#so funny i was supposed to post in bulk some of the videos i made hehe

[livexdolan]

A/n: Tumblr accidentally posted this when I went to save it. In conclusion: I hate Tumblr. Here’s your concept boo sorry about the confusion :))

“Honey, I’m home!” You call out into the house, jokingly.

Shutting the door behind you, you immediately hear the loud sounds of people in the den. Smiling, you set your bag on the table and walk to the open doorway. Grayson, Ethan, Kris, and Larri are all sprawled on the couch, playing the game you recognize as Call of Duty. Grayson’s sitting at the edge of his cushion, obviously too into the game to realize you are watching him. Larri and Ethan are not as into the game and when Kris smiles at you from her spot next to Ethan and says, “Y/n! You made it!” The two give you a smile.

“Larri! You’re supposed to be covering my 2! Bro!” Grayson groans and you laugh, finally catching his attention. Grayson glances over to the doorway, his ears perking up under his headset at the sound of your giggle. You look like an angel to him, leaning against the doorway in jean shorts and a cropped tank top. The light from the windows and lights outlining your body beautifully.

Of course, you’re just his friend, so he can’t tell you that but he wants to. Meeting Grayson and Ethan through Kristina, you never expected to fall for the younger, loud, and boisterous twin, and yet, here you are, “Y/n! Hey,” Grayson tries to sound casual but you smile at the pitch in his voice.

You know Grayson likes you, it’s pretty obvious. At first, you found it sweet and kind of funny but now that you like him back- every time you’re around him you blush more and laugh more and it’s just- more. All of your friends know you like each other but you can’t help but feel slightly insecure- being two years older than Grayson is not your ideal scenario. You’re also nowhere near as skinny or toned as the other girls Grayson has dated. Being 5’8 and a little bit curvier than most girls in LA- you’re used to being kind of- pushed aside.

However, when you’re with Grayson, you feel like you can take on the world. You're forceful front, with Grayson by your side, you are unstoppable. Grayson, Kristina, and Ethan were the reason you finally went for your dream of opening your own small business online. Grayson even stayed up with you way too late many nights helping with your website, buying products in bulk and getting the best prices, even making you cup after cup of coffee so you wouldn’t fall asleep. Some nights, he would even carry you to his room, tucking you into the warm comforter after he found you passed out at the island counter.

A few months later, you had gained thousands of followers, were working on multiple collabs with different influencers (including Wakeheart), and being able to afford to rent your own apartment, getting out of your three-bedroom apartment with four other people. You owed everything to the twins and your best friend.

“Come sit next to me, yeah?” Grayson’s voice broke you from your memories and you nod, going to sit next to him on the floral couch, “You know how to play?” You shake your head, looking up at him, biting your lip.

“No, I was never really interested in video games,” You reply and he smiles, knowing you're more of a go skateboarding and surfing kind of girl.

“Well, today’s your lucky day. I’m gonna teach you how to play,” He smirks down at you, the butterflies in your stomach wake up, swarming around your belly.

“Grayson! With your rat-ass lookin’ self! We’re losing lover boy!” Larri’s shriek pulls the two of you out of your little staring contest and you both blush.

“Sorry, sorry,” Grayson mumbles, moving his fingers nimbly on the controller, “Come here, Y/n//n, sit between my legs so I can show you what I’m doing,” He doesn’t even look back at you from the screen.

You’re sure your entire face is the color of a tomato as he lifts his arms up, saying something to Ethan about checking out a house for weapons. You hesitantly slide between his legs, his legs widen further so you nestled against him. Bringing his arms back down, they’re now wrapped around you, the controller almost sitting in your lap. Your heart is racing so fast you can barely breathe, all you can see hear, feel, is Grayson. His warmth, his scent, his arms around you, his thighs on either side of yours, his breath behind your ear, and his chest pressed against your back.

He leans into you slightly, making you sit up straighter, “Relax,” his voice whispers into your ear, causing goosebumps and a chill down your spine.

Your body follows his command without you even realizing it, and you’re now pressed fully against him. You can feel his heart beating steadily against you and it bothers you that he can be so calm at this moment. He grabs your hands and shows you how to hold the controller, showing you what each button and knob does as the two of you watch the screen. It takes you a while to understand, seeing as you’re more interested in the feel of being cuddled up to him, but slowly-but-surely, you get it. By the time you start to really get into it, Larri has already left, and Ethan and Kris called it a night, leaving the two of you alone.

To your dismay, Grayson pulls his hands away, but your disappointment is replaced with a rush of blood going through you, as his hands land on your hips and squeeze slightly, “Try it on your own. You’re doing great,” he says, encouragingly.

Knowing he wouldn’t let you do it on your own if he didn’t truly believe you could you straighten up a little, cracking your knuckles before grabbing the controller. Grayson’s chuckle rumbles against your back. You elbow him jokingly, "Shut up."

You end up getting killed in about 20 minutes- but they were the most exciting 20 minutes of your life. You weren't even upset about losing, instead, turning to cheer with Grayson you give him a wide smile. His heart skips a beat, "Did you see that? I got not one-" you hold up your index finger, "not two," you put up your middle finger, "but three!" your ring finger goes up next, "Three headshots! I am amazing! Woo!" Grayson laughs, his whole body vibrating with excitement from your excitement.

That's when you both realize how close you are to each other. Your smiles falter slightly as the adrenaline rush you're on starts to fade. You notice the circles under his eye and can't help but feel bad about keeping him past his bedtime. Before you know what you're doing, you reach a hand up, brushing off an eyelash on his cheek. Grayson watches you carefully, praying to whoever's listening that he doesn't do anything stupid like sneeze or burp. You smile at him and his heart melts at the way your face glowing in the dim lights.

"Hey, Gray?" You whisper, afraid if you talk any louder you will burst the bubble that surrounds the two of you.

He smiles cutely, "Hey y/n/n?"

"I really like playing video games."

Grayson stares at you for a second, before bursting with laughter. You pull back, eyebrows high on your face, "What? What's so funny?" You pout, thinking he's laughing at you.

He sobers at the look on your face and sighs, "You're too cute. oh my God, I thought you were going to say something super serious. Jesus." He tucks a hair behind your ear, the grin never leaving his face.

Before you can say anything, your phone goes off. You scramble off him to get the phone. Your friend's name flashes on the screen and you text her that you'll call her later. You see how late it is and turn back to Grayson with a guilty look, "It's a lot later than I realized."

Grayson tries (and fails) to cover how disappointed he was, "Oh. You need to get home?"

"No, I was actually gonna ask if I could stay the night?" His heart stops for a moment, thinking you meant to stay with him but you, painfully, fix your mistake, "I mean like- in the guest bedroom, obviously," you laugh nervously and he does too.

The two of you part quickly after that, going to your respective bedrooms to calm down. As Grayson stares at the ceiling above his bed, he swears that tomorrow he's going to do everything in his power to get you in his bed.

A/n: I really went off-script with this- I'm sorry. I'd love to do a little continuation of the next day but I felt this was way too long. Sorry about all the technical issues too :)

[out-of-this-dimension]

Hypothetically Rewriting Assault’s Story + Some General Assault Opinions

There’s a game my husband and I like to play when we watch a movie, play a game, or read a book that has a story that we don’t really enjoy or we enjoy certain parts of but not others.  We look at things we’d keep and things we’d change and we build a story from there-- sort of like an AU but we don’t really go into the writing part, we just stick to theorizing and mapping a general story.

I decided to play that game with Star Fox.  Not because I think Star Fox has a bad story but because sometimes I think the stories could have been handled better.  Note: for the rewrite game, I only really look at story, even for video games, I don’t really look at gameplay mechanics, but I do understand those have a lot to do with story potential so I do take it in as a factor... I just don’t bother to “rewrite” the mechanics, if that makes any sense at all.  Some of my list today will include boss encounters but I wouldn’t necessarily say those are mechanic-related... more like “event-related”.

I’ve mused a bit in the past about rewriting Adventures and Command and I do have plans to do a mock up of an Adventures remake eventually.  However, today I was thinking about how I would go about handling an Assault re-write in particular.  Much like Command and Adventures, I don’t have any beef with the core story but I do think there’s a few things that could’ve been better about Assault’s storyline-- like they had good ideas rolling but they didn’t quite refine them.

Under the cut because SUPER long.

My basic feelings on Assault are pretty positive.  I think the game is generally just fun and I like that it feels like the natural progression from SF64.  I liked getting to see planets we haven’t seen since the N64 era in better graphics and I liked seeing Star Wolf return.  I also just thought the aparoids were neat enemies. 

Generally speaking, though, when it comes to Assault, I think it suffers from the thing it tries to push the most-- the story.  I think a lot of people get caught up in thinking the story is better than it is because it’s the first game since SF64 that really follows the same Star Fox vibe without retelling the Lylat Wars.  Don’t get me wrong, the overall plot is great but the execution and pacing are... wonky.  Certain characterizations also take a hit in some regards but no one really talks about that when Command exists. That’s something we’ll talk about later on with this post.

That being said, Assault really does have a lot good going for it.  An absolute banger of a soundtrack, some great dialogue, a neat story synopsis, the introduction of cool characters like Panther and Beltino (who existed but was always off-screen), and just good levels.  

So, here’s what I would add, I suppose, if I were to somehow have the ability to rewrite Assault.  Originally I had this in paragraph form, but I’ve made it into more of a list under topic segments with main points bolded for your viewing pleasure.  Some of these points might be considered nitpicky and while I do understand that yes, this is a game about space animals, I do hold the developers in high enough regard to make a game with a continuity that makes sense.

The Story Changes

- Reduce Pigma’s storyline in Assault.  This is the biggest one for me because a bulk of the plotline feels like a giant chase to just get at Pigma and it feels like it derails from the actual plot with the aparoids.  We only go to Sargasso because of Pigma.  We only go to Fichina and then back to Meteo again, because of Pigma.  That’s 3 levels in a 10 level game devoted to just tracking down Pigma and chasing him.  While it makes the build up to fighting Pigma kind of nice, I personally feel like the plot could be reduced to 2 levels.  If Assault overall was a longer game, I could see them making it 3 levels.  Overall, though, in its current state, I feel like the side plot overstays its welcome and the aparoids promptly get shoved to the side in favor of “Oh no, we gotta get to Pigma!” And I get the main motive here is to show how the aparoids affect people and because of the build up, it does a good job at showing how utterly terrifying the aparoids are.  But it’s still too long given the length of Assault’s story. The only alternative to this is make Assault longer, which... honestly, it should be.  

- Revise the scene with Tricky.  I’m obviously not well-versed in dinosaur biology but I’m pretty sure dinos didn’t grow that fast from what studying I HAVE done.  And why is he suddenly king now?  Did his parents die?  He seems not affected by this at all?  Like it’s a funny scene with him, Fox, and Krystal, but it’s odd if you really look at it.  Give us, as players, more context because I’m still not even sure what happened to make Tricky suddenly the leader and... big.  As a note, you’re gonna hear me gripe a lot about the Sauria level in this post.

- The Star Wolf + Peppy sacrifice is a low effort way to raise tension/stakes and then cop out.  Oldest trick in the book, imo, is to act like you’re going to kill off important characters only for them to be alive miraculously.  And let’s face it, as an audience we all know they aren’t going to kill those characters because it’s Nintendo and those characters are too beloved.  I would’ve forgiven them for only doing this with Peppy or Star Wolf, but when you tack them both together and throw in the fact they make it seem like you’re going to have to kill General Pepper too... yeah, it’s just a bit much of the same trope over and over again.  I wanted to put a note in here about how I’m fine with the Great Fox being “sacrificed” but overall, it needed to return to the series because of it’s icon status, but I think that’s more of a gripe at Command instead of Assault.

- Keep Pigma alive.  This will conflict with a point I have later on about the game consistently having characters cheat death for easy drama points but with Pigma, I would’ve kept him fully alive... but maybe with some physical damage from the aparoids.  I understand he’s semi-alive in Command and tbh I don’t know where I stand on that.  Why keep Pigma alive, you might ask?  I feel like his character has a lot more potential than being “just the greedy guy”.  Like he’s got good potential future villain material for future games and... if I’m honest?  I just don’t see Nintendo wanting to keep Pigma dead so why even bother killing him off?  They couldn’t even commit to him being dead in Command anyways so it seems very moot.

