wanted two things to hook viewers in: A permenant love intrest for Jay, and an adorable kid character. The former.. was acutlaly quite resonable, as i’td both give jay a “win” as it were, allow the cast to have another femlae character and give him someone else to confide in besides Doris or Jeremy, to give those characters a break. The other was less so and we’ll get into why when we meet her. 

This episode really is a second pilot, reintroducing about half of the main cast. Marty, Elanor, Margo and as I said Franklin are all absent. But their reintroduced soon enough with the fourth episode in both broadcast and dvd order, and my personal faviorite “A Song for Margo, is entirely focused on Jay’s parents and sister, while Lady Hawke has marty breifly at the start for broadcast order and he’s in the frmaing device for Sherman of Arabia in dvd order. So the characters all get a proper reintroduction to new audiences, but it was the right call to NOT shove them into this one, still introducing new people to the new cast, but letting the two new additions to it breathe and get properly intergrated into this universe.. well more Alice than Penny but we’ll get to that. It’s part of why, besides the genuine extra coat of polish aand seasonal changes I feel this is the better episode. 

So we open with Jay on his show and two parodies in a row. The first is a few good men but with Jack Nichelson making fun of Christan Slater for sounding like him even though. they honestly aren’t too similar other than both doing that pause thing a bit. So yeah not their best but the second segment makes up for it “The Nightmare Before Channukah” a parody of the nightmare before christmas that was so beautifully animated and funny, that they actually bumped it up to the season premiere.  But while the parodies are good Jay’s show is once again, this happened a LOT in season one, in jeapordy, being beaten by the Benedictine monk variety hour. Which while the Bendictine Monks are VERY much an artifact of the 90′s a choir of monks that somehow went mainstream, the whole segment is so absurd and wonderful it stands on it’s own and is still funny to me in 2021. Duke comes in anda fter trying to softball things shows the change I mentioned: He’s actually sorry the show is in danger and is genuinely sincere that he’s sad he’ll probably have to cancel it versus season 1 where he was ready to cancel it what felt like every other episode. And I prefer this, where he can still mess with jay or flex his power over him, but is more cordial with the guy and it allows more jokes between the two. 

So Jay’s not doing so good.. and during his crappy day he spots a 30 something woman and her young daughter struggling in the rain and stops his cab to help. And gets maced for it “MMM, Jalapeno”. Though Alice does apologize and Jay does understand as it is New York and she graciously takes the offer. It’s in the cab their properly introduced. Aliice thompkins and her daughter penny who in a great bit punches jay in the nose for not liking the lion king (”rex reed did the same thing”) and then kissing him on the nose in apology (”Rex did that too” And he acompanies them in.. and also gets conked on the head by a potted plant and put in a materinity dress. 

So we get to know Alice and what her deal is: Alice was once married to and supported the career of country star Cyrus Thompkins who was.. less than subtle in his music about how faithful he was

Easily one of my favorite gags of the series if in part for Pat Overall’s delivery. So she moved from Knoxville to New York to prove to her daughter a woman can make it on her own, and proves she’s smart, talented and driven she just needs a break. She seemingly gets one in a man in a bright white outfit who says “this is your ticket out of this rundown flophouse” only for him to cheerfully exclaim “Your being evicted!”... PFFFTT. Cue where the commerical would be

So during this lull in the action let’s talk about Alice and Penny’s voice actresses: Alice is voiced by Park Overall, though for some weird reason I thought she was voiced by Hollly Hunter. Dunno why. Park is an outspoken liberal, supporting my boy bernie sanders in 2016 and in general seems like a fascenating lady. Naturally like with Jay’s parents I know her from something more oddly specific, the sitcom Reba, as I did not realize she voiced alice depsite using a similar voice for her character there, Reba’s best friend Lori Ann.. And while Park TRIED her best.. the character didn’t work out: a combination of it being simply funnier that barbra jean tried to wedge herself into the roll and the fact Reba really didn’t need a horny abrasive sidekick meant the charcter had a very short shelf life and the audience had very low patience for her.  I did like her constnatly insulting Brock as he was not a good person andi t was nice SOMEONE besides Reba actually got to roast him on a regular basis. 

Penny was voiced by the one and only Russi Taylor, who sadly passed in 2019. She voiced Huey Dewey and Louie, Webby Vanderquack, Minnie Mouse, Fantasma, the imcomprable martin prince...

Among tons of smaller rolls. She’s sadly missed. We’ll get more into what they add or subtract from the show in a minute, as the next day at work Jay wonders how to help, though Duke’s interjection gives us two great gags: his “30 second workout” which involvees throwing jay around like a medicine ball and.. well this. 

The man is a legend for a reason. He earned that golden statue. So Jay TRIES slipping alice the money only to give it “To my good friend crazy postman”, and Alice refuses the money due to pride.. even if you know, she has a small child and new york is expensive but Jay finds a better solution, hire her.. even if it’d make it impossible for them to date. For all of one episode. What keeps the power dynamics from feeling EUGUUUUGGHH here is that Jay treats alice like an equal partner at work and dosen’t let their relationship really impact things outside of one episode, and dosen’t use his position to get into a relationship with her nor does she use being responsible for a turn in his fortune for hers. 

And yes turn in fortune, as a makeover and a change of attidue under Alice’s direction, which is utterly amazing to watch and wow’s duke and hte audience, wins back his fans and his job is secure. Duke meets alice and we get more great duke stuff. including something truly iconic...

I want bears who sing for me, doo dah, doo dah. But yeah things are well though Jay ends up admitting to Jeremy he can’t stop thinking about her “Her merest smile is like pedals of the empreror’s bathwater, BATHWATER I TELL YOU BATHWATER. “ So Jeremey encourages him carpe canum “Seize the dog”. He does so.. and the day but instead finds Alice with her ex Cyrus whose trying to win her back. Wuh oh.  Once the asshole leaves, and agrees to give her the night to think, Alice admits the only reason she’s considering it is she has a weakness: his singing melts her like butter on a bagle (”God i’ve been in new york too long”. )  Jay tries to talk her out of it at the critics meeting for “Dennis the Meance II Society” which involves Dennis pulling a drivebye on mr wilson.. why wasn’t this the second live action dennis the meance movie? WHY I ASK YOU. But Jay gets a good idea, as Alice TRIES to tell the asshole to get to stepping (And to see penny often, she’s not a monster), he works his evil song magic.. only for Jay to undercut it with his own amazing song on acordian. “Cyrus is just a virus, he wants to tie you down while your still young. Your potetial, is what’s essential, you could someday be another connie chung!” And that ultiamtely shows WHY jay is the better man. He just wants what’s best for her and dosen’t care if it’s him, he just wants it not to be THIS asshole. He’s not even trying to win her over, which a lot of these gestures creepily lead to. He just wants to help her be who she’s MEANT to be. And that’s why this works better: Instead of a fake relationship built on lust and someone conning the other person, it’s a real one built on genuine chemistry. Also Alice you know dosen’t just.. vanish after an episode but is a permenant part of the cast. I mean she does for the webisodes but we don’t talk about those. 

So our hero undercuts Cyrus one more time  Cyrus: “Loverrrr, without you there’s no other” Jay: Give him a chance he’ll do your mother....

I mean he’s not worng, So Cyus is sent packing and we get a nice romantic moment between the two. 

Final Thoguhts: Sherman, Woman and Child This one is truly excellent. It relaunchs the show on all cyllanders. And frankly Alice was a fine addition to the cast: her own fully fleshed out woman with her own personality outside of jay, who was tough, smart and a good counterpoint and confidant to Jay and it felt like she’d always fit. Penny on the other hand, apologizes to the late Russi Taylor who tries her best, just dosen’t work and feels ultra cloying and out of place in the series and unspurisingly is barely used after this. But overall a better pilot than the actual pilot was already pretty good and a fine pair of episodes. Check em out whenever the series eithe rgets on a streaming platform or pops back up on youtube as Sony’s struck it down... despite not putting it up anywhere i’m aware of. Seriously sell it to HBO Max or Disney I want a reboot. But for now this series is awesome check it out and until the next rainbow, it’s been a pleasure. 

[currywaifu]

𝐭𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐞: you can have half 𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩: hyodo juza/reader 𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: sfw 𝐰𝐜: 3.0k words, 2 images

𝐚𝐧: my first a3! fanfiction

He was in three of your classes. Three, and not once have you gotten the chance to talk to him! Granted, you never took the initiative either but after a few months, you’d think some kind of pair or group activity would pop-up to help you out.

The two of you were even in the class with the highly-acclaimed (by the student body) matchmaker professor, and either you were too subtle with your pining or weren’t interesting enough because not once has she tried to pair you up with him, or anyone for that matter.

Seriously, what does one have to do to get close to Hyodo Juza?

There wasn’t a particular moment you could pinpoint when you fell for Juza, but rather it was an accumulation of things that got you more and more attracted to him.

His cool and tough exterior first caught your attention, from the way he dressed to his purple hair. It didn’t help at all that he was extremely attractive to you.

Then you started noticing more things about him, like how polite he was to the professors, or the tiny smile he wore when he ate the anmitsu from the school canteen, or when that one upperclassman handed him some mochi, or when the photography-club senior gave him a box of pocky.

Juza being a sweets lover? Isn’t this what they call ‘gap moe’? Ahhh, your poor heart.

“That’s it!” You exclaimed to yourself excitedly, sitting up from your bed so quickly your head hurt slightly.

“I’ll give him some sweets as a conversation starter!”

Easier said than done.

“Isn’t it awkward to just give sweets out of nowhere to a guy?” You whined, hiding your face with your arms and laying your head down on the table. Your friends sighed for the nth time within the past hour, patting your head comfortingly as the two of them looked at you incredulously.

“It’s normal to confess feelings through sweets though?”

You jolted your head back up to look at the girl. “And who said I was gonna confess?”

The disbelief on their faces increased tenfold. “You’re not?”

Grimacing at the volume of their voices, you looked around to see if anyone was paying attention. By the history books section, you locked eyes with the librarian who paused putting back returned books to glare at your table, causing you to give an awkward smile in return.

Right, library. Inside voices.

“I wanna become friends with him first, but I’m too much of a wimp to even approach him huhu…” When the two girls don’t respond, you turn to the direction where they were staring straight ahead. A slight heat spread throughout your chest and into the roots of your hair.

“Omg, yankee Barney is here.” Choking on saliva, the speed at which you turned away probably gave you whiplash.

“I was gonna go with Dibo the Delinquent Dragon, but I like yours more.”

The two crackheads were stifling their laughter and looked like they were moments away from bursting out and getting themselves kicked out of the library. “Shut up! Let me wallow in my misery in silence.”

“Oh? Since when did Elmo get so dramatic?” Feeling your face heat-up and redden further, you stood up to leave.

“I’m gonna get strawberry milk from the vending machine, go talk shit without me.” You groaned, only staying long enough to hear them laugh as loud as they could without getting caught.

...

There was only one left, and you were the only one in line. How lucky was that? You waited for the machine to do its thing and drop the milk carton through the chute.

Except it wasn’t doing its thing. Odd. Should you stick your arm in the slot? Shake the machine? Kick or punch the glass? Ask someone for help? All of the above, in that order?

Fate had decided for you.

“You, do you need help?”

Holy holy holy-

Hyodo Juza was behind you! And he was talking to you!

Okay brain, here’s the game plan. Turn around, casually ask him for help, thank him, introduce yourself then continue the conversation from there!

Except you decided to make like the vending machine and malfunction.

“I- uh- yes? Please?”

Fuck, you probably sounded dumb. What kind of first impression is this? That response would probably get you intimacy points close to none. You went outside to cool down but weren’t the heat levels rising again?

He stared at you for a second, before quickly looking away and kicking the machine. Ahh, wasn’t that really cool? He crouched down, sticking his hand through the slot before handing you the carton.

“Strawberry milk…”

It looked like he was glaring for a second, but wasn’t he staring because he actually liked the flavour? He was holding out the drink to you, but you hastily pushed his palm back towards him.

“Thanks! You can keep it since you helped me with, you know. The machine! Okay, see you in class Ju-san!” You spoke quickly, before swiftly fleeing the premises.

Back in the library, you let your head fall down on the wooden surface. “You look like crap, what happened?” Letting out a pitiful whimper, you look up at them with a pout ready on your lips.

“He probably thinks I’m weird now…” The two girls exchanged a look with each other.

“Not that you aren’t, but what you do boi?”

“Ju-san…” He murmured quietly, palming the pink and white milk box in his hand. He sat in the dorm’s living room, wondering what he should do.

Juza’s seen you before in a couple of his classes. You always sat somewhere in the middle beside your friends, taking down notes and asking questions when needed. Other than the fact that you were a hard worker, he didn’t really know anything else about you.

Until the fateful encounter today.

At first, he thought you were scared of him from the way you froze up like a mannequin. Then you turned to him, not looking afraid but definitely a little faint and red-faced. Were you sick?

