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my-writings-and-musings · 4 years ago

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Same anon thank you for answering my question! I was wondering if you could do headcanons for MTMTE Rung, Megatron, Rodimus, Minimus, and Swerve with an Artisic human reader that just sees the good and creative artist side of everything? From books to pictures to even their own bot? Like they can just look at their bot and go out on a whole rant on how beautiful their optics are from the color to their expression. if that’s too many characters you can take any one, I don’t mind! Thank you and have a good day ❤️

You're welcome! I'm always open for clarification, so feel free to ask questions about whatever you'd like if you're unsure on anything. I took a little liberty with this one, but I've got all the requested bots because darn it all these beautiful mechs deserve recognition!

Rung

·He discovers your artistic inclination thanks to years of experience reading personalities and emotions at a glance, but he wasn't prepared for the depth of your conviction in seeing the world through a creative lens, which he learned upon speaking to you about your process as an artist. This surprise grows as he sees you sketching around the ship, your exuberance for the inherent beauty in everything coming through in every conversation you share.

·When he praises some of your sketches on a quiet day in his office and is compelled to ask how you developed your style, he's fascinated by your explanation, and his spark is warmed by how beautifully you describe the world around you and credit it for inspiring you. He's visibly shocked when your list of current subjects and muses includes him specifically, and you can't help but chuckle at the usually calm bot looking so absolutely flustered. There's no way for him to hide any of that feeling when he requests a bit of clarification; there's hundreds of bots on board, what about him could possibly stand out?

·You're happy to elaborate on your process to a bot who so regularly underestimates his worth and lay out why he in particular piques your interest. The warmth and goodness of his being is such a rare and beautiful thing, you explain, but also so rarely appreciated that it drives you to try and capture that essence in a manner one can see. How could you not? Such compassion and empathy and forgiveness should be remembered! You've also seen that he's capable of accepting any genuine apology, and to have that level of mercy after so much war is beautiful, enough that you have to try and show it.

·To say he's touched is an understatement of unfathomable proportions. Removing his lenses to clear optics blurred with tears, he doesn't even know how to begin processing your praise of his character when you add that his physical self hardly fails to encourage you either. His glasses nearly slip from his hands when he hears you say that. You continue quite easily; the kindness in his optics and the sweetness of his smile, combined with his genuinely handsome profile, simply inspire you to start sketching.

·He's touched, but you have to understand, he is NOT accustomed to this level of praise. Between the near tears and the blushing he has to politely excuse himself to recover from this absolute tsunami of emotions, but being flustered and melted at once is enough to have him smiling through a little blush all day long. While he tries to take a little bit of your mindset into his everyday life going forward, he gets a bit dazed every time he sees a sketch of yours that includes his face, as that level of artistic devotion being dedicated to him is more than he'll ever be able to process. Not that he minds...

Megatron

·Being more familiar with the written word, he enjoys the arts but has little experience with those who create them, and time has not been on his side in regards to learning more. Thus, you're one of the first artistically inclined individuals he's been able to discuss the topic with, which he was motivated to do after catching a glimpse of your work. He could swear some of your sketches bear a resemblance to him, but he says nothing on the matter and is certain his optics are tricking him.

·Your talk of technique quickly surprises him by shifting to inspiration, which to you is the primary driving force of your work, as it influences how you go about conveying the subject matter. Eager to share what you mean, you explain that anything can have beauty worthy of capturing if you just take the time to look at it right. Even the most mundane or seemingly unappealing things can be remarkable if you know their story, and you want to convey that energy as wordlessly as possible.

·A little overwhelmed but quite impressed by your manner of reasoning, he rather jokingly asks if even beings like himself could ever inspire you, or perhaps another artist with your mindset. He's caught off gaurd like never before when you, quite enthusiastically, reply that he most certainly can and does! To keep his composure he recalls portraits of his likeness being commissioned to inspire his soldiers, but never believing these fell under the category of art so much as they did propaganda. They often depicted him quite... violently as well.

·Having never seen these pieces, you reply that your own experience is tied more to how you see him now, and you flip through your sketchbook to demonstrate. As close to your level as can be, he's speechless while you explain what you wanted to capture about him in each sketch, whether it's a quick study or a detailed project; and that's how safe he makes you feel. Hearing himself referred to as a protector cuts straight through his powerful armor.

·You depict him looking almost... gentle? Hearing you describe the his immense size as a source of comfort and his strength as a tool of keeping peace processes about as clearly to him as a foreign language, but he nods along and keeps the conversation going until his duties call him away. Though he says nothing of it, he volunteers himself for more of the physically demanding work around the ship. His body's purpose had always been decided for him, but you've reminded him he has the only true say in its use, and that everything really is a matter of perspective. Perhaps he'll take up sketching once this is all over.

Rodimus

·He's certainly always had an appreciation for visual appeal, even if his idea of beauty doesn't often overlap with what most would consider artistically valuable. This and his natural alertness makes him quick to notice you often sketch about the ship, frequently when he's present, but at first he leaves you alone to work in peace. Having a hobby on this crew is beyond valuable, and he doesn't want to distract you from a passion... That is, until he decides on one especially slow day to just ask you what you like to doodle about.

·You can tell he wants to be a little nosy, if only because he's naturally a curious bot about these things, but you're more than happy to share regardless. There's a lot due to the ample downtime on the quest, and he has to squint so he can properly scan the many sketches on the human sized paper. He happily recognizes friends, locales about the ship, even earth things he knows about... but he's not ready when he finds a picture of himself.

·While he remains outwardly playful, teasing you with how he'd pose if you only asked, he's internally flattered that you took the time to draw him. More specifically, he's touched by the way you drew him. The sketches and portraits portray him as a calm but amicable leader, standing tall and serving as a guide to those around him, a true "father to his men" kind of bot... it's everything he wants to be, but is quite certain he's not. He's barely able to keep up his smooth persona when he asks about your process.

·You explain that you find inspiration in everything, but he's been your chosen subject lately for a lot of reasons. It's no secret he's handsome, but you see something more when you look at him, and you did everything you could to show it here; there's a real leader in him. Maybe some bots don't see it under all the bluster and sarcasm, but you see how much he cares for every bot on his crew. He wants to be the best for all of them, and even if he struggles at times, that effort is beautiful to you.

·It takes everything in him to bite back some very embarrassing tears, and the crack in his voice doesn't help him hide the emotion, though he covers that up with unconvincing coughs and claims something got in his optic. From then on he seems to stand a little taller and find his assigned duties a little easier to bear, but you absolutely notice how he poses in what he believes to be heroic fashion whenever your sketchbook comes out. Inspired by his enthusiasm, you invite him to model more officially, and the crew is just happy to see him so enthusiastic.

Minimus

·Being as observant as he is, your consistent appraisal of your surroundings is not something he'd ever miss, but your frequent sketching in the most random places does leave him absolutely mystified. Every time he sees you there's artistic supplies on your person, but he can't find anything that appears to be worthy of putting to paper, so what could you be drawing? He respects your privacy too much, and feels too silly about his curiosity, to interpret and ask you for an explanation.

·Thus it's with some small eagerness that he finds one of your sketchbooks after it's been misplaced, and he sees the perfect opportunity to slip in a question. For the sake of handling something so tiny, he approaches without his armor, offering the lost item back with barely concealed pride at your delight to have it returned. In the moment of truth he nearly falters, but does indeed manage to ask what you draw around the ship. He leaves out the fact that he's observed you whenever you draw in his presence.

·The question has an answer only he seems to think isn't obvious; him! You spend time together frequently, and while everything is fair game for sketching, he's a very regular subject for you. Whether he's wearing the Magnus armor or not, you explain that the commanding aura he radiates is something you can't help but find beautiful. That word choice baffles him enough that he has to interrupt; beautiful? Commanding? Even without his armor?? You're delighted to assure him that you absolutely mean that.

·Hearing you describe the details of your reasoning, like the quiet dignity of his stance or the calm intelligence of his red optics, touches his spark in ways he wasn't expecting. He's calm and speaks softly as he keeps the conversation going, asking questions about your various works and listening attentively when you answer, processing your view of the universe as being packed with beauty in all the places people don't think to look.

·Any bot that sees him during the remainder of the day absolutely notices the change to his entire demeanor; namely that he's smiling a soft and barely perceptible smile. It's not long after he requests a few sketches from you to keep in his office, whether they're of him or not, and he has them framed in places of honor. He doesn't tell you, but you figure it out, that one particular drawing of him you gift for his sake is kept securely stored in a compartment by his spark.

Swerve

·Many bots may see him being a tad bit on the shallow side when it comes to the arts, but our beloved barkeep has his own unique appreciation for creativity and all the ways it can be visually expressed, and you recognize it not long after meeting him. As his bar is a frequent hangout for everyone, you find it to be a fantastic place to sit and sketch, as the variety of bots makes it quite easy to have your choice of subjects even if you have to sit on a table. Obviously Swerve notices and asks you what you're drawing when traffic slows one evening.

·You're happy to show him your work and he's always eager to hear what everyone is up to, so he starts asking questions about your art in general. How long have you been an artist? What's it like suddenly having a whole ship of aliens to sketch? Why draw here all the time? At that query you light up brilliantly, and he's delighted by your enthusiasm as you describe all the incredible sights the bar has to offer.

·You list some of your favorite things to draw, like the many friend groups on the ship that gather here, the brilliant colors of the glowing vats of enjex, and him smiling and rushing with orders through it all. That last one gets a flash of surprise from behind his visor, which is quickly overtaken by exuberant delight; you've been drawing him?! He babbles out a surge of confusing statements that you're eventually able to interpret as a request to see, just one he's too bashful to say directly.

·Happily obliging, you're touched by how he smiles at every little sketch, and feel compelled to explain that he's a big part of why you love drawing here. You try to see beauty in everything, even what often gets overlooked, and there's so very much of that here. The bar is one of those places that everyone knows is special, but you know he's the reason they love it like they do, and that his enthusiasm and hard work hold it all together. You find that inspiring, and actually quite beautiful. It doesn't hurt that his brilliant smile is always a treat to sketch.

·Trying to play it cool and totally failing, he doesn't quite hide that he's near to tears when he asks if you'd like to hang some of your work up in the bar, or maybe have a little corner for yourself to draw from. He just doesn't want you getting squished while you sketch, is all! And having a better vantage point is ideal for someone so small! When you accept, he gives you your own human sized accommodations not too far from the heart of the bar, and every so often when you sketch he'll glance up at you absolutely beaming.

#transformers #more than meets the eye #mtmte #idw #lost light #maccadam #tf #rung #megatron #minimus ambus #rodimus #swerve #self insert #human reader #requests #anon #my writing #transformers headcanon #my asks

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thestrangeprophet-blog · 4 years ago

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The Muse and the Soldier

· f/reader x Levi Ackerman

· No NSFW

· HC storyline

· I do not own the rights to any of the characters

· PLS support the actual Attack on Titan anime

You open your eyes and take pleasure in the feel of the morning breeze coming from the window. Breathing in the air which carried the aroma of those special blue flowers potted downstairs in front of your tea shop. Seems you have left all your pencils across the desk and the drawings plastered to the walls from the night before had fallen again. You pick up the drawings and admire the one yet to be finished. It is of a regular customer you normally see when they come back from a scouting mission. Piercing grey eyes in contrast to his fancy dark undercut. Levi Ackerman. You always wonder how he has the time and will to keep up with his hair. After laying his portrait neatly on your desk, you ready yourself for another day brewing the finest tea you can in hopes of seeing Levi for another bout of his favorite tea.

The Captain and Commander Erwin were frequent visitors to your tea shop because Levi had always recommended it. For one reason or another, the tea you brewed satisfied him beyond what he would brew himself with what he had. Erwin had thought the same as well and it brought you enjoy your tea could be held to such standards. As a fellow tea lover, the subject of tea was never a boring conversation with Levi, no matter how short or blunt it was with him. Sure, most people see it as something more along the lines of hot leaf juice. It’s more than that and Levi understood it though it went unspoken.

Captain Levi came alone today and took his usual seat. It was rather unusual but you carry on and bring his favorite. The teapot whistles and steams like Titan smoke with the lingering scent of black tea that trails through the wind. As you set his cup in front of him and pour his tea, you notice he seems lost further in thought than normal. You finish pouring his tea and hesitantly ask if there is anything else you can do for him. He takes a second to come back to this moment and raises his head ever so slightly. His hair still covering those captivating grey eyes. Releasing an exhausted breath, he asks of one thing of you.

Levi: I- If it’s no trouble to you… will you sit with me Y/N? Even just for a moment?

Y/N: That’s a bit of an odd request, Captain. I’m surprised you even remembered my name. But sure! Anything for my best customer.

Levi: You don’t have to address me as Captain. J-just Levi will do… and thank you.

You sit in the chair across from Levi where Erwin is normally seated discussing the next expedition and plans you have for Eren and the cadets of the 104th Cadet Corps. As of in this moment, this is simply two human beings sitting together enjoying tea. Just sounds of the breeze against your ears and the softened sips coming from across the table at the lips of the man before you. Levi’s cheeks are flushed with a gorgeous rosy blush. It seems he wants to start a conversation but has no idea where to start. Its adorable how a man with a reputation for being such stone cold badass could be flustered over tea. You strike a smile in his direction and find your own way to start a conversation he could initiate. Call it encouragement if you will. The sketchpad and pencil you keep handy finally get put to use. The pencil scratching against the paper caught Levi’s attention though he kept to his tea. He watched as he appeared on the paper before him in awe.

Levi: Hey Y/N, is that supposed to be me?

Y/N: Oh, uh yeah haha! I figured you weren’t much in the mood to talk so I didn’t want to bother you while you were enjoying your tea.

Levi: You are a woman of many talents I see.

Y/N: I wouldn’t say that much.

Levi: N-nonsense. I come here to enjoy the tea you brew perfectly and the singing you think I can’t hear. Didn’t know you were so skilled with a pencil as well.

Y/N: I usually never have the time to draw during the day Levi.

Levi: Can I request something? I’ll pay for it.

