#which would actually be really smart considering that there's probably some nostalgia for those series now | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

reversemoon255 · 4 years

Photo

Digimon Adventure: Last Evolution - Kizuna

I’ve been a fan of Digimon since I first watched it as a kid, but I’m also one of those weird fans where I’m more excited to see the series give us something new rather than treading old ground (I’m not very nostalgic in general), so I wasn’t actually that excited for Kizuna, especially after the terrible experience it was to sit through Tri. Still, the movie surprised me, and grabbed me a lot more than I though it would. I didn’t cry at the ending, but I did well up a bit. Still, this movie isn’t without its problems.

Rather than going over the goods and bads like I normally do, I’m actually going to go through this one chronologically, as I feel it’s the best way to tackle this film’s strengths and flaws. Sit back for a long one, folks.

Chapter 1 (Parrotmon and the First Adventure): We start out with the same intro music we got in the original Digimon Adventure movie. This first section is full of a lot of very purposeful callbacks, like Greymon VS Parrotmon and the recreated evolution sequences. This is the part of the movie where I think this works the best, grabbing people’s nostalgia right at the beginning, getting them to remember the good times with the Digimon before the drama starts. My only, very minor, nitpicky issue is that the Agumon to Greymon sequence is a bit choppier than the original, but it’s also not meant to play 30+ times over the course of two years, so it’s easily forgiven. Also, I’m gonna put PIN 1 in the aurora, because we’ll be coming back to that later.

The animation here is also fantastic (the few moments of off CG aside). It’s been a while since I’ve seen fight scenes this good, and this is probably the best they’ve ever been in Digimon. I also enjoy that Taichi and Yamato are immediately on good terms. So much of Tri was them arguing with each other, so seeing them as friends is nice.

Chapter 2 (The New Normal): Something I didn’t notice the first time, but did on a repeat watch was Sora’s Digivice with its timer ticking down in the opening credits. I’m not a fan of how little Sora was in this movie, especially considering her reinterpretation in the reboot hasn’t been that strong, but I do think the route they went with her was fitting for her character.

Seeing Taichi and Yamato in a rut while everyone else is pursuing their dreams is well done. I definitely feel like I’ve been there before in one form or another, and it’s easy to empathize with. Also, seeing the two of them drinking is so surreal. And them talking about how they have a hard time fitting their Digimon into their lives, only to almost immediately have the idea of losing on them thrust upon them hits very hard on the first watch.

Menoa’s voice... As a native English speaker, hearing people who are supposed to be American in anime only to spout obviously line-read Katakana is always a little vexing to me. I definitely weigh it a bit based on the budget of the show I’m watching, but this is a very big budget movie and they could have gotten a better trainer at the very least to go over the lines with her. Her character is well done, though. I thought she was certainly suspicious my first watch, but on a rewatch I caught more hints, such as her reaction after Izumi mentioned his database.

Chapter 3 (It’s in the Internet): This is where I started falling off a bit. Let me know if this sounds familiar, “Taichi, Izumi, Yamato, and Takeru must battle a Digimon inside the internet. Just as they seem to have the upper hand, it evolves and the children must rely on Omegamon to defeat it.” This particular part of the movie is recycled from Children’s War Game. Even Eosmon darting around the arena with a timer going, being difficult to hit and having to be forced to slow down is reminiscent of how Diablomon was defeated. This really took me out of the film, and it kind of gets worse, but we’ll get there.

Maybe this is me, but I can’t help but feel the whales during Omegamon’s evolution are a callback to Summer Wars >_> I do like the new version of his sword with the flared guard.

Chapter 4 (Some Old Yet Newer Friends): I don’t agree with Menoa’s explanation for why Digimon disappear, but my evidence as to why hasn’t appeared yet, so we’ll put PIN 2 in that. Menoa’s assistant on the other hand was a decent red herring. I wasn’t sure which of them it actually was until the full reveal.

I can’t properly express how excited I was to see Miyoko and Hawkmon after Tri. The 02 crew got so shafted that seeing them here and how involved they were in the plot had me legit excited. There’s actually a ton of 02 love in this movie in the background that I was very appreciative of. That brings me to another point, though, that this movie feels very responsive to Tri. The heavy inclusion of the 02 cast over many of the other original Adventure members, the number of cameos from the final episodes of 02, and a very certain plot point that we’ll stick PIN 3 in for now all point to this. Heck, it was even revealed to be in production near the end of Tri, which was supposed to be the series finalé, except people didn’t like Tri so they apparently didn’t want the series to go out on a sour note (though not a bitter-sweet one).

Chapter 5 (People Change): Can we talk about how Agumon finds Taichi’s stash? It’s a little too real, man. But this scene also brings up the point that the Digimon haven’t really changed since 1999, yet the children have significantly. The Digimon change their appearance and the humans change on the inside. It’s also a little weird how the Digimon aren’t that beat up about saying goodbye. I mean, they don’t want to, but they aren’t crying their eyes out. But we’ll talk about that more when we actually pull out PIN 2.

Also, seeing Sora at the end of this chapter, knowing what’s happening to her is really sad on the second watch.

As a little bonus, I was questioning the Digivice Smart Phones until Taichi turned his off and Izumi’s name popped up. Good show-don’t-tell. That scene also has some great lighting...

Chapter 6 (Better than Himekawa Maki): You definitely feel bad for Menoa. Her story is very (and probably purposefully) similar to that of Himekawa Maki’s from Tri, but in this case we feel more for her because she went through what our leads are going through right now. Her plan makes sense to her because of her tauma. And as we’re talking about the similarities to Tri, I’m going to pull PIN 3 and mention that Taichi and Yamato are going through the same thing that Meiko did. It’s strange that they’re recycling the Tri plot for this, but it works so much better here because our connections to these characters, that we’ve known for years, are so much stronger than those of the new ones introduced in Tri. And it’s 1/10th of the run time, too. It’s almost like Tri was terrible or something O_O

Chapter 7 (Touching Down like a Revenging Hurricane): So now we’re on to a Digimon trapping Chosen Children and reverting them back to children all for the sake of one Chosen Child who has aged up. Man, that sounds familiar. It’s almost as if this plot point was taken from another movie or something...

Look, I wouldn’t harp on it so much if every Adventure + 02 Digimon movie didn’t have plot elements recycled for this film. The beginning was Adventure, the first battle with Eosmon was War Game, Tri is sprinkled throughout, we’re currently on Touchdown, and everything from here up to the final is Revenge of Diablomon. Don’t get me wrong, this was probably on purpose, and they are well integrated, but it pulls me out of the movie super hard. As I’m writing this, I’m on the scene with the 100 Eosmon reveal, just like all the Kuramon. They also do the thing all the Kuramon do where they combine together and defeat Omegamon (by removing his arms, weirdly), only to have two Digimon achieve a new evolution to defeat it.

That being said though, it is, again, handled very well. The damage you see done to Omegamon in these scenes is heartbreaking, and you can certainly feel the weight of the situation.

I also want to pull PIN 1 here, because they bring up the aurora again. There’s never actually an explanation for it, is there? It just shows up one day. It helped Menoa make Eosmon, it drove Parrotmon and apparently other Digimon crazy, but where it came from and why it’s here is never actually explained. I feel like this is bait in case they’re ever at the point where they need another big nostalgia push again and a plot for another movie. But I also don’t want to see that. After Reboot wraps (even though I like it) I’d like to see a new cast, Digimon, and story please.

I also don’t believe a word of anything Menoa says in these scenes, but she does a very good job of pushing Taichi and Yamato’s buttons. I also want to point out, it’s Greymon that isn’t phased by all this and goes on the attack when they’re doubting themselves.

Chapter 8 (An Unreliable Narrator): Time to pull PIN 2.

This is the reason why I don’t believe Menoa. This scene. Menoa kept going on about children losing their infinite possibilities and being unable to supply their Digimon with power, but the Digimon we see going through this situation don’t reflect that. Evolution is a two-way street. We help the Digimon evolve, but in turn they help us evolve, and it is when we reach the pinnacle of our evolution, when the job of the Digimon is done that they disappear. Menoa sped through her evolution because she wanted to become an adult, and when she finally achieved the dream she had set for herself is when Morphomon disappeared, but she’s so traumatized by her disappearance that her views on the situation are negative. This has to be a bad thing, there can’t be a positive reason why the Digimon would disappear. But Agumon and Gabumon are happy. Happy that they could see the great people that Taichi and Yamato turned out to be.

Gotta say, the CG fight with Omegamon and Eosmon (Perfect) isn’t as great as the previous ones. Definitely gets better when we get to Eosmon (Ultimate). This is also a scene where they very easily show the stakes by having Taichi and Yamato getting injured, which we don’t see a lot of, not to mention Omegamon getting sliced up as I said previously.

Also, how many kids got stuck with Numemon as a partner?

Chapter 9 (We’re All Together): I hate that whistle. Every time I hear it in Adventure I start crying. And seeing Sora without Piyomon in these scenes is also heart wrenching on a repeat. I enjoy the others getting involved in the Eosmon fight, but I would have liked it if all the Chosen Children who were captured helped out (though I understand the nightmare that would be aging up all those 02 designs). Overall, just some good, back-to-back emotional moments.

Agumon Bond of Courage and Gabumon Bond of Friendship are decent designs. They definitely feel more newer Digimon than anything that would have appeared in the first season, but that’s ok. It took me a while to get used to Agumon’s new face (it’s kinda weird how human they get; makes me feel like wanted this to be a Bio-Merge). Though brief, their appearance is also beautifully animated.

Seeing Menoa lose Morphomon is also pretty emotional. Actually, this whole ending sequence (y’know, the part of the movie that’s the most itself rather than rehashing old material) is very good, and it’s constant heart-tugs one after another.

Chapter 10 (Goodbye for Now): As I said, there’s a lot of tug-at-your-heartstrings moments throughout the film (especially the ending), but this is the biggest one. This is the one that almost got me. I’m choked up a bit even writing this. It doesn’t help that they end it with a non-movie, realistic cry. But as Gennai said, as long as you have infinite possibilities...

This movie does feel like it embraces the epilogue from 02, and in that epilogue everyone has their Digimon again. And when’s the moment in your life when your life becomes chaotic and hectic and full of infinite possibilities again? The unifying thing everyone in the epilogue has? Kids.

I know that sounds weird, but it makes sense. I can totally imagine Taichi sitting on the couch, and his wife walks in and tells him she’s pregnant, and there’s this stunned silence for a moment, then Agumon pops out from under the cushions and says “How did that happen!?” I’m sure there are other ways it could happen, but that’s the most comedic and “Toei pushing having kids to help with the Japanese population crisis” way I can think of doing it.

I’ll also give special mention to the credits, where they go out of their way to show the 02 Crew with their Digimon, but the main cast without. But, again, we know they get them back. And hopefully they don’t make that movie anytime soon, because I’m sick of Adventure. I’d like new things, please!

Overall, this is a good movie, but it is, to me, heavily hampered by the fact that it is too nostalgic. The animation and writing is fantastic, but that writing is built on the back of elements from the previous movies. If you haven’t watched all those movies multiple times like I have, you’ll probably enjoy it a lot more than I did (and I enjoyed it a lot, still), but be aware. Next time we talk Digi-Shop will probably be about Reboot.

Unless I manage to get my hands on the rest of the Xros Wars toys. (Where are you, MailBirdramon!)

#Digimon #Digimon Adventure #Digimon Adventure tri #Digimon Adventure Last Evolution Kizuna #Last Evolution Kizuna #Last Evolution #Kizuna #Review #Movie

25 notes · View notes

lightsandlostbells · 5 years

Note

so, overall, what did you think of season 3 of stranger things?

It took me a while to answer this question because I had to sort out how I felt about this season! I guess if I had to narrow it down to an overall opinion: enjoyable, but very messy. Had some of the series’ best moments but also, while I was watching, I had far more grumbles and gripes than the previous two seasons.

I’ve never really been hung up on whether this show is derivative or plays too into nostalgia or w/e. Plenty of media does that. And despite all the time I’ve spent dissecting micro-expressions and weighty silences in European teen dramas that are filmed for the cost of a candy bar … I am way into genre films and TV shows. I love monsters and superheroes and spectacle! I watched Stranger Things the weekend it premiered because I love ‘80s movies about kids on bikes having adventures, I eat that shit up. So I don’t expect this show to be a hardcore deconstruction and re-imagining of those tropes (though that sounds like a pretty great show), I’m fine with it being what it is: a solid, spooky sci-fi/horror throwback series. What matters most is whether the story and characters work. Personally, I would say whatever criticisms you can make of S1 and S2, they had heart, and unfortunately I think some of that heart was missing from S3. Much of that, IMO, comes from sidelining some of the familial relationships that were at the center of the narrative in S1 and S2, like the Byers family and Hopper & Eleven, and to some degree the important friendships like the party, although there were other friendships introduced in this season so that wasn’t as glaring. It’s not a surprise that one of the best-received parts about this season, Steve and Robin��s friendship, is also responsible for one of the most heartfelt scenes Stranger Things has ever done.

There was also a way larger emphasis on comedy in S3. Comedy is probably my favorite genre, and I did laugh at a lot of humorous moments in this season. But I also felt like there was more comedy for comedy’s sake, like long sequences created intentionally to make the audience laugh. Whereas in S1 and S2, I can’t remember any scenes like that? The comedy was more understated and came from character personalities and relationship moments rather than joke set pieces. That’s perhaps another reason why S3 felt like it had less heart.

My hope for season 4 - and I am assuming there is a season 4, because apparently this show did mega ratings for S3 - is that they don’t add more major new characters (except love interests for the gay characters, go ahead with those, lol) and instead focus on the existing cast, which is already a very strong ensemble, yet many of the characters have gotten pushed to the sides. I would love if they added to the episode count: a lot of Netflix series drag out their seasons, like they have enough story for 10 episodes but have to stretch it out to 13, but Stranger Things has the opposite problem. I feel like if they had 10 (or 11, ha) episodes they could have more time for breather moments and more space for character arcs. This season was really fast-paced in my opinion, and although that’s a positive in many respects, I missed a lot of the down time.

Also, I think every season has taken place over like a week maximum, not including the epilogues, and like … you can make the story last longer than a week! Not everything has to go to hell in like a day or two.

Some more specific opinions underneath, obviously lots of spoilers.

First of all, I gotta say, I feel like a weirdo, because so many of the reviews for this season are like A RETURN TO FORM AFTER A DISAPPOINTING SECOND SEASON and UP THERE WITH SEASON 1 NOT THAT CRAPPY SEASON 2 THAT NO ONE LIKED and uhhhh … I liked season 2 just fine? It’s probably my favorite. There are things I don’t like about it, but the stuff I love is stuff I really, really love. Hopper and Eleven’s relationship, for instance. Steve and Dustin teaming up and Steve Harrington becoming a guardian to four children. Those are not just great elements to the series, but directions that I think only a second season could have taken - Hopper and Eleven’s bond wouldn’t have had half the weight if they weren’t established as traumatized, broken people in S1. Steve Harrington becoming a babysitter would not be nearly so delightful if we had not known him as the popular douchebag stereotype from S1 - if he were just a cool dude hanging out with kids from the get-go, the impact wouldn’t be as great. After S1 used Will Byers as a MacGuffin in S1, S2 gave Will a much larger role and that little actor acted his ass off. His performance generated a lot of genuine suspense and chills. There was Sean Astin being lovable! Paul Reiser’s character being a surprisingly good guy! Yeah, there are big flaws in the season, and you can argue it’s too much of a repeat of S1, but to me it was a version of S1 that made the characters more specific and interesting. I’m just … genuinely baffled by how it’s supposed to be demonstrably worse than the others. Because of the Kali episode? I didn’t think that one was terrible, either. I think it broke up the momentum of the chaos at Hawkins Lab, and Kali’s friends were obnoxious, it’s certainly not the greatest writing of the series, but as a whole the episode is like. Fine. It’s fine. It’s mediocre, not atrocious. It’s not the worst thing ever. It doesn’t ruin anything about the story or direction or the series. Most importantly it’s easy to ignore or skip on a rewatch if you don’t like it. The backlash was way overblown.

My biggest disappointment with season 3 was Hopper. Whaaaaaaat. Whaaaat did they dooooo.

Hopper in previous seasons is a flawed, messed-up human being, but I always knew where he was coming from. When he yelled at Eleven in S2, I still got why he did it. In this season he felt cartoonish. The overprotective paternalistic dad trope is annoying BUT I might have been less bothered had they connected it more to Eleven’s lack of experience with the world, less RAWRRRR KEEP BOYS AWAY FROM MY GIRL. Or if Hopper had not demonstrated like, actual rage toward Mike and we just saw him fuming about it to himself or venting to Joyce, if he was trying to keep that shit under control. (I did laugh at him singing “You Don’t Mess Around With Jim” in the car, I gotta admit.)

But his attitude toward Joyce was what really bummed me out. I’m not into this show for shipping reasons, but I low-key enjoyed the possibility of Joyce and Hopper hooking up based on previous seasons. This season felt like they were writing a completely different dynamic for them, one that was much more aggressively obnoxious. I think their intentions were clear - they were going for a Sam-and-Diane relationship, something that was referenced early on in the Bob flashback - but the problem is that their relationship was not like that at all in S1 and S2. When I think of Joyce and Hopper from those seasons, I think about him supporting her after Bob died, or listening to her concerns about her son, or working together to find Will. They didn’t have this combative dynamic! Frankly watching giant-ass Hopper yell at tiny Joyce was viscerally unpleasant. (Side note but in the first trailer there was a shot of Hopper running at the Fun Fair with someone else who I assumed was Eleven, but no, turned out to be Joyce, Winona Ryder is just that tiny next to David Harbour.)

Also, considering this season ended with his death (and we all know he’s not really dead but OK) it’s such a waste that there were few Hopper&Eleven moments! Only the finale brought some quality content on that front. But otherwise their relationship was out of sight, out of mind for almost the whole season, which wasn’t a great choice, both to maximize the emotional impact of the ending, and to expand upon their situation post-S2. I mean, it’s been months since then, how has their relationship changed now? Hopper’s letter talked about the stuff he enjoyed doing with his daughter - why didn’t we see any of that on screen this season? It could’ve helped with the Mike angle, too, like show Hopper and Eleven watching TV together and laughing and having a good time, and then the phone rings and it’s Mike and suddenly Hopper’s watching TV alone as Eleven’s now focused on her boyfriend, we see his disappointment, etc.

Scoops Troop - Now they were a delight. They had such a ludicrous story but for the most part it worked due to the characters playing off each other and because the writing/acting/directing embraced the silliness.

Steve Harrington is easily one of the best characters on this show. I fucking love that guy. He’s consistently entertaining, he’s had possibly the best character growth out of anyone in the series, he’s evolved from a stock ‘80s asshole stereotype into someone who’s funny and sympathetic and likable. He’s this amazing blend of the ridiculous with the heroic. Steve and Dustin were great together, as they were last season, and I’m cackling that Steve acquired YET ANOTHER CHILD under his supervision without even trying. But the MVP of the season was the Steve & Robin friendship. Holy shit do I love that relationship. Holy SHIT.

Robin herself is a terrific new character, smart and funny and once you know she’s half-Uma, you can’t unsee it. I was loving her already and then the bathroom scene happened and I YELLED. I was so utterly overjoyed. If they had made Steve and Robin hook up, honestly … I would’ve been fine with it, like this show doesn’t need more heterosexual romance but at least they had a fun dynamic, but man, the friendship angle was so so superior. It’s a type of relationship that media is lacking, and the specific circumstances of this friendship made it genuinely moving to me. I keep wanting to write like a meta post devoted to just this relationship because I just have so many emotions about it! But they play well off each other as a comedic duo and as an odd couple friendship, and they’re really what each other needs, IMO. Steve needed this close friendship more than he needed a girlfriend; in this season he’s clearly adrift and we’ve seen the kind of shitty friends he had in like season one, is Dustin the best pal he had at this point? And I love Steve & Dustin but Steve needed a good friend his own age. Robin is a lesbian in small-town Indiana in the ‘80s, and she was clearly full of fear that Steve would hate her if he knew, and for him to accept her so easily, not even making a big deal about it? That’s kind of life-saving, really. I can’t wait to see more of them, if Netflix wants to make the half-hour Clerks-esque spinoff about them working in a video store and shooting the shit, I would be 100% down for that.

I have some mixed feelings about Erica because I think she could have benefited from getting the same humanization as the other kids (and I’m going to leave the discussion of racial tropes gently by the side at the moment but … yeah). The other child characters are played more like actual people with vulnerabilities, which has been part of the show’s appeal since the first season, and Erica was more like the sitcom kid who always has a snarky quip ready; however, she did make me laugh and I like that they tapped into her being a nerd, I wish they’d explore that in future seasons with the character. “I’m ten, you bald bastard” was one of my favorite lines of the season, I lost my goddamn mind.

Billy - Lmao, so Billy in S2 was the woooorst. This dude had ZERO redeeming qualities. His abusive dad creates a smidgen of sympathy, I guess, but Billy goes so far beyond normal teenage assholery that it didn’t make a dent in my opinion of him. You can redeem someone like Steve Harrington, first of all because Steve actually feels regret and works to correct his mistakes, but Steve also didn’t go to a point of no return in the first place. Billy did, for me. Physically and verbally abusing his younger sister? Attacking a black middle-schooler for the crime of being in the same room as his white sister? What a piece of shit.

With that in mind - I have no problem focusing on him as a villain this season, I really don’t. It justifies his inclusion in S2 other than as a human antagonist who’s ultimately not really connected to the main plot, as it retrospectively establishes him as an even greater threat in this season. I also think the actor did a good job with the material he was given. However, ultimately this dude’s arc was underwhelming. The thing is … I can tell they were trying to show Billy struggling with the Mind Flayer, but Billy is so lacking in any positive qualities that it’s kind of like, where does that struggle even come from? Yeah, even the worst people aren’t going to be wild about having a monster from another dimension hijack your body and use it to collect people for spare parts, but this is the same dude who was about to run over Mike, Lucas, and Dustin on their bikes last season for absolutely no reason. He beat Steve to point of unconsciousness and could’ve put him in the hospital. He assaulted Lucas. So I really need some evidence of Billy’s moral compass because it is not inherent and there’s in fact plenty of evidence that it doesn’t exist. I’m not very enthusiastic about redeeming a racist, abusive creep, but I also think if you’re going to go for him helping Eleven at the end … you have to show some current potential for goodness, not just “used to be a nice kid.”

A really glaring omission: the lack of any family/home scenes with him, Max, and their parents this season. We left off last season with Max telling him to leave her and her friends alone. How is their relationship since then? Is there still a lot of friction? Is there a tense peace? Has their relationship improved in any way? We really needed to see that follow-up. I get that Max crying over Billy this season makes sense in that he’s still her family and we can still have love for those who hurt us … but I also feel that we needed something between them to justify her pain, like even just the potential of their relationship being a fraction better, or the suggestion that Billy used to be OK to Max before he went full asshole. And I think we really needed to see Billy’s dad being currently abusive in this season - tbh, missed opportunity that the dad didn’t get flayed like, out of revenge (which would have been both satisfying and horrifying), missed opportunities for suspense when we think Billy might serve up Max and her mom to the Mind Flayer, etc.

Another missed opportunity: drawing parallels between Billy and Will. Both are possessed by the Mind Flayer. Both had shitty dads calling them homophobic slurs. Both could be read as gay (I’m not hungry to claim Billy as LGBT representation or invested in this interpretation but his scenes with Steve in S2 admittedly have that sweaty homoerotic dick-measuring vibe, if you want to take it there). Their names are both William, FFS. The difference is that Will is a sweet and gentle kid surrounded by loving family and friends who fought to save him, and Billy is a violent, cruel dude who probably doesn’t have any real friends, just shallow connections. You could show how the Mind Flayer could more easily possess and manipulate someone like Billy, but that wasn’t really explored.

