#SHE WROTE 18 OF HER 19 NUMBER ONE HITS. AND THE ONLY EXCEPTION WAS A COVER THAT WAS NEVER MEANT TO BE A SINGLE

[niccage]

Sorry for the Mariah Carey spam but yesterday my coworker revealed that she didn’t know that Mariah wrote all of her own songs and it really upset me. Like not even kidding i almost white boy punched a wall

[lochtayboatsong]

The Jesus Christ Superstar essay absolutely no one asked for.

Last weekend, I watched the pro-shot of the 2012 arena tour of Jesus Christ Superstar starring Ben Forster, Tim Minchin, and Melanie C, because it was Easter and it was up on YT for the weekend.  I never managed to do my annual listen-through of Leonard Bernstein’s Mass this year, as is my usual Easter tradition, so I figured “Why not watch/listen to this instead?”  It was my first time seeing and hearing JCS in full, and Y’ALL, it has been living rent-free in my brain ever since.  I have a mighty need to get my thoughts out, so here they are, in chronological order by song.  

1) Prologue: I love the way JCS 2012 makes use of the arena video screen.  The production design and concept clearly took a lot of inspiration from the “Occupy ______” movement, which makes it feel a bit dated now.  But every single production of JCS is a product of its time period, so this is a feature and not a bug.  

2) Heaven On Their Minds: This is a straight-up rock song.  It wouldn’t be out of place on any rock and roll album released between 1970 and 2021, and it boggles my mind that Webber and Rice were both in their early twenties when they wrote it.  Also, the lyric “You’ve begun to matter more than the things you say” hits hard no matter the year.

3) What’s the Buzz: A+ use of the arena screens again, this time bringing in social media to set the tone.  Also, this song establishes right from the outset that Jesus is burnt out and T I R E D by this point in the story.  Seriously, can we just let this man have a nap?

4) Strange Thing Mystifying: Judas publicly calls out Mary and Jesus claps back.  Folx, get you a partner who will defend your honor the way Jesus defends MM in this scene.  Also Jesus loses his shoes and is mostly barefoot for the remainder of the show.

5) Everything’s Alright: Okay, this is one of the songs I have A LOT to say about.  First, it’s important to know that I was a church musician throughout all of my adolescence and into my early adulthood.  The pianist at the services I usually played at was a top-notch jazz pianist, and also my piano teacher for about six years while I as in high school and undergrad.  (Incidentally, I had a HUGE crush on his son, who was/is a jazz saxophonist and clarinetist and also played in the church band, but that’s a story for another day.)  One of the hymns we played a few times a year was called “Sing of the Lord’s Goodness,” which is notable for being in 5/4 time.  Whenever this hymn was on the schedule, it was usually the recessional, or the last song played as the clergy processed out and the congregation got ready to leave, so we were able to have some fun with it.  After a couple verses the piano player and his son would usually morph it into “Take Five,” a famous jazz standard by Dave Brubeck which is also in 5/4 time.  Anyway, the first time I listened to this song in full, it got to Judas’s line “People who are hungry, people who are starving,” and I sat bolt upright and went “HOLY SHIT THIS IS ‘SING OF THE LORD’S GOODNESS/TAKE FIVE.’”  And I was ricocheted back in time to being fourteen and trying to keep up with this father/son duo in a cavernous Catholic church while simultaneously making heart-eyes at the son.  Final note: This is the only song in the musical to feature all three leads (Jesus, Judas, and Mary Magdalene) and is mostly Jesus and MM being soft with each other in between bouts of Jesus and Judas snarling at one another.

6) This Jesus Must Die: I LOVE that all the villains in this production are in tailored suits.  LOVE IT.  Also, Caiaphas and Annas are a comedy duo akin to “the thin guy and the fat guy,” except in this case it’s “the low basso profundo and the high tenor.”  Excellent use of the arena video screen again, this time as CCTV.

7) Hosanna: My background as a church musician strikes back again.  It honestly took me two or three listens to catch it, but then I had another moment of sitting bolt upright and going “HOLY SHIT THIS IS A PSALM.”  Psalms sung in church usually take the form of call-and-response, with a cantor singing the verses and the congregation joining in for the chorus.  If I close my eyes during this song, I have no trouble imagining Jesus as a church cantor singing the verses and then bringing the congregation in for the “Ho-sanna, Hey-sanna” chorus. 

8) Simon Zealotes: This is part “Gloria In Excelsis” and part over-the-top Gospel song.  Honestly it’s not my favorite, but it marks an important mood change in the show.  The end of “Hosanna” is probably Jesus at his happiest in the entire show, and then Simon comes in and sours the mood by trying to tip the triumphant moment into a violent one.  Jesus is not truly happy again from this moment on.

9) Poor Jerusalem: Also not my fave.  It kinda reads like Webber and Rice realized that Jesus didn’t have a solo aria in Act I, so they came up with this.  But it has the distinction of containing the lyric, “To conquer death you only have to die,” which is the biggest overarching theme of the story.

10) Pilate’s Dream: Pontius Pilate might be the most underrated role in this entire show, and I love that this production has him singing this song while being dressed in judge’s robes.  

11) The Temple: The first half of this is one of the campiest numbers in Act I, at least in this production, and it’s awesome.  The second half is one of the saddest, as Jesus tries to heal the sick but finds there are too many of them.  Also the whole scene is almost entirely in 7/8 time, which I think is just cool.

12) I Don’t Know How To Love Him: Mary Magdalene’s big aria, and one of the songs I knew prior to seeing the full-length show.  This production has MM taking off her heavy lipstick and eye makeup onstage, mid-song, which is kind of cool.  Melanie C says in a BTS interview that MM’s makeup is her armor, so this is a Big Symbolic Moment.

13) Damned For All Time: The scene transition into this song is played entirely in pantomime, and I love it.  The solo guitarist gets to be onstage for a bit, A+ use of the video screen again to show Judas on CCTV, etc.  Love it.  And then this song is Judas frantically rationalizing what he’s doing, and what he’s about to do, with Caiphas and Annas just reacting with raised eyebrows and knowing looks.

14) Blood Money: This is where the tone of the show really takes a turn for the dark.  I think this might be one of Tim Minchin’s finest moments as Judas, because his facial expressions and microexpressions throughout this scene speak absolute volumes.  And the offstage chorus quietly singing “Well done Judas” as he picks up the money is a positively chilling way to end Act I.

15) The Last Supper: Act II begins with major “Drink With Me” vibes.  (Except JCS came WAY before Les Miz, so it’s probably more accurate to say that “Drink With Me” has major “The Last Supper” vibes.)  Jesus and Judas have their knock-down, drag-out fight, and it’s honestly heartbreaking, thanks again to Tim Minchin’s facial expressions.  A well-done production of JCS will really convey that Jesus and Judas were once closer than brothers, even though their relationship is at breaking point when Act I begins.

16) Gethsemane: This is Jesus’s major showpiece and one of my faves.  Jesus knows he has less than 24 hours to live, he knows he’s going to suffer, and worst of all, he doesn’t know whether it’s going to be worth it.  It’s an emotional rollercoaster to watch and to perform, and it goes on for ages: something like 6 or 7 minutes.  Fun fact: the famous G5 is not written in the score.  Ian Gillan, who played Jesus on the original concept album, just sang it that way, so most subsequent Jesuses have also done it that way.  Lindsay Ellis has a great supercut of this on YT.  John Legend notably sang the line as written during the 2018 concert.  

17) The Arrest: Judas’s Betrayer’s Kiss is played differently across different productions.  The 2012 version is pretty tame - I’ve seen clips and gifs of other productions, including the 2000 direct-to-video version, where they kiss fully on the mouth and have to be dragged apart by the guards and it is THE MOST TENDER THING.  Then the 7/8 riff from “The Temple” comes back and the 2012 version lets the video screen do its thing again as Jesus is swarmed by reporters.

18) Peter’s Denial: Not much to say about this one, as it’s basically a scene transition.  But it’s a significant moment in the Passion story, so I’m glad they included it.

19) Pilate and Christ: The 2012 production continues with the theme of Caiaphas, Annas, and Pilate all being bougie af, since Pilate intentionally looks like he just came from tennis practice during this scene.  Also he does pilates...hehehe.

20) King Herod’s Song: Tim Minchin says in a BTS interview that JCS works best when Jesus and Judas are played seriously and the rest of the production is allowed to be completely camp and wild and bizarre all around them, and he is bloody well CORRECT about that.  Case in point: King Herod.  There is not a single production of JCS that I know of where Herod is played “straight.”  He’s been played by everyone from Alice Cooper to Jack Black, and everyone puts a different zany spin on him.  In JCS 2012 he’s a chat show host in a red crushed velvet suit, who is clearly having the time of his LIFE. 

21) Could We Start Again Please: This is another of my faves.  Just a quiet moment where MM, Peter, and the disciples try to grapple with the fact that Jesus is arrested and things are going very, very badly.  This is also my favorite Melanie C moment of the 2012 show.  Her grief is very real, and the little moment she has with Peter at the end is very real.

22) Death of Judas: This is basically Tim Minchin screaming for about five minutes, and incredibly harrowing to watch on first viewing.  

23) Trial Before Pilate: Possibly my single favorite scene in the entire 2012 production.  This is another harrowing watch, but there’s so much to take in.  The “set�� that the entire show takes place on is essentially just a massive staircase, and the people with power are almost always positioned above the people without power.  In this scene, the crowd shouting “Crucify Him!” is positioned above Pilate, which is a very telling clue to Pilate’s psychology during this scene.  Jesus is at the very bottom of the stairs, of course.  Excellent use of the video screen once again during the 39 Lashes, to show the lash marks building and building until the entire screen is a wash of red.  Pilate’s counting also gets more and more frantic, especially starting around “20.”  And all the while the guitar riff from “Heaven On Their Minds” is playing.  Jesus’s line “Everything is fixed and you can’t change it” is played quite differently in different productions - here it’s defiant, but elsewhere (in JCS 2000 for example) it’s almost tender, like Jesus is absolving Pilate for his part in the trial.  But it always ends the same - with Pilate almost screaming as he passes the sentence and “washes his hands” of the whole sorry business. 

24) Superstar: The most over-the-top number in the show.  Judas, who died two scenes ago, comes back to sing this.  There are soul singers.  There are girls in skimpy angel costumes.  The parkour guys from the prologue are back.  Judas pulls a tambourine out of hammerspace midway through the song.  And Jesus is silently screaming and crying as he gets hoisted onto a lighting beam while all this is going on.

25) The Crucifixion: More of a spoken-word piece than a song, it’s Jesus’s final words on the cross over eerie piano music, and another harrowing watch.

26) John 19:41: An instrumental piece in which Jesus is taken from the cross and carried, at last, to the top of the stairs, before being lowered out of sight as the video screen turns into a memorial wall and everything fades to black.

So.  I know I’m anywhere from three to fifty-one years late to this particular party, but I am on the JCS bandwagon now and I’m thoroughly enjoying myself.  :)

[facets-and-rainbows]

Blue Exorcist 10th anniversary book Q&A session

The 10th anniversary book has a section where Katoh answers 100 questions submitted by fans on Twitter, so here they are translated/paraphrased! May contain manga spoilers up to the recent flashback arc, so be warned.

(Note that I’m playing it very fast and loose here because there are A HUNDRED OF THEM, so not exact wordings, but it should capture the gist. Lemme know if there are any you want elaborated on)

1. Katoh likes the feel of traditional drawing more than digital but is impressed with how far digital has come

2. Meph THOROUGHLY ABUSES spacetime to watch all his shows and ensure that he gets all the merch he wants

3. Did the girls take all of Yukio’s school uniform buttons in middle school? Yes, they did (apparently it’s like A Thing for girls to ask for a button from their crush at middle school graduation, based on some sad movie from the 60s where a guy who got drafted as a kamikaze pilot gave a girl one of his uniform buttons to remember him by)

4. Rin's tail is about a meter long

5. There are tons of servants working at Mephisto's mansion. Belial is in charge of them

6. Katoh borrows from all sorts of neat real locations when making settings

7. Katoh identifies with pretty much all the characters the most! Except Lucifer.

8. Demon designs she's proud of include the impure king and hachirou, pretty much anything that was the main one in an arc

9. Katoh lists a bunch of her favorite musical artists/music she’s listening to recently: King Gnu, Official Hige Dandism, Kenshi Yonezu, BAD HOP, Sakanaction, Keyakizaka 46, Hypnosis Mic, Aimer, B’Z, Queen Bee.

10. Awww the rabbit manga that characters are often reading isn't just Robo to Usakichi, it's an even older one that she drew as a little kid

11. She likes industrial style interior designs

12. Rin and Yukio alternated who got the top bunk growing up, because they couldn't agree on it lol

13. Katoh cares a whole lot about panel layouts and speech bubble positions, might even be her favorite part of the process (it shows!)

4. Katoh does NOT have a mashou, lol

15. Rin has probably been practicing in secret so he can learn to carry stuff with his tail

16. Izumo probably got into shojo manga around 1st grade, her mom had some around the house

17. Specialty dishes: Rin - lots of stuff but especially nabe Yuri - stuff you can throw together quickly Shiro - stuff he learned from Yuri and/or cookbooks, alongside teaching Rin Yukio - Does. Not. Cook.

18. Can't pick a favorite place she's been on research, but there's no place like Japan

19. Kinzou's band isn't currently meeting because demons, but he's probably still thinking of new songs

20. Hardest characters to draw: anyone with detailed flowing hair. Hardest to write for: Lightning and Gedouin. She had to go read books about serial killers specifically for material for Gedouin, lol 

21. Suguro actually gets a dorm room to himself, though allegedly Yukio is technically assigned as his roommate, lol. Didn't end up that way what with Yukio being a teacher and also Rin’s whole...situation

22. Shiemi makes some of her own hair accessories! Cute

23. Katoh doesn't mind if you include stuff with fan letters but check with the editor first

24. Time for making each chapter: Planning/storyboarding: 1-5 days. Sketching: 3-5 days. Drawing/inking: the rest. Just...the rest of the time

25. Neither Suguro nor Izumo have dated before and neither is currently dating. But that's probably just because things were hectic for them! It could happen

26. Yukio breaks 5 or 6 pairs of glasses a year, someone get this kid a strap or something

27. How many spare glasses does Yukio have? Check the fanbook lol it's in there (dang it Katoh)

28. The demon she wants us to pay the most attention to is Lucifer. Because plot.

29. What's under the Order's big meeting table? It's a BOTTOMLESS PIT and if you fall in it you DIE that's what makes it COOL (laughs)

30. What are the job requirements for the angelic legion? Literally just Arthur liking you and inviting you to join

31. She WANTS to do more character profiles but just hasn't gotten to it

32. Rin's tail feels like a cat tail, texture wise

33. The "red Assiah fire" is literally just actual fire nothing special

34. Rin's current hair color is light blue fading to white at the ends

35. Thoughts on Rin's growth: she likes that he stays positive in awful situations and she also thinks it's very main character of him to face the past instead of avoiding it

36. Mephisto didn't purposely surround Rin with stuffed animals when he woke up after going crispy. Mephisto's bed is just Like That

37. Kurikara was based on a cool sword she found in a sword book, but that one was technically just a ceremonial sword. The symbol on it us a Sanskrit letter kaan (sp?) associated with Fudou Myouou

38. Kuro can communicate with normal cats and hangs out with them often

39. Sometimes Shiemi's skirt is extra fancy around the hem what's up with that? Apparently it's an optional accessory that comes with the skirts help I haven't noticed this and don't know any fashion terms in any language

40. When coloring, Katoh always tries to have an overall theme in mind ("emphasis on blue" etc) so it comes together in the end

41. Yes the twins are genetically related to Shiro because of Goro (she says they're like his nephews but I say GENETICALLY at least they'd be indistinguishable from his children)

42. Strongest mom of all the strong moms around here? Yuri! Did you SEE her give birth??

43. Are you careful about your own health Katoh-sensei? Not particularly! Her mom has had to bring her food at work sometimes! Don't do this at home kids

44. At the dating events Shura goes to, does she drink cocktails in moderation? Yeah, she probably downplays her normal drinking habits at these things. But normally she's down for just about any kind of drink

45. Lucifer just really likes oysters okay

46. How many pages of manga does Katoh draw in a day? If she's being good about self-care: three. Maximum number ever: TEN

47. Mephisto is one of those folks who can eat like a garbage compactor and never gain weight. Possibly because his body resists that sort of change the same way it resists aging etc

48. First food Rin cooked: fish burger type patty. Yukio's favorite things Rin cooks: fish simmered in soy sauce, yellowtail with daikon radish. It's fish all the way down

49: Did Rin ever get more monthly allowance from Mephisto? It doubled! He gets TWO 2000 yen bills now (rip) [T/N: That's uh, that's USD $37.26 a month or 33.10 euro]

50. Why isn't Rin more popular with the girls? He gets nervous talking to them, plus he's too oblivious to notice even if he DID have some fans

51. Why change Suguro's hair? She gets bored with keeping everything the same, and she wanted a visual representation that he was getting serious and going into kind of a training arc

52. Things Katoh pays extra attention to when drawing: trying to capture the feel of whatever she's drawing (like "that looks warm and soft" or "I bet that guy stinks" cough Lightning cough)

53: Does Rin take after Yuri more? (He's got her eyes!) Katoh tried to draw Yuri so she looks like both twins. Personality, too - Yukio has her smarts and Rin has her optimism

54: Do you ever wanna be like Mephisto? Well she'd like to be able to get away with just ANYTHING EVER, but no, let's not be like Mephisto

55. Konekomaru not only carries around a cat toy in case he meets any cats, he MAKES cat toys to carry around based on what he thinks the cats would like

56. How'd you come up with Shima? Go read the fan book!

57. Do the kids have Twitter/Instagram accounts? Rin - probably not. Konekomaru might be on some social media. Paku and Izumo are totally on instagram

58. Is there something Rin makes that you wish you could try? All of it! That's the whole idea! He's good at cooking!

59. Will we ever have a (G-rated) reveal of what ALL of Mamushi and her family's tattoos look like? Maybe! She'll think about it

60. Does Arthur have a repertoire of different hairstyles? Not really, he just puts some of it up on the top. Heck he might even have people to do that for him

61. If you wrote a shojo manga what would it be about? She'd have to do a lot of research before even coming up with a story, since there are so many style differences between the genres aside from just the subject

62. The other two of Mephisto's top 3 favorite foods: Cup ramen and....f-fried bubblegum?? Is that a THING???

63. Where do you start when drawing a character? Usually the outline of their face but if it's a complex pose/composition she'll start with whatever's in the foreground (like hands)

64. If Katoh could have a familiar, what demon would she choose? Mephisto. As the all-powerful author, she might actually be able to command him as a familiar!

66. If you swapped Yukio and Rin's relationship around what would change? not much, you'd pretty much have Rin going to the Illuminati and Yukio going to the past

67. Top 3 foods/souvenirs to try in Kyushu? Well she doesn't know what’s good CURRENTLY but when she was there she always used to like burdock tempura udon, hakata torimon (a kind of manju with white bean paste inside), and Chikae style cod roe. today I learned Katoh went to high school in Kyushu

68. Katoh listens to music a lot while she's storyboarding, then when she and the assistants are all drawing and inking they put various videos/movies and stuff on in the background

69. For all his hitting on girls, is Shima actually popular with the ladies at all? He's got enough girls in his life that he probably COULD find a girlfriend if he really wanted, but the double agent thing tends to get in the way. He still wouldn't be as popular as Yukio though (side thought/translator’s note: Shima would be proud of being number 69.)

70. Katoh has the ending planned out in a big-picture way, but there are still a few details here and there that she's fretting over

71. It's cute when the boys put their ties over their shoulders when they're working on something! Where'd that come from? She just figured a tie might get in the way and that seemed like a realistic way to get it out of the way

72. Looks like Yukio is getting some facial hair! What about Rin? They're both about the age for it, but maybe Rin can't grow a beard yet. Maybe a little peach fuzz here and there

73. Katoh's favorite blue exorcist merch? There were some exorcist licenses a while back, and the exorcist pins. Basically it's really cool that these little accessories she drew ACTUALLY EXIST NOW, LIKE YOU CAN HOLD THEM IN YOUR HANDS

74. Okay realtalk how long do we have left, I don't want the series to end yet? We're solidly in the second half by now but it's not, like, ABOUT to end yet

75. Katoh would be a Knight meister, based on what characters she likes to play in games and such

76. How many people in the whole exorcism cram school? More than you think! She doesn't give a number but apparently licensed exorcists also attend classes for new meisters, etc, so there's a wide age range attending

77. How's Arthur feel about, like, studying Taming on the way to becoming Paladin? He's at least mostly accepted that you have to use demons to fight demons effectively

78. Konekomaru started wearing glasses in his first year of middle school, so like 7th grade (more recent than I thought!) He has one spare pair, in contrast to Yukio lol

79. Katoh's current obsessions? Ghost/scary stories! She's even been going to live readings of them recently

80. Media Katoh consumes for inspiration? A wide range of foreign teen drama, horror/suspense, shojo manga, light novels, anime, etc. Special focus on things where two boys are in conflict or there are brothers involved

81. If they weren't exorcists what jobs would they have? Rin - chef. Yukio - doctor. Shiemi - uh, florist?

82. Inspiration for the design of True Cross Town? Katoh and her assistants gathered up a bunch of references, picked out stuff they felt matched the tone, and mashed them all up together

83. Did you use any references etc for the school/exorcist uniforms? She says she probably should have but she just kind of made them up before publication

84. Favorite part of drawing? For color pages, picking out a color scheme. For black and white, drawing in all the little details (though she doesn't always get time to lately)

85. Once again confirms the demon kings' weird hair is a representation of their horns. ADDS THAT PEOPLE WHO CAN'T SEE DEMONS CAN'T SEE THE WEIRD HAIR

86. Now that Yukio's at the Illuminati, where's he gonna get his Jump SQ and spare glasses? Well he probably never planned to stay for long, but hey it's a big ship and they might have an optometrist and/or newsstand there

87. Do you base the demon characters on any references etc? Not really, she just gets a general idea of popular demon designs and then makes up her own in her own style

88. Merchandise Katoh personally wants to have made: stuff that an adult could just use in their day to day life. Also, it's not gonna happen, but if her favorite figure brand made AoEx figures she could die happy

89. If Beelzebub's host body was a beautiful woman, how would Shima react? Would the womanizing win out over the bug phobia? Katoh replies that Shima would probably just faint from being near a girl that pretty, before the bugs even got involved

90. Will the twins ever get to smile and eat dinner together again?? We'll just have to wait and see!

91. What do you check at a "scenario check"? what's a scenario check man I dunno They check for people being out of character or the setting feeling off. They had a lot of these checks for the anime, but they also do them for the drama CD, games, and all that other stuff where multiple authors are involved

92. Why does Shura use baldy as an insult for people who are clearly not bald? She feels like they have some kind of metaphorical, mental kind of "baldness" and she's calling them out on it. Whatever that means

93. After Blue Exorcist ends, what do you want to draw next? She has SO MANY IDEAS, SO MANY

94. Did Katoh make up the Shinto chants that, for example, Izumo used against Gedouin? They're assembled from bits of actual Shinto prayers according to what feels right in the scene

95. Yukio reads the Jump SQ, right, and, just hear me out here, he likes gag manga, right? Does this mean he reads Salaryman Yukio? It's something he would read, but let's say that in the AoEx universe there's just a very similar manga that he finds oddly relatable

96. What do Yukio and Shima do in their free time on the Dominus Liminus? oh my god you guys this ship has so many amenities.  Yukio probably spends time reading in the library, which they totally have. There's also, like, a gym, and a movie theater, and a THEATER theater, all of which are free. Shima probably hangs out at the pool (!) and goes to the movies, and hits on illuminati girls, lol

97. Easiest character to draw? The ones with boring simple hair, lol. Lightning gets an honorable mention for ALSO not having eyes in most shots, but Rin wins--he was specifically designed to be easy for Katoh to draw because that's what you want in your main character

98. How do demons understand gender? They just possess whatever feels like the best match to how they feel in Gehenna, whether that's a man, or a woman, or a rat, or whatever

99. Where do you start when you're coming up with a story? She starts with character design and how the characters relate to each other. Currently she's just continuing an existing story, so she works on splitting up the overall plot into episodes and fleshing it out with scenes and information about characters

100. When do you feel most happy? She honestly feels like she lives a very happy life overall. Mentions noticing a lot of little things, like how nice her cats' heads smell when she cuddles them or taking a nice cold refreshing drink of water. There's happiness in everything. aww.