That didn’t explain how you just rushed off without your drink, and that odd nickname.

Ju-san.

Ju-san.

“Juza? Are you okay?” Flinching a bit, his eyes met with Omi’s concerned amber coloured ones.

“Omi-san, I’m fine…” He replied, doing little to convince Omi who proceeded to sit down next to him.

The strawberry milk was still sitting in the purple-haired boy’s hand.

“Are you not gonna drink that?” The brunet didn’t say it aloud, but both of them knew what he meant, ‘It’s not like you to just save it for later, so something’s up.’

“Someone gave it to me.” If the 4th year student was surprised, he sure didn’t show it. Instead, he gave a smile as if he knew this would happen eventually.

“And then? Why don’t you want to drink it then?” It probably wasn’t cold anymore if he had it since class hours.

“It’s not that… it feels…” Juza trailed off, looking for a word that would describe their chance meeting.

“Weird?” Omi supplied, but he shook his head. No, that wasn’t it.

“Sudden? Confusing?”

“Both of those, I think. Also, Ju-san…”

The brunet’s ears perked up at the nickname, almost believing he misheard it. Was this Ju-chan 2: Electric Boogaloo? Ah, Juza attracts cute people, doesn’t he? Can it be that cute people see through that toughness and see his softer side? It’s certainly true with Juza’s cousin.

“So they called you that, huh. Ju-san because Ju-sa sounds like Juza?”

Said person ignored him, unaware of the pink on his cheeks. Being a good mother senpai, Omi decided to help him out. Since Juza’s been delaying drinking the milk, he probably thought he didn’t deserve a free drink out of nowhere. That was an issue with a quick and easy fix.

“I’ll help you give them something in return on Monday.”

That was enough for Juza, who finally ripped the little plastic packet and poked the straw through the carton hole.

For a lukewarm drink, it tasted particularly good today.

You spent an hour last weekend praying to a couple deities that you could start over your first meeting with Juza. Not only that, but didn’t you end up calling him something weird?

You were walking to class when your friend leaned in closer, voice quiet so only you could hear. “Alert, yankee Barney is approaching. I repeat,”

“Don’t repeat.” You mumbled, not having the nerve to respond further, watching as he slowly neared you.

“Hyodo-san? Did you need something?” His mouth twitched at that, before handing you a purple tupperware.

“For last Friday. You can give the container back tomorrow.” You stared at the purple-haired man in shock, before accepting the gift.

“Thank you, Hyodo-san. I’ll be sure to enjoy it!” He lingered for a moment, waiting to see if you’d say something else, before nodding and walking past you and your friend.

Did that just happen?

You didn’t even realise your friend had stepped away from you until she came back running and shaking you with a magnitude strong enough to make a tree collapse.

“I thought you said he was gonna think you’re weird and shit! The fuck is this then?”

“Wait hoe I’m still shookt, let me check.”

Lifting the lid, the contents inside made your mouth water, and you wouldn’t be eating lunch for another 3 hours! Cookies! The torture of having to wait to consume them. Well, one couldn’t hurt?

Delicious! And the crisp, the size, the texture- all of them were to your liking.

“Hoh— isfh— so goo—“

“Oh look, there’s a note. While you’re greedily eating your heart out, let me read it.” Your friend pointed out, before unsticking it from the plastic lid.

“Juza felt bad for the free strawberry milk, so I helped him prepare something to show his thanks. I hope you enjoy. P.S. Ju-san? That’s cute.”

You almost choked, your friend wildly patting you on the back. “What’s this? A note from his mom or something?”

“Ju-ju-san…” You muttered in embarrassment. So he did pay attention to that! Not only that, but he even told someone about it? Well, that wasn’t your biggest worry right now.

“Isn’t this too much just for one strawberry milk? I have to find a way to repay him back!” Your friend narrowed her eyes at you, before shaking her head.

“Why do I feel like this is gonna be the start of a strange back-and-forth between the two of you?”

The next day, you handed him back the purple tupperware.

“Open it, it’s my favourite from the bakery two streets down.” You told him, doing your best to mask your shyness before walking away.

As soon as you left, Juza opened it to find a slice of red-velvet cheesecake and a disposable fork inside. He’ll eat it for dessert later. As he was about to close the lid, he noticed the cute sticky note designed like a strawberry.

Thank you for the cookies, they were really good! I passed by a bakery last night and thought you’d enjoy this!

You signed it off with your name, and he realised that he never knew it until then.

He said it quietly, testing out how it sounded.

He sighed, staring at the library door which you exited from.

The school canteen had some delicious milk bread, but don’t they sell strawberry shortcake on Wednesdays?

…

Wednesday, you delightfully ate a slice of strawberry shortcake which came with a plain white sticky note with nice calligraphy from Juza.

On Thursday, Tsuzuru found Juza eating dorayaki while reading something on a pastel blue paper.

Friday came, and the usual purple tupperware had two Castella cake slices and a lined paper, clearly ripped from his notebook, folded and taped to the lid.

Juza wondered if it would stop by next week and be handed an empty tupperware, but a surge of courage must have overcome you because Monday came with brownies and a note.

I don’t want you to keep ripping pages from your notebook. Do you have Inste? Discord? If you’re up for it, I can message you there instead. Otherwise, my number is…

He placed the paper with your socials somewhere he wouldn’t lose it.

...

Monday night arrived when you got a text from an unknown number.

This is Juza.

What a simple message, but somehow your heart fluttered. Your phone dinged again when you got a follow notification on Inste. Scrambling to follow him back and check out his posts, you didn’t know whether to laugh or be amazed when you saw that the posts there were purely promotional for MANKAI plays, some of which he wasn’t even in.

You took a screenshot of the image of him with the vest and purple tie and asked about the play.

It may not have been in person, but that marked the longest conversation you’ve had with Juza so far. Somehow the two of you went from talking about acting to food, to hobbies and complaining about teachers and before either of you knew it, it was midnight.

A couple days pass by and its Thursday night when people notice a change in Juza. Particularly, his phone habits.

“He’s not as bad as Itaru, Banri, and Kazunari but…” Tsuzuru trails off, looking at Omi who only seemed amused.

“He’s been spending a lot of time talking to someone is all.” The two of them turned their heads back to the first year as he let out a small laugh.

Three weeks in the food exchange and the two of you began having actual conversations in real life. It started when he handed you the purple tupperware, asking how you were and how your weekend was.

It somehow resulted in the two sitting together during classes, and having lunch together when Omi and Tsuzuru were busy.

You began to wonder who would break the streak.

You were running late. Maybe it was a bad idea to rush an essay worth a good chunk of your grade in the span of 8 hours, but somehow you managed to complete it at 3 am.

Thank god for online submissions. You wouldn’t be able to stand a noisy printer at this hour.

After plugging in your laptop and phone to make sure it would be fully charged before classes start later, you flop onto your bed to take a well-deserved rest.

When you woke up, it was 11 am.

Shit, you just missed a 3-hour lecture. Shit raised to the power of two Juza was in that class. Would he be worried that you weren’t there?

It looks like you’ll be the first to turn in an empty tupperware.

Still, you have a plan B prepared.

...

Juza was worried. When you messaged last night you hadn’t mentioned being sick at all. Had something happened? Sure, he didn’t get to message you that much over the weekend because of increasing practice hours but you’d definitely say something.

Omi and Tsuzuru eyed Juza as discretely as they could. No purple tupperware, no wonder he was upset. It went unsaid, but it clearly stopped being about the surprise desserts every other day and more about the person giving them.

“Ju-san!” An unfamiliar voice reached the former two’s ears, but the latter was clearly well acquainted with it based on his reaction. All three men turned around to see you, smiling and holding out Juza’s favourite food.

It was anmitsu with cream, specifically the one from the campus canteen.

“They wouldn’t let me put it in the tupperware, but will you accept it anyway?”

Did he look like he cared where the anmitsu was placed? Sure, it made him happy that despite skipping a class she still remembered to get him something, even more, his favourite dish, but…

“You didn’t show up to class a while ago.” Juza was frowning. You knew he usually gave off an angry disposition, but this was different.  

“Sorry, I was up ’til 3 am and forgot to turn on any alarms, haha.” He sighed.

“So the goodnight text then was-“

“A lie so you wouldn’t scold me for it, which obviously didn’t work in my favour.”

Having previously failed to notice the two upperclassmen, you turned to greet them, introducing yourself as Juza’s friend. “Sorry to disturb your lunch.”

Omi smiled. He introduced himself, as did Tsuzuru. So this was his troupe mate’s special friend. “Not at all. Have you eaten? You’re welcome to join us.”

Too tired to protest, you thanked him and sat down beside the purple-haired boy. “I just rushed here without eating, actually. Oh, I should probably get my lunch-“ You proceed to stand back up, but a firm hold of your arm from Juza stops you.

“You can have half.” He says, sliding a lunch set with a serving size you didn’t even know the university provided.

“What?”

“You slept through breakfast time, too. We can share.” He insisted, clearly not accepting no for an answer.

You take the unused chopsticks and begin to prod at the side dishes. “Fine, but now I owe you something. Should I get you banana milk from the vending machine?”

Juza looked away for a second, eyes hesitant as he glared at the anmitsu instead of you. When he looked back, he seemed to be filled with resolve.

“Then watch me… Autumn Troupe’s next upcoming play, I mean.”

For a moment you felt heat beginning to encompass your body, but quickly tried to shake it off. Of course Juza meant his acting.

“Obviously I’m watching it. Opening night and closing night, if I can help it.” You insisted. As if you would miss the chance to see him on stage. Sure, your massive crush on him wasn’t gonna go away any time soon, but to be able to see him do something he was extremely passionate about?

“Quick, help me finish lunch already so you can enjoy your anmitsu, Ju-san.”

...

The two of you somehow forgot the presence of Omi and Tsuzuru, both of whom were listening to your conversation intently.

“Then watch me? Seriously, lines like that can be interpreted…”

“I think we’ve become the third and fourth wheel, Tsuzuru.”

want to order again?

[wolf-stark]

You ask I deliver — both tfatws asks in one!

tfatws weekly ask 1

i finally saw ep1!! i wont be able to see ep2 until thursday at the earliest but i already have some Thots on this ep. here are the ones I remember

first is, and i'm so sorry for this, a grammar lesson. an appositive is when you stick an additional phrase in between commas, dashes, or the like. i actually just used one! the "and i'm so sorry for this" in the first sentence of this paragraph is an appositive. thing is, most english speakers don't normally use them when they speak, only in writing. so i'm always on high alert whenever i hear somebody in tv or movies use one. (it's generally a marker of bad screenwriting). anyway there was one right in the beginning of the episode. the white army guy yelling at sam wilson said "first lieutenant Torres, our intel officer, will be helping on the ground." yeah so. the writing of this series started out on the wrong foot for me. but the rest of the episode was obviously tons and tons better (every interview i see with malcolm spellman makes me love him more and more)

the contrast between the opening minutes (falcon action sequence) and the rest of the ep.... i would 100000/10 rather watch a series with just sam and bucky dealing with life. i dont give a single crap about the flag-smashers or any of that. i just want sam, sarah & fam getting their boating business back on the ground & yeeting racist dickwads, bucky going through therapy and making amends, sam and joaquin being bros, sambucky homoerotic tension, etc.

the cinnamontography! wandavision mostly used cinematography to signify era n stuff. tfatws doesn't have wv's premise to go off of, so here's some tricks i noticed:

with sam there's obviously all sorts of shots with the captain america iconography next to his face, but he hasn't totally claimed it. there's the mural of steve rogers in the background; there's sam staring into the shield like it's a spectre of steve's face; there's sam looking into the exhibit, the shield and sam separated by glass and a layer of camera focus. steve is a constant spectre, always there, an idea, a symbol himself. sam's relationship with this iconography is distanced. he is separated by glass exhibit walls. by painting canvases. he doesn't yet feel worthy to take on that iconography. this whole thing was pulled off quite well but also a bit on-the-nose if only in quantity. there's just sooooo much fancy iconography stuff

speaking of the exhibit, there's something that i get real pissy about. it's when like, there's an action going on you're supposed to be paying attention to but the cinematographer is like,,,, hey! check out this location! or this headline! or something! there was a lot of that in the exhibit. the camera was like, you could focus on sam and rhodey's convo (which was fine but could have been so much better with an extra like 10 minutes of deep character study talk) but noooo you want me to look at the symbol for the united nations and read all the text about bucky who hasn't even showed up yet. shut up i know the lore and ill watch the shot-by-shot breakdown yt vids you don't have to make the shot this long jkdsalcjklasejf

my fav trick was with bucky and the therapist. i had seen a clip of the scene with bucky and the therapist beforehand and i thought the cinnamontography was super obnoxious, but then i was like, oh duh. the shots frequently change the distance between the camera and its subject. sometimes it's uncomfortably close and sometimes it's really far. a clear allegory for the duality of therapy, esp for bucky! therapy is an invasive process wherein he is ruthlessly examined, picked apart, and berated for his trauma (this therapist is crap in every way btw, "mean therapist" works for greg house and greg house only). so the camera goes close. it makes the viewer claustrophobic like bucky. but when he's like "no i haven't had any nightmares" the camera suddenly goes really far. we see bucky as this tiny head in the center of the bottom of the frame. we are distanced from him. he has pushed us away. we cannot see him. he lies because he is vulnerable. so yeah, amazing work there. the therapy scene was hard to watch on purpose!

