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callme-chaos · 3 years ago

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Tommy SMP (DSMP)

H-hello? How did you get in here? Tommy doesn’t usually let randoms in. Uhhhhh lemme just consult the list real quick. What’s your name?

Huh. Doesn’t sound familiar. Buuuuuuut there you are. On the list. What’s your purpose here then, pal?

A tour? Well, the person who usually does the tours is out in the moment… But I guess I could show you around. If you would like to follow me – yeah just ignore the holes and stuff. They’re just remnants of a couple of wars we’ve had.

What kind of wars? Bro, where have you been?

Not from around here? Evidently. Well, first there was the Disk Wars. You see, Dream had these cool disks but Tommy really wanted them, you know? And this is /Tommy SMP/ and not /Dream SMP/ after all so there was all that. Then there was this Quackity kid who tried to start a nation and Tommy didn’t really like the look of that. And so Tommy and this Ranboo guy decided to blow it all up – I don’t remember the details. You see, I’ve been away… uhhhh… travelling so I don’t really see too much of what goes on here. That and I seem to be forgetting a lot of things… I really should fix that-

Huh? You’re confused. Buddy – I haven’t even told you about the Egg yet!

Yeah! An Egg! I can show you it right now actually. Just follow me.

The vines? Yeah! They’re a nice shade of blue but they’re a real pain to cut down, you know? They just seem to grow back stronger. Now, just pop down this hole here – yeah just straight down.

Oh! Ah. I really should have warned you about the fall damage, huh? I’m sure we can pop into George’s bakery later and fix you up. Providing George is in his bakery… He stopped baking a while back.

Why? I don’t actually know. I’m not really too involved in the politics around here (travelling and all that) buuuuut I heard a rumour that him, Ranboo, Charlie Slimecicle and Technoblade have started like a secret club. Not sure exactly what they do but if Ranboo is involved it can’t be good. Anyways! Here’s the Egg. Don’t step too close though – I’ve heard it has some serious manipulative powers. Niki’s best friend Foolish got transformed by it the other day. She was quite upset. I think she runs a cult in the Egg’s honour with Ponk or something now. She’s nice but pretty scary when she wants to be, I’ll tell you that much.

The Egg is giving you weird vibes? Yeah. You and me both. The blue is giving me shivers actually. Shall we continue our tour elsewhere?

Next? Hmmmmm. I know! I’ll take you to Hannah’s castle and museum. They’re a great tourist spot! Follow me.

Yes we have a museum! History has been made here on the SMP, I’ll have you know. This SMP was founded by the Tommy Team made up of the hot-headed, dashingly attractive Fundy; the greatly popular, widely enjoyed Bad Boy Halo; and, of course, the 1000IQ man himself, TommyInnit. Though, Tommy… hasn’t been about much… lately… not since… you know…

Well, if you don’t know I hardly have the time to explain now! (I’ll maybe show you later if we have time…) Anyways! Here we are: Hannah’s museum. This miserable little dark room here is a recreation of L’Manberg’s Final Control Room. Back in the first L’Manberg verses Greater Tommy SMP war, L’Manberg’s founding fathers (Schlatt, Sapnap, President Quackity and Vice President Dream) were all betrayed by a member of their own battalion: Hannah-Rose. They were dark times, kid.

You want to know more about President Quackity and his right hand man Dream? Well, they were incredibly close – practically brothers. They both went through a lot together. Until Quackity finally blew up L’Manberg and was subsequently killed by his own father, Charlie Slimecicle.

I didn’t say they were dark times for nothing, you know? Dream took it harder than anyone. And Tommy took the opportunity to traumatise and manipulate the fella further. Tommy even managed to convince Dream’s best friend, Schlatt, that he was the root of all problems on the SMP.

We couldn’t believe it either. Dream did have one friend, Ranboo, for a while. But they ultimately disagreed on their ideas of justice and went their separate ways.

Sad times, indeed, kid. Anyways, where to next… Oh! Hello, Eret! How are you doing?

Ah. He’s busy. Off being cracked at bed wars I suspect.

What’s the big black building over there?

Uhhhhhhhh… Have you seen HBomb’s hotel? It’s great this time of year! Just this way, matey. Technically it belongs Dream but HBomb briefly took it over. There was some kind of dispute between the two guys – nobody here really takes HBomb that seriously. (Personally, I blame the ancient skin he still wears. Kid really needs an update, you know?)

That? Oh, I suppose you can still see some of the remnants. That used to be Punz’s UFO. Someone blew it up but I’m not entirely sure who…

How do I know it was blown up? Look, I’m just taking Quackity’s word for it.

He did die but then he was recently brought back to life. He spends most of his time with Dream outside Las Nevadas.

Las Nevadas is basically the Tommy SMP version of Las Vegas. It’s pretty cool actually – wanna check it out?

Cool! We’re actually heading in the right direction for that anyways. So, where are you from?

Yeah, I gathered you weren’t from around here but where are you actually from?

…Not gonna tell me? Fine. So be it. You sure are a mystery, huh?

I’m not flirting! I just- I… Ah! Look at that! We’re already here! It’s pretty dramatic, right?

You should see it at night. Everything lights up and it is magnificent.

It belongs to Wilbur. He’s the head honcho around here. He’s here alongside Puffy and Phil. Oh! Speak of the devil, if you squint a little bit you can see Phil down there now, bouncing around. He’s a cutie really – though his puns do get tiresome.

What do you mean “you don’t get tired of puns”?

…Are you human?

…What a terrifying answer. Okay! Moving on!

I’m aware that it’s one of the ugliest structures in existence – but you can’t blame Wilbur and Las Nevadas for /that/ abomination. That’s what Quackity and Dream installed last time they were here together.

I know it’s phallic but you don’t have to say that out loud! Come on, man, have a little class.

That up there? That’s Schlatt and Techno’s “cookie castle” as I like to call it. When Dream was exiled, Schlatt met Techno and they started getting really close. They’re everybody’s favourite couple now. I think it’s a friendship that will last a long time, you know? They seem to have a lot in common.

Like what? Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh They’re both American?

Look, if you know, you know.

Alright! Next – shall we have a change of scenery? Las Nevadas can get quite… heated, so perhaps we can give the snowy biome a visit, yeah? Now, when we get there it’s important to tread carefully: the forest is enchanted, practically everything there will eat you and, worst of all… Ranboo lives out there.

Ranboo? He’s a terrifying force of nature. I heard he slayed an entire army all by himself, owns a pet polar bear and he helped Tommy take down the entirety of L’Manberg. Ranboo and Tommy – they’re one formidable duo.

No no! There’s no need to be afraid! Apparently Ranboo’s arsonist days are over and he has his carer Charlie Slimecicle watching over him so he’s been relatively quiet recently. I like to think their neighbour Technoblade has been a good influence on them both.

Technoblade is a gentle soul. Poor kid just wants to make everyone happy, you know? I wish everyone was more like Technoblade sometimes – the world would be such a different place…

Nah, nobody can really sleep soundly – not when Antfrost and Purpled are still out there. The Eggpire and Las Nevadas never really rest when it comes to their members. Oh! But by far the worst person to come across – the real reason I haven’t slept in weeks on this server – is… Oh. Oh dear. I think I’ve summoned him. Walk this way – quickly! – and don’t make eye contact…

NO JACK I HAVE NO DESIRE TO WITNESS THE JACK MANIFOLD “GRIND” NOW PLEASE TAKE YOUR FILTH AND YOUR CAT-MAID OUTFIT AND GO BOTHER SAPNAP OR SKEPPY INSTEAD!

…Alright, no need to look at Jack like that.

Jack Manifold in a cat-maid- no. Don’t make me lock you up in Pandora’s Vault along with- uhhhhhh.

Forget I said that. Speaking of Skeppy, he built Schlatt and Techno a beautiful mansion around here somewhere-!

He also built an extraordinary diamond sculpture a while ago-

Please no.

…I guess you leave me no choice then, huh? I guess, I can show you the prison – but we have to be really, really careful, okay?

Who’s inside? Well…

I didn’t forget! It just… Tommy. Tommy is in the prison right now.

Well, of course I didn’t want to tell you! It doesn’t really look good on the server when the person its named after is locked up for life for doing unspeakable things.

No! I’m not gonna tell you what unspeakable things he did – it wouldn’t make them unspeakable then, would it?

…I don’t believe anyone else is in there, no. Why?

Ranboo? Nahhhhhh! Ha ha! What do you know, you silly goose! Well, before we go into the prison, we’ll have to get Puffy’s permission. She’s really strict about who she lets in and out of the prison and takes her role as prison warden very, very seriously. No one has ever died or been injured or brought back to life or wrongly imprisoned while the prison has been in her care.

What do you mean – “not convincing”? If you don’t trust my word, then that’s a /you/ problem.

…The prison is this way. Now, when we get in let me do all the talking… You know what? Perhaps you should stay outside. I’ll go in, talk to Puffy and try to get permission to go in – but I make no promises, understand?

…Alright, wait here.

…

Puffy said no.

No, it was a pretty definitive no actually. Wh-where are you going?

You can’t! Puffy hasn’t given you permission!

There’s nobody in there /to/ save. Tommy deserves to be in there-

There is nobody else in the prison!

