#barbie roberts ~ thread

[thefvrious]

@chmerical said -> ​❝ i’m good at a lot except for being a parent, it seems. ❞

barbie had only been staying with gloria and sasha for a few short weeks, but they were the best weeks of her whole entire life! she experienced genuine laughter juxtaposed against other emotions she'd have never had the opportunity to feel in barbieland, where everything was perfect. they laughed, cried, sighed, talked, ate junk food, went for joy-rides. it was the life, and she loved living it.

most of all, though, barbie loved seeing the interaction between sasha and gloria. it wasn't perfect by any means, but sasha didn't make it easy. she was a moody teenager whom gloria handled with grace and tenderness. it made barbie's heart ache in her chest, longing for something she'd never had, would never have the chance to have. it was so clear that sasha meant the world to gloria, so to hear the woman be so down on herself about it tore barbara to pieces.

"oh, gloria." she said, leaning in, both hands on the other woman's forearm as her brow furrowed with her growing concern. "you're the best parent i've ever seen!" that didn't account for much, and she realized as soon as she said it, cocking her head to the side with a bashful little laugh. "well, i mean, you make me feel things when i watch you with sasha. wonderful things. don't you know you two are most of the reason i wanted to be here? you're a wonderful mother. she's just being stinky right now."

[thefvrious]

“Strawberry!” She practically squealed in excitement. “Even better!” Barbie’s eyes were wide and practically glittering with her excitement as she watched the thick, viscous slush fill the glass. “Oh, I have one of those!” She said of the cards, pulling a wallet seemingly out of nowhere only to offer a useless plastic Barbie card with a gleeful, maniacal grin. When the bartender looked at her then Michael like she was nuts, she barely noticed. She did notice, however, that he took Mikey’s card and not hers. Pouting, she slid her card back into the wallet. “Must be a man thing.” She said with a shrug, settling on the stool next to him before having a sip of the frozen beverage, wincing from the surprise of it.

“Oh... I never actually talked to Emmie.” She confessed with a laugh, licking a bit of daquiri off the bottom of the straw. “She just wished really hard, and I talked to Weird Barbie, and then I came here and found you! And now here we are!”

"Perfect. Strawberry daiquiri please." He gestured towards the slush machine as the bartender poured one out for the blonde in a margarita glass and poured out a beer for himself. Taking out his wallet, he put one of his cards down to start a tab before gesturing towards a booth, taking both their drinks for them. He placed his beer before him and hers opposite before sliding onto his seat.

"Alright, so, Barbie - what did Emmie say to you? To get you to come find me and stuff." He continued to play along, playing loose with his words before taking a sip of his beer.

[percentstardust]

@dvarapala

"I have to get a degree to do most of the careers here in this world, yeah?" Mattel has done their part for her and they have helped her establish an identity in the real world. She has her own place, not exactly a Dreamhouse, but it was a nice home with a pool not too far from the beach. She has a new vehicle. Most of her new life was being provided by the Mattel company. She did not have a job or, well, anything really. She was grateful for it. She was starting a new life. She was Barbara Roberts now. Not stereotypical Barbie."

[melodyplucked]

@sunnybarbie liked for a STARTER

❝   falling in love really isn't for the weak... they should put one of those warning labels on it.    ❞    he chuckles, a bit sarcastic.    ❝   like- don't try this at home    ❞    ricky shakes his head before just turning to smile at the girl a bit hopefully. the movie they're watched with the substitute teacher still plays, and he has yet to determine what this romance on screen has to do with ap bio... maybe they can at least talk a little- as long as they're quiet. ricky likes his new school well enough, including his lab partner in the seemingly perfect, popular, barbie roberts. she really is sweet, and smart, way smarter than he'd ever be. but even as he is sort of making friends, it still sucks being away from nini, and missing her hurts the worst...    ❝   i uh- you and ken seem really sweet though. it kind of reminds me of being back home with my girl.    ❞    

[everlightblessing]

            tag drops: barbie!

[shefatalesarch]

THE MUSIC WAS LOUD and excitement coursed through her as she found rythym and danced her gaze turning back towards her company. "come on, you wanted to get out, you wanted the distraction!" she shouted as she gestured her fingers towards himself quickly with an eager grin. "dance with me!" she insisted quickly.

@damssel ♥ for a starter from barbara 'barbie' roberts

[thefvrious]

@whatscanon said -> "hi barbie! how're you liking the new decor?!"

drowning in a sea of thoughts she can't chase away, barbie is in her head. this is new, she doesn't like it, can't seem to snap out of it. it takes barbie's voice to pull her from the reverie -- no, not reverie, more like waking nightmare. was that the opposite of a daydream? when had everything stopped being so perfect?

the switch is flipped, though, and she shakes off the dissonance and offers the other barbie a wide, glittering smile -- as manufactured as the rest of her. "love, love, love it! oh, i wish i was good at that." she says, pushing herself up, turning in a circle to take it all in. everything all the barbies do at all times is exceptional. and she's just... well, stereotypical? what's that mean? "what inspired you this time?"

[bakedbakermom]

can you tell use more stories of what it was like waiting/watching the x files when it was on air?>:)

i was late to the fandom - i stumbled across the episode Humbug during the hiatus between s6-s7 and was HOOKED. i was also, unfortunately, 13 at the time, and not allowed to use the internet nearly as much as i wanted. so i can't tell you about what the fandom was like before 1999.