did bucky slip a note to yori inside the dollar bill? bucky stop making me emooooo. the suuper awkward fake smile has me 😭 (veteran trying to adjust!)

mark my worrrrds when sam asks someone y the govt picked john “white bread” walker they’re gonna say “we needed somebody everyone can get behind....someone uncontroversial, someone everyone can see themselves in” like that exact racist dog whistle

tfatws weekly ask 2

just saw ep2 so im taking advantage of the 2 seconds i can be on tumblr without worrying about tfatws spoilers before new episode drops

when isaiah said "your people put me in prison for being a hero" and bucky thought "your people" means hydra. 🤦‍♂️

speaking of racism, the interplay between sam being Black (anti-Black racism) and sam being the Falcon (negrophilia, "can i take a selfie w you as i deny you a loan?") and the intersection between the two (j*hn lichrally called sam "steve's wingman"! he takes the crypto out of crypto-racist in like 2 seconds!) !!!!!!!! a Black celebrity's Black experience, the separation of man and identity!!!! (thinking about vanessa bayer in snl in that skit "beyonce is black" telling her black friend "you're not black, you're...my girl!")

after sam gets racially profiled by cops we see j*hn standing in front of cop cars cinematic parallels turns out j*hn is racist who knew

this therapist sucks major ass but she got bucky and sam together in the same room and ready to collaborate...that's something ig. it was lichrally couple's therapy she said she used her miracle exercise with couples sambucky antis get blended

bucky says "he was wrong about you so maybe he was wrong about me"...that's not how people talk. when therapist asks bucky, the guy who doesn't talk at all about himself, "y do you hate sam", the last thing bucky's gonna do is actually connect his hatred of sam to his own self-worth issues. bucky generally refuses to talk about himself, so why would he talk about himself in the one context that nobody ever links back to their own neuroses: hatred of other people? one thing human beings hate most is admitting we're wrong. admitting you hate someone because of your own issues? that's a major therapeutic step. bucky would absolutely have to be prompted to do that. even like one or two lines of dialogue more would have set up that line better. but in terms of the actual thought? an amazing way to take the sam/bucky relationship. bucky bases his self-worth on steve believing in him, and if steve is wrong bucky has no self-worth, so 1) he has to develop self-worth disassociated from steve's assessment of him and 2) he has to love himself before he can love sam, and 3) he has to realize that sam giving up the shield is a sign of sam's humility not his unworthiness.

conversely, we don't get into why sam hates bucky? yeah sam has the right to hate a guy that has tried to kill him (albeit while brainwashed) multiple times, and now shows up in his life just to bash him but. everything happens so fast i cant follow their relationship

in fact i dont feel like i understood much of anything. like y did bucky and sam go on that mission together? how connected are sam/bucky/joaquin with the government? doesn't bucky just want to retire now? literally what is everyone doing/feeling and why???

if battlestar becomes a knowing commentary on the black best friend stereotype i'm gonna party, but i dont expect much of that

the interplay between man and symbol. captain america is obviously a symbol. the shield is obviously a symbol. but steve rogers? the. man behind the cowl? he too seems to become a symbol. a paragon of a good guy, so good he's unreachable. steve was just a guy stop idolizing him the last thing steve would want is to be idolized

as the resident musician/music nerd on mcublr, 1) that captain america rally music slaps, but 2) re: the song at the end of the ep, if you're just gonna rip off mozart's lacrymosa then at least play mozart's lacrymosa. we wont blame you the lacrymosa slaps (if you dont know what im talking about go on yt and search it up youll recognize it fo sho

look i love enfys nest as much as the next guy but if tfatws is gonna get erin kellyman to play another innocent little gurl blackmailed into the fakeout-villain position (her text seemed to suggest as such) then 😡 like why can't women just....be evil? young, freckly, innocent-looking women? girls are not untouchable pure objects but full of rage and resentment just as much as anyone can be

bonus ep1 comment: bucky says about that senator whose car he hijacked, "she continued to abuse the power i gave her." fictionaldarling on yt say that he says "i" because he can't disassociate himself from his winter soldier persona which begets endless and senseless guilt. like dude. can i not be emo for like 1 second.

OKay. First off, as much I enjoy your sending it to me, what made you decide to send me these??

-

TFATWS WA #1

Don't worry about getting this to me as early as possible. I usually don't watch the episode right away.

1. Cool writing lesson.

2. Everyone wants a comedy show [like Friends] about the MCU superheroes.

3. Cinematography is always a beautiful thing.

4. Sam definitely has to carve his own Captain America status for himself, outside of Steve's ya know everything.

5. They have to do that for people who was just now tuning in because they're in love with Sam Wilson or Sharon Carter.

6. I think the therapist was taking a 'tough love' approach for Bucky, because she likely has some very strong opinions about the literal assassin she's been assigned to give therapy too. She did not choose to talk to him, she was assigned that make that clear in the second episode.

And, Bucky isn't lying when he said it wasn't a nightmare. It wasn't a nightmare, it was a resurfaced memory. So, technically he wasn't lying - and yes, the camera does move away because while he's saying he didn't have a nightmare, he's not expanding on what actually happened - so, he's still pushing the therapist/us away.

7. Bucky, and Steve, have/had a TON to adjust to.

8. Yeah, I agree that will be the bullshit line they give. If they ever actually talk about it.

TFATW WA #2

Yeah, always got to take advantage of avoiding those spoilers lmfaoo.

1. Honestly, that line was double meaning. Both about White people and Hydra [which is made up of mostly white supremacists/nazis] So, the line is gesturing to both White People in general and Hydra assholes together. I think the terminology is “double edge sword”??

2. This whole paragraph structure confused me, ngl - so I'm going to answer it the best I can. I do like that they're not ignoring the fact that Sam being Black is 1000% the reason he's not the Official Captain America - because the gov't is racist as hell.

I also like the little lines about how they point out little things about Sam's Falcon persona, like that kid calling him 'Black Falcon' specifically and Sam's response show the split between Sam and Falcon itself.

John is a dick for calling Sam the wingman of Steve Rogers. Sam was a hero all on his own before Steve asked him to join up again. [Side note, it's lichrally??]

3. Exactly, the parallel of Sam being profiled and surrounded while just on the street and John being surrounded by fans and being able to spring Bucky with apparently only a few sentences shows a Loooooot

4. Honestly, at this point I wonder if she's not actually a therapist and is just an agent assigned to assess Bucky outside of an Official Building. I do know, however, that her 'look at each other and speak' exercise is actually a real therapy practice. It's just a little slower.

5. Actually, I think he would've blurted that out. That whole line. I don't think Bucky hates Sam. I think they could've done the scene better, but I think that had Sam prodded him/the therapist been more annoying Bucky would've lost control of his emotions and blurted out the whole "If he was wrong about you, he was wrong about me" but I feel like the writing for this show is just... not there. Sometimes you blurt shit when you get overemotional and I think that was what Bucky was supposed to be like.

6. I don't think Sam hates Bucky, I think he doesn't trust him though. I do wish they'd talked about that though. The whole 'talk to each other' scene should've been a LOT longer and a LOT slower.

7. Sam and Bucky's relationship is being fast tracked because they don't really know how to work the relationship out, writers-room-wise. Bucky is technically retired, but I feel like he's trying to live up to Steve's expectations and doing what Steve would've done and we all know that if Steve was there, Steve would've jumped on that plane with Sam. It looks like Sam/Bucky/Joaquin are a side-team based from Military services but as Sam says they're all free agents so...?

8. Sadly, They seem to just be propping up to be another stereotype.

9. Captain America is a symbol. Steve Rogers is a man. But now Steve Rogers is an idol because of all the shit he's been through and honestly, it's not a bad thing he's become an idol for people - it's using Steve as a reason to make White Bread Walker the next Captain that makes Steve's idolization so fucked.

10. I don't know anything about music so I have no opinion here, sorry.

11. Enfys?? Also, I think they did the whole Innocent Girl Thing as side commentary for Bucky lowering his guard about seeing a young girl rather than a guy.

12. Bucky is the Winter Solider. The Winter Solider is Bucky. That is how Bucky will always see it because although he was brainwashed, it was still him and he remembers all of it. When you have constant memories of something 'someone else' did, you tend to not be able to pull the two personas out of each other. I want Bucky to take up the title, White Wolf instead of Winter Soldier. Honest.

This is all my opinion, I’m honestly a little disappointed with the writing of TFATWS so far so... I’m not really optimistic about this.

[loststarsabove]

My thoughts and opinions on the slew of recent trailers and announcements that no one asked for, but I needed to process all this information. These are just my opinions so don’t hate me.

Marvel:

WandaVision - Not very interested in this and it looks a little too trippy for my taste, but might watch it anyway to see Jimmy Woo and Monica Rambeau (and Billy and Tommy?)

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier - Easily my most anticipated of Marvel’s offerings. I was disappointed that it was delayed but it looks like it will be worth the wait! The trailer was epic. It looks like an action movie. I love Sam and Bucky, and their relationship and banter. Also I can’t wait to see my girl Sharon!

Loki - Not sure what to expect from this one and the trailer did not make things any clearer, but I’m just thrilled that Loki is getting his time to shine away from the Thor franchise.

What If? - Now that I’ve seen the full trailer I am actually quite excited for this! Also the animation looks gorgeous.

Hawkeye - I am not a fan of Jeremy Renner or what they did to Clint’s character in the MCU - hopefully this series will correct some of that. However the dog is adorable, Hailee Steinfeld looks really good as Kate Bishop, and I’m interested to find out what Yelena’s role in the story will be. 

Ms. Marvel - From the brief clips we have it looks like a cute, heartwarming, and inspiring story. It has jumped to the top of my list! 

She-Hulk - I’ve hated Bruce Banner in everything after The Avengers so I hope his involvement in this show is minimal.

Moon Knight - Not interested at the moment.

Secret Invasion - I was never one of those fans who felt like this story had to be adapted for the MCU and I liked what they did with the Skrulls in Captain Marvel, but I’m 100% for it now that Samuel L. Jackson and Ben Mendelsohn are involved!

Armour Wars - Finally giving Rhodey a leading role after playing pivotal supporting roles in a gazillion movies is long overdue. Sounds like an interesting premise. Will definitely watch!

Ironheart - Not very familiar with the character so I don’t have much of an opinion at the moment. Will probably watch though.

The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special - For some reason I have the feeling this is just going to be a Star Wars Holiday Special parody/rip-off.

I Am Groot - Will probably be cute.

Black Widow - I’m over it at this point. Was never really into it. Should have come out years before Endgame. Will only be watching for Yelena Belova.

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings - Admittedly was not familiar with the character prior to the announcement. I like Michelle Yeoh and Awkwafina though, and I’m interested to see what the movie does with The Mandarin (after the disaster that was Iron Man 3). No real opinion until I see the trailer.

Eternals - Would not be interested in this at all except for the fact that I like Gemma Chan, Richard Madden, and Kit Harrington. The cast is massive and star-studded to the point of feeling bloated.

Untitled Spider-Man 4 - Not sold at all on the multiverse/spiderverse, but the previous MCU Spider-Man films are among my favourites and I thought they both sounded like crap initially. Will definitely reserve judgement until I actually see the movie. As much as I adore Tom Holland’s Peter Parker, my wish for this movie is that we see a move towards more classic Spider-Man comic elements (The Daily Bugle and Peter’s photography, a mere mention of Uncle Ben, Harry and Norman Osborn, etc.)

Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness - Not really interested right now.

Thor: Love and Thunder - Will likely not be watching. An unpopular opinion but Ragnarok was my least favourite MCU movie.

Black Panther II - Right now I am just eagerly awaiting any announcement regarding their plans for where they are taking this franchise. 

Captain Marvel 2 - I loved the first movie, Brie Larson, and Carol Danvers. Kamala Khan and Monica Rambeau appearing in this makes me so happy! Hopefully Goose will be back! The Ms. Marvel tv show seems to imply that Captain Marvel is famous enough as a superhero to have merchandise, so I hope this movie explains when and how that happened (presumably during the 5 years after the snap that we didn’t see in Endgame).

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 - Very torn about this one. I really loved the first two movies, but my enthusiasm for the franchise has admittedly soured due to controversies involving certain members of the cast and crew. Will watch it, but not particularly bothered either way.

Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania - I am truly upset by the decision to recast Cassie Lang, perhaps to the point of being irrational. Hopefully I get over it because I have been looking forward to this movie for so long. The plot sounds good and I am anticipating much family cuteness.

Blade - Never saw the original movies and only know the character from Spider-Man: The Animated Series.

Fantastic Four - We all knew this was inevitable. Just give me a comic accurate Susan Storm and a teenage/young adult Johnny Storm (because if we don’t get Spideytorch content then what’s the point?) and I will be happy.

Untitled Deadpool - Not the biggest Deadpool fan, but the second movie was amusing. Will probably watch out of curiosity. 

Untitled X-Men/Mutant movie - Not sure how they are going to integrate Mutants into the already very established history of the MCU. If they do go ahead with this movie I hope that it focuses on different characters from the 20th Century Fox X-Men franchise. Personally I don’t want to see Erik and Charles played by anyone else after Ian McKellan, Michael Fassbender, Patrick Stewart, and James McAvoy.

Star Wars:

Obi Wan Kenobi - We have Hayden Christensen! This is not a drill! Honestly I am so happy! He was absolutely incredible in RotS and he truly deserves all the love he’s been getting over the years. As exciting as a reunion between his Vader and Ewan’s Obi Wan will be, a tiny part of me is frustrated because I thought Episode IV implied that their encounter on the Death Star was their first encounter since Mustafar? I’m sure they will find a way to make it work, however. Deborah Chow is an amazing director. I hope they cast a young Luke :3

Andor - Definitely my most anticipated Star Wars project after Obi Wan Kenobi. Really excited to see more of life in the Rebel Alliance, and loving the sound of the “nail-biting spy thriller” angle. Glad that Genevieve O’Reilly is back as Mon Mothma. Keeping my fingers crossed for Jimmy Smits. 

The Bad Batch - The animation looks stunning. Always interested to see more of the early days of the Empire.

Ahsoka - I don’t want it

Rangers of the New Republic - Not a lot of information except that it’s “culminating in a climatic event” with other stories, which sounds ugh. Reserving judgement until we learn more and see a trailer.

Lando - Awaiting more info. No word yet on whether Donald Glover or Billy Dee Williams will be back, but we can’t go wrong if either one (or both) are involved.

The Acolyte - Sounds like it could be interesting. Glad to see other time periods in the Star Wars universe being explored.

Star Wars: Visions - Will probably watch for pretty anime animation.

A Droid Story - Sounds like it will be cute, and I love droids so will probably watch. 

Rogue Squadron - Unless it’s an adaptation of the EU Rogue Squadron, I’m not particularly interested. If we’re getting Corran Horn, Mirax Terrik, Tycho Celchu, and Wes Janson, however, then I am 100% onboard!

Untitled Taika Waititi Star Wars - Not a fan of Ragnarok as has already been established, nor did I like aspects of his episode of The Mandalorian. Can’t imagine that I will be interested.

Other:

Fate: The Winx Saga (Netflix) - This looks like a cheesy guilty pleasure at best and a dumpster fire at worst. I wish that Prince Sky’s hair was longer. W.I.T.C.H. would have translated better into live-action if they wanted to adapt a mid-2000s era cartoon.

Batwoman Season 2 (The CW) - This looks like a huge improvement from season 1. Judging from the trailer I think they made an excellent decision by bringing in Javicia Leslie. The character dynamics all look really interesting. My most anticipated CW show along with Superman and Lois.

[nitrateglow]

Favorite film discoveries of 2019

Every year, my new-to-me favorites list always shocks me in some way. This year, the sheer amount of movies made in the 2010s on display is INSANE by my standards. Of course, most of the modern movies here are throwbacks or tributes to older styles of cinema, so maybe it’s not that shocking in the long run.

Another running trend this year: movies that are old but not as dated as we would wish. Many of the older films here deal with xenophobia and political strife in ways that still feel shockingly prescient today-- the more things change...

ONCE UPON A TIME... IN HOLLYWOOD (DIR. QUENTIN TARANTINO, 2019)

I never thought the day would come where my favorite movie of the year would actually be made after the 1970s, let alone by Quentin Tarantino. Then again, this movie is all about the end of Old Hollywood as well as a big love letter to the 1960s, so maybe it’s not that shocking a state of affairs. I adored this movie, the level of detail, the laidback yet elegaic vibe, the comedy and the relationships between all the characters. It was one of those movies where I loved even the scenes where nothing seems to be happening at all-- I mean, who knew Brad Pitt feeding his dog and watching TV could be entertaining?? But it is and I can't wait to see this one again!

INTENTIONS OF MURDER (DIR. SHOHEI IMAMURA, 1964)

Intentions of Murder has an insane premise, one that runs the risk of being tasteless: a housewife in a miserable, exploitative marriage is raped by a sickly burglar during a home invasion. Even worse, she can’t shake him, as he’s suddenly infatuated and wants her to run away with him to the city. And weirder still: her current existence is so miserable that she’s TEMPTED. While abuse and rape are grim subjects for any story, Intentions is actually about a woman coming into her own and finally standing strong against all these men trying to use her. It’s a weird blend of drama and dark comedy, a truly savage satire on patriarchy and class-snobbery.

JOKER (DIR. TODD PHILLIPS, 2019)

I went into this movie expecting to think it was overhyped and when I first left the theater, I was all ready to say “it’s good but not THAT good.” But it ended up haunting me for weeks afterward, and I found myself thinking about how everything just tied up so well together, from the grotty urban hellscape which serves as the setting to Phoenix’s brilliant performance. It reminded me a lot of A Clockwork Orange in how intimate it lets you get to this violent man while never pretending he is someone to be glamorized or imitated.

SIMON (DIR. MARSHALL BRICKMAN, 1980)

How do I even describe Simon? Alan Arkin is brainwashed by a group of overpaid intellectuals into believing he is descended from an alien toaster. Then he gets a messiah complex and starts gathering disciples as he rails against television, condiment packets, and muzak. It’s a little uneven at times, sure, but the satire is really inspired. The whole thing is like a combination of Mel Brooks, Stanley Kubrick, and Woody Allen’s styles, and it is quite hilarious for those who thrive on cult oddities.

PEEPING TOM (DIR. MICHAEL POWELL, 1960)

Though it came out the same year as Hitchcock’s Psycho and has been nearly as influential for horror cinema, Peeping Tom remains underseen by everyone save for film theorists. And what a shame that is, because this movie is more frightening than Psycho. Sure, that may be because Psycho is so predominant in popular culture and just so influential that it no longer has the same shock value, but there’s something about Peeping Tom that gets under my skin, something sad, even disgusting. I felt dirty after watching it-- and this is 2019!

MIDNIGHT MARY (DIR. WILLIAM WELLMAN, 1933)

Loretta Young got one of her juiciest roles in this pre-code crime drama. Her Mary Martin is more than just a good girl forced into criminal circles-- she’s a complicated creature, compassionate and desperate and lonely and bitter and sensual all at once. This movie is a fast-paced, beautifully filmed ride, cloaked in that Depression-era cynicism that makes pre-code Hollywood of such interest to movie geeks the world over.

WILD BOYS OF THE ROAD (DIR. WILLIAM WELLMAN, 1933)

Wild Boys of the Road is a quintessential Depression-era movie, relentless in its bleakness and rage. That the main characters are all starving kids only looking for work makes their struggles all the harder to watch. William Wellman is quickly becoming one of my favorite directors: his gritty style and compact storytelling are just perfect for a ripped-from-the-headlines drama such as this. And the “happy” ending has one little moment that just knocks any smile you have right off your mug. Absolutely see this.

THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING, THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING (DIR. NORMAN JEWISON, 1966)

Sometimes, when you watch a movie only because a favorite actor is in it, you get subjected to pure trash like Free and Easy (oh, the things I do for Buster Keaton). Other times, you get cute gems like The Russians are Coming, The Russians are Coming, which, as you probably guessed, I mainly sought out for Alan Arkin. But the whole movie is hilarious, the best kind of farce comedy, populated by enjoyable characters and a sweet-tempered humanism that grounds the wackiness. While a little overlong, this movie is quite underrated-- and sadly, its satire of American xenophobia and Cold War panic is not as dated as we would like to believe.

ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN (DIR. ALAN J. PAKULA, 1976)

Who knew a political thriller where most people know the twist could be so intense and riveting? It’s about as nonsensical as feeling suspense when you watch a movie about the Titanic and hope the boat won’t sink-- but damn, it’s magical. All the President’s Men is real white-knuckle stuff, with Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman projecting both youthful excitement and deep panic as they proceed with their investigation. It scarcely seems to have aged at all.

WHISPER OF THE HEART (DIR. YOSHIFUMI KONDOU, 1995)

There’s a scene near the end of Whisper of the Heart where the protagonist Shizuku shows the finished first draft of her fantasy novel to her first reader, the grandpa of one of her schoolmates. She weeps because it isn’t the perfect image she had in her head, despite how hard she worked on it, but the old man tells her that it takes polishing and discipline to make the work come to its full potential. Few movies about artists are so honest about how hard it can be, how unsupportive others can be in their demand that everyone be “practical.” As a writer who struggles to create and constantly doubts herself, this movie spoke strongly to me. I recommend it to any creative person.

THE PHANTOM OF THE PARADISE (DIR. BRIAN DE PALMA, 1976)

I’d been wanting to see this movie since my high school phan days. Holy crap, is it WEIRDER than I could have ever imagined, a true camp masterpiece. I’m shocked it was never tuned into a stage show actually, but then again, we would miss those trippy camera angles and we wouldn’t have Paul Williams as one of the greatest villains of all time.

DUEL (DIR. STEVEN SPIELBERG, 1971)

When people talk about the best movies made in the “Hitchcock without Hitchcock directing” tradition, why is Duel so seldom mentioned? The scene in the cafe, packed with paranoid tension and tense camerawork, alone should qualify it. Duel is most known as the movie which put the young Steven Spielberg on the map. It’s quite different from his later work, grittier and less whimsical for sure. Even the ending seems almost nihilistic, depending on how you view it. But damn, if it isn’t fine filmmaking.

CAROL (DIR. TODD HAYNES, 2015)

This gorgeous throwback to Douglas Sirk melodramas is also one of the best romantic movies I’ve seen in a while. Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara have the sweetest, tenderest chemistry-- it was like seeing Lauren Bacall and Audrey Hepburn as love interests in a film. Unlike Sirk, there is little in the way of ripe melodrama here-- everything is underplayed, aching, mature. And I can say this is an adaptation that is better than the source book: it just feels so much warmer.

12 ANGRY MEN (DIR. SIDNEY LUMET, 1957

All I can say is that this was every bit equal to the hype. Common movie wisdom says people sitting and talking in a room is going to be boring on film, but movies like 12 Angry Men prove this is not so when you’ve got an excellently tense atmosphere, an inspired script, and a stable of fine actors to work with. Like The Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming, this movie has not significantly aged-- much to society’s discredit.

A STAR IS BORN (DIR. GEORGE CUKOR, 1954)

Another movie I went into not expecting to love as much as I did. When movies from the 20s or 30s tended to get remakes in the 1950s, I always find them too garish and big, victims of glossy Cinemascope and overlong runtimes. Compared to the lean 1937 classic original, I expected sheer indulgence from this three-hour remake. Instead, I got my heart torn out all over again-- the longer runtime is used well, fleshing out the characters to a greater degree. Judy Garland and James Mason both give what might be the best efforts of their respective careers, and the satire of the celebrity machine remains as relevant and scathing as ever.

BLANCANIEVES (DIR. PABLO BERGER, 2012)

Oh, it feels like this movie was made for me specifically. It’s shot in gorgeous, expressionistic black-and-white. It’s set in the 1920s. It’s a clever adaptation of a classic fairy tale. It’s as funny and charming as it is bittersweet and macabre. Instead of more superhero movies, can we get more neo-silent movies like this? PLEASE?

THE FAVOURITE (DIR. YORGOS LANTHIMOS, 2018)

I’ve heard The Favourite described as a “bitchy lesbian Shakespeare play,” but this description, while a little true in terms of general tone, does not get to the heart of what makes this film brilliant. More than love or sex, this movie is about power-- particularly the corrupting influence of power. And it corrupts not only morals but love itself. Innocents become Machiavellian schemers. Lovers become sadomasochistic enemies. Good intentions turn to poison. This certainly isn’t a happy movie, but it is moving and, strangely enough, also hilarious. I was reminded of the chilly, satirical world of Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon more than once-- and for me, that is not a bad movie to be reminded of.

