#the wardrobe in this movie btw? choice

[clancykisser]

Ok I can't hold back when I want to talk about f/os on here, much less holding back on keeping who an unknown one was SO

-points- This is Henry Hart from the Henry Danger Movie that just came out a few days ago! I loved him SO MUCH in this movie, and since he's an adult in it I've decided to just say 'fuck it' and kiss him with a separate movie-only insert uwu

His tag is 🪢 Our ship tag is going to be Binding Force 🪢💌

[catdemontraphouse]

Through having an autism moment for one of my favorite movies and its related medias (the current Beetlejuice fixation) I came to the following conclusions:

*Beetlejuice’s favorite color is probably red, which is probably a reference to the color of the star he’s named after

*Beetlejuice enjoys fashion and could even possibly be considered a designer (yes rly) Despite being a grungy character who’s known for being smelly and gross… he is a designer/seamstress with a vested interest in fashion???

Yes I’m going to explain in horrifically unnecessary detail. (It’s the autism) and yes this draws from all the juices but tbh any one of them would work as a stand-alone example (except maybe musicaljuice but he’s critical to the sewing part and also he’s the cute one)

————————-

The argument for Beetlejuice being an amateur designer:

There’s an interview somewhere with the costume designer for the musical that says they wanted the pinstripe black and white suit to look like it had been repaired and modified over the years, because since Beetlejuice was a loner, he’d been solely responsible for making and maintaining his wardrobe. So like, he sewed his own suit by his lonesome out of fabric of some sort. Because if it was magic why the hell would it need repairs? Which suggests at least to me that he *enjoys* making clothes because why go through all that work if you can materialize anything at will? And I mean it fits so, I’m sure it wasn’t his first ever pattern making and sewing experience.

There’s also the way toonjuice refers to his suit as having “never been washed” on numerous occasions so I don’t reckon it’s something he just makes from magic and poofs into nothingness on the fly? Though toonjuice could be argued to buy his clothing since they never stated he made it and he lives in some kinda monster city idk. I’m saying that suggests physical matter somehow not like, idk a temporary illusion? If you can wash it, it has some sort of mass to it right?

Listen, why the fuck a guy who can make his own patterns and sew an entire suit would not wash it is beyond me but okay. Anyways the point is there’s a suggestion being made here by the franchise that Beetlejuice makes his own clothing in the traditional way by sewing together some sort of permanent matter. I can’t say I get the same impression from moviejuice though. There’s not much to suggest his clothing isn’t just temporary magic bullshit, save for the visible decay… ok wait maybe it is made of permanent material. 🤷‍♀️ either that or the dust, tattering and moss is a fashion choice? 🤨🤨

Ok so for this next part let’s just like, put aside the weirdness going down with the wedding thing in the movie (btw I’ve seen it numerous times and I feel like it’s def “a green card thing” in the original as well, pay attention to the characters’ behaviors/interactions throughout the film with one another and u can see what I mean.)

Beetlejuice probably designed that red wedding dress right? Because he materialized it or pulled it out of thin air or whatever? And the matching red tux, same thing. I kinda think that was the fashionista in him taking the excuse to make dramatic evening wear lol. Using Lydia as a Bratz doll dressing her up in his designs smh

There’s also how jazzed up and amused he was by turning Otho into a walking fashion faux pas, or at least I have to assume that’s what he was doing when he ripped the guys outfit apart and replaced it with something that caused Otho to scream in terror. How tf does a smelly guy in a crypt know what’s considered a style no-no unless he’s into this shit lol

Oh and uh if you’ve ever seen the cartoon he dresses himself up in all sorts of little outfits on the fly, like very frequently. If nothing else he’s coming up with the concepts for these clothes, maybe not constructing them himself in every version of the franchise but he’s at least designing the outfits in all of them or so I assume. He also gives other characters makeovers or new outfits on various occasions. It seems for Beetlejuice, the living are like breathing Barbie dolls he sees no issue with dressing up in his latest creations.

I’ll now explain the “favorite color is red” thing:

*Beetlejuice doesn’t wear many outfits in the movie, but three out of the four I can remember had red in them. The aforementioned wedding outfits were primarily red. His shirt under the coat in the guide outfit is red. 🤷‍♀️ (Adams undershirt that he copies is red but I don’t rly think it counts) Whenever he’s seen wearing a saturated, non-neutral color, it’s red.

*didn’t he crash a little red car in the model at one point?… I just watched this movie again like last month and I forget already. That car in the photo, he crashed it into a fire hydrant earlier in the movie, didn’t he? Idk maybe not

*his tombstone has his name written on it in red

*toonjuice always has red nail polish 🤷‍♀️

*idk if this counts for anything but the nightclub Juno created to lure him away from the Maitlands was entirely red idk

*and the star Betelgeuse is a red supergiant, so yeah

Bonus entry is this guy a reference to Viy or am I overthinking it???

Yeah ok I’m def overthinking it. 🤦‍♀️

That’s all i have to say. All that crap above. Bye.

[spoiledsummerdasies]

Being a fictive from a controversial source (Lolita)

A post by Delores “Lolita” Haze (NEVER CALL ME LOLITA. I MENTION IT HERE ONLY SO PEOPLE KNOW WHO I AM)

This is long, and obviously covers triggering topics, so TW for everything under the cut.

Let me tell you something right off the bat, you can’t control who you split. No one in this system actively wanted to split a character from one of the most controversial and misunderstood books to ever exist. And yet, here I am. 14 years old, only girl in the system. I’m extremely lucky to have formed without exomemories, but I am fully aware of what happened to me in my source, it’s uncomfortable to live with that information, but I have to endure it. I do try and separate myself from my source to an extent, I don’t want to trigger myself you know? But the entire conversation around Lolita interests me. I categorise those who are interested in the Lolita franchise (book and movies) into four categories:

1- people who actually understood the story. They know it’s not a love story, that it’s more akin to a horror if anything. They like the story for its writing style, or the movies for the cinematography or fashion etc. these are the people I like. They don’t romanticise or victim blame.

2-people (usually young) who don’t understand the story. They’re usually young girls with an older man k*nk who romanticise it.

3- people who have zero media literacy and can’t figure out that h*mbert is an unreliable narrator who warped everything to for his sick, victim blamey viewpoint. These are the ones that get all outraged and call anyone who even mentions the story a PDF

4- literal actual PDFs who completely missed the point of the story entirely.

Notice how only 1 of those 4 categories are safe people to interact with?

The publishing industry and the 60s movie absolutely failed the story. The author himself specifically asked for no girls or pretty pictures on the cover of the book for the soul reason of making sure no one went into it with the preconceived notion it was a romance. Just look at what happened once the 60s movie came out, no preconceived notions to a whole heap of them. The red, the sunglasses, the lollipop, the girl.

While I do admittedly like the music in the 60s movie, they butchered the story. And they shed me of my entire Identity. My name is Delores Haze, Dolly or Lo to my friends. Not Lolita. That’s the name my abuser gave me to strip me of my identity. Every single character in the 60s movie calls me Lolita. They age me up to 16 (still a minor btw), they didn’t show any of the abuse (yes I know there were laws in the 60s but still), they framed it as a romance. The director was a creep too, reportedly messing around with the 16 year old actor. I firmly believe that there’d be less controversy around Lolita if the 60s movie never existed.

The 90s movie did better, but it still has its flaws. This is the incarnation of Lolita I’m mainly split from. With the red hair and the (absolutely amazing) wardrobe. It’s ok to admit the fashion is great btw, because it is. I feel like if they filmed it and edited it in a more eerie, almost horror like way they could have gotten the exact message of the book across. At least in this adaptation they show the abuse for what it is. The fighting, slapping and kicking, h*mberts creepy ass desires. And it’s good they used a body double for the more explicit parts to protect the still teenage actor. They kept me 14, still a bit older than the book but at least it’s still very young and gets the message across somewhat the same. What I think let this adaptation down was the cinematography and editing choice. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a beautifully shot movie. But that romantic, dreamlike, hazy view they use only further romanticised the story to many.

I bring all this up to make a point, it’s easy to romanticise the story because of what the movies did to it. Those with bad media literacy (so like half the planet) and those who haven’t read the book won’t understand the point. They’ll miss the fact this is a cautionary tale on how abusers work. That they’re often the people closest to you, that they’re manipulative, unreliable narrators, that they’ll twist things in their own favour and victim blame to justify their sick actions. I’m the victim, I always was. I’m 12 in the book, 14 in the 90s movie and 16 in the 60s one. All of those ages are minors, a child.

All of that being said: it enrages me that I can barely exist in public as a fictive of Dolly purely because people are media illiterate and don’t understand the story is and always has been akin to a horror that WARNS of the dangers of PDFs not a fucking love story. If I tell someone who I am and where I’m from it’ll either be “you read/watched Lolita? You must be a PDF” or “ew don’t romanticise Lolita!” As if we have any control over who we split. As if I’m not the victim and always was. As if the whole reason I split wasn’t because the host WAS harassed as a teenager. Just being a regular singlet who likes the franchise will get you harassed, but being a FICTIVE? It’s like walking on egg shells every single day I exist in plural spaces or just in public in general. It’s not my fault people can’t understand my source, that the publishing industry and movies failed the book, that PDFs do exactly what the book warns and warp the story to fit their sick fantasies.

I’m sure all fictives from controversial sources can relate to this part: no one ever asks how I’m doing NOW. Now I’m in a system, in a different body, in a safe environment. They stay hung up on the abuse I endured they completely neglect to get to know me for who I am now. They don’t know anything about me, my favourite colour (red), my favourite food (berries), my favourite drink (frozen coke), my hobbies (vintage collecting and fashion). I have a brother and dad in this system, a family that love me and don’t hurt me. Despite the body being trans masc, I don’t actually mind fronting. In fact I’m exited to get top surgery because in the headspace my chest is flat (bc you know, I’m a child). I’m fairly happy now, sure I have my bad days and get triggered sometimes, but I’m safe. I’m healing.

Fictives are not their source. They can be connected to it yes, but they are living a whole different life in a whole new body. They grow and change just like anyone else.

I am Delores Haze, my in sys dad calls me kiddo. My brother calls me Lo-Lo. The system calls me Dolly or Lo. Sometimes is Las, or shortie. But I’m not Lolita. I never will be. I exist in the system to help us survive, I’m not my source despite having a connection to the fashion and aesthetics. Fuck Humbert Humbert, fuck those who don’t understand my source, and fuck those who reduce introjects down to their source. I am not a “nymphette” I am a 14 year old girl.

TLDR: Lolita is not a love story, respect all introjects even if they have a controversial source. Learn media literacy. K word all PDFs.

