#Mia is a genuinely really good character and trying to sell her as a better alternative while bashing the characters ppl do like Tumblr posts

[liedownquisition]

Jason Todd's timeline and "Age"

So, there's a lot of discussion of Jason Todd's age esp as relative to other sidekick vigilantes, particularly Tim and Mia. I believe the exact words are usually something about a "grown ass man beating up/trying to kill teenagers."

DISCLAIMER: This particular post is specifically regarding the "grown ass man vs teenagers" statement, I have posts regarding the "tried to kill them" portion and other stuff like "seriously Jason Todd is like being shot by a marshmallow gun compared to what goes on directly before and after him in these incidents, also you don't bitch about the right stuff, also a lot of you prop up characters who are Objectively Worse, and no that's not hate on your fave it's just me calling out hypocrisy". It just takes time to find digital copies of the panels I'm using. NOTE I AM NOT JUSTIFYING HIS ACTIONS. I'm just saying y'all blow it out of proportion for petty character hate. Like, shit, they're superheroes. Jason's soooo fuckin' tame. He's not even framed as a big deal to the teens it's only the adults that think it's that much of a problem.

Courtesy readmore post cut:

Now, to start off, we all know Jason died at 15 & a few months off from 16 (if you want me to dig up panels, sure, but I figured at this point that wasn't in question). Tim at this point is somewhere between 12-13, and we have this panel in Lonely Place of Dying which takes place a few months later:

So that's a ballpark of 2-3 years between Jason and Tim.

But Tim's age is really fucky and they keep de-aging him tbh. We can extrapolate that his confrontation with Jason was between the ages of 16-17 bcs it's after the arc where he has his incredibly shitty 16th birthday in Robin Vol2 #116 and before Red Robin where he's stated to be 17. This would put Jason between 18-19 at the time. (If you really want me to find panel sources for Tim's birthday and his age in RR then, sure, but I don't think they're necessary. I used it more as a guidepost for Jason's age, since we have a clear idea of what the age gap is.)

At least, on paper.

Mia for her part I've had a hard time finding like, on panel mentions of her age and if anyone can direct me to it being explicitly stated I'd love that. I'm rereading old comics but it's a LOT of comics to hunt down & dig through. To my understanding she was fifteen when Ollie first met her, and there's at Minimum of about a year and a half between that to her meeting Red Hood, more likely at least two? because there's at least few months between that and her joining the Titans, the Doctor Light stuff, then One Year Later, and then returned to Star some 3 months after Ollie came back to run for mayor? And then Jason not too long after. So, two years feels safe. Puts her at 17-ish, Jason at 19-20

Once again, I specify: on paper.

People would happily point out at this point that the upward stretch of a 4 year age gap is a "huge gap in maturity." And yeah, under normal circumstances, I'd agree.

But, and this is going to get contradictory bcs I found Two different timelines (BOTH written by Winick, lmao), and depending on how you read it it could be up to three different possibilities. Let's Start with Batman Annual #25: Daedalus & Icarus.

Timestamp before Jason's resurrection, which is pretty well known at this point:

Next, him waking up from a coma afterwards, when he escapes the hospital:

Now the above could be interpreted as either 1 year after he died if we're assuming that it's using the same "start" point to count as the resurrection (unlikely), or one year after he came back (more likely).

Next, the timestamp right before a guy recognizes him and sells him out:

And, finally, the timestamp before being put in the Pit:

That is, count it up, between 3-3 1/2 years where Jason was dead, in a coma, or otherwise not particularly... cognizant of the world around him. His ass is NOT developing emotionally, socially, or mentally like this, which pretty handily bridges the gaps there. Taken at face value, Jason's maturity level is going to be, unironically, younger than Tim's in the wake of these setbacks.

Now, if we go to Lost Days issue 1, it doesn't specify how long he was dead, nor how long he was in a coma, so we'll just carry those two over, what we DO have is this from just after Talia brought him home:

This puts him as being on the streets for five months, so we're at just shy of two years so far. And then we have this:

Which is right before Talia puts him in the Pit.

So, in summary: 6 months dead, 1 year coma, 5 months on the street, and something like 1-1 1/2 years with the League which...

Actually puts us on almost the exact same timeframe either way. 3 to 3 1/2 years. It just changes whether Jason was on the streets or with the League for longer.

And is utterly incomprehensible because comic timelines are a freaking nightmare.

If we're being generous, then that would put Jason at a minimum of 19, maybe toeing the line of 20 for UTRH, again, on paper, because like hell are you convincing me he did less than a year's worth of training abroad throughout Lost Days. Yeah maybe they trained him in fighting while he was catatonic, muscle memory and all that. But the other teachers that we KNOW of? The bombs, guns, probably something to get him up to date on handling all that tech we see him using, Egon, potentially arguably All-Caste if you want to draw from n52...

but you'd have to knock at least a year and a half off of his internal/personal development from death & coma, at minimum. Maybe you could argue he was somewhat developing while in his "the lights are on, but nobody's home" phase, you can't say it's at the same level as a normal person might when going about their day to day life, and it's difficult to measure. But he's not hitting the kind of milestones that he should be for his age. I wouldn't put him at anything less than two years behind. So if we use our upper estimates on Jason, and lower estimates on both the developmental setbacks and Tim/Mia's ages that gives us:

Jason toeing 20, mentally 18, fighting Tim at 16. 2 year gap, kind of stretching the physical age gap if we assume Tim had just barely turned 13 when he showed up to be Robin. - OR LESS

Jason maybe 21, mentally 19, fighting Mia at 17, two year age gap again. Honestly, still not that big of a difference - OR LESS

And, to be frank, that's not even counting the mental development issues that come from the intense physical trauma from dying - and I swear to fuck don't give me the "He's not the only one who died he's not special" speech.

HOW MANY OF THE OTHERS YOU'RE USING AS A GOTCHA LOST, *GESTURING AGGRESSIVELY ABOVE*, LITERALLY MULTIPLE YEARS OF THEIR LIFE.

