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literaphobe · 2 years ago

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@baeksseju OKAY SO yesterday morning i forgot to set my alarm clock and woke up at 7:48am instead of… 6:30am KFKSKDKSKSSK and that was MY BAD like i didn’t know and i still don’t know whether i set an alarm or not or if i just forgot like i tend to do. anyway. im gonna call my friend P and my other friend S. so every monday and wednesday morning at 8:30am we have our sociolinguistics class. P & S (whoever of them comes first) (its almost never me) get there and save us the same 3 corner seats in the second last row. i always get the corner most seat bc im the latest one usually UM ANYWAY

so this girl we know from this random amalgamation of people who we hung out with for like 1-2 weeks at the start of the semester started like FUCKING loving P bc like P is really funny and talks shit about people they hate and never replies to messages for several hours (unless its me or her bf or one of our other real friends) <- my theory that these people have anxious attachment style and P ignoring them only makes them want her MORE

P is also kind of a people pleaser in the sense that she’s a fake bitch (HER WORDS ❤️) and even if she dislikes u or hates u or talks mad shit about you YOU WONT FUCKING KNOW BC SHE’LL STILL ACT LIKE UR BEST FRIEND WHEN SHES FORCED TO INTERACT whereas well. i mean in real life at least. the SECOND i start disliking someone… you’ll usually know. WHICH IS A PROBLEM BC THIS ONE GIRL WHO RECENTLY BECAME GIRL I WANNA FUCKING MURDER #1 ON MY HIT LIST. became. convinced. that i fucking hated her. and she was right! but P was working w her on two projects so i had to pretend i didn’t 😭😭 anyway i dodged her attempts to have lunch w me last friday and she hasn’t texted me since. AND we have a theory that C <- codename for my most hated girl in school <- u will feel genuinely murderous if you find out why. Like. KNOWS? we don’t like her anymore? and only communicates w us for school stuff?

BUT THIS OTHER GIRL IN THEIR FRIEND GROUP FOR THE SEMESTER (i genuinely think they will all stop being friends the moment they don’t have classes together) -> lets call her A . like. LOVES P now? so back to what actually happened. SHE WALKED INTO CLASS AT 8:35AM AND FUCKING SAT IN MY SEAT.

when she KNOWS that seat is saved for me.

and well. P and I have this ongoing joke that she’s the fake bitch and i have the biggest fucking balls ever because. i just fucking. say crazy daring shit sometimes. and this other enemy we have, B (trust me she is SO bad that her entire cohort in her year above us GOT HER KICKED OUT OF A CLASS BECAUSE OF HOW AWFUL SHE WAS) got like intimidated by me during a zoom call bc she was bored and started running everything we were all writing through GRAMMARLY when we werent even done writing our part on this PEER REVIEW ASSIGNMENT about another group. and it pissed me off so i told her ‘hey is it okay if you don’t edit my work until i’m done with it? sorry, it’s distracting’ and well she didn’t edit my work at all after that and sounded scared when she talked to me KFKSKD i mean i was TRYING to be nice but well IDK

anyway. because of P’s tiny balls. and also because it all happened so fast. and also because I WASNT THERE TO DEFEND MY FUCKING SEAT. and the fact that i was gonna be so abysmally late there was no point in saving me a seat. P couldn’t really do anything to stop her

BUT DID A KNOW THAT? NO SHE FUCKING DIDNT. i could’ve been there a minute later and i wouldn’t have had A FUCKING SEAT. I DIDNT NEED IT BUT ITS THE PRINCIPLE OF THE MATTER .

SO. A started PEEKING AT P’S LAPTOP. and was like who’re u texting?? (me) who’s the trio?? (me S & P) and when she found out P was texting me she smirked and was like ‘tell michelle im sitting in her seat’ and so P texted me that HOPING id get the hint that A was watching (I DID THANKFULLY) and i was like WHAT THE FUCK but i hope you realize the back is BETTER than the front

moving on. A’s reasoning for sitting in my seat was that C sat TOO up front (IT WAS LITERALLY ONE ROW IN FRONT OF WHERE THEY ALLEGEDLY USUALLY SIT ?) and that was like too much for her to handle apparently. anyway. P and C had to consult w the professor for a panel discussion they have to lead on wednesday. so A was like come look for us after for lunch!! <- we didn’t. but does A take the hint? NO! even C had the mind to walk away after the consultation instead of trying to join me P and S. which i now realize. is so. Salt and Pepper. ANYWAY. A keeps texting P!!!! and fucking telling her to sit with her during the next class??????

oh. we have another friend. his name is H. i met him in a cursed group project last year and he saved me during summer when i got sick and missed classes. he’s really sweet and i hope he’s always my friend. ANYWAY. he was gone during all this because his sociolinguistic project group (which B is INNNNNN JFC) insisted on them all eating lunch together. and before they left P was talking to H and B saw and was like Um… are u close to P? during the lunch. and he was like yeah i am what about it. oh right y’all are in a group project for another class right? and B was like yeah… ig P and michelle are kind of hard to work with… like we were supposed to be doing an assignment and they were playing games in class :/ -> WE WEREN’T. also. WE WERE DONE??? WITH WHAT WE NEEDED TO DO? AND THE ASSIGNMENT WAS FARRRRR FROM BEING DUE and i told them. i wasn’t gonna do anything else in class that day because i had a huge test and i was really sleep deprived so any work i did wouldn’t be good. and EVERYONE ELSE WAS FINE WITH THAT. BUT HER????? she claimed to be ‘90% done’ with her bit by the end of class. mf i don’t trust the quality of ur fucking work 😭😭 and finding she was only in our class bc everyone else in the year hated her so much she got HELD BACK was fucking vindicating. like she does fucking nothing but get upset that her non-existent ideas don’t get used only to act like she does everything (WHEN SHE DOESN’T)… other groups in our class were TERRIFIED to get paired w our group for the peer review assigmment BC THEY ALL FUCKING HATE HER

anyway. KFKSKDKSKDKD. we meet H in our second class of the day. we saved a seat for him as we usually do. BUT IT WAS ALSO. ME AND P’S PLAN. to fucking. get seats in the back hidden by a pillar. SO WE DIDNT HAVE TO SIT WITH A. anyway i said ok im gonna be on ur left we are gonna put H on yr right so EVEN IF A MOVES SHE CANT DO SHIT. eventually. A realizes we r all the way at the back and she’s like WTF ARE U DOING THERE? COME HERE? and P had to start fake bitching and wave over and gesture that they should move to US

A starts DMing P. and sends her a video message (a thing on telegram) where her and this other girl r jamming to some song the professor’s playing in class. and P is like oh god… we have to send one back. and she’s like. michelle. you have to fake bitch with me. and i start fake crying and i go I DONT WANNA ☹️☹️☹️ and she’s like YOU HAVE TO… WE NEED TO FAKE BITCH BACK… and i was like okay :(((( and so we sent one back. AND THEY SENT BACK ANOTHER MESSAGE ??? so P was like ok nvm fuck this im not sending another back fuck u

after class. P’s granddad is picking us up (P asked me if i wanted to come with and i was like SURE) and we bump into the girls and A is like . WEIRDLY TOUCHY with P. and im like ????? bc even i don’t touch P like that 😭😭 and we were like um haha bye maybe we’ll sit together in class next time ! and me and P got into the lift WHICH THANKFULLY NO ONE FOLLOWED US INTO. and we were like WHAT THE FUCKKKKK and started pointing middle fingers at her (we are 12) and so we get into the car and i WIND UP HANGING OUT AT HER HOUSE ALL DAY

this is um. the third time ive been there? and today her mom was home and this is the first time im meeting her mom (who LOVES me btw. her grandparents love me too. IM EXCELLENT AT MAKING OLD PEOPLE LOVE ME. or well. old chinese people. im a lot better at P at speaking chinese which helps???? IG???? idk they think me and P are very similar and that im very cute)

the whole time im at P’s house vibing she gets texts from A and well P accidentally told A that theres a test tomorrow (IN 30 MINUTES BABY) its just a small quiz tbh but A was like OMG DO U WANNA STUDY WITH ME????? so P ignored her texts because SHE WOULD RATHER DIE and anyway P walked me to the bus at like 9 something at night… and A asked P for her discord… so P told her but didn’t add her to P’s private server (which im in) and she used her boyfriend as an excuse for not being able to call her <- when i got home me P and her bf hopped into VC together

OH YEAH. UM. P CONVINCED ME TO GO ON A VACATION W HER. AFTER THE SEMESTER ENDS. her bf and we had a bit all day where like bc i was at her house he was like WTF ARE U CHEATING ON ME… and then sent like clown memes fkdkfkskdksdk like he was a clown etc… so i was like im gonna start threatening to fuck u to keep him in line (he lives in malaysia where we are going) MOVING ON. im going for essentially 2 weeks and P’s going for like 3 and afterwards she’s coming back w her bf and we’re gonna hang out AGAIN (we have a dinner reservation together in DECEMBER) <- i booked a ticket next to her and everything

so A in in a discord w C and they have facecams on?,? for some reason. and P claims she has to help her bf w homework bc its due tomorrow (HAHAHAHAHAH) and A gets annoyed and is like… why do you care??? why do u have to help him???? and P is like ???? bc i love him…????? and i was like WTFFFFF hearing this in VC (bc i was showering while it happened) and i told her bf u think i wanna steal ur girl??? she wants to STEAL ur girl from me AND you And he was like wtffffffff WTFFFDDD anyway un

THATS ALL ill give more updates if any of you wanna hear more??? LMAOOOOO IVE BEEN NOT REPLYING TO P THIS ENTIRE TOME IVE BEEN TYPIG THIS OUT BC I WANTED TO PUT IT SOMEWHWRE IN CASE ANOTHER FRIEND WANTS TO KNOW FJSKDKSKDJSJD its very messy . BYE

#replies #long post #personal

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miserablesme · 3 years ago

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The Les Miserables Changelog Part 2: 1985-1986 West End

Hello, everyone! This is the latest edition in my attempt to chronicle all of the musical and lyrical changes which the show Les Miserables has undergone over the years. Today, we look at the differences between the later of the two available Barbican preview audios (more on that in Part 1) and the West End variant of the musical as it existed in 1986. Only one rather poor quality audio is available of the show's pre-Broadway, post-Barbican form (though a friend of a friend has multiple masters from the era that she apparently keeps meaning to digitize). It is known to come from 1986, but the exact date remains a mystery. As such we cannot know when exactly most of the changes might have been made.

Reportedly (according to The Complete Book of Les Miserables) the majority of these refinements were made between the closing of the Barbican show and the opening of the West End one. However, some further refinements were doubtless made during the Barbican previews, and some likely were made between the opening of the West End production and whenever the audio was recorded. With all that cleared up, let's get started!

As I mentioned in Part 1, the very early Barbican previews of the opening "Work Song" featured this chain of lyrics (no pun intended):

I’ve done no wrong

Sweet Jesus, hear my prayer

Look down, look down

Sweet Jesus doesn’t care

I killed a man

He tried to steal my wife

Look down, look down

She wasn’t worth your life

I know she’ll wait

I know that she’ll be true

Look down, look down

She’s long forgotten you

As has also been established, later previews removed one sequence of lines to create the following exchange:

I’ve done no wrong

Sweet Jesus, hear my prayer

Look down, look down

Sweet Jesus doesn’t care

I killed a man

He tried to steal my wife

Look down, look down

She wasn’t worth your life

However, by 1986 another sequence was removed and the originally removed one was added back then. Thus, the still-current lyrics as of today are as follows:

I’ve done no wrong

Sweet Jesus, hear my prayer

Look down, look down

Sweet Jesus doesn’t care

I know she’ll wait

I know that she’ll be true

Look down, look down

She’s long forgotten you

A much better choice of cuts in my opinion. The point of the opening scene is to present the prisoners sympathetically, as comparatively innocent victims of an overly brutal and elitist police system. Establishing a member of the chain gang as literally being a murderer doesn't really help send that message!

Everything stays the same until "Fantine's Arrest". The Barbican previews feature this sequence:

(FANTINE)

There's a child who sorely needs me

Please monsieur, she's but that high

Holy God! Is there no mercy?

If I go to jail she'll die

(TOWNSPEOPLE[?])

Take this harlot now this minute

Let there be a full report

Let her go back in the morning

Let her answer to the court

(FANTINE)

Gentle Jesus! Won't you save me?

Are there tears enough to cry?

(JAVERT)

It's the same pathetic story

Please monsieur, my child will die!

I have heard such protestations...

By the 1986 recording, everything between "Take this harlot" and "Please monsieur, my child will die!" has been totally removed. I have a bit of a soft spot for that sequence, though I can't earnestly say the musical lost anything by removing it. Indeed Javert comes across as unbelievably heartless there!

As Part 1 pointed out, the earlier Barbican preview had Valjean shout "You know where to find me!" at the end of "Who Am I?", while the later preview did not. The 1986 recording interestingly reinserts that line, but now Valjean speaks it much more casually, without the slightly cheesy passion of the first recording. This makes me wonder whether or not it was initially removed because it was hard to take seriously, and a calmer rendition was reinstated as a compromise? Who knows.

A subtle change occurs at the beginning of the "Confrontation" sequence. During the Barbican previews, the number opens with a few notes being played and then repeated. However, by the 1986 recording the notes do not repeat. It goes straight into Javert's announcement (which Roger Allam has now learned to sing on time!) after the notes play the first time. The sequence would stay this way for quite awhile before being further shortened - more on that in a later edition!

We now go to the subsequent number, Little Cosette's famous "Castle on a Cloud" song. The Barbican previews give her a few lines before the main number starts (sung in a similar tune to her remarks about Mme. Thenardier's arrival at the end of the song):

They’ll come back any minute

And I’m nowhere near finished

Sweeping and scrubbing and polishing the floor

It’s the same every day, oh please!

Don’t let Madame hit me again

I should be used to it, but then

I know a place where nobody has to work too hard

And where I won’t be lonely again

These lines, taken closely from the original French concept album, don't really add much to the number plot-wise that won't be stated later except for more explicit confirmation that Mme. Thenardier is abusive. Perhaps partly for this reason, by the 1986 recording these lines are removed, and after the opening instrumentals it goes straight into the number we all know.

As I previously mentioned in Part 1, the later recording I have of the Barbican previews cut out the following lines during the preamble to Master of the House. I originally mistakenly claimed that the cuts occured after Thenardier's verse, but in actuality that verse too is removed.

(THENARDIER)

My band of soaks, my den of disollutes

My dirty jokes, my always pissed as newts

My sons of whores spend their lives in my inn

Homing pigeons homing in

They fly through my doors

And their money's good as yours

(CUSTOMERS)

Ain’t got a clue what he put into his stew

Must’ve scraped it off the street

Hell, what a wine

Châteauneuf de Turpentine

Must’ve pressed it with his feet

Landlord over here

Where’s the bloody man

One more for the road

One more slug of gin

Just one more or my old man is gonna do me in

By the 1986 recording, they are back in all their glory. Indeed, as you can read in Part 1 of this series Trevor Nunn himself has confirmed that the crew decided the number didn't work as well without the full preamble (an exception being, shockingly enough, Cameron Mackintosh).

During the Barbican previews, "Master of the House" was followed by a beautiful Well Scene between Valjean and Little Cosette:

(LITTLE COSETTE)

There is a castle on a cloud

I like to go there in my sleep

Aren’t any floors for me to sweep

(A FEW SECONDS OF INSTRUMENTALS)

(VALJEAN)

Don’t be afraid of me, my dear

Tell me your name and have no fear

How cold it grows when the sun has set

(LITTLE COSETTE)

I’m not afraid

Monsieur, my name’s Cosette

(VALJEAN)

Nor will you be afraid again

I come to take you from this place

There is a better world, you’ll see

(LITTLE COSETTE)

Give me your hand, and walk with me.

This leads into the humming duet between Valjean and Cosette. However, in what I consider the biggest mistake of this era's adjustments, the Well Scene was totally excised from the West End version and "Master of the House" is following directly by the humming duet. Trevor Nunn remarked a degree of regret about this in 1990's The Complete Book of Les Miserables. I don't have the book on hand right now, but I'll put down the exact quote later.

Of course, the Well Scene would later return in a much different form, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Perhaps to compensate for the deleted scene, another scene is added after the "Waltz of Treachery" number. During the Barbican previews, Valjean's "It won't take you too long to forget" is followed by a lot of vamping and eventually a reprise of Valjean and Cosette's humming duet. The West End production slightly reduces the vamping from about one minute to about forty-five seconds, and adds a scene (sung in the tune of "Castle on a Cloud", specifically the "there is a lady all in white" part at first and the main chorus for "Nor will you be afraid again" onwards):

(LITTLE COSETTE)

We're going home right now, monsieur

What is your name

(VALJEAN)

Now my dear

I've names enough, I've got names to spare

But where I go, you always will be there

Nor will you be afraid again

There is a sun that's shining yet

(LITTLE COSETTE)

I'm going to call you my Papa

(VALJEAN)

I'm going to call you my Cosette

The normal humming duet follows. This is a fascinating scene which seems to be exclusive to the brief era after the Barbican previews but before Broadway. It's interesting how it incorporates elements both of the opening Well Scene and of the more well-known later closing scene to the "Waltz of Treachery". It's also intriguing how it incorporates elements not really touched upon this directly in any other version of the musical, specifically just how mysterious and secretive Valjean is to the world in general as well as the fact that Cosette, in fact, is not truly Cosette's given name.

Everything seems to be the same from this point until "The Attack on Rue Plumet". In the Barbican previews, this is how the opening goes:

(EPONINE)

'Parnasse, what are you doing

So far out of our patch?

(MONTPARNASSE)

This house, we're gonna do it!

Rich man, plenty of scratch

You remember he's the bloke wot got away the other day

Got a number on his chest, perhaps a fortune put away

Took off like a guilty man, why would he want to disappear?

Now we're gonna do him right, this time no one will interfere

Everything from "Took off like a guilty man" onwards is removed from the West End version. Later in the number, we hear approximately the following exchange in the Barbican show. Fans have debated what exactly some of the lyrics are, but this is how I hear them:

(CLAQUESOUS)

What a palaver, what an absolute treat

To watch a cat and his father pick a bone in the street

(THENARDIER)

Not a sound out of you

(EPONINE)

What do you care if things scare me

(THENARDIER)

Listen 'Ponine, there might be jewels inside

There could be something for all

There could be bruises enough

You will have your share

(EPONINE)

Well I told you I'd do it, I told you I'd do it

The West End production reduces the vamping prior to this scene. Additionally, everything between "What do you care" and "You will have your share" is removed, meaning the "I told you I'd do it" is a direct remark to "Not a sound out of you". This is a much more linear and succinct way of moving the plot in my humble opinion!

That's it for act one! Act two begins largely the same, up until the scene where Gavroche reveals Javert to be a traitor. First off, Javert's original claim that they will "play their games" is changed to "spoil their games".

Next is probably this version's biggest change in the entire musical up to this point. Originally Gavroche sung approximately the following lines (once again, the recordings aren't as clear as would be desirable) in a unique tune heard nowhere else in the musical:

Good evening, dear inspector, lovely evening my dear!

A charlie for a copper who pays a call

I know who you’re supposed to be, Inspector Javert

Who never showed no mercy to no one at all

So don’t believe a word, none of it will wash

This time you’re reckoned without Gavroche!

The West End version scrapped this sequence and replaced it with "Little People" (which originally appeared in a much longer form later in the musical). This is how it went:

Good evening dear inspector, lovely evening my dear

I know this man, my friends, his name's Inspector Javert

So don't believe a word he says 'cause none of it's true

It only goes to show what little people can do

And little people know, when little people fight

We may look easy picking but we've got some bite

So never kick a dog because he's just a pup

You'd better run for cover when the pup grows up!

This edited placement of "Little People" is often attributed to the original Broadway production, but in fact it made its debut in the West End show. I'm not sure when exactly this was, given that the original cast album uses the long version. However, by the 1986 recording this is how it goes. It should be noted that it's not quite in its Broadway form, however; most notably, "We'll fight like twenty armies and we won't give up!" is not present.

A minor difference occurs during the First Attack sequence. In the Barbican production, this is how the students respond to their victory:

(GRANTAIRE)

By God, we've won the day

(LESGLES)

See how they run away

The West End production swaps the two students' lines, allowing Grantaire's slightly incredulous spirit to have a more poignant and/or amusing effect depending on your perspective.

Consequently given the new placement of the song, the show obviously had to be edited to remove the original "Little People" number. Originally, this is the way the show transitioned between the First Attack and "Little People":

(ENJOLRAS)

Courfeyrac, you take the watch

They won't attack until it's light

Everybody stay awake

We must be ready for the fight

For the final fight

Let no one sleep tonight

(GRANTAIRE)

Only little boys may sleep

For little people need their rest

Little tucks are quickly drained

And little grapes are quickly pressed

Come on little mite

It's time to say goodnight

Cue the original "Little People" number in all of its long, silly glory (in case you somehow don't know it, here are the lyrics). The West End production (and everything afterwards) cuts Grantaire's verse, so that the scene transitions straight from Enjolras' announcement to "Drink with Me". As much as I love the full-length "Little People" number (and I really do love it), I admit removing it was definitely the right choice. It's just so sweet and optimistic, it feels out of place in a musical as tragic and cynical as Les Miserables. It doesn't help that its placement is between a high-stakes action scene and a somber, slightly drunk reflection on the nature of friendships, sex, and romance. It's a wonderful song but a terrible Les Mis song. I do love it, though, and I also love how Grantaire manages to make his pre-song metaphors alcohol-related.

In the sewers, the Barbican recordings feature a unique tune not heard anywhere elsewhere in the musical (it can be heard here) before transitioning to the final Valjean-Javert confrontation. Apparently, this music was accompanied by a short chase scene. However, by the time of the 1986 recording there is instead what is essentially one repeated note which then transitions into an instrumental version of "Look Down". This is followed by the same Valjean-Javert confrontation as before.

And that just about sums this part up! If I missed anything feel free to let me know, as my goal is to create a changelog as thorough and complete as possible. I plan on making more parts in the near future covering all the changes that have been made in the show up until this day (discounting concerts). Any feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated.

