#God we need persona 6 to come out and have cameos for everyone so they can all be my age again like what the fuck lol

[redcorvid]

Btw replaying my source and I’m still a gay person in case you all forgot

[sunflower-witch27]

Why I think “Rocketman” is one of the best movies ever

So my new go-to movie on bad days is “Rocketman”. I strongly connect with this movie even though I personally have not experienced the vast situations that our beloved Sir Elton Hercules John has gone through in his life. That being said, here are the things I want to massively bring to light (obviously from movie stand point). These are my personal opinions and interpretations, don’t hate me. Disclaimer: TW and *River Song voice* spoilers!

TL:DR “Rocketman” covers a vast array of subjects that I feel should be allowed to be openly talked about more in order to rid of the harmful associations and mentality associated with them, while having great scenes and people who played a part in the life of an amazing musician and person. Just overall amazing; if you haven’t seen it, watch it. 

#1: He understands the struggle to open up.

One of the first things Elton says when he shows up to the facility is to make a joke (natural defense mechanism) but then says, honestly, “I’m here because I want to get better.” I struggle with depression and anxiety and one of the hardest things I’ve ever done was admit “I need help. I want to get better.” Just having that be the beginning of the movie is so strong and I feel allows those in the audience to realize that there is nothing wrong with seeking help. It helps break the backwards mentality regarding mental health issues and mental healthcare. 

#2: The relationship with John

Honestly this one hit hard for me. I was lucky to never have a form of abusive relationship, but I’ve had family and friends be in relationships that seem ok on the surface but when time passes and situations occurred that made them realize that they weren’t entirely loved and being abused either physically, mentally, or emotionally. Even when John punches him before the concert at the Albert Hall, Elton ends up staying with him for a bit longer before deciding that he had enough, and because he was still his manager, John still was stuck in his life, even if he was a constant presence, which makes it harder to break free from an abusive relationship (physical or otherwise). His words to John when he sees everyone at the end: “I was holding onto something I never had in the first place”. That’s always the hardest part, realizing that no matter what you thought or felt, someone never cared for you the way you thought they did. 

#3: The “breaking down” of Elton at the facility

Honestly I think this was one of the best cinematography decisions of the movie. As we go through the movie, we see all the events that Elton goes through in his life and rise to fame, and when the storyline goes back to the facility and group meeting, he loses a bit more of the outside persona that he hides himself in as an artist. He moves from the outfit he shows up in, to having nothing but a bathrobe, to wearing comfortable clothing so we can truly see him as a person. Then, after Bernie comes to see him and give him music, we see him become himself again. 

TW: #4: Elton’s “campaign to k*ll himself”

So this one is rather difficult. I haven’t reached the point in my depression where I wanted to “unalive” myself but I have many friends who have struggled with that feeling (and unfortunately a couple who carried it out). When Elton and Bernie are at the restaurant and Bernie says “campaign to kill yourself going well, I see” makes me think about how destroying one’s self isn’t just self-harm and suicidal thoughts; it puts the focus on unconventional ways, such as bulimia; sometimes it’s not eating at all. I know I’ve had days where my depression is bad enough that it tells my body not to eat. When my partner asks if I’ve eaten and I say “No, I don’t feel like eating”, that’s my depression telling me not to eat. In “Rocketman”, we see various amounts of substance abuse, but we also see a side that isn’t immediately thought of when our bodies try to think of ways out. 

#5: “What were you like as a child, Elton?”

This one was also interesting to watch because you can tell yourself, “yeah, I had a good childhood” and yet we look back and we see that sure, we were cared for as a child but we also see the parts that essentially f*cked us up. For me, it was realizing that me being “little shy and quiet Emma” was actually me with anxiety and having at least two months of severe depression when my teacher died in 5th grade. For Elton, it was realizing that he was never truly loved and trying to obtain love wherever he could find it. Obviously not every parent is perfect; I have great parents but looking back, I wonder if they knew or just didn’t accept/care about it. What happens to us as children shapes us as we get older, sometimes those things we can’t see or understand until we’re older and understand our actions on a deeper level. 

#6:  The cameos of actual Elton John outfits

Another amazing show of cinematography was having subtle nods to the various outfits worn by Elton John. Some were obvious, like the “feather” outfit, the queen, the various glasses, and the baseball suit; some weren’t as obvious like the multi-patch jacket, which we see at Mama Cass’s party, and his robe that he wears when he plays “Your Song” (i think of the Christmas commercial for John Lewis in 2018). Whether he was performing or just doing a short scene, having Taron wear the multitude of outfits offers a nod to Elton’s fashion. 

