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itsclydebitches · 4 years ago

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YYH Recaps: Episode 4 “Requirements for Lovers”

Hello, everyone! It's been quite a while, huh? Ah, the endless cycle of wanting to write and yet, astoundingly, not writing. I know it well.

Good ol' writer's block has skedaddled for a time though, so let's make good use of that and dive into Episode Four: "Requirements for Lovers."

Ohhh, YYH getting spicy with its titles 😏

Actually wait, I shouldn't be making dumb jokes just yet. First I want to acknowledge a slight change to future recaps: YYH, RWBY, and anything else I might try my hand at. Namely, a lack of pictures moving forward. A few weeks ago — months? I honestly can't keep track — tumblr implemented a new limitation where no post can have more than ten images in it. It's a move that, while I'm sure has its justifications, makes sharing analyses of visually-based media all the more difficult. I'll be doing my best moving forward to describe scenes as needed, as well as combining connected images together to stretch out my limit, but I'm not going to pretend that it'll be the same as getting the visual play-by-play we’re used to.

Tumblr certainly is a website, huh?

Anyway, we open on Yusuke once again lamenting the difficulty of hatching a spirit beast that doesn't immediately devour him from the head down. On the one hand this is an admittedly easy way to reset the story over the course of this arc — the storytelling equivalent of waking your character up each morning — yet I cannot deny that if I were undergoing a resurrection test, it would consume my every thought too. Can't really blame Yusuke for endlessly bringing the conflict up when the conflict is this deadly.

Well, deadly for a ghost, anyway.

Specifically, he's worried about how embarrassing it would be to get eaten by something that came out of an egg this tiny. I'm torn between reminding a fictional character that things grow — a pissed off chicken could kick my ass and it started out in an egg too — and just shaking my head over the absurdity of worrying about embarrassment when, you know, you would cease to exist. It's not even a matter of, "What if I die and then I'm embarrassed about it in the afterlife :( " Yusuke is already IN the afterlife. He's got nowhere to go but oblivion!

Luckily, Botan takes a more practical approach to these worries, pointing out that he'll be just fine provided he does some good deeds. Yusuke starts a rant about how do-gooders are only ever out for themselves.

Yusuke, you dumb-dumb, you're a do-gooder now. What was all that help for Kuwabara, hmm? As said, these early episodes exist in a semi-reset loop, where Yusuke needs to stew in his main character flaws for a while before any real growth starts to stick. Those flaws being, primarily, "I'm a pessimist" and "also I hate myself."

Case in point, Botan accuses him of always seeing the glass as half empty. Which, while true enough (outside of his confidence in fighting, anyway), by now we've got a pretty good sense of where Yusuke developed this attitude. He affirms this by talking about how Koenma's got him by the balls, "just another idiot abusing his power!" With an alcoholic mother and those teachers from last episode, it's no wonder Yusuke thinks this way. Mr. Takenaka's interest and Keiko's care aren't enough to combat the rest of Yusuke's experience, not when Takenaka is an outlier and Keiko is Yusuke's peer. Her desire to keep him on the right track reads only as an inevitability at best (the downside of having a perfect childhood friend), or a legitimate annoyance at worst. Or, as we'll continue to see in this episode, a way for them to flirt.

Is it any wonder Yusuke would sneer at Koenma's offer then, expecting the worst? The fact that Yusuke is still undergoing the challenge at all, no matter what he says, speaks volumes to me.

However, Botan is less than comfortable with his criticisms. She panics a bit at Yusuke insulting the (junior) ruler of the underworld so blithely. That, and the fact that he's carelessly tossing his egg around.

(Yes we’re using precious picture space for memes are you SURPRISED?)

Anyway, Botan isn't just concerned for the sake of concern. She cautions Yusuke against speaking too freely because there may be investigators checking in on his progress. No sooner does he ask what those investigators look like than one appears.

Thunder! Lighting! An energy so intense that Yusuke is briefly blinded! It is, as he says, quite the entrance. What kind of being could possibly be at the heart of such an astounding show?

Why, this teeny-tiny cutie, of course.

Remember, few appearances in YYH coincide with the character's true self. Would you ever assume this is the all-powerful investigator who holds Yusuke's future in her hands? Of course not. That's the point.

The investigator introduces herself as Sayaka and immediately demonstrates that she has no more patience for Yusuke's attitude than Botan does. "These damn kids," he mutters and my brain briefly blue screens because Yusuke. You're fourteen.

Plus, Sayaka and Botan clearly have some sort of eternal youth situation going on, so there's that too.

Sayaka is, in a word, fantastic. She pulls no punches with Yusuke, teleporting away from him with what can only be described as a shit-eating smile, all while refusing to tell him what exactly she's investigating. “I’m sorry, but that’s a secret!” However, Keiko is clearly at the forefront of her interest. She refers to her as Yusuke's "girlfriend."

Botan is more than happy to point Keiko out — because of course they're still following her around! — and pulls a Et tu, Brute? on Yususke, leading Sayaka right to her. Like most of the Underworld, Sayaka is rather shocked that the pretty, popular, scholarly girl is supposedly into the delinquent. It's the power of childhood friendship, you fools! Specifically, Sayaka references the "positive markings" that Keiko has accumulated, but the audience already knows by now that such markings are suspect at best. Yusuke himself is proof of that. So if his terrible marks don't preclude him from being a young kid's savior, should we really view Keiko's as proof of superiority?

I mean, Keiko is fantastic, but that's not really the point here.

Starting her own investigation into Yusuke's life, Sayaka begins with one hell of a bombshell: "There's no point in doing [the resurrection] if the people closest to you don't care." WOW. Not only is that a harsh assessment, it's one I don't think I can personally get behind. The offer to restore Yusuke to life is built on the acknowledgment that their system is flawed (even if there's no work to change or dismantle that system): they thought he was worthless, his sacrificial death seems to have proven them wrong, and now they want further evidence, in the form of this trial, that Yusuke is a good person at heart. The whole point of this challenge is to give him a second chance, with testimonies like Mr. Takenaka's emphasizing that Yusuke has always been capable of more, so long as he applies himself. This, as we'll see throughout the series, applies to relationships too. The Yusuke with one friend he play-fights with, a distant mother, and a school worth of kids who are terrified of his very name is not the future Yusuke they expect him to become, so... why base his resurrection on what he's already (not) accomplished? Granted, the show is very unclear about what, if anything, Sayaka will do if she decides that Yusuke doesn't have a life worth going back to (even if I have my own theory discussed at the end), but the fact that this is suddenly a factor at all seems grossly unfair, not entirely unlike Kuwabara's rigged promise. We as the audience know that people love Yusuke. Yusuke himself is beginning to acknowledge that. But if this fourteen year old delinquent truly had no one that wanted him back from the dead... isn't that all the more reason to allow a resurrection and give him the chance to build a life where he would be missed?

This stupid shonen got me thinking too much istg.

Yusuke, ever the self-deprecating pessimist, bypasses all of the above thoughts and jumps straight to, "It's clear if [Keiko] had any sense she'd want me gone." I'd find that attitude incredibly sad if I wasn't distracted by how cute Botan and Sayaka are, sitting on the oar together. The spirit girls who fly together, thrive together!

Botan starts teasing Yusuke about having a crush, which just feeds his temper and Sayaka's confusion. Deciding that she needs to gather more info, they follow along for an average day of school because these earlier episodes are, apparently, ghost-stalk Keiko hours.

We see her reading aloud in class from Heart of Darkness (not the easiest book for some middle schoolers), scoring a point during volleyball practice, refusing to let one girl cheat off her homework, but happily helping another who runs up with a question. So she's pretty, athletic, and academically successful, the trifecta for any good love interest. Sayaka is impressed not just with her "nearly perfect" scores, but also the maturity that Keiko demonstrates, such as maintaining her morals about cheating while remaining compassionate.

Actually, I really love the contrast this provides for us, the viewer. Meaning, Keiko is shown to be at her least mature when in Yusuke's presence. Not that her responses aren't justified, but watching her dramatically snatch gum from his mouth, slap him across the face, or pull crazed expressions as she yells at him is a far cry from this calm, poised, soft-spoken Keiko. It's a way to visually show us that she's comfortable in his presence, despite the suspect humor attached. Not that the Keiko we see at school is faking or anything — she is legitimately that kind and articulate — but we see that being with Yusuke allows her to relax in a way she doesn't with others. School!Keiko is, as Sayaka says, pretty much perfect, 24/7. Yusuke's Keiko is a little rougher around the edges, in a way that implies a multifaceted personality shining through.

However, the only conclusion our trio draws is that, given Keiko's accomplishments, any attraction must be one-sided.

Poor Yusuke lol.

In a plot move that is so ridiculously contrived, just as Yusuke is grappling with the accusation that Keiko couldn't possibly like him back, a "handsome boy" arrives to ask Keiko out. He says that he couldn't bear it when she stopped reading Heart of Darkness because he's fallen in love with her voice. "Will you be my girlfriend?"

Please excuse me while I lose my shit over how ridiculous this is. I legitimately straight up cackled when I watched this scene.

Luckily for Mr. Absurd, Keiko takes him seriously — and lets him down easy. She says she can't be his girlfriend and when he presses the "Why?", asking if she already likes someone else, Keiko confirms that she does. This is done through a shot of her feet. Not a POV shot given the angle, but close enough that it feels like we're stepping into Keiko's shoes (haha), shyly staring down at the floor in embarrassment and regret.

Rejection complete? The guy screams.

I mean he screams.

I mean this nobody we're never gonna see again unhinges his jaw and lets out an unholy shriek the likes of which makes me shriek in utter GLEE.

It's insane. It's wonderful. I'm going to use one of my coveted image spots to show you his face:

Look at that and tell me this show isn't amazing.

Okay, I'm focusing again. As Keiko runs off Botan and Sayaka start dragging Yusuke, teasing him about how Keiko chose him over that "charming handsome boy."

...Please scroll up and look at that image again. I find YYH's definition of "charming" and "handsome" to be hilariously wrong.

Yusuke, as per usual, throws himself into damage control, claiming that Keiko didn't say who she liked, so really it could be anyone. They're not buying it. “'I like Keiko' is written all over your face!” Botan crows. Meanwhile, Sayaka is scribbling in her little investigator's journal that feelings on both side are severely misunderstood. "Suggest serious counseling."

Fantastic idea, Sayaka. I'd personally suggest counseling for the whole dying/best friend getting resurrected thing... but relationship woes work too!

We cut to later when school is out and Keiko has gone over to Yusuke's. To say that Atsuko has done a poor job of keeping the house clean lately would be a serious understatement.

Keiko points out the old food and broken glass specifically, cluing us in that this isn't just a messy environment, but a dangerous one as well. This is proven when she accidentally knocks a stack of books over and a used bowl falls onto Yusuke's face. What's interesting is that Keiko says that things are "back to normal" now, though I'm not sure if that's in reference to the state of the house, or just the note Atsuko left behind, asking Keiko to take care of Yusuke while she's out. I'm inclined towards thinking it's just the note, partly because of Keiko's shock when she first arrives, because the house wasn't shown to be in this state prior to Yusuke's death (first image above), and because the note is accompanied by a great voiceover that makes Atsuko sound quite sloshed when she left. That's what's normal, the drinking and carefree attitude, not the state of her home. If we buy that reading, it allows for another fantastic look into Atsuko's mental state. If she's already an alcoholic, the trauma of her son's death and the following revelation that he's coming back might make her struggle in other ways. Like finding cleaning to be an impossible task.

She's depressed. It doesn't excuse the state she's left Yusuke in and, as previously acknowledged, YYH is definitely not a show interested in this nuance, but I still find it fun to take what little we've gotten and run with it.

However, Keiko is firmly on team "WTF Atsuko." She hurries to make sure Yusuke wasn't hurt by the falling bowl, bemoans him being "covered in garbage," and says that leaving him in this state should be considered a felony. Knowing it's far beyond her power to fix Atsuko's failings, Keiko swears to come here after school every day until Yusuke regains his body. It's as she's cleaning him of the dust that's gathered that Keiko becomes entranced with Yusuke’s features. Particularly his lips. The soft lighting returns, their theme song swells, and Keiko gets thiiiis close to kissing Yusuke for the first time.

Which is a little weird, right? I mean, we know why Yusuke is freaking out. Beyond the embarrassment of a middle schooler receiving his first kiss while two ghost girls eagerly watch on, he's made a hobby of denouncing his interest in Keiko to anyone who will listen. But for the average viewer — for Keiko herself — don't we care the he's, you know, dead? Or if not technically dead, very unconscious? Don't get me wrong, I fully understand the appeal of this situation in a generalized, cultural sense (with the side disclaimer that I'm reading a Japanese product through an American lens). Sleeping Beauty exists for a reason and there's definitely an element of that here: a gender-reversed setup where Keiko’s kills may break the "curse" of Yusuke's untimely death. Even his in-between state of being mirrors the "death like sleep" of the fairy tale. But when you strip away those Disney-esque thoughts, we're left with a girl about to kiss an unresponsive body, not as a common gesture of care (the parent who kisses their child while they sleep), but as a first time, romantic milestone.

It's a little weird lol.

But embrace the romance! As well as its inevitable interruption. Just as Keiko is about to land a peck, the neighborhood watch committee announces a heat and fire warning, startling Keiko out of her thoughts about Yusuke's "beautiful face." (There's another gender reversal for ya.) She gasps at her almost-action, conveniently remembers that her mom wanted her to do some shopping, and hightails it out of there before embarrassment can really kill them both.

So she runs off for food... in a sweater? The outfit is cute and all, but I wonder what the animators were thinking, putting Keiko in a puffy pullover during an episode all about a heat wave.

It's about at this point that the plot goes from cute romance to absolutely buck wild. The fires the neighborhood watch committee mentioned are not, in fact, due to the overwhelming heat, but an arsonist that's going around tossing molotov cocktails through open windows. Why is he doing such a thing? I don't know. Arsonists be doing arson, I guess. The important bit is that Yusuke's place is his next target, considering that Atsuko forgot to lock the windows when she went out. Within seconds all that garbage is set ablaze, quite obviously putting Yusuke's resurrection chances at an all time low.

"Wake up, stupid!" he shouts at his unconscious body. Mood, Yusuke. That's me every morning.

So this is a full scale emergency now and everyone is scrambling trying to think of something to do. Yusuke comes up with the idea to possess himself like he did Kuwabara — nice attempt at a loophole there — but since it would technically count as his resurrection, no dice. Botan decides to go get Kuwabara himself, even though he's too far away to do anything. It's still worth a shot. Sayaka, meanwhile, watches all this unfold with a somewhat clinical detachment. She's not quite indifferent and she's definitely not cruel... she’s just not as emotionally invested in this as the other two. Which not only re-emphasizes her purpose here, as an observer judging Yusuke, but also highlights the bond Botan is forming with him. As mentioned before in regards to her hanging out with Yusuke rather than ferrying souls, Botan is well past someone assisting Yusuke simply because it's a part of her job. He's her friend.

We get some shots of the growing fire which includes a hazy texture to the animation I quite like and then we cut to Keiko several blocks away, shopping bag in hand. Word of the new fire spreads, with one bystander mentioning that it's the twelfth today.

"This is eerie.”

“Yeah, I can’t help feeling we’re under attack.”

That's because you are! Someone stop that man!

Sadly, I don't think the arsonist is mentioned again, let alone captured. We'll just have to relegate that to my incredibly niche fic wishlist.

Keiko also overhears that the latest fire is on fourth avenue, which of course is where Yusuke lives. Recognizing that he might be in trouble, she takes off at a run.

Meanwhile, Botan finds Kuwabara practicing his kicks against a Yusuke dummy. Amazing resemblance, right?

Watching for the purpose of recapping, I'm picking up on a lot of details in the animation I quite enjoy. I don't think anyone would claim that YYH, at this point in time, has the most impressive or flashy animation (the fight scenes later are another matter entirely), but there's a clear love for the product that shines through. The scared expression on Kuwabara's dummy. His unexpectedly dainty kick, complete with pointed toes. Botan's more translucent coloring to emphasize her supernatural status compared to Kuwabara. There are a lot of nice touches despite the overall simplicity.

Plus, you can't forget the lovely irony of Kuwabara fighting a defenseless "Yusuke" while the real guy actually lies defenseless amidst a fire. We already know that despite his tough talk, Kuwabara would be horrified to learn that his friend rival had died (again) in such a manner.

Capitalizing on that transparency, Botan runs a hand through Kuwabara's back to catch his attention. He gets his "tickle feeling" and instinctively looks around towards Yusuke's house, seeing the smoke. "Something tells me I should go that way." Gotta love a guy who drops everything to chase a vague, supernaturally induced hunch.

As Kuwabara leaves we cut back to Keiko arriving at the house, staring in horror at the blaze. We get an audio flashback to her talk with Yusuke where she promised to take care of his body until he got back. So she tries to run in, only for a couple of the onlookers to snag her, quite correctly keeping her from undergoing a suicide mission. We learn later that Keiko absolutely would have died without Yusuke's sacrifice, so her "You cowards!" is born more of emotion than justified accusations. It's not cowardly to look at the raging inferno in a small apartment and realize that recklessly running in will only result in two dead teens, not one.

