#she’s a ‘writer’ in the room but is credited as a consultant which Fair i get it fr fr

[victimized-martyr]

oh to be hired as mattrey’s brain trust for a run and help the story be completed on time and support trey where he needed it …

[popculturebuffet]

Ducktales Comics: Spies Like Us and Dime after Dime or Weblena: The Preschool Days (Lena Retrospective) (Comissioned by WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy people and welcome back to Shadow Into Light, My Lena Retrospective, which fittingly has now come to Women’s History Month! I sadly do not have anything besides this arc prepared for the month. This month is pretty packed for me with two shows a week to cover, as while there’s only two weeks of Ducktales left final space starts up right after to take it’s spot, two arcs to cover, and two time specific movie reviews: animal crossing the movie and the 1990 TMNT film. I will try to get more than the currently planned top 12 superheroines list out there... but this month is very tight as is, so if I do not I deeply apologize.

Now that’s out of the way, it’s appropriate we start Women’s history month on some likely lesser known parts of Lena’s history, with some comics stories focusing on our faviorite emo lesbian duck and her 87 counterpart. Before I get started on that though Kev my patreon pointed out something intresting a few weeks back i’ve been forgetting to get to and since we’re looking into Minima, I felt this was the perfect time to do so: Lena’s Concept art. 

There’s quite a few things to gleam from this. For starters as pointed out in the reddit thread I got the image as a whole from this was made in 2015, meaning Lena was one of the first new characters designed for the series and was part of it from the VERY early stages, as evidenced by the fact that despite clearly having their new personalities established, Beakly and Webby still had the old designs. 

The other notable change is that her first design was way more like both Magica nad Minima, a bit more modern, but clearly far more obvious who she was related to. She also had all black feathers making the shadow twist a bit more obvious and was likely done away with both to avoid giving that twist away, the same reason for the fake lestrange name, and to avoid accidently black coding her, as while Lena being black would’ve been intersting, it also would’ve invited a firestorm of controversy given that their one black character in season 1.. woul’dve started off as a homeless, manipulative antagonist, and none of that would play well nor was it something the progressive crew of this show couldn’t spot from a mile away.  And even this early on they have an almost final design ready, simply changing the shirt to fit her personality more, and her hair to be pink because it honestly looked better She also had green eyes throughout, but for whatever reason they phased them out. That part I don’t quite get as they look nice but probably they were hard to translate to the reboot style once they settled on their own. Her purple eyeshadow and haircut though have stuck since and were good calls. 

One last VERY obvious note.. Webby was gay for Lena from minute one. While Dana helped it is now VERY obvious they gay coded this relationship from the design phase, and the crew was entirely aware the whole time and I gave them less credit than I should have. They clearly had this in mind, and it’s very likely ONLY subtext because Disney, while making more and more progress, is very reluctant to have queer characters as Owl House was a struggle and since they have a tighter leash on properites based on the sensational 6, that means Frank knew they had the same odds of making Webby or Della queer in anything but subtext that a pig has of suviving in a slaughterhouse. I bring this up because I fear the series getting accused of queerbaiting somewhere down the road instead of doing what they could with a bad hand and hoping they could make the show as gay as they could. Penny is as out as they posisbly could get her, and Violet and Lena’s dad’s got a full apperance, if no speaking role that made it obvious beyond a shadow of a doubt their gay and did it in a plot important episode. So they did their best and I want them to get credit for that. 

But while this is all intresting stuff, join me under the cut for the meat of today’s review as I dig into Lena’s only apperance in the tie-in comic that was never punished here, and the only apperance of her protoype Minima.

Spies Like Us:  As I mentioned this comic was never published here which is doubly weird to me because of how I knew this story existed. Since I follow comics weekly and buy trades reguarly, I read the solicits companies put out eveyr month to see what new series are coming, what the ones i’m currently reading are doing, and what trades are coming out. That sort of thing, and it’s something I love. I know their basically adds.. but their well put together adds that really pull you into the books you like. The big two and the indies are all very good at it and sometimes i’ts the only way to know a comic is coming if the company dosen’t make a press release for it ahead of time. 

So naturally given there are several comics I follow at idw, paticuarlly the TMNT comics, I read those solicits and found they were going to do an issue with Webby and Lena becoming spies, and was excited about it. I ended up forgetting about it and never really followed the Ducktales comic as it came out, and upon reading an issue or two recently, one for another comission by kev as one story, happy happy valley, was particularly terrible. For those who haven’t read the story or my review, it involved the family getting stranded on an island where their forced to partake in activites and smile..that somehow turned into an aseop about Louie wanting to be rich. It ended with this

Yes.. really. That actually happened. But even with this, I fully planned to cover the issue when I covered Lena, and brought it up to Kev when he commissioned the retrospective. He gave me the discord equilvent of a blank stare and had never heard of it. I soon found out why: the story was replaced as, and fair play to disney, it spoiled Beakly’s past from the agent 23 episode which wasn’t going to air in time.  What dosen’t work is they never reprinted the story in The US.. didn’t put it in a future issue and just swap it’s place didn’t put it in the nothing. And the story was fully complete as we’ll see, with a cover and everything so they had no excuse whatsoever to NEVER use it, even with what happened to Lena in the season finale, this clearly took place before that and it was weird to just shelve it because of that. But thankfully when a bunch of the stories were reprinted overseas, this and another one, also webby centric got published overseas. But not in english.

Lucky for me, I was able to find an english translation of an english story which you can read RIGHT HERE. It was translated by @neopuff and I thank them for it as without them this review would not be possible and want to give them all the credit. So was it worth all their hard work translating it? Well let’s take a look. 

We begin at the Manor where Lena is skulking around suspiciously.. though it turns out she and Webby are just playing hide and seek. Though Lena accuses cheating. The dialouge here is pretty flat though that’s not Neopuff’s fault at all. As I can attest from reading other stories a lot of the early IDW comics are just this flat in dialoguge no matter the writer as they were likely given character descriptions and basic info about the show they likely had written up for merchandising and Frank and Co were given no involvement and likely weren’t made avaliable to consult on the comics to help them be a bit more fleshed out. It’s very obvious to me Disney just tried to get these pumped out so they’d have a series in stores to tie in without carring about qualities and given Scrooge debuted in comics, their lack of care toward that side of things in general, but especially in the first american published original duck comics in a while, bothers me a lot. It’s inexcusable. 

That being said the story isn’t half bad nor is the setup as the two hear a beeping and find it’s Beakly’s phone going off with a mysterious message from Q, Webby thinks she’s been reactivated, and is encouraged by Lena to go look after her while she stays along. While Webby says in response

It just feels grossly out of character for both. Lena is far more subtle about manipulation as shown five minutes ago and Webby blindly trusts her. Because she has a massive crush on her and is naïve about how the world works. It just seems very odd of her to get suspicious as she never does on screen, and again it comes off as Disney having barely given the writers any materials on them when i’m sure Frank or Matt would’ve been happy to write up a thing for them to help outside of the usual press materials they were given. 

Though hte last line isn’t all that out of character and has an obvious answer as within a jumpcut Launchpad’s taking them to London and is told to blend in.. which he does with an australian flag and accent.. good gag. 

So our heroines do some heroic breaking and entering and look for the package, but soon find while hiding it’s already in transit.. and had obvious bows on int. Whoops. Our heroes trie the old follow tha tcar bit and refreshingly, it dosen’t pan out as the guy stops and tells them to get out. A nice twist. Unable to follow, our heroes instead find launchpad lost, as his map is upside down

So Lena dares him if he can follow that plane, a nice bit of character for both. I will give Joe credit. While the dialouge’s a bit flat and there was that out of character moment.. for the most part he does nail the actual character down and does use it decently enough. He’s just not given enough page room or actual details to work  with is all. 

So while our heroes follow they end up having to crash as they run out of fuel.. lucky their with the expert but end up near home where the package is delivered to. Turns out this wasn’t a spy thing, this was just a thing with her aunt. That’s fine and a nice gag.. it’s just ruined by just sorta.. ending. Lena leaves disapointed and Beakly scolds webby for “playing spy” and she’s sad. That’s it that’s how it ends. Which dosen’t fit the characters, as while Beakly would defintely scold her, it just dosen’t FIT that she’d be that tearse or not appricate the effort or give her an actual lecture and it feels like Joe had no idea how to end this after the gag and just.. ended it. 

Final Thoughts for Spies Likes Us: This was okay.  It is a bit of a disappointment as for the only story not available.. i’ts just okay and not really above an average Ducktales comics story, with some nice character bits but feeling a bit weak overall, as do at least the first half of the idw comics. I haven’t read the later stuff to see if it got better. It’s worth a read if you like Webby and Lena as characters and it’s not BAD, it’s just not anything impressive and is a simple hyjinks filled misunderstanding story. 

Dime After Dime:

So now  we go back a bit to the original. I didn’t do these in chronological order because frankly, Dime after Dime is the better story of the two and the bigger one at that, so I have more to work with here. But the original also had comics and honestly from the few i’ve read much BETTER comics. I chalk this up to two things: The Ducktales 87 comics seem to have come out AFTER the series was already a hit, and since Ducktales is pretty close to the original uncle scrooge comics minus it’s own tweaks here and there, it’s easy enough to just write the stories like you would a regular uncle scrooge story, just with Webby and Launchpad added, whereas the idw writers were staffed with writing for all new versions of the characters with noticable differences without much to go on.  It’s why to me with tie in comics you have two options: Wait long enough so you can put your story inbtween the episodes like the Steven Universe and Regular Show comics did or just make your own continuity entirely like the Adventure Time Comics and the Archie TMNT Adventures series did. The ONLY time i’ve seen a comic work like this is the Bravest Warriors comic, which had a talented writer and fit well enough in the margins until it sadly ended.. and honestly is BETTER in some cases than the series. I might get to it someday. The point is this comic shows why you need to have a deft hand adapting something instead of just falling your arms about and hoping it’ll work. 

So today’s comic was part of some Disney Series called cartoon tales, which clearly repackaged comic stories from wherever, and put them together. I don’t know much about it and the only other issue avaliable collects the disney adventures adaptation of “Just Us Justice Ducks”, which I might cover at some point. This book does have two other stories which i’d be happy to do on comission or on my own at some point, one involving gladstone the other gizmoduck, but for now, i’m just sticking to the title story and the reason you all came here. 

So we open with Magica gazing into her crystal ball from her Mt. Vesuvies base saying that Scrooge will never know what hit him I know exactly what and who wiil hit him thank you very much. 

Scrooge is seeing Webby off to her first day of day camp, getting all teary eyed which is touching. Beakly apparently goes with her as the story never SAYS Sshe does but she’s not also not around when the story moves on, as Launchpad says it looks like rain. Scrooge dismisses him, though Launchpad turns out to be right. Scrooge had good reason for once though, instead of just being a dick good on you comic for making me not want to punch him in the face, trust me that is a high bar to clear with the scrooge comics, as the weather was fine just a minute ago. Naturally it was Magica All Along! Nothing scrooge can do now that eveyrthing has gone wrong! Her entrance though is sadly not a catchy earwormy tune, but .. this confusing line

I think your thinking of Gladstone. And he’s still single so.. have at that but no Scrooge is the one who values hard work over anything else and brags about THAT or being rich. I .. I don’t get this line and frankly I don’t want to. Even in stories where the dime is supernaturally lucky and the source of his wealth he dosen’t boast about it because he’s not stupid and dosen’t want everyone knowing how to bankrupt him instantly. This line will baffle me until I die, presumably, given my life’s tragetctory, after reviewing an episode of mighty ducks and slipping on some a jerky wrapper. 

Scrooge asks what she wants... 

No this isn’t that kind of story sadly. Her plan is to.. zap the bin with lightning and take the dime. Really just went with your first draft didn’t you magica? But as stupid as this plan is Scrooge has prepared for it. He installed a lightning rod on the bin to save on power, and to power his new super soaker traps. So all Magica did was save him money. She flies off and nothing is acomplished. 

So we get back to Webby at the Teenie Weenie Day Camp.. and just so you don’t think that was a terrible joke on my part...

My theory for how this name got approved at all is the editor KNEW how that sounded and just wanted to see if Disney would actually print a comic with the phrase Teenie Weenie without getting what it means in slang or how hilariously inapproriate it is to namme a children’s camp after it. 

Your probably wondering who that grown woman calling Webby a dweeb is. Well story wise, she’s SUPPOSED to be another kid at the camp around Webby’s age. In practice, she looks like THIS in closeup

So it looks and plays like a 30 year old woman snuck into the day camp and no one’s noticed she’s not actually a children. Or their just humoring her because she had a week to live. I don’t know. I do know she doesn’t get to judge on names. 

Snippy Von Glitz, proof rich people really do hate their kids and this this comic is trying personally to give me material. Snippy is your average alpha bitch, taking a chair from Minma and being obnoxious and classist and all that jazz. Minima gets hers back by making the chair bouncy then returning it to normal so Snippy gets in trouble when she makes up things about the chair, with the lady in charge getting ready to call her Dad. You cannot convince me that her “Dad” is just what she calls her husband, this is how they both get off, and that the lady at the preschool only tolerates it because they pay her a lot and so far the kids haven’t noticed Snippy is 30. Webby likes minima finding her name pretty, proving that the ho yay is alive no matter the webby and magica relative, and Minma returns the favor by saving her from a block. 

Minma is reluctant to make an actual friend, finding they aren’t worth anything and given most of the kids here apparently pick on her and her aunt is well.. Magica, it’s understandable why she’d be so cold. But Webby presses on and says something from Scrooge about friends. Which given Ducktales scrooge has none goes weird but it gets Minma to find out she knows and lives with Scrooge, so she cons webby into taking the dime for show and tell, showing that she can manipulate them with her powers, and that he won’t notice it’s missing, getting her with “I thought you wanted to be friends” 

So let’s pause for a second and compare and contrast the two: Both are the niece, or at least sorta in Lena’s case, of Magica, both manipulate webby, and both are her first real friend: The 87 boys are little monsters and I don’t consider them friends or even brothers, while the 2017 ones are just that: brothers. Their her siblings in all but blood, not friends and have hteir own long complicated history. 

But otherwise the two are vastly different. Lena is a far more complex character as she’s been abused her whole life, is a rebel because Magica hardly gave her agency, and while she starts wooing webby out of self interest it’s clear even as far as the first episode she cares. Lena would gladly be part of the world if she could and this whole scheme is to gain that choice. 

Minma is still sympathetic but very different: She walls herself off because the other kids laugh and mock her for being herself and lashes out at them.. not unreasonably mind , but still feeling she needs no one else.. but as we’ll learn later she’s only helping Magica to finally feel accepted, to get all the fancy clothes and stuff that will make her popular instead of that grown woman masquerading as a kid for disturbing reasons. Minma is at her heart just a hurt kid desperate to fit in. And while Lena shares the desire for a place to belong.. it’s at it’s core much sadder. Lena.. wants a family. Someone to love her and to care about her and actually look after her. Minma has that she just wants to be loved. it’s similar but very diffrent and I can see why Lena evolved into what she did, as Frank and Matt ended up going in a far darker but ultimately more interesting direction. Minima is not a bad character at all though and without her I don’t think we would’ve had Lena, but at the end of the day the 87verse is just not that complicated, so the reboot needed something more and that more evolved into who we have now. 

Both kids excitedly talk about their new friends, with their respective guardians being distracted. Scrooge is distracted by the fact his car is a bit bumpy and Launchpad offers to fix it up for free with some parts from a buddy, which given the sentence “This won’t cost you anything” makes him erect, Scrooge agrees. Magica meanwhile, whose watching Minima while her mom is away which raises a LOT of questions we don’t have time for like who she is, is she’s poes wife or does Magica have other siblings... it’s a lot of questions we’re never going to get answers to. 

The next day Webby got the dime easy as Scrooge was distracted. so Minima swaps them while she’s distracted. But while swiping it was easy, which to be fair Webby is likely approved in his security so it woudln’t match her.. or the story just needed to progress. You make the call. 

Magica does the logical thing and goes and get sthe dime and the story ends there.. and i’m shitting you, she of course brags to scrooge, reveals minima as her spy, and offers to RACE him for it shortly after he realizes he has a fake.

The only major flaw in this story is Magica’s overconfdience, which isn’t BAD persay, but here has gotten to dumbass proportions. She just can’t plan for anything and a CHILD has a better plan than her that only dosen’t work for reasons we’ll get to. And that plan is almost ruined by Magica taunting scrooge!

So a race is on but Launchpad has transformed Scrooge’s old Model T into this

Damn that’s cool. Scrooge of course dosen’t like it, but honestly you get what you paid for. Oh that’s right you paid nothing for something you NEED to use every day for transportation. 

At  the rickity thickity bridge, Steve Buschemi’s worst roll and her minion ask Webby to roll with them and Minima mistakes this for betrayal planning to soak them all.. only for Webby to DEFEND HER, pointing out minma’s her friend, how she dresses is fine and she loves her no matter what.. the last part’s implied. The 30-year old asshole and her minon leave Webby and Minma is genuinely touched, as no one’s done that for her before. She put up so many walls... she didn’t realize someone could ACTUALLY care about her, so obessed with thinking she had to be like that soccer mom in preschoolers clothing, she just had to be herself: kinda werid but in that fun adams family way. Webby says she knows Minma would do the same.. so while she prepares to let’s get back to the race. Magica realizes Launchpad’s roadster is actually gaining and spreads some tacks, but Scrooge counters with some money.. because of course he has a lot of money in the trunk. But Magica takes out the bridge and while scrooge awesomely JUMPS IT... he’s still too late. 

As you probably guess though, Minima had a change of heart, and gave Webby the real dime back, and Scrooge confirms it. Minima TRIES to tell Magica, and Magica is horrified her niece is a goody goody “I”ll never hear the end of it at my astral aerobics class”.. I.. I want to see that. Let’s raise those spirit ladies and kick kick that soul, doge that shadow king punch them in the soul. Yes! Now eat it eat it and absorb it’s power!

We end on a button joke as Webby apologizes for taking the dime., Scrooge accepts it and Webby tells them magica learned to carpet and they gulp for some reason. 

