#crushcandles' weekly rec post

[crushcandles]

rec: scavengers reign

The crew of a damaged deep space freighter are stranded on a beautiful but dangerous planet.

There's so much to like about Scavengers Reign. Impeccable colouring, just-right pacing, realistic, impactful voice acting, complex relationships, unflinching gore, violence and sadness, all set in a world that's full of curiosities and mystery and danger.

All that and more, but for me, the best part is the very beginning. Scavengers Reign doesn't begin as the Demeter 227's mission starts. It begins after it has already failed. The series opens with an accounting of cargo ships by unnamed workers, and the notation of the Demeter 227's disappearance. No expenses will be put towards their rescue. A worker says he hopes, for the Demeter's sake, that they're already dead. There is no time, no resources to spare. They cannot care about the lost crew.

The opening credits start. Even here, it's too late. Gentle, mournful piano plays. The ship is damaged, debris and cold corpses caught in its open wounds. An unstable sun boils and licks nearby. There's a planet, Vesta, poisonously blueish-green and bruisy, cloudcover swirling. The only sign of life and movement are escape pods taking off from the drifting Demeter, burning in the atmosphere, heading to a planet that does not, and will not, care about them.

[crushcandles]

rec: then dig it up and devour by frankoceansmoonriver (the witcher, explicit, geralt/jaskier, 2.9k)

This treat of a fic has been on my Marked for Later list (typo: lust) for far too long, but I read it at exactly the right time to get maximum enjoyment out of its practical bedsharing sexiness, featuring a young Jaskier who knows what he wants and gets it and a Geralt who's craving a kinder experience. I won't post them, but the last few lines are great – enjoy the road that gets to them.

There has been nothing to read wrong. They were just sharing the space. Geralt has done nothing to initiate this, Jaskier is just young and hopelessly horny most of his waking hours. Geralt wants desperately to be annoyed. He’d like very much to grunt and snarl in the bard’s face, to smack his hand away, but he also doesn’t want that even a little. 

[crushcandles]

rec: laughing at clouds by cassyl (Stranger Things, explicit, Robin/Nancy, 5.7k)

All of @likecastle's ronance is wonderful, but laughing at clouds is truly my ideal ronance story: snappy dialogue, the possibility of going to the movies, feeling like a square peg in a round hole even after all these years, and open ending. It even has some light shenanigans! All of it written with such a naturalness I can't believe it doesn't happen like this. This story is a huge influence of all of my own ronance thoughts, feelings, and writing.

After Steve hangs up, she tries to answer Steve’s question. What’s the harm in her and Nancy hanging out? Why is Robin making this such a big thing? It’s not that she’s actually all that intimidated by Nancy, really, despite her promising career and excruciatingly normal clothes. They were friends once, however fleetingly. They could be again. It could even be fun, hanging out with her. But if it’s not, she thinks, she’s not sure she’ll be able to bear it. And maybe that’s what she’s really afraid of—discovering that, somewhere along the way, the bright spark she saw half-hidden under Nancy’s prim and proper exterior has gone out. What if she’s no longer the girl who made Robin run barefoot across the grounds of Pennhurst Asylum and turned to laugh breathlessly at her clumsy gait as they fled the scene? Robin doesn’t want to find out that all she and Nancy Wheeler really are to each other is two people who went to high school together. She thinks that might be worse than never seeing Nancy again.

[crushcandles]

rec: taking a silly stroll down nostalgia lane

I'm currently dealing with Whatever's Gotten Into Me Lately, and it's filling me full of an aimless, hollow yearning for places I cannot return to and people I can no longer be. Heavy stuff, but it's not all like that. Sometimes it just motivates me to do things like go into my parent's basement, which is a dusty, unfinished, and kind of creepy place, just so I can emerge triumphantly with my electric green-and-yellow 1997 original Tamagotchi clutched in my fist.

With two new button batteries, it's like my blobby little friend never returned to his home planet. Except for how I enormous my fingers seem on these tiny buttons, but I can relearn precision. The sounds are shrill, Tamagotchi wouldn't dream of selling my personal information to the internet at large, and I'm crushed under the anxiety of being a parent way too soon. Let's see how long I can keep the little bastard alive this time.

