#RE : ╱ INTERACTION. › WE ARE UNUSUAL AND TRAGIC AND ALIVE.

[sbones]

@gelwaz​         SENT.         💬

❛❛       i         just         want         a         nice,         easy         life.         what’s         wrong         with         that         ?       ❜❜

[zdbztumble]

So About That Roxas…

Well, it’s that time - time to invite unholy disdain upon myself for my blasphemous views on fan favorite Roxas!

OK, that’s an exaggeration. I don’t know how unpopular what I’m about to say really is. And to make this perfectly clear up-front - I don’t dislike Roxas. I think he’s a fine character, and his (very) long prologue is one of the strongest parts of KH II. But I do find Roxas more valuable and compelling in how he relates to other characters, and in the fact that he is an aspect of Sora, than in his own right. All on his own, I don’t find Roxas to be particularly active or interesting.

And that isn’t a flaw. Given what Nobodies are (prior to DDD, at least), I would expect that from Roxas. Almost every member of Organization XIII isn’t terribly dynamic or dimensional on their own merits - their personalities are one-note (if that), which can be by turns tragic, obnoxious, or an effective foil for the protagonists. When Roxas draws jealousy from Hayner, general confusion from his friend group, some amount of pathos from Axel, mixed emotions from Riku and disdain from DiZ, and attraction from Namine, he’s a great example of the latter. I never find him obnoxious, and when he is on his own, there is a sense of tragedy with him. Because while Roxas may have agency, and does display a curiosity - almost an obsession, after a while - with gaining answers for the strange things happening to him, he’s ultimately empty. None of his joys, none of his curiosity - and not even his rages and despairs - last. He ends up defaulting, always, into a quiet, resigned, and hollow state, and he doesn’t seem happy about that. 

This is true of the Twilight Town prologue, at least. In the brief flashbacks we’re given in KH II, and at the beginning of the Sora/Roxas fight, a different Roxas appears. He’s still empty at the core, but his front to the world is crueler, dismissive even of the words of his supposed best friend Axel, and predatory. We learn later in the game that DiZ altered Roxas’s personality when he dropped him into the digital Twilight Town, and it’s not hard to see why. Even with the altered personality, the strongest display of feeling Roxas can manage is anger. It’s only when Roxas confronts Sora, accepts him as “a good other,” and fully rejoins with him, that Roxas appears genuinely happy and alive in KH II.

But I do have problems with how Roxas is used, in KH II and especially in 358/2 Days. To start with II - there are some pretty big missed opportunities. Roxas was a member of Organization XIII, presumably working toward their goals (to go just on what we see in KH II), and every member of the Organization who sees Sora recognizes Roxas within him. Wouldn’t it have been nice to have someone else do the same? If, when visiting one of the Disney worlds that Sora hasn’t been to before, there was a character who had a negative encounter with Roxas, and therefore fears Sora and the Keyblade?

The lack of any such scene speaks to a larger problem with Roxas in KH II: his limited relevance once the prologue ends. He does come up here and there throughout the play time, which I do appreciate, but he doesn’t really have an impact on Sora before their clash other than as a source of mild confusion. Sora’s reactions to being called by Roxas’s name never progress much past “huh? Cut that out!” and he has no real reaction to learning that his own Nobody was a member of Organization XIII. Had Roxas’s activities over the past year created a negative consequence that Sora had to deal with, that might have invited some internal conflict within Sora’s heart, culminating in a much more emotionally charged clash with Organizers like Xibar and Saix. Hell, even without such a scene, the knowledge that a part of him was a member of the bad guys could have, and should have, made Sora feel at least a little upset. That’s not to say that the absence of such a mini-arc is a dealbreaker for KH II; what we did get works well enough. But, much like Roxas himself, something seems to be missing.

A future game might have been able to address this issue...had it not been for 358/2 Days.

This isn’t a revisit of Days; I can’t very well revisit a game I only ever played the first few minutes of, years ago, before losing touch with the friend who had the DS card for it. You’ll get no views of the gameplay here. But I am familiar with Days; I’ve read the breakdowns, researched its writing, and watched the movie multiple times. And I gotta tell ya - I know the game has its fans, and it may have some strengths and concepts missing from other titles, but I really don’t care for its story. And that has a lot to do with how it mishandles Roxas.

I’ll start with a caveat - I am not the audience for Days. At no point while playing KH II did I ever want to know any more about Roxas or the Organization than that game saw fit to reveal. What we got was enough for them to work as the villains in that story, and that’s all I ever needed them to be. This was always going to be an easy title for me to skip, or at least not take any real interest in. But that’s a matter of taste. Plenty of people take more interest in the backstories of Roxas and the Organization than I do, and this was perfectly acceptable as a subject for a midquel game. But the execution, IMO, is a complete mess. It ignores or retcons several of the snippets we get about the Organization in KH II, to poor effect, and fails to expand on any of the villainous Organizers in a way that might turn them from one-note video game bosses and elements of a hive mind into fleshed-out characters. Axel is given several coats of whitewash, and his history with Saix lacks any resonance when Saix is left as such a hollow villain. There’s no playing alongside Disney characters in a game so given over to original KH lore, and that lore is rewritten in ways I don’t like. The trends of mystery for its own sake and teasing histories and future events at the expense of the story at hand continue, the same few points of lore and logistics are over-stressed, and the dialogue and voice acting just isn’t good (and can anyone tell me why they re-dubbed Christopher Lee in the HD movie version? I mean...it’s Christopher Lee!)

