#comics are hard. so i just do little scene snapshots

[readingrobin]

June was the beginning of summer reading and man did I come out swinging. If you've been following me for a while, you know that summer reading is a BFD at my work and we have a competition between departments to see who can read the most. The winning department is awarded a 3D printed trophy of a pineapple to store in their office for the rest of the year. My department hasn't won since I switched roles in the library, but really that does not do anything to hurt my competitive nature. I'm a little bit behind where I want to be in my goal towards a specific point total, but it won't be hard to catch up. Gotta give Youth Services a run for their money.

Total Books Reads: 14

Total Pages Read: 5,608

Books Read:

The Princess and the Grilled Cheese Sandwich by Deya Muniz (4/5) - An undeniably sweet, charming, hilarious love story that really puts you in the mood for a toasty grilled cheese. Seriously, I must have had three separate cravings while reading this comic. Each character has such a lovable personality, from Camembert's at times clueless, yet endearing nature, to Brie's sweetness and passion for her causes. They work well as a duo, their personalities a true compliment to each other. 

The artwork is absolutely stunning, especially when to comes to the outfits. It gave me flashbacks to The Prince and the Dressmaker in how articulate and gorgeous they could be. Brie's commitment to pink really makes each one of her wardrobes leap off the page, and, again, brings a great balance when seen with Cam's deeper palettes. 

I somewhat like the anachronistic aspect of the story, that you have traditional depictions of the monarchy with lavish balls and opulence that you would expect out of a fairy tale, and then someone would literally be playing with a Nintendo Switch in the next scene. It plays with the theme of steering away from tradition, depicting more contemporary, progressive-minded characters in a world that still holds onto the aesthetics of the past. 

The Bloody Chamber: And Other Stories by Angela Carter (4.5/5) - Review

The Coyote Road: Trickster Tales edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling (3.5/5) - Trickster tales are my bread and butter: Coyote, Hermes, Loki, Crow, Anansi, each one so varied in their mischief but share a great chaotic force. This archetype has always fascinated me, particularly in how involved they are in humanity, whether that means taking an active role in a creation myth or imparting some wisdom that helps humankind develop in a world that is always in flux. This anthology sports many of these figures, as well as some original ones, and mostly gets its job done of portraying various tricksy individuals.

Like any anthology, it had its hits and its misses. My favorite was "The Fiddler of Bayou Teche" by Delia Sherman. The atmosphere of this particular story really stood out amongst the rest, as well as the voice of the narrator, who has a Cajun vernacular that sucks you even more into the setting. The inclusion of the loup garou also is a massive plus for me. Always a sucker for werewolves am I.

Other stories I enjoyed were "One Odd Shoe," "The Listeners," "Crow Roads," "A Reversal of Fortune," and "Black Rock Blues." Probably a bit of a sign that, out of 26 stories, I only resonated with a small fraction of them, but that's just how it goes. I was definitely thinking by the end that the anthology felt a bit too weighty, or perhaps I was trying to read too much in one go. A lot of the more middling stories were unfortunately stuck in the second half, so by the end it felt a little bit more of a chore to get through.

Burning Down the Haus: Punk Rock, Revolution and the Fall of the Berlin Wall by Tim Mohr (3/5) - An interesting snapshot in history of the punk movement during the time of the Berlin Wall. The author makes the bold claim that the punk presence was a cause for the fall of the wall when he doesn't really say anything to back that information up. The book mainly talks about specific people within the punk community and the challenge of trying to live a subversive lifestyle when going against the status quo could get you arrested. The journeys of some of the people were very engaging, though some did seem more fleshed out than others and many didn't get much of a resolution. I would have loved to have read some retrospectives from some of the people in the community, as it seemed that the author was in contact with them, just to get a wider scope of their stories.

Squire and Knight Vol. 1 by Scott Chantler (4/5) - A charming, funny graphic novel that champions the thought of books over brawn, shown through a young squire saving the day by using his intelligence and reason to get to the bottom of a cursed town. The art of the comic is wonderfully fall-like, the author sticking to a palette of muted oranges, yellows, blacks, and greys that also give it a distinct medieval vibe. Definitely a worthwhile quick read if you like a bit of mystery and humor with your quest narratives.

Also there's a cool looking dragon in it, which should be enough for anyone to read anything really.

Spindle's End by Robin McKinley (4/5) - Robin McKinley has such a fine way of transforming ages old stories and making them more vibrant and engaging for a modern audience. Given how passive Sleeping Beauty is in her own fairy tale at times, McKinley does a phenomenal job of making Rosie a very active agent in her own story in this retelling. Her stubborn, determined, and no nonsense attitude had an odd way of making her endlessly endearing and her rise to action in the climax, as well as her sacrifices, solidified her as a strong, layered character.

The world is so mischievously magical, to the point where fish are a myth and, if you let your kettles unattended, the magic dust settling over them may lead to a surprise of snakes in the pot. McKinley's descriptive style only adds to the mysterious wonder of this land, not making it too difficult to feel yourself instantly transported within its pages.

Since I am a big fan of female friendships that are polar opposites, like the rough and tumble Rosie and the beautiful, princess-like Peony, it's always a shame when those relationships fall second place behind the romantic interests that have all the appeal of drying plaster.  Also, how old exactly is Narl? He's already a smith by the time Rosie is a baby and she develops feelings for him by the time she's 16 having known him her whole life. I have no idea why large age gap romances with emotionally distant men are such a trend in fantasy but I really I think we've had enough of them. 

Other than that, this was a stand out read for me, which is a welcome surprise since I found her other work, like Beauty and The Outlaws of Sherwood to be a bit middling. 

Violet and Jobie in the Wild by Lynne Rae Perkins (3/5) - Read this book as it is my library's book of the summer for this year. It's a simple, sweet story that deals with adapting to new situations shown through two house mice suddenly finding themselves living in the wild. Since the story stuck mostly to lighthearted adventure, I was surprised by its somewhat bittersweet ending. It was a little more mature that what I usually expect out of stories like this, saying that sometimes people drift away from who they love to get where they need to be, and that's all right. The memory of them is what keeps that love alive and I thought that was a sweet sentiment to end on.

The Secrets of Chocolate: A Gourmand's Trip through a Top Chef's Atelier by Franckie Alarcon (2.5/5) - Has some great insight into the process of chocolate making, as well as some scrumptious illustrations that really had me craving some chocolate afterwards. It was a so so reading experience and I mainly read it to fill a category for summer reading, so I can't really give it too high a rating.

The Sandman: Act III by Neil Gaiman (5/5) - Another gorgeous installment in the Sandman Audible series. Seeing as this one collections the Orpheus story, it has some wonderful, beautiful, and melancholic music to it. The full cast brings each character to life and I continue to be impressed at how truly immersive this series is as an audiobook.

The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston (4/5) - Romances aren't usually my kind of thing, but when you mix in the qualms of a struggling author with ghostly shenanigans, then that makes a title a little more enticing. It also helps that the story focuses on the vulnerabilities surrounding grief as well as love. Florence's emotional journey was such a compelling element, especially when she holds so many fears, aspirations, and insecurities that seeing her come to terms with them feels like more of a triumph.

Though there was plenty of raw emotions in this book, it never turned morose. There is something comforting about seeing Florence rekindle her love for her hometown and finding refuge in her family. Tensions run high at times, but ultimately they're there for each other and somehow make a funeral home feel like a lively place. It's an oddly cozy book at times, full of reflection and soft moments.

Firekeeper's Daughter by Angeline Boulley (4/5) - Firekeeper's Daughter is such a powerful, heartbreaking, but necessary book. Boulley takes the complicated life of Daunis, full of grief and pain. but also an unwavering love and devotion to her family and community. I love how the author speaks of Daunis in relation to her community, that she finds solidarity, wisdom, and support in the Elders that hold the traditions and knowledge of her heritage. Daunis comes from a mixed background, but being Ojibwe is a fundamental part of her character and how she views herself. I loved that she always felt confident in who she was, even when so many refused to recognize her place in the tribe.

I have to say, this book was hard to read at times. Daunis faces so many betrayals and moments where people try and succeed to take advantage of her. It's difficult to see a community in danger because of people who only want to use it for their own selfish desires. The stakes are what make Daunis' every move so important and, even when some decisions don't seem so smart in the moment, you know she's doing everything she can to make sure the people that she loves stay safe. 

Her relationship with Jaimie I felt was handled very maturely. It feels like a natural parallel to Travis' and Lily's, one that knows and respects the aspects of love and what comes with it and one that doesn't. Boulley makes it abundantly clear through so many plotlines that self serving actions are what truly destroy a community and harmony with its members. 

Definitely worthy of its many accolades and a great conversation starter for many of the issues it discusses. 

Mortal Follies by Alexis Hall (3/5) - Review

Spider-verse by Dan Slott (4/5) - An epic Spidey tale for the ages. Though there were SEVERAL Spider people that I was not familiar with, I felt like the story handled/balanced them well enough with the more recognizable ones so it never felt too confusing. I'm sure many of them were introduced in this event series (I definitely tracked this story down solely for reading anything that involved Spiderpunk) so I didn't feel outrageously out of the loop.

While I felt that the story dragged on and off, I never got too bored with it. I wish that the omnibus I read had organized the comics so that certain character-specific issues were included at the time they happened within the overall story. Scarlet Spider, Spiderwoman, and Spiderman 2099 have separate issues that tie directly to the overall plot and are collected after its end, which make them feel like a pointless bit of catch up. They are exciting and important issues, but they could have been integrated a little more coherently.

Definitely going to see if I can track down some more Spiderverse event comics.

Edge of Spider-Geddon by Gerardo Sandoval, Jason Latour, Zac Thompson, et al. (3.5/5) - Sort of a setup for a larger event comic, but gave great introductions/reintroductions to more Spideys across the multiverse. Also, I am a simple creature, and when I see Spiderpunk on the cover, you can bet that I am going to read it in a heartbeat.

Average Rating: 3.71

[davidmann95]

Comics this week (12/1/2020)?

calvatronlordofall said: Today’s comics?

Far Sector #9: Another comic I won’t understand until it’s done and I can reread the whole thing but that I’m enjoying anyway. Really, really hope Jemisin continues contributing to the medium in some form after this, because she absolutely has a gift for it.

Strange Adventures #7: He doesn’t care for tyranny, folks. And JEEESSSUUUUS, Doc

DCeased: Dead Planet #6: Some quality DC Comics nonsense problem-solving, but not sure at all whether the chips are gonna fall in favor of the stuff about this I’ve been really liking or the aspects I simply don’t care about at all.

Tales From The Dark Multiverse: Wonder Woman: War Of The Gods: While I’ve seen plenty of them around the periphery in anthologies and so forth I think this is Vita Ayala’s first full work I’ve been exposed to, and tbh I can’t say I’m taken, even given the pretty threadbare-seeming material for them to work with. I’ll still give Children of the Atom a try, but my expectations have been lowered. Nice seeing Trish Mulviihill’s colors though, thought they looked familiar and it turns out she worked on my beloved Superman & Bugs Bunny.

Batman: The Adventures Continue #7: Yeah, now that it’s all said and done, definitely the best take on the death and return of Jason Todd.

Batman #104: Art’s taken a hit, but Ghostmaker’s getting more and more fun as a character the more that comes out about him. And surprising seeing Dick in his real Robin suit in flashback, Dark Designs had him still rocking that New 52 abomination. It really seems like the policy RE: costumes in flashbacks with him remains up in the air at any given time?

Anonymous said: Thoughts on the long-awaited BatCat?

Anonymous said: Bat/Cat the objectively best comic of the week. Thots.

Batman/Catwoman #1: I imagine disappointingly, quite few - both the best and worst part of this book is that King’s entire spiel on “This is gonna be such a different animal from my regular run, this is my DKR, this is my ultimate prestige statement on the characters” was pure hype, this is just the next issue of his Batman run with Clay Mann as the new main artist. And it’s good! I like it! I think it’d take awhile for anybody to tumble onto the ‘three timelines’ aspect of it if they didn’t go in knowing about it since the color of Catwoman’s suit is the only obvious tipoff for a chunk of it, but it’s still a well-constructed piece of comics in line with the story up to this point, even if it’s so in line with it that it pretty much puts the lie to the notion that this was originally conceived of as a special prestige project in the same way as Strange Adventures or Rorschach. Mostly I’m just struck now that it’s out by the guts of doing a straight sequel to Mask of the Phantasm, given that’s maybe the singularly least divisive major Batman story: everybody on every side of the Batman-loving aisle recognizes it as hallowed ground, so nobody’s gonna not be let down if you fuck it up. I really need to rewatch it, it’s been well over a decade and unlike Return of the Joker my memories of it have almost entirely faded.

Black Widow #4: The further in I get the more I’m struck by the cleverness of the central conceit. How do you construct a drama around a century-old woman whose business has her have to mostly forsake most normal human connection? Make the literal supervillain plot that she’s been forced to have incredibly intimate human connections, and now she’s just gotta deal with that on top of what would otherwise be fairly routine Black Widow stuff.

Miles Morales: Spider-Man #21: Hate to say it folks, but even discounting the severity of the delays this arc’s been a dud. Really hoping it finds its feet again soon.

King In Black #1: Holy cow, this was ass. I went in thinking “well, I’ve resigned myself to having to get this to understand the crossovers into books I’m already getting and tie-in minis I do care about, but Cates still has a baseline level of competency so it should still be perfectly readable”, but this is just...nothing. This is that modern Dan Jurgens tier where it’s so bland and perfunctory and inoffensively executed it loops back around to infuriating, except Dan Jurgens’s writing if nothing else at least doesn’t strut around in tangible self-regard as the next great sales-shattering triumph of the Punk Rock God Of Comixxx like Cates’. And when was the last Marvel event on this scale with such little hype behind it? Even Empyre seemed like it had more weight on arrival, and much as I enjoyed it I’m pretty sure that book mainly existed to fill space until we got this. Maybe it’s just the circle I run in. I swear I remember Thanos Wins being pretty fun, and I just reread Atomahawk and that was still a hoot, so it’s a shame Cates has turned out this way, and worse he’s ended up Marvel’s new golden boy. Unless my dad likes it (and if so hey, he’s not alone, I imagine this is selling gangbusters) I’m sure not grabbing another issue, so I guess I’ll have to do my best with context clues in figuring out what’s going on for...Guardians of the Galaxy, S.W.O.R.D., Daredevil, Namor, Return of the Valkyries, the Joe Fixit Immortal Hulk one-shot, Iron Man/Doctor Doom, and the next book below. Fuck.

The Union #1: I’ve only read Everything Used To Be Black And White for Jack Staff but I was definitely curious what Grist would do here, and it didn’t disappoint! Fun little story, bunch of neat character ideas I’m looking forward to seeing developed further, very lived-in feeling slice of its corner of a superhero world.

Marvels Snapshots: Civil War: An excellent little parable that I’m surprised we didn’t actually see the likes of in ‘06, and frankly worth getting a mediocre Miles Morales arc for (even if it was disappointing that that one had to be where the ball was dropped) if this is where Ahmed’s attention was going instead.

Daredevil #25: So I turned two pages at once and accidentally spoiled myself at the last possible moment for the big reveal of the issue, so that sucks. Still a great issue though - one that manages to function as a logical extension of an incredibly street-level story even though it can only possibly exist as an extrapolation of the wildest excesses of the Marvel universe - but I cannot imagine how the hell the next is gonna cleanly pivot into King in Black shenanigans.

Kill A Man: A new OGN by Steve Orlando, cowritten with Phillip Kennedy Johnson and with art by Al Morgan and letters by Jim Campbell, the reductive though not inaccurate pitch is ‘queer Creed’. But since this is likely to sail under the radar I need to emphasize this is one of Orlando’s absolute best works, a real triumph of the form that’s among the best comics of the year (good GOD does this put to shame 99% of superhero comics fight scenes by the end), and a must-buy for any fans of his work. I’m just gonna let how hard the title and solicit text go speak for themselves:

“As a child, James Bellyi watched his father die in the ring as payback for slurs thrown at the other fighter. Today, he's a Mixed Martial Arts star at the top of his game, and one of the most popular fighters in the world...until he's outed as gay in his title shot press conference. Abandoned overnight by his training camp, his endorsements, his fans and his sport, to regain his title shot Bellyi is forced to turn to the last person he ever wants to see again: Xavier Mayne, a gay, once-great fighter in his own right...and the man James once watched kill his father.”

[aaronmaurer]

TV I Liked in 2020

Every year I reflect on the pop culture I enjoyed and put it in some sort of order.

Was there ever a year more unpredictably tailor-made for peak TV than 2020? Lockdowns/quarantines/stay-at-home orders meant a lot more time at home and the occasion to check out new and old favorites. (I recognize that if you’re lucky enough to have kids or roommates or a S.O., your amount of actual downtime may have been wildly different). While the pandemic resulted in production delays and truncated seasons for many shows, the continued streaming-era trends of limited series and 8-13 episode seasons mean that a lot of great and satisfying storytelling still made its way to the screen. As always, I in no way lay any claims to “best-ness” or completeness – this is just a list of the shows that brought me the most joy and escapism in a tough year and therefore might be worth putting on your radar.

10 Favorites

10. The Right Stuff: Season 1 (Disney+)

As a space program enthusiast, even I had to wonder, does the world really need another retelling of NASA’s early days? Especially since Tom Wolfe’s book has already been adapted as the riveting and iconoclastic Philip Kaufman film of the same name? While some may disagree, I find that this Disney+ series does justify its existence by focusing more on the relationships of the astronauts and their personal lives than the technical science (which may be partially attributable to budget limitations?). The series is kind of like Mad Men but with NASA instead of advertising (and real people, of course), so if that sounds intriguing, I encourage you to give it a whirl.

9. Fargo: Season 4 (FX)

As a big fan of Noah Hawley’s Coen Brothers pastiche/crime anthology series, I was somewhat let down by this latest season. Drawing its influence primarily from the likes of gangster drama Miller’s Crossing – one of the Coens’ least comedic/idiosyncratic efforts – this season is more straightforward than its predecessors and includes a lot of characters and plot-threads that never quite cohere. That said, it is still amongst the year’s most ambitious television with another stacked cast, and the (more-or-less) standalone episode “East/West” is enough to make the season worthwhile.

