#Ultimate Halloween Destination

[theadventurebuddies]

Unlocking the Secrets of Knott’s Scary Farm This #Halloween!

Ready for an unforgettable Halloween adventure? Join us as we explore the enchanting world of Knott’s Scary Farm this Halloween season.

View: https://youtube.com/shorts/sM1DZnY9csg

#knottsscaryfarm #HalloweenAdventure #SpineChillingFun #UltimateHalloween #HauntedSurprises #HalloweenEnthusiasts #SpookyMazes #HalloweenEntertainment #HalloweenMagic #KnottsScaryExperience

[happilychee]

sabertooth headcanons pt. 1

I feel like mashima could've made sabertooth just a smidge less flat... they all had so much angst in them and the potential to evolve and grow as people... or they could all turn nice in the span of an episode. that works too.

♡ sting is a sweetheart. he's a genuine, caring, and kind boy who grows up to be a charming and earnest young man. that is, unless he's on the battlefield. old sabertooth sting makes an appearance in those moments. his smirk is cruel, his taunts are like daggers, jabbing away at the opponent. he's cocky and arrogant, and maybe he has the right to be so because his attacks are so powerful they blow the enemy away.

♡ lector is the kind of friend who talks major shit about whatever you're doing as he's helping you. he tells sting how dumb it is to go on a mission alone in mid-flight to their destination. ride or die? nah, lector is fly or die.

♡ rufus loves tea brewing. this is one of the few areas of knowledge that he chooses not to use his magic on. he loves sitting down with a good book and reading about the history of tea, tea cultivation, the proper culinary techniques to brew the perfect cup of tea.

♡ orga is the reason sabertooth has open-mic nights. the (second) strongest guild in fiore turns into a comedy club on tuesday nights, and surprisingly, it's good. orga serenades whoever comes to mind that night: it's been sting, rogue, yukino, all the usual suspects, and on one memorable occasion, mr. yajima. yukino tells the most wholesome, funny stories while frosch and lector act out the scene behind her. in what was probably the most fever dream moment of sting's life, minerva took the mic and delivered such a seething, deadpan stand-up that she got the entire guild cheering for her.

♡ minerva goes all out for halloween. besides just being into arcane magic and the history of magic, she loves spooky things. also, she's a bit fucked up, and this is a good outlet for her. sabertooth will gladly take minerva's scarily detailed sculptures of severed limbs over her lashing out any day of the week. to her guildmates' surprise, she also organizes a family-friendly haunted house in the guild hall for the kids of gazania.

♡ in my heart of hearts, sting does not become sabertooth's guild master. I headcanon him as a healer, so I think he would establish an infirmary in sabertooth and oversee it. unsure if rogue or minerva becomes guild master. I think minerva would be better suited for the role, but there's also recency bias against her because of jiemma. and she needs time to process everything that went into sabertooth's upheaval.

♡ which sabertooth member do you never want to piss off? you might think it's minerva or rufus or even the twin dragons. no. it's yukino. she is the sweetest, kindest member of sabertooth by far, and also the most patient. if you offend yukino, she's unlikely to do much about it, but celestials forbid you hurt her friends, especially minerva. she'll send her spirits after you, and no one will ever find your body.

♡ sabertooth, despite their efforts to become a kinder place, is still a hard guild to get into. they're not like fairy tail where anyone can just join. the core members argue for a long while about what kind of entrance test they should have. ultimately they decide on a test of strength, but not just physical ability. minerva says that it's in the eyes, whether someone has the drive and tenacity to always improve themselves and make sabertooth proud. she tries to be subtle, but she's also staring at yukino the entire time. one eyebrow wiggle from lector turns minerva as red as the cat's fur.

[meat-wentz]

hi mx meat ^_^ do u have any horror movie recs for someone who’s trying to get into the genre? classics and such?

omg yes yes yes!!!!

slashers: halloween (1978), a nightmare on elm street (1984), the texas chainsaw massacre (1974), scream (the ultimate slasher, i would watch this after watching the first three listed here), black christmas (1974), you’re next, and a couple of 00’s slasher remakes i think everyone should watch at some point for being total encapsulations of how mean the 00’s were: house of wax (2005) and sorority row (2009)

zombies: night of the living dead (1968), dawn of the dead (1978), day of the dead (1985), 28 days later, train to busan, shaun of the dead, return of the living dead

paranormal: the shining (1981), poltergeist (1982), the changeling (1980), the innocents (1961), crimson peak, the devil’s backbone, ju-on, ringu, pulse (2001), talk to me, candyman (1992)

vampires: the lost boys, interview with a vampire (1994), near dark, fright night (1985), dracula (1931), bram stoker’s dracula (1992), buffy the vampire slayer (1992), the hunger, let the right one in

dark magic/possession/devils and demons: jennifer’s body, rosemary’s baby, the exorcist, the witch, the craft, the omen (1976), evil dead (1981), evil dead 2, suspiria (1977)

creatures: ginger snaps, the thing (1982), alien, aliens, american werewolf in london, the mist, the faculty, the fly (1986), invasion of the body snatchers (1978), it (2017), the babadook, jaws

other: teeth, donnie darko, american psycho, get out, the rocky horror picture show, the phantom of the paradise, carrie (1976), videodrome, may, it follows, hereditary, saw, hellraiser (1987), child’s play (1988), final destination (2000), psycho (1960)

here’s a lil smattering of what the genre has to offer!! i tried to give you some range in eras and subgenres and mood while also maintaining a pretty classic intro list to horror! i hope you enjoy a few of these and if you like one, the best thing about horror is there’s literally 100+ more movies just like it out there, so if you ever need a more niche curated list once you’ve found out what you like just hmu again and i gotchu!!!!! <33333

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Just watched Late Night with the Devil! It's a really fun, fantastic, and creative horror film...until it isn't! David Dastmalchian is fantastic throughout, giving a career highlight in his lead role, and at least two thirds of the movie really make the most out of the conceit that this is a found footage situation. But there are quite a few bits in the last act that stretch believability to the limit and kind of lose the plot. Sure, they look cool and there's some really great practical effects, but it kind of misses the mark a little bit. The ultimate conclusion of the story is good and the last act isn't awful, but it does toss away a lot of the stuff that made this movie so unique in the first place. I think this is destined to be a cult classic, but it's never going to really be a bonafide classic alongside Evil Dead or Halloween. A really good horror film, maybe just shy of greatness. Oh, and they really shouldn't have used those AI generated intermission cards, because it was obnoxiously blatant and really took me out of it whenever one popped up.

[grigori77]

Critical Role, Campaign 3 Episode 76

Wow ... just wow ...

This is a good one, actually. Love LOTR, so yeah, this is great fun.

Ah yes ... Marisha is clearly NOT in the mood for his shit this week. Oh, the water spray! Yeah ... that's right ... typical Sam ... oof, this is a BAD skit ...

Laura and Ashley failing spectacular to live up to their respective character's classic accents is quite charming actually ... oh wow, has Pate FINALLY got his own t-shirt? Sweet ...

Sam: "I am Gimli, son of ... what was it?" Oh gods ...

New intro? Really? Oh shit ...

Fuck me ... I am SHOOK ... I dunno what I liked more, the lashings of Imodna or the way Fearne has such a cute and innocent smile on her face while wreaking bloody havoc ...

Matt's already having trouble with the beard. Wonderful ... Happy Halloween indeed ... XD

Aaaaaaaaagh no ... NOW he makes them roll ...

Oh, he rolled a 100? Oh ... shit no ... not a 5 ... SAMUEL FUCKING RIEGEL!!!

Ow! OW OW OW OW OW!!!

66? Please ... Taliesin: "Whose foot is coming out of my arm?"

Yeesh ... that was hairy ... but HELLO!!! Hi there, Sun Tree! Nice ...

Ooh, a greeting. Sweet ...

Marisha freaking out about hearing the Chetney voice coming from Travis dressed like Aragorn, son of Arathorn is so on point for how this session is destined to go ...

Oh man ... Laudna having traumatic flashbacks walking through Whitestone ... ouch ...

They're geeking out about being back in familiar surroundings ... ah yes, Percy's workshop. :3 Sweet ...

Tinkering? Oh, okay ... hey! Verna and Joe ... and Dancer! Yay! And Pussy 2 ... XD

Percy! Yay again! And he's just as crotchety as ever ...

Ah, so Percy and Dancer are NOT getting along, apparently ...

Whoa ... you are KIDDING ME ... NO ... NO ... IT IS NOT ... yes, it is, Allura! Sweet! All we need now is Kima showing up too and the full set is COMPLETE ...

So he has MORE of these simulacrum things. Cool ... but also not. Yeah ... crap ...

Allura knows Ludinus? Great ... but yeah, she thinks he's a douche too. Par for the course ...

The Harness is now largely RETROFITTED? Whoa ... sounds quite sleek and sexy, in fact ...

Way to go, Allura ... nice work there, clearly ...

A power still? Interesting ... the Quintessence Array? Even more so ... yeah, I figured this had the potential to be something NASTY ... yeah, good plan ... oh for ... CHETNEY!!!

The main course? Oh ... okay then ...

2 points of Fire damage AGAIN ... and a little inconvenience for Percy, too ... XD

Oh gods ... the hat ...

Children ... they're all still children ... EVERY TIME he mentions Pussy 2 ...

Allura: "This is extremely intense and extremely dangerous." FCG: "Like Chetney?" Travis (flipping his wig): "Oh baby ..."

Ashton (to Percy): "Adults are talking. Shush now." LOL

Oh, so Orym knows Allura already? Well it does make sense, of course ...

Whoa ... that was it? Oh boy ... IT'S ALIVE!!! O.O

SOMEONE ... to try it? Really?

