#arguments straight from the kindergarden

[mrshudson-magnussen]

Yes you did ask me. That's the thing of social media, you know? You interact with people and you get answers. Don't post your bullsh*t on social media if you can't work with answers that doesn't pamper you or clap for your hate and crap and your crying.

Cause that's all it is. Crying and hating. You don't watch the show, fine. Good. Now stop to annoy people who watch it and like it. Your comparison is stupid and doesn't make sense. I don't even need a long explanation why it doesn't make sense (a sentence was enough). But just 5 minutes of logical thinking are enough to get there on your own too (at least if you're not from a country that's all the time in war mood or something). And the funny thing is, if you could put your hate for a show, you don't even watch, aside for a minute, you would notice it yourself. But no...

Heavens, people these days. As if you all couldn't get your day by if you don't hate on something.

I follow Tolkien blogs and sides for art and for infos and for memories and all the nice things. Not for this bullsh*t.

[ohsalome]

Some more reactions of “ordinary russians” to their country committing genocide in ukraine on their tax money (mostly from the BTS fandom)

Some clarifications for the context:

“Where have you been all these 8 years” is a popular accusation russians have today against ukrainians. 8 years ago russia invaded Donetsk and Luhansk under the fake premise of protecting them from cannibalistic banderivtsy and installed puppet governments there. Russian military aided by local collaborators have been terrorising the region. Among their tactics was using civillian buildings (houses, hospitals, kindergardens) as live shields, and just straight up bombing civillian targets. During all this time, russian media blamed ukrainian army for the crimes committed by the russian army there, whose presence they straight up denied. And today russians use it as some kind of argument against ukrainians speaking up about our genocide, although god help me to understand what kind of point is it supporsed to be. During this time russians have been kidnapping donbass civillians and putting them into the torture camps; they have been sexually trafficing donbass women; they have illegally conscribed donbass men to serve as a cannon fodder in the ongoing phase of the war; they have violated every single ceasefire; they have been sabotaging humanitarian corridors and disrupting attempts of creating safe ways for the civillians to flee the war zone. During this period, Ukraine has sent to Donbass 5,5 more amounts of humanitarian help despite having much smaller economy. However, in the imaginary world of those people, “ukraine has been bombing Donbass for 8 years” (although missles haven’t been actively used since 2015).

[jupitermelichios]

So I decided to rewatch Suicide Squad and I have some thoughts...

This isn’t really a review so much as it’s just a series of thoughts and impressions. I will say that while it’s still one of the worst made films I’ve ever seen, it’s never boring, which is by far the biggest sin a film can commit. It’s bullshit but it’s consistently interesting bullshit which makes it better than something like Fant4stic, which is as bad and incoherant but also just incredibly dull. I don’t think this could ever have been a good film, there was too much massively wrong with it before shooting even started to have been salvagable, but I do think it could have been a lot more coherant if it hadn’t been for the reshoots, re-edits, re-edits of re-edits and all the the other stuff that happened to it post production. Unlike something like BvS, I get why some people liked this one.

On that note, while I am going to end on a few possitives this basically a roast so if you don’t want to read about a film getting picked apart, this probably won’t be your jam. But if like me you find critiques of bad movies cathartic, read on. I’m not the first person to do this, but I’ve spotted some stuff I haven’t seen anyone else talk about so hopefully there’ll be something new for you.

All the dialogue is just slightly off in a way that’s hard to pin down, in the way that a lot of comprehensible stuff written by computers and neural networks is just slightly off. It’s got that phishing email or pornbot quality to it. Literally the fourth or fifth line in the film is Griggs saying about the prison rations, “...Everything a growing young man needs like you”, which isn’t nonsense, but is clearly wrong, and a lot of the lines have that quality to them.

In a similar vein, Deadshot’s daughter is written like she’s five or six, but the actress looks about twelve. I actually went and checked how old she was when this released, because I know white people are often wildly bad at judging the ages of black kids and I’m bad at judging ages in general, but no, she was 12 or 13 when this was shot, so why’s she written like a toddler? She doesn’t give a good performance (which is not the actresses fault, Will Smith barely gives a good performance in this and he can do this shit in his sleep, there’s no way a kid could have risen above the terrible script and direction) which makes it even worse, because you’ve got this pre-teen delivering dialogue written for a kindergardener in a way that feel like it’s maybe the first time she’s ever seen the script, and it makes what is otherwise one of the most competant scenes in the movie feel just as off as everything else.

