#I think it's pretty obvious that Desiree is involved

[madametamma]

A while ago, I posed the question ‘Where do fans stand on Danny having an obsession?’  With different answers all around. 

Some said they don’t like the idea that Danny has an obsession because it takes away his agency and makes his choices less meaningful if he’s forced to do what he does.

Some said they loved Danny with an obsession because that can lead to angst potential.

Others said it depended on the story.

What about all of the above?

Danny seems to be slacking off in ghost hunting lately, at first it was just, “I haven't gotten a full night’s sleep in a while, let me take a break.” But that was quite a few days ago and his sleep schedule has gotten back on track so there’s no excuse for him to be cutting patrolling short tonight, or for him to ignore what could possibly be a villainous plot going on in town, Sam insists!

Tucker points out that said villainous plot is just a new hot dog shop opening up in town which she waves off.  She insists Danny could be doing more.

Danny replies that if his ghost sense goes off, he’ll do his job, but it’s nice to take a few days off.

Sam leaves Danny and Tucker to play games while she hops on her scooter to patrol the city by herself. As she zooms through the streets she mutters “I wish the one with actual superpowers on this team was more obsessed with with doing this job than me.”

When the friends meet up the next day, Danny is much more vigilant.  Sam’s pleased although Tucker is bummed that Danny doesn’t want to see a new movie after school in favor of patrolling the city. 

For a little while, everything is good.  Danny is taking his job as a hero seriously, ghosts are getting beaten and taken back to the ghost zone, crime is noticeably going down in Amity.

Tucker points out to his friend that he might want to do something about those bruises on his face and Danny waves him off.  Hazards of the job. Sometimes the ghosts get a few good shots in.  He’ll just say it was Dash, if anyone asks.

By next week, Danny was noticeably skipping more classes than usual.  His excuse being ‘ghost fighting’ and Sam warns that he should be more careful.  Even his clueless parents are going to notice.

Later that night, Sam’s house gets a call from Jazz.  She thinks she knows what the conversation is going to be about and prepares some excuses on Danny’s behalf, but is thrown off when she confronts her about not seeing Danny since Yesterday.”

“He staggered home at 2:00 AM last night, looking like he got run over by a truck! me, mom and dad tried to talk to him but he looked so exhausted, the only thing we could think to do was send him to bed, thinking we would talk again in the morning but he was gone when we woke up.  We haven’t seen him since then! Sam, what is going on?!” Jazz cries.

At that moment Danny flies in through her window, ectoplasm seeping through an an enormous gash on his abdomen. 

“Can I get a patchwork?”, he mutters, groggily. Sam hangs up the phone in shock.

She goes to work, stitching up his wounds.  Danny murmurs some explanation of why it’s not that bad and how he’ll just need a minute before he’s ready to keep going, as his eyes droop and head nods in his exhaustion.  She tells him that he can just take a nap here until he’s well enough to go home but he disappears the instant she’s finished.

[badabjng]

Huma moodboard - proposal (Huma's Happily Ever After 2/4)

When, after almost a year of living together, Harry finally decided to pop the question to Uma, basically everyone got involved. And, to these days, they all still wonder how they managed to organize everything and keep the secret from a clueless Uma.

Jay, Carlos and Ben, with the help of Jane, took care of setting up the location for the date. Harry wanted it to be by the beach, their favorite place and the place where everything started, where they kissed for the first time.

Lonnie and Audrey took care of the dinner. Harry tried to help but ended up burning the lobster, so he got kicked out of the kitchen.

Dizzy handmade the ring. She and Harry spent entire afternoons working on the perfect model. He wanted it to be fancy and elegant, but still something that screamed "this is made for Uma" . The choice of using a sapphire of the same color of her hair was almost obvious.

Celia had a really peculiar job: she had to go through Uma's stuff in Ursula's house to find a picture of Harry and Uma that they took years ago. It was a very important part of the speech Harry had in mind for his proposal.

Mal and Evie's job was probably one of the hardest: have Uma wear a fancy dress to a "casual date" with her boyfriend. Evie thought it would look perfect with Harry's more edgy style in the engagement pictures.