HOWEVER i can tell you that the end of s7 was a nail biter, and the summer between 7 and 8 was filled with an unprecedented surge in fanfic as we all tried to imagine what season 8 would bring. (i wrote one that i may return to at some point, it was very apocalyptic.) there were a LOT of angry fans when robert patrick was announced as joining the cast, to the point where many of us felt like scully hitting him with water in Within was meant to be a catharsis for US.

what i miss most about those days, however, is how creative and connected the fandom was. there were web hosts out there like angelfire and geocities where anyone could make their own completely free website about whatever they wanted, with a simple wysiwyg interface (what you see is what you get, aka drag and drop) so even the most tech-illiterate among us could make something cool - and if you knew html (or had lissaexplains bookmarked) you could make something truly spectacular.

there would be surges of new fic and fanart after every episode (some more than others lol). you would find screencaps and videos on napster from those who had better tech than you. being 13 with a strict 10pm bedtime and no computer of my own, i couldn't hop on the forums after the episode like i wanted; instead i'd have to wait until monday afternoon after school to catch up on all the hot goss and new content, and i had NO irl friends who watched the show until high school (literally day one a girl named jenn spotted xf art on my binder and we were friends immediately). so you can imagine that by the time 3:00 rolled around i was positively VIBRATING with the need to talk about it.

there was one official forum and dozens of fan-made offshoots (walter's wenches, for example, started as a sub-board on the main forum and then became its own group) that felt like small towns. you could follow individuals or threads and get notifications for posts and updates. this was before social media, so it was all as anonymous as you wanted it to be.

i met several penpals on the official board that i stayed in touch with for years after the series ended and the board was shut down. one of them was a collector of xf memorabilia up in canada from whom i was able to buy several tapes of hard-to-find episodes (if you missed one, you had to hope for a rerun or a marathon) and merch (xf barbies my beloved) as well as extras like interviews and music videos and the celebrity deathmatch segment etc.

i miss late 90s/early 00s fandom so much.

also i was in catholic school and learned more about sex through fic than my school's pitiful sex ed would ever begin to touch on (did you know the penis goes in the vagina? because they never said that. did you know women can orgasm? because they never said that. etc)

[thefvrious]

since meeting gloria, things have changed exponentially for the doll. she's got a taste of what real life is, what it means to exist for a real reason other than someone's satisfaction, as someone's plaything — the idea that being played with too hard would wind up leaving you weird and ostracized. she's happier here, now, she thinks, with gloria. and sasha. they're her people.

if barbie can't do anything else, she wants to be the positive force in the lives of these young women. gloria, sasha — they need her as much as she needs them, she knows, and she wants more than anything to be good for them, to them, to give them what they deserve, to help them actualize the sorts of fantasies that barbies just don't think about because everything for women is perfect there as a way to disguise how fucked up it still is out here.

barbie sits and listens, canting her head to the side as all the weight spills and spills out of gloria. the blonde's brow furrows and she feels only a little better with the warm, soft weight of gloria's hand on top of hers. "you have nothing to be sorry for. i'm here to listen to you. always. i just wish i knew better, wish i could help you better." she sighs, squeezes gloria's hand, leans in to kiss her cheek just gentle. "you're the reason i'm here, you know? so you're definitely doing something right." whatever that means.

continued from ( x ) // gloria vasquez & barbie roberts

𝗜𝗧'𝗦  𝗡𝗢𝗧  𝗟𝗜𝗞𝗘  𝗕𝗘𝗜𝗡𝗚  𝗦𝗢  𝗦𝗘𝗟𝗙  𝗗𝗘𝗣𝗥𝗘𝗖𝗔𝗧𝗜𝗡𝗚  𝗜𝗦  𝗢𝗨𝗧  𝗢𝗙  𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗡𝗢𝗥𝗠.  it's  not  unlike  her  to  take  angsty  teenage  fury  to  heart,  letting  those  biting  words  swim  and  swirl  around  her  mind  until  they  eventually  settle  themselves  onto  the  tip  top  of  the  mountain  of  shortcomings  she's  all  too  aware  of.  it's  almost  impossible  to  tear  her  away  from  the  pit  of  wallowing,  for  her  to  reach  up  and  trust  that  she'll  be  pulled  up  and  out.  and  yet,  here  she  is,  barbie,  a  bombshell  of  a  person,  as  lovely  inside  as  the  stunner  she  is  on  the  out,  offering  up  her  hand.  how  can  she  sit  there,  all  frowns  and  frustrated  tears  prickling  away  when  there's  a  bright  light  in  front  of  her?  there's  warmth  in  those  baby  blues,  warmth  that  𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙬𝙨  𝙖𝙬𝙖𝙮  the  iciness  of  the  aftermath  of  a  spat.

