#edwin epps

[fullcatkryptonite]

Fassbender characters. challenge Who is going to win?

We start with two masterpieces both directed by Steve McQueen. Unpleasant characters both, but I loved them both. Very difficult choice.

[lyledebeast]

Over the past few weeks, I have been consuming a steady diet of period shows and movies, most of them centered on 19th C America.  Glory (1990), 12 Years a Slave (2012), and The Underground Railroad (2021) are a few examples.  Most of these stories feature villains who are racist White men.  This has given me an opportunity to think in particular ways about how villains work and what makes them effective and also put me in an interesting frame of mind for my yearly The Patriot rewatch.

What all of these racist White villains have in common is not just their brutal actions but their conviction that Black people are intrinsically inferior to and less human than themselves.  This is not an individual belief each respective villain holds; it is the foundation of the chattel slavery-based culture in which they live.  Edwin Epps in 12 Years a Slave has a wife who pressures him to be even more brutal than he is and neighboring planters who, while they may treat enslaved people with less overt cruelty than Epps, do not censure his practices.  Due to this system, the odds are stacked in Epps’ favor to such an extent that protagonist Solomon Northrop is only able to get away in the end because a White friend comes from New York to prove Northrop is who he says.

Colonel Tavington, on the other hand, simply wants to win the war at any cost.  His goal is to stop the South Carolina militia from preventing the British Army’s progress north, and he has no problem will murdering civilians in service of that goal. He has no particular hatred of women, children, and old Patriots, but he can find them. They are defenseless against the Green Dragoons because, well, the dragoons are heavily armed, but the movie’s protagonist is not.  Tavington tells General O’Hara that Benjamin Martin and his militia have killed as many as eighteen British officers in two months. Cornwallis has tasked Tavington with finding the militia; how hard would it be for them to let him?

While Epps’ villainy relies on the support system of White supremacy to make it effective, Tavington’s relies almost wholly on his personality and the shock value of his actions.  The most shocking aspect of violence against Black people in 12 Years, ironically, is how mundane it is.  Just before he goes to the Epps plantation, a lynch mob strings Northrop up from a tree branch, his toes barely touching the ground.  Even after the overseer stops them, he leaves Northrop there for hours while everyone goes about their daily activities around him. That Epps administers more violence than others is owing to Northrop spending more time with him than anything else.  There are many White men, and one White woman, inflicting such violence, and bystanders simply ignore it.  What else can they do? 

What is actually shocking about Tavington’s violence against civilians is how many times the militiamen, and the audience by proxy, are shocked by it.  Tavington murders Thomas five minutes into his first appearance in the movie.  An hour and a half of run time and many months of story time later, after Tavington and the dragoons have burned seven militiamen’s homes and murdered the inhabitants, Martin sends the militia home, marries off his son, sends his new inlaws home to conduct business as usual, and you won’t believe what happens next! Even Tavington draws attention to how expected his propensity for violence should be at this point after locking Martin’s in-laws and their neighbors in the town’s church.  When his subordinate informs him that the regiment is ready to fire the town, Tavington is confused by his confusion.  “The town?  Burn the church.” Honestly, Wilkins.  Get your head in the game. 

If what makes villains effective is simply wrecking havoc on the lives of the protagonists and their loved ones, then Epps and Tavington both fit the bill.   But I find that to be truly effective as a villain, a characters’ violence has to be supported by something other than their own individual whims. Epps is able to commit so much violence against enslaved people, including the protagonist, because his society supports the beliefs that underpin his actions. Tavington is able to commit so much violence against civilians because the protagonist cannot be bothered to stop him. If what is most chilling about 12 Years is how little value Black people had as human beings in the antebellum South, what should be most chilling about The Patriot is how little value even White women and children, who make up the bulk of Tavington’s victims, had in Colonial America. 

[lehnsharrk]

Reblogging this bc I've updated it a few times since it was first posted...

