#It's so great to see how much effort an American put into this movie and making this contest look so real and fun in this movie

[with-my-calamitous-love]

I APOLOGIZE IF ITS A LITTLE TOO MUCH, JUST A LITTLE TOO SOON

kirishima x reader

thoughts on how kirishima acts in a relationship

inspired by so american

eijiro kirishima, who texts you goodmorning and goodnight religiously. you're the first person he wants to talk to in the morning and the last person he wants to hear from before he drifts off. his face turns almost as red as his hair and eyes whenever his phone lights up with a buzz, seeing that you've replied to him. he saves your contact with a <3 right next to your name. your photo is a picture he snapped of you wearing one of his tank tops, sitting loosely on you. normally his sculptured biceps fill out the fabric to the brim, but he prefers the way you wear it. he wants to stare at you every time he picks up the phone in the morning to text you.

eijiro kirishima, who lets you help him dye his hair after the third time you insist on it. he feels a slight hint of embarrassment, thinking its un-manly to need help with a simple task, but after the first couple of rounds he insists on you doing it. he loves the way your fingers weave delicately through his hair, touching up his roots and treating him like he’s a glass sculpture. and afterwards while he waits for it to set he’ll help you with menial tasks in return- like finishing your algebra (not that he’s any better, but he means well) or making you a quick dinner. he’s an expert when it comes to self-care, and knows that working out and eating well isn’t healthy if its not accompanied by nourishing your happiness. he knows what candy’s to bring to pick up for you while he’s purchasing his dye, what movies to play in the background while he’s letting his hair soak, and exactly how to hug you when it’s all done.

eijiro kirishima, who becomes a sucker for sappy love songs once you get him introduced to it. at first, he hums along to your playlist in the car. then he’s following the artists you like on instagram and keeping up with their recent music. then it’s actively going out of his way to listen to them because each line about love and longing is about you. he makes a playlist titled [y/n] <3 and its all the songs that have made you come up in his head. little do his gym friends know that he’s streaming the tortured poets department while he’s lifting weights DOWN BAD CRYING AT THE GYM ANYONE

eijiro kirishima, who absolutely loves anything you create. muffins, bread, brownies- you’ve suddenly tested his willpower when it comes to his rigid diet. but he can’t help himself- everything tastes better when he knows you’ve put the time and effort into it. with so many eyes watching the young hero, he often forgets to properly feed himself- which is when you come in, always reminding him to eat. when he’s not looking, you’ll slip an extra treat or two in his bag, and come home greeted with a hug and kiss of gratitude for keeping his tummy full.

eijiro kirishima, who comes to you seeking refuge from his insecurities. he has quirk envy badly, sometimes just staring at the heroes he sees around him and wonders how he could ever live up to them. he feels as though he pails in comparison, not knowing how to articulate his worries into words. sometimes he’ll simply hug you, resting his chiseled chin on your shoulder while a huff escapes his lips. he doesn’t need to say anything because you know him. you know how he gets in his head. so you kiss his temples and remind him that he is exactly how he should be. that he’s enough. enough to be strong. enough to be a great hero. enough to be the red riot you love so much. he’s enough for you. and thats what plants are smile on his face as he leans in to kiss you. it’s enough for him too.

eijiro kirishima, who loves showing you off at the gym. mostly to his friends, who comment on how he seemingly never shuts up about you- but a part of him finds pride in the jealous stares others give him. he almost wants to give them a look of ‘i know, right?’ while they admire your beauty, the way you look when sweat ripples down your skin and your cheeks are flushed pink. but he feels sorry for them. sorry that they can’t have you they he’s got you. his eyes sparkle when he sees you pushing yourself, feeling inspired that he now has someone to be so proud of. he’s always proud of you.

eijiro kirishima, who worries he’ll mess it up with you. that it’s all too good to be true- that theres no way he got so lucky so young. he worries you’ll grow bored, tired, or sick of him. he worries you aren’t as in love with him as he is with you. because eijiro kirishima is so, so in love with you. he knows this is love because he sees more than just a high-school fling, he sees the future. he sees someone he will always run to with open arms. and when you kiss him back, arms wrapped around him in a tender embrace, he gets the feeling that you’re so in love with him, too.

[thewadapan]

Spent today checking out The Amazing Digital Circus and Murder Drones, and god, the kids today have it so good when it comes to this sort of content. When I was a teen, I was obsessed with Red vs. Blue and RWBY, which I think it's fair to say are the equivalents of the time, and the sheer gulf in terms of writing quality and production value is stunning. I hear there were some rumblings of unprofessional conduct from the production company, which would hardly be surprising considering this is yet another guys-working-from-their-basement success story, but much bigger companies with much shittier business practises consistently put out much worse content than this.

The Amazing Digital Circus is definitely the better show of the two, thanks to its slam-dunk premise and some great writing from Gooseworx. The producers have talked about aiming to fill a perceived gap in the market between kids' cartoons (The Boss Baby) and adult animation (Bojack Horseman), and I think they have successfully threaded the needle to create a very unique tone. There's a sense of these works existing totally outside the mainstream media machine; they're not getting BBFC rated, but you just know millions of kids are watching them. It's on YouTube and the fact that it looks like some Frozen Spider-Man kids' slop just means da parents won't question what their kids are watching.

But truth be told, there's nothing objectionable about the content of The Amazing Digital Circus whatsoever. It's unusually metatextual and loosely apes the aesthetics of much darker media, touching on slightly more existential themes than your typical kids' cartoon, but it still has a lot in common with those same cartoons. The zany characters are all fairly one-note, and the emotional arcs of the episodes are honestly quite straightforward. The second episode in particular has an absolutely textbook plot structure to it. It's a far more self-assured and traditional style of writing than you ever see in this kind of independent work—certainly far more so than Murder Drones, which is written by an insane person.

More than anything, I'm reminded of how I felt watching Puella Magi Madoka Magica: that it's a very solid work of fiction, but that the people who'd get the most out of the work are isolated teens struggling to make the transition into adulthood. Certainly if nothing else, the fandoms of these shows must be bringing a lot of kids together around the world. I adore this soundbite from Goose: "Above anything else, I just wanted it to feel kind of lonely." You see Pomni's worldview shatter, she suddenly finds herself in a body that feels completely wrong, and she has to construct a new kind of belonging for herself.

As for Murder Drones, that show's absolutely fucking nuts, yo. The writing is at once painfully basic and utterly incomprehensible. If someone just sat down and explained the plot straightforwardly, it would be fantastically boring. But man, the presentation, the sheer delight the animators seem to approach every scene with...! I'd say it's clearly trying to use "the characters are robots" as an excuse to expose da kids to some absolutely shocking levels of gore, much like the Transformers movies, but midway through the series it starts straightup swapping the oil and wires for blood and bones and you've got to respect that.

The writing itself is so excruciatingly irony-poisoned that it goes beyond cringe and somehow wraps back around again to being sincerely funny. The show kind of wants to have its cake and eat it in terms of constantly lampshading how flat and cliché the emotional plotting is, but also clearly aiming to genuinely tug at the heartstrings and whip fans into a frenzy. And it kind of succeeds, I think! The way it veers between bizarrely high-effort implementations of memes, seriously cool fight scenes and horror visuals, and big emotional moments is very disarming. If The Amazing Digital Circus is an attempt to faithfully rework the American-cartoon formula for a slightly older audience, Murder Drones aims to crib the aesthetics of high-school cartoons while actively rejecting every traditional narrative technique used in those stories. Which means it's kind of bad, which means it's also kind of great.

If it's not already, then within a couple of years it will be deeply cringe to have ever been into Murder Drones in particular or (to a slightly lesser extent) The Amazing Digital Circus, in much the same way that everyone seems embarrassed to admit they were ever a Homestuck fan. But like with Homestuck, I feel like these series are genuinely pushing at the frontiers of storytelling in a way that's commendable and might inspire new kinds of writing once the fans grow up.

ENA is also pretty good, for the record.

[orkbutch]

ok ok, i know this isnt a wicked blog but its time for me to say my thoughts on the Wicked movie trailer.

I'm not stoked. I'm not much of a musical version lover already, but two things really rubbed me wrong, and I believe they apply to the musical as much as the book in their importance within the Themes.

Elphaba being played by Erivo and being black is cool. Erivo is a great singer, and her hair looks sick, and Elphie's hair is important. However, that casting choice being combined with a white Fiyero (who is Not White in the book, and very much experiences colonialist racism) and with no prosthetic effort to make Elphaba Not Beautiful (which is a Significant Element of Her Experience And Character), spoils any truly transgressive or progressive bite to that casting decision.

The only of the core mains thats not white is the character that is green. Interesting. The character who is extremely belittled for her appearance because she has a deformity, and because she's unattractive by conventional standards (esp because of her hawkish nose and strong chin), is a beautiful woman. Interesting!

Something about this just rubs me wrong. I think the musical has always made me skeptical in this area because its core adaption decisions were always bent toward stripping Wicked of much of its commentary on racism. In the book Fiyero is Vinkan, clearly coded Native American, and Winkie is a slur. They made the slur the name for the Vinkans in the musical. If I recall correctly, Quadlings aren't even mentioned in the musical. But Fiyero in the musical... I don't even know Why they keep him being a foriegn prince because he isnt written like hes foriegn from Gillikin at all. His ethnicity seems totally flattened, a slur that indicates no cultural or experiencial distinction from Gillikin.

I think that may have happened because Animals were already considered an allegory for racism, and they wanted to make that allegory cleaner and easier to condense into a musical plot. Thats my theory. However, that is a misreading. The Animals are not a perfectly singular allegory, and I think you could argue several inspirations, but the most apt interpretation for sure is that the Animals are an allegory for people with disabilities and neurodivergence, as Elphaba's experience is.

The Animals are not merely culturally different or isolated. They are not falsely believed to be different from the Gillikins or the Munchkinlanders or Vinkans. They ARE different, not because they aren't people but because their basic needs are different, and are not adapted to by society. They have hooves, and different skeletons, and different senses, and different mouths that can't necessarily make the kind of speech humans use.