heart's  full  at  the  blondes  words  and  for  gloria,  it's  enough  to  get  a  small  smile  out  of  her,  𝗴𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗳𝘂𝗹.  one  day  she  might  be  able  to  see  things  through  a  happier  lens,  with  more  kindness  for  herself  than  she  ever  allows,  ❝  i  just...  it's  so  hard.  it's  like  everyone  knows  their  lines  and  what  to  do  and  where  to  go  and  how  to  solve  everything.  and  i'm..  here,  tossed  out  onto  the  state  with  no  script.  and  every  choice  i  make  is  wrong  and  i'm  ruining  the  whole  play.  and  sometimes  i  just  want  to  throw  in  the  towel,  call  him,  y'know,  brian,  and  ask  him  how  the  hell  he  does  this.  but  i  can't  because  then  i'm  basically  admitting  i'm  the  worst.  and  that's  not  going  to  happen.  ❞  finally,  a  breath,  awareness  hitting  her  like  a  truck,  the  momentum  of  her  rant  stopped  (  𝘧𝘰𝘳  𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳,  𝘪𝘯  𝘢𝘭𝘭  𝘩𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘺.  𝘸𝘩𝘰  𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘴  𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯  𝘴𝘩𝘦'𝘥  𝘦𝘯𝘥  )  there's  a  hand  reached  up,  gently  landing  on  barbies  own,  ❝  i  am..  so  sorry  about  that.  but  um,  thank  you.  thanks,  really.  i  kind  of  get  lost  in  the  doom  and  gloom  so  it's  nice  to  have  a  reminder  it's  not  all  bad.  ❞

ft. @thefvrious

[truly-hopeless]

The Barbie Bug Bit Me HARD And I Can't Decide What to Write

So as I mentioned near the end of this post, I want to start writing for Barbie (well, I say "start," but I have one up already, albeit a short one inspired by a song from a musical that I'm not super fond of and may rewrite) to break the monotony of only either writing Death Note or my novel. I watched and loved several of the princess/fairy tale Barbie movies as a kid and still think fondly of them today; finding out that some of the movies share voice actors with Death Note (a brainrot that has lasted for four years now) was a neat bonus and has helped renew my interest in Barbie, as did the live action movie that came out this summer. So I have a lot of ideas for stories I'd like to tell using the characters, some recent while a couple others have been marinating for a couple of years now. But with the new limit I'm putting in place to make sure stories will actually get finished, I can only pick ONE of these ideas to write for now and I can't decide what I want to write. So I'm going to tell you, who is reading this, a little about the stories without giving too much away about the plots and then ask you to pick which one you'd most like to read out of the choices.

Threads and Seams: Retelling of the Princess and the Pauper, but in a Rashamon-stylr and with things diverging heavily from canon as early as chapter one when Preminger's attempt to expose Erika as an imposter and blame her and Julian for Anneliese's disappearance backfires HORRIBLY. Will also be a little dark.

Untitled Changeling!Erika AU: Another Princess and the Pauper retelling, except Erika is a fairy who starts to learn more about herself and grow into her powers as she impersonates Anneliese. A lighter fic than the previous idea, but there is a small amount of body-horror planned and some other fairies introduced as supporting characters can be tricky.

From Violet to Fly Trap: A young woman wakes up as Princess Luciana from the novel "The Island Princess," which diverges heavily from the Barbie Roberts movie she enjoyed as a child and ends on a sad note since the author died before she could finish it. With her knowledge of what will happen, Luciana is determined to make sure Ro gets the happy ending she deserves...even if she has to outvillain her mother in order to do it. I've been reading a lot of webcomics where someone is reborn into a novel that ends badly and/or as a character that will suffer A LOT and, upon realizing this, does what they can to avoid this fate and ends up changing the entire story. And since I also have an evil part of me that wants to write bad endings to light-hearted things and make myself and others cry, I thought, "Why not combine the two? Create an angsty mess for the protagonist to clean up?"

Barbie In Danganronpa: Pretty self-explanatory, Barbie and her friends are trapped in a school and are told that the only way to get out is for someone to get away with murder. This is one that I've been thinking of for several years now, jotting down character notes, going back and forth on who should live or die, and I have the prologue and two out of the "six" chapters (if you've ever played Danganronpa, you'll know that there are two parts to each chapter, and the fanfics I've seen also have each game chapter last for several story chapters) outlined. This will utilize characters from My Scene to fill out the cast and I also have several ideas for alternate endings. May or may not try to incorporate visual elements, if I can either learn to do it myself or commission someone to do it.

Missing Scenes: My Scene Existential Horror AU. My idea is that it starts out light, showing literal missing scenes about things we know likely happened off-screen (stuff that could act as stand-alone one-shots), but then gets dark once the real world changes to the work (dolls being replaced or discontinued, personalities being rewritten, even changing styles) start to impact the fictional characters, particularly Barbie's replacement Kennedy. May make this a script and try to see about making this an analog horror, but considering my struggles with Death Note: Legacy that might not happen.

Survival Guide For The Vegetarian Vampire (title may change): My Scene Romantic Horror Comedy AU. River has hit rock bottom. He's struggling to find work as a musician, his girlfriend has dumped him, and he can no longer go outside during the daytime without his skin breaking out into horrible boils and he can't feel full no matter how many veggies he eats. Thankfully, his roommate and long-time friend Chelsea is there to help him out, but will she continue to stick around when they both find out just how much he needs her? Crack idea I had at work that grew legs along with a not-crack ship attached (the diary entries said that long before River and Barbie got together, Chelsea had a crush on River before he let her down gently and she realized they were better as friends; I feel it'd be ironic if the tables were turned in adulthood, but Chelsea is 1. not ready for a new relationship [I'm not fond of positively portraying adultery/infidelity, so she and Hudson will have been apart for a few years, though I haven't figured out the specifics such as if it's because of a break up or death] and 2. unsure if River actually likes her now or is just on rebound or only interested in her blood or both).

