#disney you dropped the ball so hard

[ytcomments-archive]

[eternalsams]

Country Boy ⇴ J.Seresin

pairing: jake seresin x fem!reader

warnings: tiny innuendos at the end. that’s it.

summary: Jake goes back home to his family for a few weeks and has quite a hard time convincing some girl he’s a pure Texas boy.

words count: 1 124

notes: this one shot was DIRECTLY inspired by this gif from Everybody Wants Some, i freakin’ love this film !

Home sweet home ! Jake came back to his home city when Admiral Simpson allowed the whole Dagger Squad some vacation after the mission. Jake really needed that. He needed to see his family. His parents, his sisters, the kids. Everyone. As soon as he was dismissed from the Admiral’s office, he booked a flight back to Austin and sent a text to his mom, telling her he was coming home the next day. He slept during the whole flight, completely exhausted by the training and then the mission. The moment he stepped out of the airport, two little blond heads jumped on him. He stumbled back and chuckled, taking his nephew and his niece in his arms and resting them on his hips. He greeted his mom and sister before taking a seat in the backseat on his mom’s car, between the two kids.

He spent the first day resting at his parents’ place, either laying on the couch watching a Disney movie with the kids or sitting in the kitchen and talking with his parents. The next day, the whole Seresin family went to the park and when the sun eventually started to disappear, Jake decided he wanted to go out. He wanted to see if the bar in which he used to go as a student was as great as he remembered. He pulled his best stetson hat out of his closet and took his jacket before kissing his mom’s cheek and leaving for town. When he parked his truck, he could hear the catchy music and hear some boots hitting the wooden floor. He felt home.

He tipped his hat back on his head and walked in the bar. It was crowded but he’s seen way worse in California. He sat down on a stool at the bar and waited until a waiter came and asked him what he wanted to drink. Jake only ordered whiskey and when he got his glass, he turned on his stool to rest his back against the counter. He looked around him and felt someone sit down next to him. He quickly glanced at the stranger and had to do a double take when he noticed the beautiful woman looking at him. You.

“Hi!” You smiled and he chuckled. Texas girls, now he really felt home. He turned to face you and smiled. “Hi to yourself. How can I help you?” He licked his lips and tasted the alcohol remaining on them. “My friends back there didn’t think I could come and talk to you, so here I am. How’s your night going so far?” You cocked your head to the side and pulled your stool closer to Jake’s. “It’s going really good, but even more now that you’re here with me.” Sweet talker. You thought, but you didn’t mind. You could feel chills running up your back as he grinned at you and you introduced yourself. He repeated your name like a prayer and shook your waiting hand. “I’m Jake, nice to meet you.”

“So, Jake, where are you from tanned like that?” You didn’t try and hide the fact that you were checking him out. He liked the attention you gave him, reminded him of the girls at the Hard Deck back in San Diego. “The tan is from California. But the guy is from our sweet Texas actually.” He gave you his Hangman signature grin and swallowed up what was left in his glass. You slightly chuckled before bursting into laughter. Jake’s smile dropped and he frowned, thinking about what in what he said could have been funny. But you enlightened him right away. “You? From Texas? No way.” You pretended wiping tears under your eye and looked up at him. “Well, I am. I swear I am, you can’t find anyone else more Texan that I am.”

“I don’t believe you. You’re the typical California boy. Tall, blonde, green eyes, arms that could do wonders throwing foot balls. But you cannot be from Texas.” You raised your eyebrows with a sly smirk and that’s when Jake snorted. “First, thank you for the compliments. Second, how can I prove you that I’m from here?” He leaned in to get closer to you and he quickly glanced at your lips when you sank your teeth in your lower lip. “Get on the bull.” You grinned, getting even closer to him. “What?” He slightly backed off. “Get on the bull and hold on for a minute. One single minute and I’ll believe you.” You nodded towards the mechanical bull a little further. Jake lowered his head and sighed in defeat. It’s been so long he hasn’t ride. But he really wanted to impress you and he knew it was the first step to get your number. When you saw him lower his head, you thought you finally cracked him. Poor California boy. But your grin faded when he stood up and walked to the bull, asking you to follow him with a simple finger move. You didn’t hesitate and grabbed your drink before following him through the crowd. You saw him say something into a guy’s ear and and went to jump onto the bull’s back.

He looked like he’s been doing that his entire life. But you still didn’t believe him. Let’s be clear, he needed to hold onto the bull for a whole minute. He placed his hand correctly and hold onto his hat before nodding to the man. And here we go! 

2 minutes later

Speechless. You were absolutely speechless. Not only Jake held on for more than a minute but he did it the hottest way you’ve seen anyone do it. The way his hips rolled and hit every bang of the bull. You could see the way his hand gripped the handle and his veiny arm keeping him from falling. And then he decided to grab his hat off his head and throw it to you. You almost missed it by how mesmerized you were by his body but quickly caught it and held onto it for dear life. You watched him walking to you and he reached out to you. You weren’t sure what to do so you only put your hand in his. He looked surprised but only chuckled before kissing your knuckles. “I wanted my hat back but your hand is fine too.” He rubbed the back of your hand.

You looked down at the beige stetson you had in hand and looked back up at him. Then back down at the hat and put it on your head, earning you a grin from the Californian Texan. “Okay, take me home, cowboy.” You kept his hand in yours and made your way out of there.

[letsgetrowdy43]

reader has a breakdown ab something and mark is there

This was a little longer than intended

It’s their fourth year, and normalcy is starting to work its way back into the little family.

Philippe has moved on with his crush, realizing that Mom is happy with Mark and that maybe they were just meant to stay friends. He’s happy for Mom and Mark and had really matured in the past few months. The co-parents were back to being best friends once again, her moving in with Mark after dating for a few months helped relieve the strain that had been put on their friendship.

Philippe had let one of the sophomore’s girlfriends set him up with a girl who was seemingly super sweet, Jess was in her third year and was really good to Phil, she was super understanding of his situation and was extremely patient with him, even when it seemed like he was being the most shit boyfriend in the world.

She was perfect, in every aspect, except for the fact that she hated one of the most important individuals in his life. The woman wasn’t sure if it was because Jess saw her as a threat or if it was just because she hated the relationship that the two shared, but she knew that Phil’s girlfriend wanted nothing to do with her. So she held her tongue, she knew that this relationship was important to him, and he was accepting of her and Mark so she let the comments and stares roll off her back.

On the other hand, Mark hated listening to this girl make comments about his girlfriend’s parenting, her relationships, and other big things that the girl was insecure about. It was hard because he knew that she wanted to stay quiet, hoping that the tension between them would die off once she was no longer deemed a threat.

It all went to shit at the first hockey party of the year, the now Juniors decided to hold the first party of the year, meaning Mark, Ethan, and Dylan had accumulated as much beer as possible and were ready for a rager.

“Phil it’s no problem really,” she said trying to convince him to go out, “I heard Jess was going, go be with your girlfriend” She smiled as he rolled his eyes and sunk deeper into the couch cushion, his year-old daughter squished against his chest. “Y’know its okay for you to go out and have fun too” he deadpanned, “besides it’s my weekend with our daughter so I’m gonna sit here watch Disney movies and go to sleep at a reasonable time,” he said motioning to the paused movie on the screen, his new favourite ‘Tangled.’

“Boo you’re no fun” “I’m no fun? You need to go out and get sloppy drunk with your boyfriend, you’ve earned it!” He exclaimed and pointed towards the front door.

And that’s what led to now, the first real-time she’s been out and socialized since she had Florence.

“I forgot how good I was at beer pong” She smiled and turned to Luca whose jaw dropped, she had sunk the pong ball in 5 different cups on her first round. “Drink” she reminded the stunned boys with a smile, Gavin and Seamus who stood on the other side of the long table widened their eyes they took turns drinking the cups she had knocked off the table. “I like this version of you” Luca grinned as he high-fived her. “This feels like frosh year all over again,” she said as she watched both Seamus and Gavin throw the balls and miss the cups.

“Hey, Jess” Seamus greeted as she maneuvered her way around the kitchen, her friends just behind her as she searched the house for someone. She stopped and smiled at the two sophomores, “Oh hey boys, have you guys seen Phil?” “He not here, he’s at home with Flo” Gavin smiled and nodded over to the woman who stood at the other end of the table with a soft smile on her lips, awkward tension filling her chest.

“Why are you here?” Jess’ brows furrowed as she fully came to a stop and turned her whole body to the group. “I live here?” She said confused looking at the boys whom all shrugged at the weird feeling in the air.

She smiled innocently before ushering for her friends to continue looking for the rest of their group, “Shouldn’t you be the one with Flo, you are her mother?”  “Philippe is with her, trust me she’s in good hands” she joked as the boys all smiled, everyone quietly praying that this interaction would end soon and put them all out of their misery. Jess smiled sweetly once more, “I’m just saying, you do put a lot of pressure on him, you think you’d at least let him go out with his friends once in a while” Luca’s jaw dropped and looked over to the girl standing next to him whose eyes just glossed over with tears, “Thank you for the suggestion Jess, really, I’ll take it into account next time I decide to put my needs over his and my daughters” her tone wavering between venomous and tearful as Jess nodded and walked away.

A laugh left the girl’s mouth as she shook her head, “I can’t believe she just said that to me” she said with a soft but shocked tone before excusing herself to go upstairs to her and Mark’s room.

Mark knocked gently on the door and opened it to see her sitting on the edge of her bed, changed into her pyjamas, looking up at Mark with smudged makeup under her eyes, “I can’t do a single thing for myself without feeling like I’m being judged for it” she said quietly as he sat next to her, his arms wrapped around her shoulders to pull her closer, “I feel like such a bad mom all the time lately.” “You’re allowed to have a life, I know you feel like you can’t, but you are allowed to have fun,” he said lowly as she nodded into his frame, her hands gently making their way around his torso as she hugs him, “and trust me there is no better mother out there, Flo is so lucky to have you as her mom, you cherish that little girl more than life itself”.

“Is there anything I can do to make it feel better?” He whispers, his fingers drawing circles on her back as she pulled away with a serious look on her face.

“Have you drank anything tonight?” He shook his head, “No, not yet” She smiled and placed a short kiss on his lips “Grab your keys, we need to go see Flo” She smiled and grabbed him by the hand to pull him to his feet.

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[slippinninque]

🐍Loan x Tommy 🍰

In which a lover comes with an apology (OC fic)

Warnings: none, fluff, short n sweet, blackman x black snakewoman, human x monster, OC fic, before work drop will edit later lol

When the diner was closed and the moon was full in the sky, Tommy went to see her.

The swamp wasn’t so terrifying now that he knew how to travel it. Or, really, now that he had protection while he moved through it.

It wasn’t anything to bring a few steaks that didn’t make the cut at the shop, throwing it into the water for the lurking gators and non-gators. Most of them were friendly from what he’s heard. The others only cared for him to hear their grumbling displeasure from the dark.

He knew he’s arrived to their meeting spot when the crickets quieted and glowing eyes began peering out at him from the bushes and murky depths below.

Those were not the eyes he was looking for, though.

Tommy shifted, turning off his boat light to allow the moonlight to glaze the water. It heightened his senses, his eyes was no match for the darkness and that was with glasses. The hair of his arms rose, August could feel an audience worth’s of eyes on him.

He called out, “You out here, Loan?”

Maybe.

The whole swamp pulsed with her voice. Around him, the creatures called and sang once again more excitedly as they knew their protector was present.

“I’m no siren or anythin’,” He said as he reached into his bag, “But I think I know to bring you out.”

Loan liked to hard to get when Tommy wasn't as punctual as he promised to be. For someone who spent so much time alone, Tommy wouldn't blame her for the attitude that comes from a broken promise.

Tommy had a trick up his sleeve though. He reached into the duffel he brought, it's ziiiiiip easing into the air like a reeling line.

Is that cake?

It took a very long time to learn how to hold in his flinches. Loan was already making herself comfortable, coiling most of her serpentine figure bulk into the boat and watching him with curious eyes. Her earlier annoyance at Tommy seemed to have taken a backseat.

“It’s a special flavor too. I got the first piece of the season for you.” When he picked up the heavy piece of cake and Loan opened her mouth wide expectedly.

Her jaw hung about five inches lower than humanly possible.The side of her jaw spreading to reveal the same obsidian -sheen scales that encased her tail, it reminded Tommy of a pair of obsidian earrings his Mama used to have.

Tommy chuckled and plopped the heavy slice onto her split tongue.

It’s sweet!

“It is. It’s pumpkin and vanilla.”

Tommy offered the parchment wrapping of the cake as well, “Are you still mad at me? The diner took a while to close up tonight, the only reason I'm so late.”

Loan balled up the wrapping and tossed it into her open mouth as she considered him. It was hard to catch her smile at first, with the way seam of Loan's mouth curled around her head.

It was there though.

“I forgive you.”

Words spoken from her very mouth was a rarity. The wildlife around them went silent in respect and Tommy could feel the truth in her words on his skin.

Tommy wasn’t much one for thinking too hard about things, but he did wonder often about the specifics of Sirens. He’s never met one before until Loan and she’s no Disney classic. First, there was no fish-tail. Her lower half was that of a constrictor’s. Where the Sachertorte brown of her skin stopped, the dark abyss of her scales began.

Tommy felt the strength Loan's tail when his boat’s engine busted on him. She towed the boat along the powerful coils of her tail as she hummed to the sound of croaking frogs.

If you stared too long at her, you will see her otherness. The slit pupil of her dark toffee eyes, just how far back her smile reached on her face. A smile he couldn't even go two days without seeing now.

The water around them spoke as she settled into the cradle of his arms, I worry when you take time. Do you not get lonely without me?

“You wouldn’t be able to imagine. You’re all I think of when I have season the chicken gizzards.”

Her laugh felt funny. Her amusement seeped into his pores, joining his.

Tommy didn't feel the water seeping into his clothes, he didn't mind the nosey creatures bumping up against partition of water for a closer look.

He only care about the gentle prick-pull of Loan's claws as she kneaded the arm across her waist. He only felt how her undulating tail pushed them lazily through the water.

Looking down at her amazing form, Tommy took a loc freed from her complicated rope of braids to hold it to the moonlight. She smelled like burning wood and deep sea, lying in his arms and gleaming like the world's first treasure. Loan could feel so light as she could slip away or weigh them both down to the sand below.

"How 'bout I stay the night with you?" Tommy spoke into the curve of her neck and shoulders to feel her shiver, "To make sure I'm truly forgiven."

The tip of her tail breeched the water and wriggled in thought, Tommy watched her battle against her sudden shyness.

This night will be cold....that's bad for you....

Tommy kicked the duffel at his feet, "That's why I brought this junk. So my lil' mortal hang ups 'bout being warm won't stop our good time."

Loan turned in arms and Tommy felt his heart hammer at her blown pupils. This sweet thing has never sang at him but Tommy would burn before he let her go.

He pressed a kisses along the invisible seam of her jaw, rubbing the neat line where scale met tender flesh at her waist. Her sigh spanned across the trees and rippled the water--something, somewhere echoed.

"I just need you to find us a nice spot like last time." He whispered, "Then I can say sorry some more...that okay?"

"That okay."

August laughed holding onto her as Loan's tail lashed, pushing them forward with a burst of speed. With one hand he steered while he other ran along vibrating scales.

Tommy felt her eagerness, her happiness of him being there. A loving sheet blanketing the parts of him that wasn't being lovingly squeezed.

There was string that could be pulled, no destiny that could be written, no fate strong enough to intervene with this truth.

This swamp had his heart forever and always.

------

Ending notes✨:just a little something rattling around in my head! Tis the season for spooky and Ive bee having hella monster fluff stories. Would y'all want them? 👀 Tell me what you think! Thank you for reading ilysm,💕✨����💖✨💕

Taglist💕: @kindofaintrovert @blowmymbackout @kindofanenigma @harmshake

@notapradagurl7 @mcondance @miyuhpapayuh @mogul93

@ms-angiealsina @educatorsareslutstoo @mysterychick93 @sageispunk @hunnishive

@8ttached @soft-persephone @hobiesmain @thickeeparker @longpause-awkwardsmile

@megamindsecretlair

[trashquisitor-shirozora]

Was browsing through early BOBF/Mando S3 criticisms on Tumblr and WOW, 93% of S2’s viewership dropped when S3 finished airing for an extremely understandable reason. As someone who got into Dinluke after all the dust settled I can only imagine what it was like becoming invested in Din’s story and being floored by the S2 finale only for it to get totally swerve-balled after a long-anticipated wait. How did you avoid the disappointment and burnout?

Spite is an incredibly powerful motivator, let me tell you.

I'm halfway joking about that, btw. I could say I'm used to disappointment and I also worked really hard not to take things too personally after being disappointed time and again year after year by fandoms I was in. Imo the healthiest attitude is that no show/movie/book/videogames/etc will ever play out the way you want/think it should so take what you can get and trash the rest. By the time I started watching The Mandalorian, I'd been burnt badly by Star Trek AOS, the Sequel Trilogy, the MCU, and the Disney machine, and I had to figure out how to accept that I like what I like, I can't change what I can't change, and I can/will run the fuck off with what I can change, which is making wildly fun and fulfilling transformative shit like fanfics and fanart.

I was actually excited about TBOBF and was utterly betrayed by the executive decision to throw him and Fennec to the side in order to absolutely trash the Season 2 finale of the Mando Show by having Din and Grogu reunite just like that. I guess I got lucky in that I had a long-running fic series that I was heavily invested in and I was not about to let Disney stop me from finishing it. Instead of letting my frustrations kill my interest in the show and fandom, I turned it into motivation to keep telling the story I wanted to tell based on the fallout of Season 2. It also helped that Andor happened.

I quit Season 3 of the Mando Show after the 1st episode and it was the best decision I ever made. I had a really rough time with it and was encouraged to step away if it was giving me too much stress. I'm glad for that. Less time and energy picking about Filoni&Favreau and Disney Lucasfilm's decisions and disappointments, more time and energy spent writing and drawing the dinluke I want to see. The nice thing about Star Wars is that it is an old and vast sandbox. Plenty of room here to build whatever sandcastles and dig however many holes you want while canon goes floundering by.

I think also that it really helped to find spaces to share with people who vibe on the same wavelength, so I'm not alone to my thoughts and spiraling myself out of a fandom I enjoyed (like what happened with TLJ but I shan't go there bc this response is long enough). Those posts about having friends you can shit-talk things with? Valid af. You need outlets to vent your grievances without setting bridges on fire, and it'll help your enjoyment of things in the long run.

I didn't avoid the disappointment but I figured out how to make something of it, so I'm still writing dinluke, I'm still drawing dinluke, I'm still getting giddy over dinluke. I actively choose to do what I want with them, and nothing Disney Lucasfilm puts out is ever going to stop me.

[rfsak2]

Spitfire, Pt. 8

So… this is short on words but hella long on feels, so I hope that doesn’t bother you. I didn’t want to write that last battle scene because next chapter is likely to be hella battle orientated. I also didn’t add smut this chapter because, honestly the Dixons are separated for much of this chapter and post-t*rture smut feels gross.

Let me know if you like it!

Spitfire, Pt. 8

Everyone always thought Daryl was the rough one. DarylxOC

Warnings: violence, emotions, injuries, lots of bad language words

Part 7

**

“Olivia, I’m not trying to be mean or anythin’ but I could use a drink. I don’t give a fuck what it tastes like but I’d rather not have to break in here for more, y’feel me? Just give me whatever will get me drunker faster.”

Olivia stared at her and Mitzi was acutely aware that there was more compassion than the usual trepidation in her gaze. “M-Mitzi-“

Mitzi shook her head. “I don’t wanna talk. I just wanna drink. I’m not interested in cleaning out the alcohol store, though, so I would like you to give me whatever you can, preferably something to get me shitfaced ASAP.”

She sighed and leant over to dig through a low cabinet. She emerged with a bottle of whiskey, about three-quarters full, and passed it to Mitzi. “Take it.”

Mitzi nodded and sucked in a shaky breath. “Thanks.”

“If you want to talk about-“

Mitzi shook her head and took a swig from the bottle as she shut the pantry door behind her. 

By the time she made it to the basement she shared with Daryl, she had drained about a quarter of the remaining liquor. She hadn’t eaten in over a day at that point, so it hit her like a wrecking ball, robbing her of her balance and making her head spin. 

She closed the door behind her and the first thing she saw was a small pile of Daryl’s clothes she had cleaned a couple days ago sitting innocuously on the corner of the bed waiting for him to put them away.

She crumpled.

“Nah, you don’t kill them. Not until you try a little.”

Daryl caught her eyes, shaking his head despite the hands in his hair.

The dimpled asshole must have noticed and followed Daryl’s gaze. “So, Spitfire and Sleeveless, huh?” He grinned. “You still ain’t worried, pretty girl?”

She sucked in a breath, forehead pressed to the floor.

She felt her body tense. 

“Spitfire, no! Don’t y’fuckin’ move!” Daryl fought against the hands pulling him back in line. “Stay there!”

She felt Carl grab at her arm.

Negan laughed and sauntered over to her. “You must really have a temper, darlin’. All these people trying to keep you from doing the colossally stupid thing I can see boiling up in your very pretty, Disney Princess green eyes.”

She spat at his feet.

She wailed.

“I don’t like killing ladies. But you ain’t acting very lady-like.” He made a small moue of dissatisfaction. “That’s unfortunate.”

She bared her teeth. “Fuck you.”

He grinned. “Between you and your man here, I’m obliged to restore order.” He shrugged and started pacing the line again. “Don’t say I didn’t warn ya.”

She pushed herself up, only to fall back against the bedroom door. 

She sobbed, images of Glenn and Abraham playing merry havoc with her ability to breathe. She reached for the whiskey and chugged. When the burn was too much, she dropped the bottle, clumsily righting it and pouring whiskey all over her jeans. 

She wiped at it, her hand coming back bloody.

“Look at what you made me do.”

In a rush of frantic energy, she shot her feet and tore her jeans off, catching sight of dark stains on the right side of her Metallica t-shirt. She tore that off as well, throwing it on top of her jeans and kicking the articles of clothing blindly away. 

Her knees collapsed under her and she hit the floor hard. 

“There are rules and the rules matter.” He grinned. “I am truly sorry.”

She didn't know how long she sat there, just underwear, pieces of that night replaying in her head, broken only by her sobs and great swigs of whiskey.

