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raziakhatunblr · 4 years ago

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Maplestory private server illegal, Tricks to avoid penalty

Maplestory private server

Is it safe? Let us understand the background and distinctive contents of private servers.

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Maplestory private host

It helps MapleStory fans better enjoy the hard work involved with constructing successful MapleStory servers. However, what about punishment?

Personal Servers are somewhat illegal because they breach the TOS or Copyright claims or something. If Nexon has captured a private host, they'll send a notification to you or sue you enjoy they did to and which no longer exist.

The reason behind most personal servers is either from people who talk about the leaked info. The manufacturer of OdinMS created his personal host, or they're rebels such as The Resistance vs. The Blend in Half-Life 2.

But, there's absolutely no possible way for Nexon to prevent all private servers. They are continuing to be advanced from moving v55, v63, v72, and so on.

How Is a Private Server like Maplestory Made?

After all the years of unsuccessful leveling, upgrading, and recruitment of guild members, together with a destroyed Ghost Boat Exorcist badge onto a three-year-old Mechanic, I chose to retire into a MapleStory Private Server.

Additionally, $600CAD to find nx and buy stuff (for example, meso sacs and store permits) to get items across and find things out in M.S. the challenging way. Yes, I sacrificed $600CAD in substantial school lunch money to get things like hair coupons in M.S. once I might have used that money to receive a supercomputer.

Nexon is observing everything

The ruined GSE badge within my 3-year-old 210 mechanics. (through celebrity improvement window) and Nexon's shortage of gear reimbursement finally led me to do the one thing nobody would ever encourage me to do: I gave up on GMS. With no GSE badge, I can not continue on GMS.

Furthermore, I wasted a lot of real cash to sell items to acquire more Mesos. Instead, I've more insults than Mesos from players. Such as"Shoo."

[caption id="attachment_1282" align="aligncenter" width="1920"] Maplestory Private waiter [/caption]

My big problem here is how do you create a MapleStory Private Server (whether it is a v83 or the most recent version)? Like, do they divide into Nexon's H.Q. and extract all of the sprites, maps, sound effects, etc., off their computers and then rebuild it like a jigsaw puzzle?

If they did, then I will need to pack my bags and fly to California to do this. Like, the M.S. files will need to come from someplace. Also, it's the sole way to acquire the Wizet Invincible Hat. Besides, you'll find guidelines on other Personal Server sites.

Mesos

That says things like"no hacking, injecting of tools/unauthorized equips/packets, no wz document editing, etc.". I feel like I deserve a holiday from this game, but don't wanna devote another 1-2-3 years recollecting all the Mesos and equipping myself.

I would like to compensate for the 3 years of the wasted moment on M.S. and get my movie/animation jobs finished at precisely the same moment.

In addition to the hat, the G.M. class itself is making me envious. Yes, they're a class referred to as"SuperGM." So with a Personal Server (a Private Server intended for my personal use ), I will see exactly what it is like to be a G.M.

And bypass all other personal server site rules. Plus, there's a skill known as"Super Dragon Roar" that really does %1000 damage to all animals on screen.

While we are on this subject of hacking, why are robots poor? I never uttered before, but as a fantastic player from GMS, I find the only fair use for them would be to let me farm Mesos while doing home chores. I could call in my friend to play M.S. while I create breakfast/lunch/dinner, do laundry, etc. Why are robots taboo to MMORPG moderators like MapleStory private servers? That and having my friend drama M.S. for me personally will make no difference (at least that's what I presume ).

A side question: why or how are Personal Servers bad? Besides the fact that they permit one to play the sport and get stuff free, I really don't see how Private Servers are poor. Additionally, when you produce a Personal Server, do you, as the admin, get a Wizet Invincible Hat?

Also, how do I protect my P.S. from Nexon so they don't locate it? ExtaliaMS got closed down when Nexon found their I.P. address. But I want to take additional precautions to avoid going to court to face Nexon.)

So for this, I will have to place my MMD project on hold for now. I have to wait until the introduction of MS2 so that I can port its models to MMD.

(this is where Time is Money. Much like E.G., construction of a condo in a boom-town; the employees need to build it quickly to allow more residents to proceed.)

Additionally, you're only allowed to perform a daily event once a character. That's like more kids than Octomom should feed.

And that I consumed almost an entire day to do daily quests on all of them because of how many negative aspects in the match slowed me down since the days passed! When it's terrible hackers, DCs (that is an online game term for"disconnections") (no matter whether I have a great or poor internet connection). Unscheduled server maintenances, or other things along those lines!

Can not you compare with a v83 Personal Server right into a quit game console like the Gamecube or even the PlayStation 1?

How can we play an old game from several decades back without a machine that's capable of doing this? So yeah, how can we try the previous skills and senior classes of the elderly servers if we can't even play with the older servers of Tonight Now? Please refer to this link for additional info about discontinued games and game consoles: A significant Note about Emulators for Game Developers.

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Also, can't you compare with an MMORPG Private Server into a Jailbreak (like IAP Cracker and Installous) for iPod Touches/iPhones/iPads? For games such as Tiny Tower, Subway Surfers, Candy Crush, and so Forth, even with no Jailbreak/with the official server. I am able to go the distance and find those games completed 100 percent without having to spend a single cent.

The programmer (s) that created these match (s) plans to place them up to download free of cost. But I can't waste any more time on these types of server-sided matches because I have other important things to do.

Besides internet service, how does a Private Server need funds to operate? Since most P.S. sites say in their community guidelines. "If possible, please contribute as Personal Servers need funds to operate...

How to Create a MapleStory Private Server [v83]

First, go to C:\

As soon as you find three folders, call all you want, but I will name them'ZenthosDev,'''Downloads,' and'MapleStoryV83' with this tutorial.

Download these programs/files.

(64bit)

MySQL Query Browser

JCE Unlimited Power Records

WampServer

LocalHost v83

ZenthosDev v83

MapleStory v83

W.Z. Files

Make certain you selected the appropriate variant matching your Operating System (O.S.) to avoid any difficulties.

Installations:

Before we start, make sure to extract everything if it's in a .rar format.

Installing MapleStory v83:

Install MapleStory with the download provided. It is a really straight forward installation. Follow the instructions.

Delete the following files/folders in the C:/MapleStoryV83 folder should they exist.

MapleStory.exe

Patcher.exe

GameLauncher.exe

shield (folder)

Installing WampServer:

Follow the directions and install it.

C:\Wamp

Don't be concerned about putting your email and these at the end. Just press finish.

Left-click it and click put Online'.

Then left-click it again and click on begin All Services.'

The Wamp icon must look totally green (if it is red or reddish, you have a problem).

Installing the MySQL Query Browser:

It is straightforward, runs the installation record, agrees to the conditions, and follow the instructions.

According to which system kind your computer as you may install 32bit or 64bit.

So set up the corresponding file.

For another simple installation, follow the directions.

Documents placement:

Paste them into these areas, overwrite when prompted.

(The (jdk1)/(jre7) folder version could differ. It is fine ). C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.7.0_01\jre\lib

3. C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.7.0_01\jre\lib\safety

Copy each of the folders and files within the ZenthosDev folder that we made before. So it seems in this way.

Now replicate the W.Z. folder within the ZenthosDev folder.

So it must look like this.

SQL setup:

Username: root

Then click on the document' button in the menu bar, and select open Directory...'.

Proceed to C:\enthosDev\SQL and open the document called'ZenthosDev.SQL.'

Following its opening, apply the file.

Preference installation:

(This component is optional if running the server to Receive your computer only)

You might also make any alterations to have the server to function how you need it.

Wait 10 minutes, and then your bat file must look similar to this.

Code:

ZenthosDev has started:

World Launched

Channel Launched

Is Maplestory’s personal server really safe?

I ask this question as somebody who has been part of the Maplestory personal server" community."

(unsure whether the neighborhood is the best term to describe it, but oh well) to get many of years now. I would not call myself a"host hopper" per se, but I have tried out a decent variety of servers to see what they provide. Most servers market towards Maplers, who prefer the old-school/pre-BB encounter.

The sole thing that differentiates them will be the attributes they supply. Some have higher or lower EXP/Meso/Drop prices to make things more or harder. Some make H.P. Washing"Optional." Some provide custom content...you get the notion.

Anyway, this question popped into my mind when I tried out a host known as"AvalonMS." I recall having a few conversations using a streamer there. He was currently looking for a server to repay. This man had hoped that Avalon would perform well. Eventually, he left because he could not see the server becoming successful and remaining alive for more than a few months.

I really don't remember his precise words. However, I believe he said something along the lines of"Private Servers need to be run with at least a small bit of professionalism, like a business nearly."

Along with the proprietors of this host, since he put it, were not too professional. Among the substantial issues was that they weren't transparent enough with the area concerning what sort of content/updates they'd do with their game. I tried looking around for their host just a minute before. And they appeared to have vanished off the face of the internet. No big surprise there.

A personal server such as Maplestory has been around. So what is the issue?

I got me wondering how many private servers have been around for a while to stay successful. When I say successful, I usually indicate they could maintain a decently-sized busy player base for an extended period. That, if you consider it, is already hard enough as it is. In any kind, Maplestory, whether it be the official game or the personal servers, isn't a super popular MMO.

The official sport is nowhere near as popular as it was during its prime. And therefore, you would think the subset of all gamers/Maplers that prefer old-school private servers inside the official game is most likely a pretty little demographic.

We've got SOME powerful servers such as Royals, Legends, Saga, etc., which have existed for a couple of decades. And these"powerful" servers hold a reasonably large percentage of personal server gamers.

I mean hell, even as soon as you go past the 6th or even 7th rated server on gtop100, you begin getting into the servers that have less than 100 active players. And needless to say, the personal server community is most likely dwindling.

There are just so many men and women who have played pre-BB Maple.

And they would prefer it on the modern versions. Finally, those folks will likely proceed with their own lives and stop playing with Maplestory entirely because nostalgia can maintain a player round for such a long time. I must wonder how many more years we have before Maplestory Private Servers die off completely. I hope we have a little bit more. More Information

#maplestoryprivateserverillegal maplestory howtomakemaplestoryprivateserver maplestoryprivateservercybercrime maplestoryprivateserverlegal ma

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vitaelampada · 5 years ago

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10 for 10 for 10

Rules: Answer 10 questions, come up with 10 more and tag 10 people. Shout out to @queen-of-salt-and-fury for the tag. This was very really fun to do and nice mental break.

The 10 questions:

1. Star Wars or Star Trek?

Star Trek. I’m not saying that all the characters in Trek are well developed, but in Star Wars they all seem the same flavour.

2. Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings?

Lord of the Rings. But you know, that’s not my final word on the matter.

3. Sabrina The Teenage Witch or Charmed?

New Sabrina only.

4. Harry Potter or The Witcher?

I haven’t seen The Witcher. So it’s The Witcher.

5. Favorite comedy television show or funny movie?

Lucifer

6. Favorite single/stand-alone book?

Wow. Let’s see, it’s Friday today so it must be “A Knowledge of Angels” by Jill Paton Walsh.

7. Favorite book series?

Twilight – say what you want.

8. Favorite animal?

Bees.

9. What would be your ideal job/career, if you didn’t ever have to worry about money?

Novelist and blogger

10. Best personality trait (in you and in others)?

Compassion

Alright here are my ten questions:

1. First/Earliest Fandom experience?

Early 1980s, when I met a Trekkie who let me watch his full TOS video collection.

2. If you had a super power what would it be?

To go without sleep.

3. If you could attend one musical event past/present what would it be?

Beatles concert in Vancouver

4. Which three people would you have at your last dinner? Past present, real life and/or fiction.

No strangers, if it’s my last dinner. Four people max, closest family and friends.

5. What is your one deal breaker?

Learning for pleasure. If you don’t do it, find a different friend.

6. If you had unlimited funds what are the top three things you would do with it?

Set up hundreds of thousands of battery charging points in the UK, so we can just ditch petrol cars now.

Buy a writing retreat – a tiny cottage where the neighbours are few but the internet connection excellent.

Launch a major vegan deli chain

7. Who is your favorite hero and favorite villain?

Hero: Spock

Villain: Dracula

8. What movie/book/tv series is your guilty pleasure?

Musicals: Chicago, Grease, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Hairspray

9. If you could time travel, what time period would you settle down and live in?

I would check out the future first. If that doesn’t get any better, I will stay put. There is no way I’m going backwards.

10. What is your one regret in life and how would you change it?

I wish I had started writing fan fiction sooner. Means I’ll just have to write more now to make up for it!

@vitaelampada My ten questions:

1. Is there a famous/classic novel you have started to read but could never finish?

Pride and Prejudice. Sorry, Ms. Austen.

2. What kind of films do you avoid watching?

Horror.

3. Name a blogger you admire and why.

Jack Munro – who makes recipes you cannot be too poor to afford, and who makes plant based seem everyday.

4. What is your favourite comfort food?

Chips.

5. Weirdest Instagram page you follow

Boz Jewellery – they must sell the meanest, chunkiest gemstone clustered engagement rings ever.

6. Are you a coffee or tea drinker?

Coffee for breakfast or after dinner. At all other times, tea.

7. If you could live a second life, how would you be different?

I’d be someone who liked hot climates and had a knack for building/fixing things. I’d learn at least one other language at a very young age and never get motion sick. I’d have very thick, curly hair. I wouldn’t be the least bit afraid of spiders.

8. Give yourself a pen name

Morgan Gelli

9. Do you wear glasses or contacts?

Glasses – two pairs. One for driving and one for screen work.

10. What subject did you study at school which has turned out to be most useful? Least useful?

Most Useful – Touch Typing. Least Useful – Physical Education, because everything was about group activities I’ve never done since school, and nothing about how to maintain personal fitness in different life situations.

Thank you @enygma0710. I tag @suswriting @theswordofpens @lucystillintheskywithdiamonds @explicitksart18 @geniakay @ashayamny @cate-adams @charlotterichard @myrefugeblog @0anhonestpuck0 - if you fancy it.

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silverlightqueen · 5 years ago

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Fallen From Grace - Part 1

←previous

demonprince!au, ot7, angst, humour, fluff, potential future smut

Word Count: 9.2k

Summary - Heaven is the goal, right? For most, anyway. Dying and then going to heaven, where everything is pure and perfect and light and happy. That’s what everyone wants, right? Well, I hate to break it to you, pal, but heaven isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. With its rigid rules and structured system, as well as its discriminatory hierarchy, it may not be the place you think it is. Don’t believe me? Just look at the story of the Seven Angel Brothers. Wait, what? You’ve never heard of the story? Are you kidding me? So you’re expecting me to tell you now? God, I’ve got to do all the work around here. The Seven Angel Brothers? God’s right-hand men, his go-tos, his ride-or-dies, his day ones? Not ringing a bell? You know, the ones that made The Mistake, which we N E V E R speak of, and, after receiving the harshest punishment from the one they looked up to the most, left heaven to live in hell? And Satan was so happy they’d chosen him over God that he made them princes of hell? And let them do whatever they wanted? And they basically made Earth their playground? And set their eyes on that girl? How do you not know about this? You wanna know more? Sit tight, bucko, this story is a… wild ride, to say the least…

Warnings: a lot of sleuthing and detective work, darkhair!ot7, mild profanity, flirting, that’s it for now sksks

a/n: hey guys! I've been so excited about this and I’m so happy to finally be uploading the first part! this isn’t proofread either so there may be mistakes !! lmk what you think and hmu if you wanna be on the taglist !! 💕

taglist💕: @keylowmonie

au masterlist

silverlightqueen masterlist

‘Is everything ready for your party, or do you need me to get anything?’ Jennie asks, voice just discernible over the noise of her television playing in the background. ‘Everything’s sorted. Can you turn your TV down, please? I can barely hear you over… what are you even watching?’ y/n asks, lying across her bed with low music playing in the background. ‘On My Block. I’ve developed a theory about those brothers, and I’m doing research,’ Jennie says, easier to hear now. ‘Research? From On My Block?’ y/n replies, holding back a laugh. ‘I’ve been watching Narcos, Peaky Blinders and The Mob,’ Jennie says, y/n laughing out loud this time. ‘Don’t tell me you think they’re part of a gang too?’ y/n asks. ‘It’s plausible. Think about it. They’re brothers, even though they don’t have the same last name, and they’re all the same age. Seven of them. They appeared out of nowhere and they don’t speak to anyone - they keep a low profile. None of them have any social media - I even did some stalking. They have matching tattoos. Being school boys is the perfect cover. No one would suspect a thing,’ Jennie explains. ‘Fair enough, but I’m gonna disprove one of your points; Kim Namjoon spoke to me today,’ y/n says, Jennie gasping. ‘What did he say?’ Jennie asks. ‘Well, I said hi and then-’ ‘So you spoke to him then?’ Jennie says drily, the other girl shushing her.

‘He said he’s heard stuff about me, but he wants to get to know me for me, and I said the same about him and his brothers. Then I told him he’s got cute dimples and invited him to the party,’ y/n explains. ‘You told a gang leader he’s got cute dimples and then invited him to your house?’ Jennie demands in shock. ‘A gang leader? He’s not a gang leader!’ y/n exclaims, laughing. ‘Why not?’ Jennie challenges. ‘Um, hello? Dimples? Amazing hair? Just the right mix of cute and hot?’ y/n says, picturing him in her mind. ‘And? It’s the perfect cover because people like you don’t see through it,’ Jennie says as though it’s obvious, y/n laughing at her best friend. ‘What makes you think that Kim Namjoon is the leader anyway?’ ‘He’s the one that always talks. I don’t think I’ve heard any of the other boys’ voices, except for Park Jimin, ‘cause I have Maths with him,’ Jennie explains. ‘Yeah, but is Kim Namjoon the oldest?’ ‘No, he’s the middle child. Kim Seokjin’s the oldest, but Kim Namjoon kinda just leads the group,’ Jennie says, y/n laughing. ‘Well, whatever. They’re not gang members, and there’s nothing wrong with having them at my house.’ ‘What? You invited all of them?’ Jennie demands. ‘Obviously. I couldn’t just invite Kim Namjoon. I told him to bring his brothers too,’ y/n says. ‘I’m telling you, they’re dangerous, y/n,’ Jennie says. ‘Listen, if it bothers you that much, I’ll ask my dad to look into it, okay? If anyone can find out, my dad can. And anyone, I’m pretty sure that if there were gang members going to our school, my dad would’ve told us,’ y/n says, Jennie sighing defeatedly. ‘Okay, they may not be gang members, but there’s definitely something weird about those brothers,’ Jennie says ominously. ‘Agreed,’ y/n says, ‘they’re all just as hot as each other. There’s not even one less good-looking one. What kind of family is that?’

‘Which one should I wear to y/n’s?’ Taehyung asks, holding up two different outfits, stood right in front of the TV. ‘Seriously, Tae? It’s not until the weekend. It’s only Monday,’ Yoongi says exasperatedly, the rest of them looking up at Taehyung in despair. ‘I want to be prepared,’ Taehyung replies stubbornly. ‘The left one, but with a Gucci belt,’ Jimin replies, taking pity on the boy, who shoots him a boxy smile in return. ‘Actually, we need to talk about that,’ Jin says, catching the attention of the other boys. ‘What about it? It’s a party,’ Jungkook says. ‘Yeah, I know, but we need to come up with some sort of plan. What are we actually hoping to achieve?’ ‘Friendship with her,’ Hoseok replies, eyes still on the TV. ‘I mean in the long term. She might be rich and have a lot of power, but she’s still a high school student. What kind of contacts is she going to have, exactly? A lash and nail technician?’ Jin asks. ‘To be fair, Jimin’s nails have been looking a bit gross recently,’ Jungkook begins, Jimin hitting him over the head with a fluffy cushion.

