#more shitty screengrabs

[ioannemos]

BEHOLD

a BABBY

bonus:

disgust.png

[thetrashywritingwitch]

Despite his parents' success in fashion and design, Katsuki just doesn't get it. That kind of visual creativity isn't something he naturally inherited like his quirk or how he annoyingly is the spitting image of his mother. It never seemed important. What benefit could he get out of art that would help him as a Hero? To him, jack shit.

Yeah, someone designed his suit and support items. Or rather, brought his shitty doodle idea to life. But that's their job, not his. He still remembers being scolded for folding one of his dad's client sketches into a paper airplane and sailing it out the second story window.

He barely remembers the middle school field trip to an art museum. Didn't pay attention to whatever the guide had to say, and didn't much care. Katsuki and his lackeys friends just joked around the entire time. All the weird, abstract stuff was ugly. All the realistic stuff was boring. No painting was gonna prove important to meeting his goal.

... However, it pissed him off that the stupid art classes he had to take caused him so much grief. He could easily get an A in every other class, but the string of B's in every art class from middle school up through UA felt like a stain on his good record. Why the hell did he need to draw vases and shit anyway?!

Katsuki Bakugo sucked at art, and he hated it. It was the one thing he couldn't figure out. He could study and memorize for a test, easy. He could practice and train to perfect his quirk, strength, and endurance. But all his drawings were rough and sloppy. His lines were shaky and uneven. Painting was messy, and if he fucked up, he couldn't easily erase it or start over like a math problem. Whatever, he didn't need to know this stuff anyway. Waste of time and energy when he had more important things to worry about.

So it comes as an uncomfortable shock when a friend sends him a DM of some art they found. "Hey it's you!! Saw this on my feed." And it's... Yeah, it's him. The tags at the bottom confirm it. Of course, his actual account wasn't tagged because he goes out of his way to actively avoid people begging for his attention so badly.

But it's weird. It's not some high impact action shot. Or copy of his unsightly mug screengrabbed from an interview. He's calm. Serene, almost. He never saw himself as "pretty" or whatever the weirdo fan clubs call him. He's got scars on scars and a scowl deep enough to reach the Earth's molten core.

He never considered the difference between how artists see the world vs how he sees it. Or how he sees himself. Is that why it never clicked? He lacks an ability that can't be acquired by training or studying harder than everyone else?

It makes him grimace.

Clicking your profile, he scrolls the gallery to see that it's all art. His portrait isn't the most recent, either. There's this confidence in the mark-making, like you know how it's gonna look before the brush hits the paper. And he knows something about confidence - that to back it up, you gotta work for it.

He knows the bubble of jealousy, too. But that's stupid. This stuff doesn't do him any good. It's not useful. It doesn't help him. So why does he absentmindedly push the "Follow" button before hiding his phone in his back pocket?

The notification ding vibrates your phone as you're eating lunch. Another spam text to block? Surprisingly, no. "New follower on Instagram: Dynamight_Official"

[youcallyourselfafilmcritic]

Yes I shouldn't be encouraging Lily Orchard by watching her content but curiousity got the better of me on the latest one and-SURPRISE-more excuses to shit on her pet hate shows but noticed something funny:

I watched through the credits because she took (unshockingly) a really shitty dig at Ant because he's the new Figure of All That is Bad that she cycles through cause I guess continuing to dig at Courtney was a bad look I don't know

So I checked her credits to see if she actually referenced the video cause she cut his user out of the screengrab (while still making it super easy to find ofc) and this popped out at me.

I mentioned her about her history of plagiarising and it actually got her to block me which LOL but notice the end credit: "Stolen Observations"

Now I absolutely do not think I pissed this woman off enough for her to do this-and said in that post she's been called out for this shit a lot more (my post even said her lifting stylistically from Harris is not that big a deal cause EVERYBODY did it)-but what does this even mean?!

You don't need to credit for this and it's a weird roundabout way of like what she thinks will spite people pointing this out? Cause it's not "observations" people are calling her out for stealing-it's mostly jokes and lifting formats wholecloth while doing little to do much to change them

(aside: it's fine to be inspired to format a video like a creator that inspired you-YMS' earlier stuff lifted a lot from Red Letter Media but he eventually grew into his own identity. Lily just grabs stuff from people she thinks are successful and doesn't do much from there)

If this IS in response to the plagiarism accusations (again not mine I assume she just saw my post in the tag saw it was negative blocked me and never thought of me again) it's such a weird desperate thing do so really? This one bizarre video credit is more fascinating to me than the entire rest of the video

[woodstoneb-b]

Hello and welcome to Woodstone Manor - I have been here since the beginning, this house growing up in my shadow. A majestic mighty tree that has stood the test of

Nah this is weird...I'm Jay Arondekar and this is all just a simulation. Because video games are awesome and so is this ability my wife, Sam has. She can see ghosts!

She inherited this house from her Great Aunt and after falling down the stairs and kind of dying for a bit - she got better! - she can see actually see and hear ghosts.

There's 8 of them haunting here (well...not exactly, but more on that later)

This is them! Well, almost all of them... From left to right - Trevor aka "No Pants" (fortunately this game doesn't let Sims go pantsless, but he absolutely insisted on me putting him in tiny underpants after this...weirdo.) He's a finance bro from 2000 - he worked at Lehman Brothers (yeah those guys), despite this he's not as shitty as you'd think.

Then there's Sasappis, he goes by Sass (a well deserved nickname my wife tells me), he's a Lanape who's tribe used to live on the land here and he died back in the 1500s. Despite that he really loves TV.

Next to him is Flower - and you can totally guess where she's from right? The 1960s. She died on the property after trying to hug a bear, drugs were involved. She's cool though, if a bit spacey.

The guy next to her is an honest to God Viking from like the year 1000. Did you know there were Vikings in New York?! I did not so this was pretty epic to find out. According to my wife the good news about Thorfinn aka Thor - he's learnt to speak English, the bad news - he talks a lot about murdering and pillaging, also cod, salmon...any fish really.

And your eyes do not deceive you, next to Thor is a soldier from the Revolutionary War - Captain Isaac Higgintoot, who you can learn all about by reading my wife's recently released book on him The Forgotten Founding Father: The Isaac Higgintoot Story - available from all good bookstores! He died from dysentery, but we don't talk about that

The guy in front who looks like boy scout, is not a boy scout, he's Pete, Pine Cone Troop Leader and awesome travel agent (kids ask your parents about that), he's from the 80s, loves D&D, basketball.

And in the back wearing the eyecatching red, is Alberta who you may have heard about from the monthly Murder at the Manor?! podcast hosted by my wife and Todd Pearlman complete and a total loon who has one of Alberta's toenails and wants to clone her she was a raising star in the Jazz Age and her loss is utter tragedy for the music world.

And this is Henrietta "Hetty" Woodstone aka the owner of Woodstone Manor - well, that would actually be my wife, since Hetty is a ghost, but yeah. She wanted a screengrab of just her because as the owner of Woodstone she deserves it. She and her asshole (we're not striking that out? No? OK) husband/cousin, Elias - Mill Owners and Robber Barons built Woodstone in the 1850s. Apparently, there was a house on it when they started, but they made it the place it is today.

Here's the ground floor layout, there's a Ballroom, a Library, a Music Room and a Games Room. So yeah, the Woodstone's were rolling in it!

The first floor, where the bedrooms are, there's actually 9 of them - well 8 if you don't include the Owner's Suite, or 6 if you take out the ghosts' bedrooms (why do ghosts need their own bedrooms? Because getting walked through hurts. They bunk up, Thor and Trevor share the Private Living Room so that means only 3 bedrooms are out of commission. Although the one marked "Spruce" isn't actually available yet because of a terrible mould issue so there's actually 5 guest rooms at the B&B in real life. But for the purposes of the game here, each Ghost gets their own room, again! They're pretty jealous of their simselves to be honest.