Her throat burned, her eyes burned. Her hip hurt from where she hit the floor.

Her bedroom door opened and Rosita poked her head in. She breathed harshly and turned over her shoulder. 

“She’s here. I have her. Go back upstairs, Carl.”

“No, I want to help. I want to be here for her-” She could barely hear him, muffled through the door. 

Shame lit her up like a Christmas tree but she couldn’t make her body move.

Rosita shook her head. “She wouldn’t want you to see her like this, flaco. Go upstairs. You can come down later when she’s ready.”

He must have listened because Rosita closed the door behind her a second later.

Mitzi sucked down more whiskey. 

“This is what we are going to do?” Rosita crossed her arms over her chest. “Sit here and drink?”

Mitzi sucked in a breath, tipped the bottle.

Rosita snatched it away from her, waiting for the liquid to settle to see how much was left. There was maybe a fourth of the bottle left. She had drank more than she thought. 

“How much was in here?”

Mitzi shrugged.

Rosita sucked on her tongue. “Oh, hell no. We ain’t doing this shit. Get up.”

Mitzi shook her head, reaching for the bottle. 

“Get up, Mitzi.”

Mitzi motioned for the bottle. “No. Give me the bottle.”

“No.” She marched into the bathroom and Mitzi could hear the glug glug of the whiskey being poured down the drain.

“Olivia was savin’ that for somethin’. Pulled it outta some special cabinet for me.” Mitzi groused.

“Oh, I know.” Rosita propped her hip against the doorframe. “Olivia told me that you had gone to the pantry and demanded liquor.” The bottle clanged loudly against the metal of the trash can. “That’s how I knew I needed to find you.”

“I didn’t demand anythin’. I asked. Nicely.” Mitzi made a face. “I even said please.”

She snorted. “She was shaking when I talked to her. Though I guess she seemed more worried for you than scared of you.”

“She’s scared of everythin’. She shakes like a leaf when I so much as sneeze near her.” Mitzi rolled her eyes. “It’s pathetic.”

Rosita chuckled dryly. “I guess. But then you’re not doing much better, sat here like some sad sack of shit.”

“Fuck you.” Mitzi huffed, the words lacking heat.

“No, fuck you.” She spat. “You drinking yourself to death isn’t going to make anything better and it isn’t going to get Daryl back.”

“Me doin’ anything but this could get him killed though.”

Rosita huffed, frustrated. “He isn’t going to kill him. You called it at the church. That cabron is just a small-time big man trying to hold onto control. He needs Daryl to do that.”

“Until he doesn’t.”

“Stop it.” Rosita tossed her head. “Stop this defeatist bullshit.”

“We are defeated. We are done. What do you fuckin’ expect from me, Rosa?” Mitzi made a gesture that would’ve come across as aggressive if she wasn’t drunk and half-naked. “What is it I can do for you so you’ll leave me the fuck alone?”

“What can you do for me?” She sneered. “Why would I need anything from you?”

“Peachy. Fuck off.”

“You think I wanna be here babysitting you?”

Mitzi sighed. “If not then why are you?”

Rosita put her hand on Mitzi’s head and leaned in. “Because you need me. And I need you. And we need each other. All of us.” 

Mitzi scoffed, tears gathering in her eyes again.

Rosita stood and started rifling through her drawers. She made a small noise of triumph when she found Mitzi’s clothes in one of the drawers. She pulled out a fresh t-shirt and a pair of leggings and tossed them at Mitzi. 

Mitzi pushed them off her lap. 

Rosita groaned. “So you’re just gonna sit there in your fuckin’ underwear?”

Mitzi scoffed. “Is there somethin’ else you wanted me t’do?”

“Miss me with the fuckin’ pity party.” Rosita sighed. “I lost someone too. And Daryl’s still alive.”

“I know.” Mitzi sucked in a breath, squeezing her eyes shut. “I’m so sorry-“

Rosita squatted in front of her, softening, tears in her eyes. “He wasn’t ever gonna pick you. You know that right?”

“He’s a coward.” Mitzi blinked, looking down at her hands. “He was always gonna pick the biggest threat. Or who he thought was the biggest threat.”

She nodded. “That’s right. And you being a woman of rather small stature, he was never going to think it was you. Even if everyone who knows you knows that you were one of the biggest threats there. He was never going to pick you.”

“I know that but-“

Rosita shook her head decisively, wiping delicately at her eyes. “But nothing. He did that, no one made him, no one forced his hand. He did that.”

“I’m pretty sure the bloody mess I made of his outpost didn’t help.”

“He didn’t kill them because of the outpost. He killed Glenn and-“ she sucked in a breath, “and Abraham because, without fear, he has no power.”

“And the fact that I led an operation that killed three or four dozen men.” Mitzi gestured agitatedly. “We can’t ignore that. I did this.”

“I ain’t ignoring anything, puta. It’s just that not everything is about you.”

Mitzi sucked in a breath like she had been slapped. “I know that.”

“Do you? Seems to me like you’re sitting here throwing yourself a pity party.”

Mitzi swallowed, tears gathering in her eyes. “I…I don’t know what else to do, Rosa. I don’t know what I can do that won’t get someone else killed.”

“Well, I do.” Mitzi was silent and Rosita continued. “We need to make him afraid.”

Mitzi looked up. Rosita was grinning ferally and Mitzi frowned. “What?”

“He’s already terrified of you, chiquita. I saw it, Rick saw it. I doubt he’s ever met a woman like you. So we’re gonna leverage that and take that asshole down.” Rosita stood. “So get up. We have to get ready.”

**

She walked up to the gates and nodded at the person standing guard. “Hey, don’t know if you remember me.”

“Here to see Maggie and Sasha?”

She nodded. “Yes, please.” She sucked a deep breath in and tried to force down the nausea that was already making itself known.

The gates opened and she smiled politely up at the guard. “Thanks, man.”

He nodded. “Heard what happened. I’m sorry.”

She swallowed and bobbed her head, throat tight. “Yeah.. ‘ppreciate that.”

A woman approached Mitzi and smiled softly. “Just know, people here at Hilltop are thinking about y’all.” Mitzi recognized her as the pretty black lady they had saved after the car accident. Mitzi struggled to remember her name- Birdie -and she reached out to squeeze Mitzi’s forearm. “Thank you for saving us and getting Craig and Andy back alive that night.” 

Mitzi blinked and breathed. The woman wrapped her in a quick hug.

“Mitzi?”

She forced herself to breathe, giving the Hilltop woman a quick closed-mouth smile as she walked away. “Hey, Maggie. How are you holdin’ up?”

Maggie wrapped her in a tight hug and Mitzi squeezed her eyes shut, trying to breathe through her nose. 

“I’m- well I’m not okay but I’m alright. How are you?”

Mitzi shrugged. Sasha approached with a tearful smile and pulled Mitzi into another hug. She felt her breath stutter in her lungs.

Mitzi squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m sorry.” She forced air out her lungs in a quick rush. “I’m sorry. I knew this could happen and I did it anyway and I’m so fuckin’ sorry.”

Maggie started shaking her head, but Mitzi couldn’t stop.

“I’m sorry that I convinced us to take out the outpost. If we hadn’t, maybe they-“

Sasha pulled her into another hug. “Negan killed them, Mitzi. He did it and he probably would’ve done it regardless.”

“But I knew-“

“Nothing.” Maggie dipped to catch her eyes. “You knew nothing for sure. And even if you did know, Negan still chose to do this. He doesn’t get to skate by accountability.”

Sasha rubbed at Mitzi’s face with gentle fingers and Mitzi realized she had started crying. “He’s a murderer, Mitz. He was gonna do it anyway. And if you had had any choice, you wouldn’t have chosen this. He took your husband.” Sasha smiled gently. “I’m not saying either one is worse, but we don’t have to worry about what’s happening to Abraham and Glenn.”

Mitzi’s lower lip trembled and Sasha pulled her into another hug.

“I will kill him. I’m gonna get D back and I’m gonna kill him.” Mitzi nodded against Sasha’s shoulder, blinking away tears. “I promise. There is nothing I can do to make this right, to bring them back, but I will kill him.”

“You don’t have to make it right.” Maggie pulled her into a hug. “It’s not your fault.”

Mitzi swallowed. “It feels-“

“He as much as said it, Mitz. He needed to make a big show, tamp down the revolution. He was gonna kill two of us no matter what.”

“I know, I do. Rosita tried very hard to knock that into my head yesterday.” Mitzi rubbed at her forehead. “But I’m still the reason why he needed to make a big show.”

Sasha smiled. “What did I tell you those pricks on the motorcycles said to me, Daryl and Abraham?”

Mitzi frowned. “What?”

“With the fuel tanker. What did they say to us? Do you remember?”

“To give them all your stuff?” Mitzi shrugged. 

“That they normally kill one of us.” Sasha nodded. “They were gonna do it anyway. At least we took some of them out. Didn’t roll over and show them our bellies.”

“These assholes have been turning up the pressure around here for months.” Maggie squeezed Mitzi’s shoulder. “Like you said, they would’ve come for us at some point. You and Rick would’ve fought them off and then they would’ve come back. We were gonna end up here, one way or another.”

Mitzi sighed and nodded.

Sasha smiled. “Besides, you’ll have a hard time killing him if I kill him first.” 

Mitzi smiled sadly. “And the student has become the master.”

Sasha wrapped her in a tight hug and pressed her forehead to Mitzi. “Maybe you can come with, be my spotter.”

“I’d be honored to be your spotter.”

Maggie wrapped her arms around the two of them. “We need to do more than just kill him. We need to take them all down. To do that we’re gonna need to wake Rick up.”

Mitzi nodded. “I can do that.”

**

“It’s just like a ghillie suit, y’ big baby.”

Mitzi breathed deep and dug her hands into the walker’s gut, retching a little as she spread it over the poncho she had scavenged. When she was sufficiently covered, she tore off the latex gloves she was wearing and pulled her scope out her pocket.

She settled back against the tree and considered the Sanctuary below her. She made notes and took a picture with an old polaroid camera. She observed for another ten minutes, watching as people came and went. 

Checking an old analog watch she had borrowed from Olivia, she leant forward, observing through her scope as it approached what she assumed could be a likely time for a shift change. 

She scratched some shorthand she had learned to use in the army on a piece of scrap paper, noting how many people changed spaces, what spaces were changed. 

She was especially interested in the odd walker barricade the Saviors had built in front of the main building. Mitzi sketched it quickly, taking note of how the residents of the Sanctuary navigated the minefield they had created.

When everyone seemed to settle, the activity coming to a smooth lull, she turned her scope to the area on the opposite side of the old factory, looking for another vantage point. She identified a new perch and moved out, dodging walkers quietly as they wandered past her. 

Settling into her new perch, a broken out window in a building half a mile away from the Sanctuary. From this angle, she could see a loading dock into the back of the factory complex. 

She sat and watched the loading dock for fifteen minutes. People brought things out, people carried things in. The varied baskets, boxes and totes suggested different origins if not scavenged goods. 

Mitzi jotted that down and took a picture of the loading dock. She turned and sketched out the rough layout of the system of roads and gates into the backside of the complex and took a picture. 

When she felt like she had that half of the building pretty well covered, she moved to a new vantage point, one that covered the front half of the building from a different viewpoint.

She lifted her scope and felt the immediate well of tears. She bit her lip to keep herself from crying out. 

There in the courtyard, Daryl had joined the people wrangling the walker minefield. He looked beat up with the beginning of a black eye and a split lip. At first, she thought he was moving sluggishly, which hinted at injuries she couldn’t see.

But then she saw him look up, squinting up and around him.

She smiled. Despite the chaos, other people in dirty sweats fighting to manage walkers and Daryl was getting the lay of the land. 

He was casing the joint. 

God, she loved her husband so fuckin’ much.

**

“There she is!” 

It took everything in her considerable willpower not to flip him the bird. Or break his scrawny neck. Or throw a knife at his smiling face.

There was a reason Rick took her knife before sending her out here.

She caught sight of Daryl in dirty sweats, face bruised. Dwight stood near him in Daryl’s vest, and she had to take a deep, grounding breath. 

“Spitfire Dixon!” Negan smiled up at her. “Never did catch your name, honey. Daryl, there, called you Spitfire that night. Figured it’d be okay for me to as well.” 

“My name is Mitzi Dixon.” She spared him a disinterested glance. “My husband is the only one who calls me Spitfire. So it is absolutely not okay for you to call me that.”

He seemed to pause, foot on the first step. 

She glanced at Rick, who shook his head subtly. Mitzi no.

Mitzi yes.

She glanced down at Negan and saw the moment he had to force the smile back on his face. 

“I guess that’s fair. I did kill two of your people- your family.” He grinned. 

She arched an eyebrow. “What d’ya want?”

“My god, you’re fuckin’ ice cold, huh?” He grinned over his discomfort. “Where did that fiery, sexy, little thing from that night go?”

She hummed. She looked back at Daryl.

“Gotta tell you, you’re not really supposed to be looking at him… like, at all.”

She turned to him, one eyebrow arched over hard eyes. “You gonna stop me?” 

He swallowed. “Nah… I admire your commitment to your husband. I’m just a big ole softie, what can I say? Let love win n’all.” He smiled, dimples and white teeth. 

She hummed, turned back to Daryl.

“You are so goddamn pretty. Hard to believe you were in spec ops.”

She rolled her eyes. 

He grinned. “Say…How in the hell did he pull you?” He stepped up onto the porch, making a production out of leering at her. She dug her nails into the bannister. “You are smoking hot. I mean really…the tattoo game is strong. If I didn’t think you would try to slit my throat in my sleep, break Dear Daryl out, I might offer you a special deal. I don’t think I’d mind marrying an Army Ranger. A sniper, at that. Something kinda erotic about it.”

She didn’t spare him a glance.

“Fuck, you’re so cool.” He chuckled. 

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him lift a hand. Felt it land heavy on her shoulder. She kept her eyes on Daryl. 

“That’s right. Heard you were a sniper.” He entered her line of sight, getting as close as he dared, leaning on the bannister. “Here’s me wondering where your rifle went.” He looked down at Olivia’s notes. “One M110 SASS. Sassy gun for a sassy lady.”

“Lost it after the outpost.” She shifted so she could keep an eye on Daryl. “You know, where I used it to kill three, four dozen of your people.”

He clenched his jaw. “Really?”

She shrugged. “Got separated, caught up in a herd on the way back.”

“That true?” 

“You callin’ me a liar?” He flinched away from her direct stare, the hand on her shoulder shook almost imperceptibly. 

Rick nodded, eyes hard on hers.

“That’s a shame.” He shrugged, sighed and leaned into her space. “Woulda liked to see it in action. Send you out on a couple of errands for me.”

“Yeah, it’s a real shame.” She drawled, monotone and bored, catching his eyes and holding them again. His grin faltered. “Woulda been mighty useful right ‘bout now.”

He lifted his hand like he had touched a hot stove. “I guess that’s it then.” 

“Guess so.”

He bit his lip. “You really aren’t afraid of much, are you?”

“No.”

“There’s gotta be something…” He leaned back. “I imagine if something happens to Daryl-”

She laughed.

“Don’t be fuckin’ dumb.” She smiled and met his eyes again. “Anything you do to my husband, I will return a hundred times over. If he even hints that someone shot him a dirty look, I will level whatever hole you call home. You can betcha ass on that.” She glanced at Daryl then back at Negan. “And lookit that, he’s lookin’ a little malnourished, a bit bruised up. You’ve already started the tab.”

“I like you even more when you speak.” Negan swallowed but forced a smile back on his face. “You sound real tough, babe, but with what weapons are you planning to carry out said return? I’m taking all of them.”

“Take ‘em. I don’t need ‘em.” She chuckled. “I ain’t worried.” 

Negan breathed deep and tongued at his lip. “I almost believe you.” 

“You should. It would be wise to do so.”

“Probably should take you with us then, if you’re a weapon.”

“Please do. I’ll get Daryl back quicker. Do most of the work for me.” She laughed meanly. “You won’t though. You take me with you and you dim assholes don’t make it back. I think you’re just smart enough to know that.”

“That so?” He swallowed and she laughed.

“Yeah, it is so. The only thing I haven’t decided is what t’do with your bodies when I’m done.” She shrugged, bright, cheery smile on her face. “I could leave your rotting corpses there to show the rest of your crew what happens when you fuck with me and mine. That way if anyone sacks up, tries to take over after you’re dead, they will know who’s comin’ for them. Or maybe let someone bury you so I have a grave to dance on. One way or another, I will obliterate any mention of you from this planet.” She turned away from him and thought better, turning back. “Oh, and you should know this,”

She pressed into his space, still speaking loud enough so his men, at least the ones who were close by could hear her. “You are fully outta your depth with me. You picked the wrong ginger, and I’m going make sure you know what a fantastic, fucked-up mistake you made. Whether, it’s me or someone else who takes the retribution outta your sorry hide, just know that I gleefully made it possible.”

He reached down and made a show of adjusting his belt. “Never popped a chubby being threatened. Toodaloo.” 

“You think you bad, honey, but we both know the truth. You’re just a small time warlord, the dictator of the week, and my list of confirmed kills was filled with motherfuckers like you well before the turn. Your bravado, as practiced as it is, ain’t foolin’ anyone. Not us, not your boys.” He turned over his shoulder and met her eyes. She smiled viciously and watched Negan take the porch stairs in one long step. She wiggled her fingers in a parody of a wave. “Bye now.”

Rick shot her a look. Negan was shaken.

“So remember, take care of my man.” She glanced at Dwight. “And keep your bitch at home. I ever catch him out, I won’t hesitate.”

Dwight chewed at his lip.

She turned back to Daryl and stared down into his eyes as long as she could as Daryl walked back toward the trucks. 

He seemed to shuffle, fumble a bit in the first couple steps, before regaining his footing and shooting her one last look.

Then she saw it. A small patch of white in the dark of the asphalt. 

She waited until she was sure they were gone and vaulted over the bannister. In the road, folded into the tiniest little triangle, was a piece of paper. 

She opened it with shaking hands. 

Love ya, D.

She took up watch at the front tower for the rest of the night.

Eventually, Rick was able to convince her to go inside and Rosita picked the splinters from under her nails.

**

Mitzi sat her hands on the back of the dining room chair. Rick looked up at her and sighed, rubbing a hand over his face.

“I want to say, first and foremost, that I know that you are doing what you think is right.” Mitzi nodded. “I know that and I know this shit hit you as hard as it hit the rest of us.”

Rick nodded. “Okay, thank you.”

“And I’ve always trusted you and never felt that I had any reason not to.”

“Are you tellin’ me you are now?”

“No, I’m not saying that.” Mitzi moved to sit in the kitchen chair closest to him. “But we can’t, Rick. We can’t just let this happen.”

“Mitzi, he’s going to kill more of us.”

“Yes, he is. Regardless of what we do, whether we toe the line for the rest of our lives, whether we fight back or not, he will kill more of us. We need to prepare ourselves for that.”

Rick shook his head. “But I can make that happen faster by doing what I think you want me to.”

“I want you to lead us against him.” 

“Thought so.” He sighed. “Death, Mitzi. That’s where I’d be leading us.”

Mitzi shook her head. “Rick, you and I, we knew people like this, you arrested them, I killed them. Abusive, narcissistic assholes who say whatever they need to maintain control. He is prepared to walk the walk, I’ll give him that but he is not all powerful and I won’t let him scare me into thinking he is.” 

“He has Daryl, Mitzi. What you are thinking about doing could get him killed.”

She sucked in a breath. “I know it could.” She swallowed, eyes blinking away tears. “Could. I hope to god it doesn’t, but as long as it’s not a ‘will, I have hope.” She leaned in, holding his eyes. “The only thing I know for certain is that if we let this stand, more of us will die. He’ll feel slighted or disrespected or angry that one of his wives didn’t want fuck him, that Daryl won’t break, that I said something mean and hurt his feelings, that it rained on Sunday, and he will take it out on us. He’ll tell us that we can stop it, that we have choices, but we don’t.”

“We don’t know that.”

“No, what we know is that I gave him ample opportunity, ample reason to punish us- to punish me -and he didn’t. He didn’t do anything.”

Rick considered this for a short minute. “He’s afraid of you.” He nodded. “You shook him up and flouted his authority, he should’ve done something. Should’ve killed Daryl right there.”

“And he didn’t. He didn’t do anything when Carl shot at one of his men either.”

“Okay, that’s true. What do you think that means?”

Mitzi sighed. “It means that he isn’t who he said he is. And if we see that-“

“His men see it.” Rick sighed and nodded. “Okay, I see your point, but that’s a big if. That’s a gamble and I can’t, Mitzi. I can’t be responsible for more of my family dying.”

“That wasn’t your fault and it won’t be your fault if- when he kills more of us.” She smiled sadly. “I can’t make you feel less guilt but I will tell you what Maggie told me-“

“You went and saw Maggie?” Rick looked more anxious in a sudden rush. “What if someone followed you-“

“Who do you take me for, Richard Andrew?” She smiled crookedly. “You didn’t even know I was gone.”

“Fine.” Rick breathed out harshly, nodding. “What did Maggie say?”

“That Negan chose this. He did it. No matter what he says or who he blames, he chose this and he doesn’t get to escape accountability.”

Rick nodded vaguely. “Ok, but how? How do we do anything without putting us- our family -in danger?”

“We are already in danger, Rick. Right now, this very minute. There's not much we can do to not be in danger.”

“Fine. Say I take that as truth, what are we gonna do?”

She made a face and Rick groaned. “What did you do?”

“You’re gonna be pissed at me, but I took a detour down to the Sanctuary-“

“You what?”

She bit her lip. “I walked my happy ass down to the Sanctuary. I just wanted to get a lay of the land. No one saw me, I promise.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “How do you know that?”

“Because I stayed as far away as I could manage and still get a clear view. I used my scope-“

“The scope on the rifle you lost.”

“Rick, you knew that I didn’t lose it when you vouched for me in front of Negan. You also knew that I wasn’t going to let him take it.” Mitzi picked at her fingers. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but I wasn’t going to let them have it. We’re gonna need it.”

Rick sighed and reached out to squeeze her knee. “I know, Mitz. Where is it?”

“I’m not going to tell you that way you don’t have to worry about lying for me anymore than you already have.” She smiled and they were silent for a few moments. “I saw Daryl.”

