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peace-coast-island · 4 years

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Diary of a Junebug

An egg-cellent day for an adventure

It's another fun filled day of baking sweet treats at the camp as we've got a surplus of eggs to use up. Good thing Emilia decided to drop by along with her daughter Michele Toni for a well deserved mother-daughter weekend. I was hoping for the day when Emilia would stop by for a visit and now she's here!

(Psstt... Andrea, Selene, Paget, Lena, Rini, Malka, Kate, Annie, and Luciana- camp's open all year round for visitors so if you can, come on over!)

Along with collecting eggs scattered across the camp and making baked goods, Emilia's also filming a travel-style vlog for her channel Emilia Eats. She mainly does recipe videos with an occasional vlog, something she's been doing for about ten years now. Along with making videos Emilia runs a local catering company of the same name.

I've always loved Emilia's cooking and baking - it's one of the many things I look forward to when I visit home - second to my mom's, of course. Also I love her videos as she's got a sweet personality that makes me feel enthusiastic about baking. I've saved a lot of her recipes for reference and sometimes I just like watching her videos just to see old friends like Serena, Tony, and Michele.

I'm glad to see Emilia in a much better place. We caught up a bit at the wedding, where I got to know Michele Toni a bit more as well as catch up with her dad. The past few years have been rough on them but now it looks like things are finally settling down for Emilia and Mr. Phillips.

Little Michele Toni's so cute, she's almost like a mini-me of Emilia. Hard to believe she's a toddler now and it's so cute seeing her take an interest in baking! I always love seeing her "cooking" alongside her mom in various videos.

Around the time before Michele Toni was born, Emilia was going through a rough time. Up until then, the Phillips-Conrad family were a happy bunch. The family had a bit of unwanted publicity as Mr. Phillips was, and still is, a big name in town, so the fact that he, a white man, adopted two young black girls was something the media wanted to dig up dirt on. Truth is, there was nothing to stir up - Emilia and Michele's mom and Mr. Phillips were good friends and he was always like a father figure to the girls. Both didn't have much living family so they assigned each other as godparents to their kids.

For years they were a happy family - Emilia, Tony, and Michele. Tony was the one who helped Emilia get started with her channel, teaching her how to film and edit videos as well as get more views. Michele was the one who helped Emilia come up with recipe ideas and in the videos where she's featured, the two would often talk about their mom. Emilia always spoke fondly of her as did Tony while Michele would listen intently when the two told stories of the past. Those videos are always bittersweet to watch, especially now that Tony and Michele are gone.

Things changed when Tony went off to college, traveling abroad and rarely coming home. Michele also went abroad and later got caught up in a hectic, stressful lifestyle, leaving Emilia in Rosevine balancing her life as a baker and a Galaxy Fighter. We all had a feeling that Tony and Michele were going to leave while Emilia stayed so it was expected that the three would go their separate ways. They were still a close knit family though - none of us suspected that something was wrong.

The deaths of Tony and Michele were a huge shock to the community. Both were struggling with alcoholism and drug addiction as their lives took a toll on them. Tony died from a drug overdose and Michele drove off a bridge, both were at their lowest point due to unlucky breaks. Then months later Serena died in the Crystal Shadow War so in that time span Emilia lost her siblings and best friend.

It was a difficult time for everyone. I was also going through some rough patches myself so you can imagine how bad it was. Pretty much everyone I knew from home was going through a terrible time because the universe somehow decided to be a dick and throw all these tragedies at us.

Thankfully, those days are behind us. Months later I opened the camp, Emilia and the other Galaxy Fighters had their spirit revived thanks to a band of adventurers - I guess you can say the darkest hour is just before dawn. Not everything's perfect right now, but we're all doing a lot better, and that's what matters.

Along with some new friends sort of turning Rosevine upside down, Emilia was in for another unexpected turn. Not too long after Serena's death, Emilia started seeing some guy who wasn't good for her. Then Michele Toni was born and she was probably the best thing to ever happen for her mom and grandpa in light of the tragedies that plagued them. It wasn't until last year when Michele Toni made appearances on Emilia's channel and stole the show. Seeing the two of them bake together makes me so happy - and I'm glad that Emilia finally feels comfortable embracing her role as a mom.

Michele Toni had a lot of fun bringing us eggs she found while exploring the camp, her favorite place being the beach. Emilia says her favorite hangout spot is Sunburst Island because it reminds her of her family's summer home in Watercolor Vineyards. I've never been there but from how she, Tony, and Michele described it, the island sounds beautiful!

While sightseeing and scavenging for eggs, Emilia filmed for her vlog and caught me and Daisy Jane up on everything that's been going on at home. Selene, Arianne, and Vitoria are up to the usual, their latest adventure happened to be with Team Magic involving smoke screens, zombies, and frozen tidal waves. Kate's got a big tennis match coming up while Malka has a concert in a couple weeks. Rini and her grandma are doing well, running the shrine as usual and planning for their yearly spring trip to Tranquility Falls. Lena and Annie are busy at the hospital saving lives and helping others. Paget's doing all right, holding her own, taking it one day at a time. Andrea and Robin are doing their best too, keeping up with Selene and the others. Luciana's checking in on everyone as usual, coming to the rescue in the nick of time.

Hunting for eggs was a lot of fun! Emilia showed off her powers a little for the campers. As a Galaxy Fighter, she's Guardian Cyclone and her powers involve manipulating air into wind, creating powerful blasts that can be as strong as a hurricane. Since a good batch of the eggs are in hard to reach places (Why, Zipper, why?), it's a good thing we have Emilia here to help her out because she's currently the tallest person here right now, she's an agile climber, and can use her powers to drop eggs that are impossible to reach. In a stroke of luck, not a single egg was broken - and we were kinda rough with them.

Once we were satisfied with the amount of eggs we collected (maybe not satisfied but you can only collect so many eggs before you get annoyed by them popping up everywhere you go), it's time to get cooking! For savory dishes we made a bunch of quiches to put many of the eggs to good use and so we can freeze them for later. We made a bunch of different kinds - spinach and feta, four cheese, kimchi, salmon and cream cheese, shakshouka, garden veggies, sausage - it's a good thing we labeled everything! Of course, we used Emilia's trusty old recipe for a buttery, flaky crust that's not only delicious, but easy to make and freezes well.

The desserts was where we went all out. I happened to score a nice bargain with a barrel full of perfect peaches so we made a lovely pie with those. Daisy Jane taught us how to make egg tarts, a sweet treat I haven't had in forever. Coco made carrot cake cheesecake bars, Claude baked a giant quadruple chocolate mousse cake, and Dora made a lovely assortment of digestive biscuits to go with freshly brewed tea. Emilia made up a recipe on the spot - lemon vanilla cardamon bars - which turned out really good.

Since the lemon vanilla cardamon bars were such a hit, Emilia's gonna make a recipe video of it - at the camp. I still can't believe that Daisy Jane and I are gonna be on Emilia Eats - first for the vlog, now a recipe video! It's taken her years but Emilia plans to get most, if not all, her friends to appear on her channel. She plans to get Team Magic on next as she's planning a video with Mariposa and Skully, developing a recipe with Angie, figuring out what she wants to do with Luna that won't blow up the kitchen, and waiting on Pippa and Willow.

I can't wait to see what Emilia Eats has in store because Emilia's been knocking it out of the park lately! Her videos have always been consistently good but in the past few months she's been putting a lot more heart into it. Even when times were tough, Emilia always managed to put on a brave face. I remember watching her videos during those times, how despite everything that was going on, Emilia continued making recipes. We all have our different ways of coping with grief and hers was to continue with business as usual, which can be a good and bad thing.

Hanging out with her and watching her play with Michele Toni, I know for sure that Emilia's going to be all right. We can't undo the past and bring back lost loved ones, but we can carry on. Maybe it's just wishful thinking, but I think I see a little bit of Michele Toni's aunt and uncle in her. She's definitely got her mom's heart and spirit.

After a fun day of collecting eggs and baking, it's time for a well deserved bonfire dinner of quiches, seafood chowder, and freshly baked sourdough bread. Then tomorrow will be more egg hunting, baking, filming, and good old camping fun!

#animal crossing #animal crossing pocket camp #Diary of a Junebug #headcanon ramble

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back-and-totheleft · 3 years

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"I do have the right to talk"

In many people’s opinion, Oliver Stone doesn’t just court controversy. He buys it dinner and tickets to a Broadway show. With movies like “Platoon,” “Salvador,” “JFK,” “Born on the Fourth of July” and “Natural Born Killers” on his resume, it’s no wonder the Oscar-winning director has a hot-button reputation of sorts. Perhaps that’s why one of the most controversial things about his new film, “World Trade Center,” which opens Wednesday, is how uncontroversial it is.

Based on the true story of two New York Port Authority cops who were pulled out of the rubble after the towers collapsed Sept. 11, 2001, the movie plays it straight – it keeps politics, one of Stone’s favorite topics, out of the picture.

During a recent conversation at the Ritz-Carlton Buckhead in Atlanta, the confident, well-spoken filmmaker talked about his new film, a few of his old films and being Oliver Stone.

Q: When the word came that you were making a movie called “World Trade Center,” I think a lot of people thought, Uh-oh, he’s going to create a controversy, he’s going to sensationalize a national tragedy. Why would that be?

A: I got politicized a long time ago. My films were seen as one thing or another. I was surprised, frankly. There’s an Oliver Stone they talk about, and he’s not me. I mean, this is a ball of years. Twenty, 30 years, going back to “Midnight Express” even (the 1978 film that won him his first Oscar, for Best Adapted Screenplay). Years of confusions and repetition of lies.

A big one, for instance, was “JFK.” The lie has been, Oliver Stone makes up history. He falsifies history. Brainwashes children. He would have us believe the idiot theory that 25 government agents, along with Lyndon Baines Johnson, killed John F. Kennedy.

The true meaning of that film was a question about what reality is in politics, what surface events mean. All the language was suppositional, except for (Jim) Garrison’s feelings at the end of the trial. And even some of that was suppositional.

The rap on the politics (in my movies) is really about statements I’ve made between the films. I could be faulted for that. I did shoot myself in the foot for saying things. But I don’t believe in being censored. Because I’m a filmmaker and a celebrity, people think I have no right to talk. But I say to you, I do have the right to talk. I’ve earned the right to talk. I served my country. I did my time. Paid my taxes. Had children. All that (expletive).

Q: But you do see that you’re a hot-button personality to people, even when it’s not a politically themed movie. People seem to react very personally to you and your work.

A: I became a hot button, especially on that film (“JFK”). But “Natural Born Killers” added to it. And probably “Born on the Fourth of July” and “Platoon” (Stone won best-director Oscars for the latter two). By the time I made “The Doors,” with the drugs, I was a “raving lefty.”

Q: Where were you when you found out America had been attacked on 9/11?

A: Nothing exciting. I was in L.A. Asleep. The time zone difference. My wife woke me up and turned on the TV. It was pretty shocking stuff.

I’m not a pacifist or a bleeding-heart liberal, as some people say. I believe in measured vengeance. Two thousand al-Qaida fighters killed 3,000 people. I’m all for going after those 2,000 and, when it became necessary, the Taliban. The world was with us, and I think I show that in the movie. That was the right war, the one Dave Karnes (the Marine who discovered the trapped men) should’ve gone to. Instead, he went to Iraq, which seems to me a confusion. A confusion I don’t understand.

Q: One of the things that ran through my mind after the movie was the line from “Manhattan,” where Mariel Hemingway says to Woody Allen, “You gotta have a little faith in people.”

A: I can’t say that’s the original reason. It was just a great story, and it was true. It came to me out of the blue. I wasn’t thinking about a 9/11 movie, but Andrea Berloff wrote this script that had these five figures in it. (The police officers, John McLoughlin and Will Jimeno, are played by Nicolas Cage and Michael Peña, with Maria Bello and Maggie Gyllenhaal as their wives and Michael Shannon as Karnes.)

They were inspirational to me. I’d never thought of it that way. As a microcosm. These people dug in. They didn’t give in to fear. They found their courage. Their faith, you can call it. The metaphysical thing that exists, the evidence of things unseen. They dug in and connected in a kind of collective dream, a collective unconscious. It’s a web, a thread, between five people.

Q: You’ve said your movies are an emotional barometer for you. Where does “World Trade Center” find you?

A: It was good to come back home after being in Iran for three years (for “Alexander”). To come back to this country, which is at war, and go back to the bottom of the cellar, so to speak. This country was raped collectively, and this is like going back to the therapist and saying, I want to know about the day of the rape. That’s where you start. Realism. Then let the demons out.

I didn’t know about these guys until 2004. And this Marine. At our first screening, we handed out cards, and the audience thought we’d laid in a Hollywood B-movie on top of the reality. They were shocked. They thought it (his character) was all (expletive).

But it wasn’t. This was the guy exactly. I saw him on TV doing interviews. And he really did go to Iraq.

Q: Speaking of going to war, in 2007, it will be 40 years since you were in Vietnam. Looking back, what do you see? And looking forward?

A: (shaking his head) Forty years goes like … it’s all moments.

The irony of it is, I was very pessimistic when I was young. Who else would go to Vietnam at age 19 to commit suicide? As I’ve become more realistic in life, I’ve become more optimistic. Because you have a better sense of the negative, and, knowing the negative, the darkness, you appreciate the light more. It makes you more optimistic when you do get the light. When you’re younger, you take it a little bit more for granted.

Q: I once read an item about you in The New Yorker.

A: (interrupts) Oh, no.

Q: You were having lunch with your mother.

A: (small sigh of relief) Oh, that was another one.

Q: She said she came to this country from France after the war (to join her American husband), and she was the only woman on a huge ship with 1,500 men. And she was already pregnant with you and was so nauseated she had to be fed intravenously. And you said, “No wonder I’m the way I am.”

