#wildest film class take I ever heard was when we watched this at the end of Italian cinema II basically for funsies

[unlikely-course]

The thing about goncharov (1973) that a lot of people don’t seem to get is like…Goncharov is clearly an Italian man working for the Russians but he’s not just some rando the rest of the characters know him—he speaks like a local, Joe knows how he takes his coffee, Mario puts that hand on his neck as he’s dying because he’s reaching out to someone who used to be a friend. Andrey talks about him as a “faithless man” but how does he know that unless he’s already been betrayed by him (or at least feels like he has)? Everybody calls him Lo Straniero not because he’s literally a stranger to them but because he has made himself a stranger to them.

This puts the conversation between Goncharov and Mario in the restaurant in a whole different light like…home is only home while you are dutiful. You are only a man while you are loyal and obedient to “better men.” If the people who claim to be your family cast you aside then what does that mean for your very identity? You can cast that aside too and then you don’t owe anything to anybody. It’s about being pushed out of family and community until the self collapses and a new self must be born.

[glamrockmonarch]

Told Me To Come But I Was Already There. Rufus Taylor (Fluff/Smut)

Request: How about a request for rufus traylor where he teaches u to play the drums!! Fluffy smutty?? Mostly fluff if that's more comfy!! Its cliche but it's cute uwu - Anon

A/N: I am not feeling the smut lately, idk it’s shark week any second now so that might be why I’m so annoyed lately...anyway enjoy this gif that makes me go “bang me like your drums” - which I did not make and I take no credit for. 

ENJOY (because I did work on this for a while)!

What was better than a day at the races? An afternoon in the studio with your best friend. It was long overdue, you promised during your last visit to the land of the Queen herself that you would stop by at the studio whenever he was actually doing something, of course, the Darkness was not working on an album at the time and it had been months since this agreement was made.

Now you stood with Dan watching as the band gathered their things and prepared to leave.

On the floor, a variety of carpets adorned the space a combination of red, brown and yellow. Panels surrounded Rufus and his impressive drum kit. Dan’s guitars in the back lay on a special rack against the wall. Justin played mindlessly on the large black piano opposite from the door.

“Are you ready, Dan? I'm bored and Lord knows we are done now that Y/N is here to distract our drummer boy.”

You chuckled and rolled your eyes at Justin’s comment. It is not like he is wrong. You and Rufus were as close as friends could be, in part you know this is why Rufus had had such a hard time finding a girlfriend who wouldn’t leave. What can you say? Yo had known each other practically since childhood!

While Rufus decided to drop out of high school when he was only sixteen, you remained in school. Meeting the Taylor kids you were still only in elementary school was a big deal for you; your parents were normal non-famous people, becoming friends with Lily unknowing of her parents status meant that you did not care for their money or their fame, it meant that when you became friends with Rufus too it was for the laughter and the amazing time you had whenever you would all do something together.

Your father being an accountant and your mother a psychologist turned housewife, you had little aspirations for anything other than a university degree at age twelve. When Rufus showed you he could go chase after his wildest dreams, your young mind decided you would follow suit! Rufus, being four years older than you, was surprised - as everyone who’d heard you say you wanted to become a doctor was when you had your mother take you to acting and singing classes. By the time you were sixteen you had already played some minor roles in big productions, you had your own tutor and a real sense of what you wanted to do next with your life and career. You attended Brit School and enjoyed your time there while you continued working and moving towards television and film, until graduating and deciding on skipping uni altogether as you were already working and getting recognition from the media and audiences.

“Is that right?” Frankie made you look at him as he spoke, looking over his shoulder as Rufus laughed in silence, a deep red shade painting his usually pale ears.

“Shut it!” You complain, with a smile too wide to seem annoyed.

It was well known by Rufus’ bandmates that you had a thing for each other, although neither one of you had acted on it.

“Alright, kids, keep it classy,” Justin says as he stood from the piano bench and left, Dan followed and then Frankie, nodding towards you and then winking at Rufus.

You went to the drum set and put your hands on your waist, looking around at the different drums and cymbals.

“See anything you like?” Rufus cocked a brow.

You shrugged.

“Looks shiny.”

This makes Rufus laugh from the little seat behind the drums. He smiled at you and twisted his drumsticks between his fingers as he offered them to you.

“Wanna give it a go?” He asked.

You took the drumsticks from his hands and watched as he stood for you to take a seat behind the large drum kit. Apparently, you had to put one foot on the bass drum pedal and hit it without stopping, which proved rather difficult as Rufus kept laughing at you.

He told you how to hit it and what to do with the drumsticks, showing you some easy moves, although soon enough you complained that you were losing the beat.

“It’s...I’m losing it, I’m losing it!” You called out with your eyes focused on the snare and tom-toms.

“Yeah,” he paused, “you lost it.”

With a couple more attempts at playing for longer than five seconds without skipping a beat or forgetting to kick the bass drum altogether, Rufus huffed loudly, a smile still present on his face as he rolled his eyes and dropped his jacket on the couch on the opposite side of the large room.

