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Stranded

What would you do if you were trapped on a desert island cast away from society, gadgets, and friends? Would your mind be lost in the isolation, or would that not be the type of thing to affect you? Would you have the will to survive, to hunt, and build shelter, or has laziness left you inefficient for the task at hand?  (more…)

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Eyes of my Enemies

Eyes of my Enemies back again, and again a long wait sorry, folks.

Previously on Eyes of my Enemies, St. J and Sammie attempt at a normal life and go out to the movies. Sammie ignores these visions of death until they overpower her and the two come fleeing home. Meanwhile, the dark creature, the Angel of Death reaps both Dip and Jo destroying their home in the process. St. J scares the angel away but was useless against the police force. The suspicious Agent…

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I am part of the education process for special needs students in a school. I am a writer, a scriptwriter, and would like to call myself a free-thinker. As such, I can say the Robin Williams film Dead Poets Society resonates with me quite a bit. I watched part of this film before after Robin Williams had died, and I watch it now in full for the first time with new eyes in wonder of all this movie has to offer. Not only does the film have a message of independence, free will, and fighting for what you believe in, it also has several ideals in it in which makes the film reach high levels of importance and perfection on the scale of cinematography.

We can relate to much of the teachings found in this film as scholars of film, dreamers, and followers of aspiration alike. As a poet, writer, or film reviewer we must be able to see from new perspectives, we shouldn’t only see films through the lens of how we believe the creator may want us to see the film, but of how we personally see the art that has been crafted.

    Dead Poets Society is a drama run by conflict, it features character development, an internal message, and creates a wide arrange of powerful emotions. If there is ever a film that wishes you to feel something deep within yourself, it is this one. Conflict is the single most important part of any story, without it, there is no film, just a happy ending. As we have learned, it used to be in Hollywood’s nature to give us happy endings and compelling stories. Compare this film to Chaplin’s A Great Dictator the war may rage on and his friends may have lost their home, but we are still filled with a rush of happiness hearing Chaplin’s speech at the end, or seeing Keating smile as his students rise upon their desks in his honor. A drama is supposed to create a whirlwind of emotions for its audience and the only way to do that is through conflict. In this film, each character has their own conflict which ties into their character development.

Leim discovers he has been an actor his whole life. He plays the role of an obedient son, but as Mr. Keating teaches him to think differently, he learns of his deep passion for acting. He learned how to be himself and to fight for what he believed in even if that means dying for it. Knox found himself madly in love with a girl who he could not have. He discovered that he had always been quiet and decided to take control over his life by not quitting until he had the girl he loves.

    Robin Williams character, John Keating, had already gone through his development. In the original screenplay, the students discover he has Hodgkin’s disease. Mr. Keating is dying of cancer and because of this, it is important for him to “seize the day” for the little time he has remaining.

That was Keating’s change of character and the motion that he wished to impose onto all of his students. Not all of them complied, stiffs like Richard Cameron and Hopkins were slow to change their ways. Cameron became a very hated character while he developed into nothing, learned little from Keating, and ended up turning him in. While Hopkins who never really saw the point of Keating’s bizarre methods eventually found his way as he too rose to the occasion and stood on his desk as a farewell to Keating. Todd Anderson played a very important role in this film. His conflict was not only to live up to his families impressive name but also, as Neil’s roommate he was adopted into the Dead Poets Society although being awkward and non-outgoing like the rest of them. Slowly, we watched his character develop as he became able to overcome his fears and break out of his shell. In the beginning, he could also have been described as unemotional, someone who cared little, but after his roommate committed suicide, he did become very emotional and started to fight on the behalf of Mr. Keating being the first to rise and say “Oh Captain, my Captain.”

    The fact that Robin Williams himself was struck with the disease of depression and hid it over his years until inevitably committing suicide, has a major impact on the audience while viewing this movie. One has to wonder about any possible correlation between the events in the film or the impact his role had on him. Like Neil, Williams kept a part of himself hidden from the world although his part much darker.

