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cctinsleybaxter · 4 years ago

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2020 in books

2020 was a year of changed reading habits; people reading more than ever or not at all, some changing their tastes and others turning to old comforts. While there weren’t any huge overhauls on my end, more free time did mean a total of 32 in a wider range of genres. In the past couple of years I found a lot of the things I read to be kind of middling and ranked them accordingly, but this year had some strong contenders in the mix. With college officially behind me I love nonfiction again, and I really need to stop being drawn in by novels with long titles that ‘sound interesting.’ A piece of advice to my future self: they will only make you angry.

The Good

The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky I loved the BBC radio play when I first listened to it back in 2017, but didn’t know if I could stomach the idea of actually reading the 700-page book, especially since I already knew the plot (spoiler alert: this had no effect and I gasped multiple times despite knowing what was going to happen; Fyodor’s just that good at atmosphere.) The story follows Prince Lev Myshkin, a goodhearted but troubled man entering 1860s Petersburg high society and meeting all of the wretched people therein as he navigates life, laughs, love, unanswerable questions of faith, and human suffering. I care about it in the same way I think other people care about reality TV shows and soap operas. I’m so personally invested in the drama and feel so many different emotions directed at these clowns that it’s like being a fan of Invitation to Love (with an ending equally upsetting to that of the show ITL is from, Twin Peaks.)

Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlanksy I adored this book. The first half reads a little like a Wikipedia article, and I was worried that it was leaning too clinical and would be disaffected with colonialism and indigenous peoples, but even that oversight is corrected for as the text goes on. It’s not going to be for everybody because it really is just the world’s longest encyclopedia entry on, well, salt, but it’s written with such excitement for the topic and is so well-researched and styled for commercial nonfiction that I think it deserves any and all praise it’s gotten. We have to talk about that time Cheshire was literally sinking into the ground, and companies who were over-pumping brine water to steal each other’s brine water said ‘no it’s okay it’s supposed to that’ so were legally dismissed as suspects.

Midnight Cowboy by James Leo Herlihy Cried. 10/10. The plot of Midnight Cowboy is very classic and actually has a lot in common with The Idiot, as 20-something Joe Buck moves from the American Southwest to NYC and meets myriad challenges as a sex worker. I’ve been obsessed with the movie for a few years now and the book made me appreciate it anew; I think it’s rare for an adaptation to take the risk of being so different from its source material while still capturing its spirit. The movie doesn’t include quieter moments like the full conversation with Towny or time spent in the X-flat, nor does it attempt to touch Joe’s internal monologue or his and Rico’s extensive backstories, but these things are essential to the book and are some of the best and most affecting writing I’ve ever read. Finally! The Great American Novel!

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones I would firmly like to say that this is probably the best horror novel ever written. The setup is very traditional in that it’s about a group of friends facing supernatural comeuppance for a past mistake, but delivery on that premise is anything but familiar. A story about personal and cultural trauma that raises questions about what we owe to each other and what it means to be Blackfeet, with a cast that’s unbelievably real and sympathetic even at their absolute worst. Creepypasta writers trying to cash in on the cultural mythos of lumped-together tribes wish they were capable of writing something a tenth as gruesome and good as this. It could very well be a movie the visuals and writing style were so arresting, and I can’t wait to read whatever Jones writes next.

Found Footage Horror Films: Fear and the Appearance of Reality by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas This is the least accessible title on the list since it’s a college textbook for people with background in film, but it was so nice to read a woman unpacking film theory with the expertise and confidence it deserves that I have to rank it among the best. I had an absolute blast reading it and am going to have to stop myself from bringing up the horror of 1960s safety films as a cocktail icebreaker.

Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy by Heather Ann Thompson

The year’s toughest read by far, but also its most rewarding. Thompson uses mountains of documents, government-buried intel, and personal interviews to explain what happened at Attica from beginning to end, and does a fantastic job of balancing hard facts and ‘unbiased journalism’ with much-needed emotion and critical analysis. It’s more important reading in the 2020s than any kind of ‘why/how to not be racist’ book club book is going to be, and the historical context it provides is as interesting as it is invaluable. The second half drags a bit in going through lengthy trial processes with some assumed baseline knowledge of legalese (which I did not have. All that criminal minds in 2015… meaningless), but aside from that editing and prose are some of the best I’ve seen in nonfiction.

