#fun fact: the losing your sense of taste thing due to shock is real

[regrettablewritings]

I'm feeling a Nevada Ramirez mood (love that damn asshole) but if you aren't feeling writing for him then I give this up to authors choice. But from the current ships numbers perhaps: 3 (because I wanna get fucked up), 9 (because I have to), 10 (because I would like to know your thoughts) and 11 (because I am wildly curious)

("I'm feeling a Nevada Ramirez mood" Translation: "I want a daddy to spit in my fuckgng mouth" Sorry, I don't make the rules about language translation.🤷🏽‍♀️)

3. Which one outlives the other, and how they cope:

You'd always kind of sort of lived in a fairytale. In hindsight, though, you probably had to: It's what probably made being with his stupid ass a bit easier. Kind of like you were living in one of those stories where a monster that terrorized some bucolic tiny town could be brought down to size by a soul of pure heart. Maybe even regain his human form.

If only your story had had a happy ending.

In a way, Nevada felt he was to blame for that; clearly, sticking with you had really only encouraged that type of behavior, or so he thought.

And now look where that ended you: All that gross-ass makeup to make you look like your last moments hadn't been agonizing (the coroner insisted it had been quick, but Nevada called bullshit); those stiff clothes that you never would've worn unless you had to (Nevada never would've put you in them if he had more of a choice); eyes closed, never to see the telltale signs of the one you left behind coming undone (actually, in a sick way, Nevada didn't necessarily mind this; it spared him the humiliation).

There wasn't even necessarily any sign that you had been targeted; the general theory really was that you'd been taken out by a stray bullet. But in some part of him, Nevada couldn't believe that. He didn't want to. It just made so much perfect sense in his mind: You were just minding your own damn business, walking home after a shift ended a little later than expected. You were the very picture of innocent and unsuspecting, all vulnerable and without him. In short: That was the perfect time for some rival gang or some shit to take a shot at you.

And the thought made Nevada's blood boil to the point that it evaporated into the air, further polluting these fucking New York skies with his inner toxicity being exposed. He'd make whoever did this to you choke. But not before roughing them up a lil bit. Maybe cut off some fingers. Some toes . . . Maybe a pound of flesh as payment if there was any time left, who knows.

But first, his men had to find them.

To say that Nevada does not take your passing well would be an understatement. He's somehow more violent. Somehow a lot less tolerant of bullshit (and he already wasn't before). If anyone so much as blinks wrong, they run the risk of having a nearly feral fuck jump at them and attempt to rip their face off.

His men, who already feared and respected him, dare not occupy the same room as him any longer than they have to. They miss you as a person, of course, but they never knew just how much of a hold you had on their boss until that hand was gone.

Sure, he goes through the usual motions seen in others, like sitting in his chair, downing copious amounts of whatever was left in his liquor cabinet. And, of course, there's the stages of grieving: He's eternally stuck oscillating between guilt and anger.

He was supposed to be the one that got killed out here, him! Not you: Sweet, kind, patient, hard-headed, stupid-assed you! He got that, why couldn't God get with the program on that!? He was the dealer, the gang leader putting himself into all kinds of problems with others; you were just some innocent bystander who happened to get caught in his web, decide they liked it there, and inexplicably stuck around.

And now you're dead. He was being selfish, you were being stupid, and now you were dead.

He stares blankly at nothing before humming with a sip of whatever the hell is in his glass now, he doesn't fucking remember. Can't taste it anyway; his sense of taste disappeared, floated away with your spirit the moment he learned of your passing.

The pure-hearted soul that kept the village safe was gone; all that remained was the carnivorous beast, ready to rampage and raze the town to the ground.

9. Which one swears more?:

Just in time for the 20210 Summer Olympics, we have a new category to observe: Fucking Goddamn Cussing Up a Shitstorm! Representing Washington Heights, we have a cussing prodigy, Nevada Ramirez! Also representing Washington Heights by way of duel citizenship between the apartments, we have . . . You!

Okay but in all seriousness, Nevada is definitely the gold medal-winner here. Science indicates that cussing helps to relieve stress and for as collected as Nevada likes to appear in front of others, 5'9" is not a lot of space for stress to go. He's constantly bottling up that shit! What's worse, though, is that the fucker makes it sound elegant.

How does he make "fuck" sound so gentle when it leaves his lips with a cold-eyed glower!? Who the hell knows!

Erstwhile, you're a pretty good runner-up. Even if you were a big cusser before getting with Nevada, you could never catch up with him -- he's just had way too many experiences where he felt the need to pepper the ambience with some cursing. And if you weren't as into it before . . . I'm sorry, boo, but you'll be picking up that nasty habit of his like you were picking up the torch for the Cussing Olympics. Bon chance!

10. What TV shows they watch together, and which ones they hide from the other:

Noah . . . How did you know I was planning to do a preference on what characters watch with their S/Os? Not that I can confirm or deny that Nevada was in that one but --

Nevada didn't really watch TV a whole lot before you two got together. It was a mix of him not having a lot of time and him not having a lot of care to keep up with anything. Everything is so goddamn serialized, what's even the point?

Really, the only reason he bought subscriptions to streaming services was to keep you entertained for when he had to be out the house or some junk. But there were a few too many times where he'd come home late and find you curled up on the couch.

". . . The hell're you still doing up --"

"Ssh!"

". . . Did you just --"

"Yes, now sshhh! I'm about to see who this chick picks to go to bed with."

Of course, 'Vada is pissed; people don't shush him, he shushes them! What the fuck could be so interesting that you'd do that!? He takes his glare from you to the screen . . . and about thirty minutes in, he gets it. He'd never say it out loud, but deep down, he knows why you like Love Island. It's stupid, it's trashy, he hates these dumbass twenty-somethings making drama out of nothing, and for fuck's sake will somebody talk to the girl with the dark skin and short hair she's the hottest one there --

Of course, he tries hard not to show his interest, taking seats next to you when you're watching "because he's tired", adding his own commentary "because these pendejos need to know better", etc. And, of course, it doesn't fool you in the slightest. As amused as you are, though, you don't tease him about it; you're afraid that if you do, your stubborn boyfriend would put up a fight in the form of leaving you to watch your silly little show by yourself. And you really don't mind sharing the show with him . . . No, solitary watching is reserved for your cartoons.

Nevada may let things with you slip to a point but the moment he learns you like to watch anything animated, he's on your ass with the ruthless taunting. Which is like the pot calling the kettle black because 'Vada's secret pleasure is even worse: daytime soap operas. Admittedly, there's some sentimentality connected to them (he remembers being at his Abuela's house and seeing her get really into some telenovelas), but the fact of the matter is really more that he's invested in the drama and bullshit going on between all this lunatics who we're supposed to buy as being doctors or CEOs or whatever over-glamorized positions they're supposed to have.

He doesn't actually get to watch them often but . . . hey, that's what he pays certain grunts to do for him.

Okay I had way too much fun writing these so lemme just cut myself off now. Thanks for asking!!!

[theodora3022]

Freaking Me Out

Pairing: Neito Monoma x F!reader (I’m not really good at this kind of stuff…)

Summary: What scares Neito Monoma more than death, is his irrational attraction to you. He was able to hide it behind his petty insults often, until one day he saw you injured, something in the blonde snapped.

Notes: Reader is a student in 1A. If you do not like it, the exit button is there for you. Otherwise, enjoy! I honeslty don’t like how this turns out, but there you have it.

Warning: Verbal abuse (It is Monoma come on, what’s the surprise), superiority complex (obviously), fluff?Insults?

“Now I hear sounds in the hallway,

rocking chairs are moving on their own,

I’m falling for you, so much so

It’s freaking me out.”

           You’re a student of class 1A, that is a good enough reason for Neito to pick on you. Even though you have always been polite and friendly. His distain is towards 1A in general, you just got caught up in the wave.

           He might still act like a bully towards you, but that doesn’t mean he hates you, in fact, he found you quite charming, it almost made him want to stop with his verbal abuses. Almost.

           Ironic enough, Neito has a soft spot for sociable people. Most people would be appalled with his rude attitude, which is what he expected. But he never got any reaction out of you with the usual insults. You brush them off as if they were nothing and kept that friendly façade, keep treating him with kindness. You are too nice, abnormally so.

           Neito is curious, what could make you lose your composure? You are always so calm and collected, it’s honestly irritating. How can he rip off that smiling mask off your face and see who you really are? Class 1A is full of idiots, so why are you any different. The way you act all welcoming, it’s all fake right? Inside, you must be just like those egotistic maniacs you called friends. Nothing had drawn the blonde’s attention this much in a long time, so when he caught a glimpse of your backside, walking towards the library, Neito followed.

           You had a terrible day, you got a bad mark on a recent test, accidently slipped on a banana skin, and landed sideways. It’s only a minor injury, so you didn’t bother to visit the Nurse’s office.(They must have more pressing injuries to deal with then a small cut) Now you got a bandage on the left side of your chin. So, you decide to treat yourself some quality time to relax in the library, surely nothing worse can happen in that calming atmosphere?

           Oh, how naïve you are.

           Coincidentally, it happened to be a bad day for Neito too. What’s his favorite pastime these days? Read Franco-Belgian comics Make fun of someone he doesn’t like. You’re just sitting there, concentrated on a history book, as if inviting his insults. The library is nearly empty, and the table you’re sitting at is behind some shelves, far away from the Liberian’s prying eyes. Perfect.

           Inviting himself to your table, Neito sits down across you with that arrogant smirk on his face. Then he starts to examine you. Oh, how adorable you look, so focused. Suddenly the book makes him feel jealous, how pathetic of him. He really got it bad. He wonders what you’re going to look like all angry, finally letting out your true self.

“What you’re reading there, (y/n)?”

           You are now scowling; obviously not too happy he had interrupted your reading. “Good afternoon to you too, Monoma. Has anyone told you it’s rude to interrupt?” You were hoping to ignore him, that he would leave on his own. Well, that’s evidently not happening.

           She seems annoyed. Never seen that before, interesting. Then Neito notices the small bandage on the side of your chin. It’s clearly not properly treated, as he can see blood leaking from its edges.

           “You’re hurt?” That smirk is gone…Is that concerns you see on his face? You never imagined someone like him is capable of such compassion. “Oh this? I tripped and I cut it. No big deal though.” Avoiding his caring gaze, you’re starting to feel uncomfortable. He is acting so…nice? Who is he and what has he done with the real Neito Monoma?