[crushcandles]

rec: like a fire in my blood by greyduckgreygoose (DND: HAT, explicit, Edgin/Xenk, 11k)

This is such a fun, rompy, the-film-but-more, instant classic of a fic. I love near misses, frustration, a furious commitment to Not Acknowledging It, and Edgin being so uncool about it all while Xenk is his funny, genuine, weirdo self. It makes the resolution so satisfying (and sexy!). I wouldn't expect anything less than such a pure delight from @greyduckgreygoose, but it's always nice to be proven right.

It didn't make much sense, honestly. He wasn’t even Edgin’s type! That sanctimonious kill-joy with perfect hair who seemed dead-set on converting Edgin back towards some path of righteousness. Who had forgiven Edgin before he even acknowledged there was something to forgive. Who seemed to effortlessly see through the layers of guile that Edgin insisted on cloaking himself with to the broken, disillusioned mess inside, and still seemed to like him for it.  That prick.

[crushcandles]

rec: the deeply personal horror of “midnight mass” – guest essay by filmmaker mike flanagan

@candybarrnerd and I have been watching horror movies together (with occasional very special guests) since August 2021. A shared biweekly journey to explore the horror genre, hand in screaming, squirming, laughing hand. Midnight Mass is the best time we had, so captivating that we couldn't wait two weeks to see more of it, so we changed our schedules to meet the next day, across the stretch of multiple time zones, watching the sun set and bring the horror with it, praying we'd all make it to that last sunrise together.

Mike Flanagan's essay explores how he made Midnight Mass, what brought him to it, and it to us.

I found a lot of these various religions’ ideas to be inspiring and beautiful, but I also found their corruptions to be grotesque and unforgivable. I wasn’t going to support those kinds of institutions any longer. I was only interested in humanism, rationalism, science… and empathy. I was also, it turned out, an alcoholic.

[crushcandles]

rec: one-pot tomato chickpeas and orzo

Quick, easy, with a taste reminiscent of spaghetti-os but interesting, this is great winter food. I make it with only one can of chickpeas, which is my taste preference but also leaves more room for me to add a roasted veggie. Makes loads too!

[crushcandles]

rec: the beast of oakhurst pass by yolkipalki (TWN, mature, Geralt/Jaskier, 183.8k)

Cinematic is a slippery, broad descriptor for a fic, but this fic was so evocative of a team heist film for me. This is casefic concerning a compelling, gruesome mystery combined with awesome ensemble dynamics and a brisk, cutting pace. This is a modern fic, modern set, but reading it gave me a glimpse the same spark and immersive thrill that I felt when I was a kid reading long, intricate casefic, which made it a wonderful companion for all the weeks I spent reading it.

Geralt is on the hunt for a monster that has claimed the lives of nearly fifty Redanians in the past two years, but he's always one step behind. That is, until he finds a young man that was attacked by the creature - the first human to come face to face with the beast and live. If he can save the kid and find out what he knows then maybe he can put an end to this thing before any one else dies. It's never quite that simple though, is it?

[crushcandles]

rec: devotee by piscaria (the eagle, explicit, esca/marcus, 4.1k)

A month has passed since Esca traveled north to Novantae to trade for some horses. Marcus tries to keep busy while he's gone.

@greyduckgreygoose and I watched The Eagle together last night. It was silly and earnest and very gay, and of course brought up discussions of fic between us. I offered my favourite, the one I've loved since I read it in 2011 (!) on livejournal (!!), the one would forsake all of eagle fic for if I had to: Devotee by Piscaria. It's so quiet, so restrained, so patient, with pining that's bone-deep, seeping in like the autumn chill and then warmed by the fire of reciprocation.

But it was in my heart to come home.

[crushcandles]

rec: majora's mask - terrible fate

Here, at the end of things, I can still feel its power

The emotion, worldbuilding, and storytelling this video accomplishes in less than five minutes is astounding. Terrible Fate explores Skull Kid's – the sad trickster figure at the centre of Majora's Mask – origins, what he gained and what he lost when he found the mask – when the mask found him. The animation is incredible, the soundscape perfect, the ending haunting.  