So which of these should I focus on first?

[percentstardust]

@deafandstoned

"My merchandise and dolls are for everyone. My motto is "Be Who You Want to Be." for a reason." Barbie has always seen her dolls for girls and boys who wanted to play with them. Her clothing line and everything in between were no different. Of course, there are masculine themed things primarily for those who prefer that given her little partnership, and relationship, with Ken. Though, Ken himself is secure in his masculinity, which makes him a figure to look up to alongside her. The two of them were quite the pair

"You should not feel ashamed about anything."

[night-unfurls-its-splendour]

The Real connecting thread between Barbie and Oppenheimer isn't existential crises or the released date.

It's Connor Swindells and Jefferson Hall

Jefferson Hall, who plays Haakon Chevalier in Oppenheimer, was Mr. Robert Martin in ITV's 2009 adaptation of Jane Austen's Emma

Connor Swindells plays Aaron Dinkens in Barbie, and he also played Mr. Robert Martin in Autmn de Wilde's 2019 adaptation of Emma.

[newromantisc]

personagens participando do ask game, por ordem de preferência: anna marie lebeau (rogue), freya, warren worthington iii, jayce talis, norville rogers (shaggy), kuai liang, sarah fortune (miss fortune), lexa kom trikru, victor van dort, natasha romanoff, barbara roberts (barbie), elijah mikaelson.

fique à vontade para transformar as asks que mandei em thread, precisa nem perguntar.

comente 🧵 na ask que você quer que seja transformada em thread.

vou enviar ask pra todos os links que achar pela dash, mas deixe um like aqui pra ter prioridade.

[kevinsreviewcatalogue]

Barbenheimer Double Feature Reviews: Oppenheimer (2023) and Barbie (2023)

NOW I AM BECOME BARBIE GIRL, DESTROYER OF BARBIE WORLD

MELTING PLASTIC, IT'S FANTASTIC

FALLOUT IN THE AIR, DESTRUCTION EVERYWHERE

ANNIHILATION, END OF ALL CREATION

...ahem. Anyway...

----------

Oppenheimer (2023)

Rated R for some sexuality, nudity and language

<Originally posted at https://kevinsreviewcatalogue.blogspot.com/2023/07/barbenheimer-double-feature-oppenheimer.html>

Score: 5 out of 5

Christopher Nolan is a very talented filmmaker who I have very mixed feelings about, and one who I think has been considerably overrated by film geeks of my generation who fixate on his successes and ignore his failures. On one hand, his Batman trilogy still holds up and has left a lasting mark on the character beyond just film, ensuring that his legacy in geek culture would be an enduring one even if he never made another movie. Inception, meanwhile, was a brilliant sci-fi thriller, and Dunkirk is one of the best war movies of the last ten years. What's more, his loving embrace of practical effects and old-fashioned storytelling is one that Hollywood could use more of in a time when it seems that bloated, CGI-fueled, franchise-baiting monstrosities are leading it down a road to ruin. On the other hand, his and Zack Snyder's attempts to apply The Dark Knight's deconstructionist approach to Superman with Man of Steel produced a movie that I didn't really like then and which has held up only worse with the hindsight of ten years of the DC Extended Universe, his sci-fi epic Interstellar was beautiful to look at but had a plot that went straight up its own ass and betrayed its pretensions towards "hard" science fiction, and while I did not see Tenet, his actions and public statements concerning the release of that film theatrically even during a pandemic struck me as pretentious to the point of callousness. What's more, he's popularized a rather annoying trend in sound mixing of trying to make audio more "realistic" that, in practice, means that dialogue often gets drowned out by ambient noise, especially during action scenes where there's a lot of loud noises going on in the background.

That said, while I believe that Nolan is ultimately human, I can also acknowledge that there's a reason why he's considered one of the best filmmakers working today. When he hits, he typically sends it out of the park. And Oppenheimer is Nolan at his best. He takes a three-hour historical biopic, one whose only real scene of spectacle is the Trinity test, and makes it feel like a three-hour epic. It has a sprawling, all-star cast and takes place over multiple time periods, often jumping back and forth between them as it needs to, but keeps its focus on a number of important threads in its subject's life in a manner that keeps it cohesive. The entire cast does amazing work, above all else longtime Nolan collaborator Cillian Murphy as the title character, a man who slowly and then all at once starts to realize what his groundbreaking scientific work has unleashed on the world. This was not the sort of movie that had me checking my watch even with its great length; no, I was gripped the whole way through, all the way to its tragic conclusion as J. Robert Oppenheimer looks back on his life and tribulations and wonders if he will go down in history as the man who destroyed the world. It is a grim film, and knowing just the barest amount about the subject matter going in, there's a reason why my double feature of this film and Barbie had me watching this one first. But it is a worthwhile one, and one that I think will go down in history as a modern classic and one of Nolan's best.

