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dirtycoolcatconfessions · 7 years

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COOL CAT DVD PACKAGE FULL ANALYSIS

As some of you may know, as a birthday present I have finally received the Cool Cat movie from a friend of mine. Seeing as I am the self-proclaimed front-runner of the ironic Cool Cat fandom, I feel it is my duty to provide you all with my full analysis of all that comes with this monstrosity, so strap in fellas, this is gonna be a long one.

Here's an image of the full package:

Alright, let's start off with the "Thank you for your purchase" type paper.

Right off the bat, let me say that every paper (bar the "poster", though that one is still preeeetty bad, though I'll analyze that when we get to it) is literally just standard-fare 8.5x11 printer paper. Now, let's start from the top. It says "Cool Cat Productions" as opposed to Derek Savage Productions, what he listed in the movie from what I can remember, so that's pretty strange. To the sides you can see two horrendous pictures of the cartoon form of Cool Cat, which both look like they were drawn in different art styles, with the one on the right for some reason reminding me of some kind of old 2D Chuck E. Cheese drawing, and the other on the right appears to be crying out in pain with weirdly-detailed clothes, a curly pig-like tail, and looking like a failed attempt at perspective. After that it lists the website, (nothing new here) and the email, which uses Yahoo, which I find fairly unsurprising.

Another thing I love which shows just how much love and care (sorry, "love" and "care") Derek puts into his products is the fact that it doesn't even specify what you ordered, (in addition, the fact that it lists "bookS", since Derek doesn't even have the Cool Cat books for sale, and the Cool Cat Stops Bullying book comes with every purchase of the DVD, and soundtrack, of which they don't sell at all, though I believe Derek stated something about wanting to sell it in the future) which really lets you know that Cool Cat Loves You in particular and cares who You are as a person. (The capitalization is really weird throughout the paper, especially when listing the various products you could have bought, really lending to the "Copy-paste" feel of the whole thing, and the Cool Cat Loves You part somehow evokes a ™ without one even being there.) Further down it asks you to print out free "Cool Cat Loves You" posters (instead of just saying Cool Cat posters, for whatever reason) which is strange for a vast number of reasons. First of all, the poster section of the website is NO LONGER ON THE WEBSITE, and second of all, using the Wayback Machine to go back to an instance when there was shows that the 11x17 "poster" is identical to the poster received in the movie package, which makes you wonder why you would want a second one.

(One fun thing to note about this image is the fact that promises that Cool Cat greeting and birthday cards are "Coming Soon!" which I feel really shows you just how much commitment Derek has towards his projects.)

Back to the original paper, we reach the bottom third of the page, we have Derek begging you to tell everyone you know about Cool Cat so that they know it's time to cut off all ties with you, followed by a call to follow the official twitter @CoolCatLovesYou, officially confirming that that twitter is indeed the real one, fucking weird and not-so as it may seem. Then there are a number of images of potential merchandise you can buy, mainly consisting of the horrendously drawn books that Derek isn't even selling because he's "still looking for a publisher." (Yeah, he couldn't get anyone to publish his books, what a fucking surprise, right? In addition, upon incredibly close inspection of these low-res images, I found that they don't even list the "Illustrated by" that's shown on the Cool Cat Stops Bullying book that came with the movie, since Derek wasn't actually the one who drew this shit. And it's not because it was only on the Cool Cat Stops Bullying book, since among the books on here IS that exact book, sans the "Illustrated by" like all others on the page. I just found that interesting.) Finally, reaching the very bottom of the FIRST ARTICLE OF LIKE 6 (told you it was gonna be a long one) we have a reminder to visit Cool Cat online for Game"s" (There's only one game on the Cool Cat page, "Cool Cat's Fun MatchGame") "Cartoons" (Neither of the two cartoons are accessible from the current page anymore) and More! (Which if by more you mean continuous self-advertising, shitty web design, and child-unfriendly content that can be easily clicked to from the page.)

Alright so, the next article, well, honestly I'm not sure what to call this one. It's got two sides, so let's start with the side I'll probably spend less time on.

Alright, so I guess this side is some kind of info paper? Still not sure what to refer to it as. If you notice at the top it lists the quote that's on the cover, "Cool Cat is Cooler than Barney the Dinosaur!" and I would like to bring to attention the fact that the quote is attributed to Ben Daka, the producer of Cool Cat Loves You, which helps in making the quote seem as incredibly unbiased as possible. (Also yeah, the fact that someone actually produced this steaming pile of dogshit surprises me likely just as much as it might you.) It proceeds to list the summary of the movie, saying what kinds of movies it is, etc. etc. etc. It also lists that it "Includes FOUR Original Cool Cat Songs" however as someone who has watched the movie before online when it was on Youtube for a brief day or two before getting taken down, I can say that there are only two that actually play in the movie proper, "Cool Cat Boogie" and "Cool Cat Loves To Rock", while one is only in the movie as an instrumental while the actual lyrics are only in the DVD menu from what I can remember ("Cool Cat is My Best Friend") and the other only plays during the credits, and is just the song from the now-defunct Cool Cat "cartoon" ("Cool Cat is Cool") however the one in the credits does have an instrumental track behind it, but I'm too lazy to find somewhere you can find that version at the moment.

Moving on, we have the "STARRING" portion of the page, in which it lists Vivica A. Fox and Erik Estrada despite their 2-3 minute appearances. In addition, if read from right to left, then it technically lists Vivica first, and even if you do read it from center outwards, the way it was likely intended, it still has Derek listed where you would most likely begin reading instead of Cool Cat, which I feel really shows off his vanity.

