#it was May - December btw

[salsa-di-pomodoro]

Guys i know Christmas is overrated on every possible level but if at the end of december i don't see at least ONE submas reunion fanfic featuring Emmet (and possibly other characters if they're staying over) finding Ingo passed the fuck out under the damn tree during Christmas morning with maybe a little note of apology from Arceus taped to his receding hairline ass forehead i will riot

Or! He could be found under the communal (is that the right word) Nimbasa city/Gear Station tree. That would also make for some fun shenanigans i think. Imagine being a depot agent and getting a call for something weird at the christmas tree and you get there and fucking boss Ingo is just sleeping under there with a little bow on his hat

(it doesn't have to be Christmas btw. If you want to put a different holiday or celebration or tradition that's also cool christmas is just the one i celebrate so the first that came to mind. Also its the funniest to me but what do i know about other religions? Absolutely nothing so if you've got a funnier alternative go for it. It could also be and invented religion from the Pokémon world. Hmm)

Edit: by the way the same thing is happening on Akari's side. I just didn't mention it cause i was in submas brain mode and did not think about it

[ivoryteacups]

btw....the party is december 18...

[ohmerricat]

so it was my mother’s birthday a couple of days ago, and as a present my grandma gave her (and the whole family to boot) tickets to a mini london tour with a guide, specifically focused on islington, in russian obviously since she doesn’t speak much english. led by this eccentric gentleman in a bowler hat who’s from moscow but has lived here for 19 years and has been leading guided tours for ten.

the tour was fun and informative. lots of tall tales mixed in with historical facts and local art history too. but the guide himself... man. imagine a cross between eddie redmayne and peter capaldi. 40ish. salt and pepper hair. hooked nose roman profile. educated. witty. storyteller. dresses like some kind of urban wizard or as-yet-unseen incarnation of the doctor. mischievous glint in his eye. learns the name of everybody in the group immediately and chats to you like a casual friend as you walk from destination to destination. i sound like a fucking creep now, don’t i, but what is tumblr if not a public personal diary? don’t think i’ve ever caught a crush this quickly before. started entertaining silly little clara fantasy delusions for a second.

then at one point while recounting an anecdote he mentioned his wife and kids, naturally that brought me back down to reality. here, have a regents canal photo instead

[oneprotagonistshort]

also a Dirk Gently WIP whenever just for kicks. from the ongoing Forces Unseen sequel

-

“Holy shit,” Todd said, hearing Dirk come in through the door he’d left propped open. “Did you know we can see the Washington Monument from here?”

Dirk joined him at the window and wrapped an arm around his middle from behind. He was suddenly feeling a bit clingy, like he was going to need to front load all the cuddles he could get, which was abjectly ridiculous. Todd had never shied away from that, if anything it was Dirk who’d been jumpy lately about tender little moments like this. Still, Dirk couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d be wanting more of this later but might not be able to get it. He hooked his chin over Todd’s shoulder and squinted out the window, not sure what Todd was referring to. 

“The bloke on the penny’s house?” he asked, not seeing it. “I don’t think he lives in DC anymore, Todd.”

“What?” Todd asked, pulling back a little to look at him before pointing at a large lit-up obelisk surrounded by illuminated American flags. “No, that. I’ve only ever seen it in movies, National Treasure didn’t prepare me for the real thing.”

“Ohhh,” Dirk said, comprehension dawning as he held Todd close to his front. “You mean the giant pencil statue.”

“The giant—Dirk, that’s the Washington Monument. As in George Washington? It doesn’t even look like a pencil.”

“Doesn’t look much like George Washington either,” Dirk mused, and whatever retort Todd had been about to fire back was interrupted by the sharp trill of Dirk’s phone. 