[bananaofswifts]

ince about 2018, Taylor Swift has been at the centre of arguably the most riveting contract dispute in music business history since Prince wrote “slave” on his cheek. It has been a conflict fought in public, in detail. No precis does the nuances justice, but the crux of Swift’s unhappiness is that the rights to her first six albums were sold out from under her nose when her former label, Big Machine, was acquired by a man she regards as an enemy: Scooter Braun.

Braun is Justin Bieber’s manager; more pertinently, he also managed the rapper Kanye West at a time when West was tormenting Swift – another vexed tale wrapped around this one in a double helix. The antagonism between Swift and West began when he interrupted her acceptance speech for best female video at the VMAs in 2009. The video in question was You Belong With Me – a hit from Swift’s hugely successful 2008 album Fearless. That album has now been totally re-recorded by Swift and was released on Friday.

Why? In November 2020, after months of hostilities exchanged via social media and the legal profession, Braun sold Swift’s catalogue on to a private equity firm, Shamrock Holdings. As part of the deal, Braun would continue to profit from the use of Swift’s early work on streaming platforms, radio, TV and adverts.

If you were trying to sell this as an art forgery, someone would eventually twig

Swift particularly objects to the fruits of her youthful labours going to a man she has accused of “incessant, manipulative bullying”, on whose watch West made a video creepily sexually objectifying her (other celebrities were also depicted).

Swift’s radical solution is to make her first six albums worth significantly less by re-recording them, so that future uses favour her, not Shamrock or Braun. Hence Fearless (Taylor’s Version) – less an album and more a breathtaking chess move, the aural equivalent of pulling the rug out from under her antagonists.

First released in 2008 – 13 years ago, a favourite number of Swift’s – Fearless was Swift’s second studio outing and first massive hit. By the time the album’s cycle had concluded, she had the bestselling album in the US and a slew of awards, including the Grammy for album of the year– she was the award’s youngest-ever recipient until Billie Eilish.

It was a different world: when the album was released, Swift, just 18, had recently broken up with a Jonas Brother. Her songs were rooted in country, but the foundations of her pop auteurism were plain. The album’s overemphasis on romance was mitigated by Swift’s insightfulness, which only grew more acute with time.

“When you’re 15, and somebody tells you they love you, you’re gonna believe them,” she sang ruefully on the autobiographical Fifteen, from the lofty vantage point of someone not yet of legal drinking age in the US. Swift’s signature ad libs were there too – the laugh on Hey Stephen – as were the killer bridges that hallmark so many of her best songs, riding on the thermal of a key change.

All this is still present, and there’s more: six unreleased songs that date from the Fearless album sessions plus a re-recording of Today Was A Fairytale, a song she contributed to the soundtrack to the 2010 film Valentine’s Day. On Fearless (Taylor’s Version), Swift has radically recreated the 2008 cover shot. Its sepia tint, and the loose peasant blouse she is wearing, very much suggest the contemporary Swift of her soft-focus albums of 2020, Folklore and Evermore.

But she has been at pains to reproduce her original country-pop as precisely as possible, the better to gazunder Shamrock Holdings. It’s a labour of revenge, but also of love: Swift has re-employed key contributors from the period and mixed them with members of her live band who played many of these songs live for years. Guests such as Keith Urban, who she toured with at the time, crop up on bonus tracks like That’s When.

These unreleased vault tracks are something of a mixed bag. They’re intended as a sweetener – choice pickings from Swift’s rich vault of unreleased material – but she has carte blanche to present them as she pleases. They’ve ended up as sedate iterations, pairing the brighter, more direct songcraft of the younger Swift with the watercolour production of the Folklore era. There are exceptions: Mr Perfectly Fine can handle the pastels, it’s such a stone cold classic Swift song; You All Over Me is similarly rewarding, not least because it is an obvious precursor to 1989’s Clean.

The core reproductions, however – of the 19 re-recorded tracks that formed the platinum version of Fearless – are a roaring success. The verisimilitude of the music is as near-as-dammit, although if you were trying to sell this as an art forgery, someone would eventually twig. The production can’t help but sound smoother, the quality of the playing more nuanced – witness the interplay between the guitar and banjo that opens the new version of the title track, or on one of the album’s biggest hits, You Belong With Me.

What really stands out, though, are Swift’s vocals. She can’t reproduce her reedier, less skilful teenage self. She parcels out her tones more cannily now, an anachronism that is no criticism. But spending time with all this juvenilia only points up the quality of Swift’s songwriting. Fearless (Taylor’s Version) is both an art project executed serendipitously and a strategic move the industry will be poring over for some time.

[horansqueen]

You & Me : chapter 29

A Niall Horan fanfiction ; rated MA

Sequel to AM CONVERSATIONS

CHAPTER 1 || CHAPTER 2 || CHAPTER 3 || CHAPTER 4 || CHAPTER 5 || CHAPTER 6 || CHAPTER 7 || CHAPTER 8 || CHAPTER 9 || CHAPTER 10 || CHAPTER 11 || CHAPTER 12 || CHAPTER 13 || CHAPTER 14 || CHAPTER 15 || CHAPTER 16 || CHAPTER 17 || CHAPTER 18 || CHAPTER 19 || CHAPTER 20 || CHAPTER 21 || CHAPTER 22 || CHAPTER 23 || CHAPTER 24 || CHAPTER 25 || CHAPTER 26 || CHAPTER 27 || CHAPTER 28

NOTES:

-one chapter is her pov, the next is his. -4.8k -im sorry, i never proofread, i hate it. -there WILL be smut. but not only smut. -this is a romance, comedy, smut story. -for the summary, check my MASTERLIST.

- notes: id love your feedbacks now that theyre happy together and id love to know what you think will happen of what you want to happen so if you read these notes please tell me!

if you want to be on the list of blogs i notify when this is updated, just message me :)

requests! : 4 requests! :) thank you so much!

Chapter 29 : His chapter

NIALL

I kept glancing at her as I drove and I couldn't take that stupid smile off of my lips. Her hair was dancing around her head, sometimes tickling my arm, cheek and neck, and it didn't bother me at all. In fact, I enjoyed it. She put her hand out of the window as it moved in waves because of the wind and the speed of the car on the high way and I loved watching her. She was wearing her stupid heart shaped sunglasses but they were new because these had purple tinted glasses, unlike the pink ones she used to have, and the smell of honey and vanilla reached my nose from time to time. I loved it. I loved her. She looked stunning in the golden hour and despite everything we had been through, at that exact moment, I was so fucking happy I could start flying.

She reached for the volume when one of my songs came on and I laughed as she started singing loud. The smile she was wearing told me I was not the only happy person in this car and I started singing with her, tapping on the wheel as she moved her upper body with the music. When the song was over I felt her reach for my thigh and she squeezed it a bit before turning the volume down again and leaning back against the seat. I could feel her gaze on my side and I was wondering what was burning my skin more : her eyes, or the setting sun hitting on my other cheek?

"Was this song written for a specific one night stand or was it just general?"

"Slow Hands?" I asked, raising my eyebrows before chuckling. "Who says I didn't write it about you?"

"Pretty sure you wrote it when we were not together anymore." she said with a frown.

"No!" I quickly replied after trying to imitate the sound of a 'wrong answer' buzzer from a tv quiz. "I started it when we were together. I just didn't really plan to add it to the album but I ended up thinking that album needed a bit more grit, i wanted something a bit more.. daring?"

She raised her eyebrows as I exited the high way and replaced her hair quickly without much success. It was adorable and I loved it a lot but I didn't mention it.

"That's daring alright. Are you talking about your fingertips or mine?" she asked with a chuckle, making me laugh.

"You decide!"

She chuckled again and I could swear she also rolled her eyes but it was hard to see because of her sunglasses. I parked a bit farther on the road and her eyes left me to look by her window. She shook her head before looking back at me and smiling.

"What?"

"I don't know, I'm always amazed at the number of beaches we can drive by here." she shrugged. "I'm just not used to it."

"You like it?"

She licked her lips and shrugged a bit, glancing down and then looking up at me. "I guess, yea. But I miss London. All the time."

I moved my own glasses up on my head and she took hers off, tilting her head and sending me a soft smile. It was a stupid thought, but at that moment, I felt the need to say it.

"You can always find your home in me." I let out, reaching for her hands and squeezing them. "You're mine, too. You're my home."

Her traits softened and she slowly moved closer, holding herself with both hands on one of my thighs before her lips reached mine. She kissed me softly and I didn't try to deepen the kiss, I just enjoyed the way he lips pressed gently but firmly against mine.

"You're my home too." she whispered, letting her eyes fall down to my laps after moving slightly away. "Unzip your pants."

"Excuse me what?" I asked with a nervous chuckle.

"Unzip your pants." she repeated without skipping a beat.

"I parked here for a walk on the beach, not for.. whatever you had planned." I explained, raising my eyebrows.

"You're not gonna say no to a blowjob twice in a row will you?" she asked, losing her smile but I could still see how amused she was in her eyes. "I'm gonna start doubting my skills."

The left corner of my lips raised and I unzipped my pants, my eyes never leaving hers. Of course I was not going to say no but damn I just hoped we wouldn't get caught. Her lips curled into a big smile before she quickly bend down. It took her half a second to have her lips around my cock and my hand gripped the wheel tight as the leather made an annoying noise. I could feel myself grow hard fast and I whimpered low. She took my dick completely in her mouth and I let out a low 'Jesus Christ' when I felt her fingers play with my balls. I looked around to see if anyone was getting closer and finally blinked a few times, looking down at her head moving up and down on me. I pushed her hair out of the way to see her better and pressed my lips together, feeling one of my legs shake. She normally goes slow and makes sure I can feel her lips on my tip, under my foreskin and down to my balls but this time, she just went fast and hard, letting the tip of my cock hit the back of her throat every time she could. I gripped her hair and licked my lips before they parted.

"Don't move, I'm gonna cum."

Quickly, I moved my hips up and down, thrusting my cock in and out of her mouth fast and hard until my eyes closed and my grip tightened.

"Holy f-, swallow it." I whispered without thinking, only half a second before I felt myself cum hard in her mouth.

I pushed her more on my cock as I felt an intense orgasm hit me like a wave and when I let go of her head, she took my dick out of her mouth but let her tongue run on the length before moving down to my balls and sucking on one. I felt my cock twitch and let out a groan as I heard her chuckle.

I quickly put my cock back in my pants when she moved her head up and the smirk she was sending me made my heart skip a beat.

"You came so fast!" she laughed, making me grimace.

"Shut up! You went so hard on my cock how was I supposed not to cum?"

I could have delayed my orgasm but I didn't see the point, especially since we were in a public place, but I didn't mention it. Of course, it made me nervous to get caught, but at the same time, the thrill was amazing.

"Do you still want to go on the beach?" I suggested, trying to talk about something else, before she nodded.

We both got out of the car and I grabbed my cap, putting it on my head and reaching my hand out for hers. She looked at it for a few seconds and stopped walking before looking up in my eyes. Something stirred in my stomach when she shook her head slightly and my arm fell back on my side. Ouch.

"You just sucked my cock in the car but you don't want to hold my hand?" I asked, raising my eyebrows. "No one will recognize us, no one cares!"

I didn't want to be rude but I couldn't pretend her behavior didn't hurt me a bit. I was normally the one who didn't want affection display in public whenever I was in a relationship but I never understood how the girls I dated could feel when I said that. Now, I had a good idea.

"I thought we... agreed that we would just.." she stopped herself and shook her head with a sigh. "I'm sorry Niall, i'm not ready for that, and you don't want that either. You hate PDA remember?"

My traits softened and I sighed, nodding slowly.

"I'm sorry, you're right, and I shouldn't have been so rude."

She licked her lips and after a few seconds, she followed me and we walked side by side on the beach with a small breeze against us. I kept glancing at her and after a while, I felt her fingers brush against mine.

"I love you, you know?" she said in a low tone, making me turn my head her way completely.

"I know, I love you too, I'm sorry, Olivia."

"I'm just.. I'm scared, Niall. Last time ended so badly, and now we're so happy. I don't want things to get bad after we make it official. I don't want what we have to vanish or even falter. I want this to last, and right now, it works, so, why risk it?"

I understood what she meant even if technically, it didn't really make sense, but I was pretty sure she knew that. I sat quickly in the sand, my knees up and holding myself with my elbows slightly behind myself, half laying down. She smiled and sat next to me in the same position, except she spread her legs out and crossed her ankles together. She was wearing soft black pants and her ridiculously dirty rainbow converse and I liked it without even knowing why.

"Okay, would you rather be always 10 minutes late or 20 minutes early?"

I raised my eyebrows and smiled slightly when I recognized the game. We used to always play that game when we were younger but as the years went by, the questions changed, and the answers too.

"20 minutes early, of course!" I frowned with a chuckle. "That was easy. Okay my turn. Would you rather have whatever you are thinking to appear above your head for everyone to see orrrrrr have absolutely everything you do live streamed for anyone to see?"

"That's an absolute shitty question." she complained. "Anything I think about appear above my head. That would imply a lot of people seeing your cock, though."

I let out a loud laughter and turned to her. "Are you thinking about my cock right now?"

"Of course!" she replied quickly. "Can't you see it above my head?"

We laughed together and she licked her lips.

"Mm, would you rather have edible spaghetti hair that regrows every night orrrr, sweat maple syrup."

I grimaced and shook my head. "This is horrible. Sweat maple syrup I guess."

"I guess I'd lick your armpits all the time, then." she shrugged, bringing a smirk to my lips.

"Oh I know you'd do it even now." I pointed out. I could swear I saw her cheeks turn a soft shade or red and chuckled. "You love my armpits. One time you literally put your face there and kissed it."

"That was an accident." she blatantly lied. " I was trying to kiss your... your shoulder."

"Liar. I was smelly too, I was just back from the gym." I added, knowing I was embarrassing her even more.

"Okay, Niall, your turn now!"

I laughed as I stared at her and finally pressed my lips together, trying to find a good question.

"Would you rather... have 10 orgasms every time you have sex but they're not that good, or just one every week but a fucking strong one."

"That's a horrible question and I'm sorry but I'm gonna go for the fucking strong one." she shrugged with a grimace. "I would be so annoying all week though, you wouldn't be able to live with me. I'd hump you all the time."

I laughed and rolled my eyes. "How often do you masturbate?"

Her eyes roamed on my face and she pressed her lips together, trying not to smile too much.

"Normally maybe, twice a day?" she just replied with a shrug. "These days, though, I don't. You're the only one who makes me cum."

I turned to her and sent her a big happy smile that she sent back.

"I would kiss you right now." I pointed out, making her smile too.

"I would kiss you back."

We stared at each other for a while and she finally looked away, turning her head to the water for a few minutes as the sun was disappearing into the horizon. I knew we should get up and leave to find a place to sleep but I didn't want to.

"Would you rather marry a 10 with a boring personality, or a 6 with an amazing personality." she let out, turning her head to send me a smile again. "Choose wisely."

"You're not asking this about yourself, right? Because you're not a 6."

"You're right, i'm a 4, at best. No wait, Heidi said a 3, right?"

"You're still thinking about that?" I asked in a lower and soft tone before she shrugged and turned again to the water. "You really shouldn't. She was just jealous."

"Heidi isn't jealous of anyone. What she says, she means." Liv pointed out. "You know, just because I know you're out of my league doesn't mean I'm not confident, or that I hate myself. I know society's beauty standards and I don't fit in. I never will. You do though." she pointed out, turning to me. "You've always been the pretty boy, the one everyone liked and wanted to be around. I was never jealous I was fucking mesmerized. Because you were my best friend and no one else's. You had picked me."

"I'm still picking you. I'm choosing you every single day, Olivia." I pointed out, sitting up and crossing my legs, looking down at my hands. "And you have no idea how many girls I flirted with that turned me down." I chuckled. "Before I was famous and even now. You could be surprised."

"That's because you seem to always fall for stupid fucking bitches. You always choose them for what they physically look like. You never try to see deeper because for you, everyone is good. But it's not true. Not everyone is good, Niall. Some people will just use you and throw you away when they're done. Some people will pick you because you're rich and famous, and some other won't pick you because you're not glamorous enough. Why do you think Heidi wanted to date you so bad but was totally okay to let you sleep with one of her best friends?"

I looked up and frowned. "Wait, what do you mean?"

"Gia Christenson? That's literally the only friend Heidi has left, yet she sent her to flirt with you at that bar when we were dating? She gave her your number so she could send you nudes when we were camping? And you literally ended up sleeping with her a few weeks before you started dating Heidi?"

My lips parted slightly but I shook my head. No, Heidi hadn't done all that just so I would break up with Olivia, that was impossible. I didn't want to believe that someone could ever do that. To anyone. I was not such a bad judge of character.

"No I mean, it's a coincidence."

"It's not. And I'm not blaming her for our break up. She didn't force you do to anything, she didn't point a gun to your head either. But when you started dating her I couldn't help but think that she had gotten exactly what she wanted and I had lost."

"And now?"

"Now?" she asked, raising her eyebrows as she turned to look in my eyes with a sad smile. "Now I'm just not playing anymore."

We kept quiet again, just listening to the waves and feeling the slightly cooler breeze hit our cheeks. It felt amazing to be here, alone, with her, but her words kept resonating in my head. Was I that oblivious?

"I don't want to marry a 6 or a 10, no matter what their personalities are." I finally just replied with a shrug. "I want to marry you. No number. Just you."

The way she smiled at me and tilted her head, I knew she liked my answer, but I kept quiet and after a while, she got up and I followed her back to the car. The sun was gone and the sky was dark but I drove to the first motel I saw and grabbed our bags before putting my sunglasses back on.

"I'll give my name." she just said as we reached the counter.

I smiled a bit and nodded before she asked for a room, gave her name and paid for it. I stayed behind her slightly and finally followed her to our room as she opened it and let me in. I dropped everything near the bed and when I turned around she was locking the door behind us.

"How much do I owe you?" I asked, putting my hands on my waist.

"Nothing, I got my check." she giggled, making me raise my eyebrows. "The number on it was astronomical, I almost came just looking at my bank account."

"Okay but this is literally a suite." I pointed out, making her roll her eyes.

"A suite in a motel I mean who cares?" she rolled her eyes, sitting on the bed.

I walked to her and bent down to kiss her lips as her hands found my cheeks. I had wanted to kiss her for hours and feeling her lips on mine after that long felt incredible.

"You want to add more fluids to these dirty bed sheets?" she asked with a smirk, making me grimace before she started laughing hard. "I'm just kidding! I'm sure these are extremely clean."

"Yea not so sure anymore."

She got up and tilted her chin up to look at me. Instinctively, my arms wrapped around her waist and I pulled her closer to kiss her gently.

"Maybe we could sleep on the floor?" I proposed in a low tone, half-joking.

"The floor is probably even worse." she mentioned just as low before chuckling. "Come on, I'll fill the bath for us. I saw it on the brochure and it looks incredible."

"For a motel room suite, maybe." I complained as she moved away.

I heard her laugh again and opened one of my bags to get some comfortable clothes for both of us, leaving the sweatpants and shirts on top of my luggage. I finally grabbed my phone and looked at all the notifications popping up with a grimace. I deleted all of them and went to check my contacts. I clicked on Heidi's name and picked the 'delete' option before doing the same with Gia and a few other girls. I was not really sure who they were, probably because they were insignificant to me, and threw my phone on the bed just as she was calling me. When I stepped foot in the bathroom, the bath was filled and the lights were dimmed, which surprised me a bit, considering what kind of motel we were in.

I looked at her sitting in the bath, definitely naked but all I could see was her breasts out of the water and slightly covered with foam. I could still see her nipples and I groaned.

"Can't believe you didn't wait for me to get undressed."

She shrugged and smiled. "Your turn. Take your clothes off."

Quickly, I took my shirt off and laughed when I noticed the way she was looking at me. She didn't say a word and I took my pants, boxers and socks off before joining her. The bath was large enough and I sat in front of her, grabbing one of her feet and massaging it gently, my thumbs pressing against her sole.

"Mm, don't stop." she whispered making me laugh as she closed her eyes and leaned her head against the side of the bath. "I didn't expect that but this is amazing. Oh, and there's a beer behind you. Thought you'd enjoy."

I grabbed the bottle with one hand and she immediately started shaking her foot to get my attention back.

"You’re so needy."

"Shut up and keep going." she just replied, making me roll my eyes, a small smile still on my lips.

We remained in silence for a while, just enjoying the warm water and the presence of each other, but after a while, my mind went from blank to filled with questions and I breathed in.

"What are we, Olivia?"

She moved her head up and her eyes opened, meeting mine. She seemed a bit taken aback by my question but she shook her head a bit before tilting it.

"We're... two best friends who... love each other, and fuck more than occasionally." she proposed slowly, raising her shoulders up. "I guess."

"What if I want you to be my girlfriend, Olivia? What do I have to do for that?"

She breathed in and out slowly, still looking at me, and took her foot back. I thought she was mad but she moved in the water and got closer, placing her knees on each sides of me and sitting on my thighs. She looked down at my chest,  bringing warm water on my shoulders and sighing before looking back up in my eyes.

"I love you, Niall. I'm in love with you. I want to date or fuck no one but you." she confessed in a very low tone. "But I'm not ready. And I don't know when I'll be. Or if I'll ever be."

I swallowed the lump in my throat and frowned a bit. "So we may never get back together?"

Her face changed and she licked her lips. "Shit happens, so we never know? I want to, and I'm trying. But I can't promise anything. It's too stressful for me. Can we just.. live today? You're going on tour, I'm about to film again and... we'll both be extra busy. We can have that discussion again after your tour?"

"My tour literally ends in september, Liv." I pointed out. "That's in over 7 months. What will happen if we don't see each other for weeks?"

Her eyes roamed on my face and she licked her lips again, as if she was trying to find the courage to talk again. "I'll do everything I can to come see you every time I have a few days off. You can come back here whenever you have a break, too. We can talk every day, text each other, facetime each other. It's not our first time apart, and... I know it'll probably be the hardest but if we want to make this work, we will, right?"

I stared at her, unsure if it was really possible but I swallowed. I wanted it so bad, whether we were official or not, and I was going to do everything I could to make this, whatever it was, work.

"I'm not gonna date, fuck or even see anyone else." she added. "Just you. I sort of expect the same from you although I can't force you but... if you decide you don't want to be exclusive I want to know who you... who else you're gonna have sex with, please? I'm honestly just scared of what an official relationship will do to us. The girlfriend and boyfriend title is just.. too big for me. For now." she paused. "Okay?"

"Okay." I whispered, nodding but feeling like shit.

She slipped her fingers in my hair and pressed her lips gently against mine.

"I love you." she murmured before kissing my cheekbone. "I love you." she repeated, kissing my jaw. "So fucking much." Her lips brushed against my neck. "More than anything." She went back to my lips. "I'm in love with you." I closed my eyes as she peppered kisses slowly and gently on my face and neck until my shoulders fell and I relaxed.

I felt her bring water over my shoulders again and she let her hands run on my chest, moving up on her knees. I kept my eyes closed until I heard a whimper escaping her lips and when I opened my eyes again, she was biting her bottom lip. I wanted to tell her that the song I had written was about marriage and that all I could think about since we went to that stupid wedding was how bad I wanted her to be my wife. It was ridiculous, knowing that I was not 100% in the relationship when we dated and that I was now in this 150% and we weren't even dating. I couldn't tell her that, though. Not after she had just told me she didn't want pressure and stress. Not after she had told me that she needed time and that she was not ready. But the words got stuck in my throat and I swallowed them hard.

"You okay?"

"Mmhm." I just replied, bringing one of my hands between her legs as I stared in her eyes.

She stiffened and finally bit her bottom lip as I slipped two fingers inside her, moving them in a fair rhythm and make her hips jerk slightly. I knew we were having a serious conversation but I was on the verge of spilling all my thoughts and feelings to her and I had no idea how to stop myself from doing that except by making her cum. I brought my thumb to her clit and stared at her seriously as her lips parted.

"Niall, I think we should wait until we get out of t-the bath." she let out in a mix of whimper and whisper. "I bought something special, just for you."

