#underrated detail in the game ill be real

[kayrockerqog]

just did the Confidence Man quest for the first time since my first playthrough today and actually ended up listening to Diamond City Radio afterwards and

Idk man but hearing Travis talking like a radio man with actual gusto and feeling confident with himself?? I feel like a proud mom hearing that.

Plus he just so happened to be talking about me reclaiming the Castle when I tuned in and I'm like "fuck yeah I did, you go kid, proud of you"

[best-underrated-anime]

Best Underrated Anime Group J Round 3: #J3 vs #J1

#J3: Cat demon stuck in cat form, gets adopted as a pet

#J1: Two high school girls overcome mommy issues with the power of YURI!

Details and poll under the cut!

#J3: Legend of Luo XiaoHei (series) (Luo XiaoHei Zhan Ji)

Summary:

XiaoHei is a young cat demon training to be an Executor, someone who maintains the balance between humans and demons. His first mission as a trainee was to steal the Sky Pearl. He succeeded, but he also got injured enough to be unable to revert to his human form. Stuck in his cat form, he gets adopted by the human girl XiaoBai as a pet. The story then follows XiaoHei’s adventures as a pet cat in a human home while also evading the pursuit of his enemy, Diting.

Propaganda:

Legend of Luo Xiaohei, at first glance, is a fun kiddy series with cute art. But the more you learn of the story, the more you realize how much thought is put into every little detail. The creator’s worldbuilding is so intricate. It’s like Adventure Time in that you think it’s all fun and games, but there’s actually so much more to it. There’s even a manhua for the side characters featuring their lives from thousands of years ago!

A lot of information will be slowly unfolded, but not once does it feel overwhelming to the viewer. Following XiaoHei’s point of view, we get to see glimpses of the wider lore, piquing our curiosity. 

In the world of LXH, demons and cultivators/immortals exist, but they don’t usually cross paths with ordinary humans because they keep their existence/powers a secret. XiaoHei himself has had little interactions with humans aside from his master. It isn’t until XiaoHei meets XiaoBai that he actually learns more about them and their way of life. Slowly, he gets drawn to the human life and also learns to have fun just like the human kids his age.

Season 1 presents to us XiaoHei’s daily life with his friends, so it’s more slice-of-life with the supernatural simply peppered around. It never gets boring, though, because there’s this ever-present tension of XiaoHei having to keep his identity a secret. We also get to meet a lot of intriguing characters, like XiaoBai’s “brother,” who helps XiaoHei fight against Diting. 

Season 2, on the other hand, is more action-packed. The plot for s2 is the Executors guild seeking humans with talent in cultivation. They screen them through a virtual reality game where they can emulate the use of powers. XiaoHei’s final test as Executor also takes place here.

I personally think the best aspect of this show is its hype fight scenes, but that’s just me craving stimulation. At its core, LXH is really a heartwarming story about a young demon learning that there is more to life than powers and fighting. Sure, the supernatural stuff is interesting, but beyond that, it’s a story of love—It’s about XiaoHei making friends and discovering what it is he really wants to do without fear of losing what he calls his home, for home will always be with him. 

Overall, Legend of Luo Xiaohei is a nice, warm show that you can binge on a slow day without missing out on the excitement a story with an overarching plot brings. Do give it a try.

P.S.: This series takes place about three years after the events in the movie (which has the same title in Chinese, but is more known as simply “Legend of Hei” in English). The series aired first before the movie, though, so it doesn’t matter. 

Trigger Warnings:

Child death in s2 (it’s fake, but the characters’ reactions feel so real)

Not really a trigger, but just in case: Teens/adults bullying children. XiaoHei is a great fighter, and the people that can match with him are only those older than him.

#J1: Flip Flappers

Summary:

Cocona is an average middle schooler living with her grandmother. And she, who has yet to decide a goal to strive for, soon met a strange girl named Papika who invites her to an organization called Flip Flap.

Dragged along by the energetic stranger, Cocona finds herself in the world of Pure Illusion—a bizarre alternate dimension—helping Papika look for crystal shards. Upon completing their mission, Papika and Cocona are sent to yet another world in Pure Illusion. As a dangerous creature besets them, the girls use their crystals to transform into magical girls: Cocona into Pure Blade, and Papika into Pure Barrier. But as they try to defeat the creature before them, three others with powers from a rival organization enter the fray and slay the creature, taking with them a fragment left behind from its body. Afterward, the girls realize that to stand a chance against their rivals and the creatures in Pure Illusion, they must learn to work together and synchronize their feelings in order to transform more effectively.

Propaganda 1:

Flip Flappers is a magical girl show that brings its own unique twist to the genre, while still being reminiscent of older classics. It has incredibly creative visuals, good characters, and an absolute banger soundtrack! The deeper messages of the show are about finding the courage to start making your own decisions and living your life the way you want it, growing up, and the struggle against controlling authority figures that entails. While it is a fun show, the emotional moments it has hit hard! It also has a yuri narrative (seriously, they even get taken to an all-girls Catholic school yuri setting one time), which I’m sure the himejoshis on this webbed site would appreciate if they saw the show!

Propaganda 2:

Look, sometimes Magical Girl Shows have fights that are just kinda… ehh. You ever wanted to see magical girls beat the SNOT out of monsters in amazingly animated, incredibly physical fight scenes? Give Flip Flappers a shot! And if you don’t, that’s fine too, because the shows genre changes every other episode anyways.

Flip Flappers has a little something for everyone. It has amazing characters. It has slick transformation sequences. It has stunning fight scenes. It has horror. It has yuri. It has mommy issues. It’s fun for the whole family!

While one would think the constant tone-shifts would leave the series feeling kinda all over the place, Flip Flappers keeps itself grounded with its amazing character work. The main two characters, Cocona and Papika, bounce off of each other incredibly well. They have so much chemistry, and it’s refreshing to see a show that actually does something romantic with its two main leads instead of just kinda dangling it in front of your face and then chickening out at the last second.

In conclusion, this show is the embodiment what having ADHD and being sapphic feels like. Give it a shot!

Trigger Warnings:

Flashing Lights/Flickering Images, Gender Identity/Sexuality Discrimination, Guns, Kidnapping, Nudity.

Depictions of child and emotional abuse, both at a side character and a main character. Control over children is a common theme in the show.

When reblogging and adding your own propaganda, please tag me @best-underrated-anime so that I’ll be sure to see it.

If you want to criticize one of the shows above to give the one you’re rooting for an advantage, then do so constructively. I do not tolerate groundless hate or slander on this blog. If I catch you doing such a thing in the notes, be it in the tags or reblogs, I will block you.

Know one of the shows above and not satisfied with how it’s presented in this tournament? Just fill up this form, where you can submit revisions for taglines, propaganda, trigger warnings, and/or video.