‘Listen. She’s rich, right? But it’s not her money, it’s her parents. I did some research into her, and I can’t find a single thing about her or her parents on the internet, except for her social media accounts,’ Namjoon says. ‘Is she insta famous?’ Hoseok scoffs. ‘Kind of, actually. She’s got around 10k followers, but she’s still on private, so she must approve all of her followers before letting them follow her, which is suspicious for a girl like her. But anyway, what kind of rich girl like her doesn’t have any information about herself or parents on the internet? It’s weird,’ Namjoon says. ‘Have you checked the dark web?’ Jimin asks, the boys all looking at him in confusion. ‘Why on earth would she or her parents be on the dark web?’ Yoongi asks. ‘You never know. Maybe they run The Mafia,’ Jimin suggests. ‘Yeah, and I’m friends with Madonna,’ Jungkook scoffs. ‘Whatever. I’m telling you, there’s definitely something weird about that girl,’ Jimin says. ‘Agreed,’ Hoseok says, ‘she’s one of the hottest girls I’ve seen in my life. What high school girl looks that angelic?’

‘Hey, y/n, did you want your seat back?’ Wooyoung asks when she walks in, having moved from his normal seat at the back of the room to y/n’s, right in the middle of the room, as always. ‘If you don’t mind,’ she replies, smiling shyly at the boy. He rises from the seat, holding up a fist for her to bump hers against, and grins. ‘Anything for you, babe,’ he replies, moving to the back amongst his noisy friends, Jungkook watching in incredulity as she slides into the seat beside him, arranging her fluffy pink stationery across the desk. ‘Hey, I’m y/n y/l/n,’ the girl says, turning to Jungkook with her hand extended, startling the boy. She admires the fratboy look he has going on; messy curly hair and an adorable grin which easily becomes a sultry smirk. She also notes the awkward way his long legs are bent beneath the desk, alluding to him being tall and lean. ‘Jeon Jungkook,’ he replies, smiling as he shakes her hand, white nails lightly touching the skin of his wrist. ‘I’m new, so, I thought I’d just introduce myself,’ y/n says. ‘Not exactly new, though. I’m newer than you,’ Jungkook says, and y/n grins. ‘I’m guessing your brother told you about me, right?’ y/n asks with a smile, and Jungkook nods. ‘He told us about the get-together you’re having.’ ‘Make sure you guys come, okay? I’ve come back and everyone’s got all these expectations of me. I just want some people in my life that’ll let me make a different impression, a new impression,’ y/n explains. ‘You’ve already made quite an impression, y/n,’ Jungkook says amusedly, ‘the cafeteria yesterday was definitely a show.’ ‘Oh, god, it was terrible,’ y/n groans, the boy laughing, ‘they act like I’m a celebrity.’ ‘I wouldn’t mind the treatment you get,’ Jungkook says. ‘I hate it. Sometimes,’ she adds as an afterthought, Jungkook laughing. She seems like a nice girl, he thinks to himself.

‘Hey, y/n!’ Wooyoung calls from the back of the room, y/n turning in her chair, giving Jungkook a full view of her fantastic figure in the uniform. ‘What’s this about a party at yours?’ Wooyoung asks, leaning back in his chair, a predatory glint in his eyes as he scans the girl. Jungkook wonders if y/n can see that Wooyoung clearly wants nothing more than to get in her pants. ‘It’s not a party, it’s a small get-together,’ she corrects him, smiling. ‘Where’s my invite?’ he asks, his friends all watching the exchange with eager eyes. ‘You haven’t had one. Yet,’ y/n says, Wooyoung raising his eyebrow. ‘Am I gonna get one?’ he asks, and y/n lets out a gentle laugh. ‘Maybe. As long as you don’t get blackout drunk like you did last time. My dad won’t be too impressed if he finds vomit in the dishwasher again,’ y/n says, everyone laughing, including Wooyoung despite the way his face fell momentarily at the mention of y/n’s father. Interesting, Jungkook thinks, noting it mentally.

The girl turns back to Jungkook then, cutting her conversation with the school’s most popular boy short. ‘But, yeah, the popularity isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. It’s only because they think I’m pretty. And because my family’s rich’,’ she says with a roll of her eyes, and Jungkook’s ears almost visibly perk up. ‘What, do they think they’re gonna get shares in your parents’ business or something?’ Jungkook jokes, trying to be clever with the question he asks. ‘Probably. It’s a shame they don’t know that they’re not business owners. It’s a rumour that’s been going around for years, and everyone seems to believe it’s true because I’ve never denied it,’ y/n says light-heartedly, and Jungkook celebrates mentally. So her father’s not a businessman. ‘Oh, right. Well, more fool them,’ he says, laughing along with her, before their Physical Education teacher walks in then, starting the lesson.

Within minutes, it’s easy to see that Jungkook has some competition for being the best in the class. Both of them compete to answer the questions, y/n drawing Jungkook out of his shell and getting him involved in the class a little more. They keep up a friendly rivalry throughout the lesson, their jokey banter entertaining their classmates, and y/n already knows she’s made a new friend. At the end of the lesson, the teacher leaves instantly, and Jennie comes in as y/n packs her bag. ‘Oh, hey, Jen!’ y/n exclaims, adorably excited to see her friend. ‘Hey, babe,’ Jennie replies, pulling y/n into a quick hug. ‘Jungkook, this is Jennie Kim, my best friend. Jennie, this is Jeon Jungkook, my new friend,’ y/n introduces them, and they smile at one another, sizing each other up. ‘I’ve invited Jungkook and his brothers over to mine, so we’ll both get to meet the others this weekend,’ y/n says. ‘Oh, speaking of which, did you want us to bring anything?’ Jungkook asks, knowing it’s custom to take a bottle or snacks to a party. ‘Just bring yourselves, and anything you might want. I’ve got enough drink and stuff, but if you want to do anything or smoke, bring it because I’m all out at the moment,’ y/n tells him, Jungkook trying not to show his shock at the open admission of y/n, a seemingly angelic girl, doing drugs. ‘Oh, cool, I’ll let them know,’ he says. ‘Okay. See you later, Jungkook,’ y/n says with a smile, leaving with Jennie.

‘Guess what?’ y/n says to Jennie the second they’re out of the classroom. ‘What?’ Jennie asks as they reach y/n’s locker. ‘He was trying to find out about my parents,’ y/n whispers, not wanting her many fans to overhear. ‘You’re kidding?’ Jennie asks, and y/n shakes her head. ‘He was trying to do it subtly, thinking I wouldn’t notice…’ ‘But obviously, you did, ‘cause you’re like a genius,’ Jennie finishes. ‘I don’t get why, though. I understand that I might come across as mysterious or whatever, considering I disappeared for a year, but wouldn’t he be trying to find out about me? Not my parents,’ y/n thinks aloud. ‘You don’t think he’s heard something, do you?’ Jennie asks, and y/n shakes her head. ‘What would he have heard? That my dad’s scary? That’s all anyone knows, as far as I’m aware. You’re the only one that knows the truth, and you wouldn’t say anything, so I don’t get it. I’m starting to think you might be right about them, you know?’ y/n says, Jennie’s eyes widening. ‘Okay, I know I was serious, but at the same time, I didn’t really think they’re gang members. It was just a theory,’ Jennie says. ‘I know, but it makes sense now. They’ve appeared out of nowhere with no backstory and he’s asking about my parents. What if they know who my dad is, know who I am? And I panicked, and told him he doesn’t own a business, which makes things worse,’ y/n says. ‘No, I don’t think so, y/n. If they knew about you and your dad, he wouldn’t be asking about your parents, would he?’ Jennie points out. ‘Yeah, I guess you’re right. I’m just being paranoid,’ y/n tries to convince herself. ‘Exactly. You’re turning into me, babe. Nothing’s going on,’ Jennie says, y/n nodding in agreement. ‘Okay,’ y/n says, ‘let’s just get working on a playlist for this party.’

‘Yoongi! Yoongi!’ Jungkook calls down the corridor, the crowds of students parting for him to get to his brother. ‘What? What’s happened?’ Yoongi asks, instantly becoming alert. ‘I sit next to y/n in PE, and I found out that her parents don’t own a business,’ Jungkook tells him, watching the tension flow out of his brother’s body. ‘Okay. And?’ Yoongi asks the younger exasperatedly. ‘So if they don’t own a business, how are they so filthy rich? It must be dodgy,’ Jungkook says excitedly, trying to keep his voice down. ‘Or they inherited in from their parents? Or they won the lottery? Or they gambled and won big? Or they’re landlords?’ Yoongi suggests. ‘No, no, it’s not like that. It was the way she said it, it seemed suspicious. She was, like, panicking,’ Jungkook says, before relaying the conversation to Yoongi. ‘Okay, I guess that it is a bit weird. But she’s clever, Kook. If she were hiding something, she wouldn’t just slip up like that,’ Yoongi says, still sceptical. ‘Maybe she was caught off-guard,’ Jungkook suggests. ‘Hmm, I guess. We’ll see. We’ll check the dark web and stuff in the next couple of days, and if nothing comes of it, then we’ll just leave her alone. Okay? No more spur-of-the-moment interrogations,’ Yoongi says, Jungkook sighing with a nod. ‘Come on, let’s head back. They’ve already left,’ Yoongi says, leading the younger boy towards the exit, ‘so it’s just you and me, kid.’

‘One of my favourite lessons. God, I missed this one,’ y/n sighs contentedly as she steps into the art room. The bright colours, beautiful artwork and sunlight streaming in through the floor-to-ceiling windows make this classroom one of the best in the school. One of y/n’s goals is to get a piece of her work up on the wall before she leaves school. ‘Wait, didn’t Jihyo leave?’ y/n asks her companion, Chaeyoung, about the absence of her old partner, who nods. ‘Yeah, one of the new boys sits in her seat now,’ Chae replies, y/n sighing internally. Another new boy sitting near her? She’s gonna get tired of introducing herself soon enough. She takes her old seat, taking out her beloved art supplies that still sit in her drawer, untouched due to the labels with her name on them in scrawling handwriting. No one would dare to touch her stuff. ‘Oh, hi,’ a deep voice says, y/n looking up at the sound. It’s another of the new boys, taking his seat beside her. He’s taller than her like the others, with dark brown hair, slightly curly and longer at the nape, dark eyes trained on the girl. ‘Hey. I’m y/n y/l/n, the new girl,’ she says for the third time this week (and it’s only Wednesday), holding out a hand for him to shake. ‘New?’ he replies with a raised eyebrow, shaking her hand firmly, and y/n grins. ‘You all know about me then, huh?’ she asks, and he nods, giving her the most adorable boxy smile. ‘I do. I’m Kim Taehyung, and I’m presuming you know about me too,’ he says, and she nods. ‘I do know about you, Kim Taehyung, though probably not as much as you know about me,’ y/n says, Taehyung nodding with a grin. ‘The whole school seems to be obsessed with you, y/n. I’d quite like to find out why,’ Taehyung says, y/n unsure of whether or not he’s flirting. As much as she might seem like a boy magnet, she has absolutely no idea how to read boys.

‘Well, I’m sure you will, if we’re partners for the rest of the year, and if you come to my get-together this weekend,’ y/n says, Taehyung still smiling. ‘We’re all looking forward to it. As much as we’ve also been the talk of the school, it’s not all been exactly positive, and so none of us have made any friends. Not really, anyway. This is the first thing we’ve been invited to in the month we’ve been here. I know Jungkook and I are the most excited,’ Taehyung admits, and y/n smiles at the thought of them being excited about going to hers, to make new friends. It makes her feel guilty for suspecting them. ‘Aww, I’m honoured. It’ll be fun, and it’s only be a small thing. 50 max,’ y/n says, Taehyung raising an eyebrow. ‘Isn’t that the same size as some people’s weddings?’ he asks, and y/n waves a hand. ‘It’s all subjective. For a girl that wants at least 500 people at her wedding, 50 is nothing,’ y/n says, Taehyung laughing at her words. God, y/n’s a roll with making all these hot boys laugh. ‘I guess. Jungkook said you’re okay with us bringing drugs. Is that true or is he just delusional?’ Taehyung asks, and y/n laughs. ‘No, it’s true, he’s not delusional. I would provide some myself, but my plug got arrested so I’m trying to find a new one,’ y/n lies in a woeful tone, coaxing chuckles from Taehyung. ‘I can get you some. I’ve got a great plug. Cheap, too,’ Taehyung offers, and y/n tilts her head, impressed. ‘I might just take you up on that offer,’ y/n replies before the teacher appears at their desk.

‘Miss y/l/n, Mr Kim, I see you’re getting to know one another, which I would not have an issue with if it were not for the fact that both of you have a year’s worth of work to do in the next 5 months if you want to pass the course,’ he says, looking down at them over the rim of his glasses. ‘Sorry, sir. We were just talking about our plans for the assignment,’ y/n says, leaning towards him over the desk, and Taehyung watches as a light blush colours the teacher’s face, and he can’t believe his eyes. Does the teacher really have a crush on y/n? As well as everyone else in this damn school? ‘Oh, very good, Miss y/l/n, Mr Kim. What are your ideas exactly?’ he asks, and Taehyung watches y/n’s eyes flit to the board that reads, ‘Duality’, almost able to see her mind working. ‘We were thinking about doing a piece that explores the duality of perspective, specifically for religion, and in particular Lucifer. In some people’s opinion, God was right to cast him out due to his sins of pride and greed, but others would think different. You could argue that we preach about self-love and putting yourself first, and that’s exactly what Lucifer was doing. He wanted better for himself, and you could even say that he didn’t agree with the dictatorship in Heaven and wanted the power to be less concentrated, and so got cast out. Some could say that it was unfair for God to have all the glory and power to himself, and that he proved Lucifer’s point by casting him out,’ y/n says, both Taehyung and the teacher looking at her in shock, but for very different reasons.

‘Very insightful, Miss y/l/n, very insightful indeed. What would your own opinion be?’ the teacher asks, and y/n thinks for a moment. ‘As bad as this is gonna sound, I’m not religious at all, so don’t think I’m being blasphemous. If I were Lucifer, I’d probably already have left, if I’m being honest. Why serve in Heaven when you can reign in Hell?’ y/n says, both Taehyung and the teacher silent. ‘Very interesting, y/n. Can you share this view with the class?’ the teacher asks, quietening the class and getting y/n to relay her opinions, this time in a much less controversial way. All Taehyung can think about is what she said about reigning in Hell instead of serving in Heaven, his blood simultaneously running cold and burning hot in his veins. He wishes for nothing more than having his abilities back, so he could tell his brothers what had just happened. ‘Are you okay, Taehyung?’ y/n asks him, breaking him out of his shocked reverie. ‘Oh, yeah, just thinking about what you said. How did you come up with it so quickly?’ he asks, and y/n laughs. ‘I just saw duality, and Heaven and Hell was the first thing that popped into my mind. I don’t really know why. I guess... I’ve always been interested in the Bible and religion, but not from a religious point of view,’ y/n replies, and Taehyung nods. ‘Is that your actual opinion, or was it bullshit?’ ‘Um, I don’t know, to be honest. I think yes and no. After studying that specific Bible story, yes, that is my opinion, but I think it’s different if you look at it from a spiritual point of view compared to a scientific point of view,’ y/n explains, Taehyung becoming completely immersed in her words. ‘But that’s a whole other argument on its own, the whole science vs religion,’ Taehyung says, y/n nodding in agreement. ‘Which is another form of duality we can work into our piece,’ y/n says excitedly, holding up a hand for Taehyung to high-five. ‘Oh, by the way,’ Taehyung says, ‘I’m like ninety-seven-point-three percent sure that the teacher has a crush on you.’ The girl bursts out laughing, a slight blush tinging her cheeks, and replies, ‘that was an oddly specific number.’ ‘I’m an oddly specific guy,’ Taehyung replies with a grin, and y/n laughs, shaking her head. ‘Let’s get started on our piece.

‘Not another new boy,’ y/n mutters under her breath, despite not actually feeling that way towards them, just having an inclination for the dramatic. Jimin sits in the seat in front of y/n’s, watching as she walks over towards him. He has his jet-black hair parted, exposing a beautiful strip of forehead, his dark eyes focused on the vision before him. She takes her seat and unpacks her bag before tapping Jimin’s shoulder, her breath practically catching in her throat when he looks at her. ‘Hi, I’m y/n y/l/n, the not-new girl,’ she says, holding out a hand to him. He grins, eyes disappearing behind his lids and he shakes her hand, silver rings cold against her skin. ‘Hi. I’m Park Jimin, the actually-new boy,’ he replies. ‘It’s nice to meet you, Park Jimin,’ she says. ‘It’s nice to meet you too, even though I’ve already heard an awful lot about you,’ Jimin says, y/n grinning. ‘All good things, I hope,’ y/n says, and Jimin smiles his devilishly gorgeous smile. ‘I don’t think there are any bad things that can be said about you,’ he says, y/n’s heart actually skipping a beat. He’s definitely the most charming so far, not to say that the others aren’t. ‘You flatter me. But I think the same can be said for you and your brothers. I’ve met four of you already, and you’re all so kind and funny and charming,’ y/n explains. ‘Which other three?’ Jimin asks, trying not to seem curious, but y/n is fantastic at reading people. ‘Kim Namjoon, Jeon Jungkook and Kim Taehyung,’ y/n lists off. ‘Ah, Tae. I knew about Namjoon and Jungkook, so you must have met Taehyung in Art, right?’ Jimin asks, and y/n nods. ‘You’re a very well-rounded girl. Psychology, Physical Education, Art and Dance, huh? What else?’ Jimin asks. ‘I do Home Economics, Music and Literature,’ y/n lists off, Jimin grinning at her words. ‘The other three brothers do those three subjects. Hoseok has Literature, Yoongi has Music and Seokjin has Home Ec,’ Jimin says, y/n groaning internally. ‘That’s so weird. It’s like we’re all meant to be friends, right?’ y/n says, Jimin nodding in agreement, with a small grin playing at his sinfully plump lips.

‘I’m looking forward to your get-together this weekend,’ Jimin says, and y/n smiles. ‘I am, too. It’ll be really fun. I’m just struggling with my outfit,’ y/n says, thinking through her wardrobe. ‘The sexier, the better,’ Jimin grins, and y/n lets out a gentle laugh. ‘I literally have, like, no sexy clothes. I have the wardrobe of a nun, if nuns were high school girls,’ y/n says, Jimin laughing, noting that she’s quite funny. He also notes the way her uniform clings to her curves and doubts there is any truth in her statement. ‘I’m sure you’ll find something. If not, it’s not the end of the world. Just go nude, I’m sure no one would mind,’ Jimin says, y/n laughing again, the noise like music to his ears. ‘As much as I’m sure everyone would like me to, my dad might appear at any point and he’d kill everyone there before killing me too,’ y/n says. ‘Ah, protective father? I can relate,’ Jimin lies, y/n’s eyebrow raising at the mention of a family other than his brothers. ‘Really?’ ‘Yeah, my dad’s super protective over us. He wants to know where we are and what we’re doing at all times. He’s a complete helicopter parent,’ Jimin says, a finger rubbing at the tip of his very adorable nose, and y/n instantly knows he’s lying. Two can play at that game. ‘God, that sounds terrible. My mum’s like that too. If I don’t reply to her texts within seconds, she freaks out,’ y/n says, Jimin nodding. ‘Parents, hey? I’ll never be like that with my kids,’ Jimin says. ‘Same here,’ y/n replies, the two eyeing each other, both aware that the other is lying through their teeth, but before their conversation can continue, the teacher enters the room.