Final Thoughts on Dime after Dime: This story was decent. It has problems, some jokes don’t land and Magica is made horribly incompetent, but minima’s character arc is endearing, and Webby herself is precious as always and her winning Minima over feels genuine. And Scrooge is in prime adoring uncle mode with her and i’ts just so cute. And the roadster race is pretty awesome to watch honestly. It’s an exceptional and enjoyable tie in story.. and not the last ducktales 87 story we’ll be covering here. Wink wonk. 

Next Time: Things get DARK as Lena and Webby head into the depths of Scrooge’s hidden bin and Lena heads into the depths of her own soul. 

Tommorow: Woo-Ooo mofos as we go back to the very beginning of the reboot! A family restored, a lost city to explore, and a glomgold rises! Be here or be square. 

[miraculouscontent]

Ask Explo--

...you know what, you’re right. Name change effective immediately.

Askplosion #10:

(unrelated to everything by the way but I DEMAND THE ANON WHO MENTIONED “REMARRIED EMPRESS” A WHILE BACK COME FORTH AND ANSWER FOR THEIR CRIMES. IT’S SO GOOD BUT IT’S UNFINISHED AND I’M HOOKED, HOW DARE YOU)

Asks responding to previous posts:

It’s okay! I figured that was what it was but it’s been so loooong.

Ah, wow.

Um, that’s definitely not a part 2; I think that’s more like a four-parter/five-parter or something.

Sorry! No can do!

That’s totally fair!

I think the reason I so quickly agreed with it is like--

I’ve been watching the Inuyasha sequel and it’s not like I don’t think the narrative’s apparent punching bag Moroha (who is fourteen years old) shouldn’t be punished when she does something wrong/sneaky/manipulative, but they punish her as if she’s Miroku (who was eighteen years old).

Basically, I want the punishment to take the age into account, or at least only affect Marinette on a more personal level and not be “Heart Hunter” where they take totally understandable feelings of heartache (remember, it wouldn’t have mattered which miraculous she took because Hawk Moth got the Miracle Box and Fu regardless; even beyond her emotions, I feel like she chose the best option available to her considering which temps she knew the location of) and then punish her for them by memory wiping Fu and taking away all of her temps and giving Hawk Moth the grimoire translation.

Yes!! I really wanted to respond to this one, thank you! (It’s this one and then there was another one talking about Luka and Adrien, then talked to me about how I refer to Luka as “soft” but not in a bad way; I unfortunately don’t remember the whole thing.)

Ahaha, and yeah, I feel you. Anti-salters are a very strange conundrum I still haven’t figured out; like, I get not liking salt, but...

I mean, when I don’t like certain content, I just blacklist it. If I end up seeing it anyway due to cross-tagging or a lack of tagging, then I just blacklist the person themself. You won’t see me going after people for that very reason; I only see what people send/ask me if it’s content I don’t like.

I’m glad you’ve found some peace in this blog! Hopefully it continues to be that way for you in the future!

(and yay, a fellow INTJ!!)

New Asks:

There are female writers? ;P I just assumed they were all locked in a closet until the male ones were like, “okay, pretend to help us here, we need one female writer to claim girl power.”

As for Ladybug all like, “Cute, isn’t she?” I think it was rhetorical (she could also be messing with him but “Glaciator” tells us that she didn’t know he crushed on her so who knows). The writers do this thing where Marinette is all panic-y and occasionally self-conscious as herself, but then as Ladybug, she suddenly gets a bit of an ego. I think it’s meant to be there in order to make Chat Noir look less... idk, “obnoxious” when he starts boosting his own ego; trying to balance the two by giving them both big heads, so to speak.

Honestly, I feel like Adrien needs less screen time. :|

Even when he’s not on-screen, characters are usually talking about him, or you see his face in Marinette’s room/somewhere in Paris. I’m become so jaded by the guy that I don’t even think it’d matter if they remade the series and gave it a “totally good and interesting Adrien.” That’s how badly the show has made him out for me; “Adrien Agreste” the character is just... sigh, I’m so done with him.

And yeah, this whole idea about, “Marinette is [x], we need more AAAAAADRIEN!” comes off really bad, lol, especially when Adrien has very little going for him.

(this ask ends off like there should be a part 2 but there isn’t one in my inbox, so sorry if there’s meant to be something else!)

The exact lyrics according to the wiki:

My wish for a cat who's in love, with our own Ladybug. Is that he'll get what he's always wanted! She doesn't know she loves him, only sees Adrien, But Christmas miracles always happen!

Yeah, especially nowadays, those lines bothers me. Not only does it imply “true selves,” but that it’s Chat who should be getting what he always wanted and Ladybug is the one with a problem.

Like, excuse me?

Probably Stormy Weather, even in the first episode. Ladybug and Chat Noir couldn’t even touch her until they arrived on top of the TV station.

+ With all those effects and shots, it made it feel more action-y than typical episodes.

Marinette, Aurore, Luka, Anarka, Jagged...

basically any name that I haven’t really heard before (”Luka” makes me think of Vocaloid but the Luka there was female), or a name that relates a lot to the character (like “Aurore” for “aurora” since she loves weather things).

dfjbghfkdgfdgnjfdg this anon really like, “I NEED ANSWERS!!!”

It’s as if these characters hit 18 or something and just grow overnight, I swear. I’m hypothetically fine with some more variety in character height (it’s not like the show tries to be realistic, after all), but maybe don’t give us official heights if they’re gonna be this weird/inaccurate.

Especially when they change it just for the sake of a shot anyway. If you watch “Simon Says” when Ladybug and Adrien stand next to each other while looking at the picture of Adrien’s mother, the very next close-up has an obvious difference in their heights from what you just saw.

They’re 3D models!!! This shouldn’t happen!

I... honestly never thought of the “less threatening” thing! Dang!

And yeah, Marinette isn’t helpless or incompetent, but because of the Adrien crush, it makes her that way at times since she’s always falling on him and--

...ugh, actually, yeah, don’t wanna think about those implications. Hard pass.

Gross.

I’m not familiar with that one, though Astruc deletes his tweets all the time (there was one tweet where he confirmed that Luka was poor and it only exists in screenshots now because it didn’t get archived and he deleted it almost like he realized that he was pointing out the blatant classism in the show, oops).

Yeah though, I haven’t seen anything like what you’re describing. Sorry!

It’s okay! Sorry for having you clarify but him choosing and Marinette deciding to never give it back are very different things.

I don’t recall Chat Noir having much purpose in the final fight (in terms of both contributing and actual fighting; I know Cataclysm broke the object to release the akuma but was it needed?) so Marinette might either go cat-less or get a temp. Plagg could also be helpful in his own right because he’s small and blends in with the night, so he could hypothetically sneak up on the bad guy.

Afterwards, there’d need to be a new cat, but Adrien would also have to reconsider his actions and really think about what happened. I could also see Plagg going to Adrien’s house, half to apologize for giving the idea to Adrien that Adrien leave without telling Ladybug, but also half to call him out for giving up without consulting anyone. Adrien is a lot of conflicting things (see Adrien’s passivity compared to Chat Noir’s recklessness) so he’d have to find a middle ground within himself.

Marinette might carry Plagg around in her purse for a while and let Plagg have a say in who he goes to. Plagg might grieve for a bit over not having Adrien around (even if Adrien was flawed, Plagg didn’t ask for any of this so Marinette is doing her best here).

O-oh.

That’s always the rough patch with “endgame ships.”  Once it’s obvious to the audience that they’re endgame, no more effort needs to be put into them.

The other thing too is how Kagami, for example, is friends with Marinette. Even once Adrimi sinks, she’ll presumably stay friends with her. Luka, meanwhile, is Juleka’s brother.

They have lives outside of their love interests. Adrien is so into Ladybug that he doesn’t have that; I mean, Nino is Adrien’s best friend like once in a blue moon.

The entire class is just watching an episode and then calling on raised hands to answer what was wrong with what they just watched.

“Everything?”

“I mean, yes, but I’m sorry, you have to be more specific to get credit.”

I think Aeon herself is fine. It’s mostly just her transformed and that transformed name that I have a problem with (she doesn’t even look uncanny so I don’t get it). I heard there was something wrong with the name “Aeon” but searching the name doesn’t give me anything I would qualify as such so I have no idea. I just wish she was given a little less “I’m programmed to--” (makes her seem less sentient) and more “[anything that doesn’t have to do with pushing the love square]” because I feel like they might’ve done the latter to make her more “likable”? I think fans of anything usually like the “matchmaker” character provided it’s for a ship they like. Also strange that they make her a robot but Max and Markov don’t extensively interact with her, but that’s a nitpick and not a criticism of her character.

...I’m rambling, my bad lol.

(Ohhh, she was supposed to be a mummy? Like, foreshadowing her “dying”?? That went right over my head but I guess that’d be where the name Uncanny Valley came from? No clue.)

Best case scenario is probably the middle or the end of Season 4.

And yeah, it really doesn’t matter to me what they do with the love square. Marinette had gone through too much suffering and the show goes out of its way to show how much stress Marinette is being put under (and also keeping Luka away during episodes like “Gamer 2.0″ even when it makes sense for them to be there, as if trying to make sure Marinette doesn’t have enough moments with him to forget Adrien).

Like, ah, yes, I totally believe that Marinette is in a position where she can make reasonable decisions about her love life while all circles of her life are on fire.

If the Sonic movie of all things can have an interracial couple, there’s no reason why this show can’t, just saying.

And, even with Marinette, she’s white-passing (according to what basically everyone says, I’m really awful about recognizing race so this isn’t my field; I wasn’t aware that Ondine was Asian, for example).

Does Nadja count? Manon’s dark-skinned (I’m still not over the fact that all the kids in this show are dark-skinned; it’s not like it’s a problem from a representation standpoint - though all the kids are also all generically bratty/whiny so there’s that - but the percentages in this show are weird) while Nadja is really light-skinned, meaning either a dark-skinned husband or Manon is adopted.

Though I guess the problem then is that we don’t know, so there’s no established couple there.

Non-Miraculous Asks:

w-who gave you the right to say such things????

Uhhhh, that might be too broad of a question, I’m sorry!

I know this isn’t satisfactory, but I will say that my favorite genre is Fantasy/Romance (it’s why I adore Red Shoes so much; by the way, an anon asked for my opinion on that a while back and I will get to it! I’d need to watch it again to get screenshots) and my least favorite is probably Tragedy/Horror.

I don’t think I’ve watched enough to really be able to say? I’ve kind of been all over but I’ve never fully gone through any of them outside of Miraculous. I’ve seen bits of Sailor Moon, Tokyo Mew Mew, Star VS the Forces of Evil (don’t know if that counts), and I meant to watch Yuki Yuna is a Hero but never got around to it. I saw the entirety of Puella Magi Madoka Magica but you guys know how I feel about that one.

Maybe Cardcaptor Sakura by default then? It was definitely not perfect but I liked some of the character dynamics (I also have a clipcut of it - basically where I go through a series/movie and cut out parts I don’t like so it’s only good stuff - so I’m cheating a little) and the male love interest was a tsundere type that I actually ended up liking, which is really rare.

!!! That sounds sweet~ I know Sailor Moon is popular so I’ll definitely take your word for it on that one.

I would also accept a “reincarnated”/”destined lovers” trope if maybe the ship themselves are the one who set it up in the first place. I have a Lukanette AU, for example, where they basically got together and then prayed to the shrine of the renewal god that they’d “always be together,” which ended up allowing them to reincarnate over and over (as if they set up their own soulmate AU ;P) and continuously find each other.

Though I guess that’s not technically a “meant to be trope,” but still, it’s a form of it but where it was totally consensual on both sides.

Also, I finally thought of a show that ended with the ship I wanted: Gargoyles. I didn’t see the entire series, mind you, but I saw most of it and Goliath and Elisa were just... quality, I adored them.

+ With Beauty and the Beast being my favorite Disney movie, they fit right in with my tastes.

I forget that AangToph (I think the “official” name for the ship is Taang, but don’t quote me on that) exists sometimes, maybe because I’ve never shipped Aang with anyone; I’ve got no problems with the ship though.

Ugh, and this is what I mean when I talk about people who set up these reasons behind people shipping something based on what they saw a few people do. It’s like, “you only ship Adrimi/Lukanette to spite Adrienette!!”

Meanwhile, me having shipped all three at one point and then dropped off the love square.

Also, me shipping Zutara has nothing to do with it being dark/edgy because I’ve never seen it that way (intriguing, sure but dark and edgy? lol) and also avoid dark/edgy ships like the plague.

I still laugh at people who are like, “you can’t ship it because it’s not endgaaaaame!” as if shows can dictate how and why I enjoy something. Like sure, if you want to let a show/movie spoonfeed you how you’re supposed to feel, then by all means, go ahead.

I suppose people may be theoretically happier that way, but it doesn’t make for an analytic mind.

I legitimately thought that “AssClass” must’ve been the actual name for something until it registered with me what it actually meant.

And eh, I guess it depends on the comparison and how accurate the comparison actually is? Like, comparing Puella Magic Madoka Magica to Miraculous... they’re not really close at all, but comparing... idk, Bunnyx to Homura or the concept behind “backfiring wishes”... maybe?

-

(note that the rest of this post is more Puella Magi Madoka Magica salt so you can stop reading here if you’re not interested in that; I’m not sure if this is all the same anon but I don’t mind letting people vent so I let them go off~)

why can’t we just have nice things

I agree, and I give a little eyeroll every time it’s like, “oh, this person had [miraculous]”

+ even just in general, I feel weird about any show that mentions/implies that real world famous people are [x] or [y] in their show. It breaks my immersion; real world locations are one thing but when it’s specific people (unless they’re made up characters like Santa Claus) or games just--break me.

I also don’t know what to think when there aren’t magical boys but you have these magical girls in this frilly outfits/skirts. The demographic is girls so I presume the reason must be like, “you can look pretty and still beat people up” (;P) but having so many magical girl shows without a hint of a magical boy makes me suspicious that it’s for fanservice. Sailor Moon has Tuxedo Mask but I also don’t know what that guy did outside of the meme of him doing nothing so I’ve got no clue.

(edit: I should correct myself that I’m not talking about Sailor Moon specifically; I don’t know magical girls that well, though I do know there are ones clearly intended for fanservice (you could say that for anything, to be fair, but still). It’s just that I see things like super short skirts or very “questionable” shots and I’m just like, “hm”)

Hmmm, good question. I feel like there has to be a lot but I’m also the type who doesn’t watch a lot of TV lol. I’m just familiar with cliches and tropes and such.

The reason I try not to use “ism”s of any kind is mostly because it’s too broad. Like, you know how the English language only has one way of saying, “I love you,” but other languages like Spanish have multiple?

It’s like that, and sometimes I think it’s too easy to throw those words out there. A “small” (possibly completely unintentional/misunderstood) offense is sexism, and then a “large” offense is called the exact same thing. I’d rather go into why something is sexist than just call it that, y’know? The only exception I make is “classism” because I feel like that’s not as... I dunno, divisive?

Anyway, for that same reason, I can’t answer firmly that, “Madoka Magica is sexist.” I will however say that it makes me uncomfortable with how the show makes out the girls being emotional because they’re young and female and then proceeds to make their life a living hell before they’re old enough to properly answer to it (I know that’s the point but that kind of makes it worse?). It doesn’t help with how all the girls have different personalities, so it’s not like you have only “crybaby girls” who are being taken advantage of; it’s basically like... all girls.

Not helped is the fact that their soul gem not only deteriorates naturally, but it can also do so faster if the girl falls into despair, which then turns them into a monster (and I know it’s kind of like an akuma thing, but the fact that it’s only girls is... I dunno, it comes off wrong?). It seems cheap that the soul gem deteriorates no matter what so it constantly needs fed even if the girl is consistently happy.

I would probably opt for the show being centered more around Kyubey being new to this or something - like, magical girls are a new thing - and then have Kyubey being surprised because they presumed that the soul gem would deteriorate naturally since “emotions are powerful but destructive to the person having them,” but then all the girls team up and help each other work out their problems. Maybe the reason magical girls are usually alone isn’t even because of the grief seed (I think that’s what it’s called?) thing not being able to be shared, but because Kyubey intentionally separates magical girls so they can’t do what the main group is doing, but Madoka is so into the idea that, “We shouldn’t have to be alone,” and so she’s constantly pulling all the girls together, which keeps them healthy.

Maybe Homura’s backstory could be that Madoka originally was more sheepish and more afraid to put herself out there, especially since she was a magical girl (who are encouraged to go it alone), which is why their soul gems were both deteriorating; they were friends but kept more of a distance, or maybe they were a team but that’s all they were. Then Madoka gives Homura the last grief seed to save her and that’s what inspires Homura and makes her see Madoka as something more than a teammate, which is why Homura actively tries to save Madoka specifically (which then encourages Madoka to want to keep everyone together as friends).

In the case that Kyubey doesn’t separate them out of concern of fRiEnDsHiP, but for another reason altogether, and then it’s ultimately their own downfall when they allow the girls to hang out and realize that it’s doing a lot of good for them.

“cute and innocent”

That was exactly it. It’s on Kyubey’s trivia section on the Puella Magi Madoka Magica Wiki.

Before the anime's first dark plot twist aired, head writer Gen Urobuchi said on his Twitter account that the "Kyu" in Kyubey's name comes from the English word "cute". This was a lie meant to further mislead fans into thinking that Madoka Magica is an innocent happy show. In a later episode, it was revealed that "Kyubey" is, in fact, short for "incubator".

In my personal opinion, a spoiled plot can’t be “ruined” if it’s a good plot. If you told me that Kagome was trapped in the Modern era for three years and then decided to stay with Inuyasha at the end of Inuyasha, it wouldn’t/shouldn’t decrease the value when I finally see it for myself because it’s good. That’s not to say that everything should just be spoiled right out of the gate, but it’s saying that maybe your plot isn’t good if you have to rely on shock value to make it work??

I FEEL THAT “ASSIGNING IT TO THE WHOLE GENDER” THING SO BAD. It just adds to my “the girls all have varying personalities so it’s not like Kyubey’s only after emotional crybabies or anything” salt.

I have no idea about any of the stuff about the writers so I can’t confirm or deny them. I will very much agree on the target audience thing though, especially with the whole “keeping the dark plot a secret” because really? Who is this for then? Like, the first two and a half episodes are for one demographic and then the others are--???

