#someone get me an extended version on dvd please

[nightblossom05]

If I Never Knew You is literally the theme of Pocahontas and John Smith's romance. The music is throughout the entire movie. It's a beautiful song to express a beautiful (though historically inaccurate) relationship. And I will forever be upset that it got cut from the movie. It's in one of the extended editions. but it isn't in the version on Disney+?? Someone please explain! The 4 minute song was so good got their relationship and acceptance of his fate. I will die mad about this.

[meowzilla93]

The people need little known facts about Baxter! Just like random headcannons, like what's his favorite holiday and why, etc. etc. Basically please just tell me more about this silly little man :)

*cracks knuckles*

me? talk about my favourite love interest in OL:BA?

Thought you'd never ask :P

favourite holiday? we already know his favourite season is fall cause nostalgia, and I almost wanna think that eventually Thanksgiving is his holiday

you absolutely know why but if i must elaborate

he is just so damn thankful for being able to reconnect with people he truly cared for, and that those people didnt give up on him; if MC romanced him, all the more thankful he has someone he can trust and rely on for the rest of his life, and that he can provide that back

but it wasnt always and only after Step 4; he needs to reconnect first for this to eventuate

and you just know that he will love hosting and cooking; any excuse to learn new recipes and show off his skills

before step 4 though? i dont think he had one, and thats his parents fault

any sort of events like these he had to attend with his family and be the 'expected perfect son' which he loathed

i do believe this is canon (pls correct if wrong) but i truly do believe he did not have any friends at his private school, and actively hated going

rebel Baxter? he sure was in his own way

spare periods between classes; he wandered off grounds to a spot where he could avoid the pompous populace

talk back to teachers? you can guarantee that; just more in that incheek way where they couldnt really punish him for what he said

can see him being the type to screw around in class and just be a bit of a bother to the teachers and students, but he was an A+ student all the way

guarantee that when asked to answer questions in class, if he was in the right sort of mood, straight up makeup facts just for the lols

(his parents might have put a stop to that real quick though)

mans was a brat we know this, and it was making the OLNF friends that made him question his life and his upbringing more

this is a touch more sad, but i think early on, he didnt really understand his parents position on things like the LBGTQIA+ community and such until he saw people he cared about be treated poorly by them, or heard what they had to say behind closed doors

i think this truly broke him and is what started the rifts in his friendships as he didnt know how to approach this (he is a kid, we cant expect him to know)

but what he did know, he NEVER wanted to be like his parents, and this is when he started his plan on moving to Virginia for uni

ahem, lets get back to some light hearted sweet stuff

i recon he went full platinum white once - pure white hair (you cannot take this away from me) but the upkeep of that was more insane than just handling black

favourite flower! rose. come on. even Cove said it in Step 1: Fancy!

though if we must choose a second option, Lupine

it has that really pretty purple colour (his second favourite colour after black and white) and its symbolism is very much on par with what he truly wants from life

google that shit, and tell me im wrong

100% reads smut; Im talking like Victorian era smut (Johanna Linsday, Amanda Quick type stuff)

October is his favourite month - the world around him was covered in that beautiful auburn colour

He loves pumpkin spiced lattes (with oat milk of course)

PRESENTS! oh oh when its Christmas time, this is the hardest thing for him because he doesnt just wanna buy something random, it needs to have meaning

You wanted to go see a museum? here are some tickets

Missed this movie when it was screening? Here is the Extended Release with all the additions DVD

You have a favourite flower or plant that you can never really have cause it doesnt grow in the climate you live in? In a frame you received a pressed and dried version of it, so you can always have it with you

.....i need to stop otherwise ill just keep going

(pls dont stop asking me though, ill talk about Baxter till death and will make a million more posts)

[witchthewriter]

Hi! I'm participating in the ship game again, because it's an addiction.

So could I please have a male ship from Buffy, Twilight and the walking dead or merlin, whichever you prefer

I'm about 5 foot (if that) in height, I have long brown hair, quite pale skin with pretty prominent freckles, blue/grey eyes and a sort of curvy build. MBTI is INFP, Hogwarts house is a gryffindor and I go by she/her pronouns.

I'm the mum friend in my group, my bag is filled with everything someone might need of a day. Hand sanitizer, hand cream, lip balm, hairbands, pens, tissues, you name it I probably have it. I like to take care of people and when the people I love are happy, I am too. That also extends into buying gifts, christmas is a busy time because I spend so much time finding perfect gifts.

My dream is to be a novelist but I would also love to be a costume designer. I just love being creative. I'd love to have a place which is mine, with comfy chairs and shelves full of books and dvds. I love watching films, especially horrors and the like.

I am pretty shy at first and I'm not too rebellious, which means for some reason my brain comes hardwired to be attracted to every bad boy on the planet at any given moment. It's a real issue.

Some more miscellaneous information about me. My favourite animals are lemurs or red pandas, my favourite colours are pale yellow and turquoise, my favourite flower is a water lily, my birthstone is a ruby and my favourite food is a dominos pizza.

Thank you!!

Thanks for participating! 

𝐁𝐮𝐟𝐟𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐕𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐞 𝐒𝐥𝐚𝐲𝐞𝐫

𝐷𝑒𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛

I ship you with Angel! His character is actually so much better in his tv series, so the Buffy version is ... kinda flat. But his character is very caring, protective and introverted. I can see you guys sitting on the couch, both reading, enjoying one another's company.

𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑠

・Calls you 'honey'. He's not overly into the pet name thing, but with you he made an exception

・Likes when you suggest dates and new things for you guys to do. Maybe he’s done them a million times, but he’s not done them with you

・Loves when you run your fingers through his hair. He often rests his head on your lap and listens to your heart beat

𝑻𝒉𝒆𝒎𝒆 𝑺𝒐𝒏𝒈:

↬ Style by Ryan Adams

𝑹𝒆𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒔𝒉𝒊𝒑 𝑻𝒓𝒐𝒑𝒆𝒔:

↬Tall Grumpy (Angel) x Short Unbothered Sunshine (You)

𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑓𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢

He loves your caring nature. Someone who cares just as much as others as he does, it takes the brunt of the effort off of him

𝑌𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑏𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑

Is Willow! I think she would love to be mummed by you - telling her to drink more water and always putting on her bandaids

𝐓𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭

𝐷𝑒𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛

I ship you with Jacob Black! I think he would really appreciate your togetherness, and caring nature. In return, he would protect you with everything he has, no matter the cost.

𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑠

・Tried to keep his secret from you for the longest time. But your curiosity got the best of you, and you couldn’t help but snoop. You actually accidentally found out about the pack one night, and from then, you were the only stranger to see the wolves. (Well, human stranger...besides Bella.)

・He gives the warmest hugs, and he’s constantly warm. Cuddling next to him, especially in the winter, is the epitome of perfect

・Likes to hound you when you’re reading or writing or doing work. He loves having your attention

𝑻𝒉𝒆𝒎𝒆 𝑺𝒐𝒏𝒈:

↬ The Train by James Newton Howard

𝑹𝒆𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒔𝒉𝒊𝒑 𝑻𝒓𝒐𝒑𝒆𝒔:

↬ Troublemaker x WHY DO YOU KEEP GETTING IN TROUBLE!?

𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑓𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢

He loves that you dream of being a novelist. Well, he loves your dreams in general. And that a lot of them include him.

𝑌𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑏𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑

Is Alice Cullen, I think she would be such a fun friend. And you wouldn’t judge her like a lot of people do. Literally, anyone who comes in contact with her judges her a little, but not you

𝐌𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐧

𝐷𝑒𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛

I ship you with Gawaine or is it Gwaine? Either way, I ship you with him. I think you would be instantly attracted to him. And your relationship would follow the plot line of ‘you fell first but he fell harder.”

𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑠

・Calls you every single pet name. ‘Sweetheart,’ ‘love,’ ‘darling,’ ‘my love,’ ‘my world.’

・ He loves getting a rise out of you. Doing stupid things to make you worried about him. But then you show him that you’d care about him even if he didn’t do the most ridiculous things

・Always brings you a flower every time you see each other

𝑻𝒉𝒆𝒎𝒆 𝑺𝒐𝒏𝒈:

↬ Flying with Mother by John Powell

𝑹𝒆𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒔𝒉𝒊𝒑 𝑻𝒓𝒐𝒑𝒆𝒔:

↬ Dumbass x Oh God I Guess That’s My Dumbass

𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑓𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢

He loves that you truly care about his well-being. He’s been alone by himself for so long, and so reliant on only him, that having someone who wonders about him is overwhelming

𝑌𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑏𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑

Is Merlin! I think you guys would have so much banter and share so many sarcastic remarks. 

[aeonmagnus]

Happy 20th Anniversary Robots In Disguise!

This year, and today in particular, marks the 20-year anniversary of Transformers Robots in Disguise airing in the United States.  This was the official English language dub of the Japanese show Transformers Car Robots, which aired in Japan the year before.   This show and it’s accompanying toy line were a big shift in the Transformers brand and affected how things moved forward in the new millennium.  It was also a big influence on me and this website in it’s early years, so both the brand and TFW2005 may not be what it is today without it.

We hope you will read on after the break to check out our celebration of Robots in Disguise on it’s 20th!

Intro

The following is not a comprehensive article on the show proper, but rather a trip down memory lane from my personal perspective.  It was a period of change in my life, in the fandom, in the brand, and in the world – all happening at once.  Robots in Disguise was smack dab in the middle of it all and I think that’s why it still resonates with me all these years later.  For a deeper dive into the world of Robots In Disguise you can check RIDForever.info, a site I maintain just about RID and Car Robots. The 2021 updates are here, and the 2017 round of updates are here.  I’d also suggest checking the TFWe issue all about RID over on the 2005 Boards.  Now, onto today’s festivities…

The Show

RID, and yes I say RID as if it is the only RID.  If you must reference that other RID show and it’s off-shoots, refer to it as RID 201x, thanks. 😊 RID aired during the Fox Kids programming block on a Saturday morning, with additional episodes set to air each weekday during the afternoon hours.  Instead of stretching the show out over the course of 30+ weeks with only a new ep each weekend, they were going to blaze through it non-stop.  By the end of the first week, we would have been 7 eps in.  That however hit a big roadblock due to 9/11 just three days later.  While some local markets did air the episodes, many larger city networks, and especially east coast markets, stuck with news coverage.   Many of us did not catch the early episodes on TV the first go around.  In addition, several of the episodes got pulled from TV due to depictions of buildings being destroyed and other similar visuals which understandably could upset children that just experienced 9/11.  So right off the bat, the new millennium and new era of Transformers were dealing with a new reality.