“I am so done with you,” he made a gesture with his hands and pulled you up by the hands. “Come on, you have to at least be able to play something!”

Rufus took a seat on the stool as you stepped back. You waited with patience, he thought about it for a moment, turning the drumsticks in his hands while the wheels turned in his head. At last, he got it. The perfect song to teach you, something typically rock and roll and easy. Something classy and cool - for his classy and cool girl friend.

“Okay, okay… pay attention, come over back here and watch the bass drum, the rest is super easy.”

You let out a single laugh and wiped your palms on the sides of your midi dress. The fact was that while you stood behind him and watched how he played you felt the all-too-familiar teenage butterflies flapping their wings around in your belly, worst of all? The funny feelings did not stop there, as his hair started falling from his improvised bun and fell onto the sides of his face you were oddly aroused. A feeling of warmth invading your midsection, your thighs squeezing together as your friend nodded his head to the beat of AC/DC’s “You Shook Me All Night Long”.

After not too long it was your turn to sit down on the black stool and try your best at playing this song, although you were aware that your best abilities would be put to use on a piano - and still leave a lot to be desired…

“For the record, I would have chosen “Girl’s Got Rhythm”, but you’re the teacher so…” Rufus paid no mind, thinking you were half-joking although he’d seen you and Lola party hard to some old school rock.

At the moment you focused on doing what he showed you before and thankfully Rufus corrections were minimal, he laughed when you hit the cymbal out of time and helped you pick up the right rhythm with the bass when it proved a bit difficult for you.

“I don’t think you’ve got the rhythm, Y/N,” the blonde drummer mocked.

You rolled your eyes and felt your hair fall on your eyes as it was free from any hair tie today.

“Give me a day, I swear I’ll get this down.” You blew on your h/c hair to get it off your face and smiled up at him, still hitting the drums, “easy!”

Rufus laughed at you and retired back to the couch, listening as you tried your best at keeping that bass drum going. He sat back on the sofa facing you and struggled with his breath as he stared at your focused expression. You were damn pretty, he knew that. It was clear that you were cute when you were a child, but during your teenage years cute dialed up and turned into pretty and now entering your twenties it was more than just that. Rufus thought you actually had it after you managed to play the transition from the chorus to the verse, hitting the right drums and reaching to the right and back to your simple snare, snare, cymbal, like it was nothing.

You smiled at yourself and kept on playing, getting a little excited you stopped and started over, this time Rufus leaned forward on his seat at the sound of your voice.

“She was a fast machine, she kept her motor clean, she was the best damn woman I had ever seen…” you sang over the sound of the drums.

“Are we moving on to singing too?” Rufus cocked a brow.

You laughed out loud and lost the beat, effectively too overcome with joy to produce anything worthwhile on Rufus’ drums.

“Fuck yeah!” You stuck your tongue out at Rufus and hit random drums in a careless manner, catching the blonde’s attention.

You let your hair fall around your shoulders and over your face as you mimicked a move you often saw drummers do, hitting every single drum in sight in an increasingly louder way, ending it by throwing your hands up in the air with the drumsticks pointing at the ceiling.

Rufus clapped, amused at your childlike joy and admiring how damn hot you looked while doing the goofiest of things - not even sounding good but owning it, which was what counted really.

“I have to admit, this should be a fun thing to do on the regular.” You sat the drumsticks back on top of the tom-toms and stood up to go up to your friend on the couch. “It feels liberating.”

With a shrug, you stared at his bright blue eyes. Rufus held your stare and you finally pushed your hair behind your ears, why would you two keep wondering about it when you both wanted the other so badly? The studio was empty and you had it all to yourselves, yet here you were playing stupid.

Hesitating with your hands still behind your ears, you decided to give it a shot, in any case, you thought you had such a strong friendship rejection of any romantic advances would not be such a big deal, after all, you had dated other people in the past and talked quite freely about it too. You slid your hands down your strands of hair that were left hanging on your shoulders and found your hands wandering down your skirt, followed attentively by Rufus’ eyes.

Confident now you saw as he laid back on the couch, starting up a conversation that for sure would lead nowhere in an attempt at distracting himself from how nice your freshly waxed legs looked from what he could see.

“And how exactly do you plan on becoming a better drummer by not playing?” He wondered.

A giggle left your lips and you stepped closer to him around the small coffee table, standing right in front of your friend.

“I guess I’ll have to sleep with someone, see if that gets me a spot on the band.” You joked.

Rufus raised his brows, his head thrown back to be able to look up at your face, amusement and something else mixed in your eyes, pulling at the corners of your mouth as well.

“I don’t think you have many members to choose from...basically everyone is taken.” He lamented with his eyes falling on your cleavage for a second.

You nodded and narrowed your eyes, pointing your index finger at his face.

“Ah,” you opened your eyes wide and raised your brows, “but the one that matters is single!”

