#if youre interested by the way we mourn people and particularly white women and PARTICULARLY within the context of the 'true crime' genre

[biblicalhorror]

Went to a book reading for a coworker/new-ish friend of mine today and afterwards we were talking about books/what we like to read and she recommended this one uthor to me and then went "oh, and she has this other really great book on vaccination!" and I was like oh no

But thank God. I looked up this book and it's actually about the history of vaccines and genuine medical corruption and why people are so deeply afraid of vaccines/toxins/chemicals etc. Which actually seems like a super interesting book! But for a second I was like oh no please don't be another secret antivaxxer you were so cool

[glompcat]

Some more Kimberlé Crenshaw quotes (particularly because I am pissed to see someone say her work does not include class, as well as someone seemingly trying to claim her for radical feminism). I’m restricting myself to just two interviews of hers because truly I could quote Professor Crenshaw endlessly.

From this interview with Time Magazine:

You introduced intersectionality more than 30 years ago. How do you explain what it means today?

These days, I start with what it’s not, because there has been distortion. It’s not identity politics on steroids. It is not a mechanism to turn white men into the new pariahs. It’s basically a lens, a prism, for seeing the way in which various forms of inequality often operate together and exacerbate each other. We tend to talk about race inequality as separate from inequality based on gender, class, sexuality or immigrant status. What’s often missing is how some people are subject to all of these, and the experience is not just the sum of its parts.

(from this interview with her and Lady Phyll by Them Magazine):

Nowadays, intersectionality has been twisted and misunderstood both within and outside of progressive circles. Some critics say that at its core, it feeds a kind of identity politics that divides us more than it unites us, and some think our granular focus on all these “isms” distract us from the real fight of class war. What do you say to those critics?

Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw: Well, to be honest, for the past 10 years I haven’t said anything to a lot of this stuff. The one common thread that it represents is illiteracy; a fundamental refusal to engage in any serious way with the problems that intersectionality was initially articulated to address. So when I hear a critique of intersectionality that isn’t about how the framework failed the projects that it was designed to address; when I don’t hear Black women plaintiffs; when I don’t hear Latinx people who were excluded from domestic violence shelters because they didn’t speak English; when I don’t hear about how the marriage equality discourse in the U.S. leaves behind trans people and poor lesbians; when the critique is not grounded in material, sociopolitical injustices, I’m just not that interested in it! Because they’re not interested in what intersectionality was initially designed to do!

Of late I’ve gotten back into at least trying to have a sense of what the discourse looks like, because as it turns out, not responding or participating in it does not mean that you aren’t brought center stage — sometimes in chains, sometimes with a gag on your mouth. So once I saw some of my work and me many times being cited as the source of the most objectionable articulations of intersectionality, I realized that silence wasn’t necessarily going to save me. So I’ve started to speak back a little bit to it. I think that the one that is the most shocking is a discourse that came in the wake of Trump’s election. One silver lining that I thought might come out of it was that at last the liberal left cohort among the intelligentsia, pundits, and organizers, would finally acknowledge that not dealing with race and racism was going to be the end of all of us, because that in large part was what motivated so many people to vote for this maniac.

. . .

Members of our LGBTQ+ community, particularly our trans siblings, face an epidemic of violence: particularly our trans siblings. An essential dilemma of civil rights movements is that in the midst of our organizing, we are perpetually in disabling, consuming mourning. Just in the past two months, Cathalina Christina, Diamond Stephens, Keisha Wells, Sasha Garden — all trans women of color — have been murdered. How do you emerge from that perpetual rage and mourning into transformative action?

Lady Phyll: Every year we hold a minute of silence at U.K. Black Pride to acknowledge the loss, the pain, the hurt, but also to celebrate and come together as one. To hold each other in that meaningful space, it contains the sorrow.

KWC: It marks the sorrow and it mobilizes it.

LP: Absolutely. It’s powerful to have so many people in that one space come together and hold each other, acknowledging what has happened to us as a community over the previous year — whether it’s our trans siblings who’ve been murdered; the government’s heinous, horrendous crime toward the people of Grenfell; the sexism that plays out in #MeToo — we’re all still in the movement together. The different shades of the diaspora are there too, but we are able to just be one with each other for that moment. Not often can we root out the source of the pain. It’s the pain and the sorrow that we feel every single day while we’re busy being disabled, while we’re busy being queer, while we’re busy being Black women trying to navigate so many spaces. It doesn’t just stop our rage and sorrow there, but it allows us to be in sync with each other.

KWC: The driving force behind #SayHerName was that so many of the families that lost women to police violence were solely in private mourning and not in public mourning. Effectively, they experienced two homicides — one was the homicide of the person, but then they also experienced the killing of the significance of the killing. Those deaths weren’t mattering to the wider Black community, and they weren’t mattering to the organized women's community that was all about violence against women, except if it was state violence against women. It didn’t even really matter to the queer community. So many of the Black women who were killed were either lesbian, bi, or trans, and their deaths weren’t acknowledged by the wider LGBTQ+ movement. So there’s individuated mourning that isn’t part of a collective recognition of loss, and when you don’t have that, you don’t have the predicate for social action to interrupt the system that produced that loss. So seeing Black Lives Matter, seeing the names of Black cishet men being lifted up, and not seeing the names of Black women at all, it was quite literally a demand to say their names. If you cannot say their names, you cannot mobilize behind them — the next step, the moving beyond the mourning. For the mothers of the victims themselves, one of the things that was just so wonderful about #SayHerName was that when they were able to come together, they discovered that they weren’t the only ones. When they came together and sat beside a dozen other women who were also mothers of women who were lost, that became enormously activating for them, not just to engage in political activism, but also to really be able to live a life. We bring them together for a family weekend to share their stories with one another and to have human connection and actually celebrate life. Because for some of them, they felt that to go on and enjoy life was to abandon a daughter — especially when the daughter isn’t getting any attention or recognition otherwise. In that space, they are able to share moments of joy, moments of being able to have a good laugh, a good drink, a good dance with each other! Many leave that space each time with a new commitment to live life clearly still in mourning about their loss, but now determined to stand in their daughter’s stead to demand accountability from their communities as well as from the state that took their lives.

LP: The erasure of the Black woman is real, isn’t it!

KWC: It’s real, and it’s in every political space that claims to be there for them.

LP: That’s how U.K. Black Pride started. It started with a group of Black queer women, because we did not see ourselves. It was a heightened experience of HIV/AIDS. There was a lot of money going into campaigns for Black gay men’s concerns, but Black queer women didn’t see that. There were no resources or services. Austerity was starting to hit the resources that we needed, especially in terms of safe housing, because we also suffered from domestic violence. So when we got together as BLUK — Black Lesbians in the U.K. — there was this empowerment in being able to recognize and connect with one another.

KWC: Isn’t it something!

LP: That’s why when you’re talking I’m just like yes, yes, yes! Somebody said to me, “My fellow Black woman, when I see her, she is my road atlas.” You are my journey, my mirror, my blueprint. Just being in this space, for me, right now, right here. What you just said about those women coming together to honor their children, to celebrate themselves as well, to know that they are worthy — it’s so important.

Finally, I want to link to this song and music video she was part of.

Kimberlé Crenshaw (a black woman) coined the term 'intersectional feminism' to specifically refer to gender and race relations so appropriating it to centre or even just include poor white men is racist and misogynistic as hell. Intersectionality is about race. Not class and certainly not cis men. If you're gonna shit all over radical feminism don't use the work of radical feminists like Kimberlé Crenshaw to justify your inanities. And maybe actually read some feminist theory.

Hi!

So actually:

Kimberlé Crenshaw, an American law professor who coined the term in 1989 explained Intersectional feminism as, “a prism for seeing the way in which various forms of inequality often operate together and exacerbate each other,”

Weird that the person who coined the term is defining it differently from you, a random anonymous person on the internet. Weird that she says it involves various forms of inequality, not just race and sex... huh.

I think I'll go with her definition, not yours.

Also I'm gonna use the work of intersectional feminists like bell hooks, who wrote a book called The Will To Change. You should check it out.

And (this is nitpicky) but I'd personally call the woman who invented intersectional feminism an intersectional feminist, not a radfem.

[nickjunesource]

I'm a new THT fan and I love Nick and June, but I need to ask, why is everyone in this part of the fandom so opposed to Serena having screen time? The story needs a villain, and she's The Villain (and certainly more interesting that Fred) so I'm kind of lost on how you lot reckon the story would function without her?

Hey!

So we can only answer for ourselves (others are welcome to chime in below and add their own thoughts), but we just find that Serena has excessive screen time. She is a character that clearly doesn't abide by Bruce's 'rule' of seeing what June sees, meaning we get a lot of pointless content with her. While we don't mind having her as one of the villains, her character is written in a very back and forth way which is incredibly annoying. Also she is written in such a way that epitomises white feminism and is undeservedly sympathetic, particularly many scenes that come after 2x10, especially the first half of season 3 where June was kinder to Serena than any of her true allies.

Something that we still find particularly irritating is the amount of screentime Serena has had involving Holly compared to the amount that Nick has had. We got to see her mourn Holly's absence for several episodes, despite the fact that she's a kidnapper who wanted to re-kidnap her. Meanwhile we've still never gotten a clear insight into how Nick handles the separation or how he sees fatherhood.

Further, we have done the June vs Serena thing in every single season. We do like that the show does establish that women frequently play roles in creating and upholding damaging, sexist systems and are people who need to be fought to dismantle things like Gilead, but there are better ways of doing it than rehashing June and Serena fighting.

Our ideal story would significantly trim down Serena's screen time and utilise her as part of a general Gilead and patriarchal enemy instead. And this ongoing pregnancy storyline never should have happened. It brings nothing to the show (even if her son is eventually taken from her, resulting in her knowing how June & Nick and others in Gilead feel) and the fact that it takes time away from more interesting characters like Nick, Rita, Janine, and Lawrence.

But with that said, we welcome your opinion. If you enjoy her story, then we're glad for you.

[grimoireoffolkloreandfairytales]

Balkan Bestiary: Zduhac

This creature is exceedingly popular in Balkans, and stories of it ( in various forms and spellings) can be found all across Montenegro, Albania, Serbia, Croatia, Macedonia, Bulgaria and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Their defining characteristic is that zduhac is a human being whose soul has ability to leave their body and ascend in sky, where they either fight malicious spirits causing storms and  elemental catastrophes, or  they themselves go out to combat and harm their rivals and neighbours. The soul is usually invisible, but it can assume form of some bug- such as moth- or even dragon.

They usually look like ordinary people, though some traditions attribute them ‘’tells’’ that can vary from being little more hairy, over having superhuman strength, to going through life in dreamy and mournful fashion. When zduhac notices trouble approaching, either by gathering of dark clouds or sensing other spirits, they will go away somewhere, or barricade themselves in their home, and not come out until storm is over and winner is decided.

There are many, many names for this creature/ type of magical ability, as it is extremely widespread, and in some cases names vary from region to region. While this can apply to many creatures, in this case it is very prominent, whether due to lore being prevalent and popular among populace, or interest of folklorists.

Zmajevit: This term means ‘’dragonlike’��� and refers to spiritual and sometimes blood conenction these people have with dragons. Aside from this, there is general use of term as epithet to describe great, courageous and strong heroes.

Alovit: This term means ‘’ala-like’’ and it’s origins are covered in this post about creatures in question.

Zduhać: The root of this word is ‘’duh’’, which is word meaning spirit.

Stihija: This word can mean unfortunate situation or calamity, but it’s original meaning seems to have been a great storm or weather catastrophe. It may be derived from Greek stihio or Albanian stuha, and above mentioned zduhac may have been derived from it.

Vjedogonja: Is bit archaic, but I believe that it means something like ‘’dhrouded in air’’ or ‘’one who pursues winds’’

Vjetrovnjak: A folk term that means something along lines of ,,the windling.’’

Oblačar: Could be translated as ‘’the cloudy one.’’

Gradobranitelj: Means quite simply ‘’defender (from) hail.’’

Vremenjak:  Could probably be translated as ‘’weatherling’.’

Vilovit: While this term in general use is archaic dialectic way of calling somebody mad, in this context it means ‘’fairylike, fey-touched’’. Those two are connected, as vilas ( fairies) sometimes have ugly habit of driving people mad.

When zduhac’s soul exits their body, it does so through trance. The body will lay down, and be still, as if zduhac is in deep sleep or nearly dead, but it will still twitch, and every wound earned in battle shall be transferred to it. Some traditions claim that if body is interfered with in any way, even something minor like turning it over, soul won’t be able to return. Some descriptions of trance resemble epilepsy seizure, and indeed legends may have been based upon it.

Zduhac’s ability to astrally project themselves, their sometimes attributed abilities of healing, prophecy and cursing cattle and crop, alongside with fact that they often fulfilled same function as folk healers and magicians ( to use english term that’s very popular, cunning folk) has led some anthropologists to believe belief in zduhaci is remnant of  prechristian shamanistic traditions, and compare them to similar people in other cultures, such as say, Italian benandenti. While this theory holds water, it is important to note that there isn’t much concrete evidence for it, and that European anthropologists are sometimes very quick to use word shamanistic improperly ( not all of them, of course, especially ones who come from cultures and regions where such living spiritual traditions still thrive, and often gets misinterpreted).

Anybody could be zduhac ( according to some claims, even animals!) but generally it is a strong man, in peak of his prowess, or a respected elder. Fact that zduhac’s enemy is traditionally feminine ala, and that they are sometimes contrasted with witches ( who traditionally attack their own closest kin and friends first), leads to some interesting ponderings.

Historically, we have many, many records of named and famous zduhaci across various regions. This is result s combination of dedicated research by folklorists, people generally knowing who is who three villages over and keeping that alive in folk memory, and fact that in certain places and times it was more or less social function of village. Some famous and beloved rulers were said to be zduhaci, but I feel safe saying this is unlikely, and probably propaganda, especially as those claims generally arose after their deaths, and were way of honouring leaders people found important and heroic.

How they are accepted by community is pretty interesting thing to me. Generally, zduhac is respected and honoured, as they fulfill extremely important function, and are guardians of their community and adore it whole heartedly. However, they can be described as strange, eccentric and uncanny, which may be partially due to fear of retaliation if one offends zduhac, but also because they can sometimes be sort of tolerated social outcasts; hermits, men who never married, thoughtful and private people, people too smart or opinionated for their close community, people with epilepsy...

Zduhac is primarily positive figure, however that too depends on your relation with them, like with people. If you anger zduhac it may retaliate, either by letting hail take down your vineyard, or sending pox upon your livestock. Also, traditionally zduhac attacks and threatens surrounding villages, particularly ones that have fed with their own, to point that some legends claim that all storms are result of rival zduhaci wrestling for dominance.

How person becomes zduhac depends on several sources:

It may be a sort of trade, the magical knowledge and practice that is passed from one to another, with several tales depicting  elderly zduhac seeking out replacement, usually a close relative like brother’s son or such. This fits with historical and folkloric records of how folk magicians and healers operated.

In certain traditions, zduhac is connected to angels and saints, and may even be counted among them, and their ability can be seen as divine blessing. Connection with sky, is of course, obvious.

In others, zduhac gains their abilities through mystical initiation performed by the Devil. It’s important to remember that this isn’t Satan of megachurch evangelism, but rural, folkloric Devil. So while powers are sinister and zduhaci can be capricious, they do serve good purpose.

It can be a natural, inborn gift. There are several explanations for how to detect newborn that will grow up to be zduhac, from birth at particular day to other notions, but most famous one and common one is baby being born with whole placenta, which is either red or white. During life zduhac will keep placenta as talisman, and needs to hide it from enemies and prying eyes.

Famously, zduhaci can be children of humans ( usually women) and dragons, which is where name zmajeviti comes from. Dragons are fond of sleeping with human women, especially royal ones, and thus their children grow up to be great heroes, brave and fierce in battle, handsome and strong, skilled warriors ( this belief of extraordinary heritage of nobility can probably be seen as distant cousin to legends of demigod descent and divine right of kings). Sometimes these men may be recognized by feathery winds they keep hidden underneath armpits.

Another connection with supernatural comes from ala, which i previously covered, and which is why they are called aloviti. Ala is traditionally enemy of zduhac, as spirit which causes storms and hail, but sometimes it is source of their powers. Ala may have been parent of zduhac ( usually fathering them), they or their parents may have been it’s victims                 ( encountered it in flesh and survived, or been possesed), or all zduhaci and alas are same beings, and whether they are evil or good depends on which village you hail from.

Zduhac may also derive their powers from the fairies, who are sometimes known to protect, associate with, or mentor humans, usually in healing arts, but they also may bless them in more spiritual manner, and zduhac’s power over natural forces may come from vila, who embody them. Zduhac in those stories may have vila for foster-mother or godmother ( or, like with dragonlike heroes, she breastfed them at young age), may be her oath sworn blood brother, done her favour or attracted her intrigue enough to make him her student. Sometimes they are said to be men who were loved by vilas- seemingly consensually, without traditional ‘’steal her veil and force her to be my spirit bride’’ story, implying that zduhac is one who had affair with vila of her own choosing, and was blessed and abandoned once she tired of her mortal lover.

[wolfqueen-is-here]

Rating ASoIaF POVs

Don’t come at me, these are my personal likes and dislikes (also I’m bored and I had a bizarre fandom encounter yesterday which made me almost consider being too old for Tumblr :P).

If you want to give me yours, I’ll be more than happy to read them!

The order is number of chapters in all the books combined, not my personal favourites. To make it more fun, I’ll also rate them in a scale from 1 to 10 (my least favourite POVs to my best-loved ones).

Here we go!

