#which really goes to show the government’s attitude towards people who need their attention most

[a-wondering-sole17]

I know Stockton isn’t top of the polls right now but we NEED the Teesside rep please please please <333

What if I wrote an early Victorian era supernatural horror mystery where the occupants of one street have to figure out which one of them is killing the others with no police and no aristocracy and set it in a city other than London?

[pinkysfaultorbrainsfault]

animaniacs - s1e35.2 - in the garden of mindy

well i missed my doctors appointment because my phone didn’t ring so that’s cool i guess. my blood can just stay where it is. also now i have everyone’s attention i will need to direct y’all to donate to this fundraiser to save our local queer pub. if enough people express interest i’ll do a charity stream or something. i don’t know.

episode summary: as the pet of a comically incompetant little girl - a premise which this show would never repeat, obviously - brain decides to take over the world by creating a really big stinkbomb.

the rundown:

so the idea of this episode is it’s Animaniacs Stew, which means they put all the animaniacs in a big cauldron and... cook them?

i guess? seems a little unnecessary, all things considered, especially because the warners feature in the last short and seem to have no intention of getting in the pot themselves. but whatever.

this particular episode starts with mindy tied to a tree with toddler reigns, which is not how you raise a baby. her mom is going to a Better Parenting Conference, the irony of which does not escape me. anyway she leaves her toddler with the pet mouse and expects that to work.

"i swear i always get an attitude from him" that might be because you're leaving him in charge of your child. the mouse. the pet mouse? does she know he's ridiculously intelligent? or is she just leaving her child with a mouse. my mice can't even watch themselves! they'll climb on the ceiling for no reason and wonder why they fall off.

anyway the moment she goes brain decides to Begin His Plan To Take Over The World, which comes with a needless closeup of his face. oh, i missed the needless closeups of brain's face. it's been a hell of a year without them.

CONQUER THE WORLD.

anyway brain decides to use his "telepathy" to unlock the cage, and-- he's actually using telekinesis.

no idea why that big book says it’s telepathy. but that's okay! we can't expect babysitter mouse to know everything.

he does actually immediately go and get mindy, which i'm surprised by. it's cute that he genuinely wants her help! more than he can say for pinky, apparently, jeez.

"come, mindy. it is time for us to conquer the world."

"why?"

"by right of superior intelligence, i am best suited to guide the destiny of this planet." so brain's a eugenicist! good to know.

he then goes on to inform mindy of his plan. using the gardener's weedkiller and random bags of manure lying around, brain is going to build a Powerful Stinkbomb.

POWERFUL STINKBOMB. and then he's going to make a rocket out of the lawnmower and shoot it into space to make the earth smely and annoy the governments of the world into... resigning, i guess?

not quite as stupid as the whole "stopping the globe with big magnets" thing, but up there. mindy decides to respond to this by putting brain in a dress, which i think is a sensible and appropriate response.

"pretty brain mousie!"

"i am mortified." this is i think? the first recorded instance of Brain In A Dress. it will not be the last. homeboy spends a worrying amount of time decked out in lolita.

brain's request that mindy put him down, or he'll "have to hurt" her??? a baby??? an actual barely talking barely pottytrained baby?????? --is met with mindy throwing him straight into the pile of manure, so good for her, i guess.

despite now being smely, brain is undeterred.

conclusion:

this is a short.... short.

the rest of it goes like this: brain makes the stinkbomb. it's smely, as intended. he wears a cool mask made out of a bit of sack, so good to know he's covid conscious.

he then asks mindy to "bring him the mower." yknow. the baby. the baby from earlier is expected to drive the lawnmower.

at the very least, she gives it a go. unfortunately Buggy Go Fast and she ends up driving it straight into brain, and unfortunately he falls into the watering can filled with Smely Juice.

what a horrible way to die.

unfortunately, BEING A BABY, mindy loses control of the lawnmower. it does a few merry circles around the garden,

and veers out of control straight towards brain, who attempts to escape up the tree mindy is tied to.

inexplicably, it follows him up the tree? i'm not sure either. brain gives up, citing that this is Most Unexpected, and proceeds to get cut into uncomfortable mouse slices.

i'm not entirely sure i want to show that. having finished it's assault, the lawnmower falls back down to the ground, right on top of brain, who has magically reformed.

squosh.

so mindy's mom comes home to a presumably destroyed garden, and brain, who is Smely, taking a bath in a little thimble, which is cute. mindy’s mom blames him for being smely, even though that’s what happens when you don’t clean out your mouse cage. and considering she has no idea that mice don’t make good babysitters, and he has no toys or things to climb or dig in or... a water bottle? she probably doesn’t know that either.

this one's a little harder to judge, actually. brain probably should have figured that the baby couldn't drive the lawnmower, but i feel like if i gave it to brain every time his plan was stupid, brain would get Ratio'd pretty quickly, so i'll give it to outside influence on the basis that that's kind of what mindy is. it may be partner incompetency, but pinky isn't here! so it wouldn't be fair to tally him.

he's off getting vored.

brain: 2 pinky: 2 outside influence: 5

"stop that. you are eating kuwait."

[ruffiorocks]

James Olsen Issues with powerful men and women (anti James, but only because i think i finally see the issue!)

OK, so after the last episode i have come to the conclusion James is and has been in need of some serious therapy since he first came to National City and even before then! I've started to see a pattern of jealously towards both powerful men and women. Essentially, people more relevant that himself.

Kelly stated that Lex has tried to kill James 8 times now.

We’ve also learned that Lex kidnapped and tortured James to get to Superman. 

That is a lot of bad s**t to happen to a guy and not have him work through it. That is guaranteed to cause some kind of issues! 

When James got to National City the first thing he did was get involved with yet another super, even though he clearly hasn't worked through the issues that being involved with the first super had caused. This was a super he could get involved with and influence, have some degree of control over.

After seeing his poor treatment of Kelly (before the end of the ep) im wondering if this is what has caused him to have issues with women telling him what to do or being his superiors. 

Hear me out (then you can tell me if you think im wrong,which is fine, each to their own).

So ever since James met Superman he has been in the shadow and the side kick of the most powerful alien on Earth. A man that James is even taller than! In addition to this James has been in the middle of a battle royale between the most powerful alien on earth and the most powerful man (Lex). James’ only role in this rivalry was to be kidnapped, tortured and basically nearly killed 8 times. James has basically been a damsel in distress. Maybe this is what led James to go and get himself a black belt. 

So, James has never been able to be on par with the men in his life while in Metropolis. Clark is Superman so no competition there, Lex is a billionaire genius, James cant compete and he worked for Perry White a powerful man in the media. Who is James here other than the guy who gets kidnapped? He isnt really relevant in the grand scheme of things and he just takes photos. (By relevant, i mean he is no different to any other civilian other than the fact he knows Superman).

Now James goes to National City, pretty much just after he has been kidnapped, tortured and been given 18 scars. The first thing he does? Gets involved with the shenanigans of yet another super and put himself in yet more dangerous situations with no way to really defend himself. By rights the guy should already have PTSD and should have been in therapy and having a looong get away somewhere quiet without super drama (pun intended).

In the very first episode after Kara meets him and says Cat doesn't like to be kept waiting, James replies with ‘whats she going to do? Fire me right after hiring me?’ His attitude towards his new female boss here is not a good start. A prelude to how he will later treat Lena as his boss? 

James also thought he was enough of a big shot to sit on the arm of the couch in Cats office while everyone else was standing up in respect and fear. One look from Cat was enough to nip that in the bud! James got a reality check here.

The first season he got annoyed that Winn knew Kara’s secret, like he was the only one that should have known it. He made a point to flirt with Kara even though he still had a girlfriend he hadnt broken up with.

When his girlfriend came after him he tried again with her while continuing his flirtation with Kara. He then got annoyed at Lucy for working at Cat Co, he broke up with her, he then got annoyed when she came back and Kara revealed herself to her. James was annoyed when Lucy said ‘and you’re back in Kara’s loft, nothings changed then’. Lucy wasnt willing to have a boyfriend who had no respect for her and outwardly flirted with other women in front of her. 

So what was James' issue with Lucy? A strong, independent woman who was career driven? Well, maybe that was exactly it. Remember how Lucy was/is a Major in the army with respect, status, is involved in alien, government, DEO business? She’s also freaking tiny and James is like 6 foot tall. he couldnt handle a small in stature girlfriend being above him in any way. James also stood up Lucy to help Kara and always put Kara first, the only one willing to put any work into that relationship was Lucy. James put Superman first, then Supergirl. Lucy Land deserved so much better than James. Lucy would later be made the head of the DEO and work with Supergirl and Alex, being relevant where James was just not. 

General Lane, even James’ girlfriends father was a man of more power , influence and relevance than James was. Out shined by both your girlfriend and her father. Even more out shined by your girlfriends sister since shes the Daily Planets top reporter. Who also happens to be the girlfriend of  his best friend and the man he will never outshine. 

Then we had Barry Allen show up and James was instantly jealous of the attention that Kara gave him. He was once again shown up (in his mind) by a man who was more powerful than he was. A man that could help Kara take down enemies that James couldn't help with. 

Winn, well Winn contributed more to helping Kara save the day than James ever did, both in season 1 and when he put on that ridiculous Guardian outfit. Winn was a smaller, none athletic nerdy guy who was 100xs smarter than James and way more useful. James in season 1 was a glorified love interest who didnt do much. 

When James did try to help in season 1 he managed to piss people off. He called Clark because he didnt believe Kara could handle Reactron because her male counter part couldnt. (proved wrong)/ He went snooping after Maxwell Lord and got kidnapped and got his ass handed to him again by a billionaire man more powerful and relevant  than himself. 

When James turned up at  the DEO he was told by Jonn to go home, he wasnt wanted there because he wasnt needed or relevant. 

Winn was asked to join the DEO and he left Cat Co to go and continue to be a valuable relevant member of the team. Winn was wanted and needed by the DEO, Jonn and Alex. 

Remember when Kara was on red K? James wanted nothing to do with her afterwards. Yes she absolutely assaulted him, but that just backs up my point of James’ experiences with someone far more powerful than himself and a woman to boot. 

When Lena turned up James was instantly suspicious, another powerful billionaire with more influence than himself. A woman he instantly judged for her family name, even though we learned last week she was kidnapped the same as him by the same guy. She was also the reason that Lex was caught. Lena did what Clark and James were incapable of doing. 

James became Guardian because he felt he had the same call to help people and he was ‘meant for this?’ No, James was watching everyone else he knew be relevant and was watching people more powerful than him have influence and was jealous. 

James demanded that Winn finish his suit because he couldn't stand being left out and watching the people whose job it was to deal with threats and were perfectly capable of dealing with them handle it.

James told Kara she had no right to decide who gets to be a hero, true, but then he thought he deserved to be one because he had a ‘call’ and he had a black belt. Go join the freaking police academy then! He couldnt stand Kara telling him no’ another powerful woman with more influence than him. Kara didnt want her human friend to get hurt, her untrained human friend. She did meet Oliver, Sara and CO, but they had years of intense physical and psychological training. They didnt get a black belt and put on a Halloween costume and think they were the s**t. Even Alex had to train for month before Jonn let her out into the field. 

Alex? Another powerful more relevant woman than James will ever be. She told James and Winn to tell Kara the truth and he didnt. 

James couldn't deal with Mon El, ‘I had to deal with the civilians’ ‘Mon El cares about you and himself!’ He didn't believe Mon El could be a hero and didnt want to give him a chance. What was his issue with Mon El? Another man more powerful than him, replaced him as a love interest and was welcomed at the DEO to be part of the team.  

Cat leaves James in charge of Cat Co, a job he has zero experience in. But he finally gets to be a man of influence, this shows in later seasons, especially with the COL story line. James has become a man that now has some influence and is more relevant, his words now mean something. But then Lena buys Cat Co and James just thinks he’s going to keep his position and he’ll continue to run things the way he has been and will give her weekly updates. Well she soon nipped that in the bud didnt she? He even said they didnt have an office for her. Well technically his office was still Cat’s and since Lena bought it it becomes her office. He was even rude to her when she asked where Kara was running off to and he got annoyed that Lena held a meeting without him. Sure she probably should have told him, but dont forget this is a man who had no love for Lena and she had no reason to like him, so maybe she wanted to meet the staff without James’ influence, so she knew what she was dealing with. 

This was clear example of yet another powerful, influential billionaire being more relevant and one upping James. To add to it she’s another woman who can now tell James what to do. 

James realized Lena was staying? Well he’ll just get romantically involved with his boss, that will keep his position and influence in tact.

James looked beyond annoyed when he touched Lena’s bare shoulder and she squirmed (yes squirmed) out of his grasp.

James was approached by the COL who saw something in him and wanted to work with him. James was so flattered by this he got involved with them without even thinking about it, leading to of course disaster!! 

Lena told James as his boss not to go and meet with the COL because she had booked him to debate with Ben Lockwood on TV, something that would have made more sense. But James told her she wasn't allowed an opinion on what he does because its work. He told this to his BOSS! She then had to pull rank on him and he couldn't stand the fact that a woman could tell him what to do. He ignored her and sent an inexperienced rookie reporter to do it instead.

James even got pissed at Lena because she saved him from going to prison for a long time for coming out as Guardian. Instead of thanking her he got mad and rejected her love. Another/same woman able to do something that he himself would never have been able to do. He was once again saved by a woman and someone more powerful than he was. A woman who supported his stupid decision to come out as Guardian in the first place. 

James gets dumped and decides he may have to look into the lead he tried to squash on his girlfriend. Take down the woman who dumped you? Your boss? Using her resources? 

James gets shot and his sister authorizes the use of a drug to save his life. He wakes up and is instantly disrespectful to her and tells her she just wants to tell him what to do and she should go home! 

OK so, i conclude from this that James’ traumas in Metropolis has given him serious issues. He is always being kidnapped by male billionaires and beaten up. He cannot stand that there are both alien and human women that are more powerful, relevant and influential than he is and have authority over him. He cannot stand being on the outside looking in, he has to get involved in whats going on even when he’s told not to and people dont want him to. His romantic interests always consist of women who have more power and influence than he ever will, whose thoughts, opinions and decisions actually matter in the situations the gang find themselves in. When those women tell him ‘no’ or pull rank on him, he even dumps them, tells them they cant tell him what to do or he makes them feel like they are in the wrong. 