    Like many great films, Dead Poets Society raises a major question; Who is to blame for Neil’s death? Was it Neil, himself. He did take on the teachings of Keating too strongly, he obsessed over the idea of non-conformity, we also are lead to believe that he did not take Keating’s advice and tell his father about his passion for acting. He was again given the perfect opportunity back in his house as his father asked him what it was Neil wanted to say, but he was silent in fear going against all of Keating’s teachings. There is the obvious answer to blame the controlling father who was made to play the bad guy and force his son into ten years of military and medical schooling. Then there is also the path less taken, blaming Mr. Keating as Cameron and the school district did. We are lead to believe this answer to be immoral. Charlie Dalton, the eccentric and overly outgoing member of Dead Poets Society goes out of his way to punch Cameron in the face signing his expulsion papers to defend Keating’s name. Although the film leads you away from this idea, one must look at the proof. One argument could be that if Neil never witnessed Mr. Keating’s absurd methods of teaching free will and seizing the day, he would never have killed himself. While this whole situation was very sad one must wonder how much impact of the note that both Keating left Neil at the beginning of the film and that Neil then left to Keating. It became sort of a message to each other that could be taken different ways. These two did have an oddly “red flag” relationship with each other which helps us understand why Keating cried after reading the note, but also makes us wonder if he felt guilty.

“To be read at the openings of D.P.S. meetings.

I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life. To put to rout all that was not life; and not, when I had come to die, discover that I had not lived.”

What type of impact did this have on the character Neil and to Robin Williams in real life? Does it mean that life is meaningless if you are not doing what you were born to do? Is life pointless if you do not love your life? Perhaps this is a goal to reach that Neil knew he could not make. Perhaps Mr. Keating knew the extreme impact that this quote had on Neil, he was the only one to read this passage out loud throughout the entire film. It is the first hidden message Keating gives Neil and that Neil eventually returns to Keating.

Besides the conflict, the messages, the depth of characters, and the overall plot of the film. One can appreciate that great conflict can be made without the major advancements of today’s technology. Like Christopher Nolan and his lacking usage of CGI and digital technology over real-life props and old-school film reels. Dead Poets Society strives to be different from traditional beliefs and make such a lasting impact on the world without the need for the amazing technology that we see in the blockbusters of today. How often do we see a simple set in Delaware become an Oscar-winning film and three-time nominee? Not very often. We also must be amazed by the lacking of tradition that this film shows as it’s lead star Robin Williams was able to make this film his own by improving an amazing 15% of his own lines. Striving to be different was not only a goal of the characters of the film but of the film’s crew itself. The boys who played students in the film lived together to bond and also studied movies, music, and radio of the 1950’s to better play their role. Then, of course, Mr. Keating’s teachings to be yourself and truly amazing people. There are several reasons why this film reached such great success and will be a long remembered film of our time as will Robin Williams.

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Works Cited

“15 Facts About Dead Poets Society.” Mental Floss, 3 Feb. 2015, mentalfloss.com/article/59232/15-facts-about-dead-poets-society.

Dead Poets Society: Analysis This movie is so important a must see for all. I am part of the education process for special needs students in a school. I am a writer, a scriptwriter, and would like to call myself a free-thinker.

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Eyes of my Enemies

Eyes of my Enemies

Previously on Eyes of my Enemies, we pick right back up in the heat of things as Sammie and St. J managed to free Katrina. Despite showing an amazing display of power, St. J still struggles to gain control over his deadly abilities. Even with all his strengths, it wasn’t enough to prevent Sammie from suffering a gunshot injury to her leg. With the combined abilities of Katrina and St. J, the…

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I’ve talked about the film Dunkirk in the past, it’s a great film to study. In this post, I’ll be using comparative elements to discover its true form. So if you too enjoy film analysis, then check it out.

Dunkirk is without a doubt a smart and thrilling film about a group of young Allied soldiers, a few piolets, and several civilians who all played their part in this historical battle of WWII. The film was crafted as cunningly as one would expect any of Christopher Nolan’s movies. Nolan has directed successful films such as Inception and Interstellar, two films that shocked the world with their creativity and in-depth plots. Dunkirk is an American film made last summer, July 2017, starring actors such as Tom Hardy, Harry Styles, and Cillian Murphy.