TYRION - 6/10

Even though he’s not my favourite character (and that’s a huge understatement), I enjoy his chapters in both AGoT and ACoK. I feel kind of “whatever” towards his ASoS chapters, but the real deal-breaker are those from ADwD. It took me nearly two years to finish that book, simply because whenever I stumbled upon his POV, I went into a coma. For me personally it presents his least likeable portrayal, least insightful journey, least understandable motivations. Moreover, he used to constantly objectify women, while judging them by THEIR potential willingness to overcome their prejudice towards him in order to sleep with him. Like get over yourself, ma boy.

JON - 8/10

He started out as an underdog, his chapters in GoT were kind of boring and whiny, nothing ever happened. But boy oh boy, I can’t get enough of him since he ventured out and started hanging out with the wildlings; and his Lord Commander chapters? Probably my favourite ones in ADwD.

ARYA - 8/10

I preferred her hanging out in Westeros, I feel like crossing the sea slowed down her story a bit. Other than that: great read!

DAENERYS - 8/10

People often complain that her chapters were kind of a bore, but for me it was quite the opposite. For a long time she was our only window into Essos, she’s also quite observant and resourceful, so maybe she’ll help Tyrion’s POV become interesting again once they finally meet.

CATELYN - 10+/10

I ofter say that Sansa’s chapters are my favourite, but if I really had to make a choice, it’d be Cat. Her POV is captivating from the very beginning, and she takes us on such a journey! She’s our first window into the Vale, into Renly’s camp (where we meet Brienne and the Tyrells), into Riverrun and the Twins! We follow Robb through her eyes, we mourn Ned with her... She never stops being an interesting character with an eventful background, thrown into situations we wouldn’t be able to witness, weren’t it for her POV. You may like her, you may dislike her, but I’d say that the importance of her chapters is indisputable.

SANSA - 10/10

What can I say? I like her insight, she’s one of the most observant POV characters in the books (maybe because she doesn’t really have her own agenda - not in a bad way, she’s a child and a captive), which makes her less self-absorbed (especially in the later chapters). Yes, her first chapters in AGoT were a bit dull, and that’s why I’d choose Cat’s POV over hers in general.

BRAN - 7/10

I know it’s the weirdest thing to say about one of the most supernatural POVs, but I kinda preferred his Winterfell chapters? He proved to be a great leader (and I’m sure he will be a good king), but some of his later chapters blurred for me into a tight knot of “I’m going north, but sometimes I warg into Summer and hunt”. I hope we explore more of his abilities in TWoW, that’s something I���m really looking forward to despite not being particularly captivated by the deep north’s charms.

JAIME - 8/10

Entertaining, insightful, arrogant - and I’m talking about both Jaime Lannister and his POV chapters. He’s an arsehole with a terrific backstory, but also a walking disaster of a character. Pure joy. The only thing I regret is getting his POV so late in the books. I know it’d ruin suspense otherwise, but still.

EDDARD - 9/10

I love going back to AGoT and reading his chapters, pretending that I don’t know how things end for him. There are so many “main hero” tropes in his chapters, it makes me laugh. Oh well, it was great when it lasted!

THEON - 6/10

HATED his ACoK chapters, LOVED the ones from ADwD. I know that writing him as a dick was crucial to making his further story more heartbreaking, but I generally can’t enjoy vulgarity, objectifying women, describing characters having sex for 15 pages etc. That’s why I hate many Tyrion’s chapters, and that’s why Theon’s POV annoyed me at first. But damn, his inner struggle, his identity crisis, going back and forth from Reek to Theon...  10/10. 

DAVOS - 6/10

Ah, good uncle Davos! I don’t know why I’m not rating him a bit higher, I do enjoy his chapters, especially because it’s through him that we learn more about Stannis and Melisandre in the earlier books. But... he’s such a boring character! :D (I know, I will have to whip myself later for writing this, feel free to send me strongly worded letters, I deserve it.) Davos’s POV works great as an exposition, but I just cannot force myself to care about him personally. Good dude, though.

CERSEI - 9/10

My queen, one and only. I think ASoS might be my favourite book, and that’s mostly because of her chapters. She’s vindictive, egoistic, jealous, unreasonable... and irreplaceable! I enjoy her slightly mellowed-down, cool-headed show version (one of the very few things that the show did right), but gosh, book!Cersei’s weak-arse schemes might be the most wholesome piece of literature, honestly. And the fact that her paranoia isn’t unfounded, that some of her frustrations are totally justified - all that makes her a character rather easy to sympathise with. She might not have the most insightful POV, but it’s certainly the most entertaining one!

SAM - 7/10

He’s a good boy, and an attentive character - his chapters are enjoyable, but not yet exhilarating. Looking forward to more Oldtown business to reevaluate.

BRIENNE - 8/10

I’m not even going to explain myself, her journey was the most enjoyable side-quest I’ve ever witnessed. Some people don’t like her chapters, and honestly, that baffles me more than liking Tyrion’s ADwD POV. :D

BARRISTAN - 4/10

For a famous white cloak, he really felt like a non-character to me. His POV was a-okay, but to be perfectly honest I was constantly paging through his chapters to check whether maybe Dany came back.

VICTARION - 4/10

I’m not a Greyjoy-stan and I probably can’t appreciate the nuance of some Greyjoy POVs, but both Victarion and Aeron read kind of flat. Don’t hate me.

ARIANNE - 8/10

I still don’t get how she was omitted from the show. Maybe she doesn’t become the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, but so many pointless characters from the books got shitloads of screen-time, and my girl Arianne got none? Are you serious? Freaking BRONN became the Master of Coin, and they decided Arianne shouldn’t exist?! And yes, I love even the almost universally hated “The Princess in the Tower” chapter.

ASHA - 7/10

She’d be higher, but there’s a lot of vulgarity in her chapters, too, and I basically don’t care for that At All. Otherwise she’s a dope character and deserves the Iron Islands.

QUENTYN - 6/10

No offence to homie, but he was a bit of a bore. A nice one, but a bore.

AERON - 4/10

See: VICTARION. He’d get even less, but at least we could experience the Iron Islands through his POV.

AREO - 8/10

I don’t see how any Dornish POV (as in being IN Dorne, not being FROM Dorne like Quentyn) could get any less than 7 points. I still think we got too few Dornish POVs, I demand amends!

JONCON - 8/10

I don’t even care about the plot (although he was one of the only two insights into Aegon’s storyline, that should count for something), I can’t with the amount of gayness in his Rhaegar flashbacks. 8/10, would recommend. 

ARYS - 7/10

He was sweet, a bit naive, but I cannot go lower due to my Dorne principle (see: AREO).

MELISANDRE - 8/10

Surprisingly one of the most wholesome POVs of ADwD, pity it was just this one chapter. What with being a Red Priestess and all, you’d expect her to radiate more... numinous energy, but her chapter was one of the most iconic ones. I won’t give her a 9 just because I only have Ned and Cersei with those grades at the moment, and I think it should stay that way. (Oi, Ned/Cersei anyone?)

Prologues and epilogues not included.

What a trip. Care to share your favs? ;)

[sweetsmellosuccess]

NYFF 2020: Part 1

It’s been a curious season of festivals  —  as always, Venice, TIFF, and the NYFF go more or less back-to-back-to-back, making for an almost indecent amount of captivating offerings for all but the most gluttonous of cinephiles  —  but not without its charms. In this time of massive uncertainty in the industry, amongst film distributors and theaters particularly, it’s deeply reassuring to know the medium is still capable of powerful statements, exquisite imagery, and haunting performances as it ever has.

Mind you, next year at this time, if there’s still no widely available vaccine, there might be a more serious dearth of selections, but for what has been an unsettling and mostly miserable 2020, we can thank the stars that films are often shot a year or more in advance of their release.

This year’s NYFF (still ongoing, as I write this) has provided some glories and some failures, more or less in keeping with the usual standard. Herewith, a quartet of selections, ranging from a resurrected Hungarian triumph, to a modern French non-romance, to the debut of a new and energizing auteur.

Damnation (1988) Dir. Bela Tarr

Perhaps no setting in cinematic history is more appropriate for shooting in low-contrast black and white than late ‘80s, post-communist Hungary. Bleak, drab, and pelting with rain, the landscape bleeds in shades of grey. Bela Tarr’s 1988 film, a newly restored 4K edition from the Festival’s “Revival” section, begins with a long shot of a ski lift-like apparatus, endlessly transporting buckets of coal to a repository, whose grinding machinery offers a looping hum throughout the film. Much as Tarr’s various musical interludes include similarly cyclical drones of accordion music, are the men and women of this nameless small city seemingly doomed to their various loops of behavior and experience. In Tarr’s Hungary, everyone looks haunted and morose, like a selection of down-on-their-luck rummies in a dive bar at last call. One such bar patron, Karrer (Miklos Szekely B.), is deeply in love with a beautiful, depressed (unnamed) nightclub singer (Vali Kerekes), married to a loutish man, Sebestyén (Gyorgy Cserthalmi), in bad debt to the wrong sorts of people. When Karrer’s friend, bar owner Willarsky (Gyula Pauer), offers him a potentially lucrative gig picking up a mystery package abroad and bringing it back to him, Karrer instead offers it to Sebestyén as a means of getting him out of debt, but more importantly getting him away from his wife, so their affair can continue apace. Tarr’s films move slowly, with long, static shots, or slow-panning camera movement, but within his frame, he packs in detail  —  from the pellet-like surface of a wall, to the expression of a group of people huddled under a station roof, staring out at the endless rain  —  and adds in acute sound effects as further punctuation (the sound of a man close shaving over his scruff with a straight-edge, for example, or water dripping from an unseen leak). As with his 1994 opus, Satantango, he includes extended shots of drunken merriment, with people dancing, stumbling, falling over each other, and coming back again, but the effect isn’t exactly heartening. As packs of stray dogs work their way over muddy, mostly deserted fields, and Karrer continues to imbibe the depressed resignation of his life’s trajectory (“the fog settles into your soul,” Willarsky helpfully explains), Tarr’s film, his first collaboration with Hungarian novelist László Krasznahorkai, presents a remarkably tactile vision of life under a blundering political machine, well past the point of repair. With its deep shadows, and obvious femme fatale, you could make the case that the film is a ripened Noir, but one with much of the magistry beaten out of it, tarnished in the mud of the fields. Karrer wears a trenchcoat, alright, but it’s only there to keep out the rain.

Mangrove (2020) Dir. Steve McQueen

Frank Crichlow (Shaun Parkes) didn’t mean to create a community, exactly, when he opened his restaurant in the section of West London that had become home to many immigrants from Trinidad and Jamaica. He just wanted to have a clean business that wouldn’t attract undue police attention, as his former nightclub, Rio, had done. As more and more natives of the Caribbean moved abroad, however, there became a greater need for a place where the community could gather and feel at home. Frank’s place became a local landmark, and Frank himself, a reluctant leader of the growing movement against the continual police harassment many of the residents faced on a daily basis. In this, he wasn’t given much of a choice: Led by a deeply racist police force  —  more or less personified by writer/director Steve McQueen in the form of the sneering PC Frank Pulley (Sam Spruell)  —  Frank’s place had been unnecessarily raided nine times in six weeks. So, when approached by local Black activists, including Darcus Howe (Malachi Kirby) and Altheia Jones-Lecointe (Letitia Wright), he agrees to take part in a peaceful protest against the constables. Naturally, the police turn violent, and in the resulting chaos, nine protestors, including Frank, Darcus, and Altheia are arrested. Over time, they are tried, acquitted, and re-tried for even more serious charges. McQueen’s film, another segment from Small Axe, his chronicle of London’s West-Indies neighborhood through the decades, focuses on this specific case, not just because two of the defendants decided to represent themselves (proving to be adept barristers), but because it became a landmark part of the British crusade for civil rights (even though, as the film’s postscript explains, Frank was still routinely harassed by the police for another 18 years after the trial). To capture the sense of the complexity of the community, McQueen employs a David Simon-esque narrative hodge-podge of smaller scenes from different characters’ vantage points and views, allowing us an in-depth sense of the neighborhood and the stakes, while rarely dipping into the more played out elements of the courtroom genre. I would say, in light of the recent racial protests after the Louisville grand jury failed to hold two of the three officers involved in the death of Breonna Taylor responsible, the film could not be more prescient, but, sadly, this would have also been true just about anytime in the last three decades. As Frank says of the incorrigibly racist leaders and henchpeople continually holding them down, “These people are like vampires, you think you beat them, but they keep coming back again.”

The Salt of Tears (2020) Dir. Philippe Garrel

From the flinch-inducing title (a direct translation from the French), which sounds like a YA novel steeped in melodrama, to the mournful piano soundtrack of the intro, Philippe Garrel’s (very) French counter-romance would seem to indicate a different sort of film than what he’s actually made. It’s a bit of flim-flammery from a celebrated director unafraid to throw his audience for a loop or two (take that title, which proves to be thoroughly ironic until the very last scene). Luc (Logann Antoufermo), a young man from the provinces, has come to Paris to take an entrance exam at an exacting wood-working institute in order to receive a degree in joining, in order to better emulate his woodworking father (Andre Wilms), a kind, elderly man with a “poet’s soul.” In Paris, he happens to meet Djemila (Oulaya Amamra), a sweet young woman falling hard for the handsome Luc, who callously breaks her heart after he returns to his village. Back home, he takes up with Genevieve (Louise Chevillote), an old high-school flame, who also falls deeply for him, getting pregnant in the process, but when he unexpectedly gets accepted to the woodworking school, he dumps her to return to Paris, where  —  you guessed it!  —  he meets up with yet another woman, Betsy (Souheila Yacoub), a stunning brunette whom, we are told via our occasional narrator (Jean Chevalier), is finally “his equal.” Or more so, to be precise, as she takes in a second lover (Martin Mesnier) to their apartment, making the unhappy Luc live as a threesome. Garrel’s charting of Luc’s endless relationship explorations themselves gets tiresome, but the director isn’t much interested in his protagonist’s romantic investments, as he is the callousness of Luc, and the young in general  —  Luc crushes two loving women; then himself gets crushed; while treating his loving father as yet another irritation from time to time  —  and the manner in which their decision-making has often not matured enough to include the expansiveness of empathy. They know not what they do, until it’s too late.

Beginning (2020) Dir. Dea Kulumbegashvili

Georgian director Dea Kulumbegashvili’s debut feature, about a family of Jehovah’s Witnesses working as missionaries in a small village outside Tbilisi, and the abuse they endure at the hands of religious extremists, captivates and bewilders in equal measure. The film begins with a long single shot from inside a “prayer house,” as congregants slowly file in and fill the pews, eventually allowing David (Rati Oneli) to begin his sermon concerning the story of Abraham, willing to sacrifice his beloved son in order to appease God. The shot remains static for so long, building its own rhythm, that it becomes that much more shocking when a side door suddenly opens, and an unseen assailant tosses in a fire bomb, lighting the floor and sending everyone into terrified tumult. Kulumbegashvili’s film is filled with similar striking compositions, long single shots with very little camera movement, the edges of the frame gradually generating increasing levels of apprehension, as the action swirls often out of our visual range. She has a way of filming the opposite of what you expect: Several key conversations between pairs of characters are shot with the focus on the reaction rather than the speaker, and vitally significant scenes are crafted with characters’ backs to us, such that we can’t read their expressions or get our normal bearings. It’s a similar conundrum for the missionaries themselves, especially Yana (Ia Sukhitashvili), David’s dutiful wife, a former actress, who tries to make the best of their difficult situation, even in the face of such violent opposition to her husband’s proselytizing, a job David, ambitious he is, sees as the key to rising up in the Church’s hierarchy. After their prayer house is burned to the ground, David leaves for a few days to meet with the Elders in order to secure funding for its replacement. Into that void, enter a detective (Kakha Kintsurashvili), who appears one night to “talk” with Yana, but ends up intimidating her into a sort of sexual compromise, an event that leaves her strangely unfazed, even, it might be said, oddly curious. From there, things get both more dire, and more peculiar, with Kulumbegashvili’s implacable camera remaining stoically witness to her characters’ increasingly distressing plight. As curious as it can be tonally, she is so in command of her narrative, the film is never less than compelling, even as tragedy becomes something else entirely. By film’s end, true to David’s earlier sermons, it’s clear that at least his most devoted acolyte has taken in the biblical lessons he proffered, for better or worse.

[lunavadash-creates]

Empyrean

A/N It was a sudden idea, but I fell in love with the concept.  Pairing: Ezio Auditore/OC Words: 6221 Warning: mention of death

Prologue 

It was a beautiful day in Florence with a cloudless sky and warm sun rays shining on the wide streets full of people. Giant flower carts standing in strategic places were trying to overcome the smell of the Arno river. Everything in this city was beautiful and fancy like it was shouting for the whole world to hear that it’s wealthy and prosperous. She had no idea that the city had changed so much during her absence, and it was so much more amazing than she remembered it. It seemed to be even bigger, full of wonders out of this world. She didn’t remember seeing buildings as big and as beautiful as the ones now. Florence itself was like a true wonderland, not an average city she grown up in. Surprisingly she thought that it was good to be home. She came back only a week ago, after the death of her dearest aunt, who was raising her instead of her parents. Flora knew the exact reason why they sent her away, but now, forced to live again in Florence, she was trying to act normal, trying to pretend to be normal. It was hard, considering the fact, that among all those people walking around the main square she could see ephemeral almost transparent figures flowing in the air. 