I mean, the flames are already right there, licking the door. Even if Keiko somehow managed to avoid burns, the smoke alone would do her in. Still, Keiko tries to mitigate the damage by dumping a bucket of water over her head. As a kid I remember thinking this was the smartest thing ever. Utterly inspired. Keep that in the back of your mind, kid Clyde, for future reference. As an adult... I have no idea whether this would actually help or not lol. Any firefighters doubling as YYH fans?

Recklessness and iffy precautions aside, I can't express how much I appreciate the story giving Keiko things to do. Yusuke recognizes that she's the only one with the maturity and open-mindedness to believe in his resurrection. She's the one picking up Atsuko's slack regarding his day-to-day needs. She never hesitates for a moment, heroically throwing herself into this blaze for Yusuke's benefit. Yeah, a lot of that still falls into the emotional/domestic sphere — what we expect of the love interest in a 90s anime — but too often action stories don't have a clue what to do with their non-action characters, not even when it comes to just supporting the fighters. They're simply... there. Keiko, however, isn't window dressing. Whether it's helping Botan survive an upcoming, supernatural plague, or cheering the team on at the Dark Tournament, Keiko is an important part of the story, despite lacking the fighting prowess of the rest of the cast.

Just as important, this episode establishes a core equality between her and Yusuke. We just watched Keiko reject a (presumably) accomplished guy for him, telling the audience that these surface differences — academics, power levels, popularity, looks — don't matter to them. Yusuke is not Keiko's lesser just because he doesn't have the same scores in Sayaka's book and Keiko won't become Yusuke's lesser just because she doesn't have spiritual power like he does. The only important thing here is that they love each other and they're both willing to sacrifice everything for the other. In the span of about ten minutes, Keiko nearly gives up her life for Yusuke and, in turn, Yusuke gives up his resurrection for her. The level of care they show towards one another is balanced, despite those differences.

They’re a good ship, y'all. Even if this recapping's got me noticing Yusuke/Kuwabara potential lol.

To get back to the plot, a drenched Keiko charges into the fire, yelling Yusuke's name for the drama of it because we all know he can't respond. Despite the audience (hopefully) recognizing Keiko and Yusuke's equality, that memo hasn't reached Yusuke yet. "You're a lot more important to this world than I am!" he yells, hammering home that despite everything — knowing he instinctively saved a child, watching his loved ones grieve for him, helping Kuwabara just because he can — Yusuke still, deep down, believes that he doesn't deserve to come back; that he doesn't measure up to those around him. The self-sacrificial nature this insecurity produces shocks Sayaka. She points out that if Keiko doesn't save his body, he's not coming back. "What's the point of being alive if Keiko has to get killed for it?"

Keiko means more to Yusuke than the rest of his living existence. Jot that down in your notebook, Sayaka!

Kuwabara arrives and runs into one of his friends who informs him that Keiko just went inside. “Yusuke’s girl? The one we saved from those thugs?”

BOY does that tell us a lot about their rivalry! I mean yeah, we've already established several times over that Kuwabara — just like Yusuke himself — is not the cruel street thug he'd like to present himself as. If these characters actually wanted to hurt each other outside of a martial arts challenge, don't you think Kuwabara would capitalize on the "Yusuke's girl" bit? Everyone seems to know that they have feelings for each other, but Kuwabara never once wields that as ammunition against Yusuke. There are no taunts about him not being good enough. Or rather, I should clarify there are no serious taunts — Kuwabara is well known for his teasing. There's also no attempt to steal Keiko out from under him, the common treatment of the love interest as a "prize" that many stories fall into. Indeed, later this episode YYH will deconstruct this a bit. Yusuke sees Kuwabara grab Keiko's hand and yells that he better not be getting "fresh" with her. But it's purely Yusuke's worries shining through. The audience gets a crystal clear picture of the situation and knows, categorically, that Kuwabara has only the most innocent of intentions in holding Keiko's hand.

(Well, running from the police isn't innocent, but...)

I keep getting sidetracked. Plot! Keiko makes it to Yusuke's room and finds that he is already on fire. She then proceeds to try and put it out by patting it with her hands. I take back what I said about Keiko's smarts in this scene. Now we know where that supposed recklessness comes from though. Apparently they're both immune to fire! Nothing to worry about here, folks.

JK she's actually in danger, despite the animation choices. By this point everyone, including Keiko, realizes that there's no way out: the fire has blocked the door. Sayaka then reveals that there is one way to save her. If Yusuke throws his egg into the fire, the energy of the spirit beast will release and guide her to safety. The catch? Hatch the egg early and it won't complete its intended function of guiding him back to his body. This beast is gonna guide one person and that is it.

Cue Yusuke's near immediate decision to sacrifice his life for Keiko's. Granted, it's not precisely one life for another. Yusuke's resurrection was always contingent upon the beast not devouring him whole — something Koenma claims would have happened at the end of the episode — meaning that it's not technically a fair trade. Yusuke might have sacrificed Keiko's life for his own... only to fail to get that life back anyway. (There's a tragedy for ya.) To say nothing of how Yusuke is currently dead and has been for at least a couple of days, whereas Keiko very much is not. There's some sort of philosophical discussion there about potential being pit against current reality.

BUT that's not the point! The emotional point is that he sacrificed his life for hers — the potential of his resurrection, the potential of that life he might have led — all technicalities aside. And I, for one, think that's very neat of him.

A blue light shines as the egg's energy is released, providing a lovely contrast to the fire surrounding them. A path forms to the door and Keiko, recognizing Yusuke's presence, follows it. "We'll make it, Yusuke," Keiko says, which is one hell of a sucker-punch now that we know she's just carrying a corpse. Unbeknownst to Keiko, Yusuke is very much not making it. That's the only reason why she is.

Kuwabara appears to help them the rest of the way which is also a pretty awesome thing considering that, from everyone else's perspective, the fire is still raging and blocking the door. Despite his spiritual awareness, Kuwabara gives no indication that he noticed this strange light, or Yusuke's hand in the rescue. Which basically means he lunged into a bunch of deadly fire for Keiko and doesn't question how in the world he isn't burned.

Keiko's hands are fine, Kuwabara's whole body is fine... fire immunity must run in the friend group!

Yusuke has another rare moment of vulnerability — "They're both okay" — and I cackle happily at the "both" because see. You love Kuwabara too, Yusuke! All this bluster about hating him and finding him annoying. The second he rushed into that fire you were crawling up the walls.

Except then that happiness gives way to something that sounds a little more shocked. Devastated. "Well, I sure am... relieved..." Kudos to Cook's voice acting. You can hear the exact moment Yusuke realizes what he's done. Not that he regrets it, but the consequences are finally sinking in. He's relieved that they're safe, yes, but now he's never going to be able to rejoin them.

As Yusuke has an(other) existential crisis, Kuwabara peels back the blanket Keiko had wrapped Yusuke in, revealing his face. “What are you doing with Yusuke’s body?! Are you some type of sick grave robber?” he shouts. God I love when a story actually keeps track of who knows what. Kuwabara, for all his recent involvement in the plot, doesn't actually know what's going on. From his perspective Yusuke died, he made a scene at the wake, he saved "his girl" from a bunch of thugs, lost a huge chunk of time only to wake up with her randomly hugging him (then slapping him), participated in a bet with his awful teacher and had a couple weird, Yusuke related dreams while studying, and has felt the presence of ghosts perhaps a little more frequently than usual. Now he's trying to help save Keiko from a fire only for her to reveal she risked her own life for Yusuke's body. Of course he's freaking out! What's she doing with that?

What's utterly fantastic though is that Kuwabara takes all of five seconds to process this and then enters immediate Ride or Die mode for Keiko. She's been hoarding Yusuke's body for undetermined reasons? Well, who is he to judge? The important thing here is that people are arrested for keeping bodies, so they've gotta skedaddle before the firefighters show up.

Hence, hand-holding and avoiding arrest.

As Yusuke starts threatening Kuwabara not to get "fresh" with her, Botan sadly reminds him that he no longer has a say in who Keiko does or does not fall in love with. The switch in tone is jarring. Whereas before Botan would have teased him mercilessly for the crush, now she knows that nothing can come of that — and it would be cruel not to remind Yusuke of that too.

"Oh no. I didn't think..." Yusuke whispers, further establishing that he knew the risks of using his egg, but hadn't allowed them to sink in yet. Now they have.

He gives a fake little laugh with, "Just when it was getting good" and I cry at the development in the span of just four episodes. Despite what I said at the beginning about the show resetting each week, there has been a lot of change thus far. Yusuke wants to live now! He wants to be there for Keiko! He looks down on his tiny family and screams at the unfairness of it all! They're talking about how they can't wait for him to come back and now that's never gonna happen!!

It hurts, friends. It hurts a whole lot.

During this conversation between Keiko, Atsuko, and Kuwabara, we see that a couple of hours have passed (it's nighttime now, the fire is out) and Atsuko is apologizing for putting them all in danger like that. And by that I mean yes, she does technically apologize with an "I'm sorry" and everything, but it's also a one sentence apology pit against... well, near death for the three people standing (and sitting) before her. Atsuko seems just as concerned by Keiko losing her hair as she does Keiko nearly burning to death and she kneels by Yusuke's wheelchair, baby-talking to him about how he forgives her, right? I love Atsuko, she's great, but objectively speaking she is not a good mother. Not right now, anyway.

Oh yeah, and just to reiterate that: Keiko's hands are fine after patting down Yusuke's on-fire body, but her hair, which I'm pretty sure never catches, has to be cut short. Ah, anime logic. Funny thing is, YYH isn't the only story to take the love interest and give her a cool, short cut thanks to a traumatic event. Anyone read Ranma 1/2?

During this conversation we also learn that, sometime between the fire and now, Keiko filled Kuwabara in on everything that's happening with Yusuke. Makes sense. He kneels beside the wheelchair, joining the others in telling Yusuke that they'll wait patiently for his return. Yusuke, above them, continues yelling about how they're waiting on a dead man.

“It can’t be helped. He made this decision on his own."

Except it can, in fact, be helped!

Just as all hope is truly lost, Koenma appears and announces that Yusuke will be returned to life. Why? Because sacrificing his egg for Keiko is a better indicator of his worth than the egg itself could have been. Despite feeding on his negative outlook and heading towards biting Yusuke's head off — something the animation backs up by showing us teeth during the fire

— Yusuke's act demonstrates a tendency towards being a "decent human being" that is "so rare." Wow. That's depressing. Still, yay that Yusuke has those qualities! And this, to my mind, helps explain Sayaka's presence. Koenma recognized that judging Yusuke couldn't be left to the egg alone and indeed, Sayaka took note of his worth before he ever threw the egg into the fire. First it was questioning why someone as amazing as Keiko would go for him, then it was solidified through the shock of Yusuke announcing that coming back to life was meaningless if she wasn't in it. Even if Keiko had somehow, miraculously escaped the fire before Yusuke's sacrifice, I bet Sayaka's report would have tipped him in resurrection's favor anyway.

Everyone is, of course, overjoyed and my heart swells at the intense gratitude Yusuke displays. My favorite part though is when Koenma cryptically says that “Your added experience with death could make you very useful" (a nod towards future events that goes right over Yusuke's head) and his response to this is a yelled, "YOU THINK I'M USEFUL?" This poor kid. The God of everything ever is chucking out revelations left and right, about resurrections and spirit beasts, but the only thing that really penetrates is the realization that someone thinks he's useful. Talk about relatable.

You know, I've been thinking about why this moment works so well. I mean, there are a lot of other stories where undermining the consequences our hero faces — either with humor, or by erasing them completely — can feel like the audience was cheated. I think YYH dodged that with a couple of crucial factors. First, Yusuke's consequence isn't something new that he's now avoided, it's just a permanent extension of something he was already dealing with. We did get to watch him inhabit the space between life and death, grappling with whether he'd ever be able to return. The story didn't deny us that growth, it just confirmed something we all instinctively knew: this tale won't end here with Yusuke permanently going to some afterlife. Second, the Deus ex Machina fix doesn't happen too soon. Yeah, it's only a couple of minutes in a single episode, but we (and Yusuke) still get to sit with that outcome for a while, soaking it in before its removal. Finally, there's no doubt that Yusuke earned this reprieve. Koenma's timing might be sudden and (if you're not genre savvy) unexpected, but looking back at the series as a whole thus far, we're able to agree absolutely that Yusuke deserves this. Far from feeling like we were cheated, this solution invites just as much celebration as we're seeing on screen, for the simple reason that we can buy into Koenma's reasoning. We know now that Yusuke is a good person. We saw him selflessly sacrifice his future for Keiko. We agree that he deserves a second chance.

Thus, the episode ends with Yusuke flying up to fill the screen in his joy, a far better, final shot than Harry Potter and The Prison of Azkaban managed 😰

And that's it for Episode 4, folks! See you later for Episode 5 💕

#YYH #Yu Yu Hakusho #YYH Recaps #mymetas

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murasaki-murasame · 5 years ago

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With chapter 54, Ao no Flag is finally, officially over, and even though I think this finale is going to be extremely controversial in many different ways, I think I . . . kinda loved it? Mostly. There’s at least one big Thing [tm] that bugs me about it but anyway the rest of this will be under a cut because spoilers lmao.

Anyway TL;DR: it has it’s flaws, but this series is basically revolutionary when it comes to LGBT representation in shonen manga, and I think that’s worthy of respect in it’s own right. Also the physical volumes are gonna start coming out at the end of this month in English and this is basically gonna be my last chance to shill for it :)

Oh boy where do I even start with this ending, lmao. So much shit went down and a lot of people on all sides are probably gonna be upset and disappointed for one reason or another.

Just to get my main complaint out the way, I’m really not a big fan of Masumi ending up married to a man [especially one that she seems to not even really like that much]. On the one hand yes I don’t want to be biphobic about it, but on the other hand it just feels like another instance of this whole cliche of a character being set up as pretty explicitly gay, with it being made clear that they aren’t attracted to the opposite sex, but then they end up in an m/f relationship at the very end and I guess we’re meant to think they were bi all along. I feel like it does bi people a disservice to basically portray them as ‘gay people that just eventually find the right man/woman to end up in an m/f relationship with’. But it’s not really my place to talk about it one way or another. In general I just think Masumi deserved more screen-time and development to flesh out her own character growth, but one way or another it feels like this series ended a bit earlier than it was probably intended to, and I think she just got the short end of the narrative stick when it came to prioritizing which characters to focus on in the second half.

I’m also still not really a fan of how little of a voice Touma got as the series goes on, to the point of there being multiple chapters where he straight up doesn’t get any dialogue even if he’s the perspective character for most of it. At least there’s a sense of artistic intention and merit to it, but in the grand scheme of things I just wish he could have gotten to DO stuff more as the series went on.

I did at least end up liking how that set up the big ‘twist’ of this finale, though, and there’s no other way the same twist could have been pulled off, but I almost just kinda wish that the author had chosen to write this finale in an entirely different way if it meant we actually got to see Touma, lmao.

But anyway that brings us to the other big reveal that’ll probably dominate at least half of the discussions about this finale and the series as a whole, that being that not only did Taichi and Touma end up in a relationship, they’re actually married. And honestly the inner writer in me can’t help but respect how effective the set-up for it was, with us seeing everything through Touma’s eyes without anyone referring to him by name, and him writing his family name in the wedding registry thing as ‘Ichinose’, to lead the reader to think that we’re just seeing things through Taichi’s eyes as a literal cypher protagonist situation. But then you get the scene at the end where Touma meets back up with Taichi, who was at an entirely different wedding, and we get the whole final scene that paints a pretty clear picture of them being a happily married couple living together in their own house. Which also kinda has to be taken in the broader societal context of how Japan more or less still hasn’t legalized gay marriage yet, which makes the twist even more effective. And also goes to show how much of a message this is trying to send.

I think it’s 100% valid to be upset about how things ended up with Masumi, but honestly if you think that Taichi and Touma ending up together is completely out of nowhere and not set up at all then lmao get over yourselves. To be perfectly blunt I think like 90% of the people who are upset about this part of the ending are just bitter that the gay dude got to have a happy ending and wasn’t just subjected to live in single misery forever. Let’s just say that after all the gloating I saw straight people do in the last chapter about how ‘things don’t always end up happily for gay people’ and ‘this series was always about the cruel realities of life’, I feel pretty fucking vindicated now, lmao.

In general I’ve got mad respect for Kaito for pulling off the galaxy brain scheme of having a shonen romance manga where the protagonist gets a girlfriend halfway into the story, then right at the end of the penultimate chapter we find out that they broke up, and then we find out that the protagonist ended up married to his gay best friend instead. I can see why people are mad about it, but I’ve always wanted to see this sort of thing happen in a manga like this. I just wish that Masumi could have also gotten a happier ending, but oh well.

Sadly I have a feeling that the whole twist of this finale also means it’s going to be even more unlikely for them to ever make an anime adaptation of this series, even though I think it could work really nicely if they made one.

I feel like I’m gonna have to reread the series at least once now that it’s over and we know exactly what everything was building toward, since it really changes a lot of things in hindsight, especially all of the various hints about Taichi’s own feelings for Touma which I always thought was just wishful thinking on my part but now seems like genuine foreshadowing. I think even this final chapter itself might feel a bit different if I go back and reread it knowing the twist, especially with how it changes the context of Masumi’s husband talking to Touma about his relationship insecurities, and what he indirectly says about Touma and Taichi’s own relationship.