8. The Last Dance (ESPN)

Ostensibly a 10-episode documentary about the 1990s Chicago Bulls’ sixth and final NBA Championship run, The Last Dance actually broadens that scope to survey the entire history of Michael Jordan and coach Phil Jackson’s careers with the team. Cleverly structured with twin narratives that chart that final season as well as an earlier timeframe, each episode also shifts the spotlight to a different person, which provides focus and variety throughout the series. And frankly, it’s also just an incredible ride to relive the Jordan era and bask in his immeasurable talent and charisma – while also getting a snapshot of his outsized ego and vices (though he had sign-off on everything, so it’s not exactly a warts-and-all telling).

7. The Queen’s Gambit (Netflix)

This miniseries adaptation of the Walter Tevis coming-of-age novel about a chess prodigy and her various addictions is compulsively watchable and avoids the bloat of many other streaming series (both in running time and number of episodes). The 1960s production design is stunning and the performances, including Anya Taylor-Joy in the lead role, are convincing and compelling.

6. The Great: Season 1 (hulu)

Much like his screenplay for The Favourite, Tony McNamara’s series about Catherine the Great rewrites history with a thoroughly modern and irreverent sensibility (see also: Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette). Elle Fanning brings a winning charm and strength to the title role and Nicholas Hoult is riotously entertaining as her absurdly clueless and ribald husband, Emperor Peter III. Its 10-episodes occasionally tilt into repetitiveness, but when the ride is this fun, why complain? Huzzah!

  5. Dispatches From Elsewhere (AMC)

A limited (but possibly anthology-to-be?) series from creator/writer/director/actor Jason Segal, Dispatches From Elsewhere is a beautiful and creative affirmation of life and celebration of humanity. The first 9 episodes form a fulfilling and complete arc, while the tenth branches into fourth wall-breaking meta territory, which may be a bridge too far for some (but is certainly ambitious if nothing else). Either way, it’s a movingly realized portrait of honesty, vulnerability and empathy, and I highly recommend visiting whenever it inevitably makes its way to Netflix, or elsewhere…

4. What We Do in the Shadows: Season 2 (FX)

The second season of WWDITS is more self-assured and expansive than the first, extending a premise I loved from its antecedent film – but was skeptical could be sustained – to new and reinvigorated (after)life. Each episode packs plenty of laughs, but for my money, there is no better encapsulation of the series’ potential and Matt Berry’s comic genius than “On The Run,” which guest-stars Mark Hamill and features Laszlo’s alter ego Jackie Daytona, regular human bartender.

3. Ted Lasso: Season 1 (AppleTV+)

Much more than your average fish-out-of-water comedy, Jason Sudeikis’ Ted Lasso is a brilliant tribute to humaneness, decency, emotional intelligence and good coaching – not just on the field. The fact that its backdrop is English Premier League Soccer is just gravy (even if that’s not necessarily represented 100% proficiently). A true surprise and gem of the year.

2. Mrs. America (hulu)

This FX miniseries explores the women’s liberation movement and fight for the Equal Rights Amendment in the 1970s and its opposition by conservative women including Phyllis Schlafly. One of the most ingenious aspects of the series is centering each episode on a different character, which rotates the point of view and helps things from getting same-y. With a slate of directors including Ryan Bowden and Anna Fleck (Half-Nelson, Sugar, Captain Marvel) and an A-List cast including Cate Blanchett, Rose Byrne, Uzo Aduba, Sarah Paulson, Margo Martindale, Tracey Ulman and Elizabeth Banks, its quality is right up there with anything on the big screen. And its message remains (sadly) relevant as ever in our current era.

1. The Good Place: Season 4 (NBC)

It was tempting to omit The Good Place this year or shunt it to a side category since only the final 4 episodes aired in 2020, but that would have been disingenuous. This show is one of my all-time favorites and it ended perfectly. The series finale is a representative mix of absurdist humor and tear-jerking emotion, built on themes of morality, self-improvement, community and humanity. (And this last run of eps also includes a pretty fantastic Timothy Olyphant/Justified quasi-crossover.) Now that the entire series is available to stream on Netflix (or purchase in a nice Blu-ray set), it’s a perfect time to revisit the Good Place, or check it out for the first time if you’ve never had the pleasure.

5 of the Best Things I Caught Up With

Anne With An E (Netflix/CBC)

Another example of classic literature I had no prior knowledge of (see also Little Women and Emma), this Netflix/CBC adaptation of Anne of Green Gables was strongly recommended by several friends so I finally gave it a shot. While this is apparently slightly more grown-up than the source material, it’s not overly grimdark or self-serious but rather humane and heartfelt, expanding the story’s scope to include Black and First Nations peoples in early 1800s Canada, among other identities and themes. It has sadly been canceled, but the three seasons that exist are heart-warming and life-affirming storytelling. Fingers crossed that someday we’ll be gifted with a follow-up movie or two to tie up some of the dangling threads.

Better Call Saul (AMC)

I liked Breaking Bad, but I didn’t have much interest in an extended “Breaking Bad Universe,” as much as I appreciate star Bob Odenkirk’s multitalents. Multiple recommendations and lockdown finally provided me the opportunity to catch up on this prequel series and I’m glad I did. Just as expertly plotted and acted as its predecessor, the series follows Jimmy McGill/Saul Goodman on his own journey to disrepute but really makes it hard not to root for his redemption (even as you know that’s not where this story ends).

Joe Pera Talks With You (Adult Swim)

It’s hard to really describe the deadpan and oddly soothing humor of comedian Joe Pera whose persona, in the series at least, combines something like the earnestness of Mr. Rogers with the calm enthusiasm of Bob Ross. Sharing his knowledge on the likes of how to get the best bite out of your breakfast combo, growing a bean arch and this amazing song “Baba O’Reilly” by the Who – have you heard it?!? – Pera provides arch comfort that remains solidly on the side of sincerity. The surprise special he released during lockdown, “Relaxing Old Footage with Joe Pera,” was a true gift in the middle of a strange and isolated year.

The Mandalorian (Disney+)

One of the few recent Star Wars properties that lives up to its potential, the adventures of Mando and Grogu is a real thrill-ride of a series with outstanding production values (you definitely want to check out the behind-the-scenes documentary series if you haven’t). I personally prefer the first season, appreciating its Western-influenced vibes and somewhat-more-siloed story. The back half of the second season veers a little too much into fan service and video game-y plotting IMHO but still has several excellent episodes on offer, especially the Timothy Olyphant-infused energy of premiere “The Marshall” and stunning cinematography of “The Jedi.” And, you know, Grogu.

The Tick (Amazon Prime)

I’ve been a fan of the Tick since the character’s Fox cartoon and indie comic book days and also loved the short-lived Patrick Warburton series from 2001. I was skeptical about this Amazon Prime reboot, especially upon seeing the pilot episode’s off-putting costumes. Finally gaining access to Prime this year, I decided to catch up and it gets quite good!, especially in Season 2. First, the costumes are upgraded; second, Peter Serafinowicz’s initially shaky characterization improves; and third, it begins to come into its own identity. The only real issue is yet another premature cancellation for the property, meaning Season 2’s tease of interdimensional alien Thrakkorzog will never be fulfilled. 😢

Bonus! 5 More Honorable Mentions:

City So Real (National Geographic)

The Good Lord Bird (Showtime)

How To with John Wilson: Season 1 (HBO)

Kidding: Season 2 (Showtime)

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: Kimmy Vs The Reverend (Netflix)

[stina-is-a-punk-rocker]

‘always and forever, lara jean’: a bungled mess of my thoughts while watching the movie

Alright, cards on the table: I never finished reading the book. I got bored a couple of pages in, so I just read up the summary on Wikipedia and called it a day.

Not gonna lie, I expected better from the movies. I loved the first movie; it was cute, it was fun, it hit all the right places. The second movie was… eh. Jordan Fisher is cute, so that’s a plus.

And then we got the third movie; the final in the To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before trilogy.

And it was somehow even worse.

Maybe I’m exaggerating. Despite its shortcomings in the plot and character development-related departments (the fact that Lara Jean wrote addresses for letters she never meant to send is something that will bother me on my deathbed), the movies have their merits. They’re cutesy and charming and enjoyable, overall; movie-LJ is sweet and unashamedly a girly-girl, which is a refreshing change from the #NotLikeOtherGirls, pick-me girls and bruh girls we had in loads of other YA movies growing up. Peter’s pretty cute, too; he’s not a possessive freak like so many other love interests (The Kissing Booth, After, Anna and the French Kiss), and his and Lara Jean’s dynamic is cute, too. Not to mention- we finally have an Asian lead whose Asian-ness isn’t the whole focus of the story!

Again, maybe I’m being extra with all this. The series is, at its core, solely for entertainment purposes. Not every piece of media has to have an underlying message and you shouldn’t need to read between every goddamn line to find something worthy of enjoying. They’re certainly helpful for whiling away a couple of hours; perfect for bingeing with a pint of ice cream in hand, and all of this is in good fun.

Also, it goes without saying, but: spoilers ahead.

The film beings with Lara Jean scribbling a postcard to Peter while she’s in Korea with her family. The inclusion of that little snapshot of Asian culture made me so happy- seriously, fuck everyone who says diversity in media doesn’t matter. I’m not even Korean, and I was overjoyed at seeing a couple of scenes just from the same continent I’m on. The K-pop music in the background was a fun touch, too (although all Korean music isn’t K-pop, but that’s a rant for another day).

(Also: Blackpink has so many more suitable songs than Pretty Savage that go with the theme of the movies. Kill This Love in the second movie while Lara Jean is getting ready to go to her boyfriend’s match is bad enough- they’re supposed to be in love in that scene, goddammit.)

One thing that bothered me throughout the movies is how obviously non-Korean Lara Jean and Margot look. It’s like whoever chose the cast went for any random Asian- Lana’s Vietnamese and Janel Parrish is half-Chinese, and it’s so obvious. You seriously couldn’t find two Korean-Americans who even vaguely resembled each other so they could pass for sisters? The actresses do a stunning job and I don’t want to shit on them, but I just wish they didn’t go with the ‘all Asians look the same, what’s the difference?’ mindset.

Also, a nitpicky thing I’ve noticed in movies with characters who read a lot: no one holds their books up while they’re reading. Your arms start to cramp, which is why you keep your book in your lap while you’re reading, or you rest on your belly and hold the book in front of you. My spine and shoulders didn’t suffer years of torture as a chronic reader for you to include characters who hold their books up while reading.

A major gripe I have with Always and Forever, Lara Jean is how the characters are almost jarringly out of character- not from the books, but from the two previous movies, too. Lara Jean didn’t have much of a character to begin with, so I can’t say much about her (she dissed Oasis at one point; it’s okay for me to be mean to her), but the rest of them are either caricatures of themselves or just totally different people.

Movie Peter >>> Book Peter. He’s almost too perfect (except for the fact that he unironically loves The Fast and the Furious, which… ew), almost too much of the ideal boyfriend. Not that my perpetually single arse would know. How do boyfriends even work? I wouldn’t know the first thing to do with one; how often should you feed it? Do you need to take it on walks?

(In the notes I’ve written towards the end of the film, I’ve complained about Peter being immature and making Lara Jean feel bad about following her dream to go to NYU. He confuses me.)

Not to mention how distractingly adorable Noah Centineo is from some angles and under certain lighting conditions (other times, he reminds me of the human version of Shrek and that bothered me). King of weird Tweets and Instagram captions though he may be, he’s got a really nice smile, and his gravelly voice is both parts sexy and disturbing.

But I digress.

I’ll never forgive the directors for what they did to Kitty and Chris- two of my favorite characters, from both the books and the movies. Kitty’s annoying to the point of being borderline unlikeable- gone is the occasionally snarky comic relief we all came to love; in her place is an annoying brat whose every line comes out forced. Also, making soap is fun; fuck you, Kitty.

Chris is essentially Dixie D’Amelio’s character from that TikToker Grey’s Anatomy ripoff; the main character in One Direction fanfiction from 2012 who doesn’t want to go to the concert but her best friend gets a ticket for her so she can’t bail but Harry Styles sees her in the crowd and falls in love at first sight and 50k of mutual pining and misunderstandings late, they get together. She’s cynical and snarky and hates capitalism and consumerism and prom (because of course she does), but secretly, she’s into it (because of course she is). My guess is that she’s there to appease all the arseholes (including myself) who accused the characters of being too one-dimensional, but it seems too out of place in a movie that doesn’t have much plot to begin with.

I really, really hate how Lucas was done dirty- throughout every single movie. Of course, it’s Lara Jean’s story so not every side character has to be fully fleshed out- but you’d think three. entire. movies. would be enough to give Lucas a bigger role than the GBF and the token black guy for the diversity brownie points. Every single time Lucas shows up, it’s to push Lara Jean and Peter’s story forward. I would’ve liked to see a romance for him pushed forward instead one for Chris- especially because he says, at one point in a previous movie, that it’s hard to find other gay boys, so it would’ve been sweet to see him find love- and Chris’s character arc could’ve been focused on reconciling with Genevieve. Instead, we see the OG Reggie from Riverdale be the one to show Chris the bright side of monogamy, and Lucas gets a date to prom as an afterthought (another darkskin black dude, so no one thinks the film is racist).

Genevieve’s character in this movie gives me whiplash. Look, I’m all for girls supporting girls- healthy female relationships are something way too many YA movies lack- but she goes from bitch queen extraordinaire to friendly the moment the next scene calls for it. Her character isn’t consistent. A redemption arc should be executed cleanly and believably; you can’t have a character be a total prick one moment and then suddenly be, “Hey, if you get into NYU, let me know,” the next.

And Genevieve’s still an arsehole to Chris; at one point, in NYC, while they’re at the NYU campus grounds (I knew that Lara Jean was going to go to NYU the moment she saw all the banners; I fucking called it), Genevieve tells Chris, “University is for people who actually have a future,” and I recoiled. I’m not the nicest of people and yet that was going too far. Chris doesn’t hesitate to shoot back a, “You peaked in high school,”, but still. Y i k e s. You can’t convince me someone’s turned over a new leaf when they say something like that.

Lara Jean’s dad (forgot his name; gonna call him Dr. Covey) is as unremarkable as ever, and his new wife (forgot her name, too… Trisha? Trina? Eh, something like that) is… unsettling. I mean, I get that they’re all loved up and twitterpatted, but there’s something about all the smiling they’ve got going on that chills me to the bone.

Also, Trisha/Trina kinda looks like TikTok’s ThatVeganTeacher and it bothers me.

Another huge problem with this movie even being made is that the series never had enough plot to continue onto a trilogy. Lara Jean’s letters are what the plots of the first and second movies revolve around; the third only mentions them in passing. The final love letter from Peter was a cute callback, but there’s a massive continuity issue with the first two movies and this last one- both character and plot-wise.

Maybe I’m not articulating this clearly enough, so I’ll use an example: take Harry Potter, for example. Harry’s main goal throughout the series is defeating Voldemort. And it takes all seven books for him to get there, to finally achieve this.

Lara Jean’s goal in the first movie changes midway; from keeping up the façade with Peter so she can avoid the crap with the rest of the letters getting out, to making her fake relationship real. It forms a bridge with the second movie; the letter that went out to John Ambrose, and her dithering between Peter and perfection (I’m not sorry). But what does the third movie have to do with any of this?

There were way too many music montages. You couldn’t go five minutes without a random pop song playing in the background, and it was annoying as hell. Don’t Look Back in Anger was w a s t e d on this stupid film. The artsy scenery shots were even worse- no, I don’t give a fuck about the New York skyline or a bird’s eye view of whatever vehicle Lara Jean is in. A few shots of Seoul would’ve sufficed; the rest was overkill. This movie is way too damn long already (almost 2 entire hours!!!); cut out a couple of those. No one cares.

I thought they’d pull the whole Aladdin trope with character-A-keeps-trying-to-tell-character-B-the-truth-about-a-lie-B-believes-in-about-A-but-B-keeps-interrupting, but Lara Jean (typing her name out is annoying, why couldn’t she have a single name, like both of her sisters?) comes clean earlier than I expected. Peter’s reaction about LJ not getting into Stanford is… uncharacteristically mature? No “Why did you lie to me?”, no accusations, not an ounce of betrayal. Which I did not expect from a guy who’s a little bitch for the greater part of book one (I really don’t like Book Peter, in case you couldn’t tell). I know fuck-all about book three’s Peter, so I can’t tell if he really did adopt this mature, well-adjusted persona, or the movie did it to make Peter seem like less of a dick (like they did it with the sextape-that-wasn’t-a-sextape in the first installment).

On a sidenote, how do these main characters in YA books get into really good colleges with zero to no visible effort? These arseholes fuck around for the entirety of the story and have way too much going on to actually do schoolwork, but they waltz into Ivy Leagues at the end. And apparently, I’m not the only one bothered by this.

There’s something to be said about how the movies don’t really sexualize minors (characters who are minors, to be fair. None of the MCs look anything like teenagers), though. It’s almost weird to see them not getting drunk and partying and having sex all the time. Maybe that’s why Lara Jean trying to get her hand on Peter’s dick felt so stilted and awkward (I cringed so hard when she kept trying to touch him and he kept pushing her hand away, holy shit).

And the kissing. It’s to be expected from a romance film, but there was so. Much. Kissing.

The amount of product placements (… actually, I could count only two: Apple and a pair of Beats headphones Lara Jean puts on at one point, but the movie shoved so many iPhones in my face that I’m obligated to exaggerate) would’ve made anti-capitalist Chris mad.

I’m guessing this all takes place in a parallel universe, sans the coronavirus. Still, being in quarantine this past year and being socially awkward for every other one, it was agonizing seeing everyone so close together in NYC. When Peter kissed the ball (lol) (I have the sense of humor of a straight boy in middle school, don’t judge me) when him and Lara Jean go bowling, I had a visceral reaction. And what are the odds of Peter meeting his estranged dad at the very same bowling alley?

