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theggning · 1 year ago

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Hello! I was the anon who asked Sapphire-Weapon about how RE6 was originally recieved. You offered to tell me about your own opinions on the subject, if you remember. If you like, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

I rewatched some scenes and I still... hate it. The script and overall story were awful imo. It's cringey but without the RE charm, lol. And I'm still mad about how watered down and silly they've made Ada in that game. It was cool to play as her, but the whole "everyone important is just in love with her or wants to be her" was so blaringly stupid and lazy. I felt it really took away from her character, tbh. She should've zipped up and thrown a bomb down. Just explode the lot of 'em and go home to a girlfriend. Would've highfived her for that. (All jokes, lol!!). And Jake... his arc really lacked effort and it's a pity because I really enjoyed him as a character. He could've had a great opportunity with his development but... nah. A little insight as an OG fan about what you loved and hated would be great!

/rolls up sleeves

I consider RE6 one of (no longer #1 but one of) the greatest disappointments I've ever had in a video game that I was otherwise really, really hype for. So BOY am I down to unload talk about it.

Honestly the thing I hated the most about RE6 is the level design. It's really a shame, because the gameplay/controls are actually really fun. I love the increased focus on melee. Mercenaries mode in that game is a blast. But unfortunately, the campaign design is so fucking miserable and such a slog you could not pay me to play through the whole thing again.

The average level design in RE6 goes like this:

Hallway full of enemies

Telegraphed set piece w/ QTEs

Hallway full of enemies

Explosion

Hallway full of enemies

Telegraphed set piece w/ QTEs

The boss monster you defeated 7 times already STILL ISN'T DEAD and pops out to chase you some more

Explosion, launching our heroes into:

a hallway full of enemies!!!!!

I remember this being particularly bad in Chris' campaign, but it's a problem in ALL of them. There's no atmosphere, very few moments of quiet, no interesting rooms or details to look at. You know how in REmake/RE0 and the more recent remakes and especially in RE4R you can look around the environment and see fun little details, objects? How the rooms look lived in and like this was a real place once? There's almost none of this in RE6. The places you walk through don't look real. That marketplace doesn't look like anyone's ever done business in it. The spa level doesn't look like a real spa. It's a hallway full of enemies that leads you to your next explosion.

To add to the problem here, the chapters are goddamn ALMOST AN HOUR LONG EACH. Unlike RE5, where the subchapters were around 10-30 minutes if you knew what you were doing, when you sit down to play a chapter in RE6 it's gonna take you an entire hour. Even if there were some little fun moments in the levels, I can't remember them and I'm not gonna go back to play them when that fun moment is sandwiched by 45 minutes of awful bullshit.

The story also does absolutely suck. I have never before played a game plot that felt more like two 12-year-olds hopped up on Mountain Dew enthusiastically spitballing fanfic ideas and jamming every single one of them into a story. What's frustrating is that there are glimmers of good ideas all over the place, but they end up falling flat or getting stupid.

I could probably rant and rave about the plot of RE6 for another 4000 words, but since it's been a literal decade since I played the game and I'm fuzzy on the details, I don't want to go too in depth. So I think I'll just throw out some things I liked and disliked for each campaign. That I remember. From when the game came out.

It is also worth mentioning that my friend and I, foolishly, played the campaigns in reverse order because that was shown to be chronologically correct. This was a very bad idea. By the time I got to what most people consider the "best" campaign, I was 80% of the way to my sinking realization that I hated the game.

Jake's Campaign:

THE GOOD:

Sherry! I love grownup Sherry. I like her silly G-virus healing factor. I like the bit where she tells Jake to stop fucking whining about the evil daddy he never met, because Sherry fucking Birkin doesn't need to hear your "woe is me"ing about your evil parents fucking up your life.

The snow level was kind of unique and interesting-looking.

The spa level was kind of unique and interesting-looking.

THE BAD:

Ustanak. I realize we're trying to recapture the magic of Nemesis for the 4th or 5th time here, but when every other goddamn boss in this fucking game comes back 50 times before you kill it, it kind of takes away from the one enemy whose entire gimmick is that exactly. I cannot remember what he looks like at all. Nemesis is iconic, this guy is just big and ugly. The fact that Jake punches him to death with his bare hands is really silly but in kind of the good stupid RE way that I enjoy. It's what this loser deserves.

I'm honestly not a huge fan of Jake in general? He has a good character arc, which is more than I can say for basically anybody else in this game, but he slots right into this godawful edgelord teenage boy catnip character archetype that was absolutely everywhere in the early 2010s in gaming.

The idea of Wesker having a son could be really interesting (even if it makes me think about Wesker fucking, which. ugh) but it's integrated in a really strange way. I frankly do not believe Jake's mother when he says she genuinely loved Wesker and that he was a "good man," a thing that has literally never been demonstrated, ever, in the entire history of this canon. It's really incongruous given everything we know about Wesker, so I'm not sure why they went with that instead of the, honestly, more sensible idea of having Jake be an unauthorized experiment using Wesker's sperm or something.

The bit where Jake, who vocally despises his absent father the entire length of time we know him, suddenly decides to get pissy with Chris for killing him, is incredibly contrived. It feels like it's in there just because they felt like they needed an excuse for Jake to be in conflict with Chris, even when it makes no sense with what we know of Jake's personality.

Chris' Campaign

THE GOOD:

Piers is the best character in this game. He's charming, he's appealing, we can sympathize with him, he and Chris have wonderful chemistry together (platonically or not- I do love me some Nivanfield.) I love what they do with him as a "successor" to Chris, and how he helps Chris through his spiral. I will never stop being furious that they killed him off. Piers deserved better.

I like the broad strokes of Chris' character arc here. Chris becoming an alcoholic and suffering real, visible PTSD from the deaths of his men is both appropriate and a sensible step for his character at this point in the series.

Carla is definitely the best villain in this game. I have some beef with her that I'll discuss in the Ada section but in terms of campaign-specific antagonists, she's both the most compelling and the most dangerous.

THE BAD:

The execution of Chris' arc is possibly the stupidest fucking writing in this entire game. So you're telling me that Chris Redfield, Superstar BSAA Founder and Golden Boy, is somehow able to just disappear from the hospital where he's laid up with head trauma and amnesia? He just, wanders the fuck away and nobody notices? Chris is gone for SIX FUCKING MONTHS and nobody is able to find him in that length of time? Where the hell are Claire or Jill in this scenario? Claire spends 2/3 of her starring games moving heaven and earth to search for her brother. In Revelations, Jill disobeys orders and goes looking for him when he's missing for 12 hours. And neither of them bother looking for him when he goes missing for half a year? If you have ever wondered why Jill or Claire aren't in this game, it's because there's no fucking way to make this stupid plot work if either of them have anything to say about it. So they're apparently just blipped out of existence for the duration of RE6. Oh hey, we found Chris. In Edonia. The same place he went missing six months ago. Guess we were too busy to really look for him that hard. Hey Piers, go drag him kicking and screaming out of the bar. There's some shit going down in China and we need our top guy on the job. What's that? He's still suffering the effects of massive head trauma? He can't remember who the fuck he is? He has no idea who we are or what he's doing? Ehhhhhhhhhhh don't worry about it, stick a uniform on him and throw him into the thick, that oughta jog his memory a bit. This bit is so stupid and irresponsible that I will never again respect the BSAA as anything but cartoonishly incompetent. Head Trauma Amnesiac Chris gets his memory jogged midway through proceedings, and flies off into a frothing, mindless vengeance rage against Ada. In the process he personally gets an entire team of BSAA operatives killed. Again. Two in one game! That's pretty bad even for Chris! It's only via being screamed at by Piers that Chris snaps out of it and goes back to being the respected leader that he's supposed to be just in time to save the world. Chris decides, then and there, that maybe he's no longer in a position to keep doing this. That he should step aside and give a new generation of fighters a chance to fight for what's right. That Piers, who's been levelheaded and focused and brave through all of this turmoil, deserves to be Chris' successor and that he's the hero the world needs now. And then Piers dies horribly, tragically, traumatically, so uh. Never mind that I guess. Making Chris an alcoholic and forcing him to reckon with the deaths of his men is a great idea for a story arc for him. But this contrived-ass prolonged soap opera amnesia drama ain't it, chief. EDIT: Tumblr, in its infinite wisdom, just linked me to a blog post I made in 2013 COMPLETE WITH PICTURES I DREW making fun of this plot point. Please enjoy!

Everybody says this is the campaign with the worst, grindiest, bullet spongiest, Gears of Wariest gameplay and they are correct.

I think we are supposed to take the ending of the campaign as inspirational. Chris goes back to the BSAA with renewed determination, and we're supposed to find this as noble or heroic. I actually find this ending incredibly fucking sad and tragic. Piers' death is haunting Chris, and he's now taking Piers' faith in him as a mandate. Piers' hero worship and respect for Chris is now being interpreted as "you can't give up-- ever." Chris has resigned himself to fighting this battle for the rest of his life. He can never hand off the reins to a younger generation. He can never retire. He can never heal. He can never stop, and he's now doomed to do this until he dies/Capcom stops dragging his now 50-year-old ass out to star in every single game.

Leon's Campaign

THE GOOD:

The first 20 minutes or so of Leon's campaign is genuinely the best part of the entire game. By the time I got to this point I was already heavily fatigued from the above horseshit so I don't think it hit me like it should have, but the Tall Oaks University section is pretty great.

I like Leon being a mentor of sorts for Helena. It's a role we haven't seen him in before and it's interesting.

THE BAD:

I find the exploitation of Deborah Harper to be really gross. Helena gets blackmailed into starting an outbreak that kills the president for the sake of her sister. By the time we reach Deborah she's already been infected. Which is FINE... but making her a moaning, writhing, voluptuous monster vamping nude around the boss arena in a clear attempt to be sexually appealing to the (presumed male) player feels really icky to me. She could have just been a regular monster? Helena would still have every reason to want revenge on Simmons?

Due to the shitty pacing and structure, Leon and Helena both come off as super incompetent. Helena won't say shit about what's going on, leading us blindly into situation after situation and promising to explain "later." Leon's inability to drive reaches parody status as he crashes like 6 different vehicles in the course of this campaign. Leon and Helena's mere presence is a deathknell for every single person in the vicinity-- every time they encounter a group of civilians, every single one of them dies horribly. If this all happened once or twice then it wouldn't be so egregious, but this whole campaign feels like these two bumblefucks fucking up and getting innocents killed.

What in the FUCK was with the underground Skyrim dungeon section? Why is this area here? Aren't we in fucking Massachusetts???

Derek Simmons is Diet Wesker and he's terrible at it. He's not scary, he's not sinister, he's not even campy fun like Wesker was. He's supposed to be this grand evil mastermind, but he's doing all of this because Ada broke up with him or put in her two weeks notice or whatever? What a fucking loser.

The whole "oh no, a secret illuminati is running the world behind the scenes" plotline. I've been calling these guys the "Failluminati' for so long I can't even remember their real name. Having an omg secret evil organization running everything in your plot is not a plot twist, it's a fucking copout. This is so stupid Capcom has never again mentioned it, with good reason.

Ada's Campaign

THE GOOD:

The one and only actually scary part of the game, the Carla boss fight. Oh my god, is that some psychological horror? In THIS shitshow?

This is my favorite Ada character design. That open jacket is really stylish.

For about 2/3 of the previous campaigns, it looks like they have finally, actually done something interesting with Ada. Oh my god, is Ada an outright villain this time? What's her motivation? Are we finally going to learn who Ada works for and what her goals are? Why is she doing this? Chris has very good reason to be angry at Ada, but Leon's going to defend her just going by his gut? That's juicy! Wow! The boys are fighting!

I think it's extremely funny that Leon never technically finds out about the existence of Carla, so he watches a video of "Ada" hatching out of a fucking egg and assumes that's really her. He never gets corrected on this notion. As far as we know, OG Leon still thinks Ada hatched out of an egg. That's hilarious.

THE BAD;

They didn't do anything with Ada at all actually! The Ada/Carla switcheroo is really obvious once you realize it's happening, and would have been a cool opportunity to actually define something about Ada. Oh no, this evil scientist releasing the C virus on the world is claiming to be Ada? We all know the real Ada would never... um.... well... To me, the frustrating thing about OG Ada is that she isn't really a character. She shows up from time to time to save Leon or be mysterious or be a pair of boobs to look at, but she has no goals. No motivation. We don't know what she's really thinking or why she does things. She's taking orders from... SOMEONE? But we never find out who, and even when we think we know who, it turns out she's betraying them. Ada deals in bioweapons for cash, while also having an apparent soft spot for Leon. She's morally gray, but to no actual end. We can't say that she would or wouldn't do this or that, because nobody knows who Ada is or what she's trying to accomplish, and the script just has her coyly alluding to her alleged "goals" without ever explaining what those are. So yeah, imagine my disappointment when it finally looked like we were going to really get a look at Ada, only to find out that everything she does in this game isn't really her, it's an angry evil scientist who's been cloned to look like her. They have this whole fucking plot set up to do something, ANYTHING with Ada, and she ends exactly where she starts because none of it was her at all. The bit at the end where Ada winks at the camera about her "true employer" and her "real goals" made me literally fucking scream at my TV.

Hey sorry Capcom, I don't actually feel sorry for Carla at all. When you fuck around with bioweapons and cruelly torture people for the sake of your experiments, I don't really shed a tear for you when you get fed into the proverbial woodchipper of your own hubris. Carla is a great villain but I don't feel any sympathy for her whatsoever, and I really don't see why Ada ought to, either. If anything I'd think Ada should be more grossed out and offended that Simmons is THAT obsessed with her.