The show, for those that don’t know – was a weird one-off in Transformers history.  We had G1 and then the G2 remixes for a bit.  Beast Wars came on the scene and ran all the way through 2000 with it’s successor – Beast Machines.   During the Beast Wars era – Japan did a couple of their own Beast Wars shows, non-CGI extensions of what we saw in the US.   Their market wasn’t quite ready for full CGI so they stuck with traditional anime.  When Hasbro decided to continue Beast Wars into Beast Machines, Takara went a completely different way – a traditional animated show which brought back Autobots and “Decepticons”, mixing them in with the beasts.  They focused the toys on a couple new and complex molds, then filled the rest of the line with repaints of previous toys.  Old 2nd tier Beast Wars toys, G2 Laser Prime, and even some Generation 1 molds in the form of the Combaticons got new life as new characters in this show, capped with the biggest TF of them all at the time – a repainted G1 Fortress Maximus, now Brave Maximus.  It was the prototype for what the Transformers brand did for years to come – repainting old toys into new characters.  Universe, Classics, Botcon, and even some Generations runs used this method to give us some great toys in the 00s.

While there is a very complicated and long explanation for how every single Japanese show is one continuity, to someone casually starting with Car Robots it was a refresh, a new story, a new arrival on Earth.  The Autobots vs the Predacons, and eventually the Combatrons/Decepticons. It was a hard cut from the last 5 years or so of CGI Beasts.  Hand drawn traditional animation featuring vehicle Transformers.  It wasn’t G1, but many of the folks who grew up with G1 were just getting out of college around this time.  They were rediscovering their childhood love of Transformers through Beast Wars, flea market finds, raids on their parents’ attics and basements, and for the internet savvy – imports of Japanese reissues from Takara.  It was a perfect storm of nostalgia; a return to Autobots and Decepticons was welcomed by kids and adults alike.

RID and TFW2005

In the years leading up to Car Robots, I was just getting into the internet, coding, design, some digital music, and all the possibility that came with it.  Beast Wars, especially when it hit Season 2/3 and the inclusion of G1 lore, really got me focusing on Transformers again as a hobby.  I eventually combined the two newfound hobbies into one and Transformer World 2005 was born.  At no point did I ever think it would last 20+ years and take over my life in the way it did.  I started the full version of TFW2005 around April 2000, with some starts and stops before that.  That was right around when Car Robots started airing in Japan.  Through the magic of 56k internet, I was able to connect with folks in Japan and get them to send me VHS tapes of Car Robots.  Really nice, high-quality tapes too, I still have them hehe.  To the younglings reading – try to picture this: no youtube, no video sharing. The concept of streaming anything did not exist yet. Napster and the eventual peer to peer stuff hadn’t fully kicked off.  Plus, we were all viewing the internet on giant computers in our rooms at the speed of 1x on your phone.  Less than 1 bar 3G mobile speeds today.

Yes, someone recorded episodes from TV to video tape over there, did that a couple weeks at a time, then physically mailed them across the world to me, who then got them on the internet.  Can you imagine waiting weeks to watch an episode of TV the size of a twitter profile avatar?  Crazy.  Uploading a full episode to the internet was a big pain in the ass, not easily done.  I decided to get a converter that allowed me to plug my VCR into the computer and encode the tape into digital format.  From there, it was reduced using Microsoft’s WMV technology so that the episodes were about 5 MB each.  30 minute episodes at 5MB each. Dimensions – 176 x 144 pixels.  4k video today – 3840 x 2160 pixels.  You can imagine that video looked like crap.  But we didn’t care – we were blown away.  Old school animation, vehicles, some cool Japanese anime vibes, it was what we as G1 fans kinda had in the back of our heads on what Transformers should be in a new era, and we were seeing it.  Most of us had no clue what they were saying or what was going on.  Also didn’t care.  I still to this day think CR/RID is better like that.

So one of the first things TFW2005 did on the internet was provide these super small windows into Car Robots and what was going on in Japan. It helped get US fans hyped up for what Transformers could be. It got us wanting the toys, and importers bringing the Takara toy line over were moving serious product.  It helped swing Hasbro, who was planning to return to Autobots and Decepticons again down the road, to move that schedule up.  Instead of running Beast Machines until 2002 and then starting what we now know as the Unicron Trilogy, it was cut short.  Robots in Disguise as a toy line and show came over in 2001, ran fast and hard for a year with non stop releases, got extended because it did so well, and then faded into the Universe line of repaints.  The new millennium of Transformers was here and Robot In Disguise kicked it off with a bang.

Wrap Up

As we all continue with collecting Transformers now, regardless if you tagged into the fandom during G1, Beasties, the Unicron Trilogy, the Movies, or just yesterday – let’s take the time to give Car Robots and RID some props!  It set the tone for what the new millennium of the brand would be.  It gave us some toys ahead of their time.  It solidified the repaint as an accepted thing in the hobby. And it gave us one crazy 39 episode run of TV that’s still a fun ride 20 years later.

For those that would like to learn more about RID and Car Robots – I still maintain a Robots in Disguise website that archives everything I have or came across.  There is a lot there if you want to go on a tour of all the awesome Car Robots and Robots In Disguise era stuff.  Check it out at RIDFOREVER.INFO! FIYAH!

Let us know what you think and remember from the good old days of RID on the 2005 Boards here!

Epilogue

If someone over there at Hasbro is reading – can someone please figure out who owns the rights to the show in the US market and then get it out on DVD in full, finally?  Work all that funky licensing stuff out (if there is any) and get it done.  The US has never had access to it via an official release.  Maybe get it up on YouTube like G1?  Something.  Announcing plans for that before the end of 2021 would be a nice 20th anniversary tribute.

[wordssplatteredoncement]

The Room is a Strange Place

Everybody has a back pocket story or two. You know the kind? The tales you pull out of your ass when trying to impress, or just entertain. I’ve divulged a couple of those cherished stories (on this very blog) over the years. I implore you to scroll a bit if you want to read about a physical altercation with a “pimp” on the Las Vegas strip or night spent with a close friend, two upset stomachs, a backed-up hotel tonight, and the culmination leading to several homeless people watching me shit in a public restroom. This story isn’t as grandiose, so I don’t want to over-hype it, but it does make me laugh every time I think about/ tell it and, I don’t know about you, I could use some laughter. Shall we proceed?

My brother and I have an unhealthy obsession with awful films. I’m not sure how it started, but we’ve always found a great deal of humor in horrible flicks. For as long as I can remember, he and I have gathered around a television set for hours watching countless “how on earth did someone create this?” movies. Our love of rancid cinema has extended to our close friends in the form of “So Bad, It’s Good” movie nights. We lure our loved ones in with the promise of as much booze, candy, and popcorn they can handle, and subject them to this perverse passion for terrible acting, cinematography, writing, lighting, set design, etc. We’re constantly in search of the next pile of trash to give an excuse to transform our living room into a shitty version of Mystery Science Theater 3000. There are some who long for the next Avengers and, while I will watch that, these bad movies speak more to my sensibilities. 

In the mid-2000′s there were rumblings that a new champion had taken the crown for worst flick ever made. The internet was ablaze with this laughably bad, nonsensical movie that was only showing in Los Angeles. The movie was titled “The Room” and it was written, produced, and starring a man I’d never heard of before, Tommy Wiseau. Not one to torrent, I spent the next few evenings learning everything I could about this film. Each review, both those that were in on this being a god-awful blunder, and those that, seemingly, weren’t hip to the fact that this was largely considered the Citizen Kane of abhorrent films, made me salivate at the chance of getting my hands on this piece of substandard pop culture. While the reviews were enough for me to know this was a “must-see” it was the interviews with the man behind it all himself, Tommy Wiseau, that drove my desire to see this film. His cadence, accent, mannerisms, look, laughter.. everything about the man just leapt out as a truly original cat. I became just as intrigued about the man behind the film, as I did about the motion picture, itself. 

Some time passes and I find myself at San Diego Comic Con, as I had many times before. For those of you uninitiated, think of San Diego Comic Con as the biggest nerd/ pop-culture orgy ever created. 120k+ plus descend upon Southern California to share their unadulterated love of movies, television, toys, and yes, comics. I went with someone who was newly christened my ex-girlfriend, thinking we could just work through things, as we’d each spent a great deal of money on the trip prior to the break up. This was a mistake. We were at each other’s throats more than a vampire at a hydra gathering. That is to say, any second away from her was more than welcomed. When she informed me that she wanted to take a nap, I used this time as a breath of fresh air (as fresh as can be in a sea of people who don’t treat personal hygiene as a top priority, that is). I hit the convention floor, in seek of an autograph of the creator of Invader Zim, Jhonen Vasquez. I’m weaving through the convention hall, when I see the man I’d become infatuated with... Tommy Wiseau. “Hey kid (I’m in my mid-late twenties at this point, mind you), you wanna buy a movie?” Without hesitation, I fired back “FUCK YEAH I DO!! How much?” This is when things got a little weird.. or Wiseau..

“For my biggest fan? Ten dollars.”, Mr. Wiseau said. “Biggest fan? He randomly stopped me, and I haven’t even seen this movie.”, I thought, but didn’t say a word, only reached for my wallet. I handed him a sweaty $10 bill, he goes to hand me the film, but reels back a second. “Do you want me to sign it?”, he asked. “Yes, please!!”, I fired back. Tommy pulled out a pin, started murmuring something, then signed my DVD. “Do you want GREH (he was saying “Greg”, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying through his accent) to sign it?” I didn’t know who “GREH” (I later found out this was Greg Sestero, another star of the film and inspiration for the movie) was, but sure, why not? As I awaited my newly autographed copy of my most anticipated movie of that year, Tommy chimed in again. “Would you like a soundtrack?”. “Um, how much?”, I cautiously treaded. “For my biggest fan? Are you kidding me? It free for you.” Genuinely creeped out, I said “Sure”. Tommy then turns and screams at a child no older than 7 to fetch me a soundtrack. The kid scurried off out of sight, leaving me with me with Tommy and “GREH”. A couple of minutes passed before the youngster returned, without soundtrack in hand. “WHERE IS THE SOUNDTRACK!?”, Tommy bellowed. “We’re all out.”, squeaked the kid. “HOW COULD YOU DO THIS IN FRONT OF MY BIGGEST FAN!?!”, Wiseau roared, then turned and asked me, “I’m so sorry. Would you like a t-shirt?”. “Oh, that’s okay. I don’t want to be any trouble.”, I said in genuine fear. “No trouble at all. GO GET HIM A SHIRT!!”, he screamed at the minor. “It’s really no problem at all for my biggest fan”, Tommy reiterated as he put me in a vice-like headlock. So there I am, in a Wiseau-headlock, standing next to “Greh”, when I notice something. There is a line of dozens of people, all holding copies of The Room, waiting to get their movies signed. In front of them, is a woman holding a sign that states “The Room: Front of the line”. Being a Comic-Con veteran, I realized these people were there to meet this man I stumbled across, had spent several minutes with, and was now awaiting a free shirt while in a wrestling hold by the man they were trying to meet. The daggers that were cast from the looks of those waiting in line would have killed me, if Tommy’s anaconda-like grip on my neck didn’t first. When the child reemerged, he handed me a shirt. I thanked the child, Tommy, “Greh”, and said my goodbyes. “Thanks for being my biggest fan. HAHAHAHAHA!!” I could hear Wiseau wail across the throng of nerds. 