[at1nys-blog]

Is a gin tonic

Pairing: Kim Hongjoong x reader

Summary: when you see him again, in the same club you think fate is on your side

A/N: @snowgirlfallen here the second part, again I'm so so sorry it took this long 😭. Btw I love this picture of Hongjoong so much, I want it tattooed in my brain because is the most beautiful thing ever

Pt.1

You managed to survive for two weeks. Two long weeks of work, some other work and did I mentioned because of work? What helped you throught fourteen days of pure chaotic errands and meetings was Ateez's discography. Since you check it out, you started doing everything with their song playing in the background. What better choice of music while at the gym or doing the dishes?

Coming back home, earlier than usual since it was Friday, you thought that you needed a change of scenary before loosing your sanity. Watching movies was nice, more than nice but not for week on end, that was too much to handle even for you.

You decided to text your friend, informing her about your plan for the night and asked her if she wanted to tag along, clarifying that whatever she wanted to do, you didn't care, you were going to party whatever if she was coming or not.

The answer came almost immediately, all in caps and it read "OH MY GOD THANK YOU I NEVER THOUGHT THIS DAYS WAS COMING ANY TIME SOON WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED???? NEVERMIND YOU WILL TELL ME ONCE IM THERE" you laughed at the device, picturing your friend excited about you suggesting such a hangout like that.

She then asked if you had a place to go in mind already, or if you two could talk where to go while getting ready. You told her you already knew where to go, but it was going to be a surprise for her. Once saying your see you laters, you blocked your phone and went to take a shower before your friend could start bombarding with questions.

You had time to shower, dry your hair and clean the room before the bell of your apartament rang, for once in your life you were glad your best friend lived fourty minutes away from you.

"Okay, you showered already, great. Now I have some make up and some cloths you might like but I need to know where we are going." she started not even greeting you, but it was fine this was just her being thrilled about the whole situation.

"I told you already, is a surprise." you weren't going to give in, no sir. You wanted to go to the same club as two weeks ago and you knew that if you told her she was going to try and change your mind.

"Listen, I know you said it is..." you started to push her in your room, there was no time to waste with stupid banter. "ehy, I can walk on my own you know?"

"It doesn't seems like it" you joked, still pushing her in your room.

Once inside you let her go, and she rushed to your wardrobe in search of something you could wear. “I though about your make up and..” she struggled to move one of the dresses that you had hanged some days ago. Watching it carefully, she decided to not take down that one. “What was I talking about?”

“The make up” you said sitting on the edge of your bed.

“Ah yes the make up. I though about some glitters. What do you think?” She growled, trying to untangle a couple of hangers that ended up together.

“You want a chair?” You proposed. “And about the glitters, well, it depends.”

“Pass me a chair.” You did as told and she thanked you. “Yes” tanking down the two dresses she pondered for a while which one was best, then went back to check on your wardrobe. “Where is that one black dress you wore last time?”

“Nah is too short for me. I threw it away.” You answered her.

“Such a waste to be honest. Ah the glitters. Check in my bag. I have the make up trousse, look if you like the glitters.” Rolling your eyes you went to see in her purse and finding the trousse you started rummaging around until you found it.

“Purple glitters? Really?” You said showing her the little box of purple and pink glitters.

“What? They are cute. And besides purple suits you.” She said and climbed down the chair. “Here. Put on this one.”

The dress was longer than the one you wore last time but much, you still thanked your friend she didn’t pick a shorter one. Looking yourself in the mirror you had to admit that the glitters were fine. They gave a pop of color with your grey and black outfit choice.

“I wonder why you aren’t a make up artist yet.” You commented, she smiled at you.

“Because people are stupid. Now, let’s go.” She said leaving the bathroom first.

You checked that everything was okay and adjusting one more time your hair before taking a deep breath, getting ready for the night. If you had to meet him, you were to and if it wasn't, it wasn't. But deep down, very deep down you wished to see him again.

The cue to the club was pretty long, your friend next to you couldn't stop moving around. Impatience running throughout her body, you could tell.

"Stop it already." you told her, she mocked you a little. "we will get inside anytime soon now." and as if your word was the clue for it, the line started to move, every second faster than the previous. "Told you"

"You are wicked, I'm telling you." when the two of you were close enough to the entrance, her eyes widened. "Here? Again? Why?"

"Why not? Listen, I liked it last time so why not coming back?" you answered. She gave you a side eye look.

“You sure?”

“Sure”

“So the man you went home with has nothing to do with why you chose to come here?”

“He has nothing to do with that.” You answered but she didn’t believe you one bit. “What? Stop looking at me like that.”

“I’ll stop when you’ll stop lying to me.” You just rolled your eyes and kept walking to get inside.

It took you twenty minutes to drop your friend on the dance floor with the promise to be back as soon as possible and with the excuse of wanting a drink. You tried to ask if she wanted one too but the loud music and the group of people dancing around her didn't help. You dropped it, not really in the mood to try harderd to ask her.

Waiting for your drink at the bar you couldn't help but hear a girl hitting on someone next to you. She was drunk, which, in your opinion was the reason why she sounded so bold. Giving a quick look at your left you giggled at the sight in front of you. A blonde girl was all over her prey, tracing her finger up and down the poor boy arm, then she went closer, wispering something to the man's ear and that was when you saw his features for the first time. Joking on your own saliva you got the duo's attention on you: the girl, kind to ask if everything was fine and Hongjoong confused.

"No, yeah totally fine. I just... Nevermind have a..." the bar man called out to you, informing that your drink was ready "thanks" you yelled over the music, whether he heard or not a mystery.

"Why are you having iced water?" asked the blonde girl, his voice give away how drunk she was. "we are at the club, you should drink something more..." she almost fell from her stoll, both you and Hongjoong went immediately to help her stay on her own feet. "Thanks. As I was saying.."

"Yeah I know is a gin tonic." your attention was on Hongjoong, he mouthed the drink's name with a small smile on his face. "you need..." you didn't had time to finish your sentence that a new voice got mixed in the little party.

"I'm very sorry for her, I'll take care of her now. Thanks." and with that the two figures left you and Hongjoong alone.

"So" he started

"So?" you said back waiting for the idol to say something

"So, I didn't thought to see you here ,again" he was trying hard to break the ice. "considering what happened"

"You mean what happened with the creppy guy or after that?" you giggled at your own words, he smilled with you. Oh how much did you missed that stupid, beautiful smile of his. Sure, you had spent quite some time scrolling through pinterest watching pictures of him but nothing could compare to what was standing in front of you.

“I hope the first one.” He giggled and you found yourself doing so too. He moved closer. Taking the seat next to you before asking how you did this past two weeks.

“Could have gone better to be honest.” At least I had your voice and face to cheer me up, you didn’t dare to tell him though, knowing a little bit about his idol self you didn’t want to bust his ego. He simply nodded, a soft nice leaving his lips. “And what about you?”

“Better now that I see you.”

“What a flirt. I can’t make your 14 days better just by being there” you said, your drink long forgotten.

“You have no idea. I was loosing hope to see you again, and now…” he simply moved his hands up and down your figure. “… you are here. I guess we had the same idea”

“And what’s that?” You asked playfully.

“Coming here. I’ve been coming to this club whenever I had a day off. My staff wasn’t too appealed but I didn’t care.” You nodded … the information he just gave you. “I didn’t see you here before so why tonight?”

“My job was draining me so I though a night out could help me out a little bit.” You confessed. “And I also hoped to see you again.” Another confession out in the world, for only him to know. He appreciated your words, you could tell by his smiling face. “Stop it.”

“Doing what?” He was truly confused.

“Smiling like that. Is nothing to smile about.”

“It is. You said that if was fate we were going to meet again and here we are.” Indeed you were, one in front of the other, talking like you knew each other for a long time. “Now I have a question. What if I didn’t come tonight? Would have gave me in seeing me again?”

“Oh totally. I only give destiny one chance.” Lie, you were going chasing him club after club. Making it seems like a coincidence that you were there too, like tonight. For everyone around the two of you, it was a coincidence the both of you were there again.

“Aigo, what a liar you are.”

“I’m not a liar. I actually give one chance to fate. If it is meant to be don’t you think the universe will bring two people together every change it gets?”

“Stop defending yourself you are not doing a good job. I can tell you are lying.” He started to stare at you, he wanted to see the moment you broke down in your eyes.

“Okay, maybe I was going to find a way to meet you.”

“You are, oh, so obsessed with me.” He laughed at it, making you roll your eyes. But he was true. His face, his smile, his voice, his laugh. Everything about him was intoxicating to you. He was just too perfect.

“Obsessed is such a strong word now, but…”

“Come with me.” He said standing up from his seat and stretching his hands for you to take. You looked at his hand first, than back at him. “Just come with me. If you trust me of course.” You did trust him, so without being asked a third time you took his hand and followed him.

You thought he was going to lead you outside, just to have some more privacy and to stop yelling above the music that was being played, but no, he took you at the end of the club, a secluted area with a couple of tables. One of the two was occupied by seven figures.

"I asked them to behave" he yelled in your ears. It was the first time he came this close to you and it gave you chills all over your body. "I hope they will listen to me once in their life" he added, you looked at him throught your lashes thinking if it was a good idea. You didn't had time to turn back that he waved at one of the boys, he turning as if he knew Hongjoong was there.

"Are you sure? I mean, you are all idols and I..." One of the members, Wooyoung you recognized him in the dim lights of the club, well mostly you could tell it was him thanks to his excitment and behaviour. He surely was someone that skipped some steps in meeting someone knew.

He was quick to take you and make you sit down next to him, asking who you were and how you were doing, after answering his question he kept asking more and more, not giving you the time to ask somwthing on your own. He wanted to know you, that was all.

You and the boys kept talking and having fun with one another, until you got a text from your friend asking you were the hell did you end up, she also texted you that if you were having some fun she didn't want to know. You got Hongjoong's attention telling him that you had to go.

"You need to stop leaving me like this" he joked and you smiled. You asked to have his phone.

"Text me if you want to talk, I'll try and answer as soon as possible." this time you were the one talking in his ear, smirking a little bit.

"You are so obsessed with me." he joked.

You waved goodbye to the rest of the group, starting to push people out of your way to finally get to your friend and when you finally were close to her, to her what she had to say she asked you where did you end up.

"I swear you have to stop disappearing on me like this. You will give me a heart attack" she scolded you. "Now, can we go somewhere else?”

“Sure. You had a place in mind or…” you asked over the loud music, she gave you a mischievous smile, looking behind you and waving at whoever was.

“I have made a new friend while you were flirting.” Turning around you came face to face with Ateez once more. Hongjoong was the first to come closer to you. “One of them suggested to go somewhere else.” She added.