We have a basement with an actual secret Vault in it! Sadly, the visions I had a piles of gold ala Scrooge McDuck did not come to be. But you can drink wine down there now, it's accessed by a secret room and passageway. Where exactly is the secret door? You'll have to visit us to find out!

There's also a whole group of ghosts in the hot water heater room that died of Cholera, my wife says be glad you can't see them.

And finally the attic, you don't wanna go up there, it's full of old stuff including metal things that are probably a tetanus hazard. Also there's a ghost of a teenage girl up there, she got murdered on her way to prom in the late 80s and she's pretty pissed about it. Which is totally understandable, although she's also a huge mean girl and that sucks.

So now you have a bit of background! Tune in next time to see how the Ghosts settle in and their excitement at actually being able to leave the Manor grounds! (Did you know Ghosts are bound to the places they haunt? Turns out they are...which is why my wife and I have to put up with them)

[writerobscura]

[IMAGES] Screengrab of conversation on Mastodon.

[Image 1 - Unknown User: Wait, so Kit Connor gets accused of 'baiting the gay' during his heartstopper publicity days, but no one puts Sebastian Croft on blast for doing the same shit while promoting 'Billy Walsh.' 0__o Yeah, he's out - but, like, his co-stars ain't?? Don't get me started on how he hangs all over his co-stars during publicity runs. It feels grossly familiar - like, scripted romance off-the-set kind of bullshit that K-drama publicists invent for the clicks.]

[Image 2 - Unknown User Reply: I didn't realise Bash was even officially out. I saw the endless TikToks with what I guessed (but didn't like to assume) was a boyf, but I stopped following him recently - for the same kind of reasons you mention here.]

[Image 3 - Unknown User: I assume everyone’s bi until they tell me different 😆 but like, how is he getting away with this shit but Connor gets dragged for it? I still laugh at that video where Locke, Connor, and Croft, are watching scenes from HS and Connor literally chides Croft for flirting with him. 😆 ]

Image 4 - Unknown User Reply: I guess because more people assumed that Croft was queer, but that Connor wasn't, when HS aired. And some may *still* believe that despite Connor's fuck-you-all-I'm-bi tweet, and Croft's vagueness. Hence for Croft it's confirming what everyone assumed so ~whatever~, but Connor was just a "straight boy putting on an act". Plus some people conflating Kit with Nick, drinking the parasocial KoolAid, and feeling entitled to have him tick the gay box so they think they have a chance.

[Image 5 - Unknown User: the parasocial shit annoys me. There’s two of those wakadoos over at LPSG on the Joe Locke thread – which is the bitchiest thread I’ve ever left. 😓 1/2 ]

[Image 6 - Unknown User: 2/2 As an aging fujo/fudan, it makes me cringe. True Fu's enjoy injecting queerness into stories traditionally meant for hets. Always fiction, never real life. Girls gushing over actors' queer-flirting reeks of homophobia – they’re viewing them as romantic or sexual entertainment. That’s a shitty way to interact with gay people because it leads to homophobic crap like - hey kiss for us, hey be gay for us… Real fujo/fudan don’t do that shit because most of us are queer.]

[dynamoe]

Original Team Venture Items from Now Museum Now You Don't (as collected in the Go Team Venture book)

I only drew that Talkin' Rusty doll to give Li'l Billy something to play with but now I guess I gotta draw all the mid-'70s merchandise The Rusty Venture Show generated so adult Billy can buy it off eBay. I'm gonna have to draw so much shit...

↓ Come Be Obsessive-Compulsive with Me Below the Cut ↓

Where does Billy keep all the vintage The Rusty Venture Show merchandise he wins on eBay? It's not on display anywhere in the trailer, unless it's in the back room that was never shown in an episode. Maybe it's just stuffed into all the built-in cabinets all over the walls? Like squirrel hiding away nuts and he forgets where he stashed them.

I'll have to go in and take screen caps of the episodes that show merchandise to see what already exists.

↑ Action Man dune buggy, Talkin' Jonas doll, Pez, jam jar glasses, board game, bobble heads, Jonas Venture air rifle and... bubble bath bottles, maybe?

(I just noticed there's no Colonel Gentleman products. Hmmmm.)

This is all Original Team Venture merch, not The Rusty Venture Show stuff. No Rusty toys at all in this episode. Those would be distinct and different fandoms. Team Venture seems to be a decade before the cartoon... the references are solidly '60s not '70s.

↑ The same stuff as above, in the episode's background, plus the X-1 plane and X-2 yacht models and some kinda aircraft carrier (?) on a plinth to the left.

I do love that Otto Aquarius Ben Cooper box costume. (Now I'm definitely making a shitty plastic-y Halloween costume for Li'l Billy— a mask that won't fit on his face with awkward eye holes and a plastic drape that says RUSTY VENTURE on it.)

Billy collects The Rusty Venture Show cartoon exclusively which had members of Team Venture as characters (but not as the focus). But mind-reading revealed he subconsciously desired that merchandise. Then stole some of this stuff when Spider Skull Island was going to blow up, so does he collect the older pre-cartoon merchandise or was it a crime of opportunity?

↑pillow, framed headshot, magazine, barrel bank, TV guide, statuette, posters, giant doll

Dermott's sister-mother Nikki's room. I need to rewatch this scene from Everybody Comes to Hank's and take better screengrabs. I see her stuff as more fan club "exclusives" made for the collector's market rather than vintage toys. On the coffee table is a Rusty-in-a-Barrel coin bank and a standing Rusty Venture statuette/maquette— both bought at whatever in-universe stands in for the Disney Store/WB Studio Store— Billy would definitely own those, too.

❓→The giant plush Rusty doll at bottom right… do you think she made that or is it a commercial product? Seems like a fan-made thing.

↑ I already drew the Rusty Venture pajamas. Billy wears 40+ year old pajamas. That can't be comfortable. He got them as deadstock— never worn vintage PJs— so that's why they still look new. He bought a whole pallet of them— he has multiples.

↑... plus the merchandise they made for The Rusty Venture Show for real, too (lunchbox, MEGOs and shirt) I hate how the "Rusty" doesn't match the "Venture," pulled from the Venture Bros title. Mixed case vs. All Caps. It's killing me.

✔️ I gotta make myself a "to draw" list of all the merchandise in Billy's collection.

[fandomshatewomen]

thanks for the explanation i truly appreciate it

i think what's made us have diverging opinions on this matter is the fact that i didn't know paper girls is an adaptation of a comic book. i don't even watch the show. i sent the original ask because i looked at images of tiffany on google and have watched stranger things (erica is one of my favorite characters, the other one being argyle) and agreed with the op instead of your reply.

im also of the opinion that people will always look like other people, there's no getting around that. we have a limited gene pool and there's only so many variations you can make by mixing and matching that incredibly unique faces are really really rare (i'd say steve buscemi has the only unique face in hollywood - at least off the top of my head).

im not upset at people in my hometown mistaking me for my mother since we look really similar (we sound similar too, everyone double checks if it's her or me picking up a phone). im also not upset at people constantly mistaking me for a different girl when i moved to my uni town because we looked very similar. never met the girl before then, we're 100% not related in any way.

so when i see people look like other people, that's all that it is to me. an example of how despite 8 billion people on this planet (im ahead by a few days with this number lol) we're still all the same. but i do appreciate the explanation that it's not the case for everyone and sometimes it goes far deeper than what i perceive it as. so thank you!

you're this anon

so story time. like ok even though I grew up with a very racially diverse family ppl used to insist I had a doppelganger and it used to mess with my head because the girl (although I'm p sure she was half mexican versus my full mexican from both sides) they thought looked like me was just fat and had frizzy hair like me. which like ok?? my lips are bigger my nose is bigger we had different interests. and more importantly I got the feeling when we were in college that people used to tell her the same thing. Like I'm fairly lightskinned.

which is literally a screengrab from my channel https://www.youtube.com/user/AliciaThePhoenix

