#swag too incestual

[jeniffercheck]

march 26, 2024. woman shocked at the amount of incest involved in the show famously dubbed "the incest show"

[dustjacketmusings]

top 5 book villains?

Ok this is very tricky, I realized that I don't tend to read books with overt villains

Anyway I wish I was farther in the burning kingdoms trilogy because the emperor sucked and I have a feeling he would be an incredible villain but he tragically didn't get enough screen time in the jasmine throne for me to put him on here. So:

5. I immediately thought of Marsilia from the Mercy Thompson series but she isn't actually a villain, she's a reluctant ally that may stab you (this is also a fun list). So in lieu of her I'll put James Blackwood. He truly was living his best vampire life in Spokane before Mercy decided that was enough murder. But he holds up the creepy vibes of vampires as well as the put upon inconvenience that master villainers do so well. "Oh now look what you've done, the walking corpse I was using to feed you is dead. Honestly no one these days has manners. "

4. Roger Conte from the Lioness Rampent. Admittedly, I don't hate this guy, but I do admit that he served by committing treason, getting killed for it, coming back from the dead, and then committing treason AGAIN. Endless swag from this guy. He spends at least one book as the kings pocket traitorous advisor and NO ONE STOPS HIM. Oh yeah that guy, who tried to kill you once. Surely he would not a second time. Let's keep him around to find out. Absolute clownery, no notes.

3. The family from Mexican Gothic. Evil, old, incestuous, rich white people! What's not to hate? They were such a buzzkill from page one. Absolutely no one had swag. They were all just miserable and horrific, so it's really impressive that they somehow managed to be more miserable and horrific as the book went on. There is no talking, no joy, no light, no fancy clothes, and absolutely nothing to save that miserable house from moth ridden decay. Sure sure the power of immortality but fucking christ at what cost.

2. The King from Deerskin. Honestly fuck that guy. Everyone hates that guy. He's such a fascinating concept too. What if the fairytale heros were real and they were so self obsessed they completely failed as parents? Has one singular daughter and heir and just forgets about her until she gets hot. The mommy issues, jesus christ. Killing him isn't enough, I need him drawn and quartered.

1. The grandma from The Flowers in the Attic. The first, the OG. The bitchy grandma has become a staple meme among my friend group because she's so endlessly hateable. Welcomes her daughter back but locks up her four kids in the attic for years on end. Heineously mean which is bad enough but shes also passively OK with them dying in the dark. The mom is also fucked up but the grandma has always stayed with me.

Send me a category and I'll give you top 5

[sabaku-no-livna]

Is your oc a Mary Sue ?

Okay I created this test back in 2016 on the french fandom, for the french fandom but its still so funny so if you want to try that test, please do. Don’t take it bad if your oc has several points doesn't make her Mary Sue and again these are only the clichés I noted, doesn't mean I got the absolute science on how to make a good OC and that my OCs does not correspond to these clichés or arn’t Mary Sues. Beware this test is full of sarcasm and second degree. Anyways ! Enjoy !

I. The design  of the OC  For your OC to be shitty, appearance is primordial. Therefor, I made you a list of clichés that you can try to cumulate to create a perfect Mary Sue. Are you ready ? At the end we’ll count the M.S points of our own Oc.  ღ Spiky hair, must be long, more likely black, red, yellow, with two colors that MUST be extra saturated ! You can take your favorite color if you want, it will work. Why thinking further ? xD  If you put two colors, make sure they clash with each other. Your hair style must be edgy, emo, so 2012 fashion with some bangs in front of the eye, nothing original please. Its weird to be original. AND WE DON’T WANT THAT. 

ღ  Piercings and tattoos are SWAG. But not any piercings or tattoo ! The labret is swag, the septum is swag, the eyebrow is swag, the belly button is swag but NEVER on the nostril its’s a golden rule of swag. Sorry. Have you ever seen an oc with a piercing in the nostril ? Nope, then don’t do that. Don’t try to invent new things. Originality is weird. 

ღ  About the body type, you got to stick to the canons : Huge breasts, large hips and butt, narrow waist (so narrow you don’t know how she can possibly bear her own weight). 

