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justafriend-ql · 1 year ago

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Do you have any fave Thai BL series? If you do, what's your top 10?

hi anon! i'm so sorry i'm only seeing your ask now. i'm not sure i could pick a top 10... so i'll give you my top 5! i'll add a link to the mydramalist page for each series so you can learn more about them too.

never let me go (2022-2023)

MyDramaList synopsis: Nuengdiao is the heir to a prestigious family. His status has forced him to grow up isolated with no room for imperfection. Then his father is shot to death right in front of him. Now he and his mother's lives are in danger. The son of a loyal Kiattrakulmethee family employee, Palm is appointed to protect him from the dangers in and outside school. In his life of uncertainty, Palm's presence leads Nuengdiao to new experiences. Where to watch: GMMTV's youtube channel or Viki Highlights: high stakes, interesting family drama, great chemistry between the two main leads

2. my school president (2022-2023)

MyDramaList synopsis: Student body president Tinn has a secret crush on Gun, the head of the music club and lead singer of the middling band Chinzhilla. The son of the principal, Tinn is instructed to axe any clubs that don't boost their school's reputation. The music club tops that list and Tinn is therefore Gun's number one enemy. Desperate to save his club, Gun will do anything, even pledge servitude to Tinn. When Tinn learns Chinzhilla has a rule that band members aren't permitted to date until they win the Hot Wave Music Contest, he vows to do whatever it takes to help them do just that. Where to watch: GMMTV's youtube channel or Viki Highlights: great balance of sweetness of seriousness, killer soundtrack, delightful friend group

3. my only 12% (2022)

MyDramaList synopsis: Cake and Seeiw have been friends as far as they can remember. Cake is very outgoing and has a lot of friends while Seeiw is very shy and barely speaks to people he's not used to being around. Despite their different personalities, they are very close. By being next-door neighbors since they were born, they became an essential aspect of each other's lives. However, as they become older, things change and so do the way they see each other. There is only a 12% possibility of having a successful first love. Would that 12% be enough? Where to watch: iqiyi (but also available on platforms like dailymotion) Highlights: slow burn, time jump done right, tremendous acting in emotional scenes

4. not me (2021)

MyDramaList synopsis: Black and White are twins with a powerful connection. After their parents' separation, though, White’s father took him abroad, and their family effectively severed in two. It isn’t until fifteen years have passed that White—now grown—returns to Thailand. One day, seemingly from nowhere, White feels an agony like death. He recovers in the hospital, but they’re unable to determine the cause. Then he picks up a call from a childhood friend, Tod. Tod tells him that Black is in a coma following a vicious attack, and he learns that Black is in a motorcycle gang. Unable to endure the harm done to his brother in silence, and suspecting it was one of Black’s close friends—Sean, Gram, or Yok—who betrayed him, White disguises himself as Black to root out the traitor. But White doesn’t know his brother as well as he thought; he’s not behaving like the Black Sean knows, distrustful and uncaring about the feelings of others. Sean's suspicious. The difference gets under Sean's skin and makes him feel things he shouldn’t. Where to watch: GMMTV's youtube channel Highlights: beautiful and gritty aesthetic, focus on social justice, arson :)

5. i told sunset about you (2020)

MyDramaList synopsis: Teh and Oh-aew were best friends until a boyhood line of reasoning turned them into rivals. Years later as they're preparing for university admissions, both pursuing interests in the field of Communication Arts, the two meet in a Chinese language class. Their reunion awakens complicated and unstable feelings. Where to watch: Viki (but also available on platforms like dailymotion) Highlights: gorgeous cinematography, phenomenal acting, angsttttt

Bonus: currently airing thai bls I'm enjoying

last twilight (2023)

MyDramaList synopsis: Burdened with heavy debt, Mhok, a technical college student, applies for a high-paying job as a caregiver to Day, a badminton player with partial blindness due to infectious keratitis. Day hires Mhok who—unlike other applicants—seems to take no pity on him. With so much time spent in each others' company, the two develop a deep bond. When Day learns he'll have approximately 180 days until he loses what vision he has remaining, how will the two weather the trials ahead? Where to watch: GMMTV's youtube channel Highlights: slice-of-life storytelling, thoughtful representation of disability, pretty cinematography

twins (2023)

MyDramaList synopsis: It is said that identical twins who are produced from the same egg will share a bond as if they were the same person. But not with "Sprite" and "Zee", the identical twins. Despite following the same route as an athlete from birth, both want to be the only one! *adding more context because this synopsis doesn't really tell you anything: after zee is injured in an attack, sprite must take his place on the volleyball team to maintain his chances of competing in the national competition. there are a few problems with this plan: 1) sprite doesn't know how to play volleyball, 2) sprite still has to attend his own jiu jitsu practices, and 3) everyone on the volleyball team seems to hate him, especially first, his new roommate* Where to watch: i've been using dailymotion, but i hear you can watch it on LoveMedia Thailand's youtube channel using a vpn (others, feel free to comment to confirm/deny this) Highlights: fun premise, focus on sports, enemies to lovers

#in my inbox #thai bl #recommendations #i hope at least one or two of these are new to you anon!

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hicyj · 5 years ago

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some thoughts about the concert before my adrenaline slips away!

so this was the first time since january of 2017 that i was able to snag a very close spot! the previous 4 times that i was close, i was always on the very right so i always got a ton of my maknaes but for this concert, my friend and iwere on the left, AND GUESS WHO IS ON THE LEFT?? YOUNGJAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! i guess he was our designated spot cause he was in front of us soo much i still can't believe it!!!!!!!!!!! and jb was hella close too which on a normal day would kill me BUT YOUNGJAE!!!!!!!!! i did miss seeing my maknaes have fun in front of me but after 3 years i finally got my top two!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! jinyoung always casually walked right past us but that's fine.. prob would've died if he danced in front of me. he looked SOOOOOOOOOOO GOOD with his permed hair and tanned self. everytime he brushed his hair back with his head i was like.. lemme brush it for u boo (i consistently swerve into jinyoung's lane at concerts. CONSISTENTLY.) we also had a bit of markson on our side! more so mark than jackson but i'm glad they came close a few times so we could see that muscle definition! protein mark was out in full force!

the crowd: initially a lot more subdued than the brooklyn concert but right around when the concert started transitioning from its insecurity theme to its security theme, the crowd livened up dramatically! i mentioned it but it really felt like 'just right' was the point that happened!

the performances: honestly maybe the best i've ever seen from them!? they were very sharp, rarely blocking the moves and even with a really long setlist of perf heavy songs they killed it! their energy as usual was infectious and i'm so glad they kept it up and gave us like 3 encores ;_; consummate performers!!! my favorite overall performances-

just right - i was IN SHOCK that they did it and so i was v excited to see it after 3 years

save you - i LOOOOOOVE this song and the choreo was excellent. when i realized it was going to be jb that'd be closest to us for the solo dance i literally had a kai/artificial love flashback and yelled an "OH NOOO" that was filled with both anticipation and dread bc i wasn't sure if i'd survive BUT I DID!

page - I LOVE THE CHOREO TO THIS SONG!!!!! i hope in the future they add it as an encore song so they can just run around and scream jackson's refrain with us!

come on - again REALLY fun choreo and they balanced having fun with being sharp with their moves!

teenager - honestly i just remember thinking they were just really hot lol. full on thirst mode lol

paradise - a fan favorite, i saw their backs for most of this one but still had fun screaming along!

hard carry remix - can't deny the power of this song on the audience!! it was def one of the energy peaks of the show!

one degree & sign were both unbelievable because of how good their vocals were. obviously have youngjae vision but he was PARTICULARLY excellent, jjp too!! the intensity of jaebeom's gaze during one degree was a LOT for me. it was what we would call smoldering lol

thank you & miracle were very sweet. i am normally completely unaffected by these songs but i surprised myself with the little well of love that was bubbling up in me during both of those songs!

fanservice wise (i can't guarantee these were directed to me so i'll just say these were all directed towards my general area.. it's only the last one that i'm absolutely sure was directed to me lol)

i don't really call to the members but jb was extra interactive with the audience tonight so i have a lot of fun clips of him on my phone.. i think we made eye contact quite a few times but again...you never know with the lights and stuff who they're actually looking at. he was really in it to win it with his cutie/sexy duality.

mark gave his trademark flirty grin and i'm always amazed how quickly he goes from cute!!! to HOT!!!!!! in person. it's different from jb cause mark stares u the hell down lol.

youngjae's transparent back of his shirt was a major plus.. esp cause that's all i saw when they moved to the extended stage

youngjae ALSO sprayed us with water and you can literally hear me screaming "OH NO!!!" right before he did it lmfaooooooooooo. but i saw the light and now realize it was Blessed water

HE ALSO DANCED IN FRONT OF US, GAVE ME A HEART, AND I JUST SCREAMED, DUCKED MY HEAD, AND FORGOT TO RETURN IT LMFAO.

ments thoughts:

when bambam bullied jb into choosing between jjp and jus2!!!! i thought bam wouldn't survive the rest of the night (LOL) but we chanted jb's name when everyone paired up without him and he was fine

speaking of pairing up...

jackjae.... are everything..............................

jjp and 2young were hella cute too!!

yugbam weren't close enough to me for me to see any moments but i look forward to watching every clip of this concert ever to find it

bambam was having the time of his life during this concert.. all his ments ("HEYYY LADIES") were hilarious and the security guards were all his fans by the end of the concert. his remixes of never ever and ssi were amazing!!

ALL THE MEMBERS' MENTS WERE IN ENGLISH!!! youngjae was visibly nervous bc he was right after jinyoung but he did SO well. i'm so grateful they took the time to learn and practice it. jinyoung said so himself by stating that he wanted to get better w/ english in order to expand globally and communicate more with us. it’s a pragmatic approach from a pragmatic individual but my immense appreciation is there nonetheless!!

jackson seemed particularly filled with emotion during the last ment. when said his "respect everyone, fear no one" line i was like AYYY YESS but at the same time i was like.. is that from a rick ross track???? lmao. he keeps saying he'll work harder and you know what- it's really paying off. his feature on rumble was by FAR the best he's ever sounded. keep working (as a solo artist and within your group!!) and we'll support you as gently and as constructively as possible!

they kept promising they'd be back next year and i would love for that to happen but i really hope they announce it farther in advance so that we can get filled venues!!!!!

there's more but i haven't rewatched the ments so i may edit this later!

other thoughts:

the unit stages were fun - nearly blacked out during youngjae's but of course i have ZERO audio for it cause of my ridic phone.

amerithaikong went hard with the autotune but it's usually the most lit (i aged 30 years typing that) part of the concert lol

sharpest choreo award definitely goes to i am me! they were ON IT!

the last chorus of eclipse when they're on their knees had me really emotional ughhhh. i could feel them putting everything into that move.

THE DENIM OUTFITS!!!! I CAN'T!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THE ULTIMATE BOYFRIEND LOOK I LITERALLY ASCENDED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (when u know parasocial relationships can only be reasonably healthy if you keep your distance but then they GO AND WEAR BOYFRIEND LOOKS WHAT ARE U SUPPOSED TO DO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

SO MANY ENCORES!!!!!! gotta be honest i think shopping mall is the antithesis of everything i love so when they were like- ANOTHER SONG?? i was like YESSSSS!!! but then bam said shopping mall and i was like damn ok.... i guess!!!!! LOL. but we got fly remix (which was awesome!!!), go higher, and a repeat of come on!!

i'm just so happy and so grateful (the word of the day!!) to have seen them again so close. i won't forget this experience <33

#add save you and page to the soundtrack of MY life #prob thirsty by taemin too for obvs reasons

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whentheynameyoujoy · 4 years ago

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So the ATLA Movie Is... Good, Actually?

Just kidding, of course it’s not, it’s so bad it sucked the paint off my walls. But after ten years of people pointing out its glaring flaws, why would anyone bother talking about this garbage heap if not to go the other direction? So here’s a very brief and very superficial list of things the movie does get kinda... not atrociously wrong.

And they won’t be fake hipster pokes, like “It’s fun to laugh at”, “The Rifftrax for this is OK”, or “Kudos to the actress for managing to say we believe in our beliefs as much as they believe in theirs with a straight face”.

(though now that I mentioned it, it is fun to laugh at, the Rifftrax for this is OK, and massive props indeed.)

Rasta Iroh

Yes, I know it’s not exactly the aesthetic of the real Iroh or that it makes no cultural sense for him to sport this do when no one else in the racebended Indian “OMFG what were you thinking Shyamalan” Nation does but goddamn, long-haired dudes are my one mortal weakness and I will ogle the hell out of him.

Jesus is that a man bun I see that’s it mum I’ve been deaded

Yue’s hair

No.

Now we’re talking. Yue’s hair turned white when the Moon spirit gave her life, so it makes sense for it to go black again when she sacrifices herself to revive the koi fish. It’s a neat detail I find myself expecting whenever I rewatch the scene in the show. Yes, I realize it’d be a pointless hassle to animate since she, unlike in the movie, immediately goes on to become the Moon herself but still. I like.

The Blue Spirit’s mop

Zuko, hun, what’s with the dance-off?

First of all, I want to imagine that Zuko the Theatre Nerd was about to leave his ship with just the mask like in the show but then stuck his head into the cleaning cupboard and went, “Yeah, more coverage might be good, even though it do seem mighty fried to shit”.

Which makes me giggle. I like to giggle.

And secondly, the hair’s movement is what makes the static mess of the Blue Spirit’s solo fight scene appear at least bit more dynamic because God knows the cinematography isn’t doing it.

Any particular reason why it’s at the edge of the action, shot all boring-like?

Now, I get why circular shots would be reserved for Aang while he’s in the practice area and then used once the two join forces. What I don’t get is why Aang’s part of the action scene has a defined visual style while Zuko’s delegated to a few stationary wide shots from afar as though he’s a tertiary goon, meaning that when the time comes to combine the respective pieces of cinema language and visually convey collaboration, there’s not really much to combine.

But as long as Zuko is stuck in this static mess, it’s that awesome disaster on his head flopping about that draws the eye, helping me understand that something even is going on over there.

It also prevents me from paying much attention to how the extras are mostly just staying put and a lot of the hits don’t land, so that’s good.

The music slaps

James Newton Howard is too good for this.

youtube

Pls ignore that the word “gods” is used in the ATLA universe

I can’t be the only one who constantly uses this piece to daydream about writing specific fanfic scenes instead of, you know, actually sitting down and writing them. It’s just so good at communicating a sense of sorrow while speaking of rebirth that I find myself getting misty-eyed whenever I listen to it. Unfailingly, the soundtrack as a whole manages to break through the mile-thick crust of horrible acting, confusing writing, and uninspired cinematography and make me feel things. And considering how everything on screen is working against it, that’s no small feat.

Imagine what a powerful experience it would be if the score was used in service of an actual movie.

Dev Patel

No wonder since he’s the only one in the film occupying that crucial intersection between “is a good actor” and “was given something to work with”. It also doesn’t hurt that he breaks with the trend of actors starring in martial arts flicks despite never having done any martial art.

And all EIP-jokes about “stiff and humorless” aside, he’s a pretty decent Zuko considering how abridged this version of the character is. A while ago, I remember hearing a reviewer say that with his comedic chops, Patel should have been cast as Sokka. And on one hand, yes, god, absolutely, I need to see that asap. But on the other? He captures all layers of Book 1!Zuko, the desperate obsession, rage, and self-loathing, and at the same time gives you a peek at the soft momma’s boy dork that’s buried underneath. For Christ sakes, he exudes intensity and ambivalence even when acting against an emotionless hunk of wood that’s giving him nothing in return.