#7: Raymond 

I have so much love for Ray; he literally pretends to be the boss man and works hard to give Elton (and in turn, Bernie) a chance to have their songs played. When they go to LA, Bernie is all ready to make his friend comfortable and was ready to go talk to Doug about refunding everyone and Ray comes in and yells at him and (honestly, I’m guessing out of sheer spite and a “you f*cking what mate?” feeling) Elton pulls himself together to perform his first night at the Troubadour. Of course, my absolute favorite scene is him singing and dancing in the control room while Elton and Kiki record “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart” because in that moment, Ray is literally everyone. Then when John shows up, I feel like Ray is obviously trying to not let Elton tangle with John because I think he knew that John wasn’t good for him. Of course, Ray’s final line to John...”Your very expensive painting is upside down.” Regardless of whether it was or not (I don’t know) but I love how it kind of messes with John’s mind a bit; he glances at it and you can tell he’s thinking “God f*cking dammit, is it upside down?” 

#8: The fact that it’s set up like a musical

I love music biographical movies (”Bohemian Rhapsody”, legendary and so well done, like seriously) but for Elton John, the only way to do justice was as a musical. And it delivered. 

#9: “I’m Gonna Love Me Again”

The song for the ending credits, after “I’m Still Standing” (which honestly, was the only song they could’ve done for that sequence) just spoke to me. Throughout the movie, we see Elton going through all these situations in life where he constantly doesn’t feel loved and that he will never have that whole filled in his life. He does and the song at the end just I think sums it up; I’m gonna love me again. 

#10: Taron Egerton as Elton John

Enough said. Also, my sister predicted it even before casting was announced. I swear she’s psychic. 

[rantsaboutponies]

Season 8 Retrospective

This... Okay, Season 8’s final W-L-T score was 0-11-15, which means that, quantitatively, it should have been the worst season yet. But...I dunno, this season just kind of...came and went. It might partially have to do with the fact that this is the eighth season of a show that should have ended with Season 3, but I think there’s a bigger factor at play here. Yes, it’s that most baffling of poor decisions, the School of Friendship!

I still cannot figure out why they thought this was such a good idea to build the entire season around. Maybe the voice actors for the Mane 6 are trying to move on from the show and are minimizing their future commitments? If it’s just trying to sell toys of the New Mane 6, they wouldn’t need to focus on them so heavily (people will buy figurines of background characters, for god’s sake), but phasing out the original Mane 6′s toyline also seems like a dumb idea. I think it’s just that corporations still haven’t gotten over the collective concept that they all seemed to have in the 1980s that kids love school and will watch anything set at a school. You know which cartoons I watched the least (or just flat out never watched) as a kid? Recess! Teacher’s Pet! Braceface! You know, the ones that spent a large chunk of time at school! School is by far the least interesting part of any child’s life! If the characters were school-age, you maybe showed a scene or two an episode just to establish that, but that’s it! A good example is Kim Possible; sure, she went to school every episode, but the majority of each episode was all the spy shit. Because no duh! (For the record, as a kid, I was also incredibly bored by any show that was just about kids doing normal shit all the time, school-related or otherwise: Doug, Rocket Power, The Weekenders, Hey Arnold!, Pepper Ann, As Told by Ginger, every single live-action laugh-track Disney sitcom...come to think of it, is that all that late-’90s to early-2000s Disney Channel and Nickelodeon shows were? Jesus Christ, I miss when Cartoon Network was fun.)

Anyway, I don’t know what kids watch these days. Maybe they don’t even watch this show; I have no idea. I haven’t kept up. Why am I even still talking about this? On with the list!

#1. “Road to Friendship”: Like I said, this one was the closest to “good” we got this season. Starlight and Trixie tend to have good dialogue together, and this was no exception. Did anyone notice that Starlight was barely in this season at all, though? They really need to deal with their constant problem of adding characters to the main cast and then not knowing what to do with them in future episodes.

#2. “Sounds of Silence”: If not for Autumn Blaze being so goddamn annoying (and the moral being fairly lame), this episode might have been better. At least I now know why I’ve been seeing kirin fanart for a few months now.

#3. “What Lies Beneath”: This was probably the only halfway decent episode involving the New Mane 6 because it actually gave us a bit of insight into their characters besides “like the Mane 6, but children”. The Tree of Harmony’s way of thinking is still super fucked-up, though.

#4. “Molt Down”: Puberty episode? Sure, why not. Still better than Big Mouth.

#5. “Father Knows Beast”: This one goes right next to the other Spike one because, like all Spike episodes, it really left little to no impact. The fact that Spike is still being written to be dumb enough to fall for some random dragon showing up and saying that he’s his father is pretty grating, though.

#6. “The Break Up Break Down”: Miscommunication storylines annoy the shit out of me, especially since Modern Family became 90% “I heard a thing and I’m going to assume the worst instead of just confirming it with the person I heard it from” episodes. At least Discord finally got a couple funny lines again.

#7. “Non-Compete Clause”: I don’t know why Applejack and Rainbow Dash thought a rehash of “Fall Weather Friends” would be a good idea if they mixed in a bit of child endangerment. Thank god the kids turned out to be smarter than them.

#8. “A Rockhoof and a Hard Place”: Still hard to believe they couldn’t find Rockhoof any digging or demolition jobs anywhere in Equestria. I do like that the ending basically acknowledged that they still don’t know exactly what the point of making Twilight a princess was or what she even does anymore.

