#Luke deliberately picks a day with no significance

[whatsfourteenupto]

At the request of Luke Smith, Fourteen finally went with him today to visit Sarah Jane’s grave. They had coffee after and he told Luke about all sorts of adventures his mother never mentioned, and answered all sorts of questions about the ones she did. They were thrilled to hear about Luke’s job and his and Sanjay’s two kids, and about what Sky’s been up to. The two of them said goodbye with a promise to talk more.

And when he got home, Fourteen cried for hours.

[firelxdykatara]

ppl love to forget that katara: 1. has her own taste, 2. developed around aang, he needed her for his development and vice versa, 3. ZUTARA IS SHIP BETWEEN AN OPPRESOR X OPPRESSED!!! Ignoring all of the development they had with their respective partners and the trauma Zuko caused Katara!!

In the infamous words of one Luke Skywalker: amazing. every word of what you just said was wrong.

It’s actually kind of ironic that you bring up Katara’s taste, since, throughout the show, we have examples of the guys she likes, to greater or lesser extents in canon--Jet (explicit romantic feelings on her part, word of god that jet was her first kiss--a kiss that would have been consensual, incidentally, something you should keep in mind for later) and Haru (she denies the crush, but that could just as easily have been because of the abomination he’d been growing on his lip rather than denying those feelings ever existed), both of whom have much more in common (in terms of both emotional and physical maturity, and physical appearance) with Zuko than either of them has with Aang.

Zuko’s book 3 hairstyle is almost exactly reminiscent of Jet’s, even, if not quite as floofy.

(This is probably in part because of Jet’s function as a foil of Zuko within the narrative, particularly given their book 2 encounters, which I think just further solidifies my point that, were it not for extenuating circumstances [like the fact that Zuko was introduced as an enemy and they had significant obstacles to hurdle before they could be friends], Zuko would have been exactly Katara’s type. Had they met under different circumstances, she could have been the girl he went on a date with in Ba Sing Se. Just something to think about.)

So, yes, we’ve established that Katara has her own taste. Her tastes seem to be boys with great hair who are taller than her, the same age or older, and of a similar maturity level.

Aang falls short (heh, short) on all counts. So it isn’t Katara’s taste in boys that led her to be interested in him. Hm!

Next, you claim that Katara ‘developed around Aang’--that she was necessary for his development, and that he was necessary for hers.

Let’s take a moment to examine that, shall we?

I will absolutely grant you that Katara was necessary for Aang’s development--only to a point, of course, but we’ll get to that later--but was he really necessary for Katara‘s growth? I suppose I could grant you this on a generous technicality--he did, after all, provide her with the means to finally leave the South Pole and find a waterbending master to teach her (although she wound up largely self-taught anyway). But that had nothing to do with his relationship to Katara and everything to do with the structure of the plot--Katara and Sokka find Aang (and he never would have gotten out of that iceberg without Katara’s own righteous anger, so even that leads back to her own power), and then they go on a quest to find teachers for the Chosen One and save the world.

The story could not have begun without first finding Aang and then providing means for the other main characters to travel with him (or, in Zuko’s case, chase him), but this has nothing at all to do with Aang’s relationship to Katara. Aang was not a mover in Katara’s developmental arc--if anything, he acted as an obstacle more often than not, his actions ranging from innocent but obnoxious (playing and flirting with girls rather than helping with chores like picking up vital supplies, leaving Katara to do all of the quite literal heavy lifting and keeping her stuck in the role of caretaker that she’d been thrust into following the death of her mother), to deliberate and harmful (hiding the map to Katara and Sokka’s father, a truly selfish action, regardless of his lack of malicious intent, and one for which he never actually apologized), to somewhere in between (”she didn’t really mean that” he says to the man refusing to train Katara because she’s a girl, when yes, she very much did mean that, and Aang was no help in finally getting the old codger to eat his words--Katara had to shove them down his throat her own damn self).

While Katara’s overall arc wasn’t exactly big and dynamic (like Zuko’s redemption arc), or in-your-face (like Sokka getting force-fed Respect Women Juice and his eventual growth into a tactician and leader), it was very much present and woven into her character--and Aang had almost no part in it. He provided her with the means to get to the North Pole, but left Katara alone to fight the patriarchy herself. He messed around while Katara took it on herself to do the chores and keep the Gaang alive, but he did almost nothing to decrease that burden so she could grow out of the caretaker role. (Contrary to popular shipper claims, Aang didn’t actually teach Katara to have fun. She already knew how to have fun. But she couldn’t indulge, because she had a responsibility to her family and her tribe, and later to her brother and Aang and Toph, and Aang goofing off and trying to get her to do the same only added to her burdens rather than subtracting from them.) He provided Katara with the necessary motive to learn to heal herself, but he certainly didn’t seem to learn from the experience of accidentally burning her, preferring instead to claim he was never going to firebend again, despite already knowing, at that point, that he was going to need to master fire along with the other elements to become a fully realized Avatar and defeat the Firelord.

He didn’t help Katara keep them alive during The Desert. (In fact, he ran off, leaving her to desperately try to keep Sokka and Toph from succumbing to the heat while worrying for his safety.) In The Painted Lady, Katara makes the decision to stall the Gaang and do what she can to help the Fire Nation villagers on her own--Aang agrees to help her when he finds out, but he wasn’t actually instrumental in her making that choice. The Puppetmaster was, again, Katara finding a master of her own, and having to deal with the fallout from that. And in The Southern Raiders, Aang was--perhaps unknowingly, if I’m being generous, because he is a child and could not reasonably be expected to fully understand the implications of what he was asking her to do or why it was impossible--actively impeding Katara’s development! She desperately needed closure, something he could not understand and actively belittled and dismissed. The only reason he relented in the end (but not without a condescending ‘I forgive you! Does that give you any ideas???’ parting shot lmao) was because Katara was planning to take Appa anyway, and letting her go (and hoping she’d just magically wind up doing things his way) was easier than trying to fight her on it.

While Aang’s existence was necessary for Katara to start down her own path, she needed neither his guidance nor his approval to follow it--and absolutely nothing would change about Katara’s arc if you removed their romantic relationship entirely.

Possibly because the only changes needed to do so would be to remove the two times Aang kissed Katara without her consent (which, hopefully, no one would actually miss), and the epilogue kiss (which was awkward and unnecessary to begin with, since ending the entire show on a romantic kiss as the final shot kind of missed the point of the story to begin with, but that’s another discussion). None of these kisses (which are the only moments in which Katara’s feelings for Aang are so much as addressed; do note that addressing them, or hinting that they needed to be, is not the same as saying she exhibited any sign of reciprocating them) altered anything about Katara’s behavior, her personal arc, or (and perhaps most critically) her relationship with Aang.

It’s that last point that is really damning, as far as ‘Katara obviously had feelings for Aang, she kissed him in the finale!’ goes. Because she didn’t ‘obviously’ have feelings for him. And the fact that he kissed her before the invasion and then she forgot about it (she literally had no idea what he was talking about during the play’s intermission until he reminded her that he’d kissed her) is pretty clear evidence that she didn’t actually have feelings for him. Not the kind he had for her.

I’ve been a teenage girl. I know what it’s like to be surprise!kissed by your crush. And I absolutely for a full fact know that I had not completely forgotten about that kiss three months later and had, in fact, spent most of my waking hours thinking about it and remembering it and trying to talk to him about it. Now, granted, I was not in the middle of a war, but even if I had been, I doubt I would have needed reminding about the fact that the boy I’ve supposedly been developing feelings for had kissed me and showed clearly that he had those feelings for me too.

At the very least, if Katara was harboring feelings that she was worried about approaching until after the war, her relationship dynamic with Aang should have shifted. But it didn’t. She acted the exact same way with him after the Day of Black Sun as she did before it--that is, as a mother figure and a caretaker, responsible for his wellbeing. (And it’s clear she never took him down off the pedestal she needed him to occupy, either--let it not be said that the unhealthy aspects of their relationship only went one way.)

And book 3 is, incidentally, where Katara went from being vital to Aang’s development to being detrimental to it--or, rather, Aang’s refusal to let go of his attachment to her (despite ostensibly having done as much at the end of book 2) was. Because despite having been told by, perhaps, the greatest authority left in the world on Air Nomad culture (even more than Aang, who had left his temple with a child’s understanding of his culture that was never able to mature because he got stuck in the ice berg while his people were wiped out) that he had to let go of his possessive attachment to this girl who never even expressed the possibility that she might harbor romantic feelings for him to begin with, after Azula killed him and Katara brought him back, he went right back into the mindset of Katara is mine, it’s just a matter of time.

And the narrative validated him for it.

Notice how, during Ember Island Players, Aang says the following (emphasis mine):

“We kissed at the invasion, and I thought we were gonna be together. But we’re not.”

First of all, if you go back and watch the scene, it’s clear it wasn’t a mutual kiss. Aang sprang a surprise kiss on Katara, which left her shocked and unhappy after he flew off. (The decision to have her looking away and frowning was a deliberate one on the part of Bryke, who wanted Katara’s feelings kept ambiguous. Heaven forbid you allow the animators to make it clear that this fourteen-year-old girl who was just kissed without her consent by someone she’d never once demonstrated romantic feelings toward might actually have some. Heaven forbid she have a little agency in her own romantic narrative. But whatever.)

Second, he says he thought they were gonna be together.

He thought.

He never once even asked Katara what she thought--or even how she felt. He just assumes. He assumes that if he kisses her, she’ll kiss him back and they’ll get together. He assumes that she must have feelings for him, even though her body language is closed off and she told him with her words that she did not want to talk or think about this right now, and kisses her regardless of those signals, upsetting her and leading her to storm off.

And the narrative rewards him, because despite the fact that they don’t have a single significant scene together after that second disastrous kiss, Katara just decides off-screen that she Does Love Him Really and walks onto the balcony to make out with him.

The upshot of all this being that, while Katara was indeed instrumental to a lot of Aang’s early growth and development, Aang was not necessary for her own arc, and their romantic relationship (such as it was) actively hampered Aang’s development in book 3, while removing it would change absolutely nothing for Katara (except saving her from some painfully embarrassing memories).

As far as your third point, I’m simply not going to get baited into explaining how reducing Zutara to an ‘oppressor/oppressed’ relationship is not only insulting to interracial couples irl (not to mention any other couple with a potentially unbalanced dynamic of societal power, since there are many more axis of oppression than just racial), but demeaning to Zuko and Katara, their personal arcs as well as their relationship development together.

However, I will point out that Zuko was not responsible for any of Katara’s trauma. She did not find violence and fighting in bending battles to be traumatic--in fact, she reveled in it. She enjoyed fighting against Zuko at multiple points (especially noticeable in their battle at the end of book 1), because she wanted to fight--she always had--and once she had the ability, she was ready to throw down with anyone who gave her the slightest reason. (Including, by the way, her own potential waterbending master.) Aang’s death at the end of book 2 was Azula’s doing, and while I think that contributed to Katara’s extreme reaction to Zuko joining the gaang, it was not something for which she actively blamed him, and it wasn’t something she believed would be repeated--she let him go off alone on a journey to find the original firebending masters with Aang well before she chose to forgive him. So she already trusted Zuko’s intentions and that Aang would be safe with him.

Finally, because this has gotten long enough already, I hope you now understand that Zuko and Katara getting together would not require ignoring any of their development with their canonical romantic partners. We’ve already established that Katara’s arc wouldn’t change in the slightest if all of Aang’s romantic advances were removed, and I haven’t even gotten into how Mai meant nothing in the grand scheme of Zuko’s development because I’m pretty sure that’s just self-evident. I mean, the video compilation put together by Nick showcasing Zuko’s journey throughout the series doesn’t include a single scene with Mai, though it does include several with Katara, and even Jin makes an appearance--because Katara, and even Jin, played key roles in Zuko’s personal journey, while his relationship with Mai happened entirely off-screen and her only real function was to showcase just how unhealthy trying to force himself back into the role of the Crown Prince was for him.

What development, exactly, is there between them to even ignore?

At any rate, I’ve gone on long enough--I hope you enjoy the fact that you activated my wordvomit trap card right when i was about to go to bed, anon, because I just spent two hours writing this instead. In case you’re interested in the TL;DR: at the end of the day, there was no meaningful, mutual development in Kataang’s romantic relationship, and those romantic feelings that did exist were largely one-sided and ultimately detrimental to Aang’s development in the final third of his overall arc. Meanwhile, Mai meant nothing to Zuko’s journey--rather like Aang’s romantic overtures, she could be removed from the show completely and nothing about his story would change--while Zuko and Katara were both vital to each other’s overall storylines, arcs and development. This, coupled with the fact that Zuko never actually traumatized Katara and, in fact, helped her achieve closure from the biggest source of her own trauma, means that Zuko and Katara have better and more believable build up that could potentially lead to a romantic relationship than either of them have with their canon romantic partners.

So no, anon, I didn’t forget anything--I think you may have, though. Perhaps a rewatch is in order? Make sure not to close your eyes for the back half of book 3 this time.

[takaraphoenix]

Hey, I’m already warning that it’s Angst! So, what would Nico, or even most of Camps and Percy’s family and friends do if Percy die? This after the Giant War and he dies in a quest. What would they do?

I know this is a weird question but I need to know! I’m writing a story about this. But I wanted to know your opinion since your PJO stories inspire me to write!

Well, first of all, I'm very flattered that I spird you to write and I wish you good luck with your writing! <3

Then mh. Generally, I try to avoid death fics, both in reading and writing.

But in this fandom you can find great ways to work around it. So the real question is, where do you want to go with it?

Percy who dies, but due to his heroics in the past earned himself godhood and now his family and friends have to cope with the fact that he is dead and a god.

Percy who dies, but Nico says "fuck this shit", storms the underworld, grabs ghost!Percy's hand and does the second jail break because let's be real Thanatos owes Percy one for saving his life so he'd turn a blind eye and Hades doesn't even dare to speak up because Nico's been annoying him about Percy Jackson's pretty eyes for years now and if he doesn't allow Nico to steal the soul back, he will never hear the end of it.

Percy who dies and just... hangs out in the underworld. It's chill, honestly, he finally gets to bond with Nico who lives down there and they get together that way (I think I literally wrote that fic before. Or a Hades/Persephone/Percy fic. Or both. Unsure).

Percy who dies and becomes a ghost. New Rome is full of ghosts in canon, isn't it? Percy could just decide to hang out with his friends. Still painful, but they adjust to it.

Percy who dies and gets reborn and like 15 years from now, his friends get to meet him again, in a new body and have to cope with that.

Percy who dies and is just... gone.

Sooo, before you can really work on "What would they do?", you have to pick what you do. Where do you want Percy's death to go, because depending on the route taken, the reactions would vary.

Obviously, everyone grieves in their own way. So keep in mind how the characters act in canon. (Which, quite frankly, in the case of Nico really only leaves the "fuck this shit" Orpheus and Eurydice version, considering he tried to bring back Bianca for years and successfully revived Hazel.)

