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sforzesco · 3 years ago

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BRUTUS, CASSIUS, HOMOEROTICISM [sort of. at least 50%] AND ROMANTIC LANGUAGE [debatable] in several [hopefully coherent] parts, by T. M. Basil after drinking several cups of coffee in a row

some amount of time ago @r-osehips gave me an opening to talk about this, and at long last, I’ve finally assembled my thoughts on the topic in a way that hopefully makes sense. [~3,000 words]

I'll preface this with saying that I have no skill for translation, but all of this is typed out, so feel free to it through a translator.

Also, I’m going to say that if you enjoy the Brutus-Cassius dynamic, I’m imploring you to read @copperbadge‘s The City War, it’s the best $2.99 you will ever spend

We'll start off with the most obvious historical example I have before diving into more interpretive discussion and later reception:

Dio 47.20 writes that: Then, despairing of the republic and at the same time fearing him, [Cassius and Brutus] departed. The Athenians gave them a splendid reception; for, though they were honored by nearly everybody else for what they had done, the inhabitants of this city voted them bronze images by the side of those of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, thus intimating that Brutus and Cassius had emulated their example.

Harmodius and Aristogeiton were celebrated as "the Liberators," and "the Tyrannicides," and they were also lovers.

The History of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides: Indeed, the daring action of Aristogiton and Harmodius was undertaken in consequence of a love affair, which I shall relate at some length, to show that the Athenians are not more accurate than the rest of the world in their accounts of their own tyrants and of the facts of their own history. Pisistratus dying at an advanced age in possession of the tyranny, was succeeded by his eldest son, Hippias, and not Hipparchus, as is vulgarly believed. Harmodius was then in the flower of youthful beauty, and Aristogiton, a citizen in the middle rank of life, was his lover and possessed him. Solicited without success by Hipparchus, son of Pisistratus, Harmodius told Aristogiton, and the enraged lover, afraid that the powerful Hipparchus might take Harmodius by force, immediately formed a design, such as his condition in life permitted, for overthrowing the tyranny.

Sticking to history, Florus' account [Flor. Epit. 2.17.7.14] of the death of Brutus and Cassius has been translated like this [and this will briefly get into later commentary on them]: Brutus, having lost his second self by the death of Cassius, in order that he might not fail in carrying out every detail of their compact (for it had been agreed that neither of them should survive the battle), presented his side to one of his companions that he might plunge his sword into it.

The latin: Brutus cum in Cassio etiam suum animum perdidisset, ne quid ex constituti fide resignaret, (ita enim non superesse bello convenerat) ipse quoque uni comitum suorum confodiendum praebuit latus.

And then, much later, in what's actually a commentary on Dante's Inferno 34.67, Florus is recalled once more, but with an extremely interesting alteration [Benvenuto da Imola (1375-80), Inferno 34.64-67]: Brutus autem, cum perdidisset animum ex morte Cassii, fugiens, omni spe perdita, precibus obtinuit ut a Stratone socio suo interficeretur

[On the subject of the Inferno, there's something about pairs in hell, and Brutus and Cassius are (wait for it) a pair in hell!]

The way that Brutus and Cassius' are tied together in death is of an interesting note, simply because they died within the same month, but some accounts have them dying within days of each other, or even within the same moment

Orosius: Reduced to desperation, Brutus and Cassius both resolved to commit suicide before the battle came to an end. Cassius offered his head to the executioners whom they had summoned, while Brutus offered his side.

and there's something about the overlapping of their deaths in direct contradiction of the actual timeline that echoes back to warrior pairs dying together. You know. Nisus and Euryalus, and not to quote Fagles, but 'how fortunate, both at once!'

To take a short detour, if you enjoy wounds, death, angst potential, and parallels, there is an account where Brutus and Cassius kill each other in the aftermath of Philippi, and Nicodemus of Damascus writes that the hand wound Plutarch writes of in his Brutus biography was actually inflicted by Cassius [accidentally]: A moment before Cassius had struck him obliquely across the face. Decimus Brutus struck him through the thigh. Cassius Longinus was eager to give another stroke, but he missed and struck Marcus Brutus on the hand.

Which ties into my next topic! Cassius and Brutus as two halves of a thematic whole! Brutus and Cassius repeatedly get compared to complimentary roles, namely: the politician [Brutus] and the warrior [Cassius]. [If you're willing to engage with a little creative exploration, consider a comparative to courtly romance dynamics, knights and the one's they're sworn to, dedication to ideals, etc etc]

To steal a quote from Brutus, assassin par idéal [Anne Bernet], just to set the tone: Cassius, de son côté, admire l'idéalisme de Brutus, sa vertu, mais s'exaspère de le croire incapable d'agir. Ils exercent l'un sur l'autre une attraction dont on ne sait si elle est bonne ou mauvaise. Cassius a besoin de l'approbation de Brutus, et Brutus a besoin d'être poussé en avant par plus entreprenant que lui. L'association est plus harmonieuse qu'il n'y paraît.

Velleius Paterculus: Cassius was as much the better general as Brutus was the better man. Of the two, one would rather have Brutus as a friend, but would stand more in fear of Cassius as an enemy. The one had more vigour, the other more virtue.c As it was better for the state to have Caesar rather than Antony as emperor, so, had Brutus and Cassius been the conquerors, it would have been better for is to be ruled by Brutus rather than by Cassius.

If at the start of the year he had thought he could live under a clement master, now at its end Cassius' wishes for a free res publica were coming to the surface. Wheter he was the one to approach Brutus or the other way around is impossible to know; we should probably assume that the idea had crossed each man's mind before one of them gave expression to it. But in either case, Brutus may never have dreamed of actually killing Caesar without Cassius' cooperation- and, presumably, vice versa.

-Brutus: the Noble Conspirator, Kathryn Tempest

While we're still talking about them being two halves of a whole, there's something of a tradition to make them into one person. To borrow Si Sheppard's words: The name of Cassius has been inseparably paired with that of Brutus for more than 2,000 years.

And if that strikes your interest, Chaucer's 'Brutus Cassius' by H Theodore Silverstein, and also Fission-Fusion Cognition in Shakespearean Drama, The Case for Julius Caear, Miranda Anderson are the papers to read! On the specific topic of Brutus and Cassius and the ordering of their names, E.Rawson’s essay, Cassius and Brutus: The Memory of the Liberators is the way to go.

Now to get into THEATRE

We aren't starting with Shakespeare, we're doing Voltaire's La Mort de César

I'm going to start with my favorite line in French:

Cassius' first line to Brutus is this: Je t'embrasse, Brutus, pour la dernière fois.

The extremely fun thing about je t'embrasse is, despite every translation going in for 'I hug you' or in the case of that 19th century translation which omitted Cassius' direction to Brutus entirely, that it can also be translated to 'I kiss you, Brutus, for the last time.'

And now we'll get into the rest of it! I'll use the english translation for the rest of this for ease of reading.

Caesar has a line very early on, in reply to Antony bitching about Brutus, saying that Brutus has a 'seductive charm' that makes Caesar overlook Brutus' faults. For context, Caesar is Brutus' biological father in this play. Cassius is introduced despairing of the state of things, declaring that there's nothing left to do except die, and Brutus is the one who proposes conspiracy, and it's here we kind of see that seductive charm come into play because Cassius immediately adopts conspiracy of assassination as his entire desire.

Later, after Brutus finds out that Caesar is his father, and now enters a kind of existential despair he never really gets out of, Cassius presents Brutus' tie with himself to be one of more meaning over Caesar's biological tie to Brutus.

[Cassius]

Friend of Cassius, what more do you want?

These titles are sacred: all others outrage them.

Brutus reaffirms this positioning of relationship importance later with

[Brutus]

Yes, I am uniting my blood with yours forever.

With Voltaire taken care of, let's do Shakespeare!

First, let's do the Tent Scene, because everything else about Shakespeare is going to get split into a few parts.

Tents in Shakespeare are places where emotions can come to light, where displays of acting [compare Brutus with his 'But bear it as our Roman actors do,' vs Cassius and 'What you have said, and show yourselves true Romans.'] can be put aside and suppressed emotion and vulnerability brought into the light.

'Brutus and Cassius have been at loggerheads for some time; they now meet and will either sort out their differences, most of which derive from misunderstanding, or severely cripple their military effort against Octavius and Antony. Brutus knows that if they desire a serious conversation, they must withdraw from the soldiers surrounding them. Brutus says: "in my tent, Cassius, enlarge your griefs." The tent provides them a safe place for intense and often heated exchanges.' [Shakespeare's Intents in Tents, David M. Bergeron]

Now let's talk about HOMOEROTICISM IN SHAKESPEARE AND THE RENAISSANCE!

The text to be reading for this is "Romans, countrymen, and lovers": Performing Politics, Sovereign Amity and Masculinity in Julius Caesar, by Amy Scott, since it covers basically everything you could want regarding what's going on between Brutus and Cassius in this play.

"Within this first conversation, we also see immediate expression of the sovereign amity shared between these men. As Cassius first approaches Brutus, he complains that the quality of their friendship has been strained of late, and he does so in homoerotic terms: “I have not from your eyes that gentleness / And show of love as I was wont to have. / You bear too stubborn and too strange a hand / Over your friend that loves you” (1.2.33-36). Cassius is clearly testing Brutus’s disposition towards Caesar’s rise, and he is not disappointed by Brutus’s response. Brutus, like Cassius, professes the intensity of the male/male bond, numbering Cassius among his “good friends,” and apologizing that he has neglected “the shows of love to other men” (1.2.43,47). Cassius, when holding himself up as a mirror to Brutus, speaks again of his love for Brutus. Although this declaration may be called into question by his objective— namely to incite Brutus to conspiracy—the abundance of protestations of both love and sincerity throughout the play belie this possibility." [Amy Scott]

While I'm still here, this is basically the Seduction scene, although it should be noted that Cassius doesn't begin laying the ground work for conspiracy until Brutus first brings up his own misgivings, and now that I've said that: This Entire Video, Please, I'm Begging You To Watch It, I Haven't Know Peace Since I First Saw It [RSC 2017′s act 1 scene 2 alternatives, guys, it’s the seduction of Cassius this time]

On the topic of Cassius and seduction: Oxymoronic Ethos: The Rhetoric of Honor and Its Performance in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Xinyao Xiao, and also Has Cassius Been Misinterpreted? David Klein.

To Revisit the Tent Scene, Amy Scott compares it to a lovers quarrel, and it's not out of place. Within the framework of Renaissance Friendship Dynamics [where Friendship/Sovereign Amity frequently overlapped with the Homoerotic and Sexual], when balance gives way to excess, namely an excess of love, it turns the entire relationship sour.

"Before Cassius and Brutus have their confrontation, however, Brutus says to Lucillius echoing the language of Renaissance friendship discourses:

When love begins to sicken and decay

It useth an enforced ceremony.

There are no tricks in plain and simple faith;

But hollow men, like horses hot at hand,

Make gallant show and promise of their mettle.

(4.2.20-24)

When Brutus and Cassius do finally bicker, Cassius complains, “Brutus hath rived my heart” (4.3.85), “You love me not” (89), and “A friendly eye could never see such faults” (90). Brutus, echoing Plutarch, answers, “A flatterer’s would not, though they do appear/ As huge as high Olympus” (91-92)—recalling also Caesar’s “Hence! Wilt thou lift up Olympus” (3.1.74) just before Casca delivers the first blow. As a true friend aught, Brutus has used harsh, corrective speech, and he emphasizes the sovereign amity they share by embracing Cassius and offering his heart as well as the hand Cassius has requested. Cassius later proclaims, “I cannot drink too much of Brutus’ love” (4.3.162)." [Amy Scott]

So this, specifically, gives way to a comparison to [I am so sorry for this] the Poliziano-Lorenzo de' Medici-Clarice Dilemma, or Let's Talk About Bedroom Rivalries

"A close, careful reading of the letters exchanged between Lorenzo, Poliziano, and Clarice in this period, alongside poems composed by Lorenzo and Poliziano, provides an alternative reading of these events. My work will demonstrate that this was not an ideological dispute, but a rivalry between the sacred, licit bond of marriage and the illicit—but not uncommon—eroticized bond between two male friends." [Love and Marriage: Emotion and Sexuality in the Early Medici Family, Karen Burch]

Earlier in Shakespeare's play, Brutus and Porcia have a confrontation in which Porcia engages in a very interesting sort of gender play with Brutus [Brutus as well]. Porcia adopts the dynamic of male friendship with Brutus to try and get him to confide in her, and when that fails, then leverages their marriage and her own virtue against him.

"Given that masculinity in the Renaissance is often arguably constructed against anxieties about women’s chastity and the control of women’s sexuality, the defamation of Portia’s chastity necessarily equals the compromise of Brutus’s masculinity. Portia next re-scripts herself as not merely a woman, but most significantly as “[a] woman that Lord Brutus took to wife” (2.1.293) and “[a] woman well reputed, Cato’s daughter” (2.1.295). She asks Brutus, “Think you I am no stronger than my sex / Being so fathered and so husbanded?” (2.1.296-297). By aligning herself to the honor of her father and her husband, Portia not only points to the economy of exchange in which she is a commodity, but she also attempts to usurp some of their masculine honor for herself." [Amy Scott]

For additional reading on Porcia and the Performance of the Masculine Gender: Portia's Wound, Calphurnia's Dream: Reading Character in "Julius Caesar", Cynthia Marshall

I'm getting to my point, I promise.

Cassius and Porcia are identical relationship mirrors to Brutus in this play. They are Brutus' intimate relationships within the narrative, and Brutus begins this play out of reach for both of them, and they are the ones that must reach out to him. Cassius has to ask for confirmation of their closeness, Porcia must do the same, and then Cassius is forced to confrontation with Brutus a second time.

The core of the Poliziano-Lorenzo-Clarice Dilemma is that Poliziano's relationship with Lorenzo highlighted something in Clarice's relationship with her own husband. His association with Poliziano and the place of status Lorenzo gives to Poliziano presents a social shame for Clarice, which then later drives a wedge between Poliziano and Lorenzo which results in a truly explosive climax.

"The conflict between Clarice and Poliziano offers an example of this emotional inequality; when Clarice felt humiliated by her husband’s apparent favoritism towards Poliziano, she reacted with righteous fury." [Karen Burch]

"The beloved has the power to wound or heal the lover as they please. They can hold the lover “in pianti e in sospiri” or conquer him in warfare." [Karen Burch]

[RSC’s 2017 JC production]

So if we engage with a little creative cross application here, Cassius is not only the ideal relationship [again, within the dialogue of Renaissance friendship politics: men are the ideal companions for men, and it is misogynistic, but we'll also note that Shakespeare's Brutus leans into this misogyny by attributing Cassius' emotional faults to his mother] for Brutus, but also Cassius the Other Lover in this situation. The person laying the groundwork for the conspiracy is Cassius, and the conspiracy is what's keep Brutus from Porcia's bed.

"The bed was the locus of the camera and had, in addition to the connotations of authority, a distinctly sexual symbolism. It acted as a euphemism for both conjugal relations and for adultery, and Clarice may have seen Poliziano and Lorenzo’s interactions in this light. Friends often shared beds in this period, and the erotic potential of these arrangements was not lost on contemporaries. Rocke mentions at least two instances in which bed sharing among a group of friends ended in sex. Poliziano himself recounts how a man sharing galley quarters with youths began fondling (“manomettendo”) his bunkmate before being humorously rebuffed. Often, Florentines framed queer relationships in terms of sleeping together or sharing beds. Understanding families might even accommodate their sons’ lovers, providing them with their own bed to share." [Karen Burch]

[The comparison is not a 1:1, but more of a play on the way that people engaged in conspiracy have been referred to as bedfellows, and as Cassius is a central figure of the conspiracy tempting Brutus over to it and subsequently keeping Brutus out of his bed with Porcia, etc etc]

"As much as Portia herself seems to interrogate the assumptions of femininity and the supremacy of homosociality over heterosexuality, the play does not, finally, endorse her position. Although Portia does sway Brutus, she must refigure herself in terms familiar to masculinity and sovereign amity in order to do so." [Amy Scott]

With this, Cassius is no longer the ideal mirror for Brutus, but instead he’s been repositioned the other who must once again seek out some kind of reconciliation with Brutus because his own position with Brutus is no longer clear. Like in the beginning of the play, distance between them has been assumed, but this time to the point of confrontation. Love and affection has turned sour, and it’s only through confrontation that resolution can be found and balance can be struck once more.

I'm going to throw in here that I personally like to imagine that they all got along pretty well historically, but again. This is a creative thought exercise that we're doing for Fun and Drama. It's about the theatrics.

Citations [not including the historical sources]

Voltaire's La Mort de César Shakespeare's Julius Caesar Brutus: the Noble Conspirator, Kathryn Tempest Brutus, assassin par idéal, Anne Bernet Shakespeare's Intents in Tents, David M. Bergeron "Romans, countrymen, and lovers": Performing Politics, Sovereign Amity and Masculinity in Julius Caesar, by Amy Scott Oxymoronic Ethos: The Rhetoric of Honor and Its Performance in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Xinyao Xiao Has Cassius Been Misinterpreted? David Klein Chaucer's 'Brutus Cassius,' H Theodore Silverstein Fission-Fusion Cognition in Shakespearean Drama, The Case for Julius Caear, Miranda Anderson Portia's Wound, Calphurnia's Dream: Reading Character in "Julius Caesar", Cynthia Marshall Cassius and Brutus: the Memories of the Liberators, E. Rawson

An additional reading list if you, like me, enjoy reading up more about homoerotic relationships and friendship discourse in the renaissance!

Between Friends: Discourses of Power and Desire in the Machiavelli-Vettori Letters of 1513–1515, John M Najemy, Homosexuality and the Signs of Male Friendship in Elizabethan England, Alan Bray, Love and Marriage: Emotion and Sexuality in the Early Medici Family, Karen Burch, "Socratic Love" as a Disguise for Same Sex Love in the Italian Renaissance, Giovanni Dall'Orto

#this is so long but. also. somehow the condensed version of how it originally started #are they (you know) conspirators?#[radio announcer voice] and next week i'll spend three hours talking about cassius and trauma re: carrhae-philippi

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struwwelzeter · 4 years ago

Note

For a variety of reasons, I got into a bit of a rabbit hole about Richard's guitars, and my brain went "oh I know someone who will probably have opinions on this" so essentially, if you feel like it, pretty please talk RZK guitars to me? Favourite? Retired one that needs to come back? (Though I probably already know the answer, that fancy black one?)