Gil's job was either the most useless one or the most useful: he provided himself and his friends with the perfect hiding spot to witness the whole thing without getting caught. Harry kind of got angry when he found out what his best friend was doing, but in the end he let him do it.

Dinner went fine, just like any other normal date, then Harry pulled out of his jacket a little box wrapped in teal paper.

"What's this for?" Uma asked, surprised. It's wasn't her birthday nor their anniversary, so she was pretty confused.

"Just open it" Harry said, with a smile.

Inside the box there was a framed picture. It was Harry and Uma, in their old pirate clothes. They were about sixteen or seventeen. They were looking away from the camera and it seemed like they were talking to someone else. He had an arm around her shoulder and it didn't show in the picture, but she had an arm around his waist.

"Remember this?" Harry asked.

Uma smiled and nodded. "Of course" she said. "It's from when we found that instant camera in the garbage and wanted to test if it still worked. We took one picture of Gil by accident, then we were preparing to take one as a crew but Desiree took a picture of us without telling us. And it was the last one, so no crew picture" she recalled.

"We had no idea she was taking a picture of us, we were acting so natural. We wouldn't be posing like that if we knew we had a camera on us" Harry pointed out.

"That's true" Uma agreed.

"We were already in love. Even if we didn't know it yet, because we had no idea what love was. We used to touch each other and be around each other all the time, and it was weird for two Isle kids to be so touchy but it just felt natural with you."

"We're still those kids. Only older, wiser. Less angry, happier."

Harry took a deep breath.

"Yes, we are. We will always be. But back then I would have never imagined that one day I would go on dates with my captain, or walk around holding her hand or - for God's sake - living with her and decorate for fall and Christmas. I thought it was something Auradon kids did because their life was so easy that they could afford to complicate it with all this love nonsense. Then that day at the Bay I realized that it wasn't complicated. With you, nothing is complicated. Kissing you in front of everybody isn't complicated. Having a picture of us pinned on our fridge isn't complicated. Love isn't hard with you. I love you, Uma. You're the only girl I've ever loved and the only one I'll ever love. And I want you in my life forever."

He tried not to talk too fast and not to make it sound like he had prepared it. And it was surprisingly easy, because the words came from his heart. He had been thinking about his speech for so long now that saying the actual word out loud wasn't hard at all. He put his hand in his pocket again and pulled out a blue velvet box and opened it, showing the ring to Uma.

"Will you marry me?" he asked.

Uma smiled. She knew something was off when Evie basically forced her to look nice for a random date. She was sure that their friends were somewhere behind the bushes ready to stick cameras at their noses.

"Of course I do" she answered. "And bear in mind that all of this is a formality and an excuse to have a fancy party, because I was gonna spend the rest of my life with you anyways, because I love you more than anyone else."

(And then, you know, the rest of the group jumped out of the bushes and ruined the romantic atmosphere. Gil was yelling "Calling it for best man", as if it was a race.)

[lookninjas]

Thomas Child:  I remember after the trial, Poe tried to check in on us again and my mom wouldn’t let him in.  And this was still before Dad got out of jail.  After that was a lot worse.  It felt in a lot of ways like they never really left the First Order.  And my mom had left before things got that bad, but I guess in her head, a lot of that stuff still held true.  We had to pray for Snoke at night.  Or “the martyrs,” which was the same thing.  

Mitaka, we weren’t allowed to see him either.  Or Des, which was hard because we grew up together.  But then we were both in high school, we had some computer access, so that made things easier.  We were MySpace friends.  We had Facebook.  Someone had the idea to start a Facebook group so all of us could talk, and that helped.

Desiree Mitaka:  I set up the Children of the First Order group, yeah.  I think there were about twelve of us.  Thomas’s younger siblings weren’t involved, and a couple of other kids weren’t either, but most of us were.  Hux was, even though he’d been eighteen.  Ben and Rey weren’t, for obvious reasons.  We had to have a few conversations about Finn, mostly because we didn’t want to -- it’s hard to explain, but I think we felt pretty responsible, for what had happened to his dad.  Even though we weren’t; our parents were.  But I finally invited him, and he joined, and it was nice, actually.  I felt like we were all pretty good friends.