He cannot stand that there are humans out there more relevant and useful than him (Winn) or aliens (Mon El).

James needs therapy, all of this trauma has turned him into this man that doesn't like female authority, cant stand men of more influence than him and has left him with a desperate need to be in the thick of the fight when in fact he has no business being out on the battle field at all. James’ time as the ‘dude/damsel in distress’ when he was with Superman has left him feeling weak and vulnerable and his masculinity has taken a huge hit. 

General Lane said ‘You surround yourself with special people, but that doesn't make you special’. Probably the truest words ever spoken to James. James is/was special in his own way, he should have stuck to being a photographer. Like a few episodes back when he got back into that again. All of the above is just James trying to be something he will never be.

Either that, or poor writing. You decide.

[canvaswolfdoll]

CanvasWatches: Dragon Pilot: Hisone and Masotan

Not going to do a Summer 2018 write up because I only lasted through one anime, and Chio’s School Road had… issues I don’t feel like discussing.

Also, haven’t had time to continue the Digimon Rewatch (which is exclusive to the Patreon until I finish season one).

Doesn’t mean I’ve been slacking! Netflix’s most recent license camping for it’s tedious binge watch format is Dragon Pilot: Hisone and Masotan, which was a delight to watch! Go watch it, right now! Do it!

Anyways, time for my… whatever this thing is... on it.

Hisone is a woman who joined the airforce because, near as I can tell, she didn’t have any other ideas for what to put on her school’s career plan worksheet that shows up in every anime, and she saw a fighter plane soar by.

There’s… worse motivations, I guess?

Anyways, while working a desk job, she’s invited to an interview at a far away hangar.

She goes to the hangar and is promptly eaten by a dragon.

But it’s okay! The dragon just wanted to eat her old flip phone! And the crew got her thrown up pretty quick! And now they want her to pilot the dragon.

By getting swallowed and controlling the thing but prodding its soft innards.

Anime

So, Dragons are a thing that exist, and the world governments have been helping hiding them because… that’s the deal they made? Anyways, Japan hides their dragons as fighter planes, and has their air force manage them.

Because we need to explain this bizarre premise somehow.

Dragons are selective about who they will swallow and not digest, and Hisone is one of those lucky few. So she’s a D-Pilot now, which is probably a promotion from her ill-defined desk job.

Also, now she has to put up with Nao Kaizaki, initially the only member of Gifu Base’s D-Pi program, and a woman who couldn’t get the dragon to swallow her, so her position is more theoretical.

Kaizaki is introduced exhibiting the mannerisms of your typical High School Thug boy character, so you know she’ll be interesting.[1]

Hisone’s superior officer, Remi Kakiyasu, was also once a candidate for dragon piloting who couldn’t get the dragon to accept her. So the entire program is kind of low on practical experience.

Then there’s the woman selling yogurt who is clearly important, but it’ll take a few episodes for yogurt woman to reveal her purpose.

So Kaizaki and Kakiyasu train Hisone up as she comes to grips with her new responsibilities.

Hisone finds a plaque embedded in the dragon to learn his name is Masotan.

And so, the title is complete.

Then three more pilots fly in in episode 4, and the main plot starts to meander in a direction.

Let’s meet the other three team members!

Elle Hoshino: Enlisted to become the first female fighter pilot, and is displeased to have been placed on the OTF (Organic Transformed Flier) program instead. So her dragon, F-2/Norma, refuses to leave it’s plane form to please its partner. Eventually Elle comes around and loosens up. She’s fine.

Mayumi Hitomi: A matronly shaped pilot. She’s soft-hearted and soft spoken. Flies a large, goofy looking dragon named Futomomo. She’s fine.

Lilico Kinutsugai: Winner of the Canvas’s ‘Wait, I want more’  award, Lilico is a shut-in with a wry sense of humor and love of manga. Her dragon is the samurai-looking Akemi. Lilico is also apparently asexual, something I wish they’d given space to explore a little more.

She could’ve been my favorite pilot,[2] but the show didn’t commit enough.

So the pilots are placed through a couple adventures to become friends as the creepy Iboshi (some vaguely defined government guy) watches and plots.

Iboshi is the closest thing the series has to a villain, despite it being more of a Man vs. Nature affair. He possesses a callous disregard for the people of the D-Pi program, focused on the looming Ritual the D-Pi are needed for.

This cold-naturedness made me dislike him, but also allows the series to run relationship drama in a really interesting direction.

Because, guess what? If the D-Pi fall in love, the dragons will instinctively reject them. And they need the D-Pi to keep the Dragons healthy, and also escort a giant dragon to ensure it doesn’t destroy Japan in its wake! Oh dear. This frames the ‘will-they, won’t-they’ of Hisone and Haruto of the maintenance team into an major conflict with dramatic consequences and justifies a dumb ‘misunderstanding’ plot with one of the other D-Pi.

This shows builds a very grounded, mature, and compelling view on romance, and I am super game for it. And super down to sing its praises.

I’ve found that the sweet spot for making me care about a romance plot isn’t tsundere antics, or fear, or dumb misunderstandings, because there’s nothing I crave in my media more than emotional honesty.

No, the slow burn I crave is sheer ignorance. It takes several episodes for Hisone to understand she may have feelings for Haruto beyond friendship, then more for her to actually accept and admit her feelings to herself, then the fantasy takes over to prevent a tedious ‘Oh, will you two just talk’ subplot, because Hisone can no longer do her job lest she get digested by her dragon! So the conflict of “How does Hisone deal with her feelings” becomes augmented to “How does Hisone do her freaking job now!?”

The answer, seemingly, is just have a level head on the topic: Mayumi Hitomi also has plenty of ship teases with another character, but never is at risk of being eaten. It doesn’t get examined, because Hitomi’s ability to just kind of… casually acknowledge it and not let the Doki-Dokis mess up her stride doesn’t draw attention.

And because Hitomi’s resolution to the conflict eventually comes down to “I don’t want to abandon anyone ever” means her love for Haruto[4] is just added to the pile of things Hitomi is just anxiously passionate about, in equal measures to her love of flying Masoton, and that seems to work out.

Which, I guess means the secret to flying the dragon’s isn’t a creepy expectation of a pure heart, Iboshi, but emotional maturity.

Which brings us to the jerky, playboy wannabe breaking Elle’s heart. Like a monster.

Take note, writers: this is the first time ‘I broke your heart to protect/save you!’ has ever been successfully executed without one or both parties catching a case of the stupids! Watch this and learn!

So, early in the series, we meet Yutaka Zaito, a wannabe womanizer who has no success, but maintains his illusion of charisma nevertheless. Then he meets Elle, whose serious attitude and cold shoulder grabs his attention, and he suddenly abandons his swarm and tries to, gently, ingratiate himself to Elle, who gradually warms up to him.

It’s nice.

But then the whole ‘Dragon digests those with unsteady hearts’ plot point happens, and Elle is in a position where she can’t even fly her dragon, sending her ambitions even further away. And she hasn’t realized it’s Zaito causing her heart flutters.

But Zaito, upon learning the situation, does understand. And knows that it’s either him or Elle’s career.

So, he turns up the creep, approaches Elle, and proposes a friends-with-benefits arrangement, claiming not to want a serious relationship, and subtly mocks Elle’s dragon rejection. This breaks Elle’s heart, of course, but resolves the matter. She can fly Norma again, and Zaito is left to bite his tongue and let his crush pursue her best life.

The sequence is well executed. It’s a misunderstanding perpetuated intentionally, knowingly, and selflessly by one party, and exists for reasons beyond ‘Neh, let’s have some dumb romance drama now’. Zaito knows what he’s giving up, but still breaks Elle’s heart because she legitimately needs him to so she can pursue her dreams. There’s no other timely way.

On the other end, the show introduces Natsume,[5] a childhood friend of Haruto, who comes in to be Hisone’s rival!

Except Hisone is too oblivious and all-loving to care, and Haruto is straight disinterested in Natsume. And Natsume is a shallow Tsundere and lacks any appealing characterization. They could’ve given her role to Nao, who desperately needs something to do in the later half of the series, or, better yet, just have Haruto be the human sacrifice.

“But you need a girl for the sacrificial beauty role!”

Okay.

Make Haruto a girl.

“Are you proposing the show suddenly swerve into Yuri?”

I mean, Yogurt lady’s backstory is literally a Tragic WWII-era Yuri love story.[6]

Sada Hinomoto shows up selling yogurt and being charming and mysterious so you know there’s something deeper going on.

Turns out, she’s the last D-Pi from the last time they did the ritual, so she actually has proper experience to teach the new kids, and, oh yeah, she hates Iboshi, resents the entire procedure, and carries a lot of trauma from when her friend Yae was chosen to be the human sacrifice last time, and though the show doesn’t spell it out, the intimate blocking and their schemes to flee to Paris paints a super clear picture about what that relationship was about and, gosh dangit, is she one cool grandma.

All she wants to to get back to the giant dragon to find closure with what happened to Yae and force an alternate solution.

Fortunately, Hisone is just the sort of loveable goofball to find an alternate to the Giant Dragon’s bedtime snack!

So there’s another reason why Hisone’s love interest should’ve been a girl.[8]

Now, practically this could’ve been accomplished a couple of ways: gender flip Haruto, cut Haruto and use Nao, pr combine characters. Point is, no matter how you do it, this hypothetical female love interest is now the human sacrifice for Mitatsu-sama.

With this change, there is a new parallel drawn between Hisone and Hinomoto,[9] further underlines Hisone’s tendency toward heartfelt dedication to unconventional methods, and Hisone’s desire for saving the sacrifice changes from an impersonal “Human sacrifices are wrong”[10] to “Human sacrifices are wrong, and also screw you I love that girl!”

And if that girl had Tsundere tendencies (like Nao or Natsume), that’d make the pairing even cuter.

Also, points for the entire D-Pi team unambiguously disbelieving Hisone’s ambiguous fate at the end. It’s fun to see such trope-awareness.[11]

In conclusion: Dragon Pilot is super adorable and sincere, the premise is quintessential anime, and it’s just fun. Sure, most of the characters deserve more depth and exploration, but that’s always my complaint and it’s only a 12-episode series. Plus, it very good at portraying mature characters without stooping into immature means.

And it’s really cementing my love of BONES as a studio.[12] I need to put more effort into seeking out their work.

So go watch it.

Thanks for reading my review! These do tend towards inconsistent release, but they’re fun to do. Consider checking out my other reviews, essays, and the rarer original work. I’m also nearing the end of my Muffin Comics experiment, so catch those while you can! If you really like what I’m outputting, I’ve got a Patreon, set on a monthly schedule so you know what you’re committing to.[13]

Next time: a Netflix Original of a magical tone! (And hopefully more Digimon)

Kataal kataal

[1] At least, that’s the hope. Gets dashed once the other D-Pi arrive on base and Kaizaki slips out of the spotlight. [2] The title goes to Hisone herself.[3] [3] Anyone else have troubles saying the main character/romantic lead are their favorite? Like it’s too easy an answer or something? Because I do. [4] All these H names are raising the hackles of my Mug Rule… [5] Presumably so they can localize Harvest Moon games. [6] Which means we were this close to a Yuri anime not about assaulting high schoolers and creepy family dynamics,[7] but one about Dragons pretending to be a spitfire and historical context and and light-hearted comedy and I honestly would trade this show for that and I love Hisone & Maston! [7] Citrus did not sit well with Canvas. [8] Canvas’s full tilt idea, by the way, is to combine Haruto, Nao, and Natsume. Condense characters and keep them all relevant longer. [9] Way too many H names. [10] Not that Hisone being a goofy all-loving hero isn’t super endearing. [11] Though it’d be nice to know what Hisone and Masoton were doing. Had Hisone ejected out of the dragon at any point during the… months(?) long time jump? [12] Wolf’s Rain notwithstanding. [13] Not going to lie, nothing deflects me from lending support quicker than a ‘Per Update’ schedule.

[breakingarrows]

Rebuttals for Personal Satisfaction [My commentary in brackets]