But as I said, the real problem is with Roxas. For a character meant to be the protagonist, Roxas cedes a lot of narrative real estate to new character Xion. Like Days itself, I know Xion has fans - ardent fans. I can’t argue with that, nor would I want to; you can like what you like, and I won’t assess and critique her as a character here. But all I can say about Xion is that, as a writer, she strikes me as redundant. A member of Organization XIII, unusually lacking in knowledge about their life beforehand, wielding the Keyblade, inducted into the Organization within this game, derived from Sora through unusual means, with a connection to Kairi and whose existence arrests Sora’s full restoration from the events of CoM; setting her character aside, Xion’s narrative function is exactly what Roxas’s was established to be by KH II.

One could say that the game makes a point of this, turning it into an orchestrated conflict between the two by Xemnas, but practically speaking, this means that Roxas spends a key chunk of the story displaced. He becomes a friend on the sidelines as the real meat of the story concerns a character who, from the very beginning, anyone who played KH II would know isn’t going to matter past this game. This ends up making Xion more important, and more interesting, than Roxas within Days itself. But almost everything that Xion goes through could have easily been given to him by dint of what we see in KH II. That Sora’s restoration is upset because his memories of Kairi are being absorbed into another being would have been especially appropriate for Roxas, since Kairi’s very name is always fractured in the restoration process during II’s prologue at first, and the process itself is at such a low number despite a year having passed until Roxas is in DiZ’s hands. Those character elements unique to Xion herself, and the conflict between her and Roxas engineered by Xemnas, aren’t enough to justify her presence in the larger KH story IMO, and end up confusing elements of the lore (replicas, memories, etc.) If she had been cut, and those aspects of her story relating to Sora’s restoration given to Roxas, the story and lore integrity would’ve been better for it.

But that wouldn’t have solved everything wrong with Roxas in Days. Let’s look back at what KH II shows us of a pre-DiZ Roxas again. A cold and predatory figure; the Dusks who first come for him in Twilight Town address him as their “liege,” implying that they served him the way other Nobodies serve the Organizers; the Organizers themselves seem to have been quite close to Roxas, taking his betrayal hard and referring to him as “brother.” And Organization XIII, as we see it in KH II vanilla, is a collective, with no real secret about its motives within the ranks - that motive being, in so many words, to let the remaining Heartless continue their genocide across the worlds just so that they can swoop in with the Keyblade, harvest the captive hearts, and offer them up to their Kingdom Hearts in a mad bid to gain hearts of their own.

So why is Roxas so innocent in Days?

That cold exterior, the flashes of temper - that’s not what we get from Roxas here. What we get is a blank slate who becomes a puppy as he strikes up a buddy-buddy relationship with Axel, and who later performs the same function for Xion. He talks about fighting the darkness and asks hopefully if he’s performing “good” deeds. His interactions with his friends show him to be cheerful and open. The Samurai are supposedly under his command, but that’s a detail relegated to the reports. His relationships with anyone in the Organization other than Axel and Xion don’t even warrant scenes in the movie, and nothing suggests that they would deem him “brother;” Saix and Xemnas regard him as no more than a tool . And even though he’s destroying Heartless with the Keyblade, and those hearts are becoming part of the Organization’s Kingdom Hearts...somehow this is a point he needs explained several times? And he and Xion openly doubt why they need hearts at all - a point presented as one to be sympathetic toward, despite everything from KH II and a good chunk of this very game stressing that it is in fact a problem that Nobodies lack hearts?

This is not what was indicated in KH II. What’s worse, it’s boring. A far more effective choice IMO would have been to let Roxas be villainous. Go the dark protagonist route; give us a cold hunter of a character, with the impulsive anger and fractured psyche Sora showed in CoM, fully aware of what the Organization is up to and the price that others will pay for it and still committed to the cause. Then, when the events of CoM play out in the background, and fragments of Sora’s memories find their way to Roxas (assuming we still cut Xion in this scenario), that’s the turning point. That’s when Roxas can doubt the Organization’s cause, when he can begin to question his lack of memories and his true identity, and betray the Organization by setting out to find Sora. Give him two separate fights with Riku, to justify the dialogue claiming such in KH II. Let him develop some awareness of Namine after he gets Sora’s memories; Namine’s dialogue in KH II indicates that they’ve never met before, but a connection at a distance could serve to give more substance to their relationship, and supply Namine with opportunities to develop as a character. Depict the scenes where she first comes into contact with DiZ and Riku, agrees to take on their help in restoring Sora’s memories, and feels conflicted about the moral gray area their harsh but necessary actions occupy. Let her be ultimately responsible for setting Riku on the right trail that ends up bringing Roxas into their hands.

Of course, one reason why they may have opted not to do this is because having a dark protagonist complicit in an evil scheme involving the deaths of countless people may have been difficult to pull off while still earning an E10 rating at most. And honestly, the story told by Days doesn’t strike me as  necessarily the best fit for a video game even as-is. They might have been better off with planning it as a proper movie from the get-go, instead of a string of cutscenes divorced from the gameplay as they ultimately presented it in the HD collections.