Like I have a lot of privilege in terms of colorism and I hated being compared to another person constantly throughout middleschool high school and my first few years of college. but the thing is this experience is not unique to me and I can prove it. my mom who's seventy now constantly compares all black men to my 2 black uncles that married into the family despite significant differences in height, weight, features, and hair. I've tried telling both my mom and dad (he does some similar stuff) about anti blackness they obviously have. and like I know they passed it on to me and my sister. but like its frustrating because they're so old now its just an uphill battle.

so like while I don't constantly have to deal with people mistaking me for other ppl as much now I do remember how shitty it feels to constantly be compared to others just because ppl can't be bothered to get to know me for who I am.

one more story before I let this go. when I was in college I actually had a work friend that I started bringing around to my friends gatherings. mind you my friends and I all went to high school and middle school together. I had history with them. but this work friend was also an alicia. instead of calling me alicia #1 (because I was previously the only Alicia they knew) or her blonde alicia they started calling me Mexican Alicia. Mind you this went on for years and it got to the point that I had to cut ties with the majority of them because I was really feeling tokenized and belittled. before I cut ties with them I tried to get them to call me Ali instead but still some of them insisted on calling me Mexican Alicia.

this is very painful for me to talk about but like there's a reason that "faceblindness" and racism go hand in hand. if you live in a white majority country you're trained to think of whites as the norm and everyone else is othered.

tldr: In all these situations it's shitty to assume that constant comparisons with other people is really so innocent. despite my lightskinned privilege I've learned and witnessed that dark skinned Black people have it even worse than I do. and like that just breaks my heart.

mod ali

[strangerinaholyplace]

A SUMMONING BUT I UNDERSTOOD THAT REFERENCE

OKAY KIDDOS TIME FOR ANALYZING THE SHIT OUT OF THIS

first of all I am only pointing out the more obscure/less noticeable/weird stuff I found, because y’all ain’t dumb and you’ve obviously seen the Demolition Lovers and the Dracs, so!

numero uno!!

hello mikeyway glasses (not exactly, but close) and I’m Not Okay inhaler!

numero dos!

y’all have probably seen her but I cried a bit soooo PANSY!!! (I’m so sorry for the shitty screengrabs btw i am not as they say hip with the computer stuffs so i just did some printscreens from yt) 

(ugh that is really bad quality sorry)

numero tres!

I am actually kinda bummed that i don’t know what that eye is (unless it’s the eye from the post box in the desert in nanana???) BUT! the picture top right corner is from The Black Parade Is Dead! In Mexico! yay!

(also i got tired of cropping the screenshots in paint so you’re getting timestamps now too lol)

numero quatro! (someone stop me i don’t know if I can count that high in spanish lo siento)

you know WHAT THEY DO TO GUYS LIKE US IN PRISOOOOON

NUMERO CINQUE (I THINK?)

most of y’all already caught that from the previous teaser but mister chemical romances jacket! raymond himself wore that!! 

NUMERO CINQUE AND A HALF

while we’re on the topic of clothes, here’s the famous skeleton hoodie that i’m still not sure if it was franks or gerards??? anyway 13yo me was obsessed with it but i didn’t have the money for one

NUMERO SEIS

speaking of interesting fashion choices... i actually have one of those. and that’s all i’m gonna say bout that. TEENAGERS! YAY!

numero sieteeeeee

now we don’t have time to unpack all of this SIKE WE DO 

this is actually a bit sad, sorry! It’s everyone who passed away, and so i actually numbered the pictures to give you a quick rundown:

oh and before that - dia de los muertos skull! and matches that will be relevant later!

1. & 2. I’m pretty sure that’s franks grandparents on his mothers side, but don’t hold me to that!

3. imo this is Dixie, bob bryars dog???? i am confusion but also i get it, they’re all good dogs brent

4. is probably peppers?? i don’t even know anymore y’all im a fake fan, he has too many fucking dogs i can’t keep up

5.  Lauren Valencia, their tour manager who passed last year from cancer

6. with a better view below is fronks grandpa! the drummer! he has a tattoo of him made by k*t v*n d

7. i am about 86.2% sure that’s Elena Way, but i don’t think gerard or mikey ever shared any pictures of her, so i’m not gonna say for sure!

8. that’s mister chemical romance senior! rays dad, who let me say looks like freddie mercury and i respect that

9. oh no another dog ummm uhh eyyy idk sweat pea??? maybe?? idk i need like a separate wiki page just for franks dogs

10. i actually don’t know who that is either so pls lmk if you do! (i feel like i’ve seen his face before but can’t place it, sorry!)

(bonus pic of mr Iero Sr.!)

OH ALSO

Our Lady Of Sorrows is the way Madonna is presented with seven swords in her heart for the seven sorrows lbh you all have read the unholyverse and know what’s up 

numero idek i got lost ocho maybe??

random old revenge era gerard way art on the wall idk thought you might’ve missed it

NUMERO NUEVE (i remembered)

I know y’all have seen it but i’m really excited about it!!!! so here it is again,,,,,, hotel bella muerte keyring!

NUMERO DIEZ!!!

NOW WE’RE GETTING INTO IT HELL YEAH LETS GO LESBIANS LETS GO

GAY VAMPIRES IN NEON COLORS THIS IS WHAT I MEAN WHEN I SAY THIS BAND HAS NEVER BEEN STRAIGHT

oh and here’s rays medic helmet from ghost of you and the STARVED TO DEATH IN A LAND OF PLENTY banner from wttbp (that banner is still the most communist thing gerard ever did and i am in love with it) from two povs so you can see better!

NUMERO ONCE! (wow i can’t believe i still remember how to count in spanish)

WRITINGS ON THE WAAAAAAALLLLS this is my favorite part for two reasons: 1. i’m pretty sure gerard did that graffiti himself because that’s his xoxo shape and 2. i love graffiti! and mcr! and mcr graffiti! ok lets go

she loves you on the left and saints protect her now on the right side of kids head, in green paint next to it is UNLEASH THE BATS also i’m not sure what the relevance of Alien Blaster is but our boys always were nerds so oh well

above and behind the middle drac are the whispers!! you know which whispers!! the one at the end of vampires!!!  also kinda cut off but at the very top it says DIE IN THE DESERT and behind the gentleman on our right i’m pretty sure is heaven help us!!! 

NUMERO DOCE (i’m really proud of myself rn)

and we’re back to the matches! 

btw this shot is dope as fuck and i love venom so much

NUMERO..... (shit now i’m bummed) 13..... idk how it is in spanish :(((((

we’re in the parade now! not much to unpack here except desolation row from watchmen which to this day is my favourite mcr music video!!!!

numero.. CATORCE! I REMEMBER!

HELL YEAH BABY I’M NOT OKAY REFERENCE

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST

i know y’all have seen it it wasn’t really subtle, but i wanted to throw in my theory! that’s not teenagers! or even the helium wars! THAT SYMBOLIZES THE BREAK UP! thanks for coming to my ted talk

i’m sorry if this makes less sense than the video itself my adhd will not stop today but i had to make this!! even if everyone has seen all of that before i’m proud that i got all of it in here!! thanks and have a nice us tour from us here in the europes 

[ioannemos]

okay 2.01 is also clownshoes for the most part. however,

can we talk about malcolm's shoes. bc he wears heels. i'm losing it

[letmetellyouaboutmyfeels]

Mads!! I was wondering if you had some thoughts on Bi!Wyatt because you write him so well and he is, uh, at least 50000% more interesting than I Am Wyatt Logan And I Am Definitely Straight!Wyatt. I JUST HAVE A LOT OF BI!WYATT FEELS

Oh. Oh you wanna know about Bi!Wyatt. Oh ho ho. This. This is gonna be fun.

AKA the Why Wyatt is Bi Meta That I Probably Should’ve Written a Year Ago But Didn’t Because I’m Lazy. BUCKLE UP BUTTERCUPS. THIS IS A FUCKING MANIFESTO.