He used to give me shit for going to State.  Because he was going to U of M.  That was fun, actually.  Picking on each other like that.  Of course, then I dropped out, but before that it was kind of fun.

[wlwfiction]

hello! i just saw a post you reblogged about racism in femslash fandom. and i was wondering if you could give me some recommendation about tv shows with diverse lesbian chararcters??

Here’sthe post 

I’m presuming by diverse you mean non-White? Thepost lists several shows already, including Queen Sugar (which I’ve seen andhighly recommend), Rosewood, The Fosters and NoTomorrow.

Others I’d recommend include:

RevolutionaryGirl Utena: A weird anime about duelling and so much more. Almost everycharacter is LGB+ and since it’s an anime almost all are Japanese. The maincharacters are a Japanese woman and an Indian Hindu woman who become a couple.However, major warnings for abuse (including rape) and incest. They’revery much shown to be wrong within the show but are examined in graphic detail.Here is a very helpful warnings guide(contains spoilers).

The‘Other’ Love Story: A webseries about two Indian girls falling in love.There are twelve episodes which go for approximately ten minutes each, so youcan binge the entire thing in about two hours. It also has a happy ending!

BlackMirror: ‘San Junipero’: With the sci-fi show Black Mirror, every episode is aseparate story, so you can watch any episode without needing to have seen anyothers. San Junipero centres around an f/f couple including a biracial Black/Whitebisexual woman and a White lesbian.

BrooklynNine-Nine: Police comedy show. In season 5, main character RosaDiaz comes out as bisexual. She’s Latina and her actressStephanie Beatriz is also bisexual (Beatriz is of Bolivian and Colombian descent). Her love interest is played by Gina Rodriguez, who is Puerto Rican American and attracted to multiple genders. The main cast also includes an AshkenaziJewish man as the protagonist, a Cuban American woman as his love interest, andtwo Black men, one of whom is gay and married. However, I can understand anyonenot wanting to watch the show due to the police themes - it’s absolutely cop propaganda.

TheLegend of Korra: A fantasy cartoon and the sequel to Avatar: The Last Airbender.All characters are Asian and/or Indigenous American. The protagonist is an Inuitbisexual woman and her love interest is a Japanese bisexual woman. Theirrelationship is made more explicit in the comic sequels, where the artist isIrene Koh, a Korean American bisexual woman. A couple of other characters havebeen revealed to be a bisexual woman and an unspecified WLW in the comics.

She-Ra and the Princesses of Power: Side characters Spinerella and Netossa are an f/f couple and Netossa is Black. It’s hoped that a few other characters, particularly the protagonist, will be canonically LGBTQ+ in future seasons. 

SailorMoon: The classic magical girl anime and again, since it’s an anime almost allcharacters are Japanese. Season 3 introduces two new main characters, Harukaand Michiru (Uranus and Neptune), who are a butch/femme lesbian couple.

How toGet Away With Murder: I’m unsure if I’d really recommend this one anymore sinceI loved the first season and the first half of the second season, but I feelthe show’s really gone downhill since then. However, the protagonist Annaliseis a bisexual Black American woman and a fascinating character.

Black Sails: Show about pirates in the 1700s. One of the main characters is a biracial Black/White lesbian. The main cast also includes a White lesbian (her love interest), a White bisexual woman (another potential love interest) and the main protagonist is a White gay man. I was spoiled on who dies and who ends up together, so I’ll just say that one out of five LGBT characters dies but the others end up in happy relationships. Message me if you’d prefer to be spoiled as the bury your gays can certainly be harmful to viewers.

Easy: ‘Vegan Cinderella’ and ‘Lady Cha Cha’: As with Black Mirror, each episode of Easy is a standalone. These two are about an f/f couple, one of whom is biracial Black American/White. She’s played by Kiersey Clemons who is a WLW.