A: She’s an Auntie Mame type. Not the greatest mother, frankly, but you’ll never forget her if you ever meet her.

Q: So you’re saying you were shaped in the womb by a lot of testosterone and a little bit of seasickness?

A: (laughs) I was probably throwing up myself.

Q: Someone once wrote that you were part Captain Ahab, part Ken Kesey. Would you add anyone to that list?

A: Oh, yeah. I’d add a few people. Any of the people I’ve done in my films have affected me. I’m part Nixon, part Garrison, part Jim Morrison.

And Alexander (the Great). I definitely lived through Alexander. I think that was misunderstood as an act of hubris, but what he was to me was the ultimate voyager. The ultimate adventurer.

Q: Which could also, in some way, describe you.

A: Yeah, but I wasn’t saying I was Alexander.

Q: Your approach to “World Trade Center” does seem different from many of your earlier films. Not so much a hot issue as a heart issue.

A: I used to be faster. I did 10 movies in 10 years. This movie was no different in its methodology, with the exception of “U-Turn” and “Natural Born Killers,” which were fiction.

I do my homework. I interviewed, and I interviewed. I interviewed everyone. We have a gold mine here. These two guys are lucid and can talk about it. And process it. This is a gold mine for me, a gold mine for all of us.

You know, the end of “Platoon” has a similar feeling. When Charlie (Sheen) is leaving the jungle, he says something to the effect: We the survivors have an obligation to the dead to remember. And with the remainder of our lives, we must bring a goodness and meaning to this life.

And I think that’s why John and Will are here. That’s why they’re helping us.

-"I do have the right to talk," The Orange County Register, Aug 6 2006 [x]

#world trade center #oliver stone #the orange county register #memories

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daskey · 4 years

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lena luthor please and thank you

wow such manners

How I feel about this character

i love this emo bitch. canon does her dirty all the time. i’m a sucker for a character who goes through a lot of traumatic shit but despite that still tries to be the best version of themself, and put more good in the world than what was done to them which like, is exactly lena.

she also has the potential to just be. really freakin weird because of her rich girl upbringing and i love it. that scene where she was practicing playing board games for game night? i love it. she’s strange and a genius but also a soft baby and canon doesn’t know what to do with her and it’s a tragedy cause we could have so many good fun moments with her. ugh.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

ok lemme go chronologically. andrea rojas was her first love so jot that down. there are definitely feelings there that haven’t gone away, and andrea still knows lena better than most people because she grew up with her. i ship them in the whole “past lovers who had a messy break up and maybe rekindle that love when they’re older and wiser” sort of way

reigncorp. i love them. where rojascorp sort of grow into and out of love i think it’s different with sam and lena. sam is soulmate material, i mean. you know the way lena talked about her first meeting with sam. an instant connection that let them both know they’d just met someone who would have staying power in their lives. i think they’re neat and underappreciated both in canon (because like, apart from ep 100 where we got breadcrumbs in an alt universe there’s really nothing else building on the dynamic that was developed in s3 with the reign storyline) and in fandom. you all are SLEEPING on this.

agentcorp. ok you know this but like the people need to know that they have chaotic bf/gf vibes. they bicker a lot, and they definitely give kara a headache with their arguing over stupid things but that’s just what happens when you have two stubborn geniuses in a relationship. when they’re both on the same page? they’re a force to be reckoned with. i think a core part of their dynamic that i like is the way they value each other’s honesty, even when it hurts. lena’s not afraid to call alex out when she’s not putting herself first (and prioritising the safety of people who can and should help themselves), and alex isn’t afraid to tell lena when she’s being overdramatic.

honourable crackship mentions: kelly/lena

My non-romantic OTP for this character

lena and jess the secretary.

My unpopular opinion about this character

she doesn’t do chores. she doesn’t know how to, since she’s so used to living in places where she gets things done for her. she realises that people don’t generally have cleaners or house staff or get their clothes dry cleaned all the time when she stays with sam. that doesn’t mean she won’t try but like, you know. it’s unfamiliar to her

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

reigncorp. rojascorp. also like maybe they could write lena as like, a smart individual every once in a while. thanks

#lena luthor #gaydisasterdanvers

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sciencespies · 4 years

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Ten Innovators to Watch in 2021

https://sciencespies.com/nature/ten-innovators-to-watch-in-2021/

Ten Innovators to Watch in 2021

This past year left us with no shortage of incredible innovations, chief among them Covid-19 vaccines. Following a harrowing 2020, we’re excited to see how innovators continue to push the envelope and bring forth what they think the world needs. From celebrating and honoring black history to improving the mental health of K-12 students, we’re keeping our eyes on these ten groundbreakers as they share their visions with the world.

Chicken-less Egg Connoisseur Arturo Elizondo

Arturo Elizondo

(Clara Foods)

“Like any good Mexican, I had two eggs for breakfast every morning, and like any good Texan I had my barbeque every Sunday,” says Arturo Elizondo. But when he learned about the devastating impacts that livestock has on the environment, he set out to find a better, more sustainable way to produce animal protein. In 2014, he co-founded Clara Foods with cell biologist David Anchel with a mission to take animals out of animal proteins.

Similar to how brewers use yeast to convert sugar into alcohol for beer, Clara Foods uses yeast and sugar to produce animal protein. Specifically, Elizondo and his team are working to produce egg proteins—one of the most challenging to find alternatives for. One trillion eggs are consumed across the globe each year, but it takes a whopping 600 gallons of water to produce a dozen eggs, he says. Since they’re so versatile and globally loved, Clara Foods is offering a cleaner alternative so that people can still enjoy eggs in all their culinary forms without the tremendous environmental impact.

Clara Foods has been knee-deep in research and development for the last six years, but the company is officially coming out of their “eggshell” in 2021 when they launch the world’s first egg protein made without a chicken, Elizondo says.

Problem-Solving Wunderkind Gitanjali Rao

Gitanjali Rao

(Gitanjali Rao)

As a 15-year-old, Gitanjali Rao is the youngest innovator on our list, but she’s certainly one to watch. She’s already tackling some of the greatest problems affecting current generations: lack of access to clean water, opioid addiction and cyberbullying.

After hearing about the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, Rao was shocked to learn that people in the United States and beyond still don’t have access to safe, clean water. In response, she invented Tethys—a sensor that can detect lead in water and upload results from the water sample to an app, allowing users to quickly and affordably see if water is safe to drink. She’s also worked to address the opioid crisis by developing Epione, a way to diagnose prescription opioid addictions for patients at the onset of addiction, after hearing about a family friend who developed an addiction after a car accident. And to address cyberbullying—a problem especially relevant to her age group—Rao developed Kindly, an artificial intelligence-powered software that detects hurtful or harmful messages and then prompts users to rephrase what they send. Her thoughtful, problem-solving innovations earned her the title of TIME’s 2020 Kid of the Year.

“My motivation to solve problems in society started in a very simple manner: to solve problems that we face on a daily basis,” she says. “I try my best to understand them and look for ways to address them. I am not always successful, but the few times [I’ve succeeded,] I feel like I have contributed in some way.”

To inspire others to innovate, Rao has connected with about 35,000 students across four continents and has more events planned in the coming months. As she moves forward in 2021, Rao says she has more ideas in the works and that she’ll continue developing her current innovations as she searches for the partners to help her out.

Storytelling Composer Barron Ryan

Barron Ryan

(Daniel Charles Folkers)

On May 31, 1921, a mob of white residents attacked the Greenwood District, a predominantly black neighborhood, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in what’s known as the Tulsa Race Massacre. The attack—one of the worst acts of racial violence in American history—continued through the next day as the mob killed more than 300 black Tulsans, displaced 10,000 others and burned more than 35 city blocks to the ground.

To commemorate the 100-year anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre, Chamber Music Tulsa commissioned composer and performer Barron Ryan to tell the story of the tragedy through a piano trio. As a Tulsa native, Ryan says that it’s important for him to tell this story—a story that needs to be remembered. “It’s an integral part of who I am, and I’m honored to do it,” he says.

“Music can tell a story without using words, [and it] has an unparalleled ability to communicate” Ryan says, which is what he aspires to do with his trio. In composing the piece, he looked through firsthand accounts of the massacre. He read about a woman who hid with her daughter and read psalms as the attack raged on. Psalm 88:3 spoke to Ryan, and it ultimately inspired the melody. One of the verses reads, “My soul is full of troubles,” which Ryan borrowed as the title of his trio.

He hopes that his music inspires people to reflect on the Tulsa Race Massacre and to be courageous—to do what’s right and not simply what is easy, he says. “I’m hoping that it’s well received, and that we remember our history as Tulsans and learn the right lessons and not repeat something like this again.”

Transit Trailblazer Andrea Ponti

Andrea Ponti

(Andrea Ponti)

The Covid-19 pandemic brought public transportation to a screeching halt as people who had the means to travel in their own private vehicles opted to do so. Andrea Ponti, the founder and director of Ponti Design Studio, took the opportunity to re-think and re-plan how we get around. Inspired by social distancing, he developed Island, an electric tram designed for a post-pandemic Hong Kong, the city where he resides.

“When the pandemic took over Hong Kong, many people turned to private transport causing a dramatic increase in traffic, pollution and noise,” he says. “What makes Island attractive is that it helps to solve all those problems. The bottom line is technology needs good design in order to be efficient and accessible to most people, and I think Island might be an example of that.”

Instead of sitting in rows, the tram’s seats are organized in circles, or “islands,” seating people with their backs towards each other so they can look out the window instead of facing others. “To me that is a safer way to commute and a fun way to take in the city sights and see Hong Kong from a different viewpoint,” he says. Plus, the tram is electric and driverless, making it eco-friendlier and more efficient.

“As a designer I really like the challenge of re-imagining products and services that we often take for granted and that can be greatly impacted by social changes—in this case re-designing trams at the time of social distancing in a metropolis like Hong Kong where social distancing is hard to practice,” he says.

Ponti started developing Island in March 2020 and has since modeled the tram and produced a number of prototypes. Moving forward in 2021, he is working to scale the protypes, move into the testing phase and secure a partner to produce Island.

Honoring Black History with Anitra Belle Henderson

Anitra Belle Henderson

(Lemaris Alston)

In 1860, a plantation owner smuggled in a shipload of 110 African people to Alabama on the Clotilda, the last known slave ship to arrive in the United States, decades after the U.S. had banned the importation of enslaved people. When enslaved people were freed in 1865, survivors of the Clotilda couldn’t afford to return to Africa, so they founded Africatown instead, a bustling town rooted in their homelands and cultures.

After years of searching for the long-lost Clotilda, a team of historians and archaeologists finally discovered it at the bottom of Alabama’s Mobile River in 2019. Now, the City of Mobile will open a heritage house in the summer of 2021 to tell the story of the Clotilda‘s survivors and of Africatown.

“We are excited to help the community tell their story,” says Anitra Belle Henderson, the executive director of communications and external affairs for the City of Mobile and the lead on all the Africatown projects. “Our goal is for visitors to understand more about those who were enslaved. They have a name and a story.”

The heritage house is designed to be an immersive experience. Visitors will feel the waves of the ocean like the enslaved people felt on their voyage, read stories of the slave trade and be introduced to the survivors of the Clotilda. They’ll also be able to visit Africatown, where many descendants of the Clotilda‘s survivors still reside.

“Each detail of the heritage house was designed with reverence to the ancestors, descendants and the community,” Belle Henderson says. “Those who are curious about African culture can visit an African community on American soil—a community that was built with hope and promise.”

“The many stories show the diverse brilliance of black people,” she says. “Since the [discovery] of the Clotilda there has been a new excitement in the community. Educating people about Africatown’s past will definitely create a bright future for a community that so deserves the attention it is receiving.”

Nautical Visionary Brett Phaneuf

Brett Phaneuf

(IBM)

In April 2021, the Mayflower Autonomous Ship, one of the world’s first full-sized self-navigating ships, will set sail from the United Kingdom’s Plymouth Harbor and traverse the Atlantic Ocean to Cape Cod, Massachusetts. It will retrace the voyage made by the original Mayflower in 1620 that brought Pilgrims to New England, but instead of looking back at 400 years of history, it represents what the next wave of nautical advances will look like.

The Mayflower Autonomous Ship is a collaboration between the marine research organization ProMare and IBM, which developed the ship’s artificial intelligence systems that will allow it to navigate unassisted across the ocean. The Mayflower team is hoping to revolutionize ocean research by creating an affordable option for scientists to study the ocean without necessarily being on board a ship. Without needing to worry about the logistics for housing people on board, like sleeping, eating and sanitation, the ship can accommodate more technology, like cameras and sensors, and stay out at sea longer.

“If it works as designed, then it will substantially drive down the cost of collecting data at sea,” says Phaneuf, a co-founder and co-director of the Mayflower Autonomous Ship project. “This will lead to [a] better understanding of our oceans and climate.”

Phaneuf’s biggest hope for the Mayflower is that it makes it across the ocean and sparks the conversation about how autonomous ships can be used to study the high seas. During this first voyage, the ship will collect meteorological and oceanographic data as well as water samples to study microplastic distribution.

Student Advocate Samantha Pratt

Samantha Pratt

(Samantha Pratt)

Two thirds of all U.S. youth face at least one trauma by age 16 that can stem from poverty, racism, domestic or community violence, or substance abuse, says Samantha Pratt, the CEO and founder of KlickEngage.

“Students carry heavy emotional backpacks into the classroom every day that they cannot put down,” she says. “I was teaching high-need students in an overcrowded classroom and could not check in with each of my students every day in order to address their issues. Out of urgent need, I decided that I had to find a way to streamline student self-report.”

