#ray collins deserved that

[frommybookbook]

this is mostly an honorary post for Lt. Steve Drumm of LAPD homicide

Hamilton's face when he realizes Perry's done it again is priceless.

[wheelsvoid]

INSIGNIFICANT ; THE BALLAD OF SONGBIRDS AND SNAKES

masterlist insignificant m.list

word count: 1,203

warnings: none

this plot does not belong to me, all rights go to suzanne collins, lionsgate films and everyone else involved with the movie.

chapter three: the mentor

The train I was forced into was far from clean. We were given nothing of luxury—only the very worst was ours. Our train, our lives, our luck.

I could feel the train rolling to a stop, and I turned my gaze from tribute to tribute. For now, I would respect them. I knew very well that if given the choice, none of them would choose to kill. Even Coral. They just wanted to live.

I watched as Jessup shifted uncomfortably, and the guilt started to each away at my skin already. He’d been bitten by the bat, and despite everything, I couldn’t stop it.

Would it be cruel if I avoided him in the arena to spare myself from watching his death?

I shook my head. I couldn’t think like that.

I got off the train with a huff, my eyes scanning over everyone I saw. Reaper, Coral, Jessup, Wovey.

I froze. How could I have forgotten?

My eyes my the cold blues of Coriolanus Snow.

When he saw me, he walked towards me in a way that looked rehearsed. I didn’t let him get to me, and I wouldn’t let him charm me. I did not like Snow, and the release of this movie hadn’t changed that.

I knew who he was and what he would become. I knew his fate, and I believed he deserved the ending he’d gotten. I couldn’t deny his intelligence, or how well he could scare a person with his power, but I wouldn’t let him scare me now.

He was not the president. Just a mentor.

I felt Jessup’s presence by my side, and when I glanced over, he was giving Snow a warning look.

Snow sent me a small smile before holding out something from behind his back. A white rose. “Welcome to the Capitol.” He said warmly.

“Not a very warm welcome.” I didn’t bother with hiding my annoyance, although I wouldn’t ignore him entirely. He’d saved Lucy’s life, and I would let him save mine.

Snow’s lips pulled into a thin line as he glanced at the rusted train. He couldn’t find anything to say, so I spoke again. “I doubt you should be here.” I muttered as I took the rose from him, bringing it up to my nose. It smelled lovely.

“Well, I shouldn’t.” He said, and I looked up at him with a raised brow. “But I’m your mentor.” Unfortunately.

I stared at him. “Fascinating.” I tilted my head. “Do you believe that I can win?” I asked.

His smile faltered. “What?”

I hid my own smile. “Well, I was just wondering if my own mentor had any faith in me or not.” I plucked a petal off the rose, watching as I let it fall to the ground.

“I—”

A girl in the distance fell off the train. I think she was named Ginnee. I watched with anger as she was pushed around, before being roughly lifted off the ground and shoved my way.

“Surprised?” I raised a brow at Snow, who hadn’t taken his eyes off her until I spoke. “Guess I’ll see you sometime soon.”

I began to walk off with all the other tributes, knowing damn well that Snow had no intentions of waiting to see me again—unless he didn’t care for me as much as Lucy Gray. Which, in all honesty, I didn’t hate the idea of. Unfortunately, I needed him for my survival.

As I was shoved into the back of a vehicle, another tribute ran off. The guards had no choice but to chase them down, and I watched as the platinum blond boy came running after me, discreetly hiding himself in the darkness of the truck.

The tributes watched him confusion, while I did my best to hide my annoyance for him. As I stared at him, for a brief moment I wondered if I could stop him from going down the path he was meant to. He was evil, and cruel and I hated him completely… but if he had yet to do all those things, could he really be fixed? How much would that benefit Panem?

Snow awkwardly looked at the other tributes, quickly avoiding Reaper’s cold gaze. “Hi.” He said softly, sounding more confident than he looked.

“What’s the matter, pretty boy?” Reaper raised a brow. He hadn’t sat down with the others, or held on for safety in case the truck swerved. He stood like steel at the back of the truck, watching Snow. “You in the wrong cage?”

“No.” His messy hair wasn’t helping his case. And despite his now-wrinkled clothes and nervous eyes, he still didn’t fit in. His clothes were too nice, probably softer than ours. He still held himself differently, like he was more important. He was from the Capitol, even if he was poor. He would never understand.

“This cage is delightful.” He shrugged. I couldn’t help the scoff that escaped my mouth.

Reaper scowled, walking forward in an instant. “Get him, Reaper.” A boy called as Reaper gripped Snow’s shirt and slammed him into the wall.

“I will kill you right now.” Reaper seethed. I never realized how horrifying a person could be until I saw him, but I still admired him. I never minded how mad he was all the time. He had a right to be if he was being forced into the Hunger Games.

“He’ll do it too.” Dill nodded, not looking up from the floor. “Reaper killed a Peacekeeper back in 11.”

“Quiet, Dill.”

“I say we all kill him.” Bobbin got to his feet, glaring at Snow.”

“You can’t kill him.” I interrupted. “He’s my mentor. I’ll need him.”

Coral scoffed, “how come you get a mender.”

I rolled my eyes, and Snow corrected, “mentor. You each get one.” Reaper slammed him back into the wall once more.

Coral raised a brow, getting to her feet. “Oh, and we’ll all just trust you on that, right.”

“I’m just,” Snow tried for a smile, holding his hands up, “here to help you.”

Coral wasn’t buying it. “Why does the volunteer over here get special treatment, hmm?” They had heard what I’d done, because Jessup had mentioned it to Wovey. Wovey, that sweet girl, liked to talk. “Why aren’t our menders here?”

“Guess they couldn’t be bothered to show up.” I shrugged, hiding my own fear. I knew this girl was planning to kill me the second she got into the arena.

I saw Snow send me a small smile, and before I could get another word in, we began to tilt sideways. Internally, I scoffed. Oh yay. This part.

Snow held onto the wall of the truck, before reaching out and taking my hand. Despite everything, I gripped onto his hand. I’d rather be the last one out, waiting until the others had cleared, than roll down the rocks with them.

Just as the others had gotten out of the way, still on the ground and disoriented, Snow’s hand slipped and we began to fall.

When I regained my bearings, I looked around at my newest environment. The reporters, the cage, the lack of privacy. I sighed, next to the Hunger Games, this was my least favourite part.

bonus chapter

chapter four

[fanartandfanfiction]

In honor of Aesop’s birthday, I wrote this fic. I sat down and wrote it in one sitting and didn’t proof read it ✌️ enjoy!

Happy Birthday (Aesop Sharp one-shot)

Aesop hated his birthday.

It just marked another year of getting older, more gray hairs sprouting, more trouble with his leg. Most years he spent his birthday with a book and a bottle of scotch. But this year he’d made a mistake…

Lydia Collins was the new muggle studies teacher, and if you thought Mirabel Garlick was a ray of sunshine…Lydia was the sun.

At some point, she’d managed to befriend him. He wasn’t sure how or when it happened, because he had no desire to be friends with the human equivalent of a golden retriever. But somehow, she’d wormed her way in.

They were eating lunch in her office, which they did occasionally. Her classroom was closer to the great hall and he didn’t feel like packing his lunch all the way back down to the dungeon.

“-so anyway, I’m screaming, the puffskein is screaming, and neither of us know how we got there.” She grinned as she told some sort of humorous story, he’d zoned out a while ago. “Helloooo? Aesop?”

“Hmm? Oh, apologies. I was lost in thought.”

“About what?”

“Nothing in particular. Go on with your ludicrous tale of tomfoolery.”

Lydia raised her eyebrows. “Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed. I was going to offer you half my brownie, but…”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to snap at you. I always get irritable this time of year.”

“Because it’s hot?”

“No, because of my-“ he looked up and realized his mistake.

“Because of your what?” She grinned.

“Because of my…allergies?”

“Your birthday is coming up, isn’t it?”

“No.”

“Liar.” She threw a Cheeto at him. “So what are we doing?”

“WE are not doing anything. I don’t enjoy my birthday. I’d prefer it to just be like any other day.”

“That’s ridiculous! Birthdays are supposed to be special! It’s a day all about you! And you get cake! Why would you not want cake?” She was gesticulating with her fork and he dodged it as it flew out of her hand.

“Because it means I’m getting older! I’m turning into my father.”

“I hate to break it to you, but you’re older than you were five minutes ago. And when I finished that sentence.”

“Your point?”

“My point is that you can’t look at it that way or you’ll be grumpy and depressed. Look at it as a victory. Fuck you, life! I’ve made it another year! Watch me do it again!”

He couldn’t help but chuckle. “I think I’ll still celebrate it the way I always do. With a book and a bottle of scotch.”

“A bottle? Keep going at that rate and you won’t have that many more birthdays.” She threw another Cheeto at him. “If you’re going to get drunk, at least do it with other drunk people so you’ll all have fun.”

“Stop throwing these at me!” He placed the cheeto on the desk. She promptly launched another one and it got stuck in his hair. “Lydia!”

“Ooh! Ooh! Open your mouth! See if you can catch it like Shamu!”

“I am not an exhibit at sea-“ she threw a cheeto and it landed in his open mouth and she cheered. “That’s it. I’m going back to my office.”

“Come on, I’ll let you throw them at me!”

He rolled his eyes and picked up his lunch. “Goodbye, Lydia.” Another cheeto bounced off his head. He left with a small smile.

The dreaded day way here. At least it was a Saturday so he didn’t have to teach. He got dressed for the day and decided to go get some breakfast.

He opened his door and jumped back as a party horn was blown in his face. “Lydia?!”

She was standing outside his door with an armload of balloons, wearing a party hat and blowing a dragon tongue party horn. She blew it again and when it uncurled, Aesop snatched it. “Aw.” She frowned as he tossed the crumpled horn aside.

“Why? What have I done to you to deserve this punishment?”

“I’m your friend, silly, and I’m going to make sure you have a fantastic birthday!”

“No, I don’t think we’re friends anymore.” He smirked.

“Here, these are for you.” She handed him the bouquet of balloons and while his hands were occupied, rushed forward and strapped a party hat to his head.

“LYDIA!”

She pulled another horn out of her pocket and blew it, then tossed a handful of confetti at him.

“You’re exhausting.” He yanked the party hat off.

“I thought you might not like the hat, so I compromised and got you this button.” She stepped forward and pinned a button to his shirt that said “BIRTHDAY BOY!” In enormous letters.

“I’m going back to bed.” He started to turn around when Lydia grabbed his hand. It was warm and soft, and he couldn’t remember the last time someone had touched his hand.

“Please. I planned a day I think you’ll enjoy. If you hate it, then you can leave and go back to bed.”

He looked into her light blue eyes and sighed. “Alright. But I’m not wearing the button.”

“Ok!” She grinned excitedly. “Let’s go get some breakfast and pick up the others.”

“The others???”

His cell phone began ringing and he pulled it out and looked at the screen. “Excuse me for a moment, it’s my mother.” He stepped away and took the call. “Hi mom.”

“Happy birthday Acey!”

“Thank you.”

“Any plans for today?”

“Yes, actually. A friend of mine has planned something.”