           No big deal? If it is not cleansed and closed properly, it could very well leave a scar on your flawless face! Monoma doesn’t know why this bothers him this much, what he does know is you need to get proper medical attention immediately. “None sense. Come, that’s get you to recovery girl.”

           “I’m fine, really. Hey, let go of me, Monoma!” He took your left hand into his without permission? What the hell? The next thing you know he is dragging you out of the library.

           “If you don’t want to cause a spectacle in the hallways, better stop being a brat and shut your trap.” Ah, there it is. The normal insults of Neito Monoma. You silenced yourself, nevertheless. Thankfully, it’s afterschool, so no one is in the hallways. You can just picture how rumors were going to spread if someone sees you and Monoma “holding hands” like this.

           The Recovery girl is busy with someone’s training injury. Much to your surprise, after taking some antibiotics ointment and a couple of cotton swabs, he decides to tend to your wound himself.

           Slim fingers carefully peeling the bandage off, the blonde’s brows knotted when you let out a hiss of pain. “It might hurt now, but it’s going to scar if you just leave it like this.” He is so focus on cleansing your cut that he missed your shock. After making sure the wound is hygienic, Neito starts applying the ointment with such attentiveness, making sure no corners are missed. His eyes are filled with worries, instead of the usual condescending attitude. It all looks too good to be real, so you stay quiet.

           Neito used to be quite clumsy as a child, so he learned how to tend to minor wounds such as yours. Fortunately, your cut is not deep or long, with the correct care it would heal in no time.

           It was not until he finishes up, after putting a new bandage over your treated wound, that Neito realizes what he has done. Not only he had literally dragged you here, but also tended your wound himself! If he does not know better, he would say he genuinely care for you. Biting his lower lip, the Blonde’s head start to spin, to think how he can excuse himself out of this awkward situation.

           “Neito?” You are calling him by his first name now? That is new. Not that he hates it.

           Then you just look at him with those innocent eyes, those beautiful eyes. And those lips, they look so tasty, he would not mind a tast-

           Wait, where did all those obscene thoughts come from?

           You two are standing in an empty hallway beside the nurse’s office, staring at each other in silence. “Thank you for that, Neito. I really appreciate your help. I wouldn’t want to have a scar.” Is that all you have to say? Normally that would be enough, but for Monoma?

           “You got two options, (y/n). One, just walk away, pretend this never happened and carry on with your normal life.” He paces towards you, you realized how he had backed you into a corner. He is close, too close-you can feel his breaths gently brushes your cheeks. Up close, you noticed he is actually quite handsome, with that well-trimmed blonde hair and those crystal blue eyes. If he were not such a jerk, he would have been quite a charmer. Wait…is he trembling?

           “What’s the other option?” You asked that out of pure curiosity. Childish, you know, but you cannot help but be amused at the blonde’s shacking form. It is not everyday you get to see so terrified and flustered, a major blush across those usually pale cheeks. A rare but delightful sight.

           Don’t you get those hints? Your innocence, while cute, is driving Neito crazy. He is so done with playing subtle. Let his knuckles brush against the uninjured side of your face, touches so soft that can be mistaken as lover’s.

           “Or” He whispers near your ear, almost towering over you; “You can show me how thankful you are for my care. I been thinking about kissing you for a while, you know.” He is buffing. Neito is screaming in his head, praying that you reciprocate his feelings. It is the least you can do after making him swoon over you for so long.

           How dare you! How dare you making him feel attached? Like you are the only thing he wants in this world? Who gives you the right to make him obsess over you?

           Neito is scared, terrified, even. This had never happened before. Due to his handsome appearance, there had been girls interested him before, but they all backed away once they learned about his personality.

           You were too astounded to move. Neito Monoma, the infamous rude prick from Class 1B, has feelings for you? Someone pinch you on the arm, to make sure this was not just some lewd dream. “What, so shocked that you can’t even speak?” Forcing your chin up with his thumb and index fingers (but still careful not to touch your wound), his face begins to lean close. You shut your eyes, half-hoping for it to happen.

           But you only felt a quick peck on your cheek. Of course he would not steal your first kiss here. Neito would want to make it a moment he could treasure forever, after a date. Not in this little dark hallway.

           “You, me, tomorrow at noon, in front of the gate.” Then he left without saying a word, almost stumbling. Only his faint cologne still lingering around you, reminding this is all real.

[citrineghost]

100 Humans on Netflix

So there’s this neat Netflix Original show called 100 Humans. I immediately got interested in it because they take this group of various humans from different backgrounds, age groups, and so on, and they use them to conduct experiments to get answers to interesting questions.

So, right away I had concerns about this show because

If you know anything about data and statistical research, you know 100 people is a very small sample size and does not breed accurate results

However, I’m very curious and wanted to see what they came up with anyway. I watched all 8 episodes and, honestly, I enjoyed watching it for the most part. However, I have a LOT of issues with the show and how it was conducted and I want to list them out here.

If you’re interested in watching 100 Humans or have already watched it, please consider the following before taking any of the show’s data as fact.

100 people is a very small sample size. This is because, the more people you have, the more weight each increment in your percentages has. With 100 people, each person represents 1 entire percent. That’s a lot. That means even a few people giving incorrect answers, having off-days, or giving ridiculous results (such as you can see in the spiders georg meme), can sway the entire result of an experiment into unreasonable territory. This is why most scientific studies attempt to get data from many hundreds or even thousands of people. The bigger the sample size, the more accurate it is to the entirety of the world.

I’ll put the rest under the cut because it gets long

The 3 hosts, who I’ll refer to as the scientists (regardless of if they actually are, because I’m not sure and don’t feel like googling it) repeatedly make false statements. For example, in one episode, they told their humans to “raise your hand if you believe you’re less bigoted than the average person here,” to which 94 people raised their hands. One of the scientists then made the statement, “If that were true, it would mean only 6% of Americans are bigoted.” This statement is entirely false. The only way to actually determine a true meaning to that would be to determine at what percentage of bigotry you are considered a real bigot. You also must consider that believing you’re more bigoted than other people in a small group, who you already have an impression of, is not necessarily indicative of how you feel you measure up to America as a whole. Anyway, I could go on and on. The only way to accurately summarize the results of that question would be to say that 44% of the humans had an inflated sense of righteousness or something of the sort.

The 3 scientists, both in person and in narration, for the sake of entertainment (if that’s what you call it) continually made “jokes” that poked fun at different groups, implied men are shit, etc. Maybe that’s fun for some people, but the kind of jokes they were making to amp up the hilarity of their host personas was genuinely just uncomfortable and made me feel even more like they couldn’t be trusted to go about unbiased research.

The scientists continually drew conclusions where the results should have been labeled inconclusive

The scientists made blanket statements about certain groups based on 1 element of research that would not stand up to further evaluation. For example, when explaining that ~93% (i think it was about that number) of Americans have access to clean, drinkable, tap water and yet some large number of single use bottled waters are sold every year, one scientist said it was because people believe bottled water is safer and cleaner than tap water. I am going to do my next survey on this to see if my own perception is flawed, but I simply don’t believe that all of the people who buy bottled water do so because they think its cleaner than “tap” (as if all tap is the same.) I know there have been studies about people drinking unlabeled bottled water and tap water and not being able to tell the difference, but this neglects to account for the fact that different houses pipes can affect the taste of the tap water running through them, people can use disposable bottles of water for certain activities or events too far away from tap for people to refill their reusable bottles easily, and so so so much more. Anyway, it just really bothers me to see “scientists” making these kinds of generalizations when they’re the ones whose results we’re supposed to trust.

The show was incredibly cisnormative. There was an entire episode based on comparing men and women that made me extremely uncomfortable with its division of people by men and women. There was the implication that all men have penises and all women have vaginas. There were implications that reproduction is a necessity in picking a partner. It was just a shitshow. There was one comment by one subject who asked, when being told to separate by men and women, “What if I’m transgender?” Obviously I can’t say for sure, but this person didn’t appear to be transgender and the sort of tone it was asked in makes me think it was literally something they asked him to say in order to get inclusivity points with the viewers and to “prove” that they’re not transphobic by having them divide up, because they said to go to the side you identify with. This whole thing is a) harmful to nb folks who would not have had a side to go to and b) completely negating the fact that the way we were socialized can have an effect on our social responses. That means that for a social experiment, a trans person could sway the results of one side due to their upbringing and the pressures society put on them before/if they don’t pass. This is all assuming they had any trans people there, which is potentially debatable.  I also take issue with this entire fucking episode because just, the amount of toxicity in proving one sex is better than the others is really gross and actually counterproductive to everything feminist and progressive. Not to mention, them implying that they’re trying to support trans people only to reinforce the notion that a trans man is inherently lesser for being a man when even prior to hatching, he would have also been force fed propaganda and societal pressure implying he’s less than for supposedly being a woman is really gross and makes me angry. The point of what I’m saying is that it’s actually not woke to hate men as a way of bringing women up because there are men who are minorities who are being hurt by the rise of aggression being directed at them for their gender. Anyway enough about that.

The tests drew false conclusions because they did not account for how minorities adapt to a world that’s not made for them. This is specifically directed at the episode where subjects were asked to match up 6 people into couples. There were 3 women and 3 men and the humans were asked to put them together into pairs. they could ask the people 1 question each but then had to match them up with only that information. The truth is, the people brought in were 3 real life couples already, which the humans didn’t know until after they matched them. The couples were m/f, m/m, and f/f. I think that’s great, but the problem is, literally none of the humans asked any of them their sexuality as their question and most people didn’t even consider they could match up same-sex people. One girl even thought that they had told her to make m/f pairings, even though they didn’t.  The scientists concluded from the experiment that the humans have a societal bias toward people, and assume they’re all straight, even if they, themselves, are not straight. I personally believe that was the wrong conclusion to draw. You could see some of the queer humans were shocked that they hadn’t considered some of the pairings might be gay. But, I don’t think it’s because they believe everyone they meet is straight, I believe this says more about what they expected from the scientists themselves. If someone is in a minority and they go to do something organized, like a set of experiments, they are going to be judging the quality and setup of the experiments by those designing them. I feel that the lack of consideration that the couples might be gay has a lot more to do with queer people having adapted to a world where queers are rarely involved or included in equal volume to the cishets. The queer humans taking part in the experiment and failing to guess gay couples shows that they have adapted to a world where they are excluded rather than a belief that every random person that they meet is straight. My point is further supported by an expert they had on the show who explained that, statistically, it was entirely likely that they were all straight and that even queers will account for being minorities by going with what’s most likely. The truth is, we are surrounded by a whole lot of straight people. It makes sense to assume only 6 people are all straight and that, if any aren’t, they may be bi.