And "What would they do?" also depends on what you want them to do. Because if you stick with canon, most of them would just be sad for a bit and then move on, if canon's anything to go by. Annabeth in HoO never even mentions Luke or her grief for her first big crush slash mentor who had died just a few short months before. I refuse to touch ToA but from what I gather no one attempted to bring back Leo and they were all just kinda sad until he returned on his own. Jason's dead too now and I don't think anyone tried to bring him back either and Piper's already smooching her new love interest from what I've heard. And "camp" as a large entity wouldn't do much; all of them have lost so many siblings in the war and they moved on from it. They'd burn a shrout for Percy and move on from it, though he is our protagonist, in the general picture of a war riddled society with child soldiers who have lost dozens of siblings in the past few short years already, his death is not that much more significant than any of the others.

You can go with the route closest to what is considered "in character" by orienting yourself on the way these characters have been shown in canon to react to character deaths.

Personally, I think Riordan was a coward who vastly downplayed the PTSD, survivor's guilt and grief these characters should have been going through by the time HoO rolled around and I think that you should make the judgment call yourself. You've read the books, you have a feel for how they acted, how they felt, how they reacted. What do you think would be their appropriate reaction?

Sure, you could give me a list of characters you want involved in this and the scenario you want to go with and I can directly answer the question you asked and tell you how I think they'd react. And that can be a good guideline if you are unsure yourself. But at the end of the day, this is your story and it must feel like yours. You have to be the one who, when reading it, is satisfied by the reactions and behind how they acted. And that can easily be derailed by looking to others for guidance. That's not meant to be me declining your answer; if you do want to know what I think specific characters' reactions would be like in a specific scenario, then come back to me with that and I'll offer you my opinion.

It's more meant to be encouragement for you to look into yourself and test your own grasp on the characters and go with whatever reactions you think would be most satisfying; they don't necessarily have to be the most in character. Not just because sometimes, as above mentioned, "in character" can be dissatisfying and deliberately play down emotions a real person would be feeling in certain scenarios (often due to the author's own lack of knowledge about the specific scenario, deliberate ignorance or ratings; it's tough to sell a kids' book series if you genuinely confront the trauma that comes with the reality of being a child soldier), but also because sometimes, being more "out of character" is just... more fun, sometimes things are thought experiments, sometimes you want the extreme reaction because it makes for a better or more entertaining read.

Since this turned, uh, longer than anticipated, to sum it up shortly: Decide what Percy's death is supposed to mean in the larger context of the story and where you want to go with it, then decide which specific characters' reactions you're looking for. In some cases, you can easily compare to how they have reacted to a similar scenario in the past and then see for yourself if you want to stay in line with that reaction, or if you feel like a different reaction would be more appropriate, or just more fun to write/read.

You read the books and, I assume, enough fanfiction to know the characters and find your answer yourself, even if you're unsure about it right now. And if you do want more detailed input, you are free to come back to me with specifics, or message me in private and we can talk certain scenarios or particular characters you're struggling with through and I'll see if I can help you. ;)

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #456

“i don’t even need your love, but you treat me like a stranger, & that feels so rough”

What was the longest time you’ve had the hiccups for? I know at LEAST over an hour. I was in agony. What type of TV shows are your favourite? Animal docs. Have you ever been a complete fangirl/fanboy over anything? Bitch I still am lmao. Do you know anyone who has died in battle? No. When was the last time you went on an adventure? Bro, I could NOT tell you. I haven't had one of those in what feels like eons. What brand is your vacuum cleaner? I actually don't know. I don't pay attention. Are you good at rapping? Never tried, but I'm sure I'd be awful. I stutter too much. Name one world issue that upsets you. Just ONE????????? Well, I can name homelessness as very high on the list. How do you feel about tanning? I hate it. I can't stand the heat, so why would I deliberately go bake in it? Have you ever given a public speech? Yeah, in front of the whole 4th and 5th grade when I was innnn... one of those grades, idr which. It was for my D.A.R.E. essay. Do you read comic books? No. Do you force your way into conversations in which you are not involved? NOOOOOOOOOOO I'm way too awkward. Kiss with your eyes open or closed? Bro who tf kisses with their eyes open, that shit is creepy. Do you believe you can change someone? No. One can only change themselves. How did you react when your first pet died? I have no memory of our first pet. Have you ever drawn anime? No. Can you use a pogo stick? When I was a kid, I became a MASTER. I got one for I want to say Christmas and I was obsessed. When’s the next time you’ll see the person that you like? Idk, first he needs to get on Facebook and see I messaged him alsdkfjalkdj. He like never gets on there. Do you like bathing/showering? No. One, it's a chore, and two, it's actually painful for me, standing up so long and propping my legs up and stuff like that to clean myself properly. Have you ever considered entering a race? HEEEEEEEEEEELL no. Rihanna or Lady Gaga? Probably Gaga, idk. Who was your first good kiss with? Jason. What accessory do you want in your bedroom? I actually kinda want a TV now? What do you take the most pictures of? Flowers. What are you always in the mood for? Lately, Krispy Kreme donuts, lol. I haven't had one in a very long time, but goddamn does a hot glazed donut sound BANGIN' right now and has for days. What is something that you never turn down? Hm... how am I blanking??? What is something that you always turn down when offered? Certain foods or drinks, like tea. Name something sexy about your significant other. I don't have one'a those. What is one of your hobbies that you refuse to give up? Um, idk. As interests work, I may move away from any hobby eventually. If you could be a professional in any sport what would it be? Dance. If you could be a professional at any instrument what would it be? Violin. Would you rather be a surgeon or mortician? A mortician. That job doesn't even seem all that bad to me? I think it'd be kinda chill somehow???? I could NEVER be a surgeon. I'd be terrified of fucking something up. Have you ever been on a subway? No. Are you in love? No. Do you like having your lip softly bitten when you’re kissing? *eyes emoji* Do you want to get married when you’re older? Yes. What was the last band shirt you wore? PROBABLY my Metallica shirt? But I'm unsure, ultimately. You can have a milkshake right now. What flavor do you choose? Ugh, I've been wanting a nice chocolate milkshake for a while. Have you ever given someone flowers? For Mother's Day one year, I collected some wildflowers to put in a jar for Mom. I've also given Jason roses before. I really wanted to give Sara some when I surprised her for her birthday, but I didn't want to ask her parents to drive me somewhere where I could buy her some, ha ha. What day of the week is usually your busiest day? None. My days are all the same. Do you have any concerts coming up? No, but UGH, I was so hyped a few days ago because I saw Motionless In White was going on tour next year, but of course they're going to the big city on the OTHER end of the state versus the capital, which I'm way closer to. -_- Bands ALWAYS choose Charlotte on the super rare occasion they come to NC... Do you like or hate the smell of fish? Ugh, I hate it. What’s your favorite brand of chips? Doritos, maybe? Between Mountain Dew and those... I am such a fucking gamer stereotype lmfao. Have you ever written a poem and then read it aloud? I think I had to before in school? Idr. Do you like pineapple? Love it. Does your house have a dishwasher? Yes. A dishwasher is one thing I MUST have in my own future house. I cannot stand touching dirty dishes. Do you know anyone who has a flower tattoo? Oh, absolutely. Sunflower tattoos are especially popular around here. How many different languages can you say goodbye in? English, German, and uhhh Spanish? Agree or disagree: You like Adam Sandler movies. I don't mind them. I've never understood the hate, honestly? I think he's capable of being funny. Have you ever had to get a tooth pulled? If so, what for? Only by myself when I was a kid losing my baby teeth. Have you ever dated anyone while they were in jail? Nooooo. If you’ve ever babysat, do you like it? Fuck no, I hate it. What is your favorite flavor on sunflower seeds? I don't like those. Do you get cold easily? No, but I get hot extremely easily. Do you get a lot of spiders in your house? I don't think so, no. Do you admire nature? I positively adore nature. If only we treated it better... Name one naughty thing you’ve done. Done sexual things in places I probably shouldn't have, oops. Name two of your favorite things as a child. Pokemon and Webkinz. Do you own a Pillow Pet? No. They're cute, though. My niece has one. Do you tend to solve problems with violence? Absolutely not. Have either of your parents gone to jail? No. Do you know a hoarder? Yes. Do you wax, pluck, or leave your eyebrows? I just leave 'em be, honestly. Do you have any interesting scar stories? Not really. Do you hate the texture of meatballs? No, I love me some meatballs. Do you get migraines? Very, very rarely. They fucking suck. Do you like guns? NOOOOOOO guns terrify me alsd;kjfal;sdjfk Are turtles amazing creatures? All animals are. :') How much time do you spend taking surveys? A whole lot. It's just that I'm like... always bored and the randomness of surveys can add interesting little flares to the day, I guess. Would you rather visit: The Eiffel Tower or Egyptian Pyramids? Pyramids, for sure. Would you like to work at a candy shop? No. I don't want to work directly with people. Do you have feelings for someone? It's funny; now that I've settled the extreme indecision, I've come to realize that they're very strong feelings. How you go from being indecisive to really, really liking somebody, hell if I know. Which one of your guy friends is the best looking? Uhhh Girt is like my only real guy friend, so I guess it's by default him, ha ha. I'm not particularly attracted to him, but he's not ugly by any means. Do you have anything to say to your ex bf/gf? I'm so sorry. Which band do you have the most of on your iPod/music player? Either Ozzy or Metallica. Most likely Ozzy, though. Which song describes your mood at the moment? Hm. I dunno. Which movie(s) do you quote the most? None, really. Which one of your best friend’s friends would you most likely date? None; we don't share irl friends, being many states apart, and not even that many online ones. Would you ever let anybody else drive your car? I don't have my own car. Which one of your friends will be the most successful? I'm not psychic. What store did you last shop at? Mom and I picked up a Wal-Mart order the other day. Do you think telepathy is real? Absolutely not. When did you last draw something for fun? A few days ago, I started a drawing of Maieykio for Sara. Who makes the most in your entire family? I have no idea. Do you like writing essays? I don't mind, if the topic interests me. Do you think plastic surgery is no big deal? Nah. Well, I think you can take it to an visual extreme, but that's just my opinion. Do what makes you comfortable in your own body. Do you take your trash to the dump or have it picked up? It's picked up. When you sneeze do you sneeze into your shirt or your hands? The inside of my elbow. Do you usually have sex in the morning, noon or night time? It usually happened at night. Did you ever fail your learners/drivers test? Haven't taken it yet. Would you rather listen to Luke Bryan or Lil Wayne? OH MY GOD NEITHER Name someone you’ve become a lot closer to recently: No one, really? Well, unless you count my change of feelings for Girt, but it's just that: a type of change. I've loved him platonically since high school, and it's like, I feel the same for him, just in a romantic way now? Does your car have a sunroof? No. Are you closer to your mom or your dad? My mom. Have you ever had a friend with benefits? Nope, not how I roll. Who’s the last person you cuddled with? Sara. Unless you count my cat. Are you friends with any of your teachers on Facebook? Former teachers, yes. I feel kinda bad for 'em now... They're all the sweetest, God-fearing people, and then there's my outspoken (online) and liberal ass sharing shit that's gotta disappoint them now lmaoooo.

[sodone-withlife]

i lost a friend (i lost my mind)

Criminal Minds Fic Part Two 

| PART 1 | PART 2 | PART 3 |

Word Count: 3.4k

Warnings: character death, canon-typical violence, mental instability (I’m reluctant to name a specific disorder or condition)

Notes: cross-posted on Ao3, and this was my first whumpfic in this fandom so forgive me if it sucks. this is canon-compliant until after 12.01 The Crimson King

For Rossi, who had seen the case file and personally witnessed the aftermath, it was a horrifyingly familiar scene. The door was left unlocked, keys were tossed on the side table, a work bag on the couch, shattered glass on the ground with amber liquid spilled all over the tile, and a phone next to the dark red bloodstain on the carpet. The only thing missing from the perfectly staged scene was the gun that had been left on the table seven year ago

The lingering scent of sage told Rossi everything he needed to know, however: he had probably gotten to the apartment only minutes after Peter Lewis left and had taken Hotch with him. When Rossi had called to check in on him, he was probably already preoccupied with the escaped criminal. With the drugs, though, he thought gravely, the struggle would not have lasted long.

As he called the crime scene techs, some distant part of Rossi’s mind wondered if this was how Emily had felt seven years ago when she had come over to check on Hotch. It took thirty minutes for the techs to arrive at the apartment complex, and while waiting Rossi jotted down all that he could see in an effort to avoid going out of his mind with worry.

He stayed in the apartment while the techs were there, hoping to be able to preserve what he could after they turned the place upside down as they processed the scene. While he waited, he made a series of calls: first to Cruz to inform him of the situation, then to each of the team to tell them to head back to the office.

When Rossi finally arrived back at the BAU, he was accosted by the team, voices overlapping as they demanded information. He raised his voice.

“Hotch has been taken.”

He was met with shocked silence and gave them a moment before plunging forward. “I called multiple times to check in on him, but it went straight to voicemail each time. I got to his apartment, and it was staged just as it was seven years ago. The only thing missing was the gun on the table, and there was a lingering scent of sage.”

“Peter Lewis?” “Mr. Scratch?” Tara and JJ asked simultaneously.

“I considered the possibility of a copycat, but it’s too perfectly staged. That case was highly classified, and it hasn’t been hacked since the Replicator, and we know how smart that guy was. That victim in Arizona, and now this?” He trailed off, sending a grave look at Reid and JJ, the only others apart from Garcia and Hotch who had been there for both cases he referred to.