“Oh, wonderful! Can I speak to Lydia?”

“Um, sure?” He held the phone out to her. “My mother knows you by name and wants to talk to you?”

Lydia grinned and put the phone up to her ear. “Hey Diana! You were right, he tried to get out of it.”

There was a pause and she laughed. “I know! Hey, how are those orchids coming along?” She gestured for Aesop to follow her and they began walking to the great hall. “I’m glad to hear that! I bet they’re beautiful.” Another pause. “Oh, how sweet! How about next weekend?” Aesop’s eyes widened. “Alright, Di, I’ll see you then. Here’s your son back.” She handed the phone back to Aesop with a smile.

“How do you even know each other, and what’s next weekend?”

“Oh, your friend Lydia called me and explained that she wanted to surprise you for your birthday and asked what you would enjoy doing. She’s a lovely girl, we ended up chatting for quite a while, she gave me some wonderful tips for my garden. Next week we’re having tea. She’s a keeper!”

“Mother, we’re just friends.” He said quietly as Lydia literally skipped down the hall ahead of him.

“I don’t know, Acey, she seems to care about you an awful lot. And it’s sweet that she went to such lengths to surprise you.”

“Yes, well thank you for calling. If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a day of god knows what awaiting me.”

“I think you’ll enjoy yourself! Happy birthday darling, I love you.”

“I love you too. Bye.” He hung up the phone and glared at Lydia. “You talked to my mother?! How did you even get her phone number?”

“I have my ways!” The blonde grinned at him.

They walked to the great hall and Aesop groaned as he saw the birthday banner. His coworkers were waiting for him and whooped as he came in.

“Now I owe Mirabel $20.” Ronen said sadly.

“Why?” Aesop asked.

“I bet her that you would find a way to get out of it.”

“Don’t hand over your money yet.” He grumbled. “So what IS on the agenda for today?”

“That’s a secret.” Lydia grinned. “Sit down, have some breakfast, drink some coffee and pull the stick out of your ass.”

They ate breakfast and he sat quietly as his coworkers chatted around him. After they ate, Lydia turned to him with a grin. “Alright, I can fit three people in my car. Who’s riding with me?”

“I’ve seen the way you drive, I’m not getting into a car with you.” Ronen chuckled.

“Fine, I’ll take the birthday boy and Mirabel. You and Dinah can take your car. I’ll text you the address.”

“Why are we taking cars?” Aesop asked.

“Because we’re going to a muggle town.” She grinned. “No wands from here on out.”

“Seriously?!”

“I teach muggle studies, what did you expect?” She gave him a sunshiney grin. “You can have lots of fun without magic. Alright, everybody ready?”

“Let’s get this over with.” Aesop sighed.

“Try not to be so enthusiastic.” Lydia winked.

Fifteen minutes later, Aesop was in the back of Lydia’s car, which was bright pink. “Is this your car or Barbie's?” He asked with a smirk.

“Oh hush. I always told myself that, when I could afford it, I would get the pink car I always wanted. It’s a milestone. How about some music?”

He sat in the back and groaned internally as Lydia and Mirabel dueted an Elton John song.

“DON’T GO BREAKIN MY HEEEEART!” Lydia sang and passed the imaginary microphone to Mirabel.

“I couldn’t if I triiiied!”

“Oh hooooney if I get restleeess!”

“Baby you’re not that kind!”

He found himself humming along quietly in the back with a small smile on his face. Lydia had put on gaudy Elton John sunglasses covered in rhinestones.

They drove for about 45 minutes before pulling into a wooded area. “We’re here!” Lydia said happily.

“Where? The place where you intend to leave my body?” Aesop asked.

They all got out of the car and Aesop saw the sign. “Pauly’s Paintball? What’s paintball?”

“It is RIGHT up your alley, my friend.” Abraham clapped his shoulder as he and Diana joined them.

They walked to the entrance of what looked like a log cabin. A muscular man greeted them. “Hey, Lyddie! Welcome to Pauly’s Paintball! Have any of you played?.”

“Nope, today we have paintball virgins. They’re gonna need the whole intro.”

“Sounds good. Why don’t you all go ahead and get changed in the locker rooms and meet me back out here?”

“Change? I didn’t bring a change of clothing.” Aesop said.

“There’s a jumpsuit and protective gear on a shelf with your name on it.” The man, presumably Pauly, said. “Are you Aesop?”

“Yes. And you are?”

“Pauly Collins. Nice to meet you!”

They had the same last name. He’d never noticed if Lydia wore a wedding ring or not.

“My sister has spoken highly of you. Based on what she’s told me, I think you’re gonna enjoy yourself.” Pauly grinned at him. He was apparently just as sunshiney as his sister. He felt an odd feeling of relief that this man wasn’t her husband. He cast a glance down at her hand and noticed there was no ring.

“Did my new helmet come in yet?” Lydia was practically bouncing with excitement.

“Sure did, though it’s just going to make you stand out more.” Pauly reached under the counter and pulled out a pink helmet.

“I LOVE IT!”

“Don’t blame me when you’re out in two minutes.” Pauly smiled and handed her the helmet. She bounded off towards the locker room. “Lydie can be a lot, believe me, I get it. But she’s got a good heart. I think you’ll have fun today.” Pauly clapped him on the shoulder and Aesop gave him a small smile and headed for the locker room.

He looked at the stack of items on the shelf. There was a jumpsuit, a helmet with a face guard, boots, and padding for his chest, elbows, and knees. “What exactly are we doing?” Aesop asked, wondering what the hell all the body armor was for.

“We will be shooting balls of paint at each other.” Abraham responded, zipping up his jumpsuit.

“I still don’t see why that requires this armor. It’s paint.”

“From what I understand, it is quite painful.”

“It’s PAINT.”

“I don’t know, I am basing my information off of what I learned on the internet.” Abraham shrugged and tied the boots.

Aesop got dressed, feeling like it was all a bit silly. He finished dressing and he and Abraham headed back out to the lobby.

The girls were already out there and Dinah was examining a gun of some sort. Pauly looked up and smiled. “Alright! Now that everyone is here, let me go over the basics.”

Aesop listened and was surprised at how physically intense the sport was. After their lesson, he turned to Dinah. “Are you going to be able to do this?”

“Oh Aesop, I’m much more spry than I look. I’ll do just fine.” She winked at him and flipped the face shield down over her eyes.

“Alright, you’ll need to divide yourself into teams. We have an uneven number so I’ll be playing as well. Since we’re the most experienced, Lydie and I will be captains.”

“Come on Aesop, you’re gonna want to be on my team.” Lydia grinned. “We’ll kick Pauly’s ass.”

“I think I’d like to join your team as well.” Mirabel smiled.

“Alright, that puts Abraham and Dinah with me. Put these patches on so your own team doesn’t shoot you. Go to your base and you’ll have three minutes to strategize. At the sound of the horn, the game has begun. The object is to capture the opposing team’s flag and bring it back to your base. If you get shot, you’re out for five minutes. You’ll have one hour to capture the flag. If at the end of the hour, neither team has successfully captured it, the team with the least hits will be the winner. Everyone ready?”

The group nodded. “Remember, no hits above the shoulder. Let’s go!”

Aesop, Mirabel, and Lydia headed to their base. They all had red patches on their chest. Lydia took the lead.

“Pauly is aggressive, he always focuses on offense, not defense, so I think our best bet is to hide out and defend our base. One of you needs to stay here, one of you will come with me.”

“I’ll stay here.” Mirabel said.

“Good. Shoot anyone that comes through that door. Aesop or I will shout RED before we enter so you don’t shoot us. Come on, Aesop.”

She took off at a jog and Aesop followed her. “I wouldn’t have pegged you for a fan of such a violent sport.”

“Oh I love it! Gets the heart pumping. If your leg starts bothering you too much, let me know and you can switch with Mirabel. Station yourself behind that tree to your right. I’ll be over here. Pay attention, I’ll give you a hand signal when I want to move forward.”

Aesop nodded and headed to his spot. This reminded him of his days as an auror, staking out locations and waiting for the enemy. Though it was more fun when the threat of death was removed.

The horn sounded and Aesop began scanning the horizon. Thirty seconds had passed before Abraham came running towards them in the middle of the field with no cover.

He let out a yelp as both Aesop and Lydia pelted him with paintballs.

“Maybe try being more stealthy!” Aesop shouted with a laugh before a paintball hit him in the chest. “Son of a BITCH!” Ok, now he understood the armor. He and Ronen headed to the benches on the sidelines. He saw Dinah roll out from behind a tree and fire at Lydia. He was surprised at how spry she was.

Lydia dodged the shot and fired one in return, clipping Dinah in the shoulder. “Damn!” Dinah trudged over to the bench.

There was another man by the benches and he handed them each a timer upon arrival. “Welcome to the time out zone. After your timer goes off, take the path back to your respective base. I’m Chad, I’ll be your timekeeper. First time, huh?”

“Was it that obvious?” Abraham asked.

“You’re on Lydie’s team, huh?” Chad asked Aesop. “She’s a killer. We’re usually co-captains.”

“Do you play paintball often?”

“At least once a week.”

Lydia came trudging over a few minutes later, head hung low. “Bastard climbed the tree.”

“Does that mean the fate of our team relies on Mirabel?” Aesop asked with a smile.

“Shit. It’s just her and Pauly!” Aesop’s timer went off and Lydia jumped. “GO GO GO GO GO!” He took off at a run towards the base.

When he came out at the end of the trail, he saw Pauly heading straight for the base. He was raising his gun to shoot when he heard the rapid firing of a paintball gun. Pauly trudged out with his hands up.

“Good job, Mirabel!” Aesop shouted.

He trotted back towards the spot he’d been in first and hunkered down. Abraham and Dinah were back in so he was on the lookout. He heard girlish laughter and looked over towards the time out benches. Chad was standing awfully close to Lydia and seemed to be flirting. He glared at Chad. Shouldn’t he be paying attention to the game?

A paintball flew past his head, narrowly missing him. He saw Abraham dive behind a bush and watched for Dinah. She was much stealthier. He saw a flash of blue and fired a paintball.

Dinah fired a few shots at him and he rolled out of the way before springing up and returning fire. This time he caught Dinah square in the chest as she prepared to shoot at him again.

He jumped as Lydia tapped his shoulder. “Pauly and Dinah are benched, we have a very small window to advance for the flag. I’ll take the lead, you follow close behind. If I get the flag, I’m going to run as fast as I can. Go!”

Lydia dashed forward and rolled behind a bush. Abraham fired a quick shot and hid. Lydia rushed forward again and this time Abraham stood up to shoot her. Aesop got him in the arm and Lydia took off at a dead run. He knew Pauly’s time was almost up so he ran behind her and kept an eye out. She dashed into the base and came out with a blue flag.

She was running like her life depended on it towards him. He saw Pauly step out and he fired a few shots, which Pauly easily dodged.

“AESOP TAKE IT AND GO!” Lydia screamed as she ran towards him. She held out the flag and he snatched it just before Pauly shot Lydia in the leg. “GOOOOO!”

Aesop ran as fast as he could, a grin on his face as he did so. This was exhilarating! He was approaching their base so he shouted “RED, MIRABEL, RED!”