[pynkhues]

curious as to your thoughts on the may december discourse (some spoilers i guess) - vili has come out and essentially said that he felt the film contributed to his victimization and hurt him. and the response from a lot of film twitter seems to be to yell ITS NOT A BIOPIC and to say he doesnt understand the film (gross). i feel like i dont really care if its a biopic or not, when the film literally quoted vili/mary kay, recreated the mary kay in prison photo exactly, and both charles melton and julianne moore studied vili/mary kay for their performances. to hand wave that all as "not a biopic" feels like a way of writing off any discomfort. i feel like the film should not have made those specific choices, but having done so they had a duty of care to vili. i dont think the film that ended up getting made is worth the continued trauma to vili even if it is art. there were other ways they could have told the story to minimize the harm and they chose not to - and i dont think that choice is a great commentary on tabloids or whatever, its just a ghoulish thing to do

I did see that, anon, and I do have thoughts on it as it's a real grey area in terms of creative license, art and storytelling, and it's a grey area that's been around really since storytelling existed, but before I get into that I just want to quickly clarify what Vili said, because I do think it's important.

Vili didn't say that the film contributed to his victimisation and hurt him, he said the film offended him because it was a ripoff:

“I’m still alive and well,” says Fualaau, now 40 and still living in the Seattle area, where the scandal unfolded. “If they had reached out to me, we could have worked together on a masterpiece. Instead, they chose to do a ripoff of my original story. “I’m offended by the entire project and the lack of respect given to me — who lived through a real story and is still living it,” he adds.

“I love movies — good movies,” he says. “And I admire ones that capture the essence and complications of real-life events. You know, movies that allow you to see or realize something new every time you watch them. “Those kinds of writers and directors — someone who can do that — would be perfect to work with, because my story is not nearly as simple as this movie [portrays],” Fualaau adds.

The reason I think this distinction is an important one to make is because in interviews since Mary Kay Letourneau passing, it's pretty clear that Vili - while absolutely being a victim-survivor - doesn't see himself that way, and even says pretty specifically in his Doctor Oz interview from 2020 that he doesn't see her as a predator or himself as having been preyed on ('there was no perversion...she was my wife and my best friend' are his exact words), and he's pretty clearly open to the idea of a film being made about his story.

I'm not saying this to diminish his feelings about May December at all (I strongly believe that Vili is entitled to feel any and every which way about the film) or to patronise his own understanding of what he experienced - I can't even begin to imagine the complexity of trying to unpack the life he shared with her - but I think it's important to reflect his feelings accurately and to provide a little context to those feelings.

With that said, do I think the creative team should've reached out to Vili before making the film?

Honestly, I don't know.

I think it's one of those questions in art where there's not really a right answer. If Vili's feelings towards Mary Kay are still lost in the silver linings of her grooming, any film that has his direct approval or involvement is going to run the risk of tacit endorsement. It also hamstrings the creative team and opens them up in terms of liability (I actually was a writers assistant on a TV show a million years ago that was sort of a bio pic and I can tell you for a fact that it was a disaster once the person it was based on got involved), and, of course, it runs the risk of shifting the focus of the story the writer is wanting to tell.

And that's the thing about art, right? By design, art is supposed to reflect us back to ourselves in ways that we might not always be comfortable with. Of course, that usually happens less literally than in how Todd Haynes has used Vili and Mary Kay's stories, but not always. Todd Haynes is certainly no stranger to the technique given Velvet Goldmine is pretty transparently inspired by David Bowie and I'm Not There is often confused as a Bob Dylan bio pic despite the fact that it's actually not.

Hell, everyone loves that Succession points a pretty clear finger to the Murdoch's, and while, of course, the Murdoch's - and Bowie and Dylan for that matter - have social, political and economic power that Vili doesn't which does impact the ethics of the decision, it's still made under the same creative ideology that aspects of a real story can render an artwork, a story, a film more emotionally authentic, can create greater resonance, can offer a sharper reflection of the world we live in and offer, perhaps, a message or a question that lingers.

All of this has actually kind of been funny timing as I just finished reading Sarah Weinman's The Real Lolita the other day which is a really excellent blend of true crime, literary history and critical commentary on this exact topic. The book explores the real life case of Sally Horner who was kidnapped by a pedophile in 1948 when she was 11 years old and was forced to roadtrip with him around America for two years. It's actually mentioned in passing in Nabokov's Lolita, but once you go a little deeper it's pretty clear how much of Horner and her story Nabokov used to create Dolores Haze / Lolita.

