#afterfame

[transpondster]

The story is terrible so I’m not including the link but the headline is very Internet-era, and the photo credit [simply: “Tumblr”] hits a nerve.

[robinallender]

I love Sam Riviere’s poetry. I think his interest is in what happens to meaning if the transmission of language is disrupted – by translation, by plagiarism, by time, or by the endless corrupting influence of the internet. His latest collection is a very freewheeling rendition of the Roman poet Martial’s Epigrams, often assisted by machine translation. It reminded me of Nabokov’s Pale Fire, where we also view the text through a weird editorial filter. If this all sounds impossibly arch to you, don’t worry, Riviere is aware of that: 

I actually have no idea what I’m talking about – sorry! It’s only a poem,
 my dainty offering. See you in the morning. 

After Fame is so funny, so silly, and actually so concerned with pretensions, and with what constitutes poetry (good and bad), and with the complex negotiations of the poet as public figure. And in the same way that his last collection, Kim Kardashian’s Marriage, which was informed by the skewed poetry of spam, felt strangely profound, so After Fame, in its fusion of voices, is often beautiful (‘the diluted evening’ is a lovely phrase) and quite moving in its gnomic utterances and de-centred meanings: 

Money still flies his way in the shadowy city… With nothing to recommend me, how on earth
 could I escape my reward? But that’s not what
 I talk about during my two-hour phone calls 
on the solstice evenings, when I like to fall asleep
 while watching many appalling films. 

Here’s a post I wrote last year after reading 81 Austerities.

[postguiltypleasures]

My Peak TV Journey *Locke & Key*

I am a fan of the comic books ok on which the tv series is based, so I had been waiting for the series for a while. But then I took a while to actually watch it, because the amount of tv out there and the amount I’m already watching is intimidating. I didn’t watch the first season until the second was out and then I took my time getting to the third. This reflects my television viewing habits more than my feelings about the show. I think it’s really good. I would like more, but also think it’s for the best that it wrapped up before they had to deal with the young cast really aging. After all, the comic on which it’s based ran for years, (not including one off spin off stories), all took place within a year. 

It treads a lot of similar territory to Stranger Things, and  over the long run works better in pacing, use of the ensemble, and making sure that episodes feel like episodes. But I understand why it didn’t have a similar break out success. For starters, it’s later, so people are primed to dismiss it as derivative. Second, Stranger Things had a much stronger opening batch of episodes. The first half of the first season of Locke & Key struggled with tone balancing. The lead character are all experiencing grief over the father’s recent murder.  But then there is the excitement of discovering the magic keys. The worst of this fell on the youngest Locke child character, Bode. (I hate to be annoyed by child acting.) This struggle between necessary plot points and getting the right tone was also an issue with the first season of Bates Motel (name checked in the series) which was all co-developed for television by Carlton Cuse. As with Bates Motel, once Locke & Key has set enough ground work to get really crazy, it takes off.

The series is very lore centric. Lots of exposition in the dialogue about what makes the keys, what each one can individually do and the history of the family that made them. The second season is the best because they had gotten enough of the exposition out of the way so that the characters could breathe, and nothing new had to be introduced to help wrap things up. 

I do generally really like the Locke family, especially the teens, Tyler and Kinsey. I liked both of Tyler’s romances, which is rare on this type of series. He’s a warm enough character that even when he’s acting out you can’t really be annoyed with him. But the star of the family is really middle child and only girl, Kinsey. Part of me wonders if she didn’t become the star because the actress, Emilia Jones, also starred in the Oscar winning film Coda. But even without that she’s the most interesting of the Locke kids. She messes up her grief by physically removing the part of her that fears, but then gets deeply involved with horror fan community/amateur film making crew who call themselves the Savinis (afterfamed horror make up artist, Tom Savini, who also has a small role in the series as a locksmith).

I mostly enjoyed the Savinis and the film series, Splattering. Unfortunately only the least interesting members were around for the final season, but at least that meant Kinsey wasn’t lonely.

I want to take a moment to write about Darby Stachfield as the mother, Nina. I always enjoy her presence and I think she did a good job with plots about her alcoholism and moving on from her husband’s violent death. She had a good chemistry with the actors playing her children. I think she seemed a little awkward when she knew about the magic of the keys, but mostly stay happy to see her. The series primarily uses fantasy tropes to explore children learning about their parents' trauma and difficulties while developing their own more adult bonds to each other. It needs some strong parental figures to work, and Stachfield, as well as Aaron Ashford as an uncle who can answer some questions, provided that.

In fact I just enjoyed the time with most of the characters. One of my biggest complaints about the series is that they killed off Eden at the end of the second season. I wanted to see her either get redeemed or become the biggest bad.

I’m not going to complain about things like the town’s public school having a dormitory presumably for plot and budget reasons (not having to build too many sets, not having to cast parents, keeping kids reliant on already introduced characters). It’s a fantasy, and I’m happy for a fantasy with better functioning public schools than in the real world. 

[kidpobretrash]

Afterfam

[augustocesaraquino]

So You Want To Be Famous... #afterfame #sesamestreet

[dailydegenerates-blog]

When the #SesameStreet reruns aren't making ends meet anymore, and you find yourself walking through #Harlem at 6:45am trying to get to work...hoping your new #Turban will keep you hidden from the hordes of parents asking for pictures with their little fat miracles... #RealLife #AfterFame #DailyDegenerates #NYCstory Photo Credit: @june457