Dimension 404: ‘Bob’: As with Black Mirror, each episode is a standalone. In the episode Bob, the main character is a Taiwanese American woman married to a Black American woman. They have a child together.

Black Lightning: DC show about a Black American superhero family, including a lesbian daughter whose love interest is a Chinese American bisexual woman.

Sidetrack: A webseries about eight WLW, including a Japanese American bisexual girl, a Black American nonbinary lesbian, an Indian American lesbian, an unspecified Latine lesbian and a Muslim lesbian of unspecified ethnicity as well as three White lesbians. It does end on a slight cliffhanger and unfortunately there’s no season 2 :/

Shadowhunters: Aline Penhallow is a biracial Chinese British/White lesbian but she’s only appeared in one episode so far.

Some I plan to watch include:

One Dayat a Time: Comedy show about a Cuban American family. The teenage daughter is alesbian and her love interest is a White nonbinary lesbian. However, this is US military propaganda in the same way that B99 is cop propaganda.

AmericanGods: Based on the book of the same name by Neil Gaiman about gods in themodern world. The protagonist is a Black man and the main cast includesBilquis, a Black bisexual woman.

Brujos:12 episode webseries about LGBT Latine witches. The main characters are fourgay guys but there’s also some WLW characters.

BrownGirls: Webseries about two female friends, a Black American girl and aPakistani American and Muslim WLW.

Dyke Central: Webseries about WLWOC.

Couple-ish:Webseries about LGBT romance and friendship. One main character is a Black WLW.

195Lewis: Webseries about a Black f/f couple, one lesbian and one bisexual.

TheNewtown Girls: Webseries about four WLW, one of whom is Asian Australian.

Leslieville:Another webseries, but I couldn’t find much info about this one.

TheSlope: Webseries about an Iranian American bisexual woman (played by DesireeAkhavan who is also an Iranian American bisexual woman) and a White lesbian.

Entangled With You: Webseries about an f/f couple who I thinkare both Black American.

That’s My DJ: Webseries where the main character is an AsianCanadian lesbian.

Retail Rejects: A webseries about being a retail employee,with no straight main characters. A few of the leads are Asian Canadian.

Pot Luck: New Zealand’s first WLW webseries, with three maincharacters, one Maori and one Samoan.

The Peculiar Kind: Webseries about WLWOC.

That’s What She Said: Webseries about Asian American WLW.

Strangers: Webseries where the main character is a biracial Chinese American/White bisexual woman, as is her actress Zoe Chao.

CardcaptorSakura: Another magical girl anime. Protagonist Sakura is Japanese and bisexual,her male love interest is Chinese and bisexual, her best friend is a Japaneselesbian with a lesbian mother, and her brother is gay and in a relationship. Warning for m/f pedophilia with some of the side characters though.

Other f/fanime on my to-watch list include Sweet Blue Flowers, Maria Watches Over Us, ToMy Dearest Brother, Bloom Into You and Whispered Words.

SeonamGirls High School Investigators is a Korean show about five girls solvingmysteries. One episode involves a lesbian couple and featured the first f/fkiss on Korean TV.

Vida: Two Mexican American sisters mourn the death of their mother, who was a WLW and married to a woman. One of the sisters is a WLW too.

Others (I don’t know a huge amount about these so Ican’t say how good the representation is):

The Bold Type: Contemporary drama about three female friends who work for a magazine. One of the trio is a biracial Black/White bisexual woman and her love interest is an Iranian American Muslim lesbian. However, read this on how good the Black representation is.

Degrassi:Apparently has some WLWOC characters but there’s so much info about the show Igot confused quickly.

DoctorWho: In Season 10 the Doctor’s companion is Bill Potts, a Black Britishlesbian.

The GoodWife: A main character is an Indian American bisexual woman.

Grey’sAnatomy: Callie Torres is a Mexican American bisexual woman, a recurringcharacter in Season 2 and a main character in Seasons 3-12. Her actress Sara Ramirez is also bisexual.