And another objection to this approach might have been that a villainous Roxas and morally ambiguous Namine might have been less “likable,” and therefore less usable in future titles. To that I say - so what? I didn’t want Roxas and Namine as characters in any titles past KH II anyway - not because they were bad characters, or because I didn’t like them, but because their stories concluded. Concluded on terms they chose, and were at peace with. It was tinged with a bittersweet quality, but they did get a “happy” ending. If a midquel story complicated their morality, that wouldn’t negate the events of KH II or the resolution they received; it would have created a journey to get them to that point, starting from a much darker place, and given more weight to the idea that it was necessary for them to rejoin with Sora and Kairi. I’d argue that would enrich what we see in KH II, whereas the actual route they took in titles like DDD and KH III disregards or undermines everything that made the ending of KH II work.

[askmarietheapprentice]

Meta Monday: why Circus Baby’s betrayal in Sister Location was a surpise while Goro Akechi’s in Persona 5 wasn’t.

Happy Goro Day. 

In a way that shouldn’t be the case, we’re introduced to her with her apparently  murdering Sad Desk Man who is either one of Scott Cawthon’ s avatars or Henry or both since FNaF World is both very meta and lore rich.

“I’ve made something terrible. Her name is Baby. It’s too late to deactivate her.”  The word terror is shown to us in the Sister Location trailer right before we’re shown the elevator for the game.  

She shows an interest in the player character sooner than Akechi (Night 2) and is also quite helpful in keeping Michael alive.( It has been brought up by people more clever than me if Akechi wasn’t the last one to join the party he’d be less suspicious.) In a way she is what the FNaF fandom has wanted since after FNaF 1 a talking robot that’s not trying to kill us. Balloon Boy doesn’t count because he’s Withered Foxy’s accomplice in killing the player character. 

We’ve known since FNaF2 that the kids want to protect and help other children and don’t trust adults “Help them. Save them. Save him her.” Even Foxy looks shocked and saddened to see the remains of his murdered audience. “ But the characters have been acting very unusual, almost aggressive towards the staff. They interact with kids just fine but when they encounter an adult they just … stare.” FNaF2 Night 4  “Someone used one of the suits. We had a spare in the back a yellow one, someone used it... now none of them are acting right.” FNaF 2 Night 6 

She becomes sorta the Phone Guy/Phone Dude of Sister Location. A morally questionable (but friendly and pleasant) character at best that you listen to because they do seem to want you to survive and they have advice that will help. They also have information important to understanding the story.  Phone Guy wants you to survive because it’ s cheaper than tearing out and replacing carpeting/ cleaning fees and guilt by the end more guilt than anything else. I think you’ re actually Phone Dude’s friend/minion and he doesn’t want you to burn or hallucinating nightmares brought on from traumatic memories. Baby wants you alive because she thinks Michael is her father and she wants him to save her from the Hell he placed her in. And she’ll need to turn his body in a suit to do so. 

She sells herself as a tragic monster just looking for an escape from being forced to commit acts of murder as early as Night 3 if you’re rebellious. Night 5 if you’re not. 

Yes I am saying that Goro Akechi would have been less suspicious if he joined The Phantom Thieves as Black Mask to break free of being his father’s assassin/attack dog as counterintuitive that may seem. Everyone else admits a selfish motive for joining before the fateful day Joker gets captured. Everyone except Crow. (Even Ren wants to clear his name and restore his reputation and can sell his soul and friends out for it.) 

In part Baby works as a twist villain because like Michael a lot of us wanted to trust and help her. It made sense to trust her too. Part of her is yet an other minor whose death William Afton is responsible for. He knew if he left her there at Circus Baby’s Pizza World there was a chance that she would win the unlucky lottery. Baby only strikes when she’s alone with her victim. He left her alone with Baby anyway. And that the more charitable interpretation. He could have always intended her to die to and possess Baby. (“Didn’t you make her just for me?”) 

To make maters worse ,Elizabeth could have died on her birthday. It was someone’s birthday. Why else would Baby smell like birthday cake? A detail that could only have come from Elizabeth. None of the robots can smell.

Akechi is also a dead minor because of his bastard of a father. At least he died rejecting his father’s evil will . (That being said I would love to see Akechi truly alive in P5R.)

Elizabeth never does she still thinks her father loves her and wants her even right before her death by fire in Freddy Fazbear Pizzeria Simulator. 

In the end Akechi loved the Thieves more than he hated his father. In The Fourth Closet Elizabeth told Charlie she hated her more than she loved her father.    

[loretranscripts]

Lore Episode 27: On the Farm (Transcript) - 8th February 2016

tw: murder, incest, abuse, gore

Disclaimer: This transcript is entirely non-profit and fan-made. All credit for this content goes to Aaron Mahnke, creator of Lore podcast. It is by a fan, for fans, and meant to make the content of the podcast more accessible to all. Also, there may be mistakes, despite rigorous re-reading on my part. Feel free to point them out, but please be nice!

In 1943, Abraham Maslow gifted the world with his list of five core essentials that every human being has in common. Today, we call that chart “Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs”, and it’s still a framework for how we understand and study much of human behaviour today. That list includes a few obvious entries, such as our psychological needs and our desires for love and affection. There are deeper concepts, too, like self-actualisation and esteem. They’re just as important, but a bit harder for many people to understand at first glance. But it’s the last item on the list that I want to focus on. It almost seems too obvious to be there, but at the same time, it has a bit of everything. It’s basic yet complex; it straddles the line, and maybe that’s why it’s so important to all of us. What is it? Safety. Humans like to feel safe. Our pursuit of safety is core to who we are as people. It’s not unique to humans, for sure – animals are very good at finding and building homes wherever they can, but it’s undeniable that safety drives a lot of our decisions, and rightly so. We deserve to feel safe – one could argue that it’s a subset of freedom. When we are fully in control of our own lives, a portion of that control will always be diverted towards safety. We find safety in many different places, though. We find it in a group of friends because, as every horror movie has taught us, there’s safety in numbers. We find it in places like our work or schools and religious buildings, although those are admittedly much less safe today than they were a generation ago. But it’s in our homes that we find the most safety. We nest there, in a sense – we build a cocoon around ourselves that protects us from the weather, from outsiders, and from harm. But tragically, sometimes that’s not enough. I’m Aaron Mahnke, and this is Lore.