"Tomorrow. Today I'm just gonna watch you fuck yourself on my fingers." I argued as I kept brushing her clit with my thumb. Then I'm gonna finish my beer, I'll kiss you, wrap a towel around you and bring you in bed, and we'll talk in the dark the way we used to always do."

She reached for my wrist and stopped me for a few seconds. "Are you gonna sing something to me?"

I breathed in and nodded. "Any song you want. As many times as you want."

It took her a few seconds to nod and I reached for her hand, moving it away from my wrist as I started rubbing her clit again. "Come on, pet, do it now."

She started moving slowly up and down on my fingers and after a few minutes, I could feel her throb around me. The sight was amazing but I couldn't help myself and wrapped my free arm around her to bring her breasts close to my face. I ran my tongue on one of her nipples before sucking on it as she let out a louder moan. She started shaking and I felt her pussy clench around my fingers. I looked down at my fingers disappearing inside her and groaned low.

"Fuck I love your pretty little fanny. So fucking wet all the fucking time."

She started shaking and watching her body quiver from an orgasm was the most incredibly hot thing I have ever seen in my life. She came down from her high and I took my fingers out before she sat back on me and her mouth found mine again.

"You didn't tell me." she whispered, kissing me hard again. "Are you gonna see other girls while we're away? You're going to meet a few on tour..."

I grabbed her waist and pulled her away to look into her eyes and I could read in hers that she felt bad for asking me, almost scared of my answer. I wished she knew how I felt. I wished she knew I wouldn't do anything that could risk hurting her again, and I knew that just telling her wouldn't mean she'd believe me.

"You're all I think about. You're all I care about. Nothing feels good without you. I told you. That year without you was the most miserable of my entire life, Olivia. I have no desire to be with anyone else. So no, I'm not gonna see anyone. I'm not gonna kiss anyone. I'm not gonna fuck anyone. I'm not even going to flirt with anyone because I just don't give a fuck about anyone else."

"This is gonna work." she whispered, trying to convince both of us. "This distance thing I mean. We'll do it right."

"We will." I confirmed with a smile. "And every single night, I'm gonna sing about you."

[onwardintolight]

Han x Leia, ESB, Trip to Bespin, angst, hurt/comfort, fluff

Summary: ESB from Leia's POV. A journey from despair to hope, a blossoming, an opening to vulnerability and love.

Warnings: Deals with some heavy themes, incl. working through trauma, depression, self-harm, attempted sexual assault. Each chapter will be individually warned.

Note: I’m currently in the process of reposting the first nine chapters here in full, since when I first wrote this fic, I only shared links to the chapters on AO3 and FFN. I will try to post at least weekly. In the meantime, if you’d prefer to binge-read it, the entire fic is posted in full on AO3 and FFN.