He heard the sound of the paintball gun from behind him and dove forward.

The horn blared again. Aesop stood up and held the flag up victoriously. Mirabel cheered and hugged him. Pauly shook his hand and grinned. “So how do you like paintball?”

“I loved it!” He was nearly knocked off his feet as Lydia slammed into him.

“YOU DID IT! YOU DID IT! SUCK IT, PAULY!” She was bouncing up and down and jumped towards him, throwing her arms around his neck. He surprised her by catching her and spinning her around before setting her down.

“That was fantastic! Thank you, Lydia.” Aesop grinned.

“I knew you’d love it!” She was beaming. “What did you think, Mirabel?”

“Oh it was exhilarating! I didn’t do much but I enjoyed watching you guys!”

“Not true, you shot the shit out of me!” Pauly grinned and pointed at his paint-covered chest.

“What a wonderful activity!” Dinah was grinning. “It felt good to get out there and fight. Did it bring back your auror days, Aesop?”

“Oh absolutely!” He still had an arm slung around Lydia.

“Come back anytime.” Pauly said with a smile. “There are showers in the locker room if you need to wash up. Where are you headed to after this?”

“That’s a surprise as well! But I promise it won’t be violent.” Lydia grinned. They all headed back to the locker room and Aesop and Abraham got changed.

“I thoroughly enjoyed myself!” Abraham grinned. “I have a feeling I’ll be sore tomorrow.”

“Me too. It was nice to do something so active and out of the box. I never would’ve considered trying it.”

“If you like trying new things, you’ll enjoy the next stop.” Abraham winked.

“I’m enjoying my birthday more than I expected to.” Aesop smiled.

When they left the locker room, Lydia was having what looked to be a heated discussion with Chad.

Aesop walked over and joined Mirabel and Dinah. “Everything alright?”

“From what I’ve gathered, Chad is her ex-boyfriend and still hung up on her.” Dinah said.

Chad finally stomped off into the back and Lydia rejoined her friends. “Sorry. You guys ready to go?”

“Let’s go!” Ronen grinned.

The radio was playing quietly and Mirabel and Aesop could tell she was upset. “Soooo you and Chad have a history?” Mirabel asked.

“We dated for a year until he decided to fuck one of my friends.” Lydia sighed. “I’m over it, he won’t let go. He’s a douche and I enjoy shooting him in the nuts with a paintball gun.”

She turned the radio up and seemed to have moved past it. She rolled the windows down and enjoyed the fresh air. Their drive was shorter this time and they pulled up to a whimsical looking building with colorful plumes of smoke coming out the chimneys.

“Welcome to the Bertie Bott’s factory!” Lydia grinned. They parked and joined up with Dinah and Abraham. “We’ve got a private jellybean tasting!”

“My mother must have told you about my sweet tooth.” Aesop smiled.

They walked into the factory entrance and a man in a striped uniform greeted them. “Hello! Here for the tour?”

“We have a reservation for a taste test under the name Collins.”

“Wonderful! Right this way.” The man walked them down the hall and into a colorful room. There was a large round glass table in the middle of the room and they each took a seat around it. Aesop ended up sitting next to Lydia, and he couldn’t help but smile. She’d put so much work and attention into making this day special for him.

Once they’d all taken their seats, a scroll appeared in front of them. It was a menu of sorts.

“You’re welcome to try as many as you’d like, these are the categories. Just say the one you’d like out loud.” The man left them and they began looking at their menus.

Aesop couldn’t decide. The categories were salty, sweet, desserts, fruit, vegetables,around the world, breakfast, unpleasant…he wondered to himself why anyone would choose unpleasant.

“I’m going to start with desserts.” Lydia said. The scroll rolled up and a tray of jellybeans appeared in front of her.

Ronen chose breakfast, Dinah chose around the world, and Mirabel chose fruit.

“I think I’ll try sweet.” Aesop said and a tray appeared before him.

“This tastes just like bacon!” Abraham proclaimed.

“Why would you want a bacon jellybean?” Dinah asked.

“Why would you want a curry jellybean?” He asked in response.

“Fair enough.”

“This tastes just like fresh, juicy strawberries!” Mirabel smiled.

“I’ve got a chocolate brownie one that’s delicious!” Lydia closed her eyes and savored it.

Aesop popped the first one on his tray into his mouth. “How appropriate, birthday cake.”

They chatted and tried dozens of flavors and dared each other to try disgusting ones. After they’d had their fill, Lydia smiled at Aesop. “Ready for the last stop on the Aesop Sharp birthday tour?”

“Let’s go.”

He knew their last stop as they strolled up to the three broomsticks. Sirona smiled as they walked in. “Happy birthday, Aesop!”

“Thank you, Sirona. It’s turning out to be a great day.”

“The upstairs room is all yours, your other guests have already arrived.”

“Other guests?” Aesop asked.

Lydia grinned. “I think you’ll be happy.” They climbed the stairs and Lydia opened the door. Aesop’s eyes widened and he grinned. “Jake! Bobby!”

“So you are still alive then?” Jake stood up and pulled him into a hug. “Nothing for years, then we get a call from this lovely lass. She tells us you’re a teacher!”

“How ya doing, Aesop?” Bobby grinned and hugged Aesop.

“How on Earth did you find these two?!” Aesop was grinning widely. “These are two of my best friends from my auror days.”

“Oh! What a nice surprise!” Mirabel smiled.

“And we’ve got plenty of embarrassing stories to tell on him.” Jake grinned.

“Oh, god.” Aesop groaned.

45 minutes later, they’d all had several drinks and were laughing and cutting up. “I’ve gotta get some air.” Lydia said and went out onto the balcony.

“Me too.” Aesop followed her out and Bobby and Jake whooped.

“Thank you, Lydia, for making my birthday enjoyable. You put so much care and thought into everything. I…I really appreciate you.” He leaned against the railing she was leaning on, and their elbows touched.

“Of course. You deserve to have a happy birthday, Aesop.” She smiled at him and put her hand over his. He placed his other hand on top.

“It’s a beautiful evening.” Lydia turned to look at him.

“I don’t really want it to end.” He replied, looking into her eyes.

“It’s not over yet, Aesop.” Their heads moved closer together. Just as their lips were about to meet, Abraham rushed outside and threw up over the railing.

“That tasted like bacon.” Ronen said as he wiped his mouth. “Too many jellybeans and too much to drink. Sorry to disturb.” He stumbled back inside and closed the door to the balcony.

“I suppose we should go back inside.” Aesop said, feeling disappointed.

“But I believe you were about to kiss me. If we could step a little further that way and away from the jellybean vomit, I think this could be quite a romantic moment.” Lydia grinned.

Aesop stepped backwards and grabbed her hand, taking her with him. He brushed the hair away from her face and tipped her chin up towards him. He leaned down and kissed her gently. His hands rested on her hips and her arms wrapped around his neck. She pulled away and they rested their foreheads against each other. “Happy birthday, Aesop.”

“Happy birthday, indeed.”

[thiswaycomessomethingwicked]

1, 17 and 37 for Vetinari?

Ahhh our difficult to pin down patrician!! A classic and a favourite <3 <3

1. Canon I outright reject

Hahaha well. I mean. TP wrote a Trope, a caricature, not a character with Vetinari. He's too perfect to be believable as a real person*. So, you know.

--

*I get why. Vetinari can't have any real fuck-ups, because then TP would be writing a different series than one-offs "the baddie of the week," which is what his bread and butter was. To have Vetinari be a real man would mean there would be true mistakes and real repercussions that couldn't be resolved as easily as TP liked to wrap up his stories. And that's fair! He wasn't writing complex political fantasy. But that does mean the canon is limiting and 2D when it comes to side-characters, including Vetinari.

--

I suppose, I reject the portrayal of Vetinari at seventeen in Night Watch because lol like hell is that any seventeen year old I've ever known. And I've known (and was my myself) "firm head on your shoulders, grounded, hyper realistic about the world" sorts of kids. They're still kids. Vetinari in Night Watch was just Mini-Patrician.

And I reject that whole-heartedly. This is one of those instances where TP really shone with his bit-characters because Downey is a perfect Stroppy Posh Obnoxious Dick-swinging Prick as only a fundamentally rich, privileged seventeen year old boy can be. Vetinari is very bland in comparison. Again! Too perfect. It's boring.

So yeah, I prefer an Awkward, Weird, Posh Prick of a seventeen year old to whatever TP wrote with Vetinari. He can still inhume a patrician. Just give him pimples and make him awkward and weird. The Tiger Scene is a small recompense - and even then, it feels too....adultish? In a weird way? That just doesn't jive with me.

17. Quotes, songs, poems, etc. that I associate with them

Too many to list outright. Fuck. Here are a very, very few that I've compiled offhand. Honestly, this is deserving of a whole second ask.

Poems/Books

Blitzed Out, Lauren Turner (poem) - granted, I apply different aspects of this poem to almost all characters.

The Glass Essay, Anne Carson (poem)

Willful Subjects, Sarah Ahmed - a full book on the concept of will and willfulness. Particularly of the concept of "willfullness" as a charge to be laid against others in a means to remove their will/agency. Anyway, it's always struck me as a book Vetinari would have on his bookshelf.

Coyote in the Dark, Coyotes Remembered, Mary Oliver (poem)

Two Atheists Banking on an Afterlife, Lauren Turner (poem)

The Awake and Sleeping Ye, Anne-Marie Turza (poem)

The Undying, Anne Boyer - another full book. Granted Vetinari doesn't have cancer, but her writing on illness and disability are things I lean on when writing Vetinari.

Litany, Billy Collins (poem)

Songs

Feel It Still, Portugal - the Man

Bury a Friend, Billie Eilish

When We Were Young, The Killers

If I had a heart, Fever Ray

Devil's Backbone, The Civil Wars

Fair, The Amazing Devil (this is truly The Downey/Vetinari song)

They Provide the Paint, Streetlight Manifesto

Drinking Song for the Socially Anxious, The Amazing Devil (another Downey/Vetinari one lol)

Quotes

"If God exists he isn't just butter and good luck. / He's also the tick that killed my wonderful dog Luke." - Mary Oliver excerpt from "At the River Clarion"

"To love rightly is to love what is orderly and beautiful in an educated and disciplined way." - Plato's Republic

"When we cut the ripe melon, should we not give it thanks? / Aand should we not thank the knife also? / We do not live in a simple world." - Mary Oliver excerpt from "At the River Clarion"

"What I want to say is / that the past is the past, / and the present is what your life is, / and you are capable / of choosing what that will be, / darling citizen." - Mary Oliver excerpt from "Mornings at Blackwater"

"I don't know what God is. / I don't know what death is. / But I believe they have between them / some fervent and necessary arrangement." - Mary Oliver excerpt from "Sometimes"

(Honestly - every Mary Oliver poem has a small set of lines somewhere within it that will remind me of Vetinari. Or, rather, I will call them to mind when I write him. Obviously, when I am reading Mary Oliver I am too busy weeping over small and gargantuan beauties to be thinking about fanfiction.)