Oh, and I guess there’s a tree in the frame.

Ba dum tss

What can I say, the guy’s good.

Showing vs telling

OK, so this movie is all tell and no show, except for one single moment. And it’s the exact moment where the original goes in the other direction in terms of how information is conveyed.

See, I never liked this. The revelation is preceded by Iroh giving advice to Zuko who scolds him for nagging. Iroh then apologizes, moves in to say the line above, and is interrupted by Zuko who seems rather uncomfortable with Iroh laying his feelings out like this. And once they’re out, Zuko verbally confirms that he knew already and Iroh didn’t need to bother.

All this extraneous information and pussyfooting ends up weakening what should be a profound scene that reveals to us, the viewers, how deep the relationship between these two in fact runs.

Compare to the movie where Dadroh acts like a parent by fussing and worrying, with Sonion needing a single look to tell him and us that he understands what it’s all really about.

It’s genuinely efficient and just good.

No Cataang

Fine, a bit mean-girl bitchy from me since I only start minding the ship in Book 3. And probably unintentional on the part of the creators since there are moments where I think they’re trying to set the romance up? There’s a, well, an attempt to recreate the famous introductory shot of fateful meaningful destiny of meaningness, there’s some slight note of saving each other’s bacon going on, I’m pretty sure they’re the only ones in the film who smile, and oh, right, Katara’s shoved into her post-canon useless role where she doesn’t ever do anything, and is all about Aang right from the get go.

Yes, I will blame the “executive producers” because a) I’m incredibly petty, and b) it’s perfectly in line with their vision of the character so why the hell not.

Hilariously, none of it reads on screen because the actors are just... yeah. These poor kids are struggling so much with delivering their own lines and portraying their own characters they don’t seem to have any strength left to create something between them. To be fair, the bare-bones shot-reverse shot style of their scenes doesn’t exactly lend itself to the idea they occupy the same universe, let alone are friends or each other’s crushes.

And I enjoy this immensely because it allows me to forget the depressing horror show Katara’s life turns into post ATLA.

Yes Zutara

I need to delve into this because it’s fucking hilarious. So in a movie which fails to establish the original’s central romance so spectacularly that if Aang got lost in a crowd I don’t believe Katara would notice, SomEOnE thought it’d be a good idea to add an utterly unnecessary non-canon moment where Zuko for some reason feels the need to pause his character-defining hunt for the Avatar which otherwise has him ignore everything and snap at everyone, and explain his central conflict to an unconscious peasant he doesn’t know, complete with gently pushing the hair from the pretty girl’s the soulmate’s the Water Tribe Ambassador’s the Fire Lady’s the love of his life’s her face away, AFTER his uncle nagged him twice to find a girl and settle down.

I just wanted to make sure we’re all on the same page and this is what we really saw.

Celibate Avatars

I have no idea why the decision was made, if TPTB thought expecting viewers to understand the story through the lens of Buddhism would be too much, or if the “executive producers” already worked their retconny magic. What I do know, however, is that there’s a big shift in worldbuilding and Aang’s struggle with his role as the Avatar stops being a personal conflict defined by a) his grief for Air Nomads, b) his notion of being robbed of the loved ones in his life, and c) the selfish attachment to Katara he confuses with true love. Instead, what he has a difficulty to accept is apparently a general notion of who Avatars are supposed to be, i.e. a fantasy version of Catholic monks, no family and worldly relations, period.

I guess either someone understood the original’s portrayal of de/attachment as “hermit no freaky”, or thought the audience would so why not go there outright.

Now, do I like this on its own? No, God no, it makes the world infinitely poorer and changes the story from an exploration of ideas which aren’t all that ingrained in the West, to a cliché tropester about a Catholic priest going Protestant so that he could be with a girl.

At least I assume that’s where they were going to take this eventually.

I mean, I think the direction was “look conflicted, this isn’t the final stage of your journey”?

But consider this—the show went there, it built on the concepts of Eastern philosophy and touched upon the ideas of spiritual awakening, only to swerve in the end and strongly imply they’re bullshit and Aang should have never wasted his time with them.

So honestly, I much prefer scanty worldbuilding to an insulting retcon by a damn rock.

Multiracial Air Nomads

Probably the most substantial “no hint of irony” point on this list and a genuinely good addition to the universe’s worldbuilding.

See, the notion of the elemental nations being perfectly separate and never mingling before Sozin has always been sketchy but it’s especially ridiculous in the case of airbenders. It never made sense to me for all airbenders to be Air Nomads and for all Air Nomads to be monks and for all monks to be chilling at the temples all the time to facilitate a quick everyone-dies genocide should an imperialistic warlord ever decide to commit one.

Because committing everyone to a single way of life at a handful of places kinda goes against the central philosophy behind airbending. Like the freedom and nomadism part.

Instead, there should be more variety to the airbending culture, with some staying at the temples as monks, hermits, and teachers while others live as nomads, travelling the world and creating more airbenders, with the resulting children in turn being influenced by the non-airbending cultures they grew up in.

And thus, not only should airbenders not be modeled after a single culture to create a one-size-fits-all lifestyle, but they should have the most diverse and dynamic culture out of the four nations.

And it’d be precisely this diversity which would pave way for an eventual reveal that some of them survived, that their complete extermination is impossible.

Because they’re everywhere.

You know.

Like air.

#atla #atla movie #zutara #anti bryke #dev patel #the last airbender #anti-kataang

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ghouladventures · 4 years ago

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Real Writing Advice

I just thought I’d share some of the tips and tricks I’ve picked up over the years in regards to writing. I am by no means an expert, but I’ve been writing screenplays (at least attempting to) and fanfics/short stories for around 7+ ish years and I have definitely learned a lot from my mistakes. I’m partially making this post to combat some of my own imposter syndrome, and motivate me to work on a script I’ve been avoiding. This is just advice from my own experience, not a bunch of regurgitated stuff from the internet.

“Write what you know” (stay with me on this!)

I know, you’ve heard this before a million times. But that’s because it’s true. I’d like to extend more on this idea though because it’s often overlooked due to how vague it is.

To me, “write what you know” means taking your life, your experience and putting it into the story. Nobody else will ever have your exact life experience, so use material from your own life. DO NOT worry about it being done a million times, because I can assure you, if you do it your own way, it will end up being unique.

WRITE DOWN EVERYTHING. As a comedy writer, it can be really hard to create funny situations/dialogue out of thin air. But observation is the key to comedy and writing in general. Anything funny I hear, a story that happens to me or a friend, I have a strong opinion about something, etc. I write it all down. Your phone is right there, open the notes and write it down because you WILL end up forgetting it. I cannot tell you how much effort I have saved because I have a whole bunch of notes that are just pure material.

Character writing is very difficult for me, as I always end up making characters that are just like me. In fanfics I end up projecting myself onto the characters hella, and I only notice during the re-reads. But...you’re the only one to reference. You ARE the main character of your life, so it’s only natural. What I do to create characters is look within. Make a character who personifies the person you want to be, the type of person you hate, the type of person you crush on, a character that shares a flaw with you, who you feel like inside vs. outside, etc. Make a list if you want, as many things you can think of. Share a piece of yourself with every character, your own experience adds a realness that can’t be replicated through research. DO NOT be afraid of flaws! Flaws are the absolute best thing you can give to a character. The character has to overcome these internal flaws to get where they want to, so don’t shy away from character flaws!

Enjoy Writing!

Too many times it’s easy to get caught up in the stress of writing. Making sure your story is cohesive and engaging, and trying to juggle a million things at once is HARD. Writing is hard. But please have fun, I beg of you.

If you love a certain movie, watch it, analyze and learn why! Don’t copy the entire movie, but take things that you really love and put it into your own story. Great artists steal. You love a certain plot point, character element, message, dynamic, etc., find a way to incorporate those things you love into your work.

Put yourself in the audiences shoes. Create the type of movies you love watching, the type of movies that cause you to jump into a fandom! Once you find out why you love the stories you do, you start getting excited about your story. For me, doing this has taken the negative connotation of “working” on a script away that I often can’t get away from my notepad. You start getting excited to write, and while that passion unfortunately dies down, keep finding reasons to be excited about your story.

Play around with genre. Tell a story from a different perspective. Add that element you thought was “too weird” to add. Don’t shut down ideas that seem too self indulgent or ridiculous, it might just lead to something. The screen/page is your place to play! Try something new, test it out. Do not be afraid to “fail” because your just brainstorming! Failure doesn’t really exist, it’s just testing and trying things until you find gold. You have a whole page of just scribbled nonsense? So what! Everything is part of the process. Stop beating yourself up before you even start.

Vibes are important

A lot of times I have no story ideas, but I want to make a movie like ______. But hey, vibes are a start! Maybe you just have a few scenes in mind, a color scheme, etc. If that’s what’s bouncing around your head, start writing them down! From there you can start connecting dots. Throw in a character you’ve been working on. Basically all of my stories start out as “just vibes”, so don’t dismiss them.

When I’m starting a new project, I’ll make a playlist of music. Not music that will be part of the soundtrack necessarily, but just music that relates to my idea. I take soundtracks from other movies and just put them all in a pile, throw it on shuffle, and write. It makes everything 100% more fun and engaging, and having the music match the “vibe” helps immensely with creating the vision.

Like making a playlist, I make a pinterest board filled with just everything related to my idea. Aesthetics, character looks, locations, etc. This helps me really create a vision of what I want this movie to be. Not the story, not the plot.

Your Brain, Your Process

There is no correct way to create anything. When I was starting out, I would read and watch a lot of “advice” and “screenwriting process” stuff. While I felt like I was gaining knowledge, it really only made me feel like I didn’t know what I was doing.

USE YOUR STRENGTHS TO YOUR ADVANTAGE. So your visual? Great! Make little idea bubbles, make a venn diagram, use a story circle, draw lines connecting ideas, use a punnett square, etc. Maybe you’re really good at writing fanfictions but not screenplays. Great! Write your scenes out like fanfictions before formatting them like a script. Just some examples but my point is, use the skills you already have. This makes it so much easier, it takes away the daunting feeling of writing and allows you to progress.

Find writers you look up to and learn from them! One of my favorite writers is Dan Harmon, so I looked up writing advice from Dan Harmon and found a bunch of advice that was extremely useful to me (highly recommended for visual people). Look up the writers to your favorite movies/shows/books, and see what you find! You’d be surprised how much extremely useful information is out there if you look. Learn from the people you look up to, the writers you want to be. I keep little notebooks and write notes (like i’m in class), of everything I learn, and when I need some help, I whip out my little notebook and find some advice, it has helped me get un-stuck countless times. Over time, the concepts you learn will become more instinctual, making writing easier.

It takes time. This is my biggest problem. I will work on a movie for a few months, then get bored and desert it. But look at any movie, if you see any storyboard or “first draft” type of stuff. It’s like a completely different movie! Great things take time, you don’t have to speedrun a whole script. Just keep working on it, it will take a long time, but it will be worth it.

I hope that was helpful to some of you writers out there!

#writing #writing advice #screenwriting #screenwriter #writer #writer advice #writing tips #actual writing #writeblr

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nobody-wants-ice-cream · 5 years ago

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Everything Wrong With The Umbrella Academy. Episode 1, We Only See Each Other At Weddings and Funerals.

Some context before the cut: This is all in good fun! I wanted to do a really nitpicky re-watch of the series and found some really cool and interesting things I didn’t notice before. This is meant to have a Cinema Sins-esque tone. However, I did take off a lot more sins than Cinema Sins would have because I do genuinely like the series and the people that made it possible. So all of the good things got one sin off and all the bad things got one sin added. This is a really long post, so grab some popcorn. If there’s anything that I missed, feel free to add it!

We Only See Each Other At Weddings And Funerals

The story opens with a random scene. I know why this is important now, but for a first time viewer this is a strange Russian show with no subtitles. Sin for the fact that this opening scene could drive away audiences when they could have opened with Pogo’s monologue or the sudden birth scene. +1

Sudden birth. I know that this is what starts the whole series, but not once do these assholes discuss the implications of sudden birth. That shit is traumatic and must have induced a lot of trauma in the mothers. Sinning for trauma. +1

The russian ladies all help this poor girl. Teamwork and togetherness gets a sin off. -1

How did they get her swimsuit off enough for her to give birth without just taking the whole thing off? Did one woman happen to have a pair of scissors on her so they could cut the crotch? Because one piece suits are not that flexible downstairs. They didn’t take it off her, it’s still covering her. Sinning for lack of realism or explanation. +1

This narration should have happened much sooner. +1

Buying children. Literally buying children. And he gets seven so he buys them wholesale. Seven sins because Sir Reginald Hargreeves is a dick that bought seven children. +7

One sin off for the soundtrack now. All the songs used in this show are bops! -1

Ellen Page starts playing the Lindsey Stirling Phantom of the Opera piece on the lowest string when the piece starts on a high note. One sin for lack of musicality. +1

Minus one sin for Ellen Page’s vibrato. Not many people pretending to play the violin get that so accurate. That or this was the talented body double. Either way one sin off for musicality. -1

“Please send more food” Reginald Hargreeves is a dick to his adopted children. He didn’t feed Luther enough, so who knows what he did to the ones he didn’t like as much. +7

Also, Luther has presumably spent four years in this base on the moon. Did he hit his head every morning? You would think that he would learn to duck. +1

One sin off for the moon plant. -1

I’m taking 10 sins off for the special effects of this entire series. -10

That car transition between Diego’s and Allison’s entrances was out of place. I know it’s meant to show that Allison is far away from the action. But did we really need that? It’s not shown when transitioning from the red carpet to Klaus in rehab. +1

What is keeping the lawnchair that Luther has on the moon down? It looks lightweight. Does he have it nailed to the moon? Is there now a lawnchair on the moon forever? +1

Tom Hopper is an excellent actor. He nailed the “just got the news that my father is dead” without saying a single word. -1

Diego doesn’t bother to untie the family he saves. He caused property damage and severely injured the thugs that broke in. No wonder Patch has a problem with him being a vigilante. +1

“Allison, will you wear Valentino to the funeral” +1

One sin off because Robert Sheehan has already won my heart as Klaus and he hasn’t said a single word yet. And for the little jig he does when he gets the drugs. Interesting choice, but I like it. I could be biased because I’ve watched the series already, but I don’t care. One sin off for Robert Sheehan. -1

Why was Vanya allowed to be playing to this empty theatre with spotlights on her? Does she have an arrangement with maintenance? Is that why the orchestra isn’t set up? +1

One sin off for the Hargreeves mansion. The set designers did an amazing job.-1

Creepy shrine portrait of Five is creepy and somehow manages to not look like Aidan Gallager. This could be a stylistic choice to show that Reggie didn’t care about Five, in which case, another sin for child abuse. +1

Creepy statue of Ben is creepy. And it doesn’t look like Justin Min or Ethan Hwang. Who is this statue honoring? +1

It has been stated that Ben’s death broke up the academy. Yet, the other four assholes stuck around for one more portrait after his death? +1

Vanya doesn’t close the doors behind her when she walks into the mansion. +1

Diego’s outfit is central to introducing his character. However, it is dumb as hell and he probably stabbed himself with the knives in the harness multiple times. Especially the ones on his back. +1

Diego is a dick to Vanya at their father's funeral. I know Reggie was a jackass, but Jesus Christ, Diego. Have some tact. I know this is meant to show that Diego doesn’t have any tact, but this is such a severe line. +1

In the first shot of Reggie’s bedroom there are 6 freaking lamps. What is he, Bella Swan? And later, there are three more. +1