You’re insane.

No, I won’t let you.

…

…I don’t think so, matey. Feel that sharp object between your shoulder blades?

I figured you did. That’s my sword. I am not afraid to push it through your chest if it means keeping you out of that prison. Understood? Now, step away from the prison.

Thank you.

…I think that concludes our tour. Perhaps it’s best you- oh! Karl is here! Karl Jacobs! Over here!

Yeah. He doesn’t talk ever but he’s still a great guy, you know?

Oi. Wave back. It would be rude not to wave back.

My name? Oh my goodness! I totally forgot to introduce myself! (Though, you never really asked until now anyways…)

It’s okay! I know I talk a lot – it can be difficult to get me to shut up sometimes – ha ha!

My name is Callahan.

#tommy smp #dream smp #tommyinnit #dream #callahan #tour #dumb #this was dumb #but still a lot fun #my name is callahan

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melon-boyy · 5 years ago

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Hi! I noticed you have a thing for Melon (I like the character too), and I hope you don't mind, but I think you may have a clear idea of how to answer a question I got about hybrids in the beastars society, in case you can answer, I am going to leave it here, ok?: "HOW WOULD A HYBRID, JUST AS CLEAR AND OBVIOUS LOOKING AS MELON CURRENTLY LOOKS, BE TREATED FOR OTHERS JUST BY WALKING AROUND IN STREETS, WITHOUT TRYING TO DISGUISE?" I make this question in especific, trying to compare to when (1/2)

Legosi and June were walking together, and everyone assume they were a pure blooded couple, the treatment they got it was so good, that they even got free dessert just for going to a restaurant! I just can get an idea of the polar opposite for someone like Melon, but I would like the opinion of someone who seems to be kmowing what they are talking about when it corcerns Beastars' society discrimination issues. Again, I hope you don't mind me asking this question and have a nice day! (2/2)

Thank you so much!!! I don't mind at all, I LOVE asks like this! Thinking about worldbuilding and meta stuff is a huge passion of mine anyway, especially if it's about my faves, so I'll write all the essays you want!

I'm going to basing my ideas for this mostly on these two scenes here:

Basically, bottom line is, people talk. A lot. Mostly behind his back, but by far not solely, and either way he knows. It's impossible not to notice these things.

The main reason for that is just how rare hybrids are, and how unusual they look. Think about it:

Interspecies marriage was legalized only 10 years ago. Some species (poisonous/nonpoisonous couples or sea/land animals) still cannot marry. No idea how Gosha married his wolf girlfriend by the way, they might've went over to animal Vegas for it or something.

We have the scene with Gosha visiting the daycare for hybrid children, which makes hybrids seem somewhat common at least, but then keep this in mind: All of those children are younger than 10.

All of their parents are probably legally married.

Due to the legalization of interspecies marriage, more hybrid children have been born in the past years. Society is currently at a changing point with these things slowly becoming more common.

HOWEVER

Back when Melon was a child, interspecies marriage was not legal, so even if his parents had been a happy couple, they would not have been able to get married, and their relationship would've certainly been looked down upon. These days, interspecies relationships are still not accepted publicly, but the way things are going, it will likely be normalized within a generation or two, as will hybrids.

Still, there is a need for a hybrid daycare, as regular daycares and schools apparently refuse to accept hybrid children.

Back when Melon was a kid, there were no other hybrids around, so he had no choice but to attend a regular school as the likely only hybrid student. After his mother died, his guardian even had to bribe his schools to let him stay, although the teachers never cared about him being bullied and likely even participated at times. We cannot see any hybrid students at Cherryton either, nor any adults, proving that Melon is a very rare case.

Going back to current times.

As we can see in the restaurant scene, Melon gets treated very differently just for his eyes and his order, and the servers didn't even see his mouth. They start talking about him as soon as he leaves, because he just looks weird.

It's very likely they don't even mean anything by it, he just looks so downright wrong it's impossible not to talk about. His mismatched face unsettles animals, especially because he's a herbivore/carnivore mix. His appearance confuses natural instincts and others legitimately cannot react to him, which must feel extremely creepy.

I do believe that, in a few years, hybrids will become more accepted into society as the birth rates have already increased and animals will just get used to them. But right now, especially older generations are just uncomfortable with the very idea. Not only because of the hybrids themselves, but also the implications of their, well, creation. Animals of different species weren't allowed to do that back in their day.

Think of old homophobes as an example. A lot of animals will refuse anything new, and interspecies marriage is VERY new.

I think that, without disguise, a hybrid in public spaces would be treated very badly. Some restaurants may refuse to serve them just as they did to Gosha for having poison, or at the very least talk behind their backs like they did in that one scene.

Now that Melon changed, he won't have a disguise anymore, so he's not going to have any choice but face this treatment 24/7. Barely anyone will treat him normally, and the few that do will likely do so out of pity. Everyone will stare at him, because people just suck.

Hybrids are likely those that everyone stares at but nobody talks to. And honestly, seeing how they get treated just in the few examples we have, I can't blame Melon for turning out the way he did.

#beastars #beastars melon #melon beastars #mine #ask

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prettylittleliarsxxxx · 7 years ago

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Carly Chaikin, who currently plays Darlene in Mr. Robot and Ian Harding, who you’ll recognize as Ezra Fitz from Pretty Little Liars are both involved in People You May Know, a film about the way that social media cultivates fame, and the dangers of creating a life online that looks nothing like the one you’re really living. For such a heavy topic, it’ll surprise you how light-hearted the film can be, while still driving home the point: Social media should help you live your life, not be your life. I caught up with Harding and Chaikin to talk about what it’s like to be a celebrity on social media, and what, if any, responsibility celebrities have when it comes to what they post.

Harding, who shot to stardom by starring in Freeform’s Pretty Little Liars, grew his following over the course of the show to his current 2.33 million followers on Twitter and 4.7 million followers on Instagram. That’s…a lot. Harding’s character in People You May Know, Phillip, is one of those anti-social media post-millennial intellectuals. Even Harding thinks he goes a bit too far, (“He’s the kind of guy who isn’t on Facebook and is proud of it.”) but that a life without social media is enviable.

“Oddly enough, because I have a social media following truly because of Pretty Little Liars, I feel somewhat obligated at times to use it or, you know, “Am I posting enough? Am I checking in with my fans?” And these are all questions that, as soon as they leave my mouth, it feels disgusting asking them. But, I realized that it’s sort of par for the course now in our industry. But I think, if given the chance, I wouldn’t have social media. Like, if somebody said to me, “You can have a long, happy career as an actor and never Instagram another photo,” then I think I would do that.” That might be because Harding, whose parents were in the military, was raised to understand that whatever he put out onto social media would come back around eventually. “It’s very easy to make a mistake and for things to be taken out of context.” It’s with this understanding that he treads pretty carefully around social media, describing it as “having a Bengal tiger for a pet.”

It’s kind of really cool at first, and it’s a kind of love you’ll never experience in your life again, but you have to stay on top of it and you have to be very wary of it because if not it will pull your entrails out of your backside…"

He laughs, "…Maybe that was too graphic.”

You never know what’s going to ignite a fire.

Chaikin, who has 156,000 followers on Instagram and 93,700 on Twitter, plays Oakley in the film. She describes the relationship between speaking her mind and social media reactions as a scary one, but mostly when it comes to polarizing topics like politics. She tells me about one instance in particular after retweeting a piece of news that she saw. “I was like, 'Trump supporters, don’t attack me, I am genuinely asking do you support this?' and of course not one person was like, ‘Yeah, I do support this!’ Everyone was like, ‘Nobody cares about your f-cking opinions!’ You know, everyone just jumps, attacks, and gets defensive…But, it does get scary because people do…you know, you never know what’s going to ignite a fire. You know, it makes me think twice about what I’m going to say, but I’ve always been the person who just says it anyway.”

When it comes to whether or not celebrities have a responsibility to speak up on social media, Harding stresses that the most dangerous way for a celebrity to use social media, is by using it but not understanding the issues that they’re bringing attention to. Look at Harding’s Twitter and you’ll see exactly what he describes: “I think my social media is pretty fluff or is just straight up advertising” which the actor says are all he really feels like putting into the world. There are times, like after the Vegas shooting, when he posted a hotline to call for people who may be looking for a loved one or a number to text if you wanted to help end gun violence. But as a rule, he just tries to be informed and give his followers the chance to learn more about the issues he's passionate about.

“I don’t try to get too pedantic on social media because it’s also made—these apps and these social media sites—have made it easier for celebrities to feel very, very important…” One thing that strikes me about Harding is how educated he is about issues like gun violence or Trump's travel ban. Throughout our conversation, he rattles off facts about them, peppering his commentary with examples of how he has made a personal effort to simply understand the whole issue. He is the epitome of responsibility on social media. Thoughtful and thought provoking; and that's because he dislikes celebrities who aren't as informed as the ought to be. "The thing that I can’t stand is when I’ll talk to another influencer or an actor who is really vocal about something and you get about three sentences in and you realize that they know, like, the baseline info of whatever that issue is or whatever that topic is. And it’s very hard for me to take those people seriously."

