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omnifalls-10 · 4 years ago

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Omni Falls Chapter 4: The Lil Psycho

It's a peaceful weekend at the Mystery Shack. As Grunkle Stan swindles tips from the tourists outside, Dipper, Mabel, and Soos sit at the table, discussing Dipper's mysterious watch and how he found it as the young Pine drinks a soda while his sister knits a sweater.

"So you found that watch in a mysterious ball?", Soos summarizes. "And after that you fought a giant gnome monster by turning a rock alien?"

"Diamond alien.", Dipper corrects.

"So does this mean you morph into aliens now?", Soos questions.

"It seems so.", Dipper replies.

"Cool dude. So what aliens can you turn into?". Soos probes, curious on what aliens he can morph as.

"So far he's morphed into the diamond alien, the red one that can shoot water, the speedy one, and the plant that can shoot fire but smells like a dumpster.", Mabel tallies off as she continues to knit herself a new sweater.

Dipper rubs his chin in thought. "Hm. But there could be potentially more than that."

Soos looks amazed by this. "Dude, that sounds awesome! Did you ever name any of them?"

"I only named Diamondhead, the crystal alien, Water Hazard, the water alien, and Swampfire, the plant one,", Dipper answers as he heads to the trash bin to throw away the soda can.

"Why Swampfire?", Soos asks.

"'Cause he smells like a flaming dumpster, when he transforms.", Mabel answers to which Dipper nods in agreement.

"Hm. Did you come up with a name for the speed alien?", Soos inquiers.

"Why, yes, Soos.", Dipper puffs his chest, priding himself on a cool name. "Blitz." Such a cool name, he thinks. Unfortunately, Mabel and Soos don't agree with this.

"Boooooooo!", Mabel and Soos jeers.

"What? You guys got anything better?", Dipper scoffs as he sits at the table, reading the Journal.

"Oh, I got one.", Mabel answers, dropping her sweater she's knitting to flail her arms dramatically. "Speedy!".

"That sounds like a cartoon character.", Dipper clarifies.

"Speedster?", Soos tries a name.

"That sounds even more bland than Blitz."

"Quicksilver!"

"The name's taken. Plus the alien is more blue and black than silver."

"Flash?"

"Taken."

"Zoom Zoom?"

"That sounds like a jingle for a commercial."

Mabel stops and thinks for a moment before she gets an idea, smiling. "How about XLR8?!"

"Awesome name, little dude.", Soos is impressed as he holds his hand out for Mabel to high five. Dipper just shrugs, he honestly doesn't mind because it would be nice to make names for the aliens that he would turn into. It would help for him to have an alias to turn towards in case someone would know about the aliens he would have.

But the chances of that happening are slim to none. As they start conversing on other random topics, the TV transitions into a commercial Soos recognizes.

"Hey, look. It's that commercial I was telling you guys about.", Soos points to the screen showing an actor crying.

"Are you completely miserable?", the announcer asks, to which the actor says "YES!". The announcer continues, "Then you need to meet..." before a lady's voice comes in with a silhouette in the background. "Gideon."

"Gideon?", Dipper asks, looking at the screen, curiously.

"What makes him so special?", Mabel inquires, wanting to know more about this mysterious figure.

"He's a psychic.", the announcer answers, intriguing the Pine Twins even more. "So don't waste your time with another so-called 'man of mystery'." The screen shows a clip of Stan coming out of an outhouse and is stamped with the word "FRAUD". "Learn about tomorrow tonight at Gideon's Tent of Telepathy."

"Wow, I'm getting all curiousy inside...", Mabel admits.

"Well, don't get too curiousy.", Stan answers with an annoyed expression on his face as he enters the room and flips up his eyepatch and hangs his suit jacket on his racket. "Ever since that monster Gideon rolled into town, I've had nothin' but trouble."

"But, is he really psychic?", Dipper asks his grunkle.

"I think we should go and find out.", Mabel suggests, wanting to see this psychic for herself.

"Never! You're forbidden from patronizing the competition!", Grunkle Stan exclaims in anger. "No one that lives under my roof is allowed under that Gideon's roof!" That said, the conman walks away to count his earnings, grumbling.

"Do tents have roofs?", Dipper wonders out loud since Stan left the room.

"I think we just found our loophole... literally!", Mabel proudly declares as she holds a string with a loophole, making her, Dipper, and Soos laugh at the cheesy joke, causing them to miss the announcer's words in the end.

"So come down soon, folks. Gideon is expecting you."

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

As the evening air is crisp as Dipper, Mabel, and Soos arrive at the Tent of Telepathy. At first glance, it looks like the Mystery Shack but in reverse, even down to Bud Gleeful standing at the entrance with a sack for customers to put money in.

"Whoa, this is like a bizarro version of the Mystery Shack.", Dipper admits as he looks around. "They even have their own Soos." He points to a maintenance worker who looks very similar to Soos, named Deuce, to which he glares at him.

"Sshh!", Mabel shushes her brother. "It's starting!"

"Let's see what this monster looks like.", Dipper murmurs skeptically. The crowd is holding their breath as a large silhouette comes forward on the stage, but starts to shrink with each step until it is in the center. The curtains pull back to reveal a short child younger than the Pines donning a large pompadour and wearing a baby blue business suit, complete with large shoulder pads, a jade bolo tie, and a flashy cape.

"Hello America!", the Gideon greets the audience, his smile being warm. "My name is Li'l Gideon." He claps and doves fly out of his hair, causing the crowd to cheer.

"That's Stan's mortal enemy?", Dipper asks, confused by how this child could be the rival to their grunkle.

"But he's so wittle.", Mabel adds, smiling at how cute the little guy is.

"Ladies and gentlemen, it is such a gift to have you here tonight!", Gideon announces to the crowd. "Such a gift. I have a vision. I predict that you will soon all say, 'aww.'" Gideon makes a cute pose and the crowd immediately gushes.

"It came true.", Mabel speaks in awe, holding her cheeks in admiration.

"What?", Dipper rolls his eyes. "I'm not impressed."

"You're impressed!", Mabel teases.

"Hit it, Dad!" Gideon calls his father, Bud Gleeful. He starts playing the piano and the young psychic starts dancing as he sings."Oh, I can see what others can't see. It ain't some sideshow trick, it's innate ability. Where others are blind, I am futurely inclined. And you too could see, if you was widdle ol' me!"

"Come on, everybody, rise up! I want y'all to keep it going!" Gideon calls out to the crowd. They, including Soos and the twins, rise, seemingly unintentionally, and they start to clap along with the beat. This confuses Dipper as this happens.

"Wha—? How did he—?", Dipper stammers in bewilderment as he looks at the young psychic.

"Keep it going!", Gideon calls to the audience before pointing to an elderly woman in the crowd. "You wish your son would call you more."

"I'm leaving everything to my cats!", the old woman yells, with her cat on her lap affirming her.

"I sense that you've been here before.", Gideon predicts as he points at Sheriff Blubs, who is wearing a shirt with Gideon's face on it and holding various other Li'l Gideon merchandise.

"Oh, what gave it away?", he gushes.

"Come on.", Dipper scoffs at this psychic's pitiful predictions. In an instant, Gideon appears beside the Pine Twins, continuing his song. "I'll read your mind if I'm able."

"Something tells me you're named Mabel", Gideon predicts before heading back to the stage.

"How'd he do that?", Mabel asks herself in amazement, she isn't even wearing her name on her sweater.

"So welcome all ye... to the Tent of Telepathy. And thanks for visiting... widdle ol' me!", Gideon finishes his dance as the song ends. The crowd cheers wildly as the young psychic catches his breath.

"Thank you! You people are the real miracles!", Gideon thanks the crowd as he drinks a bottle of water. The crowd leaves, very pleased with the performance that occurred in the Tent of Telepathy. Except for the cynical Dipper.

"Woo! Yeah!", Mabel cheers in excitement. "That was amazing!"

"No wonder our uncle's jealous." Dipper smirks, knowing that despite being fraudulent about being a psychic, Gideon is at least more entertaining than Stan. "That kid's an even bigger fraud than Stan!"

"Oh, come on.", Mabel encourages. "His dance moves were adorable! And did you see his hair? It was like, whoosh!"

"You're too easily impressed.", Dipper remarks, knowing that it doesn't take much to make his sister go starry-eyed.

"Yeah, yeah!", Mabel laughs, giving Dipper a playful shove as he starts laughing with her. What they don't know is that they are a pair of eyes watching them leave in intrigue and obsession.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

In the quiet morning, Dipper browses through the journal psychic related. He remembers what Gideon did to the audience by raising up unanimously like they were under his command, even Dipper himself, who never intended to get up. He wants to know if there is something that could do what the young psychic did to the audience because Dipper doesn't believe that Gideon is inherently psychic, mind you, but he's aware that he's able to control individuals somehow. So far he's found nothing.

His focus is deterred by his bubbly sister. "Check it out, Dipper! I successfully bedazzled my face!", Mabel exclaims as she blinks some of the sequins from her eyelids. "Ow."

"Um...Is that permanent?", Dipper asks, not sure how he's supposed to react to something like this.

"I'm unappreciated in my time…", She laments, disappointed that her brother can't appreciate her artistic ability. The doorbell rings.

"Somebody answer that door!", Grunkle Stan yells from upstairs.

"I'll get it!", Mabel answers as she wipes the sequins off her face as she heads to the door. She opens it up and finds a bashful Gideon on the other side.

"Howdy.", the young psychic warmly greets her.

"It's 'wittle ol' you!", Mabel gasps in surprise.

"Yeah, my song's quite catchy.", He laughs nervously before he gets to the point, rubbing his arm. "Now, I know we haven't formally met, but after yesterday's performance, I just couldn't get your laugh out of my head."

"You mean this one?", the bubbly Pine asks before doing her signature laugh, much to Gideon's delight.

"Oh, what a delight!", Gideon smiles brightly. "Now, when I saw you in the audience, I said to myself, 'Now there's a kindred spirit! Someone who appreciates the sparkly things in life.'"

"That's totally me!", Mabel laughs before coughing up some sequins that land on Gideon's suit, bedazzling it. This amazes the young psychic.

"Enchanting.", Gideon whsipers. "Utterly enchanting."

"Who's at the door?!", Grunkle yells from inside.

"No one, Grunkle Stan!", Mabel yells back in response.

"I appreciate your discretion." Gideon thanks. "Stan's no fan of mine. I don't know how a lemon so sour could be related to a peach so sweet."

"Aww, you're just saying that.", Mabel giggles at the compliment.

"Oh, I mean it with all sincerity.", Gideon ensures her. "Now, what do you say we step away from here, and chat a bit more. Perhaps in my dressing room?"

"Oh! Makeovers!" Mabel exclaims in delight. "Yahoo!" She pokes Gideon in his stomach a little too hard.

Gideon laughs before holding his gut in pain, mumbling "...Ow."

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Mabel returns to the Mystery Shack with her makeover: her hair is curled and held in place an absurd amount of hairspray, overmanucured nails, and excessive amount of makeup. She sees her brother at the same chair from earlier, deeply engrossed into his journal. "Hey Dipper. What's goin' oooon?", she asks as she dangles manicured fingernails over Dipper's head.

He looks up from the journal to see her fingernails and slaps them away in surprise. "Whoa, where have you been? And what's going on with those fingernails, you look like a wolverine." He really doesn't like this much makeup on his sister. It's making her look even more bizarre than the sequins she had on her face.

"I know, right?", she answers, playfully growling and scratching the air. "I was hanging out with my new pal, Gideon. He is one dapper little man."

Dipper sighs. "Mabel, I wouldn't trust anyone whose hair is bigger than their head."

"Oh, leave him alone!", Mabel defends her new pal. "You never want to do girly stuff with me! You and Soos get to do boy stuff all the time." Anything girly she wanted to do, Dipper would opt out and do boy stuff with Soos. Gideon's a breath of fresh air to share the same interests she has.

"What do you mean?", Dipper asks, only for Soos to come in the room, excited.

"Hey dude, you ready to blow up these hot dogs in the microwave one by one?!", the handyman asks, holding the hot dog pack in his face.

"Am I!", Dipper answers, equally excited as they run into the kitchen to pop the dogs in the microwave, laughing. Mabel sighs, rolling her eyes as Dipper proves her point.

The next day arrives and Gideon takes Mabel to the roof of his factory. They are able to see the whole town of Gravity Falls.

"Whoa, the view from your family's factory is nuts!", Mabel exclaims at the view from up top. "Good thing we both bought our….."

"Opera glasses!", she and Gideon cheer, bringing them before pointing them at each other, laughing.

"Mabel, when I'm up here lookin' down on all those little ol' people, I feel like I'm king of all I survey." Gideon explains, whispering the last part ominously. He turns to her, smiling. "I guess that makes you my queen!"

"You are being so nice to me right now, quit it!" Mabel laughs, smacks him in the stomach, playfully.

"I can't quit it. I am speaking from the heart." Gideon admits, holding his heart.

"From the where-now?". Mabel is confused by where the young psychic is going.

"Mabel, I've never felt this close with anyone. So, so close." Gideon explains, stroking his crush's hair, giggling.

"Look Gideon, um…", Mabel tries to explain as she pushes his hand away, uncomfortable. "I like you a lot, but let's just be friends."

"At least just give me a chance." Gideon insists. "Mabel, will you do me the honor of going on a date with me?"

"A play date?", Mabel helplessly asks.

"Uh-uh."

"A shopping date?"

"Nope. It'll just be one li'l ol' date, I swear on my lucky bolo tie." Gideon swears, holding his bolo tie. Mabel looks at the smitten psychic’s green eye, uncertain. She knows that Gideon means well and it would be cruel of her to leave him up on his offer. After all, he promises for one date and he seems to be a man of his word.

"Ummm. Okay, then... I guess…", Mabel answers, still feeling weary about it internally.

"Mabel Pines, you have made me the happiest boy in the world!", Gideon laughs, giving her a big hug. She doesn't feel fully comfortable with it until she realizes something.

"Are you sniffing my hair?"

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

"It's not a date-date, it's just, you know, I didn't want to hurt his feelings and so I figured I'd throw him a bone.", she explains her dating situation as she and her brother play some video games in the living room.

"Mabel, guys don't work that way.", Dipper refutes, his focus never faltering from the game. "You give them an inch, they'll take a mile. At some point, he's gonna fall in love with you."

"Yeah right. I'm not that lovable.", she scoffs, before executing Dipper in the game, cheering in victory. "Yes!"

"Okay, we agree on something here." he grouses and drops the controller. The doorbell rings outside, causing Mabel to stand up and get it.

"I'll go get it", Mabel goes to answer the door, only for a white stallion horse to burst through, neighing. This causes her to scream in surprise and take a few steps back. She looks up from the horse to see Gideon donning cowboy attire, extending her hand out towards her.

"A night of enchantment awaits, m'lady!", he says.

"Oh boy.", she mumbles, to herself. After the horse ride towards their destination, an aquatic themed restaurant which is one of the expensive and finest restaurants in Gravity Falls, they're able to get their own private booth. Even Gideon's stallion is allowed in as it drinks from the fountain.

"I can't believe they let us bring a horse in here.", Mabel says awkwardly. Honestly, the extravagance of this place is not something she's used to being in. Even the menu options when she first checked looked very expensive, even though Gideon said he would pay for it.

"Well, people have a hard time saying no to me.", Gideon winks at her, putting his feet up on the table. As he does this, a waiter arrives to refill their glasses with crystal water, smiling.

"Ah, Monsieur Gideon! Ze feet on ze table! An excellent choice!", the waiter compliments.

"Jean Luc, what did we discuss about eye contact?", Gideon asks, not even glancing at the garcon, frowning.

"Yes, yes, very good.", the waiter adheres, walking back and keeping his eyes away from the young psychic.

Mabel actually looks down at her plate to see various forks, "I've never seen so many forks.", she mentions in amazement. "And water with bubbles in it? Ooh lala, oui, oui."

"Oh! Parlez vous francais?", Gideon asks her.

"...I have no idea what you're saying.", She admits. This makes the young psychic chuckle as their orders arrive, a live lobster for Mabel and a steak with mash potatoes for Gideon.

"I gotta say Mabel", Gideon speaks. "I've been to this restaurant many times but tonight, it feels very special."

"Yeah…", she says as spokes at the lobster on her plate which it pinches her fork in return.

"And tomorrow's date promises to top this one in every way!", Gideon promises.

This causes her to jolt up in realization at what he just said. "Whoa whoa, you said just one date, and this was it."

"Hark! What a surprise!", Gideon says, seemingly ignoring what Mabel is saying. "A red crested South American rainbow macaw!" As he said that, a giant macaw lands on Gideon's forearm. He silently counts to three before the macaw talks.

"MABEL! WILL YOU- ACCOMPANY- GIDEON- TO- THE BALLROOM DANCE- THIS THURBDAY-", Gideon shakes the bird briefly. "THURSDAY?!" The macaw coughs up a letter and flies away. After that declaration, many of the patrons started gushing at Gideon's display of affection to the point crowd near the booth in excitement on Mabel's decision.

"They're expectin' us. Please say you'll go.", Gideon asks her, holding up the letter and unaware of the pressure he's putting on her.

"Oh, Gideon, I'm sorry, but I'm gonna have to say-", Mabel starts before looking back at the patrons and to Gideon, who are waiting for her to say yes. She's been promised only one date and that's all she wanted, but the pressure from saying no to someone who went out their way to do this seems too steep. She doesn't want to disappoint anyone, especially Gideon. After a deep breath, she makes her decision.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

At the Mystery Shack, Stan arrives in front, looking miffed as he holds a newspaper article showing a picture of Gideon and Mabel together with Dipper, Wendy, and Soos. "Hey, hey! What the jackal is Mabel doing in the paper next to that crazy pickpocket Gideon?!" Stan specifically told to not hang around the little gremlin. Why don't they listen?

"Oh, yeah, it's like a big deal.", Wendy explains, looking up from her magazine. "Everybody's talking about Gideon and Mabel's big date tonight."

"WHAT?! That little shyster is dating my great niece!?", Stan yells.

"I wonder what the new name will be for the power couple. Mabideon? Gideabel?", Soos brainstorms before gasping."Magidbeleon!" Stan turns towards a nervous Dipper.

"You knew anything about this, kid?", he interrogates him.

"I didn't!', Dipper answers. "I didn't hear about it and plus, I told her not to do it anyway." After hearing this, Stan grumbles before re-entering, wearing his suit.

"Yeah, well it ends tonight.", Stan declares, heading towards the door. "I'm going right down to that little skunk's house; this is gonna stop RIGHT now!" He slams the door and heads to the car, driving to the Gleeful residence. Stan's car skids to a halt in front of Gideon's house. He gets out of the car and marches towards the front lawn and starts knocking on the door, loudly.

"Gideon, you little punk! Open up!", Stan yells before reading a sign on the door that says 'Please Pardon This Garden', before slamming the sign towards the ground. "I will pardon NOTHING!" Gideon doesn't answer the door, rather, his father, Bud Gleeful answers it with a balmy smile.

"Why, Stanford Pines! What a delight!", Bud greets the conman.

"Out of the way Bud, I'm looking for Gideon!", Stan answers, pushing past the patriarch to find the little twerp.

"Well, I haven't seen the boy around.", Bud informs, his smile never leaving. "But since you're here, you simply must come in for coffee!" He gently pulls Stan inside.

"But-but I came-", Stan stutters, trying to get back to his task.

"Ah, ah, ah. It's imported.", Bud explains. "All the way from Colombia." They walk as the tea starts to get made.

"Wow... I went to jail there once." Stan remembers fondly. He allows himself to enjoy the interior design of the house, whistling. "Some digs you got here.", he compliments before eyes focus on a clown painting. "Oh, this. This is beautiful." Bud and Stan sit down and enjoy some freshly brewed coffee.

"Now, I hear that your niece and my Gideon are, well, they're singin' in harmony lately so to speak.", Bud recalls, seemingly happy for son's blooming romance with his beau.

"Uh, yeah, and I'm against it!", Stan declares, pushing a couch cushion to prove a point.

"No no no. I see it as a fantastic business opportunity.", Bud explains to Stan as they pass across the family photo in which there was Bud, Mrs. Gleeful, and their two children: a younger Gideon and a blonde haired teen with a bored expression. "We've been at each other's throats for far too long, yes we have. This is our big chance to set aside our rivalry and pool our collective profit, you see."

Stan closes the register. "I'm listening."

While Stan and Bud are talking about financial profiting, Mabel returns to the Shack after an emotionally draining date with the lobster still on her. She walks in to see Dipper relaxing at the table as he's reading his from the Journal.

He looks up to see his sister come in. "Hey. How'd it go?"

"I don't know.", Mabel answers, putting the crustacean in the fish tank. "...I have a lobster now."

"Well, at least it's over and you'll never have to go out with him again.", Dipper proclaims before going back to reading. He realizes his sister hasn't said anything, onliy tapping on the glass of the fish tank. "Mabel? It's over, right? Right?"

She turns around and exclaims frustratingly, flailing her arms. "He asked me out again and I didn't know how to say no!"

"Mabel, it's not that hard. All you have to do is say no."

"It's not that simple, Dipper.", Mabel says. "I do like Gideon, as a friend slash little sister, so I didn't want to hurt his feelings! I just need to get things back to where they used to be. You know, friends."

Easier said than done. Dipper thinks to himself, shaking his head. Mabel has always been the one that tried to make everyone else feel joyous. Disappointing them is something she hates doing.

True to Dipper's thought process, Mabel tried to say how she really felt about dating Gideon, only for her to backtrack and just go dancing with him on the ballroom floor. She tried again when they were getting some food, but she got nervous as people were gushing at the "couple". Even now, as they're boat riding down the stream with Old Man McGucket paddling, she's mentally trying to push herself into telling Gideon the truth.