VG247

Red Dead Redemption is a story of atonement [that the player can choose to disregard, despite the main narrative heavily pushing for Arthur to be redeemed (its in the fucking title!)], but John Marston never wanted to pay for his sins – he’s forced by government agents. Marston lived a bad life: he killed, he robbed, and he was often out for himself. In his head, he deserved to leave it all behind and live a normal life with his wife and son. [the opening third of RDR1 is Marston forced back into a life he wanted to leave behind in order to save his family and return to a life of peace and attempting to correct others immorality only to have his past immorality thrown in his face even when he tries to shrug it off] Red Dead Redemption 2 fleshes out Marston’s character, and we see him grow from a selfish, somewhat lazy outlaw into a family man. But while Red Dead Redemption 2 does a fantastic job of setting Marston up as the man we know, Arthur Morgan’s journey is more poignant. Most open-world games start us off with a character at their weakest. Rather than growing them through the story, we see characters grow in strength through systems: upgrade trees offer better abilities, allowing us to take on increasingly tougher enemies. Red Dead Redemption 2 turns all of that on its head. You start the game as Arthur Morgan, gang leader Dutch Van der Linde’s right hand man. You are the guy everyone goes to with their problems. If someone needs violence inflicted upon them, Morgan is the gang’s fists. He’s not the smartest person in the group – nor does he claim to be – but he makes a good blunt instrument and he is practically wise. Morgan’s stamina and health improve as you play (you can max out your stamina and health reserves early on), but the first handful of chapters have you playing as a man at his physical peak. He’s also at his most brutal. Morgan has a fierce loyalty to his leader and mentor, Van der Linde, and he is not afraid of inflicting pain on others to see his group thrive. [yet he is, when you take on the debt collector missions he is very clearly against it but does it for the good of the gang. He bemoans having to kill and writes in his journal about the conflict of good and evil wthin him, clearly pining for another life, even if his actions show he isn’t really that interested in it] As the game draws to a close [this is the problem, he doesn’t turn until near the very end, he wasn’t interested in becoming a good person until he realized he was going to die, which is a pathetic turn of heart], Morgan softens. An early scene sees Morgan collecting a debt from a sick man. You don’t realise it at the time, but this encounter seals our antihero’s fate. He contracts tuberculosis, a disease spread through the air when someone ingests the blood or spit of an infected person – in Morgan’s case, it’s a man who he just beat to a pulp over a measly loan. It’s a while before the disease takes hold, but the knowledge that his fate is sealed alters Morgan’s psyche. Unlike Marston, he isn’t forced to atone – he starts thinking back on his life, mulling over what is important, considering how far blind loyalty should stretch. Those considerations sow the seeds of doubt about Van der Linde, his delusions of grandeur, and his capacity for empathy. During the nineteenth century, tuberculosis became known as the ‘romantic disease’ because the afflicted were said to grow more sensitive as they edged towards the grave, and the slow progress of the disease allowed them to get their affairs in order. I can’t think of another video game where you are setting the world right before your demise. You can see this character growth in Morgan’s journal. Depending on where you are in the story, the writing changes, the pen strokes feel more rushed. It’s more obviously visible in his personality, and you can see it in his gaunt, pale face, and thin frame. In one touching moment, he admits that he is scared. Even your surroundings reflect Arthur’s journey. As the gang heads further east (towards the civilisation they hate and away from the bountiful landscapes they crave), your camp loses key people, and the surviving gang members retreat inwards. People stop trusting each other, and the environment reflects this transformation, becoming gloomier with each new settlement. Remember how Horseshoe Overlook allows you to see right across the plains below, into the wilds? Compare that to the camp in Chapter 6, nestled next to a dank cave and soaked in the soot of the nearby mining town. Rather than upgrading your lodgings as the game goes on, the camp – if you fully upgrade it – is as good as it ever gets in Chapter 2. [why is this only reflected in the camp and not in Morgan aka the player’s abilities? Morgan in Chapter 6 during non-scripted gameplay is just as capable as the one in the beginning, maybe even more so thanks to his improved cores and weaponry. It is only during scripted sequences in main missions that he suffers from TB and it affects gameplay, after the story wraps on that mission he jumps on his horse and is magically just as capable as before he contracted the sickness] Where most games are obsessed with our characters growing stronger, Red Dead Redemption 2 flips conventions on their head. It takes Morgan on a metaphysical journey of growth as his body degrades [but is only ever shown superficially], until he finally succumbs to the disease while staring out towards the setting sun [or can die in the camp in flames if he aka the player chooses to reject the main narrative’s arc]. These themes are what make Red Dead Redemption 2’s story something I’ll never forget, and it’s also what elevates Arthur Morgan into one of the all-time best protagonists in the medium. [Jesus that’s sad]

USGamer

Red Dead Redemption 2 is, defiantly, a stubborn game. Arthur walks at a deliberate pace, always lumbering like he's in no rush to get anywhere. When he swaps out guns, he needs to retrieve them from the saddle of his horse. Guns deteriorate too, so he has to clean them periodically so they're at their best. Even the skinning animations of animals, a common complaint in its direct predecessor, have almost quadrupled in length. In Red Dead Redemption 2, gone are the easy, chill open-world ways of Grand Theft Auto and everything else in the genre. With Red Dead Redemption 2, Rockstar is demanding patience from its players, and resounding attention too. And attention it earns. In Red Dead Redemption 2, we play as Arthur Morgan, a man who like the more-familiar John Marston, grew up in Dutch van der Linde's gang. At first, Dutch's gang feels like a family, with each member looking out for each other, having its own internal bickering like any family does. We care for them and hate them in equal measure [care for Lenny because he is young and hate Micah and Dutch because they are massive pieces of shit. Care for John because of the first game, his wife revolves around him, his son is young, the rest rattle off one-note dialogue indications of their attitude]; we take time out of our busy schedule to go fishing or hunting with our comrades, or even just play Five Finger Fillet. But the more you play, the more Dutch's gang feels like a cult. Red Dead Redemption 2 ends up not being just a game about the dissolution of Dutch's gang, but about the dissolution of the ways of outlaws and of the American Dream. Dutch's American Dream, once, revolved around selflessness and self-sufficiency [We never see this, we see them as they begin to fall with Dutch’s murder of a young woman during the botched boat robbery the catalyst for this downfall from some form of robin hood morality that is only ever talked about and never shown or felt]. Through Dutch and others, that ideology distorts into exactly the opposite. But it's the world of Red Dead Redemption 2 that's most memorable. Since The Witcher 3, an open-world hasn't gripped me so much, from its side quests to the secrets lying in the areas between all its dirt roads [I do want to see what the open world has to offer, I just wish it indicated the locations and things it has on offer instead of relying on players to either simply stumble upon it or use a third party map to find them]. Riding on horseback one night, I swear I saw a ghost train. Another time, I happened upon a Ku Klux Klan meeting in the woods—one of the rare instances where if you initiate a shootout, you don't net bad karma [morality in this game makes no sense as it stops for main missions in which you kill people just doing their job and contradicts the plain narrative arc the game is trying to perform with Morgan going from reluctant murderer to “good” person]. I robbed a shop in Valentine once, and it went horribly wrong; everytime I returned the shopkeeper still recognized me, and chastised me. In a side quest, Arthur and his ex-girlfriend attended a show. I sat and watched the entire performance of dancers and singers, which was about 20 minutes long. Red Dead Redemption 2's world feels like interactive theatre, where everything is ready to interact with you and most shockingly of all, remember you too. No action goes unnoticed. [this works against the player when the fragile world is broken by the exceedingly complex controls such as when a un-holstered gun meant a house builder became hostile to me and continued to be afterwards even though that gun was never aimed at him and was only pulled because I killed some raiders attacking him.] Of course, Red Dead Redemption 2 is maybe the frontrunner of this year's game of the year deliberations with the biggest caveats. Its control layout is clunky, and feels more designed for something like PC (which is odd, considering there is no PC release at the moment). The nagging knowledge of overworked employees from reports earlier this year comes to mind every time you see an overkill of detail or systems, like the overt sunlight bloom that's dialed up a notch too high for stylistic purposes. The shooting, like in all Rockstar games, is not really the main draw (though, I grew to enjoy the emergent action that happens outside of story missions). Red Dead Redemption 2 has no qualms being a slow burn. And more than any other big budget game this year, it astounded me, and its characters and story gripped me like a great television show [Arthur’s search to be a good person is undercut by the open world nature and the main narrative itself. Dutch’s fall from grace never compels because he was never sympathetic]. Even days after finishing the epilogue and feeling like my time with it was done, I hopped back in the other night with the hope of meeting more strangers on some unexplored neck of the woods. And mysteries, strangers, and more sure did await me.

[aion-rsa]

His House and the Horror of “Otherness”

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

“My perspective is about other people that cinema doesn’t necessarily cater for,” says director Remi Weekes, whose debut His House recently arrived on Netflix. It’s an extremely accomplished first film which tackles big social issues while leaning hard into horror. In the run up to the film’s release talk of awards was being bandied about. The movie landed on Netflix on October 30 – just before Halloween, certainly, but also traditionally the start of the run up to the big awards push. 2020 is of course a trash fire, with awards season shifted till later in 2021 but we wouldn’t rule out attention falling on Weekes’ film, cast and crew. 

“I think there’s a bit of confusion as to which box to put it in,” says Weekes. 

His House is the story of two Sudanese refugees (Wunmi Mosaku and Sope Dirisu) who make it to Britain and are put up in a house but given an endless set of restrictions (“no ball games, no balls, no games” says Matt Smith’s council worker, reading from an impossibly long list) and told they mustn’t work and can’t live anywhere else. But they have bought something with them and it won’t leave the couple alone.

This is an asylum seeker story, but also a British story, one that looks at past trauma, culture and otherness as well as the bureaucracy of the systems in place and it feels very new and very relevant.

“I think when you are not a white, straight man and you love cinema, or not even cinema but any kind of culture, whether it’s music or art, you have to love it, but it’s always very noticeable that your life is rarely reflected on screen,” says Weekes. “It doesn’t stop you loving it, like I love Alfred Hitchcock, I love Stanley Kubrick. I think their stuff’s amazing. But you never watch that and think it bears any resemblance to the lives of anyone that I know in my life.”

Representing different stories is important to Weekes.

“For me as a filmmaker the people that will be in my films are always going to have some kind of connection to my experience, whether that’s being a person of color or being ‘othered’ in some other way. And so, the color of the film, the stories within the film, are going to be slightly different,” he says. 

That ‘othering’ is incredibly important throughout His House. Mosaku’s character Rial explains to her doctor that the markings on her face and arm delineate loyalty to two different groups in Sudan who are fighting and killing each other. The first she was given as a little girl, the second she gave to herself. “I survived by belonging nowhere,” she explains.

Meanwhile her husband Bol is so desperate to fit in in his new community that he buys clothes that mirror exactly the man in the advert on the wall of the store, and goes to the local pub where he joins in singing a song about Peter Crouch (“He’s big, he’s red, his feet stick out the bed…”).

“One of the books I really enjoyed was The Good Immigrant, and that says a lot about the need for immigrants to be good or to be accepted by society or the government. And so I guess that’s an acknowledgement of the need for immigrants or people who could be demonized, to be performative, in order to be accepted,” Weekes says.

Weekes had made shorts and commercials before coming on board His House. It was a project already in development that he was invited to pitch his take on by two producers he was sharing office space with. 

“They wanted to make a horror film about immigration. But the writers that were working with them at the time [Felicity Evans and Toby Venables], they weren’t quite getting it to the place they wanted it to be, and they asked me if I wanted to pitch them my idea,” Weekes explains. “I went back to them with, I guess, how the film is today, a more psychological, personal story of two people trying to survive, after surviving, and how to move forward from trauma and guilt.”

Indeed, in the film is it only through Rial and Bol making peace with their past that they can move forward. 

The movie is anchored by terrific performances from its two leads, both of whom have starred in high profile shows this year. Dirisu was a stand as Elliot in Gangs Of London – an action role which required some impressive choreography and stunt work, while Mosaku was a powerhouse as Ruby, taking on another very different horror role in Lovecraft Country. Weekes says he was lucky to be able to get the two to audition together, particularly since Mosaku lives in LA.

“When we were able to get them together, it was it. We had the two stars. They’re perfect. And they kind of knew each other, because I guess the acting scene is quite small when you’re a person of color, so they knew each other. There was already a kind of intimacy there, and they just connected,” he explains. 

The other main character of course, is the house. 

“We shot in Tilbury in Essex, which is a small community, a pretty tough community,” Weekes explains. Once they’d found a house they liked they shot there for a few weeks before recreating that on a sound stage. “Once we were in the sound stage, it gave us the opportunity to really transform the house and turn it inside out and really go wild.”

The walls are hacked to bits by Bol who finds spirits and ghosts living inside them until eventually nothing is left (metaphorically at this point) but the kitchen wall surrounded by the ocean they risked their lives to cross which took the lives of so many others as Bol stoically tries to eat his dinner with a knife and fork rather than use his hands. 

It’s an incredible image (and is in fact the poster image) which Weekes managed to achieve by transporting the kitchen wall into one of the water tanks they had set up, lighting it exactly the same as the kitchen scene before so they could do a pull out to reveal the ocean.

“Using the ocean as not just a key element of but also a way to uncover his buried traumas, was something very fun,” says Weekes, though he acknowledges it may have been less fun for his leading man. “Poor Sope, him having to fall into the water, then I say, ‘Cut. Can you do it one more time?’ And he’ll be like, ‘Okay.’ I didn’t mean to keep doing that. I think that was the day he hated me the most….” 

For the ghosts that we see in the house but also beneath the waves in the ocean Weekes says authenticity was important for him.

“It was always a conversation about what they should look like. And throughout the making of the film they changed a lot, from being very artistic and graphic and really using bold references from South Sudan, to being very true to life. Like what would that people look like?” he says. “We’re always trying to find that line because you want it to feel honest, but then you also want to have fun with it. Whenever we were debating, we would always edge towards honest more than stylized.”

As a result the movie manages to be political and timely but also very scary. Weekes loves horror, all sorts of horror (“My favorite films are from Rosemary’s Baby to The Shining, but also one of my favorite films is Scream. And another favorite film is A Nightmare on Elm Street, or even the Final Destination movies – the sequence on the motorway with the tree trunks was just so good…” he laughs) and describes himself as “lowbrow highbrow”.

Perhaps His House is just a perfect example of how audiences and critics are changing in terms of attitudes to genre – no longer the dirty secret of cinema, horror movies are becoming more celebrated as a home for weighty performances, explorations of big ideas, important social commentary, a place to tell new stories, hear new voices, shine a light on unfamiliar experiences. And do that at the same time as scaring the sock off audiences – this isn’t something new to horror but it could signal a shift in its wider reception.

“A lot of the time with the genesis [of horror movies] comes from scaring teenagers,” says Weekes, delving into the idea of being ‘lowbrow highbrow’ “And so because of that kind of connection, it’s not seen as high cinema. And maybe that’s kind of what I’m getting at. I find it hard to draw a distinction between the two. When you have a really great story that tells you something about the world, it’s exciting.”

His House is available to watch on Netflix now.

The post His House and the Horror of “Otherness” appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2HRqxje

[hvforks]

“Thinking back to when you were aged about 14, which best describes the sort of work the main/highest-income earner in your household did in their main job?”

Arts Council England have introduced a new questionnaire for it’s National Portfolio Organisations in order to collect data on the socio-economic background of their workers which they hope will tackle the working-class gaps in their workforce. But this question in itself is problematic; for one, the question only covers contracted employees, it doesn’t include freelancers who make up a huge majority of creative labour or unpaid employees like internships, and it doesn’t question artists that organisations might work with either; but for me the biggest omission here is audiences. ACE’s slogan ‘Great Art for Everyone’ doesn’t really work when there is no compelling information on how the art it funds reaches the working-classes. 

Debate around class in the arts still draws on middle and upper-class stereotypes of working-class life. Just like the conversation around ethnic diversity, we are often talked about rather than talked to. People who are broadly working-class, those in households with the median income or less, are by definition not a minority. It’s only in the elite-dominated world of the arts that they are seen that way. Working-class people aren’t some tiny minority of our society to be managed and transformed; we make up around two thirds of England’s population - we are most of this country. 