The Bad

The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn A friend and I decided to read this together because I’m obsessed with how insane the author is and wanted to know if he can actually write.

He cannot.

The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All by Laird Barron Barron is an indie darling of the horror fiction scene, so I was excited to finally read one of his collections but can now attest that I hate him. If you’re going to do Lovecraft please deconstruct Lovecraft in an interesting way. I had actually written a lot about the issues I have with how he develops characters and plots, but one of the only shorthand notes I took was “he won’t stop saying ‘bole’ instead of tree trunk” and I feel like that’s the only review we need.

Bats of the Republic by Zach Dodson Look up a photo of this author because if I had bothered to glance at the jacket bio I honest-to-god wouldn’t have even tried reading this.

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone I went in with high expectations since this is an epistolary novella I’d seen praised on tumblr and youtube but oh my god was there a reason I was seeing it praised on tumblr and youtube. This is bad Steven Universe fanfiction. Both authors included ‘listening to the Steven Universe soundtrack throughout’ in the acknowledgements, and to add insult to injury there’s a plug from my nemesis Madeline Miller.

The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton The premise of this one plays with so many tropes I like that I should have been more suspicious. It’s a dinner party with stock characters one would expect of Clue, and rather than our protagonist being the detective he’s a man with amnesia stuck in a 24-hour time loop. Body-hopping between guests, he must gather evidence using the skillsets of each ‘host’ until he either solves Evelyn Hardcastle’s murder or the limit of eight hosts runs out. I read a lot of not-very-good books, and it’s so, so much worse when they have potential to be fun. This is how you lose the most points, and how I abandon decorum and end up writing a list of grievances: • Our protagonist can only inhabit male hosts, which I think is a stupid writing decision not because I’m ‘woke’ but because wouldn’t it make sense for him to also be working with the maids, cooks, and women close to the murder victim? • Complaining about the limitations of hosts makes some sense (e.g- there’s a section where he thinks that it’s hard to be an old man because it’s difficult to get to the places he needs to be quickly), but one of his hosts is a rapist and one of his hosts is fat. Guess which one gets complained about more. • One of the later hosts is just straight-up a cop with cop knowledge that singlehandedly solves the case. We spend some time being like ‘wow I couldn’t have done it without the info all eight hosts helped gather’ but it was 100% the detective and he solves the murder using information he got off-screen. • The mystery itself is actually well-paced and I didn’t have a lot of issues with it (e.g, there’s a twist that I guessed only shortly before the end), which makes it all the worse that the metanarrative of this book is INSANE. No spoilers but the reveal as to why our unnamed protagonist is even in this situation is stupid. I just know they’re going to make it into a movie and I’m preemptively going to aaaaaaaaa!!!

Trust Exercise by Susan Choi The fact that this was the worst book I read all year, worse even than the bad Steven Universe fanfiction, and it won multiple awards makes my blood boil. I could rant about it for hours but just know that it’s a former theater kid’s take on perception and memory, and deals with sexual abuse in a way that’s handled both very badly and with a level of fake deepness that’s laughable. Select fake-deep quotes I copied down because at one point I said ‘oh barf’ aloud: -I’m filled with melancholy that’s almost compassion. It’s sad the same way. -[On a friendship ending] We almost never know what we know until after we know it. -Because we’re none of us alone in this world. We injure each other.

There are also bad sex scenes that I can’t quite make fun of because I think (HOPE?) they’re supposed to be a melodramatic take on how teenagers view sex, but I very much wanted to die. Flowers were alluded to. Nipples were compared to diamonds.

Honorable/Dishonorable Mentions (categorized as the same thing because, well,)

The Life and Death of Sophie Stark by Anna North This book was frustrating because the first third of it is fantastic. It’s set up to be a takedown of the manic pixie dream girl trope, jumping from person to person discussing their relationship with the titular Sophie, and indirectly revealing that she was just some girl and not the difficult and mysterious genius they all believed her to be. Then in the third act, BAM! She was that difficult and mysterious genius and she’s now indirectly brought all the people from her past together. I wanted to scream the plot beefed it so bad, but the good news is I really liked this octopus description.