ღ If you REALLY don’t have any design ideas it doesn't matter. Make a gender-bend of Naruto or Sasuke. IT WORKS. 

II. The back story of your OC

For your OC to fit in the story like some shit falling on top of carbonara pastas, your backstory must be as CHEATED as possible. It must affect the main manager plot a maximum, just to enhance your oc. NEVER FORGET IT : Your OC is the center of the world. 

ღ Lets start by the beginning. For the name of your OC take some name that sounds Japanese. You can even invent one, as long as it sounds Japanese its perfect. To do so, insert some “ki” “ko” “su” “shi” “mi” et you got a name ! 

ღ Here is one of the supreme principle : Your OC is the most gorgeous, intelligent and strong. Its legit ALL THE MEN IN THE PLANET are desperately in love with her. 

ღ Your OC must be paired, or have had an affair, with at least one of the canon characters (better if its a main one) of the anime. Leave Shoji and and all the other Rock Lees for the ugly ones, YOU got Sasuke and Naruto waiting for you in your bed. So here’s a list of decent crush for a Goddess like your OC : 

Sasuke, Itachi, Naruto, Kakashi, Neji, Gaara, Madara, Deidara. Others are for the ugly ones. Don’t touch it, may have diseases ... :/ 

ღ  As your OC is the strongest, she must have super badass jutsus and have a chakra of ALL TYPES AT A TIME, she must master ALL the technics, and the must is her having an demon within. If possible a demon with tails (we don’t know why it wasn't mentioned in the manga but WHO CARES ?) that would be stronger than all the canon demons combined ! OR she can cumulate all the demons. Another SWAG thing is to have special pupils. If you don’t have the creativity to invent some, just use the sharingan/byakugan, or directly the rinnegan. OR you can cumulate them. Do like Sasuke ! This guys was clever. He knows the secret of success. 

ღ  Your OC must FUCK the game, so don’t hesitate to make her a princess, a vampire, a Rage, or even a Goddess. SHE IS TOO HOT TO BE HUMAN. Regular shinnobis are for people with no ambitions. 

ღ When you have to describe her personality always indicate this : “sweet, shy, friendly, cold, mysterious, choleric, courageous.” How is it totally paradoxal ? WHO CARES ? It doesn't have to be accurate in your character in her story anyways, that’s just for the presentations. For your OC to be really obnoxious she has to have a shitty personality. She has to clash every canon characters, be a burden for everyone else, OR, the opposite, a fuckin’ Deus Ex Machina ! Your girl she would have kicked Madara’s emo ass in a sec ! 

ღ  Her relationships with the canon characters are VERY IMPORTANT. Try the hidden blood binding. It’s SOOO original. Incest is not to provide, we all love what’s forbidden by the law and morals ! But always use main characters first, and don’t hesitate to put your character in a canon team, even if you have to kick off Sakura to do so (after all who cares for her ?). And for secondary but popular characters such as Itachi, Gaara and Neji ... Well as long as they are canons and popular ! Its better if they are in the Akatsuki or Kages though ! The best thing would be to be the hidden maleficent twin of Sasuke and have an affair with him OR Naruto’s genderbend paired with Itachi. The really SWAG clans you can put your OC into if you got no creativity to create an over powered shitty clan are : Uchiha, Uzumaki, Namikaze and Otsutsuki, and Hyuga only if there is no more room in the previous I quoted. 

ღ  Your OC must have a tragical backstory, horrible and complicated, incoherent or completely empty and lacking of depth cumulating all the best clichés of the fandom. 

In the first case your OC is broken by her past traumatic experiences, which gives her a dark side, a madness within, an emo vibe. She must be complaining all the time about her misunderstood pain. 

In the second case, your OC must be cheesy, always smiling and enthusiastic for no reason, and be a little stupid. Okay VERY stupid. But well ! She has big tits at least ! So its fine. Her biggest trauma must not exceed in terms of violence her little brother finishing the Nutella. 

ღ  Or, you can also try having a SUPER weak OC. Because with Mary Sues you are either TOO strong or TOO weak. No nuance please. It would make your character too credible. AND WE DON’T WANT THAT. Your OC must be rejected by everyone, hated and underrated (#victimlol) only her One True Love will see the light behind her shaggy hair. 