In a lot of ways I think this series was a master-class in visual storytelling, and leaving things unsaid. But unlike a lot of stories that relegate the LGBT thematic arcs to metaphors or hints or unspoken words, this lead to a really concrete ending that gives you a lot to look back on and re-examine the story with. I’m honestly a lot more willing to excuse how little of a voice Touma got as the series went on now that he actually got his happy ending, one way or another.

There’s also a lot to be said about editorial censorship and pressure to keep certain story elements unstated and implied, if not removed entirely, which has to be taken into account for pretty much everything like this. Not like it’s an excuse for everything, but we all remember stuff like the censorship and whatnot that went on behind the scenes with Yuri on Ice from the various higher-ups.

I really hope that series like this can slowly pave the way for more straightforward and explicit LGBT narratives within mainstream shonen manga, but these things take time, and for now I’ll take what I can get.

Anyway I’m at least definitely going to be buying the series in English even though I already own it all in Japanese already, lol.

#murasaki rambles #ao no flag #this series was a fucking RIDE y'all #the last few pages actually made me kinda emotional once the big twist dawned on me

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baebeyza · 5 years ago

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Pros and Cons of all the TF shows I watched [updated: Unicron Trilogy and BW Neo]

Update info: Whyever the hell I wrote this and why people care about my opinion is beyond my current understanding, but @chaoticgirl23 asked for the Unicron Trilogy I hadn't watched back then, so- Also decided to write down if I actually like the show or not xD

(also I removed wfc, because I cant really judge after all with the show not being finished) My personal opinions + stuff that can be dubbed controversial and problematic, so beware for racism and sexism! But also beware of my idiotic attempts at humour

G1 (loved the show with all my heart)

Pros:

- The original show

- big cast of loveable characters

- Really awesome human side characters

- Very clever and witty dialogue

- fucking batshit insane

- Rodimus Prime is babe

Cons:

- apart from Arcee, female autobots being treated like a subspecies and only appearing in like one episode (3 if you are generous)

- Motherfucking country called “Carbombya”

- Some human characters are actually shit (those boys from B.O.T)

- Rodimus fucks as a human and not as a robot

- Everything animated by AKOM

- Galvatron’s portrayal as a person with brain-damage reads as ableistic (Personally I still love his G1 version more than the others I’ve seen)

- The “You’re only truly disabled if you lose your courage” line from Chip, it was explained to me that it’s ableistic as well

Headmasters (loved the show)

Pros:

- exciting plot

- characters die, fuck yeah

- Planets get destroyed, fuck yeah

- <3 ~ Power of Friendship ~ <3

- Sixshot is babe

Cons:

- Everything about Cyclonus and Wheelie

- Rodimus fucks off after episode 10 and never comes back

- Arcee going from warrior to secretary

- If you come from IDW I have to break it to you that Chromedome is straight

SuperGod Masterforce (loved the show with all my heart)

Pros:

- A darker and more serious storyline if you’re into that

- Lots of character arcs and well-written characters in general

- Decepticons having a more family like dynamic

- Decepticons with a level of depth to them

- Redemption much

- Ginrai is babe

Cons:

- This show’s focus is on the humans so if you don’t like human TF characters, this aint for you

- The character Cab has a level of racist stereotyping - he comes from a fictional country in Oceania called Karin and the depiction of that country is everyone living in wood homes and having no electricity. (The show plays in the future so that makes it worse) Cab himself gets introduced as a Tarzan kinda dude who can talk with animals.

While I found Cab himself not bad as a character, the problem with how his background is written sure is stupid and insulting. There isn’t a lot of focus on his country in the show however, but it’s still there

- There is a scene in which the boys Shuta and Cab spy on girls during swim class (they get called out and apologize for it though and the “fanservice” scene itself is really damn modest and tame)

Victory (loved the show)

Pros:

- Similiar fun tone as G1

- lovable cast of idiots

- Exciting episode plots

- Leozack is babe

Cons:

- The only two prominent female characters are love interests and nothing else (which is drop in quality when compared to Masterforce, which had Minerva as a fleshed out autobot with agency and Mega as an interesting female villain)

- Leozack never punches Deszaras in the face

- Fucking retcons the destruction of Mars in Headmasters

Beast Wars (loved with all my heart)

Pros:

- Really compelling story and characters!!!

- Well written dialogue

- Wonderful character animation

- Dinobot is HONOUR and babe. Also I’m crying

- Megatron and his bullshit

Cons:

- Megatron and his bullshit

- That stupid love triangle subplot in season 3

- Some major plotline not being fully developed (the Vok plotline)

Beast Wars II (liked the show)

Pros:

- The Predacons in general

- Lio Convoy (the Optimus of the show) having a son

- Galvatron is babe and so is Starscream

Cons:

- Maximals are lame apart from Lio Convoy and the arc with his son Lio Junior

- A lot of uninteresting characters an episodes

- The Jointrons as racist mexican stereotypes

- Only female robot is part of a love triangle (even more annoying than the love triangle in Beast Wars)

Beast Wars Neo (liked the show)

Pros:

- Big Convoy being a lone wolf turned teacher was a really sweet story to follow <3 How he and his team learnt to trust each other over the course of the show was really nice!

- Unicron in this show was a delight

- D-Navi was always fun

- Magmatron was a rather nice Decepticon leader

- Heinrad is babe

Cons:

- No girls (Boo!)

Beast Machines (very conflicted, tend to dislike)

Pros:

- Plays entirely on Cybertron

- Explores themes of technology and organic life forms and really tries to be something different and deep

- The last episode is really nice

- Jetstorm is babe

Cons:

- No fun allowed - the maximals are really frustrating because we only ever see them being angry and fighting and a lot of them only show us their worst sides

- The maximal character models are HIDEOUS

- You may not actually like the philosophical aspect of the show, especially when you think too long about it and realise it’s kinda shit

Robots in Disguise 2001/ Car Robots (liked the show)

Pros:

- New continuity! New story, new take!

- Funny and lighthearted

- Cute characters

- Sky-Byte/Gel-Shark is babe

- Ultra Magnus/God Magnus is a fucking jerk and I love it

Cons:

- Sideburn/Speedbreaker’s gag about loving red sport cars and chasing after them - it’s played as a joke all the time but I can see that stuff making people uncomfortable when they see the female driver trying to get away from him and his catcalling (Apart from that I do like him a lot though)

Armada/Micron Densetsu (disliked the show)

Pros:

- Lots of feels between Megatron and Optimus

- Starscream's arc

- The ending arc

- Jetfire was babe

Cons:

- The pacing was unbearable

- Half the time the characters didn't act like people and I was confused about almost every conflict, action and point they made. It's not a great story when I watch episode and need an hour to figure what the hell the story even was

- The parts I liked in concept are not helped by how unnatural and weird the characters acted at times. I liked the ending, but how they got there was so weird that I just can't enjoy it

Energon/Superlink (loved the show)

Pros:

- Megatron/Galvatron - Everything about him

- The japanese voice acting was fantastic!

- Really nice death scenes (I love death scenes btw)

- Mirage/Shockfleet being in love with Megatron

- Bringing back old names apart from Megatron and Optimus

- Rodimus being an equal to Optimus was a nice touch

- The few scenes it was 2D animated

- Jetfire/Skyfire is babe

Cons:

- Animation

- The "for the toys" thing kinda ruined some characters, where instead of getting the toys as completely new characters, they killed old ones and brought them back with a new model. It did suck story-telling wise (and me, loving death scenes, get annoyed when a death scene gets ruined by bringing the character back). So you got all these character arcs that feel like the just stopped

Cybertron/Galaxy Force (loved the show with all my heart)

Pros:

- Love the setting and world with all the different colonies and how they were explored ~

- Optimus Prime, this one is my favourite version of him!

- Vector Prime, they should bring him back

- All the different leaders

- The friendship between the characters- this show has my favourite set of Autobots from all TF media

- This also has my favourite Mega&Star dynamic

- Starscream himself is so well done here!

- Jetfire/Dreadlock was babe

Cons:

- Megatron was lacklustre. When it came to him and his dynamics with other characters (apart from Starscream), he was hardly written as a person with feelings. He never reacts to anything happening within the ranks of Decepticons and it is really disappointing, because there was a lot of potential! (with Flame Convoy and Chromia specifically)

Animated (loved the show)

Pros:

- Character writing, plot and themes!

- Lighthearted tone but enough scenes that dig a little deeper

- Really nice and smooth animation

- Optimus is baby

Cons:

- The chins

- No 4th season

Prime (loved the show)

Pros:

- Best friggin fight scenes and animation in general

- Really exciting plot

- Ratchet is babe

Cons:

- Predacon Rising exists

- Characters dying for budget reasons (Just don’t hire celebrities when you cannot pay them for more?)

Robots in Disguise 2015 (it's okay)

Pros:

- ...the Stunticons are babe

Cons:

- characters never developing and learning the same shit over and over again

- almost no interesting villains

- even the interesting ones being shoved aside a lot

- no real built-up for the climax

- lots of filler and not enough time spent on the actual plot of a corrupt Cybertron goverment

Prime Wars Trilogy (loved the show with all my heart)

Pros:

- Megatron, everything about him, he’s babe

- I really like the soundtrack

Cons:

- Bad storytelling, both narrative and visual

- Horrible or mediocre voice acting

- Static and bad facial expressions

- Static and bad character animation

- Feels like no one involved in the production had any idea how to tell a story

Cyberverse (meh)

Pros:

- Really cute as fuck

- Big cast

- Astrotrain is babe

Cons:

- No time for character arcs, they just jump from set up to conclusion with nothing in-between

- Unfocused plot that jumps from one idea to another

- Megatron broke my heart and I hate him

#transformers #tfa #tfp #g1 #beast wars #bwii #prime wars trilogy #cyberverse #headmasters #masterforce #victory #beast machines #rid01 #rid15 #bey's shit #transformer posting

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mi4017 · 4 years ago

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SILENT VOICE (KOE NO KATACHI) 2016

I’m a sucker for slice of life shows, i love it for the same reason i like comedy!

they’re lighthearted, give a feelgood vibe - with a colourful cast of characters that normally have very nice interactions - a kind of fun you can only see characters have, not real people.

usually I'm not big on anime... its just not a media that i grew up with and have no nostalgia nor personal interest for. I can completely see why others enjoy it, but its just not for me: and I think that’s a completely fair and respectable point of view.

but dang... this film is beautiful.

Koe no Katachi / Silent Voice (2016)

When a grade school student with impaired hearing is bullied mercilessly, she transfers to another school. Years later, one of her former tormentors sets out to make amends.

i think conceptually - this is a really nice story. redemption is a theme i feel always has a special place in storytelling, there’s something about watching the protagonist overcome the difficulties they’ve had in their past, and come back a better person because of it thats so rewarding.

I think that’s due, in part, to the way everyone thinks of themselves - humans are naturally very doubtful, and self-deprecating: the fastest to point out their own flaws. i don't think i know anyone that is genuinely happy with who they are, with everyone ashamed of some part of themselves, and their pasts.

however - the context of redemption is an important factor. there’s unforgivable acts that cause immense damage - so much so, that no matter how different they are, they can't bring themselves to forgive what they’ve done.

personally, i agree with the mentality that the victims of situations should be the factor that dictate whether the act is forgivable or not, but that doesn't necessarily mean you can forgive yourself.

the film centres around a boy named Shoya Ishida, who bullied a deaf girl named Shōko Nishimiya, when he was a kid - and is seeking to make amends for the way he treated her.

in the film, this is down-played, with it taking up about ten minutes of the film, as an opening segment.

I’ve both read the manga, and watched the film. The way each version is handled differently yet still tells a similar story, with the same cast of characters is a point of interest to me, and i think each version has it’s charm.

if you're interested, i personally prefer the manga version - it’s much grittier, and makes scenes from the movie a lot more understandable, due to missing content - the tone becomes understandable.

Shõko transfers to Shoya’s school, and instantly things change - with classes having to accommodate for a student, with a disability. this annoys Shoya, and his friends, and to ‘get back at her’ as they see fit they begin to tease her.

Shõko wears hearing aids, and Shoya learns that yanking them out will entertain both him and his friends. A female student, Naoko, also leads the way in ostracising the deaf girl.

Shõko does everything in her power to fit in, communicate and make friends, but due to her disability she is ultimately forced to spend her time alone. this unfair treatment seems absolutely barbaric - but the sad reality is that it happens.

i personally have a few audibly-impaired pals, and it’s upsetting to watch the way they’re treated. People find it difficult to communicate with them, and in essence - due to not enjoying the time they spend with them, isolate them. this is, of course, a generalisation based on my experience - i think that this is what makes my friendship with them feel unique - a percentage of the individuals i encounter have very few connections, which makes their bond with myself feel more significant.

Shõko is targeted by Shoya, and his gang - who pour water on, trip her up, and rips out a number of her hearing aids: one time so forcefully her ears bleed.

He is scapegoated as the only bully in the class despite how many of his classmates have contributed to Shõko’s suffering. Due to this, his friends turn their attention on him, and the torment they inflicted on Shõko is now being flipped on himself.

we skip over the next few years of Shoya’s life - they pass, as nothing noteworthy happens. Shoya lost everyone, now he can’t look anyone in the eyes, which is visually represented by x’s over the faces of all the students at school.

He’s alone. but accepts this as his punishment for what he did to Shoko.

i think this is one of the aspects that sold me on the film: the second you see what Shoya has become you instantly understand he’s truly changed. he’s gone from a spunky kid, swaggering down the halls with tons of friends to this sorry state.

he's resentful for the way he treated Shõko, so much so that he’s considering killing himself - conveyed by the simple and chilling way he cuts out the rest of a calendar after the date he chooses to die.

after reuniting with Shõko, the rest of the film follows the new relationship they build, along with the reactions of their old classmates.

“What I have given a lot of attention to when portraying Shoya’s position and circumstances was to portray Shoya as an individual character – to carefully understand and stay true to the intentions of what he saw, what he felt and what actions he took. I have tried to build the character so that Shoya will be able to act as himself, no matter what the circumstances,” - Yamada.

It’s hard to argue that Shoya is not worthy of redemption: he works for years to pay back the cost of the hearing aids, he almost kills himself, he accepts his own isolation and misery, and he reaches out to Shoya to make amends and help her wishes come true.

I walked away from the experience truly contemplating a lot of things. to all the people out there who picked on me at school, the ones who made me feel like shit and hate myself.

i forgive you.

and i hope one day - you can do the same. forgive yourself

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365days365movies · 4 years ago

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February 24, 2021: Annie Hall (Part 2)

Back to a great movie made by a, uh...controversial figure!

Back to The Neurotic Misadventures of Alvy Singer! First part of the Recap is right here. On we go!

Recap (Part 2)

Well, dinner’s awkward with Annie’s family, which includes her anti-Semitic grandmother, who sees Alvy as the most Jewish stereotype ever, in yet another case of visual storytelling. Seriously, Allen is extremely adept at melding verbal and visual storytelling in an amusing fashion.

That’s made even clearer when Alvy speaks to us again, and compared Annie’s family to his own, as the screen divides in two. Towards the end of the scene, the families converse with each other and compare their traditions. It’s, uh...it’s fantastic. I genuinely love it.

After dinner, Alvy talks to Alvy’s brother, Duane (Christopher Walken)...and just, like...just watch this. Please.

youtube

That’s fucking hilarious.

We fast forward, and Alvy and Annie are arguing about close contact between Annie and a college instructor of one of her classes. She says it was nothng, and counters that Alvy’s not willing to commit to a relationship. She believes that this is because he doesn’t believe she’s smart enough, which leads to another flashback.

Fresh off of a visit with a Freudian psychologist recommended by Alvy, she comes home having seemingly had a breakthrough. But her dreams also seem to suggest that Alvy’s smothering her. That’s seemingly confirmed by the fact that he’s been following her around when we flash forward to the argument about the professor. Fuckin’ YIKES.

The two basically break up, right there on the street, immediately causing Alvy to go into a spiral of confusion. He asks random people on the street questions about their relationships, in a sort of fourth-wall breaking way. This leads to Alvy remembering watching Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs as a child, and immediately falling for the Evil Queen rather than Snow White.

That bring us into an animated segue starring Annie as the Evil Queen (I think, since that’s definitely Diane Keaton’s voice), and Alvy as himself. He asks her if she’s ornery because she’s on her period...and yeah, it’s the right time to point out that Alvy DEFINITELY is not a perfect guy. In fact, he’s kind of a paranoid asshole whose neuroses tend to ruin his relationships, but he never truly blames himself for those problems, always seeming to target outside factors. Yeah, dude needs a therapist, but...maybe a different one?

Rob appears in the animated dream, and tells him that he has a woman just for her. That woman is Rosicrucian reporter Pam (Shelley Duvall), who’s...not the right person for Alvy, clearly, as is proved by their tough sex that night. But right after this date, Alvy gets a call from a clearly distressed Annie, who asks him to come over at 3 in the morning. But why?