David Castaneda really brings Diego to life with his interaction with Luther in Reggie's bedroom. -1

I know I already took sins off for the special effects, but Pogo deserves another two off. Special Effects team, you did good. -2

“How long has it been since Five dissapered” is the most obvious bit of exposition/foreshadowing. To the point where it reads lazy. Another option would be Vanya asking “How long has it been since” and trailing off from there. Pogo knows what happened. This is a crucial reveal, let the audience wait for it a bit. +1

One sin off for Vanya being a good sister to Five. Fluffernutter sandwiches and leaving the lights on is heartwarming. -1

Props to these child actors for being able to portray the way Reggie treats them and how that affects their emotions in the scene where they wanted to say goodnight to Reggie. -1

However, Reginald Hargreeves is a dick to his adopted children. I will keep sinning this. +7

After Reggie shuns and ignores his children, Luther’s hand on Ben’s shoulder is a subtle way to show that Luther and Ben were sort of close, which is what an excerpt from Vanya’s book implies in the comics. Good job directors or actors for making that choice! -1

Robert Sheehan in the office scene. This is where we meet Klaus as an audience for the first time with dialogue, and he fucking nails it. -1

“Thank God he’s not our real father so we couldn’t inherit those cold dead eyes! Ahh! Number Threee-” The delivery on that line is excellent. -1

Klaus’s dangly necklace that looks kind of like dog tags foreshadowing the real dog tags he wears later on in the show. -1

No way in hell Klaus’s skimpy outfit provided enough concealment for that massive box. In fact, in the shots we do see of his back, we should have seen the outline of the box. +1

Sir Reginald Hargreeves is as obsessed with lamps as he is with collecting children. His office is full of them! +1

“Do you think he wears that thing in the bathroom” “Like in the shower” “Yes, absolutely” Allison and Luther have some good interactions. This is where they really act like siblings making fun of another sibling. -1

A woman who told bedtime stories to her kid about her uncle on the moon forgets that said uncle has been on the moon and judges him when he doesn’t know about her divorce.+1

“Rumor thing” Way to be specific, Luther. +1

Allison’s expression at the family meeting when she takes a sip of her drink. Emmy Raver-Lampman is what makes this character likeable. -1

Reginald Hargreeves was a dick to his children. The whole favorite spot thing? Yeah that. Golden child abuse victim. +7

Sir Reginald playing tennis with Hitler line. -1

Luther accuses his siblings of killing their father. Have some tact man, not at the funeral. This makes sense for the character and his circumstances, but I am still sinning it because Luther doesn’t think he did anything wrong. +1

I feel kind of bad for Luther after his siblings leave the room. Great acting on Tom Hopper’s part. -1

How did Allison get into the bank? +1

Luther straight up throws this man out of a building! That guy is 100% dead. And then he admonishes Five for being a killer later! +1

“Guns are for sissies, real men throw knives!” is a line that would only be spoken by a twelve year old that has never faced the judgement of people he isn’t related to. Also, Diego practiced this line in front of a mirror. +1

But that throw was badass, so... -1

Also, how did Klaus, Diego, Five, and Ben get into the bank as well? We only see Luther enter. And presumably Five teleported in. So were the rest already in there? +1

Five manages to jump faster than a bullet here, but in episode two he’s a lot slower when jumping from one side of the table to the other. You could make the argument that the table is in the way, but there was a human being and a bullet in the way here. +1

“Woah! That’s one badass stapler!” This is the first sin off because Aidan Gallagher can act, and it will not be the last. For all his grumpy 58 year old man, he also manages to shine while playing a young version of said grumpy 58 year old man. You would think that one or the other would be a little weak, but no he nails both performances. -1

But, how did Five switch the gun and the stapler? And why do we never see him do this again with more useful items like a briefcase or one of the machine guns used by the local commission hires? Can he only switch items with a similar mass? How does this power work? +1

Luther is the one that tells Ben that there's more guys in the vault to kill. Not Klaus who could have been like “a ghost said there's more guys in the vault”. What exactly did Klaus do on missions? He isn’t shown helping the hostages or fighting in any way. +1

“I didn’t sign up for this.” yeah Ben, like it’s a summer camp and not your abusive father buying you as an infant and then forcing you to kill people. +1

Kenny’s mom appearance. Also, the woman mixes leopard print leggings, a black dress, a square pattern cardigan, and a hat with stripes and a pom-pom. +1

“Can we go home now” Ethan Hwang had great delivery on that line. -1

Sir Reginald Hargreeves is a dick to his children. He forces 6 of them to kill, and then makes it seem like it’s all fun and games to the one he isolates. +7

When did they get coats and scarves? Did Reggie bring them coats and scarves while coming down to address the crowd? +1

Also, Reggie was on the roof of a different building with vanya! What did the kids do while they were waiting for him? Stand around and look pretty? Not likely, Ben was covered in blood. +1

Also, when did Ben have time to clean up? He is significantly less bloody in the scene where Reggie talks to the press. Yet his mask, uniform, and a bit of his jaw still have blood. This suggests he had time to wipe down. What kind of magic wipes are these that soak up and remove blood quickly and where can I get them? +1

The way the children wear their scarves show their personality. Luther has it done properly, Diego has his flapping around, Allison and Klaus have tied it fashionably, Five has it done well, but not as proper, and Ben has it done like Luthers. Well done costume people or actors who made that character choice. -1

The entire scene when Klaus attempts to summon Reggie from the afterlife. -4

I forgot that Klaus actually calls him Reggie in this scene. I thought it was just a fandom thing lmao. -1

How did Klaus clean up the ashes without leaving evidence on the bar? Did he vacuum it? +1

The cutesy fighting posters are a great set design choice. -1

Allison had her trauma tattoo refreshed at some point. It’s faded on Klaus, but on her it’s perfectly visible and stark. I’m sinning because they don’t show or tell why Allison might want to do this. +1

Also, that guitar Klaus was cuddling in a later scene, was just in the kitchen for some reason. Why? +1

Five and Ben are not part of the I Think We’re Alone Now dance party. I know it’s for plot, but come on! They don’t even have another dance party later to make up for this. +1

Diego and Vanya totally saw each other when Diego went to close the door between the foyer and the living area. +1

Luther and Vanya’s dance moves. No hate on either though because I dance like them if it isn’t swing or any other partnered dance +1

Diego, Klaus, and Allison’s dance moves. -1

Also, the song is heard all the way in the kitchen. There is no soundproofing in this mansion. +1

Luther punching down the airplane is funny. -1

David Castaneda doing those amazing dance moves in character. -1

Oh hello Five. Nice of you to show up and kickstart the plot into being something other than washed up superheroes are really sad and abused. +1

“Daddy!” -1

Why were Five’s powers affecting random objects? +1

Klaus is the only one with self preservation. “I vote for running” +1

“Does anyone else see little Number Five, or is that just me” is a great line because Klaus can see the dead. However, the dead don’t show up in massive portals, otherwise something like that would have happened when we see Dave in The Day That Wasn’t. +1

Five asks for an exact date and then Vanya gives him “the 24th” real specific, Vanya +1

Five doesn’t close the fridge properly because that doesn’t matter in the apocalypse -1

“In the end I had to project my consciousness forward into a suspended quantum state version of myself that exists across every possible instance of time” “That makes no sense” “well it would if you were smarter” the mark of someone being smart is being able to explain concepts like this in layman's terms. If Five were as smart as he said he was, then he could have been able to come up with an analogy. That or the showmakers have no clue what they’re talking about and wrote a bunch of science-y bullshit to make Five sound smart. +1

Diego was ready to throw hands with Five, someone who looks thirteen and was thirteen until Five explained otherwise. +1

“Dolores kept saying the equations were off” so in other words, Five knew that his equations were off, but he still risked it. +1

But also, Five knew his equations were off, but he was so desperate to see his family that he risked it anyway. -1

Nations Gazette paper has articles that look like they’re actually about the headline. -1

“What part of the future do you not understand.” -1

Aidan Gallagher’s delivery in that scene really set the tone for his character. Impressive. -1

Five decides to dress in the full on school boy getup. Complete with the tie and the blazer when those items aren’t necessary. +1

Aidan Gallagher and Ellen Page are two kick ass actors. They play off each other surprisingly well. -1

“You mean like what happened to Ben” “Was it bad?” What happened to Ben? This remains a sin until they explain it. +1

“May the darkness within you find peace in the light” that sounds really bad. What a horrible thing to have on your statue. +1

Jordan Claire Robbins’s performance of Grace -1

Luther and Diego are so emo that they don't need umbrellas. You’re in The Umbrella Academy! This had to be a personal choice to not carry one. +1

Klaus’s face when Luther dumps out the ashes. -1

The camera cuts to Five when Diego says that Mom gave them actual names. -1

The fight between Luther and Diego is stupid. +1

Klaus and Five fight over who is going to protect who. +1

“Stop it!” “Hit him! Hit him!” -1

The detail on Ben’s statue. It shows his toe and knee have been touched many times by people who presumably miss him and love him. -1

Luther punches Ben’s statue in the crotch, which makes Klaus’s face 10x funnier once you remember that Ben was probably there too. -1

Luther punches Ben’s statue in the crotch and beheads it, suggesting that Luther had something to do with Ben’s death. -1

Luther punches Ben’s statue in the crotch. +1

Klaus puts his cigarette out in reggie’s ashes. -1

Reggie narration +1

Reggie is a dick to his kids +7

The stupid, bright green jumpsuits +6

What is the point of this exercise? How does running up the stairs make them better heroes? +1

Young Diego either practiced “That’s not fair, Five’s cheating” or his stutter is only there when the plot calls for it. +1

Child Abuse tattoos +12

The fact that Vanya feels left out because she didn’t get a child abuse tattoo. Reggie, you fucked up these kids real bad. +2

We think that Reggie is comforting Luther after he got a child abuse tattoo, but no, he’s actually just attaching monitors to his head. +1

Reginald Hargreeves likes to watch young children sleep. +7

Vanya foreshadowing. Her monitor showing more activity then the cut to her taking one of the pills is brilliant. -1

Vanya still doesn’t close the academy door behind her when she leaves. +1

“An entire square block, 42 bedrooms 19 bathrooms” Five are you a real-estate agent now? +1

“Dad hated children too, but he had plenty of us!” Klaus would be excellent at cinema sins. Seven more for child abuse +7

What are the rules to Five’s jumps? We only really see him jump to places he can see unless he is time traveling or in the instance where he jumps to the car. Speaking of, the car had the keys in it. Reggie, are you trying to get it stolen +1

Diego is a dick to Allison about her divorce. +1

Klaus and Diego’s interactions make me happy. -1

The Klaus theme is a wonderful piece of music. -1

Robert Sheehan making David Castaneda laugh. -1

We get our first glimpse of Luther’s arm here. It’s super weird and vague and only teases the reveal. This is where the ape reveal should have been for the audience and where it would have made sense. Doing the reveal in a later episode is weird. +1

Five doesn’t know how to break correctly, which contradicts “I know how to do everything” +1

Something I just noticed, Five completed the uniform not only with the tie and blazer, but with the hair gel too. +1

The towing guy chooses to sit next to Five at an empty counter. +1

Five looks so offended when Agnes refers to him as “the kid” -1

The creepy smile Five pulls in an attempt to look innocent doesn’t make Agnes scream in terror. Seriously Aidan Gallagher, what the fuck was that that was absoulutely terrifying. +1

Five attempts to relate to a man that looks the age that he should be, but it ends up exceedingly awkward because Five looks 13. +1

The tow truck driver helps him out, but how was Five going to pay for his coffee? We don’t see him with money. Was he just going to jump out to the car? +1

Five never gets his cup of coffee :( +1

“Istanbul was Constantinople/ Now it’s Istanbul not Constantinople”. This whole scene is great. Five plays with them like he did in the bank scene which shows that even if he did age, he didn’t do it around people so he doesn’t have maturity. -1

Five stabs a guy with a mop and kills him. -1

Five stabs a guy in the crotch with a pencil, then uses the same pencil to stab him in the eye. In between he throws a plate at another guy. This is badass. -1

Five jumps in a way that actually does make two of the idiots shoot each other. Which means that technically, Patch was right. -1

Five kills a man with his bare hands. -1

But he stops to put his fucking tie back on. +1

And yet after all that, the goriest thing is when Five pulls the tracker out of his arm. Props to the makeup department and Aidan Gallagher’s acting skill for making that look so real. -1

Five should be way sweatier when he walks out of Griddys. Unless he moped that up with some napkins? What are these super absorbent napkins and where can I buy them? +1

Agnes should be far more traumatized. And definitely shouldn’t have survived that. +1

Diego is emo with the monocle. +1

Luther flashback narration. +1

Klaus, thankfully interrupts this. -1

“Number 6 “Ben” (deceased)” -1

We can see Ben depending on if it’s Klaus or Diego talking. -1

The vigilante mask Diego wears +1

Five jumpscare in Vanya’s apartment. +1

“Rapists can climb” yes Five. Continue with the criminals that can climb. Including you. +1

This whole scene is the best ending to an episode in the entire season. -1

Aidan Gallagher and Ellen Page play off each other with subtle expressions. This acting talent is amazing. -2

“The world ends in eight days and I have no idea how to stop it” “I’ll put on a pot of coffee” roll credits. I love this ending for many reasons. It’s a total mic drop moment. -2

Overall review:

While actively looking for nitpicky things, I got to see the first in a whole new light. Both the great parts and terrible parts stood out in a way that they didn’t when I wasn’t looking for them. Robert Sheehan, Aidan Gallagher, and Ellen Page were the stand out actors in this episode. All three contributed something significant that didn’t heavily rely on the script writers.

The child cast also really stood out to me. All seven of them had very limited screen time (I am counting Gallagher playing a child version of his character in this assessment) and they absolutely made the best of it. Out of all of them, Ethan Hwang stood out to me because of his overall great delivery. I hope that we see him play Ben in a more in-depth way in season 2.

Don’t get it twisted, I genuinely like this series and I think that it tells a great story. I just think it’s fun to nitpick and look deeper. After over analyzing everything else, it’s time to get back to basics. Especially because the season 2 trailer could drop any day now.

Total: 82 sins

Sentence: Tennis with Hitler and Sir Reginald.

#The Umbrella Academy #all in good fun #luther hargreeves #diego hargreeves #Allison Hargreeves #five hargreeves #ben hargreeves #vanya hargreeves #i worked really hard on this

194 notes · View notes

avatarinspirations · 4 years ago

Text

Avatar Kyoshi music

Here are some songs I like for Kyoshi’s story. It’s gonna get random XD

Angst

“Again” by Flyleaf.

“Anything” by Mae.

“Are You With Me” by Trapt.

“Baby you wouldn’t last a minute on the creek” by Chiodos.

“Bionic” by Christina Aguilera.

“Bite To Break Skin” by Senses Fail.

“Breath” by Breaking Benjamin.

“Breathe” by Michelle Branch.

“Broken Crown” by Mumford & Sons.

“Build your own Disaster” by Ice Nine Kills.

“Calling All Angels” by Train.

“Calls Me Home” by Shannon LaBrie.

“Carry On” by Fun.

“Change” by Taylor Swift.

“Change your mind” by All-American Rejects.

“Coffeeshop Soundtrack” by All Time Low.

“Cold” by Crossfade.

“Colors” by Crossfade.

“Crawling” by Linkin Park.

“Dare you to move/Meant to live” cover by Anthem Lights (original songs by Switchfoot).

“Dead in the Water” by Ellie Goulding.

“Demons” by Imagine Dragons.

“Don’t Tell Me” by Avril Lavigne.