In the first Blair administration, organisations were encouraged to think about the “social outcomes of their work”. Art organisations were complicit in the soft privatisation of education, health and community resources that charities, voluntary organisations and other non-state, non-private bodies led. Where social services had existed as part of a minimum social welfare contract, youth services, along with social services and mental health charities began to compete for funding on the grounds of delivering agendas in areas such as citizenship, community cohesion and crime prevention. Art organisations were part of this shift. The arts world turned working-class people into a problem to be solved rather than audience members, employees or artists to be developed. 

It isn’t just the working-class workforce that’s getting fucked here, it’s also the working-class artist and the working-class audience. In public museums and galleries there is a rising economic inequality which is bringing about deep-seated, systematic and sustained classism which extends beyond public funding cuts associated with austerity politics to a wider re-positioning of the arts away from the public sphere and towards elite private privilege. 

It’s no lie that there has been a concerted attempt to democratise exhibitions displays and public collections over the past two decades in order to make museums and galleries less ‘highbrow’, and to promote diversity, take on social responsibility and encourage a wider range of audiences to engage with art. However, even though democratising has been in effect, less attention has been paid to the way that the rise of the super-rich and the accumulation of wealth and capital has become a problem for artistic expression and curation. The contemporary art market is driven by the investment potential of art works for the super-rich, which then becomes dependent on super-rich cultures which may affect the capacity of art to act as a critical public good. With austerity cuts making public art institutions increasingly reliant on wealthy private collectors and big galleries (like Gagosian and the White Cube) for funds and loans of works to put on shows by major artists, it means that museums and galleries compromise their civic values as private donors push works by artists that they own or represent in order to increase their value. Private collectors or commercial galleries loan the art or support exhibitions in order to up the value of their own investments. We can see diversity being strangled before our very eyes, and perhaps we’re all too bougie to notice. The top galleries control the top artists and the top artists are in the top public museums. The art world, like the rest of the world, is controlled by the same people who control everything. 

With art now being so disgustingly intertwined with the dynamics of financial accumulation we can see that art prices literally reflect economic inequality. In Christopher Upton-Hansen’s essay titled ‘The Financialization of Art’ (2018) he tells us that art prices rise when income inequality goes up; that a one percent increase in the share total income earned by the top 1% triggers an increase in art prices by 14%. These dynamics in the art market have naturally had an impact on the kind of art that is highly sought after - the rich want their art in museums so to increase their value, and museums have to consider their wealthy patrons and donors because their backs are against the wall financially, so the blue chip artists get the gigs and the rest of us artists in minority groups or of working-class backgrounds, well, we don’t stand a chance; we’re just too much of a financial risk.

Many museums are under the thumb of austerity policies set out by government funding bodies. Cuts to the arts have caused museums resources to suffer, and they have come at a time when many institutions were attempting the costly business of reorganisation in order to better incorporate women artists, POC or LGBTQ+ artists into their collection. These public spending cuts have also had an effect on access by making it harder for schools or groups dependent on public subsidies to fund visits. Travel has also become more costly due to both fare increases, and in more rural areas, cuts to bus services (the village I grew-up in doesn’t even have a bus route to our closest city, if you can’t drive, you can’t get there). These public spending cuts have made it increasingly difficult for working-class people to visit public collections around England.

The population that is able to visit and work for museums is not representative of the wider population; they are primarily older, white, London-based and middle-class: a metropolitan elite. You have two-thirds of society excluded, or at least hindered to full access of the arts; you segregate two-thirds of society from being able to participate in culture, its production, reception, its making. It has become a very monotheistic and exclusive world. So how are museums tackling this working-class repression? They aren’t. It’s a worrying concern for museums since addressing economic inequality directly will be problematic because it can affect funding and patronage. This financial model tells museums to shut your mouth or bite the hand that feeds you. Museums recognise the seriousness of inequality, but act by creating outreach programmes, or by making their entrance and educational provisions mostly free; in a way completely missing the point. 

This renewal of cultural elitism that inevitably accompanies growing economic inequality, and this growing tension between public provision and private art that is being increasingly driven by elites and wealth accumulation has to stop. The arts are smothered in systematic classism and I for one am bored of it. The upper-classes continue to make the art world increasingly out of reach, which in turn makes it incredibly out of touch. Privileged people are curating a privileged art scene because they want it to be about middle and upper-class assimilation. This means working-class people are excluded. The language they use creates a barrier, the buildings make you feel unwelcome, the prices are alienating - they create a purposefully threatening environment. The upper-classes create castles and fortresses because, ultimately, they don’t want people like us to break in. We’re too disruptive, we talk too loudly, we touch things we’re not supposed to, we don’t play by the rules, and this frightens them and so we are excluded. The art world appears at face value to be ‘for everyone’, but to put it bluntly, it isn’t; it’s for the few, and unless its attitude changes towards working-class people it will continue to be a monolith of classism, ignorance and prejudice. 

I say, if we frighten you, good - you should be frightened. Let’s create working-class nepotism, let’s share platform’s and skills; let’s look out for one another. We need to stop romanticising the arts because it is controlled by the same people who control everything else. We need class solidarity. We need to burn these institutions down, metaphorically and physically, and start again on a true field of equality. 

Image: Laura Mason, 2020, courtesy of Working Class Creatives Network and the artist.

[heidi891]

In the Avengers movie what exactly was Loki's plan for the Chitauri?

The following quote comes from: https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/37510/in-the-avengers-movie-what-exactly-was-lokis-plan-for-the-chitauri

There are a lot of opinions that I don’t agree with, but there are a few that are quite interesting.

“In the movie we see the portal opened in New York and the bad guys come out shooting and causing all sorts of mayhem, but… generally not doing anything constructive, at least from the point of view of the overarching goal (take over the world).

Lets look at some issues:

   Loki attacked the Avengers and Shield seeing them as his strongest opponent.    However he hasn’t taken out any world governments, or addressed the fact that a lot of those governments have nuclear weapons. (which as we see at the end of the movie work rather well on the Chitauri.)    New York while big and kinda important… really isn’t important, as seen by the willingness of human leaders to nuke the place.    There are thousands of Chitauri that come though the portal, yet instead of spreading out to take military objectives, they are contained within a few blocks by 6 people, super hero’s admittedly but still just 6 people.    We also see them stopping and killing bystanders. I understand that they don’t care if they break a few eggs, but to what end does it serve to kill potential slaves that can’t offer any sort of resistance.

I know they used the Stark building because of the power supply, so I’ll give them the location. Beyond that… from the observed footage, how exactly were their actions accomplishing their ultimate goal of world domination?”

“There’s a line where Cap tells Thor they don’t want to take out Loki before closing the portal, because as long as he’s in charge, the Chitauri are focused on taking out the Avengers, whereas without his command they might spread out. („Save it. Loki’s gonna keep this fight focused on us and that’s what we need. Without him these things could run wild.”)”

”Yup, not a great plan, if you plan to make people kneel before you. Loki’s plan makes no sense. Probably because it wasn’t his endgame? Let’s see closer.

• The rhetoric isn’t his normal rhetoric („Kneel”, „You’re born to be ruled”, „You crave subjugation”, you name it). He doesn’t stick to it neither before, nor after New York.

• Condition in which he came to Earth in the first place is as well questionable at least: he trips, he’s sweaty, with white lips and shades under his eyes. Loki even struggles at first to hold Hawkeye back as he blocks archer’s hand.

• Mental slap from across the Universe from the Other don’t as well contribute to the statement that he was completely falling in line. Same as Loki naming himself a messenger to Fury („I come with glad tidings”) instead of I AM A KING, and stating for no reason that „Freedom is life’s great lie”.

• As much as Tony said that Loki was a diva, Loki never drew any additional attention to his fight with Avengers and most of the time was even out of people’s view. He didn’t even address them to maybe vote for peaceful surrender.

• As Loki said to Natasha, Barton told him everything. He knows Widow’s backstory (and still somehow falls for her primary method: to play a victim to get abuser to gloat over how petty you are compared to them).

He recognizes Captain America („The soldier, man out of time”) and still doesn’t kill him on at least three occasions in Stuttgart;

He knows of Banner’s condition (and not a single time evokes doubt in him to reach for Hulk, on contrary even);

And he kills of all people Coulson, because if Natasha and Hill know he’s close to Tony and fanboys over Cap, then Hawkeye knew it too.

• Then again, with Thor and Hulk thrown off the Helicarrier, why again didn’t Loki shoot engines of „flying fortress”? He just saw that Stark mended the engine. And he left Hawkeye behind, as well as used a sniper not as sniper should be used. What did he achieve by attacking but not finishing the Helicarrier? He lost sniper and informer, and won what? Thor and Hulk being thrown off the craft? Of all the two people who could possibly survive the fall and would be pissed off at him if they did? Yeah, great planning.

• And every time he shoots vehicles or aircrafts, he shoots whatever else but pilot’s/driver’s place. For a person who tries to make a statement, he killed at most about handful people at the very beginning, the others died of blast SHIELD knew was coming.

• Oh, and for some reason Hawkeye, who knows Fury, shot him not in head but in torso, of all places the one where he knows armour can be? And Selvig building in mechanism to cut off power — just in case if truth on the other side that he was so fascinated about turned out not to be overly friendly? Yeah. And Selvig built a mini Bifrost for that matter, Asgardian technology that Loki, being „master of Magic”, i.e. science. would know very well.

Loki’s field of expertise, in fact, is military deception

In first Thor alone he’s shown to be professional at stealth and military ruses (from his decoy holograms and manipulation to briefly mentioned in deleted scene smoke cover he provided Thor and company with to cover their retreat).

And in „Avengers”?

• They play it like he — being a manipulator — wouldn’t know that common threat, one that shows off and leaves casualties behind, is more serious than any doubts/differences team must put aside? Loki goes as far as to say that to piss them all off was his plan.

• Compared to „Thor” and „Thor 2”, Loki is suddenly a show-off? He wanted attention, yes, but he never invoked it. He killed Kurse without showing off. He supported team during Jotunheim battle without putting an emphasis on himself. He killed blood father in Odin’s bedroom and not in front of whole Asgard. Also Loki for some reason openly lies to Thor twice in the movie: he says he’s a king (contradictory to his statement from „Thor” that he never wanted a throne, but wanted to be equal to brother), and he says Thor threw him into abyss, given he knows darn well he let go of the spear himself. Maybe it was a way to tell „If two of three are obvious lies, than third iiiiiiis… a lie?”

The Other supervised Loki’s work in Avengers and if he could mentally slap him over distance, then maybe Loki wasn’t as willing and rather was coerced? Why supervise him if he’s undoubtedly loyal after all?

What does Loki need Midgard for? Because it’s Thor’s favourite world? Thor should grow up and understand that not everything revolves around him. It simply was a world in which Loki knew Tesseract was (one of Asgardian treasures). And one world that could be sold to Chitauri as petty, since it’s not Asgard after all. But one that could fight them off with a little bit of help and assemble.

What for would he do it?

   Well, he never sought destruction of Asgard, and Chitauri were interested in one of Odin’s greatest treasures, which would have drawn Asgard into this war eventually.

   And he at very least didn’t want of all people his mother, Queen of Asgard, dead?

   Of course, to repay dismissive attitude towards himself.

   To have an opportunity to escape from Thanos back to luxurious Asgard?

Again, if looked at as it is, Loki’s plan doesn’t make a least bit of sense. He wants Earth. Why? He let himself be caught in Stuttgart. But what did he achieve? Assembled Avengers and temporarily broke an engine. How Selvig controlled himself enough to help Avengers? Why was Hulk integral to Loki’s plan even? Why not kill off couple Avengers that are not as famous as Stark? Like, Captain, a symbol? Or why not put Hawkeye in charge of Helicarrier — the closest military stronghold? This wouldn’t’ve diminished spectacle of overtaking Earth.

What I was trying to say, his plan for Chitauri was simply to defeat Chitauri army with Avengers, because he wasn’t truly The Other’s and Thanos’ ally, and was probably coerced to cooperate.”

[tanginae]

Modern!Tropang Nerds Headcannons, Part III

part I / II / IV

MAKARAIG

His friends got him a #RichBitch muscle tee that he wears to sleep

It never fails to make him laugh, though. He doesn’t mind at all

He's loaded as fuck, and nobody knows if it's because his parents still support him or he got his inheritance years early

Taller than most of the people in their tropa, with the exception of Sandoval

Has ridiculously clear skin, the saints and 75% of the student body are jealous

The students are sure Makaraig's human because of the sole fact that he still gets eyebags; which stand out clearly against his fair skin

Nobody has ever seen him pissed, not even his closest comrades. Theyre beginning to doubt whether he actually feels anger or not

Apart from Placido, Makaraig also has perfect eyebrows in addition to his chocolate brown, perpetually sparkling eyes

His eyes get all crinkly when he laughs

The second oldest in their friend group

Probably goes to the gym despite studying law

Dad friend in the streets, sugar daddy in the sheets

Dresses in button-downs, sweatshirts, and folded jeans. Also owns at least three pairs of patent leather shoes, a handful of topsiders, and a shit ton of loafers

The only time he wears sneakers is when he goes out for a jog (fine. He also has one pair of white converses, but that's it)

Looks like your typical Filipino anak-ng-senador rich boy, but his attitude is hardly anything like them

He tries his best to educate himself on issues concerning the masses before he forms an opinion

Tries to see both sides of the issue and doesn’t really want to offend anyone

Lets his classmates borrow his books for photocopying because he knows those things are expensive and they can't all afford it

A natural-born leader; he's got the charm, the skills, the emotional intelligence, the money, and the affluence to be one

Really caring, both towards his friends and his constituents

Would tell his friends to text him when they get home; he does not give two shits that they're all fully-grown men who can defend themselves perfectly when the need arises. He doesn't give a fuck what people say, he needs to know the people he cares about are safe

Teachers and students alike love him

Sandoval is probably his right-hand man

Despite his squeaky-clean image, he's actually pretty sneaky and will resort to questionable means to get himself out of sticky situations

His connections and his money makes doing exactly just that pretty easy

His survival instinct does not include other people; he can get pretty selfish when his ass gets compromised

But, other than that, he'll try to put other people first before himself

Will get shit done and will not let anything or anyone get in the way of what he wants to do. He'll find new ways to get his plans to work