To do so, Pratt designed KlickEngage—an app that allows users to self-report their mental state each day by completing a two-minute survey. The app, which has reached thousands of kids,then provides students with targeted coping mechanisms while delivering real-time data to educators so that they can identify and supports students carrying heavy emotional loads, Pratt says. Schools have the ability to make a huge impact for students by providing health services and resources, but they’re often limited and underfunded.

“By directly serving students, teachers and schools, we limit the impacts of adverse experiences on school engagement in early years of education so that there is a higher likelihood of student success in later years, breaking the cycle of trauma and poverty,” Pratt says.

Students are still facing adversities, plus the compounded issues brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic, such as unemployment, food insecurity and fear-based anxiety, Pratt says. Since KlickEngage is able to be adapted for a physical or virtual learning environment, it can help educators check in with students, even from a distance. In 2021, KlickEngage is planning to grow its impact and reach more classrooms.

Pandemic-Inspired Architects Jing Liu and Florian Idenburg

Jing Liu and Florian Idenburg

(Vincent Tullo)

In 2020, homes transformed into all-in-one offices, gyms, daycares, classrooms, vacation destinations and restaurants as people’s lives became confined to their residences. As a result, people noticed just how important their home environment is to their mental and emotional wellbeing, say Jing Liu and Florian Idenburg, the founding partners of SO–IL, an architecture and design firm.

At the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic, Liu and Idenburg were in the beginning stages of designing a new 30-unit residential building in Brooklyn. They also found themselves adjusting to living and working from home with their two daughters, and they say that experience helped shape the design for the new building, to be completed in 2022. Now that people are home all the time, Liu and Idenburg needed to create a space that was both multi-functional and comfortable for residents. For example, they moved bedrooms to opposite sides of the apartment to muffle noise and distractions, which are typically clustered together. They also incorporated multiple outdoor spaces for each unit, creating easy access to fresh air and sunshine.

The pandemic has highlighted what people really need in their homes, and architecture trends in the future will reflect that, they say. “The main lesson to take away is that the lifespan of a building will be longer than the interval between pandemics,” they say. “From a sustainability standpoint, we should endeavor to build buildings that last ‘forever.’ It means we need to design for future pandemics.”

Mosquito-Trapping Mastermind Kennyjie

Kennyjie

(Eric Lau)

When industrial designer Kennyjie (he prefers to go by just his first name) was 12 years old, he contracted dengue fever—a flu-like disease transmitted by mosquitos—while living in Indonesia. “Being able to afford long hospital care, I was one of the privileged kids who walked out alive,” he says. Mosquito-borne disease prevention has remained an issue close to his heart, and it’s the driving force behind his new innovation, Quito.

While visiting Bali, Kennyjie noticed that the mosquito prevention tactics were inconvenient and ineffective, so he set out to design his own. Quito, which made the International Top 20 for the James Dyson Award in 2020, uses a simple chemical reaction to produce carbon dioxide and an artificial human odor to attract mosquitoes, and then it vacuums them into a chamber. By luring mosquitoes in instead of repelling them, Quito reduces their local population and the chance of disease transmission. It’s designed to be placed in tropical resorts to lessen the likelihood of an outbreak as people travel in and out of the region.

Kennyjie traveled through multiple Indonesian villages to ensure that Quito’s design is informed by the local culture, economy and climate so that it fits into the “geographical context in which it is needed,” he says. This year, Kennyjie will continue running more tests from his home in Melbourne, Australia, until international borders are open and he can start pilot tests in Indonesia.

#Nature

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thisbluespirit · 5 years

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Ten Favourite Characters

Memed from @mariocki And despite the numbering, not really in strict order, although I tried and no. 1 is definitely no. 1.

10. Kathryn Janeway

"There are three things to remember about being a starship captain. Keep your shirt tucked in, go down with the ship... and never abandon a member of your crew."

Okay, basically, me and Star Trek is: I like it if it has Captain Janeway in it. If it does not have Captain Janeway in it, I might go so far as to mildly enjoy it from time to time, but Janeway is the essential thing. I walked in one day and saw Kate Mulgrew on the screen and sat down immediately, eventually asking my friend, in hushed tones of awe, “Who is that?” (I’m not even joking.) (I don’t hate the rest of ST or anything, but, you know. It’s not Doctor Who and it doesn’t have Captain Janeway in it, what can I say? I like the one with the whales, too?)

9. Jenkins

“Magic is not an exact science. If it were, it would be science.”

With Jenkins (John Larroquette), The Librarians takes a mythical character I never gave a thought to, or imagined I would want to, and gave me All the Feels about him. By the end of S1, I was drawing hearts around Jenkins every time he appeared and that happens all too rarely at the moment, so I think he has to go on this list. (I’m a Doctor Who fan, how could I not love a grumpy immortal caretaker with a magic door and a heart of gold?) *draws hearts around him regardless of his disapproval and annoyance at said hearts*

8. G’kar

“No dictator, no invader can hold an imprisoned population by force of arms forever. There is no greater power in the universe than the need for freedom. Against that power tyrants and dictators cannot stand. The Centauri learned that lesson once. We will teach it to them again. Though it take a thousand years, we will be free.”

G’kar’s arc is just beautiful (from semi-villainous schemer to unwilling religious icon), as is every part of his epic relationship with Londo, and he is my favourite. There was a period in S1 where there were about 7 episodes without him and I nearly died. And, I mean, I really like Babylon 5 and everybody else in it, but that was just cruel and unusual. Thank goodness it never happened again. Andreas Katsulas was just brilliant.

7. Seventh Doctor

"That's what guns are for. Pull the trigger, end a life. Simple, isn't it? Why don't you do it, then? Look me in the eye, pull the trigger, end my life. Why not?"

What do you do with a thing like Doctor Who in a meme like this? I could do my top ten fave characters just in Doctors, let alone companions, before we even get started on minor characters, so let’s have my favourite Doctor do the honours for everyone here. He hates unrequited love, loathes bus stations (terrible places, full of lost souls and lost luggage), and knows we all have a universe of our own terrors to face, and he’ll be back in time for tea.

With Ace, of course, who is also the best. As are so many of the rest.

6. Servalan

"There’s no one as free as a dead man.”

It’s so hard to choose Blake’s 7 characters! They’re all so fascinating, that’s why it still gets watched and loved. If I’m honest it’s Vila or Servalan, and today I went for Servalan, which probably will save anyone from getting stabbed in the back. I love me an evil lady and Jacqueline Pearce’s Servalan is probably my favourite villain in anything, especially in terms of characters who remain irredeemable, but are also plausible and interesting. She’s certainly the most fabulously dressed, anyway.

5. Lynda Day

”I don’t do conversation. Everything I say comes out like an order. I say hello and people salute!”

Like every other girl of my very specific age demographic in the UK (Press Gang was watched by something ridiculous like 80% of its target teenage audience, which I don’t think has ever happened before or since), I wanted to grow up to be Lynda Day, dictator editor of the Junior Gazette. It’s probably as well that none of us did, but she was the very best, and I remain grateful to have had her around, and Julia Sawalha was always fantastic right from trespassers will be exterminated to there are crocodiles.

4. Silver

Sapphire: “You’re supposed to lose sometimes.”

Silver: “Oh! I wondered why I wasn’t having any fun.”

So, Sapphire and Steel are pretty amazing, right, but let’s be honest, I was always watching this for the red-headed guy in Assignments 3 & 6, and he did not disappoint. I mean, Sapphire & Steel is the weirdest, creepiest low-budget thing with our srs bsns inhuman heroes and then suddenly David Collings turns up and makes light-bulbs glow and turn into glitter. He is the sparkliest, no one can deny it and he can slide right into the perfect OTP and turn it into the even shinier OT3. Not that that stops him flirting with everyone else as well, of course.

3. Regina Mills

“There's no redemption for me. There's only suffering. Because now I have a curse. The curse of knowing the difference between good and evil. And I'm caught between them. If I revert, I lose everyone I love. Henry, my friends, everyone. And if I go forward trying to be good, I have to live with my past darkness and all its well-deserved consequences... But for me, it's a simple choice really. I'd rather suffer than see that pain on the people I care about. This is my fate.“

Regina gets to go from being Once Upon A Time’s original OTT fairytale villain to hero (and plays out every possible shade in between, plus various cursed and alternate versions of herself, not to mention her evil doppelganger), and Lana Parrilla’s just amazing at All The Things. I went from not even liking her to somehow letting her rip my heart right out of my chest when I wasn’t looking. (Bonus shout out to her mother Cora Mills/Queen of Hearts (Barbara Hershey) too.)

2. Frank Marker

"Have you heard about old heads on young shoulders? Well, you employ me, you get an old head. You get old shoulders, too, but then no-one's perfect."

I’m with @mariocki here: Alfred Burke’s run down, small-time enquiry agent in Public Eye (TV 1965-75) is one of the most utterly 3D, real and compelling TV characters I’ve ever come across. (With a bonus mention for the very lovely Helen Mortimer (Pauline Delany), because I might even love her a tiny bit more than Frank some days. <3)

1. Ruth Evershed

“I like to think no institution in the country is safe from me.”

I had to think about this long and hard a while ago, and Nicola Walker’s Ruth from Spooks | MI5 is still probably my favourite character in anything. It’s tough. But RUTH. I love her so much. There’s a S2 DVD commentary with Howard Brenton and Nicola Walker on her first episode and basically Nicola just sits there going, “I love Ruth.” And I’m: “ME TOO.” From her first appearance, dropping the files, buggering the Home Office, and breaking the desk lamp to more serious, angsty, later stuff, she’s just so damn good at her job (and in Spooks that’s a tragedy waiting to happen).

It’s really hard to list only 10 though. I’m an all-eras Doctor Who fan. I’d need three posts at least just to start on that, I keep falling in love with characters from ancient telly and every now and then I even watch new things...

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cctinsleybaxter · 5 years

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2019 in books

The year’s contenders for the good, the bad, and the rest. I used to make a list of the ten best books I read all year, a tradition encouraged by my mom as far back as high school, but out 2019′s twenty-six mediocre offerings it didn’t really come together. Instead I’ve decided to break my ‘honorable mentions’ category into three subsections that I hope you’ll enjoy. In order of when read, not in order of affection:

Honorable mentions [books I liked; 3+ star material]

The Fifth Season by N.K Jemisin was given to me as a Christmas present last year, and I wasn’t sure how much I would like it since I don’t really do high fantasy. Rules need not apply; I loved the world building and narrative structure, and the characters were so much better than I’m used to even when their arcs seemed familiar at first glance. I guessed what was going on with the formatting maybe a little too quickly, but even then it was emotionally engaging and I was eager to keep reading and see what happened next. Haven’t devoured a book that way in years.

The Periodic Table by Primo Levi has been on my list for a while; as a memoir told through short stories it’s hit-or-miss, but so worth it. I especially loved getting to read his early attempts at fiction, and the chapter Phosphorus regarding his first real job as a chemist in 1942 (his description of his absolute disgust at having to work with rabbits, the feel of their fur and the “natural handle” of the ears is a personal favorite.) This excerpt is one I just think about a lot because it’s full of small sweet details and so kindly written:

“[my father] known to all the pork butchers because he checked with his logarithmic ruler the multiplication for the prosciutto purchase. Not that he purchased this last item with a carefree heart; superstitious rather than religious, he felt ill at ease breaking the kasherut rules, but he liked prosciutto so much that, faced by the temptation of a shop window, he yielded every time, sighing, cursing under his breath, and watching me out of the corner of his eye, as if he feared my judgement or hoped for my complicity.”

Slowing Down from Mouthful of Birds by Samanta Schweblin is a one-page short story, but I’m including it because it’s the best in the book and one of the better stories I’ve read in general. I won’t spoil it for you since it’s more poem than anything else (and you can read the whole thing here.)

A Short Film About Disappointment by Joshua Mattson deserves to be lower in the order because it’s like. Bad. But I couldn’t help but have a self-indulgent kind of love for it, since it’s a book about white boy ennui told through movie reviews. It definitely gets old by the end (one of those things where you can tell the author lost steam just as much as his leading man), but parts of it are so well-written and the concept clever. 80+ imaginary movie reviews and psychosomatic possession by your traitorous best friend.

The Gone-Away World by Nick Harkaway has one of the greatest twists I’ve ever read in a novel, and no that’s not a spoiler, and yes I will recommend it entirely on that basis. It does its job as a multi-year sci-fi epic; reminds me a lot of Walter Moer’s early stuff in that it’s a bit Much(tm) but still a good mixture of politics and absurdity and absolute characters. Tobemory Trent was my favorite of the ensemble cast (but also boy do I wish men would learn how to write women.)

My Only Wife by Jac Jemk is a novella with only two characters, both unnamed, a man describing fragmented memories of his wife. It has me interested in Jemck’s other writing because even though I didn’t love it she writes beautifully; reading her work is like watching someone paint. The whole thing has a very indie movie feel to it (no scene of someone peeing but there SHOULD be), which I don’t think I’ve experienced in a story like this before and would like to try again.

Mentions [books I really wanted to like but my GOD did something go wrong]

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou is the most comprehensive history we have of Elizabeth Holmes and her con-company Theranos. It’s incredibly well-researched and absolutely fascinating, but veers into unnecessary pro-military stuff in one chapter (’can you believe she tricked the government?’ yes i can, good for her, leave me alone) and carries an air of racism directed at Holmes’ partner and the Pakistani people he brings onto the company. Carreyrou works for WSJ so I don’t know what I expected.

Circe by Madeline Miller was fun to read and goes down like a glass of iced tea on a hot day, but leaves a bit of an unpleasant aftertaste. It says a lot of things that seem very resonant and beautiful but ultimately ring hollow, and the ending is too safe. Predictable and inevitable.