"Hah, you know I thought dancing was gonna be the end of the evening, right?", Mabel recalls, nervously as Gideon said that they were just going dancing. Gideon holds her hands, lovingly.

"Don't you want this evenin' to last, my sweet?", the young psychic asks.

She instinctively jolts away. "NO!", she answers quickly before backtracking and trying to be more passive towards the clingy Gleeful. "I mean yes. I mean I'm always happy to hang out with a friend, buddy, pal, chum, other word for friend…"

"Pal?", McGucket chimes in.

"I already said pal.", Mabel answers before coming up with another word. "Mate?"

"How about soulmate?", Gideon asks, lovingly. As he said, fireworks appear with a heart and Mabel's name inside of it. She looks distraught, she wanted to just to let Gideon off easy but he's basically put her in a situation that she can't say no to.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Dipper walks downstairs, humming. Once gets closer down the stairs, he hears his sister talking towards herself.

"...I mean, he's so nice, but.. I can't keep doing this. But I can't break his heart. I have no way out!", Mabel rants towards, walking around in a circle, trying to find a way out of this.

Dipper walks in. "What in the heck happened on that date?", he asks her.

"I don't know!", Mabel admits, holding her head in frustration. "I was in the friend zone, and then before I knew what was happening, he pulled me into the romance zone. It was like quick sand! Chubby quicksand!"

Dipper shakes his head and puts a consoling hand on shoulder. "Mabel, come on. It's not like you're gonna have to marry Gideon.", he comforts her. Unfortunately, Stan doesn't get the memo as he walks in with a Team Gideon T-Shirt.

"Great news, Mabel. You have to marry Gideon!", Stan informs, much to her distress.

Mabel is distraught. "Wh-what?!"

"Yep. It's all part of my long term deal with Buddy Gleeful. There's a lot of cash tied up in this thing.", the conman explains, pointing to his T-Shirt. "Plus I got this shirt. Ugh, I am fat." Mabel runs out of the living room, screaming.

"Bodies change, kid!", Stan yells to her, missing the point as to why she ran. "Bodies change…." Dipper just sighs and walks into the attic to see Mabel hiding in her sweater. It's getting that bad.

"Oh no. Mabel?", Dipper asks.

She's cradling her head in her sweater and rocking back and forth. ,"Mabel's not here. She's in sweater town."

He crouches near her with a sympathetic look on her face. "Are you gonna come out of sweater town?", he asks her, only for a whimper to be her response. "Alright, enough is enough. If you can't break up with Gideon, I'll do it for you."

She pops her head out with a hopeful expression. "You will?" He nods his head in response and she gives him the biggest hug that she can. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

True to his word, Dipper took a long trip across Gravity Falls flying as a new alien he found in the watch until he reached his destination: The Club, another restaurant known for its extravagance. He reverts back to his human form and takes a big breath before reaching inside to see Gideon sitting in a booth awaiting Mabel. Dipper heads to the booth and clears his throat.

"Oh. Dipper Pines, how are you?", Gideon greets the young Pine with simulated delight. "You look good, you look good."

"Thanks, you uh…", Dipper laughs nervously. "Look, Gideon. We've got to talk. Mabel isn't joining you tonight, she uh, she doesn't want to see you anymore. She's uh….. kinda weirded out by you, no offense." After he says those words, Gideon sitz there with the same expression on his face processing those words. He stays like that for three minutes, creeping Dipper out.

"So what you're sayin' is...you've come between us.", Gideon says very slowly, his eye twitching ever so slightly.

Dipper starts to get a little nervous. "You're not gonna like, freak out or anything, are ya?"

"Of course not.", Gideon laughs, faking a smile on his face. "These things happen. Bygones, you know."

Dipper sighs, relaxing. "Oh, well that's a relief." Just as he says that, the watch twitched from red to green, beeping to signify that it's charged up. This action causes him to jolt a bit in surprise and Gideon to look at it in intrigue.

"That's an interesting watch you got there.", Gideon inquires as looks at the watch. There's something engaging about it. "Where'd you get it?", Dipper instinctively hides his hand with the watch behind his back for a moment before coming with an answer.

"Uh...", Dipper stumbles before finding an answer. "I-I bought it from…..Japan. It took alot of money to get and it was a...rare item to search for, you know."

Gideon continues to stare at the young Pine, with a smile that starts to become erie. "Fascinatin'."

Dipper looks left and right, chuckling nervously. "So. Okay. Cool. Sorry man, again but uh, hey, thumbs up, right?" He turns around to leave, unaware that Gideon still had that malicious smile on his face.

"Thumbs up indeed, my friend.", he whispers to himself.

As he reaches outside, Dipper lets out a breath that he didn't know held. "Huh, that went better than expected." He honestly expected for Gideon to flip out if anything, he sighs and heads back to Shack, ready to tell her that her Gideon situation is taken care of…..or so he thinks.

In the Gleeful Residence, Gideon is staring into his mirror, seething with rage. He usually doesn't get this angry most of the time, but there are a few things that make reach this peak. The first cause for this could be that he couldn't get what he wants and the second being siblings. Everytime, he hears anything about siblings, it always goes back to his older brother. How his father or mother would look at the pictures of him fondly, how they wouldn't have so much finance without some of his help, how he would always be respectful towards his parents, how successful he is. Him, him, him. No matter what he tries, he'll never have the power, attention, and success to the magnitude of what his older brother has.

With Dipper, he did two things wrong: him being the brother of Mabel and him taking his love away from him. "Dipper Pines, you have no idea what you've done!" He growls, grabbing his amulet tightly and a candle starts to levitate and the light bulbs on his boudoir explode. His other furniture starts levitating. "You've just made the biggest mistake of your life!" And like that, he throws the levitated objects on the ground hard enough to shake the room.

Bud Gleeful arrives into the room, shocked to see mostly everything destroyed. "Gideon Charles Gleeful, clean up your room this instant!", he scolds his son, firmly.

"I CAN BUY AND SELL YOU, OLD MAN!", the young psychic yells furiously, scowling at his father, who looks taken aback before shrugging.

"Fair enough.", Bud sighs before closing the door. Gideon turns his attention away from the door and looks down to see a picture of his love, Mabel and the wretch who angers him, Dipper. He holds his amulet and concentrates on incinerating the side with Dipper, leaving Mabel on it. He laughs with malicious intent.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

After the breakup, Mabel has been feeling a whole lot better. To celebrate, Soos and the twins decide to have a simple game Soos tucks a pillow under his shirt and they try to tackle him.

"Hit me, dudes.", Soos holds his arms out, waiting for them to charge at him. They come at him in full force, laughing as they fall down. "Feels good."

"I'm so glad everything's back to normal!", Mabel sighs in content, feeling relieved that the Gideon ordeal is over.

"You said it.", Dipper agrees, chuckling. As he speaks, the phone rings from inside the Shack, causing the twins to look at each other.

"Your turn.", they both say, only for Dipper to say it later. He gets up and heads inside to answer it. "Hello?"

"Toby Determined, Gravity Falls Gossiper."

"Oh hey man. Sorry for accusing you of murder last week."

"Water under the bridge! Say, we want to interview you about whether you've seen anything unUSUAL about this here TOWN since you've arrived."

"Oh, finally! I thought nobody would ever ask! I have notes and theories! Uh huh, uh huh." He pulls out a notepad and writes the address Toby tells him. "412 Gopher Road. Tonight? Got it." He heads back out, telling Mabel and Soos where he's going and when he'll be back. After a long walk to his destination, he arrives at a factory. Dipper looks at the notepad to check and see if he has the right address, to which he realizes that he does. He opens the door to the factory.

"Hello?", Dipper calls out, hearing nothing. He looks inside to see that nobody's here and turns around to leave, only for the door to slam shut. He pushes on the door to try to open it to no avail. Suddenly, lights turn on and he turns around to see Gideon in a swivel chair, petting a doll of himself.

"Hello, friend.", the young psychic greets him, coldly.

"Ugh, Gideon.", Dipper groans, exasperatedly. Why is he bothering him?

"Dipper Pines, how long have you been living in this town?", Gideon asks the Pine, playing with his toy. "A week or two? You like it here? Enjoy the scenery?" His voice changes from veiled child-like curiosity to quiet fury at the second half of his question.

Dipper starts getting uneasy but calms himself. "What do you want from me, man?", he demands, wanting the young psychic to get to the point.

"Listen carefully, boy.", Gideon's tone becomes deathly serious. "This town has secrets you couldn't begin to understand!"

"Is this about Mabel?", Dipper asks, getting to the point. "I told you, she's not into you!"

This makes Gideon slam his arms on the swivel chair. "LIAR! YOU turned her against me!", he yells as he jumps from his chair, grabbing his amulet and marches toward Dipper. "She was my peach dumplin'!"

"Uh, you okay, man?", Dipper asks, walking back. Gideon lifts his hand up and Dipper's body is covered in an ethereal blue aura and lifted into the air. With a swipe of his hand, Dipper is thrown onto boxes hard. He pulls himself up only to see Gideon grinning at him with malice.

"Readin' minds isn't all I can do.", Gideon laughs ominously, enjoying the dread etched on Dipper's face.

"But-but you're a fake.", Dipper tries to explain.

"Oh? Then tell me, Dipper….", the sadistic child inquires, levitating various merchandise and objects. "Is this fake?" After that question, he starts throwing plates, spoons, and forks at Dipper, who dodges a good portion but gets nicked in the face, vest, and knee, much to the vengeful child's pleasure. Gideon decides to up the ante by throwing cups at constantly moving Pine.

Dipper does everything he can to avoid the merchandise Gideon telekinetically throws at him. The ruthless psychic grabs a cabinet and launches it at the Pine, who jumps out the way to avoid it but ends up hitting the back of his head in the process. He rubs it to ease the pain before he sees the malicious Gideon levitating above him, sneering.

"Grunkle Stan was right!", Dipper yells at the young psychic. "You are a monster!"

"Your sister will be mine!", Gideon declares madly, laughing as he lifts up another cabinet to launch at the young Pine, who hides behind a stack of heavy boxes. The cabinet crashes into the boxes to the wall. Dipper grunts as he realizes that his right arm is bruised, but thanks to the boxes taking most of the damage from the cabinet, he's mostly fine.

Dipper pushes himself up as much as he can to activate the watch. It beeps on and tries to find the right alien that can help. Diamondhead?, Dipper thinks. Swampfire?! Water Hazard?! XLR8?! Come on, there has to be an alien that I'm familiar with! He tries to find the aliens that he knows but to no avail. He almost stops seeing a fire alien. But could this help? He doesn't know what it can-

"Come on out, boy!", Gideon demands , levitating cutlery that are poised to skewer the shapeshifter. "I ain't finished punishing you yet!" Dipper hears this and tries to move, accidentally pressing it via moving across the boxes. As this happens, a massive green light illuminates under the boxes, temporarily blinding the vengeful psychic.

"What in tarnation?!", Gideon asks, puzzled. That green light just came from under there. How did this scoundrel create a light that bright? This might be a distraction of sorts. Gideon thinks as he starts getting impatient and levitates the boxes away. But before he can finish, a massive torrent of flames breaks out of the clutter in an explosive fashion.

Standing opposed to the malicious child is a confused charcoal man. He's composed of a brownish-red rocky texture with intense heat radiating from underneath, specifically ending out of his flaming head, hands, and feet. This shocks the young psychopath before he gets enraged.

"How?!", Gideon demands. "How did you manage to turn yourself into a Pyronite?!" His outrage causes the fiery man to jolt out of his stupor and gives a determined scowl towards the delusional psychic. So this is another flame alien like Swampfire. Maybe I should call him Hetablast, Dipper thinks before mentally sighing. Really wished I had something on this alien that….Gideon somehow knows? He shakes his head and focuses on the present.

"Stop this, Gideon.", the Pyronite demands before getting into a battle stance. "This is your first and final warning." His ultimatum provokes the sociopathic psychic more than he's already feeling at the moment. He lifts up his patented cutlery and launches them at the morphed Pine, who only raises his hand and gives a precise fireball that melts them and charges towards Gideon, pelting more fireballs at him. The crazy psychic sets up a shield as the fireballs explode and disperses on impact. The embers land on some of the boxes, to which causes them to ignite.

"You think you have the right to threaten me, boy?!", Gideon scowls, telekinetically grabbing the flaming boxes and tosses them at the flaming alien, who blasts them into nothing but ash. This gives the young psychic enough time to grab the Pyronite and throw him out through the wall.

Heatblast rubs his head, groaning in pain. "Ow...that hurt." Dipper gets up to see a levitating and apoplectic Gideon, holding up cabinets and heavy boxes. The insane psychic glares at the familiar emblem on the center of the Pyronite's chest. That design looks familiar, Gideon thinks before he realizes it. That watch! That watch is what is allowed that wretch to morph into that Pyronite. First, Dipper turns the love of his life against him and now, he has a piece of technology that can morph him into any alien he sees fit? The insane psychic doesn't know which one makes even more angrier. He decides to channel his anger into throwing his crates at his pyrokinetic opponent.

The transformed Pine dodges most of the crates and blasts the rest of them away. He looks at his fiery hands before looking at his fiery hands before looking at Gideon, who is pulling out more items from the factory as potential weaponry. The Pyro-Pine looks down, quickly trying to form a plan. He probably can't attack and defend at the same time. I can exploit that. He points both flaming hands on the ground. Let's hope Soos was right about copying that comic book character. The flames escape from Heatblast's hands and he finds himself being able to rocket up into the air via propulsion. Once he finds his balance, he flies towards Gideon at high speeds, reaching ascension and delivers a two handed fireball attack.

The vengeful Gleeful puts up his shield as Dipper delivers a massive fireball. Just at the right moment, Gideon grabs the fireball, the flames going from a raging orange to ethereal turquoise, and throws it back to the descending Pyronite. Reaching high velocities, Heatblast crashes into the grassy ground to leave a crater and upheaval of dirt, he propels him out of the crater after a moment's pass. Gideon levitates a massive assortment of lamb shears and in tow, the morphed Pine delivers an intense stream of fire that melts them onto the ground in a hot mesh.

While Dipper's attention was on melting the scissors, Gideon sneakily grabs two of his branded water gallons. After he deals with the scissors, he sets himself up and tosses them into Heatblast, the water causes the Pyronite's fire to be extinguished.

"Uh oh", Heatblast is surprised that his flames are out. What do I do?, Dipper thinks. Before coming up with an idea. If my flames are high enough to melt metal, maybe I can reignite- Heatblast is slammed by a barrage of heavy boxes courtesy of the vengeful Gideon. He finishes up his attack by grabbing one of his cabinets and lifts it up under the Dipper before slamming it down hard on top of the morphed Pine.

"What can you do now, boy?!", Gideon yells, grabbing every item in the factory, ready to finish off the transforming Pine. "That Pyronite form takes time to reignite! Now that you're weakened…." Heatblast gets up slowly, his heat coming back. Gideon tosses everything at him with devastating force. "DIE!"

The Pyronite gets himself up to deliver an equally powerful attack. "HAAA!", Heatblast screams intensely as he delivers a massive flow of flames, greater than before.

The barrage of items being thrown at high velocity and the great stream of fire causes a massive collusion. The massive collusion causes an explosion to erupt instantly, making Gideon to skid across the ground and Heatblast rolls across the grass, burning it, slamming into a tree before falling to the ground. After a few moments pass, Gideon and Heatblast get up, both looking heavily damaged. For Gideon, his blue suit is mostly covered in dirt and ripped on the sleeves and face is scrapped, there's some cuts on his arm. Despite this, he still looks very angry, panting for his breath. Heatblast's movement is slower than usual and, like Gideon, is panting, feeling exhausted.

Heatblast decides to ignite another fireball, while Gideon gets ready to counterattack. Just when he's about to launch at the Gleeful, he hears a dreadful sound. Beep-Beep-Beep. Heatblast's eyes widened. "Oh, no.", he rasps before being enveloped in a crimson light. What replaces the Pyronite is a beaten up Dipper, who's levitated by an apoplectic Gideon and slams him into the wall of the factory, knocking the wind out of him. He tries to break free but to no avail.

"Will you just give up?!", Dipper yells, glaring at the crazy child. "She's never gonna date you, man!"

"THAT'S A LIE!" Gideon screams in anger before his attention is turned towards a flaming box of lamb shears. He turns back at the restrained Pine, smiling sadistically. "And I'm gonna make sure you never lie to me again, friend." He levitates the flaming lamb shears slowly towards Dipper, who tries to move out the way but can't. The deranged psychic just keeps laughing in twisted delight as the shears get closer and closer towards cutting the Pine's face.

"Gideon! We have to talk!" Those words make Gideon freeze in surprise. He turns to see a livid Mabel with her fists clenched.

"M-Mabel. My marshmalla.", Gideon drops the shears on the ground before fixing his hair, nervous as he's caught redhanded. "What are you doin' here?"

Mabel closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. "I'm sorry Gideon, but I can't be your marshmallow. I needed to be honest and tell you that myself."

Gideon is taken aback by what she says. She doesn't want to be his marshmallow? "I-I don't understand." he responds, squeezing the amulet that represents his broken heart, which in return, squeezes Dipper.

Dipper feels his body tightening up, uncomfortably. "Uh, Mabel!? This probably isn't the best time to be brutally honest with him!", he calls out to her. Mabel gets a brief look of concern on her face when she glances at Dipper before giving a "sincere" smile towards the distraught Gideon.

"Hey, but we can still be makeover buddies.", she offers, holding his hands gently. "Wouldn't you like that?"

"Really?", Gideon asks, hopeful as he loosens his grip on the amulet. Mabel's eyes never left the amulet and at the right moment, she takes the chance.

She snatches Gideon's amulet off and Dipper falls down."No, not really! You were attacking my brother, what the heck?!"she exclaims. Gideon is shocked by what Mabel just did and tries to get his tie.

"My tie! Give it back!", Gideon demands, only for Mabel throws the amulet to Dipper who gets up and runs after the amulet's trajectory and catches it.

"Not so powerful without this, are you?" Dipper taunts but Gideon screams and charges at Dipper with sudden speed, making him drop the amulet and knocking them both off the cliff.

"Dipper!"

Dipper and Gideon scream. Gideon punches Dipper and the two start hitting each other before they realize that they're getting closer to the ground, making them scream again. But before they splat on the ground, they're both covered in the ethereal blue aura. They look up to see Mabel, holding the mystic amulet, levitating along with them and then floats down.

"Listen Gideon, it's over. I will never, ever, date you.", she declares. With that, she drops them down and throws the amulet to the ground, breaking it. The ethereal glow howling away in the wind.

"MY POWERS! Oh this isn't over. This isn't the last you'll see of wittle... ol' me.", the crazed psychic declares, walking into the dark forest.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Stan finishes signing papers in the Gleeful's living room area. "Ah, this is livin', brother.", Stan sighs in content, leaning back on the couch.

"From now on it's all name brand foods and clown paintings.", Bud Gleeful agrees, taking a swig of his coffee. Just as he says that, a livid and beaten up Gideon bursts through the door. "Gideon? Are you—?"

Ignoring his father, Gideon stands on the coffee table, scowling at Stan, pointing his fist at him. "Stanford Pines, I rebuke thee! I rebuke thee!"

Stan is confused. "Rebuke? Is that a word."

"The entire Pines' family have invoked my wrath! You will all pay recompense for your transgressions!", Gideon declares as he points his nemesis.

"What, you got like a word-a-day calendar or something?", Stan asks, still not taking the young psychic's rage seriously.

"But-but sunshine?", Bud intervenes, laughing nervously. "What about our arrangement with Mabel and—?"

"SILENCE!", Gideon yells at his father, "The deal is off!"

Bud just sighs, before looking at the conman. "Well, I see that he's takin' to one of his rages again. Sorry Stan, but I have to side with Gideon on this one." He rips up the contract, terminating any plans for Mystery Shack and Tent of Telepathy merger.

"Okay, okay. I can see when I'm not wanted.", Stan realizes before grabbing the clown painting and starts to run.

"Stan, I'm-I'm sorry but I'm gonna need that painting back! Stan? STAN!", Bud tries to call out to the conman, only for his words to go on deaf ears.

"TRY AND CATCH ME, SUCKERS!", Stan declares, running to his car, putting the clown painting in the back, driving away. After a long ride, he arrives at the Mystery Shack, where he hangs up the clown painting. "I coulda had it all.", Stan contemplates. He turns and looks at the twins, who look exhausted physically and emotionally exhausted. "What the heck happened to you two?"

"Gideon.", The Pine Twins answer, equally tired after dealing with the crazy psychic.

"Gideon. Yeah, the little mutant 'swore vengeance' on the whole family.", Stan scoffs sitting in the recliner, mockingly raising his fist in the air imitating the angry psychic. "Ha, I guess he's gonna try to nibble my ankles or somethin'."

Dipper gets up a bit. He realizes that Gideon's powerless without his amulet. "Oh, yeah. How's he gonna destroy us now, huh? Try to guess what number we're thinking of?"

Mabel gets up, smiling at the young psychic's misfortune. "He'll never guess what number I'm thinking of.", Mabel says before laughing. "NEGATIVE EIGHT! No one would guess a negative number."

"Uh oh.", Stan gasps jokingly at the Twins. "He's plannin' on destruction right now!" He lays on top of the twins, to which they all laugh, enjoying Gideon's loss.