‘I know you all hate theory lessons, but I’ve got a bit of news that might brighten your day,’ she says instantly, the class falling silent. ‘Oh, y/n! You’re back!’ Mrs Kim says the second her eyes land on the girl, getting distracted, y/n’s mouth stretching into a smile. ‘I am, Mrs Kim, and I’m glad about it too,’ y/n says softly. ‘I hope you don’t mind me asking where you were?’ Mrs Kim says, y/n showing a second of hesitation before answering, Jimin listening intently. ‘Had to attend to some... important family stuff, but it’s all good now. I did confirm it with Mrs Lee before leaving, and she promised to keep me registered as a student here, so I could come back when I wanted to,’ y/n says cryptically, and Jimin can’t believe what he hears. Her parents must be more powerful than any of them thought possible if they managed to keep her a place at the school for an entire year. It sends a shiver through him, before he remembers who he is, sitting up in his seat with pride. ‘Ah, very well. It’s great to have you back, and just in time for our new project. We’ve been given the stimulus for this year’s final piece. ‘Dichotomy’. Just the word, no painting or poem like the previous years,’ Mrs Kim says, the class completely silent. ‘I’m assuming none of you know what that means,’ she says, both y/n and Jimin raising their hands to give the definition.

‘Ah, Mr Park, I’m glad to see some contribution. Can you give us your understanding of the word?’ Mrs Kim asks, y/n stung that she wasn’t asked. Maybe they really have taken her throne. ‘Oh, that’s okay, y/n can give her answer,’ Jimin says, and y/n flinches in shock. He has his back to her; how did he know she raised her hand? ‘No, that’s okay, you go ahead, Jimin,’ y/n says, the boy turning to face her, the class watching the exchange with interest. ‘Dichotomy; a division or contrast between two things that are or are represented as…’ he trails off, letting y/n finish the sentence. ‘Being opposed or completely different,’ y/n replies, their eyes locked together unwaveringly. ‘Very good, both of you. I think we’ve found our first pair,’ Mrs Kim says, Jimin’s plump lips curving up at that before he turns back to the front. The rest of the lesson goes by very uneventfully, neither y/n nor Jimin contributing anything more to the discussion of what a piece about ‘Dichotomy’ could include, too busy in their own worlds. When the lesson ends, Jimin turns to face y/n. ‘What’s the dress code for yours this weekend?’ he asks, and y/n smiles. ‘Whatever you feel comfortable in,’ she replies, and he nods. ‘I’ll see you this weekend then,’ he says. ‘I look forward to it,’ she says as he leaves the room, left watching in confusion.

‘Argh!’ a strangled cry comes from down the hall into Hoseok’s room, the boy jumping up from his bed and running out to investigate. He nearly knocks Jungkook to the floor, the other boy having the same idea, both of them heading down to where voices are murmuring, in the monitoring room. When they walk in, the other five boys turn to look at them, faces illuminated by the bright screens aligning all four walls of the room, computers and TV screens showing various security footage clips, and coding and algorithms. ‘What’s going on?’ Hoseok asks, Yoongi sighing in annoyance, slumping down in his seat. ‘We can’t find a single thing on them on the dark web. No trace at all of a y/n y/l/n,’ he says. ‘Have you all had a look?’ Jungkook asks, his older brothers all nodding. ‘Do you mind if I have a go?’ he asks, big doe eyes reflecting the screens before him, and Yoongi gets up from his seat. ‘Knock yourself out, kid, I’m going to sleep,’ he says, trudging out of the room. ‘God, I’ve got a really bad headache,’ Jimin says, Taehyung reaching out to rub the other boy’s temples. ‘I’m not surprised. The lights are way too bright in here,’ Hoseok says, squinting. ‘Come on, let’s go. Leave JK to it,’ Jin says, putting an arm around Hoseok’s shoulder and leading him out of the room, Namjoon, Jimin and Taehyung following behind.

The youngest boy works diligently, trying route after route, search after search, hack after hack, just to find a single trace of the girl. And, after three hours, two cartons of banana milk (brought to him by Jin) and several failed attempts, Jungkook is rewarded. ‘Oh, my God!’ he shouts, unable to believe his eyes. Mere seconds later, Hoseok is practically skidding into the room, Jimin hot on his heels. ‘What?’ Hoseok demands, Jungkook moving aside to let them read the screens, taking the momentary break as an opportunity to close his eyes and process the thoughts racing through his mind. ‘You’ve… you’ve gotta be kidding me,’ Jimin whispers, both he and Hoseok staring at the screens with wide eyes. ‘Namjoon! Taehyung! Seokjin! Yoongi! Get in here!’ Hoseok shouts, the boys entering the room one-by-one, looking around at the screens in shock. ‘This has gotta be some kind of joke. There’s no way. Jungkookie, have you edited these?’ Yoongi asks, the youngest boy shaking his head. ‘You were right, Jimin. The dark web was the perfect place to look,’ Namjoon says, patting the other boy’s back. ‘Yeah, I know. So how is Madonna, Kook, considering you’re friends with her?’ Jimin asks, referencing his earlier statement, the younger boy scowling half-heartedly. ‘So what do we do now? Do we tell her we know? Or do we keep our mouths shut?’ Taehyung asks. ‘We can’t tell her. We just… we keep it quiet for now. When we go over to hers on Saturday, we’ll try and search the house for anything that might prove all this true. We never know, it could be fake. It’s not worth the risk to confront her,’ Jin says. ‘How do we search the house? She’s gonna suspect something, and it’s not like she already doesn’t,’ Namjoon asks, the boys falling silent for a moment. ‘Let’s be real; she’s back after being away for a year. This party is gonna be a celebration and a half, probably a rager. She’ll probably be white-girl wasted, and even if she’s not, she’ll have her hands full with everyone else who is,’ Yoongi says, and Jimin shakes his head. ‘No, she’ll notice. She’s the smartest person I’ve met, outside of our lot. There’s no way she wouldn’t notice, and, even if she doesn’t, she’d realise afterwards. We’d probably leave something out of place by accident, and she’d notice that. She’s seriously clever,’ Jimin says. ‘That’s a risk we’re gonna have to take. If it’s disproved somehow, then we tell her we were trying to find the toilet or something. But if not, and if she tries to confront us about it, we tell her we know. See what she says,’ Hoseok suggests, Namjoon nodding in agreement. ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea. Not after what we’ve just learnt. We know what she is now, and you’re still gonna risk it?’ Jungkook says, and Taehyung grins. ‘Yeah, we know what she is,’ he says, smiling widely, ‘but she doesn’t know what we are. Does she?’

‘Hey, y/n!’ the girl hears from behind her, turning around to see the crowds of students in the corridor parting to let Jeon Jungkook through, followed closely by Kim Taehyung and Park Jimin. She takes a deep breath, nervous about facing them alone, before putting on a kind smile when they reach her. ‘Hey, Jungkook, Taehyung, Jimin,’ she says gently, the boys smiling back. Her heart races, being surrounded by three beautiful boys having her breath shallowing out. ‘How are you?’ Jungkook asks. ‘I’m good, just a bit lonely today,’ she says forlornly, Jennie having gotten her period last night, and when Jennie gets her period… let’s just say, it’s not pretty. Projectile vomiting and all. ‘Lonely? I’m sure you’ve got hundreds of people that would keep you company,’ Taehyung says, the other students staring at the group stood in the middle of the corridor with blatant curiosity as they walk past. ‘Yeah, but none of them are really my friends. I mean, I guess the boys are okay, but I’m not in the mood for their antics today,’ y/n says, jutting her chin out to where Wooyoung and his gang stand. Wooyoung nods at y/n with a smirk and she smiles back. ‘God, he’s so annoying,’ she says as she waves, the three boys in front of her laughing.

‘Well, you’re welcome to sit with us if you want, babe,’ Jimin offers, putting an arm around the girl. The other two boys watch with raised eyebrows, noting the way y/n unconsciously snuggles into him. ‘I appreciate the offer but don’t you wanna check with your other brothers first? I don’t wanna intrude,’ she replies, big eyes looking up at the three of them. ‘They won’t mind. Namjoon already knows you, and the others can meet you for the first time. It’ll be fine,’ Taehyung says. ‘Yeah, it’d also get people talking,’ y/n says drily. ‘Yeah, it would. The mysterious school angel and the rumoured mafia boys sat together. It’d cause an uproar,’ Jungkook says drily, y/n feeling a chill run through her at his words. The four of them all laugh, the unspoken words hanging in the air. ‘Okay, I’ll sit with you guys then,’ y/n says, the four of them turning towards the cafeteria, the corridors now empty due to everyone already being in there.

When they walk in, the room falls silent, everyone staring at the four of them, clearly shocked at Jimin’s arm around the girl’s waist. They make their way up to the food line, everyone letting them skip in front to get their food (pizza for the boys and a salad for y/n again), and head over to the table where the other four boys sit. Jungkook lets y/n sit down first so she’s sandwiched between him and Namjoon, opposite the three brothers she hasn’t met; Jung Hoseok, Kim Seokjin and Min Yoongi. ‘Hey, I’m y/n. Jimin, Taehyung and Jungkook invited me to sit with you guys, ‘cause Jennie’s not here today, and I took them up on the offer. It’s nice to meet you,’ y/n says prettily, her nerves not showing at all as she reaches out a hand for each of the three eldest boys to shake one after the other. ‘Nice to meet you, y/n. I’m Jung Hoseok,’ the boy says, eyes locked with y/n’s as he takes her hand into his much larger one, y/n unable to believe how beautiful he is with his dark eyes, dark hair and heart-shaped lips. ‘I’m Kim Seokjin,’ the boy smiles, y/n’s breath taken away at the most handsome boy she’s seen in her life, plump lips, shining eyes and soft dark hair making him look like a prince. ‘And I’m Min Yoongi,’ the last boy says, smiling at he shakes y/n’s hand, y/n unable to take her eyes off his wavy chocolate locks, sparkling brown eyes and adorable gummy smile.

‘I’ve finally met all of you,’ y/n says with a smile, the boys laughing. ‘Guys, she has lessons with you too. Home Ec., Music and Literature,’ Jimin says, and Jin frowns. ‘Were you not in our Monday morning lesson?’ he asks, and her face becomes unreadable. ‘Oh, no, I had to have a meeting with Mrs Lee, just to go over the rules and schedule and everything. And then I had meetings with some of my subject teachers to talk about courses and work to get extra credit during some of the other lessons,’ y/n explains, the boys all nodding in understanding, though not one of them believes her. ‘Ah, understandable. So you’re in Literature this afternoon?’ Hoseok asks, and y/n nods with a smile. ‘I did wonder why there was an empty seat in the middle of the room,’ he says, y/n flushing as the other boys laugh. ‘Do you sit in the middle of the room in every lesson?’ Namjoon asks her, y/n nodding embarrassedly. ‘Okay, so you might not like me asking, but you should know from now that I’m a very blunt person, so I say things that other people might think are inappropriate. How exactly did this whole ‘Queen Bee’ thing come about?’ Yoongi asks, y/n laughing, all of the boys interested in her answer. ‘To be honest, I’m not really that sure. The first two years of high school were normal for me; I had lots of friends, but I wasn’t exactly ‘popular’ or anything. And then, for my 16th birthday, my dad said he’d throw me a big party. I told Jennie about it, and she got drunk with Chen, and she has a big mouth when she’s drunk, so she told Chen about the party and he told everyone. Then everyone wanted to be my friend because they’d heard that my dad was letting me have alcohol at the party so they all wanted to come. So I invited the whole year group and I thought that my popularity would disappear after they’d had an invite. But everyone bought these really expensive gifts and they were all desperate to spend time with me during the party. And then afterwards, I stayed relatively popular, and when we came back after summer for the next year, it was like I was some sort of celebrity. They were all obsessed with me, and it’s only continued,’ she explains, the boys all taking two important things from what she says.

‘That’s insane. Was it like a rager?’ Jungkook asks, and y/n laughs. ‘I mean, as much as a Sweet 16 can be. The only alcohol we had was WKD and Smirnoff Ice, but everyone treated it like it was vodka, and were behaving like they were wasted,’ she says, the boys laughing too. ‘So are you 18 yet, y/n?’ Taehyung asks, y/n shaking her head. ‘In a few months, in July. My dad said I can have a party for that too, but I’m not sure if I want one yet,’ y/n says, before deciding to question the boys too. ‘So how old are you all?’ she inquires. ‘Me, Yoongi, Hoseok and Namjoon are 18, and Jimin, Taehyung and Jungkook are 17,’ Seokjin says, y/n eyebrows furrowing in confusion. ‘We’re adopted,’ Yoongi grins, y/n letting out an ‘ohh’ of understanding. ‘I did wonder,’ she laughs, pushing the salad around her plate with her fork. ‘Well, me and Namjoon and Taehyung aren’t adopted. Us two are twins, September babies, and then Tae was born in May. But Yoongi – October – Hoseok – December – Jimin – March – and Jungkook – June – are all adopted,’ Seokjin explains, nodding in understanding. ‘God, I bet your parents have to spend so much money on all you guys. Just the food alone,’ y/n says, looking around at all the empty plates in front of them, whilst the boys laugh. ‘Our grandparents were crazy rich, owned loads of land, and when our parents inherited the land, they sold it, so they became even crazier rich,’ Hoseok says, y/n nodding as he speaks. ‘Oh, cool. I guess you guys are similar to me. My dad and his parents own a whole lot of land too, but they farm it, so that’s where our money’s from. My mum doesn’t work though, just a housewife,’ y/n lies, the boys nodding at her words.

‘But, anyway. Let’s talk about mine this weekend. You guys still don’t have my address, right?’ y/n says, the boys shaking their heads. The girl reaches into her bag and pulls out her phone, the latest iPhone. She gets up the contacts page, creating a new contact. She writes in ‘Kim Namjoon’ before handing him her phone, and he types in his number, handing it back to her. Before anyone can say anything, Mrs Lee appears beside their table, and the boys all look at the phone in y/n’s hand, waiting for Mrs Lee to take it off her, considering the school has a no-phone policy. ‘Ah, boys, y/n! It’s lovely to see that you’ve become friends! How are we all?’ she asks, her eyes momentarily pausing on y/n’s phone, but she doesn’t say anything. ‘We’re great, thank you, Mrs Lee. How are you?’ y/n asks in reply, Mrs Lee smiling. ‘I’m well, thank you, my dear. I actually came over to give you a message, from your father. He’s asked you to give him a call if you can. It’s an emergency,’ she says, y/n’s face falling slightly before she pulls herself back together. ‘Okay, thanks, Mrs Lee,’ she says, before turning to the boys again. ‘Thank you for letting me sit with you, guys, I appreciate it. I’ll text you my address later, Joon, and I’ll see you in Literature, Hoseok. See you later,’ she says with a smile, following Mrs Lee out of the room, everybody’s eyes on her again.

The boys are silent for a few seconds before Namjoon speaks. ‘Did she just call me Joon?’ he asks, having never been called that name before. ‘Um, yeah,’ Taehyung replies, all of them dumbfounded. ‘Did the headteacher really just pass on a message from her dad? Like, is that a joke?’ Jungkook asks. ‘Obviously not. It’s clear why, though. Doesn’t matter if I’m the president; if y/n’s dad wants me to pass on a message, I’m gonna pass on the message,’ Jin says. ‘For real, but did anyone else notice what she said? About her dad? She didn’t mention her mum once when she was talking about the parties. She only mentioned her as an afterthought. It’s always her dad,’ Yoongi points out. ‘Yeah, I wonder what the deal is with her mum,’ Hoseok says thoughtfully. ‘In dance, she said something about her mum to me, but I don’t think she was telling the truth. I don’t think she has a mum anymore. She’s either left her and her dad, or she’s dead. I’m calling it now,’ Jimin says. ‘Why don’t we go ask… you know who?’ Taehyung suggests tentatively. ‘Are you kidding me?’ Namjoon demands. ‘No! He’d have all the answers, or he could at least give us our abilities back, so we can get answers ourselves,’ Taehyung points out. ‘If we tell him we want our abilities back because we’re curious about a high school queen bee, he’d probably kill us,’ Namjoon says with a eyebrow raise. ‘You know he’d never do that,’ Taehyung scoffs. ‘Okay, but he’d be angry,’ Hoseok says reasonably. ‘Fine, fine, forget I said anything,’ Taehyung says, taking a piece of lettuce from y/n’s untouched salad. ‘No, Tae, it’s a good idea. We do need answers, but I don’t think we should go to him,’ Jungkook says, Yoongi nodding at him, both of them on the same wavelength. ‘Exactly, Jungkook. I told you guys when I first saw her, she’s the perfect opportunity,’ Yoongi says. ‘Who?’ Jin asks. ‘Little Miss Loose-Lips,’ Yoongi grins, ‘Jennie Kim.’

Jennie drags herself to the front door, blanket trailing along behind it, and opens it to see y/n stood there, her laptop and a stack of papers in her arms. ‘Wha-’ Jennie begins to ask but y/n pushes in past her, sliding off her shoes. ‘Oh, come in,’ Jennie says savagely to the spot where y/n was stood before shutting the door loudly. The girls head into the kitchen, y/n putting the stack of papers to one side and loading up her laptop. ‘I’m happy to see you, but I told you not to come over. I’m ill, I don’t wanna vomit on you. And my parents would be fuming if they knew you were here. And your dad would be too,’ she says, y/n only half-listening. ‘It’s a code red,’ she replies shortly, opening up tab after tab on her laptop. ‘I would’ve come over to yours if it were that bad of an emergency! You know what your dad said about you leaving the house!’ Jennie exclaims, shocked at her usually sensible best friend’s recklessness. ‘I don’t care what dad says. And you’re ill, you said it yourself, so you wouldn’t have been able to drive,’ y/n says with a note of finality, Jennie knowing not to push the subject further.

‘So what’s all this?’ Jennie asks as y/n spreads the papers out across the table, before stepping back. ‘Have a look yourself,’ y/n says, Jennie leaning forward curiously. They’re all news articles, each headline containing the words ‘seven brothers’. And everyone last one of them talks about the mysterious disappearance of them from these rural small towns. Jennie’s heart pounds in her chest, mouth drying up with confusion as she reads, looking up at y/n when she’s done. ‘Where… where did you find all these?’ she asks the girl, whose face is unreadable, but Jennie can practically feel the excitement rolling off her in waves. ‘I had one of my dad’s guys look into it,’ y/n begins. ‘Why?’ Jennie demands. ‘I sat with them at lunch today and it’s like they were hanging off my every word. Every time I mentioned my dad, I could see this, like, eagerness in their eyes. They’re trying to find out stuff about me, just as much as I am about them,’ y/n says, Jennie shaking her head in shock. ‘But anyway, my dad’s guy couldn’t find anything on our internet, so then he looked on the dark web,’ y/n says, Jennie gasping. ‘This was all on the dark web? Why? They’re news articles from normal news companies,’ Jennie says. ‘He told me that someone’s moved them on to the dark web to hide them. So they were on the internet first. I’ll bet anything it was them, Jennie,’ y/n says. ‘Well, it’s got to be. One of them even lists off their names. Nathan Kim, Sean Kim, Yousef Min, Holland Jung, Jim Park, Tavon Kim and Jude Jeon. Same last names and same first two letters of the first name. Jimin’s isn’t very original either,’ Jennie says drily, almost coaxing a laugh out of y/n.