Rick looked up at her. “Yeah?”

She nodded, sucking in a shaky breath. “He didn’t see me, but he was out in this courtyard area where Negan keeps walkers.”

“Was he okay?”

“He was…” she smiled. “He was casing the joint and not being very subtle about it. They haven’t broken him.”

“Good.” He laughed. “We’re gonna get him back.” He squeezed her knee again. “Don’t know how yet, but we will.”

She nodded. “That’s partially why I was there. I’m going to start making plans. I won’t tell you about them so they don’t make interacting with that asshole anymore difficult, but I can’t sit around here doin’ nothin’.”

**

“Stop.”

Mitzi snorted, eyebrow arched into her hairline, and moved to pass the woman standing guard in front of the house.

“I said stop!” The woman snarled and reached for Mitzi’s arm.

“I don’t care.” Mitzi stepped out of her reach. “This is my house.”

“Stop before I stop you.”

Mitzi laughed in a crack. “You and what army, kid?”

The woman took a step up the stairs, going nose-to-nose with Mitzi. Mitzi laughed and stepped closer in. 

“G’on, do it.” Mitzi grinned. “You’re tough, but you ain’t never tangled with someone like me. I guaran-fuckin’-tee it.”

“How much you wanna bet?”

Mitzi leaned in closer, laughing when the other woman pulled back, clearly used to being intimidating via reputation alone. Not used to people who advanced instead of holding ground. 

Mitzi stepped in closer. “You see that? I don’t bet on sure things.”

“Arat, let her pass.” Negan sounded disappointed and she smiled cruelly when a shadow of doubt crossed Arat’s face.

“Yeah, Arat, let me do the thing I was gonna do anyway.”

Arat snarled and made to get in Mitzi’s face again.

“Arat.”

Mitzi blew her a kiss and took the stairs two at a time. She disregarded Negan and plucked Judith out of his arms. 

Negan frowned. “You think I would harm one pretty-” He reached up to tweak one of Judith’s blonde waves.

Mitzi moved out of his way and adjusted her hold on the toddler who was now blithely muttering ‘MiMi’ against her shoulder. “I think you killed someone in front of his obviously ill wife. I also think you made a big show of a man cutting off his son’s hand only to tell him to stop when you got your reaction.” She looked down her nose at him. “So yeah, I do.”

He shrugged. “Fair enough.” He grinned. “Say, you look real good with that baby on your hip.”

Mitzi groaned and moved to take the empty rocking chair, not comfortable leaving Carl out here with Negan alone. She caught Olivia’s anxious eyes from the otherside of the door and tried to reassure her with a small smile.

“It’s okay.” Negan licked at the corner of his lip. “I’ll wait. I wager another couple of months without your dear husband may change your tune.”

Carl snorted. “I wouldn’t count on it.”

Negan turned his asshole smile on Carl. “You’ll get it when you’re older.”

“He gets it fine. He just knows me and my husband better than you do.”

“Lifers, huh?” He looked mildly contemplative but she saw a flash of tension in his face. “Noone can stay loyal forever.”

“Is that why you have so many wives?”

“Yeah!” He chuckled at Carl, covering yet more tension. “One of the reasons.”

Mitzi hummed, letting Judith play with her fingers idly. “You drove out here just to shoot the breeze? Just out here talking about your wives with a teenager?”

Negan grinned. “No, I’m returning him to you. Y’see he took it upon his own self to visit me at home.”

“Jesus Christ, Carl.” Mitzi tried to keep her voice low and even for Judith’s sake. “You did what?”

“Oh, you’re gonna love it when I tell you what he did during the visit.”

Carl shrugged, clearly unapologetic.

“He gunned down two of my men.” Negan looked gleeful, as if he was looking forward to her reaction.

Instead, Mitzi turned her eyes on him, assessing. She kept quiet and watched with interest as Negan grew visibly uncomfortable.

“Huh.”

“Huh, what?”

She shrugged. 

“I said no.”

Negan cast her one last look before he turned away, grabbing his bat from the chair he had left it propped up against, and watched Arat interacting with Spencer. “Don’t be an asshole, Arat. Let the man pass.” Spencer climbed the stairs looking like he stepped out of a Lacoste ad, holding a bottle of liquor. “Oh, crap. Is that for me?”

Spencer put on his best prep school smile. “We haven’t officially met. I’m Spencer Monroe. Hi.”

“You gotta be fuckin’ kiddin’ me.” Mitzi threw her head back and laughed.

Negan tutted, amused. “Don’t be rude, Mitzi.”

She snorted and turned to Judith, making a face. The toddler squealed with laughter and patted at Mitzi’s cheeks.

Carl stood, walking over to her and Judith as Spencer settled in his vacated seat and suggested pulling out the pool table across the street.

They started discussing the various amenities Alexandria had and Mitzi made a retching sound when Spencer cheered Negan’s proposed “vacation home”.

Spencer glared at her and she flipped him the bird behind Judith’s head. “Just make sure you use protection, Spence. Wrap it before he taps it. Look at that man. A true hero. Taking one for the team in fuckin’ khakis of all things.”

“Mitzi.” Carl shot a pointed look at Judith.

“Sorry kiddo.”

**

“You were right.”

She hummed and knocked elbows with Rick. “Rosa was right. Sasha and Maggie were right.” She shrugged. “I had to be woken up just like you.”

Rick sighed. “Still didn’t take you as long.”

Mitzi chuckled. “Let’s chock that up to the differences in our general temperaments.”

Rick snorted and looked up to address the person at the gate and stop, eyes watering.

She followed his line of sight and smiled up at Maggie. 

Rick was the first to pull Maggie into a hug, the tension leaking out of the group like water. Mitzi smiled, feeling some of the same relief but knowing that she wouldn’t feel better until Daryl was in front of her.

She waited her turn and squeezed Maggie in a tight hug. Maggie smiled and opened her mouth to say something as Mitzi’s gaze drifted over her shoulder.

She froze and sucked in a breath. Daryl caught her eyes from across the grass. Mitzi felt immediate tears in her eyes, her knees quaking, her breath stuttering in her lungs. “F-fuck!”

Maggie grinned. “Yeah.” 

She stumbled past Maggie, who was also crying. Rick laughed, his eyes red and glassy, as she passed him up at a full speed sprint. 

She hit Daryl like a freight train, wrapping herself completely around him and fisting her hands in his shirt. “Fuck!”

“Hey, baby.” 

She chuckled wetly. 

Daryl reached up, cradling her head, whispering. No one mentioned quite how long it took for her to pull away from his chest.

She discreetly wiped at her eyes and stood on her tiptoes to press her forehead against his. “Say it to m’fuckin face.”

He smiled softly against her lips. “Fuckin’ love ya, Spitfire.”

“I fuckin’ love you, too, D.” 

He kissed her full on the mouth. She gasped and arched into him, so overwhelmed that it didn’t even register that they were surrounded by a small group of people until Jesus politely cleared his throat.

She pressed a second more chaste kiss to his mouth and smiled. Her hands shook as she anxiously checked him for injuries. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”

Daryl swallowed, nodding as he wiped at her eyes. “M’fine, Spitfire.”

**

Mitzi rolled her eyes as Gregory continued with the theatrics. Daryl looked about ready to march across the room and shut him up himself.

She considered it but considered staying pressed shoulder to hip to Daryl’s side much more important than a braggart with little to be desired.

Even his taste in interior decorating was shoddy.

“And by the way, who would train all this cannon fodder?”

The answer was resounding, down to Jesus. “Mitzi!”

“Mitzi? Who’s Mitzi?”

Mitzi shook her head. “I am, prick.”

Gregory looked less than impressed. “It doesn’t matter, it was rhetorical~” he singsonged.”I don’t want to know. I don’t want to hear another word about any of it, ever.”

Rick huffed, agitated. “Would we be better off without the Saviors, yes or no?”

Gregory rolled his eyes. “Yeah. Sure. Okay.”

Michonne tagged out Rick, fighting to maintain her characteristic composure. “What are you going to do to fix the problem?”

“I didn’t say we had a problem.” He dismissed her. “You did. And what happens outside of my purview, is outside of my purview.”

Daryl pushed off the wall. “What the hell, man? You’re either with us or you ain’t. You sittin’ here talkin’ outta both sides of your mouth.”

Gregory stood, straightening his shirt sleeves. “I-I think I’ve made my position very clear.”

“What you’ve made clear is how utterly useless you are.” Mitzi wiped her hands over her face, short temper even more frayed. 

“I’m sorry, what was your name again?”

Mitzi laughed. “It doesn’t matter what my name is, you won’t be around much longer to remember it at this rate.”

He made a face, comically aghast. “Are you threatening me?”

“Nah, you ain’t worth the energy it would take to do that, fool.”

He rolled his shoulder more agitated than he was willing to admit. “This is who you want to train my sorghum farmers? This foul-mouthed plouc?”

Mitzi laughed. “You don’t even got the balls to insult me in English.” She nodded at Rick. “Why did we think he’d sack up and do something for his people again?”

Rick sighed, but seemed to think Gregory might deserve what was coming to him, or that it wouldn’t make it worse at any rate. Still he tried. “You should watch how you talk to her. Mitzi has been exceptionally on edge this past week.”

“Well, if she would just behave herself, we could maybe discuss this.” Gregory made a face. “Oh, wait. No. No we can’t, whore’s mouth or no. I’ve made my decision.”

Rick shot a look at Mitzi and shrugged.

Mitzi was on him in a second. She hooked her foot around his ankle and caught him by his shirt collar before he fell backwards. 

“I could kill you in a dozen different ways and you, being weak and useless, would be unable to do anything to stop me. So, yeah,” She let him go and he fell backwards into his chair. “I can train your sorghum farmers. I just need you outta my fuckin’ way.”

Gregory blushed and stood. “I would like to thank you all for not being here today and not having this meeting with me… or being seen on your way out.” 

**

“Holy shit.” Mitzi breathed. “What the fuck?’

Daryl chuckled, sitting on the edge of the bed they had been given for the night. “He thinks he’s a king.”

“D, he has a fuckin’ tiger.” She laughed. “What the fuck is going on? Do y’think someone dosed us or something?” 

She wandered closer to him and he reached out to pull her between his legs. He pressed his forehead to her sternum and sighed. “Missed ya, Spitfire.”

She ran her fingers through his hair and pressed a kiss to his head. “Missed you back, baby. So damn much.”

He pulled her into him, wrapping his arms around her. She moved to straddle his lap, kneeling on the bed. “As cheesy as it is.” She swallowed. “I thought I lost you.”

He hummed, lifting his head to press a kiss to her lips. 

“I thought I’d never see you again and I knew it would be my fault.” She cradled his jaw and blinked away tears. “I couldn’t sleep while you were there, D. I kept thinking about what they could be doing to you and-” She spluttered to a stop, eyes squeezing shut to staunch tears. 

“Hey…” He pushed her hair outta her face and tutted.

“And I just keep remembering that I could’ve kept this shit from happening-”

He sighed and pressed another kiss to her mouth. “Baby, none a’this is your fault.”

Shaking her head, she stepped away from him. “Everyone keeps saying that, as if they weren’t there when I pushed for taking the outpost, when I planned it and led it.” She shrugged. “I did that. Glenn and Abraham are on me. I’m the reason he took you, D.”

He huffed. “Nah, baby, I got Glenn killed and I got me taken. After Abraham, he kept fuckin’ with you and I knew you were gonna react and I couldn’t let that happen.”

She sighed heavily in frustration. “Daryl.”

“Baby, I wasn’t gonna let you die there.”

“Even if it meant that you would die?” She swallowed. “‘Cause as odd as it is, we got lucky that he took you.”

He chuckled. “Are y’surprised? Y’know I would take a bullet for y’baby. That I wouldn’t let my wife die out there.”

She rubbed a hand over her face. "It woulda served me right. Only I get to escape the consequences of my colossal fuckups.”

“Mitzi.” He caught her hand, drawing her back to him. “Y’were right, baby. Y’were.” She dodged his eyes and he lifted his hand to wipe at her eyes. “You knew that this would start somethin’ and it did, but y’were also right that it was the only play.”

“But y’could have died.” She wiped at her face. “You got tortured and you coulda died-”

He caught her eyes. “Baby, I coulda died any of the million times you gotta buzz in your fool head and popped off at some crazy asshole. None of that changes that you are right. You were right to pop off at the crazy asshole and you were right about that outpost and y’re right now. I will always follow your lead, baby. As hotheaded as you are, I trust you with my life. I always have.”

She breathed out harshly. “I’m gonna bring him down. I told Maggie I would kill him, but I’m gonna make it possible for one of y’all to kill him.”

He nodded, hands on her hips. “Glenn ain’t your fault either, Spitfire.”

“Ain’t yours either.”

He shrugged. She smiled and set her hands on his shoulders, climbing into his lap. “Look at us, Guilty and Guilty-ier. Guess I shouldn’t look the gift-horse in the mouth.”

“Don’t give a fuck about no horse.” He pressed a kiss to her mouth and coaxed her mouth open with his. “I just wanna sleep next to m’wife tonight.”

She breathed deep and smiled at him. She leaned into him, pressing her forehead to his. “I love you.”

“Love you too.” 

Part 9

[jjtheresidentbaby]

I can’t get over little ant and cg spider can u do the prompt of why stress balls became banned! 💗😭

˚. ❝₊˚ stress balls ❞ ˚₊·

» ant vaughn x spider white

» a/n: does ant not having any little gear & quinni knowing about his regression directly contradict my cg!malakai & cg!spider & little!ant fic? yes. am i going to try and change it to make sense? nope

» warnings: pet names, talk of teethers/pacifers/chewlery

“Bud we can’t keep doing this.” Spider sighs as he wipes at the weird goopy substance on Ant’s face, the brunette avoiding Spider’s eyes as he knows he did the one thing he was asked not to. He bit into the stress ball Quinni got him. And it popped, just like last time, and the time before that, and before that.

“S’nice to chew on.” An unimpressed look gets shot Ant’s way and he quickly drops his head back down, only to be caught by Spider’s hand on his cheek again.

“I know you like chewing on things but remember the conversation we had about what was acceptable to chew on and what wasn’t? You know stress balls fall under the not chewable list.” It’s actually a conversation they’ve had multiple times for multiple items.

At first it was his hoodie strings, while not harmful, it was leading to the strings becoming frayed and loose string getting stuck on Ant’s tongue; then it was the stress balls he kept popping and getting those jelly-like balls all over the floor so Spider switched the kinds of stress balls he was buying, only it didn’t help much and they found themselves with the same issue. There’s a list of other items Spencer can’t remember that Ant’s been known to chew on, he puts everything in his mouth.

“Sorry Spi.” A small sigh leaves Spider as he shakes his head and brushes his thumb at Ant’s cheek.

“I know buddy, it’s okay. But no more stress balls, they’re officially banned.” It’s hard for Spider to put such a harsh boundary up when it comes to Ant’s regression- he always worries he’s crossing the line- but this is for Ant’s health, if he ingests whatever is inside the stress balls it could lead to serious problems and that is the last thing Spider wants.

“But Spencer!” It’s drawn out in that whiny tone Ant knows Spider won’t let slide, he fixes Ant with a raised brow expression and the latter clicks his mouth closed in seconds.

“I’ll let Quinni know and she can help me find something more suitable for you to chew on, k?” The want to argue is clear as day on Ant’s face but he nods, knowing if he argues he’ll only make things worse and risk getting punishment.

“Like those necklaces she wears?” It’s something Spider’s brought up more than once but Ant was always avidly against, for reasons unknown to Spider. But chewlery is a good solution for Ant’s constant urge to gnaw on things.

“Mm if you want, we can get teethers too, or a pacifier.” The last bit is added a little hesitantly, Ant’s cheeks instantly burn red and he drops his head again.

“You know I’ll get you whatever you need.” He’s already splurged on a Disney+ account and a bucket of random toys for Ant to use while small.

“…teethers might be nice.” A smile spreads over Spider’s face as he nods along, leaning to press a kiss to Ant’s forehead.

“I can do that. And I’m proud of you for communicating what you need.”

[1800-page-not-found]

Blade's actual story (honkai star rail/stelleron hunters x reader)

oh my god you guys kafka is so hot id let her run me over with a semi truck but actually not because i dont like pain

implied kafka x reader

I wrote this for what reason

its absolute chaos, read at your own risk

contains swearing

what am i doing with my life

i want to apologize before you read this

"Do you ever have the urge to dropkick a child?" You wondered out loud as you rest your head on kafka's shoulder. "Y-" But before kafka could say any more, blade butt in. "Everyday."

You sat up straight and stared at him. "I wasn't fucking talking to you, you piece of shit we should've just left you there at the Xianzhou Luofu." You moved to strangle him before Kafka turned you around and caught you in a superb romantic position. "You shouldn't go after that man child, put all your focus on me, won't you?"

"Do we kiss now?" you speak, slowly inching you way to kafka's scrumptious lips. She giggled and leaned to kiss you.

Blade, shocked that his mother would kiss that atrocity (he's referring to you)-oh my gosh are you going to be his new step mother? You started to laugh evily and throw balls of fire at him. (This was a figment of his imagination, this did not happen in real life.) Oh no, you're going to be an evil step mom! (only to blade ofc)

Out of the pure shock and terror, blade started to foam in the mouth and dropped dead like the rat he is. You went to check up on him because you didnt want to clean up another dead body. "He's not going to die unfortunately because he's immortal" you said.

"Oh really? I thought he would turn into a fair-" suddenly kafka's words were cut off (again) as blade started to grow cute pink wings and become your fairy godmother. Instead however, when he woke up, he started to throw his cute fairy wand that was pink and covered in glitter at people he was supposed to grant wishes to causing him to get fired by the fairy godmother association. This caused him to turn into shrek.

Kafka, actually terrified for once in her life pulled out her guns and shot at her own son, well what do you even call it now? idk either. anyway she started shooting but shrek-blade was bullet proof! it grabbed you by the hair and pulled so hard it made you bald. Kafka screamed in terror seeing your naked head and started to turn into a disney princess. You on the other hand turned into whats his face the villain in smurfs with the bald spot dude but more gorgeous and feminine/masculine. You became evil and ruled the world along side your wife who was now a disney princess but it turns out she was cheating on you with prince charming and so she ran away with him and lived happily ever after, but you, super heart broken, sang with shrek and finally turned into the donkey and ate shrek (you killed him)

the end youre welcome

p.s. silver wolf saw the whole thing but after a second, she thought it would be cool to hack another jet but when she got on it it blew up and well everyone died including her so

dont play with fire-literally.

[richincolor]

Review of Rez Ball by Byron Graves Heartdrum

Publisher’s Summary: These days, Tre Brun is happiest when he is playing basketball on the Red Lake Reservation high school team—even though he can’t help but be constantly gut-punched with memories of his big brother, Jaxon, who died in an accident.

When Jaxon’s former teammates on the varsity team offer to take Tre under their wing, he sees this as his shot to represent his Ojibwe rez all the way to their first state championship. This is the first step toward his dream of playing in the NBA, no matter how much the odds are stacked against him.

But stepping into his brother’s shoes as a star player means that Tre can’t mess up. Not on the court, not at school, and not with his new friend, gamer Khiana, who he is definitely not falling in love with.

After decades of rez teams almost making it, Tre needs to take his team to state. Because if he can live up to Jaxon’s dreams, their story isn’t over yet.

My Thoughts: Forgive me for a second, but I need to gush. I don’t often gush, but I really did love this book and Tre’s story. From the very beginning Byron Graves had me on the edge of my seat. We are dropped right into the final moments of a regional playoff game that means a lot to Tre, his family, and his community. The loss they’ve had makes them want the victory even more than usual. Byron expertly weaves that tension throughout Tre’s year to come and made it so putting down the book was almost impossible.

The structure of the story is that Tre is trying to make the varsity team with the ultimate goal being an NBA spot and one of his friends is making a documentary along the way. It was a clever bit of storytelling because Tre does several interviews for this film and we get to hear his answers to questions that might not be asked in typical daily conversations. The documentary frames the story well.

Aside from the way the story is structured, the setting and community is incredibly vivid. The rez, the high school, and the basketball courts are painted clearly and it feels like I stepped through into this space and time to see and hear the “beautiful chaos” of the game and can appreciate the relationships of everyone involved. This book is going to speak loudly and clearly to those folks who’ve played and/or watched rez ball.

Though Byron Graves was definitely writing to and for Native readers, this story can also speak to others because there are universal themes of pain, loss, community, love, survival, and people striving to thrive. There are difficult situations and many moments of intense pressure on and off the court. I appreciated that there are wins and losses and it’s hard to guess which one is coming. Above all, it all felt real. Life isn’t often as tidy as a Disney or Hallmark movie. Tre is making some excellent choices like his summer training plan and he’s also managing to make some poor choices that create dumpster fires.

He’s surrounded by friends, including one he’d like to have as more than a friend, and family who help him navigate life and bring love, laughter, and sometimes hard truths. HIs parents are still grieving the death of his older brother so it’s a struggle for all concerned, but they are steady. They don’t always see through to his pain, but they give him space and support when they do see past his armor.

Recommendation: Get this as soon as you can. Pre-order. Recommend it to your local library. Do all the things that will get it into your hands and into lots of other hands too. It’s a page turner with a lot of excitement and heart. I will be recommending this one to pretty much anyone. I watched basketball frequently with my father when I was a child, but am not interested enough to watch it on my own as an adult. Nevertheless, I cared about every single game in these pages. Graves pulled me in there and had me in the stands jumping and cheering with the Red Lake Warriors fans.

[holding-hands-and-hearts]

It Was Tuesday

content warning: talk of suicide / suicidal ideation.

They called to tell me you tried to kill yourself on a Tuesday. 

It was so late at night it was long into Wednesday, but for me it was still Tuesday evening, in the way that insomniacs’ schedules simply shift everything a few hours forward and noon is at 6pm. I did the math on the drive over, adding up the hours until the time I picked up the phone. I knew how you’d have done it but couldn’t say who’d found you, and the ambulance was usually pretty quick but the hospital receptionists don’t call until they know whether to give their deepest condolences or just tell you you’d better come in. 