Looking at the leader of the group you rolled your eyes but smiled nonetheless.

“You are so obsessed with me.” You mocked him but took his hand and left the club followed by your best friend and the rest of the group.

The rest of the night was spent having fun, club hopping around Itaewon and having a snack, or two, in between and talking about nothing as the ten of you were friends since ever.

[seravph]

Hi, I didn't really know who to reach out for this question, but do you have any tips on how to find your own unique fashion style? I'm not really looking to hop on popular clothing trends on social media e.g. eboy/girl or cottagecore, so I'm not exactly sure where to start! I come to consult you because I've seen some of your posts and you look very well versed in fashion and you seem to know your own personal style. My wardrobe is very outdated and I would like to update it to reflect the truest expression of myself. Thank you 😊 You don't have to answer this if you don't feel like doing so btw 😅

EEEE more fashion asks i love these thank you!!!! warning this got a lil (very) long so its under the cut :^)

so first and foremost the most important part about curating your own style is to learn more about your body and what flatters/doesnt flatter it. it's learning some basic fashion 'rules' pertaining to proportions, cuts, etc. there are plenty of resources on this if you dont know where to start (kibbe body test, video, video) but keep in mind this step has nothing to do with your weight!!!! i could talk wayyy more about this but at the end of the day, some clothing is just more flattering for specific body shapes - that doesnt mean you cant wear something that isnt perfectly flattering, but knowing your body and knowing what flatters it will make you understand your own style and help guide the pieces you buy. fashion 'rules' arent necessarily meant to be followed, but just understood so that 'breaking' them is a conscious choice. (it also really helped with my insecurities???? like this step is basically recognizing that its not your body thats unflattering, its the clothing, if that makes sense???)

also remember that every 'style' works for every body type. i.e if you want to be a 60s vibe but youre too curvy for shift dresses, there are plenty of clothes in a similar style that would look great on you <3 basically, if you dont like the way a piece looks on you, you can still achieve the same vibe with a different article of clothing thats more flattering. but also umm.... you can just wear the unflattering thing if you want LOL if it makes you happy... then it becomes your own controlled decision <3 live love laugh follow your heart

okay. now that you have that out of the way. there are a million ways to develop a sense of style, and no particular order in which i recommend them. what i love doing is creating pinterest boards for the spring/summer or fall/winter seasons and just filling them with pieces i would wear in a perfect world. i dont mean like cottagecore aesthetic boards, just boards full of runway looks and clothing pngs that i like. i also love making little outfits for characters which can influence my own style. everyone thinks of their style differently; i think of my own outfits as little vignettes with narratives behind them, but other people are more concerned with just wearing things they think are pretty, other people view it as an expression of art or their identity, and other people just want to feel comfortable!!! its all up to you and what youre drawn to!!

one thing that tan france mentioned once was to go online window shopping by going onto the website for a brand you like (regardless of whether its affordable or realistic!) and just adding things to your cart that youre interested in. dont worry about how expensive they are or anything, and when youre done, remove all the items you like the least. and then keep reviewing and removing until you have just a handful of really nice items you really like, and keep doing this with other brands until you can identify common threads between the pieces you like. you dont have to buy them!! in fact maybe its better if you dont!!! and the websites dont have to be like zara or h&m ... go on balmain or chanel if you want, play pretend and have fun!!

re: the last bullet point, i think a big turn off for people in terms of fashion is the idea that you need to wear something palatable and 'appropriate.' its like looking at a runway and thinking "its nice, but i would never wear that in real life." but honestly????? in a perfect world i would be wearing full gowns to the supermarket!!!! if your ideal style is imaginative but unattainable, your style in practice will be a microcosm of it. basically... dream big... dont be afraid to 'overdress' if its what you like!! one of the best pieces of advice i ever got was from my aunt, who offered to by me a plastic tiara. i asked her when i was ever going to wear it irl, and she just looked at me and said "??? you can wear it whenever you want to!!" so true!!! wear a tutu to mcdonalds. wear a bedazzled tux to prom. who cares

accessories, nail polish, hair, jewelry, perfume and makeup goes a long way in developing style. i dont wear a ton of makeup, but just putting some color on my cheeks achieves a kind of sunkissed lovestruck vibe that i strive for. i paint my nails red because i think its chic or bright colors so they contrast with a toned down outfit. even wearing no accessories is an accessory in itself. accessorizing (or specifically not accessorizing) is like adding texture to an outfit imo

anything that advises you about 'absolutely necessary essentials everyone needs' is entirely wrong. there is no one size fits all; i.e everyone says you need one good pair of denim jeans, but i havent worn jeans in two years!!! an essential for ME is a pair of neutral wool shorts, but an essential for another person could be a thick knit sweater or for another person, a flannel. the idea that everyone needs a 'little black dress' or a 'basic white t shirt' is preposterous. YOUR essentials depend entirely on YOUR style. a pair of denim jeans is useless if you hate wearing jeans!!!!

as for my personal style, im mostly influenced by movies, books, songs, characters, feelings, colors, high fashion, and costumes. ultimately, you should worry less about what you want to be and worry more about what you already like. every piece i have kind of plays into some narrative ive constructed, or otherwise theyre all special to me :) if you want to update your wardrobe, dont feel the need to over consume fast fashion (or any fashion for that matter) to do so. if you take it slow and buy pieces you really love, every item will have a story and you'll begin to develop a more stable internal style and they'll last longer :)

let me know if you have questions or want me to talk more about any of this because i really love answering these kinds of questions!!!!!! especially the body type thing because thats such an important but long winded thing i couldnt really fit it all LOL

some more videos + resources about style and fashion i think are interesting:

deep dive into kibbe body types

pinterest aesthetics, fatphobia, and white washing

lies about clothes to unlearn in your twenties

studio ghibli: how clothing shapes identity

breakfast at tiffanys style analysis: the reinvention of onself with fashion

will the millennial aesthetic ever end?

go viral, post #spon, get canceled: how social media transformed fashion in the 2010s

analyzing the "is it a cute outfit or is she just skinny?" meme

[sp00kyjellybeans]

what your horror movie crush says about you!

This is a new series im doing lol send a message to my inbox for the next movie!

And why not start with the original Scream cast! btw this is purely my opinion, jokes and jabs... so don’t take it too seriously

Billy Loomis: This is the obvious choice I feel like. If you’re not too deep on slasher tumblr I’d say you’re a little basic but I can see the appeal. If you are deep on slasher tumblr you are DEDICATED to this man. No one comes above. I also feel like you kinda have a savior complex... like “i can fix him” type beat. It’s also possible that you get offended when ppl say that he’s overhyped and not that hot. You also like a little toxicity because it adds “spice.” You’re also submissive. 

Stuart Macher: You’re definitely a little manic. That or you’re either super shy who likes the hyper guys who brings you out of your shell or you’re wanting someone to match your energy. You also think Stu is underrated and perhaps that Billy ppl need to give the hype to Stu for once. You find his parts so goddamn funny/entertaining too, like he has so little screen time so you enjoy every bit you get. He’s also your emotional support himbo. You’d probably thank him for stabbing you and find his ghostface scenes super hot. You like roleplay (yes, in the sexual way.) You also drink monster energy. 

Randy Meeks: You are so soft. Like you might not look like it but you at least act like it. You can’t get over his death either and you’re a little mad at Wes Craven for allowing that. Anyway you usually go for nerdy guys one way or another, you wouldn’t mind if they simped for you. You also tend to make the first move when it comes to anything. You might like him also bc you’re a horror fanatic and you’re a little elitist because you’ve watched so many. You also probably have his mini speech about rules memorized. You might be a little freaky but not as much as Billy and Stu ppl (or ppl that like both.)

Sidney: I’m either in love with you or wanna be your best friend. Ppl who have crushes on Sidney have my heart. You like to go endgame with whoever you’re with but if you happen to end up with a pretty boy like Billy you have definitely been a little worried he would try to kill you (but lets be real you kind of want it to happen. the 90s tried demonizing hot men and it didn’t work. it just made horndogs like us on tumblr come out to find each other.) You like to keep things simple and you most likely stick to a routine. You’ve also thought about what you would do as a final girl in a horror movie numerous times. I’m getting vanilla vibes. I’m going to assume you’re a hufflepuff, too. 

Tatum Riley: You guys are rare honestly, but you’re really cool people. Tate is truly an underrated character and so pretty. You’re also pretty fluid with just about anything and want relationships to be chill with no pressure. Before you had a crush on her you probably wanted to be her. Which brings on the point you’re probably a lesbian. You also love her wardrobe and that leads me to believe that y’all have a really good sense of style. Getting earth sign vibes. Random I know but I get that sense. Your sun or venus is probably an earth sign. 

Dewey Riley: Also kind of rare. You like a hopeless romantic. In a way you’re cheesy and you like cheesy but you want someone who’s actually dedicated to you. You also really like angst in fanfiction, idk argument scenes just really make you feel something at 2am on a Tuesday night. If you’re acab you’ll only accept Dewey and Charlie Swan as cops, no one else. You’ve probably watched the You Cannot Kill David Arquette documentary. Also vanilla vibes here.

Gale Weathers: I don’t believe that you exist honestly. If you’re number one crush is on Gale you probably like Courtney Cox in everything that she’s in and you’ll defend Gale’s bangs in Scream 3 with your life. You either hate her and Dewey’s relationship or love it. No in between. You probably also major in journalism and you’re one of the hardcore reporters. No remorse. Just coverage. 