The Vial of Cleansing Flame? Really? You're gonna start with THAT?!!!

Chet has 69 hit points ... OF COURSE he does ...

So we're really doing this ... okay then ...

Percy really is getting the short end of the stick in this at every turn and I love it ... XD

Enchanted Dishwear ... that cleans itself? Wow ... that is spectacularly crap ...

It's actually working ... oh boy ... five temporary hit points? And ... WHAT does it do Travis?

Holy fuck that us pretty choice actually ... also a little scary ...

Sam's flask ... oh my gods ... the ultimate ...

Table of Smart People ... yes, very true, Ashton ... ask the experts ...

Let's NOT Rend Ashton into a thousand pieces ... YES!!! Give it to Fearne!

Are they suggesting that Ashton and Fearne ... mate?

Allura's really gonna try going into Ashton's head? Seriously?

Aaaaaaah ... this is getting trippy ...

Dunamancy? Oh, here we go ...

Oh boy ... more Ashton backstory lore dumping! Yay! I love this stuff ...

The Luxon? Hmmmm ...

Oh shit ... the Malleus Key ... oooooh fuck ... wow, this is some heavy shit ... he DREAMS ABOUT this shit? O.O

:3 Laura mimicking the Merry waddle as she comes back to the table is adorable ...

Oooh ... is that a Mighty Nein namedrop there?

Ashton: "Wanna put a weird fire emperor in you?" Fearne: "Well, I mean it wouldn't be the first time." XD

Marisha: "Shirtcocking through Whitestone ..."

Long suffering Percival De Rolo ... XD

Laudna uses Pate to do some magical eavesdropping ... hmmm ...

A heart-to-heart with Dancer? Oh this'll be interesting, and likely really tough too ...

Wow ... this is really refreshing ... this is GROWTH ... awwwww ... yeah, we really needed this ... FCG definitely needed this ...

Ooh, some fresh info on D? Yeah, that would be helpful ... a mask? Hmmmm ... I wonder what Matt's setting up with THAT little detail ...

A hug? Really? Awwwwww ... awkward, but sweet ... :3

So Pate's listening in on Percy and Allura ... here we go ...

It's true, WE ARE currently being invaded by aliens ...

Crap, he's been discovered! Oh boy ... that is hilariously embarrassing ... he's doing the Worm? Yeah, I can imagine it's a bit disturbing ...

Oh, I love that little undead rat thing ...

Ah, food? Nice ... meanwhile the LOTR quotes continue apace ... XD

Orym is a very pretty bride, apparently ...

Discussing the particulars of the Harness ...

Large antlers? Oh! Hey! It's Keyleth! Yay!

Ah yes! The War Room! It's been a while ...

Paintings? Oh wow ... the adventures of Vox Machina! Sweet ...

Whoa ... Keyleth's MUM?!!! So cool ...

Time for a break, then ... yes, then we can concentrate on the really COOL stuff ...

Okay, here we go ...

Ah, so, the bigger picture is revealed ... hmmmm ...

The Reilora have special and specific powers against Divine magic ... ooooh ... interesting ...

Whoa, so the ongoing thing with Ruidus is making things continuously WORSE for all of magic in Exandria? Shit ... that's even worse ...

Imogen's dreams, yeah ...

Good girl, Imogen, you go ahead and mess with him telepathically ... XD

Yes. She IS very capable ...

Travis actually rolls to see if Chetney just drops dead right now ... apparently it's LOW ... oh boy ... Travis: "I'm flirting with it ..."

They are still kind of the Bumbling Fucks, but now they're becoming more powerful and important Bumbling Fucks ...

Marisha + that wig = Tilda Swinton ... fuck, once you see it, you really can't unsee it, can you?

This is what makes a bunch of heroes, right here ...

Matt: "We are not rolling for pregnancy."

Oh yeah, Caleb and Beau ... what HAS happened to them?

No teleportation to the moon ... yeah, probably not a smart move ...

Keyleth sends her mum to rally the troops and everybody grins as they quietly geek out ...

Insight check on Legendary Weapons? LOL

Oddly specific scrounging for treasure from FCG ... Percy: "Why does that sound so familiar?"

Bells Hells giving Keyleth such adorable nostalgia ...

Matt's beard is becoming comedy gold, it really is ... XD

A moment for Orym and the Voice ... :3

Keyleth advising Orym to keep an eye on Imogen due to her mother ... Keyleth: "Family ties can be ... confusing." Hmmmm ...

Does FCG know about devils? Religion check? Oh boy ...

Going on a tour of Whitestone? Hmmm ... what, go call oh Whitestone Andy? Throw some rocks at him? He was a big douche to her ...

Oh yeah, Vex was pretty fond of them all in the end, wasn't she?

They're being watched? I think I already know who this is ... Orym goes looking ... yeah, it is her, isn't it? Hello there cuteness ...

I love Gwen so much, she's such a sweetheart ...

She thinks Chetney's 4,000 years old? Awwww ... :3

Laudna introduces Gwen to Pate ... oh gods ...

Pate: "I'm very friendly ... in the presence of children." Oh gods indeed ...

Now she's showing her the Hound ... and she loves it ... ye gods even more ...

Fucking hell Ashley, how do you get 32 on an Insight check? Damn right she gets Whispers ...

Oh, she sensed something when she touched Laudna? Hmmmmm ...

Imogen, Laudna and Fearne follow her up into a room ... and now they're playing a game to try and coax her out? A group Persuasion Check? Hmmmm ...

Well this might still work ... just be honest with her ... and Laudna does just that ... then leaves? Oh ... that's really sad ...

A hatred? Oh man ... was that fucking Delilah? Damn it, it was ... bollocks ...

Planning a little Witchy Adventure after dark? Okay then ...

Ashton is wandering about with the other boys ... what, Changebringer's temple? Hmmm ...

Splitting up, now off to the Matron of Ravens' Temple ... nice secluded spot for it, definitely ... here we go ... a graveyard? Interesting ...

Oh, the Dawnfather? Interesting ... more modest and homely, at least ... here we are, Altar of the Raven ...

A statue of Vax? Oh wow ... that is awesome ...

Looking for an entrance ... oh, that was surprisingly easy ... and now it is PITCH BLACK ... hmmmm ... going downwards ...

Scrawny hairless ancient dwarf? How the hell does THAT work?

Othinon? Okay then ...

Five stone sarcophagi ... right ... so they're more symbolic, then?

Oh gods Ashton what are you doing? Dear fucking gods do not open that ... oh, very good joke there, Ashton ... but seriously, what the fuck is he doing?

And now he is SEALED INTO THE SARCOPHAGUS ... now Othinon is directing them to go into the others? Hmmmm ... Chetney and Orym and SHARING one ...

Nothing's happening so far ...

Oh shit, are they starting to trip out? Yeah, here we go ... it's very subtle but it's happening ...

Each having their own separate but similar experience, it would seem ... or ARE THEY sharing communication after all? Seems to be both ...

Oh okay ... hello there, Raven Queen ...

Now they're floating in a black shapeless void ... the Matron looking down upon them ... oh, so Ashton's going to try climbing out using one of the chains ... and it works? Now they're ALL doing it ...

The chains break? Now they're falling and she just explodes into a mass of ravens ...

Wait ... so what, was that actually some kind of blessing? Weird ...

That was quite the trip ... for all of TWO MINUTES ...

Meanwhile FCG has gone to the Horizon Temple ... oh, hello Osli! Nice to see a familiar face ...

Oh fuck ... Letters saying if something IS going to go bad he asks the Changebringer to maybe make it happen just to HIM and not to his friends ... come on, FCG ... don't destroy us emotionally like that ...

FCG really does have a very healthy relationship with his goddess, all things considered ...

So business has been particularly brisk at the temple lately ... par for the course, really ...

Sam: "Thank you, Cat Stevens." Matt: "It's the least I could do, ZZ Top."

Reconvening at the crepe stand ...

Holy shit, the guy there IS Whitestone Andy? Motherfucker ... Laudna is being magnanimous in her anonymity ...

Meanwhile Imogen is just subtly messing with him ...

Fuck, did FCG REALLY just Banish Andy? XD

Oh, NOW he finally remembers ... oh, maybe it's NOT him? Gods, I'm so confused ...

Closure ... nice ...

Back to the castle, time for rest and turning in ... Nice place go finally get some overdue PROPER rest. Reflecting on what's to be done, and what's to come ...

They almost don't let him, but Matt calls it a night after all ...

So that's that for the night ... and Happy Halloween ...

[pghbabesonbikes]

FBX

by Sara Khalil

Alleycats are a fun, low-pressure way to race. That’s why I always try and get people to do them, ha. First, you’ll receive checkpoints & a spokecard. Next, you’ll make a plan to bike to one, many, or all of the checkpoints. Lastly, you’ll follow the spectacular race directors instructions to complete the alleycat and bonus, you’ll feel like a million bucks. You’ll leave the race day with your delicately positioned spokecard in your front wheel for years to come, a small yet important token proving you kick ass. 

Every alleycat is organized a little bit differently. Sometimes the checkpoints are literally an address which is definitely a win for the navigation nerds. Other times they’re mediocre riddles or even just a spot on a map (that’s not even drawn to scale 🙃). It’s likely you’ll find all the things you need at them, like rad people to keep you motivated, snacks/drinks, cheerful signs, a much needed floor pump, among other things…

The strategy for attacking an alleycat can also really vary. Buddy up with people, you can do it in a group! If you’re worried about navigating or simply just want to have fun then rely on everyone’s brain for navigation (at your own risk!) and see where you place! More competitive? Wanna see if you have the street cred to really do the thing?? Try and rely on your own navigation to get you through it, whether that is google maps or your experience driving Uber. Honestly, sometimes I just follow the tire tracks and hope for the best… 

I work for a local bike share company that hosts 2 alley-cat-style rides each year. I call these alley-cat-style because they aren't races, but more multi-destination rides that are designed to get folks of all comfort levels out for fun, social, urban rides. Even though these rides lack the big race mentality, these rides are really fun for riders of all levels, and ultimately, you can bring whatever energy you want! Bike or Treat is our Halloween alleycat that takes place the Saturday before Halloween every year (a fun scavenger hunt race), and Le Tour De Donut is our April alleycat with 4 checkpoints each stocked up with donuts from local bakeries and coffee.