Not counting adults, of course. Barry lost years, Hal lost years, Ollie I think also lost a couple years? but A) they came back still adults, bodies pretty much the same. B) While Jason's body didn't go through a magic growth spurt in canon, it did still grow esp while with the League.

I'll eventually get around to Titan's Tower & GA#72 (tbh, there are other people who've already done Titan's Tower and it'd probably be better than what I do, so I'm more going to focus on the latter, but there IS a specific part of the former that drives me nuts that I don't see brought up a lot), and maybe if we're feeling spicy all my issues with UTRH starting with how Winick is just as guilty of retroactively writing Jason as being inherently a bad penny since his Robin days as any of the other "modern" writers. Like, bud, Severe enough Head Trauma is legitimately enough to change someone's personality, not to mention trauma. It wouldn't hurt your narrative for that eerie difference, the Shade of What Once Was if you're really going for RH being Like that.

Final addition: I swear to god if you use my post to start up some kind of petty-ass ship war or flame other characters I will immediately turn off reblogs and replies I am Not Dealing With That Shit, please and thank you.

Anyways, @glitter-stained, your interest made me decide to actually put the work in now to pull it up rather than passively gather stuff to dump whenever discourse pushes me over the edge so, here ya are. Looks like you did have it closer on the mark than I did.

[piccolina-mina]

Our girl is thriving this season, but what the fuck is this Wyatt plot? I need your thinks about this one. I just knew you'd be six posts in on this by now. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

*sighs* For fk's sake, nonny. I don't even like talking about it because I get ranty.

What do you want me to say? Honestly, everything you can imagine I would feel about this, you're probably right. Because you know, I'm that b*tch always getting ranty about racism and stuff.

In short, I hate it. I think it's unnecessary, tone-deaf, random, pointless, lowkey offensive, and illogical. I legitimately find it triggering AF. And it doesn't make sense.

It's Unnecessary. There is a fraction of a chance that it will connect to something more significant, but even if that's the case, I'm confident that end result or connection could've taken place without this random reform racist Wyatt storyline. This series has struggled enough as it is properly utilizing all of its primary characters as well as providing them with decent screentime and arcs. It literally makes no sense to spend any of that time that could be used elsewhere on primary characters on a recurring guest star.

This isn't actually about Rosa, it's about Wyatt. Following up on the previous point, this specific arc caters to Wyatt. Revolves around Wyatt. Rosa is just a passive participant and vessel for this Wyatt storyline. So again, the arc itself is about a recurring character. At least when they did something similarly bringing back Cam to siphon time and arcs away from its main cast they found ways to implement it better and tied her to multiple main characters, so it wasn't a total waste.

The intended Wyatt/Rosa parallel is illogical. I know what they're intending to do with this storyline, drawing parallels between Rosa's experience coming back from the dead after ten years and trying to make sense of that and atone for things before and having this second chance to make things right and go down the right path and so forth and Wyatt losing his memory and his racist ways and having to reconcile with who he was to who he can be and all of that. I understand the concept they're trying to sell. It just doesn't work. Rosa's addiction is not equivalent to Wyatt's racism and violence. Her mental illness isn't either. It's dangerous to invite the comparasions with this storyline.

It's not successful redemption. True redemption is Wyatt knowing and remembering his actions and then trying to atone for them. It's not the convenience of amnesia wiping out his memory only giving him distance from his actions rather than really facing up to them. Because of the amnesia, to Wyatt, it's like he's hearing about another person. It's a cop out. He doesn't Actually have to do the work to redeem himself or atone or learn or grow. IF we're supposed to compare it to Rosa, she knew what she did and remembers and knows how she hurt her loved ones or whatever and she's actively trying to make amends for that as part of her program... a program that Wyatt isn't working or anything BTW.

They've contradicted themselves too much and are rewriting their own work and thus twisting everything up just to make this storyline work and it still doesn't. The timeline is all fkd up... what they established already all of it..The Longs were racist before Kate's death. Kate was racist. To suggest that a 10+ amnesiac blackout clean slates and erases all of Wyatt's racism is just wrong. As in it literally doesn't even make any sense. That is not how the amnesia works but they keep playing both sides of it trying to make it work. To sell us what they're claiming, he would have to have ALL of his memories wiped and have forgotten who he was completely.

Wyatt is behaving like he's shocked by racism in this town but they're also trying to argue that he was born into it. Wyatt was surrounded by racists and his friends come from racist families but he's acting like the very concept of him ever being ingratiated in it is some huge surprise. Wyatt looks affronted by things like Confederate flags. Wyatt being steeped in and surrounded by racism predates his amnesia period.

Kyle mentioned that line about Wyatt putting Whites Only on water fountains, and it sounded like a school prank. It also sounded like something Kyle was reminding Rosa of as if she was alive when that incident happened. Therefore, Wyatt was doing racist stuff before she died. Kyle would've been out of school by then so how else would he know that or why would he bother retaining it?

IF Wyatt and Rosa really were friends before (which holy retcon), then it makes no real sense that he would get psychopathically angry about his "friend" who does drugs getting into a car accident with his sister who does drugs. He would've mourned them both not jumped to severe racism and violence. But both he and Jasmine's family (who are MIA for all of this) did that... jumped to racism. So was Wyatt indoctrinated by his family or indoctrinated by message boards and shit? And if Wyatt and Rosa were friends than why was Kate such a racist bitch to Rosa?

They're backdrafting history JUST to make this storyline that we don't need with a character who isn't even a main one to work.

By not actually addressing that Wyatt has to unlearn racism and giving him an out through amnesia, there is the very realistic issue of that latent racism to come out at any given time. What happens when he's drunk? What happens when he's really angry at a POC?

Tying Wyatt's redemption with his clear affection for Rosa is again dangerous and irresponsible. I know we would all like to think that love is the way and through love it can heal racism, but that puts the responsibility on the disenfranchised person to be "lovable." Because if Wyatt WAS friends with Rosa once then that means the second Rosa did something unlovable she was just another *insert racist slur of choosing* right? It means that there's a possibility that if his feelings for Rosa dwindle or things go sideways in some way there's a chance that he could revert back to those racist ways. Loving Rosa(linda) and pinning all of his wanting to be better on her because of her makes his actively learning to be anti-racist conditional. Right now he's not doing this for him. He's doing it because of Rosa.