ღ If you are a bit CrAzY you can invent a country where she’ll be on top, but the best is for her to come from Konoha. Stay on the right track. 

I think I gave you all the best tips I had to make an OC perfectly obnoxious. ♥ To illustrate my own sayings, let me introduce you, my own Mary Sue : 

Suskiki Uchiha ! 

Name : Suskiki Uchiha

Age : Immortal 

Team : 7 (who cares about Sakura anyways ? Lol) Family : parents : Fugaku and Mikoto Uchiha / big brother : Itachi / twin brother : Sasuke / cousin : Naruto (yes its possible) Personality : Has big boobs Love interests : Sasuke, Naruto, Itachi, Gaara, Deidara, Suigetsu, Kakashi, Peter Pan, Edward Cullen and Jon Snow Story : Suskiki is the hidden sister of Sasuke. Not so hidden bc she is in team 7.  For real she is the princess vampire of and has the power of emo. Her childhood was so terrible you cant imagine. What was it ? Idk you cant imagine i said ! She supports Naruto since childhood bc they were both rejected. Why ? Bc she was too beautiful duh ! She has in her the demon Nyan cat dragon of darkness the most powerful of all ! She has both sharingan and byakugan for no reason (maybe her mom had an affair ?).  NOW LETS TRY THIS QUIZZ : 

Does your OC have : 

1)  Spiky or flashy hair ? 2)  Piercings/tattoos ? 3) Big breasts ?  4) Is she the female equivalent (physically) of a canon character ? 5) Was her name picked randomly because it sounded Japanese  ? 6) Are several canon characters into her ? (3 and more is yes).  7) Is she paired with one of the decent canons quoted before ?  8) Has she got a demon ? 9) Has she got special pupils ? Is she from a SWAG clan ? (if not you suck) 10) Does she have a special statut ? (princess, vampire, kage ...) 11) Is she “ “sweet, shy, friendly, cold, mysterious, choleric, courageous.”  at the same time ?  12) Does she have any blood binding with one of the canon characters ? Marriage doesn’t work.  13) Incestuous with one of the canons ? 14) Is she part of one of the main teams of the Naruto gen ? 15) Has she got a tragic back story ? 16) Is she bad at everything/super powerful ? 17) Was she rejected ?   18) Does she come from Konoha ? 19) Does she look like the  character she is paired with ?  20) Was she part of the Akatsuki or did she join Orochimaru ? 

So now you can count your points and it will give you a grade over 20. The closer you are to 20 the most Mary Suish your OC is. I personally tested it on Yukiko she got : 6 points. And you what is your score ? ;)

[redsoapbox]

SHADOWLARK / INTERVIEW

Shadowlark is Ellen Smith, guitar and vocals, Chris Quick, keys, programming and synths and James Warrender, drums.  

One of the highlights of last year’s Sŵn Festival was a mesmerising set by Shadowlark. A hurried conversation, as the band was packing away its kit, led to the promise of an interview – and here it is!

How did Shadowlark get together? Did the band spring up organically, through shared friendships, or did you each answer a musicians’ wanted advert and strike it lucky? 

E.S: As with most cities, I imagine, Leeds is pretty incestuous in terms of its music scene. We’d all been involved in various projects in the past, some of which included all 3 of us - so yeah, I guess it was pretty organic in that sense. I’d say we’re pretty lucky to have got it together though. 

CQ: For me, there were no other people I could have imagined doing this music with. We were friends before starting playing music together so that helped to draw us together again when starting Shadowlark. 

Back in the mid-nineties, BBC2 ran a fascinating series called Rock Family Trees, which charted the evolution of some of the leading bands of the day, revealing the odd skeleton in the musical closet along the way. Which member of Shadowlark has the most to fear from a close inspection of their musical C.V? 

E.S: Well… my Mum’s maiden name is Jagger. However, much to my disappointment there doesn’t seem to be any connection to the king of swag. But I’m more of a Beatles girl anyway. 

Your home patch is Leeds, a city that gave birth to The Wedding Present, Gang of Four, Soft Cell and The Mekons, to name just a few. Which hometown bands did you see playing live when you were growing up? 