After that, we have the imperative ">Get Your COOL CAT Today<" which makes it sound like some kind of cat adoption poster or something. After that there's the blatant lie of "We Appreciate Your Business" followed by a statement saying that discounts for schools, libraries, and stores are available, which honestly makes me wonder if there are any places that even carry the movie that aren't online. Also it's kinda weird that they'd have that on one of the papers that comes with the movie. Does Derek expect people to be so blown away by their movie that they just have to bring this flyer to stores and shit so that others can feel the joy of the movie? I don't fucking know this entire analysis is just me talking to myself and probably pointing out shit you could have noticed yourself, but hey if that's not what the blog itself is I don't know what is. Anywho, another fun thing to note is the fact that according to the flyer, the runtime of the movie is 75 minutes, which actually makes it debatable as to whether or not it could actually be considered a film. Final thing to note of this side is that I was indeed correct in my previous assumption that the movie was supposedly made by "a Derek Savage Productions" as opposed to the "Cool Cat Productions" stated on the earlier paper, which is weird.

Anywho, next side of the paper, let's go.

Now this side, this side infuriates me to no end. It's pretty much one glorified advertisement for the movie you already purchased. To save on time, I think I'll probably speed through this one tbh since the last time I wrote this thing it took me like 4 hours and it mainly consisted of pointing out every little thing on the page, so I'll just give the main things. First of all, why the fuck would you advertise your own movie in the flyer that comes with the fucking movie??? In addition, why does it advertise the books? As I previously established, the books aren't for sale, since Derek's still looking for a publisher. After that, it states that there are Cool Cat eBooks, which I'm pretty sure there aren't any, and they wouldn't even need a publisher I don't think. Also, just to point out, Derek actually managed to misspell merchandise as "MERCHINDISE" at the very top.

The movie also claims to be a "DOVE AWARD" winner. After some research (I.E. one single google search) I found that the "Dove Award" is actually an award given to exceptional Christian music, so unless the soulful ballad of "COOL CAT IS COOOOOOL" won one of those, I find it highly doubtful that its correct. Next to it, you can see a logo with the words "FAMILY APPROVED" and "ALL AGES". This is the "award" Derek was actually talking about, which is really just an organization that makes sure that movies are family friendly, which sure is a real fucking accomplishment. Below that the flyer claims that it's **STARRING** Vivica A. Fox & Erik Estrada, who really nailed their 2 minute "starring" roles. After that there's some quotes, including one by the late Adam West, may he rest in peace, saying "Cool Cat is Cool!" despite the fact that on the Cool Cat site the quote from West actually says "Cool Cat is Fun!" which shows just how trustworthy this quote was, plus the fact that Derek most likely got the majority of celebrity quotes by walking up to them and asking them to say it. After that there's a quote of "I Love Cool Cat!" from Bo Derek, an actress starring in such great films as Tarzan the Ape Man, Bolero, and my personal favorite, Ghosts Can't Do It. (All of those films had incredibly negative reception btw, apparently all three of which won her three seperate Golden Raspberry Awards). Finally, below the advertisement for some hideous hats and shirts, there's the godawful pun of "Get Your Cool Cat Purr-chindise" which manages to misspell the latter half of merchandise again, though on the current website, it says "Purr-chandise" so Derek had to have fixed it sometime, but seeing as this flyer is advertising the hats which only just came out a month or two ago, this flyer was made recently, so I don't fucking know.

Moving on, we've got the Cool Cat Loves You Poster.

The first thing to note is that the poster feels like it was made on 11x17 printer paper, and all-in-all feels really low quality. In addition, it's fairly creased and banged up since Derek apparently doesn't know that you're supposed to roll up posters when shipping them. The main thing I want to note that stands out to me is the fucking background. When I first got it, I thought Derek, like, spilled coffee on it or something, but when I went to look at those posters online using the Wayback Machine, I found that it was completely intentional. I have no worldly idea why anyone would think that this would make a good background, since it gives off either an accidental coffee spill vibe or a 1984-esque dilapidated post-apocalyptic "Big Brother is Watching" sign from it.

That's about all I have to say for the poster, so let's move on to the keychain.

First of all, I'm debating whether or not to put this keychain anywhere since I would probably run a high risk of getting the shit kicked out of me. Anywho, there's not much to say here, it feels like a generic truck stop souvenir keychain, except the fact that Cool Cat is weirdly not centered is bothering me.

Here's the back side to the keychain.

Again, not much to say, other than the fact that I never want to see the question "Got Cool Cat?" ever again.

Now we have the book that came with the movie, Cool Cat Stops Bullying. Here's the front cover:

As you can see the art is fucking hilarious and it looks like Cool Cat is being held at gunpoint. And again, I'd like to point out that it wasn't even Derek who drew this, it was some guy named Robert Rainbow. Imagine paying someone to draw your book and getting this in return. Also, fun thing to note, Daddy Derek is actually a cat in this one (Yes, that is actually supposed to be Derek, since Cool Cat refers to him as Daddy Derek in the book) which poses the question of why the ever-loving FUCK isn't Derek a cat in the movie? (I'll tell you why, it's because Derek still thinks he's hot and wants to show off his "body" in the movie, plus the fact that he was likely way too cheap to have more than one costume made, though it could have easily been avoided by not having the parents, namely Derek, show up often, or in such complex scenes, etc etc. You get the drift, it's just lazy and self-aggrandizing).

Following that, there's the back of the cover.

Again, not much to analyze in detail, except for the fact that Derek would apparently charge $3.49 for this shitty thing, despite the fact that you can read it in around 2 minutes or under.

After that there's the side of the cover, which actually has some sad little tidbits of its own.

