#the game is pretty much pokémon meets ben 10

[dragonanon]

Playing Cassette Beasts for the first time like: “What kinda Ben 10 shit is this??”

[best-tv-theme-song]

Polls will start to be posted within the next week or so.

Bracket list under the cut!

UPDATE: LIST CANCELLED

*Starred shows have multiple theme songs or I have combined shows in a franchise in an effort to include as much as possible. These will have preliminaries built-into their polls on the first round. This is how it works: 1. all of the songs will go into a poll together against one other show; 2. the COMBINED votes for those songs will determine which show wins that poll; 3. only the top voted song for that show/franchise will move on, if the show has won the poll. (If you are confused it will make more sense when we start, I promise!)

The 100

30 Rock

9-1-1*

The Addams Family

Adventure Time*

The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

All That

The Amazing World of Gumball

American Dragon: Jake Long

Animaniacs

Arcane: League of Legends

Arrested Development

Arthur

Assassination Classroom*

Austin & Ally

The Backyardigans

Barney & Friends

Barry

Batman*

Bear in the Big Blue House

Ben 10*

Better Call Saul

Beverly Hills, 90210

The Big Bang Theory

Big Time Rush

Bill Nye the Science Guy

Black Sails

Bluey

Bob the Builder

Bob's Burgers

BoJack Horseman

Bones

Boy Meets World

The Brady Bunch

Breaking Bad

Bridgerton

Brooklyn Nine-Nine

Buffy the Vampire Slayer*

Captain Planet and the Planeteers

Charmed

Cheers

Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers

Choo Choo Soul

Code Lyoko

Codename: Kids Next Door

Cold Case

Community

Cory in the House

Cowboy Bebop

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend*

Criminal Minds

CSI*

Cyberchase

Danny Phantom

Daredevil

Dawson's Creek

Death Note*

Desperate Housewives

Detective Conan

Dexter

Dexter's Laboratory

Diff'rent Strokes

Digimon*

Doctor Who*

Dora the Explorer

Downton Abbey

Dragon Ball*

Dragon Tales

Drake & Josh

Ducktales*

ER

Ever After High

The Fairly OddParents

Firefly

The Flintstones

Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends

Fraggle Rock

Frasier

The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air

Friends

Fringe

Full House

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood*

Futurama

Game of Thrones

George Lopez

George of the Jungle

Gilmore Girls

Glee

The Golden Girls

Good Omens

Gravity Falls

Grey's Anatomy

H2O: Just Add Water

Hannah Montana

Hannibal

Happy Days

Hawaii Five-0*

His Dark Materials

Horrible Histories

House, M.D.

How I Met Your Mother

How It's Made

Hunter × Hunter

Huntik: Secrets & Seekers

I Dream of Jeannie

I Love Lucy

iCarly

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia

The Jeffersons

Jeopardy!

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure*

Jonas

Justice League

Kim Possible

The Last of Us

Laverne & Shirley

Law & Order*

LazyTown

The Legend of Vox Machina

Leverage

Lilo & Stitch: The Series

Little Einsteins

Lizzie McGuire

Looney Tunes & Merrie Melodies

The Love Boat

M*A*S*H

Mad Men

Madoka Magica*

The Magic School Bus

Malcolm in the Middle

The Mandalorian

The Mary Tyler Moore Show

Merlin

Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir

Mister Rogers' Neighborhood

Mob Psycho 100

The Monkees

Monster High

The Muppet Show

Murder, She Wrote

Murdoch Mysteries

My Babysitter's a Vampire

My Hero Academia*

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic

The Nanny

Naruto*

NCIS

Neon Genesis Evangelion

The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh

New Girl

NFL (various network themes)*

Ninjago

The O.C.