Okay so my last complaint is actually something that ONLY could have happened in the weeks immediately following the game. You know how AGENT is just, a stupid blank slate character who feels really out of place? That's because he didn't originally exist. He was patched into the game a few weeks after release, I think about the same time they added the ability to play Ada's campaign without finishing the other three first. Originally, you played Ada's campaign solo, as ONLY Ada. It made the psychological horror-y segments around the Carla boss fight a lot scarier and more impactful. There was, however, a slight problem in that RE6 was designed to be co-op from the ground up. Which means the very mechanics of the game are not designed for a solo character. Because recovering from near-death requires a second character to revive you. So for the first few weeks after release, when you played as Ada and got badly injured, you were forced to just sit there and watch her limp around for 20 seconds and die. Get hit by an enemy? Limp around and die. Injured by a trap? Limp around and die. Fail a QTE? Limp around and die. No recourse. No revival. Fall into the red and Ada suffers a slow, prolonged, unskippable death that you cannot escape from. At this point I had spent 40something hours playing the rest of the game, getting increasingly angry at the bad pacing and the worse story, so the extra frustration of Ada's literally broken gameplay in her campaign absolutely drove me over the edge. I managed to beat her campaign before the Agent patch that would have fixed this problem, but by that point I had come to terms with the fact that I absolutely hated RE6 and was deep in my mourning period for my prior anticipation.

Anyway, that's my tragic beef with RE6. Is it as bad as people say? Oh yeah. I think so. Is it as bad as I remember? Probably.... maybe? Does it deserve a second look from my initial impressions at launch? Yeah, probably. But the sting of that first playthrough still haunts me and I don't know that I'm ever going to sit through it again. I'd rather just take the lore notes and the little plot details that I did enjoy and run with those than force myself through the rest of the slog again.

I like how I said I was gonna be brief but then I ended up probably typing 4000 words about the plot anyway. AH WELL.

#resident evil #resident evil 6 #resident evil meta #sorta #this post is mostly me complaining about re6 via my hazy memories of it from 10 years ago #probably got some details wrong #OH WELL

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ashintheairlikesnow · 4 years ago

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I’m sure he means well enough, but uh, Jake rubs me the wrong way. Maybe it’s the savior complex. He doesn’t really have a life outside of the Safehouse. We saw the fight with his mom, about him not having a “real” career. Like he literally devotes all his time, energy and resources into this. Why? What does he get out of it other than personal satisfaction? I think he loves the idea that people need him.

It could be the hypocrisy of “not” sleeping with pets. After being so adamant about it this whole time and then to go for the sluttiest pet that shows up? Kinda sus, tbh! Like not even just Kauri, like one would be an exception, I guess, but also I know he wasn’t like “sleeping” sleeping with Chris but I think the bed sharing is kinda just.... no. Would deffffff be against HR regulations lol.

Maybe it’s just because we are supposed to like him, I dunno man. Don’t take it personally! I love your the rest of your characters and all of your stories and I think you are a fantastic writer! But Jake makes me want to pull my hair out.

Hey, Anon! I appreciate this comment, and I hope you weren’t worried that I would be mad or anything. While every writer kind of has the “oh no but that’s my son” response, I actually really enjoy seeing how people see my OCs and their actions over the course of a story.

Heads-up, I ramble a lot and this got long

Jake definitely does have a savior complex, and it’s rooted in his childhood abuse by his father and his sense that the people who could have helped (family, friends, community) chose not to, and instead simply stood by while he and his mother fought alone to find a way out. As a young adult getting into pet lib, he found a place to channel his innate need to NOT be the person who sits by and does nothing, and he definitely throws himself headlong into it.

It’s less about the rescues needing him, and more about him needing to feel like he’s building something out of the wreckage of his own early life, something better. That he’s MAKING something better for other people than what he himself had, providing the support that he didn’t receive, giving the care that he struggled to even admit he needed.

Jake’s not perfect, but he’s not enjoying the dependence on him - far from it. He is, though, trying to sort of change the timeline for other people so it won’t look as much like his own.

As far as not having a life outside of his work, that’s very true! Not only is he working full-time and living in the safehouse, he is also going to school with the specific intention of gaining skills and knowledge to run a safehouse himself (which he eventually does) and provide even more advocacy for the rescues, who often aren’t safe to speak up for themselves. In the Speak Out arc, which I’m kind of easing into now, you’ll see Jake struggle with the push and pull of knowing that, long-term, keeping these secrets isn’t as much help as the rescues deserve, and knowing that speaking out could have even more ruinous results.

t could be the hypocrisy of “not” sleeping with pets. After being so adamant about it this whole time and then to go for the sluttiest pet that shows up? Kinda sus, tbh! Like not even just Kauri, like one would be an exception, I guess, but also I know he wasn’t like “sleeping” sleeping with Chris but I think the bed sharing is kinda just.... no. Would deffffff be against HR regulations lol.

When Jake and Kauri meet, they are 23-24ish and 21-22 respectively (more or less- I change my mind on the exact numbers now and then, just go with it). When their long-running friendship and pining eventually becomes a relationship, Jake is nearly 30, and Kauri not far behind. The interim seven years or so involved a lot of change for them both, and Kauri himself changed a lot. I don’t write this chronologically and I really haven’t done enough to develop Jake’s changes, too! I can see why it’s weird to read it, thinking through the lens of early, vulnerable Kauri. But as @whumpiary I think said at one point, at some point a person is not defined by their tragedy or trauma and can define themself. Kauri defines himself, with time, and it’s strength for him to reach out and take Jake’s hand.

(For the record, I kind of hissed through my teeth at describing Kauri as slutty in a way that’s pretty judgy, only to have Kauri’s response be, “So what if I am? I’m having fun” because... well, Kauri gonna Kauri and he is ~unbothered~)

I do bristle a little at the platonic bed sharing with Chris. Chris comes out of things deeply dehumanized and degraded, and seeking out the comfort of someone when he is scared at night is actually pretty important to him. Jake isn’t pushing him on that at all. Chris also pursues similar behavior with Antoni - and also Nat! - when Jake isn’t around for some time, and it becomes less and less common and eventually stops entirely as Chris becomes more solid, steady, and stable with therapy and rebuilding his life.

Also, I love the idea of the most harried Linda in the world working at safehouse HR.

THAT SAID

I totally see the validity in not liking him! People have had similar feelings about Nate Vandrum in Danny’s story because of his initial passivity and not doing anything to help (Danny actually hates Nate for a while, too, during early captivity, and ooooh I should write out some of that).

Please don’t take my rambling as trying to make you like him, I’m totally not, I just love the excuse to ramble about character motivations and internal thought processes and whatnot.

I found this ask really interesting (I woke up to it and I’ve been thinking it over ever since) and appreciate you sending your honest thoughts!

#jake asks #ash starts and doesn't stop

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angel-of-death-2015 · 3 years ago

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🔥 What is an unpopular opinion you have on Resident Evil? Could be about the games or the movies.

The new movie is trash. That alone is enough 💀 A grown ass white man can have his shitty fanfic get turned into a movie? Then why hasn't anyone hired me? At least I give a shit about storytelling.

Overall? The series dipping away from the OG lore isn't working out. RE7 and RE8 almost have NOTHING to do with Umbrella. Umbrella is a whole afterthought in both games. The only things Umbrella-related is Chris Redfield showing up to clean up the mess at the very last minute and a little letter about Spencer we read for two seconds. There are other ideas we could've expanded on like Alex Wesker returning after she successfully possessed a kid at the end of Resident Evil Revelations 2. When it wasn't Wesker, Alex was the only kid outside of the siblings that was successful with keeping tabs with Spencer and fucking shit up behind the scenes. We could bring back Sherry, Jake, Sheva, and Carlos for a new game and throw in Christopher Cakes Redfield. This whole vampire/werewolf shtick and hardly any absured zombies is fucking stupid.

It's also so fucking white. The very few characters of color we have and all of them excluding Ada are hardly thought about. Sheva was fucking LUCKY to be the main female protagonist in her own game. But her story of being a survivor from Umbrella's tyranny on her country, her people, and all of Africa that caused her to get involved in several political scandals just to LIVE due to constant manipulation from both ends (in Kijuju and in America right before she was guilted into joining the BSAA) was drowned out and turned into a wild goose chase for Chris to find Jill after seeing one mere pic of her that could easily be photoshopped. And Sheva was constantly erased from the covers of HER GAME THAT SHE'S THE STAR IN by both the fans and Capcom. She was replaced by Jill Valentine, who was just a SIDE CHARACTER that only has less than twenty-minutes of screentime in the entire game that doesn't include the DLC. Hell, even with Carlos Oliveira in the Resident Evil 3 Remake. He's constantly stripped of his personality and dumbed down to be dumb as hell by white fans who only see him as a stupid hot Latin lover lap dog for Jill. Carlos has wit and is intelligent. He's not a fucking himbo that solely exists to worship a white woman for white fans to get off to.

And speaking of Jill, she's a full fucking white woman. She is not half-Japanese. Full fucking stop. People only hung onto the ONE LITTLE TIDBIT that her mom was supposedly Japanese in the very first or second game she starred in just to be racist to Hannah John-Kamen, the mixed black actress that portrayed Jill in the recent movie Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City. Racist fans were PISSED that a black woman got the role of their sassy white badass #567677 so they used that severely outdated "fact" that doesn't mean shit just to be assholes about Hannah. Because if Jill being half-Japanese was really important, then why the fuck has NO ONE created such outrage about Jill being casted and modeled after monoracial white women for every single game, movie, or other forms of media for twenty-five years? I'm so fucking serious. Even in Resident Evil 5 with the files you have to find about Jill that's written by Wesker, Jill's race and nationality is "Caucasian" in black and white. Not mixed. Not half-Japanese. Not half-Asian. Jill Valentine is not half-Japanese. She is a full white woman. The people who only cling to that one "fact" about her that has never been consistent and enacted on by the writers and developers of the games for twenty years are die-hard OG fans that aren't pressed about it because they forgot or don't care because it's obsolete or racist fans that used it to harass a black woman for earning the role in the movie that IS JUST A SHITTY FANFIC THAT IS NOT A COMPLETE FAITHFUL ADAPTION TO THE FRANCHISE. Because if Jill's heritage was really important, we would've actually seen ANYTHING about it be implemented into the games. Carlos Oliveira's heritage is important because you KNOW and SEE that he's a brown Latin American. Sheva Alomar's heritage is important because you KNOW and SEE that she's a black woman who was born in the city/country of Kijuju in Africa and how Umbrella has experimented on her people. Stop the cap about Jill. She is a white woman and a lot of white fans were bold as hell to turn her into a white feminist and be able to enact their gross racist fantasies on Carlos with her.

#angel answers #resident evil #unpopular opinions #lmfaooo i went IN #but thank you steph! 💖💕

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shijiujun · 5 years ago

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[Eng] History3: Trapped Diary Logbook - Days 18 to 21

♡ Days 18 to 21 of Filming History3: Trapped

Note: These are my translations! Please do not repost anywhere else. I’ve added the photos but I couldn’t scan HQ versions because I didn’t want to damage the book haha sorry about that guys!

Highlights:

Jiang Chang Hui (Steven Chiang), the guy who plays the teacher in History2: Right or Wrong, makes a cameo

This is all I need to say:

Day 18

In the confrontational scene between Hong Ye and Ah De, the most important props were red wine and cheese. The scent of Blue Cheese saturated the air and everyone jokingly said that they thought someone stepped on something (foul). Hong Ye really worked hard eating cheese the whole morning, and when they took a break for food, Diane said that her stomach is all filled with cheese, there’s no more space for rice!

In the few scenes in the morning, Ding Chun Cheng (who plays Dao Yi) didn’t have any lines, and the challenging part was how to perfectly act out his emotions without any lines. The truth of it was that Ding Chun Cheng already looks like a piece of art just quietly sitting there, and Diane joked, “Just now I accidentally met his eyes and I was so nervous that I forgot my lines”. From this we can see that we really should not make light of the amount of charisma Ding Chun Cheng has.

And while today was Hong Ye’s first day of filming, it was also the day she had to cry the most, and Hong Ye said, “Gu Dao Yi, the person who hurt me the deepest, is actually you! It’s me who got used to it, who got used to you protecting me and this habit turned into liking you”.

During the filming, the director continuously tried to guide Diane through her emotions, so that she could better express the pain and hurt in Hong Ye’s heart. In the end, Hong Ye cried so well that even I as the editor was saddened, and the camera guys at the side also said that the scene was very heart-wrenching.

Steven Chiang came to visit the set! When Steven was filming for Right or Wrong, Diane also visited him on his set, and on that Steven was actually filming his bed scenes. This time, it’s Steven’s turn to visit, and Diane is filming a very important emotional scene. Both filming for the both of them required a lot of thinking to grasp the character and scene, and from History2: Right of Wrong to History3: Trapped, we can see that both of their relationships with the director are very good, and not only do they joke around and chat, but will also exchange thoughts on acting.

Day 19

It’s here!!! The much anticipated Feitang CP intimate scene is finally here! (Make some noise~)

In order to take back the lead on Tang Yi, Shao Fei already made his stand to Vixen Ah De early in the morning, saying “Today I’m going to make out with Tang Yi, bye!” Shao Fei obviously wants to piss off poor Ah De.

On this day of filming, the scene where Tang Yi presses Shao Fei to the wall really scared Officer Meng. When Chris, who’s so much taller than him, pressed him to the wall, all Officer Meng could think at that point was, “I’m done for! I’m about to be attacked!”