Reid finished the thought. “It’s definitely him.”

~~~

Hours passed as Cruz managed to wrangle leeway for the team, turning their cases over to other teams so they could direct their focus on finding their unit chief. With every lead Garcia found and they tracked that ended with another hint to yet another location, they became more and more certain that Scratch was toying with the profilers.

JJ had the presence of mind to ask after Jack, to which Rossi assured her he was safe and taken care of. It wasn’t a lie, he told himself, trying not to think about the team’s reaction when they would inevitably find out. I just mean it in a different way.

“We are getting nowhere with chasing whatever the hell Peter goddamn Lewis is leaving for us,” Garcia burst out in frustration, nineteen hours twenty-three minutes and seven seconds after Rossi discovered Hotch was missing. JJ placed a calming hand on her shoulder, even as she agreed with the analyst’s frustration.

“We need to take a step back, we’ve been pursuing this track since the beginning,” she shook her head and stood up, gesturing for the near-tears analyst to join her. “Bring a laptop, we’re going to get the others and try to look at this from another perspective.”

The team quickly gathered in the conference room, tension thick in the air as they looked to JJ.

“I think we need to look at this differently,” she told them. “We’ve been chasing what Scratch has been deliberately leaving us from the beginning, and that has gotten us nowhere.” She looked around the table at her colleagues. “Hotch is his target—the attacks directed at him have been designed to be the most psychologically damaging—so let’s look at the case from that direction.”

“Profile and dig into Hotch, you mean?” Reid clarified, feeling a strange mix of excitement and terror at the prospect, especially given the situation.

Rossi nodded slowly in agreement, speaking up after having spent the last few hours in angry silence as he chased down leads. “And figure out what Scratch might use, like what we did seven years ago—with Foyet”

“Okay, I’m sorry for interrupting, but can someone explain who this Foyet guy is?” Luke interrupted, a confused look on his face as those who had been present for that case went silent.

“George Foyet, also known as the Boston Reaper,” Rossi finally said after a few moments, vivid memories of that year pushing to the front of his mind. “Almost eight years ago, he broke into Hotch’s apartment and stabbed him nine times before dropping him off at the hospital. When Hotch broke through the anesthesia, we figured out that the Reaper was planning to go after his family, and so his wife and child entered protective custody.”

He looked up at the ceiling. “What we didn’t know was that the Reaper had been watching the marshal and Hotch’s family from the moment they entered the program, and almost a year later, he made his move.”

He sighed, shaking his head. “Hotch had to listen as the woman he’d loved since high school got killed over the phone. When he finally got to the Reaper, he ended up killing him with his bare hands before he could hurt Jack.”

He looked at the horrified expressions on the newer profilers’ faces. “Everything was very different after that—understandably, of course. It was pure hell for him, and we made it a point to not talk about it unless he brought it up first.”

There were a few moments of heavy silence before Luke spoke up, an idea coming to him. “You said the staging in Hotch’s apartment was practically identical to the scene after Foyet attacked him?”

At Rossi’s nod, he sat up straight and quickly laid out his idea. “Scratch gets off on psychological torture, and that was proven by his attacks on Hotch. Knowing this, is it possible for him to have found another place of similar significance to Hotch that he might take him to?”

The profilers thought back on their interactions with the unit chief but shook their heads as they came up empty. They looked to Rossi, who stared at the center of the table, looking conflicted.

“Rossi?” JJ asked carefully. The man blinked, making a decision as he sat up straight.

“Manassas,” he said simply. At their confused looks, he clarified, “his hometown. He inherited his childhood home after his mother died, but he never went back, not once since he left for college.” He didn’t offer additional information, letting the others draw their own conclusions from the loaded explanation.

“Um, guys?” Garcia interjected, hand moving rapidly over her keyboard. “I’ve been keeping an eye out for any weird activity on the servers, and I just picked up an intruder in the system… it looks like they’ve implanted a link into Hotch’s file.” The team’s focus snapped to the analyst, who froze in horror.

“Garcia?” JJ asked concernedly. The aforementioned analyst stiffly grabbed the remote, turning on the larger screen, which showed what was on her laptop screen. The team turned to look, only for Rossi to leap up as their expressions morphed into one of horrified realization when they recognized who was thrashing on the bed, fighting against his restraints.

“Can you trace its origin?” Tara asked quietly, transfixed.

Garcia nodded quickly. “Yeah, I’m doing that right now, but it’s only being viewed by us right now.”

Reid fidgeted, unable to tear his eyes away from the sheer terror in his boss’s eyes. “Everything Scratch does is deliberate. This hack isn’t even discreet, so he clearly wants us to know about it and find the stream,” he thought aloud.

“It’s coming from Manassas.” Garcia looked up at Rossi, who looked both upset and relieved that his hypothesis was correct. “But it was only routed through a few proxy servers. It’s like he wants it to be this easy.”

An oppressive silence fell over the team.

“What the hell is his endgame?” Luke finally asked.

No one knew how to answer.

~~~

In the end, it didn’t matter what his endgame was. When Garcia managed to find surveillance confirming Scratch’s presence in Manassas, they went to Cruz. It was decided—reluctantly, on the team’s part—that the FBI tactical unit would move in while the profilers would be on standby on the chance that he would decide to play games.

(There was also a tacit agreement between the brass and the agents that, no matter what, Peter Lewis would never see the light of day again.)

They got to Manassas in under an hour and spent just as much time talking to the local PD and giving them a rundown on the situation. It was nearly sundown when they finally got into position around the run-down house after sweeping it extensively—they were under no illusions that he didn’t hide traps around the property.

“Anyone have a visual?” Rossi took the lead, asking into the radio.

“Affirmative on Peter Lewis, second floor southeast window.”

“Do not take the shot,” he instructed back over the radio as Garcia pulled up that live feed on the screens the profilers were huddled around inside the command vehicle. Much to their cautious surprise, Peter Lewis was standing in full view with his back to the window, looking down and seemingly watching something.

“What’s he doing?” JJ asked the question on all of their minds. No one answered her, all trying to decipher what they could see of his body language while knowing full well he was probably doing this on purpose.

The camera zoomed in. They watched as he deliberately turned to face the agents outside and smiled, eerily serene as he looked at the agents surrounding the house.

A movement in the background darkness caught Reid’s attention. “Is that…?” he started, pointing at the monitor. The others leaned in closer, only to jerk back when the sound of two gunshots came from the house.

“Oh my god,” Garcia breathed as JJ, Reid, and Tara looked back at the screen, Rossi and Luke having run outside to accompany the tactical team. The four stared as Peter Lewis slowly slid out the window he was hanging limply from, smearing dark red blood on the ledge and dropped bonelessly to the balcony under him, dead with two shots: one to the heart and one to the head.

~~~

Hotch (—not Aaron, never Aaron again, never, never, nevernevernever—) whirled around when he heard heavy footsteps heading towards his direction. He struggled to push past the blurry distortion of his vision while the part of his psyche which fractured back when he was a child tried to bring him back into his head (it’s not safe, it never was safe why are you trying so hard—).

(—nonono why are you aiming the gun what if it’s the team you’ll never forgive yourself for this—)

(—but what if it isn’t? What if Scratch planted that idea into your head, what if you didn’t actually shoot him, what if it was just the drugs, what if—)

“Aaron?”

(—no, no, no, NOT AARON) He flinched, limbs feeling both like lead and air as he stumbled over his feet trying to back away.

“Hotch?”

The room stopped spinning for just a brief moment, but long enough for Hotch’s eyes to clear and take in three things:

There were three members of the FBI tactical team in front of him with their semi automatics pointed at him

Rossi and Luke were standing just behind them at the doorway, Rossi in front and gun holstered with their hands in the air

He was pointing a gun at them, and his finger was resting over the trigger

(—what the hell is happening why am I preparing to shoot why do they have their weapons out why is Rossi looking like that is that even Rossi—)

Regarding what he was seeing with distrust, he kept his gun out and aimed at them as he whirled around to check what was behind him.

His gaze zeroed in on the blood smears, vaguely lowering the gun as he walked closer, tilting his head, transfixed. He looked over the window ledge to where the smears stopped and promptly stopped breathing. (—no, no, no I was right it was the drugs I didn’t actually kill him it was the drugs the drugsthedrugsthe drugs—)

Peter Lewis looked back at him, and eyes wide open.

In a split second, he leaped over the ledge and made his way to where Peter Lewis was, barely feeling the pain as his bare feet landed on the rocky and weathered stone floor of the balcony.

“Now I know what scares you,” his words (—the same ones from the first time no no no—) floated over to him, his mouth stretched open in a Glasgow smile.

Hotch blinked once, trembling as the sight before him shifted: Scratch had a dark red hole in his forehead and a dark red stain on his chest, blood pooling under him and looking well and truly dead.

He blinked again. There was that terrible smile again, his taunting voice talking to him again.

His shaking became more and more pronounced as Peter Lewis shifted from being dead to being alive, over and over and over—

He dropped to his knees, forcefully closing his eyes and putting his left hand over his ear as felt blindly for a pulse on Scratch’s neck as he tried to block out the distorted, taunting laugh.

(—I can’t feel one, but is he really dead? Am I just missing the pulse point? Wait, is that a pulse? No, no, no, he has to be dead hehastobedeadpleasehehasto—)

The laugh grew in volume as Hotch wrenched his arm away from his head and grabbed the gun he had dropped on the ground with his right hand.

(—why is it so loud why won’t he leave please get out please get OUT—)

A sharp, burning pain ripped through his side, but all he felt was relief as everything—including that terrible laugh and taunting—finally started to fade away into white noise, as his vision darkened and took the insane eyes away from his sight.

A sudden warmth engulfed him, and he knew no more.

~~~

Rossi’s heart stopped when he followed three of the tactical team into the room Scratch had been in. There was Hotch, blood dripping from multiple cuts on his face and still dressed in what he had gone to work in—only his shirt was hanging open and stained by the blood from the wounds that Scratch reopened after years of healing and scar treatments.

It took a second for him to realize why the tactical agents still had their weapons out: Hotch had a Glock aimed at them. He shoved down the instinct to keep his gun out as he realized the unit chief’s eyes were glazed, darting all over as he pressed his left hand to the side of his head and periodically closed his eyes and leaned into it as if he were in pain.

Instead, Rossi put his gun back in his holster and lifted his hands up. He ignored the sharp intakes of breath he could hear from Luke behind him when he found the standoff as Rossi tried for some familiarity.

It hurt to see him flinch and stumble backward when he tried using his first name. “Hotch?” he tried again, relieved to see his eyes clear. Rossi saw the moment Hotch become more cognizant of his surroundings—when he whipped his head around to check behind him.

Rossi watched as some of the tension drained out when Hotch slowly lowered his gun and turned his whole body away from them. “Hotch?” Rossi tried again, slowly moving forward and internally panicking when he didn’t respond.

He froze halfway across the room when Hotch looked over the window ledge, then he realized what had caught his attention when he climbed over and just stood, looking down.

Rossi looked out towards the front, noting Reid, JJ, Garcia, Tara, and other agents outside carefully watching the scene unfold, and then back inside, gesturing for the tactical agents and the two other profilers to stay back.

“Hotch?” he tried for the third time. When he saw him clamp his left arm over his ear and squeeze his eyes shut as if he was reacting to physical pain, he abandoned all caution and ran to the ledge, getting there in time to see him reaching forward blindly as he dropped to his knees.

The sunset cast a warm glow over the chilling scene as he suddenly realized with a pang that Hotch couldn’t trust his eyes or ears, that he was looking for a pulse to make sure the monster was dead.

His worry increased exponentially when Hotch started shaking, muttering “no” over and over again. It started out quiet, but it got louder and louder until it became a yell when he suddenly wrenched his hand away from his ear and stood up, a strange calm settling over his face, the complete opposite of the panic he had just exhibited.

Rossi lunged forward in horror when he realized Hotch had picked up the gun he’d dropped and was lifting it to the side of his own head, vaguely hearing Luke rushing for Hotch as he managed to pull his arm down.