This is important because Elphaba uniquely relates to the Animals, and its because Elphaba has a deformity and is super autistic. This is the other thing that always rubbed me wrong about the musical: it always implied that the only thing that made Elphaba "ugly" to people was her green skin. Thats... weak shit!!! In the book, Elphaba is Not beautiful. She is hatchet faced. She is tall and androgynous and looks weird. And this is IMPORTANT, because it makes Elphaba a genuinely transgressive character!! Her experience is layered! She is green but also breaks gender rules, is awkward, is self hating, is rude, ect. ect. It strengthens her empathy she feels toward Animals, because she feels so othered from society that she feels non-human, alienated.

The book also handles Elphaba's attractiveness much better; it does a great job of depicting someone who is not beautiful but is nevertheless Hot, which Elphaba is. When Glinda looks at her for the first time and thinks that shes beautiful, she is not looking past Elphaba's skin and she does no make over. She puts Elphaba in an orange hat as a joke, and sees how it matches her skin and suits her, and it makes Glinda realise that the green of Elphaba's skin can be beautiful to her. And that changes how Glinda sees Elphaba; Elphaba does not change.

okay im just complaining about the musical now. But idk, I wish that they'd used this opportunity to do better by Fiyero, make the themes a bit better... and just... put some light prosthetics on Erivo. Just make her look a little uglier! A little more hatchety. Its not like it'd be out of place, Ariana Grande as Glinda looks spooky as fuck. Why does she look like that. I like it bc I like Glinda looking intense and spooky but it IS weird

[dweemeister]

Instant reactions to the 96th Academy Awards

A rough night for me. But there have been rougher ones before. I imagine most of my comments put me in a very lonely minority, as has been apparent the last few months.

But here goes:

For all intents and purposes, yours truly was on the Killers of the Flower Moon train. An extraordinary crime epic from Scorsese, with astounding craftsmanship and fantastic performance from Lily Gladstone. More than what I previously believed possible, a major studio production went out of its way to make sure that its Indigenous American representation on-screen was as genuine as it could possibly be (still imperfect, as the film acknowledges, but what an effort). And yet, KOTFM goes 0/10. I've never had a favored Best Picture nominee be shut out in such a way before. And I'm not surprised at all by it. It was clear that non-American and non-Canadian audiences didn't get the context to the film (a criticism I understand, given the screenplay) and, in other quarters, folks thought it was too long (I admittedly have a higher tolerance for longer movies) and others have said something akin to the fact that they are getting tired over "racial guilt" movies from America. I'm not in the mood to respond to the last one. I think it deserved better tonight. I particularly think Lily Gladstone deserved better tonight.

Stat upheld: two non-white actresses have never won on the same night in Oscar history. History, in and of itself, was always against Gladstone.

Oppenheimer winning? Fine, I guess. It was my #4 choice of the ten Best Picture nominees. I guess Christopher Nolan was overdue, but I have always been a Nolan skeptic. The film certainly is his most humanistic, and I appreciate that. As for the narrative organization and editing trickery? It mostly serves to take me out of the movie. And I don't think Nolan truly understands what thematic film music can accomplish for his movies. I think RDJ should have had much more competition all season long, but he did not. Most people are gonna say this is the return of the Academy's favorite subgenre... the Great Man Biopic. But in composition and structure, Oppenheimer (and even Maestro) resembles very little of the past Great Man Biopics. It'll be interesting to see how history treats this movie.

I disliked Poor Things. I didn't care for its sense of humor, didn't agree with many folks' opinions that it was a magnum opus of female empowerment. I thought it was incredibly male gaze-y and troublingly sanitized its scenes of sex work. Jerskin Fendrix's score was unlistenable outside the context of the film and distracting within it. But it has four Academy Awards and people love this movie, so my opinion can go to heck?

Well done Da'Vine Joy Randolph for her win as Supporting Actress for The Holdovers. I truly hope this opens up a lot more new opportunities for her going for! Wonderful speech.

And speaking of wonderful speeches, both documentary winners got me very emotional. The Last Repair Shop is on YouTube for American and Canadian viewers, and it's simply wonderful. Perhaps the happiest I was all night long! And then came Mstyslav Chernov's speech after winning for 20 Days in Mariupol. Chernov had, arguably, the speech of the night. And I agree with him. I, too, wish he never had to make his film and that he never won this Oscar. But he did his job to document what happened in Mariupol. And for that he (and the Ukrainians suffering and dying in their war versus Russia) deserves our plaudits and support.

Once more, Hayao Miyazaki cannot be bothered to show up to an awards ceremony. It's hilarious! I would have voted Robot Dreams, but The Boy and the Heron is not a winner to sniff at. Spider-Verse will have one more shot.... whenever the third movie comes out?

Good lord, they selected the worst possible winner in Animated Short with War Is Over!. There's an unwritten rule that the Academy, among the fifteen nominated shorts, must select one which will piss me the hell off. And for the second straight year in Animated Short, they have done exactly that, choosing something akin to a soft drink commercial.

Billie Eilish and Finneas are now the youngest and second-youngest ever to win two Oscars, after Luise Rainer (Best Actress for 1936's The Great Ziegfeld and 1937's The Good Earth). That feels very, very weird. In both cases of this record.

The "I'm Just Ken" performance? Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (Like Ken)??? Busby Berkeley choreography? What do the kids say? Inject that straight into my veins? It was wonderful.

And speaking of nods to cinema history, I'm so glad they led off the stunt performers tribute with Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harold Lloyd. :,)

And congratulations to Godzilla Minus One and its Best Visual Effects win! After seventy years, Godzilla is now an Oscar-winning franchise, and its win percentage is 100%! Simply wonderful!

I think the moral of the story is that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) has been gradually internationalizing over the last decade. And the results of that were very clear tonight. Does that mean I'm too provincial in my tastes? I don't know. But wins such as Emma Stone's, Anatomy of a Fall, The Boy and the Heron, and Godzilla are demonstrative of that.

I'm glad this season is over. I certainly hope that Killers of the Flower Moon will be looked upon more kindly by history and time, without the bells and whistles of awards campaigning and a fuller understanding of why it was made the way it was.

This month has been fun! But now it's time to see movies again without the lens of awards for a long, long while.

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

How the “Disney Renaissance” narrative changed, the few pivotal movies that got left out…

It is often agreed that the famed Disney Renaissance began with the 1989 theatrical release of THE LITTLE MERMAID… A return to the kind of critical acclaim the studio’s animated features hadn’t enjoyed in a long while, especially on a consistent basis. And apparently, their first box office hit in a long while.

History shows a different picture… THE LITTLE MERMAID, in fact, was merely building upon an upward climb that not only Disney Feature Animation was seeing back then, but also other divisions of the enterprise’s film domain.

It’s not like Disney Animation was really struggling THAT much anyways, before Michael Eisner and Frank Wells and Jeffrey Katzenberg came into the picture with a returning Roy E. Disney. Things were far from great in the ‘70s and early ‘80s, yes, but the features made between the posthumous release of THE JUNGLE BOOK in 1967 and the misfire release of THE BLACK CAULDRON in 1985 did not lose money. ARISTOCATS, ROBIN HOOD, RESCUERS, FOX AND THE HOUND made beaucoup bucks in several European territories, for starters. THE RESCUERS even enjoyed rather enthusiastic critical reception on American soil, with one figure asking if a “renaissance” (!) for animation was underway… In the year 1977… 12 years before THE LITTLE MERMAID came out.

Really, it all begins in the summer of 1986 with the muted release of THE GREAT MOUSE DETECTIVE.

This one entered full production after Eisner/Wells/Katzenberg assumed control, and it was Katzenberg who had significant changes and facelifts made to the project, other than its silly title change. Despite the production being a more enthusiastic one for its young animators, more so than the previous endeavors, Disney didn’t really go ham on its marketing outside of a few trailers (which were surprisingly lost until some really cool folks did lots and lots of digging in the recent years). In fact, its theatrical posters were the early mock-ups. They just… Went with those, and called it a day…

MOUSE DETECTIVE was no blockbuster by any means. $26m domestically only put it $5m above the previous summer’s BLACK CAULDRON, but because it hadn’t cost as much as CAULDRON nor was marketed much, it was considered a profitable success. Reviews were generally positive, too, the best for a Disney animated feature since THE RESCUERS nearly a decade earlier... It no doubt kept the thought of shuttering the animation studio at bay, and it no doubt created some enthusiasm within the walls of the studio.

Later that year, former Disney animator turned rival Don Bluth struck big with a picture that freakin' Steven Spielberg produced... AN AMERICAN TAIL. Released by Universal during the Thanksgiving frame, the feature does the unprecedented: It takes the box office crown that Disney had held for decades. A real upset! Reportedly, it got Katzenberg and all of them nervous. All of a sudden, there was a real push to invest in making animated films. By early 1987, Disney began to put more pictures into development. Only three was in the works by then: Modernized Dickens adaptation OLIVER AND THE DODGER, classic fairy tale THE LITTLE MERMAID, and a RESCUERS sequel. By the end of 1987 and into early 1988, BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, ALADDIN, and a story about the African wildernesses were in some form of development.

Summer 1988 saw the release of the live-action/animation hybrid WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT, a revolutionary animation and VFX spectacle that involved Spielberg as producer, directed by BACK TO THE FUTURE director Robert Zemeckis, and had most of its animation provided by the esteemed Richard Williams house across the Atlantic.

Critical darling, huge box office smash, animation and classic American cartoons are cool again to the general public...

OLIVER & COMPANY came next in the fall of 1988. A full-fledged marketing effort, and Disney had the guts to release it next to Bluth's THE LAND BEFORE TIME, which Spielberg back as producer, **and** freakin' George Lucas as well...

It was a big hit. $53m domestically, and - according to Disney at the time of its release - over $100m at the worldwide box office, taking the crown back from Bluth in addition to beating his newest endeavor. Things were looking up...