“Dust & Gold” by Arrows to Athens.

“Everybody’s Fool” by Evanescence.

“Evil Angel” by Breaking Benjamin.

“Explosions” by Ellie Goulding.

“Fight Song” by Rachel Platten.

“Fix You” by Coldplay.

“Fly from the Inside” by Shinedown.

“From Yesterday” by 30 Seconds to Mars.

“Fully Alive” by Flyleaf.

“Gives you hell” by All-American Rejects.

“Headstrong” by Trapt.

“Helena” by My Chemical Romance.

“Hero” by Skillet.

“Heroes” by Alesso.

“Hit me with your best shot” by Pat Benatar.

“Hit the Floor” by Bullet for my Valentine.

“Hit the Floor” by Linkin Park.

“Hold Me Down” by Halsey.

“HTML Rulez Dood” by the Devil Wears Prada.

“Hurricane” by Bridgit Mendler.

“I’m So Sick” by Flyleaf.

“In the air Tonight” by Nonpoint & Phil Collins.

“Innocence” by Avril Lavigne.

“It Only Hurts” by Default.

“It’s My Life” by Bon Jovi.

“Justify” by The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus.

“Karma” by Alicia Keys.

“Kings & Queens” by 30 Seconds to Mars.

“Monster” by Skillet.

“Move Along” by All-American Rejects.

“My Hero” by Foo Fighters.

“Never Too Late” by Three Days Grace.

“One Girl Revolution” by Superchick.

“One Woman Army” by Porcelain Black.

“Only One” by Yellowcard.

“Over & Under” by Egypt Central.

“Papercut” by Linkin Park.

“Prelude 12/21″ by AFI.

“Rain on Me” by Lady Gaga & Ariana Grande.

“Ready to Fall” by Rise Against.

“Rebirthing” by Skillet.

“Reverie” by Megan McCauley.

“Savior” by Skillet.

“Shake It Out” by Florence & the Machine.

“Shattered” by Trading Yesterday.

“So Cold” by Breaking Benjamin.

“Somebody that I used to know” by Mayday Parade.

“Sorrow” by Flyleaf.

“Supernatural” by Flyleaf.

“Tears don’t fall” by Bullet For My Valentine.

“The Cave” by Mumford & Sons.

“The Climb” by Miley Cyrus.

“The Greatest” by Sia --> I especially love Madilyn Page’s cover.

“The Rescue” by American Hi-Fi.

“This is Gospel” by Panic at the Disco.

“To Hell & Back” by blessthefall.

“Waiting for the End” by Linkin Park.

“What have you done” by Within Temptation.

“What I’ve Done” by Linkin Park.

“Whisper” by Evanescence.

“You’re Not Alone” by Saosin.

Score Music (Mostly epic)

“A Building Panic” from the Titanic soundtrack.

“Air” from the Angels & Demons soundtrack.

“All or Nothing” by Brand X Music.

“Antrozous” by Hanz Zimmer (Batman Begins soundtrack).

“Attack at the Wall” from the Mulan soundtrack.

“Battle on the Tower” from the Beauty & the Beast soundtrack (the Gaston vs Beast half).

“Birth of a Hero” by Soundcritters.

“Blossoms” from the Mulan soundtrack.

“Bonded for Life” from the Indian in the Cupboard soundtrack.

“Bring the Pain” by Brand-X Music.

“Bumblebee Captured” from the Transformers soundtrack.

“Caeser’s Home” from the Rise of the Planet of the Apes soundtrack.

“Call to Arms” by Two Steps From Hell.

“Chatting with Clark” from the Supergirl Season 1 soundtrack.

“Coffey on the Mile” from the Green Mile soundtrack.

“Destiny” by Filip Olejka.

“Destroying the Corpses” from the Haunting in Connecticut soundtrack.

“Evolve Nation” by Sub Pub Music.

“Farewell” from the Pocahontas soundtrack.

“Firebird Suite” by Igor Stravinsky.

“Floating Away” by Epic Score.

“Glory Seeker” by Immediate Music.

“H2O” from the Angels & Demons soundtrack.

“Here comes the King” by X-Ray Dog.

“Heroes” by Randy Dominguez.

“Jim Saves The Crew” from the Treasure Planet soundtrack.

“Kill ‘Em All” from the Carrie 2013 soundtrack.

“Lacrimosa Dominae” by Immideate.

“Legion” by Randy Dominguez.

“Like a Fire” from the X-Men: Apocalypse soundtrack.

“Love & Loss” by Two Steps From Hell.

“Marriage Proposal” from the Young Victoria soundtrack.

“Neodammerung” from the Matrix soundtrack.

“Person of Interest” by Immediate Music.

“Prologue” by Jeremy Zuckerman from the Legend of Korra soundtrack.

“Ready for the Fight” by Epic Score.

“Redemption” by Andreas Christodoulou.

“Red Sea” from the Prince of Egypt soundtrack.

“Remember the Titans” by Audiomachine.

“Return of the King” by X-Ray Dog.

“Rise of the Abyss” by Two Steps From Hell.

“Sands of Time” by “Audiomachine.

“Shenzhou” from the Gravity soundtrack.

“Short Hair” from the Mulan soundtrack.

“Silver comforts Jim” from the Treasure Planet soundtrack.

“Superhuman” by Baby Rattle.

“The Age of Man” by Fringe Element.

“The Battle” from the Chronicles of Narnia soundtrack.

“The Burning Bush” from the Prince of Egypt soundtrack.

“The Doll Survives” from the Mulan soundtrack.

“The Fall of Man” by Groove Addicts --> this is the music I imagine when reading the Kyoshi vs Xu Ping An <3

“The Great Eatlon” by James Newton Howard.

“The Huns Attack” from the Mulan soundtrack.

“The Master Plan” from the Mulan soundtrack.

“The Moon & the Superhero” from the Hancock soundtrack.

“Their War Here” by Hanz Zimmer & Junkie XL (Batman vs. Superman soundtrack).

“The Ultimate Gift main title” from the Ultimate Gift soundtrack.

“Tornado” by Hanz Zimmer (Man of Steel soundtrack).

“Trilogy” by ATB.

“War is Coming” by Epic Score.

“We Shall Rise” by Epic Score.

“World on Fire” by Ninja Tracks.

Love

“All I Need” by Within Temptation.

“Arms” by Christina Perri.

“Beside You” by Marianas Trench.

“Back to Life” by Hailee Steinfeld.

“Boom Clap” by Charlie XCX.

“Can’t Help Falling In Love” by A*Teens.

“Crazier” by Taylor Swift.

“Everything” by Lifehouse.

“Falling in Love” by Falling Up.

“Fearless” by Taylor Swift.

“Flashlight” by Jessie J.

“First Time” by Lifehouse.

“For you I will” by Teddy Geiger.

“Hands on Me” by Vanessa Carlton.

“Here in your arms” by Hellogoodbye.

“How you get the girl” by Taylor Swift.

“I’d rather be in love” by Michelle Branch.

"Impulsive” by Wilson Phillips.

“Juliet” by LMNT.

“Love Me Like You Do” by Ellie Goulding.

“Salvation” by Gabrielle Aplin.

“She is the Sunlight” by Trading Yesterday.

“She looks so perfect” by 5 Seconds of Summer.

“Smile” by Uncle Kracker.

“Starving (feat. Zedd)” by Hailee Steinfield & Grey.

“Start of Time” by Gabrielle Aplin.

“Stolen” by Dashboard Confessional.

“Stuttering” by the Friday Night Boys.

“Thinking Out Loud” by Ed Sheeran.

“Whenever, Wherever” by Shakira.

“Wish you were here” by Avril Lavigne.

“With Me” by Sum 41.

“Yellow” by Katherine Ho.

“Your body is a wonderland” by John Mayer.

“Your Guardian Angel” by The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus.

Other

“I Lived” by One Republic.

“I’m Alive” by Celine Dion.

“I won’t give up” by Jason Mraz.

“Part of Me” by Katy Perry.

“Release Me” by Agnes.

“Superheroes” by The Script.

“Undefeated” by Jason Derulo.

“Wild Heart” by Sabi.

“You’re a god” by Vertical Horizon.

Please, feel free to add to this list!

#Avatar Kyoshi #Avatar The Last Airbender #Rise of Kyoshi #Shadow of Kyoshi

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thehereticaldeserthermit · 4 years ago

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𝕆𝕦𝕥 𝕆𝕗 ℂ𝕙𝕒𝕣𝕒𝕔𝕥𝕖𝕣 ℚ𝕦𝕖𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟𝕤

ROLE PLAYER GET TO KNOW YOU PROMPT

Alright TDC Community It’s time for a task,

and this time we’re all going to get to know each other a little better.

Under the cut, you’ll find forty out of character questions split into two parts: OOC about your muses, and OOC about yourself! Answer what you’d like, add more if you’d like.

When you’re done TAG some of your writing partners and keep FUN going.

-there is no pressure to participate

-IF You Are Reading This And You’d Like To Participate Consider Yourself Tagged My Friend!

Much Love,

TheJesseWhoLurks

I tag @lyr-taxidermist @theghostofharar @hurdygurdyskeksis @urskekyagvi @skekmal-the-hunter @skekso-the-emperor @gourdplayer @hedonistschambers @ulvanmaudra @littlebluezoologist @the-wandering-urru @queenofthetides @juliejewel24 @thecastleurru

OOC About Your Character(s)

1. What do you want to get out of playing this character(s)?

The reason I wanted to write for Gra was to meet fellow fans that loved the world of TDC as much as I do, I wanted to find fellow writers. I wanted to steep myself in the fandom. You can easily consider me skeKSis obsessed but I am growing a fondness for their counterparts -slowly ❤

2. Describe your character(s) with three words.

Passionate | Erratic | Trustworthy

3. What made you decide to write this muse?

Originally I was going to pick up The Ritual Master, he’d been my OG fav from the movie BUT Gra kept ... poking me with his scepter? Like; I live in the desert, you live in the desert, Ima recluse, you’re a recluse =we are simpatico. I think The Heretic picked me because he simply would not leave my mind when I considered him as a possibility.

4. If you could change one event in your muse’s life (in their main or canon verse), what would you change?

Canon. I mean they left us kinda hanging there. We really do not know what happened do we? They are simply, just not there anymore. I do not want them to perish, I want them to make it to the finish line and become urSkek. It breaks my heart to think they did not make it.

5. If you could tell your muse one thing, what would you tell them?

I would not say anything, just hug him REALLY tightly and probably not let go until he gives me a chitter-laugh.

6. If you could give your muse one gift, what would you give them?

I would like to give them...ME.

7. If you had to take one positive thing away from your muse, what would you take away?

I do not want to take a positive thing from the fibers that make up Gra. I feel they are very interwoven in his tale. Removing one would make another untether. If I could take away or diminish a bad trait Id have him not be so stubborn and or impatient but then again he would not be Gra now would he?

8. If you could “borrow” one aspect of your muse and apply it to yourself or your own life, what would you borrow?

His determination, passion. Damn son. You get things done.

9. Do you genuinely want your muse to be happy? What do you think would make them most happy in life?

Yes. He’s gotten his ass handed to him, I think he might be owed a slice of peace and happiness. What makes him most happy? He’s already showed me; his relationships whether its friendship, extended family or a lover those are treasures he holds near and dear to his heart.

10. Do you enjoy putting your muse through angst? What do you think would break their heart the most?

Usually I prefer to plot out angst rather then let it completely run a-muck because you never know what your partner is comfortable with, what might trigger them in a detrimental way and simply set fire to a plot unintentionally.

I already know; it literally is ... break his heart.

11. What do you love about your muse?

His dynamic energy, the wild fire, the mystical chaos, the creativity is off the charts. His sharp distinguished features, the way he looks shamanistically feral as compared to his brethren and their Garthic garb. His use of the color red. His scratchy rasp of a voice. His laugh.

12. What do you hate about your muse?

He is a high maintenance muse, he is demanding and screeches loudly for what he wants.

13. What about your muse amuses you?

The fact that he is a skeKSis. This brings a whole slew of challenges to the table for a writer. Case in point, I was writing a reply one day and I went to put something in along the lines of ‘he arched his brow and blah blah’ THEN he hit me! He has no eyebrows to arch, ahhh! I have to stop and think about how to write out expressive traits or reactions that are not of the usual human reaction tone.

14. What about your muse makes you sad?

How fragile his heart really is after all the shit he’s endeared.

15. How would you describe your muse to someone about to meet them, in person, for the first time?

Get Ready For A Wild SURPRISE!

16. Would you like your muse as a person if you met them in real life?

Yes, I like creative souls. I cherish them.

17. In what ways are you better than your muse? In what ways are they better than you?

I do not think I am or he is better than the other.

But I will say he is a handsome devil, for a skeKSis.

18. Why do you think you connect to your muse?

Creative. Outcast.

19. What aspect of your muse’s personality is most important to you? What aspect of your muse’s personality do you think is most important to them? Is it the same? Why or why not?

His passion and drive. I’d say its the same answer for us both. All of the accomplishments he tackled probably had their stacks of obstacles with each to-do. You’d have to have an unending supply of passion and drive to keep going, to complete all. He really is a work-a-holic and a busy body skek.

20. Has your character(s) changed over the time that you have been playing them? How have they changed?

Not yet but I am sure he will, creative liberties will be taken since I only have a a episode or two to work with -am I right?

About You!

1. What is your name?

Jesse.

2. What is your profession?

secret shit.

3. What do you do to relax?

I write. Play video games. Naps are divine. Hot coffee and watch YT videos. DOodle. Desert combing walks. Long hot baths. Organize things xD

4. What is your favorite treat (desert)?

All kinds, I’m not picky. I love me some chocolate lately.

5. Favorite movie

Too many to list. Its October right now. All I want is Hocus Pocus, some Harry Potter and Practical Magick at the moment. Tis the season.

6. Favorite book

I do not think I have a favorite. BUT I will admit that I have a copy of The Dark Crystal that I STOLE FROM A LIBRARY YEARS AGO! I have kept it all this time, its falling apart and its aged with beauty and I adore it ❤ I also have a Jim Henson book about puppetry and his works, there is a page from TDC and if my memory serves me right it has the concept art of skekGra in it sooo sooo I was looking at skekGra YEARS AGO AND HAD NO CLUE the conjunction that would line up in the future! I really neeed to go find this book but its in a storage shed that will be a fresh hell to get to =[ *

7. Favorite vacation spot

Anywhere where its either very green and or by some body of water. Ocean, river, lake. Yes, good. -not very many humans around save for present company reading thiiiis.

8. Favorite Disney movie

Are you kidding me? Too many to list, although I will say The Sword In The Stone did play a part in Gra’s Crystal Skimmer named Archimedes after the grouchy old owl.

9. How did you first get into role playing?

Years ago. I started writing on face book. I wrote for a pirate believe it or not, he was my first muse and he holds special place in my black heart and probably always will. But I am disinclined to acquiesce the gift of further details about this scurvy cursed muse, Ha!

10. What was your first platform? If it was something other than Tumblr, what made you get into Tumblr?

It was face book, before they got all crazy about accounts and security. I moved over to tumblr because writers were incredibly rude and rapid fire RP-ers. One liner sentences and I’m like NOPE I need a novel length.

11. What’s a grammar rule you find yourself breaking or ignoring a lot?

Sometimes I have a touch of dyslexia, sometimes I typo, sometimes I am too tired to proof read, sometimes I make blunders. But I tend to focus on my mistakes rather then other peoples. I just go with the flow, I just write no matter what their level of ‘proper grammar’ IS because I’d like to think that maybe they are just starting out, maybe they will fall in love with writing and maybe they will be the next author who creates a world we all fall in love with and want to immerse ourselves in.