Lucifer:The main cast includes Mazikeen, a bisexual Black woman. In addition, the maincharacter is a White bisexual man.

Master ofNone: A main character is a Black American lesbian, played by Lena Waithe whois also a Black American lesbian. Obvious warning for Aziz Ansari though.

Person ofInterest: Main cast includes an Iranian American WLW.

She’sGotta Have It: The main character is a Black bisexual woman.

StillStar Crossed: Romeo and Juliet retelling, about Rosaline and Benvolio afterRomeo and Juliet’s deaths. Rosaline and various other characters are Black.Unfortunately the show was cancelled after one season of seven episodes, butone of the main characters, Isabella, an Iranian woman, was confirmed to be a lesbian by heractress andwould’ve had a love interest if the show hadn’t been cancelled.

From Dusk Till Dawn: Main character Kisa is a Mexican American bisexual woman.

I’ve left off shows which kill off WLWOC or are blatantly racist in other ways (Pretty Little Liars, Orange is the New Black, Sense8, The Catch, Riverdale, Glee, True Blood, Scream Queens, The Magicians, Empire, Scream, The Handmaid’s Tale, Gotham) though I may have missed some.

[gakkawojin]

eesti laul thoughts and things

chucking this under the cut bc eesti laul is a real thing this year and i have Thoughts

La Forza / Elina Netšajeva - conceptual, bit weird, like it tho, i think it would need good staging to not come off as a joke and be taken seriously. If it all goes pear shaped i can see another La Voix on our hands and no one needs that

On My Mind / Desiree - nice enough, very modern, doesn’t really go anywhere but very much an earworm for the duration of the song. Very forgettable though, i don’t remember anything about it by the time i’ve listened to another song after it

Pseudoprobleem / Miljardid - bit of a dirge? Again doesn’t really feel like it goes anywhere but it does have some sort of promise, with some decent staging it probably wouldn’t feel so directionless and repetitive. Like that it’s in Estonian, that’s about the only compliment i can give it

Home / Stig Rästa - I LOVE MY SON. Obvious semi 1 winner if not potential whole show winner. Very reminiscent of UK Ed Sheeran style acoustic pop, very cozy and warming. Will probably find its way onto my regular playlists even if he doesn’t win.

Näita oma energiat / Tiiu x Okym x Semy - i want to die, i get that you want to be modern but this is an absolute disaster of a thing. I have absolutely nothing positive to say here, this is horrendous and if this somehow makes the final I will give up.

Everybody’s Dressed / Aden Ray - nice unique voice, I feel like he could probably carry it off live if he had decent staging. But it’s a completely bland song that will absolutely be forgotten because even if the other songs aren’t necessarily as good, they’re more interesting and this is gonna fade away between the others.

Thousand Words / Sibyl Vane - interesting vibe, i like that it’s a little different to most other things in this year’s Eesti Laul. With good staging (I’m thinking kind of like Rasmus Randvee’s from last year) it could do decently. Lyrically I think it’s a bit weak but if it sounds good live I might forgive that.

Külm / Etnopatsy - very atmospheric and floaty, nice refrain, and i love the use of Estonian. It’s a very sweet song, but would need strong and moody staging to reflect that, and if the vocals are weak live then this will inevitably sink like a stone.

Drop That Boogie / Iiris & Agoh - vocals here are incredibly annoying, she sounds like she’s been run through a cheap voice changer. Not here for it. The beat itself is lacking and i think it would struggle live.

Laura (Walk With Me) / Vajé - dig this, very modern and well produced, very radio, but would need good staging and good live vocals to carry it. It reminds me of an English song but i can’t place it for the life of me (bf reckons Hey Brother by Avicii)?? But definitely one of the strongest songs in semi 1 if not overall, will probably end up on my playlists after Eesti Laul.

Koplifornia / Metsakutsu - Once again I have absolutely nothing nice or constructive to say here. Horrendous.

(Can’t Keep Calling) Misty / Frankie Animal - dig it, pretty catchy and fun. It’s an interesting genre choice, but it’s another song that will need good/interesting staging and if it’s just your band standing there with some LEDs it could fall flat.