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      We see these characters face all odds as they are all placed in terrible situations. Most of them don’t get the chance to fight, or even speak much for that matter because of the intense conflict that surrounds them.

This film is different than other Christopher Nolan films with its historical background and little dialogue. It’s different from other war films with a largely one-sided battle, an irrational storyboard, and an even deeper focus involving civilians. Because of this, I raise the question; was Dunkirk a war film up to par with films like Full Metal Jacket, or was it more of a thriller based on creating suspense?

The film Dunkirk takes place on a battlefield but is that enough to qualify it to be a war movie? One could compare Dunkirk to the grittiest, most realistic, and passionate war movie, Full Metal Jacket. By doing so, there would be side to side comparisons between what is surely an American made war film, next to a clever and elegant piece that stuck success at the box office. There is more to compare than just the setting of a war film, but its themes, emotions, and the director’s choices involving elements such as music and dialogue also make a large impact on a film’s genre.

What makes a film a war story? The war itself does not matter, nor does the timeframe, or the individual battles. It is the emotions depicted, the reasoning for the film, and the overlining themes of heroism and bravery that make certain movies war films. Dunkirk shows the historical battle for Dunkirk where the allied forces needed to be rescued by their own British civilians. The story is true as it is powerful showing the desperate situation these men had to endure and the nationalism and bravery the civilians of Great Britain displayed as they traveled to France to save their army.

Full Metal Jacket also showed the dedication of soldiers and opens up to the long-held idea that war is hell. Although these two films were created decades apart from each other and depict wars from separate time periods, they still share the same values, when it comes to the dedication of soldiers.

While everyone is in agreement of uplifting the men who fought and died during combat, not all war movies praised the specific wars that our country participated in. Going back to the definition of a war film, it’s reasoning. “Joker” in the film Full Metal Jacket, played a journalist in the marines long out of combat. He wore a peace symbol button that conflicted with the message written on his helmet “Born to Kill”. After his traumatizing time in boot camp, months spent in Vietnam, then finally his brush in conflict, Joker learned much about this war. He saw that the people they are supposed to be helping hated them, the people they killed were just farmers, and the war itself was changing the psychology of its soldiers.

Compare the suicidal scenes of Full Metal Jacket to Dunkirk. When Private Leonard murder-suicides his Sargent, it was out of revenge for the mistreatment he was put through. When what we saw from the allied soldier on the beach of Dunkirk was an act of desperation. He walked into the sea himself and was never seen again a result of the stressful situation he was in. Sargent Hartford’s death was more of a shocking turn and a statement against the harsh treatment of soldiers in training.

Full Metal Jacket was made to show the real conflicts of war and the suffering that so many men went through for a war that didn’t need to be fought. Dunkirk on the other hand showed a completely different war and had a much more positive message. It was made to show a better side of humanity. In the darkest of moments humans won’t fall apart, but group together as a nation and risk their own life to save others. In Dunkirk, you didn’t have to be a soldier, or even a man, to be a hero. You didn’t have to win the battle to be victorious or even put up a decent fight. As WWII had a more positive cause, the reasoning behind the war films made about it tends to also show positivity. The Vietnam war was widely protested against so the films about it view the war negatively.

While war films can have happy endings, and often do so, the themes of survival, and civilian intervention are not typical in these type of films but do occur.

It seems fairly obvious that Dunkirk should be labeled a war film. After all, it fits the parameter being a fictional piece based on true events of war, the Battle of Dunkirk. But that only describes the setting that needed to be placed, without any indications of what type of action should be featured. “Fighting that war, planning it, and undergoing combat within it should fill the major portion of the running time” (filmrefference.com).