Allrighty, buckle up because this is gonna be long. After much consideration I have decided to split it up in two parts because I don’t think I can make it fit into one post that is still vaguely tumblr appropriate, and I really wanted to do it some sort of justice. I still feel like I don’t. But oh well. Full disclaimer, I am NOT a guitarist, but I lived with a few, two of my best friends are pro players and I’m a sponge so I kind of soaked some bits and pieces up over the last 15 years. But in case any lost guitar hero finds this and disagrees with me over the finer points of tone wood: I know honey, I oversimplified, and I am wrong. I tried? 💜 for easier read I formatted everything specific to Richard’s guitars normally and anything general about electric guitars in cursive.

My main sources besides watching about a 100 a month of guitar tube videos (that is youtube for guitarists) with my ex, my main sources will be this interview and this.

Richard Z. Kruspe (of Rammstein and Emigrate)’s Guitars - In Order of Appearance, Part 1/2

Diamant (Les Paul Style)

“I traded the acoustic for a guitar called Diamant, which was like a Les Paul version in East Germany.” - RZK

Now I’m skipping the acoustic he started out with, because it’s basically impossible to know what that was, and go straight into the electric. Now presumably, it would have been something like this, a soviet build Les Paul rip off. The irony is that these still go for several thousands up on reverb today for being historical and collectors pieces. The thing is, that while anything east build might have used cheaper materials, I would assume this thing isn’t worse than any of the beginner/intermediate models sold today, if not better, and kids all over the world do decent stiff with those.

Something general about electric guitars is that you don’t really so much play the guitar, you play an entire system. The instrument doesn’t make the sound, it only influences it. You play a guitar - but you even more so play the amp. Which makes this a bit tricky, because an e-guitar is a slab of wood and a copper coil, and amps are way more complex. You can make the exact same guitar sound so many ways. Still - there are tendencies. The fact how and why and to which degree the shape and wood of a solid body (a guitar without a hollow wood piece) influences the sound is highly debated and can get a bit esoteric sounding to sane people non-guitarists, but there are some differences in how the general set up and build of the guitar changes things, and tendencies how they are traditionally outfitted. Les Paul style guitars are normally humbucker guitars, Stratocasters and Telecasters normally are outfitted with single coils. Usually a guitarist can switch - between using the bridge, the neck, or both (or more) pick ups and depending on where the pick up is located they pick up different frequencies, different aspects of the sound. Humbuckers produce a richer, deeper or fuller sound than single coils. Very roughly speaking, think the Stones vs. Metallica.

Fender Stratocaster

“Then in East Germany, we had this imagination to get one of the great guitars, to me it was always the Fender Stratocaster because it was the Jimi Hendrix guitar. I didn’t know anything about pickups or humbuckers or whatever. So there was this guy that I met in a café in my old hometown and he was buying all these books because he could get all the books out through customs and he would store them in my apartment. So we became kind of acquainted. He would come over and pick up the books. So one time he came over and I asked him if he could get me a guitar and bring it over. In East Germany, if you exchange money from East to West it would be like 1 East mark and 20 West mark. SO everything I had, I changed it to West Mark and I gave him the money and I gave him the money and asked him to please buy me a Fender Stratocaster. I gave him the money and I didn’t hear anything for like three months, nothing. I wasn’t able to call because we didn’t have phones and stuff like that – it was a different time. So I thought fuck, I gave him 1400 west mark and now he’s gone and never coming back. [...] Then my imagination was so high, I thought the guitar would just play by itself and I wouldn’t really have to do anything, which I found out was bullshit. I was really happy that I had the guitar but it wasn’t really the sound that I had in mind.” - RZK

The first time I heard that story, I literally went “no, no, no, don’t be stupid, don’t give him your money, you won’t even like that guitar, stupid, lost dumbass.” I can not, for the life of me, imagine him play anything other than humbuckers. He apparently does use single coils for some things today again in the studio, but still, it’s so obviously wrong. He did play one again sometime during the late 90s, but I couldn’t find anything on the pick ups he used with that, but can hardly imagine he kept the original, unless he needed it for a specific sound maybe in one or two songs. I get it though. For many, many people the Fender Stratocaster is THE guitar. Jimi Hendrix is the main reason for that, but it’s also the countless idols that picked it up after him for the same reason, people who ended up plastered on the walls of angsty teenagers in their own right. This totally has to do with the whole amp thing aswell. You see your idol play that type of guitar ... but it’s not even half of the sound, and it won’t sound the same. Maybe probably they changed the pick ups, they have an effect rig, the spend hours fiddling with the knobs on an amp you can never afford. It’s never the same. Which is why ...

Fender Telecaster Black Gold

Then I had a guitar that I was very fond of. It was an older black and gold telecaster – there weren’t very many of them made at that point. I put a Seymour Duncan Jeff Beck SH-4 in there, like a humbucker. I remember it was like my beauty guitar and I needed someone to put that pickup in and I was with Paul and he had more experience with that stuff than me so he would get out a hammer and a chisel and he start banging away on it and I was like ‘Fuck! Fuck! Don’t do that!’ but we put the thing in there and it was one of my favorite guitars” - RZK

... this one first didn’t really make sense for me for him. It’s even more a classic single coil guitar than the Strat is, and it only really started making sense for me when I learned he Paul indeed put a Humbucker in there. It’s a stunningly beautiful guitar, and weirdly non-modern for him. I don’t know why and this is completely instinctual on my part, but I find it fitting he played it during that time after the wall came down, which seems to have been a rough time for him generally, it seems like a somehow super emotional guitar, this relic. Telecasters were some of the first electrics ever build, it’s such a pioneer, but it’s also one that alot of punk bands used, possibly because they were old and cheap in the 70s and noisy and people customized it and put other pick ups in. The whole putting a chisel to it and adding a humbucker into it is such a “I’m gonna make whatever I have fit for me, and I’ll love it” move. If you look at it, a double coil pick up is really something you have to force to go in there, you really have to break it open. There is also this:

“... and then I think I had to sell it because I needed drugs or something. I was really sad that I sold it because I was at a very low point in my life.” - RZK

If I would get the chance to do one thing only for him to thank him for his music, I would go back in time to that Richard who is just sad about selling that guitar and hug him, and tell him he doesn’t need to worry, because they will name guitars after him in the future. It breaks my heart so fucking much. But of course, it’s what opens the doors to what happens next, which is ...

ESP 901

“That led me to my very first convention in Frankfurt. With guitars, it is like with women, you have to fall in love. Sometimes you get a guitar and you fall in love later but there has to be some sort of connection with it. So I was walking around that convention and I saw that guitar hanging at the ESP stand. It was a 901 ESP Sunburst and I was looking at it because it was such a beauty. And I was walking around for hours – they probably thought I was some weird guy who wants to steal the guitar. I bought that guitar and that’s how I got connected with ESP.” -RZK

He might have fallen for it because it is pretty, but it did come with a ESP double humbucker set up, with an added condensator to muffle up the sound, although not yet an active one (more on that later). It was a 90s metal guitar, one of those things marketed to the Metallica generation, something loud and heavy and full. Also, and this is where I will put in another general insert, there is something else about the choice of electric guitars that we haven’t talked about yet.

Now, I’ve discussed that you can push or pull the sound of a electric quite far in one or the other direction with what pick ups you use, what effects, what amps. But what this ignores is that especially standing up a guitar is a really shitty asymmetrical piece of equipment. And what that does to your body is that it needs to fit you, your hands, and your playing style. Some people prefer it chunky, others like sender. Guitarists, especially the 80s shredders, like to talk about a “fast neck”, which is another one of those things that get slightly esoteric, but which usually means a slimmer neck and slightly bigger frets, that need less way for your fingers to press until the string gets stopped. Someone who plays very bendy blues might dislike that and prefer something to dig in their fingers more down to the fretboard to get more control over how they bend the string. There are different neck profiles, there are different neck lengths, and all of it contributes to how comfortable someone might find their guitar.

I am mentioning this, because until today, Richard’s guitars are build very similarly to that ESP 901. His Eclipse Model is a tad different (again, more on that later), but the one he uses the most, the RZK I, has the same neck scale, similar frets, and that comfortable ESP slender neck. Even the shape seems to be inspired by turning it upside down. He has said in interviews that he hasn’t got very strong hands, and it makes perfect sense to me. I bought my own electric (again, more on that later) purely because I wanted to own one and not even so much because I ever had any real ambitions of learning to play it, but my friends at the time (10 years ago now) forced me to try out alot (!) of models (despite me knowing what I wanted), and the only guitars that I tried that had slimmer necks were Ibanez guitars, which in turn were wider. Ironically Frankfurt is my hometown, so the place to try a lot of different models is That exact convention Richard went to, and I haven’t skipped a Musikmesse in the last 15 years. I was at atleast one were Richard was too (I just didn’t care at the time, yikes), and it somehow greatly pleases me he found “his” guitar at that particular convention. Things have changed in recent years, but electric guitars always were in Hall 4.01, with ESP being left of center in the middle, and I don’t know, I can just see him walking in circles around it, and it makes me so emotional for him because it’s what musicians do at that place. It’s really loud, everyone is playing, there is someone better noodling around at every corner, and it can be quite an intimidating setting I think. And every year you see that one kid coming back and back again to that same stand, staring at that one guitar until they finally work up the nerve and ask to try it (or the staff takes pity on them and offer). And it’s the same everytime, they think “oh god they must think I am crazy” but really, nobody does. Everyone in that hall who owns a heart knows what those dreams are made of, and all it maybe does inspire is a “oh god, I hope that one makes it”. I digress. I think it’s more common now to look for different neck styles and companies started caring about it, but especially coming from Fender and Gibson guitars, that neck is honestly just very, very nice for weaker hands.

This is where I will stop, because it makes a good moment for a break and this post is honestly getting too out of hand otherwise. There will be a part 2 - where Richard starts using active pick ups, starts playing my favorite guitar in the whole wide world (and stops playing it), and finally, set up his own signature.

This is him with that 901 though: when he must have had it pretty much brandnew, while he used it, and right before he sold it.

#richard kruspe #rzk #richard zk #rammstein #esp #electric guitars #can you tell I love him very much #although i might love the guitars more than him #i keep meeting guitarists and I never know if i like them or the fact they play guitar

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cordeliaflyte · 4 years ago

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Would love to know your thoughts on the rutger bregman book when you finish it!!!

dearest merle! it took me months to answer this ask - something i'm ashamed of - but i finally got around to finishing the book today.

the below is a condensed version of the ten pages of notes i took while reading it, which are rather chaotic and repetitive at points - but in my defence, bregman repeated his own arguments too.

one of the main arguments that bregman makes is that "evil" or "immorality" - which we'll define as causing unnecessary harm - are rarely caused by the individual, but rather the society they live in. i agree - nothing exists in a vacuum. however, society, as a nebulous concept, isn't imposed on us by some imperceptible power - it is crafted by people. people in society have different levels of power, and the harm they can cause to others is directly proportional to said power - but be it on a micro or macro scale, our actions have an impact on others and while they are influenced by the society we live in, we must nonetheless strive to minimise the harm we cause - and few of us do.

bregman illustrates many of his arguments with heartwarming stories about people coming together in times of crisis - take, for example, natural disasters - and overcoming adversity, selflessly looking out for their neighbours. but crisis very often leads to the creation of divisions, an us vs them mentality, and a complete disregard for the safety of others. the current pandemic is a prime example - see the widening of class differences, the rise in racist hate crimes, and people refusing to take safety precautions because they are inconvenient to them.

another argument repeated quite often throughout the book is the fact that media cherry-picks the most sensationalistic and senseless acts of death and despair, because human suffering is simply more interesting that the mundane - people talking to friends, creating art, laughing and learning. again, i agree with him - many of the more tabloid-adjacent news outlets would have you believe that the everyday norm is dismembered heiresses being found on riverbeds and charming, precocious children being held for ransom in tiny basements. the news doesn't often focus on the mundane - but the mundane isn't just love and work and friendship and boredom and chores, it is also, for billions of people around the world, sexual violence, familial abuse, workplace and housing discrimination, etc. these things aren't sensationalistic either - they're frightfully common, frightfully boring, and thus, they're rarely reported on.

throughout his book, bregman mentions that when he told people what he was working on, they approached the idea that humans are good with a large dose of cynicism, simply because we are raised to believe humans are selfish (which isn't the case worldwide, not all cultures are individualistic). they pick the easier choice - accepting the image of the world and their fellow humans that they are presented with at face value. i'd argue that it is the tendency of humans to pick the easier choice, to obey, to avoid challenging their worldview that leads to - for a lack of better term - immorality (see definition in point 1).

often, when bregman presents his feel good stories about people cooperating in adversity, he also mentions troubling details that, again, show undue harm being done. one of the examples he used were six boys from tonga, aged 13 to 16, who were shipwrecked on an island, and instead of descending into a "lord of the flies" style madness, they built their small community on the basis of communication and cooperation, never resorting to violence, and acting mature beyond their years. after a year spent on the island, they were rescued - and promptly arrested, an event which was probably racially motivated. and the reason they were shipwrecked in the first place was attempting to flee their school, where, according to their reports, they were neglected.

bregman contrasted the example of the boys forming a peaceful society on a small island with the chaos that always ensues when adults in reality shows are put in similar situations. the contestants are pitted against each other by the show runners, who seek to frustrate them and make them lose control for the amusement of the audience. whenever contestants try to cooperate, form a mutually beneficial society for a short while - a radical idea - they are punished. "goodness" - i.e. harm reduction - and radical thought being punished just don't seem like particularly helpful examples for the "humans are inherently good" thesis

bregman seems to be a big fan of primitivism, constantly citing civilisation as a source of harm - a position i'm always sceptical about, because personally i love vaccines and dental care, but i know this is a knee-jerk reaction and bregman isn't plotting a return to a land without dentists. but what i do take ire at is the idea that humans are somehow "corrupt" versions of their natural selves and that our lives have grown too complicated, and only a return to "primitive" society can return us to the aforementioned natural selves.

tied to the previous point - his arguments remind me of the "noble savage"'... archetype? he seems to paint a picture of "primitive" indigenous people as role models for those "corrupted" by civilisation, who in turn must be saved by a return to their "purer" selves, instead of individuals with flaws and agency.

speaking on indigenous populations - bregman also invokes the inhabitants of the easter islands. for a long time, the world at large believed that a hundred years or so before colonization, the islanders effectively perpetrated a genocide, killing off a large proportion of their population - a claim which was later disproven. yay! humans can live in peaceful societies without committing genocide, and thus, are not inherently evil! disregarding the fact that european colonists later massacred a large part of the islands population, and sold most of the survivors into slavery?

i was very excited for one of the chapters, entitled "after auchschwitz". i was interested how bregman would reconcile his argument with the tragedies of the twentieth century - the holocaust, but also genocide, and to a lesser extent war in general.

(this chapter, i might add, was preceded by a quote by anne frank - you know the one, about the inherent goodness of people. i was hoping that bregman would comment on the fact that anne wrote the quote before she and her family were sent to a concentration camp)

so you can imagine my surprise when the chapter was not, in fact, about concentration camps or genocide. but rather about. unethical 70s sociological experiments.

no really! a chapter titled "after auchschwitz" was, in fact, primarily about the stanford prison experiment. an experiment that was, granted, inspired by concentration camps, but still. it's misleading to invoke "real", large scale violence, and focus instead on "simulated", small scale violence.

we all know that the stanford prison experiment was, as far as experiments go, rubbish to legendary degrees. it doesn't prove anything - but it does, perhaps, show that people under large psychological duress are capable of evil, even when they themselves are not "evil".

it is, i'd argue, the human tendency to obey authority and especially to conform to societies standards that poses the largest danger. disobedience is man's original virtue and whatnot.

and when he does briefly refer to concentration camps, bregman treats them like a very 1940s phenomenon, disregarding the fact that they have been around for much longer and still exist today.

in cases like that one experiment with electric shocks. you know the one. do not, perhaps, show an innate tendency to violence, but rather people succumbing to pressure. but history is full of unprovoked instances of violence, of pogroms and lynchings. there is usually an instigator, yes, but judging from reports, people in the right mindset don't need much persuading to butcher other people.

also re: electric shock experiment - those who thought they gave the assistant lethal shocks showed extreme guilt and some even cried but like... so what? what use is a conscience if it doesn't stop you from, to your knowledge, killing someone? are your feelings really more important than your actions?

he doesn't say this, but a lot of the arguments he presents do seem to boil down to "people aren't evil, they're just stupid!" which doesn't sound more encouraging, i'm afraid.

an alternative takeaway would be "people are good, unless they have power" - which isn't exactly a radical, revolutionary idea. most people have heard the maxim "power corrupts". but the thing is that almost everyone holds some amount power over others - the oppressed factory worker in a poor nation who works 12 hours a day for pittance might still execute power over his wife, who relies on him for money, and she in turn might hold power over her children, and so forth. and that power is often used to cause undue harm and exercise control.

he criticises machiavellianism, saying it doesn't reflect how society works, and one of his proofs is that his philosophies were espoused by bismarck, churchill, and stalin - hardly admirable figures in terms of (you guessed it!) causing harm. but i don't see how that discredits machiavelli? like all of the above were very succesful

and he keeps repeating the primitivism argument throughout the book which gets tiring. like i'm truly sorry you were born in the last 5% of human existence thus far when, in your opinion, humanity started going to the shits, but it's getting a bit tiring

he cites money and nations as concepts as harbingers of the current (negative) state of humanity, saying they're very recent concepts and have no basis in reality. they're artificial concepts, sure, but their effect is very much real, and while achieving a nation-less, money-less society is possible on a small scale, i think that at this point they are such large aspects of life that reigning them in seems impossible.