ON THE WATERFRONT (DIR. ELIA KAZAN, 1954)

Another classic that’s been on my list forever that I was delighted to find worthy of its reputation. It’s a classic tale of redemption and social justice, perfectly acted and shot. While I still prefer A Streetcar Named Desire as far as Kazan is concerned, this might be a better movie in the objective sense. Actually, more than even Brando, Karl Malden is the acting highlight for me-- he plays a priest torn between staying silent or truly speaking for the Gospel by demanding justice for the poor parish he serves. Just brilliant work.

KLUTE (DIR. ALAN J. PAKULA, 1971)

A perfect thriller, just about, and a great example of the “NYC is hell on earth” subgenre of the 1960s and 1970s. Jane Fonda is a revelation: she feels so real, not at all like a starlet trying to seem normal if you know what I mean.

KISS KISS BANG BANG (DIR. SHANE BLACK, 2005)

As far as subversive noir goes, this is the most entertaining. I would put it up there with The Big Lebowski as far as goofy takes on Raymond Chandler are concerned-- I don’t even really know what to make of it, but I laughed my ass off anytime I wasn’t going “WHAT???”

What were your favorite film discoveries in 2019?

[rynhaswritersblock]

letters | p.p.

summary: after too long a wait for you and peter to just get together, the team decides to get you together their way.

warnings: mild cussing, awkwardness, super fluffy ending (cause that's what i do best)

+ + +

"Insanity," Tony sighs, watching you and Peter walk to your separate rooms after a very awkward yet somewhat flirty conversation.

"It's like they're afraid that admitting their feelings will kill them or something," Bruce shakes his head.

"Enough of this," Steve says, scooting forward on the couch and putting his elbows on his knees, leaning forward. Everyone, seeing his seriousness, simultaneously leans in. "we need to find a way to get Y/N and Peter to confess their love for one another. Anyone got any ideas?"

The group of heroes looks around at each other, thoughtful looks on their faces, yet no ideas coming out of their mouths. Wanda lets out a slight gasp, struck with an idea.

"We could do a little spin on this popular movie I watched a few days ago?" she suggests.

"Which would be...?" Bucky asks.

"It's called To All the Boys I've Loved Before,"

"Oh! I've seen that one on Instagram!" Shuri smiles.

"Yeah. What I was thinking was maybe we could write letters to Y/N and Peter pretending that they're from each other," Wanda says, eyebrows lifted in anticipation.

Tony claps his hands together. "Perfect."

With that, the group gets to work, everyone assigned their own jobs in order to make this project the best it could be. Wanda gave everyone a premise as to what was in these letters while Natasha came up with the wording, Shuri writing "from Y/N," and Dr. Strange writing "from Peter."

Needless to say, Strange was unhappy with his job, especially since he was chosen for it right away, since "doctors have the messiest handwriting." It took Clint reminding him that it was an insult to Peter, as well, for him to lift his offence.

After an hour of careful writing and Bruce hurriedly searching up synonyms for words, the letters were done. Sure, they were a bit cheesy and maybe not as authentic as they could be, but, in the words of Tony: "If they're stupid enough to not get together after all this time, they're stupid enough to believe these letters."

And so, once the team passed the envelopes around, planting kisses onto each (Bucky getting really passionate during his turn, of course), the letters were ready to be sent.

+ + +

You sat on your bed, working on an assignment for school. A frustrated groan fell from your lips as you read the next question, running your fingers through you hair and pulling on the strands.

"I really don't give a crap about hydrogen b-"

Your mutters were cut off by the sound of paper sliding across the floor. You look over to the door, an envelope laying on the ground with your name scribbled across it. You furrow your brows, sliding off the bed and walking towards the object, leaning down and grabbing it.

Your name was scribbled on the envelope in a messy yet neat way, the handwriting reminding you of Peter's. Your eyes narrowed at the writing before you realized that it was Peter's handwriting. You chewed on your lip as you walked back to your bed, carefully opening the envelope and pulling a piece of paper out of it.

Y/N L/N, I've liked you for a long time. I'm not really good at talking about stuff like this and I may end up just rambling, but I'm trying here. I've been too scared, well, terrified, actually, of telling you how I feel in real life. So here I am, I guess. I've had a crush on you ever since we met at the airport in Germany and really hope you feel the same. God, this is stupid, but oh well. I like you. From, Peter

Your mouth drops slightly as you read the note, furrowing your brows at some points.

Peter likes you back.

Still, there was something weird about it.

Whether it was the odd tone of the text or the fact that no one had ever liked you back in your whole life, something felt off.

Nevertheless, your thoughts were consumed by three words: I like you.

+ + +

Peter sat at his desk, bottom lip caught between his teeth and brows furrowed as he worked on an old piece of tech he found in Tony's lab. With one final pull, he snapped off a piece he'd been working on, a satisfied sigh falling from his lips. He leaned back in his chair for a moment.

An envelope slipped underneath his door, causing the boy to turn his head towards it, untamed curls shaking slightly at the movement. Feeling lazy, he tapped his wrists together, web-shooters forming around them. With the flick of his wrist, he webbed the envelope and it flew straight into his hands.

His eyes moved across the object. His name was printed neatly in what he recognized to be your handwriting, or at least close to it. With a slight shrug, he slipped his finger across the envelope, opening it and pulling the letter out.

Peter Parker, I like you.

A gasp fell from the boys lips, looking away from the paper in almost pure confusion before returning to it, eager and slightly distraught.

I know we're best friends and liking you might make everything weird, but it's the truth. You and I both know that I'm not very good at expressing my feelings, but I'm really trying here, and hope you'll understand. You're my best friend and have always been so funny and accepting and weird and strong and brave and stubborn and I really appreciate that. So. Yeah. From, Y/N

A wild range of emotions ran through Peter that made him instantly dizzy. One on hand, you like him back, but on the other hand, this seemed pretty out of character for you. It would've already been difficult to process that you liked him if you just told him, but you sending him a letter?

Seemed a bit odd.

Still, his thoughts were consumed by three words: I like you.

+ + +

You set the letter down next to you on the bed, tapping your foot anxiously. It had only been a few minutes since you read it, but you were going insane.

You had to tell someone.

A defeated groan falls from your lips before you shake your head, grabbing the paper and running out of the room and to the commons. You turn the corner, socks sliding across the floor, and see the entire team sitting and watching a movie. Just as their heads turn to you, the sound of footsteps come pounding down the opposite hall. You turn, hand raising the letter in the air, to see Peter come bursting in.

His eyes meet yours.

You immediately recoil, overcome by awkwardness and fear of confrontation, and crumple the letter, sprinting off to your room.

Peter does the exact same thing.

The team waits until they hear the sounds of your doors shutting before throwing their heads back and groaning.

"Idiots," Rhodey shakes his head.

"I swear, it's like they're those opposite magnets. They can only get so close," Natasha sighs.

Thor pitches in. "Back on Asgard we didn't have this problem. If anything, we showed our affection too much, if you know what I'm saying."

"Ugh," Natasha says, pinching her nose.

"Alright, that's it," Tony blurts. "I'm locking them in a room together."

Everyone shares glances before shrugging and nodding, watching the man to see how he wants to accomplish this.

"F.R.I.D.A.Y., can you call Y/N and Peter to the training room and lock them in once they're both there, please?"

"Will do," the A.I. responds.

"And pull up the live security footage on the commons TV, would you?"

+ + +

"Y/N, Tony Stark has requested for you to go to the training room."

You lift your head from your hands, brows furrowed.

"What? Why?" you ask. You didn't mind training, but you thought you were training tomorrow, not this evening.

"He's requested that you go immediately." F.R.I.D.A.Y. replies.

"Alright," you mutter, sliding off your bed and slipping on your training shoes before heading out.

The doors slide open, letting you enter to see Peter, chewing nervously on his bottom lip and fiddling with his fingers.

"Shit," you whisper, turning on your heel.

But you just about walk into the glass, the doors not opening for you. You tilt your head in confusion, lifting an arm to manually open it instead.

Locked.

"The doors are locked from the outside," Peter says, nervousness laced around his words.

"Double shit," you mutter before turning and grabbing your fingers; messing with them was a habit both you and Peter had when you were nervous. You began twisting your ring around your finger, not caring about the red marks that would eventually show up.

"So..." Peter starts, unsure of what to say.

"So..."

The two of you look at each other, just a few feet apart, nervously fidgeting. You both open your mouths.

"I got a letter confessing your love for me and I don't know what to do."

Your words intertwine with Peter's, coming out at the exact same time. Confused expressions grow on your faces.

"Wait, you got a letter, too?"

Again, you speak in unison with the boy, causing light smiles to tug at each other's lips before you dig into your pocket, pulling out the crumpled piece of paper. The two of you switch papers.

You cringe as you read your "letter" to Peter. Sure, it was decently accurate, but, if you were gonna write him a note confessing your love, it would not have been like that.

"That's not..." Peter mutters as his eyes skim over the paper.

You look up at him. "What?"

"Wha-" his head snaps up to look at you. "Oh, it's... it's nothing."

"Peter, what?" you ask.

Your tone breaks the boy's barrier, making him spill.

"This says I had a crush on you since Germany. That's not true."

Shit.

You ignore the stupid pain in your chest. "So, wait, you don't-"

"I've been in love with you ever since you totally killed me in a training session, then tripped on your way out."

The words knock the air out of your lungs.

"You're in love with me?" you whisper.

Peter's fidgeting only worsens as he nods.

"I'm in love with you, too." you say.

A smile breaks on his face and he points a hand, webbing your wrist and pulling you to him. Strong, familiar arms wrap around you and you hug him back, resting your head on his chest. After a few seconds, you pull away, confused.

"Then who wrote these letters?"

Peter furrows his brows before he's struck with realization, sighing.

"The team."

"Oh my God," you mutter, turning and running towards the doors, Peter following suit. "Why won't these open?"

The two of you push on the doors, which barely even budge.

"Hey! Lovebirds!"

Sam's voice rings through the intercom, making you jump back in surprise. You and Peter look up at the security camera, now pretty much positive that the entire team was watching your exchange.

"Guys, let us out," Peter says.

"Hey, hey, hey, now, wait a second," Sam says, his tone cocky. "I don't believe you two are done with this little moment, yet, are you?"

A groan falls from your lips.

"What do you want me to do, make out with the boy? What, do you want us to have sex?" You ask, lifting a brow at the camera.

Peter jumps slightly at the word, face reddening at the very idea. Of course he had thought about it- he was a teenage boy- but hearing you talk about it was a whole different thing.

"Pete, just kiss the girl, goddamnit." Sam sighs.

You let out a snort, beginning to sing Kiss the Girl before Peter grabs your neck, bringing you to him and connecting your lips. Your singing stops immediately as you kiss back, placing your hands on his chest. You slowly pull away, smiling at Peter before turning to the camera and flipping it off, receiving multiple shouts from the team through the intercom.

Peter smirks at you and raises his brow and you smile, jumping onto his back. The boy runs through the doors, which finally unlocked, and to the commons with you on his back.

The boy dances around (which, in turn, makes you wobble around funnily on top of him) while you point at the team, sticking your tongue at them. You and Peter then begin singing Kiss the Girl, which makes the team join in.

Needless to say, the dance party you had that night went hard.

+ + +

much love <3

[shinygoku]

Thunderbirds (2004)

A review by me, CutCat! This is 8-ish pages long!

Spoiler for the end of the film warning: Alan is in International Rescue. What a twist!

Totally Turbulent

Soooo, Tbirds ‘04 is one of those Infamous Adaptations, at least among those who enjoyed Thunderbirds (’65) and of more recent times, Thunderbirds are Go (’15). It’s one of those Bad Live Action Adaptations to a near sacred property, making it dubious contemporaries with Dragon Ball [Evolution], Avatar [The Last Airbender] and suchlike.

But wait, is it really That Bad?? Why is it as divisive as it is? What caused the film to be the way it is, and quite unpopular at that?

First I’m gonna make a long story very short by saying that a Live Action Thunderbirds movie was on and off production for many years, and that the script we ended up with is apparently better than another one that was pitched... but there are reports of cooler scripts further back that never made it, for various reasons. It’s almost a story of it’s own right but I’m only going by 2nd hand information at best, so I’d rather just link them at the end for Additional Reading if y’all felt so inclined.

With that out of the way, we have the Takes from the Andersons to look at. Sylvia had a very favourable reception to it:

"I felt that I'd been on a wonderful Thunderbirds adventure. You, the fans, will I'm sure, appreciate the sensitive adaptation and I'm personally thrilled that the production team have paid us the great compliment of bringing to life our original concept for the big screen. If we had made it ourselves (and we have had over 30 years to do it!) we could not have improved on this new version. It is a great tribute to the original creative team who inspired the movie all those years ago. It was a personal thrill for me to see my characters come to life on the big screen."

Whereas Gerry had a considerably blunter response at the opposite end of the scale:

"the biggest load of crap I have ever seen in my entire life."

