#cowells

[chalkrub]

reminiscing about childhood books after that ask - all due respect to cool sleek movie toothless....but to me, he will always be a mean little gremlin

[one-time-i-dreamt]

Guy Fieri trapped me in an electrified cage and told me to write his name down on a sticky note, and if I got it wrong the cage would shock me and I would die. For some reason, I thought he was Simon Cowell, but when I put the sticky note up, it didn't shock me, leading Guy Fieri to have an identity crisis.

[campichor]

EPIC: The Musical - Ruthlessness

[macs-instantdoodles]

The song "Soldier, Poet, King" by The Oh Hellos is perfect for these three.

Had to draw the three of them happy because they go through too much

[larrylimericks]

16Oct24

He took the stage first, just a boy, Now the first one to leave, just a boy. Nothing’s right, hearts are torn, For Liam, we mourn — Knowing Payne means we got to know joy.

[classichorrorblog]

Village Of The Damned (1960)

[sicilianolive]

wolverine (2000-2009), you will always be famous 💛

[fluffyslug]

Does anyone remember this scene from 'How to Speak Dragonese'? The one that was so wierdly out of character for Hiccup but still felt totally right?

I love this scene. Fishlegs should be there too but I left him out to make room for speech bubbles so just imagine that he's dangling off to the side somewhere absolutely dying.

[kingofthewilderwest]

We need to start questioning the conflation of "maturity" with "increased stakes."

It's not to say higher stakes is always a bad choice. The first half of the How to Train Your Dragon book series has an endearingly whimsical, child-like feel. Hiccup's issues in the first half of book one are an obnoxious, cat-sized Toothless pooping in his helmet. The movie adaptation might have made the book and its counterpart distant cousins, but it was a thoughtful move to alter concepts to the appropriately theatrical: books and movies aren't the same medium. Hiccup riding alone on Toothless, exchanging fire blasts with a mountain-sized dragon, and losing his leg came off as well-done storytelling.

Hiccup staring at a prosthetic never happened in the book. He didn't lose his leg in his encounter with the Green Death. It was, as the creative powers behind the movie said, a result of the increased stakes. They didn't do this just to be more dramatic; they did it because it seemed that, based on how their narrative was going, this made sense. And this was a soft, quiet, shocking, breath-taking scene that instilled how good the movie handled its stakes. It gave us a reflective reaction to consequences that audiences might not have expected. This movie understood timing, pauses, quietness, narrative arc, poignance, reflection, emotion, love, and heart.

We know about the conflation of live action as "more mature" than animation. But a medium doesn't change maturity levels. We all know that's bogus, and many analyses have been given on that. Disney live actions add extraneous gunk, down to Gaston having a past relationship with war (so I've heard, from the people who actually watched the movie), and Disney giving us the sad scoop on why Belle's mom isn't around. Furthermore, lots of times, when I see the conversion of animation to live action, I notice creators feel a need to "raise the stakes" -- in line with the erroneous view of "giving maturity."

But "higher stakes" often means inserting action in place of mindful interaction. I feel today's Hollywood movies, in their treatment of "action," don't let movies pause and breathe anymore - ergo, they don't let us think. Isn't it more juvenile to actively avoid thought in favor of "hey look I made the building go boom"? There may be less "stakes" in introspection and mindful dialogue, but that's what gives it its maturity. That's how we went from Iron Man 1, with its grounded treatment of war and abuse, to the mindless high spectacle MCU is today.

Snappy one-liners or moments that clap at contemporary issues don't substitute for maturity. What can make a story mature is characters grappling with issues in a natural narrative through-line. A snappy one-liner is its own form of speedy spectacle.

We know about the conflation of "gore and sex" with "mature audiences." I believe they're right that graphic sex and gore is designed for adults. But that doesn't make it mature, and that doesn't make it the only way to target a medium for adults.

"Realisticness" isn't maturity. Per above regarding animation: realistic visuals are nothing. And if you think that putting more Debbie Downer material into your adaptation makes it more adult, you have to ask yourself why the themes that spoke to people's souls got muddled in its midst. We weren't mature enough to interact with the most subtle, nuanced, and impacting voice of the story. But hey! Look! There's more corpses, I guess!

It's not the visuals, it's not the events. It's not the "things." It's not the basic insertion of the external. Get past the superficial, get past the top layer of presentation. It's the mind. It's the ability to think. It's the ability to be still. It's the ability to be interested and attentive when something is slow or quotidian, because we can understand why that is important for narrative growth or arcs or themes or commentary on the human condition. It's the ability to know when and when not to include something. It's the ability to make resonant impact. It's the ability to be deep with your emotions or your themes. It's the ability to take what you have and grow it in a way by which we can derive something deeper.

Maturity is critical thought and well-conducted, appropriate responses to content of any kind.

As DeBlois tells Empire, the move to live-action brings a different emphasis to How To Train Your Dragon; a new heft, both physically and emotionally. “It’s so dialed-up in terms of stakes — having a fully credible, photo-real dragon stomping around trying to kill him,” the director says.

And maybe that DeBlois quote is taken out of context. Maybe there's more going on than that one sentence conveys. Maybe Empire is making their own erroneous assumptions. But "so dialed-up in terms of stakes," isn't, on its own, a good appeal. The animated movie already dialed things up - and knew when to include or not include something. A live-action that imitates the visuals of the animated movie exactly, as if no independent thought has been done to its unique adaptation, to the pros and cons of the medium, to what a independently-presented story needs and doesn't need... It has to make you wonder: how many conflations of "maturity" are going on?

How long are we going to keep making our own conflations?

[fedtothenight]

the worst part is that there is no closure. maya henry won’t have justice & now will be getting harassed for something she had no play in; liam won’t ever be able to get sober, be healthy and make amends; his family has lost a son that they had to see spiral out of control. and the industry that chews and exploits young people to get everything out of them only to spit them out as loose cannons when they’re adults will continue to thrive and produce entertainment

[haveyouseenthisseries-poll]

[semioticapocalypse]

Lee Miller. Elizabeth Cowell wearing a Digby Morton suit. London. 1941.

I Am Collective Memories   •    Follow me, — says Visual Ratatosk

[campichor]

pov you just insulted the king of the wilderwest

[macs-instantdoodles]

Three boys named Hiccup, three sea dragons with scars over their hearts

[twopoppies]

Have you seen this tweet? https://x.com/katiewaissel24/status/1846683373311611061

Katie Waissel one of his friends is saying she hopes Simon doesn’t write a statement about Liam, basically implying that Simon ruined him and saying “we all know the truth”…

Not a secret to some of us in the fandom esp Larries that Simon broke down the boys. It’s only sad that Liam never recovered like the others.

Ugh. I didn’t even think about Simon responding to the news.

x

[sunshineandlyrics]

THIS reply!