Then THE LITTLE MERMAID released in Thanksgiving 1989, rest is history... They saw a small bump in the box office road with THE RESCUERS DOWN UNDER in late 1990, but rebounded BIG TIME with BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, ALADDIN, and THE LION KING, one after the other...

So yeah... ROGER RABBIT aside, because it wasn't a Walt Disney Feature Animation production (Spielberg especially felt the studio's crew weren't really cut out to make the animation of a high level that he was looking for), the two pictures before MERMAID are typically left out of the Disney Renaissance narrative.

MOUSE DETECTIVE was a much lower-budget endeavor, seen as a B-picture of sorts. It didn't make a huge amount at the box office, it had merely only made its money back and got good reviews. So some do not count it because of that. But on the other hand, it was the directorial debut of Ron Clements and John Musker, the reviews were very solid, it showcased the then-young animators having the kind of fun they didn't enjoy on FOX AND THE HOUND, MICKEY'S CHRISTMAS CAROL, and BLACK CAULDRON... For some, it is the seeds of the Renaissance. The launchpad for the rocket.

OLIVER & COMPANY is even more baffling when you consider it took the highest-grossing animated movie crown back from Bluth, and was the first animated film to make over $100m worldwide on its initial release. However, the reviews were more mixed for that one, and it's considered an incredibly outdated film. Which it is, I won't lie. It's certainly stuck in the late 1980s, for sure, and many consider its storytelling to be average at best. They feel the story is definitely buried in the hip attitude and pop star voice cast.

But its success was absolutely important to what lie ahead.

Disney *used* to credit it as such...

Look at the BEAUTY AND THE BEAST sneak peek from the May 1991 VHS release of THE JUNGLE BOOK...

OLIVER is a prominent part of the narrative. RESCUERS DOWN UNDER, which was only a few months old by the time they put together that sneak peek, is not alluded to whatsoever. The narrative is OLIVER, then MERMAID, now BEAST. An example of the studio's upward climb... No DOWN UNDER, despite its technological innovations that allowed for BEAUTY AND THE BEAST to even be made the way it was...

DOWN UNDER got a more mixed critical reception and also underperformed, but that was largely because Disney had lost faith in the film long before it was released. After a not-so-great re-release of the original RESCUERS in spring 1989, it was largely just seen as a vehicle for the further development of the C.A.P.S. process of digitally inking and painting animated movies. A full-length test feature/gap filler, if you will. Then it came out, wasn't warmly-received, and it didn't do great. Disney immediately excluded it from their new upward climb narrative.

(Though, I guess as compensation, a trailer for THE RESCUERS DOWN UNDER comes on after this JUNGLE BOOK tape's BATB sneak peek. It's a short trailer for its home video release, though it looks to be a snippet of a commercial or theatrical trailer.)

Flash-forward... ALADDIN is coming out...

Its marketing emphasized MERMAID and BEAST as the stepping stones to that film...

No OLIVER, and certainly no DOWN UNDER...

The fall 1992 release of ALADDIN was where it was cemented, that THE LITTLE MERMAID started it all...

[astoundingbeyondbelief]

Kaiju Week in Review (February 18-24, 2024)

Godzilla Rivals: Mothra vs. M.O.G.U.E.R.A. begins with a standout fight between Mothra and Ebirah. From there, however, the Queen of the Monsters spends most of the story on the sidelines, with a brawl involving Mechagodzilla, Garuda, Jet Jaguar, and M.O.G.U.E.R.A. over the fate of her egg taking center stage. A mech fight on that scale is unusual for a Godzilla comic, and despite the misleading title, it's a decent issue. Writer Johnny Parker II sat down for a lengthy interview with Kevin Derendorf and Raf Enshohma this week; I haven't had time to listen to the whole thing, but I do know he talks about his valiant efforts to put Medical Jet Jaguar from Godzilla Island in the comic.

Justice League vs. Godzilla vs. Kong #5 also released this week. Afraid it didn't leave much of an impression on me; the book is juggling a lot of narrative threads now, and I don't see how it wraps them all up satisfactorily with just two issues left. I would've liked to see a more focused cast (and not just because it takes forever to list all the DC characters on Wikizilla each issue, haha). They also finally mention Monarch in this issue, which only makes the absence of the Monsterverse's human characters more conspicious.

Between Dune: Part Two and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, March was already going to be a great month at the movies for giant monster fans, but they'll now be joined by an anime classic: The End of Evangelion. GKIDS is bringing it to North American theaters on March 17 and 20 (a Sunday and a Wednesday, respectively). All showings will be in Japanese with English subtitles. This is not, as some reporting has suggested, the first time the film has ever played in the region—I found a Facebook event page for a 2019 screening in Omaha, for instance—but it is certainly the first major release. Be forewarned that if you haven't seen Neon Genesis Evangelion, you'll be confused out of your mind, as the film serves as an alternate ending for the final two episodes. But you've got time to get caught up.

Like many a Godzilla movie before it, Godzilla x Kong is leaking like a sieve, with a number of alleged screenshots of the Titans now making the rounds online. I normally wouldn't mention such things in this column, but they show a couple of characters who haven't been officially confirmed to be in the movie yet. So here's a warning to be on your guard if you're spoiler-shy.

[loverrofmineee]

The Parting Glass - Robert "Rosie" Rosenthal x OC

Summary | AO3

Chapter 1- Brief Flirtations With Landings

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thorpe Abbotts was buzzing with a mix of excitement and worry as the first batch of American pilots would be landing later that day. The men and women of East Anglia had been anticipating this day for weeks, hoping that these men would help them to win the war. Sorcha’s bunkmates were included in this group, more on the excited side, as they were eager to meet the new men.

“-and American men are just so handsome in a way that the Brits aren’t. There’s a reason they have all the movie stars you know.” One of the girls, Aileen, spoke with great enthusiasm. She was a petite girl from Northern Ireland who had opted to work at Thorpe Abbotts to meet handsome American men, and also help the war effort.

“I understand that, but Brits have lovely accents that just make everything sound so much better than it is. The way they say darling is just so much more appealing than our boys.” Anika, another bunkmate, was quick to defend her position in the argument that had been going on for at least 10 minutes.

Sorcha remained to herself during her friend's verbal sparring, instead re-reading the most recent letter from her brother. He detailed his most recent mission, as they had just been allowed to start flying a little over a month ago, and the thrill had not worn off yet. Cormack was stationed in Kings Cliffe as a fighter pilot for the 61st Fighter Squadron. His position in combat often worried Sorcha, as was her right as the eldest sibling and the closest thing he had to a mother overseas, but she was glad her brother was enjoying himself, as war tended to leave men more desolate than how they began. A knock against the bunk door caused Sorcha to raise her eyes, to be met with the presence of Major John “Bucky” Egan.

“Morning ladies,” Egan said with an ever-present smirk in his voice.

Aileen, who may or may not have had a crush on the Major since he arrived, was fast to greet him, standing up from her seat, causing an unpleasant sound to emit from the wood scraping against the concrete. “Good morning Major!”

Bucky gave her a short glance over before addressing the rest of the girls, “Mind if I steal Miss Devlin from ya? The brass requested that she be my personal driver today.”

“And why would they do that?” Sorcha questioned giving Bucky a slight glare.

“Because I requested it.”

Bucky had a smug smile on his face after he spoke, enjoying the fact that he was making Sorcha annoyed. Ever since the two had met during Bucky’s first day on base, they continuously engaged in playful banter, seeing how far they could push each other. He enjoyed the challenge and viewed the Devlin girl as a good friend. Sorcha could say the same for Bucky, as he brought out a side of her she had planned to put away during the war but was quickly cracked open again due to the Major’s manner.

“You’re the worst.”

“I don’t think you really mean that. How could you not love a face like this.”

Sorcha just scoffed at the major’s words, gathering her things for the seemingly long day ahead of her. “I’ll see you later girls.”

“As always, it was lovely to see you ladies,” Egan said, shooting the girls a wink, causing a rapid flush to Aileen’s cheeks as she just waved, unable to speak.

The two friends made their way to Bucky’s jeep, given to him due to his status as Air Exec. Sorcha climbed into the driver's seat, barely giving Bucky time to get in before hitting the gas.

“Jesus Devs, it seems like you’re trying to kill me.”

“Now what would I gain from that? No one else lets me drive their cars. If I lose you, I lose all the perks I gain on your behalf.”

Egan chuckled at the girl's words as they drove past the tarmac, soon to be filled with B-17s. In truth, both were looking forward to the amount of airmen landing today. Thorpe Abbotts had felt too empty for their liking, only filled with office staff and higher-ranking officers who had no time for anything other than planning missions. Sorcha understood their positions, as wartime was not a place for days spent lounging about, but she wished they’d at least loosen up a little bit.

“I’m excited to finally meet this Buck you’ve been talking about nonstop for weeks,” Sorcha spoke with a hint of enthusiasm, not trying to start Bucky on a tangent about his best friend that would go on forever. She thought it was cute how much he cared about his friend, friendships like theirs were what men needed during war, someone to have throughout the horrors.

“I think you’ll like him. He’s not as fun as I am,” Egan spoke with a teasing grin, choosing to keep his emotions hidden from the girl, “but he’s a good time. One of the best damn pilots I’ve ever seen.”

“Huglin will be happy to have him then. He’s been like a rubber band just waiting to snap this week,” Sorcha had already experienced the frenzy within the tower as crews took to the skies, casualties and loss alongside them. Colonel Huglin was a strict man, which was a fitting trait for his line of work, but he was strict on promoting no fraternization between the women and men on the base. That rule had been long gone since the beginning, but he liked to remind all new crews about his policy. “, but God bless him for taking the job. Lord knows we need someone like him.”

Bucky nodded in agreement as they watched the planes on the tarmac taking their spots, trying to find Cleven's plane. Sorcha had slowed down as they approached the busy landing strip, but the lack of speed annoyed Bucky, “C’mon Devs, no point in slowing down now. Buck’s fort is right over there.”