12. Are there any languages besides English in which you think you could comfortably roleplay?

I do not RP in other languages. However I did have a muse at one time who was French, I would throw in little phrases but it was never entirely done in French and I do have a British muse at the moment, so again I will use slang and little sayings to make them well rounded as best as I can. Those are just little details I like to include that many others might skip on but I thrive for deets.

I do however have role play writing partners that are from ALL over the world which is amazing to me.

13. Do you listen to music while your write?

ALOT. I have tracks specifically for skekGra, that take me to his frame of mind. Even TDC soundtrack at times, the puppet show song and the blue flame part 2 are on replay a lot.

14. Are you a morning, day, evening, or night writer?

I am all over the place. My life is very hectic. I’d like to say its usually in the afternoon of evening for me, the house is settled down and things are silent but thats not always how it works out. Oftentimes I will sit down and write a reply or two, then dip to do mundane human things that adults do, then return back for a few more replies.

15. How does tiredness affect your writing?

Kills it. The weekends I work long hours therefor my brain is like WHAAAT.

16. What is your biggest obstacle to writing every day, if time doesn’t count?

It is always TIME. Sometimes stress levels can be an obstacle too, no lie. If something major is going on, I just throw my hands up like ‘I got nothin’’ and thats that.

17. How many drafts is a paralyzing amount?

Oh damn. Been there done that. I am much more picky about it nowadays. I try to limit skekGra to a certain number of replies because he also has to allow room for other muses.

Currently: Gra has ten replies on tumblr -no actually 11 &&& 4 on discord. I am two shakes away from cutting HIM OFF! lol.

18. Is there anything character-wise or writing style-wise that you can’t stand?

I’m open to different characters, I have written with a lot. I love a writer who has style, I appreciate the effort.

Etiquette, manners and consideration are oftentimes LACKING as of late.

19. What kind of anonymous questions are your favorite?

ANYTHING as long as it is not anon HATE.

20. What is your weakest point in writing? Angst, fluff, dialogue, etc.?

T I M E not having enough time to write the angst fluff and dialogue, smut too lets be real. It really is a bummer to me when I do not have the time, I work, I have a a lotta responsibilities, my life is like a hurricane a lot of the time so TIME is my weakness, oftentimes I am super J E L L O of people who are online all day, every day, always there I’m envious and I get writers FOMO which makes me laugh but its so damn true I could ugly laugh cry about it.

#OOC: Post Is Out Of Character #||| Just a lil get to know me thingy |||#the dark crystal #tdc age of resistance #skeksis #skekgra #skekgra the conqueror #skekgra the heretic

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blodreina-noumou · 5 years ago

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I was tagged once again for a hiatus tag game by @boomheda! This time, we’re gonna take a look back on my favorite Happy Moments in The 100 (although we recognize that even happy moments in this show are bittersweet.)

In no particular order!

1 - The Rover Scene + “Add It Up” Sing-Along

Cheerful, clean, unwounded, adventurous, capable, and strong - the Delinquents at their best. I also think this is one of the best soundtrack moments on the show, but I’ve been a fan of the Violent Femmes for over 15 years now, so I’m biased. It was nice to see them be silly and have fun, the way teenagers 100 years before their time might have.

2 - Everyone Gets a Break in Sanctum + Madi and Jordan Are Cuties

Things go wrong soon enough, but for a couple of days, our heroes got to eat, shower, rest, and joke around with each other. It gives Madi and Jordan the chance to show off their status as “the kids” of the group (although Jordan is only a kid in social experience, not biologically,) and play up a fun adopted sibling vibe. It kind of evokes early Delinquent vibes.

3 - Clarke and Lexa Get Together

If we ignore everything that happens afterwards, this is such a perfect moment. This might be the happiest either woman ever was. The way the realization hits them both at the same time, that they were looking for each other. The futile but admirable attempt at a nice, platonic handshake to say goodbye. The way this bit of contact unravels them. Clarke’s lust. Lexa’s tears. The quiet pillow talk they have afterwards. And then everything was fine forever and nothing bad happened.

This definitely ranks high on the bittersweet scale. 😞

4 - Memori’s Royal Glow-Up

Probably my actual favorite moment of s6. Seeing these two scrappy, outcast lovers rise to the status of royalty was immensely satisfying, even if the way they got there was a bit underhanded. I think they more than redeemed themselves by saving the others after the Lightbournes blasted off. And my little bisexual brain just about burst, seeing them both in formalwear and eyeliner.

5 - Marper’s Videos

This one is just on the sweet side of bittersweet for me. Although it was very hard to lose Monty and Harper, the fact that they had a happy life together, safe and in love, and started a family, is the perfect ending for them, and helps ease some of the pain.They were both so tired of fighting, and I don’t think they would have been happy at all at Sanctum. They would’ve fought for their friends, like they always had, but they were both ready to be at peace. They found that, and so far, they’re the only characters who have.

6 - Jaha “Gets Floated”

Moments of levity are few and far between on this show. Jasper getting to play an old camp prank on Jaha is a fun moment, especially since the writers got to make their “I guess you got floated” joke. Darkly funny, given that Jasper is referencing the many lives Jaha is responsible for taking as Chancellor. It’s the kind of twisted humor you’d expect from people in their position, and something I think the show could use a little more of.

7 - “Day Trip” Is Too Funny

Is there anything more hilarious/terrifying than a hundred unsupervised teenagers wandering around the wilderness, stoned out of their minds? This episode definitely treads the line between dark and funny, and it makes for one of the best “filler” episodes this series has ever done. So many hilarious lines!

“You are the most beautiful broom in a broom closet full of brooms.”

“Is the moon in here?? I can’t change the tides if the moon won’t cooperate!”

“Noo, this is an anti-grounder stick!”

8 - Bellamy and Clarke Reunite After Six Years

Whether or not you ship it, it was satisfying to see these two embrace after so long apart. They were on the brink of something before Praimfaya - that can’t be denied. Knowing how hard it was for Bellamy to leave Clarke behind, and how relatively lonely Clarke was without him and the rest of their friends, makes their reunion especially sweet. Too bad no one knew then how much everything had changed.

9 - The Blake Siblings Are Back

One underrated aspect of the Blake sibling dynamic is how in sync they are, when they’re on the same page. This was such a small moment, but it really made me smile. Josephine, in Clarke’s hijacked body, makes one final, desperate plea to Gabriel to let her live. The Blake siblings are done, because Clarke’s body is running out of time. So they react with a classic simultaneous eye-roll, both turning away in disgust at the same time. It was probably the moment that convinced me that they were gonna be okay, weird as that might sound.

10 - Spacekru

There is no one single moment - I still think this is the best found family dynamic in the whole show. Here’s some of my highlights: Echo and Raven sparring, everyone eating algae together, Murphy being a goblin with an entire half of the ship to himself, their excitement/anxiety when they see the Eligius ship, Bellamy and Emori’s “we didn’t die” exchange, Harper comforting Emori, Bellamy telling Monty to grow something besides algae, Echo and Murphy and Raven and Emori in the snow, Monty and Harper marching from Polis with their family, and every single other moment, too. I miss Spacekru.

Tagging a handful of folks - if I forget you or don’t tag you and you want to do this, feel free to steal it! As always, feel free to ignore for any reason. @dylanobrienisbatman @doortotomorrow @osleyakomwonkru @katersann @twinzmoon @lovelyrosiey @blodreina

#my brain is foggy so I'm forgetting a lot of people #tag games #the 100 #clexa #bellarke #marper #memori #spacekru #the delinquents #blake siblings

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fullregalia · 4 years ago

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20/20.

This year, in hindsight, was a real write-off. I had grand plans for it, and while I ushered it in in a very low-key manner since I was recovering from the flu, I’d expected things to look up. Well, you know what they say about plans (RIP, my trip to Europe). I got very, very sick in early February, and I’m not entirely sure it wasn’t COVID. Since March, the days have been a carousel of monotony: coffee, run, work, cook, yoga, existential spiral, sleep. My Own Private Year of Rest and Relaxation, if you will. Of course, life has a way of breaking through regardless; I attended protests, completed my thesis, graduated from grad school, took a couple of road trips upstate, and celebrated the accomplishments and birthdays of friends and family from a safe social distance. It was all a bit of a blur, and not ideal circumstances to re-enter the real world, or whatever this COVID-present is.

Throughout it all, in lieu of happy hours, coffee dates, and panel discussions, I’ve turned even more to culture and cuisine to fill the the negative space on my calendar where my social life once resided. However, since a global pandemic ought not to disrupt every tradition, here’s my year-end round up of what made this terrible one slightly more tolerable.

After an ascetic fall semester abstaining from TV in 2019 (save for my beloved Succession), I allowed myself to watch more as the year wore on, and especially after graduation. I caught up on some cultural blind spots by finally getting around to The Sopranos, Ramy, Search Party, and Girlfriends. I wasn’t alone in bingeing Sopranos, it absolutely lived up to the hype and then some; this Jersey Girl can’t get enough gabagool-adjacent content, pizzeria culture is my culture!

Speaking of my culture, there was also a disproportionate amount of UK and European shows in my queue. Nothing like being in social isolation and watching the horny Irish teens in Normal People brood. I’m partial to it because I share a surname with the showrunner, so I have to embrace blind loyalty even though there was, in my opinion, a Marianne problem in the casting. Speaking of charming Irish characters with limited emotional vocabularies, I belatedly discovered This Way Up a 2019 show from Aisling Bea and Sharon Horgan. And while Connell and Marianne are actually exceptional students, I found the real normal people on GBBO to bring me a bit more joy. Baking was abundantly therapeutic for me this year, and watching charming people drink loads of tea and fret over soggy bottoms was a comfort. I also discovered the Great Pottery Throw Down, and as a lifelong ceramics enthusiast, I cannot recommend it highly enough if you care about things like slips, coils, and glazing techniques. GPTD embraces wabi sabi in a way that GBBO eschews flaws in favor of perfection, and in a time of uncertainty, the former reminded me why I miss getting my hands in the mud as a coping mechanism (hence all the baking). Speaking of coping mechanisms, like everybody else with two eyes and an HBO password, I loved Michaela Cole’s I May Destroy You; though we’ve all had enough distress this year for a lifetime, watching Cole’s Arabella process her assault and search for meaning, justice, and closure was a compelling portrait of grief and purpose in the aftermath of trauma. Arabella’s creative and patient friends Kwame and Terry steal the show throughout, as they deal with their own setbacks and emotional turmoil. Where I May Destroy You provides catharsis, Ted Lasso presents British eccentricity in all its stereotypical glory. At first I was skeptical of the show’s hype on Twitter, but once I gave in it charmed me, if only for Roy Kent’s emotional trajectory and extolling the restorative powers of shortbread. For a more accurate depiction of life in London, Steve McQueen’s series Small Axe provides a visually lush and politically clear-eyed depiction of the lives of British West Indians in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Lastly, how could I get through a recap of my year in tv if I don’t mention The Crown. Normal People may have needed an intimacy coordinator, but the number of Barbours at Balmoral was the real phonographic content for me.

Turning my attention across the Channel, after the trainwreck that was Emily in Paris, I started watching a proper French show, Call My Agent! It’s truly delightful, and unlike the binge-worthy format of "ambient shows” I have been really relishing taking an hour each week to watch CMA, subtitles, cigarettes, and all.

Honorable mention: The Last Dance for its in-depth look at many notable former Chicago residents; High Fidelity for reminding me of the years in college when my brother and I would drive around listening to Beta Band; and Big Mouth.

Music

My Spotify wrapped this year was a bit odd. I don‘t think “Chromatica II into 911″ is technically a song, so it revealed other things about my listening habits this year, which turned out to remain very much stuck in the last, sonically. I listened to a lot more podcasts than new music this year, but there were some records that found their way into heavy rotation. While I listened to a lot of classics both old and new to write my thesis (Paul Simon, Leonard Cohen, Prokofiev, and Bach) the soundtrack to my coursework, runs, walks, and editing was more contemporary. Standouts include:

Saint Cloud by Waxahatchee, which makes me feel like I’m breathing fresh air even when I’m stuck inside all day

La Bella Vita by Niia, which was there for me when I walked past my ex on 7th avenue (twice!) and he pretended that I didn’t exist

Fetch the Bolt Cutters by THEE Fiona Apple, because Fiona, our social distancing queen, has always been my Talmud, her songs shimmering, evolving, and living with me every year

Shore by Fleet Foxes, for the long drive to the Catskills

Women in Music, Pt. III by HAIM, because these days, these days...

Musicians have been reckoning with tumult this year as much as the rest of us, and the industry has dealt with loss on all fronts. I’d be remiss not to talk about how the passing of John Prine brought his music into my life, and McCoy Tyner, who has been a companion through good and bad over the years.

Honorable mention to: græ by Moses Sumney; The Main Thing by Real Estate; on the tender spot of every calloused moment by Ambrose Akinmusire; Punisher by Phoebe Bridgers; folklore by you know who; and songs by Adrianne Lenker.

Reading

What would this overlong blob be without a list of the best things I read this year? While I left publishing temporarily, books, the news, and newsletters still took up a majority of my attention (duh and/or doomscrolling by any other name). I can’t be comprehensive, and frankly, there are already great roundups of the best longform this year out there, so this is mostly books and praising random writers.

Last year I wrote about peak newsletter. Apparently, my prediction was a bit premature as this year saw an even bigger Substack Boom. But two new newsletters in particular have delighted me: Aminatou Sow’s Crème de la Crème and Hunter Harris’ Hung Up (her ”this one line” series is true force of chaotic good on Blue Ivy’s internet). Relatedly, Sow and Ann Friedman’s Big Friendship was gifted to me by a dear friend and another bff and I are going to read it in tandem next week.

On the “Barack Obama published a 700+ page memoir, crippling the printing industry’s supply chains” front, grad school severely hamstrung my ability to read for pleasure, but I managed to get through almost 30 books this year, some old (Master and Margarita), most new-ish (Say Nothing, Nickel Boys). Four 2020 books in particular enthralled me:

Uncanny Valley: Anna Wiener’s memoir has been buzzed about since n+1 published her essay of the same name in 2016. Her ability to see, clear-eyed, the industry for both its foibles and allure captured that era when the excess and solipsism of the Valley seemed more of a cultural quirk than the harbinger of societal schism.

Transcendent Kingdom: Yaa Gyasi’s novel about faith, family, loss, and--naturally--grad school was deeply empathetic, relatable, and moving. I think this was my favorite book of the year. Following the life of a Ghanaian family that settles in Alabama, it captured the kind of emotional ennui that comes from having one foot in the belief of childhood and one foot in the bewilderment that comes from losing faith in the aftermath of tragedy.

Vanishing Half: Similarly to Transcendent Kingdom, Brit Bennett’s novel about siblings who are separated; it’s also about the ways that colorism can be internalized and the ways chosen family can (and cannot) replace your real kin. It was a compassionate story that captured the pain of abuse and abandonment in two pages in a way that Hanya Yanagihara couldn’t do in 720.

Dessert Person: Ok, so this is a cookbook, but it’s a good read, and the recipes are approachable and delicious. After all the BA Test Kitchen chaos this summer, it’s nice we didn’t have to cancel Claire. Make the thrice baked rye cookies!!!! You will thank me later.

Honorable mention goes to: Leave The World Behind for hitting the Severance/Station Eleven dystopian apocalypse novel sweet spot; Exciting Times for reminding me why I liked Sally Rooney; and Summer by Ali Smith, which wasn’t the strongest of the seasonal quartet, but was a series I enjoyed for two years.

