#SharedImagination

[athenanfaymont]

🧦📚🖖✨ Happy 25th of May — Geek Pride Day, Towel Day, and a Celebration of Imagination!

Today we celebrate a little bit of everything. Star Wars, Tolkien, Douglas Adams, Geek Pride Day, Reader Pride Day… and what’s beautiful is that they don’t clash. They don’t compete. They accumulate.

Because that’s what happens when you create imaginary worlds: you end up building real communities.

📖 When we first fall in love with a story, when a character makes us feel more seen than any real person ever has, it usually happens in solitude. In a quiet room, in soft lighting, on a rainy afternoon or under an endless summer sky — that first connection is intimate. Private. Almost secret.

And then… you go looking for others. And you find them.

🎮👾 Over time, the worlds that once felt like personal sanctuaries become shared gathering spaces. It doesn’t matter if you started with Harry Potter, Marvel, One Piece, Star Trek, Terry Pratchett, Final Fantasy, Doctor Who or Dragon Age. What matters is that each one opened a portal. And on the other side, there weren’t just dragons or starships: there were people like you.

And that, for me, changed everything.

Because I wasn’t quite “weird enough” for any urban tribe, nor “normal enough” to blend in. My teenage years felt dull on the outside, eccentric on the inside. I never really fit in at school. But books, games, forums, fanfics, and films offered me an alternative home. An imaginary one. An immense one.

🌍✨ I imagined my place in the world — and in doing so, I found it.

And I’ve never really stopped. I keep writing, rereading, sharing, gaming, theorising, falling in love with impossible characters and recognising myself in real people. People who were also saved by a world that doesn’t exist. People who turn imagination into something shared.

💫 Today, I celebrate that. I celebrate the kind of community that forms when someone says: “You like this too?”

Because in that moment, it’s no longer just yours — it becomes ours.

[His imagination was filled with everything he read in books… by Salvador Tusell to illustrate Don Quixote.]

[adollarformythoughts-joemama]

The Crown

                            series review and strictly just my opinion

*clears throat*

      For Netflix, this was a gamble; a gamble that just happened to cash out laurels for the team. The Crown has been met with top-notch ratings, glorifying reviews, and a plethora of awards for the actors and the show itself. The show is quite a rarity really. Overall, it has simple, ordinary themes which are shy from gripping romance, scintillating thriller, or gut-wrenching comedy. Yet, the show somehow manages to retell this un-mystified, unembellished human history in the most magnificent and surreal way possible. These simple arcs did occasionally make me feel like an old soul for till now I had gawked at tactful renderings of war, or mystical, other-worldly creatures and their concocted fictions and surely not at Queen Elizabeth II giving a dressing-down to English prime minister, Winston Churchill! The Crown was a successful attempt at historical fiction and here is why I dare to make such a claim.

*DISCLAIMER: CONTAINS SPOILERS. THOU HAST BEEN WARNED*

 Plot/Accuracy:

  Let’s get the topic that calls for the most discourse out of the way first. The plot cannot be disputed much considering that these are factual events. While some of the arcs are manipulated to provide the plot with flow, and continuity and the characters with some foundation, most of them are quite authentic. There are two points of conversation when it comes to the plot- the accuracy and the choice of incidences chosen to be revisited.

One should bear in mind when talking about accuracy, that this show doesn’t fall under documentaries, but rather historical ‘fiction’. Therefore, I find that the certain liberties taken by the show are completely acceptable. To reinforce my point, here are some words from Philippa Gregory’s ‘Three Sisters Three Queens’:

“The rules of writing history mean that a historian can only speculate about [her] emotions; but a novelist (or in this case, a writer) is allowed, indeed, obliged to recreate a version of them. This is where historical fiction- the hybrid form- does something [I] find profoundly interesting- takes the historical record and turns it inside out; the inner world explains the outer record.”

You see, this indeed is the flair of historical fiction. Not just with analyzing these characters and their intentions and emotions in said moment, but also with threading out a consequence in an interesting way: take Season 4, Episode 5, Fagan, for example, where the effects of Thatcherism (the unemployment crises for one) were highlighted through a real but unrelated incident. I think the central problem here is that the Royal Family of the show are still very much alive and attributing these traits to them may not be undisputed, consequently, as opposed to talking about a by-gone era where media didn’t have much influence either.

As to do with the show’s selection of incidents to portray, I don’t know if I can fully agree on the argument that the show missed out on a few major events. Again, I find myself searching for the exact words to explain my stance thoroughly so once more allow me to cite the words of one redditor who aced my job for me. @sharedimagination on Reddit:

“The show is more about interpreting and recreating the events that shaped the monarchy- the Crown as an entity, not people…. The events [you reference] were moments that didn’t impact on the ultimate trajectory of the Crown and the Queen’s reign. We see so much of Charles and Diana because their marriage and ultimate divorce changed the face of the monarchy and how it operates forever.”

Pretty self-explanatory ain’t it? That being said, some events of the show also acted as a backdrop to explain the conditions in Britain during a certain period and well, they made sense too. A common argument I had noticed being brought up was them not showing more of Princess Diana’s wedding. I for one, never found that to be a problem because the events leading up to it were evidence enough to show the precarious condition she had been roped into and the ceremony in itself wouldn’t have added much to that. In contrast, Princess Margaret’s wedding scenes, for instance, were insinuative and descriptive of her circumstances.

