#i was certain it was either gonna be lewis or oscar

[leclerc-s]

talk about an unexpected win

[rocketinthesky]

I’ve been thinking a lot about why a lot of people are starting to hate Lando sm and while i do think part of it does have to do with him just performing good and having a championship winning car, the other part might just be because he’s “changed” and he’s had a few “immature” moments so to speak. Like people are largely unhappy with his petty comments with Lewis in the cool down room (which yes as a lover of the norris boy i agree lashing out was childish and unnecessary), how he acted about Oscar’s first win (which to an extent ik why people are upset at Lando’s behaviour but…i can sympathise with both sides and can’t dislike him for that because it was a painful and complicated situation), and most recently his “cocky” comment after winning the dutch gp where he repeated Max’s signature line or wtv (which i myself didn’t see much issue with since they’re friends and Max himself didn’t show any significant emotion towards either).

A lot of it boils down to people calling Lando arrogant and perhaps him not “delivering” enough to be that arrogant and my opinion on that is: firstly) the whole SPORT is built on arrogance lol every single driver on the grid is competitive, arrogant, and so pumped full of adrenaline and rage that they say and do a lot of stupid shit when high on the emotions from a race. Literally every driver ever, from the grid now and from the past, has been far from perfect. Think Seb, the grid’s father even after retirement, hailed the nicest most genuine driver ever. Ya think he hasn’t had his cocky, fucked up moments? My mans was a MENACE in his prime. Yall need to stop wearing rose-tinted glasses for your favs lol. Max, who’s gotten into many childish altercations after races, like the infamous moment with Ocon and even last year with George. But no one criticizes Max to that degree (disclaimer: i don’t dislike any of the drivers i’m using as examples. I am a lover of all but that also means i criticize fairly). It’s fucked up to say you excuse certain behavior from someone just because they’re winning more or a better driver in your opinion. Very very fucked up to call someone who’s open about the mental struggles of being a racer “weak”. Lando’s far from perfect but so is every other driver on the grid.

They’re all human, they’re all clinically insane because only a crazy person would live their life riding at that speed for the thrill of it. They’re all heavily flawed, they’re all emotional beings. They have their moments of pettiness, aggression, immaturity, arrogance. This isn’t just in defense of Lando but of every driver on the grid. Stop putting them on a pedestal of unrealistic standards. They’re fuckin F1 drivers, some of the most fucked up (said fondly) species of human. And stop being hypocrites. It’s okay to criticize them, rather we should criticize them. I was and still am very vocal about how unnecessary Oscar’s recent comments about Stroll was, but it’s something i also won’t dwell on because it’s just part of the sport lol. I won’t hesitate to criticize any of them, even my favs, because that’s the healthy way to be a fan of someone. But mindlessly hating someone is so stupid. I mean ig u do u but if you’re gonna hate over dumb shit just be ready to get backlash over it lol

Anyways idk if this rant even made any sense.

Tl;dr - Lando’s shown some immature/“unlikeable” emotions like a normal human being and now everyone hates him for it despite ignoring the same behaviour from their favs. Lmfao. Peace out. Stay sane🫡

[maxlarens]

ok so I must come back with more driver!reader thoughts especially with how they can work at red bull. maybe bc I’m a massive sports person and have read many either “x player has always been a girl”/gender swap fics or what but I kinda love the idea of driver!reader being someone who is absolutely talented, but gets to f1 bc she has family there/the timing works right and while she’s talented, she thrives in a team environment. She can absolutely and does win and set records, but her focus beyond being the best driver she can be is getting more opportunities for women who can drive lights out but lack the connections to make it to f1. I hope that makes sense but something like that to me, someone who wants a WDC but maybe can see that she’s gonna need a shit ton of luck or drive absolute lights out for herself to get it but can get the team the constructors and get a nice number of wins under her belt. She believes in herself for sure, but knows the WDC might not be in the cards for her

this might be TOTALLY delusional of me, but in my little fantasy world she definitely gets a wdc at some point. in the same way i think lando, george, oscar (and a few other drivers) are definitely capable of getting a wdc. i don’t see her becoming a several time wdc champ, twice at the most— but yeah in my head she’s capable of that in the right car. BUT also i don’t she could do it in a redbull? thats another discussion though. i see her definitely staying in f1 for a long time. she amasses a bunch of loyal sponsors and even if her performance takes a bit of a dip she hangs on at midfield teams who need a bit of a mentor and want someone consistent.