Also, is anyone going to dwell on the fact that like … Max is living with an abusive man as her stepfather? He’s shown hurting Billy’s mom. Does that not concern anyone that he is very likely to attack either Max or her mom?

Oh, and thank God they didn’t take the Billy/Karen thing all the way. In retrospect, even weirder considering Billy’s mommy issues.

Joyce - I get that it’s a big leap downward in emotional investment to go from “must save my son” to “fucking magnets, how do they work” but I liked that she had her own investigation that wasn’t full of emotional turmoil. Winona forever.

Mike - Everyone is ragging on him but I think he was less terrible than people are making him out to be. He was bratty in a teenage way, but he wasn’t the worst kid ever. I didn’t take his now notorious line to Will (“It’s not my fault you don’t like girls”) as something intentionally cruel or homophobic, just something that came out wrong and that he instantly regretted, and he and Lucas did seem genuinely apologetic over the D&D game and went over to Will’s in the rain out of concern. And the reason he lied to Eleven was because SCARY ASS HOPPER threatened him??? Also, his concern over Eleven overexerting herself was not misplaced, lmao! It really took that long for anyone to go, “Hey, should we be worried about the amount of blood coming out of her nose? Should we be concerned about the effects on her brain?” Sure, Eleven has the final say in whether or not she uses her powers, but tbh… she didn’t have a normal upbringing and her view of her powers is probably skewed. Like, would Eleven have enough basic medical knowledge to be worried about brain damage or nosebleeds, or would that just be the norm to her? Is she making these decisions with a full grasp of the potential consequences? Anyway, I don’t have a more negative opinion of Mike after this season.

Eleven - I loved Eleven a lot in this season. I don’t know if it did a ton for her character arc, but it’s nice to see her slowly develop into more of a normal girl. And the season was rough for her in terms of getting her ass kicked, she goes through so much mental and physical pain! In the end she loses her dad and her powers!

Of course one of the bright spots was her and Max becoming friends! Not gonna lie, there was something a little … simplistic about some of that depiction of friendship for me - just that so much of it was SHOPPING and GIGGLING and BOY TALK, girls being GIRLS, when Max has been portrayed as a tomboy and Eleven is a telekinetic kid raised in a lab, that maybe their interactions shouldn’t have fit the mold quite so much - but it doesn’t truly bother me because they were so sweet and fun. I loved them tracking down Billy together and I appreciate that their friendship carried throughout the season, that Max was the person shown carrying an injured Eleven along with Mike, Eleven comforted Max after Billy died, etc. That was a definite sore spot of S2, the girl-on-girl jealousy and Eleven flat-out rejecting Max’s friendly introduction, and I do think they took that feedback into account for the better here. I also like that Eleven was clearly taking cues from Max, the more “worldly” of the two about boys and clothes and teenage attitudes in general - it gave their friendship a more specific shape.

I cannot WAIT to see her living with the Byers family next season. Like if they don’t spend significant time on that dynamic, it will be the biggest disappointment. There could be 8 episodes of just boring mundane Byers domestic scenes and I would love it, please inject it into my eyeballs, Duffer bros. I want to see her bonding with all of them, trying to fit in at school, attempting the most normal life she’s ever had. Also lmao, she and Will can finally have a goddamn conversation??? I hope they’ve been withholding that relationship because they were planning to go all out with those new sibling vibes in S4. They are the two characters who have been most traumatized by the Upside Down, we deserve to see them connect.

On that note, I have a lot of thoughts about Will in this season! Mainly - underused as FUCK. After all that trauma of being possessed by the Mind Flayer last season, they barely utilize this connection in the second half of S3. Even his Spidey sense hardly came in handy??? Now that was really weird, IMO, because the least they could do was have that feeling alert the others or be useful, but lmao it was practically pointless.

It’s weird because I’m not sure if they just don’t know what to do with Will if he’s not being a victim (which is stupid because there’s plenty you could do with him), but at the same time, he has one of the most poignant subplots of the season. From the reactions I’ve seen, Will feeling rejected and left out as his friends move on really resonated with a lot of viewers. But then this thread is abandoned after episode 3, for the most part. Will cries and destroys the place that represents his childhood, a place that was created specifically in response to trauma (mentioned in S2 that he and Jonathan built it after their dad left), this is very rich emotional territory … and then the show’s just like ehhhhhh moving on. He’s just hanging out in the background and touching his neck for the rest of the season.

And now I gotta talk about that other thing with Will.

I am so confused by what the Duffer brothers are trying to accomplish with Will’s sexuality, because on the one hand it seems like they have a really clear idea about it and on the other hand they’re just like¯\_(ツ)_/¯ The thing is … it seems very obvious they have always thought of Will as gay. This is blatant from the original pitch from the show as well as one of the S2 scripts (the only one that’s available publicly, so who knows what else they’ve written). I accept that people have different interpretations, but The Line this season is far from the only textual support for Will being gay, and I think it makes for a much, much stronger narrative if you read Will as gay in addition to not wanting to grow up as fast as his friends and being stunted from trauma - that is an entire meta post in itself, though.

What gets me about the ~ambiguity is that the Duffer brothers planted the gay hints in the first place! They are absolutely not there by accident! Like I’m not speaking for the teenage actors but lmao, the adults involved in the writing and directing of this series absolutely fucking knew how that “not my fault you don’t like girls” scene would be interpreted, especially considering fans were debating Will’s sexuality from the beginning, based off the many homophobic comments leveled at him in S1. There have been TV shows where fans latched onto gay “subtext” that was likely unintentional, but this isn’t one of them.

IDK, man, it’d just be nice to have some confidence in where this is going. I loved Robin and the bathroom scene made me think that yeah, they might do a decent job with Will’s sexuality, something I might have doubted before. Under no circumstances do I expect a Skam S3-style coming out arc for Will, but I’m also uncertain if I should expect anything from the show on this front at all or if they’ll play it coy to the bitter end. Though I guess I’d still take the ambiguity over giving him a female love interest after everything. Lol, that would be a giant oh-fuck-no.

Real talk, though, let’s discuss what an utter waste it would be to not write a scene where Joyce tenderly accepts her son when he comes out to her. You really aren’t going to bring that instantly iconic moment to life, assholes? You’re not going to provide that for Winona Ryder’s and Noah Schnapp’s Emmy reels? MAKE IT HAPPEN, BASTARDS.

Nancy and Jonathan have a reputation for the most boring plots but they’re fine, w/e. I’m not deeply invested in their romance but I don’t want to fast forward their scenes or anything. Nancy is an underrated character; she’s extremely proactive and always has been, and I enjoy watching her shoot things. I think the best thing they could do for both characters, though, is to separate them next season, not just physically but storyline-wise. Jonathan would be best in a subplot involving his family, because he’s at his most likable as a son and brother, and Nancy should either go off with Mike (a sibling relationship that is VASTLY undeveloped), or she should team up with Robin. I mean it, Nancy and Robin would be a power pairing, let me show you my manifesto. Both are smart young women who are good at solving mysteries. Would Robin think Nancy is a priss after Nancy unloads several rounds into the latest demogorgon chasing them? Would Nancy find Robin a refreshing alternative to the crushing suburban conformity that she claims to want to avoid? Oh, the possibilities. Meanwhile, Steve tags along in the background, all like OH SHIT, my lesbian BFF and my ex-girlfriend are in cahoots!

Lucas and Max were playing relationship counselors to Mike and Eleven through much of the season. Max still had a fair amount to do, but Lucas needs a meatier subplot next time. I feel like they’re not sure what to do with him? I would like to see him and Erica interact more since their dynamic so far is one-note.

There is one hell of a conversation to be had about the Evil Russians of this season, but I’m really not the person to do it.

Also about the depiction of capitalism this season. That’s more thinkpiece-y than I am equipped to do right now.

The product placement is something that should bother me more but I’m just like … shrug. Except that New Coke bit because that was an actual mood-breaker.

Could have done without Russian Terminator guy. That was a blatant ‘80s homage so I get why he was there, he just wasn’t all that interesting. And was that guy supposed to be superpowered or something? Was he getting jacked on Upside Down steroids??? What was his deal???

Alexei/Murray was the true OTP of the season, let’s be real.

The trend of lovable, doomed minor characters continued with Alexei. Props to that actor for making you root for the guy. He even made me kind of love Murray? I was very WTF over that guy encouraging two teenagers to fuck in S2, and I’m still not into his habit of telling people to bang even when they’re adults, but I guess he just needed a sympathetic Russian buddy to win me over.

There were a ton of moments where I felt like the characters made stupid choices as opposed to earlier seasons. Will getting dragged into the Upside Down in the first 10 minutes of the series is an impressive example of a horror movie character doing everything right and making good decisions - a 12-year-old, no less. And he was still overpowered by the demogorgon so it’s not like making good decisions will always save you! Whereas this season I was like LORD some of these characters are drinking dumbass juice.

There was also so much silly stuff happening, like things that are even more far-fetched than previous seasons, but I just kind of went with it. Yeah, of course there’s a secret Russian base under a shopping mall. Sure.

This season is objectively disgusting in terms of gore and yet I was fine with it? And I’m someone who was repulsed by Barb’s corpse in S1. The Mind Flayer being made of people was some nasty shit but effective horror. I felt bad for the poor little rats :( Oh, and the flayed humans, too. Some of them. Was sad to see Mrs. Driscoll bite it but FUCK those cartoon misogynists from the newspaper.

Visually beautiful! Starcourt Mall is an amazing set and I’m rather sad that the mall was destroyed, although that was basically a foregone conclusion. Some great cinematography, too. On a purely aesthetic level I had a great time just blasting this season into my retinas.

I have had the motherfucking NeverEnding Story theme song in my head for almost two weeks and I’m suffering.

#lillypedalsxx #replies #stranger things #also they referenced my university this season so i dug that thx 4 the shoutout

27 notes · View notes

i-do-unimportant-things · 4 years

Text

*clap clap* Movie review

So yeah, Charlie’s Angels, the 2019 reboot of the TV show. A feminist movie but really just a clichè action movie with a mediocre plotline, relying on it’s ‘woke points’ to be watchable.

First, let’s talk about the movie itself and why it did so badly.

The 2019 Charlie’s angels is an action comedy movie about three female super spies trying to retrieve a weapon of mass destruction from the wrong hands directed by Elizabeth banks, the guardian calls this a ‘weaponised feminist frenzy’. This movie hit the theatres at the start of the year and went on to fail so badly, the financial loss can only be explained by claiming there’s a wage gap. Charlie’s angels is originally a TV show from the mid 70s, but nowadays, no one would consider the show ‘feminist’. The entire plot of the TV show existed around the three main female characters being hot, and near naked. Nevertheless this sleazy show was successful and had a few movies coming out in the years 2000 and 2003. And on November 15 2019, the latest Charlie’s angels came out from Sony studios. Sony, the same company that has brought you: Ghostbusters 2016 and the Emoji movie. Now don’t get me wrong lots of movie companies use nostalgia to try and sell tickets, but no one does it quite as poorly as Sony. The movie tries too hard to be some sort of woke feminist statement, but it ends up just being really forced. One of the main actresses, Kristen Stewart has commented that this movie is ‘taking down the patriarchy’ Ah yes, this feminist reboot of a non-feminist show, is taking on the patriarchy head on! C’mon, no one will believe that this mediocre action film is making is making any kind of significant social impact. It would have made a much bigger impact if the movie was not only made by women, but also, enjoyable to watch. The movie was, unsurprisingly, a massive flop shattering Elizabeth Banks dream of turning it into a franchise. It had a budget of $50 million and ended up making $8 million in it’s opening weekend. No one cared to see it, and for those who did, they hated it. Like, seriously despised it, 4/10 on IMDB? Even shark tale is rated better than that. But Elizabeth Banks wasn’t ready to admit that maybe, just maybe, her movie wasn’t that good. No, instead she was bracing herself for a box-office flop, by blaming men. Prior to the movie’s disastrous opening weekend, she had said that if the movie didn’t do well, it would reinforce a stereotype in Hollywood that men don’t go to see women do action movies. Here’s a little thinker for ya, if people don’t go and see your movie, it may not be because all men are sexist pigs, but people would rather watch a good movie. Regardless of whether or not there’s a female character in it. Not to mention other medias with female leads have gone on to be extremely successful. Alien? Kill Bill? Tomb Raider? Both Frozen’s? Metroid series? Mulan? Wonder women? Bank’s counters this by saying that the female comic superhero movies are only successful because they are tied into a larger, male genre of movies. Wait so, the successful movies starring women are successful because men are sexist, but your movie isn’t successful because men are sexist? What are you babbling about? Look, I understand it sucks to see a movie you directed, produced and acted in fail, but this weak finger pointing is not going to help.

Now let’s analyse the movie and see why people hated it so much.

Above all, Charlie’s angels is a comedy spy action movie that doesn’t work as a comedy, spy or an action movie. The plot is basically this high-stakes mission about retrieving weapons of mass destruction. But the problem is that the movie never bothers to actually visually establish as dangerous or as anything really. All we see is one of those devices killing one guy right beside it and then being automatically self-destructed. Then there’s the “action”. It’s mostly just noise without any meaningful character moments or choices or obstacles or any real sense of danger. Most of the time the action sequences don’t even serve any purpose plot-wise. On top of it the physics of it are so illogical they just make no sense. Like just watch the car falling out scene. But all that aside what I wanna focus on is the aspect of Charlie’s angels that is probably the main cause of it’s downfall more that anything else; it’s relentless obsession with gender. There’s a difference between a good female-led movie and a movie so blindly obsessed with the feminist agenda that it gets to the point of being destructive to itself. A lot of times with a certain agenda of gender or social class or whatever they tend to feature a core theme that empowers the group or demographic that it’s about. And with Charlie’s angels the care theme is obviously female empowerment which is made very clear from even the first line in the movie “I think women can do anything”. Basically the core theme of Charlie’s angels is that women, by nature, can do anything. In itself, it’s a great message for younger female audiences. The problem is that the movie quickly grows so obsessed with this theme that instead of it being positively empowering, it actually becomes negatively degrading. Because when Charlie’s angels claims that women by nature can do anything, it doesn’t mean that women can do a certain specific set of things they set their minds to, it means that women, by nature, can do literally everything. And before you say that I’m saying it’s a problem because I hate women, hold on. There’s actually a major character issue that comes with this obsession; it makes every female character and main hero shallow and superficial and takes away their individual uniqueness that’s supposed to make them who they are. To show what I mean let’s look at our three main angels; one of them is this tall angel who initially is established as the physical brawler of the team, she’s powerful and likes to solve obstacles by running straight at it and punching them until their no longer obstacles. And that’s great that’s something that gives her character individuality and can delve much deeper into the movie. Thats who she is but then, she makes this smart science trap using chemicals, then all of a sudden this physical brawler turns out also to be a super-smart chemist, and to be clear; she doesn’t become that, she doesn’t learn to be that she already is that because again, women by nature, can do and be anything. So what exactly is the issue with this? Well at first she is this one specific thing, but then turns out to be an entirely other thing and suddenly, we don’t really know who she is anymore. To build on this example look at the Kristen Stewart’s angel, the way the movie tries to establish her is that she’s this confident improvisor of the team who uses her wits to gain an advantage over others. But the movie also presents her as just as competent of a physical brawler aa the tall angel, which not only makes her witty hustler personality kind of pointless, it also destroys her individuality it’s hard to know who Kristen Stewart is as a person when she can do and be the exact same as the person right next to her, and if we don’t know who she is it’s hard to get into or develop her as a character when we’re not even sure what it is we’re getting into or developing. The only character difference seems to be that Kristen Stewart says what ever haha ‘funny’ she has on her mind. Then we have princess Jasmin’s angel who is this super smart technology nerd thrust into this world she doesn’t belong in. And she could be a pretty Interesting character, if not for the fact that the movie has already presented the tall angel as super-smart as well, and the fact that Jasmin seems to be able to handle herself in a fight too. So, what makes her different? Who is she compared to the others? Who is she as an individual person? And pretty much with every female character the movie is so unhealthy obsessed with this agenda of female empowerment that it just ends up being a weakness. The characters don’t struggle, they don’t have any flaws or depth they don’t have anything that would make them individual people that the audience can care about and watch grow because in a world where everyone is special, no one is. When women by nature can do or be everything, the one thing they can’t do is be unique.

In addition to empowering the group their about, the other thing these movies with social agendas often do is villainise the demographic opposite them and show how they need to struggle to overcome obstacles set by this opposite demographic. And since Charlie’s angels is about women, obviously here the point is to showcase men and the evil they’re capable of. Which again, is made very clear, even from the very beginning. Basically, all male characters in Charlie’s angels are in some way douchebags who treat women in a derogatory sense. There’s a total of three good guy men in this movie. One of them dies, another one is cleansed of his whatever sins by a women beauty, and the last is like the perfect man from a dystopian world where women have enslaved men. So the message is that men can be a bit of an annoying obstacle to women. I personally don’t like this message, but it has potential to explore some really deep themes with it. But the problem again, is that this movie is so blindly obsessed with it’s agenda of having men be evil that it inadvertently destroys the very message it’s trying to explore. Firstly, just like the female side, all the males are diluted down to unrealistic caricatures nobody can take seriously. The security guard for example, his character is supposed to portray men abusing power against women, and it could have been a very powerful message, but the reason that moment doesn’t work whatsoever is because we’ve never even seen the security guard before, and so we have no perception of why he would do this. He’s not being evil because he’s jealous of Jasmin’s career, he’s not being evil because he’s hurt inside or anything, the movie is saying he’s being evil just because he’s a man. All men in this movie are being evil just because their men and that’s all there is to it.The movie doesn’t give us any reasons or explanations, no explored internal fears or flaws or motive or anything under the surface and that’s not how real life people function, that’s not how to get anything done with your message other than it being scoffed off as shallow and dumb. Secondly, this men are evil obsession creates a big narrative problem. In the sense that the plot of the movie quickly becomes very one-dimensional and easy to predict. For example, near the midpoint of the movie there’s a twist that Elizabeth Banks, who is the leader of the angels, might be evil, she might have some evil plan that involves tracking Patrick Stewart’s good guy character. But then you remember that this movie has just spent it’s entire runtime proposing that all men are evil just because their men which would then mean that OH WOW WHAT A SURPRISE THE MAN IN A FEMINIST MOVIE IS EVIL. The problem is that it’s really not that much of a surprise to anyone because from the start the film has done everything in it’s power to condition the audience to believe that women are all good and that men are all evil. Having a message criticising men or a whole demographic can be great and powerful. But you can’t let yourself be so blindly obsessed with it that you don’t even bother delving deeper into it.You can’t have women be good just because women are good and men be bad just because men are bad. That’s not realistic, that’s not how the world works, that’s not a message that will get anyone to listen and above all, it’s not good writing.

Another danger that can very easily come true in movies with social agendas is that the message they’re pushing becomes very one-sided. To the point of alienating a certain section of the audience. And with Charlie’s angels, wether the filmmakers intended it or not, the fact is that the movie altogether as a whole is very anti-male. I’ve already commented about all male characters being portrayed as shallow evildoers, but there’s also an underlying theme that men as people are objectively sinful creatures who deserve bad things to happen to them. It docent matter who they are or what they have or haven’t done, if something bad happens to them, it’s okay because they deserve it. For example, there’s a long-running ‘joke’ where the angels continuously injure a bunch of guys and then make quips about wether or not they’re gonna wake up. But there’s nothing inherently wrong with this, when your making a movie, you are allowed to portray any group of people or entities in whatever positive or negative way you want. So if you want to make a blatantly obvious movie where a specific gender as a whole is portrayed as the worst possible thing in the universe, that’s fine. But you also need to understand is that there’s also gonna be financial consequences from that specific audience. See, before Charlie’s angels hit theatres, it was clear it was gonna be a flop. And knowing this, director Elizabeth Banks had said what I had put above: “if the movie didn’t do well, it would reinforce a stereotype in Hollywood that men don’t go to see women do action movies” and wether or not the statement has truth(which it doesn’t) is irrelevant. The importance of the statement is the implications that Elizabeth Banks doesn’t understand the concept of biting the hand that feeds. Now I don’t really like the anti-male stuff in Charlie’s angels, but as I’ve said, you’re allowed to do whatever you want in your show. So I understand why male audiences didn’t go out of their way to pay money to see their own gender be continuously criticised and called evil. For example if you make a whole movie ridiculing females and calling them the scum of the earth in a very on-the-nose way, you can’t just expect females to swarm in and support it. Thats not how it works. Whatever message your movie has, you have to be smart about how you deliver it. Don’t just say ‘Women good, men bad’ find a way to imply what it is you wanna say through metaphors. As a filmmaker, you would want everyone to enjoy the film, regardless of gender or race or whatever. I’m not criticising Charlie’s angels because I hate female-led movies. I’m being critical of Charlie’s angels because superficial agenda movies like Charlie’s angels are the reason why we still have so relatively few female led movies. And I’d like to think that by now we’re past one-dimensional messages like this.

1 note · View note

smokeybrandreviews · 5 years

Text

Cheeseburgers

The Infinity Saga is over. The MCU is moving forward into uncharted waters. Disney+ has pushed back certain shows and moved up WandaVision. Black Widow finally has a well deserved movie, postmortem. The future is wide open but, before we get on a brand new pain train, i wanted to take a look back and talk about some of my favorite movies from the first eleven years of the MCU.

Avengers: Infinity War

This movie, man, is probably peak MCU. There are better films in the series but you’ll be hard-pressed to find a film that walks the line of comic book and cinema to deftly. This is the penultimate tale for that first decade and what a f*cking climax it was. Holy sh*t! There was just so much good in this film, from character development to visual flair to legitimate stakes. I’m a massive Marvel fan and i am well aware of the Infinite Gauntlet saga in the comics but seeing this sh*t? Seeing Thanos actually Snap? I never though in a million years that would happen onscreen. And then it did. It was at that point i absolutely knew the MCU was about that life. I knew to expect the unexpected because , with the wealth of the Marvel universe to draw from, they were going to craft some motherf*ckers of stories.

Like, I f*cking cried when Pete got dusted. I shed legitimate tears and I’m not even embarrassed to say it out loud. For a film to move me like that? and it’s not Forrest Gump? Motherf*cker had to be on point, for sure. The entire theater was silent as those strings hummed and Thanos sat on his farm, smiling contently. I had never experienced that before The entire auditorium - completely silent. We were in disbelief. We were in mourning. I saw Infinity War in theaters four times and literally every time, the same thing happened. In two hours and some change, Marvel had gave a theater full of people straight emotional trauma. Your movie has to be absolutely on point for that to occur.

Speaking of Thanos, yo, how was this big ass purple grimace looking motherf*cker one of the best antagonists of film, period? How was this cat written so well? I lost my sh*t when they teased him at the end of Avengers and that little bit we got of him in Guardians was cool but i was not prepared for how goddamn formidable he turned out to be. Josh Brolin brought this character to life but the writing gave me real agency. I was flabbergasted by how great this character turned out to be. Thanos felt real. He felt flawed. He felt legitimate. Id have to put him up there with The Dark Knight Joker and Hans Landa as one of the best antagonists ever.

Spider-Man: Homecoming

I adore Spider-Man. Ive written at length about that love. He’s the reason i even picked up that Marvel comic all those years ago. I’ve seen every cinematic iteration of Webhead and i mst say, this portrayal is the truest to the source material i have ever seen. Cats get on the MCU about making him Tony Stark jr. but most people don’t understand that’s where he was going anyway. Most people don’t know that, in the comics, he’s basically Reed Richards jr. and since the MCU has no Reed, Tony is a pretty smart substitute. But that argument is inconsequential because the core of who Spider-Man is, the actual spirit of the character, has been captured so perfectly by this version of Pete, it’s borderline miraculous. I love Tobey McGuire’s take in Pete because he was the first to do it. Kind of like how i have such nostalgia for the 89 Batman. That version of Spider-Man felt like the old Lee/Ditko version from the 60s. Andrew Garfield was adequate. He didn’t get a fair shake though, mostly barbecue the writing in his run was so goddamn terrible. But this new kid? This casting was as perfect as RDJ was to Iron Man.