[blitz0hno]

For the ask game: general 1, 3, 6, 7. Prisoner, 1, 3 (Amane), 4 (mikoto) I didn’t ask too much questions did I

I AM SORRY FOR TAKING SO LONG RAHHHH I got the notif, forgor, got another ask for this like a day ago, forgot again, and finally check my inbox today lmao you asked the perfect amount of questions no worries!!

General:

1. My favorite prisoner? It really is Mikoto I cannot tell a lie 😭 why? He's just... So heartbreakingly earnest. And when I was on Milgram Twitter back in 2021 I really didn't want his story to be a DID story. I wasn't about to discuss that stuff on a pretty public account no matter how intrigued we were. However, as time went on, and we thought about how all the other prisoners are "mentally ill" in some form or another, we held out hope that the whole "DID murderer who doesn't remember" thing would be subverted in some way. We came to really really look forward to his second trial, and after Purge March even moreso. In our opinion, Milgram team fuckin DELIVERED when Oct. 25th came around. While I personally relate more to John, Mikoto's story and how it's being told are very important to me. The extreme ambiguity of it all makes it better honestly; it's strikingly realistic in that sense. A host who has no idea what's going on or how to deal with it, in a boat with a bunch of presumable singlets who feel the same way, strikes a chord that few other medias have. Plurality is a very difficult topic to do justice, but I think Mikoto's narrative is very humanizing.

3. Favorite headcanon has gotta be the sibling-type relationships, particularly Amane and Fuuta. I love the idea of them stirring up trouble together. Trans headcanons are also my favorite anything ever (transmasc Fuuta and Mikoto/John and nonbinary Amane are my personal favs but transfemme!Fuuta, transfemme!Kazui and other trans headcanons are all GOATed imo)

6. RAHHHHHHH DIFFICULT favorite MV? siiiigh it probably is MeMe. Surprise tone-shift? Check. Tarot motif? Check. THE CRIME IN BRUTAL DETAIL? Check. Lyrics go crazy. Color palette goes crazy. Outfits go crazy. Although I will say "I Love You" is criminally underrated and provocative. Also LOVVVVED Harrow, Tear Drop, INMF, Purge March and Deep Cover. It's so hard to pick!!

7. Who I would get along with? Ironically, probably Fuuta. I think I would put up with his gruff attitude better than most, and we'd probably have similar worldviews regarding justice and the systems in place in society. I've been in similar (thankfully less serious) positions regarding his murder. We both enjoy video games and ramen lol he's still a little shit tho. I also feel like Yuno and I have very similar worldviews and would get along just fine.

Prisoners:

1. What do I think of Amane? Easily one of my favorites. Why? SHE IS SO REAL THAT'S WHY. She's thoroughly heartbreakingly indoctrinated but STILL trusts herself enough to do what's in her best interest in protecting herself. She denies herself so much joy to honor her devotions, even though I'm almost sure she will come to realize that the only "god" looking out for her is her. She just wants everyone to have the "heaven" of infinite happiness she's been promised, and doesn't yet understand that it's something one must make for themselves and that no one can see and know her every move and judge her like that.

3. Amane's first verdict was cruel, but I understand why it happened. Magic's very vague about who she killed and it seemed like she did it simply because the doctrine said to. It was almost like she'd been manipulated into doing it and didn't feel bad at all. When really, she was just joyous that she got to punish her abuser for once, using the rules THEY told her; not the other way around. I still do regret voting "unforgiven," personally. Her second verdict though? Based. I was in the trenches w y'all for that shit. Purge March my beloved. She had every right to punish someone who would torture a child and I don't see how Kotoko doesn't get that??? Amane inno sweep all the way they better treat my girl RIGHT from now on.

4. What do I wish people understood more about Mikoto? Woooo boy. How do I word this.

In the fandom: Mikoto is just a host alter - he's as capable of being mean and aggressive as John is capable of being nice. And his response to John and anger towards the protector is as natural as it is unfair. He's not immune to being a flawed human and deals with stress very differently from John despite sharing a body. Mikoto's denial keeps him going along "normally," but it's doubtless that "he," Mikoto, is truly the responsible one for the crime (as hosts often are the ones making big decisions). And idk, people seem to understand overall?? But there still seems to be confusion sometimes, about how John isn't "just" a protector, but a completely separate person/ego state. Neither one is the "main" alter, or a "nicer"/"better" alter. They're rounded people like the rest of the prison.

In-universe: I wish they understood him and John. I wish they knew he switched sometimes, and that though they're different they aren't dangerous just by virtue of being like that. I wish Mikoto wouldn't shame himself for not "measuring up," and accept himself and what he's done. But we're going to superhell so idk about that.

Thanks for asking!

[johannas-motivational-insults]

Jo’s Top 10 of 2020

I see lots of artists doing that thing where they post a piece from each month of the year... unfortunately my content creation isn’t necessarily consistent and it’s hard to track what month individual fic chapters were posted in, but I figured I’d do something similar and post my Top 10 pieces of content I created in 2020, what they’re about and why I love them. I actually did get a fair amount done this year thanks to the lockdown, but I’ve narrowed it down to these ten that I’d like to reflect on. (To be fair, I’m probably forgetting something huge. Feel free to leave comments if you think I passed over something important lol.)

10. Friendship in the Horde (meta): This is something I’d wanted to write for a while but finally got around to finishing in February. It’s basically a sociology paper lmao, an analysis of the social hierarchies and systems of the Horde. It was also a convenient excuse for me to gush about Catralonnie, an underrated (friend)ship. But honestly this was an important piece for me because I have always identified with the Horde characters way more than any of the rebels (other than Adora, who grew up in the Horde) and part of why is how they are in an unsafe environment and end up forming relationships that are helpful for survival but hinder them psychologically. And I think to understand the Horde characters and really evaluate their motives and choices you need to understand this first.

9. The Sting in My Eyes: On the surface this is just a run of the mill hurt/comfort oneshot, but it was a really important post-canon processing fic for me. I had a lot of feelings about Catra’s relationships with Shadow Weaver and Melog in season 5, particularly about how Catra must have felt really conflicted after Shadow Weaver told her what she wanted to hear all those years but in a way that felt unearned and out of the blue. It was really cathartic for me to write a scene where she struggles with those mixed feelings but has Adora and Melog to help her process them. And I had long associated the song the title is from with Catra and Shadow Weaver’s relationship, and the way she died trying to redeem herself really solidified that connection.

8. Hail Mary, chapter 6: This was supposed to be a short chapter mostly about the backstory between Catra and Scorpia in this au, with some Catradora yearning thrown in. It evolved into a massive, sprawling thing that is very atmospheric in terms of how the setting and vibes are described and how in the moment it feels. Hail Mary is like that sometimes but that type of narration is usually about football games rather than parties, so this chapter was a fun change of pace in many ways. It was really nostaglic for me to write too, the nerves of being a teenager at a party with your crush and how intense everything feels. And the Scorptra stuff really is delicious, it was nice seeing them have that conversation they never got to have in canon and truly make up, and the tiny sliver I added of Catra’s earlier history was heartbreaking in the best way. So this was not what I intended to write, but it turned out way better for it.