As for me, a mere fan of predominantly the TAG series with limited but fond memories of the 90’s TOS reruns, I’d been inclined to ignore it and write it off as a DBE or TLA lost cause. But the combined effect of me deciding to check out unpopular media for myself, namely Dragon Ball GT and the live action Super Mario Bros. movie, and thoroughly enjoying both; and the other effect of TAG finishing but my fixation reawakening with the need to consume More, I dived deeper into the fan base than I had dared to before, in which I found more reasons to watch it and make up my own mind fairly.

Find out what I thought, and a review of the movie itself, below the Cut! ✂

Stormy Story

Ok, enough teasing, I see good things in the movie but not enough for it to be a secret masterpiece, not by a long shot.

1/3 Stars from Me. That’s Poor. (Compare with 2/3 being Good, and 3/3 being Excellent)

My main beef is unfortunately kinda the crux of the whole story, so while there were aspects I really liked, it had permanently set the bar low, and other issues were not helping matters. I’ll go into the problems after I sum up the plot.

[sitcom harp music]

14 Year Old Alan Tracy is stuck in a stuffy school with only his nerd friend to confide in. Something’s eating him up, and it’s jealousy over how his family are International Rescue, the secret rescue workers whole pilot the Thunderbirds, impossibly cool craft with capabilities vastly exceeding standard technology. Even when he’s allowed out of school and back to the Island, his envy and barely repressed resentment over not being a member himself causes him to go off and sulk and to try taking Thunderbird 1, the hypersonic jet plane, for a joyride.

His father and the leader of International Rescue, Jeff Tracy chews Alan out for almost compromising the need for the organisation to remain secret, lest their advanced technology falling into the wrong hands. Alas, said wrong hands are already working against IR: The Hood, a diabolical, cold blooded criminal with psychic powers and a grudge against Jeff. After successfully tracking the location of Tracy Island, he launches a missile towards Thunderbird 5, the Space Station where IR monitor potential disasters to prevent as much damage as possible, manned by John Tracy.

With TB5 crippled and John injured, Jeff and his other three older sons all scramble to the disaster zone via Thunderbird 3, the Rocket Ship. But with Tracy Island largely unmanned, The Hood moves in and aims to use the Thunderbirds to rob bank vaults while simultaneously smearing International Rescue’s good name. As the only Tracy brother left on Earth, it’s up to Alan and his 2 friends, Fermat and Tin-Tin, to foil the Hood and save his family, proving himself worthy in the process. He is also assisted by IR’s London Agent, Lady Penelope, and her driver/butler/lockpicker, Parker.

...

Ok, so that’s a summary you may read on the back of a DVD box, maybe it’s a bit long but whatever. Do you see what’s wrong with the story? The massive rift in the formula that should be within a template set by the hugely popular TV Series?

Critical Crux

For me, the main issue with the movie is that the Tracy family are thrown under a bus, or perhaps it’s more like being locked in a closet, in order for Alan to rise up and be The Hero. A show that was about each of them having different roles and personalities to the others, and the movie sees the best way to adapt the premise is to reduce 3 of them to cardboard cutouts who aren’t allowed to do or say anything meaningful, with the exception to this getting the dubious honour of getting a missile and exploding space station to the face.

I can’t clearly express how much this pisses me off! It’s downright insulting and baffling as well. They had pre established characters right there for the taking but go NO! Let’s make OCs to fill this newly created void instead and make the main Message of the film Friendship Teamwork.

Why does every child-skewed media hafta have the Friendship message? It’s a good one, sure, but nothing said in this film about it was fresh or original. Y’know what I see far, far less? Not just in Kid Flavoured Media, but all sorts? The importance of Brotherly Bonds between actual brothers!! I don’t subscribe to the massively misunderstood message version of ‘Blood is thicker than water’, but a story with the siblings actually pushed and stressed and coming out stronger at the end would have ruled!!

[For what it’s worth, the actual saying is “The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb”, i.e. the bonds you choose to forge are more important than happening to be born to certain people. This correct message is still compatible with literal siblings though!]

The other, somewhat lesser Large Issue with the movie is simply that we don’t see much in the way of Rescues with the titular Thunderbirds. We only get the tail end of the Oil Rig in Act 1, and then the ‘Birds are used predominantly to get to London and save 1 Monorail Car with TB4.

Watsonian Woes & Doylist Dilemma

When looking at Media, there’s 2 main angles to consider; Doylist and Watsonian. Doylist is the “real life / meta” angle, the structure of the story or interests of the author being in the plot, that kinda thing. Watsonian is the reason given within the story.

All stories have Watsonian and Doylist reasonings, the trick is to blend them in and not use a weedy Watsonian reason for something stupid happening.

Why bring this up? Because it’s still part of the Huge Problem I have with the film; the Doylist reason for all of IR being incapacitated so easily is so Alan can shine without fighting for focus in a large group. I don’t like it, but let’s go along with it for now.

Believe it or not, but I can accept that a Movie format isn’t going to be the same as an ongoing series. There’s way less time and you gotta hit certain beats. Ideally you also condense the essence of the show into the film while being more than just a long episode. They didn’t hit this note in my opinion...

But other than ‘It has to happen for he story to work’, there’s no damn reason for all the Non-Alan Tracys to be cooped up in the crippled TB5! They put all their eggs into one basket when a considerably more sensible choice woulda been to have a small crew, and the others remain on base. Because even without factoring in a worst case scenario where another missile hits them while in space, killing them all, which totally could have happened for all they know, there’s also the part about them being International Rescue! They gotta be ready to respond to other disasters should those develop. TB1, 2 and 4 were still available for use!

If I was Jeff making the boneheaded decision, I would have taken a second to think about it and have 1 of the Bros come up in 3 with me. Seeing to John shouldn’t be something 4 people are needed for, it would just get more crowded and the oxygen would be used way faster! Considering they all come close to asphyxiating, 2 less people would mean things weren’t so damn close to the wire! (Granted, the movie also has them falling into Earth’s atmosphere and burning up as a hazard, but the whole crew being there doesn’t affect that.)

Jeff! You’re the patriarch and supposedly most experienced dude in the whole movie! Why didja run into that trap with both eyes open? Stressful situation, sure, but in the Rescue Business you need to be able to listen to the cold, clinical angle. You’re risking more of your sons’ lives making such a rash judgement!!

Character Conundrums

This is the part of the review where I begin to really emphasise the differences between TOS and this movie. I’ll hold off TAG for now in the interest of fairness.

The movie is a mixed bag when it comes to the individuals within it. Some have been refreshing updates to stuffy 60′s tropes, but several draw the short straw, feeling even stiffer than their marionette precursors.

Alan - Hoo, boy. The plot follows Alan.... for the third time if you’re factoring in the Supermarionation movies, which was quite the baffling choice as Puppet!Alan is quite the obnoxious jerk. But whatever, new movie, new canon, new Alan. While the Alan of the 60′s was a bizarrely whiny brat of a character considering he was supposed to at least be in his early 20′s this Alan at least makes more sense to be annoying. But yes, he starts off as a sullen jerk with unclearly defined jealousy towards his own brothers and seemingly a lack of grasping the stakes behind International Rescue, viewing being one of the crew as a Cool Job rather than a gruelling, life-risking ordeal. Over the course of the movie (mostly Act 3) he becomes less of a berk and a better team player, even going as far as to save the Hood personally.

Jeff - One of the stronger characters in the movie, even with this poor choice I’ve gone on about already, haha. You get the real impression the job means the world to him, but still secondary to his sons. An update and improvement to the sometimes stodgy and holier-than-thou character from the 60′s, plus his proactive role makes him way less of a backseat driver.

Lady Penelope - Best character and a splendid update to the 60′s Socialite. This Penny is always a delight to see, although her ability to change clothes offscreen sometimes pushes plausibility, haha. She and Jeff also have very natural and endearing chemistry, so for this iteration at least, I’m up for shipping them, something I can’t say for TOS.

Parker - Remarkably true to the beloved puppet version and another highlight. His interplay with Penelope is some of the best dialogue in the whole movie, and was written by Richard Curtis in an uncredited role, or so I’ve read.

The Hood - A shockingly sadistic and cold blooded so-and-so. His Psychic powers have been given a huge boost, and the depths of his spite generates all the tense scenes the movie has to offer. His performance may be the best in the whole film, simultaneously over the top while also completely deadly.

Tin-Tin - Y’know, Tin-Tin is a funny character, in how she’s very different in all versions. I enjoy her in TOS, but her potential as an engineering assistant, mathematician and member of IR are quickly discarded to make her a secretary, which is further demoted to bringing coffee. Ahh, The Sixties! One of her other defining features was the sometimes bickering sexual tension with Alan. Movie!Tin-Tin is still the implied love interest [and the same age] with him, but she’s also an Action Girl extraordinaire, with abilities bordering on metahuman. She can trek through the jungle without slowing down, she can dive underwater for prolonged sequences, and has a variation of her Evil Uncle’s Psychic capabilities, but used for good. Notably, the Kayo of TAG takes significantly more from this Tin-Tin to the original, sadly sans Telekinesis.

Fermat - The only OC I’m gonna dignify with a section here lol. He’s basically mini-Brains, complete with the way he t-ta-tal- -distinctive speech patterns. But yeah, as the hypersmart and nerdy pal, I feel that his role is pretty superfluous, though his performance in the movie got me to soften up, he’s a good kid. Just one who, like, is part of the deal breaking issue I have with the whole film. In a way I think he’d have made a better lead than Alan lmao

Brains - Not much to say here, he’s also a dude in distress for a majority of his screentime. Seems to be older than his TOS self and a bit less subservient to Jeff, but also a father ....or Fermat is his clone. They never make that clear. He’s hit on by the Hood’s Female Scientist and it’s played for comedy, more on that later.

John - In TOS, his role was infamously minimal, as Gerry Anderson took such a strong disliking to the John puppet and the TB5 model that he exiled both into space with a few token shots per episode. So in comparison, this movie is far kinder to John! He has a nice, genuine chat with Jeff, without any mission to initiate said videocall. The movie is also quite mean to John in how he gets bombed by the Hood, his space station in tatters, his arm hurt and then near suffocation with Jeff and most of his brothers. Ahh, the conundrum of being John.

Scott, Virgil and Gordon - No, they don’t even get their own paragraphs in my review. Their lack of presence and importance in the movie is my giant gripe (have you noticed yet?) and it got to the extent that I feel they could have been combined into one character to save casting money. They get maybe 5 lines each, if that. I literally can’t tell Scott and Virgil apart (I know they have name tags on their uniforms, but in most scenes I couldn’t even read that) other than knowing 1 of them is taller. Which that one is, is a mystery.

The only one with a slightly distinctive appearance and air is Gordon, which is another can of worms because he seems to be the designated Doubtful Jerk Brother and that drives me mad!! In TOS he wasn’t as main a character as Scott, Virgil or Alan, but he was still a defined person with his own abilities. And his personality was as a slightly mouthy but the most lighthearted character! Why didn’t they carry that over?!

And yeah, Scott and Virgil are pretty much the Main Two of the brothers in TOS, so their roles being reduced to 1 token act during the oil rig rescue each [Gordon didn’t even get that!] is all the more mind boggling.

Hood’s Minions - Can’t be assed to write their names out, I refer to them as Heavy Dude and Science Woman. Heavy Dude is the Heavy, and his character consists of Dumb and somewhat Sadistic Muscle. Science Woman is first objectified (we see her ass first. Yes, really.) but then it’s ‘revealed’ that as she has Austin Powers level teeth, she’s uuuuuglyyyyy and her otherwise genuine attraction towards Brains is played for laughs with this angle. And that’s still female on male sexual harassment, which doesn’t fly with me. Eeeesh. Bad writing! She does Science Things for Hood.

The Rest - Kyrano and his wife are in this. Wife is Original but basically Grandma’s role, though she doesn’t even get a single word to say. Rip. Also the Hood has a few more generic mooks from somewhere, but seemingly only for part of the movie. Kyrano didn’t do much in the show except get bullied by the Hood and little has changed.

Tone Trouble

I feel like the movie has a bit of an issue with balancing a consistent Tone. Again, let’s look back at TOS. It was a Family Show, designed to not just appeal to little kids, but to also keep their parent and other adult amused. Maybe some of it was also the result of the times, but striking to me is that they allowed the characters to get pretty hurt, complete with red paint being applied to look like realistic blood. Some of the criminals, including the Hood himself, would be very vicious, how he treats Brains in Desperate Intruder comes to mind. There was even firefights resulting in death, like the memorable climax of Operation Crash-Dive, where Gordon has to shoot a saboteur in the back, into the open sea below the compromised plane. He then proceeds to hold the cut wires together with his bare hands. Don’t try this at home, kids!