It was the size of a three-year-old child, and it seemed awful to me that something could be so far from human and obviously want something as badly as it wanted to get out of the tank.

Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women by Kate Moore Cool new nightmare speedrun strat is to hear a 2-second anecdote from a documentary that people used to get radium poisoning from painting watch faces, be curious enough that you buy a book to learn more, and be met with medical and legal horror beyond anything you could have imagined. This was almost one of my favorite books of the year! Almost.

Radium Girls is very lovingly crafted and incredibly well-researched; one of those things that’s hard to get through but that you want to read sections of again as soon as you’ve finished. The umbrage I take with it is that it’s very Catholic. The author and many of her subjects are Irish and their religion is important to them, but it casts a martyr-y narrative over the whole thing that I found uncomfortable. Seventeen-year-old girls taking a factory job they didn’t know was dangerous are framed as brave, working-class heroes, but there’s not a set moral lesson to be gained from this story. Sarah Maillefer didn’t make “a sacrifice” when she agreed to the first radium tests, she agreed because she was terrified. She didn’t think she was helping she was begging for help.

The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins by Anna Tsing Tsing is an incredibly skilled researcher and ethnographer; there are so many good ideas in this book that I’d almost consider it essential leftist text… if I could stand the way it was structured. Tsing posits that because nature is built on precariousness she will build her book the same way, allowing it to grow like a mushroom, and thus chapters don’t progress linearly and are written more like freeform poetry than a series of academic arguments. Some people are really going to love that, but I’m me and a mushroom is a mushroom and a book is a book. I don’t think in the way Tsing does, and while I tried to keep an open mind it’s hard to play along when something is this academically dense and makes so many ambitious claims. As if to prove how different our structuring methods are, I’ve made my own thoughts into a pros and cons list

Things I liked: • ‘Contamination’ as something inherent to diversity • ‘Scalability’ as a flawed way of thinking (Tsing has written whole essays about this that I find very compelling, but a main example here is that China and the US have come down on Japanese matsutake research for being too ‘site specific’ and not yielding enough empirical data) • Discussing how Americans were so invested in self-regulating systems in the 1950s we thought they could be applied to literally everything, including ecosystems • “The survivors of war remind us of the bodies they climbed over- or shot- to get to us. We don’t know whether to love or hate the survivors. Simple moral judgements don’t come to hand.” • Any and all fieldwork Tsing shares is amazing; I especially liked reading about the culture of mushroom pickers living in the Cascades and their contained market system

Things I didn’t like: • Statements that sound deep but aren’t, e.g- “help is always in the service of another.” (Yep. That’s what that means. Unless an organism is doing something to help itself which then nullifies your whole opening argument.) • A very debatable definition of utilitarianism • “Capitalism vs pre-capitalism,” which seems like an insanely black-and-white stance for a book all about finding hidden middle ground • A chapter I found really interesting about how intertwined Japanese and American economies are, but it tries to cover the entire history of US-Japan relations. Seriously, starting with Governor Perry and continuing through present day, this could have been a whole different book and it’s a good example of what I mean when I say arguments feel too scattered (the conclusion it reaches is that in the 80s the yen was finally able to hold its own against the dollar. Just explain that part.) • A chapter arguing that ‘true biological mutualism’ is rarely a focus of STEM and is a new sociological development/way of thinking which is just… flat-out not true

For all the comparisons art gets to ‘being on a drug trip’ this anthropology textbook has come the closest for me. Moments of profound human wisdom, intercut with things I had trouble understanding because I wasn’t on the same wavelength, intercut with even more things that felt false or irrelevant. I can’t put it on the nice list but I am glad I read it.