- Bring Bill and Katt back.  Assault is acts a bit like a big reunion of all of our SF64 favorites but our two favorite side characters are suspiciously missing.  Wouldn’t Bill be out on the front lines fighting against Andrew in the beginning?  Or maybe back in Katina?  And wouldn’t Katt inevitably show up in the midst of the invasion, maybe to pointedly check in on Falco?

- Bring Andrew back for the final fight. I think Andrew being defeated early into the game is fine overall but I think bringing him back in for a reunion final fight against the aparoids would serve to really solidify that it’s really everyone vs the invading aparoid force.  It would show that not only is Star Wolf willing to put aside their differences but so is basically everyone in the Lylat System in the name of survival.  Imagine the Venomians and Cornerians working together against an aparoid fleet, giving Star Fox and Star Wolf time to attack the queen?  I just think it’d be neat and it’d open up the potential for some fun banter mid-mission.  I do understand that quite a few people consider Andrew canonically dead after Assault but personally, I feel that his defeat left his fate questionable (I’m a staunch believer that unless there’s a body, they’re probably alive, especially for Nintendo games because, again, they never like to kill people off) so him returning in Command never really bothered me.  

- In general, reconsider some of the character portrayals.  Unfortunately, when a series has a different studio for each game, character portrayals will inevitably have inconsistencies.  While I give Namco a lot of credit for putting in oodles and oodles of detail into the game (particularly the levels), I think they failed in their portrayal of Fox, at the least, and Wolf is a considerable offender as well.  While it’s obvious that Fox in Adventures was effectively modeled off of Sabre even in terms of personality, Rareware was at least able to justify Fox’s newfound jaded attitude with the passing of many years and a distinct lack of steady income, resulting in the team being in disarray.  Assault’s Fox is a stark contrast to his cynical interpretation with seemingly no explanation other than maybe “Oh, I have more money and a gf, maybe I should behave myself��.  As if the sudden change in personality wasn’t random, Fox also just seems very blah, like a blank slate stereotypical shooter game protagonist dude with little to no emotion.  Wolf is less obvious but gets slated into a mentor-like role midway through the game and ends up in a respectful rivalry with Fox... which there’s nothing inherently wrong with that except for it happening abruptly (and, I mean, Peppy is right there).  But I take less issue with this and more of an issue with the fact that there’s an entire level establishing that Wolf now runs a crime den with effectively what seems to be an army and no one bats an eye at this.  He doesn’t even call on them to help with the aparoids.  Did they all die when the aparoids attacked Meteo?  Are they safe somewhere else?  Where do they go?  How was Sargasso able to operate without the CDF being on their doorstep with warrants for arrests?

- Don’t kill all the dinosaurs.  A bit of a dramatic statement but the ending screen that showed all the damage to Sauria really bothered me.  While I understand that the dinosaurs had less of a chance against the aparoids than a more technology-focused society like Corneria, I was a bit disappointed that the decision was made to just state that a lot of tribes had been wiped out.  I know this could easily be retconned in a future game and I feel like it should be.  “But why, Amalia?  Why are you disappointed by that?”  1) It’s a little too grimdark for my tastes.  2) The fact it all happened off-screen felt very hand-wavy.  And 3) It brings into question the entire point of Adventures.  Why did we bother to save this planet if it was going to be reduced to rubble and ash 1 year later?  Where were the Krazoa in all of this?  Why did they not make an appearance at all to try to stop the invasion with their alleged powers?  It just raises too many weird questions and I feel like Namco didn’t think it through too much.  Which I mean, sure.  Family, kiddo game.  I’m not asking for bigbrain plot and lore but I’m squinting at this bit because it does feel very contrary to the lore from the previous game.

- Make the aparoids more relevant.  As nice as it is to have a random bad guy from another galaxy, I feel like there was more that could be done with the aparoids in terms of their origins.  Tiny things, mind you, not huge revelations.  Off the top of my head, they could have been tied into Krystal’s backstory to help alleviate some of the complaints that she was too random to be added to the series’ main cast.  Alternatively, they could have been a product of Andross or even a weapon prototype from Corneria that fled the lab (I actually thought the game was leaning in that direction for a bit then just Nothing Happened).  I get that the vagueness of their origins leaves room for people to speculate and speculation is nice but... when you leave too many things unknown, it starts to feel less like giving fans room to interpret and more like just doing random things for the sake of it.  I think a lore tidbit here or there would work wonders for the aparoids instead of leaving them as just borg/zerg clones.

Level-Based Changes

- Add either Aparoid RedEye or Aparoid General Scales as a boss to Sauria.  Given that this level mysteriously lacks a boss, which is just weird compared to the other levels, I think that they had the opportunity to add something cool to go along with the cinematic feel they were going for with Assault.  Assault’s cutscenes do play in a movie-like fashion and it’s clear they’re trying to make the game as epic as possible.  It’s a shame they had so much fodder for a great boss here but they failed to go through with it.  Alternatively: Add a Krazoa-Aparoid fusion.  Why?  Because Star Fox is about cool epic sci-fi and that would be cool epic sci-fi incarnate.

- Add a boss to the Aparoid Homeworld Level, aka the penultimate level.  Another one I felt was personally weird that there was no “final defense system” to challenge the team.  Would be cool to do an aerial battle over the aparoid planet with some giant flying aparoid.

- Be kinder to Sauria.  The level had some good homages but overall was incredibly small and incredibly short.  It felt like a bone tossed to Adventures fans but was not entirely true to the setting built by Rareware.  I’m... not even sure where the Sauria level is supposed to take place?  I presume it’s Walled City but it doesn’t really have the same color scheme or aesthetic?  Also where is my revised Adventures music?  Why do all the other levels get it but Sauria doesn’t? 

- Put some of those funky items from the multiplayer into the main campaign.  I don’t know why some of these things, items especially, were omitted unless it was purely due to time constraints.  I remember having missile launchers and jetpacks in the multiplayer and was a bit sad that they were not in the main campaign.  Retuning the levels and adding those in would be a nice breath of fresh air for the more tedious on-foot missions.

- More levels.  Self-explanatory.  Still sad we didn’t get the Zoness or Titania levels in the single-player mode.  

I think all of the above changes would improve the game, though I recognize all of this is being said 16 years later after lots of time to contemplate Assault’s weaker points.  I’m not entirely certain how long Star Fox Assault took to develop but given that there’s obviously quite a bit scrapped from the game (an entire arcade mode was scrapped as well), I’m going to assume that the studio felt pressured to shove the game out the door and into the hands of customers.  It’s a shame, really, because I think a little bit longer in the oven would have done a lot of good.  Still, the product we got was good in its own right and a game that many people look back on fondly.  I haven’t gotten to replay it in years but I hope to quite soon.

You might wonder why I bothered typing this all out and I guess my point was this-- Assault was great but it wasn’t perfect, and while a lot of other games fall under a crushing amount of scrutiny, Assault seems to dodge it.  And don’t get me wrong-- I adore Assault.  But given that not many takes exist out there about rewriting it, I decided to give it a shot.  For variety’s sake.  

I do want to a mock up of a revised Assault story, which I think I will get to work on after completing this while all my ideas are still fresh in mind.  So stay tuned for that sometime in the near future.  I will also be doing my Adventures mock up at some point but probably not for a little bit as I do wanna focus some of my free time on actual fic-writing.

Anyways, if you stuck around this long, thank you for reading!  Have any changes you’d like to see to Assault if you could time machine your way back to the early 2000s?  Feel free to post in the comments, I’d love to read your ideas!

[keelywolfe]

FIC: A Haunting Prospect (baon)

Summary: It's almost Halloween! Getting scared is tradition, right? Right??

Tags: Spicyhoney, Established Relationship, Humor, Mild Gore, Haunted House

Notes: I tagged this for mild gore, but remember, it's all fake blood in haunted houses. ^_^

Part of the ‘by any other name’ series.

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Read it on AO3

or

Read it here!

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“we’re gonna be late," Stretch moaned. He was pushing on the dashboard as though he thought he could somehow speed the car up by will alone.

“We will not be late,” Edge said calmly. The speedometer didn’t waver one digit above the posted speed limit. “We said we would meet at eight and it will be eight when we get there.”

Stretch didn’t seem to have a reasonable argument for that and settled for flopping back in his seat, pouting silently. It didn’t keep him from taking Edge’s hand when he settled it on his knee, twining their fingers together.

The stream of cars ahead of them suddenly slowed their progress, all turning into the same lot, and the triumphant ‘I told you so’ look on Stretch’s face only faltered as they turned into the parking lot at 7:59.

“On time,” Edge announced, without a hint of smugness. Not that Stretch was fooled by that and his glare said as much.

“barely,” Stretch mumbled. His sulk evaporated as soon as he got out of the car, bouncing on his toes impatiently as Edge took care to lock it before rounding the trunk to join him. His husband’s excitement was hard to resist, even with his own reluctance making his steps drag. He let Stretch grab his hand, pulling him along,

The building loomed before them, the mock broken windows flashing with fake lightning and screams echoing both inside and out. The entrance was surrounded with a Gothic metal gate and spindly dead tree limbs dangled to catch at the clothes of any passersby. A sign hung on the side of the building, the letters dripping down in a false bloody smear, welcoming them to ‘Lucifer’s Asylum’.

Edge took in the entire atmosphere with distaste. “Tell me again why we’re here?”

“‘cause andy wanted to go!” Stretch said cheerfully. He took in the atmosphere with delight and it was probably too much to hope that he wasn’t taking mental notes for his own Halloween display. “plus, this haunted house won all kinds of awards, it’s supposed to be one of the scariest in the state.”

“I fail to see how that explains you two wanting to come.”

“it’s halloween!” Stretch said stubbornly. “getting scared is tradition.”

Edge hummed thoughtfully. “Be that as it may, I’d like to state for the record that no matter how scared you are, I’m not sleeping with the lights on tonight.”

“you won’t need to,” Stretch sniffed, even as he startled when one of the bowing tree branches caught at his shoulder. He stepped away from it, ignoring Edge’s pointed look. “it’s all for fun and what, is a bunch of skeletons supposed to scare me? i don’t think so, might even be distant relations.”

No, of course he wouldn’t be frightened at all. Not in the slightest. Edge mentally prepared himself for whatever was to come, saying lightly, “So long as none of them steal your heart away, I’m sure it will be fine.”

The line at the entrance went down the side of the building and into the parking lot, shuffling slowly along. The bulk of them were teenagers and young adults, playing on their phones as they stood around shivering in the cold in costumes that didn’t cover nearly as much as they should. They took their place at the end of the line, Stretch immediately imitating the others by pulling out his phone. He took pictures of the buildings, his thumbs moving rapidly over the screen as he posted them to one social media site or another.

“Hey, awesome costume!” One of the other patrons said as he walked past, pausing to giving them a thumbs up. He was with a young woman and the pair of them were wearing a great deal of black clothing and white makeup, interspersed with dripping trails of red.

“thanks,” Stretch grinned. He waggled his fingers, letting the bones click together, then let his eye lights snuff, only to relight them with a flare. Show off. “been working on it all my life.”

“Wow!” His companion leaned into Edge, who stiffened, forcibly keeping still as her eyes roved over him curiously. “That’s so realistic, how did you animate it?”

“Magic,” Edge said shortly.

They both laughed amicably, drawing away enough for Edge to relax. “Trade secret, got it.”

They moved on, headed to the back of the line, chatting excitedly. Edge slipped an arm around Stretch, pulling him in a touch closer, away from the Humans on either side of them who were disinterestedly continuing with their shuffle to the entrance. Stretch leaned against him, letting Edge keep him close.

“you okay?” Stretch murmured, too low for anyone else to hear. “i mean, we don’t have to go in—"

He squeezed Stretch gently, sliding a hand into the back pocket of his jeans. They might not have an ass to grab, but it made for a convenient temporary leash of sorts. “I’m fine, love, they didn’t mean any harm. Considering where we are, I’d think we’re honestly safer than normal.”