Y/N: No need to pay me. What can I do for you?

Levi: I need you to draw someone for me. I don’t really know them too well, but they have a face I could never forget.

Y/N: Oh I wonder who this special person is! Could you describe them for me?

Levi: Well, they’re around the same height as me maybe a bit taller. They have long black curly hair that glistened as though it was a fire at sunset. Brown eyes like fresh honey in the morning and glistened with a hopeful shine I envy. They wear some rather dark clothing year round even when its hot outside. Their nose is slightly hooked and cheeks soft and red. Their lips glistened and they look soft to the touch. And even though they don’t think it looks very nice, they have a scar across their left eyebrow. I’m not exactly sure how they got, but they always try to cover it behind their hair yet it still finds a way to see the light. Their jawline is soft and looks like it could rest perfectly in the cups of your hands.

Y/N: Wow Levi, I didn’t realize you had a way with words.

As the form you forge is refined from guidelines to distinctive features, the person he is describing truly is a sight to behold. You may not have the colors to use but you understand the value of what those colors are which are just as powerful. Levi sits across from you amazed at your skill for a second time until you’ve finished your work. You hand him the final sketch and you already know he just asked you to draw yourself but play it off. He takes the drawing into his hand and holds it up so you and the drawing are in view with each other.

Levi: As beautiful on paper as you are in person. Tsk, your hands are even a work of art on their own.

Y/N: If I may say I’m rather flattered you’d ask me to draw myself just for you but you aren’t very good at making your flirtations subtle. Unless you weren’t trying to be subtle in the first place.

Levi: Oi its not my fault you decided to pull a journal out of nowhere while we’re drinking tea together!

Y/N: You are one hundred percent correct Levi. Really for a man who exudes such confidence, I’ve never seen you even stutter let alone get flustered over tea. Its cute.

Levi blushes even more and looks away trying to play it off. He already knows you’ve got at least one finger wrapped around him. No one really talks to him like that besides this Hange person he mentions. They sound like an interesting character from the way he describes them. You would love to meet them one day when they aren’t experimenting on Titans. For now, your gaze remains fixed on Levi’s profile as he tries to regain his composure. You would not have assumed he was even interested in such trivial things other than being a clean freak.

You are aware of Levi’s reputation but just getting to sit with him in such an intimate setting gives you a next level view of him. The clean undercut and soft flowing hair was just asking to have someone’s fingers run through it and embrace the feeling of each strand even if it meant making his hair just a little messy. Each group of strands followed the path of the wind as leaves blew from the vines. His jawline was as sharp as the blades he carried to cut down titans like butter. His hands, though they bore the weight his fallen comrades and the destined purpose to eliminate and survive, seemed delicate under the rough calluses of combat. But his eyes. Those damn grey eyes. They pierced right through me whenever you got the chance to see them yourself. All of the things they saw, and the feelings kept behind them like a locked door. There is so much pain rage behind those you wonder when the last time Levi got to see something outside the realm of horror outside and within the walls.

Y/N: Levi?

Levi: Yeah Y/N?

Y/N: When was the last time you’ve ever had a chance to relax and just lay low for awhile?

Levi: Can’t say. I don’t think I’ve given myself a damn break but I can’t afford to. I don’t exactly have anything else to do.

Y/N: Hmmm. Let’s change that. Make sure you make yourself available tomorrow at sundown. Come back to the shop and dress casual. I know somewhere we can go. I’ll even grab an extra book so you can out those hands to work other than killing Titans and jotting down whatever it is you do write for your paperwork.

Levi: B-but I c-can’t just abandon my po-

Y/N: Shush. In case you haven’t noticed you don’t have any missions scheduled for at least another week. Plus business around here is slow. We could both use a little time for ourselves. Even if its just a moment.

Levi: *blushing even more* uh- ok. I guess it wouldn’t hurt. You didn’t have to act like such a brat about it.

Y/N: If you weren’t Levi I would throw this lukewarm teapot of tea all over you

Levi: *Smiling ever so slightly* hmp I uh… I guess I could see you doing something like that. Okay, I’ll be back tomorrow to pick you up. I’m curious as to where this place is anyway.

Y/N: Alrighty then it’s a date! No ifs ands or buts. You got that Levi?

Levi: Loud and clear.

You’re leaning over the table to make sure Levi knows where he needs to be. You’re close enough to him you can smell the scent of the tea you made him mixed with just the scent of him. You’d kiss him right then and there if you really wanted to. Looks like he had the same idea but you pull away because you weren’t in that much of a rush. His lips were parted as they awaited your lips to meet his. It was thrilling seeing him even a little desperate for you but making him wait was even better. As much as Levi felt he couldn’t abandon his post, he couldn’t say no to you. He’d been working up the courage to talk to you for as long as he has been coming to your shop. Though he wasn’t the one to ask, Levi appreciated that you were the one to take the lead in making plans to accompany each other on a date. You’d been waiting for the opportunity to even be in this position. Now that it’s here, you make plans to make the date an enjoyable one that Levi would also like. Good first impressions are still pretty important. Especially if you want to make a good impression for Levi.

Levi: Tsk, its almost sundown. Id better get back to the brats at HQ.

You grab his hands and ask him to wait just a little while longer.

Y/N: Well if you’re going to be leaving, at least let me give you some extra tea and a meal to take back with you. It’s the least I can do for agreeing to going on a date with me on such short notice.

Levi: Tsk make it quick please.

Y/N: Don’t rush me. I’m being nice to you. I usually don’t just give out free tea and meals to anyone you know.

Levi: I’m sorry. Thank you. I- I uh really appreciate your generosity.

You hand Levi the tea and meal you made just for him. You touch hands for a moment and get goosebumps for the first time in a long time. You blush just enough that Levi notices as well and gives a small smirk. You exchange that smirk with one of your own.

Levi: Thank you again Y/N. I guess I’ll see you soon.

Y/N: You guess?

Levi: I will see you soon.

Y/N: Much better. And by the way, you have a very charming smile. I wish I could see it more often. It suits you almost as much as that cold gaze you’ve always got equipped.

Levi: I never really gave it much thought what that looked like. I’ll pick you tomorrow. I promise.

Y/N: You’d better if you know what’s good for ya hahaha! I’ll see you tomorrow, Captain.

END

Comment if you’d like a Pt. 2!

#levi ackerman x reader #aot #aot headcanons #attack on titan #levi #aot x y/n #levi headcanons #levi fluff #aot imagines #attack on titan x reader #aot x reader #levi hc #levi ackerman headcanons #levi fanfiction

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doshmanziari · 4 years ago

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Architectural Criticism in 2021/2022 || Part 1.5

Before writing a fuller continuation of my previous essay on architectural criticism, I’m inserting a mini-essay that focuses on a particular piece of criticism. Let me be clear: I don’t see Kate Wagner, the person behind @mcmansionhell, as an enemy; I’m just using one of her articles as an example because I had, in my essay, already linked two articles of hers (more accurately, one article and an image from another), and I’d rather elaborate on what I mean when I write “...a vapid buildup to a politically convenient takeaway” than bring in an entirely different item. Wagner, in my view, represents a sort of destabilizing criticism that takes pleasure in tackling “dry” subject matter with breathless, Meme-heavy sarcasm. I find the tone off-putting, but I appreciate it as one attempt to invigorate and broaden the audiences of architectural appraisal. My issue is that by now the joke has overestimated its capacity for judgmental clarity. Really anything can be made fun of if you’re determined enough, and the more of an unquestioning audience you have the easier it is to believe everything you say is true or coherent.

The image was from this 2018 Vox article: “Betsy DeVos’ summer home deserves a special place in McMansion Hell” (a title likely devised by the editor; given the other residences Wagner has lambasted, I would be surprised if she truly believes this is among the worst). My observations won’t make sense unless anyone who is reading this reads her article as well, so please do that if you’d like to follow along. It should take only a couple of minutes.

What I’d first draw readers’ attention to is that Wagner spends the first four paragraphs on the United States’ beyond-vast inequality of wealth. Two of these paragraphs are the article’s largest, and the article is twelve-paragraphs-long, meaning that 1/3 of it is devoted to establishing a socio-economic context -- at least, that is the pretense. Once Wagner writes “...getting paid to make fun of DeVos’s tacky seaside decor is one of few ways to both feed myself and make myself feel better”, it is clear that her personal intent is a kind of vengeful mocking, and that her intent for readers is to prime them to associatively, knee-jerkingly despise anything which could come next with flat-affect “lmao”s. It’s hardly irrelevant to mention economic realities when examining luxury items (and what else is a mansion?), but Wagner’s subsequent analysis is not really architectural or even artistic: it is rather about looking at several photographs of a building, knowing who lives there and hating that person (and also imagining that they were responsible for all design decisions), and then mocking this-and-that in whatever ways one can devise. These grievances are understandable, but understandable grievances do not automatically lead to perceptive criticism.

Please look (perhaps again) at the first image. Note that only four, maybe, of the fourteen details Wagner chooses to focus on -- “no wry comment needed”, “these look like playdoh stamps”, “when you love consistency”, and “oh my god is this a shutter” -- approach anything vaguely resembling coherent criticism; and the other four images fare even worse (with the exception of the highlighting of an apparently absurd interior balcony). The rest are inane attempts at saying anything at all. Writing “hell portal” by an upper porch area may be funny for a moment, but what does it actually express? Well, nothing, except the author’s own irritation which will find whatever it can to announce its contemptuous sarcasm. Wagner’s captions will land only to the degree that the reader is humorously sympathetic.

The aforementioned remarks, excepting the one about the embedded chubby Tuscan columns’ Play-Doh-likeness, suggest that the worst thing a building can do is be formally heterogeneous. The implicative corollary here is that good architecture is eminently justifiable in all of its parts -- consistent, unified, rational. This is as fine a personal belief as anything else, but when it is wielded as dogma against architecture which has no interest in being a Petit Trianon it can only reveal its intellectual self-limitations. Wagner writes that “there is a difference between architectural complexity and a mess”, yet what that difference may be is hand-waved away. We just have to believe that thirteen different windows styles is too much. What’s the threshold? Does it depend on the size of the building? The types of styles used? Who knows.

Now of course bad architecture exists, and sometimes the failure indeed points to deficient editorial acumen; for architecture, like any other art, is as much about what’s included as what’s excluded. But in saying so little about the shingle style itself, Wagner seems to have given no thought to readers concluding that all shingle style houses are freakish -- more specifically, concluding that this freakishness is a damning transgression, and that no self-respecting, punching-up class-warrior would ever be caught dead sincerely enjoying their geometric, “exquisite corpse” escapades. In fact, the freakish tendencies of shingle style houses are just what make them such great fun to see, visit, or reside in. Wagner’s article, as far as I can tell, omits this possibility. When she writes, “Betsy likely went with this style because it is very popular in New England and in coastal enclaves of the rich and famous in general”, one is being pushed to presume that the only probable reason the shingle style exists or could be preferred over another style is to signal élite solidarity.

The photograph right above is of Kragsyde, a Massachusetts shingle style mansion, designed by the US-Northeast-oriented firm of Peabody & Stearns, completed in the 1880s. It was demolished almost a century ago, but the few exterior images of it which remain are, I think, fascinating -- maybe most of all for its enormous archway, possibly a porte-cochère, which has a thin, overextending keystone bizarrely driven into the top like a nail puncturing a petrified rainbow. I bring the building up because Wagner gives us no reason to consider why Kragsyde may have been a genuine architectonic accomplishment and not merely an oversized farce of contiguous pretensions. To the layperson hot off of the Vox piece, there may be no artistic difference between it and DeVos’ place, except that perhaps Kragsyde has a more consistent fenestrative application (would that make it better? if so, why?).

I appreciate that only so much can be said when you’re limited to less than a thousand words, especially when the issue is “complicated” (as the byline for Vox’s First-person series advertises). But the problem I keep coming back to is how DeVos’ mansion is treated as a stand-in for DeVos herself. This makes any architectural critique, no matter how pressed it is for size, flimsily presentist: its durability starts and ends with how alive the architecture’s resident(s) and political presence are. On some emotional level, this is pretty sensible: if we despise monarchical institution, we can find a sort of loophole to enjoying Versailles palace on the basis of it no longer being the residence of royalty. Our awe over its decadence and scope is intersectionally “admissible” on the basis of its having become a UNESCO World Heritage site. Similarly, one can imagine DeVos’ mansion being appreciated in a hundred years (should it still exist then) because the passage of time will have rendered DeVos’ person a historical fact, and perhaps more separable, and then tolerable, in that regard -- even if the building remains private.

But if architecture is, as a craft, critically whittled down to nothing more or less than inorganic expressions of social disparities, with every aesthetic decision a reflection of politically explicable taste, then we must assume that a great deal of the world’s most remarkable architecture is equally ridiculous and despicable, since so much of it was born out of great privilege and required specialized resources. I doubt Wagner actually believes this, because it would betray the entire premise of her McMansion Hell project, which is to demonstrate how so many modern day mansions are deeply unpleasant mounds of visual illiteracy, and cannot hold even a stump of a candle to the luminously learned and eclectic talents of prior great architects such as Mackintosh, Norman Shaw, Lutyens, or Ledoux. So what’s the takeaway here? As far as I can tell, it’s simply that if you hate Betsy DeVos, and if you care about class, you should hate her house too. And I do not think that that is architectural criticism.

#Architecture #architectural criticism #mcmansion #shingle style

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vampiresuns · 4 years ago

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Fine Arts and Equally Fine People

1,845 words. In which Cadenza and Dante decide to have a little competition to woo Amparo Cassano, but Dante’s attention is taken away by someone else. Anatole flexes his language abilities for someone, and Milenko runs after a certain Countess.

Cadenza and Dante belong to @arcanecadenza.

Dante and Cadenza looked at the poster announcing the play they came to see in Vesuvia’s Community Theatre. A painted poster depicting a scene with the characters of the Operetta, announcing “La Cassano'' as the main character above the name of the play.

“That’s her,” Dante said, Cadenza still silently looking at the poster, her eyes tracing the lines of Amparo’s smile.