Harding grew up outside of Washington D.C., so his friends who are in “saving the world” industries (as he calls them) are putting their passion into action when it comes to the causes like human trafficking and gun violence. He looks at these friends and sees them really working to make change. He uses the word "slacktivism" to describe the way that we are quick to use hashtags but slow to head out to the polls when it's time to vote on issues. “I think if you really feel that you need to put out a post for moral reasons or you’re standing up for a cause, just make sure that the effort that you exert in being online and Instagramming and tweeting is then met in real life with an equivalent.” In other words, put your Instagram likes where your mouth is and strive to make a difference aside from just a few hashtags.

Harding has more followers than Chaikin, something I only point out because there are differences in their opinions when it comes to their responsibility as celebrities with a following. Where Harding has a clear sense of "this could backfire" and therefore tries to keep his content light when he can, Chaikin wishes she “had millions and millions of followers that could hear those things and hear what I have to say” when it comes to the issues she is passionate about. She mentions Ellen DeGeneres and her social media campaign to save the elephants after Trump decided to reverse the ban on big game trophies as an example.

She’s thankful that celebs like Ellen are using their platform, but it’s a double-edged sword. “It almost like, makes everything feel more hopeless and helpless that all of these people who can reach millions and millions…that it still doesn’t fix anything necessarily.” She captures sort of perfectly what I think a lot of millennials feel when it comes to effecting change, “I guess I don’t really feel like I have that much power to influence that many people.”

But that doesn’t mean that she just stops putting herself out there when it comes to the issues. I mention one tweet in particular that caught my eye; one about the sexual assault allegations coming out of Hollywood. I mentioned it because I was struck by her honesty. She tweeted, “It is a dangerous time to be a dangerous man – ladies, don’t stop talking.” And it looks like she takes her own advice: She's not going to stop talking until people start listening.

Where there is Chaikin’s opinionated Twitter feed, unfazed by whether or not people agree with her, there is Harding’s belief that “No good deed goes unpunished.” While he acknowledges feeling some responsibility and being comfortable with a little backlash, he also admits that it makes him anxious, “especially as an actor, of doing too much. Because then people start to know you as one thing and perhaps you’re less believable in other roles.” That Bengal tiger could rear its ugly head any moment.

As for what these two actors have in common, well, they both think that Millennials have a lot to learn from People You May Know. For Chaikin, it’s about looking past social media to see that what you’re interacting with is surface: “We look at social media and we think that’s actually their life. You know, I look at so many people’s feeds like, ‘God, your life is so cool. Like, I want to do that! Why don’t I get that?' And I will get envious of someone’s life and we don’t think about the fact that it’s completely, not fake, but it’s one, single screenshot of just the good times."

For Harding, the film’s message is that there’s a life outside of social media, but also that social media should have its limits, and that it’s our job to impose those limits for ourselves. “It should only be a tool for communication and for sharing of ideas. It should not be a tool for hate, it should not be a source of self worth…I don’t think it’s a new way of expressing really deep ideas. I think it’s a way of perhaps starting a conversation, but it sure as sh-t isn’t a place to go get news. If you really want to start a conversation, if you really want to effect someone’s life, you have to talk to that person.” People You May Know will be released on demand and digital HD on November 28.

#ian harding #carly chaikin #people you may know #social media #other projects

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aghostpost · 8 years ago

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can u write a bruce imagine with the "I'm rich" line thanksss

A/N: I’m gonna combine this request with a prompt I made my friends randomly pick for me for a lil’ 2-for-1 special~ They also chose Bruce and “Hit me!”, number 32 from this prompt. Here the reader knows Bruce is Batman and she’s an anti-hero herself. Not to be confused with Verismo; this reader has no special/supernatural ability!

You put one guy in jail, or in my case a body bag, and another shows up. Bad guys popped up in Gotham like patients in a hospital, and to keep up I had to be prepared no matter what. You get rid of one threat to the city and some other jackass thinks of it as a chance to climb the ranks. They all think they’re better than the last guy, smarter, richer, have more power. Some are even smart enough to learn from the mistakes of the competition that got caught, but every criminal has one thing in common: greed. With new criminals came new challenges, so I was here in the gym getting some training done to stay in fighting shape. I liked to think I had the inside scoop on criminals because I was just shy of becoming one myself. Gotham is a sewer hole that swallowed me alive, but I’ve seen the underground life. It wasn’t pretty. But I’ve also seen the GCPD fail the city more times than I can count.

I’m here to do what they can’t. I operate around the law, bending the rules or breaking them altogether. What sense was there shoving bad guys in a cell when somehow they managed to get back on the streets months later to do the same shit? Rehabilitation didn’t happen in the prison system because there is no changing these people. Now I have more blood on my hands than I sometimes care to admit, but that doesn’t make me a criminal. No, I like to think of myself as Gotham’s salvation, the saving grace of this city.

My training was interrupted by a man that would probably consider himself the same, although we were nothing alike. Two polar opposite sides of the tracks, two different ideas for cleaning up Gotham. “What’re you doin’ here?” I huffed, beating a punching bag to a pulp.

He smirked to himself. “Just checking on the place. Newly acquired property of Wayne Enterprises.”

“Believe it or not, I’m surprised. I didn’t think there was a scrap of real estate left in Gotham that didn’t have your name on it.”

“This gym is a prized possession of Gotham. I thought what better way to give back than to fix things up around here, no?”

“You can do whatever you want with your money, Bruce. You’ve got more than enough of it. But,” I said with one final punch at the bag, stepping away with my hands on my hips, “it’s my day off. Did you have to do it today?”

“You aren’t happy to see me?”

I rolled my eyes and went to a nearby bench, wiping my face with a towel and helping myself to my water. “Am I ever?”

He chuckled to himself. “Well like I said, I’m only here to take a look at what changes I want to make. I saw you, thought I’d come say hello.”

“Hello. And now, goodbye.”

“Warm as ever.”

“Last I remember you were sneakin’ around zip-tyin' people to pipes. You want a warm welcome from me?”

“Wouldn’t that be your mistake, letting me get behind you?”

“You think I didn’t know you were there? Only mistake I made was thinking I could kill that bastard before you stopped me.”

“Yes, likely story.” He had that usual arrogant look and that usual condescending tone that made me want to scratch his face off. “Better luck next time then, Y/N.”

I scoffed. “Is there a reason you’re a smug asshole or do you only do that to get on every one of my nerves?

“You only say I’m smug when I’m right and you’re wrong.”

“Right about what? You think I can’t tell when someone is coming up behind me? I ignored you believing I could bring my arm down and stab that asshole faster than you could subdue me. That’s the only thing I’m wrong about, but trust me it won’t happen again.”

He nodded. “Good, good. Learning from your mistakes.”

“Geez, who are you, my grandfather?” I took another drink before turning away from him and climbing in the boxing ring. “I’m ready when you are, Tommy.” Tommy was one of the gym trainers here who I took a liking to. He was smart and good at his job, got a lot of fighters out of this gym and somewhere in Vegas fighting for big bucks. Him, I didn’t mind taking notes from.

“I got this one, Thomas.” I turned to to see Bruce removing his coat, tossing it on the bench beside my water bottle. I look at Tommy who seemed just as confused if not more than me.

“Uhhh, you sure about that, Mr. Wayne?”

He nodded, rolling up the sleeves of his navy blue cashmere sweater. “Yes.”

“C’mon, what are you doing?” I asked, completely unimpressed.

“You say you knew when I got behind you, right?”

I chuckled, shaking my head. “Are you serious?”

He shrugged. “I just want you to prove it, that’s all.”

“You don’t have a business lunch to go to or something? Meeting with your lawyers, whatever else it is big time corporation owners do?”

He smiled to himself. “It’s my day off, too.”

“Of course it is.” I rolled my eyes. “How do you explain to the audience how you’re such a good fighter, Batty?” I mumbled low enough for only him to hear.

“Easily. I’m rich. People have done many things to get to me and my money; it only makes sense I take a self defense class or two, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Sure, maybe. Don’t think that would explain you dressing up and takin’ on the things that go bump in the night, however…” That said, I walked to the opposite side of the ring. He wanted me to prove it then I would. The sooner I got this outta the way the sooner I could get back to my actual training. The gym fell silent as everyone was now interested in why billionaire Bruce Wayne was inside the ring. I took a second to redo my ponytail, waiting patiently for him to sneak up on me, listening closely and focusing on my surroundings. A shift in the ring, the feeling of another presence in my space; I waited for either to happen but everything remained still. After a moment nothing happened and, assuming he was just annoying me as usual, I rolled my eyes at this waste of time. “You know-”

“-What-” he interrupted from directly behind me.

“-Fuck!” I whipped around at lightning speed with a right hook that he blocked with his forearm.

“Very good. You didn’t catch me behind you but you rebounded quickly-”

“-Shut up!” I swung again and this time he dodged, and before I knew it I unleashed myself unto him. He was quicker than I expected. The most he ever did was knock a gun outta my hand or find some way to block me from taking someone out; I never had a moment of combat with the Caped Crusader myself. It was different than the training I was used to. Tommy had more experience, yes, but I was a fast learner. Bruce? He was lightyears ahead of me.

