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peepingtoad · 5 years ago

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@kyugens said: Does Jiraiya resent Hiruzen in any way, for the way he handled things regarding Orochimaru, Minato and even Naruto? And even so, is Jiraiya aware of the Third's tendencies to oversee Danzo's vile plans, and how that's affected negatively the village? Does Jiraiya wish he could've done something differently about that? | headcanon asks | always accepting! |

I believe there are a number of things that Jiraiya resents Hiruzen for, the above included—but I think it’s still important, before I go into it, to say that Jiraiya still holds a lot of love and respect for the man, and would never place all the blame on his shoulders for the world’s ills. Especially as he grows older and realises that his own choices during difficult times had consequences, he does have faith that Hiruzen really did have the best interests of the Village at heart... mostly, and even if that in itself was often at odds with his own beliefs of treating people with humanity regardless of where they come from. Even so, he is left in the end with very complex feelings around Hiruzen for a number of reasons.

It’s probably safe to assume that while the Sannin were growing up, they probably thought Hiruzen was the bees knees. I mean, they were being taught personally by the Hokage himself—how cool is that? I believe that Jiraiya considered him very trustworthy, what with Hiruzen being his only male role model, to the point where I headcanon he was the only one Jiraiya told about Gamamaru’s prophecy after he first heard it. This is how I believe a young Jiraiya was allowed to travel the world for a little while even before taking on a genin team of his own (as per filler, which I have happily cherrypicked).

But as far the other scant material we’re given goes, I’d say that the big turning point for them all comes with how the Second War was conducted. Namely, Hiruzen’s refusal to hear Tsunade out regarding the need for more focus on the medical field, which without a doubt shocked Jiraiya (I think I recall seeing him in the background of that scene). He would have expected, being both on the frontlines and close to Hiruzen, that their opinions on the state of affairs would be taken very seriously, so seeing one of their trio being brushed aside definitely stung—and would sting the more their comrades dropped like flies all around them, as realisation sunk in that they were reduced to cannon fodder, with medical support limited to Tsunade and perhaps a few others who had informally discovered a flair for it at the time.

Next comes the relatively light consequences he faced for remaining in Ame for three years to train the orphans, which again Jiraiya (perhaps naively) saw at first as Hiruzen respecting his dreams of realising the prophecy. Given the implication that this is where the Sannin really begin to fall apart, my headcanon is that the years following his return saw him being utilised more for espionage than before, leading him to find his niche as an adept spy... with the downside of not being home enough to reconnect with his friends (whether Tsunade has already gone by that point is variable for me in RP terms, but I like to think she was allowed to stop fighting and establish proper training for medical-nin when it became clear there would be a Third War).

Of course, there then comes the point where Hiruzen offers Jiraiya the Hokage seat for the first time, which frankly floors him given he’d never expressed an interest before. Worse than that, however, is the fact it drives a more decisive wedge between himself and Orochimaru. This would become a source of resentment as it seemed almost like a deliberate move to pit them against each other or even a cowardly means on Hiruzen’s part to divert Orochimaru’s bitterness away from himself—either that, or the old man was acting on the misguided belief that things were well enough between them that Orochimaru would simply fall into line with Jiraiya becoming the leader. Not to mention, Jiraiya couldn’t help suspecting that there were those who would see him shackled to the village rather than going out into the world and seeking change his own way, rather than the village’s. And after learning what became of Sakumo under Hiruzen’s watch, who could blame him for becoming suspicious of every move?

But I think it’s important to recognise that ROOT, even at this point, was still highly secretive to the point where Jiraiya clearly didn’t have any idea as to its involvement with the death of Yahiko—which, of course, had been reported to Jiraiya as all three of the orphans’ deaths (which I believe was directly and deliberately Danzō’s doing, but for the sake of brevity I’ll maybe go into that another time... tbh I can’t even remember if I’ve written this in a headcanon to date). It wouldn’t be until shortly before the Uchiha Clan Massacre that Jiraiya would gain even an inkling as to how truly bad ROOT was, his only knowledge prior to then being that Orochimaru was able to get away with unethical experiments for so long thanks to being part of ROOT. However by the time the Uchiha Massacre was impending and he confronted his fleeing ex-students, he gained some small insight into the powers behind Hiruzen that he realised could never be ousted while Hiruzen was still in the Hokage seat (which naturally led him to the force of nature that is Tsunade upon Hiruzen’s death, knowing that he would forever be needed far afield).

Of course, by this point Minato, who was the one person Jiraiya truly believed could have changed things, had already perished. While Jiraiya doesn’t place blame on Hiruzen for the fact he and Kushina died (because truly at the time, he was too busy wondering ‘could I have stopped it’), he was aware that Minato himself had entrusted Hiruzen specifically with Naruto’s upbringing. His late student equipped him with the details of Naruto’s seal and the warning of the masked man on purpose, so that he could go on to discover the culprit and put a stop to them where a Hokage couldn’t—and awful as it was, taking on the duty of working in the background was an easy enough thing for a grieving Jiraiya to accept at this point, knowing he’d not be in any position to raise a child (read: knows but won’t admit he is depressed, see the linked headcanon which sort of answers a lot of this question in general now that I look back on it).

By the time we come to the big man’s official First Appearance, with the hindsight of the entire story (and my embellishments) at my disposal, I think the bad blood is pretty clear by the fact he directly tells Ebisu not to let Hiruzen know of his return at all. We don’t see him speak to Hiruzen even once between returning to Konoha after twelve years and the old man’s death, which I think says a lot, and revisiting these themes now I can see a lot of that being to do with what he allowed to fly in terms of ROOT and Danzō, but also what he learns of how Naruto was raised... for which there is really no excuse, because even if Jiraiya also wasn’t around, Naruto could have at least been afforded knowledge of what he was, as per his parents’ wishes (and again, I think Jiraiya was encouraged to go off and do his thing because that secret would not remain safe with him while Naruto was small). Then there’s also the matter of him not going to Hiruzen’s funeral, instead going to the place where he had fond childhood memories to mourn in private—because they really were the only fond ones he had from before Hiruzen became so apathetic.

... So in essence, yeah. Jiraiya’s full of resentment, as much as I think the child in him does still love Hiruzen. In fact, I believe Hiruzen was the prime example of why Jiraiya never wanted to set foot into that office as Konoha’s ruler. However I do think that he recognises where he could have focused his own energies more on the village—for example, had he returned upon learning that there was foul play involved with the Uchiha Clan Massacre, he might even have found out that not all of the Ame kids died, or something else that could have prevented him going into Ame blind to die. But of course, that is a choice he recognises as his own. It was between focusing on cleaning up Konoha and getting embroiled in that whole mess with nobody who would realistically back him up (after helping two fugitives—one being Hiruzen’s own son—to escape no less, as per my headcanon), or allowing those who orchestrated the Kyūbi attack to go unchecked.

TL;DR it’s complicated. He resents Hiruzen, he wishes he could have changed things, but knows what else he would have risked going unchecked to do so.

#kyugens #{fanmail}#{memoirs(headcanons)}#when i found that old headcanon i linked i realised i was retreading a lot of ground #some new stuff in regards to danzo and root's part in things and jira's team and the massacre #hmmm maybe i should be fleshing out more? need to write about root MORE #and in general the headcanons i've injected here... some of those need more fleshing out #{headcanons | history & life events}#{nindō | ninja way}#{bonds | character dev}#{meta&analysis}

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eclectia · 5 years ago

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Dead Space: Horror Through Design

Dead Space is a game that needs little introduction. A claustrophobic sci-fi horror set in space that manages to rise above its action horror roots to become something truly chilling at times. One of the main ways in which it achieves this is through the visual and environmental design of its levels; or rather level, because the game takes place all in one contained space – the USG Ishimura.

In this post we're going to be looking at how the game creates tension, how this permeates the entire game and how this game-feel effects the player. The main sources of horror in Dead Space is of course the Necromorphs, the flagship enemy of the franchise which can only be killed by what the designers termed “tactical dismemberment”; but these monsters quickly become a stale exercise in jump scares and enemy gauntlets. Well designed body horror will only get your horror design so far if you're only willing to engage with players through predictable gameplay beats and genre convention.

In my opinion the more tense sections of the game are the first few sections, where Necromorphs are few and far between and the suggestion of the monster is more than enough to send shivers down your spine. The game suggests monsters more than throws them at you and asks who are you and how are you, a mere engineer, to defeat these monstrosities? That question, that “what if?” is a prime source of tension through suggestion and demonstration. The game shows you how powerful these enemies are in an opening sequence that proffers you no option but run -and run fast- and then spends the next half an hour both teaching you how to defeat them in one-on-one encounters, and creating a distinct fear of “they could jump out at any time”. This is clever, allowing the player to face off against enemies in singulars, to practice the games dismemberment system before it really starts to throw hoards at you, but it also compounds upon the horror.

It achieves this in two ways. The first is of course through the narrative story bit of “here's the monster killing a bunch of people who surely [according to existing game convention] are more than well equipped enough to deal with it”; that initial splash of subversive jump-scare is a shock so early – not even 3 minutes – into the game and during a completely innocuous section to boot. It is a very good example of “show, don't tell”. Instead of having someone tell you something is aboard the ship, the main enemy bursts into play and makes its presence and danger to you, the player, known. And then of course, a fast fumble into gameplay where you could be assailed at any moment and which sets up a clear predator-prey dynamic for the rest of the game – you are being chased, you are not the chaser. It does all of this without telling you, without audio logs or “I'm being followed”, which would perhaps be ham-fisted. This of course erodes as the story goes on and you equip bigger and better weapons, begin to predict the jump-scares and find exactly those sorts of logs, but that first slice of horror is delicious.

The second way in which the game introduces tension to the player is by showing, repeatedly, Necromorphs climbing back into the walls and vents, ready to emerge again at any point, from anywhere, or so it seems – and to the player, feels- for one very important reason; the very vents, shafts and walls from which they jump out and retreat back into are littered all over the environment, all around you. In several scripted sections Necromorphs specifically watch you from them, making them feel omnipresent and constant but aside from these visual cues, you can hear their thunks and clicks as they climb about, unseen but very much felt. This reinforces the predator-prey dynamic and oppressive atmosphere. You are firmly within the spider's' web, a fly. They are all around you, sometimes making themselves known, sometimes not, but always there – audible, and palpable.