Part: Masterlist | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | Epilogue

~~~

They awoke suddenly and all too soon, startled by the sound of someone entering the room. Leia blinked. For a second she forgot where she was; then it all came flooding back in hideous detail. Her entire body ached. Han moaned.

“Get up,” growled a low, sinister voice.

Summoning what little strength she had, Leia rose, pausing to assist Han as he got up, too.

It was the bounty hunter, Boba Fett, and several stormtroopers. “You’re coming with us,” he said, and a few of the troopers moved to put cuffs on Han. Leia felt a surge of panic. Were they going to take him away now?

But no, the troopers were readying all of them.

“Oh dear,” exclaimed Threepio. Currently, he was just a head, a torso, and an arm, but Leia was grateful, despite everything, to have him back. Chewie quickly dug a net out of a pouch on his bandolier and gathered up the droid and all its various parts, stringing them to his back. “Really, this is rather uncomfortable,” Threepio complained.

«Deal with it,» muttered Chewie. Impatient, the troopers prodded them towards the door.

They followed the bounty hunter deeper into the bowels of the city; the corridors growing more industrial as they went. They hadn’t been walking long, but Leia’s body was dragging; her movements slow and clumsy, her mind groggy. The ache hadn’t gone away. She could only imagine how Han, walking beside her, felt.

Threepio, seemingly unaware of the state of things, prattled on about his discomfort. She barely registered it. She was focusing on Han, at least as much as she could while trying not to stumble. She needed to see him; needed to hear him breathing next to her. Finally, a door ahead of them opened, and they went through.

Leia would have stopped, frozen in her tracks, if Chewie and the troopers hadn’t been so close behind.

It was the place from her dream.

The room was large, round and dark, with a sunken central ring surrounded by the walkway they were on now. Bluish light lurked around the perimeter; it ceded to orange in the center, glowing out of the grated floor like tongues of fire. Steam billowed up through the grates and puffed down erratically from the ceiling, which bristled with strange machinery. In the middle of the ring, there was a strange, circular hole. Around it stood Lando and his aide, another squad of stormtroopers, and a number of busy Ugnaughts.

Leia blinked, wondering if she were still asleep.

But no. There was a faint yet distinct metallic scent on the air—she could almost taste it—and a loud rumble and whine emanating from the machinery. Her dreams had omitted such details. Fear, raw and wild, nearly overpowered her.

Fett led them down a short stair to the central ring; at the bottom, he directed them to the right, and they halted behind Lando. Darth Vader descended from the opposite stair, his gait slow and triumphant. She refused to look directly at him, but her fear grew sharper as the monster from her nightmares took shape once more, his presence looming like a shadow over the room.

“What’s going on, buddy?” Han spat out the last word with contempt.

“You’re being put into carbon freeze,” Lando replied, not looking at him.

“What if he doesn’t survive?” Fett hissed at Vader from across the room. “He’s worth a lot to me.”

Leia turned to Han in horror and found he was already looking at her, his eyes solemn and sad.

No, she thought, panic sweeping through her. This couldn’t be happening. She wasn’t ready to lose him yet.

She couldn’t lose him yet.

Certainly not like this.

Han watched her, resignation showing on his face. Somehow, his lips widened slightly into the hint of a smile, compassionate and apologetic, that she knew was hers alone.

“Put him in!” Vader ordered, and the moment shattered. All of a sudden, Chewie was yelling; tossing stormtroopers everywhere. Threepio screamed in fright. For a moment Leia felt a surge of wild hope—it wasn’t over, they could still fight—but then she saw the other troopers surrounding them, blasters raised, and Vader, always Vader, standing stone-like across the ring, entirely undismayed.

No. This wasn’t going to work. They would die fighting the inevitable, and then there would be no one to warn Luke, and no one to rescue Han if by chance he survived. They had to live, somehow.

“Stop! Chewie, stop!” That was Han’s voice, rising through Threepio’s frantic pleas. He went to stand right in front of him, catching the Wookiee’s gaze as more stormtroopers approached with another set of handcuffs. “Hey! Listen to me! Chewie, this won’t help me! Save your strength; there’ll be another time.”

Suddenly, Leia felt a cold chill. Almost of their own accord, her eyes were wrenched to the other side of the ring. Vader was staring at her. She felt open, laid bare, seen in a way she didn’t understand. He was a gravity well, a black hole pulling her in towards destruction. What would he do with her after this? She backed away slowly towards Han and Chewie.

“The princess,” Han was saying. “You have to take care of her.” Yes, she needed Chewie now, and Chewie probably needed her just as much. She was willing to admit that, although she once would have bristled at the idea of needing anyone. Sure, she was capable, and she could take care of herself. But people, friendships, love—that was something capability couldn't replace, no matter how high she built her walls.

It wasn’t just that, though. Shaking herself out of her terror, Leia guessed what Han was getting at. She drew close to Chewie, reaching out to stroke his fur. The Wookiee had sworn a life debt to Han; he would never betray that, except to protect someone else who he felt came under it. With a slight shock, she realized that she was now one of the rare few.

“You hear me? Huh?” Han prodded.

Chewie let out a desolate yes.

Han turned to face Leia. Suddenly, his lips were on hers, and she reached out towards him desperately, kissing him with everything she had left. For a moment they slowed down time; defying their enemies, denying the end.

And then he was torn away from her, the taste of his lips still on her tongue. He stood on a platform that had risen in the central cavity, and his eyes didn’t leave her.

Vader was going to take him from her, like he had taken everything else, and as in her nightmares, she was powerless. They were weak and surrounded; there was no way out.

There was nothing she could do, nothing that wouldn’t make it worse.

But there was something she could say. The words formed deliberately, without hesitation; echoing throughout her entire being, a shout flung to the farthest stars. She no longer cared about anyone else knowing. She no longer cared if it caused her pain. She no longer cared about regrets, because she was finally, absolutely certain that she would regret it a lot more if he never heard the truth.

“I love you,” she said.

Han looked at her gravely. There was no hint of surprise; only love. “I know.”

The warmth of his reassurance and the freedom of the truth flooded her heart. It mingled with the agony of loss, both comforting and painful. They loved each other, and now, they would lose each other.

I know.

Past conversations flickered through her mind.

“It’s not your fault.”

“I know if it ever came to that, you’d do somethin’ to save me if you could.”

“I would.”

“I know.”

The Ugnaughts unbound his hands. The platform began to lower, slowly, inevitably. Their eyes locked onto each other, filling with tears, and they never let go until the moment the machine hissed, Han’s head was thrown back, and steam billowed up around him.

She turned away, burying her head in Chewie’s fur. The Wookiee let out an anguished wail.

“What’s going on?” Threepio demanded. “Turn around! Chewbacca, I can’t see!”

The machine whined loudly, and she looked to see a claw-like structure descending from the ceiling. She forced herself to watch as it latched onto what was below and slowly began its ascent, bringing with it a large, human-sized block. Her throat was constricting, her mind spitting denials. She grabbed onto Chewie’s arm and clung to it, and he pulled her close.

The Ugnaughts examined the block, and then—casually, as if it were of no consequence—they pushed it over. It hit the floor with a clang. Leia flinched. Han’s features could still be seen; his hands were raised as if to protect himself, and his face was caught in frozen agony.

She trembled. She couldn’t weep now. Not in front of Vader.

Lando crouched beside the carbonite block—beside Han.

“Oh, they’ve encased him in carbonite,” Threepio remarked, having finally gotten a good glimpse. “He should be quite well-protected; if he survived the freezing process, that is.”

Lando finished examining the data panel in the encasing. Then he rose up on his arms to look at his old friend with his own eyes. Leia waited, hardly daring to breathe.

“Well, Calrissian, did he survive?” Vader inquired.

“Yes, he’s alive,” Lando responded, not moving. “And in perfect hibernation.”

Relief swept through Leia, and Chewie gave her shoulder a squeeze. There was still hope, however small.

“He’s all yours, bounty hunter.” Vader turned to the Ugnaughts. “Reset the chamber for Skywalker,” he commanded.

An officer approached. “Skywalker has just landed, milord.”

Leia caught Chewie’s eyes worriedly.

“Good,” Vader responded. “See to it that he finds his way in here.”

Her eyes traveled back to Han’s still, petrified form. She stared at it, trying to commit every feature to memory. She never wanted to forget. Not him, and not what they’d done. Fury filled her; fury that they would do this to him, fury that he had been separated from her, fury at the sheer, incomprehensible horror of it all.

Then grief came rushing in, and the fury was overwhelmed.

Lando finally finished his reverie. Rising, he marched over to Leia and grabbed her arm. Without even a sideways glance, she pushed him away.

“Calrissian,” she heard Vader say, “take the princess and the Wookiee to my ship.”

“You said they’d be left in the city under my supervision!” Lando argued.

“I am altering the deal. Pray I don’t alter it any farther.”

Vader swept out of the room. Leia didn’t watch him go. Her eyes were still frozen on the one she loved.

For the first time, she allowed a few silent tears to fall.

[grigori77]

2019 in Movies - My Top 30 Fave Movies (Part 2)

20.  FROZEN 2 – so, another year, then, and once again Disney doesn’t QUITE manage to net the animated feature top spot on my list, but it’s not for lack of trying – this long-awaited sequel to the studio’s runaway hit musical fantasy adventure is just what we’ve come to love from the House of Mouse, but more importantly it’s a most worthy sequel, easily on a par with the much beloved origin.  Not much of a surprise given the welcome return of all the key people, from directors Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee (who also once again wrote the screenplay) to composer Christophe Beck and songwriters Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, as well as all the key players in the cast.  It’s business as usual in the kingdom of Arendelle, where all is seemingly peaceful and tranquil, but Queen Elsa (Idina Menzel) is restless, haunted by a distant voice that only she can hear, calling to her from a mysterious past she just can’t place … and then she accidentally awakens the four elemental spirits, sending her homeland into mystical turmoil, prompting her to embark on a desperate search for answers with her sister Princess Anna (Kristen Bell), ice harvester Kristoff (Jonathan Groff), his faithful reindeer companion Sven, and, of course, living snowman Olaf (Josh Gad). Their quest leads them into the Enchanted Forest of Northuldra, a neighbouring kingdom, ruled by simple, elemental magic, that has remained cut off from Arendelle for decades, where they discover dark, hidden truths about their own family’s past and must make peace with the spirits if they’re to save their home and their people.  So, typical Disney family fantasy fare, then, right? Well, Frozen 2 certainly dots all the Is and crosses all the Ts, but, like the original, this is no jaded blockbuster money spinner, packed with the same kind of resonant power, skilful inventiveness and pure, show-stopping WOW-factor as its predecessor, but more importantly this is a sequel that effectively carves out a fresh identity for itself, brilliantly taking the world and characters in interesting new directions to create something fresh, rewarding and worthwhile on its own merit.  The returning cast are all as strong as ever, Menzel and Bell in particular ably powering the story, while it’s nice to see both Groff and Gad getting something new to do with their own characters too, even nabbing their own major musical numbers; there’s also a welcome slew of fresh new faces to this world, particular Sterling K. Brown (This is Us, Black Panther, The Predator) as lost Anrendelle soldier Mattias and former Brat Pack star Martha Plimpton as Yelena, leader of the lost tribe of Northuldra. Once again this is Disney escapism at its very best, a heart-warming, soul-nourishing powerhouse of winning humour, emotional power and child-like wonder, but like the first film the biggest selling point is, of course, that KILLER soundtrack, with every song here a total hit, not one dud among them, and there are even ear-worms here to put Let It Go to shame – Into the Unknown was touted as the major hit, and it is impressive, but I was particularly affected by Groff’s unashamedly full-bore rendition of Lost in the Woods, a bona fide classic rock power ballad crafted in the fashion of REO Speedwagon, while the undeniable highlight for me is the unstoppable Show Yourself, with Menzel once again proving that her incredible voice is a natural force all in itself.  Altogether, then, this is an absolute feast for the eyes, the ears AND the soul, every inch the winner that its predecessor was and also EASILY one of Disney’s premier animated features for the decade.  So it’s quite the runner-up, then …

19.  ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD – since his explosion onto the scene twenty-seven years ago with his runaway smash debut Reservoir Dogs, Quentin Tarantino has become one of the most important filmmakers of his generation, a true master of the cinematic art form who consistently delivers moving picture masterpieces that thrill, entertain, challenge and amuse audiences worldwide … at least those who can stomach his love of unswerving violence, naughty talk and morally bankrupt antiheroes and despicably brutal villains who are often little more than a shade different from one another.  Time has moved on, though, and while he’s undoubtedly been one of the biggest influences on the way cinema has changed over the past quarter century, there are times now that it’s starting to feel like the scene is moving on in favour of younger, fresher blood with their own ideas.   I think Tarantino can sense this himself, because he recently made a powerful statement – after he’s made his tenth film, he plans to retire.  Given that OUATIH is his NINTH film, that deadline is already looming, and we unashamed FANS of his films are understandably aghast over this turn of events.  Thankfully he remains as uncompromisingly awesome a writer-director as ever, delivering another gold standard five-star flick which is also most definitely his most PERSONAL work to date, quite simply down to the fact that it’s a film ABOUT film.  Sure, it has a plot (of sorts, anyway), revolving around the slow decline of the career of former TV star Rick Dalton (Leonardo Dicaprio), who languishes in increasing anonymity in Hollywood circa 1969 as his former western hero image is being slowly eroded by an increasingly hacky workload guest-starring on various syndicated shows as a succession of punching-bag heavies for the hero to wale on, while his only real friend is his one-time stunt double, Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt), a former WW2 hero with a decidedly tarnished reputation of his own; meanwhile new neighbours have moved in next door to further distract him – hot-as-shit young director Roman Polanski (Rafal Zawierucha), riding high on the success of Rosemary’s Baby, and his new wife Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie).  Certainly this all drives the film, along with real-life events involving one of the darkest crimes in modern American history, but a lot of the time the plot is largely coincidental – Quentin uses it as a springboard to wax lyrical about his very favourite subject and pay loving (if sometimes irreverently satirical) tribute to the very business he’s been indulging in with such great success since 1992.  Sure, it’s also about “Helter Skelter” and the long shadow cast by Charles Manson and his band of murderous misfits, but this is largely incidental, as we’re treated to long, entertaining interludes as we follow Rick on a shoot as the bad guy in the pilot for the Lancer TV series, visit the notorious Spahn Ranch with Cliff as he’s unwittingly drawn into the lion’s den of the deadly Manson Family, join Robbie’s Tate as she watches “herself” in The Wrecking Crew, and enjoy a brilliant montage in which we follow Rick’s adventures in Spaghetti westerns (and Eurospy cinema) after he’s offered a chance to change his flagging fortunes, before the film finally builds to a seemingly inevitable, fateful conclusion that Tarantino then, in sneakily OTT Inglourious Basterds style, mischievously turns on its head with a devilish game of “What If”.  The results are a thoroughly engrossing and endlessly entertaining romp through the seedier side of Hollywood and a brilliant warts-and-all examination of the craft’s inner workings that, interestingly, reveals as much about the Business today as it does about how it was way back in the Golden Age the film portrays, all while delivering bucket-loads of QT’s trademark cool, swagger, idiosyncratic genius and to-die-for dialogue and character-work, and, of course, a typically exceptional all-star cast firing on all cylinders. Dicaprio and Pitt are both spectacular (Brad is endearingly taciturn, playing it wonderfully close to the vest throughout, while Leo is simply ON FIRE, delivering a mercurial performance EASILY on a par with his work on Shutter Island and The Wolf of Wall Street – could this be good enough to snag him a second Oscar?), while Robbie consistently endears us to Tate as she EFFORTLESSLY brings the fallen star back to life, and there’s an incredible string of amazing supporting turns from established talent and up-and-comers alike, from Kurt Russell, Al Pacino and a very spiky Bruce Dern to Mike Moh (in a FLAWLESS take on Bruce Lee), Margaret Qualley, Austin Butler and in particular Julia Butters as precocious child star Trudi Fraser.  Packed with winning references, homages, pastiches and ingenious little in-jokes, handled with UTMOST respect for the true life subjects at all times and shot all the way through with his characteristic flair and quirky, deliciously dark sense of humour, this is cinema very much of the Old School, and EVERY INCH a Tarantino flick.  With only one more film to go the implied end of his career seems much too close, but if he delivers one more like this he’ll leave behind a legacy that ANY filmmaker would be proud of.

18.  CRAWL – summer 2019’s runner-up horror offering marks a rousing return to form for a genre talent who’s FINALLY delivered on the impressive promise of his early work – Alexandre Aja made a startling debut with Switchblade Romance, which led to his big break helming the cracking remake of slasher stalwart The Hills Have Eyes, but then he went SPECTACULARLY off the rails when he made the truly abysmal Piranha 3D, which I wholeheartedly regard as one of THE VERY WORST FILMS EVER MADE IN ALL OF HUMAN HISTORY. He took a big step back in the right direction with the admittedly flawed but ultimately enjoyable and evocative Horns (based on the novel by Stephen King’s son Joe Hill), but it’s with this stripped back, super-tight man-against-nature survival horror that the Aja of old has TRULY returned to us. IN SPADES.  Seriously, I personally think this is his best film to date – there’s no fat on it at all, going from a simple set-up STRAIGHT into a precision-crafted exercise in sustained tension that relentlessly grips right up to the end credits.  The film is largely just a two-hander – Maze Runner star Kaya Scodelario plays Haley Keller, a Florida college student and star swimmer who ventures into the heart of a Category 5 hurricane to make sure her estranged father, Dave (Saving Private Ryan’s Barry Pepper), is okay after he drops off the grid. Finding their old family home in a state of disrepair and slowly flooding, she does a last minute check of the crawl-space underneath, only to discover her father badly wounded and a couple of hungry alligators stalking the dark, cramped, claustrophobic confines. With the flood waters rising and communications cut off, Haley and Dave must use every reserve of strength, ingenuity and survival instinct to keep each other alive in the face of increasingly daunting odds … even with a premise this simple, there was plenty of potential for this to become an overblown, clunky mess in the wrong hands (a la Snakes On a Plane), so it’s a genuinely great thing that Aja really is back at the height of his powers, milking every fraught and suspenseful set-piece to its last drop of exquisite piano-wire tension and putting his actors through hell without a reprieve in sight.  Thankfully it’s not JUST about scares and atmosphere – there’s a genuinely strong family drama at the heart of the story that helps us invest in these two, Scodelario delivering a phenomenally complex performance as she peels back Haley’s layers, from stubborn pedant, through vulnerable child of divorce, to ironclad born survivor, while reconnecting with her emotionally raw, repentantly open father, played with genuine naked intensity in a career best turn from Pepper. Their chemistry is INCREDIBLY strong, making every scene a joy even as it works your nerves and tugs on your heartstrings, and as a result you DESPERATELY want to see them make it out in one piece.  Not that Aja makes it easy for them – the gators are an impressively palpable threat, proper scary beasties even if they are largely (admittedly impressively executed) digital effects, while the storm is almost a third character in itself, becoming as much of an elemental nemesis as its scaly co-stars.  Blessedly brief (just 87 minutes!) and with every second wrung out for maximum impact, this is survival horror at its most brutally, simplistically effective, a deliciously vicious, primal chill-ride that thoroughly rewards from start to finish.  Welcome back, Mr Aja.  We’ve missed you.

17.  SHAZAM! – there were actually THREE movies featuring Captain Marvel out in 2019, but this offering from the hit-and-miss DCEU cinematic franchise is a very different beast from his MCU-based namesake, and besides, THIS Cap long ago ditched said monicker for the far more catchy (albeit rather more oddball) title that graces Warner Bros’ last step back on the right track for their superhero Universe following the equally enjoyable Aquaman and franchise high-point Wonder Woman.  Although he’s never actually referred to in the film by this name, Shazam (Chuck’s Eugene Levy) is the magically-powered alternate persona bestowed upon wayward fifteen year-old foster kid Billy Batson (Andi Mack’s Asher Angel) by an ancient wizard (Djimon Hounsou) seeking one pure soul to battle Dr. Thaddeus Sivana (Mark Strong), a morally corrupt physicist who turns into a monstrous supervillain after becoming the vessel for the spiritual essences of the Seven Deadly Sins (yup, that thoroughly batshit setup is just the tip of the iceberg of bonkersness on offer in this movie).  Yes, this IS set in the DC Extended Universe, Shazam sharing his world with Superman, Batman, the Flash et al, and there are numerous references (both overt and sly) to this fact throughout (especially in the cheeky animated closing title sequence), but it’s never laboured, and the film largely exists in its own comfortably enclosed narrative bubble, allowing us to focus on Billy, his alter ego and in particular his clunky (but oh so much fun) bonding experiences with his new foster family, headed by former foster kid couple Victor and Rosa Vazquez (The Walking Dead’s Cooper Andrews and Marta Milans) – the most enjoyably portions of the film, however, are when Billy explores the mechanics and limits of his newfound superpowers with his new foster brother Freddy Freeman (It Chapter 1’s Jack Dylan Glazer), a consistently hilarious riot of bad behaviour, wanton (often accidental) destruction and perfectly-observed character development, the blissful culmination of a gleefully anarchic sense of humour that, until recently, has been rather lacking in the DCEU but which is writ large in bright, wacky primary colours right through this film. Sure, there are darker moments, particularly when Sivana sets loose his fantastic icky brood of semi-corporeal monsters, and these scenes are handled with seasoned skill by director David F. Sandberg, who cut his teeth on ingenious little horror gem Lights Out (following up with Annabelle: Creation, but we don’t have to dwell on that), but for the most part the film is played for laughs, thrills and pure, unadulterated FUN, almost never taking itself too seriously, essentially intended to do for the DCEU what Guardians of the Galaxy and Ant-Man did for the MCU, and a huge part of its resounding success must of course be attributed to the universally willing cast. Eugene Levy’s so ridiculously pumped-up he almost looks like a special effect all on his own, but he’s lost none of his razor-sharp comic ability, perfectly encapsulating a teenage boy in a grown man’s body, while his chemistry with genuine little comedic dynamo Glazer is simply exquisite, a flawless balance shared with Angel, who similarly excels at the humour but also delivers quality goods in some far more serious moments too, while the rest of Billy’s newfound family are all brilliant, particularly ridiculously adorable newcomer Faithe Herman as precocious little motor-mouth Darla; Djimon Hounsou, meanwhile, adds significant class and gravitas to what could have been a cartoonish Gandalf spoof, and Mark Strong, as usual, gives great bad guy as Sivana, providing just the right amount of malevolent swagger and self-important smirk to proceedings without ever losing sight of the deeper darkness within.  All round, this is EXACTLY the kind of expertly crafted superhero package we’ve come to appreciate in the genre, another definite shot in the arm for the DCEU that holds great hope for the future of the franchise, and some of the biggest fun I had at the cinema this past year.  Granted, it’s still not a patch on the MCU, but the quality gap finally seems to be closing …

16.  ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL – y��know, there was a time when James Cameron was quite a prolific director, who could be counted upon to provide THE big event pic of the blockbuster season. These days, we’re lucky to hear from him once a decade, and now we don’t even seem to be getting that – the dream project Cameron’s been trying to make since the end of the 90s, a big live action adaptation of one of my favourite mangas of all time, Gunnm (or Battle Angel Alita to use its more well-known sobriquet) by Yukito Kishiro, has FINALLY arrived, but it isn’t the big man behind the camera here since he’s still messing around with his intended FIVE MOVIE Avatar arc.  That said, he made a damn good choice of proxy to bring his vision to fruition – Robert Rodriguez is, of course, a fellow master of action cinema, albeit one with a much more quirky style, and this adap is child’s play to him, the creator of the El Mariachi trilogy and co-director of Frank Miller’s Sin City effortlessly capturing the dark, edgy life-and-death danger and brutal wonder of Kishiro’s world in moving pictures.  300 years after the Earth was decimated in a massive war with URM (the United Republics of Mars) known as “the Fall”, only one bastion of civilization remains – Iron City, a sprawling, makeshift community of scavengers that lies in the shadow of the floating city of Zalem, home of Earth’s remaining aristocracy.  Dr. Dyson Ido (Christoph Waltz) runs a clinic in Iron City customising and repairing the bodies of its cyborg citizens, from the mercenary “hunter killers” to the fast-living players of Motorball (a kind of supercharged mixture of Rollerball and Death Race), one day discovering the wrecked remains of a female ‘borg in the junkyard of scrap accumulated beneath Zalem.  Finding her human brain is still alive, he gives her a new chassis and christens her Alita, raising her as best he can as she attempts to piece together her mysterious, missing past, only for them both to discover that the truth of her origins has the potential to tear their fragile little world apart forever. The Maze Runner trilogy’s Rosa Salazar is the heart and soul of the film as Alita (originally Gally in the comics), perfectly bringing her (literal) wide-eyed innocence and irrepressible spirit to life, as well as proving every inch the diminutive badass fans have been expecting – while her overly anime-styled look might have seemed a potentially jarring distraction in the trailers, Salazar’s mocap performance is SO strong you’ve forgotten all about it within the first five minutes, convinced she’s a real, flesh-and-metal character – and she’s well supported by an exceptional ensemble cast both new and well-established.  Waltz is the most kind and sympathetic he’s been since Django Unchained, instilling Ido with a worldly warmth and gentility that makes him a perfect mentor/father-figure, while Spooksville star Keean Johnson makes a VERY impressive big screen breakthrough as Hugo, the streetwise young dreamer with a dark secret that Alita falls for in a big way, Jennifer Connelly is icily classy as Ido’s ex-wife Chiren, Mahershala Ali is enjoyably suave and mysterious as the film’s nominal villain, Vector, an influential but seriously shady local entrepreneur with a major hidden agenda, and a selection of actors shine through the CGI in various strong mocap performances, such as Deadpool’s Ed Skrein, Derek Mears, From Dusk Til Dawn’s Eiza Gonzalez and a thoroughly unrecognisable but typically awesome Jackie Earle Haley.  As you’d expect from Rodriguez, the film delivers BIG TIME on the action front, unleashing a series of spectacular set-pieces that peak with Alita’s pulse-pounding Motorball debut, but there’s a pleasingly robust story under all the thrills and wow-factor, riffing on BIG THEMES and providing plenty of emotional power, especially in the heartbreaking character-driven climax – Cameron, meanwhile, has clearly maintained strict control over the project throughout, his eye and voice writ large across every scene as we’re thrust headfirst into a fully-immersive post-apocalyptic, rusty cyberpunk world as thoroughly fleshed-out as Avatar’s Pandora, but most importantly he’s still done exactly what he set out to do, paying the utmost respect to a cracking character as he brings her to vital, vivid life on the big screen.  Don’t believe the detractors – this is a MAGNIFICENT piece of work that deserves all the recognition it can muster, perfectly set up for a sequel that I fear we may never get to see.  Oh well, at least it’s renewed my flagging hopes for a return to Pandora …