But there was no way in hell I’d admit that to him.

I was throwing blows at him nonstop but for whatever reason he remained on the defensive, which was doing a pretty good job at further frustrating me. He just made it look so effortless, didn’t even work up a sweat. I hated it.

“Hit me,” I grunted, slapping his hand from my fist that he managed to catch before it connected to his jaw.

“What was that?”

“Hit me!” Quickly I reached and grabbed the throwing knife I kept sheathed at my ankle and swung, slicing the air as he backed away from me.

“Whoa! Y/N, you can’t-”

“-It’s fine, Tommy. Bruce and I are old friends, I wouldn’t hurt a hair on his head.” Bruce’s face revealed nothing but I knew he realized how serious I was. “You can stay on the defensive or you can hit me and knock the blade outta my hand. Your call.”

“I think you know the answer to that.”

I shook my head. “No fun playing with you. No matter; I would hate to ruin such a nice sweater anyway.” I turned my back and stepped outta the ring, all eyes on me as I grabbed my things from the bench and went back into the locker room. Everything went back to normal after I cleared the room. I straddled the bench and did some post workout stretching, trying to think of the other errands I needed to run after I showered at home. The hairs stood on my neck and before I knew it I whipped around and hurled the blade as fast as I could. It went through a locker door and slowly Bruce stepped from behind it.

“So you could sense me…”

“Maybe. Maybe not.” I grinned to myself. Truthfully I didn’t sense him behind me in the ring. This time I saw his reflection for a tiny second in the locker room mirror and just reacted quickly enough where it may have seemed I could feel him behind me.

“That was going to split my face open.”

“Then you should be proud of your reflexes. Besides, I said it was your sweater that I didn’t wanna ruin.”

“Instead you settle for ruining property.”

“Add it to your list of fixes, I’m sure you can cover it. What was it you said back there? You’re rich?” I spun around on the wooden bench to face him. “Why wouldn’t you fight back?”

“It wouldn’t have been fair. I’ve been at this way longer than you, Y/N. And frankly, I didn’t want to embarrass you.”

I scoffed. “Geez, I didn’t know you were actually this full of yourself.”

“Just being honest-”

“-I’ve taken down far worse than you, Bruce,” I reminded him as I stood and made my way to stand face to face with the man. “My opponent underestimating me for being smaller and a woman is ironically my biggest strength. It’d be wise of you to remember that.”

“I never underestimate my opponent and I always expect the unexpected. Luckily, you aren’t my opponent.”

“I’m not?”

“Of course not. We’re on the same team. We fight the same bad guys, just not the same way.”

“That’s putting it mildly.” I was over this little visit and training was a bust. I packed my things into my backpack and closed my locker. “Until our next run in, Batty,” I said waving him off behind me.

“Wait- You don’t want this?” I turned to see him pulling the knife from the locker door and chuckled, continuing my exit.

“You keep it. I got one on the other leg too if you want a matching set.”

#request #bruce wayne x reader

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theconservativebrief · 6 years ago

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For the past decade, Canadian journalist Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall has been on a quest to find a cure for the common hangover.

To this end, he consults remedies both medical and folk: He undergoes an IV treatment at a medical institution in Las Vegas called Hangover Heaven; consults with a menagerie of academics, a Druid, several doctors, and the CEO of 5-Hour Energy (among others); participates in a glacial New Year’s polar bear swim; absorbs the beer-soaked wisdom of the English countryside; and ingests any number of curative concoctions, with varying degrees of success.

These experiences become fodder for Hungover: The Morning After and One Man’s Quest for the Cure, a book that is as concerned with the science and culture of hangovers as it is with relieving them. I called Bishop-Stall to find out what we know about hangovers, why we don’t know more, and why — if hangovers are so miserable — people keep drinking. Our conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

How did you end up spending a decade researching hangovers?

The more that I started to look into the science of it and the history of it, the more I realized that, first of all, no such large endeavor had ever been undertaken. There were no books about hangovers, really. I mean, there have been jokey coffee table books or some sort of ancient, obscure references, but there was really so little for what became, to me, such a large part of human experience. That disconnect was just too obvious, and so I just became more and more fascinated by it.

If it’s such a core part of human experience — drinking too much, feeling physically wrecked the next day — why hasn’t it been studied more?

I think there’s something mysterious about the phenomenon. It’s a sickly, crummy, negative feeling, for the most part, and how much do we really want to focus on that? That may be one part of it. Even for me, it took a long time to realize what a wealth of fascinating stories come out of miserable aspects of life.

Also, there’s just been so little focus on it in the medical and scientific communities, just because there’s a very easy way to dismiss it: Well, you did it to yourself. It’s your own fault. You drank. If you didn’t drink, you’d be fine, so why even try to look into it anymore?

It’s a phenomenon that is scientifically and culturally fascinating, but we just say, “Oh, you know, it’s easily solvable.” The strangest thing is we believe it’s easily solvable because we did it to ourselves, but we also feel like we can’t actually solve it. Hangovers are so dichotomous in that way. It’s the same thing for cures: Everybody either thinks they have a cure and they go around telling everybody about it, or they believe that nobody has one.

The weird thing about hangovers is that that they’re self-inflicted but generally not fatal. Just deeply unpleasant.

Right, so it’s not necessarily a question of say, overdose. A hangover is actually withdrawal. It’s a quick withdrawal, much quicker than what happens with a lot of drugs. It usually leaves your system entirely within 24 hours. But the mechanism that breaks down alcohol and then filters it out of your system is so complicated and affects so many aspects of human physiology that it’s very difficult to understand.

Then combine that with the fact that we haven’t even really been trying to understand it through most of human history. We feel like we know so much about everything these days that there aren’t uncharted territories. And yet I was very hard-pressed to find people who could explain hangovers to me or were in agreement with each other about what the mechanism behind them even is.

Let’s back up for a second: What is a hangover, physiologically?

There are so many things going on. It starts when alcohol is broken down in the body— when the body processes alcohol, one of the byproducts is acetaldehyde, which is a toxic substance.

Then the body starts to react to that acetaldehyde, and it causes all sorts of nasty things, including very strong immune system responses from the body. A lot of what’s happening in a hangover is our body trying to defend itself from this nasty byproduct.

One of the many mechanisms that [kicks in] is an overall inflammation of your cells. I mean, in all your cells: your skin cells, the cells of your liver, your pancreas, your eyes. Everything becomes inflamed, and one of the many problems with cell inflammation is that it stops your body from absorbing water properly.

Alcohol already is a diuretic, and then you add the fact that your body isn’t absorbing water properly, and that’s why a huge part of hangover is dehydration. But when people say, “Well, it’s just dehydration,” they’re really not understanding that even the dehydration is just a symptom. If it was just dehydration, you could just drink water and you’d be fine, right? But it’s that it’s a dehydration that can’t be managed, because your body is in a state of not being able to absorb water. Every part of the body starts to activate in a somewhat panicked way, it seems to me, when the alcohol leaves the system.

Besides, you know, drinking in moderation, is there any way to stop that from happening?

For me, the only real way to stop a hangover is to stop it before that mechanism starts, because once it does, it’s such a domino effect. It ends up infiltrating every part of the body. Once it starts, the only thing you can do is treat it. By treat it, I mean just lessening the severity and the duration.

You spend a lot of the book trying various hangover cures — everything from doctor-administered IV drips in Las Vegas to eating charcoal scraped off your actual fireplace.

One thing that really surprised me when I was doing my research is how many ancient, ancient remedies actually have modern scientific reasoning behind them. I guess that’s the wrong way of looking at it — there are reasons that we now see, scientifically, why ancient cures could have worked.

So for example, when I did my “12 pints in 12 pubs” tour in England [an attempt to recreate the apocalyptic pub crawl in the 2013 film The World’s End], I kept asking all the bartenders, while we were getting drunk, for their best remedy, and all of them would say a proper British fry-up, which is basically eggs, bacon, and a bunch of other stuff.

Eggs have always been one of the most common remedies, and it turns out that one of the things that’s inside eggs is N-acetylcysteine, which is the same amino acid I ended up identifying as the most important ingredient in my own personal cure or concoction.

Same things with ancient remedies like boiled cabbage — we now understand that cabbage is a chelator, which means that it goes into the body, grips onto toxins, and then pulls them out with it when it leaves your system. It’s the same way charcoal works, which is why they give you charcoal tablets if you’re having an overdose. But it correlates with my Victorian chimney sweeps method of putting fireplace soot in a cup of milk and drinking that. A lot of these remedies that just seem folkloric or really esoteric actually do have some scientific reasoning behind them.

It seems like different remedies work for different people, to the extent than anything works at all.

I think that’s definitely true. I mean, think of how vastly different everybody responds to alcohol to begin with.

The way that alcohol targets the brain is much more impossible to track, and more scattered, than almost any other drug. If you look at most molecules that enter the brain and change brain chemistry, they’re targeting one or two specific receptors. Whereas alcohol sort of blankets the frontal lobe, where there are thousands upon thousands of receptors, and it affects all of them. What you’re dealing with is a totality of brain chemistry rather than a very tiny equation.

