#but at this point i'm in constant pain Somewhere and most notably my back and my chest

[saturnvs]

the chest pain that comes with living under constant stress is really something huh. ouch

[that-ari-blogger]

Part Of Who I Am (More Than Anything)

A duet is a conversation and a contrast. That’s not me being pretentious, that’s literally what is happening. A duet is two characters communicating with each other and with the audience. Sometimes they agree, the vast majority of the time they don’t, but they are talking to each other and presenting their perspectives.

In a musical, the songs tell a story, and duets are a powerful tool to show changing perspectives.

But, there’s more to a song than just the lyrics, especially in a musical, and when all work in tandem to create meaning, you get something like More Than Anything.

Let me explain.

SPOILERS AHEAD: (Hazbin Hotel, The Wild Robot)

First, some framing. This song is told by a father and a daughter, a king and a princess, a protagonist and… that’s actually rather complicated.

As such, there is a generational theme to this song. It’s two times colliding, the past and the present. But it’s also two sensibilities colliding in a truly brutal way.

Lucifer’s objective throughout this whole musical has been to protect his daughter. He has been utterly awful at it, but he hasn’t wavered from that goal.

Case and point, he believed that he was a bad influence on his daughter, so he stayed away. This was, in my most humble of opinions, a bone numbingly stupid decision. Supporting his daughter by not supporting her.

This then got exacerbated by the drive to redeem sinners. Lucifer saw himself in his daughter and saw only his mistakes. He saw his pain and tried to save her from failure by not letting her taste success. Supporting his daughter by not supporting her.

Notice where the spears and arrows all came from. They were the ones aimed at Lucifer in the previous shot. From his perspective, anyone near him is in danger.

His objective is in the right place, and while I’d like to say that Jeremy Jordon carried him in terms of likeability, I have to give credit to the writers and animators for his incredible characterisation. But the execution of his goal was about as flawed as you can get.

“There are times when I still wonder about you. You are someone I have loved, but never known And you'll never see the reasons I had For keeping my claws away when they were close enough to hurt you.”

In 2015, the Crane Wives released an album called Coyote Stories. Now, I am biased by the fact that I love this band to no end. But if you have spent any time browsing the Animated Music Video space online, you will have come across this album.

Most notably is the album’s twelfth song, and the one I just quoted, Never Love an Anchor.

This is a cover by Førest Fincent. They made another but this one had some art I loved for a thumbnail, so I'm recommending it.

The Crane Wives have complex emotions down to an art, but I want to focus on this song because of how it relates to guilt and fear of connection.

It’s a song trying to justify itself. The narrator has convinced herself that, for whatever reason, she is a negative part of someone’s life, and so she positions herself as the anchor in the titular metaphor. You can’t love something that holds you back.

"On some level I think I always understood that a ship can never really love an anchor. So I did the only thing that I could and severed the rope to set you sailing from my harbour."

But that’s not what anchors do. Anchors hold you steady. They keep you safe in a storm. They hold you in the dock and they let you move around without straying too far into danger. But crucially, they come with you. When you need to go somewhere, you can lift the anchor and take it to wherever you are going next.

The song emphasises it’s point with rigidity that it breaks only twice. Throughout the song, there is a delicate rocking rhythm brought about by the guitar and the backup voices. It is mournful, but cyclical. Nothing happens, it’s safe but motionless.

Even the lyrics find a constant rhythm and repeated tune. Except for two places.

On “never see the reason”, the singing rises in pitch to become a plea before sinking back down, swallowed by the rest of the music that hasn’t changed one bit.

It doesn’t matter her reasons, you’ll never understand them, you don’t need to, the song doesn’t care. Instead, the song wraps around itself to present one thing as real:

“I am selfish, I am broken, I am cruel I am all the things they might have said to you Do you ever think of me and my two hands? And wonder why they never soothed your fevers? And wonder why they never tied your shoes? And wonder why they never held you gently? And wonder why they never had the chance to lose you?”

The entire song contorts around this segment, with the guitar hammering out chords like a bare-knuckled boxing match while the bass and drums desperately try to keep a brave face up, only to falter at the end and join in the assault with those final words.

“And wonder why they never had the chance to lose you.”

This was not about you. This was about the singer. This was her protecting herself. It was a selfish desire that no excuse could possibly remedy.

This was never about you.

There are no more lyrics after this, the music just plays a victory lap to gloat over the lyricist. It drew out her weakness and guilt, put it on display.

I kid you not, my favourite trope in all of media is this shot. The door closes and the camera looks back at a person, who drops their happy demeanor just a second too quickly. We see all that joy before hand, then we see it was an act. I love this trope so much.