As a side note, both for this project and my own enjoyment, I want as complete a collection of Les Miserables audios as possible. I already have most of what’s commonly circulated, but if you have any audios or videos you know are rare, I’d love it if you DMed me!

Until the turntable puts me at the forefront again, good-bye…

#les mierables #les mis #les miz #barbican #west end #changelog #history #1985 #1986 #comparison #the les miserables changelog #changes #theatre #musical #part 2

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destieltropecollection · 5 years ago

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Destiel Trope Collection 2020 Day 1: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics

A Bite to Remember | @darmysasagiri

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 1104 Main Tags/Warnings: Alpha/Alpha, Top Cas/Bottom Dean, Mating Bites, One Night Stands Summary: Alphas can't mate Alphas, everyone knows this, or do they?

Oblivious Mates | @fangirlingtodeath513

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 1984 Main Tags/Warnings: Castiel/Dean Winchester,Castiel (Supernatural),Dean Winchester,Knotting,Mating Cycles/In Heat,Heat Sex,Rut Sex,A/B/O,Friends With Benefits,Consensual Somnophilia,Mating Bites,Misunderstandings,Lack of Communication,Fuckbuddies,Spooning,Cuddling & Snuggling,Naked Cuddling,True Mates,Scenting Summary: Dean and Cas have been heat/rut fuck buddies for a while now, but Dean's starting to get second thoughts. His feelings evolved a long time ago but now he's feeling guilty about holding Castiel back from finding his true mate.

Sun Warmed | @suckerfordeansfreckles

Rating: Teen & Up Word Count: 2586 Main Tags/Warnings: alpha Cas, omega Dean, first meeting, house-sitting, a bit of voyeurism Summary: Dean is a little bitter, but only in the safety and privacy of his own head, and definitely never around his brother and his new sister-in-law. Because those two really do deserve all the happiness in the world. And just because Dean wishes for a little happiness for himself, he will not ruin their bliss. The thing that’s a little hard on Dean, lately, is that during the past few months, Sam and Eileen’s new house somehow started to feel more like home than his own apartment does. He’s not even over that much, but he feels so safe and good and happy, here. It’s a space he feels like himself in, and it’s not really the company, it feels more like the energy around their house, the amazing smell seemingly haunting Dean when he drives back home and slowly loses it. He’s not sure which flowers Eileen planted that smell this way, but he’s been meaning to ask her for months. Currently, Sam and Eileen are in Hawaii for their honeymoon and Dean gets daily selfie updates while he house-sits for them. And somehow, during all of that and while accidentally flashing a guy, he figures out where that amazing smell comes from.

Essential Services | @Imbiowaresbitch

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 3444 Main Tags/Warnings: Roommates, omegaverse, explicit sex, top Cas/bottom Dean, alpha Cas, Omega Dean, mating bites, quarantine, pandemic, heat/rut sex Summary: Cas has been sent home to work as an unessential service. When he arrives, he realizes his roommate Dean clearly wasn't expect him to arrive. What happens when they finally give in to each other?

Kiss Me, Kill Me | @saltnhalo

Rating: Mature Word Count: 4668 Main Tags/Warnings: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha Castiel (Supernatural), Omega Dean, Assassin Castiel (Supernatural), Guard Dean Winchester, Assassin Dean Winchester, Canon-Typical Violence, True Mates, Scenting, BAMF Dean Winchester, BAMF Castiel (Supernatural), Murder Husbands Summary: Seasoned hitman Castiel Novak is just looking to take out his target and get paid, but should've accounted for the fact that he may not be the only assassin at tonight's party... Cue the mysterious, green-eyed man who is more of a match for Castiel than anyone he's ever met.

Up On The Rooftop Greenhouse | @envydean

Rating: Teen & Up Word Count: 5017 Main Tags/Warnings: alpha!michael, omega!dean, Beta!Castiel, Arranged Marriage, truemates, defying truemates, fighting destiny, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff, Kisses, Wedding ceremonies, pack houses, mentions of potential abuse of power Summary: Michael Shurley is Dean Winchester's true mate. Except, Dean has been in love and dating the Winchester house gardener, Castiel Novak, for nearly three years and Dean doesn't want that to stop. He needs to find a way out of the impending wedding before it's too late, especially when Michael shows his true colours.

A Strange Place To Find Love | @navajolovesdestiel

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 6159 Main Tags/Warnings: Alternate Universe, Alpha/Omega, Alpha Castiel (Supernatural), Omega Dean, Heats, ruts. Knotting. Happy Ending Summary: The Alpha/omega Rut/heat Center was the brainchild of a ‘more progressive, more caring’ government. In reality, it was just a way to stop Alphas from jumping unmated omegas when they were in rut, and to stop unmated omegas from getting knocked up during a heat by some Alpha they picked up, then having to go on welfare because the Alpha wouldn’t pay pup support. Dean Winchester worked for the center as a willing omega. Castiel Novak decided to give it a try.

Steel and Whiskey | @saltnhalo

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 6207 Main Tags/Warnings: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha Castiel (Supernatural), Omega Dean, Mafia AU, Mobster Castiel, Mobster Dean Winchester, Mistaken Identity, Explicit Sexual Content, Top Castiel (Supernatural), Bottom Dean Winchester, Topping from the Bottom, Knotting, First Meetings, BAMF Dean Winchester, BAMF Castiel (Supernatural) Summary: When Castiel agrees to meet with the leader of the Winchester pack in the heart of his territory, he does not find the alpha he’s expecting. Instead, he meets an omega in Dean Winchester’s apartment with stunning green eyes and an alluring air of danger. Someone should have warned Castiel that the Winchester leader is not an alpha.

Just Here For A Good Night | @saltnhalo

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 6646 Main Tags/Warnings: Alternate Universe - College/University, Fraternities & Sororities, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha Castiel/Omega Dean Winchester, Top Castiel, Bottom Dean, Team Dean's Red Ass, Dom/sub Undertones, Dom Castiel, Fluff, Frat Boy Castiel Summary: In which Dean is looking to get laid at an Alpha Phi Alpha party, and sets his sights on Castiel, who's just trying to make sure that nothing bad happens on his watch.

Are You Real, Dean Winchester? | Maleyah (AO3)

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 7447 Main Tags/Warnings: Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Rape/Non-con Elements (not between Dean and Cas), Mental Health Issues, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha Dean Winchester, Omega Castiel, Mating Bond, Hurt/Comfort, Self-Medication, Near overdose, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Hallucinations Summary: Castiel struggles to survive in a world that was never right for him to begin with. So far, he has always survived his turbulent mind... because despite everything, his broken brain, his loneliness, the never-ending struggle, he's a fighter. One night, exceptionally reckless, borderline overdosed on his meds, he wanders the streets, foregoing his self-preservation. Hoping for the end, almost finding it, unless his brain is throwing him for a loop again. ... Only to be found by Dean Winchester.

Did you get my reference? (WIP) | @spnsmile

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 8918 Main Tags/Warnings: Top dean w/ bottom castiel, explicit Summary: Take Dean, most handsome CEO with very pretty face and just your typical successful Alpha who owns his own company at the age of 30. But despite popular belief, Dean has one problem he needs to solve before an international conference: he hates the smell of unmated Omegas. Come Castiel, a clumsy word-class geek literature major who appeared in front of Dean in the middle of a raging river. His scent drives Dean's instinct to bite, plus he gets rid of all other scents in the air. Now Dean only has to convince him to be his plus one. Which means having a talking encyclopedia who trips in its own legs. How can Dean protect his high-wired True Mate from other Alphas and himself?

It's A Hard Knot Life | @navajolovesdestiel

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 10874 Main Tags/Warnings: Alternate Universe, Alpha/Omega, Alpha Dean Winchester, Omega Castiel, Punk Castiel, Rape, Tattoos. Knotting Summary: Dean walked up the counter and his nose was filled with the scent of peticior and sandalwood. He took a deep breath. The guy never looked up. Dean cleared his throat. Nothing. He rapped his knuckles on the counter. The guy didn’t look up, but he said, in a gravelly voice that gave Dean shivers, “Yeah?” “I was wondering if you had the latest CD by St Paul and the Broken Bones?” The guy looked up and Dean found himself looking into eyes so blue, he didn’t have a name for the color. The black eyeliner just accentuated their color. “We have a system here for finding things. It’s called alphabetically, you may have heard of it? That means the S’s are right between the R’s and the T’s.” Then he went right back to reading his book.

Black Rose Tattoo | @navajolovesdestiel

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 10989 Main Tags/Warnings: Alternate Universe, Alpha/Omega, Alpha Castiel (Supernatural), Omega Dean, Tattoo Artist Castiel (Supernatural), Flower Shop & Tattoo Parlor. Explicit Sexual Content, Knotting, Pups, Dean is demisexual Summary: Dean heard the motorcycle before he saw it. He looked out the big front window of his shop, and waited until the cycle appeared. He watched the Alpha pull to the curb, stop the bike, get off and take off his helmet. He’d watched the same scene every day since he’d opened the flower shop next to the tattoo parlor. The Alpha shook his perpetually messy hair and walked to open his shop, out of Dean’s view. Dean sighed and went back to work.

Palaces of Rome (WIP) | @tucuxia

Rating: Mature Word Count: 11291 Main Tags/Warnings: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha Castiel/Omega Dean Winchester, Alpha Sam Winchester/Alpha Gabriel, Alpha/Alpha pairing, Alternate Universe - Ancient Rome, BAMF Castiel, BAMF Gabriel Summary: Despite his size and his father's expectations, Dean presented as an omega. Infertile, male omegas have no rights in Rome, so John arranges to sell him to the son of the Emperor in an attempt to provide his alpha son, Sam, a better life. Sam joins the army under General Gabriel's expert tutelage, swearing to become a warrior famous enough to buy his brother back. Dean accepts his place in the prince's harem, but he's about to stumble upon the biggest secret in Rome, one that has kept hundreds of thousands of male omegas enslaved for almost eight hundred years. The secret will either push Rome into an age of peace and prosperity or it will shatter one of the greatest empires in the ancient world.

Something Dark | kradarua (AO3)

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 16466 Main Tags/Warnings: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha Dean Winchester, Omega Castiel, Spanking, Under-negotiated Kink, Rough Sex, Rimming, Choking, Dom/sub Undertones, Thief Dean Winchester, Dark Dean Winchester, Dark Castiel, Dark Sam Winchester, Dark Charlie Bradbury, Possessive Dean Winchester, Illegal Activities, Torture, Sexual Slavery, Murder Husbands, Killer Castiel, Killer Dean Winchester, Top Dean/Bottom Castiel Summary: Castiel looked even wilder in person. Dean let his eyes roam over his (now fully clothed) form, smiling appreciatively. He inhaled deeply, curious to find no real trace of a scent. “He’s on scent blockers,” the employee explained. ""Running this auction is involved enough without having to settle claim disputes if an omega’s scent triggers some alpha’s rut.” That suited him fine; both he and Sam were on scent blockers most of the time and he’d planned on requiring that Castiel stay on them too. It helped with anonymity. “Thank you,” he said, “That will be all.” The employee gave a small bow and left to service the other high bidders. “Well, Cas,” Dean said cheerily, “Let’s go home.”

Porn and Peonies | @navajlovesdestiel

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 20865 Main Tags/Warnings: Alternate Universe Alpha/Omega, Porn Star Dean Winchester, Alpha Dean Winchester, Omega Castiel (Supernatural), Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Mpreg, Mating, Switching Summary: When Cas accidentally meets his favorite porn star, Dean Smith, he's thrilled. He never expects what comes next with Dean Winchester, Alpha to his omega.

Mulanatural (WIP) | @tucuxia

Rating: Mature Word Count: 33385 Main Tags/Warnings: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha Castiel/Omega Dean Winchester, Alpha Sam Winchester, Beta Adam Milligan, Mulan (Disney) Summary: Dean Winchester is possibly the worst omega in his town; he's too big, too strong, and way too dominant. When the Matchmaker rejects his suit for a mate and the Huns invade China, he has to pretend to be an alpha to save his brother's life, but he may well lose his own in the process. Worse, he may dishonor his whole family.

A Symphony of Flavors | @wargurl83

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 43223 Main Tags/Warnings: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Chefs, Minor Character Death (offscreen) - Freeform, Alpha Castiel (Supernatural), Omega Verse, thar be smut here, Top Cas/Bottom Dean Summary: Master Chef Castiel Novak likes his life ordered. Controlled. Sensible. He's an Alpha with no mate and no hope of finding one. His life is turned upside down with the death of his sister and taking guardianship of his nine-year-old niece, Claire. Add to that, there's a new sous chef taking up space in his very orderly kitchen with his loud music and brash attitude, and for some reason Castiel just can't take his eyes off him. Dean Winchester loves to cook, love his mom, and loves kids. His goal has been to work with Chef Novak for as long as he's been in Kansas City. What he wasn’t prepared for was an Alpha all of his own…

The Nuances of Pack Politics (WIP) | @tucuxia

Rating: Teen & Up Word Count: 72679 Main Tags/Warnings: Alternate Universe - High School, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Omega Castiel/Alpha Dean Winchester, ,Alpha Sam Winchester, Omega Gabriel Summary: Castiel and Gabriel Novak are having a hard time fitting into their new school, constantly harassed by older alphas now that they have lost the familiar protection of their own brothers. The Pack, a group that claims to welcome and protect omegas at their high school, may offer them a chance to change all of that, as long as they can get in.

Grown-Ups Making Grown-Up Choices | @carrieosity

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 81039 Main Tags/Warnings: Humor and Fluff, Pining, Self-improvement, Self-worth issues, Comedy, Awkward Flirting, Mating, Sexual Harassment, Threatened Non-Con (brief), Healthy Relationships Summary: Dean is a grown-ass man - he can take perfectly good care of himself, thank you very much. Except that sometimes the easier or more fun choices aren't always the right or best ones, and, all right, maybe thinking ahead and working the long game isn't his strongest suit. It's fine! He's fine. When he meets Castiel, he realizes that flying by the seat of his pants may not be the best way to attract the super-serious (gorgeous, funny, genius) Alpha. Dean's shrink has been telling him he needs to start making ""grown-up choices,"" and if that's what he has to think about in order to make Cas fall for him, then he'll give it a whirl.

Celestial War (WIP) | @tucuxia

Rating: Mature Word Count: 151571 Main Tags/Warnings: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha Dean/Omega Castiel, Alpha Sam/Omega Gabriel, Alpha Crowley/Omega Balthazar, Mating Cycles/In Heat Summary: The three tribes--Celestial, Wilderness, and Spellbound--have been at an uneasy stalemate for generations, but a prophecy about four omegas could bring about a full-scale war that will destroy them all.

don't care where you've been (WIP) | @thanks-tacos

Rating: Explicit Word Count: 240842 Main Tags/Warnings: Omega Dean, Alpha Castiel, Top Castiel/Bottom Dean, Past Rape/Non-con, Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Alternate Universe - Domestic, Arranged Marriage, Abused Dean Winchester, Caring Castiel, Happy Ending, full tag list in the fic Summary: Dean's life is finally changing. After years of enduring Alastair's abuse, the alpha dies and Dean's married off to the next alpha the system pairs him with - Castiel. The man is strange and distant, but not exactly bad, and Dean's determined to be on his best behavior and not mess up the chance he was given. Soon enough, though, he fucks up anyway and has to call the alpha for help. Castiel's lived his entire life without an omega by his side, and he was fine with that. He doesn't know how to proceed once he's suddenly married to a beautiful man who's obviously been through a lot. Omegas were always a confusing subject to him, so he tries not to interfere much - neither of them is there by their choice. But when Dean calls for help, he understands he's going to have to set some things straight and engage more.

#destiel trope collection 2020 #destiel trope collection #destiel #Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics #omegaverse #day 1

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aion-rsa · 3 years ago

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How the Jaws Scene in Back to the Future Part 2 Predicted Modern Blockbusters

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Back to the Future Part II is a strange movie. As a sequel that director Robert Zemeckis and screenwriter Bob Gale never intended to make, the ambitious follow-up to one of the greatest sci-fi comedies of all time was put into production simultaneously with Part III, which may have ultimately hurt the middle chapter since Zemeckis was still shooting scenes filmed in the Old West while editing Part II’s trippy vision of the then distant future…of 2015.

Even so, there are elements in the second Back to the Future that still play like gangbusters today, particularly in the sequences set during 2015. To be sure, part of the charm now is what those wild guesses about the future got wrong—such as the idea we’d all be driving around in flying cars, or even simply own cheap cars that didn’t run on fossil fuels. There were no real hover boards in 2015 (or 2021 for that matter), nor even automated Texaco pumps. Yet what Back to the Future Part II got very right is the numbing horror of something like Jaws 19.

Indeed, one of the best bits in the whole film is a slight dig at BTTF’s own studio, as well as the legacy of the film’s producer. The original Jaws is of course the first modern Hollywood blockbuster and it put Steven Spielberg on the map. With its innovative storytelling of leaving the monster to the imagination before finally providing the spectacle in the third act, Jaws is a masterpiece in narrative restraint that could still play for all audiences.

…Which is something no one would say about the three cash-in Jaws sequels that Universal Pictures green lit in the span of 12 years after 1975. In fact, when Back to the Future Part II was released in ’89, it’d only been two years since Jaws: The Revenge, the one where the ghost of Jaws went Bahamas and chased the Chief Brody character’s widow to the Caribbean while on a vendetta for what happened in ’75. It’s kind of hilarious.

As is the scene in Back to the Future Part II. In that sequence, Michael J. Fox’s Marty McFly stands slack jawed in the middle of Hill Valley’s town square, the same space that was so memorably used in the first BTTF film where Marty was forced to finally accept he’d traveled to the year 1985. In the sequel, he comes to realize what it means to be in 2015 when he turns around to face the local multiplex, which has only one film on its marquee: Jaws 19. And then to demonstrate to Marty the state of 21st century special effects, the “HOLOMAX” release teases its thrills as a holographic Great White Shark emerges from the building and descends on Marty’s head.

Perhaps like many an audience member who choked on their popcorn kernels in ’75 with fear, Marty screams bloody murder—and then realizes it’s just a movie and scoffs, “The shark still looks fake.” Yes, it always did, but at least in the first movie that didn’t matter so much.

At the time, the scene was a nice dig at Universal’s expense as well as the Jaws franchise as a whole. What was once the most revolutionary Hollywood movie of 1975 had become a punchline by 1989: a once glorious title that’d been run into the ground with endless cash grab sequels. And the joke is even funnier because of the “19” in the title. Nineteen movies of the same franchise. Could you even imagine?!

Oh, how sweet the irony is, then, that one of the most absurd notions in Back to the Future Part II turned out to be the most true! No, there haven’t been 19 Jaws movies (yet), but that might be by virtue of the studio churning the franchise’s mystique into putty before Gen-Xers and Millennials could grow up with it beneath unsullied nostalgia glasses. Nevertheless, the future where Jaws 19 could exist came true.

Consider that we scoff at the idea of 19 Jaws movies being made in 40 years, but Marvel Studios has released 25 pictures in only 13, with two more due out before Christmas 2021. And that doesn’t even include the television shows that are now coming to dominate Disney+.

I know what some will say: Marvel movies are a series of interconnected franchises, as opposed to one amorphous content farm. But that’s not entirely accurate. There are exceptions, of course, which stand out as singularly distinct from other MCU efforts. There’s Black Panther, for instance. That 2018 Oscar nominee is totally removed from the events of The Avengers, you might say. Then there’s Guardians of the Galaxy and its wacky space opera shenanigans occurring literal light years away from the events of Iron Man 3.

And yet, the appeal for most moviegoers, and the brilliance of Marvel’s marketing strategy, is that they all seem like the same thing to the undiscerning eye. And even to the discerning one, there is a pat familiarity to the formula, story beats, and sitcom-esque ability to wink at the audience at its own silliness. Tonally, they all feel of one piece. Hence why the first Shang-Chi movie was gladly welcomed by the industry last month as Marvel’s latest blockbuster hit—a feat borne in large off it being the next Marvel movie, as opposed to a new original property without a built-in audience.

It’s an aspect to the whole series which caused Dune director Denis Villeneuve to suggest that some Marvel movies are “cut and paste.” It’s also a formula which aids the studio to force its millions of fans to see it “as all connected” and be encouraged to go see the Ant-Man sequel they might otherwise skip in order to discover how its post-credits scene will set up the deus ex machina for Avengers: Endgame.

And that aforementioned Black Panther originally had its protagonist introduced in Captain America: Civil War, an Avengers movie by another name. It’s also the only “Cap” flick to cross $1 billion because they stuck Iron Man in it. Similarly, James Gunn’s Guardians films are genuinely auteur-driven, yet they still worked as a years-long tease of Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame’s big bad: Thanos. Hell, Infinity War’s biggest selling point in the trailer was seeing the Avengers and Guardians meet face-to-face for the first time.

The methods and talent being used to produce these endless sequels are far more sophisticated and entertaining than the hack work which produced Jaws: The Revenge, but then that’s why Jaws only lasted four movies and Marvel’s already mapping out its 30th “event” in the next few years.

This is not meant to only criticize Marvel, however. They are simply the most successful studio at exploiting their intellectual property in the 21st century. Universal’s own Fast and Furious movies aren’t half bad at that game, though. This summer just saw the 10th “Fast Saga” movie when you count Hobbs and Shaw. And while Vin Diesel claims the 11th main line Fast and Furious movie will be the last, you just know with its own Avengers-sized cast that Hobbs and Shaw will be merely the first spinoff franchise from “the family.”

Even Spielberg, who was reportedly never happy with the Jaws sequels and what they did to his first masterwork, has been much more ready to “open up” later successes like Jurassic Park. Considered a “smart” blockbuster entertainment in 1993 that inspired genuine awe from millions of moviegoers, that film’s fourth sequel (which was produced by Spielberg, like all the follow-ups) reveled in watching dinosaurs stalk around a haunted house, as if they were Frankenstein and Dracula. Next year’s Jurassic World: Dominion is supposedly intended to be the “final” film of the three most recent, Chris Pratt-led sequels, as well as another sendoff to the original 1993 movie’s cast. Yet it seems dubious that it’ll be the last film set in that “universe.”

After all, the “Skywalker Saga” ended with a whimper in 2019’s Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, but Disney is preparing to churn out more Star Wars movies and TV shows than ever before in the next decade.