This entire storyline has placed the burden of forgiveness on Rosa, his victim. Without him ever having to actually make amends. It's this turn the other cheek BS that means there's nothing too big or harmful that can't result in forgiveness. It relies on Rosa and all that she represents to extend an inhumane level of mercy and grace to their tormentor and oppressor that was never once extended to them. It's such a consistent and problematic thing projected on disenfranchised parties that ONLY benefits the majority and makes them feel good. It's a narrative of meeting someone halfway when the playing field was uneven and the minorities are in actuality doing more work and making a longer trek. Halfway and meeting in the middle only works if both sides were even. They are not. It's the reaching across the aisle both sidesms when one side was clearly and actively more harmful than the other and than calling that peace and equity. It is not.

This storyline was meant to scintillate some viewers with this "what if" notion and teach others a meaningful lesson or be this poorly thought out gateway to exploring a complex storyline but it came at the expense of other demographics who actively have to deal with racist crap. And because of their problematic approach what is simply "just entertainment" to some who has the luxury of not having to think about it beyond that, is just gross and insanely triggering and uncomfortable to others. The others who deal with the reality of the subject at hand.

They wrote themselves into a corner with Wyatt so trying to dig him out of that no matter the cost or logic is absurd. This storyline could've worked better if Wyatt's racism didn't also include conscious, constant, extreme violence. But they spent all of this time making Wyatt the face of violent racism and now are trying to redeem him with no real effort. He wasn't just using slurs or making microaggressions. He wasn't some insensitive or aloof white person. He is a murderer. He has killed people. He technically murdered Liz in cold-blood. He knew she was in the crashdown when he shot up the place. The lights were still on. He beat up Arturo so badly he nearly killed him well after his friends even stopped. He attacked and intended to kill Rosa. And his handiwork was a constant thing, enough for Jenna to comment on it. And now we're supposed to ignore all of that because he has amnesia and has puppy dog eyes?

The fact that we can entertain (and for some succeed) Wyatt in all of his hot white dudeness' redemption after everything he has done slips into the inherent racism of society in the first place and is enraging. Because systemically and culturally and inherently society will bend over backwards to find a way to absolve a hot white guy no matter his actions. Flint and Noah couldn't get this type of redemption... So their intended storyline about evolving from racism STILL plays into the racist structures set up in society.

And because some people like it, there's this slippery territory of NO everyone who genuinely enjoys this aren't racist for enjoying it. But yes, this entire storyline and how it is playing out is at the very least racially insensitive.

In order for this storyline to work they would actually have to show Wyatt doing the work. They don't have enough time to dedicate to such a delicate storyline. It's been a C and D filler storyline with 45 second to a minute scenes. That's not enough time to explore this properly. We would've needed to see Wyatt returning home from the hospital. We would've needed to see Wyatt with his friends and it not feeling right and his discomfort. We would've needed to see Wyatt going through his yearbook and googling himself and the horror and disgust he felt. We would need to see this through his eyes. But we didn't have the time for that and we wouldn't have anyway because he's not a main character. We only get Wyatt through Rosa's eyes and they haven't even dedicated enough time to that for it to work. Rosa isn't conflicted at all. She didn't struggle to forgive him. She was reduced to a school girl with a crush and an insane level of grace and they just threw that at us with no buildup whatsoever. I don't know where Rosa's head is and how she got to this to place. Not really. And the only thing working about this is the chemistry between two actors who are allegedly dating so of course there's chemistry.

It literally feels like another instance of a favorite actor being shoehorned into a storyline just for the hell of it. Just because they didn't want to let Dylan go or something. Just to give him something else to do.

[eustochium]

reviews of every movie i’ve seen in theaters lately, because this is what i do with my friday nights now. maybe spoilers or whatever if you care

-Elvis: i do genuinely believe austin butler made some faustian pact for an oscar because there’s no way that he managed to turn out a performance like that when his resume to that point consisted of supporting roles in Sharpay’s Fabulous Adventure and Vanessa Hudgens’ Coachella appearances. anyway it was unfortunately good, bc Baz Luhrmann is the hollywood purveyor of grandiose spectacle and tragicomic fairy tales, and for that end chooses his source material very well. costume design was objectively perfect, because of course it was. staging a montage representing elvis’s hollywood years to an instrumental britney spears mashup before punctuating it with the sound of a gunshot and cronkite’s voice announcing the assassination of MLK is probably one of the most insane creative choices i’ve seen on a screen and shows that baz knew exactly what kind of story he wanted to tell. the unfortunate part is that baz is also a wildly wealthy white australian who, despite a well-intended effort, was extremely out of his depth in trying to portray the nuanced realities of race in mid century america as they pertained to Elvis Presley’s career, but this effort still led to objectively the best musical scenes in the movie. stan yola and go stream her album right now. 8/10

-Don’t Worry Darling: literally so much fun. Harry Styles didn’t quite sell the character for me thru most of it, until the ending sort of gave some justification for why he might have come across as less than wholly convincing—but tbh i doubt that was an intentional performance choice. his press conference soundbite about how DWD “feels like a movie” got rightfully clowned on but it’s actually like. the most apt assessment of it lmao. definitely sets you up to know there’s gonna be some big shocking final twist, and while idk how i feel about it, at least it kind of resolved my biggest issue throughout watching most of it which is the glaring fact that not a single person in this movie convincingly looks like they’re from the 1950s. everyone in the movie has a face that knows about texting and the costume design doesn’t help either, literally like an online brain poisoned person’s mental image of what 1950s suburbia looks like, so that works. messy plot that didn’t really know what to do with itself. nevertheless Miss Flo ate and left no crumbs, as the kids say. also the supposed controversy abt the behind-the-scenes drama was one of the first truly enjoyable entertainment news cycles in a good long while. not a great film but genuinely a great time. 7/10