[kimheecheon]

dont mind the proportions n style n shit these are very rough sketches. but pls look at some outfits i whipped for my beloved oc hehe putting together clothes is so fun

very long oc talk below hoohoo

funfun fact abt me but when i was younger i rly liked fashion n even took sewing classes in case i wanted to seriously pursue it but i think as i grew up i realised that i hate designing clothes if i don't know who it's /for/. ppl make fashion choices n it says so much abt them, yk? thats what makes playing dress up so fun! to me the face/body ur born with is just whatever u happen to be born with; its what you deliberately choose w your conscious brain that is more true and 'natural' to you, ykwim? so my ocs tend to have distinctive (to each other) and ostentatious style. miel is traditional-inspired mix-and-match, rough around the edges; zia is evil-futuristic-government-core, monochromatic and structural; roxy is classic hollywood glamour; anna is cutesy frilly pastels; jade is corporate chic (not ostentatious. blegh); and so on and so on. i don't necessarily like them personally, neither are they objectively good, but that's not the point.

now we get to this specific guy. let's call them ellie. ellie is a bit of a recluse, doesn't go out much if at all, doesn't like to /be seen/ there's a backstory ofc but i'm not going there. this is also why i blanked out their face here, i did draw it tho. anw for this reason they don't really dress up, 99% of the time they're just in some black hoodie n sweatpants combo. i imagine their entire wardrobe is just one drawer. black obscures shapes, it works,

but that's not what they're /like/. their favorite color is the entire rainbow, their room is headache-inducing for literally everyone else, with all the hodge podge of bright colors and patterns and random novelty trinkets meticulously arranged on the floor. and if it was up to them, they'd definitely dress in a style similar to that— colorful, whimsical, and fully covered. but they don't have a reason to, right? at home, they just want to wear something comfortable.

but well, when you've had an oc for like 7 years they grow up with you, kinda. ellie is by no means a socialite, still kinda poorly adjusted, but they're much happier now. they want to b alive. experience things. n maybe look cute doing it. they're just beginning to, they want to, but well, they don't /have/ clothes n they're not exactly accustomed to the shopping and dressing up.

but if anything ellie is deeply loved by their (new) friends and family. on god they're making it happen. i can imagine them banding together (ellie included but they're full of doubts, honestly) going through online shops and their personal wardrobes trying to coming-of-age-movie-makeover ellie.

look 1: i call this the "yeah, i, the artist, am a kpop noise fan". but anw this one is styled by roxy (they live together and is almost the same size, convenient). this is neither of their style, but it suits ellie so well (for reasons i cannot elaborate on) (that blue biohazard sign is plot relevant) n that's more important for her. miel has that exact jacket but they had to buy ellie a new one bc they're very different sizes.

look 2: the styling is a collaborative effort between jade and ellie themself, they're married btw. ellie thinks this is the peak of fashion, for now. everything here is actually theirs. the jacket they knitted themselves. the patches they sewed. date night fit.

look 3: the cropped hoodie is borrowed from anna, who is also the stylist. the shein argyle flare jeans and blue vans are borrowed from roxy. anna's definitely most considerate of comfort and accessibility and wear-at-home-bility for [redacted] reasons. and just most considerate in general.

look 4: styled by zia, the only person practical enough to pick a raincoat tbh. shein top borrowed from roxy, again. rainbow umbrella is just ellie's umbrella they've had for a while now

anw. there's a lot of backstory on them that is going to stay in my docs and nowhere else forever, unfortunate since i don't know how to accurately convey just how big this is, im in my feelings man. for ellie and their personal growth, their first sets of going out clothes; the community effort– them feeling they are so, so loved. every single person on ellie's personal stylist team is happy for them, and they feel this, even if clothes may not be that big a deal for most people, this is an achievement for ellie and they celebrate. now the looks themselves may not be stellar, every one of ellie's friends dresses better, free-er, but before ellie gets there they will work their hardest to pick things that ellie would like (but still through their own aesthetic lenses, as ppl tend to do).

do ellie wear these out a lot, as intended? no, they're still a homebody. but they will wear a yellow sweater with purple sweatpants at home too, and things are a little brighter, literally and figuratively.

i love love love making clothes with ppl in them. nd baby? these ones have multiple people in them!

(n, aesthetically speaking, lets savor this intermediate style before ellie gets really comfortable dressing themselves and start wearing things as hedache-inducing as their interior decor sense lmao. though emotionally i cant wait for ellies circus clown era theyll enjoy it a lot)

[shootfighting]

Thoughts on Ruben Patterson

thanks for the ask (I sent you one too, btw, I hope you did get it bc tumblr is a mess...)

anyway...

i actually had to watch the last one third of the movie just now

i'd been putting it off because it's just one shittily choreographed fight after the other. sigh, what one doesn't do to see billy shirtless tho, am i right?

so now my opinion

looks wise he is off the charts, my fav billy is old billy but 93!billy was such a good vintage. technically speaking he really peaked then (and so did ralph and tig, what a year!)

perfect hair, great tits, long legs, eyes looking particularly sad and blue... some great wardrobe choices, i really like early 90s men's fashion (ofc the 80s were the best but EARLY 90s had their charm too).

also the guy gives me all sorts of gender envy

now personality... he is an interesting character trapped in a very bad movie. there is so much potential here! squandered by too big a focus on shitty fights that take up so much screen time :/ (i mean we have talked about this...)

i love how sweet he is with kids, that's lovely! i could just watch ruben running that cute little school and be perfectly entertained for an hour and a half.

but then plot twist, the boy has an unexpected dark side to him!

his rapid downward spiral is wild and very enjoyable to watch (billy genuinely tried here even tho the movie is baaad! especially his eyes convey a lot!)

interestingly, at first one might think that money to save the school will be the main incentive, but ruben is also drawn to the violence itself. both fascinated with and scared of it. it's like nothing this sweet boy has ever seen before! it compels him! but he is also not able to fully commit in his fight with hawk. i do wonder how the fight with nick would have played out, but the movie does basically chicken out and not show us that (which of course resolving the conflict between shingo and martin kove's character is important, but we got robbed of a resolution with nick and ruben!)

ruben's dark side is really a thing that would have been worth exploring more!

i haven't seen shootighter 2 yet tho

sadly he gets a mid 90s haircut T___T and that's all i know

also christian sex scene...

yeah that's it. i do need to watch it.

[ohshcscenerios]

with Christmas season approaching, what kind of 'Hallmark movie premise' would you see for Haruhi x the hosts??? bc everytime I see 'city lawyer woman and small town woodsman who teaches her about the magic of Christmas' I think Mori x Haruhi and like. Disney level animal sidekicks of Mori's raccoon and chick lol. Hope your halloween went well btw and ty for the video series!!! You have the prettiest brown eyes btw ^^

This is the cutest idea and I want a fan-fiction series of these hallmark stories 😭 Also thank you so much, I'm so glad you enjoyed the videos! I was very disheartened because they flopped on TikTok but I still had fun making them ☺️.

Haruhi x Takashi:

I can definitely see their story being a "city lawyer woman meets rugged yet shy woodsman". I can even see Takashi being a school teacher in this scenario. Maybe he still lives in the woods because he enjoys his privacy but from 7-3 he teaches history at the high school.

Now, I want to say their situation would be the classic "there are no hotel rooms available in this small town" and Haruhi so happens to meet Takashi at the only has station. He overhears her asking where she can stay the night and he knows she won't find a place at this time of night so he walks over and offers the small guest cabin on his property. He explains that's where his cousin stays when he comes to visit but she can stay there as long as she needs to.

Also, when Haruhi goes to the high school to talk to Takashi about the case she's working on his students ooh and awe at the hottie standing in the hallway and when he walks back inside they're all snickering that he has a secret girlfriend. He doesn't correct them, just tells them to turn to page 30 in their textbooks.

She offers to make them dinner as her way of thanking him for his generosity. They eat together almost every night. At first they talk about the case - or what Haruhi can disclose - and the town's history, but after a while they start talking about their lives, their families, their goals and dreams. Soon their light chatter isn't just friendly conversation anymore.

Takashi looks forward to seeing her after work and Haruhi finds a strange peace in living in the quiet wood. Then one night they're sitting outside under the stars with a cup of coffee and Takashi gathers the courage to ask if she has to leave when the case is done... or if she could stay with him.

Haruhi x Kyoya:

Hear me out; small town girl living in the big city to pursue her dream of becoming a lawyer meets cocky businessman who is visiting to scope out a coffee shop. He wants to buy it so he can turn it into an office for the Ootori Group so they'll have grounds in the city. It also so happens to be Haruhi's favorite coffee shop.

They meet by accident one morning but it's not the classic meet-cute scenario. Haruhi sits down with her cup by the window and Kyoya approaches her with a tablet in one hand and a tea in the other. He asks to sit with her since the place is packed and the only seat available is right in front of her. She says yes and for a while they sit in silence until Haruhi asks what he's working on. He states it's rude to pry on other's business. Haruhi says she can see him designing a building blueprint on his tablet and it looked cool. Kyoya adjusts his glasses and asks if the people here are always this nosey. Haruhi gets insulted. Kyoya doesn't care since the coffee shop will hopefully be gone by the end of the month and leaves.

They continue meeting each other nearly every day at the coffee shop. Their backhanded insults slowly turn into sarcastic flirting. Soon Kyoya and Haruhi are caught in the rain and he offers her a ride to her apartment. In the car he opens up about his life, confessing that his father is the one who is making him do this. If he can establish the Ootori Group in this city it'll help prove himself. Haruhi considers this and asks if that's really what he wants, if he really wants to take over the family business or if that's just another thing his father is making him do. Kyoya stays awake that night, unable to sleep because of that question.

The next day he texts his father and informs him the coffee shop isn't a good location for their office. His father is disappointed and makes a sly comment of asking one of his brothers to finish the task Kyoya couldn't do on his own.

That was what made Kyoya realize - he didn't want to work beneath this tyrant forever. He didn't want a life ruled by his father.

Kyoya returns to the coffee shop and sees Haruhi sitting in their usual spot. With a smile and a newfound goal, he approaches her with a tablet in one hand and a tea in the other.

Haruhi x Tamaki:

Why did I first think of Elf 🤣. In all seriousness, I think Tamaki would be the one hoping to fill Haruhi with Christmas cheer. I can see Haruhi working at a law firm but not as a lawyer, maybe as the receptionist, and she's all business. She has goals and she's intent on climbing the ladder to her own office. Tamaki is a new intern at the firm, hired during the Holidays since the Christmas season is usually the busiest time of year for the firm. Tamaki instantly takes a liking to Haruhi and stops by her desk every morning for a hello and a smile.

Soon he's bringing her a cup of coffee. Peppermint, mocha, salty caramel, whatever sweet seasonal flavors the area has to offer. He just wants to see her smile. One day she does.

Tamaki asks her out on a date which she declines but after five more attempts she says yes and meets him at a casual restaurant a few blocks from the firm.

Haruhi opens up and confesses Christmas is a hard time for her since losing her mother. Tamaki becomes solemn and says he can relate with her, that he too misses his mother during the holidays. Haruhi avoids the holidays while Tamaki embraces them - for the same reason.

With this new bondship they unknowingly become closer.

Tamaki still tries to get Haruhi into the Christmas mood but giving her small treats every morning and she complains he's going to make her fat but he only laughs it off.

Then the firm closes for the Christmas weekend and Haruhi is sitting in her apartment alone. No Christmas tree, no Christmas lights, not even a Santa mug... But she sees the pumpkin spiced muffin on her kitchen counter from that morning and decides...

She calls Tamaki and asks to spend Christmas with him.

Haruhi x Hikaru:

Ok hear me out; Haruhi is a lawyer with her own office on the top floor and Hikaru is the computer tech who is charged with teaching her how to use the new technology the firm just adopted. He has to teach her how to use the new tablets, presentation screens, and mobile devices. Haruhi wishes they would have left things as they are but she has no choice. Time to adapt.