I dunno. Me personally, I just like feel good stories. I do like some good conflict and drama (for context, Remarried Empress is basically a webtoon that gives you things to feel salty about and then makes its own salt fic as its plot, allowing for endless streams of feels and catharsis, so I’m definitely not against drama), but there are other times where I just want to feel good watching something.

I feel like the show expects the characters to be selfless/perfect and then punishes them even though it’s their writing that’s causing them to act out. I can’t really talking about “out-of-character” but sometimes it’s just obvious where “we did this because we needed a plot/conflict.”

Like, hello? We don’t need the main characters screwing up; why can’t we just have some feel good thing where they take the day for themselves (seriously, imagine a Miraculous episode where Chat Noir actually tells Ladybug to take a couple days for herself, like maybe someone else gets the earrings for a few days as a temp while Marinette gets to breathe; IMAGINE IT). Not everything needs to be high-stakes to be interesting and you need those calmer moments so that the action-packed ones feel more intense.

SAYAKA DESERVES BETTER.

I feel like the magical girl genre as a whole can be way more complex than it’s made out to be. I think people hear the word “magical girl” and think “cute girls in short skirts talk about girl problems and fight evil with the power of friendship and accessories.”

Ugh, just the mention of Rebellion makes me sigh internally.

Congrats on working on your own magical girl story! I hope it goes well for you!

I know it’s not technically a magical girl show, but there was also Totally Spies that Astruc worked on to some degree (I think there was some characters who were based on/a loose reference to the mains from that show but I don’t remember exactly).

The thing about the female characters suffering is that they could make for good lessons on positively directing one’s emotions (like Usagi from Sailor Moon, for example, maybe having a problem with taking her anger out on her friends, but learns that she can save that rage for the bad guys; “Gamer 2.0″ from Miraculous could’ve done that, honestly, by having Ladybug absolutely WRECK all of her gaming opponents in “violent” (cartoon violence obviously) fashion). It’s just a shame that it’s not taken advantage of.

Sayaka??? Selfish???????

*does not compute*

(Also, I wasn’t tired of them, don’t worry! It was a little overwhelming in my inbox but it’s me who’s allowing all the asks to flow in so the blame isn’t on you lol.)

I’m not sure where this obsession came from with, “you have to be selfless and you’re not allowed to use your powers for yourself.” It’s like the world’s going to end if a character leaves to go Self-Care or something. I think what happened is that shows got this idea that promoting only the giving of others is great and it’s not important to take time for yourself (even with “Gamer 2.0,” it was still Marinette playing games with everyone else, and they treated her dedication and seriousness like a bad thing when she literally did not have time to waste and they didn’t give a reason why it was good for her to take a break, only that she should).

This usually leads to the “demonization” of characters who sport a lot of self-confidence or any sort of ego. It works on both sides; Marinette is a punching bag because of her anxiety and occasional lack of confidence, but if she had an ego as Ladybug, there are parts of the fandom who deem her “obnoxious” (i.e: “Reflekdoll”). There’s a delicate balance between “be confident” and “be humble” and it’s a tightrope act.

[pengychan]

[Good Omens] Winging It - Genesis 9:5

Summary: Shockingly, attempting to destroy an angel without consulting God first comes with consequences. There is more than one way to fall, and a thousand more ways to inconvenience an angel and a demon who just wanted to be left in peace. Characters: Gabriel, Crowley, Aziraphale, Beelzebub, Michael, Uriel, Sandalphon Rating: T  

Prologue and all chapters are tagged as ‘winging it’ on my blog.

A/N: Guess who has two thumbs and stumbled onto a writer's block? That's me. Pretty relieved to be past it.

***

“Lord Beelzebub…”

“Not now. I’m busy,” Beelzebub buzzed, not lifting their eyes from the screen on their phone. Gabriel was suggesting they go see some museum with old planes, which he had developed an odd fascination with. To be fair, Beelzebub could sort of see the point: it was amusing how humans had tried so hard to soar the skies, not unlike angels could… and yet kept coming up with ways to make the experience absolutely miserable from start to end. 

Hell may or may not have had a hand in the constant reduction of size seat and space between rows. They grinned at the thought, sprawled on their throne, and began typing up a reply to Gabriel’s suggestion. They didn’t get to write a lot. 

“My Lord, I urgently request audience.”

Beelzebub scoffed, finally looking up. “Urgently? What can be so urgent, Dagon? We hardly have anything much to do, considering that all we were supposed to work towards and build up to has no happened, so--”

“Yes, that is-- that is what I mean to talk to you about, my Lord. If you please.”

There was a serious edge to Dagon’s voice, which was actually nothing new because Dagon always took her work very seriously, but this was… more serious than usual, Beelzebub could tell. Slowly, they put down the phone and straightened themselves on the throne. 

“... Speak,” they finally said.

Dagon stepped closer, but didn’t speak right away. Instead she glanced around, uncharacteristically nervous. “As you know, I have been chairing numerous meetings while you were-- otherwise occupied.”

Beelzebub frowned. “Important matters,” they declared as their phone pinged, with Gabriel suggesting they may like to visit the London Dungeon while they were there.

“Of course, my Lord. As you were busy, I filled in for you, as per your request, and many are… dissatisfied.”

A scoff. “We’re in Hell. What kind of Hell would that be if we were not dissatisfied?” they said, but their voice was not quite as dismissive as they knew it ought to be. And Dagon could tell, surely, because when they spoke again their own voice was firmer, almost emboldened. 

“More dissatisfied than the norm, I mean,” she said. “I need to make clear, Lord Beelzebub, that I mean no disrespect-- nor insubordination-- and that what I am simply reporting, uh, concerns. To your ears alone.”

Not to Satan’s, then, Beelzebub thought , Gabriel’s voice ringing out somewhere in their mind. 

Why rebel to the absolute authority of God to pass absolute the absolute authority of Satan?

“Since the Armageddon did not come to pass, many are wondering what comes next,” Dagon was saying. “We have received no word from him . No new instructions, no indication of a change of plans or… any plan at all. The entire purpose of our existence seems to be gone, and now we wonder--”

“And who ever said that was the purpose of our existence?” Beelzebub cut her off, suddenly angry. Dagon looked up, a flash of something on her face.

“... Lord Beelzebub,” she said, more slowly. It was the tone of someone knowing a misstep could cost their very existence, and yet willing to take a chance. A very human trait, that. Humans took chances. And, a very long time ago, so had they. “You know I am loyal to you.”

“I am aware.”

“Am I correct in assuming the same questions I am asking now have crossed your mind too?” 

Beelzebub leaned back against their throne, and for a few moments there was only silence - the kind that can only be heard, or rather not heard, moments before something is uttered that can never be taken back or ignored again. Well aware of the seriousness of it, Beelzebub finally spoke in a low voice.

“What if the War never happens?” they said. “No resolution, an eternity of corrupting mortal souls because of orders we received thousand of years ago, according to a Plan we all rebelled against in the first place and that is now moot. An eternity of this,” they gestured at the dark walls and ceiling, “because of the orders of one. Is that what is being whispered through Hell?”

A pause, and Dagon nodded, eyes still darting around. “I know some would say that questioning his orders is treason--”

“Well, it is. That’s why demons are whispering and not yelling about it,” Beelzebub replied, and stood, causing Dagon to immediately step back to give them space. “But it seems to me that the concept of committing treason did not stop us the first time around. At least the lot of you learned to be more secretive now.”

“Ah. Yes, well… that is not to say we have plans to-- that is not to say we have plans yet,” she said quickly. “We are only thinking over our options, now that it seems the entire purpose of our work is gone.”

“Of course.” Beelzebub folded their arms, and looked at Dagon straight in the eye. It was a dangerous game they were stepping into, but they had never been the kind to back away from dangerous games. If they were, they may have never Fallen in the first place. “Perhaps I should find the time to chair this next… meeting.”

Dagon nodded, and flashed a sharp smile. “We’d welcome you to it, my Lord.”

***

“Have you given any thought to what Sandalphon said?”

“He says a lot of things. You’ll need to be more specific.”

“You know what I am referring to.”

The scrape of pen on paper stopped, and Michael sighed, finally looking up at Uriel. “I was rather hoping you had forgotten about that conversation.”

“We don’t forget things,” Uriel pointed out, coming to sit across her desk. “Except those who used to be with us before the Fall. And we know now it was not God to will it. We did it ourselves.”

“Enemies are easier to fight if you can't recall them being anything else - you said so yourself.” Michael leaned back against the seat, folding her hands on the desk. Her eyes drifted to the drawer where she kept the phone she once used to get in touch with her contacts in Hell - the back channels, as she called them. But even then, it was nothing personal. They were still enemies, and occasional cooperation did not change that. “And they are enemies still.”

“But it’s not looking like that fight is happening,” Uriel replied. “The Great Plan is no longer in place, and we have no instructions as to how to proceed. We have not received an order in a very, very long time.”

“... We were ordered to banish Gabriel.”

“Which was a test. And we failed.”

“What are you getting at?”

“Now that the Great Plan is… null and void, it seems, we are still doing as we always did. Following orders, or whatever we took as orders.”

“Took as orders?”

“We never got any directions on how to run things, did we? There was an end goal, and we figured the rest out.” Uriel gestured at the immaculate room around them, at the paperwork on Michael’s desk. “As efficiently as possible, preparing for the War. We took initiative. Did things we were not expressly commanded to do… and things we were not expressly forbidden to do.”

And God never forbade us to think of the Fallen as they were before the schism. 

God never forbade us to punish a traitorous angel either, and yet.

Michael forced the thought out of her mind, and sighed. “What is it you’re driving at?”

“That maybe what happened with Gabriel proves that we are meant to question… some things,” Uriel said. She leaned forward, folding her hands on the desk as well. “Such as our true purpose, if no War is to happen in the foreseeable future. And that we may not be the only ones asking ourselves such questions just now.”

… Wait. Did she just say-- did she mean--?

Under Michael’s startled gaze, Uriel smiled. “You are not the only one with access to some back channels, Michael.”

There are no back channels, Michael almost said, but that would have been Gabriel’s line and she did not utter it. Instead, she tilted her head on one side as she considered the implication of what she had just heard. 

“... There is unrest in Hell, then?”

“Well, to be entirely fair that is like saying there is oxygen on Earth.” Uriel shrugged. “You’d be hard-pressed finding a time without unrest in Hell. But according to my contact, demons have been left quite directionless without the Great Plan or any War in sight. They don’t know what to make of it any more than we do. And they are questioning whether going on like this, business as usual, is worth it. This may be a sign of interesting developments to come.”

Michael reached up to rub her temples. “Tell me they are not thinking of another uprising.”

“I wouldn’t give too much credit to the amount of thinking that generally goes on downstairs, but it wouldn’t be their first.”

“And their first attempt did not go their way.” A pause. “Are you suggesting we intervene?”

“I am suggesting we keep watch,” Uriel said, and stood. “And an open mind. Perhaps the order of things we have known since the first War is at its end, after all.”

“If we act in a way God disapproves--”

“I trust God will make it known very, very swiftly if that is the case,” Uriel replied, and Michael found there was nothing she could retort to that.

***

"Does he really have to come by?"

"He has to return the book."

"He could leave it outside or something. With no need to actually come in."

"It is an antique and very rare book, Crowley. I will not have it left on my doorstep. What if someone takes it - what if it rains?"

"Fine, fine. But no inviting him over for tea."

A chuckle. "I was not planning to, believe me. We already have a guest coming, after all."

"Much more appreciated than the Archangel Fucking Gabriel if you ask to me," Crowley muttered, and that was the end of the conversation.

And yet he was unable to shake off the uneasy feeling that something was not quite right. 

***

“Wait. You mean to tell me you got that book from your traitorous angel?”

“Yes.”

“You told him what it was for?”

“I may have mentioned it. ”

“What possessed you into thinking it was a good idea!”

“I didn’t really think--”

“Ugh, of course you did not!” Beezelbub huffed and dropped back against their seat, arms crossed, kicking the one in front of them for good measure. Thankfully, said seat was empty. “You ought to have kept your mouth shut.”

“Not what you said last night.”

“What?”

“I said, I didn’t think it would be an issue. What do you care about the opinion of an angel?”

A scoff. ”An angel who is certain to relay the information to a renegade demon we know all too well.”

Gabriel shrugged. “He won’t need to.”

“... I beg your pardon?” Beelezebub glanced up, nothing in their voice, pose or expression indicating they were begging for anything, much less pardon. Gabriel shifted, only… marginally uncomfortable.

“He may have been present at the time I, uh, borrowed the book.”

“Uuuugh,” Beelzebub groaned, a hand reaching up to press against their eyes. 

Gabriel raised an eyebrow. “That was about what he said, too.”

The hand covering Beelzebub’s eyes went down just enough for them to glance up. They were still scowling, but not quite as much. “Oh?”

“I daresay he was rather disturbed.”

“Was he now.” Beelzebub sounded rather interested now, the corners of their mouth curling up almost imperceptibly. Gabriel smiled. 

“Scarred for life, I would say,” he confirmed. It had… honestly not been his intention at the time, but it seemed to please Beelzebub greatly. 

“Well,” they finally said, “I suppose it will not hurt if I come in with you when I return the book. So I can have a look at his face, and--”

“Excuse me, may I see your ticket?”

Both Gabriel and Beelzebub glanced up to see a ticket inspector beside their seats, wearing a uniform that looked rather like it had been salvaged from the jaws of a dog and with a smile that was only halfway convincing. Beelzebub, never one to appreciate being interrupted while speaking, snorted. They had protested quite adamantly when Gabriel had mentioned the need to buy tickets, pointing out it was unbecoming of the Lord of the Flies to pay a fare like they were some spineless, law-abiding mortal.

“No,” they informed the ticket officer, sounding incredibly outraged by the request. By their side, Gabriel began frantically searching his pockets for the tickets he had purchased for both of them. “You may not.”

The ticket officer blinked. “You mean you don’t have a ticket, uh…” he hesitated. “... Sir?”

“It’s Zzzzzzir to you, and--”

“Here!” Gabriel almost yelled, sticking his arm over Beelzebub’s head to hold out two tickets. “We have tickets! We do, here, see? Great. Have a nice day!”

As the mortal left, only a little perplexed and without the foggiest idea whose ire he had almost become the target of, Beelzebub turned to glare at Gabriel.

“I told you I needed no ticket.”

“It spared us an inconvenient argument.”

“I could have incinerated that mortal where he stood.”

“... See, thing is, that would have been even more inconvenient.”

“Hmph,” Beelzebub replied, and sank back into the seat. “Why take a train in the first place? I could have transported you to London in the blink of an eye.”

“Last time you did that, it was far from discrete and we were seen.”

“And memories were wiped. It is not hard.”

Gabriel shrugged, glancing out of the window. “Well, there is the fact I do enjoy the scenery, too,” he said. It was a bright day, after all, and the countryside around them a luscious green. “The bright sky, the sun--”

Clouds gathered suddenly above the train, iron gray, darkening the sun. As rain began beating against the glass, abrupt as it was violent, Gabriel groaned. “That’s childish,” he declared, turning to Beelzebub with a pout. That gained him a smirk. 

“No it isn’t. It’s petty. Not the same thing.”

A sigh. “Fair,” Gabriel said, and leaned back as well, putting an arm over Beelzebub’s shoulders. The smirk faded, and an eyebrow went up. 

“I cannot recall asking for this-- show of physical affection.”

“Does it displease you?”

“... I suppose I can tolerate it,” they said. Outside, the downpour cleared as quickly as it had come - a phenomena British meteorologists, who made an art out of the national pastime of talking about the weather, would discuss at length that evening across all channels. Gabriel smiled a little, but refrained from saying anything. It was a nice silence. Peaceful.

So of course, Beelzebub took it upon themselves to break it. “What would you say if I told you me and a few lieutenants are thinking about an uprising?”

Ah. Gabriel blinked, and glanced over. Were they really thinking of fighting the War without the Armageddon having happened to signal its start? He certainly hoped they wouldn’t choose Earth as the battlefield. Actually, he rather hoped it would not happen; he’d rather not see Beelzebub, or any of his former colleagues, get destroyed by either holy water or hellfire. “I would say that it’s probably not a wise idea. Your army lost once before, and-- not that I mean to brag, but I did oversee the preparation for the War, and I know for a fact you would be crush--”

“You misunderstand. Not an uprising against God.”

Gabriel blinked again, and looked down. “What? Against who, then?”

Beelzebub craned their neck to meet his gaze, giving him a look that told him in no uncertain terms he was an idiot. “Idiot,” they said, just to make sure there was no doubt left over what they meant to communicate. “Who do you think? Who rules over us?”

Oh. Oh, shit. “What-- an uprising against--” he sputtered, pulling away his arm to grab Beelzebub by both shoulders and shake them. God, had they lost their mind? A failed uprising against Satan would spell their doom, and that of anybody following them in that folly. Satan would not be content with casting them out. “It is a terrible idea!”

Beelzebub tilted their head. “You gave me the idea.”

“I have terrible ideas!”

“Are you arguing for us to remain under his rule even if we decide we no longer wish to?”

“I am arguing for you not to get yourself destroyed!” Gabriel gave them a shake, which thankfully did not result in immediate mutilation, although he was probably on thin ice. “Can’t you just-- walk out on him, or something?”

“I find destroying him would be a preferable, more permanent solution. In case he means to stop us.”

“The power he has--”

“He’s not an evil version of God, Gabriel,” Beelzebub cut him off, their voice perfectly calm. “He started out the same as me or you. What power he has over the forces of Hell, we gave him that by following his orders. And we can claim it back.”

There was sense in what Beelzebub was saying, Gabriel knew, but he was unable to truly hear it; all he could think was Satan, the negation of everything God stood for-- whatever it is God stands for -- utterly destroying Beelzebub with naught a word. If that happened, what then? What of him? What would he do?

I won’t lose you again.

“If this goes wrong--” he began, only to pause when Beelzebub gracelessly slapped a hand over his mouth, nearly knocking the back of his head against the window.