This will be in two parts. The first will be my arguing why I think Wyatt is bi (pointing out examples that support my argument) and the second will be musing on why taking a character like Wyatt and making him bi is a more creative and interesting writing choice and gives him depth and complexity as a character.

PROLOGUE

Okay before we get started, people are probably wondering why I’m putting so much goddamn effort into writing about the possible sexuality of a character that managed to royally piss us all off for two thirds of an entire season.

Two reasons:

The first is that as I’ve mentioned countless times previously, Wyatt Logan isn’t a malicious person. He’s not a villain. He’s had genuinely good and loving moments. His toxic behavior actually makes him a wonderful example to people watching because it shows how otherwise good men can exhibit this behavior, and in my fiction I love to give him a chance to overcome that behavior and be the good and loving person that he can be and was meant to be. @brassmama once said I should start tagging all my fic “The Emotional Redemption of Wyatt Logan” and frankly, she’s right. That’s what I set out to do. Because to me, just hating on Wyatt and wanting to set him on fire is fucking boring.

also the amount of hate some of you show is concerning me are you guys okay?

Why hate when you can stretch your writing skills and give a character a thorough and well-earned redemption arc? Because shocking news, a lot of the toxic people we meet in our lives are not one-dimensional villains that we can dismiss. It’s not our job to fix them but by golly don’t you hope that they grow past that and become better people? I know I do.

Second, my anger at Wyatt isn’t actually mostly at Wyatt. It’s at the writers. It’s at the shitty boring writers who decided to just hand him his happy ending instead of taking the golden opportunity before them to give him a nice deep and complex redemption arc. It’s at the writers who decided to make him a toxic asshole in the first place instead of taking all his potential in season one and putting it to damn good use and making him a character who was interesting for all the right reasons instead of making him one who was interesting because he pissed us off. Two strikes means you’re out in this particular game, writers.

So. I didn’t come onto this goddamn blue hellsite in order to adopt Wyatt motherfucking Logan of all characters but since I am his mother now I am going to make him interesting and I am going to give him his emotional redemption and one of the best ways to do that is to make him bi so without further ado, here is a) why I think he’s bi and b) why that matters.

PART THE FIRST: LA PREUVE!!!

Before we get into this, I suggest that you quickly read my meta on why I see Wyatt Logan as submissive rather than dominant. It touches on some moments I’ll be mentioning here and helps to further round out how I see his character.

Let’s start at the beginning, shall we? With our favorite British spy, Ian Fleming, in 1x04. This is Wyatt’s reaction when he learns that it’s Fleming they’re dealing with:

“NOT NOW BONER!”

“Oookay that’s hot, he’s hot.”

“Oh oh oh he’s funny and cute aaaahhh”

“LUCY LUCY LUCY DID YOU SEE OHMYGOD DID YOU SEE WHO THAT IS AAAAHHH!!!!” *puppy eyes*

What’s important to note here isn’t just Wyatt’s reaction, but Lucy’s. Lucy is looking at Wyatt with a bit of fond exasperation–she’s saying “seriously?” Rufus has a similar reaction a moment later (although it was too quick for a screengrab, dammit). It’s like they’re annoyed, in a gentle friend way, by Wyatt’s behavior.

Note that Lucy’s geeking out and hero worship is never greeted with suspicion or fond annoyance by Rufus, Wyatt, and later on Flynn. Lucy’s hero worship and knowledge of historical characters is considered one of her strengths, because it allows her to get close to them. So why are Lucy and Rufus reacting this way when Wyatt hero worships someone?

Maybe because it’s not hero worship but, rather, a crush. Lucy and Rufus’s reactions much better fit friends dealing with their friend and the object of his affection.

We see this again in 2x2 with Wendell Scott. Scott makes what can only be described as a ‘sexy entrance’, throwing a man out of his tent and striding out while rock music plays, the camera panning up his body. *fans self* Oh hello sailor.

And the camera goes immediately to Wyatt who has THIS expression on his face right before saying breathlessly, “that’s…”

Wyatt then rushes in to defend Scott (who is just… hhnngghhh… sorry I need a moment that man is a Lot…) and shakes Scott’s hand with this look on his face:

If this isn’t the definition of heart eyes I don’t know what is.

When Scott compliments Wyatt, Wyatt blushes and looks away, pleased and embarrassed. Wyatt then spends the entire episode gooey eyed over Scott, and in a telling moment, tells Scott about his abusive father–private and intimate information that not even Lucy, Wyatt’s official love interest, knows about. It would make far more sense for Wyatt to tell Lucy about all this since she and Rufus are clearly wondering why Wyatt’s so knowledgeable about cars, and Lucy is Wyatt’s chief confessor at this point. Out of everyone, you’d think he’d be most comfortable telling Lucy about something like this.

But instead, he tells Scott about his father, clearly wanting to connect with Scott and be closer to him. This is something you see people do all the time when they have a crush on someone or are attracted to them: we tell them intimate details about our life in order to grow closer to them, intended to speed up the relationship process and stimulate them to be intimate with us in return (since we want to know everything we can about the people with whom we are infatuated).

Moreover, Wyatt’s reactions to Scott contrast Rufus’s reactions. Rufus also greatly admires Scott, and their growing connection as two black men despite their differences based on the times they live in is central to the emotional plot of the episode. But once again, Lucy and Rufus are basically telling Wyatt to “cool it.” Why Wyatt and not Rufus? Because with Wyatt, they’re not telling him just to calm down, they’re telling him to keep it in his pants.

Another thing to note about Fleming in 1x04 is that Wyatt is envious of his interactions with Lucy. Here’s his reaction when Fleming kisses Lucy’s hand:

🎶HEY JEALOUSYYYYYYY 🎶

Not the best screengrab but he’s trying his damndest not to roll his eyes.

Now, we the audience are probably supposed to make the jump in logic that Wyatt is envious of Fleming i.e. Wyatt is attracted to Lucy. But in the previous episode, 1x03, Wyatt tried to use the telegram system at the Vegas hotel to warn Jess of her death and save her life. He’s still hung up on his dead wife and wants to save her (we see this again in 1x06 when Flynn states outright from the journal that Wyatt is ‘obsessed’ with Jess and bringing her back). At this point in the series, Wyatt is still in love with his wife and wants her back. There’s no reason for him, therefore, to feel possessive of Lucy in any way.

But Fleming is Wyatt’s hero, not Lucy’s. So if Wyatt is attracted to Fleming, his envy makes sense. He’s envious of Lucy for getting all of Fleming’s flirtation and attention.

However, conversely we see that Wyatt is uncomfortable around other men who might show him interest. In 1x16 at the gay club, we see that Wyatt is extremely discomforted and stated that he “feels like a piece of meat.” Wyatt has so far been perfectly comfortable with LGBT+ people such as Denise, and then he’s comfortable with Ethan Cahill later on, so this doesn’t stem from homophobia but specifically from gay men thinking Wyatt is gay. I admit I’m drawing from personal experience here but in said personal experience, men who react with such discomfort tend to be suppressing a few things themselves–most straight men I know would laugh it off or roll their eyes.

Wyatt, however, is outright skittish. He’s acting like he’s got something to hide. Our first indication is when Lucy says, “This is 1954. You could get arrested for being gay.”

I couldn’t get a good enough shot of Wyatt’s reaction but here’s the tail end of it. Wyatt reacts to this assertion with discomfort and self-consciousness. Why would he do that? It’s not like they’re talking about him… unless Lucy’s reminder that people think being gay isn’t okay has painfully reminded Wyatt of himself. Wyatt grew up in a small town in Texas. I doubt they were all that kind to LGBT+ people there.

This is Wyatt right after a guy checks him out:

Check out his face. Wyatt’s avoiding the guy’s eyes, shifting uncomfortably, looking at the ground. Look at those puppy eyes. He’s scared–but why would he be scared? He’s not going to get jumped or anything. What could he possibly be fearing? The only thing that makes sense is he fears being outed, somehow, by another gay man who might be perceptive enough to metaphorically back him into a corner and force Wyatt to reveal something that he’s not ready to reveal.