I was also bothered about Circe’s relationships with Odysseus and Telemachus as a focal point, not because they’re father and son (Greek mythology ethics : non-committal hand gesture) but because it’s the traditional “I used to like bold men but now I like... sensitive men.” Which as a character arc feels not unrealistic but very boring. You close the book and realize you’re not nine and reading your beat-up copy of Greek Myths, you’re an adult reading a New York Times Bestseller by a middle aged straight white woman.

Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor could have been the best thing I read all year and I’m miserable at how bad it ended up being. The concept is excellent; a thirteen-year-old girl goes missing in a rural English village, and every chapter chronicles a passing year. I knew it would be slow, I like slow, but nothing happens in this book and it ends up it feeling like Broadchurch without the detectives. Plus, McGregor, you know sometimes you can take a moral stance in your story and not just make everything a grey area? Especially with subplots that deal with things like pedophilia and institutional racism?

Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl by Andrea Lawlor is about a twenty-something who moves from Iowa to San Francisco in the 90s and explores gender and sexuality through shapeshifting. It was something I really thought I would like and maybe even find helpful in my own life, but I couldn’t stand a single one of the characters or the narration so that’s on me! It does contain one of my favorite lines I’ve read in a long time though:

“And anyway, weren’t French boys supposed to be like Giovanni, waiting gaily for you in their rented room and actually Italian?”

Dishonorable mentions [there’s no saving these fellows]

The Butterfly Garden by Dot Hutchinson was supposed to be a fun easy-to-read thriller and what can I say except what the jklfkhlkj;fkfuck. It very quickly goes from ‘oh hey I read books like this when I was 15’ to ‘oh the girl who intentionally gets kidnapped by a wealthy serial killer is accidentally falling in love with his son and can’t stop talking about his eye color now huh.’ I felt like I was losing my mind; why did grown adults give this 5 stars on Goodreads.

The Beautiful Bureaucrat by Helen Phillips is supposedly surrealist horror fiction about working an office job in a new town, and reminded me of that rocky third or fourth year when I really started hating Welcome to Night Vale. All spark no substance, and even less fun because you know it’s going nowhere. I’ve also realized this past year that I cannot stand stories about women where their only personality trait is the desire to have children. People will throw the word ‘Kafkaesque’ at anything but here it was just insulting.

The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai alternates point of view between Yale, a gay man living in Chicago in the late 80s and watching his friends die, and Fiona, the straight younger sister of one of those friends now looking for her erstwhile daughter in 2018. It was nominated for the 2018 Pulitzer, and part of my interest was in wondering how we were going to connect the plot lines of ‘the personal cost of the AIDS crisis’ with ‘daughter lost to a cult.’

The answer is that we don’t. The book is well-researched and acclaimed beyond belief, but it is SUCH a straight story. Yale’s arc is fueled by the drama of his boyfriend cheating on him and infecting them both, Fiona is painted as a witness to tragedy and encouraged to share their stories with her own daughter. “You’re like the Mother Theresa of Boys Town” one of the men complains bitterly of her, and the claim goes undisputed. It’s a story that makes a lot of statements about love and families and art that I feel we’ve all heard before to much greater effect.

#long post #stardate 2k19 #apologies for any typoes or bad wording i've been trying to write and edit this for like the past week and a half

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ohcndrea · 5 years

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ft. Bruce Pearson, Ida Pearson, Zachary Pearson, Andrea Pearson, Louie Pearson contents: history, quick facts, and too much detail for a bunch of npc’s written by: sam, a dumbass triggers: death i mean its family history my guys

Bruce Robert Pearson ( father )

better known as: Bruce

faceclaim: Blair Underwood

age: fifty three

occupation: head of paediatric surgery at Yale New Haven Hospital

relationship status: married

zodiac: taurus

Ida Bente Pearson ( mother )

better known as: Ida

faceclaim: Vibeke Boe

age: fifty one

occupation: professor at Yale Law School ( field: family and juvenile law )

relationship status: married

zodiac: capricorn

Zachary Dante Pearson ( older brother )

better known as: Zach

faceclaim: Jacob Artist

age: twenty six

occupation: medical student at Yale School of Medicine ( focus: neurology )

relationship status: single

zodiac: pisces

Andrea Mona Pearson

better known as: Drea

faceclaim: Alisha Boe

age: seventeen

occupation: junior student at Broadripple Academy

relationship status: single

zodiac: aquarius

Louie ( family greyhound )

better known as: Lou or Louie

faceclaim: imagine jenna marbles dog kermit but bigger

age: six

zodiac: aries

History

A successful legacy has been something that the Pearson family has been after for some time now, Zachary and Andrea are only the latest generation to feel its pressure. Before them was their father, Bruce. The son of an ambitious small business man who never got as far as he wanted to. Now, that’s not to say he was unsuccessful. He was quite successful, by anyone’s standards. He just never got as far as he dreamed, as far as he believed he deserved to go. So when he didn’t make it, who else would carry the expectation but his oldest son: Bruce Pearson. Luckily, Bruce had already inherited his father’s ambitious spirit. He was energetic, charismatic, and above all, eager to please. But like all children that hold their parents hopes and dreams on their shoulders, he eventually let his father down. You see, while he had the perfect attitude for it, he had no desire to be a businessman. Especially not one trapped in one town, in one experience for the rest of his life. He once described it to feel as though he were picking out his own casket.

Ida had always felt similar, except about everything. Every part of her early life felt as though she were organising everything for once she was gone. A feeling that was largely due to her family’s attitude towards death, which was always prepared for it. The person Ida is now doesn’t believe in curses, but when she was young it was almost impossible not to. With each birth that happened in her family, there was a death. Usually within a month, sometimes within a week or even the same day. And Ida as a child had felt especially cursed for the night she was born a true horror occurred. As her parents shared the news of the birth of another beautiful, healthy baby girl they found out their family in law had been involved in a home robbery gone wrong. Ida’s cousin first, suspected to have scared the burglars followed by his parents as they reacted to the loss. Three deaths for one life. While her parents tried to protect her from that mentality, the rest of the family was not so forgiving. She grew up constantly thinking that the universe would eventually have to balance itself out and take her too, that she was constantly out running death. It left her torn between trying to make the absolute most of everything she did and not trying at all. As she got older, she chose the former.

The two initially met during a very important part of their lives. Bruce had moved across country to study biology to prepare for his eventual medical school application and not business like his father had hoped. Left most of his life behind and started pursuing a life he believed was the one that would bring him the most joy. The one where he could contribute while not wanting to roll over and die for how bored he was. Ida was on exchange in the states, getting her first experience of the world without her family right behind her, breathing down her neck and reminding her of something that happened minutes before her birth. Deciding what she wanted to do and what she wanted to pursue. Her mind was set on psychology. Study of the mind so maybe she could figure out the intricacies of her own family’s mentality. But it was her meeting with Bruce that lead her to the path she eventually followed to became a lawyer and later a law professor. While during their first meeting the two did not form a romantic connection they were exactly what the other needed at the time. Someone to believe in them, encourage them, and push them to achieve all they ever wanted to. After a semester of becoming close friends, Ida returned to Norway and tragically they grew apart. There was no hard feelings, simply distance.

Their reunion years later was not planned but was certainly not unwelcome. While neither of them believed in fate, both would agree their reunion was extraordinarily lucky. Even if it was a dislocated shoulder on Ida’s part that ended up bringing them back together. Their relationship progressed quickly, catching up at bars turned to dinner dates at nice restaurants, leaving a few things at each others places for convenience turned to applying for apartments together with both their needs in mind. And finally, pregnancy quickly followed by engagement. It wasn’t until that point that the two really started making an effort in becoming closer with each of their families. Realising then that they didn’t want to do all of that alone. Ida desperately wanted her father to walk her down the isle and Bruce wanted to see her dance with her father at their wedding reception as much as he wanted to hear his mother say how proud she was of him while they danced at the same reception. There was some push back, first, neither of their families had really known how serious the relationship had been. They felt cheated and betrayed from being kept so distant and in the dark about their childrens’ lives. And then they found out Ida was already pregnant. Both families could easily be described as conservative or at least, traditional for seperate reasons. While Bruce had his doubts, his parents were rather devout Christians. They definitely believed that the child could not be born out of wedlock, but didn’t want their son to be married simply because he knocked “some girl” up. It took a fair amount of convincing to assure them that the news of the coming baby had only sped up the proposal he had already been planning. Ida’s family had their reservations for different reasons. Like the Pearsons, they too were traditional and believed that the baby could not be born out of wedlock, and were upset the engagement had happened before Bruce had asked the family for permission. But they also feared for the curse. While Ida had fled to America to escape the constant reminder that her life had taken three of her relatives, it quickly returned to discussion the moment it was revealed she was pregnant. Would the curse worsen because the baby would be a bastard? Not exactly the thing a pregnant woman wants to hear, but a question she heard whispered a lot whenever her family gathered.

But they prevailed. Through judgement and the stress of pregnancy, they made it to the other side and were wed. They had their first ‘legal’ wedding in America, in a church in Bruce’s hometown of Anderson, Georgia. A gorgeous affair that at least Ida’s parents and elder sister were able to make it to until they were able to have their second wedding in Trondheim, Norway, Ida’s hometown. Between the two weddings however, they had to wait for their child to be born. Mostly because Ida couldn’t travel too far, especially not internationally being almost full term. Partially because the closer the baby’s due date came, the more she feared the curse. Would her family blame her beautiful baby for another loss like they had her? Or would his birth finally take her life, had she invited death to come and collect her after so many years and leave her son without a mother? One thing she hadn’t considered, was that her son’s birth would take the life of someone she loved so dearly. The same day Zachary was born, Ida’s own father passed on from cardiac arrest. While Zachary was welcomed so warmly by the American family, he did not receive such love when they made it to Trondheim a few months later. Of course the family was excited for the new baby, they were always excited for a new baby, and her mother was delighted to be a grandmother. They were just in mourning, they couldn’t celebrate while in mourning. Something that took Zachary many years to understand was that while his American family didn’t even know of the curse, to his Norwegian family he was a reminder of tragedy. And he lived too far away, saw them too little to ever truly become anything else to them.

After all the high expectations and pressure Bruce and Ida had received from their own parents throughout their lives you might expect they wouldn’t put the same pressure on their own children. That they might have learned from their parents and not want their children to experience what they did, but unfortunately for Zachary, and later Andrea, this was not the case. They did believe they had learned from their parents, that they now knew exactly what kind of life their children needed to lead in order to be successful and start a legacy that wasn’t family curses and small businesses. While he was still quite young, Zachary was allowed to participate in the extra curricular he wanted, it wasn’t until much later that it was claimed that most of them were a distraction from his studies. While he was pushed into it, he did always enjoy science and math and what his parents considered the “useful” subjects at school. He loved science fair time because it usually meant he got to mess around, talk very loudly about something his classmates likely didn’t know, and if he picked the right thing, he could make something explode. But nothing compared to being able to run around a court or field, be a part of a team, and have people cheering you on. Little league basketball practice and games were his favourite times of the week and he always came back from them with flushed cheeks, wobbly knees, and giant smile.

However, it didn’t last. While people with exceptional talent and incredible dedication and a large amount of luck could make it as a star athlete, Zach’s parents didn’t think it was reasonable to dream for something that only might happen even if he did everything right. They had a vision of something far, far more reliable for their son. A reliable, and impressive career was what they had in mind. Something like medicine, law, or science. Something that would certainly add to their legacy with hard work and next to no luck necessary. It wasn’t that they told young Zach that he had to give up basketball and focus on his studies, no they would never. They simply said that basketball was a distraction, that his academics were what would take him far. And with that he started to develop a fear that if he got distracted, he would fail, let his parents down. He couldn’t just aim high, he had to reach his dreams too. Or, at the very least, his ‘realistic’ dreams.

By the time Ida was pregnant with her second child, Zachary was already well on his way to being everything her and Bruce had dreamed of for their children and their legacy. That, thankfully for Andrea, would lift some of the expectation off of her. While she was expected to continue the legacy they were trying to build, if she didn’t, at least Zach was already doing it. Learning from their ‘mistake’ with their eldest child, Drea was only encouraged to take up extra curricular as hobbies. Hobbies that had designated times and either didn’t distract from her studies or encouraged them. As much as they tried to push her towards the latter, Drea seemed to stick more with the former and on top of that did everything she could to let hobby time bleed out and take on more of her life. She was always pushing to work longer on an art project, or run a few more laps, anything that would get her away from study groups and mathletics and debate teams. As she started to get older, she realised it was easier to just pretend she was interested in academics and keep her hobbies more secret from her parents. Put on the show they wanted to see. And thus, the legacy of hiding things from their parents continued. Not exactly the successful legacy the Pearsons had in mind, but they were all very, very good at it.

Now don’t forget the curse, because it reared its ugly head for Andrea’s birth too. The Norwegian side of the family was worried again, especially after Zachary’s birth seemed to have robbed them of a beloved father, uncle, and grandfather. And Ida was scared too, she desperately wanted another child but she was taunted by the idea that it would steal another family member. But once again she persevered with the help from her husband and this time, her son too. And when Andrea was born, Ida thought that the curse might have finally ended. And so did her family. It was a cautious joy, and rightfully so because it didn’t last very long. Exactly one month after Andrea’s birth, Bruce’s mother passed away. While the time between birth and death, and the fact that it was a member of Bruce’s family and not Ida’s made it hard to connect it to the curse, the fact that Andrea grew up to be so similar to her grandmother did not go unnoticed. Rebellious spirit paired with artistic flair. Almost as though her grandmother’s spirit had passed on to her. But unlike Zach, Andrea had the opportunity to at least try and fight that association in the minds of her and her grandmother’s loved ones. While they didn’t live very close, Connecticut was closer to Georgia than Trondheim and that was enough. The person who took the longest to forget, was Bruce. He saw so much of his mother in his little girl, which only made him want her to succeed even more, push her even harder for success to honour the memory of his mother.