We don't have registration up yet for Le Tour, but folks can see all of our upcoming events here: https://pogoh.com/events/ 

My favorite kind of alleycat is the “go fast get there first” classic style - the Frigid Bitch way!

Every year I plan to do it solo, and if someone tries to tag on I always let them know there’s a non zero chance I might ditch them because I’m in it to win it. When the checkpoints drop, I usually bust out a paper BikePGH map to get a feel for where the checkpoints are across the city, highlighting potential routes between each. I’m confident in my ability to navigate most neighborways and bike lanes. I never use technology to navigate because it kinda takes forever to be honest! If I’m gonna skip a few, it’s usually the ones that are on hills, because I’m a slow-ish climber. I have a side plan that if I make it to a certain point by a certain time, then I’ll go for them!

The plan, roughly

This year when the checkpoints dropped, I was kicking myself because I knew almost all the checkpoints from doing the training rides, but I missed the training ride that hit Climax St! Of course it was a stop for FBX. And the south side slopes are kind of my kryptonite - I almost never climb them. This meant I really had no idea how much time Climax st was going to add to my route. I decided to nix Climax and Rialto from my gameplan for the day. I didn’t think I would have time to make them. 

Jo at the lake

My first stop was the lake. From there, I promptly guided my pal to a staircase that no longer existed, then to what I believed to be the checkpoint, but what was really the weird statue/shrine in South Oakland. Once we finally found Romeo St, it was a real vibe - we ditched our bikes and ran up the stairs to someone holding a sign that said “You’re a bitch!” which warmed my soul and spotted a friend Jarrod taking photos. We quickly said hi and bye before heading down the new-to-us, fully functioning staircase that connects to Bates and swiftly hiked our bikes down it. We crossed Hot Metal Bridge to hit OTB as fast as possible. Our plan was Grandview next, but somewhere along the way my bud egged me on to try Climax and we split. Turns out, it wasn’t a bad climb (the memory is distant now, ha) ANDDD Venture Outdoors had a s’mores stop at the top. Score. 

Photo by Murphy Moschetta 

I like to move quickly, so I bombed back down to south side and made my way over to climb back up PJ McCardle. I noticed my front tire was going flat when I got to the overlook and a volunteer, Bobby, helped me pump it up. Thankfully it didn’t give me any trouble for the rest of the race. I continued on, at this point feeling a little beat from climbing up two big hills. I was solo. I hit the point and kept on rolling. Somewhere in the Strip I linked back up with Jo and she encouraged me, yet again, to go for it. I sped up to hit Rialto. The next few checkpoints are kind of a blur. I slid through Polish Hill before heading to the button to see my friend Erin, and roped my way down to the official checkpoint near the water. 

Last up, I rushed up to hit the last stop, Bananna-lenaville. I felt an emotional burst because the volunteers were counting down “10… 9… 8…” as I rolled up. I found out later, they did that for a lot of folks… good call team Bananna-lenaville! I started off to the Wheel Mill in hopes I’d get there quick! I ditched my bike on the sidewalk, ran up the stairs, and politely threw my manifest at the volunteer. FBX was in the books. I took a look around to see who was back (though it’s impossible to tell how you did) and started swapping stories. A few popular questions were floating around - “How many checkpoints did you hit?” “Who did you ride with?” “Did you hit Rialto?” Everyone had a different day. 

Proof I did it

I finished in 25th place and got ALL the checkpoints. I was pretty stoked about how I finished, but even more excited to announce a little secret my friends and I were a part of - the brand new Pittsburgh Babes on Bikes Racing team! We’re a couple of badass babes who are introducing racing to more women and under repped gender identities, organizing group rides/clinics, and generally getting more folks to get out together to try more on two wheels. Our team aims to add more novice riders as time goes on. 

photo by Monica Garrison

If you’ve ever thought about racing mountain bikes, well, this is your year! We’re hosting a bunch of pre-rides out at Yellow Creek State Park  in anticipation of one of my favorite races, the YC Monthly Grassroots series. The first pre-ride is March 23rd and the race follows the next weekend. There are three routes available - beginners tackle 8 miles, sport riders hit a 16 mile out and back with a few creek crossings, and experts go after the full 23 mile loop which has some rocky bits. Pick your distance and come check it out with us in March! Frigid Bitch racers get a discount code for race registration. 

My most prized collection

I’m looking forward to another year of Frigid Bitch. Less than a month out, I’m full of excitement wondering if I’ll get any new friends or flats along the way. What will the weather be like? What bike will I ride? Am I even going to know where the fucking checkpoints are?? Anything can happen! But it’s nice to know it’s gonna be a surprise. 

[deadincel]

what if chad and mindy were ghostface ?

a ficlet on the twins discovering what they were destined to do taking place during VI! contains spoilers!

wc: 702

chad and mindy had promised themselves it would never come to this. they promised each other, sam and tara, their friends— the ones they swore to protect— that they would not let the event in woodsboro alter them. that they could still be normal after what happened to them.

it started slow. it started with gale weathers.

mindy had refused to purchase her book. she had seen the effects it had on sam. she had seen what weapons that words could be. chad had refused to buy it, he wouldn’t give gale weathers his money for her betrayal, but that didn’t make him any less curious.

his roommate had a copy; it was seemingly untouched. the papers were dusty. ghostface returns by gale fucking weathers.

he wanted to say that it didn’t irritate him. he was not victimized nor villainized. he had simply existed as part of the story— mindy as well. the meeks-martin twins, heroic in their tragedy, their tragedy…

for a while, the two couldn’t be without each other. they had sworn to protect one another, and they had ultimately succeeded. new york city wasn’t like woodsboro— they didn’t have to be afraid to die in their own spaces. it was easier to be afraid of the dark, of robbers, of creeps on the street, because they had been through worse. they had been through the worst thing anyone could imagine.

and they had promised it would all be okay.

and it was. they had begun to think that good things could happen. the city felt like home. school felt safe. their friends felt real.

chad and mindy, at times, did not feel real.

they realized it together, their special twin power, they communicated it through their heads, through their eyes, in their mannerisms, that something bad was going to happen, but they couldn’t figure out what.

chad found a mask in mindy’s dorm. a cracked, old mask of a monster, and he knew. the what became a vocation. he held it in his hands, turned it over, studied every dip in the plastic.

at first, he buried those feelings. he buried the mask back where mindy had hidden it. he had to remind himself that his sister just liked movies— stab was a franchise. she was a devoted fan of horror. it could’ve been a coping mechanism, but it could’ve also been something else.

the latter, scarily enough, seemed more plausible.

it wasn’t until he found a copy of ghostface returns on her shelf that it became entirely possible.

when he asked her about it, she didn’t flinch, she didn’t hesitate with her words. she spoke confidently and straight: i know you feel it too.

it. the calling. ghostface. it had sprouted into their dna, maybe from the bloodshed they’d witnessed, maybe from a second dormant factor that stemmed from their trauma.

chad didn’t fight back.

in fact, he took it all in.

it wasn’t hard to score a costume. stab was big. halloween was approaching.

nobody would suspect them.

as mindy put it to him while they draped themselves in black robes, i like to think of it as lighting. what are the chances of it happening to the same person twice?

what were the chances that the meeks-martin twins, survivors of brutality, down one uncle because of it, finding freedom in a new state, snapping?

high. unreasonably, disgustingly high.

but it had felt so fucking good to kill jason carvey.

it felt good to keep secrets, to share something special with his sister, to know they’d never be suspects if they hid well enough. mindy’s knowledge of horror films propelled them forward, kept up their status of prey.

but even in their spiral downward, they would not hurt those closest to them. they would keep tara and sam and anika and ethan and quinn away from the macabre. they would only defend them, and hurt those who crossed them.

chad liked to think of it as a blessing. they were protecting their loved ones. they were sacrificing their lives for them. they made sure that no harm would come in their way. and if that meant that they had to live in fear?

it was worth it.

[lemonadeandlanguages]

ULTIMATE TRAINS

for autumn asks

Trains - if you could spend the fall anywhere, where would you go?

Ooh idk if this counts, technically, because it's not a destination per se, but there's a train in Canada that goes from Toronto to Vancouver over four days, and the idea of getting to see all of the country in the fall with all the colourful leaves and cool weather sounds so cool!!

Ultimate - describe your best holiday experience.

I don't really celebrate any holidays in the fall 🤔 so my favourite experience wasn't directly related to a holiday, but I got to experience it because it was a statutory holiday and I got a day off work, so I guess that counts? Anyways, I used that free day to go to a bunch of local landmarks that I could never find anyone to go with and I spent a wonderful (and exhausting) day playing tourist in my own city, took some really great photos and I met a few nice people along the way :)

In terms of specific holiday stuff, I got to spend Halloween in Times Square when I was 13 so that was pretty cool I remember some of the stores nearby were handing out candy which was nice because I wasn't able to go trick or treating that year

Thanks for the ask! :)

Autumn asks

[ratnas]

Los Angeles Complete Travel Guide

LOS ANGELES FAMILY TRAVEL GUIDE

The second largest city of the US, Los Angeles has its own unmatched magnetism. In my growing up years, I recall Los Angeles as the venue of the Olympics. And then subsequently over the years, this most prominent metropolis in California, as the glamorous hub of Hollywood. Beverly hills where stars own palatial houses. And of course Disneyland ! If you’re a Disney fan, and are traveling with your family surely you couldn’t possibly return without a trip to Disneyland in Anaheim. 