#2020 #books #long post #(in case the read more isn't working)

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reggies-eyeliner · 4 years ago

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okay okay hi! this is me asking for a (jatp) matchup (off anon bc we’re taking a Risk!) male or female is fine shsjsh okay okay. could i also please get a band/song matchup? 🥺👉👈

i’m an istp scorpio, 5’7” with purple hair and brown eyes, fair skinned too (well im a lil paler but—)! im probably rather obnoxious. im sarcastic and stubborn, and i probably listen to music nearly 24/7. i like to write even if i rarely ever have any ideas, and i love to watch movies (horror is my fave genre but i love pretty much any!). i probably watch way too many cooking competition shows considering i do not cook. i stay up until morning and sleep in until,,,who knows when?? i *love* board games, especially clue. im not always verbal with my affection but i’ll make my friends cupcakes and playlists and give them gifts all the time so it evens out— tho i do NOT trust people at first but once i am friends with someone, im vv impossible to get rid of 🤷🏻‍♀️ i drink a lot of coffee and i think im funnier than i probably am. somehow vv energetic and not at all?? kind of loud and i tend to ramble (like right nOw—) have been called aggressive but rly im just,,,go big or go home!! all or nothing!!

as for the band/song matchup! my emoji aesthetic would probably be 😈🎃✨🔮🌙🕯🎧💫 my fave jatp song is between now or never and wake up i think! fave genre? like music? probably pop rock or alternative. and my style, if we’re talking clothes, is a lot of skinny jeans, t-shirts, any and all jackets, boots, and converse. we wanna look stylish but still comfy. as for extracurriculars, i was in drama at one point and also latin club but other than that?? i don’t do anything shsjsshj okay i THINK that was everything?? so sorry this is rly long!! tysm for your time and have a great,,,week?? month! and thank you again!!

Hey @julies-molina!! I’m so so sorry that this took longer than expected, but I hope you’re doing amazing ^^ AND WHAT PURPLE HAIR THAT SOUNDS SO CUTE OMG WHAT???? Oh yeah and make sure to hydrate and get lots of rest, stay safe!

I match this lovely person with...

Julie Molina!

TO THOSE WHO ARE ALREADY THINKING, “BLAH BLAH SHUT UP YOU ONLY SAW HER USERNAME AND-”

NOOOOO

You two ooze chemistry, and I have very lovely headcanons, ideas, and facts to EFFING PROVE IT- Right, so you and Julie! To begin with, I think she’d definitely be able to look past how “obnoxious” or “stubborn,” you think you are, and she wouldn’t mind it at all! In fact, she almost welcomes it, because I literally can’t imagine Julie dating someone who isn’t expressive. She sees your faults as more of ways that you’re more you than ever, so she truly doesn’t care! And the fact that you listen to music 24/7? UH, YES QUEEN?? Istg, every time Julie sees that you have some sort of fancy headphones on, she’ll instantly take em off, yeet them onto her ears and ask, “Watchu listening to?” She loves it whenever she sees you vibing to different songs on your own, and even though you think it’s a bit silly, she loves it! The fact that you’re capable of doing so much is almost comforting or welcoming to her, so does she care at all that you might not have ideas? No, of course not! She loves to peer over your shoulder and help you with whatever you’re working on. And more than anything, your ideal date together would definitely be this: coming back after a very long night of karaoke, a bit of swimming, a bunch of food, and then just plopping onto the mattress and binge-watching horror movies. I have no idea why, but I can see both of you popping some Sprite brought to you by JATP, and no matter what you watch, she’ll make sure to watch with you! And definitely, the morning after, you two would binge watch Master Chef or the Great British Cooking show, and then try your best to recreate every single one. Never ends well most of the time, but hey, it’s fun! And no matter how you may act, she adores it whenever she sees you dancing or acting like the chaotic crackhead she loves. Julie will make sure that you two are literally the best friend couple, so you can confide in anything with her. All she wants is for you to feel safe, comforted, and loved!

Band Matchup!

YOUR ROLE IN THE BAND WOULD BE: The one who carries the entire crew without you even noticing it. I’m like 90 percent sure that you have no frickin idea how amazing it is to have you on my dash?? You’re always bringing things to life and constantly reblogging content that I love, and you’re honestly the sweetest person in the band. I definitely think that you’d be amazing friends with Alex, so you two would start jamming out in the middle, while Reggie and Luke did that very manly face-to-face rocking, and Julie led the song, and you two would just vibe. I think that by the end, the entire band ought to realize how much life you bring onto the stage! They make sure to appreciate you more than enough though <3333

Song Matchup:

THE SONG THAT I’M GETTING VIBES FROM YOU IS: Now or Never!

I’ve always seen you as something very much linked to Now or Never-- you showed up at the very start, brought the world to life, but also spread a message in between.