And there it is, my story of a strange encounter with a bizarre man who made one of Hollywood’s worst. I love The Room. I’m not entirely sure if I love it purely because of how bad it is, or have an affection for it due to the aforementioned meeting with the people who created it. Either way, it goes down as one of my favorite celebrity encounter moments and genuinely a film I watch more than those that make my “favorite film” list. It’s a movie I’ve subjected several friends victims to, and one that I can’t wait to put others through. That moment in time, and the flick itself, is a constant reminder, that even when life hands you lemons, you can always chuck them at somebody. 

[jelliclesong]

Let me just preface this by saying I love the musical, I loved the movie, and I’m almost certainly going to buy it when it comes out on DVD. That said, I have some Thoughts about Cats. (in no particular order, because fuck that.)

 Tagging @captainschmoop and @wendigutz, who asked for this. For the rest of y’all, have a read-more:

-So, the straight-up human feet? -1000/10, Do Not Want, will feature in every nightmare I have for the rest of my life, oh gods.

-Dame Judy Dench, I love you. That said, please stop making eye contact with me through the camera.

-We got the pre-patched version, so some of this may change, but the way things interacted with other things was occasionally VERY strange. No one’s (creepy, human) feet touch the ground properly, Mistoffelees’ ears kept phasing through his hat, the tails and ears in general didn’t read like cats’, and the amount and style of fur occasionally changed from one shot to the next. Also, for some reason Dame Judy Dench appeared to be compressed in a way that no one else was.

-Someone who isn’t ace please watch Rum Tum Tugger’s song and tell me if it wasn’t sexy because I don’t find things in general sexy/am attracted to weird shit, or if it wasn’t sexy because it was bad. (I’m inclined to believe it’s the latter, but I’m curious what other people think.)

-Sir Ian McKellen is living his best life and I adore him.

-Boy howdy are they trying /real/ hard to give this thing a plot, huh. 

-The dialogue is jarring, mostly because of its existence. 

-I did not need to know what a Taylor Swift/Andrew Lloyd Webber collaborative song would sound like, and now that I do know I wish I didn’t.

-Seriously, they cut chunks out of a couple other songs just so they could add that in. 

-Y’all did my girl Teazer dirty and I’m not pleased.

-Cute patterning on her and Mungojerrie, at least. I dig the colours. 

-We’re not talking about Rebel Wilson. I refuse.

-We are really, REALLY not talking about Taylor Swift.

-Macavity, weirdly, was a disappointment. I think it was because they were trying too hard to make him a Hollywood-villain-with-a-character-arc maybe? But something about it just felt really flat by the end.

-I was Very Concerned they were going to do the entire Growltiger song. Like, I love that song, but it’s hella racist and we really need to leave it in the past thanks.

-I love this Mistoffelees and I’m keeping him.

-This is more a preference of mine, but I missed Scottish Skimbleshanks. 10/10 for the mustache, though.

-Milk bar? The fuck?

-They seem to have fixed a lot of the scaling weirdness from the trailer (context did help with that)

-Someone somewhere in this process is Very invested in Victoria/Mistoffelees/Munkustrap as a threesome. Like. /Very/ invested. I’ve seen fanfic that was less overt.

-The extending nails were a little too far over into uncanny valley for me.

-The weird “Pound on the floor and meow” take on applause was wildly disconcerting.

-I was pleasantly surprised; all of the singing was decent. Some sound balancing weirdness here and there, but the voices were good, and for the most part I liked the style shifts they did to things.

-Overall? I really enjoyed it. There are definitely things I’d have done differently, but it isn’t nearly as awful as the entire internet would have had me believe, so I’mma call it a win. (and honestly, I’m used to people holding up Cats like some shiny example of “bad theater”, like you get bonus points for hating it with some cosmic theater critic.)

[5questions]

Sebastian Castillo

Sebastian Castillo’s 49 Venezuelan Novels is a magical book of unique and surreal micro-fiction with a new story on every page. Full of depth and imagination, Castillo uses imagery in a simple yet intense way. From stories of fish markets to spiteful violins, it almost seems that these novels are snippets of family stories long passed down, just now put to paper. With the nature of a born storyteller, Sebastian Castillo provides readers with gorgeous stories.

-from the publisher; buy the book here

How did you plan and edit this book? How did you decide on “49”? How did you decide on “novels”?

I wrote it slowly, piecemeal, like most things I’ve written. I’m not sure when, exactly, I decided to frame them as novels. Right now, I’m remembering how Félix Fénéon’s Novels in Three Lines affected me when I first read it—maybe some of that seeped in. Another big influence was the Borges quote I used as an epigraph: that one could reduce a 500-page book to a few pages. I wanted to push that further by crystalizing a novel in a paragraph, or a sentence. Calling them novels felt right to me—I wanted to believe they were novels, and by believing that for long enough, they became novels. I decided on 49 because the number felt incomplete, like there was something missing which the reader would have to put together, somehow. I wanted to invite the reader to play with me.

There is a constant tension of transition and change in each of these novels. Why is time and its movement so hard for us to grasp?

I’m glad you thought so.

I don’t know if I’ll be able to answer the question well. But I’ll say—one of the things that I’ve struggled with most in my life is accounting for my experience of time. I’ve dealt with a lot of death: several family members, my mother, my friends. I’m sad that things which felt so long, so detailed, so exact, can often wash away the longer you live. There’s entire portions of my life I barely remember! Georges Perec said, “I can’t remember my childhood.” Me neither, and sometimes I would extend that to yesterday.

I had to write my mother’s obituary last year. I was in a state of shock at the time—I think I still am. She was the person I loved most in the world. While writing it, I was heartbroken by how an entire life—with all its flavor and peculiarity—was flattened into a list. It felt both comedic and merciless. Maybe that’s one of the reasons I was drawn to writing fiction: to work in a medium dedicated to damaging time and its dull, insistent violence. If that sounds grandiose and pathetic, it’s because it is. But I have to do something.

There are no markers of products or pop culture allusions in these pieces, and yet we live around popular consumer culture everyday. Why did you decide to disregard these influences in your prose?  

There are a few echoes from real life scattered throughout, mostly from my childhood: cheese arepas, Parque Central (the neighborhood where I grew up in Caracas), and maybe one or two other things. I did, however, intentionally limit those real-world markers. I wanted the book, and the world it evokes, to live in a different reality, somewhere between a street corner you can smell and a poorly remembered dream. The “Venezuela” of the book is an imaginary place, I think—one that exists only there.

What is your day to day life like? What’s your work? When do you write?

I’m an adjunct instructor. I teach English and Creative Writing. I used to live in Philadelphia for many years, and I now live in Mount Vernon, NY, where I grew up after leaving Venezuela. I love teaching and hope I can do it indefinitely. In terms of writing: I tend to have periods where I’m working on things consistently, and fallow periods where I’m somewhat ignoring writing. I used to think it was important to write everyday—and I’m sure it is for some people—but I’ve come to accept that it’s not for me. I read every day, and that’s always been more important to me than writing.

What future projects are you working on? Do you see yourself ever returning to this medium of mini concept novels?

I’m not sure if I’ll return to the mini-novel. I tend to build larger projects off a formal conceit, and am frequently prone to starting new things and never finishing them. So I think, at least for now, I’m done with them.

I’m almost finished with my next book, Not I, which is in the tradition of formalist autobiographical texts—things like Joe Brainard’s I Remember, Édouard Levé’s Autoportrait, and Lyn Hejinian’s My Life. I take the 25 most common verbs in the English language and run them through every verb tense with a first-person statement. Here’s an excerpt, from the Simple Future section:

I will be something very small.

I will grow into jealousy.

I will do what has to be done.

I will say plain, nasty things.

I will get what I want.

I will make do.

I will go to the poet’s moon.

I will know too much about the government.

I will take out the trash.

I will see Atlantis, but not for a long time.

I will come when called by my lord, unfortunately.

I will think about serious illness.

I will look up my own skirt.

I will want more when I’m rich and lonely.

I will give coal to both friends and traitors.

I will use your porcelain bathtub now.

I will find the things you’ve been hiding from me.

I will tell your secrets to nationally distributed magazines.

I will ask for nothing in return.

I will work until I can get away with doing nothing.

I will seem suspicious, but please trust me.

I will feel that terrible pressure.

I will try a new path.

I will leave you with this.

I will call the police on myself.

I started working on it a few years ago as a bit of a diversion. But what began as an Oulipean/conceptual exercise became, at least for me, something exciting and playful. I hope to publish it at some point.

The other thing I’m “working” on: an audio commentary for 49 Venezuelan Novels called “The DVD Commentary of 49 Venezuelan Novels Deluxe Edition.” Remember those commentary tracks that used to come with movies on DVDs? Maybe they still have a version of that, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen one. I always liked how they created a separate experience, something distinct from the original movie—watching someone watch something. So I’d like to do a version of that with the book. My plan is to disparage the book and the person who wrote it.

[el-dibidibidorado1]

Untamed Pt.7

Pairings: Bucky Barnes x plus size MASTERLIST

A/n: sorry for the late update! I hope you guys had a wonderful Thanksgiving!!!

"Y/N?!"

Noooooo it's my day off! Pulling the blankets over my head and rolled over.

"Y/N?!" Noooooooo.

"Y/N!" Angrily I sit up and bring the blanket down. My eyes open and....... What the fuck? There is a Christmas tree in the middle of my room?! Oh my god there is a real pine tree in the middle of my room!

Slowly, I crawl out of my bed and sit In front of the tree. The smell filled my nose heavenly and the ornaments.......looked familiar. Except for this one, a turtle dove? My fingers softly touch the dove. Who put this here? All of this.

"Y/N" Mom and Ed open my door with scared and angry expressions.

"Someone broke i-" mom looked at the Christmas tree and looked back at me then back at the tree.

"Ta-ta da" I nervously say and extend my arms out.

"I don't know if I should ask how this got here?" Ed pointed at the tree.

