#I just found it funny that out of all the popular 80's slow songs they happened to choose the one i have an unnatural hatred for

[faltermoth]

My Unrestricted Opinions on Stranger Things 2

linking @capthawkeye as requested, im sorry this turned into such a rant :’)

First off, i loved the 80′s vibe in the first season and i still love it now its so damn good. One of those things i never knew i needed until i saw it. Like the theme song has to be one of my favorites of all time, it just captures the essence of the show so perfectly god dAMN. 

But before i talk about the rest of the  Good Shit i gotta get some stuff off my chest about this cause oooOOOHHHHH boy there was some weird shit with this season.

Problem #1.

Max served no purpose. I kept waiting for her and billy to like,,,,, do something??? Like max kinda just followed the boys around, and billy was an antagonist to steve, but like, for what purpose?? Its not even that i dont like them, its more that i dont care about them cause we weren’t given any reason to care about them. So if anything, i really hope season 3 does something about that

Problem #2.

Mike didnt do shit in this season either. I really liked his character in season 1, but in this one, anything having to do with him or his development involved him pining over eleven or some shit, and that was fine and all, it served a purpose, but i would have liked to see a little more of his development with other characters too. Like the scene where he talked with will, that was GOOD SHIT, i wish there was more stuff like that.

Problem #3.

The entire plot line with dart. HoLy FuCK. Dustin what the fUCK? Why are you keeping this horrifying lamprey-pollywog thing????????? Did you not learn your lesson about weird creature bullshit from last year? especially after you watched it sprout fucking LEGS out of the sides of its body??????? that shit aint natural!! And what the fuck are the chances of discovering a new species of that complexity in the middle of god damn iNDIANA? Amazon rain forest, i could see. Galapagos islands? For sure. But BOY sure as hell not in the middle of the US of A. But for the sake of argument, lets say he just got real excited and weirdly attached to dart (Which i know is what they were going for, but god damn that decimated the ever-loving shit out of my suspension of disbelief). So Will, obviously aware of the fact that he spit up a worm boy that looked suspiciously similar to  dart. They even show us a got dang flashback. WHY THIS BITCH AINT SAY ANYTHING ABOUT IT UNTIL ITS TOO GOD DAMN LATE?????????? ooooOOOHhh that really salted my apples, like i blame that shit 100% more on will than i do on dustin. And in the last episode where dustin meets full grown dart in the tunnels and then…..,,,, i dont even know what the fuck happened? ??? ? I thought the demodogs were a part of the hive-mind? Why was dart exempt from this? Like he physically should have not been able to break from the hive mind, heckin WILL could barely break from it. My ONLY guess is that Dustin left a bit of imprinting on dart as a baby worm, but like even thats a bit of a stretch for me.

Problem #4.

Love triangles. Ive never been a fan of them, and i likely never will.

Problem #5.

The overall ost for this season was not as impressive to me as the first season’s. Like i remember specific tracks from scenes in the first season, but i didnt get any of that with this one. It wasn’t bad by any means, but it definitely wasn’t that memorable.

Problem #6.

Ok, i fully realize this is 1 000 000% a me problem, but fuck this show for getting the Stalker Song stuck in my head. Now dont get me wrong, i absolutely adore The Police, theyre one of my favourite bands, but oooohhhhhhhhhHHHHHHH why is their most popular song Every Breath You Take? I remember when my mom first showed me that ear blood and she told me how it was mega popular when she was in highschool, and it would always be played as a slow song at the dances and i was astounded by this????? Its about this dude’s creepy stalker-attachment to a girl and ahhhh?????????? why was that a good candidate for slow dance music? Also i just think it sounds like shit, especially compared to their other stuff (actually i hate their entire Synchronicity album but thats completely unrelated to this). So knowing all this, i remember sitting there watching the snow ball scene and then it dawned on me that it would 100% be a possibility that  the stalker song could play, and when it did i think i died a little bit. Like y’all couldn’t have played Every Little Thing She does is Magic??? thats the real good shit, not this schloppy garbage. The ONLY redeeming quality to this choice in song was that it acted as a really nice duality to the fact that the shadow monster is also watching every move they make as the lyrics suggest, which i thought definitely fit the song very nicely.

Ok now that i got that all out of the way i can talk about the Good Stuff

 First off, id like to just acknowledge the fact that all these kids are such good actors? like holy shit, especially millie, so god damn talented, im crying

Every scene with Hopper and eleven were so good. Their character dynamic was so good. They played off each other spectacularly, and i hope we get more in season 3. Like they were hands down the best part of this season for me, no questions asked. The scene with eleven’s psychic tantrum was my absolute favourite, it was shot so well, the dialogue was perfect, you could understand  why both of them were so rightfully upset, i just loved it.