“probably,” Stretch agreed. “for once, we’re the norm.”

They watched as a group of ‘skeletons’ headed towards the back of the line. Stretch waved energetically and they waved back, one of the shorter ones yelling, “Skeleton power!”

“solidarity!” Stretch called back, grinning as they hooted and laughed.

The line was long, but it went quickly enough. Stretch texted Jeff as they got closer to the front. “they already got their tickets, they’re only waiting for us. if we’d gotten here earlier…”

“They wouldn’t be waiting for us if they’d come on time,” Edge said calmly. He stepped up the kiosk but before Edge could purchase their tickets from the masked person at the counter, he heard a shout from behind. He turned, automatically keeping Stretch behind him.

“Hey, you two,” a human Male called to them. He ran up, almost panting, and grabbed Edge by the arm, attempting to pull him along. Edge didn’t move, hardly rocking on his feet as the human gave another impatient tug. “Come on, man, you’re already late!”

“I beg your pardon,” Edge said coolly.

“we are?” Stretch leaned against Edge’s back, peering over his shoulder. “late for what?”

“You were in at seven today,” the Human said, heavy with exasperation, “Come on, Lisa is waiting for her break.”

Behind Edge, Stretch started giggling madly. “well, i mean, if lisa is waiting, we better hurry.”

“No,” Edge told him sternly before turning back to the Human, “I assure you, we don’t work here.”

The Human only sighed tiredly, “Look, we talked about this before. Everyone gets paid at the end of the night, if I pay early people duck out on me.”

Stretch slipped under Edge’s restraining arm, dodging his attempted grab easily, “and that’s a sound business practice, but, look, this isn’t a costume so much as an ongoing life choice.” With one hand he raked up his sweatshirt to show his midsection, or lack thereof, exposing his spine and ribs. When the Human only stared, dumbfounded, Stretch pushed a hand into his ribcage and waggled his fingers, singing out, “tada! no bones about it, pal. or well, actually nothing but bones.”

There was a muffled shriek behind them. All the Humans close by were staring and many others leaning out from their place in line to goggle at the suddenly very real skeleton before them. Edge sighed inwardly. Perhaps it was a good thing Jeff worked in public relations.

The Man who’d been trying to employ them stared, a bright, ruddy flush crawling up his neck to his face as he sputtered, “Oh. Oh!! Oh, god, you’re Monsters! I am so sorry, I didn’t mean, I thought—well, you know what I thought. Look you can go through free, I didn’t mean to insult you.”

“You didn’t,” Edge assured him. “We know we’re skeletons.”

He laughed, uncertainly, but it gained in volume as Stretch laughed along with him. He let his sweatshirt drop back down, shivering a little as it fell back into place. “hey, it’s cool. it’s no skin off my back, yeah?” They walked through the turnstile as the Man laughed again, a little harder this time, and Edge firmly pushed Stretch forward even as he called, “glad i could tickle your funny bone!”

They turned a corner and close to the entrance, Jeff and Antwan were standing together, tickets in their gloved hands.

“Hey! What took you guys so long?” Antwan groused. His coat was buttoned up to the top, a scarf wound around his neck. Jeff was bundled into his own jacket, but he was wearing a headband with a jaunty pair of devil’s horns on them.

Stretch let out a long-suffering sigh. “we woulda been here sooner, but someone had to take a shower so he’d be sure to be the prettiest.”

“I’m always the prettiest,” Edge said blandly, even as Jeff snickered. Hm, he also had a tail pinned to the back of his coat, velvety and red, and the spaded end was making a fair attempt at tangling with his feet.

“won’t get an argument from me,” Stretch said cheerily, “plus, i almost got a new job, but edge wasn’t going for it.”

“I already have enough work to do and I’m sure he rethought it after he heard your stand-up routine,” Edge told him dryly, “Jeff, you might want to let your team know there may be some pictures and video on the internet of a skeleton pulling his shirt off.”

“it wasn’t off!”

Jeff blinked, glancing between them and seeming to decide if there was any stripping being done then Stretch was the culprit; a wise conclusion. “Yeah, okay. Um. Why were you stripping? If you want to hit that venue, we’re on the wrong side of town.”

“it was totally a misunderstanding!” Stretch sulked, but it turned quickly into a leer. “besides, whose gonna complain about seeing these sexy bones?”

“Certainly not me,” Edge said, “but it’s a view I prefer to keep to myself.”

Stretch ran his tongue lightly over his teeth and Edge had to resist the urge to try to catch it with his own. “awww. jealous, babe?”

“Intensely,” Edge said, deadpan.

“don’t you worry, you’re the only one for me,” Stretch cooed. “my skele-one.”

Edge caught hold of him again, reeling him in close as they handed their tickets to a bored-looking Human at the door. Or perhaps it was the zombie costume, zombies did have a kind of an aura eternal boredom surrounding them. “The Humans don’t know to appreciate the view anyway. Try to keep your shirt on inside, I’d hate for you to catch the socket of any of the skeletons here.”

Stretch laughed, snuggling in close. “yeah, yeah. okay, now! let’s do this thing.”

The very first room was made up to look like a kitchen, the so-called blood-splattered chef booming laughter as he stirred a huge pot that seemed to be boiling with the heads of his victims. Sickening, perhaps, but not frightening. Edge could easily see the seams in the plastic skulls, smell the chemical odor of the fake blood.

Next to him, Stretch made a small noise, squirming loose to loop his arms around Edge’s shoulders from behind, clutching almost hard enough to choke him.

“Are you all right?” Edge murmured.

“yeah,” he breathed. “yeah, that’s just…i’m fine.” But he didn’t loosen his grip, crammed up tight against Edge’s back, forcing them to shuffle along together.

The next room was of a child’s birthday party, bloody streamers hanging and balloons that flickered to show skulls within them. A sinister clown stood holding a knife over a cake that resembled a severed Human head. Edge ground his teeth; again, he didn’t find it frightening, but instead even more distasteful. The clown cackled, waving the knife at them in offering as they moved past.

In front of Edge, Jeff was cringing against Antwan as well, his face mostly buried into his side, only peeking out occasionally to take in their gory surroundings. Antwan glanced back to meet Edge’s gaze through the darkness, exaggeratedly rolling his eyes. Edge more than agreed with the sentiment; neither Jeff nor Stretch enjoyed being scared, why in the name of all the stars had they want to come here? It hardly mattered now because here they were and all they could do was get through it.

The next room was made up to look like a butcher shop, with various limbs hanging from hooks and the walls grimy with fake blood. The meat cooler displayed its grim wares, feet and hands, coils of rubbery intestines and with every step further into the room, Stretch clung to him tighter, practically crawling up his back.

“Love, I do need to breathe,” Edge coughed out. The arm around his cervical vertebrae loosened fractionally, but Stretch was shaking so hard his bones were clacking like castanets. Perhaps they should see that Human again about getting paid, Edge thought wryly, surely they were adding to the local ambiance.

The sudden roar of a motor came from behind them, a figure lurching out from the shadows with a squealing chainsaw. Obviously a costume, the chainsaw didn’t even have a chain, but in the split second it took Edge to see that, Stretch was already screaming.

Edge abruptly found himself off his feet, lifted in Stretch’s arms as he whirled around and shoved Edge between him and the ‘maniac’. He was barely on his boots again, reorienting with the actor in front of him rather than behind, when the chainsaw was lifted threateningly and suddenly the world was blurring, the heat of the room dissipating into the cold of the outside as they were pulled through the void into the parking lot.

He barely had a chance to jerk away from Stretch, hunching over and gagging. He managed to keep from vomiting through the sheer determination not to humiliate himself in a place where curious Humans were walking past, some blatantly staring.

Swallowing back his nausea, he turned to see Stretch standing close by, his eye lights miserably downcast and his hands twisting together. Bright orange was burning high in his cheek bones and he was the very picture of embarrassed misery.

“babe, i am so sorry,” he started unhappily, “i just reacted, i didn’t mean to—” The sound that strangled out of Edge made him pause, blinking, “um. are you okay?”

The noise continued, despite Edge’s efforts to choke it back. It was either give in or break, and Edge finally burst out laughing. Harder than he ever had in his entire life, doubling over with it and finally Edge stumbled down to sit on the crumbling pavement, his head hanging down between his updrawn knees as he struggled to breathe between guffaws.

“You—" Edge rasped out, still laughing helplessly between gasps, “you just—“

“yeah, i just.” Stretch’s mouth twitched into a smile. “sorry about that.”

“You picked me up!” Edge choked out. Tears were stinging his sockets, verging on overflowing. “What was your plan, to throw me at him?”

“don’t think i had a plan,” Stretch admitted, shuffling his untied shoes. “hey, it’s a sign of my love!”

“that you’re willing to sacrifice me to chainsaw destruction is a sign of love?”

“okay, not that part. the whole letting you protect me thing!”

“Oh, really.” The laughter was finally easing, though Edge was still panting, trying to catch his breath. “And how does shortcutting us outside fit with that?”

“fuck if i know, i'm making up the bullshit as i go.” Stretch flopped down to sit down next to him in a scatter of gravel, gingerly leaning against him. It was as much an apology as his soft words, “i really am sorry.”

Edge slid an arm around him and pulled him closer, hugging him tightly as he pressed a kiss to the top of his skull. “No harm done, love.”

But the memory of Stretch screaming and shoving him towards the chainsaw maniac was going to linger fondly. If ever his brother chose to be running surveillance, Edge prayed to the Angel that tonight was that night.

“Hey!” They both looked up to see Jeff and Antwan heading towards them. Jeff broke into a run, skidding to a stop with a skitter of gravel. “You guys okay?”

“yeah,” Stretch sighed, shaking his head ruefully, “sorry about the quick exit. the chainsaw guy okay?”

“Um, well,” Jeff scratched the back of his neck awkwardly. “Yeah, he’s fine.”

“He was laughing so hard he had to sit down,” Antwan said bluntly. “He was rolling in the floor when we left.”

“oh,” Stretch mumbled, renewed orange rising in his cheekbones. “well. that’s good. i guess.”

“Less paperwork than if he was traumatized,” Jeff agreed. His grin was lopsided and warm. “Hey, so the orchard next door has cider and donuts, if you want to stop over.” Typical of him, an offering for a new venue that would help ease Stretch’s embarrassment.

“Of course,” Edge said firmly, before Stretch could say a word of protest. He was still faintly nauseous, but a walk in the cool air would help. By the time they had their donuts and cider, he was feeling better and they sat outside together in the chilly night, Stretch snuggled in close to Edge as he munched on his donut, freely laughing at Jeff’s description of how the actor reacted to his victims suddenly vanishing in front of him.

Edge wasn’t as fond as sweets as Stretch, but he ate the cinnamon spicy donut, drank his cup of steaming cider and listened to his love’s laughter, hardly tinged any longer with embarrassment. Even if the evening didn’t turn out like Stretch hoped, to see that he was still enjoying himself, laughing with his friends, brought joy to Edge’s soul, a deep, swelling love that warmed him from within.

He didn’t even protest that night at bedtime when Stretch left on the closet light.

-finis-

[innuendostudios]

Thoughts on... some more games

[discussing The Silent Age, Unforeseen Incidents, and Unavowed; all spoilers studiously avoided]

Thoughts on The Silent Age

I think I first heard about The Silent Age on an episode of Idle Thumbs at least a year ago? They implied it was a neat bit of time travel malarkey, and that’s exactly what it turns out to be. You’re a janitor in the 1970s who has a run-in with a dying time traveler who tells you basically everyone in the future he’s just arrived from has died of a horrible plague, he’s come back to prevent the outbreak, but now that he’s dying it’s your job to finish his task. You inherit his portable time travel doohickey and... well, solve a bunch of adventure game puzzles.

What we have here is a smattering of puzzles with the twist that every location exists both in the “present” and the post-apocalyptic future. It’s a clever hook, and it makes a fairly standard set of adventure game puzzles more interesting, though you’ll jump back and forth in time so much that becomes mundane. Outside of a few sequences where your time travel doohickey is out of power - which have some of the better solutions - every puzzle requires a jaunt forwards or backwards through time. Every single one. It loses some novelty after a bit. It doesn’t help that every single puzzle is also an inventory puzzle. The time travel mechanic seems like it would lend itself to some real clever braintinglers, but time travel mostly exists as a way of getting around locked doors, sneaking past guards, and giving you two versions of every room to look for inventory in. Any object that looks like it’s important, you need to slap another object on. The formula never changes.