“Listen, it’s not even a plan yet,” they muttered. “Just ideas. I am far from the only one with questions over our purpose now that the so-called Great Plan has apparently gone out of the window. There may or may not be an uprising, or we may or may not just walk out on him, or we’ll only grumble and then absolutely nothing will happen. I don’t know yet. So don’t get your feathers ruffled.” A pause. They shifted a little before clarifying, “... That wasn’t meant to be a jab about your wings.”

Ah. Gabriel stared a moment before he snorted out a laugh, leaning back against the seat. “God,” he muttered, running a hand through his hair. “All right, all right. Just promise me you won’t take risks-- needless risks-- and that you’ll tell me if any decision is made.”

“... I suppose those are requests I can satisfy,” Beelzebub conceded. “Although I am not certain what difference you would make, being a mortal and all.”

“Perhaps, if I speak to Michael--” Gabriel began, and trailed off at the sharp look that gained him. He held up his hands. “No, no, hear me out. The Heavenly forces may be able to help.”

“What?” the Prince of Hell rolled their eyes. “Is your human form old enough for dementia to set in already? Heaven will not help us. We are the enemy.”

“But Satan is the Enemy. That makes you the enemy of their Enemy. If it means taking him out of the picture, or significantly reducing his power--”

“If we do rid ourselves of his reign, it doesn’t mean we have any intention to return to Heaven. The idea of being there makes me break out in hives.”

That was… a bit of a shame, really, but Gabriel could at least see the point and did not argue further. He did, after all, nearly break out in hives himself at the mere thought of residing in Hell. “No, of course not, but… well, events have made clear that both Heaven and Hell may be long overdue for an overhaul, and the enemy of my enemy--”

“We can free our own damn selves,” Beelzebub cut him off, their voice cold enough to make Gabriel fall silent. They glared at him for a moment, as though expecting more arguing, but when that failed to happen the scowl faded and they sighed. 

“I don’t plan on getting myself destroyed, and I will not disappear on you,” they said, and leaned against his side again. “That I do promise. No need to bash your head before you bandage it.”

“I think you mean--”

“You know what I meant to mean,” the Lord of the Flies muttered, and Gabriel managed a smile, putting his arm around their shoulders again. He felt their frame relax a little. “... Well then. I cannot say I am not curious to see for myself the expression on the traitor’s face when he sees us both cross the threshold, so I guess I will accompany you into the bookstore. Afterwards, I suppose…”

The rest of the train ride - not long, truth be told - was spent without incident, making plans for the afternoon that would not come to be.

***

I know that boy.

Realization hit Hastur - who was not meant to be in London, but who was still unable to let go of the very pleasant fantasy he could get a shot at revenge against Crowley if he kept lingering there - within seconds of seeing the boy in question crossing the street only a few meters ahead of him. 

An unremarkable-looking young mortal, and he wouldn’t have stood out among the several people crossing at the same spot without bothering to wait for the green light, as most pedestrians in London and indeed across the world. He wouldn’t have stood out but for one detail: when someone you think is the Antichrist looks at you straight in the eye and informs you that you smell like poo, you tend to remember what he looks like. And oh, did Hastur remember the little bastard well. 

He could have torn him apart right there and then in the middle of the desert, of course, but trying to figure out what in Heaven was going on - what in Heaven had Crowley done - was the priority, and he had no time to indulge in some good, old-fashioned bloodshed. But oh, Hastur thought as he began following the boy, now… now he had all the time he wanted, and plenty of humans to do his bidding within striking range. 

Contrary to popular belief, Hastur had always found that the most privileged, sheltered humans were the easiest to corrupt in the most spectacular fashion, with the most far-reaching consequences. But desperation is also a powerful tool, and the job he needed to get done now wouldn’t require too much finesse. It would be short, a powerful push, straight to the point. 

And it takes so, so very little to snuff out a mortal life.

***

The folding knife in Noah’s pocket seemed to burn. 

Having it on his person had always made him feel uneasy, ever since he had bought it second-hand, but after the third time someone jumped him - because jumping a homeless man just trying to get a few hours of sleep with his dog was apparently some bastards’ idea of fun - he’d decided he needed something to defend himself and Chip with. Thank God, he hadn’t needed to use it. 

But he really ought to now, if anything to try cutting into somebody’s bag or backpack. He hated the idea, and he’d made it so far without the need to rob anyone - shoplifting food, he decided, did not count, and to be honest he didn’t have the skills needed to pick pockets - but the vet who came from time to time to take a look at Chip had said very clearly that without surgery, his dog was pretty much done for. 

“Her hip dysplasia is too severe. It can only be fixed with surgery and physio, Noah. I can give you something to help with discomfort, but in the long run…” he had sighed, and made a vague gesture. “It may be kinder to let her go when the pain becomes too much.”

That was not an option, clearly, nor was giving her up for adoption because she would be at risk of being put to sleep - not the most adoptable dog, a seven-year-old mongrel with fucked up hips. He had almost nothing left but Chip and fuck it, she wasn’t even old. It was not her time yet, it was not fair.

The vet had offered him a payment plan, though, and Noah only had to get some money together for the first instalment. He’d immediately sold his tent, a few belongings he had left from his previous life, the nice coat a man had given him a few months prior on a rainy day. 

"It’s looking like you should get to work to build that Ark, no?”, he had said, and Noah had found it funny, then. Not so much now: the biblical Noah saved all kinds of animals on Earth, but he was struggling to save his own damn dog. But he would, no matter what he had to do; a cut backpack and a missing wallet must suck, but not as much as losing the only friend one had left. He felt sorry it had come to that, but--

Well, if that isn’t the perfect target. 

The thought came to him unbidden, and it felt oddly alien. Noah found himself turning to see the target in question, a kid walking down the street; as he looked he felt a sudden, inexplicable wave of hatred against him

Look at that, just the watch at his wrist would pay for the entire operation. Spoiled brat. Thinks the world owes him something. Go on, what are you waiting for?

Noah began moving, anger mounting to the point he heard the blood rushing in his ears. He moved in quick, long strides, eyes fixed on the boy - spoiled brat, a silver spoon down his throat while I go hungry and cold and my dog is sick and I cannot help her - and never noticing the pale man with black, black eyes fixed on him in turn, whispering through the corner of his mouth directly into his mind.

Pull out the knife.

Noah broke his stride, something in the pit of his stomach turning, a clear thought  - a thought that was entirely his own - cutting through the haze of red-hot fury and desperation for a moment. 

I don’t want to hurt anyone. 

He didn't, he really didn't, he hated the idea of robbing anyone, let alone harming them and that was only a kid, he was making a mistake, he was--

No one needs to be hurt. Just a scare, nothing more. Scare him, get the watch, save your dog. It will be a lesson, is all. A lesson that no one is safe. Accidents happen. 

Noah began walking again, approaching the boy as he began crossing the street towards an old bookstore. He felt oddly disconnetted, a buzz in his ears and something burning in his chest. His hand slipped in his pocket, and closed around the folding knife.

Accidents happen. 

***

“And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man.” -- Genesis 9:5

***

[Back]

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[florrickandassociates]

TGF Thoughts: 3x09-- The One Where The Sun Comes Out

This episode was way more engaging than the last. I talk a lot about Maia in this one; the writers finally figured out how to use her!

Reasons I shouldn’t write recaps after a year without seeing an episode: I forget basic stuff, like that it rained for all of season 3. You know, because ATMOSPHERE and WEIRDNESS and QUIRK. And SYMBOLISM. Can’t forget symbolism. 

To be fair to the writers, it did rain a lot last year. All I remember about the month of June is rain. They predict everything. 

Maia’s new job at a call center (I can’t recall if we’d seen her at the call center before this episode) is something she takes very seriously. Just kidding. She acts disdainful towards anyone who dares ask for her help and then hangs up on them. On one hand, this seems like a terrible job so I get her “fuck it all” attitude. On the other, she’s being suuuuuper bratty.

Right. I refreshed my memory. We did see Maia at this job in an earlier episode. 

Consult-a-Lawyer is where all the LGwhatever rejects go. Sounds miserable. 

Blum walks in, and Maia makes a, “Oh God, THIS asshole” face. Coincidentally, this is also the face I’m making as I realize I’m going to have to listen to this loud man I had blocked from my mind yell obscene things for two more episodes. 

Blum wants to hire Maia. She agrees, as does her friend Lili. I believe Maia has other choices (remember how she turned down Diane’s offers to help when they weren’t exactly what she wanted?) but also, yeah, I’d want to get the hell out of Consult-a-Lawyer too. 

Now it is hailing. Everyone from RBL is in blue. Remember those picspams we all used to make where we’d oversaturate the background to make everything blue? I wouldn’t need to oversaturate this image to make the blue pop. 

I truly don’t understand why the main page of All Access thinks I am in the middle of some random season 2 episode when I am clearly in the middle of 3x09. When I click on the show, it understands that I’m in the middle of 3x09 and allows me to resume watching. Why wouldn’t you optimize your homepage to encourage people to keep watching!? (All Access isn’t alone in this: HBO Go also makes it very hard to figure out where I left off when watching a series.) 

So, because Carl Reddick was a sexual harasser and RBL covered it up, ChumHum is insisting on an internal investigation, led by a woman who is-- you guessed it-- quirky. And even worse, it’s one of the quirks that’s actually not funny because it’s a real condition people live with?? How are we still doing this, show?

This is RBL’s best year ever. Yay! I forget if that tracks with anything we’ve seen. I guess the existence of ChumHum alone is enough to make that true.

Oh NO, Book Club is in this one too!? Liz, wisely, says she’s done and refuses to go with Diane. 

Maia tells Blum no, she won’t work with him. She thought he was rescuing her from hell, but he’s really “dragging her down deeper.” This is accurate. Maia may not be the smartest character on this show, but she’s got her eyes wide open when she works with Blum. 

Blum wants to work with Maia (duh) because her father is a piece of shit respected by other pieces of shit. This checks out. This is quite logical, tbh. 

Maia requires very little convincing. This is not because she is in such a hard spot she has no other options. This is because she is bored and hates the world because she didn’t get her way and had to deal with consequences. It took very little to turn Maia from an innocent to a villain. Perhaps that’s because she was always complicit. (If you’re 26 and went to law school and you can’t understand privilege even on the most basic level, it’s because you’ve been tuning out everything that challenges you.)

Maia seems way more confident now. She’s SO much more fascinating as a villain than as a protagonist, likely because even when she was the protagonist everything she did was so selfish it was hard not to see her as a villain. Props to the writers for recognizing that and leaning into it. They don’t explicitly tie her actions here to her actions at the start of the series, but this only works because Maia’s always been one slight away from going bad. 

And yes, I think villain is the appropriate word for someone money hungry and willing to work, no questions asked, with someone as slimy as Blum. 

Maia hires her friend Lili to help out, which, admittedly, is a nice thing for someone I just called a villain to do. 

After further “messages” from the con artist who started Book Club, the Book Clubbers want to SWAT someone. This sounds fucking terrifying. Diane pushes back and the rest of Book Club is totally ok with this strategy.

So Diane reveals that Valerie’s a con artist and it causes squabbling. It somehow backfires because people believe the woman claiming to have a message from Valerie. Even the one who can do all the IT things--the one who could very easily (by show logic at least) just simply look up the records and phone numbers herself-- believes her. 

Is a big group setting really the way internal investigations are done? I’m no expert, but this feels like a bad approach!!

Marissa doesn’t think the firm has racial issues! Ha ha. She thinks the racial pay gap issues are totally resolved because the associates got raises. As much as I want to believe someone as savvy as Marissa wouldn’t think like this… I kinda believe it. 

Lili also seems kind of terrible, like someone who can’t wait to go on a power trip and fuck over every person who has ever said anything mean to her. 

Oh goodie, we’re talking about sexism now. I appreciate that they’ve featured a few associates over the course of season three. I don’t remember their names since I last watched these episodes a year ago, but I remember that they’ve been in several episodes. I hope to see them in season four, and to learn their names. 

Someone says men weren’t considered to head up Lucca’s department. This is blatantly false. Also, idk what these other associates can do, but Lucca’s proven herself to be adaptable, smart, and someone who can go above and beyond. Plus, she is someone who is out for herself, with tons of career options. She’s someone you want at your firm. 

The female named partners are biased against men, says a (you guessed it!) male associate. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahhahaha no. 

Marissa calls the associate out on this, and another (female) associate steps in to say she’s in no place to talk since she’s stealing Jay’s job. If it didn’t seem like there was room for both of them, this would be true. 

In a move I appreciate, the mailroom employees are also in this scene, talking about how they didn’t receive any bonuses to correct for the pay gap because of their class. When one of the associates says they didn’t receive a bonus because of race, a mailroom guy calls her out for not knowing his name. 

And then it devolves, as so many of these scenes do, into people talking over each other.

While I like that they address these issues so often on this show, I don’t think “inequalities are controversial and there’s no solution so here are people talking over each other” is the best approach. Sure, I can appreciate different points, and I don’t need the show to tell me how to think, but at this point I think the show needs more of a POV on this. It feels, too often, like they’re saying “Controversy! Huh!” 

Marissa goes to Liz and mentions the other women Carl Reddick assaulted. Liz, understandably, hasn’t looked at the files Marissa gave her. She says she will but asks Marissa to keep quiet around the investigator. So sounds like she doesn’t intend to do anything. 

Oh no. Is this the ep with the retcon where Liz and Adrian actually did hook up!? And put it in work emails!? All I have to say about this is that it’s a bad decision. Sometimes the writers get so close to making a bad decision and then walk it back enough so that I can relax, and then bring it back later, for no reason. It’s even worse that way, because by that point I’ve already formed a strong opinion about it happening. The moment that set me off the most in TGW was when Alicia and Peter agreed to renew their vows at the end of 421, followed by a commercial break, followed by a promo with Alicia kissing Will. I HATED the love triangle at that time. I mean HATED. That commercial break allowed me to relax into the idea that the writers had ended the love triangle. The promo shattered that idea, and, in turn, I slammed my computer shut so hard it nearly broke. That is not a feeling I like. That is the feeling that learning Liz and Adrian fucked gives me. 

NOT EVERYONE HAS TO SLEEP WITH EVERYONE. IT IS SOMETIMES MORE INTERESTING WITHOUT THE ILLICIT AFFAIRS. THERE ARE MORE INTERESTING WAYS THAN HOOKUPS TO ADDRESS THAT THEY USED TO BE MARRIED. For starters, can we get an episode where Liz calls Adrian out on the condescending voice he’s always using when he talks to her?

Oh yes, this is also perjury. Why. Why is this happening? Why would Liz and Adrian admit this to an investigator knowing damn well they lied under oath, and also, why would they lie under oath? I know we saw it happen but was it really worth two partners perjuring themselves bc they fucked their ex??? 

When the stakes are high for no reason (or for a stupid reason) it doesn’t maximize drama. It just makes me tune out the drama. If I believed Liz and Adrian had a good reason to perjure themselves, maybe I’d care about this. Maybe they did. But the fact I don’t remember it-- and I’m someone who can name every single episode title of TGW in order-- suggests to me it wasn’t a good enough reason. 

Liz goes to shred the file with the rest of the info on her father’s victims. See, this is a bad choice that I understand. It’s her father’s legacy and her firm’s future, and she has all the power right now. It could come back to bite her, but I get why she takes this risk. I get why this situation is fraught. 

Credits time!!! 

Maia’s also decided to dress like a Bad Girl. She is trying VERY hard. But she’s pulling it off. She’s speaking without hesitation and actually taking an active role in getting things done. It speaks volumes about her character that the first time she’s been motivated about anything work related, it’s something morally bankrupt. 

Apparently the black and white associates are sitting apart from each other. Julius says it’s not intentional; there’s a hot desk system. That held up well.

LMAO people think Julius and Marissa are sleeping together. Julius does a spit take-- the appropriate reaction.

“You’re really a Rindell?” a potential client asks Maia. “Raised at his knee. Taught me everything he knows,” Maia says proudly, displaying a framed picture of her and her father. I’ve said it like five times already but it’s SO dark that Maia would use this to her advantage. We’ve seen some opportunistic shit on TGW/TGF but Maia gets so shameless, so fast, with no remorse. Damn. 

RBL is trying to disbar Blum. He doesn’t care. He tells Maia to take care of it and to use the allegations (which she doesn’t realize are real) against Carl to make it go away.

Diane is talking to a computer. I’m over all the Diane plots.

Liz is glad the Book Club is still fighting even if she’s not involved, which is the stance it always made the most sense for Liz to have. 

Diane allows Book Club to proceed with their latest scheme because she finds the dude they’re targeting deplorable. If this plot didn’t involve Book Club I’d find it to be an interesting moral dilemma. 

An actually interesting dilemma: Liz informs Marissa she will not be disclosing the names of any additional victims. Marissa clearly thinks this is the wrong call but keeps her mouth shut. An unusual amount of restraint for her. 

Maia and Marissa are still friends! Is this the episode with the bizarre Maia/Marissa kiss that I still don’t understand the point of? 

Marissa divulges info about the firm’s Reddick drama to Maia, which is uncharacteristically stupid of Marissa. But there’s no bridge Maia isn’t willing to blow up to help Blum. She’s prying and manipulating a friend who faked a drug test for her and got her through the worst time in her life so she can prop up a mean, cruel man. There are other paths for Maia. I want to be absolutely clear that I think she is choosing this one because things got the slightest bit challenging for her. 

Maia realizes what she’s doing and stops herself saying she has to go because “everything we talk about from now on, you’re gonna blame me for.” And rightfully so! 

OH, the kiss is because Maia is acknowledging she’s fucking over their frendship, isn’t it? Earlier they’re about to drunkenly kiss and one of them talks about not fucking friends they don’t want to fuck up the friendship. So the kiss is fucking over the friendship. Or maybe it’s just a kiss. 

“You’re gonna hate me. Just remember, this has nothing to do with us,” Maia says. Ha, I believe this less than I believe Alicia’s “this was never meant personally” in 5x05. (Hitting the Fan isn’t a bad comparison here, since Alicia does make a choice to fuck over friends when she has the choice to not fuck over friends. I think what makes that “gray” for me while this is villain territory for Maia is how fast this happens. Alicia’s taking the clients whose accounts SHE has sustained, and starting a firm she truly believes will be better (for herself, as a company, for her family). It’s a selfish decision. Her options aren’t reduced all that much either (she’s the governor’s wife, if she wants to leave her firm she could go anywhere). But I can see her side, I can see how fraught the choice was for her, I can see how the way things played out made the tensions worse. Maia burns her friendships to the ground so she can work with a loathsome man because the opportunity fell into her lap while she was hating the world too much to do anything productive with her life. 