Writing:

      The writing…oh my God. That’s all there is to say. The writing is appropriate and not over-done, smart and rather iconic at times. Bless whoever came up with John. F Kennedy’s slandering of honorifics in Season 2, Episode 8, Dear Mrs. Kennedy. Be it the witty remarks between Philip and the Queen (the discussion regarding her new haircut in Season 2, Episode 5, Marionettes, the burn regarding the ballerina in Season 4, Episode 9, Avalanche, to name few), the heart-wrenching monologues from the characters ( “the only person I have ever loved is you…” from Season 1, Episode 9, Assassins, “you have a father…” from Season 4, Episode 1, Gold Stick), the wise insights of theirs (“…alongside the dull, dutiful, reliable, heroic strain runs another…” from Season 3, Episode 2, Margaretology) or even the audacious comments of Charles’ about/to Diana, each seemed to have been written with much thought and ingenuity. One of the maybe two instances where the dialogues seemed to me a bit unhinged were the last words from the Queen to Churchill. Her going on about him being the roof over her head, the spine in her back, and the iron in her heart came off a tad extra and maybe even pretentious. He was a support to her in the genesis of her reign and a great help to her and the country he served, but the dialogue was far too flowery. It’s still a great achievement, nevertheless, that this show has a such paucity of bad writing. The repeat of certain lines in the show to draw parallels between two characters never failed to hit either.

Each of the major characters represented their own ways of looking at the world and the monarchy. Eventually, you’d find yourself siding with a character and their own thought-out morals. Being a lover of regularity and rationalism, I found my compass leaning toward Queen Elizabeth throughout most the series. Her inner monologue comparing herself to her far more ‘edgy’ and fun sister, and at another time to the bewitching beauty of Mrs. Kennedy and her finally embracing her dutiful and mundane self as one that was needed to sustain the monarchy, gave the character much authenticity and depth. It was also fascinating to see the narrative switch to Princess Diana in the later season in a very fluid way. The story sort of panned out from the Queen and other family members to the Princess who now has an intimate and personal front where each of her feelings and actions are validated or analyzed as opposed to the Queen herself who is now presented from a third person’s point-of-view where some of her reactions may come off a bit callous or disregarding as attestation to the same.  

Acting:

I’ve come upon a staunch consensus that British television has some of the most brilliant actors to grace the big screens. Both Olivia Colman and Claire Foy nailed the impression of the Queen. Olivia Colman also struck a continuity within the cast change by not only doing the former but also by capturing the nuances in Claire’s acting as well. Speaking of Claire Foy, her take on the lovesick Queen Elizabeth was heart-wrenching. I couldn’t help but feel smitten, and at the same time, admire her acting chops in the scene where she was showing the family videos of the Duke of Edinburgh’s voyage. Adding to the romance of the series, another raw and well-acted out sequence was with Charles and Diana, where they began to fall in love just before Charles’ ego got the best of him. You almost start to believe they could make it. Ahh if only! Jason Watkins did a great job at portraying his real-life counterpart, Harold Wilson. The fact was made apparent to me only after watching one of the Prime Minister’s own interviews. The intonation and the manner of speaking were uncannily similar. There were several other actors who did well regardless of their screen-time. Several of them I’ve seen continue to ace their roles in other dramas/ movies too, supporting my conviction in the beginning. Among the actors who were praised for their rendition, but I believe fell short of the task were, Gillian Anderson and Josh O’Conner. There was something uncharacteristically amateur about Gillian Anderson’s acting in particular. Forgive me, it felt very disingenuous and had weirdly no semblance with the real Margaret Thatcher. It was forced and yet off-the-mark at the same time.

Recasting in a series is usually tricky and most often faulty. The Crown arguably had one of the most tolerable recasts in TV history. While it did take some time warming up to the entirety of the new cast, they did a pretty good job with most of the actors. I am, however, apprehensive of the newer cast for the upcoming seasons. There’s something about Umbridge *winces* playing the Queen that just rubs me the wrong way. I am prepared to be swayed though, if that be the case.

Music:

The music was simply *chef’s kiss* Much appreciation to the sound department for choosing fitting pieces which were also relevant to the time period. This is surely one of the few shows with the best music choices. To revisit my favorites selections: Inglan is a Bitch from Season 4, Episode 8; Uptown Girl from Season 4, Episode 9; Carlo from Season 3, Episode 6; Beggin’ from Season 3, Episode 8; Can’t Take My Eyes Off of You (wasn’t this just absolutely adorable?) from Season 4, Episode 6; Starman (posh bougie) from Season 3, Episode 9… The soundtrack for the whole production was euphonious.

After all that’s been said, there are countless more moments where the show moves you. Countless more where the team’s work truly stands out not only amongst partnering Netflix shows but also in the genre. It truly leaves one at the edge of their seats musing about what’s next. I would say let’s wait and see how the story plays out but oh… how ironic! I had said that The Crown was a successful attempt at historical fiction? I gladly rest my case.

My rating: 9/10.

Feel free to share your opinions and views down below.