Podcasts

I’m saving my most enthusiastic section for last: ever since 2018, I’ve been listening to an embarrassing amount of podcasts. Moving into a studio apartment will do that to you, as will grad school, add a pandemic to that equation and there’s a lot of time to fill with what has sort of become white noise to me (or, in one case, nice white parents noise). In addition to the shows that I’ve written about before (Still Processing, Popcast, Who? Weekly, and Why is This Happening?), these are the shows I started listening to this year that fueled my parasocial fire:

You’re Wrong About: If you like history, hate patriarchy, and are a millennial, you’ll love Sarah Marshall and Michael Hobbes’ deep dives into the most notable stories of the past few decades (think Enron and Princess Diana) and also some other cultural flashpoints that briefly but memorably shaped the national discourse (think Terri Schiavo, Elian González, and the Duke Lacrosse rape case).

Home Cooking: This mini series started (and ended) during the pandemic. As someone who stress baked her way through the past nine months, Samin Nosrat and Hrishikesh Hirway’s show is filled with warmth, banter, and useful advice. Home Cooking has been a reassuring companion in the kitchen, and even though it will be a time capsule once we’re all vaccinated and close talking again, it’s still worth a listen for tips and inspiration while we’re hunkered down for the time being.

How Long Gone: I don’t really know how to explain this other than saying that media twitter broke my brain and enjoying Chris Black and Jason Stewart’s ridiculous banter is the price I pay for it.

Blank Check: Blank Check is like the GBBO of podcasts--Griffin Newman and David Sims’ enthusiasm for and encyclopedic knowledge of film, combined with their hilarious guests and inevitable cultural tangents is always a welcome distraction. Exploring a different film from a director’s oeuvre each week over the course of months, the podcast delves into careers and creative decisions with the passion of completists who want to honor the filmmaking process even when the finished products end up falling short. The Nancy Meyers and Norah Ephron series were favorites because I’d seen most of the movies, but I also have been enjoying the Robert Zemeckis episodes they’re doing right now. The possibility of Soderbergh comes up often (The Big Picture just did a nice episode about/with him), and I’d love to hear them talk about his movies or Spike Lee (or, obviously, Martin Scorsese).

Odds & Ends

If you’re still reading this, you’re a real one, so let’s get into the fun stuff. This was a horrible way to start a new decade, but at least we ended our long national nightmare. We got an excellent dumb twitter meme. I obviously made banana bread, got into home made nut butters, and baked an obscene amount of granola as I try to manifest a future where I own a Subaru Outback. Amanda Mull answered every question I had about Why [Insert Quarantine Trend] Happens. My brother started an organization that is working to eliminate food insecurity in LA. Discovering the Down Dog app allowed me to stay moderately sane, despite busting both of my knees in separate stupid falls on the criminally messed up sidewalks and streets of Philadelphia. I can’t stop burning these candles. Jim Carrey confused us all. We have a Jewish Second Gentleman! Grub Street Diets continued to spark joy. Dolly Parton remains America’s Sweetheart (and possible vaccine savior). And, last, but certainly not least: no one still knows how to pronounce X Æ A-12 Boucher-Musk.

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winterbites · 5 years ago

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(Major JoJo's Bizarre Adventure anime spoiler warning) My review of...

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Phantom Blood is really good in my opinion. I hear a lot of people say that it isn't as good as the rest of the series but I personally enjoyed it for the story, the set-up, and the characters. For a 9 episode season, I feel like Akari did a good job of setting up the world and what you can expect the series as a whole progresses.

Starting with the show in general, Phantom Blood isn't really that bizarre when compared to other anime of the same style/story. I think I understand what happened though: This was the very first part of the series that Akari created and thus didn't really have a grasp on just how bizarre it should/could have been. The narative is a nice touch that's lost little by little as the series goes on, instead being replaced by the standard internal monologue or external explaining that you'll usually see in shounen anime. I think the reason for this is because, since Phantom Blood is short (since it's most likely just a set-up arc), the narration is there to help time in the story pass quickly while still keeping the viewer in the know of what's going on.

Next is the music. The intro song is full of energy and the art style that accompanies is fantastic, like 2D art turned into 3D if only you had the proper 3D glasses. During the last episode when sound effects were added to the intro song, I was crying tears of orgasmic joy. It's so unique! I had never heard an intro song do that before in all my years of watching anime so I was more than pleasantly surprised when I heard it for the first time. As a matter of fact, I liked it so much that I immediately found it on Youtube and saved it, but back to the topic at hand.

I can't say much about the soundtrack since I don't know all of the individual songs, but I always say that an anime is as good as its music; and I gotta tell ya, the music in Phantom Blood is kickass. Also high in energy and emphasizes the fights.

As for the outro song, it's the same line as the intro: I absolutely love it. One thing that I learned from my theater class is that if you play a song that directly opposes to what's happening on the screen, the impact will be larger on the audience given that the correct choice of song was picked. So, when an episode in Phantom Blood ends in sorrow or high tension (which is usually what happens) and the slow guitar strings segways into Round About, the lively outro song, the gravity of the situation hits you even harder than just playing something sad or creepy. Imagine this: something ominous happens or somebody precious dies, you get the usual "To Be Continued" arrow and a song, something that you wouldn't normally use for such an occasion, starts playing and you're just left there to let it all sink in as that upbeat song continues to play during such a downtrodden time. It's a fantastic use of music that not a lot of people explore, and I know there isn't much that can be done since getting a new outro song just for a few occasions adds on costs, but I still love it.

Now for the characters, once again there's not much I can say. It's a 9 episode anime so there isn't going to be a lot of character development that the viewer will be able to see. Still, the character designs are unique and the characters themselves are likeable. However, I have to say that they all kind of have the same personality, excluding Dio and Tarkus (after revival). Of course, each of them comes from different walks of life, but, when considering their morals and personal opinions, they all seemed similar in that sense. Dio, as expected, is a huge asshole that's out for Jonathan's neck in particular because fuck that guy, that's what I'm guessing Dio thought each time he saw Jonathan doing literally anything that wasn't suffering.

Following that train of thought, I found Dio's motives throughout Phantom Blood to be kind of wishy washy. First he wanted to get rich in his own way to spite his father, but then he became a vampire and I don't think it was ever explicitly said what Dio wanted at that point. World domination would be the assumption but you know what they say about assuming. Dio did seem to love his mother as he constantly cursed his father for driving her to death, but it was never really touched on again after he became a vampire.

Finally but definitely not least: the animation. Is there really anything to say here? David Production did a fantastic job of turning the pages of the manga into episodes of the show. They stuck so close to the original source, even animating the Japanese words, like the word menacing, onto the screen, giving each a unique color that fits the word and little quirks like a subtle pulsing animation while it crosses the screen. Of course, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure isn't the only anime that has this special treatment, but it's certainly true that, when it comes to JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, it's very flavorful and just wouldn't be right without it.

#jojo's bizzare adventure #jojo's anime #jojo's spoilers #jojo no kimyō na bōken #jojo part 1 #jojo part one #phantom blood #dio brando #david production #hirohiko araki

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ranier-layarte · 5 years ago

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LONG Character Survey: Ranier Leveilleur

BASICS.

FULL NAME: Ranier Kyran Layarte Leveilleur

NICKNAME: Ran, Raven

AGE: 21-25 (depending on expac)

BIRTHDAY: 1st Sun of the 2nd astral moon

ETHNIC GROUP: Au ra (Xaela)

NATIONALITY: Eorzean – From Ul'dah

LANGUAGE(S): Eorzean,

SEXUAL ORIENTATION: No

ROMANTIC ORIENTATION: Isn't this the same as the above?

RELATIONSHIP STATUS: Married

CLASS: Weapon Master

• Proficient in almost all martial weapons.

• Tends to carry multiple weapons at all times.

• Prefers Axes out of all the bladed weaponry

HOMETOWN / AREA: Ul'dah

CURRENT HOMETOWN/ AREA: Shirogane Mansion

PROFESSION(S): WoL, Scion, Machinist, Businessman, Crafter

PHYSICAL: Extremely fit, exercises daily. Muscular build

HAIR: Black/Dark Blue

EYES: Crimson

NOSE: Average, straight, roman-esque

FACE: Straight essentially a greek nose. (At least if I had to try and describe it)

LIPS: A bit on the thinner side, very lightly pink.

COMPLEXION: A mix of Fair and Medium?

BLEMISHES: None

SCARS: Scar on left thigh from stab wound, Scar on left midsection, and upper right thigh.

TATTOOS: WoL tattoo on the palm of his right hand. (Working on giving him another)

HEIGHT: 7'4

WEIGHT: 330 LBS/ 150kg

BUILD: Tall, Muscular, Fit,

FEATURES: None

ALLERGIES: None, at least not yet.

USUAL HAIRSTYLE: Long hair parted in the middle framing the face. Pulled into a ponytail and held with a silver bead big enough for the tail.

USUAL FACE LOOK: Around 40% expressionless, 30% Scowling, 20% Reflective, 10% happy.

USUAL CLOTHING: Higher end clothing generally a mix of casual with formal preferring long pants and a short sleeved shirt. Boots of some kind and armor of some kind at all times. Either under or over the clothes having a preference for the bulkier armors.

PSYCHOLOGY.

FEAR(S): Dying and thereby becoming unable to prevent future deaths and incidents. A fear of the unknown. (Which is part of why he tries to prepare for so many things)

ASPIRATION(S): Being able to amass enough wealth to live comfortably and to continue making the lives of the less fortunate easier. Helping create a better society for all.

POSITIVE TRAITS: Empathetic, Compassionate, Humanitarian, Perseverance, Fairness, Courageous, Loving, Self discipline, Reliable, Thoughtful, Patient

NEGATIVE TRAITS: Bossy, Jealous, Secretive, Grumpy, Harsh, Aloof, Stubborn, Cruel (Only to enemies but that doesn't really matter to people does it?) Arrogant (In some things though less now)

ZODIAC: Pisces

TEMPERAMENT: Mix of choleric and melancholic.

SOUL TYPE(S): King, Warrior, Server (In that order)

ANIMALS: Raven, Bear

VICE HABIT(S): Training, Fixing machines, Drinking, Rubbing Chin,

FAITH: The Twelve (Loosely)

GHOSTS?: I mean if you've seen them you can't deny them.

AFTERLIFE?: With everything we see there has to be right?

REINCARNATION?: Yes, it's clear there is.

ALIENS?: Yes.

POLITICAL ALIGNMENT: Leftist

ECONOMIC PREFERENCE: Prosperous, everyone has what they need. Along with the means to go beyond that if they are willing and able.

SOCIO POLITICAL POSITION: I think there’s enough to go on.

EDUCATION LEVEL: Higher end of the spectrum, attended sharlayan schooling for a few years of his life. (Around three) Was home taught and by other teachers. Extensive knowledge in numerous subjects such as Machinery, Technology, Gunsmithing, Gemology, Business. Holding the equivalent of a mixture of Graduate or Masters in the subjects.

FAMILY.

FATHER: Kyran Layarte

MOTHER: Sahar Layarte

SIBLINGS: Kyari Layarte

EXTENDED FAMILY:

NAME MEANING(S): Ranier (Rainier with out the first I Meaning Wise army apparently)Kyran (Beam of Light) Sahar (Early morning or Dawn) Kyari (???)

HISTORICAL CONNECTION?: My families connection to history? My connection? My father was one of the survivors of the hotgo tribe also. Does fighting in the Calamity among all the other events count?

FAVORITES.

BOOK: Whatever has his current interest, it can very.

MOVIE PLAY: Does this mean Movie or Play?

5 SONGS:

• “Shock me” Baroness

• “Up In The Air” Thirty Seconds To Mars

• “Rise” League of Legends, Glitch Mob, The Word Alive

• “Unbreakable” Of Mice and Men

• “Drown” Bring Me The Horizon

DEITY: Halone

HOLIDAY: Valentione's day

MONTH: March

SEASON: Fall

PLACE: Beside his wife or workshop.

WEATHER: Light rain

SOUND: The turning of pages, the sound of rain, metal moving against each other.

SCENT(S): Smoke, Metal, Old books, and sweat

TASTE(S): Dulcet, Spicy,

FEEL(S): Rocks, Silk, Smooth metals,

ANIMAL(S): This was listed before.

NUMBER: 1? I don't know.

COLORS: Black, Blue, Red, Gold, Silver

EXTRA.

TALENTS: Metalworking, Singing, Sewing, Gem Cutting, Technology, Smithing, Machinery, Dexterous.

BAD AT: Getting rest even now, Not over exerting himself, Not overthinking potential scenarios that may never happen. Dealing with almost all animals, Even now sometimes talking about what bothers him too well, but he’s gotten much better over the years/expansions.

TURN ONS: Caring, Helpful, Courageous, Educated, Aggressive. Listening, Reliable,

TURN OFFS: Selfishness, Boastful, Belligerent, Cruelty, Intolerant, Racism, Weak willed, Careless,

HOBBIES: Creating new things be it machines, armor, clothes, weapons, tools, etc. Working on the same as before. Reading, Exercising, Cooking. Shopping.

TROPES: Pragmatic Hero, Bad ass boast, Big Fancy House, Chekhov's Gun, Determinator, Don't You Dare Pity Me, Genius Bruiser, Heroic Build, It's All My Fault, No Challenge Equals No Satisfaction, Super toughness, Friend to All Children, The Chosen One, The Ace, Ain't Too Proud To Beg, Always Save The Girl, Berserk Button, Death glare, Excuse me while I multi task, Game face, Hypocrite, Lady and Knight, Not So Stoic, Not So Invincible After all, Red Eyes, Take Warning, Stern Teacher, Undying Loyalty, The Power of Love

AESTHETIC TAGS: Workshops, Tools, Kitchens, Weaponry, Guns, Armor, Fine Clothes, Rain, Feathers, Azure Skies, Romance.

VOICE CLAIM(S): Keith Silverstein, (Speaking voice) John Rzeznik (Singing) John Baizley (Singing)

FC INFO.

MAIN FC(S): Free company? Azure Talons.

ALT FC(S): What?

OLDER FC(S): What?

YOUNGER FC(S): What?

GENDERBENT FC(S): What the fuck?

MUN QUESTIONS.

Q1: IF YOU COULD WRITE YOUR CHARACTER YOUR WAY IN THEIR OWN MOVIE, WHAT WOULD IT BE CALLED, WHAT STYLE WOULD IT BE FILMED IN, AND WHAT WOULD IT BE ABOUT?:

• I genuinely don’t know. Something with the grandeur of lord of the rings maybe? But with the ability to add comedy and romance in the proper way. I'm all for serious movies but I enjoy the ability to add a well executed joke or sweet moment. It also would probably not just be a single film. Taking the general events and using my fics as material would probably be fine.

I’d have to think about it a lot more than I will right now

As for the name, well, I don't really have many options. But, probably something with Final Fantasy XIV as the main title. Give it a JRPG title I suppose as a sub title. Sort of like Warriors Dissonance or Uncovered Stories.

Q2: WHAT WOULD THEIR SOUNDTRACK / SCORE SOUND LIKE?:

• Ambient, switching to full of energy, able to convey emotion. Again mentioning LOTR, the score by Howard shore is really great and able to accompany many scenes in such a fantastic manner. As for the other bits perhaps the addition of artist tracks such as from favorite bands and those songs that have meaning to him. Like the ones listed above.