“It is. Let’s get in.”

The siblings got inside, showing the tickets they had already purchased, in the standing Yard. Cadenza would’ve preferred to be sitting in one of the galleries, but they had been told by the cast of the play (and Amparo herself) that many of the acts and intermissions were interactive, so a Yard position might be more fun, if they desired to experience the play in full. Besides, the play had already been going for some time, so it wouldn’t be as packed as it was during the first weeks of it.

“Did you bring her anything?” Dante asked as they handed their coats in the coat check. “I wasn’t really sure of what the exact Vesuvian custom is, and then I thought everyone must bring her flowers, then I didn’t know who to ask and books were not very illustrative on the matter—”

“So?”

“So I brought her a self-refilling pen. Actors need to mark scripts all the time, don’t they?”

Cadenza hummed as she gave a coin to an usher in exchange for a program for the play. “I brought her tea. Asra said she always asked him to brew her some tea when she was over?”

Dante gave her a betrayed look.

“What? He’s a friend of hers.”

“That’s cheating.”

“I would’ve brought her tea anyway.”

“That’s still cheating.”

Cadenza decided to focus on the program, which explained the basic argument of the play, had a list of the dramatis personae and the name of whom they were played by, as well as other tidbits here and there. It was useful to take her away from her nerves. Cadenza didn’t exactly know what she was doing, even if she was confident enough in herself. It felt almost like a date without being a date (and with her brother there), not to mention gift-giving had never been her forte. She had been too busy to compose something for Amparo, but she had wanted to. Maybe she would be able to later.

She hoped she was. She had been beautiful and so sure of herself in her flowing dress; her lips were defined and always curving up slightly, her hands soft as they had brushed with Cadenza’s, telling her how she wished she could make it to the play, not just for herself but for the play’s sake.

“But I do hope I’m reason enough,” she had added, clearly flirting. Cadenza had told her she would be better company than her brother in a streak of competitiveness, making Amparo laugh.

Cadenza found herself playing with the corners of the program, dog earring them; she frowned at it and offered it to her brother.

Her brother didn’t respond.

“Dante? Dante. Dante.” She rolled her eyes, leaning her shoulder against her brother’s.

“Uh? Oh, I wasn’t looking.”

A blush began to bloom on Dante’s cheeks, Cadenza giving him a funny look as he began fidgeting, throwing one last glance in the general direction he had been looking, before taking the program out of Cadenza’s hands. Cadenza followed the direction of her brother’s gaze and finally saw him, recognition dawning on her. He was as blond as ever, animatedly talking to a man with dark, bronze brown curls, dressed in black.

She couldn’t help but to give a curious look to her brother. “I didn’t know you knew Anatole.”

“You know him too?”

“Dante, I’m pretty sure half of Vesuvia knows who he is, but yes, we have tea together sometimes. Well, I have tea, I’ve only ever seen him drink coffee. He’s a friend.” She paused, in the background the orchestra still played. “Where do you know him from?”

“The palace library,” the program was now completely forgotten in Dante’s hands. “I run into him from time to time, but we never visit the same sections. We talk sometimes, he’s, hm, very charming.”

The play began not very long after, the siblings dropping the subject altogether, even if Dante still seemed to steal looks towards the box Anatole was sitting in. The play was everything it promised to be and more: Amparo had been right, standing on the yard was never tedious, tiring. Something was always happening that took your attention away from standing on your feet — an actor would run through, someone would begin in an Aria in the middle of the crowd, leaving you to wonder when they got there.

Amparo herself was stunning. Her voice was clear and melodic, capable of softness and drama; when she danced, the stage moved with her, the lights dancing to her lead. She transformed on stage, and Cadenza felt herself be transformed with it.

The crowd clapped, the siblings joining the ovation, and eventually the theatre began being evacuated. The siblings did as Amparo had told them too: they went backstage, announcing themselves. One of the lyricists of the Opera volunteered to go let Amparo know, and as soon as she cleared them, the lyricist came back to guide them through the hecticness which was the backstage of Vesuvia’s community theatre, asking them their opinion on the play.

“We don’t really have private changing rooms but this is La Cassano, she’s too delightful not to let her get away with a little of this. Not that I need to tell you two, hm?” She said, cheeky.

Amparo emerged from beyond a curtain. “Zinovia, don’t torment my guests! Only I can do that.” As a hello she winked to the siblings, holding the curtain open for them to come in. “I’m so glad you too could make it! Please, make yourself comfortable.”

The changing room, which was really just a space separated by dividers and colourful curtains, was not very personalised. Zinovia had been right when she said this wasn’t Amparo’s own changing room and in fact had space for more people. It was still cozy, if a little messy, with puffs to sit as well as a patched up armchair.

Amparo sat in the chair of one of the vanities in the room, wearing a well loved, dark blue robe.

“I do have my own changing room in the other theatre, so I hope you’re not put off by people announcing themselves in and out. If you’d prefer more privacy, we could always grab drinks afterward, I think I know just the place.”

With the mention of drinks, Cadenza mentioned the tea, saying it was inside the pockets of her coat. Amparo, lightly touching her arm, told her not to worry, she could send someone to retrieve the coats. “It’s nothing, I promise.”

Before she could do anything, a voice came from beyond the robe. It was Anatole’s. “Are you decent and are you available, Lele?”

Amparo snorted. “I’m not decent, but I’m wearing clothes, if that’s what you’re wondering.” She opened the curtain with one swift motion. “And almost always available for you two. Cadenza, Dante, these are Anatole and Milenko — my cousins.”

“Oh, I do know both of you,” Anatole added with a smile.

“I don’t!” Milenko said cheerily. “Hi!”

While Milenko gave Amparo a quick kiss on her temple, congratulating her for the performance, Anatole gave Cadenza a friendly wave, but, to the latter’s amusement, focused on her brother. “Non sapevo che fosse tuo fratello, Cadenza. Dante, è un piacere, come sempre,” he took Dante’s hand to bring his knuckles to his lips. “I also didn’t know you two liked Opera, what a delightful coincidence. Amparo, Lenko, should we all go to get something to drink afterwards.”

Milenko had his head poking outside of the curtains, and was yelling a thank you back at someone. “I have to run.”

Anatole raised his eyebrows at him. Amparo gave him a quizzical, yet amused look “Because...?” She said.

“Apparently the Countess was discreetly watching the play with one of her sisters, and they’re leaving, so I have to go like, right now, I’m going, I’m gone.”

Amparo’s and Anatole’s attention was taken away from the Alighieri siblings, as they encouraged Milenko and wished him luck, telling him to run fast and to go already, watching him get through the backstage crowd as he turned to yell back at his cousins that Nadia was what beauty itself should look like. Amparo laughed, and Anatole rolled his eyes.

“So,” Cadenza began, sitting on the armchair and straightening the nonexisting wrinkles in her dress, “you talk sometimes.”

“We’ve only talked, Cadenza.”

“I win then?”

Dante paused. He looked at his sister, then at Anatole, who was talking about something he couldn’t make out with Amparo. “Okay, fine you win.”

“I did say she would find I’m better company.”

Dante didn’t have a chance to argue, because Amparo and Anatole had their attention back on them, asking them if they would like to go for drinks with them afterwards. Neither Cadenza nor Dante found a reason to complain.

Soon enough their coats were retrieved. Dante took out the self-refilling pen, but Amparo politely declined. “I do mark up my scripts all the time, but I am sure Anatole will find that a little more useful. He collects quills after all.”

“You do?”

“I do,” his smile was inviting, bright, his eyes curious, looking between Dante’s face and his hands.

“Take it then, it’s yours.”

With Dante’s attention otherwise occupied, Amparo took her chance to sit closer to Cadenza. She played with her own hair, taking it to the side so it fell over her shoulder.

“Thank you,” she said, leaning forward, resting her chin on her hand, her arm propped over her knee. “The tea smells fantastic. Did you enjoy the play?”

“Very much, your singing is stunning.”

Amparo smiled, her playful intensity folding over and away, a quiet kind coming in its replacement as her dark, green eyes scanned Cadenza’s face. “Thank you,” her tongue poked out between her lips when she said ‘thanks’. “I like it very much that you could come. Let me finish changing, and we’ll be on our way, is that alright?”

“Alright.”

“Alright,” Amparo repeated as she stood up, a smile reserved only for Cadenza on her face.

In the background, the sounds of the backstage crowd of technics, direction and actors blended with Dante’s impassioned conversation with Anatole about the principles of transmutation. Cadenza was sure she had heard Anatole say before that alchemy is nothing he is very versed at, yet he seemed to be holding the conversation just fine. Perhaps she’d ask the next time she saw him, perhaps she’d forget to. Right now, following Amparo as she got behind a divider to get dressed and talk about the play and the rest of their night with her seemed like a much better prospect.

#the arcana #the arcana oc #my writing #aelius anatole #amparo cassano #milenko #dante #cadenza #sabina's ocs #dantelius #camparo

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passionate-reply · 4 years ago

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This week on Great Albums: Soft Cell’s 1981 debut, Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret! The first great gay synth-pop album, and the one that walked so that acts like Bronski Beat, Erasure, and the Pet Shop Boys could run. Yeah, “Tainted Love” is cool, but have you ever heard “Sex Dwarf”? Full transcript after the break!

Welcome to Passionate Reply, and welcome to Great Albums! Today’s video tackles Soft Cell’s 1981 debut, Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret. While “Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret” is not necessarily a household name, this album did produce one track that I can just about guarantee that you’ve already heard, assuming you have any familiarity with Western popular music.

Music: “Tainted Love”

“Tainted Love” is one of those classics that’s almost too big for its own good, with an enormous shadow in popular culture. Few compositions from the 1980s, from the general arena of synth-pop, or, indeed, in the popular music canon, have quite as much of a legacy. As an introduction to the significance of Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret, it’s not an awful start, but it does have a bit of an “obvious single choice” feel--not only for that huge hook, but also for how tame, even quaint, it starts to feel compared to the other stuff here. “Tainted Love” is a gay song, sure, but it’s only expressing that idea in an abstract manner--it is a cover, after all. What the remainder of the album lacks in “DUN DUN,” it makes up for in frankness and remarkably candid handling of sexuality, which still manages to be a bit shocking, even as this album reaches its 40th birthday. Could anyone but Soft Cell’s Marc Almond really have sold us the raw, lurid raunchiness of “Sex Dwarf”?

Music: “Sex Dwarf”

Beyond the outrageously explicit nature of “Sex Dwarf,” its most noteworthy characteristic is just how playfully, cartoonishly devilish it is. I’ve always read it as a work in the grand tradition of the queer community reclaiming the trope of the camp gay villain, seen so often in popular media. In its purest form, this gay villain archetype is the ultimate expression of chaos and disorder--their rejection of social norms of gender and sexuality and their threat to the status quo go hand in hand. While it’s reprehensible to simply equate queerness with evil, there’s a long tradition of reclaiming that same imagery, turning the lavish power of such transgressor figures into a badge of strength, and that’s how I tend to interpret “Sex Dwarf.” That said, for as much as tracks like these seem to almost force a specifically gay reading of the album, it also seems interested in themes of sexuality and sin, more broadly. Take the track “Seedy Films,” for example, a more playful number full of slinky clarinet, teasing rattles, and breathy, almost gasping female backing vocals, seemingly suggestive of a more heterosexual vantage point.

Music: “Seedy Films”

I like to think of each track on Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret as coming to us from the perspective of a different anti-hero, each as unreliable and capricious as the last. Another key track that complicates issues of perspective and identity is the album’s tense opener, “Frustration.” “Frustration” delivers on its title musically, with a stubborn refusal to ever resolve its constant melodic tension at any point during its runtime, making it legitimately fatiguing and stressful to listen to. Its lyrics might be interpreted as a critique of the boredom lurking behind mainstream society’s “ideal” life of suburban safety, and a send-up of the alleged appeal of fitting in and being normal. But we could interpret it equally well, as a song that’s less about being “straight” in the sense of “square,” and more about being heterosexual--perhaps as the lament of a closeted gay man, tormented by an incommunicable internal struggle, despite all the material comforts in the world.

Music: “Frustration”

Either way, “Frustration” can be compared to “Secret Life” on the flip side, which focuses on the idea of a divide between one’s external facade of a respectable and ordinary existence, and the darkness of one’s internal, deviant, carnal desires.

Music: “Secret Life”

Whether their narrators are parsed as gay or straight, their songs are certainly tense tales of repression and release. And they’re also mediated by the idea of being trapped in a tame, and particularly middle-aged existence. The clearest expression of the theme of getting older, and possibly more and more constrained by the need to put on airs of respectability, is, naturally, “Youth”:

Music: “Youth”

The stale, conservative lifestyles of the middle-aged certainly don’t seem like the most natural subject matter for a debut album by a pair of twenty-somethings, but I like to interpret this fixation as a bit of a memento mori. The urgency of enjoying life’s pleasures, now, is checked by the fear of a future in which that window of opportunity is closing. As I said earlier, all of these tracks are narrated by some character or construct, and in that sense, the real identities of Marc Almond and David Ball matter fairly little. In the world of Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret, nearly everything feels constructed or artificial--it’s all just an act, as much as “Secret Life”’s narrator puts on a respectable front. The superbly campy “Entertain Me,” which wouldn’t feel out of place in some cult musical, engages most clearly with the idea of performance, bringing in a giggling call-and-response choir and a chaotic clamour of percussion in its desperate attempt to, well, entertain us. Critically positioned at the top of the second side, it’s the perfect place for the album to second-guess itself as a work of art.

Music: “Entertain Me”

That track is certainly more “Rocky Horror Picture Show” than “Architecture & Morality,” isn’t it? While the synth-pop acts penetrating the mainstream before Soft Cell, like Gary Numan and OMD, had a bit of punk’s rough, low-budget, DIY ethos to them, Soft Cell were the first ones really crafting performative, self-aware post-disco synth-pop, that owed more to the swooning divahood of Donna Summer in “I Feel Love” than it did to the starched shirts and robo-rhythms of Kraftwerk. Much like disco, Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret is truly a production--dense, luxurious, tweaked to perfection in a studio, and featuring several traditional instruments that are uncommon in rock, such as “Frustration”’s saxophone and “Seedy Films”’s clarinet.