Sorcha laughed at her friend's enthusiasm, pushing harder on the gas pedal to get them where they needed to be. As they pulled up in front of Cleven's plane, Bucky practically jumped out of the moving vehicle, “May I remind you of your earlier complaints when you were halfway out of a moving car?” Sorcha chastised the man.

“Time and place Devs!” Egan called with a smirk as he walked up to one of his friends, “DeMarco!”

“Hey, Major!” DeMarco responded, holding the leash of a husky in one of his hands, the dog trailing behind him. The sight of the dog made Sorcha get out of the jeep, eager to meet the pup in front of her.

“Where did you get that dog, Benny?”

DeMarco grinned at Bucky’s question, eager to tell the story, “I won him at craps!”

“You took this baby above 10,000 feet.”

“He’s got a mask,” DeMarco explained, “It cost me three bucks. But boy, does he love to fly.”

Benny’s grip had loosened on the leash, causing the dog to run up to the Devlin girl leaning against the jeep. She was quick to pet it, giving the husky all the attention it wanted. The voice of another pilot caused her to look up, while still petting the dog. “He wouldn’t stop howling.”

“That’s because he’s part wolf.”

“That wolf is part dog.”

Sorcha let out a small bark of laughter at the man's comment. The men's attention had now shifted to the uniformed woman petting the dog, looking to Bucky for an introduction. “Gentleman, this is the lovely Sorcha Devlin,” Egan began, horribly butchering her name, as he wasn’t familiar with Irish pronunciations. “She’s been putting up with me while I’ve been waiting for your crews to arrive.”

“I wouldn’t say ‘putting up’ per say,” Sorcha teased as she rose to greet the men, “I was the one to give him a tour on his first day and now he won’t leave me alone.”

“If that isn't the story of my life.” The other pilot chuckled at the girl's words before walking over to shake her hand, “Major Gale Cleven, pleased to meet you.”

A teasing smile grew on the girl's face as Cleven introduced himself, happy to finally meet the man Bucky had been talking about for weeks. “Ah, so this is the famous Buck I’ve been hearing all about.” She glanced at Egan, watching him shift uncomfortably during the interaction, “I think we’re going to be good friends, Major.”

“I don’t like the sound of that,” Bucky spoke, looking between his two friends, “It’ll turn out bad for me.”

“Think that highly of us do you Bucky?” Cleven asked, sarcasm dripping from his voice, “I tend to agree with Miss Devlin here.”

“You can call me Devs, practically everyone here does since they tend to mispronounce Irish names.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, Devs.” Buck smiled softly at the girl, appreciating that Bucky had found a friend to keep him company while waiting for the crews.

The loud buzzing of a plane broke the silence that fell over the trio, all glancing to see whose fort it was, as if Sorcha had any clue. “Well, there’s Brady,” Bucky spoke, answering the girl's silent question.

Sorcha watched as the plane flew further from the tarmac, seemingly having a mechanical issue on board. The bells signaling emergency personnel rang throughout the field, nurses and Red Cross aids rushed to their ambulances to respond to the situation. The girl couldn’t help but feel stuck in her position, as she had little to no medical training and wouldn’t be of help on the mechanical side, but she could never get used to the feeling of helplessness when it came to situations like this.

“We should head over,” The voice of Bucky snapped the girl out of her thoughts, “You coming, Devs?”

The girl just simply nodded her head as she climbed into the vehicle, letting Bucky drive this time. She listened to the men chat idly in the front as they made their way over to the plane in the field, counting the number of uniformed men there were. Sorcha prayed there had been no casualties, as it would likely send the new men into a spiral before they were even in the air. As the Jeep pulled to a stop, she made brief eye contact with one of the men, seemingly talking to his captain. Sorcha offered the man a small smile in hopes of quelling his obvious worries.

“Everyone okay?”

The two men responded with a brief “Sir,” before Bucky called the pilot, whose name was Brady, over. Sorcha suddenly felt an urge, whether it was maternal or sympathetic, to comfort the worried man a few feet away. She hopped out of the Jeep, going unnoticed by the men in the front, and made her way over.

“Hi,” She began, startling the man before her, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to pop up like that.”

“Oh- oh no it’s ok, I was just…” The man trailed off, gesturing to the scene around them, obviously caught off guard by the woman in front of him. In an attempt to ease his nerves, Sorcha offered her hand for him to shake, “Apologies for the lack of introduction. I’m Sorcha Devlin, I work over in the tower as a navigation clerk.”

The man’s eyes lit up at her words, “Oh, that’s great. I’m Harry Crosby, but the guys call me Croz, no relation to the singer though. I’m um the navigator in Brady’s crew.”

“So we have something in common then!” Sorcha smiled at Croz, glad she had made him less anxious, “I should be seeing you around the tower then since you’ll be picking up your maps and such from my desk.”

Before Crosby could answer, Bucky slammed on his horn, gaining the pair's attention. “C’mon Devs, no flirting with the crews!”

“I’m not flirting Bucky, or are you just upset that you don’t have my undivided attention for once?”

“You wound me Devs, you truly do.”

Sorcha chuckled to herself and turned back to Croz, who had a questioning look on his face, “Devs?”

“You’re not the only one with their surname as a nickname. Honestly, these boys are lacking creativity.” Bucky’s horn beeped again, signaling that he was ready to leave. “I’ll see you around Croz.”

He gave her a small wave as she jumped back into the Jeep, Bucky taking off almost immediately. “So, making friends with the new guys already. What would Huglin have to say about this?” Egan teased as he drove.

“Oh shove off, the man was clearly going through a lot. Isn’t it part of your job to make the men feel welcome?”

“Not as welcome as a pretty girl would make him feel,” Bucky spoke, the joy of teasing his friend evident in his tone. Instead of responding, Sorcha sent him a sharp glare, not wanting to advance this particular conversation.

The three continued with small talk as they drove back to base, Sorcha learning more about Buck and Bucky through each other's teasing and stories. Buck Cleven was a charming man, to which no one’s surprise, had a girl at home waiting for him. Sorcha found the notion romantic, though she herself could not relate to the feeling. She had sympathy for the women who were forced to wait at home for their significant others to return. Sorcha had already dealt with this on a daily basis, and she had sworn to herself that she would never fall for a pilot. Her sole focus while on base was doing her job properly, and praying that her brother was ok.

As they drove closer to the barracks, Crosby was in the unfortunate position of practically being hit by Bucky’s Jeep, “Wrong side of the road, Lieutenant!” called Egan, reveling in getting to tease the new guys.

“Sir,” Croz started before glancing at Sorcha, adding a curt ma’am to his greeting.

Sorcha returned the smile as Bucky continued to speed away, “Welcome to England boys!”

[cosmo-watches-movies]

Timeline (2003)

Plot: American dude joins an archeology team in france because he wants to get at a girl. However his dad dissapears and the team find a note he wrote 600 years ago. They use a newly developed teleporter turned accidental time machine to rescue him.

I’m trying to find the right word for what this movie is. It does what it sets out to do allright, but its not particularly extraordinary or memorable. I think calling it a flick might cut it. Yeah, it’s a time travel/medieval action flick, but in a good way. It’s watchable, okay for a sunday evening, you know what I mean?

As I said in the summary we have the american dude (Chris Johnston, played by Paul Walker) who joined the excavation, and his father (E.A. Johnston, played by Billy Connolly) who dissapeared. The excavation team travel to the place where the scientists accidentally developed a time machine and set out to travel back in time to rescue Chris' father. Included in the rescue team are also Andre Marek (Gerard Butler) and Kate Ericson (Frances O'Connor), who worked at the excavation aswell.

So an amazing thing this movie does is, it tries to be as scientifically logical to an average audience as possible. They explain everything about the timetravel so it makes sense to every averagely educated viewer (i.e me) and I think it’s all around plausible. They did a pretty good job as long as you’re not further educated in quantum physics I think, but I am not so I buy it. If you want to know how they explain it in detail watch the movie, short to say they use a worm hole to travel through time and they even explained how they found out where and when the wormhole ends and it’s all very clever if you don’t think about it too much. 10 year old me would’ve gone crazy for the science part of all this. I think it’s great.

Aaaaanyway, just putting this here. If you already lost someone in the past and don’t quite know how all this wormhole stuff really works, is it that clever to send a whole team of people into a medieval warzone to try and save him? I don’t know, but I think it’s gonna be reaaallly hard to find an insurance that covers this situation.

As it turns out that out of all the possible places and all possible moments in the history of the entire universe, the wormhole, just so happens to end in Castlegard in 1357, which is a for human archeologists very convenient time and place. Of course this is the site where the earlier excavations took place and that was the initial reason the scientist called for Johnston to help. Promptly loosing him in the past quickly after.

“But Cosmo,…” I hear you ask, “where is Michael in all of this?” Oh, my sweet friend I am getting there very soon, just you wait. It will be worth it believe me.

First tho we have to get our team to the past, of course they need a way back aswell, so they get a little pendant each, that when pushed sends all of them back to the future (lol) at the same time.

In a very painful process they travel 600 years to the past and arrive in Dordogne, France. Oh, by the way, they took only one (1) guy who speaks french. His name is François. (I’m crying, 100% effort on the scientific explanations, 0% on naming their characters)

So now we have a group of english passing people and one french passing guy in a place where a french castle is occupied by the English. Fun times will not be had. And we see this immeadiatly because the two security men they took with them get shot with arrows immediately. One of who presses their mark and while dying gets transported to the future. But oh no he had a granade and it goes off in the lab so the time machine is now in shambles.

In the past our team flees to the french camps but get captured by the English. And this is where Michael as Lord Oliver de Vannes has his big entry. Somehow…It takes almost 40 minutes before we meet his character, which is fine.