‘Look at this one,’ y/n says amusedly, getting momentarily distracted as she hands Jennie a paper, grinning widely. ‘Is this… a blog post from a fangirl?’ Jennie asks, and y/n nods, laughing. ‘Oh, my God, this has gotta be a joke. ‘For those of you just joining the fandom’ – fandom, really? – ‘let me tell you a little bit about the boys. Kim Seokjin is the oldest. He’s the crazy one that you can’t help but love if you talk to him. Yeah, he’s dangerous, but he’s also charming, and the life of the party. He’s the dealer and he’s great with a knife. Then, there’s Min Yoongi. He’s the scariest one. He runs the streets, and everybody knows not to mess with him because he’s ruthless. He’s always got a lighter in his hand and a gun in his trousers. Jung Hoseok is the third oldest – he’s the interrogator and he tortures the people that they capture. Basically, he’s a crazy bastard, but he’s so lit and will turn up at any party. The leader Kim Namjoon, the middle child, controls all the finances and stuff. Don’t let the dimples mislead you because he’s terrifying, and is always packing, no matter what. Then there’s Park Jimin, and he’s the assassin. He lures people into bed with his good looks, and then kills them. But he’s drop-dead gorgeous, so people still always go for him. Then Kim Taehyung. He’s the hacker, and he controls all of the technology and gets information on their enemies. But he’s really sweet and kind if you speak to him, you’d never think he’s a criminal mastermind. And then the youngest is Jeon Jungkook. He’s the fighter. He’s trained in, like, a hundred different types of martial arts and stuff, and he can literally kill someone with a single movement. He’ll try and fool you with his bunny smile, but he’s scary.’ Are you kidding me? So they’re literally a gang then?’ Jennie says, eyes wide and heart pounding in shock. ‘Well, that’s the funny thing. That one was from Kobe, and my dad’s guy told me that’s where the biggest Yakuza syndicate’s headquarters are based. They were literally part of a clan of the Yakuza, Jen! But then, none of the others mention any kind of gang activity. Some of them even speak about them being charitable and kind young men that have helped the community. And then none of them have follow up articles. Like they just... forgot about them,’ y/n explains. ‘What the fuck? This is so weird,’ Jennie says.

‘It gets worse. Look at some of the dates on them,’ y/n says, Jennie looking at the dates. ‘What? ‘19th September 2001. Seven teenage boys go missing in the small town of Newbury, England.’ How is that even possible? They would’ve been little kids in 2001, not teenagers,’ Jennie says incredulously. ‘I know. Some of them date back to the 80s and early 90s, before we were even born,’ y/n says, Jennie shaking her head in disbelief. ‘I don’t see how that can be possible,’ Jennie whispers, eyes scanning the different articles again. ‘Well, Jen, I found something. After doing a lot of research, and I mean, a lot. As in hours-worth-’ ‘When? You had school.’ ‘Dad called me at lunch so I had to go home. I’ve had since, like, 12.30. Six hours, Jen. Six,’ y/n says, her best friend supressing a laugh at the thought of her impatient best friend spending all that time researching. It’s longer than she’s ever spent on a school project. ‘Anyway, so, I found this,’ y/n says dramatically, turning her laptop to face Jennie. The girl reads it intently, y/n watching the way her face changes as she reads, illuminated by the fluorescent light from the screen. Once she’s done, she looks up at y/n, her face half shock, half disbelieving. ‘There’s no way,’ she says, and y/n raises an eyebrow. ‘Jen… I think it’s plausible,’ she says, Jen’s mouth dropping open. ‘You’re kidding me. y/n, come on! Both you and I have IQs far too high to believe in this shit,’ Jennie says, y/n shaking her head. ‘I don’t know, Jen. I really think it’s possible. What other explanation is there for them being teenagers for the past thirty years? You know I’ve always been interested in this kinda shit and… I don’t know, it seems legit to me,’ y/n says, Jennie starting to agree. ‘I still don’t know, y/n. What do we do now?’ she asks the girl who sighs. ‘I don’t know. We can’t really confront them,’ y/n says, and Jennie gets an idea. ‘At your party, on Saturday, let’s try and do some… digging. Get some more information out of them. What do you think?’ Jennie suggests. ‘I don’t see why not,’ y/n says, ‘that sounds like a plan.’

‘Hey, y/n,’ Yoongi says when he walks into the room, taking his seat beside y/n in the music classroom. ‘Hey, Yoongi. How are you?’ she says, putting her phone into her bag and turning towards him, giving him her undivided attention. ‘I’m good, thanks. How about you? I didn’t think you were gonna be in today; Jin said you weren’t in Home Ec. this morning,’ Yoongi says, and y/n smiles slightly embarrassedly. ‘I went over to Jennie’s last night to check up on her and ended up sleeping the night. And neither of us woke up ‘til 11 so I had to come in just for the afternoon. And also wear her uniform,’ y/n says sheepishly, Yoongi laughing. ‘Is she not in today?’ he asks. ‘No, she’s still ill. She should be better for my... get-together tomorrow, though. Speaking of which, I completely forgot to text Joon the address so here,’ she says, handing Yoongi a slip of paper with her address on it. ‘Oh, okay, thanks. What time does it start?’ Yoongi asks her. ‘9ish,’ y/n says, and Yoongi raises an eyebrow. ‘Don’t parties usually start a little earlier than that?’ he asks, and y/n laughs. ‘People show up early to my parties rather than late. It’ll be in full swing by 8.30,’ she says, Yoongi chuckling. ‘So, we’ll probably be there at around 10 then,’ Yoongi jokes, and y/n laughs. ‘To be honest, you might as well. Ooh, also, there’s something else I was supposed to tell you guys. I always have… like, an afterparty kinda thing. Like just me, Jen and a few others, smoking and chilling and listening to music, so I’d like it if you guys stayed behind for that. Usually Wooyoung and the boys stay behind, but I’ve not been in the mood to deal with them lot recently,’ she says, coaxing a laugh from Yoongi. ‘Yeah, sure, that sounds great, we’d love to. Well, I should speak to the others first,’ he says, y/n giggling behind her hand. ‘Yeah, sure, just let me know. I’ll actually text Joon later so you guys have my number,’ y/n says, Yoongi nodding as the music teacher walks in. ‘y/n, great to have you back,’ the teacher says, but before y/n has a chance to reply, he delves straight into the lesson. ‘Oh, thanks,’ y/n says, under her breath, Yoongi chuckles at her sarcasm, the two exchanging a grin.

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douxreviews · 6 years ago

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Quantum Leap - Season Five Review

It had been awhile since I watched season five, and some of it was better than I remembered. Unfortunately, some of it was worse.

Celebrity leaps

The Kennedy assassination? What were they thinking? ("Lee Harvey Oswald," 5.1 and 5.2.)

Quantum Leap always played with celebrity encounters as cute little supplemental by-the-ways and isn't-this-fun, like Buddy Holly and Michael Jackson, and honestly, I totally understand their desire to try something new, to do a high concept two-part episode. But "Lee Harvey Oswald" was terrible, uncharacteristically grim and unforgivably dull. Quantum Leap is a science fiction adventure show with a great deal of humor and charm. It is not a documentary.

Not to mention that Quantum Leap's raison d'etre is to fix "what once went wrong." How on earth could they possibly fix the Kennedy assassination without changing a massive event in American history? Having Sam save Jackie Kennedy, who died in the original history, was an interesting twist, but it was also a cop-out. Especially when you consider what Jackie did with her life after Jack Kennedy's untimely death. (No judgment there, honestly. I'm just saying.)

It also felt wrong to see Sam so affected and influenced by the person he leaped into that he couldn't change anything, and it's telling that this was the only way they could make the script work. We all know that if Sam had been himself, he would have found some way to stop the assassination. I understand from the internet that Donald Bellisario believed that Oswald acted alone and that it was the point he was trying to get across. And I will respond by saying that a show like Quantum Leap was not the place to do it.

"Goodbye, Norma Jean" (5.18) didn't work either, despite a good performance by Susan Griffiths as Marilyn and some enjoyable faux cameos by actors playing Clark Gable, John Huston and Peter Lawford. The big question for me again was, why? What did Sam put right that once went wrong? Supposedly, Marilyn needed to live a little bit longer and do one last film, and if The Misfits had been one of the greats, I would get it, but honestly, it's not a great film. If they had to do Marilyn, wouldn't it have been great if Sam had kept her from committing suicide earlier in her life?

The other two celebrity leaps this season were outright fun, though, and those did work.

I loved Scott Bakula doing an actual impression of "Dr. Ruth" (5.14) in an episode that featured the real Dr. Ruth Westheimer. While the double entendres were uncomfortably thick on the ground, it was pretty much the perfect celebrity leap to illustrate the differences between the reserved and prudish Sam, who had a terrible time doing a radio show about sex, and Al, who didn't hesitate to avail himself of free sex therapy in the Waiting Room with Dr. Ruth herself. We also got a timely reminder that Al has been married five times, and that he still loves his first wife, Beth.

I also enjoyed "Memphis Melody" (5.21) where Sam leaped into a young Elvis Presley. It was so much better than Lee Harvey Oswald and Marilyn Monroe because it wasn't depressing, and Scott Bakula got to sing as Elvis. Very nice. Especially his version of "Amazing Grace." (Which is not what they're singing in the photo below.)

Movie tributes

One of Quantum Leap's constant go-tos was movie tributes and/or ripoffs. In "Leaping of the Shrew" (5.3), Quantum Leap did The Blue Lagoon, and they even got Brooke Shields to guest star. You'd think that wouldn't work, but it was actually pretty darned cute. They also did Coming Home in "Nowhere to Run" (5.4), and it even guest starred an adorable pre-Friends Jennifer Aniston. But honestly, the way they got around Sam walking around while he was supposed to missing his legs was pretty darned weird.

Points for trying

I liked the idea behind "Trilogy" (5.8, 5.9 and 5.10), an interesting twist in the formula where Sam leaped into three different people while trying to save the same person, Abagail Fuller. It was almost like they finally addressed the "what happened to the person Sam saved later on" question. But the story acquired a mildly incestuous feel when Sam went from being Abagail's father figure in part one to her fiance in part two. And the idea of Sam fathering a child while not in his own body was interesting, but also weird. Although I did like the idea of Sam's brilliant daughter Sammy Jo helping out at the Quantum Leap project. Were they thinking about casting her as a permanent character? That could have been fun.

I also liked "Killin' Time" (5.5), where Sam leaped into a serial killer and had to explain the truth about the Quantum Leap project to his hostages. The best part about it was that there was actually action at the project in alternate universe 1999 as the killer escaped and Al took off after him, while Gooshie had to replace Al in the imaging chamber. I'll admit that the face paint, neon decoration and strange computer stuff didn't work, mostly because we all know now that 1999 didn't look like that. Maybe I should have taken that to mean that all of Quantum Leap happened in an alternate universe?

I wasn't as crazy about "The Leap Between the States" (5.20), the first and only time that Sam leaped out of his own lifetime, inhabiting his great-grandfather and romancing his great-grandmother back in 1862. It might have been a little better if they'd managed to resist white savior syndrome.

"Promised Land" (5.11) was a nice idea in theory, popping Sam back to his own home town with people he grew up with. Maybe a little hokey, but at least he got to see his late father one last time. But couldn't we have spent time with Sam's family again instead of getting stuck in a bank for the entire episode?

No points for trying

And then we had the evil leaper. (5.7 "Deliver Us From Evil," 5.16 "Return of the Evil Leaper," 5.17 "Revenge of the Evil Leaper")

Okay. I can see where the writers would have hit on the idea of an evil counterpart to Sam, but I thought it made absolutely no sense and was in fact never explained. Was Satan carrying on a Quantum Leap project of his own to put wrong what once went right? Although it was nice to see the characters from season two's "Jimmy" again and the carrying on in the women's prison was sort of fun, it just didn't work for me. Plus Alia's existence made Sam non-unique, which is something you don't want to do with your lead. The evil leaper concept didn't deserve to take up three full episodes of their final season.

The series finale

I hadn't seen "Mirror Image" (5.22), the final episode of Quantum Leap, since it aired, and was really looking forward to it because I remembered how choked up I was by that last scene with Beth and that final card about what ultimately happened to Sam. Unfortunately, I am sad to report that I found the rest of "Mirror Image" to be sub-par.

Sam arrived in a barroom at the moment he was born, and for the first time, when he looked into a mirror, he saw himself. That was actually a powerful scene, and it was touching that his hair had started to become gray. There were many scenes in the barroom in the coal mining town of Cokesburg that included actors from previous episodes playing other characters. I'm sure they were going for some sort of huge metaphorical what's-is with the mine collapse, but I just didn't get it.

I also thought it was sad that, even though the resolution of the series was all about Al Calavicci, we saw too little of him in the finale. Instead, we got Bruce McGill as the enigmatic Al the bartender, who kept giving Sam clues about what's going on. Was this new Al supposed to represent the God who had sent Sam on this strange journey? I suppose so.

We also learned that it was always Sam's unconscious choice to keep leaping, that his leaps would become more difficult, and at this point, Sam could choose to go home. The fact that Sam chose instead to leap back to the end of "M.I.A." and change Al's life forever was by far the best part of this mishmosh of an episode. Sam's ultimate choice was a selfless expression of love for his closest friend. It was also a radical, series-changing choice, breaking all of the rules we've come to accept as governing Sam's leaps. It was emotionally satisfying, though. So like Sam to give such a huge gift to someone else instead of taking advantage of his one last opportunity to go home. Tragic.

That last title card, "Dr. Sam Becket never returned home," really got to me way back when it first aired in May of 1993. This time, when I saw it, the one big thing that struck me was that in their rush to close down their series, they spelled their lead character's name wrong. (It's "Beckett," with two T's.) Maybe they made that mistake because "Mirror Image" wasn't supposed to be the series finale and they were forced to tack on an ending.

While that last scene with Beth, and its implications, were a worthy end to the series, and I loved the idea of Al happily married to the love of his life, the thought of a sad and exhausted Sam choosing to continue leaping forever was emotionally wrenching. In a way, it also negated everything that happened in the entire series. The Al Calavicci that helped Sam on every step of his journey is no longer the same Al Calavicci. I guess I need to remind myself that I must never try to apply logic to time travel stories.

Bits and pieces:

-- The credits for season five featured a new arrangement of the original theme song. It was terrible. Awful. Blech.

-- Notable actors: Neil Patrick Harris, age twenty, in "Return of the Evil Leaper," Stephen Root in "Goodbye Norma Jean," Hinton Battle from the Buffy musical in "Revenge of the Evil Leaper," and Meg Foster of the amazing eyes in "Trilogy."

-- Bruce McGill, who played Al in the series finale "Mirror Image," was also in "Genesis," the pilot episode. That was a nice touch, since I assume it was deliberate.

-- I hadn't known this until I looked it up, but Susan Griffiths ("Goodbye, Norma Jean") has made a career out of playing Marilyn Monroe. And Michael St. Gerard, "Memphis Melody," played Elvis several other times as well.

-- Just a general observation: when I was finished my rewatch, I figured out what years Sam leaped into the most, and which months of the year. There were very few winter leaps, which makes sense since they filmed in Los Angeles. It also makes sense that the writers would mostly choose the 1950s and 1960s because they could do more interesting period stuff. The year Sam leaped into the most was 1957 (seven times).

And in the end:

Despite this mostly negative closing review, I enjoyed rewatching Quantum Leap more than I thought I would. It was a creative series that aired at a time when there was very little quality science fiction on television, and the two lead characters and the actors who played them were exceptional. There's also no question that Quantum Leap is showing its age a bit sooner than it probably should.

There are a lot of series revivals going on right now. What would a reboot of Quantum Leap be like? I bet that in today's "it's all about the arc" environment, they could go in some truly interesting directions.

What do you guys think?

Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

#Quantum Leap #Sam Beckett #Al Calavicci #Scott Bakula #Dean Stockwell #Quantum Leap Reviews #Doux Reviews #TV Reviews #something from the archive

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thehumanarkle · 7 years ago

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[NOTE: I had to make some changes to this post after I realized I screwed up and there were 9 episodes in the first half of the season. I goofed on account of only the first 8 being visible on the CBS Discovery page. All points made refer only to the first 8. To minimize the amount of editing I’d need to do, I’ll keep my thoughts on Episode 9 to myself for now.]

Okay, I have watched the first eight episodes of Star Trek Discovery, and I have some thoughts.

1: The pilot isn’t very good, but compared to other Trek pilots, it could’ve been worse. Overall, I’d place it about equal with “Caretaker,” but better than “Encounter At Farpoint” and “Broken Bow.” “The Emissary” and whichever one you count for TOS (”The Man Trap” for air date order, “Where No Man Has Gone Before” for production order) top the list. My biggest problem is that if the intent was to convey that Burnham’s bad choices in these two episodes (I count both as the pilot since they dropped the same day) was partly the result of her concussion and partly her years of suppressed human emotions bubbling up at the worst possible time, that should’ve been made clearer. I mean, if that was the intent. If so, I actually like the idea. Not the execution though.

Also, the title was wrong. I know some people have griped about the story Burnham tells where the title, “The Vulcan Hello,” comes from, but that itself actually does make sense. But to phrase it the way they did makes it sound, albeit unintentionally, that the Vulcans shoot first with everyone else, not just the Klingons.

2: I have mixed feelings about Rainn Wilson as Harry Mudd. Part of that has to do with the actor being somewhat problematic, but I’m not going to get into that. The other part is, while his performance was certainly enjoyable to watch, as a lifelong Trekkie I’m a bit uncomfortable with the idea of Harry friggin’ Mudd being kinda scary. I mean, even scarier than Capt. Lorca, who I am pretty sure is on the verge of a total breakdown thanks to his untreated PTSD. That said, his (Mudd’s) second episode is, so far anyway, my favorite of the season. Definitely one of the better uses of the Moebius Loop I’ve seen (though not as good as Stargate SG-1′s “Window of Opportunity”, but what can ya do?)

3: The new look of the Klingons sucks and I hate it.

4: I didn’t like it at first, but the design of the title ship has grown on me.

5: In Lt. Stamets, Anthony Rapp has somehow managed to give us a chracter that, IMO anyway, is somehow both more annoying AND more likable than his Rent character.

6: Feminist critiques of this show about WOC not named Michael getting killed off left and right? Valid. Here’s hoping they cut that shit out in Season 2.

7: I really wish the Fanboys would stop bitching about the spore drive. Yes, we know they don’t use it in TOS and beyond. But that doesn’t make it a plot hole; there’s still a whole half season to go, and I bet by the end of it we’ll get a reason why the drive was discontinued. I don’t know if it’ll be a good reason. I certainly hope it is. But it will be a reason. So calm the fuck down.

8: For those people ready to write the show off completely based on the 8 episodes we’ve had so far, let’s just take a look at where the other 5 live-action Trek shows at this point in their first seasons.

TOS: This almost isn’t fair considering it was this show’s iconic status that allowed the others to exist in the first place, but allowing for both the production technologies and social norms of the time, we’ve got 7 good episodes, and 1 episode that can’t really be judged fairly because a lot of the series rules weren’t in place yet; hell, they hadn’t even locked down Kirk’s middle name. Sulu was in a blue shirt. We had no McCoy, Scotty, or Uhura. Obviously, I’m talking about “Where No Man Has Gone Before” here. So, we’ll call that a success rate of 7/8. TNG: As a kid, I loved all of these, but with the benefit of hindsight, there are no good episodes here. The Ferengi were introduced, but it was Deep Space Nine that saved that Trek species from ending up just a regrettable footnote. “Where No One Has Gone Before” (not to be confused with the TOS pilot) has some pretty visuals going for it, but that’s pretty much it. 0/8. DS9: The only episode from DS9′s first 8 I would call bad is the Q episode, but even that is saved from garbage by virtue of Sisko punching Q in the face. The Pilot’s the only good one of the bunch though, with the rest just being okay. So, we’ll go with 7/8, but with an asterisk. VOY: 2 mediocre episodes, plus 1 episode that introduced an interesting villain that the show sadly completely failed to utilize properly (the Vidiians). Neelix suffers a fair amount in that episode though so I’ll round up to Good. The rest were just plain bad though. 3/8. ENT: One of the first episodes gave us Jeffrey Combs as Shran. Granted, the episode itself wasn’t that great, but later on they were able to do more with Shran, and eventually give us a greater glimpse at Andorian culture, so I’ll be generous and give that one a good score. The rest of the episodes were just varying degrees of bad (with “Unexpected” crossing over into full-on offensive). 1/8. And that’s me being generous mind you. So how does DSC stack up, at least in my opinion? Well, apart from “The Vulcan Hello” and “Battle at the Binary Stars,” there hasn’t been an episode I’ve truly disliked, and even then I didn’t hate them. I was more disappointed than anything else. So, when you add up the episodes that were okay with those that I liked (so far only 3), you get a First 8 Episodes score of 4/8.