The *New* Fassbender Psychopath Scale 😈

*Updated 02/23/2025*

I wanted to expand on the one introduced on the Kelly Clarkson show, below are the Fassy movies I've seen, my general "psychopath" rating for each character and reason why

Disclaimers:

For context I am essentially swapping "psychopath" with "evil," I am in no way trying to tie this to any psychological disorders or do a deep dive into any characters. Just a very surface-level "how nefariously evil is this character?"

These are my opinions, I encourage you to share, comment and make your own ratings. I will also be updating as I watch more of his films.

There *will* be spoilers so if you haven't seen these movies/shows, consider yourself warned!

The scale will also be a 0-5. I'm using 👿 and a zero will be a 👍

Let's go! 🦈

Movies 🎥

Hunger: Bobby Sands 👍

Only going off the context of the movie, he was on hunger strike for his cause and ended up starving to death. (Not doing a deep dive, don't know too much about the real person or protest).

Eden Lake: Steve 👍

Guy and his girlfriend just trying to escape and survive a gang of murderous teenagers.

Fish Tank: Connor 👿👿👿👿👿

Oh boy, this guy... He grooms and r*pes a child, and then if that wasn't bad enough, she's the daughter of his girlfriend, and if THAT wasn't bad enough, we find out he's got a wife and child he's been keeping this from.

Inglourious Basterds: Lt. Hicox 👍👍

Goes undercover to help defeat the n*zis (helps get a few killed too, even though he dies in the process).

Centurion: Quintus Dias 👍

Just a soldier, trying to survive.

Jane Eyre: Mr. Rochester 👿👿👿

Keeps his wife, suffering from mental illness, locked in the walls and keeps it a secret so he doesn't scare off another woman he's trying to marry.

X-Men: Erik Lehnsherr/Magneto 👿👿

Erik's anger comes from a place of trauma and his worst fears keep coming to fruition. That being said, he does blindly distrust all humans, betrays Charles multiple times and causes so much unnecessary destruction.

A Dangerous Method: Carl Jung 👿👿

Doctor cheats on his wife with his patients, twice.

Shame: Brandon Sullivan 👍

A man suffering with addiction and trauma, plus added guilt when his sister stays over. Wish I could give him a hug.

Haywire: Paul 👿👿

I wasn't paying attention (he's not in it for that long) but I think he double crossed the main character and shot someone?

Prometheus/Alien Covenant: David 8 👿👿👿

I will defend David with my dying breath but to be honest, he does some horrendous things. Intentionally infecting humans with alien parasites, massacring an entire planet, killing and experimenting on someone he loved? Sorry David, you're getting a 3!

12 Years a Slave: Edwin Epps 👿👿👿👿👿👿

Sadistic slave owner and r*pist, about as evil as it gets (and yes I put an extra 👿).

Frank: Frank 👍

Poor Frank has done no wrong, just wants to make music and wear mask.

Slow West: Silas Selleck 👿

Starts out tricking the main character so he can find a bounty but has a change of heart.

Macbeth: Macbeth 👿👿👿👿

M*rders the king in his sleep so he can become king, orders Banquo and his son killed (although the son does escape) and burns MacDuff's wife and children at the stake.

Steve Jobs: Steve Jobs 👿👿

Greedy businessman, neglectful father and stole credit from his friend and business partner.

The Light Between Oceans: Tom Sherbourne 👿

He and his wife were heartbroken after their miscarriages but he does technically kidnap a child, keeping her from her grieving mother. He does eventually turn himself in.

Assassin's Creed: Cal/Aguilar 👿

Callum 'the pimp killer' Lynch "avatars" his assassin ancestor Aguilar. (It is about assassins after all, had to give him something).

Song to Song: Cook 👿👿

This movie was hard to follow but I'm giving him a two because he might be a groomer (he met the main character, who he later sleeps with, at 16) and he screwed Ryan Gosling's character out of the copyright to his songs.

Alien Covenant: Walter 1 👍

Don't really think Walter can be evil, he doesn't have the capacity that David does.