Don't look down 'Cause we're still rising Up right now And even if we hit the ground We'll still fly Keep dreaming like we'll live forever But live it like it's now or never

From what I think, I think that you’re honestly one of the sweetest, kindest people on here of all time, and you don’t get enough credit for that! I feel bad for anyone who hasn’t interacted with you yet because they certainly haven’t met someone as kind as you like honestly 🥺🥺 ilysm!!

I’m sorry if this was too short! Have an amazing rest of your whatever-time-it-is! <333

Requests are open, matchups are currently closed :) <3

<hugs!!> ilysm, stay safe!!

#julies-molina #hi i love you #have an amazing rest of your whatever time it is!#hugs :D #or shoulder pats #now or never #julie molina #julie x reader #jatp matchups

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pilferingapples · 6 years ago

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Beeble Mis 5b : Who Gave You A Gun?!?

PREVIOUSLY on BBC Les Mis: it was Barricade Time, babey!

I’m trusting people better with geographical/layout descriptions than me will take this one. But other points:

- I give Wardrobe hell in this show and I do not take it back, but also let me say they’re doing a solid job on lower-class clothing. I especially like the poor woman in the march whose outfit is almost complete but her overblouse is too small and shows the lacing of her corset at her waist-- not sexy at all, it looks exactly like what it is, not being able to make/afford a top that really fits.

- ... A Riot Occurs! And okay yeah, listen, I’ve been trying really hard to evaluate this show as This Show, just an adaptation of the book, as Davies emphasized it was. But this is a very 2012 way to film the chaos as the riot erupts. I’m not saying it’s bad! I actually think it works! I just also think it’s Very Samey, and there are other ways to film chaotic sequences.

- The worker from The Something Cafe earlier (who I think may have been the one Enjolras saved earlier too?) comes up as they’re starting to build the barricade and is all WELCOME COMRADE and they are obviously really solid with each other and why Why WHY isn’t this worker just Feuilly?!? Enjolras has a canonical Worker Activist Bestie! It would have been a fine thing to go with!

...Were they afraid of mispronouncing “Feuilly”? because. I could understand that.

- “There’s only one line of attack!” says Enjolras and okay this is the kind of thing that people in genre shows say before being attacked from behind but it’s also like the whole deal with the Corinthe barricade so

- there’s a flag that I *think* has the date of the July Revolution on it? Not sure? Can anyone confirm?

- Grantaire grabs HALF A STOOL yes very good Grantaire

- Matelote is here! With a cockade in her hair! Slapping Grantaire in the face AS HE RICHLY DESERVES

- I am loving this HISTORICALLY ACCURATE multiracial and multigender crowd! Thank you!

- And now it’s time for COMEDY JAVERT!!! He is going to the barricades in his STEALTH CAP because he cannot TRUST anyone else to apprehend Jean Valjean! Who will definitely be IN THE VERY CENTER of the rioting! At...a small barricade..on an obscure street... with only 40-50 defenders...

you know if the IRL Official Intel had been this Hot and Happenin’, Charles Jeanne and Co. might have won:P

-BACK TO THE BARRICADE BUILDING, Gavroche steals the Mean Barber’s Plaster Head and Wig for and brings it along? for reasons?? , and then encounters Mabeuf

--okay Mabeuf being here is a Great Example of the way this series so often brings in canon details but gutted of the context that really makes them matter. We’ve seen nothing of his slide into poverty, his struggle, his desperation; there’s no reason to think there’s anything to him showing up (with tricolor sash!) except a genuine determination to Do His Part. I’m not sorry he’s here; I’m sorry it doesn’t tie in with anything else more.

- ...if Feuilly were here they’d be building a better barricade

- JAVERT IS HERE! ON THE CASE! TRACKING DOWN THE NOTORIOUS REBEL JEAN VALJEAN I’m sorry this is forever hilarious ACTUAL DIALOGUE:

Javert, Super Casual: Is a man named Jean Valjean with us? Quinnjolras, who very realistically has no idea who tf JVJ is: Not that I know of Javert, Super Smoothlike And Very Casual: He’ll be in the thick of it,MARK MY WORDS

Sadly then we of course cut to : Jean Valjean! or rather Cosette, trying to sneak out past Jean Valjean. And Marius! Sneaking into the Garden House!