To kill a spider. Yeah, she calls him to kill a spider in the bathroom. He’s clearly upset by this, and acts hostile and critical of Annie, while speculating on her current relationship status. He also mocks the fact that she can’t kill a spider...until he sees the spider, which is apparently huge. What proceeds is him destroying the bathroom in order to kill the spider, which is hilarious, naturally.

But as expected, the spider’s not the reason that she called him. Because she actually just misses him. He lies about having Pam at his place, and the two reunite, deciding to continue their relationship. With Rob, they go to Brooklyn and visit Alvy’s memories of his family - literally.

Once again, I’m genuinely impressed by the visual storytelling. They interact indirectly with the memories, and it’s fantastic. Seriously, I understand the appeal of this film, because it’s very well-written and conceptualized. And that concept is well-realized as well. I am impressed.

Annie’s once again singing at a club, and it’s a good song. On a related note, Diane Keaton has a nice voice! Never knew, but she’s a very talented woman. Alvy agrees, and tells her as much after her set is finished. A man named Tony Lacey (Paul Simon, yes, of Simon and Garfunkel, holy shit) approaches her and asks if she’s attached to a record label, but a jealous and paranoid Alvy essentially sabotages the possibility.

Instead of going to a party where she could potentially make a connection, Alvy convinces her to once again go and see The Sorrow and the Pity. And from there, we see each of their therapy sessions, side-by-side. And things are...not going well. Yeah, since Brooklyn, the two aren’t gelling like they used to.

After a VERY funny scene involving cocaine (yes, really), the two go with Rob to Los Angeles around Christmastime. They’re there so that Alvy can present an award on live television, and also to see Rob’s television show. He suddenly comes down with a case of nausea and sickness, and the doctor can’t figure out why. However, as soon as the award show finds a replacement for him, he gets immediately and miraculously better.

They head to a party later on, held by Tony Lacey, much to Alvy’s display. Also attending the party is...Jeff Goldblum? He, uh...he forgot his mantra.

On the flight home, the two have an internal monologue about their relationship, and both of them each come to the conclusion that their relationship no longer works. That inner monologue breaks into outer monologue, and they mutually agree to break up.

When they get back, they formally break up, and would appear to be complacent with that. However, Alvy basically IMMEDIATELY regrets it, which he tells to passersby on the street. He goes out with another woman, but it also doesn’t work out. Meanwhile, Annie’s in L.A., working with Tony Lacey on a record deal. Despite her urgings for him not to, Alvy flies all the way out there to reunite with her, and even rents a car that he can’t really drive.

They reunite once again at a restauant, where Alvy immediately proposes to her. However, Annie wants to stay in L.A., as she’s happy, and criticizes Alvy’s inability to enjoy life. She refuses him, and says that she’s not sure she loves him anymore. He’s not really OK with that, and has a hard time accepting the idea of just being friends.

They part ways with some turbulence, and Alvy immediately gets in a car accident, and gets arrested after having a neurotic breakdown. He’s bailed out by Tony, who goes to get him after being interrupted from...sleeping with twin 16-year-olds...Jesus.

Upon returning to New York, Alvy writes a play that’s LITERALLY just their relationship the way that Alvy wishes it would end. He speaks to the screen and notes that as his first play, it wasn’t particularly very good.

However, he did run into Annie again after all that time, back in NYC, where she’d moved back. They reminisce over the good times, which is seen through flashbacks through all of the moments of love in their relationship. However, they part ways without any further longing. Alvy closes us out on a joke, and relates it to his feelings on relationships as a whole.

I thought of that old joke. This guy goes to a psychiatrist and says, ‘Doc, my brother’s crazy. He thinks he’s a chicken.’ And the doctor says, ‘Well, why don’t you turn him in?’ And the guy says, ‘I would, but I need the eggs.’ Well, I guess that’s pretty much now how I feel about relationships. They’re totally irrational and crazy and absurd and . . . but I guess we keep going through it because most of us need the eggs.

And that...was Annie Hall! Wow. As comedies and as romances go, that was absolutely not what I was expecting. I’ve got a lot of thoughts, but I’ll get to those in the Review! See you there!

#annie hall #woody allen #diane keaton #tony roberts #carol kane #paul simon #christopher walken #romance february #romance movie #romcom #romantic comedy #user365 #365 movie challenge #365 movies 365 days #365 Days 365 Movies #365 movies a year

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theropoda · 4 years ago

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3, 4, 6-8, 11, 13-17, 19-22, 26-30 uwu

WOO LAD THAT’S A LOT THANK U!!! this got long and i wrote an essay or two LOL so im putting it under a readmore!

3: Best game you’ve ever played? WEEEELLLL.......let me preface this with two things: one, i am a FAKE GAMER as in my laptop is not at all made for gaming, it’s piss poor, so a big chunk of games i’m interested in is because i watched a playthrough of them lol. i have a 3ds but only 3 games on it (animal crossing new leaf, tomodachi life, nintedogs & cats). second, i’m very bad at choosing favorites of things.....BUUUUT .....i choooooose, in no particular order, OFF, pigeonetics, elder scrolls oblivion, pathologic classic HD!! i’m more than likely forgetting a few though, so sorry about that

4: Worst game you’ve ever played? as i said above, cannot choose favorites, neither can i choose whatever the opposite of favorites is but...uhh, does lif even count as a game? like lif, the stupid little furry flash game i remember playing on some shady website. it was surprisingly very active with a BUNCH of people there but i kept dying like every 5 seconds....AWFUL

6: A game that’s changed you the most? WELL define Changed.....ummm aha first thing that comes to mind is OFF. it’s one of those things where you never knew you wanted something so fucking bad until you saw it--and it’s like that for me. i NEVER knew i loved that odd, surreal, colorful, “looks playful and simple in some parts but incredibly violent and unnerving in other parts” aesthetic til i played it. like aesthetically i love that game to BITS and something about it just stuck with me til the end of time.

later in life (meaning, past year or so) it changed me because it taught me a lesson about storytelling and creative endeavors. a very useful lesson. which is: things don’t really need to have a meaning. stories, art, music, writing, whatnot, while it CAN be deep and meaningful, while you CAN use it as a way to communicate with the world about all kinds of heartfelt things, it can also be...nothing, really.

once i, as usual, got ridiculously overwhelmingly sad about small things. specifically seeing other people around me come up with all kinds of deep and meaningful characters and stories, sometimes putting them into webcomics or writings of theirs, and they were all so well-thought out and detailed and what i envied most was people put a lot of themselves and their experiences into them, venting and coping through them, whilst also making these larger-than-life grandiose complex stories and worlds and so on and so forth.

it made me look at my own ideas and get mad/frustrated at how shallow they were. but then i remembered OFF and i felt better because Fun Fact, mortis ghost has a now-abandoned dA account and if you go through the comment section on his profile, he answers a lot of fan questions and he mentions several times that the game didn’t really have a “meaning”, it didn’t really have a “deeper story” or moral or anything, really. i’m paraphrasing this but i vividly remember him saying “i wanted to make a game, so i did”.

that made me feel a lot better because it made me realise that sometimes art--especially stories, in my case-- doesn’t NEED to be DEEP or have MEANING...sometimes it can just BE!!!! sometimes it really can just be all about AESTHETICS like who GIVES a shit if there’s a hidden meaning if you take the first letter of all of your characters’ names and put them backwards, sometimes all that matters is if they just VIBE with you y’know....

yume nikki is similar in this regard bc that game doesn’t have any story other than “collect egg” and yet it’s so impactful. that game doesn’t have a story or meaning it just IS........ :) GOD THATS SO LONG IM SORRY ABOUT THAT but yeah. funny violent ghostbusting baseball man is a game that changed me :)

7: A game you’ll never forget? OFF AGAIN LOL,,, it’s just so memorable because of how unique it is. visuals, soundtrack, story, everything is so memorable. unforgettable. oh god you can tell how much i love this damn game can’t you

8: Best soundtrack? yakuza 0, OFF, there is a picture (another game by mortis ghost, again composed by alias conrad coldwood who also composed OFF), pigeonetics (the entire soundtrack of which is here), jojo’s bizarre adventure all star battle and eyes of heaven, silent hill 2 & 3, undertale....probably forgetting more but all of these...earcandy

11: Hardest game you’ve played? i am a shitty gamer so this is Most games i’ve played lol!! but uhh..well you see. hardest game i remember playing as of recent is pathologic classic hd in which it’s...not only hard to understand what any character is saying at any given time lol but also, i don’t think it’s HARD it’s just...you need to focus. you REALLY need to fucking focus and pay attention in this game. so i wouldn’t say its HARD, but i’m only putting this here bc it’s in recent memory.

i say recent memory because the true answer is susceptible to “yeah, but now you’re older, it must not be so hard.” as in if i played it now i think i’d have a way easier time. but when i was around....10-12 years old i had several ps3 video game adaptations of animated movies and i had SUCH a fucking hard time with them. g-force, bolt and up in particular were fucking HARD. like genuinely, the hardest time i had EVER had in my live playing video games is tied to these three fucking games. g-force and bolt ESPECIALLY. one particular level in bolt took both me AND my sister around a year to fucking finish.

again, i was baby, so i bet i’d have a much easier time with them now that i’m 17. but for now, in my experience, bolt and g-force for the ps3 were harder than pathologic classic. i think icepick lodge should take a few notes for them for pathologic 2.

13: A game you were the most excited for when it wasn’t released yet? STREETS OF KAMUROCHO...i spent the entire day of its release anticipating its launch lol

14: A game you think would be cool if it had voice acting? hmm..most games i like and know about do have voice acting so i dunno....i guess it would’ve been kind of cool if morrowind had like, full proper voice acting. but i can understand why it only voice acted things like greetings and battle insults because GOD that game is SO...complicated...and as a result, the conversations are so lengthy and text-full. playing morrowind is really like a goddamn book! if it was voice acted i’m sure all that information would have to be shortened bc i know no one is going to fucking voice act two whole paragraphs

15: Which two games do you think would make an awesome crossover? pigeonetics and yakuza in which instead of being about the criminal underworld it’s about shady and unethical pigeon clubs, breeding, racing, etc etc...a lot of illegal shit does happen in the world of pigeons especially when it comes to racing; prized racers have been kidnapped and held for ransom before. and then there’s Avian Cucking: The Sport, where people breed the sexiest pigeons (horseman thief pouters), release them outside to seduce other people’s sexy pigeons, and bring them back and keep ‘em, drama ensues. will kiryu ever escape his past as a professional pigeon-napper, and find solace in his new life as a pigeon hobbyist? find out now by playing YACOOZA......

JOKES ASIDES i don’t know i really don’t....umm, pigeonetics and animal crossing somehow?? :O... like, instead of managing your own town it’s managing your own loft!...orrrr, the jojo games (all star battle & eyes of heaven) with yakuza, because i think they’re somewhat similar because they’re both haha Wacky Silly AND serious over the top fighty-fighting.....or maybe a crossover with OFF and discover my body, which, despite being an incredibly short and obscure indie game i still love to bits for what it’s worth. WAIT ANIMAL CROSSING AND MINECRAFT THAT WOULD FUCK SO HARD OH MY GOD

16: Character you’ve hated most? From what game? i can’t think of any character i like, HATE...with a burning passion.. there are a few i dislike or have a complicated relationship with though.. i’m not interested in the series anymore but ouma from drv3...i’ll admit that he is a bit fun sometimes, especially in the very early beginning he’s a likeable brat but as the game progresses he becomes more irritating than anything and i have an issue with him in regards to writing, despite the fact that i have never been awake in any english class ever lol. it’s too long to put in this already long post but i’ll keep it at that. if you like him, well, good for you for finding joy in something i couldn’t! but he just doesn’t do it for me.

AH I JUST REMEMBERED....MINE......FROM YAKUZA 3....maybe i’d change my mind if i watched a playthrough of y3 again, because i think you always absorb something better on your second watch (tho i honestly Dont have the energy to do that all over again, the yakuza games are too fucking long), but i really hate his writing. spoilers for y3 but, i think mine’s writing, alongside other things in the game, were super messy...and a big part of why i hate him is that not only is he one of those “could’ve had great potential but fell flat” sorta guys but also his love for daigo is seen as some fans as good gay rep and i?????/.............um....WELL let’s just say that, i think people nowadays will see any gay character ever in any circumstance and say it’s good gay rep just based off the fact that A Gay Character exists....he was Not, good gay rep imo....he was not, let alone, Good. .........

17: What game do you never tell people you play? can’t think of any games i wouldn’t tell people i play.. idk exactly what this question’s asking. does it mean what game you don’t tell ppl you play bc you’re embarrassed about it...? i’m not very embarrassed by any of them. the only thing that comes close, i guess, is uhh lioden and wolvden. i’ve only interacted with those communities a LITTLE TINY WEE BIT, yet of what i’ve seen it’s a goddamn dumpster fire and i’d never want to be associated with them lol

19: Which game do you think deserves a revival? i’m well aware it’ll never happen and that it’s more a wet dream than anything but...PT/silent hills..... on a more realistic/”could happen” note, PIGEONETICS!!!! SERIOUSLY, it’s an amazing game about amazing animals and it teaches genetics in a very simplified and efficient way!! genetics is SO hard for me to understand, i fucking hated studying it but this game really helped me understand how it works AND its super engaging and interesting!! HOWEVER, of all the pigeon genes we know of, only a handful were seen in pigeonetics and i’d LOVE a sequel that employs new game mechanics AND new genes!! i wanna learn about bronze and stencil genes! i wanna learn about phenotypes like grizzled and pied!!! genes like sooty and dirty!!! @ UNIVERSITY OF UTAH GENETICS DEPARTMENT PLEASE IM BEGIGNG YOU

20: What was the first video game you ever played? earliest memories of Gaming involves me at my aunt’s house playing two games: super mario brothers and some kind of trapeze game. i don’t remember anything else though

21: How old were you when you first played a video game? i can’t remember but i must’ve been REAL tiny.... 6-9 years, maybe??

22: If you could immerse yourself in any game for one day, which game would it be? What would you do? immerse myself meaning go into their world...? huh....on one hand i’d like to go in the world of yakuza 0 to play in the arcades and do whore related activities but i’d also love to go into the world of animal crossing (and i’m pretty sure i’d be some sort of generic dromaeosaurid in that game!!) and shop, chat with villagers, do chores for them, go fishing, bug hunting, eat delicious fucking food like the apples mangos peaches cherries etc etc.....OH AND FOSSIL HUNTING THAT’S THE BEST PART!! though it would definetly be a little weird, to be a little dinosaur and finding a fossil of a...little dinosaur....i guess the non-sentient species went extinct and the dinosaur i am is some kind of, descendant of a sapient non-avian dinosaur that survived the k-pg extinction event...oh but who cares all i want is a cool little ambulocetus fossil or something. and some cherry pie :)

26: Handheld or console? my old ps3 just went kaput one day years ago so i haven’t used it in years so i can’t compare well... but i’d say handheld, because it lets me like DO stuff more...would love to get a console one day, a ps4 maybe but i’m kinda worried it’ll make me stay in one room all day wasting away my time when there’s other stuff i can do, y’know? but something handheld like my 3ds, on the other hand...i can do stuff with it. i can take it to my room and play it between breaks i take as i clean the room and fold my clothes, i can watch something on the tv and play the game during ad breaks, i can take it outside too if it has charge to last me a while! so....handheld i guess

27: Has there ever been a moment that has made you cry? yakuza 0 and undertale in particular have ALMOST made me fucking bawl with many of its moments....yakuza 0 especially, after that Fucking Ending i had trouble sleeping because oh my fucking god. video game people SAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

28: Which character’s clothes do you wish you owned the most?

29: Which is more important, gameplay or story? HMMM....well, if i were to play a game with a shitty story but really good and fun gameplay i’d probably continue playing it for the gameplay. but if i played a game with shitty gameplay but an interesting story, there is a chance i’d play it more for the sake of the story but also i might just quite and see the rest of the story on youtube or something. i’m more likely to go through a boring story for fun gameplay than go through boring gameplay for an interesting story, so i guess gameplay is more important to me....that is, WHEN i actually own and play a game as opposed to when i just watch someone play a game because i don’t own the game but wanna know abt the story lol

30: A game that hasn’t been localized in your country that you think should be localized? i have no idea how video game localization really works....but i assume localizing a game in india would mean something like, removing content according to cultural norm and also somehow translating it into the 22 official languages..? or just two or three language if it’s tied to a particular state, which seems way more doable. i honestly have no idea? i’ve never interacted w the indian gaming community that much to be honest, all i know of it is of the video games i’ve seen sold in some game stores and a few whispers about like solid snake or whoever from my school’s cafeteria....the most popular games here, to my knowledge, are those very streamable games like fortnite and PUBG and your call of duties and whatnot. those generic shooters. and even then, that honestly isn’t the “indian” gaming community bc this country is so FUCKHUGE, it’s just tamil nadu. one state.

soooo, according to what little i know of gaming interests in where i live, i don’t think any of the games i like should be localized here bc i don’t really think there’s an audience for it as far as i can tell :( maybe animal crossing? it’s a fun little games for all ages and i think it has a chance of becoming popular here, so maybe that is worth a shot! but i can’t think of any other game that i like that really has an audience here (other than Me lol)

#asks #stommevrouw #THANK U EVIE THIS WAS SO FUNNNNNNN #WOOF haha this made me tired #im probably hitting the bed now! thank u!!