This is not to say you should feel ashamed for enjoying any of these movies or franchises. Folks like what they like. But what Back to the Future Part II perhaps unintentionally predicted was that audiences would have an appetite for a proverbial Jaws 19.

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When BTTF became a trilogy, sequels were still seen as a creatively risky proposition. Filmmakers often maintained artistic credibility by attempting to turn sequels into a larger thematic whole—often as a trilogy. Lucas set that standard with Star Wars, and only after his buddy Francis Ford Coppola claimed he’d never make another Godfather movie after Part II. Spielberg originally walked away from Indiana Jones after three movies, and many likely wish he’d stayed firm about that in retrospect. Meanwhile, Zemeckis and Gale have done the near impossible thing: refuse to allow Universal to make a fourth Back to the Future movie or reboot the series entirely.

But equivocations in the industry about a proverbial Jaws 19 are long gone. What was once a cheeky riff on the dystopian Coca-Cola billboard ads in Blade Runner have become a modern day reality in 2021. And hey, there’s now a real holographic Times Square billboard ad for that, too.

The post How the Jaws Scene in Back to the Future Part 2 Predicted Modern Blockbusters appeared first on Den of Geek.

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fearsmagazine · 3 years ago

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Screamfest Horror Film Festival Announces Initial Lineup for 21st Edition

Screamfest® Horror Film Festival, the largest and longest-running horror film festival in the United States, announced their first-wave lineup of competitive features and shorts for its 21st edition. Running October 12th through 21st at the TCL Chinese Theater, Screamfest® welcomes audiences back to the big screen for a collective experience they won’t soon forget. Tickets can be purchased here: https://screamfestla.com

The Retaliators will open Screamfest® LA on October 12th for its North American premiere with a red carpet prior to the screening. The film follows an upstanding pastor who uncovers a dark and twisted underworld as he searches for answers surrounding his daughter's brutal murder. Directed by Bridget Smith and Samuel Gonzalez Jr. and written by the Geare brothers, The Retaliators also features a high-octane original soundtrack and cameos from some of the biggest names in rock music, including Five Finger Death Punch, Tommy Lee, Papa Roach, The Hu, Ice Nine Kills, Escape The Fate, and more appear on screen. Marc Menchaca (Ozark), Michael Lombardi (Rescue Me), and Joseph Gatt (Game of Thrones) star in this horror-thriller which reveals a game of revenge played using a new set of rules.

Considered the "Sundance of Horror," Screamfest® is proud to showcase new work from independent filmmakers from across the globe. Highlights from this year’s program include the World Premieres of Father of Flies, the haunting tale of family life and the supernatural and Teddy Grennan’s Wicked Games where a long weekend at a country estate is turned into a nightmare when a group of masked intruders invades the property. Little do they know one guest has a surprise for them.

Four films will be making their North American debuts at the festival. In addition to The Retaliators, Richard Waters’s dark folk horror Bring Out The Fear traps its protagonists in an unsolvable maze where a sinister presence awaits; Clare Foley stars in the sci-fi horror The Changed where an alien presence takes possession of the hearts and minds of her city; and Isolation depicts nine tales of terror which are woven together as remote people work to survive an increasingly deadly outbreak.

US premieres at the festival include Russia’s #Blue_Whale produced by Timur Bekmambetov, which follows Dana as she works to uncover the truth behind her sister’s suicide; Argentina’s fantasy horror film Nocturna: Side A- The Great Old Man’s Night which depicts one old man’s journey to rethink his past and present and question his reality; and Kratt by Rasmus Berivoo in which children stumble upon an instruction manual to create a supernatural being.

West Coast premieres at the festival include a joint production between the US, Mexico, and Venezuela, Exorcism of God which follows an American priest working in Mexico who, due to a botched exorcism, carries a dark secret with him; hailing from Ireland, Let the Wrong One In dives into the complications of family ties when a vampire is discovered in the family; Erik Bloomquist follows twins who spend a night at a remote inn to investigate their missing father in Night at the Eagle Inn; North American distribution rights to the Argentinian The Returned (Los Que Vuelven) - which follows a woman in 1919 prays to a mythical deity to resurrect her stillborn son - were acquired in a new venture between Peter Block of A Bigger Boat and Seth Nagel, Scott Einbinder and Garrick Dion of 5X Media; What Josiah Saw explores a farmhouse haunted by the past; Alone With You stars Emily Bennett, Emma Myles, and fan-favorite Barbara Crampton in a twisted tale of memory and horror unfolding over a romantic homecoming for a distant girlfriend; and When I Consume You by Perry Blackshear where two siblings get more than they bargained for when hunting a shadowy stalker.

The festival will also feature a Special Presentation of Daniel Farrands’s Aileen Wuornos: American Boogeyman starring Peyton List and Lydia Hearst, which follows the notorious killer through a little known chapter of her life in Deland, Florida.

“After a challenging year for cinema, we are excited to return to our home at the TCL Chinese Theatre for our latest lineup of frights,'' says festival founder Rachel Belofsky. “While last year’s drive-ins allowed us to continue to celebrate horror films as a community, we have missed the magic of the traditional theatrical experience.”

Formed in August 2001 by film producer Rachel Belofsky, Screamfest Horror Film Festival is a female-run 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that gives filmmakers and screenwriters in the horror and science fiction genres a venue to have their work showcased in the film industry.

Please find the 2021 Screamfest feature line-up below:

Aileen Wuornos: American Boogeyman (US, 2021) - Special Presentation Written and Directed by Daniel Farrands Produced by Lucas Jarach, Daniel Farrands, Meadow Williams, Swen Temmel, Luke Daniels, Daniel Davila Executive Producer(s) Nicolas Chartier, Jonathan Deckter, Lydia Hearst, Alan Pao Cast Peyton List, Lydia Hearst, Tobin Bell, Nick Vallelonga, Swen Temmel, Meadow Williams, Andrew Biernat Based on a little-known chapter in the life of America's most notorious female serial killer, "Aileen Wuornos: American Boogeyman" takes place in 1976 when 21-year-old Aileen (Peyton List) arrives in Florida attempting to escape her tragic past. Soon she marries wealthy yacht club president Lewis Fell (Tobin Bell) who offers her the chance to become part of Florida's high society. Ultimately, the victimized Aileen surrenders to her murderous impulses and wreaks havoc on the peaceful seaside community of Deland, Florida.

Alone With You (US, 2021) - West Coast Premiere Directed by Emily Bennett & Josh Brooks Written by Emily Bennett & Josh Brooks Produced by Andrew D. Corkin & Theo James Cast Emily Bennett, Emma Myles (ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK), Dora Madison (BLISS, VFX), and Barbara Crampton (RE-ANIMATOR, YOU'RE NEXT) Charlie (Emily Bennett) is setting the atmosphere in her sleek, two-story apartment in Brooklyn for a romantic homecoming for her distant girlfriend Simone (Emma Myles) who’s been away for work. There are past glimpses of visual tension between the two, so we’re led to feel that this meticulous setting of mood may be a peacemaking gesture. Enamored beyond all good sense, Charlie begins to experience a myriad of unsettling incidents, and the horrors of what has transpired are slowly revealed in the shards of Charlie’s resistant memory.

#Blue_Whale (Russia, 2021) - US Premiere Directed by Anna Zaytseva Written by Evgeniya Bogomyakova, Anna Zaytseva, Olga Klemesheva Produced by Timur Bekmambetov, Anna Shalashina, Igor Mishin Cast Anna Potebnya, Timofey Eleckii, Ekaterina Stulova, Diana Shulmina, Olga Pipchenko, Polina Vataga, Daniil Kiselev After her younger sister Julia commits suicide, troubled adolescent Dana decides to find out what led to her death. Examining her sister’s computer, Dana finds a secret chat group where adolescents are encouraged to kill themselves through a challenge called "Blue Whale". Dana’s investigation leads her ever closer to the truth, but to really discover what happened, she herself must play the deadly game. #blue_whale // #I_want_to_play_the_game is inspired by real events that happened in Russia in 2015 and 2017.

Bring Out The Fear (Ireland, 2021) - North American Premiere Written and Directed by Richard Waters Produced by Alison Scarff & Richard Waters Cast Ciara Bailey, Tad Morari, James Devlin Rosie and Dan are a couple in a doomed relationship. While taking a final walk in their favourite forest, they find it has trapped them in an unsolvable maze. The paths lead nowhere, the trees never end, the sun never sets, and a sinister presence stalks and torments them, trying to drive them insane... There is no escape. But what exactly are they hiding? This dark folk horror will leave you questioning what is real and what is malicious trickery.

The Changed (US, 2021) - North American Premiere Written and Directed by Michael Mongillo Produced by Taylor Warren and Eloise Asmuth Cast Clare Foley, Jason Alan Smith, Carlee Avers, Doug Tompos, introducing Olivia Freer, with Kathy Searle, and Tony Todd Something has taken possession of the hearts and minds of the populace. Kim (Clare Foley), Mac (Jason Alan Smith), and Jane (Carlee Avers) try to convince themselves it's paranoia, but before long the city is besieged by the changed. By the time they realize an alien intelligence has merged with their neighbor, Bill (Tony Todd), a horde of changed is amassing outside their suburban home.

Exorcism of God (US/Mexico/Venezuela, 2021) - West Coast Premiere Directed by Alejandro Hidalgo Written by Alejandro Hidalgo, Santiago Fernández Calvete Produced by Alejandro Hidalgo, Joel Seidl, Karim Kabche & Antonio Abdo Cast María Gabriela De Faría, Will Beinbrink, Joseph Marcell Peter Williams, an American priest working in Mexico, is considered a saint by many local parishioners. However, due to a botched exorcism, he carries a dark secret that's eating him alive until he gets an opportunity to face his own demon one final time.

Father of Flies (USA/UK, 2021) - World Premiere Directed by Ben Charles Edwards Written by Kirsty Bell Produced by Kirsty Bell, Phil McKenzie Cast Nicholas Tucci, Camilla Rutherford, Davi Santos, Page Ruth, Keaton Tetlow, Colleen Heidemann A haunting tale of family life. A vulnerable young boy finds his mother pushed out of the family home by a strange new woman, and he must confront the terrifying supernatural forces that seem to move in with her.

Isolation (US, 2021) - North American Premiere Directed by Larry Fessenden, Andrew Kasch, Dennie Gordon, Bobby Roe, Alix Austin & Keir Siewert, Christian Pasquariello, Alexandra Neary, Zach Passero, Adam Brown & Kyle I. Kelley Written by Larry Fessenden, Cody Goodfellow, Dennie Gordon, Zack Andrews & Bobby Roe, Kyle I. Kelley & Adam Brown, Keir Siewert, Zach Passero, Alexandrea Neary, Christian Pasquariello Produced by Nathan Crooker, James P. Gannon Cast Larry Fessenden, Dennie Gordon, Graham Denman, Damien Gerard, Bobby Roe Sunny Roe, Bodhi Roe, Adam Brown, Alix Austin, Hannah Passero Marieh Delfino, Alex Weed, Fine Belger, Hans Gurbig Woven together are nine tales of terror that follow isolated citizens from around the world as they confront their darkest fears in an attempt to survive an increasingly deadly outbreak.

Kratt (Estonia, 2020) - US Premiere Written and Directed by Rasmus Merivoo Produced by Rain Rannu, Tõnu Hiielaid Cast Mari Lill, Ivo Uukkivi, Jan Uuspõld, Paul Purga, Nora Merivoo, Harri Merivoo When children are left at Grandma's without smartphones they’re bored to tears. That is until Granny finds them loads to do. She also tells them about a magical creature named KRATT that’ll do whatever its master says. When they stumble upon an instruction on how to build one they don’t hesitate. All they have to do now is to buy a soul from the devil…

Let The Wrong One In (Ireland, 2021) - West Coast Premiere Written and Directed by Conor McMahon Produced by Trisha Flood, Ruth Treacy, Julianne Forde, Michael Lavelle Cast Karl Rice, Eoin Duffy, Anthony Head, Mary Murray Let the Wrong One In follows young supermarket worker Matt, who is a little too nice for his own good. When he discovers that his older, estranged brother Deco has turned into a vampire, he's faced with a dilemma: Will he risk his own life to help his sibling, with blood being thicker than water? Or will he stake him before he spreads the infection further? The film stars upcoming Irish talent Karl Rice and Eoin Duffy, along with Buffy the Vampire Slayer icon Anthony Head, in the role of Henry; a taxi driver with a sideline in vampire hunting.

Night at the Eagle Inn (US, 2021) - West Coast Premiere Directed by Erik Bloomquist Written by Erik Bloomquist, Carson Bloomquist Produced by Erik Bloomquist, Carson Bloomquist Cast Amelia Dudley, Taylor Turner, Beau Minniear, Greg Schweers, Erik Bloomquist Fraternal twins spend a terrifying night at a remote inn to investigate the last known whereabouts of their father. As they dive deeper, the property's dark secrets ensnare them in a hellish labyrinth they must escape before dawn.

Nocturna: Side A - The Great Old Man’s Night (Argentina, 2021) - US Premiere Directed by Gonzalo Calzada Written by Gonzalo Calzada Produced by Alejandro Narváez, Javier Diaz Cast - Pepe Soriano, Marina Artigas, Lautaro Delgado Synopsis - Ulysses is a hundred-year-old man, he lives alone and is on the verge of death. The last night of his life, he will experience something that will force him to rethink his past, his present and his view about his reality.

The Retaliators (US, 2021) - North American Premiere - OPENING NIGHT Directed by Bridget Smith, Samuel Gonzalez, JR. Written by The Geare Brothers Produced by Allen Kovac, Michael Lombardi, Mike Walsh Executive Producer(s) Dan Lieblein Cast Michael Lombardi, Marc Menchaca, Joseph Gatt, Jacoby Shaddix, Katie Kelly, Abbey Hefer, Ivan Moody, Zoltan Bathory In THE RETALIATORS, an upstanding pastor uncovers a dark and twisted underworld as he searches for answers surrounding his daughter's brutal murder. A high-octane original soundtrack and cameos from some of the biggest names in rock music set the tone as this horror-thriller reveals a game of revenge played using a new set of rules. Marc Menchaca (Ozark), Michael Lombardi (Rescue Me), and Joseph Gatt (Game of Thrones) star. Five Finger Death Punch, Tommy Lee, Papa Roach, The Hu, Ice Nine Kills, Escape The Fate, and more appear onscreen and on THE RETALIATORS Original Soundtrack, coming soon via Better Noise Music.

The Returned (Los Que Vuelven) (Argentina, 2021) - West Coast Premiere Directed by Laura Casabe Written by Laura Casabe, Paolo Soria, Lisandro Colaberardino Produced by Alejandro Israel Cast Maria Soldi, Lali Gonzalez, Alberto Ajaka South America, 1919; a landowner's wife is desperate for a child of her own, having suffered through multiple miscarriages. She finds hope, however, in a seemingly outlandish plan: she'll pray to a mythical deity to resurrect her stillborn son. The plan works, but along with the child comes something else...something evil.

What Josiah Saw (US, 2021) - LA Premiere Directed by Vincent Grashaw Produced by Ran Namerode, Vincent Grashaw, Bernie Stern, Angelia Adzic Executive Producer(s) Cole Payne, Scott Haze Written by Robert Alan Dilts Cast Robert Patrick, Nick Stahl, Scott Haze, Kelli Garner, Tony Hale, Jake Weber Everyone in town knows about the haunted Graham Farm on Willow Road. You'll hear there's a bad history to it. Josiah and his youngest son, Thomas, are all that remain of this estranged family. But after experiencing terrifying visions from beyond, Josiah decides they must change their ways to right a great wrong. After being away for over two decades, Eli and Mary, Josiah's eldest children, are enticed to sell the property and reunite at the old farmhouse in hopes of closing this haunting chapter of their lives for good. Sins of the past will be paid in full.

When I Consume You (US, 2021) - West Coast Premiere Written and Directed by Perry Blackshear Produced by MacLeod Andrews, Perry Blackshear, Evan Dumouchel, Libby Ewing Cast Libby Ewing, Evan Dumouchel, MacLeod Andres, Margaret Ying Drake Siblings Daphne and Wilson Shaw practically raised one another. They’ve protected each other from everything life has thrown their way. Daphne’s professional life is soaring and she’s looking to adopt a child. Wilson is interviewing for a position at a local school, hoping to become a teacher. But Daphne has an unsettling, dangerous stalker whom she can’t seem to shake, and now threatens to destroy them both. They hunt for their tormentor through the shadowy streets of Brooklyn, honing their bodies and minds for a showdown. But this foe may prove to be more than they can handle. They will break and rebuild themselves if necessary to save each other, and protect the light they know is in this world for them... if only they can persevere.

Wicked Games (US, 2021) - World Premiere Written and Directed by Teddy Grennan Produced by Bennett Krishock, Heath Franklin, Burton Gray, Teddy Grennan, Christopher Walters Cast Christine Spang, Markus Silbiger, Michael Shenefelt, Conner Ann Waterman When Harley joins her new boyfriend for a long Halloween weekend at his country estate, they're invaded by a bank of masked freaks and forced to play a Wicked Game. To the intruders' unpleasant surprise, Harley's hard-boiled history has endowed her with a bag of tricks which give the game a surprise ending.

Standing out as one of the top tastemakers in the genre of horror, Screamfest has been a launchpad for top tier franchises and storytellers. Among the numerous films that have been discovered and/or premiered at the festival include box office hit The Wretched, Tigers Are Not Afraid, We Summons the Darkness, Pledge, The Master Cleanse, Tragedy Girls, American Mary, Paranormal Activity, 30 Days of Night, Trick ‘r Treat, and The Human Centipede.

Screamfest selects award winners at the close of the festival. Film entries are accepted in the categories of Best Feature, Directing, Cinematography, Editing, Special Effects and Musical Score. In addition, there are special categories for Best Animation, Best Short, Best Documentary and Best Student Film as well as a Screenplay competition.

Screamfest® takes the health and safety of its guests seriously and proof of vaccination or negative COVID test with a temperature check will be required for entry. Masks are required at all times while inside the venue. Hand sanitizer stations are placed throughout the theater and lobby with special cleanings in between screenings. Screamfest® will comply with all LA County regulations and policies are subject to change.

For more information or the latest news, visit screamfestla.com

#film news #movie news #festival news #screamfest #selections #lineup #2021

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jackdawyt · 5 years ago

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Given that Tevinter Nights is just over one month old, and the majority of you have had a decent chance to pick it up and give it a good read, I want to share my full-spoiler predications for Dragon Age 4 based on many new aspects Tevinter Nights brings to the ever-so expanding universe of Dragon Age. As a quick preface, this sort of video is definitely going to be more of an opinion piece, sharing my own thoughts and marvels on everything Tevinter Nights foreshadows for the future game.

I encourage all of your thoughts and theories too, so share them down below! But, without further ado, I’ll start by sharing my predictions on the main tone of Dragon Age 4.

Tone:

The Dragon Age games have always followed a Dark Fantasy approach to storytelling with morally grey choices, excessive gore and truly twisted plot-beats like ravenous Broodmothers, and Hawke’s mother’s macabre death, which was oh so gruesome and a pinnacle example of Dragon Age’s dark fantasy tone.

While some may argue Dragon Age: Inquisition was the weakest in this dark fantasy department, Tevinter Nights revitalises any hope for the return of deeper and darker themes in the next Dragon Age game.

Y’see Tevinter Nights, acting as a prologue for Dragon Age 4, introduces a bounty of dark fantasy storytelling that will certainly push the future plots in a most diabolical way.

Introduced in this book, we had plenty of things that would give even a darkspawn the heebie jeebies!

From: evil twisted human/centipedal/insectoid monstrosities, demon worshipping cults, ancient wicked beings, (“Cekorax”), death and blood magic, murder machinations, eldritch horrors, domestic abuse, inhumane treatment, ghastly apparitions, demonic possession, and plenty more hard-hitting themes that are paving the way for Dragon Age 4’s story.

And if none of those themes satiated your own dark desires for the next Dragon Age game, well, don’t forget about the main narrative focusing on stopping a prideful and powerful elven mage who can take shape into the wicked Dread Wolf attempting to commit mass-genocide for the sake of his long-lost people. Oh, not to mention the fact that this elf could’ve broken up with you too, causing your heart to ache every single second as he tears down Thedas, and the love you once shared together...

With that said, Dragon Age 4’s tone should certainly take the franchise back to its dark fantasy roots if it follows the layout Tevinter Nights has laid ahead. Let’s move on to the next game’s potential locations.

Locations:

First up, The Tevinter Imperium.

From the Capital City Minrathous, home to the Magisterium to Elven tombs lurking in The Silent Planes. There are many prominent locations that could make for a worthy visit within the Imperium. However, with the ongoing Qunari Antaam invasion ransacking many of Tevinter’s northern cities, many of the Imperium’s major holdings will be torn by the current war and preparing for a siege.

Not to mention the other major epidemic on the Imperium and its people - the scheme Solas has to destroy the veil. Not that this pain will be exclusive to the Imperium, as by gum, it will hurt all of Thedas.

But, the entirety of Tevinter’s land was once in possession of the ancient elves during the elvhen times. Solas’s scheme seeks a redemption of his people, and so a reclamation of the land is merely inevitable.

The people of Tevinter are not only evading a brutal religious conquest against their homes, but an elven God’s conflict too.

With so much contention impending, the Tevinter Imperium is critically endangered. Can Tevinter’s most contrived government save its very people, or will we see this once great Empire stumble into chaos?

Next up, Nevarra.

The main ongoing conflict in Nevarra regards the Van Markham, Pentagasht and many other nobles fighting for their own right to the throne, as King Marcus’s reign will soon end with no heir to rule after him.

However, just outside of the Capital; Nevarra City, lies the Mortalitasi’s Grand Necropolis, a stronghold and morgue built into the side of a mountain to hold Neverra’s elite family tombs.

In a very recent catastrophic ritual held in the Grand Necropolis caverns, the Dread Wolf attacked the Mortalitasi, sending demons to stop the ritual and kill the rest of the mages. In a desperate effort, the surviving mages sealed the caverns with no trace of the invading demons.

Investigating the Dread Wolf’s movements may play a huge part in the next plot, and having the Mortalitasi as allies could change the tide of battle. So, Nevarra’s Grand Necropolis would certainly make for a grand visit.