Maia’s crying in the office when Blum finds her. She knows what she’s about to do. She’s sad she’s going to do it, but she knows she’s going to do it. I don’t think she considers, for a moment, not fucking over Marissa. As soon as Marissa gives her the intel (which, no matter what Maia says, she was totally fishing for), Maia’s mind is made up. Does it make it better if she cries about it? 

And Maia KNOWS it is a betrayal. She says she knows “a friend will interpret it as a betrayal” because she knows it is one. She tells Blum she doesn’t know if it’s a betrayal because “I’ve lost track these days” (that line sounds surprisingly Alicia-esque) and tells him what she knows. That’s one of those questions that if you have to ask, you know the answer. 

Thought experiment: Would it be a betrayal if Maia were an activist who wanted to get the word out about an abuser? I think a lot of why I react so harshly towards Maia’s choice here is that (1) she sees it as a foregone conclusion that she’ll use the info and (2) she is using it to help Blum. Blum isn’t shades of gray (50 shades of gray joke here). He is despicable. He isn’t morally ambiguous and you can’t even say his ends justify his means because his ends are despicable too! 

Ah, a scene I won’t have much to say about. It’s going to be Blum on his bullshit.

Oh, I do have something to say, but it’s a sad thing. Mark Blum, the actor playing ACDB lawyer Julius Kreutzer in this scene, sadly passed away from COVID-19 last week. 

Roland Blum representing sexual assault survivors to fuck over a rival law firm makes me sad.

Marissa does, in fact, interpret Maia’s actions as a betrayal. She calls her immediately and asks, “you fucked me over?” “Not intentionally,” Maia says. Oh, own it. You knew the moment she said it what you were going to do; this was an intentional action with an inconvenient consequence. 

The partners find out, thanks to Blum, that Julius is going to be a federal judge. And they are not happy.

More talking over each other! Cultural appropriation has entered the mix of complaints. Lucca decides to intervene by going to the partners about the new seating plan. And this is why Lucca, and not that associate, is heading up a department. She knows when to go to management and isn’t wasting her own time in these squabbles. (Tbh, Lucca recognizing that bickering with no resolution in sight isn’t productive makes me wonder if the writers have more of a POV than I’m giving them credit for. Maybe they’re trying to say that talking over each other is futile and aggravating.)

Why the hell does this investigator want to integrate the mailroom by firing black people so they can hire more white people?! Setting aside for a minute that that is a profoundly stupid idea, that can’t possibly be legal, can it??? 

RBL decides that, backed into a corner, it’s time to just own up to their wrongdoings. It works with the ACDB, at least until Blum brings Maia into things.

Book Club kills someone. I truly don’t know how to feel about Diane having literal blood on her hands. This scene should be way more dramatic than it feels. This is the problem with having stakes too big for the show. Instead of getting invested, I write off the far-fetched plots, and I can’t really care about character drama that stems from something so over the top I don’t believe it. 

Diane thinks Book Club didn’t want the guy dead. What about this group that was working to hack voting machines suggested that they wanted him to live???? 

Liz says Diane has to report them, but Diane worries she’s implicated. Who could have imagined that working with crime-loving resistance group would have legal ramifications?! It’s not like Diane and Liz are lawyers or anything.

Liz thinks Diane needs to convince Book Club that everything they’re doing is because of a con artist, but that’s a solution to a different problem. Diane knew Valerie was a con artist and still pushed forward with Book Club because she was committed to the cause. Why would any of these other women abandon the group at this point? What difference does it make if Valerie is a liar.

Shock of all shocks, Book Club is planning their next attack. It’s almost like they are a group of criminals who meet in shady spaces at odd hours. The time to be noble about this shit was weeks ago, Diane and Liz. You’re complicit. What did you think you were getting into? 

Book Club does not like that Kurt is conservative. Diane gets mad and basically threatens them.

“You two are just as culpable,” one of the Book Clubbers says. She’s not wrong. Maybe not JUST as culpable, but culpable for sure. It’s possible that I just don’t want to see Diane and Liz be culpable for things this atrocious and stupid so I resent this plotline. (That said, to go back to Hitting the Fan as an example of a character I love doing a thing that is morally questionable at best, I can accept my faves doing things I don’t like. There’s something about the scale of Book Club’s actions vs the scale of the show that feels off.)

“The truth is what you make it,” Blum tells Maia. A familiar lesson for this show.

!!!!!!!! Is CBS reading my unpublished word doc?! Because today All Access understands that I am watching 3x09.

It’s also updated the key art for TGF to the season 4 image, which says “What is memo 618” in larger font than the show’s title. I am sure I will come to care about memo 618; however, it doesn’t make me want to watch the show or tell me anything about the show, so I don’t get why it’s on the poster. 

ALSO there is no question mark on the image so that’s gonna drive me just a little crazy.

Blum manipulates Maia by telling her she shouldn’t let anyone control her. Maia doesn’t agree to help him; she heads home instead.

Liz and Adrian talk about sleeping together. They had previously said it was a mistake, but Adrian wants to reopen the discussion. All Liz wants is privacy. 

Adrian then asks her if she regrets “fucking”. Yes, he says fucking. Those are his words. Liz is like, what do you want to hear? And it breaks up the tension of the moment. THAT is more compelling to me than all the perjury stuff. (Also, neither of them regret it.)

I don’t think I have a problem with them sleeping together… just a problem with it happening off-screen (I don’t need a sex scene-- just want to know how they got there!), being retconned, and then being used to create drama. If they want to hook up, go for it. 

Oh, look, it’s a stock footage shot of the outdoors. Busy streets? People walking around? Seems fake.

The stock footage is to show that the rain has stopped, btw. It just feels like it’s designed to taunt me with the idea of public parks and bustling streets. 

The ChumHum report is out and the partners look very! Serious! But Liz and Adrian are in the clear. 

The investigator basically just finds the firm grew too fast and that’s their only real issue. The Carl Reddick issue will hurt, but it’s survivable.

But they’re still losing ChumHum. They were always going to lose ChumHum. Diane goes outside to enjoy the good weather while she can.

Maia doesn’t show and Blum gets disbarred. It’s fun to watch him squirm, having just lost his power. He rambles nonsensically. 

Maybe Maia isn’t a villain. I truly don’t remember this scene happening; I thought I remembered her showing up to defend him! Score one, Maia. This episode is the most interesting Maia’s ever been. 

I also don’t remember Diane singing on a park bench. But I like it!

Book Club is threatening Diane now. They’ll destroy her (or kill her?) if she tells on them. Dramatic!!!

[mobius-prime]

23. Special - Sonic the Hedgehog in Your Face!

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Oh dear GOD what am I looking at?! That's some serious mood whiplash after the last issue's ending.

Anyway, this is our first special issue, and it's extra long! Time to strap in.

Princess Sally's Crusade - Conclusion (The Quest)

Writers: Mike Kanterovich and Ken Penders Pencils: Art Mawhinney Colors: Barry Grossman

This story, like every other story with Penders' name on it, may list two different people as the writers, but really, it has Penders' mitts aaaallllllllll over it. This is the very first time we see the introduction of the Light Mobius timeline, though it's not named as such yet, and boy, we'll be seeing it again, many more times. But for now, onward!

Sally's been distracted ever since Julayla's death, and since Julayla has left her everything she owned, it's Sally's task now to go through it all. She finds a neat blue vest - which finally completes her look - as well as a strange map, which she resolves to look at tomorrow. That night, she's awakened by some strange noises, which turn out to be coming from the white ball - which dissolves into:

Eyy, took her long enough to show up! It's Nicole the artificial intelligence, and Sally's new best friend. After consulting Julayla's map, Sally discovers it leads her into the Forbidden Zone, a strange and deadly place where not even Robotnik himself will tread out of fear. Sally's determined to do this herself - with Nicole at her side - but of course, the rest of the team doesn't like being left out of things.

And so, with the Tornado as their ride (oh hey! There it is!) they fly to their drop zone, where they evade Robotnik's patrols and head into the Forbidden Zone itself. Rotor stays behind, as the pilot, but everyone else makes it in safely. And now, begin the challenges! First, they face a terrifying cyclops, which they defeat through the power of… not doing anything!

…fair enough! Next up is a ferocious griffin, which Tails attempts to fight, as he's the only one in the group who can fly. However, he needs a weapon, and so spotting a sword in a pedestal nearby he attempts to free it. Hey, any of this sounding familiar?

After this monster also is defeated in an unconventional manner, they're up against the final challenge: the classic "two heads, two doors" question.

Sally, being the quick study that she is, figures out the answer easily (ask one head what the other would counsel, then do the opposite), and they proceed through the correct door to the final room. There, they find a chest on a pedestal, a chest which unexpectedly contains a single scrap of paper - and at this point, we're suddenly thrust into a flashforward, which takes us forward a full two decades.

Sonic and Sally are married now - for real this time - and have two children together. Bunnie's been deroboticized, Sally's father is alive and well, and Robotnik was defeated in a decisive battle some time ago. And, amazingly, we finally find out where Nicole came from - the future!

That's right - Nicole was invented by Rotor in the future, after she was tragically destroyed in the final fight against Robotnik. And though future-Sally is delighted to see her again, she knows Nicole can't stay. After all, there's a stable time loop to be created, and she's at the beginning of it.

It's actually quite touching, if you ask me. This story sort of touches on the idea that it's not the destination, but the journey that makes you who you are, and the idea of "a gift to myself, from myself" is quite a nice one. But, as the end slide notes, this is only one possible future, and we're a long way away from seeing this come to pass. So looks like we'll be dealing with Robotnik's ugly mug for a while yet. Darn!

Tails' Tallest Tale

Writer/Pencils: Scott Shaw! Colors: Barry Grossman

Hey, remember Scott? He hasn't made an appearance since the very first couple of issues, and back then he was just the penciller. Now he's doing the story as well! Great to have you in the writer's seat, Scott!

Sonic claims in the first panel that this is Tails' first solo story, but c'mon, we know that's not true! He's had at least a couple before now. Tails is on his way to the local Sonic-Con, an event I would absolutely love to attend myself if only it existed. In lieu of Sonic himself making a personal appearance, the club decided having Tails make a speech would be the next best thing. Yay, Tails is finally getting some of the attention he deserves! While on his way, a toad scares him and he falls into a stream. Not a big deal, but when he arrives and realizes he forgot to actually prepare a speech…

Woo! Go Tails! He sure is a badass in his imagination - that's how it goes for most kids, I guess.

However, in the middle of his speech, who shows up to crash the party but… well, I'll let you fill in the blanks, it's a neverending cycle by now. No one there knows how to fight… except Tails, of course! If his speech is anything to go by, he has more than enough battle skill to take Robotnik down, right? Right?

Hey man, he tried. Give him some credit at least.

However, he can't give up. Everyone is still in danger, and so with lives at stake, Tails comes up with maybe one of the first real Tails-esque plans of the comic's run so far. If he can't defeat him with brawn, he'll use his brains!

And just like that, Robotnik is rendered so dizzy, he's unable to fight anymore, and runs away to get some sleep. Hooray for Tails' first real victory against Robotnik!

And just like that, we're at the end of the comic's very first double-length special! We're back to regular issues tomorrow, but there's a lot more of these to come.

[bythebigcoolingtower]

I Wrote a Simpsons Script...

Over the last couple of months, when I’ve had time, I’ve tried to write something that was not only better than what’s currently being produced but could also find a place lower down the seasons. I don’t think I’ve been successful but I thought I’d share my endeavors for an important reason: It made me realize how hard coming up with an idea, writing and editing a script for a cartoon was. For some background, I write scripts for films part time and try to sell them, so far (obviously, because I wouldn't shut up about it if I had) I’ve not been able too (partly because it’s tough to sell scripts in England and partly because I don’t have the money/time/resources to make them independently) but I do have some experience in shaping a narrative, the structure of scripts and other techniques, so I’ve not walked into this blind. Whether it’s good or not is your opinion, seriously, feel free to criticize it, if you think it’s bad, tell me, I’m a grown man, I can take criticism. If you like it, that’s allowed too, but the main question is this: What season do you think it’d fit into?

Be warned, it’s 30 pages on Word so it’s a long read, it’s your choice, you don’t have to. For reference: Italics are description, bold is who’s talking, normal is dialogue, (Beside name is ‘Off Screen’, under name is the way the line is delivered).

(Disclaimer: I obviously don’t own the rights to the Simpsons, this is a non-profit idea and simply a writing exercise to keep me amused, so I believe it falls within fair use, please don’t sue! If you want me to take it down, I will.)  

OPENING CREDITS

COUCH GAG: The family sit on the couch, Maggie is a baby’s bottle, Lisa a plastic cup, Bart a glass, Marge a wine glass and Homer a beer mug. They are then filled with drink, Maggie with milk, Lisa with orange juice, Bart with Buzz cola, Marge with Wine and Homer with Duff.

EXT. CHARITY FUN FAIR – DAY

We move down from a clear blue sky past a sign, ‘CHARITY FUN FAIR: WHERE ONLY THE CHAIRTY IS OBLIGATORY’, down into the park which has been taken over by various things.

There’s a puppet show, some games and a stage. It all looks very cost effective, as if they wanted to bare minimum to maximize profits.

Walking around are the Simpson’s, looking a bit bored, except Marge who’s seems disappointed. Lisa holds a brochure about the fair.

MARGE

Fifteen dollars for cotton candy, what charity would charge such high prices?

Lisa consults the brochure.

LISA

‘Quimby retirement homes’.

(she reads more)

He wants a place in Tobago.

BART

I thought he already embezzled funds for that?

LISA

No that was for his golf club membership in Bermuda.

HOMER

(wistful)

I wish I could retire.

BART

What’s stopping you?

HOMER

Burns had us sign contracts in perpetuity in exchange for a second ice machine.

STAGE, CHARITY FUN FAIR – LATER

Quimby is on stage, along with a few others, and has a big smile on his face. Something sits under a sheet on a table beside him. He approaches the microphone to address the crowd, which includes the Simpsons.

QUIMBY

Thank you ladies and gentleman for your tremendous charity. I’m one step closer to getting a holiday home in Trinidad.

There’s scattered applause, murmurs. Quimby doesn’t care, carries on as an assistant walks over with a bucket.

QUIMBY

To show my appreciation I will now draw a winner from this bucket of parking tickets, that’s worth more than the prize in question, this-

Quimby unveils the prize, a toaster oven, has to be told by his assistant what it is.

QUIMBY

Toaster oven, I didn’t want as a gift.

No applause this time, just coughs and confused looks. Quimby draws a ticket.

QUIMBY

Marge Simpson.

The family react with little enthusiasm. Scattershot applause as they move up onto the stage.

QUIMBY

(to Lisa)

Congratulations, Marge.

He shakes Lisa’s hand, she can’t be bothered to tell him, it’s over quickly enough.

QUIMBY

(to his Assistant)

Bundle the cash, my flight leaves in an hour.

Quimby and his assistant leave, the stage is vacated by all but the Simpsons and a reporter, TOM, 20′s, The crowd disperses.

TOM

This is headline stuff, can I get a quote?

LISA

This is your headline? I thought you reported on real news, like your stories on the upcoming winter.

TOM

That was a Game of Thrones review.

LISA

Oh.

TOM

We haven’t printed a real news story since the town got high speed broadband. No one reads the paper anymore.

MARGE

Well, it would be nice to be named in the paper in a context other than: “we apologize for erroneously reporting the death of Homer Simpson”.

TOM

(to Homer)

Oh hey, I thought you looked familiar.

HOMER

Can you print a different picture of me this time? That old one makes me look fat, I’m portly.

TOM

Sure, we’ll send our new guy round later.

LISA

I thought Fred was your photographer?

TOM

He was until 7/11 poached him. They offered him something we couldn’t.

BART

Job satisfaction?

TOM

A wage.

(pause)

Oh and that.

INT. DINING ROOM, SIMPSON HOUSE – NIGHT

The family are sat around the table eating.

HOMER

This is great pasta honey.

MARGE

It’s Shepard’s pie.

HOMER

Do you want the compliment or not?

Moe enters, camera in hand.

MOE

Hey everyone.

HOMER

Hey Moe-

(sees camera)

Are you the Shoppers new photographer?

Moe looks around, stutters.

MOE

Uh... yeah... I sure am.

LISA

How did you get in?

Moe panics slightly.

MOE

Gather round, picture time.

There’s a knock on the door.

MARGE

I should get that.

Marge walks past Moe, who stands awkwardly at the top of the room, to the front door.

DOOR

Marge opens the door to CLIVE BREWER,  38, average looking, gentle.

CLIVE

I’m Clive Brewer, from the Shopper.

MARGE

If your-

Marge turns right to find Moe has gone, then left to see an open window at the back of the living room.

MARGE

Never mind. Please, come in.

DINING ROOM

Marge shuts the front door and walks Clive into the room, then sits back down.

CLIVE

Hi, it’s nice to meet you all. I thought it’d be good to have the toaster oven in the picture.

HOMER

The what?

CLIVE

The prize you won.

Nothing, the family don’t remember it.

CLIVE

Earlier today.

Nope.

CLIVE

It’s the reason I’m here.

HOMER

You should probably just take the picture.

CLIVE

Alright, big smiles.

The family bunch up, Clive takes the picture.

THE SPRINGFIELD SHOPPER

HEADLINE: LOCAL FAMILY FILLS PICTURE SPACE

SUB STORY: FRED PROMOTED TO ASSISTANT MANAGER

INT. GROCERY STORE – THE NEXT DAY (MORNING)

The family are out shopping, Marge reads the newspaper, very proud that they’re on the front.

MARGE

What a great picture, we’ll have to ask Clive for a copy, he’s so talented and nice.

HOMER

Pfft, he’s no nicer than me, Carl, Lenny or Moe.

MARGE

Last week you told me Moe throw a mug at you.

HOMER

(laughs)

Oh, honey, that was only because I hit Lenny in the head with a pool cue to stop him biting Carl after he’d bruised Lenny’s arm in Moe’s annual pain Olympics.

