#movie retelling

[thekidsfromyestergay]

Just saw a video like "um actually rocky horror isn't good queer representation because frank sexually assaults janet" girl he kills and eats people. It's called the rocky HORROR picture show not the rocky cute gay rep tw t-slur picture show

[prideprejudce]

the fact that reboots used to be like thirty or forty years apart and are now instead like 3-10 years apart is absolutely ridiculous. like are we so trapped in a capitalist hellscape that instead of us naturally cherishing a beloved piece of media like it deserves and looking forward to NEW stories with NEW universes we have to watch the same thing over and over and over again with reboot after reboot after reboot until that media has been so sucked dry that us as an audience are literally sick at the mere mention of it

[demigods-posts]

all that i need is for percabeth to be in a situation where the only way they can make it out alive is if one of them can win over a group of monsters by telling a captivating and convincing love story. and it's just annabeth very dramatically and humorously reciting the first five books of the pjo series from her perspective. and the monsters are just eating it tf up. and percy's just facepalming so hard.

[farosdaughter]

heaven must have sent you from above

heaven must have sent your precious love,

oh to find a love like yours is rare these days

'cause you've shown me what happiness is in so many ways

YOUR MONSTER (2024) dir. Caroline Lindy

[screenshotsonpinterest]

Thinking about how Starkid’s raised nearly half a million dollars for Cinderella’s Castle simply by being transparent about where their money goes, being nice to their fan base, hiring unproblematic, talented people, and creating good, original art

[alatismeni-theitsa]

In "KAOS" nothing is anything, and everything is wrong

Two disclaimers: I am no stranger to modern art, and I have no issue with queerness in shows, or in my own mythology (I'm Greek). I am also aware that KAOS is a comedy. It's in the gutter of British comedy, but still part of the genre. At least I laughed every time they said "Oh God!". I don't believe this is the same person who wrote the great and amusing "End of the F**king World"! The premise of "The gods in our modern world" appeals to me a lot, so that wasn't my problem either. My general issue with KAOS is its horrible delivery, bad writing, and piss-poor Greek representation.

This is gonna be long and full of stupid gifs, so sit comfortably, grab a coffee or some popcorn and... pame!

The "ILoveGreekMythology" Kid

Art without context is just a pretty thing to look at. Most of the time, this context can be found within the art piece itself, as the artist has taken care to weave it in. KAOS refuses to connect itself to any context besides the names and a few vague powers. It aims to exist outside of those "boring old stories of the Greek myth" and be entirely "fresh and modern". Something impossible when the entire show and the meanings are based on ancient recorded material. In other words, KAOS is so meta that it ends up being nothing. KAOS cannot stand on its own because you need more than the viewers being familiar with the Greek myth basics to pull such a show off.

KAOS tells us "See? I know all the names of the gods, and what they did, and I know all the locations, so I am qualified to tackle this". More or less like any Western kid who takes all their knowledge from PJO and Marvel and proceeds to unironically hate ancient deities and make a girlboss out of Medusa.

Here's a Greek word for you guys, ημιμάθεια, meaning "half-knowledge". Α Greek saying very well declares "Half-knowledge is worse than no knowledge". The confidence of thinking you know enough often leads you to grave mistakes whereas the humility of not knowing prevents you from touching shit that you shouldn't. When you have no idea what the original myth is trying to say and spit on its meaning, knowing a few names and locations is just smoke and mirrors. I don't believe the audience fell for that.

And don't get me started on the "subversions". A good subversion is intriguing and thought-provoking. In KAOS, every twist was hollow - Greek myth related or otherwise.

"What if Euridice doesn't love Orpheus?" I don't know, babe. What if??? What was the point of that? What did you show us? That women's stories are dominated by men and men don't listen to women, perhaps? And you chose to twist... the love story of Orpheus and Euridice to show this?? One of the best and most tragic love stories Greek mythology has to offer?? You just mocked the myth, you didn't make anything profound out of it.

The Greek Stuff (Nothing salvageable)

I was surprised to see they had a Consulting Producer (Georgia Christou) and an Assistant Script Editor (Isabella Yianni) who happen to be Greek. And I stress that because those people probably weren't hired or utilized for being Greek. We are not sure they were involved in cultural decisions because we have no evidence and because shows with no Greek elements can have more Greeks than that on their staff.

Okay, perhaps they took 5 seconds to ask Isabella about a greeting - which they proceeded to say in a wrong intonation 🙄🤌It's where Poseidon says "ya sás" in the Fates, by the way. How he said it sounds more like "for you (pl.)" than "health to you (pl.)".