Meanwhile, at the Gleeful Household, in Gideon's room. He's making dolls of the Pines family, grumbling and growling to himself. He plays with the Mabel doll, looking at it lovingly as he imitates her voice. "Oh, Gideon, I still love you. If only my family weren't in the way." He picks up the Stan doll, disgusts etched on his face as he impersonates him. "Look at me. I'm old, and I'm smelly." He grabs the Dipper doll with a scowl on his face, mocking the Pine. "Hey, what are you gonna do without your precious amulet now that I got a watch that allows me to morph into aliens?"

He laughs, ominously. "Oh you'll see boy…", he closes Journal 2.

"You'll see."

#chapters #dipper pines #mabel pines #soos #stan pines #gideon gleeful #heatblast #omni falls

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duhragonball · 4 years ago

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7 Comfort Movies

Tagged by @pandemicpicnic . List your seven favorite comfort movies, then tag 7 people.

This is a good thing to pass around, since I could use the diversion, and as I think about this list, I realize how long it’s been since I last saw a lot of these movies.

In no particular order...

1) Dragon Ball Z: Fusion Reborn

I dunno if these are necessarily comfort movies, as opposed to just movies I like the best, but I don’t watch movies a whole lot, so I’m guessing my all-time favorites are probably close enough. Movie 12 is good watchin’, period. This is a movie about everyone working together. Friends, enemies, strangers, the living and the dead, the damned and the divine. I watch this movie and wish that we in the real world could put aside our differences so easily and blow up all the Nazis.

2) Superman IV: The Quest for Peace

People say this is the worst Superman movie, but fuck that noise. This is the only one where Superman throws all the nuclear weapons into the sun. But one of them has a chicken nugget attached to it, which grows into a clone of Superman with scratchy fingernails, his only weakness. So Superman has to kick his ass on/with the moon, and then tell everyone that nuclear war is too big a job for Superman, because we’ll just re-arm the minute his back is turned.

This is a story about high school physics, Luthor. Sometimes the things we fear the most are only the darker side of our greatest strengths. If humanity has the power to destroy itself, then doesn’t that mean we have the power to save ourselves as well? The choice is ours.

3) Spaceballs

Some killjoys actually hated this movie, and point to it as evidence that Mel Brooks lost his touch. I respectfully submit that those people are dumb. Spaceballs came out during the dark years between Return of the Jedi and Phantom Menace, when we all wanted more Star Wars but thought we would never get more. Brooks heard our pleas, and gave us this movie, which is basically Star Wars with dick jokes all over it. People always go on about how Star Trek predicted smartphones and the Simpsons predicted the Trump administration, but only Spaceballs was prescient enough to declare: “Fuck! Even in the future, nothing works!”

This is a story about following your heart. If all you care about is duty, and obligation, and profit, you’ll end up marrying some dullard, or owing your soul to a talking pizza, or roaming the universe in search of air.

4) Batman: Mask of the Phantasm

This is the best Batman movie ever, and maybe even the best comic book movie period. In 1994, Batman the Animated Series was popular enough that they made a feature film and ran it in theaters and everything. I remember some smartass article at the time questioning whether parents would see the point in taking their kids to watch a movie of something that’s on TV for free, which is just dumb. It’s not like they ran four episodes of the TV series for this thing. It’s an original story! Anyway, Batman has to figure out what the deal is with this new vigilante who fights crime with murder, which is also a crime. He also gets very sad in place and it’s very emotional and I bought the soundtrack as soon as I could because I wanted to listen to it and feel things.

This is a story about the future, and promises, and the roads not taken. And when all is said and done, maybe the choices we made were the right ones after all, in spite of our second-guesses.

5) Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

I considered putting Revenge of the Sith on this list, since that’s usually the one I look up clips from on YouTube, but there’s no topping Jedi. I saw this in the theatre when I was six and everything was awesome. Jabba the Hutt, wint-o-green lightsabers, speeder bikes, Ewoks breaking stuff with logs and rocks, it’s just a pleasure to watch. Also, this movie introduces Emperor Palpatine, and lays the foundation for the Sith lore that made me love Revenge of the SIth in the first place. Not long after we got home from seeing this movie in 1983, I tried to draw this scene in the screencap above, because it left such a deep impression on me.

This is a story about feelings. Every butthole in Star Wars is always telling everyone else what to feel and how much they should feel it, and don’t get too attached to this or that. But in this movie Luke has to exercise restraint and then cut loose, give into his passions and then reign them in, care for his friends and family but also be willing to let them go. Everyone can give him advice, but he’s got to hoe that row himself, and figure it out as he goes. He doesn’t always get it exactly right, but he still gets it.

6) The Transformers: The Movie (1986)

The historians will say that cartoons like the original Transformers were nothing more than glorified toy commercials, made possible by the deregulation of children’s entertainment in the 1980′s. I find this incredibly unfair, because that analysis ignores the fact that Transformers was a fucking awesome cartoon. They’re all robots, so they could shoot and punch each other without any guff from standards and practices. And since the show was designed to promote an entire toy line, there were literally dozens of characters, each given a surprising amount of character and personality. Starscream (center) and Ramjet (right) are practically the same toy, but kids wanted both of them because Starscream is a whiny, shitty drama queen, and Ramjet is a dumbass who likes to hit things with his head. Astrotrain (left) is just a cool dude who can be a train or a space shuttle.

This movie is the height of the franchise, where they could raise the stakes even higher, and introduce even crazier concepts like planet-eating monsters and robots actually killing each other for keeps. I see fans from my generation acting all traumatized over all the deaths, like they never should have done that in a movie marketed for children, but this was a story about renewal. The old order changeth, and it falls to the newcomers to rise up and carry on. I’ve always taken a lot of comfort in the way these characters pass the torch. The Smurfs were never brave enough to have Papa Smurf name his successor.

7) UHF

Geez, I haven’t watched this one in forever. I’d have to double-check to see if I even have it on DVD. UHF was the ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic vehicle from the late 1980′s. I want to say ‘89. He plays a guy who takes over a TV station and runs all these ludicrous shows on it until it becomes the most popular channel in town. It’s basically a bunch of sketch comedy stitched together into a movie, and it doesn’t try to apologize for this.

This is a story of the importance of imagination, and of being true to yourself. Al’s character has trouble finding a steady job, and its’ easy to conclude that there’s something wrong with him, but it’s really just that he hasn’t found the right opportunity for his passions and skills. Once he finds his place, he rises to the occasion.

And that’s my list. Now I gotta tag people. @auralime, @ediblenonsense, @semercury, @twobellsilence, @drowning-in-this-starry-serenade, @cozymochi, and @glintea.

#that shot of the twinkie weiner sandwich is strangely poignant to me #when i was 11 it was hilarious #when i was 18 i was determined to make my own #out of some misplaced sense of patriotic duty to the weird al fandom #then al went vegetarian and it seemed kind of silly #now i watch the scene where he makes the thing and i just feel bad for him because his character's broke #i'm old enough to get the context finally

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cosmiceverafter · 5 years ago

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Buffy the Brave

Inspired by Alex Manes finally getting his beagle, and for my love of BTVS. Wrote this the same day I found out the news!

You can find it on my ao3 as well.

The first time he saw her, she was sitting out on his porch. It startled Alex to see the little face looking up at him.

The beagle didn’t have a collar and looked too thin for his liking.

When he tried to go over to her, she backed away slowly with her head down. The thought of why she cowered away from him made him sad; she didn’t seem to have known a lot of love in her life, and humans were sometimes something to be afraid of. She was old enough to have been through a lot.

When his father came to mind at that moment, he nodded without saying a word as if to silently translate: believe me, I get it.

He had tried one more time to get a bit closer and she ran off into the woods.

The next time, Alex was putting something into his car getting ready to go into town, when he saw her nervously poking her head out of the bushes next to the cabin. He had whistled and patted his thighs, but again, she backed away, disappearing in the trees.

Alex decided it was time to let the dog know that not all humans were monsters. He went into town and bought some dog food. Alex put that and a dish of water on the porch and went inside.

He had sat there looking through the window, longer than he would have liked to admit but he was anxiously waiting for her visit. After some time, she slowly came out from the trees once more and slowly looked around. When there was no threat, the beagle walked around sniffing the ground.

Alex smiled as he watched the dog stick its butt up in the air, black nose to the ground. Beagles were known for their good sense of smell. Alex wondered if she could smell alien….

Finally, the beagle made her way to the porch and found the food. She sat and ate for quite a while. Then she plopped down. The sun was setting and maybe it was the way the light hit her fur, but at that moment, Alex knew she had found a home.

He knew he had to slowly earn her trust though. So every night, he had continued to put food out, and every morning it would be gone. He even got a soft bed for her to curl up on at night.

She would never let him get too close to her though. But at this point, he knew she was a stray or worse, abandoned by her family, an experience he knew all too well.

One night, the weather turned for the worst. It started as just a wind storm, but quickly the hail began to fall in what seemed like buckets of golf balls. The thunder rumbled the ground and lightning lit the sky like spiderwebs.

Alex kept looking outside, hoping to see the beagle. He was worried about her in the storm.

He was bending down to light a fire when he finally heard it—a howl.

Alex quickly made his way to the cabin door but opened it carefully to not scare the dog. Slowly but surely, he opened it up to see that little face staring up at him. The dog was trembling in the cold and he moved aside and held the door wide open.

The beagle sat there hesitant at first, so he waited patiently. He backed away from the door and sat on the couch to give her confirmation that it would be safe to enter.

The thunder crashed again and the dog whimpered softly.

“Come on,” Alex said calmly. ��Please come inside.”

The next thing he knew, little paws clicked on the wood floor as it made its way in. The dog shook the water off its fur and slowly came all the way inside.

Alex smiled and pulled a blanket off the couch and onto the floor. After a few moments, the dog went over and circled a few times before curling into a ball by the warm fire.

Slowly, Alex made his way into the kitchen to get it some more food. He put it by the blanket and closed the door.

They sat this way for a while, but the dog never seemed truly content. The thunder was just too loud. Louder than he’d heard it in a long time. It shook the cabin and everything inside it.

He was able to see that the dog was a girl, without getting too close. He had sensed this as much. Alex noticed as she kept getting up and would pace the cabin, before sitting down again.

Alex wanted to do something to take her mind off of the storm. He clicked on the old tv he rarely watched, and her silky long ears lifted slightly.

As he flipped through the channels, she seemed uninterested and still unsettled.

Finally, he found a channel with old reruns of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Alex smirked, he had loved this show growing up. He always wanted to be a badass like the slayer. And well, the men on the show were beautiful. They always made his heart flutter. Each character had inspired him, but none as much as Buffy herself. She’d literally gone through hell-and-back. If she could handle hell on earth, well he had thought so can I.

He settled on the couch and watched the episode where Spike had entered the high school and Buffy was trying to keep everyone safe, including her mother. Alex got so into it, he hadn’t even heard the patter of paws.

Alex looked down to see the beagle on the side of the tv. She was actually watching the show!

Every time Buffy kicked a vampire’s ass, the dog would wag her tail. She stayed like this for a while and every time a commercial came on, she looked over at him as if to say really? “That’s unfortunately out of my hands, girl. But it seems like it’s a marathon!” Her tail wagged again.

So the two of them sat there, watching hours of Buffy. They watched the funny episodes like when the characters couldn’t remember who they were because of Willow's spell; the creepy episodes like the one where the town loses their voices and the floating men take their hearts; and even the sad episodes like the one where Buffy loses her mom (the dog gave a little whimper at that one). But even though it had been hours of watching this show, she never moved away from the screen, only to lie down as she watched.

She finally seemed content and at peace.

The storm had finally ended and neither had noticed. Buffy, it seemed, kept them brave and got them through it, especially the dog.

Buffy the brave…

Alex’s eyes widened, “Hey,” he said softly, “Buffy?” The beagle turned around and wagged her brown and white tail as she tilted her head slightly. “How would you like to stay... and...um, watch some more?”

Buffy, as the name seemed to stick, surprised him by jumping up on the couch and curling into his body. She was warm and soft. He could feel the steady beat of her heart. She was calm and seemed happy at last. Now he finally felt at peace. So content.

“Welcome home, my brave girl.” And as she licked his face, he knew she was going to slay his heart forever—in the best possible way.

#alex manes #buffy the beagle #alex x buffy #my fic #my graphic #roswell nm #alex manes fic #buffy the beagle fic

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mx-ishikawa · 5 years ago

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F/O February Day 1: Reverse Self Ship

welcome to F/O February y’all!! :D for this prompt, I decided to do a little drabble! because I felt it would be easier to explain that way XD” honestly the reverse selfship AU is so good??? so here’s my contribution for today! XD (warning for brief mentions of self-harm and other injuries, other than that this should be a perfectly safe read!)

“Rex Rex Rex! It’s on!! Quick, we gotta catch it!!!”

“Okay Emmet, I’m coming, jeez!”

Rex hoisted himself off his bed with a low grunt as Emmet scurried to the living room couch. He knew how excited his brother got over his favorite show. Four years ago, popular sitcom Where Are My Pants? had been his all-time favorite television series, but then his heart was stolen by a quirky cartoon called Light in the Darkness that he stumbled upon by chance. The show followed an adventurous, tomboyish young woman dubbed Light and her interactions in the secret world of monsters of all kinds, fighting the evil ones and befriending the good ones. There was quite an uproar within the fandom when the titular lead came out as agender a year before, and quite a bit of discourse since she still considered herself female in a vaguer sense. But none of that mattered to Emmet. He loved the character for her personality, and couldn’t care less about her gender or lack thereof.

Oh, he loved her alright… his Tumblr was filled with screenshots and fanart of Light, he had all the merch of her he could afford, he even had a plush of her, which he was currently holding in his arms. He was immediately attached to her as soon as he got into the series; at first he thought she was just a comfort character, but before long, he realized he was actually flat-out in love with her. He had always gushed about her, and occasionally other characters, to Rex, and constantly pushed him to watch it. Rex always listened to Emmet’s gushing and supported his love for the character, but for the longest time, he didn’t get around to watching it. He was in a terrible mental place at the time; he engaged in risky and destructive habits, he drank, he smoked, he self-harmed, he got in trouble with the law, and developed other unhealthy coping mechanisms for his insecurities and mental issues. He was a troubled soul who was paranoid that their mutual circle of friends hated him and that he’d never be good enough for anyone. He distanced himself from everyone he loved—even his dear brother Emmet, with whom he had always been joined at the hip before. It was only when he got involved in a reckless motorcycle accident after an argument with Emmet that Rex realized just how much danger he was putting himself in, and how much he was worrying his brother. After that, he vowed to better himself and get some help. He also moved in with Emmet as his insistence, saying he wouldn’t worry as much and that he could help Rex get on track. That turned out to work like a charm, and he was happier than he’d been in a long time ever since.

It was only then that he was finally able to watch an episode of his brother’s favorite show with him. He didn’t know exactly what he was expecting from the cartoon, but it certainly surpassed whatever those expectations were. Rex was surprised that Light in the Darkness contained more adult-oriented humor, as Emmet typically didn’t watch those kinds of shows. And he also understood why Emmet loved Light so much—she was a goofy, funny, charming, kind, and humble hero who knew what it was like to feel like a nobody or that you’d never be good enough. It also happened to be an episode in which Light tried to talk to and reform one of the main villains, and she gave a clumsy but convincing speech about how she could relate to the villains struggles, but wished he would handle them in a way that benefited both parties. Rex didn’t want to admit it, but that damn speech pulled at his heartstrings. And by the end of the episode, Rex found himself smitten with Light as well. At first he tried to hide his feelings from Emmet, thinking he would be angry with him for encroaching on his selfship. But Emmet did find out eventually—and he was ecstatic. He was beyond happy to share her with his brother, as that meant they could gush about her to each other more often, and soon the brothers agreed that Light had enough room in her heart for the both of them. After coming to that conclusion, they created their own self-shipping sideblog that they co-modded together.

Now Emmet wasn’t exactly the creative type, and sometimes he was jealous of all the great artists and writers within the community, but he did enjoy remaking the three of them in Picrews and other character customization games. He also gushed about Light a lot, using lots of capitals, exclamation points, and heart emojis in said gushes. Rex, on the other hand, was beginning to dabble in photo editing, so he took a screenshot of Light and Photoshopped her into a picture of him and Emmet, among other such edits. He gushed about her too, of course, but his were more straightforward and consistent to whatever specific quality of hers he was talking about, with less weird emojis.

Neither of them told anybody in their respective workplaces about their love. Emmet tried way too hard to fit in and was already seen as weird despite that; he didn’t want to add onto that as a grown man who was hopelessly in love with a cartoon character. Meanwhile Rex didn’t give a damn about fitting in or what his coworkers thought of him, he just wasn’t the type to open up to people he didn’t know well enough. However, their mutual circle of friends knew very well about their selfships with Light, and they all shipped them. Their best friend Lucy had even created a few artworks of the three of them, which they both proudly displayed on their blog (with proper credit, of course). They had been doing this for almost a year, and at this point they were perfectly content opting out dating real people in favor of shipping themselves with a fictional character.

“It’s a new episode!!” Emmet squealed, plopping onto the couch and kicking his feet excitedly. “I can’t wait to see what she does today!”

“You think she’s finally gonna give Lord Beelzebub what’s coming to him?” Rex asked.

“I hope so! Now that guy is a real jerk.” Emmet puffed his cheeks out. This particular villain was beyond hope of reformation—Light tried, multiple times, but it was clear that he wouldn’t be happy until his evil deeds were done. Emmet pouted very briefly over this fact before perking up to sing and shimmy in his seat to the theme song. Rex chuckled at how excitable his brother could be. He kept his mouth shut after that, as Emmet hated when people tried to talk over his show.

The episode started out with Light hanging out with some of her monster friends and being her usual dorky self, but that only lasted a couple minutes before she was alerted of some other villain’s plan. The scene then transitioned to a dramatic montage of Light putting on cool-looking armor, then panning from her toes to her head as she heroically posed in the armor.

“Wow…” Emmet swooned. Rex gave a low whistle.

She only stood like that for a few brief seconds before random pieces of the armor suddenly fell off and clattered to the ground, much to Light’s dismay. “Aw damnit, no! Get back here!” Light complained as she crouched to pick up the fallen pieces. This elicited a giggle from Emmet and a chuckle from Rex. “Dork…” Rex lovingly muttered.

By the next scene, she has duct tape all over her armor, making the brothers laugh again. She and her monster friends were devising a plan of attack when Emmet’s phone buzzed. “Shush,” he said, keeping his eyes glued to the screen. He was mesmerized as Light led her friends into battle, but before they could see just who they were up against…

“Gahh, commercials,” Rex groaned, muting the TV. “This is why watching things online is so much better.”

“Yeah, but this is a new episode, we gotta catch it as it airs and support the creators!” Emmet argued.

“Yeah okay. Aren’t you gonna answer that text message?”

“I suppose I could since it’s a commercial break.” Emmet reached into his jeans pocket. “But whoever it was should no better than to bother me during my show!” He pouted as he checked his phone. “Oh, it’s Lucy…” He opened the message, and a mere second went by before Emmet cracked up laughing.

“Must’ve been a good one,” Rex chuckled.

“Oh my gosh, Rex, look at this!” Emmet laughed, shoving the phone in Rex’s face. It turned out Lucy sent a meme that read “when you storm a dragon’s cave and discover it’s hoarding mac and cheese” with a redraw of Light in the “it’s free real estate” meme. People who weren’t fans of the show wouldn’t understand the meme, but it made Rex burst into raucous laughter.

“Oh my god!” he roared. “She would totally say that!”

“She would!” Emmet giggled. “That’s amazing.”

“Our datefriend is high-key a dork,” Rex laughed. That statement sent Emmet into another fit of giggles.

“She’s our dork though.”

“Hell yeah.”

“I just wish I knew her real name in full.”

Rex sat up, surprised. “What do you mean, ‘in full’?”

“Well, remember in Clash of the Chimeras when she was signing the form thing for that order? She could only write the letter K before she got interrupted by the gremlin breaking things in the other room. So that means her real name must start with a K, and we don’t know anything else about it.”

Rex nodded. “And you would rather call her that because…?”

“Because it would help me feel closer to her.” Emmet held his plush a little tighter.

“Well, you could always give her a headcanon name. or just call her K until her real name is fully revealed, if that ever happens.”

Emmet pondered this for a moment. “I suppose that could work.” Suddenly, he perked up. “Oh! It’s back on!” He hurriedly un-muted the TV and his eyes were glued to the screen once more.

Soon enough, Light and her friends were battling the villain, and at some point, her left gauntlet fell off. Emmet gasped as the villain used this opportunity to slash his claw across her arm.

“Oh no…” Emmet whimpered. Rex lightly traced his own scar on his shoulder from his motorcycle accident. The two were at the edge of their seats until the end of the fight scene—the villain was defeated, but Light was still bleeding. Her worried friends crowded around her, but she still seemed in high spirits.

“Guys, I’m fine!” she insisted.

“You’re bleeding,” a friend argued.

“Just out of my arm. I’ve bled from far worse places.”

Emmet made a choked-out noise in surprise.

“Oh my god,” Rex laughed.

Still, Light let her monster friends bandage her up. Luckily, there were plenty more laughs to be had by the end of the episode. As the credits rolled, Emmet kicked his feet excitedly again.

“Ahh, that was so awesome!”

“As it always is.”

“Poor Light though. She doesn’t deserve any nasty scars.”

“No, she doesn’t,” Rex agreed. “But it won’t get her down. Knowing her, she’ll probably be proudly toting it and bragging about her battle by the next episode.”

“Yeah, probably,” Emmet chuckled. “But if she was real, or if I lived in her world, I’d take care of every single injury she got and kiss it better!” His loving smile gradually morphed into a longing frown. “I’d give anything for that.”

Rex patted Emmet’s back. “Me too, kid. Me too.”