The Office

One Day at a Time*

One Piece

Only Murders in the Building

Orange Is the New Black

Ouran High School Host Club

The Owl House

Parks and Recreation

The Partridge Family

Phil of the Future

Phineas and Ferb

Pinky and the Brain

Pippi Longstocking

Pokémon*

Power Rangers

The Powerpuff Girls

Pretty Little Liars

The Price Is Right

The Proud Family

Psych

Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure

Reading Rainbow

Reba

Red Dwarf

Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Riverdale

Rugrats

Sabrina the Teenage Witch

Sagwa, the Chinese Siamese Cat

Sailor Moon

Sanford and Son

Saturday Night Live

Schitt's Creek

Scooby-Doo*

Scrubs

Seinfeld

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Sesame Street

She-Ra and the Princesses of Power

Sherlock

The Simpsons

Smallville

Sofia the First

Sonny with a Chance

The Sopranos

Spider-Man

SpongeBob SquarePants

Star Trek (instrumental themes)*

Star Trek: Enterprise

Star vs. the Forces of Evil

Stargate*

Steven Universe

Stranger Things

Succession

The Suite Life of Zack and Cody*

Suits

Taskmaster

Ted Lasso

Teen Titans

Teen Wolf

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Teletubbies

That '70s Show

That's So Raven

Theory of Love

Thomas & Friends

Tokyo Ghoul

Total Drama

Totally Spies!

Transformers*

True Blood

The Twilight Zone

Twin Peaks

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

VeggieTales

Veronica Mars

Victorious

Voltron: Legendary Defender

W.I.T.C.H.

The Walking Dead

WandaVision*

Welcome Back, Kotter

The West Wing

Westworld

What We Do in the Shadows

The White Lotus

Wild Kratts

Winx Club

The Wire*

The Witcher

Wizards of Waverly Place

Wonder Pets!

Wonder Woman

Wow! Wow! Wubbzy!

The X-Files

Xena: Warrior Princess

Yellowjackets

Yu-Gi-Oh!*

Yuri on Ice

Zoboomafoo

Zoey 101

[weekendwarriorblog]

WHAT TO WATCH THIS WEEKEND May 10, 2019  - POKEMON: DETECTIVE PIKACHU, THE HUSTLE, TOLKIEN and More

It’s Mother’s Day weekend and while Avengers: Endgame seems to holding strong, we get four new movies in wide release, two of which I’ve seen, both of which are pretty decent. Unfortunately, due to illness, I’m running a bit late on this column, but I’ll try not to cut too many corners.

The big movie this weekend is POKÉMON: DETECTIVE PIKACHU (Warner Bros.), starring Ryan Reynolds as the voice of Pikachu and Justice Smith from Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, plus the likes of Bill Nighy and Ken Watanabe, the latter who seems to be Legendary Pictures’ go-to Japanese actor. (He’ll be appearing in Godzilla: King of the Monsters later this month.) I’m hoping to still get around to reviewing the movie, but I will say that I generally enjoyed it, even if my connection to the material was the old TV cartoon rather than any of the games. (Look for that review before Friday, if I’m able to get my ass gear. In the meantime, here’s my interview with director Rob Letterman.)

I’ve been interested in the Anne Hathaway-Rebel Wilson comedy THE HUSTLE (U.A. Releasing) since it was called “Nasty Women” and was a straight-up remake of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, but I just haven’t had time to catch the one press screening, so it looks like I’ll have to catch this sometime down the road.

And then there’s POMS (STXfilms), a new Diane Keaton comedy featuring an ensemble of actresses in their prime, including Pam Grier and Jacki Weaver. While this doesn’t look like my kind of movie, I totally would have gone to see it if I could, but I’m less apt to see it than The Hustle.

The other movie opening Friday which I’ve seen and enjoyed is TOLKIEN (Fox Searchlight), directed by Dome Karukoski (Tom of Finland) and starring Nicholas Hoult as J.R.R. Tolkien and Lily Collins as his wife Edith Bratt. I’m hoping this finds an audience, even though it’s obviously competing with much stronger and more high-profile films.

Mini-Review: I began to watch this movie with some trepidation, because at least at first, it seemed to be a typical biopic, much like director Dome Karukoski’s previous film. At least as the film began, it cut between Nicholas Hoult’s Tolkien while on the frontlines during WWII and his early schooldays at King Edwards and then Oxford, where he formed a bond with three other students.