Another spectacular scene this season was the one where joyce plays back the footage will took halloween night, and she sees the shadow monster outlined in the static of the tv screen. holy shit did that blow my mind. Gave me the same feeling as her communicating to will through the christmas lights last season, pure gold.

I also continued to enjoy all the dnd analogies they used, like True Sight was such a good metaphor for what they thought will was experiencing.

Just the entirety of episode seven honestly.

STEVE what a good father of five, i really loved his turn of character in the last season and he is such a wholesome person and im glad he and nancy broke up cause fuck nancy, she served a purpose but i never liked her character, she dont deserve steve.

I also was really not expecting to like bob as much as i did. he was just such a good-hearted person. I was also not expecting him to die. rip bob and rip joyce’s sanity.

THE AESTHETIC OF THE SHADOW MONSTER WAS SO SO GOOD HOLY SHHHHHHHH and i really loved the fake out where we thought will would be the spy into the upside down, and then it turned out the shadow monster was actually using will as the spy, that was goooood shit. like when the realization hits that will set up the trap for the lab guys in the tunnels, that was so so good.

Thats about all i can think of right now, the rest of it i thought was good, just nothing that stood out like above mentioned things. I may add more if i think of any

[troop-scoop]

Mistakes & Regrets I

Summary: When a trip to your Dad’s hometown of Hawkins goes wrong, you end up in the year 1983, and have to learn how to cope with being stuck in the past.

Pairing: Steve Harrington / Future!Reader (Slow Burn)

A/n: This is my first stranger things fic, I’ve done other fandoms, and i’ve been itching to get this idea out, let me know if you liked the first part, and if you want to be tagged! (Pls be nice, i’m shy lol) (Also, I had this on a side blog, that I decided to bring to my main blog)

•••

The 1980’s were weird, that was your final opinion. Mainly because it was so much like home, they had phones, they dressed almost like you were used to, they had music you’d grown up on, like The Clash and Elton John, but a lot of the songs that were decades older than you, were new to them.

And while you knew every lyric to ‘The Safety Dance’ and ‘Come on Eileen’ everyone around you was still trying to learn them, and would jumble them from time to time. But at the young age of two, you were dancing along to The Clash while your dad laughed and danced with you.

Knowing that some songs you loved wouldn’t come out for up to twenty years later made you upset, not being able to listen to Nirvana. Suddenly you wanted to be in the car, listening to your dad try to sing along to Ed Sheeran or Taylor Swift. It was always amusing seeing his reaction to the newest songs on the radio while he drove you to school.

There was another thing about this time period that you found weird. They actually had lockers. All of the lockers from your school had been taken out in the late 90’s when a kid hid a gun and drugs in his, so no one had lockers except for in the locker room. So having to remember two different combos was a pain in your ass.

“L/n!”

A heavy sigh escaped your nose as your lips went thin in fake annoyance even though he hadn’t fully approached you.

“What do you want, Harrington?” You questioned, turning from the open grey locker to see him just a few feet away.

He gave you a look of fake offense as he leaned against the locker next to yours a hand over his on his chest, sadly were the latch of your own was, so you couldn’t use the door as a shield,

“Hey, now, who said I wanted anything? I just wanna talk to my friend.”

You were kind of friends. He was nice, at least to you. Though you’d seen him be a douchebag to other students. The cliche you’d seen in a movie of highschool. The popular guy who only cared about popularity and the people he was around. And you didn’t know why he thought you were a good person to be around, because when you were six you accidently set your curtains on fire while the babysitter fell asleep. And you were pretty sure you gave off ‘crazy bitch’ vibes.

You turned back to the locker and shook your head, grabbing your English textbook and looking back to him, a hand holding onto the door while you leaned into it. “Okay, why do you want to talk to me?” You questioned with a fake smile.

“Alright, grumpy. Tommy H, Carol, and I wanna hang out at yours tonight. My parents don’t leave for three more days, and  Carol’s mom hates Tommy, and you know how Tommy’s dad is.” He explained, looking down at you.

You hummed in amusement. “Not happening.” You responded, grabbing the hood of his hoodie and placing it in his locker, closing the door in on it. “Have fun.”

“Y/n!” He exclaimed in a sudden panic at being stuck in your locker, not being able to pull himself loose. “This isn’t funny, I will tell Mrs. Click!” He threatened as you stepped back, a genuine grin on your face as you looked up at him.