Best Los Angeles Getaway With Family

As LA is huge, with Anaheim being a city in itself, plan your itinerary in such a way that you first visit the parks. There are two Disney parks  near Los Angeles in Anaheim, 26 miles away. It is highly recommended, to first spend 2-3 days here. Stay in one of the hotels just walking distance from the parks and then move to main  LA for the remaining part of your trip. 

HOLLYWOOD, LOS ANGELES 

Staying in a centrally located hotel in West Beverly Hills, Hollywood, at the doorstep of the Walk of Fame boulevard has its advantages. Just as you step out, you’ll find yourself on the legendary Walk of Fame boulevard, having the longest list of stars, celebrities and performers. 

It’s a pleasure to stroll here. The views of the tree lined street, the blue skies above and brightly colored buildings is picture perfect in the day and transforms into a wonderland in the night when the fluorescent lights are lit. 

It was Halloween during that time, and if you too happen to visitng in this month, then look forward to being fully entertained by all sorts of the weirdest and scariest dressed passerby’s. 

 There are a plethora of museums on the boulevard that can be visited depending upon your interest and time. These include  the Guinness World record museum, World of Illusions and the Hollywood Wax museum to name a few, that are great for families. Also plenty of cultural activities happen – live theatre, art galleries, film complexes and music concerts. 

BEVERLY HILLS 

Beverly Hills has been the setting of innumerable films, and  to be actually present there was like a dream come true. And above all, the most magical moment was to watch the shooting of a movie starring Brad Pitt on the streets of West Hollywood. This sort of completed our trip and was the ultimate experience. 

If you’re a tourist visiting Los Angeles for the first time, it’s worthwhile to take a chartered tour to the famous Beverly Hills. There are multiple types of private trips with a live commentary at hand including half day, full day or few hours. The three hour tour included Beverly Hills, residence of celebrities and film stars, and finishes off at Rodeo drive . This is actually quite sufficient, as you can do it at your own pace rather than a hurried, longer trip,  in which a lot is squeezed in.  

One advice here,  before the tour begins make sure to eat something and be refreshed as there are no stoppages in between, specially if you have younger children accompanying you. 

https://travelsimplygo.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/LA8.jpg

The tour halts at vantage points from where the iconic Hollywood sign is visible on the hill-side. Sunset Point and Bronson Avenue give a clear view, and are ideal spots for photos. 

You’ve seen them in movies, now see where your favorite stars live, hang around for a while, listening to interesting stories narrated by your guide, gazing at their posh, sprawling homes/ mansions !! 

Afterward, the tour continues onto the upmarket Rodeo drive, with its high class stores of luxury brands. Here again there are no halts and is the final destination, where you are dropped off. 

Griffith Observatory – There is more to the Griffith Observatory than the exteriors and stunning views of the city from its elevated position. A planetarium inside and a number of ticketed shows too draw tourists. 

 FAMOUS BEACHES 

Santa Monica beach – the pier at Santa Monica is worth visiting. It’s a picturesque point on the Pacific Ocean, having  loads of activities, a children’s park, or street performers vying for attention and tips. 

The other prominent beach of LA is Venice, spectator sports like basketball, baseball, football, soccer etc are played in abundance  on these beaches. 

The `city of angels’, looks spectacular after dark when it’s lit up and truly comes alive. The best way to enjoy that is to drive through the streets around the Hollywood area, where traffic congestions are less. Admire the high-rises or the  wonderful houses in the residential neighborhood!  

If you wish to have more adventure and unlimited fun, then there is Universal Studios, Hollywood. Apart from the plethora of thrilling rides and sci-fi shows,  of particular interest here are the movie shooting sites, and complete tours of how special effects are created in films.  

Though Los Angeles is fringed by the Pacific Ocean, and has nice beaches, the weather is not typical beach type. It can be classified as a Mediterranean climate – characterized by  dry summers and wet winters. My own experience of the weather in October – sunny and warm during the day and evenings becoming mildly cold as temperatures go down. Going by the diverse activities offered here, travelers can pack accordingly.

[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

Just shower thoughts... For a long time I've been confused about why Meyer wrote the Jacob/Renesmee imprint. Most of the weird shit that happens in Twilight I can justify as leaning into the monsterfucker/Phantom of the Opera angle or worldbuilding fails. But the baby soulmate thing?? But And Then There Were None kickstarted a wire in my head that transmigrated me into Stephenie Meyer's head during my shower.

I'm Meyer writing New Moon. I want to set the groundwork to break the love triangle in Edward's favor. I need Jacob out of the way, preferably dating someone else. But I don't want Jacob to seem like he loved Bella less, or like the kind of guy who would treat a woman like she's his second choice. Solution? I apply my weird concept of true love to the problem. Bang, imprinting. He loved Bella as much as he could but was destined for someone else! For now, Jacob is un-imprinted for now since I want the love triangle to be central to the Eclipse plot.

However, writing Eclipse I get stuck. Jacob is Bella's best friend. If he imprints on someone else, it means that he can't go with Bella on her immortal voyage of true love. She'll be sad. Unacceptable. Ok, I say. Jacob imprints on a vampire. Then he and Bella can stay friends, forever, as the new vampire (RenesmeeLite) will prove vampires can be good people.

BUT I still have a problem. What if some Jacob/Bella fans don't buy the new ship after all the drama in Eclipse? What if they (rightly) argue imprinting is thralldom and hate it? What if they (god forbid) make postcanon Jacob/Bella fanfic where the imprint breaks and the old ship re-sails? I need to make it clear that a) Edward/Bella are in unbreakable true love and b) Jacob/Bella's connection was sincere but ultimately platonic.

For a) marriage and sex are pretty big commitments. Escalate. The biggest commitment? A baby. Half-vampire baby can never die and thus never be forgotten. Renesmee will complete my Edward/Bella endgame. For b) ... I realize... I've written RenesmeeLite. Renesmee solves the Jacob/Bella friendship problem as now not only does Jacob have to like vampires, he has an excuse to join the Cullens and officially follow Bella around for the rest of her life! Also, Jacob's relationship with Bella is retconned to imply that his great love for her was only due to her similarity to his true soulmate/the call of fate. The Cullens and wolves complete the alliance arc begun in Eclipse, which they will no doubt use to someday take down the terrible Volturi and potentially become vampire royalty themselves. Ignoring the implications of that, it's a good day to be Bella. As for now, I edit Eclipse to add foreshadowing to Jacob's destiny... sorry Claire and Quil, you'll have to be sacrifices.

What do you think? Do you buy it?

And Then There Were None a Halloween Twilight special by myself and @therealvinelle that readers caught us out on while we were still anonymous.

It's a delightful theory the trouble is that's not really what we do here on this blog. This is a blog to divest ourselves of authorial intent or to try and peer into the mind of Meyer and ask "why?" For one thing, it keeps the blog consistent, for another I genuinely have no idea.

Meyer is utterly incomprehensible to me. Not only are we different people but... I mean, look at Edward. Look, there's your normal Phantom of the Opera bad boy tragic love interest type, and then there's Edward and the shit he says. And it's unironic, we're supposed to genuinely like him, she thinks he's a dream boat as he says, "I'll eat your babies."

How does one even comprehend such a person?

In this case though I'll go on a limb and say that given Meyer having doubled down on imprinting in the first place as well as Edward...

I think it was the plan to start with and perhaps even the reason imprinting in the series exists at all.

We see way too much foreshadowing in New Moon with imprinting immediately brought up with Sam and Emily, it is already a significant plot point and one Jacob finds himself concerned about when he realizes he doesn't imprint on Bella.

Already we had Chekov's Gun: Jacob hasn't imprinted which means that it will always be a loose end until he does. At some point in the series he will imprint and it will not be on Bella.

And given all that build up to Jacob wanting it to be Bella so badly, as well as the Claire/Quil subplot, and everyone else imprinting...

I think it was always going to be Renesmee. He was always doomed to be tied into the family and for Meyer this was always the ideal dream solution like where you're playing dolls and all the dolls marry all the other dolls and now they're a big happy family and everyone's related.

Adding to this, the love triangle was one of those hilarious love triangles where you know who the author's going to pick immediately. Twilight, Bella dates Edward. New Moon, Bella's very sad over Edward and considers Jacob for 0.02 seconds before dumping him because Edward's back. Eclipse, Jacob asks Bella to dump Edward and she says no the entire novel then marries Edward. Breaking Dawn, Bella marries Edward.

Jacob was never made a competitive option for Bella and it was always clear, the entire time, I'm sorry guys but it was hilariously clear she was going to pick Edward. Always.

Which meant that while Jacob needed a clean exit from the love triangle I... also don't think he was in the love triangle for Meyer. Sort of, yes, but I honestly think that's the weird set up that Jacob later quotes in canon of "Oh, Bella, I was totally into you because I was going to imprint on your vampire baby in the future. This makes so much sense."

... Does it Jacob? Does it?

I think Renesmee and Renesmee/Jacob was always the plan and everything else was just set up to get there.

(Worth noting, though I don't know too much about it, is Forever Dawn which was the book Meyer pitched after Twilight to her publishers which is essentially the plot of Breaking Dawn with a few tweaks.

It should be taken with a bit of a grain of salt as it was never published and I'm personally dubious of whatever copies people say they have floating about or what concepts were leaked, but nevertheless we seem to have a lot of the same stuff.

