#Ryan Gosling Summer

[bettsfic]

we as a society have spent too long bereft of epic action-adventure romantic comedies. years, decades even, without over-the-top pyrotechnics and absurdly timed makeout sessions, by-the-skin-of-their-teeth resolutions and good writing. at last the embargo has been lifted.

[arielsojourner]

So I was in Greece and found out it was a lie.

All those episodes of Xena Warrior Princess and Iolaus: The Legendary Journeys.

They.

Were.

LIES.

Did you know that throughout ALL of Greece for all the centuries leading up to when the Romans invaded, all of the many myriad city states and colonies-- west to Sicily and south to Africa and north east to Asia Minor, all of them: no temples to Ares.

None.

All the other gods? Yup. Hell, they even imported Isis from Egypt so she has shrines on Delos. DELOS. The holy birthplace of Apollo. Shrines to the Egyptian goddess Isis.

But Ares? No.

And in both shows that was the WHOLE plot. It was always about Ares and his temples and shrines. Even the Young Hercules spin off with Ryan Gosling as Hercules and the actor who would later be Fili the Dwarf playing young Iolaus, Ares was always in his temples and always trying to protect his temples from being smashed up or destroyed. And I visit Greece for the first time in my life and go to all these amazing sites-- Delos, the canal at Corinth, Olympia, Delphi, Athens, Ithaca, Patmos, Tinos etc. and . . . no Ares. No temple to Ares.

And when you visit Greece and they take you to the ruins of the temples of Athena and Zeus and Apollo etc. you learn that people built temples for the gods to use as like vacation homes when they didn't want to stay on Olympus.

All those city states. All those colonies and during the entire Hellenic period no one built one single temple to Ares according to the docent at the Delphi museum.

Apparently no one wanted Ares as a neighbor.

[sprqpointintern]

everyone on the internet right now

[livelovecaliforniadreams]

[witchb1tches]

Rest In Peace 🤝 I'm Just Ken

[writelikeurruninoutoftime]

Ryan Gosling had no right to be that hot in The Fall Guy yet here we are

[livelaughlobotomyxx]

making my way through ryan gosling’s filmography and hyperfixating on all the different characters like the ball getting knocked around in a pin ball machine.

[blondie20000]

2023 Summer crushes!

2024 Summer Crushes!

Honourable mention.

[barrracuuda]

Remember when I said I needed more time with his design?

This is fanart of @drizzeltheraincat fanfic, the Heaven’s Fall series!

(Hope you like this one as much as the first drizzle!)

[arabellanextdoor]

I’m not bitter anymore cause —

I know what we had was real

the notebook (2006) | 123 mins

directed by nick cassavetes

[bettsfic]

so i watched a movie called Half Nelson last night, for which Ryan Gosling was nominated for an Oscar in 2006. it's about a middle school teacher struggling with a drug addiction who forms a deeply inappropriate relationship friendship with one of his students after she catches him using.

i have no pertinent craft thoughts about this film (you can read my Ryan Gosling Summer craft essays in this month's newsletter) but my notes for this particular movie became as unhinged as the movie itself, and i thought i'd share them.

because my handwriting is mostly illegible, i've provided a translation and context below each note.

Jesse Pinkman vibes

Calculator watch!

Dan (Gosling) is basically a proto Jesse Pinkman in this movie. and he wears a calculator watch. it's worth noting that during the sex scene later, there is an inordinate amount of attention placed on said watch, and i honestly can't tell if that's supposed to be funny or not.

Gets high, goes to a bar, starts lecturing girls about pedagogy

this is the only part of the movie where i liked Dan, because i too lecture on pedagogy when i'm high.

Broken Social Scene ass soundtrack

just found out that Broken Social Scene did in fact score the film.

"I cleaned up," he says before railing a line of cocaine

no context needed.

"Are you a communist?"

"It's just not cool to be a Nazi anymore, baby."

HE IS GRINDING AGAINST HER AT A DANCE?

I trust Anthony Mackie way more than this fucker

Bloody nose in class

Dead cat?