No one liked Andreas Gruber. They thought the old farmer was greedy, and the public perception of the man was that he was rude and cranky. He was an old, crusty farmer, and no one around him appreciated that very much. Gruber was 63 and his wife, Cäzilia, was 72. They lived on their farm, about 40 miles north of Munich, between the small, German towns of Ingolstadt and Schrobenhausen. It wasn’t their farm, though. No, it belonged to their daughter, 35-year-old Viktoria, who lived there on the farm with them, along with her two young children. Her daughter, Cäzilia, was seven, and Josef was two, and it was Josef’s birth that really got the neighbours talking. Viktoria’s husband, Karl, had left to serve in the First World War in 1914 while she was pregnant with their daughter. According to all reports, he died there in the trenches and never returned – so who fathered Josef? Local gossip, fuelled by a dislike of Andreas Gruber, claimed the boy was a product of incest between Viktoria and her father. The birth certificate, though, simply listed the initials “L.S.”, leaving the boy’s paternity a mystery to wonder and whisper over. The farm provided ample privacy from the gossip, though. It sat in a large clearing in the thick, German forest, close enough to nearby Kaifeck to be part of the village, yet far enough away to be outside the normal flow of life there – hinter, as the Germans would say. The farm was hinter, or behind the village of Kaifeck, so most called it Hinterkaifeck. They still interacted with the village, though. Young Cäzilia attended school six days a week there, the postman delivered mail to the farm regularly, and a local woman even lived with the Grubers as their maid. From everything I’ve read about the family, the seemed to be nothing more than ordinary. Sure, they were broken in certain ways – Viktoria’s lost husband, Andreas’ reputation as a greedy crank were hard to miss – but overall, they were just one more German farm family, doing their best to get by.

In the Autumn of 1921, the Gruber’s maid quit her job there on the farm. She claimed, of all things, that the farm was haunted. She’d heard noises when no one else should have been around; she noticed items that had been moved, items that no one else would admit to; she never felt alone. It took a while to find a replacement, and in the meantime, winter arrived. Life on the farm became more insular. There were no crops to tend to, so the Grubers cared for their animals and stayed warm. But little things were beginning to happen that caught their attention, things that shouldn’t be happening, and it made them wonder if maybe, just maybe, their old maid had been right. They began to hear those same noises in the attic. Andreas even found a newspaper in the house that he had no memory of buying. When he asked his wife and daughter, they were just as baffled. And then, one of the house keys went missing. It was unsettling to say the least. In late March of 1922, though, Andreas noticed the most unusual thing of all. He’d been outside the house to fetch something, perhaps firewood, or to check on the exterior of the house. The night before had given them another fresh layer of snow on the ground, so perhaps he needed to inspect the roof – we don’t really know. But as he walked from the house to the barn, Andreas claimed he saw footprints in the snow. They started at the edge of the forest and covered the distance between the trees and the house, ending there. Perhaps a traveller passed through in the night, maybe a local had been walking through the snow and gotten lost – it happened from time to time. But what was odd about the tracks was that they didn’t go back, they just… ended there. We know all of this because Gruber himself told some of the locals while he was in town that next day. He was clearly disturbed by the things he had seen, but none of his neighbours had experienced anything similar. And that was the last time anyone saw the old farmer alive.

The first clue that anything odd was going on, at least to the people of Kaifeck, was when little Cäzilia failed to show up for school on Saturday, April 1st. The next day, the entire family was absent from church where they attended – pardon the pun – religiously. Cäzilia missed school on Monday as well. Finally, when the postman arrived on Tuesday, he found Monday’s mail still on the porch where he left it. This drew his suspicion, and he mentioned it back in the village. The people there put the pieces together and decided that something had to be amiss, so later that day, a group of neighbours gathered together, and they quickly set off to visit the farm. You know how muffled and quiet it can get outside when there’s been a lot of snow, as if the sounds of the world around you have been muted and hushed? I imagine that those men were keenly aware of that unnatural silence, standing there outside the Gruber farmhouse that day. One of the men shouted out for Andreas, or anyone else in the house, to come out and speak with them. They just wanted to make sure everyone was safe and well, but no one answered – just more of that muted, snow-covered silence. Not giving up, one of the neighbours – a local man named Lorenz Schlittenbauer – led the group to the barn. It was daylight, so perhaps Andreas could be found working in there with the animals, but when they opened the door they were greeted by a grizzly sight. There, on the straw-covered flaw, lay the bloody bodies of Andreas, his wife and daughter, and young Cäzilia. It was clear that something horrible had happened to the family, and Schlittenbauer quickly walked from the barn to the house, which were connected by a door. Inside, he found more bloodshed. Maria Baumgartner, the new maid who had started work on the farm just the previous day, lay dead in her own bedroom. Little Josef, last to be found, had met the same fate. It was a scene of devastation and gore, and it left the men stunned. Within a matter of hours, investigators from Munich arrived to go over the scene and gather evidence. They wanted to piece together what had happened, to discover the story, to find clues that might point to the person, or people, responsible. What they did uncover, though, was far more disturbing than answers.