And it’s all very nicely paralleled with them both being quiet and Marius is looking in a window and Cosette has her hands on the doorknob to step outside

and VALJEAN ATTACKS HER FROM BEHIND LIKE A HORROR MOVIE MONSTER

HOLY SHIT

she screams and begs to be let go, and he just! won’t ! he keeps Ever So Calm as he physically restrains her, calmly telling her that oh, it’s dangerous Out There, as opposed to in HERE, with a frigging superhuman keeping her restrained

he finally lets her escape back up the stairs and she yells I HATE YOU which is honestly seeming less Spunky Teen and more TOTALLY JUSTIFIED ACT OF BRAVE DEFIANCE holy shit

holy shit

I hate this Valjean so much y’all, this is so bad

the camera pulls away and shows us he is A Sad but !! I don’t care! Don’t PHYSICALLY RESTRAIN YOUR TEENAGER AND LOCK HER IN THE HOUSE

at this point in the recap I actually had to take a break and get some tea because holy shit

but okay. Okay. I’m back.

--and the scene is MERCIFULLY back to the House With Gardens In, where Marius is having an Existential Crisis and Eponine...is trying to convince him to live? and hook up with her? But she Name Drops the Chanvrerie Barricade apparently by mistake, here because this is the Les Mis where Women Aren’t Given Much to Thinking, and so Marius goes off to Die , as Marii do

then it’s back to the barricade! Where Courfeyrac , Mabeuf and Gavroche arrive at the head of a bunch of new recruits! Through the alley....into the barricade with only One Line of Attack...hhhhyeahhh. I . I get where like you couldn’t do a MASSED charge from that alley but it would be REAL easy to do a smaller distraction sortie? I think?

eh, I’m not Battle Tactics Blogger , back to the plot.

Gavroche spots Javert and immediately rumbles him; Enjolras and Courfeyrac and Not!Feuilly etc seize him and take him hostage. Go Team!

And then it’s evening,and all across Paris the lights are...doing things and people are singing!

But There is No Joy in Corinth, Except For Me! because Javert is tied to a post! and HILARIOUSLY YELLING ABOUT JEAN VALJEAN.

Actual Dialogue: WHERE IS HE! YOUR LEADER! JEAN VALJEAN!

I’m glad Quinnjolras thinks this is as funny as I do

Javert, to a group of armed revolutionaries: You’re mistaken, my friend! You’ve ALL BEEN LED ASTRAY.

Javert, my guy, I hate this Valjean too, but I don’t think he’s behind POLITICAL ISSUES IN PARIS.

Quinnjolras gets a We’re Not Assassins line when Gav makes to shoot Javert; I am pleased!

Meanwhile Not!Feuilly and Friends are outside watching the barricade; they call that the first charge is coming.

The first charge goes pretty well, Dramatic Fight Scene wise! Quinnjolras gets the barricade to use Good Bullet Economy, and is convincing as a combat leader, at least in this moment. Courfeyrac...gives the impression of being someone totally new to this, but getting the hang of it. Gavroche is Super Pumped and kills someone with Javert’s musket I think? (WHO GAVE HIM A GUN). (Bossuet I am pretty sure is killed.) And Grantaire, who has a gun somehow (WHO GAVE YOU A GUN)...gets an actual look at violence and shuts down. For any of the others,I’d be deeply annoyed by this, but it’s a good way of showing the basic Issue here: Grantaire has no real violence in him. He can be a jerk , but he doesn’t have the conviction to carry himself over the horrors of dealing real harm or real death--or seeing it come to others. War is genuinely awful! and he’s really not capable of this. It’s a good moment, and fits with the new way they’re doing his arc so far.

...and then as I’m appreciating this, and as the barricade is celebrating, it’s time to Raise the Flag! And Mabeuf volunteers! And Quinnjolras is like”hahah no grampa it’s fine” and Mabeuf says “I said I’ll do it”, and climbs up the barricade all awkward. And Not!Feuilly looks over at Enjolras like ??? and Enjolras does that shrug that means ‘Hey I Tried But Grampa Won’t Stop’ and Mabeuf puts up the flag and everyone goes YAAAAAY and Marius sneaks onto the barricade and Mabeuf gets shot.