The scientists frequently broke an already small sample size into even smaller groups. The group was very frequently broken in half, in thirds, or into sets of 10 people. These sample sizes tell us almost nothing actually conclusive. 

The experiments/tests frequently were affected by peoples abilities, unrelated to what was being tested. For example, one test that was broken down into 6 people and 6 control people competing at jenga was meant to show whether needing to pee helps or hurts your focus. first of all, sample sizes of 6 are a fucking joke. Second, this completely ignores these 6 people’s actual ability to play Jenga. If someone sucks at jenga with or without needing to pee, them losing Jenga when they need to pee says exactly fuck all about whether needing to pee affected their focus. They should have tested people’s Jenga skills beforehand, counted the amount of moves they made before the tower fell, and then did it again after hours of not peeing to compare their results. This test made no logical sense at all.

The scientists ignored the social effect of subjects knowing each other as well as duration of events during their last experiment. They were testing to see if people with last names near the end of the alphabet get a shittier deal because they go last in everything where things are done by name order. They tested this by doing a fake awards ceremony where they gave out some 30 awards to people, gauging the applause to see whether the people at the end got less hype and therefore felt worse about themselves than those in the beginning who got the fresh enthusiasm of the audience. the results showed that the applause remained fairly consistent throughout the awards. The issues with this test are numerous, but here are the three I take most issue with. 1) the people here all got to know each other very well over the week it took to make the show. People who know each other and have become friends are much more likely to cheer for each other with enthusiasm, regardless of how long it’s been. On the other hand, polite applause from a crowd at, say, a graduation, where you are applauding people you don’t know, WILL start off more raucous and grow very quiet except for individual families near the end. 2) the duration of the test was a half hour, which is not very long at all and doesn’t say much to test the limits of enthusiasm. Try testing the audience at a graduation with a couple hundred graduates that also involves the time it takes to walk all the way up to a stage a hundred feet away, accept a diploma, and then wait for the next person. These kinds of events take hours and nobody keeps up their enthusiasm that long unless they’re rooting for someone in particular. 3) this study tested only one of many many ways name order affects a person. Cheering and applause is only one factor. It does not take into account people having their resumes looked at in alphabetical order and therefore people at the beginning of the alphabet being picked before anyone ever looks at a W name’s resume. It doesn’t take into account a small child’s show and tell day being at the very end of the school year, after 6 other people have brought in the same thing they planned to. No one cares about their really cool trinket because they’ve seen a bunch like it already. This test doesn’t take into account how many end-of-the-alphabet people just get straight up told, “we ran out of time. maybe next time,” when next time doesn’t really exist. I feel genuinely bad for the girl who suggested this experiment because the scientists straight up said something akin to, “lmao her theory was bs ig /shrug” even though it was their own shitty research abilities that led to their results.

They did one experiment intending to see how many people have what it takes to be a “hero.” The request for this test was made by someone curious about the effect of adrenaline and if it really works how some people say. The scientists thought it an adequate method to determine an answer by testing their reflexes with a weird crying baby sound and then dropping a doll from above while they were distracted with answering questions. The scientists looked up before the doll dropped to indicate a direction of attention. While this does give some answers about peoples intuition, reflexes, and ability to use context clues, its entirely an unusual situation, makes no sense in reality, fails to take adrenaline into consideration literally at all, and has a lot more to do with chance. The person dropping the doll literally couldn’t even drop it in the same place from person to person. Some got it dropped into their lap and others almost out of arm’s reach. This, like a few of the other mentioned experiments, was during the last episode, which felt lazy and thrown together last minute, with very little scientific basis to any of the results. The last episode was weak and disappointing overall. 

One of the big issues I have with this show is actually their repeated use of the same group. They said at the end that they had done over 40 tests. Part of doing studies is getting varied samples of people in order to get more widespread results. Using the same 100 or less people (already a tiny sample) repeatedly is a terrible research method. You’re no longer studying humans at large. You’re studying these specific humans. You can’t take the same group with the same set of inadequacies, the same set of skills, and the same set of biases and then study them extensively and in many different ways like this. Your results are inherently skewed toward these specific people and their abilities. I expected them to at least get a new group each episode - every 5 or so studies - but no. They keep the same group all week, which makes the entire season. This is inexcusable in research imo.

The next issue is contestant familiarity. The humans all getting to know each other is great, socially, but it also destroys the legitimacy of many of the studies that involve working together or comparing yourselves and your beliefs

Many tests had issues with subject dependency. One study, meant to compare age groups and their ability to work together to complete the task of putting together a piece of ready to assemble furniture had each group with members they relied on entirely. A few people built the furniture while one person sat across the room, looking at instructions with their back to the others. They had to relay the instructions through a walkie talkie to another contestant and that other contestant had to relay it to the people they’re watching build the chair. You cannot study a group’s ability to build something with instructions by the ability of one single person to communicate. You’re testing that individual and the rest of them on two completely different capabilities. One person fails at being able to communicate and everyone else becomes unable to build the furniture. Even if everyone else in the group is more effective than all the other groups at building ready to assemble furniture, they might end up falling in last because of their shitty communicator who is literally not able to convey simple instructions. (yes, this actually happened in the test)

One test judged the subjects at their speed of getting ready, to see if men or women are faster at getting ready. While most elements of this test were just fine, the part I took issue with was that they did this test without regard to social convention. They told the subjects they were going on a field trip and to get ready by a certain time. Then, they gave them many things to get distracted by, like refreshments to pack with them, a menu to preorder lunch from, and so on.  The part that upsets me about this test is that they ignored social convention entirely, to the point that subjects were judged based on their conventional actions and expectations more than their actual speed at getting ready. The buses promptly shut their doors and left at the time they were supposed to but there was no final call to get on the buses. In general, when a group is to be taken somewhere by bus, there will be an announcement to load up and leave. You could clearly see many of the subjects were ready to go and were just standing around talking while they waited for fellow subjects to finish getting ready. I have no doubt that, if given a final call, most of them would have loaded up within a couple minutes. However, they were relying on the social convention of announcing departure and were therefore, left behind entirely (for a nonexistent field trip). These people who were left behind were counted as being late and not making the time cutoff. If one were to look at the social element of this situation, if everyone there believed there would be a warning before departure, the fact that 24 to 14 women to men were loaded onto the buses at departure doesn’t necessarily indicate the women were faster to get ready. It seems to me that it’s more likely to indicate anxiety at being late and a belief that they need not impede on anything lest they be reprimanded or have social consequences for taking too long - something women are frequently bullied for. There’s also the chance that many who boarded without final call are more introverted or antisocial. Plus, we can’t forget to include the people who have anxiety about seating. If someone is overweight, has joint pain, or has social anxiety, they will be more likely to board early to get a seat they feel comfortable in. If they had counted up all of the people socializing and waiting on the sidewalks nearby, they may have found that there were more men who were ready to board up at a moment’s notice. I’m not saying I think men are faster to get ready, I’m just saying that we can’t know based on who boarded without a final call. If people believe they will have a last minute chance to board, a large number of them will take the last few minutes to socialize with their new friends until they’re told they have to board. Therefore, this test cannot be considered conclusive without counting and including the people who were ready and not boarded as a third subset.

Honestly, I could go on and on about how sensationalist and unscientific this show is, but I just don’t have 6 more hours to contribute to digging up every single flaw with it. There’s A Lot.

My point is, if you feel like watching this show, which I don’t necessarily discourage inherently, I just beg you to go into it with a critical eye. Enjoy the fun of it and the social aspects, but please don’t rely on the information provided and please don’t spread it as fact, because it’s not.

It’s entertainment, not science.

[ct-hardcase]

TROS Review

I’ll start by saying something I already did: I liked the movie, but it wasn’t a good film.

What I mean by that is, as a fan, I like some of the beats it hit. It had good trio moments, good stuff for Rey and Finn individually, as well as Leia, and I genuinely enjoyed those. The pacing, however, was interesting. The entire first quarter of the movie was driven by plot devices and shock value, and I found myself wondering, after they went to yet another planet to find the macguffin, when the real plot was going to happen. Things picked up in the second half, but there were still some weird choices made. Specifics below:

Stuff I did like: 

Force Sensitive Finn! It’s about damn time, honestly, but I’m very glad that Finn got to realize the Force within him (and I think that’s what he was trying to tell Rey this whole time? This was unclear). The fact that he had some conflict with both Rey and Poe over that was also great.

I thought I was going to hate Rey Palpatine a lot more than I did. Because of JJ spinning it into a “it doesn’t matter who your bloodline is, as long as you choose your family/destiny” theme, I didn’t mind it as much. Still kind of cheesy, but not the worst way they could have gone about it. I like Rey adopting the Skywalker name.

I was hoping for “power-drunk bastard” Kylo and I did cherish him while I had him. The fact that he was determined enough to find the Wayfinders and find actual literal Palpatine was pretty neat. The fact that he was also briefly power-drunk enough to try to turn Rey into his equal in the dark side was pretty cool too.

This movie surrounded the Force in general--Kylo and Rey are good saber duelists, but they aren’t the best, so I think it was a smart decision to focus more of their impressive feats on the Force.

General Poe! I really wish it didn’t have to happen like that, but I’m so glad to see Poe Dameron get his due in this regard. His fear at leading and everyone comforting him along the way was a good story to tell.

The actual creepy, cultlike aesthetic of the Sith was really fun in the last half, complete with faceless crowds and soul-transfer rituals.

I have wanted Rey with a yellow lightsaber for SO LONG and I finally get it, yeehaw everyone.

The entire trio dynamic was really great. They promised a movie with them and it delivered. In particular, the Poe and Rey dynamic really picked up the slack from the last two movies. Finn’s dynamic with Poe and Rey were the sweetest things, and the end of the movie really showed that he found family and love with those two.

Chewbacca is great, and I’m glad he got a scene where he could mourn.

I’m also glad he at least got to say hi to Lando.

Jedi Master Leia!!!! I’m so happy that it’s canon that she got trained as Jedi and that she’s Rey’s Master and Rey feels connected to her which makes sense because Leia actually put time and effort into training her (no offense Luke, your Force Ghost cameo was really powerful too and nice).