He is the main villain, but only technichally so, because he exsits mainly to give the opposing English force a headfigure. He doesn’t really get a big introduction, I assume because at this point the audience already knows what the deal is and that the English are the enemy. Exposition has been delivered, Oliver just gives them a main target to oppose. In the first scene he’s in we just see him amids swordfight training with his fellow men and then be an ass towards the protagonists and their team. That’s basically all he does and is. This is not one of Michaels deepest roles, but I’ve found him very entertaining nonetheless, mainly because some of his line deliveries just crack me up. I can’t even say what it is, it’s just funny to me. Obviously I can’t really show this here, I'll give you one example later, just watch the movie and see for yourself. Maybe it’s on purpose I don’t know. Maybe it's me.

Let’s take a closer look at the scenes he’s in, there aren’t that many. (I think he has less screen time than Miles had, even though he’s the villain for the main storyline of the movie)

As I said we meet Lord Oliver during a training swordfight. They use these funky swords with yarn around them and tassles at the tips, I love them, I want one. Now, is the fighting they do realistic? I don’t fucking know and I don’t really care, it looks cool.

I’m a big fan of this move especially:

Again, 10 year old me would’ve loved this

The hero team are brought to the place where the English are currently training (or just showing off their coolest tricks idk) and after proving he’s the most awesomest and strongest dude in the room Oliver introduces himself to them and of course wants to know who they are. Upon learning that they are scottish he decides to be an ablsolute prick about this whole situation.

He does some more awesome(tm) sword moves and afterwards asks them if they know “the old scottish man”. Chris then explains that the old man is a magister and they where several days behind him and didn’t know that they where following him. After Chris is done however Oliver decides he doesn’t give a shit about that and asks about the tall young man (oh no, we as the audience think, thats Farncios)

Now the dynamic in the room shifts, as the only conclusion the English can make now, is that he’s a spy. Oliver could have Francois killed at the spot, but he’s an ass, so he decides to humiliate him first.

Poor guy :(

In another ass move Oliver has the poor guy executed and thus the epic story of Francois, the frenchman comes to an end...

Then the hero team are shoved into the attic, where they find Chris’ dad who tells them that he promised Oliver Greek fire (an incedairy weapon), so he wouldn’t be killed on the spot. We shortly see Oliver again in a short scene where he has small quarrel with a young french woman, who’s absolutely not having any of it:

If you ever wanted to see Michael Sheen actually get slapped in the face, there you go. I’m not joking she really slapped him. You can see his curls bounce upon impact and if you watch the scene it sounds…just ouch

The next part of the movie is them escaping, being split up because Merrick saves the french girl.

Also we learn that the french girl is Lady Claire, who is intregral to the history of this place, because the English killed her, which rallied the French so they could win the battle. But Marek already fell for her so that’s terrible news for him. I would’ve skipped explaining this, but it will be important later.

(For some reason the plot of this movie is really complex. I have to give it to them, this film is 2 hours long and there is literally zero filler. I’m sorry if I skipped some important storybeats, but I don’t want to transcribe the whole movie in detail for a character who’s in like four small scenes)

In two different raids first Chris Dad and then Claire and Merrick get recaptured.

The English assume a defensive position at castle La Roque and the french position themselves right in front of it. While both sides prepare for battle Chris and Kate try to find a secret entry into the castle to save his dad again.

The battle starts, reenter Oliver. LMAO I love this, the castle is being attacked by catapults flinging huge flaming stoneballs into the walls and Oliver DOES NOT MOVE A MUSCLE!

(F’kin Dark Lord coded mf)

The English answer with their first Greek fire spear thingy, but at first it seems very dissapointing. Oliver is not impressed…

But then the French try to extinguish the fire with water and that ignites it further. Job well done Lord Oliver is happy. The battle goes back and forth as one would expect with archers and fire and everything. (Fucking love these shots, again, don’t know how accurate, but they look great)

Battle commences. I don’t know why, but Oliver giving the battle commands brings me great joy. He commands a row of night arrows to be shot after the fired ones which kills a whole lot of frenchmen, he’s quite pleased with himself.

>:) < literally him

Chris and Kate get stuck in a tunnel that is supposed to lead them inside the castle.

Meanwhile the French earn two good chances, first they learn of the tunnel that leads into the castle and send a troup to investigate and then they hit the front gate of the castle with one of their trebouches (very lucky hit)

This leads to the best line of the movie imo:

Delivery on point, this line is part of a balanched breakfast

We shortly see the scientists in the future desperately trying to fix the transporter. There is a subplot with one of them kinda giving up and rebelling, but honestly idgaf, I think they added this just to raise suspense. There would be nothing really missing if they hadn’t added this.

In an attempt to have the French surrender Lord Oliver puts up Claire to be hanged right in front of them if they don’t lay down their weapons. Merrick sees this and decides to confront Oliver in an attempt to stop him by threatening to blow up the whole arsenal. This almost works, but Olivers second in command thinks he sees through this apparent bluff and stops him from falling for it. But it wasn’t a bluff. Merrick throws his torch in the arsenal, causing a huge explosionthat throws everyone wildly around the castle. The french cheer and Chris and Kate now have a free entryway to the castle, so do the french, they storm in from the outside and inside. Arrows and close combat.

Here’s where my favourite action shot is in this movie:

Watch this a couple of times, what was supposed to happen here? First he swings the sword, unfortunately very obviously, miles in front of this guys head and then the dude falls like he had a rug pulled from under him? How? What? And the sound they played! You can’t hear it, but it’s not a *swoosh-klonk-aaaargh*, like as if he's actually hit with a blow that could swipe him off his feet, it’s just a tiny *bink* and then he dramatically throws himself to the ground. Great action shot, I love it.

Marek runs to get Claire free while the french leader fights Oliver. Now those of us who payed attention earlier, know that Oliver is really, really good at swordfighting, so he will be very hard to beat. I live for this scene, Oliver is giving it all, fighting multiple people back to back, not showing any weakness. He has the french leader on the ground and raises his sword for the final strike, but Chris slides into his legs and throws him to the ground. They scuffle and Oliver throws Chris to the side. Chris scuttles away, Oliver gets up quickly and follows him menacingly. Chris is cornered but finds a battle axe (?) and tries to stab his opponent. This plan fails, Chris already sees his end coming, again Oliver raises his sword, but he is stopped by the frenchman, who doesn’t hesitate, he grabs Oliver and stabs him (right in the heart I assume). Oliver collapses and, triumphantly, his killer states:

Fuck yeah, If I have to see a character who’s played by my favorite actor die, this is THE ONLY WAY!!!

Yadda, yadda, yadda, the French win the battle, our heros survive. Chris, his dad and Kate get back to the future and Marek decides to stay with Claire.

The scientist, who rebelled is accidentally transported back to the past and is immeadiately stabbed or (beheaded for all I know) by an english rider.

The protagonists discover a message Marek and Claire left before they died and all is well. (Exept for the four innocent people of the excavation project who died on this adventure, they are dead)

Yay, fun, enjoyment, happy times, this movie is entertaining.

I think this movie is allright, the writing is solid enough and they put some great effort into the action scenes. So why did it bomb at the box office? Well… this movie was kind of doomed upon release. This film released to theatre 26th of November 2003. And guess what film released just one week later!?! Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King! (!!!)

I’m so sorry they had no chance. This is so damn sad, but also so fucking funny. Generally there is absolutely nothing wrong with it this film. Maybe, if it had been made like ten years earlier it would’ve been a great success? But not in 2003, unfortunately.

Back to our main focus though: I LIVE whenever I see Michael in an action scene! I can’t even explain the excitement these scenes cause me. I don’t even care if he wins or looses a fight as long as he’s in it. You can see that he gives his all in these scenes and it’s very captivating. I was indeed shouting at my TV because I was so in it. (If you can you should avoid watching any kind of Sheen movie with me in one room, because I will be very obnoxious about everything he does. Who would've guessed?)

All in all, there is not that much depth to Lord Oliver as a character I think? As I said he’s pretty much just a personified version of a general opponent. More of an obstacle than a character.

He’s also barely in this movie. He has like ten lines, the (great) fighting scenes and then he’s killed. All of this is fine, he serves his purpose very well and once again Michael gets everything out of this character that he can I think. It’s just that beyond him being the obstacle for the heroes, there isn’t much else. To me he’s memorable enough but he’s not very deep.

I’d like to point out again that I find it very funny that Oliver is an asshole just for the heck of it. I mean of course he is, he’s the villain. As flat as he’s written, for the story he accomplishes what he’s needs to. But I sincerely hope I wasn’t supposed to take him seriously, because I just can’t. I don’t know what it is about him but he’s so cartoony that I can’t help but find him hilarious at times. The first time I watched this film I was very much in the story, don’t get me wrong, but on my second watch I kind of lost it. Maybe I’m in too deep with the fandom atp but I can’t find Oliver that threatening anymore. Or it could be that with the way this movie is shot, they managed to make him look kind of small? I know Michael isn’t that small, he’s like average height, but the way he’s framed and when he then always stands next to actors who are taller than him, it makes him look kind of smol. And that goes right against any kind of threat level he built up with his evil demeanor. They got it right in the end fight, when they film him from a bit if a different perspective, but the rest of the movie? He be tiny. (I have not felt this effect in anything else before so I don’t know exactly what’s going on here)

So he had his cool moments, but all in all I’m certainly not scared of him really. I know he could kill me in an instant, but I’d ask him to say something in a scottish accent for me and then die laughing my ass off.

What brings me intense joy aswell is, watching the bts material of this movie, we have Michael explaining how doing action scenes like in this movie is a bit like playing pretend when you’re a kid and that sounds like (as exhausting as it probably is) he has a lot of fun doing stuff like this. You go Michael, live your best life!

That’s it. This movie is allright. If my description intrigued you, I think you’re gonna enjoy the film. Now give me my knights armor and my fake sword I have to go battle one specific englishman and his entourage.

RIP Francois

[rabbitcruiser]

Pony Express Day

Pony Express Day celebrates those brave souls who made up the unique mail delivery system of the same name. Back in the days of the wild west, there was no Fed Ex, no Postal Service that ran that far west, no planes, and delivery by ship were likely to take months if it ever got there at all.