Much of the film is told in flashbacks from the year 1954, as Oppenheimer is undergoing a security hearing to determine whether or not his Q clearance should be revoked due to suspicion that security leaks at Los Alamos National Laboratory under his watch may have enabled the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to take great strides forward on its own atomic weapons project. We start in the interwar period as Oppenheimer establishes himself as one of the world's leading nuclear physicists, continue through his establishment of the Los Alamos laboratory, the Manhattan Project, and the first and only wartime use of nuclear weapons, and conclude in the postwar years as he grows increasingly concerned about the destructive potential of the atomic bomb and especially the hydrogen bomb, becoming a leading voice in favor of arms control instead of an arms race. Through it all, his left-wing sympathies, owing to him being both a Jewish man watching the rise of fascism and a scientist whose profession strongly values the free flow of information, bring him first a measure of soft distrust during the war and then a more hard-edged suspicion afterwards as East/West wartime collaboration breaks down into the Cold War, especially given his interaction throughout his life with people and organizations (including his brother Frank, his wife Katherine, his mistress Jean Tatlock, and the Berkeley professor Haakon Chevalier) who were at one point or another connected to the Communist Party of the United States.

The film starts and ends with Cillian Murphy, who plays Oppenheimer at various points over the span of more than twenty years and is captivating in all of them. In his early scenes, between his hair and his performance, he evokes the feeling of a young "rock star" intellectual with his sights set on a bright mission to change the world, bringing with it the requisite ego. Being tapped to run the Manhattan Project forces him to clean himself up, literally and figuratively, adopting a more traditional haircut and dress while ending his overt dalliances with the various communists around him; while he remains with his wife after she explains to him that she lost faith in communism after her fiancé ran off to fight for the Spanish Republicans and died there (in real life, it was more complicated, but it's implied anyway that she's not being wholly honest here), he pulls back from Chevalier when he tries to get him to spill some nuclear secrets to pass along to the Soviets. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki leaves him haunted after he finds out just how much damage his weapon did, best conveyed in a scene where Nolan's sound mixing is actually used well as the congratulatory speech Oppenheimer is giving to his fellow workers at Los Alamos is drowned out by his own internal panic. Before the Trinity test, the possibility is raised on more than one occasion that the atomic bomb might ignite Earth's atmosphere and destroy the world; while that obviously didn't literally happen, the film ends with Oppenheimer wondering whether or not he might have done so metaphorically.

This is not a movie that glamorizes Oppenheimer. On one hand, it spotlights how he was not only one of the greatest minds America had at the time, but also somebody with a strong moral code, from how his politics were motivated by a genuine desire to do right by the world to how he helped recruit numerous European Jewish physicists into the Manhattan Project by recognizing how Adolf Hitler's antisemitism was causing him to cut off his nose to spite his face. On the other hand, by the time he realized what he unleashed and put aside his dispassionate pursuit of science for its own sake in favor of activism, the cat was already out of the bag, and what's more, his idealism, paired with his womanizing, blinded him to the threat of spies seeking to steal his research and use it to empower the Soviets, ultimately destroying his hope that the postwar era would see global cooperation for the betterment of all instead of the competition for power and glory that it ultimately became. He may be the main character of this film, but by the end, even he wouldn't tell you that he was any sort of hero.

The story here is big, and Nolan wades right into it and makes it feel big. At times, the number of supporting characters, famous faces in both the historical figures and in the all-star cast playing them, was almost too many to keep track of, but Nolan keeps it focused on the big ones, specifically how they all interact with J. Robert at various points in his life. In a unique touch, the "present-day" scenes in 1954 are shot in black-and-white, and the flashbacks in color, a choice meant to show that the security hearings are purely fact-based while the flashbacks are colored by Oppenheimer's memories of the events but which I think also served to highlight how, by the time the Cold War was in full swing, his youthful idealism had long since withered in the harsh light of how things actually played out.

And more importantly, even though this was a very "talky" movie, it felt as propulsive as any of Nolan's other films. Ludwig Göransson's score lent a sense of urgency and impending dread to the proceedings, knowing that it was telling the story of the inventor of the most fearsome and deadly weapon ever conceived and always seeming to be driving the film forward. Nolan and cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema crafted a visual style that feels naturalistic in true Nolan fashion without necessarily going grim and gritty, whether it's the musty old libraries and classrooms that have a hint of dark academia to them or the vistas of Los Alamos, New Mexico that feel consciously designed to evoke Westerns, a comparison that Kitty herself makes when she first sees the town, highlighting the irony of how that older, simpler age of American history was about to be brought to an end through a project carried out in the kind of scenic Western vista that John Ford himself might have shot a movie. It was a long movie, but it was not a bloated one in the slightest. After all, how can you be when you're telling the story of a man who, for better or worse, changed the world?

The Bottom Line

Oppenheimer is another film that proves that, when Christopher Nolan is on the ball, he knows how to make a masterpiece. Whether you're a movie buff or into history or science, this will probably stand the test of time as a classic, and a definitive treatment of the life and work of J. Robert Oppenheimer.

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I was told that the preferential viewing order for this would be to screen Oppenheimer first and then Barbie, so that's exactly what I did.