And then there’s Hunter Fell, a small town just west of Nevarra City, where a tavern called ‘The Teahouse’ appeared to be the last known location that Solas had made a physical appearance. Another worthy place to investigate further plot ties.

Throughout the lands of Nevarra, there are at least elven more ancient elven/dwarven thaigs that are built into Nevarran mountains, to our knowledge, only one has been opened and it contained horrific mutilated creatures followed by a gas that had a stench of the ocean.

Nevarra and its surrounding areas are ripe with plot lines and narrative potential that will need to have a huge impact in the next Dragon Age game.

Following that, we’ve got Antiva.

Just like Tevinter, the majority of Nothern Antiva is under widespread invasion by the Qunari Antaam. However, quite unlike Tevinter, Antiva doesn’t exactly have their own dedicated military forces, instead the country relies on the Anitvan Crows to take action.

The leaders of the Antivan Crows have their own inner conflict as one of the eight major houses leading the crows decided to sign a contract with the Qunari for a peaceful invasion, in which Antiva would be ‘spared’ in exchange for the deaths of every other talon.

The talons discovered this treachery and put the situation to bed with the death of the Kortez family talon. With the peaceful conflict in shambles, a very much hostile Qunari invasion lingers on the horizon for Antiva.

Although the Anitvan Crows may make for a worthwhile trip to Antiva, who can say what will remain of the country when Dragon Age 4 arrives.

Lastly, we have The Anderfels.

To my knowledge, the most outstanding location The Anderfels has to offer is Fortress Weisshaupt, the headquarters of the Grey Wardens.

There’s been a lot of talk regarding the Anderfels Wardens, that they have a secret, or they’ve discovered something, or they’re all dead. henceforth, Fortress Weisshaupt has cut communications to the other Wardens across Thedas, remaining silent and alone.

Could this sworn secret silencing the Wardens from the other groups be the return of Griffons? Have they discovered even more intelligent darkspawn, perhaps another Magister of old, or are the Warden leaders fighting amongst themselves?

The search for this truth could make for a notable quest line in Dragon Age 4.

I’ll shuffle away from Rivan as a prominent location because I believe this country is intentionally neutral for many reasons that I’ll uncover in the next category.

With that, let’s talk about one of the biggest aspects that is going to make or break the next Dragon Age game.

The Protagonist:

Spy.

We’ve known for a fair while that Dragon Age 4’s previous iteration had the player prance around Tevinter as a spy, partaking in high risk, high reward heists. However, before major development picked up, the project was canned and the majority of its ideas were too.

It’s unknown if any of that previous work will make its way into the latest iteration, or if it’s all been scrapped.

But, before we shed a tear thinking about what Dragon Age 4 might’ve been based on the original iteration... If Tevinter Nights has taught me one thing, it’s that this spy role for our new protagonist still has plenty of potential. So, keep your daggers at the ready because I wouldn’t call playing as a spy off the table just yet.

As it stands, a spy is the biggest and best contender we have for our next character - chasing every lead after Solas, attempting to find a crack in his grand scheme, recovering intel and ancient artefacts, all the while being someone completely different than The Inquisitor. We’re a nobody, someone who can slip between the seams without garnering any attention.

Which is the perfect role to defeat Solas because he doesn’t know of both our existence, and weaknesses.

Tevintet Nights builds up a lot of espionage plotlines, introducing brand new factions in Thedas that are particularly interested in subterfuge and trickery. Or as I like to call it hankey-pankey. Each attempting to gather information to defeat Solas before he set’s Thedas ablaze.

So, because many major factions throughout Thedas operate a sole spy network, we have plenty of race origin stories for our next spy, conceptually.

Say we play as a human; we can be a member of the Tevinter Siccari. If we’re a dwarf, we can belong to the Carta. If we choose an elf, we could be an Ex-Fen'Harel Agent, and if we played as a Qunari, we could be a member of the Ben-Hassrath.

Satisfying each race with their own reconnaissance background, allowing the protagonist to have an already established understanding of Solas and his plan, so they can begin their journey of attempting to stop him.

Through heists and other risky missions, we could embark on a fast pace, tense narrative that’s more akin to a suicide mission. Very much different to the previous Dragon Age entries, however, completely logically given the tone of the predicted narrative.

And, Maker’s arse, I could go on with many more ideas for a spy protagonist, but we’ve got other concepts to move on to. If that doesn’t quench your thirst for potential spy dynamics in the next Dragon Age game, well I did create a dedicated video to this topic that you can check out.

Lord of Fortune (Treasure Hunter).

In the same direction as a stealthy spy, but rather quite different and certainly stricter, but has its own unique appeal (..) we could potentially play as a Rivani Lord of Fortune! More apropos, a distinct Treasure Hunter seeking fortune, wealth and any opportunity that pays well enough.

And perhaps the gig that pays well enough is to, without question, recover certain artefacts and idols that may be required in stopping an Elven God that wants to destroy the veil. However, that information is beyond our pay grade, and were not one to question a paid job.

And then, as things escalate, our Treasure Hunter finds themselves in a perilous situation, and they decide to take the hunt against the Dread Wolf, with more reason than just coin, but to fight for Thedas and their new family.

What marks a Lord of Fortune as significant is the fact that they’re from Rivan, a country we’ve not yet seen much of in Dragon Age, and somewhat of a neutral location for our next protagonist. As they make choices that may affect Tevinter or Nevarra, they won’t have a bias based on that being their home, they will be able to make a neutral choice based on the context given, and none other.

There were plenty of nods to the Lords of Fortune in Tevinter Nights. Regardless, if we’re not playing as one, we’ll certainly encounter one or two in the next game.

Executor.

And in a completely obscure, but necessary direction... how about playing as an Executor? A being, or person, or whatever the heck they are, from “beyond the sea.” This character style would grant the players with a new perspective on Thedas, and would allow new players to pick up the series, as you’d slowly learn about the narrative piece by piece, playing as someone who probably doesn’t know much about the world of Thedas, and would need somewhat of an education on the events of this world.

We don’t know much about the Executors at all, so what’s better way to discover them then actually playing as one?

The Inquisitor (Dual?).

As my final protagonist concept for Dragon Age 4, I feel it necessary as an Inquisitor fanboy to reiterate the ancient method many fans would like to see, and that is the dual protagonist mechanic. Allowing the next game to have two protagonists. As a TLDR, because I’ve talked about this before, but let's say we play as the returning Inquisitor for 20% of the game as they find loose ends on Solas, deal with diplomatic and political matters, and have more of a conversational style to gameplay. Then, we switch to our new protagonist who spends the rest of the game exploring Tevinter, building allies and attempting to stop Solas.

Putting this topic to bed, the Inquisitor needs to witness the end to Solas, whether peacefully or vengefully, he’s the Inquisitor’s friend, rival or romance. So, they need to be there to deal with him.

Potential Allies:

Anyhow, we’ve talked about the next protagonist, let’s explore some plot threads and briefly run through the factions we may, or may not have on our side depending on our choices in Dragon Age 4.

The Mortalitasi

Nevarra’s own death mages who’re responsible for mummifying the bodies of elite families using powerful necromancy and binding magic. It is said that the Mortalitasi are so powerful, they influence and sway the king’s decrees and decisions over the kingdom.

The Tevinter Siccari

The Imperium’s best shadow network, made of highly skilled and secretive agents who each come from slave families, they are formidable and honourable warriors.

The Qunari Ben Hassrath

The Qun’s dedicated spies and enforcers, they’re responsible for re-educating those not familiar with the Qun, however, the group are currently fixated on Solas’s movements. Reportedly The Ben Hassrath have the most knowledge about the Wolf than anyone else on Thedas, because of this, they remain a neutral party in Thedas’s war effort.

The Inquisition

Remnants of the Inquisition army continue the mission of their Inquisitor, with many agents enlisting to fight against an opposing threat.

The Carta

This crime syndicate has been investigating all matters concerning the blight that has become ‘bad for business’ in the dwarven kingdom, like the red lyriun idol.

The Executors

Mysterious beings who come from beyond the sea, they would rather not see this world come to an end, and so they too seek a demise to the Wolf.

The Antivan Crows

Antiva’s best and brightest hired assassins, who’ve recently denied the Qunari Antaam’s ‘peaceful’ contract for invasion. Now, they will fight for their country and its people.

The Grey Wardens

The legendary heroes of old are long gone, the group continues with incompetent leaders who stain the title Grey Warden. However, those who linger in Fortress Weishaupt have a secret, one that has not yet left the premise. Whatever that may be...

And I’m sure plenty more factions will arise; however, these were my main hot takes based on Tevinter Nights. With that, let’s discus the rivalling factions that will most likely be out for our blood in the next game.

Enemies:

The Qunari Antaam

The Qun, under the leadership of Sten as Arishock, stands divided. The Antaam, the Qun’s dedicated military branch has decided for themselves to invade Thedas without authorisation from the rest of the Qun. The zealot army sieges cities across Northern Tevinter and Antiva, continuing to rampage all of Thedas’s land until the people either kneel to the Qun or pay the price with their own blood. They will not stop until their mission is complete, and no one will get in their way, not even their own people.

Solas/Dread Wolf

Solas seeks to destroy the veil, destroying Thedas. He’s absorbed Mythal’s essence so he can rise as the horrific Dread Wolf, a creature who has taken residence in the Fade, with his own demon army whom serve him willingly.

Ancient Elves

Ancient and Dalish Elves have joined Solas’s ranks, known as the Cult of Fen’Harel, they abide by Solas’s every scheme and have begun to cause chaos for Thedas, like attempting to set up a calamity feud between the Qunari Ben Hassrath and Tevinter Kinsman. Who knows what they may do next?

Venatori Remnants

They tried to summon an ancient demon in Tevinter’s capital city, surely, they aren't over that plan just yet.

Main Story/Plot Points:

Now we get to the juicy story predications, where I get to speculate the heck out of many key plot aspects of Dragon Age 4’s narrative. So, hold on tight to your tinfoil hats!

The Red Lyrium Idol

The whereabouts of the Red Lyrium Idol are still quite the mystery, we’ve learned a great deal about this device, however, we still don’t know what it represents, and how significant it will be regarding Solas’s plan to destroy the veil. So, will we be embarking on a McGuffin style questline to find this idol before Solas gets it?

Let’s say we’re a spy journeying into epic heists, attempting to beat Solas to the finish line and destroy this idol before he gets it. Or, maybe this idol plot-point may be wrapped up by the time of Dragon Age 4’s launch, and we’ll be doing something else?

The point is, this idol is still a mystery and it needs solving, so by that measure, it’s probably going to have some involvement in Dragon Age 4.

Solas/Dread Wolf Antagonist

Based on what we know about the story going forward, Solas will most certainly be the next antagonist, that’s a given at this point unless the plot drastically changes and Mythal or The Titans, or a new evil takes that position. As it stands though, Solas seemingly is the big bad of Dragon Age 4.

And, he’s has already risen as the Dread Wolf, so that’s just grand, we’re already doomed! The plot will most likely focus around stopping Solas before he destroys the veil... if there even is a way to stop him.

As another obvious predication, I believe we may follow between two main choices throughout every action in the next game, those choices are: do we want to redeem Solas, or stop him. If our intention is to redeem Solas, then perhaps he’ll listen to what we’ve got to say, however, if we pursuit his death, then perhaps we’ll only be greeted by The Dread Wolf.

Allies

Regarding the main plot of defeating Solas, I believe we’ll be gathering more intel on the Dread Wolf by teaming up with many dedicated factions across Nothern Thedas. While some groups may join our ranks more willingly like the Mortalitasi, I believe we may have a few decisions between choosing one faction over another because of their own quarrels. Like choosing between the Tevinter Siccari and Qunari Ben Hassrath, each providing agents and intelligence in their own way against Solas, however, completely hostile to the other faction.

We’re going to need allies to stop Solas, there’s no way around that. Not every faction is going to get along, and magically unifying every divisive faction under one banner would be unrealistic and feel cheap in my opinion. If we can choose between key factions, there’d be a sense of contention throughout every single choice we could make.

As well as gathering and helping as many allies as possible who support our cause against the Dread Wolf, I have a few more main mission predictions like embarking on epic heists stealing and claiming Elven artefacts and Evanuris runes. And stopping key agents of Fen’Harel and their destructive plans for Thedas.

Side Plots:

Alongside our main story content, we’ve got plenty of side plots and threads that need to be explored. So, here’s a rapid list of some extra conflicts I think we’ll see in the next game.

The Grey Warden’s sudden silence at Fortress Weishaupt.

Aiding the Mortalitasi.

The Qunari Antaam’s invasion against Northern Thedas.

Uncovering Ghilinan’s Creations, Pre-Veil Monsters and Ancient Thaigs.

The Remnant Venatori Cult threat.

The mysteries concerning the Titans.

Companions:

And, now we get to the most subjective list, the roster of companions we may share this journey against Solas with.

Rogues:

I want to see Vaea, she’s my favourite character in the comics and she appeared in ‘Harold Had The Plan’. I know I speak for even the comic writers that she deserves a spotlight in the next game. The only problem is, she doesn’t kill, but heck, she could perform a support role in the group.

Next up, Scout Lace Harding. She’s been teased, but she deserves a comeback as a bigger role, and she can serve as a reminder of the Inquisition, filling the new protagonist in on previous events correlating to Solas.

And, Lucanis Dellamorte, an Antivan Crow assassin introduced in ‘The Wigmaker Job’. Although he has no interest in becoming First Talon, he’s said to be his grandmother’s favourite, and she intends on making him her heir.

Mages:

Vadis, an Altus Thief introduced in ‘Half Up Front’. She was disowned by her father because of her relationship with an elf. As of which, she’s a wayward traveller who came across a calamity scheme of Fen’Harel’s which would’ve caused an incredible feud between the Qun and Tevinter. Since stopping those responsible, and making herself known to the Dread Wolf, she’s headed to Kirkwall to meet Varric Tethras so she and her partner can strike back.

A Female Qunari. Patrick Weekes tweeted back in 2017 that this sort of character style would be a biggie because it’s someone they haven’t done before. I don’t have any character in mind because there were no significant female Qunari’s in Tevinter Nights, however, that doesn’t mean we can’t have a guess. We’ve had two previous warrior Qunari, and I think we’d all love to see an ex-sarrabas, wielding powerful Fade magic.

Philliam, a Bard! Is a scholar responsible for collecting and curating many texts in Thedas. His knowledge and penmanship would certainly be a large help, not to mention his dashing personality, he’s a Bard for Andraste’s sake!

Warriors:

Fenris, as a returning character from Dragon Age 2, I think Fenris is one of the most viable characters to return as a companion. His lyrium tattoos provide for a very unique combat style, and he’s got plenty of substance in Tevinter as he continues his blood trail of magisters. Not only that, he’s been setting slaves free and is personally involved in a red lyrium plot conducted by the Venatori remnants.

Grey Warden Ramesh is a man who has seen some true horrors in his life. Introduced in ‘The Horror of Hormak’, Ramesh has seen one of the many ancient thaigs that contain ancient elven nightmares, as he witnessed his partner sacrifice her life so he could escape. His mission stands to warn the rest of the Wardens of the remaining eleven thaigs.

“Hollix” is a Lord of Fortune introduced in “Luck in the Gardens”. They defeated a great tentacle monster lurking in the gardens of Minrathous, with the assistance of Dorian Pavus and Maevaris Tilani. Not only can they perfect the fine arts of theft, but “Hollix” makes for a great hunter and tracker.

Silly:

As for some sillier, but very much necessary companion predictions, I have a few more that I need to share:

A Nevarran Mortalitasi Skeleton, in the Grand Necropolis, the death mages have actual skeleton servants who do pretty much anything for their masters, being bound by a spell to serve for the rest of your days will do that to you. I say, if they’re already bound, why not have one too?

In the opposite direction, I’d like to see my Mabari Dog return. That is all.

How about an Executor? They’re such a mystery, if we’re not going to find out what’s behind their vyrantium robes any other way, then we may need to take a gander and see for ourselves.

And, lastly, I’d be silly not to ask for an Elven God companion.

In truth, these are just a few of my companion predications very much based on Tevinter Nights, I believe the next game will have a variety of different companions. The main takeaway from this section going forward is to expect the sort of character we haven’t already had, as Patrick Weekes stated.

Let me know your predictions down below, what you think we can predict for Dragon Age 4!

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thatiranianphantom · 5 years ago

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Riverdale, Buffy, and the Musical Episode, an analysis.

Hey all! I have spent far too long writing out my thoughts on Riverdale vs. Buffy’s musical episode, from the perspective of a theatre nerd. Thoughts are welcomed!

To those who aren’t aware, I, your humble author, am a massive musical nerd. I have ALL the musical memorabilia, Broadway and the West End are places I’ve visited many times, my favorite genre of music by far is musical theatre, and I am just a musical nerd in all senses of the word.

Which leads to a...perhaps more sharp criticism when a medium like TV attempts to dive into the world of musical theatre.

(Also, full disclosure, while I enjoy the music of Carrie, Heathers, and certainly Buffy’s musical episode, the music of Hedwig just...don’t work for me. It’s not bad music, it’s not a bad show, it’s just not my thing.)

In this short analysis, I’m going to attempt to explain why Riverdale’s musical episodes fail, and why it IS possible to successfully mount a great musical episode on TV, by way of example, Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s episode “Once More, With Feeling”.

First, a short recap of both shows’ musical episodes.

Currently, Riverdale has three musical episodes. These are all jukebox shows (performing pre-written and pre-performed songs), based on three popular musicals. They first did Carrie the Musical, then Heathers, then Hedwig and the Angry Inch. As to this point, all of them have occurred in a diegetic setting - that is, the characters were aware that the songs were being performed. Carrie and Heathers were explained as being the school musical of the year, and Hedwig was ostensibly performed to prove a point, and to support a student struggling with his own identity.

Buffy’s one musical episode was in season six, arguably one of the darkest seasons Buffy ever had. It is also a diegetic musical, but not a jukebox musical. It features original songs, written by show creator Joss Whedon. The songs are given explanations and each one is written specifically to fit a character.

To sum it very basically, Buffy’s musical episode is much, much better. It is the first episode I would recommend if you were ever in the market for a musical episode, and it takes itself very seriously, while occurring in a very unrealistic setting.

At the point Carrie occurs in Riverdale, the characters are dealing with a serial killer known as the Black Hood, who ends up murdering their friend and cast member by the end of the musical, on stage. Of the three musical episodes, you could make a pretty strong argument that the first two musicals tie themselves into the plot best. The role of Carrie’s mother is given to Alice Cooper, because she is also struggling with family issues. Purportedly, the song “Unsuspecting Hearts” is used to make up between two characters, as is “You Shine”.

Buffy’s musical episode occurs at a time where the characters are all struggling with big secrets that they don’t feel able to tell. It’s driving a wedge between all of them, and there’s a large undercurrent of tension. Buffy can’t tell her friends about the depression she’s struggling with, Willow is becoming dangerously addicted to magic, which has caused her to cast two spells, erasing a memory of a fight from her girlfriend Tara’s mind. Spike is in love with Buffy, but is very much wrestling with what that means. Giles has made plans to leave, because he feels like he is hindering Buffy’s growth. Anya and Xander are having serious doubts about their upcoming marriage. The tension created by all these boils under the surface, but nobody plans to say anything.

The catalyst for this episode occurs in the form of an unnamed demon, who is accidentally summoned and whose primary power is to make people sing and dance - until they can’t stop, and they burn up. It adds a note of risk to the episode. They are being forced into this, and the stakes are high if they don’t comply.

And so, one by one, all the characters are forced to express their deepest secrets through song, and the demon leaves them to deal with the fallout. It did what Riverdale, fundamentally, has never managed to do: the songs force the plotline foreward.

That would have been impossible without the songs. The characters are unwilling to open up to each other, and they feel unable to express themselves, until the demon literally musically forces them to do so. At the end of the episode, their biggest secret, the secret that will inform the rest of the season, is revealed: Buffy’s friends didn’t pull her out of Hell, they pulled her out of heaven, where she was at peace, and now the world around her is bright and violent and she is miserable. That revelation will literally carry us to the season finale.

Riverdale’s musical episodes are, in a way, explained as above. High schools do musicals. It happens. But all of our main cast, and all in the lead roles? Not likely. And that explanation is made even thinner in the latest musical episode, where characters burst into song at random, like Betty and Jughead’s fight in the bunker, or Kevin and the girls breaking into “Wig in a Box” during a sleepover.

The issue becomes very contrasting between the two musicals: Buffy builds their world around the songs. The songs are crucial to the plot. The episode wouldn’t work if these specific songs were not given to these specific characters.

Riverdale, however, bases the songs around the plot, and the result is a very odd episode with songs shoehorned in. They aren’t necessary, they’re just...there. Buffy crafts a plot around the songs. Tara finds the flower Willow used in a previous episode to wipe her mind of a fight, and we can see the song naturally build off that. Tara sings Under Your Spell, which is meaningful because she is quite literally under Willow’s spell. Toni is shoehorned into the Heathers musical to be a choreographer, despite there being no previous indication of any experience with choreography, because they need to get her into the room to sing Candy Store, because Heathers features this song, which means they have to.

The Riverdale musicals take none of the plot of their source materials, which strips the very songs they struggle to add in of all their context and meaning. For example, Hedwig is a show which features a domestic violence plotline as one of its main arcs. Hedwig herself is a pretty terrible person. You would never know that from watching the episode. Heathers’ entire premise talks about how it’s very easy to influence someone into cruelty to the very people who were kind to them, and how quickly a lie can spiral out of control. None of that features in the Heathers Riverdale episode. These songs are powerful because of the context that surrounds them, and that is just...gone. Hedwig’s final song (Midnight Radio) exists in universe as a song where Hedwig finds emotional catharsis and hands her stage off to someone else. It’s exceptionally meaningful, because the whole musical has been a journey to this point. None of that poignancy is able to be translated to Riverdale.

In contrast, Buffy’s final song (Where Do We Go From Here) feels very earned because it feels like the end of a journey for the characters. All their secrets are exposed, and you can feel the ramifications that will last for a long time after this. And that’s not even mentioning Buffy’s solo Something To Sing About, where she is literally begging for something to make her feel more alive. This only works if Buffy is singing it. The song is designed around her, and it is where she admits her biggest secret. The song is necessary, it is crucial. NONE of the songs in the Riverdale musical episodes have this same power.