#my writing #self ship #self shipping #self shipping community #au #reverse self ship #selfship au #self ship fic #reverse self ship au #f/o february #fictional other february #f/o: Emmet #f/o: Rex #we're not so different #poly self ship

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killscreencinema · 5 years ago

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Secret of Mana (SNES)

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I have a tense history with Secret of Mana.

When the game was first released by Squaresoft in 1993, the commercial (above) really captured my interest. The luscious visuals of the commercial and the simple premise of a boy finding a magic sword - it all reminded me enough of Zelda to be worth looking into!

I didn’t get around to renting the game until about a year later, after we had moved to a small town in Kentucky called Lewisburg. This town was in no way, shape, or form a “burg” - it was hardly even a hamlet. It consisted of a Piggly Wiggly and a gas station - that was it. So you can imagine how boring it was to live there as a child. My adolescent brain was starved for imaginative storytelling, so it was at this specific point, when I was at my most receptive, that I dived into the world of J-RPGs, beginning with Secret of Mana.

The moment I turned on the SNES, I was captivated by game, from its curious use of whale song during the Squaresoft logo to the gorgeously cinematic title screen accompanied by some of the most beautiful music I’d ever heard in a video game (then one day in the near future I’d play Final Fantasy III, the music of which would blow my mind apart). I loved everything about this, and I hadn’t even begun the game yet. This was a good sign.

The game begins with your main character, Randi (which is an odd name to give a sword wielding fantasy hero), finding an old sword by the waterfall in his village and pulling it from the stone. This act allegedly unleashes hordes of monsters, earning Randi a one way ticket to banishment from his village. Randi quickly gets swept up into a quest to save the world’s “mana” from being exploited by an evil Empire, who plan to resurrect the Mana Fortress that could potentially destroy the world.

When I finally got into the meat of the game, I must admit I had struggled with it. Keep in mind this was my first RPG, of any sort besides Zelda, and unlike A Link to the Past, this game didn’t hold your hand when it came to letting you know where to go next or even the basic mechanics of the game. Playing it again as an adult, it’s a lot more linear than I remembered, but I can still see how the child version of me could get lost. For one thing, you don’t meet your two companions in any particular order. You can meet the sprite, Popoi, first or you can meet the girl, Primm. Figuring out how to navigate their menus and control their actions was a whole other learning curve I probably never mastered as a kid.

Anyway, at this point, you’re probably wondering “So why is your history with this game tense? It sounds like you rather liked it.” True, I did like it, despite not having a clue what I was doing and progressing through the game’s main quest at a snail’s pace. Bare in mind, I had rented this game, so if I wanted to make it far, time was of the essence! So I had finally, ARDUOUSLY made it to the Witch’s Castle, the first major dungeon of the game. After hopelessly wandering around for so long, I was excited and proud to have finally made it this far. I took a break from the game to watch TV, while my little brother invited a neighbor kid over to play video games (I want to say the kid’s name was David). I could hear them playing Secret of Mana in our shared bedroom, so I yelled a warning from the living room to NOT save over my game.

At some point, I got bored and decided to watch them play the game. I got to my bedroom just in time to witness David, that little dipshit neighbor kid, SAVE OVER MY GAME! My brother looked up at me in dread, and must have saw the rage in my expression, as he immediately left the room, abandoning David to my wrath. I screamed obscenities at him, picked him up by the scruff of his neck, and hurled him bodily out the front door. Having been sufficiently terrified, David never returned to our house for anything after that. Even though I hadn’t made it very far into the game, I was much too heartbroken and angry to continue playing it, as it just drudged up angry feelings whenever I turned it on to see David’s game in save spot mine used to be in.

So that’s why I haven’t played Secret of Mana for over 20 years... until now.

Okay, well, the real reason it took me this long to play it again is because I’ve played so many superior RPGs since then, Secret of Man seemed crude and quaint by comparison. Once Final Fantasy came into my life, Secret of Mana was on the outs, and would stay that way until my interest in retro games reignited late into my adult life. But, yes, I also had a weird, negative emotional association with the game that probably factored in somewhat.

Playing through it as an adult, I must admit the game holds up mighty nicely. The soundtrack is fucking fantastic for one and vibrant, colorful graphics are a treat for the eyes. The sucky thing about the soundtrack is it is often cut off due to memory limitations the game occasionally experiences. I believe it has to do with the extremely high quality of the music (by which I mean on a digital level, not composition-ally), which dragged on the SNES’s processing capabilities.

The combat in the game is decent, although I found the hit detection questionable and inconsistent. I’m not sure how much of that is my fault, such as in boss battles where the enemy flies through the air and I’m unable to land a hit on them, perhaps due to them being in flight (although sometimes it seems like I can hit them just fine every now and then while they are in flight). It would have been nice if a “MISS” or a “0″ would pop up to let you know that you did, indeed, land a hit, albeit an ineffective one. Otherwise, it often feels like I’m feebly wacking away at an enemy, my weapon seemingly going through them but not inflicting damage. It can be very frustrating, but it’s not a game breaking problem.

The game can also be very tedious, such as how you have to upgrade your character’s skill level with every weapon or level grind magic spells until they are sufficiently high enough to be useful. The latter problem in particular bit me in the ass during the final boss fight, when I discovered that I’d need to use a particular spell in order to even damage the boss, but I had neglected to level up that magic entirely. So I was pretty well fucked and had to start the entire Mana Fortress over again, this time after having gone back and level grinded ALL of my magic to a reasonable amount (Level 3). That playthrough was much more successful, but shit, it would have been nice to have been warned “Hey, make sure your Dryad magic is leveled up before this fight!” Like... just have one of the characters in my party go, “Hey, Randi, we should practice Dryad before going to the Mana Fortress, don’t you think?”

My final complaint about the game is the story. It’s serviceable enough, but the characters are very flat. At no point did I feel like I really understood who the bad guys were. There’s Thanatos, a cult leader; the Emperor; and some guy who tries to run you over with his hover bike like three times over the course of the game. Randi, Primm, and Popoi are also very shallow, with Popoi being the only one with any discernible personality (that being a petulant wise ass). In the long run, the gameplay is fun enough that it kept my interest hooked, but a meaty story would have really put the experience over.

While Secret of Mana isn’t perfect, and far better games have since come after it, the game is still worth playing. It is a masterfully developed game, made by an incredible gaming company at their absolute PRIME.

#secret of mana #snes #super nintendo #squaresoft #rpg #jrpg #seiken densetsu 3

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midnight-watch-committee · 5 years ago

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Story 3: home is where the monsters are

The Louenburg-Vallen residence, 9:45 am, November 21st,2023.

The warm fall sun had broken in through the curtains in just the right way to paint the whole room a gentle yellow yet not enough to be blinding. The type of pretty you only see professional photographers catch... the kind of pretty that my parents would’ve already had their cameras out to catch before the moment disappeared. Beth walked into the living room, stretching and letting a small smile out, the bright sun pulling her beauty out from deep within her. She kissed me gently on the cheek, whispering a soft “Good morning, sleeping beauty,” and heading over to the coffee brewer to make a pot. People say that they look their worst in the mornings but she was... perfect in this moment. From the way her hair kept falling in her face, to her soft and slow movements, to the bags under her eyes. I wished I had a go pro on my head right now so all of this could be recorded, but I settled for having this moment now. I heard the front door open and slam shut. I tried to say something about it, but nothing came out. I tried to say it louder, scream it, but no matter how much I tried it’s like the air around me was snuffing it out. Then... IT came in... came back. I tried to get up but my legs wouldn’t move. The tall pale creature slowly stalked its way to Beth, her still not noticing. It inched closer, its pale, bloodied gown trailing behind it. It reached a long pale finger out, gently taping it against her forehead. As it did, I watched every drop of blood fire out of the mouth of the woman I loved in a heartbeat. I tried to get up, to run, but I still wasn’t moving. Looking down I saw both of my arms and legs were in casts, broken. “Don’t worry, dear.” It said, its voice sounding like the voice recordings of my mom my grandfather kept, “I’ll be here to take GOOD care of you... for the rest of your life.” It’s permanent smile seeming more twisted than I remembered, but that didn’t matter. It’s jaw slowly unhinged, it’s sharp teeth on full display as it swiftly bit down, taking my head with its bite.

The Louenburg residence, 2 :00 am, January 3rd, 2019.

I woke up in a cold sweat, on the floor in Beth’s place. Well, her parent’s place. I was generously offered sometime here after Beth realized I live completely alone in a house that doesn’t really belong to anyone anymore. That short amount of time ended up becoming a more permanent situation around my 17th birthday back in November. I made my way into the kitchen and reached into the cabinet, grabbing a cup for myself and opening the fridge. “What to drink?” I said to myself a couple times. “We have cold brew coffee in the back.” I heard a voice say from the table. “I already had three” Beth joked, wiping her heavy eyes. I took some of the cold brew and poured it for myself, “You want some?” I asked. She turned it down, and I took a sip of it, realizing how much she hated my liking of black coffee. I sat down next to her in pitch blackness, wanting to turn on a light desperately. She sighed as she stared at her computer screen and I cracked a “Another bad fan fic?” Getting a sad nod from her, her head on the table. I gently pet her and she sits back up. I take my cold brew and invite her to come watch the news with me in the other room. She follows slowly, tired real Beth being similar to tired dream Beth in that department. That thought makes me shudder and I quickly turn on the tv and start flipping through the channels, eventually coming across the news station her uncle works for and seeing the title card “What is the Midnight Watch Committee?” and turning up the volume, whipping out my phone to record what her uncle says. “Now, some of you out there may remember back in late June when we did a story on the cabin that supposedly didn’t exist according to police and real estate agents that got up and chased that truck full of students from Big Horn High School, but new information handed to us says that there’s more to this story than the police are letting on yet again.” One of my other pictures was thrown up of a ghost of a student that haunted our high school. Poor kid, I’m glad his story is being told, even if it is on late night news. “Yes, folks you are looking at a ghost of a student, according to the Midnight Watch Committee this student was murdered by a teacher a few years back however police refuse to investigate, instead telling us to put up a reward hotline for whoever knows who these kids are, but we aren’t doing that tonight. These kids, in my opinion are doing more to help the people of Wyoming than these garbage cops! Yeah, I said it!” He looked off at something, someone on set who must’ve gestured for him to stop and they cut to commercials. Beth gave my arm a gentle slap, “Look at you, Ms. Camera Girl! That was a really nice shot you got there!” I stopped recording and smiled “Yeah well you found the body so who’s the real reporter?” She sighed “Yeah, shame we couldn’t get a photo in before the cops snatched him up.” I nodded, noticing the “Children’s survival guide” was now open, for how long is unknown to me but I turned on a light and looked at it. “No” was all that could escape my mouth as I looked down at it before me. It... couldn’t have been, but it was. Laying there on the page was the creature from my dreams. Beth looked at it, a confused look on her face. “Juni, what’s so bad about this? It’s just like everything else we deal with all the time.” She had no idea, nor could I just explain this to her. The page was the same as you’d expect for all the others... but not. Sure, the art style was the same but this thing wasn’t out in a field acting nonchalant, it was in a house, it’s finger on someone’s forehead, the blood exploding out of them like in my dream. “What the fuck” I mumbled, taking a picture and sending it to Mickey. My heart was racing and I couldn’t tell how much was from the fear and how much was the coffee. I grabbed my cup and chugged the rest, getting a wide-eyed expression from Beth. The caffeine was the least of my concerns, I stormed over to the fridge and [the rest of the events of this day was redacted to avoid self-incrimination].

The Louenburg residence,12:02 pm, January 4th, 2019.

I woke up, mildly hungover and with a bloody hand, wondering how I managed to hurt it in the first place. I sulked off to grab food, checking my phone and seeing Mickey blew it up last night. The new crack in my phone told me I must’ve dropped it or thrown it, either way I'd have to get it fixed at some point. I grabbed a granola bar and munched down on it, finally reading the page from the book, just barely holding back tears. I looked for anything that could help but all it said was: “Terror eater: Threat level alpha, avoid at all costs. The creature hunts down veteran monster hunters and people with hidden trauma, marking their victims by using graphic nightmares to tag them. Only tagged people can see Terror Eater. People near the victim when they died will have any of their memories erased of the person before they died, leaving only the day they died in their memories.” The list of victims was extensive, only listing “Monster hunter” or “Non hunter” instead of the person’s name. It was cold, it was direct, it was what you’d expect from a monster hunter who couldn’t remember these people...or these people didn’t exist at all before their deaths. Either way, the picture didn’t help, and the page next to it saying “YOU DID THIS TO YOURSELF” scribbled poorly on the page didn’t help the situation. I closed the book and stuffed it in my bag, hearing it bounce around a bunch but not wanting to address it at the current moment. I grabbed my camera and went outside, going for a walk and taking pictures of whatever I found to be nice. Birds chirping, flowers growing, rivers flowing. I must’ve walked miles because by the time I found the same river twice I realized there weren’t any rivers in Big Horn and I was completely lost. The heavy foliage of the trees around me suffocated the light, making things that much harder. I tried running in one direction for a while but this thing seemed to go on forever. I heard a rustling in the bushes nearby. I jumped and turned to it, the creature from my dreams standing there. “Juniper dear,” the fake voice of my mother said “You’ve been an awful daughter. Scaring the public with this nonsense, you should be ashamed.” My legs froze, ignoring my commands to run. “I’m going to have fun fixing-” suddenly it stopped and looked up at the sky, like something was telling it something. It let out an angry sigh and disappeared back into the foliage, an opening in the dense trees I hadn’t noticed before suddenly appeared and I, not being one to look a gift horse in the mouth, bolted out of there, afraid that whatever told it off would change its mind.

Big Horn, Wyoming, 9:30 pm, January 12th, 2019.

Getting out I recognized some shops nearby, telling me I was in the center of town. Not like recognizing a shop was the give-away, there’s no shops near Beth’s...well, she insisted I call it our house so I shall, our house. We lived in the middle of nowhere, but how I ended up here was beyond me. Turning back around I noticed that the forest I had come out of was gone. Not just harder to see, completely gone, like I had been somewhere that doesn’t exist, absolutely gone. I was barely three steps from it but I decided not to dwell on it any longer, dreading it choosing to exist again. I whipped out my phone to call Beth but it was dead, forcing me to go into a nearby shop and actually talk to someone. My palms were soaked with sweat, wiping them on my pants didn’t help much. It was 30 degrees Fahrenheit that day but if you took one look at me, you’d think it was 110. I slowly made my way to the pawn shop, standing in the doorway, reaching for the handle then pulling my hand away out of fear, I must’ve done it twenty or so times before someone nearby came over. “Are you ok, ma’am?” the stranger asked me. He was well dressed, too well dressed for Wyoming. He was brown, tall, and looked like your average CEO. “No, I’m not” I barely squeaked out. Concern made Its way onto his face, “Do you know your parents’ number?” he said reaching for his phone. I shook my head, “They aren’t around anymore.” I said, my voice still shaky. He gave me the look everyone does when they first find out, said the usual “I’m so sorry” that I've heard a thousand times and tried to think of some way to help me. “Do you have somewhere you can stay? A hotel, a friend’s house, anywhere?” he asked, scratching his head. I nodded, “I have a friend, I’ve been spending some time at her place.” I was starting to calm down, it was slow but still, I was calming down nonetheless. “I’m guessing they aren’t close by, otherwise you’d be walking there. Here,” he said holding his water jug out to me, “you look exhausted. Mind telling me what happened to you.” I paused for a second. On one hand, stranger danger. On the other, it seemed fine and I was really dehydrated from all the sweating and walking. He looked at me, puzzled. “Weren’t you just reported missing?” He asked, still staring at me. “If I was missing, how would I know?” I half joked back, hoping he’d stop staring. “Well, whoever reported you probably misses you. Let me give you a ride back, it’ll probably be faster than waiting around for someone.” I didn’t really know what to say, again stranger danger. If school taught me anything, and it almost didn’t, it was never get in cars with strangers. He reached in his pocket for something and I covered my mouth with my hand to stop him from drugging me that way. He whipped out his badge and handed it to me. “My name is Chuck Garrison, I’m not going to hurt you, I just want you to get home safely.” He said. “Check my whole car if you want, I have nothing to hide.” I wasn’t exactly sure how trustworthy he was, but at this point it was him or nothing, I guess. I followed him back to his car, taking him up on his offer to check his car and snapping a few pictures of the interior and license plate and shoving them in my bag in case he tried something. He spotted my camera, but I didn’t care, it was survival at this point. Sitting down, I started messing with the radio, stopping when I recognized Pink Floyd on one of the stations. He took note of that, I could see the gears in his head turning. “So... the camera, any particular story behind it?” Seriously? What am I a suspect? I thought to myself. “No, got it from my grandfather.” I said, punching my address into his gps. He could tell I was avoiding something but guess his humanity overwhelmed him and we switched subjects, “What are you here for, special agent?” I asked, not sure how anal he was about being addressed by his rank or not, if special agent is even a rank. “Some kids raising some hell.” He said, trying his best to focus on driving. He was here for us, wasn’t he? Either way, I wasn’t quite sure I wanted to raise more alarms for him, we spent the rest of the ride in silence. Trees, deer, the quietness of the nowhere-ness. That’s Wyoming to me, that’s home to me. Each tree we drove past reminded me I was out of the thick of it all.

The Louenburg residence,9:45, January 12th,2019

As he pulled into ‘our’ house, he handed me his card, telling me “Call me if you ever need a ride” jokingly. I took it, thanked him and got out. I tried my key on the lock and sure enough it worked. I was somewhat surprised by that, even more surprised by Beth, who was just staring, eyes locked on the phone with a spare missing persons poster of me next to her. Her dad was the first one to see me, running over and hugging me. “She’s back!” he screamed out to the whole house, everyone running over to see for themselves. Her mom came in and squeezed me tighter than her dad, Beth just stood there, tears rolling down her face. When everyone else let go, she grabbed my face. “I don’t know if I should kiss you or kill you right now.” she mumbled softly. “Either works.” I joked. “Juniper, do you know how long you were gone?! I honestly thought you might’ve died!” she screamed at me, letting go of me and crossing her arms. “I...” I looked around, it seemed like everyone was waiting on an answer. “I don’t” I said, confused. “Juniper,” her mom chimed in, “You’ve been gone for over a week.” My head started to spin. How could I have been gone that long? I sat down and did the only thing I knew how to at the moment. I cried, a lot. I’m not leaving that out of this transcript, I’m not ashamed of it. It was rough, not truly understanding it all. You would’ve done the same and don’t kid yourself by saying something different. We all cried a little that night. We talked about all the things I missed, which was a short list since it was only a week but still, talked about how much everyone missed me. That caught me off guard... it was the first time anyone had said it to me before. “I missed you.” felt like gibberish. No one felt safe having me sleep alone downstairs anymore, so Beth let me share her bed, setting a pillow wall between us. I honestly hated that pillow wall so much.

The Louenburg residence, 2:40 am, January 13th,2019.

I shot upright in bed. It was taunting me. Terror eater wanted me to feel true fear before I died. Even though the dream was the same as the last, the feelings it caused in me was the same, like it was all new. I broke down, what else was I gonna do? Beth must’ve noticed because I felt her hand slowly make its way to my leg. She mumbled something in her sleep that I couldn’t understand. I stayed up for most of the night that night, watching the time pass on her alarm clock as fear ate me up inside. I shouldn’t feel like this, I should be able to protect the ones I love, not hurt them more. Isn’t that what monster hunters do? The back-door opened, it was Beth letting her dog, Roxy, back in. Roxy was your average German shepherd corgi mix, if you had to hide your corgi as another dog, don’t call Beth because this dog was way more corgi than anything else I had ever seen, and this includes most corgis. The dog did its dog thing, eating some food then going off to find Beth’s mom. It was her dog but we were allowed visitation rights. A good custody agreement if you ask me! I smile and pet her as she walks past me. Beth smiles and watches the dog. Normally she was the one to quiet her cries of misery by picking her up every now and again and setting her on whatever she was looking at, but Beth had another girl she was worried about. She went up and hugged me and I hugged her back, understanding how much it hurts to not have someone you love around for a long time. I couldn’t understand why she missed me so much though, honestly I still don’t. My face went red, “You can let go whenever you want, yknow” I reminded her. She let go, embarrassed and thinking she made me uncomfortable, she didn’t but I still wasn’t sure how I could possibly say “I love you” to her, especially since I'd only been home for a day. “I should... go check on the dog.” She said and quickly disappeared. The hairs on my arm started to stand up and my camera started to glow again, “Shit” I mumbled to myself. It was here, how did it get here though? The question escaped my mind as I bolted to the next room, the further I could get from that THING the better. Fear was starting to be the only thing powering me, darting around a corner and sprinting down the dark hallway, Beth’s mom calling after me as I passed her but I didn’t have time to deal with that. If it came down to it, her window was the furthest from any door in the house and the ground wasn’t exactly far, I’d jump out. I slammed the door behind me and sat by the window, waiting for it to come. The door opened and I sprinted for the window, whatever came in was faster, it grabbed me by the collar just a few inches away from the window. I struggled, I wasn’t going out like this, I wasn’t letting Beth see my body if I died. I’d rather her never knew I existed at all than have to deal with the pain of finding me dead. “Juni! Calm Down!” it was imitating her, I didn’t even turn around to face it but I knew it was. Beth turned me around to look at her “Breath for god’s sake!” she practically screamed at me. “Can’t you see it?!” I actually screamed back, which in hindsight seemed really mean. But to anyone who could’ve seen it, you’d know it was right in the door way, very slowly closing in, like it was taunting me. “Juni, what’s gotten into you?!” she half screamed. Then it clicked, “people with hidden trauma,” would it really just- I had to try. “Beth, I’m scared, I’m scared that if something happens again, I won’t be able to protect you guys-” I started, it bolted for me at this point, in one last ditch effort I screamed. “I’LL LOSE YOU GUYS LIKE EVERYONE ELSE!” I closed my eyes tight, after a few seconds I opened them again and... it was gone. I cried into her shoulder, partially from the pain of having that all come out and partially from the joy of surviving to another day. The bright pink blur that was her room was much more comforting than nauseating at this point. She held me tight and I held onto her just as tight. “Maybe you should talk to my therapist?” She suggested. I nodded and laughed a little, she didn’t find the irony of it funny, I still don’t think she finds “extreme therapy” as I called it nearly as funny as I do. I was just glad to be alive and never deal with that again... unless I have another traumatic experience.