“A tattle tale? Didn’t think you’d stoop that low, and also, Mrs. Click? You think I’m scared of my History teacher? She’s afraid of saying ‘Wench’ out loud while we reading historical texts. She’s not intimating.”

Steve nodded a bit in thought. “Yeah… Okay, maybe I didn’t think that through, I’ll go to principal-”

“If I get suspended, I get suspended.” You shrugged. “Find a way to get me something to listen to music on, and something that has music on it, and then I’ll let you go.”

“Are you… Are you bribing me? Y/n L/n is bribing me? The new girl is bribing me.” He said in awe, still grasping onto his hoodie, looking at you with his mouth agape and his eyebrows raised.

When you only tilted your head he groaned, pulling on the cotton material. “Fine, Walkman or Record Player?”

“Hmm… Walkman.” You replied.

“Queen or Blondie?” He questioned, a smile coming across your face as you reached up to the lock.

“Both.”

Steve rolled his eyes as you unlocked your locker, setting him free. “That wasn’t fair, you look innocent.” He grumbled.

You mimicked his eye roll, closing the locker and walking away through the hall. ‘Fair’ being repeated in your head. Nothing was fair anymore to you. You’d been normal, just an annoying kid who was obsessed with Grey’s Anatomy, and history. That was what you had to your name. Your friends had once watched the bad uneducational tv show with you just to try and understand your obsession, you dad even had given it a chance, only saying that most of the characters were annoying.

But you only had history now. And some of the things you were supposed to learn in AP European history haven’t even happened yet. And it was freaking you out.

What was freaking you out more? Knowing you had a ‘classmate’ in your History class, who sat next to you, and was your relative. Your dad’s brother.

Sitting next to him was strange. Because he was your uncle. He’d been the one who bought you your first bike, and watched you fall off and break your wrist after your dad had let go of the bike.

To say that being his partner on a history project was weird, was an understatement. Because the entire time you felt like hitting your head against the desk, because he didn’t really change.

“What’s so important about a quote?”

“Are you serious?”

“As serious as the Titanic.” You responded, brows furrowed.

He stayed quiet for a moment. “I don’t know.” He admitted, receiving a chuckle from you as you watched him flip through the book. “I don’t even understand this project.”

“Come on, we have to choose a quote from a historical piece of fiction, We were assigned Romeo and Juliet.” You said grabbing your book and flipping to a certain page. “Romeo, oh Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?” You teased, knowing that the page you were on didn’t have that in there.

The boy was technically older than you, but right now, you were the same age, and he was shaking his head with a smile. “It’s like she wanted him to be stalking her.” He responded.

“What?”

“She’s asking where he is.” He shrugged. “It’s weird, cause he still doesn’t come out when she asks that.”

“That’s not what she means. It’s early modern English. Phrases were different. She’s asking why he has to be Romeo. In modern words it’d be ‘Romeo, oh Romeo, why does it have to be Romeo.’ She’s upset because the guy she likes is in the enemy’s family.”

The boy looked at you, eyes scanning your face for a moment, looking for any hint of you joking, but he didn’t he finally spoke. “You could teach this class better than her.” He said in a hushed voice to make it so Mrs. Click didn’t hear.

“No-”

“L/n!” The two of you snapped your attention to the older woman who was scowling. “Back to work!”

You rolled your eyes and looked back to him as the bell rang. “That’s our cue.”

The 80’s were weird, and you didn’t like them. What with being so similar to home. With your uncle in the same history class as you, and being close to your dad, but older than him and not seeing him as your dad. And knowing people around you who were almost Baby Boomers, and in your time, would reprimand you for the jokes you made and your views of the world.

Being 16 in your time had been easier, able to cheat off websites for homework, and texting, which seemed to have been taken for granted by you.

Here, you couldn’t say you didn’t have a mom, but rather two dads. Because it was the 80’s and you knew the comments you’d get. You also couldn’t say your full name. That the dad you were genetically related to was the one who gave you the second last name that your uncle had and everyone would question it, and it pained you not being able to go by it, because he’d taught you more things than anyone else ever had. He’d taught you how to ride a book, and said that he’d be disappointed if you ever got ditching class, and that if you were going to do it, not to get caught for his sanity.

You would regret ever coming to this town with him, and you would regret the choice to ever run out of Enzo’s after your other dad yelled at you for being drenched from the rain after you ran in, finding that it was a formal restaurant and not a casual one. You’d regret going into the woods and getting lost, because all you wanted, was to be held by your dad and have him tell you it was going to be okay, You wanted to hear him walking down the hall late at night when he couldn’t sleep and you were hiding under your blankets with your phone, tying not to get caught for being up late.