Bella still gets pregnant and marries Edward. Jacob still imprints on Renesmee. The Volturi still show up as the big bad. Victoria is still a major player (though this time takes on the role of Irina the nark).

This, of course, points to Renesmee/Jacob always being the endgame rather than the solution Meyer happened upon for the love triangle problem.)

But at the end of the day, I'm guessing too, and the best I can really do is shrug and say who knows with that one.

[sunshinel3mon]

The Ultimate Destination for Your Halloween Costumes: HalloweenCostumes.com

Looking for a place that will transform your Halloween experience? If you’re tired of sifting through limited selections at local stores, HalloweenCostumes.com is your go-to destination. With over 10,000 costumes and 3,500 exclusives, this online retailer promises an inclusive, high-quality, and budget-friendly Halloween shopping experience. Let’s dive into why this platform might be your next…

[kayssweetdreams]

A Wonderous Christmas

Timeville loves a good holiday, whether it be the world's biggest Easter egg hunt, to The ultimate Halloween-fest, they always manage to have the biggest holiday spirit. However, the holiday that they seem to have the most excitement for, the time that everyone looks forward too, is that of Christmas.

The hustle and bustle in town as filled with many workers preparing various decorations to cover the town, or shoppers looking for that perfect gift to bring to their special someone. The smell of peppermint and Gingerbread filled the air while the falling of snow floated in tune with Christmas carols.

A postal truck could be seen zooming down the icy streets, rushing to its destination. "Coming through!! Light delivery!!" The postman shouted, avoiding the various people and piles of snow. Where is he going in such a hurry you may ask? Well, that would be to the Azure Isle, the location of the Bruno Household.

Sliding down the hills, the postman just BARELY made it to the mansion, to an awaiting Stefan Bruno. "Wow! 2 minutes early!" He joked before giving him a hand "You have no idea! These things are HEAVY!! Why do you need so many?" He asked. Stefan gave a chuckle "Well, the house isn't going to decorate itself." He said, pointing to the large property coated in snow, and half decorated with various lights.

Thea Bruno came out, a few more decoration boxes she was holding. "Stefan Dear? Could you please come grab these real quick?" She asked. Stefan immediately ran to help his wife. "Here we go dear, I'll handle the decorating on the roof. And speaking of which, Where is our daughter?" He asked.

Thea gave a knowing smile "You know where she is, she went with her friends to the mall." She said. "She wants to find the PERFECT present. Even though she doesn't know what exactly that is yet." She said. Stefan smirked, they both know that their daughter loved to shop. "Hey Thea, Look what we're standing under." He said, pointing up.

Thea saw that they were standing underneath someone mistletoe...and Stefan gave a flirty look. "Oh Come here you!" She said, pulling him closer as they shared their Christmas smooch.

Meanwhile, In Wonderworld...

While Timeville was filled with holiday induced enthusiam, Wonderworld was practically overflowing with the Christmas spirit. The theater was decked out in the most beautiful Christmas decorations you've ever seen, as the sound of a entire orchestra was heard blasting out full force, Christmas carols in Balanese.

The Tims could be seen hopping behind the positive Maestro, all of them now had a little Christmas accessory on, whether it be a little sprig of Holly, or Reindeer antlers, they all hopped behind their equally festive maestro.

Balan picked up a small white Tim with a black top hat, making it look like a snowman "Oh I just love the holidays! They bring me with so much cheer! And soon, Christmas will be here!" He cheered, booping the Tim on the nose. The Tim gave a happy chirp, before it hopped down with its siblings.

Balan smiled at the positivity emanating from the Tims, before he felt a somewhat neutral presence behind him "Oh Balan, You say that every year, how the holidays always fill you with cheer" Lance said, his own suit being more festive as well.

Balan just gave his normal large grin as he wrapped an arm around Lance "Oh Lance, Where's your Christmas spirit? The holidays are for everyone! There's no reason to fear it!" He boasted, the light seemingly getting brighter with Balan close to them. Lance just simply removed Balan's gloved hand from his shoulder "Balan, Every year it's the same. You throw your party, and go all out with no shame." He said.

Balan waggled his finger at Lance "Oh but you forget, we ditched the status quo! After all, the inhabitants and Wonder Stars are coming, my tentacled Foe!" He reminded. Lance rolled his eyes and was about to retort, when an Air Cat, who's fur resembled a white cat came out "Balan! The food for the party is almost done if you and Lance would like to sample them!" She said, holding up a tray with Gingerbread cookies, that resembled the Tims, Negati and costumes.

The scent of the cookies got to the both of the maestros noses, a smile gracing both of their faces "I could do with one or two, Lance? How about you?" Balan asked, only to see the dark Maestro already biting down on a Ghostlii shaped cookie "These are splendid! Truly well done! I suppose that I can have more than one?" He asked. Balan and the Air Cat laughed at Lance's love of Gingerbread "of course! Right this way!" She said, leading the two into kitchen to try more Christmas treats for their holiday soirée

Happy Holidays everyone! Here's a Christmas gift from me to you, A holiday tale true and true! Now the story is getting started, so join in! Grab a seat! This is one holiday story that can't be beat!

[foolishaetherguardian]

So I went to a weird highschool.

And I don’t mean like weird by normal standards. I mean I have had my college friends consistently refer to my school as a cartoon school.

And I didn’t believe them until I had to explain the yearly events my school had. We had the normal stuff, homecoming, prom, mole day, etc. But we also had some weird stuff. Like the yearly crosstown scavenger race that was held on halloween and that you could win two letter grades worth of bonus points to applied to whatever classes you asked for it in, you could spend them in 5′s. It’s a schoolwide event. So the upperclassmen had the advantage of being able to drive, everyone else had to get an approved guardian to drive them. Oh and to participate you had to dress up in a costume fitting that years theme. Teams could be up to 8 but tended to be two couples and the matchmade pair. The matchmade pair is whoever the two couples wanted to get together so it was a massive event where couples tried to set up their friends with each other. But every year there were a few junior and seniors that were made “dream teams”. Like the smartest, most athletic, and the person with the fastest car all would team up to win.

Well come sophomore year and I know I am going to fail Geometry if I don’t get the bonus. It’s only October but I’m already floundering. I’m a sophomore. My group is mostly sophomores, but we all wanted to win at least once. We decide we’ll win this year. The scoring was broken down into getting the right time, the right mileage (the route was a secret and encoded so this was almost impossible to get right), completing all the tasks, and school based trivia (Like which teachers dated when they were in highschool? Who wore mascot outfit in 1999?). Because time and mileage were so difficult to get right the trivia and tasks tended to decide the winners. We couldn’t win trivia without cheating or stealing a senior and making a “dream team”. We would never stoop so low. So we decided to go for the perfect score in the other three categories, which had only been done once before in the 30 years our school had done this for. I was the navigator, Cade was the timekeeper, Dax was in charge of backtracking miles we missed, Daniel was in charge of tasks, Clayton was there as a limiter (keeping us from undershooting the time and mileage by taking short cuts) and we recruited the most dangerous approved guardian we could, Cade’s mom. None of us were really well equipped for our roles. This was our gamble. If she drove slowly or too fast we’d lose on time. But we all wanted to win. But we practiced, distance estimation, guessing destinations based off of context, tracking miles by block, tailing the route designer to figure out how fast she drove. The announcement of the theme was made. And we show up dressed as the dalmations from 101 dalmations with Cade’s mom, unprompted, showing up as cruella deville. We were the only unisex sophomore team that year. The senior’s had two dream teams, the genius twin’s team and the drama team, both of which we had ties too. The genius twins were close friends of mine and the drama team was just all around great people. But it didn’t matter if I liked Ben and Abby as people and if the drama team all were the biggest scariest teddy bears I’ve ever met. We had come to win.

We were slow out the gate, getting a starting place of like 23rd out of 36 cars. But that was fine. Fastest time didn’t win. Correct time did. We made it to the first task and blew it out of the water. We felt good. We make it to task two by a combination of good guesswork on my part and Dax figuring the miles that the official route would take. With the miles figured Cade figured how long we needed to loiter circling the block after arrival. Second task is ultimate frisbee against alumns. And this is where our refusal to make a dream team hits us. I’m not athletic. Dax would be if he wasn’t in a boot. Cade Danial and Clayton are our only real players here. Against 6 alumns, all of who had gotten basketball or track scholarships to big schools. We thought this would be where we lost. If we lost to much time scoring our three goals we’d lose the whole thing. We hadn’t left breathing room. There were also 3 other tasks. But we go all out. Dax plays back, acting as a relay to save the rest of us. I ran interception. Dax’s relays keep us in the game long enough to score. But we can’t get the frisbee back. So as per usual I do something stupid and get myself hurt. I sprint up in the blind spot of the target of the latest pass. We both go up. And I swat it. Then the 220 lb college basketball player lands on top of me. Me who weighs 120 lbs and am built like a twig at this point. My shoulder dislocates on impact. But we scored before anyone realized that my arm probably shouldn’t be in front of my shoulder, myself included. I’m a literature nerd, I read all sorts of books but I had recently been reading James Patterson. So I decide I’ll use the books description of how to relocate a shoulder and I pop it back in. And then the EMT, who the school has on call for this event, puts me in a sling and we keep going. The alumns let us score the last point as an apology. The next task is an alphabet shopping spree with a cost limit of 30 dollars. Cade’s mom takes the lead here. She finds brands we didn’t know existed and we complete it with enough money left over to spend W on a quart of whoppers. The next two event are easy enough, tag in an abandoned auditorium and a haunted house they had made in an old factory in the depot district. We get to the final destination and loiter. We are desperately doing math to figure out our desired arrival time. And it’s in two minutes. But our mileage is off. So we need to close the gap. Cade’s mom then pushes 70 up and down the nearest major street at nearly midnight, once again unprompted. And we come in and hand in our blank trivia sheet, 5 task badges, mileage and time. Tasks are perfect, time is perfect and mileage is correct. If no one else got 3 perfect out of 4 we’d win. Genius twins arrive next. They see us and laugh, goodnaturedly. We’d been joking about winning for the last month. And they handed in their trivia, 3/4 done, time a few minutes off, mileage well short, and task badges, all done. We smiled and ordered food at the restaurant that was our final destination. Two other senior teams arrive then the drama team arrives, perfect trivia good mileage, all five badges, time off by a half hour. We were pretty sure we won now. And so we all basically melted into the booth, shakes and burgers crowded in front of us like a 90′s teen drama dinner scene. Ben and Abby sat with us and ate as the rest of the teams who hadn’t quit, or DQ’d in two cases, trickled in. On Monday we heard the results, we had won. But because we had three perfect scores and one zero they decided to change the rules to evenly weight the categories next year. None of us on that team won again.