Boarding school was never something that had been envisioned by Bruce and Ida. Private school certainly, they wanted to give their children the best chance they possibly could and they’d decided that public school was too focused on sports and arts, not the academic vision they held. Of course, Zachary being Andrea’s elder by almost ten years, was the first to reach high school. Several schools were thrown around but they eventually landed on an all boys catholic boarding school for Zachary. Catholic hadn’t been their first choice but religious education was hard to avoid not only within New England but also within private education. But it made their elders (what remained of them) happy, and it was a good school so off Zachary went. To get his education and start to gain some independence. And because he graduated as valedictorian and made it into Yale with dreams of med school, his parents considered it a job well done and were already picking out boarding schools for Andrea while she was still a few years off high school at all. But truth was, he had hated it. Being so surrounded by school and people he didn’t like, and then going home to relax and find his parents only ever wanted to talk about school too? It was suffocating. But it was easier to suck it up, and accept that it was so he would have the best possible chance to succeed and live up to his parents expectations, than it was to try and tell anyone how he felt, much less his parents. So that’s what he did. What he didn’t consider, was that his little sister would have to go to boarding school too, given his success.

coming eventually: a seperate post specifically detailing drea’s relationships with members of her family bc thats a whole other 10 paragraphs lmao

#this long as shit and is still the summarised version #but its been sitting in my drafts for too long and i like the graphic too much so : )))))) here it is #( about. )

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hiyo-silver · 6 years

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Untouchable - Goodbye, Stanley Uris

Summary: Stanley is struggling with the death of his boyfriend and with the issues in his friend group, seeing overdose as his only way out.

Chapters 1 2 3 4 5 6 + ao3

Stan can only sit in his room in silence. He’s always had perfect attendance though high school after his health issues in middle school. He has to make up for it for his college applications. But now, after the death of his boyfriend and the deaths of two boys he’d hardly known, the world feels like it’s crashing down around him and he’s now unsure, unsure which parts really matter in anything. He stays home from school one day, and then another, it doesn’t feel worth it, everyone is only dying after all, there isn’t much else to learn in a classroom. Only in the real world.

He finally comes to school by Thursday, his mother’s voice ringing in his head. “Living life is like riding a bicycle, if you just stop, you fall off entirely,” she’d told him on Tuesday, and on Wednesday, and the phrase that has pushed him to school on Thursday. He can’t let a few incidents in his senior year of highschool dictate his entire course of life, he wants things to get better. He floats his way through the day, his legs like jelly and a seasick feeling in his stomach. He’s the weakest link, he’s decided that much. The weakest link who’d been at the top until the tower came crumbling down.

The ones who are or were once popular are most at risk for suicide it seems, becoming more evident with every note they find next to a body. The non popular kids seem near unaffected. Stan gets it. He can almost feel Eddie’s pain, and Henry’s, and Patrick’s. It all becomes too much sometimes and the school bell rings in his ears like a harrowing scream, leaving him pale and shaking as he goes to hide in the boys bathroom instead of going to chemistry, one of the classes he’s had with Eddie before.

Bev hasn’t been speaking to him, Bill seems as out of it as he is. He hates that with Bill being so new to the group that all this was here to welcome his senior year, the year they were going to make the best of his life, but they’re far past that now, there’s much larger things going on, much bigger problems to solve. He wonders how much Bill understands. He vaguely remembers one of the years he’d mostly been off of school that he heard about a kid losing his brother to a killer, that kid had been Bill Denbrough. He’s a guy who definitely understands loss, but he doesn’t know how to approach him for help in a time like this, both of them hurting.

He doesn’t know how to approach anyone for help, he now realizes that he’s basically in this alone. He looks himself in the mirror, deep dusty half moons under his eyes and a complexion that rivals that of Casper’s. He sighs, turning the knob on the sink with a silence breaking shriek, letting the cool water pool in his palms, bringing it to his face, trying to splash some more healthful color back into his skin. He closes his eyes, his hands not leaving his face, his movements slow and achy.

He finally removes his hands, letting his eyelids slowly rise to see if his reflection has changed. All he sees behind him is Beverly, immediately swiveling around to view her. She’s always followed he and Eddie in here, it’s just habit to now. “Stanley,” she starts, her tone rough and sharp as ever, a bit jarring to Stan’s half awake state, bringing him right back to reality.

“Hey, Bev,” he smiles softly to her, shoving his hands into the deep pockets of the sweatpants he has on, he’d never dress this way in public usually, but putting in effort to his appearance feels too much, drowning too deeply into the deep dark sea of depression he’s only understood once before, when his grandfather had passed away, and even that doesn’t compare to the deep feeling of tragedy currently running through his veins. It’s not like his grandfather, his grandfather had been old and deteriorating, he’d been ill. Eddie hadn’t, he’d been young and boisterous and passionate in everything he did. Especially in how he loved. How he loved his friends and how he loved Stan, and even in how he loved himself on occasion.

“What are you wearing?’ is the exact next sentence out of Beverly’s mouth, obviously not in the mood to be gentle and tender. Some people react to grief by wallowing in sorrow until they become emotionless, others fill with a rage that cannot be matched by someone who is not dealing with a loss. Her own aesthetic has stayed the same, the piercing emerald green of her skirt matching the green of her eyes. Her eyebrows carved perfectly into an aggressive arch that matches her stance near perfectly.

“Uh-” Stan scratches the back of his neck nervously, not liking the version of his best friend in front of him. She’s much too tense. She’s always been strong and powerful and knows what she wants, but she’d never scolded him this way, especially in times of trouble. She’d usually been there with Eddie and with a carton of ice cream for them all to finish together, though they’d always put in extra hours at the gym the next day. They can hurt, but they can’t fall out of their reputation, it’s taken too much to uphold all these years to slip up. “Pajamas, taking an off day,” he admits softly, picking at the skin around his fingernails.

“Since when does Stanley Uris take an ‘off day’?” she asks, her voice raising and begging him to test her, “Your reputation is my reputation, we don’t take off days, Stan,” she warns him, “You’ve already been out of school and you lost all your snapchat streaks and you’re just not you, Stan. You’re being dumb, don’t let this take over your life,” she demands, a layer of thin concern beneath her voice, though she’d never dare let it rise to the surface and show. She doesn’t want to be weak, it’s one of her biggest fears. Ever since she moved in with her aunt, she’s taught her only to be proud of herself and speak her mind, and that she just needs to keep going. Like with Andrea Uris’ bike analogy, she can’t just fall off.

“Can you just leave me alone? I need to take a piss,” Stan says, his own voice becoming sharp and angry and near cruel in return. He doesn’t want to cope with this anymore. Like he’s known since it happened, he’s the weakest link here. Beverly scoffs and storms out, the door swinging back and forth in her wake as she stomps out and back to class, “Goodbye, Stanley,” being her last words to him. She doesn’t want him anymore. He can only think of how much of an embarrassment he is.

He looks at himself in the mirror again and he sees a monster. The monster is him. He can’t save his boyfriend and he can’t be of comfort to his friend either. Weakest link. He doesn’t know how to go on. Weakest link. He can’t uphold Eddie’s legacy. He’s the weakest link. He reaches in his bag for his anxiety medication. He’s the weakest link. He hears it over and over in his head, like a million departed souls chanting in his ears as they await his arrival. Weakest link, weakest student. Unworthy. He uncaps the orange bottle, he fills his hand with water, swallowing a few of the pills and letting his anxiety make the room spin and swirl around him, washing it down with the handful of sink water. Weakest. He takes another handful of pills and lets the powdery circles drag down his throat. He drops the bottle, and drops to the floor. Link.

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grigori77 · 6 years

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2018 in Movies - My Top 30 Fave Movies (Part 1)

30. MANDY – easily the weirdest shit I saw in 2018, this 2-hour-plus fever dream fantasy horror is essentially an extended prog-rock video with added “plot” from Beyond the Black Rainbow director Panos Cosmatos. Saying that by the end of it I was left feeling exhausted, brain-fried and more than a little weirded-out might not seem like much of a recommendation, but this is, in fact, a truly transformative viewing experience, a film destined for MASSIVE future cult status. Playing like the twisted love-child of David Lynch and Don Coscarelli, it (sort of) tells the story of lumberjack Red Miller (Nicolas Cage) and his illustrator girlfriend Mandy Bloom (Andrea Riseborough), who have an idyllic life in the fantastically fictional Shadow Mountains circa 1983 … at least until Mandy catches the eye of Jeremiah Sand (Linus Roache), the thoroughly insane leader of twisted doomsday cult the Children of the New Dawn, who employs nefarious, supernatural means to acquire her. But Mandy spurns his advances, leading to a horrific retribution that spurs Red, a traumatised war veteran, to embark on a genuine roaring rampage of revenge. Largely abandoning plot and motivation for mood, emotion and some seriously trippy visuals, this is an elemental, transcendental film, a series of deeply weird encounters and nightmarish set-pieces that fuel a harrowing descent into a particularly alien, Lovecraftian kind of hell, Cosmatos shepherding in one breathtaking sequence after another with the aid of skilled cinematographer Benjamin Loeb, a deeply inventive design team (clearly drawing inspiration from the artwork of late-70s/early 80s heavy metal albums) and a thoroughly tricked-out epic tone-poem of a score from the late Jôhan Jôhannsson (Sicario, Arrival, Mother!), as well as one seriously game cast. Cage is definitely on crazy-mode here, initially playing things cool and internalised until the savage beast within is set loose by tragedy, chewing scenery to shreds like there’s no tomorrow, while Riseborough is sweet, gentle and inescapably DOOMED; Roach, meanwhile, is a thoroughly nasty piece of work, an entitled, delusional narcissist thoroughly convinced of his own massive cosmic importance, and there’s interesting support from a raft of talented character actors such as Richard Brake, Ned Dennehy and Bill Duke. This is some brave, ambitious filmmaking, and a stunning breakthrough for one of the weirdest and most unique talents I’ve stumbled across a good while. Cosmatos is definitely one to watch.

29. THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER’S WEB – back in 2011, David Fincher’s adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s runaway bestseller The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo became one of my very favourite screen thrillers EVER, a stone-cold masterpiece and, in my opinion, the superior version of the story even though a very impression Swedish version had broken out in a major way the year before. My love for the film was coloured, however, by frustration at its cinematic underperformance, which meant that Fincher’s planned continuation of the series with Millennium Trilogy sequels The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest would likely never see the light of day. Even so, the fan in me held out hope, however fragile, that we might just get lucky. Seven years later, we have FINALLY been rewarded for our patience, but not exactly in the fashion we’ve been hoping for … Fincher’s out, Evil Dead-remake and Don’t Breathe writer-director Fede Alvarez is in, and instead of continuing the saga in the logical place the makers of this new film chose the baffling route of a “soft reboot” via adapting the FOURTH Millennium book, notable for being the one released AFTER Larsson’s death, penned by David Lagercrantz, which is set AFTER the original Trilogy. Thing is, the actually end result, contrary to many opinions, is actually pretty impressive – this is a leaner, more fast-paced affair than its predecessor, a breathless suspense thriller that rattles along at quite a clip as we’re drawn deeper into Larsson’s dark, dangerous and deeply duplicitous world and treating fans to some top-notch action sequences, from a knuckle-whitening tech-savvy car chase to a desperate, bone-crunching fight in a gas-filled room. Frustratingly, the “original” Lisbeth Salander, Rooney Mara, is absent (despite remaining VERY enthusiastic about returning to the role), but The Crown’s Claire Foy is almost as good – the spiky, acerbic and FIERCELY independent prodigious super-hacker remains as brooding, socially-awkward, emotionally complex and undeniably compelling as ever, the same queen of screen badasses I fell in love with nearly a decade ago. Her investigative journalist friend/occasional lover Mikael Blomkvist is, annoyingly, less well served – Borg Vs McEnroe star Sverrir Gudnasson is charismatic and certainly easy on the eyes, but he’s FAR too young for the role (seriously, he’s only a week older than I am) and at times winds up getting relegated to passive observer status when he’s not there simply to guide the plot forward; we’re better served by the supporting cast, from Lakeith Stanfield (Get Out, Sorry to Bother You) as a mysterious NSA security expert (I know!) to another surprisingly serious turn (after Logan) from The Office’s Stephen Merchant as the reclusive software designer who created the world-changing computer program that spearheads the film’s convoluted plot, and there’s a fantastically icy performance from Blade Runner 2049’s Sylvia Hoeks as Camilla Salander, Lisbeth’s estranged twin sister and psychopathic head of the Spiders, the powerful criminal network once controlled by their monstrous father (The Hobbit’s Mikael Persbrandt). The film is far from perfect – the plot kind runs away with the story at times, while several supposedly key characters are given frustratingly little development or screen-time – but Alvarez keeps things moving along with typical skill and precision and maintains a tense, unsettling atmosphere throughout, while there are frequently moments of pure genius on display in the script by Alvarez, his regular collaborator Jay Basu and acclaimed screenwriter Steven Knight (Dirty Pretty Things, Locke) – the original novel wasn’t really all that great, but by just taking the bare bones of the plot and crafting something new and original they’ve improved things considerably. The finished product thrills and rewards far more than it frustrates, and leaves the series in good shape for continuation. With a bit of luck this time it might do well enough that we’ll finally get those other two movies to plug the gap between this and Fincher’s “original” …