If you look closely enough, you can see that the book is fucking stapled together, which I find hilariously depressing. In addition, the publisher is sourced as "Blue Thunder Books" which from my extensive google searching towards the topic, doesn't seem to be a real publisher.

I would love to post every page of the book itself, but I feel like that might be grounds for some kind of copyright takedown from Derek, though I'll continue looking for some legal way for you guys to see each page, since each one has an illustration, and they're fucking hysterical. Here's a single image for you guys as a little teaser:

Anywho, onto what you all have been waiting for, the main attraction, the only thing that was purchased and all this other junk just came with for free: The movie. You all have probably seen the box a hundred times, so there's not much for me to analyze there, but here's the front:

One thing I'd like to point out that I haven't seen anyone else discuss is the fact that Derek and Maria, though most notably Maria, are incredibly low quality and poorly cropped in, to the point where you can't really even make out Maria's face since it's so blurry.

Here's the back:

And here's the side:

What's interesting to note here is the fact that on the top of the side there's two little icon image things, one of Cool Cat, and one of Vivica Fox, both of which are pretty low quality.

Anywho, enough stalling. Time to open this motherfucker up.

I'll be honest, when I first opened this thing up, the first thing I noticed was the smell, oddly enough. It's really hard for me to describe, though I will say it's a weirdly bitter, sour smell, maybe something like glue mixed with something else. I have no idea. Anywho, as it was previously pointed out by YMS, the image on the disc is literally a fucking sticker. Unlike YMS's, however, is the fact that it doesn't come off just by breathing on it, so I'm guessing it was just glued to the disc. In all honesty, I haven't even put the disc in my computer to play it yet, since I'm afraid I'll either somehow get a virus from it or that it'll melt inside my computer. I'll just put it in.

Okay, so after putting the disc in the DVD the Disc Drive I got this.

Alright, so there are two folders, the audio one is empty. Great. Then there's the video one.

No idea what this means. Guess I'll have to play it on a DVD player for now.

Anywho, I guess that there wraps up my analysis! It was mainly me just blabbing on and on about things you probably don’t care about, and doesn't really have a conclusive "end'' or anything, but hey if anything else pops up I'll be sure to notify you guys. Thanks for reading this far if you did, and hopefully Tumblr won't crash before I can post it this time.

#mod cool cat #cool cat #cool cat saves the kids #cool cat loves you #this took forever #I put too much time and effort into things #dirty cool cat confessions #i wonder if derek would appreciate my review of his shipment ;)

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fromhollywoodtobollywood · 7 years

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Alright, people my first Bollywood movie is...

Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (1998) dir. Karan Johar

This movie is...a lot of things. It is three hours long so lots of shit goes down. I struggle trying to fit this in to a typical 3-Act Hollywood screenplay structure because it feels like two movies in one. If it were released in the US, the second half would be released a year later as a sequel to the first. But I digress...Let’s begin.

The story opens with Rahul (Shah Rukh Khan) and his wife, Tina (Rani Mukerji). They are in love! They are married! They are having a baby! It’s a girl! But tragedy strikes. Shortly after Tina gives birth, a doctor informs Rahul that she is suffering from severe internal bleeding. Internal bleeding that she somehow knew was going to happen? I’m pretty sure that’s not how internal bleeding works. Anyway, even though this woman is “profusely bleeding” (doctor’s words) on the inside, she still has the composure and stamina to say proper goodbyes to her husband and write a series of letters to her baby daughter (to be given to her each year on her birthday). I realize if I don’t suspend my disbelief, I may not get though the first 20 minutes of this movie. But seriously, they can’t find a medical consultant in India? I’m Indian, and I can name five MDs in my family. Back to the story: Tina makes her husband promise two things: One, that he will never cry because he looks ugly when he does. That’s going to be fantastic for his toxic sense of masculinity. And two: That they name their baby daughter Anjali. It’s a perfectly normal promise and a cute name. Anyway, she dies, he ugly-cries and we are transported to...

MUMBAI, 8 Years Later (I’m assuming this is 1998 based on the year the film was released)

Anjali (Sana Saeed) is now a super-cute kid on the eve of her 8th birthday. While it’s never established what Rahul does for a living, he’s pretty loaded by any standard. 8-year-old Anjali has a camcorder in her room and her own TV with MTV India. In her spare time, she pretends to be an MTV VJ like Neelam. Anjali speaks a charming mixture of Hindi and English that she clearly learned from MTV. She says things like “I’ll be back next week: Same time, same place.” Anjali loves chocolates and wants to be a VJ when she grows up. The character of Anjali is approximately my age so by the time she’s old enough, MTV won’t have VJs, it’ll just be Teen Moms. BUT ANYWAY, she leaves the house to meet her dad on a bridge and this is where things get a little...freudian. Her father is two hours late to meet her (so this little kid has been standing alone in the middle of Mumbai for two hours). When he sees her, he tries to win back her good graces with flowers, chocolates, and a teddy bear like a fuckboy who forgot it was Valentine’s Day and ran to CVS. In this moment, his daughter says she is “tired” of having to be his daughter and his wife (because she picks out his clothes). He responds with “Well, if I have to be your mom AND dad, then you can...” He doesn’t finish the thought because it’s creepy as fuck. But they quickly apologize, do a cute handshake thing, and head home. At home they run in to Grandma (Farida Jalal) who is leading a Hindu Bahjan group of older ladies. She is very pious and has the same shruti machine as my grandmother. Anjali runs in and greets her Grandmother with a TOTALLY APPROPRIATE “Hi, sexy!” greeting. If I had done this to my grandmother (during bhajans, no less) she would have smacked me. Seriously, why is this kid allowed to have MTV in her room?