There was a gunshot.

~~~

The moment they saw Hotch raise the gun to his head, JJ broke into a flat out sprint into the house as Reid, Tara, and Garcia froze in their place in shock. When a gun went off, an icy feeling settled at the bottom of their stomachs as they shook out of their stupor and started running behind JJ.

The four had the presence of mind to move out of the way at the shouts of the emergency personnel that had been on standby. By the time they made it to the balcony, Hotch was already unconscious and on a stretcher on his way down to the ambulance with Rossi sticking close behind, focused only on the man he considered his son.

“What happened?” Garcia asked shakily, looking to Luke who shook his head helplessly, staring at the dead psychopath.

Reid shook his head, a strange amalgamation of fear and loathing on his face as he turned and walked away, nothing more to do in the house. Garcia sent a pleading look towards the remaining three, a tear slowly falling down her face.

JJ sent a look towards Luke, who nodded. “I can stay and take care of clean up.”

“I can, too,” Tara added. JJ sent them a grateful look as she turned to guide Garcia out of the house and into the SUV Reid was in. The drive to the local hospital was charged with fear, the silence only interrupted by the profiler’s attempts to remain composed.

“What happened?” Reid repeated the question Garcia had asked on the balcony, voice breaking.

JJ swallowed, not taking her eyes off the road, and shook her head before answering after a few minutes of silence. “Peter Lewis had just under twenty-four hours with Hotch. Whatever happened, it was enough to make Hotch think that the best solution was to…” she cut herself off, unable to say the words aloud.

Silence once again reigned until the analyst broke it with a quiet, tearful question. “Is he going to be okay?”

No one answered the question for no one truly knew the answer.

The SUV remained silent for the rest of the drive. When they arrived, they sprinted as one through the entrance and crashed into Rossi as he made his way to the waiting room, staring at his bloody hands with a container of disinfectant wipes under his arm.

He didn’t look up, not even as JJ approached to help him clean Hotch’s blood off his hands, not even as Tara and Luke joined them. And that was how they remained: the team strewn about the waiting room until they were allowed to see the unit chief.

[stephadoodles]

After doing the posts with the name meanings, I wanted to do some analysis of how the characters are named on the show, since there tends to be a lot of significance when it comes to what the characters’ names are. Some of the literal name meanings don’t really have any significance, but some do. And there is a lot that can be reflective of someone’s personality in names that they have chosen for themselves as well. 

Andi - It’s pointed out at one point that it’s not a nickname for anything, but just simply Andi. It’s a cute, original name that’s unique just like the character. Since Bex prefers to go by a nickname rather than her actual name, it makes sense that she would choose a unique name for her daughter (and can you actually see Bex naming her daughter ‘Andrea?’).

Buffy - Her name is pretty self explanatory. She’s named after a strong female character known for kicking butt. When we’re first introduced to her, just that bit of pop culture context gives you an idea of what her character is going to be like. It also suggests that at least one of her parents is a bit of a nerd, and it makes me sad that we never got to meet her dad for that reason. 

Cyrus - His name means ‘of the sun,’ and out of all the characters, his name meaning is probably the most relevant to him as a character and likely done on purpose. There are several other minor characters whose story lines directly relate to his, and their name meanings are very relevant, which leads me to believe that his name choice was deliberate as well. He generally has a sunny, cheerful disposition, is always trying to be positive, and is one of the only characters that is rarely portrayed in a bad light. 

Jonah - His name means ‘dove,’ and it’s actually pointed out in the context of the show, which I thought was interesting, since nobody else’s ever is. Doves are used throughout various cultures and religions, but generally are used to represent peace. Jonah is definitely a peaceful guy, and just wants everyone to get along. 

Bex - Her full name is Rebecca, but she makes it very clear that she doesn’t like it. Rebecca means ‘to tie or bind.’ It’s too much to get into here, but Bex is a driving force in the show and many of the major story lines happen as a result of her. In a sense, her presence ties a lot of characters and stories together.

Throughout the show, she reinforces that she wants to be called by her nickname, which is a more unique and unusual name than Rebecca, which is pretty reflective of her personality. She likes to stand out and be different and doesn’t like to conform. However, she will allow someone to call her Rebecca if it means she gets extra food, which also says a lot about her character.

Bowie - I wasn’t in the fandom when it was revealed that his real name is Steven, and it’s something that I think is kind of hilarious, and it isn’t talked about enough. Steven is such a typical guy’s name, and it doesn’t fit him as a person at all. Obviously, Bowie is a chosen nickname after a famous musician, and it’s definitely a unique and unusual name, which reflects his personality perfectly (and it just goes to show that he and Bex are perfect for each other in that regard). We never learn his dad’s name, but his mom also has an unusual nickname, so it clearly runs in the family.

Cece - Her name choice is relevant very early on in the series. When Andi can’t call her ‘Mom’ anymore, she has to choose something else and ‘Grandma’ is not an option. Celia is a more formal name, and definitely fits her character early on in the series. With her choosing to revert to her nickname when she was younger and lot more freewheeling (as is suggested with the bikini scene), it starts down the path of her character development where she goes from being uptight and even cold, to the goofy, fun loving character that we see dancing in the dinosaur costume during the finale (and now I want to do a whole character analysis on Cece).

Amber - Amber was a tough one. Her name is in reference to either the color or the gemstone, both of which are pretty self-explanatory but not really a reference to her character. There are a lot of different ways that amber is used in various cultures, with different meanings attached. One source suggested that the actual element itself helped to boost confidence. There are a lot of references to how it represents the sun. There wasn’t anything that really related to her character, and hers is the only name that I struggled to find a meaning for. 

Marty - I’m assuming that his full name is Martin, which means ‘warlike’ and originates from Mars, the Roman god of war. Considering how competitive he is, this is a pretty accurate name for him. Don’t know if it was deliberate, but it fits pretty well. Also, he’s another character that chooses his own nickname: Marty from the Party. This speaks more to his nature as a goofy, lighthearted kind of guy. 

TJ - Oh, boy. With the fandom speculation around what TJ stood for, his name is probably the most discussed out of everyone. And I need to know what Luke Mullen’s thought process was for this, and how much of TJ’s story line was planned in advance, because there’s a lot going on there and it all works together. So, obviously both parts of his name were after famous musicians. They were both unusual names, which is why TJ was embarrassed to tell anyone (and why it was such a big deal that he trusted Cyrus with it.) 

Since Luke got to pick, did they always have the idea that his parents were really into music and his mom was a piano teacher, and that TJ would one day reveal that he could play piano as well? Because Luke managed to pick a name that was a piano player with an unusual first name that was also somehow a Shrek reference. I need answers.

Also, Jagger, but I don’t know if there’s any deeper meaning to that one.

Iris - Her whole purpose on the show was to be Cyrus’ girlfriend and help him realize that he’s gay. She’s named the character from Greek mythology, who is the goddess of the rainbow and messenger of the gods. In a sense, she’s there to send Cyrus the message that he’s not attracted to girls, and instead is attracted to guy. Also, rainbows.

Plus, she has a very sunny and upbeat personality, and is a little bit like a human rainbow. I can’t help but believe that her name choice was very deliberate. The fact that it also rhymes with Cyrus is pretty awesome too. 

Kira - Oh, boy again. Other people have pointed out that her name is the female variation of Cyrus. This is the other name that I believe was deliberately chosen. It’s just too big of a coincidence to be otherwise. When researching this, I also found that if you’re considering the Irish version of her name, it comes from their word for ‘black.’ In contrast to Cyrus’, ‘of the sun,’ they are literally complete opposites of one another, dark and light. Considering the fact that their personalities are also opposites, and TJ ultimately has to choose between them, it’s some pretty awesome symbolism. 

I just think it’s really cool how deep I was able to go with some of these name meanings. Some of them  (Cyrus, Iris, and Kira) seemed to be deliberately chosen with the name meanings in mind, in relation to the character’s personalities and even the story lines. Others, like Bex, Bowie, and Cece are names chosen by those characters that are a reflection of who they are as people and how they want to represent themselves to the world. A few of them I may have read more into than was intended, but it was still fun to do. It just goes to show how different Andi Mack is from other shows like it, since there’s so much meaning in the writing and creation of the characters.

Also, I need Luke to explain everything. 

[douxreviews]

Jessica Jones - ‘A.K.A. I Have No Spleen’ Review

"My name on your case file does not make me a victim."

Jessica Jones is forced to confront her own vulnerability.

You can imagine how well that goes.

There's something interesting going on this season with Jessica Jones and the way they're layering the plot across episodes, and I'm really grooving on it.

'The Perfect Burger' and 'You're Welcome' pulled the time honored conceit of telling more or less the same story from two different perspectives for the sake of making some interesting character contrasts and burying a couple of reveals. That's usually a good trick, structurally speaking, since not only does it allow you to do some character exploration, it also has the bonus effect of making your season feel more tightly focused. 'I Have No Spleen' pulls another variation on this trick by essentially having Jessica spend the entire episode pursuing a false assumption that is ultimately revealed to be a mare's nest before it circles back to the exact same ending point that the previous two episodes shared and giving us some new and unexpected information.

So, that's essentially an entire episode's run time devoted to a side quest that turns out to be irrelevant and mostly serves to mark time until Jessica can be in the right place under the right circumstances to finally pick up the real scent. I say that pretty baldly, which makes it sound like a criticism, but it absolutely is not. It allows a lot of space for character work without feeling like the plot is treading water, and like the technique used in the first two episodes results in the storyline maintaining a lean and focused feel, which is a really good look for the show. If there was a specific complaint I had about season two, it was that it often felt more sprawling and unfocused than it was intending to be. These first three episodes feel like a very specifically designed course correction to that.

There's a clever use of audience assumptions here, since we're all more or less on the same incorrect page. We and Jessica are assuming that she was the target of the attack, and that therefore the attacker must be someone who has a beef with Jessica. This naturally leads both Costa and Jessica to assume that it's one of her clients, since the quickest way to get irritated with Jessica is to have met her. Jessica takes it one step further and assumes that it must be the work of Andrew Brandt, her most recent investigatee. Brandt is of course the ever-so-charming gentleman who had his sister beaten up in order to acquire a statue, and the resident of the apartment that Trish and Jessica both ended up in. See both previous episodes for that complete story.

Of course, that turns out to be not at all what's going on, and we'll talk about that in just a moment, but let's dig into what this episode really had on its mind when it wasn't pretending to be hot on the trail of Jessica's attacker. This episode was about two women who see themselves almost entirely in terms of eliminating all trace of vulnerability from their lives, and what happens when they have the illusion of invulnerability stripped away.

Speaking of invulnerability for just a moment, I can't have been the only one who'd forgotten that Jessica wasn't technically invulnerable, right? When she was stabbed I was genuinely surprised and had a very clear moment of, 'Wait, she can't be hurt, can she?' We get so used to heroes with super strength and the power of jumping really high that we subconsciously just assume that freedom from being hurt is part of the standard package.  And of course, it isn't. If it was, Luke Cage wouldn't be so special. Well, sure, his abs would still be pretty special, but that's beside the point I'm making at the moment.

One of the goals for Jessica this season is an attempt to live as a hero. She's genuinely trying to be a better person and to use her powers in a heroic way, as a result of the events of last season. But in her mind, in order to be a hero you have to be invulnerable and she has just had it proved that she is not. That's an incorrect assumption on her part, of course, but it really makes sense for her as a character that she would see things that way. This was actually a really nice way for the show to pick back up the most successful aspect of season one, the way it addressed the sexual assault survivor metaphor. In Jessica's situation, with what Jessica has been through, nothing can be as important to her as her sense of self protection. No burger is perfect enough to protect Erik Gelden if he was in any way responsible for taking that away from her.

Jessica's plan for regaining the sense of control that she needs just to get through her day to day life is to solve the mystery of her attack on her own and not let the police handle it, which is entirely on brand for her. It's touching that Costa kind of gets that and lets her do it. Her plan gets a bit of a setback when she finds out she's been on entirely the wrong track, however, and it's here where the episode shows what I was talking about earlier in regard to a 'treading water' plot not being without value. This is the story of Jessica Jones needing a win in order to regain her sense of security, and not getting it, and that's a story worth telling. Particularly as the thing that ultimately allows her to stay in the hospital and thereby metaphorically accept temporary vulnerability, is the text of help from Jeri Hogarth.

Jeri is Jessica's mirror at this point. She's starting to be unable to ignore the impending acceleration of her ALS symptoms and is desperate to find ways to regain the sense that she's in control of her own life. Unfortunately, for Jeri that seems to involve deliberately seducing her ex-lover in an attempt to break up that ex-lover's current happy marriage, which is... I mean, where do you even begin to unpack that? The look of disappointment on Jeri's face when she finds out that Kith and Peter have an open marriage, and therefore her successful seduction of Kith was entirely meaningless, is heartbreaking and complicated. And look at that, it occurs at exactly the same point in the plot as Jessica's lowest moment in the hospital.

What makes this all fascinating is the scene which is really the emotional core of the entire episode. Jeri comes to Jessica's office, and among other things they discuss one another's current weaknesses. What's fascinating is the fact that they're both constantly attempting to turn the conversation away from their own problem and instead express sympathy and support for the other's. Neither of them can bear to be the object of concern for even a moment, despite the fact that they both quite clearly do care about one another's troubles and the expressions of sympathy they're making are 100% genuine. They're just also a way to avoid receiving sympathy themselves. That's just a great scene.

As for the side characters, They carry on much the same. Malcolm continues his journey to the heart of 'pliable ethics.' Trish continues to embrace the life of a superhero with all the verve of a college freshman who just discovered environmentalism, and is just as intolerable while doing it. Although it was hard not to sympathize with her when her co-host told her she was born to sell crappy clothes on shopping TV. Trish and Jessica's relationship has always been my favorite thing about this show, and I have such grave concerns about where this final season is going to leave them.

And while I'm sharing concerns and hopes, could Malcolm's new girlfriend Zaya maybe not turn out to be evil? Please? Because I'm getting a serious 'I'm going to turn out to be evil' vibe from her. Similarly, I'm really hoping that Erik the burger guy doesn't turn out to be evil, although I find him kind of attractive and everything in my personal dating history guarantees that that means he's evil.

Of course, the real winner of this episode is clearly Doctor 'I Love to Make Spleen Puns.' Totally loved that guy.

Bits and Pieces:

-- I really enjoyed the detail that the hospital totally understands about superhumans and factors that into patient care. That was just a really nice bit of world building.

-- Does Jessica's superpower set involve having a better than average immune response? Because what the show said was accurate; the duties of the spleen are also taken on by the liver and, to a lesser extent, the lymph nodes, but maybe Jessica doesn't want to put too much reliance on her liver handling the job. I'm just saying.

-- Did Jeri have any reason other than trying to break up Kith's marriage to have Malcolm spy on Peter? I think I might have missed something significant regarding that.

-- Minor quibble, but the hospital would have discussed her spleen situation with her before getting Jessica a medic alert bracelet. For one thing, insurance tends to not cover them, and for another they take a bit to get made. There's no way that she would have found out she'd lost her spleen that way. I get that it's 'show don't tell' narrative shorthand, but I felt obligated to put the real information out there.

-- While we're talking sound medical advice from your considerate television review website, blood in your urine (for males) is absolutely typical after blunt force trauma to the torso, and typically will be released before the flow of urine, not after. It's most often nothing to be concerned about, but check with your doctor if it persists or worsens. DouxReviews is not a medical practitioner, and should not be viewed as a source of diagnostic feedback.