Spirits, lost souls, ghosts of the dead bounded to this world by their unfinished businesses, anger, sadness, love, curses, desires and othe unknown reasons. And she was able to see all of them, suffering and longing for the lost life. She took a deep breath and looked down, trying to focus on a book, she was reading but the urge to listen and watch people around was too big for her to resist. She rose her gaze again to devour the view. She missed people, being surrounded by a loud, colourful crowd of warm, material bodies. There weren’t too many people in the countryside she lived so she used to spend a lot of time with her aunt and ghosts, even when they travelled it was only to helped trapped souls of the damned. It was a good life, noble but lonely. She felt surprisingly good seeing all those people of Florence, even if she wasn’t part of any group. But who knows, maybe she will be able to make some living friends? Unfortunately, among all those people she had seen at least three ghosts and she didn’t want to drag their attention, not yet anyway, she was supposed to act normal, and talking with ghosts didn’t belong to that category. Soon she noticed two girls sitting close to her, the wore beautiful red dresses, and their hair was braided into complicated plaits. For sure they were rich aristocrats, it was visible in their gestures, way of talking, and the clothes they wore. But their voices were nice to listen, so she focused on them. They were discussing men and all their assets; who is the most handsome, rich, influential. And among different names, there was one that particularly took her attention. She had no idea who was Cesare Borgia, but that name was truly interesting. As far as she heard he was rich and important, a man holding great power, perfect party for aristocratic ladies, right? And he was unmarried. Flora smiled to herself, trying to imagine a man from their description, she had no idea if he was young or old, but he had to be very handsome, otherwise, those women wouldn’t be talking about him with that amount of excitement. 

“Oh my God, Ezio is back?” one of them suddenly asked nervously, changing the topic of their conversation and reaching for her perfect hair, trying to make it even better. The second one was no less amazed by this whole Ezio, so Flora decided to see that object of their new fascination. She followed their gazes and saw a handsome man in amazing, white robes, who was walking down the street with a smile on his face and confidence emanating from him like he was the most important person in this city. But what caught her attention was not him nor a woman he was talking to. These two were surrounded by death, ghosts were following them closely, looking at them with pure desperation. Both ghosts were shimmering with dimmed light, but one of them had a glimpse of redness in his form. For a short second her gaze crossed with one of the ghosts and on that moment, she knew she was screwed. She looked away quickly, but it was already too late, as soon both of them stopped following the pair and looked at her with confusion and hope. 

“You can see us, right?” she heard a voice, nervous, shaking and seemingly distant.

She ignored it, focusing on her book. Rarely this technique had worked, but it was always worth a try. She gasped loudly when a pale face emerged from pages of her lecture. The white, shimmering figure sat on a bench, crossing his arms in front of him, and looking at her with a piercing gaze. It was a ghost of a young man, confident, handsome, hopeful. He frowned when girl ignored him, pretending not to see him. 

“I’m sure she can see us” she heard the voice of the second ghost, who was approaching her slowly and soon stand right next to her, bending a little to reach her ear.

“Don’t be afraid, dear. Nod if you can see us, we will not hurt you” he promised softly. She sighed deeply, and again she put her book down on her laps, slowly stroking the hardcover of it, like a treasure, thinking about what to do. She wanted to ignore them, pretend to be normal, but she couldn’t. They were trapped, probably unaware of their state, and she wanted to help them. She was too kind-hearted to ignore such suffering, so in the end, ghosts could see a slight nod of her head.

Suddenly she took her book and turned on her heel to walk away, fortunately, both ghosts followed her closely, she could feel that cold, piercing, intense sensation that was sending shivers down her spine. Years ago, she hoped that one day she will get used to that feeling but that never happened. Even now she felt tense and cold when ghosts were close to her. They were emanating with coolness, making her skin tingle and all those tiny hair rises. 

She was walking fast through Florence, looking for a perfect spot to talk with ghosts, she didn’t want to attract attention, people weren’t too lenient when it comes to “talking with oneself”, that was causing too many problems which she couldn’t afford to make one right now. 

It had taken some time but, in the end, she finally found a place, peaceful and quiet, unfortunately, near the cemetery. That shouldn’t be suspicious even if someone would catch her talking to the grave, in the end, people have dealt with mourning in different ways. She sat on a little, stone bench near the entrance before she looked at ghosts, ready to hear their wishes.

“Everyone ignores us! Acting like we’re not even here! Why are they doing this?” the younger man was a bit irritated; he couldn’t understand what was going on. The second ghost frown, nodding his head in agreement. They both stood before her, visibly demanding an explanation, answer that would help them understand what had been happening to them all this time.                      

“Let’s start from the beginning,” she started slowly, calmly. She should tell them the truth, but gently, not to scare or upset them. But was there any gentle way to tell them that?

“I’m very sorry to be the one telling you this but… people around cannot see you because you are… dead.”

It was far too easy for ghosts to turn into evil spirits and she was still seeing that glimpse of redness in the older man. She had to be careful with that one, but at the same time truth had to be spoken first. She was w bit nervous about their reaction, she had seen plenty of ghost’s outburst, it was very dangerous. At the same time, it was very common for ghosts to not be aware of their death and those two were no exception. They were equally confused by her words, probably took it as a joke before sudden realization hit them like a wrecking ball. In the end – that explained everything. 

“Uberto. That cursed traitor!” the older man shouted, making woman shiver a little by this sudden outburst. The man swung his hand out of anger at the fence of the cemetery, but his hand went straight through it, proving that he was no more but a spirit.

“Calm down, calm down!” she asked, standing for a moment and looking him straight in the eyes. “whatever happened it’s too late. Please, calm down, you don’t want to hurt anyone, do you?” she hoped there was no panic in her voice, but she was the nearest living being and didn’t want to end up wounded or dead. Angry ghosts were dangerous!

Fortunately, that worked, for now, and the ghost took a deep breath, or at least he looked like doing so. It was a cruel fate to become a ghost trapped in a merciless world, sentenced for almost eternal banishment, but since now she was here, they both had a chance to find their salvation and peace.

“My name is Flora and I can help you go to the other side. You cannot stay here so we must find what is binding you to this world. What are your names?” 

“Where are our manners?! Mi dispiace, Bella. I’m Federico Auditore da Firenze”

“And I’m his father, Giovanni Auditore da Firenze. I’m very sorry for my outburst” 

Both of them bowed elegantly like true noblemen before deciding to sit next to her on that little stone bench, making her shiver a little bit more. She hated when ghosts decided to stay too close, but she couldn’t do anything about that. Ghosts were thinking and seeing the world differently from the living ones and were completely unaware of that fact. Dealing with them was more like trying to solve a very fragile yet dangerous mystery, one mistake and everything would be destroyed.

“That’s fine. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” she started politely, as she was taught. She had to restrain her emotions, keep calm. “So now focus, please. Usually, there are a few things that can keep people from moving further. Lack of proper burial, unfinished businesses and objects or people holding important memories. We are near the cemetery, so I suggest looking for your graves. Or… maybe you know what can keep you here?”

“You don’t seem to be surprised by us. Is it… an ordinary situation for you?” Federico asked nicely, couldn’t help his curiosity. In the end, she was a woman, she was supposed to look pretty and take care of the house and her future husband, not roam the city and talking with ghosts. Yet frown, looking closely at her form, without a doubt he would be interested in her if they met in different circumstances. Surprisingly, for now, he was simply lost, not sure what to do. Yes, after his father outburst he remembered the fear, voice and sudden sharp pain that ended so quick…

“You are not the first ghosts I’m seeing nor the first one I’m going to help. So please, focus. I don’t want to be rude, but you have to cross over as far as possible, being here is dangerous both for you and people in the city” she tried to explain the situation for them. 

 “I don’t know, bella, what might keep me here. I don’t know what happened to our bodies after…” Federico sent her a wanly smile, before standing up. Giovanni looked at her, lost deep in his thoughts. He followed her on the cemetery but didn’t speak until she stopped near the little white tomb, probably one of a little kid.

“I don’t remember. I mean I remember things but not everyone. I feel like my memories are shattered into pieces and I cannot focus on them. How can I know what keeps me here?” that was a valid point that made her stop again, this time near some very old, forgotten grave.

“I am not a specialist Giovanni and my theory probably have a lot of holes but ghosts I met usually had parts of their memories back after we found some kind of a trigger. For example, after seeing a grave they remembered how they died or after seeing a family member they remembered the feeling towards them, secrets they shared. What do you know about yourself right now?”

“My name, my wife, Maria, my three children Federico, Ezio and Claudia. I was an assassin, lived by the creed but I don’t remember anything else.” 

She nodded, sending him a comforting smile. Assassin? Creed? She had no clue what he was talking about, but ghosts couldn’t lie so she could only accept that that information.

“Don’t worry Giovanni, you will have your memory back”

There were no people in the cemetery, so she felt quite comfortable while talking with a ghost, wandering around the cemetery. As much as she liked being surrounded by people, she never actually fit among them. It was so difficult to keep her ability hidden from others and while being among ghosts, she preferred to be alone. Soon she got distracted and, lost in thoughts, she wandered around, looking at all those names, craved in murmur and granite. So many dead people, she wondered how many of them were waiting for a judgment day or different medium, ready to help. Fate was really cruel, and the worst part was that there was nothing to do to avoid it. Giovanni was following her, looking around, he seemed to be calmer right now. red shimmer almost completely disappeared.

She stopped, when she heard Federico shouting at them, claiming, he had found the grave they were looking for. It was a dirty and quite old tomb with dusty letters forming into names Giovani Auditore, Federico Auditore, Petruccio Auditore – three men… no, not men. Two men and a child. She frowned, looking at the inscription and soon she turned to look at the ghosts, standing still next to her. There were only two of them, was it possible that only the child went to the other side? She really hoped so because spirits of children were the worst and she didn’t want to deal with it. She was going to ask Giovanni since he told her that he had 3 children, was it possible that he had forgotten one of them?

“Traitors are not worth remembering” 

She turned suddenly only to face an old man, local undertaker probably. He was supporting himself on a shovel, partly dipped in the ground. His look was glued to the names on the grave. The man was old, wrinkled, but his eyes were still bright and penetrating. He watched her appraisingly, but there was madness, anger hidden deep in his soul, that was now showing in his eyes. Flora ignored every alarming bell, that rang in her body only to asked him.

“Do you know who they were?”

“Auditores? Of course, everyone knows them! Those three were hanged twenty years ago for treason, their bodies have never been found. It’s not even a true grave, more like memorial made by Giovanni’s boy. The only one who survived, but he very rarely visits Florence nowadays”

“Treason? Oh, god, that’s terrible!” she said honestly. That would explain a lot since sudden death was the main reason for people to have unfinished businesses and traitors were usually objects of vengeance.

“Don’t regret the dead, girl. And go home, a lone woman shouldn’t visit the graveyard on her own. Run.” he said darkly and quickly tear out the shovel from the ground, making Flora jump away. His dark laughter was hunting, so she turned around, determined to run away as far as possible, but both ghosts blocked her path.

“We aren’t traitors! That was guile! Templar’s scum wanted us dead because we are the only ones who could stop them from fulfilling the prophecy!” Giovanni was again angry, and his redness became more visible, he was furious, ready to break something or someone.

“Father, calm down, you are scaring her!” Federico stood in front of him, trying to put some sense into him. Again, the man calmed down, ashamed of his behaviour.

“Signore, signore! Please wait, can you tell me more about those Auditores?” she shouted, running after that scary undertaker. She was almost terrified of him, but no living person could match an evil spirit. She would rather deal with him than with Giovanni. 

“You poor, stupid girl. There is nothing more. Their home is standing empty, the family moved out of Florence and my patience is running low. And you don’t want to wake up the dead with your reckless screaming and inquisitiveness, do you?” now this man became even scarier and dangerous. His voice was more like a roar, deep and piercing. That man was far from being normal and his unfounded anger was terrifying. This time she had no intention to push his patience more and just run away, as he told her. Why she had always met crazy people? Dead or alive – it didn’t matter, she just had no luck with people in general and what was more, she felt that that man will haunt her in nightmares. 

“You are not buried here!” she said, when she finally stopped running away, her breath was sharp and quick, voice hoarse. She needed a few moments to calm down and gather her thoughts. They were not buried properly, but somehow, she felt that it wasn’t the source of their problems, after twenty years there wouldn’t be much left of their bodies anyway. There were so much more hidden in their past, she was sure of it after seeing the second outburst of Giovanni. Somehow, she felt that ghosts in front of her had never had normal lives.

“Templar’s scum, prophecy, assassins. I have no idea what those are, but it seems that they are the cause of your strong feelings. What about you Federico?”

The younger man looked at her confused, not sure about this. Those words were awakening some strange feelings, faded memories inside him but he didn’t feel like it was actually a cause of his confinement. There was something more, someone. He could see that blurred outline of a woman in a long dress, but he couldn’t remember her name of features. He answered by shaking his head gently, he didn’t know.

“Signorina, what about our home? We lived here before the accident, maybe that place will help us?”

“Good idea, Giovanni,” she said, allowing the ghost to take a lead. She had no idea where their house could be, but it looked like older Auditore remembered the place. She wondered if there were still people living there. If Ezio, his son, was out of Florence, then the house could be sold to support the family. Or Giovanni’s wife could still live there. She could expect a lot of things about that place but be heavily guarded was not one of them. Near the entrance of the house, there were two men with long, sharp swords, few more were positioned nearby. Those mercenaries look tough and merciless, even in her dreams she couldn’t possibly stand a chance again even one of them. She looked at ghosts with wide eyes and turned on her hill, deciding to stay away from that house, every part of her body was screaming that going in there was dangerous.

“It wasn’t guarded when we lived there…” Federico seemed to be worried while looking at the building, he grew up in. This place was holding every memory he would need to become free, but could he expose that girl to a danger?

“Well, that makes it complicated and I would rather avoid those people and their swords. I should go with you because there may be a need for me to take something for you, if any of you is bounded to an object, I must destroy it. So, the only option is probably to wait until the evening and came back when it’ll be dark.”

“We will find a place for you to slip through” Giovanni offered, sending the woman a smile. He was calmer now, more peaceful but Flora could see that redness in his form was no less visible, quite on contrary. That red glimpse was even more noticeable, Giovanni didn’t have much time left. But those guards… She would lie by telling she wasn’t afraid. She was terrified, put between the devil and the deep blue sea. She couldn’t fight guards nor leave a ghost behind since they could start haunting her, so there was no “good” option for her. The only thing she actually could do, was trying to break into that house, go in stealth and run away as quickly as possible, hiding in the darkness. She had no idea if it’d work, but she had to try, Giovanni’s redness was a sign of impending disaster.

 Evening came far too soon for her. It was dark outside but now she had needed equipment that included dark cape with a hood, some salt, flints and an iron chain for protection. She also had a dagger, but it was against the living being, in case she had to protect herself in combat, what she would rather avoid.

Hidden behind some bushes, she was waiting for Federico and Giovanni to return to her with information on how was she supposed to slip into that house. She had to do it quietly and fast, guard that was standing near the front doors looked rather dangerous with his shining sword and a torch in his hand, to scatter the darkness around. He was quite tall and very buffy, it was obvious that his muscles carried a great strength, Flora was no match for a person like them. He could break her in two without even putting effort.

“There is a window on the first floor that’s not locked. If you manage to lure guard away you will be able to slip in” Federico appeared so suddenly behind her, that she jumped and shot him an angry look. She wanted to tell him again not to appear so suddenly; in this one day he did it thrice already, but it was no use right now. She had to be quiet now.

Flora moved from her place, going in the right direction until Federico gestured her to stop and pointed at the window that should be unlocked. She bit her lip, even scarier guard was standing there, he looked tired and annoyed, while leaning against the wall with half-closed eyes. Flora decided to improvise a little and took a round rock in her hand just to throw it in the direction of a guard. He flinched at the sound it made and looked around, searching any intruders but in the end, he didn’t move from his post. The woman looked around and found a little wooden stall, standing next to the opposite building. Probably someone was using that for selling vegetables or some trinkets. She picked up another stone and aimed at this stall. She wasn’t sure how big or durable it was, but she certainly didn’t expect that the stone will hit one of the supporting stakes, causing the construction to collapse. Giovanni looked at her disapprovingly, he never supported destroying other people properties and was about to give her a lecture on proper behaving but when the alarmed guard went to investigate, she rushed to the window. She struggled a little to open it, the mechanism got a bit rusty, but in the end, she managed to slip in and close the window again.

“You should not destroy that stand, Flora! What if it was the only source of money for a family or…”

“I didn’t do it or purpose! I just wanted to lure that guard away!” she said, trying to defend herself and stayed calm, but Giovanni only shook his head crossing arms on his chest. It was clear that he had a lot of misbehaving children. She rolled her eyes and took out one candle to light her way around. She went on the first floor, where the family used to live and but stopped midstep, looking around. This place was beautiful, even if it was dark inside. Beautiful paintings were decorating walls and the furniture looked so expensive. After taking a closer look she could recognise willow wood and amazing decorations, inlays of ivory and gold. No wonder that this place was guarded! She was probably in the main room because there was a table made of dark wood with caryatids supporting its weight; around were standing sgabellos, excellently made chairs with patterns so rich that it reminded her of endless circles of water crashing with each other. There were also big mirrors with golden frames, she saw in one her own reflection and her lips twitched at the sight. She was standing in the dusty, dark and abandon room, wearing a black cape, with a candle in one hand surrounded by ghosts. She chuckled darkly, how ironic! She was aristocrat, she should be sleeping in her room, waiting for a new day to come and shine bright like a diamond, attract men, make them lose their minds for her and only her, how life could be so strange, to put that curse on her and change everything?

“Where do you want to look for? Federico? Giovanni?”

“I want to go to my room,” said Federico, showing her staircase again and leading her to his room. She wasn’t surprised to see the big, richly decorated room of a young aristocrat. She looked around with visible curiosity, most of the furniture were hidden under white cloaks to prevent dust from gathering.

“You never could keep this place tidy” she heard Giovanni sigh and laughed a little, seeing as Federico rolled his eyes theatrically. But he started looking around and Flora soon joined him, putting a candle on a holder. She opened one of the drawers, looking at different papers. She even found a journal and frowned, she wanted to read it, curious about what secrets could be hidden in it. She had no intention of using it against anyone, it was just undying inquisitiveness. She opened it and soon Federico was next to her.

“I was looking for it! Yes!” he said enthusiastically, trying to grab the book. His hand went straight through it, causing him to groan. Flora turned pages for him to see the most recent notes and soon it was clear what probably kept him here. A woman.