Going by this definition of a war film, it’s hard to say that enough action was taken to make Dunkirk a war movie rather than an evacuation movie. Conflict occurs when two foes confront each other, but throughout this film, we saw the Allied Forces as open targets. They had no way to fight and little ways to run. The film was dominated by Germany’s success in cornering the British and French troops onto a beach where they could pick them off slowly. But there still are war movies that are not heavily reliant on action. Films like The Best Years of Our Lives displayed a post-war scenario that was heavily influenced by war, but not inclined to show conflict. Other films will do the same using flashbacks to return to the war periodically as it is an important part of their plot. The question is, do these count as war films?

“I didn’t view this as a war film,” says the director. “I viewed it as a survival story”

Christopher Nolan went to another great director for advice when making this film, the creator of Saving Private Ryan, Steven Spielberg. In Spielberg’s recreation of the battle at Omaha Beach, his war movie featured limbs being blown off, vicious battles, and depressing losses that the audience empathized with.

“We didn’t want to compete with that because it is such an achievement. I realized I was looking for a different type of tension” (Nolan).

This director found many ways for his film to distinguish itself from others.

Besides Nolan’s classic cinematography techniques and overly extreme attention to detail, he strived to be different in a variety of ways.

“I needed suspense, and the language of suspense is one where you can’t take your eyes from the screen,” he says. “The language of horror is one where you hide your eyes. You’re looking away. It’s a different form of tension (Lang).

The way Nolan got his audience to keep their eyes glued to the screen was by crafting a thriller like we’ve never seen before. He gave us characters we had no reason to connect to. A random British teen in the middle of the war, a pilot making a brief flight, and a man with nothing but his son, a friend, and their sailboat. The names of the characters did not matter as some of them were only mentioned once. In the traditional war film like Full Metal Jacket, we get involved with our characters, the Marines showed in that film were brought up from the beginning of their training at boot camp. We saw these characters develop into killers before they were shipped out to Vietnam. It was important to see these character’s rise up because it made the film all that more traumatic when they were killed. They spoke to each other, told them stories and we learned of all of their differences being from random parts of our nation. We wanted to see them succeed, not just because they were on the American front, but because we had time invested in them and learned who they were.

Christopher Nolan’s approach to recreating the war was much more different as it was told like a thriller. It was hard to remember characters name’s and faces as they all seemed to be the same. Tommy, who started in The Mole, lost his entire squad within the first minute of the movie. Normally your men are the ones who will stick with you throughout the entire movie, naturally an elite killing force. But Tommy was an inexperienced soldier on his own. His first friend was a French soldier who didn’t speak English and was completely silent in most moments. Together the two met other British soldiers, but still, there was little dialogue. The British soldiers, for the most part, looked alike and when the French spoke, there were no subtitles making you rely almost entirely on what you saw, which was a visual masterpiece.

Instead of focusing the camera on the main points of battle, the conflict, German U boats and air force fleets, we got to see the faces of the terrified Allied soldiers as misfortune struck. When a torpedo was fired at the large destroyer they sneaked on to, we never saw where the missile came from, only the effects of its destruction. When they were in the boat waiting for the tide to come in, you had no idea where the shots were coming from while the soldiers were trapped within the boat. It was all very real, the emotions of the audience were shared with the film’s characters as we had no more information about the world than they did.

The aspect of closely following a set of characters and giving the audience a first-person viewpoint rather than the full knowledge of a third person view is common in thrillers, not war movies. Traditionally, war films pride the soldier’s tactics and show the battle plans usually spoken by generals around a large table then carried out by the foot soldiers. Or in Full Metal Jacket, when the sniper was gunning them down in the final scene, we all knew where she was, but the men didn’t. Imagine if we could have closer felt the emotions that Joker did at that moment. It’s hard to when you know something that he doesn’t.