This is so hard to watch.

i don't know how to provide context for this. i had such profound secondhand embarrassment that i could barely keep watching. the succession of events goes something like: Dan has sex with a woman who asks him the next morning if he's a communist. they have a conversation about politics. we skip to a middle school dance/mixer where Dan dances very inappropriately with the 13 year old he's "befriended," Drey. by this point the movie makes it very clear that their relationship is inappropriate. Dan gets high behind the school building and offers to give Drey a ride home, but she goes with Frank (Anthony Mackie) who is a drug dealer but a way better guy than Dan, even though he's trying to get her to sell drugs for him. Frank is trying to save Drey from Dan; Dan is trying to save Drey from Frank. the next day, Dan gets a nosebleed in class and later comes home to find his cat dead? for some reason? i don't know. it's all so painful.

[a graph of Ryan Gosling's characters, with bad to good as the X-axis and likable to unlikable as the Y-axis. Dan Dunne, the character in this movie, is in the "good, unlikable" quadrant.]

to pass the time i created this handy little chart, which puts Ken (Barbie) and Lars (Lars and the Real Girl) in the likable/good quadrant, with K (Blade Runner 2049) and Noah (The Notebook) slightly below them, Sierra Six (The Gray Man) and Dean (Blue Valentine) in the likable/bad quadrant, Jacob Palmer (Crazy Stupid Love) in the bad/unlikable quadrant (sorry i know i have followers who love this movie but womanizing just really pisses me off, even though he does grow as a character by the end), and Dan Dunne (Half Nelson) in the good/unlikable quadrant, even though i kind of changed my mind by the end of the movie.

i forgot Handsome Luke (Place Beyond the Pines) and the driver (Drive), but i think they'd both be close to the center but in the bad/likable quadrant.

For all this movie's faults, burnout drug addict middle school teacher Ryan Gosling pouring an entire pot of coffee into a thermos is a LOOK.

this scene had very little context and i have none to add.

[Ryan Gosling movie] checklist

shirtless

mommy issues

misunderstood loner

falls for cute blonde girl (CBG)

good guy made to do bad things

inappropriate relationship

still bored, i made a checklist. Ryan Gosling's characters are always at least three of these, with "shirtless" and "mommy issues" prevailing. also "cute blonde girl" isn't a description as much as a flat character type that fascinates me.

HE BUYS FROM HER WTF WTF WTF

okay during what i found to be a both boring and torturous film, a scene happens that made me go "oh, i get why he was nominated for an Oscar for this." Frank has gotten Drey to start selling for him, and she goes to a motel to drop off, where she finds two sex workers, some random guy, and her history teacher, Dan. this is the third time she's caught him using but he's always kind of guilty and apologetic about it, and my interpretation is that a lot of their "friendship" has to do with him trying to earn back her admiration. but this time, he's on the bathroom floor and he just gives her this look, the patented Ryan Gosling "i'm in love with you" look which is probably why he's the romantic lead in so many things, and hands her a wad of cash. and it's so wildly fucked up to see that look used in this context, weaponized, because it's not to her, it's to the baggie she's holding.

the whole movie is very much a critical commentary on white savior narratives. i have no idea if it's a successful commentary, or even if it's a good movie, but i can safely say i've never seen anything like it. i don't think it's aged well, overall i don't think it's Gosling's best performance even though many people believe it is, and i absolutely don't recommend it.

[law-avocados]

So here's a little fun fact about the fall guy movie that many of you may or may not know. The fall guy is actually a reboot of a 1980s tv show called the fall guy that is basically the same as the movie where he's a stunt man but not only is Colt severs a stunt man he is also a bounty hunter (which is something I wish they explored in the movie), the show is like kind of hard to find because it's not on streaming and there's only 1 season available on DVD (in the us anyways). In the very end of the fall guy movie when the two "cops" show up well that just happened to be a cameo by Lee majors and Heather Thomas who portrayed the original colt and Jody in the 1980s tv show.

[raspberry-arev]

You know that ancient (and wonderful) Tumblr take on love triangles... where the girl is aroace and the two hot men realize they were moreless trying to impress each other and start dating instead?

Well I already subscribe to the Aroace Barbie head canon, so Greta Gerwig, 2Ken When?????

(the colors are a bit silly again but that's just my alcohol marker thing. I try, it does a thing, I might not be satisfied but it's too late now bithc) (also they would be so good for each other. himbo on himbo romance. "Kenning all over each other" in Ryan Gosling's words)

[thebeaconstreetcollection]

[islawila]

mood idk

[finelytaylored]

nobody look at me ever again I'm bursting into flames.

I'm gonna need AT LEAST 5-7 business days to process the fact that Gerard and Ken have cunty matching bestie sunglasses...