Speaking of Peter’s daddy issues (I’ve written “Hardin but diluted” in my notes; I watched this movie at, like, 1 AM; I’m not entirely sure what was going through my head at that point)- I hated how they guilt-tripped Peter into giving his father another chance. In the wise words of Hannah Montana, everybody makes mistakes- but leaving your wife and two kids for another woman is pretty far from a little oopsie on Mr. Kavinsky’s part. I don’t blame Peter for hating him, and I’m not in a place to judge whether Mr. Kavinsky (does he get a first name?) should be forgiven or not, but I feel like they let him off too easy and made Peter seem like a misunderstood teenager with anger issues for not accepting Mr. Kavinsky’s (crappy) apology at once.

And it adds nothing to the story at all; Mr. Kavinsky peaces out after having one (01) coffee with his firstborn, and he’s never seen again. If you’re going to introduce a subplot, make it tie into the main storyline- the very least you could do is make it an important enough part of the story to have more than 10 minutes of the run time. It makes no sense as to why they’d bring up Peter’s dad in this last film, when he’s already gone through two perfectly fine. I guess it was a ‘tying everything up’ part… even though no one cared.

Lara Jean’s handwriting is surprisingly ugly for someone who’s written that many love letters. And her styling took a definite nosedive; her outfits in the first movie were so effing cute, but now they’re just… meh.

There are so many conversations and lines that the writers must’ve thought sounded good enough for someone to type out the quote in curly font and slap it on a screenshot from the movie to post on Instagram, but when it comes to the actual delivery, they just sounded… weird.

Peter says one time near the beginning of the film, “You know what I’m looking forward to the most in college? Never having to say goodnight,” because he expects him and Lara Jean to get into the same college.

But I guess the word they should’ve used was ‘good-bye’, because this just makes him sound stupid.

At one point, Lara Jean asks Kitty how much Kitty’s gonna miss her when she goes off to college, and Kitty says, “A four.” Later on, she confesses, “I’m gonna miss you a twelve, Lara Jean,” and all I could think was, “But we’re endgame, Archie!”

(In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t let people know I’ve watched Riverdale; it lessons my credibility.)

Still, there remains some good to be found: all the baked goods looked very delicious and made me crave chocolate chip cookies. Peter wearing the socks Lara Jean gifted him at the beginning of the movie was a cute gesture, and Lara Jean giving Peter her teal hatbox? The one she kept her love letters in? Was so? Cute? Help?

And hey, it’s a cliché that’s been done to death, but I’m always a sucker for that part in movies where the girl walks down the stairs in a pretty dress with her hand on the banister and the boy turns around and his mouth falls open and all he can say is, “Wow,”- and this film did not disappoint! Not to mention how cute both Lara Jean’s and Chris’s prom dresses were.

Dr. Covey and Trisha/Trina’s wedding was cute, too- I struggled to decide whether Kitty wearing a necklace that says ‘feminist’ and a tux is a bit too on-the-nose, but I’ve decided that it’s nothing to get my knickers all in a twist about (for clarification: it’s not the necklace or the crossdressing that made me debate this; I just wish they didn’t make a big deal out of it- I wish they didn’t have Kitty and Lara Jean get into an argument about her not wearing a dress, if that makes sense?).

And the final letter- the one from Peter to Lara Jean- I ate that shit up; it was so, so, so cute.

In conclusion (why is it so easy for me to crank out 3k about my thoughts on a Netflix movie and yet when it comes to English Lit. at school, I’d stare at a blank sheet of foolscap for ages?), did I enjoy the movie? Not really. There were parts of it that I liked, but it was overall too boring and I kept wishing I’d watched the new SKZ Code episode instead every few minutes.

But that doesn’t mean that it was bad. I kinda feel a little sad, actually, now that Lara Jean and Peter’s story has come to a close; To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, the first movie, is one of my favorites, and bitch though I might about them, the kinda grew on me… like an innocent plant, at first, but then like a fungus. Not a parasitic fungus, just not mutualistic, either… kind of like a commensal.

Maybe I should stop with the biology similes.

[fredheads]

WIP WEDNESDAY (special birthday edition)

i flopped hard and did not write a thing for @fredsythes birthday not a special fic and not even a chapter of my own debauchery that i was gonna pass off as a present real quick so in order to make it up here is an extra long wip wednesday for clown au ft. some real gay ass shit ❤️ 🧡 💛 💙 💜 💚🥰pls enjoy

Harry Clayton came jogging up to them then, no longer wearing the blue uniform of the Church School band. He had replaced his trombone in the Neibolt School music room, and had changed into blue jeans and a cream-coloured shirt. A canvas bag flapped against his shoulder. FP noted, almost unthinkingly, how pronounced the muscles in his legs and arms were. Harry was built more solidly than any of them, even Hal and Fred, who were the biggest and tallest, respectively. 

“Hey,” said Harry abruptly, his eyes sliding over Hiram and FP before landing on Fred. “I saw him,” Harry confided, lowering his voice. “The clown. As we were going up Main Street Hill I saw him passing out balloons to kids. 

“It was the same one you talked about. He had a silver suit with orange buttons. And orange hair. And he was smiling, but… there was something wrong about him. He was facing away when I saw him, but as soon as I recognized him he looked at me. And something about him… it scared me. And the paint on his mouth was dripping. It looked like blood.” 

“I told you!” Hiram suddenly shrieked. He threw his ice cream on the ground and covered his face with his hands. “I told you! It’s here!” 

‘Let’s go,” said Fred quickly. His mouth had hardened into a thin line, and his jaw was taut. He touched FP’s shoulder abruptly, and a warmth flared from the place where his fingers pressed. Fred steered them towards the road. “We should f-find the others. Have you g-got the s-s-slides, Harry?” 

“Yeah.” Harry patted his bag. “My dad’s got a lot of stuff about Riverdale. It goes back a long time.” 

“Why’s your dad care so much?” FP asked. His own ice cream had melted down to a stump of cone, and he threw it on the ground as they walked. 

“He thinks it’s interesting. He told me once it was because he wasn’t born here. It’s like he came in in the middle of a movie and-” 

“He w-wants to see the s-start,” Fred said, and Harry smiled at him. 

“Exactly.” 

They found Hal, Mary, and Alice together at the fence bordering the tilt-a-whirl. Mary had been marching with the Boy Scouts, and was wearing her neckerchief and neatly pressed uniform. Alice was eating a stick of spun pink cotton candy and laughing at something one of the others had said. FP gauged by the exhilarated and terrified look on Hal’s face that they might have spent the morning together. The bigger boy was blushing so badly that FP expected smoke to start spiraling out of his ears. 

“W-We’re g-going to my h-house,” Fred explained. “H-Harry’s going to s-show us the puh-pictures.” 

The smiles disappeared from their faces, replaced by the serious looks of small adults. They walked in a solemn pack through the crowded streets and away from the festival, pushing their bikes by the handlebars. Fred’s house stood vacant and quiet, though music and fanfare from downtown floated very faintly over the tops of the neighbourhood trees. A tattered row of pinwheels turned doggedly in his neighbour’s garden. Fred pulled up the garage door and began setting up the projector while the others pulled up boxes and stools to use as chairs. 

FP stared at a photo tacked above Artie Andrews’ workbench. It was a ragged snapshot of the Andrews family on vacation. Oscar was there, sandwiched between his mother and father with a hand in each of theirs. And Fred was standing at his father’s shoulder, his head leaning against Artie’s arm, beaming at the camera. He looked very young and very happy. 

FP had a fantasy sometimes of telling Mr. and Mrs. Andrews off for the way they treated Fred. In this fantasy he was usually over at the Andrews house, maybe eating dinner or sitting with Fred at the kitchen island. The air was thick and painful, and Fred was trying to talk to his parents, and they were ignoring him. FP could see the tears welling up in Fred’s eyes, and his jaw was clenched like he was trying his hardest to be brave, but he was hurting. FP saw him hurting and it made him lose his cool a bit. 

In this daydream he jumped up and laid into both of them, really blew up and gave them the business. Fred looked embarrassed, a little, but grateful too. He looked at FP with stars in his eyes, like no one had ever done something like that for him before. FP indulged himself in this vision the way he did his dreams of becoming a rock star or a stand up comic in his adult life - it had the same mythical, incandescent quality as those daydreams, though this particular one recurred with frightening severity. 

“You’d better start treating your son right,” he told Mr. and Mrs. Andrews. In this fantasy he also had a strong, gravelly tough-guy voice, like he smoked a pack of cigarettes a day. He was suave. He meant business. “Do you hear me? Oscar’s gone, but Fred’s not. Fred’s still here. And your son is the smartest, strongest person I’ve ever met, and you don’t even know it.” 

His arm would go around Fred, then, wrapping around his broad back and holding him tight. Fred’s parents looked shamed, but FP wasn’t done. No, they’d know when he was done. He was just getting started. “This whole time you’ve been ignoring him he’s been braver than you’ve ever been in your life,” FP told them, and his voice rang out across the dining room clear as a bell. 

Sometimes Artie started to give him some trouble, but FP stopped him cold every time. 

“Don’t make me hurt you,” he would say to Artie Andrews, cracking his knuckles. “I don’t wanna hurt you, but I swear to God, I will. If you make him cry again, I swear to God you’ll regret it.” (He savoured these particular words like spun sugar in his mouth, reciting them sometimes in the veil between dreaming and waking like an actor rehearsing for his opening scene.) 

Fred would pull on his sleeve, but FP wouldn’t be calmed. He was a loose cannon. “I’m not crying,” Fred would say sometimes, wiping his eyes and trying to be brave, and that would make FP hold him tighter. 

Artie always apologized. They both did. “Don’t say sorry to me, you say sorry to him,” FP would order, and Fred would turn to him with those wide, adoring eyes in which FP could see reflected all the stars in the universe, and a tear would tremble on the rim of his lower lashes. 

“You didn’t have to do that,” Fred would say when they were alone. He wouldn’t stutter either - FP would have fixed that one up too. 

“Sure I did, kid,” FP said. “You’re my best friend, aren’t you?” 

And Fred would smile at him, a smile that was brave and hopeful and then he would 

(NO! NO NO NO!) 

(yes yes he would KISS-)

kiss FP on the cheek, only here the dream would be so bright and wonderful that FP would come to in a start, would throw it off blushing with his tongue drier than sawdust and his stomach cramping madly, the dream and reality overlapping in lovely translucent strips so that flashes of it were still visible - Fred’s hand on his wrist, Fred’s hot dry lips on his cheek, and then he would leave it entirely with superhuman effort and go back to the start like rewinding a tape, sitting at the kitchen table, telling Fred’s parents that they’d better wise up. 

He got as far as telling Artie off the second time around when he looked up suddenly and realized he was the only one still standing in the middle of the garage. Mary was sitting on a folding chair to his right, asking him what the hell he was doing. FP dropped quickly onto a nearby crate and shook the dream out of his head. 

“Just thinking me thinks,” he said glibly, crossing one ankle on top of his knee and bouncing it, and Mary shook her head slightly and turned away. 

Fred pulled down the garage door, sealing out the light. In the moment before FP’s eyes adjusted to the pitch black, he had a horrible thought. Suppose something reached out of the dark and grabbed his neck, or a set of teeth fastened in his leg? Suppose the clown was behind them all now? Then the projector flashed on, illuminating a square of flat garage wall, and the breath came back to his body. 

“Some of these pictures go back hundreds of years, my dad said,” Harry explained. He was feeding slides into Artie Andrews’ projector, his broad shoulders silhouetted very handsomely in the blue light. “When you all were talking about the clown, I realized I’d seen something like it before. And after I saw it today, I’m sure I recognized him.” 

“You recognized him?” Alice asked, sounding horrified. 

“Look.” 

The slide clicked into place, throwing an outline of a photo on the garage wall. The projection was a scan of a black-and-white ink sketch, showing a clown entertaining a group of children. The children were smiling, but the clown was not. Its mouth drooped down in a sorrowful frown, its eyes gloomy black pits. There was an awful aura about the antique photo, as though the black and white lines radiated malice. 

PENNYWISE THE CLOWN read old-timey writing across the bottom. 

“What’s the date on this?” Hal asked. 

“My dad says this one is from the early seventeen hundreds. Back when Riverdale was just a beaver trapping camp.” 

This phenomenal news rocketed FP into action. “Still is! Am I right, boys?” FP shoved Hiram hard with his elbow and threw a hand up for a high five. Hiram looked at him blankly. Fred frowned. Mary shook her head at him until FP put his hand back down.

[dherzogblog]

songs/20

Happy Holidays Everyone! I started making these yearly playlists in 2001 as an attempt to connect with friends in the wake of 911. It was just before the dawn of ITunes, and way before social media. We were not in touch like we are today. I burned dozens of individual cd’s one at a time, printed up customized jewel case covers and snail mailed them all out. It was an annual month-long labor of love. Over the past few years, streaming music has made it much easier and faster to compile and distribute, and frankly much more fun. I still look forward to putting the playlist and blog together and sharing it with all of you. Particularly this year as it gives me a chance to connect with so many friends I haven’t seen in quite some time. It was a tremendously challenging year for all of us. I was grateful to have had my family here in LA the entire time, we remain healthy and well. The west coast Herzogs know just how lucky we have been. The next year will not be without its own challenges, but I'm hopeful we are able to move past this pandemic and the exhausting events of the past 4. More than that, I look forward to seeing each and every one of you in 2021. Until then, be safe, be well, and be good to one another. Enjoy the music.

ox peace, dh

Los Angeles CA. December 2020

Khruangbin - Time (You And I) Don’t ask me to pronounce the name of this eclectic trio from Texas, but this dubby disco tune had me returning to its chilled out groove often during the last few decidedly “un-chill” months. Dreamy and funky, the groove takes me back to NYC’s early 80′s club scene and Ze Records releases from the likes of Kid Creole and Coati Mundi.

Anderson .Paak- Lockdown Scenes from the front, June 2020

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Bill Withers (1938-2020)- Use Me The legendary Bill Withers left the playing field at the top of his game in the early 80′s, hardly heard from again. And while he didn't pass from Covid, his healing pop hymn Lean On Me seemed to be everywhere as people found music to help them cope with the challenges of the pandemic. Withers left behind a legendary and enduring group of hit songs that moved easily from soul to folk to pop, not to mention the subtle rolling funk of this one.

Black Pumas- Fire Strong debut from an unlikely Austin duo that garnerd both buzz and grammy nods. The critics are calling it “psychedelic soul”. Not quite sure that nails it, but like the artists coming up next, they’re carving out new ground while drawing inspiration from classic sources.

Gabe Lee- Babylon

Marcus King- Wildflowers and Wine

Charley Crockett- Welcome to Hard Times

Three artists that are literally changing the face of Country and Americana music. Soulful, authentic and diverse, reaching back for inspiration but always looking forward. If you like this sort of stuff they are all worth checking out. Each album is filled with quality songs.

Low Cut Connie_ Private Lives Philly’s Low Cut Connie are back at it with a double album that plays like the soundtrack to a boozy night at your favorite bar. Sweaty, funky and not a little bit messy. If Peter Wolf and Bruce had a kid it would be this blue eyed soul boy. Adam Weiner grew up in the shadow of the Jersey shore and can't help but have a bit of that E Street hustle.

Willie Nile- New York at Night One of New York’s beloved adopted  son’s dropped this love letter right into the jaws of a battered metropolis driven to its knees by the pandemic. It was heartbreaking to listen as the “city that never sleeps” came to a full stop. Somehow I still found myself coming back to it, imagining night’s ahead, when NYC is back on its feet and I’m roaming its streets. Looking for music, a beer, or maybe just a slice, and fueled by the irreplaceable energy and promise of the greatest city on earth.

The Long Ryders- Down to The Well Americana pioneers the Long Ryders reunited last year for a surprisingly solid album. This single sounds like it could have been recorded during their 80′s heyday featuring their trademark Byrds like jangle and harmonies, but the lyrics mark this song as unmistakably 2020.

The Speedways- Kisses Are History UK power pop outfit reach back to the the 60′s on this sweet slice of retro pop perfection.

Billie Joe Armstrong- That Thing You Do

In the early days of the pandemic we had all our kids (+ a significant other) at our house for a few months. It worked out great and we were luckier than most. The biggest issue was keeping enough food, weed and wine around.  There were some great nights with amazing meals, followed by gathering around the TV together. We re-watched The Sopranos, binged Billy On The Street, and revisited some of our favorite movies. One night we went back to a old family favorite, Tom Hanks’ underrated love letter to the one hit wonders of the post Beatles era, That Thing You Do!  I’ve seen the movie several times and it never fails to please. A true feel good film and a perfect Kodak snapshot capturing a simpler time in American pop culture. 

While we watch the unlikely chart topper’s The Oneders  fizzle as fast as they rose to fame, its not really the point. The movie is really an old fashioned love story. Playing like a perfect hit song you can listen to over and over, full of both hooks and heart. I always thought the title track, written by Fountains Of Wayne leader Adam Schlesinger  (who we lost to Covid), brilliantly captured the British Invasion sound every group wanted after The Beatles stormed America. Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong must agree. During the pandemic he cut an album’s worth of cool covers including a faithful version of this one.

Gerard Way (W/Judith Hill - Here Comes the End A tale of discovering music in 2020:  Heard this on a Netflix trailer for the series The Umbrella Factory. Turns out it is performed by Gerard Way (My Chemical Romance) who also writes the comic book the series is based on. (got all that?) He’s joined on this searing garage/psych rave up by the talented and versatile Judith Hill doing her best Merry Clayton.

Hinds- Spanish Bombs I’ve been following this Madrid based, all female outfit of punky garage rockers for a few years now. I think they are pretty great. This track, recorded for a Joe Strummer tribute bursts with an unbridled joy the stone faced and politically minded Clash could never muster. I bet Joe would love it though

The Secret Sisters- Hand Over My Heart Have enjoyed their harmonies for some time now. This one gives me vague Wilson Phillips vibes and I don’t really mind. 

Tame Impala- Breathe Deeper I know I’m supposed to like this guy, all the cool kids do, I’ve even seen the band at Coachella. Over the years very little of the music has stuck to me, but the pandemic offered a bit more free time to dig into this funky dubby, chilled out jam, and it stuck with me. Not to mention that 2020 was all about deep breaths.