Wyatt then tries to blow it off, “he’s looking at me like I’m a piece of meat,” but if we actually look at the onceover the gay guy gives him… it’s not actually that objectifying. The man looks down, then looks Wyatt right in the eyes and smiles at him flirtatiously. There’s no sloooooow drag up Wyatt’s frame, no wink, no outright leering. It’s quite tame compared to how most men look at women. But Wyatt’s response is that he feels like a piece of meat. His discomfort is actually disproportionate to the action that sparks his reaction.

But of course, all of these examples pale in comparison to the main one. The piece de resistance, the most compelling set of reasons yet, I give you… (drumroll, please)…

GARCIA FLYNN

Wyatt’s reactions to Flynn are… extreme. Rufus and Lucy have more reason to dislike Flynn than Wyatt does, and yet Wyatt’s the one storming all over the place and acting like just being around Flynn gives him an allergic reaction. He’s constantly going out of his way to push Flynn away and show Flynn just how much Wyatt hates him. It’s like Wyatt needs to prove to Flynn–and to everyone else–just how much Wyatt dislikes him.

Like this moment in 2x06 when Wyatt demands that Flynn “keep them safe”:

Note that Flynn winks at him:

was this wink scripted Goran Goran hey hey was this wink scripted or did you do it in the moment because Certified Mess™ Flynn can’t resist flirting with Wyatt to knock him off his game Goran inquiring minds need to know GORAN I HAVE QUESTIONS

And Wyatt is caught off-guard by the wink and then has to turn around and collect himself, taking a deep steadying breath:

Or take this moment when Flynn walks into the bunker in 2x03…

…where Wyatt literally stands up and storms out of the room upon Flynn’s entrance, saying to keep Flynn on a leash. Wyatt can’t even handle being in the same room with Flynn, while Lucy and Rufus (y’know, the guy Flynn got shot in 1x15) manage to stay in the room and have much smaller reactions to Flynn.

Note: Flynn definitely checks out Wyatt’s ass as he leaves I’m just saying–

Wyatt might as well be waving a giant red flag going HEY! HEY! I HATE THIS GUY! IN CASE ANY OF YOU THOUGHT I MIGHT LIKE THIS GUY OR EVEN RESPECT HIM THE TINIEST BIT!

We get even more of this in 2x07 when Wyatt gets extremely aggressive and tells Flynn to stay away from Lucy:

…and they were roommates.

(Oh my God they were roommates.)

…I mean do I even need to talk about the homoerotic subtext in these screenshots?

Wyatt, however, has more reason than anyone besides Lucy to connect with Flynn. Not only because they mirror each other, but because Wyatt gets to see a vulnerable and personal side of Flynn that nobody else does. Flynn doesn’t tell Lucy about his family’s murder–he tells Wyatt. Lucy doesn’t see Flynn risk his own existence to save his brother’s life, Wyatt does. Why does Wyatt get to see these moments if not to set the two men up as a parallel, a mirror for one another, and frankly why does he keep insisting Flynn’s an asshole when Wyatt is privy to moments like these:

Quote: “He just saved your son’s life.”

Quote: “Every memory I have of you, you were always sad. I know what it is to lose a child. I didn’t want you to lose your son, not if I could stop it.”

Moments where we clearly see Wyatt realizing Flynn’s not such a bad guy and understanding that Flynn is complex and has layers and weaknesses and powerful, understandable motivation. Why would we a) get to see Wyatt with Flynn in these moments of vulnerability and intimacy but then b) see Wyatt go out of his way to continually push Flynn away more than anyone else?

This has no bearing on the whole bi thing but frankly, this is one of Wyatt’s best looks. 10/10 suit. Pretty pretty puppy.

There’s only one reason: he’s scared of Flynn getting too close to him. And why would he be scared of that? Same reason he’s scared of the gay men in the bar hitting on him: Flynn might see a secret that Wyatt isn’t ready to look at.

1x08 is Flynn at his third lowest point (second lowest being his suicide mission in 1x16 and lowest of all being the end of 1x10/beginning of 1x11 when he kidnaps Lucy). He is ready to erase his own existence to save his brother and make his mother happy. It would make the most sense for Flynn to be seen like this by Lucy, who is the only character who’s made any attempt to understand him or connect with him and is the one he’s making the most effort to reach out to, the one he says he’ll “make a great team” with someday. Not to mention that given the disappearance of Amy from existence, Lucy’s the one most poised to understand what Flynn’s doing: saving a sibling. And Lucy’s the one (prior to 1x16) with a good relationship with her mom, just like Flynn, and would feasibly understand wanting to do anything to make one’s mother smile. Wyatt’s mother is never even mentioned in canon.

But it’s not Lucy who sees him like this and gets this intimate glimpse into Flynn’s past and home life. It’s Wyatt. Wyatt gets to see that–and usually in fiction writing, the character who gets to see that is the romantic interest or the character who at least has some sort of romantic feeling for the person.

Hmmmmmmm.

But before the Space Race, there was an even more prolonged and intimate moment between the two men–the first real interaction they have and one that, for me, cemented Wyatt as a closeted bisexual.

I’ve left this one for last, since it’s our biggest piece of evidence: The Watergate Tape.

AKA Wyatt Logan Has a Brain Glitch, AKA Wyatt Logan Has a Bi Crisis and Discovers a New Kink, AKA In Which Wyatt Logan Realizes He is Kinkier and Gayer Than He Originally Planned

thank you to @extasiswings for the second title

Aaanyway.

So. In this episode, Flynn captures the Time Team and sends Rufus and Lucy to get information for him while he holds Wyatt hostage.

I think I’ve seen this porno.

Flynn then spends his time with Wyatt telling him about Lucy’s journal and how Lucy writes about Jessica Logan’s death–in fact this is how the audience finally finds out how Jess died–and that Wyatt is ‘obsessed’ with Jess’s death and needs to learn to move on. In return to earn Wyatt’s trust, Flynn tells Wyatt how Flynn’s wife and child were murdered by Rittenhouse (again, this is how the audience also learns the story).

It’s a startlingly intimate moment between the two men. Like with Scott, we’d expect to hear the story of Jess’s death through Wyatt talking to Lucy, the person to whom he is closest and the person who at this point he is starting to show sexual attraction towards (I personally think Wyatt started to really be attracted to Lucy in 1x05 after she steadies him at the Alamo during his PTSD attack but anyhow). But instead, we hear it in a painful and intimate exchange between these two.

Pay attention to how Wyatt gets super uncomfortable when Flynn gets close to him, how he looks up at Flynn through his lashes, how very submissive Wyatt is being with his body language.

“Raise my chin even more to look Flynn directly in the eye? Nah. Gonna do a half-head tilt so I’m giving him a sultry side-eye.”

Wyatt also throughout their exchange (before Flynn pushes Wyatt’s buttons and makes him angry) routinely gives Flynn these looks:

Hmm, where have we seen Wyatt have that facial expression? At Fleming, for one, and at Lucy, for another. It’s a flirtatious expression.

There’s no reason for this screencap I just think it’s preeeetty. Mmm. Bask in the pretty.

Actually this screencap does a good job of illustrating the use of this scene to parallel the two men’s lives and storylines and show how they mirror each other.

Also? Look at how Wyatt’s positioned.

He’s not just in a hugely submissive position, he’s in a sexually suggestive position. He’s tied to a chair, and Flynn is looming over him, both of which are submissive. And look at how his legs are spread. His feet aren’t tied, by the way–Wyatt is doing that subconsciously, which puts, ah, certain aspects on display and in another situation it might be manspreading but given the positioning of the rest of his body and the situation he’s in, I sure as hell wouldn’t be manspreading. Manspreading suggests confidence and relaxation. His life is in danger and when we’re in danger whether we like it or not we instinctively go to protect our ‘vulnerable bits’ including, especially for men, our junk. By spreading his legs like this, Wyatt isn’t asserting his relaxation or confidence, he’s displaying himself.