SMILE: viscerally creepy at a few scenes but that’s rly all there is. freaky premise on the surface but overall not very good and didn’t have anything to say about its central theme of trauma that hasn’t already been said much more effectively by plenty of other, much better movies. 3/10

Pearl: slapped, went absolutely insane, spoke to the soul, talented brilliant amazing showstopping spectacular never the same un-afraid to reference or not reference etc etc. never seen X and don’t particularly care to bc there’s truly nothing i could ever imagine in any way adding to what that movie did for me. didn’t breathe once during mia goth’s entire 8 minute monologue, literally exited the theater feeling like that “girls with they ____” meme, in the best way. she named her murderous pet gator after Theda Bara. absolutely zero notes. 10000/10

Moonage Daydream: A good movie to go see with your mom, if your mom’s celebrity crush growing up was David Bowie. 9/10

[cozcat]

I’ve been thinking about Here We Go Again... (in summary: the more I think about it, the more issues I have with it.)

a lot of the reaction seems to be hyping it up far more than I enjoyed it, and it’s weird, because I do absolutely adore Mamma Mia, so why shouldn’t I? but I think it’s adoring Mamma Mia that makes it so hard to love the sequel.

so here are some reasons I don’t think I’m connecting with it, just as a point of discussion. there are probably more that I’m forgetting. (I don’t want to study. also I’m chatting with Nicole about it and so I’m overthinking it rather than overthinking a passage from Henry V.)

the fact that it was written and directed by a man just irks me. the musical and the first movie are very much by women, primarily for women, and just... it doesn’t sit well.

it does as well feel like Ol was cashing in on the big name - with the amount of liberties taken with canon, it felt almost disrespectful to the first movie. a few blips, I can take; warping so much of it felt ridiculous.

for one, Donna’s mother is supposed to be dead. she’s supposed to be dead, and Catholic, and to have thrown her daughter out when she got pregnant. if Ruby was in the exact same situation as Donna, why did she tell Donna not to bother coming back? had we seen Cher in the flashbacks, we could have had a big number from her earlier on - when you release 80% of her screentime before the movie comes out, you can’t claim you wanted to build up to her appearance - as a flashback with young Donna, maybe a distant-over-time duet with Donna, have her pop up again at the end when they all partied with their younger selves. viciously Catholic Ruby with a fraught relationship with her daughter would have worked, would have made more sense. and then we could have seen Cher acting, rather than Cher playing fictional-Cher.

young Rosie and young Tanya meeting the young dads in passing also absolutely didn’t work for me. Rosie harbouring a crush on Bill for twenty years just felt... weird. Donna in MM1 reveals to Tanya and Rosie that there were two other potential fathers - why did they then need to meet them?

(however, you can pry aromantic bisexual Tanya out of my cold, dead hands.)

on the young fathers - their personalities were fine, but honestly, they could have rolled with the designs from MM1 a little bit. I’m not saying replicate them exactly, but where was Sam’s long hair and seventies facial hair? where was Harry Headbanger’s headbanger aesthetic? Bill seemed alright, but “long blonde hair” is still a thing now. they definitely seemed to want them to be modern-day-attractive, which was depressing.

also, they could have at least mentioned Harry being gay in passing. have the ticket guy hitting on him, and a panicked “no sorry I have a husband”. he doesn’t even need to actually have a partner, just acknowledge that he’s gay. (he’s the only major lead not paired off by the end. Tanya is hinted to hook up with Fernando’s brother. Bill and Rosie are back together. come on, Ol, you wrote and directed Imagine Me And You for fuck’s sake.)

and they could have at least checked the timelines from the first movie. that was just lazy.

young Donna didn’t gel with me as Donna. (I’m not the only person to say this, but it bears repeating.) it’s not really because of the acting, but the writing; I couldn’t connect the Donna we all know to the Donna we were shown. young Tanya and young Rosie were brilliant - but let’s be real, they weren’t given enough to work with to go either way, so while their portrayals were great, we didn’t have enough of them onscreen.

having Donna die, offscreen, a year prior, with no explanation just felt cheap, and like a disservice to the character. apparently Meryl wasn’t available for most of the filming, but that’s not the answer. if Meryl is your main character, you work around her, and you don’t do a character such a massive disservice. but if you have to do that - what happened? was it an accident, an aneurysm, a long-term illness? these things matter, and it’s something that detracted from the movie for me - I kept expecting to find out, but we didn’t.

but really. have the arc with Sophie and Sky all take place in NYC, so that modern Kalokairi isn’t the focus for as much of it. have Donna be in NYC with Sky, marketing the villa or just working on something to do with it, or fuck it she’s just travelling and Sky’s away for a different reason, and have Sophie realise while Donna is away that she’s pregnant - do the parallels that way. she didn’t need to die to be offscreen less!

(spitballing with Nicole: Donna was recording an album. Donna finds out her mother is dying, so flies out to see her, rolls up with Cher in tow at the end. I actually fucking love that idea. but really. ANYTHING.)

seriously, don’t sell me this as the feel-good-movie-of-the-summer when I’m sat in the cinema crying for most of it. My Love, My Life was beautiful but I can’t listen to that or I’ve Been Waiting For You now without having a bit of a crying fit. which is bad, because I LIKE THOSE SONGS. starting a feel-good movie by killing off a main character with no real reason is not a good way to start it.

also they did Kisses of Fire dirty. ABBA has plenty of weird songs that would have worked, why did they have to mangle one I genuinely love for the laughs. and yeah that’s eight separate links to peppy ABBA songs that have genuinely bizarre lyrics or themes.

also they really could have warned us when they released the soundtrack that The Day Before You Came was only ever intended to be album-only. I kept expecting it - it would have been lovely during the credits - and then, well, it’s the song that never came.

and where the fuck was Hasta Manana on the soundtrack. the best sung song in your entire film and you don’t even release a full recording? some of the songs sounded a bit gutsless - When I Kissed The Teacher was so clearly recorded in a studio, and it grated on me when a lot of the songs sounded like that.

but seriously. it wasn’t as happy as it could have been, it wasn’t as in-character for a lot of it as it could have been.

there were things I did like, but as you can tell, there were a lot of things I didn’t. and overall, it was enough to detract from me enjoying the movie. like... it was fun, I’ll watch it again, I’ll buy the DVD (mostly for the special features they’ll probably skimp on), but fuck me the first movie is so much better, and I’m trying to pretend this one isn’t even canon. it’s Sophie having a weird pregnancy fever dream? whatever reason I can think of is better than accepting it, because otherwise it kind of poisons the first movie in hindsight.