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radramblog · 4 years ago

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Top 5 Games, ever...?

This was sort of on my mind, considering the recent GOTY post I made. Come explore the hyperfixations that managed to stick around long enough to be my top 5 list.

5. Uhhhhhh

So turns out I haven’t figured out what number 5 is yet. I suppose instead I’ve got to split it among the honourable mentions, huh.

Kirby Super Star Ultra is probably the best game from the GBA/DS era of the series and is just a blast to play. It introduced Masked Dedede, and all the banging music and memes that come with it, and probably deserves a spot here just for that.

The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth removes all the awkward Flash Stuff from the excellent original, and adds so, so much more content- the game’s final expansion still isn’t out yet as of writing but even now there’s just so much to unlock. While some aspects of the game can be pretty unforgiving, you probably aren’t going to be exposed to the worst of it unless you get into it pretty hardcore, and if you do, you’ll get used to it. It’s a roguelike, after all.

Speaking of roguelikes, FTL: Faster than Light is chaotic yet serene, brutal but fair, and a bunch of other pretentious dichotomies wrapped into a neat little bow. It takes some getting used to the mechanics, but once you get the hang of it, building your little ship up and up in the face of all odds is extremely satisfying. Have fun dying hopefully not too many times.

SPEAKING of permadeath, Realm of the Mad God gets a spot here just out of sheer hours I’ve spent with it. After a messy few years with a not-so-great owner lead me to dropping the game, it seems finally to have recovered and has devs and community that actually freaking care about it, which is nice. Also, it’s free, and the recent transition to unity has the game looking better and playing smoother than 12-year-old me could ever have dreamed of.

Terraria isn’t just 2D Minecraft btw, its actually more of an RPG/Metroidvania thing, you probably know at this point, but its pretty good hey. Still haven’t fully dove into 1.4 but considering I thought Red was done at 1.1 I’m not complaining with what I have played.

4. Fallout: New Vegas

(...ish??)

I’d argue that between the primitiveness of the original Fallout games (I’ve tried to get into them, but I just can’t) and how…meh… the other Bethesda ones are, New Vegas is the only one in the series to stand up strong. Obsidian’s excellent writing and tweaks to the gameplay of 3 make New Vegas feel like an actual world, rich and characterised, which was something I found lacking in previous open-world RPGs I’d played up until that point (which admittedly might just have been Skyrim). It’s a game that challenges you to make choices that actually matter for more than the mere moments of an altered dialogue tree, both in dialogue and character building, which helps make the game actually replayable. It is also the first game in a long time that really sold the idea of DLC on me, seeing as each of the game’s 4 expansions adds an entire new region of world with its own stories and unique gameplay, tying together with the main plot but standing on their own. I am excluding Gun Runner’s Arsenal from this for obvious reasons, though it isn’t like GRA is a bad DLC or anything- on the contrary, the sheer scope of modifications and munitions makes playing a repair/science-based character incredibly fulfilling- but it just isn’t at the same scope as the other 4 (Courier’s stash barely counts seeing as its just oops! All preorder bonuses).

New Vegas is one of the few games I have actually 100% completed, achievements and all, but I’m still pretty sure there are bits I’ve missed, paths I haven’t taken, characters I haven’t talked to. Despite its inhospitability, the Mojave is always a comfortable place to return to.

3. VA-11 Hall-A

(Hey look, my phone background)

Vallhalla is a masterclass in storytelling, atmosphere, and aesthetic. Like all good cyberpunk dystopias, you get themes of class and transhumanism and artificial intelligence, but they aren’t the point of Vallhalla. Through the window and lens of cyberpunk and PC98 nostalgia is focussed a surprisingly human story centred around the protagonist, Jill, which through multiple replays still hits me in the feels just so. Of course, Jill’s story is not the only one being discussed, as every single patron of the bar has their own life going on, and the glimpses we get imply a rich, often interconnected, world. Glitch City is, frankly, a shithole, and it’s not like you don’t get some assholes coming into the bar while you’re working it. The first patron you serve, in fact, is a great example of this- Donovan D. Dawson, essentially a parody of J. Jonah Jameson, is a colossal prick and knows it- but its clear he has his own system of morals and it is mentioned that he’s excellent at his job, much as he gripes about it. He’s rude and more than a little sexist, but frustratingly charismatic and authoritative, and he’s just one of many people who show up throughout the game. Vallhalla is the perfect game to sit down, grab your preferred beverage, and just relax with.

2. Total Annihilation

(This image is on the steam page for this one, despite blatantly not being from vanilla TA)

I think I actually need to explain this one. Total Annihilation was a game released in 1997 made largely by Chuck Taylor, who would later go on to produce spiritual successor Supreme Commander. It’s an RTS game featuring exclusively robotic units with a fairly chunky aesthetic, allowing the visuals to age better than some, and a fully orchestrated soundtrack by Jeremy Soule, who would later go on to do work on a whole bunch of stuff, most notably Skyrim.

Total Annihilation is an intensely nostalgic game for me, being one of the first games I ever got to play as a kid outside of edutainment stuff, and I’d argue still holds up today (especially with the excellent Escalation mod). What it lacks in story (it’s pretty basic, but functional) it makes up for being miles ahead of its time mechanically, being the first (?) RTS to function in 3 dimensions- heights of things actually matter, hills exist and certain units climb them better than others, shooting down airplanes is difficult without anti-air but possible if you aim *just* right. While appearing pretty similar and having largely analogous units, the two factions of Arm and Core are well fleshed-out in terms of aesthetic and playstyle- Arm preferring fast and cheap equivalents to Core’s slow but powerful- and the unit variety is sufficient that strategies can vary wildly based on the map. Both campaigns as well as those from the game’s expansions are challenging, but satisfying, limiting the units you can produce to force exploration of different playstyles.

Total Annihilation isn’t something I tend to binge play for hours anymore, but I’ll pick it up for a bit every so often, and I don’t see that stopping for a long time (especially due to the recent steam release).

1. Pokémon Emerald

(At the top, where it belongs)

Yeah, this was inevitable. Pokémon is my favourite series ever; Emerald is my favourite in the series. Go figure.

Emerald, being the final game for the franchise’s days on the Game Boy, reflects everything Game Freak had learned in the first 3 generations of the series’ history. The game’s balance is challenging but fair, never spiking so tough that it is insurmountable but never holding your hand either. The AI opponents are throwing odd combinations of mons and moves at you from every corner, double battles are everywhere but rarely mandatory, and the variety of available mon both before and during the postgame is excellent. The added features on top of Ruby and Sapphire are great- Battle Tents serve to replace 3 of the contest halls (they should have all been under one roof to begin with) and provide a taste of what would later be available in the Battle Frontier. The Frontier is probably the single most expansive and challenging postgame in any Pokémon game, providing the game with a longevity that is sorely needed due to the inaccessibility of Pre-DS multiplayer. The game also manages to tie together the plot of both Ruby and Sapphire into something that feels natural, and provides the series’ first ever actual cutscene, which felt a lot cooler at the time than it sounds now. The return of animated sprites gives the Pokémon a level of life far beyond the static sprites of RSFRLG, and in my eyes wouldn’t feel the same until Black and White several years later. The return of the Pokégear phone in the form of Match Call, as irritating as it is to some, makes the world feel alive in a way that Sinnoh and Kanto probably never will, in addition to making grinding a fair bit less tedious and more beneficial. It is, altogether, probably the perfect Pokémon experience, and in my opinion only one other game comes close (its Platinum).

Oh also, they got rid of the font from Ruby and Sapphire, thank fuck, that shit is atrocious.

#ramble #video games #pokemon #retro games #lists

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svtskneecaps · 5 years ago

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i’ve been enabled

here’s the sitch on the goddamn harry potter hogwarts mystery app game

it fucking sucks

here’s my main issues in a handy list i’ll go down later:

the gameplay

energy

art / visuals

the story

the writing

the choose your own adventure like elements (technically gameplay since there isn’t much else l m a o)

and i have receipts for most of this stuff. fun fact, i’ve been taking videos of all plot relevant events since year 1.

some context:

i’ve played up to year 3 myself. i have watched up until the very beginning of year 5 in someone’s youtube series (will bits? that was his main character [henceforth referred to as MC]’s name, however that was a year ago and it was in the background like a podcast so the details are sort of fuzzy. i have not played the game since march (it’s september, ish), but i’m loading it up as i type this just to get a feel for it

idk whether to assume my audience has or hasn’t played the game. i’ll keep my complaints as clear as possible.

i’m mainly an author so the storytelling sections are where i’m really going to pop off, since that’s something i have the most experience with and passion in, but i’ll be touching on everything else because compounded it’s all pissing me off lmao

[a couple hints at spoilers for maybe an event in year 1, and year 3, but nothing major]

let’s start with: THE GAMEPLAY

there isn’t any

literally. there’s like. zero gameplay.

you tap some highlighted figures, and then sometimes you get to trace a little shape, and sometimes you get to play rock paper scissors to fight somebody (they did manage to make duelling slightly better but it’s still not good by any standard)

sometimes you get to choose between three dialogue options, but those have barely any impact on the story or on your character. any impact they have is limited to a couple stat points, or maybe some house points, or like. some event at the end of the year. but like barely any make any real serious difference (but i’ll touch on that more later)

and then there’s the factor of stat points (and this gets kind of mathy, so feel free to skip to the bolded sentence)

for those who haven’t played the game, you have three stats (empathy, courage, and knowledge) that you can level up by taking classes, 1, 3, or 8 hours, for various rewards

back when i stopped playing, i had gained 8914 points in courage. if i recall correctly i was only about halfway to leveling up that stat. if you take an 8 hour class, you receive consistently 200 stat points, with a possibility of extra rewards that i can’t count for since those are randomly generated.

to get those 8914 points, i would have had to take 44.57 8 hour classes (while 8 hour they only take about 7, counting for the 2 hours it takes my energy to recharge to full). with 44.57 classes taking 7 hours each, to get halfway to level 24, i would have had to have done:

THIRTEEN STRAIGHT DAYS OF GRINDING, ASSUMING THAT ALL I HAD BEEN DOING WAS CHECKING ON THE HARRY POTTER HOGWARTS MYSTERY APP

and again, I WAS ONLY LIKE HALFWAY TO LEVELLING UP

I AM BARELY BEGINNING FOURTH YEAR. I AM NOT EVEN HALFWAY THROUGH THIS GAME.

i think they’ve fixed this now; it said i had 8914/1550 courage and when i got stat points it fixed itself and jumped me from level 23 to 28, so thanks for that jam city.

but it doesn’t change the fact that the grinding is fucking horrible and i’ve done my fair share of hours, and who knows what it’s going to look like when i get to a higher level again

the energy

yes, i know it’s an app game. i know they want my money. but holy FUCK the energy recharges disgustingly slowly, and every bit they expand my energy bar is an insult

“here, have another energy capacity!” they say, and then add to the amount of energy it takes to complete a task at the same time, so now shit just takes me even damn longer

it’s an insult. don’t think i didn’t fuckin notice jam city.

since it’s an app game, naturally, energy requires paying real world money or the (semi) rare in-game currency to get more if you blow through your bar. they want your money. i know they want my money, but it doesn’t make me any less disappointed by how damn blatant they’re being. app games like bakery story probably also want my money, but at least those are still fun to play.

the art / visuals

now i’m not an artist. nor am i a 3-d modeller. but if solo indie devs and 10 men teams can make video games that have to have models with a much fuller range of motion (since there’s ACTUAL GAMEPLAY and not just little cutscenes of characters moving around) and that don’t make me sick to watch, then jam city working on a HARRY POTTER GAME should be able to (jk rowling fucking sucks but her books have brought in so much goddamn money that they can afford to pay their devs enough to make the game look good; in this case i’m not entirely sure where the blame lies)

there’s like. 10 motions characters can use while in the cutscenes and talking. like 10. and i can recognize every one of them, and there is not a single motion unique to a character. the characters are something i’ll touch on later in the storytelling sections, though. just, please god give them SOMETHING even SLIGHTLY different. like make two versions of a couple of the crowd animations at LEAST, so that when people celebrate at the end of the year there’s not twenty people in the shot doing the same “pump my fists in the air in celebration” motion at the exact same time. PLEASE.

sometimes animations in story events and classes sync up too, which is. beyond distracting. like it’s completely immersion breaking and i mean please, please jam city, if you haven’t fixed that please fix it. please.

the animations that roll in flying class are fun, ONCE. when you’ve seen them eight hundred thousand times because you’re grinding up your courage stat, they get hella boring. all of the classes are like this to some extent but flying is the biggest offender since those were the longest animations. if they haven’t implemented a skip button since i last played it, they should. they fuckin should.

also the fertilizer animation in the greenhouse scenes is gross. you pick up a deformed cone of dirt with your shovel like a slice of cake and then shove it clipping through the edges of a pot, where it disappears without a trace. i hate it. jam city please make the game look good.

if you still play the game please tell me it looks better; i’ll be playing through a couple things after i post this but it’s hphm. it’s gonna take me a goddamn long time to hit all the points and confirm whether what i complained about has been fixed or not

also also, wearing dresses is so distracting, especially while dueling. the way the dress flexes around your legs is like you’re wearing clothing made from jello and when my character does the idle animation her hands clip through her skirt, and there’s all kids of glitches with hair where it clips through outfits (and why in the fuck do the necklaces float a full foot from the character’s body)

the storytelling

alright there’s a lot to cover so strap in

i’m not mad about the story having some of the same beats as harry potter. whatever, right? if it worked, it worked. having a big climax at the end of the year just works well for storytelling. having a school bully antagonist also works well for easy storytelling (it’s kinda cheap, but whatever works, right?) it’s what you DO with the archetypes you use that makes or breaks your story

jam city broke it

i don’t know how to organize my thoughts so here’s a bulleted list

it is very clearly obvious they wrote this as they went along (ex. a previously unseen character pops up in year 3 and was supposedly the best friend of your greatest enemy in previous years) and didn’t think to fix the plot holes

there’s too many goddamn characters (i love them, but with a big cast comes a whole host of problems [I WRITE FOR A KPOP GROUP WITH 13 MEMBERS, I HAVE A LOT OF EXPERIENCE WITH THAT], and we’ll get there)

there’s too much goddamn filler for the sake of forcing us to spend time and in-game energy (yes i KNOW it’s an app game and they want our money but THEY COULD BE A LITTLE MORE SUBTLE ABOUT IT)

what honestly pisses me off the most about it is that IT COULD BE GOOD

IF THE STORY WERE GOOD, I WOULD FUCKIN IGNORE ALL OF THAT OTHER SHIT

but it’s not, and here’s the biggest gripe i have:

none of the choices you make matter. none of them. to the point where it’s immersion breaking at BEST

for example, while my MC is a hufflepuff, i know a lot of people play in slytherin. scenes where snape gets upset with your character and takes away house points no longer make sense for a slytherin MC, because snape would be infinitely more likely to give you three years of nightly detentions, or pitch you off the astronomy tower, than he would be to take house points from slytherin

honestly, they should have waited. if they wanted to put choose your own adventure elements into the game, they should have planned out every single one of those story arcs in detail, and THEN released the game. they could leave some of the more basic choices in and those choices only mattering for short term effects wouldn’t irk me as much as it does right now because THERE WOULD BE CHOICES THAT MADE A DIFFERENCE.

your very first choice over how you felt about your brother’s disappearance only matters for what wand you get (which i immediately forgot which really says something about the impact of that choice :)))) ). no matter what you pick, you still end up chasing after him for the rest of the game, so who cares?

story beats don’t land different based on your house. you could absolutely play it that merula hates you regardless of your house, that’s fine. just remember that if your MC is slytherin and lives in the female dorms, she probably shares a room with merula. which makes things fucky for all kinds of reasons, none of which jam city addresses in the current game, as far as i’m aware

also, there’s the deal with rowan

rowan is a character that goes into your mc’s chosen house no matter what (and as rowan changes pronouns with your player, i’ll be using “they” [or “she” as my player is a she and that’s what i’m used to; i’ll try to refrain but i might slip up occasionally] ). as far as i can tell, rowan’s personality remains the same no matter what house you’re in. they don’t try to play up the traits that match the house, rowan is just usually a sweet bookworm. why would the hat have put them in gryffindor? rowan khanna for me has never seemed to display any gryffindorish traits; or at the very least, no traits that should be prioritized over, say, the ravenclaw traits they have VERY STRONGLY (since rowan fills a sort of hermione role; rowan knows things about things and is your go to for research)

can we just put rowan in ravenclaw? sure, it would make it hard for fans in different houses to communicate between each other about the story for a time since certain sequences of events would play out differently, but here’s the thing:

if events play out differently based on your choices, people will want to play your game multiple times to get every ending

that’s the fun of a choose your own adventure game. if events play out distinctly differently if you’re a hufflepuff or a ravenclaw or a slytherin or a gryffindor, then people will want to play through the game four times at LEAST, once for each house, to get all the fun pieces of story (WHICH MEANS, they’ll be spending more and more time and using more and more energy, so you can make the same amount of money off people buying energy and watching the ads and maybe MORE while being able to cut out some of the more shitty pieces of filler)

in the current version, your house is just, what color are your robes and who is your prefect. i haven’t watched anyone who wasn’t a hufflepuff, but i’m sure that certain scenes and conflicts play out the exact same no matter what house you’re in

as an example, your house should affect how the duelling confrontation in year one should have gone. snape and flitwick should have different dialogue based on whether you’re a slytherin, or a ravenclaw, or a gryffindor, or a hufflepuff. snape fucking hates gryffindors, so he should be far less lenient against gryffindors, and on the flip side he should be battling between himself with how strict to be if you’re a slytherin; maybe he hates your guts because of a grudge against your brother, but you’re still in his house and we all know snape plays favorites. flitwick should be more disappointed if you’re a ravenclaw, because that’s his house and he had higher expectations for you. neither of them have many ties to hufflepuff that would skew the confrontation in a drastic direction, but had this been the first version of the game, then the confrontation that plays out in the current version we have would work fine for hufflepuff; you’re one of flitwick’s favorite charms students and he taught you this skill, and he’s disappointed to see you use it in this way, but not nearly as much as if you were one of his own