We then see a speech competition at Anjali’s school where kids are given a random word and have to speak extemporaneously on that subject for one minute. It’s weird but at this point, not the strangest thing that’s happened in this movie. Anjali is pitted against a girl named Jasminder (like ‘Bend it Like Beckham”!) and of COURSE the word Anjali gets is “Mother.” She begins to cry on stage when her dad steps on stage and basically does her speech for her because she is sad. The audience thinks this is adorable and he gets a standing ovation. We return to Rahul’s mansion where he plays basketball inside near one of those Beyoncé hair fans. This house is off the chain. His mother implores him to get re-married for the sake of his happiness and Anjali’s. Rahul insists that love and marriage are something that only happen once in a lifetime. He also says Anjali is alright because she has the letters from her mother. Sure. Because a birthday letter totally makes up for not having a mom.

The next morning, Anjali awakes on her birthday in her truly spectacular bedroom (seriously, what does Rahul do for a living?) and runs down stairs to a stack of presents that would make Dudley Dursley jealous. She pushes all the presents aside to find the letter from her mother. In a voice over, her mother says that this year’s letter will be different from the past. This year, her mother is going to tell her a story about Rahul, Tina, and someone named Anjali. Hashtag, intrigue.

FLASHBACK to Xavier College in the late 1980s

Rahul (still Shah Rukh Khan…they didn’t pull a Chandler Bing/Zac Efron thing here) is playing basketball flirtatiously with a young woman named…Anjali (Kajol.) OG Anjali is smart, funny, and a fantastic athlete (although nothing they do resembles real basketball). However, we KNOW she can’t be taken seriously as a love interest for Rahul because she has short hair and dresses like a combination of Sporty Spice and Dennis the Menace.

A few words about the fashion choices in this film: Although this is supposed to be the 1980s, everyone is dressed like it’s the late 90s. Rahul runs around campus in that GAP sweatshirt and Ralph Lauren rugby shirts that were ubiquitous in the late 1990s. OG Anjali wears a lot of cute but anachronistic, DKNY, Adidas, and Nike separates. No one wears a mullet, no one has feathered/permed hair, nobody’s jeans are acid washed. I have no problem with flashbacks in movies but the fashion and hairstyling make it seem like this is still 1998. Also, does Bollywood have a pass when it comes to showing licensed products and characters? So far I’ve seen a Tweety Bird, a Coke logo, a Pepsi machine, and a background character carrying a Mickey Mouse binder. It doesn’t feel like intentional product placement and I wonder how they got away with this.

Back to OG Anjali and Rahul. While they play “basketball” one accuses the other of cheating and they get in a fight. This brings us to our first SONG AND DANCE BREAK. Honestly, this is why I signed up for watching Bollywood movies. Unfortunately, there are no subtitles for the songs so I can only guess what they are about based on context clues. This one appears to be about Rahul and Anjali’s basketball fight which happened in private but is discussed on the campus radio station. So Anjali dances with her friends, Rahul dances with his and by the end of the song, they are friends again. The song has a fun beat and the choreography is pretty on point. This is probably the second most musically talented school after East High (What team? WILDCATS!). This song would have worked really well as a stand-alone music video and single but of course, this is Bollywood/India so a song can't just be a song.

We return to campus as usual where the principal (Anupam Kher) is waging a war on short skirts. Meanwhile, he ogles a particularly attractive member of the faculty (and so do the male students). I want to take this moment to say that while Hollywood films aren’t always *great* in regards to how they treat the female body, there is something particularly noxious about the male gaze in this film. Sexually objectifying a student or a teacher is just a fun, quirky thing the men in this movie do. It’s especially troubling to think about how Bollywood portrayals of this type of harassment influence Indian gender politics. If anyone has a suggestion for a Bollywood movie where women are visually treated with respect, please let me know. BUT ANYWAY, the actor who plays the principal is actually someone I recognized from playing the dad in “Bend it Like Beckham” and the dad in “Bride and Prejudice.” When I looked him up on IMDB, I learned he is probably the most prolific working actor in the world. Dude has THREE HUNDRED AND NINETY ONE acting credits to his name. Congrats on the career, man. He is happily talking to OG Anjali, a good student and a “good girl” who doesn’t wear short skirts like “other girls” (kill me, please). Principal Malhotra mentions that his daughter (who lives in London but somehow goes to Oxford) is going to do her final year of college at Xavier.

When we meet Principal Malhotra’s daughter she is none other than Tina, (Rani Mukerji) Little Anjali’s mom. We can tell Rahul is into her because there is music and he stops flirting with another woman when she walks in the room. We all know he eventually marries her and fathers her child so this meet-cute is a little anti-climactic. The real magic happens when OG Anjali meets Tina. Seriously, these two share some LOOKS and have some palpable sexual chemistry. If homosexuality weren’t literally a crime in India, I’d like to see these two in a rom com about how they fall in love and scam Shah Rukh Khan for his sperm so they can raise their daughter away from the ever-present male gaze. They have more chemistry with each other than either of them has with Rahul. I’m shipping this so hard and it’s not going to happen.

On campus, Tina faces a very specific form of harassment. Since she dresses modestly, is conventionally attractive, and the principal’s daughter, she is not openly catcalled the way other female students are but Rahul and his bros (in a pretty shitty flirting attempt) ask her to “prove” she’s “Indian enough” by singing in Hindi. Apparently, because she lives in the UK, that means she’s westernized and no longer “Indian.” There is so much wrong with this that I simply cannot. Sorry, that’s the westernized white girl in me talking. In all seriousness, Rahul is supposed to be the campus Cassanova and his idea of flirting is making a woman publicly “prove” her cultural identity. It is hella problematic #notwoke. Tina slays her rendition her rendition of “Om Jai Jagdish Hare.” This is a song sung during Aarti at Hindu prayers. Even I, a culturally beige-washed American, know the chorus and a few verses of this song because if I didn’t sing a long and stay for Aarti, I didn’t get ladoo and ladoo is delicious.