"Good. Cause I don't know how either" they both came in and sat next to me looking at the tree. It's beautiful. Whoever placed it here is amazing. Creepy, but amazing.

"It smells amazing" all of us take a deep breath, taking in the wonderful smell. Who knows how long we sat there just looking at the tree.

"Who wants pancakes?" I asked.

"Me" Mom said touching the turtle dove

"This is new" I nod my head and take it down.

"Usually there is two. One for a friend and one to keep, but here we have one."

"Should we freak out about all of this?" Ed questioned. I feel like if I should, but I don't. Why? Why can't I freak out about this?

"Oooh these are nice!" I look at Ed playing with some sunglasses. The sunglasses! I forgot to give them to Bucky! Aw man!

"Take those off! They are a gift to someone!" I get up and take them off his huge head.

"WHO?" He asked childish, putting his hands to the side.

"Someone special" I place them in the desk.

"Well I'm going to make the pancakes, get ready we're going to grandma's" we all got up and went out separate ways. Getting my clothes ready I head to the shower. The marks are gone but now there is a scar left behind, make up will do.

With no care I put my music on and get in the shower. I have gone back to showering once a one or twice times a day and it is fine, still feel dirty, but I can't let it get to me.

I let the music take over me and begin singing while washing my hair.

~send you my love on a wire~

~lift you up every time~

~everyone oooooooooo~

The thought of someone breaking in kinda scared me, and the thought of someone placing it in my room while I was sleeping made it worst. Holy shit! I mean the tree is beautiful, but who could have put it in there it's super heavy, and so quietly too. Rosie and Caroline know that I wanted a really tree for Christmas! Them bitches will give me socks or something they dont want. They are out.

A real Christmas tree is all I wanted! But who did I also mentioned that I wanted one. Then the realization hit me like a bowling ball hitting a pin.

"BUCKY!" I yell and open my eyes making soap get in. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck that stings. I hurry and get the soap off and finish my shower in a speedy.

Quickly I dry my body and comb my hair. I should have known from the beginning that it was him. My stomach began to get butterflies as I thought about Bucky bringing a pine tree into my house quietly. He gave me a real Christmas tree for Christmas!

"Mom! I need to go somewhere can I get the car?!" I yelled running down the stairs.

"Is 12:37 we need to be at grandmas at 2" she was still making pancakes.

"I'll be back super duper fast!" She gave me her serious look. Come on, please.

"Please I need to go" I gave her my best puppy eyes. Fall for them, fall for them! She threw me the keys, happily I gave her a kiss and ran out. As i raced to Bucky's place I began trying to wrap the sunglasses. That's it! Is that all I am going to really give him! NO! I need to buy him something else! Should I just wait? Or give him the sunglasses?

"Nope! I'm waiting!" Getting out of the car I slip on ice but manage to get a hold of the car door. Getting myself together I go and knock on his door.

Knock knock knock!

I wait for 10 minutes but he doesn't answer. Ugh he's not home! I hit my head against the door. After a couple of seconds I get in the car and head straight home. What did I expect? he has family, duh. Getting home I literally flop myself on the couch.

"Where were you?" Ed asked me.

"Hukmmmmmm" my face was squished against the pillow.

"Huh?"

"I know who gave meee the tree!!!!" Shouted into the pillow. He sat next to me and put a hand on my back.

"His name is Bucky Barnes." He just hummed.

"Ed say something?"

"What do I say?"

"I dont know?! Something?!"

"Is he different?" I nod

"Is he like the other guys?" I shake my head

"Have you....you know?" I shake my head again. I lift my head and look at the destroyed artificial tree. A little chuckle escaped me thinking about Bucky just trying to get all the ornaments.

"How did you guys meet?"

"Work" I sit up trying to fix my hair. He didn't ask anything else. We ate and went to grandma's. We did the same thing over and over again, eat dinner, sit In front of the t.v. or look at the stupid fake tree, then open presents and asking where my boyfriend is, then we eat more. Same. Shit. Over. And. Over. Again.

--------------

"Hey Bucko" Tony sat next to me while drinking his spiked eggnog.

"Hey" he gave me one and I gladly drank it. Alcohol didn't affect Steve or I. Super solder serum.

"Ready for presents?" I nod my head and look at the tree. Damn, Tony goes all out! The thing is almost touching the ceiling.

"You know I didn't buy anything for you guys......i thought I wasn't going to come."

"Hey. Your presence is better than anything" he puts his head on my shoulder and finishes his eggnog.

"Tony what are you doing?" Nat asked amused.

"Don't ruin the moment!" Tony yelled and began digging into his pocket.

"Here take a picture. And post it on my Twitter account. Saying something nice" he put his head back on my shoulder and his hand on my chest like a couple.

"Smile honey"

"No" i deadpan.

"Come On sweetheart" I try moving away but he pulls me back down.

"COME ON. LOVE MEEEEE" I manage to get up and Tony falls to the floor getting a hold of my leg.

"3......2......1!" Nat takes the picture. She showed us the picture cracking up.

"Ohh Oh this is perfect" Tony let's me go and grabs his phone and process to upload the picture.

"Come and open presents!" Steve yells. Once we where all in the room Sam had a Santa hat while giving out the presents. Everyone got a bunch of presents! I got one but it didn't matter I felt good. Bunch of clothes and video games where scattered across the room it was amazing! It felt like home, I just missed someone.

"I know......Buck" Steve caught my attention from Peter teaching me how to use my new phone.

"Hm?" Both Steve and Tony give me a heavy box.

"This is from all of us." Tony said with a huge smile on his face. I began ripping the paper. Man, I felt so excited! I don't care if i just got two presents they ment something important. A record player!

"Look inside" clint said.

A bunch of old records that I enjoyed from the past. I got up and hugged Steve for the wonderful memory before war.

"Hey Bucko" I felt overwhelmed by the gift that a lump formed in my throat.

"There is something else Buck" I look at them and they had huge smiles.

"We might have gotten Tony to make you a mp3 player and put new music in there. It's the songs we think you might like. Some of our favorites too" Clint said as I open the small box inside the case.

"Thank you" I mumbled. I feel overwhelmed with comfort and care.

" Mr. Bucky sir are you crYING? " slowly I wipe my cheek. I guess I am. I try to hid the little tears but I guess I failed.

"I guess I am kid" I lightly chuckled and Peter gave me a bone crushing hug.

"DoN' t cRY" I...

"Peter..." can't...

"Peter........" breath..

"PeTER!!"

"Yes Mr.Stark?"

"Let him go. He can't breath!" Soon as he let go I felt myself take a large amount of air.

"Damn kid you got a strong hold" my voice came out raspy. Laughter filled the room.

---------

"Here we are Buck" Steve turned on the truck. He wanted to drive to my studio. 3 hour drive just talking and singing like old times.

"Thanks Steve and Sam"

"Yeah whatever. But next time can we hear music from this era! I wanna hear some Kanye West man!" Sam kept on blabbing and blabbing. Ignoring Sam I got out and walked to my door with my stuff.

"Hey" I whip my head to the side and see Y/n.

"Hey. What are you doing here?" I open the door and let her in first.

"Thanks. Umm I wanted to th-thank you for the tree. It's beautiful" her cheeks turned pink. "Welcome" I mumbled and placed my stuff on the bed.

"I got you something.." she gave me a Christmas bag. "It's not like your gift sadly. I wish I could give you something better" I open the bag and see the sunglasses that i wanted and a DVD movie. Dumbo.

"We can finally see the movie. If you want." She was nervous, I can tell. All I need is her presence, she made this Christmas better.

"Y/n, you watching the film with me will make my Christmas perfect"

Tags: @tnupsweetpie

[poirott]

hey there any idea where to watch all of the murder on the orient express deleted scenes? :)

Hey there, anon! Thank you for your ask. There are 11 deleted scenes on the Murder on the Orient Express (2017) dvd. Some have been uploaded online via media outlets and some by fans. I’m including links to the uploads, and my own screencaps of the rest of the scenes:

- Hotel Check-in - Poirot arrives at the Tokatlian hotel in Istanbul. He’s telegrammed specific orders about his room reservation (10 bath towels, 10 bottles of mineral water, etc). The scene introduces his OCD. I did a gif set of it.

- Poirot Bedtime Rituals - We see Poirot’s slimming exercises routine and moustache grooming. He’s wearing a corset. Here’s a gif set. The only look we have at Poirot’s famous moustache kit. Ken Branagh talks about the kit here.

- Pierre Michel (the conductor) interview - The only suspect interrogation scene they cut. It’s a shame because Marwan Kenzari’s performance is touching, and the location they went with for the interview is visually interesting.

- Departure - A great shot of the Orient Express leaving the station. We see all the characters inside the traincars as they speed past the camera. Poirot is at the very end in the last car, looking pleased. This isn’t a CGI scene, it was shot in camera.

- The following tweet from a fan has a video of three deleted scenes:

1) The Mr Ratchett/Poirot sequence from the Arasta Bazaar/Alternate Opening scene, an alternate - and much longer - intro scene of several characters before they get to board the train. The widowed Mrs Hubbard is chatting up a bunch of local children, Pilar Estravados the missionary is talking to a jewelry seller, Miss Debenham is taking pictures on her camera and spots the Count and Countess Andrenyi.

In the movie we only see Ratchett and the Count and Countess Andrenyi at the cafe, but no Poirot, who got cut out. In the full deleted scene he’s got a bigger role, he sees the Count fighting the paps and is about to intervene (rising from his chair), when the Countess arrives and the fighting stops. Poirot sits down again. He’s eating a lot of food, and getting excited over famous desert, and like the clip in the tweet shows, Mr Ratchett is also ordering him a bottle of champaigne, but Poirot asks for a cup of hot chocolate instead, and toasts Mr Ratchett in thanks. Chefs making the chocolate for Poirot and closeups of Godiva chocolate do not appear in either the deleted scene or the theatrical cut. I giffed the Godiva sequence here. 

2) Dreamscape - The full “Poirot vision”-like scene in b&w in which we get inside Poirot’s mind. It’s a sort of re-cap of the different clues Poirot’s gathered so far. He’s looking at all the suspects one by one, and there’s a cool group shot of them facing him. More on this scene below.

3) bits of the Poirot Bedtime Rituals scene I’ve already mentioned.

That’s all the scenes I’ve managed to find online, there might be more out there, the studio took down several clips. The ones left from the dvd are:

- Alternate Opening - B&w scene of Colonel Armstrong alone in a gloomy, darkened living room. He’s watching a projector clip of himself, his wife and daughter at play when they were all happy and carefree. Little Daisy is playing with her teddybear and dolly.