This horror is only as effective as its opening sections. In my opinion as the game goes on and you get stronger and more desensitised to the jump scares of the game, the shock of seeing an enemy climb out of an open vent or back into one, accompanied by a scare chord, is lessened slightly. After all, when they climb out, you'll be able to deal with it in all likelihood. To a lesser degree another way in which the game uses environmental design is less to do with the actual design of the ship so much as placement of objects throughout the game; the presence of bodies. The first time you pass one, it might lay prostrate and in your mind dead. But when you return, inevitably after having picked up an essential item, they may spring back to life with shocking certainty. The first few times this happens it is undoubtedly scary but when every [monster] body in the game bar one does this, it quickly loses its shock value and in my mind, is a good example of why jump scares stale so fast – through predictability and player anticipation. The best jump scare is sporadically used, not the very crux of the horror itself.

That constant, oppressive feeling of “they're everywhere, all around me” is compounded by the very nature of the USG Ishimura. It is a ship, drifting in the dark annals of space, that final frontier. You cannot leave because you have no escape option. The corridors are winding, gaping maws filled with environmental storytelling in the form of scrawled messages, crazed passengers and an intense feeling of claustrophobia. It is easy to get lost and disoriented on the ship, especially when many corridors lead to dead ends and you are constantly backtracking and crisscrossing over your previous paths, opening new ones and returning to prior areas through previously inaccessible doors. It can be very disorienting after 2 hours of exploring one section, to suddenly find yourself back in an area from 4 hours ago, emerging from a door you probably forgot existed until this moment. Clever changing of previous environments as things happen in game – bits of ship getting blasted off or reconnected to energy grids allowing for more exploration, the meaty growths spreading across the ship and new enemies appearing and bodies disappearing all help older areas to feel fresh, rather than stale retreads. All of this, also, done without words, without telling the player. It all contributes to a feeling of confusion and being truly lost in what is actually, a rather small gameplay area and this in itself is a really clever use of space and navigation to make a game feel larger than it is.

But this clever design is slightly watered down somewhat by one of the navigation mechanics in the game. You can press a button and a visual guide will pop up showing you the path to the next objective. Honestly, this feature feels entirely ancillary to me; there are signposts clearly telegraphing areas you need to go; there's a map on the tram that pops up at the beginning and end of every chapter-so why not incorporate that somehow-; and the rest of the game prides itself on having no user interface so why have something as clunky and immersion-breaking as this tool? It undermines the very horror of feeling lost, of encroaching deeper and deeper into the abyss, and it also undermines the clever design beats that include signposts and symbols that show you where to go. Your companion, Kendra, also gives you directions so your knowledge of the games' space and how it all connects together, is actually unnecessary and at no point is the player required to demonstrate their knowledge of the layout, or even allowed to get lost which could really have added to the fear and feeling of being trapped. That feeling is entirely undermined for the sake of convenience.

However, one way in which the claustrophobia of the level design is compounded is in the cameras, and tightness of the corridors. Taking cues from Resident Evil 4, Dead Space features an over-the-shoulder camera of almost cinematic proportions. We are following Isaac through the game, watching everything almost -almost- from his perspective, and we see exactly what he sees. Necromorph bodies and open vents, and text scrawled on walls, and all. This camera, twinned with the tight, narrow corridors, contributes also to a feeling of closeness, of the walls and very cameras closing in on you, everything so close together. You are being watched, by the camera and the Necromorphs both.

Another design choice, namely the light being twinned with the weapon you are using, adds to this. All outside of your narrow target is often too dark to see in certain areas where the game ups the tension using darkness. You could be focused entirely upon an enemy, torchlight glaring furiously in its face, but that will be all you can see; which forces you to confront the horror in front of you, and leaves you with a question. What if there's another outside of the light, outside of your view? This is another way in which the design of the game uses suggestion and “what ifs” to scare the player. Not only this but that most primal of fears, nyctophobia, is incurred. That light in darkness is a pinprick, barely allowing for you to see ahead of yourself, and making you feel, again, like everything is closing in on you. Darkness all around, the ships walls all around, Necromorphs all around.

Other areas of the game use the very colour of lighting – harsh oranges, reds and yellows – to signify danger, fear and that an area isn't yet safe. In enemy gauntlets, you will find an alarm blaring and an orange beam flickering, to show you that there are yet still enemies around that you must kill before you can progress. This is one thing that, I think, enemy gauntlets do well – you are trapped in a confined space [within an already confined space] and must get rid of all the enemies before you become their next victim and all aspects of design in this case are telling you “danger, get out” as well as allowing you breathing room once the danger is alleviated.

All of these design choices – the enemies established in the walls, limited lighting, winding corridors, the tight camera, the maze-like structure of levels and the disorienting feel of repeating back on yourself all contribute to a very precise feeling within the player. You are trapped, you are tracked, and this all creates tension, unease, and fear. Of course, this is just one of the ways in which Dead Space creates fear.

#dead space #video game #games design

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wrockingwriter · 6 years ago

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Obscurials: Before, During... After?

What we know about Obscurus and Obscurials is very limited.

We know:

- An Obscurus is NOT a magical creature, so it’s not like a dementor or lethifold. It’s not a beast at all, there are not wild Obscurus, which means that they are unique to their Obscurial and tied to them entirely.

- An Obscurus is formed when someone with magic represses their magic entirely; that person is called an Obscurial.

- An Obscurial has to have trauma/fear driving the repression; fear is essential to an Obscurus forming

- Obscurus were more common before the International Statute of Secrecy, when magical people feared the repercussions of being found by people who would cause real harm to them.

- Common knowledge in the universe (according to the MACUSA) is that there hasn’t been an Obscurus/Obscurial in centuries, which is obviously false based on both Credence and the Sudanese girl Newt encounters.

- Obscurus are destructive, and at least vaguely parasitic in nature, fuelled by fear and anger and hate.

- There is NO record of an Obscurial surviving past 10 years old.

--- So, knowing that, we have a few characters that we already know of in the original Harry Potter series that had the potential to be Obscurials, just based on their having dark and potentially abusive pasts, but did not:

Harry Potter: Obviously lives in a negative situation, but doesn’t show any signs of being an Obscurial. Violent things don’t happen around him, his magic always acted in ways that protected him in passive ways far more like accidental magic. Also, as part of a running theme of the series, Harry Potter is Oblivious to anything that directly affects him. He ends up on a roof while running away from bullies, that’s cool. His hair grows back overnight, at least he doesn’t have to go to school with that shitty haircut! The glass disappears at the zoo, and he thinks it’s weird but doesn’t think he had anything to do with it.

Harry’s noticing/realising that there was anything in common between those magical experiences is what I think stopped an Obscurus from forming. He wasn’t repressing anything because he did not think he had anything to repress- his obliviousness saved himself.

Tom Riddle Jr.: Lives in an orphanage, which we’re not shown in a favourable light. But, Tom Riddle doesn’t ever view his magic as something negative. He saw it as a tool that would make him more powerful than his bullies. He saw it as something positive that made him unique, instead of it being something that set him as a bigger target for the older children/bullies at the orphanage.

Tom not viewing his magic as negative, or something to be hidden, is what I think stopped him from becoming an Obscurial and forming an Obscurus. His circumstances were negative, but he never allowed fear to dominate his thoughts when it came to the unknown power that made him unique

Merope Gaunt: Probably the one character who came closest to becoming an Obscurial, Merope lived in a heavily emotionally (and physically, going by the attempted strangling Bob Ogden stops) abusive household. Her father Marvolo and her brother Morfin are shown repeatedly calling her a squib and blood traitor. Albus Dumbledore himself says that powerful negative emotions endured on a chronic basis can interfere/drain on a person’s powers, and this certainly applies. They call her a muggle, ask what her wand is even for, and this obviously has taken a toll on her. She’s shut down, barely able to control what little magic she exhibits, when Bob Ogden visits.

Merope’s sources of trauma/fear/abuse are removed from her home and thus her life. During the time they were gone she was able to try and use her magic, eventually snagging Tom Riddle Sr. through duplicitous means. Whether it was by potion or Imperius curse doesn’t really matter, she used magic to get this end. I think that the fact that she had examples of magic that weren’t inherently tied to abuse probably helped her to not entirely repress her magic because of her fear. And thus prevented an Obscurus from fully forming. (Though I DO think her years of not really accepting her magic (mostly due to her family’s abuse) caused a strain on her body that her months in squalor following her releasing Tom Sr. from his mental slavery assisted in causing her death right after giving birth to Tom Riddle Jr.)

--- We’ve only got two examples of character that were/are for SURE Obscurials:

The Sudanese girl Newt encounters at age 8, a few months prior to the first FB film, whose Obscurus is likely the one inside Newt’s trunk held in the stasis bubble. This would explain why Newt is under the impression that he could separate an Obscurus from the Obscurial, as he managed to contain this Obscurus though the Obscurial still perished.

Credence Barebone who we encounter in young adulthood, around age 20. Which is FAR beyond the recorded age Obscurials reach. Double that, in fact. Lives in an incredibly dark situation; surrounded by the New Salemers and their rhetoric, being raised by their leader who hates the concept of magic, and being scorned upon by the general populace because of his adoptive family.

He’s shown to be in at the very least an emotionally abusive household, adopted by a woman who takes corporal punishment way too far. Mary-Lou Barebone says to Credence ‘Your mother was a wicked, unnatural woman!’ which implies that she knew Credence’s birth mother. She beats him often, to the point where Credence doesn’t offer any reasons or excuses when Mary-Lou extends her hand for his belt.