In Dunkirk, the idea of splitting the story into three separate pieces with different characters have different missions is not too uncommon in war movies. Joker and his buddy from boot camp, Cowboy, met after going their separate ways in the Marines. Similarly, but with an entirely different game plan, Nolan had his three separate stories on three separate timelines, but they all collided towards the end. It may have been confusing to think when you notice Tom Hardy’s character, the pilot, only has one hour of fuel, but Tommy lasted multiple days in Dunkirk. The entire story was broken into pieces then put back together to create a thrilling chain of events with action never letting up. Even in the regular war films, there is time set aside for plot, character development, and time elapsing. But in Dunkirk, it is explosions and gunshot with only the intense feeling of awaiting danger in these in-between time.

This suspense has a sound to it that kept the audience thrilled even in the dialogue-less quiet moments. Christopher Nolan’s composer Hans Zimmer has worked with him in the past and the two enjoy putting a special kind of sound illusion to give his films that suspenseful touch. He is able to create a tone that seems to be getting higher and higher without actually changing its audio. The technique is called The Shepard’s Tone, it’s used by creating multiple layers on an ongoing loop. Three tones are made at different levels but all play at once separated by octaves. As the audio plays out, the highest tone comes in but fades away, the middle tone plays loudly all the way through, and the deepest bass tone slowly comes into audibility. When placed in a loop, you will always hear two of the tones ascending up the scales at the same time. You think you are hearing something constantly ascending, just like the suspense in the movie. This never-ending intense loop sounds eerie like you are rising up without control, it relates directly to the rising tension of the film, which is why Christopher Nolan loves using it so much (Vox).

Click here for a video with the full explanation.

Music like this should be featured in war movies, but it’s not because it’s too much. The goal of a war movie isn’t to scare or intimidate your audience. The bloodshed and gore they show in Full Metal Jacket or Saving Private Ryan is purely for historical accuracy. Dunkirk doesn’t even feature that much blood and remained a PG-13 movie despite the countless deaths. Perhaps this is because Dunkirk is one of the few war movies where you should fear drowning more than you should gunfire.

Throughout the several scenes out at sea, there is always the threat of sinking. Within the labyrinths of WWII warships, one torpedo strike could fill an entire level full of water with no way out. In this film, you either drowned or were blown away off camera by dropped bombs. Not one big name character died, they didn’t use any cheap gimmicks to make you feel sad. This wasn’t an emotional movie it was an intense one. Films like, Saving Private Ryan, wanted you to feel sad for the lost characters, and in Full Metal Jacket, you were supposed to think about the corruption of government. But Dunkirk the only way that you connected with these characters was by seeing through their eyes better than you did in either of those two war films.

Unlike Full Metal Jacket with its gloomy ending where we question what it is we are fighting for, Dunkirk ends at first with a glimpse into what “survivors guilt” looks like. They were just saved by an amazing feat of heroism like we see in countless movies, but no one was happy. They rode away from danger with blue faces covered in black oil. Tommy had seen so many deaths, the owner of the sailboat and his son had lost a friend, and Tom Hardy’s flew away into the sunset deeper into German territory out of fuel and ready to surrender. They were depressed as they got off their ships and made their way into England to prepare for the inevitable next stages of the war fearing Germany would soon conquer the world.

The blind man handing out blankets to the troops told everyone “Well done.” One responded with “All we did is survive.” To which he replied, “That’s enough.” It wasn’t until they truly reached England that the story took an uplifting turn, because the film’s message wasn’t at all about the troops in battle or heroism of soldiers because all they really did was die and cower. The real heroes were the citizens of Britain who risked their lives to save their army, but still, they all rejoiced as the soldiers returned home. There was talk in the papers of the bravery those sailors had and their prime minister Churchill rallied the nation with his famous speech “We Shall Fight on the Beaches”. No true war film shows such defeat, no war film avoids the theme of soldiers’ bravery and sorrow over fallen brothers.

Can we call the film about the greatest military disaster a war movie when the true heroes were not soldiers but civilians? Can we call Dunkirk a war movie if it was a one-sided battle with enemies on all sides with a vicious air force that slaughtered the Allied men?

Dunkirk is without a doubt a war film, yet it has the tendencies of a good thriller. Who is to say that thriller cannot take on a battlefield? Who’s to say war films can’t have the aspects of horror? We mix genres more and more today with our interest shrinking and greater stories being required. This type of film needed to take place on Dunkirk because you cannot be so easily thrilled with regular warfare which the Battle for Dunkirk was not.