and invokes the noble savage again and again, showing himself in favour of tribal societies, depicting them as egalitarian - i'm sure many of them are, but many also have a strict hierarchy or like. practice fgm. once more he seems to treat tribal people as a monolith of goodness as opposed to... people.

he also cites prehistoric people, their egalitarianism and low rates of violence but. forgive me for my ignorance because i did not research this. how do people know. doesn't the definition of prehistory include a lack of records??

he also mentions that in small, tribal societies, conformism can be a good thing, as it makes people act for the communal good. this is another knee-jerk reaction of mine but i think of conformism as society's most significant vice, so this strikes very much against my beliefs

later on, he also says reproduction is another proof of humanities goodness. perhaps it's a controversial opinion, but i disagree. i find it hard to find reasons for reproduction that aren't egoistic. it's survival instinct, sure, but it's not an "inherently noble pursuit".

later yet, he brings up schools which grant large degrees of freedom to students and shows how they're good for developing their minds. this might be a me thing but i know from experience that when i'm granted freedom without structure, i do nothing - though perhaps that speaks ill of me, and not humanity.

there have, in fact, been many studies on schools like this being helpful to student development and i certainly won't argue with them - but let me nit-pick. bregman says that fewer students have adhd in these schools, as it is a condition caused by being locked inside a room all day which is not only offensive, but also just plain wrong

and also while showing how granting children freedom lets them develop (which i naturally agree with) he brings up that "dangerous playground" study. you know the one. this isn't a coherent argument, this is just my bias speaking , but as a child, i promise i had no desire to play with rusty nails in abandoned warehouses. i liked my boring playgrounds with wooden swings.

then there is a chapter on communism and how it could be a remedy to societies ailments. but bregman and i seem to operate on very different definitions of communism. he naturally starts with saying maoist china and stalinist russia and cambodia under pol pot weren't really communist which... sure, if you want to argue semantics, i'm all for it, but it's an old and essentially useless argument. if "real communism" has never been tried (as the author claims) - why?

and then we pass to perhaps the most bizarre fragment of the book. paraphrasing only slightly: "but why are we now so opposed to the word communism? when we pass each other salt at the dinner table, is that not communism? when we selflessly hold a door open for someone, is that not communism?" i.... no?? no it's not. that's not what communism is girl stop

he then also says facebook is actually communist in many ways since a lot of its value comes from photos people willingly share for free. i could not make this up if i tried.

i think that in most terms i agree with bregman on policy - direct democracy, school and prison systems, changes to the criminal justice system - and our reasoning is partially similar, but i don't think the information we both have access to proves that humans are inherently good.

and then come perhaps my least favourite arguments because i for one am a spiteful bitch but yes. it is time for christian ethics 101 and turning the other cheek.

he cites ghandi and mlk as examples of turning the other cheek working. i think ghandi went too far with his policy, what with saying "jews ought to have marched silently to their deaths or committed mass suicide to make nazis feel ashamed" and like. we do remember they killed mlk, right?

as an example of turning the other cheek, he cites humane prisons in norway, where prisoners are granted much larger freedoms than usual and are on equal footing with the guards, who aren't armed and act more as councillors. i don't really see how this is an example of turning the other cheek, though - the guards are not the victims of the inmates (it was a prison for violent offenders - many of them murderers). i agree with him that prisons, if they must exist, should treat inmates humanely and with respect, but i don't see how this relates to the turning of the cheek. statistically, many of these men probably murdered their mates in a drunken dispute, or killed their wives - and i don't think turning the other cheek would have helped their victims.

he also cites south africa in the sixties as an example of turning the other cheek, when anti-apartheid activists would meet up with pro-apartheid activists and talk - this included nelson mandela who had frequent talks with the leader of a white supremacist paramilitary organisation of afrikaners staunchly opposed to black south africans getting the vote. and it worked - the man, whose aim was starting a civil war, relented. but racism isn't a simple matter that can simply be solved by talking. and it is often a pragmatic policy which i don't disparage, but turning the other cheek and having to treat someone who refuses to acknowledge your humanity with an exorbitantly disproportionate amount of respect is inherently degrading.

skipping ahead, in the epilogue bregman lists ten rules he tries to live by, and one of them is, i shit you not, "don't punch nazis". and punching nazis doesn't stop them from being nazis, but turning the other cheek gets people killed

the rise of fascism is perhaps one the largest threats we are dealing with and fascists are not just isolated and misinformed (and in this day and age, ignorance is a choice). they are dangerous.

this is by no means an essay or an exhaustive list, just a slightly chaotic and much overdue collection of opinions which i don't know how to put under a read more. take care <3

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ichika27 · 4 years ago

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The World Ends with You

(Yeah, it’s the same screenshot I used for my post about ep. 1. I couldn’t get a new one so...)

Ah, first week without the TWEWY anime to look forward to. I’m actually kinda sad cause I’d miss waiting for the episode every Saturday night (Ani-One posts theirs on that day here). I have some stuff I wanna say about the anime so I thought I’d make one of these plus this is a good way to end the twewy anime blog post series I make every week. I’ll try not to spoil until the very bottom of this post which will have a spoiler warning.

Also, this will be very long and rambly as most of my fandom posts are haha.

Story:

A boy named Neku wakes up in the middle of Shibuya with no memory and finds himself as a player in the Reaper’s Game. For a week he must partner up with a girl named Shiki and both of them must complete missions, battle creatures called noise, and survive as failure meant erasure.

Characters:

Neku Sakuraba - our main protagonist who somehow lost his memories and is now playing the Reaper’s Game. He’s a loner who isn’t too keen on getting close to anyone let alone working alongside anybody - unfortunately for him, it’s a requirement if he wants to survive. As a player he has an assortment of abilities to fight off noise and other enemies (in the game this meant he can use a lot of different pins).

Shiki Misaki - the nice and friendly Shiki becomes Neku’s partner in the Reaper’s Game. Unlike Neku she has knowledge of the game and fills Neku in on things he doesn’t understand. Her ability is to control her stuffed toy called Nyantan/Mr. Mew which she uses in combat.

Beat - the tough skateboarding player, he’s somewhat more like the typical hot-blooded shounen protagonist when compared to Neku. He’s protective of those he care about especially his game partner, Rhyme. He uses his skateboard in battle.

Rhyme - Beat’s game partner who is a lot kinder and calmer than him. Rhyme tends to be the one to reason with Beat when needed and the two are always seen together.

Yoshiya Kiryu - a mysterious boy who seem to know more than he lets on and acts at times acts suspicious. He prefers to be called by the nickname Joshua.

Sanae Hanekoma - a cafe owner who helps out Neku and the others and would give them advice. His advice prove to be very helpful and Neku takes them to heart. Seem to have a lot of knowledge about the Reaper’s Game but doesn’t seem to be a reaper himself.

Thoughts:

(I tried my best to not be spoilery in the character descriptions so some names weren’t written in full)

The World Ends with You (or in the original Japanese “Subarashiki Kono Sekai”/It’s a Wonderful World) is an anime based on the video game of the same name. It had to compress an entire game’s worth of story within it’s 12 episode run which meant they cut out a lot of things and combined some scenes to quickly run through them. It’s theme song is the anime version of the game’s original OP “Twister” although this wasn’t what was originally planned but an incident involving the band who sang the original theme forced them to make changes. The original voice actors from the game also reprised their roles for the anime. The series is created to be watched before the release of the long-awaited sequel game.

The art style is made to be similar to it’s game version (with a bit of change to adapt it as an anime like when it comes to body proportions). They also retained the effect of the characters from the UG (players/reapers) being brightly colored while those from the RG having darker/muted colors. While the noise are obviously cg, I personally liked this since they’re said to be from a different plane anyways so it’s a nice contrast to those from the UG and RG. They had to update the setting though as years had passed since the original game’s creation and they had to model anime version of Shibuya to what it’s real life counterpart now looks. The characters are also given smartphones instead of the flip phones they had in the game (anime-only watchers who are gonna play the game would have to get used to them still using flip phones though lol).

Okay so story-wise... it’s rushed. Of course it is. They shortened it so that what’s left would mostly be important plot points from the main story but they cut out many scenes that consist of character interactions and several little things that could’ve fleshed out the characters more. The gameplay is also made simpler with some mechanics taken away and the mini games weren’t adapted (RIP to Reaper Creeper and Tin Pin Slammer, especially the latter as you’re severely missed). The game boast an assortment of characters and some NPCs have their own stories but due to the anime’s limited run time, they had to either be cut out (and are just given cameos) or given smaller roles (and their stories weren’t adapted). They did, however, give a few bits and pieces of information that weren’t in the game such as some details about certain characters and one supporting character was given a bit more screentime that they did in the game version.

Despite the rushed nature of the series (which may or may not affect how one views the story itself), the anime made sure to adapt several important scenes and the dramatic stuff is made worse... like, they really had to make some deaths harder to take. The battle scenes were nice as well although my biggest complaint about them is that the boss fights were over too quickly. There were scenes that were changed for the anime version and there are those that I liked and those I didn’t but there are many which I think was as good as the game’s version.

Do I recommend the anime? The game is better, the characters and story are more fleshed out and the way the character/relationship development happens is better paced so of course, me, biased already would tell you to play the game instead if you haven’t yet. Do I recommend those who played the game to watch the anime? Yes! Yes I do. I think the anime is better watched when you’ve played the game and know the stuff that they cut out cause it’ll make better sense that way. Plus I found it enjoyable seeing the scenes from the game animated and the characters are speaking whole dialogues and moving. It’s great!

Even if the anime wasn’t perfect, like I mentioned before, they did their best to condense the entire main story in a 12 episode series and it tried to be as faithful as it could to the original story so despite the deviations when it comes to how things got to the way they did, if you summarize important plot points, they would be the same (with some details changed). Overall, it was very enjoyable and it wasn’t as bad as I feared when I heard how many episodes the anime was going to have.

Some spoiler thoughts:

It would’ve been better if the anime had more episode count than just 12. Cramming a 3 week story of game into just 12 made the thing very rushed with Week 1 only getting three episodes, Week 2 getting four, and final Week getting five. They had to get to the good stuff so they cut off a lot of scenes where the characters are interacting with each other which means they suddenly get character developments and relationship developments too quickly. It might not be that obvious to anime-only watchers but to me, it felt kinda sudden and it feels like it doesn’t work out well story-wise since Neku had to learn how to trust other people and make friends and with how he started vs. how he came out of it contrasting each other.

By the way, they made the characters look good in the anime. Especially Joshua. Have you seen Joshua? He’s so pretty in the anime. I want a picture of him I could stare at anytime I want to (I do not own a phone, sadly).

I like how they gave Eri more scenes though and that they changed her outfit for the anime so she won’t look exactly like UG!Shiki. All of her scenes though made me feel like I wish the anime gave closure to Shiki’s own story by showing us her and Eri making up. Another scene I liked in the anime is Neku’s fanboying of CAT when he finds out the truth. It was adorable.

Some info was taken away from the anime. Beat and Rhyme leaving home had scene dialogue and unlike Beat just narrating it in-game but they didn’t mention specifically why he was angry and his trouble at home. Joshua wasn’t present when Sota and Nao gave Neku a pep-talk either which is a shame cause I think that helped Josh as well.

I mentioned before how the anime made things go too fast. They cut off chunks of not-main-plot story that let the characters interact with each other more which means each game day is shortened as well. I think it made sense that Neku wakes up at the scramble in the end and not stressed out because he didn’t go through as much as his game counterpart did. That said, game Neku learned a lot from more than just the main cast in the game compared to the anime so I like his character development in the game better.

They took away Tin Pin Slammer. I am sad and disappointed. I was hoping so bad for Another Day to be adapted even if it’s an OVA. That and the ramen incident are part of Josh’s week which meant some side of him wasn’t shown (I mean, anime fans don’t know he wasn’t there on week 3 since he’s busy playing a kid’s game elsewhere and how he could talk about food like he is from a cooking anime). Speaking of Josh, they made him very suspicious from the get-go in the anime. I understand as there’s a limited run-time and they can’t really afford to be subtle about it but it meant some of the fun interactions with Neku is gone and so are some scenes where they actually got along. At least they had ice cream together, I guess?

(I have more to say when it comes to Joshua cause he’s my fave character but this is long and my thoughts on it would make this way longer. I might make another post.)

In the end, it wasn’t perfect but the anime was fun and enjoyable enough that I found myself looking forward to it every week. Seeing scenes I recognize from the game in animated form (with voice acting!) felt exciting and awesome. I’ll miss this show and I still wish it was longer.

If you’ve read this far well, thank you. And also I’m confused why but still hopefully that was a good time-killer. I have so many other things I wanted to comment on but that’s for another time. Maybe.

#Subarashiki Kono Sekai #subaseka #the world ends with you #twewy #sana_post

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pastelpastilles · 4 years ago

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𝔽𝕚𝕟𝕒𝕝 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤

Oh, you thought my last retrospective was the end?

I can finally talk talk talk again, which is a beautiful and freeing feeling. These are sort of scattered, lost thoughts, because I just wanted to summarize the last 3 generations and some of the Process(tm) behind everything.

General Story Thoughts

Vampires really have been part of the story since the beginning. I really presented berry simblr with this weird, sorta spooky family with bat ears and fangs and tried passing them off as totally normal folks. Somehow, that worked? Dreams do come true.

Originally, Luna was going to live in Forgotten Hollow, but I changed that very last minute. Like, right after I started playing.

The vampires were actually supposed to come to the forefront in Gen 2--Verity Vine was supposed to “sense” them right after her first date with Ries (there’s a scene of her glancing behind her as they leave that clearing, the vampires were actually there!) I pushed them back to Gen 3 and I’m glad I did! I was able to create all the Forgotten Founder lore.

I actually feel pretty good about this as a “first draft.” I know what things I would change now, what should be tightened up.... Even from the first attempt at a reboot.

Now that you know about the vampires, I can explain more about how heirs are chosen... It’s the bat ears. If a child has bat ears, I generally roll to see if they have fangs.

In addition to bat ears and fangs, heirs usually do have some supernatural talent, one that might not be obvious at first. It may or may not come up in the future, but for reference...

Verity Vine is a natural dreamwalker, which we have known since the beginning.

Kabinett was seeing glimpses into the future, guys. He was having prophetic dreams the whole time. That’s why I kept insisting he wasn’t dreamwalking.

Had Maddy been Turned, she would have very much been a Succubus... Her talent is literally being desirable.

Generation 3 Thoughts

From the moment I knew I was doing “double heirs,” I knew Kabi was going to die. Really. It made it very... strange, to finally reach that point, in story, when I had already made my mental peace with it years ago.

The biggest changes were OJ’s path, and Maddy’s final form. Maddy was supposed to lose her memories, and would be forever trying to figure out what happened that night (which is sad)!

Obviously, the biggest inspirations for Gen 3 were 80s movies and Stranger Things, as well as... Frozen! Elsa & Anna were lowkey inspirations for Kabi and Maddy, and I remember once saying that Kabi’s love story was “more Frozen and less romantic.”

I think, if I do redo gen 3, I would make that clearer--I think at the end of the day, Kabi and OJ both sort of confused their “I love you but more than a friend” feelings. Kabi’s greatest concern was really always that OJ wouldn’t be part of his family.

Epilogue Specific Thoughts

Each epilogue was a scene I wanted to include when I was planning on a much, much longer (but different) storyline.

Kabinett’s first reveal was always going to be to Luna, after she and Maddy returned from their trip. I cut the events of their trip, though. They aren’t that important to Maddy’s arc, really. That became the first epilogue.

Sage was always going to stick around and be Maddy’s rock, so once I decided Maddy was going the vampire hunter route, I knew Sage needed to be the Willow she was always meant to be. Thus, her epilogue.

The third epilogue was actually just going to be an edit. I wanted to give The Sauce and the Murder Barn a proper send off, and originally it was to Chainsaw by Nick Jonas... And then Taylor dropped folklore and we got exile featuring the Sauce’s Demons.

This is not what his original end was--for a really long time, he was Maddy’s end game. I was pretty committed to it, and what happened was... I was driving home one day, trying to figure out reboot shit, and I just.... knew it was Ojaddy. It had to be them in the end. This was like, last year-ish. I actually stopped driving and messaged Sam like “I WAS WRONG, OJADDY IS THE END GAME” which was pretty out of the blue, ngl.

The fourth epilogue being Veriling was because I was intending on a longer, ongoing arc for Veri dealing with depression/child loss. It got condensed into that awful, sad scene that I love.

OJ’s epilogue was a VERY early scene I wrote, back when he was supposed to leave PB Bay for years and years and years and come back when Maddy was like. 30. Yeah, Kabi was always going to come back and be like “You need to let me go, bud. Please. Date my sister, carry on my family line.”

And of course... Maddy Moon. Once I knew Maddy wasn’t losing her memories of that night, that she was going to go for vampires, I knew I needed her to dust Azura. That last line of hers was what the whole thing was built around lmao

There was actually a bigger scene where she drew the Orange vampire in by flirting, and then OJ arrived and Maddy broke character bc that’s my husband fiance!

But I really wanted to finish this so... We got a rushed, condensed scene.

Reboot...?

Anyway, let’s consider those two up above. It’s kinda weird that I ended on a cliffhanger, where the heirs are on opposite sides of something Big, right? And Maddy just not knowing Kabi’s still technically alive...

So like. About that:

The spares pretty much disappeared once I called Gen 3 done. In the reboot-version of the story (Lunacy), I cut out a LOT of Veriling’s kids.... Like I halved the amount.

I was purposefully very vague about tagging Kabi’s vampire moodboard as Kabinett Puck. That’s because I’ve been considering Veri taking Ries’ last name in the reboot, and most of my notes refer to him as Kabi Puck.

I also introduced several things that you’d think I would expand on in the epilogues, right? Luna’s gift to OJ, Maddy the Vampire Slayer... Like, there’s a lot to sink your teeth into there!

So... As we hit the epilogues, the timelines of the “reboot” and the “original draft” sort of... merged in my mind. And I really... really... want to keep exploring this world, and finishing Gen 3 off actually helped me decide certain things I would rather do with Lunacy Gen 1.