[prozach27]

Resident Evil 7 Rant

OKAY Y'ALL, I just finished two playthroughs of resident evil 7 that included reading all documents and getting both endings, so now I'm ready to sit back and talk about it. That being said, I have a lot I gotta say. First of all, THE PROS: *Dude that theme song is BOMB. I wanna download it. I L-O-V-E the music of RE7, and I never say that about games outside Zelda *Returning to its horror roots was done very well, in my opinion. RE5 & 6 were honestly terrible, and amounted to nothing more than forgettable action games. RE7 turns the charm of survival horror that it captured in its first games to a modern, FPS gamestyle, and it does it wonderfully. I was hella impressed, and even on playthrough 2, got freaked when jack jumped out at me or was right behind me when I didn't expect it. *Immortality -- I have to say, I love it. It's great having these main enemies that nothing works on, especially when it means you have to hide (and on higher difficulties when it's a death sentence if they find you, all the better). It's great knowing that your weapons don't work, and how much damage they do makes it so much more thrilling. My first playthrough I was genuinely petrified while I ran to hide under floorboards and the like. *Eveline is a GREAT ADDITION TO RESIDENT EVIL. I L-O-V-E the way they could 'scientifically' pull off her supernatural tendencies, I love the aesthetic of the twisted ten year old girl luring in victims because she wants a family, and I love the reveal at the end that she was the grandmother all along. *THE ENDING. Okay, not the cutscenes because they were boring; but when you stab the toxin into Eveline's neck and it cuts to it being the grandma and she starts crying "Why does everyone hate me?" My heart melted just like her body did. On playthrough 2 it still made me SO DAMN SAD TO HURT THAT POOR OLD WOMAN. SHE JUST WANTED A FAMILY TO LOVE HER. Now, what I WISH they'd done: *They REALLY could have made the Eveline storyline hit harder and they dropped the ball, I think. I get that she's a bioweapon, but the way she acts towards the end (and apparently at the beginning when she told Mia to kill you) seems out of character. She wanted a Dad, and she wanted YOU to be the dad. She invited you there. Why would she suddenly want to kill you when you try to escape with Mia? I understand that the "plot" argues it's because she thinks you're both trying to abandon her, but they could have fleshed this out better. Mia could have said something like "please stay, don't you want to be a part of the family?" And when Ethan says no, Eveline could have gone rampant. *Furthermore, they totally could have had a plot point be trying to find ways to protect the girl from the family, too - since Mia was babysitting her, it would have been easy to sell that the girl was trapped there also. It would have made the game WAY more compelling as you find notes suggesting the girl isn't right, and the reveal at the end would have been all the wilder. Especially if instead of being psychotic and losing sympathy, if Eveline played on the fatherly instincts (why are you trying to hurt me? Etc). It would be way more compelling as a BOW too. *My critique of missed plot aside... SO MUCH OF THIS STORY DOESN'T MAKE SENSE. *Why did Ethan not use serum on himself to cure the infection? Why does he only use it on Zoe or Mia? *Why does literally NO ONE address that Ethan is infected and just whisk him away in a helicopter at the end? THIS GUY IS INFECTED. You could argue that killing Eveline somehow kills all the infection (which as far as I remember was never once stated in any document?) but that still doesn't explain why he got on a damn boat and tried to sail away from his problems and everyone was just fine with it. *Why didn't Eveline calcify him???? We see that she could literally kill anyone under her control at any time when she kills Zoe out of nowhere. If she sees Ethan has the toxin and is coming for her, why isn't she instantly killing him? Maybe it's because his infection isn't far enough, but then why isn't that addressed? She just sits back and lets it happen (literally lol). *Why was Ethan so down for his wife to just go out to other regions entirely to babysit? That's not a normal thing. They're married. If she has a job that involves nursing bio-organic weapons, how does she just casually hide that? *What tf is going on with Lucas *No like really what were they trying to do here with him. He's totally unhinged (and they set it up that he was before the infection), but like?? I get that he got free of her mind control with the help of the unnamed organization, but why is he delighting in killing everyone so often? Where is the transition there? What the hell? *Where does he go??? He literally is like "I'M NOT DONE WITH YOU" and you see his traps all through the next stage so I expected to fight him but nah. He's not in the game ever again. What? *What is going on with Zoe??? *She's apparently been infected for three years so it can't just be "willpower" keeping her from being psychotic, and as far as we're told, Lucas isn't sharing his drugs with her that keep her from being under Eveline's control. The game would have made TONS more sense if Zoe was the one working with the organization, but no -- it's the deranged brother, and she just somehow is fine and herself and the family is alright with her constantly trying to help intruders kill them. *The enemies and some of the bosses are literally SO. STUPID LOOKING. *No like really, the mold things don't look scary, they just look dumb. Jack and Eveline's final forms look like something that wouldn't pass on the Nintendo 64 without a laugh. It's 2017, tentacles and sixteen weirdly-shaped eyes aren't scary anymore, they're just dumb. FINAL THOUGHTS: Re7 is a mixed bag. Truthfully, I do love the game and it is officially one of my all-time favorite installments in the series. I think it built off of a lot of the survival horror that made older games great while imbuing it with modern gameplay. You get a really great experience that keeps you terrified and engaged as long as you don't over-analyze what they're showing you. However, the storyline - while novel and an excellent addition to the series - needs a lot more clarification for it to even start to make sense. I'm fine with ambiguity (who knows what organization made eveline!) but ambiguity around key parts such as why Zoe still has her wits about her detracts from an engaging plot. Furthermore, enemies are boring and lack anything horrific -- especially two of the bosses. The baker family and Mia as a whole are terrifying and make the game great, but the additional enemies are repetitive and uninteresting. That being said, the game is DEFINITELY worth a play through and is one of the best survival horror games I've played in years. I strongly recommend it to anyone wanting a good scare 😱