The most noticeable thing about the cover of the album is almost certainly its lurid blue and fuchsia lighting, gleaming harshly against Almond and Ball’s leather jackets. It immediately takes us to the sweaty, nocturnal, and of course, homoerotic world this music dwells in. The duo stare us down, with fairly cross or standoffish posturing, suitable for an album as in-your-face as this one. There’s a bit of a narrative hook here, with Almond either producing this mysterious, almost certainly illicit package, or perhaps tucking it away. Almond’s sunglasses are a small detail, but one that I think holds a lot of contextual significance. There’s a long history of erotic art aimed at the gay male audience utilizing devices like hat-brims and shades to create a “disrupted gaze”--a sort of lightly objectifying, or compartmentalizing, manner of sexualizing its subjects. I’d also be remiss if I didn’t mention Ball’s snakeskin necktie, which is another classically sexy touch. Note also the neon light motif used for the text, which contributes to that nightlife feel as strongly as anything else. With a name like “Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret,” it would’ve been truly sinful to write that out in anything besides this warping neon, and it’s the perfect title to accompany an album that’s as insistent and gleefully tawdry as they come.

Earlier, I had contrasted Soft Cell with other major players in synth-pop who came before them, and I think that context is vital to understanding why this album is so indispensably important. Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret is, quite simply, the first great gay synthesiser album. Growing up in America, the rock and roll heartland, it’s hard to escape the understanding that electronic music is inherently gay-coded. But that’s an impression you won’t get from that first generation of artists, who presented as unpretentiously butch, and were more interested in singing about factories, spaceships, and telephone lines than about sex or romance with anybody. The deep relationship between queer culture and the music synthesiser simply wouldn’t have blossomed the way it did without Soft Cell, and the unforgettable worldwide success they achieved with “Tainted Love.” Without that foot in the door, the rise of groups like Bronski Beat, Erasure, and the Pet Shop Boys later in the 80s would’ve been unthinkable. That alone makes Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret a piece of essential listening for anyone seeking to understand the history of electronic music.

While Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret remains Soft Cell’s great masterpiece, and they never reached the same heights of commercial success again, they went on to release two additional studio LPs before disbanding in the mid-1980s. Marc Almond went on to have a fairly successful career as a solo artist, bagging a few additional hit singles in the UK, and David Ball became half of the house duo The Grid. The pair did re-unite in 2002, to produce a rather serviceable LP called Cruelty Without Beauty, which explores many of the same themes of their earlier work, albeit through a lens of Information Age dread.

Music: “Caligula Syndrome”

In 2019, we were told to expect the true final report of Soft Cell, in the form of a grand farewell concert entitled “Say Hello, Wave Good-Bye”--a title pulled from one of the singles off Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret. But, for all of the hype, it looks like that really won’t be the end for them after all, as Soft Cell have announced yet another reunion in 2021, and another new studio album in the works. So we’ll have to see what else these two have in store!

Overall, my favourite track on Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret is the single “Bedsitter.” It’s all about questioning whether the life of hedonistic excess is really worth it in the end. It’s about those moments one spends between benders, binges, and flings, gripped by emptiness and self-doubt. Therefore, the presence of “Bedsitter” adds some nuance, and undercuts a lot of the easy, simple conclusions we’re tempted to make, from a surface-level reading of the album as a free-love bonanza. With languid and melancholy verses clashing with a disconcertingly anthemic refrain, it’s filled with tension from within, and despite its lack of external conflict, it comes across as one of the more unsettling tracks we have to choose from. That’s all for today. Thanks for listening!

Music: “Bedsitter”

#music #great albums #album review #album reviews #synth-pop #synth pop #synthpop #soft cell #marc almond

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anhed-nia · 4 years ago

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BLOGTOBER 10/7/2020

I missed THE GOLDEN GLOVE at Fantastic Fest last year. It was one of my only regrets of the whole experience, but it was basically mandatory since the available screenings were opposite the much-hyped PARASITE. As annoying as that sounds, it was actually a major compliment, since what could possibly serve as a consolation prize for the most hotly anticipated movie of the year? Needless to say, I heard great things, but I could never have imagined what it was actually like. I'm still wrapping my mind around it.

Between 1970 and 1975, an exceptionally depraved serial killer named Fritz Honka murdered at least four prostitutes in Hamburg's red light district. Today, we tend to think of the archetypal serial killer in terms of ironic contradictions: The public is attracted by Ted Bundy's dashing looks and suave manner, and John Wayne Gayce's dual careers as politician and party clown. Lacking anything so remarkable, we associate psychopathy with Norman Bates' boy-next-door charm, and repeat "It's always the quiet ones" with a smirk whenever a new Jeffrey Dahmer or Dennis Nilsen is exposed to the public. The popular conception of a bloodthirsty maniac is not the fairytale monster of yore, but a wolf in sheep's clothing, whose hygienic appearance and lifestyle belie his twisted desires. In our post-everything world, the ironic surprise has become the rule. In this light, THE GOLDEN GLOVE represents a refreshing return to naked truth.

To say that writer-director Fatih Akin's version of the Fritz Honka story is shocking, repulsive, and utterly degenerated would be a gross understatement. We first meet the killer frantically trying to dispose of a corpse in his filthy flat, wallpapered with porno pinups, strewn with broken toys, and virtually projecting smell lines off of the screen. One's sense of embodiment is oppressive, even claustrophobic, as the petite Honka tries and fails to collapse the full dead weight of a human corpse into a garbage bag, before giving up and dismembering it, with nearly equal difficulty. The scene is appalling, utterly debased, and yet nothing is as shocking as the killer's visage. When he finally turns to look into the camera, it's hard to believe he's even human: the rolling glass eye, the smashed and inflated nose, the tombstone teeth and cratered skin, are almost too extreme to bear. Actually, suffering from a touch of facial blindness, I had to stare intently at Honka's face for nearly half the movie before I could fully convince myself that I was, in fact, looking at an elaborate prosthetic operation used to transform 23 year old boy band candidate Jonas Dassler into the disfigured 35 year old serial murderer.

Though West Germany remained on a steady economic upturn beginning in the 1950s and throughout the 1970s, you wouldn't know it from THE GOLDEN GLOVE. If Honka's outsides match his insides, they are further matched by his stomping grounds in the Reeperbahn, a dirty, violent, booze-soaked repository for the dregs of humanity. Though its denizens may come from different walks of life, one thing is certain: Whoever winds up there, belongs there. Honka was the child of a communist and grew up in a concentration camp, yet he swills vodka side by side with an ex-SS officer, among other societal rejects, in a crumbling dive called The Golden Glove. The scene is an excellent source of hopeless prostitutes at the end of their career, who are Honka's prime victims, as he is too frightful-looking to ensnare an attractive young girl. These pitiful women all display a peculiarly hypnotic willingness to go along with Honka, no matter how sadistic he becomes; this seems to have less to do with money, which rarely comes up, and more to do with their shared awareness that for them, and for Honka too, it's been all over, for a long time.

Not to reduce someone’s performance to their physical appearance, but ???

To call Dassler's portrayal of Honka "sympathetic" would be a bridge too far, but it is undeniably compelling. He supports the startling impact of his facial prostheses with a performance of rare intensity, a full-body transformation into a person in so much pain that a normal life will never become an option. His physical vocabulary reminded me of the stage version of The Elephant Man, in which the lead actor wears no makeup, but conveys John Merrick's deformities using his body alone. Although there is an abundance of makeup in THE GOLDEN GLOVE, Dassler's silhouette and agonized movements would be recognizable from a mile away. In spite of his near-constant screaming rage, the actor manages to craft a rich and convincing persona. During a chapter in which Honka experiments with sobriety, we find a stunning image of him hunched in the corner of his ordinarily chaotic flat, now deathly still, his eyes gazing at nothing as cigarette smoke seeps from his pores, having no idea what to do with himself when he isn't in a rolling alcoholic rampage. The moment is brief but haunting in its contrast to the rest of the film, having everything to do with Dassler's quietly vibrating anxiety.

Performances are roundly excellent here, not that least of which are from Honka's victims. The cast of middle-aged actresses looking their most disastrous is hugely responsible for the film's impact. These are the kinds of performances people call "brave", which is a euphemism for making audiences uncomfortable with an uncompromising presentation of one's own self, unvarnished by any masturbatory solicitation. Among these women is Margarete Tiesel, herself no stranger to difficult cinema: She was the star of 2012's PARADISE: LOVE, a harrowing drama about a woman who copes with her midlife crisis by pursuing sex tourism in Kenya. Her brilliant, instinctive performance as one of Honka's only survivors--though she nearly meets a fate worse than death--makes her the leading lady of a movie that was never meant to have one.

So, what does all this unpleasantness add up to, you might be asking? It's hard to say. THE GOLDEN GLOVE is a film of enormous power, but it can be difficult to explain what the point of it is, in a world where most people feel that the purpose of art is to produce some form of pleasure. This is the challenge faced by difficult movies throughout history, like THE GOLDEN GLOVE's obvious ancestors, HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER, MANIAC and THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE. Describing unremitting cruelty with relentless realism is not considered a worthy endeavor by many, even if there is real artistry in your execution; some people will even mistake you for advocating and enjoying violence and despair, as we live in a world where huge amount of movie and TV production is devoted to aspirational subjects. (The fact that people won't turn away from the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, no matter how monotonous and condescending they become, should tell you something) How do you justify to such people, that you want to make or see work that portrays ugliness and evil with as much commitment as other movies seek to portray love, beauty, and family values? Why isn't it enough to say that these things exist, and their existence alone makes them worth contemplation?

A rare, perhaps exclusive “beautiful image” in THE GOLDEN GLOVE, from Fritz Honka’s absurd fantasies.

You may detect that I have attempted to have this frustrating conversation with many people, strangers, enemies, and friends I love and respect. I find that for some, it is simply too hard to divorce themselves from the pleasure principle. I don't say this to demean them; some hold the philosophy that art be reserved for beauty, and others have a more literary feeling that it's ok to show characters in grim circumstances, as long as the ultimate goal is to uplift the human spirit. Even I draw the line somewhere; I appreciate the punk rebellion of Troma movies as a cultural force, but I do not enjoy watching them, because I dislike what I perceive as contempt for the audience and the aestheticization of laziness--making something shitty more or less on purpose. A step or three up from that, you land in Todd Solondz territory, where you find materially gorgeous movies whose explicit statement is that our collective reverence for a quality called "humanity" is based on nothing. I like some of those movies, and sometimes I even like them when I don't like them, because I'm entranced by Solondz's technical proficiency...and maybe, deep down, I'm not completely convinced about "humanity", either. However, I don't fight very hard in arguments about him; I understand the objections. Still, I've been surprised by peers who I think of as bright and tasteful, who absolutely hated movies I thought were unassailable, like OLDBOY and WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN. In both cases, the ultimate objection was that they accuse humans of being pretentious and self-deceptive, aspiring to heroism or bemoaning their victimhood while wallowing in their own cowardice and perversity. Ok, I get it...but, not really. Why isn't it ever wholly acceptable to discuss, honestly, what we do not like about ourselves?

The beguiling thing about THE GOLDEN GLOVE is that, although it is instantly horrifying, is it also an impeccable production. The director can't help showing you crime scene photos during the ending credits, and I can't really blame him, when his crew worked so hard to bring us a vision of Fritz Honka's world that approaches virtual reality. But it isn't just slavishly realistic; it is vivid, immersive, an experience of total sensory overload. Not a square inch of this movie has been left to chance, and the product of all this graceful control is totally spellbinding. I started to think to myself that, when you've achieved this level of artifice, what really differentiates a movie like THE GOLDEN GLOVE from something like THE RED SHOES? I mean, aside from their obvious narrative differences. Both films plunge the viewer into a world that is complete beyond imagination, crafted with a rigor and sincerity that is rarely paralleled. And, I will dare to say, both films penetrate to the depths of the human soul. What Fatih Akin finds there is not the same as what Powell and Pressburger found, of course, but I don't think that makes it any less real. Akin's film is adapted from a novel by Heinz Strunk, and apparently, some critics have accused Akin of leaving behind the depth and nuance of the book, to focus instead on all that is gruesome about it. This may be true, on some level; I wouldn't know. For now, I can only insist that on watching THE GOLDEN GLOVE, for all its grotesquerie, I still got the message.

#blogtober #2020 #the golden glove #fatih akın #heinz stronk #jonas dassler #margarete tiesel #difficult cinema #horror #slasher #serial killer #period piece #adaptation #historical #biopic #fritz honka #i may have been watching a lot of powell and pressburger movies recently #sorry...

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gguktarts · 5 years ago

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decathect | jjk (1)

1. to withdraw one’s feelings of attachment from (a person, idea, or object), as in anticipation of a future loss

summary: if one thing was clear to you when you first met Jeon Jungkook, it was that he would never love you. at least, not the way you wanted him to.

pairing: jjk x reader genre: unrequited love au? || angst || little fluff if u Squint || drabble series word count: 2.7k parts: 1 / ? | next » cw: uhh kinda unhealthy depictions of a crush, & jk is a fuckboy w lots of tatts and long hair so that deserves a warning on its Own i say

note: so,,, this was supposed to be a short fic bc i wanted my heart broken but it turned into a drabble series……………….we’ll see how that goes!!! rip

You’ve heard of him from your friends, and from their friends: about the infamous Jeon Jungkook and the reputation that precedes him. He’s, first and foremost, an art major — and an excelling one at that. In the short three years he’s been an undergrad, his work has been featured, so far, in a total of 4 major art exhibitions. His displayed work apparently sells rather quickly, too, which surely earns him more than enough money to successfully continue his various artistic endeavors and out-of-uni activities. You’ve heard he’s also into tattoos, boxing, and photography on the side, for example. Whether it was true or not was not something you focused on, but considering his friends were they ones telling the tales, you didn’t doubt it. Not that you thought of it often, or at all, really.