"Regardless, I want to spell out that, in Judaism, a person can do real, profound, comprehensive repentance work and even get right with God—experience atonement—even if their victim never forgives them. Repentance and forgiveness are separate processes.” - Danya Ruttenberg excerpt from On Repentance and Repair

"Monuments are interesting mostly in how they diminish all other aspects of the landscape. Each highly perceptible thing makes something else almost imperceptible." - Anne Boyer excerpt from Garments Against Women

"It took me so long to realize / there are people who start fires, not to tend them, / but to see how things burn, and it took me even longer / to realize some places need fire simply to survive." - Caitlin Scarano, excerpt from “During the Wildfires” (this is also a Grima quote, honestly)

37. What they really think about themselves

As noted in the first question - Vetinari is a hard one to read and write because he's two dimensional in the text but given enough that he's not a full blank slate. But it's also a lot of nonsense we're given to work with. Masks, really.

And I think that's partially it - does Vetinari know what he thinks about himself? Or is he wholly Patrician, now? When he looks in a mirror, what does he see? Ghosts of previous patricians hovering in the hinterlands? Nothing so melodramatic as that, likely, but maybe. He has his maudlin moments in the books.

Fundamtenally, though, I think Vetinari's biggest trick is that he isn't faking anything. There's no mask. There's no cover. This is just who he is as a person. Cold, ruthless, calculating, cunning - but also given to a dry sense of humour, partial to moments of sentimentality, of being maudlin or philosophical when the mood strikes - also loves his irony and sense of occasion or moment and so on.

I think he has a fairly grounded sense of self. We're never given reason to think there's misalignment between how Vetinari sees himself (practical, efficient, capable) and how he behaves as patrician (practical, efficient, capable).

I'm not sure I'm really get at this question. But that's what I have to say on it for now. More may come to me later.

----

Thank you so much!! I do love talking about this weird freak of a man. Bless him that scag.

[docrotten]

MOTHER’S DAY (1980) – Episode 261 – Decades Of Horror 1980s

“You get what you deserve in them Deep Barons, you lez-beans! You won’t be causing no one no trouble no more!” Really? That’s all you got? Join your faithful Grue Crew – Crystal Cleveland, Chad Hunt, Bill Mulligan, and Jeff Mohr – as they celebrate one of their favorite holidays Troma-style with Mother’s Day (1980).

Decades of Horror 1980s Episode 261 – Mother’s Day (1980)

Join the Crew on the Gruesome Magazine YouTube channel! Subscribe today! Click the alert to get notified of new content! https://youtube.com/gruesomemagazine

Gruesome Magazine is partnering with the WICKED HORROR TV CHANNEL (https://wickedhorrortv.com/) which now includes video episodes of Decades of Horror 1980s and is available on Roku, AppleTV, Amazon FireTV, AndroidTV, and its online website across all OTT platforms, as well as mobile, tablet, and desktop.

Two brothers kidnap and brutalize three women for the pleasure of their demented mother.

Directed by: Charles Kaufman

Writing Credits: Charles Kaufman, Warren Leight

Produced by:

Alexander Beck (executive producer)

Michael Herz (associate producer)

Charles Kaufman (producer)

Lloyd Kaufman (associate producer}

Michael Kravitz (producer)

Cinematography by: Joseph Mangine

Editing by: Daniel Loewenthal

Production Design by: Susan Kaufman

Art Direction by: Sandy Hamilton

Assistant Art Director: Rex Piano

Costume Design by: Ellen Lutter

Special Makeup Effects by: Josie Caruso, Rob E. Holland

Selected Cast:

Nancy Hendrickson as Abbey

Deborah Luce as Jackie

Tiana Pierce as Trina

Gary Pollard as Ike (credited as Holden McGuire)

Michael McCleery as Addley (credited as Billy Ray McQuade)

Beatrice Pons as Mother (credited as Rose Ross)

Robert Collins as Ernie

Peter Fox as The ‘Dobber’ (credited as Karl Sandys)

Luisa Marsella as Terry (credited as Marsella Davidson)

Kevin Lowe as Ted

Scott Lucas as Storekeeper

Ed Battle as Doorman

Robert Carnegie as Tex

Stanley Kaufman as Older Man at Pool Party

Mother’s Day, directed by Charles Kaufman and featuring an admirable performance from Beatrice Pons as “Mother,” looks far better than it deserves to look. Except for Pons and cinematographer Joseph Mangine, Mother’s Day features a group of relative novices, and yet, the acting, story, and humor propel this film from beginning to end, even though it’s a bit tough to watch in places. Hey! The three lead victims of Mother’s clan even have story arcs! Eli Roth’s favorite movie can’t be all bad, can it?

At the time of this writing, Mother’s Day is available to stream from Shudder, Tubi, PlutoTV, and several PPV sources. The movie is available on physical media from Vinegar Syndrome in a 2-disc Region Free Set: 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray.

Every two weeks, Gruesome Magazine’s Decades of Horror 1980s podcast will cover another horror film from the 1980s. The next episode’s film, chosen by Jeff, will be Roadgames (1981), directed by Richard Franklin (Patrick, Psycho II) and starring Stacy Keach and Jamie Lee Curtis. Get ready for some Ozploitation!

Please let them know how they’re doing! They want to hear from you – the coolest, grooviest fans – so leave them a message or comment on the Gruesome Magazine Youtube channel, on the Gruesome Magazine website, or email the Decades of Horror 1980s podcast hosts at feedback@gruesomemagazine.com.

Check out this episode!

[cust-archive]

And...Jack:

Achievement Hunter roll call!

[piratefairy-moonlight]

can't wait to come back as a ghost when the gay angel has entered the public domain :)

[c-m-li]

Old school YA dystopia books that deserve some love:

Ever since the well-deserved success of The Hunger Games books that was skyrocketed by the movies, we have been inundated by so-called YA Dystopian books. Unfortunately, it seems that a disproportionate amount of them are hollow copy and pasted versions that get paler and paler with each incarnation.

This post is brought to you by my love of dystopia from books published before or around such books as the Divergent series.

(no hate to those who enjoy the ya dystopian books that have been coming out in droves in the past decade) (if you love the book then you love it, that’s the point of literature)

I bring these to you in the hopes that I can entice those who are sick of the YA dystopian genre into seeing how they should be written. YA dystopia is what revolutionized teenagers into thinking that they could change the world, they could go head-to-head against corrupt governments. Now that we’ve grown up, it’s time to inspire the next generation.

disclaimer that this is by no means meant to be a comprehensive list, just what i have read over the years

Dystopia at its finest:

The Shadow Children Series by Margaret Peterson Haddix

The Giver Quartet by Lois Lowry

The Bar Code by Suzanne Weyn

The Uglies Trilogy by Scott Westerfeld

The Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins

Truancy by Isamu Fukui

The Delirium Trilogy by Lauren Oliver

The Slated Trilogy by Teri Terry

The Blackcoat Rebellion Trilogy by Aimee Carter

The Declaration Trilogy by Gemma Malley

The Matched Trilogy by Ally Condie

Dystopia where the characters have special powers:

The Reboot Duology by Amy Tintera

The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken

The Pledge Trilogy by Kimberly Derting

Dystopia where the characters are more interested in the YA romance than toppling the government:

The Selection Trilogy by Kiera Cass

The Awaken Trilogy by Katie Kacvinsky

Dystopia with a dash of the apocalypse:

The Birthmarked Trilogy by Caragh M. O’Brien

The Razorland Series by Ann Aguirre

The Chemical Garden Trilogy by Lauren DeStefano

Dystopia that is way old school and probably isn’t YA but they are must reads of the genre:

1984 by George Orwell

We by Yevgeny Zamyatin

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

This is my love note to YA Dystopia literature and I wish you happy reading.

[ghostbergara]

🔥☀️🌱 for the lgbt asks!! <33

well for 🔥 theres this incredibly long answer ahsjj

for ☀️, yes absolutely!! For starters i guess if you'd count it, helping me discover what trans was and that it was me, Sam Collins majorly and a bunch of others that i don't remember anymore. And then theres one person who really made me feel like i was just allowed to be my queer self however i wanted to.

this is long again, sorry

So there was a family thing for trans kids and their parents at the one (and only) trans... clinic??? department?? in Denmark (i started transitioning around 13) which me and my parents went to, mainly for their sake. Here there were 2 trans men speakers (there was supposed to be a trans woman as well but sadly she was sick) along with a doctor and psychiatrist. They both told their stories. One had gone the very 'stereotypical' or straight route through his transition (he was lowkey sexist too but thats a whole other thing) and the second one, mikey, had gone in every non-traditional route. He was actually speaking after having physically detranstioned, not because he wasnt or isnt trans, but because that was where he was in life right now. He had just had kids with his husband (i think it was his husband, this was a while ago) and was living in.... some other country mainly as far as i can remember. I wont go into his full story but basically his message was you're not any less valid for not going the traditional routes or not fitting into the stereotypes and that there was no 'taking a step back' you were always going forward, you might just take a new path.

First of all, this is what turned my mom from being very unsupportive and angry into being very supportive (to the point where she has made a facebook group for trans parents to make sure others dont go the route she did). and second of all, it helped me let go of this need to fit into all these stereotypes and stupid 'masculinity rules' (aka toxic masculinity) AND most importantly, i had asked him once there were no parents in the room, if i could be gay and still be 'valid' as a trans man. I knew of course that yes you could but for myself i still felt like I couldn't. Hearing from this adult trans man that i respected so much, that even my formerly transphobic mother respected, that of course i could. It made such a big difference to me. I'll be forever grateful to this guy for sharing his story in a room full of sceptical parents and the very clinic that had denied him at the start of his transition and taking his time to answer my question.

And then of course my lovely lovely doctor Katherina Main who is a ray of sun in this terrible system. She is amazing and i love her. She is so invested and enthusiastic about her work and really makes the sometimes hard or awkward medical talks feel light and comfortable. After sexologist klinik (the one trans clinic for young trans people), which is a NIGHTMARE, literally ask ANYONE who's been there its horrible, getting through them and to the medical part, expecting the worst and then meeting Katherina? Biggest relief i have ever felt my entire life. She changes so many trans peoples lives and is a light in our transitions and i hope she knows that!

Yes all of this doesnt really fit the question but goddammit Katherina deserves the recognition

Okay ill try to keep 🌱 short im so sorry 😭

I think honestly younger me would just go "ooooooohhh now it all makes sense!"

LGBTQ+/Queer Themed Asks

[bag-of-broadway-snacks]

So I finalky finished my Starlight Sequence Comparisons. And just a disclaimer: I think all the actors/actresses listed are amazingly talented. I am only rating one performance so who knows why they sounded like they did at any given time. Also note that these are my opinions! So don't freak out at me.