[its-just-like-the-movies]

A Cure For Wellness (2017) B-/C+

At eight films into the year, who’s to say if Gore Verbiski’s A Cure For Wellness will still be the strangest film I’ve seen from 2017? Get Out, Raw, and American Fable have rolled on by, with Personal Shopper waiting right around the immediate corner, in all of their own distinct flavors of horrifying, strange, and discomfiting, and that’s nothing to say of films like The Beguiled off in the distance. But with a budget at least nine times higher than Shopper’s and eight times higher than Get Out’s (Fable and The Beguiled don’t have a reported budget, as far as I can tell), Wellness’s weirdness has been its primary selling point, both within itself and as a child of the studio system with tens of millions and a name-brand director of popular money-makers behind it. Its reputation for being absolutely batshit has superseded most conversation about it, even acknowledging lapses in plot, theme, length, and characterization. And Wellness lapses in all of these areas, regularly. The obviousness of where it will go is so heavily thudded in its first half that it keeps working against itself in moments that should be wonderfully odd. But once everything officially goes to shit for our hero, and the film finally stops pretending to hide what it’s doing and starts luxuriating in its own insanity, all that foreshadowing is recuperated in the service of executing these story beats in even stranger ways than I could have possibly expected.

Let’s start from the beginning, or maybe the prologue, where an initially nameless CEO dies of a heart attack working late in his company’s office space. The dead man’s body bathed in the light of - and dwarfed by - a seemingly infinite number of desktop computers is both the first in a multitude of striking imagery and a red herring, implying the film will have a long-reaching thesis about how American business-people are literally working themselves to death. From there we see the ascension of corporate cog Lockhart, only to be sent to off a mysterious resort in Sweden by the partners of his corporation, blackmailing him to retrieve their missing partner so that they can bring him home and lock him up as a patsy for their own shady dealings. The casting of Dane DeHaan, already so gaunt, is enough to reinforce the idea of death by overworking as Lockhart heads off on his assignment, seemingly peeved at the tremendous effort he’s undertaking simply to go and pick up this rogue suit. Not until he lands in the limousine taking him to that gothic wellness center do we see or hear anything of real value to the plot, establishing not just the truly bizarre story of how the hospital came to be but the contentious relationship between the hospital and the village leading up to it, rooted in said bizarre goings-on. This only really matters for a single detour into town, though, as Lockhart spends the rest of the film trapped in the wellness center as a patient and a test subject.

I do hope that calling him a test subject isn’t considered a spoiler, but it’s hard to call that overarching narrative all that shocking. From the moment we arrive the wellness center has a sterile, menacing aura that’s only enhanced once we get inside the institution and meet director Dr. Volmer and his ward Hannah, played respectively by a slimy Jason Isaacs and young Mia Goth, looking like Shelley DuVall as a Tim Burton ingenue. Like a lot in Wellness, the exact nature of their relationship is one you’ll likely realize long before you’re told about it; the first eighty minutes of the film are torn between trying to maintain some impression the hospice is normal enough and DeHaan is just imaging things or either going full bore up its own ass. And since the entire plot is built on how goddamn bizarre everything actually is, there’s not much going on for the first half outside of the few moments Verbinski goes “fuck it” and lets everything happen all at once. I spent those eighty minutes longing for the sheer, sporadic insanity of moments like the deer limping its shattered body off the road and away from the car wreck, the missing CEO slinking into a pool and spending too much time getting his head wet, Lockhart’s first treatment in the tank that may or may not have been infested with dozens of eels. A trip into town wherein Lockhart takes Hannah with him as he tries to establish contact with his employers is perhaps the first scene that manages to genuinely build its own kind of tension as we watch Hannah float around the bar, orbited by intrigued and skeevy punks, unaware of the dangers these kids are to her as she wanders into the bathroom and steals an abandoned tube of lipstick before dancing to the jukebox with the other kids. Meanwhile, Lockhart meets a farmer who becomes the thirty-eighth person to dish out something about the legend of the mad baron who opened the institution before comparing Lockhart to an injured cow the farmer has to slaughter.

From here we have about two more labyrinthine explorations, each more unraveled than the last one, before Lockhart confronts Dr. Volmer at a dinner table sequence that finally lays bare what he’s doing to the patients bare- involving even more eels and the suspiciously ineffective water that isn’t stopping teeth from popping out due to dehydration. And once we learn this, A Cure for Wellness at last stops trying to resist its strangest impulses and doesn’t just jump full bore up its own ass, but starts actually driving forward in the narrative after spending so much time trying to obfuscate its mysteries. Scenes start landing punches, stakes really matter, and the reveals land with such potency that it doesn’t even matter you already figured out this mad tale of incest and genetic experimentation over an hour ago. The real surprises in the institution are not the horrific farming of its patients, but the sheer gusto and fright with which these moments are finally visualized instead of whispered at us by a doomed woman cutting up newspaper scraps (Celia Imre, not given enough screen time to contribute her own brand of spookiness).

But what’s most striking is how assured and confidently the film reveals its layers of madness and human experimentation once it gets there. Never have I seen a man rip off what’s left of his face with such vigor, or the burning of a ballroom be shot with the same sweeping gorgeousness, if not more, as it had been when it was a party celebrating a truly awful success. Its set pieces had always been effective and well-shot, but the vigor in those moments has spread to the rest of the film, now that it’s given itself over to its own strangeness. The ending is, if anything, bigger than I had expected in its rampaging through the institution and its characters as Dr. Volmer sets his final plans in motion, and as Lockhart raced to find him I genuinely wondered how on earth he could pull this off. Wellness’ weirdness is not just potent but utterly grandiose, going full-scale melodrama in its last half hour in order to fulfill a story with fewer layers to it than Raw or Get Out, in realizing a plot it was too happy to telegraph from its earliest moments, and I’ll be damned if the sheer spectacle didn’t bowl me over better than any “event” blockbuster I’ve grumbled my way to a ticket for with my boyfriend.