We know just from being alive and knowing people that all our brains are very different. To say alcohol does X for one person doesn’t mean it’s going to do the same thing for another. And the same thing seems to be true when it withdraws from our system, which also appears to be quite complicated.

One of the doctors you talk to argues that the whole idea of “curing” hangovers is misguided, because they have an important function: to deter people from drinking too much. Is it a good idea to cure hangovers?

Well, I’m not sure, and it seems that we are really somehow reticent to the idea anyway. What I don’t get is it seems like when I talk to people, everybody takes for granted that we all really want a hangover cure, but then everybody also seems to take for granted it’s impossible to find one. Those two things don’t connect for me at all. I mean, we all can sit there and watch a movie and see actual monsters that we’ve made on a screen.

We can believe that we put robots in our own blood, that we go and walk on the moon, but everybody’s like, “Nah. There’s no way we could cure a hangover.”

It makes zero logical sense. I think we’re somehow predisposed to not think it’s possible because — maybe intrinsically or maybe subconsciously — we know it shouldn’t be possible for the continuation of the species. I don’t know. But the weird thing is that it also cuts the other way, because they’re not as much a disincentive as it seems they should be. People know they’re going to get a hangover and still get drunk. That’s one question that came up working on the book: If hangovers hurt so much, why do we keep drinking?

I’ve never heard anybody talk about this, but I also think there’s a good chance that a lot of us get addicted to hangovers themselves.

People get addicted to the actual sensation?

A hangover gives you a bizarre freedom from having too many options at any one moment, or life being too complicated and you being anxious because you’re torn in too many directions. All of that can, to some degree, go quiet when you have a hangover because you have only one main objective, which is to survive this pain. For some people, it can be a bizarrely liberating thing because you don’t have any choices to make at that time.

And to a lesser degree, I think a lot of people get into the mode of taking a vacation from their everyday worries. They’re able to focus on the sickening task at hand, and I think some people — even subconsciously — start to crave that a little bit.

It’s sort of meditation-adjacent, except with nausea.

Yeah. Meditation-adjacent. I think that’s a good way of putting it.

Original Source -> Hangovers are not a new problem. Why don’t we have a solution yet?

via The Conservative Brief

#IFTTT #The Conservative Brief

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allmyluckwentintofacebookpoker · 7 years ago

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A Key to Happiness, #3

Sometimes I think, just about random things, silly little thoughts and funny little questions. Things like, why did we evolve to smile, what kinda thing is that, things like, why are people so different in the way they treat one another, things likke, why people will self harm, and that last one I'm going to ramble on a bit about now. For a long long time now, since one of my friends had done it, I've been questioning why it's a thing, not what made my friend do it, but why, my friend did it, and there is a very big difference there. Naturally, self harm can be an unfortunate symptom of depression, depression being a side effect of overwhelming seemingly ever lasting negativity. These are the building blocks of this discussion. And so with all thoughts, I think where you can its nice to layout what the problem and the effect is, making it easier in your mind to find the solution sooooo. In this case the problem is negative thoughts, whether this is bullying, overwhelming education, family, relationship troubles. So now we know the problem, the solution would be the polar opposite, if you're sad, you do something happy and you can leave feeling neutral or better sometimes. Although we need to take into account that for someone to be self harming, in most situations I've been apart of, its very hard to do something positive, let alone positive enough to counter balance the negativity, and so we get presented with a problem. If somebody is having negative thoughts, and they can't counteract them with positive thoughts, they are with few options, their mind is plagued with negativity, occupying their thoughts and surely sabotaging ther actions. And so we have a new scenario, we've gone too far past "Negative thoughts", and our problem is now, "Negative thoughts occupying every thought", with depression many tasks can become a challenge. And so like before, we have a problem, we'll have a guess at the solution. Negative thoughts occupying every thought.. We know we cant counteract that with positivity because at times that can be hard to muster in such a state, and of course we wouldn't want to use other negative thoughts just to stop that one. So what is left to occupy the mind..? Something strong and something external. In the film Swingers, years upon years ago, the protagonist is sad as a result of a breakup, going through this, his friend encourages him (despite resistance) to go to Vegas, this is an example of that, maybe not to the same calibre, but the logic behind it stands. Plenty of people eat food in excess to make things more enjoyable, I reckon if you put on a quality podcast and have a bucket of KFC not too much can pop up into your mind, whether its good or bad. I box, personally, and I know few that do the same for the same reason, which is to get anger out, but also to just keep our mind focused on the strength of the hit, the ducking and weaving, things like that, better than sitting in bed thinking about sad things, sometimes anyway And then there are those that self harm, and the way I see it, its for the same reason, because when you cut your mind snaps on and prioritizes the threat, the pain, its a world easier to stop caring about your problems as you do, in the moment anyway. Thats my thinking for it, I write it out because sometimes all I can think is just have a shot at something, the times I've cut, if I had been speaking to a meaningful friend, watching a captivating video, or had someone to just switch my mind away from that mindset, thats all it woukd have taken. So I encourage any of you reading this to first question it, see if it actually applies to you, if you actually believe it, it very well might be nothing relevant to your situation. But if it is, just have a shot at occupying your mind meaningfully in other ways, if you're a car person, maybe take a look at the specifications for that car you've been thinking about, or if you're a gamer go have a shot on the hardest difficulty and give yourself some time to play around, if you like makeup, consider an ideal universal look for you, do a bit of research into it, and if you have a goal, something that makes your heart bounce, look into it for hours and think about how it'll be when you get there, think about your problems in little ways and then find solutions. Take your time, don't forget to breathe, and you'll be alright.

#010902072017 #ramblings

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jordoalejandro · 8 years ago

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The Sixth Annual List of Movies I Saw the Past Year

Year six. Movie ranking time. Not much up here because I wrote a lot on the actual list. Let's just get to it.

Here are all the films I've seen that have come out since-ish the last Oscars ceremony (2/28/16).

29. Fences - The biggest problem with this film is that it's not really a film. Fences reads more like a filmed play, which makes some sense, because it started as one. Still, when adapting anything from one medium to film, you have to add some, for lack of a better word, movie-ness. Fences doesn't. With the exception of just a few scattered scenes, the film takes place in and around the family home. Important scenes happen off-screen because they didn't happen on-stage in the play. Actors go on long, strained monologues about life because that's what happens in a play (they have that play cadence to them that constantly reminds you you're watching people act in a production). I mean, look, Denzel Washington was, as they say, a force. When he's on the screen, he's commanding. And Viola Davis is the only one who can keep up with him. But I wouldn't say I particularly enjoyed their acting. I think they did a good job for what they were going for, but they were definitely playing to the back rows too much for my taste. There's maybe something here if you like big performances, but I found this to be a real slog, like sitting through a show you didn't really want to see.

28. Jackie - This was, at the very least, a good looking film. And Natalie Portman does a solid job as Jackie Kennedy, shining in the prerequisite shock and horror scenes, though she does give off a strange vibe in many of the other scenes. I confess I don't know what the real Jackie was like most of the time, so maybe it was on the money, but Portman's Jackie, with her affected -- though from what I've heard, apparently accurate -- voice comes off as a bit peculiar. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, like she was air-headed, but not dumb; present, but not wholly there. Chalk it up to being in a bad state following (spoiler?) JFK's death, maybe? Anyway, the movie itself was not great. I think the problem is that not all real life stories necessarily deserve the movie treatment. There's certainly some interesting stuff in the immediate aftermath of the assassination, but around that, it's just kind of a series of disjointed scenes of Jackie being upset in a passive-aggressive, standoffish way. This and Manchester by the Sea are both movies about dealing with grief, but Manchester deals with it in a much more human, grounded, emotional way. This film feels like it's expecting the fact that it's about the first family to do the heavy lifting. Also, I have to note the score. It was this loud, avant-garde style music that reminded me of Philip Glass's work in Koyannisqatsi (that's right, I went to film school). It frequently felt at odds with the movie and was fairly distracting. A weird choice by the director, one of many weird choices made in this film.

27. Lion - This was another true story that I wonder if it was worth making into a film. There's just not that much here. (SPOILERS) The movie is essentially three parts: the first 45 minutes, Saroo, the main character, is a child in India. He is separated from his family and gets lost and wanders around India's streets getting into perilous situations. He eventually gets adopted by an Australian couple. The next 45 minutes, you have Saroo as an adult in Australia. The last 20 minutes is a lot of Googling and then a quick trip. Now, there's certainly some interesting stuff in the first 45 minutes about poor children in India (though, if I'm being honest, it's a little well-trodden ground. Hell, Dev Patel even starred in one of the films I'm thinking about that handled this subject matter better). But the second 45 minutes were just a whole lot of nothing: a guy living in Australia wonders about his previous life, decides he wants to know more about it, and then just acts aloof for a long time for kind of no reason. Saroo mentions at one point in this segment that he doesn't want to tell his adopted mother that he's looking into his former life in India for fear it would hurt her. So instead, he separates himself from his family and friends and retreats back to his dark apartment to obsessively Google stuff and set up a Homeland-style board of clues. Unsurprisingly, this makes his friends and family worry about him. I mean, was it really so hard to just tell your mom, "Hey mom, I'm curious about my past. I'd like to look into it." But then, that might've been a quick discussion, and how else do you stretch out the middle section of a film without creating unnecessary drama? So, then, the last 20 minutes (SPOILER warning again, because this is going to be about how the film ends), Saroo goes on one final, looooong Googling binge, figures things out, flies out to India, finds his hometown almost immediately, finds his mother almost immediately, has a quick reunion, and the movie ends. (END SPOILERS) I think there's a premise here could've been something much better. Instead, it was a strangely structured, fairly unsatisfying film. On the bright side, decent acting from both Nicole Kidman and Dev Patel.