Tom Holland kills it as Spider-Man. His version of the character feels right. It feels modern. It feels like Ultimate Pete but grounded in the spirit of the 90s cartoon version. He’s this massive geek, this kid really, granted power in tragedy and it feels so goddamn authentic, i couldn’t believe it. The second he showed u in Civil War, i absolutely knew Underoos was about to be a star in these films and that is saying a lot considering how loaded this cast has become. Homecoming was the first film we got to see Pete stretch his legs and it was f*cking brilliant. Everything about this movie is what a great Spider-Flick should be and the MCU nailed it! if i never got another Spidey appearance, this movie was more than enough to sate my appetite. Homecoming is my second favorite MCU movie. I loved every second of it!

Also, how about that Aunt May stinger, though?

Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Look, i love the Dark Knight. For me, that is the pinnacle of a capeflick. That movie was a great crime thriller first, a Batflick second. Nolan approached it with a grounded sense of reality that left you, as an audience, breathless. It is one of the best films i have ever seen in my entire life and Ledger gave one of the most brilliant performances ever captured on celluloid. There is nothing as good as that film in the MCU. The Winter Soldier comes f*cking close, though. This movie made me sit up and realize that the MCU had some teeth. Until this thing came out, i thought we were going to get a bunch of flamboyant costumes and snarky Wedonisms. I wasn’t mad, mind you, Avengers was dope, but Winter Soldier took all that campy bullsh*t out back and murdered it. This movie was the MCU growing up and almost everything afterward has been brilliant. The Winter Soldier forced everyone to step their game up with how goddamn brilliant it turned out to be. I can’t say there were any performances as great as Ledger’s Joker but i can make the argument the overall writing was better than The Dark Knight, and that is stupid high praise.

Guardians of the Galaxy

This film has no right to be as good as it is. I went into this thing on a whim, mostly because I thought it was going ti be filler like Ant-Man or something, and then it wasn’t. It was great. Legitimately great. I had no idea the MCU could take a C-rate team like the goddamn Guardians and uplift them so beautifully. James Gunn took those characters and wrote the best Star Wars film since f*cking Empire and I didn’t think that was possible, not with this wayward branch of Marvel History. Seriously, if you do even a minuscule amount of research on who the Guardians are, they’re a joke. I mean, they have a f*cking talking Raccoon on the team! Gunn had the wherewithal to lean into that and he produced one of the best in the entire MCU. He took these loser clowns and injected so much emotion and humanity into them, you couldn’t help but love their rag-tag asses. This was the first MCU movie to move me to tears. That stuff about Quills mom? I felt that. Both times. On an extremely personal level. I was the young Quill. I watched my grandma, the only person who i believe loved me unconditionally up to that point, die just like Quill’s mom; Cancer and everything. I was about his age when it happened, too. That sh*t f*cked me up. To this day, i have nightmares about it. Seeing that sh*t so accurately captured in a capeflick was the most for me and I legit had to leave the theater until the first part of the movie passed. To this day, i can’t watch that scene. I can just barely make it through the Dance of to Save Th Universe, but that opening gambit? No way. It hits way too close to home for me. Still, for a comic book movie to solicit such a response? It has to be special and Guardians is one of the best.

Iron Man

Boy, we’ve come a long way since Tony Stark uttered those fateful word, “I am Iron Man.” But none of these other films would even have the opportunity to exist if he hadn't said them. Iron Man had the tall order of being the first, proper, MCU film AND compete with The Dark Knight. N one thought a film about B-List superhero, narcissistic billionaire, and straight up lush, Tony Stark, would amount to anything. How wrong everyone turned out to be. I knew, from that second i saw the teaser and concept art by Adi Granov, that Marvel was taking this sh*t crazy serious. Then there’s the casting of Robert Downey Jr. That sh*t was a boon, for real. The entire cast of this first film was impeccable but RDJ makes this movie. He IS Tony Stark. Even before he got comfortable with the character like in the later films, fresh out the box with the scripts, you can tell he knows how to bring this tinkerer to life. You had to nail that aspect in order to have any chance to build something great and Marvel hit a goddamn bullseyes, for sure. Revisiting this flick, Iron Man isn’t as good as the later films in the Infinity Saga but it still holds up against the vast majority of entries and that’s saying something.

I love these films, man. As a geek growing up reading these stories, reenacting them with their action figures, sitting glued to the television every Saturday as their cartoons aired, I never imagined id see such a berth of fantastic media brought to life on the silver screen. Seriously, some of my favorite interpretations of these characters appear exclusive in the MCU. War Machine, Thor until recently, Ant-Man, f*cking Hulk? i never gave these assholes the time of day in the comics but in the MCU? They’re fantastic! And it has everything to do with how well written they are in-universe. There are over twenty films in this run an i love all of them to varying extents. Spider-Man: Far From Home, Black Panther, Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Endgame, Thor: Ragnarok, and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 all could have made this list. For sure, they’re 6 - 11 or whatever, but that speaks to the sheer depth of the MCU. I’m not even counting flicks i would consider B-tier like Captain Marvel or Avengers or Iron Man 3 or Doctor Strange; All of which are still dope in their own right.

There is just SO much great in these films and i can’t wait to see where we go next. With Disney acquiring Fox, Marvel finally has the full toy box to play with and i am absolutely a tizzy with the potential arcs they can adapt. Secret Wars? Annihilation? Age of Apocalypse? Avengers Disassembled? Dark Reign? F*cking Onslaught?? I have no idea where we are going but i am, for sure, jumping on this pain train once again.

#Marvel #MCU #Infinity Saga

2 notes · View notes

smokeybrand · 5 years

Text

Cheeseburgers

Avengers: Infinity War

Spider-Man: Homecoming

Also, how about that Aunt May stinger, though?

Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Guardians of the Galaxy

Iron Man

2 notes · View notes

playeroneplayertwo · 5 years

Text

The Ten: 5.19

It seems a good icebreaker, or as good an icebreaker as any, to lay bare my top 10 of all time. Clear the air, so to speak. Get to know each other. It’s fair to say that this may be a make or break moment for us. Hopefully, I won’t lose you. Let’s see.

This is a list I imagine I’ll update periodically (which is why it’s dated), as my wife Kathleen (Player Two) and I play a lot of games, and a lot of new games. I’m a notoriously curious and searching type, and I love trying new games, sometimes to my wife’s chagrin. More often than not, my spare change goes to new games for the house. New games that make a splash tend to spike pretty high and then slowly fade. It’s not a great trait to have, especially in someone who tries to speak or write critically about quality (ie write reviews). But being that I’m aware of this, I hope that tempers it at least somewhat.

Anyway, where’s the list, you say? Here we go:

1. Brass: Birmingham (2018)

Oh boy, it’s a new one. Cult of the new? To be fair, Kathleen and I have played this game fairly regularly for the last eight months. By our third play or so, I knew it had locked itself into my top spot. I’d done a fair bit of research on the OG Brass (now Brass: Lancashire) prior to purchasing Brass: Birmingham, and by the time I eventually took the dive and purchased Birmingham, I was as excited to try it as I was unsure we’d actually enjoy it. At the time, it was the heaviest game we’d played, and it also relies heavily on route building–it’s in fact one of the most important parts of the game. I mention this because tactical spacial elements are not Kathleen’s forte. In fact, it’s one of her least favorite mechanics.

This is a good time to tell you that Kathleen and I think (and play games) very differently. Kathleen is a strategic player, relying on long term planning and execution to maximize scoring/performance. I, on the other hand, do not make long term plans. I find it not only remarkably difficult, but also unenjoyable. I’m a short term/tactical player. On my turn, I’m more likely to look over the board, get a lay of the land, and make the best, most advantageous play available to me at that moment.

Brass: Birmingham remarkably manages to cater to both of our play styles, which is one reason it ranks so high. Birmingham presents a myriad options for players to pursue. You’ve got a whole pile of different factory tiles you can build, a whole mess of locations or regions to move into, and about as many different strategies to pursue on your way to the end game. I don’t think I’ve ever played the same game of Brass: Birmingham twice, nor have I ever pursued the same options. The card play means, for me, that I will go where the cards lead, and I find using these cards as a guide to build my engine incredibly satisfying.

2. Covert (2016)

Dice placement. For some reason, this mechanic sounds incredibly unappealing to me, and I think it’s because it’s literally a portmanteau mechanic consisting of the worker placement mechanic using dice, two individual mechanisms that I seem to enjoy less and less. Dice I tend to avoid for their randomness (yes, I know that’s the point), and Worker Placement, in it’s most stereotypical application, I find frustrating. Why can’t I just put my worker wherever I want and just run my engine? Being stymied in a worker placement game just annoys the hell out of me.

So why do I love Covert?

It’s a pretty straightforward points race built around mission cards that have specific requirements. And using the dice as workers seems a fairly typical euro mechanism, but what I like about Covert is how puzzly it is. When you place your dice workers, they’ll be placed on round tracks with spaces numbered 1-6, and you won’t be able to place a die unless it’s adjacent to another die. In this case, you can do anything you want, but only if you plan correctly and work well with the other players. It becomes an order of operations puzzle, which may frustrate some, but I love it.

Also, I can’t get enough of that spy theme. And the production is fantastic.

3. Eldritch Horror (2013)

Ah, Cthulhu. For being the spawn of such a troubled person (HP Lovecraft), I find Cthulhu’s mythos and surrounding universe positively enthralling.

But dice! Ugh yes, this is a huge, sprawling, long, and [sorta] bloated game that is built all around a very simple dice rolling resolution system. I have no way of justifying why this doesn’t bug me, but it just doesn’t.

Maybe I’m just a sap for the theme (Indiana Jones + Cthulhu = Win). Or maybe it’s nostalgia, considering this is the game on my top ten that I’ve played the most and had the longest. But, if I try to dig into the real reasoning here, it’s probably because this game manages to give you a big, rich, story-based experience that feels like an event when it’s over. Yes, it’s the biggest, longest play session on this list. But I love every minute of it. Even those maddening bad dice rolls.

4. Lord of the Rings: The Card Game (2011)

A long time ago, Kathleen and I came to this hobby via Magic: The Gathering, the deep, long standing king of the collectible card game. Magic is a great game, but it brings out the worst in me as a gamer. Playing Magic makes me both a bad winner and bad loser. Frankly, that’s a terrible combination. Why would you want to play with me at all?

This obvious problem led us to cooperative board games. If I’m gonna lose, why don’t I just lose with you. That’s a refreshing change of pace!

And speaking of losing, hey let’s talk about Lord of the Rings: The Card Game. The word used most frequently when talking about this game–by me and pretty much anybody who’s ever played it–is PUNISHING. And yes, it’s punishing. Kathleen and I have played a few punishing euros at this point (feed those people), but this is something else. Get a few bad card flips from the encounter deck and you’re suddenly up to your eyeballs in LOTR baddies. Orcs and goblins? Oh hai. But your dwarves or hobbits or whatever are never really out of it. Smart deck building (and luck) definitely has carried us out of the tall grass on more than one occasion. And there’s something to be said for a game as well balanced as Lord of the Rings. More than once, a game has concluded on a turn where we either win or lose based on that single turn’s outcome.

The theme doesn’t really do much for me, but I took the dive on this game because it looked like a well-designed and well-supported cooperative card game (of which there really aren’t too many). It’s stood tall over the years, and I hope it continues for a while. When I first played Arkham Horror: The Card Game, I figured it would knock this down a peg or two. But the designers’ ingenuity in the LOTR quests and encounter deck designs has been (for me, at least) a much more rewarding experience.

And I appreciate a cooperative game where you actually lose more often than you win. It seems a rarity in the co-ops we have.

5. Great Western Trail (2016)

I’d heard and read so much about this game prior to purchasing it that I almost didn’t even want to get it (which is exactly how I feel about Concordia and Trajan, subsequently). I dig the cowboy theme, but beyond that, I’d pretty much phased out all the actual details on this game’s gameplay.

But yeah, it really is good. Ya’ll were right. I love games that are heavy but are built around simple gameplay, and Great Western Trail epitomizes that. One your turn you move your cowboy on the (effectively) huge rondel board and then take an action on the space where you stop. That’s it.

The beauty of the game comes from the remarkable breadth of options you can pursue. Using cowboys to buy cows, hiring engineers to move your train and build stations, hiring carpenters to build buildings and busy up the board, and completing objectives are some of the main tasks you’ll be focusing on, and what really clicks for me with Great Western Trail is that it’s a tactical player’s dream. The board is constantly changing, and as it changes, so must your plans. The objective cards steer you somewhat, but you’ve really gotta cut your own path across the wilderness here.

Oh, and I love deckbuilding as a sort of side dish mechanic. It isn’t always enough to sustain a whole game, but it’s great as a single piece of a pie.

6. Gloomhaven (2017)

All right, so this big beast has moved all over my ranking in the year+ since my first game. I won’t lie, it sat at #1 for a while. Then it slid a little, then a little more. I mean, it’s still at #6, so it’s not exactly plummeting. It’s the Board Game Geek #1 game of all time (as of this writing), and it’s hard to say if it’s deserving of this (and if not, what deserves the spot instead). Again, this is so subjective, and games like this or Scythe tend to be lightning rods for people who want to take a shot at the new hotness.

But yes, it’s good. It’s very good. I’m not as enamored by the sprawling nature of it as I was, nor the campaign, but being a person who loves variety, it’s scope is certainly a nice bonus. But after you haven’t played it in a while, it becomes a HUGE box that takes up a whole shelf and is a bear to set back up. And even though the box is 20lbs and takes up a whole shelf and the game takes 20+ minutes just to set up, the card play in Gloomhaven is just stellar. I love that this is essentially a tactical minis game with a euro engine. Tactical minis games rank incredibly low on my chart o’ interest, but this game takes that standard tactical minis expectation and smashes the shit out of it.

Despite its niggling flaws, it’s an excellent game.

7. The Exit Series (2017-?)

This is the last co-op game on my list, and I just looked back and saw that there are four on here. I was just talking to Kathleen about how much I’d rather play competitive games instead of co-ops, and apparently I said that in a moment completely lacking self-awareness. Also, this is a cheaty kind of entry considering we’ve played at least eight Exit games.

Remember when I said that I liked Eldritch Horror because it was an event game that provided a big, rich experience? Well, the Exit games give you a meaty, brainier experience in a slightly shorter time period. There’s not much story–despite the designers really trying to cram one in there–but I’ll always love Exit because it’s become our Date Night game. Kathleen and I will get some nice booze, take out food, and sit down with a new Exit after we put our son to bed. The experience can be frustrating–remember we think very differently, but each experience has always been something to remember (except the Secret Lab; what happened in that one?). Special props to Exit: Dead Man on the Orient Express, in particular.

The puzzles are really satisfying when you crack them, especially after working on them for a while. We take longer than average to do these because we resist those hint cards as much as possible, so our games can stretch. But Exit should be an event, and when savored like one, it doesn’t let you down.

Also, if you have concerns about the value of an Exit game, if you look at it as an event (like going to the movies or *cough cough* playing T.I.M.E. Stories), it’s actually a very good value. Recycle it!

And finally, yes, Exit trumps Unlock any day of the week.

8. Glory to Rome (2005)

That Glory to Rome is out of print is a cryin’ shame. Our copy isn’t even a real copy, I printed a crappy DIY version at Staples and then cut and sleeved them with old Magic commons. Our copy looks bad, is cut unevenly, and has eery MTG watermarks shining through the thin weight paper, and I couldn’t care less. This game is awesome. It’s got about a million different combos that are all seemingly game-breaking, but the fact that everything is so powerful is really what makes this game so exciting.

Multi-use cards are one of my favorite mechanic, and this game is completely built around them. And like any well-designed game that is build all around cards, the design of this never leaves you feeling hamstrung by bad card draw. If you’re doing badly at Glory to Rome, it’s your fault. Sorry. You haven’t found the combo that will win the game for you. I can say this because I’m terrible at Glory to Rome, and I know it. That’s not saying I’ve not won before. I have, but more likely than not it was because I accidentally stumbled onto something good.

Like Brass: Birmingham, no two games of Glory to Rome are the same. There are so many cards in the box, and the subtle sense of humor that permeates some of the cards just tickles me (please see: latrine).

It’s fast and exciting, and giving you options on other players’ turns is also one of my favorite mechanics. I’ll happily play and lose Glory to Rome anytime.

9. Nippon (2015)

Full disclosure, this is the newest edition to this list, and Kathleen and I have only played this a few times, but there’s something about this game that really fascinates me.

At first blush, it feels like Brass, but it’s not. Like Brass, this is an economic engine, but it doesn’t allow the multi-turn build up to The Big Turn like Brass. Then I thought it was a little like Great Western Trail, but it’s not really like that either. Great Western Trail presents a ton of options, but by the end of the game, you really need to work on all of them, at least a little bit, or else your score will suffer. Nippon, however, doesn’t make you do a little bit of everything. There are a number of elements in Nippon (like trains), that can be all but ignored except for certain circumstances. It’s a game built around area control via slow burn engine building. A number of other elements to the game are very specific tools you can use to hone that engine, but could just as easily prove useless under the wrong conditions.

This may be misdirected musings by someone who hasn’t played the game enough, but it feels right to me. The last time we played, I came to the realization that the game felt so fraught because I was trying to do too much. The game presents you with a large amount of avenues to pursue because you don’t actually have to pursue them all; you can’t, there’s not enough time in the game (or money!). You need to choose your actions and build the best engine as quickly as possible.

Nippon is a cutthroat fight that feels both wickedly fast and frustratingly slow at the same time. Special bonuses for completely subverting the worker placement mechanic with its own implementation that runs the whole game. It’s a puzzle that I have relished greatly.

10. Star Wars: The Card Game (2012)

Two Fantasy Flight LCGs on the list? Sweet Christmas!

But yes, this is a great game. I’m not sure it ever got much love, and it saddens me that it’s now dead, but it’s such an interesting design. That it does a fine job of simplifying deck construction is just a bonus.

I appreciate that Star Wars feels like a game of high stakes gambling. The first few turns are slow and quiet as you work through your deck and build your forces, but once conflict erupts, everything tends to break wide open. Each decision you make has massive repercussions, as single large mistakes will lose you the game. Add in some actual bluffing and a ticking clock, and this is the simplified and streamlined (if safer and less wild) version of Doomtown: Reloaded, another card game that I absolutely love.

But where I think Doomtown ultimately fails, Star Wars succeeds. The game doesn’t get bogged down in complexity, and instead feels relatively streamlined considering its medium weight. Every time I play this game, I’m impressed by how smart Eric Lang’s design is. I feel like he played a ton of Magic: The Gathering, and then he removed all the things that bothered him (and bothered me, too).

I think this game is overlooked and underplayed, and dare I say forgotten, but for my money, it’s absolutely worth revisiting. And played over and over again.

Please remember, this list will change. Check back occasionally to see how. If you have any questions or opinions of your own, let me know in the comments!

Thanks for reading!

Eric (Player One)

#top ten #board games #board game #great western trail #gloomhaven #brass birmingham #star wars card game #nippon #glory to rome #exit #eldritch horror #lord of the rings card game #covert game #covert

1 note · View note

creepywonderland-pony · 7 years

Text

Tag Game

Rules: Answer questions given to you, write 11 new questions, and tag people to answer those questions!

Reglas: ¡Contesta las preguntas que se te den, escribe 11 nuevas preguntas y etiqueta a otros para que respondan esas preguntas!

I was tagged by @real-life-sucks-ass (thanks!)

I’m answering this in two languages so I can tag more people c: / Lo responderé en dos lenguajes, así puedo etiquetar a más gente c:

1) What would an evil version of you look like? Describe it or draw it. / ¿Cómo luciría una versión malvada de tí? Descríbela o dibujala

I am my own evil version. Lmao kidding. Oh boi, it took me a lot of time to get this one! I think my evil version would be as extra as me, therefore she would dress in all black and have really showy makeup (unlike me), and will be very very rude and conceited. Lowkey I want her to have a cool hairstyle, but ceteris paribus, my hair is so straight that she would probably be trapped in the same I-cant-do-anything-with-this-hair hell.

Soy mi propia versión malvada. Lol, broma. ¡Me tomó mucho tiempo pensar en esta pregunta! Creo que mi versión malvada sería tan extra como yo, por lo tanto, se vestiría completamente de negro y tendría un maquillaje muy vistoso (a diferencia de mí), y sería muy grosera y engreída. A medias quiero que tenga un peinado genial, pero ceteris paribus, mi cabello es tan liso que probablemente quede atrapada en el mismo infierno de no-puedo-hacer-nada-con-este-cabello.

2) Share your knowledge! Teach us something weird you know :D/ Comparte tu conocimiento! Cuentanos algo extraño que sepas :D

I’m not quite sure of how unknown this fact is, but it will always shock me that the first biological weapons were corpses contaminated with the black plague catapulted into walled cities. And just to be sure I can surprise you, I’m going to tell ya that plesiosaurus and pterosaurs weren’t dinosaurs, in fact, all dinosaurs lived on the land. These species are classified due to the differences in its anatomy (especially bone structure) as big flying/swimming reptiles.

No estoy segura de cuán desconocido es este hecho, pero siempre me sorprenderá que las primeras armas biológicas fueran cadáveres contaminados con la plaga negra catapultada a las ciudades amuralladas. Y solo para asegurarme de que pueda sorprenderte, voy a decirte que los plesiosaurios y pterosaurios no eran dinosaurios, de hecho, todos los dinosaurios vivieron en la tierra. Estas especies se clasifican debido a las diferencias en su anatomía (especialmente la estructura ósea) como grandes reptiles voladores/nadadores.

3) You find a way to stop the time, as long as you want, as many times as you want. Only you can move, everything else is frozen. While it’s frozen, you don’t age. How do you use that power? / Encuentras la forma de detener el tiempo, por tanto como desees y tantas veces como lo desees. Solo tú puedes moverte, todos lo demás están congelados. Mientras [el tiempo] está congelado, no envejeces. ¿Cómo usas ese poder?

As I’m the most boring human being on this planet and also because I’m always stressed with college or wanting to write or watch a show, or paint, etc; I would probably just sit down and do as many things as possible. It would be very helpful tbh. I would also enjoy some time on my own, and maybe i would also be a little robin hood and take a few things from large commercial chains to give them to the poor. Yeah, mostly those kind of things.

Como soy el ser humano más aburrido de este planeta y también porque siempre estoy estresada con la universida,d o con ganas de escribir, o ver una serie, o pintar, etc; probablemente me sentaría a hacer tantas cosas como fuera posible. Sería muy útil tbh. También disfrutaría algo de tiempo por mi cuenta, y tal vez también sería un pequeño robin hood y tomaría algunas cosas de las grandes cadenas comerciales para entregárselas a los pobres. Sí, como ese tipo de cosas.

4) Can you cook? If so, please share a recipe with us? / ¿Puedes cocinar? Si es así, por favor comparte una receta con nosotros

I can certainly prepare a really good white rice and some pasta and salad lmao. Mmm sweet things are my speciality tbh, but I never learn the recipes from memory so… sorry.

Ciertamente puedo preparar un arroz blanco muy bueno y un poco de pasta y ensalada. Mmm cosas dulces son mi especialidad tbh, pero nunca me aprendo las recetas de la memoria así que … perdón.

5) If your life was a book, what would the first lines be like? (It can be a serious biography, a funny light book, poetry, drama, romance, or even a comics of child’s book, whatever you want!) / Si tu vida fuera un libro, ¿cómo serían las primeras líneas? (Puede ser una biografía seria, un libro divertido, poesía, drama, romance, o incluso un cómic de un libro infantil, ¡lo que quieras!)