The reason I talk about this song instead of the one I’m ostensibly analysing is to point out the power of the music itself. In Never Love an Anchor, the lyrics and the music represent different sides of the same person. Her excuses and her true intentions. What she says, and what she means.

It's also the exact same as Lucifer’s worldview. This was not about Charlie at all. Everything I said before was true, but objectives can be sabotaged, and it was exactly this that messed up Lucifer’s relationship with his daughter.

This was never about Charlie for him.

Speaking of whom, Charlie is relentlessly optimistic. She is the child who wants to push boundaries, and yes, she is going to get hurt, but that’s the point.

In a way, she relates to the Spiderman proverb. “With great power comes great responsibility.” Charlie has access to the power of authority, but also that of the king of hell, and she is using it to protect people from extermination.

Charlie is unconditionally good, and her father is the literal devil.

So, music as a vehicle for storytelling.

Well, this song is split into three parts. Charlie’s, her Dad’s and the finale where they both sing together. There’s a bridge, but we’ll get there in a moment.

We start with a guitar.

This is the pattern. It’s floaty, and draws you forwards, before looping back to itself. It’s stable, and nothing happens.

For the record, take a look at the opening of Never Love an Anchor and see if you notice the similarities.

It’s the movement. They both feel like they are rocking, like a lullaby. They both have the high note to draw you forwards but are kept grounded by the base. And they are both fundamentally static.

It also continues throughout Lucifer’s section of the song until we reach his daughter’s section. Nothing changes in the guitaring of Lucifer’s backing music. There is one slight addition, but we will get there in a moment.

Before that, however, look at Charlie's part of the song.

The difference here is multifaceted. First up, the key signature changes from D flat Majour to B Majour, but second, we have a new instrument that needs to be taken into account.

Now we have a drumkit. It’s a simple rhythm, but this is a simple song, and it repeats along with the rest of the tune.

Lucifer's name means "light bringer. It comes from a roman deity of Venus who's Greek counterpoint was named Phosphoros, meaning the same thing, or Heosphoros, which meant "dawn bringer". Our boy is associated with change, and the beginning of a new day. He is the herald of the closing of night, a man who exists to let you know everything is going to be ok. That's going to come back later on in the show.

Suddenly we have a theme. This song is about Charlie taking what her father tried to do and doing it her own way. It’s fundamentally based off of the same thing, but she has shifted things around and added her own flair.

It’s a reframing, and if you look at it, that’s exactly what this song is about. Charlie has tried to convince Lucifer by showing him that the things he says are false, but this isn’t about that. So, she switches track to showing him his own legacy and how the stuff he believes about himself is wrong.

“So in the end, it's the view I had of you That showed me dreams can be worth fighting for”

No sir. You ain’t a bad influence on me at all. You inspired me to do this. You’re a good person ya dingus.

This is best exemplified by the song’s titular motif.

I haven’t really spoken about the piano much yet because it really hasn’t been a big part of the song up until now. It’s been backing up the guitar and playing the same bass note to make that seem louder. But on its own? Not much.

Until now. Every time Lucifer sings the song’s title, he is echoed by this descending melody that once again repeats itself until the final section, which is notably lower. It sounds like descending a scale. When he sings, it rises, and the piano brings him back down to start again.

That final note drop however gives an air of resolution to the piece. It’s his final decision, yes, but it’s not one he has willingly taken. The key signature reenforces how this isn’t something he is happy about, but he feels it’s necessary.

Compare that to when Charlie sings the same section.

It’s the same. It’s shifted down a bit like the rest of the song, but it’s the exact same melody.

So… what gives?

For starters, this is the same thing as before, with Charlie trying to persuade her father that she is doing the same thing as him. She is inspired by him, but giving it her own taste. Most notably, the key signature once again makes this seem hopeful.

Although, there is one more element here that is giving some motion to Charlie’s part of the song, and that is the rest of the piano part.

Is Charlie builds up to the titular motif, the piano starts to build with her, gaining power and emotion as it goes until she says those words and…

It’s the same as her father. That power is held for a moment as the song stores it while Charlie is just plain and open to her father.

“I need to save my people more than anything.”

She’s made the point that she is inspired by her father, but this is what is actually important right now. Heaven is an actual problem worth more than Lucifer’s self-loathing.

Ok, I have questions about Alastor. This shot frames him as reassuring and supportive, and he is. He's a villain, but he is also genuinely supportive. He is the opposite of Lucifer. Where the king of Hell's intentions were good but his actions were terrible, Alastor's intentions seem malevolent, but as far as I can tell, his actions towards Charlie have been, for the most part, positive.