- Newsreel (Extended) - B&w reel of news footage and newspaper clippings about the Armstrong kidnapping case, “the story that shocked the world”. It serves as background info for the audience. Shots of the crime scene, the funeral, mother screaming on the floor, Daisy’s teddybear guarding a fresh grave.

- Breakfast - The extra footage that was cut from the Wailing Wall scene. After Poirot exposes the Chief Inspector, the Inspector wants to attack him from behind but Poirot intercepts with his cane without looking back. He doesn’t see the breakfast boy with the eggs who’s followed him to the Wall, and he swings his cane, hitting theeggs by accident. The tops of the eggs the boy is holding out to him, are cut off. Next shot is of Poirot finally eating breakfast, he’s seated by the Wall, with the boy and a waiter standing beside him.

- Train Montage - A short clip of Orient Express staff/waiters setting the tables, bringing in crates of food, arranging champaigne bottles, etc. Just a few extra shots that didn’t make it into the film.

- Luggage - Bouc and Michel the conductor going through some of the passengers’ luggage. Mostly closeups of the contents of their suitcases, with quick shots of Estravados the missionary, Schmidt the maid, Marquez the salesman and Hardmanthe professor, and one extra line from Estravados.

There are about 30 mins of other deleted footage that never landed on the dvd, including two major action scenes - Poirot chasing MacQueen the assistant out in the blizzard, shooting at MacQueen in warning, then saving him from drowning when the man falls into a river, and Poirot defending himself from Dr Arbuthnot, almost falling off the train and using his wits to get back inside.

Changes from the original script to the theatrical cut: The original denouement scene happened in the dining car like in the book (and the 1974 movie), not outside, though I’m not sure if they ever filmed the first version. There are some huge differences between the original script and the film. A lot of the clue-explaining, some of the exposition, character-establishing and other character moments, extra lines from interrogation scenes, chunks of dialog, etc, were cut. Settings and certain lines of dialogue were changed. More canon quotes were added into the movie, such as Poirot’s famous “My name is Hercule Poirot and I’m probably the greatest detective in the world” line from The Mystery of the Blue Train. Miss Debeham and Dr Arbuthnot kissed twice in the original script! No kisses in the movie. Pilar Estravados was Greta Ohlsson, like in the book (Estravados’ name comes from Hercule Poirot’s Christmas).  Poirot remembers his canon “love interest“ Vera Rossakoff. She only gets a mention but is kind of instrumental to him solving the case. Vera was changed into “Katherine” in the movie, a new character, someone from Poirot’s past. Was it because Vera might appear in future movies?

Most of the characters get a bit more screentime in the original script. Poirot has a HUGE, HUGE “getting-inside-the-detective’s-head” scene where he sees all the suspects frozen like ice, or like in a photograph, and he can walk through the photograph and observe each suspect, each frozen facial expression, and analyze what everyone told him in interviews. He’s looking at all the clues again in his mind, brushing away those that aren’t relevant. For the audience, this would have been a bigger and more helpful re-cap of the mystery compared to “Dreamscape” above. It would have been an amazing showstopper scene.

I wish they could have kept some of these scenes as one of the biggest criticisms about the movie was that the audience couldn’t really follow the clues and play “detective”, Poirot did all the explaining himself - and quickly - and didn’t give them enough of a chance to solve the mystery on their own. The screenwriter originally had POIROT ANALYZE ALL THE CLUES in great detail. All the clues from the book are present. Poirot’s all about the clues and observation. He brainstorms which suspect could be guilty, which pairs of suspects could have killed Ratchett together. He considers them all in his mind, all the variations and possibilities, and the audience can see his thoughts. He’s moving from one suspect to the next, in a “refresh my memory” sort of scene for the viewers.

He’s not “omnipotent” nor “guessing” like some critics have complained. He tells you how he came by the conclusions. He does it in the movie but originally he talked a lot, lot more, and the scenes were trimmed for time constraints. Some of the details regarding the clues were the first to go. I love the movie dearly and always will but there’s an even greater potential in the original script, I think. Hopefully we see more deleted footage on future dvd sets. :)

Thanks again for your ask! If anyone would like me to gif any of the deleted scenes, please let me know! :)

[fionaapplerocks]

Paul Thomas Anderson's 6 Music Videos (DVD, 2001 or 2002)

This is one of the rarest items you'll ever find!  This is the only "official" DVD that collects all of PTA's famed music videos!History of this DVDPTA compiled this DVD himself and handed out an EXTREMELY LIMITED number of them to very select people.  Among them was Greg M******i, the filmaker that ran PTA's official website/fansite.  Greg sold this DVD, as well as some other PTA DVD's, to me in 2003.The quality of these videos is incredible!  For any of you that have that only been able to view these videos on youtube, this will really be a treat for you!Below, please find a list of the videos included on this amazing DVD, along with a brief overview of each film (taken from cigarettes & redvines)

What videos do you get?

Try - Michael Penn

michael penn walks down a very long hallway filled with strange people and magic tricks.

breakdown 'try' was shot during the editing of boogie nights while the film was being reviewed by the mpaa. delays allowed a window of time to shoot and edit the music video. the longest hallway in north america, which incidentally is in downtown LA, was used as the only shooting location since the video is only one shot. paul has commented that he would like to someday shoot a movie there, but his idea of interlocking stories likely turned into 'magnolia'.

michael penn on his music video: "I was having a hard time trying to figure out what to do for a video for this song, and I was talking to Paul about it and he had always expressed a desire to do it, but I really didn't think that he would do it, that he would be able to because he was cutting Boogie Nights at the time. We started talking about the song apparently he knew a location in Los Angeles which is the longest hallway in North America, it's 3/4 of a mile long, and we went there together and kind of looked at the location and we walked it while a walkman was playing the song and it was just about the same length to walk it as the song. That kind of suggested an idea and it worked out great because the video is one continuous shot so there was no editing involved so we were able to do it all in one weekend. And that's what we did. I think it took about 14 takes to accomplish."

'try' contains numerous details that only get stranger upon repeat viewings. the video has a dreamlike quality that extends beyond the asthetics and into the actions of the people inside. crew members in the background look for objects with flashlights and take paintings off the walls while phillip seymour hoffman jogs to catch up with a rolling michael penn, who is handed a guitar which is never played. the camera passes through many extras and removable walls, eventually coming upon stretch of hallway that is an exact replica of the movie 'they shoot horses, don't they?'. pta's hallway adaptation is complete with referees on rollerskates and a gig young lookalike.

Save Me - Aimee Mann

save me was shot during the off-moments in principal photography during magnolia, paul having aimee mann stand into the shot during various key moments in the characters day. it was initially speculated that aimee was digitally put into these shots after the fact, but knowing paul's actors' willingness to do his bidding on a moments notice - this is obviously incorrect and would have been an unnecessarily expensive way of shooting the sequences.

breakdown the video is staged in similar fashion to the 'wise up' sequence in the film -- following each character at a key moment, but this time with aimee mann lurking in the shadows or beside them singing the lyrics.

the characters are reflected technically in the showy stagings of jimmy gator & frank mackey's blocking (gwenovier's preview monitor & table move, jimmy gator's rotating couch and multiple things that come alive behind them before cutting away) to the careful dollies with claudia, linda & donnie smith. the film's caretakers of sorts are the only ones appearing to be productive - phil watches over earl, jim kurring on the job presumably about to pull someone over.

even the day-player's characters are encapsulated with limited screen time - the best example occurring throughout the 'smiling peanut' sequence. the camera dollies behind the bar towards donnie smith, and before each character leaves the frame, they turn and react to bill macy in their own way. (brad smiles brightly, thurston blows smoke bitterly in donnie's face)

Across the Universe - Fiona Apple

fiona apple covers the beatles classic 'across the universe' for the film 'pleasantville.' this was paul's first music video with fiona apple, which is a re-creation of the soda pop vandalism scene from the film. fiona, wearing large old fashioned headphones, sings & travels unfazed by the chaos and destruction surrounding her.

an interesting note: the version of the video that lives on the pleasantville dvd, the camera hangs on fiona's face for several seconds before slowly fading out, whereas the version on the '6 videos by PTA' (a dvd paul made after the couple's break-up) that shot barely exists before a rapid fade out ends the clip.

breakdown the music video was shot on location with a motion control camera. the presence of mirrors and complicated rigs made this a fairly expensive shoot. the idea behind motion control photography is that the camera can perform the same movement twice, which is very useful for compositing two shots where the camera is moving. the video is only made up of five shots made up of many composited shots.

the music video opens with a stained glass section of the shop window being destroyed. the glass and the bench that is thrown through it are computer generated and have been motion tracked into the shot. real glass elements are added as characters jump through the window. the motion control aspect of the video is apparent as the camera moves through the window to see fiona apple in front of a mirror, which the camera is not present in. it is likely that another camera performed a mirrored motion track with that side of the set partially removed.

the false nature of the mirror is visible just after a chair is thrown through the foreground at about 8:29, where the mirror's image seems to fade into itself, likely the bridging of two separate takes. as the camera moves closer to fiona, her reflection is more visible and has some unusual properties to it that seem to defy description. at this point fiona begins to move through the set without walking (she is sitting on the rig at this point).

the shots that follow are a combination of high speed photography of the set being destroyed and footage of fiona shot with the same camera movement only without the action in the background. some of the compositing is visible around her neck/headphones near the end of the first shot. look carefully for small sections on her left side that seem to be wavering or wobbling, these symptoms of compositing are different than blue/greenscreening ones.

the spinning shot is simply a variation of the previous shot, with fiona attached at the waist to a rotating rig. rotating debris was composited into the foreground to further distract the eyes as ILM's tricks hide everywhere in the frame. the third shot is the simplest in the video, and features a lighting change on fiona as the camera moves closer to her.

the beginning of the fourth shot begins extremely close on fiona's face and pulls out partway through, further suggesting that the percussion of the song is responsible for the damage being done to the store. the camera moves around her face 180 degrees to pull out with another lighting change as fiona walks across the counter. keep your eye out for some ridiculous extras through the window in the top right corner of the frame.

as the camera pushes back into fiona's face, wavering softness is visible around the edges of her hair suggesting more tricky compositing.

the final shot of the video is one of the more complicated ones, and begins with fiona sitting cross legged in front of the door. since the lighting changes caused by people running through the door and obstructing the major apparent source of edge lighting (the sun), the light highlights were changed on her body when the video was being composited. this is apparent especially when the shiny part of her hair is changed: we should see the individual strands of her hair, but instead the white glow just turns grey. fiona exits the frame to leave us with more slow motion photography, and ends as the camera pushes in on her again. computer generated letters spelling 'the end' have also been composited in the background.