Credence sees magic as a way to escape the life he’s currently leading. He willingly spends time searching for the child Graves (Grindelwald) asks him to find, under the impression that if he succeeded Credence would be taught magic. That he would be able to escape from his current living situation. He fears Mary-Lou and her beatings, but sees Graves (Grindelwald) and his talents as positive (though we don’t know how they came into contact), and truly views himself as being without magical talent.

He knows that anything that sets him apart from anyone else in Mary-Lou’s eyes is cause for a beating. Even without knowing he has magic, he knows anything different is going to cause him pain and thus should never be expressed. He suppresses any kind of individuality, doing and wearing whatever Mary-Lou instructs.

In the newest trailers for the Crimes of Grindelwald, it’s revealed that Credence is a Lestrange (his bloodline will likely play a large role in his surviving as an Obscurial/controlling the Obscurus for so long) but the circumstances surrounding his adoption are still unknown. He obviously doesn’t remember his family of origin, but each time he tried to address Mary-Lou in a familiar way he is rejected, though she doesn’t do much to dissuade him from thinking of Chastity and Modesty as his siblings, she still beats him far more than any of the other children she’s adopted. Which seems to imply that he was quite young when he was adopted, and Mary-Lou likely beat him for any accidental magic without explaining what had caused the punishment.

The Obscurus we see in the film shows us exactly how destructive they can be. First destroying a No-Maj residence, then killing Henry Shaw Jr, and later Mary-Lou/Modesty, all leading toward the final confrontations at the end of the film. Credence has no memory of any of the actions taken by the Obscurus, still believing himself as being powerless until he seemingly has a moment of connection when GrindelGraves says that he has no further use for him when Credence leads him to a frightened Modesty after Mary-Lou’s death-by-Obscurus and Modesty’s death in the wreckage of their building.

Credence seems to have a moment where his conscious wants (escape, magic) and subconscious desires (freedom) meet and agree with one another in Credence’s rage at GrindelGraves. From what we can see, an Obscurus is a separation of the magic of a person from their body. The Obscurus takes actions that align with the subconscious desires of the Obscurial they’re attached to (Henry Shaw’s death is the clearest example of this) but doesn’t seem to leave the Obscurial with the memories associated with those actions. So this anger seems to cause the knowledge of having this power to awaken, and in his rage he’s able to have some semblance of control over the force he’s unleashed.

At the panel I hosted at LeakyCon 2018, at several points people who studied and work in Psychological fields, or in Family Law, talked about the kinds of ways younger minds cope with awful situations. How dissociation breakthroughs, when the affected people start to reconnect these facets of themselves, usually came with emotional extremes. Being pushed to a limit. If we think about Credence and his magic like two facets of someone with a dissociative disorder, those things match up. Credence is a prime example of the repercussions of an abused child and the lengths they go through to survive.

Throughout the final confrontation with the Obscurus, appealing to Credence as a person, showing care, seemed to bring Credence more into himself- he almost calms down completely under Newt and Tina’s affections and promises of protection! But GrindelGraves interrupts their attempts with more violence, immediately bringing Credence back into the fight AND flight response the Obscurus channels in him.

At the end of the film, there’s a focus on one wisp of the Obscurus- and we now know that Credence is not only IN the Crimes of Grindelwald film, but is central to the film. He’s a person again, coming back from being a smoke manifestation of destruction, but we have no knowledge of how much he remembers from that last confrontation.

--- The final person I want to talk about is the one we’re all pretty much positive was an Obscurial

Ariana Dumbledore: Violently attacked by three muggle boys at the age of 6 for accidental magic, their father Percival went to Azkaban for going after the boys in question and Kendra moved the family to Godric’s Hollow. There they kept Ariana out of public view, and many people either didn’t know about the Dumbledore daughter or thought that Kendra had produced a squib.

Aberforth describes the aftereffects of it as ‘it destroyed her… She wouldn’t use magi, but she couldn’t get rid of it; it turned inwards and drove her mad, it exploded out of her when she couldn’t control it, and at times she was strange and dangerous. But mostly she was sweet, and scared, and harmless.’ He speaks of how he was able to calm her when no one else could, but that she was unbalanced and had magic exploding out of her at moments she couldn’t hold it in any longer.

During one of her fits of seething rage/uncontrollable magic that Aberforth was not there to curtail, their mother Kendra ended up dead. Only a few months after her death Albus, and Gellert had the argument/duel that ended with Ariana’s death. Ariana is 14 at the time of the event.

The isolation from people outside of the family likely contributed to her fears, but also kept her aware of magic outside of herself not being inherently bad. Traumatic experiences are even more so to the mind of a child- at least, the things that went wrong for me as a child seemed impossibly huge and awful. Actually, most emotions seemed incredibly powerful and extreme from my view as a kid. Everything is the ____ thing EVER, which I can see contributing heavily to Obscurus forming. They’re formed by repression and intense negative emotion- and few have as intense emotions as children.

Aberforth is under the impression that Ariana was attempting to help during the duel, and lost control- but there’s also the distinct possibility that this was her moment of clarity, where her conscious wants (for the fighting to stop) and subconscious desires (for her brothers to get along again) met and she saw no reason to restrain the force within anymore.

Ariana being an Obscurial, and losing control in the duel between Albus and Gellert to reveal this power concealed within her, would also explain Grindelwald’s obsession with Obscurus and Obscurials in the film. There’s little else that could connect the to film series’ together as strongly as the (mostly ignored) Dumbledore past and the Dark Lord who inspired Voldemort.

(I have a silly side theory that Ariana’s Obscurus, after her death, whatever little bit of it had thought, put itself into the Hog’s Head portrait. Why else would Aberforth have a portrait of her when she was so helpless instead of when she was happy?)

Credence and Ariana both have positive associations of magic (Ariana with her family, Credence with GrindelGraves) while having a great fear associated with it (Ariana’s attack by the muggle boys, Credence’s adoptive mother beating him) and a clear preference for one sibling over another (Aberforth, for Ariana, and Modesty for Credence) and their magical explosions accidentally killed someone they cared for (Kendra Dumbledore and Chastity Barebone).

--- Obscurus, what are they in relation to Obscurials?

As an Obscurus is NOT a magical creature, and instead is a parasitic manifestation of magic, they’re unique to the person they’re formed from.

I’m pretty positive that they’re the actual separation of magic from the magical person. They’re the negative manifestation of their magic, destructive and influenced by the subconscious thoughts of the person they’re attached to.

- This tenuous connection of thought between the Obscurus and Obscurial had some attendees ask if, maybe, an Obscurus is kind of like an accidental Horcrux, but without a container it can’t exist for very long. Which would explain the historical reports of Obscurus appearing, causing a lot of damage, and disappearing. It would also kind of explain the near-compulsion Kowalski had when he saw it in the trunk to approach it.

- This connection also bring into question- does an Obscurus who, for lack of a better word, consumes their Obscurial consume the body as well? I think that, if it’s a purposeful giving over to the emotional overload, the Obscurus will use all the energy available to them- including their life and the bits holding their body together. But I also feel like an Obscurus gets to the point of being able to take over the Obscurial, just overwhelming them without their agreement or relinquishment of what little control they have, that the Obscurial dies as a result of the SHOCK of their magic completely separating from their body.

Can an Obscurus exist without their Obscurial? I don’t think they can take action, or exist for very long. I think that an Obscurus, as a manifestation of subconscious intent and repressed magic, cannot exist without a purpose. I think an Obscurus would exist for a moment, but without a target/mission would dissipate. I think the Obscurus in Newt’s trunk, if released from the stasis bubble thing, would have a moment of action before falling apart.

Can a forming Obscurus be destroyed/reintegrated with their Obscurial? I think that an Obscurial, early in the stages of developing an Obscurus, could halt and likely even reverse the process by no longer repressing their magic. An acceptance of their magic could likely stop an Obscurus from forming because it wouldn’t be repressed, and the person in question would no longer have strong negative emotions associated with their magic either.

Can Credence control his Obscurus? I think his ability to do so is going to rely a lot on his bloodline, probably. I also think that, in order for him to even begin to do such a thing he’s going to have to confront and accept his past. Not forgive, but accept that it happened to him and learn from it and build from it. I think Credence’s story is going to be about accepting and recovering from horrible trauma, and that the things that mark you as a target aren’t necessarily negative things. Credence’s story is going to be about acceptance and growth past trauma and fear, and the things you can build from it.

BUT NOW THAT WE’VE COVERED THESE THINGS I HAVE A THEORY FOR YOU!

We have many examples of light and dark magic in the series, and the differences between. We know that dark magic is destructive and light magic is mostly passive.

I’m going to claim here that an Obscurus is the opposite of a Patronus- or, rather, that they’re flip sides of the same coin. Magical protectors inherently tied to one magical person in particular.

- Both Obscurus and Patronus are powered by intense emotion- an Obscurus by fear and a Patronus by happy memories. Both are protective, though in different ways- a Patronus is a shield, where an Obscurus would be a sword.

- An Obscurus is destructive, seemingly only in relation to something negative happening to their Obscurial (Henry Shaw, Mary-Lou) where a Patronus is inherently passive in their protection, not destroying anything but instead pushing at any dark force until it is a safe distance away from their caster.

- An Obscurus is seemingly directed by subconscious intent, the longings that go unspoken and unacknowledged/repressed. A Patronus is directed by conscious intent, it has to be purposefully summoned and directed by the caster.

- A fully formed Patronus is a beacon of light displaying the caster’s soul, where a fully formed Obscurus is literally hiding the caster as fully as it can in smoke.

This theory then brings up a whole new kind of conversation, if we run with it.

If someone used a Patronus against an Obscurus, what would happen? I’m of the opinion that it would entirely depend upon the strength of the Obscurus and the caster of the patronus involved. I don’t think an Obscurus would EVER be destroyed by a Patronus, but I think a powerful enough Patronus could probably CONTAIN an Obscurus. Bring the Obscurial back to the forefront and thus get them into person-form again. Like, if you think about it in terms of an Obscurus being depression/ptsd and a Patronus being happiness and acceptance, the fact that they’re two different people would be like a depressive person surrounded by positive people. It doesn’t make it any better, but it does make those burdens easier to bear. At least in my experience it does. So an Obscurus being surrounded by the very personification of their happiness would probably cause an Obscurial to become more aware of what’s going on in that moment. Someone else’s good fortune won’t solve your problems, but it can remind you of the moments of light, if that makes sense.