With that you pulled on your skirt and raised the fabric of your dress up as you sat on Rufus’ lap, straddling him, now your faces were close and your chests were almost pressed against each other’s. Wrapping your arms around his neck you felt his arms snake behind you and hold you too, pulling you closer on his lap.

“What have you got in mind?” He wondered, his blue eyes giving him away when his gaze fell from your e/c eyes to your lips.

Taking the opportunity you reached to cup his cheek and grazed the golden hairs of his growing beard as you leaned forward to touch his lips with yours in a kiss so soft it felt like it almost did not happen. Until it did. Encouraged by your sweet little move, Rufus brought his hand to your cheek too and pulled you in harder into him, his lips pressing on yours with a force less sweet than before.

Although it did not take you by surprise, you were eager and enthusiastic about his positive response. Your lips moved along with his and you let your hands drag down his neck and to his chest, pushing him away briefly when his tongue had just ventured into your mouth. You did not know if this would be a great idea but for sure it would be worthwhile, so you spoke softly to him about the one thing bothering you.

“I really really really want you to put your hair down,” you gave Rufus a side smile and watched as his hands left your body to reach behind his head and with fanatic disposition take the elastic out of his long golden hair. “There he is!”

Rufus snorted and rolled his eyes at you, but put his hands on your hips and tilted his head to put his lips against yours again. This time you crashed your lips onto his and kissed him with a new need, a want that grew in your belly as you tangled your fingers in his hair when you messed with it and Rufus let out little pleased sounds.

He did not mean to get busy with you, in fact, you were supposed to meet Lily, Lola and Rory for dinner though right now, Rufus’ thoughts were somewhere else… in fact he could not think straight with your lips on him and your tongue against his. He just pictured how pretty you would look if he got his way with you, and he would be responsible for it - this only increased the tightness on his jeans that got a little more unbearable as you left wet open-mouthed kisses on his neck, nibbling on his adam’s apple, your breath fanning over his skin.

And it did not help that you seemed to know exactly his thoughts as you started grinding your hips on his. Poor boy, wanted you so bad he almost felt embarrassed.

You were confident with what you were doing and once you felt his erection beneath you, you did not pull away from his neck until Rufus pulled your face close to his and landed short desperate kisses on your previously pink-coloured lips. His hands left your sides and you could feel that both of you were trying to get some friction from one another, Rufus touched your cheeks for a brief moment before sliding down your chin and falling on the pretty black buttons of your dress, he started undoing them with his lips still on yours. Soon your light gray bra was on full display and Rufus’ lips were making their way down your jaw to your neck and collarbone, his beard tickling your skin and his mouth surely leaving marks behind. You did not care, you reached down between your bodies and pulled the zipper of his jeans down, making him moan against the tender flesh of your breast, he bit onto you when you touched him through the fabric of his navy blue boxers.

“Shit, Y/N…” his  voice sounded like a shaky breath, and you smiled down at him when you heard him.

You watched him bury his face on the valley of your breasts as you worked his cock with your hand, pumping it with the help of his own pre-cum as you too felt arousal gather between your legs.

Rufus felt himself getting closer and closer and his hands soon found a grip on your ass, pulling you farther up on his lap, venturing to kiss your lips he snuck a hand up your thigh and between your legs, pushing past your underwear to feel your cunt already wet and slippery, ready for his swollen cock.

Without hesitation, his finger swiveled over your clit and your mouth let out a loud surprised moan against his cheek. Rufus gasped for air and after just a few seconds so were you, with one hand on his shoulder for support as your hips moved desperately chasing that sweet friction his fingers were giving you while you jerked him off.

“I would love to be inside you,” Rufus admitted, his voice raspy on your ear before he nibbled on the soft flesh of your earlobe.

There was no time to waste, you pulled away from him, your hands swiftly slipping under your dress as you pushed your panties down and kicked them to the side to come back to sit on Rufus’ lap.

He kissed you and grabbed his own cock as you straddled him, excitement bubbling in your stomach as you sank down onto his hard length, feeling every inch and every vein as you were pulled down by his hands on your waist now. You rocked your hips against his and held on to the back of the sofá as you started riding him, your body adjusting just fine to his length and girth. Your hands slid under Rufus’ shirt and you touched his stomach and chest before he dared let go of your hips and take it off, throwing it away somewhere before thrusting his hips up and meeting yours, a little spasm shaking your thigh as a wave of pleasure ran up your spine.

You called out his name and pressed your chest to his as you kept on bouncing up and down his cock, rufus could feel your walls clench around him ever so often and it drove him mad, he just wanted to watch you cum around him, so he pulled your hair away from your shoulders and kissed your cheek, then your neck when you threw your head back grasping onto his shoulders for leverage. He fund your clit once again with his thumb and drew circles over it while you rode him, bringing you closer to the edge, Rufus squeezed your butt and nibbled on your sweet spot under your ear, only now learning of its existence as it was the last straw and your orgasm hit you with full force, delicious waves of pleasure expanding through your body that laid against Rufus; who marveled in the sight and sounds he was getting out of you. His cock twitched inside you and you did your best through your high to not stop riding it, although it was a matter of moments after he came, his cock spilling inside your throbbing cunt.