Seeing this need for a specialized delivery service, Leavenworth and Pike’s Peak Express Company took an opportunity to expand into this void. From this important decision was born one of the most iconic pieces of American History, whose influence is felt in hundreds of Pony Express Day Festivals throughout the American Midwest.

History of Pony Express Day

The Pony Express existed for 18 months between the days of April 3, 1860, to October 1861. In these days there was no airmail, no great American Highway, all there were was hundreds of miles of wide-open spaces with not much in between but animal-filled wilderness and bandito filled hollows.

During this time, if you wanted to send a letter or small package from anywhere East past the gateway of St. Joseph, Missouri, there was only one way to go. The Pony Express was a massive employer for its time, with up to 80 young riders employed at any given stage, with stringent requirements on their age, size, and weight.

The Pony Express preferred to employ the youngest riders they could, in part for their resilience, and in part for how light they were. The lighter a man was the longer the horse could run and the more cargo the rider could carry, and since the horses were put to go full tilt for 10 to 15 miles at a stretch before changing, this was of vital importance.

The rider changed out every 75 to 100 miles, but the mail never so much as slowed even in the worst of weather. While the average trip from coast to coast (On Horseback!) took 10 days, when they delivered Lincoln’s Inaugural Address, the trip was made in a mere 7 days and 17 hours.

How to celebrate Pony Express Day

With Pony Express Day Festivals being a staple all throughout the United States, there are tons of opportunities to celebrate the bravery of these young mailmen. You can spend Postal Express Day dressed up as one of these adventurous young souls who served as the heart of America’s fast-tracked postal line while watching equestrian events commemorating the challenges they faced.

Speaking of equestrian events lets not forget the true heroes of this endeavor, the horses that carried men and post across the nation time and time again. These events often have a broad range of related events, including food-related events.

Chili was one of the staples of the old American West, and as you might imagine there was often a pot of this spicy staple bubbling to keep the riders fed as they came in and out with the packages.

If you find yourself without a local event, you can host one at your home. Make Chili and Cornbread, find logos and the like to print out online, and get the 1953 movie ‘Pony Express’ featuring Charleston Heston and Rhonda Fleming!

This is a classic about this amazing American institution and the trials and efforts of the men and women who fought to make it a reality. So get together with your friends and family on Pony Express Day, and celebrate the Pioneer spirit of the Old West!

Source

[fredseibertdotcom]

 Fearless. Three stories. 

Bob Pittman was my boss (I wrote about Bob as one of my mentors here), the one who gave me a lifetime career in television, when I was positive I was going to be a record producer. Like great bosses can sometimes do, he drove me nuts on more than one occasion (God knows how many times I annoyed him!), but more often than not gave me the rope to hang myself (thanks Bob!). But over the years I watched him succeed over and over and I finally have had enough distance to see...

...that Bob is fearless. A fearless competitor, fearless leader, fearless mentor, probably a fearless flyer. It’s one of the many qualities of Bob’s that’s brought him from radio and MTV to the heights of media.

I had a first hand look on this numerous times, with Bob as a boss, then a client, and finally as a friend. Here are three stories that not only have stuck with me for the past 40 years but have affected my own behavior, but personal and professional ever since.

1.

Very early on at MTV Networks, we had a management offsite meeting in Montauk. I’m not much of a joiner and not a drinker, but one night I found myself in a packed car of party co-workers; seven folks in a car meant for five. I was stuffed in the back with Bob and someone sprawled across our laps. 

You have to know how isolated Montauk is, and at night there are no streetlights, and here we were barreling through the darkest of roads. Suddenly, Bob leaned forward and put his hands over the driver’s eyes.

“We did this all the time at home in Mississippi. No one ever got hurt!”

I wasn’t so sure his luck was going to hold.

The woman on my lap leaned in close and said, “That’s what I like about Bob. He’s fearless.”

.....

2.

Bob was 25, I was 27, he was my boss as the head programmer at The Movie Channel, a start up, early cable channel owned by Warner Amex Satellite Entertainment (WASEC), a joint venture between two huge corporations, Warner Communications and American Express. Every expense was heavily scrutinized for efficiency and effectiveness, and my first production assistant was brought on as a freelancer only. He was creative, smart and funny, if a little disorganized.

A few months in he up and quit. “I’ve got an eye disease, I’ll be legally blind in a few months. I’m going to go live with my parents and I’ve sold my comics.” He’d been collecting since he was in grade school.

It came out that his vision was kind of like being underwater with eyes open and the degeneration would stop at a certain point. Reading was possible but only with a machine that could take books and papers and blow the type up by several inches. Insurance would pay for it, but he was a freelancer with no coverage.

“Well, I’m not going to let you quit. Your problem isn’t your vision, you’re just a little messy and undisciplined. Let's see what I can do.”

Back in the day, corporate health insurance wasn’t as computerized and organized –or quite as necessary– as it is now and maybe I could pull a weasel move and back date him as an employee for health coverage and get him his machine. I didn’t know Bob all that well, we’d met through my first media mentor, but he seemed like a real corporate type –at least compared to me– and he’d have to clear it.

I held my breath and launched into the PA’s issue.

“It’s simple, backdate his employment, get him insurance.”

The PA stayed, got his gizmo, and legally blind or not went on to become the company’s worldwide creative director for sister channel Nickelodeon.

Bob wasn’t a corporate weasel after all, he was a fearless warrior for his people.

Bob in MTV days, with a frame from Silver Cloud Productions’ “Dot to Dot”

.....

3.

A month into my gig at The Movie Channel, Bob announced The Music Channel and asked me to lead the creative efforts of the channel-to-be. He had a clear vision of a format that would be, exclusively, music videos 24 hours a day, interrupted occasionally by “VJs.”

“So,” I asked Bob, “what else will be in the clock? Jingles, like Top 40 radio?” I hoped not, but I couldn’t really picture anything else.

“No! Are you kidding? NO!!! We’ll do animated logos.” Remember, we didn’t have a name no less a logo.

He could tell I was a little confused. “What?”

“Imagine this.” He was already sounded triumphant. “There’s an animated cow grazing around. All of sudden! An axe comes of of nowhere and cuts off its head. The head falls to the ground, veins spurting blood. The cow vomits! And in the vomit is our logo!!!”

Wow, I thought. Bob will let me do whatever I want!

Bob’s creative fearlessness was the beginning of a change in television that would reverberate for decades.

By the way, we’d never produce the vomiting cow, but...

"Bessie the Cow" by Tom Pomposello from fredseibert on Vimeo.

[aeshnalacrymosa]

Zootopia: a love letter

Judy & Nick w/ unnamed OC, colored pencil on white paper, June 2018

Zootopia is an important movie for me. While I live in a largely monocultural nation, my country’s colonial past and the millennials’ online exposure has made me conscious of the racial tensions dividing the world, and Zootopia has helped me navigate the nuances of racial conflict. Judy Hopps’s journey through Zootopia is a story that resonates with ethnic minorities in the age of globalization. Her diminutive size and nature as a prey animal has put her in a secondary status against the predators and larger mammals of the city, but her efforts to prove herself reveals prejudice in herself.

I know many fans from various other cultural backgrounds see themselves in Judy (I’ve seen fanart of Judy in a hijab or kimono, etc.), but to me, as a Filipino, I saw through Judy the millions of Filipinos—mostly nurses and domestic helpers—seeking greener pastures in first world countries for their families at home. I have yet to follow in their footsteps, but I also have ambitions of pursuing work abroad, preferably in North America like some of my relatives. But for the longest time, especially in my youth, I had qualms about going to America because of myths and horror stories about how the wider world sees us. As a child, I’ve heard stories of Americans still believing that “Filipinos live in trees” as recently as the ‘90s, or the backhanded praise of having “good English” or “no accent,” disregarding that most of us are bilingual or even trilingual from childhood. I became wary of how I’m going to be perceived. But going with Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde on their wild otter chase, it occurred to me that those stories and myths were also indicative of self-destructive victim mentality. The movie cemented in me something that I already learned from my first (and so far only) visit to California in 2011, when I didn’t feel unwelcome at all, and the locals were friendly and didn’t seem to notice or care that I’m a foreigner.

Similarly, by immersing herself fully into the life of the city, Judy discovers that nobody is what they seem. Chief Bogo is a prey animal, but he is the physically imposing leader of Precinct One in the Zootopia Police Department and is a big softie inside. Mr. Big is a vicious mob boss but also a doting father. Benjamin Clawhauser is a predator, but he is the first friendly individual that Judy meets at work. Finnick is a tiny, adorable little fox with a deep voice and a mean streak. He and Nick become con artists because foxes are seen as untrustworthy and unemployable. Dawn Bellwether seems like a sweet and harmless sheep because her boss bullies her all the time, but she is a mastermind of an insidious attack against predators. And Judy herself, having grown up being warned against predators, has unknowingly internalized some prejudice and discovers herself to be not as progressive as she thought herself to be. By rekindling her friendship with Nick Wilde, Judy Hopps overcomes her prejudice and goes on to make the world a better place with her new partner.

I am currently very active in the Encanto fandom on Tumblr now that much of the Zootopia fandom has migrated to other platforms ever since the great porn purge of 2018. I was primarily a lurker around the Zootopia fandom, happily consuming content, commenting as much as I liked but contributing barely a handful because 2016-2019 was not my most creative period. I regret not interacting then as much as I do now with the Encanto fandom, but I do bring into the current space something I learned from Zootopia and its fandom: A common love for something and having similar values can overcome any differences you might have, even racial differences. An artwork as meaningful as Zootopia or Encanto brings out the best in a lot of people. With hope in my heart and creativity in my hands, I intend to someday explore the world and leave prejudice behind.

[theshannonlewis]

Library person here! I’d like to add that library staff at all levels are super invested in fighting against book bans and censorship on the whole. Accessibility of information is part of our core mission, and one we take very seriously. Part of that means, yes! if you request a book and it’s possible for us to purchase a copy, it’s almost guaranteed that we will. And if a book gets checked out frequently, we’ll likely buy more copies.