7. A Better Son or Daughter (AMV): I’ve done other Adora AMVs, but this one is really my iconic piece. The song is perfect for Adora, so perfect it’s on Noelle’s Adora playlist. The vid itself is a character study about Adora’s mental health struggles and the way she represses them, as well as a tribute to her resiliency and her eventual triumph of getting to a better place in her life. This is a song that gives me a lot of feelings and once I was making it about Adora it gave me even more, so this was a very satisfying piece to complete. I wish Noelle had gotten a chance to see it but oh well, maybe down the line.

6. Hail Mary, chapter 12: This is the chapter that much of the fic had been building to, Catra and Adora in conflict because Catra finally got the chance to be Adora’s hero and Adora shot her down. It’s painfully analogous to canon, both in terms of how (I suspect) Catra felt in Thaymor and Adora’s tendency to victim blame because she’s so pragmatic. There’s definitely some tones of Taking Control in there but Lonnie does a much better job of examining Catra’s psychology and needs than Glimmer did in canon (a writing error imo, Glimmer should have had more insight). Adora just wants to help but sometimes in her quest to do so she disenfranchises others, and this was a much needed look at that aspect of her character. It’s also an excellent illustration of what it’s like to play a peacekeeping role in an abusive household and how stressful it is trying to protect others while also protecting yourself.

5. Unstoppable (AMV): This is not my favorite Catra AMV I’ve ever done, but it might be the cleverest. The soundtrack is a song about mental illness masquerading as a song about being a bad bitch, which is basically Catra in a nutshell. The lyrics are incredibly fitting for her and her arc as it develops over seasons 1-4. The vid itself takes a hard turn in the interpretation of the lyrics, going from talking about how no one can stop Catra to how she can’t stop herself because she’s in such a terrible sunk cost fallacy spiral, and I think I got several death threats over that twist lmao. As someone who primarily deals in angst, there’s hardly a better compliment to be paid.

4. Demons, chapter 31: This one got real dark on me. The concept of this chapter was originally an examination of how comparing abuse can get really dicey but you also have to respect that other people have had different experiences from you and you have to be careful not to equate things or make it sound like you’re talking over someone else. I guess it’s also a bit of a look at how autistic people (like myself) will often explain why they can empathize so others know they understand rather than saying empty platitudes, but that can come off as insensitive or like they’re making things about them. I mean, in this case Adora kinda was making things about her, but she was provoked into it by a parade of comments insinuating she didn’t suffer at all, which was also unfair. Anyway it’s one of the more important Catradora fights in Demons and something I’d written bits of over a year prior, it was that important to the plot, but it also took a turn I was not originally planning. I finished the chapter when I was in a really bad depressive and self-loathing spiral and that bled onto the page, but it worked perfectly for Catra in this scenario... that push and pull of feeling like the world has hurt and victimized you mixed with knowing you’ve done some bad things yourself and feeling like you don’t have a leg to stand on when mourning the ways you’ve been hurt. It’s intense as all fuck but it’s excellent.

3. Hail Mary, chapter 11: Speaking of dark Catra content, this chapter... whew. It was really something else, to read and to write. I have written flashbacks in Demons that are more detailed and even include explicit violence but because those scenes are always in flashback form I never really got the chance to sit in the head of an abuse victim waiting for the other shoe to drop for an entire chapter like I did here. It’s quite different from the rest of Hail Mary stylistically and is both highly sensory and extremely internalized. It took me back to some terrifying moments in my own life so it was difficult but also extremely cathartic to write. It’s important too because it really sets up where Catra was at mentally heading into her big fight with Adora, and that chapter is in Adora POV. This chapter is ranked so high simply because it’s... polished, as @malachi-walker put it. It almost is its own story within the story and really noteworthy as a piece all its own.

2. Demons, chapter 26: This chapter is very similar thematically to Hail Mary 12, just based in the canonverse. It deals with one of the core (but highly neglected by fandom) conflicts between Catra and Adora, where they both need to feel like they can take care of and protect the other but also detest feeling weak or vulnerable themselves. It leads to Adora’s ego making Catra feel disrespected and Catra’s behavior confusing Adora and making her think she’s an ungrateful brat rather than someone who needs so badly to be needed, just like her. There’s definitely some power struggles in this chapter but finally they’re able to get to the heart of it and seeing them talk it out is so satisfying. Getting this chapter published was also important to me on a personal level because, like I said, this aspect of their conflict and relationship is rarely acknowleged for how important it is when really it’s one of the deepest conflicts between them in the series. It’s a scene I started writing pretty much as soon I knew I was extending the fic into something longer because I just needed them to have this conversation, so finishing it was so satisfying.

1. Satisfaction, chapter 3: This chapter took me a really long time to write, both in terms of time to get it published and time I actually spent working on it. It’s the crown jewel of a fic that’s really important to me and I had to get it just right, so I spent more time agonizing over every detail and rewriting things to get them absolutely perfect than I usually do (I’m a perfectionist anyway, but this took it to a whole other level). But in the end it was worth it, because this chapter is damn fine. It’s really hot, as you’d expect from a smut fic, but it’s also an excellent character study of how both Catra and Adora were affected by their abuse and trauma and the issues it raises for them in terms of sex and intimacy. Also, come on, we need more BDSM fics out there that focus on the actual point of it all (the trust involved) and promote communication and do the character work to explain why they might be into it in the first place.

BONUS (from December 31, 2019): One of my favorite pieces of 2020 technically came out in 2019, but I posted it on New Years Eve so most people first saw it in 2020. It’s an absolute banger of an AMV called I’m Not Jesus that’s all about Catra and Adora’s anger towards Shadow Weaver and their refusal to forgive their abuser. Funny enough this came out before Adora’s iconic “I will never forgive you” line, and Shadow Weaver definitely made things more complicated with how she went out, but I think the sentiment still applies.

[mischiefandi]

OKAY

you guys I have stayed silent for too long: there is an app that you guys have got to try out

CHOICES

it is literally the best thing in the world besides Friends and dylpickle. it’s basically an app on which there are a LOT of ‘books’ and each book has chapters (obvi I know) 

Now there is everything, romance, sci-fi, fantasy, adventure, horror like literally you would not believe the range of genres such a seemingly small app contains

there are more than 10 series that you can choose to play, certain books only have 1 book (lol) but there are also quite a few who have multiple books = series. AND these books have a very special element, you can choose how the story goes! the writers offer you countless choices to make that make the story suuuuper fun and interactive, it’s honestly an awesome way to go through the story.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE READ BELOW THE CUT I SWEAR THIS APP IS AWESOME JUST GIVE IT A CHANCE

let me tell you the pros of getting this app.