Jake said that he was really stunned to his soul, and this was as expected of Tang Yi - his power and aura was so strong, Shao Fei you’ve got to work harder! He definitely can’t lose on his spirit, although that is inevitable considering that the person he loves just had to be a gang leader.

And today’s focus was the main CP’s first intimate scene. From the very first take, Jake and Chris were half naked and showing their torsos until the very end. During the filming process both Jake and Chris would exercise every time they could, so that they could present their best selves to the camera. As for how it ends, everyone please go and watch <<Trapped>> to find out!

Day 20

Team Three’s two dazed and confused members are usually inseparable when they work, and even when they’re dismissed from work they’re still glued to one another, bantering during dinner and making so much noise incessantly.

During one of the scenes where the both of them are seated at the dining table and snatching the meal bento from each other, although in the show the only cut shown was the both of them snatching food and insulting one another, but the director didn’t shout ‘cut’ for a long time, letting the both of them continue to bicker with each other and improvise their lines. Unexpectedly, Zhao Zi began to develop another storyline as he suddenly asked, “How were you taught at home? Don’t tell me the Meng Family’s standards are only just like that?”

Shao Fei of course gave as good as he got, and since the director didn’t shout ‘cut’, he would act with Zhao Zi until the end. “Don’t you speak of my family! I told you not to say that!”

And then Zhao Zi asked again, “Oh that’s right! You’ve never talked about your family, what do your dad and mom do?”

At the sudden turn of script, as the both of them started to delve into each of their character’s backgrounds, Shao Fei replied, “They’re both dead, are you happy now?”

The mystery of their births made everyone on set have to control their laughter, and that was really tough.

After the director shouted ‘cut’, the both of them still continued to discuss their birth, and when they were both studying their characters, the character backgrounds were designed for Shao Fei and Zhao Zi to both have their parents dead, and for both of them to have grown up under the care of their grandparents. With such similar backgrounds, no wonder Zhao Zi and Shao Fei are the best partners, from police academy all the way to now!

Day 21

You want me, Officer Meng, to accompany you to shop? And I’ve still got to carry your big and small bags, isn’t this such a waste of talent on a small matter?!

Jake and Diane originally were classmates from Q Place, but this is the first time they’re working together on a show, and both of them said that acting with each other was really easy and a relaxing experience, with the both of them feeling really comfortable with each other. Their very first show together they are enemies, and they have to argue and bicker with one another noisily in the department store. Hong ye even helped Shao Fei to pick out a pig-print pair of underwear in a lingerie store. There’s a huge story behind this pair of underwear - and the director agreed that Shao Fei should be wearing this kind of underwear! Afterwards, the wardrobe department really bought this underwear, hoping that they would be able to use it during the scenes at the back, even though they ended up not using it.

#history 3: 圈套 #history3圈套 #jake hsu #kenny chen #history3: trapped #history 3: trapped #chris wu #OMG BACKSTORY ON SHAO FEI REVEALED WTF #SHAO FEI IS AN ORPHAN TOO WHO GREW UP WITH HIS GRANDPARENTS #OMGAH?!!!#FIC!!!#history3 diary logbook #diary logbook #translations

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andymull · 5 years ago

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AEW Revolution 2020 - Preview & Predictions

Jon Moxley vs Chris Jericho (c) - AEW Championship Match

Will the first ever AEW champions reign finally end tonight? Or will Le Champion retain?

A feud that’s developed really well over time as they've been waiting for this PPV to really hit it big, from the group to the eye patch nearly everything has hit it out the park.

For me I see a new champion crowned in Mox, but what follows for Jericho? Im not sure if we really know the answer yet to that question, in that I dont think he’ll want to be around weekly and would rather leave for afew months do some gigs then return later. Maybe stay around for a big rematch but then look to take a break, but then what becomes of the Inner Circle without its charismatic leader? It really could slow their progress without their leader around.

As for Moxley as champion who steps up as his first challenger? Do they get around Cody not being able to go for the title after his MJF feud? Maybe Lance Archer goes instantly into the title scene with his debut and carries on the brawls he had with Moxley in NJPW? After that it looks alittle bleak to be honest, Omega is in his tag team with Page, Pac has been beaten this week by Kenny and one win over Orange Cassidy tonight may not be enough to propel him into the slot. And the other person in the top rankings is MJF who will HAVE to beat Cody to take that spot, I thought that match was fairly dead on as to Cody winning but maybe that’s more open, more on that later....

Mox takes the win and the title - MOXLEY

Cody vs MJF

The blood feud reaches its peak tonight after all of the steps required were crossed by Cody, but can he get that vital win over MJF or will a further step find itself in Cody’s way (its Arn!).

This has been the best feud that AEW has put on so far, Cody has positioned his-self so well in staying away from the title scene immediately to see how that settles down before getting involved and instead focused on making this feud the best it can be without needed a belt be the focus.

Initially I saw this a clear win for Cody while making MJF a deadly threat at the same time, I then switched to being in the mindset of someone turning on Cody to help MJF win (Arn its you!), then ive gone back to Cody winning again lately in his heroes journey. Its just that the prospect of Arn turning on Cody would be great, Arn has convinced Cody to go through all of the requirements MJF made no matter how tough or degrading but now imagine if Arn screws Cody tonight and it was all for nothing!! All done to embarrass Cody, to show MJF as the mastermind paying off Arn, to move MJF to the world title scene knowing Cody cant follow him.

Honestly lets flip a coin and stick with it.............Cody.......there we have it! Cody wins and moves to a respectful feud with Moxley for the title, while MJF retains his heat by feuding and beating Darby Allin - CODY

The Young Bucks vs Kenny Omega & Adam Page (c) - AEW Tag Team Championship Match

Should be a really fun match with guys comfortable with each other, I expect this to develop differently to how its being built in that I see Kenny getting no joy to begin by being friends with the Bucks then will take Pages approach to really not caring who they are just wanting to beat them.

We really need Omega in the world title scene and to be honest this tag team story is just going to hold him away for longer, we’ll have the tag reign then then titles loss then him and age feuding when they split, that’s going to be afew months still. Dont get me wrong it will provide some great moments and matches, and the most important thing here being them getting Page built to a much higher level.

The Bucks really need the titles soon I just feel they want to get Jericho’s long reign finished first before doing another one, give it another month and I feel they pull the trigger on the title change just not tonight - OMEGA/PAGE

Dustin Rhodes vs Jake Hager

Finally we get to Hager being able to have a match, his MMA contract has seemingly been pretty restrictive for him with them not fancying him losing weekly on tv and become a weaker fighter for them to use on MMA shows.

This has been ok so far, worked the injury angle with Dustin and afew brawls, I really dont think this should go too long and should be fairly easy to predict in Dustin getting a great reaction but ultimately losing to Hager - HAGER

Darby Allin vs Sammy Guevara

Another well built feud here doing better than the previous match and needing to do so as well, with both guys being less known by the general public its been tough to have them work together and both get over. The inclusion of Sammy into the Inner Circle was vital as without that I dont think this would work just yet. The development of Darby has been good both in getting over his style as well as his character which does still need work but is definitely going in the right direction.

In terms of the winner I think it has to be Sammy, and I feel that due to my thinking that Jericho may take alittle time off and see Sammy as being a winner tonight and trying to step up and take the Jericho spot if he’s away - GUEVARA

Kris Statlander vs Nyla Rose (c) - AEW Women’s Championship Match

The recently crowned champion in Rose defends her title in a match that was delayed recently against Kris, this should develop into more of a bruising match than the title has seen in recent months with Riho as champion.

I really dont see the need to change this title anytime soon so expect them to have Kris get some good highlights in with her moves and character but ultimately Nyla will retain her crown - ROSE

Pac vs Orange Cassidy

And we have Orange’s first singles match in the company and his big opportunity, and it really is big as he has gotten over the gimmick so far and has the fans behind him but the next big step is carry that over into actual matches and not just spots.

Pac meanwhile just needs the win, nothing else, just the win.

Will be interesting and eye opening - PAC

SCU vs The Dark Order - Pre Show Match

Match wise we’ve probably seen this already once or twice, with the big news being how they move along the angle of Chris Daniels and the Dark Order leadership.

I doubt we get a final answer tonight with this only being on the pre show so I imagine everyone's thinking up ideas of a clever way to tease something but finally not get there just yet. I guess at the Dark Order getting the win with failed help from Daniels leading to SCU thinking he failed to help on purpose - DARK ORDER

Should be a fun show, hopefully the matches dont go too long like they did pre Dynamite, but will provide some great action.

Hopefully over the next few months we get the likes of Lance Archer, Luke Harper and maybe Matt Hardy added to the show, then the challenge will be to get them into the mix in a vital way to improve the brand further.

Bye for now

Andy

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jojotichakorn · 5 years ago

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HIStory3: Trapped: Review (& General Info)

About the Series:

Summary: A police officer and a gang leader were killed in a gunshot attack four years ago. What's the secret behind this case? The only survivor, Tang Yi, is now the gang leader. Shao Fei is a police officer, who’s been following Tang Yi around for the past four years, trying to figure out what’s really happened during the attack. Will he be able to get to the bottom of the case? And can something unexpected come out of their rivalry? (Trailer)

Couples: Main gay couple, as well as two side couples - one gay, one straight.

Running Time: 10 episodes - around 45 minutes each - 8 hours in total

Cast (& their Instagram pages): Jake Hsu (Shao Fei), Chris Wu (Tang Yi), Andy Bian (Jack), Kenny Chen (Zhao Zi), Diane Lin (Hong Ye), Sphinx Ding (Dao Yi), Zhang Guang Chen (Andy), Stanley Mei (Li Zhi De), [more].

Where to watch? VIKI (if you watch on mobile, you’ll have to download the app).

Related Shows: HIStory is a recurring Taiwanese BL series, however, each season is separate from the others and none of them are connected in any way, so there’s no other Trapped content out there.

My Review:

Rating: 9.5/10

Short review: Trapped is my favorite BL of all time. It has a good plot, fantastic acting, the most wonderful couple ever (whose intimacy is handled incredibly well), amazing characters, awesome friendships and a whole list of other great things. Despite having one controversial character, a slightly questionable background couple and a not-so-satisfying (though still not bad) ending, I don’t think there’s anything that could stop you from enjoying it. And though, as usual, it’s obviously your own decision to make, it’s definitely a must-watch in my book.

Extended review (under the cut):

I consider Trapped the best BL that exists to date – without a shadow of a doubt. Not everyone agrees with me and that’s entirely understandable, however, I assure you that even though someone might prefer one or a couple of other BLs to this one, everyone considers Trapped one of the best ones for sure.

The plot of Trapped is thought-out and actually good. It obviously isn’t a masterpiece of modern cinema, however, unlike so many other BLs, the plot actually matters. It’s interesting, gripping, well-thought-out, with a nice mystery and some unexpected reveals that might actually surprise you. Everything gang-related isn’t just there for show – it’s done tastefully and doesn’t seem cheap at all, you truly believe it. So many moments are hilarious, especially in the beginning. And the show is very meticulous and careful with all its little details, so there are no annoying minor plot or aesthetic inconsistencies that could take you out of immersing into it. The pacing of the plot is a tiny bit slow in the first couple of episodes, but it needs that to build itself up properly, and it quickly picks up as soon as it can.

The characters in this show are amazing. You will not only fall in love with the mains, but also adore most of the background characters and hate the rest of them, which just goes to show how much each of them can impact you emotionally because they’re that fucking great. All the details about the characters are well thought-out and awesome too. Tang Yi is not just a gang leader in name – Chris, the actor who plays him, does a fantastic job of showing just how intimidating Tang Yi can be and generally convinces us of him being the Big-Bad-Gang-Boss through so many brilliant subtle acting choices. The villain is actually threatening and terrifying too. Shao Fei can be rather embarrassing and cringy, however, Trapped certainly manages to show that this is truly just his personality, and they’re not just doing this for laughs. Besides, I’ve heard many people who usually get second-hand embarrassment all the time say they didn’t feel awkward for Shao Fei at all – he isn’t embarrassed since this is his true, authentic self, so no one else is embarrassed for him either. Finally, two background queer characters are fantastic. Usually, in other BLs background queer characters, who aren’t there for a romantic plotline, are never anything beyond a stereotype and are always there for laughs. That’s not the case in Trapped. Both of the characters are absolutely incredible, authentic and beautiful – most certainly one of the best background characters I’ve seen in any BLs.

I must note that one character definitely caused some controversy in the fandom, and I can’t say much else beyond this without giving you a gigantic spoiler. However, even though I do think they could’ve handled the topic better overall, I don’t find there’s anything wrong with having one of the many queer characters in the show be a bad person. I’ve talked about it many times and, considering the fact that we still have at least six positively-portrayed queer characters, the seventh being a piece of shit does not affect the representation in any way and doesn’t suddenly give all queer people a bad name. There are shitheads among us too, you know. And it’s important to talk about it.

Moving on, let’s talk about relationships. For starters, the main couple is hands down the best enemies-to-friends-to-lovers you’ll ever see – that I personally guarantee. Their romance is developed well and treated with the care it deserves, and they end up being the most adorable, wholesome couple ever. I also want to especially point out how well Trapped handles their intimacy. A lot of other BLs have their couple treat each other like friends half the time, be dating another half and kissing/having sex on rare occasions. In reality, though, a couple is always intimate with each other. And I don’t mean that everyone fucks like bunnies – no. I mean couples have intimate conversations, hold hands, kiss each other in a million different ways (and on a million different spots), cuddle for no reason, hug, express emotions and, of course, sometimes have sex. Not every couple does absolutely everything I’ve just listed, of course, but you get the overall point. Couples are intimate. And Trapped gets that. It shows that. And that’s wonderful. As for others, the straight background couple takes up just enough screen time to not annoy you and it’s actually kind of cute, which is super rare for me to say. Now, the gay background couple is rather questionable. One of the guys is kind of oblivious and juvenile, while the other pushes him too hard. It’s not so critical that I’d tell you to skip their moments, however, it is definitely food for thought and I’d say pretty problematic.