C.Q: I remember seeing Dinosaur Pile-up do a show in the round at the Brudenell in the middle of the room with the crowd completely surrounding them in a circle, and then saw them again at Leeds festival. It was seeing bands make that transition that inspired me that we could do the same. 

J.W: My local music scene was Sheffield. I saw Arctic Monkeys in the early days (around the release of Beneath the Boardwalk), though I can’t say I was massively impressed by them at the time - I am a fan now! 

Did any of the bands have a lasting impression on you, even influencing the music that you make today? 

J.W: When I arrived in Leeds the wealth of new music really captivated me. The support from all of the local music scenes I think made the biggest impression, over and above any individual band/artist. It felt like there was a lot of encouragement to get involved in music in the city, and years later I like to think it's still the same. That hotbed of talent constantly pushes you to look for inspiration from all genres, and I think Shadowlark’s combined taste in music really feeds the creative process in a really healthy way. 

C.Q: There were a few great Leeds and Manchester bands that whenever I did shows with them I’d end up on stage joining in on their shows, or found myself moonlighting the odd time if someone's band member was ill at the last minute. I learned a lot from just collaborating with people, in particular about how other bands dynamics and internal workings worked. Paul Thomas Saunders was influential as I filled in at the last second for a show at Green Man festival for him as his keyboard player and bass player all in one, that was the first time I’d played keys bass live which then influenced our idea to have Shadowlark as a three-piece and combine the role of live bass into the keyboards. 

Is there a thriving music scene in Leeds these days, or has it been difficult to find places to play locally? 

E.S: There’s always been a great music scene here as far as I’m concerned. I believe Leeds is home to one of the best venues on the planet in the Brudenell Social Club.  

C.Q: Leeds has always been a great and supportive place to play gigs, whatever music you chose to make there’s always been a passionate promoter or a venue out there that will give you a chance to play it live. 

In terms of your songwriting – do you write individually or in partnerships?

E.S: In a mixture of ways. I tend to write songs on my own acoustically and then bring them to the studio and we’ll all work on them together there - same for Chris I think too. But for me, I always have to start with the song and that has to be good on its own before we embellish it in any way. 

You played the BBC Introducing tent at Glastonbury last summer, in what was only your tenth gig. Were you able to relax and enjoy it, or were you completely overwhelmed by the prospect of playing such a legendary festival? 

J.W: There is certainly a level of expectation in your own mind, but we are all performers at heart. You have to try and thrive in that environment, and the real pressure is created by yourself, no one else. I think we nailed it anyway! 

E.S: I was scared. 

C.Q: It was one of those gigs that it almost felt as if I was watching someone else play it. Like one of those out-of-body experiences, you hear people say they had when they’re not conscious but can see the room below them. We’d practiced and played so much in the rehearsal room that once on stage it was like autopilot took over and my hands just somehow did all the playing by themselves and I got to just enjoy performing it. 

I’ve seen your sound variously described as a) synth-infused indie-pop, b) ethereal electro-pop and c) hypnotic pop.  Which of those comes closest to defining the band’s music? 

E.S: We probably tick any of those boxes I suppose. Not to give away any secrets, but a big part of our sound involves spending a lot of time hooking up what are essentially comedy toy keyboards to really nice guitar pedals and plug-ins. Hours of fun. 

How disciplined are you as songwriters? Do you set aside time each day to work on songs, or do you take a more relaxed approach and wait for inspiration to come along?

J.W: We all try to get as much time together as possible each week to work on songs and arrangements. It works in a variety of ways. I think some days inspiration finds you, and other days you have to work at it to get the same outcome. Ultimately it doesn't matter if we get a song we are all happy with at the end. It’s just part of the fun! 

Your debut single “Do Your Worst” comes with a feisty lyric - ‘So do your worst / crack your fingers and curse’.  It sounds very much like a painful real-life experience channeled into art? 

E.S: I always write personally and I’m generally not the best at opening up about these things! So they naturally tend to come out in song form. That song was definitely born from frustration and a nod to being thick-skinned.   

The follow-up single “Control” is a brooding, dystopian number with an appropriately bleak and mysterious video to match. What were you hoping to communicate with this song? 