AND NOW PEOPLE WANT TO PLAY THE GAME MULTIPLE TIMES TO GET ALL THE DIALOGUE, WHICH MEANS MORE TIME, MORE ENERGY, AND MORE MONEY, JAM CITY, ARE YOU HEARING THIS??? MORE MONEY!!!!! IT’S A WIN WIN FOR EVERYONE

while we’re at it, change jacob to match his house. if you’re still gonna make him have the same house as the MC, make him match it. from how all the characters describe him that bitch is as slytherin as they come, if you’re gonna make him a hufflepuff with me then give him a clear, hufflepuff motive god damnit

finally,

the characters

there’s too many.

the problem with a big cast is no one gets enough screen time and some characters end up getting shunted to the side. that’s just what happens. you HAVE to zero in on four or five side friends and let the rest of them slip to the side. looking at my friends menu there are 17 characters you can befriend, not including hagrid, the quidditch crew, dobby, talbott, and chiara (since those are, as far as i know, unlocked via side quests, which are... fine. i don’t have any particular gripes about the side quests except for the thing with lupin being twice the size of tonks which, if you’ve read the seventh book i don’t need to explain how weird that is to you)

and BECAUSE there are so many, a lot of them have to be defined by one trait. ben is a coward, rowan’s clever and booksmart, penny has her hand on the school’s pulse and makes potions, liz likes creatures, charlie fuckin loves dragons, tonks likes pranks (seriously that’s her whole personality), andre likes clothes, barnaby is a dumb jock that likes creatures

like, traits are fun. but if that’s ALL THEY HAVE, that’s when things get a little fucky

how many of these characters have dimensions? i’m in year 4 chapter 4. the first screen recording of the game i took was on december 5 of 2019, and assuming i played about a minimum of 8 hours a day (”““played”““) until the final screen recording [may 20, 2020] before i dropped the game for about six months (i know for certain it was more than that, since i had some kind of activity going on at just about all times for at least a month of that, but i’ll take the generous estimate), at bare minimum that makes 1344 hours i spent playing this game, or about 56 days (keep in mind, this is a LOW estimate)

in those 56 days of gameplay, i don’t know ANYTHING about the characters other than their utility in my quest. i don’t know penny’s favorite color or even her favorite potion to brew, or how and why she started and when [there’s a reveal in third year that i watched someone play through, but i don’t know if i ever played through it myself; i don’t have any screen recordings of the event]. i don’t know anything about ben or his family aside from the fact that he’s muggleborn. i know some basic facts about barnaby’s family, and that he’s tough and likes creatures. rowan grew up on a tree farm and i have a vague recollection of her mentioning siblings. do we know anything about them?? do i know anything about how the characters interact with each other?? are barnaby and liz friends? they both like creatures. do they talk to charlie?? do ben and penny hang out while we’re not there? are ben and jae friends?? are jae and charlie??? DO THESE CHARACTERS EXIST WHEN THEY AREN’T NEEDED FOR THE CURSED VAULTS???

why in the fuck don’t i know these characters?? why don’t we know anything about tonks other than her affinity for pranking?? there’s a sharp bias in who the writer’s favorites are (they like the characters with angsty pasts they can twist around; what do we know about ben aside from his blood status? and he’s been around since first year; he’s the second friend you unlock. i know more about barnaby and i’ve known him for a much shorter time)

if you separate the routes, you get a chance to zero in on certain characters and actually develop them. if you’re a gryffindor, you befriend ben, charlie, and jae much more quickly and they make up the closest of your friends, along with rowan, if jam city is determined to keep their tutorial character constant across all plotlines (i still think rowan should be solely a ravenclaw, but i’ll allow rowan’s house to change so long as their personality shifts to emphasize certain qualities in order to match the change in house; your house should not just determine the color your robes are)

if you’re in slytherin, maybe you befriend barnaby in place of ben in the original game, or maybe there’s an arc where you clash heads with merula (who can still be an enemy even if you’re both in slytherin; merula doesn’t like competition and the MC is exactly that) and the rest of the slytherins in your year find themselves caught in the middle; maybe there’s an arc where your MC finds themself totally alone without allies due to the conflict between them and merula (might i suggest year two, while coming up on the climax of the year?)

hufflepuffs get to focus on tonks and penny much closer. ben can also be in this plotline, but he shouldn’t take center stage (characters should cross over plotlines, but only take center stage in one, aside from perhaps rowan if rowan remains constant). maybe chiara can get implemented into the main plotline to fill out the roster, and if not, diego caplan can get implemented earlier (i haven’t met him yet and know nothing about his character)

and ravenclaws get the ravenclaw characters BUT YOU GET THE POINT, i don’t want to bore anyone by repeating myself; this is long enough as is

what i’m saying is, these characters all have a different enough base that each route will be different just by focusing on different characters; ben and jae will respond to a situation much differently than penny and tonks might, which would ALREADY shake up the storyline of each house based on which house you choose in the beginning, and then characters overlap plotlines so you could leave hints in each route to the other characters’ unique backstories and motivations that leaves the player wanting to get to know the rest of your WELL DEVELOPED CAST (((MAKE SURE THEY’RE WELL DEVELOPED OR THIS WILL NOT WORK)))

WHAT I’M SAYING IS, THIS GAME COULD HAVE BEEN SO GOOD

if they put more effort into the story then maybe i would have gunned through the hufflepuff route so quickly and then restarted to go through all the rest of them. if you want people playing your game for longer then THAT is the way to go

yes, it will take time. yes, it will take effort. but you know what?

IT’LL ALSO MAKE YOU A FUCKTON OF MONEY FROM PLAYERS PLAYING EACH ROUTE IN FULL AND THEN PLAYING THEIR FAVORITE ROUTES AGAIN SO WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU WAITING FOR

anyway, what i’m saying is, i hate this game so much because of the potential it had to succeed, and the potential it had to be a really good game. even if they didn’t change the gameplay much, even if they didn’t change the models, i could get past ALL OF THAT if the story was interesting

so uh. jam city, if you’re reading this, please. i will let you take away all of my days of playing this. i will let you render all of my progress obsolete and send me plummeting back into my first year at hogwarts to go through the game again, if you JUST, MAKE, MULTIPLE, ROUTES!!! MAKE MY CHOICES MATTER DAMN YOU!!!!!!!!

i’m also willing to let you use the ideas i posited here without credit or payment. because that sounds like a legal hassle and i am far too lazy to deal with that sort of thing, i just want to play a good game. please. please give me a good game to play.

also, make energy take 3 minutes to recharge. please.

so uh

TL;DR : i hate this game. and i wish i didn’t hate this game.

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youngerdaniel · 5 years ago

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Youngo’s 2019 at the Movies (with Baby Yoda)

IT’S THAT TIME AGAIN, FOLKS...

Wherein this blog crawls out of the woodwork with fresh aspirations for a more consistent content strategy in the year to come. Like a Baby Yoda emerging from his floating iron egg to great the sun. So let’s dust off some cobwebs and talk about the great movies that came out in 2019.

BRIEF UPDATES FROM THE WAFFLER This year marked a turning point. No, not that fucking decade that everybody’s making a big deal about. Not even that I hit 30 but thankfully have most of my (still not totally gray) hair... Nope, I went into business for myself. I leapt off the stable lily pad of 9-5 etc. and went freelance! Life’s been full of stories since then -- both the kind I write, and the kind I get to look under the hood on. I’m happy to report I’ve written more than ever before... Just not blogs, and mostly stuff I’m not at liberty to discuss.

*Clears throat. Pulls up the collar on his trench coat.* And I may have had more hair turn gray. Turns out, running your own ship is quite a bit of work, especially when you’re teaching yourself how the hell you do it. Nevertheless, I loved the shit out of every minute of it, and I still use phrases like nevertheless. It could easily be a blog (or several) for a different time, but the short and easy explanation of the absence is I was busy, it was fun, get over it.

Besides, we don’t actually care about whatever lame excuse I have for why I haven’t been posting. We’re here because it’s 2020 and time for a listicle, dammit! This one is neither definitive nor ranked. But dang if 2019′s fodder didn’t come sauntering into theaters like the big chuckling cherub of Christmas Present, with a cornucopia of awesomeness.

THINGS I LOVED, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER:

UNDER THE SILVER LAKE David Robert Mitchell’s neo noir takes a fittingly existential approach to detective fiction. An enigmatic case, hidden clues and coded pop culture, Andrew Garfield’s charmingly hapless sleuth... There’s a lot to love in this weird soup of a movie. At times nightmarish, often trippy, and an excellent performance from a parrot. Late night fodder.

CLIMAX Gaspar Noe does not make sane movies. With Climax, there’s a hypnotic quality that sucks you in and drags you along on its nightmarish journey as a group of dancers drink from a punchbowl laced with drugs. The result is absolute bedlam, and everything from the lighting to the camerawork pulls its weight to put you into the action. This is the kind of thing you watch and marvel that, “Wow, they went there.” to varying degrees of satisfaction. Like a freight train barreling toward the side of a mountain, it’s hard to look away even though you know you probably should.

JOJO RABBIT And then there’s a different kind of madness. The movie that billed itself as “The movie that shouldn’t work.” Jojo Rabbit is so full of heart. This is Taika Waititi in full force, and hilarity meets real pathos. Love is better than Nazis. It’s a simple message, and I think it doesn’t need to be much more. The relevance of such a narrative in our time is pretty disappointing, but the truth seems to be that we need ones like this to come along and remind the collective. The mashup of humor with genuine drama is balanced in a way that will feel familiar to fans of THE HUNT FOR THE WILDERPEOPLE or BOY. The performances are superb, and it’s a beautiful looking film. If you missed it last year, start the new one off right and amend this problem.

US The thing I dug the most about US was how unique it felt. Original premises in horror are on the rise, and there’s no denying the man leading the wave is Jordan Peele. The social commentary elements of this followup to GET OUT play with a little more subtlety, and in some ways it almost felt like a stronger move... But I refuse to compare the two of them. US stands out in its own right, and carries some of the most memorable performances of the year. A twisting narrative that crackles with tension, and a concept that haunts the imagination. What if your every action had an equal an opposite effect on a mirrored version of yourself? A study on the impact of the class system, and a nightmarish what-if to explain the real life series of underground tunnels that span the United States. Also, that costume design! That Alexa gag! The way this one opens up at the midpoint was such a delight in the theater. I’d apologize for spoilers, but let’s be real... You’ve seen this movie.

AD ASTRA Best summed up as “Daddy Issues in Space,” AD ASTRA feels like the kind of sci-fi mysteries that were made in the late 70s and 80s. A spellbinding journey to the far edges of the galaxy to save the world, and maybe prove that aliens exist. Oh, and to stop your possibly insane father from destroying the human race on the way. Brad Pitt is on fire, and everything about this potent emotional journey remains focused on his character’s dilemma of deciding whether or not his father was a good man, what it means to him and his own isolated existence, and whether he can overcome that shit and live a life instead of taking risks. From its opening scene to its closing one, this one blends gripping life-or-death set-pieces exploring the dangers of space travel and the cyclical nature of humanity’s progress with small moments. The journey, the heart-wrenching climax, and the harrowing trip home is well worth the rental fee. Check it out.

THE GIRL ON THE THIRD FLOOR

Some horror movies exist to make you think, some exist to cover their protagonists in black goo, subject them to grueling physical and psychological lament, and chuck ‘em through a woodchipper for good measure. The Girl on the Third Floor takes your average premise of “Stubborn and troubled guy picks a fixer-upper house to flip, only to discover horrors beyond his imagining” and leans hard into the gross-outs and festering boils of body horror. Reminiscent of Evil Dead, Amityville, and Dead Alive, there’s so much insanity to love, and the movie makes some big turns -- some surprising, some daring, some a little out there. It is by no means perfect, but it’s got a charm about its rough edges. You will never look at a marble the same way again.

I LOST MY BODY

I know. “A life-affirming work” left me a little skeptical too. But from its very first frame, I LOST MY BODY is arresting. Its hypnotic narrative follows the story of a severed hand in search of its owner, and has great fun carrying you along with its troubled protagonist’s journey from a crush to obsession. The sheer amount of visual storytelling and striking imagery is worth the runtime, but for any arthouse lovers feeling a little too chilled to hop down to the nearest indie theatre can open a new tab and have at it. Didn’t expect to be as moved by this one as I was, and for that I must recommend it.

AVENGERS: ENDGAME The fact that a movie like this can even exist is pretty amazing, and I have to say, as the culmination to the Avengers saga as we know it, ENDGAME delivered something with way more heart and character than I expected. Funny, sad, bittersweet, and massively satisfying. This is the Thanksgiving Turkey dinner of movies. It’s got everything. But the best part for me was how little fighting the big superhero finale of the decade had to it. Firmly rooted in character, taking ambitious and surprising turns in their trajectories, and balancing the fanwanks with a genuinely exciting story. I mean, c’mon. Time heist? A Greatest Hits play that also recontextualizes a few of the lesser films of the sweeping franchise? The third act battle felt a little tacked-on, but the conclusion felt like exactly what we needed.

READY OR NOT I love this movie. Love it like an adorable, scrappy friend who always manages to make their social commentary entertaining. Hide and Seek turns deadly for a bride to be when she meets her future in-laws, the proprietors of a board game company that takes their product very seriously. A darkly funny survive-the-gauntlet-till-morning ride. Great characters. Awesome kills. A few really unexpected and delightfully devilish turns. Oh, and it takes a stab at privilege and how far some people are willing to go to preserve theirs. It’s got teeth, a mean bite, and it’s fun to walk around the neighborhood. If you liked YOU’RE NEXT, you will probably love this movie. I still can’t get its final few moments out of my head. And I mean that in the best way.

PARASITE Speaking of social criticism and privilege, there’s no denying the brute fucking force of PARASITE. Following a struggling family who imbed themselves into a rich family by posing as the help, this madcap game of suspense takes so many surprising turns that even describing the full plot spoils the fun. Go into this one having read as little as possible. It will take you for a spin. Part con movie, part social critique, part comedy and part tragedy, it’s a lot to digest, but it’s a damned tasty treat.

KNIVES OUT In a word, it’s fun. Rian Johnson’s locked room murder mystery packs some wonderful barbs in the side of affluence, armchair activism, and the corruptive nature of wealth. A wealthy novelist is found dead, and all of his family members have motive... But don’t let the familiar set-up fool you, KNIVES OUT plays fair with its audience, but it is a fast runner. The story jumps ahead of you almost every time you think you’ve got it figured out. Daniel Craig’s genius sleuth is full of likable energy, protagonist Marta is full of layers, and the family are all such a pleasure to watch. Several times along the trip, I had no idea where the story would turn next, or how much further the envelope could be pushed, but by the end, I came out marveling at its construction. The production design is unreal. The direction and vibe are so unique, and by the closing image, it’s nearly impossible not to enjoy the shift in values. There’s also a speech involving donuts that I will be reciting at parties for the foreseeable future.

DANIEL ISN’T REAL

I closed off the year with this wildly inventive take on the possession trope. This. Movie. Is. Nuts. Which, considering it was produced by the same folks who did MANDY, shouldn’t come as a surprise. A mind-bending tale that riffs on Jekyll and Hyde, with a great modernization tackling the concept from a mental health perspective... It’s not the first time it’s been done, but the execution is just excellent. We follow a disturbed young man whose imaginary friend hatched from a childhood trauma makes a devilish return to play hell with his adult life. It’s a psychological horror that’s FIGHT CLUB meets THE DOUBLE. Great look. Excellent creature design and visuals for a cosmic horror that makes great use of low budget devices. If you’re looking for the answer to the age old question of “Should my third act involve my protagonist battling his inner demons literally with a rooftop sword fight?” You’ve found your contender.

I’ll tell you this, reader friend. The hardest part about 2019′s slate at the box office was deciding what to see. There were so many interesting movies that came out, brimming with big ideas and social commentary. Sad as the state of the world is, there’s no denying times of unrest have a knack for yielding great art. The Trump era has made its stamp on Hollywood for better or for worse. But the rising tide of voices pushing back give me a bit of hope, and a lot of salve for the whole existential dread thing. I think that, however small it is, is good.