To be honest, I wasn’t sure I necessary needed to see a Dead Poet’s Society type way of getting the viewer to know more about the fantasy author, but that’s just a very small part of the film. Where the film really picks up is when Hoult and Collins take over their respective roles, because this is when the romance between Tolkien and Edith becomes a larger part of the story. It’s a bittersweet tale where Tolkien is forced to pick going to Oxford over continuing this romance by Colm Meany’s pries, who has become Tolkien’s guardian after his mother dies suddenly. The majority of the film bounces between Tolkien in the trenches and dealing with school issues, being a poverty-stricken orphan, but he finds an ally in Derek Jacobi’s headmaster.

I’m constantly impressed by what Hoult has been doing as an actor as he gets older, but Collins really brings more to their scenes together than any of the classmates or acting veterans.

Tolkien is a flawed film for sure, but the last half hour is so abundantly full of feels it’s easy to forgive the earlier problems, as Tolkien seeks out one of his school chums on the battlefield, a part of the movie where Karukoski is allowed to shine as a director. (Honestly, I think Steven Spielberg would be quite proud if he made this movie, and that’s saying something.)

I’m not sure this movie will be for everyone, even those who love Tolkien’s work as much as I do, but as a testament to what an amazing life he had before he started writing The Hobbit, it’s quite an amazing story with a worthy film to tell it.

Rating: 8.5/10

You can find out my thoughts on the weekend box office over at The Beat.

LIMITED RELEASES

There’s actually some decent movies opening this weekend, but the one that I want to give special attention to is John Chester’s doc THE BIGGEST LITTLE FARM (NEON), which is all about how he and his wife Molly left their California apartment living behind to try to develop a 200-acre sustainable farm outside L.A.  For months, my favorite doc of the year was NEON’s Apollo 11 about the 1969 moon launch, but this quickly took it over after I saw it, because it’s amazingly educational in terms of what it takes to make a farm work. It also looks absolutely fantastic, and seeing the trailer in IMAX in front of Apollo 11 made me really want to see it. If you want to see a great doc that hopefully will be in theaters over the summer, then definitely look for this one. I’m sure it will open in a few cities Friday but hopefully NEON will do another great job getting out there as they did with Apollo 11 and Three Identical Strangers last year. This movie is a MUST SEE.

Kenneth Branagh directs and plays William Shakespeare in his new historical movie ALL IS TRUE (Sony Pictures Classics) which also costars Dame Judi Dench and Ian McKellen. It follows Shakespeare on his return home to Stratford after the Globe Theater has burned down, as he tries to reconnect with his older wife (Dench) and his two estranged daughters. This is a fine film if you’re a fan of Shakespeare’s works and were interested in knowing more about his last days, because it features a great script by Ben Elton, and fine performances by Branagh and Kathryn Wilder as his younger daughter Judith, who gets caught up in controversy while trying to find a husband. It will open in New York and L.A. this weekend, and you should look out for my interview with Sir Kenneth over at The Beat in the next couple days.

Opening at the Metrograph this week is Abel Ferrara’s PASOLINI (Kino Lorber), an amazing look at the Italian filmmaker as played by Willem Dafoe. I’m not particularly familiar with Pier Paolo Pasolini’s work, although the Metrograph did a pretty extensive retrospective last year. Like with All is True above, the movie covers the last days in the filmmaker’s life, and it proved to me that Dafoe is doing some of the best work of his career these days and like a few others (Woody Harrelson and Ethan Hawke, for instance), you can put Dafoe in your movie, and it will immediately make it better. I haven’t seen much of Ferrara’s recent work but I feel it’s been a while he’s been at the height of his greatness with Bad Lieutenant and King of New York, so it’s nice to see him creating a new movie in that general vein.  Apparently, Ferrara’s movie premiered at Cannes many, many moons ago, but I think it was a smart move by Kino Lorber to save the movie and give it a release. By pure coincidence… or not… MOMA has been having a Ferrara retrospective (see below), so if you haven’t been able to get up there and see the movie, then you now have a chance with Ferrara and Dafoe doing QnAs after a few showings this weekend.

Matt Smith plays cult leader Charles Manson in CHARLIE SAYS (IFC Films), the new movie from American Psycho and The Notorious Bettie Page director Mary Harron along with her frequent collaborator, writer Guinevere Turner. As a huge fan of their previous moviesand with interest in the subject matter, I’m not sure why I never got around to watching the screener I’ve had for months, but much of it has to do with how generally busy I’ve been. Anyway, it will open in around 35 theaters and be on VOD this weekend if you have similar interest.