It was the phrase they used that got me, I think. Attempted to take your own life. So casual, like you could just pick it up and walk away with it, and you’d just dropped it somewhere along the way. How is it to hold a life in your hands? Does it squirm between your palms? Or is it docile enough that you can just watch it for a while, trace the pits and scars and broken parts until something tells you that you may as well just trash the whole thing?

They called on a Tuesday, and I was sitting at the kitchen counter doing taxes when the phone rang, my dirty dishes stacked somewhere beyond my W-2. They called me by both names, and I was oddly touched that you’d had me as your emergency contact since before everyone else started saying “doctor” when they addressed me. I can’t believe I still don’t know what I’m doing, I told you after the piece of paper came in the mail, but what’s a PhD supposed to do about that? Turns out education doesn’t exempt you from real life. The doctorate doesn’t do the dishes, and I don’t know why in the world I bothered in the first place. 

Then they told me the ambulance had brought you in unresponsive, said the trauma care team is still working, and I think my brilliant response was “oh”, like I knew what all of that meant beyond the fact that you weren’t dead yet. They said the working assumption was that you’d tried to take your own life, that bizarre little phrase, like the trauma team was trying to pry it back from you as if you were a child trying to hold something you shouldn’t. It wasn’t too far from the truth, probably. 

I should come as soon as possible, they said, and then there was a pause on the other end of the line, and whoever it was staffing the phones at God-knows-what hour the Tuesday night you tried to die asked me if all of that made sense. I burst out laughing. 

I still picture them on the other end of the line, behind some circulation desk in some lobby, holding the receiver a few extra inches away from their ear; they saw someone’s kid in tears because they had to get a flu shot today, an empty-eyed daughter signing her dad’s postmortem, a repeat patient coming to chemo in a ball gown, and now I’m laughing because you’re nearly dead in the next room. It wasn’t until my sides ached and my lungs burned and I’d knocked my W-2 and half the stack of receipts off of the counter that I stopped, and my voice was practically a croak when I said “I’ll be there.”

Nothing’s sure but death and taxes, and it looks like we’re both just doing our best to be certain. 

*******

Do you remember that time you stayed awake with me? I was doing my dissertation, I was always doing that nightmare of a dissertation, determined to pull an all-nighter so I could tell myself I’d done something. You sat in the hard-back kitchen chair two feet away, watching Disney movies and reaching over to squeeze my hand when I stopped typing. Your fingers were warm. 

By four-thirty in the morning you’d finished the Emperor’s New Groove and Tangled and gone most of the way through Wall-E, and I was hungry and cold and hadn’t written eight thousand words in eight hours like I said I would, so you put the cinnamon rolls I’d been saving for an unspecified special occasion in the oven and held a butter knife full of fake cream cheese frosting in front of my nose. I gave up on the dissertation.

I didn’t have a couch, but the sheet set had come with an extra duvet I didn’t need in the spring and my next-door neighbor was a live-laugh-love fanatic who gave away throw pillows like party favors at the end of every season, so we grabbed oven mitts and forks and sat down to eat warm cinnamon rolls straight from the pan. The sun was rising outside my window and the woolen March clouds were positively dreary, but I tangled our ankles together, you laughed when I got cinnamon goop on the end of my nose, and you were so bright and beautiful in the early morning light that I forgot about anything else. 

It was nearly the same time in the morning when I started pacing in the waiting room. The doctors would all come to talk to people who weren’t me, and the tearstained faces of the others who’d waited overnight disappeared one by one, and slowly I was convinced I’d dreamed it. I still smelled cinnamon when I thought of you. I saw the outline of your face in the early morning light, warm hands and sticky fingers on the floor of my stupid apartment, and I remembered thinking so clearly how you were the most beautiful human being I’d ever seen. 

How in the world did you end up here?

I didn’t think anyone could be angry at someone suicidal, but all of a sudden I’m pissed at you, walking so furiously I’ll wear a hole in the stupid industrial carpet. There’s a lady in one of the chairs who looks like she’s lived there for at least the past week, gives me a dirty look as I go by for the six millionth time and I don’t care. They called me on a Tuesday night to tell me you had tried to kill yourself and here I am, so royally furious I want to shake you by the shoulders until you understand how much I hate that you didn’t call me first.

*******

Someone comes to tell me you’re alive when I’m already halfway done planning the funeral. I have this mental image of you upstairs eating Jell-O, and it’s not really you, but I’d take it. The other part of me already knows exactly what you’d look like lying in a morgue, and the dead feeling in the pit of my stomach tells me that that one’s more right. I know you’d hate a church memorial, don’t worry. I know you better than that. 

It’s Wednesday, no longer the morning, just Wednesday, and I ask if you’re okay. They don’t seem to know what to tell me. Visitors aren’t allowed yet, but the cafeteria’s open. 

“Okay,” I say. And I sit. I’m still angry at you. 

When you get out of here, we’re going to make cinnamon rolls. It’ll be sunrise, and maybe the weather’s terrible, and I still don’t have a couch, but I can’t do it without you. I can’t imagine any of this without you. 

*******

[dynamite-derek]

The Best Sort of Sendoff

Note: This article contains spoilers for Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth. For reference, I am in Chapter 10 of the game right now, so this won't contain end-game spoilers. This is instead a look at what happens in the "Memoirs of a Dragon" portion of the game. It's risky writing this before I finish playing, after all this is the franchise that used rubber bullets as a plot twist, but I have faith in the writers to not suddenly drop the ball.

In most films in the Rocky franchise after the first two, there would be a scene where Rocky looks back on his past and you get a great montage of scenes. They would show his triumphs, his hardships and generally make you feel good for following his story up to this point. I would like to think this is because Sylvester Stallone never knew when the final Rocky movie was actually going to be. Rocky Balboa was a legendary character, the movie's world isn't the only thing bidding farewell to him - the audience is too.

Saying goodbye to a character the audience has spent a lot of time with is a tricky thing to do. One of the main complaints about the Disney Star Wars films are how they treat characters from the original trilogy. Return of the Jedi had a pretty happy ending for the main cast but fast forward to the sequel trilogy and everybody is miserable, their lives suck and they die in a way that left a lot of people feeling unfulfilled. Regardless of what you think about the quality of these films, the treatment of these characters is a gigantic reason the reception towards them is so chilled.

The Like a Dragon franchise has not had Kazuma Kiryu as its main protagonist for two games now. Yakuza: Like a Dragon, the seventh entry in the franchise, replaced him with a character that feels like his polar opposite. Kiryu is stoic and keeps a lot of things internalized, Ichiban Kasuga is loud and personable and wears his heart on his sleeve. They both come across as good people but in different ways. Kiryu did get to show up in that seventh entry, but he felt like more of a cameo role. It was like getting to spend one more afternoon with the living legend. It wasn't his show anymore, but he was around.

Little did we know when playing those games that Kiryu would get a farewell tour. Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name kicked this all off with a nice little side story about Kiryu living life as a man who is supposed to be dead. It's mostly a standalone piece, but the references to Kiryu's past adventures come hitting hard and fast at the very end. I wrote that the ending to that game is a masterclass in video game storytelling and I stand by that - if you've stuck with Kiryu through all his adventures so far, it is one of the best scenes the medium has ever conveyed.

There wasn't a sense of finality though. That title ended with Kiryu saying he wanted to live a little bit for himself. He was already a major part of the ad campaign for the eighth entry in the franchise, Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, so there was no feeling that we were saying farewell to this guy. In a sense, we would be getting a new chapter for this legendary figure. Rocky Balboa would be getting one final fight in that ring.

Infinite Wealth gives you that finality. Kiryu shows up and it is revealed that he has cancer and only has months to live. While he is still an imposing and larger than life figure, his time on this earth is up. He doesn't seem too bothered about it though. The audience might be going like "hey dude, why don't you reconnect with Haruka or something?" but the man himself just wants to accomplish this last mission he is on and die in peace. You spend a long time in Infinite Wealth going around Hawaii with the future and past of the franchise yucking it up and it just feels great. Chocolate and Peanut Butter together at last!

At some point in the game, Kiryu's illness gets the better of him and he is sent back to Japan to take it easier. Given that he has months to live, he shouldn't be fighting baddies with Kasuga all day and night, he should be resting. Who knows, he may have more time than he thinks! At this point, the game decides to start letting the player say goodbye to this character. Your party and Kiryu's old friend Makoto Date note that the dragon of Dojima has spent the majority of his life looking out for others and should really spend his last moments doing something for himself. That's right, Kiryu gets to star in the hit 2007 film "The Bucket List"

The game then opens up a bit of story called "memoirs of a dragon" as part of this bucket list. You guide Kiryu to a bunch of locations in Japan, both in Ijincho and the very familiar Kamurocho, and relive all sorts of things. It's one thing seeing the gate in front of Tenkaichi Street and going 'oh yeah, I've seen that gate before, it's in every single one of these stinkin' games,' it's another thing to have your main character reminisce about this and what it means to him. Sure, a lot of time media can best convey emotions by showing and not telling, but hearing your fading protagonist talk about the old days gives you more insight into those things and can help the player feel a little bit more.

These scenes vary greatly in their emotional impact. Some of them are goofy, with call backs to side games like Yakuza Dead Souls or Like a Dragon: Ishin. Some of them are sweet, with our protagonist talking about characters who don't even seem to appear in this game like Goro Majima or Taiga Saejima or Shun Akiyama. If you played past Yakuza games, you know who these guys are and it's nice to see them acknowledged in some way even if they don't play a major role here. You remember them and Kiryu does too. This is a memory of his life, not just a memory of what you experienced in Infinite Wealth to this point.

At some point, Kiryu's friend Date decides that this whole process needs to get a little more personal. You see, the Dragon of Dojima is supposed to be a dead man. He fakes his own death in order to protect his loved ones because he was privy to some government secrets that put everyone in danger. So Date decides to gather some people and have Kiryu sort of listen in on their conversations so he can see how they're doing without him. The conversation almost always circle back to Kiryu and how awesome he is (was), so it can feel a bit like Tom Sawyer listening in on his own funeral, but it's sweet hearing people give their thoughts nonetheless.

Sometimes Kiryu will interact with these people, but he never actually explicitly says who he is. He'll say he's Taichi Suzuki and leave it at that. You get the impression that everybody knows it's really him, so they'll say really emotional things that start with phrases like "well if he was here, I'd say something like..." It's just very sweet to get a sense of closure with characters that normally would just be one and done. You never got to see Rocky Balboa get one more chat with Clubber Lang well after the fact, but longtime minor foe Lau Ka Long sure as hell gets one final moment to see the legendary yakuza one more time.

All of these scenes are a really nice look back on this guy's life. The player gets to be privy to a lot of introspection and dialogue they normally wouldn't get to be a part of. The best part of this is, you never get the impression Kiryu is a miserable person who isn't ready to go out. He instead goes with the approach of "I thought I had finished all I needed to do, but getting this extra closure has been really nice." It's incredibly sweet to see orphan boy Taichi as a grownup and doing well for himself. As players, we saw this fella when he was just a little brat at the orphanage. Kiryu put on a wrestling match for him! The last time Kiryu saw him was when he was a child too, so this little scene is great because both the protagonist and the player get to see this long gone character and go "his life seems pretty neat."

Probably the most impactful scene I had gotten to at this point would be Kiryu seeing Kaoru Sayama one final time. For those that don't remember, Sayama was Kiryu's love interest in the second Yakuza title and the two of them ended up parting ways because of different goals in life. It was always sad to me, personally, as a player that she got written off and just vanished into the void but here she was once again. And yeah, her life is going great! She's working hard to help ensure that the youth don't go down the wrong path, she made a good life for herself in America.

But Date hones in on her lack of a wedding ring and it is revealed that, yeah, she keeps kinda busy so it's hard to find someone. But also a part of her wants to stay available just in case Kiryu really is alive, as a lot of people whisper in the underground. Date almost lets it spill that well he's actually still there, but Kiryu (communicating via secret spy headset so he can listen in) stops him and says it's not necessary. Later on he says something like "to know she still cares is more than enough for me" and that his current situation would just make things worse for her. He isn't regretting his past choice of parting from her here, he is instead appreciative of the person she has become.

Being able to see and hear all of the impact this character has had is really something special. You've spent hundreds of hours as Kiryu talking to all these characters. You're not only saying goodbye to this legendary video game character, you are also saying goodbye to his world and the people he cared about. This isn't just a farewell to Kiryu, it's a farewell to the old.

By not portraying Kiryu as a miserable sadsack on death's door but instead showing him as a man ready to face death head on, the writers of this title really make this feel like an excellent farewell. He doesn't need to be in a Wonderful Life scenario where everyone tells him how important he is, but he gets to experience it anyway and appreciate it. It's a final gift for a man on his way out. These characters aren't trying to redeem Kiryu or make you see him in a different way, they are simply reaffirming what you the player already know: that he's awesome.

We will probably never see a character get as great of a sendoff as this again. There will not be an Uncharted game in 10 years where you get to revisit all the old characters and see where life has taken them. So appreciate this for what it is - another great example of storytelling in video games.

[dearweirdme]

I feel sad for Tae, this is obviously a stunt and I doubt he agreed to do it for clout and exposure, he didn't seem happy to do it and he is not feeding it in any way so that leave of some other options, I think it was more about providing a cover for tk, I don't think it's a coincidence that it happened just before both of their solo debut, jk's being international makes things more high scale too, so jk is also benefiting from this without dealing personally with the hard stuff, I won't argue that this has made tae even more popular but he's being attacked constantly, people making everything about him about this woman and prepared to make his hard work about her too, calling him a coward and making fun of him with 5k likes, always being on the news bc of "dating" it's also not necessarily a good thing, your fans calling you a liar and thinking that you are ball less when you are one of the bravest ppl out there mustn't be nice, ppl insulting even his family and this situation created a bunch of ppl obsessed with his privacy and personal life, like some army won't admit it on public but they have whole gcs for gossipping and he is the focus, and all bc yg and hybe are using him for this media circus, and this all before caring about his artistry and considering how Tae has been acting like him posting that wake up song tht has a clear message just after the Bruno Mars concerts when all the social media rockus was about tn, him coming out of the airport and doing a live immediately to show us that he is alone....yeah I doubt this doesn't bother him at least a bit, he is someone with a lot of integrity, what I'm saying is that it pains me to see the situation and it started to annoy me to see everyone benefit from it, jennie and YG, jennie is being victimized big time in twitter and every critisism done to her about stuff like her actions and lack of effort in concerts it's pin down to ppl 'jealousy' of her dating Tae, no critisism is valid now even the ones coming from her own fans and ppl are super defensive of her, even more than before, and jk too....this lifted some of the gay rumors just in time for his international debut ( I don't think this is coincidental) and I know this bc when Jennie dropped those pics so many comments from different accounts not even armys or shippers were ppl cheering bc 'tk is so not real' and ppl thinking in what should be just a typical gay kpop ship first thing everytime those rumors break tells me that deep down a lot of ppl thought or feared that there was some truth in tk and are relieved and happy that it's being 'debunked', I guess this is part the goal, a bit of protection for the both of them but yeah I don't like it that's Tae just dealing with all the bad stuff and jk only getting the benefits, at least that's how it looks bc obviously we don't how he feels emotionally but facts are facts and the one dealing with the worst of all is taehyung, lots of new ot6 accounts, ppl didn't leave jk bc of this rumor as much as tae, ppl aren't calling him liar and a pussy in mass scale, he doesn't have to see his face on the news bc of dating rumors, he is seeing it bc of the success of his music that hybe pushed ( which I think it's really deserved bc he has worked hard his whole life) but things don't look fair to me in regards of Tae,how fitting it was Tae saying that he would take the responsibility sometimes I wonder if that's the dynamic of their relationship.

Hi anon!

Yeah, this is the worst part of being in showbizz really. I agree that Tae probably isn’t unaffected by this, though I hope he has maintained a bit of distance from social media. The way it looks now, I think he agreed because it’s a fairly short stunt (only one walk for him, and the rest is mostly done by fandom) and it probably allows him more freedom in the long run. I feel his post with the Disney hoody is rather pointed. Reclaiming his true self a bit. I don’t think it’s been mainly to hide Taekook, but rather to make it seem that he (also) dates women. I’m quite curious to see how the launch of his album will go (in general, but also regarding this).

I don’t agree that Jk benefits from this without doing anything himself. Jk has been deemed ‘straight’ the last couple of weeks because of Seven. He didn’t need Tae to do Taennie, since to most of fandom and the general public Tae and him are just friends. They’ve successfully hidden that way for years now, and only now something like this is happening. I really suspect it’s because of Tae’s album, and because he wants to be able to be more himself in general. People are sadly enough more inclined to accept/ignore a hint of queerness when a man very publicly dates a woman. We’ll see soon I suppose, since his album is probably going to be released soon.

I think Tae and Jk are very connected. Jk’s tears when Tae’s grandmother died tells me that he is not immune to Tae’s hurt at all. I therefore think that Jk will also have hurt because of this Taennie thing. If not for himself it will have been for Tae. There’s no benefit in standing by while your partner is rumored/shipped with someone else. That hurts! Jk is also a very feeling, emotional person.. it took him quite some days to come on live again after the Paris stuff. You don’t come this far in a relationship (that is already complicated) by letting one person carry the brunt of it.

[thewistlingbadger]

The owl house is NOT the best animated show that Disney channel has ever made.

Disclaimer: This is an opinion piece and does not mean to actually invalidate anyone else's opinion, this is just mine.

The owl house is a good show that is beloved by many. And why wouldn't it be? The animation is Stellar, the voice acting is phenomenal, it's incredibly diverse, has dark themes, and manages to incorporate new ideas into the fantasy genre that has mainly been hogged by a book series that was released over a decade ago (if you know you know). I hear a lot of people say that this is the best show Disney has ever made, but I fail to agree with this claim.

As much of a good show the owl house is, it drops the ball when it comes to story (sometimes, not all the time s2 is the best). Most people combat this by saying that the show is canceled early, which is true. However, the show was canceled when the finale of season 2 was in place, giving the writers and the creators much time to contemplate how to work out season 3. Each episode of season 3 is also twice the length of a normal episode, so they were given more time to flush out more things (you could also consider it to be six episodes instead of three due to the run time).

Instead of using this opportunity to their advantage to finish out the show and the most satisfying way possible that they could with their means, they opted with trying to rush the story into something that was more safe and more along the lines of fan service. Was that a bad choice? Not necessarily but I find it hard to say that a show is the best when it had to resort to tactics like these.

Episode 1 of season 3 is by far the best episode in the entire season. It gets the most done with the time it had, is narratively satisfying, and also presents new concepts. These new concepts as well as concepts that were established in prior seasons, end up being dropped at season 3 progresses. For example: episode 1 of season 3 presents the struggle that Luz has with going back to the demon Realm. It is revealed that she intends to go back to the human realm when this is all over and break up with Amity. Of course, this never happens. Not because between episode 1 and episode 3 Luz has significant development, but because that's the most satisfying ending for the fans. (I'm not counting the "all I ever wanted was to be understood" as significant development btw). Another concept from season 3 is the character of Evelyn, which is just another question that goes unanswered. Not because they didn't have time, but because they used their limited time to wrap up the show to work on other things that ultimately had no effect on the end of the show (ex: Willow's last minute character development).

So if I don't think the owl house is the best Disney animated show, then what do I think it is? Gravity falls. Gravity falls was a tightly knit show that ended almost a decade after the owl house. The owl house and Gravity falls have a lot of overlap. They're both about a teenager who moves to a new and strange place where they make friends, enemies, and intend to uncover the secrets of the place. Dana even worked on Gravity falls! The main difference between the two however, is that gravity falls knew what it was doing the whole time, and the owl house didn't. Alex Hirsch had the story of gravity falls completely thought out from the beginning. Disney even asked him for another season, but he refused because he knew what he was doing and what he wanted.

In conclusion: the owl house is not the best Disney channel animated show because it fails to wrap up all thoughts and ideas that were intentionally left unanswered due to poor planning and unfortunate circumstances. Gravity falls is better because it does everything that the owl house does, but actually delivers on it's promises.

[angeflrs]

Flufftober — Day 02: First Date.

Pairing: Max Goof / Yakko Warner.

Fandoms: Animaniacs, A Goofy Movie (Disney), Ducktales 2017 (Disney).

Word Count: 959.

Versión Español: https://archiveofourown.org/works/50488909/chapters/127630225#workskin

LouLou: don't forget that tomorrow we will see the new episode of Roman Empire II I know, Lou jsjs Who knows what would happen if I miss it /s I have to go now xoxo LouLou: First, yuck.  LouLou: Second, good luck on your date.

***

Max looked at his phone one last time, a fond smile though on his muzzle as he quickly put it back in his pocket and looked at his date next to him.

He still felt like he was in a dream, an incredible dream where the funniest and most unique guy had accepted a date with him.

He couldn't help but admire the outfit he had decided to wear today, although the mere fact that he was wearing something other than those smoky topaz pants and lavender polo shirt already made him feel so special that it was hard to keep his tail still. Today, however, he was wearing a mustard-colored Top T-shirt with a Darkwing Duck print with jean pants with a calf-length hem. Overall it was simple, but Max couldn't help but think that he looked so cute.

“You're going to like this place. It’s like a vegan ice cream parlor.” Max said, once he managed to take his eyes off Yakko to see that they were reaching his destination.

“vegan?” Yakko tilted his head with a curious look.

Max stopped when he arrived at the place, a humble place with pastel colors and an eighties style. He steps in front of Yakko, opening the door and holding it for him. That made Yakko's cheeks turn pink as he entered first.

“They make the ice creams with completely lactose-free milk, the standard is almond milk, but if you are allergic, they have options with soy milk.” he explained, as they both approached the register and the employee who was smiling at them.

Yakko perked up. "That sounds great."

The employee across the bar took this opportunity to speak.

“Good afternoon, what would you like to order? We have a promotion today: Three-ball cup. You can choose the flavor you want from our options and when you finish you can take the cup home.” The boy raised his hand, showing the screens above him with the promotions, he pointed out where the cup with ice cream of different flavors was and in the corner the price.

“Oh, Dot would like to drink grape juice there to look fancy, shall we order that?” Asking, Yakko turned to Max for an answer.

"Sure." Max nodded at Yakko and quickly looked back at the employee. “Two cups please.”

The employee nodded back and then pointed to the other side of the bar where the trays of ice cream flavors are displayed. “Choose your flavors.”