But you had the fear that you’d never see your dad, as your dad. That you’d have to continue growing up in a time that has been written in history books. That you’d have to watch as technology progressed, and that you’d be conscious and aware for the year you were born.

You were still a kid, even if you didn’t look like it. Just six year ago, you’d been in elementary school, and you still got nightmares and went to your dads’ room because you were still scared of sleeping alone. You hadn’t been since, until now. You could barely sleep at night in the unfamiliar room of the motel you were living in, without your parent’s room down the hall.

But you were trying. And you wanted to redo everything, if you could build a time machine, you would. But that hadn’t even been available in your time, let alone 83’.

[sciencespies]

The True History Behind 'Six,' the Tudor Musical About Henry VIII's Wives

https://sciencespies.com/history/the-true-history-behind-six-the-tudor-musical-about-henry-viiis-wives/

The True History Behind 'Six,' the Tudor Musical About Henry VIII's Wives

Meilan Solly

Associate Editor, History

Inspiration struck Toby Marlow during a comparative poetry class at Cambridge University in fall 2016. Participating in a discussion on William Blake, he found his mind wandering and began scribbling a series of unrelated notes: “Henry VIII’s wives → like a girl group … Need Lucy!!” 

Then an undergraduate student tasked with writing an original show for the upcoming Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Marlow brought his idea to classmate Lucy Moss, who agreed to help bring his vision of a Tudor-themed pop musical to life. The product of the pair’s collaboration—Six, a modern reimagining of the lives of Henry VIII’s six wives—premiered on London’s West End in 2019 to much acclaim. (A cast soundtrack released in September 2018 similarly became an unqualified success.) Now, after an extended delay caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, the musical is finally making its Broadway debut.

L to R: Abby Mueller (Jane Seymour), Samantha Pauly (Katherine Howard), Adrianna Hicks (Catherine of Aragon), Andrea Macasaet (Anne Boleyn), BrittneyMack (Anna of Cleves) and Anna Uzele (Catherine Parr)

Liz Lauren

Six “didn’t come out of a love of the Tudor period particularly,” says Marlow, 26. “It came from us having an interest in the representation of women in musical theater, having women on stage doing funny and hilarious things.” Moss, 27, adds, “What we were interested in doing was reframing the way that women have been perceived in history and telling their side of the story.”

The Tudor period, with its “soap opera”-esque political machinations and rich cast of female characters, offered the duo the opportunity to explore contemporary issues like feminism through a historical lens. Though Six prominently features the rhyme historically used to describe the fates of the Tudor king’s queens—“divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived”—the musical moves beyond these reductive one-word summaries to present its subjects as fully realized individuals. “With all of them,” says Moss, “there was so much of interest beyond the moment they got married or divorced.”

Marlow and Moss drew on a range of sources when writing Six, including Antonia Fraser’s The Wives of Henry VIII and documentaries hosted by historianLucy Worsley. The musical’s layered repartee deftly balances references to Tudor culture with nods to modern music, like the line “Stick around and you’ll suddenly see more” (a play on “Suddenly, Seymour” from Little Shop of Horrors). Still, Marlow explains, the show’s goal isn’t to convey history with 100 percent accuracy. Instead, “It’s [asking], ‘What if Anne Boleyn was like this?’ And how does that change the way you think about this very famous historical figure?”

Six frames its story as a makeshift talent competition in which the wife whose life was most tragic “wins.” The rules are simple: “The queen who was dealt the worst hand … shall be the one to lead the band.” Each wife sings a solo summarizing her experiences, engaging in acerbic banter in between verses. (During these numbers, the other wives act as both backup singers and dancers; beyond the six solos, the 80-minute show features three group numbers.) Ultimately, the women decide to form a girl band instead, leaving the king out of the narrative and imagining an alternate future featuring far happier ends for all of them.

Historian Jessica Storoschuk, who has written about Six extensively on her blog, has found that in school and popular culture, the queens are usually only talked about in terms of their fate. “[Six] is this kind of ridiculous satire of [that],” she says. “It’s a really intelligent way to explore their experiences, or, I should say, one part of their experiences, because their downfalls are not all of their lives.”

Below, find a song-by-song (or wife-by-wife) breakdown of the true history behind Six. Click through the interactive tools to learn more about specific lyrics from the show.

The song: “No Way,” a Beyoncé- and JLo-inspired “girl boss feminism” anthem, says Moss

Though Catherine of Aragon’s marriage to Henry lasted 24 years—collectively, his five other marriages spanned just 14 years—she has long been overshadowed by her successors. The daughter of Spanish monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella, Catherine came to England as the bride of Henry’s older brother, Arthur, Prince of Wales. But Arthur died shortly after the pair’s wedding, leading the Spanish princess to (eventually) marry his heir, Henry. 