OLC (Ray Shell, Lon Satton)

-Okay so I'm biased in this case but Ray has always one of my favorite Rustys he has an credibly powerful voice with amazing diction. So easy to understand him and because of that you can connect with the emotion that the Starlight sequence is supposed to bring. The actor playing Poppa here also did a marvelous job he kept his voice very powerful and clear. Sometimes actors end up dropping off when Rusty starts singing but he didn't have that issue. I really liked both performances here. Overall one of the best performances of the Starlight sequence. 10/10

NSE (Greg Ellis, Lon Satton)

-Okay so for this production I still thought Rusty did very well. His voice wasn't as powerful as I like and he had a bit of a slurr to his words. However, I could still understand him very clearly thanks to his good diction. Overall I had no problem with his performance, I thought he did good. My problem with this performance is Poppa. Lon Satton was returning to the role and, for whatever reason, despite his amazing performance in the original London cast, he amped up and sounded way too much like a boy band gospel singer. And it just takes me out of the performance because the Starlight Express is supposed to be this God, this Heavenly being and that's why the powerful booming voice really works. It's supposed to leave you breathless in wonder not make you feel like you're in a concert. I have a problem with actors over singing in general so Poppa over singing here kind of took me out of the experience and its a shame because Rusty did fine here. He was just being out shined. 7/10

1988 Bochum (Steven Skeels, Trevor Georges)

-This is another performance I really like. But I do have one issue with it. Although Poppa and Rusty both sound very good, Poppa was a bit too loud, so I couldn't I almost couldn't hear Rusty most of the time. So you have this effect where it sounds like the two voices are competing rather than coming in for a harmony. though they're both singing different lines Poppa and Rusty should be feeling the exact same emotions so they should complement each other. It's always difficult to do Duets like this where you're singing two different lines over top of each other, so I can understand the difficulty they had here with moderating Poppa's voice to accommodate Rusty. So overall it was a very good performance I only had very minor issues with it. 9/10

1987 Japan/Australia (Bobby Collins, Richie Pitts)

-So this is how I die. All right now just a little disclaimer, I love Bobby Collins. I love his performance in a lot of songs from Starlight Express. However, I do not like how during the Starlight sequence, he sounds like Sandy from Daria singing The Starlight sequence. I have no idea what happens to Bobby during the song but he looses a lot of the emotion in his voice and he suddenly gets weird diction too it. I just don't like it. Poppa here had his own issue, he sounded like he was tense during the whole song and singing a bit too much from his throat. So while I like both of the singers in other numbers they just didn't come together to make this a good listen. I can see the appeal to some people, but not for me. It's not the worst performance favorites. 5/10

1991 Bochum (Colin Munro, Stevie Woods)

-I don't have too much to say about this one. I will say it almost had the opposite problem of another version. Rusty was a little bit too overpowering, but not so much that was noticeable for the whole song. Overall both Poppa and Rusty were very good singers, the diction was there. I could use a little more emotion but other then that I don't have many complaints. Good job for both of them. 9/10

2007 UK (Oliver Thornton, Michael Samuels)

-

Oh my gosh, okay this one is so beautiful. Rusty had wonderful voice that actually reminds me of Ray a little bit. Poppa brought home the whole number, he had this deep, booming, enchanting voice that I personally look for. My only nitpick is at the climax of the song, Poppa didn't quite reach that last note so the song didn't have that full on hit you in the chest feeling, but honestly that's so minor. 10/10

2015 Bochum (Kevin Kohler, David E Moore)

-

Another number that starts stellar! Poppa did so good here, he kept such a strong voice that really hit. It was more aggressive I'm usually used to but I honestly thought that fit the song as well. Kevin Kohler, of course, did good as usual. Unfortunately, he was just no match for Poppa and when it came time to sing his part of the climax you just could not hear him at all. A little bit of a shame but I mean with how loud Poppa was being, anyone would have trouble overpowering his voice. That would have to be fixed with mics rather than just singing alone. Overall its very good preformance. I love the energy that both actors kept up during the whole thing. I only have the one complaint. 8/10

2017 Workshop (George Ure, Mica Paris)

-This is just kind of a fun one for me. Rusty here short of sounds like a bratty teen. He has this problem throughout the whole Musical and I don't know if it was the day or that's how he usually sounds, but it was not my favorite performance for this song. Momma did fairly well for the most part. You can hear in her voice she was having trouble hitting her notes. I wouldn't be surprised if her vocal range was a little higher than was written for the Starlight sequence. As this was the first time Momma had sung to the public, are l I think it was a great first impression. I don't have much to say about this as it of course wasn't professional since it was just a workshop. So, I'll give it a 9/10.

2019 Bochum (Blake Anderson, Bianca Atalaya)

-This version is so underrated. Momma's voice is just as powerful as the original London cast. She sounds gorgeous and she really brought in a lot of emotion. Rusty here as well had a lot of emotion the voices collide and it just hits you. I really loved it. My one complaint is that Rusty did start off a little bit shaky. I was worried for a little while that he wouldn't be as good as he ended up being towards the end of the song. Really good tweaking it would have been perfect. 9/10

30th Ann. (Dan Ellison, Reva Rice)

-And to top it all off, this version may be like my favorite of all time. Dan Ellison as Rusty always puts a smile on my face. He really has earned his hype in the stex fandom. He's got a voice that carries so much emotion and projects like nobody's business. Ms. Reva Rice also does so beautifully as Momma in both productions I've listened to her in. She absolutely hits it out of the ballpark every time. I certainly hope that they'll release an album at some point. Its a gorgeous performance and deserves that sort of preservation that many others have gotten. 10/10

I had fun with this and if you want me to talk about any other songs let me know and I will!

[springmachinery]

The super detailed eyebrow guide Part 1

Hello everyone, this will be my first post on this blog. Let’s cut to the chase, the first thing we will be talking about is eyebrow styling. There is no one “ideal” eyebrow shape that suits everyone and likely you suit a couple of eyebrow styles yourself. There is no absolute “wrong” answer when it comes to eyebrows, it greatly depends on what kind of vibe you desire to give off: cute, professional, sexy, mature, innocent, anything goes. These will just be some tips that might help you to figure out what works for you, just remember that it is very difficult to make an absolutely accurate guess without seeing your full face, this is ideally a self-help resource.

First of all, you will often see the basic styling guide that goes something like this:

However, I found that this wasn’t absolutely helpful to me. What about thickness? The height of the brow? How arched should I go? Some girls look amazing with perfectly straight brows, right? Is this the only arch that looks good? It’s hard to find info on all of this so let me start:

The thickness of the brows

Think of it this way: The eyebrows are supposed to accentuate what is already there or balance it, as such it is important to follow the lines of the face to create appropriate harmony. Faces are complicated and you may even suit a different type of eyebrows when you have more weight on you, I know I do. Along with that, when it comes to eyebrows, the eyes are the most important determinant, but not the ONLY determinant. Some faces need more softness/sharpness so you add the appropriate eyebrows, at other times, you want to play exactly into the type of features that you have. 

Would you say your facial features are more elongated, narrow and have a certain lightness? None of your features stand out, rather they all work together, no facial feature is too large. Then go for a thinner brow. Think of celebrities like Taylor Swift 

Or Charlize Theron

Heather Morris 

Hyuna ( kpop idols rarely rock completely thin eyebrows, but you can see that among them she has a thinner variant)  

Another point to present is the “chubbiness” vs “dryness” of your face. The more “dry” your face is, meaning the less facial fat and roundness you have, the more likely thin brows suit you. Let’s look at Halle Berry - the thinner her face became, the more she suited thin brows. 

And the midpoint:

One thing to notice is that her eyebrows were never TOO thick - her balanced features would simply never allow for it. Look at someone like Charlize with thick eyebrows, it just didn’t suit her. Her features are simply too delicate for that.

Are your features larger, heavier, more "in your face" - especially the eyes? Consider a much thicker brow like the following ladies. The brows need to follow the lines of your face, if your eyes are very “strong”, they deserve an appropriate assistant! Lucy Hale

Sofia Vergara

Sofia Loren

Lilly Collins

Aisha

Look how much better Beyonce looks with thicker brows, these eyebrows are not that thin to begin with, now imagine how much less flattering thinner eyebrows would be for her face:

The same can be said about Lykke Li, her face is much more balanced when she sports thicker brows due to her beautiful heavy features. 

Notice that many of these women have either rounder or wide cheeks, even if their faces may not hold onto more flesh, that’s the bone structure. That is a trait that suits thicker brows, on the other hand, the ladies in the “thin eyebrows” category often have slightly narrower lines and sharper bones. The thin eyebrows soften them up. 

However, there are some exceptions to this. If all of your features a very large or maybe even your forehead is smaller than you’d prefer, you may go the complete opposite route and take thin brows.

A youtube Anncy is a beautiful example of someone who made the right call going for thin brows instead of thick ones. Larger brows would wear down her face and perhaps take more space away from the rest of her features. When you have large features, sometimes it is difficult to juggle proportions: adding large eyebrows can take away either from eyebrow height or forehead length so if you recognize yourself in this, consider going for thinner brows even though your features are large. The only image of thick brows on her I could find offhand is this  but I felt it would be unfair to put them with the other ones, as I feel the lightning and angle isn’t equal or as flattering, but hopefully you get the point. 

Another example of this is Angelina Jolie. She goes for much thinner eyebrows than you’d expect from someone with features as large as those. 

Big eyebrows would simply be too much competition for the rest of her face:

However, many people don’t fit any type perfectly and that’s also perfectly fine. Most are in the hybrid category, so they have to pay attention to various features.

Kerry Washington is one such example. Her features are larger, yet her eyes are very delicate. Her face is narrow, but there is much fleshiness to it. She goes for a brow that isn’t too thick or too thin. They’re narrow to follow the longer line of the face, yet not too thin to harmonize with the roundness of her features, cheeks and chin. 

Megan Fox has fairly small features and yet she looks better with thicker brows? Why? Because her face possesses a certain sharpness, particularly in her features, that needs thick eyebrows to balance them out. This also has to do with her coloring and contrast, but that will be its own category in a following post. 

Also, while it may seem like blondes suit thinner brows and brunettes thicker ones, that may not exactly be it. I put the example of Lykke Li who shows that a blonde can perfectly rock thick eyebrows, and Hyuna and Halle, as an example that brunettes can also look beautiful with thin ones. I’ll go more in depth about this in the Coloring section. 

Arched vs Straight eyebrows

The arch of the brow depends on your overall features and the style you want to convey. A longer midface may suit straighter, longer eyebrows to add width to the face. Straight eyebrows also make you look younger and more cute. They can also help the forehead look wider. An example of this is Yoona, this girl has a longer midface and the brows add a vertical line that breaks apart the length of the midface. The straight brows also suit her cute and youthful appeal.

Mina from Twice is another good example of this. The straight brows add balance to the length of the face.

I would suggest straighter brows to people who’d prefer a cuter look usually, however many sexpots, so to speak, go for this look to balance out their features. Look how much width these straight brows, that extend far out, allow Jessica Alba’s longer face.

Straight eyebrows, depending on how dark they are, can also add drama and make the face seem more symmetrical and lifted, especially if the ends of the brows point up - that’s why they’re popular with models. Notice how symmetrical and compact, or even wide, a lot of these faces appear due to this effect. Additionally, these faces appear more dominant or modelesque and may even photograph better, which is why you may want to try them out. 

Let’s look at Nyane, her straight brows with a slight elevation towards the end point out the beautiful symmetry and sharpness of her face. When they are arched, there is too much sharpness. Even if they were shaped differently, the elevated arch would take away from a more balanced look.  