The friendships in Trapped are sort of a double-edged sword. On one hand, we have Shao Fei and Zhao Zi, who were proclaimed to be best friends, but don’t end up having any meaningful moments together and are really out of the loop with each other’s lives by the end of the show. This can be explained and justified, but I still feel like it’s a little unrealistic. On the other hand, though, we have Tang Yi and his friends – mainly, Andy, The Doctor (whose name I, apologies, don’t remember), as well as Hong Ye and Tang Guo Dong. Despite only seeing a couple of moments with each of them, we get attached to every character and their relationships with Tang Yi very easily. His friendships with Andy and The Doctor are familiar and realistic. His relationship with Hong Ye is deep and authentic – you can truly see they are like siblings to each other. And his relationship with Tang Guo Dong is so beautiful and raw that you end up falling in love with the “found father” trope and wish you had the same relationship with your parents or any mentor figure, really. Despite Tang Yi and Tang Guo Dong only having four small scenes with each other – all of which are flashbacks, their dynamic is my second favorite in the show and their relationship is one of the best father/son relationships I’ve ever seen.

Finally, the show is shot beautifully and the acting in it is on a completely different level. Seriously, you will say, “Holy shit, this actor is so good!” like every other second. I literally grabbed my pen to write some version of “the acting is so good” in my notes, while rewatching the show for this review at least twenty times, and the only thing that stopped me is already having it written down thrice.

The very last note I have is about the ending. Now I will say immediately that this show does not have a bad ending – I could not have it as one of my favorites, if it did, I’m strictly a happy-ending kind of person. However, the ending is still a little too vague for my taste and I wouldn’t say I’m satisfied with it. It’s not the end of the world and overall it’s an alright ending you can live with – nothing bad happens. However, I wouldn’t call it the best ending this show could have – and that’s all I can say without giving any spoilers.

Finally-finally, should you watch this show? Fuck yes! Absolutely, my guy! Have you heard all I’ve just said? It’s brilliant. An absolute fucking masterpiece, I’m telling you. So yes, I recommend it to literally everyone. There is legitimately no other series I want to show everyone as much as this one – this is fucking mandatory in my book. Regardless of however I feel about it though, at the end of the day, it’s obviously your own decision to make.

#my fav show is in my dudes #history 3: trap #history 3: trapped #archer's bl recs

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rpdwong · 6 years ago

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[LET’S TALK RE2MAKE] Claire, Sherry (+ Leon) and Found Families

The Found Family trope is probably one of my favourite fictional tropes. Give me those relationships where a group of characters with nothing in common find each other and they become “home” and support each other, no matter what. It’s a powerful message: you choose your family. If you’re lucky, you might have a nice biological family that loves you. But that’s not always the case, and people should bond over something more than their blood ties. I think Claire and Sherry’s (and Leon to some extent) story in RE2 rings very true to this trope, and I was looking forward to watching how it developed in the RE2make.

Once again, I was happily surprised—to the point where I was almost teary eyed at certain scenes. I love Resident Evil with all my heart, and I cry at literally everything, but RE doesn’t usually have dramatic tension or sadness that hits that hard. But Claire’s scenario in RE2make did manage to get me and man, Claire and Sherry deserve a hug, a shower, all the puppies and parrots.

Sherry’s strangled relationship with her parents was explored in the original game. But, as I mentioned in my previous Let’s Talk RE2make about Ada and Leon, the game had its shortcomings when it comes to storytelling, simply because it’s a product of its time. I know RE2make is probably not most narrative driven game (we have BioWare games and, even though I haven’t played all of their games, I know Naughty Dog is praised for this) and it could do better, but when it comes to Resident Evil it IS a huge improvement—and this shows with Sherry’s character as well as Annette.

You see the strained relationship between mother and daughter in their brief encounters, you can also see that the Birkins were REALLY shitty parents, but Annette did care about her daughter—though that doesn’t really excuse her behaviour, but people are complicated and this is how it is.

So we have this poor little girl with huge abandonment issues, running around a police station looking for her mom, though she knows Annette doesn’t always have time for her (you might think NOW she should). But she is scared, she’s been chased by a monster (and as far as I remember, I think she’s aware the monster is William, right?? I really need to replay all scenarios, just writing all this from memory), alone and defenseless…

And then she meets Claire.

I think it’s important to highlight that Claire is also very young here, just 19 years old. A BABY AS WELL. We know she’s capable of looking out for herself, but it’s still a terrible situation, she might even be still worrying about Chris’ whereabouts here (depending on which scenario you play). But Claire, despite having no obligation to take care of Sherry, looks after her and decides to help her find her mom/escape.

Claire even takes it upon herself to save her from Irons. Again, Claire could just have walked out once she makes it out of the station—but she doesn’t. So, for once, there is somebody there for Sherry. Someone she can rely upon and trust, who makes her feel protected, as any child should (especially in a situation like this).

When Claire rescues Sherry from the dumpster, after she’s been infected, Sherry asks her why Claire is doing all this. Claire answers: “Because I care.” Then I start crying, because this is so beautiful. It’s not that Annette doesn’t care, we know she does in some way—but she’s still terrible with Sherry (that conversation they have over the CCTV makes me want to punch Annette so, so badly) when the girl needs her the most, needs that reassurance that “hey, everything’s going to be fine”.

Claire is the one who gives her that, who genuinely cares about her and shows it. It’s great that Claire also calls out Annette on her shitty behavior a few times (when she finds Sherry and later on before fighting G 3). When they’re on the cable car, Claire wants to give her the pendant back. Sherry rejects it, because it was a gift given by her mother, when all she wanted was for her to be home and spend time with her. It’s a sort of memento of everything that’s wrong between mother and daughter, in some way. Doesn’t help that, later on, we find out the pendant is the key to get the vaccine. We could say this is Annette’s saving her daughter in some way, but I also think it’s just another link to Annette and William’s job, which was the problem in the first place.

In the end, the bond Sherry and Claire develop is that of a newfound family. Thankfully, for the first time, Capcom has given us confirmation on what the hell happened to Chris and Claire’s parents, and we know they died in a car accident. So she only had her brother as family, which is why Chris is so important to her. The reason she travelled to Raccoon City because she hadn’t heard about him in a whole month. Maybe she even knew about the mansion incident, so she was getting worried something might’ve happened (though I don’t think Chris would tell her much, just to protect her).

But the thing here is that Sherry doesn’t even have a Chris. She has nobody, she’s alone. Claire can relate to being parentless, that’s why she bonds with Sherry (as she tells her to comfort her at the beginning). But, just as she had Chris, Sherry deserves that one person she can trust and rely upon—and that’s her now. They become family during this terrible experience, because Claire moved heaven and hell to save Sherry when no one else did. She was there for her when it mattered, unlike her parents (disclaimer: even though I really like Annette’s evolution in this game and she’s a good character, you can see I hold a grudge against her— it made me so angry how she treated Sherry!).

Now, I mentioned Leon in regards to the Found Family trope, because I think he more or less is a part of it. Leon, Claire, Sherry and Ada are all the “original” Raccoon City survivors (we have Jill afterwards, but since her story is completely isolated from RE2 and in a different game, I don’t think it counts for this). Ada’s a complicated case because of her role in the story and she only makes contact with Leon (except for that tiny moment in the original, where she retrieves Sherry’s pendant) and she doesn’t actually escape with them.

But Leon and Claire are our heroes, they make it out alive of Raccoon City and they help Sherry in the process. Even though in the RE2make Leon and Claire interact way less than in the original, and Leon doesn’t even meet Sherry until the very end, I think that last scene still resonates in the audience as a family moment, in which Leon is included.

In the original it’s all fun and games, until Leon says the “It’s up to us to take out Umbrella” or Claire says “I have to find my brother”. They have made it all more light hearted and fun in the RE2make, which I also think is much more realistic than just HEY WE HAVE TO BRING UMBRELLA DOWN or Claire immediately leaving, as RE3’s epilogue implied. After all she’s done for Sherry, she wouldn’t just leave her like that.

I have heard of two main criticism regarding the ending I’d like to address before finishing up this thing:

a) Sherry is way too cheerful after having just lost both her parents (and especially her mom, whose death affects her more). I can understand this and it is a valid complain, but I also think it could be a coping mechanism. That’s why she even jokes with the “You guys could adopt me!” because now she’s lost her real family, but has found a new one in Claire, and hey, this new guy seems to be on Claire’s good side and he’s helping and taking her to safety. I mean, I’d LOVE to be adopted by Leon and Claire, who wouldn’t??? I also think this is a case of Resident Evil not being ever really 100% down to Earth. RE endings always end up in a hopeful note, sometimes even cheesy. It’s a way to comfort the player as well, after all the terrible things we’ve been through with our characters. I think this is just another version of that, and it’s so beautiful to watch Leon and Claire holding Sherry’s hands and walking into the sunset. There might be problems ahead, but hey, they made it out! They are alive! It’s less cut and dry than the original, and it gives you a feeling that they’ve all bonded over this experience. And this is so fitting with what we know from RE6 Sherry. She talks about Leon and Claire with the utmost admiration, tells Jake they’re the reason she’s alive and she just wants to live up to their example. I think this ending resonates with that feeling she shares in RE6 and it’s beautiful.

b) Capcom is pushing Leon/Claire as a pairing. Ok, let’s open this can of worms. First of all: I hate shipwars, they are pointless and a waste of precious fandom time, and I don’t ship Leon and Claire, never have in my whole life, but I do see the appeal and it’s clear some of their interactions in the remake are kinda flirty. And this is all fine. Now, I don’t think their interactions at the end are the flirty ones.

When Claire jokes about the “one helluva first date”, she’s answering Leon’s comment when Sherry asks them about the girlfriend/boyfriend thing (where he points out they’ve just met, literally). Then Leon’s answer to Claire is clearly a reference to what has actually happened to him with Ada. That being said, Capcom was probably teasing the idea in a fan servicy way, but it’s still all in-character. Sherry’s the one pushing all those things here, and it can be explained because she’s just a 12 years old girl and is wondering who Leon is and why Claire knows him, since they’re happy to see each other alive. Hence the adoption comment later on. Sherry craves a family and, right now, these two people are practically her world after having suffered terrible things.

I do see Leon and Claire as sort of parental figures to Sherry, or at least the big sister/brother vibe, but that doesn’t mean Capcom is pushing anything here, IMO. My only gripe with all this is that I liked the idea of Claire being one of the few female characters that had 0 romantic tension with Leon, but still I don’t think we can call it that since they barely interact and it was just flirty banter. (I do enjoy, though, that their interactions are friendlier than in the original and they keep cheering each other up with those “We’re gonna make it!!). And hey, they’re both VERY PRETTY. If I were Leon, I’d get all flustered around Claire and viceversa. As some people have pointed out, both characters have a record of being flirty in general with other people, so this isn’t out of character for them either. In any case, I don’t think this is what’s happening in the ending scene and, even though it’s a nice fan service moment for people who do ship Leon and Claire, it can be seen just as a easily as a Found Family moment without any romantic connotations. Both work perfectly and leave every fan happy, no need for ship dramas. They ruin everything and it’s not worth it.

Seriously, that image of the three of them walking together into the sunset, holding hands fills my heart with happiness <3 Whether you ship one thing or another, don’t let anyone or anything rob you of the beauty this moment holds for Resident Evil history.

#claire redfield #sherry birkin #leon scott kennedy #resident evil 2 remake #resident evil 2 #meta #mine: meta

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superbeitmenotyou · 5 years ago

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Spider-Man: Far From Home: The Screenwriters explain the Twists

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This text incorporates spoilers for Spider-Man Far From Home.

Back it got here to crafting “Spider-Man Far From Home,” the screenwriters, Chris McKenna and Erik Somers, had an incredibly complex web to weave.

The movie sends Peter Parker and his superhero buddies, Spider-Man, both played with the aid of Tom Holland on category travel via Europe, but “removed from domestic” nevertheless had to grapple with the tragic catastrophe of “Avengers: Endgame,” wherein Peter misplaced his mentor, tony stark.

“Far From Home” additionally introduces Jake Gyllenhaal, an extra superhero who appears to be on abate’s facet but whom savvy comedian-e-book fanatics will automatically admire as Mysterio, certainly one of Spider-Man’s basic foes. and then there’s the rely upon unravelling character accoutrement introduced in ’s “Spider-Man: homecoming,” including Peter’s beginning accord along with his classmate MJ Zendaya.

In a fresh telephone dialogue, McKenna and Sommers whose previous collaborations include “Spider-Man: homecoming” and “ Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle” explained how they juggled these abounding plot aspects and got here up with a surprise end-credit score aberration that guarantees to circuit Spider-Man in a whole new course. here are edited excerpts from that conversation.

How did you arrive on the choice to acquaint Mysterio as an ally who’s working with Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury?

Chris McKenna one of the hardest issues with these motion pictures is touchdown on the villain. With Mysterio, there have been models of the memoir where he was at the forefront as an out-and-out villain that Peter and Nick have been chasing around Europe as he pulled off these events, all building to this lower back legend of why he became doing it, which changed into a totally different third act. We went downloads of different anchorage.

Erik Sommers however in the end, as a result of Mysterio offers so lots in deception, it changed into a variety of herbal that it led to a chronicle structure where his whole identity changed into a deceive for a long time.