If it’s a weak Obscurus against a strong Patronus, it could likely help the Obscurial accept their magic and such, if it’s the other way around then I’d expect no affect.

Is the bubble holding the Obscurus in Newt’s trunk made from Patronus energy, then? Well, it certainly looks it to me. The same silvery smoke that is a Patronus before the caster has enough power/memory to give it form. Or the control to choose not to do so. But we certainly don’t know for sure.

On that note, though, I’m going to open the floor- who wants to jump in?

Comments, questions, concerns?

LET’S TALK!

(2018)

#obscurus #fantastic beasts #hp meta #obscurials #leakycon 2018 #op #ariana dumbledore #credence barebone #merope gaunt

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hereticalvoice94 · 3 years ago

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Nietzche stated that “God is dead”. Crowley created a religious philosophy by which man could lead his own life unencumbered by the fetters of organized religion. Both of these great men have been inspirations to me as a writer, thinker, artist an all-around human being. What does it mean to be human? How did we get here? Is there a god? And if so, what is its nature?

All of these questions, and More, have I pondered and stumbled about, thinking of a sufficient answer. I dare say that I still don’t know the answers to any of the above stated questions. But it is my hope that throughout the remainder of my life that I could get a sliver or glimpse of the “Inner World” - a small gap in the fabric of reality that I can hear the voice of god say, “My son, I’m here”.

My life’s work, or Magnus Opus, should be enthralled with grand adventures and climactic scenes of titillation and or pure ecstasy. However, as I write this, at the primed age of 27, I have traveled little, wrote nothing of truly great delight nor experienced much of the outside world.

There is, however, a distinct yearning to grow in other areas, such as, epistemology and psychology and to experience the outside world and to reconnect with the original temple of God - nature. As I pen this paper, it is my hope, or dream, to live a truly fulfilling and undoubtedly by some, lawless and sinful life; a life free to be the free spirit that I am!

Hopefully, I will live my life to the fullest, unconfined and unfettered by the shackles of religious, ethical, moral and sociological restrictions; isn’t that the true Left-Hand Path? A life lived to the most extreme. A life lived to break free from all taboos and limitations.

If there is no god, no deity to be praised nor revered nor worshipped, then dare I say that the god in which mankind should be thankful for is the God of his own will - the will to live, the will to compose beautiful symphonies and quartets, the will to write the most eloquent prose and poetry, the will to create the most awe-inspiring art - that is a god I could revere. A god by which meaning and purpose are not superfluous but essential - a will that excels in its natural habitat - the “Transcendent Will”.

A god doesn’t need to exist, or be present, in order for us to find awe-inspiring or mystical joys of the natural world around us. In fact if a god dose exist, especially the one in the Bible, Talmud or Quran, it would fly in the face of nature and her glorious essence. The biblical or abrahamic god is the demon-king and liar of all of the natural world; a force for ill not good.

Furthermore, a god that personally Intervenes in the lives of people, answering prayers and working miracles, for example, would have the greatest audacity to answer someone’s prayer to heal them from cancer when the omnipotent and omniscient deity would have put the cancer in the patient in the first place or allowed it to happen. This by definition of distich and psychopathic at its finest; A lousy and capricious God that has nothing better to do than to curse someone with an illness and then heal them while they beg for their life; that is evil, that is wicked.

But let us not go on about the sorrows of the world, but let’s look beyond it and transcend even death by living life to the fullest with our will in mind. What better way than thrusting both middle fingers to death, and telling it to fuck off, than to live life in the moment and to live it with meaning and purpose? Nothing.

One must rise above this nihilistic and apathetic universe, a world that has little to no meaning, and to smash down all laws, all morals and all restrictions! Fuck Jesus! Fuck Allah! Fuck Buddha! Fuck Shiva! We must cultivate and nourish the “Transcendent Will” in one’s self.

This is where the individual takes form - a group or collectivist mindset is an earthly ill that must be extinguished. The “Transcendent Will” shall overcome all obstacles and challenges, thus needing assistance or guidance from the group is utterly useless.

The individual should fight tooth and nail, fist and hammer against the common goal of the herd and group. But if he cannot sufficiently deal a lethal blow to an enemy, such as an anti-individualist philosophy like fascism, then the individualist might have to gather a group to take down the enemy. Thus, It is the will and resolute spirit of the individual to lead the charge of death, not the group; the group is a mere tool while the individual is the spearhead of it all.

Such men, like Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin would qualify as great ambassadors of the ideals of the individualist and embody the spirit of the “Transcendent Will”; kings who could have remade the world according to their Will and then transcend beyond the confines of the common herd and sheep. However, the individual can become corrupt. As In the case of Hitler, who advocated the state or the collectivist-ilk to conquer the individual, he then betrays the “Transcendent Will” and makes a fatal mistake that cost him the war.

By imposing his Will onto others, who each have their own Will, he makes the mistake of overstepping the boundary of his Will. Hitler tears down the flag of the individual and creates a police state to enforce the collectivist-scum.

Now, I shall lay down the ideals of what a person with the “Transcendent Will” embodies. He makes no concern for morals, religion, society or group dynamics to take hold of him. He unfetters his spirit from the shackles of the burdens of morals and ethics. He admires nature and treats her with great respect. He calls for the death of those that would impose their ideology or group over the individual. He yields to no one. He flourishes in the creative world of art, literature, music and so forth. He relinquishes all limiting limitations. He imposes his Will upon others that would dare to deny him his. He thinks for himself. He is law unto himself. He makes no attempt to bargain with his freedom and puts all to the sword who would dare to deny him this! He makes no attempt to impose his Will over others unjustly. He is born free and he shall live free and he shall die free!

#philosophy #religion #my writing

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how-mom-died-blog · 4 years ago

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Movie Review: To Dust

My Wife is obsessed with human composting... and I know something intense is on the horizon. We moved to Washington State a few years ago, and shortly after we arrived (dumb luck or more evidence that we’re living in a simulation?) Washington became the first state to legalize human composting.

Washington became the first state to legalize “human composting” on Tuesday, when Gov. Jay Inslee signed a law that will allow human bodies to be converted into soil in licensed facilities.

The state law, which passed with bipartisan support, is aimed at providing a burial alternative that is less costly and more environmentally friendly than cremation or traditional coffin burials. It will take effect on May 1, 2020.

source: https://time.com/5593438/washington-legalizes-human-composting/

We’ve had long conversations about this, Emily and I. Most methods of bodily disposal are horribly toxic to the environment, and the simple act of burying a body inside a coffin speaks very directly to our culture’s inability to face the reality of what death really is—part of the natural cycle of energy transfer on this planet. We humans have such a narrow focus when it comes to our lives. We are intensely afraid that we aren’t somehow “special”, and we have built massive monuments to immortalize our lives, long after we are gone.

If anything, my comic aims to open up conversation about dying, making it less taboo so that we can lift some of these veils that prevent us from preparing for death or acknowledging death. Our failure to face death leads to our resistance of aging.

From plastic surgeons mutilating people to “look like a 28 year old lizard” (Bill Burr, You People Are All The Same, Netflix, 2012) to transhumanist Ray Kurzweil making the preposterous claim that he wants to cure death altogether, in his lifetime, our culture is brimming with examples of how we have divorced ourself from the natural processes of the earth. Is it any wonder that the planet feels so desperately out-of-balance?

“The fact that we put pillows in caskets shows how little we understand about death.”

— Caitlin Doughty, mortician, activist, and advocate of death acceptance and the reform of Western funeral industry practices.

We come up with crackpot theories as to what lies beyond, and then we create ideologies around these stories and go to war over them. It has even been suggested that evangelicals who truly believe in the rapture would rather propel this planet to the brink of destruction, just to bring it on as soon as possible. All of this is to say, when we deny death, we deny life.

Oh yeah. This was supposed to be a movie review.

So the other night, I’m flipping through my streaming watchlists and I find this gem on Prime.

Shmuel (Geza Rohrig), a hasidic cantor in upstate New York, distraught by the untimely death of his wife, knows little more of life after death than what’s written in the Torah and Talmud, and is worried that his wife’s burial has put her soul in great pain, preventing her soul from ultimately reconnecting with the divine. He enlists the help of Albert (Matthew Broderick) and they embark on a quest to understand exactly what happens to the human body after it dies.

Eventually, (spoilers) Shmuel decides to free his wife’s corpse from the confines of the box she was buried in, and develops a clandestine partnership with Albert to move her body to an above-ground human composting site.

I found this movie to be darkly funny and challenging at times. Shmuel’s character was a little less complex than I would have preferred. That said, I enjoyed it enough to watch it more than once. It was great seeing Matthew Broderick in a dry and serious role like this, and the two had great, if not awkward, chemistry together. I even learned a thing or two about human decomposition in the process.

Look, I say all this like I’m fully liberated from the cultural taboos that prevent us from accepting death, but when Emily talks about how she wants her body treated after she dies, I truly wince. It’s a strong wince that starts with my face and ends somewhere inside my heart. It’s a conversation I don’t want to have, even after all we’ve been through. Even after filling out our POLST forms in our mid-30s. I’m struggling just like everyone else. But these conversations are really important to have with our loved ones. They’re important to have with everyone, because we can’t keep roaming this earth with our heads in the sand, in regards to our true nature.

We are part of this planet. We came from it. We will return to it. And the fact that we have iron in our blood proves that we are also children of the stars, because all of the iron on Earth was produced in the intense conditions present in the hearts of stars, released by supernovae, and distributed across the universe to coalesce over billions of years as gravity-wells that become planets, and from within these planets, we emerge. What business do we have boxing ourselves up inside coffins and pyramids, removing ourselves from the natural order of things? We do these things because we hope that we are special. But that is so short-sighted because when you zoom out and consider that universal perspective, how can we NOT feel special? We are the universe becoming alive, experiencing every configuration possible. We are not insignificant. We are everything.