On the other hand, for the e-girl or cute girl look, the straight eyebrows don’t point up, rather, they point down. Look at the classic e-girl Belle Delphine for that. For the cute girl look, choose either an end that points neutrally or down. Beware that an eyebrow that point down may make your face appear less lifted, but many faces can handle it pretty well. It’s all subjective and not everyone wants the lifted look.

As for arched brows, they definitely bring up the sex appeal and make your eyes appear lifted. This is great if you want to go for enhanced sex appeal or have a negative canthal tilt (downturned eyes) that you’d like to change. Arched eyebrows are a classic and they add that “wow” factor to the face, in addition to that, it’s also a great choice for those who have a baby face and want to stray away from that. It’s great to add that arched eyebrows can break up a wide face and add “length”, it can also shrink the forehead and make the eyes appear larger, but that will be further covered in the placement section.

Gigi Hadid has beautiful eyebrows that make her eyes appear huge due to the high arch point. The eyebrows are her best feature and certainly add something to her look. Pay attention to how babylike her face would look without those eyebrows, if you’d cover them, her face would seem so much softer. The arched brows are exactly what make her face model like. It’s that extra something.

Aishwarya Rai is famous for her sex appeal and beauty and her eyebrows play up that aspect - she often lifts up one or both brows in photos to get an even more pronounced arch.

When her eyebrows are straighter, she loses some of that seductiveness.

Anne Hathaway has beautiful downturned eyes, however, in case one would like to “lift” the area up, so to speak, they could try out this type of style. The arch of the brow is exactly above where her eye ends and goes down, making for beautiful harmony.

Eyebrows can also be more sharply arched or have a more rounded arch. A sharper arch can add more dimension to the face, as well as sex appeal, while the rounded one can accentuate femininity (look Gigi and A,R, or someone like Sofia Vergara). Marylin Monroe, in tune with old Hollywood beauties, sported a sharper arch often, as did Olivia Wilde, to suit her sharp features.  

Naomi, is also an example of beautiful arched eyebrows, that mix up both the rounded and sharp aspect by going to no extreme. This can suit you really well if you have a mix of sharp and round features like she does (high cheekbones, elongated face + full lips, rounded cheeks etc.)

If you can’t decide which eyebrow to go for, consider the mix of the two: where the eyebrows bottom line is more straight and the top of it is arched. It is often seen on women with cat eyes that want to add softness but also show off that allure. Notice how the bottom of Barbara’s eyebrow here is straight and the top is arched - this is also great if you have difficulty with shaping your brows as it is forgiving for filling in + it looks very natural.

All of this said, it is up to you if you want to add sharpness or softness to your face - there is no right call and a lot of it has to do with what your style and taste is. Many of these women have tried out all types of arches and found that each look “sold” something, a particular essence. It is up to you to choose what you like, however, I hope this guide helped you in discovering which eyebrows suit what style. 

I wish to also address more finely tuned details of the eyebrow such as:

-Eyebrow placement (Low and High placed)

-The placement of the arch and its effects on the look you are portraying

-Having eyebrows compliment individual features (close set eyes, wide set eyes, broad noses etc)

-Coloring of the eyebrows

and perhaps some more. Stay tuned! 

[lgbtqiacab]

Thoughts of an angry feminist lesbian — Pride & Prejudice edition

Disclaimers: I know it's not all that pertinent to judge a 208 year old book with today's values but I never come to tumblr.com in order to be a productive member of society. I just like to rant in the void, like everyone else. I'm a simple woman, after all. Also I'm reading the gay version (Gay Pride and Prejudice by Kate Christie because I have no time for the straights anymore). Will update in time.

- Elizabeth Bennet is such an NLOG it hurts my soul. She is annoying as hell. She reeks of internalised misogyny. I'm very ambivalent with her character. I ship her really hard with Caroline Bingley though. Enemies to lovers is the way.

- Lydia should have been the heroine. Get it, girl. Premarital sex is the best sex, so I'm told. She absolutely does not deserve to be cut off from her family. Blame George Wickham. It's literally in his name that he's the culprit. No victim/slut shaming in this house. Ew.

- Kitty/Catherine "becoming good again and marrying some rando after not being around Lydia's bad influence" is slander. Stop.

- Mary does not deserve to be trashed on the tl 24/7. She also should have been the heroine. A woman with ambition? Who wants knowledge? That's my shit. Yeah she's struggling but who isn't??? She trying her best and (hopefully) enjoying herself and that's the most important thing. Also the real treasure was the friends we made along the way.

- About Mary again, she is always portrayed by perfectly conventionally attractive women in the latest adaptations and it makes my blood BOIL.

- Fitzwilliam Darcy, Caroline Bingley and Charles Bingley are all raging homosexuals.

- Darcy and Bingley are hiding a passionate relationship. They are so in love wow. You know I'm right.

- Darcy is that depressed homo™️ (the emo bf) and Bingley is the ray of sunshine who gets him out of his shell. I have so many headcanons about them. OTP. *cheff kiss*

- Give Mrs. Bennet a rest, she's the only one trying to help her daughters having a future. She is not "hysterical" or a comic relief to despise. She is making sure she and her children have a roof over their head after Mr. Bennet dies. That's called parenting. It is expected from a parent. Get ✨ it ✨ together ✨ y'all.

- Mr. Bennet is a horrendous father. I want to slap him. That mf does nothing else but despise the wide majority of his own children and makes fun at their expense. He's like respecting women (my own children too) who do not meet my conversational standards? Heck no. He doesn't give a flying fuck about what happens to his family after he dies. Sure man, read your books and be pedantic/detached from these "crazy women" all you want, so edgy of you. Also cutting his own daughter off?? What's up??? He'd probably be posting "I hate my wife jokes" and "edgy" sexist/transphobic/homophobic/anti-masks memes on facebook nowadays. He would say stuff like "wake up sheeple." Ew again.

- The Bennet family is sO dysfunctional jESUS-

- Catherine de Bourgh is a domineering woman (why is that a such bad thing, Austen???? I think it's very hot of her) and is basically a boomer BUT- in her defence, she is merely wishing for her daughter to be safe. Just like Mrs. Bennet. The times were harsh on unmarried women.

- William Collins is so bland, we get it, Austen. Don't get me wrong, he's a dumbass for sure but we get it, Austen.

- Btw my favourite thing about Austen is that she gives her name (Jane) to all the best/morally-upstanding/prettiest/most candid/kindest/angel-like characters and honestly whaT A MOVE. Our girl be manifesting before it was cool.

- "You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you" is such a powerful phrasing. What an drama queen, love it. Ily < ymamttyhaiaaly

[jupitermelichios]

DC: The High-School AU: The Series: The Staff (the musical)

So I finally cast the school staff and teachers for my DC High School AU, which I thought some of you would have some fun with! I took the subject list from a fairly fancy looking private school, because only schools you have to pay for have their subject lists online, so I’m probably offering way more classes than your average state school, but hey, it’s my AU and I wanted to cram in as many supervillains, obscure heroes, and bad jokes as possible.

Admin & Staff

Principle - Amanda Waller

Deputy Principle & Treasurer - Noah Kuttler (the Calculator)

Nurse - Myra Mason (she was Dr Midnite’s nurse and love interest in the 40s & 50s, then got fridged, but I’m unfridging her and giving her a job with much better survival prospects)

Councillor - Ethel Peabody (she’s a psychiatrist from the Gotham TV show, and also in my headcanon, Amanda Waller’s sister)

Librarian - Stanislaus Johns (The Librarian. I considered bookworm for this job but he’s literally called the Librarian, what was I supposed to do, not use him?)

Admin Staff - Laura Conway (Superman supporting cast and occaisional vampire), Mabel Martin (Riddler’s secretary), Theresa Collins (Goldstar, also Booster Gold’s secretary)

Business

Loren Jupiter (aka Mr Jupiter the richest and therefore most thrustworthy man in the world) - Business 101, Business Law, Entrepreneurship

Wesley Dodds (Sandman) - Business Communications

Annabeth Chamberlain (Brimstone) - Marketing, Hospitality & Tourism (she doesn’t work in tourism, but I figure anyone who can waitress while also having the power to set people on fire and damn them to hell and keeps her job probably knows a whole lot about customer service)

Family & Consumer Science

Miss Tribb (Lobo’s childhood teacher who inexplicably survived the extinction of their species) - Childhood Developement, Early Childhood Education

Neil Richards (The Mad Mod) - Texiles/Sewing, Fashion

Tenzil Kem (Matter-Eater Lad) - Food & Nutrition

Finance

Noah Kuttler (The Calculator) - Personal Finance

Foreign Languages

Matron Bertinelli (Nu52 Huntress, who I’m declaring a sepperate character and the aunt of pre-52 Huntress because they’re radically different characters and I like both of them) - ASL, Italian

Chang Jie-Ru (Nu52 Yo-Yo) - Chinese, AP Chinese

Yolanda Montez (Wildcat II) - Spanish, AP Spanish

Barbara Minerva (Cheetah) - Latin

Health Sciences

Myra Mason - Emergency Medical Responder training

Charles McNider (Dr Midnite) - Anatomy & Physiology, Health Class

IT

Brian Durlin (Savant) - Computer Programming, Web Dev

Jennifer Lyn-Hayden (Jade) - Digital Art 101

Arnold Wesker (Ventriloquist) - 3D Animation, 3D Graphics (I don’t know why but the idea of Wesker as an animator just tickled me. Obviously his real passion is stop-motion, but he learnt 3D because there were more jobs)

English (the fancy private school called this ‘language arts’ which is so prentious it makes me feel slightly nauseous)

Wesley Dodds (Sandman) - English Language, AP English Language

Rac Shade (Shade the Changing Man) - English Literature, AP English Literature

Chloe Sullivan (the worst character in the Smallville TV show, a hotly contested position) - English Language, Communications 101, supervises the School Paper and the Yearbook

Shelly Gaynore (The Whip III) - Englist Literature, Creative Writing

Basil Karlo (Clayface) - Intro to Shakespeare

Nick Scratch (officially his supervillain name is just Scratch, but I refuse to consider that a code-name, looking at you Drake) - Communications 102: Public Speaking

Mathematics (which has a 100% villain make-up, which seems accurate from what I remember of high-school maths)

Noah Kuttler (The Calculator, because I think I’m funny) - Pre-Calc, Calculus, AP Calculus

Harlan Graves (The Underbroker) - Stats, Algebra 1, Algebra 2

Angelo Bend (Angle Man, becuase I know I’m funny) - Geometry, Trigonometry

PE (I realise this is probably too many PE teachers but there are a lot more caonical althetes than just about any other job in the DCU except maybe scientist)

Lawrence Crock (Sportsmaster, you knew this was coming) - Gym, Weight Training, coaches Baseball, Basketball, Tennis & Hockey

Lisa Snart (Golden Glider) - joint-coaches Cheerleading, coaches the Drill Team, Wrestling

Randy Hanrahan (Stallion) - PE, joint-coaches Cheerleading & Cross-Country, coaches Football

William Everett (Amazing Man) - PE, joint-coaches Cross-Country, coaches Track & Field