So, sorting by rank you get (remember, this ONLY applies to the first 8 episodes of the first season, not the series overall); TOS: 7/8 DS9: 7/8 DSC: 4/8 VOY: 3/8 ENT: 1/8 TNG: 0/8

9: Oh, I forgot to mention this; he can have his douchey moments, but overall, I like Saru. Though I imagine him being played by Doug Jones has a fair amount to do with it.

10: This scene didn’t bother me at all.

If they were going to do the F-bomb, at least it was in the context of an exclamation of excitement, and not something sexual or insulting.

In Conclusion: It’s not a great show. But it’s not the dumpster fire much of the Internet would have you believe it is. I think it can be a good show though and hopefully, CBS will take at least some of the feedback they’re getting from critics and fans into account. Not all though, because honestly some of the criticisms are bullshit.

All that said, CBS All Acces is terrible and this show should be on NetFlix seeing as NetFlix subscribers already helped pay for the series to begin with and it is flat out gross that people who already paid for this show once (by way of their NetFlix subscriptions) can’t actually view it (in the U.S. anyway) without paying again. THAT criticism of the show is not bullshit. It is one I 100% agree with.

#star trek discovery #Thoughts #how long before some assholes decides i'm not a real trekkie because of this post?

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thesinglesjukebox · 7 years ago

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TAYLOR SWIFT - LOOK WHAT YOU MADE ME DO [4.39] Man, look what she made US do.

Elisabeth Sanders: Here is the thing about Taylor Swift: anybody that has truly loved (despite themselves) Taylor Swift has done so because of her sharp, frightening edges, because of the way in which she is the mean girl in the midst of a panic attack, because she's petty, because she's crazy, because she believes in things and at the same time when those things aren't as they seem wants to crush them in the palm of her hand. Any interpretation of Taylor Swift that doesn't incorporate this is simply bad research. In 2006: "Go and tell your friends that I'm obsessive and crazy--There's no time for tears / I'm just sitting here, planning my revenge." In 2010: "And my mother accused me of losing my mind /But I swore I was fine /You paint me a blue sky /And go back and turn it to rain /And I lived in your chess game /But you changed the rules every day /Wondering which version of you I might get on the phone, tonight /Well I stopped picking up and this song is to let you know why" In 2012: "Maybe we got lost in translation / maybe I asked for too much / or maybe this thing was a masterpiece / til you tore it all up." And finally, in 2014, a culmination of the songwriting combined with the publicity--well, just listen to "Blank Space." I can't quote the whole thing. At the time it was brilliant, a parody that dipped just enough into the real, a joke about both media extrapolation and actual content. But we're past the time for parody. It came, it was good, it went. The criticism still followed, for other reasons, for deeper reasons, for real reasons. Along with, I'm sure, superficial ones. But if "Blank Space" was Taylor Swift's petty Gone Girl fan fiction, "Look What You Made Me Do" is the unfortunate chapter in which we have to acknowledge that the fiction was never that self-aware, and that an excavation of complication, when confronted with complicated times, sometimes reveals not a complex sympathetic maybe-villain, but simply a person not equipped to be making mass art right now. Taylor's pettiness, her villainy, her strangeness, has always been her most interesting feature. Maybe, now, too many years into seeing but not seeing it, it's just--not that interesting anymore. She's not your friend, and she's not your enemy, she's just--well. As she says, "I don't trust nobody and nobody trusts me." I think that might be her final truth. [3]

Stephen Eisermann: I've never been a big Taylor Swift fan -- I like her music well enough, but there was always something about the details she painted and the cards she showed that it felt a bit... made-up. Still, I always had a weird feeling that Taylor and I had very similar personalities and personal life trajectories (bear with me) and this song reinforces that. When I was younger and "straight" (16-18), I was very quiet, nice to a fault, and introverted. Thanks to my name and skin color, a lot of (racist) older people always said it was hard to believe I was a Mexican teenager because I was so quiet, polite, well-spoken and bright. Much like Swizzle during the "Taylor Swift" and "Fearless" era, I was considered naive but genuine-hearted and people loved to love my niceness. However, I soon started coming to terms with my sexuality and started being a bit more open with myself and others about who I truly was, just like we saw glimpses of pure pop and more evocative lyrics in "Speak Now" and "Red." I still built stories and a narrative that painted me as more mystery than gay, just as Taylor toed the line between squeaky clean young adult and Lolita, but I was a bit more willing to explore. Soon after, the inevitable happened and I finally had my first NSFW encounter with a man, and was even MORE willing to be who I really was. I let my gay flag fly and if people asked, I wouldn't dance around the question, but own who I was. Taylor didn't hesitate one bit when she announced 1989 would be a pop album in its entirety, and I didn't so much was stutter when telling questioning friends my realization. Still, a part of me hid things from ass-backwards family members and people who I knew wouldn't "understand," just as Sweezy continued to play the victim card to hold on to some of the innocence that was slowly falling through her fingertips like sand on the last day of vacation. However, there is only so much sand one hand can hold and BAM -- my family became aware of my sexuality and Taylor was exposed. I was at a crossroads -- do I drop my family and throw out ALL the dirty chisme I had accumulated over the years at different holidays, effectively exposing the most bigoted family members, or do I keep my mouth shut and weather the hate, being all the stronger for it? I wanted so badly to be vindictive and evil, but I choose the high road for reasons I'm not really sure I can effectively communicate. Taylor, however, has opted for the darker route. "LWYMMD" lacks detail, yes, but it's intentional. I just... I just know it. She has secrets up her sleeves she will soon reveal -- nobody willingly takes the villainous role without ammo, and Taylor has been MANY things throughout her career, but unprepared is not one of them. This song is calculated, petty, unnecessary, and very much beneath her, but it allows me to live vicariously through her and I want her to drag her detractors just as I want to drag my family members through the mud they continue to think I belong in. And just as my bigoted family members will get theirs, so will Taylor's enemies, I'm sure. [10]

Will Rivitz: "I think I have a part to play in this drama, and I have chosen to be the villain. Every good story needs a bad guy, don't you think?" -Lorelei Granger, Frindle (Andrew Clements, 1996) [9]

David Moore: Phonogram: The Immaterial Girl Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie (Image Comics, 2015) Synopsis: Years ago, a young woman obsessed with music videos and mythic pop celebrity made a deal with the King Behind the Screen -- she gave up half of herself to gain the mystical power needed to eventually lead a coven of music obsessives. Now the deal's gone sour, and her darker, sacrificed self has switched places to destroy the coven with an ill-advised electroclash revival. [7]

Alfred Soto: Electronic swoops, piano on the bridge, lots of boom boom bap -- this single could be the new St. Vincent, or, to return to once upon a long time ago, to a track from Lorde's estimable Melodrama, a flop also largely co-written with Jack Antonoff. A skeptic of her first singles since 2009, I approached "Look..." with caution; on the evidence she's anticipated this caution. "I don't trust nobody and nobody trusts me," she sings while soap opera strings add the requisite melodrama, and for a moment I thought she sang "I don't trust my body." I've never cared about biographical parallels in any art, especially in popular art where the insistence feels like conscription; the blank space where she wants the audience to write his/her/whatever's name is a sop to us. Less persuasive is the talk-sung part informing her audience that the "old Taylor" is "dead," as if Fearless fans needed an 808 dug into their faces. It will sound terrific on the radio. I'll skip it when I buy the album. [5]

Crystal Leww: The emerging narrative of Jack Antonoff as the next king of pop production is perplexing because his resume is honestly pretty thin. It's unclear what Antonoff actually brings to the table other than an amplification factor; Antonoff's songs have only been as good as his collaborators. This works when artists are working with a strong vision they can execute against -- e.g., CRJ's "in love and feeling like a teen again" on "Sweetie," Lorde's earnest wide open heartbreak on Melodrama. It is damning if artists are falling into their worst habits. Taylor Swift is a very solid songwriter -- it's nearly impossible to have the kind of career she had in country music if you're not -- but it always falls back on specificity, the emotional connection that she can forge with her fans when she knows what she's trying to convey. "Look What You Made Me Do" fails because it's unclear what it's about -- is this song about haters? Kim and Kanye? Her exes? The media? -- and Antonoff using Right Said Fred makes it all seem very clunky. The song sounds like it could have really leaned into a psycho ex-girlfriend vibe, but it's not self-aware, not funny, not sure of itself. Ultimately, "Look What You Made Me Do" isn't awful, but it's not catchy, which is its worst sin of all. Taylor Swift's still a decent songwriter ("Better Man" was great; "I've been looking sad in all the nicest places" almost made up for that Zayn collab), but this isn't even yucky -- it's just kinda boring. [4]

Katherine St Asaph: The curse continues. Maybe it's that the past month I've been listening to very little but "Anatomy of a Plastic Girl" by The Opiates and "Justice" by Fotonovela and Sarah Blackwood, and here's the exact conceptual midpoint. I've heard comparisons to electroclash, NIN, mall emo, Lorde, but I hear more Jessie Malakouti or Britney on Original Doll: frantic tabloid petulance, slightly updated with a "Problem" anti-chorus, but otherwise things I like. Otherwise, Swift's style has not changed: self-referential ("actress" and "bad dreams" shuffle her images to make her the heel) and threaded with subliminals ("tilted stage" is literal, "kingdom keys" keeps up with the konsonance) Just as "Dear John" parodied its subject's lite-blooz guitar, "Look What You Made Me Do" parodies the austere tracks of 808s and Heartbreak on, like "Love Lockdown" in curdled Midwestern vowels: trading soporific for loaded. The song has inevitably become about everything but itself. Her milkshake duck brought all the boys to the yard, and they're like, this is garb, and I'm like, the Internet deplorables haven't adopted this in any better faith than they did Depeche Mode; any of pop's myriad songs about the tabloids would read as "political" if transplanted into 2017 (is Lindsay Lohan's "Rumours" about FAKE NEWS?), and Swift's suffocatingly prescriptive "Southern" "values" pre-Red were as politically suspect as this, and more insidious. The next salvo of attack: its rollout being unprecedentedly gimmicky and exploitative, never mind how aforementioned Depeche Mode did the same pre-order thing, or Britney Spears upholstered-carpetbombed "Pretty Girls" in everyone's Ubers, or Rihanna's Talk That Talk was launched with gamified "missions", or Srsly Legit Band Arcade Fire spent months on fake Stereogum posts and fake Ben and Jerry's. Doesn't help that when Taylor is bad, she's stunningly, loudly bad; the second verse, in its magnification of the cringiest parts of "Shake It Off" and "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together," seems to last forever. (The phone call is fine, though; no one had a problem with "How Ya Doin'" or, like, "Telephone.") It's no good for catharsis, definitely not relatable, maybe on purpose: like being too sexy for your shirt, all you feel is cold. [6]

Katie Gill: On the one hand, Taylor using the language of abusers in the chorus of her song is clueless at best and worrisome at worst. On the other hand, blatantly riffing off of "I'm Too Sexy" is a surprisingly smart choice for a chorus and I'm shocked that I can't think of anyone who's tried it before with this level of success. But on the one hand, for a song about how she's getting smarter and harder, the lyrics don't reflect that, giving us some petty Regina George level nonsense instead of anything remotely resembling depth or nuance. But then again, that snake is pouring Taylor Swift some tea and all the Taylor Swifts are beating up the other Taylor Swifts in a battle royale hahaha this video is so amazingly dumb. I guess I'll split the difference and give it a [5]

Alex Clifton: I've always wanted give-no-fucks Taylor Swift, but I'm dying for context, as this album (and sing) will sink or swim based entirely on the narrative she creates. She's clearly setting herself on fire in order to rebrand herself, although I question her self-awareness. The music video indicates yes, with a brilliant 30-second scene featuring various Taylors mocking each other. Yet "Look What You Made Me Do" is also curiously passive, with a reactionary title and a bored chorus--more a sign of privilege and status. The ambiguity between honest, wronged victim and villainous persona here is intriguing, especially given Swift's penchant for earnestness; obviously she cannot be both, but the tension drives the song. The song itself is a mixed bag; Swift returns to the messy rapping last heard on "Shake It Off" with an equally cringey spoken-word interlude, but her voice is simutaneously delicate and confident as she comes out swinging. While I love seeing Blood!Swift writing a hitlist of enemies like an evil Santa Claus and the hint of confronting the less attractive/more honest parts of her role in the spotlight, only time will tell whether this is truly a playful new direction or more of the same old tune. (Also, what did we make her do? The answer is classic Swift, diabolically obvious: we made her write a song about it.) [7]

Jessica Doyle: A week on I still hear more self-loathing than anything else. Nothing the supposed New Taylor offers up comes off particularly convincingly; there's no glee in her reinvention. Compare the way she rushes through honey-I-rose-up-from-the-dead when she once sounded like she was thoroughly enjoying Boys only want love when it's torture. She doesn't sound smarter, or harder; look what you made me do, when she's spent the last eighteen months making a point of not doing anything. There's no air in here, no space beyond the multiple annotated versions and multiple thinkpieces declaring her a walking horsebitch of the Trumpocalypse. Just Taylor Swift practicing telling herself to shut up, Taylor Swift wondering about karma, Taylor Swift reading Buzzfeed and taking careful notes, Taylor Swift unable to make a point about anything at all except Taylor Swift. You don't realize, when you're in the thick of it, that self-loathing is just as relentlessly, narrowly egotistical as any other kind of self-obsession. It gets old, finally. It wears you out. It wears everybody out. Right? Yes? Can we all agree to be worn out now? Are we going to allow her to move on? She can't rise up from the dead if we don't let her die first. [3]

Cassy Gress: There was a time when I thought 1989 pajama-parties-and-kittens Taylor was the "real Taylor." I don't know if that really was. What I do know is that trying to figure out who the "real Taylor" is, and arguing on the internet about it, is fucking exhausting. So much of her musical output has been autobiographical, or meant to sound generically autobiographical to women listeners; so much of her reads as "pussycat with claws." Sometimes she emphasizes the pussycat side, soft and vulnerable; "Look What You Made Me Do" is the claws side. But Taylor, who we know has the ability to be nuanced and evocative, is here transmitting her intent (to destroy Kanye, or Katy, or Hiddleston, or her old selves, or just to be the cleverest sausage) like a hammer to the skull. This, like much else about her, is exhausting to watch/listen to. I would much rather close the blinds and put on my headphones and watch GBBO reruns in my jammies. [2]

Olivia Rafferty: Washing in with the arrival of her sixth album are a tidal wave of thinkpieces on Swift, all set within the context of her A-list feuds, miscalculations and politics, or lack thereof. We've all sifted through stories of fake boyfriends, cheap shots and oblivious colonialism, and I'm going to speak for all of us when I say we probably should just all take a goddamn break from the vortex. I'm placing LWYMMD in a vacuum for now. Reaching into the embarrassing depths of my personal history, I can draw up two different past-Olivias who would be a perfect fit for this song. I'm gifting the verse, pre-chorus and middle eight to my 10-year-old self, and the chorus to my 17-year-old self. Olivia at 10 would lap up the overly-dramatic opening lines, the "I. Don't. Likes" and their thick punctuation. It's served with the attitude that would have made you want to stick on a crop top and pick up one of your tiny handbags to fling about during an ill-prepared dance routine -- no, Mum, it's not finished yet! And the moment of absolute pre-teen glory is the cheerleader delivery of the spoken half-verse, "the world moves on another day another drama drama," I can literally see the Beanie Baby music video re-enactment. All of these melodic aspects are playful but lack the precision or maturity you'd expect Swift to deliver on this "good girl grown up" song. When the chorus hits you suddenly mature into that 17 year-old whose friends-but-not-really-friends played that Peaches song at someone's house party. You could probably embarassingly attempt a slut-drop to it in your bedroom, pretending you're a dominatrix who's just split some milk on the floor. But the overall impression is that if Swift is trying to be naughty, sexy or dangerous, she's missed the mark a little. Now at 25 I'm listening and thinking that the chorus still snaps, but if this track was an attempt at sexualising Taylor in a way that's not been done before, it's only made it clear that she's still got a lot of growing up to do. [6]

Joshua Copperman: From the first bar chimes sound effect, I was worried, and I suppose my feelings didn't improve by the time the "tilted stage" line happened. On "Out Of The Woods", Antonoff and Swift brought out the best in each other (Jack's big choruses, Taylor's specific references), but on "Look What You Made Me Do", they bring out the worst (Jack's obnoxiousness, Taylor's pettiness.) Antonoff can do flamboyant earnestness, especially when it blends with Lorde's self-awareness and quirkiness; he just can't do dark and edgy. Or even campy, apparently: the glorious video mostly takes care of that, giving the song an intensity and glamour that it doesn't have nor deserve on its own. Yet even the video often misses the humor inherent in moments like the terrible rap in the second verse, or the already-infamous lift from "I'm Too Sexy". The ultimate effect is like John Green praising a burn of himself without realizing why the burn was deserved in the first place. In this case, it's one Taylor saying to another Taylor "there she goes, playing the victim, again", even though the preceding song couldn't even play the victim or villain well enough. [4]

Mo Kim: There was a time in my life when I looked up to Taylor Swift. I was eighteen once, clearing my throat of all the doubts that haunted it, and the only way I had to express myself was through songs about slights that exploded like firecrackers. But a voice with that strength comes with responsibility. Sometimes you need to stop reveling in the volume of your own speech to see the platform of power you stand on; otherwise you might build a version of yourself on the rickety foundation of innocence only to find it crashing down. On "Look What You Made Me Do," she's still trying for the pottery shard hooks that once made her so important to petty queer kids like me. It works in bits and spurts: that second verse is a bucket of water and an emergency siren to the face, and the pre-chorus utilizes a sinister piano and eerie vocal production to great effect. Too bad, then, that the flimsy chorus and winky-face lyrics cave in on themselves more easily than almost anything she's written before (like a house of cards, some might say). That it so blatantly abjects responsibility onto her audience, however, is the biggest point against it: instead of personability, or at least the pretense of it, there's just layer after layer of metanarrative. Instead of a telling that acknowledges her history -- a complicated, troubling, rich one -- there's just Queen Bee Taylor, sneering over a landfill heap of old Taylors before she discards of all her past selves. I used to hold stadiums in my chest as I listened to the stories Swift spun; now I feel like the lights have finally crackled out, and here she is, dithering in the debris of her crumbling empire, and here we are, looking down. [5]

Josh Love: If Taylor wants to go in, that's her prerogative, but because this is a song that none of us plebes can actually relate to, it's only fair to judge it solely based on whether it goes hard, and I'm sorry to report that Taylor has no bars. "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together" and "Shake It Off" seemed like wild stabs at first too, but they possessed an inclusivity that's curdled into Yeezus-level petulance here. There's nothing here to suggest she's capable of making Reputation her Lemonade. At least the video gives me some hope that maybe she realizes she's a complete dork. [3]