“No one would have thought that Constanza was worthy to be a heroine, for her life is so boring that this book will make you sleep” Pfff, this is a hard one. I would probably like to have a really smart and sarcastic context, as Jane Austen always wrote; but in the case I’m blessed with being part of a fantasy book I want it to start with a fight or super badass escape.

“Nadie hubiera pensado que Constanza era digna de ser una heroína, porque su vida es tan aburrida que este libro te hará dormir” Pff, esta está dificil. Probablemente me gustaría tener un contexto muy inteligente y sarcástico, como Jane Austen siempre escribió; pero en el caso de que sea tan afortunada como para ser parte de un libro de fantasía, quiero que comience con una pelea o un escape súper rudo.

6) How’s your day so far? / ¿Cómo ha sido tu día hasta ahora?

Pretty calm, I woke up late, eat my breakfast and spend some time on my social media. I also got a comment on a fic so I’m happy c:

Muy tranquilo, me levanté tarde, desayuné y pasé un tiempo en mis redes sociales. También recibí un comentario sobre un fic así que estoy feliz

7) How many languages can you speak?

I can speak Spanish (native), English (quite fluently, but I mumble some words, working on that tho), and I started learning French (but I can only say really simple stuff).

Puedo hablar español (nativo), inglés (bastante fluidamente, pero farbullo algunas palabras, estoy trabajando en eso de todas formas), y comencé a aprender francés (pero solo puedo decir cosas realmente simples).

8) Rec us one or two good fanfics you’ve read recently! / ¡Recomiéndanos uno o dos buenos fanfics que has leído recientemente!

Ok, so. These are going to be different answers for obvious reasons. Lately I have not read so much in English and I do not know if we will coincide in fandoms but:

Rose Tinted by darkbrokenreaper is a Killing Stalking fanfic that i really like because it doesn’t romantice the uhealthy relationship between the characters, it characterizes them very well (which is especially laudable in my opinion, especially considering that there are some whose minds we still can not totally understand), the plot is really good and over all is really really well written. As a summary: Bum has amnesia and Sangwoo, after realizing that he has fallen in love, takes advantage of it pretending that they are married; from there it develops everything that Bum lives from waking until he realizes that something strange is happening, and seeks to escape.

Another fic that i liked is from Yuri on Ice, On My Love. It is so well written and full of feelings that i cant even think clearly. Just read it please, the plot is so iteresting and i literally cried twice. As a summary:Yuuri has an accident and wakes up young again, in a world where he does not know Victor (his beloved husband) and dode has not yet made a career in figure skating. Many feelings.

I actually need to catch up with both fic yet oops

Ok. Estas van a ser respuestas diferentes por razones obvias. Últimamente he leído mucho de latin hetalia so:

Arranquemos del invierno de rantingprince me gustó mucho. Lo estaba leyendo en clases y me sentí embargada por sentimientos de nostalgia y a la vez una enorme calidad en mi pecho. Si alguna vez le ha leido dabrán que redacta muy bien y su estilo fluye y te hace flotar. Muy recomendado, no tiene un gran plot pero sí mucho sentimiento.

Seguimos dando Vueltas de Iris también muy recomendado, me la sufrí toda leyendo (ppor Martín y por Manu y por todo), pero fue tan lindo al mismo tiempo como todas las heridas fueron sanando y ambos encontraron en el otro lo que necesitaban. Claro que para entender van a tener que leerse La Mansión Prado primero, pero tbh ambos son tan tan buenos que me lo van a terminar agradeciendo.

Y ya que estoy en esto, hay versiones traducidas al español de On My Love de Yuuri on Ice, que no sé cuán buenas sean. Pero si lograron captar la mitad de la belleza de ese fic, entonces deben leerlo. En serio.

9) What do your family members and/or partner think about you being into fandoms (and writing fics or drawing fanarts if you do so)? Are they supportive? / ¿Qué piensan los miembros de tu familia y/o pareja de que estes en fandoms (y escribiendo fics o dibujando fanarts, si lo haces)? ¿Te apoyan?

My family doesn’t even now what a fandom is and they don’t know that I write fics, neither I want to tell them. I’m not sure, but they probably would not be very supportive (not for the writing part but for writing about gay otps). Also, I’m single af lol.

Mi familia ni siquiera sabe qué es un fandom y no saben que yo escribo fics, ni tampoco quiero contarles. No estoy segura, pero probablemente no me brindarán mucho apoyo (no por la parte de escribir, sino porque escribo sobre gays). Y soy super soltera lol.

10) Your top 3 fav characters ever? / ¿Tus 3 personajes favoritos de la vida?

After a long time of reflection I have decided that my fave of all time is Fitz Chivalry Farseer from The Farseer Trilogy because he is so useless but at the same time he tries so hard, and I suffer so much each time I read him to the point that I already feel that he is a part of me now (but I’m always changing of mind tho, since The Fool is so bold and sarcastic, and every time he opens his mouth I can not stop smiling, it’s really hard to choose between these two).

My second is Merlin from BBC Merlin. He is such a cinammon roll and his smile is so beautiful and he always tries to hep people and also he is so sarcastic too. If I was not so emotionally engaged with Fitz after reading so many pages of him, Merlin would be my number one. And honestly he is my number one of all the tv shows I’ve seen. I love him.

Finally, I’m going to choose Wonder Woman both as my favorite female character and favorite superhero (I’m sorry spidey, you are my second tho, and I still love you). I literally cried on every single fight scene because I felt really empowered and after watching it I wanted to kick some asses tbh. To this day I still smile when I remember the movie. And she is so strong and smart and kind, it is impossible to not love her.

Ugh, I left so many of my faves outside. This was hard.

Después de un largo tiempo de reflexión, he decidido que mi favorito de todos los tiempos es Trapié Hidalgo Vatídico de la Trilogía de Vatídico porque es tan inútil, pero al mismo tiempo se esfuerza tanto, y yo sufro demasiado cada vez que lo leo, al punto que ya siento que él es parte de mí ahora (pero siempre estoy cambiando de opinión, porque Bufón es tan atrevido y sarcástico, y cada vez que abre la boca no puedo parar de sonreir, es realmente difícil elegir entre estos dos).

Mi segundo es Merlin de BBC Merlin. Es un cinammon roll, y su sonrisa es tan hermosa, y siempre trata de ayudar a la gente, y también es tan sarcástico. Si no estuviera tan emocionalmente comprometida con Fitz después de leer tantas páginas de él, Merlín sería mi número uno. Y, sinceramente, él es mi número uno de todos los programas de televisión que he visto. Me encanta.

Finalmente, voy a elegir a la Mujer Maravilla como mi personaje femenino favorito y superhéroe favorito (lo siento spidey, tú eres mi segundo de todos modos, y aún te amo). Literalmente lloré en cada escena de pelea porque me sentí realmente empoderada y después de verla quise patear algunos traseros tbh. Hasta el día de hoy todavía sonrío cuando recuerdo la película. Y ella es tan fuerte, inteligente y amable que es imposible no amarla.

Ugh, dejé a muchos de mis favoritos afuera. Esto fue dificil.

11) Tell us 3 fun facts about yourself / Cuéntanos 3 datos divertidos sobre ti

-I have a little mole under my right eye that I find cute / Tengo un pequeño lunar bajo mi ojo derecho que encuentro lindo.

-I’m really into women’s political issues and I want to work on that area / Realmente me interesan las cuestiones políticas de las mujeres y quiero trabajar en esa área.

-I used to be blonde, now I’m brunette / Solía ser rubia, ahora tengo el pelo castaño.

And now I’m tagging: @a-pair-of-iris, @leochamposa, @coloresfrios, @bluebirdinatree, @pico-sour, @lemonmilk1, @im-a-boat, @veektahr @mardeleste y @dinosauria–anacleta

To answer these questions / Para responder estas preguntas:

1) What is your favorite song and why? (You can choose 2 if it is too hard to only pick one) / ¿Cuál es tu canción favorita y por qué? (Puede elegir 2 si es demasiado difícil elegir solo una)

2) If you had the ability to enter the universe of any story, which one would you choose and why? (You can choose anything: video games, books, comics, movies, etc) / Si tuvieras la capacidad de entrar al universo de alguna historia, ¿cuál elegirías y por qué? (Puedes escoger cualquier cosa: videojuegos, libros, comics, películas, etc)

3) Tell me, what are your top 3 favorite things about yourself / Dime, ¿cuáles son tus 3 cosas favoritas de ti?

4) If you could make a wish without any limits, what would it be? / Si pudieras pedir un deseo sin ningún límite, ¿cuál seria?

5) What would you do if the zombie apocalypse started right now? What is your plan? / ¿Qué harías si el apocalipsis zombie iniciara ahora mismo? ¿Cuál es tu plan?

6) What is your favorite historical time and why? / ¿Cuál es tu época histórica favorita y por qué?

7) What would be your ideal future life? / ¿Cuál sería tu vida futura ideal?

8) Your top 5 writers evers and why? (can be both books and fanfics) / ¿Tus 5 escritorxs favoritos de la vida, y por qué? (pueden ser tanto libros como fanfics)

9) Best 2017 memory? / ¿Mejor recuerdo de 2017?

10) Do you have any oc? If so, would you like to tell me a little bit about them? If not, tell me a little about your favorite character ever and why you like them! / ¿Tienes algún oc? Si es así, ¿te gustaría contarme un poco sobre ellos? Si no, cuéntame un poco sobre tu personaje favorito y por qué te gusta!

11) If you could be a magical creature, what would you choose to be and why? How would you look? / Si pudieras ser una criatura mágica, ¿cuál escogerías ser y por qué? ¿Cómo lucirías?

Por supuesto pueden decidir no hacerlo! No hay ninguna obligación (: Espero que se diviertan~

#tag game #tag meme #i have a lot of fun answering these #personal

14 notes · View notes

sparda3g · 6 years

Text

5 Reasons Why Tokyo Ghoul Anime Split the Fan Base Apart

After Tokyo Ghoul:re Anime premiered, there were many reactions and feedback that are both positive and negative. It has gotten to the point the old recurring slogan from anime fans made its return that signify manga fans as rude and selfish babies. I am one bad baby then.

But this isn’t about ridiculing the anime or pointing out the superior version that is the manga. No, because that’s already taken care of by millions (and millions) of fans. What I am here for is to discuss on the possible reason why the fan base has been divided. Keep in mind, this is solely based on my opinion; not stating to be fact or confirmed. It’s all based upon reading many comments around the web.

This is the 5 Reasons Why Tokyo Ghoul Anime Split the Fan base apart.

5. Manga Readers Just Want to See Highlights Animated

It became apparent when the opinions are divided into multiple approaches. One in which has people just watch the anime to see the highlight; thus, not caring about the backstory or information that created the lore into a phenomenal one. It could skip all the detail for all they want; so long they get to see the best part animated.

Scenes like Sasaki versus Takizawa or Kaneki makes his complete return during Rose Investigation Arc. It’s probably why the opening straight-up spoiled nearly every key moment of the season, including a big villain that was meant to be in hiding but thanks to the opening, it serves no purpose. Thank you, Studio Pierrot. If there’s one thing that you can argue and I probably would agree with, it’s this season is catering more to the manga fans than the newcomer.

“Phew. For a second, I thought I have to worry about surprises. Thanks, Studio Pierrot.”

If it only wants to show the best part while disregarding many fundamental pieces for plot and characters, then they’re already doing a good job. Sadly, with the new art style and animation yet to be on par with Season 1, I may not be all that please. But for others, that may be perfectly fine.

4. Manga Readers Want the Most Faithful Adaptation

This one is what I can relate to, so allow me to speak briefly on their behalf. Admittedly, we can be selfish and very demanding, but in my case, I don’t mind the scene to be changed and altered to fit the anime sequence. Like in Attack on Titan, where it decided to adapt the backstory of a character that was meant to be hidden until much later on, but at least it is faithful to the original source because the scene still maintains the premise behind it. The issue that fans really have is it altered too much to make it not its kind.

There’s actually a valid reason for that punch, but the anime decided to make Akira as a hard ass boss instead.

They don’t want the series to be seen as action Shounen-esque, hence the downplay and disregard character’s moment that would give them more dimensions and help out them to stick out more than your average trope kind. The first episode left them an impression of what’s already done before in Shounen; however, Ishida in his work purposely did that but created a new layer that made them more than what you usually see. In one chapter, he purposely display the fight in Shounen style; a Tournament, heroine doing the usual praying pose, and the intense atmosphere of glorified rival of the century. That’s Tokyo Ghoul.

Imagine Tokyo Ghoul as a Shounen series...

The fans also despise the tone to be altered too much; gone with the terror and thrills that the series is known for. Again, the pacing was rushed in anime because many points they skipped involve talking and info dump. However, you can’t develop a character at its best without a background or build. You’re only seeing the moment, but not knowing why it’s heavily significant. It hurts to know that other anime adaptation gets treated faithfully in compare; only to evaluate their blood to boiling hot.

3. Some Fans Just Want the Anime Back

There are fans that just want the anime to make a return. For every time the sales does really good in weekly basis, a fan or two would be begging for another season alas “Season 3 when?” Whether they read it or not, they just want the anime to come back. It can fall under any kind of reasons including the one I listed above.

There’s always a moment of fans starts discussing with “It’s been a long time” or “Wow, how much I have missed this series.” Even the ones that don’t like the anime previous seasons would be complimentary towards the next season. Granted, the aftermath is a different story, but they did show gratitude; although, it can be argued that it is for Ishida.

He is one of the most beloved Mangaka today; that is if we based on a poll that ranked him in the top 3 favorite Mangaka. It could be the fans’ way of showing their gratitude towards him for receiving another season. It is said that receiving an anime is a blessing for the Mangaka, regardless if it is good or not. That all said wouldn’t it hurt to plead for a reboot instead, fans? That would be fantastic…

…A man can dream…

2. Anime Fans Stick to Anime Only

After the premiere episode of Tokyo Ghoul:re, there were dozens and dozens of the reactions that simply can be described in one word: What? Many have questioned on whether :re is supposed to take place after Root A or is it a new story with a new protagonist. That is a clear sign of what source they’re following, let alone if they read the manga or not.

Wait. Didn’t he die? What’s going on?

I give them a credit though: they at least prayed that Root A wasn’t canon and felt relieved to know that it has been cancelled out. Although, that creates a new problem: what is happening now. This could be seen as a blessing in disguise because this is where the manga fans can jump in and persuade them to read; probably even convert them to their own wishes. It’s clever when you think about it.

That all said if the anime fans only focus on the anime, then that’s why the anime gets a different opinion other than rushed and unfaithful. They follow what the anime provide them, not what they left out to force you to read the original source. It’s like how I explained my criteria on reviewing anime; if it doesn’t happen in here, I won’t excuse it just because it’s explained elsewhere. They like what they see and although you could argue that the original could provide even better materials, they may not care for it. Why? Because…

1. Simplicity is Justice!

Not so long ago, I have returned to watching anime; only this time, my options are much broader than before. To my recollection, the battle/action genre is the one to get the most views and fans. It is probably the case of different times, so maybe in the past, people wished for drama or heavy story. Today, it looks like nostalgia and action is the key for popularity success.

Why do you think Summer films are considered Summer films? Why do you think films that won the Best Picture don’t draw a lot in the box office compare to the likes of Transformers? Of course, this is pretty subjective but I would argue that the only possible explanation to it is because those films are simple and action-packed. There are smarter films out there, so not all hopes is lost, but the point is the draw relies on beloved franchises, nostalgia, and brain tossed out genres.

Case in point, anime universe isn’t far apart from it. Dragon Ball, Boruto, My Hero Academia, and other Battle Shounen series are the one that attract the audience the most. It’s basically the Summer film of anime. Tokyo Ghoul is not Shounen nor does it highly focus on battles like one-on-one combat. It’s more of a thriller and psychological series that puts the characters and plot first than action. In its anime department, it’s the opposite and in terms of success, it’s probably for the best.

“Hooray! I remember this from the manga!!”

If it were to adapt at the manga pace, fans wouldn’t want to know the background right away, so they want action or a sign that there will be one. You noticed that in Weekly Shounen Jump series first chapter shows what it is about and the action. In Tokyo Ghoul, you are following along the world being explored; not knowing that we will get action like the stuff we know today. After all, it begins with Kaneki running away; is that what we should expect? Instead, anime rushed to chapter 5 for the first action scene; letting the audience know that there’s action.

That all said anime only fans wouldn’t know that there is more to its lore and yet, they’re fine to leave it like that. They probably don’t want to think a lot of its conspiracies, the character’s in-depth progression, the foreshadow pieces, and probably its atmosphere. Everything about the anime is simplified for straightforward narrative. Even Kaneki has changed to more of Shounen protagonist than a human who strives to fit in. The dialogues are toned down to noticeably simplified words, which ultimately changed their character. The action is kept but made to be flashier with Kagune lighting up for whatever reason. All of that is fine.

It’s similar to manga itself in some regards. How there will be a silent chapter, which fans will dislike it because of lack of dialogues. Basically, there are different tastes for everyone. You can be upset at the case of wrong people read this series, but it is smart to let them be and not blow a gasket. I admit, it is a bit frustrating, but I won’t bash them. It’s just a simple case of different strokes, different folks, Anime may have tarnished your beloved series, but don’t let your anger tarnished yourself.

There you have it. That’s how I see the reactions from the premiere and despite myself not fond of the anime, if you enjoy it, that’s fine. I could only wish for the fans to give the manga a chance. Also, a wish for a reboot, but that’s just me being selfish. But one could dream and hope for the best.

Until next time, take care!

#tokyo ghoul:re #tokyo ghoul re #tokyo ghoul :re #tokyo ghoul #anime #manga #top 5 #season 3

1 note · View note

hutchhitched · 7 years

Text

The Vintage Joshifer Series: End of Love—Chapter 12

End of Love by hutchhitched

Author’s note: After much too long, this story is back. I appreciate those who’ve read in the past and those of you who will read it now. I am beyond humbled and grateful.

Historical events in this chapter center around the Summer of Love, a gathering of members of the nation’s counterculture in Haight-Ashbury. Although I rarely encourage wikipedia as a source, the page for the Summer of Love entry is actually quite well done.

The Long Hot Summer of 1967 was the name given to the 159 race riots that occurred in the United States during that year, which happened to combine with a heat wave across much of the nation.

Scott McKenzie’s "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" served as the anthem for the Summer of Love.

Berkeley, California, June 1967

“I can’t believe we graduated,” Brenda squealed as she and Jennifer entered their apartment after the commencement ceremony. Bags of clothes, boxes, and other belongings filled their living room, and Jen’s stomach dropped at the realization that her time in California was drawing to a close.

“It’s surreal.”

Brenda laughed and headed to her bedroom. “I’ve got to change. Got a hot date tonight,” she tossed over her shoulder. “You’re meeting your parents for dinner? What about Chris?”

“I’m meeting my parents, yes. Chris and I broke up,” she explained. “We weren’t that serious anyway—just somebody fun to pass the time this year.”

“Someone to help you forget about Josh, you mean.”

Her roommate’s comment hit her in the gut. She’d spent the better part of the year since she’d run out on her best friend trying to figure out how to function normally without him, and she’d failed pretty miserably. Even her ex-boyfriend’s name reminded her of Josh and his family.

“It didn’t work,” she muttered and waved away Brenda’s concern. “It’s fine, Bren. We’ve covered this already. It was my own fault for sleeping with him and then sneaking out while he was asleep. I should have known better than to think I could handle sex with someone who had so much experience with other girls.”

Concern colored Brenda’s features, and she moved back into the living room and pulled her roommate down next to her on the couch.

“I don’t believe his sexual escapades had anything to do with why you came home that morning glowing with diamonds in your eyes. Nobody’s that good in bed.”

Jen flushed as she remembered the feel of him inside her while she rode him. She forced herself to breathe normally at the memory of his eyes closed in orgasmic agony as ecstatic moans gurgled in his throat when he came. The feel of his hands on her breasts, the pressure of his finger on the nub between her legs, his masculine scent as he pulsed inside her. She didn’t have anyone else but Nick to compare him to, but Josh was that good.

Taking a deep breath, she unclenched her fists and her thighs and admitted what she’d tried to deny for a year.

“I let him go, and I was stupid to do it.”

Puzzled, Brenda asked, “Then why did you?”

“Because he was leaving. He was going to Chicago, and I couldn’t ask him to stay. I couldn’t do that to him.”

“But why was it okay to do it to yourself?”

Jen scrunched her eyes closed and held her breath. She felt like she’d been punched in the solar plexus, and she didn’t want to give into the pain her roommate’s words created as they sat in their half-packed apartment. Everything was ending, and she could hardly stand to accept it.

“What he’s fighting for is important. He’s trying to change the world, and I’m…”

“You’re what?”

“Another girl in a string of many for him.”

Brenda sighed and shook her head. “I don’t think you’ve ever been just another girl to him any more than he’s ever been just a guy for you. From the first moment you met him, you couldn’t stop thinking about him.”

“Yeah, but I hated him.” Jen’s mirthless laughter bounced off the walls and echoed through the half-empty apartment.

“Is that what it’s called? You couldn’t stop wondering about him once you met him in the student union. You remembered everything about him; you asked me questions about him afterward; you might have said his name in your sleep a few times.” Brenda watched her roommate before adding, “You compared Nick to him the same way you did every guy you went out with this year.”

“I did n—” At Brenda’s pointed look, she admitted sheepishly, “Okay, at least part of that is true.”

“A lot of it’s true, and you know it. We have another few weeks before we leave. Maybe you should use this time to figure out why you said yes to a job in Chicago. I’m sure it had nothing to do with that being Josh’s last known location.”

Jen’s mouth hung open as her roommate pranced down the hall and closed herself in her bedroom. Apparently, she hadn’t been as sly as she’d thought as she arranged her life post-college and post-Berkeley, but hopefully not post-Josh.

****

“Jen, can you do me one more favor before you move to the Midwest and become a career girl?” Bradley, the editor of the The Daily Californian after Nick’s matriculation, grinned at her and waved a sheet of paper. She dropped into a chair across from him and heaved an exaggerated sigh.

“Why must I be so vital to the life of this paper? Thank God for me.”

“Vital and completely humble, aren’t you?”

“Always,” she waved dismissively and nodded at the paper. “What’s the assignment? I might have one more story in me. Can you make it worth my while?”

“I think it might be one you’d like to cover—a little farewell to California in general and Berkeley in particular. There’s something happening. I’m not exactly sure what it is, but it’s big. If I know you, and I do, you’ll be able to identify it and explain it in a way that makes sense. You’ve always been good at that—finding that one nugget of truth in mess of information and boiling it down. That’s why your work is so good.”

She flushed and considered her hands for a few moments before agreeing. “Well, when you put it that way, how can I say no?”

“Right.”

“So, give me some guidance. Where do I start?”

“Haight-Ashbury. There’s been an influx of people from around the nation, mostly people our age, mostly frustrated with the government. They’re all coming here and…communing or something. Protests; concerts; marches; demonstrations. It’s like all the hippies in American decided Berkeley’s the place to be this summer. Lots of free love.”

“The Summer of Love,” she mused.

“What?”

“Nothing.” She shook her head and held out her hand. She glanced at the information on the paper he handed her and nodded. “I’ll head over this afternoon and see what I can see. It’ll be a nice distraction over the next few weeks. I assume you want a feature, not a news story.”

“Probably best, yeah. I trust your judgment. You’re good at what you do.”

“I really appreciate your guidance this year. It was nice having someone new in the editor’s chair.” She flushed and babbled an apology.

“No worries, Jen,” Bradley chuckled. “You’ve had a rough year, but you’ve got good things coming to you. I feel it, man.”

“Well, I’ll feel my way down to Haight-Ashbury and get started. Later.”