Matron Bertinelli (Huntress, sort of) - coaches Soccer & gymnastics

Performing Arts

Lisa Snart (Golden Glider) - Dance

Hartley Rathaway (Pied Piper) - Music 101, Music Theory, Composition, teaches Guitar & Percussion

Isaac Bowin (The Fiddler) - Music 101, AP Music Theory, leads Jazz Band, Orchestra, Marching Band

Siobhan Smyth (Silver Banshee) - part-time, leads the Choir and teaches singing

Basil Karlo (Clayface) - Theatre, Theatre 101

Simon Trent (Grey Ghost) - Theatre, Theatre 101, Film Studies

Ted Kord (Blue Beetle) - Theatre Tech

Mary Louise Dahl (Baby-Doll, from B:TAS) - Film Studies, Video Production

Betty Bates (Lady-at-Law, who is technically owned by DC now due to corporate buy-outs) - Debate

Science (do you have any idea how hard it is to pin down areas of specialisation for comic book scientists? TNT is on this list entirely because he’s the only actual honest-to-god professional chemist I could find)

Kirk Langstrom (ManBat) - Biology, AP Biology

Pamela Isley (Poison Ivy) - Biology, Environmental Science

Thomas “Tex” Thomas (TNT) - Chemistry

Achilles Milo (Professor Milo, again not really much of a code name) - Chemistry, AP Chemistry

Will Magnus (I refuse to even dignify it as a code-name) - Physics, Earth Sciences

Ray Palmer (The Atom) - Physics, AP Physics

Adam Strange (DC is just doing this to fuck with me, personally) - Astronomy

Social Studies & Humanities

Barbara Minerva (Cheetah) - World History

Maxie Zeus (ffs) - World History, AP World History (fun fact, Maxie was canonically just a normal history teacher before he got lightning powers, became convinced he was Zeus incarnate, and set out to become a criminal, making him my favourite DC mobster by a country mile)

Terry Long (aka one of the only characters to really deserve to get fridged) - US History, AP European History

Eobard Thawne (every code-name he has is stupid, but lets just go with Reverse-Flash as the least awful option) - US History, AP US History

Nick Scratch - US Government, AP US Government, AP Comparative Politics

Rex Tyler (Hourman) - AP Art History

Magdalene Kyle-Burton (Sister Zero, she’s a sometimes-nun and a sometimes-sister to Catwoman) - Comparative Religion

Michael Carter (Booster Gold) - Economics, AP Microeconomics, AP Macroeconomics

Jonathan Crane (Scarecrow) - Psychology (there is exactly one heroic psychiatrist in all of comics, and I’d already used Dr Fate elsewhere. Scarecrow seemed like the least bad option of the remaining pool for being around children, and he does at least have teaching experience)

Adam Strange - Sociology

Betty Bates (Lady-at-Law) - Law

Richard Occult/Rose Psychic (it’s complicated, lets just say Dr Occult and leave it at that) - part-time, Criminal Justice

Technology & Engineering

Ted Kord (Blue Beetle) - Electronics, CAD, Woodworking

John Henry Irons (Steel) - Engineering, Metalworking

Will Magnus - Robotics

Visual Arts

Linda Lee/Danvers (she’s Supergirl, but I’m making her a different character from Kara Danvers/Kent because the DCU is really short on artists and I needed someone to teach the damn class, although the only thing that really makes her distinct from other supergirls is that she fucked a horse that one time and IDK how that will translate into a personality...) - Ceramics, AP Studio Art: 3D Design, Art 101

Rex Tyler (Hourman) - Graphic Design, Drawing, AP Studio Art: Drawing

Jack Knight (Starman) - Painting, AP Studio Art: 2D Design, Art 101

Jennifer Lyn-Hayden (Jade) - Photography

So there you go - I’ll be honest I still don’t really understand how high-schools in the USA work, and I have no idea what Design studio art even is so I kind of assigned those ones at random, but now it’s done and cannot be changed.

As always this universe is open to prompts so if you want a chapter focussing on any of these characters just drop me an ask or a comment and I’ll see what I can do. Making Dr Occult & Rose Psychic a single gender-fluid person is already on my list to do, since that’s who I thought they were for a longest time when I started reading comics and I’m still kind of annoyed that isn’t canonically what’s going on.

[seriouslycromulent]

Let me be frank ...

I don’t care what critics say. I never have. I’ve spent the majority of my life liking and disliking art and entertainment based on my own personal perspectives and interpretations that often goes against whatever the majority thinks about a creative work. Whether it’s a painting, a play or a poem, I’ve always thought for myself, and I’ve been more than happy to stand alone in my love and appreciation (or contempt and disdain) for a creative work or concept. 

So when I share this critics’ response to Zack Snyder’s Justice League below, I’m not turning my back on my lifelong tradition of not giving a damn. I’m simply sharing something positive about Snyder’s work, which I believe for the past 8 years has been unnaturally maligned by simpletons, haters, and those who refuse to evolve in a world that continues to evolve without them. 

Although my opinion is the ultimate one that matters to me, I’m happy to see Snyder get the kudos he deserves. I know there are still haters and folks determined to try and harass everyone into joining their cult of the un-evolved. I can’t fix those people. Any more than I can fix people who still support Trump or think that being queer is a choice. 

The best I can do is ignore them and not give them any of my divine energy. But most days, I opt to mock them because no one is their best every day. 

Anyway, here is just a little of the professional critical feedback on ZSJL shared on Twitter this opening weekend by Ray Porter (the actor who played Darkseid). Enjoy!

[It reads:]

“It’s maddening. It’s monumental. It’s art.” -- Matt Zoller Seitz, RogerEbert.com

“Truly a new film -- and a knockout / This has to be one of the most visually spellbinding comic-book movies ever made.” -- Owen Gleiberman, Variety

“Nobody frames superhero action more lovingly than Snyder / Visually dazzling, and far more visceral.” -- Bryan Lowery, CNN.com

“Zack Snyder’s Justice League is a magnum opus to be admired and enjoyed.” -- Julian Roman, MovieWeb

“Zack Snyder’s Justice League is brilliant and brave, smart and complicated, hopeful and inspiring / the ultimate DC superhero movie” -- Mark Hughes, Forbes

“Zack Snyder’s Justice League is a mad and magnificent, four-hour apocalyptic pop epic in a genre increasingly hidebound by formula, it stands as a monument to exceptionalism that itself feels exceptional.” -- Robbie Collin, The Telegraph

“A tantalizing look at a world that could have been.” -- Edgar Deggans, NPR

“Justice is served.” -- Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian

_____

Bless you, Mark Hughes and Robbie Collin!

[ucflibrary]

The sad passing of director Lynn Shelton last week underscores both the rich lineage of female directors she belongs to as well as the immense progress the industry still needs to make in giving these filmmakers the deserved opportunity to give us such wonderful movies. So in honor of Shelton, it’s as a good a time as any to highlight a couple of her legendary predecessors.

~

The Hitch-Hiker (Ida Lupino, 1953)

In 1953, actress-turned-filmmaker Ida Lupino became the first woman to direct a film noir, The Hitch-Hiker. It follows the story of two friends, Roy Collins and Gilbert Bowen, on a fishing trip to Mexico who pick up the hitch-hiking Emmett Myers, a murderer trying to escape into Baja. The film is somewhat rare among noirs in that it isn't set in a big city, instead taking place mostly in the wide open desert roads of California and Mexico through which Myers is trying to make his escape. This highlights their isolation; the bleaker the landscape, the more urgent the captives' despair becomes.

The movie is a taut and lean 71 minutes and Lupino is quite efficient at getting us to understand everything we need to know about these characters. She may be sketching with broad strokes but she quickly defines and distinguishes these three men. Bowen tries to remain level-headed, knowing that the key to survival is keeping your head down as long as necessary. Collins becomes increasingly desperate, ready and waiting to pounce on their captor as soon as he can. And Myers is a menacing villain, controlled on the outside with a just barely visible rage coiled to burst out at a moment's notice.

But by defining these men in such elemental ways, she's able to undercut some of the inherited tropes of masculinity within these hard-boiled genres. In that way, she's much closer to her contemporaries such as Nicholas Ray or Samuel Fuller than the earlier practitioners film noir.

Lupino was already a movie star by the time she tried her hand at directing and the fact that she was doing so for her own production company is what likely gave her the freedom to do so at a time when so few women were helming productions (she also wrote or co-wrote many of these films). This period of artistic freedom lasted not even a decade and she went back to a successful career as an actress. But it served as a model for one way women could wield agency in the industry—a model, 60-plus years later, Hollywood still needs to catch up with.

The Hitch-Hiker is available on Kanopy through November 13, 2020.

~

Cléo From 5 to 7 (Agnès Varda, 1962)

The influence the French New Wave movement of the late 50s and early 60s had cannot be understated, and its effects are still felt today. Their progenitors read like a murderers’ row of cinephile gods: Chabrol, Truffaut, Rivette, and of course Godard. And though Agnès Varda would be perhaps belatedly regarded in the same company, she would firmly establish her bona fides by 1962's Cléo From 5 to 7.

The film follows in real time a beautiful singer wandering Paris, nervously awaiting the results of medical tests that will reveal whether or not she has cancer. Beauty is often the currency by which women have to navigate the world and Cléo is fully aware of that. "Ugliness is a kind of death. As long as I'm beautiful, I'm even more alive than the others," she says early in the film to pacify herself. We see this quite strikingly every time she walks on the street. In a vérité-style typical to the French New Wave, scenes play out in the city amongst a public, who either don't realize or don't care a movie is being shot in their midst. And as Cléo (as portrayed by an impossibly beautiful Corinne Marchand) glides down the streets of Paris, she catches every man's eye, leaving no head unturned. But self-worth based on another's gaze has its price, as the several men she encounters dismiss her existential dread as merely attention grabbing. "Everyone spoils me. No one loves me," she laments.

If Varda was atypical among her New Wave counterparts simply for being female, she was also different in that she did not emerge from the ranks of the French critical elite. She was by trade a photographer and while other early New Wave films had a purposefully unvarnished aesthetic, Cléo From 5 to 7 shows the keenly astute eye for framing and editing that would become a hallmark in the director's later works.

Where Cléo ends up, while primally important to her, feels less significant to the movie than all the seemingly random tangents that brought her there. She sees Paris, and herself, with a fresh set of eyes. Perhaps others she will encounter will do the same. With Varda it's about refreshing our gaze; it's not about what we see, it's about who we see.

Cléo From 5 to 7 is available on Kanopy through August 21, 2020.

[wafflewarriors]

The Not-So-French Mistake

Chapter 1: Angelic Abductions 

Sydney woke to an unfamiliar ceiling. She stood, eyeing the room, hands outstretched in a protective circle. The setting sun beamed in through the yawning windows and their golden rays glared over her face. Feverish, sweltering heat crashed down and sweat trickled off her forehead. It was the occasional, rickety hotel room with thin, decorative curtains and typical furniture. Yet a threat lingered in the air. 

Her apparent amnesia heightened her fear. However, with the lack of visible threats, she allowed her rigid shoulders to drop an inch. Nothing was off, per se, besides the apparent fact that she hadn’t recalled purchasing a hotel room; and for reasons unknown, her senses were warning her that she wasn’t alone: like a hidden, buzzing alarm somewhere in her conscience.