With all the time they spend together they begin talking - then they talk over coffee - then they talk over dinner. At first Haruhi tells herself she's just making a new friend, that her busy work schedule doesn't allow for romance, that they can't be more than friends. She's been putting off relationships for so long so she could focus on her work. Surely Hikaru would understand.

He doesn't. Within a month's time his work there is done. He's installed all the new technology into her office, taught her how to use it, and left the manuals on her desk - along with a note explaining his feelings.

Haruhi realizes she loves him just as he's walking out of building and for the first time since working at the firm Haruhi is seen running down the stairs.

Haruhi x Kaoru:

Obviously Kaoru has to be a fashion designer. I'd say Haruhi is a small town girl going to a community college when Kaoru stumbles into town. She's going to get her associates there before moving onto a big-name college in the city for the rest of her law degree. Kaoru is just supposed to be passing through on his way to a convention.

He gets caught in a blizzard and ends up at Haruhi's front door. Thankfully she's able to live on her own in a one bedroom apartment so Kaoru takes the couch for the night. It all happens so fast they don't even have an introduction until morning.

Over coffee Kaoru introduces himself as a rising fashion designer and how he's supposed to be at a convention by the next day for fresh and upcoming trends. Haruhi sadly tells him it'll take a week for the plowers to reach her street. He's stuck there.

Kaoru, bored out of his mind, goes through Haruhi's closet and tosses her bland clothing on the bed. He promises to renovate her wardrobe when he gets the chance to which Haruhi refuses. She doesn't need to look like a rich snob. Kaoru reminds her law school will demand a sense of fashion, even if it's just business suits. Name brands have a voice in the world in the law.

During their time together Haruhi and Kaoru realize they get along very well. During the week stuck inside they sit by the floor heater with their instant hot chocolates and joke that it beats a roaring fire.

Soon the blizzard stops and the roads are plowed within 9 days time. Kaoru already missed the convention and he's very disappointed but he's still hesitant to leave. He asks Haruhi when she'll obtain her associates degree. She says by spring. Kaoru smiles and tells her to live with him when she goes to college in the city. He had a spacious three bedroom apartment on the skirt of the city - with a walk in closet.

Haruhi x Mitsukuni:

Forgive me but I can't think of a scenario where Mitsukuni isn't an elf in disguise 🤣. It's the perfect job for him; he'd be surrounded by sweets and toys all day. Maybe he has to act as Haruhi's Christmas guardian. He has to help her fall in love with Christmas again.

They don't fall in love... I can just see them becoming good friends. Maybe Mitsukuni gives her a snow globe of the North Pole and says that's where he'll be if she ever needs him again.

[moviemunchies]

Alright I love this movie so I don’t know how objective of a review I can write. I have fond memories of this movie--we went and saw it as a class trip in middle school, and ever since it’s been one of my favorite fantasy films. I mean, yes, it totally came out when it did and padded its battle scenes out more because it was cashing in on the crowd of kids what like Lord of the Rings but that doesn’t make it bad, does it?

So, first things first-- no, The Chronicles of Narnia is NOT an allegory. Stop saying that. 

Anyhow I imagine most people who read this blog know the story, but if you don’t: during World War II the four Pevensie children, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy are sent to the countryside manor of Professor Kirk. While exploring the house, Lucy comes across a wardrobe, and within the wardrobe she enters another world called Narnia. Soon enough, they all make it there, but it turns out that there’s a prophecy about them, and the tyrant that’s taken hold of Narnia and cursed it with eternal winter, the White Witch, wants to kill them.

Also, one of them betrays them to the White Witch for the promise of supremacy over the lot of them. To be fair to poor Edmund, he was magically drugged, and he didn’t know she wanted to murder anyone.

So our siblings must seek out Aslan, the Great Lion and true king of Narnia (who is totes Jesus, still not an allegory) and end the reign of the White Witch!

Like I said, I have seen accusations that this was Disney’s cynical attempt to cash in on Lord of the Rings but aimed at children. And I don’t know that it’s wrong to say that, but it’s also short-selling this movie. I mean yes, a lot of this movie was filmed in New Zealand, and WETA Workshop did the effects for this movie.

But you guys know that WETA will work the shiz out of the effects and props, right? The level of detail on the design in this movie (and the sequels) is INSANE and look, I didn’t think that they’d go this hard on designing a story that many people think of as a souped-up children’s fairy tale, but they did and it is GLORIOUS. There are plenty of little details that you may have missed the first time watching that you pick up if you’re paying attention. Like you know that in the final battle Jadis is wearing Aslan’s mane on her collar?

[I have some of the concept art saved on my computer, btw.]

The character arcs are also great developments/additions? They’re not all true to the books, and I do kind of miss that. But I do understand WHY those changes were made. For example, in the novel Edmund’s dickishness is mentioned to be a result of the terrible school experiences he had (Lewis didn’t much like the English education system). Here, to tie it into the other characters his acting out is in large part because his father’s been absent during the war, and butting heads with Peter.

Skandar Keyes is a fantastic Edmund. He gets better in the next movie, but in this one he conveys a lot of the conflict within Edmund, so that he’s sympathetic as the movie goes on, even if he does a lot of things that are pretty terrible (for a child, for the record--it’s not that he really gets into a lot of grade-A evil).

Peter’s characterization is made much more explicit as the older brother who is sometimes a little too hard on his siblings. I think William Mosely does a fairly good job. He gets annoying as an older brother sometimes, but that’s the point, and it makes sense how he and Edmund would be butting heads.

Probably to act as foreshadowing for what happens to her later in the series, Susan is the skeptical one, the logical one, the one asking questions about what the heck is going on and trying to make sense of it all. I think they lean a little too hard into this at times--she starts telling Peter to put down his sword when they’re surrounded by wolves. Otherwise I like that she has a much stronger character arc than in the novel, and Anna Popplewell does well with it. I mean, she’s still pretty likable, and you can see that she is someone trying to achieve the best for her family.

Georgia Henley’s a great Lucy. It would be very easy for this role to be annoying and it’s not, it’s quite lovable. Lucy’s very young and innocent, and in some stories this would play against her, but in this story (both book and movie) it’s kind of her strength? She’s endearing, she’s lovable, and that’s what you need in Lucy Pevensie.

Also we should probably talk about how the child characters are aged up a bit. Of course, this being Hollywood and trying to do action scenes with a twelve-year-old would be… unwise, I get it. But it is a bit weird that Peter and Susan are being sent off to the countryside when, even allowing for Dawson Casting, they’re old enough to stick around their family. They’re not really children. I don’t mind, but it is a case against it as an adaptation, and it works a bit against the logic of the film.

Also Tilda Swinton is having a ball as Jadis, the White Witch. She doesn’t really look like the character description, but she’s fantastic as a cruel and haughty queen, and really, no one does weird ethereal and near inhuman beauty like Tilda Swinton. She apparently had so much fun with the role and the people at Walden Media liked her so much that they put her in the next two movies with whatever scrap of justification they could grab.

Liam Neeson voices Aslan and does a good job. Don’t know if there’s that much that makes him stand out other than needing a serious actor to do the voice. It’s good, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t know if there’s anything in this film that makes Neeson a better choice than any other particularly famous actor.

[Apparently for one of these movies, Neeson took his family on safari to “prepare for the role” which is silly but hey if you can take your family on safari and excuse it as a work trip, why not?]

Final word before the sendoff: the CGI in this movie is still pretty good? It’s not perfect--watching it this past time made me think how something about the Beavers still looks noticeably artificial. But they still look fairly realistic. And I know it’s been said before, but the animal characters in this movie are incredibly expressive despite also looking like real animals, a trick that seemed impressive then, but after _The Lion King_ remake came out a couple years back, one of the defenses of the lack of expressive characters in that film was “Well we wanted them to look realistic!”

And DISNEY, the studio that released both movies, did THIS one FIFTEEN YEARS EARLIER, and also WITH A LION, and managed to make Aslan convey facial expressions and emotions through impressive CGI! WHAT THE FUDGE!

If you like the fantasy works of C.S. Lewis, I imagine you will like this film, unless you’re very strict about adaptations being close to the works they’re inspired by. Even then, I think it’s a pretty good adaptation, and that the changes made are those that make for a better cinematic viewing experience. If you’re not as familiar with the source material but you like fantasy, and children’s stories, you’ll probably like this movie.

Like I said, I have seen some people accuse this movie of being a lower-tier Lord of the Rings cash-in. I don’t think that’s the case, but if you’re very interested in serious fantasy and war stories, this movie’s not going to work for you. I don’t think there’s any blood at all in the film; if there is, it’s very little. Which considering the amount of action and the battle sequence in the climax is maybe a bit egregious.

I think it’s a good movie and a pretty solid adaptation of one of the foundational texts of the modern fantasy genre. Take a watch.

[coll2mitts]

Super Mario Bros. (1993)

Thanks to the awesome people who donated to Extra Life (you still can, btw!)  y'all will now be treated to a retrospective on the 1993 classic movie, Super Mario Bros.  When I took on this milestone, the first (and only) person I messaged for ideas on terrible (but wonderful) films based on video games was my friend Max, who has a history of viewing and talking about bad movies.  He suggested this, and while I was aware of this magnificent piece of cinema history, I had not had the pleasure of viewing it myself.  He hooked me up with a copy, and to say this film lived up to my expectations would be an understatement.

I couldn’t help but be charmed by this movie.  It is filled with so many questionable creative choices that were fucking ridiculous.  Mario and Luigi not being blood related?  Sure.  Cheesy Italian accents replaced with a New York ones?  Yeah, why not?  Having all the enemies in Super Mario Bros. be canonically dinosaurs?  I mean... It's a choice informed by the great media dino wave of 1993, but whatever.  Yoshi is a dinosaur, if we want to extend that to goombas and Koopa for whatever reason, I'm down.  Having these dinosaurs live underneath New York City in a parallel dimension?  It's based on a video game, why the fuck not?  Everything is so goddamn bonkers.

The opening credits roll, and we’re told that 65 million years ago, a meteor created said underground parallel universe dinosaur land.  We witness a human-looking woman, who is really a dinosaur, leaving an egg baby on a church doorstep.  Don’t think about it too hard, the logistics of a human giving birth to an egg that size are just... it’s gross to think about.

We’re then introduced to the titular characters, Mario Mario and Luigi Mario.  Yes, their last names are Mario.  Making them the Mario brothers.  Because this movie is interested in answering the important questions.  Mario is the owner of a failing plumbing business, while Luigi is a conspiracy theorist who would have really enjoyed modern-day YouTube.