Now we get to the structural problems with this script. A half an hour passes with that is pertinent to the plot of the film. There is a student talent show that is completely irrelevant to the overall plot of the film and simply another excuse for a song and dance. It’s a great song. If they played this at a party, I would not be mad. Tina, Rahul, and OG Anjali essentially improv a full performance and it goes over like gangbusters. It also seems to be an excuse to dress Tina and OG Anjali like 2/5ths of The Spice Girls. Tina is Posh. OG Anjali is a strange mixture of Sporty and Baby. Again, a fun song but would work better as a single. The title song of this film is set among the ruins of a Scottish castle (seriously). For all the shit Rahul gave Tina for going to school in the UK, he seems super content wearing his GAP sweatshirt while singing and dancing in the land of his colonialist oppressor. Sadly, the title song is the least catchy of the film and doesn’t seem to make much sense. Are they all having the same dream about Scotland? Is it a paid advertisement for popular athletic brands of the 1990s? Is it a political statement about India, Scotland, and British colonialism? Who the fuck knows.

We finally come to an important plot point. In an English class taught by the sexually subversive faculty member who wears miniskirts, the students are reading Romeo and Juliet. TANGENT: The professor’s notes on Romeo and Juliet are covered in pictures of Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. These are licensed images from the 1996 film. How did this get past Baz Luhrmann’s lawyers? Tangent aside, instead of asking the students specific questions about the text (or movie), she poses the super deep question: What is love? *insert “A Night at The Roxbury” reference here* Really? What is love? Poor Tina. She left Oxford for this? Rahul answers the question with the level of intellect and sophistication we come to expect from him. He says “love is friendship” causing both Tina and OG Anjali to believe that he is in love with his best friend, OG Anjali. We know this is not true because Tina and OG Anjali are the real love story of this movie. WHY ELSE WOULD SHE NAME HER DAUGHTER AFTER HER?

At this point, OG Anjali believes she has feelings for Rahul and becomes weepy-eyed. When she goes to him to confess her feelings in a wheat field (as one does), he greets her with a confession of love. He then retracts it without giving her a chance to respond and says he was just practicing for when he plans to tell Tina. This guy is the goddamned worst. Why are we supposed to like him, again? OG Anjali responds to this the way any intelligent, self-possessed woman would: By dropping out of college. Rahul and Tina are upset and try to get her to get off the train. She does not. Cool. Way to make a great life decision. Which brings us back to…

LITTLE ANJALI CRYING WHILE READING THIS IN A LETTER. Remember Little Anjali? It’s her birthday? She somehow managed to be a sweet kid despite being raised by MTV and a borderline negligent father. This is the halfway point in the film. Seriously, this shit is only half over.

It’s now up to Little Anjali to reunite her father and her namesake. She decides to play a word-association game she learned by watching MTV-India to get more background information on OG Anjali. This misguided little girl starts the game by jumping on her father’s back and asking him what word he thinks of when he thinks of the word “sexy”. She says this while on his back. The visual isn’t great. Rahul responds to the “sexy” prompt with the name of HIS MOTHER. This family needs some serious therapy or they are tip-toeing treacherously close to Greek Tragedy territory. Anyway, when she says “Anjali”, he responds with “Sharma” (OG Anajli’s last name). While this seems farfetched that he’d say her last name when his own daughter Anjali is being carried on his back, it’s is not even the most bizarre thing to happen in the last five minutes of this movie.

Little Anjali and the grandmother ask more questions about Anjali Sharma. Rahul says she was his best friend in college. He explains that OG Anjali “wasn’t like other girls” because she enjoyed sports and didn’t “wear make up or short skirts.” “She was one of the guys,” he explains with a smile. I’m starting to think that OG Anjali is just the Bollywood iteration of the Hollywood “cool girl.” I want to take this moment to say that not all American exports are good. Sure, we may have given the world Diet Coke and “Hamilton” but this concept of the female lead who is “not like other girls” is hashtag problematic as hell. “Not like other girls” implies that it is somehow better to be in the company of men and masculinity than it is to be among things and people deemed “feminine.” While it’s on the surface empowering, it’s underlying message is steeped in outdated and patriarchy perpetuating myths about gender. Additionally, no girl is like all “other girls” because women and girls make up 3.5 billion people worldwide. Each girl and woman has her own interests, passions, and opinions that make her unique. It makes me truly sad to see other cultures adopt this “not like other girls concept” and use it to propagate problematic gender norms in their own societies.

That last paragraph was brought to you by my Seven Sisters education. Back to Kuch Kuch Hota Hai- Rahul, his mother, and Little Anjali head back to Xavier College to see Tina’s father on the anniversary of her death. While there, they decide to look up Anjali Sharma. Principal Malhotra says that he knows someone who might be able to help. Rifat Bi, the housemother of the girls dormitory remembers every student and as it turns out is still in touch with Anjali.