Fast as You Can - Fiona Apple

paul's most random format experiement. shot in various locations around their shared la home, paul filmed fiona with everything from a lumiere camera to a modern 35mm camera.

breakdown the video was shot after the completion of magnolia, and just looks like paul and fiona apple having fun with tricks. fiona described her song as 'full of gags', and wanted the video to reflect that in an acoustic way (ie avoiding anything computer generated). the shoot was extremely rushed and concepts were made up on the spot. the footage changes aspect ratios and frame rates constantly, likely the result of adjustable motors or hand cranks. the video made a lot of people upset when the frame rate runs out of sync with the music (on purpose). the video also marks one of the first appearance of the iris out at the end of the video, which paul would later use in punch-drunk love. the video was nominated for 'best pop video of the year' at the annual billboard music video awards.

the lens effect. pta uses this effect in this video as well as magnolia ("but it did happen") it involves dropping various lenses of different lengths into the camera during the shot - giving an in-camera circular looking jump cut. this technique is also used in the opening of steven soderbergh's 'schizopolis' to a humorous and mystifying degree.

Limp - Fiona Apple

a video which main gimmick revolves around the replacing of the color blue with red on and around fiona, as well as lights & fireplaces turning on and off. fiona awakes from a scene not dissimilar of that from magnolia (ray and claudia blocking, before jimmy knocks at the door). paul's original idea for the puzzle involved some complex trick of having the pieces rise from the table and form themselves.

Paper Bag - Fiona Apple

paper bag was shot at a restaurant in los angeles' union train station in early 2000. the dancing was choreographed by michael rooney, whose work includes bjork's 'it's oh so quiet', fatboy slim's 'praise you', and most recently 'i heart huckabees'.

breakdown the video carries pta's classic camera whips and high contrast colour palette, and very obviously shows his love for old fashioned musicals (ie 'singin' in the rain). the video features fiona apple spinning around a train station helplessly as children surround her with intricately planned dance moves. the child aspect seems to be derived both from apple's lyrics "i thought he was a man but he was just a little boy" and the 1976 film 'bugsy malone', in which children portray a world of gangsters. the lighting flows from deep blues (near the beginning and end) to high contrast red and whites (in the middle).

[hellopromusic]

I wrote this guide with it to be a simple guide to self-radicalize future wotas. If you disagree with me, please make a better graphic, I just want to make it easy as possible for new people to get involved. 

If you are just getting into Hello Project, things can be overwhelming. So I am writing a mini-guide on my recommendations for how to get involved with the groups. In short you pick a group, then pick a girl, then cheer her on with every release, seeing her struggles and her successes.

So start with youtube and just watch like three or four videos for each group. After you decide you like a groups aesthetic, its probably best to get right into the dvd magazines to start seeing the group's personality and to see the chemistry the different girls have with each other. 

A dvd magazine is a video that is about an hour long that has the girls doing something other than music, it may be back stage conversations, or on stage MC's, it could be athletic competitions, it could be punishment games, or the girls going on a vacation, or the girls eating food, etc.... dvd magazines are also the cheapest video you can buy, but if you ask around in communities, you may find people who will loan you a copy or make you a copy of their dvd magazine if you don't have money. Check the Hello!Project wiki for what the latest dvd magazine for your group is.  After watching dvd magazines, its way easier to identify the girls in the group because you see them for extended periods of time, unlike the cuts in a music video. In my opinion, the best way to really start engaging in the community is to pick one or two girls who you want to cheer on and then watch their growth. Check out their member blogs and any photobooks they may have. Cheering on the idols and watching their growth is probably the most rewarding part of being a fan of an idol. After you pick your favorite members, then you can start learning about the other things they do, and all the devious ways Hello!project has devised to part you from your money. But I would not suggest spending any money on a group until you know at least half of it's member's names and colors. Also do not forget about the Kenshuusei (there is a Tokyo and a Hokkaido Kenshuusei), it can be especially rewarding to watch their journeys.

Before you spend any money, become involved in the English fan communities. There are many, and the community may be dispersed, but do not become discouraged, you are not alone. In my opinion, you should spend a lot of time at the Hello!Project Wiki, its good, detailed, and has immaculate English records of what things Hello!Project releases. If you like forums you can check out hello!online, jplop, mm-bbs, or JPHiP. for news on H!P you can check out Hello Project News Service.  For images, tumblr is still pretty active. The Hello!Project twitter community is quite active. There are app-based communities like discord and amino. You can join the discord channels Hello Project Fans, here, and Hello Project Chat, here. There are translation sites like wota in translation, project blog, project hello, and hello project radio.

When you are ready to spend money there are a lot of ways to do it. You can spend money on music, live performances, videos, merchandising, or pictures. Hello Project releases music both physically and digitally (sometimes only digitally) in single and album formats. Main benefit of albums is they have new songs you have never heard recorded, main benefit of the singles is you get instrumental versions of the songs (which are fantastic! You SHOULD listen to them!). Petit Best is also an annual sampler of that years’ Hello Project music, so its an album that collects some releases for all the groups into one CD. Petit Best will sometimes be the only way to get the digital releases on CD. Each group has a number of live performances they do a year, seasonal tours (spring and autumn) along with summer and winter hello project concert tour with all of Hello!Project together, and an annual Hina-fest (notable for its random shuffle units). In addition they do other live performances for Fanclub members throughout the year. In my opinion as a music wota, the live performances are really some of the best content Hello!Project produces. There are many videos that are released including concert videos, dvd magazines, fan club videos, gravure videos (IV) for individuals and groups (every member does a gravure video as an introduction, but as time goes on they may do gravure videos that are not related to photobooks, and generally photobook making of dvds are a great way to get to know the idols themselves. Merchandising is some of the hardest stuff to get your hands on as an overseas fan, in general you have to get lucky online or attend their overseas shows. Hello project sells pictures of the idols in a variety of formats, most are available in limited quantities online.

Anyways, I hope this helps someone, as I am still learning about how to be a fan in this community as I type. Good luck and may your oshi become a center in her group... Amen, lol.

[whipplefilter]

fan fic: Baby Driver

This is for @holyporsche, who shared her UTTERLY ADORABLE HUMAN AU MCQUEEN BABY HEADCANON with me. I wanted to see if I could write the version of it where the cars are cars, and this is what I came up with! It ended up a tad more melancholy than I’d initially imagined, but I hope the cute balances it out. <3

Summary: Cruz--and the rest of the racing world--haven’t seen Lightning McQueen in five years, 183 races, and a lot of questions gone unanswered. Then one day, he shows up with a tiny plus one.

Cruz, these days, is a legend. It takes about three seconds for someone to find her and tell her she’s got visitors: McQueen and a plus one.

A tiny plus one.

The tiny plus one doesn't have a name yet, hasn't chosen one; for now, she’s just Baby. She's still nursing an automatic transmission and is just now learning how to school it out of neutral. But when Cruz charges toward her, Baby mirrors the motion.

They collide with a soft plastic clink, kissing nose to nose.

"200!" chirps Baby because no McQueen has ever learned to count 1, 2, 3, have they?

Baby sings 200, 400, 500, and Cruz shoots an impish, conspiratorial glance at Lightning.

And Cruz would never, ever tell him this, but she kinda misses the Fabulous blue. She's not used to seeing him in his new get-up, clean of sponsors and candied red, like it's the 60s all over again. He's not the 95 anymore.

Vitoline's racing the 95 this season: It's someone new and probably pleasant whom she hasn't yet met. She'll admit she hasn't tried that hard; it's been years now, but to Cruz, the 95 will always be Lightning. 

The association might be even harder for Cruz to let go of than Lightning's acting like it is for him--but then, she'll probably never know how he actually feels about all this. Lightning McQueen hasn't touched tires to a Piston Cup track in half a decade. Not even to spectate.

Cruz hasn't seen him face-to-face since the end of her rookie year.

"How was Rio?" Cruz asks, because she did, at least, get that postcard last month.

Lightning makes a face, as though he's the baby and not, well, Baby. "She liked the water. A lot. She liked going very deep in the water."

"California girl, huh?"

"We live in Arizona!" Lightning objects. "But every time Sally picks our vacation, we always end up--"

"She has her mother's mouth," says Cruz, and his expression softens.

Cruz seizes the opportunity. "Which means she's gonna roast you once she learns more words."

"Nah, she's gonna know to respect her eld--" Lightning starts, as Baby coasts straight past Danny, and Storm, and takes up pole position in defiance of three forklifts, a flag car, and four formidable security SUVs who seem wholly ill-equipped to deal with this intrusion.

"Huh. And her daddy's attitude," Cruz notes. "Dangerous combination!"

But the flag car--Wesley Wheelie--he's a father of eight from a family of thirty-seven, counting all the halves and steps. So he whips out his green flag and waves it right in Baby's face. When he shoots it up over her head, she shoots forward--at a hot five miles an hour.

The actual quals aren't for another three or four hours, but Wesley keeps waving the flag in Storm's face, as though Storm's life depends on his winning this race.

"She's gonna lap you, buddy!" Wesley jibes.

Storm glares at him hard, but he's wholly at Wesley's mercy, because being made fun of is only the second to last thing on earth Storm wants in his life. The last thing he wants is to be the guy who ran over Lightning "Fabulous" McQueen's damn infant.

Danny, for his part, scratches the race almost immediately, laughing so hard he starts choking on his own exhaust fumes. Cruz hears him trying to crawl into the stands to get a better view of the field, but his hysterics win out over his handling, and he just ends up belly-down in the dirt.

"I hate you," Storm hisses at him. And Wesley. And Cruz. Lightning, he ignores.

"He says that a lot," Cruz tells Lightning, solemnly. "I think it's a term of endearment."

Baby's still making her way around the track--really flying now, eight miles an hour. She's making almost as much forward progress around the track as she is laterally.

Almost.

"She's good," Cruz says.

Lightning wheedles his LF tire through the dirt. "Well! She's seen every. single. race. of oh, some Dinoco racer. Even the ones you can only get on DVD. She's kind of obsessed."

"You've been watching?" Cruz asks.

"Obviously."

"I thought maybe--"

"Give me some credit!"

Cruz sees a glimmer of it, then. How hard it is for him to be here, how happy he is to be here, how much he wants to tear around this track, make it is again, make this world his again. How much he has now beyond this that he'd never, ever give up, that he loves more than what he loves most in the world. It's a delicate paradox, but hey, it's the language they all speak out here. Lightning wants to be here, and he absolutely doesn't. Yearning hurts.

"She wanted to meet you," Lightning says, in answer to Cruz's unspoken question. "I'm not gonna say no."

"She acts like she already has!" Cruz laughs.