-- I was just thinking that Jessica shouldn't be able to walk around as casually as she was doing when she collapsed and passed out. Thank you, show.

-- I suppose that, technically, what happened to Wendy in season one might be described as a tragic accident. But that feels like underselling it.

-- Reading between the lines, Jeri cheated on Kith with Wendy and then left Kith for her.

-- My favorite moment of kindness that I've seen on television for ages: Malcolm, knowing that Jessica would resent any help he gave her as pity, prepared a bill for his time in advance so that she had an out to protect her dignity. That actually made me go 'Awwww' out loud.

-- I adore Gillian, Jessica's new assistant, and have a million questions about her backstory.

Quotes:

Doctor: "That's what I'm trying to ex-spleen to you." It's hard not to love the doctor.

Jessica: "Where would a liter of bourbon a day fall on the reckless scale?"

Jeri: "The Cale Caesar is quite filling." Kith: "Talk about faint praise."

Kith: "See? All of the wine."

Jessica: "A hero is strong. A hero is invulnerable. A hero has a goddamn spleen."

Jessica: "You've been a hero for five minutes. I've been one half my life." Trish: "You've been super, Jess. There's a difference."

Gillian: "It's 12:29. I'm taking lunch. And there's a client waiting in the office. Should I tell them you've recently been the victim of a violent crime and are currently indisposed?"

A really focused and well structured entry into a season that I feel is only just getting started. I mean that in the best possible way. I think the word I'm looking for here is 'disciplined.'

Eight out of ten cases of unabashed verve.

---

Mikey Heinrich is, among other things, a freelance writer, volunteer firefighter, and roughly 78% water.

[grigori77]

2018 in Movies - My Top 30 Fave Movies (Part 3)

10.  BLACK PANTHER – remember back in 1998, when Marvel had their first real cinematic success with Blade?  It was a big deal on two fronts, not just because they’d finally made a (sort of) superhero movie to be proud of, but also because it was, technically, the first ever truly successful superhero movie starring a black protagonist (the less said about the atrocious Steel movie the better, I say).  I find it telling that it took them almost twenty years to repeat the exercise – there have been plenty of great black superheroes on-screen since Wesley Snipes rocked the fangs and black leather, especially in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but they’ve always been in supporting roles to the main (so far universally WHITE) stars (the now-cancelled Luke Cage was a notable exception, but that’s on-demand TV on Netflix). All of this makes the latest feature to glide smoothly out of the MCU mould so significant – the standalone star vehicle for Civil War’s OTHER major new success story (after 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming), Prince T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman) of Wakanda, finally redresses the balance … and then some. Picking up pretty much RIGHT where the third Captain America film left off, we see T’Challa return to the secretive, highly-advanced African kingdom of Wakanda to officially take up his new role as king and fully accept the mantle of protector of his people that his role as the Black Panther entails. Needless to say, just as he’s finally brought peace and unity to his homeland, an old threat reappears in the form of thuggish arms dealer and fugitive-from-Wakandan-justice Ulysses Klaue (Andy Serkis, gleefully returning to his blissful scenery-chewing Avengers: Age of Ultron role), leading T’Challa to travel to Busan, South Korea to bring him back for judgement, but this is merely a precursor to the arrival of the TRUE threat, Erik “Killmonger” Stevens (Michael B. Jordan), a mysterious former Special Forces assassin with a deeply personal agenda that threatens Wakanda’s future.  This marks the first major blockbuster feature for writer/director Ryan Coogler (co-penning the script with The People V. O.J. Simpson writer Joe Robert Cole), who won massive acclaim for his feature debut Fruitvale Station, but also has good form after sneaky little sleeper hit Rocky-saga spinoff Creed, so this progression ultimately just proves to be another one of those characteristic smart moves Marvel keeps making these days. Coogler’s command of the big budget, heavy-expectation material is certainly impressive, displaying impressive talent for spectacular action sequences (the Busan car chase is MAGNIFICENT, while the punishing fight sequences are as impressively staged and executed as anything we saw in the Captain America movies), wrangling the demanding visual effects work and getting the very best out of a top-notch ensemble cast of some of the finest black acting talent around.  Boseman brings more of that peerless class and charisma he showed in Civil War, but adds a humanising dose of self-doubt and vulnerability to the mix, making it even easier for us to invest in him, while Coogler’s regular collaborator, Jordan, is absolutely spell-binding, his ferociously focused, far-beyond-driven Killmonger proving to be one of the MCU’s most impressive villains to date, as well as its most sympathetic; Oscar darling Lupita Nyong’o is far more than a simple love interest as tough and resourceful Wakandan intelligence agent Nakia, The Walking Dead’s Danai Gurira is a veritable force of nature as Okoye, the head of the Dora Milaje, Wakanda’s elite all-female Special Forces, Get Out’s Daniel Kaluuya muddies the waters as T’Challa’s straight-talking best friend W’Kabi, and powerhouse veteran actors Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker and John Kani provide integrity and gravitas as, respectively, T’Challa’s mother Ramonda, Wakandan religious leader Zuri and T’Challa’s late father T’Chaka.  Martin Freeman and Andy Serkis have joked that they’re essentially the “Tolkien white guys” of the cast, but their presence is far from cosmetic – Freeman’s return as Civil War’s bureaucratic CIA agent Everett Ross is integral to the plot and also helps provide the audience with an accessible outsider’s POV into the unique and stunning land of Wakanda, while Serkis is clearly having the time of his life … and then there are the film’s TRUE scene-stealers – Letitia Wright is a brilliant bright ray of sunlight as T’Challa’s little sister Shuri, the curator of Wakanda’s massively advanced technology and OFFICIALLY the most intelligent person in the MCU, whose towering intellect is tempered by her cheeky sense of humour and sheer adorability, while Winston Duke is a towering presence throughout the film as M’Baku, the mighty chief of the reclusive Jabari mountain tribe, despite his relatively brief screen time, his larger-than-life performance making every appearance a joy.  This has been lauded as a true landmark film for its positive depiction of African culture and presentation of a whole raft of strong black role models, and it certainly feels like a major step forward both culturally and creatively – it’s so rewarding to see a positively-charged black intellectual property enjoying the almost ridiculous amount of success this film has so far enjoyed, both critically and financially, and it’s something I hope we see far more of in the future.  Like its predecessors, this is a fantastic superhero movie, but under the surface there are some very serious, challenging questions being asked and inherently powerful themes being addressed, making for a deeper, more intellectual film than we usually receive even from a big studio that’s grown so sophisticated as Marvel. That said, this IS another major hit for the MCU, and a further example of how consistently reliable they’ve become at delivering great cinema.  Very nearly the best of the Phase 3 standalone films (that honour still belongs to Captain America: Civil War), and it was certainly a spectacular kickoff for the year’s blockbusters.

9.  BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY – I’ve been waiting for this movie for YEARS.  Even before I knew this was actually going to happen I’d been hoping it would someday – Queen were my introduction to rock music, way back when I was wee, so they’ve been one of my very favourite bands FOREVER, and Freddie Mercury is one of my idols, the definition of sheer awesomeness and pure talent in music and an inspiration in life.  Needless to say I was RIDICULOUSLY excited once this finally lurched into view, and I’m so unbelievably happy it turned out to be a proper corker of a film, I could even tentatively consider it to be my new favourite musical biopic. Sure, it plays fast-and-loose with the historical facts, but remains true to the SPIRIT of the story, and you know what they say about biographical movies and their ilk: “if it’s a choice between the truth and the legend, print the legend.”  That’s a pretty good word to describe the man at the centre of this story – Queen frontman Freddie Mercury truly was a legend in his own lifetime, and watching the tale of his rise to fame alongside fellow musical geniuses Brian May, Roger Taylor and John Deacon is a fascinating, intoxicating and deeply affecting experience, truthful or not, making the film an emotional rollercoaster from the humble beginnings with the formation of the band, through the trials and tribulations of life on the road and in the studio, the controversies of Mercury’s personal life and the volatile personal dynamics between the group themselves, to the astonishing, show-stopping climax of their near-mythic twenty-minute performance slot at 1985’s Live Aid charity concert at Wembley Stadium.  Needless to say it takes a truly astounding performance to capture the man that I consider to be the greatest singer, showman and stage-performer of all time, but Mr Robot­ star Rami Malek was equal to the task, not so much embodying the role as genuinely channelling Mercury’s spirit, perfectly recreating his every movement, quirk and mannerism to perfection, right down to his famously precise, deliberate diction, and he even LOOKS a hell of a lot like Mercury.  Sure, he’s come under fire for merely lip-syncing when it comes to the music, but seriously, there’s no other way he could have done it – Freddie had the greatest singing voice of all time, there’s NO WAY anyone could possibly recreate it, so better he didn’t even try.  (Honestly, if he doesn’t get an Oscar for this there’s no justice in the world.)  Malek’s not the only master-mimic in the cast, either – the rest of the band are perfectly portrayed, too, by Gwilym Lee as May, X-Men: Apocalypse’s Ben Hardy as Taylor and Joe Mazzello (yup, that kid from Jurassic Park, now all grown up) as Deacon, while there are equally strong supporting turns from Sing Street’s Lucy Boynton as Mercury’s lover and lifelong friend Mary Austin, Aiden Gillen as the band’s first manager John Reid, Tom Hollander as their lawyer and eventual manager Jim “Miami” Beach, Allen Leech as the Freddie’s scheming, toxic personal manager Paul Prenter, and New Street Law star Ace Bhatti as his stoic but proud father, Bomi Bulsara.  This is an enthralling film from start to finish, and while those new to Queen will find plenty fo enjoy and entertain, this is an absolute JOY for fans and geeks who actually know their stuff, factual niggles notwithstanding; it’s also frequently laugh-out-loud HILARIOUS, the sparky, quick-fire script from The Theory of Everything and Darkest Hour writer Anthony McCarten brimming with slick one-liners, splendid put-downs and precision-crafted character observation which perfectly captures the real life banter the band were famous for.  The film had a troubled production (original director Bryan Singer was replaced late in the shoot by Dexter Fletcher after clashes of personality and other difficulties) and has come in for plenty of stick, receiving mixed reviews from some quarters, but for me this is pretty close to a perfect film, chock-full of heart, emotional heft, laughter, fun and what was, for me, the best soundtrack of 2018, positively overflowing with some of the band’s very best material, making this one of the very best times I had at the cinema all year.  They were, indeed, the champions …

8.  MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - FALLOUT – while Bond may remain king of the spy movie, and Jason Bourne still casts a long shadow from the darker post 9-11 age of harder, grittier espionage shenanigans, I’ve always been a BIG fan of the Mission: Impossible movies.  This love became strong indeed when JJ Abrams established a kind of unifying blueprint with the third film, and the series has gone from strength to strength since, reaching new, thrilling heights when Jack Reacher writer-director Christopher McQuarrie crafted the pretty much PERFECT Rogue Nation.  He’s the first filmmaker to return for a second gig in the big chair, but he’s a good fit – he and star Tom Cruise have already proven they work EXTREMELY well together, and McQuarrie really is one of the very best screenwriters working in Hollywood today (well respected across the board since his early days co-writing The Usual Suspects), an undeniable MASTER at both crafting consistently surprising, thoroughly involving and razor-sharp thriller plots and engineering truly JAW-DROPPING action sequences (adrenaline-fuelled chases, bruising fight scenes, intense shootouts and a breathless dash across the rooftops of London all culminate in this film’s standout sequence, a death-defying helicopter dogfight that took the prize as the year’s BEST action beat), as well as penning some wonderful, wry dialogue.  Anything beyond the very simplest synopsis would drop some criminal spoilers – I’ll simply say that Ethan Hunt is faced with his deadliest mission to date after a botched op leaves three plutonium cores in the hands of some very bad people, leading CIA honcho Erica Sloane (a typically sophisticated turn from Angela Bassett) to attach her pet assassin, August Walker (current big-screen Superman Henry Cavill), to the team to make sure it all runs smoothly – a prospect made trickier by the resurfacing of Rogue Nation’s cracking villain Solomon Lane (Sean Harris).  Tom Cruise is, of course an old hand at this sort of thing by now, but even so I don’t think he’s EVER been more impressive at the physical stuff, and he delivers equally well in the more dramatic moments, taking superspy Ethan Hunt to darker, more desperate extremes than ever before.  Cavill similarly impresses in what’s easily his meatiest role to date, initially coming across as a rough, brutal thug but revealing deeper layers of complexity and sophistication as the film progresses, while Rebecca Ferguson makes a welcome return from RN as slippery, sexy and very complex former MI6 agent Ilsa Faust, and it’s great to see Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg back as series keystones Luther Stickell and Benji Dunn, who both get stuck into the action far more than in previous outings (Benji FINALLY gets to wear a mask!); Jeremy Renner’s absence this time could disappoint, but the balance is maintained because the effortlessly suave Alec Baldwin’s new IMF Secretary Alan Hunley gets a far more substantial role this time round, while Sean Harris tears things up with brutal relish as he expands on one of the series’ strongest villains – Lane is a thoroughly nasty piece of work, a monstrous zealot with a deeply twisted but strangely relatable agenda, and method man Harris mesmerises in every scene.  McQuarrie has cut another gem here, definitely his best film to date and likewise the best in the franchise so far, and strong arguments could be made for him staying on for a third stint – this is the best shape Mission: Impossible has been in for some time, an essentially PERFECT textbook example of an action-packed spy thriller that constantly surprises and never disappoints, from the atmospheric opening to the unbearably tense climax, and if ever there was a film to threaten the supremacy of Bond, it’s this one.

7.  THE SHAPE OF WATER – one of the most important things you have to remember about my own personal mythology (by which I mean the mishmash of 40 years of influences, genre-love and pure and simple COOL SHIT that’s informed and moulded the geek I am today) is that when it comes to my fictional heroes, I have a tendency to fall in love with the monsters.  It’s a philosophy shared by one of my very favourite directors, Guillermo Del Toro, whose own love affair with the weird, the freakish and the outcast has informed so much of his spectacular work, particularly the Hellboy movies – the monster as a tragic hero, and also the women who love them despite their appearance or origins.  Del Toro’s latest feature returns to this fascinating and compelling trope in magnificent style, and the end result is his best work since what remains his VERY BEST film, 2007’s exquisite grown-up fairytale Pan’s Labyrinth.  Comparisons with that masterpiece are not only welcome but also fitting – TSOW is definitely cut from the same cloth, a frequently dream-like cinematic allegory that takes place in something resembling the real world, but is never quite part of it.  It’s a beautiful, lyrical, sensual and deeply seductive film, but there’s brooding darkness and bitter tragedy that counters the sweet, Del Toro’s rich and exotic script – co-authored with Hope Springs writer Vanessa Taylor – mining precious ore from the fairytale ideas but also deeply invested with his own overwhelming love for the Golden Age of cinema itself.  This makes for what must be his most deeply personal film to date, so it’s fitting that it finally won him his first, LONG OVERDUE Best Director Oscar. Happy Go-Lucky’s Sally Hawkins thoroughly deserves her Oscar nomination for her turn as Elisa Esposito, a mute cleaning woman working in a top secret aerospace laboratory in Baltimore at the height of the Cold War, a sweet-natured dreamer who likes movies, music and her closeted artist neighbour Giles (the incomparable Richard Jenkins, delivering a performance of real sweetness and integrity). One night she discovers a new project in the facility, a strange, almost mythic amphibious humanoid (Del Toro regular Doug Jones) who has been captured for study and eventual vivisection to help create a means for men to survive in space.  In spite of his monstrous appearance and seemingly feral nature, Elisa feels a kinship to the creature, and as she begins to earn his trust she develops stronger feeling for him – feelings which are reciprocated.  So she hatches a plan to break him out and return him to the sea, enlisting the help of Giles, her only other real friend, fellow cleaner Zelda (The Help and Hidden Figures’ Octavia Spencer, as lovably prickly and sassy as ever), and sympathetic scientist (and secret Soviet agent) Dr. Robert Hoffstetler (a typically excellent and deeply complex performance from Boardwalk Empire’s Michael Stuhlbarg) to effect a desperate escape.  The biggest obstacle in their path, however, is Colonel Richard Strickland (Michael Shannon), the man in charge of security on the project – the rest of the cast are uniformly excellent, but the true, unstoppable scene-stealer here is Shannon, giving us 2018’s BEST screen villain in a man so amorally repellent, brutally focused and downright TERRIFYING it’s absolutely impossible to take your eyes off him – who has a personal hatred for the creature and would love nothing more than to kill it himself. He’s the TRUE monster of the film, Jones’ creature proving to be a noble being who, despite his (admittedly rather bloody) animal instincts, has a kind and gentle soul that mirrors Elisa’s own, which makes the seemingly bizarre love story that unfolds so easy to accept and fulfilling to witness.  This is a film of aching beauty and immense emotional power, the bittersweet and ultimately tragic romance sweeping you up in its warm embrace, resulting in the year’s most powerful and compelling fantasy, very nearly the finest work of a writer/director at the height of his considerable powers, and EASILY justifying its much-deserved Best Picture Oscar.  Love the monster? Yes indeed …