#lovecraftian horror #surreal horror #horror #adventure #lgbtq #horrorstories #short story #midnight watch committee

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buddaimond · 6 years ago

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Pattinson's High Life. Actor on challenges and rewards of Claire Denis' space drama

by Amber Wilkinson (Eye for Film UK)

Robert Pattinson was in San Sebastian last week to attend screenings of Claire Denis' latest film High Life, alongside co-stars Juliette Binoche and Mia Goth. The film tells the story of man who finds himself isolated in deep space with only his baby daughter for company, flashing back to consider what happened on this ship full of ex-convicts, including the feisty Boyse (Goth), overseen by a doctor (Binoche) obsessed with inseminating the female members of the crew and with extracting semen from Pattinson's abstemious Monte.

Catching up with Pattinson in a suite at the city's exclusive Marie Cristina Hotel, I ask him about how challenging building a relationship with the baby (Scarlett Lindsey) was, given that the first act of the film is just the two of them alone in space. It turns out it was just as difficult as you might imagine.

"I always thought the character was supposed to be a lot weirder than it ended up becoming," he says. "We'd already cast these identical twins for the babies. I met them the night before and there were two things. They were constantly with their mum and twins. You might have thought identical twins would be good because if one's not working you get another in to do the same thing. But no one figured out that if you split up twins who are constantly with each other, they go crazy.

"The night before, I was trying to bond with these kids for two-and-a-half hours and the only way I could make them even slightly happy was to pretend to be a monster. They weren't even happy, they would just stop crying for one second and scream instead. I was like, 'This is not going to work, unless you want to have an entire movie with a baby that's looking absolutely terrified.' So we cast Scarlett, who's one of my best friend's kids like the night before we started shooting and, so, I didn't want to be horrible to her because she's my friend's kid."

He says he had met the tot previously, when she was very young, adding, "Well, she didn't cry", but it was still a full-on job and not just when it came to acting.

"With this, it was kind of in the morning when she first left her parents she kind of cried for about 30 minutes but then she was fine. But if I gave her back to her parents then there would be the same process again. So it ended up being that I would babysit her the entire day - and it's not even normal babysitting because she could never cry ever, so I was with her for hours, so if there was the slightest hesitation or the tiniest bit of a tear coming on, I was like [Pattinson makes playful baby noises]. It was absolutely exhausting but it definitely ends up adding to their relationship. I really didn't want her to be upset, whereas in the script my character was much more indifferent."

The British actor says that he "prioritised" the film, which was in development for five years. "I was initially going to do The Lost City Of Z with James Gray and they almost overlapped and that shows because it was ages ago when I did that," he adds.

"There are certain directors who I would kind of cancel everything else for. James Gray was kind of one of them too. I don't know how ready I was but I just knew that I wanted to do it."

Pattinson, whose career has taken a much more adventurous trajectory since he found fame as vampire Edward Cullen in the Twilight series, says: "I couldn't really have had a more perfect career. To have that crazy explosion which was great fun. I really liked making all the Twilight movies which were great fun. Then to basically transition as soon as it ended to doing exactly what I wanted to do - I couldn't have asked for more."

The 32-year-old reveals that his experience of working with David Cronenberg on Cosmopolis "changed everything about how I go after different filmmakers".

"He randomly came to me," he says. "I'd never met him. I found the initial email exchange with my agents the other day and I was saying, 'I don't think I should do it, I'm going to mess it up.' I was trying to get out of it. I don't remember that at all, and I got really convinced into doing it.

"But with Clare, I said I wanted to work with her years before I even met her and it took ages for a meeting to happen and years after that for the movie to happen."

The list of directors he's also like to work with includes Catherine Breillat, Jean-Luc Godard, Jacques Audiard and Leos Carax. Speaking about the way his attitude changed towards the shaping of his career after working with Cronenberg, he adds: "I thought I had to have more control before".

"I would make decisions where I was thinking I had a more direct relationship with the audience rather than the directors. So I did [fiml]Bel Ami[/film]. It was the only time I really thought I'd try to subvert the audience's expectations. Because, at the time I had Twilight which has a very female audience so I thought it would be kind of funny to play a part that was specifically screwing over women and stealing their money. I was thinking I shouldn't rely on myself, I should work with people who are cleverer than me. After working with Cronenberg, I didn't know how to do the movie at all. I was avoiding rbrn talking to him. When I finally talked to him, I said, 'I'm sorry, I've been nervous to talk to you because I don't really know what the movie's about about' and he said, 'Yeah, me neither'. But he said, 'It's kind of juicy, right?' It's a cool thing. As soon as I realised that, whenever I watched a movie that had a big impact on me, I'd immediately go after the person and I still do that now."

Speaking about working with Brady Corbet on Childhood Of A Leader, he adds: "I'm always a little bit wary of working with first-time directors because I don't know how to judge someone at all, I'm really bad. Every director is good in a meeting. But with Brady I'd just know him for such a long time - since I was 14 - and anyone could tell you that he was a savant. I like people who really feel that there's a particular imprint that they put on a movie. With Cronenburg and Clare it just feels like a very specific world they've built - it doesn't just feel like they've recorded some stuff happening and just stuck it together, it feels like a world that's existing and it's contained in the movie."

As for the less mainstream nature of his more recent films, he says: "I don't feel like I'm 'properly' arthouse - these are big names. I don't feel like I'm trying to be super-obscure.

"I think most super-commercial movies, generally the directors have only done TV commercials before or they are random people. With mainstream movies, I feel like I've seen them all before. The amount of scripts you get that are quite formulaic and I don't know what the point is."

With High Life, he says: "I had no idea what to expect. I had no expectations in a really good way. If you see a director who has made Beau Travail - I could look at that and feel so much from that movie without really knowing what it is saying at all. But I just know it's great. So I just very much trusted in whatever Claire wanted to do with it. The first time I saw it, I definitely found it funnier than I expected. Nobody is finding it funny but the first two times I watched it I was crying laughing."

And, like many before him who have worked with the French director, he is full of praise for her.

"She's just a unique person," he says "I'd met up with her tons of times over the years before we started doing it. I just loved hanging out with her, she can be so kind of warm but at the same time, just so weird. She'll pick subjects out of nowhere and I've never met anyone like her. On set, she's just very funny. No one quite knew what the story was about but there was so much faith in her. It was an interesting work environment where no one's trying to sabotage it. Normally, if a director couldn't fully explain exactly how they want things to be done, a lot of the time actors will start going, 'You don't know what you're doing, this is going to be shit.' and then they start protecting themselves and their performance. There wasn't a single day, no matter how strange the subject matter got, it seemed that everyone was very supportive of the movie. That's because of Claire, she inspires that a lot. She's a very sweet person."

He says he wishes that the directors he works with had more of an audience but is self-deprecating when I suggest that he brings fans along with him to his films.

"Like 10 people," he says "I think the majority of people who would go and see this are people who like Claire, adding, "I hope that every movie I do that it starts to create a sort of expectation that I only do stuff that's trying to be interesting."

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e350tb · 7 years ago

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Steven Universe - Ruby Stars: Chapter Seven

A Trip to Wilmingmore

In the city of Wilmingmore, there was a enormous megamall. It was an enormous, grey concrete structure with a round roof, surrounded by a vast tarmac plain of parking lots and loading bays. It was if it resided in a gigantic black hole in the middle of the city, separated from the city centre and the docks by a ring of freeways, elevated roads and the railway line. It was the commercial heart of the state - it was called the Delmarva Centre.

Although the centre was vast, the stores inside needed space for their excess goods. On the eastern, dockyard side of the Centre were a series of warehouses for this purpose. They were old, dark and dusty, but they protected a sea of products from the elements.

That wasn't the only thing they protected.

Sometime in the previous winter, a corrupted quartz had lumbered down from Jersey in search of warmer climates. She travelled by night and slept by day, and incredibly had gone completely unnoticed by the time she reached the city.

She didn't like the city, however. It was loud, crowded and bright, and metal monsters screamed down the roads and railways at all hours. She had tried sleeping in the sewers underneath the city, but the dampness and the smell made her uncomfortable. So she wandered further along, cold and miserable, until at last she found one of the warehouses.

Inside, she found a bed in the corner. It was large and wooden, and she could just about fit inside, once she pushed out some of the strange trinkets that were already inside. Satisfied, she climbed inside, carefully closed the lid, curled up and went to sleep.

She slept for a very long time indeed. She was only awoken by a jolt as her bed started to move.

As it turned out, the crate belonged to an electronics store, and it was being moved inside the centre so that the contents to be added to the in-store stock.

Both they and the quartz were in for a nasty surprise...

"...yeah, I'm with Connie. I mean, fifty pages? That's way too much..."

"But Jenny, it's adorable!"

The van pulled into an empty parking space, and Greg turned off the engine.

"Okay, remember where we parked!"

Sadie climbed out of Greg's van, stretching her arms and legs. Wilmingmore wasn't that far from Beach City, but she was glad to be off the road all the same. In any case, she'd been looking forward to this for a while.

She, Steven, Connie and Jenny had come up to the Delmarva Centre to buy equipment for the band. Greg had suggested some new sound equipment, and they'd decided to make a day trip of it. Buck and Sour Cream hadn't been able to come (something about a project, they said), but that didn't mean they couldn't have fun on their own.

In any case, she needed the down time. Training back at Beach City had moved on to summoning her weapon. It wasn't going well, probably because she didn't have the first idea of what her weapon actually was. A day to cool off and focus on herself would probably be good for her - Garnet had even said as much herself.

"Okay," said Greg, "I'm gonna go pick this sound system up from WirelessShack - you guys meet me back at the van at about... three?"

"Are you sure you don't need help?" asked Sadie, "You're doing this for us, and..."

"Nah, I'll be fine," replied Greg kindly, "You guys enjoy yourselves!"

He wandered off in the direction of the Centre entrance.

"So," asked Connie, "What do you guys wanna do?"

"I'm pretty sure there's an arcade in there," replied Jenny, "I mean, if they haven't closed it or anything. I haven't been here for a year..."

"Or we could go to the LEGU Shop!" exclaimed Steven.

He held up his hand and Connie high-fived him.

Suddenly there came a low rumble. Connie looked at her stomach and blushed slightly.

"Well, guess we know what we're doing first," said Sadie.

She chuckled as they headed inside.

"...Seriously, you're making us come here so that you can use a payphone."

"It's not my fault they didn't have one at the office!"

"Bracknell, before we leave, we're getting you a mobile phone. I mean come on..."

Clancy and Bracknell wandered the colossal avenues of the mall. They were in search of what Clancy reckoned might have been the last payphone in the city of Wilmingmore so that Bracknell could call his parents on his mother's birthday. Clancy would have lent him his phone, except he was under no circumstances to lend his OSS-issued phone to anyone else - his boss had repeatedly told him that it was worth more than he was. Besides, it needed his fingerprints to work.

In any case, he was privately glad to be out of the factory-turned-office. The metallic smells were often overbearing, and either Bradshaw or one of his lackeys called him every couple of hours. At least now he had an excuse to ignore them - and if he got Bracknell a phone, he could claim it was work.

Eventually, they reached the payphone. It was nestled in a corner overlooking a massive, circular concourse. As Bracknell dialled his parent's numbers, Clancy walked over to the railing and peered over it - he felt like a bit of people watching.

It was lunchtime, and people were generally heading to the food court, which was on the other side of the avenue Clancy had just come up. Some were getting business from students, as the Wilmingmore University generally allowed breaks for lunch around this time. There were a lot of people at Cold Issue, for example, and a few more at GameShop. Comparatively, the WirelessShack just across from him was quiet.

Suddenly, a familiar person caught his eye.

Clancy cursed under his breath as he saw Greg Universe, a U-Bahn sandwich in his hand, wandering over to the WirelessShack. He was whistling a tune, and seemed to be in good spirits.

"Okay," Clancy whispered to himself, "Don't worry, Bracknell's gonna be on the phone for a while, I don't have to talk to him..."

"Yeah, I'll call back when I get my phone. Give Dad my love! Bye!"

Clancy's eye twitched as Bracknell hung up the phone.

"She's at lunch with Grandma," he said, walking over, "I'll call her back tonight after I set up my phone. So, WirelessShack?"

Clancy frowned deeply.

Greg stood in line at the WirelessShack, waiting for the man in front to finish paying for his TV.

It took a lot to annoy Greg, but this man was starting to do just that. He was a well-dressed man in a fine suit with no tie, his hair immaculately coiffed, and his voice underlined with a deeply aristocratic air. He probably could have ordered a TV online (or gotten somebody else to do it), but instead he insisted on insulting and abusing the staff at the counter.

"Hurry up, you!" he spat, "I want this television today!"

"Uh-y-y-yes sir," replied the cashier, "I-I just need to make sure your card is valid before I can..."

"Valid? Valid? Do you know who I am?"

Greg was about to open his mouth and ask the man to cool off, when he suddenly felt a soft kick against his heel.

"Ooh, sorry sir, my fault."

"Nah, it's fine," Greg said, turning around.

He paused.

He didn't recognise the man that had kicked him - he was a short, suited, dark-skinned man who looked friendly enough. Behind him, looking as though he wished he was absolutely anywhere else right now, was Agent Clancy Miller.

"Clancy?" said Greg.

"Uh...Greg, yeah," nodded Clancy, "I… uh… we were just getting this kid a phone."

"A phone," nodded Greg.

"Yeah."

"And you went a hundred miles from Washington to get it."

"I… uh..."

Clancy sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"I'm not here about your kid, alright?" he said at last, "They just want me to keep watch on gem stuff."

Greg nodded sceptically.

"Is...is Sadie well?" asked Clancy hesitantly.

"She's-"

"I want to see it before you load it up!" barked the rich man, "Bring the box out here and make it quick!"

Greg shot the man the sternest look he could (which was hard, as he was not a naturally stern man) before turning back to Clancy.

"She's okay," he replied, "She's living with the Gems for now."

"Yeah, Barb told me," nodded Clancy, "Do you...check in on her?"

Greg nodded.

"Does she tell you anything?"

"I promised I wouldn't tell you or Barb anything she didn't want you to know," replied Greg.

"Um, sir, I'm sort of feeling a bit 'third wheel' here," interjected the other man, "How do you two know each other?"

"Stay out of this, Bracknell," grunted Clancy.

The older agent sighed.

"Look, Greg, just... make sure she stays safe, okay?" he said, "Not for me. For her."

"She'll be alright," replied Greg, "I promise..."

"Ah, perfect! Finally, some punctuality. Wheel it up and I'll look inside."

The rich man was looking at a crate that had been wheeled up from the back. It was about waist high and quite wide - it must have been a very upmarket television. A grumpy looking worker was unscrewing the bolts to the lid. The rich man leant over him, waiting impatiently to see inside.

"Come on, come on, we haven't all day! Let's see it!" the man snapped, with his holier-than-thou attitude that made Greg's skin crawl.

The workman muttered something under his breath as he unscrewed the last bolt. Then, slowly and carefully, he lifted the lid off.

"Wait," said the wealthy man, "That isn't..."

A blue blur flew right into the snob's face, knocking him hard onto his back. Despite the panic of the moment, Greg had to admit it was a little vindicating.

The creature standing on the rich man's chest resembled a very large, very furry and very agitated bobcat. It's fur was light blue with a sprinkling of darker blue spots. Instead of a muzzle it had a beak, and one of its eyes was replaced by a blue gemstone. At the end of its tail was a large, sharp spike.

"Corrupted gem," hissed Clancy.

As the store erupted in a cacophony of amazement, some terror and a few laughs at the annoyingly well-tailored man's misfortune, the gem's head darted around. She seemed to be shaking - Greg realised it must be terrified.

"Okay, everybody quiet down!" he said, "She's scared!"

At that, the rich man tried to sit up. He scowled at his assailant.

"Get this hideous creature off of my new suit!" he thundered.

The gem jumped and yowled. For a second she dug her heels into the man's chest, causing him to wince and yelp in pain - then she was off, out of the store and into the mall, bowling down everyone in her way.

Greg, Clancy and Bracknell watched it disappear towards the food court.

"We... we should get after that thing," said Bracknell.

Clancy sighed.

"So much for a day off," he muttered.

Sadie picked at her food and sighed heavily.

They were sitting in a restaurant in the food court - a fifties-styled diner, with an old jukebox and a lovingly restored roadster out the front. Sadie and Jenny sat alone in the booth; Steven and Connie had gone to try and work the jukebox.

"What's up, Sadie Killer?" asked Jenny.

Sadie stared at a fry in her hand.

"I'm starting to notice that everything seems to taste different," she replied.

"So you hate some of the foods you used to like?" asked Jenny.

Sadie nodded, pointing to an unfinished burger on the side of her plate.

"I never used to have a problem with them," she explained, "But now onions make me gag when I try to eat 'em. And it's not even just that! I don't need as much sleep as I used to or get tired as much, and I never feel like I'm too hot or too cold, and..."

In fact, it was more than simply the taste of the food. Perhaps she was being paranoid, but she was sure that people were looking at her differently - and why wouldn’t they? Her strange new red eyes, the gem that poked out from under her shirt - these were not things normal people had. She felt like everyone was judging her, silently fearing her - like she was something other than what they were.

She no longer felt like Sadie Miller (and in many ways she wasn’t - after all, Clancy Miller wasn’t even her father.) In many ways, she hardly felt like Sadie at all. She felt more a Ruby, less a human, the gem in her torso starting to weigh on the wires supporting her sense of who she even was. They grew tauter by the day, and she felt about ready to snap.

Jenny put a hand on Sadie's.

"Hey, girl, breathe," she said.

Sadie closed her eyes and breathed in and out slowly.

"I just... feel less human," she said, "And that's not fair, because I'm not any different from Steven and he never feels like he's not human... at least I don't think he does..."

"Look, Sadie," replied Jenny, "I'm not gonna pretend I understand this, but it's okay if you're scared of what's happening to you. I mean, change is freaky. But you're gonna get through it. You're not alone."

Sadie nodded and smiled weakly back at her.

"Yeah," she sighed, "I guess you're right."

Anything else she might have said was interrupted by the return of Steven and Connie.

"They unplugged the jukebox," said Connie, shrugging, "Someone set it up to play What's New Pussycat twenty-one times."

"Geez, really?" asked Sadie, "Somebody must've had a lot of time on their..."

A shriek echoed through the diner.

Sadie got up, looking out into the food court. Scores of people were racing for the exits, although a few had stopped and whipped out their phones and cameras. The cause of the concern was a blue monster, large and fluffy, that stood on a table. It growled at a security guard, who was very nervously backing away.

"A corrupted gem!" gasped Steven.

"Darn it, now?" exclaimed Connie, "But I left my sword at home!"

"You have a sword?" asked Jenny.

Connie shrugged.

"It's a long story."

The monster growled, stepping towards the security guard. It looked like she was preparing to pounce.

"Okay, we need to bubble her," said Steven, drawing his shield, "Just take it nice and easy, and..."

Suddenly, everything seemed to happen at once.

A young man in a black suit dove out from behind a table, aiming to tackle the monster. He missed, landing hard on his stomach and knocking over the table next to it. A bottle of ketchup crashed to the floor and sprayed him in the face.

The creature just about jumped out of her skin, shooting off the table like a startled cat. She roared and thundered towards the window of the diner. With a mighty crash she jumped through, landing right in front of Sadie and Jenny.

Before they could react, she roared again - this time, a sonic boom burst from her mouth, picking Sadie up and sending her flying into the back wall. She hit her head hard - she slumped to the floor, her vision swimming. Dust flew everywhere.

"Put him down!"

Sadie's vision cleared. She saw the monster - she had lifted Steven up by his shirt with her tail. Connie had picked up a stool and lifted it over her head - she was about to charge in.

"OSS! Stay back!"

A man stepped through the dust, carrying a crowbar. Sadie's eyes widened.

It was Clancy Miller.

"C'mere girl," Clancy urged, "C'mere. Nice and easy..."

The creature dropped Steven - he landed hard on the tiled floor. She turned to face to agent, growling again. Clancy braced himself slightly - he didn't seem to have noticed Sadie.

"Yeah, that's good, away from the kid," said Clancy, "Over here, I can make this nice and easy..."

The monster pounced towards Clancy. He held up the crowbar like a swordsman parrying an enemy - with a sickening crunch, the crowbar bent out of shape as the monster caught it in her beak. She tore it from the agent's hands almost effortlessly and threw it to the floor.

"...oh," said Clancy, backing away, "Uh… shoot, um..."

The monster charged again. The agent shut his eyes.

Before she could tackle Clancy, he was shoved into cover by Jenny. They both landed hard in a corner booth, the agent knocking his head hard on the bottom of one of the stools. Instantly, the creature turned - it growled and prepared to charge once more. Jenny shielded the stunned agent and braced, waiting for the attack to come.

Sadie shook the dizziness from her head and grit her teeth.