The Joker. A lot of people have written a lot about Leto’s Joker but I want to add two things to the discussion I haven’t seen talked about much before. Firstly, before the electro-shock torture and acid bath, he and Harley have no romance. Like, explicitly, there is no romance, or even cammeraderie there. He’s her patient. She’s his jailer. He didn’t seduce her, he just tortured her until she gave in. That’s literally shown in the film. Even after the torture when she’s now on side he still really doesn’t like her, and not in a Paul Dini BTAS he doesn’t like her but he also wants her around kind of way. He doesn’t want her in his life. He orders her to leave him alone and she fucking stalks him. That’s not even subtext, she is specifically his stalker, because apparently the solution to the relationship being abusive was to retconn Harley into also being a creep as though that somehow solves something.

Secondly, Joker isn’t smart. Not only is he no longer emotionally intelligent (and comics Joker is many terrible things but he’s probably the most emotionally intelligent character in DC, that’s a lot of what makes him so dangerous because it’s how he manipulates people) he’s not intelligent full stop. His great plan for breaking out of Arkham? Some of his goons from the outside literally just shoot their way in to get to him. Even leaving aside the fact that Arkham apparently isn’t set up to deal with that kind of violence in this world despite Batman having been opperating for a decade, that’s not a clever plan, and it’s not Joker’s plan. 'Hope some of my dudes are loyal enough to come get me’ isn’t any kind of escape plan, and nothing we see after that point suggests that this was a moment of weakness. Joker just straight up isn’t very bright in this, which is weird because that’s one of the few genuinely consistent character traits he has. He’s no Riddler, sure, but he’s really smart and that makes him hard to contain.

Ayer made Harley functionally a sex worker in this, and it doesn’t actually matter that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with sex work or that sex work is real work, because David Ayer definitely thinks there is, and also really really hates women. David Ayer hates women so goddamn much. The only thing Slipknot does in the entire film apart from die is hit a woman just for being a woman.

When Waller arrives at Belle Reve, Croc is doing push ups. And that’s fine, it’s a classic movie shorthand for ‘bored prisoner is also fit and strong’, but the actor isn’t actually doing pushups. He’s got one knee tucked under his body to support his weight, and is clearly actually just sort of bobbing his head. What I suspect happened is that the prosthetics on his arms and chest were too heavy to allow that kind of movement, which would tie up with the stiff way he holds his arms throughout the film, but he’s not even bothering to pretend very hard and it adds to this pervading sense of off-kilter wrongness the film has.

Rick Flagg is supposed to be ‘the best special forces opperative this country has’, but he’s... really bad? He’s no use in any of the fights, he’s incapable of working with a team and has zero interpersonal skills, and when he’s assigned to be a bodyguard, he immediately starts fucking his client which is like, bodyguarding rule 1. He’s really bad at his job. (Which would be fine if the explanation was that he’s a fucking psychopath who’s 100% willing to just murder a civilian in the line of duty, but he’s meant to be Hannibal Smith more than Dirty Harry, and also if he is here because he’s a psychopath, why did Amanda Waller assume June Moon would be into that?!) He even has to be blackmailed into joining the opperation, so he’s incompetent, unprofessional, causes unecessary conflict, and isn’t even loyal to the project, so why him and not, I don’t know, literally any other character?

On the subject of June Moon, she goes (alone) on an archeological dig in a rainforest somewhere, finds a cave full of human remains and ancient artefacts, and literally her first action is to deliberately smash one of the artefacts, presumably just to see what would happen? IDK! We never get any explanation for that, but it’s definitely meant to be deliberate and not accidental when she smashes it! Why are archeologists in movies all so terrible?!

People have joked a lot about the fact that the movie changes the purpose of the squad from ‘plausibly deniable black ops, especially on American soil’, to ‘punching Superman’ but kept Captain Boomerang on the team, but there is actually an explanation given. A really really stupid explanation. Amanda Waller says that he’s there because ‘he faced down a metahuman and survived’, referring to him surviving being arrested. By the Flash. Who is famously non violent, and in fact in the next film in the series specifically says he’s never fought someone. So Boomer is on the team because he didn’t die when Flash picked him up and carried him to a police station, and Amanda Waller thinks that’s some kind of achievement. Like that isn’t the case for literally everyone the Flash has ever caught. And Flash is a street level hero, so that’s a whole lot of muggers and purse snatchers who are apparently capable of fist fighting Superman by Waller’s logic.