With a wave and a grin, she exited the office where she’d spent so much of the past few years. A wave of nostalgia closed her throat with the knowledge that this was her final story for the university’s newspaper.

Her time in California would end in just a few weeks and her best connection to Josh would be broken. He hadn’t returned since she’d walked out on him. There had been no phone calls, no letters, no nothing. Something inside her couldn’t give up hope, but a year without contact had all but killed her optimism.

“Where are you, Josh?” she murmured as she neared Haight-Ashbury.

As she parked, she noticed the sheer volume of people close to her age who wandered the streets. Men with shoulder-length hair and women in flowing dresses and sandals sat on street corners, at outside cafes, and on stoops. The sound of acoustic guitars and friendly chatter greeted her as she observed the crowds. The acrid scent of weed and body odor assailed her, and she fought to keep an impassive expression on her face when a group of men wolf-whistled at her.

Josh would have loved this scene, she mused. She tucked into a recessed space on a corner so she could watch and listen.

****

“Andre. Man.”

“Joshua,” Andre drawled and took a hit from the pipe.

“Yeah, man. I agree.”

“I didn’t say anything,” Andre noted and closed his eyes. Josh scrunched his nose and nodded seriously before shaking his head from side to side.

“But your silence is profound.” Sucking in a lungful of smoke, Josh held his breath and closed his eyes as the hit washed over him. “Silence connects us all. The depth of it is infinite.”

“You’re so smart,” a female voice murmured from behind him. “That’s so deep.”

Josh turned and settled his gaze on a stunningly beautiful woman with dark brown hair and eyes that sparkled as she smiled at him. His limbs were heavy, and he swallowed hard. She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, and he released an inaudible grunt as his balls tingled.

“Well, hello there, doll,” he said with a smirk. “Come over here.”

“Victoria,” she murmured as she pressed against him. “I’m named after a queen.”

“Appropriately so,” he observed. “Want a hit?”

She puffed on the bowl and then turned to kiss him. Their tongues tangled as the smoke passed between them. They kissed for minutes or hours, he wasn’t sure, and he racked his muddled brain for a place they could be alone.

“Do you live here?” she asked when they broke contact.

“I’m between cities. What about you?”

She nodded and stretched against him so that her breasts rubbed against his bicep. “I’m a junior at Berkeley. Perfect timing. Can you imagine missing this because you graduated a few years too early? Such a shame.”

“Time is irrelevant,” he argued. “Only the present matters.”

“That may be true for some, but what about for those that miss something? What about the soldier in Vietnam who waited one second too late to duck behind a tree and takes a bullet in the shoulder? What about the girl who misses her cycle by one day? What then?”

He blinked. She had a point, and he wasn’t sure how to respond. “I think you’re the smart one.”

“There’s room enough for both of us, you know.” What she said made a lot of sense, so he nodded and linked his fingers with hers.

Josh had meant to find Jen when he returned to the West Coast, but he’d had no luck. He missed her—even after an entire year of absence. He knew it was partly his fault for not trying harder during the school year, but he was still smarting from her slipping from his bed as he slept last June.

It had taken weeks of cajoling to convince Andre to return to Berkeley with him, but the flood of hippies to the Bay Area had finally convinced them both they needed to be there this summer. The national news showed a utopian scene in Haight-Ashbury. An estimated 100,000 people who believed the same way he did were living together, protesting the war, and showing the rest of the nation how to attain inner peace.

The days stretched into weeks, and he forgot to look for Jen. She wasn’t there anyway. He’d figured out that she’d graduated, and no one seemed to know where she was. He didn’t have many contacts left who ran in her circles, but each of them had tried to find her for him.

Instead, he filled his days with Victoria and what had come to be dubbed the Summer of Love. He was young and free, and his draft number still hadn’t been called. Things could have been a lot worse.

He woke early one morning in late July. As he rose from the bed, he glanced at the girl who shared her place with him for the past few weeks. Her dark hair was tangled from the night before when they’d smoked and fucked until they passed out together. Victoria was smart, one of the smartest women he’d had the pleasure of bedding, and she was his type.

At least she was the type he’d enjoyed before falling for his best friend. Since then, curly blonde hair and sparkling blue eyes danced in his dreams and taunted him with images of her beneath him as he lost himself in her heat. The sound of her contented sighs in his ear as she reached orgasm haunted his waking hours, and he cursed his morning wood that had grown more rigid in the few minutes since he’d woken.

Josh muttered under his breath and sat down at the scarred Formica table in the alcove that served as Victoria’s kitchen and shoved his right hand into his white briefs. He tugged and jerked as the light from the sunrise crept across the floor and up his body. It didn’t take long before he groaned and came, careful to capture his ejaculate with his undershirt instead of letting it hit the floor.

Victoria slept through his climax, and he stretched and padded to the bathroom. He cleaned himself, brushed his teeth, washed his face, and grabbed some crumpled clothes from beside her bed before poking his head into the living room.

“Andre,” he stage whispered to his friend who’d crashed on the couch on the few nights he hadn’t hooked up with someone. “You awake?” Andre released an incoherent grumble, which Josh took as a sign he wasn’t ready to begin the day. He grabbed his wallet and slipped from the apartment and into humid summer air.

He moved through the streets until he reached the Blue Unicorn, a small coffee shop popular with the hippies with whom he’d spent the past few weeks. Jefferson Airplane gave way to Janis Joplin on the radio, and Josh ordered a coffee and a muffin. As he sipped his drink, he picked up a crumpled newspaper and grinned when he saw it was The Daily Californian, the paper where Jen had worked during her time at Berkeley. He settled into his seat and perused the front page when he saw a byline that made him choke on the hot liquid.

“The Summer of Love, by Jennifer Lawrence,” he whispered reverently when he stopped coughing. “She’s been here all along.” With hungry eyes, he devoured her writing and relaxed into the familiar rhythm of her phrasing. It only took a few sentences to realize this was one of Jen’s better stories.

Across the nation, the Long, Hot Summer of 1967 has been marked with race riots and property destruction in Atlanta, Boston, Cincinnati, and most recently Detroit. Yet, this summer in Haight-Ashbury can best be described as a Summer of Love, not hate as the location would suggest. Thousands of the country’s thriving counterculture have descended on the city to seek a utopian communalism that promises love, acceptance, and rejection of the status quo.

Flower children from across the nation bring their hopes and dreams for a world free of poverty, nuclear war, and governmental corruption. The Council of the Summer of Love serves as the governing body of the movement, although many involved would balk at the comparison of the gathering to the national government. The Council doesn’t seek to limit the freedoms of the approximately 100,000 hippies who live in harmony together.

Lest anyone ridicule the movement as a drug-induced orgy of free love, one needs look no further than The Diggers to understand the importance of community improvement that undergirds the celebration. The self-proclaimed community anarchists are comprised of activists and Street Theater actors who seek freedom and consciousness. The Diggers opened Free Store, which provides supplies for all, regardless of their financial situation, and plan to launch a Free Clinic to provide medical care for those in need.

San Francisco community leaders, including Mayor Shelley and Police Commissioner Cahill, admit they are leery of the movement, which seems to seek peaceful actions and non-violent protests like sit-ins over the more radical actions of members in some movements. With the Blank Panther Party for Self-Defense in nearby Oakland, tension remains high for law enforcement.

Released on May 13, 1967, Scott McKenzie’s "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" serves as the anthem for San Francisco’s Summer of Love. Highlighting the desires of “gentle people” who are staging a “love-in,” the lyrics express the abiding desire this generation possesses for learning to love each other and eradicating the threats to the world their parents and grandparents have created on this globe.

Likely, the Summer of Love’s significance will only be understood years from now when the world recognizes the value of pursuing love and peace rather than seeking to bomb and destroy. For me, personally, this movement allows me one last chance to write about the vibrant community where I spent my formative college years. I can see the possibilities the flower children envision in the camaraderie in the streets of Haight-Ashbury. I am sad to leave the Bay and begin my career elsewhere, but I know some day I will return.

When I do, I’ll be sure to wear flowers in my hair.

Josh swallowed hard and blinked quickly to relieve the sting burning his eyes. The date on the newspaper was three weeks prior. If the feature was her last before she left for parts unknown, it was likely she was already gone.

Angry at himself for allowing Victoria to distract him from his true purpose for returning to the West Coast, he gripped his coffee cup so hard his knuckles ached. He should have tried to contact Jen before a year passed. His pride was the only reason he hadn’t, and now it was too late. There were no more leads to follow, no more people to ask. His felt the strings holding Jennifer to him break for good, and he choked back a sob.

“Best wishes for a good life, sweetheart,” he murmured and folded the newspaper so he could tuck it into his jacket pocket.

With a heavy heart, he left a dollar on the table and headed back to Victoria’s apartment. Not even her toned legs gripping his waist as he lost himself in her was enough to ease the ache in his heart.

For him, the warm months in the middle of 1967 weren’t the Summer of Love. They were the end of it.

#joshiferrecs #joshifersource #fyeah-joshifer #the vintage joshifer series #end of love #1960s #jhutchdirectory #joshifer fanfiction #joshifer

16 notes · View notes

0poole · 5 years

Text

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic

Good God.

I finally managed to watch the final episodes of the show, and even though it wasn’t the most pitch-perfect ending ever (and even though I skipped like all of the final season), I still gotta dish out my thoughts on the whole thing. It’s not my tippy-top most favorite show, but it’s definitely the one with the most lasting impact on me. I mean, considering it created one of the biggest fandoms of all time, I’m pretty sure I’m far from alone there.

Obviously have to start from the beginning. I think I got into MLP around the 2nd season, maybe in the middle of it but definitely before the 3rd. I don’t exactly remember, since it was so long ago, but the first two seasons might hold some of the most saccharine, mindless nostalgia of all. Every single episode holds some spot in my memory, even the filler episodes with the cheesy notes to Celestia at the end of them. Honestly those were adorable, even if they were the classic kid’s show trope of “Let’s explain the moral to the kids who don’t have half a brain” but it’s actually pretty charming. That’s nostalgia talking, by the way. Obviously. If I found a new show today that did that, I’d roll my eyes a little, and I probably did when I was first watching the show.

But, it’s an understatement that this was my life. Of course, I was at that time of my life where one thing could very easily become my entire world, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t matter to me. The pretty solid, unchanging artstyle gave me an opening to try and draw it, and for years I exclusively drew ponies, and even when I had a human character, I’d only be able to draw them in pony form, so I ended up meshing their stories into fanfiction on how they could become ponies. My “Icon” character at the time, Satyr, was probably the first original character I drew, and I can still remember the exact drawing I made of him. Obviously a pony, he was sort of larger and masculine, conveniently blinking eye so I didn’t have to deal with that, basic hair/tail styles, and for some reason a jagged zig-zag pattern going laterally across his body, like those “How would a horse wear pants?” memes. I thought it was really good, so I kept going, and here I am ages later still drawing stuff. I couldn’t even bare to fully ditch the shitty characters I made (and I’m going to explain them without context because I just feel like it): Satyr got split into his immortal and prince-ly side; Diane, a manic serial killer, shrunk down but kept her impossibly anxious personality; Gaseous is basically all the same, except he doesn’t meet the rest of the crew in what parts of his story I know about; Sistenagon (here we go with the weird names, they don’t mean anything) still kept his (her? Don’t actually remember which I called it) wasp-y nature, except in the form of an insect-based fairy tribe leader; Stelerachyt, who I drew as a Diamond Dog, is still a big, fluffy, dog, but turned into a more regal and kingly type of person; and Myriad Alloy (the only one with an actual pony name) got a complete makeover, and actually became my favorite end result after all is said and done.

Like, I love ranting about these guys. They were basically my own Mane Six. And yes, Satyr TOTALLY dated Twilight. Why wouldn’t he? Main character a Main character. Plus, he was supposed to be me, and I totally wanted to hit that. I’m not ashamed to admit it.

I mean, I guess a big part of why I actually went down that path was because of the large fanbase. I didn’t begin with the beginning of the show, but I guess I came in with the first large wave, so all of the stuff I made got just enough attention to make me think people wanted to see what I was making. If I started out with OCs, no one would’ve cared, and I very well could’ve stopped.

Even apart from that, this show definitely kick started my downward spiral into femininity. I mean, it’s pretty self-explanatory. Everyone “knew” MLP as being something super shallow, only to be enjoyed by shallow little girls, then they pumped out Friendship is Magic and everyone else loved it, so I gave it a shot, and I loved it too. Obviously every fandom has the people who openly, irrationally hate them, but the whole thing was welcoming enough to keep it solidified in my mind, and bish bash bosh, it kept going and will probably keep going into eternity. It’s funny, even then I drew Satyr with the more feminine pony design (not entirely because drawing the male pony type was harder), so I was setting myself up for the future.

I guess this kind of gives me a window to talk about My Life as a Teenage Robot, because for as long as I could remember before actually watching the show, I seriously despised any instance of XJ9 I could find. If an image of her popped up on screen, I would close it faster than if it was porn found while around my parents. I don’t know why she was so harshly ingrained in my mind. You could argue I just hated “girly” stuff before I realized I actually loved it, and didn’t want to face my emotions, but I wasn’t exaggerating at all about that porn thing. I actually couldn’t look at her for more than a second. But, one day I decided to cave in and see what was up, and soon enough she became one of my favorite cartoon characters of all time.

Back to ponies, some of the content produced by the fandom also had some extremely fond memories in my mind. I think I still have some songs by The Living Tombstone and WoodenToaster on my MP3 player (partially because it’s just good stuff) and for some reason playing on MLP-themed TF2 servers was actually really fun too. Some notable fandom people reacting to recent episodes was a spectacle I always looked forward to, and I still am subscribed to Saberspark and Ratchet on Youtube after all this time, probably as well as various other people who are still there but haven’t posted anything since the settling of the fandom. I just remembered, Hotdiggetydemon probably qualifies for all that too, since his .Mov series was the talk of the whole fandom. That, and Friendship is Witchcraft. I had to re-look up the name of that one though, but I still loved it.

I guess I should play favorites, huh? Favorites was the one game everyone in the fandom played.

Favorite episode: Can’t not be a tie between the 2-parters of Season 2. Discord is a riot, and Chrysalis is actually one of my favorite villain designs of all time. I’m a sucker for both shapeshifters and bugs, so you can’t expect me to not like her. Glad she rode the villain boat till the very end, although reformed Discord is definitely fine too. Plus, the rest of the Changelings turned anyway.

Favorite song: You expect me to not tie things up here? The Flim Flam brother’s Super Cider Squeezy 6000 is great, as are the brothers themselves, and I also love This Day Aria, since it’s the focal point where people realized this show seriously wasn’t just colorful, cute ponies. The Art of the Dress is also pretty catchy.

Actually, just remembered. Under Our Spell might be it. Took me a while to remember the EQG stuff, but that song is seriously good, and unironically better than the generic dribble that somehow magically beat it.

Favorite background pony(ies): Vinyl and Octavia are a pretty cute duo, and with the killer duet in the Slice of Life episode, ya gotta love em. Funny thing, though: There’s this background pony that looks almost identical to my current self-insert pony OC, with purple hair and a grey coat, with a seemingly writing-based cutie mark and green eyes. He’s even a unicorn too. It wasn’t intentional, I swear.

Favorite CMC: Sweetie Belle is too much. Her little squeaks are too pure. I can’t take it. Applebloom has nice colors, though.

Favorite Princess: If you don’t say Luna you’re a cop

Favorite non-pony species: Obviously Changelings, but after their reformation the honors actually switch to the Kirins, just because of how cool they look. The Yaks are pretty fun too. Speaking of…

Favorite nu-Mane Six (or are they called the School Six? Whatever, you know what I mean): All Yona. And yes, I had to look up her name was, who cares? She’s adorable.

Favorite of the Pillars of Equestria: I honestly love that they made Starswirl an actual character in the show. For the longest time, people just assumed he would stay in the form of Twilight’s Nightmare Night costume forever, but then they actually made him real! That’s really cool.

Favorite Equestria Girls design: Once again, Sweetie Belle steals both this spot and my heart.

And, of course… Favorite of the Mane Six:

Honestly, it just depends on the mood I’m in. Not even remotely lying there.

Fluttershy would’ve been my answer way back then, since I was into the shy types. There’s definitely something still there. You can’t deny that she’s the most cuddly of them all.

Twilight might’ve been a tie for the top around then too, since I was also the too-smart-for-humanity type. That leads into you liking the “smart” ones. Plus, in the latter half of the series, she did feel like she was put one step above the rest of the cast. That kinda makes her feel slightly off, I guess. Still like her, though.

Pinkie Pie’s one of those that I can imagine liking, but if I ever actually had to deal with that much energy I might actually melt. And, not in that I’m-totally-in-love kind of melting. Literal, actual melting.

Rarity, in terms of concept, is easily my favorite type of character for the show. On the surface, she’s the generic fashionista type that every girl’s show has, but instead of her being someone who “just makes clothes” she’s actually seriously hard working and goes through all the regular motions you’d expect from an artist. Turning such a cliche on its head and giving it a much more realistic image is perfect for this show. Also, she’s purple. I like purple.

Not much really needs to be said about Applejack. She really seems like the most logical one of the group, even at the very beginning. That’s great to have when everyone else is acting like spoiled/sheltered brats (at least, when she’s not acting that way either).

But, I really gotta be honest… I’m never really in the mood for Rainbow Dash. She’s like the opposite of AJ, where she’s always some degree of arrogant, and even though watching her achieve her dreams is nice, her big head gets a little annoying for side gags. Also, if you showed me a plain picture of the Mane Six, I would’ve told you she was the main character instead of Twilight, just because she stands out so much more. I mean, the show isn’t called “Twilight Sparkle: Friendship is Magic,” but still.

If you really want a straight answer, I’m in a Rarity mood right now, so I’ll go with that. It’s probably the safest bet, because, like I said, I do love purple. Not just purple, but purple AND white put together. One of my favorite color combinations. Just add a little gold, and you’re, well, you know...

But… Yeah. All good things had to come to an end. I feel like its time came. Plus, they ended the show with the little story book thing they did in the very first episode, so as far as I’m concerned the series is complete. It did its job, anyway.

#mlp #mlp fim #friendship is magic #my little pony #rant #rambling #opinions #nostalgia #poole #cute #mlp 10th anniversary

1 note · View note

bomber-base · 8 years

Text

Sora Says: Super Bomberman R Sure is a Thing

Bomberlovelies! It’s your fruit-snack-loving neighborhood Sora here with some SBR stuff.

First off, I’m not sure how many people this matters to, and I suppose technically I’m practically a month late on this, but! I’ve been striving to keep the Base as spoiler-free as possible for those unable to play SBR for the time being. So, as you may have noticed, spoilers are noted and/or cut in the posts that they happen to appear in. I’m not sure how long to keep this up for; maybe six months to a year? What do y’all think? This is the first time I’ve ever had to be cautious about spoilers for a general audience, so I’m a little unsure on the etiquette.

Secondly, I’ve tested out the recent patch for SBR, and the controls are definitely improved. I had to use the not-quite-a-d-pad on the Joy-Cons the first time through, but now I can comfortably use the joystick to get around. I’ve been lost in the fields of Hyrule for the time being, though, so I haven’t yet had too much occasion yet to fully enjoy this update.

Thirdly, to the surprise of absolutely no one, I have Thoughts™ about this game. Not comprehensive ones, not coherent ones, and probably not even particularly interesting or unique ones, but Thoughts™ regardless. So here they are, spoiler-free: not so much a proper game review as it is me just bomberblathering into the void.

***

Super Bomberman R appears to be the result of what Bomberman used to be trying to score with what Bomberman could be. Unfortunately, they barely make it to first base, and on the way to second base they fall into a sudden rift in space-time that leads to the universe of Normal End TSA, a universe which could ultimately be considered responsible for that other reboot everyone knows about. This is a terrible metaphor from a terrible fan with terrible crack theories. That is to say, SBR should have been a triumphant return to form for the Bomberman series, but ends up being...a little less so.

For a loser like me, who properly came in during the Nintendo 64 era and had been super-stoked about the apparent return to that style of gameplay with the now-canceled Bomberman 3DS, the reality of SBR is once a golden promise and twice a leaden disappointment, a description which really shortchanges lead in its ability to shield us from bone-frying radiation. While obviously I was -- and still am -- relieved that Konami is actually making good-faith efforts to bring Bomberman to life again and save him from the nothing he’s become, I was much less thrilled with what they threw back to, and wholly unimpressed by the result from a gameplay standpoint. With mechanics that are pared down even compared to the game that inspired them, SBR completely failed to sell me on the old-school formula. It’s more impressive in terms of the rebooted aesthetics, with stronger visuals and writing, but the general execution of the reboot arguably comes at the cost of some of the nostalgic power that Konami wanted to harness.

Fans who lit their fuses with the SuperBomb games might feel differently than I do, of course. It’s entirely possible that maybe this game isn’t “for me,” that there’s something I’m missing about SBR that would trip the nostalgia wire in someone else. As a childhood fan of the Bomberman games for Nintendo consoles around the late 90s and early 00s, it’s difficult to talk about the flaws of SBR without making it sound like I’m just bitter that it’s not Bomberman 64 R(edux). I mean, I am, but that’s beside the point. Also I have yet to properly play Bomberman 64 so I’m probably not even a real N64 fan. In the cascade of sentiments that follows, though, I've done what I can to meet SBR on its own terms in order to argue that, even by the retro standards it draws from, it doesn’t live up to what it could or should have been. Conversely, there were things I quite liked about the game! And I’ve made my best effort to give credit where credit is due. Make no mistake: SBR had more pressure than other games I could name (like a certain legendary one...) to pull off a perfect 10 on balancing tradition with innovation. Both directions come with their high points and pitfalls, and fans will have differing opinions about how well Konami scored on either.

Personal grievances aside, I ultimately think it was important for Konami to first prove that they still had a handle on the bomberbasics, especially given the quirkier entries that got released in the lead-up to Hudson Soft being assimilated into the Konamiborg. (I mean, I liked Custom Battler Bomberman and think more people should check it out, but how did they even decide it was a good idea?) While I’ll contend that this game is maybe too basic, the overall choice to reference the SuperBomb series makes sense considering that Bomberman’s heyday was during his Super Nintendo days. (My gosh, have you seen the merch? The merch!!!) So in the end I can’t really blame Konami for using it as a springboard. I can only wish that they’d stuck the landing a little better.

The takeaway: Super Bomberman R is a more of a gilded lead pebble than a 24-karat star, but, like lead, it still has its uses and strengths. It’s a relatively decent effort by Konami to reintroduce him back into console gaming, a distinctive entry in Bomberman’s history up to this point, and a solid choice to start a revival with -- almost in spite of itself.

Hate the Game, Not the Player (The Game Already Hates the Player)

(I should note that I’m saying all this from the standpoint of having beat single-player once on Beginner mode. Aside from being a terrible fan with terrible metaphors and terrible theories, it also turns out I’m also a terrible gamer. The Terrible Tyrantress of Bomber Base: that’s me. So it’s entirely possible that some of my beefs with the gameplay are rectified in the two other difficulties, or in some other unlockable thing I haven’t done or heard of yet.)

How “pared down” are we talking, in regards to this game’s mechanics? When I began the initial round of wordbarfing, I initially wrote that Super Bomberman R was such a throwback that remote bombs don’t exist in it. Turns out that both Super Bomberman 3 (which appears to be the primary inspiration for SBR, considering that they share the same basic plot premise) and the original Bomberman game for NES featured them. Whoops. No Hearts or Louies/Tirras either, which means that Bomberman is back to the good ol’ days of being a one-hit wonder. Fair enough: that’s pretty old-school, right? We don’t need no stinkin’ heart meter in these parts. But let’s take a closer look at the powerups. SBR has a functional enough set comprised of Bomb Up, Fire Up, Fire Down, Speed Up, Power Glove, Boxing Glove, Pierce Bombs, and Rubber Bombs. But it’s quite clearly lacking when you compare it with SB3′s offerings. And for a game which actually translates your score into in-game currency for continues and unlocking multiplayer options (a.k.a the shit that 99.5% of bomberfandom cares about), it’s unfortunate that Konami decided not to include bonus items (which, again, were featured in both the original Bomberman for NES and Super Bomberman 3) to help boost your numbers. Additionally, the lack of Bomb Downs and Speed Downs/Sandals lowers some of the stakes of the gameplay. You gain points for every power-up you collect, so it’s not inconceivable to theorize that running into a Bomb Down or a Speed Down would result in you losing those points. (Admittedly, I’m not sure at the moment how Fire Downs function in the game from a score standpoint, since I’ve avoided them thus far.)