“Ah,” you sighed against your pale friend’s face, his cheek was bright pink from the sexual activities. “For the record, I don’t mind public places...but next time let’s get a room?”

Rufus exhaled a laugh and nodded his head, kissing your cheek he combed your hair back and tucked a strand behind your ear.

“So there will be a next time, huh?” Rufus’ eyes seemed to gleam with excitement. “After a date, I hope…” he tilted his chin down to get a glimpse of your expression as you looked down at him from his lap.

“If your sisters don’t kill us first for being late!” You giggle, leaning down you rub your nose against his. “We should get going.”

Before you stand, Rufus whines and pulls you against his chest, holding you he leant back on the sofá and had you put your head on his shoulder, nuzzling happily onto his neck. He ran his hand up and down your exposed arm while you drew shapes on his bare skin.

“By the way, you are an awful drummer. At most, you can stand backstage. Take it or leave it.”  

[blazardragon]

Korotan D: English Translation of Chapter 7 (Last Chapter) 

Finally, we have reached chapter 7! It’s been a fun ride, but all good things must come to an end :’D

In this chapter, Karma confronts Nagisa about Kayano, so Nagisa’s thoughts are revealed to the reader a bit more. Only a bit, though, as it seems that Nagisa might be better at reading Karma than Karma is at reading Nagisa. Also, a good portion of this chapter is Kayano being amazing and the class’s well-read folks (Hazama, Fuwa, and Mimura) appreciating her amazingness. Well, I guess everyone in 3-E found her amazing, but those three’s conversation about movie adaptations was fun to read ^^

Chapter 7: Performance Time

“We’ll start filming in 10 minutes! Hurry it up with your preparations!”

Nathonni raised his voice through a megaphone. The art group was busy working to reproduce an authentic-looking street of food stalls. Sugaya, too, worked as a member of the art group, painting one of the stalls so that a feeling of livelihood could be felt.

Kimura, Isogai, Kataoka, Okano, and Maehara, the members of Class E who were particularly confident in their physical abilities, hurried to put on their costumes in the waiting room. After hearing about Class E’s efforts to recover the golden Buddha statue from Jerome, the director suddenly decided to add another scene. It was a scene where ninjas who pursued Rin from Japan have a showdown with Jerome, a scene that was once rejected because they didn’t have enough stuntmen. He offered to have Class E play the part of the ninja group.

Knowing that he was about to take part in an action scene, Kimura was itching with excitement as he checked out the ninja costumes, which Hara helped make. Karma peeped in on the five ninja figures as they waited in the waiting room.

“Westerners really like having ninjas appear for no reason, huh~  But if it’s that director, it may end up being interesting after all, so I’m looking forward to this, too.”

“I’m jealous of you, Karma. If word got out that you did the stunts for Jerome the heartthrob, you’d be soooo popular with the girls!”

The idea was very like Maehara.  Thanks to Jerome’s injuries, he was unable to complete his action scenes, and because Karma could move well and had a build similar to Jerome’s, Karma was selected to be his stuntman. Karma being Karma, he looked calm on the surface, but, in truth, he was thrilled that he was going to perform in one of director Nathonni’s films.

“Karma, you’re really happy, aren’t you? Even if you try to hide it, I can still tell.”

Nagisa saw through Karma’s heart.  

“Not really.”

Karma had a broad grin as he said this.

 Nathonni broadcasted his orders through his megaphone.

“Okay, take-one! Action!”

Mimura, who was appointed as the assistant director in charge of directing the extras on-site, received Nathonni’s orders and made a large motion with his hand.

“Action! Walk!”

People acting as passerbys began walking back and forth along the street. Those stationed at the food stalls also began acting. Karma, acting in place of Jerome, and Kayano, acting as Rin, ran through the area. They made it look as if they were running away in a hurry. Behind them, ninjas hiding themselves behind their masks and black clothing were following in pursuit. The ninjas made use of their agility as they jumped over the pedestrians and ran atop the food stalls, and, in the blink of an eye, they caught up to and surrounded the pair.

“Cut! Magnificent! That was even better than I had imagined!”

Nathonni cried out in excitement.

“But why in the world are you all so physically capable?”

Kurahashi, who was observing beside the director, puffed out her chest as she answered.

“Our P.E. teacher in middle school was super strict! If you ever saw his superhuman moves, you’d totally offer him a job~”

 When it became time to re-shoot the kiss scene that Kayano had messed up repeatedly, Nathonni anticipated that Kayano would be nervous, so he urged the staff to work quietly. Sensitively feeling such an air around her, she continuously told herself to concentrate. However, when rumor got around that the two stars’ kiss scene was about to be filmed, the crowd of onlookers became even larger than usual.