This is a very confusing way of trying to explain that... I’m not canceling the reboot, but we are continuing... with Gen 4. Probably soon! I want to play with Ojaddy a bit, because they deserve a bit of a break, and you’ll start seeing Slice of Life stuff on my main soon.

In the meantime, coming up on this blog, I have a fun little project staring Sage that I can’t WAIT to start posting! And eventually... We’ll move back to @simmancy. Not just with my hell project (the Masquerade AU), but also with actual... bpr... content. So if you like these characters... Good news! They’re going Into the New World! And if you don’t like them, well... I think their kids are pretty cool, so. There’s that.

As always... Again, and again, thank you for reading! See you on the otherside!

- Kit

#in retrospect

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nox-artemis · 4 years ago

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Isidro brings out the worst in Berserk (or, me going on a long, dumb tangent like the old days)

Tis’ time.

I was watching The Kavernacle’s recent upload about how a lot of anime capitalizes on this weird fetishization of women and girls - which is for the most part true and is why I personally try to stay clear of a lot of anime. Honestly, any anime that focuses way too much on the “Japanese school girl” archetype and anime that depict nearly all female characters as though they’re still in the adolescent stage either behavior-wise or “phenotypically” (like that moe shit) kind of weirds me out.

Berserk has kind of stayed away from this, but it seems like it teeters on that because so many of the female characters in the series are under the age of 20. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that but I noticed in the chapters where the Guts’ party first arrived on Elfhelm, the character designs were on the borderline of giving characters that round cherubic type face, but especially with the female characters. In the recently chapters (From the last two years) Miura seems to have chiseled the style again, which is more preferable IMHO.

But I think this kind of tangles into some wider problems I find with some character designs. If people remember me and my content, probably my biggest gripe with Berserk as a series was its usage of sexual violence toward women. It still bugs me but I can give Miura credit in that he seems to have teetered away from using it so exploitatively. THAT SAID, I think as an older fan (and an older person altogether) I think a bigger overarching issue with Berserk is that Miura was never really that good at creating female characters.

(I can have so many interesting opinions now that I don’t care about making friends within this fandom)

No I’m not saying people shouldn’t draw any adult female character with more youthful features (I mean, as some who is at that age where I experience ageism, a lot of people - particularly men - believe that as soon as a woman hits 25 they’re suppose to shrivel up??? 🤨) just -

DON’T KNOW WHY A LOT OF (MALE) CREATORS DON’T UNDERSTAND THAT WOMEN CAN HAVE DIVERSE FEATURES AND DIVERSE PERSONALITY TYPES.

I think that diatribe is for another day (I know I’ve been explaining this to other people on my other social media during my Tumblr hiatus). But to condense what I’m saying, I notice that there isn’t a lot of age diversity of female characters: most of the female characters are in adolescent. Now, I don’t think it was a big issue in early Berserk because - and even though I still take some issue with how over-exploitation was handled - we still got to explore these young girls as characters whether it were girls like Casca, Theresia, Rosine(Rosalind), Jill, or even Erica and we’re meant empathize with the cruelty (or potential cruelty in the case of Erica) that the world dished out to them. Even with Luca and her gang we got explore the concept of sisterhood if just for a bit.

Now there’s less of that - WHICH CAN BE A GOOD THING because not every female character’s traumatic origin has to be rooted in a gender-based violence backstory. I like having Schierke not having a clear backstory and being “wise beyond her years” and we can just keep it that way. Only problem is that I see a lot more that weird lol!con humor when it comes to her - especially with her relationship with Guts.

I’m thinking of the excuse they use in hentai where, “the young prepubescent girl character is really a 7000 year old demon-lord from another dimension - so it’s not really p*doph!l!a.” Schierke is way mature for her own age, so she’s practically an adult. 😒

This isn’t just an issue with Schierke. Like, I notice a lot of up-skirt shots with these newer young girl characters; with Isma it’s kind of worse because she also embodies that “too naïve to know that she’s a turn on” when she’s like what? Thirteen? Fourteen?? I guess we’re also given the excuse that a lot of these characters are magical/supernatural/near-human so you can away with a lot more. Now that they’re on Elfhelm and there is a litany of these female characters we just have a bunch of the fantasy-universe version of the Japanese school girl shit, where we enter -

Ugh. Isidro.

I wasn’t too fond of him the beginning but I could appreciate his place a little. But his introduction was the point where we we start to see more of that typical dumb, pervy schoolboy humor in the series. I get it: Isidro is a teenage boy.

So was Guts.

And Griffith.

And Rickert.

And it’s just as important to have a diversity of young boy characters as well, but it’s just that for the amount of spotlight Isidro is given, not much of it is meaningful, especially in recent chapters. If anything his character is devolving IMO. MAYBE it’s some weird affect that Elfhelm has on him and other characters that is yet to be explored, but I somehow doubt it. Maybe it’s a phase that’ll be gone soon. I dunno.

Maybe just overall the time spent on Elfhelm isn’t being spent as productively as I had hoped for. I mean BY NO MEANS AM I OVERLOOKING THE FACT THAT AFTER OVER 20 YEAR OF WAITING CASCA IS FINALLY CURED WHICH IS BY FAR THE BIGGEST ACCOMPLISHMENT IN THIS SERIES EVER but I think with so much anticipation of what comes next for her and Guts it’s frustrating to see other side stories that aren’t focused on their to reconciliation spent so frivolously. We got a bit with Guts and the Berserker armor; we got a bit with Schierke and her training; we got a bit with Farnese and her training; we got a bit with Casca retraining her self and her trauma.

See what I’m getting at a bit? We’re just getting bits and shit, it seems. No streamline story arc. We get introduced to one bit and then POP where at some other point with some other character. I get that things are a bit different in this setting because this is the first time in a long while that Guts, Casca and their company are actually physically safe from the affects of the formers’ brands. I with so much rest and recreation time I WANT there to be more retrospective time as well.

I’ve said elsewhere that I’m super duper disappointed with how Puck has gone downhill, especially in regard to he and Guts’ relationship. We haven’t gotten any sort of meaningful interaction with him since Isidro came into the story. AND EVEN BETWEEN THE TWO OF THEM IT’S MORE OR LESS MEANINGLESS FRIVOLITY. Couldn’t Puck and Isidro be using their on-screen time more wisely, even if it has to be away from each other. What happened to Isidro wanting to be a bad-ass swordsman? Like, just being associated with two badass swordsmen (now that Casca is active again) is not a replacement for character/skill development. DO SOMETHING. BE INSPIRED OR SOME SHIT (INSTEAD OF LOOKING UP WITCH SKIRTS).

And what the hell is Serpico doing? And Roderick? And aren’t there like three or four other -

- OKAY this is what happens when have these big ass fantasy adventure parties where only a third of the occupants actually contribute shit of merit. That’s why the O.G. Band of the Hawk worked; I guess that’s neo Band of the Hawk technically works but I just don’t give a shit about them because #fuckgriffith.

GOD DAMMIT I JUST NEED THE STORY TO GET BACK TO THE HOLY TRIAD CHARACTERS ALREADY (GUTS-GRIFFITH-CASCA). PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD LET MOONLIGHT BOY BE A BRIDGE TO THAT HAPPENING SOON. щ(ಠ益ಠщ)

I think I have to stop here.

Don’t you miss this? Me starting on one note and ending on something completely different but universally important?)

#berserk stuff #my berserk stuff #isidro #casca #guts #schierke #anime was a mistake

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tungstenb · 4 years ago

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WIP Weekend Whenever

Tagged by @rpgwarrior4824, @ljandersen, @natsora, and @inquartata30. Thanks for the mentions, everyone!

Inq and Nat asked for fluff, so that's what I'm gonna try. I don't think my writing style is suited for fluff. But! An attempt was made. ^_-

I'm planning a bit of an intermission between SAtS and BODS — a series of vignettes from the trip to Thessia first referenced in "Cardamom and Cloves" — so here's a snippet from that (~2,500 words).

Enjoy!

Thessia: Day 2

Something's wrong.

It wasn't so much a thought but a feeling, an instinct. A surge of adrenaline to rouse her from sleep, to tense her slack muscles and propel her to act. One short intake of breath and she shot upright. Eyes keen. Mind ready.

Stillness. Early dawn.

Not wrong, only different. She'd forgotten.

Armali.

Shepard sank back down onto the plush bed, her sigh lost in the breeze rumbling with the crashing surf. Beyond the vast bedroom windows and billowing sheer curtains, new light tinted the scenery outside in a cool muted grayscale, the sky dilutely inky, the ocean mercurial, the scattered islands and jutting rock formations awaiting the colors of day, just beginning to come to life with swaying trees and flocks of birds. She sighed again. Allowed the last of her hypervigilance to bleed away. And as she shifted, turning to her left, she couldn't help the smile that tugged at her lips.

Beside her, Liara slept soundly, facing away, curled up comfortably under a drape of sheets. The relaxed curve of her shoulder rose and fell slightly with her steady breathing, the gentle sheen of microscales still somehow catching the dim early light. She glowed, even in the gray.

Shaking her head, Shepard barely suppressed a quiet breathy laugh, all amazement and relief and disbelief. She never thought she could have this. Never thought her heart could feel so full. She reached out, stopping just short of running her knuckles gently over Liara's arm, or sweeping the fallen strap of her nightgown back up over her shoulder.

She wouldn't wake her.

Hand sinking into the pillowy mattress, Shepard propped herself up and swung her legs over the bed, taking a deep breath, rolling out the residual soreness and tension in her shoulders, stretching her neck, massaging her bad leg. She stood. Breathed. Stretched again. The woven rugs were soft beneath her feet and the stonework cool as she made her way to the kitchen. Priority: coffee. Leave it to the asari to perfect the tech even for that. She hummed as she scooped the fragrant grounds into the machine, tapping a few buttons to start it brewing.

By habit she brought up her omni-tool before remembering she'd decided to ditch her usual early-morning reading for the week, her daily newsfeeds and all but the highest-priority messages muted, their pinned widgets grayed-out and transparent on her homepage. She clicked her tongue over the whirring and dribbling of the coffee maker, then wandered to the refrigerator, idly appraising its contents.

The rental house had been stocked with essentials before their arrival — maybe standard Armalian fare, maybe items a bit more suited to human tastes, maybe things Liara had requested specifically, Shepard couldn't be sure. Two large glass bottles, one green juice, the other milk (or something milk-adjacent). A variety of eggs cradled in a basket, some small and pastel, some larger, textured and mottled with bluish spots. A package of dense, doughy bread, sliced, cylindrical in shape. Small blocks of what appeared to be cheese, or butter, or another sort of cultured or aged dairy product, wrapped in decorated waxy paper. Assorted vegetables in crisper compartments. A bowl of shiny berries. A jar of… whatever the hell. She grabbed it, unscrewed the top, took a whiff. Fishy.

Best wait for Liara to wake before attempting to cook. Bit out of her element, at least with these ingredients. Chances were she'd fuck it up, Liara would wake up laughing at her and her sad burnt breakfast lump, and they'd have to go out to eat. And maybe Liara'd prefer to go out anyway, head to a quaint little cafe on the waterfront that starched its cloth napkins and served fancy drinks with like, olives and celery sticks or whatever the garnish for socially acceptable breakfast/brunch booze was here. Probably best to defer to her judgment; this was her home, after all. But she could, at the very least, have tea ready for her when she woke.

Taking the milk-like bottle and setting it on the counter, she readied and leveled her translation overlay. Tapped for an audio sample. Melikhratun, said a silvery voice in her earpiece. She poured some in a glass and tasted it. It was reminiscent of melted vanilla ice cream, even in thickness, and it coated the interior of the glass. Kinda weird, oddly tasty. She shrugged and set the glass aside, skimming through the article.

Melikhratun: a sweet liquid cream/yogurt made from haavi milk, rich in… well, everything. Fat, sugar, protein, vitamins, sometimes probiotics; eezo content variable, generally ranging from 0.5 to 5.0 ppm, depending on livestock origin and feed. Ideal for the energy needs of those who make ample use of biotics. Many regional versions, cultured and uncultured, in a multitude of flavors, some seasonal, some staples, some festive varieties only making brief appearances for annual holidays, most notably porfuranq flavor, for Janiris. Either drunk straight, used in recipes, mixed with other beverages — and essential for serving arwamaasi, a tea made famous in Serrice.

She tapped the link to arwamaasi, the article popping up beside the one for melikhratun, humming a tune as she shuffled over to the pantry.

Arwamaasi, arwamaasi… that one also sounded familiar.

The hinge squeaked as she opened the pantry door, and she turned. In the sliver of the bedroom still visible from the kitchen, she found Liara still sleeping soundly, face serene, arm relaxed resting before her. Thankfully undisturbed by the squeal of oxidized hardware needing oiling — constant humidity and salty sea air would do that. With a quiet breathy chuckle — and a mental note to tend to it later — she turned back to her search.

Translation overlay active she scanned the labels, looking for a match among the tins and boxes and jars lining the shelves. The pantry was well-stocked — nonperishables left by previous guests — and she scanned over the bubbles of transliterated text that popped up in real-time.

Arwamaasi, arwamaasi, arwamaasi, she repeated, silently. Liara had said the word before, back on the Normandy, the syllables rolling off her tongue as sweetly as the scent of spice that permeated the air and lingered on her lips after she'd drunk cup after cup, counting on the kick of caffeine to keep her awake and alert long after staring at her terminal had strained her eyes and made her mind weary.

"It's just not the same without melikhratun," she'd explained to Shepard, but assured her she enjoyed it even without the rich, sweet Thessian dairy product. Not practical to keep it aboard: perishable, spendy, difficult to acquire without eezo contamination. I'll see what I can do, regardless, Shepard had thought. Errands on the Citadel. What's that stuff called again? Alone, she'd detoured on Tayseri Ward and ordered coffee from an asari-owned cafe, hoping to jog her memory. Thought to ask for something nice to put in tea, a specific kind of tea, what's-it-called? Stopped. No, just the coffee. But… god, no. The gesture would be too forward. Her omni-tool chimed as she finalized the transaction and rocked, agitated, on her heels.

Pull yourself together.

It had ached, hurt like hell back then. Soft freckled cheeks and supple lips and spiced tea and she'd punched the Normandy's elevator console just a bit too hard, because it wasn't right, all these impure thoughts she couldn't shake, but what could she do but go run on the treadmill for half an hour and blow off that steam and longing and frustration because fuck, Liara had to know what she was doing to her when she talked so smart and sucked on her teeth and licked her lips and smiled like that.

No fucking way in hell should she even think about making the first move.

But if Shepard swiveled to her left — and she did, then — there, only meters away, Liara slept, that placid comfort clear on her face in the early light, and that sight ached too, but it ached so good. Warm and full and perfect and — god, how did she get so lucky? Bouncing on her heels, she quietly hummed while her nose and her eyes crinkled in a grin she couldn't fight, and she shook her head, scoffing in disbelief.

Shepard turned back toward the pantry, peering through the hovering transparency over her forearm. And a match. She waved the translation app away, tin in hand, flicking back to the article.

Arwamaasi: developed by tea artisans in Serrice. Made with leaves soaked in concentrated spices, then expertly woven into packed shapes designed to bloom when steeped; then fermented, where they grow in pungency; and then aged, where they condense into pellets as they dessicate. High in caffeine, this tea is treasured for its distinctive flavor, heightened with the addition of melikhratun.

Making it would be simple enough, and she collected the rest of what she needed — the melikhratun already sitting out — and switched the electric kettle on. The dry, compact tea pellets rattled in the tin as she pried off the top, then stuck her nose inside. Sniffed once and pulled back at the pungent sting. Punchy. Smells like a concussion but probably tastes real good. Gingerly, she plopped a pellet into a glass teapot.

Shepard poured a mug of coffee and drank, leaning against the counter as the tea kettle heated. It was good coffee. Really good, actually. Even better in the quiet, with the gentle humid air, the soothing rhythmic crash of the waves, the incredible view. She smiled, eyes lingering on Liara, still fast asleep —

The kettle beeped shrilly and Shepard spun to turn it off, shushing and admonishing it for its disruption, and quickly poured the boiling water into the glass teapot while sneaking glances toward the bedroom.

Stupid noisy thing. Hopefully it didn't — nope, still sleeping.

The packed cluster in the teapot unfurled lazily like some sort of sea creature, releasing amber swirls as its delicate leafy arms swayed in the steaming water. Shepard sipped at her coffee, waiting for the tea to finish steeping, tapping her fingers against the countertop as she sang soundlessly. She topped off her own mug before finishing Liara's tea preparation.

Coffee in one hand, tea in the other, she returned to the bedroom, setting the tea cup down on the nightstand. And as she lingered there, smiling, the sweet scent of arwamaasi spices wafted on the humid breeze. She leaned over, kissing Liara lightly on the cheek. When she pulled back, though Liara's eyes remained closed, a sleepy smile warmed her face.

⁂

Something warm and sweet tinged Liara's fading dreams. She stirred. Yawned. Stretched, breathing deeply as she sat upright, spilling out of a loose cocoon of soft sheets. Before her, on the nightstand, was the steaming source of that familiar scent, sweetly spicy and full as it mingled with the fresh air and tickled her nose. She picked up the cup and swiveled to look behind her.

Unsurprisingly, Shepard's absence on the bed meant she was out on the balcony. There, she sat, ankle on the opposite knee, coffee in hand, staring out at the ocean.

For a moment Liara just waited, watching her, one leg tucked up on the bed as she drank her tea. She'd never seen her look so relaxed. Never had her heart felt so full.

Eventually she slid off the bed, greeting Shepard with a light brush of her hand on her shoulder and a playful tousle of her hair.

"Mornin'. How's the tea?" she asked, scooting over in her chair to make room.

"Perfect." Liara sat, their shoulders brushing.

They didn't speak for some time, Shepard resting her head on Liara's shoulder, both watching the birds and boats and waves as the sky continued to lighten and the comfort of closeness was enough. Shepard set her mug on the table first, hopping off the chair and heading down the balcony stairs before Liara could ask where she was going. Reluctantly, setting aside her own tea, she followed.