A note about Rifat Bi: She is a devout Muslim woman and when she is introduced, the Muslim call to prayer is used as background music. I am ashamed to say that as an Indian-American raised in an increasingly Islamophobic society, I heard that music and got scared-like white lady walking through Compton scared. I thought some “Homeland” shit was about to go down. And I’m a liberal! I voted and volunteered for Hillary! But as ashamed as it made me feel to feel fear upon hearing “Allah u Akbar,” I used this as an opportunity to challenge my Islamophobic assumptions. Rifat is a helpful and kind woman who does what she can to help the Khanna family find OG Anjali. When she gets a phone call that OG Anjali is engaged, she tearfully tells the family the news. At this point, Little Anjali (instead of crying) puts on a hijab and sits on a prayer mat. Although this plot point is Kellyanne Conway level ridiculous, it’s actually a very earnest expression of interfaith prayer and a rare positive portrayal of Islam. While little Anjali prays, Rifat gets another phone call to say Anjali’s wedding has been postponed until December because of astrology.

So what has become of OG Anjali? Well, she’s engaged to an NRI (that’s Non-Resident Indian) who lives/works in London. Her fiancé is a man and I was a little bummed by that (sigh, India). OG Anjali now presents herself in a more traditionally feminine way. Now when we see her, her hair is long, her eyebrows threaded, and she is wearing…makeup. Granted, it is her engagement party but she doesn’t go back to wearing track pants or jeans for the rest of the film. I guess now that she has feminized herself in a traditionally Indian way, she’s the focal point of this second-half love triangle. Her fiancé, Aman Mehra (Salman Khan) seems like a cool dude and he and his bros have some sick dance moves. If Pinterest existed in India in 1998, pictures and video of this scene would have been a bigger wedding trend than mason jars. Aman is also infinitely more watchable, charismatic, and attractive than Shah Rukh Khan. He is not quite the match for OG Anjali that Tina was but she’s dead and nobody’s perfect.

OG Anjali wants to take some time while Aman goes back to London to teach singing/dancing to kids at a summer camp. Little Anjali finds out about this by calling the engagement venue and eavesdropping on the conversation OG Anjali and Aman have about the camp. With new knowledge about the summer camp, Anjali begs her dad to go. He says absolutely not because she has never shown any interest in singing or dancing. Really? This kid watches MTV all day Does Rahul know nothing about his kid? God, he’s the worst. Rahul leaves on an “Exporter’s Trip” (so he’s an “exporter”...is that a job? whatever) to London leaving Little Anjali in the care of her grandmother. While he is at the conference he runs in to Aman and there is a bit of confusion with the phones when both Anjalis call at the same time. The men share a laugh before telling the other “best of luck with your Anjali.” Get it? Because women are property!

Little Anjali and her grandmother use this opportunity to escape to OG Anjali’s summer camp. Gotta hand it to Little Anjali for enlisting adult help. If this were a Hollywood film, she would have stolen her dad’s credit card number (I’m looking at you, “Sleepless in Seattle”). Anjali and her grandmother head to the camp and it’s actually pretty cute. Mrs. Khanna schools the Anglophile camp director on colonialism and goes as far as to dismantle his portrait of Elizabeth I. Honestly, I’d like to watch a movie about an Indian grandmother dismantling colonialist symbols and taking back her power but alas, this is as fruitless as wishing for a queer romance in a Bollywood film. Meanwhile, Little Anjali meets her name sake while dressed like a “Dora the Explorer” cosplayer. Rahul (Parent of the Fucking Century) decides to use MTV to reach out to his daughter and says “Anjali, I miss you, please come home.” OG Anjali hears this and briefly thinks Rahul is talking about her. In that moment, she realizes Little Anjali is Tina and Rahul’s daughter. OG Anjali cries dramatically upon seeing the picture of Tina that Little Anjali sleeps with. Shortly after the identities are revealed, Little Anjali leaves a message for her father with the sound of her sneezing and he runs dramatically to the camp. Remember, this is the same man who left his child to wander the streets of Mumbai for two hours.

Rahul arrives at the camp while the children are singing “Ragupati Raghava Rajaram”-a song I sang every morning as a child. Unlike my childhood prayer, this song has a dance floor beat. I think you could probably play this at The Abbey in West Hollywood and it would be a hit. If I heard this version while sipping a G&T and talking to my new best friend about the red carpet at Cannes, I’d be weirded out in the best possible way. Rahul walks in just in time for ladoo (sweet timing, dude) and calls for Anjali. Both his daughter and his love interest respond-that’s not a Freudian nightmare at all. OG Anjali and share a cinematic moment. Rahul decides to just stay at the camp with his daughter and mother while they sing dance out some feelings of unrequited love and play “basketball.” Little Anjali is finally able to show off her singing and dancing skills. Girl has some skills. All that MTV has really paid off. All these background kids are seriously talented dancers. I can only imagine how good Disney Channel India is.

This is where things get *dramatic* again. OG Anjali remembers she is still engaged to Aman and leaves the camp in tears. A little boy in a turban who hasn’t talked before, cries and tells her not to leave. When Rahul sees OG Anjali leaving he hands her the scarf she was wearing the day she left college. Has he really had it this whole time? Also there are a ton of continuity errors with OG Anjali’s engagement ring-sometimes it’s garnet and others times it’s diamond. Is there no one whose job it is to check for these things? There are so many poor, unemployed people in India. Bollywood could solve a lot of problems if they hired some people to spot and avoid blatant continuity errors. Economics lecture aside, it starts to rain and who shows up but Aman saying he loves OG Anjali and is ready to get married because fuck astrology. Little Anjali and Rahul look distressed.

Little Anjali decides to try a little reverse psychology with Aman. She tells him that he is a very handsome man and could have any woman he would want. Why would he want to marry OG Anjali? God, she’s going to be a monstrous teenager. Aman (jokingly) goes along with what Little Anjali is saying. He says he is handsome and doesn’t have to settle for someone “dark and fat.” Way to reenforce colorism and body shaming, Bollywood. It’s not enough that this movie takes place in India and no one has a “dusky” complexion but let’s throw a little fat shaming in there as well. Nonetheless, Fair and Lovely ™ Aman says that he loves OG Anjali and is ready to get married.