Looking it up, I can’t say I’m shocked about the critical mixed reception, perhaps even the poor returns financially, but I wish things had gone a little better for this odd little fucker. If you’re hoping for more out of a film than strangeness, perhaps check out the talents of Eve Stewart, shuttled off from the greater horror of Tom Hooper’s sets, striking a fine balance in her realization of the institution that can flip from perfectly normal, uncomfortably sterile, and truly haunted, and that’s before we even get to the underground lair or some crazy aboveground shit. Bojan Bazelli’s cinematography, operating within the spa’s blues, the cast’s whites, and whatever flourished of color are called upon amongst all this pale, does similarly skilled work realizing set pieces like Hannah wading through a pool or the ballroom escapades horrific to watch and visually stunning. Bazelli and the makeup department must get credit for accenting DeHaan’s sickliest features, and making Goth look so much like she’d never touched sunlight, like every Victorian heroine meant to symbolize The Hopes And Dreams Of The Oppressed or something like that. I can’t say you’ve really missed much if you missed this film while it was in its theatrical run, but I know seeing that crazy shit on the big screen was enough of an amplifier to keep it in my head for a while. Then again, maybe it’ll feel even more at home on the Syfy channel when it isn’t showing one of its delicious, homemade fish-beast movies. If it’s ever there, I encourage you to give it a shot, even if you hop in an hour late. You probably haven’t missed the good stuff, you can easily catch up, and it’s better than you’d give it credit for just by looking at it. 

[squaredcirclesirens]

REVIEW: NOVA Pro Wrestling : NOVA Project 3

Well, Hello again! It’s been a while since we here at Squared Circle Sirens have gotten to review a NOVA Pro Wrestling event (darn you work and your harsh August schedule making me miss Angelus Layne vs Keith Lee and so much more) but we are back in the game, and what a show to come back to.

Nova Pro Wrestling hosted it’s 2 Year Anniversary Supercard – NOVA Project 3 on Friday, September 22nd at the Jewish Community Center in Fairfax, Virginia. Which, if you haven’t been, I will continue to argue, is one of the best independent wrestling show locations that exists. Coming into this show, we already were told that Mia Yim would be making her return to Nova Pro Wrestling to take on top heel in the entire company, Angelus Layne , who was coming off of her huge main event against Keith Lee at Cool For The Summer. Normally, this match alone could sell as the “one women’s spot” on most companies, and be fine. However, NOVA continues to deliver with not just one more women’s match on the card, but two.

Yes. Three Women’s Matches. One Card. And they all had time. God. Bless.

Also advertised for the show was Jordynne Grace who has been literally everywhere, and doing incredible things, going against Allie Kat who has continued to impress in matches going back to her debut for NOVA back in July. This match was set to be for a spot in the Making Towns Classic, a 16-woman tournament, in May. The winner of this match would join Delilah Doom as the second woman to join the tournament.

Also advertised on the poster was crowd (and site) favorite, Faye Jackson who has been on quite the roll since making her debut for NOVA back in April and continues to deliver for the NOVA Pro Crowd. Faye took on the returning Sahara Se7en who took on Faye Jackson back in July at NOVA. Could Sahara beat Faye in retribution or would Faye Jackson continue her roll in NOVA?

One of the huge things I really appreciate about NOVA, is they always start on time. This company has gotten to the point where they know what they’re doing, and they know how to deliver on time, which is definitely appreciated. And since I upgraded to the front row this time, I was the second person in the ring area, which I felt special. Naturally, I chose to sit next to the Gated Community. For those of you who don’t know about NOVA pro, one of the top stables in NOVA is called the 1%, which is represented by a group in the audience called the Gated Community who has a special sectioned off (with stanchions and a red carpet) seating area, and they are always lively and a fun part of the show. When and If women become part of the Gated Community, I’ll instantly be sold.

Nonetheless, We kicked off the main show with Sahara Se7en versus Faye Jackson. Sahara is still new to NOVA Pro, so the crowd is still feeling her out, but this girl has personality. Billed from Cairo, Egypt, Sahara definitely runs the Egyptian Royalty gimmick and plays a strong heel. And when Milkshake hit the sound system, the crowd instantly popped. When Faye Jackson came through the curtain, the crowd was ready to go. Faye definitely got the crowd going and Sahara played a strong part in being a good heel to help the crowd get even more into Faye. Prior to the bell even ringing Sahara was already mouthing off with the crowd, and Faye, when it came to the Ref having to check Faye and her backside.

The match started pretty quick with some chain wrestling, including a fun spot where Sahara went for waist lock, Faye teased as if she was going to use her infamous backside to get rid of Sahara, but Sahara grabbed a head lock to the crowd’s disapproval. Sahara has some incredible kicks that look hard hitting and Faye continues to increase her moveset with an sweet looking crossbody and an intense spear that even made the crowd pop. The end came with Faye hitting the Drop it Like it’s Hot (Michinoku Driver) to be able to defeat Sahara in the opener.

This match stood out to me in comparison to their first encounter. Don’t get me wrong, the first encounter was good, but was only about 4 or 5 minutes long. This match went about 8 or 9 minutes and we got to see more of what Sahara can bring to the table, and Faye Jackson continues to grow as one of the top babyfaces in NOVA Pro. Especially for an opener, this match did its job and got the crowd hyped up through the rest of the card. Although, I am still waiting for Faye vs Veda Scott one on one. So long as Veda doesn’t keep cheating. But who am I to judge. I’ll definitely still be on the lookout for the super fun feud to continue between Faye and Veda. But make sure to not sleep on Sahara Se7en. This girl has some potential, and I really hope she continues to get the opportunity to shine in NOVA. She really can deliver a strong character and continue to put on fun matches that continue to look good, and I definitely want to see more.