Barbie (2023)

Rated PG-13 for suggestive references and brief language

Score: 4 out of 5

As a toy, a character, and a pop culture icon, Barbie is a figure with a lot of baggage. On one hand, when she first debuted in 1959 on store shelves that were otherwise lined with dolls of babies and young children, she was a game-changer, one who turned dolls from a fantasy of motherhood to a fantasy of being all grown up. She was the original ideal of the modern, liberated woman: beautiful, glamorous, and, as time went on, capable of working every career under the sun, while also having a handsome (boyfriend? Best friend? It's varied over the years) named Ken. On the other hand, having Barbie, a very '50s/'60s idea of a modern, liberated woman (even one who was herself designed by a woman, Ruth Handler), as an ideal to live up to has done a number on the self-image of generations of young girls, especially when it came to standards of physical beauty, and her aspirational marketing often ran head-first into a world where women and girls often found themselves treated as second-class citizens compared to men and boys.

As such, the announcement of a movie based on Barbie, officially licensed by Mattel, was inevitably going to have to tackle all of this head-on: what Barbie was originally conceived as versus what she had come to represent. And when it was announced that Greta Gerwig, a young filmmaker known for naturalistic, relationship-focused dramas who came up through the "mumblecore" scene in indie cinema, would be directing and co-writing the film with her longtime partner (both creative and romantic) Noah Baumbach, I thought I'd figured out exactly what kind of movie I was going to get just from the trailers: a stinging satire of Barbie's complicated relationship with womanhood and girlhood, wrapped in over-the-top girly aesthetics. That is more or less the film that they delivered, but not in the directions I was expecting. Make no mistake, Barbie is an avowedly, unapologetically feminist film, and one that I'm not surprised has already inspired plenty of unbridled, predictable rage from a certain class of commentator. But it's one that surprised me, and one where really getting into the meat and potatoes of its message would require giving away some of the best moments of the movie.

So, to keep this brief, I had a blast with Barbie. It is undoubtedly a very snarky parody of the doll line, its commercialization, and how people have reacted to it over the years, but it is also an affectionate one made by somebody who clearly spent much of her childhood playing with Barbie dolls and suggests here that they played a big role in making her who she is today. It couldn't have had better casting, not just in its sprawling all-star cast but also in its leads, Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, who not only perfectly look the part of the iconic characters they play but take them to some very interesting and even daring places over the course of the film. It's a visual treat, especially in how it imagines the neon-pink world that Barbie and Ken live in, and its jokes were not only hilarious but also hit very close to home, like the most biting Saturday Night Live parodies of Barbie done on a blockbuster budget. Even if you're the most rugged, bearded manly man who thinks he's above this kind of movie, I guarantee, you'll laugh your ass off watching it.

The film starts in Barbieland, where all the Barbies and Kens live. It's presented to us as a utopian matriarchy where all the Barbies are successful women living their best lives and running everything, and the Kens are eye candy who are happy to live for their girlfriends. Robbie and Gosling's characters are the classic, stereotypical Barbie and Ken we all think of when we hear the names "Barbie and Ken", the beautiful blonde bombshell and her hunky-yet-chaste romantic partner whose life revolves around two things, Barbie and the beach. It's established early on that the Barbies know they live in a fantasy world connected to a toy line in the "real world", and that their purpose is to serve as an aspirational ideal to young girls so that they can become better women when they grow up. Which makes the thoughts of death that Barbie has one day rather unfortunate, especially as they mark the beginning of a breakdown of her perfect life. Turning to "Weird Barbie", a wise older Barbie who lives alone and is connected to a real-world Barbie doll whose owner badly mistreated her, for help, Barbie sets out on a mission to the real world to find the little girl she's connected to, with Ken coming along for the ride.

The film doesn't linger for very long on the mechanics of how all of this operates beyond "it's magic", and frankly, it doesn't need to, dropping enough hints that most viewers could probably figure it out on their own. The Mattel corporation is fully involved, but while Will Ferrell's vaguely villainous CEO has shown up in the marketing for this, he and the company as a whole are chiefly two things: the butt of many of the film's jokes, and more importantly, red herrings. The actual villain is telegraphed pretty early once Barbie and Ken enter the real world, and their identity is rather important to the film's central themes, but I will hold off on spoiling it because it's just such a fun moment that I don't wanna give away. Rest assured, though, this is not a film that rests on its laurels and just throws a torrent of classic Barbie iconography at you to distract from a threadbare story.

And it all starts with the casting. Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling as Barbie and Ken may just be the most perfect casting I can imagine, two actors who both embody the kind of mid-century Hollywood beauty standards that Barbie and Ken were based on and are also two of the most gifted actors of their generation (side note: Gosling's been around for so long that I was surprised to see that he's only eight-and-a-half years older than Robbie), meaning that they don't just look the part, they fill it with personas that I imagine will color how people view the dolls for a very long time. Robbie grabbed me from the moment we get an early dance sequence set to a Dua Lipa disco banger in which, after voicing her thoughts about death, she's tries to go back to putting on a happy-go-lucky party girl face -- but every so often, for just a split second, we see the look of worry creep in. Her comic timing, one of her strongest yet most underappeciated assets, is also on full display here, setting up some of the most hilarious scenes in the film. Throughout, Robbie delivers the kind of performance that would vanquish any doubts as to whether or not she's just a flash in the pan, running the full gamut of emotions as she has to learn about the real world and all its messy stuff. She would've easily walked away as the film's MVP if it weren't for Gosling, who matches her beat-for-beat as Ken learning about his own place in the world and what it really means to be a man. He gets a pair of great musical numbers that both land incredibly well even if he doesn't have the best pipes, and does an amazing job making Ken not just a partner to Barbie, but a mirror to her in some key ways.