First off the books are suuuuper fun to read, the authors are honestly very talented, and the characters you guys, you WILL fall in love. I know. I’ve fallen in love w quite a few Pixelberry characters (aka drake, mark, damien, jake, chris then zig, raydan) just so many beautifully crafted stories with hundreds of possibilities.

The choices make for a very interesting and innovative way of reading a story, its fun and satisfying to have it go a certain way rather than another

the graphics are very cool, a lot of the characters are very hot, the ‘sets’ are so beautiful and detailed and it is so fucking awesome: here is an example

the mcs (my character) are gorgeous and there is a wide variety of faces to choose from, plus you get heterosexual and LGBT love interests which is awesome cause that means you can fall in love with both a boy and a girl!

in some books, the authors have given us the option to play as a boy and in a certain book where you have to choose a certain activity to do during a school year, wether you are a boy or a girl does not influence the choice between marching band, football team or cheerleader which is AWESEOME

the stories tackles issues like sexism, homophobia, bullying, racism, addiction, PTSD and other mental illnesses, harassement, sexual assault, etc which is very important and intelligently talked about in this case.

okay now the downsides cause there are always cons...

certain choices are only pickable by paying with diamonds and sometimes these choices are hella expensive and not always worth it. it happens with clothing, certain exclusive scenes, dialogue, actions, etc. this is a major downside tbh because sometimes the app shames you for not having picked the diamond choice. 

(you get one free diamond per chapter completed and one free diamond whenever you watch an add after a chapter, I personally do so every time that way I get more diamonds, trust me you want them gems)

in order to play a chapter, you need a key. you have to wait 4 hours to get 2 keys and once you have 2 keys, you can’t get any more, which basically means that you can’t play more than two chapters in 4 hours! once you’ve used 1 key, the counter starts again and you wait 2 hours for a second key basically. 

it can get annoying but it’s also pretty cool cause it makes the story last longer and you don’t binge it like a Netflix show, it also adds some suspense. 

you can buy diamonds and keys but that’s with real money and it is a waste of money, really. 

plus, it is very easy to go down the rabbit hole and get sucked in so please don’t make the same mistakes I made lol, DO NOT EVER buy a diamond pack or keys .

EVER

why am I telling you this? because no one I know plays this game and it sucks being alone in a fandom :( its honestly such a fun game with tons of cool and intriguing stories and it is an underrated app. seriously.

check out, you won’t be disappointed!

if I can give you some recs for books you might want to start with, I recommend:

-A Royal Romance (sounds dumb, it’s actually awesome as fuck)

-Endless Summer

-It Lives In The Woods (aaaaah my fave tbh)

-The Crown & The Flame (omg I loved this one SO MUCH)

yup! hope you guys check it out, it really is super fun <3

[mrmichaelchadler]

It Was All a Ridiculous Mistake!: Brian De Palma's Sisters Hits Blu-ray

A few years ago, I found myself writing an article for this very website in which I did anoverview of the films of Brian De Palma. Initially, I wrote about the films in a straightforward chronological order but towards its completion, it was decided that I should rank them in preferential order. As someone who considers De Palma to be his favorite filmmaker, this was a dream article to write. While I still pretty much agree with the order that I put them in, my only regret is that it appears as if I am underrating or outright dismissing some highly worthy works. Take “Sisters,” De Palma’s 1973 film that marked his first full excursion into the horror/suspense genre that his name would be synonymous within a few years of its release. When I wrote the article, despite praising virtually every aspect of the film and complaining only that the ending came across as a little rushed, I placed it at #14, right between “Mission: Impossible” (1996) and “Body Double” (1984). Now, having just watched “Sisters” again on the occasion of its Blu-ray debut as part of the esteemed Criterion Collection, I find myself thinking that perhaps I should have ranked it higher, partly because of the significant effect that it would prove to have on De Palma’s career and partly because it is just as striking, shocking and startling to watch today as it was when it debuted more than 45 years ago.

Just before making “Sisters,” De Palma was in the first real low point in what would eventually prove to be a roller-coaster career. Having begun his career with the low-budget underground films “The Wedding Party” (which he made in 1964, though it wasn’t released until 1970) and “Murder a la Mod” (1968), De Palma scored a cult hit with “Greetings” (1968), an outrageous satire about a trio of friends (including a then-unknown Robert De Niro, who De Palma worked with on “The Wedding Party”) navigated the social, political and sexual upheaval of the late Sixties, and followed that with the equally audacious semi-sequel “Hi Mom!” (1970). The attention that De Palma got from these films was noticed by Warner Brothers, who hired him to direct “Get to Know Your Rabbit” (1972), which was intended to be a studio version of the kind of contemporary social satire that he had been doing on the streets for practically nothing with his friends. Perhaps predictably, De Palma’s iconoclastic sensibility put him at odds with both the studio and his star, Tommy Smothers, and after numerous clashes with both, he was eventually fired from the project. The resulting film, which sat on the shelf for a long time before being briefly released, was a total flop that was all the worse for De Palma because his name was still on it even though he had nothing to do with its final form. 

After that bruising experience with the world of studio politics, De Palma elected to return to the world of low-budget independent filmmaking that allowed him to have more control over his work. The initial inspiration for what would eventually become “Sisters” came when De Palma read a 1966 article in Life magazine about Masha and Dasha Krivoshlyapova, a pair of sisters from Moscow who happened to be conjoined twins. In particular, he was struck by a photograph that pictured one of them looking as sunny and cheerful as can be, while the other had a darker and more disturbing expression. In addition, the photo had a caption that mentioned that while the two sisters were perfectly healthy from a physical perspective, both were beginning to develop psychological problems. Using that as a jumping-off point and determined to make a film with a more concise and straightforward narrative than his previous, improv-heavy works, he and co-writer Louisa Rose, whom he had met when both were attending Sarah Lawrence College in the early Sixties, penned a screenplay that would take that notion and spin it out into a grisly mystery/thriller that would also pay obvious homage to such favorite filmmakers as Alfred Hitchcock, with nods to such classics as “Rope” (1948), “Rear Window” (1954), “Vertigo” (1958) and “Psycho” (1960), and Roman Polanski. 

(At this point, I am about to describe the plot of the film so if you haven’t seen it yet and want to go into it as fresh as possible, feel free to put this essay aside until after you have watched it.)

As the film opens, ad salesman Philip Woode (Lisel Wilson) is getting dressed by himself in a locker room when a blind woman enters and begins to undress. As it turns out, Phillip is the victim of a “Candid Camera”-like game show entitled “Peeping Toms” and the contestants have to correctly guess whether he quietly stood there and watched as she continued to strip or if he did the noble thing and left. After being reunited on game show stage, Phillip and the woman, who is not blind at all but an aspiring French-Canadian actress-model named Danielle Breton (Margot Kidder), are presented with their prizes—Danielle gets a full set of cutlery while Philip, who is African-American, receives dinner for two at a supper club called the African Room—and decide to go make use of Philip’s prize. Although their meal is briefly interrupted by the arrival of Emil Breton (William Finely), who claims to be Danielle’s ex-husband and who insists that she come back with him before being thrown out of the place, the two hit it off and wind up going back to her Staten Island apartment. Once inside, Philip sees Emil standing watch outside and creates a ruse to convince him that he has left and after Emil departs, he returns and spends the night with Danielle on her sofa bed.