#death and dying #death positive #death positive movement #human composting #above ground burial #gaia #starchild #children of the stars

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wkyi-blog · 6 years ago

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3 Reasons Why I’m Long LA Tech ☀️

Goodbye summer, and hello still sunny weather! After graduating from HBS this past May, I decided to spend this summer being a tourist in my hometown and reconnecting with friends, places, and experiences in LA. I ended up learning about their passions, their industries, and their thoughts on the LAtest trends. I especially enjoyed wandering around their chill-tech office, which revealed a lot about their culture. After learning from 20 of the fastest growing tech companies across major industries, I’m long on LA tech because of the following key reasons:

Recent home run exits and influx of institutional and industry-specific capital to seed and grow the next tech generation

Uniquely diverse industries going through a creative renaissance (creative capital of the world as Mayor Garcetti officially established)

Universities producing large tech talent pools while favorable climate attracting and retaining talent

1. Recent home run exits and influx of institutional and industry-specific capital to seed and grow the next tech generation

If SF Bay Area is in its mid 50’s like a seasoned CEO, then LA is in its early energetic 30’s as a newly minted Director. SF Bay Area has seen massive exits, dating back to the 1960s when Intel was founded, 1970s for Apple and Oracle, then 1990’s for eBay, Yahoo, PayPal, and Google, then followed by the 2000’s Facebook, Twitter, Uber, and Tesla. On the other hand, LA has recently seen a few home runs from Snap, Dollar Shave Club, Beats by Dre, and Oculus VR. After employees vest at Snap and Google Venice, they’ll spin off to either found startups or become angel investors for other founders looking to build. This won’t happen overnight, but it is inevitable as families establish roots in the community.

There has been an influx of institutional capital from long-time VC’s and new industry-specific VC’s. Upfront Venture and Greycroft continue to raise massive $400M and $250M funds respectively, while newer funds like Fifth Wall Ventures (real estate tech), Bonfire Ventures (SoCal B2B), Embark Ventures (deep tech), and CAA Ventures (entertainment) provide more industry expertise. As both tech talent continues to increase and venture capital continues to follow in lockstep, there will be healthy incubation and support for startups in the growth stage in the coming decade.

2. LA is uniquely diverse in its industries going through an innovation renaissance

Some of the major industries in LA are media, entertainment, transportation and logistics, aerospace, e-commerce, real estate, and health & wellness.

As the original entertainment capital of the world, LA is the home of major offices of Disney, Netflix, and Creative Artist Agency (CAA). Media has no boundaries when it comes to expanding to other countries. With the massive population in China, there are a lot of opportunities to create content in LA and then scale internationally. And the reverse is true, as Chinese media giant ByteDance ($75B) and Spotify have just opened offices in West Hollywood and downtown LA, as they look to connecting with content creators and hiring talented engineers and business development teams. Also, Intel recently built a 10K square feet dome studio for volumetric VR/AR video productions, taking advantage of the creative content, talent, and real estate in LA.

Gaming is well positioned in LA, as top gaming developers Blizzard Activision and Riot Games (League of Legends, Tencent acquisition) are born and raised here. Gaming is growing massively and globally because of its scalable and democratic nature, in which anyone in the world can play or create new games with just an internet connection. With the rise of eSports, LA leads much of the innovation as the top developers have already experimented the past few years. They have taken a page out of NFL and NBA sports leagues to create their own like Overwatch League and building physical stadiums for live events drawing in 11M viewers. As a result, they are creating new job opportunities and pulling in talent from traditional sports leagues to enhance their business development.

Transportation gets a bad rap in LA, but that just shouts opportunity especially in such a large metro area with the second largest population in the U.S. Recently, Santa Monica approved some of the biggest players: Bird is based out of Venice Beach, and LimeBike is aggressively putting its stake in the ground, while Uber (via Jump) and Lyft are inevitably establishing themselves. Driving has been the main mode of transportation for most people, except in West LA most recently. After living in Venice Beach for a summer, I noticed the medium distance last mile could easily be solved with ridesharing, and the short distance last mile can be solved by scooters. Cars are not going away anytime soon, but we do see a major platform shift into multi-modal transportation that can involve public transportation, ride sharing, scooters, and then our feet. (Perhaps they’ll be running shoe-sharing on the streets...). The new modes of transport will lead to more frequent social interactions; this density will lead to more and faster information sharing, which is often cited as an interactive ecosystem for creativity and innovation.

Frontier mobility tech has quite literally launched few moonshot ideas in LA. During World War II and the advent of Cold War, LA became the nation’s hub for weapons research and aerospace, and it has had a residual effect on today’s massive bets in mobility. Now, it is the home of SpaceX, Richard Branson’s Hyperloop, and a fellow USC Trojan’s startup Relativity Space, building and launching 3D printed rockets in days. Also, Uber Elevate is partnering with NASA to launch their first pilot city in LA, because its highways can greatly benefit from air taxis. Every year, LA experiences forest fires, so drone startups like DroneBase and AirMap have been hatched out of necessity, capturing data from hundreds of feet above ground while optimizing for safety and cost. Many of these decades-long infrastructure bets require industry-specific talent and a vast amount of land to test products, both of which are ideal in LA.

Fashion, e-commerce, and CPG companies are able to competitively differentiate in LA thanks Hollywood and media. Some of the biggest consumer brands are right in LA, because fashion and beauty is a big part of its culture. For example, Jessica Alba founded The Honest Company and Gwyneth Paltrow founded Goop, both CPG companies have capitalized on their founder’s star power. From the investor side, Ashton Kutcher and Kobe Bryant both have their VC’s investing in consumer startups like Bird and BodyArmor (Gatorade competitor), respectively.

Health & Wellness has always been a big part LA culture due to the entertainment sector and “sun’s out guns out” weather. In fitness, SoulCycle, Rumble Boxing, and CorePower yoga studios have opened up locations from West Hollywood to downtown LA. In meditation, Headspace has been growing rapidly driven by a trend towards mindfulness. From a tech perspective, my section mate from HBS Amira is founding Struct Club, a technology platform for fitness instructors, transforming the way they design and teach classes because of the health and fitness industry and culture in LA.

Real estate is multi-faceted in LA ranging from beach-side resorts in Malibu to Beverly Hills and to large suburban inland neighborhoods. In fact, one of the largest real estate brokerage companies CBRE $16B along with others is headquartered in downtown LA. This sounds like a traditional industry and not tech-enabled, because it really hasn’t experienced much innovation until recently. For example, storage is a very antiquated industry dominated by Public Storage ($37B) but starting to be disrupted by LA-based Clutter, an on-demand storage startup capitalizing on the underutilized storage spaces due to LA sprawling nature. Though it will not change overnight due to the inertia of the industry, it has already started to shift and will accelerate when incumbents play catch-up.

3. Universities producing large tech talent pools while favorable climate attracting and retaining talent

LA Metro has 10M people making it the second largest city in the U.S., but it hasn’t really claimed itself as the second hottest tech scene. Sure, it has Silicon Beach, but I personally cringe when I try to boast about it. Part of the reason for lagging is timing. As we segment the total population we find that LA has great technical universities such as USC, UCLA, CalTech, UC Irvine, and Harvey Mudd producing almost 10% of the nation’s engineering graduates. But many of them end up being brain drained to SF and NY. My friends and I are prime examples of this. Lastly, we find that professional training is critical in producing experienced talent. Think of this as the Google, Facebook, Amazon, tech powerhouses that produce talent that learn from the best and end up leaving and starting their own companies. Now, LA has Snap, Google, and other tech-enabled industries training next generation of entrepreneurs not only in the internet space.

Weather is not just small talk when people talk about LA. There is a good reason why people live here. Spoiler alert - it’s because there are beaches, it’s always sunny, and the sun usually makes people happier. New York, Chicago, Boston can be freezing, while San Francisco frequently fools you because it looks sunny until the fog rolls over. Good weather matters.

There are LA specific challenges, but I remain optimistic

However, the future will be a bumpy ride up, because there is a reason for how long it’s taken for LA to establish itself as a contender for the tech throne. LA is notorious for its traffic, and I’ve personally experienced 3 hour round trip drives from east to west LA visiting companies. There are metros being built and mobility startups, but it’ll take years or decades to truly solve the commute problem. Homelessness continues to be a major issue with almost 60K homeless, only second to NYC, as I’ve witnessed many tents set up near tech companies in Venice Beach and downtown LA. This may continue to happen if affordable housing doesn’t meet demand while many homeless from colder states are moving to LA for a better weather. The city has been experimenting with creative ideas like subsidizing homeowners to build backhouses to provide more supply and lower cost of living. Whether this will solve the problem is less important in the short term, while LA’s private and public sector’s innovative attitude is more promising in the long term.

Despite all the challenges, as an LA native, I remain optimistic about what the future of LA tech community looks like. Having lived in NY, SF, Boston, I’ve noticed there are similar energy and innovation that have allowed tech to thrive in those areas, while differentiating LA with its massively diverse industries and, of course, its unparalleled weather.

What city are you long or short tech? Feel free to share your thoughts and if you’re working on an interesting startup let me know if I can help! [email protected], LinkedIn, FB Messenger, Instagram.

Wilson

P.S. Many thanks to all the old and new friends for indulging me and my musings at their workplace!

#losangeles #la #tech #startup #vc #venturecapital #founder #entrepreneur

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scifitalk · 7 years ago

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Official Synopsis:

Fueled by his restored faith in humanity and inspired by Superman’s selfless act, Bruce Wayne enlists the help of his newfound ally, Diana Prince, to face an even greater enemy. Together, Batman and Wonder Woman work quickly to find and recruit a team of metahumans to stand against this newly awakened threat. But despite the formation of this unprecedented league of heroes—Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Cyborg and The Flash—it may already be too late to save the planet from an assault of catastrophic proportions.