His legs are spread, he’s tied up, he’s looking up at Flynn through his lashes, and he’s wearing a shirt that’s stretching across his chest, drawing attention to it. Now, in day to day reality, we sometimes wear shirts that do this and it doesn’t mean anything. But this is fiction and that means a costumer put that actor in a shirt that they knew would stretch across his chest in that way and therefore make him look even more sexually suggestive and exposed, and they chose to undo his top buttons and expose more of his throat, making him look more vulnerable and suggestive through that as well.

If Wyatt was, say, hanging from his wrists, that would be submissive, but not sexually suggestive. This, however, is both. The way the two sit together, the way Flynn tries to get on his level, the soft lighting, the way the two are wearing a pastel version of each other’s colors (Flynn’s signature color is burgundy and Wyatt is wearing pink, Wyatt’s signature color is blue and Flynn is wearing pastel blue)… if Wyatt was a woman there’d be no doubt that we’re seeing a prelude to a romantic connection here.

Throughout the whole confrontation with Flynn, up until the point where Wyatt’s angry over Flynn bringing up Jess’s death, Wyatt is in a suggestive, submissive position, he’s giving Flynn flirtatious looks, he’s uncomfortable in a not now boner way when Flynn gets too close the same way he was with Fleming. The whole time Wyatt is acting like he’s uncomfortably aroused.

Wyatt then takes great pains to shove away any connection with Flynn. There’s no real attempt to reason with Flynn, or acknowledge their similarities. Instead he denies any connection between them and calls Flynn a sociopath. Why? Because you can’t let any man to whom you’re attracted too close or he might figure out those dark feelings you’re trying to deny and/or hide. Wyatt is practically allergic to Flynn’s overtures or even to Flynn’s presence, as we already covered in 2x03, 2x06, and so on. But he keeps being given reason to think Flynn isn’t such a bad guy (1x06, 1x08). His shoving Flynn away like this only makes sense if Wyatt is scared of what will happen if Flynn gets too close to him, physically or emotionally. And it all starts here with 1x06.

It was this conversation that led me to go hmmmm and then re-examine 1x04 and take a closer look at Wyatt’s behavior in subsequent episodes.

So, to recap:

Wyatt shows in 1x04 that he is capable of being attracted to a man given his behavior around Fleming and Lucy and Rufus’s reaction to Wyatt’s behavior (”ugh get a room buddy,” etc). This is seen yet again in 2x02. In 1x06, Wyatt has a long conversation with Flynn where it is in a vulnerable position emotionally and physically and is furthermore in a sexually suggestive and submissive position in relation to Flynn. In 1x08 he gets an intimate look into Flynn’s psyche and childhood and family. In 1x16, we see Wyatt is uncomfortable in a LGBT+ setting suggesting he is not comfortable with his own sexuality and is scared of being found out. For all of season two, he then goes out of his way to show Flynn and everyone else how much he absolutely hates Flynn, despite having the least reason to do so, since his only reason is vying for Lucy’s affection and Flynn doesn’t become a true threat to that until 2x06. But in 2x03, 2x06, and 2x07, we see Wyatt making sure Flynn knows he’s not wanted.

Conclusion: Wyatt is bi. Wyatt is uncomfortable with being bi and has not accepted that about himself or perhaps even admitted it to himself. Wyatt is attracted to Flynn, as seen in 1x06, and has tentative romantic feelings for him developed in 1x06 and 1x08 based on seeing Flynn in vulnerable moments and learning intimate details about Flynn’s life. Wyatt then pushes Flynn away in order to push his own bisexuality away and avoid confronting it.

Wyatt being attracted to Flynn is the only logical conclusion for Wyatt’s behavior towards Flynn pre-2x06, given that Lucy and Rufus have more reason to dislike Flynn than Wyatt does, and that Flynn is not a true contender for Lucy’s romantic affection until 2x06 (he is, but Wyatt has ZERO reason to know this until 2x06 when Wyatt sees Flynn and Lucy smiling and joking together and walking down the hallway together, presumably towards one of their bedrooms for a private conversation, and Lucy tells Wyatt how great Flynn was on the mission). Wyatt has no reason other than being attracted to Flynn.

Wyatt being bi is the only logical conclusion for his behavior towards Fleming and Scott, given that Lucy and Rufus also have characters they hero worship and are not treated by the other two the way that Wyatt is when he ‘hero worships’ Scott and Fleming. Compare and contrast Wyatt’s behavior towards Scott with Rufus’s behavior towards Scott.

Wyatt being bi is the only logical conclusion for his behavior at the gay club, given that he is otherwise shown to be comfortable with LGBT+ people and seems not only uncomfortable but genuinely afraid, which as a Delta force-trained man who can more than protect himself physically, he has no reason to be–unless he’s hiding his sexuality and is scared of exposure.

The proof is in the pudding. Wyatt is bi. At least, according to my headcanon he is.

We can’t say for sure what the writers intended for Wyatt’s sexuality, and I’m not saying with any of this that they were secretly writing him as bi the whole time. I’m certain that some of them definitely didn’t write him that way *cough* Arika *cough* but either way I would never presume to know about the secret or hidden agendas of the creative team. This isn’t me saying “the writers were going to reveal Wyatt as bi in season three!” or “they secretly wrote Wyatt to be a closeted bisexual!”

Rather, this is me showing you through screenshots and a breakdown of Wyatt’s behavior in the episodes that it is perfectly possible and even logical to conclude that he is bi, and that I can use the actual source text (in this case the episodes) to back up my assertion.

This got annoyingly long so you can read the rest here!

[iwritesometimes]

y’all, i’m about to lose my goddamn mind

don’t actually watch this video, it’s just a six-minute long MAC commercial. i just want it here as a record it exists. it’s extraordinary. please enjoy my shitty screengrabs of the model just before the ~look~ begins

and of the model with the complete ~look~

and you tell me what’s been done to her. i’ll wait. you can’t, because i swear to jesus these pictures are identical. the lighting’s overhead instead of facing her and she’s thrown on a little light brown lip balm, right? maybe a little mascara.

what the shit is this. i watched this video and i couldn’t even tell you. FOURTEEN PRODUCTS, twenty if you count the six brushes. i literally watched, with my eyes, the artist apply all fourteen products and SAW NOTHING HAPPEN. six minutes of my life watching one woman help the other put on functionally invisible makeup.

oh but wait, i’m not done

yes, folks, for this “glowing, gleaming, and vibrant” look, you need only fork over FIVE HUNDRED AND FIFTY-SIX DOLLARS (AND FIFTY CENTS). for the privilege of spending at least six and more like sixty (because you’re not a professional makeup artist with a video editor in the wings) minutes of your life applying functionally invisible makeup for......................Reasons. i’m sure they’re good ones.

friends, we have been conned, bamboozled, goddamn tricked. we have been systematically gaslighted, lied to, and robbed, for years, in the pursuit of unreachable and ever-shifting standards, always just readjusted out of reach whenever we achieve the next miniscule, incremental advancement in socioeconomic status. and for what? to literally LITERALLY spend the better part of six HUNDRED dollars to look the EXACT SAME AS WE ALWAYS DO. it’s. it’s miraculous in its own way, it’s fucking genius, and if it weren’t so goddamn damaging it’d be a hell of an admirable grift. i just

i need a fuckin drink.

[johnnymundano]

Rolling Thunder (1977)

Directed by John Flynn

Screenplay by Paul Schrader and Heywood Gould

Music by Barry De Vorzon

Country: United States

Running Time: 95 minutes

CAST

William Devane as Major Charles Rane

Tommy Lee Jones as Sergeant Johnny Vohden

Linda Haynes as Linda Forchet

James Best as The Texan

Dabney Coleman as Maxwell

Luke Askew as Automatic Slim

Lawrason Driscoll as Deputy Cliff Nichols

Lisa Blake Richards as Janet Rane

Randy Hermann as Billy Sanchez

James Victor as Lopez

Charles Escamilla as T-Bird

Pete Ortega as Melio

Cassie Yates as Candy

Jordan Gerler as Mark

Jacque Burandt as Bebe

Paul A. Partain as Ethan

James N. Harrell as Grandpa

(Guilt Trauma: I was to busy flashbacking to The Shit to take screengrabs, so IMDB got robbed for ‘em.)