“Gabrielle… I remember now! I wanted to court her, I… I bought a necklace for her as a gift. I was supposed to give it to her, we were…we wanted to meet on that day but they…” Federico looked frantically around like he was about to panic. Giovanni looked at his son before he reached for his arm and shook him by it. The sudden realisation must have hit him now, he looked so fragile and sad, desperation was emanating from his cold form. Flora couldn’t do much to help him, whoever was, she probably moved on if she was alive.

“Flora can find that necklace, right?”

“It’s probably somewhere here,” she assured him, starting look for it. She opened every drawer, chest and wardrobe, finding some more papers, coins, trinkets, and some strange plans and maps, even weapons! In the end, she found a little box with a gold necklace that was sitting hidden under one of his many pillows on the bed. She opened a box to make sure that it’s the piece of jewellery she was looking for and showed it to Federico, who again tried to grab it but yet again he failed. The necklace was made of milky pearls and would suit perfectly every lady, even Flora was impressed with it, she rarely had seen so nice jewellery. That Gabrielle would be one of the luckiest women in Florence if Federico was still alive. A pity that fate was so cruel.

“I need to see Gabrielle, I want her to have it, to remember me, can you do it, Flora? I beg you I have to make sure…” he said quietly with shaking voice, looking at her like a broken man. Flora nodded in response, giving him a warm smile.

“If this will help you find your peace, then of course! I know it must be hard for you but… I’m so sorry Federico,” she said quietly, hiding the box in her bag.

“Now, Giovanni, where should we look for your cause? Bedroom? Other room?”

“No. I remember, my dear, who I am. Or I should probably say who I was. I need you to open a secret room in my office, something tells me that there is something important.” He said, pointing her direction. She didn’t quite understand why he needed a secret room but who was she to judge? She just went back on the lowest floor trying to be noiseless, entered Giovanni’s office and stood in front of a plain wall with painting on it, seeing nothing unusual about this place. Just a simple room with bookstand and a big desk.

“This, Flora. You have to push and turn this painting, then the entrance will open”

“Will it be loud? I don’t want the guard to hear it”

“No, it couldn’t be loud, that would drag unwanted attention”

After turning the painting, the wall moved itself, opening another room in front of them. It was a little space with a golden chest in front of the entrance. At the top of it was a strange symbol she couldn’t recognise, but it probably had a meaning, maybe even an important one? Flora opened that chest, but it was completely empty. She frowned, turning to face bookshelves near the wall. She loved literature, so that place took her interest immediately. Her eyes caught the attention of the same strange symbol as in the chest on several books. She took one of them to take a better look.

“Take it” she heard a silent whisper of Federico. She obeyed, putting it in her bag and took another that was pointed to her by him. She would never miss the opportunity to gain some knowledge. She smiled at the ghost and turned around to face Giovanni. And that was a mistake. His appearance was changing, he was turning red, anger was emanating from his form, the temperature in the room dropped drastically and soon everything began to shake a little.

“He took it. Ezio took everything, documents that were supposed to compromise De’ Pazzi Family. Yet they had won that battle and now I am dead! Federico is dead, my little Petruccio is dead, Ezio and Claudia are no longer here and my wife, my love she’s…” he didn’t finish, letting himself drown in anger and sadness that filled him like a poison.

Suddenly every lying object rose from its place, picked up by cold, strong wind that surrounded Giovanni’s ghost. Objects started to fly around the room, making Flora step back to the office again. The situation there was no better, everything was flying, crashing with each other, hitting walls, shelves, mirrors. A paperweight hit the window so hard that the glass had broken into hundreds of tiny shards, that were soon lifted but the same force that caused everything else to move.

“Giovanni, calm down, calm the fuck down!” she screamed. Trying to hide somewhere from that flying objects, but it was no use. She could only try to protect her face with hands, while the ghost was slowly falling into despair. Federico was terrified and was just looking at his father, screaming to him to calm down. Outside the guards were alarmed by the sounds of crashing objects and braking glass, when another window turned into pieces. But one who got closer was almost immediately hit with a big, heavy pyxis, straight in the head, causing him to fall in the ground.

“Giovanni, if you don’t calm down you will turn into the evil spirit! You will never see your family ever again!” she screamed at the man, trying to make him pay attention to her words.  “This is your last chance, soon it will be too late! Don’t do it to your family!” she screamed from the top of her lungs, knowing that if she survives this, her voice would turn hoarse later, but it didn’t matter. She tried to get close to Giovanni, but she couldn’t avoid every flying object and soon something hit her back, making her fall on the ground. A piece of glass cut one of her hands.

“Giovanni!”

Ghost looked at her terrified, still fulfilled with sorrow and anger, but seeing blood on her hand, that was now marking the carpet made him lose it all. Everything dropped on the floor as he fell to his knees, hiding face in hands, weeping desperately. Flora rose from the floor and came closer, squatting in front of him.

“Giovanni, it’s fine, I promise! Let’s go, guards are coming!” she said, before running from the office. She jumped over the unconscious guard and run towards the entrance that was now open only to crash with another man. His grip tightened on her wrist painfully.

“You little thief!” her started, but the woman still with adrenaline in her veins, took her dagger and hit him in the head with its hilt. It was strong enough to make man loosen his grip but not enough to knock him out, so she just decided to run, run for her life, like she was being hunted down by the devil himself.

Fortunately for her, it was dark, so she could soon hide from the man, as he was not in sight anymore. Probably he saw his companion and decided to take care of him, maybe he was shocked by the mess Giovanni crated. Either way, she managed to run away and hid between buildings. Her heart was beating so fast, she was afraid that soon she would get a heart stroke. Fortunately, adrenaline started fading away slowly from her veins, making her breath steadier. But while her body was calming down, the pain found its way in, she hissed feeling stinging in her cut hand. Blood was dripping from her fingers, but she had nothing to dress the wound with.

“I’m so sorry, Flora. You showed us so much mercy and I… I…”

“Don’t mention it, Giovanni. You’re in a very… peculiar situation, I’m aware that controlling emotions may be hard for both of you, just… you must try to keep calm. Next time there may be no going back for you. If you turn into an evil spirit, I will have to kill you and that will not give you any guarantee that your soul will be saved” she explained slowly, trying to make her point. It was too important to ignore it, especially that Giovanni was already and the verge of breaking. Ghost nodded in response, letting her show them the way to her home.                    

She had her room on the first floor but the whole wall was covered in some green bush that allowed her to enter and leave through the window. She jumped into her room, closed window and put the bag down on the floor. She felt so tired right now!

Giovanni looked at her worried and guilty, Federico was strangely silent. Flora ignored them both and soon hide her cloak, weapon and throw her bag under the bed. She commanded the ghosts to close their eyes when she stripped and changed into her sleeping gown. Then she cleaned her hands and with big relief, she found out that her wound was superficial. Unfortunately, it was this place that hurt, but she could endure it. She was lucky that as an aristocrat, she could wear gloves without any suspicion!

“I am so sorry, Flora, forgive me” Giovanni’s voice was silent and lenient. He was a very composed man and he didn’t quite understand what had changed about it, where all those emotions came from and influenced him it the most brutal way, making him lost him equanimity.

“Please… just don’t think about it. I must sleep now, but we will talk tomorrow, make a new plan. Just take under your consideration that other people cannot see or hear you, so try not to make me look weird in front of them. My mother is already not too happy about my presence here and I don’t want to cross that border.”

Both ghosts agreed on her terms and let her sleep. Flora had no idea that right now a messenger was rushing to Monteriggioni to inform Ezio Auditore about an intruder, who had broken into his home and destroyed his father office.  

[brownstonearmy]

2020-09-05: Juiced! (Part 4)

August 6 (Thursday late afternoon)

Today's adventure picks up in the late afternoon after a perfectly average workday. Earlier in the day, Spleenifer received a surprise "gift" from the aspiring necromancer from the previous adventure: a gently-used display model of the spinning princess casket that she had been eyeing the other day. It even has the label attached! "The rave from the grave that puts the FUN in funeral!" it reads. Perhaps this is an indicator that the wannabe-necromancer is trying to turn over a new leaf and make better life (unlife?) decisions?

After clocking out for the evening, the party convenes at Jangles' house to discuss what they should do about Zaribeth Quickfingers. Jangles mentions that Zaribeth is a successful businessperson that is probably using her various business operations to hide something shady. Lucky needs clarification on several points in the discussion because it gets difficult to differentiate between regular idioms and innuendos in this group. If Zaribeth is running a shady operation of any real significance, there's likely to be some sort of bookkeeping or paper trail somewhere that can be used as evidence. If the party can find that, they stand a real chance of thwarting Zaribeth's plans.

But before the conversation can conclude, Jangles shushes the party. Someone's tripped the magical alarms on the perimeter of Jangles's house! Q (who goes as Razzle today), tells Jangles to go hide just as the lock to the front door clicks open and several muffled whispers reach the back room where the party is hiding out.

Razzle starts a diversion with a stellar performance mourning the loss of their lover, Jangles. Tears flow, along with plenty of wailing and gnashing of teeth. The intruders weren't expecting anyone to be here, but they try to play it cool and announce that they are police who are collecting evidence as part of a continuing investigation against Jangles.

Lucky grabs a jar of fart powder from Jangles's work desk and turns herself invisible. She creeps out into the front room and sees three people in street clothes poking around. These folks sure don't look like members of the constabulary, so Lucky tosses a cloud of the fart powder into the air so it covers the trespassers. Spleenifer grabs some more fart powder for good measure, because you can never have too much flatulence in this game.

Two of the three get enough of the powder in their mouths to cause a coughing fit that quickly turns into a belching fit before progressing into a continuous burp. They grasp their throats to help air get in, but it's only flowing in one direction right now. Don't get this stuff in your lungs, folks, because there's only one way for the gas to escape, ya dig? The one who avoided the worst of the powder drags his companions out of the house and tries to escape from whence they came.

Razzle, Lucky, and Spleenifer follow the three amigos back to a shady-looking warehouse. Lucky is still invisible, and Razzle is sneaking through the shadows like a ninja. But poor tall Spleenifer, clad in noisy chainmail takes the most direct path to gain access to warehouse: asking politely to be let in (though only doing so at the suggestion of an invisible Lucky). The guard informs her that Yance is the only other person allowed in the warehouse aside from the lumpers and dockhands.

Yance is the only way to get in? LUCKY ACCEPTS THIS CHALLENGE. She casts Seeming and now Razzle is Yance and Lucky is Razzle. It's like Inception, but with layers of people instead of dreams. Anyway, Razzle-Yance walks up to the guard and asks to be let in along with his companions, Lucky-Razzle and Tall Lady. Yes, Spleenifer is introduced as Tall Lady, because you have to use a fake name when infiltrating a shady warehouse. That's just how it is, folks; I don't make the rules!

Several people of questionable moral integrity are standing around, and I know you're not supposed to judge a book by its cover, but you'd understand if you looked at these covers. One person is sitting on a stack of crates with a box full of rings that he seems to be counting, while the others merely eye the new arrivals with disinterest.

Razzle-Yance makes an executive decision to enter one of the rooms just off the main warehouse floor, silently hoping that it doesn't contain Original-Yance. Good news, there's just more crates and a desk in here! Lucky-Razzle asks Tall Lady to stand watch for a moment "for reasons" while she shuts the door. Lucky-Razzle's actual reasons are to loot the room, but she starts making loud suggestive sounds as a decoy. Razzle-Yance joins in the charade as they both inspect crates for anything of value.

During a particularly strenuous round of bedroom vocalizations, Razzle-Yance hears a thump inside one of the desk drawers, despite not touching the desk. Inside the drawer is a pile various papers and a false bottom that reveals a leatherbound journal with only 10 pages. Lucky-Razzle finds a pile of assorted spices that naturally get relocated to her satchel. And in case it becomes relevant to the plot, here's what she snagged:

Powdered pecans

White Pepper

Anise

Nutmeg

Cinnamon

Cloves

Cardamon

Nutmeg

When Razzle-Yance opens the journal, "Hey where are we on the deal?" is the only thing written on the first page. But before they can close the journal, more writing scrawls on the page. ""Did you find it yet? We need leverage soon."

Back in the central part of the warehouse, Tall Lady is still standing guard. One of the warehouse guards saunters over and tries to talk her up. Tall Lady responds by discussing at length the pain in her hip when waking up. But that just leaves room for the sleazy warehouse to try a pickup line. He's a hip specialist, you know! And he'd be glad to take a look at it in the other back room if she's interested.

Surprisingly, Tall Lady agrees, but not for the reasons you might think. The clueless john thinks he's gonna get a tall order of Tall Lady hanky panky, but Spleenifer would like for him to drink a tall glass of Respecting Women Juice. Of course, things do not go according to plan for either of them.

Inside the other back room, Holden Harcourt and Yance Elbereth are huddled around a table discussing business matters. Yance hasn't been able to find Brynnan's ring, and Yance lost most of his leverage with Brynnan by trading the horn to him. Holden and Yance both turn to the interlopers. Holden remembers Tall Lady from his previous arrangement to return Trashpit to the sewers in exchange for finishing the work of relocating the treasure. Perhaps Tall Lady could be a potential ally, and naturally he explains this in monologue form. Important talking points follow:

Holden wants to be the wealthiest person in town

Lawrence Stout cheated him out of a business deal, and Holden wants him bankrupted

Maybe Tall Lady and friends might be interested in a strategic partnership

Tall Lady extends her hand to make the deal. Holden does the same and a handshake happens. BUT THAT'S NOT ALL! Tall Lady stomps on Holden's foot and dumps her share of the fart powder directly into his mouth. Holden starts gasping, then belching followed by the signature Continuous Burp. We don't negotiate with terrorists in this group!

A crack of lightning blasts through the northern wall of the warehouse and everyone's favorite douchelord walks into the fray. He has no quarrel with the party today, but Brynnan knows that Yance and Holden have been conspiring against him to find the ring. They won't find it, because it's in a secure location, but Brynnan's been doing some scrying of his own and knows where Holden keeps a certain important journal. Mind you, Holden can't stop burping and Brynnan casts Dispel Magic on him. Not be polite or anything, just to get Holden to shut up long enough for Brynnan to do his own Bad Guy Monologue.

Razzle-Yance is sneaking out the back door before things get too heated, but an invisible Lucky-Razzle is still in the room where the journal was recovered. Brynnan struts over to the drawer and rips out the false bottom... and the journal is still there? Lucky-Razzle used her minor illusion abilities to conjure up an illusory duplicate of the journal. Except she doesn't know what's actually in the real journal so she filled its pages with diary entries about Hilaria.

Holden interrupts Brynnan's monologue and tells him that the journal he has isn't what he thinks it is. It's just the way Holden and his boss communicate. Brynnan throws a tantrum and blasts a hole in the ceiling with another lightning bolt. Then he casts Chain Lightning on the occupants of the warehouse.

Lucky-Razzle unleashes a wild magic counterspell to stop the destructive lightning and succeeds. The lightning bolts are replaced with puppies that are running around and doing other regular puppy things. Brynnan grabs Holden by the collar and flies through the hole in the ceiling. He's gonna make sure Lawrence Stout bankrupts Holden, and that Holden is alive to see it. And then he drops Holden, who crashes into crates below.

But Lucky-Razzle has yet another trick up her sleeve! She breaks out the Mizzium Apparatus and uses it to cast Vicious Mockery on Brynnan. Brynnan’s delicate psyche takes the full brunt of the mockery and the insults rattle around enough to make it difficult for Brynnan to keep track of everything in the heat of the battle.

Original-Yance flips up the hood of his cloak and tries to sneak out before Brynnan notices him. Bird wings sprout from Original-Yance's cloak and he flies up and away. Or at least he would have done so, had Brynnan not cast Wall of Force in the air right above Original-Yance and the resulting collision knocked him out and sent straight to a hot date with the cold ground.

Lucky-Razzle runs over to Original-Yance and shouts "Lucky!" as though Original-Yance was actually an illusion worn by Lucky. I'm not gonna call him Lucky-Original-Yance, but only because there's already a lot of hyphens in the names from this adventures. This is some quality misdirection work on Lucky-Razzle's part, and Brynnan falls for the ruse.

Razzle-Yance is fleeing through the eastern alley, and Brynnan's aerial perspective allows to see the person he thinks is the real Yance trying to escape. He blasts Razzle-Yance with a Cone of Cold, but they're still standing. Brynnan announces that he's going to mercifully let Yance live because he still has the potential to acquire more artifacts for Brynnan.

Tall Lady whips her casket out like a beyblade and rushes into action to save her companions. Lucky-Razzle and Original-Yance hop in, though Original-Yance requires some assistance because he is clearly suffering from the effects of a concussion. The casket drifts and weaves through narrow streets and alleyways as Brynnan gives chase.

Razzle-Yance steps through a Dimension Door to end up in front of the mayor's house and divert Brynnan's attention. The casket crew are dodging boxes and uneven cobblestones to try to get Original-Yance some medical attention from Mom at the fighter's guild, but Brynnan is gaining on them. In a last-ditch effort to force Brynnan to retreat, Lucky-Razzle polymorphs a passing bird into a giant Roc. Continuing the chase proves to be too much effort for Brynnan, and he nopes out of there with prayer hands and a teleport.

Mom fixes Original-Yance back up, though he's still gonna have a headache in the morning. Original-Yance is offered Kalani's old cot at SHART HQ to sleep off his injuries. After all, he could be a valuable source of information.

While all this is happening, Razzle-Yance is running back to their apartment for safety. Remember to secure your own oxygen mask before attempting to assist others, as the traditional medieval saying goes. Once Razzle-Yance makes it to safety, the journal thumps in their pocket. They take out the journal and see that there is more writing on the page: "Heard sounds of a lightning fight, everything okay? I think we should relocate the books to Salem's in the meantime. In the usual box."