Picking up shortly after we last saw Bruce and Diana go their separate ways, the story reconnects these two characters who may not always see the same road toward their shared goal. But it’s their shared motivation—to do right by the sacrifice Superman made—that allows them to find common ground very quickly in order to face Steppenwolf, an eight-foot-tall warrior from the nightmare world of Apokolips. He seeks the power to conquer the world and transform it into his own. He is no ordinary villain, and it will take an extraordinary force to defeat him.

Zack Snyder states, “Just the idea of getting the Justice League together on the same playing field, taking their place in the cinematic landscape as a team and embarking on an amazing adventure…the mere concept of it was awe-inspiring.”

In the film, the loss of Superman—of hope—is the catalyst for everything that happens, on both sides. But there is little time to mourn, and even less time to take action. Earth is vulnerable, primed for attack because of that void. And because the hero who stood for hope and justice is gone, the League must unite in his stead, to fight for the world he saved. Producer Deborah Snyder adds, “These characters all have such unique personalities, and such different powers and abilities, and the chance to pool them together to see how powerful they can be as a unit was such a thrill. Not to mention the urgency of their mission. There’s no time to practice. It’s game on from the moment they come together, because this is an extremely formidable enemy.”

To form the League, the story takes us to the ends of the Earth and beyond: from a gritty Gotham to Central City, the populous Paris to the frozen wilds of Iceland, from Themyscira to Atlantis, and from buzzing Metropolis to the serenity of Smallville. If Bruce and Diana can succeed in recruiting the others for this larger-than-life battle in which all their worlds are at stake, they will come together as the greatest team of Super Heroes in the DC universe.

Ben Affleck: “Batman still really resonates because on the one hand he’s a Super Hero, but on the other hand he is just like us,” Affleck states. “He feels vulnerable; he bleeds if you cut him. He is a real person on the inside and yet he is ‘super.’ There are all kinds of contradictions inherent in that, which makes for interesting storytelling.”

Gal Gadot: “Wearing my costume felt like the most normal thing because I had been doing it for six months before,” Gadot states. “But seeing everyone else wearing their own costumes was wonderful. I remember the first three days, I kept looking at all the guys and me in costume, and I just kept laughing because it felt so surreal. So many Super Heroes, standing together. It was really great to be shooting this movie.” “Wonder Woman is the greatest warrior.She has such amazing strength, but at the same time she can be very, well, human. She cares so much for people and she just wants to make the world a better place because she sees the world as very special. Life is so complicated and we forget about the simple things, but she always remembers them: love, hope, do good in the world. And I think that’s something that everyone can aspire to.”

Erza Miller: “The Flash is a scientist in the sense that a scientist studies the natural order of things, makes observations and performs experiments,” Miller explains. “But Barry’s inherently interested in quantum mechanics because he’s literally running into them. “When we first meet Barry in the film, he’s just awakening to his powers. He hasn’t really tested them out, he’s not yet breached the event horizon, as it were. But he’s starting to feel there’s an opportunity waiting for him.”

Ray Fisher : “Cyborg became the very technology that was used to rebuild him. The technology his father used was alien and it imbued him with super-abilities. He has super-strength. He can fly. He’s a technopath, which means he can interface with anything technological. He has worlds of information at his disposal, not just from our galaxy but also from other universes. But it’s all pretty new, so he struggles with it. It begs the question, ‘How deeply should you allow yourself to become entrenched in the idea of who and what you are? ”

Jason Momoa : “He’s the heir to the throne of Atlantis, but he’s not the king yet. So, as always, he’s between worlds. But here at the frozen ends of the earth, he has a purpose. Arthur is a good man, he helps people who genuinely need him, and he’s found a place where they accept and respect him. He can take off his ‘mask’ here.”

Henry Cavill: “There’s nothing quite like playing Superman, It’s still surreal.There was a moment where I was really tired near the end of a long day, and I was thinking ‘I’m hungry and I’m looking forward to getting to bed.’ And then I realized I had Cyborg, Aquaman, and Wonder Woman all standing in front of me, and they were in costume and it looked so fantastic. And all of a sudden, my fatigue went away. I just wanted to live in the moment and appreciate that I’m doing the thing that I wanted to do as a kid, but as real as it gets as an adult. You become very thankful for that kind of thing. Martha is seeing everyone mourning this Superman character, but she’s mourning Clark, her son. And she can’t tell anyone that Superman was her son. It’s a terrible loneliness and pain for her to go through. It’s excruciating for both Martha and Lois to see all these people mourning a man that none of them truly knew.””

Costume Designer Michael Wilkinson and his concept artists came up with an immensely detailed 3D model of Cyborg, defining the graphic language and textures of the alien world. They then handed it over to the visual effects department, who continued to develop Cyborg’s look under Snyder’s direction and guided by the actor’s performance. For the shoot, it was simply a matter of Wilkinson’s team sewing together Ray Fisher’s “pajamas”: the blue-dotted performance-capture suit that the skilled VFX artists would digitally replace, under the supervision of visual effects supervisor DJ DesJardin. Wilkinson also turned his attention to Superman’s suit, marking his third go ‘round. “This time, you’re going to see a Superman that’s a little more lustrous,” says Wilkinson. “We developed an extremely beautiful metallic chromed under-suit that Henry wears, using materials and processes that weren’t available for previous versions of the costume. And for the over-suit, we created a mesh that’s a slightly bolder blue than the last film, so he really jumps off the screen in such a heroic way. And Zack had the fantastic idea of incorporating some Kryptonian scripts throughout the suit, so we wove some of that language, which we’d developed for ‘Man of Steel,’ through the S, across the bicep, through the belt, and in the cuff details. It adds that extra layer of meaning and detail for the audience.”

The suit was created by screen-printing a dimensional print onto a thin mesh that is itself the latest in fabric technology. “It’s even more sheer and beautiful and lustrous than what you saw in ‘Batman v Superman,’” Wilkinson asserts, “but super strong so that it didn’t fall apart when it was stretched tight. We also found amazing new printing inks that make a very dimensional, high-raised surface, and new paints that make it appear almost chromed. All of these little tweaks add up to a bolder, more impactful costume.” Techniques aside, perhaps the newest territory for the “Justice League” costume department was in housing the entire costume crew under one roof. Normally on a film of such scope and scale, each main character’s costume is made by a different manufacturing company, under the direction of the costume designer. But this time, the filmmakers did something they’d never done before.

Finally, Wilkinson’s costumes also had to withstand the “tuning forks.” First developed for use on “The Matrix Revolutions,” they were introduced to the filmmakers by stunt coordinator Eunice Huthart. The device resembles a huge tuning fork, hence the name. The actor is strapped into the middle, and there is a counterbalance that enables him to mimic weightlessness, like being underwater, for example. Not only can he be rotated forward and backwards, but also on the y-axis. Just as Superman can fly, Aquaman can float.

The film also stars Amy Adams as Lois Lane, Jeremy Irons as Alfred, Diane Lane as Martha Kent, Connie Nielsen as Hippolyta, and J.K. Simmons as Commissioner Gordon.

The “Justice League” screenplay is by Chris Terrio and Joss Whedon, story by Chris Terrio & Zack Snyder, based on characters from DC, Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. The film’s producers are Charles Roven, Deborah Snyder, Jon Berg and Geoff Johns, with executive producers Jim Rowe, Ben Affleck, Wesley Coller, Curtis Kanemoto, Daniel S. Kaminsky and Chris Terrio.

Justice League Preview Official Synopsis: Fueled by his restored faith in humanity and inspired by Superman’s selfless act, Bruce Wayne enlists the help of his newfound ally, Diana Prince, to face an even greater enemy.

#Ben Affleck #Erza Miller #Gal Gadot #Henry Cavill #Jason Momoa #Joss Whedon #Justice League #Michael Wilkinson #Ray Fisher #Zack Snyder

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starringemiliaclarke · 7 years ago

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Press: Game of Thrones: How They Make the World’s Most Popular Show

TIME – The battle for Westeros may be won or lost on the back of a lime green mechanical bull.

That’s what it looks like on a January Monday in Belfast, as Game of Thrones films its seventh season here. Certainly no one believes the dragons that have thrilled viewers of HBO’s hit series exist in any real sense. And yet it’s still somewhat surprising to see the British actor Emilia Clarke, who plays exiled queen Daenerys, straddling the “buck” on a soundstage at Titanic Studios, a film complex named after this city’s other famously massive export.

The machine under Clarke looks like a big pommel horse and moves in sync with a computer animation of what will become a dragon. Clarke doesn’t talk much between takes. Over and over, a wind gun blasts her with just enough force to make me worry about the integrity of her ash blond wig. (Its particular color is the result of 2½ months’ worth of testing and seven prototypes, according to the show’s hair designer.) Over and over, Clarke stares down at a masking-tape mark on the floor the instant episode director Alan Taylor shouts, “Now!” Nearby, several visual-effects supervisors watch on monitors.

Clarke and I talk in her trailer before she heads to the soundstage, at the beginning of what is to be a long week inhabiting a now iconic character. Behind the scenes it’s more toil than triumph, though. The show’s first season ended with Daenerys’ hatching three baby dragons, each the size of a Pomeranian. They’ve since grown to the size of a 747. “I’m 5-ft.-nothing, I’m a little girl,” she says. “They’re like, ‘Emilia, climb those stairs, get on that huge thing, we’ll harness you in, and then you’ll go crazy.’ And you’re like, ‘Hey, everybody! Now who’s shorty?!’”

She has reason to feel powerful. On July 16, Clarke and the rest of the cast will begin bringing Thrones in for a landing with the first of its final 13 episodes (seven to air this summer, six to come later). Thrones, a scrappy upstart launched by two TV novices in 2011, will finish its run as the biggest and most popular show in the world. An average of more than 23 million Americans watched each episode last season when platforms like streaming and video on demand are accounted for. And since it’s the most pirated show ever, millions more watch it in ways unaccounted for. Thrones, which holds the record for most Emmys ever won by a prime-time series, airs in more than 170 countries. It’s the farthest-reaching show out there—not to mention the most obsessed-about.