The bottom tier, at water level, served as a dock. As Shepard leaned against the partial railing, taking in the scenery, Liara nestled up beside her. "Did you see something?" she asked.

"Something?" Shepard scoffed in amazement. Gazed back out at the ocean. "Everything," she said, awed.

Liara only chuckled softly in response, the warming breeze tickling her crest and her affection leaving her speechless. Pausing, she traced the curve of Shepard's cheek, her skin soft and slightly — as she'd recently learned to say — peach-fuzzy. "What did you want to do today?"

"That's such an open-ended question." She took Liara's hand and cupped it in both her own, running her thumb over her knuckles. "Dunno. This's your home. Anything. Surprise me. I'll even close my eyes the whole way there, if you want."

Liara shook her head, amused. "I would be willing to wager a significant credit sum that you couldn't manage to keep your eyes off me for a minute," she teased.

"Oho. Oh. One whole minute."

"An entire minute." Liara smirked. Lowered her hand from her grasp. "Okay. Let's practice."

"Okay." Shepard's gaze was unwavering as she shifted her weight from foot to foot, hands at her sides.

"I'm starting a timer," Liara warned, and brought up her 'tool.

Shepard closed her eyes, the hint of her smile still there, as she took Liara's hands in her own.

Hands occupied as they were, Liara couldn't reach out and cup Shepard's cheek, run her fingertip over the scar on her brow, trace the stubbly texture of the buzzed hairs on the sides of her head. But she could, in this moment, lean forward and kiss her.

"Five seconds," Liara announced smugly, pulling away.

"Hey — uh, no!" Shepard sputtered. "Sabotage. Doesn't count."

Liara flicked up her brows. "Try again, then?"

"I have a feeling by 'try again' you mean — ahhh…"

Liara kissed her again, pulling her close. Suddenly, she gasped and staggered back — and not because Shepard's fingertips had found pressure along the ridges on her spine.

A trio of maidens skipped by on a motorized skiff, squealing and hollering their delight at the show while triumphantly waving protective hats and fishing gear. Liara clapped her hand over her mouth, eyes wide.

Shepard, shoulders rocking with silent laughter, cleared her throat. "Uh, where were we?"

"Day plans," Liara said, removing her hand from her mouth just enough to speak.

Shepard continued to rock with laughter. "Right," she deadpanned.

"Hmm." Liara gazed upward, sucking on the inside of her cheek as she thought. Looked back to Shepard, raising her brows. "Armali Natural History Museum?"

"Oh shit, dinosaurs!"

"Excuse me?"

Shepard, expectantly wide-eyed, mouth excitedly open, burst into actual laughter.

"Is that a 'yes' or a 'no'?" Liara pressed.

"It's a 'whatever you want to do today, Li.'"

"Petraaa."

That earned Liara a nose-wrinkle. "Nobody calls me that."

Liara tapped the end of Shepard's nose and shrugged, grinning. "I do."

"At the very least," Shepard said, playfully swatting the arm attached to Liara's nose-bopping-hand away, "we should talk breakfast first." She took Liara in her arm, pulled her close, kissed her shoulder. "There's some weird-ass eggs in the fridge if you know how to cook those. Or we could eat out… hey, why are you looking at me like that?"

Her grin turned devious. "I think I'd like that," she said, and she grabbed Shepard's hand and pulled her up the stairs.

#wips #SAtS #LWLS #my writing #shiara

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livlepretre · 4 years ago

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Hey! I saw you mentioned that you outline your chapters for FE! Would you be willing to share an outline of one of the earlier chapters? It doesn't matter which one but I'd love to see how you structure your outlines. Mine tend to be all over the place and I struggle with condensing things down to chapter to chapter in order to tie everything together. Any outline I've tried tends to hinder and frustrate me. It's okay if you're not comfortable though! ILY :)

Hi there! Yes, I’d be happy to share!

This might get a bit long, because my outlining is kind of a process (but I swear by it-- I literally cannot write more than about a thousand words, total, like, there would be no more story, if I didn’t have an outline to work from).

1. The first thing I do is I write a very general outline of the whole fic. This can be either numbered, or bullet pointed, or if it’s stream of consciousness, I just say Thing A --> Thing B--> Thing C etc. Here’s part of the original outline for FE, from 2011, which I whipped out in 2016 when I decided to really give this fic a shot:

Obviously a lot has changed (there’s an actual plot other than the relationships, now, and certain storylines like Rebekah seducing Tyler on Klaus’s orders were dropped completely) but the broad strokes for what I wanted from the fic are there. The initial outline doesn’t have to be particularly detailed, or articulate-- it’s just to get down where you want the story to go. (I left off the last few bullet points because they’re still relevant to where FE is heading 😈)

2. The next step is actually breaking the outline up into either chapters or arcs. FE has gotten wildly out of control size wise, so I begin by outlining the entire arc since chapter-by-chapter would be way too hard (which is why sometimes I go on hiatus for like six months... that’s me trying to figure out what happens in like 10 chapters at once).

The first step is to divide my overall/general outline up into what goes in what arc, and then I try to think about what events would happen-- what scenes could possibly arise to make those things happen. I also like to list out any plot elements that NEED to happen, so that I don’t forget. For example, as of writing chapter 34, here was my list (color coded by what I thought might go in certain chapters):

I also write out a very loose version of what’s going to happen-- a lot of this is actually phrased as questions, because writing out what’s going to happen usually makes me realize that there are huge gaping holes in my plan. That’s sort of the point of this-- usually I end up answering the questions as I keep flow of consciousness writing. Here, again, is my general outline for New Orleans part 2, full of typos, inconsistencies, and the occasional dropped storyline:

As you can see, this is really informal and a MESS. It’s not even quite in order, but, combined with my list of plot events, it gives me the general shape I need to figure out what goes in chapter by chapter.

3. Now I finally bullet point out whatever scenes I may have for the chapter. Here’s the outline for chapter 40, which is really what ended up being chapters 40 & 41 because I split the chapter in half during the writing process:

There are some details, like whether to set it at the safe house vs the manor, which got changed for logistical reasons-- too complicated. Also, obviously, Stefan did not have his humanity turned back on here-- didn’t end up making sense with the 3 year time gap, although it would have been heartbreaking.

4. The last thing I do is I gather any scenes I may have written earlier and not published to see if they can be recycled or reworked somehow. I keep those scenes at the bottom of my word doc and whenever I’m starting a new arc, I look through them to see if any could fit-- that’s why the outline for chapter 40 is in green; I wrote the scene where Elena flees over the lawn to make Klaus chase her around the time I was writing chapter 7 and so I had that scene in green as well to match them up in my notes. I’m very color-oriented, but it’s all about finding the organization method that works for you.

So, that’s basically how I outline. I start with the general, and I refine, refine, refine. It’s hard to come up with the scene by scene stuff at the beginning, so start generally and work your way toward the more specific is my advice.

Happy writing!

#anonymous #fairytale ending #on writing

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sheliesshattered · 4 years ago

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This Isn’t A Ghost Story extras for Chapter 6: The Future

Chapter 6 of This Isn’t A Ghost Story has been posted! You can find it here on Tumblr, or here on AO3. Spoiler-ish extras under the cut!

With chapter 6 under our belts, we’ve made it through the main portion of this fic! The next two chapters will wrap up a few loose ends -- and possibly create a couple more, of the open-ended variety -- and if I hadn’t gotten quite so deep into the world-building for this, I might have actually ended the story here. All the research I did for the world-building directly inspired the next two chapters, which were both written and finished before I had anything more than a basic sketch in place for chapter 6.

Egyptology in the 1920s has clearly been a huge part of the world-building for this story from the beginning, and we get a bit more of it in chapter 6. The Doctor mentioned Howard Carter briefly in chapter 5, and here we loop back around to that and find out that Clara and the Doctor knew Carter well. I didn’t want to derail the chapter too much with talking about their friendship in any detail, but large portions of the timeline of when they were in Egypt in the 1920s was built around the historical events of the discovery and documentation of Tutankhamun’s tomb, and there are a few passing allusions to it in the journal entries in chapter 3 as well.

Howard Carter (pictured above in 1924) and his team of excavators found the entrance to Tutankhamun’s tomb in November of 1922, which would have been during the phase when Clara and the Doctor are exchanging letters and falling in love. One little historical detail that I sadly couldn’t quite use was that 23 November 1922 was actually a date of minor significance in the discovery of the tomb. It was the day that Carter’s financier, Lord Carnarvon, arrived at the dig site to witness the opening of the tomb, along with his daughter Lady Evelyn Herbert, who would have been about a year and a half younger than Clara. This picture of the three of them was taken at the entrance of the tomb in late 1922, and is similar to how I imagine Clara and the Doctor’s picture with Carter would have looked:

As the tomb was being excavated, Carter and Carnarvon assembled a team of experts to help with the huge task of cataloging, preserving, and translating all the many items found in the tomb, and though I never called it out specifically in This Isn’t A Ghost Story, I figure the Doctor was part of that team, probably specifically focused on translation work. In late February 1923, there was a short halt in the excavation that lasted a few weeks, which was what led, in our fictionalized version of events, to the Doctor briefly returning to Glasgow, and Clara’s impulsive decision to follow him there. After their wedding in May of ‘23, Clara and the Doctor went directly to Egypt, and the Doctor returned to work on Carter’s team.

Family members, tourists, and the press were all known to visit the dig site during that first year of excavation and the resulting media craze:

Given that, and Clara and the Doctor being ‘disgustingly in love newlyweds’ it seemed reasonable that Clara would have visited the site at least a few times, and been on good terms with Howard Carter. Carter actually got his start in Egyptology when he was hired as a young man to paint reproductions of ancient temple walls and other Egyptian artifacts:

During the excavation of Tutankhamun’s tomb, he made detailed sketches, including careful measurements, of every item removed from the tomb and where it had originally be found in the tomb. Much of what we know about King Tut’s tomb now is down to how methodical Carter was in documenting the original untouched state of the tomb, both with measurements, drawings, and photography. These are both drawings Carter did of the tomb during that period:

Chapter 3 mentions that Clara decided to learn to draw in the summer of 1923, so I liked the little detail that it was Howard Carter, with his meticulous and beautiful art, that suggested she take up the hobby. Modern Clara also notes in passing that she drew all throughout her childhood, particularly her ghost, which all connects back to those early days of their marriage in 1923.

I’ve got more up my sleeve about the world-building elements for the next two chapters, but since chapter 6 was the last chapter I finished, long after chapters 7 and 8 were done, I thought I’d talk a bit about the writing process as well. The final scenes I wrote for the entire story were near the end of chapter 6, and despite knowing what I needed this chapter to do, what needed to be in place to set up chapters 7 and 8, chapter 6 gave me a bit of trouble along the way.

I imagined this chapter in a lot of different ways as the story was evolving, but I always knew I wanted to emphasize the possibility of future travels for Clara and the Doctor. The theme of ‘101 Places To See’ is so strong in canon that echoing it for 1920s Clara was a big part of my world-building from the beginning, and I felt like any version of a happy ending for Clara and the Doctor had to include travel. An early draft of this chapter ended on Clara’s final line from Mummy On The Orient Express, ‘Then what are you waiting for? Let's go.’ to help emphasize that travel theme -- and because I can never resist borrowing a line from canon whenever I can find an excuse.

Another early sketch for this chapter had Clara and the Doctor venturing out for grocery shopping, with the Doctor complaining up a storm while Clara tried to carry on a conversation with him without any strangers taking note of it. Originally I had planned to include more of Clara’s work week, and had scenes roughed in where her friend and fellow teacher Amy Pond found out that Clara had gotten “engaged” over the weekend, leading Clara to have to make up something on the spot about how she’d been in a long-distance relationship that had only recently turned serious, which was why Amy had never met him. There was a whole thing about how Clara and Amy (who taught ancient world history) were co-directing Coal Hill’s production of Antony And Cleopatra, and Amy wanting to make sure that Clara wasn’t going to run off to see the world with her new fiance before the night of the play. Eventually that all got boiled down to just a single exchange between Clara and the Doctor, as I decided to keep the focus tight in on the two of them and their relationship, and not even include dialogue from any other characters.

One thing that comes up again and again in my writing projects is that when I’m imagining the plotline early in the process, it always takes up a lot more calendar days than the final product does. I imagine events taking place over the course of weeks, but then find that the emotional flow works much better condensed down to a handful of days instead. Despite my stories following that same pattern in development for more than a decade now, it somehow always seems to surprise me, lol.

Really early on in working on Ghost Story, I knew I wanted to keep Clara’s canonical birthdate of 23 November 1986 and build the rest of the timeline around that, and I picked out November 2014 as the time period for the main part of the story because it corresponds roughly to when the end of s8 of the show originally aired. But in a very early outline of events, Clara didn’t have the nightmare that led to her memories coming back until the night of her birthday, a full week later from what ended up happening in this final version.

Even as recently as a few weeks ago, I was still planning on ending this chapter on her birthday, and it wasn’t until I started digging into the scene by scene and line by line breakdown of the chapter that I realized that it really wasn’t necessary. And leaving her birthday as an upcoming event folded in nicely with the ‘Future’ theme I wanted for this chapter, so again I decided to keep the focus tight on Clara and the Doctor’s relationship as they unravel the mystery and deal with the fallout of what happened in 1927.

Figuring out what I actually wanted to happen this chapter versus what could be left on the cutting-room floor, as they say, was a huge part of the final phase of writing This Isn’t A Ghost Story. Once I had cut out extraneous scenes and meandering plot tangents (and poor Amy Pond), I was left with a very specific list of scenes and conversations, and I wrote them much the same way I write everything, jumping around to a given scene as dialogue or internal monologue occurs to me. To me it always feels like putting together a large jigsaw puzzle, filling in holes and connecting up pieces as the puzzle comes together.

I find that technique works really well for me when I’m in early and mid development of a story, but once I was down to just a couple of scenes that still needed written, progress slowed way down. I got to the point where I knew the emotional content of a scene and even most of the dialogue, and needed just a little bit of stage direction to stitch the whole thing together. Those of you who have been following along with my #process thoughts posts here may remember me posting about working on that last scene just a couple of weeks ago, trying to wrestle it into shape.

@tounknowndestinations, @praetyger, and a few others of you have asked about it, and I can now reveal that the very last bit to get written was the sequence with Clara preparing for bed and then the two of them getting into bed. I had the awkward sex conversation and the final scene the next morning already written, I just had to connect the first part of the chapter up with those last scenes. I’m happy with how it eventually came together -- and very curious to hear if any of you could pick out that that was the last bit written? -- but not having the option to work on anything else, just those specific words in that specific place, made it more of a struggle for me than writing most of the rest of Ghost Story.

My husband and beta reader Jack was more involved with the editing of this chapter than he was with any of the other chapters, and in several places helped me rewrite individual lines or conversation beats until we were both happy with how they read. @praetyger asked how I know when writing is ‘done’, and I have to admit it’s mostly a process of reading it over and over again, and then getting Jack to read it and taking his feedback seriously. I tend towards overly long run-on sentences, so if Jack gets lost while reading a sentence, that’s one he’ll call out as needing to be reworded for clarity.

There’s one sentence in this chapter that we went back and forth over quite a lot: ‘The feeling of what might have been that seeing their wedding photo had elicited in her wasn’t some strange, misplaced jealousy, but rather the knowledge she carried deep in her soul, buried in her subconscious, that their story wasn’t over yet.’ It was originally even more wordy, and Jack would have preferred the final version be a lot more simple, but it just didn’t read right to me without ‘elicited’ so I stuck to my guns on that bit, even as I filed down some of the wordiness in other parts of the sentence.

Both for reworking a sentence and for writing big sections in the first place, my method is generally to write it and edit a little as I go, trying to get the word choice and pacing as close to what I want as I can on a first pass. Then I’ll let it sit, at the very least overnight but often for days or longer at a time, then come back and reread it when it isn’t so fresh in my mind. At that point, sometimes a phrase will jump at me as awkward or something I used just a paragraph or two earlier, so I’ll rewrite it, let it sit, come back and edit it all over again. Sometimes what seemed like plenty of room for an emotional beat when I was writing it will go by way too fast when I reread it, so I’ll add to it, give it space to breathe. Rinse and repeat.

For the record, Jack’s favorite line from this chapter is this bit of dialogue for the Doctor: ‘“Yes,” he allowed warily, clearly not sure where she was going with this.’ I imagine it’s probably for similar reasons as why he liked the ‘she didn’t add again but knew they were both thinking it’ bit from chapter 5. I try not to put my own marriage into my writing too much, but there are some experiences of being married that I think are probably pretty universal.

@ephemeralhologram asked about my writing inspiration, and for me my writing is always driven by a kernel of a what-if idea and a desire to convey a certain emotion. I almost always start out with a ‘plotbunny’ idea, some tiny thing that I daydream about and consider from multiple angles until a plot and emotional tone starts coming into focus.

For Ghost Story, it was actually a shitpost here on Tumblr about a real estate agent having a conversation with the ghost who haunts the house they’re trying to sell, along with wanting to try telling a Twelve/Clara story in an alternate universe completely separate from the show canon, which I had never done before Ghost Story. The emotional tone started out much sillier, more in line with that Tumblr post, but as I got into the world-building and decided I wanted to have a mystery and mutual pining at the center of this story, the tone shifted quite a lot.

The other major drivers of writing inspiration for me are that I enjoy putting words together into interesting and emotionally evocative combinations, and I enjoy conveying character emotion and eliciting emotion in the reader. No matter what fandom I’m writing in, no matter how close to canon or how AU, how short or long the story is, those two things are always at the center of my writing.

I walk around the house or do chores that I don’t have to focus on too much (dishes are excellent for this) just tossing around bits of dialogue in my head until I find an emotional beat that grabs me or a bit of phrasing that I really like. I jot those down into a googledoc -- most of my DW stories start out in a doc called “Doctor Who Bits” that is in fact just fragments of multiple stories, and then eventually a story will graduate into having its own dedicated googledoc. Figuring out the plot is just as much about deciding on the emotional journey I want to take the characters and/or the readers on as it is deciding on an order of events.