28. ISLE OF DOGS – I am a MASSIVE fan of the films of Wes Anderson. Three share placement in my all-time favourite screen comedies list – Grand Budapest Hotel, The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou and, of course, The Royal Tenebaums (which perches high up in my TOP TEN) – and it’s always a pleasure when a new one comes out. 2009’s singular stop-motion gem Fantastic Mr Fox showed just how much fun his uniquely quirky sense of humour and pleasingly skewed world-view could be when transferred into an animated family film setting, so it’s interesting that it took him nearly a decade to repeat the exercise, but the labour of love is writ large upon this dark and delicious fable of dystopian future Japanese city Megasaki, where an epidemic of “dog flu” prompts totalitarian Mayor Kobayashi (voiced by Kunichi Nomura) to issue an edict banishing all of the city’s canine residents to nearby Trash Island. Six months later, Kobayashi’s nephew Atari (newcomer Koyu Rankin) steals a ridiculously tiny plane and crash-lands on Trash Island, intent on rescuing his exiled bodyguard-dog Spots (Liev Schreiber); needless to say this is easier said than done, unforeseen circumstances leading a wounded Atari to enlist the help of a pack of badass “alpha dogs” voiced by Anderson regulars – Rex (Edward Norton), King (Bob Balaban), Boss (Bill Murray) and Duke (Jeff Goldblum) – and nominally led by crabby, unrepentantly bitey stray Chief (Bryan Cranston), to help him find his lost dog in the dangerous wilds of the island. Needless to say this is as brilliantly odd as we’ve come to expect from Anderson, a perfectly pitched, richly flavoured concoction of razor sharp wit, meticulously crafted characters and immersive beauty. The cast are, as always, excellent, from additional regulars such as Frances McDormand, Harvey Keitel and F. Murray Abraham to new voices like Greta Gerwig, Scarlett Johansson, Ken Watanabe and Courtney B. Vance, but the film’s true driving force is Cranston and Rankin, the reluctant but honest relationship that forms between Chief and Atari providing the story with a deep, resonant emotional core. The first rate animation really helps – the exemplary stop-motion makes the already impressive art of Mr Fox seem clunky and rudimentary (think the first Wallace & Gromit short A Grand Day Out compared to their movie Curse of the Were-Rabbit), each character rendered with such skill they seem to be breathing on their own, and Anderson’s characteristic visual flair is on full display, the Japanese setting lending a rich, exotic tang to the compositions, especially in the deeply inventive environs of Trash Island. Funny, evocative, heartfelt and fiendishly clever, this is one of those rare screen gems that deserves to be returned to again and again, and it’s definitely another masterpiece from one of the most unique filmmakers working today.

27. VENOM – when Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man saga came to a rather clunky end back in 2007, it felt like a case of too many villains spoiling the rumble, and it was pretty clear that the inclusion of bad-boy reporter Eddie Brock and his dark alter ego was the straw that broke that particular camel’s back. Venom didn’t even show up proper until almost three quarters of the way through the movie, by which time it was very much a case of too-little-too-late, and many fans (myself included) resented the decidedly Darth Maul-esque treatment of one of the most iconic members of Marvel’s rogues’ gallery. It’s taken more than a decade for Marvel to redress the balance, even longer than with Deadpool, and, like with the Merc With a Mouth, they decided the only way was a no-holds-barred, R-rated take that could really let the beast loose. Has it worked? Well … SORT OF. In truth, the finished article feels like a bit of a throwback, recalling the pre-MCU days when superhero movies were more about pure entertainment without making us think too much, just good old-fashioned popcorn fodder, but in this case that’s not a bad thing. It’s big, loud, dumb fun, hardly a masterpiece but it does its job admirably well, and it has one hell of a secret weapon at its disposal – Tom Hardy. PERFECTLY cast as morally ambiguous underdog investigative journalist Eddie Brock, he deploys the kind of endearingly sleazy, shit-eating charm that makes you root for him even when he acts like a monumental prick, while really letting rip with some seriously twitchy, sometimes downright FEROCIOUS unhinged craziness once he becomes the unwilling host for a sentient parasitic alien symbiote with a hunger for living flesh and a seriously bad attitude. This is EASILY one of the best performances Hardy’s ever delivered, and he entrances us in every scene, whether understated or explosive, making even the most outlandish moments of Brock’s unconventional relationship with Venom seem, if not perfectly acceptable, then at least believable. He’s ably supported by Michelle Williams as San Francisco district attorney Anne Weying, his increasingly exasperated ex-fiancée, Rogue One’s Riz Ahmed as Carlton Drake, the seemingly idealistic space-exploration-funding philanthropist whose darker ambitions have brought a lethal alien threat to Earth, and Parks & Recreation’s Jenny Slate as Drake’s conflicted head scientist Nora Skirth, while there’s a very fun cameo from a particularly famous face in the now ubiquitous mid-credits sting that promises great things in the future. Director Ruben Fleischer brought us Zombieland and 30 Minutes Or Less, so he certainly knows how to deliver plenty of blackly comic belly laughs, and he brings plenty of seriously dark humour to the fore, the rating meaning the comedy can get particularly edgy once Venom starts to tear up the town; it also fulfils the Marvel prerequisite of taking its action quota seriously, delivering a series of robust set-pieces (the standout being a spectacular bike chase through the streets of San Fran, made even more memorable by the symbiote’s handy powers). Best of all, the film isn’t afraid to get genuinely scary with some seriously nasty alien-induced moments of icky body horror, captured by some strangely beautiful effects works that brings Venom and his ilk to vivid, terrifying life. Flawed as it is, this is still HUGE fun, definitely one of the year’s biggest cinematic guilty pleasures, and I for one can’t wait to see more from the character in the near future, which, given what a massive success the film has already proven at the box office, seems an ironclad certainty.

26. SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY – the second of Disney’s new phase of Star Wars movies to feature in the non-trilogy-based spinoff series had a rough time after its release – despite easily recouping its production budget, it still lost the $100-million+ it spent on advertising, while it was met with extremely mixed reviews and shunned by many hardcore fans. I’ll admit that I too was initially disappointed with this second quasi prequel to A New Hope (after the MUCH more impressive Rogue One), but a second, more open-minded viewing after a few months to ruminate mellowed my experience considerably, the film significantly growing on me. An origin story for the Galaxy’s most lovable rogue was always going to be a hard sell – Han Solo is an enjoyable enigma in The Original Trilogy, someone who lives very much in the present, his origins best revealed in the little details we glean about him in passing – but while it’s a flawed creation, this interstellar heist adventure mostly pulls off what was intended. Like many fans of The Lego Movie, I remain deeply curious about what original director duo Phil Lord and Chris Miller could have achieved with the material, but I wholeheartedly approved Disney’s replacement choice when he was announced – Ron Howard is one of my favourite “hit-and-miss” directors, someone who’s made some clunkers in his time (The Da Vinci Code, we’re looking at you) but can, on a good day, be relied on to deliver something truly special (Willow is one of my VERY FAVOURITE movies from my childhood, one that’s stood up well to the test of time, and a strong comparison point for this; Apollo 13 and Rush, meanwhile, are undeniable MASTERPIECES), and in spite of its shortcomings I’m ultimately willing to consider this one of his successes. Another big step in the right direction was casting Hail, Caesar! star Alden Ehrenreich in the title role – Harrison Ford’s are seriously huge shoes to fill, but this talented young man has largely succeeded. He may not quite capture that wonderful growling drawl but he definitely got Han’s cocky go-getter swagger right, he’s particularly strong in the film’s more humorous moments, and he has charisma to burn, so he sure makes entertaining viewing. It also helps that the film has such a strong supporting cast – with original Chewbacca Peter Mayhew getting too old for all this derring-do nonsense, former pro basketball-player Joonas Suotamo gets a little more comfortable in his second gig (after The Last Jedi) in the “walking carpet” suit, while Woody Harrelson adds major star power as Tobias Beckett, Han’s likeably slippery mentor in all things criminal in the Star Wars Universe, and Game of Thrones’ Emilia Clarke is typically excellent as Han’s first love Qi’ra, a fellow Corellian street orphan who’s grown up into a sophisticated thief of MUCH higher calibre than her compatriots. The film is dominated, however, by two particularly potent scene-stealing turns which make you wonder if it’s really focused on the right rogue’s story – Community star Donald Glover exceeds all expectations as Han’s old “friend” Lando Calrissian, every bit the laconic smoothie he was when he was played by Billy Dee Williams back in the day, while his droid companion L3-37 (voiced with flawless comic skill by British stage and sitcom actress Phoebe Waller-Bridge) frequently walks away with the film entirely, a weirdly flirty and lovably militant campaigner for droid rights whose antics cause a whole heap of trouble. The main thing the film REALLY lacks is a decent villain – Paul Bettany’s oily kingpin Dryden Voss is distinctive enough to linger in the memory, but has criminally short screen-time and adds little real impact or threat to the main story, only emphasising the film’s gaping, Empire-shaped hole. Even so, it’s still a ripping yarn, a breathlessly exciting and frequently VERY funny space-hopping crime caper that relishes that wonderful gritty, battered old tech vibe we’ve come to love throughout the series as a whole and certainly delivers on the action stakes – the vertigo-inducing train heist sequence is easily the film’s standout set-piece, but the opening chase and the long-touted Kessel Run impress too – it only flags in the frustrating and surprisingly sombre final act. The end result still has the MAKINGS of a classic, and there’s no denying it’s also more enjoyable and deep-down SATISFYING than the first two films in George Lucas’ far more clunky Prequel Trilogy. Rogue One remains the best of the new Star Wars movies so far, but this is nothing like the disappointment it’s been made out to be.

25. AQUAMAN – the fortunes of the DC Extended Universe cinematic franchise continue to fluctuate – these films may be consistently successful at the box office, but they’re a decidedly mixed bag when it comes to their quality and critical opinion, and the misses still outweigh the hits. Still, you can’t deny that when they DO do things right, they do them VERY right – 2017’s acclaimed Wonder Woman was a long-overdue validation for the studio, and they’ve got another winner on their hands with this bold, brash, VERY ballsy solo vehicle for one of the things that genuinely WORKED in the so-so Justice League movie. Jason Momoa isn’t just muscular in the physical sense, once again proving seriously ripped in the performance capacity as he delivers rough, grizzled charm and earthy charisma as half-Atlantean Arthur Curry, called upon to try and win back the royal birthright he once gave up when his half-brother Prince Orm (Watchmen’s Patrick Wilson), ruler of Atlantis, embarks on a brutal quest to unite the seven underwater kingdoms under his command in order to wage war on the surface world. Aquaman has long been something of an embarrassment for DC Comics, an unintentional “gay joke” endlessly derided by geeks (particularly cuttingly in the likes of The Big Bang Theory), but in Momoa’s capable hands that opinion has already started to shift, and the transition should be complete after this – Arthur Curry is now a swarthy, hard-drinking alpha male tempered with a compellingly relatable edge of deep-seeded vulnerability derived from the inherent tragedy of his origins and separation from the source of his immense superhuman strength, and he’s the perfect flawed action hero for this most epic of superhero blockbusters. Amber Heard is frequently as domineering a presence as Atlantean princess Mera, a powerful warrior in her own right and fully capable of heading her own standalone adventure someday, and Wilson makes for a very solid and decidedly sympathetic villain whose own motivations can frequently be surprisingly seductive, even if his methods are a good deal more nefarious, while The Get Down’s Yahya Abdul-Mateen II is more down-and-dirty BAD as David Kane, aka the Black Manta, a lethally tech-savvy pirate who has a major score to settle with the Aquaman; there’s also strong support from the likes of Willem Dafoe as Curry’s sage-like mentor Vulko, Dolph Lundgren as Mera’s father, King Nereus, the ever-reliable Temuera Morrison as Arthur’s father Thomas, and Nicole Kidman as his ill-fated mother Atlanna. Director James Wan is best known for establishing horror franchises (Saw, Insidious, The Conjuring), but he showed he could do blockbuster action cinema with Fast & Furious 7, and he’s improved significantly with this, delivering one gigantic action sequence after another with consummate skill and flair as well as performing some magnificent and extremely elegant world-building, unveiling dazzling, opulent and exotic undersea civilizations that are the equal to the forests of Pandora in Avatar, but he also gets to let some of his darker impulses show here and there, particularly in a genuinely scary visit to the hellish world of the Trench and its monstrous denizens. It may not be QUITE as impressive as Wonder Woman, and it still suffers (albeit only a little bit) from the seemingly inherent flaws of the DCEU franchise as a whole (particularly in yet another overblown CGI-cluttered climax), but this is still another big step back in the right direction, one which, once again, we can only hope they’ll continue to repeat. I’ll admit that the next offering, Shazam, doesn’t fill me with much confidence, but you never know, it could surprise us. And there’s still Flashpoint, The Batman and Birds of Prey to come …

24. THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI – filmmaker brothers Martin and John Michael McDonagh have carved an impressive niche in cinematic comedy this past decade, from decidedly Irish breakout early works (In Bruges from Martin and The Guard and Calvary from John) to enjoyable outsider-looking-in American crim-coms (Martin’s Seven Psychopaths and John’s War On Everyone), and so far they’ve all had one thing in common – they’re all BRILLIANT. But Martin looks set to be the first brother to be truly accepted into Hollywood Proper, with his latest feature garnering universal acclaim, massive box office and heavyweight Awards recognition, snagging an impressive SEVEN Oscar nominations and taking home two, as well as landing a Golden Globe and BAFTA for Best Picture. It’s also the most thoroughly AMERICAN McDonagh film to date, and this is no bad thing, Martin shedding his decidedly Celtic flavours for an edgier Redneck charm that perfectly suits the material … but most important of all, from a purely critical point of view this could be the very BEST film either of the brothers has made to date. It’s as blackly comic and dark-of-soul as we’d expect from the creator of In Bruges, but there’s real heart and tenderness hidden amongst the expletive-riddled, barbed razor wit and mercilessly observed, frequently lamentable character beats. Frances McDormand thoroughly deserved her Oscar win for her magnificent performance as Mildred Hayes, a take-no-shit shopkeeper in the titular town whose unbridled grief over the brutal rape and murder of her daughter Angela (Kathryn Newton) has been exacerbated by the seeming inability of the local police force to solve the crime, leading her to hire the ongoing use of a trio of billboards laying the blame squarely at the feet of popular, long-standing local police Chief Bill Willoughby (Woody Harrelson). Needless to say this kicks up quite the shitstorm in the town, but Mildred stands resolute in the face of seemingly overwhelming odds, refusing to back down. McDormand has never been better – Mildred is a foul-mouthed, opinionated harpy who tells it like it is, no matter who she’s talking to, but there’s understandable pain driving her actions, and a surprisingly tender heart beating under all that thorniness; Harrelson, meanwhile, is by turns a gruff shit-kicker and a gentle, doting family man, silently suffering over his own helplessness with the dead end the case seems to have turned into. The film’s other Oscar-winner, Sam Rockwell, also delivers his finest performance to date as Officer Jason Dixon, a true disgrace of a cop whose permanent drunkenness has marred a career which, it turns out, began with some promise; he’s a thuggish force-of-nature, Mildred’s decidedly ineffectual nemesis whose own equally foul-mouthed honesty is set to dump him in trouble big time, but again there’s a deeply buried vein of well-meaning ambition under all the bigotry and pigheadedness we can’t help rooting for once it reveals itself. There’s strong support from some serious heavyweights, particularly John Hawkes, Caleb Landry Jones, Peter Dinklage, Abbie Cornish and Manchester By the Sea’s breakout star Lucas Hedges, while McDonagh deserves every lick of acclaim and recognition he’s received for his precision-engineered screenplay, peerless direction and crisp, biting dialogue, crafting a jet black comedy nonetheless packed with so much emotional heft that it’ll have you laughing your arse off but crying your eyes out just as hard. An honest, unapologetic winner, then.