Next Goal Wins: Thomas Rongen 👿

Intentionally misgenders and deadnames a character because he's upset at her, later apologizes. Also a bit of a jerk to everyone at the beginning.

TV 📺

A Bear Named Winnie: Lt. Coleburn 👿

He brings a baby bear to a military camp. Also leaves the bear at a zoo, letting her live out her life in a small cage instead of releasing her back to the wild when he had the chance.

William & Mary: Lukasz 👿👿👿

Jumped through the episode to watch the Fassy bits but ew... Guy m*lests the midwife that just delivered he and his girlfriend's baby.

Sherlock Holmes & The Case of the Silk Stocking: Charles Allen 👿👿👿👿👿

Even though it's two characters, I'm rating them the same. One's a child m*lester and murder and one knew about it and did nothing.

The Agency: Martian 👿

He is knowingly putting himself, his daughter, the cia AND his girlfriend at risk all because he can't let his relationship go? (Spoiler: he still can't and ends up going double agent to rescue her).

Here's the original video for context:

Let me know what you think!

Share any suggestions of what movie or show I should watch next.

[diioonysus]

by your bedside

[horizon-verizon]

I can’t believe there’s excuses for what Rhaenyra says about Nettles, the only Black character in the Dance (“a common thing”, “low creature” and “you need only to look at her to know she has no drop of dragon’s blood in her”). Trying to pass it as her paranoia due to Mysaria and cheating doesn’t work. If you call a POC a racial slur, that’s racist regardless of whether that person did something to you. Rhaenyra isn’t Daenerys or Arya, she tried to murder a teenage Black girl. I am not here for any Rhaenyra’s stan trying to excuse or downplay a white woman’s misogynoir and classism because her sons died. Grief doesn’t make you suddenly racist, or compel you to say racist things. You were always that way. The grief just brought out the racism and supremacism that was always simmering beneath the surface.

Actually, Rhaenyra reminds me of the racist Southern plantation owner Mary Epps in the film 12 Years a Slave, who feels jealous and threatened by Patsey (played by Lupita Nyong’o) when her husband Ed constantly rapes Patsey and other female slaves. Mary hates and blames her and the other Black slaves for “seducing” her husband, while making excuses for his outbursts of rage, violence and lust. (obviously, Daemon isn’t as vicious and sadistic as Edwin Epps).

Yeah, I've argued as much HERE, that the language tells us all we need to know of the blood purity leveraged against Nettles and the Black Jezebel-characterization GRRM employs to clue us into a very American racial dynamic b/t white women and Black. Particularly black women because the Black Jezebel stereotype is a unique, direct result and mechanism coming from the dehumanization of Africans for the slave trade and the slave system in the U.S.

[quantumfrail]

When Solomon Northup was finally freed in 1853, he had to leave Patsey behind on Edwin Epps' plantation and I wondered if we ever found out what happened to her.

"The last we know of Patsey is what Northup described in his memoir - a highly skilled cotton picker who endured extreme physical and sexual abuse from Edwin Epps while also facing cruel jealousy from his wife. Northup wrote about having to witness her brutal whipping at Epps' command, one of the most harrowing scenes in both the book and film.

Despite extensive research by historians, no definitive records have been found of what happened to Patsey after Northup's departure. Like many enslaved people of that era, the details of her later life and death were not documented in historical records."

edit: https://www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2017/03/enduring-legacy-patsey/ Perhaps most satisfying, Devendorf reported that “Patsy went away with our army last week, so she is at last far from the caprices of her jealous mistress.”[8]

While we do not yet know what happened to Patsey past the mid-point of the war, these recent discoveries reveal that she at least survived long enough to attain freedom in the summer of 1863.

[lehnsharrk]

This post is both cursed and pure gold, i love it

FASSY MOVIE SWAP FRIDAY!