[anauro]

for scrubs and surgical drugs, number 12 Was there a scene you wished you could have included? Why didn't it fit in? and number 13 My favorite line of dialogue from this fic was [the fight between Regulus and Sirius after James' crisis (the one where Regulus pretended to give him a full dose of drug to keep him from leaving]. What inspired it?

Hope you have a safe travel and arrive to your destination without a horrid crack in your neck!

Behind the scenes fanfics ask game

Hi Limo!

12. Was there a scene you wished you could have included? Why didn’t it fit in?

Kind of! My initial plan for the Halloween night for Reg to bring someone home for the night and then James runs into the guy in the kitchen in the morning. The “oh you’re James? That explains a lot” line was supposed to happen then.

It didn’t fit, because Reg’s feeling went a bit further than I anticipated and also I didn’t know if James could handle it at that point. I think the taking care of drunk Reg was much sweeter choice, but ultimately I ran it past Yaz and they chose!

13. Was there anything that inspired the fight between Regulus and Sirius after James’ crisis?

Not really, it just came to me randomly and I thought it was perfect for the angst and also fits what I have planned for Sirius later. I mainly wanted James to choose Regulus over Sirius, I think it was a big change in their relationship (ha, sorry French anon, I didn’t include that in your q earlier!) and a bit of a game changer really.

Thank you, Limo! Trip is okay, but it’s so bright in that compartment and I’m after an all night wedding, so really exhausted!

Also, I tried sending you an ask, but internet is patchy, lemme know if it didn’t actually send pls!

[grigori77]

Movies of 2023 - My Pre-Summer Rundown (Part 2)

The Top Ten:

10. SICK – Ultimately the year’s biggest horror cinema SURPRISE (so far, anyway) was also one of the year’s VERY FIRST standouts period, a brilliant little streaming sleeper from Peacock which snuck in under the radar but EFFORTLESSLY captured my attention AND the darker parts of my imagination. Best of all, though, it was SO COOL to see legendary revisionist horror screenwriter Kevin Williamson return to the “big screen” again after spending so long plying his trade on TV – I was VERY MUCH the target audience for Scream when it came out, I just ATE UP his delicious post-modern deconstruction of the slasher genre and its subsequent follow-ups (although Robert Rodriguez’ The Faculty, his fantastic take on alien invasion movie tropes, remains my very favourite of his offerings to date), even if it did lead to a fresh sub-genre which, paradoxically, became increasingly tired and toothless as the years progressed.  In the end, I think it’s probably A GOOD THING he took a step back – he just needed a chance to rethink things and find a fresh angle to come at the genre … and BY THE GODS has he ever found one with THIS.  Interestingly, for Williamson at least, the Pandemic couldn’t have come along at a better time, giving him fertile ground indeed in which to grow a particularly potent darkly comic slasher horror thriller which EASILY lives up to his masterworks.  Taking place in the early days of the original outbreak, when the first Lockdown was just starting, infection alerts and self-isolation were becoming a major thing and everybody was PANICKING over how much they really DIDN’T yet know about what was REALLY going on, the setting was already ripe for some pretty intense, chaotic storytelling … so adding a brutal serial killer with a penchant for killing off the idiots who flagrantly flaunted the COVID safety restrictions and purposefully went out of their way to pretend things were the same as normal was a damn slick move.  The main bulk of the narrative revolves around three college kids in some nondescript part of the US – Parker (Blockers and The Society’s Gideon Adlon), a well-off party girl who’s looking to make some major changes in her life, and her best friend Miri (up-and coming R&B artist Beth Million), who go to Parker’s family’s expansive country home to quarantine in comfort, and Parker’s newly-EX boyfriend DJ (Man of Steel and Teen Wolf’s Dylan Sprayberry), who turns up ostensibly to try and patch things up between them but may simply have come for a lucky hook-up – who are targeted by the killer who subsequently hunts them during a night of fraught tension, smartly staged stalk-and-slash set-pieces and a hefty dose of Williamson’s characteristic jet black-but-enjoyably geeky sense of humour, which is this time pitched to a particularly sharp edge of biting finger-on-the-pulse satire given the rich socio-political real-life material he’s able to mine here.  The small but extremely potent cast are all BRILLIANT, although the film really is DOMINATED by Adlon, who once again shows that she’s destined for GREAT THINGS INDEED in the future with a brilliant turn that runs an impressive gamut from irresponsibly entitled to vitally determined survivor once circumstances have fully driven her to take proper responsibility for all her childish behaviour, making for a compellingly sympathetic young heroine we find easy to start rooting for.  It probably helps the man behind the camera is John Hyams (All Square, Alone), son of legendary genre-hopping director Peter Hyams, who shows he’s definitely inherited his dad’s impressive skill by crafting a lean, tight and precise slice of horror cinema which takes full advantage of a tight budget and (mostly) a single location, which means the end result is a brilliant little comedy horror gem that I’d heartily recommend folk hunt down on streaming, or at the very least keep in mind for Halloween …

9. COCAINE BEAR – gods, if EVER there was a true story that seemed TAILOR MADE for cinema, it’s the bizarre tale of Cokey the Bear, AKA Pablo Eskobear, an American black bear that died after ingesting 34 keys of cocaine that were dumped out of a smuggler’s cargo plane over the Tennessee wilderness in 1985.  That being said, it’s not a huge surprise it’s taken Hollywood SO LONG to actually get it made, perhaps it’s just TOO CRAZY a concept for it to have been made before now.  Ultimately, the film takes A LOT of liberties with the truth to instead craft an entertaining story, but in the end that’s definitely the smart move, simply using the concept as a springboard to craft a gloriously batshit horror comedy with a JET BLACK sense of humour populated by an offbeat collection of quirky characters. Keri Russell stars as Sari, a nurse and single mother who has to brave the woods in order to find her young daughter Dee Dee (The Florida Project’s Brooklyn Prince), who’s playing hooky in the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest with her best friend Henry (Sweet Tooth’s Christian Convery) right when Cokey goes on a drug-fuelled homicidal rampage; meanwhile, recently bereaved widower Eddie (Solo’s Alden Ehrenreich) and his best friend Daveed (Straight Outta Compton’s O’Shea Jackson Jr.) are two drug cartel enforcers reluctantly scouring the area in search of their lost product at the behest of Eddie’s overbearing St Louis drug kingpin father Syd White (the late, great Ray Liotta, to whom the film is dedicated); and then there’s hapless but dogged Knoxville detective Bob (the venerable Isaiah Whitlock Jr.), who knows he can bust White if he can just get his hands on the evidence.  All three parties converge in the park while the bear wreaks merry havoc in Elizabeth Banks’ third film as a director (after Pitch Perfect 2 and the CRIMINALLY mistreated and overlooked Charlie’s Angels reboot), which looks like it might FINALLY get people to start taking her serious BEHIND the camera as well as IN FRONT of it – this is a proper laugh-riot of a film which is also delightfully non-PC, and it’s liberally peppered with impressively blood-soaked effects to thrill the gore-hounds as well as an impressively well-realised digital animal character in the eponymous drug-addled beastie.  The cast are brilliant too, Russell and Ehrenreich both particularly impressing in their respective nominal lead roles while the two kids are EXCEPTIONAL (particularly Convery, getting to overact as one of the most hyperactive-yet-not-irritating kids I’ve ever seen on screen), and it’s both enriching and a little bit heartbreaking to watch Liotta once again acting his socks off in one of his very last film roles; that being said, several of the scenes are thoroughly STOLEN by the irrepressible Margo Martindale, who’s clearly having the time of her life in one of her most gloriously OTT roles as foul-mouthed, much put-upon park Ranger Liz.  Ultimately this is a horror comedy where the balance is definitely tipped very much in favour of the laughs over the scares, but that’s fine, because with a concept this batshit bonkers we were always gonna find it too funny to ever be remotely scary, so the end result is one of THE FUNNIEST MOVIES I’ve run across in the cinema so far this year, gleefully revelling in its own inherent irreverence.  It’s just about the most fun you could ever expect it to be, which is what you’d want from a movie about a cocaine bear, really …