Loved Jannah’s plot with the group of deserter stormtroopers (and the fact that all of them are implied to either be in-tune with each other or Force Sensitive???? Hello??? Some of Rey’s first students there perhaps?)

Rey jumping toward Finn, yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

Despite my feelings toward bendemption, the moment with Han legitimately got me. Ben finally being candid with Han, Han talking to his son frankly, Ben finally accepting Han as his father, and Ben throwing the bled saber into the ocean called back to tlj really nicely and makes that moment hurt a bit less for me now.

(also, it paid off to read Rise of Kylo in this instance--because the lightsaber is the “Ren” he was effectively throwing his title away when he threw that out and that’s also probably how the Knights knew he was gonezo)

Palpatine getting defeated by his own hubris is very very nice. You can’t outfight Palpatine. You’ve got to beat him Ezra-style: by having him underestimate you.

If Kylo had to get redeemed, at this point in his career, redemption through death is a good path for him.

Hi Knights of Ren!

Stuff I didn’t like:

Bye Knights of Ren!

I’ll just be blunt and put the rylo kiss up here. That kiss was nowhere near necessary. A romance with Ben wasn’t pursued after the fact and he died, so it didn’t even fulfill rylo that much, and so now we have a kiss where nobody’s happy. Congrats.

I’m conflicted on Leia dying in order to give save Ben/give Rey the opening to kill him. On one hand, I’m glad she died for the mission, on the other, it put such a weird taste in my mouth that I couldn’t even mourn when she died because I was so conflicted.

I also felt :/ about Rey healing Ben because of my obvious anti-bendemption bias, but also, if we’re going to commit to killing people and Rey fearing her inner darkness, go all the way with it. If she’s trapping herself on ach-to, have it be because she did kill Kylo, finally, and she’s feeling conflicted about it.

I’m usually not one to say that a m/f romance is “making a character straight” because I’m bi and I don’t like that erasure, but Zorri definitely felt like a way to “no-homo” Poe because so many people thought he was gay. It was unnecessary, super straight, and really felt like a bird flip to LGBT+ fans.

Also, Poe being a spice runner both ignores his canon backstory of being a new republic military brat that went into the resistance, but is also just straight-up racist. Thanks for having your latino character be a drug runner, lf.

RIP Hux. Domhnall Gleeson played the part so well and he deserved better. I like the spite direction, both Rian and JJ can stick the fact that they made him comic relief where the sun don’t shine. I like the impunity with which he was killed but he was way neutered. Glad Finn got to shoot him.

They way overused the “did [x] die??? did they not?????” in this movie. It loses its punch after a while. Chewie, Threepio (in terms of memory), Kylo, Kylo again, Rey, and then Kylo for real this time.

I loved Finn being Force Sensitive but they really dropped that thread and kind of ignored it after they introduced Palpatine. If you’re going to introduce him as FS, commit.

Ditto Jannah and the deserted stormtroopers.

[theundergrounddrabbles]

SayaMilky (request)

Upon the last song, she heard the crowd roar for her. Miyuki knew only one thing and that was to rush back to the room to the nearby hotel for a fan.

She’s had fans over and most to just talk in a meeting room to expand on her thoughts but this one had her from the start. The short, black hair and thin framed glasses was what caught her heart at the first performance upon the cafe in Osaka that night.

Her words were soothing as a songwriter who had also wanted become a singer one day as they talked over coffee. SYA was her name but Miyuki knew her as Sayaka. She had sensed guilt over her success. That questionable decision to take that offer when Sayaka always took to the streets with her guitar and sung her sorrows along the station.

Miyuki had the one request which SYA had agreed upon was to make a fan club with the company’s acceptance and saw it skyrocketed. She didn’t have to perform on the streets but when she opened up the show, Miyuki grew conscious of her talents however there was a catch.

“I want someone else to sign me. Not your company. If it happens, I will still be your fan.”

It struck her as competition. She hated it because of that fact. The sorrows of a woman in her mid-20s to the world while she could be thrown a song and make a choreography pattern which brings millions at the snap of her fingers.

Miyuki changed into shirt and jeans as she ran through a back alley and into the service entrance. The elevator up to the floor which oversaw the city and exiting into the empty hallway as her feet pattered below to the door when she scanned in.

“Did you like the show?” Miyuki asked as she saw the smile.

“It is what Milky does.” The woman replied.

“Nee-san, don’t flatter me. Tell me what it is I did wrong.” Miyuki pouted, running to the couch.

“Not making me watch the encore.” Sayaka growled. “Where you pull your best songs.”

“I couldn’t stand it if they saw us together.” Miyuki replied, wrapping her arms around her. “I’d rather be known as a sleeze than to be known as your lover.”

“Strong words.” Sayaka smiled, fixing her glasses.

“SYA... she’s my biggest fan and my first. Always telling me what I do wrong. Being frank. Also...”

“You’re sweaty.” Sayaka smirked.

“Bath?” Miyuki suggested.

“As always.” She pecked her on the cheek.

Sayaka pulled herself off the couch and gripped the fingers of Miyuki to the bathroom with the large tub when she turned the knob to the water flowing from the spout before turning back to press her lips upon Sayaka.

“You... you do know that I have been asking around.” Miyuki exhaled.

“Thanks. I’ll find my way.” Sayaka grinned.

“I would miss you.” She pouted.

“It’ll be okay since it’ll make these occasions special.” Sayaka snickered. “You don’t have to throw your body around like before and I can always see if you’re around before you resort to pleasing yourself.”

“I hate you. My body can be sweaty and then you talk about my loneliness with my body thinking about it. I had to pee that one time and then the sudden shock brought me back to life. I was soaked in juices when you came to check on me. That day I had three pairs doused in my lust.” Miyuki growled, running her hands along her arms.

“Would have been better to sell it?” Sayaka teased.

“Fan club president is a pervert.” Miyuki scoffed.

“Make a little money of you thinking about these nights. Once you leave, it is those times where I just go back out onto the streets and strum while you perform in Tokyo.” Sayaka spat as Miyuki pasted one onto the lips.

Peeling back, Miyuki glanced down and punched the chest of her fan.

“It’ll be good to please someone again. I don’t want to think about that. Strip down.”

Both didn’t hesitate about their coverings and revealed their bodies to each other like before with Miyuki turning off the water and walking over to the shower. Sayaka turned the knob to the overhead and sprayed both with the warm shards of water as Miyuki squatted behind Sayaka’s body.

“Hey!”

“I didn’t want to be sprayed.” Miyuki pouted, pulling herself onto her feet.

“We have to wash up though.” Sayaka argued, grabbing her partner’s ample chest. “It isn’t like they’ll be clean by themselves.”

“Nee-san! You’re making me weak.” Miyuki moaned, pulling away and grabbing the soap from the counter. “Have they grown?”

“It’s been the same.” Sayaka smirked. “You’re just anxious.”

Lathering the bar in her hands, Miyuki turned to the large pair and massaged them as she handed it over to Sayaka. The first partner was a producer, it broke her virginity but Sayaka tore her down with the marathon. She had concluded to amuse her male partners but Sayaka was not easy to pass and the nights were long.

Tonight would be different. She had to make it quick. Sayaka wasn’t going to make it easy as she latched on and rubbed her body with the soap.

“I heard that cry before.” Sayaka murmured.

“I’m dirty. You’re not making it clean by using your body to make me cleansed. I know this isn’t going to make you stop but tomorrow...”

Miyuki groaned upon her thoughts. Her fingers were around the core, pressing up as Sayaka lunged then into the abyss.

“I have a meeting. I need to leave early. Please leave before the check out time.” Miyuki rushed her conclusion. “I love you!”

“Understood.” Sayaka nodded, turning towards the shower.

“Are you mad?” Miyuki asked.

“No... just happy to be with you.” Sayaka replied with a smirk.

Shivering, she observed Sayaka walking towards the bath. The men could never force a real squeal from her. She didn’t considered a prick to satisfy her anymore and wouldn’t chase as long as she had some power. However, Sayaka’s fingers were beyond herself as a tool to fill her needs.

Taking a seat in front of Sayaka, she pulled the arms around her body and leaned back into the cushion when she felt the lips reach over for a brief embrace.

“Is it enough time to have fun?” Sayaka whispered into her ear. “I know if you keep coming, it’ll be over quick.”

“I wanted to come here instead of partying with the rest of them. They think it’s unreasonable but to have my body satisfied before heading to Tokyo is my goal.” Miyuki shrilled upon the nibbling on her earlobe. “It’s to make it up to you.”

Miyuki drew the hands up to the chest. The firm grip drowned her fears with the light movement within Sayaka’s grasp. The tepid temperature of the bath made it uneasy to release from the grip as she continued to move the bosom.

“This meeting... it’ll be for a new tour for the fall. I want you to come along. They feel it’s good to have an opening act but I have to find an excuse to not sign you.” Miyuki wailed.

“Hmm... maybe money.” Sayaka breathed.

“They would offer the world to have you but to lose you, is not my ideal situation.” Miyuki answered.

“Classic I guess.” Sayaka smirked, pulling her onto the ledge.

The contrast of their muffs was a point since Miyuki was concerned while Sayaka had remained conservative. The sensitivity was easier to find than the other way around as her head dove into the crease.

The hot breath upon her rapidly cooling body made her uneasy. The lust dripped from her body as the tongue gathered what it could with the hand cupping around the short-haired woman’s head.

Miyuki would have declared it already if she had the chance. No one would know this person was also an aspiring singer and songwriter. The addition to forcing the orgasms to come in rapid succession as she slowly slid back into the bath and turned to Sayaka with her mass of black hair upon her sex.

Miyuki but her lip upon her turn. She acknowledged the one thing she had over her fan but in return, she wasn’t able to drive her up the wall as she tasted the heated lips with the fine follicles lining the area.

The head slowly went into a vice as she continued to lick the sex slowly, eyeing the entry point as the light cries echoed in the room. Miyuki was not used to with it but with a piece of meat, it was easier yet through practice, she tolerated all as she broke the grip and retreated back to cleaning the area again when she peered upwards.

“If I continue...”

“Don’t think too much. You’re doing well. It’ll be better if you work on it.” Sayaka smiled back. “It’s almost there.”

Miyuki felt peeved at first with the hair. She had always liked being trimmed, if not bare. Sayaka was covered and the first time was harsh on her mouth. Over time, she saw the usage as it lingered longer but not to the extended period before her fingers came into play. It was that chance when she nibbled more on the exposed slit and the thunderous moan as the geyser exploded into her mouth and dribbled down into the water when Sayaka slid back down into the bath with Miyuki in her grasp.