Also: libraries pay creators - often at higher royalty rates per copy than they get from traditional booksellers - and books that are well-loved, we buy many, many copies of: to fulfill holds AND replace books that have seen a lot of wear and tear.

Not all libraries have equal access to digital resources, and the depth and breadth of the collection will vary a lot based on the size and budget of your local library district. But many libraries are also part of collectives, and will transport and check out books to people at libraries in different parts of your region/state at no cost, to ensure you have access to books they might not have in their own collections.

The American Library Association (ALA) IS the front line in the fight against book banning, and though we don’t always talk openly about it, library staff throughout the country are developing strategies to push back against book banning efforts, for the very purpose of ensuring equal access to all materials for all people.

During Banned Books Week (and really the whole of September/October), our district had displays of banned and frequently challenged books in all of our locations - and the response from the public was incredible. Most people were shocked to see which books had been challenged and wanted to know why. Not only did it prompt some great conversations with people who aren’t super aware of the surge in book challenges…it also meant we checked out so many banned books that we started running out of copies to put on display - which is 100% the best problem for a library to have, and we solve it by…buying more of those books!

Also, many libraries are funded by local millages, which means they’re somewhat insulated from state and federal level changes, but very much do rely on local support for budgeting - which means both paying attention to your local elections, but just as importantly, showing up, asking questions, and checking out books from your local library. Those statistics are largely how we prove our worth on a governmental level, and help secure the funds we need to keep our collections robust, diverse, and accessible.

TL;DR: now is a GREAT time to get a library card if you don’t have one. If it’s been a while since you’ve been to one, you’ll be surprised at everything they have to offer - from books, movies, music, and comics to passes to museums or zoos in your area, or even people who can help connect you with mental health or housing resources. YMMV based on the size and location of your library, but if nothing else: your local library is a safe place you can be, without spending any money.

I'm already seeing advice from people in the US to purchase queer books and other banned or "controversial" books on paper as a way to combat the wave of government censorship that is coming. While this is a good idea (it is! absolutely!), it's not accessible to everyone, and truly, we're not going to be able to consumerism our way out of this one.

If you can buy the books, do. Whether you can buy the books or not, borrow them from your library.

Borrow the paper versions. Borrow the ebook or audiobook versions. Request the titles you want that your library doesn't have. The more a title circulates or is requested, the better librarians are going to be able to defend keeping it if and when it's ever challenged.

Use libraries like @queerliblib too. The more members they have, the better they'll be able to fundraise.

Your community resources depend on you using them. Borrow the books before they go away.

InB4: Piracy is not the solution here. We're trying to keep community resources available, not make sure individual people can read individual books. Different problems.

The books are still available. Borrowing them from your library and returning them on time and in good condition will help keep them that way.

[wild-at-mind]

Checking in on someone who I had to unfollow after 7/10 was a mistake. I genuinely don't get how someone who posted in such a nuanced, balanced and fair way about queer community issues was completely unable to bring that to the issue of a war that genuinely affects tens of thousands of real people, on both sides, in so many different ways. What happened? What broke inside people?

Because of this breaking, this person has become someone who doesn't understand, or pretends not to understand, why people on here might want to stress the positives in Kamala Harris's record, to do with trans issues etc...its because they are fucking terrified of another Trump presidency, and they KNOW that there are tonnes of Americans on here who will happily use any excuse to choose inaction instead of using the relatively minimal effort of casting a vote. (I know voting in America is not minimal effort for everyone, but people who do this tend not to be the people affected by voter suppression.) They know their audience. Do we need yet more people listing off every single bad thing Kamala Harris ever did? Of course not. We've seen plenty of that. It leads to nothing but nihilism and apathy. And people spreading the idea that you will become impure if you vote democrat. Fuck off with that OCD bullshit. As an OCD-purity brain person myself who has to fight it every day, I absolutely hate this rhetoric. Voting for a candidate that is objectively better than the other candidate on day to day issues that affect you and your loved ones, even if the candidate is not perfect, is a good thing. Most offline leftists (yes- shocker, they exist and are better than us all) realise this but tumblr is a fucking OCD hell spiral and has been ever since the first Trump presidency. I saw it all, and I remember what it was like before. Night and day. Back then people cared incredibly much that Disney movies should be diverse. It sounds trite now, especially as Disney movies are relatively diverse in the present day and it didn't solve racism or anything, but I miss those days.

To borrow something I saw on another post: no one else needs to know that you held your nose and voted, not your cool leftist online friends, not anyone. Someone's gonna become president no matter what you do, its not like option 3 is anarchist utopia. Personally I use my 15+ years of adult life experience to see that imo, countries need leaders, because leaderless movements barely work in fairly small grassroots activist circles, where we have all seen what happens in leadership vacuums. That said if any of the 'making a stand and not voting and here's why' posters appeared to have any deeply held anarchist views, that they had held and developed over some time, I think I would respect them more. But they never do. I think they are just holding out for a perfect politician? FYI, that person will never come. I see socialist types here in the uk still angry that Corbyn didn't get in all those years ago, acting like it was our only chance of salvation uh I mean a decent leftist government....its so weird because to anyone watching the real world it seems clear that governments always disappoint people, and are always forced to make decisions about international conflict that the generally anti-war general public does not like. But instead of seeing how these systems force probably decent individuals to participate in horrible things while in power (similar to how we are all put in societal positions where we have to buy clothing made in sweatshops and electronics with components extracted by miners who are put in unsafe conditions), they either think a perfect and pure politician, a Corbyn, will come along and do everything perfectly, or if they are more anarchist they want no leadership at all, but this is probably impossible with the size of the world as it is.

Ugh I'm just rambling now. Get involved in alternatives to party politics all you want- they are great, citizens assemblies etc have given people voices in issues that cannot be easily decided at a ballot box. But.....you still have to participate in the current world. Please do it.

[disappointingyet]

Challengers

Director Luca Guadagnino Stars Zendaya, Josh O’Connor, Mike Faist USA/Italy 2024 Language English 2hrs 11mins Colour

More tennis, less bedroom stuff than the buzz suggests

[Minor spoilers for the early part of the film – and if you’ve seen the trailer, that gives away much more than I will]

I wasn’t expecting Challengers to be so much of a sports movie. I mean, I knew it was about tennis, but I was not anticipating, for example, the classic sports pic framing device of most of the plot happening as flashbacks between the action from a crucial match. (To mention just one very un-Luca Guadagnino-like film, For the Love of the Game, the least-loved of Kevin Costner’s baseball movies, does that). 

So there’s plenty of tennis in this film and the production team put in a lot of effort to make that action feel visceral and immediate, some of which works and some of which is very annoying. Towards the end, it’a almost Guy Ritchie-like, that lack of faith that what you are showing is interesting to the audience so you have to gimmick it up.

That match is a final, but it’s the final of a third-rate tournament taking place at a suburban tennis club for which the winner’s cheque is $7,200. The film admirably withholds information about who these people are for a while, but eventually we learn that Art Donaldson (Mike Faist) is big-name player in decline, being pushed towards one final shot at glory by his wife/coach/manager Tashi (Zendaya). His opponent is a down-on-his luck yet still cocky player called Patrick Zweig (Josh O’Connor).

Flashback 13 years and super-tight best buds Art and Patrick are winning the doubles at the Junior US Open and will then play each other in the boys’ singles final. The big star of the tournament, though, is Tashi Duncan, who strolls to victory in the girls’ final. Art and Patrick are aware that junior wins often don’t lead to great adult careers but no one doubts Tashi is destined for greatness. Both Art and Patrick are instantly obsessed with her and she’s at least amused by them…

The hype around this film suggested maybe these three would be a throuple. It’s actually more of a traditional love triangle, although often quite a grumpy one, played out over those 13 years. Oh, there’s something going on between the guys but it’s largely unspoken. In terms of what you see, the film is surprisingly chaste – it’s been widely described as a (ahem) sexy movie but that’s about the vibe between the three leads rather than what they actually do.

But what it is – to a surprising degree – is a three-hander. There are no secondary characters with any plot of their own. I’d guess the person with the most screen time after the leads is the umpire (Darnell Appling*) in the framing match – who is just umpiring and doesn’t even have a character name. There’s a tournament administrator who gets one good scene (Burgess Byrd), an awkward Tinder date, a couple of other players get lines and that’s really it. 

So the film rests entirely on the trio and whether the dynamic between them is convincing. I think it is. I was (maybe unfairly) surprised by how good Josh O’Connor is in this film. I think the only thing I’ve seen him in Emma. and he didn’t make a big impression in that – I instinctively dismissed him as more of the plague of privately educated British actors infesting Hollywood. But his American accent is (as far as I noticed) flawless and somehow the fact that he looks a bit like Jonathan Richman makes the fact that he’s playing this swaggering, spoilt waster a bit more interesting. He's excellent here.

Faist’s role is the less active one – he has to be a bit wet but also a passive schemer, a guy waiting patiently for things to fall his way and giving them a sneaky nudge (probably both as a tennis player and as a person.) 

And Zendaya as Tashi? Firstly, she has to project a ‘this woman walks into the room, everything else stops’ aura. That she can do. She also has to be the tennis obsessive – we’re meant to understand that Tashi is both much more attuned to the business of the sport than the blokes while also being capable of being swept away by the transcendent nature of the game.

And Zendaya’s got maybe the trickiest task of the three because her character – for reasons the film does make clear – has to be the most different between the present-day and flashback portions of the movie. Her best moments certainly come in the flashback. 

When director Luca Guadagnino gives the characters space to talk, Challengers is good verging on really good. The stuff in between I’m less keen on – there’s quite a bit of really tacky slow-mo, for instance. 

And I hated the ending. Not in a ‘I wish there was a different outcome for the one of the characters’ kind of way, just in a ‘this is a really unsatisfactory storytelling option’ way. I had a long discussion with the friend I saw the film with afterwards, and we felt we understood the resolution the film-makers wanted and why it would be tough to achieve it in a different way, but still: to me it falls very flat. 

But up to the final couple of minutes? Challengers is good, definitely something you should see. 