Yakko quickly walked over to look at each flavor, his hand holding his chin while the other rested on his hip. Meanwhile, Max took out his wallet and paid for the ice cream beforehand.

When he joined Yakko, he was still struggling, his bean eyes narrowed in a look of pure, adorable concentration.

Max took a moment to appreciate the view and then looked at the flavors. “For me… Oreo, vanilla and tiramisu.”

The boy who served them began to pour Max's drink when Yakko finally decided. “mint, chocolate and caramel please.”

They received their glasses with a spoon and found an empty table by the front window. They ate the first fifteen minutes in silence, Max fascinated by Yakko's expressions as he took his first bite of each flavor as if it were the most delicious thing in the world.

“so, this is your first date?” 

The sudden question caught Max a little off guard, almost dropping the ice cream off his spoon before putting it in his mouth.

He thought about it while he ate, looking out the window at the people passing by on the street.

“Well, I had a girlfriend in high school, we dated during the summer of our senior year, but when she started college she left the country, a week later we realized that it wasn't worth staying at a distance and we left it as friends.”

Yakko ponders for a moment, before asking another question. “And how was your first date with her?”

“Do you really want to know that?” Max raised an eyebrow.

The other shrugged, “I'm curious, sue me.” taking a spoonful of mint and putting it in your mouth.

Max was quiet for a moment, before smiling sideways without looking at Yakko. “I took her to a special ice cream shop.” He barely finished the sentence, covering his face and trying to dodge the napkins that were thrown at him while he laughed. Once calmed down, he spoke again. “I actually took her to the cinema. I was so nervous that I couldn't remember anything about the movie when it was over, the next day I came back alone just to watch it again."

There was silence at the table after that, although it wasn't awkward or heavy so Max saw no need to worry. He ate more of his ice cream until he had less than half left when Yakko spoke again.

“You don't look nervous now.” His voice was softer, not accusatory, but inquisitive.

Max smiled, looking Yakko in the eyes. “I was nervous when I asked you out because I didn't know if you would say yes, but you make me feel calm, I feel like myself when I am with you.”

Yakko's cheeks flushed red before he lowered his gaze shyly. “I think the opposite happens to me.”

Max tilted his head, a gesture associated with a confused but still cheerful puppy. "in a good way?"

Yakko laughed, his black eyes having a special sparkle in them. "In a good way. You bring out a side in me that I didn't even know and I like it.”

"I like it too. I like everything about you, in fact.”

[loopy777]

Ultimately the problem with the whole AFO and OFA BS is that they just go too powerful for their setting.

AFO far moreso though.

The two single worst problems battle shonen manga and anime has in terms of combat, is regeneration, and super durability.

Regeneration is the fucking worst, because it means that the character can just take damage after damage, after damage and get back on their feet, until suddenly THIS new attack is for all the marbles. There's nothing wrong with a healing factor that allows speedy recovery, but when everything can be healed up in a minute or instantly, it never fucking works.

The ONLY way to do a villain with regenerating as one of their main features, is if there is some sort of weakness that shuts the regeneration off cold, like Heracles burning the Hydra's head stumps, order of the stick dealing with a hydra by letting it grow too many heads for it to function, or Disney's Hercules to drop that mountainside on top of it, crushing the entire beast, and not just the Hydra's heads.

Meanwhile there is the invulnerable villain, that will take stupidly powerful attacks, and then the dust cleared and they were completely fine and unharmed.

This was popularized by Dragon Ball, and unfortunately became a mainstay of that series, but at least DB has the advantage that the characters in that series has the excuse that they became stronger than most real life religious pantheon's as the series went on. The fact god like beings can shrug off bullets or low level lasers kinda makes sense.

In fact one of the dumbest moments in the terrible sequel Dragon ball super, is when one of the strongest beings in existence is shot through the chest by a common ass laserbeam, which might sound fine on paper, but the rules of the universe at that point had so clearily established that it wouldn't work, so when it did it just made everyone facepalm.

Mha though, is not a series about the exploit of godlike beings. It's a series of what is the superhero equivalent of a low fantasy series, where while there was incredible power and force thrown around by the likes of all might and AFO, injuries(barring that damn regeneration quirk) actually mattered.

Compare Shigaraki's beating in the war arc, and how he left that fight as a broken shell, with the way every single character has been throwing everything at him and AFO and you see how the way battle has shifted so hard.

To be blunt, hori wrote himself into a corner by giving the villain group so few actual henchmen compared to the heroes, which means that now at the endgame, other than a chosen few MC's, EVERYONE has to be fighting AFO or Shigaraki.

And it doesn't help that the manga devoted way too damn much time to the wrong things too.

The entire fight at the flying school ended up being a complete nothing burger where the heroes weren't able to score a single good hit in, in exchange for bakugo maybe dying, and Mirko losing more limbs, and everyone else taking a beating.

There is a very, very specific fight from dragon ball that this sequence was trying to copy, a fight against a character called nappa, where the heroes are just trying to buy time for the MC Goku to show up.

And that worked. The crew vs Nappa is a great fight, but the reason it worked was because it was used to drive home the point of just how fucking screwed the heroes were.

Every single one of those guys except for two of the weaker members, died in that battle, and that was the entire point. They went to their deaths just to buy some time, and the entire narrative was framed around that fact.

The problem with the sky fight is that it did not successfully frame it in the same way, just copying the steps, without understanding the tempo or music that made those steps work to begin with.

Goku returning at the end was a glorious moment in dragon ball, the triumphant return of our hero, the proof that the cast's sacrifices were not in vain, and even after that, the two surviving characters from the nappa fight went on to play immense importance in the follow up fight as Nappa is defeated, and his buddy and boss Vegeta takes center stage to fight Goku head on.

By contrast, Izuku showing up at the end has none of that weight. It's not a glorious turning point, it's just another step of a fight that is already dragging on way, way too long.

The way to fix this is simple.

Characters REALLY needed to die in this fight, and they needed to have spectacular deaths. As old Julio scoundrel said, it doesnt matter if you win or lose... So long as you look really cool doing it.

They needed to get in solid, genuine hits that clearly affected Shigaraki, all the while the realization that pretty much all of them were going to die here began to set in with every single death... And yet marching on anyway. By not havi

I'll be honest, if i had been writing this story, i would have killed off every single hero in that fight other than lemellion, Mirko(Her giving up all her limbs in exchange for holding off Shigaraki for just a while longer works just fine, it just needed better focus) and maybe anteater.

As for the whole AFO shit, the problem ultimately is the same, only here there is a much easier, and less bloody solution. Take away his limbs for each hero encounter.

AFO is living on borrowed time anyway at this point... So why not embrace that? Have him take these stupidly enormous hits... And it actually does ginormous damage to him. By the time he reaches All Might, he should be on his last metaphorical legs, one arm, no legs, one eye, etc. All the while he regresses in age.

These changes would fix all the problems, but it would have given the big, slog that is the final battle here some much needed progress, rather than endless, no progress battle, after endless no progress battle.

Well, I admit I'm not as down on it all as you are, as I have been enjoying the individual character moments, even if the battle has kind of been treading water. But I'm not sure I agree with your proposed solutions.

Having more mooks probably would have had diminishing returns, as there are only so many characters who can be developed into something worthwhile in a story with an already large cast, so that defeating them will feel properly triumphant. As it is, I don't think I've ever cared about Spinner.

And killing people off would make the final fight feel more epic and worthwhile, but I think it would undermine the more important part of the story, that of the next and better generation inheriting the world and trying to do better. If the whole next generation is dead, it doesn't matter that Deku survives and is the greatest hero, because we saw that making a single person the Symbol of Peace isn't sustainable. Given a choice, I'd trim the fight rather than lose out on that theme. But I do like that all the students get a chance to get a hit in on OFA, even if it's not effective; they're participants in striking back against the shadow of the legacy of the previous generation.

My own proposed solution is to scrap the idea of a giant fight altogether. Have a complicated mission where everyone's powers are needed to find the Thing that will turn off OFA's power so that someone can one-shot him. Thus they all get to contribute, and we can throw in some nice battle moments for people while keeping up a propulsive heist-style mission.

But I think the Shonen Jump editors would fire me for that, so what do I know? To paraphrase a business adage I've heard, "No one ever got fired for hiring IBM imitating a decades-spanning hit manga/anime franchise."

[tomeandflickcorner]

Haunted Mansion Double Feature

I decided to do something special for Halloween this year.  For those of you who aren’t aware, the Haunted Mansion is one of my favorite rides in Disney World, and certainly my favorite in Magic Kingdom.  If I had the opportunity to be a cast member at a Disney theme park, being assigned to that ride would be my first choice.  For that reason, I thought it would be fun to review the movie that was based on the ride.  Of course, unlike most movies based on Disney rides (such as Jungle Cruise from 2021 and the somewhat obscure Tower of Terror from 1997), the Disney company actually made two attempts at a Haunted Mansion movie.  But which one is the superior version?  Let’s venture into regions beyond and find out. Kindly step all the way in please, and make room for everyone. There’s no turning back now.

The Haunted Mansion (The 2003 Version)

The opening for this film is really creative in the way it tells a story without any dialogue, simply letting the music and visuals do the work.  A masquerade ball is being held at an elaborately decorated mansion.  With the help of some tarot cards that appear on screen at various points, we’re told how a love story met a tragic end, with a young woman writing and leaving behind what appears to be a suicide note for an unknown reason.  Her horrified lover discovers it and takes off running to try and stop her, but arrives too late as she has already drank the poison-laced wine.  In his grief, the man ends up taking his own life as well, hanging himself from the rafters (which obviously references the hanging man from every version of the ride, excluding the one at Hong Kong Disney, which arguably might not even count as a Haunted Mansion ride in the first place.)

It then cuts to the modern day.  A young boy who appears to be delivering papers pedals his bike up to the now seemingly abandoned mansion.  In hindsight, it seems a bit strange that this paper delivery boy decided to venture out to the mansion to begin with.  As the audience, we already know that there’s nobody currently residing there (nobody living, that is), and I got the impression that the mansion is a bit off the beaten path, so it’s doubtful there are any other houses nearby who would be needing a newspaper delivered.  Are we supposed to just assume he’s there on a dare?  Either way, the boy is quickly scared off when a ghostly face bursts out from the mansion in a threatening manner, along with a disembodied voice ordering the boy to go away.  In the paperboy’s haste to ride away on his bike, he drops some of his papers, including a stack of flyers for a real estate business called Evers and Evers, which is run by a husband and wife team, Jim and Sara Evers, played by Eddie Murphy and Marsha Thomason.  The smiling face of Jim Evers printed on the flyer leads to a somewhat awkward transition to Jim in the middle of showing a house to a pair of prospective homebuyers, Mr. and Mrs. Coleman.  Mr. Coleman is seemingly dragging his feet in regards to agreeing to buy the house, despite his wife’s approval of the place.  So Jim ends up using a rather interesting tactic to convince them.  His wife and business partner, Sara, calls him up in the middle of the house viewing to confirm their plans for later.  It turns out that today is their wedding anniversary, and they have plans to go out for a nice dinner that evening.  Jim, taking advantage of the fact that the Colemans can’t hear Sara’s half of the conversation, words his responses to Sara’s questions to make it sound like he’s speaking to someone else who is interested in buying the house.  The very idea that someone else might buy the house they’re currently looking at prompts Mrs. Coleman to announce that they’ll take the house, overruling her husband’s handwringing, delivering a hard smack to his stomach in the process. (Somehow, I don’t see this marriage lasting for very long, but what do I know?)

We then cut to what looks like a Tiki bar somewhere, where Jim is delivering the signed offer to Mr. and Mrs. Silverman, who I assume are the couple who were selling the house in question.  The Silvermans are, to put it bluntly, overly chipper to the point of being annoying.  Jim is really trying to get them to hurry and sign the document indicating that they’re accepting the offer on their house so he can make it to the anniversary dinner with his wife, but they do not pick up on his obvious need to get going.  Even when he directly tells them that he’s pressed for time and has to get home to his wife for their anniversary, they continue to waste his time by trying to sing a goofy little song.  Finally, Jim gets them to sign, but as he’s making his way to the exit of the establishment, he’s stopped by another couple who overheard Jim finalizing the deal with the Silvermans, announcing that they’re also interested in buying a house.  Because Jim apparently doesn’t believe in carrying around business cards to hand out, and didn’t think to simply give them his phone number so they could get in touch with him later, he ends up sticking around a bit longer to discuss what they’re looking for in a house.  As you might expect, this results in Jim completely missing the anniversary dinner reservation, which naturally makes Sara upset.  Not even Jim’s attempt to make it up to her by buying her a large teddy bear and expensive looking watch is enough to diminish her ire.  She tells him off, reminding him that he didn’t just miss their anniversary.  He also missed two birthday parties, a soccer game and a barbeque because of his determination to sell as many houses as possible.  Jim, to his credit, is taken aback by this.  And he announces on the spot that they’ll head down to the lake and spend the entire weekend there with the kids.

Okay, so, here’s the thing.  Clearly, this movie is trying to use that whole plot trope with the workaholic father who needs to learn his lesson about how his family is more important than work.  But the problem with that is that it doesn’t really work in this case.  Because while it is apparent that Jim is dedicated to his job, he is clearly making an effort to be there for his family as well.  Hence his impromptu decision to take the weekend off to spend quality time with them.  Come to think of it, a lot of the movies I’ve seen that try using the workaholic father trope don’t really work, either.  Take movies like Hook and Jingle All the Way for instance.  In those movies, Peter and Howard both made the effort to leave work in time to make it to their son’s baseball game/martial arts graduation ceremony.  Except they don’t manage to make it in time, arriving after the game or ceremony was over.  While I don’t think it was ever established what Peter’s holdup was, the main reason why Howard didn’t make it in time was because he got stuck in traffic, which is hardly his fault.   I don’t know; maybe I should simply add the workaholic father trope to the list of Hollywood plotlines I don’t care for.  While I get where they’re coming from when they attempt to tell these stories, I think the people who tell them forget that if the father doesn’t go to work, he won’t be able to provide for his family.  And speaking as someone who works a full time retail job, I can appreciate how the demands of work can keep someone from making it to family events, even if they wanted to be there.  While I imagine it’s a bit different with desk jobs and other such office related work, it’s not unheard of for time off requests to be denied.  And sometimes, things come up that prevent you from clocking out on time.  Honestly, the only time I’ve actually seen this workaholic father trope work was with Mary Poppins, and that was because the movie made it abundantly clear that Mr. Banks was severely disconnected from his children and really didn’t make the effort to spend time with them, even going so far as to dismiss them.

Anyway, movie.  Jim heads upstairs to inform their children, Megan and Michael, about their spur of the moment family vacation.  This enables us to meet the two Evers children and gain an idea of what they’re like.  Immediately, we learn that Michael has arachnophobia as he comes out of his room, screaming that there’s a large spider on his window.  Jim makes an attempt to turn this into a teaching moment for his son about the importance of not being afraid and whatnot.  He then proceeds to try and get Michael to kill the spider on his own with a rolled up magazine.  But while they’re arguing over the matter, Megan, the older sibling, strolls up and takes it upon herself to kill the spider for them.  Okay, so we got an arachnophobic son and a no-nonsense daughter.  Unfortunately, that’s pretty much the only attempt the movie makes in establishing the personalities of the Evers children.  Though the movie does make a point to show that Michael managed to smuggle Jim’s copy of Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue into his room, which is probably meant to make us view Michael as a typical 10 year old boy, as I imagine a lot of straight boys his age were starting to develop an interest in girls.  Even so, that doesn’t really make these two very well developed characters.  Then again, the kids aren’t really the focus of the movie.

On a side note, though, I do take issue with the anti-spider stance this scene took.  I don’t much care for how the movie is low-key encouraging people to kill spiders that make it into the house.  House spiders are actually very beneficial, and are largely harmless.  (I say largely because there are indeed venomous spiders out there, but this movie is taking place in the US, so unless you’re dealing with a black widow or a brown recluse, you really have nothing to worry about.)  While I can understand how some people might find spiders creepy to look at, spiders prey on insect pests, including the ones that transmit diseases like typhoid and malaria.  Having a spider or two in your house can actually keep you safe from getting seriously ill, so do yourself a huge favor and allow the spider that made it inside your room to live.  If you absolutely can’t stand having a spider in the house, simply catch them in a paper cup and release them into the wild.  Maybe even into your vegetable or flower garden so they can dine on aphids and destructive caterpillars, and you don’t have to waste money on chemical pesticides that can contaminate your garden. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

We then cut to downstairs, where we see the plot starting to pick up.  Sara is in the middle of the phone call with a man requesting to set up a meeting to discuss selling Gracey Manor, an old house that the man’s employer is ‘eager to move on’ from.  It’s slightly hard to make out Sara’s handwriting as she writes out the information, but it looks like the street address is 17400 Tarkin Avenue.  Oddly, the only Tarkin Avenue I could find information on is a street in Las Vegas, Nevada.  I doubt that’s what they were trying to place this movie, however, particularly when we later see that Jim and Sara’s car has Louisiana plates on it.  So maybe there’s another street by that name elsewhere, or the movie writers were just making up street names.  In any event, the man on the phone asks Sara if she’d be willing to come down tomorrow to discuss the matter, also requesting that she come alone.  The reason he gives for this is that they got a copy of their flyer and the employer in question thought that only Sara looked trustworthy.  (Obviously, by reading through the lines, we’re supposed to realize that the caller is referring to the flyers that the paperboy dropped earlier in the movie.  So, yeah, there was a plot related reason for the paperboy to ride his bike up to the mansion, but it still makes little sense in terms of the movie’s reality.)  Sara, in regards to the phone caller’s requests, states that she and her husband work as a team, and that she is unavailable to stop by tomorrow as she has plans that can’t be broken.  That’s when Jim comes back downstairs after his meeting with the kids.  When he sees the address Sara had written down, money signs instantly appear in his eyes.  According to him, the houses in that location are all huge multimillion mansions.  So if they could sell a house up there, it could be really beneficial to them in terms of their real estate business.  Sara, however, reminds him that they already made plans to go up to the lake that weekend.  To this, Jim decides to compromise.  They’ll still head up to the lake for the weekend, but they’ll make a quick detour to Gracey Manor en route to the lake, stating that it would only take 20 minutes.

They eventually make it to Gracey Manor, and the first sign of weirdness happens right as they arrive, when the front gate, which was shown to be padlocked shut seconds before, opens on its own when Jim and Sara’s backs are turned.  However, this doesn’t deter them or arouse their suspicions, and they venture up to the front door.  As they’re looking around the grounds, discovering a vast cemetery in the backyard in the process (which leaves Megan flabbergasted that her parents would even try to sell a house with dead people), a clap of thunder is heard, and it suddenly starts to rain rather heavily.  So the Evers family have to quickly make their way to the front door, which opens on its own, allowing them, and the viewing audience, to get their first look of the mansion interior.  Admittedly, it doesn’t seem to resemble the interior of the actual Disney attraction.  Yeah, it’s certainly has elaborate décor and is nice and dusty, with cobwebs lining just about everything.  But it does simply look like a typical spooky house. 

As they’re looking around the place, a sudden noise alerts them to the approach of Ramsley, the butler.  And his introduction is appropriately ominous, from the way he slowly walks toward them to the lighting illuminating the dark corridor he’s walking down.  Ramsley remarks that they were not expecting anyone except Sara to show up, but still decides to press on, stating they’ll simply have to add more place settings as the master of Gracey Manor wants to discuss the matter of selling the mansion over dinner.  To this, Sara announces they can’t stay as she wants to get going with their family trip.  Jim, on the other hand, pretty much waves off her objection, saying they shouldn’t be rude and that it couldn’t hurt to stick around for soup at the very least.  So they make their way to the elaborate dining room, where they soon meet Edward Gracey, the owner of Gracey Manor.  According to him, the mansion was built by his grandfather, who spared no expense.  As dinner is being served, Edward Gracey and Ramsley explain that they normally wouldn’t have called them down on such short notice, but there have been ‘more disturbances’ lately, so time was of the essence.  But before more could be established, Ramsley looks out the window and announces that the sudden storm has caused the nearby river to flood into the road leading to Gracey Manor.  As such, the Evers family are essentially stranded there until morning and will have to stay the night.  Sara once again states that they had plans and really can’t afford to stay any longer, but Master Gracy declares that there’s no other option.  It’s also worth mentioning that during this whole sequence, both Ramsley and Master Gracey barely acknowledge Jim’s presence, even when he tries to offer a handshake in greeting.  And Master Gracey, at one point, stares rather intently at Sara.  It’s the kind of look that you really shouldn’t give a woman when her husband is sitting right there.  Jim, while he does seem to notice this, apparently decides not to comment on it.

After Ramsley shows them to the rooms that have been prepared for them, Sara and Jim get into an argument.  Sara yells at Jim, saying that they were supposed to go to the lake, but that he just couldn’t resist coming out there to look at Gracey Manor, and that the only thing he seems to care about anymore is work.  Jim counters this by declaring that, as much as Sara complains about how much he works, she certainly doesn’t seem to mind how he is able to bring home expensive gifts for her. Sara, in retort to that statement, takes off the watch Jim had given her and tosses it aside before storming into the bathroom and locking the door.  Yeah, as I said before, I can tell what the movie is trying to do in making Jim seem like a workaholic who takes his family for granted.  But I think Jim made a fair point by pointing out how Sara didn’t seem to have any reservations about accepting the kind of lifestyle that came from Jim bringing home large paychecks and whatnot.  (Though I can also see how it really wasn’t the best time for Jim to bring that up during the argument.)  Besides, if Sara really had been against coming out to Gracey Manor, she probably should have put her foot down earlier.  For instance, in an earlier scene when they were still driving to Gracey Manor, Jim gets a phone call from someone from his real estate office about another potential sale.  While we do see Jim briefly consider coming home from the lake ahead of schedule so they could begin that new business transaction, we also see him nonverbally conferring with Sara, who responds with a look that makes it clear that coming home early is out of the question.  So it’s not as if Jim is completely dismissive of Sara’s needs.  I’m sure if Sara was really adamant against coming to Gracey Manor, Jim would have relented, or at least have agreed to postpone the trip there until they were on the way back from the lake.  But that’s just me.