I can’t believe I had to satisfy my thirst for remote bombs with BotW. Unexpected perk of a Zelda game is unexpected.

The lack of item variety might not grate so much if the overall context of the gameplay were more diverse and/or expanded. SBR does a little better than its predecessors in introducing alternate stage objectives for each world, but I found that the ones for world 1 and world 5 were too similar, which is fairly glaring when you’re only looking at five worlds in total. Additionally, the objectives that requires you to find a set amount of certain objects don’t randomize their location, removing an element of challenge from the gameplay. The field enemies are generic and monotonous, with what seem to be only aesthetic variations across worlds (and movement speed across difficulties, as I understand it). You can sometimes take them out via bombing a support structure that collapses on top of them, which can be fun when it happens, but there aren’t too many opportunities to pull that off and not much incentive to do so other than personal validation. The Baroms/Balloms/Valcoms/no-one-cares-about-localization-consistency-with-Bomberman highlight my earlier point about SBR’s innovation at the cost of nostalgia: their flipped design is an interesting twist, but I admit I didn’t even realize what they were until someone pointed out their balloony nature. On the other hand, at least SBR also gave us the Hige Hige Bandits (technically they’re from the Saturn iteration of the games, but it was around the same era and they’re cute so I’ll let it pass), and you get the impression that the mecha forms of the Dastardly Bombers were absolutely made for 3D. Their arena fights feature some really smart AI as well, even on Beginner mode. (Though there are still sometimes...mishaps...) However, I’ve seen less-than-impressed comments about the rinse-and-repeat nature of their mecha fights, which further reinforce the dull repetitiveness that appears to be endemic to this game as a whole. At this point I would almost welcome a bonus stage of Pontans armed with just 1 Bomb, 1 Fire, and 1 Speed. While there are over 50 stages in the game, 1/5th of those are boss battles (if you count the arena battle and the mecha battle as two separate stages) and they overall go by quite fast.

Comments about the disparity between the dearth of game content with the game’s full retail price are further underscored when you consider that story mode’s main replay value appears to solely be in earning currency to unlock all the multiplayer goodies and custom antenna attachments. Not that replaying story mode for battle mode booty is anything new, of course. But at least something like Bomberman 64 also featured a way to unlock additional story mode content, and you were able to customize the full character instead of just the antenna. The setup reads like Konami trying to Stockholm players into liking a half-assed single-player misadventure. I’m a little concerned that SBR potentially demonstrates the modern limitations of Bomberman’s original arcade-based formula, i.e., the gridded, linearly-progressing stages. With the chance to reboot Bomberman for a new generation of gaming, Konami needs to do what the Zelda team did for BotW and sit down to figure out what is actually a legitimate convention of bombercanon, and what is a convention only because “that’s how it’s always been,” especially if it grew out of the technical limitations of the past.

I’m not gonna shut up about Zelda, okay. I was Zeldatrash before I was bombertrash.

In terms of multiplayer, well, we already know that Konami sorta bombed it a little out of the gate, given the lag issues for online play. But even at its core, the multiplayer experience doesn’t make the grade -- or at least as high of a grade as it should have for a series that has such a huge reputation as a party game. You can’t even argue that it’s just “going back to basics,” as SB3 at least let you choose whether you wanted to do an all-out Battle Royale or a Tag Match, along with offering item minigames to let players have a chance to start the following match at an advantage. On the other end of the spectrum, one of the selling points of the Switch is its ability to adapt to multiple setups for on-the-go or at home. It’s not hard to surmise that Konami wanted to get hitched to the Switch in order to promote Bomberman’s multiplayer capabilities. So why are the battle mode options aside from the stage selection so bare? Obviously we don’t yet have any sort of insight into the development process and timeline of SBR, but it seems like they should have at least blown battle mode out of the water given 1) the price they charged for the game and 2) how much downtime the franchise had. It’s not like they didn’t have any inspiration for it, either: all they had to do was look at Bomberman Generation and they’d be set to start the party. Online play does host some interesting features, such as ranked match-ups and the ability to create individual battle rooms for yourself and whoever you invite to fight things out with, but I’m not sure how this compares with something like, say, Bomberman Live. Someone more informed is going to have to pick up the slack. The point is, where’s my Reversi Battle, dammit?!

Even the Way I Do Subsection Headings is Cool (Spoilers: It’s Not)

The first surprising thing Konami did for the franchise this year was to announce an actual console game for it. The second surprising thing they did was to upgrade the aesthetics of the original in both visuals and storytelling. The third surprising thing they did was Bombergirl. That they bothered to introduce no less than eight protagonist characters, animate cutscenes with those characters in them, and have those characters voiced with (at least in Japanese) some all-star talent continues to astonish me, not to mention some of the little spoilery details they threw in. While I generally agree about how short the cutscenes are, the writers still managed to make the most of what they were given to work with. Each sibling gets their fifteen seconds of fame not by hogging the spotlight and leaving the rest of their siblings in the dark, but by sharing it and letting the personality dominoes fall where they may; notable moments for me are the ending cutscenes for world 1 and world 3. In this way, in spite of the large cast and the decidedly-less-large narrative space, no character feels too neglected. We’re not talking JRPG levels of writing depth here, not by a longshot, but it’s probably the most consistently entertaining writing I’ve seen from a Bomberman game.

(Granted, the Bomberman series likes its writing the way Zoniha likes her men, i.e. barely there. So it’s not like SBR had a high bar to clear.)

The colorful cutscenes directed by Poeyama and illustrated by Hideyuki Takenami burst with expressiveness and fun, and the redesigns for Bagular/Buggler and the Dastardlies are delightful extrapolations of their older looks. So it’s a mystery to me why Konami didn’t extend any of that good stuff to the actual gameplay graphics. I said in a previous post that the contrast between the realistic environments and the cartoony vibe of the characters would probably help with navigating the game world, but in actuality I found the environmental details too overwhelming and distracting, which when combined with the then-iffy controls led to more than a few deaths for me. (World 3, I would say I’ve got my eye on you, but I need to keep what’s left of my poor eyesight.) Additionally, while they’re well-rendered, they’re also on the generic side, which is doubly disappointing given the distinct nature of the cutscene visuals and the character designs. It’s not like there hasn’t been a 3D Bomberman game with overly-stylized gameplay graphics before (see again: Bomberman Generation, and to a lesser degree Bomberman Jetters), so why so standard? Especially since such a direction, again, arguably neutralizes some of the nostalgic charm of SBR. Who the hell hails the Bomberman games, especially the Super Bomberman ones, for their ultra-realistic graphics?

The animation only kinda makes up for the uninspired environments. Konami gets my applause for the unique walk cycles, victory poses, and idle stances, any one of which would have been more effort than I would have expected out of them. But they all have the same bomb-throwing animation that honestly barely qualifies as an animation considering how it feels like it lasts half a frame. I wouldn’t normally harp on something so nitpicky except that Konami’s own promotional efforts for the game made such a big deal of the UNIQUE PERSONALITIES!!! of each bombersib. If they were already going as far as to customize each character’s idle stance, it seems like such a gross oversight to not also customize the other basic movement associated with a Bomberman character, or at least give it a little more flair and presence. The enemies also just flop over and blip out of existence when they die, which aside from being unsatisfying in general also doesn’t do justice to the source material. I’m not asking for bloody gibs splattered across the scenery here (although that could be kind of funny if handled in just the right tongue-in-cheek sort of way), but watch a couple of minutes of gameplay from SB3 and you’ll see that along with featuring death animations in general, different enemies even have different ones. In short, despite some genuinely nice attention to detail -- let me reiterate that the designs for the Dastardlies’ mechas are pretty awesome -- the gameplay visuals generally don’t match up to the fun factor of the cutscenes, resulting in a slightly inconsistent feel for the game and (more importantly) some missed shots at recapturing the charms of the original.

Given the effort Konami has put into the upgraded aesthetics and narrative and the subsequent promotion focusing around that (yes, I’ve seen episode 2 of Bomberman TV and me and BDR are working on summarizing that; well, mostly BDR, really), it’s hard not to think that Konami was trying to cover up a manure mound with sheets of rainbow gold. Nevertheless, that same effort, along with some spoilery stuff, suggests the possibility of follow-ups in this particular iteration of the canon, which can hopefully only be a good thing. I’d still prefer a return to the more traditional Bomberman lore, but I don’t mind riding shotgun for this. I mean, shit, the scenery’s great.

The Rest is Still Unwritten (Because My Pen Ran Out of Ink and Pommy Ate My Spare One)

There are some other things I could kvetch about in this game (things I didn’t touch upon here: the English voice-acting and the music, particularly the menu tracks), but in the end, I’m still happy SBR exists, and I don’t regret shelling out full price for it. The awesome thing about modern gaming is that Konami is able to fix parts of SBR according to player demand via online patches, as mentioned at the top of this post, which also means that, theoretically, there’s room for DLC to address the lack of content. The recent releases of Bomberman games of VC indicates more official interest in the series again, while the direction displayed by SBR show promising experimentation and expansion of the canon. And the scale of the promotional efforts for SBR is clearly Konami putting on some serious gameface in the matter of making Bomberman relevant again. It’s like seeing the signs of the apocalypse on Opposite Day.

As of the time of posting, the third week of numbers is in for SBR, from both Media Create and Famitsu (via Game Data Library). No matter which metric you go by, SBR has broken over 50,000 copies sold in less than a month, which is on par with or beyond the lifetime numbers of many other Bomberman games. Super Bomberman R might be far from a perfect game, with some circumstances mitigating its impressive numbers, but it’s still one to respect.

#bomberman #super bomberman r #news #review #even though i said this wasn't really a review #sora says #but seriously #don't let me do a comparison of botw's throwback approach versus sbr's #it's only going to lead to kool-aid tears #and more terrible tsa references #also i'm old enough to eat mario kart fruit snacks whenever i want

6 notes · View notes

recentanimenews · 5 years

Text

Does Boruto’s Time Skip Arc Fit the Tone of the Original Naruto Anime?

Over the course of 2/3rds of this year, some of us on the Crunchyroll Features team embarked on an incredible journey known as THE GREAT CRUNCHYROLL NARUTO REWATCH. We went through all 220 episodes of Naruto and got to see everything from incredible fights to a whole lot of filler. For someone like me, it was a fun way to watch a series I completely missed out on since by the time I stopped watching anime around 2003, Naruto really hadn’t become the popular juggernaut it’d eventually become.

Since the Rewatch, the creators of BORUTO: NARUTO NEXT GENERATIONS clearly were reading along and thought, we should totally do something that fits into this very specific feature. This new time skip arc of Boruto was intriguing to me as someone who’s only watched Naruto and not ventured past that, especially with the idea if they can recapture the style, feel, and storytelling of a series that had its last episode over ten years ago. So, with Naruto still fresh in my mind, is this new arc going to be reminiscent of the main story or more in line with a filler arc?

Coming to Boruto with very little knowledge of what’s happened in the series and everything else that transpired in Shippuden, it’s a bit intimidating to dive in considering I’m missing over 600 episodes of content. Boruto actually seems to understand that there might be people like me coming to this arc who aren’t following along with the current product. You get a good mix of seeing folks you’d remember who are now older. That included me exclaiming, “Choji, you look old!” Plus, you get a good introduction to Boruto and how he is as a character before we get to time warping.

There are some odd things for newcomers such as Naruto being cold to Boruto and Sasuke no longer being the poster child for Hot Topic, but it’s nothing that is confusing in any sort of way. Boruto also does a decent job of showing off its villain for this arc and explaining their motivations and powers pretty quickly, despite them clearly being around previously. Once Sasuke and Boruto find themselves back in the Hidden Leaf Village of the past, that’s where the show really showcases that it knows what it’s doing. Since that happens at the end of an episode, Boruto immediately lets you, the viewers, know you’re going back to the past by switching to the classic Naruto next episode music.

The changing of music continues throughout the rest of the arc as now all of the backing tracks are ones you’d constantly hear in Naruto. It’s such a smart decision that they could have not made and instead stuck with the Boruto soundtrack. Hearing those older tracks gives you a nice warm feeling, and it’s legitimately true nostalgia—which is weird for me to say since I’ve only just watched Naruto, but it still works all the same. It’s as if you’ve unearthed this unseen Naruto arc that never aired during its initial run from 2002-2007. If you weren’t paying attention to the screen and were just listening, you’d think this was actually Naruto.

The artstyle doesn’t really change from how Boruto has seemed to look previously, yet the younger versions of Naruto, Sakura, and everyone else looks the same as you’d remember them. Their designs fit in with the style that Boruto uses and doesn’t hinder or hurt these older characters in any sort of way. The only knocks I’d have against it is that the animation doesn’t seem to be as experimental or wild as Naruto could be at times, although there haven’t been any big fights for it to really do that. Also, I kind of with they’d switched from 16:9 to 4:3 for when they’re in the past, but I get that’d probably be a tough switch considering everybody involved in production is so used to creating shows at that aspect ratio now.

Now, let’s talk about this arc’s story since that’s the crux of the whole thing. The abilities of Urashiki that they described certainly make this whole story possible in a way that’s believable, and it’s placed just before the Sasuke Retrieval Arc to ensure Sasuke doesn’t run into himself. Sasuke basically putting the rules of Back to the Future in effect so Boruto doesn’t mess up the future is funny, and there’s even a moment where you get worried the show might take one of the plot points of that film series. The writing seems pretty good throughout as well, but then you have to see aspects like Sexy Jutsu again which is still groan inducing. If you put kid Naruto into something, that’s gotta show up apparently. We can only hope this arc doesn’t end with a fart joke or with some of the bad ways Naruto would try to implement humor.

All of the other trios show up as well which gives you a good chance to remember how these characters were as kids. Obviously this arc hasn’t completed yet, but if we don’t get some ridiculous Boruto versus Rock Lee encounter, I’ll be very disappointed. It would have been easy to just make this an easy nostalgia cash in arc, but the writing thus far has captured what made those early Naruto arcs so fun. The determination of Naruto, his ability to try his best despite being racked with the guilt of Sasuke leaving, and allowing Boruto to see this new side of his dad that it seems he’s never witnessed before. Despite this arc not having Naruto as the person leading it, he’s still a big proponent that it keeps the soul of the original Naruto and gives you new character moments with someone who’s been well developed for almost twenty years in anime.

Through six episodes, this doesn’t really have the same feeling that even the best filler arcs of Naruto had. This is certainly much more in line with the adapted source material, since we’re not meeting characters and having them immediately not mean anything. Although, this actually has the same problem that Naruto filler had in that we know that Naruto can’t have anything bad happen to him. Unless Boruto is going to go off in a completely shocking direction, he’s not going to die, get gravely injured, or get any affliction that affects his future self. If that does end up happening, you’d presume to think it’d get solved in some sort of way. Even with that caveat, it really doesn’t take away from what this arc has shown thus far.

This Boruto time skip arc made me realize how much I’d missed young Naruto’s adventures with his pals and all the shenanigans he’d get into. It’s fun to see him be a little turd at times, but still have that heart of gold that makes his story so appealable. I went into this thinking that Boruto might make this a bit tough to follow, but it’d be at least fun, and it’s exceeded my expectations. I am very excited to see where this arc goes. For those of you that only have vague memories of Naruto and didn’t go further, haven’t really dived into Boruto, or just want to see the younger versions of these classic characters, it’s safe to say that Boruto has done a great job of recapturing what made the original Naruto a fun ride.

Where are you expecting this time skip arc to eventually lead to? What kind of shenanigans can Boruto and Sasuke get up to with Naruto, Jiraiya, and everyone else? Has this led you to feeling nostalgia for Naruto? Let us kow down in the comments below!

---

Jared Clemons is a writer and podcaster for Seasonal Anime Checkup where he can be found always wanting to talk about Love Live! Sunshine!! or whatever else he's into at the moment. He can be found on Twitter @ragbag.

Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

0 notes

thesnhuup · 5 years

Text

Pop Picks – October 31

October 31, 2019

What I’m listening to:

It drove his critics crazy that Obama was the coolest president we ever had and his summer 2019 playlist on Spotify simply confirms that reality. It has been on repeat for me. From Drake to Lizzo (God I love her) to Steely Dan to Raphael Saadiq to Sinatra (who I skip every time – I’m not buying the nostalgia), his carefully curated list reflects not only his infinite coolness, but the breadth of his interests and generosity of taste. I love the music, but I love even more the image of Michelle and him rocking out somewhere far from Washington’s madness, as much as I miss them both.

What I’m reading:

I struggled with Christy Lefteri’s The Beekeeper of Aleppo for the first 50 pages, worried that she’d drag out every tired trope of Mid-Eastern society, but I fell for her main characters and their journey as refugees from Syria to England. Parts of this book were hard to read and very dark, because that is the plight of so many refugees and she doesn’t shy away from those realities and the enormous toll they take on displaced people. It’s a hard read, but there is light too – in resilience, in love, in friendships, the small tender gestures of people tossed together in a heartless world. Lefteri volunteered in Greek refugee programs, spent a lot of interviewing people, and the book feels true, and importantly, heartfelt.

What I’m watching:

Soap opera meets Shakespeare, deliciously malevolent and operatic, Succession has been our favorite series this season. Loosely based on the Murdochs and their media empire (don’t believe the denials), this was our must watch television on Sunday nights, filling the void left by Game of Thrones. The acting is over-the-top good, the frequent comedy dark, the writing brilliant, and the music superb. We found ourselves quoting lines after every episode. Like the hilarious; “You don’t hear much about syphilis these days. Very much the Myspace of STDs.” Watch it so we can talk about that season 2 finale.

Archive

August 30, 2019

What I’m listening to:

I usually go to music here, but the New York Times new 1619 podcast is just terrific, as is the whole project, which observes the sale of the first enslaved human beings on our shores 400 years ago. The first episode, “The Fight for a True Democracy” is a remarkable overview (in a mere 44 minutes) of the centrality of racism and slavery in the American story over those 400 years. It should be mandatory listening in every high school in the country. I’m eager for the next episodes. Side note: I am addicted to The Daily podcast, which gives more color and detail to the NY Times stories I read in print (yes, print), and reminds me of how smart and thoughtful are those journalists who give us real news. We need them now more than ever.

What I’m reading:

Colson Whitehead has done it again. The Nickel Boys, his new novel, is a worthy successor to his masterpiece The Underground Railroad, and because it is closer to our time, based on the real-life horrors of a Florida reform school, and written a time of resurgent White Supremacy, it hits even harder and with more urgency than its predecessor. Maybe because we can read Underground Railroad with a sense of “that was history,” but one can’t read Nickel Boys without the lurking feeling that such horrors persist today and the monsters that perpetrate such horrors walk among us. They often hold press conferences.

What I’m watching:

Queer Eye, the Netflix remake of the original Queer Eye for the Straight Guy some ten years later, is wondrously entertaining, but it also feels adroitly aligned with our dysfunctional times. Episode three has a conversation with Karamo Brown, one of the fab five, and a Georgia small town cop (and Trump supporter) that feels unscripted and unexpected and reminds us of how little actual conversation seems to be taking place in our divided country. Oh, for more car rides such as the one they take in that moment, when a chasm is bridged, if only for a few minutes. Set in the South, it is often a refreshing and affirming response to what it means to be male at a time of toxic masculinity and the overdue catharsis and pain of the #MeToo movement. Did I mention? It’s really fun.

July 1, 2019

What I’m listening to:

The National remains my favorite band and probably 50% of my listening time is a National album or playlist. Their new album I Am Easy To Find feels like a turning point record for the band, going from the moody, outsider introspection and doubt of lead singer Matt Berninger to something that feels more adult, sophisticated, and wiser. I might have titled it Women Help The Band Grow Up. Matt is no longer the center of The National’s universe and he frequently cedes the mic to the many women who accompany and often lead on the long, their longest, album. They include Gail Ann Dorsey (who sang with Bowie for a long time), who is amazing, and a number of the songs were written by Carin Besser, Berninger’s wife. I especially love the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, the arrangements, and the sheer complexity and coherence of the work. It still amazes me when I meet someone who does not know The National. My heart breaks for them just a little.

What I’m reading:

Pat Barker’s The Silence of the Girls is a retelling of Homer’s Iliad through the lens of a captive Trojan queen, Briseis. As a reviewer in The Atlantic writes, it answers the question “What does war mean to women?” We know the answer and it has always been true, whether it is the casual and assumed rape of captive women in this ancient war story or the use of rape in modern day Congo, Syria, or any other conflict zone. Yet literature almost never gives voice to the women – almost always minor characters at best — and their unspeakable suffering. Barker does it here for Briseis, for Hector’s wife Andromache, and for the other women who understand that the death of their men is tragedy, but what they then endure is worse. Think of it ancient literature having its own #MeToo moment. The NY Times’ Geraldine Brooks did not much like the novel. I did. Very much.

What I’m watching:

The BBC-HBO limited series Years and Years is breathtaking, scary, and absolutely familiar. It’s as if Black Mirrorand Children of Men had a baby and it precisely captures the zeitgeist, the current sense that the world is spinning out of control and things are coming at us too fast. It is a near future (Trump has been re-elected and Brexit has occurred finally)…not dystopia exactly, but damn close. The closing scene of last week’s first episode (there are 6 episodes and it’s on every Monday) shows nuclear war breaking out between China and the U.S. Yikes! The scope of this show is wide and there is a big, baggy feel to it – but I love the ambition even if I’m not looking forward to the nightmares.

May 19, 2019

What I’m listening to:

I usually go to music here, but I was really moved by this podcast of a Davis Brooks talk at the Commonwealth Club in Silicon Valley: https://www.commonwealthclub.org/events/archive/podcast/david-brooks-quest-moral-life. While I have long found myself distant from his political stance, he has come through a dark night of the soul and emerged with a wonderful clarity about calling, community, and not happiness (that most superficial of goals), but fulfillment and meaning, found in community and human kinship of many kinds. I immediately sent it to my kids.

What I’m reading:

Susan Orlean’s wonderful The Library Book, a love song to libraries told through the story of the LA Central Library. It brought back cherished memories of my many hours in beloved libraries — as a kid in the Waltham Public Library, a high schooler in the Farber Library at Brandeis (Lil Farber years later became a mentor of mine), and the cathedral-like Bapst Library at BC when I was a graduate student. Yes, I was a nerd. This is a love song to books certainly, but a reminder that libraries are so, so much more. It is a reminder that libraries are less about a place or being a repository of information and, like America at its best, an idea and ideal. By the way, oh to write like her.

What I’m watching:

What else? Game of Thrones, like any sensible human being. This last season is disappointing in many ways and the drop off in the writing post George R.R. Martin is as clear as was the drop off in the post-Sorkin West Wing. I would be willing to bet that if Martin has been writing the last season, Sansa and Tyrion would have committed suicide in the crypt. That said, we fans are deeply invested and even the flaws are giving us so much to discuss and debate. In that sense, the real gift of this last season is the enjoyment between episodes, like the old pre-streaming days when we all arrived at work after the latest episode of the Sopranos to discuss what we had all seen the night before. I will say this, the last two episodes — full of battle and gore – have been visually stunning. Whether the torches of the Dothraki being extinguished in the distance or Arya riding through rubble and flame on a white horse, rarely has the series ascended to such visual grandeur.