“There.” Sayaka hummed.

“If it comes out, I want to accept it.” Miyuki announced.

“It’s fine by me. I want you to be happy.” Sayaka wrapped her arms around the head. “It’ll be good.”

“To announce I’m a lesbian though... I’ll take my chances.” Miyuki moaned.

“Again don’t think too much.” Sayaka whispered. “Enjoy this.”

The thought escaped her. Miyuki knew how much the risk would be to be friends with her lover and now exposing it. Sayaka had heard about who Miyuki had been connected with which was false since the interaction was there.

Then, it was the next idea when Sayaka’s job came to mind for the singer.

“Fan club... how’s everything?” She asked.

“Getting the dues and giving out items as we speak.” Sayaka announced. “The new tour should boost morale.”

“I’ll make it even better.” Miyuki snickered, feeling the warm kiss upon the nape. “I came.”

“It’s fine.”

The time didn’t matter to them. Miyuki had accepted the idea when both left at the same time and wiped off. Sayaka had her pajamas ready while Miyuki went with her see through lingerie. The last sight for the time being as they closed their eyes.

She awoke to the alarm and changed into her normal clothing, stuffing the soiled clothing into the trash bag as she left for the station.

The nights were always short but the number and name was a call away to notify the fan club of new events and the occasional picture to remind them of the close relationship.

[ratherhavetheblues]

INGMAR BERGMAN’S ‘THE DEVIL’S EYE’ “We must get to the root of the evil…”

© 2021 by James Clark

     Early on, in my tenure with Wonders in the Dark, I delighted in the films of Jacques Demy. In those days, I guess I was easier to please. In time, I realized that only two of his films transcended sentimental melodrama. Strangely enough, the two I came to embrace were his first two. The first, Lola (1961), had deftly threaded the needle of wit, disappointment and gallantry. The second, Bay of Angels (1963), pertaining to gambling on the roulette wheel, is a diamond-hard saga of a woman, Jackie, plunging into seducing the universe itself. How, then, did Demy become a student of ontological reflection, only to quickly abandon it? His paradigm, filmmaker, Ingmar Bergman, was made of stronger stuff.

Jackie, being not only a pariah but a poet, can (somewhat) bring to the table much of the emotion of what is lacking in civilization as we have come to know it. “We’ll live the high life.” (That latter phrase, many years later, becoming a title of a film by Claire Denis, another—more tenacious player—in the orbit of Bergman.) “Happiness makes me versatile… No! Voluble…” (Both terms having their value.) “The mystery of numbers… I often wonder whether God rules over numbers… The first time I entered a casino I felt as if I were in a church… He got custody of the baby… Lucky Strike… This display of flabby flesh makes me sick… Why deny this passion.?”

“Versatile”/ “Voluble.” The latter term can mean, “rolling effectively,” clearly the sense of a mystery which Jackie clings to as her only purchase upon planet Earth. Her disinterestedness, however, has sadly underestimated threading a needle of wit and gallantry. Going the extra mile, and then some, we have, first of all, however, the makings of confusion in the form of satire toward Christian  foibles. We are nonplussed by an apparition purporting to be the Devil, dressed as a contemporary corporate leader, spending much of his time admiring his face in a mirror. Make no mistake, this presentation is a challenge to discover those who are alert enough to see something discreet, very rare and crucial. Bergman’s film, The Devil’s Eye (1960), is a filmic treatise of the phenomena of bathos and pathos, and its stairway to the elements. Let’s see if this daunting puzzle can open your eyes.

He doesn’t go out of his way to provide an engaging introduction. In fact, the precinct is  perfumed with the spleen and resentment of old ladies. Two of the key advisers to the CEO are garbed as to the effeminate style of the Age of Enlightenment, The Age of Reason, current in the eighteenth century. But the overriding stance is one of shallow cowardice, a hell having endured for a long time—in fact, since the dawning of humans. The so-called Devil, as the episode dawns, involves the old-ladies’ game of needing to see some dirt upon the wonders of mutual affection, particularly, involving a pact of chastity before their marriage. (One of the pedant pansies, hoping to find a cure for the leader’s indisposition as to advantage, emotes, “We must get to the root of the evil.”) This hobgoblin nonsense transmutes to the business of two employees of a large firm seeking to make a coup upon a naïve, disorganized holder of a treasure, presumably just the trick to get the workplace back to boffo.

Hanging on to the vexation of the madness of eternal life, the business venture—after a display of the principal, Don Juan, no less, needing something to brighten up the boredom of the headquarters, namely, daring one of a swarm of hotties without heat plunging a dagger into his heart that does not deliver—he and his sidekick, Pablo, reach the supposed sucker by way of a dried-up well. Instantly, like a blue-chip of lore, they establish a bullish atmosphere with the target’s father, a clergyman, by Pablo’s skills in auto repairs. (A significant stain, though, has already occurred, within the intercourse at the office. Don Juan, grossly overestimating his range, declares that a death blow remains, “the only pleasure” his body has not yet tasted.)

 Don Juan may regard this junket as routine, but his associate has the humbleness to recognize a wonder. “Look, Master! Trees. Flowers. And clouds. Grass, water, birds…” (Don Juan becomes distracted by an apparition of a priest. [“I’m supposed  to ensure your safety, my little ones.  Pablo catches a figment of this madness. “No fun with the ladies! I won’t tolerate it. My sense of humor is also limited. ”]) Pulling away, however, from a lifetime of fear, he  vows, “I’ll find some clever way to fool you.” (At the moment when Pablo learned of this windfall-travel, he, far more expressive than his boss, yelled, “I’ll enjoy it like a fool enjoys his own inners… I’m going to taste life, smack it between my lips. I’ll devour as much as I can…”)

 After the rescue of the vicar’s car, the latter declares, “That’s how it always is… My life is just a series of fortunate accidents.” On to the vicarage, where the strangers meet the fortunate one’s wife, being a strong contrast—a semi-invalid and poet. Don Juan, feeling anxious about the intrusion and eager to get down to business with the capital, remarks, “I understand it’s not a good time…”/ “On the contrary,” she insists, “I was dying of boredom. You’ve saved me. At least for tonight… My poor husband is overjoyed. He worries that our lives here are boring and dull.” Though she promptly dismisses the poetry as “just to pass the time,” and, in response to the polite guest that he’d like to hear some of her works, she forcefully and laughingly tells Don Juan, “No, you definitely won’t” [hear my poems]. (At this point, Renata, the poetic odd one out,  soon to show us her poetry in action within the short time we have, would seem to be a mere hobbyist. She’ll soon, though, give us quite a surprise, an enactment leading a charge of brilliant pathos, where nearly always the effort crashes to bathos. Bergman again, opening our eyes and our hearts.)

 While Don Juan is accompanied by the vicar to Natan Britt-Marie (the name wobbling close to Satan)—she the one being primed to lose the business of power—Pablo, the real enthusiast, to Don Juan’s cheap mystique, begins to savor the poetry of life. His lingering with Renata is readily accomplished, true to a desperation in both of them which the drift of a paradoxical love has granted to them. She returns to her novel about a musician (vaguely like Jackie’s  “Voluble”, only to realize that Pablo, after some goofy nonsense by the vicar in the living room) had made a U-turn back to her fortification. In fact he jumps fully dressed, including his overcoat, into her bed, like a wild and wise pet. She is not completely cogent in her disarray. (“My reputation…the scandal and what the servants would say.” But then she looks around and rushes to the bed, regaining her hidden strengths. “This is my bed, and I won’t leave it because a clod of a man hops into it.”)  Pablo begins to reach over to her neck. (An arrangement of them in bed: a shadow in between; Pablo at right; and her vigorously rushing, once again, out of the bed.) Standing behind her at her dresser, he remarks, “Let’s postpone what we intend to do, for a while, Renata. It’ll increase our pleasure. No, don’t say a word. I know everything. I can read it in your eyes. Your wisdom, your stormy character, your femininity, your tenderness, your frail health… Everything forbids you to let yourself go in an inevitable embrace.” /She derides, “Really?”/ “Everything forbids you, I say! But there is a dark spot in your spirit, Renata. A dark spot of uncontrollable sensuality, pent up for too long. It’s only in your dreams that you give it free rein and give in to pleasure.”/ More goading and also hoping, from her. “You’re certain of that?”/ He tells her, despite being a focus of gentle fun, “Hold out a little longer, Renata…” (He’s holding her around her shoulders.) “Just a short while. Where was I?”/ She prompts, “In my dreams…”/ “That’s it… You’ll enjoy limitless pleasure…until it reaches the point of pain and shame…”/ She ridicules his desperation. “Where do you get all this from?”/ He settles down with, “A thing or two has stuck throughout the years [often overkill]. But inspiration is always the most important. And now my soul is so inspired I can barely stand up straight.” In a voice-over she tells him, “You’re tired.”/ “Yes, I’m tired. The blood in my legs is boiling and my stomach is full of butterflies.” (She is both delighted and fearful.) “No,” she says; and turns her back and marches along a corridor.