Thank you to @tounknowndestinations, @ephemeralhologram, and @praetyger for the questions! I am more than happy to answer any questions about my writing process or details about this story, or anything really, so feel free to hit me up in my ask, or in the comments on this post, or in a comment over on AO3. Thank you to everyone who has followed along with this story, and for all the support and encouragement you’ve offered along the way, I couldn’t have written this story without this wonderful little corner of the Whouffaldi fandom! ❤️

Extras for Chapter 7: The Museum

#This Isn't A Ghost Story #This Isn't A Ghost Story extras #process thoughts #my writing #Doctor Who #Doctor Who fanfic #Clara and the Doctor

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wildbootsappeared · 4 years ago

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Continental Divides Chapter Discussion #0: Humble Origins/Editing and Rewriting

I recently enjoyed hearing Negrek talk about the behind-the-scenes of the most recent chapter of Salvage and was inspired: I figure some of you might be interested in hearing some of that type of thing for Divides, too. CD touches on some pretty complicated subjects (historical events and politics and glazed-over-science) that are worth teasing apart a little more. So I’m going to start slowly adding in some chapter reflection posts! Keep in mind that these will probably be full of spoilers, and you’ll want to get caught up before you read em.

If you want to hear me talk about something specific, feel free to shoot me a question.

(By the way, if you’re not reading Salvage yet—fam, get on my level. I’d describe it as a black humor odd-couple tale of … friendship??? Hm, that’s definitely not the right word, is it? Anyway! Featuring: an absolute goblin of a pokemorph, dismemberment, corruption, and Very Good Decisions. And lovely prose, by the way.)

With that, let’s get into it!

(CD spoilers below!)

Art by Giulia Bernardelli

From Humble Origins

I’ve mentioned before that Mark and Natalie were my first original characters. They were side characters in my first ever fic from … god, 2003 or 2004-ish? So in many ways, they’ve grown up with me.

I learned about fanfic shortly after Ruby and Sapphire came out in the US, so of course baby OSJ had to try her hand at a Hoenn journey fic. I’m really sad that I don’t have a copy of the original text anymore because it was hilariously bad. You see, Brendan and May had to run away from home (instead of just … journeying like every other trainer?) because they were IN LOVE (after, like, a day and a half at most) but their parents WOULDN’T LET THEM BE TOGETHER. The story featured dazzling moments of creative genius like … Brendan and May “sneaking” into Rustboro at the wee hour of 10 am, whereupon May ran into a lamp post somehow.

Later, Mark and Natalie appear to yell at our poor heroes and then at each other. Lots of yelling. In their first inception, Mark and Nat were basically discount Jesse and James but with less dress-up and queer subtext. Mark had a glorious moment of running while dragging his feet (?). Also, during a double battle against Brendan and May, I forgot about his zubat, so it fainted because “it was tired from flying,” despite having no feet and despite taking zero hits during the fight. Then Mark took shelter from the rain under a tree, where Natalie yelled at him some more and decided for both of them that they had to team up “temporarily” to get the red and blue orbs back from those meddling kids or something. I had grand plans for this whole plot where Natalie would kidnap May to get the orbs, but then May would end up in Magma’s hands (like a human hot potato), and Brendan would have to rescue her??? Something, something, Mark and Natalie see the error of their ways and team up to help Brendan and May … do stuff?

Anyway, I never finished it, and that’s definitely for the best.

I did revisit Mark and Natalie a few years later, though, this time for a story of their own called Out of Hand. I didn’t finish that one either, but I do have the original text this time (plus snarky comments and a “review” from me ten years after the fact). I can’t honestly tell you it was … good. Maybe good-for-a-highschooler. But! When I stumbled upon it again in 2018, there was enough in it that almost worked that I started to think about how I’d handle those themes and characters as an adult.

A lot has changed since then, but that 2010 draft of Out of Hand established some of the skeleton of Continental Divides. For example, that was when Archie became Natalie’s brother to help explain how she got involved in Aqua. I decided to keep that structure because it was a good way to let Natalie start as a neutral party/reader proxy and then quickly become embroiled in the conflict. It was also the first time Mark’s sister appeared, though I don’t think I’d decided what to do with her at the time except to use her as decorations in his angsty dreams, haha. His smoking habit also started in 2010. I, too, thought he’d quit “years ago,” in literal real time. Jokes on me—it turned out to be a useful way to signal the start of him losing control, the negative influence of Cora/Magma in his life, his hypocrisy, and his guilty feelings about things he’s burned. Scarlet appeared for the first time in this draft, too. I think I was equal parts trying to humanize Archie and to write my way through feelings about growing apart from/pining for someone. Her backstory took up a disproportionate number of pages in the old draft, but I liked the idea of keeping her around as a figure who could complicate Natalie’s relationship with Aqua and with Archie. The 2010 has a couple fights between Mark and Natalie that I respect for bringing real danger to the protagonists ... but also can’t help laughing at. They literally fight until they tumble over a waterfall, like a cartoon. Silly as those scenes are, you can also see how they laid a foundation for scenes like the fight in Chapter 9.

CD is basically me responding to Out of Hand with, “I see you and I raise you.”

2010-OSJ had some vague feelings about inequality and environmentalism, but none of it was very well thought-out. She mostly wanted to tell an enemies-to-lovers story, in part because she thought she was living in one IRL. Nowadays, I’ve got a lot of feelings about climate change, political divisions, activism and responsibility, corporations, policing, and whether or not violence is a good answer to certain kinds of questions. Hoenn is a safe space to explore those feelings. (It’s got pokemon, so it’s inherently more fun, right???)

Kyogre and Groudon are such obvious parallels to sea level rise/more intense storms and rising temperatures/wildfires respectively that I couldn’t resist. And in Magma/Aqua I see a lot of parallels to political conflicts happening in the US right now. The far left and the far right don’t share a vision of what a “better world” would look like, but they do share a mutual mistrust of “the swamp” and all the ways the government tag-teams with corporations to dunk on ordinary people. I’d love to believe that someday we could team up across the aisle to fight corruption together. It’s certainly hard to imagine how we could get to a better world with one half of the country pitted against each other … Something has got to give eventually, probably not peacefully.

My versions of Magma and Aqua aren’t exact parallels to the US political left and right—both are pretty left-leaning, for one—but I still find a lot of hope in the idea of two enemies from rival factions learning to (eventually) care for one another and work together towards common goals. At the very least, it’s something I can manifest and control on the page, and that makes me feel better about all the things I can’t control.

Editing and Rewriting

My first attempt at Continental Divides was inarguably an improvement on earlier versions of Mark and Natalie … but it still took quite a bit of rewriting to get to the draft that’s available to read now. The first draft in 2018 opened with what’s now Chapter 3, the protest in Rustboro. I had the right idea with “starting at the beginning,” but starting with an action scene was the wrong move: we didn’t know enough about Natalie to care when she was in trouble or to understand why she was making any of those choices. Moreover, even though the political content is important, this is ultimately still an enemies-to-lovers story: the beginning needed to center Mark and Natalie’s relationship. You know, to establish some interest before it all implodes. The next attempt ran a little long, though, and the current version condenses their initial meeting and Nat’s backstory much better. Maybe the next time I start a new project I’ll have an easier time knowing what makes a good starting point, but this time there was a lot of swinging back and forth to find a balance.

If you’re interested in seeing how my first chapter changed over time, you can see that here.

I’m really happy to have a first chapter I know is a solid representation of the subject matter, tone, and writing level of the later chapters. Getting stuck in an editing loop is a real danger … but if you’re ever going to edit part of your fic, let it be the first chapter. A good first chapter is critical to keeping potential readers onboard. I can tell from feedback that I’ve stuck the landing now.

Hope you enjoyed this not-so-little reflection on the origins of this story!

Some music (Spotify links):

Night of the Long Knives - Everything Everything

MMMMHMMMMM - Four Fists

#continental divides #pokemon fic #pokefic #pokemon fanfic #team magma #team aqua #fanfic #writing about writing

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moonlightmadnessreviews · 5 years ago

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Polaroid (2019)

Sick days are for catching up on movies! Now I love a good, classic horror staple, but sometimes it’s fun to jump into the pool of Netflix horror and what should I stumble upon but 2019’s Polaroid. Directed by Lars Klevberg, Polaroid adapts Klevberg’s 2015 short of the same name. Having directed last year’s Child’s Play remake, which I actually had a lot of fun with, I was excited to see what I already felt was going to be a pretty bad teen horror. But is it as bad as the trailers made it look, and does it have anything at all to do with it’s PG-13 rating?

Polaroid builds on Klevberg’s original short, opening with a condensed version of said short’s events, where we see teens Sarah and Linda going through a box belonging to Sarah’s late mother. Upon finding the cursed Polaroid camera, Sarah decides to take some racy pictures for her boyfriend (made all the more special because it’s physical rather than digital?) and is promptly killed off by a shadowy figure. The movie then follows shy outcast Bird Fitcher and her group of friends as they’re hunted by the malevolent being inhabiting the SX-70 Polaroid camera. The being jumps from photo to photo, reminiscent of Death in Final Destination 3, choosing its victims based on the order the pictures were taken.

Our cast of characters are lead by Kathryn Prescott as Bird, Tyler Young as Conner, Samantha Logan as Kasey, and couple Mina and Devin are played by Priscilla Quintana and Keenan Tracey respectively. Mitch Pileggi also stars as the towns shady Sheriff Pembroke, Davi Santos as Bird’s co-worker Tyler, Grace Zabriskie as Lena Sable, and the wickedly talented Javier Botet as The Entity. Prescott does what she can in the role of Bird, at times feeling somewhat stiff and uncomfortable in the role due to poor writing. Her friends unfortunately don’t come off as real people and are incredibly one dimensional, just filling in the roles we’re used to seeing in these movies.

Most of my problems with the film come from the screenplay by Blair Butler, who was also one of the writers on Hell Fest, a movie I didn’t hate but certainly had its issues as well. There are moments in the film where I was left wondering why certain lines where left in and angered by character’s dumb decisions. For example, we learn that Bird was in a traumatic and devastating accident with her father, leaving her with a deep scar she hides with a scarf. Throughout the first act, we hear characters teasing her (“Hey look it’s scarf girl!”) in ways that made me wonder if anyone who worked on this film had ever actually attended high school. Children can be petty and horrible to one another, but rarely do they come off that lame. Though Bird wasn’t written with much depth to her, I did like this layer to her character, and I just wish it had been presented better.

Horror movies are famous for their “Why would you go in there?!” moments, but this movie made me wonder if I’ve a deep rooted fear of the dark. No one in this film seems to keep any lights on in their homes, making it easy for The Entity to kill them! At one point, when walking her friend to the door, a character turns around and calls her friend’s name. Now... you just watched her walk out of your house, and are now calling her wondering if she’s somehow leapt back in through a second floor window? Perhaps if there were any lights on in the house, she wouldn’t have been so confused. The darkness that looms over every shot does help the mood of the film, and it does set up a good deal of jump scares, albeit not very good ones, which does bring me to Blair Butler’s defense. This seems more like a decision handed down from the studio to fill the movie with more and more of these cheap scares.

The movie does set up rules for the camera and how The Entity hunts its prey and I liked how, when trying to destroy a photo in order to save themselves, we see that whatever is done to the photo happens in real life. We then watch as Mina’s arm catches fire and another character is pinned to a wall by an invisible pencil. This, along with the rules that The Entity itself had the same vulnerability to light and heat as a photo would was a nice touch. I should add how much I liked Javier Botet’s looks as The Entity. It’s a highlight of the film, though I was offended that they made him so wheezy. As an asthmatic, I hope not to be looked at as a monster. I simply can’t breathe sometimes.

The movie did surprise me come the third act. We come to find that a killer, Roland Joseph Sable, had been in possession of the haunted camera and photographed his victims with it, before being killed by police. Upon investigating this, Bird comes to find Sable was merely a father driven mad by the bullying of his daughter Rebecca, chasing down those bullies after his daughter hung herself. There is one last twist where we find the bullies were in fact trying to save Rebecca from Roland’s abuse and he planted photos of Rebecca to make it seem like the bullies pushed her to suicide. This is the movie I’d wished I’d been watching! In my opinion, story would be much more interesting, and even though all the twists and turns in such a short period of time it did seem a bit silly, could have been the start to a franchise! If we just look at how horrible Ouija was compared to it’s sequel Ouija: Origin of Evil, I don’t think it’s such a stretch to salvage the story of Roland Joseph Sable and his haunted camera. I have to give credit to Butler where credit is due, as that story certainly saved the movie for me.

Speaking of movies we could have gotten, it’s interesting to see how, when watching Klevberg’s original 2015 short, the idea for a very different movie was certainly there. Though I’d love to see a detective movie following the murder of Rebecca Sable’s friends and her father, Klevberg seemed to have had a story in mind that had more to do with grief. After movies like Hereditary and the Babadook, it’s clear that audiences can understand when a movie is speaking metaphorically, and the Polaroid short seems to hint more toward’s Sarah’s grief and longing to have closure with her recently deceased mother. I feel if Klevberg had the opportunity to expand on that story, we would have gotten an A24 style horror movie instead of a something belonging in the Conjuring Universe.

A lot has been said about PG-13 horror. Fans of the horror genre seem to hate it, largely due to the quality of movies we’ve gotten in the last few years that are released under this rating. But if we look at movies like The Bye Bye Man, Ouija, The Nun and Polaroid, there are problems that have less to do with the rating. Yes, kills will be neutered and we won’t have as much gore, but blood will not make up for bad writing and studio interference. Klevberg is a director whose work I am coming to enjoy, and Butler’s screenplay, though not great, pulled through with some cool ideas in the end. When studios allow film makers to make the movies they want, and stop demanding jump scares over substance, PG-13 horror will stop getting the bad rap it’s so often teased for.

Rating: 2 Full Moons out of 5 🌕🌕

#polaroid #polaroid movie #polaroid 2019 #horror movies #film reviews #horror #horror films #movie reviews #moonlight madness #moonlight madness reviews #kathryn prescott #madelaine petsch #tyler young #javier botet #lars klevberg

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dr-m-r-ma · 5 years ago

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Article 2: Termination

Part 2/2

Genre: drama, romance Rating: PG-13 Group: Monsta X

Summary: Hyejung met Changkyun at a private party hosted by mutual friends. After one drink too many, they accidentally get caught fooling around by Dispatch photographers. What started as a sarcastic joke became a reality, forcing Hyejung to see Changkyun more often than she wanted to.

Disclaimer: This is 100% fictional and my own story. It is unrelated to the actual events and real people of Monsta X and Starship. Hyejung Lee (이혜정) is an original character created for this fanfic. Parts will be written in Korean with English translations. I did not major/study in English/Korean, nor was I ever strong in English/Korean grammar, so there will be grammatical mistakes. This fanfic is written in third person and past-tense for ease of writing. The full title: 제 2 조: 계약 해지, 헤어질 때 (Article 2: Termination, When We Break Up)

The words came out before she thought it through, and by the look of horror on Joohee’s face and the ecstatic look on the manager’s face, Hyejung knew. She fucked up.

As she opened her mouth to take back her words, Changkyun’s manager placed blank sheets of paper and a red inkpad in front of her. He said, “그럼 여기다 먼저 쓰시고, 다 끝날때 공증 받을게요.” (Trnsl: “You can write here first, and when you’re done, I’ll get it notarized.”) With that, he got up to leave.

Hyejung still had her lips parted, but no sound came out after he mentioned that her terms would be notarized. The manager looked back at called out to Joohee, “그쪽도 나오시죠.” (Trnsl: “You should also come out.”) Hyejung looked up, trying to hold onto Joohee with her desperate eyes. Joohee also tried to stay, but Changkyun dismissed her.

“우리둘이서 할 얘기가 있는데, 친구분을 좀… 내보내봐.” (Trnsl: “I think we have stuff to talk about privately, so try to… kick your friend out.”)

Joohee gaped at his arrogance and provoking tone. Hyejung, on the other hand, sighed with defeat. She patted Joohee on the shoulder, “하… 언니, 근처에서 커피마시고 있어. 다 끝나면 전화할게.” (Trnsl: *Sigh*... “Joohee, go to a cafe nearby. I’ll call you when I’m done.”)

With Joohee and the manager gone, the room was cold and silent. The air was thick, like it was layered with piercing needles. Hyejung and Changkyun stared at each other, each of their eyes trying to win the fight.

When his lips curled up to the side a little, she could see his canine peek out. The sight of it brought her back to the night before, making her shiver. She didn’t want those memories barging in anymore, so she grudgingly looked away.

“큭크크ㅋ” (Trnsl: “Keukeke”)

His small laugh pricked Hyejung -- she wanted to splash another drink in his face, but ah, unfortunately, they had both finished their glasses of water.

Ignoring his mockery, she took a pen and twirled it in her fingers. “이거 빨리 끝내자.” (Trnsl: “Let’s hurry up and finish this.”)

“와우. 적극적이네.” (Trnsl: “Wow. So proactive.”) he smirked, causing Hyejung to raise an eyebrow at him. He continued, “솔직히 좋았지? 기사 터지고 나서 얼마나 기뻤겠어.” (Trnsl: “Honestly, you liked it, right? You must have been so excited after seeing the news article.”)

아...이새끼… (Trnsl: Ah… this bastard…)

But she knew better than to let him provoke her like that. Instead, she started writing the first line of the contract onto her paper.

연애 계약. (Dating Contract.)

Then she was stumped. Twirling her pen in her hand again, Hyejung stared down at the mostly blank paper. 뭘 써야되지? (Trnsl: What do I need to write?)

“계약기간. 1년.” (Trnsl: “Contract period. 1 year.”)

Just the sound of his low voice sent a wave of irritation. She finally looked up at him with a frown that deepened by every moment they interacted. However, she was taken aback by the look on Changkyun’s face. It looked like he was serious about writing the contract as well, as the smirk was wiped off and he stared down at the paper as well.

Hyejung pushed back. “너무 길어 -- 6개월로 가자.” (Trnsl: “That’s too long -- let’s go with 6 months.”) As she began to write the words, Changkyun threw his hands up in exasperation.

The action irked Hyejung and immediately they started arguing.