While they’re out trying to find work, they run into Miss Amy March herself, Daisy, who is an archeologist in charge of digging up dinosaur bones from a New York City construction site.  She’s being forced off the property by the mob, who apparently are annoyed that a blonde lady in cargo shorts is coming between them and whatever the fuck they’re building.  

They try and intimidate her, she storms off to use a payphone to call for security, and is almost picked up by two inconspicuous bozos in a cab who apparently are stealing Brooklyn women off the street for no reason.  Their plan is quickly thwarted by a random moving pane of glass.

Instead, Daisy runs right into Luigi, who forgets how to human once he sees her pretty face.  He asks her on a date, where she reveals even more exposition.  She believes the meteor that destroyed the dinosaurs landed in New York City.  Oh, and also, she’s the abandoned egg baby.  Luigi is also an orphan, and this shared trauma apparently gets them both hot and bothered.  They wander off to the dig site, because an underground pit attached to a sewer is so romantic, and it is also where Daisy feels the most comfortable.

What if we made out at the bone pit?

Their touching moment is cut short when the mob sabotages the plumbing in the sewer and water starts flooding the area.  They run to get Mario, because he is a plumber, to fix the pipes, which is so fucking clutch, I love it so much.

While the Mario brothers are distracted, Daisy is captured by the weirdo twins and dragged into the alternate dinosaur universe.  Mario and Luigi follow, and we’re treated to the most fucking amazing transition scene of Bob Hoskins spinning wildly through colorful rocks.

Turns out, parallel dinosaur world, or Dinohattan, is fucking lit as hell.  I am convinced that Futurama based their sewer city on this movie.

King Koopa, who is a dinosaur with badly bleached hair gelled back in an effort to look like Michael Douglas in Wall Street, has taken over Dinohattan.  He is the one who asked the goons to kidnap Daisy, because of the tacky crystal necklace she wears.  Apparently, it is a piece of the meteorite that crashed into earth, and once he puts the piece back into the original space rock, the dinosaur world will merge with the mammal world after 65 million years of his people being sequestered underground, and Koopa will have endless resources at his disposal.  Also, Daisy is a princess, and her dad is a giant fungus taking over the city, so that’s totally normal and not at all weird.

Problem is, the two idiots he sent to grab her didn’t think to check if she was wearing the necklace.  Turns out, Luigi has the necklace, or had the necklace, as they are quickly mugged by a granny, who is then robbed by a lady with a bright red spiky latex coat and springy robot feet.  The brothers are then arrested by the dinocops and are grilled by Koopa for the whereabouts of the rock.  When they play dumb he uh... reacts in a proportionate way.

I am not even going to attempt to explain the devo process...  It is a combination of insane and fucking disgusting.  Whoever in the costuming department looked at the cute fucking mushroom Goombas in the video game and decided to translate them into this scaly, jagged-teethed nightmare fuel deserves to be committed.

Also, there’s only one lizard king, and that’s Jim Morrison, so back off, buddy.

What is hilarious to me is this is the story the screenwriters came up with.  Super Mario, as a video game, doesn’t have much lore, right?  You slide down pipes, you jump on mushrooms, and you save the princess from a spiky turtle.  They took that game and created... This.  A parallel underground dinosaur universe that has a sentient fungus as a king, taken over by a human-like t-rex that devolves other lizards into tiny-headed night paralysis demons.

The middle of this movie alternates between a slog of expositional scenes about Daisy being a princess, and pretty entertaining action scenes of the Mario brothers running from Goombas while trying to find and save Daisy.  Mario and Luigi steal a cop car and drive it off a cliff Thelma and Louise-style; They cosplay as Ketchup and Mustard to steal the necklace back from Big Burtha while asking her to stomp on them; They jump off a bridge into a garbage truck; They break the pipes in Koopa’s building to freeze everything, and get past an elevator full of Goombas by making them dance.

Watching Daisy damsel-in-distress-it in Koopa’s high rise office building and fend off advances by a long-tongued dude who devolved her father into a mushroom was pretty boring and disturbing.  Alternatively, witnessing Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo pretend to jump on giant sheets of fungus really sold this movie for me.  It succeeds when it tries to be ridiculous and fun, and fall flat when it attempts to integrate any sort of drama that I’m assuming was added to make this story more appealing to adults.

Mario and Luigi eventually find Daisy, and she introduces them to her father - a giant dripping blob suspended from the ceiling.  Luigi wants in her pants badly enough that he pretends this is a reasonable thing to do.  Mario heads further into the building to free the other ladies kidnapped by tweedle dee and tweedle dum that they initially thought were Daisy, but weren’t.  The newly assembled group are able to escape by sliding down the frozen pipes on a mattress before they are green-screen launched out of the pipe and back into the greater Dinohattan area.

The amount of times Mario and Luigi use their plumbing skills to overcome obstacles may be my favorite part of this movie.  The plot goes out of its way to justify a really bizarre character trait for the original game.

Anyway, the end of this movie comes at you fast.  First, the sentient fungus king gives Mario and Luigi a bomb, and they decide to wind it up and aim it at Koopa.  This takes about 10 minutes of screen time to matter again.

Koopa’s second-in-command tries to merge Daisy’s stolen necklace with the meteor, and instead gets skeletoned to bits, prompting the best line delivery reaction from Daisy, a deadpan “Yikes”.

Because the necklace has now been returned to its resting place, the worlds start to merge Infinity War style.

“Mr. Koopa, I don’t feel so good.”

Koopa and Mario end up back in Manhattan, and Koopa just starts shooting his devo guns at human mobsters, turning them back into primates, and giving their wardrobe a whole new literal definition of monkey suit.

Luigi uses his super plumbing powers to drill the necklace back out of the meteor, separating the worlds again.  The bomb finally goes off, they devo Koopa into slime, and the citizens celebrate by immediately painting over his ever-prevalent propaganda.

The king evolves back into a mushroom person or something, and Daisy stays in Dinohattan to get to know her father better.  Mario and Luigi return to their lives in Brooklyn as plumbers, and their heroic acts make them conspiracy community famous, as they now refer to our heroes as the Super Mario Brothers.  Roll Credits.

Except not, because Daisy returns to ask for the help of a couple of great plumbers, setting up a sequel that will never, ever happen because there is no god and we’re not allowed to feel joy.

Honestly, Super Mario Bros. is great.  It owned every bold plot and visual choice it made, and I have to respect it.  I could listen to John Leguizamo say Mario like 700 more times.  Y’all are missing out if you think you’re too cool to watch this movie.

I’ll be back to musical reviews later this month.  I have a few seasonally appropriate movies in my big red sack waiting to be placed under the tree...  Yes, I meant to phrase it that way.

[zendyval]

Nah ya’ll will excuse anything. Did z also tell Sam to shoot her body in a voyerisctic manner? She made the decision to walk around half naked sure, which still can be criticized btw, but Sam has filmed women in everyday single one of his works through the male gaze, that’s his problem.

This might be the most ridiculous ask I’v gotten yet. First off, if Z chose to walk around in a tank/undies or full on naked that would be her choice and she can’t be criticized for it because it is up to her how she wants to portray her own body. You can criticize a wardrobe choice for a movie but it is her agency to wear or not wear whatever she wants and you get no say in that.

In relation to this movie, her body IMO was not remotely shot in a voyeuristic manner in this film and I’d like to know what parts of it supposedly were unless you expected her to only show herself from the neck up. All the implied oral sex stuff was shown from angles so you never actually see any part of her body full on and the bathtub scene was literally shot from the neck up with her in the tub the whole time. You don’t even see an actual body part in this movie.

There are many things to take issue with this but the one I can guarantee holds almost zero water is the Marie shot through the male gaze nonsense. Unless to you visible nipples through a tank top, which is just what happens in life when you’re cold and outside, is male gaze. Apparently I would be shot from the male gaze every damn day of my life.

Hold him responsible if you feel there were male gaze issues in some of his other projects (Ass Nation) but you are not going to create issues where there are none. It doesn’t automatically become male gaze because other projects of his may have had those issues. I can see arguing that for Euphoria before this.

[deathvalleyqueen]

Odds for Sean please! 💋

alright because you asked for the odds and @faithchel asked for the evens I am going to just plop all the questions for Sean in one post... So lets get to know Sean better shall we... this is obviously all bellow the cut because ... the dash... lol THANK YOU BOTH <3 

ALL THE FLUFFY ASKS BELLOW THE CUT yes all 25 O.o ... I lost these once *shakes fist*

1. What’s their go to pick up line/flirting tactic?

Oh… Sean used to be sooo smooth in his younger days…dropping pick-up lines left and right but honestly as he got older he realized that showing real genuine interest was more important that having the cleaver pick-up line. He really just tries to be decent. Show the person he cares by his actions not his words. Like helping Faith/Rachel how to play guitar…. Which is something he does in part to be able to spend more time with her...which is his way of flirting lol.

2. Can they dance?

Yes, yes he can… very well. He keeps this talent a closely guarded secret only exposing it to John… his closest friend… at John and MJ’s wedding when he decides to dance with his sister like they did when they were kids.

3. Underwear style?

Boxers… simple man that he is.

4.Crayons, markers, colored pencils or paint?

Crayons, they were a very coveted item in the MacKenna household growing up so I would say Crayons. 

5. What was their childhood stuffed animal of choice?

He had a dark brown bear he named Floppy that he still keeps on his bed, though he will claim it’s there for decorative purposes only. Sean can’t bare the thought of getting rid of his oldest companion. 

6. What’s their sleeping position?

On his stomach, usually with the pillow over his head rather than his head on his pillow. No blanket, just a sheet as he always gets too hot when he sleeps. 

7.Do they snore?

Not badly, but a little. 

8.What do they act like when drunk?

Sean is one of 2 ways when he is drunk… which really depends on what he is drinking rather than how much. If it’s beer, wine, clear alcohol… Sean is a happy funtime guy. You throw in like Whiskey… Rum… any of the darker alcohol you are asking for a fight to happen. So sean tends to stick to Beer and be the life of the party rather than joining his brothers in the wrecking crew. 

9.Sweet, sour, salty, or savory?

Sour… he is a big sour candy guy.

10.Can they play an instrument? If so, which one(s)?

He can play guitar and also sing. 

11. What would their favorite book be?

He has no shame in this, but the Hobbit. He read it as a kid and Sean is not a massive reader, but the Hobbit is the one book he has read more than once and he reads it to Lily (MJ and John’s oldest)  when she is little. 

12.  What is their guilty pleasure?

Drinking, like it’s a massive no-no in eden’s gate but Sean never stops (maybe a bit of on alcoholic not trying to judge but this may be a little fact. He can’t be perfect...also you may see this as common theme among the MacKennas the love their substances) also he is a smoker… of both cigarettes and O.o other things that are also a leafy plant… again I reiterate he needed flaws….no one is perfect.