I’m ambivalent about inventory puzzles, because an adventure game engine is generally designed such that you can fit rather a lot of different kinds of puzzles into it. I made a point in my Monkey Island video that the opening three trials each involves a completely different part of the engine: learning patterns in the dialogue system, interpreting information in the picture window, and possessing without necessarily using inventory while the game makes jokes with the sentence line. But inventory puzzles have always been the path of least resistance - they’re the simplest to design and the easiest to program. So far as inventory puzzles go, The Silent Age’s inventory puzzles are not at all bad, but, given there’s a much more interesting time travel mechanic right there, it's a missed opportunity.

As for the story, for much of the game, it seems purely functional. It’s not particularly original - as you can guess from the premise, it’s borrowing a lot from Back to the Future and Twelve Monkeys. And time travel stories can often feel like puzzle boxes more that interesting narratives; a bunch of curious loose threads in the first half are all explained in the second half when you see how the time-travel shenanigans played out. The characters aren’t deep, the horrors of the apocalypse aren’t deeply felt, the ethics and mechanics of time travel are hinted at but not really engaged with. For much of its runtime, it’s just a well-oiled machine, and you play to watch the cogs turn and the tumblers fall into place. This can be satisfying but also kind of hollow.

But, unlike a lot of time travel stories - and a lot of adventure games I’ve been playing recently - it gets richer in the final act. Right when you feel the puzzle box clicking inexorably and obviously into shape, the game makes room to get just a little bit heady. Not intensely so, but enough that the game proves smarter than you thought. And it manages to find an ending that is unexpected and oddly compelling. It still grazes against some topics its not prepared to delve into - okay, game, you’ve dutifully avoided the bootstrap paradox in some clever ways, but don’t these laws of causality kind of prove that fate exists? - but it does give the ending a bit more heft than I was expecting.

It’s a quick, play-it-in-an-afternoon game, and it didn’t exactly knock my socks off. But after so many capsule reviews where I say “good game, but I wish the ending was better,” it feels really good to say, just this once, “the ending made the whole experience better.” It’s short and it’s cheap and it’s worth checking out.

Thoughts on Unforeseen Incidents

I’ve never really gone into my problems with Broken Sword - and today is still not the day I rant about how Broken Sword is everything wrong with adventure games - but, as I’ve said elsewhere, Unforeseen Incidents is Broken Sword if Broken Sword were good.

It’s got a similar flavor of hapless dork protagonist who stumbles into a conspiracy by pure chance, a similar female journalist sidekick whom he clearly has a crush on, and even the last line of dialogue in the game seems like an intentional inversion of the ending of Broken Sword. The difference is that the conspiracy actually makes sense, the sidekick is capable and interesting instead of just cute and French, the jaunting between locations doesn’t have overtones of imperialist globetrotting ripped off from Indiana Jones, none of the puzzles are infuriating, it maintains a consistent tone, the jokes are actually funny, and there are no cutscenes with Don Bluth’s rubbery faces and bad pacing. (I said I’m not getting into it today!!!!)

So, yes, Unforeseen Incidents does Broken Sword one better, and, seeing as Broken Sword is (bafflingly) considered a classic, that should put the game on your radar. But, also, even if it’s markedly better in every way, the game is clearly derivative of Broken Sword, which robs it of some novelty. (It also borrows a major plot twist from a certain not-very-good action movie, but it would be a spoiler to say which one.) It’s generally good advice that, if you’re going to steal, steal from someone you can improve upon, but it would have benefited from feeling a little more original.

Anyway, the basic plot hook is - in keeping with The Silent Age - trying to stop the outbreak of a plague. The main character, Harper, is a broke handyman in a small town that appears to be ground zero for an incredibly virulent and lethal disease, and he gets involved, at first, to help out his professor friend in finding a cure. (So I guess that’s another game that borrows from Back to the Future, but Harper’s friendship with Professor McBride is at least a little more plausible than Marty’s with a disgraced nuclear physicist.) Things get weirder and more complicated from there.

Here’s a thing that happened while I was playing: Most of the puzzles are fine. Just fine. Nothing to write home about, but they get the job done. A few were a bit annoying, but nothing insulted my intelligence. But there were about three that actually stumped me, where I couldn’t think of what to do next, and I looked up solutions online. Now, most of the time, when I look up a solution, the answer is something dippy and I think, “Well, that wouldn’t have been interesting to solve,” or, “How was I supposed to think of that?” It’s rare that I regret looking up solutions to adventure game puzzles, because, generally, if I’m looking up a solution, it’s because the game has not convinced me solving it myself will be interesting.

But, in this game, every single puzzle I looked up the solution to I kicked myself for not thinking of the answer on my own. This is not my usual experience! The solutions were actually clever, and I would have felt genuinely smart for figuring them out. I kept thinking, “Shit, I should’ve thought of that!” I dunno why this happened multiple times in this game when it’s so uncommon in others. Maybe the bulk of the puzzles were normal enough that I kept assuming the ones I was stuck on didn’t have interesting solutions. Maybe they didn’t prime me for the kind of lateral thinking I’d have to employ a handful of times. Or maybe I’m just not as smart as I think. (No, no, it can’t be that.)

It might be a pacing thing? Since most of the puzzles didn’t give me trouble, the game moved at a pretty steady clip, so the few times I was legitimately stumped just ground everything to a halt. A game that had more stumpers might’ve had a more methodical pace, where being stumped wouldn’t have felt frustrating. But, whenever I didn’t know what to do, it was annoying, because the game felt like a page turner whose pages suddenly refused to turn.

Or perhaps I’m making excuses! The short version is, when you get stumped in this game, take a break and come back to it later, see if you can’t figure the stumpers out on your own. I think you’ll be happier if you do.

The writing is generally good across the board, owing, I suspect, to some journeyman script work from Alasdair Beckett-King of the Nelly Cootalot games. The story really lends itself to stock characters and functional dialogue, so having everyone be just a little more believable and interesting than is strictly necessary is quite lovely.

Overall, the way the conspiracy shakes out is, well, believable and it works fine enough, but it’s not... interesting. There’s some solid character work thrown in at the climax that’s seemingly there to make up for an underwhelming payoff in the plot proper, but it doesn’t carry enough weight. I don’t get to say “the ending made the whole experience richer” this time; it’s another good game with a weak ending. (Not bad, just weak.)

Still, I had a really good time with Unforeseen Incidents, and would highly recommend it, if recommendations are, for whatever reason, what you came here for. It’s got good characters and great voice acting and some nice twists and turns, and the design ain’t have bad, either. Check it out.

Thoughts on Unavowed

It finally happened! I’m writing up a Wadjet Eye game! (Well, it is in a batch of mini-reviews, not getting a whole post of its own, but shut up.) My previous assessment of Wadjet Eye as a company was that their games - both those made in-house and those published but made by other studios - are consistently interesting and often good but never great.

I might be taking that back now.

The buzz around Unavowed was that its opening was one of its best sequences, so I grew skeptical of the whole game when the opening didn’t do much for me. Having finished the game, I’d say the first half hour is actually beneath the quality of the complete product - the writing is fine but not amazing and the first proper puzzle is actively bad. Rather than opening strong, I feel the game’s real talent is for deepening as you play it.

The basic premise is that you are a person - in my game, a woman - who has spent the last year possessed by a demon. The game opens with the demon being exorcised from your body by what is basically the supernatural version of the Men in Black or the RIPD - a jinn and a fire mage who police the secret world of spirits and elementals who hide in plain sight in New York. Having been touched by a demon and having no place to go after a year of murdering people while possessed, you join the Unavowed and work to uncover the mystery of what your demon was up to during the year you can’t remember. Spirit activity has been on the rise lately, so your adventure also involves recruiting new people to the Unavowed who have been, in various ways, touched by the “other side.”

Where the game started to click for me is when I recruited Logan - a bit character from my opening flashback - into the team proper, and I, er... fell in love with him? I don’t usually crush on fictional characters, or on men (real or imagined), but in the rare event it happens, I apparently have a type? Logan is a strapping, bald, man of color with a soft voice and a tortured past and he’s filled with regret but also working every day to be a better person and he’s even good with kids and oh god I adore him. He’s also a spirit medium, which means, if I died - and I would die for him - he would ease my passing, but how can I move on to the next world if the thing keeping me here is you, Logan? How?

The richness of the characters is what starts to bring the whole thing together, and they are some of the best characters I’ve hung out with in a game. The game is rife with little touches that keep the spotlight on their personalities - you bring two companions with you on every mission, and there’s a smalltalk feature where whichever two you picked will just chat about whatever, and you’ll find yourself lingering in a scene with nothing to do just because you want to hear the rest of the conversation. You can also chat with your companions at any time, which serves as a hint system but also lets you make smalltalk of your own.

The buzz has mostly praised this focus on character, but I think maybe folks are giving the plot short shrift? Things are pretty episodic for the first chunk of the game - you have a mission, you bring two teammates with you on it, and you go home when the mission is done - but around the midpoint there are... developments... which are, frankly, kind of brilliant? I don’t want to say more than that, but its the kind of stuff that reframes what came before, and it starts building towards a complex, satisfying, and unpredictable conclusion. Dave Gilbert is good with characters, but he’s no slouch at plot developments, either.

There are still some weirdnesses that I wish weren’t there. This is one of those games where one needs to clarify that having good writing is not the same as having good dialogue; Unavowed has frequently excellent writing but its dialogue is only OK. One of those games where I keep rewriting it in my head, which is generally a sign that the emotional beats are solid, I just wish they’d been written slightly differently. Being given the choice of who joins you on missions means that puzzles that can only be solved with the abilities of people you didn’t bring with you are still present, and they, at times, threw me off of what I was actually supposed to do. I also couldn’t understand why I couldn’t just go get the person who can do the thing I need done; the game rather arbitrarily refuses to let you swap out teammates once you’ve started a mission, even though the plot sometimes demands one get swapped without your consent. (In my game, Vicki got shortchanged, because, every mission I brought her on, for plot reasons she would get replaced with Logan partway through, not that I’m complaining.)

The game also borrows the “moral choice with lasting consequences” that everyone’s been borrowing since The Walking Dead, and even does the thing when it confronts you with the consequences of all your decisions in the late game, and, while it executes it okay, it was contrived when The Walking Dead did it, it was contrived when Life is Strange did it, and it’s still contrived today. There have to be better ways to make your decisions feel meaningful than having an antagonist monologue all your choices back at you in the endgame!

Also, for a game so focused on character, I wish there were more complex character arcs. This is a thing video games are kind of notorious about: The cast of Unavowed often have character-building moments, but, because they can happen in any order and some are optional, they can’t really change the character in any meaningful way (at least, not without writing a whole lot of additional content). In my game, my darling dear Logan had a fairly significant epiphany that, due to the nature of the game, was never mentioned again and didn’t alter his trajectory. In screenwriting terms, it was a Transforming Change that never led to an Ultimate Boon. If I’m being honest, the beat was also a little pat, but there were several similar beats with other characters that landed with more impact, but also never came to anything.

All that aside, I really fell for this game. The plot seems designed to justify vignettes that explore the game’s magical world, but each vignette also furthers a satisfying narrative. In my experience, you often get one or the other. It’s one of the best narrative games I’ve played in recent memory, and, of all the ones I’m discussing today, the one I’m most likely to play again. It’s definitely the most cohesive and complete game I’ve played from Wadjet Eye; I’m not sure how I’d rank it against Resonance, which has higher highs but is a deeply, deeply flawed game. Fortunately, we live in a universe where we don’t have to choose!

Unavowed is great. You should play it.

Odds & Sods

I also played Virginia recently, but have nothing to say about it except that it’s beautiful and you should play it right away, and I played Alum which... hoo, I am not ready to talk about Alum yet.