E.S: Control is a big song for us- it was the blueprint for a lot of tracks to follow. Really it’s just about some internal battle that most people I’m sure experience at some point. Figuring out what you wanna do, not always knowing but trying to make sure you don’t lose sight of that and let other things get in the way - just life. We love that video - it’s perfect. 

Current single, the post-break-up tune “See Each Other Right” is a big, bold and beautiful track, which clearly illustrates the band’s enormous potential. It seems to me that you’ve made rapid progress over the course of just three singles. How much has it helped to have someone like Dan Austin to work with in the studio?

E.S: Yeah, I think that song developed after we’d settled into our skin a little. We definitely wanted to play around with some different feels, but it all came together pretty quickly. We love working with Dan, he really gets what we’re doing and brings that extra bit of experience and passion to the party. It’s important and difficult to find people like that, we’re lucky we found him.

C.Q: We’ve always been on the hunt to find an amazing producer who can take our own production to the next level. Dan took our recorded version of See Each Other Right and took it somewhere we had never thought it could go. 

I enjoyed your ad-hoc set at Sŵn last year (where you played as a duo). Was that your first time playing in Wales and are you planning to return soon?

E.S: Yeah, that was our first Welsh Shadowlark experience and we loved it. We’re hoping to be out and about a lot this year touring, so I’m sure we’ll be back soon. We’d love to for sure. 

C.Q: It was such a great response and friendly crowd, we’d love to come back as the full band and do lots more shows, and play a few other Welsh dates too.

 Can we expect a Shadowlark album sometime in 2018? 

J.W: You can certainly expect more music from us - we have a lot of it to share, and we’re excited to get it out there and both in recorded form and on the road!

 What would success look like for Shadowlark? 

J.W: A bathtub filled with hummus, and unlimited crudites to take a dip with!

E.S: Gross. We’d like to make a few records, see the world - all that. That would be great. Then we can see how far we can take the rider.

 C.Q: Just keep being able to make the music we love and share it with people.

Shadowlark will be featured in my forthcoming blog on new music -28 bands in 28 days, which will run through February.

Thanks to the band and their management for facilitating the interview.

[stgeorgesmovielover-blog]

King Arthur: Legend Of The Sword

It seems Hollywood really cannot get enough of this mythological legend, and so we have yet another remake- or 'reboot', if you will- of King Arthur of Camelot and his faithful companions: the Knights of the Round Table. This time around, the gauntlet has been thrown down to Director, Guy Ritchie (you see what I did there? Gauntlet?...oh never mind). For those who don't know, Ritchie is best known for his uniquely British gangster flicks (think Snatch, Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, and The RocknRolla), and especially for his particular brand of quick wit!

You may think, then, that a reboot of Kind Arthur that's been Directed and co-written by Guy Ritchie, would be a little odd- and you would be right. Simultaneously, the best and worst thing about his King Arthur is that it’s an utter mess on the grandest of scales (and the biggest of budgets). On the one hand, a generic fantasy film in the standard wheelhouse of the Warner Bros. superhero movies, and on the other hand, a cockney-fied mash-up of the same; it's like two completely different worlds, styles and genres, coming together. The now, all-too-familar, franchise-hungry studio model has produced far too many idiotic rehashes of classic myths and fairy tales, but it has to be said, this is the first that is actually funny- on purpose. We can call that the 'Ritchie Charm' and this is certainly where the Director gets his plus points.

The prologue to King Arthur sets up expectations for a film that seems incongruously humourless by Ritchie’s standards, as Arthur’s father, Uther Pendragon (Eric Bana), overcomes Mordred (the evil Mage- or Wizard, to you and I), and his army, while defending famed Camelot from giant elephants. Not only is it evident from the offset that we are dealing with an overly exaggerated fantasy, but we are also completely steering clear from the classic tale, as it should be noted that: other than being a knight, the traditional Mordred is also Arthur’s illegitimate progeny from an incestuous affair between he and his half sister (perhaps this is where Games of Thrones' George R. R. Martin got the inspiration for his dirty Lannister family secrets from?).