Marge stares at him, doesn’t like any of that.

EXT. SPRINGFIELD SHOPPER – LATER ON

The shopper is housed in a wide, one storey building, Marge’s station wagon is parked outside.

INT. FOYER, SPRINGFIELD SHOPPER – SAME TIME

Marge carries Maggie with her as she stands at the reception desk, a woman, FELICITY, walks over to her.

FELICITY

Hi, can I help?

MARGE

I was looking for Clive Brewer, the photographer?

FELICITY

He should be at his desk. We can look after your baby while you talk to him. We’re running a day care to add a little extra cash until our readership picks up.

MARGE

You are? I didn’t know that?

FELICITY

You didn’t? We advertise it all the time-

(pause)

Oh.

OFFICE – MOMENTS LATER

Marge enters what should be a loud bustling office, full of journalists and writers, but instead finds around twenty very unenthusiastic employees, mainly students, not doing much at all.

Clive stands out like a sore thumb, not least because he’s stationed by a window with the sun is beaming through it.

Marge walks over, Clive sees her, smiles.

CLIVE

Marge, hi, I assume you’re here because we referred to Homer as a “buffoon” in the article.

MARGE

Well, he is really more of an oaf but I was actually hoping I could get a copy of the picture you took. It’d be nice to have one were Homer isn’t giving the kids rabbit ears.

She takes out her phone, opens up the picture folder and shows Clive several photo’s as she’s described. The shadow on the wall behind the kids makes them look like characters from ‘Life in Hell’.

MARGE

I just don’t get why people find it funny.

Clive laughs. Stops when he really hears what Marge said.

CLIVE

Sure, I’ll print you off a copy.

Tom, walking past at the time, overhears the conversation.

TOM

The printer here doesn’t work.

CLIVE

It doesn’t?

TOM

No, wasn’t this explained when you were given the tour?

CLIVE

I was supposed to have had a tour?

Tom looks around.

TOM

(covering)

No.

He walks off. Clive sighs.

CLIVE

I guess I can’t print you off a copy.

Marge can see his disappointment, smiles trying to perk him up.

MARGE

Don’t worry, we have a printer a home, you can bring the picture there.

CLIVE

(trying)

Sounds like a plan.

EXT. PARK – THE SAME TIME

Bart, Lisa and an annoyed looking Homer walk around the park, it’s barely been cleaned since yesterday, or the days before that.

HOMER

How many days do I have to do this for?

LISA

Dr. Hibbert said you need to walk for at least an hour a day for the next three months.

HOMER

Three months! What’s the point?

LISA

(concerned)

Dad, he said in your condition you could die at any moment.

HOMER

(grumbling)

That can’t come soon enough.

Lisa gives him an off look, concerned but confused as to whether Homer actually understands.

BART

Why am I here?

LISA

You were supposed to be walking Santa’s Little Helper.

BART

Oh, yeah.

(pause)

I’m sure he’s getting plenty of fresh air.

CUT TO: The basement of the Simpson house, pitch black, SLH barking incessantly.

BACK TO: Homer and the kids walking, Lisa now concerned by the amount of rubbish about.

LISA

Did they even bother cleaning up from yesterday?

They pass a crumpled sign: 2017 CHARITY DRIVE. QUIMBY WANTS A PORSCHE.

LISA

Or last year?

HOMER

Lisa, fly tipping is a part of nature, ever since the caveman.

LISA

It’s destroying the natural environment of the animals.

BART

Looks like there adapting to it.

We pan across the rubbish, which the animals are using, including a family of raccoons operating the toaster oven.

LISA

Well, it’s not right, animals deserve to live with the same rights as us, nature deserves to flourish and not be cluttered by plastics that should be being recycled. I’m going to start a group to clean this place up.

Homer gets down to Lisa’s level, puts his hand on her shoulder to calm her.

HOMER

Lisa, is this the type of thing were you ask me to join and I keep saying no and you just keep asking and interrupting while I’m trying to drink beer and watch TV, until I eventually cave?

LISA

(shyly)

Yes.

HOMER

Then consider me in.

INT. KITCHEN, SIMPSON HOUSE – A LITTLE LATER

Marge carries Maggie into the kitchen, leading Clive through with her.

She puts Maggie in the high chair.

MARGE

Take a seat, I think the printer’s in the basement.

Clive takes a seat at the table, takes his bag off as he sits, from that he takes out his laptop and opens it on the table.

Marge walks to the basement door, opens it, SLH rushes out.

MARGE

Hmmm.

She disappears downstairs. Clive begins clicking through his laptop, trying to find the image.

He goes through various folders, opens one that he hadn’t meant too, it’s full of beautiful shots, landscapes of parks, woods and forests.

Clive opens one, a melancholic look upon his face. Maggie begins laughing.

Turning, Clive sees that it’s the picture Maggie is amused by.

CLIVE

You like it huh?

(pause)

Yeah, it’s alright.

Marge can be heard coming back up.

CLIVE

Let’s just keep it between us.

He backs out of the folder, Maggie stops laughing.

Marge re-enters, carrying a really old looking printer.

MARGE

Here we go. We only use it when Lisa wants to print out protest leaflets. Luckily she’s boycotting paper right now.

CLIVE

I’m sure it’ll work fine.

Marge puts it on the top, plugs it in, it comes on immediately. She hands Maggie the bottle she’s reaching for.

CLIVE

It’s connected. Here-

From his bag Clive takes a ream of paper, hands it to Marge.

MARGE

Do you always carry so much paper?

CLIVE

Oh, I took it from the office.

(pause)

I mean, there not actually paying me.

Marge shrugs, puts the paper in. Clive clicks on the picture, selects print, the process begins immediately.

He backs out of the folder, leaving him on the page with all the folders on.

Quickly the picture prints, Marge is very pleased with it.

MARGE

What a great shot. You really do have a talent.

Clive is non committal, modest.

CLIVE

Maybe.

MARGE

I’ve got the perfect frame for it too, hold there.

Marge leaves Clive sat with Maggie again, she sees the situation, ‘accidentally’ drops her bottle on the laptop, the printer starts up again.

Clive turns, looks panicked once he sees that it’s printing the pictures from earlier.

CLIVE

What are the odds?

One after another they print, Clive tries to grab them as quickly as he can, to hide them but can’t. Maggie laughs.

MARGE (O.S)

It fits perfectly.

Marge enters to see Clive stuffing a couple of the printed pictures into the toaster, she looks suspiciously at him, wondering what he’s up to.

At that moment the printer jams. The final fully printed picture flies out, lands at Marge’s feet.

Putting down the family portrait, she picks up the printed picture, a glorious shot of the early evening.

MARGE

Clive, did you take this.

Clive looks embarrassed, by both his actions and Marge seeing his work.

CLIVE

(nervous)

Yeah.

MARGE

It’s so expressive-

She moves around, fishes another from the oven.

MARGE

They all are. Why would you hide them?

CLIVE

I guess because they remind me of what I had, lost.

MARGE

Please, sit down, tell me.

Clive takes one of the pictures from the toaster, gives it to Maggie, then sits down.

INT. GYM, SCHOOL – 30 YEARS EARLIER

An eight year old Clive sits on a stall.

CLIVE (O.S)

My passion for photography came from my dad.

A photographer stands behind an old camera, readies the shot, beside him is Clive’s dad, DANIEL BREWER, 36, taking multiple pictures.

CLIVE (O.S)

He was always taking pictures of me, the whole family.

MONTAGE - OVER THE FOLLOWING YEARS

Daniel takes pictures of Clive in the bathroom, sleeping, at school, playing sports, as he has his first kiss, first date and even through the window of his first ‘adult sleep over’.

CLIVE (O.S)

I just started doing the same.

Clive takes pictures of Daniel in the bathroom, sleeping, at work, watching sports on TV, watching Clive play sports whilst Clive plays and while Daniel is taking pictures of Clive.

MARGE (O.S)

Are you two still close?

CLIVE (O.S)

We haven’t been close for a while.

EXT. TRAIN TRACKS – DAY, 20 YEARS AGO

Daniel stands in the middle of the tracks, camera ready.

CLIVE (O.S)

He was trying to take a picture of the front of a train.

A train can be heard approaching, Daniel takes his stance.

The train approaches from behind Daniel.

EXT. FUNERAL, CEMETERY – A COUPLE WEEKS LATER

Daniel’s headstone is a camera, his picture is a picture of him taking a picture of the picture taker, presumably Clive.

The family weeps in sadness, as does a now eighteen year old Clive. Still, he continues to take pictures.

CLIVE (O.S)

After that I vowed to take my time in my work and for a while that went well.

INT. HIGH END MAGAZINE COMPANY – TEN YEARS LATER

A happy Clive, now twenty eight, shows off the negatives of his work to his boss, MR. HARTFORD, 44.

He gets the thumbs up, which he takes a picture of.

CLIVE (O.S)

But it didn’t last, with smart phones, people wanted shots quicker and I just didn’t work fast enough.

EXT. TOWN SQUARE – TIME LAPSE, OVER 12 HOURS

Clive arrives in the empty town square to take a picture of a new sculpture, he takes his stance and waits.

Over the course of the next twelve hours, hundreds of photographers, selfie taking tourists and interested locals take pictures.

There’s also a protest about the statue, people with banners and plaques turn up, then the police arrive to stop them, there’s a conversation and then the police join in with the protesters.

Lastly a work crew turns up and removes the statue, Clive is alone again, finally takes the picture.

INT. KITCHEN, SIMPSON HOUSE – THIRTY MINUTES LATER

Marge has sat and listened, she and Clive have also drunk coffee in the interim. Maggie is asleep, holding the picture Clive gave her.

CLIVE

Eventually the work began to dry up, now I’m wherever here is, taking pictures for nothing.

MARGE

Clive, I’m so sorry.

He sits upset, but he’s been like this for a while so it’s almost normal to him.

CLIVE

It’s not the work or money I miss, it’s the feeling. That passion I used to have when I was an eight year old, like there was nothing more important.

(sigh)

I wish I could capture that again.

HALLWAY – AT THAT MOMENT

The door bursts open, an impassioned Lisa enters as SLH bolts out the house.

LISA

(loud, excitable)

Mom, get the printer, were making flyers!

EXT. PARK – TWO DAYS LATER (MORNING)

Lisa has organized an impressive line-up, along with the family, her and Bart’s school classes, Skinner, Willie and Grampa, Jasper and the old Jewish man. Each has a rubbish picker, bag and hi-vis jacket.

Skinner looks annoyed and anxious, walks over to Lisa, who’s reading through her to-do list.

SKINNER

Exactly how many more favors does the school owe you? I feel this is bordering on absurd, especially since you already hijacked the band to play for sick children at the hospital.

LISA

Your right, maybe I have been abusing my power.

Skinner relaxes, but Lisa isn’t done.

LISA

Although I’m quite sure the building shouldn’t be held together with driftwood and crazy glue.

All Skinner’s good thoughts have gone, he groans.

SKINNER

Young lady, I’d like to see you run a school on two hundred and seventy five dollars a month without resorting to crazy glue and criminality.

LATER ON THAT DAY

Everyone is picking rubbish up, rather un-enthusiastically, but slowly the park is looking a little better.

Sat under a tree, watching, is Clive he eats a toasted sandwich. Marge walks over to him.

MARGE

Clive-

(sees the sandwich)

Where’d you get that?

CLIVE

A raccoon gave it too me.

MARGE

Oh.

(pause)

Is any of this inspiring you?

CLIVE

It’s great to watch your daughter care so much about nature and boss around her principal but it feels like something’s missing, I can’t put my finger on it.

Lisa, seeing Marge and Clive talking, has come over.

LISA

Mr. Brewer, maybe joining in will inspire you, being involved with the experience.

Clive stands up, sandwich in hand.

CLIVE

Your right, it’d certainly be more helpful than me just sitting around. Hand me a stick.

In comes a stick, held by Homer, his bag and jacket in the other hand.

HOMER

Have mine.

Clive takes it, Homer runs off, drops the rest of his stuff.

LISA

Dad!

He walks back to Lisa.

HOMER

Lisa, honey, I wouldn’t leave unless it was very important.

LISA

But-

Homer snatches Clive’s sandwich-

HOMER

Yoink!

Then runs off.

CUT TO: Close up, Homer, moments later. He laughs to himself.

HOMER

Got away clean.

He looks around, finds he’s back in the park, gear on. He stares at his legs, accusingly.

HOMER

(to his legs)

I said go to Moe!

Homer looks back up, finds Moe stood there, in full gear.

HOMER

Moe!

(confused)

What are you doing here?

Moe laughs, looks away, remembering.

MOE

Well, you remember the other day, when I was in your house?

He looks back to Homer, who’s gone, his stuff on the floor.

Moe sighs, looks away, finds Homer stood the other side of him, chastising his legs, he looks up.

HOMER

Moe!

(confused)

What are you doing here?

TIME LAPSE – OVER THE NEXT FEW HOURS

Lisa, Clive and the rest pick up what rubbish they can, but it’s a losing battle.

First the other kids leave at three o’clock with the school day over, then the old folks at four being called back for bedtime, then Skinner and Willie leave.

Now with only Clive and the family they face other residents openly fly tipping as they clean up. For everything cleaned three more things are dropped.

It hits early evening, everyone bar Lisa is exhausted.

7:10PM

Maggie is asleep on Marge’s shoulder, even she is yawning.

MARGE

Lisa, I think we should stop for today, we need food and rest. We’ll come back tomorrow.

Lisa puts another can in the bag, knows that Marge is right but has a hard time accepting it.

LISA

(sadly)

But we aren’t even close to half way done and Clive-

She looks across the park, to the tree Clive was sat under earlier, where he is now, grabbing his stuff.

MARGE

It’ll be better tomorrow.

Lisa well’s up.

LISA

But if we don’t do the work today, there won’t be a tomorrow.

In goes another can, her bag splits, the rubbish falls out and she bursts into tears.

The family stand, as sad as Lisa but unable to help her.

From the tree Clive can hear Lisa, he turns and sees her, his eyes ache over her pain, he can feel his own, the rejection, the loss of his father, in the pit of his stomach.

Grabbing his camera, Clive steels up, he aims and takes a picture.

INT. OFFICE, SPRINGFIELD SHOPPER – LATER THAT NIGHT

ON THE COMPUTER SCREEN: The picture of Lisa crying, rubbish at her feet, family beside her. The headline reads: TOWN MUST CLEAN UP ACT.

Alone, Clive writes the story himself.

PRINTING ROOM – LATER

The paper runs through the machines, Clive snaps the process.

At the end of the process, the papers are bundled, Clive snaps it.

INT. BACK OF VAN – EARLY MORNING

Paperboys throw bundles of the paper onto the street for waiting sellers, Clive is in the van handing the papers to them and, of course, taking pictures as he does.

EXT. STREET – MORNING

A young paperboy rides his bike quickly, throwing papers to the doors.

Behind him Clive runs, struggling to keep up and take pictures at the same time.

INT. BEDROOM, CLIVE’S APARTMENT – A LITTLE LATER

Clive sleeps, exhausted, his finger on the resting on the button of his camera which faces him.

INT. LISA’S ROOM, SIMPSON HOUSE – 7:30AM

Marge is waking Lisa up, but Lisa is reluctant.

LISA

(sleepy)

Do I have to get up?

MARGE

No, honey but at least read the paper first.

This intrigues Lisa, she gets up fully and is handed the paper by Marge.

Her eyes light up seeing the headline and picture she reads the story below. The sub headline is: FRED FIRED. PAGES 3-12.

LISA

Do you think it made a difference?

MARGE

I wouldn’t have woke you up if it hadn’t.

EXT. PARK – 9AM

The whole town, inspired by the picture or perhaps feeling really guilty for making an eight year old cry, are out picking up rubbish.

Lisa watches over them, helping herself.

Clive enters the park, having just got back up, Lisa spots him immediately.

LISA

Oh Clive, thank you!

She gives Clive a hug, he half smiles, a little embarrassed.

CLIVE

Wow, I didn’t think it would have so much of an impact.

LISA

Then why did you do it?

CLIVE

Because I didn’t want you to give up, I wanted you to keep that passion, that fight that I lost.

LISA

Do you think you’ll rediscover yours?

CLIVE

Maybe in time, but right now I want to take pictures to show what can be achieved with a passionate spirit.

PICTURE MONTAGE – OVER THE REST OF THE DAY

We start with a picture of Lisa stood in front of a large group of helpers. Lisa working within that group.

Moe, Homer and the other barflies picking up cans and bottle’s of beer.

Skinner picking up bricks. Skinner putting the bricks in his car.

Homer picking up the toaster oven. The raccoons fighting Homer for the toaster oven. Marge, Bart and Maggie helping Homer take the toaster oven. The raccoons crying.

Jimbo, Kearney and Dolph putting together a bin. Then putting Milhouse in the bin.

Shots of people cleaning, the park changing and eventually being clean.

Finally the whole town together in a photograph, in the background is a plane.

5PM

The town talks as it begins to disperse, rolling past the park is a black car, Quimby’s. The window rolls down.

INT. BACK, QUIMBY’S CAR – CONTINUOUS

Quimby, very well tanned, takes off his sunglasses to look at the scene in the park.

QUIMBY

Someone find out what’s happening.

One of his bodyguards exits the car.

Through the window we watch the bodyguard, who is dressed top half in a suit and bottom half in shorts and sandals from the holiday, walk over to Carl and talk to him. He walks back to the car, leans in at the window.

BODYGUARD

Apparently the town came together to clean the park and Lenny’s having an ice cream party, can we go?

QUIMBY

No you moron, but this park thing, that we can exploit.

(thinks)

How much money do we have left from the holiday?

BODYGUARD

Around three hundred dollars sir.

QUIMBY

Perfect.

EXT. SPRINGFIELD MUSEUM OF ART – THE NEXT NIGHT

Lit up and looking good the museum has a stream of patrons entering it.

ENTRANCE – SAME TIME

A doorman stands selling tickets, beside him there’s a sign:

TONIGHT – CLIVE BREWER EXHIBITION (ADULTS: $30, KIDS $20)

TOMORROW – PICTURES FROM YESTERDAYS EXHIBIT.