This wasn't fair. She'd come here to get away from her problems, just for a day. Not only had a corrupted gem turned up to ruin it, but her once-father had also had the gall to turn up and make everything worse. Now her friend was going to get hurt, and she was just sitting here, watching numbly.

Jenny didn't deserve this.

Steven and Connie didn't deserve this.

She didn't deserve this.

It just. Wasn't. Fair.

"Get away from her!"

Sadie lunged to her feet, rushing towards the gem monster. Her gem glowed, and she felt something emerge from it. Without thinking, she grabbed it and pulled it out.

She lifted the short, red spear and buried it into the monster's back with all the force she could muster. There was an enormous puff of smoke, and she heard something hard land on the floor.

She landed on her knees, breathing heavily. As the adrenaline wore off, she gazed in wonderment at the weapon. It was a practical spear, no more than a meter long - it was dark red with a lighter red head. It seemed to glow slightly, but perhaps that was Sadie's imagination. She glanced from the weapon to her gem and then back again, her face going slightly pale.

"Did… did I make this?"

She looked over to Jenny and Clancy. The former had already gotten up and was running over to check on her friend (she seemed to be stowing her phone as she did), but Clancy was frozen in place, gazing in stunned silence at the half-gem.

"...my god," he breathed.

Sadie wondered if he was in awe or horrified, but she couldn't help but suspect the latter.

They stared at each other in numb silence. Jenny was saying something, but Sadie couldn't process it. Steven was bubbling the gem, and Greg had arrived with the other agent - they were saying things too, but they might as well have been mute.

At last, Clancy spoke again.

"I can't… I… Bracknell, we need to go!"

He sprung to his feet, adjusting his tie with shaking hands as he walked briskly to the door. The younger agent - Bracknell, apparently - quickly followed, glancing back towards the ruined diner as he did. They passed several diner patrons and mall customers, none of whom paid them any attention.

All attention seemed to be on Sadie. She swallowed, her throat dry, and looked at her shaking hands.

She didn't want this. She didn't want this.

"Sadie?" asked Steven, his voice underlined with worry.

Sadie clutched her head, the spear vanishing as she let go of it. Her head was spinning again, and she felt like she was going to be sick.

"... I… I think I need to go."

"Sir," said Bracknell, "What the heck was that?"

They had driven back to the factory in utter silence, Clancy's hands clutching the wheel so hard that he feared he might crush it. Now, sitting in the parking lot, his partner had decided to break the oppressive quiet.

"She's not supposed to actually have a gem, Bracknell," replied Clancy, "I… she's supposed to be normal."

He clutched his forehead and ran a hand through his hair, gritting his teeth.

"That's what Barb wanted, that's what I wanted, that's what Kay wanted!" he exclaimed, "She was supposed to have a normal life, and I told her about that gem, and I screwed it up!"

"It can't be that bad, can it?" asked Bracknell.

Clancy breathed in, shaking his head.

"The ruby I was supposed to get from Beach City," he replied, "The one I was supposed to find..."

There was a long silence, save for the sound of Clancy’s ragged, anxious breathing.

"Oh," said Bracknell flatly.

"Yeah," snapped Clancy, "Oh."

He shook his head.

"And then I just ran off," he sighed, "She probably thinks I think she's some kind of freak. She doesn't need that, and..."

Hesitantly, Bracknell put a hand on his partner's shoulder.

"It's okay, sir, it's okay," he said, "Just… we'll figure it out, alright?"

Clancy shook off his hand.

"No," he said, sending his partner a sharp glare, "This is my mess, Bracknell. I don't want you mixed up in it."

He sighed again, turning the engine back on again. Bracknell bit his tongue and swallowed, not daring to speak up.

"Right, let's go," he said.

"Go where?" asked Bracknell.

"To one of the other Wilmingmore malls," replied Clancy, "We still need to get you that darn phone."

The sun was setting as they approached Beach City.

The van ride had been quiet. Greg had taken everything in his stride - he could always get the new sound system another day, after all. Steven and Connie had quietly discussed the bubbled gem and the possibility of getting a sword rack for the van for the next time they travelled.

Sadie had spent the whole trip home looking out the window - she felt absolutely miserable.

There was a soft beep from Jenny's phone. She checked the message and smiled.

"Yo, Sadie Killer?" she said.

"Yeah?" sighed Sadie.

Quietly, Jenny wagered a question.

"Feeling any better...?"

"No," replied Sadie.

"Well, I've got a little something for you," said Jenny, smiling, "Here, take a look!"

Sadie looked at Jenny's phone. On the screen was a picture of her in the diner, spear in hand. Her eyes seemed to glow like burning coals, and the discarded gem of the monster lay next to her. She frowned - could that really be her?

No wonder people thought she was a freak.

She was about to say something that effect when Jenny scrolled down, revealing a long list of messages received. She smiled earnestly as Sadie read through them.

looking good SK!!! that spear would make a rad prop in our next vid!

Buck is pleased.

SADIE!!! AWESOME SPEAR!!! WE NEED TO TALK, I HAVE TO PUT THIS ON MY BLOG!!!

omg jen?! she beat a monster! that's amazing!

Hello Sadie

Excellent work! We'll need to discuss how you did it, but I couldn't be more proud!

From Pearl

By Jove! She looks like a modern day Artemis! I'll have to cast her in my next play!

Sadie continued to read the long list of replies. It seemed that Jenny had sent the picture to just about everyone, and they'd all sent praise back. She shook her head - how was she supposed to process this?

"See?" said Steven, "Nobody in Beach City thinks you're a freak!"

"They do think you're awesome, though," added Connie.

Jenny put an arm around Sadie's shoulders.

"Sadie, it doesn't matter if you're human or gem or one of Ronaldo's sneople," she said, "You're still Sadie, and that hasn't changed. All the people who matter still love you, girl!"

"Yeah!" Steven and Connie exclaimed.

"Yeah!" said Greg.

He paused, biting his lip.

"I wasn't listening, what's the conversation about?" he asked.

Sadie smiled.

"Yeah, I guess," she sighed, "Thanks."

She closed her eyes and put a hand over her gem, slowly breathing in and out. She still didn’t feel human - but just for a moment, she felt like Sadie again.

"It really means a lot," she said sincerely.

#steven universe #ruby stars #sadie miller #connie maheswaran #jenny pizza #greg universe #agent clancy miller #agent philbert bracknell

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manuelpxtl741 · 5 years ago

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Medical Cannabis - The Federal Response

"It struck be lately while seeing tv that the UNITED STATE Federal federal government is truly absolutely nothing greater than the political incarnation of Jabba The Hutt from the Celebrity Wars flicks. As you may remember, Jabba was a formless, slow moving, obese entity that ruled with an iron fist while devouring sources gave him. He did not pay for anything, he just took them, and he was not there to assist anyone but himself. Those he ruled over had no say in exactly how their resources and wide range were utilized as well as had no chance in removing Jabba from his position of power. Type of sounds like our political class presently sitting in DC.

Jabba came to mind today as I thought about some current incidents in which the Federal government has obtained so big that it is doubling back on itself and also putting itself in some very unusual scenarios and conflicts with the reality of the globe around us:

- According to an article in the July 23, 2010 problem of The Week magazine, a Boston Federal court has actually ruled parts of the Federal Protection of Marriage Act to be unconstitutional. This act restricts the Federal government from identifying gay marriages and approving Federal advantages. The judge ruled that the Federal law forces Massachusetts to discriminate against it very own citizens. Now for the weird part. the Obama administration is now compelled to appeal the ruling, even though his administration and the Democrats accountable of Congress oppose the Defense of Marriage Act as well as want it rescinded. The Federal federal government has actually obtained so big that it is using up legal resources for something that it does not want to exist to begin with.

- This unusual scenario is similar to the existing illegal alien situation. A current Associated press write-up reported that the most recent data relative to illegal border crossers reveals that the Federal government lately had the highest degree of prosecutions for illegal aliens and the highest possible deportation levels of illegals since they began tracking such statistics however at the same time this same Federal government was in court battling the new Arizona state legislation that was attempting to stem the flow of illegal aliens into that state.

- Returning to gay marriages, according to a July 15, 2010 Associated Press write-up, the country of Argentina recently ended up being the first Latin American nation to legislate gay marriage. The short article reported that Chile as well as numerous various other South American nations are likely to attempt and follow suit. Do we assume that our Jabba, displaying as the American political class, has any kind of opportunity of making that occur in this nation when it finds itself in court preventing gay civil liberties?

- According to a short article in the August concern of Reason magazine, because 1996 fourteen states and also the Area of Columbia have actually legislated cannabis use for cbd doral clinical purposes and also numerous various other states are taking into consideration doing the same. This remains in straight conflict with Federal law which has actually sometimes caused Federal raids of medical cannabis service providers which are unlawful under Federal law yet legal under state legislation. This is likewise in conflict with Obama the campaigner who wanted to decriminalize the drug when he ran for Head of state now protects the outlawing of it at the Federal degree. Once again, government has actually gotten so large that we have actually gone into the unusual zone pertaining to medical cannabis where it is lawful at the same time as being illegal.

- Speaking of medicine disputes, a recent Associated Press post reported that the Federal Veterans Matters organization would allow its people to make use of clinical cannabis if those people stayed in the fourteen states where clinical marijuana is lawful. Therefore, one arm of the Federal government (Veterans Affairs) is perfectly great with medical marijuana use while various other arms of the Federal government (FBI, DEA, Federal statuary) intends to clean it out.

- If you think the Federal government has a drug trouble currently, wait up until the Oakland City Council elects on whether to allow industrial farming of cannabis to be developed in city restrictions, commercial farms which would create marijuana for medical usage along with for use in products varying from baked goods to body oil. Winning candidates who would certainly run these farms would have to pay annual permit charges and eight percent of their sales to tax obligations as well as bring $2 million in liability insurance policy. Similar efforts are being pushed in various other cities throughout the state together with a November ballot problem to legalize non-medical use marijuana, according to the article. Now consider the materials of a brief blurb in the July 23, 2010 concern of The Week publication that reported on a Rand Research that ended from their analysis that the legalization of marijuana would reduce the street price by up to 90%. Therefore, the efforts in California might help in reducing the street price of the medicine which consequently would dramatically decrease the power, wealth and also impact of the Mexican medicine cartels which would certainly be an advantage. Nonetheless, in the face of this excellent collection of outcomes (more profits for the local governments, much less of a stigma of marijuana users, much less police resources spent on breaking marijuana individuals, the weakening of the Mexican medication cartels) do we think that the Jabba the Hutt monster in DC is nimble enough to comprehend what the advantages are or will it proceed down its course of dispute at the Federal medicine enforcement level?

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- Consider a Washington Message write-up from May, 2007, qualified ""Federal Loans Fuel Promote Coal Power Plant Kingdoms."" The article talks about a remaining Clinical depression age Federal program that supplies affordable finances to develop coal fired, high pollution power plants utilizing taxpayer money. According to the article, ""the [funding] assistance is a significant pressure behind the rush to coal plants, which spew carbon dioxide that scientists criticize for global warming."" Thus, while the Obama administration is pressing an environment control bill in order to fight versus global warming, the same government is funding power plants that do just the contrary. Makes no sense.

- A current Associate Press post reported exactly how the Feds had busted 94 individuals for defrauding the Medicare program. This was a great development however why was our Jabba so slow in getting these arrests done? Medicare scams has been taking place since the day Medicare started a number of decades back, why did it take such a painfully slow-moving time to start jailing the cheats? One of those arrested had filed over 3,700 deceitful cases under her name before she was jailed, just how slow can you obtain?

We could continue. The UNITED STATE government has actually gotten so big and so sluggish, similar to Jabba the Hutt, that its several folds up of skin conceal waste, stupidness and also the doubling back on itself, i.e. government laws and also activities in conflict with itself or the wishes of those running the federal government. We can go on and on regarding exactly how slow, ineffective, as well as wasteful our Jabba is, regarding just how our Jabba never ever resolves a problem whether it is unconfident borders, falling short public institutions, escalating healthcare costs, and so on, just how our Jabba wastes untold billions of dollars on trademarks, pointless efforts, as well as fraud-infested programs, or just how our Jabba does not know just how to control the economy, resulting in sky high public debt degrees as well as an extremely creaky financial situation with reduced development and also high unemployment.

Jabba is extremely poor for all of us but he is hard to remove. Via the set aside process, the gerrymandering of Congressional areas, do-nothing campaign finance legislations, as well as various other approaches, Jabba has lots of defenses versus loss in an election, defenses that even a Jedi light saber can not quickly pierce. Long-term, it is vital we start to enforce term limits on political leaders to make sure that they never ever once again get as fat, sluggish, wasteful, and inefficient as Jabba The Hutt. Short term, this November is crucial because it begins the procedure of electing out the Jabba incumbents and ultimately getting in some streamlined, reliable, and also courageous Jedi warriors who will make the difficult choices to get the size of federal government controlled as well as make that scaled down government a lot more efficient as well as much less odd and also much less contrasted."

#CBD #cannabis #cannabidiol

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terrordave1 · 5 years ago

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The Follow highlights were“transcrammed” from the 2019 Flashback Weekend panel celebrating 40 years of Rich Koz’s Svengoolie. The event began with a video presentation narrated by the original Svengoolie – the late Jerry G. Bishop. The panel was moderated by WGN Radio’s Nick Digilio and proved an entertaining 90 minutes – with a few surprises!

Nick Digilio: You started working with Jerry G. Bishop when you were just a kid.

Svengoolie: (laughs) It was that long ago, wasn’t it? I’d just graduated from high school and was about to go to college. Jerry was a live announcer back when they used to have live staff announcers on all the TV stations. He happened to be on Friday nights when they were running these horror movies and started to do the voice (Transylvanian accent) and more schtick before later expanding it out with old sound effects…many that are now my sound effects. I was a fan of his radio and television work and he used to run jokes that people would send in. So I started sending some and he used a lot of them. I told him I was a broadcasting major and he volunteered to come on my show at the college station. Then he said, ‘Would you mind writing song parodies, parodies of commercials, and such?” Eventually, I started working with him and when his show was canceled he was nice enough to bring me with him to WMAQ Radio. Back then you weren’t a sidekick, you were a producer, so I was doing that while also playing 80% of the people who called him on the phone. (Sven discusses some of the skits they did) Later when the opportunity came along for him to reprise the role of Svengoolie he wasn’t interested but suggested I take over as the Son of Svengoolie with his blessing. I shopped the idea around to various stations and one program director laughed and hung up on me. Eventually, I called WFLD-TV (Channel 32) which was the station Jerry’s Svengoolie had originally run on and they said, “That sounds really interesting…let’s have a bake-off!” and open it up to anyone to compete for the role. Here I’d created full scripts, had all these ideas, and everything else but had to audition with other people doing different things. Eventually, I did get the job. So in 1979, forty years ago, I hit the air as Son of Svengoolie.

The original Svengoolie – Jerry G. Bishop

Nick: And what was the first movie you presented?

Svengoolie: In the Year 2889 (1967) and boy was it terrible.

Nick: Let’s talk about the makeup changes over the years. You look a lot different than when you first started.

Svengoolie: Actually, I did more shading back then, more subtle and not with the straight lines you see here. I used a real crepe mustache…crepe was real hair…and for the little beard. I used this stuff called spirit gum as an adhesive. Spirit gum is absolutely awful stuff and I remember going to my dentist and he said, “Wow, your gums are in really bad shape” and we couldn’t figure out why. Finally, we realized that it was the spirit gum because I was constantly touching the area to adjust it and getting some in my mouth. That was when I decided it was better to just paint on the mustache. I figured if Groucho Marx could paint his on, that was good enough for me.

Nick: You mentioned the sound effects that you shared with Jerry G. Bishop. My favorite is “Ow Ow OWWW!”

Svengoolie: A lot of people ask where they came from and, with most of them, we aren’t sure. They were taken from old comedy records, commercials, and stuff Jerry had recorded with his colleagues. We’ve also added to our collection and now have over a 1,000 different ones. They’re all numbered and we try and keep track of them. All of the ones you hear I’ve scripted but in-between filming Chas (Ailing) will often play a few and it’s a lot of fun.

Speaking of Chas, he was filming this panel

Nick: I’ve been at the station many times and one thing I’ve noticed is how much work you put in. I’ve seen your scripts and it’s hours and hours and hours of work for each show.

Svengoolie: Well we have a very small staff. People think TV shows have huge staffs of people and in many cases they do. With ours, it’s just me, my producer (Jim Roche), my director/editor (Chris Faulkner), and our video guy (Chas Ailing) and then whomever they assign to be floor supervisor while we’re taping.

SEE this photo in glorious black & white in the upcoming Scary Monsters Magazine #114!

Nick: How different is your current set compared to the one at WFLD?

Svengoolie: Well it’s a whole different feel to it. For the WFLD stuff, they put up a few walls with a door. And then they found some flats that had been stored upstairs which were used back in the ‘50s for “Shock Theater” featuring the horror host, Terry Bennett a.k.a. Marvin. After I started up again at WCIU in 1995, I’d been told they gave them over to Columbia College but when I called them they said, “Oh, we repainted those and took them apart a long time ago.” So we had to start over with just some black curtains and then we finally got some walls. Eventually, we got a brand new set built for us by Acme Design of Elgin. They built the coffin first and then all the great sci-fi features like what one of our fans calls the “Clux Capacitor.” There is a new door and gargoyles that are designed after Boris Karloff and Vincent Price. It’s great stuff and has such a great look to it. Now, with all the additional lighting, it really stands out.

Nick: I watch you every week and love your parody commercials. One of my favorites is the one for “Die Pillow” (parody of “My Pillow). Let’s play that for the audience.

Svengoolie: Okay, and after you see it, I’ll tell you the story of why I don’t like him. (audience laughs)

Nick: Well I’m sure we each have a story as to why we don’t like him. Anyway, let’s roll the commercial…

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Svengoolie: Are you familiar with the local radio station that comes from MeTV, MeTV FM? They play various eras of music and it’s a lot of fun. Like most radio stations they do commercials and “line reads.” So they were going to do line reads for “My Pillow” and the boss came to me and said, “Well, you’re our main live person on MeTV, so do you want to do these commercials?” and I said, “Sure, that will be fun.” Suddenly Mr. ‘hug the pillow’ over there says, “Oh, no! He hosts horror movies and that’s terrible! I don’t want him doing my commercials!” (While Sven is quoting him, he’s using a hilarious voice impersonation that Nick sites as Dr. Smith from “Lost in Space”).

Nick: So what are your favorite skits from the earlier years?

Svengoolie: We did one at WFLD called “Mr. Robbers Neighborhood” that was done before Eddie Murphy did his “Mr. Robinson’s Neighborhood” on “Saturday Night Live.” It was a Mister Rogers parody about him going into people’s homes and stealing things. He changes his shoes to sneakers so people won’t hear him and when he has trouble opening things he had his friend “Mr. Crowbar” to help him out. I always liked that one. We also did one that would not have been politically correct today called “Gandhi and Dagwood” based on the Blondie and Dagwood movies.

Nick: How do you come up with the ideas for your parodies?

Svengoolie: Basically, you have to keep your mind open all the time. You’ll notice something and that’s when things happen…and I’m not sure how quite honestly. I’ve learned to pay attention to everything, even if you aren’t really focusing on it.

Nick: We have to talk about this…Revenge of the Creature (1955) in 3D. It was 1984 and people are still upset about it.

Svengoolie: Well, at that time somebody held the rights to Revenge of the Creature in 3D and it was played around the country at various local stations with 3D glasses being sold at select stores. We shot promos for it all over the place like Lincoln Park Zoo, the Chicago lakefront, and Shedd Aquarium. I even played an announcer during the show who would say “Put your glasses on” and “Take your glasses off.” I guess they were afraid the Empire Carpet man (commercial personality on ‘70s/’80s Chicago TV) was going to pop out at them during breaks (audience laughs).

Here’s the thing…first of all, there weren’t a whole lot of big things that popped out at you during the film. You had the electrifying thing, the creature falling forward, and always fish in the foreground. Meanwhile, the station was worried because they had a lot of big sponsors who paid a lot of money for their spots and didn’t want any mistakes. So they dubbed everything…the movie and my bits…all onto one tape. If you know anything about videotape, when you make a dub the quality won’t be as good as the original. Secondly, I’ve heard rumors that the transmitter for the station was not at full power. I don’t know if that would affect it or not but here’s the main thing; remember those old TV’s, the adjustments for a lot of their features were in the back. So you’d have to be behind the set to adjust them for the 3D. The way they did it was show a screen with two different sides to it and then adjust one of the controls until you saw (with your glasses on) both sides looking the same. So you couldn’t see anything but had to yell to your friends, “How bout’ now? Nope? Okay, how about now?” – And you only had a minute to get things set up. So some people had problems with that and were unable to get the 3D effect. 7-11 (local convenience store that was one of the two locations selling the glasses) had to give out coupons as restitution and someone even did a Class Action Suit. From then on I’d get people yelling at me at appearances, “Hey, I want my 89 cents back!” So some people won’t let me forget while others ask if I’ll ever do it again. That would be rather difficult on a national level and, to be honest, I’d be happy NOT to do it. (audience laughs)

What I would not give to still have my 3D glasses from that night!

Nick: So how are movies chosen?

Svengoolie: Getting movies is a lot harder now than it was back on WFLD because you have so many streaming services and cable channels that get all the rights. Before, you’d have distributors knocking at your door trying to sell packages to you. It just doesn’t work that way anymore. We have to seek them out and there’s a lot of competition. My boss, Neal Sabin, managed to get the Universal movies which have been the cornerstone of our show. And now we’ve managed to get some from other distributors including Warner Bros and Sony/Columbia which help to widen things out but the Universal films are our main stock and trade. People love them though occasionally I’ll get people saying, “Oh no, another Frankenstein movie…” And I’m thinking, “It’s Frankenstein, c’mon!”