13. If they got a new pet, what would they name it?

He does have a dog, he ends up with a yellow lab dog named “Charlie” that he adopts when he hates being alone in his house by himself. Charlie is a girl btw. 

14. Beachhouse, cozy snowy cabin, treehouse in a forest or desert paradise?

Beachouse, he used to have one…. But the things you give you to follow your best friend/brother in law to start a cult am I right?

15. What would their favorite board game be?

Cards Against Humanity…

16. What do they smell like?

He smells warm, like spicy warm… I picture him using like warmer scented things. A little like a camp fire, cuz of how much he can smoke. Depending on time of day maybe a little beer… 

17. What’s their favorite smell?

Cinnamon Rolls Baking in the oven… It was a Saturday tradition that their mom would bake them on her one day off work and it was the one time in the week where everyone got along/behaved for more than 10 minutes. 

18. If they were drunk, what would they get a tattoo of?

UH this happens… and John tattoos a rubber duckie on his ass… because Sean tells him it “has to be done… God told me…” mocking Joseph with his Sister. John said he was doing it out of spite… so Sean refers to it as the “Spite Duckie” if it ever comes up. No regrets though, none. 

19. Describe their laugh.

Joyous, a touch mischievous and bright. When he laughs, it’s hard not to join him. 

20.Hoodies, knit sweaters, wool coats or just a blanket to stay warm?

Hoodies, pretty much that’s a standard part of his wardrobe. 

21.Are they good with their hands? How do they deal with household-type maintenance?

He isn’t that bad, he can fix basic things. Knows a bit about cars, but he is the least handy of the MacKenna kids...even his sister knows more practical skills. 

22.If they had a custom car horn, what would it be?

Never Gonna Give You Up - the Rick Roll song… because he would do it for the memes… that’s just who Sean is. 

23. Favorite carnival attraction?

Truthfully… Funnel Cake. 

24. Showers or baths?

Showers.

25. What’s their ideal day off like?

Sleeping, Pizza… maybe spending some time with the nieces or his sister… He sees John enough but I suppose John is allowed to join in. Maybe take a drive out to see Faith, pretend to be helpful around her trying to flirt awkwardly. More pizza… beer… maybe meeting up with the brother to play cards… probably not… just drinking beer with the dog at home watching bad 80’s movies. 

[hereisisa]

Have you seen the new orange/purple flag? It reminds me of the colors Anna is wearing. And the wheat in her hair too! what's going on? Is she queen of a new land?

I don’t really believe that.

My theory is that the new flag (the one on the left)

is the flag of the Sami people, the tribe Elsa and Anna will meet, and Iduna was one of them.

You can see a ear of wheat in Anna’s hair too here:

(btw this would point once again to the party being a party for the new people and not a coronation or an engagement party), and also here:

Anna wearing those colors is (in my opinion) just a reminder of Elsa and Anna’s heritage.

Why not dress Elsa like that? For many reasons.

For starters she’s gonna have that necklace who probably was her mother’, so she’s gonna have something of her mom’s home too. And there could be more, we have to wait the movie to see.

Then she’s the Queen of Arendelle. She wouldn’t and couldn’t wear another people/tribe’s colors.

And finally…Do you know how hard would it be to change Elsa’s colors and appearance??? There’s a reason she doesn’t have many hairstyles as Anna’s and they don’t change her much. She’s the face of the movie (and I’m NOT saying she’s more important than Anna, just that she’s more…iconic, for reasons, and yeah, when the general audience hear the word “Frozen” they think of Elsa in her ice dress).

I have a funny tale about this:

When Georgina Haig was on OUAT and I was a fan of the show, we theorized for a whole summer how they would even dress Elsa and Anna in “modern times” clothes. Because if you’re an OUAT fan you’ll know that the fairytale characters arrived in Storybrooke they started dressing with modern clothes.We wasted our time cause Disney didn’t give the OUAT team the permission to even remotely alterate Elsa (and Anna’s) appearance.

She has to wear the ice blue dress, that will have to be approved by Disney (they made at least 2 similar version of it, and they had to approve hair and shoes too), and she couldn’t absolutely change into modern clothes. She was always to be recognizable at first sight.

And so poor Georgina’s “nightmare” began LOL where she had to walk in the Vancouver woods by night, filming her scenes, paying constantly attention to her dress. People weren’t allowed to walk too close to her because they could step on the dress and ruin it.The woods were cleared before she was allowed to walk the pathway because of THE DRESS. I remember other actors saying they were constantly yelled at by the assistant director or the wardrobe department insiders: “mind THE DRESS!!!” “you’re too close to THE DRESS!!”

It wasn’t “don’t get too close to Georgina”. Who cared about her? She was the carrier of THE DRESS! lol Because THE DRESS was Elsa and Elsa was Disney’s money maker and the most important part of Elsa’s partecipation at OUAT.

Now….I can only imagine how many hours the Frozen 2 team spent in reunions trying to decide on how to dress Elsa for Frozen 2, and drawing different versions of clothes who were then sent at Disney bosses for approval. It’s a months’ long job.

With these premises…..You’ll see how to change Elsa’s colors into something that is not immediately recognizable wouldn’t be so easy.

I’m not saying it’s impossible….In Frozen Fever for exemple she’s in green cause the blue wouldn’t be in contrast with the sky. Try to imagine this pic with blue dresses….

Nope. It doesn’t work.So what I’m saying is that they’ll go with easier choices: blu/light blue colors for her dresses, a touch of purple (the cape in Frozen 1, the nightgown in Frozen 2) to remind us she’s royal (purple means royal) and a beautiful lilac ceremony dress that is not too different from light blue.

They can allow themselves more liberty with Anna. And that’s why I believe she’s the “carrier or her mothers’ colors and traditions”, this time.

Why Kristoff is in orange/black too? For the same reason Elsa and Anna were both in blue in OFA and both in green in Frozen Fever. Cause colors are used in the movies and animations to express feelings, ideas, to help the viewers to connect the dots. We know he’s Anna’s boyfriend and the audience can recognize it just looking at him. In movies people wearing the same colors are usually from the same family (Elsa and Anan in OFA and Frozen Fever), group, tribe, etc…He’s connected to Anna. Of course he’ll wear something “coordinated” to her.

That’s all, in my opinion. We’ll see soon if I’m right or wrong.

[wahbegan]

Oh Wait Now I Can Do a Proper Candyman Trailer Breakdown

I can analyze everything in the first trailer much better now, I think with the supplementary material provided by the puppet show and the other TV spot oh right i guess i should put this under a cut like I do cause i just know it’s gonna get long as balls all right

Opens with yeah recap of Candyman legend nothing really to see here

Not much in the bathroom scene either apart from it first introduces this Candyman’s shtick of only being visible in mirrors and shadows which is really neat...oh yeah also no the one Asian girl def chickens out after the 4th Candyman repetition so he literally only kills the white girls which i find personally hilarious. Speaking of hilarious....the girl with the buzz cut? Her character’s name is Boof. Ah, to be young again...anyway

There’s a lot of like...ochre and seafoam in this trailer, have you noticed? Like the bathroom, Candyman’s pants and coat idk i doubt it’s thematic it’s probably just an aesthetic choice but it’s interesting colors for a horror movie

“I feel really connected to this neighborhood” yeah as i mean everyone knows by now but Anthony was kidnapped by Candyman as a baby so it’s hard to tell how much of his fascination with the dark history of prettied-up Cabrini Green is just pretentious artsiness and how much is Candyman’s influence

Okay so the local ominous old kook here says something I find very fascinating when he tells him where he lives. Anthony said I just moved in around the corner, and OOK says “The old candy factory...” not next to the old candy factory or anything, just “the old candy factory”

Now we know from the puppet trailer that there’s a new character they’re introducing who is a black worker at a candy factory with a hook, but y’know like a real person hook that actual amputees get, maybe cause of a factory accident, i do not know, who was good natured and gave free candy to kids on his way home because y’know he works at a candy factory and some white cops saw, assumed he was a paedophile, chased him down to the bottom of the stairwell of presumably the building he lived in, and beat him to death

This character actually seems p important, in the new TV spot there’s a shot of a guy in a trenchcoat and seafoam pants in front of a building i THINK MIGHT be him, and a shot of some cops descending a stairwell, so I think we’re actually gonna see what happened to him, and I think he is going to be introduced as y’know a competing story to Daniel Robitaille’s, he’s MY BEST GUESS going to serve the function in the plot of revealing to the audience the idea presented in the puppet show trailer, that Candyman is more of an abstract entity or a floating moniker, it’s not necessarily bound by the identity of Daniel Robitaille

Anyway, i’m pretty sure by OOK’s comment here that the condos Anthony and Brianna live in are literally built on top of where the candy factory where that guy worked used to stand

Oh yeah just neat little shot of the graffiti of Candyman more as Clive Barker designed him fun reference

Bee stinging Anthony, more on that later, also notice he’s not just a painter, he’s a photographer as well because that becomes important

Oh yeah “he’s the monster that’s part of this neighborhood” is in all probability part of the same speech from the TV spot “Candyman ain’t a HE, he’s the whole damn hive. He’s the way we deal with the fact that these things happened. That they’re still happening.” Candyman I’m prob gonna make a whole post about this but his transformation from urban legend used to cope with random violence and urban decay in Clive Barker’s story to urban legend used to cope with racial violence seems complete in this movie, and I believe thematically the idea is the gentrified Cabrini and Anthony are under the delusion that this is a monster, a story of the past, and Candyman appears to...disabuse them of that notion. With a big fuck-off hook

We know from the TV spot the all-black portrait he’s working on in his apartment is Daniel Robitaille, and a damn good likeness of Tony Todd can I just say who the hell did these paintings they’re amazing anyway the one we see at the gallery of the man with the swollen face is I think the candy factory worker who was beaten to death. That guy i think is also the one who introduces the concept of the seafoam pants and ochre coat btw to Candyman’s wardrobe. Cause of that, he might be how Candyman appears when he kills the High School girls i do not know but that’s interesting, ain’t it? Candyman appearing in different ways to different people depending on the story they’ve heard

Oh the mirror opening to the space behind it must be a reference to the hole through Candyman’s mouth graffiti in the og i just got that that’s pretty sweet cool exhibition

When bearded guy in that god-awful Overlook Hotel carpet-looking button up shirt is saying Candyman, that movie that’s being projected in the background...I’m not sure which, but based on what little more we saw of it in the TV spot, pretty sure that’s footage of the lead-up to/possibly the actual act of the arrest or murder of one of Anthony’s Candyman subjects which is ahh....dark. I mean hell, he’s black, if anyone can do it he can but that feels a little tasteless Tony buddy

Anne-Marie is still obvs shaken up about Candyman, based on their two brief interactions in this trailer I’m assuming...well, cause he was a baby when it happened, he wouldn’t remember, i’m assuming she never told him about what happened to him and this is the first he’s hearing of it.