And on that little note, the adventure concludes for the evening. Stay tuned next time for more!

[rheyninwrites]

In From the Storm 4

You laughed, then pulled up some videos of cars, explaining that they went much, much faster than he was used to. When he seemed satisfied with that, you moved onto the website of a store not far away to help him pick out some clothes. Unfortunately, despite the fact that it was still fall, they were heavily advertising swimwear, particularly ladies swimwear. As you watched Arthur’s eyes widen and his face grow flushed, you struggled to switch to menswear as quickly as you could. When you’d finally switched, you had to explain to him that clothing, especially women’s clothing, was a great deal different nowadays.

“I figured that out pretty quick. Jesus! I’m just glad you ain’t dressed like that.”

You pulled an uneasy face. “Actually, I’m dressed like this because it’s cool outside right now. I don’t dress quite like that, at least not daily, but I wear shorts and tank tops when it’s hot.”

Arthur’s eyes bugged out slightly, making you laugh again before you drew his attention to the clothes on the screen. It took a good bit of time, but eventually you were able to get the things he’d like narrowed down enough to feel comfortable taking him to the store. You measured his waist and inseam first, somewhat to his discomfort, so that you could be in and out as quickly as possible.

The ride, once you got him in and buckled, was decently smooth. You took back roads, so you could go a bit slower, and tried not to make any sudden moves. He was definitely a bit uncomfortable, but seem to relax a little more as the drive went on. He was quick to get out when you got to the store, though.

You took his arm, guiding him into the store. The first thing you did was get him to pick out shoes, before he got into trouble for not wearing any. Unsurprisingly, he picked a pair of sturdy work boots that slipped on, in brown. You had him put them on immediately, saving the box and tags to pay for them on the way out. After that, you got him a few pairs of sweatpants in the proper size, a few colors of t-shirts, a few simple flannel shirts, and then you handed him a few styles of jeans and pushed him towards the dressing room.

“Ah, come on. I really gotta try these on? Can’t we just buy some?”

“No. You might not be comfortable in them, and I don’t have the money to buy things you won’t wear. Now get in there and try them on!”

The dressing room attendant rolled her eyes, laughing quietly as Arthur made his way to the back room, grumbling. About a minute and a half later, you heard him loudly cursing, then a sound like heavy fabric being thrown. Several minutes and a lot of rustling later, and Arthur emerged, pushing one of the pairs of jeans at you.

“These, goddammit.” He growled, while you passed the other pairs to the attendant, who was doing her best to stifle a laugh. “We done now?”

“Not quite, angry-pants,” you laughed, while he stood scowling at you like a petulant child. “But I promise you won’t have to try anything else on.”

He continued grumbling to himself as he followed you to pick up a couple more pairs of jeans in the same style. Then, you moved on to the next section of the store, where you picked up a package of white undershirts and sports socks. Then you lead him over to the underwear.

“Well, cowboy, pick your style.”

He raised his eyebrows at you. “You gotta be kidding me?”

“Hey, feel free to go without, but it’s probably a bit more comfortable to wear something underneath your jeans, at least.”

After looking a few minutes, he pointed towards a package of long boxer briefs. You found his size, debated teasing him about what colors he’d like, and decided against it. He’d had enough for the day already, and it wasn’t even time for lunch.

Once you’d paid for everything, he grabbed the bags and insisted on carrying them to the car for you, making more than a few girlfriends nudge their boyfriends and point your way. Before you closed the trunk on them, however, you grabbed a pair of socks, tossing them into his lap as you got behind the wheel.

“Wear ‘em with your boots. I’m not letting your feet and boots stink in my house.”

Though he complained, he did what you asked, and you suspected it was more because of his bad mood leftover from the dressing room than because he didn’t want to. While he pulled the socks and boots back on, you cranked the car and played some music, settling on some soft old school style country that, for whatever reason, was labeled “folk” music.

Though initially he made a face at the strange music, you noticed that he seemed more relaxed than he had before, and you turned it up just a bit higher. Arthur clearly wasn’t as nervous this ride, and before you knew it, one of your favorite songs came on and you started singing along, getting louder and adding in the silly dance moves you always did when you were driving alone. You heard a soft chuckle and looked over the find Arthur watching you, a smile on his face.

“Sorry. I’m kind of a dumbass sometimes. I’ll stop if it bothers you,” you said, feeling a blush on your cheeks.

“Don’t stop on my account,”he laughed. “I was just watching you have a good time.”

You stuck your tongue out at him playfully, but couldn’t find the courage to keep singing the way you had before. Though he’d said he didn’t mind, knowing he was watching made you feel much more self conscious, and you ended up not doing more than mouth the words the rest of the ride home. Arthur wished he hadn’t laughed or said anything. He had actually liked hearing you sing.

Once you were home with all of Arthur’s new clothes, you popped off all of the tags and got ready to wash them. When Arthur heard there was a machine that cleaned the clothes on its own, he insisted on watching you.

“Honestly, Arthur, it’s not that interesting. You can’t even watch it clean them, I don’t have a fancy one with a glass door.”

“Maybe its just not interesting to you ‘cause you’re so used to it. I ain’t never seen anything like it.”

He had a good point, one you had to keep in mind when it came to everything, so you let him watch, explaining it as much as you could as you went along. There were some questions you couldn’t answer, but you told him you could always look them up for him on the computer later. That started an entire conversation about computers and the internet, which you also couldn’t properly explain, so you showed him how to use the laptop to look up things while you made lunch.

As you pulled out your veggie burgers, you realized that he’d probably never even heard of the idea of being a vegetarian, and he almost certainly wouldn’t understand it. That might make things pretty difficult, since even thinking about raw meat made your stomach churn. You weren’t about to be one of those people who tried to sneak something meatless in, though, so you did your best to broach the subject. It turned out that, while he was skeptical that it was possible to be healthy without eating meat, he was more than willing to try it, at least. It turned out that he’d never heard of or seen burgers, either, so it was an entirely new experience for him. He opted to leave off any condiments and just try the patty and bread together. You waited, watching him chew thoughtfully, then swallow.

“You know, it ain’t too bad. Sure ain’t worse than some of the stuff Pearson’s made.” He started laughing initially, but it died out quickly as a sad look settled on his face. “I guess ain’t none of that was real, though.” He put his food down, drawing in a deep shaky breath. “All my friends, my family- none of it was real. It was all just a game.”

You could see tears welling up in his eyes, threatening to spill despite how hard he was trying to control himself. Without thinking twice, you rushed to his side, throwing your arms around him and pulling him into a fierce hug. As you stroked the back of his head, he gave in, letting the tears he’d been holding back fall freely. Tears of your own threatened. How do you mourn something that never existed?

“They were real, though. They were real to you, and that’s what matters.” You placed your hands on the side of his face, looking into his eyes. “Plus, each of those characters, those people, they brought joy to so many people all over the world. They were real to those people too, and they’re real to the people who created them, and the people who gave them voices, and personalities.” You pulled him into another big squeeze. “Just because they’re fictional doesn’t mean they’re not real.”

He hugged you back desperately, needing the feel of something solid. After a few minutes, he let go of you, wiping his eyes.

“I’m real sorry. I don’t mean to burden you like this. First you’re buying me things, teaching me things, and then I gotta go and get all sad on you. Just don’t worry about me none, alright?”

You rolled your eyes, putting your hand on top of his. “You’re not a burden, Arthur. I promise you that. I’m happy to help you.”

You looked into his eyes, a gentle smile across your lips. He returned with a half smile, sadness still settled in his eyes. You squeezed his hand quickly, then returned to your food, hoping you hadn’t overstepped your bounds. As you stare, He watched you, wondering what the warmth he felt blooming in the pit of his stomach could possibly mean.

[scvereignty]

introduction i.

A D E L A I D E  W I N D S O R (  p r i n c e s s  o f  e n g l a n d  )

bespoke houndstooth blazers, watching your mare come second place, exposed lace garters, sipping from a bottle of warm champagne, grey skies, french erotica, a wet slip dress with nothing underneath, white roses, reciting passages by heart at parties, mascara-stained sheets, sitting by open windows despite the cold, black velvet, heavy books by pretentious authors, jewels at the breakfast table, the dirty hem of a long dress, hidden gardens, purple hickeys on pale thigh, smoking in secret, sleeping naked, perfect tennis whites & an immaculate backhand, bows in tangled hair, audrey hepburn films & grace kelly sensibility, placing their hand over your neck mid-kiss and squeezing hard, oversized sunglasses paired with red eyes and dark circles, never wearing the same coat twice, the weight of history, the shot that puts down a lame horse, perfect posture, lingerie and silk in the library, sucking whip cream off of strawberries, making love in the stable, watching the sunrise from the garden in an evening gown.

age: twenty-one

nicknames: di, rosie, little princess

sexuality: heterosexual ( publicly ) / bisexual ( private, exploring )

gender: cisgender female

title: her royal highness

( + ) elegant, graceful, intelligent, clever, intuitive, adaptable, creative, impulsive, sensual, motivated, self-confident, hard-working, mature, modest, reliable, outspoken ( - ) pretentious, aloof, melancholy, judgemental, private, elusive, deceptive, guarded, secretive, unforgiving, sensitive, affected, mistrusting, self-destructive, changeable, indecipherable

UNDER THE CUT : HISTORY, TRIVIA, & CONNECTIONS !

A BRIEF HISTORY ;

the youngest windsor & only princess of england!

i’m currently keeping her actual childhood/family background undecided until i get the chance to plot with her brother(s), but as per the connection description: the siblings were initially v close while their parents were rather absent

notably, adelaide & her brother james had an extremely special relationship. as the eldest and youngest of the brood, from the time adelaide was born, james’s affection for her was almost paternal in many ways — and she loved him to pieces.

literally, like, there are shots of james walking adelaide hand-in-hand into her primary school, and even as they got older, she considered him her best friend and biggest protector. this is highkey inspired by my own grandmother & how she describes her relationship w her own late brother uwu

a charming, odd child, who was labelled as an old soul very early in life. very well mannered and mature, but prone to somewhat unusual flights of fancy 

a lowkey trouble maker -- or rather, incredible adept at being subtle. with at least one wild elder brother, it was both easy to learn from their mistakes and appear innocent in comparison

as adelaide got older, that old soul developed some of the troubles they’re ought to. she craved art, passion, love, justice, intense emotion, experience. she engaged in these behaviours moderately and with subtlety, particularly in comparison to silas. she was/is less about wild partying and more about deep experiences, and as such there have rarely been any stories about the little princess and drinking/inappropriate behaviour

she had always had a changeable nature and was susceptible to bouts of depression, but the death of james hit her in a way she has yet to recover from. while the whole family was devastated, no one took it harder than adelaide, who to this day calls him the love of her life

for the two years since his murder, adelaide has been in a poor mental and emotional place. unable to fully move on despite the time that has passed, she has both retreated further into herself and sought out unhealthy methods of coping ( ie. the usual -- alcohol, travel, and occasionally drugs )

hence she’s chosen to come to genovia, a decision that surprised even her parents. remaining in london has kept her in the throes of mourning, so she hopes to let go of some of her grief by arriving somewhere new and attempting self care

reputation & aesthetics tend to be very immaculate and proper, so it’s often a surprise to those that find out the young princess has that darker, troubled, sensual side to her - that she can drink gin straight without wincing, or has bruises and hickeys beneath her silk blouse

has never had any desire to rule/never considered it an option, but instead focuses her life on the betterment of people but domestic to the uk and worldwide through charity & philanthropy

TRIVIA ; 

the nickname for her in the uk is “the english rose,” or several variants (“the little rose,” etc) due to her fair complexion & nature. her reputation is very princess diana-esque: a modern, classy woman who devotes her time to philanthropy & charity

considered a fashion icon! 

an extremely accomplished horse rider, considered one of the best competitors in britain despite not actively competing in years. she’s down showmanship, jumping, dressage, & eventing. yes, she is the horse girl

despite her tiny height, form, and general fairylike facial features, this girl can drink a surprising amount of people under the table. is this a sign of a Problem? CERTAINLY

if you think you are the most beautiful and/or incredible thing to walk this earth, she thinks you are incredibly stupid. she’ll name 14 pieces of art right NOW that are more interesting than ur looks 

makes a habit of calling out those that are arrogant/rude

she started smoking when she was fourteen. her parents still don’t know.

camilla macaulay, grace kelly, and princess diana are probably her biggest inspos

very accomplished liar - she has an incredible poker face

she wears a locket james gave her every day. he had it specially made with an inscription (either a quote from a little princess or the secret garden, i haven’t decided), but since then she’s had the other side inlaid with a photo of him :c

her favourite disney movie is alice in wonderland, which is also one of her favourite novels

PLOTS & CONNECTIONS ;

the best friend: self explanatory! very open to how their friendship came about and when, but someone who knows adelaide intimately, and one of the few that can still read her even when she’s putting on her otherwise immaculate facade

the no-good: someone that would have been her corrupter, perhaps, or thought to be -- until they realized she was not the delicate thing one would seem. could be friends with benefits, drinking buddies, someone who encourages self-destructive behaviours, or any combination of this.

the counsel: young as she is, adelaide knows herself intimately, and as such knows a great deal about women in general -- this muse is coming to her for advice on how to court mignonette (or another lady)!

the lionheart: a dear friend, and someone similar to adelaide insomuch as her old soul, maturity, devotion to philanthropy, etc. someone to either decry or poke fun at the triviality of so much around them

the skinny love: it’s been the wrong time since childhood. but it’s always been the right time to hold terrible affection for each other. how heartbreaking, to keep on watching but never kissing.

the charged: inspired by this gif set. the true terrible influence, unhealthy relationship, disaster in a glass bottle. they infuriate each other, say the worst things that can be said. then they let it out in bed -- or almost go. getting closer every time

the antagonist: preferably a princess or someone of noble enough birth that they could have attended the same academy in their teen years. alternatively, could just be a pair that runs into each other frequently at those fancy aristocratic events. ( x ) is someone that leans into that queen B(itch) trope, or otherwise is confident to the point of arrogance/is unphased by potentially offending others by saying what they want, when they want. adelaide, blank-faced over her glass, calls this person out for their behaviour. as such, an intense dislike starts to brood between the two

the affair: we talking sex, we talking scandal, we talking familial outrage. we can talk more about specific circumstances, but i am very solid on the aesthetic of That Scene in atonement: aka green dress, up against the library walls during a dinner party, walked in on at the perfectly terrible moment. my initial thought was that these two met for the first time when the windsor’s were hosting a dinner/ball/celebration or something in honour of this royal/important family, and adelaide and ( x ) had incredible chemistry -- or at least sexual attraction. it only takes a few hours and several glasses of champagne for them to end up in the library in an entirely compromising position before someone walks in on them and snitches to the family. the whole evening is absolutely ruined, both sets of parents in disarray, and while the press never hear why the night was the fiasco, there are now rumours of tension between the two families/nations. alternatively, this could have been started some time long ago and wasn’t 100% a one-off

the young love: adelaide’s longest relationship, which began sometime in late high school or early college and lasted several years. preferably someone of royal blood, because this was in many ways - especially aesthetically - the Perfect Relationship. not only was adelaide wildly in love with them, but their relationship was public, and the press considered it an incredible feat that a prince and princess would naturally begin dating. this kind of aesthetic, ja feel? everyone that knew them felt they would get married, including adelaide. but for whatever reasons you like, this little prince broke up with her, and subsequently broke her heart & dashed her dreams. prior to james’s death, this was the greatest pain she ever endured. still do this day if she references “my ex,” or compares a man to someone, it’s this guy. despite whatever time has passed between break-up and now, adelaide still treats him with some disdain -- she’s both still hurt, and still harbouring lingering affection for him.

the exploration: the first woman that made adelaide question her sexuality !! i’m open as to what this is, how it happened etc; whether anything physical occurred or they were merely flirtatious and physically close; if it was one-sided or reciprocated, etc.

[themachiavellianpig]

80 Days Review: Sky Pirates, Mechanical Elephants and Mutinies, oh my!

80 Days is what happens when you take a novel about travelling round the world within a strict time limit, add some serious steampunk elements, and then top it all off with an exceedingly generous helping of the best written storylines I’ve seen in a long time.

Full review and minor spoilers below. 

You play as Passepartout, valet to the eccentric and inscrutable Phileas Fogg. Your aim is to escort Fogg around the world in 80 days, travelling from city to city by whatever means you can scrounge up, all the while managing the finances and your master’s good health. The gameplay controls have been ported over to the Switch very well - choosing your routes and selecting dialogue options are easy, as are the buying-and-selling mechanics which you can use to bolster your finances by trading goods from one country to another. The map itself is a 3D globe which spins in the most obliging manner; the routes which you can take are marked in white, while the route behind you is marked in bold red. The globe is worryingly empty when you begin your journey, but new routes are unlocked almost constantly as you buy new maps and schedules, explore new cities and chat to fellow passengers.  

The real strength of the gameplay is, however, in the superb quality of writing. The gameplay text is presented as Passepartout’s journal, full of his own observations of the beautiful world which he is hurtling through at breakneck speed. The dialogue choices along the way begin to shape the character of Passepartout - are you delighted by the world you see, or horrified by the injustices you find along the way? Will you be the consummate professional valet and keep your cool, or will you be declared the captain of a band of mutineers? (I swear I did not mean for that last one to happen)

The game is clearly tracking these choices - two dialogue choices was apparently enough to label me “dependable” in my first playthrough and as I moved across the world, Passepartout moved to “zesty”, back to “dependable” and then onto “dab-handed” before we made it back to England. The game also tracks Passepartout’s relationship with Fogg throughout the game and, while I was expecting to be judged on my valeting abilities, it quickly became apparent that all of my decisions had the potential to affect how Fogg felt about his servant. On one particularly disastrous playthrough, my relationship with Fogg dropped so much that he “scarcely trusted [my] ministrations anymore”, undoubtedly the most cutting feedback I’ve ever received in a videogame.  