“Quietly, quietly.”

Mimura told the locals in English and through his gestures to try not to make a sound. However, it turned out that such a thing wouldn’t be so easy.

As many trainees gathered around the filming location in a hubbub, Nagisa silently distanced himself.

“Nagisa, where are you going? The filming site is that way.”

Karma caught Nagisa.

“I was thinking that I should try not to disturb Kayano.”

“You’re the one who said that Kayano’s blade isn’t so fragile. What are you going to do if you don’t put your faith in her here?”

“ ……Also, when I watch Kayano’s kiss scene with Jerome, I feel really anxious.”

“Ooh? And why is that?”

“Because of her work, Kayano’s in a frightening world where it’s impossible to know just what might happen, right?”

“Well…… I guess.”

“If by chance she were to get involved with a lewd beast like that and have her career as an actress adversely affected in the future…… when I imagine such a thing, supporting her in person feels so complicated.”

Karma burst out laughing when he heard Nagisa refer to the new Hollywood star as a “lewd beast”. He didn’t know if Nagisa was saying this as a friend, as something like a parent, as a fan, or as something else entirely, but Karma knew that for Nagisa, too, the fact that Kayano is a special, precious existence will never change.

“Look, instead of chatting here, let’s go watch her. If you’re going to support her, you have to watch her properly with your own eyes.”

Karma grabbed Nagisa’s shoulders and forcibly pulled him along.

At the filming site, Kayano and Jerome were already standing in position. Kayano stood with a nervous expression, straining to keep her concentration from breaking. In contrast, Jerome was staring at her with a smirk on his face. This was because out of all the girls he has done a kiss scene with, every single one of them had fallen for him.

 “Action!”

 The scene began with lines from Rin.

“You’re only in it for the money!”

“Yeah. I do love money. But you know, there are other things I love besides money!”

“Like what!?”

At Rin’s strong response, Jerome grabbed both her shoulders.

“You.”

Jerome closed in on Rin’s lips, and gave her a bold, masterful kiss.

When I release my lips, Haruna’s gonna be looking at me with lovey-dovey eye-

 At that moment, Rin slapped him.

Stunned, Jerome reflexively held his cheek, but Rin removed his hand and kissed that same cheek.

“Don’t just steal my lips as you please! With this, we’re even.”

Jerome stared at Rin, eyes open wide. Rin’s lively smile stood in stark contrast against his expression, inspiring even greater interest in the audience to witness their adventure.

“Hey, don’t space out on me! We need to go retrieve my father’s Buddha statue!”

As Jerome’s face returned to its original whiteness after the slap, Rin pulled Jerome’s arm and led him forward.

 “Cut! Haruna, your ad-lib was the best!”

Nathonni was roaring with laughter as he praised Kayano. Jerome, on the other hand, looked as if he wanted to protest.

“D-director! Doesn’t this totally go against the script!?”

“Yup, it does. Haruna proposed the idea to me, telling me, ‘Rin is a determined, unyielding character, so having her be swayed by a single kiss from a man is way too simplistic. I want to add to this scene.’ However, never in my wildest dreams did I think that suddenly slapping you would be her ad-lib! I’m in awe!”

“Wai- but you treated my ad-libs like a joke! Director, you’re laughing way too much!”

“Jerome, your talent is in your reactions to other people’s ad-libs. You can check the video we recorded just now. Your expression is first-class, which maximizes the charm of your character.”

“……”

In fact, the director’s eyes were on the mark. Later on, the comical expression Jerome made in this scene was highly acclaimed, expanding his range as an actor.

 What a woman…… She didn’t change a single line, and yet with just one slap, she doubled the liveliness of the whole scene.

 Checking the video, Jerome was astonished at Kayano’s acting sense, which made both of them shine. It was as if she were a killer wearing an actor’s skin. If he were to get lazy on his acting, he, the protagonist, would be devoured. He figured he should stop trying to flirt with her for a while…… For the rest of the time they were filming, he looked so serious that one would have thought his life depended on his acting.

 When Kayano returned to the waiting room, Class E suddenly encircled around her.

“That was so good! He’s a bad guy, but you straightened him up!!”

“That slap wasn’t in the script, right!? Was that what you’d call an ad-lib?”

“Although, considering that the script was set for you to be all lovey-dovey from one kiss, that slap is quite the sudden change. The director took it well.”

“Kukuku, we laid the groundwork.”

With their plan complete, Hazama and Fuwa laughed.  

“It’s a common thing for screenplays based on great novels to lay down such undisguised opportunism. Even when the original novel isn’t a love story, they employ cheap developments such as that. In the original novel, the charm of Rin’s character is supposed to be her unshakable, strong heart.”

Fuwa nodded approvingly at Hazama’s opinion.

“And that’s precisely why it’s better to make use of her self-assured character! I told the director that when we were eating.”

“The director didn’t take it as bad as I thought he would. It sounds like the producers were pushing for it since it was written by a screenwriter they had sponsored, but it seems he was unsatisfied with the script. Right, Mimura?”