For what it’s worth, none of these films are reinventing the wheel or burning flags... But they are asking questions. Okay, CLIMAX, really isn’t asking anything, but it is fun as hell. There’s just as much merit in the salve as there is in the flame that caused the burn. So may your 2020 be full of entertainment. I’ll try to get some useful content up here at least every couple of months in smaller digestible forms. Now go forth and brunch, you hungover, resolution-breaking slob.

#journal #yearinmovies #2019 #year in review #baby yoda #movies #writing

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wcndcr · 6 years ago

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HSHQTASK033: NEXT GEN

this is going to be the longest essay ever & i’m not sorry bc @irenaemilija & i have a lot of headcanons.

when anton and irena fell in love and pictured their forever, children were not in any part of it. anton never saw himself be a father and irena didn’t want children because her own family experience as a child was so shitty ? after her convoluted abdication, she wanted to live life without pressure or obligations. however, they were nudged about children a lot as the years passed and eventually after lots of therapy, irena began to warm up to the idea. yk what these two are like, when one wants something, the other one will enable it. so these kids were carefully planned and had after a lot of discussion. the pregnancies themselves were traumatic, irena didn’t take to being pregnant very well and anton kept apologising for getting her pregnant everytime he witnessed her discomfort ( he’s soft ok sue me ).

there was parental panic like oh god how do we be parents, how is life going to change, what are we going to do, what if we're shit at it and screw them up, what if they grow up to be the antichrist. ——— this made them grasp blindly at anything and everything they could to learn” books, classes, advice from nice normal people, an equally paranoid team. AS A RESULT, anton and irena unintentionally eventually became very hands-on and involved ( but also quite rookie, confused and not-as-authoritative ) parents even though they did have help.

so laura & i present: ALEN HENRIK & GRETA KATARINA BERNADOTTE ( julian schratter & lyndon smith )

irena named them. these children were put on this earth for the sole purpose of torturing irenton and not in the way you might think. they wanted for nothing and went on many travelling adventures sitting on anton’s shoulders with irena ready to fight anybody who upset them. anton and irena didn’t magically change, when they became parents. they didn’t filter themselves and were simply genuinely curious about their children and wanted them to grow up safe & healthy and find their place in the world. the result shockingly was two individualistic, well-adjusted, secure, albeit headstrong and stubborn people, who unfortunately, really love being around their parents and talking to them about stuff bc they’re fun and therefore will meddle and cockblock and give unsolicited romance suggestions to their own damn mother and father WHO JUST WANT TO BE LEFT ALONE. error 404: boundaries not found. irenton thought they could resume their idyllic ‘let’s run away and do things together’ life after both kids hit 18. this backfired big time. alen and greta are their parents’ keepers. they own them. they fuss over them, they keep them in line, they believe their parents would be lost without their glorious presence. there is nowhere in this world irenton could go where alen and greta can’t find them & join them bc they know their parents too well and lowkey get a kick out of it tbh, they’re demons. irena is secretly baffled that she has managed to raise kids that actually like her & that’s something she is so proud of but also like alone time w anton??? when?????

ALEN got the best of both parents in terms of looks. it’s hard to tell who he really resembles more, but he has irena’s deep brown eyes and an even brighter smile than vera, anton and sol put together, jaws chiseled like both parents, anton’s enviable hair with a darker hue of brown. he’s unseated anton from his wonderbrow throne because his are thicker. he’s a true creative who unlike anton, has channelled that wild imagination and gift with handling people into something tangible. he had a strong personal style by age six and a really good eye for themes and colours, by his teens he was doing theatre school, dabbling in modelling, and playing the guitar, piano, drums — and for some strange reason, rugby. he received military training as a royal member like his father did, did his MBA and after that his pursuits became more technical in the creative sphere, he became adept at photography, capturing landscapes and shooting film, visual storytelling, and was the media’s favourite darling with his smile, comfort in front of the cameras and generally interesting life — the opposite to irena at that age. he’s a passionate guy, something he inherited from both parents and enjoys his family dynamic, because honestly seeing his peers and their parents really made him realise how he and greta really have it good. he DOES also... have irena’s temper, and is confrontational. he doesn’t necessarily start arguments, but he’s argumentative and will engage when provoked and will finish it — pursuing the matter until the case is closed, he won’t stop once he’s started and won’t let you run away from it.

he and his sister tend to bully and tease their parents in a good-natured way with their quips and pranks, thinking they’re smarter than both parents and have the sheer balls to give their own parents relationship advice. prob have been doing it since they were 5. ( this is anton's fault, who told him to ask toddlers what to buy mommy for her birthday and tell them all his decision struggles? now they think they're cleverer. ) they’re also not ashamed to tell their parents tmi things about their lives and irenton tries to find new ways to die each time.

GRETA got vera and ebba’s startling blue eyes and anton’s hair colour. her features are much softer and rounder ( probably from irena’s mother, but we don’t talk about her in this house ). she was born 2 years after alen, much to his dismay and chagrin. they grew up fighting, wrestling, bickering and picking on each other, but also being each other’s best lieutenant outside of the immediate family sphere. greta is a genius at puzzles, games, complex equations, and does occasionally have the tendency to copy her brother and compete with him, for no other reason than for bragging rights and to annoy him ( it’s ok he does it right back ). she is also the most chill zero-drama albeit sarcastic person in the room who will be like, jESUS cALM dOWN drink some chamomile tea. barbarians really offend her tbh... unless she’s hitting her brother. which she doesn’t really do in public anymore. greta is also the legend who has kindly and resoundingly let her dad know know he isn't hot shit since age 11 months. anton has spent every year since trying to impress her. he’s still trying. other than that she’s loyal, generous, and an activist. she wants to change the world via sustainable technology and has changed her major about 7 times, girl’s just so interested in so many things. today it’s anthropology bc why are you the way that u are? the next it will be finance, and then computer science, then who knows tbh. out of the wider bernadotte family she’s the one who takes charge and plans big family events because her event planning skills are that good, and is gifted at herding a crowd.

#hshqtask033 #here u go j

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lozenger8 · 6 years ago

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in awe of somethin' so flawed and free

Written for @scottappreciation week, Days 5, 6 and 7 (Heartbeats Rising, The True Alpha, Road Ahead). Scott/Stiles, G except for all the swearing. Title from Hozier because I am nothing if not predictable.

There’s an old adage in storytelling of ‘show, don’t tell’ which people frequently try to apply to real life, but Scott doesn’t know how to explain how deeply he’s fallen in love with Stiles without saying the words, because nothing being shown is new. He’s always wanted to be this close to Stiles, always put his life on the line, always imagined a future of them together. Scott has pulled himself apart for Stiles and sewn himself back together, and when he did that, he loved him, but not in the same way. Before, the love felt deep inside him, a tiny ball of warmth beneath his rib cage. That sensation is still there, but now it stretches all through him, radiating out beams of light that skitter over his skin.

Stiles has been back in Beacon Hills for four months and five days. Scott’s not truly back, yet, still commuting to graduate veterinary medicine classes at Davis. And every time they’re in the same room, Scott thinks this is the time he’s going to tell Stiles, this is when the truth will finally slip out. But somehow, some way, he always manages to contain himself.

The thing is, Scott loves the person he can be when Stiles is around, loves who Stiles brings out with a well-timed in-joke, fond smile, raised eyebrow, squeeze on the shoulder, handshake, hug. Only his mom knows him the same way Stiles does, and sometimes that’s a curse as well as a blessing, but there’s such relief in being known. However, he loves Stiles for Stiles too, for being funny and loyal and the parallelogram to his square. Scott’s in awe of how he’s grown, how they both have. Scott thinks, together, they’ve become something to be admired rather than feared, a force of calm and confidence.

Plus, Stiles is objectively hot, there’s no denying it. When Stiles sits close to him, Scott’s pulse races and his tongue goes dry, and he can’t stop visualizing how they’d look together, because damn.

“Are you okay?” Stiles asks him on one such occasion, because he does that now, he checks in. Sometimes it’s a little on the condescending side, but Scott still likes it, because for Stiles to be making the effort, he must really care about the answer.

Scott pauses for a moment, because how could he tell Stiles he’s fine, he’s good, he’d just be better pressed all up against Stiles, limb against limb, lips against lips?

Like that, probably, using those precise words, but they’re lodged in the back of his throat.

Better to show him, maybe, but what if Stiles doesn’t reciprocate these feelings? Sometimes, Scott thinks… maybe. But then that air of suggestion dissipates and he assumes it was imagined.

“Honestly? I’m kinda exhausted. Finishing off my degree is kicking my ass,” Scott says, because he has learned to both accept and mention his limitations more frequently and it’s been very useful, especially in moments like this when Stiles frowns in commiseration and rubs a comforting hand up and down his arm.

“Skip the pack dinner and movie night, go straight to bed?” Stiles asks, and Scott knows he doesn’t mean to make it sound like it’s something they’ll be doing in tandem, in the same bed, but his nervous system doesn’t.

“No,” Scott says. “I wanna see everyone and when we’re all together I feel energized.”

“I asked Alan about that and he said it’s purely psychosomatic. There’s no mythical True Alpha pack boost magic.”

“I don’t care. And the great thing about placebos is that you can know they’re bullshit and yet they still work.”

Stiles graces him with a wide smile, which he does a lot more now; half-knowing, half-skeptical, and he moves his hand from Scott’s upper arm to his shoulder. The touch lights up every single nerve on his right side and Scott’s spine shivers.

“Tell me if it gets to be too much.”

“I will,” Scott replies with a dramatic roll of his eyes. He might even be telling the truth.

Scott wasn’t lying about wanting to be with the pack. He can and will listen to hours of Liam and Mason debating the latest movie to watch, likes watching Corey and Hayden mocking them with love-filled expressions, and will sit behind Malia alongside Kira and braid her hair. Sometimes, Lydia video calls from Oxford. Stiles talks shop with Noah in the kitchen, ostensibly preparing food and usually bringing far less than Melissa and Scott bought into the living room. Scott will attempt to pick Alan’s brains in some covert study revision in the guise of casual conversation and never get away with it. When they play the movie, Stiles will sit so close to Scott he’s practically in his lap. And it’s good.

This night, he really is so tired his bones ache, so Scott says his goodnights halfway through the second movie and goes to shower before tucking himself up in bed. This ability to cast himself loose when he needs to is one of the many benefits of still living with his mom when he stays in Beacon Hills. He’s going to get his own place, eventually, when he makes a living wage and isn’t pulled pillar to post. Luckily, his mom seems in no hurry to push him out.

An hour later there’s a knock on his door. Scott awakes, flicks on his lamp, mumbles, “Come in.”

“Oh, you really went to sleep, shit, sorry,” Stiles says, looking poleaxed.

“I did tell you I was tired,” Scott says, sitting up against his headboard and tugging his sheet so it covers him to his waist. He’s wearing boxer briefs and only boxer briefs, and even though he’s been naked around Stiles before, these days doing so feels charged.

Stiles shrugs a shoulder. “That’s my go-to excuse when I need me-time.”

“I would not being doing that in a house full of supernatural and extraordinary humans,” Scott states, emphatically.

“I did not mean it like that, oh my God,” Stiles replies, giving a shocky little laugh. He hikes a thumb over his shoulder. “I’ll go.”

“No, stay. I think that power nap did me a world of good.”

Scott gestures to the side of his bed and after he closes the door, Stiles settles there on top of the sheet, shoulder nudging into Scott’s. His sleeves are rolled up and Scott reminds himself to take slow, deep breaths to calm his rapturous excitement at the possibility of skin meeting skin.

“Are you sure it’s just you being tired?” Stiles asks. “There’s been something different about you lately I can’t pinpoint.”

Scott wants to tell Stiles the truth, but he also doesn’t want to put this barrier between them. He knows they won’t break, they’ve been through too much, but they’ll definitely change, in small yet significant ways. Stiles will stop touching him so much, and that little piece of familiarity, or home, will disappear.

“It’s nothing bad,” Scott says, because it’s not. He refuses to think of his feelings as something to discredit, diminish or degrade.

“All right,” Stiles says, though every tone is grudging.

“You trust me, right?”

“Always. With my life.”

“Then please trust me on this.”

Stiles nods, picks at the hem of his shirt. In the half-light of the room he’s all angles and shadows, and Scott’s heart rate picks up to astronomical heights. The heat he always feels where Stiles is concerned burns inferno hot. There’s tension between them, taut as one of Stiles’ yarn threads.

“You want a run-down of the rest of the movie you missed?” Stiles asks, taking that tension and cutting it, short and sharp.

“Yeah, go on, spoil me.”

For the next hour, they chat, until Scott’s woozy again and Stiles is fully slumped against his arm, head cradled on his shoulder. Scott’s the most comfortable he’s been in a long time, with the weight and heat of Stiles on him, the scent of him in his nose.

“I should let you sleep again, but I don’t wanna,” Stiles says, quiet. They turned Scott’s lamp off a while back so they’re shrouded in the dark.

“Cruel. I thought you cared about my best interests?”

“I do, but I care about mine too and every part of me wants to be near to you.”

Scott tries, really hard, not to read too much into that, but it’s a pretty suggestive declaration. “Even your spleen?”

“You fuckin’ nerd. Especially my spleen. My lungs. My skin. My heart. All my organs, really. Nope. I just heard what that sounds like. No need to say it.”

In the interests of ‘show, don’t tell’, Scott reaches over and takes Stiles’ hand. He twines their fingers together, strokes his thumb in soft circles against Stiles’ delicate skin. It feels so right and he wonders why he never tried before.

In the interests of really needing and wanting to tell Stiles, he speaks too.

“I feel the same way. That’s the difference you’ve been noticing. I realized I’ve fallen in love with you.”

Scott can only see an impression of Stiles’ expression, but all fear he held evaporates as Stiles snuggles even closer to him and sighs. “Thank God. I thought I was the only one.”

They hold onto each other a little longer and then Stiles shifts position. Scott can feel him a few inches away, can just about see the whites of his eyes.

“Are you gonna kiss me?” Scott asks, hopeful.

“Actually, I was waiting for you to kiss me.”

When they kiss, it’s a mutual movement. Stiles’ kisses are all-encompassing. He has a way of mouthing at Scott’s bottom lip with a sweet suck. Scott’s whole body is set alight and he embraces it, embraces Stiles.

And this, this is new, this way of expressing the love he’s always felt. Scott smiles into their kisses and thinks about all the other ways he can show Stiles how thoroughly he has his heart.

#my words #text post #scottmccallweek #sciles #foreversciles #I will write this story 500 times #and I will write it 500 more

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ginnyzero · 6 years ago

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Trivialization of Writing in Today’s Society

Writing is an important skill. Writing is more than the ability to write the alphabet and string the letters into words. Writing is the way we express ideas. It is an important tool in our society from writing business letters, making deals, interviews, pitching projects to writing sermons and stories.

Schools would teach creative writing in the lower classes. But then as students got older, this was phased out in favor of business writing, pitch papers and essays. These pitch papers and essays were touted as important skills that students needed to learn to survive in the university environment and the bigger world. And the ability to tell a story, which is what the basis of these essays and pitch papers were really about, became lost and ‘less important’ in the scheme of things. (The structure of an essay is just as important as a structure of a story.)

Writing, storytelling, the ability to string words together into a cohesive, coherent whole with a beginning, middle and ending isn’t valued. The idea that writing a book is work is actually laughed at. Writing if it isn’t journalism or scientific papers is not considered a viable career. We recommend our children become doctors and lawyers. People who follow protocols and rules, instead of encouraging to be creative and think freely.

For some reason there is a prevailing attitude in our society that anyone can write a novel and be good at it. Media encourages this view. I can think of two shows that I like off the top of my head about how Doctors, a Medical Examiner and a Forensic Anthropologist are both writers. Media has pushed that these two fact loving rational people have the creativity to write novels and write novels well that apparently have emotional appeal that connect to audiences. (I am still trying to figure out after 11 Seasons of Bones when Brennan actually has time to write these novels. And I’m not sure now when Maura has time to write her novel.)

They put forth this message that writing a novel is relatively easy and fame is assured once you’re published. However, I find it hard to believe that both of these very analytical characters are able to connect to an audience. With Brennan they try to explain that Angela is her “human editor” and comes up with the scenes that aren’t fact driven. It really burned me that they showed Clark Edison getting a novel deal while they used excerpts on how horrible writing was for laughs. They also cut out the fact he'd need an agent, not go to the publisher's directly. They made it seem even horrible writers could easily get a book deal. Thankfully, this was never brought up again. (Maura got a critic from her editor that her characters were flat and her setting didn't come alive and I cheered. Yes, constructive criticism that made sense!) Even the procedural Castle, who was about a writer assisting a homicide detective, used a writer who was already successful and just suffering from writer’s block. At least he seems to understand story and has emotional grounding to connect to an audience. But they still avoided that it takes time, effort, talent and learned skill to write a novel. (Castle always wrote off screen.)

There are a lot of people who believe that they can write a novel despite not having done any creative writing since third grade. (I think I may have done some creative writing in ninth grade for class but I went to a private high school.) A lot of people think that they have a novel in them. Without thinking through the entire process or knowing how a novel is structured. And if they’re willing to take the time to learn about structure and put the effort into sitting down and writing. Then more power to them, yay, more people being creative. However, most people do not have the fortitude or the desire to write novel even if they think they can. So those that do take the time and put forth the effort to write a novel, even if it isn’t the greatest novel aren’t taken seriously because “anybody can do that.”