Sky / Eliis Pärna & Gerli Padar - the gay duet ESC deserves. Song itself is dated and nothing particularly new, but their harmonies are very sweet. Nothing revolutionary or anything, but it’s nice and inoffensive (if forgettable) and I can see it in the final.

Welcome to My World / Evestus - What the fuck is happening here and how do I make it stop. Manages to be both bland and bizarre all at once, doesn’t do anything for me. I can see this coming with a Triana Park-esque hot mess staging too, and no one needs that.

Spellbound / Girls in Pearls - I love the sound they’ve gone for (it kind of reminds me of early MGMT) but I worry it’ll be hard to replicate live to this sort of standard? The staging would need to be something special too I think, otherwise it could come across as kind of wishy-washy and weak.

Tempel / Indrek Ventmann - literally this is the light at the end of the tunnel for semi 2 honestly. Modern, interesting beat, should be able to carry it live. Song has just enough direction that it works. Could probably win SF2 and should easily be in the final.

Young / Karl-Kristjan & Karl Killing ft. WATEVA - very cute, modern sound, I could see this doing well in the televote. Yet another song that needs good staging or it could fall flat or get sidelined by something flashier.

Täna otsuseid ei tee / Marju Länik - cute, inoffensive, the use of Estonian sounds especially sweet here. Will probably get lost among other songs because it’s not really much of anything and while it is very cute it’s also not got much to it and could be forgettable live.

Knock Knock / Nika - largely inoffensive, but chorus is irritating. Will probably struggle live because of the volume of mixing involved in the vocals and general sound. Quite forgettable and I can’t recall it after it’s finished.

Show A Little Love / Rolf Roosalu - oh it’s 1983 again for all the wrong reasons. It reminds me of De Toppers in the least complimentary way possible (if there is a nice way to compare someone to Satan’s own band, De Toppers). Make it stop.

[ultralifehackerguru-blog]

New Post has been published on http://lifehacker.guru/the-13-best-movies-you-didnt-see-in-2018/

THE 13 BEST MOVIES YOU DIDN'T SEE IN 2018

LAST YEAR, FOLKS in the US spent $11 billion going to the movies. Yet the bulk of those people, and those dollars, went to the mega-blockbusters—the Panthers, the Venoms, the Avengerseseses. Even though indies are getting a renaissance thanks to streaming services, there’s just not the same thriving middle-class that there was in decades past, and a ton of legitimately great films still don’t get in front of as many eyeballs as they should. So, fine, you let some smaller gems slip by; now’s your chance to make things right. Got a few free evenings over the holidays? Queue up these 2018 unsung heroes first.

Suspiria

Amazon Studios’ art-house horror flick did modestly well in its small theatrical run, but limited distribution meant it didn’t get the attention it deserved. Directed by Call Me By Your Name‘s Luca Guadagnino, the film is, on the surface, a remake of Dario Argento’s horror classic of the same name. But it’s also much, much more than that. (Star Tilda Swinton, who actually plays a few roles in the film, went so far as to refer to it as a cover version of Argento’s original.) Beautifully shot, with an appropriately haunting performance by Dakota Johnson, this Suspiria goes beyond the tale of a witch-run dance school by digging its nails into the many ways the past will forever haunt us. It’s not for everybody, but if you have an itch for something truly gruesome and mind-bending, this’ll scratch it. —Angela Watercutter

First Reformed

Here’s a sentence I never imagined myself writing in 2018: Ethan Hawke gave one of the best performances of the year. It’s not that I didn’t think he was capable; I just didn’t see him showing up in a dark eco-conscious Paul Schrader film wherein he plays an alcoholic priest trying to keep his sanity and his congregation together. And yet, here we are. Moody, existential and even a little bit ethereal, First Reformed is one of the year’s craziest headtrips—right down to the ohshitwhatthefuck? ending. It got a very limited theatrical run but has been playing free to Amazon Prime subscribers for a while now (as well as Kanopy). If you happen to be one—or even if you’re not—go watch it immediately. —A.W.