McKenna There’s going to be people accepted satisfactory with the comics who reactivity to peer right through him, however, you type of can’t be concerned about that if you happen to develop with an artifice like this. You simply ought to achievement so you might get abroad with it lengthy satisfactory so that back the show comes up, people are still having fun with the film.

Mysterio employs enough deep-cut comedian-publication references — together with a back epic involving an alternative edition of the earth — that alike super enthusiasts might locate themselves satisfied in the beginning.

Sommers That truly did aid. Any time we locate ourselves with a twist or shock exhibit of something like this, we are looking to do as lots as we can to give protection to it and abstract from it ahead of time.

McKenna What we saved asserting is that he needed to consider as a true personality, so we desired to supply him a tragic again yarn with the entire particulars of coming from an additional apple, and ensure that the Elementals he’s combating acquainted like a becoming, Avengers-stage threat. surely, it turned into all smoke and mirrors, but we desired to accomplish it as plausible as feasible, and what helped become making Nick acerbity — the battiest man on the planet — apparently fall for it.

Sommers if you consider of what Mysterio is doing as actuality a con, again a sensible con man is going to employ different individuals to help promote his lie.

within the conclusion-credit scene, we find out that Nick isn’t Nick in any respect — as a substitute, a shape-shifting alien from “Captain Marvel” has been posing as Nick Fury for the total film.

McKenna Thematically, we desired to accept as many illusions and twists as viable, and up during the conclusion of the movie, we wanted to make you question everything you’ve viewed before.

however it becomes really a concept that got here later in the manner, and it helped because if anyone within the audience had considerations with Nick fury falling for Quentin’s nonsense, it changed into a nice defence valve to accept.

How a good deal did wonder divulge to you about the big twists in “Avengers: Endgame” in case you begun penning this film?

McKenna We were like, “wait, who goes abroad? and how do they arrive back?” We didn’t basically see “Endgame” except the most fulfilling — might be if we’d common more in strengthen, we might accept fabricated a funny story about Valkyrie using a Pegasus since you really are looking to reference that.

Sommers You’re accustomed every little thing on a need-to-recognize basis.

McKenna the two important things we knew have been the -yr hole and the ramifications it could accept for the individuals who did and didn’t get blipped away. And, certainly, the tony of all of it.

The shadow that tony’s demise casts over this film nearly makes him an alternative version of Uncle Ben from the Spider-Man comic books. back chic bequeaths a magnificent reward to abate in “far from domestic,” it could as well come with a bit observe announcing, “With first-rate power comes amazing accountability.”

McKenna The different “Spider-Man” videos definitely handled Uncle Ben, and “accession” hinted at it, however, you’re appropriate: In a lot of methods, the gravitas really comes from abate’s accord with chic.

Sommers It’s affected that there likely changed into an Uncle Ben and the ache of that accident is lingering there, but this gave each person the probability to actualize a whole new accord between Peter and his mentor, Tony, and to contend with the loss of that, which is a very potent, emotional experience in his life.

within the mid-credits tag, a posthumous video from Mysterio exposes Spider-Man’s secret identity to the world. That’s principal shake-up for this personality. Why acquaint it now?

McKenna We had been challenged via the producers to come up with whatever thing that abate sacrifices through the end of this movie, and after we hit upon that as a group, it grew to become a very horrifying theory: “Oh, no, we will do this! then it’s no longer a Spider-Man film anymore!”

Sommers sooner or later, we realized that because of it afraid us, you need to run toward it.

McKenna, It’s the sort of daring manoeuvre that it grew to become assured, especially with a difficult persona like Mysterio, who’s this darkish father figure. From the grave, is he making an attempt to give abate his “I’m adamant Man” moment? It’s advance aloft him, however, is this a lesson or an abuse?

Mysterio additionally frames Spider-Man for the crimes he’s been committing, which would initiate the next movie in an extremely different region.

McKenna, We have been questioning, “Are we activity as abysmal as we deserve to at the end of the movie?” We performed with the thought that Peter is the one who sacrifices his identification out of call all over the last combat, then it appeared more wonderful if Mysterio tricks him into doing it, but any time we wrote an edition where he was being printed to the world in that fight, it felt like it beneath the achievement. So earlier than it grew to become a tag, it becomes really simply the end of the film: right as he feels he’s dispatched up as Spider-Man, he has the rug pulled out from under him once again.

Sommers We had been basically debating, should still we just show who Spider-Man is, or should we body him for whatever thing and turn him right into an abomination? ultimately, we decided that each was how to go. It’s any such triumph on the end as a result of he’s received the girl and at last, becoming a big swing in the course of the city, so we are looking to knock him down as far as possible.

The greatest surprise of the movie is that the id show is advertisement via J. Jonah Jameson, the daily adenoids blowhard who became played by way of J.k. Simmons within the common “Spider-Man” movies directed via Sam Raimi. Simmons reprises the position right here, making him the first actor from a different set of movies to join the present wonder cosmos as the same personality.

McKenna both of those ideas got here together resplendent quickly. I don’t understand if it became director Jon Watts or somebody else who talked about, “it 'll be each day adenoids, and it 'll be J. Jonah Jameson.” That concept has been lingering round due to the fact that “homecoming”: How will we insert our new version of J. Jonah?

Sommers There had already been some activity in possibly the usage of J.k. Simmons when we brought J. Jonah again, so as soon as it was decided that we have been acting to reveal Peter’s identification on the very conclusion instead of the last combat, it all fell into region very artlessly that J. Jonah would be worried.

McKenna whatever thing that had been amphibian through this complete movie changed into the thought of “false information” and how can you accept as true with everything you see? We had been toying with the conception that Mysterio would turn Spider-Man right into a villain, similar to he did within the comic books, and it acquainted like that again angry into this J. Jonah. because of the Alex Jones of the MCU.

With newspapers on the wane, it’s fun that J. Jonah Jameson has basically become a YouTube personality.

#entertainment #spider-man #spider-man far from home #marvel #mcu

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ryanmeft · 6 years ago

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Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse Movie Review

Spider-Man 2 set the standard for the wall-crawler’s celluloid escapes, and the movies have been trying to catch up to that ever since. Thanks in large part to poor decisions by Sony, it never came close until Marvel got a hand on the property again. The last thing I ever expected from Sony’s own spin-off movies was that they’d be any good, especially after surviving Venom. As it turns out, the soul of the character just needed animation to set it free. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is not only a great entry in the webslinger’s mostly forgettable filmography, it’s in the top tier of superhero films, period.

Miles Morales (Shamiek Moore) is a black teen being sent to a private school after winning a scholarship; his father (Brian Tyree Henry) is a by-the-books cop who struggles to understand his growing son but loves him anyway, which sounds cliche but works because the character is so well-written. His mother (Luna Lauren Velez) is unfortunately sidelined, and spending more time on her in the sequel would be welcome. He looks up to his uncle Aaron (Mahershala Ali), who shares Miles’s love of graffiti art but who is also some sort of a criminal. I mention Miles’s race because it’s important: the movie elects for a happily stable family and a smart kid with a bright future, a rare focus for African American characters in cinema. The movie is not political in the slightest, and treats this as if it’s not uncommon, because it isn’t. It’s a deliberate contrast to Peter Parker, whose life is a constant mess. Miles gets his powers with a similar spider bite and without much fanfare.

Speaking of Peter Parker, he shows up, voiced by Chris Pine, and gets in a big fight involving the Green Goblin (Jorma Taccone) and the Kingpin (Liev Schreiber), classic Spider-Man villains somewhat re-imagined for the setting. When things go wrong trying to stop a dimension-combining device, Miles lands the gig of stopping the machine from firing again, but can barely use his own powers. Another Parker (Jake Johnson), an older and out-of-shape one who has given up on life, shows up and doesn’t make a very adequate mentor. He’s eventually joined by numerous other versions. Spider-Gwen (Hailee Steinfeld), who is clearly here to launch her own spin-off, is cynical and calculating. Peni Parker (Kimiko Glenn) is an anime take on the character whose powers are actually invested in a machine that I think is piloted by a spider itself. I’ll be honest, I lost the details in the rush, but she works because she’s more homage to the form than parody. Spider-Ham/Peter Porker (John Mulaney) is sadly underutilized and didn’t really add as much as he could; there’s too many other Spider-guys for him to stand out. By far my favorite was Spider-Man Noir, a version who is almost all shadow, wears a fedora and trench-coat, and is voiced brilliantly by Nicolas Cage, who channels Humphrey Bogart and James Cagney. Indeed, the voice cast is so stuffed that Lily Tomlin and Zoe Kravitz end up in tertiary roles. Each of these alternate heroes got sucked into Miles’s universe and will see their molecules fracture like a bad radio signal if they don’t get back. For this, they seek the help of a batty-but-brilliant scientist (Kathryn Hahn), who provokes one of Parker’s best lines. Each is accompanied by a quick and humorous rundown of their respective origins, which both serves as a nice send-up of the now-tedious origin story and fills in whatever small amount of info the audience might need.

A disclaimer for those who are understandably confused about Spidey’s cinematic history: none of these Spider-People are the same one from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, that interconnected place of Guardians and Avengers. The Parker here appears to be some version of the one from Sam Raimi’s first trilogy, and considering the divided reception of that line, it’s an interesting choice (it still contains the best Spider-Man movie, and a couple lackluster ones). It matters far less than it does in the MCU, because this movie feeds more on energy, humor and heart than on continuity. To my recollection (it’s been a while), all of these characters exist in some way in the comics, but you don’t have to care. On screen, they play off each other wonderfully. The jaded Parker is like those wizened mentors from every movie ever made about a plucky kid finding his way, except this guy, while having the skills, doesn’t care. That’s a decidedly different look for Spider-Man, one that only an animated film, specifically only an animated film this unique, could pull off; an apathetic hero is just not something audiences would accept if he were the main character. The Noir version has the most potential for his own movie, as his universe is the most different from what we’ve seen before. Like Rey in Star Wars, Spider-Gwen is unfortunately given the least interesting character, but there’s room for development later. For some reason, the same people that decided we need more female heroes (which we do) also decided they always have to be---pardon the expression---the straight man. Will we maybe have a female take on Tony Stark at some point? I won’t hold my breath; the culture just isn’t there yet.

The heroes are of course opposed by the afore-mentioned villains, joined by many others: Prowler, a Batman-esque fighter, Scorpion (Joaquin Cosio), Tombstone (Marvin “Krondon” Jones III) and a surprise bonus pick who I will not mention because you should discover it for yourself, except to say this person really works while, in a way, bringing back a long-absent, long in demand foe. When machines are activated and villains are fighting, the movie does occasionally veer somewhat close to confusion, but it always recovers, with the exception of some of the villains being rather generic. Animation has unshackled the agility, speed and wit Spider-Man has always evoked in the minds of people flipping through comic panels. There’s a litheness to the movements of the characters that no amount of CG could ever replicate, and a boundless energy that the unique animation style---designed to look like comic panels in motion and, to my eternal shock, actually successful in this---works perfectly with.

Still, the most surprising thing is how the emotions carry through. Each Spider-Dude-or-Dudette has their own tragedy and loss, and the sense that no matter what universe he exists in, he’ll always have to deal with that is sadly poignant, especially for anyone who grew up on the Spider-Man mythos. There are actual stakes here; even the motivations of the Kingpin have real heft. The movie has been handled by Lego Movie producers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, with a small army of co-writers joining along the way, and the surprise is that for once, so many cooks have managed to concoct something that feels so sincere.

If you aren’t a comic person, don’t worry. There’s enough heart here to sweep you up even if you don’t know your spiders from your bats. Stan Lee’s posthumous cameo feels fitting, in a movie that does right by his (and Steve Ditko’s) best creation. Nerds tend to declare amazing absolutely every comic movie that comes out. And every once in a while, they’re right.

Verdict: Highly Recommended (3 1/2 out of 4 stars)

Note: I don’t use stars, but here are my possible verdicts.

Must-See

Highly Recommended

Recommended

Average

Not Recommended

Avoid like the Plague

You can follow Ryan's reviews on Facebook here:

https://www.facebook.com/ryanmeftmovies/

Or his tweets here:

https://twitter.com/RyanmEft

All images are property of the people what own the movie.

#spider-man #marvel #Nicolas Cage #the lego movie #mahershala ali #hailee steinfeld #movies #shamiek moore #brian tyree henry #luna lauren velez #chris pine #jake johnson #zoe kravitz #lily tomlin #kimiko glenn #john mulaney #joaquin cosio #superheroes #comics

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amatsuki · 2 years ago

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Golden Delicious @ VIFF 2022

Golden Delicious is a queer coming-of-age story about a gr 12 boy living in East Van. It touches on social and parental expectations, and figuring out who you are and want to be.

The writing was out of the park. There were some absolute laugh-out-loud moments. The pacing never felt slow (ok, I think the basketball team tryouts were a little gratuitous) while giving the characters time to live and breathe. Some of the family dialogue was a bit too well-communicated but, in general, the characters felt real. The film managed to develop each of the four family members within its two hours without it feeling rushed or overly long. The film transitioned between subplots well, and did so in a way that I could never quite guess what development would come next.

There were some gorgeous scenic shots, the best of which featured East Van awash in sunset. (If you’ve never done it before — ride the SkyTrain in East Van during sunset! Best view in the city.) The writer Gorrman Lee and director Jason Karman said they used transition shots to convey emotion and the passage of time. They also wanted to show Vancouver as not just a cloudy, dreary place. There was plenty of green trees and blue skies — and a cherry blossom shot, of course. They shot in March of 2021, so the amount of blue sky they captured is actually impressive.