What you did question was why exactly he felt the need to stop by Taehyung’s very own, very private, and very expensive Goghrik’s Vancrylics paint collection to use instead of his own. You didn’t want to think him as cheap because, quite frankly, you knew nothing more than those whispered rumors and offhanded comments Jimin and Yoongi perpetrated on occasion. So, you settled for thinking nothing until you could get concrete answers.

For a long time Jungkook remained a simple ghost, until finally one day he just existed. Everywhere, and then, always. As if meeting him once meant he’d open the door to your home to welcome himself as an indefinite guest, you suddenly had no week free of his presence or his trace. Like a growing avalanche you learned about him with repeated increase, sometimes by choice, and sometimes by mere coincidence. Maybe it was pure coincidence, too, how you came to fall for him — for Jeon Jungkook, the artist, the fuckboy. With time though, you came to a different understanding.

Liking Jungkook was no coincidence. It was a curse – a long, and tediously everlasting hex you’d so far failed to get rid of.

And it all started, you begrudgingly admit sometimes, with some paint and very little luck.

Being in one of the most prestigious Universities in the country naturally means you consistently face the demon of a huge – nay, an enormous campus. A wide lake rests between dispersed buildings while Hi-Q food marts border each cluster of separate dorms, connected all entirely by desire paths and concrete roads. It's no surprise then that a map is the standard gift given to all entrance students, though by now you’ve memorized practically all zones you inhabit (i.e. the Natural Sciences’ Atrium, the Physics Department, and your own dorm). Most people still use theirs, along with the mandatory transportation fare card Admissions urges all newcomers to get. More than anything it’s a must-have for anyone who wants to actually make it on time to class — more so when they’re not blessed with taking courses on a near-by group of Departments.

And it just so happened you’re amongst those ill-fated few.

For four years now you’ve been a resident of Dorm C, exactly the furthest of the dorms from the NS Atrium. Instead you’re — uselessly — at a walking distance from the Plastic Arts department, a place you’ve ventured to for only a single semester back in your second year. Back then you had decided that taking Pottery was a great way to fill in some of your electives, an idea which mostly Taehyung, an art major himself, cemented in your head. You remember nothing of your treks to the department, nor of the lessons you received, but your memory often recalls it happened whenever you visit him. Your final project, a 2-piece set of misshapen cups of tea, still rests atop one of his many bookshelves to this day. Taehyung calls them “endearing”, something about them “truly reflecting a purpose beyond what their ‘perfect brethren’ are subjected to”. Which, really, is code for “they could be used as mugs, but I like them better as vases for Namjoon’s succulents,” and you’re okay with that.

Namjoon, an English Lit major, is Tae’s roommate and the other occupant of their two-bedroom flat. As luck would have it they stay on the floor above your own, right atop your much smaller and much lonelier dorm room. It’s actually one of the shared excuses you all use for your constant visits.

Half of the time you spend on their flat includes being tucked away on their couch, reading astronomy journals or watching documentaries Joon frequently sits through alongside you, or sleeping under Tae’s covers simply because he enjoys the company and can’t seem to sleep otherwise. The rest of the time the boys, sometimes with you in tow on an off day, migrate to Jimin and Yoongi’s shared flat in Dorm D. They share their space with Jungkook, if Yoongi’s complaints about late-night water-fests were anything to go by, though you’ve never seen him there.

No, ironically, the first time you crossed paths with him was in the lobby of Dorm C — your dorm. You remember he was shifting and wandering around like a lost puppy, his eyes restlessly searching for something or someone. It was him, you knew, because he’s often featured in your shared friend’s Instagram posts, and because he’s very hard to miss.

He was — is big, towering over you easily, and was then dressed all in black. A mix of comfy and effortlessly put together in perfect execution, the rolled-up sleeves of his sweater did nothing to hide the ink covering his veiny forearms. You were instantly thankful — you’ve always been drawn to tattoos. They’re admirable on others and on yourself, and you instantly had to push down the desire to keep marking your body for reasons only pertinent to the feeling of the needle on your skin or the aesthetics of the design. Your poor ass couldn’t afford another so soon, anyway.

The other thing that gave him away was his signature dark hair, long and parted in the middle to fall over his round, soft eyes. It covered his multiple piercings but did nothing to take away from the sweet persona that settled over him. Despite the dark and the goth, he seemed… cute. Very cute, and very confused. The way his eyebrows furrowed at his phone screen just before he searched through the scattered students was a dead giveaway. He was likely lost, but that wasn’t very surprising. For all the time Tae and Joon spend on Dorm D, the same couldn’t be said otherwise. Visits to Dorm C were seldom for the rest.

And a lost Jungkook… wasn’t your problem. A simple look at his boyish features was enough to ignite some sort of weird somersaults in your chest, and you wanted nothing more than to ignore it and run far away. So, you tried.

Blinking away the staring he had thankfully not noticed, you made for your own room as embarrassment coursed through your jittery limbs.

You didn’t make it very far before your plan backfired. You had to go near him to reach the elevator, and it apparently didn’t matter that you were practically hiding inside your bag, your hand rummaging through it for your room cardkey.

“Hey—uh, Y/N right?” you heard, and your body froze.

A look up, and there he was. Jeon Jungkook, calling your name. It was weird hearing your mesh of letters on his tongue, foreign to his palette yet pronounced to perfection. Equally confused as he looked before, and even further more embarrassed (you couldn’t help but think, amongst all the chaos in your mind, that his voice was ridiculously soothing and fitting for his physicality), your throat only let out a very intellectual “huh?”

“Um,” Jungkook’s eyes went wide, his head cocked to the side at your reaction. His feet shifted under him, and you tried ignoring the way his cheeks grew a lovely shade of pink when he spoke again.

“I’m Jungkook, and hyung—Taehyung mentioned you before. He isn’t answering and I’m a bit lost, so I was wondering if you could give me directions? Unless you’re not… Y/N?”

You’re often a recurrent character in Tae’s stories, so it shouldn’t have surprised you he’s spoken of you before. But it did.

“I am Y/N,” you relented, maybe a bit more bitterly than you intended. You couldn’t help but pout at the sudden reminder of Tae’s love for recording you during your most… inopportune moments. “Where is it you want to go?”

The boy in question rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly, a bunny-like smile making a sudden appearance. His teeth seemed to jut out a bit, and his upper lip disappeared almost entirely, but you were sure of one thing instantly: his smile was the prettiest one you’d ever seen.

You felt your chest constrict at the sight without any sense of permission, your ears going up in flames. Clearly, you were bonkers. You continued your walk towards the elevator, praying he’d keep up somewhere a bit farther from you. But he followed without question, easily settling besides you and offering glances from the corner of his eye. You pressed the up button and pretended not to notice, playing around with your cardkey while you both waited.

“To hyung’s dorm — I haven’t ever been there, as strange as it sounds, and I need to borrow some paint.”

“Borrow some paint?” you hummed, the notion seeming somewhat silly to you. “After you’ve used it you can’t return it, so would it really be borrowing?”

You moved to look at him questioningly, curiosity getting the best of you, and the feeling you were hit with was far too paralyzing for you to carry. It was a sudden storm of affection, a wave of currents that spread and tightened, tickling and burning your stomach each second you saw his crinkled eyes, his teeth fully bared into a humorous grin. It made your feet stick to the ground even after the doors of the elevator greeted you open.

“You’re a weird one aren’t you?” he muttered airily, more to himself than anything, before shrugging and prompting you to follow him inside the confined space. “Technically, you’re right, but saying I’m borrowing stuff sounds nicer, doesn’t it? It’s all about semantics. Don’t worry though, hyung lets me take some of his whenever I run out.”

“Okay.”

Neither of you said much after that, but you did take him all the way to Tae’s and Joon’s front door. He thanked you softly before you left, with a smile sincere and gentle in ways you hadn’t expected. You remember nodding along and, possibly, wishing him good luck on his art project, but you weren’t sure by the time you reached your room.

You remember skipping your assignments that night, choosing instead a hot shower and the comforts of your recently cleaned bed. It was the first attempt at forgetting the whole event, a new mission for your mind to complete before a crush settled its anchor.

You were used to six handsome guys. You drew the line at seven.

Meeting Jungkook for the first time was disastrous for the days that followed. Maybe you were being a bit dramatic, but it was rightfully warranted. Your brain had vaguely memorized what he looked like outside of pictures, and now you saw him everywhere. It was the frequency bias all over again, and it had no escape, just like that one time you wanted to dye your hair and suddenly half the population seemed to be dying it that very color. Similarly, interacting with Jungkook meant noticing him in your peripheral when he wasn’t front and center, knowing it was him in the distance. It only worsened when your paths began to regularly cross.

It happened and continuous to happen mostly in the presence of Tae or Joon, or any of Jungkook’s roommates.

Whenever you’d spend some time on the couch with Joon, he was there. Whenever you woke up midday and decide it was high time to cook brunch for three (four then), he was already there. When Yoongi invited you over to hear some of the pieces he’s been working on, Jungkook was miraculously in the apartment. Oh, you wanted to steal some of Tae’s shirts? Jungkook catches you red handed, some stolen paints of his own right in his treacherous hold.

It’s absolutely maddening.

You wouldn’t mind it so much if it weren’t for the fact that each new stare, each new smile, leaves your stomach in complete shambles.

Who could take you back to the time when you hadn’t heard his loud laugh? To when he hadn’t seen you loafing around in your onesie after a killer test and stayed to comfort you? He even called you cute, shared some of his milk and made sure to leave only after he’d seen you smile. Sometimes he’d even notice you watch your documentaries only to pop a random question about space, or even about the science behind Star Trek or Star Wars when “Clearly FTL travel isn’t possible?” (To which you’d answer: “Not yet it isn’t, you non-believer”) before falling quiet and leaving you be. They were small conversations with no more than 3 lines exchanged, but they were more than enough for the butterflies seeping through your ribcage to go on a frenzy.

And despite everything you heard and everything you began to know, Jungkook was possibly the softest, sweetest, and most annoying person you knew. At least superficially.

You still knew nothing personal about him, with your interactions being limited to shared spaces, but you didn’t think much of it until you began to see all kinds of things: his cute habits, his quirks, and even the way his tattoo collection grows.

You’ve silently noticed the way he wiggles his toes when he sits to watch a series, how he blinks a lot when he’s confused. You’ve seen the way he scratches the back of his head when he’s not confident about something, and how his eyes smile before his lips do, and the way his laugh resonates all around the room in the most euphoric melodies. All of this you come to know as unequivocally Jungkook. And you know, you know you’re so whipped for him that you can’t stop being in-tuned with it, with his little things.

But you’re also aware of your situation, and it doesn’t surprise you when your chest starts to hurt over it — over him, because you see his other things: the way each week curls a different girl around his waist, the way his eyes turn cold when he says he doesn’t do relationships, and the way he looks at you.

It’s never with disgust or anything of the sort. It’s just that you’ve seen the way he looks at the girls he fucks with, the girls he finds attractive, the girls he likes for a single night to then discard them.

And he’s never looked at you like that. You suppose that’s good, but... then again, you guess it means you’re nothing. After all, Jeon Jungkook never offers you any hope, he never shows any interest. Technically you’re not even his friend — not really. You’re Taehyung’s other best friend, an outside addition to his usual friend group, and now to his life. You’re okay with that, you have to be. You haven’t sought him out, haven’t done anything to close the gap between you. Water and care is something you never wanted to give your unjustified feelings. You never wanted them to grow, even now.

You just failed to take note of the rain pouring over the earth and pooling beneath your feet, and you don’t notice you’re drowning until you see him at the end of the day.

The girl attached to him is a stranger to you, just like the rest you’ve seen, yet you can’t seem to shake the thought that something must be different. Whatever she has seems to be enough for the tattooed man to shatter his distaste for PDA, at least for the time being.

Your legs hesitate to unceremoniously halt in the middle of the hall. Your eyes battle not to widen and not to stare, for a second desperate to make sure that what you’re seeing is real, that you’re seeing Jungkook kiss for the first time in forever as if you hadn’t known all this time that he fucks and loves behind closed doors.

And it doesn’t matter that the kiss isn’t gentle, that he’s kissing her as if she were the very air he needed to breathe. No, what makes you sick is how he notices, how he sees you, and how he does nothing but pull her closer in response.

You push yourself to move as soon as his eyes drift away again, unwilling to tremble before him and unwilling to make any more mistakes.

Class would have to wait. You needed coffee, even if it meant being late. And you absolutely hate being late to Astrophysics, but you definitely hated seeing him more.

#jungkook fanfic #jungkook angst #jungkook fluff #jungkook x reader #bts fanfic #bts imagine #bts jungkook #bts fic #bts fanfiction #drabble series: dct

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lilycove-department-store · 4 years ago

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Octopath Traveler: Review

Let me start by saying that, historically, I’m not a huge fan of turn-based RPGs. Ironic, given that my favorite game series of all time is Pokemon, but I consistently find most JRPGs to be a bit slow-paced and convoluted for my liking. Octopath Traveler, for the most part, managed to subvert my expectations and kept my attention for much longer than I expected going in.

Octopath Traveler is not terribly unique in its gameplay or story, but instead carves a niche in an otherwise crowded genre with stunning visuals, solid fundamentals, and a character-driven gimmick. The game begins with the player choosing one of the eight possible character options (ranging from a staunch, by-the-book knight to a “dancer,” a medieval-fantasy representation of a stripper). Each of these characters has a few tidbits of backstory to entice the player, but not much beyond that. I chose Ophilia, a cleric and the adopted daughter of this universe’s archbishop, for no reason other than she seemed fairly nice and I knew I would want a healer on my team.

The games largest problem became clear fairly immediately: the pace of Octopath’s cutscenes is glacial, and there are a lot of cutscenes. I immediately checked the settings menu for a quick fix, but the most you can do is speed up text speed slightly. Normally this would get the job done, but 50-70% of every cutscene is comprised of movement, not even actual dialogue. Between every line of speech spoken by a given character, their adorable little sprite twitches slightly to add emphasis to their next phrase. I was able to burn through the text itself, but the little interruptions added up and I spent a substantial portion of my playthrough watching nothing happen.