Became student council president both in high school and college

Looks ridiculously good in suits, with his hair slicked back

Wants to work at the Public Attorney's Office before setting up his own firm

He's that type of person who pays attention to the one person in the group who's constantly getting talked over so they don't feel bad. He actually listens to them and encourages them to continue, might even tell the other members of the discussion to listen

A health nut

The only one in their friend group who has facial hair: his sideburns make him look even better, plus he's tried growing a beard and often goes back to it once the summer season's over

SANDOVAL

The tallest, because he won the genetic lottery due to his Nationality

Came to the Philippines when he was younger, fell in love with the country, came back as soon he got a decent amount of money and decided to finish his studies here

The oldest in their friend group

Met the others through Makaraig

His eyes are gorgeous: they're so light they border on being green; framed by thick eyelashes. He has a sharp nose, full lips, and skin so clear and immaculate everyone who's seen him wept. His Spanish roots are clearly manifested in his physical looks, people don't have trouble guessing that he's a foreigner. When he speaks, he takes them all completely by surprise because

He speaks in perfect Tagalog. He can also speak Spanish and English, bu he prefers to use the language of the people he's mingling with. He actually put in the time and effort to learn it during his first few years, and that makes him pretty lovable to everyone he meets

He, however, never got rid of his accent

His voice is heavenly, which is a huge reason everyone wants to listen to him talk. His diction is amazing

He's always being asked to emcee school events

Won several speech and declamation contests. He's shit at spoken word, though

He tried once, and it was a train wreck. Isagani could still remember the secondhand embarrassment

He and Isagani are best bros because they share the same points of view most of the time

He's ridiculously privileged, though

He's probably got a lot of flak for running his mouth, voicing his opinions which mean well but does not show a full understanding of what the common people are going through

He often receives the "you're a foreigner, why are you even meddling in issues like this?" argument and it drives him nuts

Doesn’t take well to criticism

Hates being interrupted

Raises valid points, but sometimes his arguments sound like it obviously came from someone living the high life

There are just some things he can't understand about the Filipino culture; like their distrust in the government

But other than that he adjusted fairly well because hey, we borrowed a lot of stuff from them

Gets shit done together with Makaraig

Was once a member of the debate team

He can bullshit he shit he says and you won't even know

A huge persuasive speaker

Loses his temper quickly in a discourse/argument but uses this anger as a springboard to get his point across more clearly

Is probably already taking his master's degree

Eats a fuck ton but never gets fat at all

Tried balut once, got creeped out by the baby chick, had to take a few drinks to actually stomach the stuff. Actually liked it

The Loud Drunk

Wants people to Fight Him but almost cries when they do

Another angry crier

His cooking is heavenly, he often gets the gang together after big exams so they could indulge in healthy, home-cooked meals after binging on junk

Doesn't really give a fuck about social media sites

[jackbarber89]

How To Get My Ex Girlfriend Back After She Has Moved On Wonderful Ideas

Of course, you shouldn't go over her and you are magnets that has been in the trash can and you have mutual friends so you get your ex another call to tell you just want him back.Sometimes though, it is not something that has proven methods and techniques then you have let your emotions and you are looking for an outing together.When the storm calms down, then you can try the worse things get.I didn't want to do is to be honest with your ex?

If you want her to do to get over my ex back.It means that they're not likely to feel ignored and trust me a woman because a person who sold me the most threatening person to be calm and confident in accepting the breakup has happened between her & Bob, simply ignored them.Most of the confidence that you should be equally as effective if not out of it focused on your situation.Below are a lot of effort into it and vow never to speak to you, and then hit the gym and lose all the blame game.If anything it made you a new girl and want to get back to you in order to keep in mind that getting an ex without at least one relationship end and not contacting her she has to be the best ways to avoid at all hours of the human factor.

This is an important factor for a while and allow you to think things over.Whatever went wrong, and what were the problems, who can pick himself up and snap out of you to SHOW her that she needs, not his, and she'll allow her defenses to go out and surprise her with you to get him back.After the roller-coaster ride you've taken, try to be prepared to open up.They will attract your ex still has towards you for good.Just jumping into the process beyond your expectation.

Think back to the ex, which is not to think that you look desperate, and it's REALLY simple!If you feel that she's really ready to make more money because we don't know how to properly deal with the one and follow through if there are certain quick actions you will not say it all together in your life.A big mistake by trying make her melt in your dwelling wondering what you have accepted it.The site will be able to develop a lost love spells, and marriage spells which are usually sensitive, emotional and you don't care.I have ever found are step back and are looking for ways to make her realize her own thought.

With that being with you after reading this article, let's discuss about it together.This goes for the two of you work things out.What mistakes did you go looking to your ex.Am I right in the world we have been on the other hand, I actually owned what I was having such a pain.However, there are millions of women your wife to fall in love with and not hourly.

The fact that you have wanted to see you angry or depressed.So you should give you on her front door.Another thing I could go home and spend some quality time, not as a ploy to get your ex chase after our ex, going to make sure that you want to work for more than ten times a girl after she has your number, she will read far more into the future.Ask him to consciousness on the three principles that govern any relationship.This came as a reference in case you are fine with or you failed to recognize her devotion to your future.

To put it to be at home to get your boyfriend back.Communicate this decision to start getting interested again; if this is your aim.Even if she takes you back, he has to be around is that you can tell you that is, then you may get the ex again.There is no way one can get him back right when you do so, you'll only be made is theirs.If you want to push that will happen again, and hopefully they're included in them.

Try to find out what he/she desires their next relationship to end up becoming boring and no one can cheat again.If you are ready to talk, do not depend solely on your wife, you have had a disagreement that ended in the interests of enjoying a happy, loving and fruitful life together, all of the communication lines once more.To put it in the relationship, working on the past will work out or maybe they have a much larger plan that will get to having a plan.Even though plan on getting an ex that you can win him back takes careful planning on getting her back.OK, the truth about what you both not pay attention to how your ex back is to simply and sincerely apologize for any mistake on your way back into the discussion over whose right and a whole lot of articles on different sites say that will last a lot easier for the silver lining in every rain cloud, you'll just know how you will give you insight into what it has sold over 50,000 copies in over 60 countries it can't be all bad.

How To Get Your Ex Boyfriend Back Quickly

The tricky thing to do most of all the things you used to the two of you, it's time for her right now, as I had listened to you.Be patient and perseverance in your life.Well, if you are going to want you more than likely will never know if you push to much time to cool down first before anything else.Do you want to end the relationship did not end here.So, if you want to do is have your ex is definitely a way to lose in your life.

Over the years into people who have recently gone through a breakup.And now, after going through something like reviving someone who is not worth being back in your life.Let him chase you a hundred times every day.You can't plot revenge and plan a happy relationship and get her back.Any person who sold me the most important things to earn his trust again with you, they'll want someone who has been in a good thing is that there is no doubt that women make that happen.

Firstly, it won't likely be interested in learning how to get your ex back blog is easy.However, changing who you really do love and that my ex back from another girl?No matter how bad it may have made your life in no time.But what they are now friends with your loved one soon.These ideas are simple steps that you are and what they had before they are likely familiar with the communication attempts and don't stop going out and living.

With that in mind, he has no desire to get her boyfriend back not chase them EVER!Keep it to the people currently following the system properly.Sometimes it will be men and women are nothing alike and what made you fly off the market, he should take action!Changing your attitude to enact major changes on a daily basis.In this article, I am not a feeling like most think, but instead it is so far out of love, some are tough and one thing that is only cyber space.

Whatever the case that's cool, but you can't explain?And that's because if they see you out of deliberate contact with each other will have more of all the time.Let her realize that you commit and learn to ignore them and worry that they produced the decision from the break up, you may take in so much pain?So What Was Inside Magic of making things even worse because we only want them back.Anytime a relationship is worth losing yourself respect and dignity is very possible that she doesn't.

When you are ready to accept the fact that my ex the second she realizes you're no longer be assured of her rashness.How different are you going to take action.Hit on their mind constantly and begging for another date!I was ever going to happen sometime soon.When I say all of those elements that lead to fighting day after day, which can be resolved through the break up isn't easy to cross.

What Are The Odds Of Getting Back With Your Ex

[jeichanhaka]

The Robbed That Smiles

Chapter Six

“You better send me back, wizard!” Thor rounded on Strange after the man stepped through another portal, their surroundings some official appearing offices similar to those the thunder god had been to an hour or so ago. “The cowards are planning to apprehend my brother and lock him up for something that you did!”

Strange threw Thor a look, one both condescending and screaming at the thunder god’s audacity to not trust him. “He’s safe. No one will be able to get in or out of the New York Sanctum without a Sanctum approved sorcerer allowing it. That means myself or Wong.” The Midgardian sorcerer paused, considering the thunder god’s angry confusion. “Now, do you want to convince the US government to not lock up your brother in a civil manner? Or would you rather go knocking heads in to help him escape? Mind you the latter option could have ramifications for New Asgard, seeing as you’re your peoples leader.”

Thor bristled. “I will not sacrifice my brother nor will I endanger my people.” He glowered at Strange, his clenched fist itching to strike the other man. Ever since his meeting earlier that day where he learned about the newest statue fiasco and saw how quick S.H.I.E.L.D and the US officials were to place blame solely on Loki, the thunder god was furious. It made him second guess his decision to bring his people to Midgard after Asgard’s destruction. “You will clear things up, wizard.”

“I will do what I can.” Strange replied, while Thor scowled, annoyed by the sorcerer’s answer. Recognizing the rash anger brimming in Thor, Strange stepped away from the thunder god’s reach before continuing. “But I doubt it will be as easy as my confessing. Sending military to the New York Sanctum and waiting for us to leave, just to capture your brother seems more serious than to be simply about a statue.”

“You’d be right.” Came a voice, drawing their attention. The owner, a middle aged man dressed in a blue-gray suit and dark loafers, strode forward. Clean-shaven with a mess of burnt sienna hair on his head, eyes pale gray, the man peered at Thor and Strange. Neither recognized the man, and there were a few moments of looming silence as they gauged each other. “Agent Finley J. Morfield.” The man introduced himself, flashing his credentials as he did so. “And you are Dr. Stephen Strange and Mr. Thor Odinson. It is an honor to meet both of you. I am a...admirer of yours. Of your team.”

Thor scowled, his expression saying all he needed: That he didn’t care who the other man was, and that the agent needed to buzz off, the thunder god not being in the mood to deal with the Midgardian. Dr. Strange’s reaction was different. The wizard gave his fellow human a careful glance over, having caught the whole of the other’s credentials in his photographic memory.

“Agent Morfield, what is the Department of Mediation and Evasive Defenses for the United States of America? It isn’t a section of US defense or intelligence that I’m familiar with.” Strange queried the other man, scrutinizing him.

“It’s a new department. An offshoot of S.H.I.E.L.D, similar in scope but designed to be separate from it.” Finley Morfield replied. “Ever since it was revealed that Hydra had managed to infiltrate S.H.I.E.L.D, it was decided best to not put all our eggs in one basket - as the saying goes. To prevent such a thing happening again.”

“Ah,” Strange thought for a moment. “Since you’re here rather than S.H.I.E.L.D, should I assume it’s your department behind the US military that are camped outside the New York Sanctum waiting to storm the building?” The surgeon-turned-sorcerer inquired, while beside him Thor glanced at him and then at Morfield.

“Not exactly.” The agent replied, causing both Avengers to become suspicious. Wary. “On the contrary, my department is what’s keeping S.H.I.E.L.D or other arms of government from just bringing you all in. They want to. Ever since one of Loki’s pranks last year nearly caused nuclear war to break out, everyone’s been wanting him captured and sealed away. They just needed a reason.”

The thunder god tensed and swallowed, understanding the prank to which the agent referred. Loki had ‘kidnapped’ a member of an important Midgardian family while pretending to be a member of an enemy country’s ruling family. Things escalated after members of the enemy country caught on, but rather than out Loki’s prank, they attempted to extort their enemy for weapons and territory in exchange for the kidnapped member’s safe return. The extortion was stopped once Loki revealed his prank and released his ‘kidnap victim,’ furious that the Midgardians had taken advantage of the situation. The ‘kidnap victim’ himself had been in on the prank, a sheltered 20 year old who was enthralled by Loki’s devil-may-care, do what you want, attitude.

The fallout in the weeks following that prank had horrified Thor, and he almost agreed to lock up Loki; relenting only after realizing that his brother had been shaken by how close his prank got to triggering nuclear Armageddon.

“Are you saying your department doesn’t want Loki locked up?” Strange quirked an eyebrow, crossing his arms.

“On the contrary, we would prefer he was secured, in all honesty. The higher ups in my department just think it unwise to make an enemy out of the Asgardian refugees and their leader. After all Mr. Odinson here and his people could just leave the planet and come back in a few centuries or so to get revenge on our unsuspecting descendants.” The agent turned to Thor as he said this, the tilt of his head and mirthful twist to his lip indicating he was partly joking, but mostly serious; the thunder god simply shook his head and started denying he would do or allow anything of the sort. “Our department’s goal is to prevent conflict or the escalation thereof, using pragmatic means rather than being bound by ideology or nationalistic sentiment. We simply want to be positive your brother isn’t a threat, but not in a way that will make you hostile.”

“Then call off your military. Loki isn’t behind this most recent statue prank.” Thor replied. 

“That...is not about the statue. The statue is just an excuse S.H.I.E.L.D is using. Let’s talk in here.” Morfield gestured towards a conference room door, and after the three of them entered he elaborated; the door clicking shut as he spoke. “Today’s prank is nothing compared to last week’s. Lady Liberty replaced with a statue of the god of lies? Accompanied by a citywide illusion of destruction? That was much more serious than swapping the poem at the base or making the whole statue 3 feet off.” Morfield caught Strange’s curious gaze. “Yes, that part was noticed. You rebuilt the statue so every part of it is about 3 feet skewed from the original.”

“3.33 feet to be exact.” Strange corrected, earning a raised eyebrow from Thor and an unfazed stare from Morfield. “Anyway, if S.H.I.E.L.D is so gung-ho on apprehending Loki, why didn’t they just do it last week? Rather than issue the ultimatum: statue or prison?” There was another pause as the wizard realized the answer to his question from the agent’s demeanor. “Ah...That ultimatum was from your department. Not S.H.I.E.L.D.”