By all accounts, the couple enjoyed a loving relationship that only deteriorated due to a lack of a male heir and the king’s infatuation with Anne Boleyn. In the late 1520s, Henry sought a divorce from his first wife, arguing that her previous relationship with Arthur was the reason for the couple’s lack of a surviving son. Determined to protect her daughter Mary’s rights, Catherine refused to concede.

Apple News readers, click here to view this interactive.

Six’s account of these events, “No Way,” takes its cue from a June 21, 1529, meeting at Blackfriars in London. After years of debate over the validity of the royal couple’s marriage, a papal court was conceived to address the king’s so-called Great Matter. Appealing directly to her husband, Catherine fell to her knees and delivered an impassioned monologue:

Intending (as I perceive) to put me from you, I take God and all the world to witness, that I have been to you a true and humble wife, ever conformable to your will and pleasure. … If there be any just cause by the law that ye can allege against me, either of dishonesty or any other impediment to banish and put me from you, I am well content to depart, to my great shame and dishonor; and if there be none, then here I most lowly beseech you let me remain in my former estate, and receive justice at your princely hand.

A 1544 portrait of the future Mary I, Henry and Catherine’s daughter

Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Portrait believed to depict a young Catherine of Aragon

Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

After uttering these words, Catherine left Blackfriars, ignoring the clerk’s calls for her to return. Without turning around, she declared, “On, on, it makes no matter, for it is no impartial court for me, therefore I will not tarry.” The queen was correct in her assessment: Henry had no intention of remaining in the marriage. Determined to wed Anne, he broke from the Catholic Church in order to make her his wife.

Catherine’s Six solo could’ve been a “super emotional [sad] ballad,” says Moss. Instead, she and Marlow chose to emphasize the queen’s defiance, emulating Beyoncé’s “Run the World (Girls)” and setting the tone for the rest of the musical.

The real Catherine followed through on her fictionalized counterpart’s pledge to remain “queen till the end of my life,” refusing to acknowledge her marriage’s annulment even on her deathbed in 1536. Catherine’s legacy, historian Julia Fox told Smithsonian magazine last year, “is that of a wronged woman … who did not accept defeat, who fought for what she believed to be right until the breath left her body.”

The song: “Don’t Lose Ur Head,” a “cheeky” number modeled on Lily Allen and Kate Nash, according to Moss

Arguably the most (in)famous of the six wives, Anne is alternatively portrayed as a scheming, power-hungry seductress; a victim of her callous father’s vaulting ambition; or a worldly, charismatic woman who rose to the kingdom’s highest office only to be targeted by jealous men.

A near-contemporary painting of Anne Boleyn

Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

The truth of the matter depends on which scholar one asks. Most of Anne’s letters and papers were destroyed following her May 1536 execution on contrived charges of adultery, incest, witchcraft and conspiring to kill her husband, so much of what is known about her comes from outside observers, some of whom had reason to paint her in an unforgiving light. Even the queen’s date of birth, writes historian Antonia Fraser, is a fact “that can never be known with absolute certainty (like so much about Anne Boleyn).”

Anne’s song in Six, “Don’t Lose Ur Head,” draws its name from her method of execution: beheading by sword. Moss says she and Marlow view the number as a playful response to historians’ continued vilification of the queen as “calculating and manipulative”: “We were like, wouldn’t it be fun to mock [that trope] and make it that she was like ‘Well, I’m just living. I did this thing randomly, and now everything’s gone crazy.’”

Apple News readers, click here to view this interactive tool.

Though the tone of “Don’t Lose Ur Head” is intentionally more irreverent than the real queen, who Storoschuk says “was incredibly shrewd, very well educated, well read and well spoken,” the broad strokes of the song are historically accurate. Anne spent her teenage years in the courts of Margaret of Austria and Francis I of France, gaining a cosmopolitan worldview that helped her stand out in England. When she caught Henry’s eyes, she was a maid of honor in service of his first wife; rather than becoming Henry’s mistress, as her sister Mary had, Anne refused to sleep with the king until they were married. To wed Anne, Henry broke with the Catholic Church and established himself as head of the Church of England. Finally, the once-besotted king fell out of love in dramatic—and, for Anne, fatal—fashion just three years after their long-awaited marriage.