Up until this point, the film has been playing like one of De Palma’s previous films—especially in regards to the acute satire on display during the game show and dinner date sequences—with the presence of Emil and the brief shot of a bizarre scar on Danielle’s thigh the only suggestions that something else is going on. The next morning, however, things begin to take a turn when Philip wakes up and overhears an argument between Danielle and an unseen person in the bedroom. When he asks, Danielle tells him that the other person is her twin sister Dominique, who is there to celebrate their shared birthday. Philip goes down to a nearby drugstore to pick up a prescription for Danielle, who is feeling ill, and impulsively buys a birthday cake for the sisters as well. When he returns, he brings the cake out to the sleeping Danielle but it turns out to be the far more crazed and manic Dominique, who grabs the knife—one of the new ones, naturally—and viciously stabs him in the groin multiple times before disappearing. Mortally wounded, Philip drags himself to the window and writes “Help” in his own blood before finally dying. 

The entire gory crime is witnessed by another resident of Danielle’s apartment complex, Grace Collier (Jennifer Salt), who immediately calls the police and runs downstairs to wait for them. As it turns out, Grace is a reporter for a Village Voice-like newspaper and her recent series of articles about police brutality have not made her a favorite among the force—when a pair of cops do arrive on the scene, they spend more time with her in the lobby bitching about what she has written than in actually getting up to Danielle’s apartment. As we see in a marvelously staged sequence that demonstrates one of De Palma’s most effective uses of his beloved split-screen visual technique, this gives the dazed Danielle and Emil, who has arrived on the scene as well, to clean up the apartment and hide the body in the sofa bed before the cops and Grace finally knock on the door. A search of the place turns up nothing, Danielle insists that no one resembling Grace’s description of the alleged assailant ("Shorter and with a twisted face") and when Grace actually finds a piece of evidence to prove that someone else was there, she herself inadvertently destroys it. The cops leave and, assuming that the whole thing was a stunt pulled by Grace in order to get material for another story about police incompetence, warn her not to mess with them anymore.

Still convinced of what she saw, Grace decides to investigate the case on her own for the paper and her editor hires a private investigator, Joseph Larch (Charles Durning), to work with her. Larch manages to gain access to the inside of Danielle’s apartment in the hopes of finding any evidence. Since the sofa bed is so much heavier than it should be, he becomes convinced that the body has been hidden inside of it but before he can do anything, movers arrive to cart it away. While Larch follows the couch on a journey that eventually takes him to Quebec, Grace continues to investigate and gets information from a Life magazine reporter (Barnard Hughes) who had written about the sisters years earlier when they had become briefly famous as Canada’s first conjoined twins. She then follows Emil and Danielle to a nearby mental hospital where she ends up getting the rest of the story, albeit in the most nightmarish and gruesome manner imaginable. 

Even though “Sisters” was De Palma’s first full-out attempt at the suspense genre, one would never be able to discern that thanks to the sheer filmmaking skill that he demonstrates here. After lulling viewers into a state of complacency during the long opening sequence, De Palma begins turning the screws on them with his ability to generate tension thanks to his detailed visual approach. The scene in which Grace’s argument with the cops is juxtaposed with Emil and Danielle trying to clean up Dominique’s mess before anyone else arrives is a virtual master class in filmmaking all by itself in the way that it effortlessly supplies a wealth of information regarding the relationship of Emil and Danielle and the mutual antipathy between Grace and the cops while simultaneously generating equal levels of tension on both fronts. It is a bravura moment that still stands as one of the greatest set pieces in De Palma’s filmography and while nothing else in the film can quite match it, a darker and moodier feel begins to dominate the proceedings—aided in no small part by the spectacularly moody score by the legendary Bernard Herrmann—and the nightmarish final sequence in the asylum, featuring key flashbacks shot in 16mm by De Palma in a manner designed to resemble “Rosemary’s Baby” (1968), is a knockout.

One aspect of “Sisters” that makes it a pure product of De Palma is in the usage of voyeurism, a theme that the director would return to time and again throughout his career. In this film, everyone is watching each other, it seems, but from skewed perspectives that prevent them from actually seeing what is right before their eyes. The game show where both Philip and the audience are seeing two different things that are not quite as they seem. Philip sees Emil but can only look at him as a jealous ex-lover of Danielle’s and not as a potential warning sign. Grace witnesses the murder but cannot actually prove anything that she saw and when she does find proof, her inability to watch where she is going ends up destroying it. It is only at the end of the film that people like Grace and Larch are able to see the truth head-on but due to circumstances, neither one is able to communicate the truths that they have seen to anyone, a notion that is perfectly articulated in the haunting shot that brings the story to a close on a deeply ambiguous note.

Even De Palma’s most devoted fans will admit that narrative logic and structure is not always of interest to him and that some of his stories do not exactly stand up to rigorous analysis when all is said and done. Therefore, watching “Sisters” proves to be a bit of a shock because the screenplay that he and Rose have conjured up is actually pretty strong and sound in the way that it provides a sturdy dramatic structure for him to build upon with his weirdo humor and elaborately designed suspense sequences. The opening 20 minutes or so are interesting in the sense that nothing really happens—none of the sex or violence that viewers might be expecting—but the characters of Danielle and Philip are so likable and engaging that it is easy to get lulled into a false sense of complacency that only makes Philip’s murder at the hands of Dominique all the more horrifying. (By employing this kind of slow burn opening, De Palma is utilizing the same approach that he would later deploy in his original version of “Raising Cain” (1992) before restructuring it into the eventual theatrical version.) With all of that going on, he manages to deftly introduce another winning and appealing character in Grace, a contemporary version of the kind of hard-driving crusading female journalist that Glenda Farrell used to play back in the day—the kind who is all about the work and becomes exasperated when her mother (Mary Davenport, Jennifer Salt’s real-life mother) keeps noodging her about when she is going to give up her hobby and finally settle down and get married. As the story progresses, things become increasingly strange and outlandish but De Palma never departs from the logic that he has established early on and indeed, one of the pleasures of watching the film again, once the surprises have been revealed, is to observe just how intricately the elements come together. 