80 Days ultimately makes the very best of its possible setting; having made enough room in their world for mechanical elephants to carry me at great cost across India, they also make plenty of room for every kind of person imaginable - fellow travellers on the trains, locals in all of the cities, people who have become traders or explorers or pilots, all of whom are real and interesting enough to deserve their own novel. In two playthroughs, I met airship pirates, a penny-dreadful novelist and her despairing father, an opium-smuggling captain who mourned his own brother’s addiction, and a pack of nuns who kidnapped me. I flirted with a man in New Orleans who had finally been freed from slavery but continued to work for his former owner and father, and I had the hypocrisy of condemning slavery but supporting French colonialism thrown in my face by Senegalese sailor. I met people who were going to lose their livelihoods and cultures to the crushing wheel of progress, and people frantically searching for loved ones stolen by slavers, and people indifferent to all the suffering around them. 

There were also moments of great humour: having spent a long ride across an ocean trying to safeguard my master’s virtue from two scheming women locked in competition with one another, I was finally locked in a pantry and not released until Fogg found me - after, it was strongly implied, succumbing to the wiles of not one but both women. In my next playthrough, the penny-dreadful novelist took her revenge by publicly identifying me as her illicit lover, leading to a duel with her father and a fair number of snide comments from Fogg. 

Simply put, despite having already made it round the world several times, I simply cannot wait to see what and who I will discover on my next playthrough of 80 Days - and the playthrough after that, and after that, and after that.

[they-did-what-to-allura]

My letter for the @justice-for-allura project. Posting mostly to remind anybody who might be lurking that this is a thing, and it’s a cool thing. If you feel bad bout how Allura’s story went down and wanna make your points known, this is a great opportunity for it.

Edit: Changed some things, fixed a couple typos and reworded some points for clarification.

To the Voltron Team, DreamWorks, to Any and All Involved with the Decision to Kill Off Allura,

Let me begin by thanking the team for giving us this iteration of Allura to begin with. She is a beloved character to many fans. If she wasn’t such a great character, there wouldn’t be so many of us upset about the way her story ended. So, thank you for Allura. She was an amazing character with interesting layers of personality and a delightful design.

In this letter I will explain not only why I was personally disheartened by her death, but also why I believe it was a poor choice to make in terms of writing and the larger narrative.

On the personal end, I related very much to Allura. I empathize with the trauma of losing loved ones and it was cathartic for me to see a character lose so much, but not be defined by that loss. A character who retained a multifaceted personality that included a playful streak, a love of sparkly things, a sense of justice, and abundant courage. She is not reduced to her loss even though it impacts her journey as a character.

Allura’s struggle with Alfor’s corrupted AI also deeply resonated with me. While this is coming from a rather abstract point, it reminds me of my own struggle with a father who is an addict. Allura had to let Alfor’s AI go in spite of how painful it was, in spite of the better memories haunting her every step of the way. The possibility I will have to let my own father go is a very real one because he has made it clear he will never change. His addiction has effectively corrupted our relationship and fed into my own stints with substance abuse. This will be an unspeakably painful decision for me and we have many happier memories that reel through my mind every moment I even contemplate making it.

To relate to a character, to be inspired by a character and her persistence, and then watch her die…really blows. My stomach sank. I felt like crap. I felt even crappier upon hearing that my friend’s nine year old niece sobbed when she watched the ending. I doubt we related to Allura for the same reasons, but I do know that Allura was her favorite character. So with that, I’ll get into the less personal and more objective reasons as to why I feel Allura’s death was a horrible decision.

Firstly, VLD is geared toward younger audiences. I know VLD has a notable periphery demographic, with many older teens and adults such as myself watching and being in the fandom. I know sometimes this periphery demographic can be louder than the intended audience, which I can only assume is children due to the toys and easy-read supplemental materials. VLD has a Y-7 rating, so even if the volume of the periphery demographic drowns out that of the intended, the rating alone demonstrates that this is a show that’s at the least meant to be accessible to children.

Children are impressionable. Representation is important for people of all ages, of course, but it is especially important to children. Kids connect more easily to media where they can see themselves and for the good or the ill, fictional characters can be role models for children.

Allura was a non-white female leader, described in-universe as the “Heart of Voltron.” That’s amazing! That’s truly rare. It’s sad that it’s rare. It’s 2019 and there should be a plethora of non-white female protagonists for young girls of color to look up to. But there aren’t.

Allura was fantastic representation for young girls of color. Representation they hardly ever get. I cannot see a single good reason to take that representation away from them. In fact, it seems downright mean to take that away from them. I do not want the excuse that the staff weren’t aware of the importance of representation, either. You can’t promote the show with official art like this:

  …and claim you’re unaware of how important representation is. Particularly for children, for whom this show was rated as being appropriate for.

I do not feel the excuse that this show was about war is reasonable either. Yes, in real life, war is painful. Lives are lost indiscriminately. This was one of the justifications cited for Adam’s death when VLD was criticized for portraying the “Bury Your Gays” trope. However, VLD had already made it clear that war had costs. The Arusian village was destroyed purposely to bait the team. Several Blades of Marmora lost their lives aiding the team. The costs of war were very clear early on in the show. Allura certainly didn’t have to die to reinforce a theme that had already been reinforced several times prior.

On that note, it is very telling that an apology letter was sent for the death of a character who had all of two minutes of screen time, but not for Allura, a major protagonist.

Many people are offended by Allura’s death, feeling that it is racist and sexist. I do not want to believe that Allura’s death was intended to be either of these things. However, there are serious unfortunate implications in killing off your only WoC in the main cast that cannot be ignored. VLD is fictional but it exists in a real world, where real people are impacted by these issues.

While Allura’s death ultimately feels disrespectful given what she represented and its sheer pointlessness in the story, I see attempts at respect in its overall framing. Allura is revered as a hero. There is a statue built in her honor. She has a legacy. These are things that generally shape the celebration of a fallen hero. But even within the framing, there are mixed signals. Most notably, her loved ones take cheery selfies in font of her monument. In my personal opinion, that is the antithesis to an attempted respectful tone.

And I specifically use the word ‘attempted’ because despite the framing, Allura’s death does not actually come across as respectful in the least. It is crammed into the last nine minutes of the final episode. It is immediately followed by a flash forward to the future. Neither the characters nor the audience have time to mourn her. I do not want to hear the excuse that Allura’s death isn’t offensive because “she died as a hero.” Simply because something may be framed to be respectful doesn’t mean it actually is. The poor execution of that attempted framing itself is one of the lesser of many harmful messages sent by the decision to kill Allura off.

In a world where representation is important, an importance that is acknowledged by the staff, somehow someone still came to the conclusion that Allura’s narrative should end in death. Intent aside, her death falls into the “Disposable Woman” cliche, and is especially gutting because she is a WoC. I cannot reiterate how rare it is to see characters like Allura, non-white women that serve as major protagonists.

Allura suffered unduly throughout the series. She lost an entire planet, her family, her home, her title, and eventually her life. She was always a giving character. She was willing to sacrifice herself to save the Balmera as early as season one. It is noble of her to have that kind of dedication, I’m not saying it isn’t. But girls are socialized to sacrifice their happiness for others, it is a message they internalize at multiple levels.

Girls are socialized to put others before themselves and to sacrifice, and this expectation is especially pressing for girls of color. The SBW (Strong Black Woman) stereotype is a notably prevalent one because of the expectation placed on black women specifically to always be strong and constantly put their own needs last. While Allura is an alien, she is in-universe a minority post Altea’s destruction and IRL, redesigned to be non-white. And many fans, including myself, do see her as specifically black-coded because of her skin tone, hair texture, and having Kimberly Brooks as her voice actress.

A hopeful ending for any character who sacrificed as much as Allura would be one where that character is rewarded for their sacrifice. Where they’re able to find happiness on the other end. Where the audience feels payoff because a character we’ve seen give for so long finally gets. Where the audience feels fulfilled because a character we’ve seen grieve and grieve finally gets to breathe. For kids to see a non-white female character get this kind of ending isn’t only hopeful, but important. Girls— especially girls of color —should be shown that they don’t have to give up everything. Boys should also be shown these narratives, because they shouldn’t internalize the expectation of the girls and women in their lives to constantly sacrifice.

Allura’s sacrifice stands out as particularly glaring when we take into account that teamwork was supposedly one of VLD’s major themes. In a show entitled Voltron: Legendary Defender, wherein the titular robot must be formed by a team, it seems very out of place that it was up to one person to save the day. What was the point of the team bonding with each other, and with the lions, if all of that was going to be rendered useless in the battle that mattered the most?

None of the main characters we’d been led to believe loved each other made any real attempt to find another solution through teamwork. They more or less accepted Allura’s sacrifice at face value even though she was supposedly important to them. The paladins offered some minimal protest, then each gave Allura a hug and just watched her walk to her death. In addition to undercutting the theme of teamwork in the show, it just felt very strange to watch. I didn’t feel like I was watching a team who fought side-by-side at all. These characters felt less connected to each other than they did during the first season and at this point, supposedly they’ve fought side-by-side for years.

Not only did Allura’s lone sacrifice seem to undercut the theme of teamwork, but it just seemed incongruent to the atmosphere of the series. While loss was depicted and prevalent in VLD, nothing ever indicated that it would be a tragedy. Watching Allura’s death play out feels like watching a show that forgot what genre it was supposed to be. The emotional beats aren’t the right ones.

We feel no payoff from her death because it didn’t accomplish anything of value in the narrative. Allura had something to live for after the war, her newfound family and love interest. She didn’t have anything to atone for, unlike Honerva. At best (and I really mean at best here) one could argue that her death contributed to Lance’s development because he spends his life spreading her message after the fact. However, many viewers understandably perceived this as a demotion for Lance with its own set of unfortunate implications. Even if that was the case— which itself feels like grasping at straws for some kind of explanation —I shouldn’t have to point out why it’s extremely problematic for a female character to be killed for her love interest’s development.

Allura’s death felt as pointless as it did out of place. It felt unsatisfying and frankly, just like someone in the writer’s room wanted to be Edgy™ for the sake of it. It also felt particularly mean coming from a team who acknowledged how important representation was to its viewers and who used representation as a promotion point.

VLD is over. That is clear. I do not write this with the intent to get the “real ending” or anything of the like. I write this to express why Allura’s death effected me personally, why I feel it has harmful messages, and why it comes across both as harsh and as poor writing.

I hope all those who were involved with this decision reflect on the feedback from the way her death was perceived, most important the feedback of the WoC in the audience. Major character death should always be handled with care, especially in children’s programs. Representation should always be handled with care, especially in children’s programs. The way Allura’s story ultimately ended feels careless at best and malicious at worst.

Signed,

An Incredibly Disappointed Viewer

[hoshigomi]

Takarazuka Special 2018- Say! Hey! Show Up!

Man, am I lucky to be able to see so many incredible things in Japan. Under the cut are all the thoughts I had about this year’s TCA special! Forewarning- they’re hardly cohesive, they’re very personal and biased, they’re SUPER LONG because I’m not writing this for anyone in particular or editing it whatsoever, and they’re whatever came to mind between the two showings or while waiting at intermissions!

The Beni/Tamakichi/Mirio/Daimon group is like. Something else. You put all four of them up there and they split off into FACTIONS, and it turns out to be Beni vs. Everyone which melts into Beni and Tamakichi vs. Daimon and Mirio and by that I mean if Beni and Tamakichi are teasing Daimon and Mirio MAN can those two sweet, sweet women not hold up. Beni is a troll. Beni is relentless. I’d call her a predator to Mirio and Daimon’s prey. The teasing never ended- but to that end, the laughter never ended either, and honestly, I loved them. I loved it. They were all charming and they all shone and the way their personalities differ (OOH do their PERSONALITIES DIFFER) was the most obvious and beautiful thing in the world. We have a FUN set of top stars, y’all. It was nice to see them all together.*

*I missed Makaze for a lot of reasons, most notably: 1.) she would have made for another great target for Beni to give hell to, and 2.) there were a lot of silk, deep, deep v-necks, and it’s kinda cruel to leave Makaze out of that, don’t you think. See you next year, Soragumi. Your energy was missed. 

Daimon can’t eat gluten??? She certainly didn’t eat any bread in France, which has everyone including me pretty aghast.

Tamakichi used to? Swim? Play HANDBALL? They for sure teased her about being in the Olympics at the noon showing, but that’s as far as my Japanese got me. Makes sense though because have you seen her shoulders?

Sorry I need to say AGAIN how much Beni Ran This Shit. She IS the oldest top right now, by a year to Daimon and Mirio and like...more years to Makaze and MORE years to Tamakichi, and I’m sure that’s part of it, but I think the other part is that she’s a natural born emcee and comedian and she knows it. When I watch Beni I think ‘oh my God I love you so much for so many reasons,’ I love that woman. That’s my top star. But then MAN, I can ABSOLUTELY SEE how those reasons might make someone else feel the exact opposite. She also like applied herself for a bunch of this show and oooohhhhh it’s so lovely when she does. 

Tamakichi asked Mirio and Beni to talk about going to Taiwan, and they sung the little ditty that I don’t know the name of but clearly is done every time they go to Taiwan because they both knew it. Beni also spoke some Chinese for the Taiwanese live viewing audience. 

There was also talk about why they all chose their final songs, how their years went and what each troupe did, and some general banter. 

Aside from the Top Stars and Todoroki Yuu, no one really spoke. The Top Musumeyaku certainly didn’t talk. To be TOTALLY HONEST, as far as this live viewing went at least, unless you’re Top Star, nibante, Top Musumeyaku, or Kacha/Hanagata Hikaru/Akira/Kai you don’t seem to have TOO MUCH camera time. Still thankful for the fact that they do the live viewings! But it IS tough to spot your whoever-else, unless they’re doing their little solos. 

Moving on from our lovely Top Stars, here’s the quick-n-dirty lowdown on what stood out to me in the show!  (I’m sorry if I missed your favorite, there were a lot of people, a lot going on, and I’m REALLY biased towards watching certain people.)

Miya had a lot of great stuff. She and Saki both had some funky songs with acoustic accompaniment. Saki’s had kind of a Western vibe. (Like cowboys, not like Western Hemisphere.)

Sorry, back to Miya, I really really hope she hangs on to top. She has her act together. She knows what she’s doing onstage, she’s pretty polished, and I personally really really dig the general tone of her voice, especially when she goes a little high. 

I saw the show twice. Both times, when Coto came on for her solos, whoever the person next to me was like SLOW NODDED. Same, seat neighbors. God she’s good. She’s looking a lot more grown up!  She’s CUTE. I’m kinda obsessed! I can’t like compliment Coto enough. Y’all know how good she is. She stands out just because she’s THAT GOOD. 

Maaya Kiho. Maaaaaya. Maaya, come back to Hoshigumi so I can see you every day of my life. That girl has SOMETHING SPECIAL. Her energy is unique and a little aggressive but flirtatious? She has one of my favorite voices in the company, hands down. She knows how to work that like specific musumeyaku sexuality but you can kind of totally tell she also wanted to be an otokoyaku. She has that IN her. I love Maaya. I want to listen to like four hours of just Maaya. 

If I had to listen to something else for four hours, it would be Ari singing Yami Ga Hirogaru. 

If I had to listen to something ELSE it might be Aasa because her voice is definitely UNIQUE in a way that really pleases me. 

I also want to quickly shoutout to Tom for running as much of this as she did- and I want to comment that I like....like her voice. It has a REALLY unique quality to it now. She’s really interesting to listen to, and she’s still truckin’!

I want Mao Yuuki and Mikkii to stand exclusively next to each other for as long as they’re both in Hoshi because that height difference is SOMETHING else. 

Speaking of Mikkii, I’d like to challenge everyone who records and edits anything for the rest of her time in Takarazuka to actually put the camera on her for more than .9 seconds, because she is ON TO SOMETHING REAL. Tenju Mitsuki is always on. Whether or not you particularly care for what she’s doing, everything she does is done with 100% follow through and intention, she has a target, she isn’t doing anything superfluous or pointless with her body. She’s SHARP. Tenju Mitsuki is a fantastic performer and I really want to see more of it. 

Speaking of fantastic performers, shoutouts to Coto (sorry, duh), Daimon, and Maaya for being magnetic in the same 100% followthrough, target, intention way. What incredible performers. 

Yuki and Tamakichi sang OKLAHOMA and while I thought I knew what heartbreak felt like, it turns out I didn’t until I realized that we won’t ever get Tamakichi/Yuki Oklahoma. 

Daimon and Sakura’s Climb Every Mountain was NICE. 

I love these Top Musumeyaku Very Much. It’s almost dumb to say but God they just all bring such different things and personalities and voices to the table. 

Welcome to Top, Misono Sakura. It’s good to see you. <3 

Senna Ayase has Got It. She rocks. She has a lot of power and she led her musumeyaku in something really sassy and nice and I just want to say that man, I hope she loves her post-Takarazuka life. 

I want to compliment Maitii on everything and mourn the fact that she isn’t leading everything, honestly. 

There was a kind of long but not too long In Memoriam Section featuring the Top Musumeyaku all speaking for a few seconds and then mostly senka members + Kai + Akira with vocal solos all in white.

I never want to see another musumeyaku’s dress dragging on the ground. Someone almost Ate It when her dress got caught on something at the edge of the stage. Please. Keep our musumeyaku upright. Hemming things isn’t that hard.

Wow, Tsukigumi is fun. I also literally can not fathom HOW Baddy was THIS YEAR. As a whole they just have a really fun, kinda off-the-cuff energy that I find very endearing.

Shimon led Chaos Paradise, which, if you’re me, was one of the most satisfying things in the world. 

Tamakichi is so beautifully EARNEST in a way that really suits all the golden age musicals she’s been getting. Maybe we CAN cross our fingers for Oklahoma...