Q3: WHY DID YOU START WRITING THIS CHARACTER?:

• As a way to work on and show that, a character doesn't just have to be overly reliant on tropes and cliches. That those are good as part of them but not as defining traits of them. Along with breaking some of those. Like how all protagonists always have dead parents, what's up with that? I enjoy seeing characters that try to break their molds and be more than that.

Q4: WHAT FIRST ATTRACTED YOU TO THIS CHARACTER?:

• My general thing in any game where you can create your own character has always been. To make who you'd want to be in this universe. I did that and then worked on it and reworked things until I got what I have now. So also, yes, he was a self insert.

Q5: DESCRIBE THE BIGGEST THING YOU DISLIKE ABOUT YOUR MUSE:

• Hard one I suppose but. I'd say how he is capable of doing so much. Even though I work with it as it is a key part of him, it's still hard to make him feel right, feel human when he's got these clear incredible strengths. He's very proficient at so many things some would maybe say he's a mary sue type of character. I make an effort to work on how he became that way to offset it. So it's a lot of extra work than if I had him being a more archetypal hero of his type. I may dislike this the most but I also like it. Love hate relationship you know?

Q6: WHAT DO YOU HAVE IN COMMON WITH YOUR MUSE?:

• A good part of our attitudes and personality though on his end they are greater generally. Along with our want to be as best as we can at certain things.

Q7: HOW DOES YOUR MUSE FEEL ABOUT YOU?:

• Honestly, and in my current state. He would probably be very upset with me and to just know me or the hand I have in his creation and self.

Q8: WHAT CHARACTERS DOES YOUR MUSE HAVE INTERESTING INTERACTIONS WITH?

• Alisaie Leveilleur – She is the main one being his main love interest, girlfriend, and wife later. Though overall he sees her as an equal and a partner, which is part of the reason their relationship grows as much as it does. Along with giving someone who he can trust in and rely on, and vice versa.

• Finn Hogveart - Who harasses Ranier often enough especially with his pet and regarding moogles.

• Alphinaud Leveilleur - and him sometimes get along strangely due to Ranier's relationship with his sister. For a long time he tried to spy on Ranier and make sure he was good for his sister even though he knew he was a good person.

• Cid Garlond - Ranier sees him as a mentor of sorts, along with someone that he can bounce ideas off of and work with on projects leading to a solid relationship between the two. The two sometimes bicker regarding their work but it's always just them being passionate for the projects.

• Gerolt Blackthorn – Similar to cid in some ways. Ranier looks up to Gerolt and his ability to continue making such amazing creations. Wanting to learn more regarding the processes means Ranier visits him when possible, bringing some drinks for him when he does. Almost having a relationship like bros. Ranier also sometimes has gone to try and sway Rowena on his behalf to lower his debt.

There are more but I don’t want to make this too much longer.

Q9: WHAT GIVES YOU INSPIRATION TO WRITE YOUR MUSE?

• I do not control the write, also Alisaie.

Q10: HOW LONG DID THIS TAKE YOU TO COMPLETE?:

Uhhhh maybe an hour all together. Over the course of three hours.

==========

Tagged by: @amandafullmetal @lyllyan-weiss

Tagging: @heyafinney @anikisbox and anyone who wants to do it that sees this.

#Ranier Leveilleur #Ranier Layarte #I did the best I could with it with the time i put into it.#I'm not the best at these either Hopefully someone finds new things or interesting #things from it

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iamcinema · 5 years ago

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IAC Reviews: #009: Extreme Life & Death: The Blair Witches of Shockumentaries: Part One (2000)

Warning: The following film contains graphic imagrey that’s considered NSFW/NSFL, and should be avoided by those who are faint of heart and don’t like the sight of real death media and violence. While the following review delves into such topics, it contains no stills from the film and is marked as safe. If you wish to view it to judge for yourself, it’s readily available online to view via Archive.org.

________________________________________

After disappearing for 84 years, I’m back in the saddle to bring in something new...or old rather. So, what’s a better way to mark my return than with a genre staple of my morally questionable childhood? We’re back in action with another shockumentary title, and this has been one of the more elusive titles thus far.

Extreme Life & Death: The Blair Witches of Shockumentaries is a three-part series akin to others of its kind; bringing us highlights and reels of death, mayhem, and tragedy caught on film. This includes the usual suspects like vehicular accidents, terrorism, natural disasters, and fantastical human feats and achievements - thus the name, Extreme Life & Death.

There’s very little information about the company, DMP Entertainment, out there as the IMDb pages for these entries are barren with nothing to them beyond their tags to explain what they were. You can find a company called DMP Entertainment online, but whether or not they’re related is hard to tell for sure. However, the cover art for Part Two bears a striking resemblence to the artwork for Death: The Final Journey, an expansive seven part series that touches on the same topic, released by Wayne Enterprises and DMN Productions around the same time. Given the similarities, my guess is that DMP Entertainment and DMN Productions are the same company - and oddly enough, both appear to be currently active with their main focus being on music production. Interesting. So, much like the legend about the Blair Witch herself, it’s tough to find solid answers as to the mystery behind these strange titles. While they may not be the most obscure or even potentially sought after, they do raise a brow as to what the hell you’re in for.

Extreme Life & Death; Part One in One Gif:

Hmm, okay, let’s try to talk about this one because I had a hard time doing so elsewhere. Also, I apologize for the strange choice in a photo since I wasn’t able to find a stand alone VHS scan of the tape for some reason. So, shout out to /u/Str8Jeffin over on the VHS sub for being lucky enough to find this. The comments on it are either those who haven’t heard about either film, or applaud him for finding two rarities in the wild - and yeah, I’ll get to Zombie Bloodbath eventually.

Now, the part I’ve been dreading when it’s come to getting to writing this is figuring out how to. As I said previously, this has been a very weird film to dig for and I wouldn’t have known about it if it wasn’t for the few shockumentary lists on IMDb that even acknowledge it and other oddball titles like Traces of Gore, More Than Smashed Pumpkins, and Snuff R73. Much like some of those titles, this applies to even production credits or cover art to confirm the validity of their existence. I wasn’t even sure if I’d be able to do much in terms of potentially reviewing this or not at all, but someone managed to find all three films on a Spanish or Portuguese website and saved them before the site went under. So, if you want to see these, I’ll provide a link at the end for you to get a taste of the action.

Now, onto the first installment...

________________________________________

Judging from just the release dates alone, my guess is that it tried to follow the train of titles of the 1990′s and the dawning of the new millenium; so Traces of Death, The Many Faces of Death, and Death File. There’s a bit of a saying that once you’ve seen one of these films, you’ve seen all of them, and in a way it’s true.

A good portion of shockumentaries are just recycled and repurposed clips and archived footage from other shockumentaries and documentaries, and after one uses something fresh to bring to the table, it’s dead on arrival and bloated up the river by the time it gets in the hands of others to spread around. For some, this can kill the mood and experience if you’re seeing rehashed films you’ve already seen before and you know what to expect. For others, they don’t necessarily see it as a bad thing or wholly disappointing. But, hey, to each their own I suppose. I guess that’s up to you with where you sit on the matter. This also rings true for the topic of narratiors and whether or not they add to the scenes or take away from it, with a sort of set in stone range from traditional documentary style narrations by Dr. Francis B. Gross and Dr. Flellis of the Faces of Death series and the brutal, in your face of Darrin Ramage and Dr. Vincent van Gore of Traces of Death and Faces of Gore, respectively.

I bring this up, particularlly the topic of narrators because you won’t find that here - well, sort of, and it goes hand-in-hand with the old saying.

_________________________________________

Exteme Life & Death: Part One is as simple and bare bones as they come, which is strange to say for a niche subgenre where the raw heart of the matter is just a showcase of death, carnage, destruction, and the like. I say that because others of its kind have more, I guess you can say, substance to them in the form of a soundtrack, narration, or chapters to help steer things along to be more organized. However, these things are noticably abscent from the film if it wasn’t previously supplied with the archived footage.

In a similar manner to how I talked about The Act of Seeing With Ones Own Eyes in my review of Le Poéme, this will either make for a rather boring watch or something more intimate and direct with the viewer because it throws you right into the heart of it with no filler. On the other hand, this can also make the film appear to be more a more cheap, thoughtless, and lazy cash-in with it’s rough, copy-and-paste style of editing. It’s really just a matter of preference for what you’re into, I suppose. While I can understand not providing either for emotion or context as a means to just push the viewer into the chaos of the scenes, I don’t get having the ability to do so out of being cheap or incompetent - which feels to be more of the case, at least in my opinion.

My process for coming to this conclusion comes in the form of many of the scenes provided, which have been recycled from previous shockumentaries of times gone by. While those films provide exposition for their origins, this film uses black and white captions to tell the limited background information instead. For example, one of the more notable scenes comes in the form of firing squad execution footage that was smuggled out of Iraq sometime in the early 1990′s. This scene has been repurposed and reused in other films with exposition, but this time around we just get a similar copy-and-paste style method of explaining what’s going on. Whether or not this cheapens or degrades the experience is up to you, because, then again, there’s the crowd that found the narration and delivery method for the early Traces of Death films to be so boring that Damon Fox was told people would just mute the film and blast their death metal albums over it.

So, enough on this topic. What can one expect if they want to see this?

I feel that the opening sequences tells you what exactly we’re in for as far as quality goes, which is that of a woman walking around a cemetery sobbing as she throws herself onto the tombstones to mourn. It feels rather cheap and forced, which doesn’t really help it that much at all. The editing style feels rather sloppy as the scenes don’t really have much direction for them as far as how they’ve organized things. To go back to Faces of Death, we have general chapters that attempt to string things along in a seamless transition; with natural disasters, animal cruelty, capitol punishment, and human atrocities being served up. Here, it feels like there’s no rhyme or reason for the direction things want to go. So, it’s not out of line to see air show disaster footage one moment and then something unrelated the next with no explanation. The footage in question isn’t particularly graphic either and is relatively on the tame side compared to other films; with some of the more gruesome scenes being that of a city block after a potential bombing, a corpse discovered in the jungles of Nicaragua, and last rites given to a man who was fatally hit by a truck.

_________________________________________

So, with all of that being said, what do I think about this one? Honestly, I don’t know. In a way, it does try to hold up on its own with trying to stand out compared to it’s bloody brothers and sisters, so I can’t say it didn’t at least try. Well, maybe “try” is a bit generous.

I’m not sure.

There’s a part of me that thinks it did it’s job alright, and there’s another that feels like it didn’t want to bother putting in the additional effort to really push things to the limit or reach it’s full potential - plus, the title alone can give you an impression as to what it’s trying to do and whether or not you feel that’s a good thing is up to you. I want to say that if the makers went there to at least give us something a bit extra (as a treat), like music or even a mediocre narrator, this could have been more of a recognized name...even if that in of itself is weird enough. It makes me wonder how many people followed in the steps of early Traces of Death viewers and just flipped on their goregrind albums to add anything at all to the experience.

Now, it’s up for you to decide what to make of this. If there’s enough interest, I can attempt to do reviews for the other two parts, even if it means repeating myself. If you want to get a glimpse of what I was talking about, you can view all three parts over on the Internet Archive that got added back in September 2019. If you’re into shockumentaries, then I’d say to give it a watch at some point, even if it’s just to say you’ve officially seen everything. For those who are new to the subgenre, then I’d say you would be in good hands to start with something like this if Faces of Death is too much for you - even if a good chunk of the franchise is recreated footage. However, if you’re into shockumentaries and this hasn’t swayed any opinion you have, then don’t fret because you won’t lose much sleep if you pass on this one.

RATING: 3/10

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gofancyninjaworld · 5 years ago

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Thoughts on One-Punch Man Season 2: Can you say mélange?

First part: Structure

Mélange (n): a mixture often of incongruous elements If you asked for a one word summary, mélange would be it. It’s no disaster by any means, and had some real charms, but it is rather mixed. Shall we dive in? :)

This is so long I’ve had to split it into two.

Yup, it’s looong

Here is where the majority of the problems we saw in the production values (no need for me to rehash, if you’re reading this, you’ve heard them all) come from.

Lack of Time

The biggest one that everyone notes is that J.C. Staff had a terrible schedule for actually producing the season, with only three episodes complete by the time the season started. The resulting push for time hurt. When you see episodes with as many as thirteen (13!) different directors on board, you know it’s a scramble. And like a scrambled egg, the inconsistencies in art and direction, often changing several times in a scene for no good reason, it showed. Where they got a little more breathing room, like the unscheduled (but surely prayed for) tennis interruption, subsequent episodes benefitted.

It wasn’t just the visuals that suffered from lack of time. Another major victim was the sound. Once again, JAM Project delivered an excellent soundtrack, but all too often, musical scores were jammed in higgledy-piggledy into episodes, leaving little time to set or build a mood. And the sound effects.. ah, they were rarely creative, often repetitive, and not always appropriate to the action. The soundtrack definitely needs a re-listen and remaster.

Lack of Respect

Probably fundamental to the lack of time, was the lack of respect given to the scale of the task it would be to adapt the manga to anime. A big part of the problem is that the manga is exceptionally well drawn. Murata’s time as an animator for Toei comes through, with many panels that are practically key frames and action sequences that look like they need only a few in-between frames to flow as actual animation.

But manga is not anime. Attempting to transliterate it straight to screen, as they did, caused a lot of problems. Most especially in the Super Fight, which deserves its own section.

Failure to Consider What Matters

Did you know that goats, unlike sheep, have short rather than long tails? If you wanted to keep something short, you could say you were making a goat’s tail of it. Neat, but what’s that got to do with anything I’m talking about here? Nothing. It’s just an aside.

With 47 chapters and 1500+ pages to turn into 12 episodes, OPM was always going to have to be condensed. The only question was what and how to do so while preserving the meaning and impact of the story.

J.C. Staff started out well enough in the first three episodes, but once the Super fight hit, their insufficient planning really hurt the story. Madhouse had planned to condense the Super Fight to two to three episodes, but J.C.Staff transliterated it wholesale, not realising that it was an aside.

Ever have something that seemed really interesting and important to do or write down, that bit you didn’t want to cut from your story? And it’s only looking back that you think ‘damn, I really should have edited that out / not spent so much time on this / gotten on with doing better things with my life?’ (trust me, I think this at least once a day) That’s an aside. That time-wasting aside that seemed so important in the moment, that is what the Super Fight was for Saitama. It not only takes him out of the action, but it also gets him to realise that he’s frittering his life away and is in danger of forgetting what’s actually important.

The way the manga keeps this from being a waste of the reader’s time as well is by using very strong framing. It takes the time to make the Super Fight contestants distinct and interesting characters (I don’t think ONE could write a boring character if he tried). But then it frames their self-important games against a very real background of street warfare. Heroes are valiantly fighting with varying levels of success to save real lives and property. The framing gets most explicit in Chapter 63 (literally called Games and Combat) where there��s a direct juxtaposition between the techniques the martial artists are using and the much stronger versions Genos has come up with to use in combat to kill monsters and save people. Up until their world collide, the Super Fighters are just foils to the heroes.

The anime, faced with time and space constraints the manga doesn’t have, chose what to prioritise poorly. They kept 98% of the Super Fight and pared back on what the heroes were doing, losing at least one hero altogether. Worse, they forgot the framing. When people go to check out the manga, they should have been reading to find out what bits of the Super Fight were cut, not discovering that Bone exists, that Okama Taichi and Iaian can actually speak, that Drive Knight has a transforming box, that monsters other than Gouketsu and Elder Centipede had disaster levels.

sorry guys, you all deserved better than you got

The result are episodes that felt pointless, at least up until Suiryu found himself in a proper jam, needing the very heroes he disparaged to save him. Once Sourface admits that they the martial artists, are completely irrelevant to all that happens next, the time misused on them starts to look silly.