[mariamga2024mi4017]

Recording the audio for the video

03/10/2024

Summary of what happened yesterday:-

we went to the 13th floor to record the video.

Movindul and Uvindu handled the setup.

Setting up the mic took some time.

We went through the script for any last minute chnages.

Since we ran out of time, we decided to go with the initial stop motion sticker idea.

Then we read off the script and recorded our audio.

Either Movindul or Uvindu will be handling the editing.

I'll be modifying the script to be sent to Irushi.

notes :-

In an interview, Mcqueen mentions that he had to go though over 1000 applications sent in for the role of Patsey.

Out of all these auditions, what made Nyongo’s audition tape so special?

Well, Mcqueen mentions that he was captivated by Nyongo’s beauty and he knew that a star was born. When all hope was lost in finding the right actress for Patsey, Nyongo revived that hope.

The first point to prove McQueen’s choice is through ‘the film highlighting Patsey’s vulnerability to the male gaze’

In the novel, Northup describes her as “...." Which shows a sense of admiration towards her

However, the film takes a different approach by describing Patsey through Edwin Epps.

As you heard from the previously played clip, Epps speaks of Patsey as if she’s his valuable possession or property. She is subjected to his objectification.

Set up photos:-

Part of the script we are omitting :-

[boundless-xxx]

Elizabeth was usually brutally honest. She didn’t like to sugar coat shit or beat around the bush. But this time, she couldn't run further from her own destructive truth. She’d been sold. Sold. Like some kind of dog to a man born of cruelty and carnage. Edwin Epps, a ruthless sadistic plantation owner, who made a name for himself of being one of the cruelest of slavers due to his relentless brutality. He viewed blacks as vermin, creatures unworthy of possessing basic human rights. And now... he owned her body but, most importantly... her freedom. Forced to live under his roof and his rules as a house slave, she lived a life of fear and constraint. She didn’t want to believe it but...it was getting harder and harder to fight him, especially when his touch burned so painfully good when she finally surrendered to it. Her body may want him, but her mind and her heart were far more calculating. She didn’t lose lost hope...no matter what he did to her. She refused to break. She would escape him and his reign of terror over her. Whether it was tomorrow or five years from now, she will not stop until she had him cold and dead at her feet. And that was the real honest truth.

*****

Edwin never thought he could be this fucking consumed by a nigger - captivated in such a way that it bordered on obsession. Elizabeth was his now and the truth of that made his blood run hot and fast in his veins. The feel of her body under his was like pure ecstasy, even when she fought him...or herself. She could try to deny it all she want, but she couldn’t hide from him. He knew desire when he saw it, even when it was shadowed by resistance and then ultimately guilt. That fire in her eyes burned him from the inside out, and it made him crave her more. He knew she was fighting for her freedom, calculating her escape, but in time, she would bend to his will until she finally broke - until she realized there was no freedom from him, no escape. That he was her master and her God. She was his and he wasn’t going to stop until it was deeply embedded into her mind, that the mere thought of denying it brought her physical pain...because it would. He had big plans for his black queen and he couldn’t wait for the impending pleasurable eternity of it all.

[super-hero-confessions]

[morilinde214782]

you know i really like the way you struggle and moan. beautiful man.

[theitalianmoviegoer]

12 Years Slave, 2013

[jacintatveit]

12 Years a Slave (2013)

Michael Fassbender Filmography Challenge: Day 32

I’m trying to get to the bottom of why my friend, someone I know and love, put terror in me. With Michael’s performance in “12 Years a Slave” he does something that few actors are able to pull off — he makes us believe at all times while he is on screen that anything could happen, that we the audience are not safe to trust that our hero will prevail.

——James McAvoy on Michael’s performance in 12 Years a Slave: x

[capsgrantrogers]

Michael Fassbender / Edwin Epps

[fussingoverfassbender]

12 Years A Slave || 2013

[sielustaja]

Fassbender Filmography 36/??

Edwin Epps // 12 Years a Slave (2013) dir. Steve McQueen