[silentauroriamthereal]

So. I met Benedict Cumberbatch the other night. 

I’m still processing, honestly, and the big thing that I need to write is another letter to him, one which I assume going in that he will never read (I can’t even imagine the volume of fanmail he must receive!), but I’ll still write it because I need to say it, even if it’s never read. In this post I want to talk about some of the stuff I want to say there, so I’m just kind of working through my thoughts here. 

This is going to be long, and a little emotional, so I’m putting it behind a cut to spare your dashes (among other things!). 

I have a few different things to say about the entire thing. First, let me just go through the evening as it unfolded: 

I managed to buy a ticket to the New York debut of Letters Live. I’ve adored the concept of this event since the first time they held it and when I found out they were doing one in New York right during the tiny window of when I was going to be there, I jumped at the opportunity, though the tickets were uncomfortably expensive for me. There is literally no other living person that I would have been more excited to see perform and potentially have a tiny chance to meet, though, and the timing seemed almost foreordained, so I did it. 

The event was phenomenal. A gigantic wall of a human was seated in front of me - an unpleasant man who was approximately 10 metres tall and 5 metres wide, and I’m 5′4, so... yeah. I waited until after the first act and managed to slip into a much better seat, hahaha! The performance was so well-planned, I thought. The selection of letters was specially curated for an American audience, with most of the content written by Americans. To hear Rose McGowan read her own letter to the Hollywood higher-ups was chillingly powerful, as was hearing Toni Morrison’s letter to Barack Obama. There were several letters funny enough to make me cry with laughter, and to my pleased surprise one of these was read by another well-loved actor of mine, Tom Hollander (who I keep feeling so sorry for these days - people must confuse him with Tom Holland all the time, and they’re not remotely similar, lol). Benedict’s first letter was an absolutely hilarious one that just went around facebook about a month ago, written by a Canadian man apologizing for having absolutely trashed, via a flock of seagulls, his hotel room in Victoria eighteen years ago. He also read one of the Chris Barker/Bessie Moore exchanges with Loo Brealey, and finished the evening with Stewart Stern’s incredibly stirring and moving letter to the family of James Dean following his death. 

Listen: seeing Benedict perform live, with my own two naked eyes, breathing the same air as him - it may sound ridiculous, but that alone was profoundly moving to me. Just seeing him, period. Then seeing him perform - breathtaking. And then hearing him read this particular letter was just - it’s hard to even put it into words. I felt a little as though I was hearing him read what could be his own epitaph. Listen to these words: 

A star goes wild in the places beyond air — a dark star born of coldness and invisible. It hits the upper edges of our atmosphere and look! It is seen! It flames and arcs and dazzles. It goes out in ash and memory. But its after-image remains in our eyes to be looked at again and again. For it was rare. And it was beautiful. And we thank God and nature for sending it in front of our eyes. So few things blaze. So little is beautiful. Our world doesn't seem equipped to contain its brilliance too long. Ecstasy is only recognizable when one has experienced pain. Beauty only exists when set against ugliness. Peace is not appreciated without war ahead of it. How we wish that life could support only the good. But it vanishes when its opposite no longer exists as a setting. It is a white marble on unmelting snow. And Jimmy stands clear and unique in a world where much is synthetic and dishonest and drab. He came and rearranged our molecules.

I mean, this is exactly how I already feel about the nature of Ben’s talent, the privilege I feel at being allowed to experience it in any way, in any medium. He has a talent that lights up the cosmos and I’m just so grateful to the universe that this talent exists and has been given a place to be seen and witnessed by the rest of us. His talent blazes, and my life is the richer for being able to experience it. 

I tried really, really, really hard not to hope too much to have a chance to meet him at the stage door after. It’s kind of impossible not to hope, but I told myself sternly that I already never thought I would have the chance to see him perform in person, and it really would have been enough. I’d joked to my friends before leaving for New York that if he so much as laid his own two beautiful eyes on me and actually saw me, heard my voice, any of that, that I could die in peace. I’ve never expected that, though, to have any sort of fleeting brush of contact like that. It’s not the nature of the way a person like him relates to a person like me. In fact, allow me a tangential paragraph here: 

Being a fan can feel one-sided. I know everything that a person can possibly know about a person whom I have never met. I can guarantee that I have seen, read, or listened to every interview he’s done, ever, with very, very few exceptions. ALL of the press junkets. I could have written his imdb page. Like many of us! I know every line on his beautiful face. I know the freckles on his skin, the tendons of his forearms and calves. I know every part of his physicality that’s ever been shown to the public, and with him, that’s a fair bit! His voice is my ringtone (it’s a clip of Sherlock saying “it’s a text alert; it means I’ve got a text”) and his voice is more dearly familiar to me than most of the people I know personally. I know his facial expressions, though he’s constantly reinventing the way the muscles of his face can move for every new role he plays. I’ve analyzed his accents from a phonetics standpoint. In short, I know everything that’s possible for someone like me to know about someone like him. And he knows nothing about me - not my name, not what I do, not what I eat, not my voice or my talents or my eyes or fingernails or passions or pet peeves - not of my existence, full stop. But that doesn’t mean that our relationship - and bear with me on that word - is one-sided. This is how it works: he gives. He gives and gives and gives. Benedict doesn’t phone it in. He BLAZES. He burned through so much energy playing Hamlet (any wonder, have you seen him in it???) in the summer of 2016 that one of the reasons Dr. Strange had to push back its filming schedule was to give him the chance to bulk up again after the play’s run. Benedict commits, and like the aforementioned star analogy, he radiates energy to every possible point of contact around him. THIS is his side of the relationship: he blazes out his talent/energy/love/passion/commitment, and we receive it, and the appreciation and love and passion we feel in return for it is something that we share with each other, not with him. That’s how fandom works: it’s not a direct thing. Not in the standard, interpersonal way. He shines; we turn to each other rather than to him, to talk about how it made us feel, how it moved us, how it excited us and made us laugh and inspired us. Somehow, this entire experience crystallized this for me perfectly. 

Now, back to the stage door: there was an absolute CRUSH of people at the barricades. I don’t want to talk about this part too much because it was extremely unpleasant. We had to wait for a long time. I would have stayed until he left the building, no matter how long it took, unless it would have made me look like a total creep, because that’s not something I ever want to do to someone I admire. He did come out eventually, and that’s when the pushing and screaming started. I once said that I would never scream at a celebrity, and I didn’t. The crowd, unfortunately, was a mix of three groups of people: 1. aggressive paparazzi 2. aggressive fanboys who had brought comic book shit for Ben to sign so that they could sell it on ebay 3. genuine fans. Guess which group was not at all problematic?? Turns out I was standing right in a knot of #2′s, and because they were hollering at him, like screaming at him to get over there and sign their shit, Ben went over to the other side of the barricade to sign stuff there. He told off one of the paps and said he was there to be with the “real people”, which I appreciated. He did come back near us, and I had the briefest of moments to talk to him. I thanked him for not having become a lawyer, and he laughed. Everyone was thrusting stuff in his face and yelling. I just had my little ticket from the show, and the comic book manchildren kept putting their stuff on top of mine. Ben finally said he was going back inside, that his wife was there waiting for him, but he turned back toward me and I managed to ask (possibly plead) if he would sign my ticket. He looked me in the eye then, smiled, and said, “Of course”. 

I stammered out a congratulations on Patrick Melrose and he smiled again and said thank you, while he was signing. But that one moment of eye contact is all I wanted. He looked at me, and he saw me. And I made him laugh. 

I was literally almost suffocated by the awful people around me, none of which were: a) female, or b) actual fans. I’ve thought sometimes, while watching videos of Benedict on the red carpet, with all of those media folk screaming at him to turn this way, smile into their camera, all of that, that it feels very much like harassment. I know that people in his position know that it comes with the job, that the fame and riches are supposed to be the offset of having no privacy, of being followed by media and fans alike, quite literally, of being shrieked and barked at like they’re trained performing animals (which I don’t like, either!). I know he knows that, but it doesn’t mean that it’s pleasant in any way. He handles it like a pro, because he is in every way a consummate professional. But it can’t be pleasant for him. He’s incredibly, extraordinarily generous with his time. As a performer myself, I know how I feel when I’ve just finished a solo concert or an opera - I feel like taking off my heels and fancy dress, putting on pyjama pants and relaxing every muscle I have on a couch somewhere, preferably with a tall drink in hand. Performing Hamlet is considered one of the most demanding male roles in the English theatrical repertoire, yet Benedict would not only perform it a stunning eight times per week, but then sometimes spend up to THREE HOURS signing autographs and taking selfies after. If he chooses to limit how long he gets screamed at by aggressive, even violent paps and shitheads who just want to use his signature for money, good for him! I respect that, even if I felt incredibly sorry for the people further back who didn’t get to have that, one brief moment of contact with this person we all admire so very, very deeply. And so, because of this, because of seeing firsthand how gross people are to him and just the sheer volume of what he puts up with for our sake, so that some of us, at least, can have that tiny moment, I don’t think I would do it again, if only to reduce that volume by one teeny tiny amount. I got my one, deeply, deeply hoped-for, fleeting, searing moment of contact. It’s all that I could have asked for. He saw me, and I had the chance to say some tiny part of my gratitude to him for what he gives of himself to all of us. That’s all I wanted. 

The wait, the near-suffocation, all of that, was worth it, to win that one precious moment. I clutched my precious ticket and fought my way out of the crowd and wandered dazedly off toward the subway, through late Friday night Times Square crowds, feeling so much that I didn’t even know how to process it. I felt like I was about to burst into tears and I couldn’t have even said why or whether I was happy or sad or possibly a cornucopia of every human emotion ever. I felt - and still feel - a bit like I just had a brush with an actual, blazing sun. It was shattering, and I will be forever changed by it. I am so grateful. 

[norman-reedus-gossip-mod]

bulk

--mod--

Because I'm a lazy ass and didn't want to transfer stuff in to comments .

Anon: Was DK at NR's art show opening today? --mod-- Not that I saw





Anon: 
I love Daryl but I was never a fan of Norman. Trust me, I've tried. I even tried watching a few of his movies including BS but I'm sorry imo they were crap movies. His only claim to semi-fame is Daryl/TWD & even then a lot of ppl I know don't watch or even recognize his name. His last barely legal gf & now DK are an example of the REAL Norman. He's not what he made himself out to be to his fans. He fooled them that he's an upstanding guy when in reality he's far from it. Don't fall for it!!!

Anon: 
Dk and Norman are laughing their asses off behind everyone's backs probably thinking we are all dumb and some of you seriously support this behavior and say it's okay. It's shameful disgusting & embarrassing nothing more
                                                                                        --mod-- I'm not exactly sure why everyone thinks they'd be laughing at the fans. I'm not being a dick just curious 

Anon: 
There's just no way she was there he was so busy and today he's busy where is she?



Anon: 
I'm really disturbed by the horrible messages on Norman's IG.. people are so messed up! Regardless of what the truth is these messages just make his fans look insane!




Anon: 
Wow, is it the same ten hateful women posting here about liar Norman and evil Diane? Because elsewhere in social media, people, mature people, are saying this is his business and if he's happy, then so are they. How refreshing. Maybe some of you should expand your horizons. --mod-- Mine are super expanded. Apparently we don't go to the same social media because there is nastiness on all of them.




Anon: 
Here we go Diane isn't his friend showing up to support him for his gallery opening tonight since she isn't even there. Probably waiting for him in their hotel room. I'm actually heavily disgusted with the game theyre playing.



Anon: 
Is that Diane at the opening on shadinyc ig story? That's exactly what the blinds said would happen.
                                                                                              --mod-- Nah that's JDM's wife




Anon: 

Well seems like DK isn't at Norman's gallery opening so she definitely isn't in Barcelona to support his work. Plus they wouldn't hide like this if it's only "friends" hanging out. Come on, some still don't want to see that Norman lied cold in you all's faces..                                                                                        .
--mod-- People are allowed to not believe something anon. We all have different thresholds as to what we need to make a decision.  For instance a picture taken from a distance isn't enough for me personally. But I respect the fact that it's enough for others and try and not to talk down to them 



Anon: 
DK doesn't seem to be at NR's art show opening today. Why do you think that is? --mod-- Maybe she's not there or maybe she wasn't invited.