Rolling Thunder is a good example of what happens when you make a Paul Schrader movie from a Paul Schrader script after rewriting it without Paul Schrader. Instead of a nuanced, multi-faceted portrait of a fractured time and a fractured man, like, say, Taxi Driver (1976), American Gigolo (1980) or First Reformed (2017), you get a fun exploitation flick that errs on the side of rightwingery. Luckily, the only thing in rightwingery’s favour is that it makes for fun movies. Dirty Harry (1971), for example is great. I particularly enjoy winding up rightwingers by telling them that Harry throws his badge away at the end because he has failed the system, not because the system has failed him. (You can make their veins really throb by pointing out that he endangers an entire school bus of kids. Never mind his peeping at “Hot Mary”.) It’s kind of the same way that Steve Ditko’s humourless Objectivist planks make great comic book characters but would make horrific people. Rightwingery is basically quick-fix cartoon shit masquerading as real world politics. And although that makes for shitty politics, luckily, quick-fix cartoon shit is right in that sweet, sweet spot for vigilante thrillers. (Other opinions are available.)

Basically Rolling Thunder is a cracking vigilante thriller, as long as we all understand it has no tangible relationship with reality, and is taken purely as an entertainment in the impotent white male revenge fantasy mode. The impotent white male revenge fantasy is a surprisingly fecund genre, and yet I still encounter a remarkable amount of resistance to its adoption as a category in HMV. Horror, Romantic Comedies, Science Fiction, Impotent White Male Revenge Fantasies…what’s up with that? Why don’t you reply to my emails, HMV? I’ll not list the many, many examples of cinematic impotent white male revenge fantasies, but I will note their irresistible allure. Being only human I’m sure we all have our favourites when it comes to impotent white male revenge fantasies; Rolling Thunder is one of mine.

It’s 1973 and PoWs Major Charles Rane (William Devane; ultra-stoic) and Sergeant Johnny Volden (Tommy Lee Jones; quietly unhinged)  come marching home to San Antonio after 7 years as unwilling guests of the Vietnamese. Rane’s manhood is almost immediately trampled by the realisation that his wife, Janet (Lisa Blake Richards; trying hard with very little) has taken up with Cliff (amiably out of his depth) and his son doesn’t remember him. Rane starts living in the shed out back and readopts his prison regime, in order to cope with his emotional pain. In a loaded exchange Rane attempts to reassert his masculinity and informs Cliff that you survive by “learning to love the rope”. Cliff is a cop but (obviously) less of a man than Rane because he didn’t go to Vietnam and get tortured for 7 years. Like Rane, (like America? Huh? Huh?) the town can’t let his past go, and a celebration is held for him at which Rane monosyllabically accepts 2,555 silver dollars – one for every day he was a captive plus one for luck, and a big red Cadillac, which is definitely not a phallic symbol, nope.

Also present is Linda (Linda Haynes; really good, actually) who has worn Rane’s ID bracelet throughout his imprisonment as a kind of symbolic gesture; returning the bracelet it’s obvious Linda will be trying to do something less symbolic with Rane given the opportunity. Although Rane’s virility has been besieged, in impotent white male revenge movies young women always find this astonishingly attractive; they are driven to seek to heal the male wound with their pliant young bodies. This in no way should be taken as a male wish fulfilment fantasy, obviously. Rane’s virility is further eroded when he returns home to find a bunch of uninvited redneck goons, who proceed to torture him in order to get his silver dollars. During this sequence there is a fantastically blatant symbolic castration, but Rane’s emasculation is not complete until his family return and the horror of civilian life finally exceeds that of Rane’s confinement. After that Rane’s on the vengeance trail and the therapeutic value of murdering low-life scumbags is once more attested to. (Note: whorehouse shootouts are not a therapy endorsed by the American Association of Psychiatrists).

Rolling Thunder is fucking bullshit obviously, but it’s a movie so that’s okay. In fact, it’s kind of the whole point. Catharsis isn’t just for horror flicks, you feel me? It’s well done bullshit though; supremely entertaining action antics. The cast are utterly committed, with Devane particularly fine at suggesting the violence beneath his placid exterior, Lee Jones ricocheting nicely between catatonic acceptance of normal life and puppyish enthusiasm for the opportunity to kill again, while  Linda Haynes makes far more of the part of Linda than it really deserves. Flynn’s direction is unfussy stuff and, far too many shots of shotgun smashed bottles in the hectic finale aside, he captures a butchly efficient Don Siegel vibe. Every now and again, through the melodrama and bloodshed, glimpses of a better, deeper movie surface. Particularly in the hilarious scene in which Rane visits Vohden at home; Vohden sitting like a golem in the midst of his family’s hellishly inconsequential jabbering. Rolling Thunder is a fun movie but it’s not to be mistaken for reality and it’s certainly not subtle. But then no one ever said “subtle as thunder” did they now?

[badgraph1csghost]

[Image ID: A picture of a cartoon penguin wearing a sandwich-board sign. The sign reads, “Behind almost every shitty meme is a person that tried to make you smile.” and in parentheses, “Look at bottom left”. At the bottom left of the picture is small white text that reads, “Have a nice day. Now look at penguin’s beak.” On the penguin’s beak, aligned with the point, is more small text, reading, “Spanish Inquisition”.

Response from badgraph1csghost, a cropped screengrab of the bottom right of the original image. ID End.]

[94erz]

I wish the online concert was VOD. Nothing worries me more than potentially spending $50 and then missing either half of the concert or all of it because I end up getting busy or something on my one day off (day of concert PST 6 pm Saturday!) 

Like there’s no getting that money back and there’s no way to rewatch if I paid but I know a bunch of ARMY will most likely reupload screengrabs later for people who didn’t or couldn’t afford to see it to begin with. Which yeah makes me feel kinda shitty but also why the hell can’t they make the online concert VOD? Like if I pay for it I’d like to see it in full, but can’t watch it the very specific weekend day they chose to perform it. 

Frustrating either way, but I’d be more pissed wasting $50 for nothing when I know they’ll probably bundle it in a memories of 2021 DVD later just like how they did with ON:E and memories of 2020.

[leam1983]

On Autumn

I call these chilly, wet days with bright colors and overcast skies the Dying Days. Nature's nowhere close to dying, she's just tucking herself into bed. No, what's really dying is a chapter of life itself. Maybe I see too much syncronicity in this, but defining moments in my life usually happened somewhere between late August and late November.

Today felt like one of those days: colorful, vibrant, chilly, with the earth smelling of decay outside the office - and everything telling me to get the Fuck outta Dodge while I still can.

The Big Boss is in denial. He's repeating to anyone who'll listen that the chip shortage is on its last legs. It's not. Appointments and referrals are in the pits, our no-shows are through the roof, and our clients are down to basically begging and groveling, plastering superlatives on dogshit rebates and hoping beyond hope that calling Joe Average for his 2014 Corolla's going to land them a buyback. My call center colleagues are filling in for the satellite teams that handle tire-change season for local garages. Hours might shift to a nine-to-five to reflect this, which I don't mind.

That covers October, and only October. November is usually dialed in months in advance, ahead of the Holidays, and now we have nothing. The salesforce might see its hours slashed within a week. I'm fine, being on the Production team, but the Sword of Damocles is still up there, all dangly-like. For the second week in a row, we've got nothing planned for Friday.

Next week? Hey Google, play The Twilight Zone's theme.