But Some Very Nice Extras

As one may expect, J.C. Staff did not have much time or space to add extra anime-only bits, which is a pity, because that’s one of the biggest reasons I go for different media versions of the same story. However, they did do some. And when they did, most were very well chosen and added nicely to the story.

I loved bits like Saitama and Genos shopping from a joint shopping list, Tareo suggesting to Garou that they read the Hero Data book together. Those were precious. A tired, exhausted Garou arriving at Bang’s dojo was possibly the best single addition, giving us some desperately needed background to their relationship...want more...

This melts the heart every time

And on that note, that’s quite enough words for one session. I’ll finish the rest tomorrow, when I’ll focus on the story they told and how it measured up to what I hoped it’d be.

#OPM #anime #season 2 #review #long #structural problems #but not awful for all that

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calliecat93 · 6 years ago

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Red vs Blue Season 17 Review, Part One

On March 9th, 2019, Red vs Blue: Singularity premiered at last. After the monster cliffhanger of S16, to say that many of us had been anxious would be an understatement. Well, it’s several months later and the season has concluded it’s 12 episode run. So, was it good? Was it bad? Well… that’s a hard question to answer. But however we feel, we’re going to be going over it today in my Season 17 Review~!

This baby got a Hell of a lot longer than intended, so hopefully, it’s coherent. I tried to be firm, but honest. No matter what I think though, there is no arguing that these people put in a lot of work to make this season a reality. I never want that fact to be ignored. So thank you Jason, Miles, Josh, Austin, Greg, Joe, RT Animation, and everyone else for all the hard work. Couldn’t have been easy, but we appreciate it all the same~!

So with that said, for the final time, let us talk about Red vs Blue Season 17.

Visuals/Machinima

This season was unique in that not only was Halo 5 still being us, but they had to go back and use all the past renditions as well. It looked like they were going to use Halo 2 Anniversary for the paradox stuff, a familiar yet different design, but I guess someone decided it was better to just reuse the older games. Which I think was probably the right choice. Halo 2 Anniversary I think would have helped add this feeling of everything being off, but at the same time seeing the previous versions helps connect to the moments more. It adds more emotional investment since we’re seeing something that we recognize being fucked with. It meant more work for the Machinima team, and I hope that they’re all still alive and had a nice vacation after it was all over cause yikes. Their efforts are greatly appreciated~

The machinima was overall very good. Josh Ornelas has been with the show for six years as a machinimator and directed at least a few episodes of S14. So he was more than fit to be a co-director for this season. Austin Clark is newer and IDK when he started (my guess is around 14 or 15), but I think he’s shown that he’s perfectly capable both as a machinimator and as a director. I never noticed any issues with the machinima that threw me off… but as usual, it’s hard to critique what are essentially video game movements/defaults. Very least whenever the characters were emotional or something, I got the feeling from how the scene was framed. Even though you can’t see the faces, the machinimators know how to frame it to make you feel the intended emotion. Episode 9 with Carolina and Wash’s talk I think demonstrated that. Yeah, the VA-ing helped, but you can see the emotion, even though there’s no emotion to display. And while Austin handled the even-numbered episodes and Josh the odd ones, everything felt like they were on the same page, which is essential when co-directing. They both did an excellent job directing.

Animation was sadly sparse compared to the last season. Wasn’t bad though. There were some good bits, like the opening credits and Wash directing his gun at Genkins in Episode 3. Oh. and Genkins getting stabbed with his own golf club was pretty gruesome, especially with his writhing around, but seeing the original Halo animated was nice. We only got one fight scene, but it was Carolina vs Carolina and it was badass. Not as creative as the Donut vs O’Malley fight, but still really good and impactful. Loved it!. The sets and effects were all very good. Just look at the opening. The effects used for The Everwhen looked really cool and other-worldly. The Labyrinth looked pretty creepy, as it should be considering its true nature. And of course, all the previous Halo’s still looked good… maybe a little dated with Halo: CE but still as good as it did in the remaster.

Overall, visually speaking, the season was really good. The machinima looked great and was directed competently. I felt engaged, and that’s what’s important. Definitely one of the season high points.

Voice Acting/Music

We’re mainly going to be discussing Dan Godwin, Shannon McCormick, Jen Brown, Ricco Fajardo, and Lee Eddy. Everyone else in the main cast was pretty much at the expected level of quality. There’s sadly not much to talk about specifically, which we’ll go more into during the character section. But Joel, Matt, Gus, Geoff, Becca, and Jason Saldana all did well and gave the quality that I expect from them, just nothing that stands out really. I’ll say this, Geoff and Becca’s performance in the finale was very strong and emotional and I loved it. Matt he both got to do Wyoming again and had to do Doc and O’Malley at the same time, which he nailed perfectly. And hearing Burnie as Church again was really nice… but never let him do English Lopez again. Ever.

Let's talk about villains first. Ricco Fajardo as Genkins is freakin’ fantastic. While we got glimpses of it last season, Genkins fun but truly shitty self is on full display this season. And Ricco is clearly having the time of his life recording it. He’s just always so cheerful and having fun, but it feels so messed up and sadistic due to the circumstances. But he owns it. Sometimes having a villain who is just shitty can be fun, especially if you have a competent actor doing it. And Ricco absolutely nailed it. We also have Lee Eddy, who voiced 479er, make her return to RvB as Chrovos. She too is clearly having a fun time. She goes full-on Large Ham with Chrovos’ theatrics and basting but also portrays her getting fed up very well. It’s the Gwen in her showing, haha. But yeah, these are two fun villain characters, and the performances very much reflected that. Loved it~

Next, we have our Freelancers, Shannon and Jen. They both got the emotions hard this season. Which considering how their plot ended last season, is no surprise. It’s no shock that these two did very well, but… man… Jen had to express a lot of guilt, but also a lot of tears and pain. Which she did very well. Carolina feels terrible and has to accept that her efforts were in vain, and Jen conveyed that very well. The second that Carolina breaks down in Episode 9… God, I just wanted to hug her. Then there’s Episode 11 where Carolina is confronting her past self, and it truly does feel like two different characters, even though it’s the same actress. It was a very strong performance this season, arguably her best one yet.

Then we have Shannon. Oh golly, Shannon. How long has he been doing Wash now? Over a decade, right? He knows this character in and out… and he perfectly shows that this season. Wash has a lot to get through this season. His anger at Carolina, him having to accept what happened, accept what has to happen, it’s a lot. Shannon nails it. From going back and forth between normal and crazy in Episode 3 to any time his anger at Carolina showed, to his talk with Carolina in Episode 5, his acceptance of his fate and prepping for it in Episode 9, and his horror to seeing everyone die in 11. And he still got lighter moments, like his interactions with Donut, which were super enjoyable. Shannon just knocked it out of the park this season, and I loved it.

But of course, the one I have to give the biggest kudos to is Dan Godwin. While he has performed Donut since the very beginning… well, he only got to do so much since Donut only got to do so much. He never did a bad job, or he was on par with everyone else, but he simply wasn’t really allowed to go beyond ‘optimistic, innuendo-spouting moron’. That is, until now. Dan got to do so much this season. He got a full range to do with Donut that he really never got, or only got so briefly. He got to be emotional, he got to be angry, he got to be frustrated, he got to be utterly done with absolutely everything. And he conveyed all of that very well. Heck, I think the pitch even lowered a little bit compared to before, or it felt less squeaky as the season went on. It feels more like an in-between of Blood Gulch Donut and pre-Paradox Donut, which I think works. Overall, Dan got to show how much experience with the character he really has after so many years of not getting to, and he was by far the best performer due to it.

Everyone in the cast did great. Even for brief returns like Miles and Gray with the Mercs, Arryn Zech with Dr. Grey, and the Freelancers all did a great job. Jason Weight as Grif’s coach was also simultaneously hilarious and scary. He clearly put his all into it, anyways. As for the music… what? Ae we surprised that it was good? David Levy and Trocadero again delivered a solid soundtrack. The fact that we have to wait for both this soundtrack and still for the S16 soundtrack continues to upset me. But at least it means a lot of quality tracks whenever they do come out. Solid job overall from the music team.

Characters

So one of the problems with these reviews is I have to remember to look at things two ways: as a fan and as a critic. We had a lot of really good character stuff with some characters… and not so much with others. And looking at it as a fan and then as a critic causes two widely different perspectives regarding this section. Normally I’d rather get the negative out of the way, but to explain the negative I have to talk about the positives first. Hopefully, I don’t come off as too harsh, but I want to be honest in this review as well. So.. here we go.

Okay, happy first. The two main focuses of this season are Donut and Wash. Let's do Wash, and in turn Carolina, first. Wash… well, got put to the side last season for the most part. His plot was mainly focused on his brain damage that he didn’t know about and ended with his blow up at Carolina. Which we all know what that leads to. Here, Wash has to deal with the fallout of it. He gets to stabilize and be back to pre-brain damage and is determined to save the others… but his anger at Carolina is lingering. His arc this season is about him forgiving Carolina, helping Donut, and accepting his own fate. I think, overall, Wash had a very good arc. And this is coming from someone who is not that big of a Wash fan.

Wash’s anger at Carolina is understandable, but he realizes that she did it out of concern for him and never meant to hurt him, and especially after talking to her in Episode 5 and how even when paradox’d she still trusts him, he forgives her. Carolina, in turn, has to deal with the immense guilt of her actions… again. Yeah, the fact that we got another ‘Carolina is guilty’ story after Freelancer, S13, and S15, it’s feeling a little repetitive. But her emotions regarding it were very well written. You do really feel the remorse and understand why she did what she did. It makes it even worse when in Episode 9, Wash accepts what has to happen and Carolina has to accept it. It was one of the toughest scenes in the season but was such a beautiful, poignant moment for both. They still have problems, like Wash fears of losing everyone and Carolina has past issues lingering still over Freelancer and her family. But it’s safe to say that they’ve both become closer and stronger.

The biggest character of this season is, of course, Donut. This was a long time coming. Up until the end of the last season, Donut was probably the most underutilized character in the show aside from maybe Lopez and Doc. He went from a dumb but semi-competent rookie to a flamboyant, one-note joke character. Like after Blood Gulch I can't think of anything significant that he contributed. Recollection more or less wrote him out/killed him off, Chorus did nothing with him, and S15 also did nothing with him and even forgot him in certain scenes. S16 began to fix that, having Donut get annoyed at being ignored, nearly betray everyone, and then get into one of the shows best fight scenes by far. So we were building up for something for this season, and sure enough, it came and it came hard… was that at innuendo? Dang it Donut, you’ve influenced me too much!

This was developed for Donut that was loooong overdue. He further got frustrated with being ignored and belittled by everyone around him. He recognized his innuendo problem and tried to actively improve it. He showed some of that competence he had in Blood Gulch, piecing things together and actively taking charge since he understood things the most. When he told everyone off in Episode 7, it felt so satisfying because of how long he’s been treated like a nuisance when he was at worst a little annoying and TMI. He was willing, tried his best, and it really felt like he was finally allowed to be more than just a joke. It really made me like and appreciate Donut a LOT more than I did before. Like he used to not just be my least favorite Red, but my least favorite of the BGC. Now? He’s right below Grif and Simmons on the Overall Favorites List. Yeah, that’s a LOT of places.

Donut was great and I wouldn't change him getting him this development… but this development did come at a cost. That being development for everyone else. The other Reds and the Blues were shafted and shafted pretty badly. The first half of the season, they are trapped with no memory and go about how they would in that time period. Which okay, it’s necessary for the plot so we can overlook that one. They get restored in Episode 6… and they are STILL badly shafted. They are all joke characters, which does NOT work when we’re this deep in the plot. I mean we get some moments, like Tucker reliving his failure on Crash Site Bravo and recognizing his fault over the past few seasons, Sarge has his scenario in Episode 11 that I thought was very insightful, but those are small moments. Sadly, Donut got too much attention. Even with Wash, him realizing how he was the Donut of Freelancer was more or less contributing to making Donut look good, as did Tucker’s moment. I like those scenes and I love Donut… but not everything had to be about him. He’s the main character, not the only one.

Let's do the Blues first. As I said, there were more or less just there and had no real major character development or effect on the plot. But that being said, they were given some legit good stuff. Tucker got it the best as he re-lived Crash Site Bravo and finally realized true leadership was. It was about stepping up when no one else would and when things were at their bleakest, not being the cool, macho guy like he kept acting like it was. Which after these past two seasons, was nice to see. I was one of the people who were perfectly fine with how Tucker was written the past two seasons because I could see why he had regressed. But I do know that a lot of people didn’t like it, and this feels like a good way to bring it all around. Have Tucker relive his worst moment, this time having to let it go through, and therefore truly remember what caused him to step up on Chorus: because he had to. It’s short, but it does its job and this along with his Labyrinth vision I think has really helped Tucker’s character immensely.

Caboose is overall pretty minor but had some good scenes like beating the shit out of Genkins in Episode 6 and figuring out how time travel worked before the others. It helps show that he’s an idiot, but he’s a smart idiot (if that makes any sense) and was a step up from his limited screentime last season. He also had my favorite line in the entire season (“These graphics look horrible!”). Sister was overall minor, but I’ll go into her later. You’ll see why when I get there. Doc was overall also minor and how the Hell he was in the Everwhen I’ll never know, but I do like him in the finale and finally getting a grip on O’Malley. He more or less is a combo of the two now and seems much more capable due to it, so that’s good. So yeah, while it may not have been a lot, the Blues and Doc were at least given something, which is better than nothing at all.

The Reds though… so you know how these past two seasons started giving them more development? You would think that since Donut is the main character, that would continue, right? Haha… nope! They went right back to ‘the comedy relief team who do absolutely nothing!’! Which after the past two seasons started to do more with them… yeah, this felt like a slap in the face. Sarge annoyed me this season. Mainly in Episode 7 where he was a hypocritical asshole about Donut’s betrayal, ignoring how he not that long ago betrayed everyone and was still feeling guilty about it. He was also the one primarily being a jerk to Donut, which did not do him any favors. I know it’s Sarge and he’s an asshole, so it’s not 100% unexpected… but I felt like it was pushed too much just to contribute to the ‘Donut is so unappreciated!’ arc. His speech in Episode 6 was hilarious though and I did like his Labyrinth vision showing that he can't handle both civilian or army life. It was surprisingly insightful in a way that I’m not used to with Sarge. So yeah, I feel his screentime was on par with Sister and Caboose at least.

Simmons… got nothing. Absolutely nothing. I mean the running gag where he kept seeing Donut shot was really funny, and it also meant he wasn't an asshole like Sarge. Heck, he seemed to be the only one willing to hear Donut out about saving them in Episode 7. And he did more or less point out how they could launch the gold club through the portal to stop Genkind from reigniting the paradox, which was minor but nice to see for him. Him not being a kissass anymore is also sticking, which seeing him back when he was pettier in Episode 2 did make me appreciate where he is now. The way that he was legit concerned for Donut during the ‘Wash shoots Donut’ gag also helps make it look like he at least cared about him in contrast to Sarge’s jackassery. But he was otherwise just there. Very least, it also means he was the only Red that I didn’t get frustrated about since his character remained consistent… until the finale with the utter bullshit that was his nightmare. Seriously guys, what the fuck?!

But at least with Sarge and Simmons, they weren’t exactly in the spotlight last season, so I don’t feel like I got cheated with them. I cannot say the same about Grif, however. Which we will cover that, as well as the Story section, in Part Two.

(Part Two)

#rvb #rvb17 #rvb spoilers #rvb reviews #callie reviews

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