One of the more intriguing, if unexpected, things about watching “Sisters” today is the number of elements on display that now play much differently now than they did in 1973. For example, the opening sequence, in which nothing of much import happens up until the moment of Philip’s murder, presumably startled new audiences back in 1973 because they didn’t have preconceived notions of De Palma as a figure of suspense. Nowadays, if someone watches it for the first time and has some vague knowledge of De Palma’s output, they will almost certainly watch that sequence with the expectation that something is going to happen. This sensation doesn’t ruin the scene, of course, but it does add an unexpected edge to the proceedings. In the booklet accompanying the film, there is even a 1973 interview with De Palma in which he discusses an argument he had regarding the opening with Herrmann, who protested the fact that nothing happened and that audiences would get restless. When De Palma responded that nothing much happened during the first 40 minutes of “Psycho,” Herrmann responded “He is Hitchcock and they will wait. They know something terrible is going to happen and they will wait until it does!”

“Sisters” is also an interesting film to watch in the wake of the #MeToo movement because it is, to a large degree, about women who are either ignored or abused by men in power. Throughout the film, for example, Danielle seems to be in the thrall of Emil but once the full extent of his background is revealed to us, we learn the full degree of the monstrous acts that he perpetrated on both her and Dominique, both in the name of “love” and science, and was able to get away with his actions because there was no one to challenge him. As for Grace, she is a perfectly competent and capable reporter but is still forced by her editor to be aided in her investigation by an older white guy—one who depart just before things start getting ugly and who then inexplicably never bothers to check in with her. Meanwhile, the cops are wildly hostile to Grace for having the temerity to expose the failings of their colleagues—so much so, in fact that they allow all of the evidence to a murder to disappear before they arrive on the scene. Even more appalling, when the lead cop (Dolph Sweet) finally realizes that Grace was right all along about there being a murder, his pathetic attempt make things right with is to give her a box of chocolates—the kind of thing that a dumb boyfriend might have done for his girlfriend after standing her up on a date in a Fifties movie. In the end, the women in the film do get some kind of closure for the traumas that have been perpetrated on them but unfortunately, none are in a position to fully appreciate it.

The aspect of the film that might be the touchiest for contemporary viewers to deal with is that it is a film that deals in large part with mental illness that itself stars an actress who herself would go on to have well-publicized mental issues herself. Obviously, this is just a ghastly coincidence but it does lead to a couple of uncomfortable moments in the early going—especially once we have seen the movie before and now have a better idea of the degree to which the outwardly charming Danielle is struggling to keep it all together. This sensation doesn’t last too long, however, because Kidder’s performance is so effective that one becomes completely absorbed in her character. Although Kidder would become a secret crush object to several generations of youngsters due to her appearances as the intrepid Lois Lane in the “Superman” films, she was ultimately one of those actresses that Hollywood could never quite figure out what to do with—she just came across as too smart, sexy and offbeat for most of the female roles being offered at the time. With “Sisters,” Kidder had a role that was tailor-made for her (indeed, she had been dating De Palma at the time and was roommates with Salt—De Palma presented them with scripts for the film as Christmas presents) and made the most of it. As Danielle, she is sweet as can be when we first see her but, as previously noted, it is taking a lot of effort on her part to pull that off and the way that she gradually shows what is just beneath that pleasant, placid veneer is beautifully handled—by the end, she comes across as both utterly terrifying and utterly sympathetic. 

Although the rest of the cast is strong as well—Salt is entertaining enough to make one wonder why her career didn’t quite take off either and Finley, who was a regular presence in De Palma’s films until his death in 2012, is a scream as Emil, who comes across as a strangely Eurosleaze version of John Waters—this is Kidder’s show and if the Blu-ray doesn’t actually have any features that could serve as a tribute to the actress on the occasion of her passing earlier this year (though it does included a revealing 1970 appearance that she made on “The Dick Cavett Show”), it could be argued that the film itself is perhaps the best and most effective possible celebration of her unique and much-missed talents.

When “Sisters” was released in 1973 by the legendary American International Pictures, it proved to be a success at the box-office and earned De Palma a number of good reviews, many of which cited the influence of Hitchcock over the proceedings, the start of what would prove to be a standard (if often inaccurate) observation about his work in general. De Palma would go on to make bigger and better-known movies over the years but few would prove to be as influential on his career as this one—many of his classic films from that point on contain ideas and images that one could trace directly back to his work here. As a result, it would also prove to be an influence, both directly and indirectly, with the countless number of filmmakers over the last four decades or so who have themselves been influence by De Palma and his work. There was even a remake of the film produced in 2006 and while it certainly had an intriguing cast—the Kidder, Salt and Finley roles were filled, respectively, with Lou Doillon, Chloe Sevigny and Stephen Rea—the fact that there is an excellent chance that you are hearing about this film for the first time right now should suggest how well it turned out.

Criterion put out a DVD of “Sisters” way back in 2000 and for this long-awaited upgrade, they have included an nice array of old and new extras. The best feature, of course, is the nice-looking 4K digital restoration that was supervised by De Palma that makes it look better than it probably has in its entire existence. In addition to the aforementioned Kidder interview, the extras also include a new interview with Salt, archival interviews from 2004 with De Palma, Durning, Finley, editor Paul Hirsch and producer Edward Pressman, the audio portion of a 1973 talk De Palma gave at the AFI and a booklet that includes another 1973 interview with De Palma and an informative essay on the history and meaning of the film penned by critic Carrie Rickey. All in all, a more-than-respectable presentation of a film that really deserves a higher ranking in the annals of suspense/horror history than it currently maintains—it is funny, unnerving and engrossing in equal measure and once it is all done, there is an excellent chance that you will never look at a birthday cake the same way again.

To order your Criterion Blu-ray of Brian De Palma's "Sisters," click here

from All Content https://www.rogerebert.com/demanders/it-was-all-a-ridiculous-mistake-brian-de-palmas-sisters-hits-blu-ray

[tinymixtapes]