Lightning laughs too, though it's more of a sheepish chuckle. "Uh, I'm not sure if she can tell the difference between you and stuffed-toy you."

"So are you--" Cruz is interrupted by a piercing wail.

Rather, she's interrupted by Lightning's reaction to a piercing wail, which she swears comes first. Lightning before thunder, he's launched himself a foot in the air before Cruz can begin to fathom why.

Baby's plowed face-first into the outer wall. Not hard, and not fast--just persistently. She doesn't know to reverse.

Lightning doesn't rush to help her, though clearly that's his base impulse. He stays corralled at the edge of the track, as though pinned there by invisible chocks, and he chants under his breath, Come on, baby. You got this! Take a breath and figure it out. There you go. Focus.

Focus.

Cruz closes her eyes and it's like she can hear it over her comm line. It's as though no time has passed at all. She thought she'd known how much she missed him. But she really hadn't--not until just now.

Come on, Cruz! You got this!

Baby don't got this. Baby's stopped crying, but she keeps prodding the wall with her nose. Maybe this time it will work. Or maybe this time. Or maybe--

"Definitely her daddy's attitude," quips Cruz.

"Haha. Ha!"

Storm catches up to her. He stares, says nothing. He's probably had his engine off since two turns ago, and he's still coasting too fast. Hits his brakes and waits. For ten seconds, Storm does absolutely nothing.

Then Baby reverses cleanly, and escapes the wall.

Danny shouts, so loud the walls of the stadium echo with his renewed laughter, "BABY WHISPERER!" 

Danny departs, muttering something along the lines of, "Oh god, where's Tim? I gotta--"

Cruz snorts. "He's a dork, but he's my dork. What're you gonna do?"

Baby drives.

She overtakes Storm again.

Storm's expression is one of almost genuine agony, he's been holding still for so long. He jerks forward and ends up a full body-length ahead of her again. When again she catches up, Baby taps Storm on the rim and says, "Excuse me."

Storm says "Whuh--" 

And Baby climbs. She mounts his tire, wedging her own under his fender and scrambling up to his hood. A moment of studied deliberation and she rolls, slow and lopsided, clear past Storm's bewildered eyes and plops down to the ground on his opposite side. Then she hits the gas and drives toward the Wesley's checkered flag.

"OH!" exclaims Cruz. "I GET IT. SHE DID THE--"

"Yes. We all get it," says Storm.

When Baby finally makes it past Wesley's waiting flag, Cruz extends a tire for a high-five. "You won! You won!"

Baby beams, and starstruck she accepts the high-five. Then she says, utterly nonchalant, "Cruz, next time I'll beat you."

It's Storm's turn to laugh. "You hear that, Ramirez? She's coming for you."

Before he disappears--likely to go put the fear of god in Danny--he awards Lightning with a sidelong glance, acknowledging him for the first time in six years.

"Cute baby," he says. Then he's gone.

"So are you gonna stay for the race?" Cruz asks Lightning, as they watch Wesley enchant Baby with his dancing flag. He's waving green and yellow and white all at once.

"Baby needs a nap," says Lightning. "Uh, that baby, not this baby," he clarifies quickly.

"Oh." Cruz tries not to look crestfallen.

"But uh-- Sally said she'd take her if I, if-- you know. Actually, Sally made me promise that I'd let her-- so that I'd-- Because you--" Lightning blurts out, fragmentary.

"Mr. McQueen! You were trying to get out of this, weren't you! If I hadn't asked, you were just gonna--"

"No!"

"You were gonna use your own child as an excuse!"

"Oh, please!"

"I'm telling Sally."

"Wait, no--"

"I'm really happy to see you again," Cruz says, abruptly ending the banter.

Lightning looks at her--guilty, yearning, happy. Mostly happy. "Right back atcha, Cruz."

"You don't have to stay if you don't to."

"Yeah I do, actually. And I do want to."

"Yeah, okay." Cruz smiles. "So... are we gonna be seeing more of you again, or is it back to Arizona after this?"

"Not for me to decide!" Lightning replies airily. He turns back to Wesley, and Baby, and the flags. 

Then he looks Cruz straight in the eyes. Really looks. "I'll take her to all the races she wants, though. 

“Gotta let her dream big, right?"

[nightingveilxo]

Two Different Kinds…of Protection (Heart and *coughs*) [Updated 3/9/18]

TEH

John: *shaves, then goes into the medical facility, where Prescriptions is on a big sign with an arrow and Ring For Assistance is also prominently displayed* (Pharmacy then, please call on your phone if you need assistance. If your heart needs help, call.)

Sherlock: He made his position quite clear.

Us: Ohhhhh.

John: Cough.

Time passes…

PROTECTOR VINYL  + Phone (But instead of the heart call, Mary buzzes on the intercom. Biggest c*ck block.)

Meanwhile, Sherlock has been on the train case with Molly (the John mirror). They discuss going out for chips (TLD Faith - We had chips.), and his helping a man put up shelves (have sex).

Fast forward…

John is saved from the bonfire, and comes around to 221B again.

John doesn’t understand, so Sherlock explains about deception. Two kinds of…(Sorry, distracted by the…

…*gratuitous booty shot*)

See, I’m staring you (the audience) in the face (while we’re investigating train carriages disappearing into…places).

Stag Night *booty shot with John standing behind him* Also, when Sherlock gets up and wipes the edge of his mouth, the transition goes to John’s mouth in the jail.

Leather seat…sleep…

T6T

Two different kinds of vinyl.

Yes, but he was a student (a younger person, but he’s a Sherlock mirror). Sherlock doesn’t have a car in TLD, so Mrs. Hudson suddenly does, and is his transport when his own breaks down. She delivers him directly (as opposed to straight) to John, because Molly won’t do.

Vinyl’s cheaper than leather. (Accepting a poor substitute will never go well.)

John explains that Charlie had been dead for a week.

John: I’m going to make a deduction…Happy Birthday. Cake is obligatory. (TSoT: according to Janine, sex isn’t obligatory).

Mary, who came to tell John when he had new patients in TEH, and use the intercom. She miraculously knows about the two kinds of vinyl, because (speaking of Janine)…

Fast forward…John and his phone (heart and Mary might be picking up what is happening?)

John’s mobile sounds, and we see this split screen with bathroom where John shaved for Sherlock.

The vampire (Sherlock was patterned after Lord Byron, who was the pattern for Dr. Polidori’s The Vampyre, which was then used for Dracula) and John are texting, and Mary is mentioning crying.

Mary says, “I know,” to Rosie right before the “I know” appears on John’s screen, rather like in MHR when Sherlock appears to be replying to John on the DVD.

ASiP Sherlock: It’s been in the same pocket as keys and coins. The man beside me wouldn’t treat his one luxury item like this, so it’s had a previous owner. (In ACD canon, this deduction was made about Watson’s watch.)

THoB

Just like Moriarty, but Henry says his father was torn apart (and we know Henry is a Sherlock mirror-same clothing colors as everyone except Molly in S4, he smokes, suppressed childhood trauma at age 7, etc, etc, etc).

Train again…

Disappointing breakfast and black coffee (with two sugars?), not tea. How very heteronormative of you, Henry. (Not Hamish)

John gets the girl’s number, but is more interested in (S)topping. John doesn’t use the train anymore or ride his bike, but we don’t know why. Mary might still have the car…

John changing his mind from the girl that was across the aisle that fancied him, E aka Euros. Also, the “I’m not free” part is a direct lift from TPLoSH, when Holmes first mentions that he and Watson are together. Have been...for five years, the same length of time since Moriarty met Eurus, since Christmas was canceled in ASiB, etc.

Route 59 was extended in 2007, which coincided with the relocation of the Euros(tar) terminal. Route 159…Henry’s napkin.

But, you waited too long to remember what would make you happy, and to fix the situation.

But, John already did his crying in TLD after telling someone he wasn’t free, so who could this be about, hmm? Moriarty, the one whose body was never found, dressed like Sherlock…

Again, referencing TPLoSH via Queen.

Just like in TEH when Sherlock and Mycroft go from playing Operation with the broken heart to making deductions, we’re going to play a new game, a different game…

If you want to use the phone (your heart), you’re going to have to work for it.

Then they get down the Chekhov gun, and we get this little gem…

Mycroft, the brain and tradition, is refusing to comply.

John has no such compulsions. He has his own version…

Early release…camera shows up John, then Sherlock, and then

…another gratuitous booty shot.

Fast forward through Sherlock and Eurus playing the duet, and the boys cleaning up 221B to John using his phone (heart) to call Sherlock.

After leaving Shutter Island, he uses the land line instead of the mobile. Also, notice how clean the flat is here, as compared to when Mary was inside of it. (The flat symbolizing the state of their marriage, just as the Welsborough’s home was a bit outdated, but still clean, and they were so happy.)

Transition scene to putting in Mary’s DVD: PROGRESSIVE SCAN  OPEN/CLOSE - CLOSE

They put in the DVD from Mary, and she says, “PS…”

Because except for punishing Mycroft for being bad, we’re back to the two men we always had, the two good men. Also, the people that helped you, will be rewarded by being allowed in 221B (see linked meta).

The reason John started his blog in the first place, wasn’t for the credit or the legend. He and Sherlock don’t care about that, and never have.

Tagging people involved in the two kinds of vinyl conversation from this past weekend, and some usual suspects @smoljohnlock @monikakrasnorada @mrskolesouniverse @victorianfantasywatson @swimmingfeelsinajohnlockianpool @antisocial-otaku @johnlockiseternal @tendergingergirl @sherlockshadow @kateis-cakeis @princesse-des-lucioles @sarahthecoat @may-shepard

[mortimers-cross]

LND Post 2 of 3

For this post, my aim is to give a play-by-play of the "highlights" of the production, as nearly as I can remember. I've been ridiculously overthinking how to write about such a widely-despised (with plenty of good reason) show, so I'm endeavouring to forget all of that and just describe the experience like one would about any other show. I went in expecting more or less a carbon copy of the revamped Australian production that was filmed and released on DVD a few years ago. Little did I know it had been revamped yet again for the Hamburg production! So, a mixture of those two is what we're getting in the US Tour, and I must say it works. There are still significant areas of weakness, ones that have been present from the beginning and, quite frankly, there's little left that can be done about it. This will be long, and there will be spoilers for the two people on earth who don't already know the entire plot.

With that in mind...

Act I

Prologue

"'Til I Hear You Sing"

I don't know that I'll ever grow used to this song being the first in the show. However, it's certainly better than Mme Giry wandering around Deserted Phantasma and Fleck's cheesy transition into the main narrative: "Remember how it was? Remember??? (HINT HINT The rest of the show will be a Flashback, I hope you understand clearly now, I CLEARLY said the keywords Was and Remember!)." Still, having spent eight years being used to Ramin's rendition, it's difficult hearing anyone Not-Ramin perform this song right off the bat, before spending the whole show growing accustomed to their voice. Still, Gardar Thor Cortes was wonderful.