And it was a long playthrough. The average playtime for this game, completing the main story for each of the eight characters, rounds out to 60 hours, a hefty chunk for any player with a busy schedule. It took me several months of on-and-off play to finish the game, though I’m sure that a hardcore player could skip through a lot of the cutscenes and finish in under 50 hours. That said, I can’t really recommend skipping the cutscenes. As slow as they are, this game lives and dies by its cast of characters, most of whom I grew to love by the end of my playthrough. Each of the eight potential members of my team felt fleshed-out and I genuinely cared about the outcomes of their stories enough to see them through (though some were a bit more tedious/strained than others).

Unfortunately, the characters also contribute to one of the game’s other most frustrating features (or lack of features): there are dreadfully few interactions between the various figures that the story follows. Each one of them has five distinct missions, complete with their own little story arcs and supporting characters. The player completes each of these missions with a team of four, three of whom are merely background actors in the primary character’s adventure. Most of the time this isn’t terribly disorienting and can even be fun; the game offers little snippets of dialogue between characters showing how their personalities clash or compliment each other and I was able to fill in the gaps with how they might interact outside of combat. Other times, however, Olberic might engage in a heated one-on-one battle with his greatest rival...only for the actual battle to take place between Olberic’s rival and four magically-enhanced strangers.

I found myself ravenous for the rare moments of interaction between characters since so much of the adventure took place in various little vacuums. Every one of Therion’s snide remarks felt like a breath of fresh air in the absence of story arc crossover. Given, there is a bit of story overlap in the postgame, but if I have to wait that long to see the characters actually come together, is the game doing what it was marketed to do? Hard to say.

As for the rest of the game, it was highly enjoyable. The combat system’s use of weaknesses and shields is unique and complex and kept me on my toes, even against weaker enemies. I really enjoyed customizing my team, and once I unlocked multiclassing it felt like I was playing a whole new RPG. The visuals are stunning, using fabulous pixel art and some blurring to give the sense that the player is looking down into an adorable little world, explored by little pixel people. I did find myself wishing for more high-resolution art of the playable characters; you only ever see them in their tiny overworld sprites, while most bosses get fully-rendered combat sprites.

The actual content of each character’s stories varied wildly, from lighthearted and mischievous to surprisingly dark and harrowing. Without spoiling too much, I found that the game’s attempts to tackle more serious subject matter felt odd given the otherwise lighthearted fantasy veneer, such that each gruesome death felt out of place alongside Tressa’s friendly bouts with local pirates. To be fair, I didn’t find anything about the game’s commentary or story to be genuinely offensive save for some light queerbaiting (if you’ve played the game you know what I’m talking about).

Overall, Octopath Traveler was a solid, classic game. It plays well and I was genuinely invested in it, if not a bit excited to be done once I finally reached the ending. I can’t reasonably endorse purchasing it at the full retail price of $60, but if you can get this game on sale like I did, it’s well worth the investment. If you lean into the fun and the characters, it feels more like a choose-your-own-adventure than the hardcore JRPG it sometimes tries to be, and I think it’s for the better.

TL;DR: Solid game, lovely characters, very long, surprisingly dark, visually stunning. Buy it? Only if it’s on sale.

#octopath #octopath traveler #review #recommend #sale only

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twentiethcenturymoviesandtv · 4 years ago

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Movie Criticism in a Modern Era

In 1904, near the birth of film itself, a paper was published called: The Optical Lantern and Cinematograph Journal. This paper was a one-of-a-kind at the time, full of interviews, analysis of equipment and methods, letters to editors, and even cartoons that made fun of stereotypes in the movie business that we can recognize today.

But that’s not the most interesting thing about this paper.

What was the most interesting thing is that, amongst all of that content, there was also a series of critical reviews of upcoming films, describing a handful of plots of a few films.

The journal would continue to do something like this for the eleven months before it was cancelled, but not before starting something that we are extremely familiar with today: film-criticism.

All through the 1920s, movie critics were becoming more popular, with newspapers hiring them to start analyzing and reviewing upcoming films. This continued into the 1930s, where the obsession with stardom boosted not only the movies and actors, but the critics, as well. More and more film critics were showing up to red-carpet events, but even with this rise in fame, it wasn’t until the 1940s where movie criticism really took off: when the analysis essay was born.

Movie critics started to write essays full of personality, persuasive papers designed to convince audiences of their argument. During this time, something else major happened: movie criticism went mainstream. Critics began working for newspapers, magazines, and, as time went by, even on television, becoming household names. There is perhaps no better example than the famous duo Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel, although others, such as Pauline Kael, Leonard Maltin, and Judith Crist are also contenders for some of the best-known movie critics of all time.

The words of these critics was often highly valued in the film community. They are professionals, well-qualified to study and examine both new and older movies, typically possessing academic backgrounds in film. And then something happened that put an entirely new spin on movie criticism: the internet.

Blogs. YouTube channels. Websites like Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, began to rise in popularity, and channels like CinemaSins, Cinema Snob, and Nostalgia Critic, began popping up all over the place. Even now, there is a vast ocean of movie review blogs and analysis, not to mention YouTube channels and community review websites. In other words, the ‘power’ of film criticism shifted: from the academics to the amateurs.

While there are still qualified critics who post their reviews, more influential by far is the score on Rotten Tomatoes, or the opinion of a favored internet personality. Once that Metacritic score is set, so, it would seem, is the movie’s reputation. We are living in an age where the average joe can make a blog, a YouTube video, or review on Flixter. Even I could be considered an amateur film critic.

The question is, is this a good thing or a bad thing?

On one hand, those of us without degrees in film are being listened to, and can influence how movies are made and how they are received with our opinions. There are more and more avenues for us to explore our opinions, and more resources for us to back our own opinions up by listening to analyses and arguments from a variety of different places. The movie industry is no longer in the hands of the ‘chosen few’, the ‘elite’ and educated. Now, the power is shared equally, if not disproportionately with the audiences, the average movie watchers. You and me.

On the other hand?

Without a level of objectivity about film, some of these movie watchers who post their opinions online do so without reserve, leaving sometimes vitriolic reviews with little to no reason for their hatred beyond personal preference. It is thanks to this modern phenomenon that has left the paths open for raging, ranting reviews against various films that simply don’t appeal to them, without rhyme or reason. Alternatively, other resources choose to look at films and nitpick them endlessly, adding up minuscule details and ‘plot holes’ and claiming that these make a film good or bad.

It is this type of thinking that leads to the Oscar viewership dropping. It is this phenomenon that leads people to value the score on Rotten Tomatoes over that of the critics.

Once again, it leads one to wonder: is this a good or bad thing?

With this decline in interest in the critics relatively objective verdict of a film due to claims of the critics and audiences never agreeing, all that’s left is to look at what the audiences have to say. Many movie goers point to the box office, or popularity of a film to decide whether a film is good instead, but by that logic, Transformers and The Fast and the Furious are on a level similar to The Lion King and Mission Impossible.

In other words, objectivity can very easily be lost if you pay attention to a movie’s popularity over its quality.

The balance between popularity and quality is not a strange one, especially on this blog. Also familiar to us is the struggle between the word of the critics and the word of the audiences. In an era where anybody can influence how a movie is viewed, it can seem like it’s more important than ever to choose a side, to figure out whose advice they are going to take. Who we’re going to listen to. Does the word of the critics mean anything, or do they simply laud ‘artistic’ films, looking down their noses at the more comprehensible fare that the viewers are more likely to see? Do audiences know an objectively good film when they see it, or will they go down defending popcorn flicks as Oscar contenders?

Which side are we to pick?

As an avid moviewatcher who both enjoys film, and wants to be objective about it, my argument comes down very closely to the same opinions I held in the ‘objectivity vs. subjectivity’ article I posted: a little of both.

Is the word of the critics valid? Yes. Critics are people too, and their opinions are (supposed to be) founded on academia. Critics can tell us if a film is objectively good, if the production quality is up-to-snuff, if the performances, pacing, cinematography and story are, by the standards of ‘good filmmaking’, good. By the same token, they can only get you so far.

Any consumption of art is subjective, and the same goes for film. We can search for like-minded reviewers and analysts who we can determine our own judgements over whether or not to see a film, or try to figure out what you liked about it. In other words, there doesn’t have to be a one-or-the-other argument.

So, to answer our previous question, is this new era of the everyman film critic a good thing or a bad thing?

Honestly? I’d say it’s a good thing.

Right now, there are a plethora of opinions that are more likely to match up with the opinions of the audience because they are the audience. By applying analysis and critical thinking to the films that people are interested in, more people are encouraged to think about the films they are watching instead of simply discounting the opinions of the critics, thinking of them as the ‘Hollywood Elite’. Now, there are more resources than ever for finding arguments for and against specific viewpoints or analyses of certain elements of certain films, genres, even directors and actors. We are living in an age where I can type in the name of a film and find more analysis than I know what to do with.

Yes, that’s a good thing. We have more viewpoints to compare, more things to think about, and we can even more easily spot when the critics and the audiences’ opinions do match up. Cases like Star Wars, Dead Poets Society, and Forrest Gump prove that it is possible for the two to agree, and the increase in access to a wider variety of opinions and reasons for opinions can help up-and-coming film critics and movie-goers alike think about what they’re watching, whether they agree with the reviewer or not.

In the end, the purpose of film criticism and analysis is to inform an audience about movies, and point out elements that casual movie-goers might not be paying much attention to. They exist to summarize, highlight, and explain what was good about a film, and what was bad about it. This serves as an excellent aide to our own thought processes as we watch movies ourselves, helping us figure out what we liked or did not like, and why, whether the critic has a degree in film or not. Film critics are there, especially in multitude, to add to the movie experience, to help us think, and to provide information about movies.

In an era where anyone can create a YouTube account or a blog and start reviewing, there are dangers of oversaturation and, of course, there’s always the possibility that you simply won’t agree with any of the opinions out there. There are those who base their reviews solely in subjectivity, and those who do the opposite. But these are problems easily solved, once again, with critical thinking, and using the feedback of others to help us formulate our opinions about whether or not to watch a film, or even to help us think about one we’ve already seen.

A degree in film is not needed to smartly evaluate a film. What is needed is fairness in judgement, and a keen eye. Knowing what to look for certainly helps, but in the end, it’s about offering a thoughtful opinion on something in order to inform and persuade, the same as it has been since 1904. Everyone has their own thoughts to share.

Movie criticism hasn’t changed fundamentally. The things that make a movie good are the same: story, characters, cinematography, performances, and all the rest. What has changed is the number of people, and the number of ways, that those things are analyzed. What we have now that we didn’t before is, primarily, variety, and the technology to spread our ideas.

All in all? This new era of media analysis is far from bad. What matters now is making sure that it’s used well. And that’s what this blog is all about.

Thank you guys so much for reading! Please, don’t forget that the ask box is always open if you have any ideas, suggestions, discussion topics, questions, or just want to say hi! I hope to see you guys in the next article.

#Movies #Film

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el-oh-her · 5 years ago

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Kate Marsh’s Rooftop Scene was better written and was more emotioanlly investing then the ending of Life is Strange

Suicide Trigger Warning

Life is Strange Spoilers

This is an opinion.

There was something that always bothered me about the ending of Life is Strange. When I reached the end of this surreal narrative, I was not happy with the idea that nothing I did throughout the entire game actually mattered. Not only because nothing in game changes the binary choice at the end, but no matter what ending I chose, it made so that none of my choices happened and those relationships no longer exist, or everyone dies and so my choices didn’t matter because everyone is dead. I felt emotionally robbed, and frustrated that all that time I spent really amounted to nothing, besides finding someone I was barely emotionally invested in finding (sorry Rachel), and putting a creep behind bars (which was a consolation to losing everything else).

Butterfly Effect Games ride a dangerous line of choice and the illusion of choice, and in this moment, for me, Life is Strange was reduced to a huge illusion of choice. In the end, nothing that the player does can change the outcome of the game. Compare this to that of Until Dawn, where you are actively trying to keep everyone alive, and you can end the game with several different combinations of survivors, from everyone to no one.

Despite my frustrations with the ending of the game, I think Life is Strange is a memorable game that people should play if they enjoy this style of gaming, and it has a lot of good messages integrated into its themes. The biggest selling point for Life is Strange for me was the well developed, unique cast of characters.

Something I applaud the game for is the complexities of their antagonistic forces. Nathan Prescott and Victoria Chase, two rich students of Blackwell, are the main force but throughout the game. We learn that Nathan has, at minimum, been emotionally abused by his father and he’s desperately searching for someone to care about him, and this has left him vulnerable to manipulation. Victoria, despite being a “Queen Bitch,” is has inner turmoil that she’ll never be good enough, and is often consumed by her own envy. David Madsen seems to always be antagonizing Chloe, Max’s friend, but we learn that he’s a war vet who is just trying his best to be a father, but struggles divorcing his militaristic teachings to his parenting. Jefferson seems to be an entity of good, from supporting Max to being a father figure to Nathan, but is ultimately unstable and mad, obsessed with his art to a dangerous, irredeemable fault.

I think ultimately, this game does what other games struggle with, and that’s with making characters that feel real and tangible. We hate Victoria because we all know a Victoria, for example.

Now, something that I found interesting about Life is Strange is that it simultaneously succeeded and failed at being a Butterfly Effect Game. Despite my aforementioned gripes, there was one moment where I was paralyzed in the moment, because I knew that my choices mattered, but I only had one chance to get it right (which is not the norm in this specific game).

Let’s talk about Kate Marsh, and her suicide scene. Why this worked so well, and was a beautiful emotional moment in comparison to what I consider a let down of an ending.

Now, I mention Nathan Prescott, Victoria Chase, Thomas Jefferson, and David Madsen not only to applaud them and let you know I don’t hate the game, but also because Kate Marsh is one of the few characters that is directly affected by all four of the antagonistic forces in a negative way.