#9 & #10. “School Daze”: I was technically right. Neighsay did return to be a villain in the season finale; he just wasn’t the real villain. The fact that they could have arrived at the solution at any time and just chose not to was really annoying. Remember, kids love storylines about legal loopholes and technicalities!

#11 & #12. “School Raze”: Yet another episode that required everyone involved to be as stupid as possible to get the plot going. Nothing like going with your first assumptions and ignoring all evidence to the contrary, eh, Twilight?

#13: “Marks for Effort”: This was just dumb. Twilight wouldn’t let the CMC into the school because they already knew enough about friendship? Yeah, sure. If anything, the episode proved just the opposite. Cozy Glow intentionally failed the test because she thought it would get them in? Uh-huh. Given her secret ultimate evil goal was to make everyone friends with her, I can only assume that she did in fact think that that plan would work, since getting them kicked out definitely wouldn’t endear her to them.

#14. “The End in Friend”: I don’t think this episode accomplished what it was attempting to. No, Rarity and Rainbow Dash don’t have anything in common. No, they don’t have to hang out together if they don’t have any activities they both enjoy. No, that doesn’t make them enemies, nor does it mean they can’t still hang out with their other friends. Sheesh.

#15. “The Washouts”: More child endangerment! Why a dangerous stunt team was able to hire Scootaloo I still don’t know, but apparently no one in the audience had a problem with that. If the lesson was to teach children not to be so fickle about picking their role models, that’s probably a good idea.

I’m not sure there’s all that much difference between these two parts of the list, but whatever.

#16. “Fake It ‘Til You Make It”: Seriously, though, Fluttershy’s only mistake was not telling those raccoons ahead of time that she was going to be using different personae. It was working!

#17. “Grannies Gone Wild”: This episode beat out Book Club by a whole month for its message of, “Old people are people too!” The Wonderbolts are assholes, Applejack is an asshole, and everypony loses! Hooray!

#18. “The Mean 6”: At least Chrysalis was still kind of intimidating in “To Where and Back Again”. This episode just made her look like a joke who had no clue what she was doing (more than “A Canterlot Wedding” already did, I mean).

#19. “The Parent Map”: Remember “Parental Glideance”? That was last year’s, “God, my parents are so embarrassing!” episode. This is this year’s. Joy.

#20. “Friendship University”: Someone was confused that I complained about Twilight apparently hating competition, even though she was trying to shut down the Friendship University because she clearly knew that Flim and Flam were untrustworthy. This person apparently missed the fact that Twilight was upset that somepony was opening a competing friendship school BEFORE she found out it was Flim and Flam who were running it, and she in fact went to the Friendship University specifically to find something wrong with it. That’s the part I was objecting to: the fact that Twilight is still so neurotic that she can’t handle not being in control of everything. In fact, that raises an interesting point. Has there ever been an episode where Twilight has had to learn the lesson of, “Other people are capable of things, too. Not everything has to be run by you first”? It certainly wasn’t this one.

#21. “Surf and/or Turf”: Hey, another episode where the conflict made no sense! And, as an added bonus, another one where just talking to the other people involved would have resolved it instantly! Huzzah! Old El Paso managed to make “Why not both?” the lesson of a 30-second commercial. I don’t know why this took so much longer.

#22. “Horse Play”: COM-MU-NI-CA-TION. “You’re a bad actress. You can have a surprise cameo at the end of our play to make the crowd happy, but that’s it.” Jesus.

#23. “The Hearth’s Warming Club”: What exactly was the message of this episode? “Don’t lie”? No, because they never told Twilight the truth; she just happened to be standing behind them when Gallus told the other kids. “Don’t wreck shit”? No, because Gallus never faced any consequences for that. Honestly, the lesson should have been directed at teachers, and it should have been, “Don’t try this shit. It never works; it just pisses everyone off, including you.”

#24. “The Maud Couple”: Worst new character of the season. Hands down. I hope we never see him again, especially if the only way we get more Maud is if he comes along for the ride. What a prick.

#25. “A Matter of Principals”: Speaking of episodes that teach the lesson to the wrong person... Remind me again why Discord wasn’t the one who learned the lesson here? Because he’s unteachable? Because he’s “reformed” and therefore has already learned all the lessons he needs to? Also, this is a rare episode where the characters do actually communicate properly (Starlight does tell Discord to knock his shit off), and they try to pretend they didn’t! Twilight gets mad at Starlight for not talking to Discord, even though she did! You can’t do this, writers! You just can’t!

#26. “Yakity-Sax”: Talk about not knowing what fucking lesson they were trying to teach. You know what? I bet this actually happened. I bet Michael P. and/or Wil Fox were practicing their electric guitar or drums or bagpipes or whatever for days on end at all hours of the night, and all their neighbors called the cops on them. This was their way of sticking it to everyone. “No! You should let me do whatever the hell I want! It doesn’t matter if it disturbs you! Fuck the system! It’s my passion! You can’t stop me from living my dream!”

There’s a holiday special next week, and near as I can figure, it hasn’t been aired in another country ahead of time! We’ll actually get to watch this one together! Yay!