March 28, 2019

What I’m listening to:

There is a lovely piece played in a scene from A Place Called Home that I tracked down. It’s Erik Satie’s 3 Gymnopédies: Gymnopédie No. 1, played by the wonderful pianist Klára Körmendi. Satie composed this piece in 1888 and it was considered avant-garde and anti-Romantic. It’s minimalism and bit of dissonance sound fresh and contemporary to my ears and while not a huge Classical music fan, I’ve fallen in love with the Körmendi playlist on Spotify. When you need an alternative to hours of Cardi B.

What I’m reading:

Just finished Esi Edugyan’s 2018 novel Washington Black. Starting on a slave plantation in Barbados, it is a picaresque novel that has elements of Jules Verne, Moby Dick, Frankenstein, and Colson Whitehead’s Underground Railroad. Yes, it strains credulity and there are moments of “huh?”, but I loved it (disclosure: I was in the minority among my fellow book club members) and the first third is a searing depiction of slavery. It’s audacious, sprawling (from Barbados to the Arctic to London to Africa), and the writing, especially about nature, luminous.

What I’m watching:

A soap opera. Yes, I’d like to pretend it’s something else, but we are 31 episodes into the Australian drama A Place Called Home and we are so, so addicted. Like “It’s AM, but can’t we watch just one more episode?” addicted. Despite all the secrets, cliff hangers, intrigue, and “did that just happen?” moments, the core ingredients of any good soap opera, APCH has superb acting, real heft in terms of subject matter (including homophobia, anti-Semitism, sexual assault, and class), touches of our beloved Downton Abbey, and great cars. Beware. If you start, you won’t stop.

February 11, 2019

What I’m listening to:

Raphael Saadiq has been around for quite a while, as a musician, writer, and producer. He’s new to me and I love his old school R&B sound. Like Leon Bridges, he brings a contemporary freshness to the genre, sounding like a young Stevie Wonder (listen to “You’re The One That I Like”). Rock and Roll may be largely dead, but R&B persists – maybe because the former was derivative of the latter and never as good (and I say that as a Rock and Roll fan). I’m embarrassed to only have discovered Saadiq so late in his career, but it’s a delight to have done so.

What I’m reading:

Just finished Marilynne Robinson’s Home, part of her trilogy that includes the Pulitzer Prize winning first novel, Gilead, and the book after Home, Lila. Robinson is often described as a Christian writer, but not in a conventional sense. In this case, she gives us a modern version of the prodigal son and tells the story of what comes after he is welcomed back home. It’s not pretty. Robinson is a self-described Calvinist, thus character begets fate in Robinson’s world view and redemption is at best a question. There is something of Faulkner in her work (I am much taken with his famous “The past is never past” quote after a week in the deep South), her style is masterful, and like Faulkner, she builds with these three novels a whole universe in the small town of Gilead. Start with Gilead to better enjoy Home.

What I’m watching:

Sex Education was the most fun series we’ve seen in ages and we binged watched it on Netflix. A British homage to John Hughes films like The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, and Pretty in Pink, it feels like a mash up of American and British high schools. Focusing on the relationship of Maeve, the smart bad girl, and Otis, the virginal and awkward son of a sex therapist (played with brilliance by Gillian Anderson), it is laugh aloud funny and also evolves into more substance and depth (the abortion episode is genius). The sex scenes are somehow raunchy and charming and inoffensive at the same time and while ostensibly about teenagers (it feels like it is explaining contemporary teens to adults in many ways), the adults are compelling in their good and bad ways. It has been renewed for a second season, which is a gift.

January 3, 2019

What I’m listening to:

My listening choices usually refer to music, but this time I’m going with Malcolm Gladwell’s Revisionist History podcast on genius and the song Hallelujah. It tells the story of Leonard Cohen’s much-covered song Hallelujah and uses it as a lens on kinds of genius and creativity. Along the way, he brings in Picasso and Cézanne, Elvis Costello, and more. Gladwell is a good storyteller and if you love pop music, as I do, and Hallelujah, as I do (and you should), you’ll enjoy this podcast. We tend to celebrate the genius who seems inspired in the moment, creating new work like lightning strikes, but this podcast has me appreciating incremental creativity in a new way. It’s compelling and fun at the same time.

What I’m reading:

Just read Clay Christensen’s new book, The Prosperity Paradox: How Innovation Can Lift Nations Out of Poverty. This was an advance copy, so soon available. Clay is an old friend and a huge influence on how we have grown SNHU and our approach to innovation. This book is so compelling, because we know attempts at development have so often been a failure and it is often puzzling to understand why some countries with desperate poverty and huge challenges somehow come to thrive (think S. Korea, Singapore, 19th C. America), while others languish. Clay offers a fresh way of thinking about development through the lens of his research on innovation and it is compelling. I bet this book gets a lot of attention, as most of his work does. I also suspect that many in the development community will hate it, as it calls into question the approach and enormous investments we have made in an attempt to lift countries out of poverty. A provocative read and, as always, Clay is a good storyteller.

What I’m watching:

Just watched Leave No Trace and should have guessed that it was directed by Debra Granik. She did Winter’s Bone, the extraordinary movie that launched Jennifer Lawrence’s career. Similarly, this movie features an amazing young actor, Thomasin McKenzie, and visits lives lived on the margins. In this case, a veteran suffering PTSD, and his 13-year-old daughter. The movie is patient, is visually lush, and justly earned 100% on Rotten Tomatoes (I have a rule to never watch anything under 82%). Everything in this film is under control and beautifully understated (aside from the visuals) – confident acting, confident directing, and so humane. I love the lack of flashbacks, the lack of sensationalism – the movie trusts the viewer, rare in this age of bombast. A lovely film.

December 4, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Spending a week in New Zealand, we had endless laughs listening to the Kiwi band, Flight of the Conchords. Lots of comedic bands are funny, but the music is only okay or worse. These guys are funny – hysterical really – and the music is great. They have an uncanny ability to parody almost any style. In both New Zealand and Australia, we found a wry sense of humor that was just delightful and no better captured than with this duo. You don’t have to be in New Zealand to enjoy them.

What I’m reading:

I don’t often reread. For two reasons: A) I have so many books on my “still to be read” pile that it seems daunting to also rereadbooks I loved before, and B) it’s because I loved them once that I’m a little afraid to read them again. That said, I was recently asked to list my favorite book of all time and I answered Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. But I don’t really know if that’s still true (and it’s an impossible question anyway – favorite book? On what day? In what mood?), so I’m rereading it and it feels like being with an old friend. It has one of my very favorite scenes ever: the card game between Levin and Kitty that leads to the proposal and his joyous walking the streets all night.

What I’m watching:

Blindspotting is billed as a buddy-comedy. Wow does that undersell it and the drama is often gripping. I loved Daveed Diggs in Hamilton, didn’t like his character in Black-ish, and think he is transcendent in this film he co-wrote with Rafael Casal, his co-star. The film is a love song to Oakland in many ways, but also a gut-wrenching indictment of police brutality, systemic racism and bias, and gentrification. The film has the freshness and raw visceral impact of Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing. A great soundtrack, genre mixing, and energy make it one of my favorite movies of 2018.

October 15, 2018

What I’m listening to:

We had the opportunity to see our favorite band, The National, live in Dallas two weeks ago. Just after watching Mistaken for Strangers, the documentary sort of about the band. So we’ve spent a lot of time going back into their earlier work, listening to songs we don’t know well, and reaffirming that their musicality, smarts, and sound are both original and astoundingly good. They did not disappoint in concert and it is a good thing their tour ended, as we might just spend all of our time and money following them around. Matt Berninger is a genius and his lead vocals kill me (and because they are in my range, I can actually sing along!). Their arrangements are profoundly good and go right to whatever brain/heart wiring that pulls one in and doesn’t let them go.

What I’m reading:

Who is Richard Powers and why have I only discovered him now, with his 12th book? Overstory is profoundly good, a book that is essential and powerful and makes me look at my everyday world in new ways. In short, a dizzying example of how powerful can be narrative in the hands of a master storyteller. I hesitate to say it’s the best environmental novel I’ve ever read (it is), because that would put this book in a category. It is surely about the natural world, but it is as much about we humans. It’s monumental and elegiac and wondrous at all once. Cancel your day’s schedule and read it now. Then plant a tree. A lot of them.

What I’m watching:

Bo Burnham wrote and directed Eighth Grade and Elsie Fisher is nothing less than amazing as its star (what’s with these new child actors; see Florida Project). It’s funny and painful and touching. It’s also the single best film treatment that I have seen of what it means to grow up in a social media shaped world. It’s a reminder that growing up is hard. Maybe harder now in a world of relentless, layered digital pressure to curate perfect lives that are far removed from the natural messy worlds and selves we actually inhabit. It’s a well-deserved 98% on Rotten Tomatoes and I wonder who dinged it for the missing 2%.

September 7, 2018

What I’m listening to:

With a cover pointing back to the Beastie Boys’ 1986 Licensed to Ill, Eminem’s quietly released Kamikaze is not my usual taste, but I’ve always admired him for his “all out there” willingness to be personal, to call people out, and his sheer genius with language. I thought Daveed Diggs could rap fast, but Eminem is supersonic at moments, and still finds room for melody. Love that he includes Joyner Lucas, whose “I’m Not Racist” gets added to the growing list of simply amazing music videos commenting on race in America. There are endless reasons why I am the least likely Eminem fan, but when no one is around to make fun of me, I’ll put it on again.

What I’m reading:

Lesley Blume’s Everyone Behaves Badly, which is the story behind Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises and his time in 1920s Paris (oh, what a time – see Midnight in Paris if you haven’t already). Of course, Blume disabuses my romantic ideas of that time and place and everyone is sort of (or profoundly so) a jerk, especially…no spoiler here…Hemingway. That said, it is a compelling read and coming off the Henry James inspired prose of Mrs. Osmond, it made me appreciate more how groundbreaking was Hemingway’s modern prose style. Like his contemporary Picasso, he reinvented the art and it can be easy to forget, these decades later, how profound was the change and its impact. And it has bullfights.

What I’m watching:

Chloé Zhao’s The Rider is just exceptional. It’s filmed on the Pine Ridge Reservation, which provides a stunning landscape, and it feels like a classic western reinvented for our times. The main characters are played by the real-life people who inspired this narrative (but feels like a documentary) film. Brady Jandreau, playing himself really, owns the screen. It’s about manhood, honor codes, loss, and resilience – rendered in sensitive, nuanced, and heartfelt ways. It feels like it could be about large swaths of America today. Really powerful.

August 16, 2018

What I’m listening to:

In my Spotify Daily Mix was Percy Sledge’s When A Man Loves A Woman, one of the world’s greatest love songs. Go online and read the story of how the song was discovered and recorded. There are competing accounts, but Sledge said he improvised it after a bad breakup. It has that kind of aching spontaneity. It is another hit from Muscle Shoals, Alabama, one of the GREAT music hotbeds, along with Detroit, Nashville, and Memphis. Our February Board meeting is in Alabama and I may finally have to do the pilgrimage road trip to Muscle Shoals and then Memphis, dropping in for Sunday services at the church where Rev. Al Green still preaches and sings. If the music is all like this, I will be saved.

What I’m reading:

John Banville’s Mrs. Osmond, his homage to literary idol Henry James and an imagined sequel to James’ 1881 masterpiece Portrait of a Lady. Go online and read the first paragraph of Chapter 25. He is…profoundly good. Makes me want to never write again, since anything I attempt will feel like some other, lowly activity in comparison to his mastery of language, image, syntax. This is slow reading, every sentence to be savored.

What I’m watching:

I’ve always respected Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, but we just watched the documentary RGB. It is over-the-top great and she is now one of my heroes. A superwoman in many ways and the documentary is really well done. There are lots of scenes of her speaking to crowds and the way young women, especially law students, look at her is touching. And you can’t help but fall in love with her now late husband Marty. See this movie and be reminded of how important is the Law.

July 23, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Spotify’s Summer Acoustic playlist has been on repeat quite a lot. What a fun way to listen to artists new to me, including The Paper Kites, Hollow Coves, and Fleet Foxes, as well as old favorites like Leon Bridges and Jose Gonzalez. Pretty chill when dialing back to a summer pace, dining on the screen porch or reading a book.

What I’m reading:

Bryan Stevenson’s Just Mercy. Founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, Stevenson tells of the racial injustice (and the war on the poor our judicial system perpetuates as well) that he discovered as a young graduate from Harvard Law School and his fight to address it. It is in turn heartbreaking, enraging, and inspiring. It is also about mercy and empathy and justice that reads like a novel. Brilliant.

What I’m watching:

Fauda. We watched season one of this Israeli thriller. It was much discussed in Israel because while it focuses on an ex-special agent who comes out of retirement to track down a Palestinian terrorist, it was willing to reveal the complexity, richness, and emotions of Palestinian lives. And the occasional brutality of the Israelis. Pretty controversial stuff in Israel. Lior Raz plays Doron, the main character, and is compelling and tough and often hard to like. He’s a mess. As is the world in which he has to operate. We really liked it, and also felt guilty because while it may have been brave in its treatment of Palestinians within the Israeli context, it falls back into some tired tropes and ultimately falls short on this front.

June 11, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Like everyone else, I’m listening to Pusha T drop the mic on Drake. Okay, not really, but do I get some points for even knowing that? We all walk around with songs that immediately bring us back to a time or a place. Songs are time machines. We are coming up on Father’s Day. My own dad passed away on Father’s Day back in 1994 and I remembering dutifully getting through the wake and funeral and being strong throughout. Then, sitting alone in our kitchen, Don Henley’s The End of the Innocence came on and I lost it. When you lose a parent for the first time (most of us have two after all) we lose our innocence and in that passage, we suddenly feel adult in a new way (no matter how old we are), a longing for our own childhood, and a need to forgive and be forgiven. Listen to the lyrics and you’ll understand. As Wordsworth reminds us in In Memoriam, there are seasons to our grief and, all these years later, this song no longer hits me in the gut, but does transport me back with loving memories of my father. I’ll play it Father’s Day.

What I’m reading:

The Fifth Season, by N. K. Jemisin. I am not a reader of fantasy or sci-fi, though I understand they can be powerful vehicles for addressing the very real challenges of the world in which we actually live. I’m not sure I know of a more vivid and gripping illustration of that fact than N. K. Jemisin’s Hugo Award winning novel The Fifth Season, first in her Broken Earth trilogy. It is astounding. It is the fantasy parallel to The Underground Railroad, my favorite recent read, a depiction of subjugation, power, casual violence, and a broken world in which our hero(s) struggle, suffer mightily, and still, somehow, give us hope. It is a tour de force book. How can someone be this good a writer? The first 30 pages pained me (always with this genre, one must learn a new, constructed world, and all of its operating physics and systems of order), and then I could not put it down. I panicked as I neared the end, not wanting to finish the book, and quickly ordered the Obelisk Gate, the second novel in the trilogy, and I can tell you now that I’ll be spending some goodly portion of my weekend in Jemisin’s other world.

What I’m watching:

The NBA Finals and perhaps the best basketball player of this generation. I’ve come to deeply respect LeBron James as a person, a force for social good, and now as an extraordinary player at the peak of his powers. His superhuman play during the NBA playoffs now ranks with the all-time greats, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, MJ, Kobe, and the demi-god that was Bill Russell. That his Cavs lost in a 4-game sweep is no surprise. It was a mediocre team being carried on the wide shoulders of James (and matched against one of the greatest teams ever, the Warriors, and the Harry Potter of basketball, Steph Curry) and, in some strange way, his greatness is amplified by the contrast with the rest of his team. It was a great run.

May 24, 2018

What I’m listening to:

I’ve always liked Alicia Keys and admired her social activism, but I am hooked on her last album Here. This feels like an album finally commensurate with her anger, activism, hope, and grit. More R&B and Hip Hop than is typical for her, I think this album moves into an echelon inhabited by a Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On or Beyonce’s Formation. Social activism and outrage rarely make great novels, but they often fuel great popular music. Here is a terrific example.

What I’m reading:

Colson Whitehead’s Underground Railroad may be close to a flawless novel. Winner of the 2017 Pulitzer, it chronicles the lives of two runaway slaves, Cora and Caeser, as they try to escape the hell of plantation life in Georgia. It is an often searing novel and Cora is one of the great heroes of American literature. I would make this mandatory reading in every high school in America, especially in light of the absurd revisionist narratives of “happy and well cared for” slaves. This is a genuinely great novel, one of the best I’ve read, the magical realism and conflating of time periods lifts it to another realm of social commentary, relevance, and a blazing indictment of America’s Original Sin, for which we remain unabsolved.

What I’m watching:

I thought I knew about The Pentagon Papers, but The Post, a real-life political thriller from Steven Spielberg taught me a lot, features some of our greatest actors, and is so timely given the assault on our democratic institutions and with a presidency out of control. It is a reminder that a free and fearless press is a powerful part of our democracy, always among the first targets of despots everywhere. The story revolves around the legendary Post owner and D.C. doyenne, Katharine Graham. I had the opportunity to see her son, Don Graham, right after he saw the film, and he raved about Meryl Streep’s portrayal of his mother. Liked it a lot more than I expected.

April 27, 2018

What I’m listening to:

I mentioned John Prine in a recent post and then on the heels of that mention, he has released a new album, The Tree of Forgiveness, his first new album in ten years. Prine is beloved by other singer songwriters and often praised by the inscrutable God that is Bob Dylan. Indeed, Prine was frequently said to be the “next Bob Dylan” in the early part of his career, though he instead carved out his own respectable career and voice, if never with the dizzying success of Dylan. The new album reflects a man in his 70s, a cancer survivor, who reflects on life and its end, but with the good humor and empathy that are hallmarks of Prine’s music. “When I Get To Heaven” is a rollicking, fun vision of what comes next and a pure delight. A charming, warm, and often terrific album.

What I’m reading:

I recently read Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko, on many people’s Top Ten lists for last year and for good reason. It is sprawling, multi-generational, and based in the world of Japanese occupied Korea and then in the Korean immigrant’s world of Oaska, so our key characters become “tweeners,” accepted in neither world. It’s often unspeakably sad, and yet there is resiliency and love. There is also intimacy, despite the time and geographic span of the novel. It’s breathtakingly good and like all good novels, transporting.

What I’m watching:

I adore Guillermo del Toro’s 2006 film, Pan’s Labyrinth, and while I’m not sure his Shape of Water is better, it is a worthy follow up to the earlier masterpiece (and more of a commercial success). Lots of critics dislike the film, but I’m okay with a simple retelling of a Beauty and the Beast love story, as predictable as it might be. The acting is terrific, it is visually stunning, and there are layers of pain as well as social and political commentary (the setting is the US during the Cold War) and, no real spoiler here, the real monsters are humans, the military officer who sees over the captured aquatic creature. It is hauntingly beautiful and its depiction of hatred to those who are different or “other” is painfully resonant with the time in which we live. Put this on your “must see” list.

March 18, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Sitting on a plane for hours (and many more to go; geez, Australia is far away) is a great opportunity to listen to new music and to revisit old favorites. This time, it is Lucy Dacus and her album Historians, the new sophomore release from a 22-year old indie artist that writes with relatable, real-life lyrics. Just on a second listen and while she insists this isn’t a break up record (as we know, 50% of all great songs are break up songs), it is full of loss and pain. Worth the listen so far. For the way back machine, it’s John Prine and In Spite of Ourselves (that title track is one of the great love songs of all time), a collection of duets with some of his “favorite girl singers” as he once described them. I have a crush on Iris Dement (for a really righteously angry song try her Wasteland of the Free), but there is also EmmyLou Harris, the incomparable Dolores Keane, and Lucinda Williams. Very different albums, both wonderful.

What I’m reading:

Jane Mayer’s New Yorker piece on Christopher Steele presents little that is new, but she pulls it together in a terrific and coherent whole that is illuminating and troubling at the same time. Not only for what is happening, but for the complicity of the far right in trying to discredit that which should be setting off alarm bells everywhere. Bob Mueller may be the most important defender of the democracy at this time. A must read.

What I’m watching:

Homeland is killing it this season and is prescient, hauntingly so. Russian election interference, a Bannon-style hate radio demagogue, alienated and gun toting militia types, and a president out of control. It’s fabulous, even if it feels awfully close to the evening news.

March 8, 2018

What I’m listening to:

We have a family challenge to compile our Top 100 songs. It is painful. Only 100? No more than three songs by one artist? Wait, why is M.I.A.’s “Paper Planes” on my list? Should it just be The Clash from whom she samples? Can I admit to guilty pleasure songs? Hey, it’s my list and I can put anything I want on it. So I’m listening to the list while I work and the song playing right now is Tom Petty’s “The Wild One, Forever,” a B-side single that was never a hit and that remains my favorite Petty song. Also, “Evangeline” by Los Lobos. It evokes a night many years ago, with friends at Pearl Street in Northampton, MA, when everyone danced well past 1AM in a hot, sweaty, packed club and the band was a revelation. Maybe the best music night of our lives and a reminder that one’s 100 Favorite Songs list is as much about what you were doing and where you were in your life when those songs were playing as it is about the music. It’s not a list. It’s a soundtrack for this journey.

What I’m reading:

Patricia Lockwood’s Priestdaddy was in the NY Times top ten books of 2017 list and it is easy to see why. Lockwood brings remarkable and often surprising imagery, metaphor, and language to her prose memoir and it actually threw me off at first. It then all became clear when someone told me she is a poet. The book is laugh aloud funny, which masks (or makes safer anyway) some pretty dark territory. Anyone who grew up Catholic, whether lapsed or not, will resonate with her story. She can’t resist a bawdy anecdote and her family provides some of the most memorable characters possible, especially her father, her sister, and her mother, who I came to adore. Best thing I’ve read in ages.

What I’m watching:

The Florida Project, a profoundly good movie on so many levels. Start with the central character, six-year old (at the time of the filming) Brooklynn Prince, who owns – I mean really owns – the screen. This is pure acting genius and at that age? Astounding. Almost as astounding is Bria Vinaite, who plays her mother. She was discovered on Instagram and had never acted before this role, which she did with just three weeks of acting lessons. She is utterly convincing and the tension between the child’s absolute wonder and joy in the world with her mother’s struggle to provide, to be a mother, is heartwarming and heartbreaking all at once. Willem Dafoe rightly received an Oscar nomination for his supporting role. This is a terrific movie.

February 12, 2018

What I’m listening to:

So, I have a lot of friends of age (I know you’re thinking 40s, but I just turned 60) who are frozen in whatever era of music they enjoyed in college or maybe even in their thirties. There are lots of times when I reach back into the catalog, since music is one of those really powerful and transporting senses that can take you through time (smell is the other one, though often underappreciated for that power). Hell, I just bought a turntable and now spending time in vintage vinyl shops. But I’m trying to take a lesson from Pat, who revels in new music and can as easily talk about North African rap music and the latest National album as Meet the Beatles, her first ever album. So, I’ve been listening to Kendrick Lamar’s Grammy winning Damn. While it may not be the first thing I’ll reach for on a winter night in Maine, by the fire, I was taken with it. It’s layered, political, and weirdly sensitive and misogynist at the same time, and it feels fresh and authentic and smart at the same time, with music that often pulled me from what I was doing. In short, everything music should do. I’m not a bit cooler for listening to Damn, but when I followed it with Steely Dan, I felt like I was listening to Lawrence Welk. A good sign, I think.

What I’m reading:

I am reading Walter Isaacson’s new biography of Leonardo da Vinci. I’m not usually a reader of biographies, but I’ve always been taken with Leonardo. Isaacson does not disappoint (does he ever?), and his subject is at once more human and accessible and more awe-inspiring in Isaacson’s capable hands. Gay, left-handed, vegetarian, incapable of finishing things, a wonderful conversationalist, kind, and perhaps the most relentlessly curious human being who has ever lived. Like his biographies of Steve Jobs and Albert Einstein, Isaacson’s project here is to show that genius lives at the intersection of science and art, of rationality and creativity. Highly recommend it.