(ALSO, RE: RIVERDALE HEATHERS, J.D. IS ONE OF HEATHERS MAIN CHARACTERS, I WAS SO EXCITED TO HAVE SWEET PEA PLAYING HIM, AND NONE OF J.D.’S SONGS WERE GIVEN TO SWEET PEA. INJUSTICE. ALSO ALSO, THIS LINE:

Reggie: Just two single straight dudes doing some theatre.

OH SWEET REGGIE. NOBODY HAS TOLD YOU ABOUT KURT AND RAM HAVE THEY DARLING?)

It should be noted that Riverdale’s songs in all three musicals are heavily reworked to fit the characters, and the TV network rating, better.

Music has meaning. The songs should be there to do something, not just have extra content to churn out and look good doing it. As stated, Riverdale’s musical episodes aren’t necessary. There are no stakes to their expression through song.

Fundamentally, Buffy understands what a musical episode is. They do only one, and that was a fight to get on the network as it was.

Think of it this way: did the songs affect the characters and plotline enough that it would still have ramifications a few episodes later?

Buffy’s certainly did.

One could theoretically say Midge’s death affected Riverdale, which did occur during the episode. One could also say that Betty and Jughead burning the trailer affected Riverdale. But those didn’t need the songs to exist. Again, they were just….there.

And then there’s the issue of vocal performance.

Look, musicals are a lot of work, and it’s hard on the voice.

Buffy’s cast does feature several singers. Notably, Anthony Stewart Head, Amber Benson and James Marsters have had separate success in music outside of Buffy.

Riverdale’s cast features a grand total of one person with professional musical experience (that would be Casey Cott, who makes that fact entirely obvious). I suppose KJ Apa counts too, so let’s say two to be generous.

But again, Buffy wins this round. Make no mistake, their songs are autotuned. Just about every piece of music you’ve heard since the 80s has had some amount of autotune applied to it. Sarah Michelle Gellar would probably be the first to admit, she is not a singer. Actually, up until she received the music, she was fully planning on being dubbed, and is openly says she is not comfortable singing. And you can tell. In the musical, she sounds fine. She’s not amazing. That’s actually the point. She sings well enough to fully communicate the emotions she’s feeling, but it feels genuine. You can believe Buffy is actually singing, not in that full voiced, broadway quality voice that so many Riverdale episodes feature, but in a normal-person singing voice, the voice we all use when we sing in the shower. Willow is not a great singer, and Alyson Hannigan is clearly not comfortable singing either. Accordingly, she’s given the fairly meta line “I think this line’s mostly filler”, and it doesn’t sound heavily autotuned. It’s a normal person voice.

In contrast, Riverdale’s voices are mostly a machine. I’d kill to listen to the raw tracks, but they are practically waterboarded with autotune. One can scarcely distinguish a real voice in there. They don’t sound like real people, they sound like professionally polished singers. And how many high schools have full choruses of broadway quality singers? It takes you out of the show. I actually would have liked Riverdale’s musical episodes far better, had they let them use their more natural voices. It would have sounded less polished, sure, but it also would have sounded more real. Lili Reinhart has a pretty voice naturally. I would have loved to see that being allowed to exist in these episodes.

(On a slightly separate note, Casey Cott is very clearly a singer. His voice is full, trained and controlled. It stands out above everyone’s in every musical episode).

In summation, musical episodes are becoming more and more common, but that doesn’t mean they’re easy to do well. However, if you understand the meaning you have to imbue music with on a medium like TV, and craft your context around the singing, it can work.

And if you’re looking for a musical episode, for god sakes, watch Once More With Feeling.

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selfwriting-sugarquills · 5 years ago

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Hey love! I absolutely love your writings and the Weasleys, so could you write a George x reader imagine where they're playing quidditch (did i spell that correctly) against Slytherin, and her playing like as a chaser and getting hit and falling and him reacting to it y'know? Sorry my english sucks :]

A/N: (ok I adore this request!!! I hope it’s good enough, these past two weeks have been really hectic and tiring, so I’m lying pretty low in terms of creativity :( but I have two weeks off for Christmas now so hopefully, I’ll have plenty of time to write all the amazing requests I’ve gotten!!)

Warnings: None (implied broken bones?)

Word count: 1.605

Fall

You were tightening the laces on Angelina’s sleeves when the twins stumbled into the changing room,

“Sorry we're late,” said Fred, dumping his bag containing quidditch gear down on the benches next to Harry,

“We ran into Filch on our way here and it turns out, he wasn’t a fan of our latest endeavours in the arts of surprise.”George’s face split into a grin as he pulled his shirt over his head and feeling suddenly flustered, you to avert your eyes. You had had a thing for George since your third year which you’d spent gawking at him and blushing deeply whenever he’d looked at you, then in your fourth year, you’d been paired up in charms, where he succeeded in a very literal sense. He’d asked you to help him practice on the quidditch pitch and you’d said yes, mostly because you wanted to spend time with him alone and you hoped that was his intention too though when Fred showed up on the pitch as well, you weren’t surprised, just a little disappointed.

Now, you were in your fifth year, your crush still going strong, not that that would help you in the biggest match of the school year, Gryffindor vs. Slytherin. The weather seemed to be on your side, being on the clear, cool side with little wind but the tension between the two teams was at an all-time high, meaning you, one of the chasers, would probably be spending most of the match trying not to be murdered.

“you know,” said Angelina, breaking your trail of thought, “there’s going to be this huge party after the match when we win,,” a smirk was playing on her lips, as she glanced towards the twins, who were sharing the tale of their latest prank with Harry and Katie,

“and when we win, which we will,” she reassured quickly, mostly to herself, “I think it’s about time you tell a certain redhead how you feel,” her smirk grew as she watched your eyes widen,

“shh!” you hushed, “he is right over there could you say it a little louder you think?!”

“I can if it will make you two finally get together,”

“Shut up!”

“Alright team,” Wood said, gesturing to your small group of people as to bring you closer, “as I’m sure you’ve noticed, there’s a lot hanging on today's’ results and Slytherin wants a victory no matter the cost, so let’s try to stay alive, and Harry,” he turned to Harry who gulped, “I assume there’s no need for me to tell you just how much I need you to catch the snitch before that Malfoy kid does,” he said with such seriousness that even you felt a surge of adrenaline.

Walking up to the entrance you were gripping your broom tightly, remaining quiet despite everyone else chatting quietly to each other, your eyes were fixated on the grass below as you listened to the cheers from the stands. An arm nudged you slightly,

“you nervous?” George’s chocolate coloured eyes watched you with amusement, though you thought you could see a hint of nerves behind the confident sparkle,

“A little,” you chuckled,

“I’m sure it’ll be fine, the Slytherins are all a bunch of gits, we’ll have the snitch before they even realise the game’s begun,” he smiled and you looked back at the grass at your feet,

“Alright team,” Wood said at the front, turning around, “‘s time.”

Normally, flying wasn’t scary to you, ever since you’d tried it for the first time you’d become somewhat enchanted by the surge in your stomach when you dipped and the dizzying satisfaction which came with learning a new manoeuvre.

A bludger zoomed past you as you dipped, the surge in your stomach feeling more nauseating than exciting. The Slytherins were indeed ruthless but so were the Gryffindor team and it hadn’t taken long before the two teams had begun to pursue a more personal feud than anything. The foul playing had begun after Katie Bell had taken a bludger to the stomach, sent by one of the Slytherin chasers, who’d somehow gotten hold of one of the beaters’ bat, causing the game to be paused for several minutes. Then, the twins had retorted by sending two bludgers after the chaser who’d sent the bludger after Katie, both hitting him, the first sending him off-course by hitting his broom, smashing it to pieces, the second hitting his stomach, much like it had hit Katie, and sending him onto the ground with a thump which caused the audience to let out a collective groan. The beater’s downfall and injury caused another break. The team was getting restless, the twins pacing back and forth, most of you sat quietly, bouncing your legs and wringing your sweaty hands as you waited for Madam Hooch to call you back onto the pitch.

When she finally did, the beaters from both teams were sending bludgers directly after each other, exchanging various swear words as they whacked the balls towards each other, completely neglecting the chasers and goalposts. You were flying in formation with Katie and Angelina, who was holding the quaffle, she sent the quaffle to Katie, who dropped it when a chaser from Slytherin collided with her, Angelina and yourself were quick, though, and without much need to communicate you dived down, where Angelina seized the quaffle easily from one of the younger Slytherins who was quick, but incredibly clumsy, passing the quaffle to you as the opposing chasers tried to surround her in order to take it from her. You headed straight from the goal, you could hear the twins cheer you on as the Slytherin beater yelled something from behind you, in a fear of being pursued, you chucked the quaffle towards the tallest ring with your eyes closed and without opening them you heard a bell go off and a roar from the stands. Sighing in relief, you opened your eyes,

“L/n scores leaving Gryffindor in the lead with 30-10” Lee’s voice could be heard ringing out over the pitch over the cheers but you stopped listening to his remarks about Slytherin, as you focused instead on a small whistling noise, which seemed to grow closer and closer, when the realisation of what it was hit you it was already too late for you to react, something fast, hard and round hit your arm with a crack as you were knocked off of your broom.

***

George had had little time to react. After you’d scored both he and Fred had been too occupied cheering for you to react when a Slytherin beater sent a bludger towards you with such speed that if George had blinked, he’d have missed you being knocked off of your broom, his heart racing as he saw the bludger collide with your side.

Only seconds later he was on the ground along with the rest of the team, running towards you as fast as his legs could possibly carry him. Madam Hooch was already crouching beside you, inspecting you, you were sitting awkwardly, holding your arm and wincing as Hooch inspected it,

“ow,” you hissed, a tear slipping down your face, George held himself back from sitting beside you and comforting you, instead, he heard himself say,

“Is she going to be okay?” to Hooch,

“Oh she’ll be just fine after a visit to the hospital wing,” Hooch said, helping you stand,

“Can you still play?” asked Wood, Hooch let out a laugh,

“With a broken arm? not a chance,” She said, “we’ll call the game off, congratulations, I believe you’ve won.” and with that, she marched off, an arm around your shoulders. George couldn’t look away as you went, his insides hurting when he heard you let out a choked sob, as McGonagall joined you and Hooch. His stare was broken by Fred hitting his arm gently,

“Let’s go get changed,” he said, George nodded but turned to look after you once more before following.

You sniffed as madam Pomfrey finished wrapping up your arm, she placed a glass of skele-gro on the small bedside table, you sighed.

“This is the worst,” you muttered as you grabbed the glass and downed it, grimacing as poured down the foul-tasting liquid, you opened your eyes when something hit the duvet resting on top of your legs. What you found were two boxes of chocolate frogs,

“Figured you might need something to help with the taste of that stuff,” George smiled, you put the glass down,

“Thank you,” you said, picking up a box, “and I’m sorry for getting hit,”

“Don’t be sorry, it’s not your fault the Slytherin team is a bunch of gits,” he said as he sat down on the bedside, “I’m just glad you’re alright, you gave me a real scare there,” he said earnestly, his lips forming a grin. Blushing, you glanced down, suddenly unable to look him in the eye, you sat there in silence for a few seconds, painfully aware of how George’s eyes were resting on your face, in an attempt to bring the silence to an end, you grabbed the other chocolate frog,

“Want one?” you asked, holding the frog out for him to take.

And so that was how you spend your afternoon, eating chocolate frogs while George told you his worst (best) jokes in order to make you laugh, someday you figured you’d gather up the courage to tell him about your crush but for the moment, you were satisfied with George sitting across from you trying to catch a chocolate frog in his mouth and failing epically, much to your entertainment.

#george weasley x reader #George Weasley #George weasley fluff #weasley twins #the twins

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tabloidtoc · 4 years ago

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National Enquirer, October 26

You can buy a copy of this issue for your very own at my eBay store: https://www.ebay.com/str/bradentonbooks

Cover Story: Death Mysteries -- Whitney Houston autopsy cover-up; Kenny Rogers’ body is missing

Page 2: Reba McEntire’s new romance with Rex Linn convinced Kelly Clarkson she needed to walk away from her unhappy marriage -- while Reba’s love life was heating up Kelly’s relationship with husband Brandon Blackstock who is Reba’s former stepson was hitting the rocks and Kelly remained very close with Reba and Reba would tell her how happy Rex had made her

Page 3: Control freak Tom Cruise is a basket case after he couldn’t charm Cher into leaving their steamy fling out of her upcoming memoir and the image-conscious actor was so panicky over Cher spilling their sexy secrets that he personally called her -- they had a strong physical attraction when they met at a White House event back in the ‘80s and eventually they hooked up and it was very hot and very intense and over in a matter of weeks but it left a nice impression on Cher so she only has good things to say about their relationship but what happened between them could prove very embarrassing if it got out and Tom doesn’t want that to happen -- unfortunately for Tom Cher wouldn’t say anything about what she intends to write and wouldn’t promise to leave Tom out and that’s made Tom even more paranoid and he’s wondering if he’s going to have to take legal action

Page 4: Kanye West is keeping a secret divorce diary to use against wife Kim Kardashian and its potential dishy dirt has her famous family quaking in their boots -- Kanye’s convinced Kim’s about the kick him to the curb and is putting together collateral to crush her and her family is the couple spirals into a $2.2 billion divorce, Jennifer Garner at 48 is flaunting her best body ever and her motivation is to compete with ex-husband Ben Affleck’s 32-year-old girlfriend Ana de Armas because Jen was tired of hearing how Ben’s fallen head over heels for Ana and wanted to remind him what he’s missing -- Jen’s always been very confident of her looks but she decided to step out of mom mode to remind everyone how hot she still is

Page 5: Devastated Lisa Marie Presley has been relying on an old pal Smashing Pumpkins rocker Billy Corgan to repair her shattered life in the wake of the suicide of her son -- Lisa Marie and Billy were spotted together at Graceland not long ago and he’s been a huge source of support for her -- though they were rumored to have had a romance in 2018 Billy’s fully committed to his baby mama fashion designer Chloe Mendel and Lisa Marie would like nothing better for them to make beautiful music again but she knows he’s taken and she needs his friendship more than ever.

Page 6: Ambitious anchor Gayle King is calling the shots at CBS This Morning after executive producer Diana Miller quit in the latest backstage shake-up; there was tension between Gayle and Diana and now Diana is gone -- it’s like the show gave Gayle the keys to the car and even if she runs it into a ditch the network gives her more power -- Gayle also clashed with former co-host Norah O’Donnell who successfully snagged the anchor chair at CBS Evening News but Norah hasn’t wowed in the ratings and it’s a matter of time before Gayle gets the coveted job

Page 7: The mystery over the fate of country great Kenny Rogers’ body has left his own family members in the dark -- sources close to the singer said he’d been cremated while others charged his body is still on ice and Kenny’s body is missing as far as most people are concerned and there’s no place fans can go and pay their respects -- it’s most likely he’s been cremated and the ashes have yet to be scattered but there have also been whispers in certain circles that he could have been cryogenically frozen to preserve his body for a later date, many of Hollywood’s biggest names are abandoning Tinseltown to escape the COVID-19 pandemic and a collapsing entertainment industry -- Julia Roberts hightailing it to San Francisco and Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson getting citizenship in Greece and Pierce Brosnan put his Malibu mansion on the market and Jim Cameron is peddling his prized L.A. compound

Page 8: Frustrated Jon Stewart’s plans to reinvent himself as the next Steven Spielberg have flopped and he’s pretty unhappy about it and he wants to be viewed as a respected serious filmmaker but he’s hit more roadblocks than he ever saw as a comedian or talk show host -- he was left fuming when Irresistible his latest outing as a director was met by mediocre reviews and limited to pay-per-view and streaming services last summer even with box office draw and best buddy Steve Carell in the cast -- he could snap his fingers and get any TV project but he’s setting his sights much higher and he’s walked away from millions of dollars to go back to TV because he wants to prove he is a creative force in the film industry

Page 9: Frustrated Brad Pitt is threatening to have ex Angelina Jolie dragged to jail if she refuses to end her harassment campaign against him and hash out a divorce and custody agreement and he’s had it with Angie’s intimidation tactics and is fed up with being labeled a bad dad and it’s no exaggeration to say Brad’s scared of Angie and he wants professional witnesses around them at all times when he attempts to see their children but for Brad though it would be the ultimate revenge to see Angie led away in handcuffs, Nashville legend Travis Tritt is trying to keep up with country music’s up-and-comers by getting a lift from plastic surgery and recent photos show the 57-year-old almost unrecognizable with a line-free face and skin as tight as a drum -- Travis is getting ready to put out his first album of new music in more than ten years and it’s hard to blame the guy when he’s completing against singers 30 years younger

Page 10: Hot Shots -- Julia Garner got a touch-up on the Staten Island set of Inventing Anna, Reverend Run visited a mural of slain Run-DMC bandmate Jam Master Jay in NYC’s Hollis Queens, Vanessa Paradis and daughter Lily-Rose Depp in Paris

Page 11: Lovestruck Chrissy Metz is already talking marriage and babies with newly unveiled beau Bradley Collins but she has a history of falling for guys fast which has previously been a recipe for heartbreak and while nobody’s doubting Bradley’s intentions there’s a lot of confusion about why they kept their romance totally hidden until now, the devastating fire that tore through Rachael Ray’s home has made her reassess her life and she and husband John Cusimano are now considering adopting a baby -- losing so many of their possessions in the fire made them realize they weren’t all that important anyway so they bulldozed the house and are rebuilding and the word is they’ll add a nursery

Page 12: Straight Shuter -- Danny Trejo cuddled a rescue pup (picture), Lizzo is the first plus-sized Black woman to ever grace the cover of Vogue but pulling off the shoot was a challenge with most designers unable to find clothes that fit her, Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel are very private and they’re livid with Lance Bass after he confirmed that they had another baby, when he was NBC’s biggest star Matt Lauer conducted almost every high-profile interview and now editors and doing a lot of cropping and zooming to preserve archived footage while removing Matt

Page 14: Crime

Page 15: Rock guitar god Eddie Van Halen who tragically died after a brave battle with cancer wanted to be buried with one of his Frankenstrat guitars that he created to define his signature sound -- Eddie felt like he owed his whole life to that instrument and he loved that thing as much as his family, Perez Hilton dished he kissed notorious skirt-chaser John Mayer in a New York nightclub and the lip-lock happened right in front of John’s then girlfriend Jessica Simpson who didn’t seem to know whether she was incredibly embarrassed or really turned on

Page 16: Cover Story -- explosive new autopsy evidence proves superstar Whitney Houston didn’t have to die -- eight years after she passed mysteries about her final moments and blatant blunders at the death scene point to murder and a shocking coverup and now investigators are demanding a new probe into the 2012 tragedy in a Los Angeles hotel bathroom and for Whitney’s body to be exhumed -- a private eye believes the autopsy proves Whitney was murdered but the case was never pursued because she was dismissed as a druggie and she was marginalized by law enforcement as a dead drug user

Page 18: American Life

Page 19: Horror movie legend John Saxon’s family started battling over his fortune even before he passed on July 25 -- in legal papers filed in May his son Antonio claimed the actor’s third wife Gloria Martel had been pocketing money against John’s wishes, Netflix faces criminal charges in Texas over the controversial film Cuties -- according to court documents a Tyler County grand jury indicted Netflix claiming it knowingly promoted visual material that depicts the lewd exhibition of the private parts of a clothed or partially clothed child younger than 18 -- Netflix said in a statement that Cuties is a social commentary about the sexualization of young children and this charge is without merit

Page 20: Suzanne Somers recently cheated death when she and husband Alan Hamel fell down a flight of stairs at their Palm Springs home and although Alan wasn’t seriously injured the terrifying spill left Suzanne in agony with two displaced vertebrae and forced her to undergo delicate neck surgery but she said the surgery went off without a hitch and promised she is on the mend, Hollywood Hookups -- Sofia Richie has unfollowed Scott Disick on Instagram, Zac Efron hopes to marry Vanessa Valladares, Sharon Stone and Mindy Kaling are both on the market

Page 21: Twelve years after she was placed under conservatorship Britney Spears remains unable to sign her own name on official documents -- Britney recently made moves asking to allow a different financial group to step in and help run her life as well as gain more freedom but lawyer Andrew Wallet said Britney to this day does not have the capacity to sign documents and make decisions for herself and she is susceptible to undue influences, the audience for the Saturday Night Live season premiere came away with more than just a few yuks they also received $150 because to get around New York State pandemic guidelines SNL gave each guest a parting gift of $150 paychecks as if they were employees, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle may soon have a new neighbor in heavy metal maniac Tommy Lee -- the drummer was recently spotted checking out a $2.3 million three-acre plot next to the rogue royals’ $14 million home in Montecito and he was obviously pumped about living there but building the tattooed rocker’s home would mean tons of truck traffic and hopefully Harry and Meghan don’t get upset with the building work he’s planning

Page 22: ABC is reeling from a barrage of allegations from employees and on-air talent who’ve blasted it as a toxic and racist working environment -- the network which is owned by the family-friendly Walt Disney Corporation was rocked when Sunny Hostin the popular co-host of The View accused company executives of institutional and personal racism in her memoir and in later interviews about the book

Page 26: Lonely country singer Kenny Chesney is looking to find a new ladylove and is talking about finally settling down for good -- he is unhappily single after his eight-year relationship with model Mary Nolan hit the rocks -- he spends all the time he’s not on the road at his island paradise in Antigua but he misses having a partner and he’s even asked pals Matthew McConaughey and Richard Branson to play matchmaker

Page 28: America is preparing for World War III as China amps up war games in the South Pacific and readies plans to invade U.S. allies -- military insiders warn China and Russia and their tyrannical accomplices in Iran and North Korea and Syria and Turkey are bracing to launch a coordinated attack against America and the west that could end in nuclear disaster

Page 36: Health Watch

Page 38: Rolling Stones guitarist Ron Wood has traded in his debauched days of sex drugs and rock ‘n’ roll for knitting, Rod Stewart revealed there’s a deep freeze between him and former close pal Elton John and that Elton refused his attempts to that things out -- the two ‘70s icons had been friends for decades before Rod blasted Elton’s biopic and his most recent music tour -- when Rod realized he was in the doghouse he tried to bait Elton with a bone for his kids by inviting Elton’s boys Zachary and Elijah to come play soccer with his sons Alistair and Aiden only to be greeted with the sounds of silence

Page 42: Red Carpet -- The Christian Siriano collection

Page 45: Spot the Differences -- Sophie Okonedo in Ratched

Page 47: Odd List

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popculturebuffet · 4 years ago

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Reviewcaps: Star Vs: Club Snubbed

Dance week kicks off! I finally advance in the tomtrospective as Star makes the critical mistake of listening to ponyhead and causes a dad fight that threatens to spill into an international incident unless she and Tom can get along. Tom dosen’t know how to be nice under the cut.