Ledisi (feat.Corey Henry)- What Kind of Love Is That Ledisi is back with some slinky, sultry R&B and jazzy vocals

Dinner Party- FreezeTag An R&B/Jazz collective featuring Terrace Martin, Robert Glasper, 9th Wonder and Kamasi Washington use sweet soul on heartbreaking and all too familiar tale..

Toots and The Maytals- Time Tough  I’ve written an awful lot about my love for Reggae over the years. Right after Bob Marley kicked the door down for me, Toots showed me around the house. Ska, rock steady, and roots. He was true reggae royalty and sadly we lost him to Covid, just after he released what would be his last album. Check my Toots tribute blog and playlist.

Mungo’s Hi Fi- The Beat Goes SKA! These clever UK roots reggae collective never fail to surprise. This kitschy Sonny & Cher cover managed to make me smile every time I heard it. No mean feat in 2020

Stone Foundation (feat. Durand Jones)- Hold on To Love Frequent collaborators with Paul Weller  (he appears on a track on the album), Stone Foundation are back with another batch of their UK soul revival stylings. This one features Durand Jones ( of Durand Jones & The Indications) on vocals and some great reggae style horns at the top.

The Pretenders- You Can’t Hurt A Fool Can’t resist a good torch song, especially sung by the smokey voiced Chrissie Hynde. Was kind of shocked at how many good songs were on this album.

Shelby Lynne_ Don’t Even Believe in Love Sultry country soul and one of her strongest albums in awhile.

Jaime Wyatt- Neon Cross Outlaw country has a new bad girl. And in case you didn’t think she was serious, she enlisted producer Shooter Jennings (and his mom Jessi Colter on one track) to help make her point. 

Daniel Donato- Justice 25 year old guitar prodigy call his music “cosmic country”.  Ok, now I’m listening. You should be too.

The Jayhawks- This Forgotten Town 30 plus + after their debut this Twin Cities alt country group led by founding member Gary Louris continue to deliver. They find their inner Neil Young on this one.

Lucero- Time To Go Home God I wish I was in a bar right now listening to this, even if I might be crying in my beer.

John Prine (1946 -2020)- Lake Marie We lost so many this year, but this one really stung. A true American songwriting treasure, who was still making great music against all odds right up to his untimely passing. His songs are known for their simplicity, and economy of words. but this one goes against the grain. I’m still not exactly certain what it’s about. Sorrowful and haunting, yet somehow uplifting and redemptive. I heard him perform it live here in Los Angeles a just over a year ago and it has stuck in my head ever since. There is surely a place in heaven for the great John Prine.  He sang about it on his final studio album in 2018. Ironically it became the last song on his last record.

Thanks for making it this far....

***Play the entire songs/20 Spotify playlist HERE!***

[absintheum]

double combo meal - kookii + rhyzaa

The smell of vanilla has been lingering in the kitchen of you hive for as long as you can remember. You had built a routine centered around keeping it that way, replenishing the grubwax in the melting pot three times every night, supplying the oil as necessary to keep it strong enough to mask the odour of the city without making you sick. It reminded you of rot, of stale saltwater, of all the things that ended with the spillage of blood. In one word, it reeked of what you should have been biologically wired to not pay any attention to, or seek out, with the exception that whatever genes had combined in your DNA, may have decided to do so with the sole scope to wire you like this on purpose, out of petty spite.

You had almost forgotten how it felt, but the back of your mind had turned it into the troll babadook, knocking from the basement door of your thinkpan, and just like troll Babadook, you had to learn to live with it, with specially made paint and various perfumes that wouldn’t let go of the fabrics of your wardrobe and the occasional elixirberry jelly lip moisturizer.

The city wasn’t the worst thing to plague your nose, however. As you grew older and closer to your ninth sweep of age, you had almost mastered the art of not letting yourself get sick from it anymore. You knew where to avoid setting foot in and where to pass, until you could map safe path after safe path.

The hardest part of the week was church day. The day in which you had to willingly walk to a place that you’d begged your lusus to let you skip attendance in your wrigglerhood. It never worked, but you knew better than to let other churchgoers see your displeased expression.

It wasn’t the incense nor the wicked elixir that did it for you. It was what they covered that felt like being punched in the gut, like covering spoiled meat in fake sugar and setting it on fire, before covering it with more fake sugar. It was the acrid smell of idolatry. The metallic one of the splatters that wouldn’t stop reeking, no matter how dry or old they were. The sour one of the bloodthirst that plagued those who had stopped sleeping in their cocoons’ slime, whose minds were beginning to wear under the nightmares. The sickly sweetness of the pixie stix that mixed in, to literally sugarcoat the reality of each and every terrible act that took place there.

Then there was a pungently acidic one, of disbelief and skepticism. It came from you. The worst one that you’d learnt to memorise. You were aware. You could see beyond what was fed to you in clowntechism, you could feel there was more to the reason your caste was always so heavily influenced by the cult built around the Mirthful Messiahs. You knew,stubborn in your conviction, but couldn’t say a word.

Church had become your still tragedy in three acts, the first one opened with the entrance, It was the click of your heels as you walked to the altar that ticked like seconds on a clock, timing the moment in which you knew you had to breathe with your mouth that signaled the beginning of the second. The handfuls of fairy dust thrown signaled the intermissions, in which you could breathe normally. The communion was the climax of the third act, before the closing of the third.

A violent, bloody climax, in which the frenzy of “whoop whoop” and discordant honks would rise as the offering met its fate. Sometimes, you had made the mistake of standing too close and the blood had sprayed on you, drenching you in the very thing you despise. It was akin to walking out of the hive with a new outfit, only to have it ruined by a shower of mud from the side of the road from  a scuttlebuggy driven by someone who handled the thing like they had stolen it.

It was infuriating, but best to swallow the croackbeast, lest you end up there in the next ceremony. You have too much to do to die so soon. There was comfort in knowing the script, however. You could count the second backwards, making the right movements, honks and expressions when needed before leaving for another week. Improv, however, you handled badly.

It was rare, but the occasional overzealousness of the moment would lead the slime-starved churchgoers into a frenzy that would end with a few smashed skulls and disembodied limbs. Such a scenario could be avoided if you were either a speedy runner, or strong enough to fight back before running to safety and letting the rest handle it, or strong enough to actually take down the opponent.

While usually you’d run, today you had been too slow.

You weren’t sure if you had been hit before or after you’d tripped on a torn limb and fell on the body that was missing it. It was still oozing blood in a shade that was a little too close to your own, it had stuck to the white of your hair and you were already dreading the following seconds. In the second it took you to regain consciousness of your surroundings, you were already being shadowed by a figure whom seemed to have been the firestarter of the chaos. In that moment, as your already cold blood froze in your veins, an old survival instinct awoke and sprung into action. May the Messiahs you doubted in so much forgive you, but you can’t blame a clown for wanting to live.

The minds of fellow clowns were already resistant to their fellows’ psychic control, but clowns who wouldn’t rest in sopor had thinning mind walls. Using one’s chucklevoodoos would be easy on them, but there was a small chance that the intruder would carry on a trace of their crazed fellow’s zealousness into their own mind. It was rare, but something to take into account, unless you were moments away from confirming or debunking completely your theories on the clown faith.

Your eyes flash and you break into the wet paper of your assalitor’s skull with little effort. The smell you dread so much grows stronger, the psychic link makes pinching your nose useless. At the limit of your patience and frustration, you hit a mental button to release psychic energy and spare yourself another hit, paying it back to your attacker. You hear their cheekbone cracking under their fist, over and over, in a gruesomely comical scene of “stop hitting yourself”. It feels like it lasts hours until you feel the link getting weaker and weaker, until it breaks. Whether the guy has just lost consciousness or embarked on a one way ticket to the Carnival, you don’t know for sure, nor want to know. Right now, all you know is nausea.

You struggle back to your feet, the blood that stained your face, hair and clothes makes it hard for you to breathe without inhaling what plagues you. A look confirms the emptiness of the church, save for a few others who, like you, hadn’t been lucky or fast enough.

The sugary and metallic scents made your stomach turn in queasiness. You dreaded coming home and staining the floor, but you were in absolute need for a shower, clean clothes and a fresh layer of paint.

The way home felt almost eternal.

You sat in the ablution trap, setting the water on as hot as it would get and scrubbing away at every patch of encrusted blood from yourself, hoping that if you could completely erase them from your skin, it would be as if it had never happened.  You came to find that you’d be disappointed from looking at what seemed like the early stage of bruises where you had fallen and were hit. The light purple under your skin ached to the touch. It took you three cycles of washing to deem yourself clean enough and free of the scent of frenzy, and by the end of it, the tip of your digits were starting to wrinkle from the moisture.

Ignoring your lusus’ knocks at the door of your respiteblock, you set alight the melting pot and watched the fruit-scented grubwax melt dissolve. You decided to ignore everything and slip in the comfort of plush and soft blankets of your makeshift cocoon, leaving outside only your head and your hands to hold your palmhusk, deciding to reply to the unanswered and unread text messages in a second moment and opting instead to watch mindlessly whatever the algorithm of grubtube had deemed worthy of your entertainment.

You couldn’t be bothered to check how long you have stayed there. You can hardly be bothered to answer a high-priority text from your matesprit. You’d informed here that today was a church day and you’d never want her worried. It wasn’t as if you’d risked getting a free skull crashing just this morning. Still, you knew that not answering was going to just result in more pressing texts, so you decided to take the male moobeast by the horns.

saccharinePierrot [SP] is juggling hearts to forensicCasefiler [FC]

SP: -x-0hello -x-0there my -x-0reddest red heart SP: -x-0what is the -x-0subject -x-0of today’s lovingly -x-0crafted -x-0conversation of which i -x-0am already -x-0aware of FC: are y0-0u alright? FC: y0-0u haven’t said a w0-0rd since service was supp0-0sed t0-0 start, and i deduce it is 0-0ver and has been f0-0r s0-0me time n0-0w FC: i d0-0 n0-0t kn0-0w h0-0w t0-0 be m0-0re e><plicit than this FC: i was w0-0rried ab0-0ut y0-0 SP: -x-0why -x-0yes, -x-0i am fully -x-0operational and -x-0functional and -x-0in great -x-0spirit, very -x-0very glad -x-0to be -x-0so FC: d0-0 y0-0u need t0-0 talk? SP: -x-0yes

The thought of lying through your teeth did cross your mind, but it was an unwise choice. Your matesprit, Rhyzaa, had been trained in the legislacerative arts of forensic examination and minored in detecting lies of people who were way better at lying than you. You were like a transparent piece of polymeric product in her specs. You supposed it wouldn’t hurt, it would almost be like a real feels jam, in person and all.

FC: i’ll get in a pile, 0-0ne sec

Damn, she was good. You snapped a quick picture while doing a sideways peace sign. You wouldn’t miss a chance to do some comedy and captioned it with a “ -x-0you -x-0know a clown -x-0too -x-0well “

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You stare at the screen, unsure of what to respond to the newly received snapshot. If they were already cocooning, it sure wasn’t because they were taking their sleep schedule into account. You kept a plush cocoon just for these occasions, all you had to do was just to kick back, take off your specs and postpone a nail appointment. Maybe it would be a good idea to book a double one, as a self-care date. In the giant wall of post-its that lived in your mind, the nail appointment reminder appeared.

FC: all piled up, whenever y0-0u are ready

Your matesprit doesn’t waste a second and starts typing away, for quite a few minutes. In fact, you’ve considered getting up to grab some water, but decided against it. You don’t have the heart to be late to a bad day talk. You did spend the better of a few minutes reading through the messy texts, trying to piece together the happenings of your partner’s morning. An especially rough day, indeed.

FC: w0-0w, y0-0u managed t0-0 take d0-0wn that dude all by y0-0urself?? FC: that’s quite a feat! SP:-x-0your -x-0awe is -x-0understandable, -x-0my -x-0dearest. -x-0but -x-0yours truly -x-0feels that they -x-0have -x-0reached the -x-0bottom of the -x-0waterwell SP: -x-0what a turn of -x-0events, a -x-0clown who -x-0despised -x-0their -x-0predispositional mirthful -x-0destiny is the -x-0same clown -x-0to grow -x-0weary at the -x-0thought of -x-0clowning SP: -x-0hark, -x-0the writers -x-0are -x-0already banging -x-0at the -x-0door! -x-0offering -x-0life and -x-0limb for -x-0the -x-0rights to the -x-0story FC: you are the last h0-0rned walking creature t0-0 turn 0-0ut t0-0 be a sell0-0ut FC: but FC: y0-0u are als0-0 the 0-0nly h0-0rned walking creature t0-0 be able t0-0 rec0-0gnise the reality of y0-0ur acti0-0ns and see them as y0-0urs truly, rather than s0-0me0-0ne’s divine wish 0-0r will FC: n0-0thing can compare t0-0 that FC: and y0-0u know that you w0-0uld never let yourself be turned int0-0 wh0-0 let their screws get l0-00-0se FC: have y0-0urself a slime mask, y0-0u deserve it

You really hope you are saying the right words. You have read several papers about similar situations: it used to be, apparently, a common practice for some sub-sectors of the clown church, to advise practitioners to deprive themselves of the sopor slime’s soothing effects. The property damage fees are something that a past heiress decided was something she didn’t want to have anything to hear about and outright attempted to ban the practice.

You were actually writing your thesis on a similar topic, but as your thesis’ title would take longer to type than it has to have a proper conversation with someone, you would rather not mention it by specific name.

A purple text bubble flashes briefly before displaying a kissy clown emoji, followed by a simple text.

SP: -x-0you always know -x-0what say to -x-0validate me, and -x-0that is -x-0deeply -x-0appreciated SP: -x-0but, -x-0moving onto more -x-0pleasant -x-0views SP: -x-0how is the -x-0most -x-0successful -x-0soon-to-be -x-0exam committee -x-0member on -x-0this lovely day?

You pause for a moment. Do you want to subject your red quadrant to an in-detail explanation of your classes and homework, or should you make an introductory powerknifepoint? You decide to spare the juridic details, but nonetheless, leave them with a reasonable explanation of your scholarly activities. It’s a great thing that they love your ramblings, you could go on as long as you have breath, but your schedule doesn’t allow for that.

SP: -x-0wonderful, while i may not -x-0be -x-0well -x-0versed in your -x-0field SP: -x-0i do -x-0love to -x-0see it-x-0grow and -x-0flourish SP: -x-0you’ll -x-0do -x-0great, -x-0i’m -x-0sure

You and Kookii were lucky to have each other, especially coming from relationships that enjoyed crumbling like a stale.. heh.. cookie.. in a glass of moobeast juice. They had that pitch affair with that jade they wouldn’t talk about, and you didn’t even have the chance to say goodbye. Your moirail disappeared into thin air. You knew she didn’t die, asyou received the occasional letter, hidden below the hive’s entrance mat and knew that calligraphy far too well and cast doubts aside. You even went so far to violate protocol and ask one of your colleagues to supervise and determine whether this was a forcefully pretty handwriting or less. You were relieved to know that it didn’t show signs of the writer being stressed, but it kept gnawing at you from the inside.

No matter how hard and where any lead brought you, eventually you were back at square one. Nobody around you could tell you anything useful or relevant and your options had ran dry. Then came Kookii. They seemed to be able to take away that gnawing feeling, that knot in your stomach that wouldn’t otherwise untie itself. You missed her so much, but eventually, you figured that you couldn’t let it consume your entire being. So you stopped looking. You could only hope she was ok. There was so much you wanted to tell her, but all you could do was wait and see if fate, the universe or whoever was pulling at the strings, decided to take pity on you and allow you to see her again, one last time, before departing to outer space. As it ws a matter of fact, you were glad you had this clown in your life. They were an oddity that you’d have never guessed could be real, but you were also delighted to find that their oddity was almost exceptional. You two just started clicking and chirping and never stopped for the better half of the sweep, and didn’t have any plans to stop. Your plans were mostly composed of your busy schedule that always had room for your perigreal nails appointment and weekly date night. You had always done your field work right, that allowed you to pick a career path that would lead you to a high rank among the other legislacerators, if you played your cards right.

This was a game of troll poker played with different uno cards editions for everyone, but you knew the rules very well. And nobody played troll uno-poker like you could while still being troll osha compliant, dashing and with perfect nails.

You wanted to do great things, even if your self-awareness manifested itself in the knowledge that the path ahead wasn’t going to be either a cakewalk, nor a choice that depended on you entirely, despite what the propaganda taught you. You wouldn’t buy it, but you, too, knew better than to run your mouth without thinking. The legal business is cutthroat and it wasn’t uncommon to hear of the passing of others who shared your ideas, but not your common sense. That meant that the common goal among a good part of the less imperialistic of your colleagues was going to be harder to achieve. It was dreadful, to think that you’d be left completely alone by the time of your ordeals.

It was dreadful, but it was still not time to fixate on those. You’d have time to dread later, all you wanted to do now was to make a good memory of your time with your favourite clown.

FC: y0-0u’re the best <3 FC: are y0-0u feeling better?

You replied simply and smiled at Kookii’s positive answer. It made you feel fuzzy inside, in an almost childish fashion. You absolutely loved it and wouldn’t give up these moments for all the success on the planet and off planet. Your flush partner’s texts kept coming, this time lightening the mood with a string of gifs picturing juvenile purrbeasts and hopbeasts being the cutest little things to ever exist. Just your favourite way to destress and feel good about the current state of things, accompanied by their cheerful sprechgesang. It was a little slice of paradise that made the rest worth.

You were thinking about putting the cherry on top and getting yourself a slime mask as well, when you heard your doorbug chirp. You put your sweetheart on hold for the moment it took you to get out of the pile and dash to the door, opening it with hope in your eyes. You died a little bit when you couldn’t catch a glimpse of anyone nearby, but picked up the letter deposited on your greeting mat nonetheless.

There was something in your heart that screamed at you to open it.

[littlemisssquiggles]

Pinehead Headcanons: Oscar Gets A Scroll

So quite a few things were teased during the first episode of V7 including the prospect of Oscar training privately with a certain individual while his friends are off on their own training missions. That being said, if this is indeed going to be the case and Oscar is carded to have his own separate development outside of JNR_RWBY for the first half of V7, this squiggle meister has only one request to tie this predicament together perfectly.