It appeared that each of the adults in the barn had been led there, one at a time. Whoever the killer had been, they had appeared to call each person into the barn alone, where they executed them with a farm tool known as a mattock, a sort of pickaxe used for cutting. Each blow to the head was powerful and deadly, and each victim most likely died instantly. The bodies inside the house had the same type of wounds: Maria and Josef were found in pools of their own blood, their skulls crushed by their attacker. As far as the police were concerned, whoever wielded the weapon knew how to use it, and they did so without hesitation. This was cold-blooded murder, without a doubt. The trouble was, the weapon seemed to be missing, it was just gone. Other aspects of the crime didn’t seem to line up with logic. For one, there seemed to be no motive behind the actions of the killer. It was known to a few in the village that, just weeks before, Viktoria had withdrawn all of her savings, borrowed more from her dead husband’s sister, and brought the cash home. She told people that she planned to invest in the farm. She even made a large 700-mark donation to the village church. All of the remaining money was still there in the house – the killer hadn’t taken it, nor had they taken any of the other valuables that filled the farmhouse. Nothing was stolen. Whoever had called the Grubers into the barn, whoever had swung the pickaxe and ended all of their lives, they weren’t interested in money. Another detail that seemed odd was the condition of the house and the farm. In most instances, a killer will flee the scene after the crime has been committed, but here, there were signs to the contrary. The animals in the barn appeared to have been fed and watered throughout the weekend, and not by an amateur, either. Whoever had tended them knew his way around a farm. Most disturbing of all, though, were the reports from neighbours that smoke had been seen rising from the chimney of the farmhouse all through the weekend. Food had been eaten, and one of the beds had even been slept in. It was hard to believe, but the facts didn’t lie. The Gruber family’s killer didn’t run; instead, he stayed in the house long after the bodies had turned cold, as if nothing had happened at all.

The question, of course, was a simple one: who could do such a thing? But this was 1922, CSI wasn’t a thing that existed yet, there was no DNA analysis available to the investigators. Even fingerprint identification was too young to have reached the farmlands of German Bavaria, but even if there had been better tools, there were other obstacles to uncovering the truth. The local men who initially stumbled across the bodies, led by Lorenz Schlittenbauer, had disturbed much of the crime scene. While the maid and young Josef had each been covered with cloth by the killer, the bodies in the barn had actually been stacked like lumber. On top of this macabre pile, the killer had placed an old door and then hay had been scattered over it in an attempt to hide it. So, when Schlittenbauer entered the barn with the others, he actually lifted the door and began to move the bodies, making a full and accurate investigation impossible. According to those who watched him, Schlittenbauer lifted and moved the corpses with no emotion or hesitation, as if the sight of it didn’t bother him at all – or, maybe, wasn’t new to him. And it was that, along with some other, subtle clues, that quickly moved him to the top of the list of suspects. Why would he do this, though? Well, he told one of the men that he moved the bodies because he was looking for his son. Think back for a moment. Remember the questionable parentage of young Josef, whose birth certificate simply listed one “L.S.” as the father? Numerous neighbour testimonies made it clear that Lorenz Schlittenbauer was L.S., and that went a long way to explaining why he led the men from the barn, into the house – he’d been looking for his son, Josef. But according to some of the men with him that day, the door between the barn and the kitchen had been locked. They knew that because Schlittenbauer pulled the key from his pocket and unlocked the door, which was more than a little curious, seeing as how Gruber had mentioned in town that one of his house keys had gone missing. And one final bit: the family dog was seen by the postman on the day before, where he had been tied to a corner of the barn outside. When the men arrived on Tuesday, though, they found it in the barn, wounded but alive. When it saw Schlittenbauer, the animal barked uncontrollably.

All of the clues seemed odd and out of place; they make your mind perk up and feel like something deeper was going on, but at face value they prove nothing at all, and that’s the frustrating part. The dog might have just been barking because of the bodies. Schlittenbauer might have had a key simply because he was the Gruber’s closest neighbour. Like I said, these clues were subtle, and that’s why he was never formally charged with the crime. As for motive, some people believe that Viktoria had sued Lorenz for alimony, and the man had refused. Clearly, Viktoria needed money shortly before the murders, as her bank withdrawal suggested, but historians are doubtful. The most likely reality, they believe, is that Josef’s father was none other than his grandfather, Andreas, and the arrangement with Lorenz simply an effort to save face in the village. Alternative theories have been suggested. There are some that believe that Viktoria’s husband Karl did not, in fact, die during World War I. No body was ever recovered or sent home, and a friend of Karl’s even testified later to seeing him alive in the mid-20s. Some people wonder, could Karl have had a hand in the murders, perhaps out of anger toward Viktoria’s relationship with Schlittenbauer while he was away at war? I’ve even read another theory that claims that Andreas had been waiting for an important letter of some kind. I can’t find more than a mention of it, but what if the killer and the letter were connected? That might explain why he stayed in the house for days after the murders – he’d been waiting to intercept whatever the letter contained. One last thought: by all accounts, the killer had been in or around the Gruber home many times before the events of March 31st. The Gruber’s former maid had quit her job because she said she felt the place was haunted. There had been the unrecognised newspaper, the odd noises, missing keys… weeks and weeks of unusual activity that eventually led up to the day of the murders. The day, mind you, that the new maid started working there. Maria Baumgartner had been killed just hours after arriving for her first day on the job. It makes you wonder: did her arrival upset the plans of whoever it was who seemed to be stalking the Gruber family? Did she see him, and pay with her life?

