#unsurprising how my trivia were mostly

[my-fandom-mania]

The OneChicago (/Law and Order) Universe

I was curious so I compared the characters to see who has really been in the most episodes up to now (March 2019). Guess who the winner was:

“🥁🥁🥁brrdrdrdrr 😂”

Christopher Herrmann!!👑

CORRECTION: Boden was in an episode of Justice, not SVU, my bad

Meanwhile, some fun trivia

- Hank Voight, Kim Burgess and Erin Lindsay have been in ALL FIVE shows

- Marina almost made it to the top 10. She’s been in 146 episodes (122🚓, 4🏥, 18🔥, 1👨‍⚖️, 1⚖️)

- Marina and Patrick have also played someone else in SVU before

- Jon Seda has crossed over the most (50x, even while not including Justice, since he was a main char.) followed by JLS (42x)

- Seda also crossed over to the original Law and Order from his old show Homicide: Life on the Street as Paul Falsone (great show, highly recommend)

-Eamonn Walker was in Homicide: The Movie with Jon Seda^

- In Jesse Spencer’s House days, Elias Koteas and Jon Seda were guests. Koteas was a criminal/disgruntled former patient and - surprise surprise - Seda played a cop. Both great episodes from what I remember

[bluezey]

So I saw In A Heartbeat

I know, I know.  “Why didn’t you see it sooner?” “It’s trending on YouTube!” “It’s all over Tumblr!” “It’s only four minutes long!”

Yes, I did plan to see this if and when I can.  And, it took me some time to realize that I can.  My recommendations of let’s plays and trivia videos were blocking the trending part of YouTube.  But, now that I finally saw In a Heartbeat, what did I think of it?

In short, this is so adorable!!

Now under the cut because of spoilers and, in this rare instance, will be using pictures of the short.

First, let me get the elephant out of the room and say that the first thing I thought when I saw the first frame was “oh my god this kid is Fear as a preteen boy and I love him already!!”

Yeah, if you know me, and I know I am, my type includes cute, skinny, nervous guys with unique, crazy hair.  Fear from Inside Out is the poster boy of my type, but this kid comes in at such a close second that he IS Fear as a preteen boy!  From frame one I fell in love with this kid and was stuck watching the short because of him.  Too bad the kid is gay, too young and taken.  So, make the love of your life the luckiest guy in the world, kid.

But don’t worry people who are crying “you’re loving it for the wrong reasons!” this is the end of my personal reasons for loving this short.  Let’s move onto the other two characters, the crush and the heart.  Now, the boy the Fear kid crushes on is suave and cute, and the heart

That’s Joy!!  That is Joy!!  This Fear kid has a heart made of Joy and I’m loving every minute of it!!

Yeah, as you can tell they took some easy read tropes to make the short an easy visual read, but that’s a forgiveable necessity since the film has no lines in it whatsoever.  Also, the short uses visual cues and the characters faces to show what they feel and what they’re thinking the rest of the time, so it’s more 90% readable and 10% trope.  Also, besides starting off as readable tropes, the characters are still downright adorable and relateable.

Now, the animation.  As you can tell from the stills, the animation is a mix of cartoon slapstick and partially realistic CGI.  Partial realism is a term I use for characters who have realistic features to them like realistic hair and realistic clothing and, to an extent, realistic skin, but they’re put on characters who look, act and move like they’re in a fluid, non realistic cartoon environment.  Even the background has these features as, for example, the trees are made of realistic leaves and bark, but are trimmed to look like they’re perfectly drawn in a crafted environment.  I think this works to tell the story to its audience:  the children.  The partial realism shows they’re telling a real life scenario that’s kind of difficult to tell these days, but they kind of sugar coat it with the cartooniness so it’s easy for kids to grasp and understand.

I also want to put in two tiny nods to the music and one point in the film.  First, the music is sweet, heartwarming, and upbeat at times.  I want to compare it to the soundtrack to Up for how charming it is.  The second is this brief second in the school:

Now, I don’t know about you guys, but I’ve seen, met and know people who make up excuses for why people are gay, up to and including “bullies call them gay so they think they’re gay” and “it’s just a popular fad.”  And up until this point you can tell that the two boys are in a private school, but you don’t see any girls in this private school yet.

While this is a neat idea, I was concerned that some confused/anti gay people will use this as an excuse to explain “well you put adolescent, going through puberty, sexually flowering boys in an all boys school, what choice do they have?”  The presence of this girl throws that excuse out the window, and has them face the fact that, even in a school of girls, this boy pined for this boy.