From now on I’m formally requiring 8-10 business days to prepare for hearing Inochi from Gaisenmon because I didn’t walk into Hey! Say! Show Up! expecting to get chills and feel the weight of the Human Condition on my shoulders. 

Shoutout to Yukigumi for replacing the ‘Nya!!’ at the end of Gato Bonito! with ...whatever sound they were approximating to imitate a wild boar. Happy New Year, everyone!

Irodori Michiru is just really cute and I love looking at her. 

Thank you Kai for your golden hair and 16 Year Strong insistence on being .3 seconds behind on choreography because you prefer being ~languid~ to being ~sharp~ because you sure were easy to find.

No amount of exclamation points, keysmashing, or attempts to describe it can make you understand how I felt when the music to Jump! from Oceans 11 started up, or when RUSTY was played by Kai. That was a dream come true. Nothing less. 

On that note, KAI SANG RAIMEI TOO, so I feel like God really Was looking out for Her Fans this Takaspecial. Thanks, God. 

Everyone’s medley started out with the Top Star singing something earnest or Powerful or Big, but our very own Kurenai Yuzuru elected to open up with SPECIFICALLY the doki doki waku waku bit from Another World. The audience loved it. I loved it. I love Beni and I love Hoshigumi and I love that they included Arigataya, Nanmaida from Another World also and I love that Kai was hopping around as Kiroku again with the biggest smile on her face and I love that we got to hear Coto’s PIPES and I love that the audience was clapping for Killer Rouge and I love Killer Rouge and I love the ENERGY THAT troupe has. 

Seo Yuria. Seooooo. Seooocchi. Get that fear out of your eyes, sweet thing. You have such a SMILE when you let yourself and your voice is THERE and you’re about to step into some big big shoes. Let yourself have this.

Rei and Saki are both coming into their own vibes! I’m excited to see where they go from here. 

Shoutout to Shidou Ryuu for getting WAY more screentime than intended because she was planted half a foot to the right and directly behind Tom at pretty much all times. Good to see you, Shidou!

The best thing about seeing people from different troupes performing together in any number is like....no one is quite WITH EACH OTHER. Like MAYBE your weird idiosyncrasies fit in well with your troupe, but they sure don’t fit with the weird stuff your neighbor is doing. It’s charming and it’s sweet and I LOVE seeing it. 

I didn’t think I’d cry either but tears DID spring to my eyes when Kai bowed. 

I would like to formally petition Takarazuka Forever to FOLLOW Sumire no Hana in encores because Sumire no Hana is kinda a downer and Takarazuka Forever is an upper but that’s personal preference.

They wished the audience Merry Christmas and Happy New Year in ENGLISH which felt like an extra treat. 

I didn’t mention every single actress in this (I’m sorry if I missed yours!! It’s so hard to remember everything and watch everyone when there are such weird combinations of actresses on the stage etc.), but God, I can honestly and truly say that to me, they all shone.  Everyone is so different and everyone is working so hard. Every person who had a solo did it with everything they had, and it was beautiful to say. While watching Saki and Tamakichi, the thought came to me that entertainers- people who choose to use their lives to make other people happy- are just so special. These women are all such hard working performers and dedicated individuals and the life they put into giving us this thing is incredible. I feel so lucky to even be able to say that I do what they do. Not with HALF the skill or talent but this was one of those shows that made me think. Oh. We are so lucky to do this. The world is so lucky to have this art form. Musical theatre really is the most wonderful thing in the world, to me. 

If more comes to me later, I’ll add it after the cut, but this is already 80 pages long and I’ve exhausted my phone notes. If you read this far, thanks and I’m impressed! I’m HAPPY to tell you more specifics about things if you want to ask, I can try to scrape my brain for whatever’s in there. 

Thanks for a beautiful 2018 in Takarazuka, everyone.  Happy New Year! May 2019 bring us beautiful things we could never have expected!

[missameliep]

The Pursuit of Happiness - Chapter Three: The Taste of Love

Book: Desire & Decorum

Word count: 3.039

Notes: First, English is not my native language and it’s been a long time since I last wrote this much. So, if there are mistakes, let me know. I will appreciate the feedback. Second, it’s my first fanfic and I was going to write a short story, one scene, but the story got longer and there are a couple more chapters… Just wanted to share it.

Characters belong to Pixelberry and I just borrowed them. ;)

On their way back to the manor, as Prince Hamid thought about talking to the Dowager Countess, he tried to gather his thoughts. Although Elizabeth stated during their stroll in the Hyde Park that she has no interest in marrying the Duke of Karlington, part of the rumours was true as it was confirmed that her grandmother in fact desires a match between her and that horrible man. Just to conceive the idea pained his heart!

He tried to suppress a frown from his brow as Elizabeth looked at him, but he was very much concerned, because if it’s the duke who’s responsible for spreading such rumours, it means his mind is set in marrying her and he is probably trying to get rid of other potential suitors.

The Duke is one of the worst kinds of nobleman he has had the displeasure to know since he came to England: whatever the duke wants, the duke shall have. He is untrustworthy and won’t hesitate in using his title and influence to get exactly what he wants, whatever it takes, no matter if he might act with treachery or who might get hurt in his schemes. In order to protect her, they should avoid for now unnecessary gossip about the nature of their relationship.

At least until he has the approval of her grandmother.

“If I dare say, my lady, since I will be staying overnight in the manor, I think it would be more appropriate if I returned to the parlour for a couple more minutes, to be seeing by others… it would be better if people don’t see us together, and particularly going upstairs together. We should be careful before prying eyes.”

“I believe you’re right. It would be better if we did as you say.” she said, nodding in agreement.

Once inside the house, Elizabeth and the prince parted ways. One last glance and a smile after he released her hand. Ms. Daly looked worried and reached her as soon as she got to the bottom of the staircase. The women went upstairs together, walking quickly to her chambers, mumbling something in hushed tones. The prince disappeared through the doors as he went into the parlour, which is now occupied only by a handful of gentlemen, only one of them will also stay overnight, the Viscount Garner of Stafford, whose wife had already gone to her designated chambers. Due to the late hour, the Prince supposes all the women of the house have gone to their rooms. He spotted Mr. Marlcaster on a darkened corner quietly sitting on an armchair drinking brandy.

He shall wait a couple of minutes before retiring to his chambers as well, and he tries to participate in their conversations. They’re discussing matters of law and the bankruptcy of one noble house in Scotland. The room smells like tobacco and brandy. He touches his face and notices his mouth curved into a wide smile, one that shows his straight white teeth; he fixes his face in a more serious facade, one suitable for such a mournful occasion and fitted to the serious subject being discussed… but it is a tremendous effort! “What has she done to me?”, he’s amused by this thought and the corners of his mouth lift again.

“Lizzy, where have you been?” Briar asks her as soon as they are in Elizabeth’s room, the door closed behind them. “Fortune smiled upon us, since the Dowager Countess have retired to her chambers a few minutes before you disappeared, and I lied to the Countess when she asked me your whereabouts… I was scared… with all that’s happening…” Briar choked on her words.

“Sorry, Briar.” Elizabeth mumbled, her face flushed, her fingertips touching her lips. She already misses his touch as if some part of her was missing. “How could this be even possible?”, she thinks.

Briar eyes her with curiosity, noticing the spots of dirt on the dress and her messy hair. She’s her best friend and they have known each other their whole lives, so she could never hide anything from her.

“What happened, Lizzy?” Briar said and giggled as she turned her around to start removing her dress, her hands feeling the damp fabric. “When I was looking for you, I noticed that a certain handsome Prince was also nowhere to be found...” she whispered into her friend’s ear.

Elizabeth’s smile faded at the thought that someone else may have noticed it too; she immediately turned around, facing Briar with eyes wide open and quivering lips.

“Briar, did anyone else…” Elizabeth said, her voice as low as possible.

“No!” Briar promptly interrupted, trying to ease her mind. “I did not tell a soul and I don’t think anyone even noticed that you were both gone at the same time. When the Countess asked me about you, I simply told her you have come to your chambers to lie down. I even spread some pillows under the covers. You see?” she said pointing to the bed.

“Thank you so much, Briar.” Elizabeth said, standing still as Briar quickly unlaced her corset.

“Were you two together?” Briar asked, a pointed smirk on her face.

“Yes, we were.” Elizabeth answered.

“Oh!” Briar said and clapped her hands.

“We took a walk and we went stargazing for a while near the lake...”

“I knew it!” Briar exclaimed. “I saw you two in the chapel, you know? You two were quite close. How was it? Did he propose? He did, didn’t he?” she said it all without pausing for breathing.

Free from her mourning attire, her undergarments and shoes, wearing only her white cotton nightshirt, Elizabeth sits on her bed and motions for Briar to join her. She starts telling her everything that happened this evening. Her cheeks flushed as she recalled some of the events. Briar clapped her hands in excitement as Elizabeth told her about what he said about her being the source of his happiness.

“So romantic!” Briar shrieked.

Elizabeth’s brown locks were unpinned from the hairdo and felt loosely over her shoulders while she brushed it herself and finally gathered her courage to tell Briar about the kiss.

“And we kissed… It was so unexpected, Briar. I have read about it in novels and poems, even heard some indiscreet remarks from the ladies in sewing circle. But it was better and intense than I could have possible dreamt! His lips were so soft... It was so intense and warm. And I felt so… I can’t even describe it! I know no words for these feelings!” she said and drew in a long breath as she felt heat risen to her cheeks once again.

Briar’s hand covered her mouth as she tried to suppress a giggle.

Elizabeth mused and said, “It felt like experiencing the taste of love…”

“You are becoming a poet! Could the prince charms be rubbing off on you?”

She simply smiled and pondered about all he has inspired in her life. After a moment, she said shyly, “However, as I had no previous experience, I am not positive that it went well… for him too.”

“How could you think that? I’ve seen how he looks at you; and I’m certain he is quite taken by you! That’s all so romantic!” Briar said and put her arms around herself, sighing.

“It was indeed romantic and very passionate. But I think my grandmother would never approve it and I know exactly what she would say: Elizabeth, a lady should never walk around unescorted and kissing a man that is not your betrothed!” Elizabeth spoke impersonating the Dowager Countess and they laughed.

“She would faint just thinking about that possibility…” Briar stated.

“I never wanted to stop kissing him. And he said he could kiss me forever...”

“Oh, Lizzy!”

“Briar, have you ever kissed someone?” Elizabeth asked this, but she really wanted to know if she had kissed one of the two gentlemen that were enamoured with her friend, but she did not dare imply anything.

“Yes.” Briar said with a sly smile spreading across her lips.

“Who? You must tell me!” Elizabeth said and clapped her hands.

“Tommy Flanagan.” Briar leaned closer to Elizabeth and just as soon as the words slipped her mouth, she covered her face with both her hands.  

“Tommy Flanagan? When did that happen? I thought you said he was disagreeable, and you hated each other!” Elizabeth spoke loudly, taken by surprise, leaning even closer.

“Two summers ago. I let him hold my hand one day when I was walking back home from Mrs. Bolton’s house… And after that he kissed me once behind the church.” Briar answered.

“But you never told me anything…”

“Well, it was not a good kiss and I thought it was not worth to mention…” Briar chuckled. “Besides, I didn’t want you to think that I was going to marry Tommy Flanagan!”

“I wouldn’t think that... I would definitely not think that.” Elizabeth said and shook her head. They both giggled.

“And recently I have kissed Mr. Woods, which was a good kiss that I was eager to tell you all about it.” She said as she leaned closer, lowering her voice.

“You did?” Elizabeth asked with a grin on her face.

“He approached me in the pantry the other day, when we were running errands for the funeral. He told how much me he cared for me and that he wished to marry me. And we simply kissed. It was a very good kiss, because we both have feelings towards each other. I think it was probably the same with you and your prince.” Briar said and winked at her friend.

“Did you accept his proposal?” Elizabeth asked eagerly.

“I told him I cared about him too but needed time to think. However, I can’t accept his proposal while we don’t know who you’re marrying and where you’re going, Lizzy...”

“Briar! But what about your own happiness? If I am to live somewhere else that is not Edgewater, does that mean you would refuse his proposal? I can’t accept that!” Elizabeth exclaimed and crossed her arms over her chest.

“Oh, Lizzy… you have been my best friend my whole life, I can’t possibly abandon you now…” Briar’s brow furrowed as she spoke.

“You wouldn’t be abandoning me. And if I become lady of this house, you and Mr. Woods would always have a place here.” Elizabeth said holding Briar’s hands. As they looked each other, they noticed the tears were welling in their eyes.

“Thank you! Thank you!” Briar said and whipped a tear that trickled down her cheek. After taking a deep breath, she continued, “You will be the first to know if I will accept his proposal… right after Mr. Woods, of course.”

They laughed until they were out of breath.

“But you still haven't answered my question: did the prince propose?” Briar said and leaned closer, her hand holding Elizabeth’s.

“No... but I think he might. He was carrying the miniature lady grandmother sent him in my behalf.”

“Oh! If you marry him, are you going to be a princess?” Briar asked.

Elizabeth considered for a moment, her mouth ajar, when she finally says, “I actually don’t really know how this works... I never asked about it.”

“I think you might! Who would have thought that Elizabeth Thompson would become a princess?”

As she hears her words, Elizabeth takes a deep breath, her smile fades and her face falls.

“What’s wrong, Lizzy?”

“I don't know if I will be able to marry him at all. You are aware that lady grandmother still wants me to marry Duke Richards even though he has been nothing but rude and malicious towards me. Such a vicious man! And I am terrified that she may refuse prince Hamid's proposal... it would devastate me! I shall not marry the Duke! I would rather die than been forced to marry him against my will!” Elizabeth exclaimed. Her face turned into a scowl.

“Do you believe she would do that to you?” Briar asked surprised.

“I believe it’s possible. She is mostly interested in assuring that I will inherit Edgewater. She told me once Hamid wasn't fit for this life, he wouldn’t know how to run the estate’s businesses... And I don’t think I want any of this if it requires me marrying that disgusting and vicious Duke.” Elizabeth said, and one tear dripped from her chin on their enlaced hands.

“Oh, Lizzy… I never thought it would come to this.” she said and held Elizabeth’s hand firmly.

“Me neither. And I can’t stand the idea of not being around him…” she said and exhaled. After a pause, she asked, “Do you miss Mr. Woods when he is not around?”

“Yes. Most of the time when I’m not really busy…” Briar said.

“May I ask your help with something?” Elizabeth asked.

“Of course!”

[preserving-ferretbrain]

The Victim Dilemma

by Dan H

Tuesday, 03 March 2009

Dan continues to overuse the word “paradox” and to be rude about Joss Whedon~

I’m going to start with an anecdote.

One of the only times I have ever actually had my mind changed about something by the simple act of having somebody explain their point of view to me was when I found a friend of mine wearing one of those white “make poverty history” wristbands.

I never liked the slogan. I thought it was idealistic to the point of naïveté. You might as well carry a banner saying “end injustice now” or “bad things should stop happening.” What my friend explained to me, and I think he was totally right, was that “Make Poverty History” wasn’t about a directionless call for “something” do be done, it was a way of saying “poverty is a problem to be solved, not something to wring your hands about.”

If we high-minded wealthy liberals are honest with ourselves, we tend to think of Africa as “the country the poor people come from.” On some level we all believe that starvation and suffering are what Africa is for. It’s nobody’s fault that millions of people starve to death despite the fact that there is, in fact, enough food to go around, it’s just the way of the world and anyway, if people stopped dropping dead in Ethiopia, what would Lenny Henry do with his time. “Make Poverty History” was a way of saying that our usual way of thinking about poverty is, in fact, totally fucked up.

This brings us back, by a commodius vicus of recirculation, to Joss Whedon, Dollhouse and The Portrayal of Women (tm). Just to be clear here, my aim here isn’t to knock Whedon, it isn’t to make him out to be a misogynist, or to “prove” that he isn’t the great big feminist he says he is. It’s just that ol’ JW is the best case in point for what is a very, very difficult issue.

Taking the Country Out the Boy: The Issue with “Ex”

One of the things that people have identified as “skeevy” (to borrow a term from FB poster Viorica) about Dollhouse is that so far most of the women portrayed in it have been victims of some sort, the classic example here being the first episode, in which Eliza Dushku’s character is programmed with the personality of a hostage negotiator whose entire career was a reaction against the fact that she, as a child, was abducted and abused.

Others have pointed out that this was actually totally okay, because she responded to the abuse by becoming a strong, independent woman, and was ultimately able to take on her abuser and defeat him (although “she” was now Eliza, programmed with the other woman’s memories).

Now I can totally see the argument that says that a story about a woman who grows stronger in response to a traumatic experience is an empowering one. The idea that this woman took a horrific experience and made something positive out of it is arguably both powerful and affirming, and you could certainly make the case that by overcoming her abuser she ceases to be a victim.

The problem I have is that an ex-victim is, to my mind, still a victim.

Look at it this way. Virtually every procedural show (be it police, medical, whatever) has the Obligatory Ex Criminal (often also filling the role of Obligatory Ethnic Minority). The ex-criminal used to live on the wrong side of the law, but has since “gone straight” and become a cop/doctor/interstellar revolutionary/whatever.

But, when you get right down to it, their job in the series is to do the criminal stuff. They pick people’s pockets, break into places the plot needs them to get into, and generally act like the Thief in a traditional D&D party. The same goes for anybody who is ex-military, ex-CIA, ex-vampire or ex-priest, the thing which they are “ex” defines their character as completely as the thing they do currently, arguably more so. The woman Eliza gets patched into her brain in the first episode of Dollhouse isn’t a hostage negotiator who happens to be female and happens to be an abuse survivor, she’s a female-abuse-survivor-turned hostage negotiator. The character is still defined primarily by the abuse, if only because without it, the episode would be stripped of most of its conflict and therefore most of its point.