The song: “Heart of Stone,” a slow, Adele-like ballad

Henry’s third wife, Jane Seymour, has gone down in history as the “boring” one. According to Fraser, she was intelligent and “naturally sweet-natured,” with the “salient characteristics [of] virtue and common good sense.” Historian Alison Weir similarly describes Jane as “endowed with all the qualities then thought becoming in a wife: meekness, docility and quiet dignity.” 

Moss and Marlow tried to flesh out these descriptions by highlighting Jane’s political savvy. During her comparatively brief courtship with Henry, Jane drew on many of the same tactics used by Anne Boleyn, most notably by refusing to sleep with him until they were married. Presenting a submissive front may have been a tactic, says Moss. It’s also worth noting that Jane used her position to advance causes she cared about, including restoring her stepdaughters, Mary and Elizabeth, to their father’s favor and speaking out against the closure of England’s religious houses.

Apple News readers, click here to view this interactive.

On one occasion, Henry reportedly dismissed his new wife by advising her to “attend to other things, [for] the last queen had died in consequence of meddling too much in state affairs.” “Heart of Stone” acknowledges this risk, but Six’s version of Jane chooses to remain steadfast in her love of Henry and their son, the future Edward VI.

Following Jane’s death in childbirth in 1537, Henry memorialized her as “the fairest, the most discreet and the most meritorious of all his wives”—a distinction no doubt motivated by the fact that she’d given the king his only surviving male heir, writes Weir. (Edward took the throne “Six” reflects this enviable status by identifying Jane as “the only one he truly loved.” As she herself acknowledges in “Heart of Stone,” however, Henry’s affection is conditional on her ability to provide him with a son.

Henry chose to include Jane, rather than his then-wife, Catherine Parr, in this dynastic portrait. Painted around 1545, the work depicts Edward, Henry and Jane at its center and Mary and Elizabeth in the wings.

Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Speaking with Vulture last year, Moss said, “The idea was about the strength of choosing to love someone and committing to someone, and that being an equally valid feminist experience.” She added, “I love that [Jane] gets to say, ‘I wasn’t stupid, I wasn’t naïve.’”

The song: “Get Down,” a 16th-century take on the rap and hip-hop “trope of being popular and bragging about your Ferrari and your Grey Goose,” says Moss

Anne (or, as the musical calls her, Anna) of Cleves was, in some historians’ view, the most successful of Henry’s six queens. After just six months of marriage, she earned the king’s enduring affection by agreeing to an annulment. Then, she proceeded to outlive her former husband, not to mention the rest of his wives, by a decade. “[Anne] did get pushed to the side in a rather unceremonious way, but she had a pretty good life,” says Storoschuk. “She was given several properties. She gambled a lot. She got to go hunting, she had the best clothes and the best food. She was loved at court.”

A 1540s portrait of Anne of Cleves by Bartholomaeus Bruyn the Elder

St. John’s College, University of Oxford, via Art U.K. under CC BY-NC-ND

“Get Down” focuses on this victorious period in Anne’s life, celebrating her independence as a wealthy, unmarried woman at Tudor court. In line with the musical’s goal of reclaiming the narrative, the number also reframes the incident that led to Anne’s annulment. Henry, enchanted by a flattering Hans Holbein portrait of his bride-to-be, was reportedly repulsed by the “tall, big-boned and strong-featured” woman who arrived in England at the beginning of 1540. Declaring “I like her not! I like her not!” after their first meeting, the king only went through with the wedding to maintain diplomatic ties with Anne’s home, the German Duchy of Cleves, and other Protestant allies across the European continent.

After just six months of marriage, Henry, eager to replace his short-reigning queen with the young, vivacious Katherine Howard, had the union annulled on the grounds of non-consummation and Anne’s pre-contract with Francis, Duke of Lorraine. Anne, from then on known as the “king’s beloved sister,” spent the rest of her days in luxury.

Apple News readers, click here to view this interactive.

Moss studied history at Cambridge and says much of her schoolwork centered around early modern German visual culture. Six actually includes a standalone song, “Haus of Holbein,” that satirizes 16th-century beauty culture and Henry’s portrait-driven search for a fourth wife: “Hans Holbein goes around the world / Painting all of the beautiful girls / From Spain / To France / And Germany / The king chooses one / But which one will it be?”

Given Holbein’s reputation for accuracy and Henry’s own declining looks (at the time of the couple’s wedding, the king was 48 years old), Marlow and Moss chose to turn the tables, having Anne proclaim herself a fan of the much-vilified portrait. Further cementing Anne’s mastery of the situation, “Get Down”’s refrain finds the supposedly unattractive queen hanging up her likeness “for everyone to see.”