“Yup. As the director, changing the script is easy if he gets onboard with Kayano’s ad-lib. In Hollywood, it’s fine if the final product takes a 180 degree turn by the time filming is complete and editing begins.”

“So, taking the director’s responses to three different people as a hint, I decided to try acting the way you saw earlier. I wasn’t sure if he was going to give me the okay, though.”

Kayano smiled wryly.

 Kayano left behind her classmates, still talking enthusiastically about the script, to get a drink when she spotted Nagisa, who was standing there with his mouth agape.

“Nagisa! What did you think about my acting!?”

“……It was amazing. Maybe I’m just stating the obvious, but…... the one standing there was Rin, not Kayano. You kissed with Rin’s heart and words, then returned to being the usual Kayano. I guess that’s what acting is.”

“It depends on the actor, but I leave my role behind the second I hear the word ‘cut’. After all, the everyday me is the everyday me! I don’t want to take my work home with me.”

Once again, Nagisa couldn’t help but respect Kayano’s high level of professionalism. He felt ashamed of himself for the unneeded concern he was feeling just moments ago.

“So, so, how was Jerome’s kiss? Was it good? Was it, was it?”

Nakamura laid bare her trashy heart as she asked Kayano.

“Hmmm, I guess it’s because I’ve felt Bitch-sensei’s kisses, but I thought it was nothing special.”

Everyone went into a bustle at her response.

“Ooh~ After facing off against a Hollywood star, our Kayano has said it herself!”

Nakamura stirred things up even more.

To press for an answer to his questions, Karma poked fun at the two of them as he observed them closely.

“And yet Nagisa was so worried that you’d go all lovey-dovey over Jerome’s kissing technique~”

“Wai- Karma!”

As Nagisa panicked, Kayano reacted sensitively,

“You’re horrible! You thought I’d brainlessly get hooked by a goofy showoff like that!?”    

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!”

Nagisa was being tormented from all sides.  

“Nagisa, go apologize!”

“You’re treating Kayano like a bitch!”

“I’m really sorry!”

Seeing Nagisa put his hands together in apology, Kayano recalled the Nagisa of three years ago.

Nagisa had apologized in the same way after saving her with his kiss when the tentacles were killing her. At that moment, Kayano was shot through the heart, and Nagisa has kept her stolen heart since then. Even now, no matter how popular the actor, no matter how skillfully she is kissed, they will never compare to the kiss her junior high school classmate risked his life to give her.    

He hasn’t noticed yet, has he……? Just how fearsome a killer he is.

The bitter smile Kayano let escape was quickly replaced by a genuine smile as she witnessed the liveliness of her classmates, unchanged since back then. She returned to her circle of friends, who were all messing with Nagisa once more.

 Everyone laughed together, hugging each other’s shoulders and joking around as the crumbled crescent moon rose above them. It was as if it wished to continue watching over those students, as if there were still more to come.

 Class 3-E is the Assassination Classroom.

Tomorrow, as well, the morning bell will ring.

 No notes, so just comments:

We need more actresses like Kayano! That kind of respect for the original source material is a rare occurrence these days! Although, as much as I love the way she changed that scene, her complaint about Rin being swayed by a single kiss is a little ironic considering how much she was swayed by a single kiss from Nagisa.

Speaking of irony, Maehara would be in hysteria if he knew how popular Karma already is with girls. He doesn’t need to do Jerome’s stunts to have fangirls.

I was hoping everyone got a line in the last chapter, but a lot of the names I had seen were just mentions, it seems. Although, a fair number of students weren’t even mentioned in this chapter D:  Where did Okuda, Takebayashi, and the others go?

I’m mildly disappointed that the moon wasn’t described as “chipped” since the ending theme for half of season 2 was called the “Chipped Moon”. However, that mild disappointment is nothing compared to the feeling of anticipation that the ending gives me. This might be overly optimistic of me, but it feels as if it’s implying that there will be more canon material in the future. I don’t want to feed my hopes, but maybe… just maybe…

I hope you all enjoyed this! It feels weird for this to have ended already. My translation is nearly 20,000 words long, so it’s a lot of new content, but it feels like we blazed through it so quickly! I definitely still want more DX 

[theworstbob]

the thing journal, 6.11.2017 - 6.17.2017

capsule reviews of the pop culture i took in last week. this week: venice, witness, 1989, gilded, punch-drunk love, sucker, bloody bloody andrew jackson, gone now, boomiverse, melodrama, before sunrise, pinata, whiplash

1) Venice, by Anderson .Paak: Paak might be really close to Greatest Living Songwriter status. Like, Malibu and Yes Lawd! are both undeniable classics, but this is ALSO so solid, solid enough that I feel like, if we get someone in the room with Paak to say, "Hey, dude, maybe don't put a bad butt pun in this one?" Paak could be running the world. Every second of this album is wonderful. Like, .Paak makes songs that make an indoor kid like me wish he was at the beach, that's like the only thing I can say about this album. .Paak' great. I don't have enough words to describe what makes him great.