Anthony Easton: This is the hardest for me to grade, because I still don't know if it is good, but it is constructed in such a way that people like me (critic, liberal elitist, homosexual) are pressed to have opinions. It steals with such quickness, and with such weirdness that the opinions give birth to other opinons, somewhere between a snake hall and the ouroboros she already quotes. It sounds like Lorde, it samples Peaches, it plays with electroclash, which was a genre that was already heavily recursive. It tries to be without feeling, but it feels all too deeply. That is enough to spend time with, that is enough to unpack. It sounds like Lorde because they are both working with Jack Antonoff. Who is cribbing from who here? Is Lorde playing like Swift, is Swift cribbing Lorde's lankness, are both pulling outside of their influence, by the commercial, mainstreamed weirdness of Antonoff? Swift was always pretty; her main skill was using guile to a stiletto edge. This edges on ugliness, but it is still "ugly." Women like Peaches or the cabaret singer Bridgett Everett know how to sing, have the ambition to sing well, but chose to reject good taste for social and political power. Taylor playing with being ugly, with being flat, with kind of half singing, with no longer being the cheerleader, is not a formal refusal of beauty as a political means but has the louche boredom of a hanger-on, with maybe a bit of anger at not being cool enough. It's a capital blankness that raids and doesn't contribute. Part of the ugliness of Peaches, part of the joy of electroclash, is not only how it absorbs the amoral around it--Grace Jones, The Normal, Joy Division, Klaus Nomi--but that the sex of it works so hard. The fucking is less pleasure than hard work--the grit of dirt and sweat and bodies. When Swift quotes Peaches, she is quoting the reduction of pop to a stripping down of bodies through a formal aesthetic choice. When she quotes noir, it is an attempt to self-consciously think of herself as a body who is capable of doing real damage. Swift flatters herself as someone whose suicide could be a nihilist aesthetic gesture. She flatters herself as a fatale. She's still the kid who does damage, and plays naif. You can't be pretty and ugly. You can't be a naif fatale. You can't pretend not to care about gossip and make your career about what people think of you. You can only be so much of a feminist and rest on your producers this much, and you cannot play at louche blankness if it is so obvious how much work you are doing. This might suggest that I hate the song, but I can't. Swift doing an "ugly" heel turn fills me with poptimist longing, and I want to hear more. [9]

Eleanor Graham: There is a bit in an old Never Mind The Buzzcocks where Simon Amstell says to Amy Winehouse, "We used to be close! On Popworld, we were close." And Amy Winehouse runs her hand down his face and says, half-pityingly and to thunderous laughter, "She's dead." I don't really know why I'm bringing this up except to illustrate that a woman killing off her former self, against Joan Didion's worldly advice, has a kind of power. The crudest hyperbole. Like Amy in Gone Girl. You don't like this thing about me? You wish I was different? Well, guess what -- I'M DEAD! This line, which Swift delivers with the manic kittenish venom of Reese Witherspoon's character in Big Little Lies, is the only redeeming feature of "Look What You Made Me Do." And yet -- even as someone who has openly thrown politics to the wind in the face of such forever songs as "Style", "State of Grace" and "All Too Well" -- this single is too hallucinatory to be a flat disappointment. Quite aside from the Right Said Fred debacle, the "aw" is reminiscent of Julia Michaels, the second verse of a lobotomised Miz-Biz era Hayley Williams, the production ideas of a mid-2000s CBBC show, and the whole thing of a middle-aged man in a wig playing Sky Ferreira in an SNL skit. Disorientating. Almost euphorically horrible. Say what you want about T Swift, but who else is serving this level of pop Kafkaism in 2017? [2]

Maxwell Cavaseno: Weirdly, everything works for me sorta kinda with the second verse. The percussion thuds in the distance just a little more effectively, and Taylor's whining drone of a rap screams up into that high-pitched melodrama, only to crash and burn into an anemic "Push It," as written by someone who forgot Lady Gaga once could fool us into thinking she was funny. Past that subsection and prior, however, the record truly never clicks. You get the sense that Swift, someone so eagerly to seize the moment, doesn't realize that the horror campiness plays her hand too hard. [2]

Edward Okulicz: Saved from being her worst ever single by an out-of-nowhere, brilliant, Lorde-esque pre-chorus (and the existence of both "Welcome to New York" and "Bad Blood"), this is pretty thin gruel for the first single off a first album in three years. Remember how dense her songwriting used to be? See how clumsy it is on this. Taylor Swift's devolution from essential pop star to somewhat annoying head of a cult of personality is complete. At least there'll be better to come on the album. I hope. [4]

Rachel Bowles: I am guessing (and hoping) that "Look What You Made Me Do" is Reputation's "Shake It Off," a comparatively mediocre introduction to what is ostensibly a good album with some timeless songs ("Style" in particular on 1989). Functionally the same, both songs have to reintroduce Taylor in a new iteration to a cultural narrative she cannot be excluded from, both heavy on self-awareness and light on her signature musical flair. Where "Shake It Off" felt anodyne and compressed, "LWYMMD" is beautifully stripped back, chopping between lowly sung and rhythmically spoken word over a synthesiser, strings or a beat -- verses, bridges and middle 8's passing, though ultimately building to nothing -- the chorus of "LWYMMD" being the swirling void at its centre, one that cannot hold, however fashionable it is to build then strip to anti-climax in EDM and pop. What did Taylor do? The absence of her critical action, the bloody, thirsted-for revenge, can only leave us unsatisfied, like watching a Jacobean tragedy on tilted stage without the final release of death for all. What's left is a painful, public death of media citations of Taylor, played over and over, joylessly. [5]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: 1989 is Taylor Swift's worst album, but that shouldn't necessarily be seen as a bad thing. For an artist whose vocal melodies were able to effectively drive a song forward, it was a bit odd hearing her rely so heavily on a song's instrumentation to do all the heavy lifting. Additionally, the painterly lyrics that drew me to her work in the first place were mostly abandoned for ones more beige (simply compare the most memorable lyrics from 1989 and any other album and it becomes very obvious). It didn't work out for the most part, but I was fine with the mediocrity. And considering how stylistically diverse the album was, I very much saw it as a stepping stone for a future project. Which is why I'm completely unsurprised by the doubling down of "Look What You Made Me Do" -- it's a lead single that's heavily tied to her media perception, finds her abandoning any sense of subtlety, and utilizes amelodic singing to put greater emphasis on the instrumentation itself. It's conceptually brilliant for all these reasons, but it doesn't come together all too well. Namely, the lyrics are almost laughably bad and distract from how physical the song can be, and her calculated attempts at announcing her self-awareness have reached the point of utter parody. That the music video ends with Swift essentially explaining the (unfunny) joke only confirms this. [3]

Rebecca A. Gowns: Every new Taylor Swift single is Vizzini from "The Princess Bride," letting us know that she knows that we know that she knows that we know that she is Taylor Swift, and since she knows that we know (etc. etc. etc.), she can be confident drinking the goblet in front of her, since she knows that she switched around the goblets when we weren't looking, and she's laughing like she's clearly outsmarted us, but little does she know that we've been building up an immunity to her odorless white poison for years. [2]

William John: The hyper-specificity is gone. There are no references here to paper airplane necklaces or dead roses in December or in-jokes written on notes left on doors. In their place, platitudes abound, choruses are forgotten, "time" rhymes with "time", and "drama" with "karma". The latter is pursued with a maniacal intensity, the parody spelled out rather brilliantly in "Blank Space" quickly undoing itself. Rather obviously, "Look What You Made Me Do" does not exist in a vacuum, and the timing and nature of its release are what render it particularly dismaying. Its author, not playing to her previously demonstrated strengths, is seemingly at great pains to fuel fire to certain celebrity feuds, all the while insisting on her exclusion from them. It wouldn't matter so much were she to denounce some of her new fans with the same fervour, but for some reason this era she's opted out of interviews, perhaps at the time when some explanation driven by someone outside her inner circle is most needed. It's one way to forge a reputation, indeed. I do like the way she screams "bad DREAMS!" though. [3]

Leonel Manzanares: An auteur whose entire schtick is about framing herself as a victim, now emboldened by the current climate to address "the haters" using the language of abuse, embracing villainhood. No wonder she's considered the ambassador of Breitbart Pop. [4]

Thomas Inskeep: "Don't you understand? It's your fault that I had to go and become a mean girl!" Yeah, okay, whatever, Ms. White Privilege. [2]

Anjy Ou: For the woman who singularly embodies white female privilege, it's kind of embarrassing that she doesn't have the range. [2]

Will Adams: If you had asked me three months ago, "Hey, between 'Swish Swish' and whatever Taylor Swift ends up putting out this year, which is the more embarrassing diss track?", I wouldn't have thought I'd need to think about the answer this much. [2]

Anaïs Escobar Mathers: "Taylor, you're doing amazing, sweetie," said no one. [1]

Sonia Yang: With an artist as polarizing as Swift, it's easy to make the conversation a messy knot about the real life conflicts she's had, but I find it more interesting to tune that all out and focus on the simplicity of her work as a standalone. "Look What You Made Me Do" is Swift at her most coldly bitter yet, but betrays the resignation of long buried hurt. It's "Blank Space" but with none of the fantastical fun; it toes the line between wary irony and jadedly "becoming the mask." Most telling is the dull echo of the song title in place of a real hook, which is actually a favorite point of mine. Reality doesn't always go out with a bang; it's more likely for one to reach a gloomy conclusion than stumbling upon a glorious epiphany. Musically, I'd call this an awkward transition phase for Taylor -- it's not her worst song ever, but it's admittedly underwhelming compared to the heights we've seen from her. However, I've sat through questionable attempts at reinvention from my favorite artists before and I'm still optimistic about the potential for Swift's growth after this. [7]

Jonathan Bradley: There is nothing Taylor Swift does better than revenge, and this is not that. This is the first Swift single that exists only in conversation with Swift's media-created persona -- even "Blank Space" turned on internally resolved narrative beats and emotional moments -- but it offers little for those who hear pop through celebrity news updates, not speakers or headphones. Compare "Look What You Made Me Do" to "Mean," a pointed and hurt missive that scarified its targets with dangerous care; this new single, however, barely extends beyond the bounds of Swift's own skull. "I don't like your little games," levels Swift, her voice venom, "the role you made me play." The central character -- the only character -- in this narrative is Swift, and she enacts an immolation. Her nastiness is the etiolated savagery of Drake in his more recent and loutish incarnation: lonely and lordly, "just a sicko, a real sicko when you get to know me." "I got smarter, I got harder in the nick of time" could be Jesse Lacey on Deja Entendu but sunk into the abyss of The Devil and God -- only it's delivered over ugly, the Knife-like electro clanging. The line that succeeds is classic Swift in its brittle theatrics: "Honey, I rose up from the dead; I do it all the time." The spoken-word bridge -- the song's most blatantly campy and deliciously gothic moment -- acts as a witchy incantation, walking most precariously the line between winking vamp and public tantrum. Swift has brought her monstrous birth to the world's light; contra the title, what it is we've made her do isn't even apparent yet. [8]

Lauren Gilbert: I was 18 when "Fearless" was released, and listened to it on repeat my first term of undergrad, feeling freedom and joy and hope. I listened to "We Are Never Getting Back Together" on repeat in an on-again-off-again relationship that should have ended years before it did. I listened to 1989 over and over again after recovering from a nervous breakdown and for the first time, really, truly focused on choosing a life of joy. I should be Here For This. I am not. Pop music thrives on specificity, and Taylor Swift in particular has made a career of writing about hyperspecific situations. This is... generic; it could be sung by Katy Perry, by a female Zayn, by Kim K herself. Taylor offers no hooks to her own life here, and perhaps that's not a flaw; female songwriters have the right to choose not to expose their own lives, and to write the same generic pop song nonsense that everyone else does. But as someone who bought into the whole TSwift authenticity brand -- even while I recognized it as a brand, even while I knew that she was a multimillionaire looking out for her own interests first and foremost, even as she was the definition of a Problematic Fav -- I can't really say I care that much about new Taylor. I could fault Taylor's politics and personality -- and I'm sure other blurbs will -- but the primary failing here isn't Taylor's non-music life. It's that there's no feeling here; it feels as cynical as the line "another day, another drama". Next. [4]

Andy Hutchins: "I'm Too Sexy" + "Mr. Me Too" - basically any of the elements that made "Mr. Me Too" compelling = "Ms. I'm Sexy, Too." [4]

Tara Hillegeist: Let's leave this double-edged sword hang here for a minute: Taylor Swift's personhood is irrelevant to the reality that she is a better creator than she ever gets credit for. Since her earliest days of the demo CDs she'd like to keep buried, Taylor Swift has never been less interesting or more terrible on the ears than when her songs are forcibly positioned as autobiography. For a decade she has cultivated an audience of lovers and haters alike that never felt her--or truly felt for her--because she never wanted them to know her, driven to own her brand even as she's deliberately averred to own up to what lies behind it. Witness the framing of an Etch-a-Sketch of a song like "Look What You Made Me Do": she releases a song about vengeful self-definition mere weeks after finally winning a years-long case against a man who sexually assaulted her and tried to sue her to silence over it on the sheer strength of her own self-representation, and the air charges itself with intimations that she instead meant it for Katy Perry, whose flash-in-the-pan "friendship" she publicly and memorably disowned in a bad song about bad blood an entire album ago, or perhaps Kim Kardashian-West, a woman whose "feud" with her arguably began with Taylor Swift's attempt to paint herself as the victim in an argument with Kim's husband but ended inarguably and decisively in Kim's favor. To claim someone would mangle her targets so ineptly even the conspiracy theorists have to resort to half-guesses and deliberate misquotes to draw out the barbs is a claim it's especially ridiculous to pin on a musician like Taylor Swift, a control freak who once built a labyrinth of personal references into an album full of songs about protagonists nothing like herself just to prove a point to anyone listening to them that closely about how sturdy the songs would be without knowing any of it. A public conversation that misses the point this drastically can only occur if there's a deliberately blank space where any sense of or interest in the person it's about could exist. There is a hole where this most powerfully self-determining popstar lives where a human life has never been glimpsed--because she cast that little girl and her frail voice aside years ago in search of something altogether more influential than such a weak vessel could ever hold. The girl who cajoled her family into spending enough Merrill-Lynch money to cover for her inability to sing until she had enough professional training to sing the songs she wanted to put to her name was never the girl who could truly be a flight risk with a fear of falling, was never the girl who never did anything better than revenge. But she wanted to be the girl who sang the words for that girl, who put her words in that girl's mouth, more than anything else in the world. She staked her name on nothing less than her ability to capitalize on the reputation she acquired. The Taylor Swift of Fearless and Speak Now was a Taylor Swift who believed she could be someone else in your mind, a songwriter dexterous enough to slip between gothic pop, americana-infused new wave, and pop-punk piss-offs without shaking that crisply machine-tooled Pennsylvania diction. A decade on, she's learned a lesson enough women before her already learned it's shocking she wasn't ready for it: when you're a girl and you make something about being a girl, everyone thinks you just had yourself in mind. The proof that she was more than that--more than the songs on the radio, you might say--was always there; it wasn't hidden, it wasn't obscured. But from Red onwards that Taylor began to die; a straighter Taylor Swift emerged in more ways than just her hair, all the kinks ironing themselves out in favor of her remodeling herself into a different sort of someone else's voice. Where once stood a Taylor Swift who sang for the sake of seeing her words sung by someone else's mouth back to her, there now stood a Taylor Swift who sang everyone else's words about her back to them. Tabloids cannot resurrect a life that a woman never lived, and no amount of retrospective sleight of hand about the girl she might have lied about being can hide the truth that neither can she. Conspiracy theories only flourish when people treat the mystery of human motives like a jigsaw puzzle waiting to be solved--ignoring that she already made it clear that was, still and always, the wrong answer to the questions she wouldn't let them ask. She wanted fame, she wanted a reputation; she wanted them on terms she defined; she never wanted anything else half as much as she wanted that. She has used every means available to her to earn them. Her awkward adolescence took a backseat to her life's dream of conquering America's radio. It's no shock, then, that all this gossip-mongering rings as hollow as a crown. The messy melodrama of Southern sympathy and thin-voiced warbles that defined the sweethearted ladygirls of generations before her and beside her and will define those that come after her, the sloppy humanities of Britney and Dolly and Tammy and Leann and Kesha Rose; these fumbling honesties, these vulnerabilities have never been tools in Taylor's narrative repertoire the way she uses the white girlhood she shares with them has been. She owned her protagonists' anxieties; but those songs have never defined her. This was always the moral to the story of Taylor Swift, to anyone--condemning or compassionate--who cared to really hear it: behind her careful compositions and obsessive pleas, Taylor Swift was never interested in making herself a real person at all. That would have cost her everything she ever wanted. And we, the Cicerone masses, ought very well to ask ourselves, before we let that double-edged sword finally fall: would it have been any more worth it, to anyone, if she had been? [2]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox ]

#Taylor Swift #Look What You Made Me Do #reputatio

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sevenluckysevens · 7 years ago

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RULES: List five tropes applicable to your character, then tag others to do the same.(Tropes Wiki)

REPOST! DO NOT REBLOG.

Tagged by: @samurai-esquire Tagging: uhh idk who’s been tagged already. @revcnite, @amightyfinebartender, @pepper-green, @voxcordis, @hiddenweaponuserkun

Affably Evil: There are villains who are Affably Evil. There is absolutely nothing separating them from being normal, polite people except for the fact that they want to Take Over the World or use human souls to power their Artifact of Doom. They're not the Stepford Smiler or the Bitch in Sheep's Clothing— their affability is a genuine part of their personality, not a mask. If they have underlings, expect them to be a Benevolent Boss. In one way, they're the opposite of an Anti-Hero. They may Pet the Dog on occasion, but won't hesitate to kick it with steel-toed boots the next second if it helps them accomplish their Evil Plan. They may well be a Villain with Good Publicity because, after all, being evil doesn't mean you have to be anti-social. If this trope gets exaggerated, this villain will invite the hero out to tea, offer them a favorite dish, talk friendly, try to appeal to the hero's better nature, and convince the heroes that the villain's plan isn't worth getting involved in or is even worth joining.

He Who Fights Monsters: Usually, not quite a villain, but they act antagonistically enough that they're little better. Something has happened to our Fallen Hero: his village was destroyed, his friends killed, his puppy roasted on an open spit, his bike stolen, whatever. All that matters is that It's Personal, and he feels that the law just isn't suitable enough (or has become too corrupt and ignorant) to be of any use to him in settling the matter. He may justify his actions by claiming that it's Justice he's after, not vengeance, but anyone with half a brain can easily see that he's out for revenge... unfortunately, we can also see that the more he hunts the cause of his woes, the more he takes on the villain's personality and mannerisms—something that our "hero" is too blinded by his single-minded goal to realize. (Side note: I feel like this trope is WAY OVERUSED and it irritates me to even try to apply it, but also, I feel like Gant.... like....... committs an impulsive murder to catch a criminal and then committed a murder to cover up that murder which is like.......... the entire story that we are given for Joe Darke’s actions.............. and no one in canon says “he who fights monsters Blah Blah Blah” and no one in canon compares him to Joe Darke, which, I think, is what makes this work. because it’s. It’s LITERALLY what happened.)

Large Ham: A ridiculously larger-than-life character, public speaker, or orator full of charisma, energy, joie de vivre, and poetically powerful speeches with dramatic gestures that can devastate a scene to a billion pieces and transform even the most humdrum scene into the most GRANDIOSE. Often played by a guest star with an Internet Movie Database listing longer than the rest of the cast put together. They usually lack an indoor voice, and greatly relish badass boastings where they will punctuate and emphasize EVERYTHING. The first line from the Large Ham will be dramatic, portentous, often just before the act break and can almost always be replaced with: "Did somebody order A LARGE HAM?!" Try it at home; it's great fun.