The song: “All You Wanna Do,” a catchy number modeled on the work of “young pop stars sexualized early on in their careers,” like Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears and Ariana Grande, as Marlow told Vulture

For much of history, Henry’s fifth wife, Katherine Howard, has been dismissed as a wanton woman of little import. Writing in 1991, Weir described her as a “frivolous, empty-headed young girl who cared for little else but dancing and pretty clothes.” Fraser, meanwhile, wrote that “[h]ere was no intelligent adult woman, wise in the ways of the world—and of course courts.” More recent scholarship has taken a sympathetic view of the queen, with Gareth Russell’s 2017 book, Young and Damned and Fair, leading the conversation. As Russell argues, “[Katherine] was toppled by a combination of bad luck, poor decisions, and the Henrician state’s determination to punish those who failed its king.” 

Katherine’s Six solo, titled “All You Wanna Do,” echoes Russell’s characterization of its subject as a victim of circumstance and predatory older men. Though her exact birthdate is unknown, Katherine may have been as young as 17 when she was beheaded on charges of treasonous adultery in February 1542. Henry, comparatively, was 50 at the time of his disgraced wife’s execution.

Apple News readers, click here to view this interactive.

The king was far from the first man to sexualize Katherine. “All You Wanna Do” details the queen’s relationships in heart-wrenching detail, from a liaison with her music teacher, Henry Manox (the song suggests that he was 23 to Katherine’s 13, but as Storoschuk points out, he may have been closer to 33), to an affair with Francis Dereham, secretary to the dowager duchess, Katherine’s step-grandmother. When each new romance begins, the teenager declares herself hopeful that this time will be different. By the end of the song, however, she realizes that all of her suitors have the same goal in mind.

According to Moss, she and Marlow wanted Katherine’s song to start out with a “sexy, seductive” tone before transforming into a “narrative of abuse” with echoes of today’s #MeToo movement. Marlow adds, “It was kind of like us talking about what happened to one of the queens and finding a way of relating it to something that we would recognize as a modern female experience.”

Katherine’s “life was so tragic,” says Storoschuk. “She was so young, and she really had very little agency over her own life. ‘All You Wanna Do’ really encompasses that.”

The song: “I Don’t Need Your Love,” a soulful, Alicia Keys–inspired love song

Often reduced to the one-word summary of “survived” or the role of nursemaid to a succession of ailing husbands, Henry’s sixth wife, Catherine Parr, was actually a renowned scholar, religious reformer and perhaps even protofeminist. In Six, she takes ownership of these attributes, refusing to be defined by her romantic relationships and instead listing her manifold accomplishments: “Remember that I was a writer / I wrote books and psalms and meditations / Fought for female education / So all my women can independently study scripture / I even got a woman to paint my picture.”

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As the last of the six to take the stage, the fictionalized Catherine has dual obligations: namely, sharing her story and setting up a satisfying musical finale. “We needed one of the queens to be like ‘Wait, we shouldn’t be competing with each other. We should support each other,’” says Moss. “Fortunately, [Catherine’s role] as a writer, educator and advocate for women helped with that.” Encouraging the wives to take back the microphone, Catherine calls for them to assert themselves outside of their marriages to Henry. “It’s not what went down in history,” the six admit, “[b]ut tonight, I’m singing this for me.”

Catherine Parr’s fourth husband, Thomas Seymour

Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

The real Catherine led a rich life beyond what’s captured in “I Don’t Need Your Love.” As alluded to by the song’s first verses, which find Catherine telling a lover that she has “no choice” but to marry the king, the twice-married young widow initially had another suitor in mind: Thomas Seymour, the dashing younger brother of Henry’s third wife, Jane. (The would-be couple wed soon after Henry’s death in 1547, but their marriage was tainted by Thomas’ improper conduct toward his new stepdaughter, the future Elizabeth I.)

Despite being forced into a relationship with Henry, Catherine made the most of her position, pushing her husband to embrace Protestantism and encouraging him to restore his daughters to the line of succession. She narrowly escaped an attempt by the court’s conservative faction to have her executed on charges of heresy, winning back Henry’s favor even after he’d signed a warrant for her arrest. Catherine died just a year after the king, succumbing to complications from childbirth in 1548.