Among the characters in the real world, meanwhile, it's America Ferrera and Ariana Greenblatt as the mother Gloria and her teenage daughter Sasha who both give this film its human soul and rest at the heart of its message. We meet Sasha first, and she's representative of young people who see Barbie as a symbol of the older generations' broken promises to girls and young women, the unattainable ideal that they could never live up to and which was all too often used to belittle them. Gloria, meanwhile, is a mom approaching middle age and working an unglamorous office job who sees Barbie quite differently, as the figure who showed her that she didn't have to choose between a career and a family, and remains attached to the ideal of Barbie even if she knows her life isn't perfect. Together, Gloria and Sasha are the ones who force Barbie to confront what she symbolizes, especially as her own life increasingly flies off the rails and she needs to figure out who she really is if she wants to... well, again, spoilers.

It was perhaps to be expected that Greta Gerwig made this a character-focused film above all else given her background, but the real surprises came in the production design. The trailers already showed off Barbieland quite vividly, and the film spends a surprising amount of time there to show it off even further, a landscape saturated in bright pink and primary colors that would feel like it came out of a Y2K-throwback hyperpop music video if it were played for even the slightest bit of irony. The other assorted Barbies and Kens (and forgotten oddities in the Barbie back catalogue like Midge, Skipper, and Allan) are played by a who's who of actors, musicians, models, and other celebrities who feel like they all signed onto this film just to have the opportunity to say that they were in the Barbie movie, and each of them felt like they were having a blast hanging out on set, the exact kind of non-stop-party energy that Barbieland needed. Speaking of hyperpop, the soundtrack too is absolutely stuffed with top-notch quality, a murderer's row of pop and R&B superstars, cult favorites, and up-and-comers that I think is likely to inspire a lot of musicians in its own right, especially with how it often plays in the context of the movie itself.

If I had one real problem with the film, it's that the bits with Mattel often felt superficial and extraneous, especially compared to the deeper commentary of the film's main satirical thrust. Will Ferrell was funny as he often is, but he felt like he was only in this to act like an oblivious jerk, he and his corporate minions barely figuring into the plot except to serve as an obstacle. There are ways I think this movie could've approached the Mattel subplot better, and which it seemed to be leaning into, presenting them not as a soulless corporate behemoth but as a company whose leadership seems to genuinely think they're doing right by the world in general and girls in particular, but is critically failing them and leaving many of them bitter like Sasha. It's a subplot that could've been fleshed out a bit more with maybe five or ten minutes of extra scenes; I'd love to see what the deleted scenes look like when this hits home video.

The Bottom Line

Barbie wasn't just a wonderful palate cleanser after the gloom of Oppenheimer, it's a legitimately great movie in its own right, as both a big, high-concept comedy of a sort we don't normally get these days and a cutting yet affectionate satire of its main subject. If anybody tells you this movie's "only" for women and girls, don't listen to them. Go see it anyway.

[swervdcity-arc]

“ s’long as the guy who hired me pays the cleaning cost   …   you could do whatever you want, for all i care, ” spoken with a smoky chuckle, while freckles momentarily squish beneath eyes. a grin so ephemeral ; it feels almost like a faded memory, already. it’s almost comical                   asking for permission, being so curt, it makes frida giggle just a bit to herself. what barbie doesn’t know, is that this stupid piece of flashy metal wrapped in sparkling silver isn’t even frida’s. once this gig is over, someone’ll fuck with the miles and turn it into a brand new piece of trash and sell it to some poor asshole. picked from a garage of cigarette smoke and mounds of cocaine                   this one has driven enough stars. it’s about time to move on to a cougar wearing burberry tartan.

“ if you wanna go i’ll take you there, ” a sooty black sneaker presses on the gas as inked hands force the wheel. busy city streets, full of middle fingers and marquees. claustrophobic, fast paced, like everyone’s in a race to be first in the slaughter shoot. it’s so easy to be so pessimistic, and it’s even easier to understand why frida sneers and snarls at anyone who dares cut her off. oh. the pub : not one of frida’s main places, sure, but not too out of her realm. she’s sat in a deal there, once, but it’s not as seedy as usual. too many chelsea boots trying to feel edgy. edison light bulbs hang from the ceilings. there’s a signed bruins jersey hanging over the bar                   which is funny, considering this isn’t even boston. “ i don’t know your type of place, but if you want the worst AMF known to man, i guess that could be up your alley. ” fingers fish through the glove compartment, and hand a lighter to the back. bedazzled, stolen from a quikmart, a knock off ed hardy dragon curling around the edges. “ they got those digital jukeboxes with top 40 songs on there, if that tells you enough. if you’re into that then   …   cool, i guess. ”

reminiscing  on  the  past  didn't  help  –  but  it  surely  brought  sentiments  once  forgotten.  it  wasn't  that  barbie  despised  the  stardom,  no.  on  the  contrary,  she  took  pride  in  her  work  and  the  blinding  flashlights  from  paparazzi  didn't  bother  her  that  much  ;  at  first,  anyway.  sometime  along  the  way,  she  has  come  to  the  revelation  that  she  misses  the  good  ol'  times.  everything  seemed  much  easier  back  then  …  or  was  it  just  a  mirage?  barbie  doesn't  know  for  sure,  but  living  in  her  fantasy,  she's  allowed  to  miss  her  old  life.  she's  utterly  lost  in  her  train  of  thoughts,  looking  outside  the  window  when  she  barely  notices  frida  seemingly  coming  back.