but absolutely the moment she stops performing up at the top of the grid and when those top teams don’t really seek her out as much, she’d very much shift into the role of championing diversity and going out on a limb to get drivers that aren’t straight white men into the sport. there’s only so much she can do when she’s young and i think she relies on lewis/mercedes initiatives in the beginning of her career if that makes sense? she feels its her role to speak out but she’s not got the resources/influence to really muscle these more diverse drivers in.

but later, when she does, that’s her main goal.

tbh i think she’s selfish. i think she’s a feminist to her core. but i think the driving comes first? does that make sense. maybe its morally bankrupt but i think she’d ignore things to a certain extent just to keep herself in a situation that is favourable to her. i don’t mean she’d put up with something awful i just think she’s letting microaggressions and unfavourable treatment slide. eventually she learns better. but in her early career she’ll do whatever she can to get the wins.

i think she’s a team player but she’s not quite like oscar let’s say. she leans a little more max or lando. which is why i think she’d have a hard time on a team with max or lando lol. they’re too similar and she’d feel slighted if they overexerted their position in the team.

[graveltrip]

Made this list last minute, literally on the eve of the 1st quali of the year, but I'm so happy that in the end I did, because I thought about this list a few times over the season and as the end of the season neared, I was getting more and more excited to see what I said and this was so fun to read back.

max wdc - ✅ we all knew it was coming.

rb will start pushing checo towards retirement (if he acts up) - ❌ i do think the attitude towards him shifted in the team, after he started talking about going for the title, but it didn't really happen.

ferrari off track politics extravaganza - ✅ expected more, but we still got the santander for me is a terrible bank saga and vasseur went on a firing spree early in the season.

merc rivalry heating up, extra points if shit goes down in silverstone or interlagos - ✅ it did heat up, but i expected more serious trouble, interlagos and silverstone were such a bad shouts tho.

a new winner (probably lance) - ➖ oscar won the qatar sprint, but that's not a proper race win, so kinda.

the ocon vs gasly beef will go in an unexpected direction and it's gonna be way more under the wrap than people expect it - ✅ not entirely sure what i meant by unexpected direction, but i think it was either that they would get on better than people expect or that the team would cause problems in their relationship, which is kinda what happened (the latter interpretation is more likely the turth imo). i've seen some people say they enjoyed the "french civil war", but i think whatever has been going on between them stayed pretty under the wraps, so i don't really understand that line of thinking, but whatever.

andretti's calvary to get into the sport continues + the fia vs liberty media vs the teams/drivers thing will come back again - ✅ the latter was a way bigger thing in the beginning of the season than at the end, andretti is still trying to get into the sport, edging ever so closer to maybe one day being accepted onto the grid.

audi stirring up things in silly season - ❌ there were some rumours that alfa romeo/sauber/audi wasn't gonna re-sign zhou and some names were touted as his replacement, but nothing came of it.

the lando should/needs to leave mclaren talk will get even louder - ✅ it did get louder in the first 3rd of the season, but with the upgrades working out well it died down pretty quickly, still gonna count it as a point for me.

haas comfortably in the mid midfield - ❌ i truly believed in them based on testing and those first fps, they struggled even more than last year.

at least one of the at boys will lose his seat at the end of the season - ➖ i knew the yuki + nyck line up wouldn't last, but i thought rbr grew out of the midseason swaps.

big aston martin controversy by/around the summer break - ❌ the frontwing saga wasn't the kind of controversy i was thinking of here.

certain reserve drivers will get more media attention than some of the actual drivers and it's gonna be annoying asf - ✅ the weekly mick articles reusing the same 3 quotes were quite annoying and f1 media/ rb pushed danny a bit too much too.

lewis comfortably beats george - ✅ quali was quite even, but in the races, apart from some instances, lewis was cooking this year.

lance is gonna be closer to fernando than a lot of people expect, he will still lose the teammate battle tho - ❌ based this on how close lance was to seb last year, but fernando was in beast mode this year.

alpha tauri vs williams flop off at the back - ❌ they had an interesting battle at the end of the season, but it wasn't really the flop off i expected for the 2nd to last place.

oscar will be the highest placed rookie, but his season will be just okay - ➖ him being the top rookie this year wasn't that hard to predict, but i thought mclaren would be just okay/below par, so he wouldn't be able show much, but that wasn't the case afterall. had a really good rookie season, even if i think some people overrated him a bit at certain times, looking forward to see how he develops.

kevin vs hülk 1st lap incident with some spicy radio - ❌ i was so off with this prediction (i think it was a filler for the number 23), they are one of the chillest pair on the grid, raced each other pretty respectfully.