INT. MAIN, SPRINGFIELD MUSEUM OF ART – SAME TIME

Everyone in town is about, looking at the various pictures on the wall, a photographer, FRED, takes pictures of them.

Lisa stands looking at one of the pictures holding a program from the evening, Clive walks over to her.

CLIVE

What do you think?

LISA

They’re so good, I’m really impressed.

CLIVE

I’m glad you like them. Honestly I’ve never had a crowd this big for my work before, where’s the money going to?

Lisa consults the program.

LISA

It’s going to pay off Mayor Quimby’s tax bill.

CLIVE

Well, I would complain and say something like “if only you could clean up the corruption in the mayors office like you did the park”, but he did pay me two hundred dollars for tonight.

MAN (O.S)

How would you like to make twice that a year?

Clive turns. His old boss Mr. Hartford is stood there.

CLIVE

Mr. Hartford? What are you doing here?

MR. HARTFORD (MAN)

We were in town to do a story on small town mayoral corruption, until Mayor Quimby paid me fifty dollars not too. Then we saw the sign, figured we’d see your work.

CLIVE

And?

MR. HARTFORD

It’s impressive, so how about coming back on staff?

CLIVE

Last time we spoke you said as long your daughter had a smart phone you wouldn’t need me?

MR. HARTFORD

(laughing)

Yes, what a four years it’s been.

(serious)

Unfortunately Stephanie has gone from a cute twelve year old to a sullen sixteen year old.

Across the room STEPHANIE, 16, is sat on the floor, headphones on, in her own world.

MR. HARTFORD

The only pictures she takes now are of herself looking unhappy. I need a true photographer, I need you Clive.

CLIVE

Okay, but not for four hundred pound a year.

MR. HARTFORD

How about four hundred pounds a day?

CLIVE

Deal.

He almost snaps Mr. Hartford’s hand off shake on it, which Hartford doesn’t quite understand.

MR. HARTFORD

(thinking)

Did I say a day or a month?

LISA

A day.

MR. HARTFORD

Darn it.

(sighs)

Nevermind, I probably fire you in a couple weeks anyway, I fire everyone eventually.

Mr. Hartford walks off.

MR. HARTFORD (O.S)

Stephanie, you’re fired!

LISA

I guess this means you’re leaving?

CLIVE

If it’s any consolation I probably would have left anyway, the paper hired Fred back.

Fred walks over at the same time.

LISA

Are the rumours true, Fred?

FRED

(staunch)

No comment.

He takes a picture of Lisa and Clive, then leaves.

CLIVE

Thank you, Lisa. You’ve given me a taste of the passion I had for photography and a chance to have another go at making it into a career.

LISA

Well, thank you for helping me clean the park.

CLIVE

I have something to give you.

From his pocket Clive takes a picture, an image of train tracks, hands it to Lisa.

CLIVE

This is the last picture my dad ever took. I want you to have it.

LISA

Clive, I can’t take this.

CLIVE

Why not? It’s just a copy.

LISA

Oh.

QUIMBY (O.S)

Yes, alright now.

Lisa, Clive, and the rest of the patrons turn to see Quimby at a hastily set up mic stand.

QUIMBY

I’d like to welcome everyone, from art lovers to lovers of free food-

Cut to Homer holding two bowls of food that was supposed to be for everyone.

QUIMBY (CONT’D)

To this celebration of our town and it’s ‘do it anyway’ spirit. And now, welcome the man who took the pictures you see here tonight, without permission, Clive Brewer.

Clive looks surprised, walks over to the mic, applauded.

CLIVE

Wow, what a reception, but your applause should be for Lisa, she’s the one who inspired all of this.

He waves Lisa over, drops the mic stand to her size and moves away from it. She gets even greater applause.

LISA

I believe strongly that this town can be truly great if we all work together and to better ourselves each and every day.

She looks across to where Clive was, he’s gone, she looks back at the crowd, all of whom are fully engaged by her words.

Taking a deep breathe she continues on.

EXT. SPRINGFIELD MUSEUM OF ART – SAME TIME

Clive watches Lisa through the window, smiles, takes a picture of her, then moves on.

CREDITS

We see Clive’s journey back to his job, then his work on the job.

We end on three pictures. The first of the front of a train. The second the back end of that same train and the third a picture taken of Clive by a nurse as he lays in a full body cast in a hospital. Big smile on his face.

END

[susanlerner]

As a girl who dreamed of becoming an actress, Anita Diamant had no idea she would grow up to become a journalist. Raised in a non-observant household, she couldn’t envision that in her adult life she would pen books about Jewish life that would break new ground by cataloging and expounding upon the array of rituals possible in modern Judaism. Diamant never thought that mid-career with several nonfiction titles to her credit, she would decide to challenge herself, break genre, and try her hand at novel writing. She couldn’t imagine that her first novel, The Red Tent would become a bestseller, a mainstay of book clubs everywhere. 

Diamant’s original idea for her first novel was to write a story about the relationship between Rachel and Leah. Realizing she couldn’t pinpoint a storyline – “there had to be more to that relationship than fighting over who gets to sleep with Jacob” – she found herself drawn to the story of Dina. “It struck me that there’s a great mystery at the center of Dina’s story, as the Bible doesn’t give her a voice.That intrigued me.” 

Diamant doesn’t consider The Red Tent a Jewish novel.“The novel is set in pre-Sinai time before there was anything anyone would call Judaism. I consider The Red Tent a historical novel more than a biblical novel. These characters populate the sacred mythology of Jews and are the proto-ancestors of the Jewish people.”She added that the novel’s popularity extends beyond readers of biblical and historical fiction because readers sense it celebrates the female. “I always look for under-told stories or untold stories, which tend to be women’s stories,”said Diamant. 

Surprisingly, research for The Red Tent didn’t involve a lot of Bible study.“I wrote the book before the internet was worth anything – the mid-1990s – so I read a fair amount, but quickly realized I did not want to be a Bible scholar.This became my story, and I focused my research on the stuff my books always include: food, sleeping arrangements, what people wore, and the stuff of the realities of daily life. There were no chickens or tomatoes in the Bible, so a major part of my time was spent researching biblical times in order to avoid anachronisms.” But writing a book that takes place in biblical times also allowed Diamant a certain freedom.“There are not a lot of historical records about biblical women so this allowed me to make up a lot.” 

Making stuff up wasn’t a part of the construction of Diamant’s first books. A journalist marrying a Jew-by-choice, Diamant wanted information on wedding rituals and asked her rabbi for book suggestions. “He told me the books out there were awful, and I should write a book on Jewish weddings myself. So I looked at the books that were available at the time, and they weren’t helpful for either me or my groom. They were either written by Orthodox rabbis or they were etiquette books – like matching your napkins and your kippas. The realities of my Jewish life as a young American, a feminist, and someone marrying a Jew-by-choice weren’t reflected in those books. In writing The New Jewish Wedding I interviewed a lot of creative people who were respectfully updating traditions in order to make them more personally meaningful.”

“After The New Jewish Wedding I had no plans to write another Jewish book, but when I had a baby I found there were no books to consult about putting together a ceremony for a daughter. And my nonOrthodox friends who were having sons had no books that explained, in terms that resonated with them, how to make the circumcision ceremony relevant. I really saw the need for such a book.” And so, The New Jewish Wedding was followed by The New Jewish Baby Book. “I wrote that book, and all my subsequent guide books, as books of options. I’m not a rabbi, so my agenda was not that you make any particular choice. I wanted to show a menu of Jewish life, a picture of how young American Jews are performing Jewish rituals. My readers may not necessarily be experts, but they are educated and smart. The purpose of these books is to give them the information they need to make their own decisions.” 

Diamant’s fourth and most recent novel, Day After Night, is the story of four young women who are imprisoned in, and ultimately escape from Atlit, an internment camp run by the British at the end of WWII in pre-Israel Palestine. The seed of the novel came about ten-years ago when her teenage daughter traveled with a group from her high school to Israel. They learned about the history of the land from prehistory to modern time, including the founding of the state. Diamant took a tour offered to the student’s parents that mirrored their children’s itinerary.

“One day we stopped in the middle of nowhere, at Atlit. I’d never heard of it – no one had. We were told the story of the October 1945 escape, and I had a light bulb moment. I thought, what a great novel! The descriptions of the camp and what life there was like are based on the small amount of information I could get. Although there’s a historian working full-time on a database at Atlit still trying to collect stories, the accounts are largely missing. The people in the camp were very helpful with the small amount of information remaining. The setting and situation are historically accurate, but characters, the four young women in the novel, Tedi, Leonie, Shayndel and Zora, are completely fictional.”

Disciplined, Diamant strives to keep her mornings clear to write. As she gets further into a book, that stretch of time expands and she writes longer into the day. When asked how her writing has changed over the years, she said: “I hope it has gotten better. I certainly hope my most recent book is my best book. I’ve had the opportunity to revise a couple of my nonfiction books and I know I’m a better writer now. I don’t know that people would notice this, but I think my writing is tighter and cleaner. I think I’m more economical as a writer and I value that in writing.” 

She’s now working on another novel. “It takes place in 1915 in Boston in a community that was very much an immigrant community – Jewish, Italian and Irish. I trace the story of one particular girl and some of her friends in a period of great change for women in America and around the world.”As for her future plans Diamant said, “I think I’ll go back to writing nonfiction after I complete this novel. I find nonfiction much easier to write and for that reason it can be more gratifying. Fiction reaches a much bigger audience though, and that’s terrific. I still do occasional pieces of journalism. I’ve enjoyed that and I enjoy getting out and interviewing people.” 

Writing has led Diamant in unexpected directions. About ten years ago, at the same time she was writing The Red Tent, Diamant was also working on a book about conversion. For research she went to Boston’s mikvah, the place of ritual immersion, which was open for conversions one morning a week. Diamant accompanied the Conservative or Reform rabbi to conversions in order to learn the trappings of the ceremony – the songs and readings offered. 

“I went many times in the course of that year. These Jews-by-choice were making an extraordinary decision, and I felt the welcome we were providing was less than what it should be.The building was run by the Orthodox community, and was not designed for conversions. There was no room for celebration. I really thought we should be able to do better. At that time I was reading about creative rabbis who were using the mikvah as a way of marking endings, for nontraditional reasons such as after chemotherapy, divorce, or sexual abuse. I also knew of rabbis who went to the mikvah after being ordained as a way to mark this momentous transition in their lives.” Diamant was spurred to create a new mikvah, Mayyim Hayyim in her home city of Boston.“It was a fairness issue as much as anything else, and a notion that this ritual should be beautiful, and should belong to the whole community. I live in the liberal Jewish community. Liberal Jews have embraced other forms of ritual, transforming it in their own way and it seemed to me it was time to transform this one.”

“Mayyim Hayyim is a multi-purpose building. We have an art gallery and stage in the education center. We’re committed to the arts at Mayyim Hayyim – they’re not incidental, they’re central. One of the things we’ve done is use the stage there to tell the story of Mayyim Hayyim. People have composed music for these plays, which tell the story of what happens at the mikvah and why it’s important. We use equity actors and professional lighting. It’s not didactic, it’s an experience of the arts. Stealing from the best, the shows are called Mikvah Monologues.” 

Another artistic challenge Diamant has taken on is lyric writing. She was listening to a CD of songs composed by one of her friends, Bert Seager. “The melodies were beautiful, and I asked him if I could try to write some lyrics for him and he agreed. Lyric writing is constrained by the line, but there’s also a freedom. You can be repetitive.You can be shmaltzy.You can say I love you – a lot. And there’s the element of rhyme, which is something I don’t use most of the time. It’s a lovely challenge, like a different language. The music really carries the words. It’s a neat collaboration. I loved it. I would do it again in a minute if I had the chance and I hope to do it again some day.”

Diamant’s work has and continues to leave a lasting impact, both in our knowledge and imaginations. “Despite that my parents were not observant, being Jewish was very much my identity – it felt cultural, it felt culinary and political too.” All of Diamant’s books, both the how-to books and novels, carry the spirit of inclusion – either informing those who are marginal, and not yet fully in the fold, or shining the light on never-been-told stories of women. 

When asked about where this impulse towards inclusion comes from Diamant replied,“I’ve never thought of that before. I like that formulation. The nonfiction books to me are attempts to open doors to people. The common thread of the four novels I’ve written is the celebration of women’s friendship, and of human resilience. I think that’s a democratic – small D – impulse that reflects both an American and a Jewish ethos and philosophy.”

(This article originally appeared in The Jewish Post & Opinion on October 26, 2011)

[centerforhci]

Nine Unconventional Ways Freelancers Landed Gigs

According to a recent study by Upwork and the Freelancers Union, the most common places for freelancers to pick up work are friends and family (36%), professional contacts (35%), and online job platforms (29%) like Upwork, Freelancer.com, Guru, and even Craigslist.

This breakdown spells trouble for some. American workers looking for projects on online marketplaces, for instance, are often competing with workers who live in countries where the dollar is strong. That means many foreign workers can accept far lower rates. If you can hire someone to transcribe an interview for $3 an hour, you aren’t giving that contract to a freelancer charging $15.

So where else can freelancers find work? Just ask these ten people, who picked up gigs in some unexpected places.

1. TAP YOUR DATING LIFE

Joy Yap found freelance work by unintentionally mixing business with pleasure. She went on a Tinder date with an entrepreneur who was just about to launch a company.

They didn’t hit it off romantically, Yap recalls. But, remembering her line of work, the entrepreneur reached out a couple months later with an offer to do some freelance marketing for his startup. “I agreed!” she says. “I’ve been doing freelance work for him off and on for about a year now, and saw the company grow from inception into a million dollar company today.”

Anyone who’s used an app like Tinder knows that modern dating often involves a little harmless cyber-stalking to gather extra intel on the person you’ve just met or are planning to meet. “One funny way I got a client on Fiverr,” says Alex Genadinik, referring to the gig marketplace, “was from a girl I was dating about a year ago. Early on during our dating, she and her friends decided to Google my name, which is very unique, and my Fiverr profile was one of the things that came up in their search.”

The woman and her friends shared Genadinik’s Fiverr profile with someone they knew who was looking for his line of freelance work, and the two ended up striking a deal. “All along I thought he was just a regular client that randomly found me on the internet,” says Genadinik. It was only months later that the woman let him know she’d played professional matchmaker. “[It] was pretty embarrassing for me because everyone was clued in except me,” Genadinik says, but hey—he got the work.

2. ADVERTISE IN REAL TIME

If you’re a freelancer, chances are you’ve sat at coffee shops with your nose in your laptop. So why not let passersby know exactly what you’re doing and that you’re available for hire?

Shayla Price says she landed a gig by creating and placing a makeshift placard saying “freelance writer” in front of her computer while working at Starbucks and other public places. Price says she’s received a few inquiries every time she whips out the placard.

3. EMAIL THE CEO DIRECTLY

“I’ve been obsessed with a large, multinational hair care brand for many years now,” says Termeh Mazhari, “so when I became a freelancer, I decided to just email the CEO directly.”

Going straight to the source may sound like a waste of time—execs usually aren’t the ones hiring contractors. But in Mazhari’s case, it paid off. “I told her about myself and the value I could bring to the company, and to my great surprise her assistant wrote me back and arranged a meeting with the CEO at their posh Manhattan office!”

What’s more, Mazhari landed more than just a tiny one-off project this way. “I ended up getting a year-long consulting gig with the brand, even though they already had a large internal PR team as well as multiple external agencies working with them.”

4. HUSTLE FOR FACEBOOK SHOUT-OUTS

After Stephanie Moore got laid off, she decided freelance full time and turned to Facebook to market her services.

“It started with one client . . . that I met through Facebook. She was very popular with a national brand,” Moore recalls, so she decided to attend one of the client’s networking events. There, Moore told her she wanted to “shift my focus from marketing and design to PR,” and the client “agreed to be my guinea pig.”

Their bargain went like this: “After each big accomplishment,” Moore says, “she would shout me out on Facebook as her publicist. Every time she tagged me, there was a guaranteed client on the way. All of her friends and potential clients began to reach out and ask for press releases, designs, etc. The more work I did, the more tagging I would get.” By tapping into one happy client with the influence to amplify Moore’s work, offers began piling up. “People would post my designs tagging me in the post, almost bragging that Stephanie Moore did it.”

Like another “solopreneur” who recently shared her method with Fast Company, Moore never thought Facebook could drive so much of her business—95% of which she now estimates comes from the social network.

5. OWN YOUR OUT-OF-THE-BOX THINKING

If you want to freelance, you have to be willing to share your ideas, even if you’re not sure they will be well received. Don’t wait for the perfect, full-proof pitch to go out and get your gig.

Just look at Chris Post. He held steadfast to his out-of-the-box thinking when he was building his freelance business. He says,

“At the time, just about every local property management company was trying to hold onto and gain tenants by offering them one or more months of free rent.

I had previously worked as a commercial real estate agent, and made a pitch to a property management company I was friendly with from that time: Instead of offering free rent to tenants, offer marketing assistance in the form of a free website in exchange for signing a year lease. They would spend less paying me to build a website than they would lose by deducting a month’s worth of rent.”

Post’s freelance career has now become a full-blown web development and marketing company called Post Modern Marketing.

6. NETWORK ON INSTAGRAM

Mallory Musante is one of the co-founders of Bold & Pop, a collective of social media, branding and web design freelancers. While they mainly find new clients from referrals, they occasionally use freelancing sites to find work. In this case, they sent a proposal to a client, researched the company a little further, and decided to follow all of their social media accounts. Musante never heard back so assumed the company had gone with another freelancer.

But wait—Instagram to the rescue. She says, “we were surprised when we received an email through our website requesting more information on our social media marketing services. While they didn’t remember us submitting a proposal on the freelancing site, we were able to catch their eye on Instagram by occasionally networking with them.”

7. PARTICIPATE IN YOUR COMMUNITY

Abandoning the traditional workplace can feel isolating, participating in your local community can be a remedy, as well as a fantastic place to drum up freelance work. Photographer Tammy Lamoureux shares a great example of community involvement leading to jobs.