All because the global chip shortage is driving prices and import costs up the wall. Things get spread out across the chain, but the consumer ends up picking up the saltiest part of the final tab. It's hard to present anything as a great deal when you're looking at a 10% upmark cost for even last-gen sedans. That means no buyback offers. That means no clients for us, and those that do hang on are told to revise their expectations.

When I took the phone, I used to be able to bring in fifteen, maybe twenty referrals and appointments a day. Now, with the same skills and toolset, I bring in three. Sometimes five or six, on my better days - and that's for the mid-range and high-end sectors.

Try calling in and around factory and manufacturing districts. Try convincing a young mother that's already struggling to make ends meet in the midst of the Delta wave that shouldering a debt in the tens of thousands is worth it when her car's barely six years old.

Fuck, no.

The call center's deserted, our huddles turned into the seven or eight remaining regulars hashing things out around the coffee machine, and it's gotten harder than ever to keep the froshes motivated. Now, more than ever, they're aware of how upper management sees them.

They're disposable, and it pisses me the fuck off. We're some of these kids' first job ever, some of my youngest colleagues are still in their mid-teens - and the fun they had over the summer's evaporated. Now we're just the breadline they need for their smartphone contract or their tentpole console and PC releases. The breezy ones turned into cavalier types, then turned brazen - then stopped giving a shit. Four of them are playing hooky almost weekly. Instead of addressing things responsibly, the floor manager's pacing around the lanes and aisles, taking anyone aside who isn't transfixed with their desktop's set of Web apps.

"I'm afraid you're not giving us your 100%" is something I've heard several times over the past week, now. She's given it to me, too. I used to think Floor Manager Boss Lady could look fierce when she needed to - a moderately non-cliché Girlboss type - and now all I'm seeing is a cornered animal. Whenever she reports back to The Actual Boss, it's with taut skin and deepening worry lines. She's terrified.

The veterans feel it, too. Apart from their pension, the paycheck made their modest lives livable. Now, though? Those with enough strength left are scrambling, and those that can't are in the process of navigating HR's darkened halls to try and find an exit that doesn't land them on the unemployment line. Half of these guys' work is starting to look like the kind of stuff you'd see pushed around work placement agencies: pages and pages of LinkedIn printouts and Indeed screengrabs.

The Actual Boss is spending more and more time at the gym. He handles things well, but you can tell that there's a punching bag, somewhere, that's taking the blame for everything from the strikes in South Africa's silica mines to the various manufacturers' head offices being stuck trying to keep the shareholders in line with offers that aren't too generous.

Others don't have release mechanisms. Some colleagues of mine stormed out of the floor manager's office, cussed out shitty scripts in full view of Production team members or just stopped giving a shit. Our metrics are getting worse, which makes people feel worse.

People openly talk about looking for other jobs. In Quebec, at least, etiquette demands that you don't publicly discuss job-hunting while on the clock. There's been several reprimands, already.

As expected, nobody gives a shit. I sure as fuck don't. I don't give in to the temptation, but I also haven't worked my own authority as a fill-in supervisor all that much. I shield the other supers, all the while nodding at the mouthier types and adding I feel ya on the after-hours Discord group.

I've got three interviews lined up. Work's already notified. Supervisors and floor boss accepted that with looks of quiet resignation, but Actual Boss came up to me, offered to give me a raise out-of-pocket (assuming I didn't tell anybody) and more or less begged me to stay.

We get along well, but I also get along with girls in Accounting. How's it going to look for me if I drink from that cup and one of these girls notices weird extras in my slips? I can't do that, not in good conscience.

One of the sales reps took me aside, a few days back. They're not fazed yet, they're partly paid by commission. They make cash even out of sales they cinch outside of our referrals and appointments.

"You know why you'd never really hack it as a salesman, Brain? You're too nice. You empathize too much."

I realized that this was coming from the rat bastard in the salesforce; the salamander who's okay with pricing overused and worn-out demos as close to Stock price as he could without breaking the law.

I smiled icily, took a swig of coffee. "Yeah, it must be nice knowing you'll just go back to the same four Nissans and that you won't ever have to confront a customer's dissatisfaction. Betcha you sleep real well, at night."

He didn't pick up on my sarcasm. "They're just opinions, bro; I'm just here to deal, y'know?"

Sure. Deal away. In the meantime, some of my colleagues have been driving the same busted sedan to the point of being ordered by the cops to get their cars towed in for servicing - all because they can't structure their budget around a broken part that costs two hundred dollars to fix.

I caught one of my older colleagues weeping, alone in the cafeteria. An older lady, sweetest person you've ever met; everyone's Favourite Grandma, no matter the lack of blood relations. She was crying, because she wasn't sure how she was going to afford Christmas presents for her grandkids.

I hugged her after sanitizing my hands, social distancing be damned. If it weren't for my Disability Savings Account, I'd be forced to stick my inhalers on my Visa.

I figured the end of my tenure there would feel like a big, huge nothing-burger. Woop, one office - and zoop; another office!

Instead, it feels like I'm watching clumsy hunters trying to work out how to put a lamed hunting dog out of its misery. Doom and gloom around the water cooler, either in the meatspace or on Slack.

Time to send more resumés - except I'd rather stop and hug more people for a few days, first.

[dynamoe]

What phrases do you think Talkin' Rusty says when you pull the string? Aside from begging his father to save him and then lots of muffled crying?

I only made a Talkin' Rusty doll to give li'l Billy something to play with but now I guess I gotta draw all the mid-'70s merchandise The Rusty Venture Show generated so adult Billy can buy it off eBay.

I'm gonna have to draw so much shit but… Where does Billy keep it? It's not on display anywhere in the trailer, unless it's in the back room that was never shown in an episode. Maybe it's just stuffed into all the built in cabinets all over the walls?

↓ Obsessive-Compulsive Nerdery Below the Cut ↓

And of course the merchandise that was actually made for real...

The Rusty Venture Show Lunchbox

MEGO Action Figures of Team Venture (Jonas Sr and Rusty)

T-shirts

I'll have to go in and take screen caps of the episodes that show merchandise to see what already exists.

Items from Now Museum Now You Don't as collected in the Go Team Venture book →

Original Team Venture merch, not The Rusty Venture Show stuff. Those would be distinct and different fandoms. Team Venture seems to be a decade before the cartoon... the references are solidly 60s not 70s.

The same stuff in the background, plus the X-1 plane and X-2 yacht models and some kinda rocket on a plinth to the left. I do love that Otto Aquarius Ben Cooper box costume. I should make a shitty Rusty Venture plastic-y Halloween costume for Li'l Billy— a mask that won't fit on his face with awkward eye holes and a plastic drape that says RUSTY VENTURE with a picture of his face on the chest Billy collects The Rusty Venture Show cartoon exclusively, which had members of Team Venture as characters, but not as the focus. But he subconsciously lusted after and then stole some of this stuff when Spider Skull Island was going to blow up.

Dermott's sister-mother Nikki's room. I need to rewatch this scene from Everybody Comes to Hank's and take better screengrabs. I see her stuff as more fan club "exclusives" made recently for the collector's market rather than vintage toys. On the coffee table is a Rusty-in-a-Barrel coin bank and a standing Rusty Venture statuette/maquette— Billy would definitely own those, too.

The giant plush Rusty doll at bottom right... do you think she made that or is it an actual product? Seems like a fan-made thing.

The Rusty Venture Pajamas Billy wears are merch (and I already drew those). He's wearing 40+ year old pajamas. That can't be comfortable. He may got them as deadstock— never worn vintage PJs— so that's why they still look new. He bought a whole pallet of them— he has multiples, too.

And the Rusty Venture merchandise that was actually made for real...

The Rusty Venture Show Lunchbox

MEGO Action Figures of Team Venture (Jonas Sr and Rusty)

Rusty Face T-shirts

"Talking Rusty Venture" pull-string doll circa 1975 mint-in-box with shelf-wear, severe corner/edge damage

← all Billy & White posts

(from the personal collection of Billy Quizboy) ↓