another not that bad, but undewhelming year from ferrari, questions around charles staying with the team start bubbling up again - ✅ yep

nyck will bring some of his fe antics to f1 and people won't be happy about it, he will continue where pierre left off when it comes collecting penalty points - ➖ i thought he would be way more unhinged, but his fe spirit didn't really shone through, apart from some rare instances.

someone will miss a race, so there will be more than 20 drivers in the standings at the end of the year - ➖ there were more than 20 drivers competing this year, but i thought it would happen because of illness, not because of rb nonsense.

alpine is not gonna the smoothest ride this year, but they will develop a good car by the end of the season - ❌ alpine not having the smoothest ride was the understatement of the century, the car was mid shit and didn't develop into much, massive firings in the middle of the season, esteban going through it this year, both drivers having a ton of bad luck etc. hope next year is better.

the las vegas gp is gonna have a ton of hype to the point of being cringey, but the race is just gonna be meh - ➖ yeah the show around the weekend was a bit cringey, but overall i enjoyed the race, there are things they can fix, but it was campy.

12/23 is quite good imo and I had a lot of fun with this, it was good to look back on this list from after the season.

2023 predictions

started writing this a few weeks ago, wanted to put together a list of predictions for the season for fun, then put it aside and ignored it. testing rolled around, i was far from finishing it and i didn't really care, but reading it back now, some of the calls i made were pretty solid predictions, so i decided to finish it, here is 23 predictions for 2023:

max wdc

rb will start pushing checo towards retirement (if he acts up)

ferrari off track politics extravaganza

merc rivalry heating up, extra points if shit goes down in silverstone or interlagos

a new winner (probably lance)

the ocon vs gasly beef will go in an unexpected direction and it's gonna be way more under the wrap than people expect it

andretti's calvary to get into the sport continues + the fia vs liberty media vs the teams/drivers thing will come back again

audi stirring up things in silly season

the lando should/needs to leave mclaren talk will get even louder

haas comfortably in the mid midfield

at least one of the at boys will lose his seat at the end of the season

big aston martin controversy by/around the summer break

certain reserve drivers will get more media attention than some of the actual drivers and it's gonna be annoying asf

lewis comfortably beats george

lance is gonna be closer to fernando than a lot of people expect, he will still lose the teammate battle tho

alpha tauri vs williams flop off at the back

oscar will be the highest placed rookie, but his season will be just okay

kevin vs hülk 1st lap incident with some spicy radio

another not that bad, but undewhelming year from ferrari, questions around charles staying with the team start bubbling up again

nyck will bring some of his fe antics to f1 and people won't be happy about it, he will continue where pierre left off when it comes collecting penalty points

someone will miss a race, so there will be more than 20 drivers in the standings at the end of the year

alpine is not gonna the smoothest ride this year, but they will develop a good car by the end of the season

the las vegas gp is gonna have a ton of hype to the point of being cringey, but the race is just gonna be meh

[letterboxd]

Snake-handling.

“I do this for the absurdity.” Co-stars Alice Englert and Thomas Mann tell us about snake-handling, cycles of fear and shame, and their new film Them That Follow.

Britt Poulton and Dan Madison Savage’s moody new film Them That Follow (which they wrote and directed together) takes place in a world rarely glimpsed in cinema—that of a serpent-worshipping religious community deep in the Appalachian mountains.

In certain Pentecostal off-shoots, worshippers bring venomous snakes into their churches, and prove their faith by handling them during services, relying upon God to ensure they won’t get bitten.The great Walton Goggins (The Hateful Eight) plays Lemuel, the pastor of one such sect, and Alice Englert (Beautiful Creatures) co-stars as his daughter Mara, who is torn between her familial religious obligations and the lure of the outside world.

They are surrounded by a heavyweight supporting cast that includes Oscar-winner Olivia Colman (The Favourite), Kaitlyn Dever (Booksmart), Lewis Pullman (Bad Times at the El Royale) and Thomas Mann (Me and Earl and the Dying Girl), who plays Mara’s best friend/romantic interest Augie, someone who rejects his community’s snake-handling.

Them That Follow is “so quiet and grounded it almost negates the evil that lies beneath the surface”, writes Letterboxd member Wood, while Karsten Runquist urges viewers to look past the slow initial build-up “because the second half is near perfect. Amazing performances from literally everyone (protect Olivia Colman at all costs) and just some great-looking cinematography”.