Oscar MUST receive his very own Scroll which he then uses to remain in close contact with JNR_RWBY, mainly Ruby who acts as his key liaison.

[Spoilers Ahead]

I’m praying that Oscar being trained by Ironwood doesn’t fall into the same outdated habit of the Writers omitting him from opportunities to gain a genuine connection with the group. No offense to the CRWBY Writers (particularly Miles and Kerry who were responsible for V5 and V6) but if I’m being completely honest here, at times I have a hard time grasping the believability that Oscar is meant to be part of the heroes.

Don’t get me wrong. I want more than anything for Oscar to be a part of the group. But at the same time I also want him to feel as if he has become a part of team of his own merits and as an audience member, I don’t think the Writers have done a good job of handling his integration into the hero team in previous seasons. 

For most of V5, Oscar was treated as a shadow to Ozpin who took up most of his screen time including one scene I was really, really hoping the Writers would’ve included Oscar in. It’s the dinner scene from V5 C7 where RNJR are catching up with Weiss and Yang.

It still bothers me that we didn’t get to see Oscar officially meet Yang and Weiss and actually play a part in all the reminiscing of the good ole days of Beacon plus shenanigans. I understand that Oscar was the new kid so it would’ve been weird to have him be there while JNR and RWY walk down memory land. But at the same times, that’s exactly why I wanted him to be there. It would’ve been cool to see how Oscar would’ve reacted to hearing all the stories of JNR_RWY’s past adventures in Vale.

I understand that Oscar also needed to converse with Qrow, cause of Ozpin. However it would’ve cool if that bit was shortened so he could’ve later joined the others and have Ruby and JNR properly introduce him to Weiss and Yang.

Seriously, it really bothered me how we got this nice dinner scene with everyone eating and Oscar is just off elsewhere inside his own head cause I’m sure Oz would’ve taken over to talk to Qrow about his findings in Mistral.

Just imagining Oscar playing silent audience to Ozpin and Qrow; not even getting to taste some of the delicious food that RNJR prepared while all the ‘cool kids’ were off laughing over a hearty meal while he’s stuck listening in on the adults. And what sucks even more is that he can’t even tell anyone else what he heard or knew from what Qrow and Oz discussed. Not like he tried, 

That’s kind of maddening when I think about it. And don’t even get me started on the completely botched way the Writers dared to shoehorn in the group coming to see Oscar as part of the team in V6 by having Jaune come to realize that Oscar is important to the team…by having him come to this realization without even sharing a heart to heart with Oscar. 

Other things were focused on for that episode. Other things the Writers claimed to be more important than concluding the discourse they sparked between two of our main characters in the last episode…by NOT actually having them talk to each other but somehow still reach the same conclusion. Oof...that plot development still stings for me. 

I think one of these fine days I’m going to have to write a more in-depth post to justify my eternal disdain towards the ninth episode of V6. You guys have heard me voice my opinions of it now and again; most of them negative. But I really had a lot of problems with that episode. Issues that I still very much have even after all this time and have actively contributed to my concern for Oscar’s writing going forward in V7. Or rather the treatment of his writing and character overall.

I guess part of the reason why I’m hoping Oscar getting a Scroll is a canonical thing is because it’s the one way I can see him remaining close to JNR_RWBY as they all go their separate ways temporarily. It’s also the one sure sign that will highlight to me that Oscar’s growing friendship with the group will be maintained and continue to grow even in distance.

Since if JNR_RWBY will be off out in the field on training missions around Solitas with the Ace Ops, I’m assuming Oscar will remain up in Atlas main kingdom with General Ironwood who will personally be overseeing to his own training.

 If that is the case and Oscar is to be separated from the group a little bit, I hope him remaining in contact constantly with everyone is a sure thing that’s actually shown in the show. I really hope it’s not another V5 bit where the rest of the heroes are one place doing their thing and acting like there isn’t a newest young member whose been added to their ranks while Oscar in turn is off doing his own thing while not bothering to maintain the friendship and team comradery he (supposedly) built up with everyone in V6.

I know it’s only been 48 or 49 days total since Oscar joined the heroes and while he still has much more growing to do, he’s still a part of the team. Allegedly. That’s how the Writers want me to feel. I just don’t want Oscar’s relationship with Ironwood to become like how things were when Ozpin was around. Oz was off being elusive with adults while poor Oscar played tag along…in his own freaking body.

I just hope the Writers don’t neglect the small development they made with Oscar being on the team without Oz in V6. Oscar is a part of the team now. Let him maintain that, please. Don’t have him ghost JNR_RWBY while they in turn act like he doesn’t exist either.

I guess the point I’m mainly getting at here is that I just want to see Oscar and JNR_RWBY keep each other updated on their respective progress as they move forward with their own individual training moments, if you know what I’m saying. I don’t know the extent to which JNR_RWBY will remain apart from Oscar.

I’d imagine they’d be staying wherever the Ace Ops are staying since they’re supposed to be working with them. Oscar on the other hand mind stay with Ironwood wherever he lives which could be...interesting. Hence why I like the thought of Oscar finally having his own Scroll.

Since Ruby is currently the closest person to Oscar as a friend amongst the heroes, I’m picturing Ruby exchanging contact info with Oscar the instant he gets his own Scroll. From there, Ruby and Oscar keep in constant communication with one another.

Ruby updates Oscar on how everyone is progressing out with the Ace Ops while Oscar in turn updates Ruby on how he’s going with Ironwood (and maybe Qrow).

I just really, really like the idea of a potential scene where Ruby calls Oscar after she and the others have finished a mission and the two spend hours on a video-call with Ruby giving Oscar an epic recap of all that went down on the mission, in meticulous detail and with jubilant exaggeration, much to Oscar’s entertainment on the other end.

As the younglings of the group, I figured the Rosebuds would at least keep in constant communication as much as they could afford; whether it’s via text or instant messaging or video calls when they’re available at the same time.

I even have this cute idea where Ruby and Oscar often exchange ‘selfies’ with each other---y’know Ruby takes captioned snapshots from their missions to send over to Oscar while he in turn sends the occasional snapchat too;; although not as good as Ruby.

I’m in favour of Oscar being technologically inept, coming from a farm bred background. Either that or Oscar is just sort of like a lost little lamb when it comes to operating a standard Scroll leading to comical moments where Ruby has to play his guiding shepherd to help the precious freckled farm boy understand the techno-stuff he’s not used to.

I just hope that if my assumption is true and JNR_RWBY and Oscar are indeed divided for a while due to their different training regiments that the show at least indicates a sign that the Rosebuds frequently keep each other abreast of their respective affairs.

I would gladly take a small moment where Ruby is about to join everyone on embarking on their very first training mission with the Ace Ops, only to receive a video call from Oscar wishing her and everyone good luck just before they jump out of the airships.

Later we can then have a follow-up parallel where Oscar is on break from one of his training sessions with Ironwood only to soon answer a call from Ruby. That’s all I need. Just two scenes to establish that these two kiddos still remain close and communicate a lot during their training. As a matter of fact, it’d be ten times more adorable if they did do that

Also if Oscar gets a Scroll, I’m praying that his official Scroll handle is ‘Cute Boy Oz’. I couldn’t help but noticed that Ruby’s Scroll handle for Jaune was ‘Vomit Boy’ in V6 as a callback to his nickname dubbed by Yang (I think) from way back in Volume 1.

Since Oscar keeping the “Cute Boy Oz” has been established twice between V5 and V6, as dubbed by Nora, I hope it’s a nickname that sticks with him and that’s the handle Ruby uses for Oscar on her Scroll.

Like picture another moment where someone---probably one of the Ops members Ruby befriended---indicates to her that her Scroll was ringing, remarking confusedly that someone called ‘Cute Boy Oz’ was trying to get her, only for Ruby to jubilantly announce that was Oscar before hastily taking the call with her favourite farm boy.

I mean ‘Farm Boy’ can also work as a decent Scroll handle for Oscar too but it doesn’t have the extra pizazz as ‘Cute Boy Oz’. Besides, I really want that pet name for Oscar to stick with him forever to the point that it becomes an inside joke between him and his teammates/friends that’s as immortal as he is.

Like just imagine, years down the line after Salem is defeated, when Oscar is a grown ass man and his closest peeps, particularly Nora and Ruby (who’d possibly be his wife at this point) still call him ‘Cute Boy Oz’.  But it’s mostly Nora. Kinda like how Toph Beifong still called Aang by her ‘Twinkletoes’ nickname for him in the Legend of Korra despite both being adults in their 40s.

I can just see that being a thing too for Nora and Oscar as part of their long-standing friendship. Like imagine  a dialogue exchange between a 44-year-old Nora Valkyrie and a 40 year-old Oscar Pine be like:

Nora: C’mon. Let’s go check in on the old gang Cute Boy Oz.

Oscar: *pouting* Nora, I’m 40 years old. Don’t you think I’m a bit too old now for the Cute Boy nickname?

Nora: *grinning cheekily* Afraid not.

That’d be cute. Anyways, that’s my headcanon. I hope you guys like it. 

~LittleMissSquiggles (2019)

[phantomchick]

My wip list

Writing out my list of works in progress in the hopes that it becomes more manageable and easier to decide which to work on after I do.

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Call Me  Fandom: dc comics / batfandom Summary: Jason calls Bruce for help after being assaulted, they deal with the aftermath both in the revenge way and the hurt/comfort way. Amount of work necessary to complete: ??? It’s a two parter fic so only one chapter left to go, however serious writer’s block to work through on this second part so who actually knows.

I tell myself that I don't need Anyone (But the truth is no one needs Me)   Fandom: dc comics / batfandom Summary: The scene in UTRH where Bruce throws a Batarang into Jason’s throat is bullshit especially because there’s never any consequences for it, that’s not just bullshit, it’s batshit! And I refuse to accept it. A What if Jason didn’t disappear into the night after the events of UTRH to arrange for his next villain appearance, fix it fic. Amount of work necessary to complete: Likely going to be one of my longest fics yet, a multi chapter whopper!  Which means a lot of work, both in research and in writing.  I need to read up on ALL of the modern captain atom comics, a bunch of the crisis event chemo Bludhaven comics and maybe a couple of other ancillary comics of that era too, before I even get to writing the nitty gritty of the fic. We’re doing this canon and we’re doing it right! A fixing-everything motivated fic putting the canon divergence back into fandom.

The Many Curses of The Wayne Name / Of Curses and Covenants Fandom: dc comics/batfandom Summary: So much of a work in progress the official title’s still not completely decided! A fic delving into the relationship between the Wayne Family and the Zatara family, told through a series of curses various generations of the Waynes have been afflicted with over the years, some of these curses the Zataras were able to remove and some they couldn’t. Currently intend to have it end with Zatanna and her nephew Zach coming to dinner with Bruce and his kids. Amount of work necessary to complete:  I already have an index of curses and which Waynes in the chronology get cursed where, ready to build with. But the series itself is still more a couple of lines and potential scenarios than any actual fic. Not sure how many stories I’ll end up telling here so unsure of how much work it’ll be to complete, likely a lot to get it off the ground though.

The Monster In The Man Fandom: Merlin, (bbc) Merlin, Summary: A continuation to CaffeinatedFlumadiddle's fic The Monster in the Mirror that ended on a horror-esque cliffhanger - written because my brain couldn’t handle the cliffhanger and had to extrapolate with a part two. Intended as a gift fic to that author. Basically the spell from an enchanted mirror has escaped and possessed Merlin, and is attempting to use Merlin’s worst fears against him until he kills Arthur. Can Arthur who has only just found out about Merlin’s magic save Merlin from what’s inside him? Amount of work necessary to complete:  Currently at a little over 5000 words but likely to need at least another 5000 to both get to the main action and resolve things.

Those Winter Sundays  Fandom: Marvel, Avengers, Iron Man Summary: Snapshots of Tony working hard for the avengers and no one noticing. Amount of work necessary to complete:  Unknown as currently more of a wip idea than a wip itself, likely going to be a oneshot containing a bunch of ficlets.

Truth is Treason in the Empire of Lies Fandom: Marvel, Avengers, Thor Summary: Thor tells the story of his banishment and return to Asgard ending with Loki falling into the Void and the Avengers have some questions, questions Thor had not thought of, remarks on things that Thor doesn't know how to explain.  He goes to Loki's cell and asks him some things becoming more and more angry despite having no one he can punch. Gets drunk and criticises Sif and The Warriors Three. Focus on Loki still being underage by Aesir standards during Thor 1. “For while the Treason I detest, the Traitor I love still.” Amount of work necessary to complete:  Either a oneshot or a two chapter fic. Need to be careful to ‘show not tell’ considering the plot I’m going with is gonna have a lot of talking about things that have already happened.

A Trinity of Head Wounds Fandom: DC Comics, Justice League Summary: Friendship fic, angst and hurt/comfort Clark yells at a concussed Bruce for being reckless and because Bruce is concussed he ends up accidentally making the slightly addled Bruce cry. When Clark notices he shuts his mouth so fast he could've crunched titanium between his teeth. Diana walks in, sees Bruce in tears and PUNCHES CLARK ACROSS THE ROOM WITHOUT HESITATION. After that there’s a lot hurt/comfort on all sides and Clark opens up about his anxiety over Bruce’s mortality and Diana bleeds on Bruce’s shoulder. Amount of work necessary to complete: It’s a oneshot but it’s one of those difficult ones where you’ve got to get everything just right or the emotional intent gets totally lost so a big ??? for this one too.

Separation  Fandom: DC Comics, UTRH Summary: Split personality disorderRed Hood and Jason Todd, alternatively, Red Hood is a demon/parasite latched on to Jay. Amount of work necessary to complete: A lot considering it’s currently just an idea.

A Stark in The Stars Fandom: Marvel, Avengers, Iron Man Summary: Tony’s survived the universe wide disaster known as the snap or the decimation and has even survived carrying out it’s reversal, but he’d much rather help Thor, Carol and the Guardians sort out intergalactic repair efforts than face the damage Steve has accidentally done to time itself back on Earth. He keeps forgetting the differences between what happened in the fake timeline and the original one the longer he’s on Earth and though he knows Stephen Strange is doing all he can to fix it, he also knows that the changes for him are a lot more confusing and disconcerting than they are for the others (Save for poor Sharon Carter).  Pepper understands better than anyone and actually packed his bag for him (with Morgan’s help) when he tried to explain what he was feeling. Maybe the little settlement on that mineral loaded planet he keeps visiting on behalf of the dwarves can help him find what he needs to get past this. Amount of work necessary to complete: This is a slower more thoughtful work about learning how to live when you never thought you’d survive and the sense of alienation you can get as a veteran returning to a world that isn’t the way you expected it to be when you got home. As such, it’s very introspective, so I want to take my time with it but realistically it’s likely to be a series of vignettes from both Tony’s perspective and the perspective of the people he encounters out in his travels through the galaxies. Max 5 chapters.

Another Time, Another Place Fandom: dc comics / Batfandom Summary: Martha and Thomas Wayne are sent 20 years into the future only to see a young man they've never met standing in their drawing room. He claims to be their grandson. I just love the idea of Jason being left in the house with Damian and Duke with Bruce, Tim and Dick gone and he's the eldest so he's gotta look after the situation Amount of work necessary to complete: However long it takes me to get past the writer’s block for the ending - I have most of a plot outline ready to write based on, except for how I’m going to resolve things. A oneshot with the possibility of an epilogue chapter to follow.

Vicki Finds A Bat Fandom: dc comics / Batfandom Summary: Vicki Vale sees Jason Todd sitting in a wafflehouse. Chaos ensues. Amount of work necessary to complete:  Currently a little over 2000 words, probably gonna need an extra 2000 before it’s done.

You Don't Know Anything  Fandom: dc comics / Batfandom Summary: Gift fic for paradise_runaway. One where the other Bat boys find out the circumstances of Jason's death and resurrection and their reaction. Amount of work necessary to complete: Started and restarted multiple times, can’t decide which route to take with it. It’s just a oneshot so once I get some inspiration to hit for it, it’ll probably be done pretty quick.