Kate Marsh is Max’s friend, and is the subject of bullying and this has led her to be depressed and eventually suicidal. Her primary issue is that she had gotten drugged by Nathan Prescott, and was video taped by Victoria making out with several people at a party, and at the end of the night she’d been abducted and photographed by Thomas Jefferson with the help of Nathan Prescott. All of this happened in one night, and Kate does not remember any of it. Since then, she’s become reclusive and depressed. There is then a later scene where David Madsen (security guard at this point) is harassing Kate over something unknown to the player.

Beyond the exposition from Max, you can learn Kate’s story and about Kate by talking to Kate, looking at her journal, and then later looking at her room, though all of that is inherently optional. Kate does not come center stage anymore than Victoria or Warren does, and so to me in my initial play through, she wasn’t center on my mind. Up until the scene on the roof, she stays as a side narrative no more important than Warren, that progressively becomes more and more centered, but no more significant, until the climax at the end of episode two.

Everything comes together at the climatic scene on the roof, where Kate decides to attempt suicide. Suddenly, this side story has become center stage and now she is a character we have to interact with.

I’m not saying I was completely blindsided, because I picked up on the narrative as I’m familiar with disinterest in passions as a sign of depression (Max comments on Kate’s violin playing) but it did take me by surprise because I did not think this game was bold enough to bring us to an active suicide attempt. This reminds me a lot of Sayori’s suicide from Doki Doki Literature Club where we can observe Sayori’s behaviors, but suicide was not what we were expecting.

The suicide scene is different from any other moment in Life is Strange. First, we learn Max can freeze time, and we learn that she can exhaust her powers and lose them momentarily. This forces us to have to talk down Kate down the roof without the help of our time powers, relying on everything we learned about her. And if we succeed, she lives, and if we don’t, she dies. There’s no easy way out of it.

I applaud Life is Strange for doing this scene so well, and it’s so well written because there are so many moving parts that allowed this moment to be shocking without being out of place, and it also pushes a very healthy message about suicide awareness and prevention. Essentially, this scene actually teaches you how you can talk someone off the ledge, and if you succeed in saving Kate I would take what you’ve learned to heart.

First I want to talk about how you’re supposed to save Kate Marsh. Nothing that is given to you through scripted exposition will help you save Kate, because that’s the point. Kate is feeling lonely and like no one cares about her. So if you, the player as Max, choose not to care about her by not exploring her room or interacting with her, you can’t save her outside of some lucky guessing. This is very true in real life in some cases(I can’t really say all because there’s always an exception). It’s not uncommon that those who feel suicidal also feel these things, and that reassurance that they matter, that someone cares about them, that there is a time past whatever is causing them suffering goes a long way. Suicide awareness and prevention is more than just checking in on your depressed or suicidal friends, it’s showing them that not only are you checking in on them, you’re remembering and invested in the friendship.

This scene was frustrating in the best possible way because you’re never given a warning that what you learn about in Kate’s room will ever become important. There’s no indication in scene as to which option is right even if you look at everything. You are, out of nowhere, suddenly tested on your knowledge of Kate Marsh, and there’s a life on the line so you better remember right. I liked this because it again pushes this message that if you want to save Kate Marsh, you have to have cared about Kate Marsh.

There are two choices Max makes that can play a role in this scene, but doing them doesn’t prevent or destine the suicide. Instead, they add a small layer of complexity as Kate confronts the players with their actions if they are perceivably wrong in her eyes.

1. Intervening with David Madsen. If you do this, Kate is grateful. If you don’t, you really become no better than Victoria in that both of you documented a suffering Kate without stepping in.

2. Telling Kate to involve the police. If you do, Kate is reassured. If you don’t, Kate is extremely depressed. Even if you said it to find more evidence which is logical, Kate isn’t in a logical head space and so this reaffirms the fact that maybe she can’t do anything about this.

The reason why these simply add complexity and don’t destine the choice is because Max as a character has decided that she’s always going to be trying to do the right thing with Kate. Max is never going to hurt Kate, so when Kate gets upset by these actions, Max explaining her logic is enough for it to make sense to Kate. I like this added touch because it feels so real to see Kate being lost in her own thoughts, seeing these actions as malice, and then being comforted and reminded that they weren’t.

It was clever that the Kate Narrative never felt very pressing. For starters, everything has already happened to Kate and beyond the bullying, nothing else seemed to be happening. Nothing that Max could actively do. It was elegantly placed in the background in tandem with all the other unique narratives of the other characters. It does become more centered in the story as we progress in episode two, with Kate’s Phone call, for example. But despite the fact it becomes more centered, it does not become more significant. I mean this in that, Max is not actively helping Kate because she is actively with Chloe. It would become more significant if Max had stopped everything she was doing, abandon the current quest, to go and comfort and help solve Kate’s issues. But that doesn’t happen, and instead, we are forced to deal with what happens because of that. The game cleverly keeps this out of the limelight, so that it feels that much more impacful when we’re forced to act.

Now, I go back and forth on how I feel about not having the ability to rewind time and Max’s apparent ability to freeze time. I think it was necessary not only to raise the stakes of the scene, but also to send a positive message about suicide awareness and prevention. This game basically said to the reader “See, you don’t need magic powers to save people like Kate, just listen to them, show them friendship, and act as a support when they need it, and make sure they’re getting the help they need.” Even if you could rewind time, it still hinged upon the fact that you had to know enough about Kate. So regardless, that message is still pushed regardless.

My gripe is the Convenience Factor. I use this term to refer to things that happen out of nowhere, because it’s convenient for the plot. These are always solved by showing us this beforehand in the form of a (narrative) gun. I refrain from saying Checkov’s Gun, since that’s more about making everything relevant and taking out irrelevant date, in that if you have a Gun in chapter 1, it should go off in chapter 2. The Narrative Gun works in reverse. If you want a gun to be shot off in chapter two, you have to introduce it in chapter one. In this case, if Max is able to freeze time and lose her abilities in Kate’s Scene, it has to happen at least once beforehand. I know that Max talks about fearing to lose her ability at one point in the Episode and I think that was their attempt to plant the gun for it to go off, but I personally think we really should have seen this in action. And there’s no excuse for the time freeze. That gun has to be planted beforehand for it not to feel convenient later down the road.

That is really the only problem I have with this entire scene. Everything is so carefully laid out with a clear but not abrasive message about suicide awareness and prevention, and it’s high stakes with an immediate showcase of how our actions have consequences. It was really one of the most emotional scenes in the game for me.

So, the question remains, why does this scene seem to work for me and Chloe’s doesn’t in terms of emotional investment? Because let’s not play around, Chloe’s death strikes others far more passionately than me. I sound sociopathic, but I didn’t hesitate to sacrifice Chloe because morally, I’d sacrifice the few to save the many, especially if the few is okay with it. In this case, Chloe was.

The other reason was because I feel like this moral conundrum is overused, and it didn’t feel fitting for this story that felt so small and contained and important on a personal level, not a world ending level.

Ultimately, I think was made me so emotionally invested in Kate, and emotionally distant to Chloe’s death is that Max already decided she was going to save Kate, and the choice is our effort to save her. Chloe on the other hand, is the trolley problem (there’s an oncoming train going to hit 5 people. If you pull the switch, it will change tracks and only hit two. What do you do?). Max has to play God and decide who to save and who to sacrifice, and it just felt unfitting as an ending. Especially since nothing that happened in the game bears any weight here.

I think it’s important when you’re writing a story with a distinct main character that the choices we make fit the character. It doesn’t seem within Max’s character to make this kind of choice, but it does make sense for her to try her damnedest to save her friend from committing suicide. Kate’s story wasn’t about whether or not we choose to save Kate or not, it’s if we can save Kate. It feels more personal to Max’s character, because it feels cliche at this point to be presented with the “do we sacrifice the few to save the many” moral issue. This problem doesn’t seem to feel unique to a character anymore.

#Life is strange #max caulfield #chloe price #Kate Marsh #Nathan Prescott #Thomas Jefferson #suicide tw

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sunnyartsstudio · 5 years ago

Photo

So, I got on Netflix again and just spent a substantial portion of this weekend binge watching the first season of The Dragon Prince and I got to say - I was monumentally disappointed.

First, I want to address the elephant-koi in the room, this series is heavily derivative of ATLA. Now, I did know that going in since literally the only praise I see heaped on TDP is that it’s a lot like ATLA (and for some of its representation, which I’ll get to in a moment, don’t you worry) and Aaron Ehasz hasn’t exactly been doing this aspect any favors by consistently drawing comparisons to ATLA itself and using his working on ATLA as a promotional tool. But, honestly, I was massively unprepared for how deep and blatant TDP’s similarities to ATLA were going to get. The intro is a lengthened rehash of ATLA’s intro. The music is eerily similar. Its seasons are listed as “books” and its episodes “chapters” and its incorporation of the elements is damn near copy/paste. This series feels like the “can I copy your homework” meme manifested in a show. And, I can’t properly summarize this issue without bringing up my second issue -

CALLUM. I feel really bad for this character. No, not because his parents are dead and he has security issues. No. Not that at all. It’s because Callum really isn’t allowed to be anything beyond a tug-of-war of “Sokka” and “not-Sokka”. The writers are constantly trying to both make Callum Sokka (Jack Desena voices him the exact same way, his humor is similar, his personality is similar) but also assure the audience that, no, he’s not Sokka. After all, he’s good at art and bad at combat - so totally not Sokka! Except when he is. Which is literally all the time other than those when those two aspects of his character are shown.

Third, since we’re discussing characters, I’m going to mention that the voice acting ranges from okay to horrendous. Ezran is the worst offender here, but, honestly, these characters can be downright painful to listen to.

Fourth, the animation. Yeah, I know this is the one area that even fans admit could be improved on, but I’m mentioning it nonetheless. It looks terrible. Now, that said, the designs and the backgrounds are actually really good. But the bizarre blend of 2D with 3D makes the movements stiff and jarring to look at and limits the characters’ range of expression, which is a massive detriment to the series and the emotional subject matters that it’s trying to cover.

Fifth, fucking Amaya. No, I don’t mean her character, I just mean an aspect of it. Now, going into the series, I already knew she was a guard and that she was deaf, and, therefore, I was already prepared for a certain level of stupid. Yeah, I know what I typed. A deaf person in the guard is a stupid idea. If she can’t hear, it’s that much easier to sneak up on her. You may not want to accept that, but it’s fact. Disabilities means there are certain things you can’t do that others can - I know. I have a disability. And it’s an odd choice to make her a guard considering she could have been a deaf diplomat or just about anything else that doesn’t put her in a situation where being able to hear is detrimental. And, unlike Toph in ATLA who has seismic sense to compensate for her blindness, Amaya is straight up deaf - there’s no trick or power or anything to compensate for it. And I could probably have just rolled my eyes at the whole thing - if TDP itself didn’t go out of its way to make the whole thing stupider. Like having Amaya enter a building that isn’t secured before any of the soldiers with her? Classic. And my personal favorite - that her interpreter is almost always standing directly behind her when she signs. What. The. Hell? Can he see through her or something? When he is standing next to her, he’s almost always looking at her face. What. The. Hell? I’m assuming she can read lips even though no one said she could (I’ll get to that in a minute too), but half the time she isn’t even looking at the person talking to her, so? Huh?

Sixth, the world building is shit. There, I said it. Honestly, I could probably get past every other issue this show has if not for that. I watched the entire season - 9 episodes - and almost nothing is established or explained as far as how the magic system works or basically anything. Outside of the intro - which, despite being pretty easy to understand, is explained over and over in the dialogue. Yes, I get the info the intro discussed. You don’t need to keep reminding me. How about using that time instead to explain how magic works? What dark magic did humans use? Why was it so bad? Just saying something is “dark” doesn’t quite cut it. Why does Claudia need stuff for some spells, but can literally snap her fingers twice and turn her hand into a flashlight. How do things work?? I get Callum’s magic. The show shows us what is specifically required for the two spells he knows and what those two spells do. Everything else just happens. And it feels like it’s used to fit the needs of the writers as opposed to making sense. It feels like the writers just pull it out of their asses whenever they want. And it’s literally the most frustrating aspect of the show.

Kind of coupled with how shit the world building is is the lazy writing. It takes literally 8 episodes (there are 9 in each season) for the show to drop the bombshell that Ezran can understand animals - and it comes completely out of nowhere. There’s no hint of this in any earlier episodes. Ezran never seems to understand Bait, didn’t know the giant discount-Unagi was lurking in the water ready to eat Bait, nothing. And, as if that wasn’t lazy enough, this is revealed when, almost to the tree Ellis is leading them to to meet the miracle healer, Ezran says that the wolf just told him there is no miracle healer. Why wouldn’t the wolf have mentioned this before you even left to meet the miracle healer?? Why didn’t the wolf mention this immediately after Ellis’s story of how they met the miracle healer and how she fixed the wolf’s leg????? Is it because lazy writing? Because I’m willing to bet it’s because lazy writing. This is why second drafts are important - so you don’t create lazy last-minute reveals and plot holes.

That said, I used the word disappointed because I went into TDP genuinely wanting to like it. I didn’t want it to be the next ATLA. I just wanted it to be a good show I could enjoy. And, to be fair, there are a lot of elements that I do like about it. Rayla and Claudia are great characters and, if focus was placed on proper world building, this could be a unique world to explore. The character relationships are fairly well developed and, while the animation is terrible, the character designs are decent. There is good in this. But it’s buried under trying to hard to remind me of a show that did all this - and did it better - and buried deep under some of the worst world building I have ever seen.

I don’t feel like I wasted my time on it, but I still probably won’t be checking out seasons 2 or 3. If season 1 is anything to go by, this series isn’t for me. If I want something reminiscent of ATLA, I’ll just rewatch ATLA. At least that has decent world building.

#tdp #the dragon prince #atla #aaron ehasz #rayla and claudia are legit badasses though and i wish them well

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sage-thrasher · 6 years ago

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Extra: “Sanitize” and Outsider POVs (Chemical Reactions)

Well, here’s 1.5k words of outsider POV: a hobbyist chemist/physicist meets Yui. Science results. It’s basically indulgent fluff I wrote for no reason besides, well... indulgence. Sparked by the thought that our knowledge of physics and chemistry has grown so much... people and science are pretty wonderful. Takes place in no specific time. Here’s Chemical Reactions.