Opportunistic Bastard: The Opportunistic Bastard doesn't have a plan, or at least not a clearly outlined one. He may have a vague goal that he's working towards, but when it comes to getting there, he's winging it. Other times the Opportunistic Bastard doesn't even have that going for him, and just latches onto other people's schemes in the name of making as much short term profit as he can. As the name suggests, characters like this excel at grabbing onto the opportunities that others present. Unlike The Chessmaster, who often fails when things don't go according to plan, the Opportunistic Bastard typically rolls well with unexpected results, exploiting every new circumstance to his own advantage. Where they tend to suffer is in the long term—a good opportunist can keep his head above water on any given day, but is ultimately going to crash and burn because they lack the vision to stay in it for the long haul. A particularly capable Opportunistic Bastard might actually be able to give the impression of being a Chessmaster, due to their ability to adapt to new situations, but even then, they are liable to paint themselves into a corner due to their lack of forethought. Opportunists of this type are usually motivated only by their own self-interest. (Side note: Literally fight me, whoever put Damon Gant down as The Chessmaster in TV Tropes’s character page.)

Meaningful Name: (You all know what a meaningful name is so I’m just going to bring in this paragraph from the TV Tropes page for him, because his name is fucking badass.) Damon is probably a pun on demon. The first kanji of "Kaiji" is "sea" (he brings up swimming a lot), and his name as a whole might allude to a Chinese proverb: "You can pick on the mountains, but don't pick on the sea [because the sea is merciless]". "Gant" (and "Ganto") come from the French word for glove, which he is always seen wearing. Marshall states during his testimony that the murderer wore gloves.

#also i always forget about meme gant and then i see what anyone has to say about him and im just. SIGH

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raziakhatunblr · 4 years ago

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Maplestory private server

Is it safe? Let us understand the background and distinctive contents of private servers.

Maplestory private host

It helps MapleStory fans better enjoy the hard work involved with constructing successful MapleStory servers. However, what about punishment?

But, there's absolutely no possible way for Nexon to prevent all private servers. They are continuing to be advanced from moving v55, v63, v72, and so on.

How Is a Private Server like Maplestory Made?

Nexon is observing everything

Furthermore, I wasted a lot of real cash to sell items to acquire more Mesos. Instead, I've more insults than Mesos from players. Such as"Shoo."

[caption id="attachment_1282" align="aligncenter" width="1920"] Maplestory Private waiter [/caption]

Mesos

I would like to compensate for the 3 years of the wasted moment on M.S. and get my movie/animation jobs finished at precisely the same moment.

And bypass all other personal server site rules. Plus, there's a skill known as"Super Dragon Roar" that really does %1000 damage to all animals on screen.

So for this, I will have to place my MMD project on hold for now. I have to wait until the introduction of MS2 so that I can port its models to MMD.

(this is where Time is Money. Much like E.G., construction of a condo in a boom-town; the employees need to build it quickly to allow more residents to proceed.)

Additionally, you're only allowed to perform a daily event once a character. That's like more kids than Octomom should feed.

Can not you compare with a v83 Personal Server right into a quit game console like the Gamecube or even the PlayStation 1?

How to Create a MapleStory Private Server [v83]

First, go to C:\

As soon as you find three folders, call all you want, but I will name them'ZenthosDev,'''Downloads,' and'MapleStoryV83' with this tutorial.

Download these programs/files.

(64bit)

MySQL Query Browser

JCE Unlimited Power Records

WampServer

LocalHost v83

ZenthosDev v83

MapleStory v83

W.Z. Files

Make certain you selected the appropriate variant matching your Operating System (O.S.) to avoid any difficulties.

Installations:

Before we start, make sure to extract everything if it's in a .rar format.

Installing MapleStory v83:

Install MapleStory with the download provided. It is a really straight forward installation. Follow the instructions.

Delete the following files/folders in the C:/MapleStoryV83 folder should they exist.

MapleStory.exe

Patcher.exe

GameLauncher.exe

shield (folder)

Installing WampServer:

Follow the directions and install it.

C:\Wamp

Don't be concerned about putting your email and these at the end. Just press finish.

Left-click it and click put Online'.

Then left-click it again and click on begin All Services.'

The Wamp icon must look totally green (if it is red or reddish, you have a problem).

Installing the MySQL Query Browser:

It is straightforward, runs the installation record, agrees to the conditions, and follow the instructions.

According to which system kind your computer as you may install 32bit or 64bit.

So set up the corresponding file.

For another simple installation, follow the directions.

Documents placement:

Paste them into these areas, overwrite when prompted.

(The (jdk1)/(jre7) folder version could differ. It is fine ). C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.7.0_01\jre\lib

3. C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.7.0_01\jre\lib\safety

Copy each of the folders and files within the ZenthosDev folder that we made before. So it seems in this way.

Now replicate the W.Z. folder within the ZenthosDev folder.

So it must look like this.

SQL setup:

Username: root

Then click on the document' button in the menu bar, and select open Directory...'.

Proceed to C:\enthosDev\SQL and open the document called'ZenthosDev.SQL.'

Following its opening, apply the file.

Preference installation:

(This component is optional if running the server to Receive your computer only)

You might also make any alterations to have the server to function how you need it.

Wait 10 minutes, and then your bat file must look similar to this.

Code:

ZenthosDev has started:

World Launched

Channel Launched

Is Maplestory’s personal server really safe?

I ask this question as somebody who has been part of the Maplestory personal server" community."

A personal server such as Maplestory has been around. So what is the issue?

There are just so many men and women who have played pre-BB Maple.

#howtoinstallmaplestoryprivateserver MMORPGPrivateserver maplestoryprivateserverillegal maplestory howtomakemaplestoryprivateserver maplestor

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nrip · 5 years ago

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How to Build a Community in the Healthcare Industry

When you think about how to build a community in the healthcare industry, and reduce the divide between medical and social circles, healthcare is the obvious connector.

Social engagement happens in medical circles of health care providers, researchers, and patients just as medical talks also happen in social circles.

This interplay happens because healthcare affects everyone.

Doctors don’t just talk among themselves in medical abstracts: they tweet, tag, and like or comment on each other’s posts.

Additionally, medical opinions and health perspectives are not confined to journals – they, too, are built around hashtag campaigns. Patient or public partnerships are now the way forward for medical research and cohort studies.

A study on “The Emerging World of Online Health Communities,” showed that:

…social outcomes sit alongside and sometimes above clinical ones. Where health care has a low tolerance of failure due to the consequences that can follow, online health communities thrive on stories of what went wrong and how people battled the system.

So how do you begin those conversations online, let alone build communities to converge in those conversations?

Here are 5 ways:

Listen and Engage with Your Audience

Health talk is everywhere, and the vast majority is online where they seek solutions and community support for health-related concerns:

online forums

health blogs

educational platforms

social media

To stay relevant and reach these audiences, the healthcare industry needs to meet consumers where they are: social media.

Use the communicative power on social networks to raise awareness and counter misinformation, provide patient support, for public health monitoring.

As you listen in, engage to understand your audience, what they are talking about, so you can use the insights in developing your strategy.

A good example of an online health community that made health-related feedback and shared stories the core of its existence is Care Opinion. Formerly Patient Opinion, it’s a UK-based online platform to share experiences of health and care services in the UK, good or bad.

It also bridges those shared experiences to the right people who can help. Health and care providers have used this channel to connect with patients, address their concerns and improve their services for a better patient experience.

Use Healthcare Influencers

Healthcare Influencers offer unique insights, led by their own experience, and lend credibility with their name.

They have the ability to reach your target audience, engage them for you, and spread your message.

Influencers have a community of followers to help you build your community from within. There is the macro-influencer with a huge social following. But there are also micro-influencers with a niche audience, not a fan base. Therefore, they are closest to the prospective customers and impact their decision-making process.

But there is a caveat – endorsements should adhere to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) rules on advertising and comply to Health Insurance Portability and Accountability (HIPAA).

Influencers are not exempt from rules even when they operate in the free-wheeling space of social media, especially on health information, and should pay particularly close attention to messaging for any drug advertising via social media.

This is a lesson Diclegis (Diclectin in Canada), an anti-nausea pregnancy (NVP) drug, learned when they used a celebrity macro-influencer to promote the medicine without communicating any risk information associated.

This resulted in an FDA warning to the maker of the drug, Duchesnay USA.

Celebrity and reality-star Kim Kardashian had to delete her original Instagram post endorsing the anti-morning sickness pill. The paid endorsement received 464,000 likes.

Kardashian had to post an updated message, including the side effects and links to the FDA website.

Source: Daily Mail

Building a Community Through Thought Leadership

One of the problems of the open-source web is the abundance of misleading and dangerous content.

Healthcare companies can rise above this noise by being a thought leader providing insights, sharing medical information, and answering patient questions.

By building trust with your target audience, you can raise awareness, counter misinformation, and clarify misconceptions.

Claiming to be the “Authentic Voice of Healthcare” is the founder of a primary care clinic in Downtown Las Vegas, Internist Dr. Zubin Damania, or ZDoggMD. He has a bolder take on thought leadership, but in a lighter way.

He takes strong positions on relevant medical and health-related issues in video commentaries, using medical humour, healthcare satire, parody music videos, and witty and amusing social media posts.

He has 1.4M followers on Facebook, 44.8K on Twitter, 147,981 YouTube subscribers, and 234K Instagram followers.

His music videos are always a hit. Taking on the opioid crisis issue, for example, he made a parody music video of Justin Bieber’s “Love Yourself”, with his version, “Treat Yourself”, an ode to those who are suffering due to the opioid epidemic.

Create Useful Content

To patients, clinicians, researchers, academicians, the internet is one of the first go-to information resource. Build your community around valuable, digestible content that educates your audience.

Well-timed informational posts, and patient stories through video or other creative formats, are easy magnets for followers. Multimedia content helps reach a wider audience.

Infographics, “how-tos,” interactive quizzes, health tips, and “did you know?”-type trivia are content styles that can attract a large audience.

Inspirational content also motivates and sparks much-needed hope, especially content related to malignant diseases. Success stories that inspire usually get shared most, increasing awareness of your brand and your name.

Cleveland Clinic knows how to attract followers, by pulling at heartstrings with inspiring stories about real patients on Instagram.

They also features posts with shocking facts about health, fat-freezing tips, motivation to exercise, posture, weight loss, and more.

Bridge and Connect Them to Resources

Referrals are very much part of the dynamics in the healthcare and medical industry. When you bridge your audience to resources of information or service, this will build your reputation as a go-to source of information.

But the work doesn’t end with a helpful recommendation – you need to engage your audience, make suggestions, initiate productive conversations between patients, doctors, industry leaders, health technologists, innovators, or policymakers.

Sensei client LifeWIRE, a health technology platform for patient engagement, shares curated content related to anesthesiology, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and the opioid crisis.

It uses and cites multiple scholarly articles, medical journals, and has quoted and featured doctors in its blog posts and white paper.

The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) thanked @LifeWIREGroup for sharing their infographic on the government’s efforts in combating the opioid crisis.

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ezatluba · 6 years ago

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WHY IS LIL BUB SUCH A FAMOUS CAT? IT'S IN HER BLOOD. LITERALLY

LIKE MOST PEOPLE, Daniel Ibrahim remembers exactly where he was the first time he came across a tiny, bug-eyed, toothless, limp-tongued cat called Lil Bub, the internet-breaking Queen of Cute. It was September 2014, during a mild night in Berlin, when the molecular geneticist found himself watching a Vice documentary on social media-famous felines by the blue light of his computer. But unlike most people, Ibrahim’s next move wasn’t to buy a Lil Bub shirt or join the ranks of her 2.1 million Instagram followers.

First thing the next morning he bounded over to the office of his fellow Max Plank Institute postdoc Dario Lupianez, who now heads a lab at the Berlin Institute for Medical Systems Biology. “You’ve got to see this,” Ibrahim told him, pulling up the video. Specifically, the part where Lil Bub’s veterinarian examines her X-rays and points to her dense leg bones, curving bizarrely like the contour of an Erlenmeyer flask. They looked exactly like a human case of osteopetrosis—a rare genetic limb malformation disorder that the pair of scientists were studying. “We should really sequence this cat,” said Lupianez.

Now nearly five years later, with the help of a successful crowdfunding campaign, an international feline genome consortium, and Lil Bub’s “dude,” Mike Bridavsky, they finally have. In her internet-royal blood the scientists uncovered two genetic abnormalities that help explain her signature squee-ness—extra toes, short stature, wonky gait, and a tongue that is forever lolling out of her mouth. Their discovery, which they posted on the preprint server bioRxiv in February, is not only helping Bridavsky care for Lil Bub as she ages, it could one day aid doctors in better treating human patients of osteopetrosis. And just as Bub blazed a trail for viral cat celebrity, by having her DNA sequenced she is once again leading the way, only this time toward precision veterinary medicine.

It didn’t take long for Ibrahim and Lupianez to track down an email address for Bridavsky, who had adopted Bub—the runt of a litter found orphaned in a tool shed outside of Bloomington, Indiana—when she was just a kitten. But it took the scientists a few weeks to figure out how exactly to ask him what was on their minds. They wrote draft after agonizing draft before finally hitting send from Lupianez’s computer. Ibrahim had not yet finished walking the corridor back to the lab before they got a reply.

“I was like, absolutely yes,” says Bridavsky, recalling the exchange. “I’ve always thought that Bub was magical, and what’s magic but everything that hasn’t yet been explained by science?”

At her next vet appointment, Bridavsky had some of Bub’s blood drawn and sent to Berlin, where it went into a freezer until the scientists could figure out how to pay for their DNA sequencing project. It didn’t exactly fit the mold of conventional research grants. The idea to crowdfund the endeavor came a few months later, over beers with a University of Pennsylvania molecular biologist named Orsolya Symmons, who quickly joined the project. “We figured if we were so curious, other people around the world might also want to know this as well,” she says. They raised more than $8,000 from 250 people in a matter of weeks. Piecing together the puzzle of Bub would take the next four years.

In human cases of genetic disease, tracking down a rare mutation often works like this: You sequence the patient and then you sequence their parents. If both parents are healthy, you can rule out any overlapping stretches of DNA that they share with their child. That wasn’t an option with Bub. “We didn’t have any information about her parents or their DNA or anything, nothing at all," Lupianez says. So they compared her genetic material to a completely unrelated cat named Cinnamon, the first feline to have its genome decoded. By using her as a reference they could begin to map out Bub’s unique sequence and figure out what it all meant.

It was grueling work. The two cats had single-letter differences between their DNA in 6 million places. That meant there were 6 million places to look for the mutations causing Bub’s singular physical traits. To narrow the search they looked first at genes known to be associated with some of them—including her extra toes and osteopetrosis. In a gene called Sonic hedgehog they found a mutation only present in a Key West colony of six-toed cats descended from Ernest Hemingway’s personal pets. Which means Bub probably comes from that long line of famous felines.

To find the cause of Bub’s osteopetrosis, the scientists looked at about 120 genes known to be associated with abnormal bone growth in humans. In one of them, called RANK, Bub had a single letter deletion never before seen in any mammal. Ibrahim and Lupianez pored over the literature and found a mouse with a similar (but not identical) mutation in the same gene. In X-rays, its limbs looked just like Lil Bub’s, only smaller. “This is in science what we call the eureka moment,” Lupianez says. “We needed to pinch ourselves to see if this was really happening.”

To make sure what they were seeing was real, they compared Lil Bub’s DNA to a stockpile of 131 cat genomes, compiled by the 99 Lives consortium—the world’s largest feline DNA database. None of those cats had Bub’s RANK mutation. Leslie Lyons, who started 99 Lives at the University of Missouri in 2014, says that Bub’s DNA is likely to help doctors better identify and treat patients of osteopetrosis. But more than that, she’s hoping it will inspire more cat owners to get their animals sequenced.

“There’s just so much we still don’t know about cats,” she says. Compared to dogs, which have been sequenced to verify their pure pedigrees and for biomedical research purposes because they get cancer at similar rates to humans (cats don’t), feline DNA is starkly underrepresented. That means there’s just a lot less scientists know about cat health and fewer treatments to cure what ails them. Lyons hopes to change that. “The long-term goal is to help save cats, either by setting up genetic tests for breeders to avoid passing on serious diseases or to do precision medicine in the clinic itself.”

Perhaps Lil Bub’s magic will help make that a reality one day. For Bridavsky, having genetic knowledge of his favorite feline has mostly provided him with a sense of security. Bub’s mutation, it turns out, causes one of the least severe forms of osteopetrosis. Which means that her strange bone growth has slowed, probably even stopped. Birdavsky doesn’t have to worry about it getting worse as she gets older. (In other forms of the disease, the persistent bone deformities often lead to early deaths.) “Right now gene sequencing is kind of a fun, schticky thing,” he says. “But it would be cool to see it transition to being valuable for the health of the pet. I’d be honored for Bub to be the poster cat for that.”

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prosperopedia · 5 years ago

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Seven Figure Income Bloggers

Over the past year, I’ve made a determination to make this blog my full-time income.

I’m hoping to make it a very large income at that. In fact, my goal is to get this website, Prosperopedia.com, to a level where it’s netting over a million dollars per year. You’ll often hear folks refer to the $1M+ threshold as a seven-figure income, a term that comes from the fact that there are 7 digits in the number $1,000,000. The trick to making a seven-figure income is to make sure that the first of those digits is greater than zero. As most people who have tried, including the majority of those who have succeeded can tell you, it’s not easy.

Is it even possible to make that much income through blogging? The answer is a definite yes. It’s been done by lots of people. I’m going to introduce you to several of them. I’ll also detail how they managed to get from starting on the idea to write their thoughts and opinions and publish them on a website to collecting seven figures’ worth of checks over a 12-month period. I’ve followed several bloggers in their

What is my plan for getting to a seven-figure income with just a simple website, a bunch of pictures and words put together in a way that provides significant value?

I’m going to write, and write, and write…and publish, and publish, and publish…until I’ve written enough useful articles, how-tos, opinions, news updates, etc. that I can prove to Google that there are good reasons to send a decent portion of its users to my domain, and I’m going to figure out how to best monetize those interactions by displaying relevant ads, product offers, and affiliate relationships. For me, the process is pretty straight forward, although certainly time consuming. I have to brain dump the stuff I already know, and I have to learn new things that I can also write about.

In addition to writing articles, which I’m much better at than the social media stuff, I’m going to build an audience of hundreds of thousands of somewhat like-minded (positive, somewhat religious, improvement-focused) people on social media accounts built to promote the Prosperopedia brand through Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, and whatever else comes along that seems like it makes sense to use.

How do Bloggers Make Money?

You’ve probably heard that Super Bowl ads cost a lot of money. 30-second ads for Super Bowl LIV in 2020 are going for more than $5 million.

That’s a cool $5 million to show your product, service, or whatever message you want to get out to the world.

Why does it cost so much?

Because the number of people who watch the Super Bowl exceeds 100 million. Having access to those 100 million people for even 30 seconds is worth the ad spend for companies that have the budget and want to reach that audience.

The same kind of numbers are at play when it comes to directing online traffic. In fact, Google’s ad revenue for 2018 surpassed $116 billion. Bing (a distant second in search engine market share) has ad revenues close to $8 billion last year.

If Google and Bing can net over $120 billion in ad revenue in a year, revenue collected from advertisers who pay for both impressions (when ads are shown on the search engines’ partners’ websites) and ad clicks, there’s quite a bit of opportunity for hundreds of bloggers to net $1M or more in a year on the traffic they attract from organic traffic that comes to them from search engines.