Hinterkaifeck has the feel of a cabin in the woods, the centrepiece of many a horror film and novel – a place of retreat, far from the demands and prying eyes of the outside world, where we could go to get away; a place where we can find safety in the middle of an unsafe wilderness; a home away from home. We want to feel safe, and thankfully most of us do, but there’s just enough risk on the outsides of the bell-curve that we’re always left wondering, what if? And that’s how fear works, it sits in a dark corner at the edge of our minds and watches. We know it’s not going to step out into the light, but we can feel it glaring at us from the dark. I can’t help but wonder if the Grubers ever had that sensation during those last few months, if maybe there had been moments when Andreas just couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching him. Did Viktoria have moments where she felt like she wasn’t alone? We’ll never know the answers to those questions, though. And one more tiny mystery: the physician who performed the autopsies on all six victims had their heads removed and sent to Munich for further study. Some reports claim that a clairvoyant was part of that research, but I can’t find proof of that. Their bodies were buried nearby in what is now modern-day Waidhofen, but their skulls remained in Munich and were eventually lost in the chaos of World War II. Today, the farm in the woods is little more than a memory. All that is left today is a small memorial, but over the year that followed the tragedy there, it stood empty like a crypt in the middle of that clearing in the forest – a constant reminder to the neighbours who passed by of all the people they lost and of the violence that had visited their small village, and maybe that’s why they finally tore it down in 1923. Maybe they couldn’t stand to look at it again. Maybe it needed upkeep that required going inside, but no one was willing to do that. Maybe they just wanted to move on and forget. Whatever the true reason was, it was only after the farm was torn down that the murder weapon was finally discovered. One of the men found it among the debris at the top of the pile, mixed in with items that had been in storage. It had been hidden inside the house all along, in the last place that anyone would look: the attic.

[Closing statements]

[ewh111]

Annual List of Favorite Film Experiences: The 2020 Pandemic Version

Happy new year! So happy to finally arrive at 2021! All the best for a much better new year!!

What a year it was. Since March 12, I've spent 98% of my time within the confines of my condo. The good thing is that as a natural introvert, I have not yet gone stir crazy. I get plenty of social interaction via Zoom. And as a type-2 diabetic, I have been especially careful, staying at home, going out only for essential work or errands, like groceries. I'm grateful that my extended family connected more through the pandemic via weekly 90 minute Zoom family check-ins.

After just two months of work from home, I surpassed the longest time I hadn't been on a plane in over 15 years. (In 2019, I took 42 flights--15 of them international; in 2020, just eight, all prior to the first week of Feb.) As someone who typically travels a lot for work, it's strange to be so stationary. But I'm not complaining. Without the daily commute, travel, and regular schedule of evening and weekend events, I've quietly appreciated the ability to get more sleep, find time to exercise, and even lose some weight. As I reflect upon the past year, I choose to look at the silver-lining and see this period as a positive, massive macro re-balancing of my life.

When things do get back to some semblance of normalcy, the ones who will have the most difficulty adjusting will be these two girls, Freddy and Maxie, who have been so spoiled with attention over the past 10 months.

Now onto this year's favorite film experiences.

What a strange year for film. The last time I experienced a communal movie-going experience was at the Sundance Film Festival back in January. Since 2020 will be remembered as the year of an uber-significant election and home confinement, it seems appropriate to begin this year's conversation with these two themes: democracy and geography, aka places we couldn't travel to.

LESSONS IN DEMOCRACY

Boys State

One of most riveting experiences is my favorite film from the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. This documentary follows four participants in the Texas edition of the week-long Boys State program. The filmmakers lucked out by selecting four boys whose journeys turned out to have fascinating dramatic arcs during the week. What unfolds is a totally engaging microcosm of the political dynamics in the rising generation of voters in America. Trailer: https://youtu.be/E1Kh_T5ZBIM

Hamilton

What a delightful escape from confinement and inability to see live theater by revisiting the stage musical phenomenon via the viewpoints of multi-cameras. It was a new way to appreciate the words, the music, the choreography, and staging of this remarkable work about Alexander Hamilton and his fellow founding fathers. Trailer: https://youtu.be/6s9sNvkjpI0

What the Constitution Means to Me

Missing live theater? Here's another gem to take in. Fast-paced, funny, deeply personal, and defiant, playwright Heidi Schreck plays herself in a mostly one-person show, revisiting her days as a teenager debating the meaning of the Constitution in dingy American Legion halls, linking her personal family history to our country's founding document. Trailer: https://youtu.be/P2zSRdVanDY

Crip Camp

Incredibly inspiring and engaging documentary about Camp Jened, a Catskills summer camp for teens with disabilities in the 1960s and 70s, which prepared many members to become leaders in the movement that eventually led to the passage of the ADA. An important piece of lesser known history and fight for social change and equity. Trailer: https://youtu.be/XRrIs22plz0

TRAVELING WITHOUT LEAVING THE COUCH

My Octopus Teacher (South Africa)

A truly meditative and surprisingly moving documentary. In a kelp forest off the coast of South Africa, a noted underwater photographer documents his, dare I say "friendship," with an octopus whom he visits every day over the course of a year. Trailer: https://youtu.be/b-lbIJHlmbE