Opening at the Film Forum Wednesday is Almedea Carracedo and Robert Bahar ‘s doc THE SILENCE OF OTHERS (Argot PIctures). Executive Produced and presented by Pedro Almodovar, this is an amazing film about the horrendous crimes committed under the Franco regime in Spain by people who were able to get away scott-free when it was decided to create an Amnesty Pact of “Forgiving” after Franco’s death. The thing is that there are people who had been tortured or had loved ones killed who are hoping to get justice or just get their bodies back from mass graves, and this doc covers those amazing efforts. Frankly, I found this film to be far more interesting than Joshua Oppenheimer’s similar films about the crimes by the Indonesian government in The Act of Killing and The Look of Silence.

The Quad Cinema will have two new exclusive releases starting Friday, beginning with Christian Carion’s French thriller MY SON (Cohen Media), starring Guillaume Canet as a man whose son has been kidnapped, so he travels across France to where his ex-wife (Melanie Laurent) lives to try to solve the crime.

Also, the Quad will be showing Nicolas Brown’s doc The Serengeti Rules (Abramorama), which looks at five ecologists who broke new ground with scientific concepts we take for granted, and it looks at how the Serengeti might be the place to look for civilizaton’s sustainable future.

Amy Poehler makes her feature directorial debut with the comedy Wine Country (Netflix), which is getting the usual nominal theatrical release in a handful of theaters but mostly will be on the streaming network. It co-stars long-tie Poehler pals Maya Rudoloph, Tina Fey, Ana Gasteyer and Paula Pell, but I’m excited to see it for Maya Erskine from the Hulu show Pen15 and the upcoming rom-com Plus One, which was one of my favorite movies at Tribeca. (Don’t worry.. I’ve started writing something about that festival, too, so stay tuned!)

Opening in New York at the Cinema Village and in L.A. at Arena Cinelounge is Akash Sherman’s Clara (Screen Media), starring Patrick J. Adams as Isaac Bruno, an astronomer looking for life beyond Earth. This becomes more of a reality when he meets Troian Bellisario’s artist Clara, who shares his interest in space.

After years of problems and lawsuits, Farhad Safinia’s The Professor and the Madman (Vertical) is finally seeing the light of day, no thanks to a lawsuit put on it by star and producer Mel Gibson, who plays Professor James Murray, who begins compiling the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, receiving 10,000 entries from Dr. William Minor (Sean Penn), who is a patient at a asylum for the criminally insane. I have no idea how bad this movie must be to be buried as long as it has, but it has a great cast including Eddie Marsan, Natalie Dormer, Stephen Dillane, Jennifer Ehle and Ioan Gruffudd, so how bad can it really be? Good luck finding it in theaters but it will prbobably be on VOD as well.

This week’s major Bollywood release is Student of the Year 2 (FIP), directed by Punit Malhotra. As you might guess, it’s a sequel to the 2012 romantic comedy, this one involving a love triangle between a guy and two girls, and it will be released in about 175 theaters on Friday.

STREAMING AND CABLE

Amy Poehler’s directorial debut WINE COUNTRY will begin streaming Friday, though I haven’t seen it yet, so instead, I’ll recommend Dava Whisenant’s fantastic doc Bathtubs over Broadway, which will premiere on Netflix Thursday. I missed this movie last year but I got to catch-up when it screened at the Oxford Film Festival in February, and it’s fantastic. It follows Letterman writer Steve Young as he follows his passion to find rare records featuring industrial musical numbers presented at corporate events throughout the ‘50s and later to energize employees.