We got an East Van roll call — Lee went to Windermere and Cardi Wong (who plays lead Jake) went to Killarney! Like Parmiss Sehat (Valerie) said, it was cool to see East Van’s diversity reflected on screen; the main cast was all POC. Funnily enough, although it’s very much set in East Van and grounded in East Van aesthetics, the high school is fictionalized.

I would have loved to asked about the tension between the Very Chinese restaurant and the North American home decor but I was nearly late and was near the back of the balcony sooo. Sad there wasn’t more Cantonese in the film.

One balcony audience member did get to ask a q though! (The balcony brethren were all trying to get the MC’s attention for him.) He wanted to ask Chris Carson (Aleks) about playing an Asian-Canadian gay character who’s confident, proudly out, and not a joke. It is so rare to see any two of these things, never mind all of it.

Ok, now I’m actually going to dive into minor spoilers.

There’s a careful balance between the two Wong children — Jake doesn’t want to follow in their father’s footsteps, but Janet does want to follow their parents’ in running the titular Golden Delicious restaurant. It’s a bit of nuance missing from a lot of Asian-American/Canadian work, I think — that following in your family’s footsteps isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Lee comes from an Asian restaurant family, and he wanted to show both the difficulties and the love in it (I’m paraphrasing heavily).

Karman works in local high schools, and you can see that in his treatment of social media in this film. I didn’t understand why there was so much social media at the beginning as it felt a bit old man yelling at cloud. However, it plays out in the plot very well, and is used to draw a line between public vs private personae. Which, as this is a queer coming-of-age story, is obviously important.

I want to know if Karman or Lee has watched Skam as a couple scenes read a bit “Skam S3 but in East Van”. (There’s one scene in particular where Jake runs into the night and I was like okay Skam 3x05.) That said, despite the similarities, the major difference is that Golden Delicious treats every major character with depth and humanity. Jake and Valerie reconcile in a believable way, and it takes months before Jake and Aleks reconcile.

Golden Delicious does show mental breakdowns via puffy winter jackets, but you also see Jake go from stereotypical Asian-Canadian quiff to hair down and messy bangs. Similarly Aleks goes from this polished heartthrob boy next door to someone softer and realer. One neat bit of symbolism is that in the Jake & Aleks bedroom scene, Aleks is completely naked and Jake is completely dressed. It’s not intended to be obvious but I immediately clocked it and it’s a deft bit of hinting. (Karman said a piece of feedback he got was there’s no obvious villain. There was, but not in the traditional plot-related sense.)

This being VIFF, there weren’t too many Q&A questions for the cast (I had one … sob). Cardi Wong did joke about the spirit of Jake taking over him, and said the “I really want to kiss you” line (might be paraphrasing) was adlibbed!

The only real question I walked away with, though, was that Golden Delicious skips straight from winter to cherry blossoms. Does Jake even go to school in between?

Golden Delicious is a beautiful, funny, and heartwrenching film. You should definitely check it out if you have the chance!

#golden delicious #viff22

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aion-rsa · 4 years ago

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The Right Stuff: What To Expect From The Disney+ Adaptation

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Actors can feel the crushing gravity of expectations when playing real-life figures, even if they’re playing astronauts. For the cast and creatives behind The Right Stuff, shooting the TV adaptation of Tom Wolfe’s iconic novel about the Mercury 7 and birth of NASA took on added historical significance during the summer of 2019, with July 20th marking the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing on the moon.

The series from National Geographic, which begins streaming on Disney+ on Oct. 9, shot at Universal Studios in Orlando, in close proximity to the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral. The day the crew filmed the first mission control scene, a NASA advisor sat in on a separate rehearsal with the director and the cast, pointing out which buttons to press and the correct terminology to use, going as far to help re-write lines in the script.

“It just made the whole thing feel so authentic,” says The Right Stuff co-producer Michael Hampton.

The actors playing the Mercury 7 astronauts—the group of military test pilots chosen to be part of the historic mission to put a man in space—had the opportunity to make a day trip to the Florida coast to participate in pilot training (without the actual flying part) during pre-production. They jumped into cockpits and spent time with specialists at Cape Canaveral. During that time shadowing real pilots, the actors who signed on to play larger-than-life American heroes were grounded and humbled by the experience.

“The biggest thing for me was seeing that massive, massive building where they built the rockets,” recalls actor James Lafferty, who plays astronaut Scott Carpenter. “There’s a majesty to it. It takes your breath away just seeing the size and the scope of it, just realizing how many people are in there at any given time, figuring out problems. The thing in that building goes to another planet. It goes into orbit, somewhere that we’ll never get to go.”

The pilot episode of the TV adaption of The Right Stuff sees the U.S. government task NASA to begin Project Mercury, with the goal of putting a man in space. Seven of the military’s best test pilots—Alan Shephard, John Glenn, Gordo Cooper, Scott Carpenter, Gus Grissom, Deke Slayton and Wally Schirra—are selected as part of the program and thrust into the public spotlight. At the crux of this adaptation is the rivalry between John Glenn (played by Patrick J. Adams) and Shepard (played by Jake McDorman) and their battle to be the first American in space (ultimately the Soviets did beat us there with Yuri Gagarin’s mission in 1961.)

Spending time at Cape Canaveral and inside the hectic mission control set transported the producers and actors to a time where it looked all but certain that the Soviet Union would beat the United States in a race to the stars. The pressure was mounting inside the government on the heels of Soviets developing an atomic bomb in 1953 and launching Sputnik in 1957. In the original novel, Wolfe writes that House Speaker John McCormack, who led the committee on Astronautics, felt the country faced “national extinction” if it failed to catch up to the Soviet space program: “He was genuinely convinced that the Soviets would send up space platforms from which they could drop nuclear bombs at will, like rocks from a highway overpass.”

That sense of urgency is prevalent in the first hour of Nat Geo’s The Right Stuff. But it’s not all that defines this adaptation. During an era on TV and in film where remakes and reboots are boundless, there’s a G force of pressure for the producers and actors behind this adaptation of The Right Stuff to not only do justice to not only an iconic book, but also an iconic feature movie in its own right.

Philip Kaufman’s 1983 feature film adaptation stumbled at the box office but was a critical darling, earning eight Oscar nominations. Its legacy has only grown over the years—particularly among pilots, many of whom were directly inspired to fly because of it—and was preserved by the Library of Congress in 2013.

For the producers of the TV series, the appeal of revisiting The Right Stuff was being able to flesh out the character development of these larger-than-life figures that are so richly detailed in Wolfe’s book. Published in 1979, The Right Stuff won the National Book Award for Nonfiction in 1980. It humanized the Mercury 7 astronauts by demystifying the hero complex that surrounded them, while providing a tense and nervy account of being a test pilot—from life in the skies to the complexity of family life at home. It’s on a very short list of the greatest nonfiction works about the space program.

“We’re going back to the book and not remaking the movie,” Hampton says. “We are sticking to the true story pretty intact. It’s what we’ve always wanted to do, it’s what Nat Geo does better than anyone, and frankly you can’t make this stuff up.”

A show about smart men and women talking fast, intensely focused on science and technology that could change the future: Sound familiar? The producers found a perfect fit in showrunner Mark Lafferty, whose writing credits include period pieces and criminally underrated series Manhattan, about the creation of the atomic bomb, ‘80s and ‘90s computer boom drama Halt and Catch Fire, and another Nat Geo hit in Genius. Though Lafferty wasn’t available for interviews the day we were on set, the cast paraphrases his words about the media frenzy around the Mercury 7 crew being America’s “first reality show.”

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“They were cowboys, but they also all of a sudden became the most famous people, almost on the planet,” says Colin O’Donoghue, who plays astronaut Gordon “Gordo” Cooper.

“There’s such a difference now surrounding celebrities than there was back then,” says Elosie Mumford, who plays Trudy Cooper, Gordo’s ex-wife. “Back then, there was the ability to have an actual private life. You’re dealing with people who don’t have perfect marriages, who don’t have the sort of all-American ideal that’s being presented; and where you see the cracks of that, and they’re desperately trying to hold onto their privacy as they become massively, massively famous.”

When Den of Geek visited the set in October, the significance of shooting during the 50th anniversary of the moon landing was a recurring point of pride for the cast. And with the Nat Geo production now moving to Disney+, they’re hopeful the The Right Stuff will land with a new generation, and it may be coming at the opportune time.

The retelling of the story of Mercury 7 takes on new resonance during a year in which SpaceX landed a reusable rocket in a giant leap towards Mars reigniting interest in space exploration; a year where scientific innovation is essential to ending the COVID-19 pandemic and curbing climate change; and the country faces an emotionally-charged political environment as it barrels toward an all-important election. The series won’t be a remedy for all our present ills, but it could serve as a reminder about what Americans can accomplish when they come together for a common goal.

“It harkens back to a time when America was a unified force, trying to get things done,” says Eric Ladin, who plays NASA official Chris Kraft Jr. “The pride that the country took in this space race is something that I think is really admirable. This was the last time that we had something bring us together as a country.”

Ladin, in researching the role, spoke to people who fondly recall the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo missions and claim “they felt more proud to be an American that day than they ever had” when they saw the U.S. put men in space.

“One man I talked to, he was a veteran, he said, ‘I felt as proud to be an American that day as when I was on the beach in Normandy.’ And so I just think that it’s a really powerful thing that we were accomplishing then. And it didn’t matter who you were, what walk of life you were in, that was something you can get behind.”

The post The Right Stuff: What To Expect From The Disney+ Adaptation appeared first on Den of Geek.

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chcrliehunnam · 7 years ago

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oth for the tv series meme

my all-time ultimate fave character: I honestly believe this is a tie between Brooke Davis and Haley James. Because like, I adore both those girls with all of my heart. They both showed their strength, and their determination over things. And I just, love, love, love them.

a character I didn’t used to like but now do: chRIS KELLER. Okay, because he came in, and he was just a douche, and I didn’t appreciate the way he was budding into Nathan/Haley’s relationship. But over the course of the show, I honestly just fell in love with him. He was an ass, but I don’t know, I think that was just apart of his charm. Smartass that he is.

a character I used to like but now don’t: Owen Morello. I mean, I wouldn’t say that I hate him. But damn did the character disappoint me. And to be honest, I could probably add Millicent here as well. Because the moment these two slept together, it was all wrong, and I just --- no. But I am pretty bitter over Owen. And Millie went downhill around s7 or s8. Liked her in the beginning tho. She was adorable.

a character I’m indifferent about: Honestly? A tie between Mouth and Skillz. And this is simply because they never really gotta shine, you know? They had their scenes, but it just never seemed like they really gotta develop into their own standing characters. Made them easy to fade into the background.

a character who deserved better: Brooke Penelope Davis. Now, I’ll say that from s6 through s9, she got a little bit of a break with the whole Julian thing. I am glad that she found someone who loved her completely, and she had grown to love back. What I did not like about the Julian x Brooke ship was that for some reason, the writers felt it was important to have her fall in love with one of Peyton’s exes, because Peyton had fallen in love with hers. I’m just???? But other then that, this character just continued to have bad luck with quite a lot of things, and I just --- she’s a beautiful person, and she deserves everything.

a ship I’ve never been able to get into: Well, I don’t think this could count as like a ship, but consider how much of a focus it was for majority of the series, I think I’m going to say the Lucas/Peyton/Brooke love triangle. And the reason that I put this here is because I wasn’t someone who had a ship war over it? Like to me, I could’ve gone either way as far as who got Lucas, and who didn’t. Though, I will say that I do believe Brooke deserved better, and that it was always going to be Lucas and Peyton. But if by some off chance, it hadn’t been, then I wouldn’t have been bothered by it.

a ship I’ve never been able to get over: Owen and Brooke. Oh my god, I was so in love with the idea of these two when he was first introduced, but come the end of the whole thing, he was a complete and total douchebag. And IT MADE ME SO MAD CAUSE THE POTENTIAL.

a cute, low-key ship: Karen and Keith. I loved, loved, LOVED Karen and Keith. And it broke my heart when Keith died, and then Karen found out she was pregnant. And I was just ;--;

an unpopular ship but I still enjoyed it: Jake and Peyton. I adored Jake, adored him. He was a young teenage father, who would do anything for his child. And he would’ve done anything for Peyton too. I did like them, but during their relationship, I knew Peyton would go towards Lucas again. And Idk, I feel like that left Jake deserving better by default.

a ship that was totally wrong and never should have happened: Can I put Millie x Owen here? I mean, do they really count as a ship? Probably not, but do I care? Nope, because wrong WRONG, ALL FUCKING WRONG. Actually, while I feel that wholeheartedly. I’m going to put Dan and Rachel here. Because w.t.f was that. No, who the hell thought of putting Dan and Rachel together? THAT WAS ALL FUCKING WRONG TOO.

my favourite storyline/moment: Can I say the Naley plotline? Because while it might not be all that realistic to some, or just incredibly rare, I loved their whole story? I loved the fact that they were so freaking strong?? Because in TV, you don’t really see that core couple. You know the couple who hasn’t broken up like thirty times, even through it’s clear they belong together, but for sake of drama, gotta keep shitting on them, until it’s toxic as fuck, and then force the audience to believe they’re made for each other shit. Like, no, Naley, yes, had their hardships, but they were literally made for each other. Like that’s fucking soul mates right there, and I love it. I love that they were teenagers who had no real idea what was going to happen, but got married anyways. I love that they defined the odds and made it work. I just really love the strength in this couple, and in their general storyline.

a storyline that never should have been written: THE NANNY CARRIE PLOT. And now I’m not talking about the first half of her plot when she moves in, and falls for Nathan, and ends up in the shower with him. And nearly causes my babies to divorce. Not that plot. I felt like that was realistic enough. Shit like that does happen. I’m talking about the Nanny Carrie coming back plot. Where she kidnaps Dan or some crap, and chases Haley and Jamie through a corn field, and I believe it was Deb who came to their rescue? Before Dan shot the crazy nanny? He shot her right? I think. Anyways, no. Just no.

my first thoughts on the show: I started this show halfway into season five. I saw a premiere one night, and thought, huh, why not give it a watch. It looks interesting. And oh my god, that was the beginning of the end for the longest damn time.

my thoughts now: GOOD LOVING GOD WAS I OBSESSED WITH THIS SHOW. I was so obsessed that I did things I don’t want to write down, because I feel like a complete idiot now for them. But lets just say, I wish I knew Fanfiction existed at this time. I haven’t watched passed s7, and to be honest, I don’t have much interest to anymore? I know majority of what happened, and how it happens, but other than that, it’s eh. And I think a lot of that has to do with how much it changed. Sadly.