   We’ll take some license with the narrative here, insomuch as following up the complete romance of Pablo and Renata right now. This film being a treasure of sensibility, there are powers needing full range now, in order to fully discharge forces coming later. The visitors are welcome to stay the night. And when the meal is ended the night begins its magic. It nearly, however, began with a crash, due to Renata’s annoyance about Don Juan’s story involving a “thrilling experience.” She sneers, “Experience? What’s that? I don’t know, anyway.” (She, not being an enthusiast of a “good read.”) And she begins to cry. Her husband’s, “Don’t be sad,” makes things worse. She tells him, “You don’t understand. God, how silly. It’s laughable. No, nobody can help me. It’s just a stupid farce, anyway…” And she goes to her bedroom. After turning out his lamp, the vicar prays, “Help me figure out my wife… Give me the vision. Teach me to understand the dark hearts of men and their hidden sufferings. Take away my childish simplicity and give me new perspective that is crisp and clear, and yet loving…” At this point, what do we have is Renata entering the suppliant’s bedroom. “I just came in,” she tells him. / “For what?”/ “Nothing… To look at you.” He welcomes her to sit down on the bed. She asks, “Would you be sad if I died?” After his shock, she perseveres, “Answer my question….”/ “I would be stricken in mourning,” doesn’t satisfy her a bit. He argues, “That’s a strange question… Because I love you, of course!”/ “But I’m a nuisance to you and Britt-Marie.” She goes on to maintain that “nuisance” has not been understood. (Her priorities pose a snag.) He tells her, “I fervently want to understand you.”/ She feels it’s like  the theatre. “You see me in one role, and that’s me. And others see me in other roles and think that’s me…” Panning closer, she says, “Nobody sees me” [which is tantamount to saying she is suffocating from a surrounding deadness]. He tells her, “You have to be honest… Honesty is the best policy…” Her expression elicits from him, “Did I say something wrong?”/ “No, you’re absolutely right. Good-night, dear. Sleep well on those big ears, and awaken tomorrow to your beautiful world and all the nice people and all your experiences.” The vicar, somewhat feeling insulted, says, “Good night, then.” (Close-up to Renata.) “What would you do if I cheated on you?”/ “What?”/ “Cheated.”/ “What?”/ “Went to bed with another man…”/ “You sure have some ideas…”/ “What would you do?”/ “What would I do?” ‘the fortunate man’ hits a wall. “I don’t know.” She needs to hear it all: “Would you throw me out?”/ “What terrible questions, Renata… I don’t understand.”/ “Would you still love me?”/ “I have to love you no matter what happens. Love doesn’t cease. It remains steadfast, no matter how life plays out…”/ “She tells him, “I feal like screaming… No! I don’t!” She kisses him, a gentle kiss. “Good night, my husband. I apologize for frightening you. I won’t do it again.” He tells her, “I wish something would touch your heart so you could feel compassion…” (Cut to Renata, sadly. )/ “You think that would be good?”/ He tells her, “I don’t know… I’ll think about it. Good night, Renata. And God bless you…”

   Pablo had entered her room a long time before. She pretends for a few minutes to be annoyed. (Of course, she’s already thinking of the endgame.) He tells her, “Our moment is here. We’ve waited long enough.” She, the metaphysical poet, rubs it in, “You can talk, but when it comes to love, you’re probably as much a fraud as any other man…” (Kudos to a husband, for the long haul.) Pablo tells her—with his own metaphysic, his own surreal nightmare—“I’m a man of passion, Renata.” She throws her book and her glasses at him. “Shut up, go away… Stop tormenting me with stupid little tricks.” She falls back into the bed. He gently approaches. “For [seemingly] 300 years, I’ve sat in hell, longing for a woman [who is truly unique]. Believe it or not—heaven, hell. It’s all lies. It doesn’t matter. You’re not risking anything. But it just might happen that you’ll experience something you’ll never forget.”/ “Experience,” she threatens. He tells her, “A dream, Renata!”/ She also uses that lost cause. “Yes, it’s a dream… The only problem is that I can’t convince myself it’s mine…”/ He tells her, “Pretend, Renata!” She tells him, “I’m too old…”/ “Can’t you fake it?”/ “No, I’ve done that all along.” (This launch has sputtered badly. The wit and crazy joy of the first meeting has crumbled to mechanism. Another word for that breakdown is bathos, superficial heartiness. The superb tonality has a stunning way to the truth.) He kneels to her in her bed. “I’m no great villain. I’m just a poor condemned man without hope or pleasure. But then I was granted earthly life for one day and one night.” Just as he had come to being convinced that the great night would not happen, he refers, bitterly, his history of mistreating his mother, a crime justly punished here. “She showed me great tenderness.” What could have been another crime of bathos, becomes a disclosure of the fleeting of passion, the fleeting of life. At this moment, pathos shines. While Renata’s appreciation may not entirely transcend resentment, pedantry and advantage, the  night does become truly magical! She thrills, “You’re not ashamed to appeal to my maternal side? You’ve managed to do something rare. You’ve touched my heart.”/ “That’s a kind thing to say,” Pablo responds. / The not quite disinterested poet tells the perhaps even better poet, “You’ve given me an experience… You’ve earned a reward.”

   Our best reward is yet to come. The abridged lovers are now steps beyond Renata’s room. He kneels and embraces her body. On the dark stairway, the vicar, seated on a stair, begins to understand “new perspective.” Pablo and Renata stand together. His bid for the briefest of alliances takes the mundane form of wanting to go out to dig up the half-finished garden. “It’ll be wonderful to freeze. And then for breakfast. I’ll have some of those large, tart, apples down by the gate. After that, I’ll return to hell, Renata. But grateful. Do you understand?” Somehow, it badly loses traction. Renata and Pablo were touched; but not transformed. There is no fruit to savor. Renata turns back to her bedroom. The vicar calls out to her. She, from out of her literary imperative, soothes out, “He touched my heart.” (Two rapid cuts.) She could not be described as lost for words. “But it wasn’t the most difficult…” He asks, “Then what was?”/ “That I thought of you the whole time.” Bathos, I’m afraid; but allowing the pathos to shine evenly brighter. An anxious caregiver asks, “What happens now?” She persists, “I felt sympathy for you… I don’t know… Nothing…”/ He asks, “So you’ll stay with me?”/ “Where would I go?” He asks, “Do you think we can make a fresh start?”/ “No, I don’t think so” [her heretofore rebellion seeming devastating]./ “Do you think we can change?”/ She invites the possibility, “We can try,” that being her first dash of pure disinterestedness since the first brave and gleaming meeting. Disinterestedness could find, far from a perfect match, the sharing of pathos. On that basis, he can ask her, “Go lie down, Renata. You’ll catch cold.” A pensive Renata slowly goes to bed.

Threaded through this narrative, we have the nominal principal, Don Juan, along lines of amorous property. There is, I think you’ll agree, that this second invasion functions more of a supplement to the drama which we have just studied. As such, the hopes of the coup pertaining to Britt-Marie will not bring into play as extensive an action as the drama with Pablo and Renata and the vicar, and its touching the depths of a cosmos—neither Devil nor God.

   Britt-Marie is first found to be vigorously at work on preparing a dream house for her husband-to-be, on the site of the fringes of the manse. Don Juan, having a very restricted range of time to perform a complicated action, quickly learns that the prey prides herself in taking chances, unlike her (supposedly) frozen parents.  That was, then, presumably, the heart of the matter. (Her fiancé is a technocrat of soil and livestock, also a brilliant handyman. His name, Jonas, however, seems to crowd where infinite range had been expected.) Along with her competitive zeal against Jonas to accomplish the remake and expect a very large family, she quickly sign’s on to the advantages of cheekiness, flamboyant skepticism. One of the items of candid speech taking the floor concerns his reverie about her womb, which annoys her. He describes her—“Blue eyes, light hair, a graceful nose and mouth for kissing, caressing hands firm breasts, round hips and a womb made for love.” Her idea of shaking things up was to tally the numbers of those she has kissed. “Of course, who do you think I am?”[a stiff like my parents]./ “May I kiss you?”[the big bad wolf, asks]./ “Gladly. You’re a real Don Juan, you.” She: “That was really innocent. Now I’m going to kiss you!” (Here one of the harpsichord ripples that signal danger. Often in tandem with a black cat.) “I’m planning on reaching 50 before I’m married… When I saw your lips, I wanted to kiss them to see how it felt…” Entrenched by her cozy circumstances, she’s intent to run amok. The mystique of eternity being questioned with impunity. The stranger remarks, “You play a dangerous game, don’t you think?”/ “Yes, dear God, life would be boring if you didn’t lie from time to time.” (In the background there’s a stain on the wall.) She brags, “The strange thing is that people believe what you say…I don’t know, perhaps it’s sinful to play. But it’s so tempting…They almost beg for it.”

From out of the vicarage, not merely “sinful…jaywalking”; but holding in vomit at the mere traces of the powers that be. “They almost beg for it.” The businessman, inured to a long deadness of dogma, has no vocabulary to tangle with these whisps of rebellion. She elucidates, somewhat: “I understand that you and Jonas live by principles. And that principles are holier than life itself.” She dilutes her antipathy, by way of, “That was both crude and foolish.” Don Juan, not wanting to expose his obsolescence, pipes up, “Quite the opposite. I sympathize with you.” Reading his phony position (“I don’t think so.”/ “Sure I do. Lack of principles has been my principle! Betrayal of morality, vice my virtue, debauchery my abstinence and godlessness my religion… ” A hard sell, and no dice. Britt-Marie had dismissed principles of abstract ideas. She clearly leaves room for principles of guts, particularly his facile weakness. “So when all’s said and done, we’re pretty similar, you and I,” the moment lacks validity. Her standpoint, lacking precision, she falls prey to doubt in the medium of pressure.

   The sophomoric rampage looks pretty sick in face of Pablo, Renata and the vicar. Britt-Marie wanted some rare action. She couldn’t see herself being a pariah and recluse. She lacked the time her parents were about to engage, with no certainties. The sequel carries many disappointments. Disappointments of bathos. And the faintest hopes of pathos. As the clash drags along, Britt-Marie tells Don Juan, “Yes, I was scared,” she explains her dash across the room, her superficial harmonies becoming bogus. “But not of you” [but herself]./ “You’re no ordinary man. You can wound me deeply.” (The irony here being that the smoothy is very much an ordinary man, a presumptuous servant of presumptuous ancient weaklings.) “It’s surprising that deep down in my heart I long for that wound.” Don Juan, hoping for chicanery, opens a door to cheapen the transaction. “Your so-called love is only a young woman’s boundless self-love. Your conceit, your reticence, all your meddlesome, so-called sense, appears in the guise of a make-believe love.” More cynicism and bombast, on the subjects of God; his having seen love up-close, “making life bearable for the rest of us wretches who fumble in the darkness; I don’t know anything about it. I’ve chosen a different path, a path called contempt and indifference.”

Being thus gullible, Britt-Marie, allowing herself to be impressed by such trendy tripe, becomes a mock-up of the norm, a domestic saint. During a dinner for the cosmopolitans, she becomes ashamed of Jonas��� lack of finesse (enthusing about a litter of piglets), that finesse being the hallmark we dare not fail, the palace of  bathos. Jonas, himself was swallowed by a bigger force, his slide rule at the ready, as our era’s phones. During the production of this essay, I happened to witness on-line an early test concerning the engines of  a trip to the moon. Despite a lot of smoke and noise, what was to be several minutes became several seconds. The voice-over treated it as deriving many valuable measurements. Only the day after, was there mention that it was a bust. The trial had to be fabulous. The whole planet is in on being fabulous. But bathos is not pathos.) While the farmer leaves in a huff, causing Britt-Marie to cry, the dandy wows the desert course with a tale about an attack. (Only Renata walks out.)