A horror takes place when characters are put up against a force so powerful that they are completely outmatched and only until they have grown as characters can they lay an attack. But for the most part, horror movies are just about survival, which Christopher Nolan himself said, this is not a war film, but a survival film. It has the music of a thriller and the videography of a blockbuster that showed the emotions of the battle that took place long ago. If there can be such thing as a thriller war film, then that is what Dunkirk is classified as. It cannot be just a war film, because it is the first of its kind, different than the gritty Full Metal Jacket, or the blood-filled Saving Private Ryan. Dunkirk is virtual reality without the headset and a visual masterpiece to all who watch it.

  Sources

Lang, Brent. “Christopher Nolan Gets Candid on the State of Movies, Rise of TV and Spielberg’s Influence.” Variety, 8 Nov. 2017. Vox, director. The Sound Illusion That Makes Dunkirk so Intense. 26 July 2017. “War Films.” Film Reference.

Dunkirk Film Analysis I've talked about the film Dunkirk in the past, it's a great film to study. In this post, I'll be using comparative elements to discover its true form.

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Eyes of my Enemies

Eyes of my Enemies Episode 7, sorry for the extended wait, so much to get done.

Previously on Eyes of my Enemies, St. J and Sammie have set out to steal St. J’s car back from his parent’s house welcoming in some unwanted memories. They continued on to the prison alone, finding Blake and Nikki busy with training. With on the spot planning, Sammie and St. J were able to break into the prison to begin their search for the fallen angel, Katrina, but found complications all along…

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Lofi Chill Hip-Hop Beats

Lofi Chill Hip-Hop Beats What do you listen to while you study/work/write?

What do you guys like to listen to while you write? I wrote a post earlier about the different techniques you can use to prevent writer’s block. One thing that I mentioned was to know your environment in which you write your best. Is at night or when you just wake up, do you brainstorm beforehand or dive right into it. Before I mentioned the idea of listening to music while you write, but now I’m…

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Eyes of my Enemies

This episode of Eyes of my Enemies is called The Prison. Another action packed thriller as our characters break the fallen angel from Holbrick Penitentiary. Enjoy

Previously on Eyes of my Enemies. Nikki is stricken with grief after giving into her animal ways and allowing the Lycan within to rampage throughout the streets. Blake shows another side of himself comforting her with the story of their species origin. Meanwhile, St. J and Sammie learn of the angel with black wings, Katrina. After an intense battle with the police, she was captured and brought to…

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Man of the Year

Man of the Year - Bryan Fagan. It's great we had this chance to talk. Learn more about this writer here.

Through blogging, we are given an amazing opportunity to connect with others with similar interests and aspirations. We are given the chance to help and learn from each other through the amazing gift that the internet is. Too many people use this device to spread hate, while there is a world of opportunity literally at our fingertips. An amazing writer, Bryan Fagan, reached out to me as friendly…

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The Pint Father

I wrote this play a little while back, a little funny but still a tragedy. Check it out.

Anyone want to read a play I made a while back. It’s pretty short, shorter than the majority of the stuff I post on this wonderful blog St. J Writing. But I got a little funny with this work. I’m not really familiar with many plays so I took a lot of inspiration from the one play I do know, A Christmas Carol. My play, The Pint Father, is about an alcoholic in 1800’s England. He goes throughout…

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Eyes of my Enemies

Latest Episode of Eyes of my Enemies is here. Sorry, would have gotten it out sooner but you know blizzard wiped out my internet and power for a few days.