At the wedding, OG Anjali can’t stop crying/thinking about Rahul and Little Anjali. When she comes down the stairs, Aman sees the distress in her face and lets her go. He tells her that he wants her to be happy even if it’s not with him. Besides, he says someone told him “he could have any woman he wants” and shoots Little Anjali a smile. This guy seems genuinely jazzed to be not getting married despite declaring his love in the rain just before this. Rahul and OG Anjali tearfully embrace and it’s assumed they end up together. Little Anjali cries tears of joy while wearing casual western wear. There is no way in hell I could have worn anything other than Indian clothes to someone’s fancy wedding. Little Anjali and Aman lead a pretty solid dance at the not wedding. A farfetched idea but hey, the choreography is on point-a pretty accurate description of the film as a whole.

#kuch kuch hota hai #bollywood #movie review #hollywood #indian #diaspora #american born desi

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abundantchewtoys · 8 years

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HS Map update

Holy shit, the Homestuck map was updated!! It's been 48 years! Finally!

Blaperile and I agree that the Masterpiece is probably going to be called just that. Maybe in Caliborn's all caps quirk, too.

And I think A6A6A2 might be called "LAND OF SOMEONE'S HANDIWORK I TOOK", heheh.

The rest remains to be seen. Will the Credits be shown separately? I think so. Would Act 7 just be called "ACT 7", or like Blaperile thinks have the sub title "Thanks for playing"? Maybe it will be "The Ultimate Reward"!

Also, I highly doubt it, but it would be neat if the Snapchat updates got their own section.

I also wonder what colour Act 6 Act 6 and Act 7 will be given, since they're on a separate "cartridge" than the previous parts of Homestuck. (Maybe the Credits will be on their own, seeing as their "container" is not a game or CD anymore, but rather a smartphone.)

Lastly, I wonder if each of the "sections" under Act 6 Act 6 Intermission 4 will be from a separate point in the timeline that John jumps too.

For that matter, I wonder if the big Retcon is perhaps designated in a special manner, too? Unlike the Critical Moment or the claiming of the Ultimate Reward, it isn't a separate flash, but it is however the final part of a sub component of the story.

----

Ah come on, Andrew added a designation/sub division for the Pre- and Post-Scratch timelines! Heh, two sides of a fourth wall. Why not an unscratched disc and a scratched one, though? Okay, granted, that's already in use for the "Discs" of Homestuck. So that seems to support my theory that the Pre- and Post-Retcon timelines might be designated differently too? Maybe "Side 3", heh. (Also, I don't think the sides are about the children being inside and then later escaping the story, since it's the fourth wall that John and Jade broke through being used as the logo, not the white endgame house.)

Ah, yup, Act 6 marks Side 2. Heh, it seems like such a small hole they made in the pane, come to think of it. I'd forgotten about the "split Act_6" command above Act 6 Act 1. What's it going to be for Act 6 Act 6, then? "Shatter", perhaps? The kids were once again scattered, isolated on their separate planets, by both the glitches and the Condesce's mindcontrolled drones Jane and Jade.

It marked Caliborn's attempt at turning the whole story in a game of pool, in that manner, you know. I... made that observation before on Tumblr in the past.

Part 3 of Homestuck starts together with Act 6. I suppose this means Act 6 Act 6 will be contained within Part 4 together with the conclusion of the story.

Pfff, looking back at the icons of the sequences, I forgot the start and end of the Jailbreak section were marked by quasi-identical images like that.

Blaperile poses a good question, what would the pseudo-symbols for the Act 6 Act 6 subacts be? Maybe just Caliborn's head each time, like what was shown in the manual for the A6A6A6 cartridge, heheh.

I knew it! Part 3 and Disc 2 both end with A6I5. (And Side 2 continues.)

Don't you just love that even grouping the fractal act structure is made into something confusing by Andrew, using Parts and Discs and Sides? Heheheheh. Oh, right. "Sides". Like sides A and B of a record. Or a disc, you could say. But in this case, there are more discs than sides, pfffff.

Another good question by Blaperile, which symbols will be placed underneath Part 4? Mayb the god tier symbols of the kids + symbols of the surviving trolls? But then, Vriska wouldn't be featured. Hmm... Tough matter. Also, what the name for the next "disc" might be is also up for speculation. (Before we scroll further down on the page and read it.) Disc 3 is inaccurate but least confusing. Cartridge 1 would be most accurate but lame. Let's settle for Cartridge 3. :P

Ooooh, split Act_6_Act6 it is! Hah, okay, and it uses Caliborn's theme colour! Oh yeah... That's right, it's because that was also the colour of the shitty curtains he used, that never stopped being a thing.

Oooooh, part 4 is designated by Caliborn's and Alt Calliope's filled cheek swirls. That's actually really fitting, given the theme of predomination at play. I hadn't thought of that. Heh, okay, as I should've seen coming, A6A6A1's title is "Homosuck". And for some reason, not one but TWO cheek swirls are used as the pseudosymbol.

So, the cartridge art is not the art for the sub act, but for the last sequence, and it's Caliborn's gloating pose instead. Fitting too.

Oooh, what's that? A6A6A1 wasn't part of a disc, but after the cartridge gets inserted, we get a new designator...

What would the name for A6A6I1 be, last guess?

... "Stardust". That's a less direct reference to the glitches than I would've thought. ... Instead of just Cartridge it says "Supercartridge", pffffff. That's probably the name used in the manual. Putting Grimbark Jade on the cover really sells the events in the sub intermission, by the way.