Anon: 
I have studied those pictures a little closer and noticed something. DK is thin as a stick - her things are practically just bones with muscles and skin on top. The woman climbing on the bike is slim too, but her things seems wider. And then she's even wearing dark jeans that's supposed to make you look thinner. I might be wrong but unless DK gained a couple of pounds over less than a week I don't think that's her




Anon: 
Mod, if they are actually together, do you think we are going to have to see it now? Do we actually have to be forced to look at her attending his art shows and walking red carpets with him? He doesn't do that stuff! I could cry at that thought alone I'm sorry Norman but I can't do that. I didn't sign up as your fan to have to put up with her and her trolling either. Please say it's not true --mod-- If they are then I'd assume we'd maybe see more of them. But I'll make this promise I will keep her to the barest of minimums on the blog. 😉

Anon: 
Mod do you think it's possible that they really are only friends? I mean why would he make an official denial like he did only two weeks ago if he was with her? It seems so weird if he did that. It makes him out to look like a complete liar. Also people were saying that he was taking pics with fans while she was there? If that's true, why would he do that with her of all people if she they were more than friends?
                                                                                                                     --mod-- I think it's totally possible they are still friends. He has friends that he's been out with and have stood back while he took pictures with fans. What strikes me as weird is no one that has said she was there took one picture of her not even a creeper..




Anon: 
I get that people are pissed but the fact is, none of us personally know N or DK. We only see their public personas. We have no idea who they truly are and have no basis on which to judge their relationship. Even if we feel we do, it still wouldn't give us the right to interfere. It's their business and none of ours. And if N is making a "mistake" somehow, it's still his to make. Respect the boundaries between fandom and real life. And if you must leave the fandom, then just leave.                                                                                                           .
--mod-- Fair point.



Anon: To people losing their shit - ever considered that N has 'lied' not to be deceitful or because of JJ, but because he KNEW that the batshit elements of his fanbase would react exactly as they have? Maybe he's keeping it quiet purely to protect DK and himself from lunatic fans who think he owes them something.




Anon: He has left up all supportive comments but deleted others. Even respectful ones just showing disapointment. I think the blind is right he will go public with her. Way to antagonize norman. --mod-- I've actually seen lots of comments that aren't supportive. He did deleted a bunch of the really nasty ones.




Anon: Mod Norman was out last night I think, was DK with him??                                          -mod--                                                                                                                                                 Not that I've heard




Anon: 
Dk and Norman both silent on SM since days. You all love to call it coincidence. I hope you all also know deep down it isn't. If they were just friends they wouldn't have to be silent for days. Reminds a lot of Lapland huuh? Let's be honest here, Norman tried to safe his image by putting out a denial so he probably hoped people would stop watching their steps. Too bad it's not working. I so hope paps call them out and the next shitstorm is coming for him. He deserves nothing else if he lies.
                                                                    --mod--Can you give me a definition of silent on sm because he's little and followed people on ig and twitter




Anon: 
So several people said Norman was there with his girlfriend. We all know he met (secretly) up with ms. attention whore. what do people need more to see he lied big times in ya'lls faces just to make himself look better. I don't get how anyone can support his behavior. He claims to love honesty and hates cheating yet he's apparently the biggest liar. If I was a fan I would be more than disgusted and disappointed and would really think twice if I want to support such shit. Lying is a no go.                                                                                     --mod--People need different things to form an opinion and others just don't care




Anon: 
NR was out at some kind of bar last night, any idea if DK was with him?

--mod-- Haven't heard anything 




Anon: 

This is what we get for thinking a guy who had dated a 20 yr old when he was 44 had changed/matured!!! Ha, that's a fucking laugh!!! This guy NEVER had standards, morals & integrity so why'd we expect he'd suddenly posses them??? My mother always told me no matter how hard you try, you can't shine SHIT!!!! Norman will never change & he'll always go after the women who are either too young or total bitches. It's very telling just what kind of person he really is. --mod-- But some of his exs are really awesome women and super nice. Perhaps people are judging to much on his last few relationships . Also who would try and shine shit that's so gross




Anon: 

Funny how Norman is quiet on SM since DK arrived in Barcelona. He didn't post nor like in days.                                                                                     .
--mod-- But I think he did



Anon: I still adore Norman.But he acts blind and stupid right now.Maybe it's a midlife crisis.At this point of drama I wonder if it wouldn't have been the smarter decision to tell the truth right away.There would've been a shitstorm for a few weeks.NOW this hurting and hating goes on for nearly 2 years off and on.Unbearable. Diane?She's a insidious piece of poo.Made multiple attempts to nail Norman down and finally succeeded.I can see a wedding and a baby in the near future.It's that easy.
                                                                                        --mod-- Whys there gotta be a wedding and baby. Both of those are weird 



Anon:
I don’t know what to think about Norman anymore.. I’m okay with him being in a relationship with someone and being happy but… with DK… ugh. I wonder if he even knows how she calls the paps… does he even care that she does this? Does he care that she trolls his fans? Does he not realize what type of person she is? And I’ve noticed that when things arise with her, rumors fly or they’re spotted together- he seems to post photos of him with kids, make a wish foundation children, etc around the same time… And his Facebook page did that again tonight… several pics that have already been posted… but were posted again tonight of him with kids and charities… and it turned my stomach because it comes off extremely fake to me now, like he’s trying to get his image to be shown in a better light whenever the DK stuff hits the fan. I always thought of him as a good person but… now I don’t know what to think anymore because I went from thinking he really cares about his fans that are kids(I know he does care) but to somewhat use them to get his reputation to look better at these times… Ugh. :/

Anon: Did anyone thought that the blond girl jumping on NR was Hillary Burton (JDM's wife), she was in Barcelona with them and she does own boots and bag like the ones in the picture, they're not a special edition made for DK (other people can have the same). When I see how many IG accounts are created by so called "fans" to only spread rumours and hate toward NR and DK, I believe this storm won't stop, so I hope you have lots of whiskies and nachos mod. --mod-- That was my first thought. Irish nachos and whiskey all weekend

Anon: Did DK go to Norman's exhibit opening tonight? Is that her in Shadi's video right after he pans from JDM? --mod-- Didn't see her there

Anon: One would think if DK was only a friend for Norman she'd be officially invited to his gallery opening. Apparently she isn't there. Sorry but that makes it all the more obvious they are not just friends .

Anon: Did DK go to Norman's exhibit opening tonight? Is that her in Shadi's video right after he pans from JDM? --mod-- No it's JDM's wife I believe

Anon: Funny how DK isn't at his opening show if she was only in Spain to support him. If they were only friends why isn't she just official attending his opening so they could easily prove they're friends. Her being not there makes everything even more obvious. She's hiding and waiting for him somewhere so they can keep going laughing about us and screwing around further. --mod-- Maybe p, if she was in Spain, they decided is was best she not attended because have you seen the hate. Also why would they be laughing

[malaysiawebsitedesigners]

The Secrets of Relevancy

Check out latest article on http://www.bjweb.com/the-secrets-of-relevancy/

The Secrets of Relevancy

In the previous section, we discussed how popular pages (as judged by links) rank higher. By this logic, you might expect that the Internet’s most popular pages would rank for everything. To a certain extent they do (thinkWikipedia!), but the reason they don’t dominate the rankings for every search result page is that search engines put a lot of emphasis on determining relevancy.

Text Is the Currency of the Internet

Relevancy is the measurement of the theoretical distance between two corresponding items with regards to relationship. Luckily for Google and Microsoft, modern-day computers are quite good at calculating this measurement for text.

By my estimations, Google owns and operates well over a million servers. The electricity to power these servers is likely one of Google’s larger operating expenses. This energy limitation has helped shape modern search engines by putting text analysis at the forefront of search.Quite simply, it takes less computing power and is much simpler programmatically to determine relevancy between a text query and a text document than it is between a text query and an image or video file. This isthe reason why text results are so much more prominent in search results than videos and images.

So what does this emphasis on textual content mean for SEOs?

To me,it indicates that my time is better spent optimizing text than images orvideos. This strategy will likely have to change in the future as computers get more powerful and energy efficient, but for right now text should be every SEO’s primary focus.

This is especially true until Google finds better ways to interpret and grade non-textual media.

But Why Content?

The most basic structure a functional website could take would be a blank page with a URL. For example purposes, pretend your blank page is on the fake domain www.WhatIsJessicaSimpsonThinking.com. (Get it? It is a blank page.) Unfortunately for the search engines, clues like top-level domains (.com, .org, and so on), domain owners (WHOIS records), code validation, and copyright dates are poor signals for determining relevancy.This means your page with the dumb domain name needs some content before it is able to rank in search engines.

The search engines must use their analysis of content as their primary indication of relevancy for determining rankings for a given search query.For SEOs, this means the content on a given page is essential for manipulating—that is, earning—rankings. In the old days of AltaVista and other search engines, SEOs would just need to write “Jessica Simpson”hundreds times on the site to make it rank #1 for that query. What could be more relevant for the query “Jessica Simpson” than a page that says Jessica Simpson 100 times? (Clever SEOs will realize the answer is a page that says “Jessica Simpson” 101 times.)

This metric, called keyword density, was quickly manipulated, and the search engines of the time diluted the power of this metric on rankings until it became almost useless. Similar dilution has happened to the keywords meta tag, somekinds of internal links, and H1 tags. Despite being more sophisticated, modern-day search engines still work essentially the same way they did in the past—by analyzing content on the page.

Hey, Ben Stein, thanks for the history lesson, but how does this apply to modern search engines?

The funny thing is that modern-day search engines still work essentially the same way they did back in the time of keyword density.

The big difference is that they are now much more sophisticated. Instead of simply counting the number of times a word or phrase is on a webpage, they use natural language processing algorithms and other signals on a page to determine relevancy.

For example, it is now fairly trivial for search engines to determine that a piece of content is about Jessica Simpson if it mentions related phrases like “Nick Lachey” (her ex husband),“Ashlee Simpson” (her sister), and “Chicken of the Sea” (she is infamous for thinking the tuna brand “Chicken of the Sea” was made from chicken).

The engines can do this for a multitude of languages and with astonishing accuracy.

Don’t believe me?

Try going to Google right now and searching related:www.jessicasimpson.com.

If your results are like mine, you will see websites about her movies, songs, and sister. Computers are amazing things.In addition to the words on a page, search engines use signals like image meta information (alt attribute), link profile and site architecture, and information hierarchy to determine how relevant a given page that mentions “Jessica” is to a search query for “The Simpsons.”

Link Relevancy

As search engines matured, they started identifying more metrics for determining rankings. One that stood out among the rest was link relevancy.

The difference between link relevancy and link popularity (discussed in the previous section) is that link relevancy does not take into account the power of the link. Instead, it is a natural phenomenon that works when people link out to other content. Let me give you an example of how it works. Say I own a blog where Iwrite about whiteboard markers. (Yes, I did just look around my office for an example to use, and yes, there are actually people who blog about whiteboard markers. I checked.)

Ever inclined to learn more about my passion for these magical writing utensils, I spend part of my day reading online what other people have to say about whiteboard markers.On my hypothetical online reading journey, I find an article about the psychological effects of marker color choice. Excited, I go back to my website to blog about the article so (both of) my friends can read about it.

Now here is the critical takeaway. When I write the blog post and link to the article, I get to choose the anchor text. I could choose something like “clickhere,” but more likely I choose something that it is relevant to the article. In this case I choose “psychological effects of marker color choice.”Someone else who links to the article might use the link anchor text“ marker color choice and the effect on the brain.”People have a tendency to link to content using the anchor text of either the domain name or the title of the page. Use this to your advantage by including keywords you want to rank for in these two elements.This human-powered information is essential to modern-day search engines. These descriptions are relatively unbiased and produced by real people. This metric, in combination with complicated natural language processing, makes up the lion’s share of relevancy indicators online.

Other important relevancy indicators are link sources and information hierarchy. For example, the search engines can also use the fact that Ilinked to the color choice article from a blog about whiteboard markers to supplement their understanding of relevancy. Similarly, they can use the fact that the original article was located at the URL www.example.com/vision/color/ to determine the high-level positioning and relevancy of the content.