And we’re back! As I put in my latest amphibia review a combination of a busy few weeks and other things to cover has kept me from doing more reviews, and as such I left this on the backburner. But I decided that just ain’t right so this week, i’m not only bringing back the tomtrospective, but i’m doing a whole bundle of dance themed episodes because as i’ve made clear in the past, and making clear for you I love em. I never went to my own school dances and the one dance I went to for Demolay was fun enough, so that mixed with the shipping, hilariaty and usual good quality brought to these affairs made me want to do a theme week after Owl House last week, but ennui made me reconsider. So now i’m re-reconsidering. Lucky you! With that we can move on. Unlike the last few tom reviews, this one.. takes place after about 80 pounds of plot have happened, so it’s time for a fuck ton of exposition to refresh your memories: PREVIOUSLY ON STAR VS:

OH GOD WHY OKAY i GET IT THE GAG’S OVER... MOVING ON TO THE ACTUAL EXPOSITION. YEESH But yeah since we could largely sidestep the main story since tom came in literally before it in season 1 and it was irrelvant to him in season 2, I have a lot to cover. Over the last two seasons, Toffee, a septarian warrior who assinated moon’s mom despite her almost brokering peace between monsters and mewman when Moon was just a teenager, plotted and schemed to destroy all magic, having star nuke the wand to spilit it in half, manupliating ludo from the inside of his half and then using his new existance as pure magic to slowly destroy it from the inside while using ludo as a puppet when necessary. Meanwhile , Star started to catch feelings for Marco just as Marco was getting somewhere with his crush Jackie Lynn Thomas, who star was being his wing man with unaware of her own feelings. This came to a head when a dance, yes another one, happened where Jackie asked Marco out on their first proper date, Star was jealous but couldn’t figure out why and this distracted her enough to let Ludo sneak in with his army of rats and then take the book. Stars parents, in a suprising move for her mom more than her dad, accepted what happened and trusted her, though Moon started covertly working to get the book back under the nose of her allies in the magical high comission. Meanwhile Toffee revealed himself, while Star finally did realize her feelings for marco and proceded to supress them. This all came to a head in the last two episodes of season 2: First Star had her song day, which meant having a song wirtten about her which was honest.. a bit too honest as it revealed her parents hiding the book, leading to the people being upset with our king and queen and the commission understadanbly being pissed Moon didn’t tell them sooner. Oh and the song also, without star’s consent, revealed she’s intrested in marco... right in front of Marco. And this part is actually really important to today’s episode but we’ll get to that. Star continued to deny having feelings for Marco instead of working through them as the school year ended, while Moon and the comisson lead a raid on the monster castle, which will also be important later, TOffe was headquartered in. Things quickly went pear shaped, with Toffee easily murdering most of the comission, including moon by sucking out their life force to increase his own power, since their all made of magic, and only lekmet, the comisson’s wise sorta leader and team healer, surivived, using the last of his own life force to save moon before ending up as a pile of dust and a horn with Moon quickly escaping with the rest of her allies.. and Toffee omniously saying he was coming for Star and his finger. Moon naturally panicked and told star they were leaving, possibly forever, for her own saftey, and Star confessed how she felt to Marco.. in front of Jackie> Which is never dealt with even when Jackie comes back.

Also this confession isn’t dealt with until near the tail fucking end of season 3. God dammit star vs , just god damn. Anyways Moon tried to both hide star and ressurect her commrades, while a miserable Marco headed back to mewnit o find her only to get captured with river when Ludo, under toffe’s advisment, took hte castle.. and not under his advisment destroyed the book and it’s keeper and local asshat glossaryck. Star eventually said “Fuck that” to “Hide and hope he never finds us” moon learned some lessons about racial tolerance she promptly unlearned next season, and Star dove into her wand with Ludo’s help, as Ludo had started to catch on to the frequent blackouts. Turns out that was toffe’s plan as he apparently kills star, and finished off magic and now restored, just casually walks off after easily taking out star’s allies.. including a greiving moon and marco. Also marco punches a whole in his chest.

But STar manages to restore magic, unlock her butterfly form and reduce Toffee to a puddle of goo which Ludo finished off.. which also means moon’s attempt to dicker Eclipsa out of freedom just got undone. Yayyyy! I mean oh no.. no no I mean yay. She’s the best part of season 3. So ALLL of that was to get to the status quo at this point: Marco goes home after a few weeks where again, the confession thing? Never brought up, while Star vows to stay to be a better princess. And yeah this does bring up one of Season 3′s biggest issues as despite Marco having dimensional scissors, the show constnatly acts like he can’t you know visit or vice versa. They just use the other dimension thing as a lazy excuse to write the earth side cast out even though....

I went with a Picard one because why not. I get it being HARD for either ot make time for the other.. but make that a PLOT POINT instead of saying “oh you have to pick one”. Because it makes no fucking sense. Especially since star can still CALL THEM, so there’s no sense in them being absent from each other’s lives. Just schedule. Jesus. And it only gets WORSE from there. Yeah see Season 3 is where the quality starts to get... 50/50. And unlike Amphibia where the last few weeks before marcy have been more one mediocre episode and one great episode the qulaity here is more “some great episodes, some utter abominations of episodes that destroy character or any semblance of plot” and some just okay ones too. Thankfully the first few from the season we have to cover for Tom, for the boy, are really good.. but we’ll get into the shit soon enough.. and somebody’s gotta shovel it. And so it might as well be me. But for now instead of shoveling horse crap we’re shoveling giant piles of sugar so pitter patter, let’s get at er, this is club snubbed. It’s 2017, a winter’s ball and the butterfly family.. is actually not doing great, as most of the other kingdoms seem to view them as week for the whole rat invasion thing.. or at least the spider bites do. Yup this is where we meet the king, queen and daughter penelope. Aka two assholes who are dumb and I hate them and their precious daughter who I hope overthrows them. To thorw back to my loud house reviews, I hate them more than rusty. And look at him. LOOK AT HIM.

The one in the center. Look at him. LOOK AT HIM. Okay my irational hatred of the little prick, which isn’t entirely irrational aside the spider bites are rude, condescending, and really need to be overthrown so Penelope can take their throne. I just hate htem.. but unlike Rusty they don’t show up as much and that’s literally all I can say nice about htem. Penelope seems nice and I wish she got more screentime and she has an intresting romance we’ll get into in a few episodes, but they are just.. their the kind of people you don’t want to be trapped in a room with alone for a prolonged amount of time. The kind of married couple other married couples, I conjecture i’m single and very lonely mind, are awkwardly roped into spending time with and then have to get drunk to ignore them sniping at each other or that ends in a who’s afraid of virginia wolfe situation. Thankfully their barely in this episode I just felt like getting my hate out at them since i’m probably not covering surviving the spider-bites for a while. Anyways while they snipe at River who fires back “They were really big rats’ and I mean.. who does that.. who comes to someone elses house and tells htem they suck under their breath.. I mean rich assholes obviously, I answered my own question there but at least do it at your own house or on the carraige ride home sheesh. Your lucky river didn’t elbow drop both of you. It’s what you deserved. Okay enough bitching about this stuff, the asshole kingdom, and penelope, along with all the other kingdoms of mewni are here for the silver bell ball, an annual tradition to reinvgorate the ties between kingdoms. It’s also how star and tom met, and that’s the topic of discussion with Star and her best friend, Pony Head... of the pony heads. Why yes a major chacter on this show is a talking horses head who acts like a mean teenage girl. And why no I have no idea where her species food goes or how she digests it, I frankly don’t want to know. Some things are better left unknown. Anywho yeah this is my first review with ponyhead in it and she’s a divisive character to say the least. Some hate her , some love her, some REALLY hate her.. me.. I find her 50/50. Sometimes she can be really funny and entertaining and a good counterpoint to star, other time she’s obnoxious and a waste of hte wonderful Jenny Slate’s talents. This time she’s more obnoxious as this entire plot is partly her fault, btu we’ll get to that. We do get her and star scoping out the other royals, though Star’s unintresteds since she knows all of them, and Pony is only intersted because Larry kelpbotom got hot.. just like archie. And he’s got abs, just like archie. Two sentences I never would’ve said for years and years but that’s what Riverdale does to you. Back on topic the two talk Tom’s transparent absence and them having met and ponyhead having predicted drama. the two then horse around a bit before moon dickishly shushes them. Star only goes along with it because she’s trying to be a better princess, hence her staying on mewni at all now the danger’s passed, but yeah... even with moon’s backstory this moment just.. isn’t every plesant. Because while her backstory explains al ot, it dosen’t forgive how she treats star at times, as all star was doing here was being a normal teenage girl and not kicking her door down or anything. Star greets the other princes and princesses, including penelope, all of who I wish had more screentime. “Sigh” It’s then we get TOM. Horay!. And his family! Double horay, Queen Wrathmelor Lucitor and King Dave Lucitor. And yes I love how , just like the prince of the underworld is named Tom, the king, even if by marraige presumibly, is named dave. King Dave. I love it. Dave is a normal sized guy while his wife is giant.. and I can conjecture how they had tom but this isn’t hte place for that. The point is their perfectly lovely people, and I like that they zigged from where they were likelky orignally going with tom having abusive parents. INstead as far as I can figure they merley spoiled him and that combined with growing up in the unusual enviroment of the underworld and their own unresolved anger issues meaning they never thought to teach him how to deal with them properly. More on this later. Anyways tom is here and in shades, because his parents are good people and River warmly greets the lucitors. IT’s time for the ball to get underway.

Glad you asked. Basically each prince or princess asks each other prine or princess to dance, until everyone's dance with everyone. Simple. However suprisingly for him, Tom picks princess Jags to dance first. It’s then Pony ruins everything because she’s Ponyhead, and i’ts her special life skill. She tells Star tom’s “Club Snubbing” her... basically showing intrest in other girls to specifically act like he isn’t intrested.. which to be fair....

DOES sound like something Tom would do.. and what Pony’s doing to Larry because she’s a terrible person. It isn’t what he’s doing, we’ll get to the why at the right time, but it’s not unfair of star to suspect that.

So Star decides to get even, pettily, by dancing with rich and talking him up and each keeps picking the other royals.. which worries dave and river because of course it does. And yeah star is being petty here... but I get it and sympahtise with it. Tom’s pulled some really manipulative shit the last few times he’s been around and she’s likely sick of it. She probably even got second hand sick of hearing what he did to marco.

So she’s probably just fed up with his bullshit.. and she still DOES think he’s cute, as was made clear by his first proper apperance, she’s just tired of him being a jackass about perusing her when she’s no longer intrested. Which is fair. Tom is trying to be better.. but i’ts understandable why Star thinks he’s just still doing the same old shit just on a diffrent day. So it comes down to both of htem with Moon hoping star dances with tom.. and naturally, still pissy she dances with Manfried , the butterflies butler, who’se delighted.. a bit too happy.. someone call the police. Anyways Dave and River start to argue over whose club snubbing who.. as I said Tom has his dad, and his moms but again future episodes, anger. Dave is more controlled because he’s had more life experince but it’s clear enough stress can cause him to snap, as we see here.. he just dosen’t have his son’s demonic powers thank god.. he is clearly built under those robes though.. or at least you know skinny but a bit muscular. I mean otherwise Wrath would be a widow after tom’s conception.

But tom just.. walks out sadly instead of reacting which further pisses star off and she follows. But this time as i’ve been making clear.. Tom has genuinely changed. He’s NOT doing some creepy scheme to manipulate her into taking him back, he learned from last time.. and from song day. See I told you it was important. He figured she was with Marco now, and isn’t mad as he puts it.. he saw it as a wake up call. She’s not into him and probably won’t be.. granted I thought he’d already learned that lesson, but i’ll let it pass. The point is he decided to give her space by not asking her and would’ve if she asked him. He was genuinely trying to be nice and respectful to her. And here’s where I can finally stop shit talking tom for the most part which thank god. I love the guy, I wouldn’t be retrospectiving him if I didn’t love this character and see him as my own surrogate fictoinal son. But I had to be honest and who Tom is at first, isn’t a good person.. but this episode and others give more weight as to the why, as well as show him genuinely TRYING. He wants to be better he just dosen’t know how... as is highlighed with star not wanting to be ignored, and Tom flipping out in a demonic rage “I DON’T KNOW HOW TO BE NICE, AT LEAST GIVE ME CREDIT FOR TRYING”. Which is what I put a pen in earlier with his parents; His parents are genuinely nice good people.. but the underworld is a diffrent, dangerous place with diffrent standards. So they likely didn’t realize their son had a troubling anger problem because of that, because a lot of the underworld is wild and vicious, until he started harassing star and doing something that raised a real red flag passed normal underworld standards. The two then quack quack bicker bicker in the sky, with an extra sized extra angry cloudy. CLOUDY YAY.. until a chair passes throught he window. Our heroes run in to see the dad fight as esccalated to a wrestling match, and is about to esclate to an international incident. Star, seeing this can’t possibly end well, finally asks tom to dance which he agrees to not wanting to see a large bearded man beat up his dad. Probably how Domink Mysterio felt a few weeks ago honestly. And his entire life. And then we get the dance.. and it’s fucking gorgeous. It’s slow and methodical, with the two at first doing this reluctnatly.. but as it goes on their walls break and the two genuinely have fun and it turns from two exes stiffly doing a dance to keep their dads from killing each other,... to somethin genuinely romantic and visually gorgeous as butterflies and flames errupt from their repsective feet before carrying them into the air and creating a beautiful tornado together. Disney really knows how to do a good dance sequence... maybe not gay representation until last week, and even then they had to be dragged into it more on that another time, but .. damn if they can’t animate pretty. It’s a genuinely beautiful sequence and easily tops the one from Blood Moon Ball.. not an easy feat mind as I say this with no bisas. I may not LIKE starco, at least not without some heavy continuity revisions.. but that dance was objectively good and so’s this one. The two land, moon rings the fucking bell to end things because again sh’es kind of a dick, and Wrathmelor causes earthquakes with her claps and reign of lava mom tearfs. Aww what a sweetheart.

So Tom asks star for a corn shake, which she accepts, aww and Ponyhead is carried out by an entorauge. Eugh. The two laugh adorably together at her shenanigans, for some reason, to close out the episode. Final Thoughts: Excellent even better than I remembered.. though it still has one or two problems, like what tom’s really doing being kinda obvious based on his body laungauge and middle part being mildly repeititive. But it’s all overridden by great character work, goregous animation and some neat world building as we meet the rest of mewni , most for the first time. I do genuinely wished they’d done more with them. And honestly.. tom and star are more adorable than I remembered. I think a combinaton of star’s later actions and the fact i wanted my starco dammit and figured tom wouldn’t last, I was mostly wrong as it took almost two full seasons for them to break up and we’ll get to that, so I had no real investment. I was annoyed he was seemingly just being throwni n the way as an obstacle to the main ship hwen they clearly changed their minds and he became more.. and then exactly that later because I can’t have nice things. We’ll get to that. But yeah a solid, enchanting episode and a good start to dance week. If you have a star vs episode you want me to review, just hit me up in akss or subits or comission it directly using those same options, or any other cartoon for that matter and follow me for more reviews as I cover Amphibia every week and will return to regular ducktales coverage at the end of september. Tom will return shortly. Until then stay safe, wear a mask, and later days.

#star vs the forces of evil #tomstar #Club Snubbed #tom lucitor #star butterfly #moon butterfly #river butterfly #penelope spiderbite #larry kelpbottom #dave lucitor #wrathmelor lucitor #reviews #animation

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vivxwrites · 5 years ago

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Hooked

*not my gif*

Word Count: 2273

Summary: Reader is Tony’s brother and the two find a way for Natasha to have a baby of her own.

Warnings: None but I will put a disclaimer: In no way do I want to offend anyone with this piece. I love Natasha and her character just the way she is, I’m not trying to insinuate that she needs to be fixed in any way.

Pairing: Natasha Romanoff x Male Stark!Reader

A/N: This was requested by @ecruzsalaz sorry for the wait! I’m too tired to edit but I hope you enjoy regardless :)

Natalie Rushman, you decided, was a gift from the heavens above. Her red hair and green eyes had you star struck and as soon as she had stepped into the ring and pinned Happy beneath her, she had your heart. She was mysterious and aloof and played oh so hard to get but you were determined to win her over, your reputation as genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist be damned. Tony liked to say that a girl like Natalie would neuter you and end your man whorish ways forever, you found that you were surprisingly alright with that. Still, she rejected each of your advances, only to give you flirty vibes the next day. She played a dangerous game but by God, you were hooked.

If someone had told you that Natalie Rushman from legal was actually Natasha Romanoff, former KGB assassin turned SHIELD agent you probably would’ve laughed in their face. But alas, after the Stark Expo where Hammer tried to murder you and your brother, she was revealed to be just that. Turns out that SHIELD sent her to decide whether your brother would be a good candidate for the Avengers Initiative, whatever the hell that was. You were a little butt hurt that you weren’t considered as you did help your brother build each of his suits, but then again you weren’t the one flying around in the thing anyway. Whatever. Natalie, er Natasha, didn’t deem your brother worthy enough and so you figured you would never see her again.

Turns out you were wrong. Flash forward two years and your brother is being called in to be a part of the initiative and help take down an alien threat. You weren’t needed but that didn’t mean you kept yourself from stealing glances at Natasha from a distance. She was as beautiful and alluring as ever, her true identity clearly amplifying both factors. You daydreamed about her kicking some alien ass from the safety of the Stark Tower safe room, tucked away like some sort of damsel amidst the danger.

A month later and renovation for the newly minted Avengers Tower had finished; Tony invited the team to stay at the tower and molded it into the team headquarters. It stood tall like a beacon of hope among New York’s skyscrapers and quickly became a symbol of peace and prosperity for the people. You worked full time in a lab, conducting various experiments and solving some of life’s mysteries; biology was more your speed. Now you found yourself working along with Dr. Banner, he was just as brilliant as all his prestigious awards made him to be and on top of that he was a dream to work with. The two of you flew through projects, holed up in the lap together for days on end, only being interrupted by emergencies and the need to pass out from exhaustion and dehydration. Tony would join the pair of you sometimes, his engineering brain always gave a fresh point of view and the three of you tackled all the bigger issues together as your own little science team.

While working with Bruce was a huge plus of having the Avengers in the tower, the biggest one for you was probably having Natasha around. She spent most of her time training in the gym but you always made sure to secure the seat next to her during all of Steve’s mandatory team dinners and movie nights. You weren’t discreet in your attempts to flirt with her, most of the team teased you about whether or not you would get the hint. Nevertheless you persisted and flirted with her and you would swear to the grave that she had blushed at least one time. It was after one of your many attempts that she had finally accepted your offer for a date and you couldn’t be happier.

You slid smoothly onto the couch next to her and flashed her your most charming grin, to which she simply rolled her eyes. “Hey Nat, how’s it going?”

She ignored you and wrapped a blanket around herself. God, there was nothing cuter than an assassin in sweats swaddled in a blanket. The rest of the team funneled into the room and you avoided looking at Tony, knowing there would be a massive smirk on his face at your current predicament with Natasha. Forty five minutes into the movie you caught sight of some UPS guys in the background and you turned towards Nat with a mischievous smirk on your face. “Hey Natasha, if I worked for UPS would you let me handle your package?”

Everyone hollered with laughter while Steve just looked confused and Bruce wore a quiet smile. Natasha sighed audibly and facepalmed, much to your delight. “(Y/N), if I agree to go on a date with you will you finally leave me alone?”

You grinned happily at her and nodded. She smiled tightly, “Fine then. It’s a date.” Tony cheered and clapped and you sat back with a cheesy grin on your face.

Natasha was pleasantly surprised on the date, you hadn’t wined and dined her like she had expected you to. Instead you took her around New York and showed her your favorite spots to get away and provided her with a homemade picnic lunch, which the two of you ate against a sturdy oak tree in the shade. You surprised Natasha, your usual cocky and showy attitude replaced by a more down to Earth one, a guy who was both sweet and funny and the perfect gentleman. You were ecstatic to find out that Natasha had enjoyed the date and you were happy to at least have gotten one from her, not expecting a second one and fully prepared to treat Nat as a friend from this point forward, yet that was not the case. As it turns out, Natasha had more than enjoyed the date and she wanted to go on a second one and who were you to decline her offer? The second date turned into a third date, which turned into a fourth, which then three years later turned into an engagement party that Tony had thrown to celebrate his brother and best friend’s relationship.

Natasha was one hundred percent the love of your life and there was no one else you could see by your side. She shared stories from her past with you and you were always there to listen gently and never to judge. One night she looked at you with tear-filled eyes, distancing herself from you in bed. “I am a monster,” she stated and you looked at her with concern written on your face.

“Natasha, you’re not a monster.” You were confused as to why she would say that and you could only assume that another piece of her past was about to be revealed to you.

Her eyes grew cold and distant, like they often did when she spoke of her past. Natasha did her best to disconnect herself from her past doings but there was something about this particular story that seemed to bother her more than usual. You could only wait, listen, and prepare yourself to do whatever it took to pick the pieces up afterwards and put her back together.

“In the red room, where I was trained, um where I was raised-” her voice broke and you could hear it crackling with emotion, “There was a graduation ceremony, I was sterilized. It made things easier… for them at least. It was never easy for me but it’s all I ever knew.”

“Natasha.” You cupped her cheek and turned her head to face you, “Natasha you are not a monster, ok?”

She avoided eye contact and you steadied both of your hands on her cheeks. “You are not a monster.” She closed her eyes and rested her forehead against yours. When her eyes opened again you saw the tears that had collected in them. “Say it with me ok?” She nodded and the two of you said it together.

She swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat, “Thank you (Y/N).”

“You don’t have to thank me babe, it’s the truth.” You smiled softly at her and she tried to return it, but you could tell something was still bothering her. “Can I ask what made you want to tell me?”

She exhaled heavily and looked at you with hesitation in her eyes. “Nat baby, you can tell me anything.”

She clenched and unclenched her jaw and murmured quietly, “I wanna have kids with you.”

You blinked slowly, letting her statement sink in. “You do?” She nodded. You grabbed her hand and squeezed it reassuringly, “We’ll find a way, Nat. We’ll find a way.”

And find a way you did, or, you hope you did. Throughout the last few months you had holed up in your lab, working your ass off to see if there was any scientific work around for the sterilization that the red room performed on Natasha. Of course the two of you could adopt but there was something special about having a child biologically. You wanted Natasha to be able to experience carrying a child, that is if she chose to, you would never force her to do anything.

“Tony I think I solved it.”

Tony glanced at you over the rim of his glasses and when he saw the hopeful look on your face he knew that you were serious, that you had finally solved the project that you had been working on for months now. “F.R.I.D.A.Y, pull up the formulas to (Y/N)’s latest project.”

The A.I’s voice chimed in response, “Right away, Mr. Stark.”

Your research was projecting all around the room and you watched as Tony stood up to look through your findings. He muttered to himself as he ran through facts himself and once he deemed them good enough he turned to face you, an impressed look on his face. “You really did it. You think Romanoff’s willing to give it a shot?”

You threw your head back in relief. “I don’t really mind either way, I just wanted her to have the option to do so.”

Tony approached you and ruffled your hair, showing off his position as the eldest, though only two years your senior. “I’m proud of you (Y/N).”

You grinned at him, “Thank Tones, it means a lot.”

He grinned back, “Now run along and tell the missus the good news.”

You rolled your eyes at him but excitedly jumped into the elevator and pressed the button for the gym, knowing Natasha she was more than likely out training. Your eyes came upon her, kicking the absolute shit out of Clint in a boxing ring and you were reminded of the day you first met. “Oh Miss. Rushman,” you called out teasingly.

You could tell that she had rolled her eyes, the action practically audible, “I’m a bit busy at the moment Stark.”

“I’ll let you finish up then. I have something to share with you in private.” You waggled your eyebrows suggestively and made faces at Clint as he dodged your fiance’s punches.

“Gross Stark,” he hollered from the ring as Nat pinned him down.

“Get your mind out of the gutter Barton!”

He threw a retort back at you but you didn’t get to hear it because you were getting dragged out of the gym and back into the elevator.

Nat arched an eyebrow at you, “Well are you gonna spill?”

You felt nerves creep through your body, unsure if she would even want to hear about your research, “Uh, not yet.”

Her eyebrow crept closer to her hairline as she looked at you curiously, “Ok then.”

You nervously pulled out your Stark pad when the two of you were safely seated on your couch together. “Ok, do you remember the talk we had a few months ago?”

She nodded slowly, unsure of where you were going with the conversation. “I figured it out.”

She gave you a confused look, “You figured what out?”

“I, um, figured out a way for you to biologically have kids. Surprise?” Natasha’s face was impassive and she remained silent. You took it to be a bad sign and panicked. “Of course you don’t have to have kids, we can adopt. Adopting is fine, I just wanted you to have the option and-”

Your heart raced faster when you saw the first tear trail down her cheek, “Nat no, don’t cry! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you upset. I’ll get rid of all the research if you want, you don’t have to do this.”

You reached out and wiped the tears from her eyes, “(Y/N), stop rambling, I’m not mad at all. In fact, I’m just surprised. You really did all this research for me?”

“Of course I did. You mean so much to me Tasha.” She smiled at you through her tears.

“Will it actually work?”

You bit your lip and nodded, “Of course it will, at least I think so. God, I hope I didn’t screw anything up.”

Natasha smiled softly at you, “I’d be willing to try.”

You grinned at her and she listened intently as you rambled on, explaining all your research to her in your complicated, sciency words. A smile was engraved on her face as you talked her through what you were passionate about and she couldn’t help but think about how much she loved you. If love was for children then Natasha supposed she would just have to be a child.

A/N: Another req bites the dust, I still have a good amount to get through, don’t worry I haven’t forgotten! I’ll be writing my carolnat series next so be sure to look out for that. Much love from Viv <3

Permanent Tag List: @aesthetiff @autumnjackson4 @captainwonderwidow @5aftermidnight @gigglygwil @fansanctuaryy @lesbian-x-blackwidow @taramitch96

P.S Let me know if you want to be added :)

#natasha romanoff x reader #natasha romanoff imagine #natasha romanoff x male!reader #black widow x reader #black widow imagine

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newstfionline · 4 years ago

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Headlines

Dueling versions of reality define 1st week of fall campaign (AP) On the campaign trail with President Donald Trump, the pandemic is largely over, the economy is roaring back, and murderous mobs are infiltrating America’s suburbs. With Democrat Joe Biden, the pandemic is raging, the economy isn’t lifting the working class, and systemic racism threatens Black lives across America. The first week of the fall sprint to Election Day crystallized dizzyingly different versions of reality as the Republican incumbent and his Democratic challenger trekked from Washington and Delaware to Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and back, each man on an urgent mission to sell his particular message to anxious voters. All the conflicting messages carry at least a sliver of truth, some much more than others, as the candidates fight to navigate one of the most turbulent election seasons in modern history.

Love or hate them, pandemic learning pods are here to stay (Washington Post) Some love them. Some hate them. But nobody working in education today can escape pandemic learning pods: the increasingly popular phenomenon in which families band together and hire a private tutor to offer in-person learning to a small group of children. Teachers throughout the nation are sketching out schedules and pondering whether they can squeeze in pod tutoring after virtual school. They are weighing health risks, deciding on ground rules—should all pod students wear masks?—and asking parents how much they will pay. (A lot, it turns out.) Sometimes, they are quitting their jobs to lead pods instead. That is what Kendra Newton is doing: The 24-year-old first-grade teacher resigned from her job with Orange County Public Schools in Florida after learning she would have to teach in-person this fall. She is moving across the country to Oregon, where she will lead a pod of eight students—for a higher salary than she earned in Florida. “It gave me a way to feel safe working,” Newton said. “I will have guaranteed money coming in and a stable idea of what my life will be like because there won’t be a school district changing its mind every two seconds. For my mental health, it’s just a better option.”

Americans see skepticism of news media as healthy, say public trust in the institution can improve (Pew Research Center) Many Americans remain skeptical toward the news media, questioning not only the quality of journalists’ work but the intentions behind it. For instance, no more than half of U.S. adults have confidence in journalists to act in the best interests of the public, and Americans are more likely than not to say that news organizations do not care about the people they report on. Yet three-quarters also are open to the possibility that Americans’ trust in the media could improve.

With office life dormant, white-collar Washington is adrift (Washington Post) Greg Crist is a D.C. lobbyist who used to wear suits, and go to lunch, and spend his days taking meetings on the Hill, or in his nicely appointed office at 701 Pennsylvania Ave. Now that his office is closed because of the pandemic, Crist is a man who commutes a few hundred feet from his Alexandria, Va., home to his silver Audi, where he spends much of the day taking calls in the only place where the important people on the other end of the line cannot hear his toddler son scream. Much of white-collar Washington has accepted the reality that it may be a long time before it returns to the office, or the office-adjacent customs of the city’s glad-handing classes: the power lunches, the networking receptions, the comped sports tickets and day trips to New York on the Acela. “Initially I thought, ‘Well, I’ll be back at work by Easter,’ ” says Crist, the chief advocacy officer and head of external affairs at AdvaMed, a medical technology trade association. Easter turned into June, which turned into Labor Day, which turned into a big question mark. The politicos and super-connecters are achy, stuck at home, stranded on the other side of the work-life divide. The lobbyists are without their lobbies. The conference denizens haven’t donned a lanyard in months. That infamous D.C. conversation-starter, “What do you do?,” has a new answer: I sit at home, stare at my screen, fend off my kids, try to keep it together. You?

Mexico states run out of death certificates (AP) The coronavirus pandemic has hit Mexico so hard that the governments of several states ran out of death certificates. Officials said Friday the federal forms started running out about 15 to 20 days ago in at least three states—Baja California, the State of Mexico and Mexico City. Authorities say a million new forms have been printed and are being distributed. The certificates are printed with special characteristics because falsification has been a problem in the past. Mexico has suffered the fourth-highest level of COVID-19 deaths in the world.

Washington firm ran fake Facebook accounts in Venezuela, Bolivia and Mexico, report finds (Washington Post) When Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido declared himself the nation’s legitimate president in January 2019, an Instagram account, @FrenteLibreVzla, posted a video declaring him a “new leader” who would bring freedom to the embattled nation, according to a research report published Friday. Those watching the video had no way of knowing the account was based not in Venezuela’s capital, Caracas, but downtown Washington, managed by a strategic communications firm with clients across Latin America. The firm, CLS Strategies, this week became the latest communications company to be chastised by Facebook for using fake accounts—including on Instagram, a Facebook subsidiary—to secretly manipulate politics in another country, in violation of Facebook’s prohibition on foreign interference. Facebook announced Tuesday it had closed 55 accounts, 42 pages and 36 Instagram accounts linked to CLS Strategies that targeted politics in Venezuela, Bolivia and Mexico. The effort spent $3.6 million in advertising across all three countries, a sum that Facebook executives said was notable for its size and reflective of what happens when actors with deep pockets mount a disinformation operation. The pages had amassed more than 500,000 followers. The operation by the public relations company is an example, the report says, of how Americans sow disinformation in foreign countries.

Coronavirus Crisis Shatters India’s Big Dreams (NYT) The hit that India’s dreams have taken from the coronavirus pandemic can be found in the hushed streets of Surat’s industrial zone. You can see it in textile mills that took generations to build but are now sputtering, eking out about a tenth of the fabric they used to make. You can see it in the lean faces of the families who used to sew the finishing touches on saris but, with so little business, are now cutting back on vegetables and milk. Not so long ago, India’s future looked entirely different. It boasted a sizzling economy that was lifting millions out of poverty, building modern megacities and amassing serious geopolitical firepower. It aimed to give its people a middle-class lifestyle, update its woefully vintage military and become a regional political and economic superpower that could someday rival China, Asia’s biggest success story. But the economic devastation in Surat and across the country is imperiling many of India’s aspirations. The Indian economy has shrunk faster than any other major nation’s. As many as 200 million people could slip back into poverty, according to some estimates. Many of its normally vibrant streets are empty, with people too frightened of the outbreak to venture far.

India and China agree to ease tension on border (Reuters) India and China said on Saturday they had agreed to work towards reducing tensions along their contested border, following a meeting of the defense ministers of the nuclear-armed Asian giants. Both sides deployed additional forces along the frontier running through the western Himalayas after a clash in June, during which 20 Indian soldiers were killed in hand-to-hand fighting. China has not released casualty figures for its troops. In the highest level face-to-face political contact between India and China since tensions first flared along the border in May, defense ministers Rajnath Singh of India and General Wei Fenghe of China met late on Friday on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation meeting in Moscow. Both countries agreed that “neither side should take any further action that could either complicate the situation or escalate matters in the border areas,” India’s defense ministry said in a statement.

Super Typhoon Haishen aims for calamitous strike on Japan, S. Korea (Washington Post) Super Typhoon Haishen is roiling the unusually warm waters of the Western Pacific Ocean. The storm rapidly intensified on Thursday Eastern time, vaulting from Category 2 to super typhoon status with sustained winds of 150 mph or greater in about 24 hours. Super Typhoon Haishen is poised to strike the same areas as Typhoon Maysak, which hit South Korea early Thursday local time, to become the second typhoon to make landfall there and in southwestern Japan in just one week. The back-to-back typhoon strikes may worsen the damage, since infrastructure has been weakened by strong winds, heavy rains and storm-surge flooding, only to be hit again.

Ultra-Orthodox Jews clash with secular Israeli officials over coronavirus measures (Washington Post) Israel’s rapidly escalating coronavirus crisis is aggravating a religious divide in the Jewish state, with ultra-Orthodox leaders accusing mostly secular health officials of discrimination and fostering anti-Semitism by focusing on outbreaks in highly observant communities. As the government struggles to contain the outbreak, ultra-Orthodox Jewish rabbis, cabinet ministers and parliament members have resisted attempts to curtail activities in ultra-Orthodox areas, including many that have emerged as covid-19 hot spots. Facing particular ire has been Ronni Gamzu, the pugnacious former hospital administrator appointed last month as the government’s “corona czar.” Gamzu has clashed with religious leaders over his efforts to impose targeted lockdowns on neighborhoods with high infection rates, block a yearly pilgrimage to the grave of a revered Hasidic rabbi in Ukraine and compel virus testing for thousands of foreign students who have recently arrived to attend religious schools, or yeshivas. Gamzu said last week that 80 percent of the most recent coronavirus cases occurred in ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods. The government expects to enact targeted restrictions Monday in 10 hot spot communities, many of them ultra-Orthodox. The tensions have riven Israel’s coronavirus cabinet, the government body that sets policy. On Friday, one day after Israel recorded 3,141 new cases—the largest single day per capita increase in any country since the pandemic began—cabinet discussions grew heated over proposed lockdowns during the Jewish holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur later this month.

Sudan declares state of emergency over deadly floods (AP) Sudanese authorities declared their country a natural disaster area and imposed a three-month state of emergency across the country after rising floodwaters and heavy rainfall killed around 100 people and inundated over 100,000 houses since late July. Flooding caused by seasonal heavy rainfall, mostly in neighboring Ethiopia, led the Nile River to rise about 17.5 meters late in August, the highest level it has reached in about a century according to the Sudanese Irrigation Ministry.

#headlines #news

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grigori77 · 5 years ago

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2019 in Movies - My Top 30 Fave Movies (Part 1)

30. GLASS – back in 2000, I went from liking the work of The Sixth Sense’s writer-director M. Night Shyamalan to becoming a genuine FAN thanks to his sneakily revisionist deconstruction of superhero tropes, Unbreakable. It’s STILL my favourite film of his to date, and one of my Top Ten superhero movies EVER, not just a fascinating examination of the mechanics of the genre but also a very satisfying screen origin story – needless to say I’m one of MANY fans who’ve spent nearly two decades holding out hope for a sequel. Flash forward to 2016 and Shyamalan’s long-overdue return-to-form sleeper hit, Split, which not only finally put his career back on course but also dropped a particularly killer end twist by actually being that very sequel. Needless to say 2019 was the year we FINALLY got our PROPER reward for all our patience – Glass is the TRUE continuation of the Unbreakable universe and the closer of a long-intended trilogy. Turns out, though, that it’s also his most CONTROVERSIAL film for YEARS, dividing audiences and critics alike with its unapologetically polarizing plot and execution – I guess that, after a decade of MCU and a powerhouse trilogy of Batman movies from Chris Nolan, we were expecting an epic, explosive action-fest to close things out, but that means we forgot exactly what it is about Shyamalan we got to love so much, namely his unerring ability to subvert and deconstruct whatever genre he’s playing around in. And he really doesn’t DO spectacle, does he? That said, this film is still a surprisingly BIG, sprawling piece of work, even if it the action is, for the most part, MUCH more internalised than most superhero movies. Not wanting to drop any major spoilers on the few who still haven’t seen it, I won’t give away any major plot points, suffice to say that ALL the major players from both Unbreakable and Split have returned – former security guard David Dunn (Bruce Willis) has spent the past nineteen years exploring his super-strength and near-invulnerability while keeping Philadelphia marginally safer as hooded vigilante the Overseer, and the latest target of his crime-fighting crusade is Kevin Wendell Crumb (James McAvoy), the vessel of 24 split personalities collectively known as the Horde, who’s continuing his cannibalistic serial-murder spree through the streets. Both are being hunted by the police, as well as Dr. Ellie Staple (series newcomer Sarah Paulson), a clinical psychiatrist specialising in treating individuals who suffer the delusional belief that they’re superheroes, her project also encompassing David’s former mentor-turned-nemesis Elijah Price (Samuel L. Jackson), the eponymous Mr. Glass, whose life-long suffering from a crippling bone disease that makes his body dangerously fragile has done nothing to blunt the genius-level intellect that’s made him a ruthlessly accomplished criminal mastermind. How these remarkable individuals are brought together makes for fascinating viewing, and while it may be a good deal slower and talkier than some might have preferred, this is still VERY MUCH the Shyamalan we first came to admire – fiendishly inventive, slow-burn suspenseful and absolutely DRIPPING with cool earworm dialogue, his characteristically mischievous sense of humour still present and correct, and he’s retained that unswerving ability to wrong-foot us at every turn, right up to one of his most surprising twist endings to date. The cast are, as ever, on fire, the returning hands all superb while those new to the universe easily measure up to the quality of talent on display – Willis and Jackson are, as you’d expect, PERFECT throughout, brilliantly building on the incredibly solid groundwork laid in Unbreakable, while it’s a huge pleasure to see Anya Taylor-Joy, Spencer Treat Clark (a fine actor we don’t see NEARLY enough of, in my opinion) and Charlayne Woodard get MUCH bigger, more prominent roles this time out, while Paulson delivers an understated but frequently mesmerising turn as the ultimate unshakable sceptic. As with Split, however, the film is comprehensively stolen by McAvoy, whose truly chameleonic performance actually manages to eclipse its predecessor in its levels of sheer genius. Altogether this is another sure-footed step in the right direction for a director who’s finally regained his singular auteur prowess – say what you will about that ending, but it certainly is a game-changer, as boldly revisionist as anything that’s preceded it and therefore, in my opinion, exactly how it SHOULD have gone. If nothing else, this is a film that should be applauded for its BALLS …

29. THE PEANUT BUTTER FALCON – quite possibly the year’s most adorable indie, this dramatic feature debut from documentarian writer-directors Tyler Nilson and Michael Schwartz largely snuck in under the radar on release, but has gone on to garner some well-deserved critical appreciation and sleeper hit success. The lion’s share of the film’s success must surely go to the inspired casting, particularly in the central trio who drive the action – Nilson and Schwartz devised the film with Zack Gotsagen, an exceptionally talented young actor with Down’s Syndrome, specifically in mind for the role of Zak, a wrestling obsessive languishing in a North Carolina retirement home who dreams of escaping his stifling confines and going to the training camp of his hero, the Saltwater Redneck (Thomas Haden Church), where he can learn to become a pro wrestler; after slipping free, Zak enlists the initially wary help of down-at-heel criminal fisherman Tyler (Shia LaBaouf) in reaching his intended destination, while the pair are pursued by Zak’s primary caregiver, Eleanor (Dakota Johnson). Needless to say the unlikely pair bond on the road, and when Eleanor is reluctantly forced to tag along with them, a surrogate family is formed … yeah, the plot is so predictable you can see every twist signposted from miles back, but that familiarity is never a problem because these characters are so lovingly written and beautifully played that you’ve fallen for them within five minutes of meeting them, so you’re effortlessly swept along for the ride. The three leads are pure gold – this is the most laid back and cuddly Shia’s been for years, but his lackadaisical charm is pleasingly tempered with affecting pathos driven by a tragic loss in Tyler’s recent past, while Johnson is sensible, sweet and likeably grounded, even when Eleanor’s at her most exasperated, but Gotsagen is the real surprise, delivering an endearingly unpredictable, livewire performance that blazes with true, honest purity and total defiance in the face of any potential difficulties society may try to throw at Zak – while there’s excellent support from Church in a charmingly awkward late-film turn that goes a long way to reminding us just what an acting treasure he is, as well as John Hawkes and rapper Yelawolf as a pair of lowlife crab-fishermen hunting for Tyler, intending to wreak (not entirely undeserved) revenge on him for an ill-judged professional slight. Enjoying a gentle sense of humour and absolutely CRAMMED with heartfelt emotional heft, this really was one of the most downright LOVEABLE films of 2019.