(On the same note as the Joker, Waller is also now incredibly stupid, but she’s mostly stupid for plot related reasons, so it sort of gets a pass? It gets more of a pass than the Joker at least, because making him comics-smart wouldn’t have necessatitated changing anything else about the film)

Re: Waller’s stupidity, her whole plan for recruiting El Diablo to the squad is... show him a video of him setting fire to some dudes. That’s it. She doesn’t even speak to him, she literally just holds up the video to the little window in his tank and seems surprised when that by itself isn’t enough.

And then when Flagg is like ‘hey let me try persuading him with actual arguments instead of just a weird video’, Diablo’s response is “You think you’re the first person to ask? I won’t do it. I’m a man not a weapon”, which gives us the amazing insight that in Ayer’s version of the DCU, there are apparently just... other Taskforce Xs running around. Other government agencies recruiting metahuman soldiers. So what exactly was the point of the half an hour or so of footage of her persuading the brass to go along with it? Because apparently they’re fine with this if every agency is doing it!

Tone? What even is tone. Griggs both has an antagonist but banter-y relationship with and brings cookies to the prisoners, but also he tortures them and is implied to be sexually abusing Harley, and like... you can’t have it both ways, Ayer. This is a one or the other situation. They can’t have a fun and jokey relationship with a man who is explicitly torturing and abusing them. Tone. You need to pick a fucking tone!

The decision to add a subplot about Deadshot being involved in a custody battle with his ex-wife was a fascinatingly terrible choice, and honestly tells you a lot about Ayer’s relationship to MRA talking points. Like, we know nothing about Deadshot’s wife except that she raised a cute well adjusted kid, so probably a pretty good parent, and that she doesn’t want her daughter to be spending time with a MASS MURDERER! So definitely a good parent! The comics just kind of handwave away Zoe’s mom most of the time, which was the right choice, because Ayer wants us to be on Deadshot’s side here, but it’s literally a choice between "a serial killer but you take credit cards” and a normal loving parent and somehow he thinks serial killer is the right answer? WTF happened in Ayer’s life that he thinks this is a choice where we side with Deadshot?! And it’s not even visitation rights or anything, Deadshot wants full custody. And the film thinks he’s in the right!

Not once, at any job I have ever had, one of which was a tourist attraction that required all visitors to wear a pass, have I ever seen someone wear a visitors pass on their sleeve. Not once. And it’s honestly such a good summary of the pervading wrongness of this film. This doesn’t feel like it was made by people. It feels like it was made by middlingly intelligent algorithms trying to pass as human.

Someone please tell me what the fuck any of this set is supposed to mean. The pose feels deliberate, but it’s not invoking anything I can see except the hanged man from the Ryder-Waite tarot deck, the halo of knives almost looks like it’s pseudo-religious imagery except that it’s not a full halo, the circle is incomplete on one side because of a broken piano, does the piano mean something? What about the babygrows, do they mean something? Does the Joker... want kids? Kill kids? Think Harley’s pregant? What the hell is any of this supposed to mean, and if, as I suspect, it was never supposed to mean anything why the fuck did they go to the trouble of making it?! What exactly does the hours this took to put together add to the movie?

David Ayer has a really weird relationship with both gang culture and latino gang culture specifically. He always feels the need to shoehorn them in somehow, and it’s this weird love-hate relationship where he apparently thinks latino gangs are so cool they have to be in everything, but is also so fucking racist he’s incapable of having a latino character who isn’t in a gang. Also in order to shoehorn them in here, he basically removed all of Joker’s henchmen (except for one scene which serves no narrative purpose) and replaced when with generic racist-stereotype LA gangs.

The fact that Griggs just hands Harley the phone in front of all the other guards and soliders was A Choice. Made even more so by the fact that Griggs never actually pay off. He gives Harley the phone, she tells him he’s “so screwed now”, and then... nothing. He’s just gone for the rest of the movie. He’s not even in the epilogue back in prison scenes.

I fucking love that the first thing Waller does is tell the world’s best assassin her real name. That is just... *chefs kiss* Everyone in this film is so fucking stupid.

I knew it was coming. I knew it was coming and I remembered the line perfectly, and I still had to stop the film because I was laughing too hard for “Ah would advise naht gettin’ killed by her, her sword traps the souls of its victims”. It’s the ‘that wizard came from the moon’ of film dialogue, and no one could have made it work, but the southern accent is really what makes that line delivery. I don’t know why, there’s just something about it in that drawl that it just endlessly hilarious.