6.  DEADPOOL 2 – just as his first standalone finally banished the memory of his shameful treatment in the first X-Men Origins film, Marvel’s Merc With a Mouth had a new frustration to contend with – Wolverine riding his coattails into the R-rated superhero scene and outdoing his newfound success with the critically acclaimed and, frankly, f£$%ing AWESOME Logan.  It’s a fresh balance for him to redress, and bless him, he’s done it within the first five minutes of his own very first sequel … then again, Deadpool’s always at his best when dealing with adversity.  There’s plenty of that here – 2016’s original was a spectacular film, a true game-changer for both Marvel and the genre itself, unleashing a genuinely bankable non-PC superhero on the unsuspecting masses (and, of course, all us proper loyal fans) and earning one of their biggest hits in the process.  A sequel was inevitable, but the first film was a VERY tough act to follow – thankfully everyone involved proved equal to the task, not least the star, Ryan Reynolds, who was BORN to play former special forces operative-turned invulnerable but hideously scarred mutant antihero Wade Wilson, returning with even greater enthusiasm for the material and sheer determination to do things JUST RIGHT.  Working with returning co-writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, he’s suitably upped the ante while staying true to the source and doing right by the fans – the script’s another blinder, a side-splitting rib-tickler liberally peppered with copious swearing, rampant sexual and toilet humour, genuinely inspired bizarreness (a grown man with baby balls!) and an unapologetically irreverent tone nonetheless complimented by a f£$%load of heart. Original director Tim Miller jumped ship early in development, but the perfect replacement was found in the form of David Leitch, co-director of the first John Wick movie, who preceded this with a truly magnificent solo debut on summer 2017’s standout actioner Atomic Blonde.  Leitch is a perfect fit, a former stuntman with innate flair for top-notch action who also has plenty of stylistic flair and strong talents for engaging storytelling and handling a cast of strong personalities.  Reynolds is certainly one of those, again letting rip with gleeful comic abandon as Deadpool fights to overcome personal tragedy by trying to become a bona fide X-Man, at which he of course fails SPECTACULARLY, winding up in a special prison for super-powered individuals and becoming the unlikely and definitely unwilling protector of teenage mutant Russell Collins, aka Firefist (Hunt for the Wilderpeople’s Julian Dennison), who’s been targeted for assassination by time-travelling future warrior Cable (Josh Brolin) because he’s destined to become a monstrous supervillain when he grows up.  Deciding to listen to his “better” angel, Wade puts together his own superhero team in order to defeat Cable and start his own future franchise … yup, this is as much a platform to set up X-Force, the Marvel X-Verse’s next big money-maker, as it is a Deadpool sequel, but the film plays along to full comic effect, and the results are funny, explosive, blood-soaked and a magnificently anarchic joy.  Brolin is every inch the Cable we deserve, a world-weary, battered and utterly single-minded force of nature, entirely lacking a sense of humour but still managing to drive some of the film’s most side-splitting moments, while Atlanta star Zazie Beets, originally something of an outsider choice, proves similarly perfect for the role of fan favourite Domino, a wise-cracking mutant arse-kicker whose ability to manipulate luck in order to get the better of any situation makes her a kind of super-ninja; Dennison, meanwhile, is just as impressive as he was in HFTWP, turning in a performance of such irreverent charm he frequently steals the film, and the return of Stefan Kapicic and Briana Hildebrand as stoic metal-man Colossus and the world’s moodiest teen superhero, Negasonic Teenage Warhead, mean that the original X-Men get another loving (if also slightly middle-fingery) nod too.  But once again, this really is Reynolds’ movie, and he’s clearly having just as much fun as before, helping to make this the same kind of gut-busting riot the first was with his trademark twinkle, self-deprecating charm and shit-eating grin.  He’s the heart and soul of another great big fist up the backside of superhero cinema, blasting tropes with scattergun abandon but hitting every target lined up against him, and like everything else he helps make this some of the most fun I had at the pictures all year.  I honestly couldn’t think of ANYTHING that could make me piss myself laughing more than this … the future of the franchise may be up in the air until the first X-Force movie gets its time in the spotlight, but Reynolds, Leitch, Reese and Wernick are all game to return, so there’s plenty of life in the un-killable old lady yet ...

5.  BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE – my Number One thriller of 2018 is a cult classic in the making and the best work yet from Drew Goddard, co-writer/director (with Joss Whedon) of Cabin in the Woods (one of the best horror movies ever made, in my opinion) and screenwriter of Cloverfield and The Martian.  It’s an intoxicating, engrossing and somewhat unsettling experience (but in a very good way indeed), a gripping, slippery and absolutely FIENDISH suspense thriller to rival the heady best of Hitchcock or Kubrick, and, as his first completely original, personal creation, Goddard’s best opportunity to show us JUST what he’s truly capable of.  Wrapped up in multi-layered mystery and deftly paying with timelines and perspective, it artfully unveils the stories of four disparate strangers who book a night’s stay at the El Royale, a “bi-state” hotel (located on the California/Nevada border) that was once grand but, by the film’s setting of 1969, has fallen on hard times.  Each has a secret, some of which are genuinely deadly, and before the night’s through they’ll all come to light as a fateful chain of events brings them all crashing together.  Giving away any more is to invite criminal spoilers – suffice to say that it’s an unforgettable film, fully-laden with ingenious twists and consistently wrong-footing the viewer right up to the stirring, thought-provoking ending.  The small but potent ensemble cast are, to a man, absolutely perfect – Jeff Bridges delivers one of the best performances of his already illustrious career as seemingly harmless Catholic priest Father Daniel Flynn, Widows’ Cynthia Erivo makes a truly stunning impression as down-on-her-luck soul singer Darlene Sweet, John Hamm is garrulously sleazy as shifty travelling salesman Seymour Sullivan, Dakota Johnson is surly but also VERY sexy (certainly MUCH MORE than she EVER was in the 50 Shades movies) as “dirty hippy” Emily, Lewis Pullman (set to explode as the co-star of the incoming Top Gun sequel) is fantastically twitchy as the hotel’s troubled concierge Miles, and Cailee Spaeny (Pacific Rim: Uprising) delivers a creepy, haunting turn as Emily’s fundamentally broken runaway sister Rose.  The film is thoroughly and entirely stolen, however, by the arrival in the second half of Goddard’s Cabin leading man Chris Hemsworth as earthy, charismatic and darkly, dangerously seductive Charles Manson-esque cult leader Billy Lee, Thor himself thoroughly mesmerising as he swaggers into the heart of the story (particularly in a masterful moment where he cavorts, snake-hipped, to the strains of Deep Purple’s Rush in the lead-up to a brutal execution).  This is thriller-cinema at its most inspired and insidious, a flawless genre gem that’s sure to be held in high regard by connoisseurs for years to come, and an ELECTRIFYING statement of intent by one of the best creative minds working in Hollywood today.  One of 2018’s biggest and best surprises, it’s a bona fide MUST-SEE …

4.  AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR – is it possible there might be TOO MUCH coming out all at once in the Marvel Cinematic Universe right now?  What with THREE movies a year now becoming the norm, not to mention the ongoing saga of Agents of SHIELD and various other affiliated TV shows (it seems that Netflix are culling their Marvel shows but there’s still the likes of Runaways and the incoming Cloak & Dagger on other services, along with fresh, in-development stuff), could we be reaching saturation?  My head says … mmmmm … maybe … but my heart says HELL NO!  Not when those guys at Marvel have gotten so good at this job they could PROBABLY do it with their eyes closed.  That said, there were times in the run-up to this particular release that I couldn’t help wondering if, just maybe, they might have bitten off more than they could chew … thankfully, fraternal directing double act Antony and Joe Russo, putting in their THIRD MCU-helming gig after their enormous success on the second and third Captain America films, have pulled off one hell of a cinematic hat trick, presenting us with a third Avengers film that’s MORE than the equal of Joss Whedon’s offerings.  It’s also a painfully tricky film to properly review – the potential for spoilers is SO heavy I can’t say much of ANYTHING about the plot without giving away some MAJOR twists and turns (even if there’s surely hardly ANYONE who hasn’t already seen the film by now) – but I’ll try my best.  This is the film every die-hard fan has been waiting for, because the MCU’s Biggest Bad EVER, Thanos the Mad Titan (Josh Brolin), has finally come looking for those pesky Infinity Stones so he can Balance The Universe by killing half of its population and enslaving the rest, and the only ones standing in his way are the Avengers (both old and new) and the Guardians of the Galaxy, finally brought together after a decade and 18 movies.  Needless to say this is another precision-engineered product refined to near perfection, delivering on all the expected fronts – breathtaking visuals and environments, thrilling action, the now pre-requisite snarky, sassy sense of humour and TONS OF FEELS – but given the truly galactic scale of the adventure on offer this time the stakes have been raised to truly EPIC heights, so the rewards are as great as the potential pitfalls.  It’s not perfect – given the sheer size of the cast and the fact that there are THREE main storylines going on at once, it was INEVITABLE that some of our favourite characters would be handed frustratingly short shrift (or, in two notable cases, simply written out of the film altogether), while there are times when the mechanics of fate do seem to be getting stretched a little TOO far for credibility – but the niggles are largely overshadowed by the rich rewards of yet another MCU film done very well indeed. The cast (even those who drew the short straw on screen time) are all, as we’ve come to expect, excellent, the veterans – particularly Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man/Tony Stark), Chris Hemsworth (Thor), Mark Ruffalo (Bruce Banner/the Hulk), Chris Evans (Steve Rogers/Captain America), Benedict Cumberbatch (Doctor Stephen Strange), Chris Pratt (Peter Quill/Star Lord), Zoe Saldana (Gamora), Bradley Cooper (Rocket Racoon), and, of course, Tom Holland (Peter Parker/Spider-Man) – all falling back into their well-established roles and universally winning our hearts all over again, while two characters in particular, who have always been reduced to supporting duties until now, finally get to REALLY shine – Paul Bettany and Elizabeth Olsen, as the Vision and Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch, finally get to explore that comic-canon romance that was so prevalently teased in Civil War, with events lending their mutual character arcs particularly tragic resonance as the story progresses … and then there’s the new characters, interestingly this time ALL bad guys. The Children of Thanos (Gamora and Nebula’s adopted siblings, basically) are showcased throughout the action, although only two really make an impression here – Tom Vaughan-Lawlor is magnificently creepy as Ebony Maw, while Carrie Coon (and stuntwoman Monique Ganderton) is darkly sensual as Proxima Midnight … but of course the REAL new star here is Brolin, thoroughly inhabiting his motion capture role so Thanos GENUINELY lives up to his title as the greatest villain of the MCU, an unstoppable megalomaniac who’s nonetheless doing these monstrous things for what he perceives to be genuinely right and moral reasons, although he’s not above taking some deeply perverse pleasure from his most despicable actions. Finishing up with a painfully powerful climax that’s as shocking as it is audacious, this sets things up for an even more epic conclusion in 2019’s closer, and has already left even the most jaded viewers shell-shocked and baying for more, while the post-credits sting in particular had me drooling in anticipation for the long-awaited arrival of my own favourite Avenger, but in the meantime this is an immensely rewarding, massively entertaining and thoroughly exhausting cinematic adventure. Summer can’t come fast enough …

3.  UPGRADE – in a summer packed with sequels (many of them pretty damn awesome even so), it was a great pleasure my VERY FAVOURITE movie was something wholly original, an unaffiliated standalone that had nothing to follow or measure up to.  But Blumhouse’s best film of 2018 still had a lot riding on it – they’re a studio best known for creating bare-bones but effectively primal horror (even The Purge series is really more survival horror than dystopian thriller), so they’re not really known for branching out into science-fiction.  Going with one of their most trusted creative talents, then, was the kind of savvy move we’d expect from Jason Blum and co – Leigh Whannell is best known as the writer of the first three Saw movies (a fully-developed trilogy which I, along with several others, consider to be the series’ TRUE canon), the film phenomenon that truly kicked off the whole “torture porn” sub-genre, but he’s become one of Blumhouse’s most well-regarded writers thanks to his creation of Insidious, still one of their biggest earners.  Once again he wrote (and co-starred in) the first three films, even making his directorial debut on the third – admittedly that film wasn’t particularly spectacular, but there was nonetheless something about it, a real X-factor that definitely showed Whannell could do more than just write (and, act, of course).  Second time out he’s definitely made good on that potential promise – this is a proper f£$%ing masterpiece, not just the best thing I saw all summer but one of THE TOP movies of my cinematic year.  It’s also an interesting throwback to a once popular sci-fi trope that’s been overdue for a makeover – body horror, originally made popular by the cult-friendly likes of David Cronenberg and Paul Verhoeven, and the biggest influence on this film must to be the original Robocop.  Prometheus’ Logan Marshall-Green is an actor I’ve long considered to be criminally overlooked and underused, so I’m thrilled he finally found a role worthy of his underappreciated talents - Grey Trace, an unapologetically analogue blue-collar Joe living in an increasingly digital near future, a mechanic making his living restoring vintage muscle cars who doesn’t trust automated technology to run ANYTHING, so his life takes a particularly ironic turn when a tragic chain of events leads to his wife’s brutal murder while he’s left paralysed from the neck down.  Faced with a future dependent on computerised care-robots, he jumps at the chance offered by technological pioneer Eron Keen (Need For Speed’s Harrison Gilbertson), creator of a revolutionary biochip called STEM that, once implanted into his central nervous system, can help him regain COMPLETE control of his body, but in true body horror style things quickly take a dark and decidedly twisted turn.  STEM has a mind of its own (and a voice that only Trace can hear), and an agenda, convincing him to use newfound superhuman abilities to hunt down his wife’s killers and exact terrible, brutal vengeance upon them. There are really strong performances from the supporting cast – Gilbertson is great as a twitchy, socially awkward genius only capable of finding real connection with his technology, Get Out’s Bettie Gabriel is subtly brilliant as Detective Cortez, the cop doggedly pursuing Trace’s case and, eventually, him too, and there’s a cracking villainous turn from relative unknown Benedict Hardie as sadistic but charismatic cybernetically-enhanced contract killer Fisk – but this is very much Marhall-Green’s film; he’s an absolute revelation here, his effortlessly sympathetic hangdog demeanour dominating a fantastically nuanced and impressively physical performance that displays truly exceptional dramatic AND comedic talent.  Indeed, while it’s a VERY dark film, there’s a big streak of jet black humour shot right through it, Whannell amusing us in particularly uncomfortable ways whenever STEM takes control and wreaks appropriately inhuman havoc (it helps no end that voice-actor Simon Malden has basically turned STEM into a kind of sociopathic version of Big Hero 6’s Baymax, which is as hilariously twisted as it sounds), and he delivers in spades on the action front too, crafting the year’s most wince-inducing, downright SAVAGE fight sequences and a very exciting car chase. Altogether this is a simply astonishing achievement – at times weirdly beautiful in a scuzzy, decrepit kind of way, it’s visually arresting and fiendishly intelligent, but also, much as we’d expect from the creator of Saw and Hollywood’s PREMIER horror studio, dark, edgy and, at times, weirdly disturbing – in other words, it’s CLASSIC body horror.  Whannell is a talent I’ve been watching for a while now, and it’s SO GOOD to finally see him deliver on all that wonderful promise. Needless to say it was another runaway hit for Blumhouse, so there are already plans for a sequel, but for now I’m just happy to revel in the wonderful originality of what was the very peak of my cinematic summer …