*Not an actor – one of Zendaya’s team 

[anon-horsey]

end of freshman year reflections

August 2022-May 2023. That was my freshman year of college. Also my first year as an adult in the US; my first year as an adult living, in a sense, on my own. As cliche as it sounds, I feel like a different person than I was when I came here in August. First point to note, college is not like the movies and YouTube videos. Its most likely going to be significantly sadder, lonelier, and shittier.

That YouTuber who got paired with a random roommate and now they're going to get married or something? Yeah, well most likely not happening. My roommate for most of college was, well, a narcissist. Now, I'm not an expert on the matter and I most certainly can't diagnose someone as a narcissist but that girl had her head so far up her behind that it was coming out the other side. She would often clean my side of the room, blow her paychecks on useless crap, and eat my food claiming not to have money. She barely put in any effort into her work, would not stop talking, and was generally an insufferable, disgusting human being. Now, she dropped out of college (not that I'm surprised) and I have no real reason to care about her anymore. Some part of me feels bad for her poor boyfriend, though. From the few times I met him he seemed like a decent person and I do not know what he sees in her. My only question for her is: how many friends and relationships do you have to lose before realizing that maybe you're the problem? But, not my monkeys not my circus.

Here's the other thing about college. There is a lot of politics. Most of the people on my floor, I'm quite certain, don't like me. Hell, I don't think most of the people in my uni like me. In most cases, I wouldn't care. But considering that I have no real friends, its really lonely. College is really bloody lonely.

Another thing to note, your university most likely doesn't care about you unless you're a specific kind of student. As a vegetarian, there's pretty much nothing substantial to eat on campus. The cafeteria is rife with cross contamination, not to mention food I'm not used to eating as an international student. The retail stores cater to meat-eaters, and the campus store is an overpriced sack of shit. Oh and, you're likely paying more than $2000 per semester for a meal plan you likely will barely use. My meal swipes were only used when I craved fries, waffles, or ice cream. So not often. Additionally, if you're an international student, good luck getting a job. Be prepared to spend more money than you thought you could without an income. Because on-campus jobs are reserved for federal work study students and American citizens. And your visa won't let you get a job elsewhere.

Now, because you don't want to spend more money that you absolutely need to survive, you can't go out. If you can't go out, you can't really make friends. It's a huge circlejerk is what it is.

The social aspect sucked for me. Well, it didn't suck, so much as just not exist. But honestly, it isn't all that bad. This semester was my favorite, in terms of the classes I took. Calculus, I'm surprised to say, wasn't a shitshow. My professor was amazing, and I actually did well. All my classes were super interesting, my professors were quite alright and I did well academically.

Personally, I don't miss home as much as I miss the life I used to have. I miss being able to pursue my hobbies to some extent, being able to hang out with my friends, small stuff like that.

All in all, it wasn't a great first year and I hope to god (if there's one out there) that it gets better because this is not how I want the supposed "best years" of my life to go.

[moontheoretist]

General Ross laughed—a raspy, weak thing and his hair seemed even grayer in the low light. “Decades, Stark. Decades in service. I believed in that shit. Had to.” He looked down at his bandaged hand and downed the alcohol in a gulp. Tony’s brow furrowed. He had known the General in a professional capacity for a long time. This was…different. Tony poured him another shot; half, this time. “It’s easy to get caught up in it. The movies, the video reels, the parades. The museums filled with history labeled as ‘American Greatness.’ The first successfully enhanced human on known record was a 6-foot-something, blonde haired and blue-eyed white man and all of it is the first thing you see when you wake up until you shut your eyes at night in a bedroom full of memorabilia. Pledging Allegiance to a flag before you’re able to form abstract thoughts. It’s all you know. And it’s a damn good story—so good and pervasive you never even begin to think. Your family’s been doing this for, what? How long?” “One of the first colonists—served with Washington himself,” came the mumbled reply. “Mm. I get it. But then you grow—start looking outside the box. You begin to hear the rumors; you hear the disturbing, gut wrenching things done for country and corporate interests. You learn about the rape, the killings, the kidnappings, the human trafficking, the burnings, the genocide, the greed…the drive to consume everything—people, land, capital. And then you wonder about your place in furthering that destruction. All that effort and sweat…for what? I’ve read the classified reports, General; just as you have. And the two of us…well, we made our decisions in the name of Empire.” “Tch. You sound like my daughter.” “She’s a very intelligent lady.” “That’s all her mother. Smarter than my ass, at any rate. Refused to join JROTC and buried her head in biology books instead. The Old Man had his own ideas about women serving so he didn’t get on her like he did me before he went six feet under at Arlington. I was sort of relieved to be honest—at least she wouldn’t end up like…Elias.” Tony noted the name but knew better than to follow that thread. Instead, he said, “So you’ve had your doubts for a while.” “Naw… …well. …Perhaps. Perhaps. But what else could I do?” “When you got a hard ass parent breathing ~legacy~ down your neck? It’s difficult to do much else. You keep on because to do otherwise would be to admit your family shed blood and died for…that. You’d have to acknowledge that you’re way more comfortable with atrocities than you’d care to admit. That your loved ones have died and you’ve wasted decades on…horror. That was how that line went, wasn’t it? 'The horror—the horror.’” “Hn. Hated that movie.” “I imagine it made you uncomfortable. I did prefer the book myself although both are phenomenal. On the other hand I am a sucker for Marlon Brando. Ooh, he was a fine specimen in his prime.” Tony sighed and adjusted himself better on the aging barstool. “I’m not saying this to rub salt into wounds because I’m not any better. When I started making weapons I had no real idea about life or death. I was in grade school. But I was good at it, it made Howard happy, so I built away. Then when I was old enough to know better? I, too, kept on keeping on. And who knows how long I would have if I hadn’t, finally, gotten a taste of my own medicine. Until I was the one being shot at—until I was the one with shrapnel tearing up my insides. Until I was being dumped head first into filthy water. I didn’t pull any triggers, and, sure, if not me then someone else would have filled the void…but the thing is those hypotheticals don’t change a goddamn thing. I can’t put that shit on any one else. And now here I am sitting on the spoils of wars, with a daughter of my own and I think about all those other daughters who…well.” Tony trailed off, eyes on the bottle in his hand. It would be easy to go right back into what he knew. Terrible for him and other people, but comfortable. Known. Every day was a struggle in breaking new ground and he wondered if there would be a time there wouldn’t be. “You think stepping out of the game will cleanse your soul?” Ross sounded curious, not sarcastic. Tony had an inkling he wasn’t asking for Tony’s sake. “I wish I had a better answer than no. Decades of being the Merchant of Death doesn’t get cleared away by a year of playing nice and giving away smartphones. That’ll be a part of my identity until I die and long after—I’ve got to make peace with that.” “Then why bother? When you’re in so deep-” The General cut himself off and his hand had closed into a fist. It shook from the force of his grip. Tony pulled his gaze away to rest on the worn grain of the wood beneath his fingertips. “I believe…now, at least, that you do the right thing because it’s the right thing. You grow, listen to others…fuck up, take your licks, learn. And at the end of it all you hopefully do better. My family plays a part—an important one. But I…I’ve got to put in the work. Me.” Ross sighed, long and heavy. “You know you don’t have to, Stark. You’re so loaded your grandchildren’s grandchildren won’t have to work a day in their lives. You could give that suit of yours to someone else and take a backseat. Lieutenant Colonel Rhodes would be exceptional. Even I can’t fault his record.” “Yeah…I’m wrestling with that, too. But it’s not just me, General. You could retire tomorrow. And with your record you’ll be buried in so much metal I could make another suit from it.” Ross snorted at that. He toyed with the shot glass before setting down and pushing it away. The old CRT hanging from the wall in the corner showed a replay of yesterday’s baseball game. Howard used to promise to take him to one—never did. Something was always more important. “If you know about Project Rebirth then you know about…what else is out there, I’m guessing.” “I know we’re not alone.” “I just wanted our kids to be safer, Stark. That’s all—that’s all. Then it all got twisted up and fucked.” Ross paused. “I chose Blonsky because he was one of us—he understood the life. Highly decorated—well trained. He was on our side. But what came out of him was an abomination. It makes you think, Stark; makes you really think.” “Abomination. Fitting.” The silence between them stretched miles. The bartender was humming along with the juke—some old country thing where the singer probably lost his woman, house, farm, and dog and not even in that order. The General suddenly asked, “You a fan of Captain America?” “Hated him. But those’re my daddy issues talking.” “I used to look up to him. Old Man served in the Second World War and told me all about his exploits. I used to think, 'that’s it.’ That’s proof that everything we stand for is right. And if we had more of him? It would be better for everyone. Conflicts would end so much quicker with less bloodshed. And if they were hurt they would be able to heal. No more corpses being left out to bake and swell in the sun.” “That would suck for the other guys, considering our track record with war crimes. But as long as America’s dominance is assured, am I right?” “You and I both know that war’s inevitable, but if—no. No.” Ross pressed his fingers against closed eyes. “That’s that old fool in me flapping his gums. All I’ve done was cause…hurt.” “The road to Hell.” “Heh, indeed.” Ross ran a hand over his mouth. “I’ve seen some shit, Thunderbolt. It made me question what we’re really doing on this dirt ball hurtling through space.” “What are we doing…hm,” Ross murmured. “What am I doing? What if it’s too late for me?” “Figured you were the type to rest when you’re dead.” “…I thought the same. But when you catch on that you’ve become what you’ve hated—shit, maybe you’ve been projecting all along.” Ross turned to face him, finally, with his brow furrowed. “Now I’m not one to get all touchy or sit with these sort of things, and God knows it’s not like I could have told this to anyone else—they’d have thought I’d’ve lost it.” “Happy to be a sounding board for your thoughts, General.” “You have given me a lot to think about, I suppose. But why are you here, Stark? Really? "Like I said, General. Most I can do is work on doing better.  Eventually, we will, all of us will, have to question what it really means being American; or, I should say, being human.”

Have Time — Will Travel by flower-of-el (NibelungVelocity)