Shoplifters

I’ve tried half a dozen times to explain director Hirokazu Kore-eda’s teleportative tale—about an ad hoc family living in near-poverty in urban Japan—and failed in each instance. So instead, here’s what Shoplifters is not: mawkish (though it is deeply moving); downbeat (despite its character’s increasingly desperate turns); nor needlessly twisty (though the family’s backstory is full of slow-building surprises). Instead, it’s a lovely, quite funny accounting of ordinary people staring down extraordinary circumstances with pragmatism, wits, and sporadic joy. And, in a year full of movies that viewed tough realities with deep empathy—from Roma to First Reformed to First Man—it’s the denizens of Shoplifters that have lingered in my mind the longest: Wondering where they are now, hoping everything turned out OK. —Brian Raftery

Mandy

You know what sucks? The fact that so few movies today are confident enough to feature coked-out demon biker gangs, strange Jesus cults, and a truly off-the-leash Nicolas Cage. Luckily, though, there’s Mandy—director Panos Cosmatos’ movie starts with that grand trifecta and goes about a thousand steps further. Shot using lush nighttime colors that would make the Stranger Things crew jealous, the revenge tale follows Cage’s Red Miller as he goes searching for his girlfriend who has been taken in by the aforementioned cult. Explaining it any further would ruin the fun (it’s also kind of impossible), but rest assured it has one of the best eviscerations of fragile masculinity ever put onscreen. —A.W.

Miseducation of Cameron Post

If you were an indie movie fan in 1999, you remember a delightful little film called But I’m a Cheerleader. It starred RuPaul as an instructor at a gay conversion camp and Natasha Lyonne and Clea DuVall as two of the unfortunate souls sent there for “treatment.” The Miseducation of Cameron Post, based on Emily M. Danforth’s novel of same name, is a much, much less campy version of that. In it, Chloë Grace Moretz plays the titular Cameron, a teenage girl who gets sent off to a conversion camp after getting caught in the back of a car with another woman the night of her prom. Heartwarming and heartbreaking, director Desiree Akhavan’s adaptation of Danforth’s novel is as vital and necessary as Cheerleader was in the late-1990s. It just has fewer laughs. —A.W.

Matangi/Maya/M.I.A.

The last time you heard from (or about) agit-pop hitmaker M.I.A. it likely had something to do with her flying her middle finger at the Super Bowl or the term “truffle fries.”That was years ago, and a lot has changed in terms of how the public, and pop culture, treats its female artists. Well, maybe not a lot, but there’s been progress—and in Steve Loveridge’s documentary, the ways in which Maya Arulpragasam was mistreated and misunderstood couldn’t be more obvious. Built on archive footage and personal footage shot by the Sri Lankan artist over years and years, it creates a fuller picture of M.I.A. than any magazine profile or online hot take ever could. It might be a little late, but it’s also right on time. —A.W.

Shirkers

The set-up for Sandi Tan’s autobiographical Netflix doc sounds like something out of a pop-culture thriller: In 1992, Tan and two other bright, outsidery teenage girls decided to make a semi-surrealist feature film in their home country of Singapore. They were aided by a mysterious older American man who absconded with the footage—and then all but disappeared from their lives. Yet Tan’s story doesn’t involve tidy resolutions or shocking twists. Instead, Shirkers is actually something infinitely more compelling: A gorgeous-looking self-interrogation about creativity, power, and the strange twilight zone between adolescence and adulthood. It also contains the most succinct one-liner about ’90s alt-teen life I’ve ever heard: “When [we were] were 14,” Tan says of her pals, “we discovered unusual movies and unpopular music.” Decades later, they all reunited for a film more unusual and profound than they ever intended. —B.R.