[crushcandles]

rec: watchin' things with friends

A small, unsurprising rec this week, but one that fills me with more than enough joy to highlight it any day, but especially today, when I get to watch two separate things with two separate friends. But this isn't a rec about watching the last episodes of Jujutsu Kaisen S2 or The Descent specifically. There's pleasure in the watching, sure, but the real pleasure is looking across the couch with your eyebrows up to say Are you seeing what I'm seeing? or in typing OH SHIT and getting back an I KNOW, RIGHT?? The love lives in the sharing of the experience.

[crushcandles]

birth/rebirth (dir. laura moss)

A morgue technician successfully reanimates the body of a little girl, but she must harvest biological materials from pregnant women to keep the child breathing. When the girl's mother, a nurse, discovers her baby is alive, the two enter into a deal that forces them both down a dark path.

birth/rebirth is a Frankenstein story, one that's beautiful, oddly calm in its gruesomeness, holding two (briefly, three) women at its circular centre as they each approach motherhood from a different path. There's no vengeance against the creators, or terrorizing of townspeople in birth/rebirth. Instead, two women find and strength and comfort in working together to care for the monster/child they created. The acting is wonderful, the cinematography quietly striking, and it's surprising the places it both goes, and how it all comes back around.

What about me?

[crushcandles]

rec: halloween lofi mix by emily ferrell

It's an off week for horror movie club, so there's less of an opportunity to talk fresh scary stuff on this Friday the 13th. It's also cool but sunny outside, a good day for some gentler, sweeter autumnal music. This mix blends samples from things like Peanuts cartoons, Spooky Scary Skeletons, and Casper with bright, brisk beats, and clocking in at a brisk 21 minutes over eight songs, it lasts about as long as early autumn does.

[crushcandles]

rec: mars express (dir. jérémie périn)

In 2200, Aline Ruby and her partner are hired by a businessman to track down a hacker; On Mars, they explore the planet's capital city where they find a missing girl who holds a secret about the robots that threaten to change the face of the universe.

Mars Express is a French, animated, neo-noir science fiction film. In other words, it's fucking awesome. There's a mystery coating existential questions, moving fast and beautiful through a subtle, intriguing world. The technological design has a ton of weight and reality to it, the voice acting is grounded, and at the end, you're left in a different place than you thought you might be, and wondering, just a little, what it all means.

[crushcandles]

rec: your name. (dir. makoto shinkai)

Two teenagers share a profound, magical connection upon discovering they are swapping bodies. Things manage to become even more complicated when the boy and girl decide to meet in person.

I'm not much of a romantic, but even my stern heart softens for comet-crossed lovers. This is a beautiful film, in the story it tells, the emotional threads through it, and with stunning visuals that walk the line between real and fantastical.

I loved every second of Your Name., but there's a moment that I can't stop thinking about. A boy, Taki, is drawing a landscape from memory in a notebook with a pencil. This isn't a spoilery, huge moment in the film, but it shows him doing something natural and thoughtless you and I have done working on our own drawings: he turns the paper to get a better angle. It is so seamless, evocative and alive. But this is all animated, so every movement, moment, and pencil stroke on the drawing was planned for and given that life through hours of collaborative effort. That kind of specificity is what punches up the power of art and it's so special to see in animation, unfairly painted with the broad brush of Only For Children.

[crushcandles]

rec: brynberry

A young man travels to care for his mysteriously ailing uncle in a small mountain town on the outskirts of everywhere.

Brynberry is compelling from its very first page. A masked figure on horseback rides toward a remote town, about to be drawn into horrors he doesn't expect. The town of Brynberry is surrounded by monsters that threaten them all, especially those willing to hunt them.

The art is greyscale, smudging like an old pencil drawing, almost trembling at times. The tone is as tense and oppressive as a rainstorm brewing. People's faces are exhausted, worn-down, no matter the moments of spare pleasure afforded to them as they struggle to survive and live in Brynberry. Dread and disgust mingle with humour and tenderness, wrapped in a cocoon of mystery. Why is this happening? What will happen next?