People talk about living in a golden age of TV ushered in by hit dramas like The Sopranos, Mad Men and Breaking Bad. All had precisely honed insights about the nature of humanity and of evil that remade expectations of what TV could do. But that period ended around the time Breaking Bad went off the air in 2013. We’re in what came next: an unprecedented glut of programming, with streaming services like Netflix, Amazon and Hulu jumping into an ever-more-crowded fray. Now, there’s a prestige show for every conceivable viewer, which means smaller audiences and fewer truly original stories.

Except for Thrones, which merges the psychological complexity of the best TV with old-school Hollywood grandeur. You liked shows with one antihero? Well, Thrones has five Tony Sopranos building their empires on blood, five Walter Whites discovering just how far they’ll go to win, five Don Drapers unapologetic in their narcissism. Oh, and they’re all living out their drama against the most breathtaking vistas not of this world.

The phenomenon is fueled by a massive worldwide apparatus that, in a typical 10-episode season, generates the equivalent of five big-budget, feature-length movies. Even as the series has grown in every conceivable way over the years—it shoots around the globe; each episode now boasts a budget of at least $10 million—it remains animated by one simple question: Who will win the game in the end? And if Thrones has taught us anything, it’s that every reign has to end sometime.

1. the fiction

It all started with a book. In 1996, George R.R. Martin published A Game of Thrones, the first novel in his A Song of Ice and Fire series. (Back then, he conceived of it as a trilogy. Today, five of the planned seven volumes have been published.) As a writer for shows like CBS’s The Twilight Zone and Beauty and the Beast in the late ’80s, Martin had been frustrated by the limits of TV. He decided that turning to prose meant writing something “as big as my imagination.” Martin recalls telling himself, “I’m going to have all the characters I want, and gigantic castles, and dragons, and dire wolves, and hundreds of years of history, and a really complex plot. And it’s fine because it’s a book. It’s essentially unfilmable.”

The books became a hit, especially after 1999’s A Clash of Kings and A Storm of Swords a year later. Martin, who writes from his home in Santa Fe, N.M., was compared to The Lord of the Rings author J.R.R. Tolkien. Like Tolkien’s Middle-earth, Martin’s Westeros is a land with a distinctive set of rules. First, magic is real. Second, winter is coming. Seasons can last for years at a time, and as the series begins, a long summer is ending. Third, no one is safe. New religions are in conflict with the old, rival houses have designs on the capital’s Iron Throne, and an undead army is pushing against the boundary of civilization, known as the Wall.

Thrones’ vast number of clans includes the wealthy and louche Lannisters, including incestuous twins Cersei and Jaime. She is the queen by marriage; he helped ensure her ascendancy through violence. Their brother Tyrion, an “imp” of short stature, is perhaps the most astute student of power. Then there are the Starks, led by duty-bound Ned. His children Robb, Sansa, Arya, Bran, Rickon and “bastard” Jon Snow will be scattered throughout the realm’s Seven Kingdoms. Daenerys is a Targaryen, an overthrown family that also—surprise—has a claim to the throne. Soon enough, Thrones devolves into an all-out melee that makes the Wars of the Roses look like Family Feud.

In the wake of director Peter Jackson’s early-2000s film trilogy of Tolkien’s masterpiece, Martin was courted by producers to turn his books into “the next Lord of the Rings franchise.” But the Thrones story was too big, and would-be collaborators suggested cutting it to focus solely on Daenerys or Snow, for instance. Martin turned them all down. His story’s expansiveness was the point.

Two middleweight novelists, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, had come to a similar conclusion and obtained Martin’s blessing at what the author calls “that famous lunch that turned into a dinner, because we were there for four or five hours” in 2006. The two writers thought Thrones could only be made as a premium-cable drama, and they walked into HBO’s office with an ambitious pitch to do so that year. “They were talking about this series of books I’d never heard of,” says Carolyn Strauss, head of HBO’s entertainment division at the time. “[I was] somebody who looked around the theater in Lord of the Rings, at all of those rapt faces, and I am just not on this particular ferry … I thought, This sounds interesting. Who knows? It could be a big show.”

HBO bought the idea and handed the reins to Benioff and Weiss, making them showrunners who’d never run a show before. Benioff was best known for having adapted his novel The 25th Hour into a screenplay directed by Spike Lee. Weiss had a novel to his credit too. The two had met in a literature program in Dublin in 1995 and later reconnected in the States. “I decided I wanted to write a screenplay,” Benioff told Vanity Fair in 2014. “I’d never written a script before, and I didn’t know how to do it, so I asked [Weiss] if he would write one with me, because he had written a bunch already.” It never got made.

The Thrones pilot, shot in 2009, got off to a rocky start. Benioff and Weiss misjudged how much planning it would take to bring Martin’s fantasy to life. To portray a White Walker—mystic creatures from the North—they simply stuck an actor in a green-screen getup and hoped to figure it out later. “You can maybe do that if you’re making Avatar,” says Weiss. “But we need to know what the creatures look like before we turn on the camera.” They also had trouble portraying Martin’s nuanced characters. “Our friends—really smart, savvy writers—didn’t [realize] Jaime and Cersei were brother and sister,” says Benioff of the ill-fated first cut. Ultimately, they reshot the pilot.

When Benioff and Weiss look back at that first season, they see plenty to nitpick. Their fealty to Martin’s text, for example, made Peter Dinklage’s Tyrion “Eminem blond,” per Benioff. (His hair was later darkened.) Still, the elements that have made the show a monster success were there—and audiences (3 million for Thrones’ first season finale) picked up on them. Arguably the most groundbreaking element was a willingness to ruthlessly murder its stars. Ned Stark, the moral center of Season 1, portrayed by the show’s then most famous cast member (Sean Bean, who starred in The Lord of the Rings), is shockingly beheaded in the second-to-last episode. By the third season’s “Red Wedding,” a far more gruesome culling, the show had accrued enough fans to send the Internet into full on freak-out mode.

Thrones had by then become the pacesetter for all of TV in its willingness to forgo a simple happy ending in favor of delivering pleasure through brutality. Even if you don’t watch, Thrones’ characters and catchphrases have permeated the culture (the apparent death of Snow was an international trending topic all summer in 2015). Saturday Night Live, The Simpsons and The Tonight Show have lampooned the show. And the recent South Korean presidential election was called on a national news network with depictions of the candidates duking it out for control of the Iron Throne.

2. the production

Wandering around the Belfast set, the scope and the orderliness of the enterprise is staggering. The wights, zombie-like creatures with spookily pale faces and dressed in ragged furs, form a tidy line as they wait to grab breakfast burritos. Outside the stage door, a few smoke cigarettes, careful not to ash on their worn-in tunics. “At first we had a season with one big event, then we had a season with two big events, now we have a season where every episode is a big event,” says Joe Bauer, the show’s VFX supervisor. Bauer and VFX producer Steve Kullback oversee a group of 14 FX shops from New Zealand to Germany that work on the show almost continuously.

One of those big events this season is a battle whose sheer scope, even before being cut together with the show’s typical brio, dazzled me. In order to get on set, I agreed not to divulge the players or what’s at stake. (Thrones has been promising this clash all along, and when the time comes, the Internet will melt.) It will be all the more impressive knowing that the cast and crew were shot through with a frigid North Atlantic wind that whipped everyone during filming and sent them all flying to the coffee cart during resets. (The cold, a prosthetic artist tells me, is at least good for keeping the makeup on.)

The setting is as grand as the action. The battle was filmed in what was once a Belfast quarry, drained, flattened out with 11,000 square meters of concrete and painted over with a camouflage effect—all of which took six months and required special ecological surveys. This kind of mountain moving, or leveling, is par for the course for Thrones.

Each season starts with producers Christopher Newman and Bernadette Caulfield circulating a plot outline on a color-coded spreadsheet, dictating what will be shot by the show’s two simultaneous camera units, which can splinter into as many as four. It’s perpetually subject to change, given the complications of a television show this ambitious—over seven seasons they’ve shot in Croatia, Spain, Iceland, Malta, Morocco and Canada as well as locations around Northern Ireland. While I’m in Belfast, my plan to watch Jon Snow in action is canceled because of inclement weather (that same wind) that makes filming from a drone hazardous. At this point, Caulfield will grab onto any small comfort. “Now the dragon doesn’t get any bigger,” she says, “so we know that much.”

Another breakdown goes out to department heads, and a massive global triage begins. Costumer Michele Clapton, for example, begins figuring out if she’ll have to dress any new characters or armies and then sets out on the most complex work. “I know that Daenerys’ dresses will take the longest,” she says. Each look, no matter the character, may take as many as four craftspeople to bead, stitch and—if there’s meant to be wear and tear—break down. Deborah Riley, the production designer, begins looking for references to new locations in the outline. Tommy Dunne, the weapons master, starts forging gear for the season’s big battles. “My big thing is the numbers,” he says. “I hope they won’t frighten me.” He made 200 shields and 250 spears for last season’s epic Battle of the Bastards.

Benioff’s and Weiss’s jobs amount to maintaining constant conversation with numerous producers. The pair are usually in Belfast for about six months a year. Wherever in the world they happen to be, they get daily video from the shoots and field an endless stream of emails from staff on location. During my visit, wolves described in the script as “skinny and mangy” showed up to the shoot looking fluffy and lustrous. Around the world, new message notifications lit up smartphone screens.

When Benioff and Weiss aren’t shooting, they’re writing. And when they aren’t shooting or writing—which happens rarely—they’re promoting. The two make a complementary pair. Benioff, who wears his hair in a Morrissey quiff, is the more sardonic one. Weiss, with silver rings in his ears, is nerdier and given to hyperbole. They say they’re still having fun making Thrones, despite the stakes, and still regularly find themselves surprised by its scale. Weiss recalls seeing the buck Clarke rides to simulate Daenerys’ dragons for the first time: “We knew it would be a mechanical bull. We didn’t know it would be 40 ft. in the air and six degrees of motion with cameras that swirl.” Says Benioff: “It’s like the thing NASA built to train the astronauts.”