23. RED SPARROW – just when you thought we’d seen the last of the powerhouse blockbuster team of director Francis Lawrence and star Jennifer Lawrence with the end of The Hunger Games, they reunite for this far more adult literary feature, bringing Jason Matthews’ labyrinthine spy novel to bloody life. Adapted by Revolutionary Road screenwriter Justin Haythe, it follows the journey of Russian star ballerina Dominika Egorova (Lawrence) into the shadowy world of post-Glasnost Russian Intelligence after an on-stage accident ruins her career. Trained to use her body and mind to seduce her targets, Dominika becomes a “Sparrow”, dispatched to Budapest to entrap disgraced CIA operative Nate Nash (Joel Edgerton) and discover the identity of the deep cover double agent in Moscow he was forced to burn his own cover to protect. But Dominika never wanted any of this, and she begins to plot her escape, no matter the risks … as we’ve come to expect, Jennifer Lawrence is magnificent, her glacial beauty concealing a fierce intelligence and deeply guarded desperation to get out, her innate sensuality rendered clinical by the raw, unflinching gratuity of her training and seduction scenes – this is a woman who uses ALL the weapons at her disposal to get what she needs, and it’s an icy professionalism that informs and somewhat forgives Lawrence’s relative lack of chemistry with Edgerton. Not that it’s his fault – Nate is nearly as compelling a protagonist as Dominika, a roguish chancer whose impulsiveness could prove his undoing, but also makes him likeable and charming enough for us to root for him too. Bullhead’s Matthias Schoenarts is on top form as the film’s nominal villain, Dominika’s uncle Ivan, the man who trapped her in this hell in the first place, Charlotte Rampling is beyond cold as the “Matron”, the cruel headmistress of the Sparrow School, Joely Richardson is probably the gentlest, purest ray of light in the film as Dominika’s ailing mother Nina, and Jeremy Irons radiates stately gravitas as high-ranking intelligence officer General Vladimir Andreievich Korchnoi. This is a tightly-paced, piano wire-taut thriller with a suitably twisty plot that constantly wrong-foots the viewer, Lawrence the director again showing consummate skill at weaving flawlessly effective narrative with scenes of such unbearable tension you’ll find yourself perched on the edge of your seat throughout. It’s a much less explosive film than we’re used to from him – most of the fireworks are of the acting variety – but there are moments when the tension snaps, always with bloody consequences, especially in the film’s standout sequence featuring a garrotte-driven interrogation that turns particularly messy. The end result is a dark thriller of almost unbearable potency that you can’t take your eyes off. Here’s hoping this isn’t the last time Lawrence & Lawrence work together …

22. WIDOWS – Steve McQueen is one of the most challenging writer-directors working in Hollywood today, having exploded onto the scene with hard-hitting IRA-prison-biopic Hunger and subsequently adding to his solid cache of acclaimed works with Shame and 12 Years a Slave, but there’s a strong argument to be made that THIS is his best film to date. Co-adapted from a cult TV-series from British thriller queen Lynda La Plante by Gone Girl and Sharp Objects-author Gillian Flynn, it follows a group of women forced to band together to plan and execute a robbery in order to pay off the perceived debt incurred by their late husbands, who died trying to steal $2 million from Jamal Manning (If Beale Street Could Talk’s Brian Tyree Henry), a Chicago crime boss with ambitions to go legit as alderman of the city’s South Side Precinct. Viola Davis dominates the film as Veronica Rawlings, the educated and fiercely independent wife of accomplished professional thief Harry (a small but potent turn from Liam Neeson), setting the screen alight with a barely restrained and searing portrayal of devastating grief and righteous anger, and is ably supported by a trio of equally overwhelming performances from Michelle Rodriguez as hard-pressed mother and small-businesswoman Linda Perelli, The Man From UNCLE’s Elizabeth Debicki as Alice Gunner, an abused widow struggling to find her place in the world now she’s been cut off from her only support-mechanism, and Bad Times At the El Royale’s Cynthia Eriyo as Belle, the tough, gutsy beautician/babysitter the trio enlist to help them once they realise they need a fourth member. Henry is a deceptively subtle, thoroughly threatening presence throughout the film as Manning, as is Get Out’s Daniel Kaluuya as his thuggish brother/lieutenant Jatemme, and Colin Farrell is seemingly decent but ultimately fatally flawed as his direct political rival, reigning alderman Jack Mulligan, while there are uniformly excellent supporting turns from the likes of Robert Duvall, Carrie Coon, Lukas Haas, Jon Bernthal and Kevin J. O’Connor. McQueen once again delivers an emotionally exhausting and effortlessly powerful tour-de-force, wringing out the maximum amount of feels from the loaded and deeply personal human interactions on display throughout, and once again proves just as effective at delivering on the emotional fireworks as he is in stirring our blood in some brutal set-pieces, while Flynn help to deliver another perfectly pitched, intricately crafted script packed with exquisite dialogue and shrewdly observed character work which is sure to net her some major wins come Awards season. Unflinching and devastating but thoroughly exhilarating, this is an extraordinary film (and if this was a purely critical list it would surely have placed A LOT higher), thoroughly deserving of every bit of praise, attention and success it has and will go on to garner. An absolute must-see.

21. JURASSIC WORLD: FALLEN KINGDOM – Colin Trevorrow’s long-awaited 2015 Jurassic Park sequel was a major shot in the arm for a killer blockbuster franchise that had been somewhat flagging since Steven Spielberg brought dinosaurs back to life for the second time, but (edgier tone aside) it was not quite the full-on game-changer some thought it would be. The fifth film, directed by J.A. Bayona (The Impossible, A Monster Calls) and written by Trevorrow and his regular script-partner Derek Connolly (Safety Not Guaranteed and JW, as well as Warner Bros’ recent “Monsterverse” landmark Kong: Skull Island), redresses the balance – while the first act of the film once again returns to the Costa Rican island of Isla Nublar, it’s become a very different environment from the one we’ve so far experienced, and a fiendish plot-twist means the film then takes a major swerve into MUCH darker territory than we’ve seen so far. Giving away anything more does a disservice to the series’ most interesting story to date, needless to say this is EASILY the franchise’s strongest feature since the first, and definitely the scariest. Hollywood’s most unusual everyman action hero, Chris Pratt, returns as raptor wrangler Owen Brady, enlisted to help rescue as many dinosaurs as possible from an impending, cataclysmic volcanic eruption, but in particular his deeply impressive trained raptor Blue, now the last of her kind; Bryce Dallas Howard is also back as former Jurassic World operations manager turned eco-campaigner Claire Dearing, and her His Girl Friday-style dynamic with Pratt’s Brady is brought to life with far greater success here, their chemistry far more convincing because Claire has become a much more well-rounded and believably tough lady, now pretty much his respective equal. There are also strong supporting turns from the likes of Rafe Spall, The Get Down’s Justice Smith, The Vampire Diaries/The Originals’ breakout star Daniella Pineda, the incomparable Ted Levine (particularly memorable as scummy mercenary Ken Wheatley) and genuine screen legend James Cromwell, but as usual the film’s true stars are the dinosaurs themselves – it’s a real pleasure seeing Blue return because the last velociraptor was an absolute treat in Jurassic World, but she’s clearly met her match in this film’s new Big Bad, the Indoraptor, a lethally monstrous hybrid cooked up in Ingen’s labs as a living weapon. Bayona cut his teeth on breakout feature The Orphanage, so he’s got major cred as an accomplished horror director, and he uses that impressive talent to great effect here, weaving an increasingly potent atmosphere of wire-taut dread and delivering some nerve-shredding set-pieces, particularly the intense and moody extended stalk-and-kill stretch that brings the final act to its knuckle-whitening climax. It’s not just scary, though – there’s still plenty of that good old fashioned wonder and savage beauty we’ve come to expect from the series, and another hefty dose of that characteristic Spielbergian humour (Pratt in particular shines in another goofy, self-deprecating turn, while Smith steals many of the film’s biggest laughs as twitchy, out-of-his-comfort-zone tech wizard Franklin). Throw in another stirring and epic John Williams-channelling score from Michael Giacchino and this is an all-round treat for the franchise faithful and blockbuster fans in general – EASILY the best shape the series has been in for some time, it shows HUGE promise for the future.

#mandy #the girl in the spider's web #isle of dogs #venom #solo a star wars story #aquaman #three billboards movie #red sparrow #widows #jurassic world fallen kingdom #2018 in movies

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sigmastolen · 6 years

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so i know my previous time through ent i was definitely mad at 2.21 “cogenitor” but... i think i’m changing my tune. i’m willing to give the show much more latitude overall this time, and while some episodes are still truly terrible, this one is actually not.

trip makes poor decisions throughout, but the episode knows it and doesn’t give him a pass -- both t’pol and archer, his only superiors on the ship, reprimand him and as much as we see trip’s side of the story and sympathize with it, t’pol is consistently also positioned as justified. and honestly it’s extra tough to position t’pol as justified given the audience bias toward, well, human rights. as a 21st century american, conscious of humanity’s history of slavery and imperialism and treating people who aren’t like us as subhuman, uncivilized, savages, animals -- i’m definitely on trip’s side. honestly we should all be on trip’s side, because trip’s side is the side of the long arc of history bending toward justice. it’s super effective to have the three lead-est lead characters on different sides of this issue, and to have archer and t’pol, who are both the most senior officers and most primary characters, in opposition to the audience’s stance. “cogenitor” gives us a truly thorny ethical quandary and it doesn’t let us off easy. there are no right answers here, and no satisfying resolution, only bad choices and tragedy.

i’m willing to give trip much more latitude this time through ent, as well -- i’m much more fond of him in general than i was, having seen how much he changes and grows over four seasons, i guess? so this time when does something awful it’s much more of a cringey “oh, bb, no” reaction than actual annoyance

it’s very similar to what i feel about early bashir, or tng when romance, especially laforge when women

charles the cogenitor is a charismatic guest star, and though the actor playing them is a woman, becky wahlstrom, i’m impressed by how consistently -- persistently, perhaps -- ungendered the performance is (despite (in despite of?) trip calling charles “she” the whole time*). i like to think, in my heart of hearts, that this is in part because of levar burton having in mind some of frakes’ comments about things he wished were different in tng 5.17 “the outcast,” particularly his wish that soren were played by a male actor.

*this is both a case of “ugh, whatever, b&b,” as well as extremely in-character for trip as a str8 white man who canonically has difficulty understanding viewpoints other than his own; see also trip’s s1 incomprehension of vulcan culture and norms

this episode makes me wonder if the vissians ever became part of the federation. technologically they’re far more advanced than any of the founding peoples, but given the rules about what kinds of societies can join, i can’t see them being welcomed unless the third gender gets equality and it seems unlikely since charles killed themself and there were no other cogenitors on the ship to tell their story and i can’t see any of the other vissians we met bucking the status quo.

the b plots are also pretty enjoyable here, honestly. reed and seven of nine’s mom bang! archer goes joyriding with ambassador g’kar!

it’s nice to see archer get to shed his command persona and just be a person, having a good time hitting it off with someone new. and it’s extremely effective and affecting to see him have to shut away that open, friendly part of himself to become the diplomatic starfleet captain again when just a scene ago he was drennik’s buddy.

good job, levar burton. good job, connor trinneer, jolene blalock, and scott bakula. good job, becky wahlstrom and andreas katsulas. even good job b&b. “cogenitor” is a solid episode of trek.

#space: the final frontier #thinky thoughts #sigma watches trek #sigma watches ent

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softshelldefence · 4 years

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I'm not too invested in the idea of domestic bliss, but I'd like to have a daughter, to raise and protect and nurture. I want this even though this country is a terrible place for women and girls who are just existing trying to get by day to day. I don't know what Andrea's daddy is thinking right now, his only child gone, her last moments alone and scared spent with attackers who had not the slightest bit of compassion. I am so sorry that we live in country like this and I am so sorry that we will move on so fast from this tragedy until it happens again in the near future.