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[seventhsunflower]

thoughts about relationships and love.

so there’s been this weird thing that’s been circulating through my head lately.  funnily enough, miraculous ladybug triggered this thought process.

dating has always been a hard thing me and i could never pin why.  naturally, we go after what we think we want, but its not always what we want or what we need.  that’s always been true.  a lot of us hear this but never really process what that really means.

i’m beginning to recognize the more pragmatic and less abstract concepts of compatibility and chemistry.  a lot of the people i was interested in, i found myself idealizing them and putting them on a pedestal because i never could get close enough to know them. i was young and i honestly constantly thought maybe i was just not approachable, i was shy, maybe i was acting out line.  i was consistently trying to be open minded and by doing so i had trouble figuring out what was a need for self-improvement and what i was just not understanding of my own existence.

the truth is that it is not your job to "get" people to like you. it is your job to recognize people who are worth caring about, and people who aren't. chasing relationships or friendships that show how little they seem to value you, it dawned on me why do i even care to win them over? what kind of prize would they be?

naturally you have to take into consideration of healthy boundaries and expectations when re-thinking a friendship and relationship, too.  a relationship and friendship could be great, but maybe one side is demanding more of the other due to a lack of something in their own life.

circling back to miraculous ladybug, i have been focusing on marinette’s crush on adrien and adrien’s crush on ladybug.  they both show this fallacy of what we think is love and what really is love. 

now i completely think that marinette falling for adrien in the rain scene was completely understandable.  how could you not fall in love with someone’s sincere display of vulnerability and kindness?  but just because adrien has that, doesn’t mean that it would work out!  i think that’s something that i got confused for a long time.  i would see snapshots of someone and perceive it as the deeper, ‘real’ them, rather than regarding it as a snapshot.

both characters get emotionally invested before they really get to know a person.  what we see is chemistry between chat noir and ladybug, marinette and adrien, but that’s what it is.  its chemistry but chemistry does not equal real compatibility.  compatibility takes much longer to figure out.  naturally this is a show and they’re meant to be together, and sometimes that lucky meeting happens!  however, most of the time (at least for myself), i get stuck in that floating mental space where i don’t know the person that well, and fill in the most idealistic blanks unconsciously.

other characters that pair up don’t do this -- it’s a natural progression.  nino and ayla for an example show an equal parts of chemistry and compatibility.  ivan and mylene are the same way -- even they sort of look very similar (hat tip to the creators for the hints).  we see love develop naturally among the characters around marinette and adrien but end up in this fantasy of adrien and marinette, and find frustration in it.  part of it because we want them to recognize who they are, but a part of me can relate to ladybug withholding mentioning it.  when you’re a literal super hero in someone’s eyes, how can you still be the same person once the mask goes off?  spider-man visited this concept several times in the ultimate spider-man comic.  blackcat was super into him until she took the mask off, and then she vomited once she knew who was under there.  sometimes its the mask and the mystique that attracts the person to you, and not the real you.

same goes for adrien and marinette.  adrien keeps her at a distance because of his attachment to ladybug, but he seems to keep his struggles a secret from her.  he tells nino obviously, that’s the first episode, but never marinette.  but adrien has met her parents, tried their baking, seen marinette blunder and be flawed and scared herself -- and adrien keeps this curated image of himself around her.

when you look at compatibility, it’s all about having similar values and longer-term goals and chemistry is the kind of emotional tingle-in-the-pants butterflies in the stomach type feeling.  it’s the sort of thing that people are on the same wavelength as you -- they act and react similarly, they have similar enough interfacing personalities and similar enough focal points.  there’s many parallels of marinette and adrien’s reactions to their love interest, their panic, their inner monologues, kindness, humor, and thoughtfulness.  they are both mirroring each other but both are too distracted by the perfected image that has the chemistry.  heck, i've been in high chemistry situations with people that i’ve barely known.  chemistry is about excitement and excitement is the unknown.

on the other hand, you have to let a person talk talk a bit before discovering compatibility.  all those little things and little words over time add up to a bigger and more complete picture. asking a lot of questions, looking for consistency or inconsistency in answers, and observe what they don’t answer. to really figure out if someone is compatible with you it’s a lot more than fluttering feelings.  it’s a literal job that requires doing a lot of investigations and to be subtle enough you’re not interviewing or prying.

examples of compatibility would be: ayla and nino.  both have very similar approaches on how they view their friendships.  they take it very seriously, and go well over the mile to have their friend’s backs.  they’re both very humorous and lighthearted, brave and to the point, and driven (both even were trying to make a movie together, and butted heads about how they were going to win!).  once they actually sat down and got to know each other the way i described, the compatibility fit.  incompatibility would be chloe and adrien for obvious reasons.  while both are from affluent families, both are into the fashion world (even chloe’s mother fostered gabriel agreste’s career), both have absent parents, both get exceptional treatment -- they really have nothing in common!  their personal cores do not line up, and with the exaggeration of the story, we can see chloe’s infatuation with adrien that parallels adrien’s infatuation with ladybug.

a real relationship needs half and half.  too much chemistry, there’s a lot of room of unknown and conflict and often can result that there’s no room for compatibility.  too much compatibility, and a person feels like a relative.

i feel really lame just figuring this out now as i usually went for the chemistry options like adrien and marinette (ladybug not seeing that chat noir and her have a lot of actual things in common, and rely on each other; adrien not seeing that marinette is trying to provide him the emotional support, love, and genuine presence that he’s desperately seeking in his life).  i can’t go back and redo many mistakes in my life, but i can go forward now considering this with a real honest mindset. 

[dustinreidmusic]

Mac's Wild Years: By Michael Hurtt.  Originally published in Offbeat Magazine

Mac Rebennack was born in 1941. Dr. John was born in 1967. What happened in between would color his whole musical career. "In New Orleans, everything--food, music, religion, even the way people talk and act--has deep, deep roots; and, like the tangled veins of cypress roots that meander this way and that in the swamp, everything in New Orleans is interrelated, wrapped around itself in ways that aren't always obvious."--Mac Rebennack In 1967, Malcolm Rebennack, Jr., exiled to the West Coast after a final drug bust that forbid him "to go to or through New Orleans," donned face paint, glitter and plumes and emerged as Dr. John the Night Tripper. His debut album Gris-Gris, and the stage shows that followed it, hawked a brand of psychedelic New Orleans R&B that mixed Mardi Gras Indian street chants with the primal gospel of holiness churches, the pianistic funk of Professor Longhair, heavy doses of hoodoo mysticism and nearly every shred of ritualistic South Louisiana culture that he'd absorbed during his decade and a half in the New Orleans music scene. From the drag shows at the Dew Drop Inn to the electric guitar evangelizing of the Reverend Utah Smith, it was a netherworld far stranger and more colorful than anything the pioneer of voodoo rock could have dreamed up. His role in it, though often been eclipsed by his later metamorphosis, established a reputation that would inform every aspect of his later musical life. Populated by high school greasers, high-rolling gangsters, down-and-out dope fiends and jive-talking record men, it was a world that had rapidly begun evaporating with the election of District Attorney Earling Carothers "Jim" Garrison in 1961. Prior to his widely known investigation into the Kennedy assassination, Garrison made his name locally by leading a systematic crack down on Crescent City vice that padlocked night clubs, juke joints and gambling dens. He often led the raids himself, pistol in hand, and by 1963 had managed to single-handedly dismantle the around-the-clock-party that had been Rebennack's entire young life. It had been one of after-hours jam sessions that lasted well into the next day, followed by "record dates" that produced aural snapshots that just reeked with crazed rock 'n' roll atmosphere: Jerry Byrne's frantic "Lights Out" and "Carry On," Roland Stone's narcotic anthem "Junco Partner," and Mac's own sinister, tremelo-charged "Storm Warning." "If we didn't have an artist and we had some studio time we'd just be the artist," Rebennack says of the sessions that produced hundreds of singles under monikers from Ronnie and the Delinquents to Drits and Dravy. The former's 1959 "Bad Neighborhood" was a greasy period piece if there ever was one. Meant to commemorate "the end of the zoot suit era," its gleeful lines of "Lie, steal, drink all day / good folks try to keep away," was an outright celebration of the lifestyle that Garrison sought to eliminate. And the Delinquents moniker was really no joke. "When we hired Ronnie Barron to be the singer with us, he was a li'l thug," says Rebennack, who'd had remarkably bad luck with great front men thus far. "We lost more singers to the penitentiary," he says, naming nearly everyone who preceded Barron with the exception of Frankie Ford. "Deadeye went to the joint for manslaughter, Jerry Byrne fell and went up for statutory rape, then Roland Stone went up on narcotics." Local disc jockey Jim Stewart once recalled that Rebennack's teenage bands "were always high, always late." But somehow through the haze, Mac would manage to simultaneously wear the hats of talent scout, A&R man, composer, producer, arranger, session musician, and when the need arose, singer. It might have stayed that way had Barron not refused to take on the Dr. John persona, which was invented with him in mind. Rebennack had started flirting with drugs when he was 12, already well seasoned in the art of skipping school and Mass to catch the street car to the early morning R&B jams at the Brass Rail. Since his father owned an appliance store that serviced jukeboxes, his childhood was spent wearing out stacks of hillbilly, jazz and blues 78s when they came off the boxes. Schooled on "Pinetop's Boogie Woogie" by his piano-playing aunt, he soon took up the guitar. By the time rock 'n' roll hit during his freshman year at Jesuit High School, he was more than ready. At Jesuit, Rebennack formed his first band the Dominos, with Henry Guerineau, then joined Guerineau's the Spades with whom he played "the Holy Father Circuit," as he refers it, starring at CYO dances from Redemptorist in the Irish Channel to Saint Anthony's in Mid-City. His teachers were current and future Fats Domino guitarists Papoose Nelson and Roy Montrell, who took an axe to young Mac's brand new green and black Harmony guitar. "He broke it all up, called my Pa and said, 'Mr. Rebennack, I ain't teachin' your son on that piece of shit. Go pick him out something nice.' I thought I was going to get killed. My Pa was hip, though. He knew it wasn't about the guitar as much as having that guitar to bring on the gig." Montrell took Mac to a pawnshop where he picked out a Gibson that he worked off lugging appliances for his dad. "My father didn't say a word til later," Rebennack wrote in his autobiography Under a Hoodoo Moon. "Apparently Roy had taken him aside and told him, 'I taught your son a lesson, that you don't get things because of the way they look. You get them on how they work." "He had a way of teaching that kept me coming back for more. During the lesson, he strung me along with ordinary riffs--but then right at the end he'd play some killer lick, his back turned so I couldn't see his fingers, and say, 'Hey, wanna learn that shit, kid? Come back next week. Now get the fuck outta here." Having already met studio owner Cosimo Matassa, who was a friend of his father, Rebennack spent his schooldays honing his songwriting skills. "Man, I used to go to school, I had a couple of comic books where the outside cover looked like a loose leaf binder. And I'd sit there in class reading that. They thought I was doing something in school but I'd be sitting there writing songs, ripping them off from Mad or Tales from the Crypt." He'd also begun hanging out at Warren Easton High School on Canal Street, a hotbed of hip musical activity that had already birthed New Orleans first bona-fide white rock 'n' roll band, the Sparks. It was here that he first encountered saxophonist Leonard James, whose band was blasting out a set of Sam Butera songs in the school gymnasium. It turned out that James knew all about the Brass Rail too, and dug the same hard-driving sounds as Rebennack did. They were soon rehearsing at James' house in the notorious St. Roch park neighborhood with guitarist Earl Stanley--now playing the recently introduced electric bass--and drummer Paul Staehle. "Leonard lived on Robertson not too far from the park and Stanley used to live around there on Dauphine," Rebennack says. "One of the things St. Roch Park was known for was as a good cop spot. St. Roch church was famous, too, because they'd take the grease out the bells by the cemetery, mix it with some graveyard dirt and some gun powder, add extra nitrate and put that all together with Patchouli oil to make goofy dust. Now, what you did with it was according to how rank a motherfucker you were." The mysterious worlds of drugs and hoodoo fascinated young Mac, but in his new musical partners he found an even deeper magic. "Paul Staehle was bad. I remember him having drum battles with Edward Blackwell and all the top drummers. And Stanley had a finger-plucking style of guitar like Snooks did, North Mexican shit that he'd learned from his daddy. He was into Earl King and Guitar Slim just like I was. We liked those cats because they did something different." Rebennack had picked up on the flamboyance of his guitar heroes a little too acutely for the priests at Jesuit, who'd brought his high school career to a halt after a Christmas talent show where they accused him of making "lewd gyrations" with his instrument. The real beef, Henry Guerineau later told Tad Jones, was that they were playing R&B instead of big band swing or Dixieland. "At the time," he recalled, "it was heresy." Stanley, who became the Spades' guitarist after Rebennack left the band, was having his own issues over at Nicholls High. "I used to hang with the gangsters, all the tough guys," Stanley says. "I was so bad they threw me out of Nicholls but they couldn't throw me out of school. So they asked me to leave and I went to McDonough on Esplanade for a couple of months, then I quit when I was 15. That was in '55. "I didn't know Mac when he was in the Spades. I just remember seeing him playing guitar at the dances. I thought, 'That guy's pretty good.' Then I got with Leonard and through Leonard I met Mac. They had a guy playing piano with them, Hal Farrar, he went by the stage names 'King Helo Attaro' and 'Spider Boy.' Now Hal was a character, he was the character of them all; the main lunatic. He liked to drink vodka, he could care less about anything, just a wild man. He used to have this Cugat jacket he'd wear and he'd play piano and try to do all of Little Richard's stuff. He even had the little moustache. In fact, he recorded the original demo of 'I've Been Hoodood' (later to become the flip side of the Dr. John hit "Right Place, Wrong Time") with Leonard." Vocalists Wayne "Deadeye" Herring and Jerry Byrne were also drifting into the group at this point. "We used to do the old low-down blues," Herring told Jones. "There weren't too many white bands that could do it. Back then if you sat in with a black band, boy, they'd jump on your ass when you come outside. People took a dim view of that but we did it anyway." While band names revolved from the Skyliners to the Loafers to the Night Trains to the Thunderbirds, the foundation remained James, Rebennack, Stanley and Staehle. "Crippled" Eddie Hynes and Eddie Shroeder often floated in on trombone and baritone sax respectively. "Whether it was Leonard's band or my band, it was all pretty much the same crew of guys," says Rebennack, "Nothing really changed other than we changed the name of the band quite frequently. It kinda helped us get some gigs and win some talent shows. We lost them under one name and won them under another." The core foursome debuted on wax with an album of raunchy guitar and sax instrumentals, Boppin' and A Strollin' with Leonard James, recorded for Decca in 1956. Rough, ready and loose, the LP was the perfect soundtrack of noir New Orleans; at once evocative of French Quarter strip joints, high school dances and hood hangouts like the Rockery Inn. Along with discs like the Saxons' "Camel Walk' and the Sparks' "Merry Mary Lou," it stands as a testament to city's incredibly potent--but often obscured--white rock 'n' roll underground. "Leonard always took pride in combing his ducktail perfect," recalls Rebennack. "I mean, he would stand in front the mirror for an hour and then put his be-bop cap on--perfect. He had his little zoot suit pressed, more than the rest of us. We'd just wear them. They were the kind that didn't wrinkle any way. "Leonard was a great hustler. He used to walk in joints where they never had a band in their life. I remember us getting a gig in the Ninth Ward at a grocery store. Leonard conned this guy into hiring us but he wanted country music. We didn't know any country music so we'd play 'Comin' Around the Mountain' or whatever. As long as we were working, we didn't care nothing about none of the rest of it." From dives like the Club Leoma, the Blue Cat and the Jet Lounge, they moved up to the Clock on St. Charles Avenue and finally, the Brass Rail. "While we were working there Paul Gayten says, 'If y'all want to keep the gig, you're going to have to quit playing songs like the record.' And that became kind of a theme with our band. We didn't play them like the records, we played them our way." Gayten also took issue with their slightly out-of-date stage wear. "We had the same suits for so long that I don't think anybody ever considered getting new uniforms until Paul started fuckin' with us: 'Nobody wears zoot suits in Chicago; they wear continental suits.' Man, here we had all our money invested in these royal blue zoot suits. And what do we do? We got some new suits from Harry Hyman's or old man Sutton's on South Rampart--continental suits--and we wore them in Gretna when they had a gang fight at Cass's Lounge. They throwed us all in the drainage ditch out behind the joint. We ruined our new suits and we hadn't even paid for them yet! "When we worked at any of them joints on the West Bank, shit happened. At Spec's Moulin Rouge, old man Spec used to have guys walking around with pieces dressed like police but they wasn't official police, they was just guys who worked for old man Spec. Gang fights was, like, prevalent. When the Choctaw Boys and the Cherokees would have their annual beef at the Wego Inn on the Hill, it would be around Carnival. And it would be like, 'Goddamn.' You know the shit's going to happen; it's just when it's going happen. I would be trying to play close to the slot machines that were on the bandstand because I figured the slots could deal with the slugs better than me. When I saw anything that looked like it could be trouble, I'd back up toward the slots. But this is the kind of shit you had to endure back in them days because you were dealing with a bunch of crazy motherfuckers. And we were crazy, too." If there was one song that distilled the insanity into the length of a 45 RPM record, it was Rebennack's "Lights Out," cut by Jerry Byrne for Specialty in 1958. Punctuated by stop-time drum breaks, a foghorn-like saxophone riff and a searing piano solo courtesy of Art Neville, "Lights Out" has justifiably been called "the perfect rock 'n' roll song." Byrne's breakneck vocal nods to a personality so bent on bringing the house down that fights--and sometimes worse--often ensued. "Jerry was one of them suckers who worked the house," says Rebennack, "but he was a piece of work. He drove me crazy a number of times in my life. He was special with that. Hey, guys wanted to shoot me over things Jerry did. He had the ability to kick up more shit with more motherfuckers than anybody I know." In 1959, Byrne cut Mac's equally boisterous "Carry On" and then got sent to prison on a trumped-up statutory rape charge. Deadeye was already behind bars. "It was a never-ending thing," says Stanley, "just make a record and things happen, you know?" Despite the trouble, says Rebennack, "our band was really popular." They'd toured with Frankie Ford behind "Sea Cruise" and Byrne behind "Lights Out" as well as backing the traveling rock 'n' roll caravans at both the Municipal Auditorium and Pontchartrain Beach Amusement Park. And the records kept coming, from Bobby Lonero's "Little Bit" to Morgus and the Ghouls' "Morgus the Magnificent." "I don't think any of us thought that much about doing a record date," reflects Rebennack. "The gigs were the fun part. When I started working for Joe Ruffino's record company, Joe asked my daddy if I could be the president of the company and my daddy says, 'What are you crazy? This boy can't even find his fuckin' shoes!' But there were so many guys we did sessions for like Andy Blanco at Drew-blan in Morgan City and a bunch of other guys that had different little labels in the country. We played on all of Cos's Rex stuff and then we did a lot of crazy stuff all through the days we were working for Johnny Vincent over at Ace. I remember we stole 'Jimmy Crack Corn' and called it 'Ain't No Use.' We cut 'Row Your Boat' with Big Boy Myles. And I don't know how many different versions of 'Junco Partner' we cut with Roland Stone. We were some plagiarizing motherfuckers." Stone, the most prolific of Rebennack's vocalists on record, had already blazed the white R&B trail with local luminaries the Jokers when he waxed the regional smash "Just a Moment" with Rebennack in 1961. His entrance roughly coincided with the departure of Leonard James, who was replaced by Charlie Maduell after he joined the Air Force. "Charlie was just as crazy as Leonard was, but Leonard never got high. On the other hand, Charlie fit right in with the rest of us because he liked the narcotics, too. Probably the only one that wasn't a really serious drug addict was Stanley. If we were somewhere in the country, we would burglarize drug stores. When we were in the city, we forged 'scripts. We were strung out dope fiends, what the hell you going to do? There was a pharmacy on the corner of Dorgenois and Canal that used to sell to all the dope fiends. You had to go in there and ask for certain things, that's when I started getting my collection of Mad comic books together. If I got a comic book and a bag of pork rinds, that meant I wanted some opiates. Everything you ordered meant something else. We used to have so much fun that who'd have ever thought we'd wind up in jail? "My favorite gig was when Roland was singing with us and we started working at Little Club Forest on Jefferson Highway. At Club Forest, you could tell what audience hit because when all the junkies would come in, they'd just want to hear 'Junco Partner' over and over. When the whores came in they'd want to hear whatever their song was that night. So there were all these songs that fit the set. That gig was so fuckin' off the hook, so much crazy shit happened at that gig alone, I couldn't even describe it. "Between Charlie Maduell and Paul Staehle, they would always hide the stash for the band. One night they had a raid and Paul had the whole band's stash in his sock. They didn't shake us down, but the FBI came in and they emptied the joint. Somebody paid everyone's bond and before the night was over, Wes, the Jefferson Parish narc, was selling the customers back their dope in the band room! This is how out there it was. "And then Charlie went out and walked the bar and did the dance of the Seven Veils. He's out and there doing a striptease walking the bar. It's one of them gigs that's printed in my brain. And we always had what we used to call our 'band-aids' back then. Before they called them groupies, we called them band-Aids." When Stone fell for one of the young ladies a little too hard, friction arose. "I told Roland, 'Hey, listen, you can't marry this girl. She's our girl. She belongs to the band.' I thought I was doing him a favor but it backfired. He was obviously pissed." Stone showed up for his next recording session with three henchmen in tow including prizefighter Pepi Flores. "They stomped my ass. Charlie went out and got a gun and was firing in the air. I says, 'Charlie, quit shooting in the air! Shoot these motherfuckers!' He didn't even have real guns. They were replica weapons he'd loaded up! But we all went to work the next night together. Me and Charlie wound up having to wear shades and makeup to hide the black eyes. That's when I learned, hey, when it comes to matters of somebody's heart, stay the fuck out of it." The good times had to come to an end and they eventually did. Stone was busted on a narcotics charge, as was Maduell, who remains in Angola today. Within just a few years, Paul Staehle would die of a drug over dose. Rebennack's own luck ran out on Christmas Eve of 1961 when he intervened in a scuffle between Ronnie Barron and a jealous club owner who accused Barron of having an affair with his wife. "I walked in to get Ronnie at the last minute because Ronnie was like Leonard James, he'd take forever to get himself all perfect. So I go to get him and the guy's pistol-whipping him. Miss Mildred, Ronnie's mama, said if anything happened to her son on the road she was going to take a butcher knife and chop my cajones off. So I'm thinking, 'Man, if anything happens to this guy, his mama's going to fuck me up.' And hey, she was much more frightening to me than this guy was. I thought I had my hand over the handle of the gun, but it was over the barrel. I'm beating his hand on the bricks and as I'm hitting it, all of a sudden the gun went off and my finger's just about to fall off of my hand. It was hanging by a piece of skin and then I went crazy. I took Paul Staehle's ride cymbal out the case and just fucked up the guy's face. I was trying to pull his eyeballs out his head." Doctors managed to reattach the finger, but Rebennack had trouble playing guitar with the intensity he'd become known for. He concentrated on the keyboard, playing organ on virtually all of Huey Meaux's New Orleans sessions, most notably those of Barbara Lynn and Jimmy Donley. The first--and perhaps wildest--chapter of his musical career officially came to a close when he was busted and sent to federal prison in Fort Worth, Texas. Upon his release in 1965 he headed to California and his future as the Night Tripper. "You know what the kicks of it was?" Rebennack asks. "We wanted to play music so bad that we didn't ever think about it. We were trying to make a hustle just off of the gigs and that was part of the fun of it. Everything we done, we had fun doing it. That was the one thing that I always treasured about them days. It was just something that happened. When you're young and crazy and stupid, you do a lot of crazy, stupid shit. But a lot of that shit is great because you're too stupid to know better. I know that we made it a point to always have kicks, to always have good times no matter what was going to go down. We never thought, 'Oh, this is a suck-ass gig we're going on.' We went on all kinds of suck-ass gigs! But while we were doing them, we had a ball."

