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The Drowned Halls

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if you like crafting and also free things, might i suggest the antique pattern library?

it’s a not for profit that’s gathering books, patterns, and other materials related to crafting that are out of copyright (or getting permission from copyright holders in some cases) in order to share them online. they scan items, clean them up, then make everything available for free!

free things are great, especially when you’re just starting to get into something. like oh, i’m supposed to spend money on this hobby i just picked up 20 minutes ago???

the first time i ended up on the site, i seriously spent hours just trawling through everything. there’s the usual suspects like knitting, crochet, embroidery, but there’s also woodwork, calligraphy, and books on things like how to mount and frame pictures. with cross stitch patterns, they also make modern charts with the dmc colour codes available.

links to their webbed site and instagram:

https://www.antiquepatternlibrary.org/

https://www.instagram.com/theantiquepatternlibrary/

behold, a glorious cat cross stitch pattern (link goes to antique pattern library page):

[image id: Multicolour charted cross stitch design of a cat sitting on a red pillow with tassels, holding a green ball]

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there should be a jesus on the cross emoji. not for any religious reasons. just so I can use it for every slight inconvenience.

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My Unhinged Proposal for what The Mummy Returns (2001) Could Have Been

Introduction - Why Some Sequels Are Kinda Doomed From The Start

I am not the first, nor the last, that will write about why sequels just DO NOT succeed. Patrick Willems has covered why the sequel has a hard time from the jump, which I think we all know before it is said, but still, it is important to hold in your head before I get to my proposal for what the second movie in The Mummy (1999) franchise could have been.

Sequels that are built quickly off of the body of one successful film without its own forward vision is probably destined to fail. We have all seen it - a second movie quickly greenlit and out in theaters within two-ish years of the first movie, which drags out the characters we loved but somehow forgetting everything about the first movie that audiences actually liked. This second movie will make less than the first, but even worse, if it made just enough, there will be a third even worse movie that feels like a wet fart even in comparison to number two.

Now. Some may actually like The Mummy Returns (2001). I'm sorry. It's fine if you like it. But as a kid who was over the moon about The Mummy (1999), the highs of seeing that there was a sequel, then the lows of what the sequel actually was felt like whiplash. I didn't have the words for what felt wrong, why the sequel didn't live up. Now, I wanna use those words to articulate what maybe could have worked, that there could have been another that actually worked.

PART ONE - What Doesn't Work in The Mummy Returns (2001) and Who/What I Would Cut

ALEX - easy choice here. There didn't need to be a kid. WHY DOES THE SEQUEL START 7 YEARS LATER ANYWAYS?? I have some other ideas, which I will get to in a minute, but sorry Alex, ya need to go.

THE DIRIGIBLE - Just, this fucking flying potato. Izzy the pilot is fine, keep him, but dangit, this thing looks terrible. Just use a bigger plane! There is nothing wrong with a bigger plane!

SCORPION KING - Do I even need to say it? I'm sorry Dwayne Johnson, this was not the first star vehicle you needed.

ANCK-SU-NAMUN and IMHOTEP - Now, hear me out. The Mummy Returns could have just been, like, the concept of a living Mummy coming back, not these two specifically. The exciting part of The Mummy is the face of Imhotep, almost wordless, sulking about and causing mayhem. These two actually emoting at each other is just not exciting. We needed a different villain, a different unmovable immortal force which drives our characters forward.

REINCARNATION - This is kind of the biggest sin of the movie. Movie One logic is this: Rick got a map and key from going to Hamunaptra - we don't see how he got it, and considering he knows how to get there without the map, the map is a red herring, and the key is the thing to focus on. Then Jonathan stole the key from Rick, and Evelyn found Rick to follow the map's course. This is luck - happenstance, inquisitiveness. and adventure.

The second movie INSISTS it is all fate, all of the first movie, and all of this movie, just destined to happen, it had to be these people, and they had to defeat both Imhotep and The Scorpion King, the CGI abomination from the depths of hell.

How, exactly, is Jonathan, fail-son supreme, stealing a key from a bar part of fate?? Why didn't Evey find the key then, if really, Jonathan is just tangential to Evey being a reincarnated princess and Rick being a former guard-now-monster-killer?

Part of the horror of The Mummy (1999) is an immortal monster who has picked humans to maim and kill who had stumbled into his wake. That unstoppable force which is blind to all else but its desires is part of the charm. Evey and Rick being a part of the original story of Imhotep seems... whatever.

PART TWO - If I Was Queen of the World, How Would I Plot The Mummy 2

MAKE. EVELYN. A. LIBRARIAN.

She loves her job. She clearly loves books and research. Why would she not want to go back to the stacks after adventure, then be called back to the field for her expertise??

Starting from two years after the plot of The Mummy (1999) could have dug into how these characters dealt with the stress and violence of their lives, as well as what the next steps in Evey and Rick's relationship looks like. Dating and working through their every day normalcy.

The Mummy Returns fumbles starting in England. It could have been fodder for The British Museum having some nefarious elements which leads to another big bad coming back to life. A bunch of older researchers working within the resources of British colonialism to harness some great power that our team discovers and has to stop - what an incredible faceless determined force! Evelyn already established in The Mummy (1999) that Banbridge Scholars got something pretty important wrong - what if that endemic poor translation and blindness to true ancient power is something our team has to combat?

I think the real fix, the real direction The Mummy 2 should have gone is Evelyn researching something new after a near-death-Egyptology-experience, and then the crew of Evey, Rick, Jonathan, and Ardeth (currently jobless after the death of Imhotep) goes ANYWHERE ELSE. Why not some other ancient culture that England has it's thumb in??

There is more we could dig into, more places a sequel could have been, and all of this part is pure conjecture on what I would like, but I think these building blocks and launching into a new world would have been more successful.

PART THREE AND LAST - Could More Movies Just Be The Mummy (1999) Please?

It is obviously too late for the movie I want to exist. The Mummy Returns exists, there was the Tom Cruise reboot, it is too late. But. Could we not have a morsel of adventure horror again? Please? Why is The Mummy such an outlier? Why can't every movie have someone swinging from a rope?? Nerds and heroes running together?? Librarians and losers and muscle daddies?? REAL PHYSICAL HORROR MONSTERS?? I still yearn for a level of comedy, running around, and spooky monsters which just doesn't seem to happen that often.

This screed is really just for me to yell about things. But. Please. Can we please have that good good mix again? The blend of genre where both action people and nerdy dorks can love it??

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big fan of stories that, while undoubtedly being about the power of friendship, acknowledge that the power of incredible violence is just as important

the love was there. the love changed everything. the crowbar helped also

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I... I love... just.... look at the lad. lookit. yisssssssssssss.

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Please consider letting Robert Roberson know that we care.

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Happy "brick a bigot"-month, here's a freebie pattern!

Reblog & comment "BRICK" and I'll DM the pattern to you ~ 🧱✨

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Instead of only collecting trinkets, I've now also USED them.

Please clap. 🥹

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A non comprehensive list of descriptors (affectionate) I have been given my friends and coworkers.

- Victorian urchin, but the not streetwise one.

- Little pageboy scrambling around the castle

- There’s a touch of Timothée Chamlet about you, like you’re destined to die of consumption.

- You’re gonna look like a pixie until you’re 50 and then you’re just gonna look like a slightly older pixie.

- The uncanny valley between teen and adult.

- Terminator, but if he was invented to fit through the vents.

- You’d succumb to a light breeze.

- Changeling child who lures people into the woods.

- Destined to die tragically for the audience.

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Please reblog this picture of my beautiful son.

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Goatsong, Leila Chatti

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Language is universal