  Previously on Eyes of my Enemies, Nikki has been found and returned to her natural state. After her first transformation into her full Lycan state, she had run amok throughout the town of LittleRock. Nikki found the bodies of those she had harmed and is suffering from guilt. She had also learned of Sammie and St. J’s relationship, not at all pleased to see her best friend and sister together.…

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Bobby Tarantino II (The Influence)

Bobby Tarantino II (The Influence)

The latest body of music by rapper Logic is coming in the form of a mixtape available to all on all streaming devices. Bobby Tarantino II, the second mixtape of the series. Logic used to be a known member of the mixtape community, back when Datpiff was huge and not filled with “Mumble Rappers” and trap music. Logic brings back the idea of passing out free music, like his colleague Chance the…

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Eyes of my Enemies

Check out the latest episode of the continuing series Eyes of my Enemies. Episode 5 is here, but if you've missed the previous ones, just hit the Weekly Episodes button. There all there along with plenty of content @ St-j.blog

Episode 5 is here! Previously in Eyes of my Enemies, St. J has finally confessed to Sammie the little information he has about what’s happened to him over the last couple day. After bringing her into the light it seems he has immediately placed her in danger as Kalexo continues to attempt to end our heroes adventures. Now, after Blake has failed to properly train Nikki in her Lycan abilities, she…

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John Wick: The Third Chapter

John Wick: The Third Chapter

The world’s favorite BA assassin is back with his chapter in what is sure to be yet another action-packed, explosive-rigged, fight fest filled with all the intensity you would expect from a John Wick Film (more…)

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Eyes of my Enemies

The next chapter of Eyes of my Enemies is here. Sorry for being a day late, if you noticed.

Previously on Eyes of my Enemies, we’ve seen Hell for what it is, a dark and terrifying place. Blake’s character was more properly introduced and turned out to be not so much of a threatening guy, he might be Nikki’s only chance of controlling her newly found Lycan abilities. Meanwhile, St. J is still struggling to find his place in all of this. He reunites with Sammie again in what would be so…

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Eyes of my Enemies

Eyes of my Enemies

Previously on Eyes of my Enemies, we’ve seen St. J struggle to find his way back into his body. We’ve learned that his death occurred three days prior and in that time in-between, the world has not been the same for Nikki and Sammie’s family. Nikki faces changes, Sammie’s vision has left her in distraught. St. J does his best to solve this mystery but Kalexo continues to delay there efforts.…

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It came to my attention that not everybody knows about the one hundred percent legitimate, Great Emu War of 1932. I’d heard about it once or twice online, but I had to know and I am so happy to find out that yes, Australia went to war with a flightless bird, and yes, Australia lost that war.

If you want to just check out the video I just watched, it’s a little corny, but it gives you all the details of probably the funniest true war story I’ve ever seen.

The Great Emu War EXPLAINED – Cool History  

Alright, so we all know that Australia is a pretty dangerous place where just about everything can kill you. But I don’t think a lot of people give props to the fearsome Emu, the only animal in the world to have ever had war declared on them. These bitches stand 6 feet in height and can run up to 30 mph. They have a six-inch claw on each of their feet and apparently are very intelligent making them; the modern day velociraptor.

Now Emus are migratory animals, they like to travel to the western coast of Australia after their mating season. During 1932, many veterans from The Great War moved to this one special section of Western Australia where they set up farms and were told to bump the production of wheat because times were tough. The Great Depression had taken place by 1929, and even Australia was feeling the economic disparity. The one crop they were told to make wasn’t selling on the stock market, and to make matters even worse, there was a drought that year. So even if they could make the wheat, they wouldn’t be able to sell it. And then, on top of all that. About 20,000 Emus, fresh out of their mating season, decided to take a spring break on the farmlands of these veteran farmers.

These men of war were done with the horrible string luck that mother nature had placed upon them. These Emus were dicks. Many farmers were too poor to afford fences, but if you had one, the Emus would’ve destroyed it anyway, because the Emus trampled on and ate every farmer’s crop, until the veteran farmers could take it no longer.

Ex-soldiers traveled to meet with none other than the Austrailian Minister of Defense, Sir George Pearce, who actually agreed to their weird bird hunting scheme. He more than agreed, he declared war on these birds. Being a veteran himself, he saw to help his fellow soldiers in their time of need. These veteran farmers were given 2 Lewis machine guns, 10,000 rounds of ammunition, two gunners to aide the men, and heavy vehicles. Pearce thought that this war might be good target practice for the soldiers, and that he might get some good PR for his efforts helping his fellow veterans, but he had no idea what those men were about to experience.