76 Days (China)

New York-based filmmaker Hao Wu worked with two journalists in China who recorded harrowing, fly-on-the-wall footage inside four Wuhan hospitals at the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak, a clearly risky endeavor unsanctioned by the Chinese government. While this may seem unappealing to watch as we still struggle with the crisis, this apolitical, humanizing, compassionate, and ultimately uplifting film documents and honors the courageous doctors and nurses and their relationships with patients and family members grappling with the unfolding crisis over the course of the full 76 day lock-down in Wuhan. Trailer: https://youtu.be/x_f6-jhbsR4

Your Name Engraved Herein (Taiwan)

The highest ever grossing LGBTQ film in Taiwan, as well as its most popular domestic film in 2020, this is a sensitive, poignant, slow-burn story of coming out and first love in an all-boys Catholic school in a still socially-repressive Taiwan immediately after the lifting of martial law in 1987. Trailer: https://youtu.be/mzfVBg54BGw

A Sun (Taiwan, again)

Driven driving instructor father + marginalized night-club hairstylist mother + high achieving, golden child # 1 son + disowned black sheep younger son serving time in juvenile prison = unhappy family. This multiple winner of Taiwan's version of the Oscar, A Sun is an intricate, engaging, character-driven family drama full of disappointment, redemption-seeking, and tragic setbacks, but uplifting in the end. Trailer: https://youtu.be/LBogLcE2wNQ

Gunda (Norway)

An unusual viewing experience, I did not expect to be so drawn in and highly moved by this intimate, up-close and personal barnyard portrait. A totally mesmerizing and beautifully filmed, black and white, wordless and scoreless documentary (only ambient farm sounds with no humans in sight)--just a sow named Gunda and her piglets with interludes by a one-legged rooster and herd of cows. And yes, there's a subtle message. Trailer: https://youtu.be/05Gc2lANyTQ

The Painter and the Thief (Norway, again)

An intriguing and fascinating documentary about the strange and complicated story of a female Czech artist, whose two most important paintings are stolen from an Oslo art gallery in broad daylight, and the thief who turns out to be an addiction-addled male nurse who she unexpectedly befriends during the trial. Trailer: https://youtu.be/LKBiKDZSf_c

Mucho Mucho Amor (Puerto Rico)

The story of the iconic fortune-teller with millions of followers in the Spanish-speaking world: the bedazzled and caped, effervescently flamboyant, gender non-confirming, Puerto Rican television astrologer Walter Mercado. Disappearing from the airwaves without a trace in 2007 after decades of daily uplifting telecasts, no one knew what happened or where he had gone. Until these filmmakers tracked him down. Here, they tell his story in this loving portrait of the legend, in time to participate in an exhibition dedicated to his 50 year career at a Miami museum before his death last year. Trailer: https://youtu.be/XEJqiucxyrs

Welcome to Chechnya (Russia)

A gut-wrenching and chilling documentary about courageous activists who help LGBTQ individuals flee the repressive regime of Chechnya where violent, homophobic beatings and executions play out regularly and whose leader denies the existence of gay people in his republic. The doc plays like a menacing thriller with the filmmaker going to great lengths to protect the identities using elaborate digital facial disguises. Trailer: https://youtu.be/GlKkj_aHMXk

Tenet (Russia, the Amalfi Coast, Oslo, the future, and the past, among other places)

This is not an easy film to like. One of the most anticipated on my list of "must sees," but the pandemic delayed my viewing till its recent VOD release. Was it worth the wait? Well, it was almost incomprehensible for the first third. But it is here because I'm still thinking about it long after watching and is high on my list to rewatch. To enjoy on first viewing, you should stop trying to figure it out and just let it wash over you and enjoy the ride--it will eventually make (some) sense. Despite all its complexities, Christopher Nolan's ambitious concept boils down to a simple plot: rich Russian bad guy (Kenneth Branagh) wants to end the world and an unnamed secret agent-type guy known only as the Protagonist (John David Washington) tries to stop him. Oh, and there's reverse entropy. And inverted time. And yeah, there are spectacular scenes with time moving forward and backwards at the same time. Like its title, the film is one giant palindrome. Trailer: https://youtu.be/AZGcmvrTX9M

Apollo 11 (Space)

Watching this documentary is like witnessing Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin's mission unfold before your eyes live, in real time. Put together from previously unreleased, stunningly crisp, and beautiful archival footage and communications audio from NASA, this is a breathtaking experience that captures the awe of the achievement without talking heads or commentary. Trailer: https://youtu.be/tpLrp0SW8yg

HOW TO DEAL WITH DEATH

Soul

This time out, Pixar tackles existential questions, like what it means to be alive and what is the "before life" in this metaphysically jazzy and terrifically "soulful" film featuring a predominantly Black cast. Trailer: https://youtu.be/xOsLIiBStEs

Dick Johnson is Dead

One would not expect a filmmaker's decision to document her father's descent into old age and dementia to be such an enjoyable and amusing ride. The result is a uniquely comic and bittersweet approach on how to handle his mortality, including envisioning and staging various ways he might accidentally hasten death. Her inspired choice to embrace the time left with her father in this way is endearing and touching without being sentimental. (And the director happens to be a college classmate: Kirsten Johnson, Brown '87.) Trailer: https://youtu.be/wfTmT6C5DnM