15.  AD ASTRA – last century, making a space exploration movie after 2001: A Space Odyssey was a pretty tall order. THIS century, looks like it’s trying to follow Chris Nolan’s Interstellar – love it or hate it, you can’t deny that particular epic space opera for the IMAX crowd is a REALLY tough act to follow.  At first glance, then, writer-director James Gray (The Yards, We Own the Night) is an interesting choice to try, at least until you consider his last feature – he may be best known for understated, gritty little crime thrillers, but I was most impressed by 2016’s ambitious period biopic The Lost City of Z, which focused on the groundbreaking career of pioneering explorer Percy Fawcett, and couldn’t have been MORE about the indomitable spirit of discovery if it tried.  His latest shares much of the same DNA, albeit presented in a VERY different package, as we’re introduced to a more expansive Solar System of the near future, in which humanity has begun to colonize our neighbouring worlds and is now pushing its reach beyond our own star’s light in order to discover what truly lies beyond the void of OUTER space.  Brad Pitt stars as Major Roy McBride, a career astronaut whose whole life has been defined by growing up in the shadow of his father, H. Clifford McBride (Tommy Lee Jones), a true pioneer who led an unprecedented expedition to the orbit of our furthest neighbour, Neptune, in order to search for signs of intelligent life beyond our solar system, only for the whole mission to go quiet for the past sixteen years.  Then a mysterious, interplanetary power surge throws the Earth into chaos, and Roy must travel farther than he’s ever gone before in order to discover the truth behind the source of the pulse – his father’s own ill-fated Lima Project … this is a very different beast from Interstellar, a much more introspective, stately affair, revelling in its glacial pacing and emphasis on character motivation over plot, but it’s no less impressive from a visual, visceral standpoint – Gray and cinematographer Hoyt van Hoytema (who, interestingly, ALSO shot Interstellar, along with Nolan’s Dunkirk and his upcoming feature Tenet) certainly make space look truly EPIC, crafting astonishing visuals that deserve to be seen on the big screen (or at the very least on the best quality HDTV you can find).  There’s also no denying the quality of the writing, Gray weaving an intricate story that reveals far greater depth and complexity than can be seen at first glance, while Roy’s palpable “thought-process” voiceover puts us right into the head of the character as we follow him across the endless void on a fateful journey into a cosmic Heart of Darkness.  There is, indeed, a strong sense of Apocalypse Now to proceedings, with the younger McBride definitely following a similar path to Martin Sheen’s ill-fated captain as he travels “up-river” to find his Colonel Kurtz-esque father, and the performances certainly match the heft of the material – there’s an impressive collection of talent on offer in a series of top-quality supporting turns, Jones being just the icing on the cake in the company of Donald Sutherland, Liv Tyler, John Ortiz and Preacher’s Ruth Negga, but the undeniable driving force of the film is Pitt, his cool, laconic control hiding uncharted depths of emotional turmoil as he’s forced to call every choice into question.  It’s EASILY one of the finest performances of his career to date, just one of the MANY great selling points in a film that definitely deserves to be remembered as one of the all-time sci-fi greats of the decade. An absolute masterpiece, then, but does it stand tall in comparison to Interstellar?  I should say so …

14.  BRIGHTBURN – torpedoing Crawl right out of the water in the summer, this refreshing, revisionist superhero movie takes one of the most classic mythologies in the genre and turns it on its head in true horror style.  The basic premise is an absolute blinder – what if, when he crashed in small-town America as a baby, Superman had turned out to be a bad seed?  Unsurprising, then, that it came from James Gunn, who here produces a screenplay by his brother and cousin Brian and Mark Gunn (best known for penning the likes of Journey 2: the Mysterious Island, but nobody’s perfect) and the directorial big break of his old mate David Yarovesky (whose only previous feature is obscure sci-fi horror The Hive) – Gunn is, of course, an old pro at taking classic comic book tropes and creating something completely new with them, having previously done so with HUGE success on cult indie black comedy Super and, in particular, Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy movies, and his fingerprints are ALL OVER this one too.  The Hunger Games’ Elizabeth Banks (who starred in Gunn’s own directorial debut Slither) and David Denman (The Office) are Tori and Kyle Breyer, a farming couple living in Brightburn, Kansas, who are trying for a baby when a mysterious pod falls from the sky onto their land, containing an infant boy.  As you’d expect, they adopt him, determined to keep his origin a secret, and for the first twelve years of his life all seems perfectly fine – Brandon’s growing up into an intelligent, artistic child who loves his family. Then his powers manifest and he starts to change – not just physically (he’s impervious to harm, incredibly strong, has laser eyes and the ability to disrupt electronic devices … oh, and he can fly, too), but also in personality, as he becomes cold, distant, even cruel as he begins to demonstrate some seriously sociopathic tendencies.  As his parents begin to fear what he’s becoming, things begin to spiral out of control and people start to disappear or turn up brutally murdered, and it becomes clear that Brandon might actually be something out of a nightmare … needless to say this is superhero cinema as full-on horror, Brandon’s proclivities leading to some proper nasty moments once he really starts to cut loose, and there’s no mistaking this future super for one of the good guys – he pulverises bones, shatters faces and melts skulls with nary a twitch, just the tiniest hint of a smile.  It’s an astonishing performance from newcomer Jackson A. Dunn, who perfectly captures the nuanced subtleties as Brandon goes from happy child to lethal psychopath, clearly demonstrating that he’s gonna be an incredible talent in future; the two grown leads, meanwhile, are both excellent, Denman growing increasingly haunted and exasperated as he tries to prove his own son is a wrong ‘un, while Banks has rarely been better, perfectly embodying a mother desperately wanting to belief the best of her son no matter how compelling the evidence becomes, and there’s quality support from Breaking Bad’s Matt Jones and Search Party’s Meredith Hagner as Brandon’s aunt and uncle, Noah and Meredith, and Becky Wahlstrom as the mother of one of his school-friends, who seems to see him for what he really is right from the start.  Dark, suspenseful and genuinely nasty, this is definitely not your typical superhero movie, often playing like Kick-Ass’ deeply twisted cousin, and there are times when it displays some of the same edgy, black-hearted sense of humour, too.  In other words, it’s all very James Gunn. It’s one sweet piece of work, everyone involved showing real skill and devotion, and Yarovesky in particular proves he’ll definitely be one-to-watch in the future.  There are already plans for a potential sequel, and given where this particular little superhero universe seems to be heading I think it could be something pretty special, so fair to say I can’t wait.

13.  STAR WARS EPISODE IX: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER – wow, this one’s proven particularly divisive, hasn’t it? And I thought The Last Jedi caused a stir … say what you will about Rian Johnson’s previous entry in the juggernaut science fiction saga, while it certainly riled up the hardcore fanbase it was at least well-received by the critics, not to mention myself, who found it refreshing and absolutely ingenious after the crowd-pleasing simplicity of JJ Abrams’ admittedly still thoroughly brilliant The Force Awakens.  After such radical experimentation, Abrams’ return to the director’s chair can’t help feeling a bit like desperate backpedalling in order to sooth a whole lot of seriously ruffled feathers, and I’ll admit that, on initial viewing, I couldn’t help feeling just a touch cheated given what might have been if similarly offbeat, experimentally-minded filmmaker Colin Trevorrow (Safety Not Guaranteed, Jurassic World) had stayed on board to helm the picture.  Then I got home, thought about it for a bit and it started to grow on me, before a second viewing helped me to reconcile all everything that bugged me first time around, seemingly the same things that have, perversely, ruffled so many more feathers THIS TIME.  This doesn’t feel like a retcon job, no matter what some might think – new developments in the story that might feel like whitewash actually do make sense once you think about them, and the major twists actually work when viewed within the larger, overarching storyline.  Not that I’m willing to go into any kind of detail here, mind you – this is a spoiler-free zone, thank you very much.  Suffice to say, the honour of the saga has in no way been besmirched by Abrams and his co-writer Chris Terrio (sure, he worked on Batman V Superman and Justice League, but he also wrote Argo), the final film ultimately standing up very well indeed alongside its trilogy contemporaries, and still MILES ABOVE anything we got in George Lucas’ decidedly second-rate prequels.  The dangling plot strands from The Last Jedi certainly get tied up with great satisfaction, particularly the decidedly loaded drama of new Jedi Rey (Daisy Ridley) and troubled First Order Supreme Leader Kylo Ren/Ben Solo (Adam Driver), while the seemingly controversial choice of reintroducing Ian McDiarmid’s fantastically monstrous Emperor Palpatine as the ultimate big bad ultimately works out spectacularly well, a far cry from any perceived botched fan-service.  Everyone involved was clearly working at the height of their powers – Ridley and Driver are EXCEPTIONAL, both up-and-coming young leads truly growing into the their roles, while co-stars John Boyega and Oscar Isaac land a pleasingly meaty chunk of the story to finally get to really explore that fantastic chemistry they teased on The Last Jedi, and Carrie Fisher gets a truly MAGNIFICENT send off in the role that defined her as the incomparable General Leia Organa (one which it’s still heartbreaking she never quite got to complete); other old faces, meanwhile, return in fun ways, from Anthony Daniels’ C-3PO FINALLY getting to play a PROPER role in the action again to a brilliant supporting flourish from the mighty Billy Dee Williams as the Galaxy-Far-Far-Away’s own King of Cool, Lando Calrissian, while there’s a wealth of strong new faces here too, such as Lady Macbeth’s Naomie Ackie as rookie rebel Jannah, Richard E. Grant as suitably slimy former-Imperial First Order bigshot Allegiant General Pryde, The Americans’ Keri Russell as tough smuggler Zorii Bliss and Lord of the Rings star Dominic Monaghan as Resistance tech Beaumont Kin.  As fans have come to expect, Abrams certainly doesn’t skim on the spectacle, delivering bombastic thrill-ride set-pieces that yet again set the benchmark for the year’s action stakes (particularly in the blistering mid-picture showdown between Rey and Kylo among the wave-lashed remains of Return of the Jedi’s blasted Death Star) and awe-inspiring visuals that truly boggle the mind with their sheer beauty and complexity, but he also injects plenty of the raw emotion, inspired character work, knowing humour and pure, unadulterated geeky FUN he’s so well known for.  In conclusion, then, this is MILES AWAY from the clunky, compromised mess it’s been labelled as in some quarters, ultimately still very much in keeping with the high standards set by its trilogy predecessors and EVERY INCH a proper, full-blooded Star Wars movie.  Ultimately, Rogue One remains THE BEST of the big screen run since Lucas’ Original Trilogy, but this one still emerges as a Force to be reckoned with …

12.  JOKER – no-one was more wary than me when it was first announced that DC and Warner Bros. were going to make a standalone, live-action movie centred entirely around Batman’s ultimate nemesis, the Joker, especially with it coming hot on the heels of Jared Leto’s thoroughly polarizing portrayal in Suicide Squad.  More so once it was made clear that this WOULD NOT be part of the studio’s overarching DC Extended Universe cinematic franchise, which was FINALLY starting to find its feet – then what’s the point? I found myself asking.  I should have just sat back and gone with it, especially since the finished product would have made me eat a big slice of humble pie had I not already been won over once the trailers started making the rounds.  This is something new, different and completely original in the DC cinematic pantheon, even if it does draw major inspiration from Alan Moore’s game-changing DC comics mini-series The Killing Joke – a complete standalone origin story for one of our most enduring villains, re-imagined as a blistering, bruising psychological thriller examining what can happen to a man when he’s pushed far beyond the brink by terrible circumstance, societal neglect and crippling mental illness. Joaquin Phoenix delivers the performance of his career as Arthur Fleck, a down-at-heel clown-for-hire struggling to launch a career as a stand-up-comic (badly hampered by the fact that he’s just not funny) while suffering from an acute dissociative condition and terrible attacks of pathological laughter at moments of heightened stress – the actor lost 52 pounds of weight to become a horrifically emaciated scarecrow painfully reminiscent of Christian Bale’s similar preparation for his acclaimed turn in The Machinist, and frequently contorts himself into seemingly impossible positions that prominently accentuate the fact.  Fleck is a truly pathetic creature, thoroughly put-upon by a pitiless society that couldn’t care less about him, driven by inner demons and increasingly compelling dark thoughts to act out in increasingly desperate, destructive ways that ultimately lead him to cross lines he just can’t come back from, and Phoenix gives his all in every scene, utterly mesmerising even when his character commits some truly heinous acts.  Certainly he dominates the film, but then there are plenty of winning supporting turns from a universally excellent cast to bolster him along, from Zazie Beetz as an impoverished young mother Arthur bonds with and Frances Conroy (Six Feet Under, American Horror Story) as Arthur’s decidedly fragile mother Penny to Brett Cullen (The Thorn Birds, Lost) as a surprisingly unsympathetic Thomas Wayne (the philanthropic father of future Batman Bruce Wayne), while Robert De Niro himself casts a very long shadow indeed as Murray Franklin, a successful comedian and talk show host that Arthur idolizes, a character intentionally referential to his role in The King of Comedy.  Indeed, Martin Scorsese’s influence is writ large throughout the entire film, reinforced by the choice to set the film in a 1981-set Gotham City which feels very much like the crumbling New York of Mean Streets or Taxi Driver.  This is a dark, edgy, grim and unflinchingly BRUTAL film, frequently difficult to watch as Arthur is driven further into a blazing psychological hell by his increasingly stricken life, but addictively, devastatingly compelling all the same, impossible to turn away from even in the truly DEVASTATING final act.  Initially director Todd Phillips seemed like a decidedly odd choice for the project, hailing as he does from a predominantly comedy-based filmmaking background (most notably Due Date and The Hangover trilogy), but he’s actually a perfect fit here, finding a strangely twisted beauty in many of his compositions and a kind of almost uplifting transcendence in his subject’s darkest moments, while his screenwriting collaboration with Scott Silver (8 Mile, The Fighter) means that the script is as rich as it can be, almost overflowing with brilliant ideas and rife with biting social commentary which is even more relevant today than in the period in which it’s set.  Intense, gripping, powerful and utterly devastating, this truly is one of the best films of 2019.  If this was a purely critical Top 30 this would have placed in the Top 5, guaranteed …

11.  FAST & FURIOUS PRESENTS HOBBS & SHAW – summer 2019’s most OTT movie was some of THE MOST FUN I had at the cinema all year, a genuinely batshit crazy, pure bonkers rollercoaster ride of a film I just couldn’t get enough of, the perfect sum of all its baffling parts.  The Fast & Furious franchise has always revelled in its extremes, subtle as a brick and very much playing to the blockbuster, popcorn movie crowd right from the start, but it wasn’t until Fate of the Furious (yup, the ridiculous title says it all) that it really started to play to the inherent ridiculousness of its overall setup, paving the way for this first crack at a new spin-off series sans-Vin Diesel.  Needless to say this one fully embraces the ludicrousness, with director David Leitch the perfect choice to shepherd it into the future, having previously mastered OTT action through John Wick and Atomic Blonde before helming manic screwball comedy Deadpool 2, which certainly is the strongest comparison point here – Hobbs & Shaw is every bit as loud, violent, chaotic and thoroughly irreverent, definitely playing up the inherent comic potential at the core of the material as he cranks up the humour.  Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham take centre stage as, respectively, DSS agent Luke Hobbs and former SAS black operative Deckard Shaw, the ultimate action movie odd couple once again forced to work together to foil the bad guy and save the world from a potentially cataclysmic disaster.  Specifically Brixton Lore (Idris Elba), a self-proclaimed “black superman” enhanced with cybernetic implants and genetic manipulation to turn him into the ultimate warrior, who plans to use a lethal designer supervirus to eradicate half of humanity (as supervillains tend to do), but there’s one small flaw in his plan – the virus has been stolen by Hattie Shaw (Mission: Impossible – Fallout’s Vanessa Kirby), a rogue MI6 agent who also happens to be Deckard’s sister.  Got all that?  Yup, the movie really is as mad as it sounds, but that’s part of the charm – there’s an enormous amount of fun to be had in just giving in and going along with the madness as Hobbs and the two Shaws bounce from one overblown, ludicrously destructive set-piece to the next, kicking plenty of arse along the way when they’re not jumping out of tall buildings or driving fast cars at ludicrous speeds in heavy traffic, and when they’re not doing that they’re bickering with enthusiasm, each exchange crackling with exquisite hate-hate chemistry and liberally laced with hilarious dialogue delivered with gleeful, fervent venom (turns out there’s few things so enjoyable as watching Johnson and Statham verbally rip each other a new one), and the two action cinema heavyweights have never been better than they are here, each bringing the very best performances of their respective careers out of each other as they vacillate, while Kirby holds her own with consummate skill that goes to show she’s got a bright future of her own.  As for Idris Elba, the one-time potential future Bond deserves to be remembered as one of the all-time great screen villains ever, investing Brixton with the perfect combination of arrogant swagger and lethal menace to steal every scene he’s in while simultaneously proving he can be just as big a badass in the action stakes; Leitch also scatters a selection of familiar faces from his previous movies throughout a solid supporting cast which also includes the likes of Fear the Walking Dead’s Cliff Curtis, From Dusk Till Dawn’s Eiza Gonzalez and Helen Mirren (who returns as Deckard and Hattie’s mum Queenie Shaw), while there’s more than one genuinely brilliant surprise cameo to enjoy. As we’ve come to expect, the action sequences are MASSIVE, powered by nitrous oxide and high octane as property is demolished and vehicles are driven with reckless abandon when our protagonists aren’t engaged in bruising, bone-crunching fights choreographed with all the flawless skill you’d expect from a director who used to be a professional stuntman, but this time round the biggest fun comes from the downtime, as the aforementioned banter becomes king.  It’s an interesting makeover for the franchise, going from heavyweight action stalwart to comedy gold, and it’s a direction I hope they’ll maintain for the inevitable follow-up – barring Fast Five, this is THE BEST Fast & Furious to date, and a strong indicator of how it should go to keep conquering multiplexes in future.  Sign me up for more, please.

[shark-myths]

Writing Reflection: 2018

I was tagged by @horsegirlharry, who i will smooch in person in ONE WEEK! 

1. Number of stories (including drabbles) posted to AO3: 15. I'm trying not to feel critical about my output this year: I was distracted by ~boy problems and emotional turmoil for a lot of 2018, so I absolutely slayed some journals but neglected my fic. but I also tackled some difficult projects, some of which I'm really proud of, and translated a lot of those big emotions back into writing, so there's a lot to give myself credit for.

2. Word count posted for the year: 224,001

3. List of works published this year (in order of posting)

Roman Candle Hearts

I'm A Wing, I'm A Prayer

The Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique

your hips, your lips, are mine

in space, no one can hear you misgender me

Girl Firsts

halfway to your heart (starting from your knees)

Boys Next Door/Assholes

Vices & Vices

Early Morning Company

Jaws of Death

Baby You're A Haunted House

The Fixed Stars of Heaven

Sell Out Girl

Think of All The Fellas I Haven't Kissed

4. Fandoms I wrote for: Fall Out Boy, Battlestar Galactica, Panic! at the Disco, My Chemical Romance

5. Pairings: Pete/Patrick, Starbuck/Apollo, Pete/Brendon, Brendon/Ryan, Patrick/Michael Day, Frank Iero/Gerard Way, Joe/Andy

6. Story with the most:

Boys Next Door/Assholes, aka the peterick SUMMER BOYFRIENDS au, aka the fic I wrote about falling in love with my ex that captures the sweetness and suffering of new summer love in a very specific and tactile way. It has the most hits, kudos, and comments of anything I wrote in 2018. I'm so glad you guys loved it so much!

9. Work I’m most proud of (and why):

Sell Out Girl, the sequel to girl out boy, is incredibly important to me and I'm so fucking proud of how it turned out. emotionally, i am prouder of the girl out boy stories  than anything else i've ever done. girlfic is how I am cleaning my wounds and healing my heart, and it is an honor to be doing that with you walking alongside me, and being touched and changed too. this fic was incredibly emotionally demanding but also, on a technical level, easy: there was lots of rambly internal monologues and angst, glitter-sharp language and poetical pain, which is my comfort zone as a writer for sure.

on a technical and writerly level, the one I'm most proud of is Baby You're A Haunted House, because i wrote it *fast*, in a fandom I'm not comfortable or familiar in, in a style I don't usually use, and to achieve a very specific artistic effect with the unreliable narrator and shifting sands of reality, while heartbroken. so I'm pleased as fuck with how it came out. it's one of my favorite things I've written in the past several years, and the perfect kind of challenge for me.

10. Work I’m least proud of (and why):

ugh, The Fixed Stars of Heaven . I usually love everything I write, but my experience of writing this fic was terrible. I was never inspired (except when researching the ISS and zero-g botany!) and the epistolary format meant I didn’t know how to develop the kind of tension I *live* for. the whole time I was writing, I didn’t go back and reread (a typical part of my process for matching tone) because I loathed it so much! I kept saying “well, something has to be my worst story” about it... and I still feel that way.

11. A favorite excerpt of your writing:

It's impossible to choose--I like my writing a lot, that's why I write the way i do. all of Baby You're A Haunted House and I'm A Wing, I'm A Prayer are beautiful to me; the love letter Pete writes in Boys Next Door/Assholes; and the whole bathtub scene from chapter 5 of Sell Out Girl, of which this is the very best part:

“Pete is safe and warm and submerged, an egg in a mermaid’s purse, waiting to swim out as a shark whenever she’s ready. She holds her breath and feels her baby beat within her. She looks up at Pat and fears nothing, nothing but love.”

12. Share or describe a favorite review you received:

every review I get makes impact on my heart. I take screenshots and save my favorites; you guys bolster me and keep me going. The best and most important reactions are the ones I get on Girl Out Boy stuff, and the outpouring of fanworks and support means the world to me. especially the way you guys showed up for and stood with me during my difficult breakup this year—wow. I love you so much.

my favorite reviews I’ve gotten this year have been a few different people who told me I was skilled at capturing the feeling of falling in love. as a feelings-and-process oriented romance writer, that means the world to me! I never know what plots my stories are going to have (my characters always surprise me), but I always know how I want a fic to feel. I’m never more honored than when you feel it too.

13. A time when writing was really, really hard:

during the slow-motion process of one of my romantic relationships coming apart in September and October! I was so anxious and keyed up and self-obsessed and miserable during that time, I literally couldn’t bear to write, and when I tried I just kept wrecking the Girl Out Boys’ lives. you guys carried me through.

14. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you:

I don’t want to spoil Sell Out Girl, but a ship I don’t typically ship popped up and I went with it, and I was exactly as surprised as everyone reading that it happened and that it felt so right and good!

15. How did you grow as a writer this year:

i tried new types of projects, like the fucking epistolary scifi fic, a flash fiction exercise, the unreliable narrator trope, and sequels. i wrote in a couple fandoms I'm less comfortable in, fairly often off of other people's prompts. I am trying to hone a cleaner writing style: I spend so much time lost and rambly in describing how characters feel, my stories lose a lot of chances for action and motion. i like my writing best when it is spare and vivid, able to actually evoke emotions rather than just tell you what they feel like. i think some of my fic this year really showcases that (like Vices & Vices ). i still grow so much as a writer, and learn so much about the craft, with each work.

i used an editing and revision process for Fixed Stars of Heaven, thanks to my dear friend JM, that i don't usually subject my work to. i also wrote through a project i was not enjoying, rather than dropping it as soon as my interest waned. my discipline as a wild, reckless writer is, slowly but surely, improving.

i wrote through my own shitty emotionally abusive relationship with a parent through the character of Andy in sell out girl, and got better at naming trauma and abuse and setting my own boundaries as a result of that.

i started reading (and a little bit writing) poetry again.

16. How do you hope to grow next year:

oh, i can't see that road! i hope i grow in ways i never expected cuz i'm faced with challenges in my work i could never have anticipated. generically, i hope i keep tightening my style and improving my discipline, and getting better at defending regular writing time.

17. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc):

- i read only works by women for the entire year of 2018, and the nourishing impact of that on my entire inner life cannot be overstated. i didn't even read a comic book or a work book if it was written by a man. i kept myself entirely pure of the labor of perspective-taking for men, or subjecting myself to men's conception of anybody else's experiential reality.

- @leyley09 my official Fic Enabler, who is SINGULARLY AND SOLEY to blame for at least two fics this year, and has encouraged my very worst ideas about a hundred more

- my unofficial cheerleading squad family on tumblr, who lifted me up and made sure i was healthy, supported, and well through my whole shitty relationship ending debacle. @glitterandrocketfuel, @secretstudentdragonblog, @allkindsofplatinumandpercocet, and @laudanumcafe -- not to mention every other beauty who commented on my sad-ass selfies or my fic. thank you, my loves.

18. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year:

EVERYTHING IS REAL

most notable and egregious examples:

- the letter pete writes for patrick in boys next door/assholes is a real love letter i gave someone

- the fight brendon and ryan have in vices & vices is a real fight i had with a partner

- the climactic kiss on the streets of new york at the end of sell out girl is my real first kiss with my new boo

the worst thing is that i don't generally farm my *past* life for my fic--everything that shows up is really recent and fresh, because i'm most interested in writing things i'm currently dealing with and experiencing. and yes, i especially steal the sex scenes.

19. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers:

be curious about yourself and your characters. if you've never written / published in a serial format, where you're only writing a week or so ahead of posting, you must try it at least once! listen to what your readers are noticing about your themes and characters! i learn so much about my the emotional resonance and direction of my stories from the people who read them and comment. my writing is so much stronger as a result of writing the majority of my work this way, and i have much more fun with it than when i write a long piece in an echo chamber with no input from you guys!

20. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year:

- i'm working on a Rent-A-Family trope + law firm AU + kidfic thing i started messing with last year

- Pete Wentz's Bisexual Realizations, a fic dreamed up and playlist-empowered by @nikadd

- a Venom AU for my beloved @immoral-crow

- Girl Out Boy hiatus fic

- and a MANIA anniversary surprise <3

21. Tag some writers whose answers you’d like to read.

all of my Peterick creator pals! @leyley09 @shatteredmirrors-and-lace23 @allkindsofplatinumandpercocet @laudanumcafe @glitterandrocketfuel and everyone/anyone else!

[paralleljulieverse]

G’day Gertie: Star! debuts Down Under  

After its global premiere in London and subsequent release to select international markets such as Japan, the Julie Andrews mega-musical Star! made its way to Australia in early-October 1968, fifty years ago this week. Release patterns for films in this era could be a little idiosyncratic, and the Australian release of Star! was no exception. The film was treated to two lavish “preview” premieres in Sydney and Melbourne on October 4 and 8, respectively, but didn’t open to the general public till October 24 with a premiere roadshow engagement at Melbourne’s Paris Theatre. Even more strangely, Melbourne was the only Australian city to screen Star! for the first six months. The film didn’t open in Sydney till 23 May 1969 with other Australian cities to follow.*

The three previous Julie Andrews film musicals –– Mary Poppins, The Sound of Music, and Thoroughly Modern Millie –– had all been major hits in Australia with Millie and Music still in theatrical release when Star! opened in late-1968. In point of fact, The Sound of Music enjoyed longer roadshow runs in Australia than anywhere else in the world: 181 weeks in Sydney (140 at the Mayfair before transferring to the Paris for a further 41 weeks), and 178 weeks in Melbourne (140 at the Paris, then transferring to the Esquire for a final 38 week run). By 1968, it was estimated that just under half the national population had seen The Sound of Music with more to come as the film entered suburban and regional release (Dale: 15; Keavney: 4-5).

As a result, Twentieth Century-Fox had high hopes Star! would do well in Australia and sent director Robert Wise on a special PR trip to the country to help launch the film. Accompanied by his wife, Patricia, Wise touched down in Sydney on 31 September 1968 where he was treated to a round of civic and industry receptions before officiating at a special gala invitation-only premiere of Star! on October 4 at Sydney’s Mayfair Theatre, home to The Sound of Music for so many years  (“New Boom”: 18). The following week, Wise flew on to Melbourne for the second Australian premiere at the Paris Theatre, another Sound of Music alma mater, on October 8. While in Melbourne, Wise gave a host of press interviews and even helped the Lord Mayor lay a plaque for a new $4-million cinema complex in the city (Messer: 8; see also, Bennett: 14; Musgrove: 2; Veitch: 18).

As with the UK response, Australian critical reception of Star! was generally very positive. In Melbourne, Howard Palmer of The Sun wrote:

“Star! the Julie Andrews epic is indeed one of those films that a critic sees with relief, because he can let his his hair down and quite safely say it is wonderful in every way...Wise has put theatre on the screen better than anyone else before him...Julie Andrews gives the drama of the Lawrence love affairs so well...Add to this the many comic scenes of her early career....and you have a complete actress...It’s a wonderful film not to be missed” (27).