What I’m watching:

We watched the This Is Us post-Super Bowl episode, the one where Jack finally buys the farm. I really want to hate this show. It is melodramatic and manipulative, with characters that mostly never change or grow, and it hooks me every damn time we watch it. The episode last Sunday was a tear jerker, a double whammy intended to render into a blubbering, tissue-crumbling pathetic mess anyone who has lost a parent or who is a parent. Sterling K. Brown, Ron Cephas Jones, the surprising Mandy Moore, and Milo Ventimiglia are hard not to love and last season’s episode that had only Brown and Cephas going to Memphis was the show at its best (they are by far the two best actors). Last week was the show at its best worst. In other words, I want to hate it, but I love it. If you haven’t seen it, don’t binge watch it. You’ll need therapy and insulin.

January 15, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Drive-By Truckers. Chris Stapleton has me on an unusual (for me) country theme and I discovered these guys to my great delight. They’ve been around, with some 11 albums, but the newest one is fascinating. It’s a deep dive into Southern alienation and the white working-class world often associated with our current president. I admire the willingness to lay bare, in kick ass rock songs, the complexities and pain at work among people we too quickly place into overly simple categories. These guys are brave, bold, and thoughtful as hell, while producing songs I didn’t expect to like, but that I keep playing. And they are coming to NH.

What I’m reading:

A textual analog to Drive-By Truckers by Chris Stapleton in many ways is Tony Horowitz’s 1998 Pulitzer Prize winning Confederates in the Attic. Ostensibly about the Civil War and the South’s ongoing attachment to it, it is prescient and speaks eloquently to the times in which we live (where every southern state but Virginia voted for President Trump). Often hilarious, it too surfaces complexities and nuance that escape a more recent, and widely acclaimed, book like Hillbilly Elegy. As a Civil War fan, it was also astonishing in many instances, especially when it blows apart long-held “truths” about the war, such as the degree to which Sherman burned down the south (he did not). Like D-B Truckers, Horowitz loves the South and the people he encounters, even as he grapples with its myths of victimhood and exceptionalism (and racism, which may be no more than the racism in the north, but of a different kind). Everyone should read this book and I’m embarrassed I’m so late to it.

What I’m watching:

David Letterman has a new Netflix show called “My Next Guest Needs No Introduction” and we watched the first episode, in which Letterman interviewed Barack Obama. It was extraordinary (if you don’t have Netflix, get it just to watch this show); not only because we were reminded of Obama’s smarts, grace, and humanity (and humor), but because we saw a side of Letterman we didn’t know existed. His personal reflections on Selma were raw and powerful, almost painful. He will do five more episodes with “extraordinary individuals” and if they are anything like the first, this might be the very best work of his career and one of the best things on television.

December 22, 2017

What I’m reading:

Just finished Sunjeev Sahota’s Year of the Runaways, a painful inside look at the plight of illegal Indian immigrant workers in Britain. It was shortlisted for 2015 Man Booker Prize and its transporting, often to a dark and painful universe, and it is impossible not to think about the American version of this story and the terrible way we treat the undocumented in our own country, especially now.

What I’m watching:

Season II of The Crown is even better than Season I. Elizabeth’s character is becoming more three-dimensional, the modern world is catching up with tradition-bound Britain, and Cold War politics offer more context and tension than we saw in Season I. Claire Foy, in her last season, is just terrific – one arched eye brow can send a message.

What I’m listening to:

A lot of Christmas music, but needing a break from the schmaltz, I’ve discovered Over the Rhine and their Christmas album, Snow Angels. God, these guys are good.

November 14, 2017

What I’m watching:

Guiltily, I watch the Patriots play every weekend, often building my schedule and plans around seeing the game. Why the guilt? I don’t know how morally defensible is football anymore, as we now know the severe damage it does to the players. We can’t pretend it’s all okay anymore. Is this our version of late decadent Rome, watching mostly young Black men take a terrible toll on each other for our mere entertainment?

What I’m reading:

Recently finished J.G. Ballard’s 2000 novel Super-Cannes, a powerful depiction of a corporate-tech ex-pat community taken over by a kind of psychopathology, in which all social norms and responsibilities are surrendered to residents of the new world community. Kept thinking about Silicon Valley when reading it. Pretty dark, dystopian view of the modern world and centered around a mass killing, troublingly prescient.

What I’m listening to:

Was never really a Lorde fan, only knowing her catchy (and smarter than you might first guess) pop hit “Royals” from her debut album. But her new album, Melodrama, is terrific and it doesn’t feel quite right to call this “pop.” There is something way more substantial going on with Lorde and I can see why many critics put this album at the top of their Best in 2017 list. Count me in as a huge fan.

November 3, 2017

What I’m reading: Just finished Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere, her breathtakingly good second novel. How is someone so young so wise? Her writing is near perfection and I read the book in two days, setting my alarm for 4:30AM so I could finish it before work.

What I’m watching: We just binge watched season two of Stranger Things and it was worth it just to watch Millie Bobbie Brown, the transcendent young actor who plays Eleven. The series is a delightful mash up of every great eighties horror genre you can imagine and while pretty dark, an absolute joy to watch.

What I’m listening to: I’m not a lover of country music (to say the least), but I love Chris Stapleton. His “The Last Thing I Needed, First Thing This Morning” is heartbreakingly good and reminds me of the old school country that played in my house as a kid. He has a new album and I can’t wait, but his From A Room: Volume 1 is on repeat for now.

September 26, 2017

What I’m reading:

Just finished George Saunder’s Lincoln in the Bardo. It took me a while to accept its cadence and sheer weirdness, but loved it in the end. A painful meditation on loss and grief, and a genuinely beautiful exploration of the intersection of life and death, the difficulty of letting go of what was, good and bad, and what never came to be.

What I’m watching:

HBO’s The Deuce. Times Square and the beginning of the porn industry in the 1970s, the setting made me wonder if this was really something I’d want to see. But David Simon is the writer and I’d read a menu if he wrote it. It does not disappoint so far and there is nothing prurient about it.

What I’m listening to:

The National’s new album Sleep Well Beast. I love this band. The opening piano notes of the first song, “Nobody Else Will Be There,” seize me & I’m reminded that no one else in music today matches their arrangement & musicianship. I’m adding “Born to Beg,” “Slow Show,” “I Need My Girl,” and “Runaway” to my list of favorite love songs.

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J from President's Corner https://ift.tt/2r33GID via IFTTT

#President's Corner #SNHUblogs

0 notes

whatdoesagoodgirllooklike-blog · 6 years

Text

The ‘Girly’ Series

Interview: Louby Mcloughlin Girly: Stylist Mcloughlin talks femininity BY LOU STOPPARD ON 1 OCTOBER 2014.

Fashion is for fantasy and to feel good, so we shouldn't judge others so much on their reference points. I don’t think we should look at women and be like, ‘are you thinking about what you’re wearing?’ Don’t think about what you’re wearing, I say.

Lou Stoppard: Tell me why you think the girly aesthetic is being so heavily championed at the moment.

Louby Mcloughlin: I don't think it's a new thing. I think it's something that's been around for a while now. I think it's been around for at least five or six years on Tumblr and in the online world, and the young people who have now grown up a little are making more grown-up art, fashion and music that's making waves in young London and filtering down. It's a bit of a post-Tumblr effect.

People want to put 'girly' into a box and a category. I think that's partly to do with it, and I also think the twenty-year cycle comes into it...that's probably a big part of it. Also, whatever goes up will come down. We had the punk thing - when I came to London about 6 years or so ago it was all about punk, everything was black, black, black. I had hair extensions, fake-tan - it wasn’t cool. It's been a long time since girls have been able to be girly-girls. So overall, it's three things really: backlash to grunge, the post-Tumblr effect and the twenty-year cycle. And that's it. But it's going to go anyway, it's going.

LS: Why do you say that?

LM: Things do - it’ll go to the next thing.

LS: It's interesting what you said about the twenty-year cycle. Just glancing back there are several things you can look at when discussing this theme - the whole Riot Grrrl movement, the nineties and all that 'girl power' stuff. Do you think that is the root of where the current girly vogue is coming out of or do you think it's something quite separate?

LM: I think that's part of it, for me it feels like there is a bit of Girl Power 2.0 happening at the moment, like girl power gone digital - that's what the kids of Tumblr are all about. The Instagram generation and the internet generation - they’re all about soaking in everything that's been done before and regurgitating it in quite an mixed-up ironic way. It's generation LOLs, it's all about nostalgia and taking things from everywhere and spitting it back out as something new. But for me, there are a lot of exciting girly things happening all over, especially in London. From the underground electronic music scene to independent zines and fashion labels to Instagram and blogs, but they twist it up for the new gen, it's not exactly as it was.

LM: I think what you say about a mixing of references is very very interesting. This idea that you can take an image of a Riot Grrrl and put it next to an image of one of the Spice Girls and put a Hello Kitty sticker near it and you get a kind of common aesthetic out of that, even though those things all have very different intellectual starting points. I think that's quite interesting.

LM: I think it's all types of girl refs and it's a bit of a fuck-you attitude; 'I’m not in this box, I can do this, this, this. And I can do it well.'

LS: So do you think there is something quite empowering about that kind of mixing of references - that mixing of something that looks a bit ironic, with something that looks a bit Japanese, with something that looks a bit retro, because it is women refusing to conform?

LM: Everyone wants to do something different to the generation before them. If they don't, there's something a bit wrong. In the nineties people sat and made zines. It's the same thing people do now digitally. Kids are just expressing themselves and trying to be different - they're trying to say something. Now people have all those elements there available to them because of the internet. So it comes out in fashion, those different references. The younger generation has a lot more references available to them to explore and mix together.

LS: Talking about all those different references, it gets me wondering if girls who do dress like this now, whether they even remotely consider an intellectual side to it. Whether they think about, you know, femininity or feminism or womanhood, or whether they literally just take it as a pure aesthetic thing.

LM: Well I think you’re going to have a mixture of both, as you would with any type of style. People want to be different. I think that the younger kids that shop at, say Topshop, get the references more than anybody. They’re the ones that are really exposed to it, they’re the ones that have grown up with it.

LS: Have you always dressed like this, is it always something thats felt very natural? Where does the starting point come from for you, is it the way your friends used to dress when you were growing up? How did you start dressing like it?

LM: I think it's just from watching television and movies to be honest. And music videos. That's it really. And it did change as well. When I was at school I was kind of like a skater girl. I was more of a tomboy. I haven’t always dressed like this.

LS: How do people respond to you? I know London is slightly more open-minded to experimental fashion, but how do people respond to it?

LM: They don't really. But as I say it was a bit uncool probably five or six years ago.

LS: And what are the kind of aesthetic references that you’re drawn to, or the labels that you like to wear? I know you post a lot about early Versus stuff. What is the stuff that you think is really really great?

LM: I like to dress with a sense of irony. I like to have fun with style and take random references to play around. I don't take it too seriously. I like my Italian designers. I feel like they look good on me. I can’t pull off a lot of, you know, Margiela. But I can wear like double Pucci, some old Versace, noughties Valentino. I have a lot of Dolce e Gabanna but I'll also add in new designers from London like Sophia Webster and Ryan Lo. I like to mix it up a bit.

LS: Do you see the way you get dressed and the way you present yourself as about reclaiming girliness and taking ownership of it? Or is it just the aesthetics that you like? Is there an element where you are saying something about how you feel as a woman?

LM: Yeah, I’ve always sort of enjoyed very glamorous, successful women. Like a woman being glam and making it - I really like that idea. So I’ve always looked up to strong women who are also quite glam and girly. That's quite interesting to me, those two things combined. Think Erin Brockovich!

LS: It's interesting this idea that for a long time, for women to be taken seriously, they had to dress in either a minimal way or in a way that echoed a man. So it's interesting that you say you admire strong women who are successful almost despite their femininity. So I guess to dress in a way that's really really girly but be really smart, there is something about that which still makes people feel slightly uncomfortable. You even get it with how female politicians are treated if they’re wearing something thats super fashion-y, people almost act like that's at odds with them being smart. I guess there is something empowering about saying, 'I can be really interested in fashion and wear really girly stuff but I’m still really clever.'

LM: Definitely. I think that's what a lot of girls are quite interested in as well.

LS: Do you ever worry though, because obviously you’ve thought about that side and the strong attitude that comes with it but you mention those young kids shopping in Topshop - do you worry sometimes when they’re wearing something that's super super sickly sweetly feminine, that they’re not thinking about that side, that they’re not trying to present themselves as strong women and they do just end up looking like a sex object to a boy?

LM: I feel like this way of dressing isn't about men at all actually, it's about girls being girls and they do it for themselves. I think sex has nothing to do with it. It feels quite cute and innocent to me and all about dressing up to be a girl and feel empowered. I think everyone should do whatever they want. If you’re going to be clever with it, and reference this, that and the other then great! If not.. and you just happened to like looking the way you do then go for it too. Who cares? Fashion is for fantasy and to feel good, so we shouldn't judge others so much on their reference points. I don’t think we should look at women and be like, ‘are you thinking about what you’re wearing?’ Don’t think about what you’re wearing, I say! That's even better. They shouldn't have to consider it so much and worry what other people will think about them.

LS: It's almost rejecting this idea that how you dress says anything about you, because obviously if you’re a grown woman, you’re really smart and you’re dressed like a child, it doesn’t mean you are a child. It doesn’t mean you’re immature.

LM: Yes! And also, who cares what anyone else thinks?

This interview was super fascinating to me just because, I appreciate how Lou Stoppard referenced how some girls do just do it for ‘aesthetics’ yet some are putting out a new woke political message. How this ‘girly’ look has been sexualised and fetishised for so long - yet, now it’s not even about sex, it’s about empowerment and disconnecting conservative connotations.

1 note · View note

itsandiesanchez-blog · 7 years

Text

Born 1976. Not Generation X.

I am 41, middle aged and getting older by the nanosecond. I’m not 21 anymore and I’m ok with that. I would be lying if I said I’d rather have wrinkles than none at all, but generally speaking, I’m alright with the advancing years and how they’ve treated me.

I am a lot of things, just.......not Generation X.

Well, let me clarify first:

Generation X was initially classified as a generation beginning in 1965 and ending in 1984 by Douglas Copeland, the so-called 13th American generation, following the Baby Boomer cohort. As it stands in that form, completely arbitrary, chronological and unyielding, I am indeed a member of Generation X. It says nothing about me other than the fact that my birth year falls into that particular segment of a series of equal, unemotional generational divides.

It was, however, a surprise to me, to find out I was indeed considered Generation X. My whole teenaged and young adult life was lived fully believing myself to be a member of Generation Y, born somewhere between 1975 and 1990. Sometime during school in the 90s, a teacher addressed us with that label, and it stuck with me ever since. By the time I was 20, I knew that Generation X was Winona Ryder and all the 80s teens that came before us and that we, the heirs to the 90s and its technological advances, were something different. It made sense to me. The older kids weren’t like us. The 80s weren’t like us. We could sense the divide and the dawn of a new era. It was upon us.

And then..... one day someone started talking about Millennials. At first I mistook it for a new generation, born after 1990, the next in line, the one that came after Generation Y. Imagine my shock to find that not only was the Millennial generation referring to people practically the same age as I was, people I worked with and hung out with, but that I was also no longer a part of their gang. Suddenly I was Generation X. Not just stalwart 1965-1984 Generation X (which I would have accepted), no - 1965-1981 Generation X, chopped off three years before the actual 20 year divide, AS IF IT MEANT SOMETHING.

What did it allegedly mean? I couldn’t find an answer to that, except descriptions and identifiers - stereotypes - that might stick to someone born in 1970, but certainly not on me. Suddenly I was “cynical”, my idols were from the 80s, and all of my formative experiences and influences belonged to someone 10 years older than me. WTF?? 1975-1981 found itself suddenly amputated from the rest of its generation. For no logical reason.

But it gets worse.

Those of us belonging to the island of Gen Y floating in Gen X started talking about it. We noticed the discrepancies in cut off years. We saw that depending on who you talked to, we were either Millennials or Gen X. The verdict wasn’t in, regardless of what Howe and Strauss said. Oregon Trail Generation, Generation Catalano - we saw ourselves everywhere, posting, discussing, putting up a fight.

Enter Xennials.

Yes, I thought. Finally.

And then I saw the cut-off years.

1977-1983

FUUUUUUUUCK NO.

As a 1976er, there is no difference, absolutely none, between me and anyone born during the 1977 to 1983 time frame. In fact, I share more with ANYONE born between 1975 and 1990 than I do with a single person born in the 60s or early 70s. We can argue about years like 1974 or 1973, but trust me, in all my 41 ancient years here on the planet, living in four different countries, I have not ONCE met someone born in 1965 or 1970 that shares my childhood and youth experiences. Let this be known once and for fucking all, because I am sick and tired of explaining it.

Why?

1. 80s pop culture and music.

Duh. I don’t really remember the 80s, aside from toys, the first video games and cartoon t-shirts. The 80s were vastly different on a pop culture level from the 90s and I was on the bench in the haze of childhood. Gen Xers had AIDS, world hunger and music and films that I only watched and listened to retrospectively out of curiosity much later on. Anyone who wasn’t a youth during the 80s (at least 15–24) would not have been fully part of that culture.

2. The Cold War:

When the Berlin Wall fell, I was obsessed with the Little Mermaid. Does my voice sound like Ariel’s? How do you like my Ariel drawing? I couldn’t give two darns about politics in 1989 and really don’t remember the feeling of the environment that preceded it. I came of age during the age of Middle Eastern wars, starting with Iraq, continuing with Iraq and leading up to 9/11. I wasn’t old enough to vote for Reagan or Bush — I am Clinton era all the way. Again, if you weren’t at least 15 before the Cold War started crumbling, you probably don’t have much to say about it.

3. Technology: Now, I am not saying Gen Xers are not tech savvy, but give me a handful of people born in the 60s or early 70s and you’ll find quite a few people who pride themselves in the fact that THEY survived a good chunk of adulthood without the internet, that THEY can live without their phones. You know the memes. I was a teenager when I first got internet and I don’t know what real life is like without it unless you’re talking about My Little Pony and She-Ra. Smart phones were second nature to me and yes, I have my face glued to my phone whenever I am not asleep. I came of age during the whole 90s tech boom and it helped make me who I am.

4. The whole latchkey running wild thing: Technically, the latchkey era didn’t end until the mid-90s and by the time I was a kid, only irresponsible parents let their kids run around like free range chickens. We were the post-Adam Walsh, milk carton era and parents were worried. Contrary to popular belief, kids STILL play outside and of course, so did we, but we did not “run out of the house in the morning and come back when the streelights came on”. Oh no. My parents wanted to see me in the yard at all times and actually gave me a physical boundary that I was not allowed to pass (our yard ditch). Friends had to be approved and parents had to be contacted for any kind of visit or playdate. New children and families had to pass the parental supervision test — I was not allowed to roam free with kids whose parents were not home or just randomly pop by someone’s house unannounced. The shift was already there in the 80s — the freedom 60s and 70s kids had was gone. Oh yes, you’ll find a few of these kids (born anywhere in the late 70s and 80s) from divorced homes engaging in the same romantic nostalgia right alongside the Xers and Boomers, but seriously, the times were gone. Although I never read it myself at the time, my parents had IT, thank you very much. They had Wayne Williams, Clifford Olsen, Randy Kraft and John Wayne Gacy. My life at 10 was no 60s Disney live action film. And yes, we loved to stay inside and play video games. Atari, Nintendo, Sega…… those were the days.

5. The pessimism/anti-Baby Boomer thing: What???? I mean seriously, whaaat??? I can’t even write about that because I don’t understand it. Hippy was not a slur to me, in fact, we were very much into that sort of thing during the later 90s. I am not a pessimist, or a cynic or a slacker and I didn’t hate my parents or thought disappointing them was “cool”. I am STILL worried what they think and I’m over 40. I know that’s just me, but again, this particular Gen X attitude was one we always associated with either dysfunctional kids or… older kids. Yep. Older kids. Real Gen Xers. We were actually kind of enemies at the time. I recall “so 80s” (accompanied by a sneer) as a thing. It always seemed to me like they were still desperately trying to recapture the 50s cool during the 90s with a giant big hair, mullet fail.

6. The absurdity of the cut off lines and criteria for these so called “generations”. Who cares if I was born one year before the first Star Wars? Really? WHY? Does the fact that I was born the year Steve Jobs founded Apple count for less? Also, who cares if I can remember Nirvana? How does that negate almost complete comtemporary ignorance (and indulgance) of major 80s bands? I mean, let’s face it: the only reason I know what Depeche Mode is, is because of songs they produced in the 90s…….but then again, wait, maybe it wasn’t Depeche Mode…..Dire Straights perhaps….. or Duran Duran? I have to Google every time. Please don’t hold it against me. At the time in question, I was too busy pretending to be Jem and the Holograms. And grunge…..the one Gen X thing that actually occurred during at least a brief moment of my formative youth, well — Kurt Cobain was dead by the time I started going to concerts. While admittedly being a real common denominator between me and Gen X, grunge was just a fledgling spark at the dawn of budding musical tastes. Bluntly speaking, I am more Backstreet Boys, Spice Girls, Weezer, Blink182 and Linkin Park. It’s hardly enough to completely reclassify me and ignore the rest.

None of these cut offs are a strong argument, folks. You might as well say that “you are an Xennial” if you were the same age as one of the actors on That 70s show playing Eric and his friends. Which, incidentally, includes anyone born from 1983 back to……you guessed it: 1976.

Yes, some kids born anywhere during the late 70s or early 80s will have had older siblings or friends that influenced them with all things Gen X, just like I know 90s kids today that know more about Gen X culture than I do due to their Gen X parents. There’s also these pesky socio-economic aspects that play a role — I’ve met ’00s babies down here in the rural south that still don’t have a smart phone or their own computer. That aspect can be quite arbitrary.

I have real Gen X friends. I have Millennial friends. And while I won’t claim to be like anyone born in 1994, I have vastly more in common culturally with my 80s born Millennial friends than I do with my 60s, very early 70s born Gen Xer buddies. In fact, the latter group tends to freely associate with early 60s born “Baby Boomers” as if they are part of the same generation, as their “remember whens” seem to be in tune with each other. There is a generation gap between us that is every bit as tangible as the one that exists between anyone born throughout most of the 90s and I. As adults, it is enjoyable now, this funny little rift — certainly food for plenty of mutual teasing, but it is real. It exists.

The times just moved too quickly in the 90s. Politically, culturally, technologically - those of us who experienced our formative years during the 90s and early 2000s are hard to classify, I get that. But....The least anyone can do is keep us together.

So stop. I repeat: STOP cutting me off from my generation and shoving me into a group that doesn’t share my experiences. If you want to be fair, keep the clean 20 year cut off — 1965–1984 for Gen X, so that I can at least be grouped with a good decade of people I can identify with. If you’re going to start chopping things up, be a little more meaningful. Might I suggest: Gen X 1960–1974? I have yet to meet a person born in 1974 that identifies as a Millennial or “in between generations”. Not to mention the nifty fact that grunge was almost exclusively produced by this demographic, a demographic which also includes many teen idols of the 80s.

Why does it matter? Well, people do ask — are you a Millennial or Gen X. And even Xennial. I kid you not! Can you imagine how much it blows to have to classify yourself as something you are NOT, suddenly stereotyped with qualities you don’t have, lumped into a category that makes you feel like oil in water, sitting there, suffocating under a label that doesn’t belong to you, while the rest of your people are bonding safely in the 1977 and beyond zone? The isolation is real.

SO STOP.

#generationx #generation x #xennial #oregontrailgeneration #millennials #generationy #generation y #generations #generation catalano

0 notes