Scene 1: Coney Island 1907

"The Coney Island Waltz"

The Trio (Fleck, Squelch, Gangle) were phenomenal throughout - voices, faces, goofy antics, everything. Their tight harmonies on the eerie-sounding trio-bits...YES. Apart from the few lines sung by the Trio, this scene remains mainly instrumental. And it's where The Set is first revealed in all its monstrous, shiny, spectacular spectacle. I can't remember exactly at what point in the music this happens, but the stage suddenly bursts into life - carnival lights come on, the ensemble wander about dressed as various performers and hawkers, and my favourite bit, The Carousel (one of the animals is a White Boar, probably actually a warthog, but I am calling it a Whyte Boar because King Richard. End of story.). The Carousel is the first (if I remember correctly) set piece to showcase the Turntable, which will be present throughout the show (and at times make me very nervous for the performers' safety).

It was this scene that indicated to me that, although my friend and I were in theory only watching this show for the music and weren't expecting much otherwise, this was going to be a much more exciting production than we'd anticipated.

Scene 2: Onstage at Phantasma

"Only For You"

This, of course, is one of the cheesy 'Erik's Cheap Vaudeville Trash' scenes/songs from which one doesn't expect much to begin with. But it is the first time you hear Meg's voice. Mary Michael Patterson is amazing (get used to it, they were all amazing) - come to think of it, she may have been my favourite voice in the entire cast. Maybe. And it's hard not to at least be entertained by the stunts and antics in this scene.

Scene 3: Madame Giry's Office

"Mother, Did You See?"

This is one scene whose Aussie Revamp Changes disappointed, and still disappoint me. It probably does flow better this way, with Giry griping about Erik behind his back rather than actually to his face (though she'd probably not be afraid in the least to complain to his face). Hmm, come to think of it, it's more like Erik wouldn't bother hanging around with the Girys all that much except when necessary. Still, I liked this scene as Giry Confronts The Phantom, because it meant more Erik-solos. They took away Erik-solos and gave them to the Girys. Boring.

"Christine Disembarks"

No idea why the Playbill has this listed under "Giry's Office," when, uh...she clearly didn't walk right off a ship into Giry's office. Oh, well.

This scene is always entertaining with all the reporters running around throwing out so many wellknown names...and then there's "CHRISTINE!!" Dramatic Lights...reminds me of Norma Desmond's "YOU there..." entrance, except there is of course NO comparison, please don't kill me.

It's also sad because you see Raoul and Christine for the first time and notice all is not well with them.

Scene 4: Pier 69

"Arrival of the Trio"

"The Journey to Coney Island"

Not much to add. See "Christine Disembarks." Oh, and love Erik's shameless "Come to me, Angel of Music" plug just before transitioning to the hotel.

Scene 5: The Hotel

"What a Dreadful Town!"

The (short) transition from "Journey to Coney Island" to this remains one of the show's most epic moments. Any and all opportunities to showcase that amazing orchestra, feature specific instruments, etc - take them all! We'll eat it up!

Cue Raoul's first big Showcase My Voice moment. Sean Thompson is perfection. Unfortunately the song indicates Raoul has become a hardened, angry man with a bent for too much drinking. But, but but - here comes one of those wonderful changes - he actually relents and sits with Gustave to look at the toy music box, and even attempts making conversation about said music box. It's only for a few seconds and gets interrupted by someone at the door, but it was a much appreciated few seconds. What They Did to Raoul (or, I suppose, what Forsyth did to Raoul) remains one of the show's most upsetting aspects.

"Look With Your Heart"

Have never cared for this song, and still don't. But the scene itself is sweet.

"Beneath a Moonless Sky"

There's no helping this song. It needs to go. It tried to be another "Point of No Return," and failed miserably and embarrassingly.

"Once Upon Another Time"

Not the deepest or most profound lyrics ever written, but those tight harmonies! "We love, we live..." sends shivers down my spine every time. And Gardar and Meghan's voices complement each other so well!

"Mother, Please, I'm Scared"

This bit is meant to be nerve-wracking on so many levels... Erik's first time meeting Gustave, Erik threatening to make him "disappear" if Christine won't sing for him... But in reality this scene makes me collapse into hysterical giggles.

Erik setting Gustave up on the railing and Christine freaking out that he's going to fall - classic Mum and Dad right there.

But this is the best bit: "Who ARE YOU?!" "IIIiiiiiiiii am your ANNNNNNGEL of MUUUUSIC, and I am DYINNGGGGGG, Christine!!!!!1111oneoneone.” There's really no way to deliver these lines and NOT sound cheesy, so poor Meghan and Gardar did their best. But his delivery of this silly line showed one of his great qualities - he's very expressive with his arms. He's running towards her with arms extended zombie-style while crying "Iii am your angel of music..." It's hard to describe, but it was brilliantly amusing.

Scene 6: Backstage

"Bathing Beauty Rehearsal"

"Dear Old Friend"

Not much to say here... This song is always entertaining. Raoul's "I need a DRINK" line gets me every time.

Scene 7: The Lair

"Beautiful"

So, so so many surprises happened in this final scene of Act 1. I had no idea there had been any significant changes here. Gustave is singing "Beautiful," when all at once he begins playing the ending of "The Phantom of the Opera." And then proceeds to sing some of it. I began hyperventilating here and didn't really stop until intermission.

"The Beauty Underneath"

Admittedly, the transition from New-Beautiful to Beauty Underneath isn't the smoothest transition in the world, but it hardly matters.

New-Beauty Underneath is...wow. Although I have a certain fondness for the original London version, it always seemed rather out-of-place. This version fit so well, and the whole scene overall is one incredible, if overwhelming, spectacle. My only real complaint is that it's so "chaotic" it's hard to follow at times. I think, though, that's sort of the point.

Here is a scene where the Turntable seriously stressed me out. Gardar, crouched down with his hands on Casey's shoulders, does this backward-crouching-walk on the Turntable going the opposite direction. It feels like this walk lasts forever (in reality it's probably not long at all) and he seems to be walking so fast and the whole time you just think he's going to end up falling on his rear, bringing Casey down with him, and getting trampled. Yes, yes, I'm sure they had everything under control. But it was nerve-wracking to watch.

"The Phantom Confronts Christine"

I've loved this scene since the original cast album, and still do. I like how they've added Erik asking for forgiveness and giving Christine permission to leave, but her choosing to promise him that she'll sing first (foolish as that promise may have been). And the bit about Gustave being his "saving grace" - one of the only good things about the entire plot.

"Ten Long Years"

I always thought this was a bizarre way to end the act, but it seemed to work here. It helps that Karen Mason is a Powerhouse of a voice.

To Be Continued

[joebustillos]

JBB’s Final Thoughts Episode 29: An Unlikely Refuge in a Time of Madness

New Year and remembering a previous way that I handled out of control love.

MP3 Version: https://joebustillos.files.wordpress.com/2020/04/jbbsfinalthoughts_episode-29_an-unlikely-refuge.mp3

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JBB’s Final Thoughts Episode 29: An Unlikely Refuge in a Time of Madness

There was a time, not very long ago, when I loved someone with every fiber of my being who wasn’t in the position to really return the favor. There was just enough encouragement for me to entertain that our stolen afternoons making out in our cars would some day become an actual “real” relationship. Thus, I insanely kept at it for more than a few seasons, trying to make this love real, even as it became clear that once she was free of her then-relationship that she was not going to be at all interested in making a commitment to being with me. I call this time my period of insanity. I am ever thankful for the two friends whom I routinely unloaded my pent-up frustrations. One of them no longer talks to me. Ugh. The other I seem to have brief flings with about every 10-years. Odd. But one unforeseen refuge during all of this was my binge watching of the Star Trek series, Deep Space Nine. What? Yeah, not anyone’s first choice.

I already loved the series, given its grittier feel, with none of the main characters really getting along in the first couple of seasons. Given that the series couldn’t really resort to the “alien of the week” scenarios of other Star Trek series, more emphasis fell on the interactions of the main characters and the evolving relationships that developed. Then in the last couple of seasons an unrequited love scenario was explored, just as I was helplessly pining for my own love, and I found myself crying my eyes out as the characters confessed their love and then sacrificed it for higher purposes. I really couldn’t stand it, that they got a taste of what I longed for, and then let it go because they needed to attend to higher callings. Damn it. That was unexpected and difficult to watch. Granted, this was at a time when all it took was a beautiful California sunset to reduce me to tears as I drove home… alone.

Eventually I ran out of episodes, the characters moved on and I hung in there a few more years hoping that our elicit kisses would become something more… Yeah, I was that insane. The reason I’m bringing all of this up is that I was reminded of all of this when I finished binge watching the series again a few weeks ago. I don’t know what insanity the series creators were going through but it really spoke to my unsatisfied passions. Actually, this recent rewatching brought me back to those extended moments of insanity and unrealized desire. Usually I watch sci-fi to escape the pressures of my real life (as an educator), but this was a case where this fictional world tapped into the part of my real life that was completely killing me and I never got what I so desperately longed for. I knew that it wasn’t going to end well for me, but just like the characters in the series, I was going to be okay in this unexpected new reality. I didn’t end up with the girl, but I was going to be okay and there was no saying that the future wouldn’t be even more amazing than what had just happened. Somehow I needed to integrate these experiences into who I was, learn whatever I could from the experience(s) and still work toward my better self. I might not be part wormhole alien running an orbital city in a far distant region of space, but I have to respect the gifts I’ve been given, honor the precious connections I’ve had with my fellow travelers, and share my narrative with other fellow travelers to help them on their own journeys. I was an insane babbling idiot who now babbles a bit less these days. Thank you Deep Space Nine for speaking to my babbling heart and helping me through my period of insanity.

Thank you for spending this time with me at JBB’s Final Thoughts. If you want to continue to participate in my outer monologue you can subscribe to my blog at http://jbbsfinalthoughts.com, scroll to the bottom of the page, click on the FOLLOW button where it says “Follow Blog via Email” and enter your email address. You can also subscribe to my YouTube channel, just search for JBB’s Final Thoughts (and make sure it doesn’t auto-correct to “jobs final thoughts”… damn auto-correct!). Catch you later, enjoy.

  JBB’s Final Thoughts Episode 29: An Unlikely Refuge in a Time of Madness JBB’s Final Thoughts Episode 29: An Unlikely Refuge in a Time of Madness New Year and remembering a previous way that I handled out of control love.