28. PET SEMATARY – first off, let me say that I never saw the 1989 feature adaptation of Stephen King’s story, so I have no comparative frame of reference there – I WILL say, however, that the original novel is, in my opinion, one of the strongest offerings from America’s undisputed master of literary horror, so any attempt made to bring it to the big screen had better be a good one. Thankfully, this version more than delivers in that capacity, proving to be one of the more impressive of his cinematic outings in recent years (not quite up to the standard of The Mist or It Chapter 1, perhaps, but certainly on a par with the criminally overlooked 1408), as well as one of the year’s top horror offerings. This may be the feature debut of directing double-act Kevin Kölsch and Dennis Widmyer, but they both display a wealth of natural talent here, wrangling bone-chilling scares and a pervading atmosphere of oppressive dread to deliver a top-notch screen fright-fest that works its way under your skin and stays put for days after. Jason Clarke is a classic King everyman hero as Boston doctor Louis Creed, displaced to the small Maine town of Ludlow as he trades the ER for a quiet clinic practice so he can spent more time with his family – Amy Seimetz (Upstream Color, Stranger Things), excellent throughout as his haunted, emotionally fragile wife Rachel, toddler son Gage (twins Hugo and Lucas Lavole), and daughter Ellie (newcomer Jeté Laurence, BY FAR the film’s biggest revelation, delivering to the highest degree even when her role becomes particularly intense). Their new home seems idyllic, the only blots being the main road at the end of their drive which experiences heavy traffic from speeding trucks, and the children’s pet cemetery in the woods at the back of their garden, which has become something of a local landmark. But there’s something far darker in the deeper places beyond, an ancient place of terrible power Louis is introduced to by their well-meaning but ultimately fallible elderly neighbour Jud (one of the best performances I’ve ever seen from screen legend John Lithgow) when his daughter’s beloved cat Church is run over. The cat genuinely comes back, but he’s irrevocably changed, the once gentle and lovable furball now transformed into a menacingly mangy little psychopath, and his resurrection sets off a chain of horrific events destined to devour the entire family … this is supernatural horror at its most inherently unnerving, mercilessly twisting the screws throughout its slow-burn build to the inevitable third act bloodbath and reaching a bleak, soul-crushing climax that comes close to rivalling the still unparalleled sucker-punch of The Mist – the adaptation skews significantly from King’s original at the mid-point, but even purists will be hard-pressed to deny that this is still VERY MUCH in keeping with the spirit of the book right up to its harrowing closing shot. The King of Horror has been well served once again – fans can rest assured that his dark imagination continues to inspire some truly great cinematic scares …

27. THE REPORT – the CIA’s notorious use of torture to acquire information from detainees in Guantanamo Bay and various other sites around the world in the wake of September 11, 2001, has been a particularly spiky political subject for years now, one which has gained particular traction with cinema-goers over the years thanks to films like Rendition and, of course, controversial Oscar-troubler Zero Dark Thirty. It’s also a particular bugbear of screenwriter Scott Z. Burns (The Bourne Ultimatum, Contagion, Side Effects) – his parents are both psychologists, and he found it particularly offensive that a profession he knows was created to help people could have been turned into such a damaging weapon against the human psyche, inexorably leading him to taking up this passion project, championed by its producer, and Burns’ long-time friend and collaborator, Steven Soderbergh. It tells the true story of Senate staffer Daniel Jones’ five-year battle to bring his damning 6,300-page study of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation program, commissioned by the Senate Intelligence Committee, into the light of day in the face of increasingly intense and frequently underhanded resistance from the Agency and various high-ranking officials within the US Government whose careers could be harmed should their own collusion be revealed. In lesser hands this could have been a clunky, unappetisingly dense excuse for a slow-burn political thriller that drowned in its own exposition, but Burns handles the admittedly heavyweight material with deft skill and makes each increasingly alarming revelation breathlessly compelling while he ratchets up the tension by showing just what a seemingly impossible task Jones and his small but driven team faced. The film would have been nought, however, without a strong cast, and this one has a killer – taking a break from maintaining his muscle-mass for Star Wars, Adam Driver provides a suitably robust narrative focus as Jones, an initially understated workman who slowly transforms into an incensed moral crusader as he grows increasingly filled with righteous indignation by the vile subject matter he’s repeatedly faced with, and he’s provided with sterling support from the likes of Annette Bening, delivering her best performance in years as Senator Dianne Feinstein, Jones’ staunchest supporter, the ever-wonderful Ted Levine as oily CIA director John O. Brennan, Tim Blake Nelson as a physician contracted by the CIA to assist with interrogations who became genuinely disgusted by the horrors he witnessed, and Matthew Rhys as an unnamed New York Times reporter Jones considers leaking the report to when it looks like it might never be released. This is powerful stuff, and while it may only mark Burns’ second directorial feature (after his obscure debut Pu-239), he handles the gig like a seasoned pro, milking the material for every drop of dramatic tension while keeping the narrative as honest, forthright and straightforward as possible, and the end result makes for sobering, distressing and thoroughly engrossing viewing. Definitely one of the most important films not only of 2019, but of the decade itself, and one that NEEDS to be seen.

26. DARK PHOENIX – wow, this really has been a year for mistreated sequels, hasn’t it? There’s a seriously stinky cloud of controversy surrounding what is now, in light of recent developments between Disney and Twentieth Century Fox, the last true Singer-era X-Men movie, a film which saw two mooted release dates (first November 2018 then the following February, before finally limping onto screens with very little fanfare in June 2019, almost as if Fox wanted to bury it. Certainly rumours of its compromise were rife, particularly regarding supposed rushed reshoots because of clashing similarities with Marvel’s major tent-pole release Captain Marvel (and given the all-conquering nature of the MCU there was no way they were having that, was there?), so like many I was expecting a clunky mess, maybe even a true stinker to rival X-Men Origins: Wolverine. In truth, while it’s not perfect, the end result is nothing like the turd we all feared – the final film is, in fact, largely a success, worthy of favourable comparison with its stronger predecessors. It certainly makes much needed amends for the disappointing mismanagement of the source comics’ legendary Dark Phoenix saga in 2006’s decidedly compromised original X-Men trilogy capper The Last Stand, this time treating the story with the due reverence and respect it deserves as well as serving as a suitably powerful send-off for more than one beloved key character. Following the “rebooted” path of the post-Days of Future Past timeline, it’s now 1992, and after the world-changing events of Apocalypse the X-Men have become a respected superhero team with legions of fans and their own personal line to the White House, while mutants at large have mostly become accepted by the regular humans around them. Then a hastily planned mission into space takes a turn for the worst and Jean Grey (Game of Thrones’ Sophie Turner) winds up absorbing an immensely powerful, thoroughly inexplicable cosmic force that makes her powers go haywire while also knocking loose repressed childhood traumas Professor Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) would rather had stayed buried, sending her on a dangerous spiral out of control which leads to a destructive confrontation and the inadvertent death of a teammate. Needless to say, the situation soon becomes desperate as Jean goes on the run and the world starts to turn against them all once again … all in all, then, it’s business as usual for the cast and crew of one of Fox’s flagship franchises, and it SHOULD have gone off without a hitch. When Bryan Singer opted not to return this time around (instead setting his sights on Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody), key series writer Simon Kinberg stepped into the breach for his directorial debut, and it turns out he’s got a real talent for it, giving us just the kind of robust, pacy, thrilling action-packed epic his compatriot would have delivered, filled with the same thumping great set-pieces (the final act’s stirring, protracted train battle is the unequivocal highlight here), well-observed character beats and emotional resonance we’ve come to expect from the series as a whole (then again, he does know these movies back to frond having at least co-written his fair share). The cast, similarly, are all on top form – McAvoy and Michael Fassbender (as fan favourite Erik Lehnsherr, aka Magneto) know their roles so well now they can do this stuff in their sleep, but we still get to see them explore interesting new facets of their characters (particularly McAvoy, who gets to reveal an intriguing dark side to the Professor we’ve only ever seen hinted at before now), while Turner finally gets to really breathe in a role which felt a little stiff and underexplored in her series debut in Apocalypse (she EASILY forges the requisite connective tissue to Famke Janssen’s more mature and assured take in the earlier films); conversely Tye Sheridan (Cyclops), Alexandra Shipp (Storm), Kodi Smit-McPhee (Nightcrawler) and Evan Peters (Quicksilver) get somewhat short shrift but nonetheless do A LOT with what little they have, and at least Jennifer Lawrence and Nicholas Hoult still get to do plenty of dramatic heavy lifting as the last of Xavier’s original class, Raven (Mystique) and Hank McCoy (Beast); the only real weak link in the cast is the villain, Vuk, a shape-shifting alien whose quest to seize the power Jean’s appropriated is murkily defined at best, but at least Jessica Chastain manages to invest her with enough icy menace to keep things from getting boring. All in all, then, this is very much a case of business as usual, Kinberg and co keeping the action thundering along at a suitably cracking pace throughout (powered by a typically epic score from Hans Zimmer), and the film only really comes off the rails in its final moments, when that aforementioned train finally comes off its tracks and the reported reshoots must surely kick in – as a result this is, to me, most reminiscent of previous X-flick The Wolverine, which was a rousing success for the majority of its runtime, only coming apart in its finale thanks to that bloody ridiculous robot samurai. The climax is, therefore, a disappointment, too clunky and sudden and overly neat in its denouement (we really could have done with a proper examination of the larger social impact of these events), but it’s little enough that it doesn’t spoil what came before … which just makes the film’s mismanagement and resulting failure, as well as its subsequent treatment from critics and fans alike, all the more frustrating. This film deserved much better, but ultimately looks set to be disowned and glossed over by most of the fanbase as the property as a whole goes through the inevitable overhaul now that Disney/Marvel owns Fox and plans to bring the X-Men and their fellow mutants into the MCU fold. I feel genuinely sorry for the one remaining X-film, The New Mutants, which is surely destined for spectacular failure after its similarly shoddy round of reschedules finally comes to an end this summer …

25. IT CHAPTER 2 – back in 2017, Mama director Andy Muschietti delivered the first half of his ambitious two-film adaptation of one of Stephen King’s most popular and personal novels, which had long been considered un-filmable (the 90s miniseries had a stab, but while it deserves its cult favourite status it certainly fell short in several places) until Muschietti and screenwriters Cary Joji Fukunaga and Gary Dauberman seemingly did the impossible, and the end result was the top horror hit of the year. Ultimately, then, it was gonna be a tough act to follow, and there was MAJOR conjecture whether they could repeat that success with this second half. Would lightning strike twice? Well, the simple answer is … mostly. 2017’s Chapter 1 was a stone-cold masterpiece, and one of the strongest elements in its favour was the extremely game young cast of newcomers and relative unknown child actors who brought the already much beloved Loser’s Club to perfectly-cast life, a seven-strong gang of gawky pre-teen underdogs you couldn’t help loving, which made it oh-so-easy to root for them as they faced off against that nightmarish shape-shifting child-eating monster, Pennywise the Dancing Clown. It was primal, it was terrifying, and it was BURSTING with childhood nostalgia that thoroughly resonated with an audience hungry for more 80s-set coming-of-age genre fare after the runaway success of Stranger Things. Bringing the story into the present day with the Losers now returning to their childhood home of Derry, Maine as forty-something adults, Chapter 2 was NEVER going to achieve the same pulse-quickening electric charge the first film pulled off, was it? Thankfully, with the same director and (mostly) the same writing crew on hand (Fukunaga jumped ship but Dauberman was there to finish up with the help of Jason Fuchs and an uncredited Jeffrey Jurgensen) there’s still plenty of that old magic left over, so while it’s not quite the same second time round, this still feels very much like the same adventure, just older, wiser and a bit more cynical. Here’s a more relevant reality check, mind – those who didn’t approve of the first film’s major changes from the book are going to be even more incensed by this, but the differences here are at least organic and in keeping with the groundwork laid in Chapter 1, and indeed this film in particular is a VERY different beast from the source material, but these differences are actually kind of a strength here, Muschietti and co. delivering something that works MUCH better cinematically than a more faithful take would have. Anyway, the Loser’s Club are back, all grown up and (for the most part) wildly successful living FAR AWAY from Derry with dream careers and seemingly perfect lives. Only Mike Hanlon has remained behind to hold vigil over the town and its monstrous secret, and when a new spree of disappearances and grisly murders begins he calls his old friends back home to fulfil the pact they all swore to uphold years ago – stop Pennywise once and for all. The new cast are just as excellent as their youthful counterparts – Jessica Chastain and James McAvoy are, of course, the big leads here as grown up Beverley Marsh and Bill Denbrough, bringing every watt of star power they can muster, but the others hold more interest, with Bill Hader perfectly cast (both director and child actor’s personal first choice) as smart-mouth Richie Tozier, Isaiah Mustafah (best known as the Old Spice guy from those hilarious commercials) playing VERY MUCH against type as Mike, Jay Ryan (successful on the small screen in Top of the Lake and Beauty & the Beast, but very much getting his cinematic big break here) as a slimmed-down and seriously buffed-out Ben Hanscom, James Ransone (Sinister) as neurotic hypochondriac Eddie Kaspbrak, and Andy Bean (Power, the recent Swamp Thing series) as ever-rational Stan Uris – but we still get to hang out with the original kids too in new flashbacks that (understandably) make for some of the film’s best scenes, while Bill Skarsgard is as terrifying as ever as he brings new ferocity, insidious creepiness and even a touch of curious back-story to Pennywise. I am happy to report this new one IS just as scary as its predecessor, a skin-crawling, spine-tingling, pants-wetting cold sweat of a horror-fest that works its way in throughout its substantial running time and, as before, sticks with you LONG after the credits have rolled, but it’s also got the same amount of heart, emotional heft and pathos, nostalgic charm (albeit more grown-up and sullied) and playful, sometimes decidedly mischievous geeky humour, so that as soon as you’re settled in it really does feel like you’ve come home. It’s also fiendishly inventive, the final act in particular skewing in some VERY surprising new directions that there’s NO WAY you’ll see coming, and the climax also, interestingly, redresses one particularly frustrating imbalance that always bugged me about the book, making for an especially moving, heartbreaking denouement. Interestingly, there’s a running joke in the film that pokes fun at a perceived view from some quarters that Stephen King’s endings often disappoint – there’s no such fault with THIS particular adaptation. For me, this was altogether JUST the concluding half I was hoping for, so while it’s not as good as the first, it should leave you satisfied all the same.

24. MOTHERLESS BROOKLYN – it’s taken Edward Norton twenty years to get his passion project adaptation of Jonathan Lethem’s novel to the big screen, but the final film was certainly worth the wait, a cool-as-ice noir thriller in which its writer-director also, of course, stars as one of the most unusual ‘tecs around. Lionel Essrog suffers from Tourette syndrome, prone to uncontrollable ticks and vocal outbursts as well as obsessive-compulsive spirals that can really ruin his day, but he’s also got a genius-level intellect and a photographic memory, which means he’s the perfect fit for the detective agency of accomplished, highly successful New York gumshoe Frank Minna (Bruce Willis). But when their latest case goes horribly wrong and Frank dies in a back-alley gunfight, the remaining members of the agency are left to pick up the pieces and try to find out what went wrong, Lionel battling his own personal, mental and physical demons as he tries to unravel an increasingly labyrinthine tangle of lies, deceit, corporate corruption and criminal enterprise that reaches to the highest levels of the city’s government. Those familiar with the original novel will know that it’s set in roughly the present day, but Norton felt many aspects of the story lent themselves much better to the early 1950s, and it really was a good choice – Lionel is a man very much out his time, a very odd fit in an age of stuffy morals and repression, while the themes of racial upheaval, rampant urban renewal and massive, unchecked corporate greed feel very much of the period. Besides, there’s few things as seductive than a good noir thriller, and Norton has crafted a real GEM right here. The pace can be a little glacial at times, but this simply gives the unfolding plot and extremely rich collection of characters plenty of room to grow, while the jazzy score (from up-and-comer Daniel Pemberton, composer on Steve Jobs, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse) provides a surprising complimentary accompaniment to the rather free-form narrative style and Lionel’s own scattershot, bebop style. Norton is exceptional in the lead, landing his best role in years with an exquisitely un-self-conscious ease that makes for thoroughly compelling viewing (surely more than one nod will be due come awards-season), but he doesn’t hog ALL the limelight, letting his uniformly stellar supporting cast shine bright as well – Willis doesn’t get a huge amount of screen time, but delivers a typically strong, nuanced performance that makes his absence throughout the rest of the film keenly felt, Gugu Mbatha-Raw continues to build an impressive run of work as Laura, the seemingly unimportant woman Lionel befriends, who could actually be the key to the whole case, Alec Baldwin is coolly menacing as power-hungry property magnate and heavyweight city official Moses Randolph, the film’s nominal big-bad, Willem Dafoe is absolutely electrifying as his down-at-heel, insignificant genius brother Lou, and Boardwalk Empire’s Michael K. Williams is quietly outstanding as mysterious jazz musician Trumpet Man, while Bobby Canavale, Ethan Suplee and Dallas Roberts are all excellent as the other hands in Minna’s detective agency. It’s a chilled-out affair, happy to hang back and let its slow-burn plot simmer while Lionel tries to navigate his job and life in general while battling his many personal difficulties, but due to the incredible calibre of the talent on offer, the incredibly rich dialogue and obligatory hardboiled gumshoe voiceover, compelling story and frequently achingly beautiful visuals, this is about as compulsively rewarding as cinema gets. Norton’s crafted a film noir worthy of comparison with the likes of L.A. Confidential and Chinatown, proving that he’s a triple-threat cinematic talent to be reckoned with.

23. PROSPECT – I love a good cinematic underdog, there’s always some dynamite indies and sleepers that just about slip through the cracks that I end up championing every year, and one of 2019’s favourites was a minor sensation at 2018’s South By Southwest film festival, a singularly original ultra-low-budget sci-fi adventure that made a genuine virtue of its miniscule budget. Riffing on classic eco-minded space flicks like Silent Running, it introduces a father-and-daughter prospecting team who land a potentially DEEPLY lucrative contract mining for an incredibly rare element on a toxic jungle moon – widower Damon (Transparent’s Jay Duplass), who’s downtrodden and world-weary but still a dreamer, and teenager Cee (relative newcomer Sophie Thatcher), an introverted bookworm with hidden reserves of ingenuity and fortitude. The job starts well, Damon setting his sights on a rumoured “queen’s layer” that could make them rich beyond their wildest dreams, but when they meet smooth-talking scavenger Ezra (Narcos’ Pedro Pascal), things take a turn for the worse – Damon is killed and Cee is forced to team up with Ezra to have any hope for survival on this hostile, unforgiving moon. Thatcher is an understated joy throughout, her seemingly detached manner belying hidden depths of intense feeling, while Pascal, far from playing a straight villain, turns Ezra into something of a tragic, charismatic antihero we eventually start to sympathise with, and the complex relationship that develops between them is a powerful, mercurial thing, the constantly shifting dynamic providing a powerful driving force for the film. Debuting writer-directors Zeek Earl and Chris Caldwell have crafted a wonderfully introspective, multi-layered tone poem of aching beauty, using subtle visual effects and a steamy, glow-heavy colour palette to make the lush forest environs into something nonetheless eerie and inhospitable, while the various weird and colourful denizens of this deadly little world prove that Ezra may be the LEAST of the dangers Cee faces in her quest for escape. Inventive, intriguing and a veritable feast for the eyes and intellect, this is top-notch indie sci-fi and a sign of great things to come from its creators, thoroughly deserving of major cult recognition in the future.

22. DRAGGED ACROSS CONCRETE – S. Craig Zahler is a writer-director who’s become a major fixture on my ones-to-watch list in recent years, instantly winning me over with his dynamite debut feature Bone Tomahawk before cementing that status with awesome follow-up Brawl On Cell Block 99. His latest is another undeniable hit that starts deceptively simply before snowballing into a sprawling urban crime epic as it follows its main protagonists – disgraced Bulwark City cops Brett Ridgeman (Mel Gibson) and Tony Lurasetti (BOCB99’s Vince Vaughn), on unpaid suspension after their latest bust leads to a PR nightmare – on a descent into a hellish criminal underworld as they set out to “seek compensation” for their situation by ripping off the score from a bank robbery spearheaded by ruthlessly efficient professional thief Lorentz Vogelmann (Thomas Kretschmann). In lesser hands, this two-hour-forty-minute feature might have felt like a painfully padded effort that would have passed far better chopped down to a breezy 90-minutes, but Zahler is such a compellingly rich and resourceful writer that every scene is essential viewing, overflowing with exquisitely drawn characters spouting endlessly quotable, gold-plated dialogue, and the constantly shifting narrative focus brings such consistent freshness that the increasingly complex plot remains rewarding right to the end. The two leads are both typically excellent – Vaughn gets to let loose with a far more showy, garrulous turn here than his more reserved character in his first collaboration with Zahler, while this is EASILY the best performance I’ve seen Gibson deliver in YEARS, the grizzled veteran clearly having a fine old time getting his teeth into a particularly meaty role that very much plays to his strengths – and they’re brilliantly bolstered by an excellent supporting cast – Get Rich Or Die Tryin’s Tory Kittles easily matches them in his equally weighty scenes as Henry Johns, a newly-released ex-con also out to improve his family’s situation with a major score, while Kretschmann is at his most chilling as the brutal killer who executes his plans with cold-blooded precision, and there are wonderful scene-stealing offerings from Jennifer Carpenter, Udo Kier, Don Johnson (three more Zahler regulars, each featured with Vaughn on BOCB99), Michael Jai White, Laurie Holden and newcomer Miles Truitt. This is a proper meaty film, dark, intense, gritty and unflinching in its portrayal of honest, unglamorous violence and its messy aftermath, but fans of grown-up filmmaking will find PLENTY to enjoy here, Zahler crafting a crime epic comparable to the heady best of Scorsese and Tarantino. Another sure-fire winner from one of the best new filmmakers around.

21. FAST COLOR – intriguingly, the most INTERESTING superhero movie of the year was NOT a major franchise property, or even a comic book adapted to the screen at all, but a wholly original indie which snuck in very much under the radar on its release but is surely destined for cult greatness in the future, not least due to some much-deserved critical acclaim. Set in an unspecified future where it hasn’t rained for years, a homeless vagabond named Ruth (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) is making her aimless way across a desolate American Midwest, tormented by violent seizures which cause strange localised earthquakes, and hunted by Bill (Argo’s Christopher Denham), a rogue scientist who wants to capture her so he can study her abilities. Ultimately she’s left with no other recourse than to run home, sheltering with her mother Bo (Middle of Nowhere and Orange is the New Black’s Lorraine Toussaint), and her young daughter Lila (The Passage’s Saniyya Sidney), both of whom also have weird and wondrous powers of their own. As the estranged family reconnect, Ruth finally learns to control her powers as she’s forced to confront her own troubled past, but as Bill closes in it looks like their idyll might be short-lived … this might only be the second feature of writer-director Julie Hart (who cut her teeth penning well-regarded indie western The Keeping Room before making her own debut helming South By Southwest Film Festival hit Miss Stevens), but it’s a blinding statement of intent for the future, a deceptively understated thing of beauty that eschews classic superhero cinema conventions of big spectacle and rousing action in favour of a quiet, introspective character-driven story where the unveiling and exploration of Ruth and her kin’s abilities are secondary to the examination of how their familial dynamics work (or often DON’T), while Hart and cinematographer Michael Fimognari (probably best known for his frequent work for Mike Flanagan) bring a ruined but bleakly beautiful future to life through inventively understated production design and sweeping, dramatic vistas largely devoid of visual effects. Subtlety is the watchword, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t fireworks here, it’s just that they’re generally performance-based – awards-darling Mbatha-Raw (Belle) gives a raw, heartfelt performance, painting Ruth in vivid shades of grey, while Toussaint is restrained but powerfully memorable and Sidney builds on her already memorable work to deliver what might be her best turn to date, and there are strong supporting turns from Denham (who makes his nominal villain surprisingly sympathetic) and Hollywood great David Strathairn as gentle small town sheriff Ellis. Leisurely paced and understated it may be, but this is still an incendiary piece of work, sure to become a breakout sleeper hit for a filmmaking talent from whom I expect GREAT THINGS in the future, and since the story’s been picked up for expansion into a TV series with Hart in charge that looks like a no-brainer. And it most assuredly IS a bona fide superhero movie, despite appearances to the contrary …

#glass #glass movie #the peanut butter falcon #pet sematary #the report #dark phoenix #it chapter 2 #motherless brooklyn #prospect #prospect movie #dragged across concrete #fast color #2019 in movies

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