On Victimhood: The Heath Ledger Effect

When Heath Ledger died, the newspapers basically all said the same thing. He was a great actor, tormented by his personal demons, and his death was a tragic waste of a great talent. It’s the same when any actor dies, particularly if suicide is suspected. He was just too driven, too talented, too dedicated to his art. His genius was rooted in a very real darkness, and so on.

You might have noticed the use of the masculine pronoun above. Admittedly I do sometimes use “he” for gender-neutrality (there go my feminist credentials) but in this case I do mean it quite specifically.

When a famous woman dies, particularly if suicide is suspected, it's a whole different story. We are not told about her towering genius, and women absolutely never have personal demons. Instead we are told about how a poor, innocent girl was drawn all unknowing into the machinery of fame, and was helpless to prevent herself being chewed up and spat out like tobacco. Candle In the Wind makes references to Norma Jeane being “hounded,” “set on a treadmill,” “lonely,” and of course “never knowing who to cling to.” Not once does it point out that she was also quite a good actress.

Famous people go off the rails, but when a man goes off the rails, we focus on the loss of his potential, we say “has the man who did all these amazing things really come to this?” When a woman goes off the rails, we say “oh how sad, and to think she was once somebody's little girl.” When a man dies, or goes mad, or both we mourn the loss of his talent. When a woman dies or goes mad we mourn the loss of, for want of a better word, her femininity. We always think, just for a moment, how much happier she would have been if she'd just found a nice man and settled down.

This is one of those situations where I think there's Something Important here but I'm not entirely sure what it is. The problem is that, in general, women do have a tougher time of it than men, so chances are Marilyn Monroe really did have a tougher life than James Dean, but the fact remains that we remember one as a great actor whose life was cut short by a car accident, and the other as a tragic example of innocence crushed by the Hollywood machine.

The problem is that women, because of the nature of society, have slightly less control over their lives than men, and slightly fewer choices. This is a bad thing. The problem is, if you fixate too much on the (real, occasional) powerlessness of women you wind up presenting a situation where women, because of their gender, are incapable of controlling their lives, or making their own choices.

To put it another way, isn't Elton John singing “Hollywood made you a superstar,” just a little bit insulting to old Norma Jeane Mortenson?

The Paradox: Life Imitates Art Imitates Life

Much as I love dissing Joss Whedon for his various airs and graces, he's in a bugger of an impossible position.

If he ignores the victimization of women, he's not really doing his job as a “feminist,” but if he portrays it, he's only reinforcing the kind of stereotypes he's trying to fight against.

It all comes back to the problem with Africa or, to put it another way, Russell's “Superior Virtue of the Oppressed.” Put simply, we like to see other people suffer, not because we are cruel but because it allows us to feel secure in ourselves. We construct convenient fictions for ourselves – like the old classic about how blind people's other senses get razor-sharp to “compensate” for their lack of sight. We invest victimhood with virtue, and that is extremely dangerous.

Regular ferretbrainers will probably be familiar with our

Fantasy Rape Watch

feature. One of the fantasy rape clichés that I have a particularly hard time dealing with is the one you might call “Rape as Rite of Passage”. It's worryingly common in fantasy for female protagonists to get raped, and for this to form a crucial part of her development “as a woman” and contribute to her unlocking her true potential. It's just plain freaky, but it's really easy to see where it comes from.

When you are confronted with somebody who has suffered terribly, be they an abuse victim, a holocaust survivor, or whatever, one of the only ways we can cope with it is to convince yourselves that the sheer fact of their survival makes them admirable. Ironically it's a form of dehumanisation, we cope with the suffering of others by convincing ourselves that they are so inferior or so superior that we don't have to care what happens to them. The alternative is to accept just how awful, cruel and pointless the world can really be.

There is a very real danger in presenting “women who triumph in the wake of abuse” as role models or icons of female empowerment. In fact there are several very real dangers.

For a start, it passes an implicit judgement on people who survive abuse but are just plain broken by it: Eliza Dushku can get over it, why can't you? I would be interested in seeing the statistics, but I strongly suspect that in real life, being abducted and sexually abused makes you less likely to become a roaring success, not more likely. I also rather suspect that if you applied to train as a hostage negotiator and said that the reason you wanted to do it was because you were abducted as a child, they wouldn't even interview you (I understand that medical schools frequently reject people for citing “because I lost person X to disease Y” as their reason for applying).

And of course it also passes an implicit judgement on women who have just got on with their lives without having the good fortune to suffer horrific sexual abuse through which they can discover their inner feminine mojo. By exaggerating the triumphs of abused women, you wind up presenting a deeply disturbing view of the world where being raped is the highest thing a woman can aspire to. Not deliberately, of course, but in a work of fiction a woman who has merely succeeded is going to get less screen time and less audience sympathy than a woman who has succeeded in spite of abuse.

And finally, there's the sexual double standard. This one's a bit tricky, but I think it's telling that while abuse for a female character is a free ticket to sympathy city by way of prestige junction, for a male character it's just a little bit icky. I think, actually, I could get past the “abuse is empowerment” thing if it applied to men as well as to women, but when was the last time you saw a male character in a work of fiction who was abused as a child and responded by becoming a badass? A good badass, I mean, not a serial killer. And it's this that I think kills the whole idea for me.

The reason you never see an empowered response to abuse from a male character is because people find the idea of a man suffering abuse, particularly sexual abuse, wholly unnatural. Put simply, men are not supposed to be victims, and for a male character to be abused in that way violates some major social taboos in the way that the abuse of women doesn't.

And that right there is the big problem. The reason people are willing to accept the idea that abuse can be a natural part of the background of an empowered fictional woman is because on a basic level we accept the abuse of women in general as natural. Africans are there to starve so we can feel good when we send them food. Women are there to be abused and oppressed so we can feel good when we “empower” them.

Bit messed up really, isn't it.Themes:

TV & Movies

,

Whedonverse

,

Minority Warrior

~

bookmark this with - facebook - delicious - digg - stumbleupon - reddit

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http://serenoli.livejournal.com/

at 09:41 on 2009-03-03Nice article. :)

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Arthur B

at 10:11 on 2009-03-03Oh hey

Something Awful

are getting in on the

Dollhouse

dogpile. I like the article because it includes the line "Unfortunately, Joss, no prophecy, shadow space government, or super hooker company will ever make a woman completely and exactly as awesome as your mom."

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Dan H

at 14:12 on 2009-03-03The Something Awful thing is made of win. I rather liked the line: "he is beating Echo and trying to rape her all over. He is punching her and doing rape moves at her."

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Arthur B

at 15:29 on 2009-03-03"Yo! Maybe it is you that should be raped."

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http://fintinobrien.livejournal.com/

at 17:10 on 2009-03-03I just noticed the Whedonverse category. Is he the next Rowling for you, Mr Hemmens? :D

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Rami

at 18:15 on 2009-03-03I wonder if the Western

(abuse ∨ oppression) ⇒ empowerment

thought process is at all influenced by the Catholic Church's long-held creeds of

suffering ⇒ salvation

…

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Dan H

at 21:34 on 2009-03-03

I just noticed the Whedonverse category. Is he the next Rowling for you, Mr Hemmens? :D

Not exactly. I actually really like Joss Whedon. I loved Buffy to much it cost my my degree, and I thought Firefly was awesome when it wasn't trying to Empower Women (tm).

Basically I think that Joss Whedon makes excellent TV shows, which unfortunately stop every couple of episodes to make A Point About How Society Treats Women in a gratuitous and heavy-handed way.

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http://katsullivan.insanejournal.com/

at 21:13 on 2009-03-04Your point about men not being allowed to be victims takes my mind to Harry Potter. Despite his years of abuse by Muggles, Harry never "internalizes" the abuse. He hates them right back. He's never a victim to their alienation like Voldemort or Snape - who grow up to become monsters of sorts.

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Arthur B

at 21:51 on 2009-03-04Well, that's because Harry is inherently virtuous, whereas Voldemort and Snape are inherently sinful, like

those who are not of the Elect

.

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Wardog

at 11:07 on 2009-03-05Kat, that's a really interesting point. I'd never really thought about Harry's abuse from that angle before - I suppose partially because horrible things happen to children all the time in children's books and partially because, at least initially, the portrayal of the Dursley's is generally played for laughs. But it does seem to fall between two stools, being neither approached seriously enough or frivolously enough (I mean, they keep him in a cupboard!) to be anything other than shallow. I know he's not a protagonist, but it contrasts rather nicely against the treatment Snape who, of course, lives his entire life as someone who has never really got over being horribly bullied at school.

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http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/

at 01:09 on 2009-03-06

when was the last time you saw a male character in a work of fiction who was abused as a child and responded by becoming a badass?

This of course makes me think of Batman, who did not suffer abuse but had his parents murdered in front of him as a child and went on to protect others. As opposed to many female comics characters who instead get raped and then get strong to fight back. There's definitely a difference.

I remember a show years ago, I forget what it was, but there was a main character who had near-psychic ability to understand serial killers because she'd been kidnapped and held by one for months as a kid. And what annoyed me so much was not only did the experience essentially give her a super power but it was like even as a child she was clearly so awesome that that's why she survived. So now she could always look at a killer and "see" how he saw things. I imagine she'd have a hard time relating to victims.

Also on the Elect HP question, I always thought this post was interesting on the subject. It was written post-GoF so long before DH was written.

http://skelkins.com/hp/archives/000149.html

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Arthur B

at 01:24 on 2009-03-06Hmm, there was a Spiderman comic where he helps some kid who's being molested, and reveals that he was abused himself by an older cousin before he became Spiderman...

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http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/

at 03:01 on 2009-03-06I think I remember that. Though I don't know if he says he's been molested or maybe that he almost was but he told someone? I can't remember now.

Note, of course, that it's not part of his origin story. He's not defined by it.

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Shim

at 07:49 on 2009-03-06The Dursleys thing to me brings to mind Roald Dahl, particularly Mathilda (the book, of course): the headmistress' comment that if you behave outrageously enough, the claims just sound ridiculous, seems pretty apt. The difference being that Dahl has a real talent for producing disturbing books while keeping them light enough to actually read.

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Arthur B

at 09:41 on 2009-03-06I've been inspired to

track the spiderlestation comic down

. (The rest of the Comics With Problems site is excellent, by the way).

FWIW, 4th panel of page 6 seems to imply that he was actually molested - he's objecting, but the narration notes that he was "too frightened to leave". In classic comic book style, Spidey concludes the comic by mentioning that he's actually been

haunted for years

by what transpired there, but he's now started the healing process, so we shouldn't be surprised if we never hear anything about it ever again.

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Dan H

at 12:04 on 2009-03-06Wow, loads of comments since I last logged on:

@Shimmin: I thought of the Dahl connection myself. I think the reason it works for Dahl is because it's so over the top that you accept it as metaphor. The "abuse" that Dahl's characters suffer is basically a representation of the way regular kids *feel* like they're being treated. Harry muddies the waters because we're always told that his childhood was an important test of his character, and because we have so many "real life" issues approached in the series.

@Sister Magpie: Batman is about as close as you can get with a male character (unless you count the Spiderlestation) but as you say there's clear blue water between "my parents were killed" and "I was raped". (Although TVTropes does observe that

Rape is the New Dead Parents

). If nothing else, having your parents murdered in front of you is still in the realm of fantasy violence, whereas rape isn't (which is why so many people thought that Spike attempting to rape Buffy was unforgivable in a way that

torturing people to death for fun

was not).

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http://mary-j-59.livejournal.com/

at 03:09 on 2009-03-22I know this is a bit off point, but I really hate the way bullying and victimization is treated in "Harry Potter". Snape is not a monster; he is a normal human being who, from what we see in the text, never received unconditional love from anyone and never had a place he felt truly at home, or even safe. Harry's reaction to what ought to be severe neglect/abuse, on the same level as young Sev apparently experienced, is completely unrealistic. He should not be as intact as he seems to be - not that he's altogether intact; Harry does show signs of narcissistic personality disorder, as well as being oppositional and defiant. But, if we are to take the Dursleys seriously, he should be much more scarred than he is.

Snape is deeply scarred. A scarred human being is not a monster. BTW, whatever one thinks of this character, he does a great deal of rescuing.

But, getting back to the original essay, it is a very uncomfortable idea that people should be special *because* they have been victimized. It seems almost a justification for victimization, doesn't it?

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Arthur B

at 14:04 on 2009-03-22

But, if we are to take the Dursleys seriously, he should be much more scarred than he is.

Well, that's precisely it: in the first half of the series, at least, we are not meant to take the Dursleys at all seriously. They're comic relief, or if you want to be really generous a satirical swipe at how the mediocre and conformist hold back the talented and special. (How Objectivist!)

Rowling asks us to take the Dursleys seriously at more or less precisely the same time as the series as a whole goes to shit.

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http://mary-j-59.livejournal.com/

at 18:27 on 2009-03-22Oh, I agree, Arthur! Another commentator online called the Dursley scenes schizophrenic from the outset. They - the Dursleys - are meant to be laughable, and yet, at the same time, their ignorance and cruelty are meant to show how very special poor little Harry is. It's queasy-making, really. But the schizophrenic attitude towards victims and victimization only gets worse, imho, culminating in Harry's torture scene in DH. Torture isn't bad, you see. It's only bad if the bad guys do it. Ugh!

But I will now stop hijacking this thread. Dan makes very good points, really. And the prevalance of this sort of violence against female characters in fantasy lit is worrying. But maybe, in the case of women authors especially, it reflects what they observe in real life?

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 23:30 on 2009-03-24Another excellent essay, Dan. You have such a marvelous way with words, and a marvelous way of articulating what I stumble and struggle for months to try to spit out. I quoted part of your "Make Poverty History" section in a recent argument because it was so well said.

"Admittedly I do sometimes use “he” for gender-neutrality (there go my feminist credentials)"

I don't think so. It's so common in today's society that you have to be truly anal about politically correct language to get it right all the time. We're never going to be perfect (well, not until we've made certain disgraceful human practices such as poverty and sexism history anyway), but that doesn't automatically make us completely antifeminist, or whatever. (See what I mean about being articulate?)

That Victim Dilemma is a real problem for me. As a writer, I see it as my duty both to point out the injustices in the world, and to portray the heroism of people who struggle against that injustice. And while there is something noble about men confronting violence against women, or white people standing up for the rights of people of color, that sort of stuff can slide into colonialist propaganda (people in Africa need white people to solve their problems for them)

waaay

too easily.

On the other side of the coin, you run the risk of romanticizing the poor, putting women on a pedestal, depicting the natives as Noble Savages, and so on.

However, I don't think this is an insoluble problem, especially once an author/writer is made aware of the risks.

As a possible solution to the damaged/empowered women problem, I'm going to bring in the show which I spent my last comment bashing:

Veronica Mars

. (It's kinda like

Firefly

, actually: intolerable main character who we're supposed to adore; problematic depictions of feminism (poorly executed sincere attempts at feminism in one case, excessively skeevy portrayal of feminists in the other); occasional highly questionable morals; and a couple other problems like that--while the other 90% is good-to-brilliant.)

In

Veronica Mars

, the title character was raped a year before the first season. Several other female characters are raped or sexually abused over the course of the series.

In Veronica's case though, it's quite clear that (like in the Spider-Man example mentioned above) she's not kick-ass

because

she was raped, she's kick-ass despite it. The other female characters are all firmly established before their sexual abuse, and afterwards, they don't become stronger or more dedicated or whatever, they try to go on with their lives and try to get over the bad experience.

(mary-j-59)

“But, getting back to the original essay, it is a very uncomfortable idea that people should be special *because* they have been victimized. It seems almost a justification for victimization, doesn't it?

Ha, well put. It's closely related to the idea that child abuse builds character.

Of course, sometimes adversity

does

make people stronger and “build character” as they say. Of course, all conscious human attempts so far to replicate such “positive” adversity to date have to my knowledge been dismal failures.

Rowling asks us to take the Dursleys seriously at more or less precisely the same time as the series as a whole goes to shit.”

Yet another spot-on observation.

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Wardog

at 10:40 on 2009-03-25Hi Mary-J - you didn't hijack the thread at all, I'm glad Open-ID is allowing you to comment.

The I-would-say-probably-inadvertent portrayal of victimisation / abuse in Harry Potter is one of the *many* problematic aspects of the texts.

He should not be as intact as he seems to be - not that he's altogether intact; Harry does show signs of narcissistic personality disorder, as well as being oppositional and defiant.

I'm never to sure what extent this is intentional - I know authorial intent is shaky ground at the best of times but I don't think we're actually meant to believe Harry has been damaged by his abuse the hands of the Dursleys.

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Arthur B

at 10:56 on 2009-03-25If Harry shows signs of NPD it's probably more a consequence of everyone in the world telling him he's the messiah (oh, and the fact that he is, in fact, the messiah) than being slapped about by comedy fatties in middle-class purgatory.

I think the big problem with the Dursleys is that, when you take away their comic relief aspects, they're basically there to plaster over a gap in the timeline. Harry's character is defined entirely by the death of his parents, the death of Voldemort, and the reaction of various characters to both of those events. This leaves an 11 year gap in the timeline where nothing actually important happens to Harry. Rowling's solution is to um and ah and finally shut him in a closet for 11 years.

Someone has almost certainly done a fanfic where Hogwarts and the wizarding world in general is just a delusion Harry has constructed to get away from the grimness of his home life (or, alternately, he's just a hopeless schizophrenic and the Dursleys actually go out of their way to help him but can't stop him running away spending months homeless dreaming of being a wizard). That would miss the point, but it'd also be pretty funny.

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Dan H

at 15:02 on 2009-03-25

If Harry shows signs of NPD it's probably more a consequence of everyone in the world telling him he's the messiah (oh, and the fact that he is, in fact, the messiah) than being slapped about by comedy fatties in middle-class purgatory.

Ah the age old question: is it narcissism if the universe really does revolve around you?

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Wardog

at 15:38 on 2009-03-25Is that a piece of fairy cake?