#answered #oth #aeirinius

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aussie-hermit · 7 years ago

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Today I went and saw Universal's The Mummy, the first in a modern reboot of the Universal Monsters Series, with Tom Cruise, Sofia Boutella, Russell Crowe and Annabelle Wallis.

When I first heard they were doing a modern take of the mummy I was ecstatic, and then I heard they were casting Tom Cruise as the lead and I was less so.

I was worried they were going to try and remake the 1999 one (you know with Brendan Fraser) and they were going to botch it in an attempt for money grabbing. The very first mummy film - the 1932 black and white film with Boris Karloff - and the 1999 adventure film are the ones I treasure very deeply and you can’t meddle or try to rewrite these. No doubt their attempt to reboot the classics such as The Mummy, Frankenstein and other classics of the horror genre can only end in failure.

However, this film was solid - it has flaws don't get me wrong and there could have been things that could have been better written or done better but as the first rebooted classic monster film it was good.

I'll touch on what I liked and what I thought makes this film worth watching and what I didn't like before suggesting what I think might have made it even better.

And please be warned, SPOILERS BELOW

What I liked:

- They didn't mess with the classic Imhotep story but built from it The story of Imhotep's love for Anck-su-Namun is the driving force of the 1932 and the 1999 Mummy stories, so you can’t mess with this story. I was worried they would try to change it but instead they borrowed the concept of it which I loved. Ahmanet basically sells her soul to the Egyptian god Set for power after her half brother is born, essentially removing her as heir to the throne. She then kills her father, his son and mother. As she is about to bring Set into the world through a human sacrifice she is mummified alive and buried in a secret tomb - and seriously they had plenty of warning signs around that tomb that screamed 'DO NOT LET HER OUT!'. But of course when she is released, she has chosen Nick (Tom Cruise) as her 'Chosen One' who will be sacrificed to bring Set into the world and sets out on the war path to accomplish this. So it follows the same basic plot of the original mummy story but isn't rewriting it.

- They did some research I was ecstatic when I found out Ahmanet was the mummy, she's actually a deity in the Egyptian mythology so the fact they looked into the mythology for inspiration of who this mummy could be made me happy. And also there is a Crusader tomb - based off an actual crusade into Egypt in the 1100's I believe - which plays an important role in the story, especially since they stole and hid something crucial to the story.

And Set was not the god of death but of chaos and violence - this annoyed me but in the grand scheme of things....I will moderately ignore this.

- Sofia Boutella as Ahmanet

Sofia Boutella! She was my main motivation to see this movie, and she did not let down! She was fantastic as Ahmanet. She was a beautiful, terrifying and powerful villain and I loved her!

- The effects The effects of the mummies was top notch, they looked like a real desiccated corpses and their movements were insanely creepy. This really brought an element of horror.

- Russell Crowe as Henry Jekyll Bit iffy about Russell's role in the film but he was perfect as Jekyll! He's sort of rounding up all these 'evil' things to study, contain and destroy them and he keeps medicating himself to stop him from turning into Mr Hyde, whom he also plays as really well. I'd really like a prequel that explores how he came into the position he's in, in this film and how he developed a medicine to keep his alter ego at bay.

- His dead mate comes back to haunt This reminded me of An American Werewolf in London and I wouldn't be surprised if that's where they got inspiration for it. So Nick's friend Chris (Jake Johnson from New Girl) gets bitten by a big ass spider in the tomb, which no one even considers looking at, and becomes a zombie who Nick ultimately kills. Cue post plane crash, and he begins to haunt Nick, sometimes just being a smart ass but more or less to help. He does get revived at the end but I wished they had more scenes of Chris being a little smart ass that only Nick could hear.

- The Easter Eggs Now when I noticed these I was bouncing in my seat, in this place where they're keeping all these 'evil' things you see a skull with vampire teeth and I noticed a preserved hand of the Creature from the Black Lagoon. I need films of this ASAP. Also when Jenny is trying to save Nick from Hyde she hits the guard with a gold book, specifically the Book of Amun-Ra from the 1999 film. This means that the 1999 story exists within this universe and makes me monumentally happy. In the next installment I demand a cameo of Brendan Fraser as an old and tired Rick O'Connell. What I didn't like:

- Flat main characters Tom Cruise's character didn't have enough depth for me and I found him quite boring. He was a marine who looted stuff from sites he shouldn't have been at and sold them on the black market - that's pretty much his entire background I got. I didn't feel any sympathy for his character or that he had anything driving him. I liked Wallis' character Jenny more than Cruise's, she slapped Nick and didn't put up with any of his shit and she caught onto the fact that by removing Ahmanet's sarcophagus from the tomb was a terrible idea first. She was the only smart one! However this was all overshadowed by the fact that Jenny was only used as a plot device - he stole her map after a one night stand which led them to the tomb, she's the reason he won't join Ahmanet and when she's killed he only then willingly becomes a sacrifice to bring her back. If they had moved beyond this I think her character would have been stronger.

What I would improve:

This might annoy some people but I think if they had made either Nick or Jenny of Egyptian descent it would have given the characters and the story more depth.

Hear me out.

If Jenny was a Egyptian archaeologist she is then given a degree of motivation to protect historical and cultural artifacts of her ancestry. Also gives more tension between Jenny and Nick - he steals artifacts of significance to sell on the black market, not really any different than the British taking artifacts from Egypt. Bonus is if she's still not used as a plot device.

If Nick had Egyptian ancestry but was removed from the culture - say his mother is Egyptian but his father is American and/or raised in America where he is surrounded by modern American culture - would be interesting. Like maybe his grandmother told him stories and such and is his only real connection to Egypt but he still becomes a thief and sells artifacts on the black market. Throws it in Jenny's face that white people did it for years so she can stop acting high and mighty, or something similar.

Just by adding Egyptian ancestry maintains a connection to the Egyptian culture, not just through the mummy. Pretty much after the opening where they explain Ahmanet and leave the tomb having found her, I found a lack of connection to the Egyptian culture.

This is where the 1999 film did better, even though the main cast was primarily Caucasian they had significant connections to Egypt and the culture.

It also adds in tension outside the romantic option which in this film I felt was unnecessary, maybe if they had handled it differently I'd be fine with it.

These are just my opinions and thoughts, you can agree, disagree or whatever.

Overall it was a solid film, with some flaws and things that could have been done better but still entertaining and a good start for a reboot of the Universal Monsters.

I give it 6.5/7 out of 10

#the mummy #the mummy 2017 #copperdragon #my review #movie review #review

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davidcarterr · 6 years ago

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Auteurs: Jacob Harris

Jacob Harris and Max Palmer. Photo by Alex Pires

The subject for the second in this Auteurs series was a no-brainer.

There are few filmmakers in skateboarding, (let alone UK-based ones) whose output has reached a similar sized audience whilst simultaneously receiving almost universal praise from all quarters than that of Jacob ‘Jake’ Harris.

From his early days as a very driven kid making videos with a group of his friends; through to his forays into the early era of Internet content with Blueprint; to his more recent position as the man behind the lens on classics like ‘Eleventh Hour’, Isle skateboard’s ‘Vase’ and most recently, the ‘Atlantic Drift’ series for Thrasher – Jake’s output has stayed true to the vision laid out in his first full-length, mixing a sense of place and atmosphere with banging and dynamically captured skateboarding.

Ask any skate filmer of note about their influences and chances are Jake’s name will come up at some point. Pointing a camera at people doing kickflips is one thing, creating a body of work that surrounds that simple feat with a sense of context that adds depth and character to the basic act of skateboarding is an entirely different level of achievement.

The fact that you can watch 20 seconds of any video that Jake has produced and know immediately that it’s him behind the lens says everything really. As ineffable as it may be, he has an instantly recognizable eye for spots, for angles and perhaps most uniquely, for the visual ephemera that surrounds the act of skateboarding and it is that perspective, (along with a crazy work ethic) that makes his output some of the most memorable in today’s over saturated skate video landscape.

So, without further ado, here’s the man himself breaking down some of his own back-story and giving a little insight into the process involved in doing what he does. Thanks for your time Jake!

Your route to where you are today is quite a traditional one in so far as you began by making full-length videos based around your friends that followed the convention of individual sections and were released in a physical format that predates the current distribution option offered by the Internet. Was ‘Square One’ your first project?

Strictly speaking no, as I’d been making videos that I put on like video CDs since I was like 12 on Handycams. I suppose Square One was the first project that was sold – if that’s an appropriate marker?

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That came out on DVD in 2009, at a point when the cultural landscape of skateboarding was very different, and also presumably whilst you were still at school – where did the impetus to make that video come from?

(Laughing), yeah I remember you interviewed me about it for Sidewalk at the time: I’m not entirely sure anymore what the initial impetus was to be honest.

I was so focused and serious about making things, anything, from a really young age and I think being completely obsessed with skateboarding, it was something I was always going to do.

Videos very much were the culture for me, and I really wanted to participate in that culture because I loved it and this was what excited me. Besides that, my friends were a group of very driven kids, whether that was to be sponsored or just to skate like people did in videos I don’t know, but as a group of kids we were very driven by wanting to do hard things and be recognised. I’m not sure where that comes from really.

Videos very much were the culture for me, and I really wanted to participate in that culture because I loved it and this was what excited me

That’s like Dan Clarke, Tom Knox and whoever else was in that video – from all different sides of London – very little in common but very much united at the time by wanting to make skate videos. But kids did just make full-length videos then, (they still do now I know but it was a normal thing back then): there were loads of crews around doing it.

I bought my first proper camera from Morph and definitely looked up to him and his crew when we were younger – they were a bit older and tougher and had all had sex when they were like 14 and smoked loads of weed and we were just a lot less cool basically.

You’ve said in interviews before that it was Blueprint’s ‘Lost and Found’ that first gave you an insight into what a skate video could (and by extension maybe ‘should’) be. What was it about that video that inspired you?

I think basically just seeing that a skateboard video could have a real artistic vision was a bit of a revelation to me. It seemed to connect skateboarding much more to life and moods that existed around it, rather than just keeping skating suspended in its own space.

I think that adage of ‘the best way of talking about skating is to not talk about skating’ applies pretty well in this context – like the best way of celebrating skating in a video is by showing things that aren’t skating and LAF was the first place I saw that.

The experience of skateboarding in a city is so varied and complex, in the situations and feelings that it invites, that it’s able to support and nourish so much imagery etc that may seem incidental, but is, to a lot of people, central to the act. LAF was the first place that I saw evidence of this.

Dan Magee really helped to step up the game as far as UK skate videos went – he was one of the first people to invest in ‘proper’ equipment (at a time when the industry-standard VX1000 was still very expensive), worked with production values similar to those of US-based vids and very deliberately created a sense of place and atmosphere that resonated with British skateboarding. Would you say he’s one of the most important skate video makers in terms of both your own outlook and British skate culture more generally?

For my approach he is definitely the most important. Lev (Tanju) did something probably equally as important with Palace, but it was maybe subverting something that Magee established, so without the one it’s hard to know what would have happened.

But more widely speaking, I have no idea what even is British skate culture?

Palace has definitely had a bigger cultural impact than anything else British skateboarding has ever produced – there’s no way of measuring that I know, but I’m pretty certain that it’s a fact. Strictly within skateboarding though, I have no idea how to think about it really, but they definitely did smash a lot of orthodoxies, thank god they did and they did it so well and haven’t lost their edge.

Which other UK filmers and editors informed your own approach as you developed and why?

I would say Chris Massey, just because Portraits is so good. Definitely nicked some ideas from Holdtight when I was younger too, he was such a force back then.

What about globally? I know you are a big fan of Josh Stewart’s output – what is it about his videos that you like? Anyone else?

I think a similar thing to Magee’s videos with Josh’s stuff really. Was well into Pontus Alv’s earlier stuff when I was a kid. These days the things I like would probably be pretty unsurprising.

So after making Square One, you did some work for Blueprint around the early days of the development of Internet-content. You filmed both the Tom Knox Welcome to Blueprint clip and the Smithy gets his pro board back one – how did that work? You were out collecting the footage and then you’d give it to Dan who would edit it into the finished project?

It was sort of like that. I did a lot of the editing myself and then Dan would just stick a wack ramp slow-mo on and credit himself, (laughs).

Nah not quite actually, he did the graphics too.

I remember he paid me something like £200 at one point and I felt so grateful, I was like 19 maybe. Now I see how exploitative it was!

I suppose it got me somewhere or something, though…skateboarding is so weird like that. At the time it would have been like doing a free internship for something that I could never really have gotten paid for, obviously it’s different now.

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It was kind of inevitable even at that point that the simplicity of the Internet distribution model would eventually take over – did you feel any differently about what you were making because you knew they were destined for the Internet, than when you knew you were creating something that would physically exist?