Surprise! The only Greek actor present (Peter Polycarpou) has less than 5 minutes of screen time and plays the caricature of an immigrant with a thick (and inaccurate Greek) accent. He has a canteen, selling falafel which is not Greek, and Dionysus buys from him an unidentified tortilla wrap (which... is also not Greek, if you haven't caught up).

For the show they brought in actors of Maori, Nigerian and Sierra Leonean, Pakistani, Black American, Latvian-Jewish, Iranian, Egyptian, Indo-Fijian and Malay descent and you tell me it was impossible for them to seek and find an English-speaking, skilled actor of Greek descent in a show regarding Greek heritage. Sometimes I wonder, do y'all hate us so much?

They considered Greeks only to give us a simple (and wrong) greeting and a stereotype. Crumbs, we are supposed to be happy with. By the way, there are over 70.000 Greek immigrants just in the UK, usually in the urban centers, many of them students or fairly young employees in the corporate workforce. Not the largest minority but not hard to spot either.

Another plague of Anglophone shows: Almost everyone's Greek name is shortened. Yes, we know their full names but we are told that we will use the short ones. Greeks and their "long and difficult" names am I right fellas? Because saying "Ariadne" apparently requires 5 years of Greek language training, and no English word ever has more than two syllables.

Coincidentally, short names are cool in Anglophone imaginary universes and the "long" names are not. it's so strange Anglophones never make universes where it's cool for Greek names to be spoken in full hmmm... They don't even want to practice saying a whole Greek name for just 2 minutes in preparation for a show full of Greek names. And don't give me that "Greek is hard" shit when we only talk about a few syllables. If Greek kids can learn English since first grade and people here can sing English songs and spell English names, you have no excuse.

They also said the name "Fotis" means light, which is close enough but... ugh.. It's like saying Sebastian means "respect". I am not sure if they asked anyone or what their research was here. If I had the writers in front of me, I'd be like:

(This character from an all-time favorite Greek show is called Fotis)

They also made the flag of "Krete" an alteration of the Greek flag and the local Cretan flag. Which is the stupidest move, because they had to remove the religious symbol of the cross to make the flag fit the universe. These are flags created based on 1) Christianity 2) the Greek Revolution of 1821.

National Greek flag to the left, local Cretan flag to the right:

Flag of the KAOS' "Krete":

The only time they seriously took into account anything Greek, was the time when they decided to remove the religious symbol of our ethnoreligion AND (from what I could observe) keep the nine stripes?? The nine stripes of our national flag represent the syllables in "Freedom or Death". The colors are from the white foustanela of the mainland attire and the dark blue vraka of the island attire, the clothing of the Revolution fighters. (That's more of a meta explanation but the characteristics of the flag were decided during and nearly after the Revolution.)

I think I don't have to explain it more but it's not a homage to put the nine stripes in an ancient era where they have no meaning, and to replace a cross??? Let's... not replace religious symbols on national flags, okay? Thank you.

Another cultural element they changed was making everyone have a dedicated coin to pay Charon. Orpheus has Euridice's coin, "her coin", and he's meant to put it on her before she got buried. In Greek culture, any coin would do. Sorry that our culture restricts your script, dear writers. I guess you had to bend this too, in order to create a cohesive plot with a semblance of a twist.

Finally, the many "Kerberus" dogs were cute and I can understand the creative decision behind that. However, in a show full of inaccuracies, this made me roll my eyes a little. I think the showrunners know that Kerveros is not a breed of dog, and there can only be one of him because he doesn't have any other "Kerveros" to breed with. On the other hand, as demonstrated from art/writing on the internet, quite a lot of Westerners are not exactly aware of how our monsters work, so forgive my uncertainty 😅

Nothing is Anything

Every element KAOS played with ended up meaningless. In the words of a Lifo article:

“Zeus is a paranoid authoritarian dictator in mid-life crisis who fears losing his power and murders his aides to vent. Hera is a promiscuous goddess who repeatedly betrays Zeus and has mutilated mute priestesses for protection. Dionysos is a spoiled and immature zoomer who, apart from pranks, indulges in orgies with all genders. Poseidon a sadistic god of the sea, who tortures the crew on his ship for fun. Prometheus is gay and killed his lover so he could overthrow Zeus. Orpheus is a famous pop singer and Eurydice does not love him. Theseus is black and gay. The Erinyes are tough-as-nails mechs that look like they stepped out of ‘Sons of Anarchy’. The Fates resemble a three-member jury in a talent show. The Trojans are a terrorist group that acts against the gods. Crete is more reminiscent of California than the Mediterranean.”