But at the same time, she’s still making that point. This is exactly Lucifer’s motivation at the start. He wanted to make people’s lives better and that’s exactly what Charlie is doing in a very real sense. It is also portraying her as the type of royalty that acts how parents should act. She needs to save her people. It’s not a want, it’s a need, and her father should pick up on that.

“Your life is not negotiable.”

The Wild Robot is a film about parenthood. It is a film about being more than you thought you could be. It is a film about neurodivergence. And it is a movie about how fate and purpose are utter bollocks. This film will mess you up, I would highly recommend it.

But this isn’t a review blog, and instead I would like to point out how it uses programming and the heart as metaphors in conflict.

A key theme in the film is decision making and the causes behind it. With “programming” taking the form of an entirely logical type of rationality.

Roz extends that metaphor towards others as a way of understanding how that part of the brain works, so this doesn’t just apply to robots.

Incidentally, Roz and Brightbill are programmed differently to everyone else. That is the neurodivergent coding.

On the other hand, the idea of the heart is so much more complex and harder to pin down.

“Brightbill was never supposed to get this far. You know that. It is more dangerous for him than anyone else. But he has a chance if, where his wings end, his heart can pay the balance.” “His heart is 48 millimeters.” “From what I’ve seen, Brightbill’s heart is much bigger on the inside than the outside.”

This makes no sense at all, and I love it. The heart is a source of strength, its willpower, but it’s also not framed as something that anyone has control over.

The heart is emotion, it’s fundamentally irrational. Brightbill was not supposed to get this far, but he did. A robot cannot be wild, but Roz is.

The heart is hope, its tenacity, it’s fear and bravery, it’s love and affection. It is everything other than programming.

The final conflict of the film that comes very close to Wall-E and then realises and takes another direction is very clearly a conflict between the Heart and Programming, and the heart wins.

“To survive, we must become more than we were programmed to be.”

This is Charlie’s entire deal in Hazbin Hotel. At face value, she is making the sinners into more than everyone thought they could be. But on further inspection, all of Charlie’s motivation comes from the heart.

I have already talked about her hope in a previous post, but this song drives home how subconscious it is for her. She wants to save Hell, but this is more of a need for her. The sinners’ lives are not negotiable, that’s what she is trying to get her father to see.

Remember earlier, though, when I said that the energy from the piano is stored? Well, here is where that comes crashing back.

That holding out makes the audience wait for a resolution to the rise, and if we combine that with a powerful set of chords, we end up with a real sense of catharsis and triumph.

We have movement, and a pattern that changes. Only slightly, but we’re finding something new for the first time since the drum was added.

Specifically, that movement is upwards. It’s about that hope that Charlie has inspired in her father.

“All that I’m hoping. Now that my eyes are open. Is that we can start again, and not be pulled apart again.”

The final section of the song doesn’t introduce any new elements at all. It’s the first section but with both Lucifer and Charlie singing. The two have started again, but this time they are singing together, and on the same page.

The song is a conversation between two different ideas. But the music itself goes out of its way to show just how similar those ideas are. One was built on optimism that failed, the other on hope that cannot be crushed.

Final Thoughts

I’m back. I had a break for a month and missed Halloween, something I am more than a little miffed about. But there’s nothing like some Jeremy Jordan to bring me back. Jeremy Jordan can do no wrong.

Do I have a crush on this man? No. No I do not. Why do you ask?

In all seriousness, I really like this song and I’m glad it’s one of the most popular in the series. It is, however, really fast paced.

This song would have served the story better if it had an entire episode to back it up, rather than sharing that time with Hell’s Greatest Dad. Both songs are fun, but the difference between them in such little time is jarring.

That is, however, a problem with the management cutting the series to eight episodes and not with the crew. But it is a problem that carries over to the next episode and the next few songs.

I have thoughts on Welcome To Heaven. Lots of thoughts.

Stick around if that interests you.

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[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

I'm not sure if you've ever been asked this but (and this is totally ignoring all ethical questions)- do you think a yeerk could bring back Loren's memories from before the crash? They seem to have far more control of their host's memories than the hosts do...

First question: does Loren want her memories back?

Maybe this seems a little odd to ask, but… she’d be remembering a lot of pain and fear, maybe a few good-ish years where she’s with Elfangor or raising baby-Tobias, and a shitton of trauma.  Losing your (traumatic) memories can actually be good for you.  Psychiatrists are developing therapies using drugs and/or ECT to help patients with PTSD and phobias deliberately remove certain memories.  The minuscule number of participants who have successfully completed the still-experimental versions of these therapies have seen considerable upticks in quality of life.