Despite nonstop production, Weiss says, “There’s still a kid-in-a-candy-shop feel. You’re going to look at the armor, crazy-amazing dresses—gowns Michele is making—then you’re going to look at the swords, then watch pre-vis cartoons of the scenes that will be shot and you’re weighing in on shot selection. Every one of these things is something we’ve been fascinated with in our own way since we were kids.”

“Especially dresses,” cracks Benioff. Weiss adds, “Especially the gowns.”

3. the players

The first few seasons’ worth of swordplay and gowns turned the show’s cast into recognizable stars. But it’s the complexity of their characters, revealed over time, that made them into icons. “My friends always say to me, ‘It’s like you’re two different people. I see articles about you in BuzzFeed’—but then they see my Facebook posts,” says Maisie Williams, who plays the tomboy turned angel of vengeance Arya Stark. Williams was two days past her 14th birthday when the show debuted. There’s TV-star famous, after all, and then there’s some-percentage-of-23-million-people-has-been-actively-rooting-for-you-to-kill-off-your-co-stars-for-six-years famous.

Thrones’ story doesn’t ask its actors to break bad or good, and viewers stay tuned in large part because of the characters’ moral mutability. Consider Cersei, played by Lena Headey, who is either a monster or a victim. The character has become more popular with fans even as she’s wrought greater carnage, including blowing up a building full of people last season. “At the beginning, people were like, ‘Oh my God, you’re such a bitch!’” she says. “What’s moving is that people love her now and want to be on her team.” That Headey, a Brit, uses an exaggerated American accent as she delivers the harsher interpretation of her work is revealing of nothing, or a lot.

She’s thought through every element of her character, though, including the incestuous relationship with Jaime that provided the show its first narrative jolt. “I love to talk about all of it,” she says, citing her frequent emails to Benioff and Weiss. “Cersei’s always wanted to be him. Therefore, for her, that relationship is completion. There’s been an envy, because he was born with privilege just for being a man. I think their love was built on respect.”

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, the Danish actor who plays Jaime, is a bit less excited to discuss the subject. “I’ve never really gone too deep into the whole sister-brother thing because I can’t use that information. I have to look at her as the woman he loves and desires. Lena’s a very good actress, and that’s kind of what carries the whole thing.” He adds, “I have two older sisters. I do not want to go there. It’s just too weird.”

Even a character like Jon Snow, as close to a pure hero as possible as Season 7 begins, has outgrown the box he originally came in. Snow, an illegitimate child never embraced by his father’s wife, is a James Dean daydream of Sir Walter Scott. “I made mistakes and felt that he wasn’t interesting enough,” says Kit Harington of the way he’s played Snow. We’re in a Belfast hotel bar, and Harington is squeezing in a coffee before he makes an evening showing of Manchester by the Sea. “That sounds weird, but I’ve never been quite content with him. Maybe that’s what makes him him. That angst.” His character has been slowly absorbing lessons about duty and power—and “this year there is this huge seismic shift where all of what he’s learned over the years, suddenly …” Harington trails off. “He’s still the same Jon, but he grows up.”

Dinklage, too, found in Tyrion a character who surpassed his expectations. The actor says he’d never read fantasy beyond The Lord of the Rings. “That’s the part of the bookstore I don’t really gravitate toward,” he says. “This was the first time in this genre that somebody my size was an actually multidimensional being, flesh and blood without the really long beard, without the pointy shoes, without the asexuality.”

Thrones catapulted Dinklage, the only American in the main cast, from a well-regarded film and theater actor to among the most-recognized actors on earth in part because the asexuality is quite absent. Tyrion thirsts for wine, sex and, crucially, love and respect. As the offspring of a wealthy and powerful family, the first two are easy to come by. The latter not so much. “He covers it up with alcohol, he covers it up with humor, he does his best to maintain a modicum of sanity and he perseveres,” says Dinklage. “He’s still alive. Anyone who’s still alive on our show is pretty smart.”

Indeed, with just 13 episodes left, everything is possible—alliance, demise or coronation. “Every season I go to the last page of the last episode and go backward,” says Dinklage. “I don’t do that with books, but I can’t crack open page one of Episode 1 not knowing if I’m dead or not.”

4. the drama

The size of Thrones’ controversies have, at times, been as large as its following. Its reliance on female nudity, especially Daenerys’, was an early flash point. “I don’t have any qualms saying to anyone it was not the most enjoyable experience. How could it be?” says Clarke. “I don’t know how many actresses enjoy doing that part of it.” That aspect of the role has faded as Daenerys found paths to power beyond her sexuality. This evolution from a passive naïf into a holy terror who rules by the fealty of her subjects is what has earned Daenerys, according to Clarke, the audience’s loyalty. “People wouldn’t give two sh-ts about Daenerys if you didn’t see her suffer,” she says.

More controversial still has been the prevalence of sexual violence. Many of the major female characters have been assaulted onscreen. In a 2015 sequence, Sansa, the Stark daughter played by Sophie Turner, was raped by her husband. According to the logic of the show, the plot gave her character a reason to seek revenge and power of her own. It nonetheless generated substantial blowback online and clearly turned some fans away from the series for good. “This was the trending topic on Twitter, and it makes you wonder, when it happens in real life, why isn’t it a trending topic every time?” says Turner, who is 21. “This was a fictional character, and I got to walk away from it unscathed … Let’s take that discussion and that dialogue and use it to help people who are going through that in their everyday lives. Stop making it such a taboo, and make it a discussion.”

Benioff and Weiss claim to have seen no other possible outcome for a character stranded in a marriage to a psychopath, in a skewed version of feudal society. “It might not be our world,” says Benioff, “but it’s still the same basic power dynamic between men and women in this medieval world. This is what we believed was going to happen.” Adds Weiss: “We talked about, is there any other way she could possibly avoid this fate that doesn’t seem fake, where she uses her pluck to save herself at the last? There was no version of that that didn’t seem completely horrible.”

Even if Benioff and Weiss don’t always admit it, the show has changed. Scenes in which exposition is delivered in one brothel or another, for example, have been pared back. It’s at moments like these that the success of Thrones seems a precariously struck balance, thriving on a willingness to shock but always risking going too far.

5. the end of the end

Benioff and Weiss claim to have sworn off reading commentary about the show, good or bad. When I visit them in Los Angeles in March, they’re writing the next and final season. I peek into a fridge in a lounge area in their offices, a room dominated by a Thrones-branded pinball machine Weiss proudly points out, to find three cases of beer with Westeros-themed labels, low-calorie ranch dressing and yellow mustard. At this point, they have full outlines of the final six episodes. In fact, they’ve been working on the very last episode, possibly the most anticipated finale since Hawkeye left Korea. “We know what happens in each scene,” says Weiss.

The fact that they know is remarkable considering the show will reach its conclusion long before the books. The last new Thrones novel came out in 2011, the year the show began. The author describes his next installment, the sixth of seven, as “massively late.” “The journey is an adventure,” says Martin, who, at 68, has fought criticism that he won’t finish the books. “There’s always that process of discovery for me.” But with young, and rapidly maturing, actors under contract and a community of artisans awaiting marching orders in Belfast, the show can’t wait.

Benioff and Weiss always knew this would happen. So they met with the novelist in 2013, between Seasons 2 and 3, to sketch out what Martin calls “the ultimate developments” after the books and show diverge. The upshot, they say, is that the two can coexist. “Certain things that we learned from George way back then are going to happen on the show, but certain things won’t,” says Benioff. “And there’s certain things where George didn’t know what was going to happen, so we’re going to find them out for the first time too.”

In preparation for Season 7, Benioff and Weiss have gotten more possessive. That has further fueled fans’ curiosity even as it has created security challenges. In the run-up to Season 6, paparazzi shots of Harington—and his distinctive in-character hairdo—in Belfast tipped the Internet off that Jon Snow wasn’t, in fact, as dead as he’d seemed the season before. “Look at how difficult it is to protect information in this age,” says Benioff. “The CIA can’t do it. The NSA can’t do it. What chance do we have?”

It’s also changed the on-set dynamic. Coster-Waldau says Benioff and Weiss have “become much more protective over the story and script. I think they feel this is truly theirs now, and it’s not to be tampered with. I’ve just sensed this last season that this is their baby: ‘Just say the words as they’re written, and shut up.’”

Then there’s the end of the end, the finale likely to air next year or the year after. Benioff and Weiss are not writing the Thrones spin-off projects HBO revealed this year that could explore other parts of Westerosi history—some, all or none of which may end up on air. In the meantime, they claim not to be worrying about the public’s reaction to their ending. (Benioff says that when it comes to endgame stress, “medication helps.”) Weiss says, “I’m not saying we don’t think about it.” He pauses. “The best way to go about it is to focus on what’s on the desk in front of you, or what sword is being put in front of you, or the fight that is being choreographed in front of you.”

What’s currently before them seems like plenty. When I first met Clarke in Belfast, she was shooting on the back of a dragon. When I leave a week later, she’s still at it. “Thirty seconds of screen time and she’s been here for 16 days,” the episode’s director, Taylor, remarks at one point. Later on, I’d remember this moment of exhaustion when Weiss described seeing the buck for the first time. He went on to add, “It probably feels a bit less amazing to Emilia, who sits on it for eight hours a day, six weeks in a row, getting blasted with water and fake snow and whatever else they decide to chuck at her through the fans.” The table with the espresso machine—just beyond Clarke’s line of sight—is well trafficked.

Clarke doesn’t seem bothered, though, smiling and chatting with the crew from atop the buck. As the state-of-the-art hydraulics move her into position, her posture shifts from millennial slump to ramrod straight. In an instant, she converts herself into the ruler of the fictional space around her. On cue, she looks over her shoulder with a face of marble. She casts into an imagined world some emotion known only to her. She’s gazing into a future that, in the flickering moments that the story remains a secret, only she can see.

Press: Game of Thrones: How They Make the World’s Most Popular Show was originally published on Enchanting Emilia Clarke

#emilia clarke #game of thrones #game of thrones cast #GOT cast #daenerys targaryen #me before you #terminator

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