---

Being wealthy and charismatic meant that Haru Watanabe was called ‘eccentric.’ He was also a middle-aged man with three children and a doting wife, the owner of a thriving spice business—mostly ran by the aforementioned wife—and a self-described scholar with a surprising amount of perceptiveness. Basically, Haru did everything else right so that he could get away with doing some things wrong.

(The first sin in question: throwing himself headfirst into physics and chemistry despite having enough money to pursue respectable subjects like history, politics, literature, or historical political literature.)

Haru had people who could do the tiresome but necessary business of actually bringing the goods from one place to another. Unfortunately, there did come times where he had to make the trek in person, generally when it involved a noble personage of one dinky plot or another who got delusions of grandeur. Haru would then kiss his wife and children, board the caravan, and head to woo the noble who was choking his trade routes. This time, he was with a scribe, a servant, and two hired Sarutobi guards.

(The greater sin: blabbing about his scientific interests with everyone who had the slightest amount of interest, which in Haru’s world, was the equivalent of looking in his direction.)

He’d talked his associates’s ears off during the journey there, and on the way back, both his employees were resigned to hearing his newest ideas--his scribe knew it by heart. Though the younger ninja had been interested at first, now the two Sarutobi were staring into the distance with glazed eyes.

(The final sin: making sure that he walked his hostage audience through the concepts in question until they understood it instead of blabbing without input, denying said audience the luxury of entirely tuning it out.)

So when Haru stopped in Chiyuku to pay the necessary pilgrimage to Healer Yui’s residence, he of course took her offer of tea as an invitation to speak about his newest pet theory. Haru hadn’t met with her personally before, having never been down this route himself, but he and every merchant with business on this side of the country knew about her. And Haru especially knew of her reputation for sharing knowledge. Was it likely that she knew anything about his interests? No, but that had never stopped him before.

“I have a great interest in science,” he began, smiling.

She didn’t pause in the middle of bandaging—the younger Sarutobi was lightly burned, but only because he’d practiced some sort of ninja technique above his skill levels, much to the exasperation of the older one—but she looked up.

“Is that so?” Yui was perfectly polite. “What kind of sciences?”

“Oh, physics and chemistry, mainly.” He let his smile grow brighter. “The very big and very small, the planets and the atoms.”

There was a glint of genuine interest now, even as she said, “Give me a minute, please.” Haru was content to wait as she gave the ninja instructions, washed her hands, poured herself a cup of tea, and took a seat across from him. “You’re a scholar in both subjects?”

Her voice was the mix of a rustic drawl and clipped enunciation that educated rural folk tended to have, and Haru could detect traces of other accents, likely picked up from all the travelers that came through Chiyuku.

(Again, he wasn’t a bad merchant. He was a rather excellent one, though his wife was the exceptional half. Haru was well-versed in the art of sizing someone up.)

“I am!” Haru sipped his tea and was pleasantly surprised by its mellow flavor. He’d had worse tea in fancier places. “Are you aware of the elements of matter?” Before he could start his theory, he needed to gauge her current knowledge.

It wasn’t quite a non-sequitur, but Yui took the small leap between topics in stride. “Yes. Carbon, nitrogen…” She hesitated. “I have the periodic chart of elements. A colleague of mine gave me some books with them.”

HHaru’s interest was piqued. “Did he?” He reevaluated her and took a different tack. “As you might be aware, we can put some elements together and create new ones. Organics from organics and inorganics from like. Not one from the other, and some combinations of elements won’t combine at all. Why do you think so?”

And so began a conversation like none other that Haru had participated in, beyond his wildest dreams. (A virtue: Haru could talk and talk and talk, but he could also listen. With colleagues and scholars—and his brilliant, incredible wife—he could sit spellbound for hours, with little to say but “Please, continue!”)

He kept asking why, why, and she kept answering. Yui spoke about the shape of atoms and the charged pieces that made up them. She spoke about the bonds between elements and the shape of those bonds, all connected by little electric pieces of matter that orbited around them. Finally, he asked about the interactions of magnets and forces, about the minutiae of why some elements had so many electric bits, why the shells around each center were numbered the way they were.

“I’ve...” she paused. “ I don’t really know. This is all a guess, anyway,” she added. “None of this will be proved for decades.” Yui cleared her throat, gone hoarse with talking, and she sipped her tea.

By now, the sun had dipped from its high point to begin its journey downwards. Haru’s guard took the opportunity to hazard a reminder: “Perhaps it would be best to continue—”

“Thank you, Sarutobi-san,” interrupted Haru. “I think we shall stay sometime longer, if it suits the esteemed healer.”

Yui seemed torn, having clearly enjoyed a conversation with someone who not only followed along but also hadn’t questioned her authority. “I wouldn’t want to keep you…”

“No, not at all!” He waved her concerns aside. “Now, you were talking about proof? How would you prove this?” Haru took care to keep his voice eager and curious, letting no suggestion of incredulity or accusation color his voice. He knew how easy it was to dismiss a woman’s knowledge, intentionally or not. Why, his own darling wife needed him as a frontman to manage the business, as silly as that was—she was better than he ever could be.

With a hesitant smile, Yui began to describe a series of fantastical devices: microscopes that used electric pieces, machines that spun bits of matter fast enough to tear them open, and lightning that could split bonded compounds in two.

Haru listened eagerly, soaking up as much knowledge as he could. His ability to listen, his experience, and his surprisingly deep well of common sense gave him a fine-tuned nonsense detector. And yet, her words didn’t set it off, likely because they made sense. Likely because she admitted freely how she couldn’t prove any of it, that this was baseless speculation.

(It didn’t feel like it.)

“What about chakra? Where does this fit in?”

The two ninja, alternatively bored out of their minds and surprisingly keen to listen, perked up at Haru’s question.

And to his ongoing surprise, she laughed. “I have absolutely no idea.” Yui leaned back in her chair, taking another sip. “An energy source from another universe? A force we don’t understand? Who knows. All I know is that it seems to break all laws of the natural world.”

Haru mirrored her body language, leaning back as well. “And you know how to use it.”

“I do, but I don’t understand it.”

He made a contemplative sound. Haru liked knowing things, and Yui had done him an enormous favor by sharing. Then again, he liked knowing things, and she… was a mystery. For not the first time this journey, Haru wished that his wife was with him. She would know what to say. (Another flaw: his stubbornness, his refusal to let anything go when it caught his interest...)

“Is your knowledge supernatural?”

(... and the bluntness that resulted from it.)

This time, everyone stared at him.

Yui blinked, a mix of shock, horror, and annoyance displayed in her creasing forehead.

Haru blinked back, suddenly aware that this faux pas was inexcusable, even for him. “Anyway,” he said, moving the conversation on before it lingered like a carelessly lit firecracker between them, “I must thank you sincerely for indulging me. As a token of appreciation...”

Haru opened the bag that he had carried with him, full of physics and chemistry books that he had planned on going over with the healer—before she’d blown away every preconception and filled his minds with theories in no book before her. He chewed his lip, considering the titles, and finally picked out the one that had the most similar and detailed analysis to what she’d told him. It was mostly a comparison of elemental properties and compounds, but… Haru had noticed that despite her detailed knowledge, she’d made up many of the words for the esoteric parts of her masterful theory.

“Here,” he said, placing the book on the table. “If you want any others in my bag, do let me know. And if it pleases you, I can send you any book on any topic you desire, if you promise to share me more of your wonderful theories.” He undercut his statement with a bright smile, trying to convey that he meant it as a friend—or at least a friendly acquaintance.

Yui gave him a careful smile back, though her openness had shuttered with his blundered statement. “I’d like that,” she said.

And just like that, Haru had another puzzle he knew he had to solve: the source of her knowledge.

#sanitize fanfic #Oc-insert #naruto fanfic #extra

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masiah · 5 years ago

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“They’ll name constellations after you one day.”

late night sentence starters / accepting *

Marlind, City of the Great Tree. It was already starting to feel much purer within the air…and the people. The malevolence had diminished significantly, and with proper offerings and respect to the Lord of the Land, now freed from his hellion’s form…things could only get better, right? He’d done all he could here, as the Shepherd, as Sorey. They all had.

Still, comfort laced each and every fabric of his being at seeing the people slowly but surely gather their offerings at the Great Tree; blissfully unaware due to their lowered resonance that Rohan himself was watching with a twinkle in his eye . The sagely older seraph had agreed to return to his duties, and as much fun as exploring the museum had been, so too, was it time to return to his own.

People of all kinds surrounded by his friends, all quietly taking a moment to gather in their own way before the restored tree, life and light resplendent in the area where the most energy felt concentrated. It was an oddly lonely feeling, as much as it brought him equal measures joy.

One day… seraphim and humans would give offerings in plain sight. Such a dream surely could be realized, and it went beyond just being the world’s Shepherd, or whatever titles he’d accumulated, some less kind. It was alright, he always thought, after a particularly nasty look or doubtful face. It was alright, he repeated again, in his mind, as sunlight filtered through the trees.

Had the earth beneath Elysia always been so beautiful if proper respect for the seraphim was restored? Had life truly been so beautiful? Had he just been waiting for moments like this to arrive in a blissful, but limited world of being the only one of his kind, and in a sense, to this day, the only one still?

( I’m glad to exist in an era like this, if it means I can do something.. )

Keeping a watchful, but thoughtful glance at the villagers, emerald gaze ever softer and softer, Sorey contemplated their next course of action —

❛ They’ll name constellations after you one day. ❜

A sweet, yet oddly dignified tenor echoed in his ear; knowing violet eyes flitting to his gentle countenance, presently set off-guard.

Ah, this kind of thing. He couldn’t say he really enjoyed that type of praise much less any praise, but the Shepherd couldn’t say he wasn’t grateful for the support either. It was a thin line to walk.

Wasn’t this girl frequenting the Dumnonia museum before he gently called her away back towards the Inn? Those rich, purple eyes should have warned him, should have made him distrust her, even find him questioning if she meant it or was mocking him.

But Sorey had never really grown into thinking that way, for better, or for worse.

A hand rises to sheepishly rub at the back of his head; feather earrings jingling with the motion. ❝ Oh! Uh…you were at the Dumnonia Museum. I’m sorry about before.

There was a lot of danger…it should be much safer now though, if you’d like to go back. You like art, don’t you? A-And history! I really…appreciate that in people, y’know? We should respect history. ❞ He tried dodging the comment; wishing to avoid it entirely, feeling praise was undeserved when he merely was doing what he felt was right and wished to do as himself…

… but her eyes kept demanding an answer; and the sun-bright smile on his face, equal measures nervous to maintain some kind of distraction from far too lofty praise when he hadn’t even done it alone and the urge to converse on their shared love in exploration would have to wait. A softer smile paints his lips; still flustered if the coloring faint to his tanned cheeks was any indication.

❝ Ah, um, right. You want..an answer to that? I want to thank you but I really didn’t…do it by myself. I don’t know how I can explain how, but hopefully one day you’ll understand. ❞

Someday you all will, that’s what I want to believe in.

❝ But thank you. I mean, it’s still really kind of you to say that. Me in the annals of ancient history…or in the stars I’ve counted so much as a kid. I guess anyone would kill for something like that, huh? Does this mean you…might? ❞

Did she believe he was the Shepherd? Could she see Rohan? He ought to ask Lailah whether or not she had any resonance…although, ultimately it didn’t matter. His dream would live on, as would his steady, onward march towards growth and belief in this world so worthy of protecting and enriching. Both in prosperity and his wish to invoke harmony between humans and seraphim.

❝ Truthfully that isn’t why I’m here. To make history for myself. Sure who wouldn’t want their name in a cool plaque or endless ruins to find just focused on them? The ultimate memorial for people who pass on someday, humans…and seraphim. A lot of people would do a lot of things just to get that praise from you.

But…is it okay if I don’t really feel I deserve so much credit aside from how kind it is to say? I just..don’t really think I could ever hope to earn that..and I don’t really want to. There’s a dream I have to see through to the end. That’s all.

I’d much rather the results of that not be something that becomes ruins but lives on forever like the stars that we can now freely see in Marlind.. that’s worth being in constellations. People being in peace like this. Worshiping the Lord of the Land and this domain. Places free of that odd feeling you get that weighs you down like a dark cloud in your chest.

If anything gets immortalized from my end, I think I’d want my dream to be cemented as something that lasts forever, no matter the struggles. Long, long, after I’m gone. It isn’t impossible. That’s..all.❞

How little you know, Gentle Shepherd!

A finger goes to scratch his cheek; gloved hand lowering as he lifts those bright emerald eyes to her face; smiling warmly and gently, as if a sun had dimmed itself so not to outshine itself and blind in its brightness.

Hasty to change the subject lest his cheeks glow any brighter with vermilion; the fledgling Shepherd hastily adds, no less cheerily, smile sincere:

❝ S-So! Yeah! Marlind! Uh, do you live here? In Marlind. I-I mean of course you do, h-haha, or you wouldn’t be here right now. I- I’m really happy things are back to normal whether or not you do live here! I-IIIII.... should stop talking.

There were some composition pieces from ruins I thought might have been possibly even from the Asgard Era. Since you couldn’t go see them before, because of me, are you going to go back and see them soon? I can’t stay much longer but…if you do go back, mind if I tag along for a bit?

It’s not every day someone appreciates history to the point of wanting to find all the secrets and hidden things we’ve missed all these centuries. I’d really love to hear a local’s opinion before I move on. I hate to leave but…well, more ruins are calling, right? ❞

While malevolence waited for no one to destroy lives like it had here.

#asterites #i take forever so i give you a long reply #bc ilu!!#i hope you like it ailli #big sis stella #☀ IC┊: to carry a passion for life and dreams; to carry the world’s as if your own.#☀ ASKS┊: never confessing to knowing everything; instead each day i learn.

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