Candyman agrees with me that the movie was tasteless

Related to that Candyman becoming a monster of racial violence rather than urban blight thing, unlike the original movie, almost ALL of his victims in this are white, which is i mean yeah more on brand considering his origin story(ies)

Candyman appearing in the mirror and Anthony’s hand rotting from the bee sting yeah may as well talk about it here, it becomes obvious at several points through the trailer that the Candyman entity if you want to call it that is taking hold of Anthony

For a split second when he throws the glass, I think you can see his James Byrd, Jr. portrait in the background (with the exposed skull)

Yeah, I’m not exactly sure what’s happening to him as he paints but it SEEMS like he’s somehow experiencing the pain of his subjects

When he’s in his painting clothes covered in black paint seems to be mid-late in the movie when he’s kinda losing his shit yeah we see later the hook come out of a sleeve in the coat he’s wearing when he gets his hand sawed off (more on that in a sec) and the paint-splattered jeans so i’m pretty sure the painting clothes with the old fur-lined coat over it is gonna be HIS Candyman Transformation Chic

“He had a purpose for you, to be another one of his terrible stories.” This is completely shooting in the dark and it came to me late at night as I was falling asleep so I have no idea how stupid or crazy it may or may not sound, BUT if we accept Candyman as a recurring entity and his “terrible stories” as victims of racially motivated hate crimes, okay, hear me out. Remember how in the OG Candyman just kept framing Helen for everything? I wonder if Anthony’s story via Candyman was supposed to be “white woman harrassing Cabrini Green residents chops up woman’s dog, steals her baby, and puts him in a bonfire to be burned alive.” Like Anthony was supposed to be a what’s the word they use in the puppet trailer’s blurb “unwilling martyr”, a black baby boy burned alive by a white woman to keep the faith of his congregation going

I feel like that might be the old candy factory worker sawing Anthony’s hand off, anyway yeah he’s in a very Candyman coat, his hand infected presumably via bee sting is being sawed off, what I really love is that you can see that not only is his right hand getting amputated, he’s been blinded in his right eye. Now remember in Candyman’s original story, Daniel Robitaille had his hand sawed off not just so he could replace it with a sick-ass hook, but because that was his painting hand, that was the source of his talent and pride and wealth. Anthony, like I said, is a painter and a photographer. So Candyman takes his hand and his eye i just love that lil detail

I think that woman in the burned church with SWEETS TO THE SWEET on the wall might be Helen, who we know is in the movie and probably has a conversation with Brianna for plot purposes cause there’s a reaction shot of Brianna in the same church saying “this isn’t real”

Yeah that is absolutely definitely 100% Anthony killing that guy in the alley so yeah i guess there’s no question Candyman gets his ass but i feel like there’s more to it because well y’know they’re very open about it in the trailer number one in a way they’re usually not about the struggle the movie revolves around and as evidenced by him killing people the movie still clearly keeps going after he becomes Candyman so ???? i wonder what’s going on

There’s a brief shot of a little girl watching what looks like her dad jump out the window, I assume that’s Brianna seeing as how y’know a kid is credited as young Brianna and i think there was a character blurb mentioning her having a troubled past, so i feel like her dad’s suicide is obliquely related to Candyman in some way. It is worth noting he seems to jump out of some kind of painting studio

This little kid finding a corpse covered in blood and bees in the bathroom is, first of all, that’s only black person we see killed by Candyman, but also it just seems so disconnected from the rest of the plot and i can’t figure it out at all that I feel like this scene must be either a cold open or a stinger at the very end

[dollsorwhatever]

Cloe+ Collection Overview

I decided to give Cloe’s hair a shot before completely writing her off for that ugly rooting, so I straightened and gave the hair some wave/body and then tucked the front of her parting back in an attempt to even out the thin-ness and give it some balance.

She’s definitely not terrible, but her facial flaws bother me too much to consider sending this one out for a reroot or keeping her in my permanent collection. This is the one that Amazon CS told me to keep (or dispose of...lol) and I returned the last replacement for yet another replacement Cloe (So....Cloe #4) and after I get a perfect one, this girl’s head will find herself in a gift package for someone that might be able to use her. (will keep her arms and clothes tho) Thoughts on the line below the cut.

My overall thoughts on this line are still forming, since I haven’t been able to enjoy them in their best state bc of the constant exchanging I’ve been going through, but my overarching thoughts so far are: -I hate the body, I’ve hated the 2001 torso since I was a teenager and it’s frankly the worst choice for this line or any line, period. Nothing looks good on it. I would have preferred the Pixiez torso hybrid with 2010 legs and Movie arms (which Hayden/MGA did know about during the conception of this line...so idk why they chose 2001) but since that torso has a smaller chest and would therefore limit compatibility with older dolls, I’d pick the Kiani body as THE choice to be the standard Bratz body going forward, since it has a nice shape and rotational hips rather than hinges, with Movie arms added on, while fitting 2001-body clothing perfectly (better than 2001 does even lol) and the legs are gorgeous. -They fucked up the skintones. The heads are all standard Bratz skintones, but the bodies are all wrong. Cloe and Jade’s torsos are like bright reddish pink and the hands match their heads, Yasmin’s entire body is bright fucking orange, Sasha’s body is slightly more olive-toned than her OG body so I won’t be able to use her arms (though I’m willing to accept this because she has the most subtle and pretty skintone of the line and she looks good as-is). Yasmin’s skintone is the most annoying because there is no subtlety to it, it’s just blatantly orange, and her shoes won’t match any other dolls.

-The shoe sculpts. Now I personally PREFER for them to utilize one sculpt more than once and I don’t want there to be a unique shoe sculpt for every doll in every line, I think that’s a waste of sculpts especially because so many Bratz shoes are pretty versatile and can be altered with pant and designs very easily, as well as the issue of skintone matching since the feet pop off.  I don’t think they utilized enough of the sculpts Bratz has done over the years and executed most of the shoes poorly. Yasmin’s ‘boots’, for example, could have easily been a pair of these boots or these boots in a dark magenta and flocked, with lace socks and it would have been a prettier/better translation of the sketch while also staying consistent with the collection. Yasmin’s second shoes should have been the Feelin Pretty heels (even matches the sketch closer than the Classic heel), Jade’s first boots should have been the PnP boots rather than the RA boots (which we’ve also seen, with that exact paint design, several times already), and switch out either Cloe or Sasha’s Classic heels for something else entirely, like more boots. Maybe those cute timberland fakes in a different color. Also they fucking destroyed the Feelin’ Pretty sculpt with Jade’s second shoes. The printed fishnet and the flame motif with the straps is just too much and really overpowers the sculpt (which btw was only used in ONE collection bitd so two pairs in this line would have been swell- especially if they used them for Cloe’s 2nd outfit instead of Jade and got rid of those fugly fishnets and flames) The fact that they used one shoe four times and remade an exact version of a pair of shoes we already have seen a billion times makes the entire shoe wardrobe of this collection feel very unfinished and poorly thought. I can only use, like, four pairs of shoes in this collection and the others are unoriginal or don’t match any dolls (Yasmin’s orange ass)

-The designs are (mostly) lame as fuck. I feel like, especially since Bratz haven’t been OG Bratz for a very long time, that they should have referenced the previous lines to make sure we were getting something new and consistent with the quality we’ve come to expect. We’ve seen several pleather bralettes already and there’s THREE in this line (we’ve seen a lot of pleather too, even), Jade’s first top is a bland PnP Meygan top and we definitely didn’t need TWO identical mesh bodysuits in this line. The clothes don’t seem to be well-rounded, just like the shoes. The quality is really lacking in some places too; Yasmin’s jacket has no inner lining (would have been a stunning piece otherwise), Sasha’s jacket is really weird and not at all what it should be (tho it is pretty well made), Cloe’s second outfit is poorly tailored especially the pants (tho her first outfit is incredibly well made, the best of the line actually), Sasha’s second dress is massive and those panels on the sides are ugly (shame bc it could have been a nice piece otherwise), Jade’s skirt doesn’t fit that well (mostly bc of the body they made it for), etc etc.  And let’s not forget the fact that every studded piece, has studs falling apart in seconds.  Jade’s pants and Sasha’s pants are sub par in comparison to the exquisite denim pieces we’ve gotten for Bratz in other eras, with realistic stitching and ‘thick’ denim with real belt loops and pockets and just going the extra mile to really push that ‘’Real clothing but mini’’ vibe.  The chokers are very nice, Cloe’s first outfit is INCREDIBLE, the hats are very nice, Yasmin’s second outfit is the second best outfit of the entire line, the bodysuits (while there should only be one) are well made, Yasmin’s 1st top (while a poor translation of the art) is cute and versatile and Jade’s white T-shirt will be a big staple piece for collectors and is very well made.  The Faces- I like all of the facial screenings on these dolls, not much to say there. I think Yasmin’s lip color should have been more subtle and Jade’s shine dots are wonky by default, Sasha’s lips are smaller than the rest but otherwise I like all of these screenings.  The Hair- The rooting patterns are bad. This isn’t a QC thing, this is a design flaw; all of the dolls have thin rooting patterns, Sasha and Jade’s partings are very short and none of the dolls have dense rows under the partings or dense rows in the back, Jade’s thatched bangs are terrible and her space buns look like antennae because they’re smushed underneath her hat. Will have to send all of my keepers for reroots and that pisses me off because MGA knows how to correctly root hair, and these 50$ dolls are basically bald.  -The Price. This price is really fucking high considering how little we got and how little they seem to have thought about this collection’s design and quality. If they fixed all of the things I mentioned above, this line would be worth 50$ to me. Higher quality denim, more diversity in clothing pieces and shoes, thicker hair and fixing the skintones would have made this a solid collection and I would have paid 35-50$ happily. But with the collection as it is, I feel like I’m not getting my money’s worth. Cloe and Sasha basically share two pieces (mesh bodysuits and pleather bralettes), Yasmin’s ‘boots’ are hideous and her second ones don’t match any other dolls (And she won’t match any other shoes), both pairs of Jade’s shoes are a travesty and Cloe’s heels are very been-there-have-70-of-that.  The QC- a joke, garbage, terrible. I shouldn’t have to return a doll four times to get a good one, and the studs on these pieces shouldn’t be falling off. MGA had over 2 years to get this collection going and they started production in August when they should have started in April, instead they rushed at the last minute and sacrificed the QC to get stock on time.