Alec Martin of the Melbourne Truth was equally enthusiastic:

“[I]f Gertrude Lawrence was alive today she would be the first to whistle and  stamp her feet at...Miss Andrews’ brilliant performance in Star!...Miss Andrews sheds her wholesome Mary Poppins and Sound of Music image to play the glamorous, temperamental Gertrude Lawrence with perfection....Star! will be a box-office success, that’s for sure” (39). 

Ronald Conway of Melbourne’s The Advocate declared Star! “[a]n agreeable, civilised musical...Julie Andrews sings and acts splendidly and it is a relief to see her in something other than Sound of Music which lasted at the Paris for ever so long...A handsome production to be enjoyed by patrons of all ages” (20). While Kay Mealun of The Australian Women’s Weekly gushed, “I found it rich and big and happy–– could have sat it through, three hours and all, all over again right away” (56). 

Not all Australian reviews of Star! were as unreservedly laudatory, though even naysayers conceded the film had charm. Colin Bennett of The Age wrote that Star! “is well set in theatreland and reproduces...a series of splendid old favourites performed to perfection by Julie Andrews who looks fabulous and sings beautifully...But [she] lacks the bite of a Gertrude Lawrence. She is too fundamentally ‘nice’ and tasteful and efficient to be really insolent or bitchy” (6). 

In a similar vein, Valda Marshall of The Sun Herald wrote: 

“Star! is like an unrealised and long-forgotten musical script of the 30s...a conglomeration of vaudeville numbers, revue material and musical acts...It lacks a central sustaining interest [and] the star herself is without a unified character...Julie Andrews is...in top form. Her voice is as sure and strong as ever. Her acting still has the same unabashed directness and warmth. But the spark of mischievousness and spontaneity are missing” (87).

Charles Higham of the Sydney Morning Herald –– who summarily titled his mixed review, “Julie glitters but she isn’t Gertie Lawrence” –– declared Star!  “a carefully made picture...with fine dramatic moments [but] there is something tame and bloodless about it...Julie Andrews in the title role...brings a brittle professionalism and impeccable coldness to a part that demanded vulnerability, anguish, a maddening neurotic edge. Impossible to imagine this athlete of the musical screen missing an appointment or failing to pay a bill, falling hopelessly and foolishly in love or singing out of tune” (6). Still, Higham mused in another column, “[o]ne hopes Sydney audiences will respond warmly to this very well-made film” (Higham: 19).  

And, for the most part, Australian audiences did respond with comparative warmth to Star!. While the film didn’t score anywhere near the record-breaking success of The Sound of Music, it enjoyed respectable theatrical runs, playing in roadshow release in Melbourne for just under six months (23 weeks from 24 October 1968-26 March 1969) and in Sydney for five months (20 weeks from 23 May 1969-9 October 1969), two of the longest roadshow runs of Star! anywhere outside London (Davies: 198. 206; Louden: 6). 

Star! also went on to a fairly solid theatrical after-life in Australia. The film avoided the debacle of post-release editing that occurred in North America and the full roadshow print screened in residual first release in suburban and regional Australian markets well into the early-70s. Star! even ran as a 70mm double-feature with Hello Dolly at Sydney’s Village Cinema City in late-1974. The film continued to pop up intermittently in subsequent years in repertory screenings. It played several times throughout the 1970s and 80s at Sydney’s Ritz and Mandarin cinemas. The National Library in Canberra hosted a special archival screening of Star! in March 1980, and the film was given a lavish one-week showcase season at Melbourne’s Astor Theatre in November 1998 to celebrate its 30th anniversary.

Star! was also a frequent feature on Australian TV screens. It made its national small screen debut as the Sunday Night Movie of the Week in October 1973 and was rebroadcast every few years thereafter: 1975, 1979, 1980, 1981, 1986 and 1989. As far as can be ascertained, the first two broadcasts were edited for running time, but most later broadcasts appear to have been the 176 min. roadshow release.

Notes:

* In a sign of the times, the delay of the Sydney release of Star! was due to the unexpected success of The Graduate which had been booked in to the Mayfair, Sydney’s “home” of Todd-AO roadshows. The theatre’s previous roadshow offering, Doctor Dolittle, closed earlier than anticipated and The Graduate was scheduled as a “filler” –– it ended up running at the Mayfair for 11 months (Louden, 6).

Sources:

Bennett, Colin. “Box Office Wisdom.” The Age Saturday Magazine. 5 October 1968: 14.

________. “New Films: Star.” The Age. 28 October 1968: 6.

Bishop, Barbara. “Julie Misses the Point.” The Sun. 25 October 1968: 14.

Conway, Ronald. “Star.” The Advocate. 31 October 1968: 20.

Dale, David. “The Tribal Mind: What Australians Love the Most.” The Sydney Morning Herald. 12 February 1999: 15.

Davies, Keith. 50 Years of Cinema and Movie’s in Melbourne’s CBD (1940 – 1989). Melbourne: (n.p.), 2016.

“Films on TV.” The Age Green Guide. 21 December 1978: 8.

Higham, Charles. “Star-Maker.” The Sydney Morning Herald. 5 October 1968: 18.

________. “Turmoil in Film City.” The Sydney Morning Herald. 24 May 1969: 19.

________. “Julie Glitters but she is not Gertrude Lawrence.” The Sydney Morning Herald. 26 May 1969: 6.

________. “Films like Mother Used to Cry Over.” The Sydney Morning Herald. 21 June 1969: 17.

Keavney, Kay. “‘The Sound of Music’ Greatest Film Bonanza.” The Australian Women’s Weekly. 36: 1, 5 June 1968: 4-5.

Louden, Doug. Sydney in 70mm. Sydney: (n.p.), 2016. 

MacDonald, Dougal. “Julie Never Stops Being Julie.” The Canberra Times. 28 September 1969: 30.

Marshall, Valda. “It’s a Happening World: Star!” The Sun-Herald. 25 May 1969: 87.

Martin, Alec. “She is the True Star.” The Melbourne Truth. 2 November 1968: 39.

Melaun, Kay. “Julie as Gertrude.” The Australian Women’s Weekly. 36: 20, 4 December 1968: 56.

Messer, John. “From Horror to the Sound of Music––That’s Wise.” The Age. 8 October 1968: 8.

“Movies on TV.” The Sydney Morning Herald: TV Guide. 12 May 1975: 1.

“Movies on TV.” The Sydney Morning Herald: Monday Guide. 27 March 1978: 3.

“Movies on TV.” The Sydney Morning Herald: 7-Day Guide. 29 January 1979: 3.

“Movies on TV.” The Sun-Herald. 15 April 1984: 84.

Musgrove, Nan. “Two Women on His Mind.” The Australian Women’s Weekly. 36: 20, 16 October 1968: 2.

“New Boom for Star Musicals.” The Sydney Morning Herald. 1 October 1968: 18.

Palmer, Howard. “Julie Proves It.” The Sun Weekend Magazine. 26 October 1968: 27.

“Sunday TV.” The Age TV-Radio Guide. 30 March 1975: 8.

“Television.” The Age. 3 April 1980: 2.

“Television.” The Age. 28 August 1981: 2.

“Television.” The Age. 21 January 1989: 18.

“Today’s TV.” The Sun-Herald. 21 October 1973: 71.

Veitch, Jack. “Why Robert Wise Doesn’t Need to Work Again.” The Sun- Herald. 6 October 1968: 18.

“What Was the Name of that Film?” The Age. 8 October 1968: 16.

Copyright © Brett Farmer 2018

[stone-man-warrior]

April 19, 2019: 3:58 pm:

From other word processing software.

(April 18, 2019: 1:02 pm:)

Safari brought African Lions yesterday.

In the evening, about 7:00 pm, I heard the roar of an African Lion. It was close. Too close.

I had taken one of many short walks as I do all day, most days. Just to the road and back again is all that I can do without getting shot at, but I still get shot often even if I just take a short walk. I always am being subject to Nitrous Oxide/Versed gas mixture. They neighborhood is fogged with the gas nearly all of the time.

Over the past week, there has been unusual activity at the Monroe, Screen Actor Guild, Seventh Day Adventist terror family cell. Unusual activity means there are members of a different terror cell there, and they are running an attack on me that is flavored with a variety of activities that come from the visiting terror cell.

The travel trailer in the backyard over there was put there by the people from the Wal-Mart terror cell. I wrote about that activity in the past, when the Wal-Mart people brought the trailer with a big, red duel wheel pick-up truck. They positioned the travel trailer, one that is about 35 feet long, in a place that is within range of the implanted microphone transmitter that was put into my jaw in 2011. The trailer is part of ongoing attacks on me. It was placed in such a way that from the windows inside, it has a view of much of my yard, and maybe a view to my house. The trailer there is right near the fence line along my driveway where I walk everyday. The trailer is an attack vehicle, it serves communication, visual surveillance, and as a hiding place. It also serves as a bullshit generator, whereby the Monroe's and other terror cell members use the trailer like a prop on a stage for a play, and the play is an attack on me when I take a walk.

This past week, the unusual activities included that even though that travel trailer has been there since last autumn, I never saw anyone go in or come out of it. I could see that sometimes there is a light on inside, and sometimes there is a television on, but I never saw anyone, nor had I ever heard any voices from within that trailer. So, a mystery trailer, where the trailer has outward signs of activity, but no one is ever near the trailer visibly. I just know that there are people nearby because the lighting conditions of the trailer change from thing to another, and those conditions change between the times that I take a walk, and I walk often throughout the day. The conditions change within twenty minutes but there are no signs of anyone anywhere near that trailer, except me on a walk from my home about five hundred feet away from the trailer.

Imagine a trailer next to your driveway that has signs of life going on, It's been there for six months, you know there is someone that uses the thing. It's right there, about twenty feet away from you, but you have never seen anyone go near it, for six months, but the lights change from time to time.

It's creepy.

So, this past week, there has been activities at the trailer. For the first time, I saw someone go into that trailer last week. It was the blue hair Deb Monroe that lost her head. Other activity over there included a bar-b-que. It would not be worth mentioning about a bar-b-que, except around here, in the past ten years or more, I have not seen anyone have a bar-b-que. Everyone owns a bar-b-que, it mandatory to have one, but they are for show, not for use. Bar-b-quing and home cooking are firbidden here, the terror army soldiers eat at a cafeteria where their diet is prepared for them. And that is part of what was interesting about the bar-b-que activities that past week at Monroe's. They faked using a bar-b-que. The blue hair Deb opened the bar-b-que, she ran a wire brush across it, but then faked cooking on it, and the odor of a freshly brushed bar-b-que grill was in the air near that part of the yard.

Then they had a fake bar-b-que dinner when the Google terror cell was there. That was the day before the Notre Dame fire in France, and I had heard them talking about that, before the fire was announced and even before it was said to have burned.

Personally, I remember the fire at Notre Dame was in 2008. It seems as though all of media worked together to fake the fire, amnd used Twitter to provide all of the bullshit commands for whatever the purpose of such an enormous bullshit story would be for. But this is a report about African Lions at the neighbor terror cell in Oregon. The Notre Dame thing is a different set of terror activities.

Last night they did another fake bar-b-que, with a different terror cell joining them, probably Wal-Mart terror cell given all of their people I have killed over in the past few days. Safari terror cell provided African Lions for the attack yesterday, April 18, 2019, that included a fake bar-b-que gathering of three people around a fire pit nearby that travel trailer under the pole barn in the backyard at Monroe's.

So, while on a walk, I heard the sound of water sloshing about, then the sound of someone yelling about a dog that jumped into the swimming pool at Chartrands. With that sound, I know what's going on. It's bullshit. They really do go this far to try an fake people out. The reason they faked the dog into to pool is because African Lions stink. African Lions have a thick, robust, odor about them. African Lions smell like a great big wet dog. You can smell an African Lion from hundreds of feet away because the odor is so strong and carries with the wind, so, they faked the dog into the pool, and shouted about it! “The dog just jumped into the pool!” followed by the sound of splashing water.

I am not kidding.

The Safari terror cell in league with Monroe terror cell, while getting ready to release an African Lion into the yard so that the Lion will kill me, used the sound of splashing water, and the verbal announcement that the dog had jumped into the pool, and they did all of that to try to cover the odor of the African Lions.

Then, they released two lions.

When I heard the sound of the fake dog in the pool, I knew what was about to happen. I was standing nearby that trailer in my driveway while on a walk when they announced the dog into the water, so, I said out loud, “Siri, power down”.

I don't have a smart phone. The surveillance equipment they use at Monroe's is driven by iphones. The implant in my jaw works in my favor sometimes. The implant worked to turn off the comm that was being used by the people at the fake bar-b-que, fire-pit gathering. Sandy and Green Hair Deb Monroe, and one other person, a male, small stature, bald with hat on, who did not allow me to see his face, kept his back turned. There was no fire in the fire pit, they were just sitting around in lounge chairs pretending to eat while keeping an eye on where I was at.

Safari released the Lions from Chartrands at 376, two of them, while the Monroe's were outside, and the their comm was turned off, just after the fake dog jumped into the pool at the Chartrands.

Two African Lions came through the woods, from Chartrands, to Monroe's as they were still outside around the fire pit. Green Hair Deb had gone into the trailer, apparently to see why the comm was not working. That is when one of the Lions came to the side of the trailer and looked up into the window there briefly. I saw that from forty feet away.

The two lions were wearing jammies. One Lion was wearing white jammies, and the other was wearing black jammies. So, the white jammie Lion was there by the trailer. I was about 40 feet away, in my yard, and saw the white jammie Lion go near the trailer. I was so excited to know that the Lion was there while the Monroe's were still outside that I was not concerned about the Lion. I was not even afraid. Mostly due to the Nitrous Gas, but still, I remember saying “It's my lucky fucking day!, The Lion is out and so are the Monroe's!

I think the two Lions are named Rothschild and Soros.

The white jammie Lion went out of sight, I went in the same direction as the Lion, but on my side of the fence. I peeked around the pole barn as good as I was able, to see where the Lion went. I heard Sandy talking to Green Hair Deb, who was inside the trailer, and the I saw the trailer door was wide open. Sandy was in a chair by the fake fire, about twenty feet away from the door of the trailer.

The white jammie Lion went into the trailer.

I had not seen or known about the black jammie Lion being out at that point, I only know there was one African Lion outside.

I walked back over to where I saw the Lion looking up at the window of the trailer, and that is when I heard the most fierce Lion roar I have ever heard. It was so deep, ominous that I could feel the Lion's roar vibrating my chest. I could feel it.

I heard Green Hair Deb say “the lion is in the trailer!”.

The trailer began to shake, nearly off of it's supports, as if Discovery Channel was filming the mating of wildebeests in there.

I walked over to the other side of the pole barn where I can see the front door of the trailer. On the way, as I walked, I heard the man's voice that was there, and could smell the lions by then. The man tried to say something, but he was unable to, he made sounds as if he was about to cry. I heard the sound of a skull popping, it sounds like someone hitting a hollow block of wood with a drumstick when that happens.

Safari trains the African Lions to do a number of different things. They train them not to chase deer. The train them to go into doors that are opened, I don't know that by any other reason except having seen the Lions get into cars that park at the mail boxes when the doors of the cars have been opened, and now, I saw the white jammie Lion go into the trailer when the door was open, even though there were two people outdoors right there about twenty feet away, the Lion chose to go into the trailer after coming around from the other side and looking up at the trailer window.

Another thing the Lions are trained to do, is respond to the words “Here kitty, kitty”. The Lions get all kinds of pissed off when someone says “here kitty, kitty”. The Lions roar very loud with the words “here kitty, kitty”, and the Lion trainer always yells at me when I say “here kitty, kitty” while the Lions are still inside of their transporting trailer. That works in my favor. I have known about that for almost twenty years. Safari has been using African Lions to kill with for more than twenty years. Safari trains the African Lions to attack human victims at the head. That is, the Lions approach the victims, they grab the victim by the shoulders with their front paws, and open their mouths, and crush the victim's head. It makes a “pop” sound, like a hollow block of wood being struck with a drumstick. If there is another victim nearby, the Lions toss aside the first victim, and they go grab the head of the next victim. The Lions don't attack the victim and eat the victims right away, the Lions look around for more victims, pop all of the heads, and then go back and play with the victims. The Lions can toss a 200 pound man ten feet into the air, and play with the victims that way. The African Lions can approach a regular tract house, and jump onto the roof of the house, about ten feet up, with no more effort than a house cat uses to jump onto a sofa. The Lions can easily leap over fences that are eight feet tall, and can jump a ten foot fence with just a bit of extra effort.

Safari brings the Lions to Chartrand 376, Nathan Phillips 520, sometimes to Myers 560 but not often, Strong on Russel at 3747, Chapman at 3701 but not often because there are horses there, and to Sunflower KOBI/NBC also on Russel. Those terror cells are used most often.

I have seen this stuff happen in my neighborhood for twenty years. The Safari terror cell usually uses an air-horn to announce that they have arrived, the kind of air-horn that comes in a can, the ones you can buy at a hardware store. The ones that people bring to football games at stadiums. They use those.

So, back to the Lions at the Monroe's fake bar-b-que. I had seen the white jammie Lion go into the trailer. I think Green Hair Deb had gone in there because the comm had been turned off when I said “Siri, power down”. I had heard Green Hair Deb say “the Lion is in the trailer”. I saw the trailer shake nearly off of it's supports. I heard that roar that vibrated my chest. And had heard the two pops of skulls being crushed by African Lions and seen what looked like the Black jammie Lion with Sandy Monroe's head in it's mouth. And I had heard the man try to say something, and seen what appeared to be that man sort of hunched over in the chair he was in. And, When I got to a place that I could see where the Monroe's had been sitting, that's when I saw the other, black jammie Lion. The Lion was in the fire pit. The chairs the Monroe's were seated in were arranged around the fire pit, but there was no fire, they made smoke somehow to fake me out, but no fire, and Sandy Monroe's head appeared as though it was inside of the black jammie Lions mouth and she was trying to shove it away.

If what I saw there is actually what happened, then I would call that a perfect day in paradise.

I though about going back to take a picture, I had started to walk over for a view from the side where I has seen the Lion look at the window of the trailer. I thought about a photo, then I realized I just have a flip-phone, the photos suck, and there are two African Lions within about thirty to forty feet of me.

I said out loud, “I need to return safely to my home, and come back out when there are fewer African Lions in the yard”.

So I did that. I walked safely home. I began to sort hum or otherwise sing the tune if the Benny Hill Show Theme Song on the way back, but I did it the way Bugs Bunny would have done it.

When I got near my front door, I turned around and shouted, “Here Kitty-Kitty”.

I saw a man running from Monroe's, had jumped the fence, and was running into the woods and behind my other house. I have three houses here. The man was being chased by the Black Jammie Lion. I heard screaming and went inside.

I don't know who it was being chased. It looked to me like all three at Monroe's had been killed by the Lions. The Lion was right behind the man as the two went out of sight and behind the other house.

I heard a child's voice from Nathan Phillips terror cell at 520 say the words “the Lion got the agent”.

And that's what happened last evening, at about seven o'clock.

When I came inside of my house, there was an intruder in my kitchen squatting in the corner and wearing a costume made of turkeys. The intruder had a house cat with her. The house cat was dead, it was a taxidermied house cat, and the taxedermied cat had a stick attached to it's belly. The intruder was squatting in the corner of the kitchen, next to the trash can, under the kitchen window, and holding the taxidermied cat up to the window sill inside of the house.

That's correct, you read that correctly.

An intruder wearing a costume made of turkeys who also had a dead cat on a stick in my kitchen.

I cut the woman's head off. Someone came and too the body out of the kitchen after I went outside for some fresh air about twenty minutes after that. When I came back in, the intruder in the turkey suit was gone, but hear head was in the trash where it had fallen. There was a child hiding behind a chair in my living room.

I went back outside, I think I was in a state of shock at that point. I just wondered around, and the Lions were still outside someplace. I could hear people yelling about the “Lions are still out”. They were probably busy with the terrorists at the Monroe's, or maybe, they found whatever agents that child was shouting about. Maybe if some agents get killed by the Lions, then they might send help, that would be good. I hope that some agents were killed bu African Lions in my yard, to preserve Freedom.

Later, a child came in, and retrieved the head of the turkey intruder. The doors were locked with two locks. They come on anyway, with a key made by a SAG locksmith. Someone said the person in the turkey costume was Rita Myers, the Vatican terror cell at 560 who make costumes from the bodies of dead human victims. Thet are my neighbors two doors down the road.

I made spaghetti for dinner, and only went on short walks after that, just to my car and back.

Please send help to Josephine County Oregon.

[askauradonprep]

About That Super Long Playlist

Long information post behind the cut! It’s pretty much the songs in the stages of the crew’s relationship.

First Round of Recruiting

1 What About Us 2 At the End of the Day 3 How Far I’ll Go 4 Brave 5 Anthem of a Runaway 6 Come Back (Ella Eyre) 7 She Got the Best of Me 8 Glad You Came 9 You Walked In 10 You’re Beautiful 11 You Don’t Know Me 12 Enchanted 13 Felt Good On My Lips 14 Girl Crush 15 Crashed 16 Do It For Her 17 Who Are You When I’m Not Looking 18 Wildest Dreams 19 Started With a Song

Rise to Power

20 You and Me 21 Bad Reputation 22 Playing With the Big Boys 23 I Bring the Darkness (End of Days) 24 Warrior 25 Let It Go

Descendants 2

26 What’s My Name 27 Here Comes the Thunder 28 One Way or Another 29 Greatest Show on Earth 30 The Edge of Glory 31 One Day More 32 Dyin’ Ain’t So Bad 33 You’re Going Down 34 Hit Me With Your Best Shot 35 Look Down 36 King of Anything 37 Rich 38 Fly 39 It’s Goin’ Down

Uma Leaving

40 Evermore 41 If Only 42 The Winner Takes It All 43 It’s Over Isn’t It

Rough Mental Health Period

44 Supergirl 45 Ring of Fire 46 Monster 47 Little Toy Guns 48 Mayday 49 Cry 50 Bad Day 51 Because of You 52 Burning House 53 Stilettos 54 Out of the Woods 55 Ask Me How I Know 56 Tomorrow 57 Landslide 58 Better Man 59 Done You Wrong 60 Stupid Boy 61 Chasing Pavements

Uma’s Return

62 Girl on Fire 63 Keep Holding On 64 Umbrella 65 Make You Feel My Love 66 If You’re Going Through Hell (Before the Devil Even Knows You’re There) 67 I’ll Stand By You 68 Safe & Sound 69 Dancing On My Own 70 Wanted 71 Innocent 72 Invisible 73 It’s Okay To Cry 74 Break On Me 75 Let It Out 76 Here Comes A Thought 77 She Will Be Loved 78 Everytime

Recovery

79 The Good Stuff 80 My Life Would Suck Without You 81 Just Give Me A Reason 82 For The Long Run 83 Shake It Out 84 I Ain’t Giving Up On You 85 True Colors 86 Every Storm (Runs Out of Rain) 87 Warrior 88 Here’s To Us 89 Little Girl 90 Mine 91 Fly 92 War Paint  93 I Won’t Let Go 94 Clean

Comeback

95 Royals 96 So What 97 Still Not Giving Up 98 Back in Black 99 Bad Blood 100 Angel With a Shotgun 101 Payback 102 Another One Bites the Dust

Second Recruiting Period

103 We’re Going to Be Friends 104 Worth a Shot 105 Enchanted (Owl City)* 106 Break Up In The End 107 I Would’ve Loved You Anyway 108 Replace Your Heart* 109 Come Back Song 110 Let’s Be Us Again 111 All Together Now 112 Jessie’s Girl 113 I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance With You 114 Both Of You 115 Bury the Hatchet 116 Team 117 Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now 118 I Will Follow You Into the Dark 119 I've Got Your Back* 120 Ain’t No Stopping Us Now

Hooking Up

121 Play It Again 122 Love Will Do That 123 Ready to Run 124 I Don’t Dance 125 Hold My Beer 126 As She’s Walking Away 127 Make You Mine 128 See About A Girl 129 Merry Go ‘Round 130 Johnny & June 131 Somebody to Love 132 She Won’t Be Lonely Long 133 Friday Night

Getting Together Officially

134 History in the Making 135 How to Love 136 Complicated 137 Heart Attack 138 Give Your Heart a Break 139 Strong Enough 140 Good to You 141 What Ifs 142 Yours If You Want It 143 Waterloo 144 Bring It On 145 Best Shot 146 Begin Again

Early Relationship

147 Love Me Like You Mean It 148 Cool With That 149 Just a Kiss 150 (Kissed You) Good Night 151 Feels Like That 152 My Girl 153 You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away 154 Dress 155 We Danced 156 Secret Love Song 157 The Fighter 158 I Like The Sound of That

Getting in Trouble on the Isle

159 Super Villain 160 Good Girls Go Bad 161 Came Here to Forget 162 Home Alone Tonight 163 Good Together 164 I’ll Be The Singer, You Be The Song 165 Bounty 166 Run 167 Bad Boys 168 Bad Girls

Partying

169 Fix A Drink 170 We’re All Right 171 What Was I Thinkin’? 172 Bonnie and Clyde 173 She’s My Kind of Crazy 174 Toxic 175 It Ain’t My Fault 176 Wild Things 177 Downtown Kids 178 Let’s Get Rowdy 179 Fastest Girl in Town 180 Somethin’ Bad 181 Me Against the Music 182 Somethin’ We Shouldn’t Do 183 Exstacy 184 Criminal 185 Like You Do 186 We Are Young 187 Setting the World On Fire 188 Die Young 189 Anthem 190 Kiss Me Quiet 191 Up All Night 192 Hurricane 193 Perfect Storm

Getting Closer

194 Quiet 195 Easy Silence 196 Soak Up The Sun 197 I Like Me Better 198 I Won’t Say (I’m In Love) 199 If I Ain’t Got You 200 You Are In Love 201 Clarity 202 Count Me In 203 Good Time 204 Halo 205 Just The Way You Are 206 Ours

Descendants 3

207 Not Ready to Make Nice 208 My Lullaby 209 Stronger (Under the Sea)

Getting Invited to Auradon

210 Long Live 211 Hall Of Fame 212 Peter Pan 213 That’s When You Know It’s Over 214 Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You) 215 Just Like You 216 Wasting All These Tears 217 Since U Been Gone 218 I Wonder 219 Praying 220 If I Die Young 221 A Little Bit Stronger 222 Survivor 223 Be Wherever You Are 224 Anywhere With You 225 We Are the Champions 226 Let It Go (Demi Lovato) 227 Fight Song 228 Eyes Open 229 Change

Dating In Auradon 

230 Kiss The Girl 231 Somewhere Only We Know 232 Always the Love Songs 233 They Don’t Know About Us 234 Blank Space 235 Womanizer

Going Public

236 She’s With Me 237 A Guy With A Girl 238 A Place In This World 239 Unforgettable 240 Fearless 241 Skydiving 242 Sparks Fly 243 Dirt Roads Scholar 244 Sunshine On the Line 245 Jumped Right In 246 This Is How We Roll 247 Cruise 248 Wastin’ Gas 249 Fast Cars and Freedom 250 Old Alabama 251 Shotgun Rider 252 400 Lux 253 Parking Lot Party 254 Beat Of the Music 255 L.A. Boyz

Auradon Partying

256 Here For The Party 257 Up All Night 258 Raise Your Glass 259 Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.) 260 Middle of a Memory 261 Cop Car 262 Crash My Party

Getting to the First ‘I Love You’

263 I’m Only Me When I’m With You 264 Can’t Say No 265 I See The Light 266 I Think I Love You 267 The Only Exception 268 A Thousand Years 269 Criminal 270 You Love Who You Love 271 Girlfriend 272 Hooked 273 I Hope You’re the End of My Story

Being Split Up By Auradon Prep

274 Stay Beautiful 275 One Number Away 276 Thinking ‘Bout You 277 I Hope You Dance 278 Sleepin’ Around 279 Think of You 280 More Than A Memory 281 Picture 282 Hung Up 283 Need You Now 284 I’m Comin’ Over 285 Just To Get To You 286 Hell Bent For Buffalo 287 Warm Safe Place

Feeling Hopeless

288 Like A Cowboy 289 Remind Me 290 Long Live The Night 291 Don’t You Wanna Stay 292 Runnin’ Outta Moonlight 293 Secret Love 294 Carrying Your Love With Me 295 Wherever Love Goes 296 I Could Use A Love Song 297 Colder Weather 298 Red 299 True Love 300 Highway Don’t Care 301 Say You Do

Fixing Things and Reuniting

302 Man in the Mirror 303 Die of a Broken Heart 304 Let’s Not Let It 305 I Won’t Give Up 306 Hey There Delilah 307 Mamma Mia 308 Where We Left Off 309 Stuck Like Glue 310 Style

Post-Reunification Relationship At Auradon Prep

311 Young Forever 312 Somewhere On A Beach 313 Cheap Seats 314 Firecracker 315 Somethin’ Stupid 316 My Best Friend 317 Lucky 318 You Won’t Ever Be Lonely 319 Do It With You 320 I Wanna Dance With Somebody 321 Somebody Like You 322 My Baby Loves Me 323 The Way You Love Me 324 Love Me Like That 325 Love Like You 326 H.O.L.Y.

Post-Graduation Adult Relationship

327 Next Stop, Anywhere* 328 I Hate Love Songs 329 One In A Million 330 Now That I Found You 331 Because You Love Me 332 For You 333 Good Kinda Love 334 Loving You Easy 335 We Found Love 336 We Weren’t Crazy 337 Because You Loved Me 338 Mean To Me 339 The World 340 Alright 341 Doin’ What She Likes 342 Somebody Wrote Love 343 Love Me Like There’s No Tomorrow 344 Yours 345 Hard To Love 346 That Kind of Beautiful 347 Jealous of the Sun 348 Never Comin’ Down 349 This Love 350 I Run To You 351 God Gave Me You 352 All About Her

Proposal and Engagement

353 That’s When You Know 354 Baby, I Love You 355 She’s In Love With the Boy 356 Amazed 357 The Rest of Our Lives 358 Lost In This Moment 359 It’s Your Love 360 Livin’ Our Love Song

Wedding and Honeymoon

361 For Just One Day Let’s Only Think About (Love) 362 Marry Me 363 Are You Gonna Kiss Me Or Not? 364 A Thousand Years Part 2 365 I Do 366 It’s A Beautiful Thing 367 I Got the Boy 368 Hold It Against Me 369 Black 370 I’ll Name The Dogs

Married, Childless Life

371 Your Man 372 No Such Thing As A Broken Heart 373 Come A Little Closer 374 Sky Stays This Blue 375 Dear Life

Kids Being Born

376 It Takes A Man 377 Life Changes 378 You’re Having My Baby 379 Isn’t She Lovely 380 You’re Gonna Be 381 Chasin’ Girls 382 Laughed Until We Cried 383 Who Wouldn’t Wanna Be Me 384 Hey Pretty Girl 385 Who Would You Be

Post-Kids Life

386 Superman 387 I’m Already There 388 Home 389 Woman, Amen 390 Good Morning Beautiful 391 A Woman Like You 392 All of Me 393 She’s Good For Me 394 Forever Love 395 I Walk The Line 396 Forever and Ever, Amen 397 You Make It Easy 398 My Wish 399 In Case You Didn’t Know 400 You’re Still The One 401 Just To See You Smile 402 I’ll Still Love You More 403 If You Ever Stop Loving Me 404 I’ll Always Love You 405 Die A Happy Man 406 Love Like Crazy 407 Remember When