The "River Styx" is a sea, the "River Lethe" is a lake, the gods are nothing more than spoiled humans, the Moirai are drag queens, the Cave is a club where you have to take a quiz to enter the underworld, and generally everything is modern, flat, mundane and anticlimactic. The producers aimed to achieve a work so meta that a "river" is now a concept, a metaphor, whatever you have in your heart. And those who want to see a river when we speak of a river are probably uncultured swines and don't understand postmodernism. Never mind that rivers are rivers in Greek mythology for a reason. That's not culturally interesting enough to explore compared to the new, cool approach of not assigning meaning to anything. That totally shows love for the original rich and meaningful material...

And the reason behind all this subversion? Probably the shock factor. They brought the characters to a point where they said "We have to save the world from Zeus" - Zeus! The father of gods, heroes and humans! - just because they could. It gives off a certain type of smugness that I personally don't like. I mean, I would like the smugness and cheekiness of KAOS if it wasn't a vapid and practically meaningless show. As nothing symbolizes anything anymore, we are just led from hollow plot point to hollow plot point.

If you cut it out of any cultural influence and see it as a story then it's... okay, I guess. But when you consider that it's meant to derive from certain material and it fails spectacularly, it's not a good story. It forgets its bases and doesn't play with the ancient elements at all. Disney's Hercules did it better, FFS!

Bad Writing (pt.1)

KAOS is not without recognizable themes but their demonstration is so juvenile and heavy-handed that it fails to influence a viewer of average intelligence. For instance, "Riddy" says to her religious mother "You dedicated your whole life to Hera, what about me?" Okay, KAOS, we get it. At the same time, this theme nulls itself because it turns out that Ridy's mother was right to do what she did, as she had a greater goal in mind. (And this, kiddos, is called Bad Writing, because your themes and scenes contradict each other)

The biggest theme I spotted was a criticism of religion and religious people who say "Do as I say, not as I do" and create exceptions for themselves. Only, it's not a criticism of anything real, in this case. It's a fact that some people in the clergy tend to preach peace and love and then they do harm, but we don't know, for example, that The Goddess of Marriage is a cheater and yet she pressures everyone into strict marriages. By focusing their wrath on divine beings who are not known for their hypocrisy, the creators missed the mark.

I can give KAOS props for how it handled Trojans to reflect real issues regarding how immigrants and war refugees are mistreated and blamed. I'd argue it was the only (nearly) well-done theme in the whole show because it had the least on-the-nose delivery and some genuine/serious scenes. But that's it.

More Bad Writing!

Jeff Goldblum's Zeus is shit. He'd crap his pants in an argument with a stern Greek dad/uncle his age. Is this character supposed to be intimidating? (Laughs in Mediterranean) That's not to say that Goldblum is not a good actor, but this role wasn't for him. The same can be said for the other actors, too. They are competent but they only give off the air of "The Greek gods if they lived in London, from the minds of people who think beards and body hair are an affliction". In addition to being misplaced, the actors cannot show their talent when following a script that resembles a children's book.

Why does THE GOD Dionysus have the maturity of a 15-year-old? I repeat, The God Dionysus. He's a freaking deity, and a very old one at that. He is not a teenager neither in appearance nor in experience. In our culture, he is mystical, mighty, wise. Why did they downgrade him so? Just for the plot? This is not Dionysus just because you named him so.

The dialogue rarely takes itself seriously to the point it has you wondering at times "Do people talk and behave like that?". In a comedy where everything is meant to be already extreme and parodied. Even in comedies, something must occasionally be serious so there is a healthy fluctuation in tone and the funny moments can hit you. In KAOS very few scenes treated their impactful dialogue as it should be treated.

The queerness and diversity (good elements, in general) were worse off for being in KAOS. Like, I want these elements to be there. I'm just sad about the whole situation. It's not enough that the show is shit, now you also give an additional reason for conservatives to shit on diverse and queer characters because they are part of a stupid narrative.

I'm the type of person who doesn't mind the queerness of Astyanax and Theseus being lovers in the context of this specific show but they're still the oddest pairing to me because they're from the most irrelevant myths and eras. Also, Astyanax in my mind is a baby who died tragically, for little reason if we are honest, so to bring him back and make him a love interest is... ekh.

In addition, isn't Astyanax supposed to be crippled after a fall from the city walls when he was a baby? Sorry to change subjects but the show is so convoluted and with so many issues that it's extremely difficult to stay on track with what's wrong.

To the person who thought this show was a good idea:

Whatever. Bye. I'm fucking done.