[mythicalsecretsanta]

Wrapping up Mythical Secret Santa 2018...

And there we have it, folks!

We’re just about to enter (or already have entered, heh) 2019, which means that’s a wrap on our second year of Mythical Secret Santa! We’ve had so much fun putting this event on in the past, and this year was absolutely no exception. 

You guys came to play: there was no shortage on the raw talent, the creativity in its many forms, and the overwhelming sense of giving and community you guys were willing to contribute - and for that, we say thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you for participating, thank you for liking and reblogging the gifts, thank you for spreading the word about our little end-of-year celebration. 

You guys are the whole, ENTIRE reason we love doing this so much, and we can’t thank you more for making it such an easy, enjoyable process for us.

It was the second iteration of what we hope will be an ongoing tradition in our Mythical fandom, and as we come up with more ideas and ways to make each year even better than the last (which we 100% welcome from you guys, too, by the way), we hope you’ll stick with us and come back for more fun and friendship next year. After all, nothing beats unwrapping a present at the end of a long year!

(Special thanks to @mythosethan for his support this year! <3 You’re our fandom angel, Ethan, and we appreciate you so much!)

Anyway, let’s get back to business...

Did you miss all the unwrapping? Well, you’ll find a wrap-up (pun definitely intended) of all the gifts from this year’s Secret Santa below the cut. Please take heed of any warnings, notes, and tags as left by their creator and/or us, and of course, enjoy!

From both of us, we wish you the happiest and most successful New Year! Party hard and safely, and we’ll see you in 2019 for whatever Mythicality our two internetainers have in store for us! 

Keep being your Mythical best,

Sims and Ren

Artwork (all rated G):

A winter’s night moment by @noctomythiclaw

A fic-inspired tussle by @arel-rhink

A cuddly Rhink comic by @ladycynthiana

A fireside Christmas scene by @hatoheart

Some spooning sweetness by @sinister-servant

A Link evolution by @MarleyMuscat11

A Christmas cuddle by @remembertherandler

A puppy love meet-cute by @peachboiis

Fiction (ratings as below):

Missing You on Christmas Day (rated G) by @afangirlsplaylist

being with you (rated G) by @electricdoves

Memories (rated G) by @good-mythical-maddi

Snapshots of Love (rated G) by @les342

The Perfect Tree (rated G) by @mythosethan

Bookish (rated G) by @like-a-wild-potato

The One With The Coffee Shop (rated G) by @ridiculuce

12 Mythical Days of Christmas (rated G) by @cypriusgray

27 (rated G) by @siirenwavves

Bravery (rated G) by @afangirlsplaylist

Sunny Skies (rated G) by @ultrahyperfixated-me

Like Coffee, Like Tea (rated T) by @archionblu

Until We Meet Again (rated T) by @elliefcutie

I Wanna Dance With Somebody (rated T) by @rhinkipoo

Surprise Gift (rated T) by @jacularmetteld

Lost (rated T) by @jules-myhairgoesup

This is Normal (rated T) by @afangirlsplaylist

Take Me Home (rated T) by @maybe-mythical

Cookie Crisis (rated T) by @mythicaliz

Untitled (rated T) by @Sammy75J

The Dog Days of Christmas (rated T) by @likeaswitchinheat

Untitled (rated T) by @mythical_tamra

Texting (rated E) by @killthenaughtyboy

You, Me, and the Mistletoe (rated E) by @the-average-bear

A Rhett Dream (rated E) by @rileyrooin

A Lowkey Christmas (rated E) by @a-smut-sundae

Tell Me (rated E) by Anonymous

Without Shame (rated E) by @fanbabble

New Year’s Kiss (rated E) by @maybe-mythical

Learning and Unlearning (rated E) by @likeaswitchinheat

Santa Battle (rated E) by @themouthking

Miscellaneous (all rated G):

A MerRhett-inspired pillow by @greenyjess

A snuggly Barbara and Jade graphic by @les342

A video edit about a certain cereal bath by @youresoloud

A Tour-inspired graphic by @les342

A graphic of our guys and their puppies by @afangirlsplaylist

[onwardintolight]

Have you had a chance to read Last Shot yet? If so what did you think?

Yes I have! I finished it the day before yesterday, and I really enjoyed it, despite a few qualms.

I especially liked Han’s emotional journey as he comes to terms with being a parent. I’m dumbfounded at how a lot of people (*cough* Reylos) have used this book to argue that Han was a terrible parent and even to insinuate that he abandoned Ben, when clearly that’s anything but the case in the book. (It’s also not the case in any canon book or source material. Le sigh.) I think a lot of people have already addressed this though, and I’ll reblog some good stuff about that later, so that’s all I’ll say on this ridiculous assertion for now. 

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed watching Han grow as he wrestles with his fear and insecurity, learns how to simultaneously be a dad and follow his passion, and starts to really find his place during this new time after the war. I’m sure I’ll struggle similarly if/when I become a mom someday; I can’t imagine how daunting it would be for Han, having never had a family of his own. I thought his struggles were really sympathetically and beautifully portrayed. 

It’s made abundantly clear that his love for Leia and his son knows no bounds — in fact, that’s exactly why he’s struggling so much in the first place. He wants to be what they need and is afraid that maybe he isn’t; maybe he’s not equipped to be the “perfect” dad, whatever that is. And he finds out that, no, he may not know everything there is to know about parenting, but that’s okay —he’s trying and learning, along with Leia, and he loves them deeply, and that’s what matters. Moreover, his passion for flying isn’t something that he has to give up in order to be a husband and dad. Both can exist at the same time. He can be true to himself and a family man.

I did find it irritating, however, that they show Han as struggling with all this, but Leia seems to automatically know everything there is to know about motherhood (@inelegantprose​ has said some good things about this). This to me reeks of sexism. Yes, Leia had a family growing up, but she had no Organa siblings and I can’t imagine she was ever surrounded by very many babies, lol. The birth of a child would raise a whole lot of fears and insecurities for her, as much or even more so than Han — particularly when taking into account the knowledge of who her real father was. 

The book says that Ben’s arrival “seemed to light up the whole world when he’d first arrived: this simple impossible sliver of hope amid so much death and destruction.” I like that idea, and I could imagine they both felt that, profoundly. All the same, I think it’s likely that while Ben was dearly loved and celebrated, he wasn’t planned, and if Leia had had the opportunity, she would not have chosen to get pregnant (at least not yet), fresh off the revelation of her bloodline. (Although I also think it’s entirely possible she was just pushing that information away during this time, denying it and not dealing with it because it was too hard to accept.) 

Anyway, I wish the book had showed some of Leia’s parenthood struggles, too, and not set her up to be such a natural supermom. However, I’ll concede these points: 1) This book is entirely centered on Han and Lando and their inner journeys, not Leia’s. 2) Leia admittedly has had a WHOLE lot of practice at looking poised and put together, no matter what’s she’s going through (something the book even mentions). 3) While I believe the author could have done a better job and portrayed it in a less sexist way, there’s still a lot of room to guess at what’s really going on in Leia’s mind. 4) At least this is less fodder for Kylo stans, I guess? Consequently, I’m not as upset as I might be otherwise.

My opinions of the characterizations in this book varied greatly. Most often, I felt like there was a remarkable sensitivity to the characters’ emotional worlds that rang true. And that, to me, is what matters most. Still, there were bits of dialogue and action that just didn’t feel right to me, and, like in some of the comics, the characters at times seemed rather like extreme caricatures of themselves. For instance, Han’s tendency to run things by the seat of his pants doesn’t mean he’s always spontaneous or unprepared. He came off as rather clueless at times, which I think does him a great disservice. He also came off  as overly gruff and terrible at communicating, which I think he is to an extent, but not nearly as much as this book makes him out to be. Also, just because Leia calls people names in ANH and ESB when she’s really upset doesn’t mean she calls everyone names all the time (as a sidenote, I found some of the names she called people in this book a little odd. Calling Han “you old lug” or “old man”?…I’m just not feeling it).

That being said, overall, I felt like Han and Leia’s interactions in this book were an absolute delight. There are several scenes and exchanges that I will treasure. I don’t want to spoil them, so I won’t go into too much detail here. I also appreciated that, while Leia’s motherhood struggles were not acknowledged, her trauma very much was. There were a few little hints and snapshots into that from both conversations and Han’s reflections that I thought were extremely well done (and left me with a whole ton of feelings).

Similar to how I felt about the characterizations, I’m kind of back and forth on the plot itself. Overall I enjoyed it, but there were three storylines going on in three separate timelines, and the fact that they were all mixed around throughout the book, while involving some of the same main characters, made it a little confusing for me. I felt like there were some leaps of logic, too, that were perplexing. However, this entire impression could be due to the fact that my brain was rather foggy the night I read most of it. Who knows, a second read-through might make it all fall into place! Moral of the story: don’t binge-read this book when you’re half-asleep. ;) 

I really loved the exploration of droid rights, and what that actually means, although I felt like there could have been a lot more said on the subject.

I’m thrilled we got a Latinx POC author for Star Wars. I’m sure there’s a lot I’m missing (do I have any Latinx followers who can tell me more?), but I appreciated the representation and perspective. Also certain little details, like the fact that there was an Alderaanian character who clearly speaks with a Spanish accent (putting an e- before a word starting with st-, for example) — more evidence for a Hispanic Alderaan! 

Speaking of representation, off the top of my head, I can think of a non-binary person, a gay person, and many people of color, including main characters (and not just Lando). On a much lesser note, I also appreciated the fact that a lot of aliens were represented too!

I loved Lando’s journey in regards to his relationship with Kaasha; exploring what it means to be his scoundrelly self and yet be committed to one person.

I really loved the look into Han and Lando’s pasts with the storylines set ten years before. There’s one element in particular that got me from the outset, which I’ll write briefly about under the cut so as not to spoil anyone.

All this continues to give me great hopes for the Solo movie, and that they’ll approach these characters with sensitivity and complexity (as well as fun).

TL;DR: This book was probably a 7 out of 10 for me — I enjoyed it quite a bit, though it doesn’t come near to replacing some of the other new canon SW books for me (of which Bloodline still tops the list). I had mixed feelings about certain things but overall I’m happy about this addition to canon! I strongly encourage you, if you have any interest at all in new canon, to ignore the ridiculous Kylo-apologist discourse and give this book a shot!

(warning: spoilers under the cut!)

The part I was talking about that really got to me was when we first meet Han 10 years prior. As the scene opens, we find Han nursing a hangover and a broken heart over a girl (he never says her name). While he eventually gets over it, we are given a poignant window into Han’s big heart and sensitive soul underneath the rough exterior. He can’t help but love people. He can’t help but be absolutely devastated at their loss. He’s lonely and constantly striving for human connection (we see this later in how he relates to Sana and develops a rather silly, sudden rebound crush on her). He tends to go all in, despite himself and the risk, and consequently, he ends up getting hurt a lot. THIS MAKES ME FEEL A LOT OF THINGS. Gaaaah I love Han Solo, okay? It hurts to see him hurting, but it also makes my heart so happy to know that someday, he’ll find the belonging he so desperately seeks.

[themyskira]

Wonder Woman #49

Previously in James Robinson’s sad spiral into senility: Wonder Woman accidentally summoned +~teh D4rK g0dz~+, a group of alternate-universe Greek Gods who are allegedly extremely dark and gritty and terrifying. ROLL CALL!

Mob God: goddess of chaos, shit version of Eris

The God With No Name: loser who walks around with a sheet on his head

Savage Fire: auditioned for the part of sexy Satan, was disappointed to be cast as a war god instead; crotch is literally on fire

Karnell: evil love god who is ~tortured~ because insert generic fridging story here

King Best: calls himself that with a straight face; giant stone Darkseid knockoff

Written as devastatingly evil heavy-hitters, they mostly just succeed at invoking intense second-hand embarrassment.

Now, after being AWOL for an entire issue, Diana is back and ready to take the fight to the Dark Gods. It’s time for a showdown!

…ooooorrrr we could just fart around for twenty pages and end on the most obvious fake-out imaginable.

First off, we need to talk about Stephen Segovia’s cover because WHAT.

Segovia is often praised for his dynamic, action-oriented art, and it’s not necessarily undeserved. Action is clearly his strength, and he excels at fast-paced fight scenes.

But he also has a tendency to deliver pages like this one, or like the splash page in WW #46, where no one part of the (invariably female) character’s anatomy seems to connect to any other part. Absurd boobs-and-butt action shots are nothing new in comics, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen such egregious examples. 

Look at Sexy Satan Lady: what is happening to her arse in that scene? Her left shoulder seems to have slipped halfway down her torso, and god only knows where her hips have fucked off to. Diana’s upper torso, on the other hand, seems to be directly attached to her hips, and she’s missing half her left leg.

But moving onto the bad joke that is this entire issue.

Diana and Jason are preparing to take on Best Buy, who seems less interested in transforming the Earth into a glorious hellscape than he is in playing out his monster movie fantasies by making himself giant and stomping on houses.

I’m serious. When the Biggest of Bads eats the entire Justice League, giving him access to unimaginable power, and he chooses to use that power to animate an impractically large and stupidly-taxing-to-operate body, enabling him to go on a slow-moving rampage through DC, I can only assume that his motive is ‘RAAAAA LOOK AT ME I’M GAMERA!!’ Because he could legitimately have used that power to consume the entire continental US in flames if that was what he wanted to do.

Steve radios in, and Diana instructs him to give the readers an exposition dump. She actually flags it, as if she’s a news anchor interviewing a reporter on the scene: “What about the other gods? Where in the world are they and what kind of damage are they causing?”

So Steve tells us who the other Dark Gods are, where in the world they are and what kind of damage they are causing.

James Robinson has been professionally writing comics for almost thirty years. I think it’s past time somebody told him to stop.

Sexy Satan Lady is inciting all the nations of South America to war.

Mobglob has the population of Britain in a rapturous thrall, which seems a little outside her ‘chaos and rioting’ wheelhouse. People are just staring into the sky, not eating or drinking or noticing anything around them. Steve says that children, babies and the elderly are already beginning to sicken and die from dehydration and exhaustion, which is strange, since this has only been going on for a good ten minutes.