Older Adults, Post Kids Growing Up

408 Moments 409 I Go Back 410 Then 411 I’d Love You All Over Again 412 Still Into You 413 In Color 414 Bless the Broken Road 415 Greatest Love Story

Legacy

416 For Good 417 I Was Here 418 Don’t Blink 419 Forever Rebels 420 Legends

* = Not on Spotify

[thorne93]

Curious Conundrum (Part 19)

Prompt: You’re John Watson’s sister. One day you decide to visit your brother for lunch, only to meet the infamous Mr. Holmes…

Word Count: 2469

Warnings: language, flirtation, sexual innuendos (maybe? idfk), murder/crime/case related stuff, angst, jealousy…

Notes: Beta’d by @carryonmyswansong Not only did she beta, but I literally couldn’t have written half these scenes without her help. She contributed majorly, even wrote some parts of scenes. I am forever in her debt.

Also, this starts AFTER Season 2, episode 1. I don’t follow all the episodes, but it does follow the timeline and hit some major events : )

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 |  Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 |

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You followed the men outside, where Sherlock and him managed to get away. Within a few minutes, you got a text telling you an address. It wasn’t Sherlock’s number, but you had a feeling it was a message from one of his homeless network.

You ducked out of the back of the apartment and made your way through town to the address. When you got there, Sherlock and John were waiting for you outside an apartment.

“I’ve nearly unlocked it...There we are,” Sherlock noted as he stood up and you two went inside a small apartment.

Sherlock asked that you find something to cut the cuffs with. You found some bolt cutters and set them free.

“Where are we?” you asked.

“This is a writer's apartment. Kitty. Remember the frisky fan I told you about?”

“Yeah?”

“That’s her. Not a fan at all. She wanted an exclusive interview and I wouldn’t give it to her.”

“Okay so why are we here?”

“She wrote a story called Kiss and Tell, claiming that a man named Richard Brook has shed light on my fraud.”

“And we’re here to…?”

“To see who Richard Brook is.”

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

The three of you sat in the dark to wait for her. She got to the door, opened it, clicked on the light and Sherlock asked, “Too late to go on the record?”

Once Kitty got settled in, Sherlock set in on her. “Congratulations, on the truth about Sherlock Holmes. Scoop that everybody wanted and you got it. Bravo.”

“I gave you your opportunity. I wanted to be on your side, remember? You turned me down so…”

“And then someone turns up and spills all the beans, how utterly convient? Who is Brook?”

She shook her head.

“Oh come on, Kitty, no one trusts the voice at the end of a telephone. There are all those flirty little meetings in cafes, those meetings in hotel rooms. How do you know that you could trust him?” Sherlock pressed. “Man turns up with a holy grail in his pocket. What were his credentials?”

At that moment, the door opened to the apartment and a disheveled Moriarty walked in. “Darling they didn’t have any ground coffee so I just got normal.”

Sherlock spun, his eyes wide with shock, yours as well. Suddenly you felt your heart drop into your stomach, your veins filled with ice. John, you, and Sherlock all looked as if you’d seen a ghost. What the ever loving fuck was he doing here?

“You said that they wouldn’t find me here,” he stammered as he backed into a wall, dropping the grocery bag. Your eyes narrowed on him. “You said that I’d be safe here.”

“You are safe, Richard,” Kitty assured and your face whipped to her. “I’m a witness. They won’t harm you in front of witnesses.”

“Wanna bet?” you muttered, utterly put out with all of this nonsense.

“So that’s your source?” John demanded. “Moriarty is Richard Brook?”

“Of course he’s Richard Brook. There is no Moriarty. There never has been.”

A dizzy spell hit your head at that moment.

“What are you talking about?” John wondered.

“Look him up. Rich Brook, an actor Sherlock Holmes hired to be Moriarty.”

Your eyes flashed to your better half, his face unreadable. Then your eyes flashed to Moriarty.

“Dr. Watson, I know you’re a good man,” Moriarty started. “Don’t--Don’t--Don’t hurt me,” he pleaded holding his hands up.

Oh he was good. Playing the part of victim. Playing the part of a scared little man, but you knew better. This wasn’t real. He was as sick and twisted as they come.

John lost his nerve and started shouting. “No, you’re Moriarity! He’s moriarty!” he insisted glancing back to Kitty. “We've met, remember? You were going to blow me up!”

Moriarity continued his charade as he said, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. He paid me. I needed the work.” He gestured to Sherlock and you thought you’d rip his head off then and there. “I’m an actor. I was out of out work.”

“Sherlock, you’d better explain. Cause I am not getting this.”

“I’ll be doing the explaining,” Kitty interjected. She went on to hand John and you papers, explaining how Sherlock had invented Moriarity and all the crimes.

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous.”

“Ask him, he’s right here!” she insisted, pointing to Moriarty.  

John went back and forth with the two of them but all you could hear was a rushing in your ears, feel the pounding of your heart, your stomach lurching. You were getting more pissed by the second.

Suddenly, Moriarity had been begging Sherlock to tell John “the truth”.

“Tell him! Tell them! Tell him!” he repeated frantically and you’d had enough.

Shaking your head, you cried, “You sick son a bitch!” Then you lunged at him, his voice getting on your last nerve. This story. The lies. The games. All of it.

“No! No! Don’t you touch me!” he said, falling over himself, getting just out of your grasp. “Don’t you lay a finger on me!”

You continued to march towards him. “Oh I’ll lay more than a finger you sniveling, lying, little snake!”

“Stop it! Stop it now!” Sherlock shouted at Jim, demanding he put this charade to bed. But he didn’t. He started to get up and run away where you and John took off after him.

But he got away. The three of you stormed out of her apartment, your minds still reeling. John was asking if any of this was possible, and Sherlock seemed to surrender and say it was possible.

“There’s only one thing he needs to do to complete his game and that’s to…��� Sherlock said, stopping suddenly.

“Sherlock?” you softly said.

“There’s something I need to do.”

“What? Can we help?” John asked.

“No, on my own.” With that he started to walk.

You shook your head, gritting your teeth. “He is such a --”

“Bastard? Annoying dick? Egotistical ass? Patronizing son of a bitch?”

“All of the above,” you muttered.

Just then you got a text message from Sherlock. “Find the computer program. -- SH.”

You showed John.

“Let’s go,” you sighed.

“Uh, you go ahead. I need to take care of something.”

“What? Not you too.”

“Y/N, someone sold Sherlock’s life. It wasn’t me, I highly doubt it was you, so who does that leave?”

It only took you a second before you answered, “Mycroft.”

“Right.”

“But why…?” you started to ask.

“I don’t know, but that’s what I intend to find out.”

“So I’m on my own?” you asked, exasperated as he started to walk away.

“For now, yes! I’ll meet up with you when I can,” he called over his shoulder.

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

You worked all night trying to find the code, not hearing a word from either one of them, except that they were at St. Barts working. Giving up a little after dawn, you decided to head to Barts to see what headway they’d made.

Just as you arrived, Sherlock called you. You stepped out of the cab and answered.

“Hey. You okay?” you greeted.

“Turn around and walk back the way you came,” he instructed sternly.

“What? Why would I do that? I’m coming in.”

“Just do as I ask! Please.” His tone made you nervous so you obliged.

“Yeah, alright. Where am I supposed to go?”

“Stop there.”

“Okay?” you said, looking around for him.

“Okay, look up, I’m on the rooftop.”

Dizziness hit your head like a freight train.

“The rooftop? What the hell are you--” you demanded, angry with him at first, until you actually saw him standing on the ledge. He wasn’t just standing on the rooftop, his tiptoes were over the edge. You gazed up in nauseous horror as you covered your mouth and gasped.

“Sherlock?! What the hell are you doing up there?! Get down this instant!” you nearly shouted into the phone.

“I... I can’t come down so we’ll just have to do it like this,” he said softly.

Your insides twisted.

“Do what?” you asked, a sob already forming in your throat. You didn’t want an answer to your question, but you half hoped it would be something benign, not the horrors that danced through your head at that instant. One horrible thing about your mind was that it quickly worked things out. Moriarity must be making him do this. “Sherlock… What… What’s going on?” you tried to speak through threatening tears.

“An apology,” he said simply.

“For what?” you tried again.

“It’s all true.”

“What’s all true?”

“Everything they said about me. I invented Moriarty.”

You shook your head, your heart beating a million miles per hour. Maybe you could get up there but… Sherlock had told you to stay put.

“Why are you saying this? Sherlock this is mad. Stop this right now.”

“I’m a fake, Y/N.”

“No, no you’re not. This is just…”

“The newspapers were right all along. I want you to tell John, Lestrade; I want you to tell Mrs. Hudson, and Molly... in fact, tell anyone who will listen to you that I created Moriarty for my own purposes.”

“I’m not going to do that,” you insisted, still biting back tears and your ever-swelling throat. “You know things about people, intimate things, that no one could possibly know in one glance. But you do.”

“Noone is that clever. I couldn’t even tell you anything other than you being an attorney, an obvious deduction. I’ve never been able to read you.”

“So? Sherlock, you can tell people their life story with one glance. I’m the exception.”

It sounded as if he gave a short, sorrow filled laugh before saying, “You always were, weren’t you? My one exception.”

His words. Those words. They sent tears over the edge.

“It’s all one big magic trick, a ruse. I research people. That’s all.”

“You’re lying and I don’t know why. I’m coming up,” you said, starting to move before Sherlock stopped you.

“No! Stay exactly where you are! Don’t move.”

Against your better judgement, you obeyed him and moved back into your spot.

“Alright. I won’t move.”

“Keep your eyes fixed on me,” he requested. “Please, will you do this for me?”

“Do... do what?” you stammered, trying to keep some composure and failing. Not being next to him, seeing him on that ledge, it made your bones, your very soul ache.

“This phone call – it’s, er ... it’s my note. It’s what people do, don’t they – leave a note?”

A strangled sob escaped your throat as you stared up at him.

“No, Sherlock. No. Just... tell me, I can help you. Please let me help you. We can solve this another way. I don’t know what he has on you but please,” you begged.

“There is no other way. Y/N, I’m so sorry for the pain I’ve caused you… For the pain I’m about to cause you. When we met… I never meant for this to happen. That’s why I told you no, the day you asked me to dinner. I warned you. I told you this would be dangerous.”

“I know, and I still said yes.”

“Do you still say yes now?” he asked ominously.

At first you weren’t sure what he meant, but as you stared up at him, it became painfully clear. He would be dead. You weren’t sure when, but he was going to end his life. Today. And he was asking if it was still worth saying yes.

“Yes,” you breathed.

“I’m so sorry you feel that way,” he apologized.

“Please. Sherlock. Don’t do this. Please, for the love of God don’t do this to me,” you pleaded. He was your first and only love. In your mind and heart, he would be your last love. He couldn’t do this. He just couldn’t. “I love you. Do you hear me? I love you!” you shouted, angry at him for doing this, for putting you in this position. Maybe the anger was just an early stage of grief yet to follow.

“I know,” he quietly says into the phone. “But you were just another part of the game.”

At his words, your heart fell out of your chest.

“I… what?” you gasped, trying to catch up.

“Just another step in the plan to make me seem more normal. John had been on me about being more human so... so I chose you, to play the part.”

“No,” you whispered, disbelief coloring your tone as you shook your head.

“Yes,” he insisted. “If I had it my way, I’d have picked Irene. She was, after all, the first woman to truly catch my eye. I could never love you, because you’d always be the other woman in my eyes. It was Irene that I loved… Not you.” Another moment passed, and you wanted to say something, anything, but your mind was spinning too fast for you to fathom a response. “I’m sorry.”

Before you could respond, he held his had out and dropped the phone beside him.

“Sherlock!” you screamed, louder than you’d ever screamed in your life. Your heart was beating so fast, you thought a heart attack was imminent.  

But he ignored you, he held his arms out to his sides and stepped off. He fell for what seemed like forever, and yet, it seemed like an instant. You wanted to move, to catch him, to break his fall, to… something! But you couldn’t move.

Not until you heard the sound of his body hitting the pavement. That sickeing sound. You’d never heard anything like that.

For a moment, you swayed, sure that you would throw up or that your buckling knees would give out. Then your mind started to work again and you began running towards him, but a bicyclist had hit you, knocking you to the ground. In your shocked state, you didn’t feel it, but your head had smacked against the pavement.

Finally, you stood up and stumbled your way over to him. There was blood... so much blood. A crowd of people tried to hold you back.

“No, he’s my boyfriend!” you shouted, pushing through them until you landed in front of him. Within a second, your brother was at your side.

“Y/N...Y/N,” he said, looking at you. “Oh, God,” he moaned, his face going to Sherlock’s body. “Sherlock… Sherlock…” he whispered in a daze.

You went to reach towards him but people kept pulling you off of him. John tried to take his pulse, but someone had gotten his hand away too.

A gurney rolled up with paramedics and they turned him over, his lifeless eyes staring up, his hair matted in blood. That was all you needed for the light to leave your own eyes as you passed out on the ground next to his body.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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[nationaldoyoungday]

hi!! 💗 i really love your aus 💘 and i was wondering if you have any text au recs?

uwu hi??? thank you i’m glad you like them!! and yes i DO have recs, i have so many omg i just want to spread the love!! underneath the cut are some (a lot) of my favorites thank you so much for asking this 💖💞💝💘💕✨

complicated by @daisyong

19/19 (completed) / jaemin x reader - where both jaemin and y/n are idols and everything is more complicated.

↳ LISTEN. this is so cute i tear up thinking about it. it’s so FLUFFY idk it’s just really good if you wanna feel soft about jaemin

chlorine dreams by @dahyunmingyu

15/15 (completed) / jaehyun x reader - there’s been a long standing rivalry at your school between the basketball team and the swim team. the swim team has been undefeated for 4 years, whereas the basketball team hasn’t won a game in 3. every year the basketball team ends up with all of the funding for the athletics department whereas half of the school doesn’t even know the swim team exists. with a bet that jaehyun wouldn’t even be able to finish a swim practice, y/n threatens the existence of both of their teams

↳ this is such an original idea and um i’m weak for swimmer!nct and it’s just really good pls read it

three’s a crowd by @qiankulture

14/14 (completed) / yuta x reader, ten x reader - y/n and yuta are a dance duo who are often assumed to be dating by fans because of their intimate pieces and how they act around each other. everything is all fine and dandy until a certain model comes into the picture.

↳ i read this before i started this account i think? and just it’s really good words can’t describe how much i like it :(

what is love? by @qiankulture

13/13 (completed) / donghyuck x reader - when haechan pulls a prank on unsuspecting y/n, she isn’t too happy. she does her best to avoid him at all costs. but it seems the universe has other plans because everywhere she looks, haechan is there.

↳ hnnng this was so cute that i hate it? the way that donghyuck tries to tell her that he’s his soulmate? my heart. anyways it’s so good! pls my heart can’t handle it

love bot by @dreamloveclub

7/7 (completed) / mark x reader - mark lee was never good with words — except when it came to talking about you. hidden behind the sanctuary of anonymity, he uses the Love Bot to express his feelings about you.

↳ if you read only one thing on this list PLEASE read this omg!! ellie is a genius and this is quite possibly the cutest thing i’ve ever read in my life? it’s such a good idea and she didn’t get enough love for it :(

love bug by @dreamloveclub

4/? (discontinued) / jeno x reader - two computer science majors and self-proclaimed amateur hackers unknowingly race against each other to find out who their secret admirers are. true love is but a click away.

↳ i didn’t think anything after love bot could be so good but this? it proved me wrong djdjdhdh it’s just as good and as always they are both dumb pls read it

puppy love by @dreammutual

13/13 (completed) / renjun x reader - renjun accidentally likes a picture on y/n’s instagram from almost 2 years ago and, foolery ensues when their mutual friends try to get them together.

↳ this made me spill all my uwus its so cute and funny omg please! i’ve said this already but i really love this (i really love everything on this list djdjdj)

not me, not you by @dyngdo

22/22 (completed) / doyoung x reader - in which a rivalry since grade school never died. y/n has always hated doyoung, and he’s always hated her, or at least that’s what they claim. but when y/n and doyoung have been framed for a crime they didn’t commit, the two have to work together to find out the truth. but amidst all the chaos, they can’t figure out what that bubbling feeling inside their chest is.

↳ as i said before, i am weak for doyoung so uh! surprise another doyoung au djdjdj but whenever this gets updated my heart? i have so much love for this fic

destined by @godrics

22/22 (completed) / donghyuck x reader - the red string of fate exists, and only few families are able to see the string, and these few families can actually cut strings and knot other people’s strings in to alter the soulmate laws. your family have been able to see the red string of fate since the beginning of time, and you are no exception. when you come back to korea after spending your summer in america, you had not expected your best friend to have a boyfriend that wasn’t their soulmate. and you did not expect their boyfriend to be your soulmate. despite this, you want your best friend to be happy, and if that means not spending the rest of your life with your soulmate and being happy yourself, then so be it.

↳ i also believe i read this before making this account? but anyways i love soulmate aus and i have a thing for the red string of fate it’s my favorite!! but this was so realistic (as realistic as a soulmate au can be LMAO) and it was really good!!!

my first and last by @godrics

20/20 (completed) / jaemin x reader - in which na jaemin finally gets the chance he’s been waiting for.

↳ again jaemin fluff? here please just read it. words can’t describe how cute this was!!

fan by @markleeh

25/25 (completed) / jaemin x reader - in which idol!jaemin finds a cellphone number of a nctzen.

↳ hhhhh this was so funny? renjun is such a savage djdjdj i’m always crying when i read this i wish my friends were this funny

how can i love you? by @markleeh

18/18 (completed) / jeno x reader - in which y/n just wants to know how youtuber!jeno looks so fine and how he likes his eggs in the morning.

↳ this was so cute too uwu everything on this list was cute tbh but this was the cutest (i want to know how jeno likes his eggs in the morning too)

not my type by @nakajeno

25/25 (completed) / yuta x reader - y/n doesn’t fall in love, neither does yuta – instead, they make others fall in love with them.

↳ yeah anyways yuta needs more appreciation and love and this fic really. hit me in the feels anyways read this or :/ it was so good jdjdjdjd i’m saying that about everything but? it’s true!

home sweet home by @dreamboynana

22/22 (completed) / renjun x reader - maybe falling in love with teen model huang renjun was a bad idea….but then again when did you ever think things through?

↳ rei is such a good writer omg!! renjun as a model hell yes!! anyways this has the perfect amount of fluff and angst and if you don’t read it you’re a coward it deserves all the love in the world

need to know by @solecitojun

20/? (in progress) / yukhei x reader, taeyong x reader - friendships are all meant to be based on honesty, yet there are many things being hidden in yours. in which your bestfriend has to figure out his feelings, and college is sending everyone on a spiral.

↳ ok listen. so i read a few aus before i started this account but um. this was the very first au and i’m telling you. i hate it so much but i love it more ughghgh i hate angst but um this really is trying to get me to love it!! yukhei deserves more but i mean don’t we all?

too late by @solecitojun

3/? (in progress) / doyoung x reader - same upbringing, same neighborhood, same lifestyle ; but what he thinks is two different worlds. they’re both from the underground scence, one fighter and another a musician. years are left uncovered. could it be too late for him, or for you?

↳ doyoung. that’s all i have to say djdjdj. no but seriously your au ideas are so good and this one is no exception i love it :(

sunrise by @wereseoyoung

15/15 (completed) / johnny x reader - no. moon y/n is not in love with one of the university night time radio hosts. it’s just a crush! … kinda… but he’s not interested! … probably.

↳ if you hear me screaming about something? it’s this fic? listen there aren’t like. any johnny aus out there but this one makes up for it because its SO GOOD?? this is literally all i’m ever going to talk about for the rest of my life unfollow me if you haven’t read this djdjdjd i love it so much :(((

starstruck by @wereseoyoung

1/? (in progress) / yuta x reader - can you believe that every tuesday practice the yuta nakamoto — smu alumni and now striker of one of korea’s biggest soccer clubs — will come down to help assist with practices? y/n doesn’t really care though. her job is to be the manager. not be impressed by some soccer star. but maybe sometimes he’s kinda cool.

↳ anyways can’t believe you are a genius and really have an au planned out for every member? i wish i was as organized and talented as you!!! this hasn’t even really started and i’m already in love save me :(

black and blue by @1nomins

10/10 (completed) / jaemin x reader, jeno x reader - everywhere a soulmate touches leaves flowers, and everywhere someone else you’ve fallen in love with touches leaves bruises. you’re happy to suffer.

↳ spence did you know i hate you because of this. not really but i love everything you write and it’s always angsty and i always end up hurting afterwards but its worth it :(

10 step love by @1nomins

12/12 (completed) / jeno x reader - or, alternatively, lee jeno’s (and huang renjun’s) 10 step foolproof program to getting the girl.

↳ can’t believe you wrote something so fluffy? anyways this is like my guilty pleasure and i love the playlist for it!! with the frank sinatra songs sjdjdjdj

1-800-loveline by @1nomins

15/15 (completed) / jeno x reader - you never imagined that finding a phone number in a school library book could lead to anything. you were oh-so-wrong.

↳ loveline? yeah i hate it. only read this if you feel like hurting yourself! i’m kidding, it’s so good but so sad but worth it in the end, as it is with anything spence writes

[digoxinpurpurea2-blog]

One of my grandfathers died of AIDS complications before I was born.

There, that's my pound of flesh. You have to present those before anyone listens to you on this fucking website.

I didn't delete my tumblr because oh no I'm the Hamilton cannibal mermaid freak. I have been that for years. And, for what it's worth, I never interacted with Israa as Israa. She tried to interact with me, once, two years ago, about the intentionally dumb garbage I wrote in my spare time. I ignored her because I didn't know who she was and I didn't care.

Nah, I deleted my tumblr because you freaks kept sending me death threats and I couldn't exactly deal with that after being awake for four days and trying to manage the emotional fallout of this monster.

Don't send people death threats, you fucking loons.

This was not about fandom, because I do not orient my world around fandom. This was about my grandfather, and not just him, and not just the other people I have known who have had their lives irrevocably altered by HIV, and not just the fact that she stole money. This was about basic common decency. It's not about me. I'm not going to pretend I'm an angel or anything but I have never done anything like this.

But this is not about me.

The person behind hivliving, Alix McLiar:

1. Lives in a $500,000 waterfront house in a wealthy suburb in the US with her married and very wealthy parents, both of whom have terminal degrees in the sciences

2. Goes to a prestigious private out-of-state university on a merit scholarship worth approximately $250,000 over four years. Or maybe not. Maybe she got kicked out. Still not sure. Her school has been contacted multiple times by multiple people, and the chief of police of her university told me that she would be punished appropriately. I believe, at least, that she's no longer involved in the school's anti-racism groups as an administrator, and I know that her advisor knows, and that the head of the diversity office knows, and that her friends all know and have completely stopped talking to her. Rephrase: she went to a prestigious university while this was going on, majoring in a healthcare-related field.

3. Went to one of the best high schools in the United States

4. Started racefaking on the internet early in her senior year of high school, possibly earlier - she was 17 at the time and is 19 now

5. Vacations internationally with some frequency

6. Is white and cisgender and REALLY FUCKING RICH, meaning she definitely used the money she got as “Israa” for drugs or something

7. Is probably going to do this again

She used the following identities:

1. Israa, Liar Prime - bigender bisexual Chinese-Pakistani 19-year-old, from the China-Pakistan border (once or twice specified as westernmost Xinjiang), HIV+ after being trafficked into sexual slavery by her parents as a young teenager, Muslimah, hijabi, once had her eye popped out of its socket after someone found out her HIV status, once raped and robbed by police at gunpoint, pregnant, miscarried, married, living in India with her wife - blueskysapphic/hivliving/angischuyler

2. Muk(h)ta (she spelled it different ways) - Somali, Catholic, raised in America by her American father who was implied a few times to be a diplomat of some sort, 18, trans woman, lesbian, married to Israa, trafficking victim, not HIV+ - thewarsnotdone

3. Naj, American lesbian POC (never specified other than that), congenitally HIV+, fairly active in ace discourse -allolesbean/hivliving

A bonus identity discovered while investigating:

4. Alix, Lebanese Jewish lesbian, self-identified as an Arab, from Lebanon, living in the states for college - lesbianeclipse

(the Jewish community in Lebanon numbers about forty, by the by. She's fond of doing this)

Israa lied a fuckton but she didn’t just pop out of the blue. She had put together the biracial trafficking victim persona before she started posting her fic. She had convinced other people of this persona before she started writing fanfiction - named the wife, picked out Chinese and “Muslim” names (yes she called Israa her Muslim name), found a beta for her fic, made up a backstory. 

And it wasn’t just hivliving that she was involved in. Israa and friends' modus operandi in fandom was to declare someone a pedophile over fanfiction, sic followers on them, threaten to dox them, force them to divulge (often sexual) traumas, and then use those traumas to harass them into self-harm. She did this multiple times, mainly to young gay teenagers and young trans men and young impoverished women. Some of those people did self-harm. And she knew it. And she kept on bullying, and told anyone who said “Stop it” that how DARE they, she is HIV+, she can do this.

And, given that Israa and her crew placed so much emphasis on IP address hits to Tumblrs as "stalking," it is absolutely impossible that none of them - including the one who followed her on her "Lebanese Jewish" tumblr and Facebook-linked twitter - did not know. This was a squad of teenagers dedicated to threatening and sexually harassing rape victims over fanfiction, with their core defense being 'Israa has been much more traumatized than you, by people like you, and she's protecting other people by hurting you.'

Yeah, no. Weirdly enough, most trauma victims don’t go out of their way to tell victims of child sexual abuse that they should kill themselves.

Israa used the social capital and following she gained being a moral arbiter and Teller Of Wise Truths About HIV in fandom (she and her crew also picked on an HIV+ member of the Hamilton cast on Twitter such that I believe he blocked them, by the fucking way) to start hivliving. 

The person behind Israa is not Muslim. Or Jewish. Or HIV+. Or Somali. Or biracial. She was not trafficked to another country by her parents. She grew up wealthy. It was incredibly obvious she was not who she claimed she was. A basic knowledge of geopolitics would have nipped this shit in the bud literally years ago, because nothing Israa said made any sense. This should have been caught day of. Other people knew and let it ride because it’s fun to cloak your repulsive behavior in the language of social justice to get away with it. Other people should have figured it out.

Point by point:

1. Language

Israa claimed to speak Chinese and Urdu natively and English, Spanish, and Kannada as second languages. She exclusively used English on her blog. She learned English as an adult and yet had absolutely perfect grammar, spelling, mastery of American slang, etc. Is this impossible? No, of course not, but learning a second language as an adult - especially in a non-immersion environment, especially one from an entirely different language family, presents a ton of difficulties. I am currently learning a second language in a non-immersion environment. Writing and reading are easier than speaking, sure, but they do not come easy.

Israa wrote like a native English speaker. She never made the mistakes in grammar or spelling common with people learning English from Chinese. She never had slightly odd turns of phrase borne from not grasping all the tiny nuances of a given English word. She never had an accidental character inserted when she forgot to rotate the language on her keyboard. (I rotate keyboards. Lemme tell you, it happens frequently.) She used British spellings pretty consistently, but not British or Indian English phrasing. Her slang was all American, young, Tumblr-approved. The media she talked about was almost all in English, minus one Chinese-American film and one Chinese novel available in English translation. She never used Chinese or Urdu on her blog, except to write brief greetings or her name. She never talked to anyone in Chinese or Urdu or Kannada. Her punctuation was completely American. She never, ever forgot a word.

This person, from a family poor enough to knowingly traffick a child into sex slavery, was fluent in 4-5 languages, presumably literate in at least 3 (meaning she could effortlessly cycle between 3, possibly 4 different writing systems) and somehow so fluent in a language she had started learning only two, three years before that she was indistinguishable from a native speaker.

How?

How was her English so native-perfect after only two or three years?

Because she didn't only have two or three years to build on. Because she was a native speaker. Duh.