The snakes might prove difficult for some film lovers to get around, as SlasherReviews warns: “Sometimes you have to put your life on the line to be a fan. As someone who [has] Ophidiophobia (fear of snakes) this was one of the most difficult films I have ever sat through. I cried. I grabbed my neighbor’s arm. A fantastic film that I will 100% never watch again.” Tyler agrees that the snake content is “horrifying, but that’s not the main focus. The focus is on characters…”.

Following the film’s screening at SXSW earlier this year, Letterboxd had a quick catch-up with actors Alice Englert and Thomas Mann.

Alice Englert as Mara in ‘Them That Follow’.

When did you first hear about snake-handling? Alice Englert (Mara): For me it was this film. I hadn’t heard about it before I read the script. It made a dramatic and poetic sense to me in some way.

Thomas Mann (Augie): I think I saw like, a Dateline thing at one point. Just like passing through the channels and I saw it. When I saw the script I was like “I feel like I’ve heard about this”, but nothing more than that. I researched it once I read the script.

What did Britt and Dan say to you about how they wanted to approach this pretty obscure topic? AE: I think they wanted to try and create a portrait that felt respectful and as unbiased as possible, and definitely to tell a story that was about the humanity of it. And the connection.

TM: It’s so easy to [say], “Oh it’s the snake movie” but it’s not really about that. It could be about anything or any strong belief that you don’t agree with. So I think it’s kind of a placeholder for a lot of different things that are going on in people’s lives right now. Snakes are just an example…

AE: …of extremity.

TM: Yeah. Or of the definitive yes or no, black or white, a snake bites you or it doesn’t. You're either with God or you’re not. There’s no nuance to the whole thing. And I think that’s a problem.

Thomas Mann in ‘Them That Follow’.

Did you have any exposure to this world in prepping for the film? TM: We drove to a Pentecostal church one weekend.

AE: We went on Pastor Appreciation Day. They were apologizing because it wasn’t a usual day.

TM: This wasn’t a snake-handling church.

AE: It’s illegal everywhere in America, except for West Virginia. You can handle snakes in West Virginia. It’s really hard to go to those churches. Also it’s really hard for a film production to be okay about letting their actors go.

TM: We thought about going to one, but our producer told us we couldn’t.

AE: I also read about it in a book called Salvation on Sand Mountain by Dennis Covington, which is a fantastic book and everyone should read it. It’s really interesting. It’s a journal, so it’s a non-fiction account of his time that he spent with these snake-handling communities.

Walton Goggins takes aim in ‘Them That Follow’.

Do you feel like you’ve come to understand what people might get from this ritual? TM: That’s like step one when you read a script like this. It’s like, okay, why the fuck are they doing this? And that’s what you try to get to the bottom of. And it’s something that’s ingrained in you.

AE: Humanity wanting to test itself is very universal and I get that totally, that wanting to kind of face what you fear is the most primal journey that you have, so I absolutely get their perspective. But I’m not gonna do it.

TM: Same here. I understand that they feel they have no choice, they feel like this is the only way.

AE: I also understand that this isn’t how I feel and want to live my life, but there are a lot of people who feel as though you have to be certain, and that being uncertain hides the truth in you. Certainty in faith allows you to journey to your place of realization and I don’t agree with that. I think you should be able to question everything as much as you possibly want. I don’t think nature is made with the rules that we imagined.

Was it challenging to get past the inherent ridiculousness of snake-handling while acting in this film? TM: Yeah and that’s what was kind of the fun part. Like, you go up to the snake and you look at the snake, like the snake holds all the power and you’re subordinate to it.

AE: Yeah of course. We’re actors, we’ve done fantasy films. Letting go of the absurdity, we have to do it.

Olivia Colman and Kaitlyn Dever in ‘Them That Follow’.

TM: To see Jim [Gaffigan] and Olivia [Colman] together, the opening church scenes. You just need people to commit or otherwise the audience is not gonna believe it. And you have to make it make sense for you too.

AE: I do this for the absurdity.

TM: Same here, the absurd stuff in this movie was really absurd and that’s always better for me.

Mara is torn between her various obligations. Alice, could you relate to that? AE: I related to the pressure that I felt to perform as a good girl or a nice girl or as a human being that’s presentable and the realization that that’s not the journey I want to go on anymore: how to be appropriate for other people. I don’t want to go on that journey anymore, I don’t think it leads anywhere that is deep or wise I think it just leads in circles and into a fear/shame cycle and I’m sick of it. I’m sick of the abyss of fitting in and I definitely relate to that for Mara, the stress of it.

‘Them That Follow’ is playing in select US cinemas from August 2. Comments have been edited for length and clarity.