No I didn’t really care to be honest. I think I always just wanted to do things well and didn’t pay much thought to the destination.

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Following this era, you began work on what would ultimately become ‘Eleventh Hour’ which was released to global acclaim in 2013. You publically said at the time that it was going to be the last full-length video that you’d make but you then went onto make Vase only two years later – what happened?

Hmm I don’t know really. I was always saying this and I still do every so often.

I think I always felt pressure to do something ‘proper’ for work, you know – something socially justifiable or if not at least financially rewarding.

I definitely have some complexes about this that I need to get over still.

During the period of making Eleventh Hour and Vase there weren’t really many perks to my life, I had no money and was mostly stuck in London.

These days I’m constantly travelling and I’m paid better and that makes it a lot easier to appreciate, but I didn’t foresee that. In Britain it’s tough too, it’s such a judgmental place and the class system is so pernicious in its reverberations, it’s hard not to feel heat from that. In the States it’s the simplest equation for peoples’ brains – “you do what you like that’s great” – but here I have to always reassure myself by feeding myself little sentences like, ‘I travel almost exclusively with my friends and barely ever have anybody to answer to and I like doing what I do’.

I travel almost exclusively with my friends and barely ever have anybody to answer to and I like doing what I do

Eleventh Hour was received really well – the skaters in it definitely benefitted as much as your own reputation as a video-maker did – and it came out shortly after the sad dissolution of the UK institution that was Blueprint. Did it feel in any way like a passing of the baton from Magee to you – or is that purely hindsight speaking?

I mean Magee always supported me and helped me out, very specifically with getting that DVD (Eleventh Hour) made and distributed. I think he saw it that way a bit, and it does make sense when said that way. But he hasn’t bowed out so I think it’s a bit soon to talk about passing any batons!

That video certainly cemented your aesthetic – lots of rough, brick spots dotted throughout the estates of London which, at the time at least, were not really seen in other UK videos, an emphasis on follow filming and a cast of your friends who still regularly appear in your output to this day. Was there an overarching plan to the feel and atmosphere of Eleventh Hour?

I have no idea really. I remember in my head the video was really about Luka Pinto and Tom Knox so I wanted to have them bookend it. Beyond that, I don’t think there was really a plan besides – ‘use some 16mm’.

Actually no I remember: I actually had a bit of a crisis when it came to editing it because I hadn’t developed much of a vision. I think I actually got Toddy to come round to my house and watch some stuff and he was really supportive, which was cool. I had no confidence. I’d forgotten about that, thanks Toddy!

I’m actually having trouble remembering whether that did happen or not, but I think it did. I was such a pile at that point in time it’s hard to know. I’ll ask him.

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Your more recent work, (particularly Atlantic Drift which we’ll come to later) seems, at least to me, to really focus on atmosphere and a sense of place – does that kind of the ‘location is the narrative’ aspect find its genesis in your earlier videos like Eleventh Hour, do you think?

My memory is so poor but I feel like my thought process is very different now. I’m sure it all contributed. I thought a lot about how spots looked in that video but I care a lot less about that now.

Following that video and its award-winning reception, you got involved in making Vase, the first Isle Skateboards video and a project really central to the success of that brand. Was that your first foray into film making with a brand-led objective, (aside from the Blueprint clips we mentioned)?

I did a Big Push for Nike SB before that but I really blew it on that one. Aside from that, yeah pretty much. Maybe a Blueprint Kingpin thing too.

Was there any extra pressure on you because you knew the expectations for the brand, the connection with Blueprint’s legacy and the fairly quick turn around required? A first video, particularly for a new brand like Isle, can really be a make or break situation I guess…

Actually didn’t feel much pressure because I wanted to be thorough for myself anyway. Besides, I had a bit of a process going and had gained some confidence from Eleventh Hour. Nick (Jensen) and I worked pretty closely playing with ideas on that video so that probably took a lot of pressure off and made it quite fun.

Presumably, the fact that most of the team were close friends who you’d worked alongside before made it less stressful though, right?

Yeah that video wasn’t stressful at all. I was really happy to be doing it.

What about in terms of aesthetics or sense of place – context-wise Vase featured a lot of places that are closely tied into your own film making practice, rather than relying on trips abroad to gather footage. Do you prefer that method?

That was mainly because trips cost money and the budget was tiny. These days I much prefer doing things on trips away. London doesn’t give me much these days – I’ve been making videos here for like 10 years and I just haven’t got any fresh takes for it. I like being in less familiar places because all the absurdities and strangeness of the places reveal themselves so much more easily because I’m looking more, and places just are different so there’s much more to play with.

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So after Vase was released – how long was it before you were approached to make content for Thrasher?

It was a few months. I got Tom’s part put on the Thrasher site and the response was so large and Tony was so into it that he just messaged me. I had a chat with him on the phone and that was that really.

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At this point you’d already said publicly a couple of times that you wanted to move away from traditional skate video making and work on shooting narrative fiction – what made you decide to embark on a serialized project like Atlantic Drift which potentially could go on forever?

I realised I’d found myself in a position to actually enjoy some of the fruits of my effort. Going out and filming skateboarding in London every day is not a job I want or ever have wanted, but being able to be away all the time makes the whole thing make sense.

What kind of brief was there for the project? Did you come to Thrasher with a fully formed idea?

Tony (Vitello) was super patient with it. He wanted it to be based around Tom and I, like making a part and putting out things regularly with a crew. Then I just did some thinking and, partly from a trip I did with Henry Kingsford to Nicaragua where I got to be quite playful, I got some ideas – we were just going to start with 6 episodes in a year and see if it worked out.

Atlantic Drift is episodic and has a sense of narrative continuity both in terms of the sense of place forming part of the story so to speak, along with the repeated appearance of a core crew of your friends exploring various different places and certain thematic consistencies – do you approach each one as a continuation of that established idea? Or does each one feel like a separate endeavour?

It’s definitely a continuation. It’s evolving as it goes though I hope. To tell the truth, on these trips I have a lot to do – I book everything and plan the day and film everything so I don’t have too much time to think, so it has to be quite instinctive. A feeling tends to emanate from the vibe of the trip for me – peoples’ interactions and just what a specific place does to your brain. The editing is where I have the most place to play I think.

On the subject on continuity, the music and the non-skate visuals are part of the narrative too I guess – something that a series needs, to stop it feeling like a vaguely connected selection of clips. What’s the back-story on the jellyfish footage? Where did you film it originally?

I don’t really know – I just had an image in my head of jellyfish swimming slowly and some feeling that we’d been drifting through our 20’s quite heavily. My girlfriend at the time made ambient music and I was hearing a lot of it and I guess it came from that. I shot the jellyfish in the Horniman museum aquarium in South London that I took my kid brother and sister to one day.

That visual marker worked out well in another way too in the sense of giving an identity to the range of clothing that dropped a little later – again continuity seems to be key here in order to rise above the median level of Internet content.

I think that that’s probably true. I think people like a strong aesthetic really.

Music and sound (or the lack of) are central to all your work but with Atlantic Drift you seem to have really taken this in a new direction – there are a lots of cuts between music, cuts to silence, switches to ambient sound – is this an area that you’ve enjoyed experimenting with? It certainly adds a sense of atmosphere often missing from the more traditional ‘timeline with tricks in ascending order of difficulty set to music’ approach.

Yeah I enjoy it so much. It’s funny because it’s really the basics of making any other sort of video but was largely absent from skate videos. I’m not sure why it was, but it’s still such a young culture I guess.

Another aspect of the aesthetic continuity you manage to create with these is tied into your repeated use of two different camera formats: the VX1 and 16mm. Is this a conscious decision based on achieving a specific feel with colour and tones etc? Or do you just enjoy using those 2 types of camera?

Well I find it’s fun to play with the documentary/cinematic opposition.

The VX1 is a sort of documentary camera and lends a certain sort of reality or veracity to footage, which is perfect. Then to use 16mm is so dramatic, so putting them next to each other creates this space between reporting and dramatising that I find fun because skate videos really are somewhere between that.

I think it can look pretty funny. In skateboarding we’re spending a lot of time mythologising what is actually probably the most trivial part of the act of skateboarding – the tricks, but also Tom eating tagliatelle in a restaurant in France is extremely trivial – it’s somewhere between these things that the actual thing that’s interesting is happening, though I don’t know what it is. Neither could exist alone and be very interesting, but somewhere in between is the appeal of skating.

VX fetishism aside – can you see a point where you’ll have to switch to a different camera format for the skating, purely because of the age and reliability issues of using that 20+ year old piece of Sony tech?

I guess so yeah, although I just bought a new one from you! Boredom will change it first, I’m sick of looking at this kind of image now

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The first 2 Atlantic Drifts were filmed on familiar territory in London – was this always the plan in tune with the concept: to kind of start off at ‘home’ and then travel with the same crew/agenda and transplant that into a different context?

I think we needed to establish our roots in the context of the series before it made sense for us to be off to other places, so yeah I think that was the plan.

The St Paul’s episode really spoke to people I think – particularly as you deliberately juxtaposed the static use of that space by tourists etc, against the dynamic use of it by the crew. How long did you actually spend filming that one and were you surprised by the reception it received, given that it was all filmed in one space?

That one was Tom’s idea. It wasn’t that long, maybe a couple of months of going there a lot, but I can tell you it was no fun. That place sucks. We’d see the same people eating lunch there day in day out and they hated us. We were ruining their quiet. Halfway through I was regretting it so badly, I felt so guilty making people come there repeatedly.

I have no real way of measuring the reception so I have nothing of any value to say about that I don’t think, but people seem to like plaza edits as a thing so it doesn’t seem so surprising if that’s true.

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Moving forwards after the first two – Atlantic Drift slowly made its way through France and to the States, stopping in New York, SF, and Vegas before ending up in Hawaii, which is about as far removed from the crusty estates and back streets of London as possible. Despite this, the aesthetic and atmosphere of each one remained continuous – how do you go about approaching this? I guess the repeated cuts to street scenes, familiar shots of cafes, shops etc create a narrative thread regardless of where you are really, right?

Just trying to shoot 16mm in a candid way always has a strange effect I think, if people look into the lens when they weren’t expecting to, you get something very odd from them, and to make this look dramatic makes me laugh a lot.

I think it comes down to that. I just try to find something off-key wherever I am. I’m a fairly happy person but I feel that most human places have a baseline of sadness and absurdity humming away – sometimes it’s very immediate and sometimes it’s more hidden but it’s there always, and everybody knows it’s there. We do such a positive and fun thing over the top of it and I like this a lot.

Mike Arnold and Jacob. Photo by Casper Brooker

From your own perspective as a filmmaker who has to some extent been defined by the context that you film within, (namely London), was there any conflict with going to somewhere like Las Vegas that’s so different architecturally?

Places are all very different but also the same, right? A lot of it is what you carry around in your head. If you’re happy in London it feels very much the same as being happy in Las Vegas, or at least to me. I feel the same goes for making a video. There’s a lot you can control, and if an aspect of a place doesn’t seem immediately complementary to an aesthetic then even better, it works in counterpoint or undercuts a vibe in a potentially interesting way if the viewer can feel some intentionality there.

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Where do you source the music? Are the musicians friends of yours?

I’ve had some music made by friends but mostly not. My ex-girlfriend and I made the intro song. I’ve just updated it though to purge my soul, (laughing).

I had a quick view count on Thrasher’s YouTube and just on there, all 8 episodes are up in the range of over a million views easily. If you factor Thrasher’s own player in too then we must be talking multiples of millions in terms of views – what’s your take on that?

I think when it gets over a certain number it becomes too hard to understand so I’ve never really thought about it other than as a number. You saying that now though does make me feel quite good about it!

I don’t know if it should though because obviously the view count is largely due to the platform – and doing something popular doesn’t mean you’re doing something good, but it’s definitely more gratifying! The more gratifying thing is finding out somebody that you respect is into it, that’s really cool.

It must have really helped the skaters out too – in terms of their profile and their positions as regards their value to sponsors – have you seen your friends benefit from this aspect of it?

Yeah definitely, Tom supports a family with 2 daughters, Mike, Casper and Ky are on big projects and everybody is doing alright. This feels great because we all benefit together and it energises everyone and we’re all so close.

Your most recent release through Thrasher was the first Atlantic Drift Catfish clip, which takes you back to London and back to your best friend Tom Knox in his home terrain. Are we to assume that the Atlantic Drift model that preceded this has come to an end?

Ah no, basically Catfish is a way of just putting stuff out there when we want. Just another outlet and a bit of a different format…

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You’re a really good skater yourself Jake and it’s no secret that filming is basically Kryptonite to personal skateboarding. Has filming so much had a negative effect on your own skateboarding?

I had knee problems for a bit but they seem to have gone mostly. Actually drinking has had the largest effect, if I don’t drink for a few days I can have so much fun skating, but it doesn’t happen as often as I’d like it to.

Who else is making skate video content at the moment that you like/enjoy? What is it about what they make that you like?

It’s such a cliché but I don’t watch that much stuff, but I like a lot of the stuff that’s generally well liked – I do like Strobeck’s stuff, I like Johnnie Wilson’s stuff and the Hockey videos. 917 things are great too. Backing Yardsale very hard too, those boys make me stoked. These things just have an energy to them and do something different without fawning to established formats, and make skateboarding look really good.

Is there anything else that you’d like to say?

To anybody that made it this far – well done but you really should have used your time way better.

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Interview by Ben Powell

The post Auteurs: Jacob Harris appeared first on Slam City Skates Blog.

Auteurs: Jacob Harris published first on https://medium.com/@LaderaSkateboar

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