Column: Favorite Rap Mixtapes of July 2018

With a cascade of releases spewing from the likes of DatPiff, LiveMixtapes, Bandcamp, and SoundCloud, it can be difficult to keep up with the overbearing yet increasingly vital mixtape game. In this column, we aim to immerse ourselves in this hyper-prolific world and share our favorite releases each month. The focus will primarily be on rap mixtapes — loosely defined here as free (or sometimes free-to-stream) digital releases — but we’ll keep things loose enough to branch out if/when we feel it necessary. (Check out last month’s installment here.) You could argue that the prolific nature of modern mixtape milieus makes for a mess of inaccessibility. You could, but we at TMT would be much too busy listening to mixtapes to participate in that academic exercise. Onto our informal survey of July 2018 then: nine writers, 14 tapes, mad points of reference and impressions, scenes and feels. Yes, it’s just a sampling, dreamy and incomplete, but selective, like picking curios from a cabinet or fishing life in the notochords, curated by your favorite jet-setting rap connoisseurs, this one writing from the suburbs of Nashville, where the flea market dollar bins are like the barbecues, i.e., smoking. –Samuel Diamond --- 03 Greedo - God Level [STREAM] Don’t doubt that God Level is the most compelling of 03 Greedo’s offerings to date, almost entirely by design. Of course, context is everything: this, his self-proclaimed debut album, came amidst the commencement of his 20-year prison sentence, a fact plainly reflected in the sheer breadth and depth of this project. Greedo utilizes the hour-and-a-half-plus to cover plenty of stylistic ground, with a knowing and foreboding, yet never overly rueful, presence behind the mic. As Jeff Weiss puts it in his heartfelt profile, “a Greedo song exists for every emotion and every occasion,” and no less so than across God Level’s expanse: there’s more conventional going in alongside post-Thugger gurgle; West Coast bounce here, blown-out trap there. And, of course, it’s all wrapped in cover art that slyly references Greedo’s iconoclastic streak, the last laugh in a sordid state of affairs. Clearly, to attain this Level, you have to kill a few idols first. –Soe Jherwood --- Future - Beast Mode 2 [STREAM] The mixtape is Future’s format. Beast Mode 2 is his 19th and the follow-up to his 14th, Beast Mode. The latter was a cold turn for the Atlanta trailblazer; a darker, colder reflection that helped flesh out his character from a 2D trap star to who we hear today. Beast Mode II follows that trend. The weight of success is a tired trope, but when Future sings “Pouring up in public, damn I hate the real me” on the tape’s final track, it doesn’t sound like the millionaire’s cry to the masses about how money doesn’t make you happy. He’s not singing for you or as a part of the emo-rap trend. This is his format, only one of two direct sequels. Unlike the elaborate sculptures of Evol or DS2, Beast Mode 2 is for Future, an etching in a diary. A passing moment. –Sam Tornow --- Pink Siifu - Ensley [STREAM · DOWNLOAD] Ensley is a girl’s name meaning one’s own meadow. But who is she to Pink Siifu? Track five, “Proud/Pray,” might offer a hint, as Pink raps, “This is for my sister.” Maybe he’s just talking about that song, but having relocated from Birmingham to Cincinnati to Los Angeles to his current artistic sojourn in New York, not to mention having also released music under the names iiye, VCR@aol.jazz, and Liv Martez, Siifu too could be an Ensley, at least in spirit, as he seeks to continuously terraform new ground for this rap shit. The meadow sprawls, and with 26 songs clocking in at over an hour, this tape is also scaled up from the field. But don’t let that fence you off — there’s a whole ecosystem here, and Bandcamp has put together a convenient guide for the journey. –Samuel Diamond --- RetcH - After the Verdict [STREAM · DOWNLOAD] It’s far too easy to let the details of RetcH’s run-ins with the law overcloud what After the Verdict properly announces: that the man is back on his bullshit. Sure, titles like “Made it Out” are reminders that the New Jersey rapper just shook off decades of jail time, but even the most explicit engagement with the court case refrains from ham-handed reckoning in favor of unapologetic flexes, like the kickoff, “I clutch the slimmy that was stocky and some beef and broccoli/ And smoke a choppy with a mami on my way to papi.” Far from a calculated return to form, After the Verdict is a refinement of the gnarled, snappish flows we heard on Finesse the World unspooled over a trim batch of ghoulish instrumentals from GRiMM Doza. Despite RetcH’s affinity for every trap upstart’s favorite purple concoction, it’s unclear whether he belongs in the same conversation with his glitzier contemporaries or with those gunning for “something made for grown folk.” What’s clearer is who this music isn’t for: the polite society do-gooders who’d smugly donate to cash-starved schools yet would flee a high-end restaurant as soon as RetcH walks in. Thankfully, RetcH will keep on snarling and sneering, erasing demarcations you thought were fixed and bum-rushing every yuppie function from Millburn to Moorestown along the way. –Cirrus Slump --- Rabit - CRY ALONE DIE ALONE [STREAM] The thing about invoking DJ Screw’s influence in nearly any beat-based form is that it’s already implied. Nevertheless, in an era of wanton creative theft, it never hurts to be explicit. Like any Houston native, Rabit’s always been outspoken about his love for Screw, but CRY ALONE DIE ALONE is his first full-on embrace of the deceased originator’s iconic mixtape form. It’s a far cry from an original Gray Tape, but so is just about everything; merging Houston classics, witch house, and the cutting edge of bass music — three distinct branches of the larger Screw family tree — the mix is less a faithful re-creation than a survey of the breadth of the legend’s influence in the nearly 20 years since his death. There’s a lot of baggage that comes along with making a self-anointed “screw tape,” as there are thin lines between tribute and imitation, or appreciation and exploitation. And the Houston originals here, including”Diamonds and Wood” and “Pourin’ Up,” provide such a zoomed-out view of the city’s vibrant scene that they can initially scan as something closer to gesture than considered selection. Repeated listens put that out of mind, however; the tape owns its origins to such an extent, from the cover art to its June 27 release date, that it can only be a labor of love. –Corrigan B --- Chief Keef - Mansion Musick [STREAM] Things were simpler in 2012. Finally Rich, and especially “Citgo” (the 13th track on the deluxe version), projected effortless style and grit, taking rap to a place it hadn’t been before and one that we didn’t recognize. It’s difficult to say whether Chief Keef has been less or more vital to music in the years since. On one hand, the 17 (or so) mixtapes he’s released since Finally Rich have attracted little mainstream recognition, and none of them has produced a single with the magnitude of “I Don’t Like.” As Corrigan B put it in his review of the very underrated Thot Breaker, “fuckers in school don’t say much about Chief Keef these days.” On the other hand, Keith Cozart’s signature is scribbled thoroughly and, it seems, permanently across the landscape of rap music. I still find his music exciting in its own right, and it shows that he knows and embraces who he is, down to those idiosyncrasies of his style that haven’t been as widely emulated as others. In a couple important ways, Mansion Musick sounds similar to the last 17 (or so) post-Finally Rich mixtapes; the vocals are clear and high in the mix, the variety of drum sounds is small, and the approach to composition and songwriting is unmistakably closer to the sputtering idyll of “Citgo” than the furious staccato of “I Don’t Like.” The piano-driven opening and closing tracks and well-executed collaborations with Playboi Carti and Tadoe particularly stand out. –Will Neibergall --- DJ Surrup - Kids See Ghosts of Screw [STREAM] It’s not at all a knock on Kanye West and Kid Cudi when I write that DJ Surrup’s slowed and throwed version of their Kids See Ghosts project is better than the original. (It’s actually my favorite of the recent G.O.O.D. projects, other than the masterful Daytona of course, plus…) Surrup has been quietly improving upon hit records for years now, and Ye seems to bring out some of the best in him (and vice versa), as The Life of Purple Pablo is also a prime example of Surrup’s sleepy-eyed, sharp-eared genius. By not only slowing and scratching his source material, but reordering and reimagining it in ways extra conducive to replay, Surrup proves himself not yet another “ghost” of Screw, but rather a diamond in the rough of remix culture. And no offense or anything, but Cudi kind of sounds in transition here, which is all kinds of bonus awesome. –Samuel Diamond --- Fat Trel - Finally Free [STREAM · DOWNLOAD] When Fat Trel was locked up on weapons charges in spring 2016, it seemed like another setback in the D.C. street rap king’s belabored transition to wider success. 