REPERTORY

METROGRAPH (NYC):

I’ve already mentioned how Playtime: Family Matineeshas become this cinematic comfort food that’s helped me relive my childhood, but this weekend, the shit gets real as they screen the 1977 action-adventure Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger, featuring the stop-motion animation of the late Ray Harryhausen. I still remember first seeing The Golden Voyage of Sinbad at a drive-through in Framingham, Mass. when it first came out and I loved it so much I picked up the novelization. I wonder if I still have that somewhere. (I’m pretty sure I saw this sequel as well.) Late Nites at Metrographwill screen Lukas Moodysson’s 2002 film Lilya 4-Ever, as well as the not old enough to be repertory film Climaxby Gaspar Noe. (Lots of cool movies coming up in this series, as well.) Another series starting Friday is the first-ever New York retrospective of Japanese filmmaker Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, whose new movie Asako I & II will have its theatrical premiere at the Metrograph starting next week. I’m not too familiar with Hamaguchi’s work – though I’ve seen Asakoand generally liked it -- but I don’t think I’ll have the time to see his 5-hour long 2015 family drama Happy Hourany time soon. The series features seven of his movies, almost all of them shorter than Happy Hour. (2012’s Intimacies, showing a week from Thursday, is four hours long.)

THE NEW BEVERLY (L.A.):

After showing the Judy Garland version of A Star is Born  (1954) today at 2pm, the New Bev has double features of Claudia Weill’s Girlfriends (1978) and It’s My Turn (1980), the latter starring Jill Clayburgh and Michael Douglas, on Weds and Thurs. Kathryn Bigelow’s Strange Days (1995) and Lizzie Borden’s 1983 Born in Flames will screen on Friday and Saturday and then the 1933 film Christopher Strong (starring Katharine Hepburn) and Anybody’s Woman  (1930) will screen Sunday and Monday. The weekend’s KIDDEE MATINEE is the animated The Chipmunk Adventure  (1987) while the 1995 anthology Four Rooms (featuring one room by Tarantino) is the Friday midnight and Anna Biller’s 2016 film The Love Witch will screen midnight on Saturday. On top of that, there’s a special Cartoon Club on Saturday morning at 10AM and Gina Prince-Bythewood’s Love & Basketball  (2000) will screen Monday afternoon.

FILM FORUM (NYC):

It’s the last full weekend of Film Forum’s“Trilogies” series and on Thursday, they’re screening Whit Stillman’s (Is this a real title for the trilogy?) “Doomed. Bourgeois. In Love” trilogy Metropolitan (1990), Barcelona  (1994) and The Last Days of Disco (1998) with Stillman doing select intros and QnAs that day. Friday is Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s “BRD” Trilogy, including The Marriage of Maria Braun (1978), Lola  (1981)and Veronika Voss, and this weekend is a Carol Reed Post-War Noir Trilogy, including The Third Man  (1949). Saturday also sees a Michelangelo Antonioni trilogy including L’Avventura  (1960) and two other films from the Italian master. Sunday and Monday sees a very rare screening of Wim Wenders’ “Road Trilogy” including Kings of the Roadfrom 1976 and Alice in the Cities. Also, on Wednesday and Saturday is a repeat of a John Ford trilogy, including Rio Grande and Fort Apache, plus don’t forget the weekend’s family-friendly Film Forum Jr, which this weekend shows a bunch of cartoons from Bugs, Daffy and Friends. Obviously, there’s a lot going on at this venerable NYC arthouse and I hope to get to some of these now that Tribeca is over.

EGYPTIAN THEATRE (LA):

If you live in L.A., you can spend a good part of your weekend at Maltin Fest 2019, taking place at the Egyptian Theater, which includes a really incredible series of screenings and events with special guests. Friday is Nicole Holefcener’s Please Give with Holefcener and frequent collaborator Catherine Keener on hand, plus a screening of Sing Street! Alexander Payne and Laura Dern will be there Saturday afternoon to screen the filmmaker’s early work Citizen Ruth, plus lots more! I also want to pay special attention to them showing the late Jon Schnepp’s doc The Death of “Superman Lives” on Saturday night.

AERO  (LA):

Thursday is a Christopher Munch double feature of The Hours and Times (1991) and The Sleepy Time Gal (2001) with Munch and the great Jacqueline Biset in person! Then it goes right into Starring Europe: New Films from the EU 2019 i.e. new films, not repertory but still interesting.

IFC CENTER (NYC)

Waverly Midnights: Parental Guidance shows James Cameron’s Aliens (okay, am I crazy or do they show this every other month?), Weekend Classics: Love Mom and Dad  shows Martin Scorsese’s Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (1974) and Late Night Favorites: Spring is the Coen Brothers’ Fargo (1996).