It really is impressive how every character in this manages to be an offensive stereotype, sometimes multiple offensive stereotypes at once.

I love how Flagg’s right-hand woman is a samurai with a magical possessed sword that traps the souls of the damned who also isn’t military and refuses to speak English most of the time, but the squad are too weird for him. “You won’t believe it, this guy Boomerage, he’s got these bent stick things, and when he throws them they come back! I am freaking out, I can’t deal with this. Oh hi Katana, trap any damned souls lately?”

Harley is explicitly malicious in this in a way no other version of Harley has ever been, which is a Freudian nightmare when you combine it with her also being more sexualised than ever, and more infantalised than any version outside the Arkham games. Someone get Ayer a goddamn therapist. (Also in the vein of everyone being dumb in this, Harley is now an absolutely terrible psychiatrist and all her diagnoses are explicitly wrong, so that’s fun.)

The fucking pink unicorn-bundle of money switcheroo. There’s nothing to say on it that hasn’t already been said but holy shit. How do you fuck something up that bad? How? It’s like looking into Chekov’s nightmares and finding a pink stuffed unicorn staring back.

I love the way the soliders just come and go in this. Are they dead, are they alive, have they abandonned the cause? Why the fuck knows? Certainly not the editors!

I love how we’re supposed to be really sad about El Diablo being dead, but not care that Croc is seemingly directly underneath the explosion and definitely about to die, that’s fun.

I need to know if it was Ayer or Cara Delavigne’s choice to make Enchantress be just.. doing a little dance. Duing all the ‘tense’ moments. Because there are probably things which undercut tension more than the bad guy having a bit of boogy, but not many.

Enchantress gets so many costume changes, and I want to believe that they’re all from different versions of the film but I honestly think it was deliberate and I need someone on in the design department for this movie to tell me why because it add nothing.

I think the best thing about the stupidly on the nose liscenced soundtrack is that it just disappears once they arrive in Midway city. After spirit in the sky it’s original music all the way until the final scene. The great soundtrack DC stans insist this film has is literally only in the first 50 minutes and the last 2 of a 2hr+ movie.

The glorification of abuse in this is... seriously fucking something else. Twilight doesn’t have a patch on this. 50 Shades of Grey doesn’t have a patch on this. This shit is disgusting, and the fact that they pushed so hard to get it a child friendly rating is just morally bankrupt.

Possitive note to end on:

The dialogue is way too on the nose and exposition dump-y but the scene in the bar works pretty well. It fulfils its role in the story, and gives us a decent dose of team bonding.

Deadshot and Harley have great chemistry, and Boomer is perfectly cast, in a way that makes me really hopeful for James Gunn’s take on the team. A writer who knows how to write friendships could do a lot with the three of them, and they’ve been the core squad since 2011 so they’re the ones who matter. It probably helps that whatever Will Smith’s faults as an actor, you could cast him opposite a housebrick and they’d somehow have great chemistry.

[hyunjin-ius]

‘I don’t care, I love it’

‘I don’t care, I love it’ pt.1

Genre: Slice of life, mention of smut, probs angst soon???

Pairings: (as of now just:) Felix x Hyunjin

Warnings: none i guess

Word count: 1K

Description: Danceteacher!Hyunjin broke up with Felix and now can’t really figure his life out. Luckily, he has friends like Changbin to  guide him. But what happens when you let a bunch of 20somethings to mingle??? Yes, it turns out that everyone knows everyone.

“Shit shit shit” screamed Hyunjin slipping down on the passanger seat of his friend’s car. The vehicle was nearing a crosswalk where said boy saw someone who really shouldn’t be seen.

„Well you know” started Hyunjin’s friend Changbin from the driver’s seat „you can’t just hide from Felix for the rest of your life” the boy stated while slowing his car down

„Well you know” Hyunjin mimicked the older with a mocking tone „I can at least try” Hyunjin stayed below window levels. He couldn’t risk seeing his ex boyfriend, after just 2 weeks of their break up.

„You are ridiculous” laughed Changbin. The older let go of the steering wheel with one hand to show a peace sign to Felix. Hyunjin watched his friend in silence from his crouched down position.

„I’m not sure how I feel about you saying hi to my ex who just happend to cross the road”

„I’m not sure how I feel about you telling me what to do” now it was Changbin’s turn to taunt the younger „Anyways he’s gone, you can sit up” it took a few more minutes for Hyunjin to feel safe enough to show his face to the world.