After intermission, we get to see Jordynne Grace versus Allie Kat for a spot in the Making Towns Classic Tournament. Allie Kat is such a fun character, and she clearly takes this cat thing to the extreme, brushing up to Bryan, the ring announcer, and playing around in the ring. She definitely plays it strong and it comes off really well. Jordynne is absolutely incredible. If you haven’t seen a Jordynne Grace match, even online, literally what in the hell are you doing? Jordynne has been absolutely everywhere, and for good reason, and this match was no different.

This match had some really strong back and forth, and both of these women showed they can really go. This match was very hard hitting and really came across like a true show. There were some strong highlights in this match, including Jordynne going for a bearhug early and Allie Kat finding her way out of it and speeding up the pace of the match quickly. Allie also hit an incredible looking Piledriver that only got a two count for the match. What was especially interesting about this match was how much the fans loved both of these women, and there were definitely dueling chants of Let’s go Allie, Let’s go Jordynne, which only increased the showing of this match. The end came with a running powerbomb from Jordynne to Allie Kat to be able to get the three count and securing her spot as the second woman in the Making Towns Classic tournament.

Jordynne Grace continues to impress, and in all honesty she is such an incredible talent live. She has continued to show that she is an incredible athlete, and dare I say it, the last pure athlete in the ring. Jordynne continues to push the bar for herself; just when you think she has had the best match ever, she goes and puts on an even better one. Jordynne Grace is someone you need to keep your eye on, because she continues to deliver and continues to be impressive time and time again. Allie Kat is also someone that continues to be someone who shows up and puts on a great show. I think for me, this match showed what she can really do. Allie Kat really cemented herself as a threat in the NOVA pro locker room, even though she didn’t win. My eyes continue to be on the lookout for Allie Kat and I’m sure she will continue to be at NOVA, especially after showing how good she really is.

This then lead us to our Semi- Main Event. Angelus Layne has continued to show just how much of a dominate force she is, and is genuinely someone who has solidified her spot as not just the top heel in the women’s division, but I am genuinely saying in the entire company. She has truly risen to the top both in character work and then backs it up with her talent in the ring. Angelus Layne is so underrated, because when she is given a ball, she runs with it, then beats the hell out of it, just because she can. Out next was Mia Yim, who got the pop of the night. Mia Yim is seriously so incredible both in and out of the ring, and I was (not-so) low key star struck, but Mia won’t let you feel that way, including when she hugged me during her entrance, and I instantly fan-girled, I won’t even try to pretend that I didn’t. Mia Yim really solidified this role as a top baby face, and she doesn’t even have to be at every show to get Hogan like pop, and this was the perfect match to Semi-Main.

This match started before the bell as Angelus attacked Mia before she could even turn around, and this match was a war. Angelus went straight to work attacking Mia with strikes and chokes in the corner, including a tree of woe spot where Angelus stands where a person just shouldn’t stand on anyone, male or female, but it got one of the loudest boos of the night. This one had such a war feel to it, that at one point, both women were on their knees trading blows all the way back to their feet, and Angelus hitting a huge Death Valley Driver into the corner. The end of this match came when it seemed like Angelus was in total control and Brittany Blake’s music hit the sound system. Angelus yelled for Mike to come out, but nobody did, Angelus turned around right into Eat Defeat from Mia Yim and Mia got the three count much to the dismay of Angelus Layne.

This. Match. Was. So. Good. Both of these women delivered and showed just how good they both are. There was a reason this match was as late in the card as it was, and for good reason. Mia Yim is absolutely incredible. I’ve seen Mia on my TV plenty of times, but seeing her live had me in awe. She is just that good. Mia Yim is absolutely one of my all-time favorites, and NOVA Pro showed why. Where do I even begin about Angelus Layne? Seriously, she is that good. Angelus has been in the ring over the past 10 years, and yet she continues to evolve as a character and be something that everyone needs to watch. I genuinely don’t understand how she isn’t booked everywhere. If you need a monster heel, who can go on the mic, who can go in the ring, and genuinely be an all-around star, then you need to reach out to Angelus Layne.

NOVA Pro continues to show why it’s a top tier independent company. For the second show in a row, they have completely sold out, and the crowd continues to be so into the show, which continues to make it something to watch. Can we also talk about how there were three women’s matches on the show? I mean this is just becoming par for the course for NOVA. They give women matches, and storylines, and time. As a women’s wrestling fan, they can take my 25 dollars every month if they keep doing this, and these women continue to deliver.

I also got the opportunity to talk to each of these women over the course of the show, and they are some of the greatest people. I mentioned earlier that Mia Yim had me star struck, but the minute I said hello, I was greeted with a hug and a full conversation that made me feel important, and she’s the star. Although Angelus Layne is a monster heel in the ring, she is one of the nicest people you can talk to at a merch table and genuinely shows that she cares about the fans and the business. Faye Jackson is the nicest person you can ever talk to and always makes the fans feel like they matter. Jordynne Grace is so humble and so sweet. Allie Kat was absolutely fantastic and was so genuinely kind, and Sahara Se7en is so down to earth and is such a hard worker that you have to root for her. NOVA books women who aren’t only good in the ring, but are awesome outside of it, which makes the support all the easier.

Overall, this show was a blast and Nova Pro continues to show that they will give women time and let them have a story and let them truly go. If you are even moderately close to the Northern Virginia Area they are so worth the 20/25 dollar tickets and you are guaranteed to see a great show. #NovaProject3 is no different, and was even one of the best shows top to bottom to date. I hope they continue to be the trend to show the talent that the women bring and show what they can really do.

And if for some reason you can’t come to NOVA Pro, that’s cool, go to Powerbomb.tv and watch them. They will be streaming their December Show Live on Thursday, December 28th so make sure you go subscribe.

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