8. ANT-MAN & THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA – coming off the back of 2022’s decidedly hit-and-miss big screen slate for Disney and Marvel’s current flagship property, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, THIS year’s first MCU release had A LOT of eyes on it.  Gods know, I definitely has TWO OF ‘EM … and it probably wasn’t the best title to be laying all this weight on, either – the Ant-Man movies in particular have always been a bit of a marmite property within the larger universe, with as many detractors as fans, which definitely didn’t help things here.  If this turned out to be third time unlucky for Paul Rudd’s Scott Lang and the rest, it could spell much larger disaster for the MCU overall, or at the very least signify that the cracks are definitely growing beyond the studios’ capacity to patch ‘em up on the run.  So I’ll admit, I went into this one with a whole lot of trepidation … was it unwarranted?  Well, being completely honest … not ENTIRELY.  Tried-and-tested comedy director Peyton Reed’s Ant-Man films have always been a pretty mad collection anyway, as much a full-blown comedy sub-franchise as the Guardians of the Galaxy movies or Thor under Taika Waititi, but even so they still managed to keep ONE FOOT on the ground even while the rest was playing EXTENSIVELY in the Quantum Realm, but this one may just have finally jumped the shark.  Granted, part of this film’s particular OTT outlandishness and unabashed WACKINESS is down to narrative necessity – giving too much away plot-wise unfortunately runs the risk of dropping some MASSIVE spoilers, but it’s at least safe to say that the vast majority of the story takes place ENTIRELY in the Quantum Realm this time, and it’s a place which is A WHOLE LOT DIFFERENT from anything we might have imagined from our very brief visits in Ant-Man & the Wasp and Avengers Endgame.  For a start, it’s A WHOLE LOT BIGGER than we thought it was, and MUCH more heavily populated by some truly WEIRD SHIT … the film also has some major heavy-lifting to do with regards to setting up the Big Bad for Phase 5 and 6 both – Kang the Conqueror (The Last Black Man In San Francisco and Creed III’s Jonathan Majors), a Multiverse-based Thanos level threat we first encountered (sort of) in 2021’s runaway hit first season of Loki.  Thankfully, this at least is one of the areas in which the movie definitely SUCCEEDED – Majors IMMEDIATELY makes his presence keenly felt as one of the franchise’s most interesting and effective supervillains, a near God Tier Bad Guy who’s clearly gonna give the whole Avengers roster a run for their money when they finally come face to face with him (in whatever form this ultimately takes).  The plot, such as it is, is pure scrambled bananas, a heavyweight mindfuck it’s best to just DISENGAGE and go with to get proper enjoyment out of – this is definitely a cinematic GUILTY PLEASURE, and trying to take it even remotely seriously immediately draws the eye to a thousand gaping plot-holes and glaring narrative stumbles.  At least the patented stunning, primary coloured visuals, winning sense of humour and cavalcade of delightfully wacky set-pieces (the clone-spawning “probability explosion” sequence is a particularly overblown, super-trippy highlight with an unexpected tear-jerk factor built in) are all fully functional and behaving correctly, and the thoroughly endearing cast all deliver admirably without a single off-note hint of miscasting – Rudd and Evangeline Lilly (returning as Hope van Dyne AKA the titular Wasp) are both pitch perfect as always, while it’s nice to see Michael Douglas and PARTICULARLY Michelle Pfeiffer getting to do a whole lot more this time round as Hank Pym and Janet van Dyne, and the glaring Michael Pena-shaped hole is ALMOST filled by a few other quality comedic turns from the likes of deadpan laugh-MASTER Bill Murray and David Dastmalchian (here returning in a VERY interesting vut also very DIFFERENT role to what we’ve seen from him here before), as well as a surprise returning face (ahem) from the franchise’s past.  Meanwhile, alongside Majors there are some other similarly noteworthy series newcomers who make BIG IMPRESSIONS, from Z Nation and The Mandalorian’s Katy O’Brien (who’s been an growing favourite of mine for a little while now), who’s a completely EPIC badass I wanna see A LOT more of in the future as hard-nosed Quantum freedom fighter Jentorra, to Kathryn Newton (Supernatural, Freaky), making the role of Scott’s now (pretty much) full-grown daughter Cassie ENTIRELY her own, and she’s clearly got a MAJOR future ahead of her in the MCU herself now she’s started carving out her own super-powered secret identity. The movie may be another flawed, somewhat unwieldy and occasionally downright CLUNKY beast, but the franchise is definitely still managing to stand up, and compared to the likes of Thor: Love & Thunder and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever it definitely holds up a good deal better in its own right.  Most of all, though, it’s A WHOLE LOT of pure, unadulterated FUN, which is ultimately exactly what you want from a big primary-coloured superhero blockbuster.  With the arrival of the new (and, apparently, FINAL) Guardians of the Galaxy movie now imminent, it still remains to be seen if the MCU can be clawed back from the brink it’s still teetering perilously on the edge of, but this, despite all that’s still wrong with it, is at least a VERY SMALL step back in the right direction again …

7. THE PALE BLUE EYE – largely sneaking in under the radar on Netflix to start the New Year off, the latest offering from highly acclaimed indie writer-director Scott Cooper (Crazy Heart, Black Mass, Antlers) is, much as we’d likely expect from such a consistently varied, genre-hopping filmmaker, a strange, unique and deeply intriguing beast of a film.  Adapted from Louis Bayard’s well-received speculative fiction novel about a young Edgar Allan Poe aiding the investigation of a bafflingly macabre murder in the US Military Academy at West Point in the early 1830s.  Christian Bale returns with typical stoic, intense and magnificently brooding megawatt presence for his THIRD leading man tour of duty for Cooper (after Out of the Furnace and Hostiles) as Augustus Landor, a former West Point graduate-turned misanthropic former detective brought in to lead the investigation into the brutal hanging and evisceration (with additional heart-removal) of a young cadet that’s baffling the faculty and local police, which is soon compounded when additional bodies start piling up.  He’s aided in his endeavours by another cadet, the young Poe himself (played to PERFECTION by Harry Potter’s own Harry Melling, continuing his meteoric and deeply impressive rise to prominence with another TOUR-DE-FORCE performance here), while the clues lead to a variety of deeply troubling twists and revelations as well as an intriguing collection of suitably odd and often highly charismatic characters played by the sterling likes of Lucy Boynton, Toby Jones, Simon McBurney and a fascinatingly unusual turn from Robert Duvall, although the real standout here is a truly MAGNIFICENT career-best performance from Gillian Anderson.  Cooper piles on the story’s doom-laden gothic atmosphere to great effect throughout while cranking up the slow-burn and deeply uncomfortable suspenseful tension throughout, while the plot is nothing short of MACHIAVELLIAN in its levels of ingenious labyrinthine intelligence, dropping an ultimate denouement that you really have to be paying SERIOUS ATTENTION to see coming, and the production design, costumes, period detailing and, most of all, the thoroughly MOODY bleak-midwinter cinematography make for a freezing cold but thoroughly rewarding feast for the eyes for the more discerning film-fanatic.  Altogether Cooper’s delivered another winner, and I hope he continues to make films this good well into the future.

6. SHAZAM: FURY OF THE GODS – it’s interesting that, at least on here, the DC Cinematic Universe (AKA the DCEU) is currently WINNING OUT over the MCU, especially given the recent MAJOR upheavals that are now rocking the franchise as a whole (and look set to continue well into the remainder of this year and beyond).  Not least because, technically, once The Flash hits cinemas and the Universe essentially gets hit with a Hard Reset under the guidance of new DC Studios CEO James Gunn, none of this even MATTERS any more going forward … certainly this fact has NOT been lost on cinemagoers, who were already starting to pull back when Black Adam came out late last year and subsequently seemed content to STAY AWAY IN DROVES for this one, likely waiting to give it a go in the privacy and safety of their own homes once it hit streaming.  In a way this sounded a pre-emptive death knell for the DCEU which I’m genuinely sceptical about it recovering from … which is a shame, because 2019’s Shazam! was one of the franchise’s BEST FEATURES, a gleefully anarchic post-modern deconstruction of the overblown superhero antics the franchise largely glorified before while never taking itself particularly seriously but simply playing it with just the right amount of knowing wink-and-nod.  Even more of a shame, then, that this has proven to be SUCH a performance TURKEY, because it’s JUST AS GOOD as the first one, taking all of the lessons that were learned from the first movie to heart and delivering more of everything that really WORKED once more, even while trying something new and fresh at the same time to expand on this little corner of the Universe with impressive aplomb and consummate skill.  Returning director Drew Sandberg (Lights Out, Annabelle: Creation) once again delivers in HIGH STYLE and customary spooky flair as he and returning screenwriter Henry Gayden (Earth To Echo, There’s Someone In Your House), along with Fast & Furious franchise lynchpin scribe Chris Morgan, expand on the adventures of coming-of-age young hero Billy Batson (Andi Mack’s Asher Angel) and his (still unnamed) superpowered alter ego (Zachary Levi), alongside his now similarly gifted teenaged foster siblings, as the Daughters of Atlas – Hespera (Helen Mirren), Kalypso (Lucy Liu) and Anthea (Rachel Zegler), a trio of immensely powerful but (somewhat) morally dubious classical Greek goddesses – come to claim their powers for their own in order to rejuvenate the Tree of Life and punish Mankind for its wickedness. The usual existential high stakes, then. Angel and Levi are, once again, ON FIRE here, the former star of Chuck in particular once again proving what an undisputable comedic MASTER he is while they both deliver MAGNIFICENTLY in the dramatic moments too, while their returning co-stars and sterling veteran support are once again just as great as before, It’s Jack Dylan Grazer particularly getting to really SHINE this time round in a particularly WEIGHTY role that nonetheless once again manages to utilise his own impressive comedic talents to full effect too, while it’s also GREAT to see This Is Us’ Faith Herman get a much more expanded role this time round as the irrepressible Darla; Djimon Hounsou, meanwhile, also gets a lot more to do as he returns as the enjoyably crabby and pompous Wizard Shazam, who’s none too happy with Billy for breaking the staff last time round and setting this all off in the first place. The Daughters, meanwhile, are FANTASTIC antagonists, Liu and Mirren clearly enjoying the opportunity to be flamboyant, majestic and over-the-top in proper Shakespearean style, while Zegler invests “Anne” with a good deal more moral fibre and complexity as the most sympathetic (and ultimately conflicted) of the trio.  Sandberg and co again deliver IN SPADES on the action, atmospherics, gorgeously exotic design and sheer creativity which made the first movie such an unexpected treat, while also delivering more of that winning, sometimes downright SCREWBALL BONKERS humour to keep it entertaining and let you know that, just like its predecessor, this film knows FULL WELL how ridiculous it is and is fully prepared to just OWN IT.  The end result is, once again, one of the best of the current slate of DCEU films, and it just makes it even sadder to think that they’re likely not gonna continue with this once the franchise reboots.  Gods know it don’t bode too well for The Flash, Blue Beetle or Aquaman & the Lost Kingdom, which is a shame cuz they also look pretty promising …