So while I can understand some of that being removed from the Movie (and TAG), there’s still the irritating going down to a perceived kid’s level for the majority of the film, which is probably also a large reason for the massive structural change. But then, there’s shockingly dark implications here and there, and the haunting sight of the crew trapped on TB5 floating lifelessly in the dark, asphyxiating. But then, again, we have goofy choreographed fight scenes with juvenile stock cartoon sounds. And then, we have Hood force choking Alan?! It has been mostly consistent until Act 3, then the tone goes up and down more than the flying machines.

Revamped Rockets

I’m mostly talking about the main craft here, though I know the Pod vehicles got modified too, I’m not sufficiently a TOS Pod Buff to go over them.

TB1 - Looks real nice! Maintains and even enhances the sleekness, and the idea of a glass cockpit is much better than having 1 tiny window and a dinky TV screen to see by. Oddly dark inside the cockpit considering how much glass there is, though. Probably my fav of the Movie Fleet.

TB2 - Oof. Looks bad, man. Like, really ugly. What have they done to the glorious design that was the Original Big Green? The unofficial mascot from her importance and unorthodox style? They turned her into a stubby, too glossy, chunky bar of green soap. The thick ass legs are a good idea but it sure ain’t enough. Also, she carries 3 smaller pods insteada 1 big one.

TB3 - Like TB1, pretty much the same design but streamlined a little. Docks with 5 sidewise instead of like pen going into its lid.

TB4 - I’m mixed. I like the idea of giving her a glass canopy and extendable arms, but the movie’s version is so boxy she looks more like a small yellow Greenhouse with the rear half of the old Four, haha. The arms also look a little stiff, can they bend? Now, if there was a sleek, glass hulled, variable armed, demolition charges-loaded Four, that would be my favourite possible version ;3 Four is my fav craft in TOS and TAG, for what it’s worth.

TB5 - I say it’s quite a visual improvement over TOS and the odds and ends jumbled look that had, though I do appreciate a bit of Chunkiness. This one really needs to have better defence too, TOS 5 may’ve been able to tank that missile lmao

FAB1 - I know that she would have been a Rolls Royce in the film, but BMW said no, so that’s not a point against the movie. And failing the classic image, it’s cute that it’s a Ford Thunderbird, though I’d have preferred one with those 50′s/60′s stylish fins personally lol. Her ability to fly is new here unless you count the Dream Sequence in Are Go (’66) and the water mode was also seen in that before this, and she gets the job done, though we don’t get to see as many gadgets and gizmos in the course of the film.

Unlikely Uniforms

I really don’t understand these. Why are they off white with minimal accent colours? What was wrong with the blueness of their suits and the broad stripe of a secondary colour? I sure ain’t saying the 60’s costumes were practical or even that fashionable, but they were very distinctive and striking!

Not only that, but for some strange unexplained reason, their uniforms all correspond not to their own speciality, but to which craft they’re currently piloting. Even if they’re all in the same Bird...! So like, four out of five are wearing identical looking red accented suits while locked in TB5. I already find the elder brothers to be the Similar Squad, and their microscopic name tags don’t help!

Why don’t they wear their own coloured uniforms all the time? Then ya don’t need the name tag at all! And the silly implication from the way there’s apparently a whole set of Craft Specific uniforms is that there’s piles of clothes that ain’t getting used in all of them, like the tiny TB4 probably having 6 whole sets on board at the end of the film.

Between that, no blue and the outfits looking like Generic Sports Wear, the only nice thing to say is the THUNDERBIRDS down the sleeve is a cool touch. Which should really say International Rescue or IR...

Mingled Misc.

Yeah, The conflation of Thunderbirds and International Rescue is a tad irritating but it’s actually something I can overlook. It’s not a dealbreaker and it makes sense the Dumbass Public would misunderstand and call them the wrong thing.

Jeff refuses Alan early access into IR and cites “No shortcuts”. Then at the end he echoes this when he is making Alan an official member, saying he did it with no shortcuts. The whole faffing scenario was a giant shortcut!!! Fuck training and being a suitable age, am I right?!

Amazingly I didn’t cover this already, but when Alan shortcuts his way onto the team he’s made pilot of ... TB4. That’s why he’s in yellow accents in the pic. Gordon is seemingly the main pilot of TB3 instead, but the movie doesn’t deign to make that clear. While I appreciate that the 14 year old with no Astronaut training isn’t put in charge of 3 instantly, I resent the careless removal of characterisation. Obviously movie Gordon never served with WASP or won the gold medal in swimming or had a massive hydrofoil crash to nearly kill him but ggggghgggaaahhhhhhhhh

Also what’s with the implication that Four is the Babby’s First Machine? She’s a highly specialised craft that would require different training to flying or Space shit! How dare you?! The most charitable link is that Alan stood around in 4 as Tin-Tin did most of the work herself, but I guess it coulda as some level of experience.

Ford Sponsorship - Gets a bit much! It’s one thing for all the cars to be Ford, but them seemingly owning the News is like an unpleasant look into a world where corporations run everything.... hahahaahaaaaaa........

Marvellous Music

Something the movie really excells at is the tunes! The remix of the Thunderbirds March is good in it’s own right and very welcome, and the new music is all solid. Special mention to Busted’s outro song for slapping so hard even people who hate the movie leave warm youtube comments about the song. I have a habit of listening to it set to TAG footage myself, haha

Sincere Summation

Look, I’ve come off negative in this, but I honestly have a lot of respect for a lot of the parts of this picture. Hood, Penelope, Parker and Jeff are fantastic, the physical models and sets have a lot of care and loving detail poured in, the music is all bangers and other little nods and homages to the show shine brightly. The director got a lot of good work in and I hold him no ill will.

I think the problem is in the Writing and probably Studio Mandates, I’m not 100% sure, but things often get snaggy when the studio you’re working under gets bought out by a bigger company partway through. Again, I’ll refer to the info I’ve seen instead of trying to relay it in my own words.

And they made a real bad call snubbing Gerry as a Creative Consultant. Some of his venom towards the film may be from that, as well as his alleged preference to Team America: World Police as a theatrical homage. And I’ve seen that before and wouldn’t really say that’s true to the spirit of Thunderbirds, but yeah...

I’d be interested in any future Thunderbirds Movies, if that’s ever on the cards again. I’d probably be even more up for continuation of the TAG series, or newer new Captain Scarlet with International Rescue involved. Either way, I want new footage of the Birds taking off again, be it puppet, people, CGI, or something new~

Extra Reading

https://securityhazard.net/2017/05/19/thunderbirds-2004/ Full movie review, warm reception. Contains photos of set pieces and costumes.

http://groovyfokker.blogspot.com/2013/02/thunderbirds-arent-go-unfilmed-versions.html Insight into some of the past issues developing a Movie, but gets some basic information wrong (Since when is Gordon the youngest and TB3 orange??)

Thanks if ya’ve been reading the whole thing! <3

[camillemontespan]

love is blind [TRR gang]

Who’s been watching Love is Blind on Netflix? Who’s become obsessed?

I hate reality TV but this show really pulled me in. So, I was inspired to write a short fic that is inspired by the show.

The premise: In this experiment, people are on the show to meet their future wife/husband. The thing is, they will never actually see each other until after they get engaged. They spend a few days talking in these pods that are separated by a wall. In one pod is the guy, in the opposite pod is the woman. They talk over speakers and fall in love based on emotional connection.

It’s fucking batshit. 

I fancied writing this short thing. It’s not even finished, I don’t know if I’ll update this because tbh I’m so busy this weekend and then I’ll be away, but I just wanted to get this down. 

Sorry for the recent spamming of fics. I’m now unemployed. 

@loveellamae​ @emichelle​ @moonlightgem7​ @ibldw-main​ @burnsoslow​ @mskaneko​ @fromthedeskofpaisleybleakmore​ @pug-bitch​ @katedrakeohd​ @marshmallowsaremyfavorite​ @jovialyouthmusic​

****************************************************

DAY 1 OF EXPERIMENT

Question: why the contestant is taking part in this blind love experiment. Are they romantic?

*************************

Leo eyes the camera and chuckles to himself. ‘Me? Romantic?’ he asks. ‘Hell no. But hey, I like an adventure and this is definitely the craziest thing I’ve ever done in my life. And I gotta tell you.. I’ve done some crazy shit in my time.’

********************************

Liam grins happily and nods. ‘I am what you would call a hopeless romantic,’ he answers. ‘I love romance and big grand gestures. If this works, how amazing a story would this be to tell my grandchildren? Your grandmother and I got engaged before we even saw each other. What a story!’

*******************************

Maxwell enters the room and gives a twirl before settling down on the chair. He gives the camera a wave. ‘Am I romantic?’ he muses. ‘Definitely. I’m taking part in this because I want to meet someone who likes me for me. Loads of girls I know are quick to write me off as being a bit weird. They don’t make an effort to get to know me. So I’d like to find a girl who sees me, like really sees me, you know? That would make me so happy.’

*******************************

Drake enters the room and instantly locates the decanter of whiskey. He pours himself a glass and takes a long swig before sitting down to speak to the camera. ‘Why am I taking part?’ he asks. ‘I lost a bet.’

He is asked if he is romantic. He shakes his head. ‘I’m too cynical for that romantic crap. I’m genuinely wondering who all these people are who have willingly signed up for this. Why would you do this? Why would you agree to marry someone before ever setting eyes on them? Is love blind? No. This isn’t a fairytale. This is real life.’ He sips his whiskey again. ‘Gotta say though.. If I meet the girl of my dreams, and that’s a big if, then I’ll give up whiskey for life.’

*******************************

Bertrand clears his throat and arranges his suit jacket delicately, feeling self conscious about being on camera. ‘I’m taking part in this because my brother, Maxwell, is,’ he admits. ‘I want to look out for him here. If I happen to meet a beautiful lady who loves classical music, the opera and literature, then that is a bonus. But we’ll see.’ He smiles now, looking down at his feet. ‘I’m a romantic deep down. I’m yet to show my true colours.’

******************************

Olivia struts into the room and sits on the chair, crossing her legs with her back ramrod straight. She rolls her eyes. ‘I’m not romantic, no,’ she says dryly. ‘I don’t believe in love at first sight, never mind that love is blind.’

She is asked why she is taking part. She smirks. ‘I want to blow this experiment apart,’ she says. ‘It’s bullshit.’

Olivia stands up now and helps herself to a glass of champagne. She toasts the camera. ‘Cheers bitches.’

*********************************

Camille enters the room and sits down, giving the camera a warm smile. ‘I’m a real romantic, yeah. I really like talking about feelings, it annoys my friends so much but honestly, I love this idea! I love the fact that this is stripped back, down to the bare bones, focusing just on communication. I love the idea of getting to know someone for who they are deep down with no judgement. I’m excited.’

Does she think she’ll meet the one? Camille laughs. ‘I have no idea. Probably not. But I’m open to meeting him if he’s here.’

************************************

Hana sits down and tucks a lock of her hair behind her ear. ‘I’m taking part because I never do crazy things like this,’ she says quietly. ‘I’m always really careful, really reserved. I also feel like nobody knows the real Hana Lee; nobody bothers to in the real world. So this is my chance. I want someone to see me for me. Am I romantic? Yes. Love is the best thing in the world.’

***********************************

Kiara enters the room and looks around, whispering in French. She sits down and nods at the camera. ‘I’m taking part because I would like to meet a man who knows what he wants in life,’ she says. ‘I’ve got ambitions and I’m yet to meet someone who can be at my level. I want to meet someone intelligent and kind. Am I romantic? Not really. But I’m realistic in who I will and won’t date.’

**********************************

Penelope enters the room and waves at the camera. ‘I joined this experiment because for so long, it’s just been me and my dogs,’ she says. ‘I want to meet someone who takes me seriously, who actually wants to spend time with me. I’m a really nice person and it hurts sometimes when guys treat me badly. Maybe I just make bad decisions? I’m hoping that being separated by a wall means that the guys I talk to won’t judge me quickly; they’ll take the time to get to know me.’

***********************************

Aurelia enters the room. ‘Alriiiight, alcohol!’ she cheers, making her way over to the drinks trolley to pour herself some wine. She then catches herself. ‘Shit, am I allowed to do this?’

She sits down and smiles at the camera. ‘I’m taking part in this experiment because I’m really curious to see if this works. I’d love it if it did, how wild would that be?! A story to tell the grandkids, right? I guess, also, in the age of tinder, I’m sick of the dating scene. It’s so harsh, it’s like the fucking Hunger Games. Let’s see if this works. I’m excited.’

********************************

Drake settled down on the plush sofa in the pod and sipped his glass of whiskey. This was his first ‘date’ of the show. He had no idea what to expect. In this pod, it was just him. On the other side of the wall was his date’s pod. A woman in the same situation as him. 

He wondered what they would talk about. How weird this was? Probably. 

‘Hello?’

Drake jumped at the female voice that sounded over the speakers in his pod. ‘Uhh, hi?’ he replied back. 

The voice giggled. ‘Oh my God, this is crazy.’

Drake smirked. ‘I know, right? Insane. So... ‘

‘Are you drinking right now?’ she asked him. 