2. Offensive racial stereotypes

Israa consistently presented herself as from western China, right along the China-Pakistan border. Never specified city or town, presumably because Alix was not invested enough in the character to pick a random town name off of Google Maps. She also once posted about her family having a dispute about the family rice farm.

There is almost no rice agriculture in extreme western Xinjiang. Not none, but almost none. Too arid.

But rice, China, right?

Also, bit of a digression as the character could have started wearing it while not living there, but about wearing hijab in Xinjiang: it's not exactly legal, right now. Crackdowns on specifically Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang have been front-page news in major English-language publications for years. Crackdowns on Hui Muslims (the ethnic group she occasionally claimed to be a part of) are less common, but they happen. And, of course, not all Muslim women wear hijab...but all Muslims are the same, in Israa-world. Speaking of.

Israa claimed that she had relatives in Gaza and that she did medical research at a clinic in Gaza under the auspices of her university.

1. How did she get a passport? It would have to be either a Pakistani or Chinese passport. Traveling from India to the Gaza strip on a Pakistani passport would be, shall we say, extremely difficult. It would be difficult for her to acquire a passport in the first place (did she have any documentation before she was trafficked? After? She was trafficked into India and India repatriates trafficking victims. Presumably she would have been repatriated to China. Would she, an HIV-positive member of a Muslim ethnic minority breaking the law in Xinjiang, be allowed to acquire a passport? How would she afford a passport? etc) 2. How would a 19-year-old non-medical student undergraduate receive permission to enter the Gaza strip, especially if she was traveling on a Pakistani passport? 3. Current Israeli law gives the Minister of the Interior the right to deny access to Israel (and thus Palestine and Gaza) to any HIV+ alien or migrant worker. Presumably Israa counted as an “alien or migrant worker,” so how did she get into the country to travel to Gaza in the first place? 4. Did Israa not realize that Pakistan and Palestine (and China) are culturally very dissimilar because they're in very different parts of the world? This is another China = rice moment. Alix assumed that all Muslims are the same? How would the aforementioned impoverished ethnic minority family be wealthy or mobile enough to have relatives at the other end of the continent?

I'm pretty sure her logic there was "Chinese Muslims are oppressed, Palestinians are oppressed - basically the same, right? Family!"

Oh and by the way she seemed to not remember if her family was based in western Xinjiang or in Karachi. She had sisters living in Karachi at some point and then she told me and, apparently, told quite a few other people, that she would be moving back to her loving parents in China soon after graduating university, at the age of 19.

Her parents who trafficked her.

Hokay.

Oh and besides the 80s high school AIDS crisis AU fic she wrote a lot of seriously offensive “Muslim AU” fic that trafficked in a lot of incredibly harmful and racist tropes about Muslim women but I said I wouldn’t mention fandom

3. Her wife

Mukta/Mukhta - Somali, Catholic, raised in America by her American father, somehow ended up in India as a trafficking victim, monolingual in English. She implied a few times that her father was some kind of diplomat. Muk(h)ta married Israa and they lived happily together as an interfaith couple, doing such coupley things as packaging Christmas care packages at Muk(h)ta's church and having wanted pregnancies.

1. As far as I can tell, Mukta and Mukhta are not Somali names, and if Muk(h)ta was monolingual in English wouldn’t she, like, spell her name in the Latin alphabet consistently 2. There are approximately 100 Somali Catholics. (Like I said, she liked doing that.) 3. An American-raised child of a diplomat being kidnapped (?) and trafficked for sex in India would have made international news. I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH. IT WOULD HAVE BEEN INTERNATIONAL NEWS.  4. Legal gay marriage does not exist in India. I wouldn't bring this up, people can call their partners whatever they want in the absence of legal recognition, but Israa made a distinction between "wife" and "girlfriend" and talked about having a wedding in a religious space, so - 5. How were two married female teenagers living together with apparently no problem in Bengaluru? 6. Muk(h)ta and Israa ended up in the same brothel together after being trafficked and one day decided to take the bus out. TO WHERE. HOW DID THEY GET THE MONEY. How Israa talked about the brothel was completely bullshit too and seems to have been based on legal brothels in Australia or Nevada - personal amenities, private bathrooms, private rooms, et cetera. 7. Again, India repatriates, or attempts to repatriate, known minor victims of trafficking - so why were either of them still in India?

Oh also Muk(h)ta's blog literally only talked about how awesome her wife was and Hamilton and she almost never interacted with other people by herself and she would have had the same non-Bengaluru IP address as Israa (same blog organization, frankly, as allolesbean), so -

4. Being a student in India

Israa insisted she, a Chinese (and?) Pakistani national, was a science student at a university in Bengaluru. She would not have been able to do this without documentation and you have to apply for a student visa in India outside of the country.

So:

1. Again. How did she acquire a passport? 2. How did she prove her residential address outside of India? 3. How did she put together the money to pay student fees? 4. How was Muk(h)ta living with her in the interim, if Muk(h)ta wasn't an Indian citizen? 5. How did she overcome the language barrier in either English or Kannada in enough time to start studying science? 6. Where was Muk(h)ta during the application process? In China? In Pakistan? In India? How?

6. The pregnancy

Jesus Christ where do I start

Israa always, always insisted that Muk(h)ta presented as a woman, was understood as a woman, etc, and the pregnancy was expected and wanted - the old ladies at church (who 100% accepted her) cooed over her baby bump.

Two AFAB people and their magic desired child baby bump. 

NO 19-YEAR-OLD HIV+ PERSON IS GOING TO RECEIVE IVF. ANYWHERE. EVER.

When someone pushed back on this, she started insisting that Muk(h)ta was a trans woman, taking hormones, and then later she conveniently miscarried.

1. How did Muk(h)ta access hormones? 2. How did Israa access her HIV medications such that she was fine with having unprotected sex (she stated a couple of times that she and Mukhta were a serodiscordant couple), and/or how did Mukhta access PrEp? 3. Why would two impoverished teenagers living on student visas (and it had to be student visas as, again, India repatriates foreign trafficking victims) plan to have a baby? 4. How did Muk(h)ta, a devout church-going Catholic living in India, safely and successfully navigate as a lesbian trans woman married to a Muslim woman such that her church accepted her and the pregnant partner unconditionally? 5. Same question but about Israa and Israa's mosque, which she apparently attended regularly 6. If the child was planned, how did Muk(h)ta, a young (17? 18?-year-old) trans woman on hormones, access the healthcare that would have assured them both that her hormones weren't interfering with her fertility? 7. How did Israa access neonatal care? 8. How could they afford all of this and yet Israa needed to ask for donations on hivliving to deal with vague miscarriage-related medical bills?

And on. And on. And on.

Am I saying it's impossible for someone to learn a language quickly, or to be Pakistani and have relatives in Gaza, or be a victim of trafficking, or be a lesbian in India, or any of the other things she claimed separately? No, of course not. I'm sure there's actually someone who is very like Israa out there, minus all the lies.

I'm just saying - are you fucking kidding me? Are all of you so illiterate about how the entirety of the world works that this bullshit was allowed to pass unchecked for two fucking years??? Are all of you so illiterate about how the world works that no one wondered why a person with this background would be spending her internet time primarily writing god damn Hamilton fanfiction??? Yes, you are, because instead of putting together this incredibly obvious idiotic racist garbage in a post to point out the many insane consistencies, I had to wade through the goddamn cash.me terms of service LITERALLY MONTHS AFTER SHE STARTED DEFRAUDING PEOPLE.

And that was obviously not the only time she'd demanded money, she just deleted her tumblrs before I could find the "friend's paypal" she had used earlier on blueskysapphic/angischuyler.

Did she ever talk about living with HIV in any meaningful way? Did she ever talk about it in a way that wasn't just yelling about not blaming asexuals or complaining about people twenty years older than her not using Tumblr-approved phrasing or whatever? Did she actually do anything with hivliving besides reblog things other people had posted and tell people to pm her for more information? The real Alix is a 19-year-old college sophomore who is so stupid about public health that she told people RENT is a good introduction to the AIDS crisis in twenty god damn seven teen and told me that she checked herself into a hospital for narcissism (spoilers: there's a huge lack of beds in psychiatric hospitals and no psychiatric ER is going to admit a person not immediately in danger, especially not for NARCISSISM). She had absolutely nothing of value to contribute. She was clearly not talking from a place of expertise. She did not sound like she knew anything about anything and what she did regurgitate was highly Americanized. If her value as the person who ran hivliving was as an HIV+ pregnant married nonbinary non-American trafficking survivor, then it should have been obvious earlier that she was none of those things.

It is not difficult to figure out things like it is costly and difficult to move between countries, or that midcontinental aridity precludes heavy-water-using agriculture, or that adults who are learning English as a third or fourth language from a non-Germanic language will have quite a bit of trouble with grammar and vocabulary even several years in, or that a nineteen-year-old bigender woman-aligned person would have difficulty living safely with her wife anywhere, or that it’s nigh impossible that a person holding a Pakistani passport could get to the Gaza strip, or that most Somalis are not Catholic.

BASIC KNOWLEDGE. BASIC COMMON SENSE. BASIC GEOPOLITICS. A few hours on Wikipedia could have thrown all of this into the garbage. 

Why did any of you believe this garbage?

Easy! Because:

1. Tumblr fetishizes oppression, especially that of trans people and Muslim women, and Alix made herself a persona that hit every jackpot possible 2. Tumblr consumes only fanfiction and thus elevates it to an insane level of importance in culture, therefore fights over fanfiction content are actual justice (it's not that fucking deep) 3. Tumblr has an extremely warped understanding of social justice theory and abuse dynamics 4. Tumblr refuses to absorb any news or history besides that which is presented on Tumblr 5. Alix was so prone to leading harassment mobs that any pushback would lead to more abuse 6. Tumblr hates gay men and would rather listen to an obvious bullshit artist than anyone the community that is primarily affected by HIV

Really can't stress that last one enough. REALLY can't. I remember some big name ~tumblr LGBT-community famous~ blogger telling their thousands of followers that the pogrom against gay men in Chechnya wasn't happening, partially because they were so stupid that they didn't know how to click through on tabloid publications to the serious reporting done by actual journalists, but mostly because Tumblr has decided that gay men aren't oppressed and AIDS is over or some bullshit.

At least five people, five men, five GAY AND BI MEN, came to Alix with their status, begging for help. She fed them garbage and lies. She looked them in the face and decided she would continue with this monstrousness and you just fucking let it happen and then you made it about fanfiction because you don’t understand that there are things way beyond fandom. She was a psychopath who OPERATED IN FANDOM and 15 years ago she would have pulled this shit on the TWOP boards or the scarleteen message boards or neopets or something.

God, fuck all of you.

I have a tiny bit of money spare this month. If you send a receipt of a donation to an HIV/AIDS-related organization of your choice to thatwhichechoes@protonmail.com, personal information redacted as you so choose, I'll match it, multiple its, for a total of $50 from my end. If that doesn't happen by February 15, I'll just send it all to one of my choice. I can hold a couple bucks spare each month so that, God willing and my rent don't rise, I can consistently send to Rainbow Railroad or my home LGBT center's HIV/AIDS program.

Nothing is going to fix what she did and she's never going to get held to account in the way she should but I'm going to post receipts every so often anyways because I am nasty and angry enough to care about other people. I am angry enough to do penance on her behalf. I have been furious and horrified and sick about this ever since I found out and dealing with her vileness has caused actual tangible harm in my life but again, it's not about me, and I'm going to remember that even if you motherfuckers won't.

I would seriously advise anyone under the age of 21 to get the fuck off of this website and go learn how to communicate with other people in a healthy manner. Go outside! Interact with other people in the real world! Read a book. Read a fucking newspaper! Learn about the world. Or you can stay here and burrow in the echo chamber and become credulous fauxwoke racist homophobic morons who prioritize calling other teenagers pedophiles til they try to kill themselves because Steven Universe or something over doing literally anything that could help the world. Your choice.

The rest of you: comport yourselves like normal fucking human beings for once in your fucking lives and sort out your goddamn priorities. Read a fucking newspaper. Stop giving obvious racist fraudsters like medievalpoc and Israalix the benefit of the doubt and actually think about the information that is being presented to you and then maybe do something more useful with your time than getting into internet fights. For example, I organized an auction in my spare time that, with the help of another lovely person and dozens of wonderful donors, raised $3,917 for various charities over six months, including $200 for GMHC and about $75 for an HIV/AIDS organization in Wisconsin. Go do something similar or get off the fucking internet! It’s 2018! You’re adults! Try tangibly helping other people, at some point, instead of engaging in this terrible narcissistic performative circlejerk where trauma has become a cudgel to beat others!

If any of you do anything like this again I will find you and I will fucking destroy you. That is a promise. 

Go to hell.

[jeonsolar]

Miraculous Ladybug 2x13

Lets comment this again. So i’m starting a little late in the episode cuz I dont want to fake it, and I just remembered to do it, so lets go:

1:57 Someone hug Chloe!

1:59 Ok, the animation? Fucking awesome so far. Like something about Chloe looks so . . . perfect. This is good animation.

2:06 Chloe’s voice sounds different. Like she finally hit puberty. Also, wtf? Buy a second heart?

2:13 Also, Chloe’s back and in the spotlight, so what this hoe gonna do to akumatize another civilian? Also where was she? Sick? It was like 3 episodes. Betcha Gabriel went to the hospital and healed her with his bear hands. “I need you. There’s less angry people in the world, since you’ve been gone.”

2:17 Prediction: Chloe will steal Marinette’s gift, Marinette will throw a tantrum, no one will believe- everyone saw the gift. . . . or maybe chloe will throw it away.

2:34 I was right. But this bitch does know that everyone saw marinette bring this gift right? What does she expect? Everyone will forget?

2:59 Miss Bustier is Lily Evans.

3:00 How will she get mad?

3:14 . . . Not what I expected. Also, Bitch, if you want to get away with it don’t fucking smirk! This is why I can’t like Chloe. She’s not even a good nemesis. And bad people who smirk when they are caught because they know they will get away with it are the worst things to exist. FIGHT ME ON THIS.

3:21 EVERYONE’S VOICES SOUND LIKE THEY ALL HIT PUBERTY except Max and Adrien.

3:33 Yo, what drugs does she take cuz I want them. I need to be as happy as this psycho.

3:40 .... The entire class became the fandom. We’ve all said those things at one point, and Astruc is now fucking with us by pointing them out on his show.

3:47 I never considered that there are like 12 students in that class. That’s small.

4:04 I love every single time Astruc hints at akumatizing Marinette. Is like ‘haha, never gonna happen, but here’s a tease’. Also, whenever Mari gets angry like that she gets a shadow of her mask on her face. Watch the intro, after Chloe pushes her.

4:14 Predictions(again) Butterfly will get on its way to marinette, happy go lucky teacher will calm her down, butterfly will get confused. Still not sure how Discount Lily Evans gets akumatized.

4:54 Bustier saw the akuma, and desperately try to happy-up marinette.

4:54

Akuma: Here I go-

Marinette: *I’m not in trouble...*

Akuma: fuuuuuuuuuckkkkkk, wheeerrreee dooo I goooo noooww?

5:09

Akuma: I hate my job. Dude, just look for another person.

Hakwmoth: NO! This bitch has evaded me for far too long. Stay put!

Akuma: Ugh, I should have quit when I had the chance.

5:34 I’m so glad we finally get that scene of someone aware of those butterflies and freaking out about it. But sad that Discount Lily Evans doesn’t understand that by touching them you get akumatized.

5:52 YO! this show is getting serious with it’s story! I love this! An actual civilian fighting back! Finally! Dept! after the last childish episode this one is soooooo pleasing!

6:17 So my theory on my fanfic is becoming true. Hawkmoth can see into their mind and sweet talk just about anyone to do his biddings, no matter how nice you are. I feel smart.

6:25 From Marinette/Ladybug’s point of view, that had to be hard to watch. I was not prepared for feelings in this episode.

6:44 One swipe both lips? Damn! That lipstick IS magic!

7:27

Zombizou: And feel the love!

Chloe: Ew.

That’s good comedy right there. Because Chloe is all of us here in tumblr.

7:49 Thank God for the suit, because otherwise Marinette would have a broken neck, or a really bruised back and be unable to walk.

8:13 This got gay really quick.... can’t wait for it to get gayer.

8:27 I swear I read a fanfiction just like this. It ended with Ladybug and Chat Noir fucking.... Now I’m going to watch the pg version of it. Ugh. Or maybe this one will end with an orgy....

8:39 No Adrien, you can’t look back like you just lost a soldier in battle! They are just hugging and kissing! This is the sweetest and mellowest episode yet! You’ve been jokier and sillier through worse akumas!

9:38 Ok, it was bad definition. . . but I swear I saw Adrien in the kiss spell running to Ladybug.

9:53 They are saying ‘Kisses Kissu’ ... isn’t Kissu how Japanese/Korean people saying Kiss?

10:08 I’ve been waiting for this moment for too long. This is quickly becoming my most favorite episode.

10:30 I know why he did it, but what if he was also hoping to sneak one to Ladybug? Hahaha, funny Adrien.

10:50 Plagg and I share a brain.

11:14 .... So I CAN make the joke about french kissing! Thank you Astruc for dropping the steryotypes first!

11:51 this is getting close to becoming my fanfiction... I WROTE IT FIRST! (kinda, this episode was written a while ago)

12:03 . . . Bitch WANTS to get thrown to the hordes. Why else would she say shit like that.

12:18 Even Marinette sounds like she hit puberty. Can’t wait for Adrien to hit it too.

13:23 Don’t lie. You weren’t even trying to catch her with your arms spread like that.

13:47 ok no. Fuck this, no. Chloe is a brick and these fuckers are letting themselves drown with her. Rule number one of being a hero: The Needs of Many Overpower The Needs of One. Drop Chloe.

14:04 Woah . . .. Adrien’s voice just dropped.

14:28 Nevermind.

14:40 . . . Maze runner? Walking dead? iZOmbie? Every zombie movie cliche ever? ROSE? Why is it some get turned immediatly and Ladybug had a conversation with Kim before he turned?

15:04 What should happen: Alya and Nino, powercouple ftw, grab Chloe, look at Ladybug and Chat Noir straight in the eyes, and just throw her towards Rose. What will happen: bitch will probably be the only one besides Ladybug to not get turned cuz Chat tends to fall for these a lot.

15:52 Oh the romance! Yes! More Nilya! Make it like Titanic:

Nino: I’ll never let go Alya, I’ll never let go!

Alya: For the love of god Nino, just go, I ain’t dying.

Nino: *whispers really close to her face* I’ll never let go!

16:08 . . . These are just kisses right? Why they acting like they gonna die if they stay like zombies for more than an hour? It aint fatal!

16:14 THROW HER OUT!

16:19 I’m so glad Nilya is here, cause waiting for Ladynoir or Adrienette is killing me and Nilya is my life support.

16:24

Nino: Lets make out babe!

Alya: Kissu!

Nino: YES!

16:49 Predictable: Chat Noir gets taken. Unpredictable: Ladybug acting like her boyfriend was taken. just partners huh?

16:55

Ladybug: Chat! I’ll save you!

Chat: I’ll just stay here Ladybug, if we are gonna end up kissing, I’d rather it be after you save us.

Ladybug: ... This . .. this isn’t the right time to flirt Chat. Why do you always do this?

17:23 ... Dark Owl had her earring almost off and this is the closest you’ve gotten, Hawkmoth? How do YOU measure it?

17:40 His voice dropped again. the actor should stop highpithing his voice and let Adrien hit puberty too. #LetAdrienHitPuberty2k18

17:43 WHAT WAS SHE EXPECTING?

17:56 This revelation will last till the end of the battle then she’ll be a bitch again. Change my mind.

17:59 I hope they keep making more animations of Chat with weird faces like that. We need them for the memes.

18:01 Ok, fine. 5 points to Chloe. But she’s on -6,458,827,247 so she’s got a long way to go.

18:04 -6,458,827,227

18:36 LIPSTICKS ARE EXPENSIVE LADYBUG!

18:58 So by these standards Nino and Alya should be getting it on downstairs, right?

19:24 They didn’t show us Nilya... they are Getting. It. On. Also, #TellUsWhatHappenedToEmilieAgreste2k18

19:53 Hasn’t said anything but “No.” yet, but .... -6,458,827,200

20:17 -6,458,826,000

20:24 -6,458,826,200

20:37 that number is long to write, just add a -500 more for me being right that she would revert to Bitch Chloe when this was over.

21:29 ... What happened between Nino and Alya?

--

OK, call me Cinema Sins cause that’s basically what I’m doing. Overall, I love this episode. It had the beauty of a fanfiction. Thomas Astruc and his team are reading fanfics #confirmed. But yeah, they had to soften Chloe at one point to turn her into Queen Bee. And Marinette will most likely do it, so she had to see it. There.

#Chloeisabrickmadeofclayandisfinallydisolvinginwater.

[alexisbundy1-blog]

[this post is just for kicks]

ok so i have a playlist called junior (go follow it) that contains almost all the songs i have discovered this year. here are some of my favourites:

“Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God)” - Kate Bush I first discovered Kate Bush the summer before freshman year. I don’t remember how, but it most definitely links back to having the knowledge that she had a song entitled “Wuthering Heights.” (Sound familiar?) Afterwards, the words “Kate Bush” became a part of my music vocabulary. Did you know she wrote “Wuthering Heights” at 18 years old, became the first woman to ever have a number-one hit in the UK, AND was only 19 when the song hit the charts? When I’m 19, my biggest accomplishment will be doing my own laundry. ANYWAY - so after two years of being a Kate Bush fan, I noticed that her acclaimed album Hounds of Love was finally on Spotify and decided to give it a listen. Her artist page showed that this one song was one of her most popular, so I gave it a go. Not to be hyperbolic, but this song rocked my world. I mean, I knew Kate Bush was one of the coolest people ever, but this song just took her radness to a new level. The synths, the power of her vocals, the lyrics, the video(!!!). Kate Bush is just a tour de force. I love her, and so should you. And also she should have been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year. Just saying.

“Personal Jesus” - Depeche Mode So technically I first heard this song over the summer but...who cares...I was technically a junior. First of all, this song goes HARD. Between the bassline and the sporadic interjections of synth, “Personal Jesus” is just simply a tune. It makes you feel badass, even if the lyrics don’t really align with that feeling, and I wish I could provide some more persuasive evidence as to why it’s so good, but you have to listen to it yourself. It’s just...a tune. That’s all.

“Edge of Seventeen” - Stevie Nicks Okay so I’m relatively embarrassed to say that I only heard this song in July...and it initially struck me because it shared the same bassline as a Destiny’s Child song...sorry, Stevie. But it’s such a good song!!!! Fun fact: the title comes from a discussion Stevie had with the late, great Tom Petty’s wife, who said she had been in love with Tom since she was the age of seventeen; however, she had a southern drawl, so it sounded as though she was saying “edge of seventeen.” And the rest is history. And you should listen to this song if you haven’t already. Another badass song with a wobbling bassline and cool female vocals.

“Praying” - Kesha No offense to Madison, but I’ve been the Kesha fan from day one. Don’t even @ me. Like, Kesha posters everywhere in my room, buying Kesha albums in secret (my mother wasn’t a fan), knowing all the words to her songs - the works. So when Kesha released this TUNE in late July/August, not only was the world shook - I was so shaken. I was like, “Is this Miss Ke-dollar sign-ha???? Is this Kesha Rose Sebert???” First of all, I was literally in pieces when Kesha’s court case ruling came out, and then she dropped this song and I was like “Adios.” I always knew Kesha was a ~talented songstress~ but her vocals on this song...I cry every time. WHY DIDN’T IT WIN A GRAMMY.

“God Bless America - and All the Beautiful Women In It” - Lana Del Rey No offense....but Lana Del Rey dropped the best album of the year (tied w/ DAMN. again don’t @ me) and it is also the best album of her career. There are a lot of fabulous songs on this album but this is my favourite. It’s so subtly political yet so ethereal. The vocals and guitar on this song just soar. I love Lana so much <3

basically Dua Lipa’s whole debut album - Dua Lipa I’ve been a Dua fan since summer 2016 and when she dropped this album she also drop-kicked me to another planet. Prior to the album’s release, she released hit after hit and I was over here like “Thank u Dua for blessing us with ur killer vocals and ur mega tunes” and THEN she had the AUDACITY to just rock my world with this album. Is it Dark Side of the Moon? No. Is it still a great pop album?? Yes. And do the songs go hard?? They go hard. No offense but every song on this album - even the bad ones (*cough* “Room for 2″) - are better than “Shape of You” and YET who won the Grammy for Best Pop Vocal Performance?? Not Dua Lipa the true winner. Anyway if you have a chance just listen to the whole album. My favourite songs are-jk I love them all. Except for “Room for 2″ just ignore that one.

“Bodak Yellow” - Cardi B ....do i really need to speak on this one...

“Go Gina” - SZA I am still so offended that the Recording Academy snubbed SZA’s debut album but WHATEVER IT’S FINE. This song is about halfway through the album, and it serves as a slight interlude. But it’s my favourite. It’s succinct, it’s gorgeous, it references Martin. SZA is so talented and deserves the world.

“Raspberry Beret” - Prince I first heard this song on the last episode of She’s Gotta Have It, the TV reincarnation of the Spike Lee film. I was a Prince fan, but this song just gave me a new respect for him. It’s not necessarily in the lyrics, but the music is just insane. There’s a combination of Prince’s signature guitar-and-synth combo, but then there’s a harmonica-type instrument as well that ties into Prince’s ventures to an abandoned farm/barn. This is a good memory of Prince. 

“Best Friend” - Sofi Tukker Can I just say...this song deserves better. I know a lot of people have heard it in iPhone ads and whatnot, but Sofi Tukker is just such an amazing group and this was the first song I heard by them and they are so talented. This song just truly goes hard. I’m upset I don’t hear it more often. The wobble of such a strong bassline adds so much energy to an already enthusiastic song. It’s a great mainstream introduction to Sofi Tukker.

the entire Black Panther soundtrack again...do i really need to speak on this....

every song on the Call Me By Your Name soundtrack but especially the Sufjan Stevens songs ok so it’s common knowledge that this movie has damaged me forever, but you know what else damaged me? the soundtrack. who else gets away with intertwining classical piano music and euro eighties hits and sufjan stevens songs? no one except for luca guadagnino. so let’s briefly discuss,,,,first of all i had actually never listened to a psychedelic furs song before and i feel like that’s embarrassing especially for me so “love my way” was just such a wow moment for me. great pop song with great lyrics that truly pertain to the movie. excellent choice. also my new favourite song “paris latino” by bandolero is just so campy and european and eighties. what a tune. and the opening song, “hallelujah junction” by john adams, is just so gorgeous. it’s such a fabulous opener. now lets talk about sufjan stevens....we’re first introduced to his music in the movie with a remix of his song “futile devices.” this remix is so ethereal and stunning; it fits so perfectly within the movie. then there’s the happy little ditty “mystery of love” that basically should have won the oscar but then i saw coco and “remember me” made me cry so i wasn’t too mad. not much to say about this one because it speaks for itself. great song. now,,..,.,.,.”visions of gideon”.....,.,.,this song is so offensive. every time i listen to it i want to sit in front of a fire place for the whole duration of the song and CRY over my lover who is getting married and teaches at columbia. it’s so delicate and haunting. it just makes me cry.

“Lemon” - N.E.R.D & Rihanna idk about you guys but i heard this on the radio like once and i was so offended by how little airplay it received because this song is just so amazing. like pharrell + rihanna = modern musical genius. this was all the world needed. 

“This is America” - Childish Gambino I know literally the entire population of Earth is talking about this song but I think the visuals are the more intriguing part (obviously). Like on its own, the song is great, but the music video adds way more to it, in my opinion. As it has been said numerous times, you really have to watch the video multiple times to catch everything, but it’s such a stunning video that really forces you to think and comprehend everything going on. Props to you, Donald Glover. Even though you have been slightly problematic in the past.

so obviously i could have like a gazillion songs listed here but a) some of them are hard to explain b) i don’t want to offend anyone and c) i tried to make it seem like my taste in music is both good and slightly mainstream so people can #relate. i also discovered a lot of bruce springsteen within this period and i am proud of myself for doing so. okay, well i hope it’s noted that i did this just for fun and would obviously not like to be graded on it i just kind of wanted to have something to reflect on the year! unlike my actual blog post for this month. and i just wanted to have a platform to talk about music and get people to listen to my playlist. ok see you!! go read my real blog post!!