Tully

Here’s the thing about Tully: It builds up to one really great twist. I won’t reveal it here, and maybe you’ll guess it before getting to the end anyway, but it’s a gut-punch. Before that happens, the setup is fairly simple. Marlo (Charlize Theron), a mother of three children, hires hip twentysomething Tully (Mackenzie Davis) as a nanny for her new baby. Over the course of weeks, Marlo and Tully become close and Marlo begins to yearn for the life she had when she was Tully’s age. Sounds dry, but this is a project from director Jason Reitman and writer Diablo Cody, a pair that has wrung blood, sweat, and tears out of domestic dramas (Juno, Young Adult) twice before—and does so double-time here. The quest to prolong youth while also raising children has never been so cuttingly portrayed. —A.W.

The Favourite

I truly thought that nothing could top Suspiria for the most haunting final moments of any film in 2018. I was wrong. Director Yorgos Lanthimos’ film about the love/hate triangle between Queen Anne of England (Olivia Colman) and her companions Lady Sarah Churchill (Rachel Weisz) and Abigail Masham (Emma Stone) ended on a note so unsettling, I’m still not done processing it weeks later. (I won’t spoil it, but I will say I’ll never look at rabbits the same way ever again.) Much like with his film The Lobster, Lanthimos’ latest lands somewhere in the gaps between drama and farce. It is, instead, a crooked glance at humanity’s relationship to power—the things people do to get close to it, to claim it, and to throw it away. In Lanthimos’ askew version of history, when Sarah’s relationship with the Queen is threatened by the arrival of her cousin Abigail, she does what she feels she must do to wrest back control and steer Queen Anne’s War to her liking. Anne, sensing the manipulation, grows closer to Abigail, only to realize her intentions might not be much better. It’s an unparalleled study in the utter lack of trust that accompanies being in charge, in the dread that comes with knowing those who seek your favor may never have pure intentions. It’s as bleak as it is laughable—and one of the most wonderfully weird tales to hit the screen this year. —A.W.

Annihilation

Director Alex Garland‘s adaptation of the first book of Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach trilogy was easily one of the best dystopia films of 2018. It was also one of the year’s finest specimens of female badassery, featuring Natalie Portman, Tessa Thompson, Gina Rodriguez, and Jennifer Jason Leigh as a team sent on a expedition to find out why nature’s rules seem not to apply in the mysterious, government-protected space known as Area X. Haunting, unpredictable, and science-y (someone turns into a plant!), it was a whirlwind head trip—and a weird examination of what it means to exist. —A.W.

Eighth Grade

Even the title strikes fear in the hearts of anyone who didn’t have the easiest time walking the halls of their middle school/junior high. In writer-director Bo Burnham’s film, that uneasiest of times is compounded by the fact that it takes place in the modern world, where all insecurities are reinforced by un-Liked Instagram posts and unreceived Facebook invites. Heroine Kayla Day (Elsie Fisher) knows she’s on a pretty low rung in her school’s social hierarchy and with each new YouTube video she posts full of advice she doesn’t take, her story becomes more and more poignant, more and more real. And whether you grew up in the social media age or not, it’ll punch you in the heart—and make you glad you survived adolescence intact. —A.W.

Leave No Trace

Debra Granik, who every reviewer will remind you made a star out of Jennifer Lawrence with her film Winter’s Bone, pulled off another wrenching look at a family on the edges with this year’s Leave No Trace. When Will (Ben Foster) and Tom (Thomasin McKenzie)—a father-daughter pair who have been living off-the-grid outside Portland, Oregon for years—are arrested and put in the system, it tests their bond in new ways, and exposes Tom to a life unlike the one she’s lived with her father. Granik’s latest is almost deafening in how quiet it is, but its message about finding one’s place in the world is loud and clear. —A.W.

Three Identical Strangers

Were you surprised by the twist? What about the one after that? These are kind the kinds of questions folks ask you after seeing this documentary about three identical triplets who discover each others’ existence in their teenage years. At the time they found each other, they became America’s latest talk show feel-good story and national intrigue. Everything that happened after that, though, is so unbelievable it pushes all boundaries of credulity. It’s a Can you believe? story that quickly becomes an examination of heredity and (possible) corruption that goes beyond unbelievable into truly mind-boggling. —A.W.

(C)