‘How did you know?’ Drake asked, sipping his whiskey.

‘Because I’m eyeing up that drink trolley and wondering if it’s okay to have some wine. You know, to calm my nerves.’

Drake chuckled. ‘Go ahead.’

He could hear the sound of wine being poured. 

Finally, she spoke again. ‘Okay, I’m settled down. So, what’s your name?’

‘Drake Walker. You?’

‘Camille Montespan.’

Drake smiled despite himself. Pretty name. 

‘Cool,’ he said. He opened his notebook that had a list of questions he wanted to ask. ‘So, Camille, where you from, how old are you, yada yada?’

Camille laughed. ‘Yada yada?’ she asked. ‘Wow, big talker. Okay, I’m from New York and I’m 27. You?’

‘I’m from Texas,’ Drake replied. ‘I’m 28.’

‘Texas huh?’ she said. ‘Are you a cowboy?’

‘Ha, I wish!’ Drake laughed. ‘I do own a cowboy costume though.’

Why the fuck had he just admitted that?

‘You do?!’ Camille cried. ‘Oh my gosh, details please. Like a halloween costume or something for the bedroom?’

Drake smirked. ‘If I said it was for the bedroom, would you like that?’

Camille let out a throaty laugh that warmed Drake from inside. He liked her voice too. It was a warm voice that reminded him of caramel. 

‘You know, I really would,’ she said. ‘Is it for the bedroom?’

‘Nah, it’s a costume I had to wear for the county fair when I was 18,’ Drake admitted. ‘Not sexy.’

‘Hmmm, yeah, not sexy,’ Camille agreed. ‘What’s Texas like?’

Drake settled back into the chair and got comfortable. ‘It’s warm,’ he said. ‘My family have a ranch so I spent my childhood outdoors. Mucking out the stables, riding the horses, fishing.. We have a lake by the ranch. My dad used to host 4th July parties, he was like the king of 4th July.’

Why the fuck was he suddenly talking about his dad?

‘That sounds amazing,’ Camille said. ‘So what’s your dad like? Is he keen on you being part of this weird experiment?’

Drake’s jaw set. He clenched the glass in his hand and didn’t answer. 

‘Drake?’ Camille’s voice was concerned. ‘Drake, you alright?’

‘Yeah, yeah..’ he murmured. ‘Uhh, sorry. My dad.. My dad died when I was fourteen.’

He heard her take a sharp intake of breath. ‘Oh god. I’m so sorry,’ she said. 

‘It’s cool,’ Drake replied quickly. ‘I’m over it.’

There was a silence. Drake wondered if he had scared her off. Well, if he had, then fuck her. 

She cleared her throat. ‘You know, when I lost my own parents.. I’m still not over it, Drake. I was five.’

Drake’s eyes widened. He could feel his heart hammering against his chest. Did she understand? 

‘Your parents..’

‘My parents passed away, yes,’ Camille said, her voice cracking. ‘So I get it, Drake. You can act aloof about it all you want and like it doesn’t hurt but it’s a void in your heart that will never be filled. You just got to take it day by day and eventually, it gets easier.’

Her breath hitched. Drake could hear it in her voice that she was getting emotional. 

‘Camille, are you okay?’ he asked, his eyebrows knitting together. 

‘Y-yeah..’

She wasn’t. Her voice was thick now. He knew she was probably starting to cry. 

‘Don’t cry on me, Montespan..’ he murmured. ‘I’m not good with women crying. Makes me say awkward shit and I put my foot in it, which trust me, you really don’t want to hear..’

He let out a sigh of relief when he heard her laugh softly at this. ‘You’re such a guy, Drake,’ she said, sniffling. ‘I’m okay.’

Drake bit his lip. ‘You sure? Want me to kick this wall down and give you a pat on the back? I don’t really go for hugs to be honest..’

Camille giggled. ‘I’m fine, but thank you. Means a lot. I can tell you don’t usually talk about feelings and things. Sorry I freaked you out there.’

‘You didn’t,’ Drake told her, his voice steady. ‘I understand.’

There was another silence which Camille broke. ‘I understand you too.’ 

*********************************************

Camille faces the camera with red rimmed eyes and a tissue in her hand. ‘What the hell was that?!’ she cries. ‘Why did I start crying? Oh my god, he’ll think I’m crazy.. God that was powerful. I cried in a room, alone, with a stranger on the other side of the wall who was basically holding my hand without actually holding my hand. Jesus. I… I need a drink.’

She is asked if she liked her first date with Drake. Camille looks down at her hands, hiding the blush on her cheeks. 

‘Yeah, I did,’ she whispers. ‘I know I cried.. Oh god, I cried on a first date, that’s awkward. But he seems nice. A bit reserved.. Though he told me about his dad which I think he tends to keep to himself? So that was really nice to be trusted. I felt like he trusted me. But, I think he’s going to be a slow burn. Under that gruff exterior is a marshmallow. I could tell because he was super concerned when I got upset. I’m excited to talk to him again.’

***************************************

Drake downs a glass of whiskey and shakes his hand. ‘That was fucking insane,’ he says. ‘So she started crying and I got all protective? I really wanted to kick that wall down. I just.. I’ve never talked about my dad before either. I never talk about him. I have no idea what happened in that pod or if you guys are putting something in these drinks, but I swear to God, I have never been that open.’

He chuckles. ‘I’m gonna be on my guard from now on.’

[precuredaily]

Precure Day 185

Episode: Yes! Precure 5 37 - “Operation Healthy Coco” Date watched: 14 May 2020 Original air date: 21 October 2007 Screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/Sc5B6vA Transformation Gallery: https://imgur.com/a/6k6SzS0 Project info and master list of posts: http://tinyurl.com/PCDabout

what has been seen cannot be unseen

I might get some crap for this but I don’t particularly like this episode either. I think Bloody just had an absolutely fantastic introduction so everything after it for a while is going to feel a bit lackluster. Not to say it doesn’t have some great moments, but.... well, you’ll see.

The Plot

Coco has been scarfing down the cream puffs lately, and the girls are starting to notice when he struggles to push himself up. He appears very rotund as a fairy, but transforms human and says he’s fine. However, Nuts lifts his friend’s shirt to prove otherwise.

make of that what you will

We are never shown exactly what he looks like, but the girls responses tell us all we need to know. Urara in particular is fairly blunt, saying he had a fat and pudgy stomach. Nozomi is pretty okay with it, but she changes her tune when Karen and Rin point out that the problem is his diet and lack of exercise, not just getting chubby. Milk takes charge and puts him on a diet.

Over in Nightmare, Kawarino offhandedly mentions that Gamao was useless, which disturbs Bunbee because he didn’t realize his last employee had been so carelessly killed. Hadenya tells him to get over it and then sets out.

Coco’s diet is going well, except for all the times he tries to sneak into the kitchen in the middle of the night to grab some cream puffs, or sneak some into his lunchbox. He gets outright depressed when he can’t eat some, so the girls conspire with Milk to make him a special meal. It goes about as well as the last time they tried to cook together. One night, Coco sneaks out of his room to the kitchen for some cream puffs, and instead finds the best gag in the episode: the fridge is completely empty except for an exercise wheel.

I just imagine Nuts going through the effort to empty the fridge and store all the food somewhere else, all so he could put this wheel in there when Coco inevitably tried to sneak a bite. So yes, Nuts shows up and says getting exercise is important as well as he demonstrates the use of the wheel. A+ television here.

Another day, Coco is out walking and smells the all-too familiar scent of choux creme. He finds a food truck selling them, and the sweet lady who runs it (who is definitely not Hadenya) offers him free samples!

He almost takes it, but he thinks about the girls, Milk, and even Nuts all working hard to help him eat more healthily, and refuses. Hadenya wolfs down the plate and then turns the food truck into a Kowaina, and throws Coco into the cabin, high enough where he’d hurt himself if he jumped. The girls catch wind of this and show up to fight. They feel their hands are tied because they don’t want to hurt Coco, and Hadenya says she’ll give him back if they give her the Dream Collet. She further taunts them by saying Coco ate cream puffs. However, what is supposed to be a damning claim gets brushed aside because aside from not being true, the girls know Coco has a stronger will than that, and he wouldn’t break his vow like that. Dream persuades Coco to jump so that she can catch him, and then they safely take out the Kowaina.

Back at Natts House, the girls surprise Coco with the fruits of their labor: special vegetarian cream puffs! Coco can see the burns and cuts on their bodies as a sign of how hard they worked so he tries one, and it’s delicious! But then Milk steps in to say he shouldn’t have any more or he’ll relapse on his diet, and tries to eat the rest. Karen points out that Milk has been eating an awful lot lately, and has gotten rather chubby herself. Everyone agrees Milk should get some exercise as well, and the last scene of the episode would be great for the “Inhuman Anime Girl Sounds” Twitter, as Milk lets out a cry.

The Analysis

If you’re not aware, Japan is a very skinny culture, with an obesity rate of about 4% (compare to the US’s 40+%), and in 2008 the federal government enacted the Metabo Law which set a universal maximum acceptable waist measurement for men and women ages 40 to 75, with financial penalties for local governments and companies that had large levels of noncompliance. I couldn’t find a whole lot of information on stigma against overweight people in daily life, but in general the only socially acceptable fat people are sumo wrestlers. All of that is to say that, while they do mostly treat Coco’s weight as the butt of the joke, there is some progressive thinking going on as well, in that their concern is less purely that he’s getting fat as much as it is the fact that he’s not eating a balanced diet. It’s an important distinction to make, and the driving force of the rest of the episode is getting him to eat healthy, not JUST losing weight. It’s not a bad premise but I don’t think they make the most of the idea, the episode is largely comprised of gags about Coco trying to sneak a bite and being told “no”.

Most notably, Nozomi doesn’t seem very bothered by Coco’s weight gain. She takes it in stride, saying a little fat isn’t so bad. It’s only when they mention his unhealthy diet that she says “oh no that’s not okay” and that’s a pretty good way to take it. After all, if he’s chubby, there’s more of him to love, but if he’s not healthy, then he may die an early death. Perspective.

Now, it seems like they writers are trying to drawing a comparison between Coco and Hadenya with her remarks about eating everything, as if eating makes you a bad person, or being fat is evil, but...... it just doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense. She’s evil because she takes enjoyment in the suffering of others, Gamao was evil because he didn’t care about the feelings of others and just wanted personal gain, neither of them were evil because of their eating habits. It’s a weird thing to throw in there and it doesn’t tell us anything more about Hadenya except that she’s impulsive, so...... it falls flat. Honestly the most interesting thing she did this episode was try to poison Coco..... at least I think that’s what the goal was? She ate them herself when he refused so maybe they were fine but then what was her goal? just to say “Haha you cheated on your diet and now the Precure won’t be friends with you, and they’ll hand over the Dream Collet”? That doesn’t make ANY sense, even if she planned to trap Coco in the Kowaina. And for that matter how did she even know he was on a diet? I would have assumed she was just tempting him because his love of choux creme is well-known, but when she’s taunting the cures she specifically lies and says he cheated on his diet, so...... it’s just weird. Come to think of it, poisoning him before they got the Dream Collet isn’t the smartest thing either, so it was just a bad plan all around. I applaud the plan if only for how extra she got with it, Hadenya isn’t typically one for disguises.

The highlight of this episode is easily the cooking segment. I would call that the saving grace, even. The comedy is so on point, I want to watch an entire series of these girls’ hijinks in the kitchen. The last time we got this was in episode 15, when they all cook for Nozomi’s ill mother, and well..... some of them have not learned. Karen still screws up portion sizes, Urara’s just kinda clumsy, and Komachi still wants to add youkan to porridge, although this actually works out. But anyway, the comic timing of their kitchen antics is absolutely perfect and I love how they play off of each other, with Rin and now Milk being the lone voices of reason. This is what Kirakira could have been (we’ll talk about that eventually). The payoff to it all is really good, too, the vegetarian choux cremes they make look delicious and if you check the gallery I included their detailed directions for making them. No portion sizes but it’s an idea to try out. Tag me if you do!

And lastly some bookkeeping:

The “dokkoisho” that Coco and later Milk utter when they fall is an old colloquial term, basically like “heave ho”. In general it implies putting strength towards something, and in this case suggests that they’re struggling to push themselves up because they’re heavy. From what I can tell, it originates with Hokkaido fishing villages and was popularized in their sea shanties.

The kowaina’s voice is higher pitched than normal, and I’m not sure why. It seems to be the same actress as usual.

The shot of Milk with the sign is very exploitable and my friend @precurehoroscopes has made a version you can play with:

Next time, man this series is full of ideas that would get explored fully in later shows isn’t it? Milk is rewriting the story of Cinderella with the girls as the characters and it’s..... a trip. Look forward to it!

Pink Precure Catchphrase Count: 2 kettei!