“야, 뭐가 문제야? 1년 너무 길지 않아? 나만 싫은거야??” (Trnsl: “Hey, what’s the issue? Isn’t 1 year too long? Am I the only one against it??”) she asked. Her voice was at least five decibels louder than before, and she was nowhere near backing down.

Changkyun puffed out his chest in what seemed like a poor attempt in making her back down. “장난해? 내가 더 싫거든!” (Trnsl: “Are you kidding? I hate it more!”)

“그럼 됐네! 6개월.” (Trnsl: “Then it’s settled! 6 months.”)

계약기간: 6개월. (Term: 6 months.)

While his face scrunched with frustration, Hyejung stared at the words “계약기간” (Trnsl: “Term”). Right below it, she wrote:

계약 해지: 헤어질 때. (Termination: When we break up.)

“그건 당연한거 아니야? 꼭 그런것들도 써야해?” (Trnsl: “Isn’t that obvious? Do you have to write all those [obvious] things?”) he sneered.

She ignored his question and instead asked if he wanted to talk about the terms of the contract. After all, the terms were the most important part of a contract. She handed him a pen and they started to brainstorm on what to put for the terms. Changkyun had hundreds of small things he wanted to include, while Hyejung constantly reminded him to condense things down. She had things she wanted to say, but she ended up nagging at him longer than the time she spent brainstorming.

As they argued for the next hour about which were necessary and which were absolute to each other, Hyejung wrote up the final version on her paper.

이용 약관. (Terms and conditions.)

티나게 행동하기. (Make it obvious.)

3일에 한번씩 같이 셀카 올리기. (Upload a selfie together once every 3 days.)

손잡는거와 가벼운 포옹 외에는 스킨십 금지. (With the exception of holding hands and light hugs, skinship is prohibited.)

1주일에 한번씩 밥 같이 먹기. (Eat together once a week.)

다른사람과 만나도되나, 걸리지 않기. 걸리면 상대방에게 10만원 주기. (Can meet other people, but don't get caught. If you get caught, give 100,000 won ($100) to the other person.)

계약 해지 전 그 누구한테 들통나면, 상대방에게 100만원 주기 + 상대방측에서 먼저 기사 내기. (If someone finds out before contract termination, give 1,000,000 won ($1,000) to the other person + let the other person release an article first.)

사랑하지 않기. (Do not love.)

They both still had things to say, of course, but it was good enough.

Hyewon sighed. Why was this harder than it needed to be? Her eyes scanned the document and she scrunched her nose at the second condition.

“3일 너무 자주 아니야?” (Trnsl: “Isn’t 3 days too often?”)

Changkyun laughed, “우리 멤버들이랑은 매일 올려놓거든? 3일에 하나씩은 아무것도 아니야.” (Trnsl: “My members and I upload every day, okay? So once every three days is nothing.”) As Changkyun started to sign his name at the bottom, it was his time to grumble. “왠지 넌 ‘갑’이고 난 ‘을’인것 같은 느낌적인 느낌??” (Trnsl: “Somehow I feel like you’re the one controlling me??”)

Hyejung rolled her eyes at him. “뭐가.” (Trnsl: “Like what.”)

“아니… 〈 3. --스킨십 금지 〉?? 내가 왜 더 바랄거라고 생각하는거야?” (Trnsl: “I mean… 〈 3. -- skinship prohibited 〉?? Why do you think I’ll be wanting more?”) He had a look of contempt and disgust dripping from his face, and it almost made Hyejung throw a punch. Almost.

He continued, “그리고, 4번 -- 매주 한번씩? 잘시간도 모자란데 어떻게 자주 만나라는거야.” (Trnsl: “Also, number 4 -- every week? I hardly have time to sleep, so how am I supposed to meet you this often?”)

Her frown deepened, and she squinted her eyes at Changkyun. He looked back, confused. So she slowly asked, “일주일에 한번씩 밥먹을 시간은 없으면서… 3일에 한번씩 만나서 셀카찍어? 그게 말이돼?” (Trnsl: “You don’t have time to eat together once a week… but you have time to meet up for a selfie once every three days? Does that make sense?”)

This time, he rolled his eyes. “아… 스트레스.” (Trnsl: “Ugh… stress.”) Pinching the bridge of his nose, Changkyun explained in a painfully slow way, as if to teach a child something new. “하루에 많이 찍으면되잖아. 옷도 몇번 갈아입을수 있고. 그러면 3일에 한번씩 올릴때 선택할 수있는 사진이 많잖아. 알겠어?” (Trnsl: “We just have to take multiple in one day. Maybe even change our clothes a few times. Then, we have a lot to choose from when we upload once every 3 days. Got it?”)

핳. 쓰래기네. (Trnsl: Ha. Total trash.) Her tongue poked into her cheek, as her eyes lost the light. Whatever positive thoughts she had about Changkyun before, if she had any, disappeared with his idea. “이야… 완전 사기같네? 너 배우 될수 있겠다.” (Trnsl: “Wow… seems like a total scam? You could be an actor.”)

“칭찬이지? Thanks.” (Trnsl: “A compliment, right?”)

Bewildered, Hyejung just let out a sarcastic laugh. Shaking her head, she went back to the contract. Changkyun had finished signing, dating and stamping his thumb with the red ink on the contract. As she reached over to sign as well, her eye glanced at #5.

“잠깐 -- 5번. 카메라에 잡히면이야 아니면 아는사람에게 걸리면이야?” (Trnsl: “Wait -- #5. Is it if one of us gets caught on camera or is it if caught by someone we know?”) As if it made a difference, but suddenly she just wanted to stall signing off on the contract.

Without so much a glance, he replied, “이거나 저거나 똑같지 않아?” (Trnsl: “Either this or that, isn’t it the same?”)

안먹히네. (Trnsl: He’s not falling for it.) She tsked and signed her name. While she dated next to her name and prepared to stamp her thumb onto the document, the same annoying and arrogant voice interrupted her.

“야, 근데 6번은 너무하지 않아? 정말 실수로 들통나면 어떻게?” (Trnsl: “Hey, but isn’t #6 too much? What if getting caught is really accidental?”)

Hyejung sighed as she slid her thumb across the inkpad. “그러니까 조심하라고.” (Trnsl: “So be careful.”)

“헐… 그건 그렇다고 치고.. 100만원은 또 뭐야? 사는게 많이 힘든거야 뭐야?” (Trnsl: “Oh my god… okay whatever about that, but what’s all this about $1,000? Are you strapped on cash or what?”)

*Click* There it went, the release of Hyejung’s imaginary gun, ready to pull the trigger. Her thumb hovered over the paper, as she was now second, third, fourth-guessing her decision to get into this contract with this dipshit. Before her finger was a hair’s length away from the paper, she muttered, “인센티브라고 못 들어봤니?” (Trnsl: “Ever heard of an incentive?”)

“...”

Hearing nothing but the satisfying silence, Hyejung finally stamped her thumb down. She knew it’d be tough having to deal with such a sassy and arrogant guy like him, but every moment she got back at him was just so sweet.

She held the document up and cracked a small smile. Her eyes glanced to the side towards Changkyun, and when she saw his pout, her eyes twinkled with more delight. In a loud sing-song voice, she said, “우리 이거 들키면 나도 안 좋으니까 우리 잘 노력하자.” (Trnsl: “It’s bad for me too if this gets caught, so let’s try our best.”)

Hyejung reached her hand out to him, and Changkyun reluctantly took her hand. Contrary to how they started, it was she who smirked evilly and he who grimaced.

< PRESENT DAY >

The interview was over, and the reporter asked if it was okay to take photos for the article. She asked them to express their love to each other as the photographer behind them snapped continuous shots.

Changkyun forced a small chuckle, revealing his teeth a little. He quietly said, “사랑해.” (Trnsl: “I love you.”)

“---꺄!! 너무 귀엽고 달콤해요!” (Trnsl: “--Kya!! That was so cute and so sweet!”) The reporter squealed, causing Hyejung to raise an eyebrow. Clearly, the reporter was a fan of him.

Seeing a blush creep up on his cheeks, Hyejung decided to play a trick. It was really only to convince others and play the part perfectly. Hell, she could have been an actress if that was a screening test.

She reached up, lightly touching Changkyun’s cheek. He immediately stiffened up at her touch, and when Hyejung leaned in, he froze. She laughed to herself, seeing the awkward reaction. The final touch was those icky words -- “사랑해.” (Trnsl: “I love you.”)

As the reporting and the photographer gushed about the couple, nobody knew what they were really thinking.

7. 사랑하지 않기. (Do not love.)

She thought, ‘하! 그럴 일은 없을거든! 그런 상투적인건 됐어.’ (Trnsl: ‘Ha! As if that’ll ever happen! Spare me the cliche shit.’)

He thought, ‘존나 웃겨. 너도 내 스타일아니고 절때 널 좋아할일은 없어.’ (Trnsl: ‘Fucking hilarious. You’re also not my type and I would never fall for you.’)

*** END ***

A/N: actually I’m not entirely sure if I should continue this?? I haven’t really brainstormed that much to continue it, but my original plan was to have it like 7-10 parts... but I feel like it’s a good ending with this part? (lmao) so let me know what you guys feel about it? comments/messages always appreciated :) // edit: for now, it will be the end!

#monsta x changkyun #changkyun fluff #Monsta X IM Changkyun #monsta x scenarios #monsta x fluff #monsta x reactions #monsta x fanfic #monsta x fic #mx scenarios #mx fluff #mx fic #mx reactions #mx fanfic #mx changkyun #kpop fanfic #kpop fic #kpop scenarios #kpop reactions #article2 fic

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animebw · 5 years ago

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Short Reflection: Little Witch Academia, Original OVAs

It’s sort of amazing to me how much goodwill Little Witch Academia acquired before even being released as a full show. Before Studio Trigger even became a household name with their breakout smash Kill la Kill, they made their mark on the anime landscape with a simple, straightforward 26-minute OVA about a school for young witches, and that OVA became the basis for an entire legacy of magic and wonder. It won hearts and minds with its beautiful animation and gorgeously rendered aesthetics, painting a beautiful picture of what this new kid on the block was capable of. And then they one-upped themselves with a full hour-long movie special set in the same world, showcasing an even greater bevy of imagination and soul. With barely four episodes worth of content, this little franchise that could established itself as a true, enduring story, one with the power to touch hearts and minds solely by virtue of how deeply it spoke to the childlike wonder residing in us all. And it was only then that they actually got around to making a complete story out of it, and, well, as the ravenous tongue-lashing I’ve given the Little Witch Academia TV show has confirmed, it was well worth the wait. So now that we finally have the finished product to indulge in, now that Little Witch Academia has reached its final form, what do we make of those first two OVAs that started this entire journey off?

Well, there’s certainly delight to be found in seeing how many of the show’s best ideas first started to take shape here. There are so many moments from across the OVA and The Enchanted Parade that made me smile in recognition of what they would eventually blossom into. We get our first glimpses of the big ship that Constanze would build in episode 18, the movie’s plot feels like a first draft for the magic festival that closes out the show’s first half, and we get a condensed version of Akko’s arc, learning not to selfishly drag her friends into her schemes without putting in the effort to earn their trust. There’s also a handful of interesting differences that suggest how the story evolved over time. Shiny Chariot’s initial concert doesn’t have that moment where the fairy bursts from Akko’s chest; instead, the fairy is a living being that dazzles Akko as it flies by her. In other words, the original writer probably didn’t have episode 22′s stomach-turning twist in mind yet, making this scene exactly what it appeared to be in the show at first: a dazzling moment of whimsy and wonder that inspires Akko to follow in her idol’s footsteps. And that idea is reinforced by the fact that in this version, Akko can actually do magic. Her power wasn’t sucked away, and she’s capable of casting spells with everyone else; she just needs to practice a hell of a lot in comparison to everyone else.

On another note, my god, the animation is breathtaking. Look, the TV show was already beautiful as fuck, with some of the best aesthetic character animation I’ve ever seen, but the budgetary freedom allowed by these single-shot projects allows them to take it to another level entirely. Everyone has so much momentum in motion, with so much attention paid to how the characters’ weight affects their actions. The slapstick and stretchy expressions are all supercharged to incredible degrees, with near-constant movement and a constant cavalcade of delightful faces. That one moment where Akko cracks her back like a glowstick? Dude, I felt that in my bones. And she is flouncy as fuck when pouring her excitement over everyone else, to an extent that the show wasn’t quite able to reach this consistently. There’s also a lot more specific detail in the comedic asides in the animation, little tidbits that further enhance everyone’s wacky clashes of personality. There’s a great moment in the first OVA where Akko somehow ends up with a knight’s helmet on her head, which allows Diana to smack its visor closed in a moment of exasperation, making for a far more effective bit of punctuation on their argument than simple words could’ve managed. That level of detail is littered throughout pretty much every scene in these OVAs. Not to mention a richer, deeper color palette, using more vibrant colors and heavier shadows to convey a much more palpable texture than the show. And when the action kicks up? Holy shit, y’all, this franchise has never been more stunning. The climax of the movie, in particular, damn near took my breath away with its kinetic energy.

That being said, as wonderful as it is to see where Little Witch Academia came from, I definitely prefer the more complete version we have in the show. The magic is still strong here, but you can tell they were still working out a lot of kinks in regards to what kind of story they wanted to tell beyond the surface-level delights. Diana, in particular, is far more of a stereotypical arrogant asshole than her more nuanced depiction in the show, and it does not work as well. What made Diana such a great foil for Akko was how sensible she was, how her antagonism was based on justifiable criticisms of the way her rival did things. Here, she’s just Draco Malfoy, and she’s not nearly as compelling. The thematic resonance also hasn’t fully come into its own yet; the conflicts presented here are a much more bog-standard “Let’s show these cynical modern people the power of good old-fashioned magic!” take than the show’s powerful thesis statement on the conflicting tides of past and future. There are some things from this OVA I do prefer; I love how it gets so gruesome when they take down the minotaur in the labyrinth, and the side squad being introduced as the ultimate troublemaking bad kids was a delightful character introduction that I wish made it into the finished product. Also, I think Amanda’s aerial dance moves just turned me into a lesbian, so there’s that. But it’s definitely a first draft, one that I’m glad I was able to see the final version of, because all the wonderful potential showcased here was realized beautifully when they found the right story to tell with it.

So in the end, while I definitely prefer the show’s version of events, I’m still glad I checked out the origins of Little Witch Academia. They were a charming trip through the conception of a truly wonderful story, and it was a blast seeing how it all came to be. And while I’m sad to be bidding this franchise farewell, I have no regrets about the time I spent with it. Thank you all for joining me, folks, and I hope you stick around for when I take on Happy Sugar Life in its place!

#anime #the anime binge-watcher #tabw #little witch academia #lwa

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morphogenetic · 6 years ago

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why you should play the ds version of 999 first and not the nonary games version: a thread

excuse the formatting of this bc im copying it from my twitter as text, but: why you shouldn’t play the nona/ry games version of 999 on your first run, a thread. lots of this has been said by other people too but i figured i would condense my opinions + what other people have said. 999 spoilers ofc, also vague vlr spoilers later on but the 999 spoilers are a lot worse lmao.

this is ABSURDLY long and i am sorry but tl;dr spoiler free version: buy tng anyway so you can easily play vlr in hd and to support the games, but play 999 on either a ds or an emulator if you have to because boy howdy the story is really meant for this platform (if you’re replaying 999 in the tng version after originally playing the ds version none of this applies LMAO)

(also this isn't meant to at ALL be angry at people who played the t/ng port first! im sad y'all didn't get to experience the dual screen version, but at this point t/ng is much more accessible and a lot of people don't even KNOW about the ds-original thing, so it's not your fault!! like i WISH to god that they had ported it in some dual-screen/two-screen way, but the fact that they didn't isn't anyone's fault. ok end this part y'all are so valid i just feel sad that you didnt experience the game in its Best State)

spoilers below the cut

1) the big one: the implementation of the dual screen thing. they were always going to have a hard time implementing this on not-a-3ds, but i'll start with the non-spoilery part: action mode...is bad. the fact that they force you into it. is bad. novel mode is more passable but the fact that they default you into a mode with nearly 95% dialogue-only, in a visual novel, is..pretty gross, and the fact that they force-switch you into novel mode sometimes anyway is. maybe an indication that having a 95% dialogue route in a visual novel...wasnt good

they EASILY could have done a split-screen mode instead, and while that wouldn't have been ideal either, it would still have allowed for the incorporation of both screens simultaneously without having to make compromises

also, petty spoiler thing, but some of the dialogue rewrites to make action mode flow better took out one of my fave pieces of foreshadowing. the main example of this is in junpei's flashback thing to getting kidnapped near the beginning of the game. in t/ng, they had him voice the 'huh, did i leave that open?' line, with respect to his window being open because, you know, zero 'bout to kidnap him. in the original, this is /not/ on the top screen (i.e. voiced by junpei) - it's on the bottom screen. without quotes, i.e. it's not something he's thinking but it's there, in the same formatting as the rest of the descriptions. in other words.....zero is the one saying 'huh, did i leave that open?' in real time, foreshadowing the dual screen twist. this is SO minor in comparison to everything else for SURE but the fact that this got left out still makes me so sad bc i LOVED it. anyway.