No. It takes skill. It takes knowledge. It takes a certain amount of talent. And it takes practice. You have to learn to do it by doing it over and over again. I started writing in seventh grade and my first story was a horrible piece of shit that had no conflict and no hardship. For a very long time I was so conflict adverse, I could barely put it into my stories. I have chapters and chapters of stories on my laptop that have great characters, great worlds, but are in the end boring because there was no conflict. Dialogue, conflict, action, world building, characters, each of these ideas takes a certain amount of time and ability to do properly. It doesn’t come easily or naturally. It can be tiring and difficult and depressing. One has to learn to do it. Sometimes you get it right. Sometimes you fail. It’s work. (And I find it fun, oh woe is me.)

I’m not a lawyer. I haven't learned the law code. I wouldn’t want to represent myself in court. I’m not a doctor. I don't know more than super basic anatomy. I wouldn’t perform surgery on myself or anyone else. I’m not a plumber. I can’t fix the leaks in my pipes. I haven't learned that skill. And I don’t expect my plumber, lawyer, doctor to be able to write even as I value their services as plumbers, lawyers, and doctors.

A doctor can heal your disease. A writer can take you to a far away place on a journey of your imagination for hours on end and distract you from pain and disease both emotional and physical.

But we aren’t given the credit we deserve. There are places where writers are barely given credit at all; movies, video games. Things that hinge on having a good story. Having a good story to hook your viewers and players into your game is just as important if not more important than having a good visual look and good game play mechanics. But who gets the credit if things go right for a movie? The director and the actors. Who gets credit when things go badly for a movie? The director and the actors. Who gets credit for a game outside of the studio? The guy in charge of the studio or the game director.

Writers aren’t really on the sets during the filming of movies. If a book writer has their property being turned into a film or television show. They don’t get to adapt it themselves. They don’t have a say in what gets changed. They’ve basically sold the rights of their own intellectual property away and have no control on how it is presented to the public. When a screen writer writes a scene that is important to the plot of the movie and the director or the editor decide to cut it for whatever reason, the screen writer doesn’t get the chance to protest that the story will no longer make sense. There are writers who get no credit for working on the script at all. They are called script fixers and it is their job to take a script and make it better.

And you would think that in fandom circles where it thrives on the exchange of free ideas it would be different. At one time, it was considered taboo to make money off of anyone else’s intellectual property. But changing times and trends and a more Japanese view of copyright began to infiltrate fandom as fandom has become more accepted and less secretive. Huge companies are turning blind eyes to copyright infringement as it brings more attention to their brand that they don’t have to pay for. There isn’t as much fear of being sued. It is almost considered normal now in fandom for artists to take fan art commissions to earn a little extra money to get through college.

But fan fiction commissions? Blasphemy. You “don’t do it.” You don’t talk about doing it. Fan creators still get greatly uncomfortable with the idea that someone could pay another person to write them something. Despite the fact it takes time and effort and talent to write as much as it takes time, effort and talent to draw. I am not saying that fan fiction writers should be paid for their work. That's a different kettle of fish. However, like a fan artist who takes commissions, there is a double standard if a fan fiction writer can't do the same. Many fan fiction writers wouldn't dream of trying to make money off writing fan fiction, just as many fan artists wouldn't dream of making money off their fandom art. However, it is an acceptable practice for artists to do so and unacceptable concept for fan fiction writers to even think about it. But, there is also now a dialogue about it in fandom circles and eventually capitalism will determine if it happens or not.

Writing is an important skill and a learned skill. The ability to tell a story in a cohesive, concise and coherent way is important in all types of work. It is too bad that our society doesn’t see it that way.

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artyloreviews · 6 years ago

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Film Review - Polar (2019)

A thrilling and ultraviolent neo-noir film, that is guaranteed to get your adrenaline pumping, whilst also giving you a good laugh with it’s sheer ridiculousness .

As a fan of Mads Mikkelsen’s work, I was instantly drawn to this gritty neo-noir film, which cover depicted a drenched and snow-soaked Mads with gray hair and an eye-patch, looking suspiciously a lot like Big Boss from the Metal Gear series, which by now you should know is near and dear to my heart. Upon watching the trailer out of curiosity, I found that this was going to by one of those films over which the word ultraviolence was pasted in big bold and blood-red letters. I was instantly hooked and I anticipated the release with glee.

Upon viewing it however, I can’t help but wonder whether I think Jonas Åkerlund’s Polar is simply a lower budget attempt to emulate the success of the John Wick franchise, by melding it stylistically with the Dark Horse graphic novel Polar: Came from the Cold, or a great, straight to the point action film, that is enveloped in Tarantino-esque storytelling, gratuitous violence and beautiful cinematography. In the end, I believe it is a bit of both. The parallels that can be drawn between Polar and John Wick are clear as day, as both their plots revolve around a retired assassin being forced back into action; however, the difference is that in John Wick’s universe, there was some semblance of cleanliness and professionalism to assassination, a sort of class act per se. In Polar’s world, however, assassination is this act of gratuitous bloodshed, where everyone but the main character seems to believe killing the target to be secondary to killing each and every innocent bystander on the way to the target itself.

Mads Mikkelsen plays Duncan Vizla, referred to as The Black Kaiser throughout the film; a renowned and ruthless assassin, who I couldn’t help but see is a somewhat different manifestation of Mikkelsen’s other role as Hannibal Lecter, sharing the same sensibilities of professionalism and showmanship in murder. His persona is built as this scarred, yet carefree veteran in his field, who seems to inspire awe in all of his peers. The only somewhat sane character in the film – Vivian, repeatedly warns that people ought to “not fuck with him” (which, ironically, every second woman featured in the film seems to do or has done previously), shining a light on his dangerous nature, much like the stories about John Wick and his infamous pencil, that are constantly retold throughout that film’s dialogue. And yet he is this kooky old man, who inflates balloons and hangs cardboard “Happy Birthday!” letters above his fireplace, chops and sorts his neighbor Camilla’s firewood, has difficulty picking what brand of sweets to buy at the shop and accidentally shoots the dog after being woken from his PTSD-infested dreams, only to replace it with a goldfish, as well as going to a local school to show kids knife tricks and pictures of sun-dried corpses, and presents Camilla with a goddamn gun as a heartwarming gift. I’d go as far to say that he is bloody lovable in a twisted and endearing way.

On a side note, after he shot his dog after the first shown occurrence of said dreams, I had this expectation that as a man who always sleeps with a gun in his pocket, he’d continue to perform the same accidental ballistics after every subsequent dream. To my immediate shock, the next time he decided to doze off was in a bloody passenger plane. I was just bracing for that inevitable moment where some innocent bystander was about to bite the bullet, but for better or worse it never happened.

The overall visual presentation of the film is probably its strongest asset. I can’t speak to the accuracy of the recreation of scenes from the graphic novel, but there is a distinguishable picturesque quality to every frame in the film. Even throughout the marketing material, one can see the clear comic-book-esque symmetry. The color grading is a whole topic on its own. Scenes with Duncan are show in this very high-contrast low saturated gray, while most scenes featuring the supporting cast feature this very vivid neon saturation where the colors pop and sometimes bleed into each other, showing this clear contrast between the old and grizzled Kaiser and the newer younger blood out to get him. The only thing that has any color to it in Duncan’s life is perhaps those dreams he keeps having, which are bathed in saturated dark reds and a lot of glitchy, distorted visuals. Even the typography used throughout the film shared that iconic VHS displacement. The addition of Gothic lettering among the brief flashes of titling is very stylistic in referencing the Germanic origins of Duncan’s nickname – him being The Black Kaiser. The layers of effects however made it almost impossible to read the text in the split second it is shown on screen, which left me waiting for character’s names to appear in dialogue, so that I can confirm that what I read was right. The cinematography is usually amazing, each shot being framed and lighted in a way that only a graphic novel could entail. However, the film features a lot of fish-eyed lensed drone photography which clearly differs in quality to the cinema-grade cameras used for the rest of the film, leaving it looking amateurish at some of the key points in the plot.

Another aspect of the visuals, which some may find refreshing in the current politically safe age of cinema, while others can find it to be incredibly jarring and distracting, is the generous displays of gratuitous sex and/or T&A featured liberally throughout the run-time of the film. It seems that each and every character in Polar’s universe has slept with each other, or is yet to do so. The difference with other graphic novel adaptation, Sin City, which by any other mean can be cited as a direct influence on this film’s style, can be drawn in a sense that even in a city filled with vices, there was this tasteful approach to the sexual, often being purely implied. Polar on the other hand has no such restraint and appears to flaunt it at every opportune moment, which I found to be garish and unnecessary, as it provided nothing to the film’s substance.

One of the best aspects of Polar is dedmau5’s amazing soundtrack. With heavy lingering synth melodies and energetic electronic beats, it creates an amazing atmosphere of tension and serenity, especially in scenes of intense drama. The tracks that stood out the most on my first viewing were “somb”, which was used in the serene and calm opening to the film, followed by “cabin”; with its very nostalgically charged synth, rhythmic drums and haunting baseline, introducing us to Duncan. “chill” features a very tense and unnerving piano tune, signaling that not all is right as a sign of what is to come. On the more action-packed side however, the heavy hitters are “midas heel”, “main” and “nosedive”, each used in some of the most visually intense bloodbaths you will ever see, pumping with adrenaline and keeping you on edge with heavy electronic beats and whining synths. And none of that youth dub-step shit, that one could expect – dedmau5 provides an honest to god EDM soundtrack with his staple melodic progressions and no-nonsense sound, mixed to perfection.

The last point of contention I could think of is probably the ending. In the interest of avoiding spoilers, I would describe it as initially surprising, but well hinted at throughout the film on second inspection. One could see it as an attempt to generate a sequel, though I am not familiar enough with the original graphic novel to say what that could entail.

Overall, I believe that Polar is a fantastic film, that wears its inspirations on its sleeve and creates an ultraviolent romp of revenge and drama, filled with all the staples of a gritty Neo-noir setting, featuring larger than life humans, able to withstand a lot of punishment, but dish out a lot as well. Even though that some aspects of its plot seem unnecessary, along with the purely visual bloating, I’d say it is worth it to sit down and watch through, but probably not with your parents, especially if you are a fan of Mads Mikkelsen or films like Kill Bill, Sin City and John Wick. I’d go as far as to say that if you enjoy video games like Hotline Miami, this can definitely be a nice intro into that type of cinema.

8/10

#film #review #cinematography #soundtrack #polar #mads mikkelsen #graphicnovel #color theory #ultraviolence #john wick #sin city #kill bill #quentin tarantino #jonas akerlund #dark horse #the black keiser

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jira-chii · 7 years ago

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I watched Crazy Rich Asians with my Dad

And my sister. It’s actually been several weeks since the event now but I still want to write about it, because there was some personal significance in it for me, and also because, honestly, it was a fun movie.

Disclaimer: I’ve only seen the movie once, and as mentioned, that was a while ago now so apologies if my memory is a bit hazy. Also, I haven’t read the book.

So the story of how this came to be starts with dad seeing some commentary about the movie on Chinese TV or WeChat or wherever Asians get their info from these days. He thought Constance Wu looked a lot like an actress he was into when he was young so he wanted to watch it. Funnily enough, neither my youngest sister nor I had watched it yet and so we organised a bit of a family outing (though it was technically only half the family).

I really can’t remember the last time I was in a movie theatre with any one of my parents. It must have been way back in primary school (which is like, almost 20 years ago now). I remember dad taking us out to eat at the foodcourts before climbing the escalators all the way to the top of the shopping centre to get to the cinema. He would purchase the tickets on the spot though the line was never very long. We would always get popcorn because it was such a rare treat for us, even though we would never finish it.

Cut to today and I’ll pretty much have consumed half a large popcorn before the movie even starts (I swear the ads before the movie these days just get longer and longer). I am also a pretty frequent movie-goer, complete with a membership card. Poor dad must have had a bit of a shock when I just scanned my phone in the priority queue to get our tickets. Also that the shopping centre had been completely renovated since the last time he was there.

Admittedly though, some things do stay the same: the buttery smell of the popcorn, and the nostalgic, childlike excitement of wandering down the corridor to get to the cinemas.

Ok that’s enough self-indulgent reminiscing. Time for some analysis.

Overall I though the movie was pretty solid. It was simple with a straightforward plot, but its appeal for me was definitely it’s relatability. I think this movie has a little bit of something for everyone, whether East or West. Asians who don’t come from a traditional family background will likely relate to Rachel, while Asians who do will find the whole first half hilarious. Anyone who fits even just half the description of a Millennial will absolutely love the best friend Peik Lin. If you’ve fallen in love before, know someone who’s fallen in love, have a kid with a partner etc., there’s probably something for you in this movie. Even if you are none of the above, the sheer spectacle of the shit crazy rich Asians get up to should be enough to entertain.

Unfortunately I don’t think the story direction was as strong as the characters. The way I see it, there were a handful of really brilliant scenes, and then everything else was kind of meh (as in they weren’t bad, but they were just good. Standard).

Unsurprisingly, the scenes I enjoyed the most were ones that carried through thematic elements that were foreshadowed in the beginning (HSC kids call this ‘textual integrity’ btw). Surprisingly, my dad also enjoyed those scenes, although for slightly different reasons.

So as a tribute to that, in a slight twist on my usual formula, I am going to analyse my dad’s favourite scenes.

**Spoilers start here if it wasn’t obvious**

Big House

Rachel visits her friend from college Peik Lin, before going to Nick’s house. Peik Lin is an awesome, down to earth character, however her family is pretty over the top and the first instance we see this is in their huge house. It’s a mansion, complete with a friggin’ water fountain and even gold plating on the ceilings or something. Rachel definitely does not relate to this extravagance, which is exemplified when she mentions something dumb about the gold plating (I cant for the life of me remember exactly what she said but the idea is it made her look like a peasant).

However this is directly juxtaposed when they go to Nick’s, whose family owns so much land they can’t even find the house. There are also two threatening-looking foreign guards (which kind of borders on racism), but the exaggeration here is used to visually convey the fact Nick’s family is a pretty big deal.

Mahjong

This was definitely my favourite scene of the whole movie and I was very impressed with its execution. The brilliance of this scene lies in its visual storytelling. Case in point: dad could only understand half the script but was able to grasp the full meaning of the scene just by looking at how the game was played.

In this scene, Rachel has made up her mind to leave Nick on her own accord, however wants to make it clear to Eleanor it is not because she was bullied into it. The meeting spot is an area where a lot of elderly people gather to kill time by playing Mahjong, a far cry from the glamorous world we’ve seen for most of the movie.

However Eleanor knows how to play, because just like Rachel she was taught by her mother. This is a good reminder that Eleanor’s life was not always easy, and a key theme of respect and gratitude for the mother figure shines through.

As they play, Rachel explains her reason for leaving: if Nick is forced to choose between his girlfriend or his mother, he will be miserable. As they are talking we see Rachel pick up a tile. It is actually a winning tile for her, but she chooses to discard it. Eleanor then grabs it and wins. This was the part dad picked up on: in Mahjong speak it means “I let you win”, which is a beautiful complement to Rachel’s key message. If Nick ends up with a girl who Eleanor does approve of in the future, know that it was all possible because of the choice Rachel made today.

Game over, Rachel leaves with her mother, the back view of their walking figures leaving at once a powerfully supportive yet fragile image.

One other thing I noticed about this scene is how it reflects the game of poker Rachel played in her lecture at the start of the film. She bluffed her way to victory there in order to teach her class about Game Theory. This works because no matter how hard the odds are stacked against her, she stands her ground and puts on a show of bravery: she may have lost the game, but she’s still in the battle.

Proposal

This scene was pretty predictable but the way it is constructed leads to a great pay-off. Nick catches Rachel as soon as she boards her plane back to America. They are in two different aisles and Nick talks while walking to maintain the same pace with Rachel.

He narrates the way he had planned to propose to her: on a secret beach with the beauty of the sunset in the background. It’s a super idealistic image and kind of reminds me of Lenny’s American Dream scene in Of Mice and Men.

Of course, his speech is hilariously juxtaposed with the reality that they are on a plane and Nick has to get out of the way of other passengers, even stopping to help one with their luggage at one point.

The cramped economy cabin is also a sharp contrast to the luxurious First Class cabin they arrived in Singapore in.

Nick jumps to Rachel’s aisle to get on one knee and finally propose to her. I appreciated the totally random woman squealing in the background while hugging Rachel’s mum but I appreciated even more that the ring Nick presents to her is Eleanor’s. The story of the ring is that it was custom-made by her husband because his mother wouldn’t give them hers because she disapproved of Eleanor. It is very obvious symbolism but incredibly satisfying nonetheless.

I appreciate this movie so much more than I normally would because of the opportunity it gave for me to have a proper conversation with my dad. Since I started working full-time, I’ve realised just how much I’ve taken these family moments for granted.

I really hope movies like this, which bridge the gap between East and West, and between parent and child, will become more mainstream in the future.

#crazy rich asians #movie #analysis #long post

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