In the book, Weinnman asks the question as to why Lolita gets to be remembered when Sally's been left to obscurity, and of course, the answer is that there are other Sally's in the news cycle, but only one Lolita in art, and that hopefully in her writing Sally Horner's story she can write her back into bookshelves and place her back into this artwork but who knows if that's what Sally would've wanted (Sarah does, at least, talk to Sally's lone surviving family member, and makes a measure to show that it's very unlikely Nabokov ever did the same).

Was Nabokov wrong for not seeking out Sally's family for Lolita? Honestly, I doubt it even would've occured to him to do so, and the fact that we do now ask questions like this about the ethics of inspiration is, I think, a good thing. We should be critical of how stories are told and who is, and isn't, involved in the telling of them, but again, I don't actually think there are right or wrong answers here.

Fiction is always inspired by real people, real events, real life, it's a part of creation, it's a part of capturing a moment in time, it's about reflection and authenticity, but of course that's been rendered more complex in recent years by the fact that we live in a world that's ever shrinking and the people or the events that inspire new stories are inevitably brought into the public narrative in a way they just weren't back in 1955 when Lolita was first published.

So what does that mean for creativity and inspiration? I don't know, but personally I guess my thoughts would be that Vili is absolutely in his rights to be offended by the film, but I also don't think the filmmakers were wrong necessarily to not reach out. It's not the most ethical choice, but I also don't think it was an inherently bad one either. This isn't a Blonde situation where they write fiction and present it as fact, the creatives have been clear about it being inspried by what happened between Mary Kay and Vili, but they're also not saying Vili and Mary Kay are Joe and Gracie.

I appreciate you feeling like it's much of a muchness though given how they've apparently lifted entire scenes of dialogue. It's a murky question after all, and it's certainly one that's more complex when it comes to people like Vili and Sally than it is with the Murdoch's or even David Bowie, but yes, I'm not sure I see it as something inherently wrong, and I don't personally think it was ghoulish. I just think the specifics of this particular case just kind of shows how the sausage is made when it comes to storytelling.

[cboffshore]

we’ve only had a tiny lil teaser of OSSAS and i’m already excited ( and terrified ) !! so, to prepare us….

with the WIP so far, which i’m sure is subject to change later on, what’s three words you’d use to describe the next chapter of witness?

Sure! I've been spitballing and sharing little chunks in the writer's server I'm in, so I think for fun I'll pull words from fellow server members and their responses to what little I've shared so far. They aren't even tone descriptors or anything. These are literally just very apt words from feedback and questions I've gotten in there.

They are: trespasser, simping, and fantastic.

Right about here is where the channel talk turned into me trying and failing to find an emo Nadakhan edit that has haunted me for years, so that's where we're stopping!!

[quaranmine]

Honestly I'd love to know what kind of comments you'd be adding to the fic for your mother. Very curious :0 (also I'm terrible at knowing what information an outsider would and wouldn't have and/or would need)

Sure, I'll add a few. (Redacted since my google account is my full name.) Also remember that y'all also got the benefit of my author's notes, but I'm not giving my mom the AO3 copy because over my dead body does she look at that account. I'm giving her a document copy. So a lot of the comments will likely be details you guys already got in either a post or author's note.

^^^ This one is written specifically because my mom, like me, has been going to Big Bend National Park since she was young. A member of my family has gone there nearly every single year since....1965? lol. So it's a fun tidbit for her to know I was thinking of it while writing this. (There will be a similar note when the Pinnacles trail comes up, because I named Pinnacles after a trail in Big Bend.)

me trying to explain Scar's general dramatic flair (i also have a comment somewhere explaining that Scar is dyslexic and that is why he occasionally mispronounces stuff in the fic, and why he says the scientific documents the rangers let him borrow were difficult to get through)

nicknames

My mother and I are both Gary the cat stans. Trust me she knows Exactly what I am picturing here.