But Uther is betrayed by his brother, Vortigern (Jude Law)- the power-hungry usurper, and our poor hero: Arthur, is sent floating down the River Thames to safe refuge and a life of relative anonymity, à la baby Moses. All of a sudden, King Arthur surprisingly and thankfully, turns into a hyper-active/ADHD-type Guy Ritchie movie, commencing with a swift montage. The film races through Arthur's growing pains and adolescence, until we see the man he has grown into, himself (the brilliantly gorgeous and charming Charlie Hunnam), who is now a fully-fledged small-time rogue on the tough streets and back alleys of “Londinium.” He runs his dealings out of the same brothel he has been raised in. But our hero would not be Arthur (and he certainly wouldn't be a Ritchie-esque Jack the Lad), without his 'Knights', or just his pals- with names like Wet Stick (Kingsley Ben-Adir), Back Lack (Neil Maskell), and Chinese George (Tom Wu). As if all the 'coolness' and 'swag' of Ritchie's iconic style weren't enough, he and costume designer, Annie Symons, have even given Arthur a proper aviator-styled shearling coat, albiet a primiative shearling one; now isn't that a sexy look for our lead?

Unfortunately, even Arthur's gorgeous coat cannot disguise the fact that this is still very much a paint-by-numbers tale. Arthur fulfils his prophecy of pulling Excalibur (the fabled sword) from the stone; gets rescued and whisked away by Sir Bedivere The Wise (Djimon Hounsou) and his loyal group of treasonous allies and, throughout, is aided by one of the few remaining Mages (Astrid Bergès-Frisbey) on a number of trippy and hallucinatory vision quests (or periods of 'finding himself') and a final climactic battle with Vortigern. And what a showdown this battle is; without a doubt, the fight is totally unbelievable- but more than just that, it's plain incomprehensible, being the type of scene that would leave some critics wondering what on earth they had just seen!

In King Arthur’s more inspired moments, however, Ritchie does a cat-and-mouse with the narrative of his reboot, discombobulating everything you'd expect from a film about King Arthur (you know, all that “reclaim Excalibur, defeat Vortigern and save Camelot” rubbish), and instead filling the the time with potty-mouthed rapid-fire cuts and flashbacks straight out of a smart heist movie- or hearkening back, so clearly, to Ritchie's very own one-two banter of his classics: Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, and Snatch. This is the King Arthur where characters wonder, out loud, how the Round Table got into Camelot- or indeed, what exactly it is. A unique take on the traditional mythology, it definitely is- but for all it's mad-cap cut-and-splice-ing, and insanely fantasised action, it is actually entertaining and pretty funny with some decent one-liners, just don't expect the genius of Ritchie's aforementioned films- because genius, it ain't!

This King Arthur has it moments—albeit mostly distorted and kind of gross- such as the trio of witch-sirens who live in an eerie and unsettling cavern under Camelot- their origin and purpose within our fable, never really explained, let alone touched upon. The brooding Law, who definitely manages to make evil sexy, even makes for a believable and creepy (though underused), villain. But though there is ample opportunity to really push the boat out and to over-indulge his well-established and iconic style, we do get the impression that Ritchie has somewhat given up on this project before we even hit the half-way mark; perhaps even he realised that this enterprise would play out like a dysfunctional marriage- with two parties (or genres) constantly at loggerheads with each other.

Indeed, this is when I think it is definitely safe to label the overuse of special effects as 'lazy', and I think Guy Ritchie has deliberately tried to hide behind them in order to distract from his uneven film. The special-effects-leaden sequences are as standard as any these days, and, to make matters worse, mostly incoherent. It's as if Ritchie tired himself out here; his vision of Camelot is as sobering and joyless as they come, which is why the humour (though entertaining in itself), feels out of place and odd. I imagine the thought of ruling over such a dreary, bleak and miserable land, is reason enough to make Arthur reluctant to claim his throne- and I don't blame him. If the film is anything to go by, Ritchie's Camelot and 'Londinium', only seem to jar with this wise-craking, humorous Arthur- and that is perhaps the best way to understand the discord in King Arthur. As always, I advise to judge for yourself but, if you're a fan of Guy Ritchie's classics- you will most likely find this a poor substitute, and if you're a fan of Arthurian mythology, then you might as well miss this one altogether- or it may make you quite frustrated, but if neither of these apply, then chuckle you will!

3/5