2.  SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE – oh man, if ever there was a contender that could have ousted this year’s Number One, it’s this, it was SUCH a close-run thing.  Sure, with THREE major incarnations of Marvel’s most iconic superhero already hitting the big screen since the Millennium, we could AGAIN ask if we really need another Spider-Man “reboot”, but I must say his first ever blockbuster animated appearance leaves virtually all other versions in the dust – only Sam Raimi’s masterpiece second Spider-feature remains unbeaten, but I’ve certainly never seen another film that just totally GETS Stan Lee’s original web-slinger better than this one.  It’s directed by the motley but perfectly synced trio of Bob Perischetti (a veteran digital artist making his directorial debut here), Peter Ramsay (Rise of the Guardians) and Rodney Rothman (writer on 22 Jump Street), but the influence of producers Christopher Miller and Phil Lord (creators of The Lego Movie) is writ large across the entire film (then again, Lord did co-write the script with Rothman) – it’s a magnificent, majestic feast for the eyes, ears and soul, visually arresting and overflowing with effervescent, geeky charm and a deep, fundamental LOVE for the source material in all its varied guises.  Taking its lead from the recent Marvel comics crossover event from which the film gets its name, it revolves around an unprecedented collision of various incarnations of Spider-Man from across the varying alternate versions of Earth across the Marvel Multiverse, brought together though the dastardly machinations of criminal mastermind Wilson Fisk, aka Kingpin (a typically excellent vocal turn from Liev Schreiber) and his secret supercollider.  There are two, equally brilliant, “old school” takes on the original web-slinger Peter Parker on offer here – Chris Pine impresses in his early scenes as the “perfect” version, youthful, dashing and thoroughly brilliant but never ruining it by being smug or full of himself, but the story is dominated by New Girl’s Jake Johnson as a more world-weary and self-deprecating blue-collar version, who can still do the job just as well but has never really been as comfortable a fit, and he’s all the more endearing because he’s SUCH a lovable slacker underdog.  The main “hero” of the film, however, is Dope’s Shameik Moore as Miles Morales, a teenager who’s literally JUST acquired his powers but must learn FAST if he’s to become this universe’s new Spider-Man, and he’s a perfect lead for the film, unsure of himself and struggling to bring his newfound abilities to bear, but determined to find his footing all the same.  There are other brilliant takes on the core character here – Nicolas Cage’s wonderfully overblown monochrome Spider-Man Noir is an absolute hoot, as is anthropomorphised fan-favourite Spider-Ham (voiced by popular stand-up comic John Mulaney) – and a variety of interesting, skewed twists on classic Spider-Man villains (particularly Liv, a gender-bent take on Doctor Octopus played by Bad Moms’ Kathryn Hahn), but my favourite character in this is, tellingly, also my very favourite Marvel web-slinger PERIOD – Earth-65’s Spider-Woman, aka Gwen Stacy (more commonly known as Spider Gwen), an alternative version where SHE got bit by the radioactive arachnid instead of Peter, very faithfully brought to life by a perfectly cast Hailee Steinfeld.  It may sound overblown but this is about as close to perfect as a superhero movie can get – the script is an ASTONISHING piece of work, tight as a drum with everything lined up with clockwork precision, and instead of getting bogged down in exposition it turns the whole origin story trope into a brilliant running joke that keeps getting funnier each time a new character gets introduced; it’s also INSANELY inventive and a completely unique visual experience, specifically designed to look like old school comic book art brought to vivid but intriguingly stylised life, right down to the ingenious use of word-bubbles and textured printing dots that add to the pop art feel.  This is a truly SPECTACULAR film, a gloriously appointed thrill-ride with all the adventure, excitement, humour and bountiful, powerful, heartbreaking emotional heft you could ever want from a superhero movie – this is (sorry MCU) the VERY BEST film Marvel made in 2018, and maybe one of their very best EVER.  There’s already sequel talk in the air (no surprise there, of course), and I can’t wait to see where it goes.  PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE give me a Spider Gwen spinoff.  I’ll be good, I swear …

1.  A QUIET PLACE – the most unique and original film of 2018 was a true masterpiece of horror cinema and, for me, one of the best scary movies I’ve seen in A VERY LONG TIME INDEED. It’s a deceptively simply high-concept thriller built around a dynamite idea, one that writer/director/star John Krasinski (co-writing with up-and-coming creative duo Bryan Woods and Scott Beck) has mined for maximum effect … Krasinski (still probably best known for the US version of The Office but now also gaining fresh traction for killer Amazon Original series Jack Ryan) and his real life wife Emily Blunt are Lee and Evelyn Abbott, a mother and father who must protect their children and find a way to survive on an isolated farm in a world which has been decimated by an inexplicable invasion/infestation/whatever of mysterious and thoroughly lethal creatures that, while blind, use their incredibly sensitive hearing to hunt and kill ANYTHING that makes a sound.  As a result, the Abbotts have had to develop an intricately ordered lifestyle in order to gather, scavenge and rebuild while remaining completely silent, a discipline soon to be threatened by Evelyn’s very advanced pregnancy … there’s a truly fiendish level of genius to the way this film has been planned out and executed, the exquisitely thought-out mechanics of the Abbotts’ daily routines, survival methods and emergency procedures proving to be works of pure, unfettered genius – from communication through sign language and slow-dancing to music on shared headphones to walking on pathways created with heaped sand and painted spots to mark floorboards that don’t squeak, playing board games with soft fruit instead of plastic pieces and signalling danger with coloured light-bulbs – while the near total absence of spoken dialogue makes the use of sound and music essential and, here, almost revolutionary, with supervising sound editors Erik Aadahl and Ethan Van der Ryn becoming as important as the director himself, while composer Marco Beltrami delivers some of his finest work to date with a score of insidious subtlety and brazen power in equal measure.  The small but potent cast are all excellent – Blunt has rarely been better in a performance of impressive honesty and a lack of vanity comparable to her work on The Girl On the Train, affecting and compelling as a fierce lioness of a mother, while Krasinski radiates both strength and vulnerability as he fights tooth and nail to keep his family alive, regardless of his own survival, and their real-life chemistry is a genuine boon to their performances, bringing a winning warmth to their relationship; elsewhere, deaf actress Millicent Simmonds (Wonderstruck) effortlessly captures our hearts as troubled, rebellious daughter Regan, delivering a performance of raw, heartbreaking honesty, while Suberbicon’s Noah Jupe impresses as awkward son Marcus, cripplingly unsure of himself and awfully scared of having to grow up in this terrifying new world.  There’s great power and heart in the family dynamic, which makes us even more invested in their survival as the screws tighten in what is a SERIOUSLY scary film, an exquisitely crafted exercise in sustained tension that deserves to be remembered alongside the true greats of horror cinema.  Krasinski displays a rare level of skill as a director, his grasp of atmosphere, pace and performance hinting at great things to come in the future, definitely making him one to watch – this is an astonishing film, a true gem I’m going to cherish for a long time to come.

[stillunusual]

LEEDS UNITED 1 BIRMINGHAM CITY 0

Leeds United: Casilla, Ayling, White, Berardi, Alioski, Phillips, Dallas, Klich (Roberts 61), Harrison, Costa (Douglas 84), Bamford (Nketiah 45).  

Subs not used: Miazek, Gotts, Davis, Clarke. This was Leeds United's centenary match, played two days after the club's 100th birthday. Elland Road was full, the atmosphere was fantastic and local lad Kalvin Phillips scored the winner. I had a great day, which started in Billy's Bar where we watched England trounce Australia in the Rugby World Cup, before going on a stadium tour conducted by Player Liaison Officer Stix Lockwood. At one point he received a call from Leeds captain Liam Cooper and put him on speaker so he could say "hello" to everyone. We also bumped into Norman Hunter, one of many Leeds legends who attended today's game and came onto the pitch before kick off. We had lunch in the Old Peacock, watched the team arrive at the ground, and after the match we went to Salem Chapel, where the club was founded on 17th October 1919, to see the new commemorative plaque that had been unveiled there by club chairman Andrea Radrizzani exactly 100 years later. Since I was last at Elland Road, Leeds unexpectedly managed to win something.... To everybody's great surprise, Marcelo Bielsa and Leeds United won FIFA's Fair Play Award for their actions during April's controversial 1-1 draw with Aston Villa at Elland Road (after Mateusz Klich scored for Leeds while a Villa player was down injured and pretty much the whole Villa team had been trying to get Leeds to kick the ball out of play so he could receive treatment, Bielsa instructed his players to allow Villa to walk in an equaliser from the kick off). Needless to say that all the usual Leeds haters were out in force all over the media to express their horror.... Form-wise it's been ups and downs of late. Things went from bad to worse following the disappointing 1-1 draw against Derby. Pablo Hernandez was ruled out of the away tie against Charlton Athletic (now managed by Lee Bowyer) due to a "muscular injury", but Adam Forshaw returned to the matchday squad. Leeds, as usual, dominated the possession but were unable to break down a determined Charlton side, who won the tie with a scrappy goal scored towards the end of the first half. Forshaw didn't start but came on as a second half substitue only to pick up another injury. Worse still, Charlton alleged that their on-loan forward Jonathan Leko was racially abused by a member of the Leeds team - thought to be goalkeeper Kiko Casilla. The matter is now being investigated by the Football Association and the player faces a possible six match ban if found guilty. There was some good news before the next game in that Luke Ayling signed a new four year deal and was finally fit to play again. This turned out to be a very significant home victory against West Bromwich Albion, who had replaced us at the top of the league following our defeat to Charlton. We won by a single goal - a shot by Gjanni Alioski that took a small but significant deflection from former Leeds loanee Kyle Bartley on its way into the net. The bad news was that Cooper and young midfielder Jamie Shackleton joined Forshaw and Hernandez on the injury list. Shackleton (hamstring) will be out for up to four weeks. Cooper (groin) is expected to be unavailable for six weeks. They were replaced by Ayling and Gaetano Berardi for this season's away trip to Millwall, which we lost in controversial fashion. In the fourteenth minute Berardi was sent off by referee James Linington after the defender was adjudged to have brought down Millwall striker Tom Bradshaw inside the Leeds box. The referee was well positioned to see that Berardi didn't actually touch Bradshaw, who deliberately dived to make it look like he did. Kalvin Phillips' proximity to the striker as he theatrically hit the turf also meant that even if there had been contact, Bradshaw wasn't necessarily in a position to score. It was the worst sending-off decision I have seen for years. It was also Berardi's eighth red card since he became a Leeds player, which means that he now holds the record for being the club's most red-carded player ever, having spent the last few months level with Alan Smith on seven red cards. Millwall scored the penalty they were wrongly awarded and ended up winning the game 2-1. The referee also denied us a clear penalty in the second half.... Berardi was cleared to face Birmingham City after Leeds successfully appealed his red card, but the FA didn't take any action against Bradshaw, despite the fact that he had deliberately deceived the referee. On Leeds United's 100th birthday the club made two announcements - firstly to bring the training ground and academy back into the city centre, and secondly - if promoted to the Premiership - to expand the stadium to a capacity of 50K. I wonder if it will ever actually happen.... We'll certainly have to play better than we did against Birmingham to make that dream a reality. Bielsa stuck with Patrick Bamford up front, despite the fact that he hasn't scored since the away game against Stoke and Eddie Nketiah scored a hat-trick for England's U21 side in midweek. The game followed what has become a familiar pattern - Leeds had the lion's share of the possession, we created enough chances to win the game easily, but it could have gone either way because of our persistent inability to make those chances count. Alioski, Bamford and Stuart Dallas were the main culprits in the first half. Dallas had the clearest opportunity, which resulted from one of our best moves of the game. Bamford set up Costa with a lovely back heel - his shot from the edge of the Birmingham area was blocked, but the ball came out to Dallas who then played a fine one-two with Mateusz Klich, only to blast his shot straight at the goalkeeper from a few yards out.... Bielsa replaced Bamford with Nketiah after the interval, and he made an immediate impact. We all thought he'd won a penalty when he went down in the Birmingham box under a challenge, but the referee adjudged the foul to have taken place just outside of the area, and predictably enough, Alioski fired the resulting free kick wide. Birmingham had more of the ball in the second half and Casilla (who seems to be becoming a safe pair of hands this season) had to make a couple of good saves to keep them out, before we finally made our breakthrough in the 65th minute. Jack Harrison stole possession deep in the Birmingham half and set up Phillips to power home his first goal of the campaign and send Elland Road into ecstacy. With our confidence restored, Leeds dominated the remainder of the match but again failed to make it safe and Birmingham still managed to hit us on the break a couple of times. They almost scored in the last minute when a cross into the box was headed just wide, but we held on to celebrate the club’s 100th birthday with all three points....

[stjohnthebaptistleicester-blog]

Your Kingdom Come

Notes to Accompany the 1030 Teaching Series

Focus for St John’s Church during Sept & Oct 2017

Summer is always a relatively quiet time in church, with many people away. We deliberately slow things down over the summer and attempt to run nothing, but the most essential activities. The idea is to give us all a break from activity for rest, recuperation and recharge. The idea is that this acts like ‘sabbath’ rest for the whole church, allowing us to re-connect with God, be re-envisioned and re-excited about what’s to come. Although our services have been run in a more ‘lightweight’ way during summer, what we have been reflecting upon within them is none-the-less significant: the Lord’s Prayer. As we have looked at this together, I have found myself identifying with the disciples as they clearly noticed the depth of Jesus’ prayer life relative to the paucity of their own. I have found myself wanting to say to Jesus just like his original disciples, ‘Teach us to pray’. It was in response to this question that he gave them the Lord’s prayer and we have sought to reflect on this prayer in our services line by line.

As we have done this together, I have been reminded that prayer isn’t so much a means to an end, something we do to get things or make things happen or to understand God’s priorities for our work or anything like that, but that prayer is our work. Prayer is the primary way we engage with God and as we do so, something mysterious happens in that we allow him to work through us. The Lord’s prayer was the way Jesus taught us to pray. AS we have said, calling in the Lord’s prayer is somewhat of a misnomer as it was not Jesus’ prayer, the prayer he gave us to pray.

I have been reminded also of how the Lord’s prayer is a prayer about identity (relationship) and purpose (calling) – it is a prayer that is rooted in our relationship with God as father – as we pray it, we are affirmed as beloved, forgiven children who can trust the care, protection and provision of our father. It’s also a prayer that flows from this relationship with Father God into purpose: your will be done on earth as in heaven, it’s a prayer that enables our will to be aligned with his, a prayer that aligns our perspective with his. It’s a prayer we pray to change things – we hear his promises and pray them into being, It’s a prayer that we use to call heaven down to earth.

Even for a beginner in prayer like me, as I begin to connect with the presence and love of God and then begin to express my desires, and thoughts in prayer, surprising and amazing things can happen. I find I am surprised by the ‘largeness’ of my prayer – I become bolder in prayer asking God for bigger things, I find myself surprised by the depth of feeling in my prayer – it can be an emotional experience – I weep or I even feel righteous anger. I can find myself motivated to ‘labour’ or do ‘battle’ in prayer for the things I know to be on God’s heart. I want to invite all of us, no matter how new we feel to prayer to come to join together in prayer during this season.

I still feel like a complete beginner in prayer. At the start of this term, I find that my prayer for the church is, ‘teach us to pray’. So we will have a focus/emphasis on prayer in the first part of this term, but an emphasis that will allow us to hear the voice of God and do some ‘vision casting’ too. In the first half of this term, our focus in church will be on the prayer, ‘Your Kingdom Come’.

In our Sunday teaching programme, we will look at a number of different passages through which we have heard God speaking that will be a prompt for us to explore, discern and imagine what it might look like for God’s kingdom to come to St John’s.

Alongside this, we have two prayer projects and we encourage everyone to take part in these:

- 48 hours of prayer from 7-9 Sept

- The ‘Lord’s Prayer Daily Challenge’  - we invite everyone to say the Lord’s prayer daily until half term. Set a reminder on your phone and say it reflectively, personally each day.

For those who are keen, we have some additional alternative approaches to prayer that people might like to explore:

  Further Daily Prayer Method

"Be still and Know that I am God; 

I will be exalted among the nations;

I will be exalted in the earth"

- Psalm 46:10 - 

 Taking a moment to be still is one of the simplest ways we can reconnect with God. So wherever you're reading this email, take a moment to stop and pray: 

Pray for a renewed sense of God’s Presence  Allow yourself to stop and acknowledge God’s presence - pray "Holy Spirit Come ”. 

Pray for the people around you Take a minute to pray for those you can see; or those who immediately spring to mind.

Pray for somewhere in the world that needs God’s attention Flick to a news app or website, and pick a news story to pray for. 

Open Heaven, Open Hearts, Open Mouths

For your friends, neighbours, work colleagues, pray in the following way:

Open heaven: Lord open heaven over my friend, may he/she know your love, healing, peace, strength, comfort, provision, etc.

Open Hearts: Lord open their heart to receive you

Open mouth: Lord open my mouth to speak to them words of truth, grace, love and blessing. Give me the boldness to share with them about Jesus.

Daily Bible Study

Blessed is the one

    who does not walk in step with the wicked

or stand in the way that sinners take

    or sit in the company of mockers,

2 but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,

    and who meditates on his law day and night.

3 That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,

    which yields its fruit in season

and whose leaf does not wither –

    whatever they do prospers. Psalm 1:1-3

Set aside 10 mins each day to read the Bible.