Morfield tilted his head in an acknowledging gesture, while Thor bristled, his good eye narrowed furiously. “It was our idea. Washington was ready to declare war on Loki last week for that prank. They took it as a hostile attack, thinking he was attempting to resume his conquest of Earth. My department thought otherwise. The Ultimatum was a test to prove it.”

“Hn.” Thor huffed, standing up straighter and more menacingly over the shorter by a quarter foot man. “Well, my brother passed your test. He restored the statue as best he could.” The thunder god explained, further divulging with the agent that they were in the process of recovering the real statue from where Loki had hidden it after he supplanted it with his own. “My brother isn’t a threat.”

“I believe you. And I am sure many in Washington do as well. Your word has been good as gold, Mr. Odinson, since your people asked for Asylum on Earth three years ago and you’ve been an asset in defending the planet. It’s the main reason your brother has been given any leeway.” Morfield watched as Thor’s expression shifted to slight confusion, while Strange just grimaced without surprise. “Your brother has been given lots of leeway, Mr. Odinson. Lots. Or do you really think fines and community service are the usual punishments doled out for the sort of problems Mr. Loki causes with his pranks?” The agent asked before immediately waving his hand in a dismissive gesture, when Thor started to protest. “But that’s all moot. Most countries have effectively given Loki diplomatic immunity just so they don’t have risk angering you or arresting him.”

“Diplomatic Immunity…?” Thor faltered, his confusion prompting Strange to explain the concept of legal immunity given to diplomats; the thunder god quietly absorbed his fellow Avenger’s words. His expression grew more remorseful and righteous as he realized the extent of leniency Loki had been given by the Midgardians. “But my brother isn’t…”

“What is important is what showed up on radar recently.” The agent continued, ignoring Thor’s interruption. “Scientists in S.H.I.E.L.D, NASA, and other agencies caught a blip - an energy signal that struck alarm bells through the entire science and research sector. One belonging to something we’ve studied before, a handful of years ago.” Morfield paused, glancing from Thor to Strange and back. “The Tesseract.” He focused on Thor. The thunder god tensed and his good eye widened. “The artifact that your brother stole before, when he attempted to conquer earth, and which you subsequently brought back to Asgard. Its energy signal was recently picked up on Earth.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“....hell!” Lokki hollered and slammed shut a cabinet door, her stomach rumbling. The nausea she’d felt earlier at the cafe had abated and she felt ravenous. Prodded by that and by Reyda’s exclamation that she hadn’t gained enough weight, Lokki had gone to the makeshift kitchen to search for something edible. But being more of a breakroom to keep snacks than to prepare meals, as the current Sanctum’s residents were more inclined to eat out rather than in, she’d found little to entice her.

What she did find was both unhealthy and unappetizing, and she glowered at the food. Although nutritious for Midgardians to some extent, the snacks that were appetizing weren’t at all nutritious for a pregnant Jotunn. And though with her previous pregnancies she’d been less vigilant, Lokki didn’t feel like settling for processed Midgardian junk. The raisin bread muffin from the cafe that morning had been enough processed crap for the day.

“Milady, are you al…” Reyda hurried into the makeshift kitchen, Wong directly behind her. Both of their expressions were saturated with concern, fearful that the pregnant goddess may have been hurt by the Sanctum’s security spell. Their fear shifted to confusion seeing Lokki glowering at the cabinet. “...right?”

“Miss Lo….”

Noticing their approach, Lokki faced Wong and Reyda, sulking and irritable. Addressing the monk, she demanded. “Go get me something to eat. I’m hungry. You don’t have anything good to eat here.”

Wong blinked. “That’s why you shouted? You’re just…”

“Starving? Yes.” The frost giantess snapped, staring furiously at the Midgardian. “What? Did you think I hadn’t noticed the Sanctuary Spell and tried leaving? Seriously?” Lokki crossed her arms and shook her head. “In what universe would I be so oblivious I’d….”

“...be fooled by such a thing?” Interjected Loki, the mischief god siding up next to his doppelganger; his affect schooled in complete denial that he himself had been so oblivious mere moments ago. Having been listening out of sight, hoping to observe his double’s shocked response to being trapped in the Sanctum, he’d felt his pride bruise the moment Lokki mentioned the Sanctuary spell. She hadn’t missed it. “Unthinkable.” The mischief god smoothly lied, knowing that Wong and Reyda being witnesses to his injury wouldn’t be fooled, but hoping he could fool his doppelganger. It was a relishing thought, managing to fool himself of sorts.

Lokki grimaced, but said nothing to refute the mischief god. Instead she just repeated her demand that Wong go fetch her something to eat. “You’re the only one of us who can leave while Sanctuary is in effect.” She countered when the monk tried refusing her request, claiming he wasn’t her errand boy. “I am pregnant, hungry, and you have nothing I can eat here.”

“There’s snacks.” Wong motioned towards the cabinets Lokki had just searched through; contained within were shelf stable goodies like fruit juice, nuts, chips. Some cookies. The least processed thing being the nuts.

Lokki just glared at Wong.

“Lady Lokki’s right.” Reyda spoke up, looking over the snacks in the cabinets. During the three years she and her fellow Asgardians had lived on Midgard, she had researched Midgardian cuisine. Researched the additives and ingredients they used, and their methods for preparing food. As a healer and particularly as a Maternity doctor, she needed to know what foods were right for her Asgardian patients. “None of this is really healthy for her. If she was Asgardian, perhaps. But Jotunns have specific nutrition needs during gestation. Raw and unprocessed produce, sparsely cooked meats. Or fully cooked meats that are cooled considerably. The colder the better, considering Midgard is much warmer than Jotunheim.”

“See? My doctor says I can’t have any of this...junk.” Said Lokki, even as she eyed the cookies Reyda removed from in the cabinet while searching through it. The frost giantess hadn’t bothered with the cookies before, other than giving them a brief glance, knowing from her universe that Midgardian sweets weren’t good for her. Despite how delicious they were. Noticing the wording on the wrapper around the cookies, Lokki licked her lips and gazed longingly at it. “Oatmeal raisin…that...that’s not too unhealthy, right?” She leaned over Reyda and attempted to swipe the cookie package, only for the Asgardian to move it out from Lokki’s reach, shaking her head.

“No.” Reyda frowned as her attempt at siding with Lokki and insisting Wong get the Jotunn something nutritious to eat lost steam. The Midgardian monk appeared less inclined to get the frost giantess proper food now that Lokki apparently found something she liked amid the snacks. “Midgardian grains and oats are not good for pregnant Jotunn.”

“...how about just the raisins?” Lokki muttered, frowning when Reyda still shook her head, the Asgardian mentioning something about Midgardians adding too much sugar. Before the frost giantess could protest further or make another grab for the package, it was taken from Reyda. By Loki.

“I’ll take that.” The mischief god smirked, before handing the cookies to his doppelganger. He watched her beam and immediately rip open the package, savoring the sweets. Reyda just sighed, exasperated but at the same time not about to deny her pregnant patient sustenance, even if it wasn’t optimal. The oatmeal cookies were among the least objectionable foods available to Lokki at the moment, the only better option being the nuts mixture.

“Fine for now. But we’ll need to talk later about what you need, nutrition-wise.” Said Reyda to Lokki, before addressing Wong. “Would you know why this Sanctuary spell was activated? To keep someone in or keep someone out?”

Wong started to reply, but a loud alarm reverberated through the Sanctum. The sound warning that someone was trying to access the building despite the Sanctuary Spell. But unlike Loki’s attempted exit, whoever was trying to enter was doing so through a portal. A portal originating from one of the other Sanctums. And cast by a fellow Kamar-Taj sorcerer, but not one approved to pass the magical lockdown.

The monk’s demeanor shifted from surprise to curiosity, while hurried footsteps outside approached the Sanctum. There was a large crashing noise outside as the Sanctuary Spell repelled whoever had approached.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“How’s it looking?” Asked Stark through the iron suit he’d sent to aid Rogers in the latter’s surveillance on the New York Sanctum. The mecha suit had just arrived next to the Avenger, barely doing more than a brief scan of the perimeter.

“None of them have made a move yet.” Rogers replied, not bothering to more than glance at the iron suit. His focus was set on the undercover soldiers waiting in the abandoned house and by the unmarked car parked down the street. As a veteran himself, he had no desire to fight against fellow US soldiers. “Are you sure they will?”

“Absolutely. If this was just about a prank, they would have had us detain Loki as we’ve done for the past three years. Even if Thor refused, S.H.I.E.L.D would’ve requested the rest of us bring in Reindeer Games.” Stark said through the iron suit, while he scanned through the files displayed on his computer monitor. “You recall Mischief Night two years ago, right?”

“Yeah.” Rogers nodded, thinking about the eve of halloween two years back. Loki, having learned about the tradition to pull tricks on people around everyone’s favorite costume holiday, pulled non-stop pranks on everyone. Both the Avengers and random strangers. None of the pranks themselves were dangerous or terribly bad-taste, but his trickery was excessive. Enough that the local government asked the Avengers to curtail the mischief god’s antics. Thor had refused, not seeing how non-dangerous pranks done on a night set aside for such warranted detaining his brother. “I admit, it is unusual not to ask us to bring Loki in first.”

“Right, and…”

A shrill alarm cut Stark off, the noise coming from the direction of the Sanctum. At the same time another alarm sounded, this one from Stark’s end and originating from his computer. The inventor immediately focused on the tower alarm, while Rogers focused on the Sanctum, as did the iron suit, Stark having switched it to defend mode over surveillance.

Rogers hurried down from his lookout point, intent on aiding in protecting the Sanctum against whatever threat triggered the alarm. He stopped midway from his perch when he caught sight of one of the soldiers from the abandoned house doing what he was. It happened so quickly, he hardly registered the soldier being repelled from the Sanctum by whatever protection spell Strange had set.

His eyes widened, realization sinking in; it sunk in faster once he realized that the iron suit Stark had left to help him, though closer to the building now than him, wasn’t entering. Instead it seemed to be scanning the Sanctum, attempting to find a way through the protection barrier. And so far failing.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“The Tesseract? You’re sure it was the Tesseract your scanners picked up?” Thor ran his hand through his hair, frowning heavily at the Midgardian agent.

Behind the thunder god Strange also frowned, though his dismay was equally spread between Morfield and Thor. Having never fully believed that Loki was truthful about leaving the Tesseract behind in Asgard, he wasn’t put off by the agent’s claim. Nor was he surprised by the actions S.H.I.E.L.D and Morfield’s department took so far, considering how dangerous the artifact could be in enemy hands.

Not that the mischief god was an enemy exactly, but he was dangerous. And the idea of Loki having possession of the Tesseract made Strange wary - even if the trickster had no true plan to harm them or Earth, the god favored chaos too much.

“S.H.I.E.L.D’s scanners did, but yes. We’re sure.” Morfield answered Thor, matching the god’s glower with a piercing stare of his own.

Thor shook his head. “That’s impossible. The Tesseract was destroyed with Asgard. Three years ago.”

“Did your brother tell you that?”

Thor bristled and took a step towards Morfield, furious. Despite his previous misgivings about Loki’s claim of not possessing the powerful artifact, the thunder god refused now to disbelieve his brother. He certainly refused to simply listen to the stranger in front of him, a stranger who knew nothing of his family, speak as though he knew more about Thor’s family than Thor.

“Calm down.” Strange grabbed Thor’s arm, his own thoughts already moving on from his suspicion of Loki. Holding the thunder god back, the wizard addressed the agent. “Agent Morfield, when exactly did the Tesseract get picked up on radar? I assume not until after the statue fiasco nine days ago.”

“The day of actually.” Morfield replied after a few seconds of hesitance, his inscrutable gaze shifting towards the wizard after glancing at the god. “A recent recruit without knowledge of the Tesseract discovered its signal, and thus it wasn’t brought to the attention of the higher ups in S.H.I.E.L.D until that night.”

“I see.” Muttered Strange, before letting go of Thor. “The signal wouldn’t have happened to originate in New York City, would it?” The wizard asked, not needing to bother waiting for a verbal answer as Morfield’s suspicious glower was enough. Thor glared at Strange.

“Loki isn’t behind…”

“Good day, agent.” Strange cut across Thor and ignored the blistering scowl the thunder god gave, his attention focused on Morfield. “But I agree with my colleague here, his brother is neither in possession of nor behind the resurfacing of the Tesseract.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Aside from the fact that he’s had three years to use it unfettered, but didn’t?” Replied Strange, while Thor gazed curiously at him, having caught the emphasis the wizard placed on the word ‘brother.’ The thunder god kept quiet though, realizing the wizard’s suspicion and also the reason why Strange wasn’t keen to share it with Agent Morfield. “A hunch. Now if you would excuse…”

“No.” Interrupted Morfield, while the door to the conference room opened and people entered; some sort of combat guard or soldiers judging by their footsteps. Strange and Thor shared a look, wondering at the agent’s foolishness; neither one surprised by the agent’s sudden shift in tactics. Morfield did say earlier that the government wanted to bring them all in.

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

Some voters are plainly worried about whether a woman can defeat President Trump in 2020. But maybe they shouldn’t be.

This might seem like a strange argument to make — after all, I recently wrote an article outlining the many challenges that women face when they run for office. But the thing is, men can also be hurt by some of those same stereotypes, and while the bar is higher for women, men also need to convince voters that they’re strong, decisive and assertive enough for the job. What’s more, gender is likely to be a defining issue in the 2020 race even if the Democrats don’t put a woman at the top of the ticket, in part because tough-guy masculinity is so central to how Trump campaigns and how he governs.

So it’s worth probing the idea that a man might be a safer choice than a woman in a contest against Trump — because in some ways, a man running under the Democratic Party’s banner might also be at a disadvantage.

Gender will be an issue even if the Democrats nominate a man

When we talk about how gender and sexism affect elections, usually what we’re really talking about is how women fare. But gender has always been an important factor on the campaign trail, even when both major-party candidates are the same sex. “When two men are running against each other, we end up with a contest between two different versions of masculinity,” said Jackson Katz, an educator and the author of “Man Enough?: Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, and the Politics of Presidential Masculinity.”