26. Captain Fantastic - I think this is a movie about how being born into a cult might ruin a person for life if they don't get out fast enough. I’m not entirely sure. I really don't know what this movie wanted from me. Viggo Mortensen and his family live out in the woods and learn survivalist techniques and do gardening and discuss literature. I think the film wants me to sympathize with Viggo but he and his family come off like annoying weirdos and he's training them to be survivalists for reasons I don't quite get. On the other hand, it obviously doesn't want me to identify with any of the "normal" people, as everyone Viggo’s family comes across in the real world is either wildly antagonistic or an easily knocked down strawman or both. The film has some funny and/or entertaining bits and decent acting from Mortensen and the kids, who did a good job by making it through most scenes without reminding me they were child actors. The kids, though, are not really developed as characters. They’re mostly interchangeable and are pretty much just used as props to showcase what a good dad Viggo is, and how smart he's making them. The movie is essentially lots of insufferable people trying to prove their extremely polar opposite views on life are the right ones, and (SPOILER) it ultimately decides that it's okay to be forest people, just as long as you also sometimes go into the real world, which… OK.

25. Now You See Me 2 - I feel the same way about this movie as I felt about the first one: they’re both nuts. First, this is one of those exhausting movies where every character is four twisty, chess moves ahead of one another. Like, not just the good guys... the bad guys, the side characters, the background characters, people who appear in just one scene... they're all part of the game. Also, the world the movie takes place in is this insane world where Las Vegas magicians are, apparently, the biggest rock stars in the world, so much so that they have news channels doing live reporting on their tricks and every time anyone sees them they lose their minds. I mean that almost literally. The crowds in this film are crazy for these magicians. They scream and laugh and cheer and gather around in huge, enthusiastic mobs in a way that has never happened in real life for magicians, ever. But here's the thing, too. These magicians? They're also on like, the FBI's most wanted criminals list from their escapades in the first movie. So they appear randomly and put on these huge shows, and then inevitably have to take off running because the feds start closing in on them. The real world equivalent is like if Beyoncé randomly popped up at parks around the country, started singing to the quickly amassed mobs, and then took off running after a few songs as large groups of feds showed up and chased her. I can't even pay attention to the story because this film world is so crazy I can't figure out if it takes place on this Earth or a parallel universe Earth where any of this makes sense. I'm find myself wondering who was asking for this world. Who was thinking, "Well, if no one is going to put to screen the story of criminal thief secret society rock star magicians, I'll be the one to do it. It's what the people want. No! It’s what the people neeeeeed!" The movie also kind of nails that cringey, awful magician speech pattern, where you force a story to go with the trick and make cheesy quips and try to add flair to make it seem cool and mysterious. I really can't tell how far the filmmakers have their tongues in their cheeks here. Did they do that awful magician talk because they thought it would be funny how bad it is and accurate to real life magicians, or did they legitimately think it was cool? I mean, some of the stuff they do seems to indicate they know and are playing, but the finale of the film comes across so sincere that I'm thinking, "Oh no. No. They meant everything." One last thing, because I can't finish this review without mentioning it: Woody Harrelson plays dual roles in this film, as his character from the original and as his newly introduced evil identical twin, which appears to be Harrelson doing something of a Matthew McConaughey impression, including wearing a Matthew McConaughey curly wig. It stands out as one of the nuttiest choices in a film chock-full of them. All this being said, I don't know if I would tell you not to watch this film and its predecessor. They aren't good films, but they're so absurd that they're kind of entertaining. I found myself laughing and somewhat captivated, despite the awfulness. You know, like watching Russian dashboard camera compilation videos.

24. Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice - Okay, here are some positives: it’s a visually interesting film, it has an interesting take on Batman (though less so than Burton’s and Nolan’s takes), there’s a fun sequence with a bunch of real world talking heads that takes on the philosophical debate about how Superman fits into society, and there are some decent action scenes (the scene in which Batman infiltrates the warehouse to get Martha is the high point). Now, negatives. Most of the action is unspectacular. The big final fight, similar to the final fight in Man of Steel, is too CGI-y, which made it hard to focus on (on the bright side, seeing the big 3 of the Justice League together is a pretty cool moment). The actual Batman v. Superman Dawn of Justice fight itself was plodding and bland and the reasoning behind it was contrived. Batman’s motivation for wanting to murder Superman wasn’t strong enough and Superman likely could’ve prevented the fight altogether by articulating a few thoughts before throwing fists. And the ending to the fight is even more contrived and nonsensical (SPOILER: sure is lucky for Superman he was adopted by a Martha and not a Susan or something. Or that Batman’s mom didn’t go by a nickname. END SPOILER). Another negative: Jesse Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor is an insane, cartoon character, down to the voice, which I can't fully place my finger on, but I wanna say... half-Snagglepuss, half-Wally Gator? I don’t know what he was doing. I think he was trying to go for an over-the-top, chewing-the-scenery villain, but he didn’t stick that landing and, in fairness to Eisenberg, it was never going to work with Zach Snyder’s vision of this world, which is: grim, dark, and no fun at all. This world is also filled with wanton destruction. People had issue with the ending of Man of Steel for similar reasons (though it had much to do with Superman causing most of that destruction and not saving people), and you might think this almost universal negative reaction would cause the filmmakers to reconsider their approach. Their solution, however, was to have the same wanton destruction (they level like three different neighborhoods in the third act) but just, this time, keep having characters say, “It’s fine, there’s no one in the area.” At one point someone mentions that this whole huge swath of downtown is empty because it’s an office district and it’s after work hours. Oh, okay, that’s reassuring, I guess, unless there are people working late, or janitors cleaning the building, or any bars or restaurants at all in the area where people might’ve gone after work. Whatever. Here’s the biggest issue with the film: it is way, way, way too overstuffed, likely the result of trying to do what Marvel did in five films in, like, one and a half. I mean, this is a two and a half hour movie where every scene feels cut like a montage and lasts about 30 seconds (except for Bruce Wayne’s dream sequences, which are meaningless and go on forever). There’s just no time to breathe in this film. You never really get to appreciate that we have BATMAN AND SUPERMAN ON THE SAME DAMN SCREEN. Oh, and HERE’S WONDER WOMAN, TOO. We should get to savor this more, but we can’t because we need to keep moving, more story, more dream sequences, more explosions leveling blocks of abandoned buildings, more of Lex Luthor's affected monologues, more pointless cameos from other members of the Justice League. And my big worry is that this isn’t going to get any better in the next movie. This movie tried to tell a story (and not a simple one, either, one with grander DC Extended Universe implications) while introducing Lex Luthor, Wonder Woman, and Batman (and all his mythology) to Superman’s world. By the time Justice League comes around, they will not have laid any more groundwork. They’ll have released Suicide Squad (which doesn’t figure to have any significant impact on the overarching film universe) and Wonder Woman (which will at least flesh her out a little more). That’ll leave Justice League to tell a complete story while introducing Flash, Cyborg, and Aquaman into the world (their two second cameos in this film were cute little Easter eggs that tell us nothing about the characters), and catching up on whatever the previously established heroes and their friends and love interests are up to, and introducing whatever villains will show up. There’s a lot of potential here to create an even bigger mess. It’s okay. I trust the filmmakers to not try and cover up any shortcomings they have in the story and character departments with more and bigger explosions. My God, this review has gotten as bloated and nonsensical as the movie itself. Uh… I didn’t hate this movie, I just didn’t like it.

23. X-Men: Apocalypse - This was another superhero movie that was kind of a mess. It's weirdly structured. The first hour is all team building for both the good guys and bad guys: new mutants showing up, meeting each other, interacting, yadda yadda. The next 30 minutes are a side mission that doesn’t serve the greater narrative of the movie at all and seems to have old been added so they could pay some fan service with a short cameo (which, in fairness, was one of the more fun parts of the movie). The last 45 minutes are the big final battle, which isn't particularly memorable and not set up well enough to really feel important. There's the obligatory shots of some cities being slowly destroyed, but we don't really know or see any characters in these cities so it feels somewhat impersonal and makes it hard to care. There's just nothing really remarkable at all about the film. There are also a lot of retreads of things we've seen in previous X-Men films: a “Cyclops's powers awaken” scene, a “Weapon X facility” scene, a “Quicksilver does a bunch of stuff really fast while era appropriate music plays” scene (though, again, in fairness, this scene is just about as fun as the last one and probably the high point of the film). There's even the "emotional appeal to Magneto" scene. Magneto’s arc in these movies is the same thing over and over again. He starts out an okay guy, then turns into an asshole, then at the last minute, becomes okay again, before leaving to go be a loner again at the end of the film. It’s getting tired. I also had a problem with how imbalanced the X-Men's powers are. The bad guy, Apocalypse, is like a God that can destroy worlds. Meanwhile, the X-Men have Beast, who is strong. And Mystique is just about worthless except to pull the one-time-per-movie trick where she walks up to a villain disguised as an ally, only to surprise attack. That, and she's good for leading the emotional appeal to Magneto to stop being an asshole. X-Men Apocalypse probably should have been two movies: one about the new class of X-Men so we get to know them better (which, granted, would've been a hard sell considering they just did a first class of X-Men movie not that long ago and we sort of already know most of these X-Men), and one about fighting Apocalypse so his plan and danger actually connected with the audience. Or maybe they just shouldn't have spent so much time retreading familiar ground.