Reading the Bible regularly is a source of nourishment and life. Through the words of the Bible, the Holy Spirit brings hope, guidance and life to our souls – there is great reward in the words of Scripture as the Psalmist says. The Bible is the story of God’s dealings with humankind and through it, we learn about God, about people and how he relates to them, and important lessons for life.

For some, the thought of reading the Bible can be a bit scary; we can feel fearful of not being able to understand it or make sense of it. But actually, reading the Bible is not difficult, you don’t need to have a theology degree for the Bible to be an source of life and nourishment to you. The Bible has an amazing ability to speak for itself and to speak directly into the situations that we face in life day to day. However, there are some simple steps that we can take to make reading the Bible easier:

1.       Read it regularly

To keep out bodies healthy we need to drink and eat every day. Likewise, for our spiritual health we need to regularly drink (pray) and eat (read the Bible). It helps to set aside a time regularly each day to do this – many people find it helpful to do this at the beginning of each day.

2.       Structure your reading of it

Rather than just picking up the Bible and reading it from beginning to the end, it can be helpful to follow a reading plan. There are many available – ask someone if you would like help. A really good place to start is to read one of the Gospels, say the Gospel of Luke, picking a paragraph or section each day.

3.       Pray as you read

Remember your aim in reading the Bible is not just to get information or because it is interesting. It is to allow the Holy Spirit to guide you and reveal to you what God might be wanting to say to you through a particular passage. Ask the Holy Spirit to be present with you and to guide you and speak to you as you read.

4.       It can be helpful to follow a simple pattern when you read the Bible. Here is a suggestion:

·         Start by being still for a moment and incline your heart and mind towards God. Take a moment to pray that God will come to you by his Spirit and speak to you through what you read.

·         Then read the passage slowly. You may find it helpful to read it two or three times. Notice anything that catches your attention. Sometimes it’s helpful to underline it or mark it in some way.

·         Then ask questions:

a.       What do you notice, what catches your attention?

b.       What insight does this give you about people and about Jesus? What questions does this raise?

c.       Is there an example to follow, a promise to trust or a command to obey?

·         Then in the light of what you have read, spend some time praying. Give thanks and praise to God for what you have learned about him, and ask him to help you apply what you have discovered.

·         Then pray through the events of the coming day, and pray for the people you will meet and anyone else who you carry on your heart.

[thebigcitynightsband]

ALMOST AWAKE

We knew from day one that we’d never see fame or anything remotely like it with this endeavor, but in the words of Robert Pollard, “we began making records anyway, just to have them.” That’s right. Just to have them. Lord knows we have nothing else. Doomed to obscurity. Born to bar band.

That’s our old MySpace bio, written in 2007 and remaining unchanged for our entire tenure on MySpace, from Tom to Murdoch.

I’ve talked about how much I miss MySpace on this blog before ( “Her Geography” was originally called “MySpace Memories”), but I suspect that I miss that particular time in my life, not MySpace itself.

I’ve also written about internet nostalgia before and how strange it feels. The architecture of the internet makes the experience of being online feel seamless from day to day because the changes are small and rarely jarring. A feature added here, another feature deleted there. A new interface, a new button. Small novelties are revealed in comfortable increments. But small changes add up to big ones over time, and although the pace of this accumulation might seem glacial, often I glance up at my computer screen and think about how fucking different the internet was ten years ago.

But, as you know if you’ve followed this band for any length of time, my tendency to look back with wistful longing is not reserved for the internet. Nostalgia is the defining condition of my life.

Back in 2011 me and my friend Russell released an album called Brampton Comes Alive under the moniker The Flower City 3, a band we’d been trying to start since I emailed about it in 2006. We tried to enlist Ryan Hacker and make an album about Brampton, but Hacker was less enthusiastic about the idea. Russell and I saw it as a challenge, writing song about Brampton, but Hacker saw it as a constraint. So we told people that Brampton was the third member of the group and made an album. I’m really happy with the finished product, even if the second half gets a little depressing, care of a tune called “Never Gonna Be Back Home” that I wrote. We did the vocals in a room I stayed in briefly on Cecil with a testy roommate who hated noise, so we only had one take to do the song before he came home and told us to stop recording, and I was happy that I got the screams right in the chorus. You can hear the song here: https://theflowercity3.bandcamp.com/track/never-gonna-be-back-home-2 For the packaging, we got Russell’s brother Luke to drive around Brampton and take photos. We chose one of Shopper’s World for the front cover, but the physical record had a booklet with five or six other photographs. The lone review we got for the record, by a blog called iheartmusic, was savage. He said it was the worst record he’d ever heard, which hurt a little, but I was glad that we made it. It was a nostalgic collection of song, to be sure, our mission statement being: this album is dedicated to Brampton, not as it is, or even as it was, but as we remember it, echoing the old maxim that what happens isn’t as significant as how you remember it. 

I thought that finishing and releasing that Flower City 3 record would finally cure me of my nostalgia, but it didn’t. I became more and more introspective, to the point where most of BCN songs are about the loss of friendship or the loss of youth. I don’t just want the band to be a self-therapy vehicle for me, but it’s hard to fight what comes naturally. Metal bands write about ancient medieval battles or zombies climbing mountains. Punk bands write about pizza and girls. And The Big City Nights Band writes songs about nostalgia and friendship. So here we are, with a new record that serves as a callback to the past.

We have an old song on Deep Space Bistro called “Almost Awake,” an off-kilter, shoegazey kind of thing, with a lot of delay on the guitar. The song was recorded in late spring 2008 around the same time I was finishing up the final mixes for A Steamroller Named Desire. I was with Jessica at the time, and I remember meeting her somewhere in Chinatown to grab food. She'd taken the bus down from Brampton while I'd spent the day recording the song. We brought the food back to my attic bedroom and ate while I played her the mix. I tried to get her to sing on it, but she wasn't comfortable with it. Previously she'd been excited to sing on songs, and we did a lot of recording together. Her voice can be found on "Be Mine This Xmas," "Hockey Night In Canada," "Greensong," "Canadian Baseball," "I'm A Skymaker," "Until They Smile," "Between Important Syllables," "Jawbreakers," "Summer Sports," "Carry Me Ontario," "Happy Man," and probably a few more I'm forgetting. But she wasn't down with singing on this one, and it was a turning point in our relationship. After that afternoon, it was much harder to get her to sing on my songs. She was struggling with depression and malaise at the time. She dropped out of school and spent most days in bed watching The Office. We moved in together in September 2009 in an attempt to salvage the relationship but it didn't last long. We broke the lease and went our separate ways in June 2010, a few days before the band released Might Minutes.

Almost Awake is our twenty-first album, meaning our discography could now legally drink at a bar in the States if it were a sentient being. The idea sparks one's imagination. If our discography were a person, it’d be an older man, NOT a gentleman but a bellowing boor lurching down the sidewalk, trying to make friends with people who have their headphones on. Friendly enough, and not a bully, but a guy who has a surplus of things he wants to say and a deficit of sympathetic ears. Enthusiastic, to be sure, yet caustic and poorly dressed to boot. He stands upwind while smoking at the bus stop. He's maddeningly inconsistent to employer and friend alike: no one knows which version of him will show up, the slick professional or the shambling, drug-addicted hustler. Always interesting though not always inviting interest. Loving but not loved. Fetid, not feted. Musical garbage. Gasoline rainbows. Yesterday's slice of pizza. Tomorrow's heartburn. A pile of newspapers in a language lost to the world. Twenty one albums of shambolic, mono, sometimes beautiful, sometimes acerbic, rock 'n roll from the metaphorical garage.

Almost Awake has some rock n roll on it, especially the first half, but it’s got plenty of balladry too. As an album it can stand on its own, but it might need assistance walking. It's helper and brother is High Hopes, our other record that came out in 2016. The two records are bookends that mine similar sonic and lyrical territory. I've been battling a drug problem for a few years now and finally starting to get the upper hand, though there have been falterings here and there. I write a lot of songs regardless, on drugs or off them, drunk or sober. A recurring lyrical themes of the early albums was friendship. I wrote a lot of songs about my friends. 

"Born to Bar Band" is about my friends who were in bands, working all day and week so they could play music at night and on weekends, hence the line "days seem long waiting to sing our songs." "Murray Street" is about Emon. We had a fight summer 2006, so I wrote a song about it. It's not Shakespeare, obviously. I preferred to put it bluntly back then: "Please don't not call me your friend." "Wedding Day" is about a friend of mine who had gotten engaged to another friend of mine. They started acted differently, didn't come out as much, which was fine and understandable, except that when they DID come out, they were awkward and kinda rude to us. It was as if they thought we were all immature losers and they were better than us because they had decided to do something adult while we were still playing in bands and drinking in bars. So I wrote a song about how I was mad about it."Why I Didn't Hate Summer 2003" is another friendship one. "Tell your friends this summer I'm just stuck working.""She Dreams Of Airports" was about my friend M___. Any song on Born to Bar Band that isn't about friendship or hanging out with friends is about love and/or relationship problems. "Bicycle Man," "Waiting," "Mathematics," "Don't Tell Me" and "Don't Fuck With Me," written about my ex-gf D____, "Run Home" and "Big Ears" about my gf at the time, N_____. "Leave Your Man" was directed toward a girl I really liked at the time. "Soda Song" is also about her. 

Later on, starting with Might Minutes I'd say, and in FULL swing by the time we got to Under the Overpass and Gimme Gardens, our songs were about nostalgia, and this nostalgia was brought on by the dissolution of many of my friendships. I'm not saying my friendships had ALL crumbled by 2010, but there had been a fundamental change to each one of them, I still don't know why, that started to drive wedges between me and my friends. These wedges were creating distance between us, inches that grew to canyons, until eventually some people disappeared altogether from each other's lives. Me coming to terms with this has not yet happened. I'm still upset over it, and I still think about it all the time, which is pathetic because I'm 31 years old. I should be married with children by now, instead of living with my parent and yearning for my lost youth.

Ember Nights

Taken from a collection of demos written last summer. The title was "Memba Thenz" for a while but I changed it to something less silly. An ember night could be any night in September, November, or December, take your pick, or a night that burns and glows, which is more poetic I guess. The song, lyrically, is about coming to the end of a long period of debauchery, and your brain is dead and your nerves are shot. The lyric is deliberately dumb, “mind like a DOA,” to match the brain deadness of the subject or something. I dunno. I like the line so I kept it. I like the lead guitar lines too and Kuehn drummed the song well. Love that tapping on the top of the bass drum, which James does sometimes too, often to great effect, as in "In The Street."

Two Packs A Day Also from last summer. This one turned out a LOT faster and punkier than I expected. The vocal is not strong at all, but it has a charm to it. There's a friendship vibe to this one, a territorial one, as in things are like this “round our way."

Summers End Wrote this one last April. Again, turned out way different during the tracking of the drums, so we went with it. There is a vocal melody but, as with "1985," I really liked how punchy and strong it sounds without any singing, so I left it alone. I still might get Ryan to sing on it and put a version with vocals on the next record. We'll see. More & More Mortified Recorded this one with Courtney on vocals. A sad song about dashed expectations and getting older. I love the blend of our voices. My mother loves this song and made me play it for my sister and her boyfriend on Christmas Eve, which was awkward, but my Mom said she still had the song in her head three days later, which is a good sign. When your Mom, who has previously not expressed much interest in your band, has a hook in her head three days after hearing a song, it gives you more confidence in said song. There’s a bit of Twin Peaks vibe.

No Window My first bedroom in Toronto was in a basement and it was windowless. I felt trapped and encumbered. No window = no escape, obviously, but also nothing to look at. Some Glum Alumni

Another song about days gone by. Before Instagram, nobody had photos of the truly good times, because everyone was having too much fun to take photos. In The Dark This is a really old cover of a Paddington song, recorded in Orangeville in 2005 in my Dad's basement. That was the first iteration of Little Ghost Recording Co and I was just learning how to record. I could barely play the drums but I got through this song okay. If it were any longer I surely would have faltered and made mistakes. The drumming as it is, is really tight-fisted on the hi-hat, which was how I played back then. I'm a much better drummer now than I was then, but still not very good. The Paddington album this song is on is called These Monsters That You've Been Chasing, which is a fantastic title. You can hear the (superior) Paddington version, which is a prom date waltz, at the following ancient MySpace page: https://myspace.com/paddingtonband/music/songs Paddington was a cool band I played in for four or five months back in 2004. The bass player Jordan hated me. A year later, frustrated at the glacial pace with which Andrew preferred to rehearse, record, and organize live dates, he organized a coup. Although he claimed that he left the band, along with Lindsay Gibb, the singer/keyboard player and the drummer whose name I forgot, what they really did was kick Andrew out of his own band and reform under the name Bedtime, Sleepyhead, which is BS if you ask me. Lindsay never cared for me much either. I didn't speak much at Paddington practices because the other members had known each other for years and had all the accrued inside jokes and experiences that come with close contact, but anytime I did try to speak or contribute to a conversation, Lindsay would wait a beat and then go: "...well, anyway..." then continue speaking as if I'd never said anything. After a while I stopped speaking entirely. I left the band unceremoniously in July or August 2004. Like The Beekeeper’s Society, another coed indie band with a polite approach to songcraft that I once played in, I never played on any recordings, so my time in those bands is lost to the ages. High Hopes A full band, electric version of the title track of our last record. I prefer the other version, but this one has its moments, particularly the break down when the bass goes for a walk and the whole band smashes back in on the A chord, those three hits, then back in. The harmonies are off kilter, but I didn't have much time to do them, so I just hoped for the best. People & Places I was digging through old demos last year, demos I'd done in autumn 2013 while living at my Dad's in Guelph and attending the University of Waterloo. I found so many forgotten gems in that pile of songs. and this was one of them. Others include "Cocations," which has already been recorded sans vocals and will be on our upcoming double album, and "Throwing Copper," which will also be on Keep It Beautiful. Sad Shitty Supermarket Holds Senior Citizen Day Again, in keeping with the theme of the album, a song about getting older and having one's expectations dashed. One & Only A love song to drugs. Western Sweepstakes This was going to be a demo, part of the collection of songs I did in autumn 2013, but I liked the song enough to dress it up with synth strings and harmonies, the usual BCN fare. I tried to record this one with Ryan Mills when James and Ryan had taken a short break during the Chords for the Bored sessions, but it didn't come out very good, so I kept that song off that album. I knew I was going to use this version on an album eventually, it was just a matter of finding the right fit.

Make It Mine A reviewer of our first album described "She Dreams of Airports" as a "hobo strum" which has "enough brio about it to win you over." He also said the song had a great title. "She Dreams of Airports" was written in a feverish afternoon during a Neutral Milk Hotel phase, so I was trying to ape Jeff Mangum by strumming loudly on an acoustic and trying to jam as many words into the song as I could, using the specific topic of travel. But the whole “hobo strum” thing wasn’t true...I wrote the song in the comfort of the basement of my Dad’s house in Orangeville. “Make it Mine,” however, was written while I was busking at the northwest corner of Queen and University last April, a transient month spent mostly on the street, trying to get enough money to get by. I’d usually make at least $20 if I played for three or four hours. I’d get bored doing CCR and Oasis though, and write my own stuff. I wrote this one on the spot, which is probably why the lyrics are so repetitive. I couldn’t write them down so they had to be basic. There’s another version on High Hopes but it’s not much better. Both version fail to get the essence of the song, which is an authentic “hobo strum,” not an ersatz one like “She Dreams of Airports.” I’d like to try it out with the full band someday soon. One Last Rodeo A song about doing drugs one last time. And doing them again the next day, just one last time. And the next day, one last time, the cycle continuing for months until you're barely alive. Drug users call the last night the "last rodeo," depressingly enough. Big City Nights Radio Report #1 A bunch of demos sewn together and presented as a radio station. A radio station I'd put on my presets, indubitably. Look for more BCN Radio Reports in the future, $2 and #3 and so on. Why not, eh? Some of these songs will be on our upcoming double album, Keep It Beautiful.