2) Witness, by Benjamin Booker: ...So, this is the last thing I'm writing? And this was a nice, bluesy rock album that made a Sunday morning slightly doper. I liked it, it was nice, listen to it if you like nice rock albums.

3) 1989, by Tay Tay: I sure do have a lot to say about this album that wasn't said two and a half years ago! I liked it. The first five songs are as good as any five songs on any album that's ever been, and then the rest of this album... Exists? Like there's no way I'm going to call an album with "Shake it Off" and "Bad Blood" on it a classic, and after hearing Lana del Rey songs I can't get behind the Lana del Rey impression that is "Wildest Dreams," like it was already an enh song but knowing it was ripping off an enh thing gives it a firm "no," but any album with "Style" and "Blank Space" and "Style" deserves plaudits, and the album does pick up with the last two tracks, which are up there with the first five tracks as the best stuff Tay Tay has ever done. End of the day, though, To Pimp a Butterfly still should have won Album of the Year, and if at the end of 2014 Catch-Up 1989 is still in the top ten for 2014 (#9 as I write this), I'd be stunned.

4) Gilded, by Jade Jackson: This? was somehow recommended to me by Amazon because I enjoy the music of Paramore. I cannot claim to have heard the Paramore in this. I heard a pretty decent if slow-moving country album! That was a fun surprise! One of my favorite things about country music in 2017 is how, like, we typically associate rebellion with punk and rap, y'know? Loud music that moves fast and is always shouting. And rebellion in country is sitting with just an acoustic guitar and singing sad songs about small towns. Like, a lot of country music is about what a small town home town dirt road party it is to be in the sticks, so the outlaws have to slow it down and reflect on whether they're truly happy where they are. So like, this album has incredibly little in common with Paramore from a music standpoint, but they share an attitude which has to manifest itself differently because of their respective genres. Basically, I'm incredibly down with this album.

5) Punch-Drunk Love, dir. Paul Thomas Anderson: hey. hey guys. did you guys know about this paul thomas anderson dude. he's pretty great. like, everything about that scene where he asks the woman out, the warehouse collapsing, the calls from the phone sex scammer, his sister haranguing him, the woman not knowing how to respond to this, him clearly not knowing how to handle the situation, the pudding the so much pudding, the score building as everything falls apart, it's so fucking good. i remember, when i was 12, this movie had like two whole shelves at hollywood video, and when my dad and my family were looking at this movie, we were like "we love little nicky! but this might be more serious? and poor innocent caralin," and i just, i wonder what a younger me would have thought about this film. i wonder how i would have reacted to this, if we actually had pulled the trigger on punch-drunk love before i was anywhere near ready to handle it.

6) Sucker, by Charli XCX: hahaha i need to do theme weeks or something like i'm supposed to think about a paul thomas anderson joint and then try to come up with a decent opinion about a fine, just a tich below great pop album. i should've eased myself into this, it should've gone punch drunk love, the kimbra album i added to provide the bridge from film master class to pop, and THEN charli xcx. i mean, i enjoyed this a lot, i had a solid, solid bus ride, but like i just need to structure the sequencing of thing journal better. like, maybe don't put the slap-hitting second baseman after the cleanup hitter, but the jason kubel type in the fifth spot, the chunky dude who kinda sucks at baseball but hits dingers more often than not. gotta think about my lineup, guys!

7) Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, wr. Michael Friedman: Well, this was good stupid fun. I think "Ten Little Indians" is a standout track, so clear a standout that it honestly belongs in a better work. It's a distillation of Native American history that doesn't seem to have any place in a musical recasting one of the shittiest presidents as a vain, morose emokid rock star, but then again, I listen to soundtracks and don't watch the shows, so fuck do I know about context. So, yeah, I dug "Ten Little Indians," and then everything else was fine and silly and took itself just unseriously that it never felt like American Psycho. Theatre in general isn't a good home for irony, but at least here, the sarcasm wasn't subtle, it was waving a giant flag the whole time saying "THIS IS DEF JOKES."

8) Gone Now, by Bleachers 9) Melodrama, by Lorde See, if I were a decent listener, I might have tried following up Gone Now with Melodrama. These reviews aren't being indexed in chronological order; I listened to Boomiverse before I gave Melodrama a spin, and looking back, I should've saved Gone Now for Friday to do a Jack Antonoff Power Block. I wonder if my opinion on these albums is colored by the interview I read where Jack Antonoff says he originally imagines all his songs for female voices, he writes his songs for women, then pitches them an octace down should they become Bleachers songs. And I found both Strange Desire and Gone Now to not really resonate with me, neither album really hitting me in the way an entity such as Bleachers should hit me. Bleachers is fun, '80s-inspired pop music -- I love that! But there's this weird disconnect I feel between the voice and the music, and I can't tell if that's a conclusion I arrived at on my own or if it was informed by that article, because while I didn't like Gone Now, I really loved Melodrama. Lorde and Antonoff work perfectly together, her voice gives life to a lot of things I heard but wasn't enthralled by on Gone Now, and they had a vision for this album -- songs have part twos! There's a reprise! ("Liability" is DOPE in the context of this album, y'all) -- which they executed sublimely. It's a complete, cohesive album that feels so much bigger than 11 songs, so full of weird ideas, and while I'm not sure how the mainstream is gonna react, I thought this was dope as hell, "dope as hell" being the highest praise my limited vocabulary has to offer.