I hate that I have internalised misogyny. I hate that I sometimes blame women for not being as smart as I am to recognise how much men really do not like us. I hate how annoyed I feel at the naivete of young girls who think older men actually like them. I hate that there is still annoyance laced in those words. Why do I not direct all of my hatred against the perpetrators of the violence I see in the emergency department? Invariably they are men, once it was a toxic woman. But overwhelmingly the perpetrators of violence are men and I waste my anger on the victims whose decisions and feelings are shaped by their own experiences of which I have no knowledge or understanding so who am I to judge?

All of my male friends: all of you are to blame. Men, stop talking shit about doing better when you all can't help but do worse because it's so easy to be worse. It's encouraged and enabled by society in the biggest and most minuscule of ways. It's encouraged by your friends, your bros, your brethrens who chortle at your violent conquests. It's encouraged by the misogynistic memes and jokey tweets about girls not giving you the time of day because they're bitches and don't know what's good for them. I have absolutely no faith in male allyship and will never depend on their protection. So many of the men I know don't know what rape is unless it's the bad guy jumping out from behind the dumpster in a dark alley story. If I were to scream at them that all those "grey area" conquest stories were actually rape, I'd definitely be told I was over reacting.

I'm just so upset about everything and what that young girl had to go through, my consciousness is just consumed with it. I think about her daddy waiting in his chair in the gallery for her to get home and then her not getting there. I am already sorry for the next parent who has to go through this.

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ash-lee-can · 7 years

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Along The Road (Chapter 6)

Previous Chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Pairings: Richonne, Shane/Andrea

Rating: PG-13

A/N: I know some people don’t read on fanfiction.net, so here’s the latest chapter on here...

This fic is not Beta'd therefore all mistakes are mine...

Chapter 6

The air was freezing, but they could only feel it on their faces as they were all heavily clothed everywhere else. Their footsteps gave a soft crunch as Michonne and her friends stepped on fresh fallen snow in the backyard of Shane and Andrea's home. It was the same backyard that she, Rick and Shane goofed around in for years in their teens, back when Shane's parents owned it. The backyard felt like it was only type of backyard of that size you'd see in the South without costing you a fortune. Just simply the norm.

It was a bizarre feeling seeing her old friends again. The first was Glenn, pregnant Maggie, who was waddling through due to her sizable belly, and their son Hershel, also known as JR, coming up to the front steps. She thought back to when Glenn was just that young, cute, awkward pizza boy who was always the one to deliver the food when she and Andrea, who were grown, practicing lawyers, having their Girls Night In with the young, fiesty, college girl, Maggie. Watching how they interacted now, she would have thought that they were that old couple with a life time of forever love you'd see in the commercials. They reminded her of her grandparents.

There was a woman named Carol with her college freshman daughter, Sophia. Michonne met her when she defended her in a case against the murder of her husband. It was a case of self defense against the abusive bastard and Michonne was determined to make sure she got off. Rick had called her up as soon as the woman was arrested at the scene. Michonne had already defended Shane, who was beating him for using "excessive force" towards that same man the year before when they had answered a 911 call and had to break up a "domestic dispute" against the two. The whole town knew the what was happening, but most of them stood by, not wanting to interfere in someone's marriage which resulted in bloodshed. Rick, secretly, asked for her help. Michonne was not about to let that woman rot for that monster's deserving demise. The woman and her daughter had no family therefore Rick and Shane decided to make them her family, her daughter even becoming Carl's best friend. She had become a woman of strength that had risen from her struggle and pain, providing for the life that both she and her daughter deserved.

There was Sasha and Tyrese. The latter was a former professional football player for the Miami Dolphins. He moved from retirement central to Atlanta after he was forced to retire himself after a bad injury in his five year career. With his younger sister planning to move to Atlanta, big brother decided to tag along. Andrea bonded with Sasha with their secret love for The Spice Girls, while Shane became fascinated becoming friends with a NFL player into becoming genuine friends. Michonne met them at a funeral a few years ago and got to know them both at the wake. Although Tyrese was the famous NFL player, Sasha was a hero back where they were from saving a supposedly doomed orphanage in a fire. Michonne determined that Tyrese was the protective teddybear and that Sasha was the headstrong woman of determination.

Aaron and his boyfriend, Eric, showed up. Andrea and Michonne met Aaron after the Westboro Baptist Church got off from criminal charged when they bombed his well community center, when they learned of his sexuality in Atlanta years ago. The duo were outraged by the outcome after following the high profiled case, contacted him, offered their services to him, and convinced him to sue for defamation, which would help financially with the damages. The duo won of course and stayed friends with him ever since. Andrea continues to work as his main lawyer since Michonne moved to France.

She didn't know Tara and Rosita before today. Andrea told her that Tara had lost her dad, sister and niece to a very messy, tragic car accident in Atlanta. Tara, who was fresh out of the police, was on duty to the messy pile up on the highway when she discovered her family's demise and left for a smaller town as a deputy. It amazed Michonne how someone who'd experience such tragedy could still live the life as a goofball. The King's County Police Department took the young one under their wings and made her family. Her girlfriend Rosita was a mechanic, who Tara first met when she took her sister's car to get fixed one day as a way to heal her grieving. They hit it off immediately, turning from fast best friends into something more.

She looked over to loner redneck Daryl Dixon. She was still amazed that they'd became friend considering that the family he'd come from. She'd never forget the way his older brother would assault her with racial remarks. Daryl was always stuck right behind him, always reading to jump in and fight by his brother's side, despite never engaging in the verbal combat, at least not towards her in particular for whatever reason, even though she was sure had with others. When Merle got locked up, again, Rick helped him come into his own. Sure Daryl would never become a cop considering his family's history with them, but there was something he could do. He found a way to better himself and his situation. By the time the old man, who owned the autoshop he and Merle worked in for years passed away, he'd saved up enough money to purchase the business. It was the same autoshop Rosita worked at. When she saw him again years back, she almost couldn't believe that he was the same. He had his brother's temper every now and again, and every now and again would find himself into trouble for getting ahead of himself and stubborness, but he seemed genuine when it came to wanting helping people and overall in a better place compared to where he used to be when they were kids.

Then there was the Grimes family. Michonne's mind went back to that morning, when she ended up to being treated to alone with adorable, scruffy bearded Rick Grimes...

Early That Morning

The aroma of Southern cooking invaded her nostrils as she once again woke in the semi-familiar surroundings. With the smell of such deliciousness, and the Christmas Eve feast she had the night before, she just knew that she was going put on a few pound just from stay there.

She glanced at her side in the bed and saw her son, Andre, still sleeping soundly with his light snores. She slowly climbed out of bed and headed for the bedroom door. She didn't know what to expect when she stepped into the living, but the sight taken her aback.

On the pullout couch Carl hanging on off one side of the the pullout bed, face down, most likely drooling, still wearing his boots and on top of the comforter that was there. He had gone out to hang, most likely party, with friends after dinner and must had come back late while everyone was still sleeping. She remembered the days where after going out late at night to party with with Shane and Rick in their younger days and sneaking back into her grandparents house before dawn so they wouldn't know she was out all night drinking cheap beer and dancing the night away.

Next to him was little Judith cuddled up into her big brother, almost using him as some form of a blanket, despite the comforter that she was under. Carl's arm was wrapped around her adorableness in a natural instinctive protective way. Maybe he was a security blanket? Maybe she was just reading too much into it? Either way, her heart warmed at and made her give a soft smile at the sight. She didn't imagine having any more children, but if she did, she can imagine her son doing the same to his younger sibling.

Then there was Rick, laying on the other side of the bed, just snoring. It wasn't obnoxious sounding, but it was definitely louder than what her son was doing in the guest room. She chuckled at how cute it was. She used to hate when Mike would snore in her ear and but for some reason the snoring sound in the room wasn't bothering her.

Still slightly tired, and not wanting to disturb the sleeping family, she headed for the kitchen to see if she find some caffeine. Hopefully there was some herbal tea she liked and not just coffee. Also it was too early in the day for delicious hot chocolate.

She walked into the cozy kitchen to various pots simmering and the oven baking. There wasn't anyone in sight overseeing the cooking, which unnerved her, until she spotted the note on the refrigerator.

'Shane said I forgot to pick up some stuff,

so we need to find a store that's open so

we can get it real quick. We'll be back

hopefully soon.

-Andrea

P.S. Check on the damn food!

-Shane'

She could imagine the debate between the two of them at like three in the morning about the food. Andrea , honestly, wasn't much of a cook. It was decent, but very basic. Shane was someone who took much pride in his cooking. He used say that his older brother Negan would tell him that, "A way to a man's heart is through his stomach, but a way into a woman's panties is the high skill level of working a skillet!" As a shirt chaser, it was a skill that Shane took seriously and tried to master as much as he possibly could, starting from Michonne's own grandmother. When they dated in their early teens, he tried to win her grandmother over by taking cooking lessons from her at the Dinner Bell diner. He took pride in his over 25 years of culinary work. And there wasn't a woman who didn't appreciate his efforts, then he wouldn't even bother and further.

The aroma of the delicious food over came her. There was no way she wasn't going to take a peek. She lifted a lid on one pot, a steam of Southern ecstacy invaded her lungs and pores. She saw a pot of cooking collard green with ham hocks just simmering away and her mouth began to water. She slowly lowered her hand in the pot of a taste-

"Checking the food right?"

She clamped the lip back onto the pot as the unexpected voice startled her. She glances behind her to see Rick standing on the other end of the kitchen, freshly woken with his messy loose curls and scruffy beard, wearing a t-shirt and sweatpants, along with an unexpected imprint against the pants she wasn't expecting to see at that very moment.

She looked up to realize that he giving her a playful smirk. She had only looked down below for a half a second but, did he notice? After a couple a seconds of slight panic, she realized that he amusement was from her food thieving. Not perving eyes.

She nervously smiled back to cover her unexpected nerves. "Well, figured I'd take a peek since Shane and Andy left out."

Rick scratched the back of his curls, still waking up. "Let me guess. Andrea forgot something, again?"

"Seems like."

They stared at each other in silence, both unsure what to say next. Then Michonne remembered the reason she came in the kitchen in the first place.

"Hey, you wouldn't happen to know if they have any tea?"

Rick perked up and walked over to her. "Yeah. Let me grab that for you." He squeezed through between her and the wall, holding onto her side for a second, to reach the top in the cabinet above one the counter she was next to. She jolted a little bit when his front accidentally brushed against her backside. This was not how she was planning on spending her morning.

"Andrea hides it up here when Shane pranked her once by pretending to throw it out once." He pulled down a gallon sized ziplock bag with various types of packaged tea bags and K-Cups and handed over to her. "So you got your green, black, white, chamomile and some other teas I can't remember." Michonne raised an eyebrow at his knowledge of various teas other than diabetically sweet. "Andrea threw away Shane's coffee once and ranted to us about our horrible coffee habits. The prank was in retaliation."

She laughed at the thought. It still amazed her how the two stayed together. Both of them were pretty stubborn people and yet they still worked. "Thanks."

She looked into the bag, spotting the white tea she was hoping for grabbed a coffee mug. She glanced over to Rick, who was pouring himself a cup of leftover coffee that Shane had in the coffee pot. "I guess the 'coffee is bad' rant didn't take huh."

He looked back at her and blushed beneath his thick beard before turning back to his drink. "Old habits die hard I guess."

"Maybe I can do a much better job of convincing you than Andrea could?" Wait! What? She didn't mean for it to come off a flirtatious as she did. Simple friendly banter. Or maybe it was just in her head?

Rick turned around again with his mug in hand. He kept his head down, not looking her in the eye, but she could tell his whole face was a little red now. "We'll see." He headed out of the kitchen, maybe a little quicker than he probably should have.

Michonne groaned to herself in embarrassment. Maybe some nice hot tea will help her get her head straight this morning. Andrea might have been right though. She needed to get laid.

Present Time

Michonne came out of the morning memory as a quick gush of wind pushed against her face a little. She looked ahead and saw the other game players standing around further into the yard, getting ready to pick teams. She looked back onto the back porch to see Andrea, Maggie, Carol, Sophia and Eric sitting down, watching Andrea, Judith and JR play around, ready for the game to start. She hustled to catch up with the rest of them so they could pick teams.

"Alright." Shane, tossing the football to himself in the air, while he addressed everyone. "Rick and I are captains, as usual. Last year's loser go first."

Tyrese, counting everyone, in his head notices something was off. "We don't have an even number though."

Shane smirks a little. "Don't worry. My extra man should be here any moment." Michonne could tell he had something up his thermal sleeves. "Pick first Rick." He tossed the ball to the other captain for his first pick.

Rick caught it easily and carefully scanned the group, looking for the first choice he already decided on.

"Oh fuck you, Grimes!" Shane threw his gloved hands in the air. Rick laughed at the outburst, to everyone's else's confusion. He knew Shane was going to pick Michonne first, but being last year's loser had it's benefits. "It's fine. You two were always against me anyways." As he looked around for his next pick. Just as he was about to call Sasha's name-

"You damn shitheads just couldn't wait for me, could ya?" A loud, male voice carried through the yard as he swaggered through the snow towards him. He was tall and handsome for sure. Michonne almost didn't recognize him, but as he gotten closer, his swagger, voice and that shit eating grin that formed behind that, she recognized that it was Shane's older brother. "Little Ricky's and his toy soldiers are in to get one hell of a Christmas."

A/N: I was originally going to make this chapter and next chapter one long as chapter, but I decided to end it on. I'll try and get the next one up as soon as I can. I hope you all enjoyed this chapter and I'd like to thank you all for the reviews. If there appears to be any mistakes, let me know so I can can fix them :)...

#Along The Road Fic #Richonne #Shandrea #Rick Grimes #Michonne #Negan #TWD Fic #Richonne Fic #Along the Road

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