and  she's  quick  to  notice  the  burning  cigarette  ;  despite  the  groundbreaking  record  of  two  months  without  smoking,  seeing  frida  living  her  life  so  carelessly  and,  possibly,  happily,  it  gets  her  wondering.  tempted.  barbie  was  tempted  and  her  apple  was  the  cigarette  she  would  have  enjoyed,  if  only  she  asked.  glossed  lips  part  ever  so  slightly  (withdrawal  at  its  finest)  as  she  leans  forward  in  her  seat,  closer  to  them.    "  there's  this  pub  that  just  opened  near  the  center.  have  you  gone  there?  "    casual  chit  chat,  though  her  lungs  were  burning.    "  also,  "    cue  the  falling  into  temptation,  icarus  really  did  flew  too  close  to  the  sun,  hasn't  he  now?    "  i  was  wondering  what  your  policies  are  regarding  smoking  inside  the  car?  "

[denimbex1986]

'July is witnessing an influx of big budget releases. From Bollywood’s Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani to Hollywood’s Mission Impossible: The Dead Reckoning Part One, Barbie and Oppenheimer, cinephiles are spoilt for choice.

You’ve probably heard of the massive box office clash between Barbie and Oppenheimer, but have you heard of Barbenheimer?

It’s a rapidly growing pop culture internet phenomenon where instead of pitting the two films against each other in online debates, people have turned it into a double feature, discussing the best order to watch the two films on the same day.

So far, there is a clear order, as dictated by internet culture led by several discussion threads — first watch Oppenheimer, a serious and intense story, and then Barbie, a light-hearted film to neutralise the heaviness of the former. But the debate around the ‘correctness’ rages on!

If only the world could agree on things this easily every day!

Barbie tells the story of the world famous eponymous doll who is expelled from Barbie Land and enters the real world with Ken on a journey of self-discovery. The fantasy comedy film is expected to be light, funny, frivolous and all-things-pink.

On the other hand, Oppenheimer is a biographical drama that chronicles the story behind the world’s first atom bomb and its creator Robert J Oppenheimer who invented it during World War 2.

Completely contrasting themes, right?

That’s what led to a memefest on social media with users comparing the two films, different in their genres and tonality. Over months, this has emerged into one united online phenomenon — Barbenheimer, where people are no longer pitting these vastly different films against each other and instead preparing themselves to watch both films on the same day in the best order possible.

What could be a Barbie Vs Oppenheimer fan war has instead brought fans of both worlds together, who will now end up watching a film other than the genre they prefer. In the end, it is a victory for cinema.

This meme culture has driven thousands of people to book their tickets in advance to not miss out on the Barbenheimer craze. It’s a moment in history where two distinctly different films with an equally strong starcast have received an equal amount of love from fans.

After years of watching franchises take over theatres, the Barbenheimer meme culture comes as a breath of fresh air for movie lovers. It gives them an opportunity to take a break from the Marvel-fication of cinema with fans feeling pressured to keep up with every series or movie release in order to stay updated with their favourite cinematic universe. It’s a constant and tiring pursuit of content that aims to serve itself more than its fans.

Oppenheimer is the first script Christopher Nolan wrote in first person to tell the story from Robert J Oppenheimer’s perspective. Despite its serious and dark tone, people are excited to see Nolan back in action with a stellar star cast of Cillian Murphy (who plays the titular role), Matt Damon, Casey Affleck, Emily Blunt, Robert Downey Jr, Florence Pugh, Rami Malek and Kenneth Branagh.

The marketing campaign for Oppenheimer has been fairly simple — regular press interviews with Cillian Murphy and a few with Robert Downey Jr. The biggest splash was perhaps a picture of John Krasinski with the film’s cast that started trending on social media.

However, Barbie’s theme and marketing strategy is in sharp contrast with Oppenheimer.

As compared to Oppenheimer’s minimalistic campaign, Barbie went all out. Microsoft and Xbox collaborated for a pink Dreamhouse style gaming console, Hot Wheels launched a pink Corvette Stingray and AirBnB created a life-size pink mansion to celebrate the movie. For promotional tours, Margot Robbie wore several outfits inspired by old and new Barbie dolls.

Mattel clearly went all out to reclaim the colour pink and crown Barbie as its sole queen.

They took something as simple and frivolous as a kids’ doll and turned it into a point of curiosity. Hence, despite having a ton of promotional material, we still don’t know what Barbie is actually about.

All we know is that it stars Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, Will Ferell, Kate McKinnon and is directed by Greta Gerwig — the same person who directed Little Women. That’s enough to tell us Barbie won’t be a run-of-the-mill romantic comedy. It’ll probably address something deeper, given Gerwig’s talent.

Memes usually follow a film, driving curiosity AFTER its release. In the case of Barbenheimer, it’s driving people to theatres in hordes, a beautiful sight to behold after ages and a reminder of the power of internet culture in controlling the film economy.

I don’t know about you, but I’m definitely a Barbenheimer girl!'