2013’s SDMG mixtape was blisteringly good, with daring, diverse production that showcased how Trel could hop on anything, be himself, and make it work, leading him to sign with the (perhaps ill-fitting) MMG label. His career has been in idle since then, save for a steady output of video singles since his September 2017 release date. And while the long-awaited Finally Free doesn’t electrify like early-career Trel, that may be a good thing; adjusting gracefully to the vicissitudes of 2018’s rap landscape, the rapper has eased off the drill-and-molly anthems and found a new sweet spot over the mourning, low-slung style of beat pioneered by 808 Mafia. But rather than swag rapping, Trel spits the same unshakable flow that made him famous — so effortless you sometimes forget he’s even rapping. –Nick Henderson --- King Carter - Prisoner of Mind [STREAM · DOWNLOAD] Slums don’t let up. Forget simply taking over this column; the crew is about to fuck around and go the 2018 equivalent of All City, whatever that may be. King Carter’s Prisoner of Mind is one of the latest in a superstring of quantum-entangled collabos from SlumsNYC and frequent comrades such as Standing on the Corner, Slauson Malone, Medhane, Caleb Giles, et al., but it isn’t just one of the latest or just anything for that matter. Streaming this, I laughed, I cried, I came, I died, I came back to life, and I made sure to download the split-track version so I could do it all (or some, but mostly all) over again. Major props due Ade Hakim (a.k.a. Sixpress) who handles the bulk of production on here and has been on an absolute killing spree of late. –Samuel Diamond --- Lil Boii Kantu - 514 [STREAM · DOWNLOAD] The fact that Lil Boii Kantu is able to hammer out non-cringeworthy covers of classic Blink-182 cuts and produce goth trap tunes that slap just as hard never fails to astound me. There’s no shortage of SoundCloud artists who claim versatility, but few can toss the word around and back it up as well as this L.A.-based emcee. Kantu’s sophomore tape picks up where Trippie Redd’s A Love Letter to You left off in 2017, pairing the former’s croaky, auto-tuned howls with murky plug beats. “Senior Ditch Day,” Kantu’s ode to pre-graduation blues, is 514’s choicest offering, laden with screechy pop-punk riffage and teenage romanticism. –Jude Noel --- Big Kahuna OG - SKY CHRYME [STREAM · DOWNLOAD] Richmond-based rap collective Mutant Academy offers a wayward vision of what it means to be a rap crew today. Though there isn’t a fail-safe path to ensure stardom, many of the most celebrated rap groups of the decade have made an art of capitalizing on the “outsider” image. If there’s a unifying “edge” to the four Mutant rappers — Big Kahuna OG, Fly Anakin, Henny L.O., and Koncept Jack$on — it’s that they’re apostles of a particular blunted, Virginia-grown everyman lifestyle wherein Ohbliv loops and Nickelus F epistles are daily sustenance. From without, this seems a plausible way of corralling local support. Yet the group found its early devotees largely by way of the internet, which in turn had Richmonders jetting to the nearest backyard boogie. The squad’s been sitting on so much material that the rollout of the recently excavated SKY CHRYME had the casual air of a SoundCloud loosie. However, disposable, SKY CHRYME is not; Kahuna feels personable without the media manicure, and the mostly homegrown, skyward beats will have even the most fusty of heads retract their diagnosis of the death of “real hip-hop” and start muttering, begrudgingly at first, conspicuously with time, “the internet is the fucking move.” –Cirrus Slump --- Theravada - State of the Art [STREAM · DOWNLOAD ] The State of the Art is goonish, unemployed, unshaven, waking up at 2 PM, driving to the fye to sell back used Eastern Conference Records releases, hoping to get enough to pick up a 2-for-30, getting broken off with an extra $2 and using it to cop some even more obscure early 00s shit, most likely from another region, with a beer-stained pen-and-pixel cover. Theravada channels that come-up, not sonically, but emotionally, giving you that “Hold up, who’s this character?” feeling. My brother said we went to the same high school, but I don’t think that’s right. I did meet the dude after a show at a pool hall in my old neighborhood, though; having never heard the word “theravada” at that point, I thought he was telling me his name was Nirvana over and over: true story. That would’ve been about the time he was working on this, I assume. The moral: Y2K was real, the singularity already happened, is still happening, and right now as you read this, it’s the year 2000. –Samuel Diamond --- Hoodrich Pablo Juan and Danny Wolf - Hoodwolf 2 [STREAM] Hoodwolf’s overstuffed successor makes the cut, despite falling short of the airtight cohesion that Atlanta duo Hoodrich Pablo Juan and Danny Wolf sealed into their debut collaboration. Populated by a deep supporting cast of emcees and producers, Hoodwolf 2 exchanges the pair’s industrial minimalism for a diverse blend of timbres and experimentation. While HPJ’s delivery remains as oddly layered and tongue-in-cheek as ever, Wolf dabbles in slasher-flick dissonance on “Bitch Nigga,” Zaytoven-inspired decadence on “Everything Rare,” and even a trap-inflected appropriation of traditional Japanese music on “Just Vibe” — exclusive to Datpiff and SoundCloud. Despite muddy mixing and phoned-in features by Lil Skies and the ever-uninspired Rich the Kid, Hoodwolf 2 reaches some impressive heights, especially when its respective collaborators embrace their innate weirdness. When your missteps are this good, you’re doing something right. –Jude Noel --- 03 Greedo & Nef the Pharoah - Porter 2 Grape EP [STREAM] In early July, 03 Greedo began what will be a considerably long hiatus from hip-hop recording and performance. Luckily (and bittersweetly) for fans, he’s promised that there’s plenty of unreleased music stowed away on hard drives, which will appear on upcoming projects. This EP, in fact, is the first to be released while he’s behind bars. It’s a collaboration with fellow Californian Nef the Pharoah, and, despite being recorded with 03 Greedo’s sentence looming on the horizon, it’s fun and carefree in a DJ Mustard summer-vibe kinda way. It fits snugly into the lexicon of hot weather-friendly California hip-hop, and Nef and Greedo balance each other’s styles surprisingly well: Nef with a consistent G-funk flavor and delivery, Greedo more melody-savvy and radio-adaptable. It’s a fun, bite-sized, easily digestible listen for warmer weather, landing just at the right time. Despite its feel-good allure, this EP will land heavy on the ears of fans who’ve been following Greedo’s explosive trajectory over the past year. It’s the beginning of a long goodbye, but at least we have unreleased material (that hopefully will contain more Nef collabs) to look forward to. –Alex Brown http://j.mp/2LWnt54