“Wanting to get more product photography gigs, we started hitting up our local craft fairs and farmer’s markets.  We get a room full of small businesses who will most likely need professional photos of their merchandise at some point or another.  So, go around from booth to booth and chat with the vendors. Take some photos of their products and make sure to get their contact info so you can send them the shots later.  They will appreciate the free photos, and you’ll be top of mind the next time they are in need of some product photos. We did this at one craft fair, and ended up with five new clients for about 2 hours worth of work.”

8. GO WITH YOUR GUT

Kelly Boyer Sagert’s usually picks freelance work based on the right amount of income attached to it. But sometimes, she decides to go with a gut feeling to see what happens. She explains how one of those gut-driven exceptions landed her unexpectedly great work:

“A few years ago, a nonprofit agency asked me to take their research about the first woman to solo hike the Appalachian Trail and turn it into an ebook. I did — and then they asked for it to also be written as a first person storytelling performance, so I did. Concurrently, the agency was having some of their video footage turned into a mini-documentary and discovered that they couldn’t get the grant funding they wanted/needed unless a play was written on the subject. So, I wrote a play script and we talked to a theater that had produced some of my work in the past, and they put on the play. So, the funding was secured, the documentary was created and, since my play was used as the foundation, I got writing credits — and the documentary was picked up by PBS: Trail Magic: the Grandma Gatewood Story.”

9. TELL PROSPECTS WHAT THEIR COMPETITORS ARE UP TO

If one company is looking for services, then their competitors are probably looking, too—or will want to as soon as they learn of it.

“I had one company contact me for a strategic marketing plan for the upcoming year,” recalls freelancer Stephen Twomey. He saw that as not just one potential opportunity but several. “I knew they were looking at other consultants as well.”

“So, since I knew company A was looking for something, I contacted companies B, C, [and] D and mentioned that one of their main competitors was looking for strategic marketing consulting”—without mentioning which one. Twomey says “Company A ended up going with a different [contractor], but company C actually bought a consulting package.”

The services you offer may not belong in a creative field, but it still often takes ingenuity to land those gigs in the first place. For just about every freelancer, thinking outside the box can really pay off.

Have you landed freelance gigs in an unusual way? Share your story in the comments below, on Twitter, or send me an email.

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[zacharyleishmanfilmstudent]

Edit and Montage – End of Module Film Production Log:

My end of module film will be produced with the specific intention of demonstrating the various editing styles and techniques I have learned and experimented with throughout my first semester. The piece will be scripted to rely heavily on Hollywood continuity style editing techniques but will include sequences that allow for the inclusion of Jawa edit montage experimentation to incorporate multiple styles and display my knowledge further.

This film will be created and finished through the successful planning of a script that lends to inclusion of these editing styles, but also through the usage of professional filmmaking equipment and editing software’s that I have become proficient in through the duration of this module. Using the knowledge, I have acquired from this module and mine own personal knowledge of practical filmmaking I hope to produce a piece that explores themes of addiction and the subsequent desperation the prior can create, creating a commentary on the successes of pharmaceutical and natural psychological treatments.

Within this production I have assumed the role of writer, director and editor to complete the behind camera duties of the piece and I have also taken it upon myself to take up the lead role of the piece and act for my own film. The decision to act within my own piece was made on the grounds that the availability of local actors whom would have time to prepare for the role was indeed, slim and because the practicality of having myself perform in the piece paired nicely with the knowledge that no one really knew this character better than myself, given I created their mannerisms and dialogue.

For the production aspects of the piece I took personal lead, allocating certain roles to available and willing filmmaking cast and crew but made an effort to ensure that my control of the project would allow me to maintain my own personal vision for the piece. This is not to mention that as director and editor I would have final cut rights and would be able to manipulate whatever aspects of the film I saw fit to do so and not have to rely upon a willing editor to find time to do as such for me.

In order to portray to a watching audience, the clear addiction my character faces I specifically opted to make use of Hollywood style continuity editing given the intimacy that the style can provide for. Through the use of montage, establishing shots and match cuts I would be able to create insights into the characters desires and motives, but would also be able to create a story that maintained a pace that would fit nicely into the three-minute time allocation for the film but would show the progression of the piece to appear seamless.

Performance roles were given to Connor Carter, to deliver a small speaking role and to both Caroline and Andy Leishman to appear as extras in non-speaking roles featured in montages. All speaking roles were guided by myself on how I wished for the lines to be delivered and the tones with which I wished for them to portray the character. After several takes on those scenes featuring Connor Carter clear balances were struck where Connor’s performance exceeded all expectations and requirements in the role given to him.

Production roles were also provided to Lydia Evans serving as my director of photography, as well as to Lucy Leishman, serving as a camera operator for those scenes that required motion that I could not film myself, whilst I was on screen.

Lydia’s presence was integral to establishing and realizing the style I had intended for the piece upon its writing. Her consultation allowed for me to create styles of framing using long and medium shots that would empathise the boredom of the character particularly within the waiting room scenes but also through the use of extreme close up shots the fear and nerves of my character awaiting the pain of sleep by making my face the centre of attention. Lucy’s aid was also much appreciated for the woods ‘nightmare’ sequences with she perfectly capturing the necessary tracking shots that I needed of my character, despite the harshness of the terrain we were filming in, as well as the short amount of time we had to film within.

The piece was shot over four consecutive shooting days. The first day saw the successful completion of all scenes requiring the presence of Lydia as D.O.P and Connor as my actor. After an extended set up and rehearsal process we were able to gain the necessary footage required and ensure that it contained content that was of a high quality, with several takes being taken to ensure we could achieve correct angles and experiment with different ideas regarding the framing, with the sequences we filmed, changing from stationary shots to those involving motion, at the recommendation of Lydia.

The three remaining days of shooting were conducted by myself, with brief interjection from my sister Lucy to assist in the sequences I couldn’t film by myself. Ultimately though these days consisted of myself focusing on framing and lighting to create scenes where the framing would still allow for close examination of the characters emotions but would be also viewable within sequences with minimal lighting. The scenes were thus filmed with a combination of production issue and home lighting that would make the scenes viewable and meet the intentions I had for the piece, such as during the night scenes where single lamps light the frame, slowly indicating the increasing darkness engulfing the character paralleling the intense need to sleep engulfing him simultaneously.

The eventual editing process became a process that proved longer than the actual filming itself. The reason for the length of the editing process was due to it essentially having to be split into three segments. The initial task was to legally source the necessary sound effects and visual effects I would need to score the film as well as to create the intended Jawa edit sequences. This involved the proper investigation to ensure I could acquire the fair use claims for the materials I sourced from Fair Footage Island and SoundBible.com as well gaining the necessary credentials to credit the creators I used the work of.

Secondly came the creation of the Jawa edit sequences that required me to from multiple sources of hypnotic visuals create a brief 10 second sequence that would compile several of the visuals into one video. After experimentation with the scaling and opacity of each of the individual videos I was able to overlap certain frames of each video onto the top of others being able to compile them into one extended scene whilst placing on loop underneath it a consistent blaring noise to accompany the multiple visuals. The finished videos were created at moderate lengths to be ready to be placed into the final cut.

Sound work was then the last task to complete before the final edit could be created. Besides the sourced audio I acquired I had to make efforts on premier pro to be able to enhance the vocal quality of the speaking actors and the various paper and grass Foley sounds I had recorded using a H4 zoom recorder. Premier pro allowed me to do this adequately and ensured that all audio could be heard clearly in the final cut. The editing process itself proved simple with the creation of match cuts and accelerated montage sequences taking time to create but being doable nonetheless. The creation of L cuts and implementation of the soundtrack were also integral as a means for creating atmosphere so synchronising the start of sound with specific frames became a difficult challenge but one I could capably achieve via the use of the scaling tool.  The final cut was one that featured the relevant styles of Hollywood continuity editing as well as Jawa edit montage, coming together to be a well-paced and competent narrative feature.

[kennethherrerablog]

This Free Program Trains Students and Matches Them With Paid IT Internships

Even as she prepared for her final semester of college, Ashley Carr felt directionless.

“I went to Miami Dade [College] right after graduating; however, I stopped school for a little while after I had a baby,” says Carr, who was earning an associate degree in business administration. “I was trying to figure things out.”

Carr was living at home with her parents and working low-wage retail jobs. Coming from inner-city Miami, she was sure her lack of professional experience would make it difficult for her to find a job in a corporate environment.

“Compared to any other job candidate that would be applying… I knew that my resume would be passed on nine out of 10 times,” says Carr, 25.

But while attending a career fair, Carr discovered Year Up, a one-year program that offered job skills training followed by an internship.

Carr was accepted into the spring 2016 session and attended the training portion while completing her final semester of college.

At the conclusion of the program, the company at which Carr interned offered her a full-time job as a business sales consultant, and she now earns $42,000 a year, plus commission.

“I’m more confident, more career-ready and just more optimistic about not only my life but also my financial situation,” Carr says. “I moved out, I live on my own, my daughter has her own room, I paid off my car.”

Carr is one of nearly 20,000 young adults who’ve participated in the Year Up program since it began in 2000.

Wondering if this could be your pathway to a better job? Here’s what you need to know about Year Up.

What Is Year Up?

Available in 17 metropolitan areas, Year Up is a free program that accepts low-income adults ages 18 to 24 who have a high school diploma or GED but do not have a bachelor’s degree.

The nonprofit provides six months of intensive job training — in the areas of IT or finance — for which participants can earn college credits. After the training, Year Up matches a student with one of its corporate partners — which include American Express, AT&T and GE — for a six-month internship.

During that year, the program also provides students with a weekly stipend. The average per year is $7,172, according to a study by Pathways for Advancing Careers and Education (PACE).

The financial benefits after completing the program are even more impressive. Participants’ average quarterly earnings rose by 53% within the first year of completing the program and almost 40% in the second year, the PACE study found.  

Closing the Opportunity Divide

In 2015, the United States spent more than $300 billion on postsecondary education programs that were not four-year colleges. The money went to community colleges, certifications, apprenticeships and federal job training programs, according to a Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce study.

Despite the opportunities for additional education, the unemployment rate for 16- to 24-year-olds who were not enrolled in college was 16.8% in October 2017, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, compared with 4.1% nationally. The data is the most recent available.

Year Up’s goal is to bridge the “opportunity divide” between underserved urban youth and the unfilled jobs that require postsecondary education, according to Polo Coronado, executive director at Year Up South Florida.

“Many of these students have great talent — some of them, for instance, can program computers or provide support for IT help desks,” Coronado says. “But they don’t really have access to those opportunities.”

What to Expect From Year Up

The Year Up program is one of the most intensive workforce training programs in the country and requires a substantial commitment from students, according to David Fein, principal associate at Abt Associates and research author for the PACE study.

“They have been able to create a simulation of businesslike conditions in the training,” Fein says. “It’s sort of midway between a conventional internship and apprenticeship.”

After completing the initial interest form, applicants sign up for an informational meeting, submit a formal application and attend interviews. Sessions run in the spring and fall, so the program admits students on a rolling basis.

“We’re looking for the interest, the readiness and the need,” Coronado says. “We have an assessment so we know more or less the kind of situation they are going through in terms of their family, their family needs and their access to opportunity.”

Once accepted into the program, students are placed into “cohorts” of peers and are assigned mentors. Students meet with smaller coaching groups weekly in addition to attending the training classes.

The courses teach hard skills like statistics and hardware repair, but it’s the professional communication classes that make the biggest difference, according to Carr.

“Developing those soft skills are what helped… like interviewing and how to send a proper email,” she says. “A lot of young adults don’t feel like they’re ready to step into a corporate environment, simply maybe out of fear or lack of skill set. I felt confident to step into that environment and thrive.”

By the close of the training period, Year Up introduces students to corporate partners at meet-and-greet events before placing them in internships. Companies have the option to offer interns full-time positions at the end of the program; nationally, the target starting offer is $16 per hour, Coronado notes.

Getting Your Foot in the Door

Although she could have spent that year looking for a job on her own, Carr is glad she decided to commit to the Year Up program instead.

“It was a bit of risk,” Carr says. “But I knew that getting the tools that I needed… would definitely get me a lot further than trying to pound the pavement like a lot of people my age do.”

Year Up required a lot of hard work and personal growth, Carr admits, but it also provided the kinds of career connections she never would have made otherwise.

“It was definitely tough, but I was ready to embrace my growing pains and come out of my shell,” Carr says. “What Year Up did was get my foot in the door.”

Tiffany Wendeln Connors is a staff writer at The Penny Hoarder. She covers benefits, invisible jobs and work-from-home opportunities. Data journalist Alex Mahadevan contributed to this article.

  This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, which helps millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. The Inc. 5000 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the fastest-growing private media company in the U.S. in 2017.

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This Free Program Trains Students and Matches Them With Paid IT Internships published first on https://justinbetreviews.tumblr.com/

[londontheatre]

Bart Soroczynski and cast of La Strada Credit Robert Day

A piece of theatre should stand alone and be judged on its own merits. One would like to do this with La Strada but the spectre of the original film haunts this production not least because it is invoked by a). the title – which should be, in English (like the translated dialogue), The Road and because b). the creative team display an almost sycophantic channelling of the original in the programme and publicity. So two questions arise: 1). Why do it? And 2). Does it work?

Federico Fellini was a cinematic genius and La Strada remains a celluloid masterpiece. There’s a perennial debate about whether good plays translate well to the screen – for the most part, I think the consensus would be “no”: here, though, we have the opposite: does a great film translate well to the stage? The intention appears to be to create an accurate as possible live version of the cinematic experience. I could see the merit in taking the story and doing a dramatic treatment of it. But Director Sally Cookson’s production merely tries to ape the original: and for me that just does not work.

Audrey Brisson, who takes on the central role Gelsomina, is onto a hiding to nothing from the start: she has to attempt to emulate, or at least re-produce, the mercurial and captivating performance of Giulietta Masina in the film – has there ever been a face quite like that of Giulietta Masina? – which is easily available for all to see on DVD, through streaming and via YouTube. Brisson has a lovely voice and performs her lilting signature tune with poignant melancholy but her stagey, awkward sub-Chaplinesque movement and expressions leave you feeling sorry for her – as a performer not as a character. Unlike the original, Brisson stays the same throughout with no development of character at all – until her final musical moment hanging from a telegraph pole. This Gelsomina lacks warmth and vitality.

Stuart Goodwin as Zampanò rants and roars a bit but as a Strong Man who can break chains with his chest he is less than convincing and despite all the bluster one wonders if he could actually punch his way out of a wet paper bag.

Bart Soroczynski as The Fool adds a little of what might best be described as “dark” light relief and attempts to impress us with some low-key unicycle stunts that down in Covent Garden would likely be performed with added chainsaw juggling for good measure – just a tad more spectacular.

To try and achieve the voyeuristic aura of the cinematic experience, which I would contend is just not possible in the theatre, we have a lot of drama-school ensemble playing depicting waves and wheels and onlookers and inner demons. Stylisation is the name of the game in an attempt to realise a cinematic experience on stage. Go figure.

Gelsomina, the naive girl sold by her mother to Zampanò for 10,000 Lire (not very much) is then bullied, belittled, humiliated and ultimately beaten up by her “owner”: interestingly the one part that isn’t stylised is the violence which is played for real. Thus the misogyny dial is turned up to 11 with no attempt to contextualise it or view it through the prism of historical perspective. Cookson claims she is “re-imagining it for a modern audience”: to that end would she have the same perspective if the subject matter were racist rather than merely misogynistic, I wonder?

The major redeeming feature of the show is the excellent music by the wonderful musicians. They give us the colour and the light and shade and the sense of purpose that is lacking from the rest of the show: a magical backdrop to the rather stilted narrative.

La Strada Full cast Robert Day

So does this attempt to bring post-Mussolini ’fifties Italian neo-realism to the English stage in the 21st-century work? Not in my book. And it begs the question: should a work of cinematic genius be tampered with, exploited, because a company fancies a “creative journey”? We wouldn’t do it with Mozart. We wouldn’t do it with Samuel Becket. Why should Fellini be fair game?

A brief word about the theatre: putting to one side the holier-than-thou comments in the programme about the Westminster Theatre that originally stood on this site, the latest building which replaced it became the new St. James Theatre (2012). Andrew Lloyd Webber’s company subsumed the St. James and renamed it The Other Palace. I had assumed this referred to Buckingham Palace across the road but no, it refers to the Victoria Palace, round the corner. Either way, it’s a completely naff new name: ALW states that he “has broken his rule of not changing theatre names”. At the risk, therefore, of being hauled off to the Tower I would gently suggest that you have made a very grave mistake, my Lord.

Review by Peter Yates

Kenny Wax Ltd in association with Cambridge Arts Theatre & Bristol Old Vic present The Belgrade Theatre Coventry’s Production

Based on the subject and script work by Federico Fellini, Ennio Flaiano and Tullio Pinelli Running time: Approximately 1 hours and 50 minutes, including an interval

CAST AND CREATIVE Cast Audrey Brisson – Gelsomina Stuart Goodwin – Zampanò Bart Soroczynski – Il Matto (the Fool) Matt Costain – Ensemble/Resident Director Fabrizio Matteini – Ensemble Sofie Lybäck – Ensemble/Swing Teowa Vuong – Ensemble Niv Petel – Ensemble Niccolò Curradi – Ensemble/Swing Tatiana Santini – Ensemble/Swing Luke Potter – Musician T J Holmes – Musician Tim Dalling – Musician

Creative Sally Cookson – Director Benji Bower – Original Music Mike Akers – Writer in the Room Katie Sykes – Set and Costume Designer Aideen Malone – Lighting Designer Mike Beer – Sound Designer Cameron Carver – Movement Director Jill Green – CDG Casting Peter Clifford – Magic Consultant Gwen Hales – Circus Consultant Matt Costain – Assistant Director Luke Potter – Assistant Touring Musical Director Fiona Mcculloch – Company Stage Manager Ben Cowens – Relighter/Technical ASM Matt Gibson – Sound/Technical ASM Rachel Middlemore – ASM/Wardrobe

Understudies Gelsomina – Tatiana Santini Zampanò – Fabrizio Matteini Il Matto (The Fool) – Niv Petel All other roles covered by the Ensemble/Swings

At The Other Palace 12 Palace St, Westminster, London SW1E 5JA 30 May – 8 Jul 2017 http://ift.tt/2lzlHsB

http://ift.tt/2rgVxxE LondonTheatre1.com