And, I’m not gonna lie, for the lack of a better word, this scene broke my heart:

I don’t want to explain why.  Mostly because this scene is the best well done scene in the short.  From the shadows, to the atmosphere, to the music, to the expressions on the boys’ faces, this scene is too good to put into words.  This is a scene that needs to be seen in order to feel its full impact.  So, yes, I am saying, see this short.

Now, if I had to nitpick, there are two moments I want to bring up.  But, it’s worth talking about as it brings up one of my favorite things about films:  the idea that one film could have multiple interpretations.

So, when I first watched In A Heartbeat, I loved the heart character, I really did.  I was really rooting for him to get the boy, even if he really was super focused on it.  And then these moments happened:

I couldn’t help but think aloud “this is getting a little creepy.”  Which, is one way to look at it.  Maybe because the boy is only watching the crush from a distance and in secret, this only made the heart pine for him as a form of infatuation, obsession or even puppy love.  Which leads me to another interpretation of it:  this could just be infatuation or puppy love.  But, that’s not a bad thing, considering these kids are preteens.  They’re just discovering love, they’re just finding who they love.  Having your first love be puppy love and not “the one” is not a bad thing, it’s just the first step into your love journey to your one, only and forever love.  And, who knows, maybe these two are the one, only and forever love, they’re just still smitten with each other because they’re still so young.  But, the only one that could be considered a negative interpretation is if this love is obsession.  Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying obsession is bad.  I’m saying those who are confused about the notion of same sex love or even against it may use this interpretation to twist the original message of the film, which is simply two boys finding love.  Am I saying some assholes will use this lovely, innocent message for horrible means?  Sadly, yes.  But, to be fair, it won’t be the first time I’ve seen an innocent message used for horrible means.  But, that’s the double edged sword for finding multiple messages in a film:  sometimes you look too deep and find a negative way to use a positive message.  Let’s just hope that, for once, we’re all mature with this children’s short.

Which leads me to the final comment on this message, where is this going?  What is the future for In A Heartbeat?  I’m not going to say that it’s going to begin positive same sex messages in children’s animation, because with such examples as Steven Universe and The Loud House, I think we’re already there.  But, who would have the balls to play this short before a children’s film?  With sheltering parents still against showing this subject to their children, I would be surprised and happy if this does get a theatrical release.  But, at the same time, wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t.  So, it’s good and unsurprising that I first found it on YouTube, where people can choose to watch this rather than “have” to watch it.  But, it’s still not a bad place to be.  When I first thought about how it was a good choice to have the film be silent as it’s only four minutes long, it made me question will there be talking if this becomes a full fledged film.  And that’s when I thought, why not make this a full fledged film?  It has what we’re looking for, romantic comedy, likeable characters, even a progressive story where its two boys who find their happy ending.  The only downside is I don’t see this being a full fledged kids, film, but I’m not saying it should be “edgy” either.  I’m thinking if this does get made as a full fledged film, it would most likely be a G rated film that gets a PG rating just to fully warn the shelter parents of its “adult situations”.  Hell, maybe as a full fledged film, they can make another romantic comedy plot of another couple.  Like, maybe in this school we see a boy and a girl who are clearly best friends and clearly more, but one is scared to take the leap and become a couple because their secret is they’re trans, and they don’t want to be outed because they fear they’ll be bullied, or worse, kicked out of school.  Hell, let’s put “mild peril” in the PG rating and bring up the reality that bullying will be an issue.  Since the heart is making it so blatant, maybe the Fear kid is already being bullied just for being awkward before he’s even outed, making him even more terrified when he is outed.  And, since films, especially independent films, would take years to make, once In A Heartbeat as a film is made and ready for distribution, we may have had enough time in this fledgling age of same sex characters in children’s films that this may get released under a big studio banner.  Maybe not Pixar or Dreamworks, but maybe Blue Sky or Illumination.

So, yeah, while this isn’t going to be the number one favorite short film of mine, which is currently Piper, it is going to be in my top five between Boundin and Day and Night.  And while I would love to see it in theaters, I think it has a better chance on YouTube and becoming expanded into a animated “PG” preteen romantic comedy.  So, yeah, there’s something here, we all knew it.  This film just firmly cemented it.  And all I can say is, Fear kid, crush, Joy heart, I wish you all the love and the best.