Svengoolie keeps the original Frankenstein monster alive on MeTV!

Nick: And people complain you show the Abbott & Costello movies all the time but Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948) is your most requested movie.

Svengoolie: Yes, and they’ll request Munster, Go Home! (1966) and The Ghost and Mr. Chicken (1966). We ran The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953) recently and it had over a million viewers.

Nick: On that note, I have a surprise guest here. Ladies and Gentlemen, Virginia Madsen…(Cheers)

Svengoolie: This is so cool! Nick and I were just talking on the radio and I said, “Boy, I’d love to meet Virginia Madsen” and now here you are!

Virginia Madsen: Yes, where’s your rubber chicken? See, now you know I did watch you.

Photo courtesy of Jim Roche

Svengoolie: Was that back in the Son of Svengoolie days? (NOTE: Madsen grew up in Evanston, Illinois)

Virginia: I just know it was a long time ago

Svengoolie: I read an article that said you and your son would watch horror movies, is that true?

Virginia: Well, he was little and I was showing him the classic originals, even silent ones like The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923 ), and he just loved all those Creature Features. But then I traumatized him. I was very tired one day and thought he’d be fine watching The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945 ). He was like five or six and there’s this moment when the portrait of Dorian Gray is revealed and there’s this burst of color in an otherwise black and white movie. So he’s getting nice and sleepy then that scene comes and he about levitates off the floor. Needless to say, we watched a lot of cartoons after that. He’s 25 now and still a big horror fan.

Nick (to Virginia): Are you a fan of horror movies yourself? I mean, you’re in Candyman (1992) obviously.

Virginia: Oh my god, ever since I was little. I would stay up late and watch you (points to Sven) and “Creature Features” on a little black and white TV.

Nick (to Virginia): So did you enjoy filming Candyman?

Virginia: Oh, it was great. We really genuinely had an excellent time. The Director (Bernard Rose) wanted me more “real,” as he said. So he was bringing me pizzas every day because he wanted me to fill out a little bit. And I loved that because this was a time in Hollywood where they always wanted you to be skeletal which was just not my frame. So every day I had pizza.

Nick: At least it was Chicago pizza.

Virginia: Well actually it was in LA. We only shot four days in Chicago. The rest was shot in the same studio they filmed Whatever Happened to Baby Jane (1962). The only time it became disturbing was close to Christmas and it seemed like every day had to do with blood. There was the dog head scene, me screaming and bloody, it was someone getting disemboweled, the doctor getting disemboweled.

Svengoolie: That sounds like every day here in Chicago (laughter)

Svengoolie: You know I heard a story of when you were shooting Sideways (2004) that there was someone with a crossbow watching you?

Virginia (at first looks confused as I shift in my seat having been the one who told him this story): Oh…yes…that’s true. They had rented his house to film scenes at night and at first, he was really amiable but when all the filming trucks showed up he went up in the hills and was very upset about it. He went riding off on one of those gator tractors with a crossbow and we’d hear him screaming up in the woods. But nothing happened, he was just aggravated.

Nick: That so weird because I watch that movie monthly, it’s one of my favorite movies of all time and your monologue in it destroys me. Now I’m going to be thinking about a crossbow every time I watch it.

Virginia: He might be somewhere out there in the darkness but that was the only…I mean that valley was so beautiful and everybody knew him and was like, “Don’t worry about it, he likes to go off with his crossbow.”

Nick: Where did you hear that story, Rich?

Svengoolie: Somebody that I know here (which would be me) told me she has a great story about a guy with a crossbow. Was I not supposed to share that?

Virginia: Well I just don’t want to make anyone feel bad.

Svengoolie: Especially someone with a crossbow.

Nick: Well, it was so nice having you, Ms. Madsen!

Virginia leaves the stage and, for the record, the “man in the woods” story came from Paul Giamatti’s commentary on the Sideways Special Edition Blu-ray. The “crossbow” part I heard from Madsen, herself, earlier that day.

Nick: Your appearance itself has altered over the years. I remember you telling me this story where you made this fantastic decision to start wearing a turtle-neck.

Svengoolie (with turtleneck) posing with my kids 15 years ago

Svengoolie: When I was at WFLD I wore the official red, Son of Svengoolie T-shirt with the green, disco scarf – which was so slippery it kept getting untied. The whole costume was awkward. I had a chain I’d wear that was actually part of a wall clock I owned that was supposed to look like a pocket watch. When I went to WCIU I thought, “Let’s do something different. I know! I’ll wear a red turtle-neck.” A red turtle-neck under hot television lights. This was not the smartest decision I ever made. After a while, I decided to go with the red tuxedo shirt which was more comfortable

Nick: Let’s talk about you going national. That’s gotta be really amazing, right?

Svengoolie: It is and I’m stunned to be hearing from people all over the country. It’s nice because many have grown up with a local horror host and I always equate your favorite horror host like Dr. WHO…you always prefer the one you grew up with. I’ve been very fortunate that these people like what I do and tell me how happy they are that I’m keeping horror hosting alive.

Nick: How about the fan letters which is one of my favorite segments. What kind of stuff do you get?

Svengoolie: We get so much stuff. A lot of framed artwork people send…we should open a branch at The Art Institute and put them all up. We have a bust of me someone carved out of a tree trunk that must weigh 200 pounds. People take so much time and effort on these things and from all over the country.

Nick: Holy smokes, Ted Raimi’s in the house!

Ted Raimi: The great Svengoolie! How nice to see you! (looks out at the audience) And look at all you civilized horror people sitting out there. These things legitimize shit you wouldn’t show your own mother!. I mean, I love horror so much – and I know all of you do, too, and can’t get enough of it…but it’s hilarious to think they have conventions for it. I mean, have you ever stopped to think about that? Yes, it’s a legitimate thing, we all need to be scared but it’s a little like porno conventions. To what end are you having a convention…what do you talk about? Watching heads fly?

Nick (reeling him in): So, uh, did you have a local horror host growing up?

Ted: We did have a local horror host…Sir Graves Ghastly. He’s one of the reasons I love horror so much. (Raimi then proceeds to do a dramatic impersonation of him) . “Close the shades…turn out the lights…you’re about to be TERRIFIED!”

Nick: Do you have a favorite horror movie?

Ted: Yes, depending on what day of the week it is. There are ones I watch over and over. At the top of that list is David Cronenberg’s The Fly (1986). First of all, it’s a Canadian film so it looks rather Canadian with its own unique style. So that gives it a weird look anyway. Then you have Cronenberg who’s a weirdo and a movie that’s a love story at its heart. It’s the classic story of “boy meets girl, then boy turns into a fly and tries to eat girl” which we’ve seen a thousand times (audience laughs). But it’s a very powerful film because like any romantic story it has to end with someone breaking off the relationship which, in this case, is done so dramatically. Jeff Goldblum’s character begs Gina Davis’ to kill him which is so powerful. It’s so emotional and yet so grisly. It has all of the elements that make a really lasting picture.

Ted Raimi leaves and Nick continues his interview with Svengoolie. He mentions his favorite parody commercials and they play one of his modern classics – “Boa Brace” which mocks the infamous Health Hotline commercial with terrible animation.

youtube

As it happens, my friends Ron and Angela Urban (“Don and Bunny”) were guest stars in this commercial and sitting in the first row. Svengoolie has them stand for applause.

Nick: Hey, I don’t see him wearing his “Boa Brace” out there.

Svengoolie: Well, that’s because he’s all better now. See, it works!

Nick: Let’s talk about Doug.

Svengoolie: I’d be happy too. Doug Scharf, who plays “Doug Graves,” has been a friend since high school. We played in high school band together, hung out, and used to make 8mm films for fun. I think he’s been a part of every TV show I ever did. He’s an incredible musician who taught himself to play the piano after he’d broken his leg. He’s a trumpet player who can play so many other instruments. He does the complete music tracks for the songs we do every week. So I’ll say, “Here’s the song we’re going to do” and then he produces the whole track while I write the words. Then he’ll show up at the studio and we’ll film the segment. I love his deadpan humor.

Nick: He’s hilarious and the vibe between the two of you is just great. All the songs are so funny and, for me, it’s a highlight of the show (audience applauds in agreement).

Svengoolie: And this brings us to another song. You’ve heard me mention Freddy “Boom Boom” Cannon, a famous icon of the ‘60s. Just out of nowhere one day he sent me an email saying he loves my show and wrote a song for me. And I’m thinking, “He wrote a song for me? The guy who sang ‘Palisades Park?” And he sends it to us and we were blown away by it, it was such a great song. And we ended up meeting him and he was just the nicest guy. He told us so many great stories about hanging out with Elvis and various celebrities. The fact that he wrote this without my even knowing about it was just so cool and it was produced on a 45 record and is available on iTunes. And I think it might even be available right here…

youtube

Nick: What were some of the worst movies you’ve shown?

Svengoolie: Oh, man…well, when we were on WFLD, we presented a movie called Track of the Vampire (a.k.a. Blood Bath 1966). Part of it was made in Yugoslavia and part of it was made in Los Angeles and neither side knew what the other was doing. It was truly awful and there was this one scene with this girl named Dorean (Lori Saunders) who dances. Her big number is like 4-5 minutes long and they use this kaleidoscope lens so you see multiples of her as if you were a fly. It was so awful. The late film editor I used to work with had a great sense of humor and did a couple things with it that made it really funny. There’s this one scene with no dialogue where the vampire is chasing this girl into the ocean. So we added dialogue to make it sound like it was her swim coach and she didn’t want to get in the water. And there was this bald lifeguard whom we dubbed as Curly Howard. Then there was another part where we patched a whole bunch of film clips from different movies along with clips of dialogue from celebrities like Liberace and Dean Martin. This went on for like three minutes. I’m sure if management had seen it, we would have both been fired but, fortunately, I don’t think management ever watched my show. It was such an awful movie that made no sense.

Nick: You have to watch every single one of these movies because you have to do all your bits and time everything out…

Svengoolie: Yes, I have to watch them and as I’m doing this I’m breaking them down for the different segments – if it needs to be edited for time or content. I take copious notes so when I get down to writing the bits I can go back and read them.

Sven’s handwritten script for “The Leech Woman”

Nick: I love Sven-Surround. Like you just did recently with Village of the Giants (1965).

Svengoolie: I think that one needed some help.

Nick: I think it’s hilarious and when did that start happening?

Svengoolie: Actually it goes back to when Jerry was doing his Svengoolie show. He was the announcer on duty back then and he’d get bored. So he and the engineers would take his sound effect parts and add them into the movies. Sometimes it was so funny because it would be so incongruous. So you might see some guy walking through the jungle and then all of a sudden hear a phone ringing. When I first started at WCIU, we would do one segment of every movie in “Sven-Surround” which we can’t really do now with the Universal classics. We do it sometimes as a separate part so we don’t interfere with the movie. Coming up this fall we’ll be re-running a show that had a Commando Cody (old movie serial) episode in it, so we redubbed all of that. People seem to enjoy those.

Nick: Let’s talk about Kerwyn. When did Kerwyn come into existence?

Svengoolie: At first when we started at WCIU, Doug would read the mail with me. Since he couldn’t always stay around we had various characters do it. There was “Ed the Bat” who had an electronically raised voice that my boss, Neil Saban, hated so much he said, “You gotta get rid of that character!” So we actually shot a bit where he fires Ed and hits him with a club. And then we used a Godzilla (Tri-Star 1998) figure and the Wacky Dactyl DJ (made with a Hasbro Jurassic Park III pterodactyl toy) and then finally as a surprise to me, my Director (Chris Faulkner) and Jessica Carlton who worked at the station for a kids’ show, created the prehistoric rubber chicken, Kerwyn. We were trying to come up with a voice for him and we looked at those eyes and goofy teeth and thought Jerry Lewis would be the best inspiration. He’s become very popular and it’s quite possible a special limited-edition T-shirt featuring him will be coming out in the future.

Nick: So what’s going on for your future. It’s your 40th year…how long are you going to do this?

Svengoolie: I’m now old enough to retire but we’ve just become so popular all over the country that I can’t see giving that all up right now, especially when I’m having such a good time with it. The fact that people like it and have made it so popular – I’ll keep doing it for a while. (audience applauds).

Nick: I saw a guy around the convention with a Svengoolie tattoo.

Svengoolie: Yes, we saw him yesterday (and so did YOU in my last Flashback post)

Nick: It’s gotta be weird seeing your face on somebody.

Svengoolie: It is. My own family would never put a tattoo of me on them. I’d have to say I’ve seen about thirty different ones out there and the artwork is often really incredible.

Nick: You guys tape just about every week, right?

Svengoolie: We tape about four days every month. After my heart attack, we decided not to shoot two days in a row but to break them up. It’s hard to say how long it takes to put a show together because pre-production with some movies often overlaps with the post-production of others.

Nick: And you’re still doing public appearances, obviously, because you’re here. Your busy season is coming up, right?

Svengoolie: They used to only be in October but now my appearances go all year long. The demand is high and we want to do as many as we can but, again, I have to stay healthy and don’t want to overdo it. Now we’re getting a lot of requests to do appearances outside of Illinois at various conventions. We’re talking about doing that and recently went to Phoenix, Arizona for a private Dish TV event and that was fun.

Svengoolie greeting a fan at one of his numerous public appearances

As the interview winds down, a young girl dressed as Svengoolie is brought on stage to say ‘hello.’

The show wraps with a montage of celebrities visiting the Svengoolie set.

Svengoolie: When I started, I never imagined I’d be doing it for forty years – back then I was just grateful I had a job on TV. It’s only possible with the support of everybody out there and it means a lot to me.

Coming up…Svengoolie greets his fans!

Dave

“An Evening with Rich Koz – 40 Years of Svengoolie” at Flashback Weekend! The Follow highlights were“transcrammed” from the 2019 Flashback Weekend panel celebrating 40 years of Rich Koz’s Svengoolie.

#Flashback Weekend #Jerry G. Bishop #Nick Digilio #Rich Koz #Svengoolie (Rich Koz)

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robbyrise · 8 years ago

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RANGERS REBORN.

So good it makes me wanna type away like i used to.

Just got back from my first viewing of the Power Rangers and i’m glad to announce I am very satisfied with what was put on the big screen. Like most movies i didn’t have any crazy expectations for the film, just minor details here and there like the story going its own route to make it different and unique from the original show but still keeping true to its essence.

My only worry for this reincarnation of a great past time from my childhood would be the fact that the old shows (and even first 2 movies) were just so corny, so bad yet so good. Trust me, there are times when i come across clips and what have you, from the old shows that make me cringe when i realized how lame and corny it was. How could they possibly make this movie NOT corny?

Why and how was i so drawn to this kind of entertainment? The power rangers taught me a sense of unity and it was probably what opened my eyes to being a part of and trusting your team (besides the Knicks). My favorite color back then was blue, so naturally Billy was my favorite ranger despite being the total opposite of his personality.

If you’re a true fan, if you were there from the beginning till maybe the 3rd-4th generation of Rangers, and you don’t have high expectations of the new movie, you will probably find yourself feeling so much nostalgia from your childhood and it will open your eyes to how much the first group really made you appreciate the essence of wanting to become a power ranger.

This is as far as I’ll go in regards to not spoiling anything. So if you haven’t seen it yet and plan on seeing it and don’t want me to ruin anything, stop reading here and come back later after you see it. If you don’t care and just want to keep reading because you’re bored, by all means go for it, just don’t say i didn’t warn you.

*SPOILERS*

The fact that they changed the story a little bit was already an indicator that i did the right thing in not wanting to expect anything from the movie that would impress me or even predict. Don't ask me how i remember this, but if i recall, the very first episode of the power rangers season 1 has something to do with a dumpster. Dumpster day or something. I don’t know, i just remember reading it, yes i could (somewhat) read at 5-6 years old. I remember Alpha and Zordon were already established in their ‘Command Center” and sensed Rita Repulsa’s escape from captivity. Want to know how she escaped? Go watch the original ORIGINAL intro of the series and you’ll see astronauts pushing over the lid of a genie stove top releasing the alien witch. The movie has her as a FORMER RANGER, the GREEN RANGER to be exact. Some will think it’s lame, i thought it was cool and acceptable.

Recruiting.

How the movie’s story pits the potential rangers together is a testament to the original series and how Zordon ordered Alpha to recruit “individuals with attitude.” The new teenagers portraying our beloved Jason, Zack, Billy, Trini, and Kimberly were all somewhat trouble makers/rebels. All of them rebels in their own right. All of them having something deep inside that could only brought out about themselves through each other, something we could really appreciate with the original rangers.

Morphers?

Remember it’s morphin time? And BOOM, out comes the morphers that EVERYBODY HAD AS A KID, well, almost everybody, and the rangers TRIBEAMED their transformation into rangers and the awesome theme came on and you know shit’s about to go down. I appreciate the fact that they really displayed these ‘rebels’ having a dark side to their personality and using the good inside them to be their source and spark to their armor. Five strangers becoming friends and willing to do whatever they had to do for the greater good of their town.

The Zeo crystals.

I didn’t realize the importance of the crystals on the show until the Zeo rangers came about (potentially setting up a new franchise). It was referenced on the show numerous times as well. But what granted our rangers their powers were their crystals, or on the show the gold coins with their Zord animals on them.

OH, don’t worry, i’ll get to the Zords. The movie gives us a better perspective of how these teenagers with attitude came about and ‘trained’ as Rangers to defeat Rita. The show pretty much put them in suits and rangers like billy and Kim magically learned martial arts whereas Jason, Trini and Zack were already established martial artists. The new rangers were forced into training by Zordon and even Alpha.

Backstories.

The writers and producers did just enough to cover each character’s lives leading up to their discovery of the power coins crystal things. All well enough for them to be unique and appreciated in their own right. Billy the nerd with some loner/awkward issues who’s father disappeared (passed away perhaps?), Zack being a wild rebel with a sick mother, Jason the star jock athlete with a desire for trouble and a disappointed father, Trini (pronounced Trin-E in the move, not Treen-e like the original show) who jumped schools every year because of you guessed it, being a rebel and then Kimberly, who had personal issues ‘not being a good friend’ i guess? She was a cheerleader also vs. the Kimberly from the 90′s that was a gymnast.

ZORDS.

Again, i’ll reiterate, there were times when I realized the old show was corny as fuck. And yes, the old Zords, while being badass in their own right, were still corny... as fuck. They were literally just remote control toys that were zoomed in on by the camera to make it seem like they were huge robots on TV. HOWEVER. If you were to fuse a real life Gundam wing with a Beast Wars transformer, you’d probably get a Zord from the new movie. The massive robot reference to crushing Bumblebee was very poetic. I’m glad i had a good crowd because they laughed and applauded that. But these new Zords? I’d say they were pretty fuckin awesome. I just personally feel like they made those corny robots toys that were on screen, cool and transformer like. Just again, in their own unique power ranger way.

TRUE ESSENCE.

I mentioned ‘essence’ earlier in this write up and that essence is something that could only be felt if you were part of the beginning. When the original rangers, despite being so cheesy and corny, made you want to be a ranger SO BAD. The concept of the power rangers teaches us the power of unity and what the team could accomplish if they worked together. They struggled to reach the full potential of their powers, almost 2 weeks even (11 days to be exact b/c thats when Alpha calculated Rita could strike). But they did to the expense of Billy who later on was revived by Zordon as Zordon realized it wasn’t his team to lead. Remember when Zordon was about to die in the 1st Mighty Morphin Power Rangers movie? the adorably HOT Kimberly at the time said, “You’re like a father to us all.” Zordon guiding the Rangers towards the right direction to reach their potential, and giving Billy the 2nd chance to live showed qualities of just that in being a father like figure to the rangers, something he’s very accustomed to in the show and previous movies. In the old show, there were PLENTY OF TIMES when the rangers “were at their doom” at the hands of Rita and Lord Zed, but they somehow ALWAYS found a way to win.

I’ll give you a perfect example of true essence. When the rangers and their Zords were pushed to the edge and they had to ‘hold the line’? Their struggle vs Goldar. Man... seeing the commercials I KNEW that the Mega Zord was going to be formed and it was going to kick serious ass, but the moments leading up to that they were all ready to die TOGETHER? I’m not gunna lie, i had the same feeling form up in my feels when Woody and Buzz held onto their friends at the end of Toy Story 3 before the claw saved them (shouts to swag surfer). As the cinema Gods as my witness, NO MOVIE has made me feel that way since Toy Story 3, LEGIT, until the new power rangers because I KNEW WHAT THE OUTCOME WAS and yet there i was, sitting on my seat reminding myself, “wow... i haven’t felt this urgent sorrow for ANY GROUP OF CHARACTERS since toy story 3.” And then they fall into the pit and you hear the Zords forming and i get this huge relief and burden lifted off my shoulders and i applaud with the crowd thanking God the tears forming in my eyes didn’t stream out b/c that would've been really embarrassing. But yeah, i’m applauding, the crowd is applauding and Billy has that comic relief line of Mama Zord-Mega Zord and as they try to advance the entire Zord falls over. Well fcuking done. No really, they didn’t just magically download the program to operate a “65 million year old alien robot” in a few seconds to their brains, they actually taught themselves how to operate their respective body part that was formed by their Zord. Again, unity, team work, Power Rangers... WOOOOO!!!!!!

I’m still kind of in shock at how much i actually enjoyed this movie. And i think that’s due to the fact that the crowd i watched the movie with was probably one of the better crowds i had watched a movie with since i got to Washington. Really. The movie culture here isn’t as passionate as what we have in New York but anyway back to the movie.