(also the fact that the narrative mode twist of all the random gore descriptions being food-like makes WAY more sense in retrospect with the dual screens, because of course a fucking 12 year old wouldn't know how else to describe gore lmao. this is kind of lost in t/ng because it makes it out to be more of something that jun/pei is thinking but i digress. dual screen for dual protagonists good thanks)

2) (YES IT TOOK ME THIS LONG TO GET HERE. SH) the final puzzle.....in t/ng....fucking sucks. not only because the puzzle itself sucks, which uh...it does (PASSWORD IS THE PASSWORD?? FUCKING REALLY??). but a) it loses the theme-ing of the sudoku itself since, yknow. 9s everywhere but,

b) more importantly, it just...doesn't have the same punch to it. even ignoring the fact that the sudden upside-down-ness is one of the best ways i've ever seen a puzzle suddenly hit you with a plot twist/a revelation, in this case the 'oh shit, we were solving puzzles from akane's viewpoint the whole time and /only now/ are we truly doing it with junpei being the input source' is just. fucking masterful. explaining this is so hard but i promise it makes sense. like obviously the twist w the dual perspectives thing is revealed right before but the fact that they suddenly (literally) flip the entire game on its head is just. *chef kiss* so good.

also, adding to this, c) the fact that the tn/g version took out the fact that you were seeing baby!kane's face while you were doing the sudoku just adds to the emotional impact of the puzzle. like, in that moment, the puzzle itself isn't the relevant factor, it's the fact that you're doing the puzzle to save her. i no joke started fucking CRYING irl when that happened bc of how hard that hit me emotionally and the fact that they didn't even have something to mimic that in t/ng makes me so goddamn sad. it's not about the puzzle, its about Saving someone via the puzzle, and they just...removed that part. h

(also another dual screen thing here bc i forgot to add it earlier: the constant perspective-swapping thing during the true end feels much less awkward on the ds since you can just naturally shift your eyes between the screens. again, minor, and there probably was never going to be a great way to implement this with a single screen regardless, but it really does flow so much better with two screens. 3ds port of tn/g when)

3) finally, a more Controversial Opinion, but the timeline flow, while absolutely great for replays, kind of ends up spoiling you on the fact that there are multiple timelines that you have to search through for the truth. i wouldn't have minded this so much if the timeline feature in t/ng only unlocked after you hit your first ending, but they didn't do that - they let you look at it from the very start, which really..misses the point of the game.

(minor vl/r spoilers incoming) in vlr, the fact that you know you have multiple branches from the start makes sense, especially both because it's SUPER obvious that there are branching points (door choices, allying/betraying, etc). obviously 99/9 has choices like that too ala the door choices, but you're actively -not- jumping between timelines. that's the point! because junpei CAN'T jump!! he's an esper, sure, though maybe only one by accident/strong emotional connection [thats a whole different thread LMAO], but the whole point is that he can't make timeline choices in the same way that phi and sigma can literally timeline shift.

(end v/lr spoilers here i think) tl;dr the timeline feature is great for replays bc its super anti-frustration but boy howdy they did not implement it well. final point: the fact that you have to play 999 from the beginning every time you get an end makes sense narratively since akane has to do the same thing - she has to go through the whole route (in junpei's head ofc) over and over, she can't just skip around. again, anti-frustration feature that i'm glad they added, but you still lose something w t/ng this way

like ngl, having to fast forward through things instead of just skipping around is annoying as hell, but akane had to do the same goddamn thing! probably way more than we actually have to do it in the game, tbh. definitely this is me prioritizing certain limitations of the ds hardware as important to the narrative but you really do end up missing out if you can just skip at will

4) very minor thing that isnt actually a plot thing at all but some of the puzzle dialogue is infinitely funnier when you have the ability to see the characters on the top screen talking at the same time you have the puzzle stuff on the bottom screen. this mostly applies to all the stuff with the cards w all the player faces on them in the...cargo room? like it's still funny without it but somehow seeing santa talking about himself on the card when he says 'that's one handsome son-of-a-bitch!' is 500x funnier when you literally see him TALKING about himself

JESUS FUCK THIS IS LONG IM SO SORRY IF YOURE ON MOBILE

#zero escape #am i tagging this? yeah. it needs to be said lmao #999 #9 hours 9 persons 9 doors #nine hours nine persons nine doors #ok to rb #long post #(i mean i put it under a cut but. jic)

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aion-rsa · 3 years ago

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The Matrix 4 Trailer Breakdown: Neo, Trinity, Morpheus, and…Smith?!

https://ift.tt/3jYfx3N

The moment Matrix fans have been waiting for has finally arrived. The next chapter of Neo, Trinity, and Morpheus’ story is almost here and Warner Bros. has a trailer to prove it. It’s an action-packed first look at Resurrections, a sequel that seems to take the franchise in new directions, and introduces quite a few new mysteries to the already complex lore of The Matrix, all accompanied by Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit.”

While it refreshingly plays things very close to the chest at a time when most trailers give away 2/3 of the plot, I’ve tried my best to dissect the trailer for some answers. But as you’ll find in the breakdown below, I’ve mostly been left with more questions and tons of excitement for this movie. Plus, a few theories.

Before I get to it, have a look at the trailer if you haven’t already:

Okay, let’s enter the Matrix.

The Setting: Is this the Matrix or Machine Heaven?

This trailer is so disorienting, it’s unclear where this Matrix movie even takes place. These movies have always been multi-setting stories, between the big simulation, smaller programs, and the real world, but this movie’s setting is particularly vital information since it’ll explain what’s going on in some of the weirder parts of the trailer.

Our first glimpse of Neo’s life after the events of The Matrix Revolutions reveals he’s back in a simulation as Thomas Anderson, but is it the Matrix we know and love? Maybe. This idyllic city by the sea doesn’t really look like the dystopian, sprawling Mega City from the original trilogy.

You may have also noticed that the signature green tint is gone. There’s actually an explanation for that. When the Matrix was rebooted at the end of Revolutions, it came back online without the greenish hue, with Sati creating a beautiful, otherworldly sunrise (not unlike the one shining down on the bridge in the first picture) in tribute to Neo.

But there’s also the possibility that this is a completely different simulation all together. I’ve gone on about this in other articles, but I have a few theories as to where this movie takes place: 1) it’s set in the same version of the Matrix as the first three movies but rebooting the simulation meant tweaks to the city, 2) this is a completely new version of the Matrix created as a successor to the one from the original trilogy, 3) this isn’t the Matrix at all and is instead a separate digital world.

Hear me out on that last point: we watched Neo die in Revolutions, not as himself but after being assimilated by Smith. Becoming one with Smith allows the Machines to send a kill signal from the real world, deleting the rogue program once and for all. But where do programs go when they’re deleted? Reloaded refers to a vague place called “the Source,” which seems to be the central mainframe of the Machines. Programs marked for deletion are supposedly absorbed by the Source.

Since Neo died only after he turned into a Smith while in the Matrix, and his real-world body died in the Machine City, what if Neo’s digital form has somehow become stuck in some sort “machine heaven” inside the Source? This theory doesn’t necessarily track with other shots of real-world Neo later in the trailer, but it could be a possible explanation for why there’s a different version of Morpheus in this movie and why Jonathan Groff’s character tells Neo at the end of the trailer that he’s going “back to the Matrix.”

Also, maybe this is just a wink at the audience, but at one point, Neo is fighting his way out of a place called “Deus Ex Machina.” This is a reference to the Machine leader who Neo brokered peace with in Revolutions. It doesn’t seem like an accident that it appears here. Perhaps the plot of the movie is that Neo is stuck in the Source and eventually he tries to find his way out?

Neo and the Blue Pill

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Wherever Neo is, he doesn’t remember the events of the first three movies and has returned to his life as sad sack Thomas Anderson. But memories of his past life are starting to sneak their way back into his head.

We see him consulting a psychiatrist played by Neil Patrick Harris to see if he’s “crazy” but it’s clear that Neo will soon wake up and re-learn the truth about his past. But someone clearly wants to stop that from happening. We watch Neo take blue pills Since the blue pills symbolize ignorance of the truth, it’s likely that these pills are stopping Neo from regaining his memories and abilities. Neo’s ditches his prescription and opts for Morpheus’ red pill later in the trailer, though.

During the red pill sequence, it looks like Morpheus and his crew have found a way to play back Neo’s past for him on a projector. How this is possible beats me, but just go with it. This is likely when Neo fully wakes up.

This scene will eventually be interrupted by a trigger-happy SWAT team, of course. What an image.

How Are Neo and Trinity Back in the First Place?

Things are about to get more confusing. If Neo and Trinity are really back in the Matrix…how the hell is that even possible? After all, they both died in the real world, which is, you know, a major obstacle to overcome if you want to get plugged back in. Yet, we see them both in the real world, hooked back up to machines, although it’s unclear if they’re back at the power plant that powers Machine City. Above, you can see Trinity seemingly alive in the real world but back in the clutches of the Machines.

The trailer does seem to tease that we’ll learn what happened to Neo’s body after Revolutions. Usually, humans are liquefied upon death to feed the rest of the crop, but Neo is no ordinary human. There are a few blink-and-you’ll-miss-it snapshots of the Machines doing something to Neo’s body, seemingly performing some sort of procedure. Neo’s eyes remain scorched from the events of Revolutions, as well.

All this implies some major, new Matrix lore could be introduced in this movie. Until now, the process through which the Machines grow humans has largely remained a mystery. We know they’re grown in pods and fed liquid human remains, but how do the Machines create these humans in the first place? And do their abilities extend far beyond growing new humans to power their city? What if the Machines also have the ability to bring the dead back to life as they seem to be doing with Neo and Trinity?

This also seems to support Cypher’s belief that the Machines could actually plug people back into the Matrix, something Trinity said wasn’t true in the original movie. Smith told Cypher that he would not only get plugged back in but that he wouldn’t remember anything about his miserable life in the real world. The Agents even promised him that they could give him a new, better life within the simulation. Cypher hoped to return as an important actor. This may be why Neo and Trinity don’t remember each other at first in the new movie.

Neo and Trinity’s Connection

Neo and Trinity’s connection is way too strong, though. They’ve brought each other back from the dead a couple of times, surely a little memory loss isn’t going to keep them apart for long. We watch them meet for “the first time” at a coffee shop — a place called “Simulatte,” as revealed by teaser footage released earlier this week — and then they’re back to kicking ass like the old days.

But it’s clear things have also changed. For example, there’s something weird going on with Trinity’s face, which seems to be bleeding…Matrix code? Does this mean this isn’t Trinity at all but a program designed to simulate her for Neo while he’s trapped in machine heaven? That doesn’t really add up with the fact that we also see Trinity alive in the real world. Maybe their digital selves are stuck in two different places and she’s actually back in the Matrix? I’ll admit I can’t get any of my theories to line up perfectly just yet.

The trailer also teases new abilities for the duo. Particularly interesting is that they can now create some sort of energy wave when they touch.

Trinity can also send out a shockwave that can put SWAT teams on their ass. But wait, the reverberation reveals another face behind Trinity’s… Who is that and what’s happening here? Shoot me some thoughts in the comments!

Is that Hugo Weaving as Smith?!

Speaking of hidden faces, in both the trailer and earlier teaser footage, we learn that Neo’s reflection isn’t quite right. When he looks in the mirror, someone else sometimes looks back. We get the best look at that reflection in the scene where Morpheus offers Neo the red pill…and holy crap, is that Hugo Weaving’s face CGI’d onto Keanu’s head?! If it is, this could mean that a bit of Smith’s code still lingers inside Neo, which also supports the idea that Neo is stuck in the Source and not the Matrix.

Is it Morpheus’ mission to somehow get him out of there? Now that you mention Morpheus…

Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Morpheus

Ladies and gentlemen, if you weren’t sure about the rumors before, we have confirmation: Yahya Abdul-Mateen is playing Morpheus in The Matrix Resurrections. But there’s something weird going on with Morpheus, too.

One shot from the trailer is particularly interesting. Morpheus is staring at himself in the mirror, condensation on the glass made to resemble Matrix code (“digital rain”) over the mystery man’s face. He looks intently into the mirror, noticing how its surface turns to liquid when he touches it.

So what’s going on here? The green hue of the scene confirms this is Abdul-Mateen inside of the simulation, but judging from his reaction to the mirror, he doesn’t seem aware that he’s in the Matrix. Morpheus looks genuinely surprised by this sudden glitch, something Laurence Fishburne would’ve taken in stride in the original trilogy. So does this mean this movie follows Morpheus before he was unplugged? Is this movie somehow a continuation of Neo and Trinity’s story but also a Morpheus origin story?

Well, maybe this is just a flashback because we later see Morpheus doing normal Morpheus stuff, like training with Neo in the sparring program.

(Like much in the trailer, the dojo seems to be a located in a place meant to evoke Alice in Wonderland.)

But we haven’t addressed the elephant in the room: why does Morpheus look completely different now if this movie seems to mostly take place after Revolutions when Morpheus looked a lot like Laurence Fishburne? Well, yes, it could be a simple recast, but this is also the universe that created whole lore about program re-skins when the Wachowskis were forced to recast the Oracle with Mary Alice after Gloria Foster’s death while filming the third movie. So there will likely be an explanation.

This could go back to one of my theories about the where this movie takes place. What if this is a continuation of Neo and Trinity’s story but in a new version of the Matrix? As the Architect once told Neo in The Matrix Reloaded, the Machines have created several versions of the simulation, tweaking things as needed to improve the program and make humanity more subservient. It’s an endless loop that has seen the heroes try to save Zion from the Machines several times before. The Matrix trilogy covered the Sixth Matrix.

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We know that each version of the Matrix places someone in the role of “the One” in order to correct the anomaly in the program, but it wasn’t clear whether it was always someone named Neo. If that were the case, that could explain why there’s someone new in the Morpheus role, too. Perhaps the Sixth Matrix’s Neo and Trinity being in this potential seventh version is corrupting things, which is why the Machines are working to keep the duo from remembering their past. (But then why would the Machines have plugged them back in in the first place?) None of this makes sense!

Or is there a bigger twist behind all this?

In footage from the teasers released earlier this week, we someone who looks like Abdul-Mateen’s Morpheus being formed from thousands of little particles expelled by some sort of machine. Are those supposed to be tiny nano bots, sort of like more advanced versions of the insect droids that formed Deus Ex Machina’s face in The Matrix Revolutions? Does that mean Morpheus was a machine or program all along?

That certainly would be quite the twist if true. What if Morpheus was a Machine sleeper cell, just another system of control all along — a “true believer” designed to rally Zion around the One in order for the Machines to more easily lead humanity through the loop that would eventually lead to the city’s destruction?

Yeah, that sounds a little far-fetched even for a Matrix movie. Maybe it’s just this version of Morpheus that’s a machine, created to jump start Neo’s journey after another faction has kept him hooked on the blue pill for years. What if this is a version of the Matrix where Thomas Anderson never got to make a choice in 1999 and has lived his life ignorant of his true purpose? In this scenario, maybe it would be the Machines themselves trying to wake up Neo. After all, without him completing his journey, the program can’t survive.

I’m giving myself a headache. Let’s move on.

Jessica Henwick as Bugs

According to Variety, Jessica Henwick’s blue-haired badass is named Bugs, which I assume is a nod to the tattoo of the white rabbit on her arm, another reference to Alice in Wonderland as well as the first Matrix movie. When Henwick was cast, it was reported that she would be playing a major role in the movie and that seems to be true.

We see her guiding Neo through a doorway to “the truth,” while later she’s running around with Morpheus, shooting at bad guys and doing A LOT of flips. It’s good to see there are going to be plenty of cool stunts in this movie.

Jonathan Groff as the Villain?

The trailer ends with who many are speculating is the villain of the movie: Jonathan Groff’s mysterious businessman who welcomes Neo (and fans) back to the Matrix. I’ve heard several theories so far, but my two favorite ones are that Groff is playing a new version of Smith or that he’s a new skin for the Architect. Whatever the case, he could be the one working to keep Neo hooked on the blue pill.

One interesting detail in the background is what looks like a “DM” logo desk plate. Is this another reference to “Deus Ex Machina?” Is it some sort of program-run company?

Another scene of note is the one where Neo is on his knees, a gun pointed at his head. We don’t see who exactly is holding the pistol. Is that Groff? I also just find it interesting how this scene kind of rhymes with the Morpheus scene from the first movie.

Priyanka Chopra, Brian Jacob Smith, and Max Riemelt

We get glimpses of other characters, too. There’s Priyanka Chopra’s character, who’s reading Alice in Wonderland when Neo drops by her shop.

Also appearing are Brian Jacob Smith and Max Riemelt, both stars of Sense8, the ensemble sci-fi series created by the Wachowskis. You can see Smith running around with Morpheus’ crew while Riemelt has made a very bad choice and picked a fight with Neo.

The Real World

The movie will visit the real world, too. We see a Zion ship flying through underground tunnels. Teaser clips also confirmed we’ll also meet at least one other crew in the movie. With Jada Pincket Smith set to reprise her role, could this be Niobe’s ship, Logos?

Meanwhile, the Machines are still all about renewable energy.

There’s also whatever this is supposed to be?

Agents Are Back

What’s a Matrix movie without Agents? We already know Daniel Bernhardt is reprising his role as Reloaded‘s Agent Johnson, but there are a few other Agents in the mix to give Neo, Trinity, Morpheus, and friends a very hard time.

Even Morpheus looks like he’s dressed like an Agent at one point!

Matrix Weirdness

There a few other weird moments in this trailer worth highlighting. Judging from the way Morpheus and Bugs are somehow able to seemingly open portals in the simulation to stop themselves from going splat on the pavement during an action sequence where they jump out of a building, it looks like Resurrections is really going to mess with how the Matrix works, breaking all kinds of rules. It’s not just about jump from one skyscraper to the other anymore.

Morpheus and his squad seem to be able to travel through mirrors at will, too. It’s maybe their favorite form of transportation. (I don’t know who the person next to Bugs is as they walk through the mirror and into the restaurant.)

There’s also a very cool inverted hallway that defies the laws of gravity. Par for the course for the Matrix but cool just the same.

Lots of Action

As trippy as the sci-fi in The Matrix gets, this is an action franchise at its core, and the trailer promises the types of big action set pieces you’ve come to expect from these movies. That includes Neo stopping bullets and redirecting missiles with his mind! It definitely looks like the Neo we know and love will for sure be back in the One shape by the third act of this movie.

We also got a quick look at the motorcycle chase sequence that we first learned about through photos from the Mexico City set. Trinity speeds through the fiery streets, with Neo riding shotgun.

There’s also an action sequence inside a train. Bugs, Morpheus, and their squad run through the carts just as someone fires a rocket into the train. Should be a fun sequence.

Oh, and did I mention Abdul-Mateen fits right into the Morpheus role?

Spot anything I missed? Let me know in the comments!

The Matrix Resurrections arrives in theaters and on HBO Max on Dec. 22.

The post The Matrix 4 Trailer Breakdown: Neo, Trinity, Morpheus, and…Smith?! appeared first on Den of Geek.

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