BAM CINEMATEK (NYC):

In the midst of Black 90s: A Turning Point in American Cinema, which will include Ice Cube’s Friday (on Friday, of course), as well as Set It Off, New Jack City, Belly, Straight Out of Brooklyn and Menace II Society over the weekend. Also, the late John Singleton’s Boyz n the Hood will screen twice on Sunday as well as on Monday as part of the series.

MOMA (NYC):

Abel Ferrara: Unrated continues this week with repeats of 1998’s New Rose Hotel, 1993’s Body Snatchers and more recent films like 2017’s Piazza Vittorio and 2007’sGo Go Tales, and this series will continue next week. The current Modern Matiness will conclude with Pixar’s Up on Wednesday and Vincente Minnelli’s Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) on Weds and Thurs, respectively.

MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE (NYC):

Panorama Europe continues through the weekend but that’s all new stuff, not repertory.

LANDMARK THEATRES NUART (LA):

Friday’s midnight screening is Wes Craven’s Shocker (1989) with a QnA… but not with Craven.. unless they plan the creepiest movie tie-in possible!

That’s it for this week but next week, we get John Wick Chapter 3 and more!

[heartythrills]

Scroll along. Just being self-indulgent to recover from a bad day.

My sister once told me that her friend’s assessment of me is that I essentially interview new people I meet to see if they could become potential friends. When I meet people, I’m usually the first to talk. I ask a lot of questions. For example, I went out to a Beer Day event with my friend? Acquaintance? in April of this year. Let’s call him Ben. Just to clarify, I barely know him though. We worked in the same company in college, but never in the same place. When he started working where I used to work, I was transferred to work somewhere else, but he knew of me because my coworkers would talk about me. Anyway, beer day. He’d been inviting me to go since last year. Him and my friend, whom I’ve known since freshman year because we were in several classes together. I finally went so it doesn’t seem like I didn’t want to hang out. Besides the warm greeting I got from him, it was awkward as hell. I don’t really drink anymore, so I didn’t know what beer I should order except that I should get a light one because I don’t know anyone there. After I got my beer, I picked a person to talk to, let’s call him Andy. I don’t about the rest of society, but I never go for people in groups. I’m a person who’s really bad at handling rejection, so I really assess the situation, or person before I approach. Things I look for includes how they’re dressed, what they wear, how they clean themselves up, their body language, are they on a device or not, male or female in some cases. Yeah, it’s not nice to judge a book by its cover but hey, if no one fucking greeted you to begin with and the person who invited you didn’t go introduce you to anyone, better go with the basics. The person I picked was a guy with a green backpack of invader zim. I wouldn’t go as far as to say that I approached him because I assumed he liked anime. Ben isn’t super obsessed with anime and comics, but does have a handful of friends who are deep into fandom. He goes to expos and conventions with his girlfriend etc. So, in the event that Andy is into any of that, I can hold a conversation. Now, don’t get me wrong, I can have all sorts of conversations, I just prefer to have conversations that go somewhere instead of small talk. I really don’t like small talk. Anywaysss, I go up to Andy and was like, Hi, I’m Tilly, is it ok if I take a seat here? Oh btw, he was still eating a burrito, the only one eating. After taking a seat, I asked him how he knew Ben and how many times he’s gone to Beer Day. Because he was very responsive, I continued to converse with him until the other host came and entered the conversation and they all got kinda caught into their own conversation. I just kinda stood there and act like I’m listening, asked them how they knew Ben, same same. Most of them actually went to the same school I did. But bc we were in different majors, we never really crossed paths. After about like 30 mins there, we went to a different bar. Ben was kind enough to keep me with him. He quickly introduced me to the girl who would be driving us to the next location. She lived in that city so she knew her way around. Apparently she has like 3 - 4 different jobs. Housing in that area is pretty expensive though. We got to the next location and I seated myself in the far table. Andy had already gotten himself a drink since they arrived there before us. There were a bit of confusion as to where we would be sitting since there were like 25 of us. Some of them didn’t go to the first bar. I talked a bit more with Andy before he took out the cards from his backpack. I guess he was prepared on how to occupy time. We played Exploding Kittens, a game I would never have ever picked up to play. Anyways I lost about 10 mins in, not really feeling the game or the crowd. I went to the restroom, texted my ride and went to order another drink. When I got back, someone took my seat so I went