Some of the bloggers I’ve followed, especially ones who make some portion of their blogging income teaching other bloggers how to make similar amounts of income (which kind of feels like an MLM, but it’s a bit different since there are no downlines and you don’t have to make your friends hate you to be a blogger), are kind enough to publish their blogging income numbers online. Some bloggers give highly detailed reports about exactly where there income comes from and what expense they incur to create that income. Others simply point out that they make over $1M in a year on their blogs.

I’ll share with you the details about a few bloggers of the seven-figure income bloggers I’m aware of, including detailing where the value comes from, as far as I can tell, that allows them to make seven figures.

Some of the information I will review about these bloggers is from a report available from a tool called SEMRush, which is used to determine, among other things, the value of the search traffic estimated to be going to a domain. SEMRush’s traffic value estimate is a data-driven guess at how much the website would have to pay in Google AdWords to attract an amount of traffic that’s equivalent to what the site is getting from organic search traffic.

Depending upon how good you are at monetizing your traffic as well as the type of traffic you’re getting to your website, from what I’ve seen of bloggers who actually share information about how much they are making, it’s pretty common that bloggers have a monthly income that’s at least half of the traffic value estimated by SEMRush for their US-based search traffic. That’s not a hard rule, but it’s a benchmark I’ve seen often as I’ve researched bloggers’ domains through SEMRush.

Steve Chou – MyWifeQuitHerJob.com

Steve Chou is a former engineer whose story involves finding a way for his wife to quit her job and stay at home with their first child in 2007. Less than ten years later, in 2016, Steve and his wife crossed the seven figure blogger threshold when his site, which was named after the experience of transitioning his wife from employee to co-business-owner, surpassed $1M in income.

Chou published a blog post several years ago, which he updates from time to time with more recent numbers, in which he says he made $1.4 million in income from his blog in 2017. I’d guess he’s hit or exceeded $2M by the end of 2019.

In his income report post, Chou gives some context that is inspiring. He explains that during the first two years of operating his blog, he was essentially writing content to a small audience. Most wannabe bloggers give up before even one year of seeing results. What very often happens with Google is that they don’t really start to trust your website enough to send the amount of traffic that will really drive commissions and ad revenue until about two years after you’ve started writing consistently.

SEMRush estimates (as of January 2020) that Chou’s US-based organic search traffic is worth $245,200 per month.

James Dahle – WhiteCoatInvestor.com

I don’t know this blogger personally, but one of my friends who knows him has commented to me a few times over the past several years updates about his progress. Hearing how well he is doing has made me feel like I should have been much more consistent about publishing content on my own blogs several years ago. Instead I’ve only recently become serious about making that (passive income from a niche blog) my livelihood.

Dahle doesn’t provide an income report or even a number for his blog income, but he did write a post in 2018 explaining what it’s like to be a seven-figure earner. Previous to reading that post, the last I’d heard from my friend, who I’ve been helping with his own blog, is that he was making the same amount blogging as he made at his job as an emergency physician.

SEMRush reports (January 2020) that Dahle’s US-based search traffic is worth $364k per month. If he’s monetizing his traffic at an average pace for bloggers, he’s probably bringing in about $150k per month.

Jill Nystul – OneGoodThingByJillee.com

I have worked with some of Jill’s relatives on a project for which we inquired about advertising on her website. The price tag was high. She obviously gets a lot of traffic, enough that even a single promotional blog post costs in the thousands of dollars range.

Jill’s story is an amazing and inspiring one. She started blogging as a therapeutic response to depression. She was told to write something good every single day.

So she did.

And it has paid off, in more ways than one. From everything I can see, including having her very own Amazon influencer shopping page and monetizing her social media accounts well, I’d guess that she’s making at least $250k per month, or $3M per year. Nice work, Jill!

The current SEMRush report for OneGoodThingByJillee.com puts her at US-based traffic estimate at $589k per month.

Richard Robbins – Prosperopedia.com

My own story is still in the making, but my intent is to come back here in the next six months and update this post with new information about having reached the tens of thousands of dollars per month in blogging income. I’m guessing it will take me a few more years to become part of the seven figure club, but success tends to beget success. Unless someone turns off the internet or I become distracted by something else that it feels like life, my wife, or my kids are calling me, I hope to break the seven-figure mark by at least 2025.

Stay tuned…

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notesfromthepen · 5 years ago

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THE MAKING OF AN OUTLAW

I was five years old when I smoked my first cigarette.

It took me and my best friend john a week of planing. Which is an eternity when your five. A few days in and we seriously considered just waiting until we were adults. But the plan was already in motion.

We lived in military housing for enlisted men with families in Fort Campbell Kentucky. Military brats. We stayed just a few houses from one another. Initially you might think that growing up on a military base would provide the much needed structure and discipline to otherwise deviant youths. You'd be wrong. In a way we were all children of single parent households. The patriarchs were gone all day, at the same time, creating a "Lord of the Flies" free-for-all for the hordes of adolescents that swarmed the base. Many firsts in my life happened on military bases. Where men are men and kids are heathens.

John and I were best friends, more like co-parented brothers actually. We spent most of our time at his house. He had all the cool shit, namely a Nintendo game system. Our households were very different. Both with macho, old school, fathers who believed a good ass whooping trumps a good talking to every time. But that's where the similarities ended.

My house was what you'd probably expect of a decorated military man and war hero. The air of a no nonsense authoritarian rule filled our dwelling and my psyche. However that was only when dad was there. Mom was the complete counter balance to dads energy. A punk rock chick that spent her teens partying with bands and madman like the Ramones, MC5, and Patti Smith. Mom has always been a free thinking, tough, rebellious, and completely loving woman. It was a completely odd paring but the balance of the two extremes worked well.

Johns house was a completely different vibe. Where my house had two strong personalities that competed for control. Johns had one clear ruler and his agenda was decadence and fun. They had all the newest toys and implements of entertainment. Big TVs, calico vision, VCR's and...... A Nintendo Entertainment System!.. The N.E.S! For those of you who were born in to a world with preexisting gaming systems I cannot over state the mind blowing affect of the first Nintendo system.

Johns parents smoked like chimneys, drank competitively and had a knee high stack of playboys next to the toilet.. A fucking wonderland for a kid. I wasn't aware of the term "white trash" at the time and even of I was, if that's what they were, I would have thought of it as high praise.

All the houses on the base were the same. Bare bones, two bedroom houses with a flat roofs and a wooden sheds towards the back.

Much of the neighborhood debauchery took place in or around those sheds.

Its rare to be able to pin point exactly when and where you became a man. For me it was the first time a caught a glimpse of the inside of johns dads shed. Every inch was plastered with the centerfolds of adult magazines. Vixens with giant breasts, startling tan lines and even more startling bushes (it was the eighties). It might sound tame now, in the post internet world of porn hub but trust me when I tell you it was life changing. Im pretty sure that I sprouted a single pube right there on the spot.

Neither me or John were saints before our latest plan. We'd both sipped the last swigs in our dads beers before, took part in petty vandalism, had been into our fare share of fights, and we were now both veterans of perusing adult magazines, and so we decided the next logical step in our initiation into adulthood was to start smoking cigarettes. Again...We were five!

It wasn't a complex plan, however it was high risk. Since we were practically men now a lil risk was nothing to be afraid of.

We made a list of the implements necessary to accomplish our goals. It was a short list: A lighter, two cigarettes, and that's pretty much it. We would get the supplies in stages. We decided to get the cigarettes first. They would be the least likely to be missed. If we made it through phase one unnoticed and unscathed then we would proceed to phase two operation "fire grab". Which was just the stealing of a lighter.

The heist would take place at johns house because, well, my parents didn't smoke. We staked out the area, the players, and the goods for a full day. Johns dad was a "no-go" for several reasons. one: he wasn't there during the day. Two (and far more importantly): was the real threat of physical violence. Johns mom, on the other hand, was there all day, left her cigarettes in the kitchen, and we were confident that we could out run her if shit went sideways. She would be the mark.

The next day we would snag one cigarette from her pack, stash it,.and repeat the process the following day, as to not arouse the suspicion that two missing cigarettes might cause.

John showed up at my house right after breakfast. We walked to his place and formulated our plan of action. Since his mom was never stationary for too long we'd need a distraction. That would be johns job. Leaving the thievery to yours truly.

We approached his front door. My heart rate began to increase as we closed in on the threshold to the little square house. Upon entering, the kitchen was immediately on the left. John pointed a the table at the far end of the kitchen. He mouthed the words "right there". A soft pack of cigarettes sat under a red lighter perched atop the table. I tip toed into the kitchen as he went to run interference on our unsuspecting mark. His mom sat on the couch in the living room folding laundry in front of the TV. Between the laundry and the soap opera drama she was completely enthralled. In hind sight our "distraction" was not only completely unnecessary but it almost did us in. As I approached the table and silently lifted the lighter off the the pack of smokes, John said "hey mom whatcha doing?"

There were two doors leading into the kitchen. One in the entryway of the house and the other, at the other opened into the living room, where johns mom sat with her back to me and the table. If she turned around she would have immediately saw me handling her pack of cigs.

Johns question startled her out of her soap induced trance. She briefly looked around. I froze with lighter in one hand a her pack of smokes in the other. My heart had never beat so fast. Just before her head swung around far enough to witness the crime in progress John picked up the remote and changed the channel. "Can we watch Space Balls?" asked my codefendant. She stopped dead in her tracks “Goddamn it John!! Go out side and play!" To this day I've yet to meet more than a handful of people more capable than a five year old John in that moment.

As quick as a magician I pulled a single cigarette from the pack, placed it back on the table and positioned the red lighter on top, exactly as I found them.

With the contraband secured we shot out of the house like two bottle rockets. The screen door slammed behind us partially trapping the string of obscenities that followed.

Once far enough away we slowed to a walk. My heart still pounding but in a different way.

So began my true addiction. An addiction to that special mix of adrenaline and chaos brought on by the subverting of rules. An addiction that has followed me like a shadow for my entire life.

It wasn't the first cigarette that I'd ever seen but it felt like it.I rolled it between my fingers examining its details. I looked the little brown filter with the tiny imperfections in the coloring. I noticed the horizontal lines, so thin that they were almost invisible, on the white paper of the cigarette. I stuck it under my nose like a fake mustache and inhaled the aroma. it smelled so much nicer that the ones in he ashtrays at johns house. I looked around before letting it hang from between my lips like I'd seen the neighborhood teens do at the park. John was less enamored by the spoils of our heist. He'd probably already done this foreplay to smoking a few times.

We made it to the shed of a uninhabited house on my street. I went in and stashed the cigarette on one of the two by fours in the dark wooden box. Step one was now complete.

The plan was to let another day pass before going back to snag the remaining implements of our delinquency.

The next day, our day of inaction, crept by at a snails pace. We bull shitted around trying to distract ourselves from the single cigarette waiting to be smoked in the empty shed.

There were two parks on the base: Sunny park and Shady park. At that age things are clearly defined, either black or white. There aren't many grey areas when your five. The two parks on the base were perfect representations of this hard line. The parks gained their nicknames obviously enough; one was sunny and the other shady. But the meanings ran deeper and its taken years of perspective to fully appreciate the depth and meaning of the two parks.

Sunny park was designed by convince. The block of houses in the center of the neighborhood created a huge field in their collective backyards. In the center of this sea of green sat the makings of a playground: swing sets, monkey bars, a slide, a merry-go-round and a big dome of interconnecting metal bars that created a geometric contraption to play on or bash your shins against. Not a single tree or bush grew in the field. Every inch was bathed in unobstructed sunlight and every action visible from the rear windows of the surrounding houses. Windows constantly manned by the bored and nosey housewives of the enlisted men.

No one under the age of twelve used Sunny park for anything other than a short cut to the other park.

Shady park, on the other hand, was designed by no one.

Shady park was tucked away in a wooded area, on the outskirts of the neighborhood, hence the name. Dirt paths leading in and out of the park cut between the towering trees. The occasional few rays of sunlight that made it through the foliage created islands of light on the park floor.

I'd walked past Shady park everyday on my way to school. From the side walk you could hear the older kids in the park skipping school. The crash of breaking bottles, foul language, and general teenage revelry was the soundtrack to my walk. Every few steps I'd catch a glimpse of the forbidden playground and its inhabitants. A mixture of fear and excitement gave goosebumps to my skin.

So in an attempt to burn through the rest of our day, while we waited for tomorrow to bring us phase two of our heist, we decided that we were ready for a romp through the darker of the two parks. After all, we were just a few days and a couple of puffs on a cigarette away from becoming men.

I remind you that this was the eighties. A decade where the, now cliche, douchebag bullies from eighties movies really existed.

Around the same time one of my cousin Judy's "friends", complete with long ratty hair, fingerless gloves, and a single dangly cross earring, flinched at me like he was gonna punch me in the face and said "Fuck you pussy!" Again, I was five! He must have been seventeen going on forty. I was so young, small, and Asian that he had to flinch down at me.. This goon was completely serious too. A hundred percent unaware. It was so par for the course at the time that only after entering adulthood did I realize how ridiculous it was.

Man I miss those days and that specific brand of asshole. And I only mention this to give reason for our trepidation of Shady park and the characters we were likely to meet up with.

John came over and we walked towards the park. We approached the foot path that lead into the park. A path that I'd walked past a thousand times, always knowing, in the back of my mind, that the time would come when I was meant to follow it. Today was that day. Ten steps in and we were in a different world. It was oddly quiet and noticeably darker. The thought that we'd interrupt a group truant teens knee deep in some sort of unholy communion made me queazy. John was the silent type but I knew he felt the same.

About ten yards in, the narrow dirt path split in two, then three, then four paths, before opening up to the Shadiest of parks.

Huge sections of concrete tubes, big enough for us to walk through, littered the park at random intervals and angles. The left over artifacts of some unfinished drainage project. Each cylinder with its own custom smattering of spray painted obscenities and vulgar pictograms. Some familiar others confusing. On one tube, a giant red dick seemed to be assaulting some sort of hairy clam standing on end.

The park felt and sounded empty.

We huddled in the first tube that we came to, the one with the clam, to get our bearings. The bottom of the tube glittered with jewels. Diamonds, emeralds, and gems of every color crunched under our feet. At the opening of the other end of the tube sat the biggest gem id ever seen. An emerald with part of a 7up logo on it. Some of the smaller shards had been there so long that their edges were dull and rounded. We picked the best ones and put them in our pockets, to build our fortunes with later.

We exited the concrete tunnel and made our way into the heart of the park. An old swing set was the center piece. Large chunks of green paint had been chipped away exposing rusted metal. The stillness and the silence made for an eerie setting. John kicked one of the swings. The chains creaked and rattled forever. It was like time stopped. Like we were un-welcomed visitors. We were technically [in] the park but something was off. We were tourists. Sightseers... Trespassers.

We walked to the decrepit merry-go-round and sat down. It groaned under our insignificant weight. I don't remember what we said. Probably nothing. John kicked at some pebbles. The chains of the swing set eventually went silent.

Finally, I said "let's get outta here."

We walked home in relative silence. I knew that things would be different once we smoked those cigarettes. The forbidden part of the world would finally open up to us. We'd be adults. We'd be enlightened.

I could hardly sleep the night before the next phase of the heist. It was like Christmas morning. I woke early, poured a bowl of cereal, and sat down in front of the TV. Before I could drink the pink tinted milk from the bowl John was at the door.

"Bobby, John's here." I jumped up, tossed the bowl into the sink, and ran outside.

When I saw john he was already smiling. "You ready?" he asked.

Now, the plan was to grab the last cigarette today and the lighter tomorrow. So I assumed he meant "was I ready for phase two?" When in fact he meant "Are you ready to do this?"

He looked around before reaching into his pocket and pulling out a a single cigarette and a red lighter! What i did to deserve such a sneaky, conniving, grab the bull by the horns, type of best friend like John I'll never know, but I was grateful.

My palms started to sweat. Hesitation and fear fought for control. Reasons to abandon our plan suddenly flooded my mind. However it didn't take long for another kind of fear, the fear of looking like a pussy, to override my better judgement. Such is life.

With chests out, strutting like roosters we walked to our shed of inequities. Some of the neighborhood kids were gathered in a driveway. They couldn't help but notice the confidence. Or maybe it was the cigarette that dangled from my lips. I pretended not to notice them as we neared, feigning a conversation with John.

One of the kids, I can't remember his name, ran up and asked "John, what you guys doing? That ain't a real cigarette is it?"

To which I smirked at him.

"Nothing" said John and we kept walking. John flicked the lighter as we made our way down the street.

We made it the house, up the side and to the shed out back. John struggled to open the door. He had to lean with all his weight to force it open.

I followed him into the dark and musty wooden box. I grabbed the cigarette that we'd stashed away and tried to hand it to John. His back was to me as he leaned his head out the door.

"Get outta here, we're busy!"

"Here" I said and handed him the cigarette. As he took it I glanced out the door. The two boys we walked past were coming up the side yard. I pretended to be pissed but was secretly glad to have an audience. I mean what was the point of being an outlaw if no one was there to witness it?

At this point the cigarettes were merely symbolic.

"Forget them" I said.."Gimme the lighter."

I grabbed the lighter and flicked it several times before it sprung a flame.

This was years before burn stop cigarettes and child-proof lighters that infuriate the drunk and elderly smokers of today.

I held the lighter out and lit johns cigarette before lighting mine.

I need to make this perfectly clear. At the time I had absolutely no idea how to inhale. The idea alone would have confused me. As far as I was concerned you just puffed on the cigarette by pulling air into your mouth. But none of it really mattered. This wasn't about smoking anymore. It was about rebellion.

We both stood there puffing away, filling the small shed with smoke almost immediately. I did my best impression of an outlaw who had done this a thousand times. But the fact that my eyes were starting to water from the smoke almost gave me away for the rookie I was.

As I fought back the tears two more nosey kids made their way up to the shed. It was the two black girls that lived next door to me. They were sisters (I mean that in their relation not color, though I guess both could apply). I don't remember their names and any attempt to guess would probably just come off as a tad "stereotype".

I do remember that, of the two, I liked the younger one. She was sweet and funny. Her older sister was an asshole, already jaded by the ripe old age of seven. She was mean and spiteful. I was actually glad that she was there to witness my bad-assery, maybe now she would give me the respect that I deserved.

The entire time the onlookers said nothing. They just stood witness, looking dumbfounded.

We finished our cigarettes, left the shed, and walked through the kids gathered around the shed. The older of my neighbors, the jaded seven yr old, said "ewwwwww" in a admonishing tone as we walked by.

John and I walked home together. The only words spoken were his":I gotta get this lighter back." I nodded and we parted ways.

I got home and went straight to the bathroom to brush my teeth. I went to my room and sat on my bed. I sat there staring at my Hulk Hogan poster and realized that I didn't feel any different. I wasn't more mature. I wasn't more bad-ass. I wasn't an Outlaw..

Some time passed, it felt like hours but I can't be sure, when my mom opened my door a crack and said "don't go anywhere your dad wants to talk to you when he gets home." My heart sank. I knew it was a wrap. Right then and there I knew it was over. A mixture of panic, embarrassment, and fear set in.

I wasn't a tough guy. I was a scared kid afraid of an ass whipping.

It turns out that as soon as we left the shed the neighbor girl ratted me out. My dad came home, promptly threatened to hand me a sore ass, reminded me that I was anything but a tough guy compared to him, and grounded me for a month.

So there it was: my life as an outlaw had started and ended in a single afternoon.

Life has a strange way of giving you, not what you want, but only what you're ready for in that exact moment. And there's no way of cheating life. No way of speeding up the process.

And so for the time being, Shady park and my life as an outlaw would have to wait...

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