Despite Jim’s attempts to apologize to Sara for what he said through the bathroom door, Sara is standing firm in giving him the silent treatment.  When Jim turns back around, however, he finds Ramsley standing right there behind him.  Ramsley tells Jim that Master Gracey would like to talk with him, and he proceeds to lead Jim to the mansion’s library.  While they’re down there, Jim admits that he doesn’t really believe in ghosts (despite what he said when Master Gracey mentioned the topic earlier), and we get Ramsley spouting out some more cryptic statements about how important it is for Master Gracey to ‘move on.’  Which does bring up a pretty big issue with this movie.  Nobody really seems to react to things the way you’d think an actual person would.  It’s obvious to the viewing audience that Ramsley and Master Gracey are ghosts.  (If you hadn’t already figured that out, just look at the title of the movie.)  So the things Ramsley is saying about Master Gracey moving on makes sense to us.  But Jim has just admitted that he doesn’t believe in ghosts.  So one would think he’s be a bit more puzzled by the vague things Ramsley is saying.  But we never see him question it.  Anyway, after a quick scene change so we can briefly check in with Megan and Michael, with Megan complaining about how there’s no cell reception and Michael wondering if the rain will stop, we see Jim puttering about in the library alone, indicating Ramsley must have left the room off camera.  As Jim messes about in the library while waiting for Master Gracey to arrive, he inadvertently discovers a hidden doorway in the nearby bookshelf, which is triggered by moving a desktop bust.  Jim, letting curiosity take hold, steps through the hidden doorway to check it out, but this results in him getting trapped in the secret passageway when the door closes behind him, and he can’t find a way to open the door from his side.

Now we get back to Megan and Michael, who are still awake for some reason.  Granted the movie doesn’t really let us know what time it is at this point, but you would think we would at least see an indication that these kids are getting ready to go to bed.  Either way, Michael decides to play around with some things he found on the nearby dresser, such as a large glass decanter of what I’m gathering is some sort of whiskey (which I personally wouldn’t trust, given that I have no idea how long it’s been in there, not that Michael is of legal drinking age) and a hairbrush.  In the process, he discovers a still-working music box.  As he’s inspecting the music box, he sees something reflected in the music box’s mirror and yells for Megan, who comes running out of the bathroom, stopping short and dropping her phone in shock.  It quickly shows us that they’re seeing a spectral blue orb hovering in front of them. Michael is quick to identify the orb as a Ghost Ball, which is a rather random conclusion for him to make.  Did we have any indication earlier that Michael had read books about ghosts?  I don’t remember seeing anything to suggest such a thing when we saw his bedroom.  Unless we were supposed to conclude that from the fact that he has a poster of Harry Houdini on his wall, since Harry Houdini spent much of the 1920s trying to debunk psychics and mediums, and before his death, he’d promised his wife that if it was possible to communicate from beyond the grave, he would send her a message with a secret code that they agreed upon. But even that’s a rather flimsy connection.  As the children watch, the orb begins floating away and passes through the bedroom door.  Megan, with no noticeable provocation, comes to the conclusion that the orb is not only sentient, but that it wants them to follow it.  So Megan ventures out into the hallway to follow the orb, with Michael quickly deciding to go with her out of a reluctance to be left alone.  Megan and Michael follow the spectral orb up into the mansion’s attic.  It’s there that the children discover an old portrait of a woman who bears an uncanny resemblance to their mother.  At that moment, Ezra the footman and Emma the maid also appear on the scene.  Ezra immediately starts to scold the children for being there, saying that the fact that they’re in the attic in the first place is unspeakable.  (And I refuse to believe that I’m the only one who’d wanted Ezra to use the word inconceivable instead, considering Ezra is portrayed by Wallace Shawn.  It was such a wasted opportunity.) Emma, on the other hand, seems to be more accommodating to Megan and Michael’s presence, offering them cookies and telling them that the portrait was of a woman called Elizabeth.  Before more could be said, however, they hear a floorboard creaking, and Ezra and Emma urge Megan and Michael to hide.  The moment the children find a hiding spot, Ramsley appears on the scene. He questions the two servants as to the whereabouts of the children, as he’s discovered that they’re not in their rooms.  However, Ezra and Emma feign ignorance, so Ramsley instructs them to bring the children to him once they find them, as he’s not willing to allow anything to disrupt Master Gracey’s plans.

I probably should mention that there was a deleted/extended scene that takes place around this part.  In the deleted scene, after giving the children their cookies, Emma reveals to them that she and Ezra are both ghosts, going on to explain that the mansion has been under a curse for 112 years, ever since the woman in the portrait, Elizabeth, had died.  When Megan and Michael address the fact that Elizabeth looks just like their mother, Ezra explains that there’s a possibility that they’re one and the same, though Emma voices her skepticism, saying that Sara might not be Elizabeth at all.  I’m not entirely sure why this scene was cut, though, as it really helps piece the story together.  At least we can still see it in the DVD’s bonus features.

Meanwhile, Jim has found his way out of the secret passage, which has brought him into another section of Gracey Manor.  He begins to make his way through the unfamiliar corridors, and in the process, he walks past a few Haunted Mansion Easter Eggs, such as the Changing Portraits (which are slightly different from the ones you see on the ride, but I’ve read that the portraits seen here are actual historical paintings, or at least replicas of them) and the Watchful Busts.  He eventually comes across a door that seems to be breathing, but Jim dismisses this as a sign of termites and ventures through the door. After some more padding, which includes a rather confusing moment when Jim answers a ringing phone, only to have Ramsley, who was on the other end of the call, hanging up without a word (why exactly did Ramsley call the phone in that particular room?  Did he know Jim would be there?  Was he trying to lure Jim into that particular room?  For what purpose? It’s never explained), Jim hears a voice in the distance and begins to follow it.  This leads him to find one of the most recognizable characters from the Haunted Mansion, Madame Leota.  For the few of you out there who don’t know about Madame Leota, she’s a spiritual medium who appears as a floating head inside a crystal ball. (Disney Trivia time- Madame Leota’s name was based on Leota Toomes, a former Disney Imagineer whose head was the model for the Haunted Mansion character.  Although Leota Toomes actual voice wasn’t quite menacing enough, so the job of voicing Madame Leota went to Eleanor Audley, who had previously voiced two classic Disney villains- Maleficent and Lady Tremaine.)

Anyway, Jim has now met Madame Leota, which leads to a mildly entertaining moment when Jim is forced into a chair as said chair and table start levitating around the room, along with various instruments.  Madame Leota, while speaking in riddles, tells Jim that there is a curse on the house and that it must be broken if he wants to escape the mansion with his family.  Jim, after his chair stops levitating, understandably begins freaking out and takes off running, with various floating instruments pursuing him.  After this chase scene continues for a bit, Jim manages to find refuge behind a door, which is where he reunites with Megan and Michael, who are still in the company of Ezra and Emma.  Jim, still not quite ready to accept that the mansion is haunted, tells his kids to get their stuff together as they’re leaving as soon as they locate Sara.  Megan and Michael, however, state that they can’t leave, as they have to help break the curse.  Jim pretty much refuses to listen to anything they say, still rattled from what he’d just experienced, until Michael tells him that Sara is in trouble, and they show him the portrait of Elizabeth.  Like his kids, Jim also instantly sees the resemblance between Elizabeth and Sara.

While all of this is going on, Sara has decided that she doesn’t want to be mad at Jim anymore and heads out to look for him.  During her search, she comes across Ramsley, who tells her (not untruthfully) that he left Jim in the library.  When Sara ventures into the library herself, however, she finds Master Gracey instead, and they start talking.  Sara asks Master Gracey why he wants to sell Gracey Manor, as it’s been his home for generations.  So Master Gracey begins to tell her the tragic story of Elizabeth, which we previously saw glimpses of during the prologue scene.  Back then, Master Gracey and Elizabeth were deeply in love with one another.  However, they were from ‘two different worlds.’  Which is obviously the movie’s attempt to vaguely touch upon the fact that Master Gracey was the rich, White heir to the estate and Elizabeth was a woman of mixed race.  Needless to say, such a union would have been strongly frowned upon in the Deep South during that particular time period.  (And yes, I know I’m putting that mildly.)  In the end, Elizabeth ultimately decided to poison herself, which led to the heartbroken Master Gracey to give into his grief and hang himself.  Since then, his spirit has roamed the halls of the mansion.  Of course, because Sara isn’t supposed to know that the mansion is haunted quite yet, Master Gracey lets her believe the events of the story in question happened to his grandfather and not to him.  (And Sara doesn’t think to question how Master Gracey’s grandfather was supposed to have hung himself while seemingly unmarried and childless.  Maybe she just assumed he’d fathered children with a different woman before meeting Elizabeth?)

Upon returning to Madame Leota’s chamber, Jim, Megan, Michael, Ezra and Emma discuss the curse with her.  Madame Leota states that Elizabeth does indeed walk the halls of the mansion, which does make it sound like Sara might be Elizabeth reincarnated after all, but she also states that they mustn’t be deceived as things are not as they appear.  She goes on to state that in order for the curse to be broken, they must learn ‘the truth,’ and instructs Jim to venture into a certain mausoleum in the mansion’s cemetery and locate a key inside a black crypt.  Finding this key is imperative.  However, Megan points out the issue of how they’re supposed to get out to the cemetery, as they’re seemingly trapped inside the mansion.  Which, of course, leads to Ezra saying the iconic phrase of ‘there’s always my way.’

Ezra’s way ends up taking a carriage hearse pulled by a skeletal horse, which passes right through the walls of the mansion.  (I suspect that this was a reference to the carriage hearse being pulled by the invisible horse that can be seen outside the Haunted Mansion attraction in both the California and Florida parks, but if that was the case, you’d think they’d make the horse in this movie invisible as well.  Was it just easier for the special effects team to make the horse a skeletal one instead?) As they make their way through the cemetery, Jim, Megan and Michael witness various ghosts lurking around, which is obviously a nod to the well-known graveyard scene from the ride.  We even get a glimpse of the Hitchhiking Ghosts before Jim, Megan and Michael exit the hearse to continue searching on foot.  After a brief encounter with the less than helpful Singing Busts (who are played by the Disneyland Dapper Dans, I believe), Megan locates the mausoleum Madame Leota indicated.  Because Michael is too scared to go inside, Jim decides to venture into the mausoleum alone, instructing Megan to stay with her brother as he isn’t willing to leave him there by himself.  Here, we also learn that Megan studied Latin for three years.  Which does make the characterization of these kids a bit harder to swallow.  Since it’s later indicated that Megan is currently 13, this means she started studying Latin when she was 10.  While I readily admit I don’t have much experience with children, I find it a bit unbelievable that a 10 year old would have an interest in learning Latin.  Of course, she doesn’t seem to be as fluent in Latin as she claims to be.  According to her, the plaque on the door to the mausoleum reads ‘beware all who enter, here lies the passage to the dead.’  But I have it on good authority that a more accurate translation is closer to ‘anyone who enters here will end up in the fire.’

Of course, Megan soon goes against her father’s wishes and follows him into the mausoleum, stating that she was worried he wouldn’t find the key.  Jim and Megan quickly find the correct crypt and are able to remove the key from the skeletal remains inside.  But as the two of them start to leave with the key, the movie decides to throw a bit more tension at us by having all the dead bodies inside the mausoleum come to life.  So we get a whole sequence of Jim and Megan trying to fend off a bunch of skeletal zombies, as well as relocating the key Jim accidentally dropped.  Eventually, Jim and Megan are able to shake the zombies long enough to run towards the entrance of the mausoleum, but just before they could reach the door, it slams shut, trapping them inside as the door locks on the outside.  And to Michael’s horror, hundreds of spiders appear and begin crawling about on the door, thereby preventing him from being able to help unlock the door and free his father and sister.  Fortunately, this hurtle is soon dealt with as Jim calls out to Michael from behind the door, reassuring him that it’s okay to be scared sometimes, and that everyone gets scared once in a while.  But that it’s important to not let that stop you.  Which is a really good message for this movie to teach.  Much better than the stance Jim tried to take up at the start of the movie, in which he claimed that he never got scared.  This manages to encourage Michael to face his fear long enough to open the door, enabling Jim and Megan to escape the pursuing zombies by the skin of their teeth.

After a brief fake out when it looks like Jim lost the key again, they return to Madame Leota’s chambers.  Only to be told that they have another stop on this scavenger hunt and now must locate a trunk.  Jim, to say the least, is feeling quite perturbed by this and decides to simply take Madame Leota’s crystal ball with them as they look for the trunk so he won’t have to continue going back and forth.  They find the trunk in the attic and, when Jim unlocks and opens the trunk, Madame Leota instructs him to ‘find the thing that must be read.’  So Jim rummages through the contents of the trunk and finds a letter inside a red envelope.  By opening it up and reading it, they find that it’s a letter that Elizabeth had written.  In the letter, she accepts Master Gracey’s marriage proposal and states that she will love him for all eternity, which indicates that Elizabeth hadn’t really killed herself as they’d been led to believe.  Which means someone must have murdered her and made it look as if she’d killed herself by leaving behind a fake suicide letter.  As they take this revelation in, Ramsley suddenly appears on the scene, revealing that he’d been the one behind everything.  He explains that his motive behind the murder was because he thought that it would have destroyed the reputation of the estate and the Gracey family name if the two had gotten married as they’d planned.  So he felt it was his duty to do whatever was necessary to prevent Master Gracey from making such a grave mistake as running away with Elizabeth.  So he tricked Elizabeth into drinking poisoned wine before slinking away through the same secret passageway Jim had discovered earlier, to make sure he wouldn’t be discovered next to Elizabeth’s body.  (I recently heard that there was a story called The Legend of Gracey Manor that was written by the creative team at Buena Vista Pictures in collaboration with this movie’s filmmakers, which delved a bit more into Ramsley’s backstory and further explained his motivation.  But outside of an article on the Haunted Mansion Wikipedia, I can’t find any information about this story, so it’s possible it was only available to readers for a limited time.)  Upon hearing this, Jim vows to tell Master Gracey what really happened, but Ramsley states he can’t allow Master Gracey to learn the truth because Ramsley’s plan involves having Master Gracey marry Sara while believing she’s Elizabeth.  Then, when Master Gracey believes he’s finally reunited with his lost love, the curse will end and everyone’s souls will be free.  To prevent them from revealing his transgression and evil plan to Master Gracey, Ramsley uses his ghostly abilities to trap Megan and Michael inside a trunk and literally throws Jim out the window, followed by barricading the windows and doors so he wouldn’t be able to get back inside.  Even when Jim tries to break the glass panels of the conservatory, they magically repair themselves each time.  (And yes, it is a bit unbelievable that Jim survived being tossed out of the attic window and falling right onto the glass conservatory dome, followed by the roof of his car.  At the very least, you’d think he’d have broken a few bones upon impact.  But in a Disney movie based on one of their classic attractions, you gotta suspend your belief a bit.)

Inside the mansion, Master Gracey is still showing Sara around.  After Master Gracey asks her if she believes that love is about second chances and forgiveness, he can no longer keep up the pretense.  He starts grilling her about why she still doesn’t recognize him or remember anything, stating that he was so sure that bringing her back to Gracey Manor would help jog her memory of how they once loved each other.  As Master Gracey continues to implore Sara to remember her previous life as Elizabeth and how they can now be together at last, ghostly figures of people dancing appear around them.  Needless to say, this completely freaks Sara out, and once she manages to pull herself free from Master Gracey’s grip, she takes off running, loudly declaring that she’s not Elizabeth.  This devastates Master Gracey, who begins to doubt that Sara is his lost love returned to him after all.  But Ramsley appears behind him, assuring him that’s not the case, and that Sara will eventually remember him.  After sending Master Gracey on his way to get ready for the wedding ceremony, Ramsley then approaches Sara and instructs her to put on the wedding dress that was originally meant for Elizabeth so she can marry Master Gracey.  To ensure her cooperation, he reveals to her that he’s holding Megan and Michael captive and virtually threatens their wellbeing if Sara doesn’t agree to pretend to be Elizabeth and marry Master Gracey.  While Sara is devastated, she relents to the blackmail.

Outside, Jim is sitting by his car, feeling defeated and beating himself up, blaming himself for the whole mess as it was his idea to come to Gracey Manor instead of going to the lake like they were supposed to.  As he’s sitting there, Madame Leota comes rolling up.  (Don’t ask me how she got out there, because I have no idea.)  She gives him a bit of a pep talk, urging him to try to get back into the mansion again, as ‘the only true failure is when you stop trying.’  This somehow gives Jim the inspiration to use the car as a battering ram, driving it right into the mansion’s conservatory (destroying a piano in the process).  Once inside, Jim manages to free Megan and Michael from their makeshift prison after fighting off a few animated suits of armor.  With the children safe and out of harm’s way, they all barge into the ballroom where Ramsley is in the middle of officiating the wedding ceremony.  When Sara sees Jim, and that their children are safe and sound, she immediately turns away from the altar and runs into Jim’s arms.  However, Master Gracey, still believing Sara is Elizabeth, orders Jim to get away from her, drawing his sword.  Jim doesn’t back down, though, telling Master Gracey that Sara is not Elizabeth, and that Ramsley is only trying to trick him into believing they’re the same woman so the curse will end.  But Master Gracey doesn’t listen, until Jim shows him Elizabeth’s real letter, which Ramsley had confiscated before he could see it.  Upon reading the letter, Master Gracey is visibly shocked and turns to Ramsley for answers.  While Ramsley tries to bluff his way out of things at first, he quickly realizes the jig is up and admits that he’d killed Elizabeth to prevent Master Gracey from marrying her and bringing scandal upon the house.  As a final act of vengeance against Master Gracey’s ‘selfishness,’ Ramsley, I guess, summons up a legion of demonic creatures to attack everyone.  But this doesn’t really lead to anything.  Because with Ramsley’s evil deed exposed to everyone, a fiery portal forms in the nearby fireplace, and a dragon like creature made up entirely of fire appears to drag Ramsley down to Hell.  But as he’s getting dragged down, Ramsley grabs onto Jim’s ankle in an attempt to take him down with him.  Fortunately, Master Gracey is able to save Jim in the nick of time, but Ramsley is left to his fate.

Of course, things are not quite wrapped up yet.  See, during the wedding ceremony, Ramsley had given Sara a goblet of poisoned wine.  Because I guess the plan was to have Sara die so she could be with Master Gracey in death.  And although Sara had the goblet up to her lips when Jim, Megan and Michael stormed in, it looked as if they’d arrived just in time.  But I suppose a few drops of the wine had touched her tongue, and the poison is now taking hold.  As Jim holds the dying Sara in his arms, the spectral orb that Megan and Michael encountered earlier appears.  The orb enters into Sara’s body, and Sara starts to levitate as a gateway to Heaven appears overhead.  It’s then revealed that the orb was Elizabeth’s spirit the whole time.  But until Ramsley’s part in her death was revealed, she couldn’t properly materialize.  Master Gracey and Elizabeth, overjoyed to be reunited at last, share a passionate kiss, only pulling away when Jim reminds them that that’s still technically his wife’s body that Elizabeth is inhabiting.  So Elizabeth’s soul exits Sara, who is instantly revived.  (So I guess possession can cure people of poison?)

As the movie wraps up, Master Gracey expresses his gratitude towards Jim, also offering his apology for mistaking Sara for Elizabeth.  As a token of appreciation for reuniting him with Elizabeth and freeing them all from the curse that kept their souls trapped in the mansion for so long, he gifts the Evers the deed to the house, giving them his permission to do what they want with it.  With that, the souls of Master Gracey and Elizabeth are able to cross over into Heaven, along with Ezra, Emma and assumingly all the other ghosts who haunted the grounds.  Well, all except for Madame Leota and the Singing Busts, who the Evers family apparently decide to take with them as they finally continue their journey to the lake.  And that’s how the movie ends, with them driving down the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, which is apparently a famous bridge in Louisiana.  And something I’ve noticed about this scene?  They’re now driving a completely different car than the one they were driving upon arriving at Gracey Manor.  Where did this new car come from?  Was there supposed to be a time jump here?

So that was the 2003 version of Haunted Mansion. While I still enjoy the movie, I can see the problems with it.  There are admittedly a few plot holes.  Such as what exactly conjured the curse that kept everyone’s souls trapped.  And why exactly were Ezra and Emma seemingly so afraid of Ramsely?  After all, they were present when Jim first discovered the letter that exposed the truth about Elizabeth’s death.  Why did they still go along with Ramsley’s deception instead of telling Master Gracey?  Also, who put Elizabeth’s real letter in the trunk, and then placed the key to the trunk in the black crypt?  The obvious answer is Ramsley of course.  But one has to wonder why he wouldn’t have simply burn the letter to cover his tracks.  And yes, I can see why some Haunted Mansion fans would take issue with how all the ghosts cross over at the end.  Because the whole point of the Haunted Mansion ride is that the mansion is occupied by ‘happy haunts.’  The ghosts are haunting the mansion because they want to be there.  They enjoy haunting the mansion.  So having them all cross over at the end does kind of contradict that sentiment.  And it’s not really explained why Madame Leota and the Singing Busts didn’t get to cross over with everyone else, either.  But all that aside, I still enjoy watching the movie as there’s enough good parts to make up for the head scratching moments.  Some of the special effects are still impressive to look at over twenty years later.  And the whole mystery aspect surrounding Elizabeth’s death is rather enjoyable.  Though I am grateful that they didn’t throw in an Eddie Murphy animatronic on the ride at Disney Parks like they did with the Pirates of the Caribbean ride.  (I know I’m probably in the minority, but I firmly stand by my stance that adding the Depp animatronics to the ride was a greater travesty than getting rid of ‘We wants the Redhead!’)  And as a side note, I probably should mention that this movie often has the characters use the word gyp*y when talking about Madame Leota.  While it’s common for people to use this word as if it’s synonymous to fortune tellers or free spirited wanderers, it was historically used a racial slur for Romani people and can therefore be very offensive to some people.  Of course, I’m giving the script writers the benefit of a doubt, assuming they were simply ignorant of the true meaning of the word, like most people seem to be.               

 That’s all I have to say about the 2003 version of Haunted Mansion, but there’s still the 2023 version to tackle, so let’s get going.

The Haunted Mansion (The 2023 Version)

This version came out twenty years after the first one, and even before the movie begins, you can tell that this one will be significantly different.  Not only is this one over thirty minutes longer, but it was given a PG-13 rating.  (The version with Eddie Murphy was PG.)