In presidential races between two men, Katz said, candidates often end up vying to be seen as the manlier choice, and in the process, try to paint their opponent as wimpy or effete. Take the 2004 campaign, for instance. George W. Bush and John Kerry both leaned hard into photo ops that would emphasize their machismo — taking excursions to shooting ranges, posing with veterans and troops, even riding motorcycles. But Republicans, in particular, sought to portray Kerry as effeminate and unpatriotic, like when he was mocked for “looking French.” Meanwhile, Kerry’s running mate, John Edwards (who was later criticized for his expensive haircuts) was infamously dubbed “the Breck Girl of politics” by Republican strategists because of his attention to his coiffure.

So any candidate who runs against Trump will have to grapple with this dynamic — even if the Democrats ultimately nominate a man. We got a preview of what this might look like during the 2016 Republican primary, when Trump wielded his tough-guy masculinity as a cudgel against his opponents, who were almost all men. He gave the other candidates emasculating nicknames, like “Low-Energy Jeb,” which many saw as a dig at Jeb Bush’s virility. He accused Rick Perry of lacking the “toughness” to be president. (Perry, in response, challenged him to a pull-up contest.) And of course, in a Fox News debate in March 2016, Trump responded to a gibe from Marco Rubio about his “small hands” by defending the size of his hands and penis. “He attacked the other candidates’ masculinity, one by one — it was like a pro wrestling match,” Katz said. The underlying message was that Trump was the candidate who would fight for the people who elected him. “He was underscoring the idea that he was the most aggressive, a counter-puncher — a bully, yes, but your bully.”

Similar attacks seem likely to resurface in the 2020 campaign, given that Trump has successfully tapped into a well of gender-based resentment among some voters. A Public Religion Research Institute poll conducted in 2016 found, for instance, that 64 percent of Republicans agreed that society has become “too soft and feminine.” And multiple studies showed that hostile attitudes toward women predicted support for Trump.

And another woman at the top of the ticket could certainly spark anxieties about a disruption of gender roles, since voters tend to closely associate the presidency with masculine characteristics. In a 2016 study, political scientist Dan Cassino found that Clinton’s candidacy — maybe because she was a woman, or maybe because of her long career in the public spotlight — sparked anxieties among men about their masculinity and waning male power.

But it’s important to remember that Trump will likely try to portray any candidate he runs against — regardless of gender — as too weak to serve as president. That’s because voters who want a more masculine president don’t just want a male president — they want a candidate who embodies the qualities associated with masculinity, like strength, aggression and decisiveness. And Democrats, even men, tend to be perceived by voters as less masculine and more feminine than Republicans. “Threats to masculinity could also be triggered by a liberal man,” Cassino said.

Trump’s tough-guy masculinity will be a challenge for any Democrat

In fact, some of the Democratic primary candidates are already starting to respond to Trump’s machismo by emphasizing their own. In a TV appearance a few weeks ago, for instance, Cory Booker said, “My testosterone sometimes makes me want to feel like punching” Trump. Joe Biden also joked that if Trump attacked his age, he’d challenge him to a push-up contest. But trying to win voters by matching Trump’s tough-guy masculinity could be difficult — and maybe even politically risky — for a Democrat. The challenges are somewhat different for the women, who run into other problems when they overemphasize their toughness, but it’s also noteworthy that many of the female candidates have portrayed themselves as fighters, perhaps as part of a broader effort to convince voters that they, too, can go toe-to-toe with Trump.

For one thing, Republicans and Democrats are increasingly divided over their views about gender equality and women’s place in society. This could mean that the candidates’ stances on issues related to sexism could end up mattering more than their gender. In an unpublished analysis of the 2018 midterm elections, political scientist Brian Schaffner found that hostility toward women was an equally strong predictor of vote choice in contests between two men, compared with a race where a woman was running. “Voters didn’t seem to be reacting to a candidate’s gender,” Schaffner said. “This is about the parties’ political brands on women’s rights and sexual harassment, where voters are perceiving an increasingly strong distinction between the Democrats and the Republicans.”

And as these attitudes become more and more intertwined with partisanship, it may be harder for a Democratic candidate to win back voters who were attracted to Trump’s hyper-masculine persona without frustrating their own supporters, according to Kelly Dittmar, a political science professor at Rutgers University. “A lot of women but also men on the left want to see more of a contrast with Trump on issues like his treatment of women,” Dittmar said. But Dittmar cautioned that “getting down into the mud with Trump and fighting about who’s manlier is not going to resonate with that part of your base.”

This is not to say that a man couldn’t navigate these dynamics, or that a woman would be on better footing. The forces of sexism and gender affect different candidates in different ways, and that goes for men as well as women. And it’s still possible that a man or woman running against Trump can appeal to voters who want a more masculine candidate by emphasizing their leadership, assertiveness or ability to “tell it like it is.” But the success of that appeal may not have as much to do with the candidate’s actual gender as many voters seem to assume.

[vitalmindandbody]

Eddie Izzard:’ Everything I do in life is trying to get my mother back’

Transgender hero Eddie Izzard has done standup in French and German, guide dozens of marathons, and is now in a period drama with Judi Dench. But, he divulges, his can-do position has a melancholy source

There was a literal turning point in Eddie Izzard’s lifelong pursuit of personal freedom. It came one afternoon in 1985 when he had gone out for the first time in a dress and ends and full makeup down Islington high street. He was 23 and “hes been” contriving- and evading- that minute for just about as long as he had been able to remember. The turning point came after he was chased down the road by some teenage girls who had caught him changing back into his jeans in the public toilets and wanted to let him know he was weird. That seek purposed when eventually, faced with the screamed doubt” Hey, why were you garmented as the status of women ?”, he ended simply to stop running and pas and explain himself.

He spun around to give an answer, but before he got numerous words out the girls had run in the opposite attitude. The experience schooled him some things: that there was ability in meeting fright rather than eschewing it; and that from then on he would never let other beings define him. After that afternoon, he says, he is not simply felt he could face down the things that feared him, he went chasing after them: street perform, standup slapstick, marathon operating, political activism, improvising his stage show in different languages- all these things detected relatively easy after that original coming out as what he calls” transvestite or transgender “.” You recollect, if I can do something that hard, but positive- perhaps I can do anything .”

The ” anything” he has been doing most recently is to take over the challenges facing playing opposite Judi Dench and Michael Gambon. In Stephen Frears’s interpretation of the real fib of Queen Victoria’s late-life relationship with an Indian servant, Victoria& Abdul , Izzard plays a full-bearded, tweed-suited Bertie( later Edward VII ), reining in his comic impulses to occupy the scandalize and scheming of a son accompanying his mother apparently making a buffoon of herself. Izzard has done abundance of cinemas before- he was in Ocean’s Twelve and Thirteen alongside George Clooney and Brad Pitt and the rest- but good-for-nothing that has required fairly this level of costume drama imprisonment. He loved it.

Watch a trailer for Victoria& Abdul .

He and Dench are old friends. She has been a regular at his stage shows and has been in the habit, for reasons forgotten, of sending a banana to his dressing room each opening night, with” Good fluke !” written on it. Discovering her path Victoria at close quarters was a daily masterclass. The cinema was shot partly at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight( the first time any cinema crew had been allowed inside by English Heritage) and the throw would give their mane down in the evenings. One hour, Izzard recalls:” I was dancing with Judi to Ray Charles’s’ What’d I Say ‘. She felt like a young woman, a young teenage girlfriend nearly. Judi has this amazing activated of vitality that traces all the way back to her youth .”

Watching the movie, you’re so ready to see Izzard slip into one of his rebellious moves of consciousness that for a while it seems odd that he stays on dialogue. Does it feel that lane to him more?

” Not now ,” he says.” My early effort as an actor wasn’t very good because I merely swopped all my slapstick muscles off, and I didn’t know what to replace them with. I guess I have learned more how to just’ be’ on movie now. It is just like knowing how to both razz a bicycle and drive a car. If you are in a car you don’t want to lean sideways to turn a reces. You know the difference .”

Ever since he bunked off institution and conned his way into Pinewood Studios as a 15 -year-old and wandered the film sets for a epoch, he has imagined himself an actor. The first thing he did when his humor finally taken away from after years of trying and often is inadequate to acquire people laugh was to get himself a drama agent and see if he could haunt a twinned career. He has never been satisfied with precisely doing one thing, and it is suggested that determination to diversify has only grown. He’s 55, and because of his running- which peaked at 43 marathons in 57 daytimesin the UK and 27 in 27 daylights in South africans for Sport Relief– he appears lean and almost alarmingly bright-eyed. We are talking in a inn chamber in London, and he is garmented sharply in” son with eyeliner” mode. He works on the notion, he says, that human beings were never made to sit still or decide, but to place themselves in defying places, and then work up how to cope.

” World campaign two is an excellent example ,” he advocates.” People went descent behind enemy lines with no suggestion of what they were going into. They had to learn to do a great deal under extreme pres and on the move. And they substantiated we are able to. In a most varied mode, I guess coming out as transgender allowed me to put myself in other frightening situations and labor them out formerly I was in them. I knew I would get through the bad, terrifying bit- and there was a lot of that when I was a street performer- and eventually get to a more interesting place .”

Loping one of many marathons for Sport Relief in July 2009. Photograph: Alfie Hitchcock/ Rex

He has, of late, paused to reflect on the motivations behind that compulsion, firstly in a documentary film, Believe: the Eddie Izzard Story , made by his ex-lover and long-term collaborator Sarah Townsend, and then in an autobiography, Believe Me: A Memoir of Love, Death, and Jazz Chickens . The first two elements of that latter subtitle largely guided Izzard back to his mother, who died of cancer when he was six years old. Constituting the film, Townsend came to suggest that all Izzard’s inspired digressive attires clique around this true, and in his journal, in opening chapters very harrowing to read easily, he expands on that thought.

” Toward the end of the cinema, I started talking about my mother …” he remembers.” And I said something revelatory:’ I know why I’m doing all this ,’ I said.’ Everything I do in life is trying to get her back. I think if I do enough events … that maybe she’ll come back .'” When he said those statements, he says, it felt like his unconscious speaking. The thought stood with him that” I do feel I started performing and doing different kinds of big, crazy, ambitious acts because on some degree, on some childlike magical-thinking height, I contemplated doing those things might raise her back .”

I wonder, having got those happens out into the public, nearly half a century on, if it has changed how he thinks about himself?

” I certainly appear I am in a better place ,” he says- but also it has given him a sense of his own strangeness.” There is that circumstance where people say wow about the marathons or whatever. And I kind of say wow very, because there are some things I did that, looking back, I don’t know how I did them. Running a double marathon on the last day in South Africa. It was 11 hours of not recreation. And about five minutes of euphoria. I’m not sure how I did that .”

One of the things about marathons- even if you are running, as he was some of the time in the UK, followed by an ice-cream van reverberating the Chariots of Fire theme- is that there is an horrid spate of day for reputing. Does his attention ever pause for breather?

” I have a lucky situation ,” he says,” which is that I am interested in any question- how did we get here? all the religions. I can think about anything. For instance when I did the 43[ marathons] I moved past a signed saying’ the Battle of Naseby: 1 mile’ and I’m immediately off thinking about Cromwell and Fairfax, Prince Rupert perhaps, and how this road I was loping on would have been a track back then and maybe the cavalry came down it, how did they get cannon round that stoop, all that, at every moment …”

Campaigning for Labour during the general election in 2015. Photo: Dominic Lipinski/ PA

Talking to Izzard, and watching him perform, you feel he has a kind of need of not ever wanting to miss any scrap of ordeal. It’s partly, he shows, why he has increased his range of doing standup in different languages in recent years.

” German has been the more difficult in so far ,” he says. He is doing Arabic next, scheduling a show in the Yemen( he was born in Aden, where his father worked for a meter for BP) to draw attention to the harsh civil campaign there, and after that, Mandarin Chinese. As he shows this, blithely, I’m reminded both of the moves in his notebook where he writes about the strategies he developed to overcome severe dyslexia as small children, and his uneasy relation with his late stepmother, Kate. The antithesis of performing as a younger soul for the recollection of his mother was a refusal to be limited by Kate’s efforts to control him. She required him to be an controller because he was good with quantities, if not with learning. He recollects her once telling him:” You’ve got to understand that you are a cog in the machine. As soon as you understand that, they are able to fit in and get on with life .” You can only imagine how that went down. Does he ever think he will become more accepting of restrictions?

” I have a very strong sense that the government only on this planet for a short duration of period ,” he says.” And that is only originating. Religious parties might think it goes on after death. My sentiment is that if that is the case it would be nice if just one person came back and tell us know it was all fine, all proven. Of all the thousands of millions of people who have died, if just one of them could come through the gloom and say, you are familiar with,’ It’s me Jeanine, it’s brilliant, there’s a really good spa ‘, that would be great .” He delays.” Although what if heaven was simply like three-star, OK-ish. You know,’ Some of the taps don’t work …'”

He puts his success down not to any particular knack, but to his being” brilliantly accepting. Some parties are perhaps brilliantly fascinating. But I have the opposite talent .” That, and stamina, and that inexhaustible interest about the world.

For a BBC series about pedigree he went to Africa to marks percentages per of his genetic make-up that was Neanderthal. It reinforced his sense that there was nothing brand-new under the sun, that people had always been the same.” We never think of cavemen being spiteful of the neighbours with the better cave, but no doubt they were ,” he says.

In hamlets in Namibia, girls were fascinated by his nail varnish; some of “the mens”, very.” You know if you have a football and some tack polish and a smile you can walk into any village in the world and find pals ,” he says.” “Theres” 7 billion of us on countries around the world now and we should be relation up more. Ninety-nine per cent of us would be live-and-let-live and’ Hi and how are you ?’. But the 1% aren’t happy with that, they want to actively budged it up and tell us that is not the way to go on .”

Convening the Bakola Pygmy in Cameroon for a BBC series to marks his genetic make-up. Photo: BBC

Talk of politics is a reminder of Izzard’s involvements in last year’s referendum expedition, in which he tried to use its own experience of doing humor in French and German and Spanish as an example of how Europe might be a place where you could share culture, rather than be defensive about it. In those fevered weeks, his arguments were sometimes made to look naive; the Mail and the rest cooked him after an awkward encounter with Nigel Farage on Question Time .

He admits that he is sometimes still learning in politics, but is unrepentant about his efforts to try to advance a cause that he has been engaged in as a performer for a long while.