10) Boomiverse, by Big Boi: One benefit of being just a dude on tumblr chronicling his experiences is that I didn't have to listen to and write a thinkpiece about a 70-minute Lil Yachty album. I only have to experience Lil Yachty through his features on other people's songs, do not have to contend with the totality of his vision. But, it is disappointing that professional music people DO have to write extended thinkpieces about Lil Yachty, when those words and thoughts and energies would have been far better spent on this album. This album is just good. There's no frills, minimal use of the obligatory Atlanta trap beat, clever rhymes, only occasional misogyny, and maybe the most jubilant rap track of 2017, "All Night." I honestly can't remember the last time I heard a hip-hop joint as joyous as "All Night." So much of my favorite hip-hop of the last few years hasn't been happy, and not even the justifiable "shit's fucked up" unhappy, the "sadness is the only valiid emotion" unhappy, and "All Night" is a statement that darkness is nothing without light.

11) Before Sunrise, dir. Richard Linklater: "Hey! I've been up since 1 AM, and it is presently 4:30! I'm going to put on this quet movie about a quiet night in Vienna so I can watch Before Sunrise before sunrise, LOL!" Yeah so I fell asleep during this one, team. Not long enough to feel like I missed a lot, not long enough for this film to lose its impact, but enough to feel like I failed this film. What I was able to see was great. It was like someone shot a podcast in Vienna, and that sounds like an insult, but I'm into movies that are just two people talking to each other, and I'd be into a podcast where two strangers try to fall in love in two hours, two people bullshitting about love and relationships and the future while wondering if they could be happy with the other person outside of the podcast. It didn't feel at all tempered knowing there's a sequel in the queue. Like, knowing these two people see each other again is disappointing, only in the sense that I don't get to live with the ending for 10 years before learning about the sequel, but at the same time, the characters don't know they're going to see each other again, and that last goodbye at the train is so heart-wrenching, the way she disappears behind the wall and the guy just follows her, trying to stay as close to her as possible.

12) Pinata, by Freddie Gibbs & Madlib: I will let nature review this album for me: I live in a garden level apartment, and outside my bedroom window, where I stationed my new computer, there's a bucket beneath the gutter in which water rests. Squirrels will occasionally come through, take a sip, and bounce. But as I was listening to this album, I saw that the squirrel was lingering outside my window. I assumed it was responding well to the vibrations created by Freddie Gibbs' pleasant, deep-voiced flow and the low-key production, and that it was enjoying the things it was feeling. This is music squirrels can enjoy, man, what more do you want. And then a Danny Brown feature came on, and that squirrel RAN, man. Like, I get it? I wouldn't expect a squirrel to respond well to Danny Brown, but I still feel that squirrel is missing out.

13) Whiplash, dir. Damien Chazelle: When I listen to music, I've found I connect to the drumming more than anything but the lyrics. Part of the reason I still listen to pop/punk is because literally every single pop/punk drummer is amazing, drumming so so fast every time. I also watch sports and speedrun streams, and one of the things that fascinates me is the maniacal drive to be great, this obsessive need to push yourself to some limit most would find unnecessary. So of COURSE I'm into a film which would marry the two, and which had the performance of a lifetime from JK Simmons, JK Simmons deserving all the plaudits he got for playing Malcom Tucker's long-lost American twin. I think Miles Teller was cat perfectly for the scenes where he's with JK Simmons, an arrogant nothing-boy who can convey talent and cluelessness, but Miles Teller is such a zero that the scenes with his family and girlfriend, where we're supposed to say "no nice boy don't isolate yourself from your loved ones to drum so good," just felt like "god shut the fuck up you whiny jerk." The film also didn't really address a couple of questions I thought might be relevant to the JK Simmons character. Does music still retain its meaning if you obsess over it to the extent that Fletcher does, do people still respond to his performances on an emotional level, or do they appreciate it on a purely technical level? There's that dinner scene, where someone in Miles Teller's family asks, "How can you have a music competition? Isn't it subjective?" and Miles Teller says, "No," but it never explores the idea of what chasing the parts of music which can be judged objective does to the music. The other question is, what right does Fletcher have to the next Charlie Parker? How does this white dude think he can own jazz? But I've spent more words finding what's problematic about the film than I did on what I liked, which is usually the sign of a great film, one I wanted to spend a lot of words thinking about.