And I just...it’s Shocking and it’s Sad in a Hey An Old Man Died sort of way, but it’s All Wrong for tone and context. The raising of the flag is supposed to be an obviously dangerous, essentially suicidal act of courage, that requires stepping into the line of open fire ; something even Enjolras hesitates to do. Mabeuf’s courage terrifies everyone , terrifies Enjolras ; Mabeuf inspires them all by his willing sacrifice, and becomes to the barricade a reminder of the courage of the Grand Revolution.

Here, putting up the flag is A Bit of A Chore; no one seems very tense about it; everyone’s watching calmly and laughing and cheering as it goes. Mabeuf’s death is Shocking, a Reminder that There Is Danger , not a foregone conclusion (and of course there’s no mention of the original Revolution as a positive inspiration). We, the viewer, don’t know about Mabeuf’s downward spiral in life, so we can’t link it to this decision, can’t see this as an act of protest and despair. Courfeyrac doesn’t know Mabeuf, so he doesn’t correct Enjolras on Mabeuf’s politics; he just seems shaken and lost by this Unexpected Death.

Mabeuf’s death is, essentially, reframed, from being a conscious, heroic , inspiring sacrifice to group of fighters who felt their courage wavering, to a Sad Loss That Awakens Everyone to The Horror Of Battle. Someone might like this choice of approach more; but it IS a choice, and a heavy one in terms of symbolism (even as it loses the commentary on symbolism!).

Anyway. Next wave of combat happens, Grantaire Nopes Out into the Corinthe (WHO GAVE YOU A BOOZE), Gavroche heads back into combat with a pistol (WHO GAVE YOU YET ANOTHER GUN) Marius RAUUUUGHS up and into Battle with the Gunpowder. It’s good! Kind of hilarious but good! The Barricade Is Saved and also happy about it instead of scolding him! GOOD !

and then Marius has a whole “it’s EASY when you DON’T VALUE YOUR LIFE” bit and Quinnjolras is like “Ungroovy , Comrade Buddy” and Marius walks down to the street level and a guard is Still Alive!1!1, and shoots at him! and hogad, Eponine sort of . Hurls herself across screen and falls in a heap RIGHT AT THE FOOT OF THE MAIN PASSAGE ON THE BARRICADE and Enjolras shoots the guard and is like “see some of us still value your life you drama llama” and i just

are they gonna move her or

--anyway , her Death Scene is very good until the odd change in final line; the shift from “I believe I was a little bit in love with you” to “I really did love you” is actually! a pretty major shift! but whatever ; Erin Kellyman did a wonderful job with the whole scene and for once I believe this Marius is truly sad at the passing of a life

The next bit with the letter is really cool! Let me give credit for that! Marius reads the letter Eponine gave him, while Valjean discovers Cosette’s blotter and reads it in a reflective plate-- a nice bit of symmetry and a cool way to use a book detail to unite the branches of the story! Valjean realizes Cosette is already lost to him-- “in her heart she’s gone” -- and I could not care less for the grief of Shouty Dragsalot, but it’s well acted for the person this Valjean is.

...and then Gavroche shows up with Cosette’s letter, and we get THIS

as Valjean JUMPS AT AND GRABS A CHILD and rips the note from his hand, and then growls at him to “hop it” until Gavroche does, in what is a really nasty echo of the Petit Gervais scene

and of course he reads Cosette’s letter and grabs a knife (WHO GAVE YOU A KNIFE), and heads to the barricade, where Javert lifts his head, alert, as his Valjean sense activates again.

...y’all I’m making as many jokes as I can but I am grieving for how horrible this Valjean is and how much more Cosette has to endure because of it?? this is grim. And while I know of course this series will stick to the plot of the book, it really would feel the most consistent for this Valjean to just flat out commit some good ol’ muderin’.

Well maybe JAVERT, SUPER POLICE PRESENCE will stop him! And save the poor barricade fighters from his malign influence! and then everyone can go get some cake with Cosette and Eponine and Mabeuf will make a Miraculous Recovery! That’s probably how it will go. No need to worry!

#Beeble Mis #Beeble Mis 5: Who Gave You A Gun #long post #death mention #abuse #Beeble Recaps

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