22. Ghostbusters - This was a decent sci-fi action flick that was passably funny, which is a huge disappointment given the film's pedigree. Paul Feig, Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, and Kate McKinnon, some of the finest people working in comedy today, should've been able to cook up something much better than this. Instead, the Ghostbusters themselves are pretty bland and deliver very few laughs throughout. Honestly, the best and most consistently funny part of this film is somehow Chris Hemsworth. And he's great, but how does that happen with all the other comedy superstars in here? The main crew is even shown up by cameo roles on more than one occasion (Cecily Strong, Zach Woods, and Steve Higgins all produce solid laughs in just their short times on screen). Ultimately, this was a pretty average film that I cannot believe people fought a culture war over. Well, I mean, I can believe it because that's where we are in society, I guess. But, you know... Come on.

21. Jason Bourne - This one had some solid action and I like that Bourne only says about 25 lines throughout. It fits his character well and doesn't bog down the film with too much exposition. But overall, this isn't a great movie, which is so disappointing because I love this franchise. The directing and editing makes for good action films, but smart writing is what made the original trilogy into great films. Maybe it was Tony Gilroy's absence, or maybe it was just trying too hard to force a story for this character, but the writing just wasn't up to snuff here. The story is slow and, even worse, feels unnecessary, created just to allow for Matt Damon to travel around Europe and the world and kick ass. I mean, I can appreciate that. That is almost all that I want from a Bourne film, but it still left me feeling a bit hollow. I will always welcome more Bourne, but if they can't find a good reason for him to continue, then perhaps Jason's story should have ended with Ultimatum.

20. Central Intelligence - You kind of know what you're going to get. This is a decent buddy cop movie with some good laughs and serviceable action, though it has a fairly predictable plot and a few really lazy "lol so random" jokes in it. Kevin Hart does his Kevin Hart thing just fine. To be honest, I actually didn't care for The Rock's character. I didn't know what he was supposed to be: shy loner, obsessive weirdo, or even possibly slightly autistic? He was reading real strange, and I just don't think The Rock was able to pull it off. He has charisma, to be sure, and I generally like him in things, but he might not have enough range to give this character that roundedness it truly needed. Either that, or it was just a poorly written character. Fun movie in general though, and good enough to watch if you catch it on cable one day.

19. Hidden Figures - This was a nice, inspirational movie, even though it felt real dull around the edges, like it was almost made for children. The plot is very paint by numbers and there aren't a whole lot of surprises here. You do get some good acting from the cast, though (of note: Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monáe, and Kevin Costner), and that helps to carry the film all the way across the finish line.

18. Deadpool - Well, I will say this, this is certainly the funniest movie to ever feature a horrific, 20 minute segment of medical torture. The humor, in general, is very quantity over quality. There are a few really good jokes that land well and the film is at its best when it's making fun of superhero tropes, but there are so many goddamn dick jokes and topical jokes that will date super poorly: Rosie O'Donnell references? Jokes about the Taken movies? These aren't exactly fresh and hilarious now. If you rewatch this film in a few years, they'll make you cringe. The film has some decent, if sparse, action and Ryan Reynolds and Morena Baccarin had good chemistry. It's fun to get a different take on the superhero world every now and then, but I don't know that this film is, or even should be, the game changer that people were saying.

17. Keanu - This movie's got a handful of genuinely funny moments and some great running jokes, though there are parts where the comedy really slows down as they try to ratchet up the drama. Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele have fantastic chemistry and the kitten is an amazing actor, just heart-meltingly adorable. Fans of the Key and Peele show will enjoy this the most, but it plays well to all audiences.

16. Arrival - Arrival looks great and has some excellent acting, especially from Amy Adams, who carries most of the film, and Jeremy Renner, who does a good job without a whole lot to work with. The villains of the piece, though, are a little too one-note, on-the-nose bureaucrats. I was enjoying this film through the first two acts or so, but I had major problems with the ending. (SPOILERS) It's, as my brother put it, "future ex machina." The film essentially uses the causal loop as a way to resolve the plot. The causal loop is cute in movies like The Terminator as a way to make you reconsider elements from the film, but I hate it being used as a linchpin to make the plot work. This film perhaps might have been better served by focusing on communication and our issues with language, which is a subject it plays with well. I would've avoided the issues of time altogether because time travel movies rarely, if ever, are told without getting messy. (END SPOILERS)

15. Hail, Caesar! - This film's story is pretty weak, but all the things that happen around the story are fantastic. Hail, Caesar! is at its best when it's paying homage to old Hollywood with really well done song and dance pieces or sending up the business with excellent comedic bits. The film looks fantastic and gets strong performances out of Josh Brolin and Alden Ehrenreich. It's a love letter to the olden days of the film industry that's not as great as the sum of all its parts. Its parts, however, add up to a very high sum.

-Okay, break time. We're about half-way done with the list so here's where I'll stop to mention the two documentaries I saw this year.

Weiner was like watching a fascinating, slow motion train wreck. It makes you sad about what a good politician Anthony Weiner could've been if he could've kept his dick in his pants. It also helps you see that his passion and inability to back down from anything -- a big part of what made him a compelling politician in the first place -- is also what makes him constantly get in his own way. It's probably what also led to him to allow a documentary crew follow him around as he ran for mayor of New York, and stay around even after his second texting scandal broke. Also, my God do you feel bad for Huma Abedin.

O.J.: Made in America is a wide-spanning, masterpiece of a documentary that presents to you, in compelling fashion, everything you ever needed to know about O.J. Simpson. It covers him from childhood through his recent second arrest and conviction and touches on every part in between, including painting a vivid picture of race relations in America at the time of the trial. This documentary is about eight hours long, but you never feel like there's any stretching. In fact, you sort of wish there was even more. It's a gripping and tragic story and Ezra Edelman did a fantastic job putting it together.

I'm not going to try and fit these two documentaries into the list of narrative films, but I will just say I thought both of them were excellent and recommend them.

All right. Let's get back to it. These last 14 films all received A-minuses or better in my invisible rating scale that I use to help me order the list, so here, in my opinion, is the good stuff.-

14. Doctor Strange - This was a very fun, visually extraordinary ride. The action scenes were excellent, making clever use of space and time. The film is well directed. There's a lot of interdimensional traveling and warping of space in this movie that could've been a mess, but it's actually surprisingly easy to follow. Benedict Cumberbatch is very charismatic, though I felt he could've used some more character building (he just kind of goes from slightly a jerk to not such a jerk). There's lots of setup and exposition about Doctor Strange and his mythology, so there's less time to really develop Mads Mikkelsen's villain, Kaecilius, which feels like a missed opportunity. Otherwise, though, there are quite a few good supporting characters, including The Ancient One, played with some depth by Tilda Swinton. Another strong addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

13. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot - Or as I called it, Zero Dark Thirty Rock thank you, thank you very much. What? Roses? You're too kind. Thank you! Whiskey Tango Foxtrot is an excellent comedy/war drama, with some great dialogue, solid acting (of note: Tina Fey, Christopher Abbott, and strong bit roles from Billy Bob Thornton and Evan Jonigkeit), and surprisingly touching and/or dramatic moments.

12. Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping - There are just so many jokes in this. They come at you a mile a minute, so there are bound to be a handful of misses (mostly when the jokes veer into the too silly, 14 year old boy stuff) but there are a lot more jokes that hit and hit hard. The best come when the film is sending up the music industry, especially using real, big names from said industry in faux interviews. The songs are a real high point, too. This was definitely the funniest movie I saw this year.

11. The Nice Guys - This one's the ol' Shane Black special: mismatched buddy "cops" (not really cops, but for lack of a better cliché), witty dialogue, violence, mystery, physical humor. It's expertly done all around from writing to acting to directing. If you're a fan of Black’s work, this is a quality addition to his oeuvre.

10. Other People - This one treads on somewhat familiar ground but does so in a smart, well-crafted way. It's a film about watching someone you love die, which makes it a hard film to watch, especially because it hits on this nugget of truth: living through the death of a loved one is weird. I mean, sure, it's painful and heartbreaking, but it's also often awkward and frustrating, and sometimes, even darkly humorous. Loss is a part of life we all must experience, but we never really know how to deal with it perfectly and this is a film that touches beautifully on that. Great acting from Jesse Plemons and Molly Shannon at the center of this.

9. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story - A great take on a war movie in the Star Wars universe, with some excellent visuals, a fantastic third act, and a breathtaking sequence featuring Darth Vader. The film has a good score but I felt it was sometimes overbearing to the point of distraction -- there's a scene where a bunch of rebels are just debating at a table and the score is playing loudly like a battle sequence. Felicity Jones was a strong lead but, and maybe this is just my own issue to get over, Diego Luna just does nothing for me. The CGI Grand Moff Tarken was a little too CGI-y for my taste. He almost felt like a Jar Jar Binks-type full CGI character that wasn't actually there. I thought it could've used some scaling back but others who saw the movie with me didn't even notice he wasn't real, so maybe that was just because I went in with the knowledge the real actor had died years ago. Ultimately, this movie presents some cool ideas and offers a different, more grounded take on the Star Wars universe, but I have to say, I did kind of miss some of the Star Wars of it all: Jedis and lightsabers and such.

8. Moonlight - A beautifully shot, well written and directed film that touches on some familiar movie themes -- being poor and coming of age, being black and coming of age, and being gay and coming of age -- but combines them in a way that is more rarely seen. It's artfully done and without excess melodrama, though it's, let's say, methodically paced (the whole movie is maybe 10 segments). The acting is wonderful all around. The main two characters who we see grow up through the film are cast well. Chiron, especially, was a rich, full character created by three different actors doing the lifting. This film also received great supporting performances from Mahershala Ali, Janelle Monáe, and Naomie Harris. There isn't really a sour note in the whole ensemble.

7. Hunt for the Wilderpeople - This one is equal parts cute, funny, and touching, and is presented in an interesting style (very Wes Anderson-ian in camera, music, and color). At times, the plot isn't as tight as I'd like it to be, sometimes becoming almost dreamlike, moving from vignette to vignette, as the heroes encounter strange people and situations that don't always make sense. Still, there's a lot of heart at the center of this strange film, and it makes for an excellent movie going experience. Sam Neill and Julian Dennison give excellent performances.

6. Zootopia - I was not expecting to love this movie as much as I did. It's funny, sweet, and very imaginative. The little world that's been created for this film is fascinating, with clever parodies and animal gags (sloths running the DMV, for example). The film provides a pretty decent mystery thriller as well, while managing to touch on issues of classism, sexism, and racism (little on the nose though they might be - it is a kid's movie after all). It's impressive considering there are seven different writers credited on the story. That's normally a bad sign, but this movie worked. If you're looking for things to watch with the family, you could do much, much worse.

5. Manchester by the Sea - As a movie (that is, a story with a beginning, middle, end, 3 act structure and all that), it doesn't quite come all together for me. I wish the story was more solid. It almost feels like a visual novel, in a way, as weird as that sounds. I wish the music, beautiful as it was, was quieter or not there, allowing us to be fully with the characters more. I think these, for lack of a better word, shortcomings, as a movie prevent me from moving this film higher up the list. The reason I have this as high as it is, though, is because if you see this not as a film but as an examination of life, it's incredible. It speaks to how life can be unfair and unbearably painful and yet still humorous (sometimes morbidly so). How love and family can be the greatest sources of strength in our lives, and the things that cause us the most pain. How we deal with tragedy, and how in life, things don't always work out. Sometimes, there isn't character growth. Sometimes, we just find ourselves drifting, trying to make it through life as best we can. Manchester by the Sea is beautiful, and real, and emotionally gutting. Casey Affleck is amazing, his pain just simmering under the surface at all times, constantly affecting him. Lucas Hedges and Kyle Chandler were both excellent in supporting roles. And Michelle Williams, in her one big scene, is heartbreaking. That one big scene, too... my God, it's devastating. Affleck and Williams made me feel more emotion in that scene than any other scene in any film this year did. Don't be discouraged from watching this film because people talk about how depressing it is. There is sadness, to be sure. It isn't a light watch. But there's levity in here as well. There's both. That's life.

4. Florence Foster Jenkins - Another movie that took me by complete surprise. You see the commercials and think this is just a film with Meryl Streep singing bad and that's the joke and that's it. And sure, there's some of that. But this movie, at its core, is a beautiful, lovable movie about chasing your dreams. About making an effort to create, and being vulnerable, and trying things, and being a positive influence on the world. It's also a story about love, and what you would do to protect and support those you love. And finally, it's a movie about empathy, and about how we should treat one another. You get some fantastic acting from Streep, of course. I mean, yeah, she's good in everything, but what she did here, with what could be a one-note character, is made a full human. Streep plays Jenkins with a kindness that makes you love her, and a dauntless attitude that makes you respect her. You want her to succeed, and, knowing she can't, you want to protect her. There's solid supporting work here, too, from Rebecca Ferguson and Hugh Grant (who does an excellent job as a man of contradictions, but one who cares deeply for Florence and will go to great lengths to protect her), but I was most surprised by Simon Helberg's Cosmé McMoon. He brings a meekness and sweetness to his role that really humanizes his character. Look, your mileage may vary here. I’m not blind to some of the issues of this film, but it just hit me in such a wonderful, unexpected way and I enjoyed it immensely.

3. Sing Street - This is a fantastic little indie film with some great music and original songs, really funny bits, and good acting (especially from Jack Reynor, who plays a mentor older brother with a little extra bubbling under the surface). The film touches on the importance of music in life (especially as a form of escapism or a way to speak about love), about taking risks, and chasing dreams. I don't have a whole much else to say about it. It just works on every level and accomplishes everything it sets out to do. One of the most enjoyable films of the year.

2. Captain America: Civil War - The most fun I had in a movie theater this year. It's filled with great action sequences, including the awesome airport fight scene (the best action sequence of the year), that actually have some strong emotion behind them and consequences because of them. It also has some excellent bits of humor sprinkled throughout. There's a huge cast here, but they are used well and play well off of each other. Robert Downey Jr., who is always good as Tony Stark, shows a little bit of range, flashing some of his acting chops in a couple of family-related emotional scenes. Tom Holland is an outstanding Spider-Man and his interactions with Tony Stark and the rest of the Avengers are some of the high points of the film. Finally, I think it's an impressive bit of writing to establish both sides of the civil war as reasonable and somewhat unreasonable. You get why the heroes pick the sides they're on, and why they don't understand how their friends could pick the other side. Their reasons for fighting each other make sense and the fight feels like an inevitability instead of a obligatory point we've been forced towards. Another hit for Marvel.

1. La La Land - Feels like this Damien Chazelle guy might be someone to watch. This movie is pure, wonderful fantasy. It's just a delight. I loved it. It's brilliantly directed and cleverly written. Every shot and scene is so visually interesting and vibrant. There's some great choreography and the music is pretty good, though I actually think it could've been better. It's enjoyable while you're in the film, but outside of "City of Stars," none of the songs really stuck with me in a way I wish they did. Also, (SPOILERS) the ending is so emotionally crushing. I get it, I accept it, it's beautiful and bold in its own way of looking at life, but, come on, if you're going for a throwback musical, end it like a throwback musical. I mean, yeah, it's a throwback musical with a modern twist and in modern life, things don't work out all the time. Okay, okay, fine. But I say leave that stark realism to Manchester by the Sea and leave this film with the magic, happy ending. That’s the effect this film had on me. I know, in my head, the ending makes sense, but this film had me by the heart so badly that I couldn’t deal with it. I was so damn emotionally invested! (END SPOILERS) Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone are incredible. They have the best on-screen chemistry of any couple on film this year. This film filled me with joy and left me in awe. I don't know how you could watch it and not have a smile on your face. That's why it's my #1 film of the year.

All right. Let's wrap it up with some individual awards.

Best Actor

5. Sam Neill, Hunt for the Wilderpeople 4. Jesse Plemmons, Other People 3. Denzel Washington, Fences 2. Ryan Gosling, La La Land 1. Casey Affleck, Manchester by the Sea

Best Actress

5. Taraji P. Henson, Hidden Figures 4. Viola Davis, Fences 3. Amy Adams, Arrival 2. Emma Stone, La La Land 1. Meryl Streep, Florence Foster Jenkins

Best Supporting Actor

5. Hugh Grant, Florence Foster Jenkins 4. Simon Helberg, Florence Foster Jenkins 3. Alden Ehrenreich, Hail, Caesar! 2. Lucas Hedges, Manchester by the Sea 1. Mahershala Ali, Moonlight

Best Supporting Actress

5. Octavia Spencer, Hidden Figures 4. Janelle Monáe, Moonlight 3. Molly Shannon, Other People 2. Naomie Harris, Moonlight 1. Michelle Williams, Manchester by the Sea

Best Director

5. Ethan Coen and Joel Coen, Hail, Caesar! 4. Taika Waititi, Hunt for the Wilderpeople 3. Barry Jenkins, Moonlight 2. Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester by the Sea 1. Damien Chazelle, La La Land

Best Screenplay

5. Shane Black and Anthony Bagarozzi, The Nice Guys 4. Chris Kelly, Other People 3. Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester by the Sea 2. Damien Chazelle, La La Land 1. John Carney, Sing Street

There we go. Way too many words about movies. If you stuck around this long, I apologize for the insane rants about some of those movies up in the 20s.

Also, if you stuck around this long, what are you doing? You're crazy and I love you.

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Annual Lists of Movies I Saw the Past Year

#Reviews #Annual Lists of Movies I Saw The Past Year

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