[periodcostumefantasylover]

Morgan Pendragon's orange robe in Camelot

[genderkoolaid]

Wait. Transmasc Shrek rules actually. Fiona turning into an ogre at night could be a metaphor for only feeling safe enough to be yourself in isolation. The overhearing scene is denying transmascness by burying it in anti-man rhetoric. This rules

Do you see my vision!!!! Fiona transmasc icon real

[the-monkey-ruler]

Real and Fake Monkey King (1983) 真假美猴王

Director: Fang Ying Screenwriter: Yao Yinghua / Li Youbin Starring: Xu Dasong / Wang Jinzhu / Zhao Yuliang / Chen Jianjun / Liu Suojin / Wang Jilin / Zhang Jinrong / Wang Daqi / Zheng Maoying / Zhang Xiaofeng / Li Aili / Gao Jianying / Li Xinpei / Le Guojie / Fang Yansen / Zhou Yan / Zhang Baogui Genre: Fantasy / Costume / Drama Country/Region of Production: China Language: Chinese Duration: 98 minutes IMDb: tt16113002 Type: Retelling

Summary:

Tang Sanzang and his disciples came to the Kingdom of Women in Xiliang. The king of the Kingdom of Women fell in love with the handsome Tang Sanzang and wanted to keep him. Fortunately, Wukong was clever and tricked the pass, so the four of them were able to escape. The Six-Eared Macaque wanted to replace Wukong to go to the West to obtain the scriptures, so that he could achieve enlightenment. So he transformed into Wukong and deliberately committed murder in front of Tang Sanzang. In order to punish Wukong, Tang Sanzang drove him away. Wukong had no choice but to ask Guanyin for help. Wukong's plans were disrupted by the Six-Eared Macaque one after another. He was furious and started a fierce battle with the Six-Eared Macaque. The two fought all the way from the Heaven to Lingshan. In front of the powerful Tathagata Buddha, the Six-Eared Macaque accidentally revealed his true identity and got the fate he deserved. Tang Sanzang also resolved the misunderstanding between him and Wukong, and the master and disciple reconciled.

Source: https://chinesemov.com/1983/Real-and-Fake-Monkey-King

Link: N/A

[gay-strawberry]

so i watched og 1979 alien and

[kabishkat19]

Grimm fairy tales🥀

Did I make a fake trailer for my hyper fixation with the dark adaptions of classic fairy tales… yes. Always felt this was a missed opportunity (I’m not crazy good at edits so be kind)🖤

[danceintheskies]

the comments on the minecraft parkour civilization video made me laugh so hard I threw up

[man-down-in-hatchet-town]

One of my favorite things about actually joining the Starkid fandom after so many years of loving Starkid but not being a part of the community is seeing how much love and enthusiasm for Starship is still out there. Like, ya'll really love the silly alien-bug-Little-Mermaid musical I was obsessed with twelve whole years ago and it warms my heart so much <3

[fictionadventurer]

I finally watched the Scarlet Pimpernel period drama, and I'm kind of obsessed with how Percy manufactures moments so he can live out every swashbuckling adventure cliche imaginable.

My men have overpowered the enemy soldiers, stolen their uniforms and their guns, and by extreme good fortune, their commander hasn't noticed that none of them have the same face anymore? We could defeat my nemesis right now, but it'd be way cooler to have them use the bullets in their fully-loaded guns to stage my execution just so I can dramatically reappear just as my nemesis thinks he's won.

We've overpowered this guy and have him completely outnumbered, but I want to engage in a completely unnecessary one-on-one swordfight with him, because I will live out my swashbuckling dreams.

You overly dramatic idiot, I love you so much, but why are you like this?

[eerna]

Obviously Dreamworks is doing this as a way to compete with Disney. I’m not against live actions. However i find it pointless to tell me the same story again just with real life elements. Use the live action to tell me more, expand the same universe that previously was a success for a new story.

Honestly, I find any kind of remakes of good things dumb. I don't really need an expansion on a story that is over and done with, because the fact that it managed to be good despite not featuring those things proves they weren't needed. And the fact that it was animated MEANS something, usually that it features something that can't possibly be done in live action. But there are COUNTLESS properties which failed in their executions that have SO MUCH to discover and reinterpret... so why not focus on them!! I don't think anyone would complain if you picked up a bad IP and made it good!!!!! I am once again asking someone to adapt Sword Art Online into a good story

[yrrtyrrtwhenihrrthrrt]

Just saw a take that Nimona (2023) was a Failed Adaptation of the comic

But like

It's not an adaptation

It's a retelling

Like yes it is a failed adaptation in the sense that I am a failed Auto Mechanic (I am not an Auto Mechanic)