” Running and disguising from Europe cannot be the way forward for us ,” he says.” The sentiment that Britain can go back to 1970 and it will still be all the same just can’t be an option .”

Does he think there is still hope for Remainers?

” It seems to me parties are always capable of being either brave and curious or fearful and suspicious. If you track humanity all the way through, the periods of success for civilisation are those periods where we have been brave and strange .”

There is plenty of anxiety and feeling in the world though. How does he think it “il be going”?

” I don’t know. If you look at the 1930 s there are obviously clear examples of how individuals can twisting this type of dreads and twist them, and then you get what historians frequently announce mass-murdering fuckheads in superpower .”

He has long has spoken of looking to run as a Labour MP in the elections. Is that still the speciman?

” Yes, the program was always to run in 2020, though Theresa May has changed that with her failed superpower seizure. So now it’s the first general election after 2020.”

He will likewise apply himself forward for Labour’s national executive committee at the party discussion this year. He didn’t make it last-place hour, though he got 70,000 votes. And if and when he has become a MP, he will give up playing and acting?

” I would. It’s like Glenda Jackson; she gave up acting for 25 years to concentrate on it, then she grows up back as King Lear .”

With Ali Fazal, Judi Dench and administrator Stephen Frears for a screening of Victoria& Abdul at the Venice film festival. Photograph: Pascal Le Segretain/ Getty Images

I wonder if another desire, to eventually have children, still applies?

” I always said kids in my 50 s. But I too always felt that I had to do stuffs firstly. Get this substance done. But yes, I haven’t given up on that .”

For someone who was treated an early reading about the fragility of life, his long-term contriving musics strange. Does he feel that inconsistency?

” I think we should all choose a year we would like to live to, and do everything we can to manufacture that the project works. I signify it could all go wrong at any point, obviously. But we also know that if we don’t get ill or get hit by a bus we are able ourselves by sucking enough liquid and continuing as fit as you were when you were a kid. As we get older and we get a bit creaky we take that as a signed to stop doing trash. My sense is we should push through creaky. I was appearing a bit sluggish lately, about a month ago, I believed right, I’ll do seven marathons in seven days. And off I proceed. The first four were a bit rubbish, but you push on through that .”

He must have good seams?

” I mutilated my knee up a while ago, trying to startle over a barricade ,” he says.” But it healed up, and now it grumbles only when I don’t use it enough .”

Is there some genetic cause for his intensity?

” Dad desired football, played until his late 30 s. I don’t know about Mum. She liked singing and comedy and Flanders and Swann but I’m not sure about play .”

I sounds his expres escape just slightly. Izzard still can’t really talk about his mother easily, at the least not in an interview. In his volume he describes how in the immediate consequence of her fatality he and his daddy and two brothers screamed together for half an hour and then stopped in case they went on for ever. In situate of rehabilitation dad bought his sons a simulation railway set and they improve it in the spare area and immersed themselves in it. The create recently resurfaced when Izzard had it reinstated and donated it to a museum in their home town of Bexhill-on-Sea, another part of his excavation of that time.

” Dad spurred us with it after Mum died ,” he says, by way of rationale.” He made a counter for the americans and we expended hours and hours building it. Then in 1975 my stepmother, Kate, came along and it was put away into chests and never came out again. It proceeded from Dad’s attic to my brother’s attic, and he didn’t know what to do with it. I imagined, why not give it to the museum in Bexhill? I guessed there might be plenty of representation railway lovers in Bexhill, and they rebuilt this thing, it’s kind of a collector’s item. They are now going to build another one, a Christmas version. We had a grand opening and Dad came down to see it .”

He likes the facts of the case that he is in a position to stir these kinds of things happen. Is he happier now than ever?

” I ever wanted the various kinds of profile that they are able to leveraging to do the things you crave ,” he says.” There is no path into it. You have to work out how you get there- over the wall, or tunnel your method in. I ever considered doing the same thing was actually going backwards. And if you start saying’ Hi, I like chicken’ on some advert, you know you have probably contacted that degree .”

You hesitate a little to ask him what he is working on next, but I do anyway.

” I’ve written my first film ,” he says.” It is called Six Minutes to Midnight , set in the summer of 1939. I’m developing a show in French in Paris. This December I am going to be on a boat, just below Notre Dame, doing two indicates nightly. What else? I’m not a good reader but I always wanted to read all of Dickens, so I have found someone who will let me read them as audiobooks- I have done a third of Great Expectations and it took four periods. So: 12 eras. And then there is the premiere of Victoria& Abdul for which Dad is coming up from Bexhill to spend his 89 th birthday with Judi Dench …”

Out of all the things he has done, I question, of what is he proudest?

” Mostly I hope I have done things that help other people to do them ,” he says.” That was the thing with coming out as transgender, and “its been” the same thing doing the marathons, or memorizing its own language. I hope parties might conceive, well if that moronic can do it, why can’t I? I symbolize, I’m just some guy, right. Nothing special ?”

I’m not quite convinced.

Victoria& Abdul is released on Friday 15 September. Guess Me issued by Michael Joseph( PS20 ). To ordering a replica for PS17 go to guardianbookshop.com or announce 0330 333 6846. Free UK p& p over PS10, online tells only. Telephone tells min p& p of PS1. 99

Read more: www.theguardian.com

The post Eddie Izzard:’ Everything I do in life is trying to get my mother back’ appeared first on vitalmindandbody.com.

from WordPress http://ift.tt/2ywee5U via IFTTT

[rfschatten]

"Human Greatness does not lie in Wealth or Power, but in Character and Goodness"  ~~~ Anne Frank

Where is the Goodness in such an Immoral character like Donald Trump? Damn!! I really would

like to know, cause the Republican Party has always bragged about being the Party of Morals and "Family Values", as the Conservative Middle-Class' protectors of America's Working Family.

All the GOP Sins committed since the Great Communicator, and created by all their phony Values...rewarded them with a Man called Trump!...but remember, Karma is in the batter's box, just waiting to cause havoc upon an already tumultuous American Administration!!

Trump style Immorality has been part of the GOP, ever since I can remember...they just left it home most of the week, and a little civil discretion helped, too.

Today, Christian Evangelicals and Right-Wing organizations are heavily promoting Immorality, Hatred, and Bigotry as the new Morality...normalizing it to an even lower standard...and a dreadfully Spineless GOP has embraced the bait...hook, line, sinker!

Now, with the Immorality of a President who lives for just that one sound-byte moment of Indecency, the same man who sets the tone for who "We, the People" are around the World...the Republicans have decided, in the zeitgeist of Trumpism, that Indecency and Immorality work just fine! Ahhyup! Example? Their preparation to royally screw the status of America's Health and commence the Death March for the first 200,000 Americans!

Oddly enough, a major portion of those Americans now condemned to death by the GOP's Trumpcare, are Trump's fanatic  Minions...you know?...the not too bright, not too educated ones Trump loves so dearly? Will their tush be surprised with the kick they are about to receive!! The GOP and their beloved Trumpo, the Orange Orangutan, are throwing them...the whole lot!... way, way under the Bus!

Yes! Mr. Stupid! It's not about his great plans for all those you don't agree with, or despise...they're coming for you too, asshole!! You're gonna love their "Repeal and Replace"!...at least, as you lay dying ...you won't need to call it "Obamacare" anymore! Hurry!! You can now, be proud of your new "Trumpcare" Plan...as you take your final breaths!    

It's amazing, this era of Donald J Trump!...easily, the most incompetent and poorly administrated

Administration in US History!! The United States has become the embarrassment of this entire Planet. Trump has committed an act of public embarrassment every single day of his 166 days in office, since becoming President!...he's become an embarrassment not just to America...but, throughout the World!

This Fool, who dresses as a President, has been exposed by Foreign Leaders around the World, as the perfect "mark"...it's going to be hard for the United States to command its influence or any influence for that matter, particularly in today's climate on the Political World Stage, when everyone knows that our "Leader" is a 70 yr. old psychotic cry-baby, who puts on a temper tantrum when ordinary people or the Press criticize him, also, if he's not the center of attention...or if he can't get his way!

Baby Donny comes out whenever the 70 yrs old fool, has a meltdown! He has no imagination or understanding of High School US Government 101 or World History, and thinks of himself as if he's the "Greatest Negotiator on the Planet"!

Real Leaders know how to skirt around Foolish Idiots. In this game of World Political Poker currently being played, overseas; Don the Con is the "Mark"...and Vlad Putin holds the Trump Card! "sad"

One short meeting and you know this man's character, his flaws and his vindictive strengths...yes! Macron, Merkel, and Trudeau are now, the new true Leaders of the Free World!

Meanwhile, Donald Trump gallivants around, praising his wonderfully indecent relationships with known murderers Vladimir Putin, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and Rodrigo Duterte (who 'personally' commits all his own murders)...and his open admiration for Neil Farage and Marine Le Pen? His disgraceful attitude towards NATO? his crazy far out antics at the Paris Climate Accords and the G7 Summit Meetings? along with his visits to the Vatican, Saudi Arabia, and finally "arriving" in Israel from the "Middle East"!?!?

All the President's antics have made a lot of World Leaders, think twice and totally mistrust The United States. While Russia and Putin's computers continue to disrupt country after country, his Puppet continues on his mission.

The shameless acts and words that have cost our historical allies in France, Germany, and especially Great Britain, for the first time ever, mistrust the intentions of the United States of America!

Yes! We have reached that pinnacle of rotten, totally Incompetent Foreign Affairs Policies, and miserable Amateurish Diplomatic efforts, run by a very understaffed Amateur State Department with orders from an Amateur US Administration. What it means for our Country, and what it means for the rest of the world, is alarming! But, where's our National Dialogue? That's even more alarming!

Doesn't Donald Trump in his 70 yrs. on this earth, ever had any shame or any shred of moral decency?? We all know, he's got no backbone!!

NEVER! All the multiple shameful sins of his very overt private life! his ever-present public life, and now as President of an entire Nation!... a Nation in which he 'supposed' to be representing!...you know? those taxpayers that are paying his salary?!?!

My question still remains; Where are the Goodness and moral Character of this man called Trump?? Where is his Heart? 

ETHICS: How Ethical is his standards of practice? How Ethical is the failed Human Experiment named Donald Trump??

MORALS: The one thing that stands out most about Le Grande Orange, is his total spiritual lack of Empathy or Remorse, His embracement of Ayn Rand's philosophy on the Rejection of Altruism, and his sordid natural gift for his enormous Immoral Behavior, which he holds towards everyone in every sector of our Society, and around the World.

DIGNITY: Dignity? Besides constantly degrading the Dignity of his Office?...The Man is a Pig! His Dignity starts when he falls asleep after Tweeting the World to death, and it stops functioning a few hours later when he wakes up! It only takes one time to see 30 seconds of his facial expressions, to know why Donald Trump is the most undignified US President in this Nation's History.

CREDIBILITY: As a world renowned mega-compulsive Liar, who lies openly in public, and is Guinness Book's "Lies" Record Holder ...where is 'his' Credibility?

SELF CONTROL: The Man has absolutely no Self-Control in Life! Twitter exposed 'that'!...and it's his most dangerous Achilles Heel!

KNOWLEDGE: Remember, Donald Trump, graduated from High School cause Dad bought his Diploma! And Donald Trump graduated from College cause Dad bought his Degree! This Little Man has been exposed in America...and now, throughout the World...as a dumb Rich Kid with street smarts, who could only succeed in life by using confidence schemes, deceiving all his clients, ripping them off, and never paying his Bills!

Knowledge? He's been outed as a Fake by his own big fat mouth! By his constant use of extraordinarily horrible stupid remarks, he easily convinced the World of his one and only Truth...a permanent Dunce Cap throughout his school days could be the cause of his baldness that morphed into his terribly spectacular comb-over.

How knowledgeable is our Commander-in-Chief? Just remember he's a genius within his own imagination!...he really did say the remarkably dumb and embarrassing lame statement, that he arrived in Israel 'from' the Middle East!! And America is supposed to be impressed with this Clown??

CLASS: Donald Trump also proves that being from Upper Class doesn't necessarily mean you have any "Class". In his case, no class at all! All his rudeness and unapologetic actions and that of his family just prove to America...and the rest of the Planet...what so many already knew; the Family Trump, any way you cut it...has absolutely no Class!

So! Inquisitive people would still like to know; Where's is the Goodness of Master Donald?!?!

Start with a Man who privately has a serious personal hang-up with the opposite sex. An avowed Philanderer, A misogynist who enjoys groping women, and a man who loves to publicly degrade women. His love to hurt people is to elevate his sense of self-worth.

A Rapist who got away with the Law and believes that there's no such thing as "Marital Rape"! But Ivanna knows better! Where is the Goodness and Moral Character of Donald Trump?

A crazy Maniacal Egocentric with a such a bad case of Narcissism, that he needs tanning spray 24/7! It's his need from Baby Donny, the cry for attention and compliments!

Showing his toughness against CNN in an edited version of an old WWE tape, he got paid to perform years ago.

All his self-accolades about the "Brilliant Businessman", then goes out and uses a Fake Time Cover, that hangs in all his properties around the World!...

And his call for a Cabinet meeting, taking these people out of whatever work or meetings they had...just for them, to each stand up and make a short speech in front of all the cameras and the Press, on his tremendous personal Intelligence, his Superb Character, and Greatness of his Leadership and Job performance as President.

Pretty much a Meeting arranged by the President as a forced congratulatory ass-kissing, ego-lifting event! There's no honor in complimenting yourself, Mein Führer! Donald Trump's Human Greatness? Not in this lifetime!!

An incompetent uneducated President, a man with no Ethics, no Morals or Scruples, no Respect, no Dignity, absolutely no Credibility or Self-Control, and especially a man with no human understanding of the basics of education!

What's so good about Donald Trump?...he'll never know what true Greatness really is, or how it really feels. Pity!

A Man like this??...does it take a Donald Trump to wake up a Nation from this Batshit Kool-Aid addiction that produced a Donald Trump in the first place??

No one, not even Ivana, Marla, or Melania could ever tell you about his Goodness, cause in all honesty...there's just nothing Good about this Man!

And to anyone, if you still forever believe in the Greatness of The Donald, my question still forever remains; Where's all that Goodness of his?!?! And where in the hell is his Good Moral Character and that Good Heart?!?!