AND THREE MORE

Mank

David Fincher masterfully tells the tale of Herman Mankiewicz, the writer of Citizen Kane. Part social history, part examination of the underbelly of Hollywood's Golden Age, part homage to Orson Welles and Citizen Kane, the film is beautifully and evocatively shot in lush black and white with standout performances by Gary Oldman as Mank, Amanda Seyfried as Marion Davies, and a screenplay by Fincher's late father, Jack. Trailer: https://youtu.be/aSfX-nrg-lI

David Byrne's American Utopia

An exhilarating and spirited concert film by Spike Lee who beautifully captures the exuberant grey-suited, bare-footed David Byrne and his similarly wardrobed bandmates on a minimalist stage--a perfect remedy for home-confined and connection-starved human beings during these unusual times. The Byrne-Lee pairing perfectly "makes sense" as you take in the penultimate number, a cover of Janelle Monáe’s "Hell You Talmbout." Trailer: https://youtu.be/lg4hcgtjDPc

Sound of Metal

A character study of self-discovery and emotional truths, Riz Ahmed gives a riveting performance as a heavy metal rock drummer who suddenly loses his hearing. The immersive experience is enhanced with the film's amazing sound design. Trailer: https://youtu.be/VFOrGkAvjAE

HONORABLE MENTIONS

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm (perhaps the film most representative of the craziness of 2020), Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (great performances by Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman), The Personal History of David Copperfield, Da 5 Bloods, The Way I See It, The Invisible Man, Trial of the Chicago 7, I Lost My Body, The Life Ahead, Wolfwalkers, The Bee Gees: How Do You Mend A Broken Heart. 

In the Queue

Minari, Nomadland, Bacurau, Small Axe, Beanpole, The Forty Year Old Version. 

2020: THE YEAR OF NON-STOP STREAMING

Honestly, given the lack of traditional theatrical releases, I did spend an inordinate amount of time streaming shows than I normally would. It has made me wonder about the challenges of narrative storytelling in the 90-120 minute format vs. the longer episodic format which is so much more conducive to storytelling and character development.

MY TOP 30-SOME FAVORITE PANDEMIC STREAMING EXPERIENCES 

In descending order of bingey-ness--is that a word?--i.e., inability to stop watching episode after episode. (And occasional commentary...)

Dark (Netflix)--I gave this German series a special shout-out last year (Twin Peaks + Stranger Things + The Wire + time travel), and season 3 finally arrived this summer. So good, I devoured it twice in one week. Complex, mind-bending, and addictively dense storytelling with time travel that makes sense (Tenet, take note) and super satisfying series finish. Ultimately unraveling the intertwined family tree of all the time-traveling characters will make your head spin for days. 

Money Heist (Netflix)--I needed something to replace my addictive need after Dark, and four seasons of this Spanish heist/thriller fit the bill perfectly. Plus, I think the series is rich in lessons on organizational behavior and leadership development/dynamics. Dissertation, anyone?

The Umbrella Academy (Netflix)--Not a genre I typically find appealing (superheroes), but I loved the combination of family dysfunction, sibling rivalry, humor, and more time travel. After finishing the two seasons, I really missed the characters and can't wait for next season. And as a JFK assassination buff, I loved that season 2 took place in Dallas,1963.

The Queen's Gambit (Netflix)--Girl survives car crash in which mom dies, grows up to be charming woman who is addicted to alcohol and does chess.

The Flight Attendant (HBO Max)--Girl survives car crash in which dad dies, grows up to be charming woman who is addicted to alcohol and serves first class. But not anything like The Queen's Gambit.

The Great* (Hulu)--Wickedly dark comedic period piece (Catherine the Great's 18th century Russia) with colorblind casting where scheming powerful people plot to get out of loveless marriage.

Bridgerton (Netflix)--A light romantic period piece (Regent era England) with colorblind casting where scheming powerful people and debutantes try to get into marriage and maybe find love.

Tiger King (Netflix)

The Crown (Netflix)

Sex Education (Netflix)

The Last Dance (Netflix)

Better Call Saul (Netflix)

Never Have I Ever (Netflix)--Best narrator ever!

Ozark (Netflix)

Watchmen (HBO Max)

Ugly Delicious 2 (Netflix)--David Chang is back with interesting take on food and culture. The classism of steak-eating?

Flavorful Origins (Netflix)

The Great British Baking Show Season 11 (Netflix)

Pen15 (Hulu)

Mrs. America (Hulu)

The Good Place (Netflix)

Ted Lasso (Apple TV)

Alex Rider (Prime)

Love, Victor (Hulu)

Giri/Haji (Netflix)

Ratched (Netflix)

The Undoing (HBO Max)

Lovecraft Country (HBO Max)

Zerozerozero (Prime)

Industry (HBO Max)

The Boys (Prime)

What We Do In the Shadows (Hulu)

We Are Who We Are (HBO Max)

Pose (Netflix)

Normal People (Hulu)

Indian Matchmaking (Netflix)

Middleditch & Schwartz (Netflix)

Schitts Creek (Netflix)--Don't be put off by this comic treasure being so low on the binge scale. The series gets better with each season, and I'm slowly watching it because I know the end is coming, and I don't want it to end.

[sbones]

@wlfcursed​​         SENT.         💬

❛❛         it      looks      like      you're      in      trouble      there.      can      i      help       ?        ❜❜

[sbones]

@fobeud         SENT.         💬

❛❛       well,           (           ....           )           what           happened           ?           i           want           all           the           details           !      ❜❜

[sbones]

@everstride​       SENT.         💬

❛❛       give           me           one           good           reason           why           i           should           wear           a           dress           !       ❜❜