On cue, a gentle, cool draft blew in the room, and there a man stood at the foot of the doorway. He entered the room, his stare stoic and concentrated with a calm expression shaping his intense features. The khaki-colored trench coat embracing his shoulders fluttered with the breeze while his stark-blue tie politely waved.

Her eyes betrayed her. She dug her nails into the sweat of her palms, forming anxious fists that would dubiously protect her from whatever evil lay before her. An ocean of questions flooded her brain in a panicked moment, and she cowered fearfully. Her elbows tucked into her ribs, palms out in surrender like a frightened animal.

The man blinked benignly. Curiously, he took a step onto the lip of the carpet. He spoke honestly: “My name is Castiel.”

With a set jaw and a wary mind, she regarded the man. He appeared harmless: his ruffled dark hair and clear blue eyes dampened her nerves significantly. Continuing to gape like a fish, she struggled to form intelligible sentences. She finally demanded, “Where am I?”

Castiel neared cautiously to avoid alarming her. “A place you do not belong.“ He extended his arm toward her face, two fingers caressing her temple in a gentle profession.

A wave of bliss shot through her, blessing her muscles into a restful state. The darkest corners of her mind eased and folded under the grace’s fluid power, and she folded into unconsciousness as her eyes fluttered shut. She went limp and steady hands caught her before she descended onto the tile floor.

Castiel supported her deadweight and unfurled his wings. Then, with a confident rush of wind, the humid prison of a deserted hotel was behind them. The angel observed his new surroundings, while he gingerly assured the girl’s safety within his arms. Castiel pushed past a startled Bobby and grunted as he set her on the couch.

Bobby’s face wrinkled his brow in confusion and then raised them again, ready for a thorough explanation. “So, who’s the girl?”

Castiel narrowed his eyes, although his expression remained passive. He revealed three gleaming angel blades hidden in his trench coat and displayed them on the table. “Angels had locked her within an abandoned hotel not far from here.” His tone was soft and concerned. Regretful.

Dean and Sam both looked exhausted: the bruised raccoon eyes from lack of sleep and the slouched mannerisms proved their late-night research and hunting.

They had chosen their stance throughout Bobby’s country home: Castiel stood with his hands in his trench coat pockets while watching over the girl, Sam and Dean were both inclined up against the antique table, and Bobby had situated himself in a wooden seat.

Dean raised an eyebrow at the girl splayed on the couch. Her auburn locks fell onto her shoulders in chocolate waves. A snugly fit jean jacket enveloped her, the sleeves’ ends frayed and torn with age and worriment, while a plain black tank top fit her middle. Black leggings clung to her knees in wrinkles, but, oddly enough, no shoes were present. Dean immediately remarked, “Can she even drive yet?” For someone associated with angels, she was awfully young.

Castiel paused, considering it literally, and before he could embarrass himself by answering, and Dean stopped the angel. The hunter chuckled and rephrased his question, “Cas, what I mean is: Why do the angels care so much about a teenager? Is she human?”

Castiel looked regretful when he replied, “Yes. She has a human soul. Whatever the angels are searching for, it is foolish.” The angel blades along the table clattered as he nudged their handles, recalling their owners apologetically. The angel huffed, reluctant to tell as they waited patiently for him to explain. He owed them one, however. After all the favors the Winchesters had given, they at least deserved answers. “They stole her from a… variance of our dimension.”

Dean pouted a lip. “So, what? They went all, Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe on her? Yanked her out of the professor’s magic wardrobe?”

The angel watched, lost as Dean made references, so he merely continued explaining without acknowledging them. “No, Dean. She doesn’t exist here. That’s what makes this extremely dangerous.”

“Like… Aslan kind of dangerous?” Dean smirked.

“Aslan? The Turkish word for… lion?” he said, looking bewildered until he had decoded Dean’s phrase as a casual joke. He huffed, “No- no, Dean. This level of interference could cause catastrophic damage to our universe. This could disrupt time itself if we don’t prevent it. This could alter fate.” Castiel sought to prove how world-altering this could become.

Dean shrugged. “Another chance that our world may be royally screwed. Why am I not surprised? You know, sometimes I feel like the world is just begging for attention.” He took a calm sip of his half-empty glass. “So how do we get her… back?”

Castiel shook his head. “I don’t know if we can. There are infinite realities out there, Dean. Finding the correct universe would be like searching for a specific atom in an entire galaxy. It’s… unrealistic. Even to our standards, ” he said.

The hunter sent a silent impressed look. It wasn’t like they were defying the laws of nature on a daily basis or anything, but he couldn’t argue.

Sam froze. “Hey, wait. Is this related to that alternate reality we were thrown into by Balthazar? The one with our lives as a television show with no mojo? I remember now. Our names were, eh, Jared and Jensen?” He remembered that day. A world where supernatural, demons, and angels didn’t exist. Nothing of the sort had ever walked among anyone. It was a blessing, really. Plus, Sam and Dean had been ridiculously rich. He didn’t have a bad memory of the place, besides the angel Virgil pouncing on their tails.

He remembered how Cas had been. Or mostly, how he hadn’t been. Misha Collins, he recalled vaguely, the sweater-wearing variant of their angel friend. His voice had been higher-pitched, too: less gravelly and low. Misha had been rather vulnerable as a human. From the homeless man’s descriptive details, Sam had pieced together that Misha had blubbered and squealed blatantly as the blade of Virgil’s knife had pinched threateningly at his neck. Nobody could blame the guy: he had been an innocent, inexperienced variant of their mid-war Castiel. Although, now that the angel was here in the flesh while Sam speculated, he couldn’t help contrast Castiel’s and Misha’s polarity.

Castiel nodded. “Yes. A similar one.”

Sam made an abundance of facial expressions when he was thinking. His eyebrows would draw crinkles along his forehead and his teeth would grind together in thought. His eyes remained steady and sure. “Then couldn’t we use that symbol we used the last time? The one that glowed red on the window we jumped through?”

“No.” The angel answered sadly. “Not that simple. We knew about your location.”

Sam leaned back further against the table at Cas’s response. It never was that easy, was it? “So that’s it? We… let her stay?”

Without hesitance, the angel replied, “No. That could altogether upset the natural order. I suggest we find the angel responsible.”

All three hunters eyed the angel in anticipation. When he didn’t respond, Bobby spoke up, “Who, then?”

Cas fidgeted. “I don’t know yet.”

It was quiet after that. A whistle of hot wind trickling in from a loose window and danced throughout the house, filling in the silence the group left. In all seasons, nature’s sounds were talkative at this end of the country. The cicadas chirped enthusiastically when the stars blinked above, and the mosquitoes nipped when summer sweat pooled in their shoes. It differed completely from the city. There was no whining of engines besides their own, and the air smelled of sweet ponderosa pine: a soft, blended aroma of vanilla and butterscotch. The Singer Salvage Yard was a rusty home for the hunters, but it was home.

Dean couldn’t shake the instinct within him that told him to question the scenario, so he spoke up, headstrong. “Okay, but is this even a bad thing?”

“Of course, it’s a bad thing-!” Bobby barked incredulously.

“Yeah, yeah, but Cas said it could alter fate. So what if this could improve things around here? I mean, if we recruited her, think of the hunter she would-”

“That was not meant to encourage you, Dean.” Castiel disagreed. “You know too well how this turns out. Becoming vain over ‘good intentions’ backfire. They always do. Of all people, you should have learned this lesson by now.” He pivoted to take a glance at the comatose teenager on the couch cushions. She seemed at peace now, but once she woke, it would be worse than at the hotel. “She was petrified when I retrieved her. Imagine if she learned what lurked in the darkness. It could break her, Dean.”

Castiel had a point.

Dean shifted uncomfortably,  recollecting old memories that started with the phrase: ‘good intentions’. Sam’s par against demon blood and had spiraled into the upbringing of the devil himself and the apocalypse along with him. The time Castiel had been juiced up on souls and transformed into ‘God’ was also an example of ‘good intentions’ gone wrong. 

Dean could additionally add the constant sacrifice of his life for Sam’s as another example of where he could officially state he had literally been forming deals with death. Wearing Death’s ring and impersonating him for an entire day just to bring Sam’s soul back from Lucifer’s cage was a rather personal issue of his. Protective was a light term.

Cas sensed the hunter’s change of attitude and figured it best to drop the topic while they were still civil and level-headed. “I suggest you all sleep. I’ll take watch.” The angel shuffled into a comfortable position, preparing to stand silently for the rest of the night as the chirrups and warbles of birds outside hushed.

So, the idle room roused, itching for its inhabitants to sleep as the stars sat above them.

Bobby was first to act, and he migrated from his seat to settle for the night. The stairs gave a distinct thwap thwap of socks against the wood to indicate he was heading off to bed and leaving the boys to their own business.

Sam rose from his corner of the table, stretching and lumbering off to the car to rest like a defeated moose. The couch was occupied, so he was making do.

Dean raised an eyebrow, trotting off to grab another drink. Nobody bothered to protest against his habits because, unfortunately, this was Dean’s way of coping with the obstacles life threw at him. Eventually, Dean would settle; however, the rattle of a fridge shutting proved it would not be for a while. He returned to the living room, glass now refilled with alcohol. He sat at the desk chair Bobby had abandoned and swayed pleasantly to the hum of crickets sounding through crevices in the walls.

Dean flashed an amused look towards Castiel. “You know, you don’t need to stand over her like a hawk. You carved the sigils into her ribs, right?”

Castiel was, indeed, hovering over the teenager. He blinked, realizing his mind had gone blank with fatigue. Faltering, he swapped his attention to the hunter. “Yes… I suppose I did,” he said, giving a weary, brief look to the couch once more before sitting on the floor with his hands rested on his knees.

“Then she should be fine.” Dean expressed his interest with an inquisitorial gaze. “What’s got you worried, Cas?”

His friend was unusually uptight. “If angels deliberately brought her here from another dimension, she must be valuable to them. If we lose her once…” he trailed off.

“We won’t,” Dean stated with confidence.

Castiel frowned pensively. “I know.” He looked to the floor, pulling at the sleeves of his trench coat. “I’m draining, Dean. My grace is fading, and by the day humanity is prodding at the floodgates for cracks and fissures. I fear one day I’ll wake up as a human.”

Dean paused at the words ‘wake up as a human’ and carefully said, “But… you don’t sleep.”

“Exactly,” Castiel muttered. He rested his forehead along his palm, finding it heavy. “I’m finding it difficult to avoid the temptation of sleep.” The angel exhaled, closing his eyes and succumbing to his exhaustion.

Dean ceased to stir his drink and instead planted it on the desk. He threw a blanket over Castiel’s resting form with a soft smile. Resting his elbows on his thighs, he absorbed the night. He browsed Sam’s laptop for data on dimensional travel, but results proved frustrating. In periods of boredom, he would rise from his seat and amble around, occasionally refilling his glass. This was what Dean accomplished when he was restless. It was just another night of nothing.

Eventually, after hours of repeating this process, the hunter drifted away as dawn illuminated the house with a tame gold. He sunk into the chair, his head lolling until it sagged against the wall.

Fortunately, it was a dreamless slumber.