Alpha 5 said his signature line 2x,the black guy is actually the blue ranger and the asian is the BLACK ranger, both the pink and yellow rangers are cute & hot AF, Rita made her monster grow and said her token line as well. There weren’t any communicators, there wasn’t a bulk or skull even though i think the bully in the movie was supposed to be one of them i’m not too sure. Mid credit scene = Thomas Oliver = Power Rangers 2. Speaking of Tommy, the actor and actress who played they original Tommy and original Kimberly cameos probably had the biggest applause of the movie. Boom. Might be a little too early to bring in Lord Zedd in the 2nd movie, MAYBE hint or reference him like Rita did in regards to the Zeo crystals.

Future?

The Power Rangers have a generation of fans that first started watching and admiring them at such young age that are now PROFESSIONALS, MARRIED AND WITH KIDS. Granted, the series has gone onto bumblefuck abyss because i obviously lost track of where the TV series has gone, that old generation could show their kids what they used to watch, and be like, “That movie that’s out? That’s a remake of the ORIGINAL rangers, the founding fore fathers of what you young maggots are watching now” kind of deal.

I AM PRAYING that this generates enough revenue and popularity that they make a nice, LONG MOVIE SERIES because THERES SO MUCH potential. Maybe something Disney could look into working a deal with Saban b/c there’s just too much to let slip away. You got franchises like Fast and the Furious that’s gone off track from how great it was before the 4th/5th movies, but could somewhat catch up to and pass GI Joe (unless they actually cross over with, wait for it...), and maybe be half as good as the Transformer series (yes, GI Joe and Transformers could crossover, because they have in the comics). I look at transformers and think thats a good goal to strive for, because movie series like James Bond, LOTR, the Matrix, and Star Wars are just at an elite level. Then I see franchises like the Underworld, Resident Evil movies (sorry, i’m just not a fan of them) and Sharknado (IDK how and why people find those movies entertaining), and it gives me hope that the Power Rangers movie reboot could just be the thing we need in the movie industry to keep it interesting unless Japan and Hollywood could work something out to bring Gundam Wing to life.

*CUE BLOG SOUNDTRACK ENDING CREDIT AND MOVIE RATING THEME = VAN HALEN - DREAMS*

ANYWAY. 9/10 Power Rangers. I’m going to see it again. WITHOUT A DOUBT.

Off topic final thought:

Where are my movie junkies at? This is off topic but i know you’d appreciate this. I had a dream... you ready? I had a dream, that Christopher Nolan, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas all worked together to make an American interpretation of Spirited Away with a movie score composed by Hanz Zimmer. Call me crazy, but i woke up and had mixed emotions about it.

#power Rangers #film #blog #movie #cinema #personal #critic #review

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junker-town · 6 years ago

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Fenway Park, a dying bar, and finding comfort in strangers

Saying goodbye to the World Series and a hard year during the final days of Tortilla Flats.

I am on my way to a bar. It’s 11 a.m. on a Saturday, and I’m sitting in a mostly empty New York City subway car as a Nor’easter whips the wind into a frenzy outside, and my brain feels like it was scooped out of my skull with a dull melon baller while I slept. I can’t really remember what specifically was happening at midnight, or 2 a.m., or anywhere in between, but I do know that at 3:35 a.m., a marathon baseball game finally ended after 18 innings and allowed everyone who stayed up to witness it to go to bed.

As I sit staring into the middle distance and question why I’m doing this after breaking my brain with seven-plus hours of baseball, it is not lost on me that this usually happens in the reverse order. You go out on a Friday, things get a little fuzzy late into the night, but you haul yourself out of bed to go watch sports the next day because your team is playing a rival, or your parents want you to go to a tailgate.

This Saturday though, it’s about the bar. Tortilla Flats to be specific — a neighborhood bar on Manhattan’s West Side that is closing after 35 years of serving cheap drinks and questionable food (Nancy the bartender yells to the crowd three hours into a 17-hour final shift when someone questions the nachos: “You get what you pay for, or are you new here?”). Saturday is the last day before the place closes for good due to drastic rent increases that have shuttered businesses all around the city, and the atmosphere feels like a sporting event from the moment people settle in.

Fifteen minutes before opening, there is already a small group of people huddled under umbrellas as the coastal storm batters the city, but not one person complains. A few have crossed state lines to be here, so being damp is not too high a price to say goodbye to Flats properly. The wake has lasted all week, packing the bar every night and requiring emergency deliveries of alcohol some mornings to make sure there’s enough to sate the next night’s crowd.

Later tonight, I’ll settle on my couch with a blanket and my computer and cover the Red Sox in the World Series, a surreal privilege I don’t take for granted. But October has been draining. Watching your own team strive for a ring without actually getting to experience each win with fans — whether at a local bar catering to Boston expats, or back home near Fenway — has been harder than expected this year. The month has been surprisingly isolating at points, and postseason excitement can’t make up for that, or the crushing anxiety reverberating through most other parts of life in 2018. Sometimes you need to feel like you’re in Fenway even when you can’t be, surrounded by strangers with the same focus.

Whitney McIntosh

Tortilla Flats with its festive decorations and a packed house.

Today, unexpectedly and perfectly, Flats has the vibe of sitting in those cheap seats. I came here to clear my mind and say goodbye to a fun bar I’ve frequented over the years. Yet, the combination of the weather outside, the occasion (though a bittersweet one), and the people envelops me and provides the very feeling of being in the thick of a group of baseball fans that I needed most.

A seemingly random cross-section of ages, origins, and backgrounds are settled on their barstools and at the cluster of tables. You’ve never seen these people before, and you’ll probably never see them again, so just like at a game, the stories start flowing immediately.

There’s Deirdre Duggan and Howard Cohen, a couple in their 60s who met as two shy patrons decades ago, set up by the bartender during a dice game. They eloped less than a year after meeting at Flats, and not more than 20 minutes after the conversation starts, their wedding song, Frank Sinatra’s “Summer Wind”, comes on over the speakers. There’s no jukebox and the bar back on duty had no idea it was their song, so the fact it’s playing feels like fate. Howard, in shock, swears up and down they didn’t ask anyone to play the song for them, and they reminisce about eloping to the islands. They show me a picture of their then-infant twins — now 17 and deciding on which quaint New England colleges they’d like to attend — in the arms of one of the owners the summer before 9/11.

Carolina Ramirez lives down the block and blew off work to give her favorite watering hole a proper send off. The lone TV is set to Fox, and as a commercial comes on for tonight’s World Series game between the Red Sox and Dodgers, she shouts, “I fucking hate the Red Sox but I always fucking love Boston people.” She once dated a Red Sox fan, but they broke up shortly after the 2003 ALCS.

Anita, also still living in the neighborhood, got laid off this week and came right to the bar afterward to get her usual order of tortilla soup and a margarita. Then she came the next day, and the next. Another margarita appears and she swears she didn’t order it, but she drinks it happily, anyway. There’s the one middle-aged guy who just wants to appreciate the place without talking to anyone, downing two quick margaritas on the rocks before heading out into the storm again.

Because we’re at an extended farewell party for a bar, there’s a cloudy understanding that nothing really matters. The conversation and the $4 beers are the real focus. The more you talk, the more you don’t have to think about the morose reason you’re actually there, that a valued place like this can just be taken away from you.

Flats was kitschy if you loved it, tacky if you didn’t. It was the most energizing type of stylized dive, with beer company-branded flags draped colorfully from the ceiling like neon clotheslines. Framed photos of Elvis, old beer ads, and Christmas lights took Flats to the next level. In one corner, a dirty plaque commemorating Sammy Sosa’s 66th home run in 1998 hung on the wall. No real reason why.

Whitney McIntosh

A plaque of Sammy Sosa’s 66th home run in 1998 hangs in one corner of Tortilla Flats (not a Chicago bar).

Everyone here was once a 20-something from the neighborhood who appreciated this place in their own way, who made pilgrimages whenever they had $20 to spend and a night free. But they’re not that age anymore. They have homes instead of cramped apartments.

In the same way you’d reminisce about the area around your favorite stadium or park, there’s talk of how the neighborhood has changed for the better or worse. In the same way you’d complain about a GM making mistakes, patrons moan about how the guys in charge might have been able to save the place if only they’d made some changes earlier. The landlord, that faceless villain, is like the callous team owners willing to take a community away from everyone. One of the owners is going around table to table and telling people to “Talk, drink, but don’t text,” evoking the old guard in any sport that is disappointed in younger fans for not paying attention to every moment of a game. Flats is a reminder, like sports and the rest of life, that even the things that prove to be the best distractions can be taken away from you without warning.

And because everyone feels the same desire for much-needed escapism, bonds are forming even more rapidly than they would among random people posted up at any ol’ bar. People are striking up conversations with each other in the same way they would with someone who lended a hand by passing your cash down the row to the CrackerJack vendor. Suddenly you start talking — about where your kids go to school, and the best parts of a recent vacation, and the worst parts of your boss — and for a few hours you’re best friends simply because you’re on the same side.

There’s the same ebb and flow of park conversation at Flats, too. You know what I’m talking about if you’ve ever befriended half a row while watching a game. Close your eyes and you can practically feel it happening. Something happens to draw the place’s attention — today that happens to be five drunk men singing and pouring more tequila into the margarita mixer, but it could easily be a hit off the Green Monster or a flashy double play — and as soon as it’s over you go right back to the rhythms of getting to know people and relaxing into the company.

Bars and sports are therapeutic in all sorts of ways, but the conversation is my outlet. For someone not quite ready to open the door to therapy, I get a lot out of talking and sharing and laughing with strangers.

When there’s a finite end to a connection, a guarantee that you almost certainly won’t see these people again, the way you can tell stories and what you’ll say is freeing. Maybe nothing embarrassing or appalling, the limits of living in society still apply, but there’s a pop to anecdotes that are normally calibrated to within an inch of their lives when told anywhere else. The nervousness about being judged for what comes out of your mouth when among friends is gone. When you live your life worrying that one errant text or dumb comment could bring your happiness to a halt, it’s liberating to know you can be yourself.

Whitney McIntosh

Patrons in the final hours at Tortilla Flats, among the kitschy decor.

In the corner of Flats, a man in an Uncle Sam costume dances with a group of friends. He’s not even celebrating Halloween, he’s just dressed that way. A drunk Uncle Sam is certainly not going to question your worthiness as a functioning human being or laugh at you for slipping up and saying something stupid. He’s a tequila-drunk man in an Uncle Sam suit.

The disagreements that happen during bar chatter are being magically glossed over, too. At one point 47-year-old Martin Kynastan, a Londoner nursing a rugby injury that keeps him from raising his hands over his head, proclaims he’s all for Brexit because he knows his job will be safe after the transition out of the EU. He and his wife’s first date was at Flats, so instead of engaging him about politics, everyone just ignores the statement. There’s only so much time left, only so much time to appreciate this place and this feeling, so let’s talk about England’s rugby team instead. The value of keeping things light today seems at the forefront of everyone’s mind — how dare you try to pierce the veil of therapeutic reinvigoration in the air?

I capture this feeling a few times a year, at most, and it’s always tucked away in a stadium seat somewhere. I came to say goodbye to a dive bar and got the surprise of feeling, for once, that unique openness without being surrounding by thousands of people. Even though I’ll be sleep deprived and fractured for a couple more days after this, I can feel my mind being knotted back together just enough to get me through the last bit of this particular stretch.

There are other bars, ones I go to far more often than this one. Ones that are more special, where I’ve made better friends with the regulars. Sometimes it’s nice to know exactly what door you need to walk through to feel like you’re okay — Gate E at Fenway right off of Lansdowne, the New England bar in the East Village, your boyfriend’s apartment, your local soccer pub where you can barely understand half the accents — but sometimes it’s even better to be surprised.

Flats closing doesn’t mean that feeling will be impossible to grasp again. But it is a reminder that for every Fenway that will be there for the foreseeable future, ready to take you in again, there are havens that can be taken from you at any moment. Seasons end, teams lose, and you have to wait until next year to capture that precise mood again. Inherently knowing good things don’t last doesn’t make it any easier when they’re gone. Especially when, while you wait to find that feeling again, there are so many awful, devastating moments that you need distraction from.

Game 4 of the World Series will start in a few hours, and if it’s an 18-inning record breaker again, the bar will be closed by the time the winning run crosses the plate. There will be people in the stands striking up random conversations between innings, and finding kindred spirits for a few hours while they avoid the stress and tension caused by what’s happening in the world, or in their lives.

An excited Dodgers fan at Flats, fully decked out in an LA hat, jacket, and shirt, waves goodbye to Nancy the bartender, now in her sixth hour of that 17-hour slog. “I’m heading out but might be back later!” the fan yells, “we can come back for dinner and the game!” Nancy tells her they might not even be open by the time she returns, they could close at any time that night if the alcohol runs out — the shelves full of Herradura tequila are emptying fast and they’ve been out of bar napkins for three days now. Even the most well-planned goodbyes can be cut short, and even the most well-played seasons can end in misery. The most effective comforts sometimes go away before they’re done fully healing you.

Baseball will be back next year. Flats won’t, but for a day they were intertwined in an unexpected way, and it made all the difference. Nothing is in our control, but sometimes throwing your hands up and saying “nothing matters” feels good. I’ll find another door to go through to find that atmosphere before April, I’m almost sure of it. But in case I don’t, the Red Sox will pick things up again in the spring and Fenway will be there with them. I know that, at least.

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milliebobbybrownfan · 6 years ago

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New Post has been published on Millie Bobby Brown Fan #MillieBobbyBrown #StrangerThings

New Post has been published on http://millie-bobby-brown.com/824-2/

Press/Photos: Millie for W Magazine

Nearly two years ago, at the British Academy of Film and Television Arts tea in Los Angeles, Millie Bobby Brown, who was then only 12, was the sensation of the party. Stranger Things, a clever, supernatural homage to 1980s pop culture, had just become a hit, and her character, Eleven, an otherworldly, possibly alien, androgynous girl with telekinetic abilities and a diabolical stare, was the breakout star of the show. Unlike the misfit Eleven, Brown, who was born in Marbella, Spain, and grew up in Dorset, England, is bubbly, charming, and has a gift for socializing. On the day of the BAFTA event (and at most other ceremonies during the hectic awards season), she was leading her teenage male costars in a kind of nonstop Millie Bobby Brown parade. The four boys, who were dressed in formal clothing that they constantly seemed to be squirming out of, were content to joke among themselves or hover around the buffet, but Brown had other plans. Again and again, suddenly and swiftly, she would round them up and march her posse over to, say, Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, or Justin Timberlake. Cheerfully, forcefully, Brown, who was wearing an age-appropriate party dress and strappy sandals, would extend her hand and say, “Hi! I’m Millie Bobby Brown. So glad to meet you!”

She was on a quest to meet her biggest crush, Leonardo DiCaprio, but he wasn’t there that day. Luckily, nearly every celebrity she did meet was a huge fan of Stranger Things and, especially, Eleven. But even if they had no idea who she was, Brown was unfazed: The future was, simply, hers for the taking.

According to her father, Robert Brown, Millie, who is the second youngest of four children (three girls and one boy), popped out of the womb in a confident state. “She’s always been a personality,” he told me during the shoot for this story. Brown, who is now 14, started auditioning for commercials, movies, and musicals like Matilda and Annie when she was 8. Her first job was a commercial for Publix, the supermarket chain. In the audition, she had to hold up some cupcakes and say, “Mom, can I have these?” Afterward, the casting director remarked to her father, “Your daughter is something quite unique.”

“When I got that first job, I knew right away that I was born to do this,” Brown recalled. She is now taller than when Stranger Things debuted, but she still looks the same: curious, hyper-alert, and appealingly wide-eyed. She was wearing fitted jeans and a pink sweater, but was barefoot. “Where are my sneakers?” she asked no one in particular. The entire Brown family has left England and resettled in Atlanta, where Stranger Things is filmed. Brown had just started shooting the third season, after Netflix signed her to a deal for a reported $3 million.

Like every teenager, Brown is umbilically linked to her phone. She has almost 17 million Instagram followers, who closely monitor her every post. When she met Drake in Australia last November, where both of them were on tour (she was promoting the series; he was performing), the musician draped an arm around her shoulder for a picture that went viral. “He invited me to his concert,” Brown explained matter-of-factly. “And now we talk all the time. I ask his advice.” Perhaps he has advised her to use her celebrity to draw attention to certain issues. When she won favorite TV actress at the Kids’ Choice Awards in March, Brown wore a denim shirt with the names of the victims of the Parkland, Florida, school shooting embroidered on the back. “I take my responsibilities seriously,” Brown told me. “I recognize that I have a voice, and I want to use it wisely.”

In 2015, when she auditioned for Stranger Things, Brown had no idea that it would become her launching pad. “I didn’t know anything about it,” she explained. “Every part of the show was top secret. I Skyped with the directors [brothers Matt and Ross Duffer], and we spoke about ’80s movies—E.T., Stand by Me, and Poltergeist. I flew to L.A. for a screen test, and the next day I got the job! I was 11. We did the show, and I went back home to England. I thought, Okay, it’s a little show. What’s next? And then we came to America for the premiere. Three days later, my whole life changed. People went crazy! My followers went up to 1 million in one day. Magazines wanted me. One of my goals was to be on the cover of W, and you see? Dreams do come true.”

After the first season of Stranger Things, Brown signed a contract with Calvin Klein and was nominated for an Emmy and a SAG award, while the show won a nod for a Golden Globe. (Last week she was nominated for a second Emmy.) Time magazine chose her for its Time 100, making her the youngest recipient to garner that honor. “I don’t think I’ve changed,” she said. “I’m not thinking, Oh, I know everything now. I still get nervous. I still get anxious.” That response surprised me: Brown has always seemed so confident. Was this sudden self-doubt part of becoming a teenager? “Maybe,” she allowed. “But I still love parties! Although, even back then at the BAFTA tea, when I met Justin Timberlake, I swear I could have fainted.” She smiled. “Ask me some questions,” she said, deftly changing the subject.

Lynn Hirschberg: Who is your girl crush? Millie Bobby Brown: Paris Jackson. She’s got great style. She’s like a sister to me. And she plays the piano!

Hirschberg: What was the first album you bought with your own money? Brown: Amy Winehouse. I was 6. I knew every single word to “Valerie.” My dad wouldn’t let me hear “Rehab”! There were definitely rules. Amy Winehouse was my go-to, but back then I sang “We Found Love,” by Rihanna, in the mornings. It got me going when I had to go to school.

Hirschberg: What’s your favorite Halloween costume? Brown: I’ve never been very good at Halloween. I play characters all the time, so what’s the point of dressing up as another character? The last couple of Halloweens, I saw a lot of people dressed as Eleven. Sometimes it’s comforting. But it’s also very interesting to see a 40-year-old man wearing the look of my 12-year-old character.

Hirschberg: As a child, what was your favorite toy? Brown: A microphone that had High School Musical on it. I could sing with Zac Efron! I watched High School Musical every single day. When I met Zac Efron, I could barely speak.

Hirschberg: What is the first e-mail you remember sending? Brown: I always wanted to be on Ellen, and that was the first e-mail I sent: to Ellen DeGeneres. I explained my life story and how I needed to be on her show. I never got a response. Five years later, I was on Ellen! She found that e-mail and showed it to the audience. Very embarrassing. I had made lots of grammatical mistakes.

Hirschberg: In Godzilla: King of the Monsters, your first film, which will be out next spring, you play a girl named Madison. Was it hard to act opposite a monster that wasn’t there? Brown: Godzilla was a tennis ball! I was always looking up. My neck hurt a lot, and I had to get dry needling. They stuck a really big, but thin, needle in my neck. Your muscle then spasms, and, eventually, you’re fine. After the dry needling, I had a great rapport with the tennis ball.

Hirschberg: Now that you live here, what do you like best about America? Brown: I love red Jolly Rancher candy. Cherry. They’re very sour. I’m not allowed to eat them anymore, because they color my tongue. Eleven is odd enough without having a red tongue.

As she stuck out her tongue to show its clean non-redness, Brown had to stop talking: It was time for hair and makeup. Without knowing her affinity for Amy Winehouse, the stylist decided that Brown’s hair should be teased into a version of the messy, high bouffant that was the singer’s trademark. Brown was thrilled. Her father, who was sitting nearby with her older brother watching Liverpool, their soccer club, defeat Roma, was smiling at his daughter’s reflection in the mirror. “You know,” he said, “Millie is all confidence and swagger in the world, but at night, at home, she can turn into a little, shy girl. It’s a side of her that only her family sees.”

As the makeup artist added a cat-eye tilt to her round eyes, Brown stared at the transformation in the mirror. I asked her if she ever felt like a typical restless teenager—did she ever want to go crazy, be rebellious, run away? “I can be rebellious,” Brown replied, carefully choosing her words. “But not so much. I’ve never been grounded by my parents. I’m a very good girl.” She paused. “But I do believe in making noise, in being loud.”

To play Eleven, Brown had to cut off her long hair and shave her head, which is something that would be traumatic for any 11-year-old. Her baldness instantly set her apart from, well, everybody. “The shaved head was a big deal,” Brown admitted. “On the one hand, it was cool. When you’re bald, rain feels like a head massage. I’d walk in the rain, and people would look at me like I was crazy. I’d be smiling—so, so happy to have the water hit my naked head. But on the other hand, people stared at me, wondering whether I was sick. Some would even laugh at me, without knowing whether I was or wasn’t sick. It was hurtful, but their attitude taught me something about compassion. In the end, being bald was the best thing I ever did—being different changed my life. I wanted to embrace my baldness and, hopefully, inspire people. And, now, that’s become my message to the world.” – Source

2018: W Magazine

#Photo Sessions #Photos #Press #Scans

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