As the movie begins, we hear the familiar words of the Ghost Host from the ride welcoming us ‘foolish mortals.’  Only it’s not the iconic voice of Paul Frees saying the line, but Jamie Lee Curtis, who will later appear as Madame Leota.  While the previous version only had vague indications that the movie was set in Louisiana (such as the Evers’ car having Louisiana plates), this movie wastes no time in establishing the location as we’re not only directly told we’re in New Orleans, but we get to see various visuals of the New Orleans natives.  With this introduction out of the way, it immediately cuts to a New Year’s Eve party.  Here, we’re introduced to our main character (or at least one of them), Ben Matthias, an astrophysicist who specializes in making lenses, and is currently attempting to create a device that can detect dark matter.  While at the party, Ben ends up meeting Alyssa, a local woman who gives ghost tours.  Needless to say, the two instantly hit it off, with Alyssa inviting Ben to attend one of her ghost tours.  But the happy meeting instantly dissolves to what appears to be a few years later.  Ben is back at the same bar, and it’s immediately obvious he’s been through something as he seems to be slightly intoxicated.  The bartender, who seems to know Ben quite well, informs him that there appears to be seven people waiting for him outside.  He then sympathetically asks Ben why he’s still leading ‘her tour’ and offers to help sneak him out the back.  But Ben turns down the offer, stating that they always follow him.  With that, Ben heads outside to meet the people who are there for the walking tour he’s now overseeing.  As Ben gives the tour, it quickly comes clear that he’s not exactly a people person.  Despite his insistence that the tour will focus only on the historical aspect of the city, the tourists constantly ask about ghosts and whether or not various buildings are haunted.  Eventually, this causes Ben to snap, loudly declaring that there’s no such thing as ghosts, and going on to state that ‘life is dirt, we’re all dirt!’  To his credit, Ben quickly apologizes for his outburst, but I am curious as to how the rest of that tour went.

As the opening sequence continues, we see a car towing a U-Haul trailer through the city streets, followed by the famous Lake Pontchartrain Causeway.  This car is soon revealed to contain Gabbie and her nine-year-old son, Travis.  They’ve apparently purchased a decrepit mansion located in the middle of nowhere, which we’ll later learn that Gabbie intended to turn into a bed and breakfast.  Upon arriving at the mansion (which, to the movie’s credit, looks practically identical to the exterior of the Disneyland version of the ride), Travis slowly begins to look around inside while Gabbie takes a phone call with the movers, who are somehow four hours behind them.  While Travis is clearly unnerved by the house, Gabbie is confident that it’ll be great once they fix it up a bit.  So Travis makes his way upstairs to select his room.  Of course, the ghosts inside the mansion waste no time in making their presence known.  Upon entering the bedroom he chose, Travis is quick to cover up a creepy looking painting of a bride with a tarp.  But the tarp slowly starts to get pulled down every time Travis turns around to set up his sleeping bag, quickly moving back into place whenever Travis shines his flashlight at it.  Until Travis looks away long enough for the tarp to be pulled all the way off.  This time, when Travis looks back at the painting, the image of the bride has vanished.  Upon hearing a ghostly voice welcoming him home, Travis quickly turns in the direction of the voice, leading to a suitably creepy moment of the ghostly bride appearing in the corner whenever the light of Travis’ flashlight is not on her, and Travis’ flashlight instantly starting to die.  When Travis’ flashlight goes off completely, he naturally turns and runs out of the room, screaming.  Gabbie, hearing her son scream, comes running over to see what’s wrong.  But when Travis tries to tell her that the house is haunted, Gabbie doesn’t initially believe him.  She tells him that while she knows the place isn’t as warm and inviting as they hoped, he still needs to give it a chance, and things will seem better once she lights a vanilla scented candle.  However, Gabbie’s tune quickly changes when she sees an animated suit of armor seemingly appearing out of nowhere in front of them.  Right away, she agrees they need to nope out of there, and they both immediately vacate the mansion and drive off.  (This alone earns the movie major points, as it shows people reacting to their house being haunted in a realistic manner instead of choosing to stubbornly stick around.) But as their car leaves the mansion behind them, a ghostly shadow appears near the gates of the mansion, stating in a sing-song voice that ‘you’ll be back.’

An undetermined amount of time later, Ben is woken up from a sound sleep when he hears someone knocking on his front door.  But it’s not until he hears the knocker letting themselves into his house without invitation that Ben gets out of bed, grabbing an empty liquor bottle to use as a makeshift weapon.  The man at the door ends up being a priest called Father Kent.  (And yes, Father Kent is played by Owen Wilson.  From what I gather, there are some who didn’t agree with this casting, but to be honest, it didn’t really bother me.)  Ben is understandably not the least bit happy about the uninvited visitor, but Father Kent isn’t bothered by this and strikes up a conversation with Ben.  In this conversation, it’s revealed that Ben had previously invented a camera strong enough to capture ‘ghost particles.’  Ben doesn’t directly deny this, but states that he was professionally ridiculed over his invention.  Father Kent then tells him about Gabbie and Travis, stating that they’d previously called him up to perform an exorcism on their haunted home, but that he thinks what they really need is a paranormal expert.  Ben essentially shakes his head, once again stating there was no such thing as ghosts.  Father Kent takes this in stride, stating that if that were the case, then there’d be no harm in coming down and taking a few pictures with the ‘ghost camera’ to settle the minds of the mother and son.  Still, Ben doesn’t agree to get involved.  Until Father Kent tells him that Gabbie is willing to pay him $2,000.  As the saying goes, money talks.  So, after Father Kent leaves, Ben goes to his closet to root through a few boxes he has stored away to retrieve his ‘ghost camera.’  As he’s gathering up his invention, he chances across a framed photograph of himself and Alyssa, which triggers a flashback to the day he’d first shown Alyssa the quantum lens he’d developed, and how he’d felt that it could change both their lives.  However, we’re not yet given any clear hints as to what happened to Alyssa, so at this point we can only speculate as to why she’s not a part of Ben’s life anymore.

So Ben makes his way to the mansion with his Ghost Camera.  Upon arriving, however, he realizes the camera’s battery is dead.  Nevertheless, he presses on and meets Gabbie at the front door.  But as Ben is about to step foot across the threshold, Gabbie quickly stops him, telling him that, as much as she might need his help, he probably should leave.  Because once he steps foot through the door, there’s no going back, and it ‘could change the course of your entire life.’  In response, Ben states that he’s willing to take that risk and steps inside, accepting the money Gabbie had offered in the process.  Gabbie begins to show Ben around the mansion, starting with the library where she and Travis have been sleeping. Here, Ben and Travis have something of a bonding moment when Ben notices the action figures Travis has arranged in front of his pup tent, which I gather are the same sort of action figures Ben had played with when he was a boy, as Ben starts talking about Action Guy a seemingly less well-known superhero whose weapon of choice is a shoe.  We also get a moment when Gabbie starts to mention Travis’ father, but she doesn’t get a chance to complete her statement.  When Ben takes out his Ghost Camera, Gabbie quickly warns him to make sure the flash is turned off, as ‘they don’t like that.’  (I’m sure everyone who has been on the Disney ride sees what they did there.)  Anyway, Ben starts taking pictures with the Ghost Camera at the various spots Gabbie and Travis show them on their tour of the mansion.  But because the camera’s battery is dead, Ben simply mimics taking pictures while making sound effects with his mouth.  Unfortunately, nothing supernatural seems to be happening during the tour, which only seems to confirm Ben’s suspicions that the mother and son duo are nuts.  However, Ben does manage to witness something small.  He happens to pass by a painting of a mariner in a yellow raincoat and matching hat.  As Ben looks at the paining, the sound of seagulls can be heard, and the Mariner’s eyes seem to turn to look right at him.  Of course, Ben simply waves this off as his eyes playing tricks on him.  He wraps things up by telling Gabbie and Travis that, according to his calculations (which are just random doodles he draws in his notebook), there aren’t any ghosts there and that what they’ve experienced was simply caused by the power of suggestion.

So Ben leaves the mansion and heads back to his place.  But it quickly becomes clear that something followed him home when his TV constantly switches channels from the documentary Ben is trying to watch to an episode of The Deadliest Catch.  When the TV remote is knocked out of Ben’s hand by an unseen force, Ben quickly puts working batteries into the Ghost Camera. Unfortunately, Ben forgot about Gabbie’s warning about using the flash, and as a result, he’s shoved to the floor as the shutter flash goes off.  When the picture he took appears on the screen seconds later, Ben sees a faint image of someone sitting on his couch.  After stepping outside to try and calm his nerves, unable to believe that he really saw what he saw, he quickly decides to go back inside and try again, though this is due in part to him wanting to avoid having to make small talk with a neighbor. (Can’t say I don’t relate to this guy.)  This time, however, while he doesn’t use the flash, nothing unusual shows up in the picture.  Shaking it off as another example of the power of suggestion, Ben tries to go to bed, only to be disturbed by water dripping on his face, followed by banging sounds coming from the bathroom.  When he investigates, he finds his bathroom door has pretty much become a dimensional portal to a storm-tossed sea.  Out of nowhere, a harpoon files by, just narrowly missing Ben’s head.

This leaves Ben truly shaken, and he retreats to a nearby café to get some coffee.  Only for the cup of coffee to get pushed off the table and breaking before Ben could even touch it.  Looking over, he sees the reflection of the Mariner Ghost briefly appearing in the window across from him, making Ben suspect that the Mariner Ghost is following him.  And when Ben once again returns home, it’s to find that his house has been completely flooded.  As a wave of water rushes towards him, the image of a man’s face appears in the wave, ordering him to return to the mansion.

So Ben drives back to the mansion to find Gabbie and Travis sitting out on the porch.  It’s very clear that they were anticipating his return.  Gabbie explains that something similar happened to them, pointing out that she wouldn’t make her son stay in a haunted house by choice, but no matter where they went, they continued to be haunted by ghosts that had latched onto them as they tried to get away.  Ben is not very happy, saying that while Gabbie did warn him before he first stepped through the door, she should have done a better job of properly explaining that he wouldn’t be able to go home again.  Gabbie counters this by saying that she would feel worse about the partial deception if Ben hadn’t taken so much money only to take a few fake pictures and scribble down random nonsense, indicating that she wasn’t fooled by his act earlier.  However, Gabbie then indirectly apologizes, pointing out that she would do whatever she had to do in order to make sure her son was safe, which Ben seems to understand.  Though he tells Gabbie that he can’t help her and that she’d be better off with bringing in an exorcist.  To this, Gabbie kinda cringes and admits they already tried going down that route.  Which leads to the reveal that Father Kent is also there, admitting that he also fell prey to the ghosts haunting the mansion and is likewise stuck there.

While comparing notes with Gabbie and Father Kent, Ben realizes that the ghosts that followed each of them when they tried leaving had all wanted them to return to the mansion.  So it stands to reason that the ghosts want them there for some reason. They just have to figure out what that reason in.  So, after a scene when Ben tries to exit the library after midnight despite Travis’ attempts to stop him, leading to an appearance of the Endless Hallway from the ride, as well as Ben getting briefly chased by a ghost wielding a hatchet, they begin coming up with a plan to figure out what the ghosts want.  To achieve this, Father Kent decides the first step is to figure out the mansion’s history, so he gets in contact with Bruce Davis, a college professor at Tulane who wrote a book about haunted houses in Louisiana.   While the book was hardly a best seller, with only nine copies being sold, their only other option was a historian who died, so they gotta work with what they’ve got.  Meanwhile, Ben will use his Ghost Camera to properly document each of the ghosts occupying the mansion.  Once they know who they’re dealing with, they can bring in someone who can help communicate with the ghosts.  Of course, the only medium in their price range is a woman named Harriet.  During this montage sequence, we also get another brief bonding moment between Ben and Travis, with Ben seeing some bullies chasing Travis as he tries to come home from school and he tries to talk to him about it.  Though it turns out that that moment serves a deeper purpose when Ben begins viewing the video he was able to catch of the ghosts that become highly active after midnight.  Ben remarks how it’s hard to get a read on the ghosts as they’re always moving about.  But Travis points out that they’re not just moving around. They seem to be running from something.

Anyway, Ben and Father Kent meet with Bruce at some hibachi restaurant, where Bruce tells them that the house where Gabbie and Travis are living has a string of traumatic events tied to it.  He explains that the mansion was discovered fully built in 1788.  To everyone’s knowledge, the land hadn’t even been worked on before that point.  The earliest recorded document that Bruce could dig up was a deed acquired by William Gracey, who purchased the estate from an undisclosed buyer.  William Gracey’s wife, Eleanor, tragically died from Yellow Fever. After her death, things started to get really weird.  That’s when Bruce starts to gush about how he’s been wanting to get an up close look at the mansion in question for the past 6o years.  But when Bruce casually mentions that he’s having heart surgery the following week, Ben immediately realizes that they can’t allow him to set foot inside the mansion, unwilling to let a man with a heart condition have to deal with getting a random ghost following him everywhere he goes.  After all, such a thing might end up killing him.  Bruce is not happy about being denied access to the house, they announcing that if don’t let him go, he won’t let them see the contents of the file he’d put together.  This standoff ends with Ben physically wrestling the file out of Bruce’s grip and then running out to join Father Kent, who ran out seconds earlier to start the car.

Meanwhile, Harriet is brought to the mansion.  And right away, she comes across as one of those parlor trick psychics.  For instance, she walks into the dining room and astutely declares that she senses people used to eat there.  Harriet announces that if there’s an evil spirit in the house, only a banishment will do the trick and that she, as a bona fide and qualified medium, is more than up to the task.  It’s important to note that she also mentions that in her brief time in the mansion, she’s sensed a lot of grief in the house, and that if grief is unprocessed, it will make a spirit stick.  But Harriet then says that, before she can begin, she’ll need a week to properly charge her crystals and conduct her research, and that she expects to be paid for that week of preparation. With that, Harriet turns to leave, stating that she’ll send them an invoice from her PayPal account in the meantime.  Of course, an irate Harriet returns two hours later, berating Father Kent about not warning her that the ghosts in the mansion were following people, and that she had been harassed by a ghostly horse and rider.  Still, Harriet admits that she now has no other choice than to help them and agrees to assist.  So they consult the contents of the file that Ben apprehended from Bruce.  In the process, they learn that after the death of his wife, Gracey lost his mind and eventually took his own life.  But before that, he’d spent all his money on a medium to try and contact his wife’s spirit.  They also learn that that, between then and now, 66 people had moved into the house, with each one of them dying in terrible and specific ways.  Cue some name drops from fan favorite characters from the ride, namely the Duelists and Constance Hatchaway.  Harriet’s ears perk up when she hears that the medium Gracey hired was Madame Leota, who was known as the greatest medium there ever was, but they all agree that they should try and get in contact with Gracey, as he must be the key to stopping the hauntings.  Ben then finds a letter Gracey wrote to Madame Leota within the file, which asked her to meet him in the mansion’s séance room.  This puzzles Gabbie.  While the mansion’s blueprints indeed depict a room at the end of a certain hallway, when she shows them the hallway in question, they find a wall and staircase leading up to the next floor, but no séance room.  Father Kent, suspecting there’s a hidden door, tries to move a wall sconce, only to find that it wasn’t a secret lever when it breaks clean off the wall, accompanied by a small shower of sparks.  But Ben then realizes that Father Kent wasn’t completely off the mark, and that the painting of a woman on the wall in front of them had two fingerholds where the eyes should be.  Thus, they find the entrance to the séance room.

Inside the séance room, Harriet leads the séance to contact Gracey’s spirit.  After a few fake outs when it looks like Harriet had fallen asleep instead of going into a trance, Harriet announces she’s made contact with Gracey, and she instructs him to write them a message using a pen and notebook she’d purchased from CVS.  After a tense second, the pen begins to levitate and the words ‘talk to Leota’ are written out.  But the moment Gracey’s ghost writes out the message, and Ben takes a picture of him with the Ghost Camera, the ghost quickly vanishes.  Now, Ben is finally convinced that Harriet can indeed communicate with the dead, and he asks if he can contact someone for him.  When Harriet asks him who he wishes to contact, Ben slowly removes the wedding ring he’s been wearing from a chain around his neck, declaring that he wants to speak to his wife.  With that, it’s confirmed to the audience that Alyssa had died, and Harriet realizes that Ben was the grieving spirit she was sensing.  But she regretfully informs him that she can’t contact Alyssa, and that she doesn’t think her spirit is there. 

Travis then asks Harriet if she can get in touch with Leota instead.  The second he asks this, the door slams shut, and an evil laugh is heard. When Ben tries to take a photo with the Ghost Camera, it’s shoved out of his hands, smashing onto the ground and breaking.  Despite the obvious aggressiveness of this new ghost, Harriet still tries to summon Madame Leota.  But this only results in the chair she’s sitting in to get quickly dragged out of the room and right out of the mansion entirely.  (And yeah, the chair Harriet is sitting in does resemble the Doom Buggy ride vehicles from the Disney attraction.)  Ben, Gabbie, Travis and Father Kent all run out after her to make sure she’s alright, but as they’re seeing to Harriet, they see a car approaching.  It turns out to be Bruce, who is understandably angry about them stealing his files and barring him from seeing the mansion for himself.  Despite Ben’s attempt to stop him, Bruce enters the mansion, but before he could retrieve his documents, he’s also ejected from the mansion via chair.  Unlike Harriet who only ended up landing in the mud, Bruce is dragged out into the main road, right into the path of an oncoming truck.  Cue an instant jump cut to the hospital.  While Bruce survived the ordeal, he was still taken in by an ambulance due to his bad heart.  While the nurse does reasonably question why Bruce was apparently riding a chair down a main road at night, she doesn’t push the matter when Ben and Gabbie are unable to come up with a plausible explanation.  Though Ben and Gabbie get worried when the nurse suggests having Bruce stay there overnight, so when a ghost (judging by the distinct sound of seagulls as well as a sprig of seaweed appearing in a UV bag, I’m guessing it’s the Mariner Ghost again) creates a convenient distraction by messing around with a neighboring patient’s bed, they quickly usher Bruce away.

Back at the mansion, while Gabbie and Trevor do their best to monitor Bruce’s heart, Harriet approaches Ben.  She offers her condolences about Alyssa’s death, but tells him that it’s good that she’s not there.  She then goes into a whole explanation about the physical plane and the regions beyond.  The place where they overlap is where hauntings occur, but if a spirit is at peace, it’ll go straight into the regions beyond and remain there.  So she speculates that’s where Alyssa is now, and that’s a good thing.  She goes on to tell Ben that sometimes, spirits in the region beyond can still send messages to their loved ones.  Harriet refers to these messages as Ghost Winks.  As an example of this, Harriet tells of her late father, who had loved model trains.  To this day, whenever Harriet is feeling particularly sad, she will randomly hear a train whistle in the distance, and she knows that’s her father saying hello.

Late that night, Ben wakes up to see a ghostly shadow looking in at him from the hallway.  The shadowy figure greets him by name, stating that they have a friend in common.  Before Ben’s eyes, what appears to be the silhouette of Alyssa walks by.  Stunned, Ben follows after the silhouette and ventures outside into the mansion’s graveyard.  After passing by ghostly figures of The Groundskeeper and his dog, as well as the famous Hitchhiking Ghosts, Ben catches up with who he believes to be Alyssa.  But as ‘Alyssa’ starts to turn around, it’s revealed to have simply been a dream when Travis wakes him up to inform him that Bruce wandered off while they were sleeping.  Concerned for the older man, Ben and Harriet head out to locate him.  They manage to run into the wayward Bruce outside the ballroom, and Bruce expresses his urgency to find Leota, suggesting that they try the attic.

Together, the three locate the attic.  Despite Bruce’s determination to lead the charge, Ben refuses to let him go up there, reminding him of his heart condition.  Bruce soon relents, agreeing to stay and ‘protect’ Harriet.  This leaves Ben to venture up into the attic alone.  Despite a run-in with Constance Hatchaway herself, who tries coming at him with her trademark axe, Ben is able to successfully retrieve a locked trunk, which he brings down to the Séance Room with Gabbie, Harriet, Bruce and Father Kent.  (I’m guessing Travis went back to sleep or something, as I don’t remember seeing him during this scene.)  Sure enough, they find the trunk belonged to Leota, as it contains her book of incantations as well as a large crystal ball.  As they study the crystal ball, it activates, and the face of Madame Leota appears.  She confirms that Gracey hired her to try and contact the spirit of his late wife, Eleanor.  Despite them holding a séance every night for an entire year, they were unable to contact Eleanor.  Although the repeated séances did open the floodgates, allowing hundreds of other ghosts to come through.  After this went on for a while, Leota urged Gracey to stop trying to contact Eleanor, in fear of what else they might inadvertently unleash.  But Gracey refused to listen.  Eventually, he started receiving what appeared to be messages from Eleanor, which begged him to join her on the other side.  Giving into the temptation of being with Eleanor again, Gracey did as the messages said and drank a bottle of poison before Leota could warn him that it wasn’t Eleanor who was speaking to him but a dark spirit who was feeding on Gracey’s grief and had the power to trap once happy souls inside the house.  After discovering Gracey’s body, Leota tried to determine the identity of the dark spirit, but before she could do so, the dark spirit managed to trap her within her own crystal ball.  Madame Leota completes her story by saying this dark spirit has already managed to trap 933 souls within the mansion’s walls, but that 1000 souls are needed for the dark spirit to complete a ritual that will enable him to escape the mansion himself.  Madame Leota also warns them to beware of the full moon, which is when this dark spirit will be at his most powerful state, and she urges Ben to be particularly careful as she can sense the extent of his grief over losing Alyssa, which will make him the most vulnerable to the dark spirit’s manipulation.