After that, Don Juan visits the girl who suddenly found pigs beneath her. The moonlight in the window allows him to perform an eclipse of the sleeping youngster’s body. When she presently wakes up, there is a kiss so intense as to cut her lip. More of the same, she tells him, “Do with me as you please… I can’t bear your suffering, which I do not understand.” (Britt-Marie’s lack of self-confidence requires some rumination. Her skepticism, though childish, included a baseline of much being corrupt. Her wanting to have it both ways, also involved the makings [at a weak volume] of fruitful paradox. But the ingredient of the stranger’s “worldly-wise” had secured her as a “significant other,” more significant than her own strengths.) As such, Britt-Marie, lying in her bed continues, “It burns and torments me more than anything I’ve ever experienced. But I’m no longer scared of you. You can’t touch my love for Jonas… I beg you to free me from your suffering… I don’t love you. I don’t desire your body. You’re frightening and incomprehensible. The wound you give me, will only hurt me and you.”

  Let’s listen to them as the clock runs out. He tells her, “Can’t you see I’m humiliating myself?” (No money, no honey.) He, too, looks to a singularity. But singularities don’t sprout on trees. She replies, “You say that you love me, and I believe it to be true, but it doesn’t matter.”/ “I don’t understand,” the crack shot insists. (Aren’t we on the same page? We’re on the same page of futility.) Britt-Marie explains, “Yesterday, I was a young girl who liked to play”—serious play, who liked to push others around. “I thought your fierceness and cool demeanor was exciting. I wanted you to hurt me.” (No pain, no gain.) “I might have been scared, but not much… You’re suffering burned me. Suddenly, I wanted to hold you and give you everything I could. But it was a lie… But last night made me an adult.” (If only saying the word could bring that off!) As for the cool, he tells us that, “the cold and calculating of heaven’s goodness” had caused a blessing. Both of them mired in bathos.

In the aftermath of the junket’s failure, there are no less than three failures of bathos: an old ladies gossip about Britt-Marie’s’ wedding night; Don Juan’s yell, “I remain one who despises both God and Satan”; and an ending, with she and he looking out to a pretty moon.

How far can the gift of pathos reach, for Renata and Pablo and the vicar. Farther than Jackie, that’s for sure!

[itbeatsbookmarks]

(Via: Hacker News)

Obviously we’re going to talk about this today:

Ok, so. Up until this year, I would’ve told you that there are two general kinds of financial bubbles. 

The first kind of bubble is where everyone believes the future will be like the present. Think credit bubbles and real estate; think 2007-2008, where the fundamental belief that drove the bubble forward and into ruin was “We’ve figured this out. We can’t lose. The risk has all been worked out. Lever up, cowboy. We will never die.” 

There are two reflexive feedback loops at work here. The first is the positive feedback cycle between that belief, “We have the future figured out”, and rising asset prices – which confirm the invincible mentality and drive it forward. The second loop is that rising asset prices translate to lower cost of capital. In a mindset like this, we get excessively comfortable with investing that low-cost capital into businesses and investments that generate predictable future earnings, or the illusion of predictable. That cheap capital can then meaningfully contribute to those earnings actually materializing, on schedule. Bubbles can genuinely be self-fulfilling prophecies; to a point. Past that point it’s bad.

The second kind of bubble is where everyone believes the future will be different from the present. Think equity bubbles, startups, and crypto; think 1999, where the fundamental belief that drove the bubble forward and into ruin was “It’s a new economy. All the rules are different. The upside is unlimited. If you get in now, you’ll be rich. We’re going to live forever.”

As before, there are reflexive feedback loops at work here too. The first loop is the positive feedback cycle between that belief, “I’ve seen the future, and I believe”, and rising asset prices – which confirm the bubble mentality, and bring on the FOMO. The second loop, as before, is that rising asset prices actually do something useful here. It means we can fund cool startups! Wacky, speculative ventures, which under normal circumstances could never raise any money, are able to access capital at attractive valuations. Sometimes they do, in fact, build the future. These kinds of bubbles can be actually good.

Unlike before, where we rewarded predictable earnings (or, the perception of them) with low cost of capital, here it’s the opposite. We’re looking for unpredictable earnings; specifically, the prospect of unknowable but infinitely high upside. These bubbles can also become self-fulfilling prophecies (dot com speculation got us Amazon, and a whole lot of broadband cable), but they blow up when expectations get too detached from reality. 

There are certainly sub-categories and variations on these two themes. For instance, one driving factor you often see associated with bubbles is new financial instruments that give the retail buying public better access (or more aggressive leverage) to the object of speculation. Crypto is an obvious recent example, but this goes all the way back to the Mississippi Company and South Sea manias, with the invention of the joint stock company and the bubbles that resulted. Other stuff matters too, like economic cycles and political narratives. But in general, up until this year, I would’ve told you that these are the two basic kinds of bubbles. 

I was wrong. There is a third kind of bubble, and it’s happening spectacularly right now. If the first kind of bubble is “everyone thinks the future will be the same”, and the second kind is “everyone thinks the future will be different”, the third kind is “everyone thinks the future doesn’t matter.” 

If you remember, the 1999 bubble had a lot to do with technology and the future, sure, but also had something to do with boomers and early Gen Xers having all of this disposable money right as online brokerages became a thing. Right now, there’s a similar thing going on. Millennials have real paychecks to spend, and stock trading fees have all gone to zero. Trading has become gaming. 

Crypto gave us a taste of the wild a few years ago, for that brief autumn where random people from your past would message you about how much Filecoin to buy. But now that itch has hit the mainstream. The stock picking day traders are having their cultural moment, led by Dave Portnoy and an army of shitposters. 

Barstool Sports’ Dave Portnoy is leading an army of day traders | Sophie Alexander & Katherine Greifeld, Bloomberg

Portnoy’s “Davey Day Trader Global” escapades are hilarious and well-known, and he’s brilliantly playing the heel; credit to him for absolutely getting how it works, Barstool not withstanding. But the bigger story here is Wallstreetbets. I’m sure most of you have heard of the Wallstreetbets subreddit by now; if you haven’t, the best way I know how to explain it is that it’s like “multiplayer Jackass for the stock market.”

Wallstreetbets started as a bunch of random internet yahoos bragging about crazy YOLO trades they’d make (and would actually follow through on!), and what enormous percentages of their net worth they’d win or lose spectacularly. I really do think that Jackass is a good comparison here. Yes, these people are trying to get rich; but more importantly, they’re trying to provoke reactions. It’s a game of who can be the most shocking. There’s really not much difference between reading some of these WSB posts and watching an old Jackass sketch. You’ll laugh until you can’t breathe, and then keep laughing when you realize someone actually got kicked in the crotch that hard. 

But as it got more popular, some actually sophisticated (and supremely aggressive) traders are getting in on the fun, and it got highly competitive and weird. It’s the newest version of “the stock market as full-contact sports with legal gambling”, and it’s a lot of fun. No one here cares about valuation or fundamentals. It is explicitly a casino. Everyone is here to get in and out of a position in the most shocking way possible. And, astoundingly, there’s enough AUM getting accumulated behind these bets that it can actually start to move individual stocks inweird ways. 

Reddit’s profane, greedy traders are shaking up the stock market | Luke Kawa, Bloomberg Businessweek

The groundwork for this strange show has been built up over a few years, but when the pandemic hit, all hell broke loose. A perfect storm of events come together: first, generational volatility in the stock market as everyone tried to get in front of (and then out from) a global pandemic; second, everyone getting quarantined at home and desperate to feel something, and third: no sports. 

Enter Hertz. Hertz was in trouble anyway; it’s carrying around a ton of debt to pay for a fleet of cars that no one wants to drive, because we have Uber now. When the pandemic hit, they got called on their debt, couldn’t make it work, so they had to declare bankruptcy and start a restructuring process. 

But then weird things started to happen. Hertz’s stock, which is literally worthless, starts to go up. And up. And up. It gets bid up a whole 500% over a 3-day period last week. What is going on?

There’s no way to describe it other than, this is a Jackass sketch taking place. It started out as these internet YOLO traders playing an increasingly stupid game of chicken. But then it… caught on? Other people started to get in on this too. Hey, obviously the stock in the long run is worth zero. Everyone knows that. But it’s going up, and tomorrow it might go up more. If this were just some dumb penny stock with a cool story attached to it, that’d be old news. This is different. 

When you see a stock getting bid up like this, the only conclusion you can draw is “The future does not matter, because in between now and then, this is explicitly just spinning a roulette wheel. The stock could go up or down, who knows, but at least you know it has nothing to do with the underlying value of the stock (which we all know is zero!), and everything to do with other gamblers. 

So Hertz sees this happening, and they’re like, well, if there’s demand for our stock, we should go sell some! I mean, it’s a ridiculous kind of demand, and it’s not “real” demand, but hey, maybe it’s real enough. So Hertz files, and is granted, an emergency request to their bankruptcy judge to issue a billion dollars worth of new stock in order to take advantage of whatever this is. Tom Lauria, one of the attorneys representing Hertz, had an all-timer line: “New platforms for day traders may be facilitating this. There are forces at work that us non-financial people, that we can only observe.” The SEC, presumably between gasps of laughter, declined to weigh in on whether the transaction was legal, saying “it is up to the company to comply with securities law.”

Just to restate how funny this is: Hertz is granted permission, by their own bankruptcy judge, to sell stock in their company which has already declared bankruptcy, because due to weird mojo in the universe, there’s a small army of reddit trolls playing chicken with each other and it just might save the company. Financial Twitter goes crazy, and (of course!) people start bidding up stocks of other bankrupt companies. It was a great day to be online. (Matt Levine, as usual, has the best writeup.)

(By the way, here’s a hilarious aside: Business Insider reports on this, and says, “oh, by the way, Hertz share price fell on the news, which makes sense, as shareholders will face dilution” hahahahaha)

So how can we think of these events as a third model in our taxonomy of bubbles? We’ve got all three pieces of our reflexive loop at work. The first is a deep belief: not that the future will be the same, or will be different, but that it’s totally irrelevant. As Hertz’s stock price rises, it confirms this temporary suspension of reality, and furthermore, it confirms that the other people you’re trading against are also idiots, so there’s an opportunity to make money here. 