over to the neighboring table and asked if I could take a seat there. Same conversation. How do they know Ben. They knew Ben through his girlfriend and through conventions. That means, they do anime and comic. So to push the conversation further, I asked if they cosplayed. Yes. What have they cod played as. These two questions measure how into anime they were and what anime or comic or game they liked. Once I get the title of the series or game, it’s easier to converse. If it’s a series or game I like, I can open up discussions or conversations. If it’s a series I don’t know, depending on how they sounded when they first tell me, I can ask them to tell me more or I can stop at that. They weren’t a bad group, and I was actually starting to feel comfortable because we were having actual conversations, but my ride had arrived at this time and I had drunken my beer too fast so I could feel the intoxication so I actually decided to leave. People don’t really admit to liking anime unless in obvious places or events like anime expo or house parties where the host is into anime. I usually don’t tell people I like anime either. It’s not that I’m ashamed of it. It’s unnecessary info if the person I’m talking to is just talking to kill time and is not actually genuine about getting to know me. And some people judge you right away for liking, not that I don’t defend anime and myself well when that happens because I do. When I was in college, I accidentally let it slip that I liked anime, and I was totally judged for it by my supervisor. She hated anime (but really it was just Pokémon) because her step daughter who hates her and she hates liked Pokémon. So my supervisor would bring it up every so often, saying that anime is cartoon and I’m like, you watch Disney animated films, you read D.C. and Marvel comics, it’s the same fucking thing. Shut her up. Anyways, in addition to just titles of series, I judge, yes judge, a person on what they like from the series or game, or why they like it. The world is filled with so many different minds, so it’s only obvious that we all like very different aspect of different things. There was this girl that became a new manager at the same office I worked at. She’s a very optimistic person. And not that I hate optimism, but there are some optimism that irritates me. So I tried to get to know her, asking any shows you watched lately? The show she loved is the show I hate. Once Upon a Time. I hate that show because I hate the Charmings, Snow White to be exact. And this girl loved Snow White. I heard her out, listened to all the reasons why she loved the series, which was all the reason why I didn’t like the series. A single conversation can give you so much insights, which is why I want actual conversation and not just the ‘hey’ ‘how’s your day’ ‘good’ 'fine’ 'anything new’ 'no’ like, work with me here! Anything new? no? Just same-o same-o? How about urself??? Ugh. You know a person doesn’t want to talk when conversations go like that. My answers are like “anything new? Not really. Life’s just going. How about yourself? How’s the bf? Are your parents still visiting? Etc etc” in terms of anime “did you read the latest chapter????” “Don’t you think Kuroo was fucking gorgeous???” I like a deeper connection. Like, to be able to pick up a series or game and be like “I hate how they used character b as a stepping stone and then abandoned him!” And the person gets me. I have a person I talk to every once in a while. Let’s name him Bob. Bob and I went to school together since 6th grade. I knew him from 5th grade though. I talked to him a lot in middle school, or maybe it was really the other way around because we both liked Kingdom Hearts, and I was a rare finding at the time since I was a girl who liked both anime and played video games. Apparently (not to brag) I was pretty popular among the boys. Yeah, the only problem was that I wasn’t aware of that. I was too focused on Inuyasha and my love for anime and Kingdom Hearts. Anyways, I started talking to him again at the beginning of last year. I was talking to him because I was interviewing him because I was working on my story and got stuck as to why the second guy did what he did and why the friend wanted the main girl to get back with the second guy. Somewhere along the chat, we went down memory lane and he admitted to liking me, which I pretended that I didn’t know but I knew because at the end of 8th grade, two girls I was pretty close to tried to set me up with him but I didn’t stay long at the party because I didn’t believe them because we were actually starting to have problems. It wasn’t until high school when another friend of mines, maybe 2 different ones were like 'yeah, he liked you, you didn’t know?’ I was like, course I didn’t know. I just thought he talked to me because I always had the latest news about Kingdom Hearts. Anyways, I pretended I didn’t know and told him he should’ve asked, maybe I might’ve said yes. At Least that’s what I thought when I was chatting with him, kinda drunk in to conversation and almost desperation really. When I reflected on it later, I realized, I wouldn’t have said yes. I had another crush at that time. And dated a different guy who I did quite liked, but broke up with him because we couldn’t even basic date, like you know hold hands. I also rejected one of my guy friends at the time, who I knew liked me because he was so obvious about it and yeah it was wrong of me to kinda lead him on by talking to him too much, spending time with him a little too much. But hey, he knew the amines I was watching. It was rare to find someone who had so much knowledge at that time. What was I talking about? Right, Bob and I started talking, kinda flirting on FB and then we went out to dinner once and hung out with some of my old classmates and his band mates for my cousins birthday and I could sense the overwhelming feeling in my chest. Yeah, I was starting to like him. But I felt he didn’t feel the same. He brushed off my feelings a couple of times, so I wrote him a letter telling him that I feel like I was starting to like him, so I was going to distance myself a bit so that those feelings don’t bloom and overcomplicate anything. We still chatted but a confession like that is bound to change one’s perspective. I won’t lie that he didn’t get meaner, bc he did. One time, I told him that he should go archery with me. When I told him I’m available any weekend in the following month, he asked if I didn’t have any friends, why were my weekends so free. Uh, excuse me. I was making time for you. And I’m an introvert, I don’t like going out. I could make plans if I wanted to, I just don’t want to. But I didn’t say any of that. I just thought it. That moment, he became someone who wasn’t worth it. I just told him, I haven’t made any plans yet. We agreed to a day but he canceled and honestly, if he didn’t, I would’ve. After that I didn’t contact him for a while and suddenly he started watching all the animes I recommended based on his taste. He started conversations, and I wasn’t gonna be a bitch about it and not talk to him. He wasn’t worth playing hard to get or ignoring or whatever. I made sure he realize what he did didn’t impact me in any way…besides the fact that I still grudge him and will forever hate him for it. I even went to a night market with him. He kept trying to get us to share food, like wtf is his problem? I agreed to eat his takoyaki bc I like takoyaki but afterwards, anything he asked me to finish, I declined, saying that I was saving my stomach for other food. I digress. Anyways, I heard him out, and realized we watch animes for very different things, liked very different animes. We always end up arguing about the anime. I don’t like his favorite anime and he complains about every tiny detail of the ones I like. I can’t have those conversations often. He thought I enjoyed him bitching about my favorite series, when honestly, I think he’s the one who enjoys me dissecting his comments. I’d write essays to him. My last straw was when he started talking about how he didn’t like Suwa from Orange, all bc Suwa was presented as the popular guy. And instead of just admitting to not liking Suwa or saying that it’s just in his nature to dislike guys considered popular in a series bc it hurts his ego for some reason, he starts dragging in Suwa’s move on Naho etc. And that got me so riled up, like You don’t even know about that until the end and you’re telling me that was the reason why you didn’t like him 'from the start’??? You were judging him based on his looks, not his character. You didn’t follow the storyline and to defend yourself, you drag in something Suwa did NOT in this world, but a parallel world? Saying that it wasn’t right? When Naho and Kakeru weren’t even dating? When Suwa was definitely not supporting Kakeru? Saying that it broke the code of bros when we can’t even be sure they were bros at all in that parallel world. To top that off, he wanted the ending to change, like what would happen if the character never go their letters? Would they have cared for or notice Kakeru like how they are now? Like, dude. That’s what happened in the other world. They didn’t care as much for him and didn’t notice the problems he was going through that’s why he committed suicide. We already k ow the end result. Like, consider the genre of the story? Consider the message of the story? Anyways after writing like 3 essays to him, he thanked me for having arguments with him, all of which he enjoys very much. I clarified that I hated those arguments or debated. I get so worked up and for what? So we haven’t really talked much since then. We went to dinner early this year, but that was about it. When he tried to bring up anime discussions, I geared toward an anime we can both rant about instead of talking about my favorite ones. I don’t like wasting time on things I don’t like. I don’t like wasting time on people I don’t like. I prefer to use all my energy loving, though that’s not to say I wouldn’t write a whole 10000 word rant about something I don’t like. Usually I would do so if it irritates me too much and I have to let it out. I’ve done so for various occasions. Anyways, I’ve written for 2 hours now so I think I’m recovered. God, I’m such a difficult person.