As you will find out later on this website, these secrets are essential for SEOs to do their job. Beyond specific anchor text, proximal text—the certain number of characters preceding and following the link itself—have some value. Something that’s logical, but annoying is when people use a verb as anchor text, such as “Frank said . . . “ or “Jennifer wrote . . .“, using “said” or“wrote” as the anchor text pointing back to the post. In a situation like that,engines have figured out how to apply the context of the surrounding copy to the link.

Tying Together Popularity and Relevancy

So far, we have discussed both popularity and relevancy. These two concepts make up the bulk of Search Engine Optimization theory. They have been present since the beginning of search engines and undoubtedly will be important in the future. The way they are determinedand the relationship between them changes, but they are both fundamental to determining search results.

Popularity and relevancy are the two concepts that make up the bulk of Search Engine Optimization theory.This fact is critical to SEOs. We have very little control over how the major search engines operate, yet somehow we are supposed to keep our jobs. Luckily, these immutable laws of popularity and relevance govern search engines and provide us with some job security.

Summary

In this issue, I explained the concepts of popularity and relevancy in relation to modern search engines. This information, along with your prior SEO experience, will make up the foundation for all of the SEO secrets and knowledge that you learn throughout from our website.

[moviesihaveseenbeforeiamdea-blog]

#347 Vertigo

Released: May 9, 1958

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Written by: Alec Coppel, Samuel Taylor (screenplay), based on Boileau-Narcejac’s 1954 novel D’entre les morts

Starring: James Stewart, Kim Novak

Had I Seen it Before? Yes

Hitchcock cameo: He’s pretty easy to spot in the beginning of the movie, walking around the shipyard. If you’re looking for a short, fat, ugly British guy in a suit, he’s hard to miss. Waltzes right on across the screen. 

This is the first movie that I’d seen before watching it for the purposes of this list. The first time I watched it was with a friend from college who was really into older movies she grew up watching with her mom, and also happened to be really into getting high, and so the two of us powered through about half an eighth on the bong while watching Vertigo. I don’t remember much as I couldn’t follow along after about a half-hour into the movie, with only a few pivotal scenes sticking out to me ex post facto. And, as I mentioned in the Treasure of the Sierra Madre entry, it took me a long time to recognize in the second part of the movie that James Stewart was actually kind of a bad guy. 

Look, I’m struggling with these entries. As much as I’m committed to this project, I’m sure what it is I’m supposed to be saying about these movies after having watched them. I like a lot of them. Considering that it’s a list of essential movies (by, again, an arbitrary standard), it’s bound to happen that most of them are going to be well-made, interesting, and interesting to look at, a lot of them are even going to be excellent. It’s hard to do appraisals routinely when everything is good, because then what’s the point of this blog other than to say that universally-beloved movies are, in fact, good?

I’m a movie guy in a casual way. I watch them, read about them, think about them, study them, and I can even pick them apart pretty good for casual conversation, but I’m by no means a critic or any kind of expert on technique, and I don’t really want to be that. It was bound to happen that I’d have an existential crisis early on in this project, so I’m using it to at least bring some spice to it. 

One thing I definitely remembered from my first viewing was being mesmerized by Scottie’s (Stewart) nightmare halfway through the movie, once Madeleine is “killed.” It’s so out-of-place for a movie of its time to me. For one thing, I’m at a loss as to how they managed to produce something so heavily-edited nearly sixty years ago, but I suppose the answer might be a bit more simple than I at first assumed. 

In spite (or maybe because) of the haze of marijuana smoke during my first viewing, it left an impression on me. The way it comes out of nowhere, so surreal, and is paired with that alarming bit of music (the composer for Vertigo was Bernard Herrmann of The Twilight Zone fame, but I’m not sure if a separate sound designer did this particular effect or not) that it’s a magical final product. I’m fully of the belief that if you’re going to indulge in a dream sequence within an otherwise straight-laced movie, you have to lean into the fantastical elements of it and not use it as a way of psyching out the audience with a plausible reality only to pull the rug out from underneath them at the last moment before a climax, which I typically feel to be a waste of the viewers’ time. 

I was sober this time, though I did watch it with people again, something I don’t normally do. On a second viewing and one where I was able to pick it apart, I saw what makes it so special. It’s not perfect, by any means. The reveal of the plot comes a little early and the movie has some significant pacing issues that spring out of that, but it’s idiosyncratic from top-to-bottom and feels like a genuine vision from a visionary director. And, as I’ve mentioned, I love James Stewart. 

It is a lonely movie, though. I remember getting that feeling while watching it the first time but not having any exact reasons as to why. I think it’s really in Madeleine (Novak), really. She’s used as a pawn by men around her throughout the movie, although it only becomes explicit in the final forty-five minutes or so. As Gavin Elster’s mistress, she’s used over and over to manipulate Scottie, a man she does seem genuinely love by the end of the film. Once Elster’s murdered his wife though, Madeleine (now Judy), is passed over by Elster as he leaves his old life behind. A woman caught between her loyalties to two men, she’s abandoned by one and can’t be seen by the other without being implicated in the crime she was an accomplice to for the benefit of the former. 

And when Scottie walks out of the sanitorium and sees her living a more natural life, she’s incapable of opening herself up to him and being with him in the way she wants. That has to be an awful feeling, and Novak does a good job of showing the conflicts of emotion in Judy. 

Scottie accepts Judy as someone else at first, but still wants to mold her to look like Madeleine, something Judy goes along with because, hey? Why not? She was already Madeleine for another man once, why not be it again for the man she loves? But, of course, just as the first Madeleine was killed by the man she loved, so is the second. What a waste. 

I think it’s that loneliness that was what I did attach to most from both viewings. I watched it with someone else both times, as I mentioned. Which is funny because this is a movie I’ve never seen alone and maybe that’s given me a certain edge to my feelings on it. The first time I watched it with someone who I was, in some way or another, deeply invested in emotionally, and watching a movie that was beloved to her was a kind of nostalgia-in-real-time thing for me if that makes any sense. By that point, the relationship was on the way out, but we had that afternoon together where things were enjoyable and relaxing if tinged with a bit of sadness as we watched two characters on screen also try and reconcile from a position of mutual manipulation and ultimate failure. The second time watching it now was with a good friend of mine who’s leaving the city we met and went to college to together. He’s the last of my college friends, and him moving away feels a little like being the last person on the planet. That’s intentionally melodramatic, but there’s something to it. Even though there are other good friends left here for me in the city, none of them are people I met in college, and so it does feel as though, like Scottie, I’ve watched the last chance at holding onto a period of my life make an exit (even if one that’s more temporary than falling out of an old Spanish mission). 

Anyway, I’m being sentimental. Vertigo is a classic, and rightfully so. In a blog dedicated to watching good movies, I’d rate this one as a good movie. 

Final thoughts:

I actually didn’t pick Vertigo because of watching Rope the day before. I picked it because I stumbled across Nerdwriter’s video on “How Alfred Hitchcock Blocks a Scene” and got put in the mood that way. There’s no way anyone reading this blog hasn’t heard of Nerdwriter before, considering that the only one reading this is Ben (hey Ben!), but if you haven’t, check out his YouTube and Tumblr pages.

The movie poster for Vertigo is pretty iconic and uses the talents of Saul Bass, who had an impressive body of work and an incalculable influence on graphic designers, read up more about him here.

The alarm sound during Scottie’s nightmare reminded me of the same alarm sound used throughout both of Tarantino’s Kill Bill movies--although I’m not sure if Tarantino intended it as a reference specifically to Vertigo (although it’s impossible to me that he’s never seen it).

It really is amazing how much more of a movie you’re able to grasp when you’re not zonked out.

Even though I’m colorblind (red-green) I could tell that the palette of this movie was colorful and really pretty. While I was watching it with my friends one of them remarked about the room where Scottie first sees Madeleine having a fantastic red wallpaper contrasting with an entire range of greens. The bulk of that effect is lost on me, which is a bummer. 

(Incidentally, Grammarly, a Chrome extension I use for spell check and light editing, doesn’t recognize “colorblind” as a word, an assertion I’m a little annoyed by).

Ben and I had a debate while watching this if Kim Novak’s blonde hair was a wig or not. I said it wasn’t, Ben won the debate.

[365-money-diary]

DAYS 22 - 28

DAY TWENTY-TWO

8:45 AM - I’m completely out of gas. Fill up at QT. $24.44

9:00 AM - I arrive at work and pour myself a toddy. I skip the toast because I’m nearing the very very smashed part of the loaf.

11:30 AM - We all decide to try this new place for lunch. I still am trying not to eat lunch out Monday - Thursday but this place seems like it has reasonable prices and healthy options. I get a tofu plate with sweet potato hash and ginger maple veggies. The portions are tiny AF and i’m still hungry when we leave. $8.64

1:30 PM - I decide to eat the soup I bought too. I was planning on buying rice to accompany it at Sprouts but now I want it as more of a snack. It’s really good and I’m happy I have it!

3:30 PM - My assistant gives me the rest of her BBQ chips because I’m still hungry.

5:15 PM - I wait ‘til the end of the day to report this because I have made many purchases throughout the day and wasn’t sure when all the invoices were going to come. I end up buying a ton more records (The Fresh and Onlys, The Wake, Ought, Protomartyr, and Tom Vek) for my set in two weeks. $110.27

5:45 PM - I arrive home and am starving still! I eat a couple pieces of bread with cherry balsamic vinegar and olive oil and some 365 “Wheat Thins” with cashew cheese.

6:00 PM - I start making rice on the stove, but end up leaving before it’s done. My boyfriend will finish cooking it for me. I make my way to Taste of Tops to meet BFF Connor. We catch up and it’s really nice. I’m still not drinking so I buy a bottled seltzer water. $2

8:45 PM - Home at last! I answer some freelance emails and eat some soup for dinner. It’s much more filling with the rice.

9:30 PM - We watch the rest of the GSW vs. Trailblazers game. It’s a complete blowout and somehow Stef Curry’s facial hair is looking more gnarly than I’ve ever seen it in the past.

10:00 PM - We watch Silicon Valley until I get tired. Boyfriend took a nap while I was meeting Connor so he stays up a little later watching bball reruns on the Firestick.

DAY TWENTY-TWO TOTAL: $145.35

DAY TWENTY-THREE

8:45 AM - We’re out of salt at the office, so I grab some from my bulk stash and a big pyrex of veggie broth soup stuff and head to the office.

9:15 AM - I’m starving by the time I get here (I think it’s the previous weekend getting back at me for skipping multiple meals), so I make a piece of smashed toast and pour myself a toddy. It’s my last cup from this batch so I make more.

12:00 PM - I walk the long way to Sprouts and call my sister. We catch up about some more logistics about RePhresh. We bid farewell when I get to the store. I buy some more Dave’s Killer Bread (not smashed this time!) and a package of organic strawberries. They’re on sale for 2.50! I pay with a prepaid Visa that my boyfriend had to give me when my only card was stolen the night before I went to San Francisco, so I pretend it’s free, but for the sake of being thorough -  $8.12

12:30 PM - I arrive back at the office and cut up some strawberries and pour myself a cup of soup. I’m either going to need more strawberries or more soup later in the day, but for now, I’m full.

2:30 PM - Chips & salsa time. Stoked that I still have this snack! It’s lasted for a really long time.

5:30 PM - I arrive at home. I snack on wheat thins and probiotic “cheese.” My boyfriend isn’t feeling so great so we lay down and watch the rest of the Rockets v. Thunder game. I fall asleep at some point for a couple minutes, but am quickly woken up after the game is finished. (Rockets won)

8:15 PM - I feel like my body has still been hating me from skipping 2 meals last weekend, so I suggest we go to Green. I get the BFF (mock chicken sandwich with cheese, avocado, ranch, peppers, lettuce and tomato) with a carrot cake Tsoynami (a Blizzard with soy ice cream) and my boyfriend gets a Big Wac with fries. I can only eat half the Tsoynami before I’m absolutely stuffed. Boyfriend polishes off the rest and we head home. $31

9:00 PM - We spend the rest of the evening hanging out on our phones and playing with Katy Perry.