^^ a few other comments on the story, ranging from "background character details" to "research details" to "totally unecessary personal opinions"

it's also fun for little self-aware asides:

She already knows a significant amount of the plot, including the ending, because I talked to her about it. That is also why she gets to read it, because the moment I opened my mouth about writing it I basically had to. I don't always talk about my writing with her but I really wanted to talk about this one. So! By talking about it I just made the decision for myself that I'd allow her to read it. She is....very excited haha. And I am too? I mean I think I am going to send it to her and then just immediately go back to my apartment so I don't have to be in the same house as her while she's reading it LOL. The embarassment of people who know you too closely reading your things etc etc. But I'm very proud of this story and I don't think she realizes how good of a writer I can be. She knows I'm good at it (like, she's read my essays and newspaper stories) but not how I handle fiction.

[emile-hides]

Tired of the cute facade, gonna start drawing myself uglier

[zoldyckd]

need therapy again.

[beachboysnatural]

my thoughts about every john garfield movie available for me to watch

Four Daughters (1938) - started it all but is not that good, 8/10 Swingtime in the Movies (1938) (short) - cool to see him, interesting, 5/10 They Made Me a Criminal (1939) - bad but not that bad, he was hot, 5/10 Blackwell’s Island (1939) - thought it would be worse, he was so hot, 5/10 Juarez (1939) - boring in every way, whitewashed, good score, 3/10 Daughter’s Courageous (1939) - cheaper, worse Four Daughters, 7/10 Dust Be My Destiny (1939) - bad, great ending monologue, he was hot, 5/10 Four Wives (1939) - bawled, well-acted but not well-written, 6/10 Castle on the Hudson (1940) - exceeded expectations, Ann Sheridan, 7/10 Saturday’s Children (1940) - good I guess but so sad, he was really hot, 7/10 Flowing Gold (1940) - Forgettable, Frances Farmer was good, 5/10 East of the River (1940) - bad script, Marjorie Rambeau was great, 4/10 The Sea Wolf (1941) - spectacular on all levels, 10/10 Out of the Fog (1941) - good, he was evil :( but hot, enjoyable, 9/10 Dangerously They Live (1941) - good somehow, very enjoyable, 7/10 Tortilla Flat (1942) - whitewashed, stereotyped, made me cry, he was hot, 5/10 Show Business at War (1943) (short) - war propaganda but interesting, 4/10 Air Force (1943) - war propaganda but entertaining, kinda shallow, 7/10 The Fallen Sparrow (1943) - actually bad, he gave a great performance, 6/10 Thank Your Lucky Stars (1943) - good musical numbers, really yikesy, 6/10 Destination Tokyo (1943) - different war propaganda, not as fun, 6/10 Between Two Worlds (1944) - bad pacing, he was so hot, made me cry, 8/10 Hollywood Canteen (1944) - too long, entertaining enough I guess, 6/10 Pride of the Marines (1945) - really good, some yikesy stuff, 8/10 The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946) - great movie, Lana Turner, 9/10 Nobody Lives Forever (1946) - suspenseful, kinda predictable, fun, 8/10 Humoresque (1946) - great use of music, kind of bad, Joan Crawford, 6/10 Body and Soul (1947) - wonderful, great acting and cinematography, 10/10 Gentleman’s Agreement (1947) - good, Gregory Peck, 9/10 Daisy Kenyon (1947) - great acting, bad resolution, he was barely there, 7/10 Difficult Years (1948) - couldn’t find the version he narrated anywhere :((( Force of Evil (1948) - great cinematography, acting, story was confusing, 9/10 Jigsaw (1949) - actually horrible, did not like this movie at all, 2/10 We Were Strangers (1949) - boring but not that bad, 5/10 Under My Skin (1950) - made me so upset, boring, too much horse, 6/10 The Breaking Point (1950) - depressing, very well acted, 9/10 He Ran All The Way (1951) - very emotional for me, well directed, 8/10

[ivoryteacups]

happy december 18 to all those that celebrate

[puppmeo]

Have you ever been assumed to be romantically attracted to someone and even just the thought of that makes you want to throw up . Anybody

[haunt-i-ng]

sometimes i feel embarrassed by how many movies i think are 5 stars out of 5 but then im like actually watching those movies and theres no way i can give them anything but 5 stars. what can i say im a generous reviewer!

[falllpoutboy]

i need to watch more movies 😪😪

[tender-curiosities]

Todd Haynes film starring Riverdale's own Charles Melton feels like it was designed in a lab for a very specific type of tumblr user