Based on a True Story

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Album Review by Bradley Christensen Aerosmith – Self-titled Record Label: Columbia Release Date: January 5 1973

When people of think of 70s hard-rock, one band that comes to mind for people is the Boston hard-rock / blues-rock band Aerosmith. They’re known for a couple of tracks, one of which is featured on the album that I’ll be reviewing today. That song is “Dream On,” and it comes off their 1973 debut self-titled album. Aerosmith is a band that I kind of grew up with, but not really, because all I had was a greatest hits album, so I was only familiar with a very basic knowledge of their work. I’ll admit that hard-rock is not a genre that I really like, but as I’ve gotten into more stuff from the 70s and 80s, it’s modern hard-rock that I don’t like, because I’ve grown really into a lot of these 70s and 80s hard-rock bands, such as Grand Funk Railroad, Guns N’ Roses, AC/DC, Boston, and tons more. Modern hard-rock, well, I don’t care for it much at all, but the 70s and 80s were rife with tons of talented bands in the genre. Aerosmith is a band that a lot of people remember fondly, and for good reason, honestly. I mean, I’ve never gotten too huge into them, but it’s because I’m not familiar with their work. I’ve sort of grown up with them, knowing their big hits, but I can’t say that I’ve really spent some time digging into their most popular work. That’s why I decided to pick up a couple of their albums. The first album that I wanted to talk about is their self-titled debut LP from 1973. I just briefly mentioned it right in the first couple of sentences, but this song features “Dream On,” and that’s probably my favorite Aerosmith song. I love the lyrics of the song, because it has a very fantasy-inspired feel to it, and the song is quite positive, ultimately talking about reaching for your dreams, or as the song puts on, “dream on.” That phrase is usually meant with a negative connotation, but it’s not bad there. I also love the slow buildup throughout the song, and by the end, it explodes and it’s such a satisfying ending to the song.

The funny this is, though, I’ve never heard the entire album, so I thought I’d try to see if I could find a copy of that. I did find it at FYE, which was nice, because I don’t mind ordering things online, but I always love finding things in stores. While doing some research for this album, I found out something I’ve always wondered about the song “Dream On,” and I noticed it throughout the entire album – frontman Steven Tyler sounds a lot different on here. His voice is awfully restrained, bluesy, and more relaxed than he’s known to be, but that doesn’t bother me, necessarily, because he’s still a good vocalist here. The thing about this LP, though, is that the band was very new to recording and producing, so when they got in the studio, they were very nervous, so Tyler went with this bluesy delivery. On the other album that I’ll be talking about, which is 1975’s Toys In The Attic, especially their breakthrough album, he sounds like he usually does, thankfully. It’s just on this one, you might notice that his vocals are very weird, and they’re not bad, or strange in the traditional sense, it’s just that he sounds a lot different than what people are used to. That doesn’t bother me at all, but you can tell how nervous, restrained, and rough around the edges the band is at the moment. You can tell they’re very new to everything, because this LP is very rough around the edges in every aspect, and in that sense, I’m not sure I really love it. I like it, though, and I like listening to this album, but at the same time, I’m not over the moon for it. One thing that helps to its advantage is that it’s very short, only around 35 minutes, so the album isn’t too long whatsoever. It won’t stay in your eardrums for very long, but nothing really stuck out to me. I mean, aside from “Dream On,” obviously, but the album doesn’t feature anything else that goes above and beyond for me.

I like this album, however, and it’s a really solid blues-rock / hard-rock album that fans of the genre, especially 70s hard-rock, will like, because it does exactly what you’d expect from the genre, but that’s about it. This LP doesn’t have what Toys In The Attic does, and by that, well, not to give much away, I mean the album’s sound has more weight to it, mainly by adding more punch and swell into the guitars and overall sound, whereas this LP never goes above and beyond. It never gets any more intense or energetic that it needs to, and aside from a few solos here and there, there aren’t quite a lot of them. I do enjoy this album, though, and like I said, if you’re into hard-rock, but you haven’t listened to this band already, or you want to get into 70s and 80s hard-rock, this band is essential listening, because Aerosmith one of the biggest bands of the genre, as well as one of the biggest bands of all time. I mean, I’m not super crazy about this album, but I’d check it out. It’s worth a listen, for sure, because it’s got good sound, and if there is one aspect that make this album stand out a bit more (not a lot, though), it’s that they have a blues-rock feel to this LP. It’s more on the blues-rock side of things, versus harder-edged rock, but they get there eventually, so that’s why there isn’t a whole lot of meat behind the guitarwork here, but at the same time, I do enjoy this album. Aerosmith is an influential and important band in the hard-rock scene, and even people that don’t listen to hard-rock exclusively, they still know who Aerosmith is, and they might even like them. Despite knowing their biggest hits, it has been kind of neat getting into these couple of albums, because they are good. This is a band that’s relatively important for rock music, although they didn’t quite revolutionize anything. They just helped to make this style of music more popular and accessible to the mainstream audience, and you gotta give them some credit there.