The second half of this reflexivity loop is even weirder. Unlike in a normal bubble, where it’s the perception of stability that drives an earnings multiple, or in an equity bubble, where it’s the perception of high upside that drives an earnings multiple, here there are no earnings. The future earnings here are presumed to be zero. But if everyone knows that, and everyone is okay with it, then everyone around the table can look at everyone else around the table in the eye, and know that they don’t care about earnings either. They only care about winning this YOLO trade. And so long as everyone thinks that, then the only limiting factor to how violent this bubble can be is how much cash you have, and how quickly the traders can find each other. The answer seems to be “lots”, and “fast”. 

I really do think that this deserves its own place on the financial tree of the life. It’s a genuinely unique form of financial stupidity that’s distinct from the other two kind of bubbles. And we’re going to see it again. Not exactly like this, but the genie’s out of the bottle now. There is enough AUM dedicated to these kind of stunts, and the internet has dropped the cost and latency of communication among these day trading Johnny Knoxvilles down to zero. 

The Hertz story is an exceptional situation. I do not think it’s likely to ever happen again. But you know what kind of public companies have zero earnings for years at a time, and where future earnings are so far away that it’s already understood by everyone to be a day-to-day game of chicken, just like this? Biotech companies. And you know what kind of companies are going to be really interesting in the aftermath of Covid? Biotech companies. 

At the end of last year in my Ten Predictions for the 2020s post, I threw out a take: “There will be a major speculative bubble in biotech companies.” I mean, I didn’t have this in mind, but you know what, this makes me feel pretty good about that prediction. One of the catalysts, I wrote, would be “A new kind of financial innovation that becomes the instrument of speculation. These aren’t a necessary component of bubbles, but they sure help. In this case, I bet there’s going to be some new clever financial product that bundles and securitizes the highly speculative IP of biotech companies, in a way that legally lets retail investors buy them through an ETF or something.” I’ll admit, at the time, I didn’t foresee the “new, creative instrument of financial speculation” being “the equity of bankrupt companies.” But why not! 

Anyway, in summary, ha ha ha ha ha. What a week.

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Im-prey-ssions

So, I started Prey 2017 up around midnight last night. Eleven hours later, I had to stop playing because I needed sleep. The only reason I’m not playing Prey 2017 right now is because I promised you I’d blog once a week, every week, and since I was busy apartment hunting, playing Prey 2017, and going to the hospital.* I still feel awful; I need several treatments, not one every six months, but dang it, I told you guys I’d write something this week, and I’m gonna do it, even if it’s just one draft. Then I’m going to go play more Prey 2017.

So, right off the bat, this game’s like a 9/10.

Like, if that’s what you want to know, there you go. I love playing this game. Now to get into the nitty gritty. I’ll be talkin a lot about positives and negatives, and I’m trying to be somewhat comprehensive. Just bear in mind: from what I’ve played so far, I like it as much as Dishonored 2 and Doom, my favorite games of last year. It’s Extremely Good.

As some of you may be aware, I really did not like Prey 2017’s demo. There are a few reasons for that, chiefly the fact that I desperately needed to go to the hospital. Literally everything was irritating me and getting under my skin. Everything. This includes Prey 2017’s melee system. Now, let me be clear here: I don’t like the melee system. I didn’t like it in Dead Island, and I don’t like it here. But the melee system is a small part of a huge game, and I happen to enjoy that game a whole heck of a lot.

Would the game be better without a stamina bar? Yes. Absolutely. 100%. The stamina bar adds nothing but annoyance to the game. It does not benefit Prey 2017’s design in any way. If they patched out the stamina system tomorrow, Prey 2017 would only benefit.

So, after the demo, I was pretty worried.

Now, something like 10 hours in: this game is a delight. I love how the station feels persistent; leave a room, come back later, find all the bits you moved right where you left them. It’s WONDERFUL!

The level design overall is Extremely Good Stuff. So far, my favorite level is Psychotronics. It feels the most reminiscent of System Shock 2, and it has two of the my favorite moments in the game so far, which I won’t spoil here. There’s an area above two big metal pods I’m still trying to figure out how to access, so I’ve got reasons to go back.

The Arboretum is fantastic. Crew quarters are ace. On and on I could go; I like every single level in this game with the sole exception of G.U.T.S., which is a long tube with zero gravity and some annoying enemies with it. Zero G outside of the station is super cool. Zero G in G.U.T.S. isn’t my thing. As a System Shock 2 comparison, G.U.T.S. is The Body of The Many. But this is one level out of like... a dozen, and as far as I can tell, you don’t have to use it again once you unlock the elevator. 

One of the coolest features of Prey 2017, which I hope everyone copies in the future, because it’s great, is the crew tracking feature. Everyone who dies leaves a corpse behind. You can use computers to pick a person to track, then find their corpse. Doing so can net you things like key cards and supplies, which opens up more of the station, allowing you to explore.

There are two kinds of Looking Glass fans, those who prefer Thief and those who prefer System Shock. I’m one of the fans who prefers System Shock; I enjoy exploring more than sneaking. It’s why I prefer S.T.A.L.K.E.R. to System Shock. It’s why I’m enjoying Prey 2017 so much. Finding a keycard and having that ‘oh yeah, I remember where that is!’ moment, going back to that spot, and finally getting to open a locked door you’ve been keeping in the back of your mind for the past few hours... it’s a great feeling. 

One of the issues I had with Bioshock is that you rarely had a reason to navigate Rapture. Bioshock 2, my favorite game in that series, went in the opposite direction, turning into a series of linear sandbox maps, like Thief. Dishonored and Dishonored 2 do the linear sandbox thing too. It’s perfectly fine design, but I’ve been hungry for a game world that I really felt like exploring.

Prey 2017 is the first truly satisfying game world I have explored since S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky in 2008. The entire thing is open, you just have to find the right keys and hack the right doors and lift the right crates. It’s a game that rewards exploration, not with a “+100 XP: Crawled a vent” popup, but because as you explore, you get this really satisfying sense of “oh, this goes here, and that goes there, and it all works like this...”

Prey 2017 satisfies my exploration itch. You have no idea. It’s why I didn’t want to stop playing until I physically couldn’t play anymore. The only games that have held my attention so strongly in the past few years were Dishonored 2, Doom, Metal Gear Solid V, and Mad Max.

The symbiotic relationship between “hunt for crewmembers” and the station’s many locked doors creates this insatiable urge to explore. I love it.

Do I have complaints? Yes. The stamina system doesn’t benefit the game. G.U.T.S. isn’t fun to explore or traverse. The dudes who stop you from moving are just Not At All Fun To Encounter. The combat is something where I sigh and go “oh well, here I go again.” Great combat should be emotional combat; there should be highs and lows, a great rhythm, elation and relief in victory.

It’s not like a great stealth game, where you don’t want to enter combat because stealthing is more satisfying. It’s not like System Shock 2, Alien: Isolation, or STALKER, where combat can be thrilling and terrifying in equal measure, due to player vulnerability. It’s... just kinda there. It’s easily the game’s greatest weakness.

Prey 2017’s combat is annoying. The enemies feel samey (they’re all fast, teleporty, and take a bunch of shotgun damage before they die) and are way too visually consistent to be exciting. If you look at System Shock 2′s enemies, there’s a lot more interesting visual variety in the designs, which makes the experience more enjoyable. There was a lot more tactical/strategic depth in System Shock 2 as well.

Fortunately, you spend far more time exploring than you do anything else. It’s so effin good, man. Like... I’m over here writing about Prey 2017, when all I really want to do is go hop back in Prey’s world and explore Talos I some more. The level designers outdid themselves.

Even fundamental, basic stuff like mantling and crouching feels super good to do. The game world is just a joy to exist and interact in when you’re not fighting dudes. The only problem I have with the game world is that certain areas (especially the maintenance/labs area) have really predictable enemy spawns, which makes the world feel a lot less ‘real’ than it might otherwise.

Basically, I like the game. I like it a lot. I like it better than every game that has come out so far in 2017. It’s right up there with Dishonored 2 (which I adored) for me. It’s engrossing, thrilling, and awesome.

With some better combat and enemy design/spawning, Prey would be as close to perfect as a game can get. If my opinions change significantly as I continue the experience, I’ll probably right a review. If I was the scoring type, it would be an easy 9/10 for me.

So, one last thing: the default settings are a bit strange.

Change mouse sensitivity to 50, turn off Damage Numbers, rebind ‘tab’ to inventory, and bind your mouse wheel to weapon changes. It’ll feel a lot better. It’s still kind of weird to navigate menus (you can’t use the scroll wheel to scroll down lists?), and for some reason, moving your mouse moves your ENTIRE CAMERA when reading computers (compare this with Doom 3′s more satisfying implementation of computer screens). Sometimes, clicking works, other times, you have to press F, and sometimes, you have to press G. It’s kind of strange. It makes sense to use G to, like, repair items in the world, but less sense to use G on a menu where it seems like F or Mouseclick will do. 

The game has a ton of these weird little UX issues that, if tweaked, would significantly improve the game. I wish they’d been caught prior to release, but I hope they get patched.

There’s no FOV slider, but that should be coming soon. For some reason, the intro videos are unskippable. You can’t click through them or anything. You can, however, turn them off by editing your game files.

I do have Extremely Negative Impressions about how the game’s been handled, though. You see, I like Prey. That’s the Real Prey, the 2006 FPS Prey. The one with Blue Oyster Cult and Art Bell. I liked that Prey a lot. If you install Prey 2017, and you have Prey installed, 2017 will be installed in Prey’s directory. It’s frustrating.

It’s also frustrating that the game is named Prey at all; did we really have to lose the original game on Steam for THIS? Did the sequel really get canned for us to play this? I can take Prey 2017 on its own merits, and it’s a great game, but the way Human Head was treated, and the way the original game is being treated leave a really bad taste in my mouth. I love Arkane. I love Bethesda. I don’t like how the whole “Prey” situation has been handled. They could have given this game so many names and avoided the problem entirely.

The Prey for the Gods Situation is really bad. Some Bethesda PR dude said somethin on GAF about “we have to protect our trademark,” but that appears to be untrue. Here’s CDPR talking about that very subject. So it seems like folks at Bethesda are being dishonest, and that really rubs me the wrong way.

It sucks that a game I’m loving right now is associated with so many negative things.

Overall, best game I’ve played since Dishonored 2, appeals to my personal sensibilities a lot more, I don’t really like the combat so I try to avoid it as much as possible, I love this world so dang much.

*I was in the hospital because of my illness.