Kandy Krush has the entire population of China consumed in a violent orgy, and the Horse With No Name is inciting Russians to suicide.

“And none of this includes the acts of madness and violence happening everywhere else in the world just from the Dark Gods’ presence on Earth,” says Steve, finishing his news report.

Remember, aside from Steve’s second-hand updates, we’ve seen no evidence of the Dark Gods’ presence infecting the world with this wide-scale hysteria and violence, aside from two people losing their shit at Diana.

Robinson tries to correct this now: over three pages, he shows us snapshots of four individuals in each of the four regions under assault from the Dark Gods, as their ordinary lives are swept up and consumed by the violent, chaotic supernatural forces that are slowly reshaping the world.

It’s a familiar device, particularly in horror comics, and the best writers can use it to truly chilling effect — think Alan Moore in Swamp Thing, Neil Gaiman in Sandman.

Robinson is no Moore and he’s no Gaiman. His is simply a by-the-numbers effort, one that in illustrates the chaos on the ground in technical terms, without imparting any particular sense of horror or empathy for the characters.

Panel 1: Character is going about their ordinary life.

Panel 2: Character comes in contact with the Dark God’s influence.

Panel 3: Character is consumed.

It’s weak, bloodless writing that only serves to rehash the two-page infodump we just got from Steve.

Diana and Jason take on Emperor Awesome.

“This planet will be unlike anything you could ever image after we’re done with it. Your hell. My heaven. Earth first and then the universe. Remade in horror.”

Again, so far you’ve done nothing but squander the power you’ve harvested on living out a kaiju fantasy, so I’m less than terrified.

Diana fluffs up her air, pushes in her neck, thrusts out her boobs and attacks tits-first.

“That’s it, brother! Hit him hard with the wind power of our father, Zeus…”

WHO TALKS LIKE THIS?!

This isn’t just lazy writing, it’s downright contemptuous. Do you think your readers are so absurdly dense that they’ve somehow forgotten that Jason has wind powers, which he inherited from Zeus, who is his father, and Diana’s as well because they’re twins? Because that’s the only justifiable reason to include such a stilted, pedantic line of dialogue in the middle of a Big Boss battle.

Jason doesn’t need reminding, and Diana’s not going to waste both breath and precious seconds. All she needs is three words: ‘Jason! Wind blast!’

(I’d argue she shouldn’t be saying anything at all here, since generally announcing each of your attacks to a larger and stronger opponent is a surefire way to get flattened, but then again, Jason is incompetent and in need of direction.)

There’s an unintentionally comical sequence in which Jason uses his wind power to lift Sir Excellent into the air and he and Diana manoeuvre the apparently unprotesting giant over the Atlantic Ocean, before dropping him in.

Thus, the scariest and most evil god that ever is or was is rendered temporarily helpless by a strong wind.

Obviously he won’t be out of the fight for long, because Robinson is nothing if not predictable.

In the meantime, Jason goes to have another crack at fighting Sexy Satan Lady. She gloats and he charges at her, while silently begging for Athena to give him the wisdom to best use the power of Dolos — Dolos being the personified spirit of trickery and cunning deception. Basically, he’s telling us that he’s planning to deceive the Dark Gods. Keep this in mind.

Diana has joined Steve for another multi-page infodump.

“We’re getting ready to deploy the Suicide Squad — multi-team, biggest version ever, actually. Plus the Titans and any Justice League reservists I can get my hands on… the trouble is, the gods keep turning the heroes, making them as insane as everyone else. The Ray, Zatanna, Damage, Beaumont and Sunny Jim in Britain, to name a few. The list goes into the hundreds. That, or as with the Justice League, they get absorbed by the gods who are made all the stronger for it.”

Hey, you know what’s more fun than watching superheroes team up to fight a world-ending threat??? Having a secondary character describe that happening from a safe distance!

Robinson has ample page-space to show us these things. The amount of time he spends each issue dicking around, rehashing things we’ve already been told and having characters deliver unnecessarily long infodumps, he could very easily devote to scenes like the ones Steve is describing here: Amanda Waller deploying a last-ditch, multi-team Suicide Squad. Other heroes and teams coming up against the Dark Gods and being overwhelmed. Magic users being consumed by the Dark Gods’ bloodthirsty and intoxicating energies. Heavy-hitters being made to turn against their own, or simply being devoured without laying a single blow.

And if Robinson is too lazy or too incompetent to write those scenes, then the very least he can do is shut the fuck up about it, instead of having Steve describe what sounds like a much more interesting comic.

Steve and Diana get word that all of the Dark Gods just vanished. (Actually, they get word that all of the Dark God just vanished, because nobody is editing this comic.) Then all five are sighted in the skies over Paraguay, where Jason had gone to fight Sexy Satan Lady. Diana rushes to Jason’s rescue aaaaaaand…

Jason: Looking for me, sister?! I have something for you— the lightning of our father combined with the fire of Hephaestus. Diana: Jason! NO! They can’t have driven you mad! I thought you’d be stronger— Jason: Mad? Why, sister, I’m saner than I’ve ever been. I see everything clearly. The Greek gods are nothing… ALL PRAISE THE DARK GODS.

In fairness, on its face this is a perfectly plausible twist, because Jason has continually shown himself to be weak-willed, incompetent and selfish — and has a track record of being tricked into the service of supervillain conquerors with only the lightest bit of prodding.

But since we’ve already been as good as told that this is a fake-out (two pages ago, when Jason announced his intention to deceive the Dark Gods), this cliffhanger just feels like more padding. There’s so little substance to this story, I can’t believe it’s gone on for this long.

Fortunately, next issue is the final one of this garbage fire of a run. I’m hoping desperately for Jason to die in the final battle, but I’m willing to settle for banished out of reach.

However, I’m pleased to note that my Jason’s-magic-armour-doesn’t-do-anything theory remains intact.

[boo-cool-robot]

X-Men Fic Recs

X-Men fandom is mildly to moderately cursed but here’s some good fic. Mostly movie-verse, mostly Charles/Erik because of like, who I am as a person. My favorites are marked with an asterisk. I’ve tried to add warnings for untagged stuff that might be upsetting, but I make no guarantees. (Also reccing a fic is not an endorsement of the author.) 

Updated 11/25/18, new additions are bolded. 

Under the cut because it sure has gotten that long!

Canon Compliant [Through The Last Stand or XM:A]

*The Building of the House by kvikindi (Peter & Erik): A take on Peter and Erik’s relationship while they rebuild the mansion post-Apocalypse. If you read one fic from this fandom, it should be this one. It’s absurd and exuberant the way any Peter fic should be, but it’s also delicate and and deeply engaged with the intergenerational trauma sunken into the bones of this family. Just, god. Probably the best cultural trauma fic for any fandom I’ve ever read. (Reading on mobile is highly recommended because of formatting.) 

*Tehillim by kvikindi (Erik-centric): Post-Apocalypse. Erik wanders around Haifa in a dissociative state, thinks on his past, and calls Charles. Sequel to The Building of the House, though it can stand alone. Luminous and beautiful and every word painful to the touch. 

the sea, the sea, by disenchanted (Charles/Erik): If you know disenchanted’s other work, you’ll know this is lovely--a dizzyingly romantic portrait of their love during First Class, even as they feel the edges of it falling apart

To Breathe Again (Impossibilities Remix) by Unforgotten (Charles/Erik): Erik returning as the world collapses in the wake of The Last Stand. I’m just a sucker for longing!!

nuclear winter by honey_wheeler (Charles/Erik): Erik watches Charles get a lapdance on the eve of Cuba and it is stunningly sad, clicking home with all inevitability. 

*Fear the Rest by Penknife (Charles/Erik, O5 ensemble): The decades leading up to being who they are in X1. Really, really strong sense of politics and place in time. Excellent, complex Erik interactions with the students. Additional warnings for serophobia. 

Anthem for Doomed Youth by Fahye (Mystique & Charles): Mystique before and during the events of First Class. Good relationship work and exploration of how their powers have shaped them. 

Canon Divergence 

*Fathers and Sons by M_Leigh (Peter & Erik): Post-DOFP, Erik realizes Peter is his kid and comes by the mansion to tell him, it goes about as well as you’d think. Line for line probably the funniest fic in this fandom, and has an vicious view of Charles that is my favorite. 

*Synthesis (Scenes from an AU) by Starlady (Charles/Erik): Snapshots from a universe where Erik came back after Cuba to help run the school. Unlike most of this kind of fic though, everyone is still political and contentious and awful as they need to be. Also, has an extremely good Jean Grey. 

the end of the world (just not ours) [INCOMPLETE] by hiyashi (Erik-centric): Where Erik does a lot of drugs instead of embracing his rage. I cannot explain in the least why I’m so into this characterization of Erik in this unfinished crackfic, but I super am.

Third Law of Motion by arcapelago: Magneto lives at the school but the students are determined to keep him away from Charles. This one is just really funny, idk. 

tel aviv series by mnabakov (Charles/Erik): AU where they met on a beach in Israel after all. Very atmospheric, languid fics. Warnings for untagged Holocaust mentions and internalized homophobia stuff. 

The Way Things Break by GrayJay (Alex and Scott): God I love good sibling fic. This is an attempt to reconcile Summers family comics backstory with the Alex of the XMCU and it comes out really well. Everyone feels extremely dimensional in their trauma, and this Scott is a darling. 

defined by my logic by lloydsglasses (Jean-centric): Sketches from the life of trans girl Jean Grey. Very sweet. 

sparkle and fade by sabinelagrande (Charles/Erik): Phew. One where Erik stays after Cuba but they fall apart anyway. Pretty much unmitigated tragedy. 

Complete AUs

*Limited Release by rageprufrock (Charles/Erik, Alex, First Class Ensemble): Modern still-powered AU where Erik and Raven are FBI agents, Charles is a controversial professor, and Alex is on parole because his brother has been kidnapped by Shaw. Exceedingly well-constructed and well-plotted. Everything is fraught and also hilarious. 

Knowledge Management by phalangine (Charles/Erik): A still-powered modern AU where Erik is a scary librarian and Charles is an amused patron, though it quickly extends much broader than that. Languid and complicated, with especially good Charles characterization. Most importantly, it’s got that good good disability content. 

*”Lessons” ‘Verse by Red (Charles/Erik): Still-powered modern AU where Charles and Erik are both super traumatized and little shits and they have Issues while they do a bunch of kinky shit. One of the rare extremely good portrayals of disabled Charles. 

If You Liked the Book, You’ll Hate the Movie by paperclipbitch (First Class ensemble): Nonpowered high school AU. Irritating that it doesn’t have disabled Charles because otherwise the characterization is great. Raven Had A Weird Childhood and has a drunk brother. Erik is a guidance counselor who has definitely killed a man. Everyone is the worst. 

Shovel Talks and Other Hazards by Unforgotten (Charles/Erik): I can’t believe this ship has 12k fics on AO3 but there’s only one good fake dating fic and this is it!! Erik is Charles’ hot neighbor that he asks to be his pretend date for Raven’s wedding, you know how it goes. Warning for an untagged CSA mention. 

*i guess i should say thanks or some shit by orphan_account (Charles/Erik): The world’s best characterization of college AU-ish Cherik: drunk, depressed douchebags with questionable morals. In Amsterdam. 

New Beautiful Things Come by raven (Charles/Erik, First Class ensemble): Modern still-powered AU where Charles is a professor and Erik runs a kosher bakery and they have a contentious romance. Notable for being one of the few AUs where it feels like queerness and mutantdom have real political weight, even if that’s not the focus. 

*Six Lessons in Living in Sin by Penknife (Charles/Erik): Canon era-ish AU where they move in together and it’s difficult. Quiet, atmospheric, sad with a deep love between them. Warnings for Holocaust mentions. 

Condonare by etirabys (Charles/Erik/Hannibal Lecter): Uh well it’s a fic where young Nazi hunters Erik and Hannibal shack up with uni student Charles. *buries face in hands* It’s really good. Warnings for violence and internalized homphobia. 

after all the breath and dirt by magneticwave (Charles/Erik, First Class Ensemble): Both dynamically fun and deeply sad characterization, all in an Inception AU where Erik haunts Charles. Nondisabled Charles. 

Non-Movie

*Scott’s Life is Hard series by yellow_caballero (X-kids ensemble; Scott; Kitty, Peter; Emma): Sometimes a family is like thirty mutant youth wannabe superheroes, all screaming, in one mansion. Also Magneto is there. Based in part on Evolution, the high school AU cartoon, but is still highly enjoyable without knowledge of that canon. Ditto for the New Mutants/X-Force stuff. The third fic in this series has an exceptional Emma Frost voice. 

Camp Xavier by captainpeggy (Kitty, Bobby, gigantic-ass ensemble): Charles and Erik run rival mutant summer camps and Kitty is going to make this her year. 

*That Would Be Enough by Wish_I_Had_A_Tail (Kitty & Erik): Modern AU where Kitty spends Passover with Magneto. Kitty just feels like SUCH a clever, overthinky teen and I love this relationship. 

That Which We Are by GrayJay (Scott-Centric): Deeply sad comics-compliant trans Scott Summers. Really really good fucked up medical stuff. (Also read all of GrayJay’s Scott fic. It’s that good.) 

Five Times Someone Questioned the Brilliance and Resolve of the Writer, Director, and Producer of the Annual Theatrical Production of the Xavier School for Gifted Individuals bystoriesfortravellers (Jean, X-kids ensemble): Tiny crackfic about iron fisted theater director Jean. There’s a line in there that absolutely murders me. 

The World Outside Was Hungry by tzigane, Zaganthi (Caffiends) (Charles/Erik): Still-powered comics AU where they meet at Columbia as students and slowly build a life together. This Erik’s sense of the world feels so appropriately odd and lovely. Warnings for Holocaust imagery and homophobia. 

Five Sleeping Arrangements by seriousfic (Scott/Emma/Jean): Scott and Jean drag Emma into having a semi-functional relationship. Everyone is a terrible delight, particularly Emma. 

[colorguardsweetheartblurrsgirl]

Shattered Remnants--Undertale AU Update... and other things!

Hey Everyone,

Sorry for the lack of updates. Honestly, I got really busy with school lately, but I’ve been working and tweaking my written forms of the comic. While making my first few pages by hand. I was holding back on major art for a while to see if I could save enough money for an art tablet to help me better color the pictures faster then using my laptops mouse pad. (Yes I know I could invest in a cheap mouse, but my history with them is many lost pieces (port or mouse) and disappointed running times  (how long battery lasted, or it lasted before refusing to work), and many other reasons I won’t get into... Huh.... Lets just say mouses and me, specifically wireless mouses just never have had a healthy relationship (at least not for several years). 

Besides I like the feel of at least having physical control through feeling through the pad. Where a sudden jerk of the mouse can mess a whole thing up, it’s more controlled this other way)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Anyways, I wanted to inform you that I’ve been lately working on a fun little present for Christmas with my characters. Although I started this late in the season when the idea for it came to me. So I’m not sure i’ll have it entirely finished for Christmas, but I’ll do my best to have it out soon. With it, I’m also planning a surprise for you by New Years.... What is it??? Well you’ll have to wait and see ;) But it may or may not be a preview, or first few pages of the comic. I will not admit to which, but in the next week or two look out for a update from me...

However, I’m planing on making a patreon page. School is important and I am struggling to find a second job to help pay for it, which means less time spent on this comic i have a long plan for. While I’m in the works of possibly creating another comic I hope to submit to webtoons when I get the right tools to complete my work faster.

But this said my main focus isn’t on the comic seeing I’m focused on finishing school for now... But it would help having a patron to pay for art supply's in the future...

However I don’t want to sound like I’m petitioning/pushing for this at the moment, seeing I have nothing to show for it...

As for the original characters picture I promised you. I have it, I was working hard on it... Even evading computer updates to keep up certain pictures of settings... When I finally updated and realized I really craped out my computer which now restarts every time I close it and open it back up.... Lets say me and computers always have a love hate relationship... It’s just I’m the one who does the dumb no brainer thing last minute. It kinda deterred me for a while. But i’m looking at my half finished page of them and I should have it done soon.

I still have considered the character greet comic, just to get to know my original characters in this.I just haven’t made time to make it. I plotted out ideas and questions that could be asked. I just got lost between everything I didn’t really put the effort into it as I hoped. By looks of things, if I manage to do it around the posting of the first few pages, I should have something like this closely following. Although I won’t make promises....

On another note the other comic I mentioned. I originally intended it as a Fanfict to a ride that I always loved. Although being a ride it was more inspired by things in it and not became my own story original characters, while mentions to the lore in it... I’m considering making a test comic for it. Though I can’t say I’ll post it any time soon, as like I said, if I’m to make it I have to have saved for a art tablet.... But just let me know if your interested. It’s a ghost story tied with mystery. I always loved mystery and supernatural themed stories growing up and this one has a fun twist to a famous ride and it’s lore. Just if I get enough interest i might post the art I already created out of fun for the story, or recreate some scene.... I just thought I’d add this little message in as well. 

BUT DO NOT FRET..... I couldn’t possibly leave this message high and dry without showing something... So instead of posting just a another long worded message that might fall on deaf ears... Instead I decided to post early concept art of the first chapter... This was the early in progress page (not taken with my best camera) art concept of the Season 1 Chapter art.... The other picture is a snapshot of my work in progress for the work I did in the musical setting I spoke of as a fun mini comic I believe in a previous message. (Although that could be a message I never posted that’s probably still sitting in docs... in that case Whoops) Anyways early on in making this comic I started a fun musical themed comic with characters of this comic. It started as a fun step back from the harder more depressing tone of Shattered... Besides I grew up on music and musicals. So I couldn’t resists... This is just an idea of my unpainted bare bones of my comic. This is hardly how the final project will look. Both pictures are somewhat old as some things have changed and in these and been fixed. But I felt they still looked good to show (and that way I don’t spoil the final version) Anyways see you Lovely's... Have Very Incredible Holidays Whatever you Celebrate, A VERY MERRY FABULOUS CHRISTMAS,

AND EXTREMELY WONDROUS HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!! Sincerely Blaze (BlurrsGirl/Sweet<3)