Harriet suggests attempting to banish the dark spirit from the house, to which Madame Leota agrees.  And she starts to tell them that, in order to banish the dark spirit, they’ll need an object that belonged to the spirit when he was still living.  But before Leota could offer further instructions, the voice of the Dark Spirit interrupts them, which causes Leota’s image to vanish from sight.  That’s when Bruce tells the others of the bad news.  While Leota had said that the Dark Spirit had managed to collect 933 souls, there had been 66 additional deaths that had occurred within the mansion’s walls since Leota had been trapped.  Which means the Dark Spirit only needs one more soul to complete his ritual.  And since all those deaths had occurred during the full moon, they only have four days left to stop this Dark Spirit from collecting his final soul.  The problem is, since a banishment requires them to use an object that once belonged to the Dark Spirit, how are they supposed to locate such an object when they don’t even know who the Dark Spirit is? Fortunately, Harriet has an idea, and she suggests trying something she calls a reverse séance, which involves her spirit leaving her body and venturing into the Ghost Realm, so she can get a look at the Dark Spirit.  (Ben points out that that sounds very much like astral projection, but Harriet dismisses this, virtually accusing him of just making up words.)

Once again, the movie gives us a quiet moment, in which Ben and Gabbie have a private conversation.  Gabbie voices her concern for Travis and how he might be processing things.  She confides in Ben how she wanted to come to Louisiana so Travis could have a chance to put everything with his father behind him and just focus on being a kid.  But she feels he can’t have that with the house being haunted like this.  So Ben heads out to talk with Travis, who also confides in Ben about his difficulty in forming friendships with the kids in his new school.  He also tells Ben that he’d talked to his dad earlier, and that his dad wants him to come visit, but Travis doesn’t want to risk making his mom feel bad.  Ben, in order to help cheer Travis up, reveals he’d brought an Action Guy action figure to go along with Travis’ other action figures, and the two proceed to play with them.

That night, everyone proceeds with the Reverse Séance.  However, it’s not Harriet’s spirit that exits her body, but Ben’s.  Ben’s spirit quickly encounters Gracey’s ghost and attempts to follow him, only for Gracey to quickly shake him.  So Ben wanders about for a bit, crossing paths with various Haunted Mansion Easter Eggs.  Eventually, he does manage to corner Gracey’s spirit and begins questioning him.  Gracey acknowledges that the whole mess was his fault, but that nobody knows the Dark Spirit’s mortal name.  Still, Gracey begs Ben to not allow the Dark Spirit to claim his last soul, as then they’ll all be trapped there forever. At that moment, all the ghosts begin to run away in fear, and Gracey announces the approach of the Dark Spirit.  Of course, those of us who are familiar with Haunted Mansion lore have already been able to recognize him by his silhouette.  That’s right, it’s the legendary Hatbox Ghost.  Upon seeing him, the Hatbox Ghost addresses Ben by name and starts to approach him.  Listening to his instincts, Ben does his best to hide from the Hatbox Ghost, even accepting the nonverbal suggestion of an animated suit of armor to hide underneath a table.  But his efforts are in vain as the Hatbox Ghost spots him by materializing his head into his trademark hatbox.  In the end, Ben only manages to get away when his friends, realizing what happened when Ben’s body momentarily gets inhabited by the Hatchet Ghost from earlier, summon Ben’s spirit back to where it belongs with the aid of a bell and Harriet’s sage smudge stick.  As Ben recovers from his ordeal, he tells the others what he saw during the Reverse Séance, saying he saw the Hatbox Ghost, and how the other ghosts were clearly afraid of him.  But Ben can’t give them much to go on as to how to identify the Hatbox Ghost’s mortal name.  All that Ben can say is that the ghost’s grin is burned into his memory.

Here, we get yet another character moment.  Ben, realizing that Harriet is probably feeling a bit put out that he managed to exit his body instead of her (particularly when she admits that maybe she is limited in her abilities), tries to reassure her, saying that it was just because he was feeling particularly raw.  And that he suspects that the Hatbox Ghost wants him as his 1000 soul.  At this, Ben opens up to everyone, telling them how his wife died in a car accident.  And losing her was particularly hard on him because, on the day the accident happened, she’d asked him to go with her to get some tater tots, which were her favorite snack.  But Ben was feeling very frustrated that day because of how much work he had to do, so he sort of snapped at her that he was too busy.  Because of that, when Alyssa got into the accident while making another stop for ice cream, she was alone when she died.  That’s why Ben had tried so hard to build the Ghost Camera, because he wanted to see her one more time.  Ben completes his sad tale by voicing his fear that Alyssa died not knowing that he loved her.  While Gabbie and Harriet reassure Ben that they’re sure Alyssa knew, Bruce starts trying to lighten the mood by making jokes about Alyssa’s cholesterol levels, citing how often she seemed to eat foods that were high in fat and salt. Despite the somewhat insensitive nature of Bruce’s comments, it does the trick, and Ben is soon chuckling, thanking him for making him laugh in the face of his lingering sorrow.

Still, there’s the lingering matter of figuring out who the Hatbox Ghost was when he was alive.  Bruce is the one who comes up with the idea of taking Ben down to a local police station and having him describe the Hatbox Ghost’s face to one of the sketch artists there.  And I’d be lying if I said this scene wasn’t funny to watch.  You can tell the sketch artist finds Ben’s description of the man who ‘mugged him’ to be fishy, particularly when Ben says the man had no nose or lips.  Still, the sketch artist does his job, though he does visually facepalm when Bruce suggests that he draw the culprit again, this time with skin.  Still, the visit with the sketch artist pays off.  Thanks to the artist’s rendition, Bruce is able to correctly identify the Hatbox Ghost as Alistair Crump.  (I wonder if this name was an intentional homage to Rolly Crump, one of the key Imagineers responsible for giving us the Haunted Mansion ride. After all, the name Gracey came from Yale Gracey, another mastermind behind the creation of the ride.)  According to Bruce’s historical records, Alistair was the son of a real estate tycoon named Addison Crump.  Addison was, to say the least, a poor excuse for a father.  According to the lore, he kicked his son out of the house when he was just a boy, claiming that Alistair had cried too much at his mother’s funeral.  After that, Alistair seemed to disappear entirely, only reappearing after his father died under mysterious circumstances.  Having become wealthy himself during his prolonged absence, Alistair became well known for throwing elaborate parties, inviting all the social elites who failed to come to his aid when he was a boy.  Only many of these guests went missing during the parties.  It was said that Alistair had become deeply involved in dark magic and needed a constant supply of blood sacrifices to maintain his power.  However, nobody ever found where he hid the bodies of his victims.  In the end, his servants, having had enough of the abuse he inflicted on them, turned against him and beheaded him with an axe.  Before dying, however, Alistair, whose head was never found, vowed revenge from beyond the grave.  Gabbie then points out that Alistair’s old estate, which is only a few hours north from them, was named a historical property and has since been turned into a bed and breakfast.  

As everyone starts getting ready to head off to Crump Manor, speculating that they’re sure to find something that belonged to Alistair there, the Hatbox Ghost, having overheard that they were able to discern who he was before he died, does his best to interfere.  Using his control over the mansion, he physically separates Ben and Travis from Gabbie, Harriet and Bruce (we’ll later see that Father Kent had stepped outside to get something from his car).  The room Ben and Travis find themselves trapped in quickly starts to turn into the famous Stretching Room, and the floor beneath them turns to a combination of quicksand, kegs of dynamite and an alligator infested pool.  Thankfully, with the aid of the paintings’ occupants, Ben and Travis are able to escape their predicament by hitching a ride on the gargoyle shaped sconces, which help them reach the ceiling, granting them access to a window to the outside.  After managing to climb down from the roof, they rejoin Father Kent, and the three narrowly manage to drive away to get to Crump Manor.  As for Gabbie, Harriet and Bruce, they’re still trapped inside the mansion.  To make things worse, Bruce starts to experience a heart attack.  Despite Gabbie’s attempt to tend to Bruce and Harriet trying to ward off dark spirits with her smudge stick, Alistair takes advantage of Bruce’s weakened state to possess his body.

After what must have been a long drive, Ben, Travis and Father Kent make it to Crump Manor, which seems to resemble the Haunted Mansion exterior at Disney World.  Much to Ben’s displeasure, the people who own Crump Manor don’t just operate a bed and breakfast.  They also host dinner theater.  Still, they make their way up to the entrance, with Father Kent saying a tour will begin in five minutes.  Despite Ben’s intentions to have this be a quick in-and-out mission, he quickly finds this will not be the case as the tour guide, Pat (played by the uncredited Winona Ryder), states the tour will take three hours, with bathroom breaks strictly prohibited.  After the tour goes on for a while, Ben hears from someone else taking the tour that its rumored that Alistair’s missing head is still hidden somewhere inside the house.  Taking this as their best lead, Ben and Father Kent begin trying to decide how they’ll go about finding the missing head.  That’s when Travis points out he might have a solution.  During the tour, he’d personally witnessed wet footprints appearing on the floor.  Realizing this means the Mariner Ghost had followed them there, they track him down to one of the rooms.  After a bit of a rocky start, Ben manages to get the Mariner Ghost to agree to aid them by promising him that they’ll help him find his way back to the sea.  Accepting the terms, the Mariner Ghost, using the steam that forms on a bathroom mirror to communicate, reveals the fact that Alistair’s 1000th soul must be willing.  The Mariner Ghost then leads the three of them down to a fireplace, where they locate an entrance to a hidden crawlspace beneath the floor.  Ben and Father Kent quickly realize that only Travis is small enough to fit through the opening.  Travis, while he is clearly reluctant to go down there, realizes that he really doesn’t have a choice.  Down in the hidden crawlspace, Travis finds that this is where the bodies of Alistair’s victims were stored, as indicated by the iconic punny tombstones scattered about.  Amongst the tombstones, Travis finds an old top hat and realizes it must be the item they came for.  Despite him getting a minor fright when he finds a human skull beneath the top hat, Travis is able to bring it back to Ben and Father Kent.

With Alistair’s hat in their possession, Ben begins the drive back to the mansion.  On the way, we’re treated to a little product placement from Burger King (this movie was teaming with product placements and namedrops of big companies like Amazon and Zillow), with Father Kent briefly mistaking Ben’s jalapeno poppers for tater tots and thinking it might be a Ghost Wink.  By the time they make it back to the mansion, it’s already dark.  Ben and Father Kent exit the car, but Ben instructs Travis to stay put.  Travis objects to this, stating that he wants to see this through to the end, but Ben puts his foot down, saying it’s too dangerous.  Travis is visibly upset at this, but he relents, stating that he’ll try getting in touch with his dad.  As Ben starts to make his way inside, Father Kent decides that it’s time to be honest, and he admits to Ben that he’s not really a priest.  In actuality, he works for a Halloween supply store, and his priestly getup is part of a side hustle of his.  Ben seems to be too stunned for words by this at first, but then decides to give Kent a bit of a pep talk, telling him that Kent helped him get back in touch with who he used to be before the pain of losing Alyssa took over his life.  Now it’s Kent’s chance to find the inner strength inside of him.  To drive the point home, Ben asks Kent if he’s ready to be a hero, turning the question Kent previously used on him back the other way.  This helps Kent agree to stay and do what he can, and they make their way inside.

Once inside, Ben and Kent start looking around for Gabbie, Harriet and Bruce.  Though it’s obvious to the viewing audience that Bruce has been possessed by Alistair from the way he was clearly hiding behind a corner when they walked in.  When Bruce/Alistair approaches them, he informs them that it’s all over as Harriet had found some mumbo jumbo spell in Leota’s book of incantations while they were gone, and Alistair had already been defeated.  When asked where Gabbie and Harriet are, Bruce/Alistair claims they went to the general store to get some taffy.  If Ben is suspicious of this, he does his best to not give his suspicions away, and he steps away to try and locate the two women, leaving Kent alone with Bruce/Alistair.  Seeing the top hat in Kent’s hand, Bruce/Alistair asks if that’s the genuine hat, but Kent claims it’s just a replica.  Not buying this, Bruce/Alistair asks to see it, but in doing so, his voice comes out distorted, which Kent clearly picks up on.  Realizing that his attempt at subterfuge has failed, Bruce/Alistair orders Kent to give him the hat and leave the house.  When Kent doesn’t comply with the demand, the two of them start to wrestle for the top hat.  After a struggle, Bruce/Alistair manages to toss the top hat into the fire, and Kent immediately dives to save it.  Taking advantage of Kent’s distracted state, Bruce/Alistair tries to come up behind him and bash him over the head with a candlestick. Fortunately, Ben had already managed to locate Gabbie and Harriet, who have been left tied up and gagged elsewhere.  And the moment she was able to, Gabbie took off running before she was properly untied.  She manages to arrive just in time to tackle Bruce/Alistair to the ground.

With the slightly singed top hat in her hand, Harriet tries to begin the banishment ritual.  However, the full moon is now at its peak, meaning Alistair’s powers are at their strongest.  Because of this, Bruce/Alistair is able to telepathically rip the hat from Harriet’s grasp before tossing it back into the fire.  With that, Alastair casts Bruce’s body aside, appearing in his actual form.  Alastair monologues for a bit, saying that he’ll be relieved to be able to be free from this house, going on to say that while there are 999 ghosts haunting the house, there’s room for one more.  He then turns to Ben, saying that final soul could have been him.  Gabbie instantly realizes that Travis isn’t present and asks Ben where he is.  Ben assures her that Travis is safe in the car, talking to his father.  This shocks Gabbie, who says that’s not possible- Travis’ father died a year ago!

Yeah, that’s the movie’s big twist.  While Travis’ father was notably absent throughout the movie, there was nothing to directly suggest that he’d died before this moment.  It was easy for the viewing audience to suspect that Gabbie and Travis’ father had simply gone through a very messy divorce.  And as this revelation sinks in, we see Travis is sitting in the car with a pen and notebook, with the pen moving on its own.  The pen writes out the words ‘I miss you, I want to see you.’  Travis voices aloud the question as to how they can see each other, and the car door opens, allowing Travis to see a yellow light shining out from a basement window.

Now that Alistair is clearly planning to use Travis as his willing soul instead, Ben and Gabbie race off to locate him in time, with Ben instructing Harriet to fetch Madame Leota and tasking Kent and Bruce to find a way to get past Alistair’s ghostly minions in order to get the hat before it burns completely.  With that, everyone runs off into separate directions to complete their individual tasks. Kent taunts the ghosts’ intelligence badly enough to get them to chase after him, clearing a path for Bruce to rescue the top hat from the fire.  Meanwhile, Harriet approaches Leota in the Séance Room. Leota states that their only hope of banishing Alastair now is if Harriet can release her from her crystal ball, so they combine their powers. Harriet is visibly doubtful that she is gifted enough to properly cast the spell that can release Madame Leota, but Leota assures Harriet that she believes in her.  As for Ben and Gabbie, they end up getting separated because of the house’s walls and floors shifting around.  Clutching at straws, Ben calls out to Gracey for help.  Right away, Gracey pops up through a hidden panel in the floor, instructing Ben to follow him to Travis.  When Ben goes through the hidden panel himself, he finds himself in an Escher like room that’s clearly meant to reference the Endless Staircase that I believe is exclusive to the Disney World version of the ride.  With Gracey’s help, Ben is able to catch up with Travis in the basement, arriving just in time to find the boy being lured to a glowing yellow hole in the stone floor by a disembodied voice pretending to be that of Travis’ father.  Ben beseeches Travis to take his hand, telling him that he was wrong and that his father isn’t here.  And if he was, he’d want Travis to be safe with his mother.  Travis suddenly breaks down, tearfully saying that he hates it everywhere, and nowhere feels right without his father.  To this, Ben sympathetically decides to change tactics, assuring Travis that he knows how he’s feeling right now as he’d felt that same kind of pain as well.  But he needs Travis to trust him now, saying that Travis can talk to him about his misery so they can be miserable together.  In the end, Ben’s words do the trick, and Travis consents to try and put the loss of his father behind him, accepting Ben’s hand.  Together, they turn and try to make their way out of the mansion, with Gracey helping Gabbie meet up with them along the way.

However, the path they take out of the mansion leads them right into the middle of the cemetery, where Alastair is waiting for them, accompanied by a legion of the ghosts under his control.  Ben, unwilling to allow Alastair to harm Gabbie and Travis, offers himself up in exchange for their safety.  But before he takes Alastair’s hand so his soul could be claimed, Harriet appears, accompanied by Madame Leota, who was successfully freed from the crystal ball.  They’re shortly joined by Bruce, carrying the remaining fragment of Alistair’s top hat.  As well as Kent and the other ghosts, who had agreed to turn against Alastair when Kent managed to appeal to their better natures and their desire to be free from Alastair’s control.  Still, Alastair is unwilling to admit defeat just yet, sending the minions who are still loyal to him after Bruce, thereby preventing him from reaching Harriet and Leota.  Travis, however, volunteers to run and get the hat fragment from Bruce in order to carry it the rest of the way.

Ben, seemingly realizing that Alastair is about to attack his friends directly, stops him by stating that he’s right- the others cannot safe him from his grief.  As he says this, he starts to reach out to Alastair to allow him to claim his willing soul.  But right before Alastair can touch Ben’s extended hand, he pulls back, declaring ‘but they can save me from you.’  With that statement hanging in the air, Harriet and Leota, having gotten the hat fragment from Travis, began the banishment ritual, which includes words that any Haunted Mansion fan will find familiar.  As Alastair is dragged down into the grave-shaped portal by purple tendrils, he tries one more time to appeal to Ben’s lingering grief, offering him the opportunity to see Alyssa again, stating that this is his last chance to tell her he loves her.  Ben, while still clearly hurting, simply responds that ‘she knows.’  And with that, he slams his foot down on Alastair, forcing him the rest of the way down into the abyss.

With Alastair gone and both Ben and Travis’ souls safe, it looks like it’s a happy ending all around, though the spell that has freed Madame Leota from the crystal ball will apparently not last forever, meaning that Leota will have to return to her imprisonment. (She is accepting of this, however, stating that the crystal ball is actually quite roomy.)  As for the 999 ghosts, despite Kent telling them that they’re all free to leave or cross over, their preference appears to remain in the mansion.  Gabbie and Travis accept this, with Travis pointing out that someone should stay and look out for them, suggesting that he’d be okay with staying at the mansion as well.

And now begins the wrap up portion of the movie.  Keeping up their end of the bargain, Ben and Travis drive the Mariner Ghost down to a pier somewhere, where the Mariner Ghost apprehends some poor guy’s fishing boat.  Sometime later, Halloween comes to New Orleans, as evidenced by the decorations lining the street.  Ben gives Kent a box of some of Alyssa’s clothes and such so they can be donated, indicating that he’s ready to move on with his life.  After Kent leaves, Ben notices the pretty longhaired cat that has been lurking about outside his house throughout the movie.  With a smile, Ben steps over to pet the cat.  That’s when he notices the collar around her neck, and when he takes a moment to get a better look, he sees the cat’s name is Tater Tot.  Immediately, the expression on Ben’s face shifts, and it’s clear when he turns and looks upward that he realizes that this is a Ghost Wink that Alyssa sent him.

Later that evening, Ben makes his way back to the mansion, where Gabbie and Travis are having a small get together for Halloween, with Harriet, Kent and Bruce in attendance as well.  Here, we learn that Gabbie and Travis are indeed staying in town, as Gabbie (who had mentioned in passing earlier that she’d worked as a doctor prior to moving down to New Orleans with Travis) got a job at New Orleans General.  And Travis’ problems at school seem to have improved as he announces he’s been voted as the vice president of his class.  Also, Kent had been inspired to get ordained as a minister, and it’s suggested that Ben has gone back to the astrophysicist world as he mentions that ‘the lecture went on a little long.’  Before Ben can enter the house, he and Gabbie jokingly repeat the exchange they’d shared upon their first meeting, with Gabbie telling Ben that if he sets foot through the door, it could change the course of his entire life, to which Ben announces that it’s a risk he’s willing to take.  And so, the movie comes to an end, with Ben, Gabbie, Travis, Harriet, Kent and Bruce sharing a meal as the various ghosts that continue to haunt the mansion dance about the room to a jazzed up rendition of Grim Grinning Ghosts that I would love to hear a full-length version of.

Overall, I rather enjoyed this version of Haunted Mansion.  While I still find the whole tragic love story aspect of the 2003 version to be very enjoyable, as well as the whole twist of the murder being covered up as a suicide, I thought this version did a better job of explaining the reason behind why there was a deadline to fix the conflict.  I don’t think they really explained why it was so urgent for the curse to be broken so quickly in the 2003 version.  After all, they’d already been waiting for 112 years by that point, so why was it so imperative to get Sara to Gracey Manor as soon as possible?  But in this movie, they made it clear why there was a time limit to defeat Alistair.  In addition, I appreciated how this movie took the time to let the viewing audience catch their breath from the overall plot and simply let the characters be people.  And full props to how the movie gave us the message that it was okay for little boys and even grown men to cry and be sad.  That’s a very important message to present in a world of toxic masculinity, where boys can often be ridiculed and mocked for showing any sign of perceived weakness.  While we do see a bit of this outlook in terms of Alistair’s backstory, his father’s harsh response to Young Alistair crying at his mother’s funeral is clearly presented as wrong.  And on a personal note, I really liked how it was left ambiguous as to whether or not Ben and Gabbie were going to get together.  While they certainly have plenty of moment where we see there’s a solid connection between them, as well as scenes where Ben is bonding with Travis in a very father and son kind of way, it’s still not explicitly stated if they’re romantically involved in the end or not.  Yes, Ben does bring Gabbie some flowers at the end, but that could be interpreted as a platonic gesture as well.  I think this was a smart move on the movie’s part, particularly since I don’t think either of them were in a place where they should think about getting into the dating scene again.   I mean, Ben had only just started putting the loss of Alyssa behind him.  And Gabbie just lost her husband and the father of her son a year ago.  While it’s not exactly clear where Gabbie is in terms of the grieving process, Travis was still very much in his mourning period.  As much as he clearly liked Ben, he might not be comfortable with the idea of Ben essentially ‘replacing’ his father.  And it’s made abundantly clear that Travis’ wellbeing and happiness is Gabbie’s main priority at the moment (as it should be).  While I certainly wouldn’t object if Ben and Gabbie end up dating if there’s ever a sequel, I am glad they left it open ended in that regard.  Finally, I can see how Haunted Mansion fans would prefer this to the 2003 version since the ghosts end up remaining in the mansion this time around and don’t cross over in the end.  Plus, this movie was practically bursting at the seams in regards to nods and references to the Disney ride.  Honesty, you could easily make an extensive list of how many Haunted Mansion Easter Eggs there were in this movie.  In fact, the only element that I don’t recall seeing in this version are the Singing Busts.  But while it does stink that they were left out, I can’t think of a way they could have been squeezed in.