Sir George Pearce seemed to have an extreme hatred of these animals. He demanded 100 Emu skins as a prize. Yes, like Brad Pitt in Inglorious Bastards.

So, day 31 into war, they are finally about to have their first battle against the birds, the first month of war was postponed due to bad weather. Apparently, the Australian drought of 1932 ended with a bang, that also apparently caused the Emu to spread thin. November 2, 1932, war breaks. The men find a group of about 50 Emus and open fire. They hardly drop any birds as the rest run away. The soldiers continued their pursuit of the birds, but after a few skirmishes, the birds remembered the range of their weapons and would keep their distance.

These birds can’t even fly, but they had their own military tactics. Destroy the crops, and run away. They were good at it too, as one soldier reported.

“Each pack seems to have its own leader now – a big black-plumed bird which stands fully six feet high and keeps watch while his mates carry out their work of destruction and warns them of our approach.”

November 4, 1932, the men find a prime position at a dam nearby. There are 1,000 Emus, just waiting. The farmer-soldiers have readied their heavy machine guns at their target and open fire, 300 bullets a minute. Unfortunately, the gun jammed after only dropping a dozen birds as the rest fleed.

The soldiers then said, Enough is enough. I have had it with these mother-fucking Emus on this mother-fucking farm, we’re putting the machine guns on the truck. Huge failure. Remember when I said Emus run 30mph, that’s pretty fast. Too fast for the trucks on off-road terrane. Plus, the machine gunners stated that they were bumping around too much for him to use the weapon properly. One Emu was definitely confirmed dead. That Emu was struck by the truck, probably in a vicious rage that this farmer had over these Emu. He actually crashed the truck afterward, and after further examination on their kill, the soldiers discovered the Emu had already sustained 5 bullet wounds.

Five bullets that Emu took and it still was trooping, fast enough to get hit by that truck. This confirmed the soldier’s fears of these crafty animals being damn near bulletproof. Major Meredith, the squad leader seemed to adopt a high level of respect for his foe stating:

“If we had a military division with the billet-carrying capacity of these birds, it would face any army in the world. THey could face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks. They are like Zulus, whom even dum dum bullets would not stop.”

November 8, 1932, they’re pretty sure that anywhere around the numbers of 50-500 Emus had died at war. Out of the original 20,000 that plagued their lands. The whole mission was a train wreck failure from beginning to end. The only bright side was, surprisingly against a superior foe, there were no human casualties.

Pearce and his soldiers were embarrassed. The media crowds that had originally flocked to protest such a cruelty to animals, now changed gears to mock their piss-poor efforts. George Pearce, who obviously had much of the blame, was called by Senator James Dunn The Minister of the Emu War. A title that I’m sure would stick.

In a semi-happy turn of events, the angry Australian farmers were given a second chance at redemption because their Emu issue was still very present. Major Meredith was back in action with more men at his disposal and more guns. These guys weren’t joking around anymore, they meant business, Emu slaughtering business.

November 12, 1932, 40 Emus died at the hand of the soldier’s machine guns they had a few early successes and before long they were at a 100 kills per week ratio. Still, not much for a much more serious military grade attack, but it got the job done. The Emus fled the area, more likely because they had eaten everything in sight and it was time to migrate. But we can let the soldiers think they won. By December 10th, the Great  Emu War was declared over after nearly 1000 Emus had died and the remaining vermin were out of sight. That is until 3 years later when they returned with a vengeance!

Even more unfortunately, there was not a Part III to complete an epic Emu War Saga. I’m guessing the veterans moved to a slightly less dangerous section of Australia. If that’s a thing.

I’m hoping you enjoyed this rant, I promise this is still a writing blog.

    Very important information here. It came to my attention that not everybody knows about the one hundred percent legitimate, Great Emu War of 1932.