„You’d think that Seoul is big enough for us. Turns out it’s not”

„Since you live in the same neighborhood, and technically work at the same place. You are right” Changbin looked at his friend „it’s small when you don’t want to run into someone” Changbin turned his head back to watch the road.

„It’s like the universe wants us to meet every single day” Hyunjin shook his head in disbelief

„It was the same universe that wanted to see you as a couple” Changbin shrugged „Maybe the universe haven’t got the memo yet, I mean about your breakup”

„Then it should restart its browser and see how I’ve changed my relationship status on facebook” scoffed Hyunjin

Hyunjin and Felix have known each other for quite a while. They’ve started to work at the same dance studio around the same time. Both being 22, at their first serious job after many failed attempts. Being newbies together was a great starting point for their relationship which slowly but surely turned out to be more than just a simple friendship. They’ve worked together as dance teachers and choreographers too. Teaching kids and teens hip-hop elements, trying to help out couples with their wedding choreos, being back-up dancers for famous singers was far more than what they could’ve wished for. The boys have enjoyed working together more than working alone or doing the job with anyone else from the studio.

Hyunjin knew that he was gay since his kindergarden days, but for Felix it was a whole new world. Developing feelings for a man was not on Felix’s bucket list to say the least. Being in your early 20’s was confusing enough. Being in love with someone from your own gender for the first time in your life was beyond comprehensible. Hyunjin knew what he wanted, but first, he had to convince Felix that not being straight does not mean that you’ll end up in hell. It was a casual topic for Hyunjin. Being gay was natural for him, and he never felt the need to hide his sexual identity from anyone. First, it started with lighthearted jokes about Felix being all smiles around Hyunjin and basically being smitten with the openly gay one. And you know how the saying goes…there’s a grain of truth in every joke.

Eventually all it took was a drunk night. The boys went out together and got hammered as fuck on a Friday night. Hyunjin felt ready to take things to the next level. At that point anyone with eyes could see that the boys were into each other. The long awaited kiss happened on the dancefloor in one of the clubs on that Friday night. Needless to say, that kiss awakened everything in Felix. Sure enough they couldn’t stop with just making out in public. That night they ended up in Hyunjin’s apartment. Not being able to repress their sexual fantasies about each other they took action. Since Felix was new to the idea of two men having sex Hyunjin tried to be as carefeul as possible. At the end he settled with the option of just sucking Felix off. Giving oral to his crush while jerking himself off was more than fine that night. For Felix it was even better. The sight of Hyunjin kneeling in front of him, mouth wrapped around his cock while simultanusly gripping his own dick was a scene to die for. That was the first night Hyunjin swallowed everything Felix could offer. Luckily there was no awkward silence the morning after, rather both of them felt relieved. From that morning they were a couple.

But life wouldn’t be complete without heart breaks. Sooner or later Felix and Hyunjin had to admit that they might be better off alone. First of all Felix identified as bi which was a great source of everday arguments. Hyunjin seemed like a boy with an ego reaching for the stars, but deep down he was scared that he isn’t enough for his lover. He was insecure and jealousy often got the better of him. His past relationships were all with men who were just as gay as him, now he was with someone who had eyes for girls as well. For Felix this whole ’being in love with a man’ chapter was too much too handle at times. They pulled through, but after a while there wasn’t any reason to keep on trying to save what can’t be saved.

Hyunjin was right about Felix eyeing girls from time to time. The final straw was when Hyunjin found out that Felix spent more time in the studio with one of his girl students than with him back at home. Cheating really wasn’t an option, and Felix swore to God that it was only a professional relationship, but it was already more than enough for Hyunjin. He thought that breaking up with Felix is going to be easier if he’s mad at the boy. Alas, he had to accept the fact that he loved to make up things, and Felix wasn’t all that bad. But it was too late then. And it is too late now.

„I’m thinking about throwing a party on Saturday or Friday” Changbin’s hoarse voice broke the silence „It’s been a while since we drank together”

„I don’t think that I’m ready to socialize and tell people that I’m single” whined Hyunjin

„Are you joking?” Changbin furiously tapped the steering wheel „You post break up songs on facebook every second day, besides no trace of Felix can be found on any of your social media pages. Everybody knows that you are single!”

„You’re not helping Changbin!”

„Yet I’m trying to!” Changbin was close to lose his temper. At this point Hyunjin knew better than to open his mouth anytime soon.