DAY TWENTY-THREE TOTAL: $39.12

DAY TWENTY-FOUR

9:00 AM - I arrive at the office and check Facebook and my email. I was supposed to have a screen share meeting with Facebook but it appears they flaked on me. I keep refreshing my applications looking for an invite or a message of some sort, but no dice. By 9:10, I give up and make a piece of toast and pour myself a glass of toddy.

12:10 PM - I heat up my veggie soup broth stuff and cut up some strawberries for lunch. The rest of my office went to Zoe’s. Feels good to be back on track trying to save money by eating lunch in the office even though this broth cost me an initial arm & a leg. Thankfully next time, I have a cheaper strategy.

1:30 PM - I leave the office to head to a client meeting in Chandler with my boss.

3:45 PM - We land a six month contract! I head back to Tempe and stop at the post office to grab a package I had to sign for -- sometimes international packages make you do that and it drives me crazy since the post office tied to my residence closes at 4:30 PM. I make it just in time to grab my package.

4:15 PM - I arrive at home. The kitchen stinks and I haven’t really cleaned up from my soup, so I do the dishes and throw three spring rolls in the oven.

4:30 PM - My boss calls to congratulate me on the contract and we chat for a bit about giving this project to my assistant. It’ll be a good opportunity for her!

4:35 PM - I open all the packages I’ve been sitting on for the past week. I received a Ludus 7”, The Fall 7”, a Tears for Fears 10” a Pylon LP, a B-52’s 12”, and lastly the international package which is a Yoko Ono LP. I sort the records and then buy a rediscovered Beep Beep LP. I hated it in high school, but now it’s incredible. What was I thinking? I also see I have an invoice for a Dum Dum Girls record. $26.50

6:30 PM - Boyfriend heats up leftover pizza for dinner. I make a salad out of leftover veggie soup and sandwich ingredients.

7:15 PM - We watch the Bulls v. Celtics game for a while and my boyfriend falls asleep. I am full of energy so I take the dog for a walk to Starbucks to get her a Puppuccino for her 2nd birthday. I call my sister on the way and we FaceTime while we walk. The barista is kind of bummed that I am not buying anything and I don’t have cash on me to tip. Pure asshole status, population me.

8:00 PM - I arrive home just as the game is finishing up. Celtics win! Boyfriend is awake. We hang out in the living room for a little bit and then I help him with some work stuff pertaining to Facebook.

11:00 PM - SIlicon Valley and bed.

DAY TWENTY-FOUR TOTAL: $26.50

DAY TWENTY-FIVE

8:00 AM - I am late for a “dentist” appointment (going to a college). I text the girl who is cleaning my teeth that I’m on my way, but she texts me back and says she’s ill and wants to reschedule. I am annoyed, but at least I’m not all the way in Phoenix. I turn around and head straight to work.

8:20 AM - Toddy and toast. I text back and forth with my friend Steve who is in town from NY. We’re going to a Diamondbacks game tonight and trying to figure out logistics.

9:00 AM - I buy a NEU! Record. So close to having this set “done.” AKA I will be freaking out for a week straight praying all this stuff gets delivered on time. $16

10:30 AM - I buy a Swell Maps LP $18.94

11:15 AM - I buy a Magazine LP $26.13

11:45 AM - Raincoats invoice comes. So excited to be done buying records / also equally excited that I’m finding such cool stuff. It’s a love / hate thing.  $24.99

12:50 PM - Beginning to think the reason I’ve been so “off” (Feeling stupid hungry even though I’m eating normally) has to do more with dehydration or hypoglycemia of some sort. Gatorade usually fixes the trick so I make walk to Circle K and grab a bottle of lemon-lime. $2.33

1:30 PM - I may have been right about this Gatorade thing. Carby sugary salty water is my lifesource. My boss also hands me my paycheck which is great because I’m feeling extra broke right now. I pause to reflect on how the feeling of being broke and actually being broke are two very different things. I am so thankful for everything I have.

2:00 PM - I start looking at spiralizers on Amazon. I have been wanting one for a really long time and might make the plunge soon. I see that they make an attachment for a Kitchen Aid which is rad, but also 3 times more expensive than the cheap looking plastic one, but after watching some youtube videos, I’m sold. I check Costco quickly before making my final purchase. They don’t have it online, so Amazon it is! $77.82

3:30 PM - My freelance client fires me. Half my fault, half their fault. I’ll accept it as a wash.

4:45 PM - An old colleague of mine hits me up for freelance work. Funny how one door closes and another one immediately opens.

5:20 PM - I arrive home from work, eat a small slice of ciabatta bread with probiotic “cheese,” feed the dog and sit for a few minutes. I look out the window and see that Katy’s mom Blu is outside (They had a litter of 12 pitbulls and gave me Katy for free.) with one of her brothers named #2. I walk over to say hello, leaving Katy in the house to eat and do her business.

5:45 PM - My really good friend who lives in NY (He will likely move soon but for the sake of consistency of this timeline, I’ll refer to him as NY Friend) who is in town visiting picks me up and we head downtown.

6:20 PM - We park in the Crescent lot and walk to my boyfriend’s office to fetch him and then head to Chase Field. It’s my first Diamondbacks game (NY Friend paid for my ticket since I paid for his Coyotes ticket last time he was here.) and I have pretty low expectations. I did research prior to arrival and found that the stadium has tons of vegan options. I buy my boyfriend and me Field Roast hotdogs. We also split an order of fries and he gets a soda. NY Friend pays for his food separately. $24.75

9:00 PM - The game is already over and I have to admit, it was pretty fun! We walk back to our cars and bid NY Friend farewell. He’s in town for 8 more days, so I’m sure we will see him again. I hitch a ride home with my boyfriend and thank him for the tickets and the ride.

9:30 PM - We are making our way home from Downtown Phoenix, when we drive past this Stella Artois beer garden thing. My boyfriend informs me that our friends in MRCH played the event and since it’s free, we might as well go in and say hello. We chat for a few minutes and then head home.

10:15 PM - We’re really tired. I think about eating a snack, but decide against it as I know I’ll just fall right asleep.

DAY TWENTY-FIVE TOTAL: $190.96

DAY TWENTY-SIX

9:00 AM - It’s super overcast today. I take that as an opportunity to make a hot Chemex along with a slice of toast.

9:30 AM - I pay an invoice for a Josef K LP. $32.78

11:00 PM - I have really been trying to cut down on my food expenses by eating in the office Monday - Thursday, and since it’s nearing the end of the month, I decide to total my expenses (I only compare debit card charges because it’s all the data I really have. I rarely withdraw cash so I consider the data to be pretty accurate). Year over year, I’ve saved $53 on coffee and roughly $300 on food (I still have two days left in the month, technically I’m at $332). Suddenly spending all this money on records doesn’t feel so painful. Could you believe that the year before that (I was single and only ate out.) I spent $650 more on food than I did this year? I pat myself on the back for reeling it in.

11:45 PM - We grab lunch at Hand Cut. They’re doing a rad $10 special which includes a burg, fries, and drink. I get a veggie burg protein style (aka with lettuce, no bread -- it has eggs in it.) with salt & vinegar fries and green iced tea. $12.80

4:00 PM - We leave a little early today because we have our work done. I head home and eat the rest of the probiotic cheese with crackers and have some quality one on one time with the Kardashians.

5:30 PM - Boyfriend comes home from work. He plays a couple games of hockey on his XBox and then we head to the mall.

5:50 PM - We stop at QT so I can buy another Gatorade. I have to remember to go to Fry’s this weekend. They’re usually 10 for $10. $2.53

6:00 PM - AZ Mills is kind of a bust. Neither of us find anything and we walk out empty handed.

7:30 PM - We stop for dinner at Halal Guys. It’s my first time here, so I follow my boyfriend’s lead and order a falafel pita. I ask if their white sauce has dairy and the counter person says no. After tasting it, I know for sure it has to. We do some googling and discover there is egg whites in the sauce. In situations like this, I usually base my feelings on taking food back if it’s going to make me sick since my reasons for veganism are environmental and I don’t want to waste food. Eggs don’t bother my stomach at all, so I eat it and make a mental note that next time, I will nix the white sauce. Boyfriend pays for the meal.

8:30 PM - We arrive home and watch a documentary about the Oklahoma City bombing. I pass out shortly after.

DAY TWENTY-SIX TOTAL: $48.11

DAY TWENTY-SEVEN

9:30 AM - The dog barking in the backyard wakes me up. It feels really good to sleep in! We take our time getting out of bed and head to the Cartel. I buy our drinks today, and boyfriend buys the bagels at the combination Einstein’s Caribou. $4.25

11:30 AM - We arrive back at home. I make plans to maybe mow the lawn and organize our music room, but boyfriend is antsy and wants to run around town. I always like doing this so we head out.

12:00 PM - We go to AZ Mills. Nike Store is a bust so we head to Chandler Fashion mall. I have fun looking at Kids Foot Locker and a couple other places but neither of us really find anything. We stop at the Target nearby and I buy baby Gatorades and Gatorade powder, underwear, and vegan ranch. I file Target charges under “home and health.” $29.94

1:30 PM - We stop at Office Max and my boyfriend buys a giant calendar for his office. We also stop at Nordstrom Rack. I don’t buy anything at either of these places.

2:00 PM - We grab lunch at Sweet Tomatoes. Boyfriend has super birthday coupon. I grab the tab. He tips. $8.90

3:30 PM - Boyfriend falls asleep, so I walk to Taste of Tops. One of the bartenders is moving and selling her record collection. She used to play a bunch of old school hip-hop back in the day, but she said she had a bunch of post-punk too. Her definition of post-punk is different from my definition of post-punk, and I’m pretty bummed. I buy one record. $10

4:00 PM - I cash out for my seltzer water. I tip with extra love. $4

6:00 PM - I’m home and my boyfriend is awake from his nap. We talk about plans for the evening and we opt to stay at home. I run to Sprouts and grab some supplies needed to make dinner plus some probiotics. Total was $55.01 $25 for food and $30.01 for home & health.

8:30 PM - Dinner is served - Spiralized sweet potatoes with a thai coconut peanut sauce and broccoli. Boyfriend likes it and complimented me on being able to figure out dishes that both of us would dig.

9:00 PM - We watch a documentary about the Sandy Hook victims. It is really sad. We watch some light hearted stuff after that and fall asleep.

DAY TWENTY-SEVEN TOTAL: $112.10

DAY TWENTY-EIGHT

10:00 AM - I deposit my boyfriend’s rent check of $526.62. I also write myself a check for $500 and transfer it to Simple, a new app I’m using to segment the money I’m saving specifically for a CR-V and a new DJ mixer. After multiple issues with technological issues of linking my bank account, I’ve decided this is the “best way.” They notify me saying for new accounts, it’ll take 9 days before I see my funds. #NotSimple

1:45 PM - #NotSimple part 2 = They send me a support message saying I can’t deposit checks from personal accounts that are in my name. I try my last ditch effort to link my the account to my PayPal. I’ll know in a couple days if this route worked.

2:00 PM - Boyfriend needs a break and we go to AZ Mills. Bad decision -- it’s way too crowded so we bounce pretty fast.

2:30 PM - We fend for ourselves for lunch -- I heat up some veggie soup and he heats up a frozen evol. breakfast burrito.  

3:30 PM - I take Katy Perry for a really long walk. First we stop at Casey’s - a patio bar in my neighborhood. I get a soda water and chat with some of Tempe’s finest bike community members toward the end of their “Speed Suit Sunday” event.

4:00 PM - We make our way home and Katy seems really lethargic. We stop at King Coffee so she can get some water. I buy a sparkling water. $4.24

6:00 PM - Home at last! I hang with my boyfriend for a little bit while he takes a break from work.

7:00 PM - Dinner = frozen veggie spring rolls and peanut sauce. I’m running out soon, but that means I’ll get to go to Costco! I spend the rest of the evening pretending that I’ll read but actually just watching MasterChef Junior. Rooting for Jasmine and Shayne.

DAY TWENTY-EIGHT TOTAL: $4.24