Setting aside the science for the sci fi, it’s also notable that Loren does not regain her memories when she morphs.  We don’t know how morphing tech works precisely, of course, because it sometimes heals long-term damage and sometimes doesn’t.  But my headcanon has always been that it has to do with user motivation and self-image.  A couple examples:

Alloran still has battle scars even after morphing because he’s Mr. Old School Warrior Code, and considers them a point of pride.

Ax doesn’t develop battle scars during the war because he grows up in a constant state of siege as part of a team with a whatever-works mentality, and has little time for outdated conceptualizations of honor.

James’s nervous system starts working again after morphing because he wants to be nondisabled and sees himself that way.

Collette’s nervous system doesn’t start working again after morphing because she identifies as disabled and is happy that way.

Tobias can’t heal his broken wing with morphing in MM2 because he’s still new to morphing and struggling to break away from the predator mentality of “you get hurt, you tough it out or you die.”

Etcetera, etcetera.  If we take that explanation as given for the moment, then it’s pretty striking that morphing heals Loren’s eyes but not her memories.  She says outright that she didn’t want to take care of a kid, and doesn’t feel up to the responsibility of being a mother (#49).  She’s also had 95% bad experiences with aliens, between being abducted by everyone from skrit na to Chapman and being dragged into some intergalactic war multiple times.  Healing her eyes helps her get away from the ableism and underemployment facing most blind Americans; healing her memories doesn’t necessarily get her shit.  She may or may not make a choice somewhere in there.  And even if she doesn’t, there may simply be nothing left to find.

Second question: What would a yeerk know that Loren wouldn’t?

Yes, we see that yeerks read hosts’ memories.  And it’s true that (at the very least) Temrash 114 can choose which of Jake’s memories Jake will focus on at any given time.  However, we see no evidence whatsoever of yeerks having insight into hosts’ minds that the hosts themselves lack.  In fact, the opposite might even be true; there are several moments with Eva pointedly using knowledge about Edriss that Edriss herself lacks (Visser) but Edriss simply doesn’t get Eva, nor does Temrash ever start to understand Jake.  So if Loren doesn’t consciously remember these events, then there’s no sign that the yeerk would be able to do so either.

To swerve back into science: there’s also the fact that brains don’t “hide” memories that they’ve successfully stored.  If you can’t retrieve it, usually there’s nothing left to retrieve.  You can have a “feeling of knowing” about a test item and later have the answer come to you with no further prompting, but if you don’t even have that feeling, then you probably don’t have the answer stored anywhere in your noodle.  Contrary to media depictions of amnesia (*cough* MM1 *cough*), there’s no such thing as a cure for traumatic amnesia.  (Dissociative amnesia is another story, but I digress.)  Loren sustains a blow to the head, either through a car crash or a violent controller or a violent controller-caused car crash, and that’s where her memories go.  She tells Tobias that she had to re-learn how to swallow and brush her teeth afterward (#49).  Re-learn, not remember.  That’s a pretty accurate summation of traumatic brain injuries.  Once the skills are gone, they’re gone.  It turns out brains (probably) do grow new cells even through adulthood, and even hints of neurogenesis are SO FUCKING EXCITING for people like me who study brains.  But the fact remains that memories destroyed through trauma are usually, well, destroyed.

Quick personal example: when I was 16, I got a concussion.  How?  No idea, because the concussion itself caused me to forget how it happened.  I know I was skiing at the time — waking up on a ski slope with a dented-in helmet was a pretty strong context clue — but I’m never going to know if I misjudged a turn, slipped on ice, collided with a person, hit a tree, got struck by lightning (okay probably not that) or what.  My brain went into emergency shutdown mode after I did the equivalent of spilling a soda on its keyboard, and the Microsoft Word document I had open at the time (AKA my working memory) didn’t have time to convert to ROM (AKA go through my hippocampus into long-term storage) in the process.  What happens to Loren isn’t the equivalent of spilling a soda on one’s keyboard; it’s the equivalent of throwing the whole computer off a forty-foot building into the ocean.  A skilled IT tech and a hell of a lot of work might get that thing running again, but if you think there’s a chance in hell that the family photos stored on your hard drive are gonna be found and restored, then you’ve got another think coming.

Tl;dr: Given what we know about real brains and about Your Brian on Morphing, I’m not convinced that a yeerk could help Loren if she even wanted help.