So, will the line for the Supercartridge perhaps not end with Act 7, but instead A6A6I4? When John blows it out of the slot? :) ... Wait, no, Blaperile reminds me Lil Seb put the thing back. (Where it came from.)

Perfectly chosen symbols for A6A6I1 sequences, by the way.

... Oh god yes. The acronym's not even spelled out, but A6A6A2 is named after LOSHIT. Called it!

That pseudosymbol though. Perfection. And indeed, once more a unique symbol.

Ahahahah, it's fitting this sub act has so many Johnfaces to go with it. (Matching icons for you and your squad.)

A6A6I2 = "theres problems" Ooooooh, yeah! Those are actually indeed the arc words to go with this sub act, with all the events leading up to the next intermission (which starts with [S] Game Over), like everyone meeting up on LOFAF.

Looking further ahead, I think Lord English's face (specifically in his "sprite form") will be the icon for A6A6A6, by the way.

And perhaps A6A6A3 is called "GAME OVER, KID", to go with "GAME OVER"? Or like Blaperile speculated, a manga reference.

... Oh. Well, yeah actually, that title does make "more" "sense" (in context). Oooooh, perfect art and pseudosymbol, too! I was just thinking of Caliborn's watermark, but in the context of whether they could serve as the act title. "Original act title, do not steal".

If my eyes don't fool me, it seems the icon for Game Over might be partially green to show it transfer from act to intermission in the same flash! Awesome. (Though the art doesn't give much away about the events in the flash, perhaps for the better.)

Hmm... Blaperile's right, it's kind of strange the events post-game over warrant so many of their own images.

Act 6 Act 6 Act 4 is called "Dark night of the feelings", pfff. I was wondering how Caliborn "moping" and feeling especially "emotional" as an artist could be translated to a good title. Oooh, and there's the CalCoin logo as the pseudosymbol - well, for a second, I'd wondered whether CalCoin would've been used as the title for this intermission...

I'm glad Caliborn's "Pure Art Skill" (and the art style of that sequence) is immortalized in icon form, by the way.

Ooooh, Blaperile was right, A6A6I4 is called F1X TH1S, hahahah. We're almost at the end! Just 5 more acts / intermissions to go, including the credits!

I like how both Rose's and Aranea's death judgment is featured on the map. Them being so close behind each other makes for a nice contrast.

Plus I like that Shelby's art is also featured.

Ooh, and like I speculated, each jump of John's warrants its own icon. R3UN1ON, Lemonsnout interrogation, MOM3NT...

Pfff, the line of icons going "John judging the scarf list - Gamzee is caught O_O - Making out underneath a cracked sky - Vriska: Turn - Plop" is hilarious.

Maybe Vriskagram logo will be the first icon for A6A6I5. I doubt "she's 8ack" will be the title, it's more likely what Blaperile thinks, "Why is everything always so wonderful". Though I wouldn't mind a "Web 3.0" reference. ;)

Heeheh, and there's the Masterpiece. Pffff, tiny clay Caliborn could actually serve as an icon on the forums.

Actually, now that I see the first icon for A6A6I5, it hits me how Caliborn's toothed grin looks like Gamzee's in A6A6I3... Or maybe also Lord English's mouthlaser pose, though since that's also Caliborn...

... PFFFFF A6A6I5's title is actually "She's 8ack", oh my freaking god. Well, that sure goes with the art.

All them lilypad scenes.

Ah come on, now that I see them side by side, I notice the parallel between Meenah and (Vriska) sitting on an edge talking and Dirk and Dave doing the same. In fact, the sky of LOTAK is also filled with explosions, just like how the "sky" in the dreambubbles was filled with other bubbles exploding.

Wow, again, so many nice icons and juxtapositions of them. Roxy creating the Matriorb, (Vriska) in tears while one row earlier she was still happy, GCATavrosprite and (Tavros) side by side...

Awww, (Vriska) and (Terezi)'s meetup as symbol for Terezi: Remem8er.

Ooooh, Collide marks the end of Part 4, is designated by PM's Victory (yussssss) and... it's pseudosymbol is the curtain thingamabob we see for the last time at the end of the flash. Tssssh.

Ahhhh, right, and so the post-Collide images are counted together with it, just like how the post-Act 4 pages were basically still part of that act.

QDFQDFQDFQSFQSFQSDFQSDF

Act 7 IS THE RAPTURE?????

DDANG ANDREW.

THAT WAS A MYSTERY WE THOUGHT NEEDED SOLVING INDEED.

Wow, I had not thought the Rapture to be Act 7. Wow. So, in hindsight, what he meant about this blowing our minds is that it's Homestuck The Anime!!

Ooooooh, and so Collide and Act 7 have title cards in opposite colours, black and white. So retroactively, Collide is meant to be the thing symbolized by the black circle on the "disc specibus" we saw way back first in Act 5, heheh.

OOOOohh, The Credits are not only featured, but designated "Post Canon"!!!

So, you know, you could kind of count the Snapchat updates into them as well! Maybe if Andrew ever makes an archive for them, they'll get added here?

---

So that was it. A great update, I wouldn't have counted on such good names anymore, it's been so long. But I like them all a lot, they're really fitting.

Like Blaperile suggests, Andrew probably took the time rereading the latter part of Homestuck to determine the icons and find good titles for all of the sub acts.

Too bad there's no icon for the Ultimate Bro Hug of 2015. Oh well.

#homestuck #upd8 #reaction #spoiler alert #[s] collide #(vriska)#[s] game over #act 6 act 6 #act 6 act 6 act 6

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