5. EVIL DEAD RISE – sometimes you just can’t keep a good franchise down, and that’s ALWAYS been the case with the Evil Dead movies. That being said, each movie has always happily been its own thing too, so even when Sam Raimi was making his original trilogy they were all movies you could easily pick up and watch as a standalone without needing to see the others too (although it was well worth doing it).  Better, though, is the fact that every offering so far has been consistently GREAT, even 2013’s sort-of reboot from Don’t Breathe and The Girl In the Spider’s Web writer-director Fede Alvarez, which did a genuinely spectacular job of bringing the franchise kicking and screaming into the new Millennium while also delivering something which was unapologetically old school in the very best way.  Thankfully this is definitely the way that the latest writer-director, relative newcomer Lee Cronin (The Hole In the Ground), has decided to do things, although he’s also taking this newly-rebooted story in a fresh new direction with a MAJOR setting change as the Deadites are, for the first time (at least on the BIG screen) unleashed in the big inner city.  It’s a bold move, but certainly has the instant charm of doing something we’ve never seen before, bringing the claustrophobic madness of the originals into a very different but equally close-quarters environment as we’re now seeing the demonically possessed monsters terrorising their victims in tiny apartment rooms, cramped corridors and malfunctioning elevators which make for a whole host of new opportunities to change up the scares, the action and the delivery of the thoroughly skewed plot.  Best of all, this is BY FAR the most female-centric film in the franchise to date, making for a much more interesting and far less testosterone-heavy atmosphere this time around as the women get to take the lead far more than they did in the previous movies.  The gods know that’s VERY MUCH my shit right there … Vikings’ Alyssa Sutherland is a veritable FORCE OF (UN)NATURE as Ellie, the downtrodden single mother trying to keep her three kids and her whole life from going off the rails until she’s taken over by the Evil when her calamitously foolish young wannabe DJ son Danny (Storm Boy and The End’s Morgan Davies) finds and reads from the Book of the Dead, while Picnic At Hanging Rock’s Lily Sullivan is endearingly vulnerable and fallible but ultimately steely as her Ellie’s estranged kid sister Beth, who comes home in a bad spot just in time to get thrown into the middle of the ensuing chaos; Gabrielle Echols (Reminiscence) and Nell Fisher (Northspur), meanwhile, are both similarly exceptional and thoroughly memorable as Ellie’s teen and pre-teen daughters Bridget and Kassie. The majority of the action plays out in the impressively squalid confines of the newly-condemned apartment building, turning uncomfortably familiar surroundings into downright TERRIFYING nightmarish hellscapes as the horrors unfold within, Cronin pulling out every trick in the book to deliver a knuckle-whitening scare-fest that skilfully works its way under your skin and grips your heart tight enough to make it explode with sheer anxiety, and, like every one of its predecessors, he has managed to pull it all off with the absolute BARE MINIMUM of digital assistance, this film representing another resounding triumph for spectacularly NASTY physical effects.  This is DEFINITELY the scariest thing I’ve seen so far in what’s ALREADY proven to be a genuinely GREAT YEAR for horror cinema, but more than that it’s ENTIRELY lived up to its legacy, earning its place in one of the greatest horror franchises of ALL TIME with pride.  I look forward to seeing what Cronin does next, and I can’t wait to see what the series is gonna throw at us next, either …

4.  PUSS IN BOOTS: THE LAST WISH – my current top animated feature for 2023 is an interesting one because, while I am a MASSIVE fan of Dreamworks Animation Studios’ output in general and the Shrek films in particular, I have to admit that the FIRST standalone spinoff featuring Antonio Banderas’ awesome fairy-tale character left me somewhat underwhelmed … yes, I know, it’s a travesty, STONE ME!!!  I know I deserve it … but really, even with Salma Hayek on board it just didn’t reach the same levels of sheer unadulterated COOL that the Shrek movies did for me.  So I approached the EXTREMELY belated follow-up with a definite sense of trepidation, despite the intriguing new animation style makeover that’s clearly HEAVILY inspired by the recent success of the first Spider-Verse movie and the massive anticipation for its incoming sequel.  It looks GORGEOUS, but as we’ve learned to our cost over the years with this kind of filmmaking, looks DO NOT always automatically mean it’s gonna be a belter.  Thank the gods, then, that I was proven wrong THIS TIME … yup, for his sophomore spinoff movie, Puss FINALLY got a vehicle he could truly be PROUD OF.  It’s got a BRILLIANT premise about it which PERFECTLY fits with the amount of time that’s passed since the first one, and definitely means that the older fans among us (like myself) can definitely find A LOT to resonate with in terms of the themes here – Puss discovers that he’s only got ONE of his nine lives left and it sends him into a DEEP existential crisis as he realises that he’s pretty much WASTED much of the time he had, and technically that means he’s only got ONE CHANCE left to truly be alive.  So he abandons his riotous adventurer lifestyle and “retires” as a lapcat for one SERIOUSLY weird cat-lady, Mama Luna (High Fidelity’s Da’Vine Joy Randolph) … only for his past to catch up to him in the form of a quartet of bounty hunters, Goldilocks (Florence Pugh) and the Three Bears (Ray Winstone, Olivia Colman and beloved up-and-coming British comic Samson Kayo).  This prompts Puss to escape onto the road for one final adventure reuniting with his long-lost love Kitty Softpaws (Salma Hayek), who’s none too happy to have him back in her life after he abandoned her at the Altar, as well as a deeply odd new companion, Perrito (What We Do In the Shadows’ Harvey Guillen), a diminutive therapy dog who was masquerading as one of Luna’s cats, as they set out in search of the Wishing Star, a fallen star that can grant whoever finds it their heart’s desire, which means Puss could get his other Eight Lives back.  Except that they’ve still got the bounty hunters on their trail, along with (now decidedly) Big Jack Horner (John Mulaney), a magic-item collecting entrepreneur who has a score to settle with Puss which definitely coincides with his fervent desire to claim the Star for himself, and a mysterious Wolf (the irresistibly silky tones of Narcos’ Wagner Moura) who may actually be Death Himself, who has his own, much darker reasons for finding Puss.  Y’know how they say you judge a hero by the strength of the villains he faces?  Well with antagonists of THIS calibre, Puss just might have finally met his match … and even better, EVEYTHING ELSE about this movie is as strong as its villains – it’s one of the most well-written, well-directed and deeply, affectingly resonant movies that Dreamworks have EVER DONE, EASILY on a par with the rest of the Shrek canon and even matching up impressively well with the true Gold Standards like Kung Fu Panda and the How To Train Your Dragon movies, everyone involved in this project clearly giving it their all in a total labour of pure, unadulterated LOVE that pays VAST dividends on the screen.  The cast, of course, are among the greatest key ingredients in this, and as we’ve come to expect from these movies they’re all pulling their weight MAGNIFICENTLY – Guillen and Mulaney in particularly deliver SPECTACULARLY in their respective roles, while Pugh and her cohorts are at once hilariously good fun but also elevate their characters FAR ABOVE their one-note bad guy potential thanks in no small part to some VERY intelligent, well-rounded and deeply complex character development from the writers, but in the end the main weight of the film OF COURSE rests on the shoulders of Banderas and Hayek, and once again they’ve both proven they are MUCH MORE than capable of bearing it with grace, professionalism and a glorious evergreen twinkle in their eyes.  As for the animation and design, this is a BEAUTIFUL piece of work, definitely one of the year’s most visually arresting films as well as, quite simply, one of the most gorgeous films that Dreamworks have ever put together, the studio effortlessly adapting to the sexy new style that made Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and Netflix’ Arcane such glorious feasts for the eyes, and the animation team deserve JUST AS MUCH praise as director Joel Crawford, a storyboard veteran who previous proved his helming pedigree in fine style with 2020’s wonderfully oddball The Croods: A New Age.  Ultimately, given the storyline, themes and the way the film ties things off so neatly, I suspect this really will be the last we see of Puss In Boots on the big screen, but if that really is the case then I gotta admit it’s ONE HELL of a swansong …

3.  RENFIELD – my current horror movie of the year sits very comfortably in the genre’s sub-category that I’ve always loved best, a horror comedy of particularly rare quality and gleeful abandon that made it one of the best and most entertaining viewing experiences I’ve had so far this year.  Yeah, like the best horror comedies it has enough genuine darkness that it CAN be genuinely scary when it wants to be, but by the sheer (literal) batshit craziness of its premise this is a BONKERS FILM, and so it wisely embraces its sheer lampoonery to full effect by delivering one of the most deliciously dark black comedies I’ve seen in a good while.  Not that it’s overly surprising – director Chris McKay cut his teeth helming The Lego Batman Movie before branching out into live action with Amazon’s criminally underrated time travelling alien invasion blockbuster The Tomorrow War, both of which were excellent vehicles for him to master the gloriously anarchic style that he finally unleashes fully formed for this brilliant alternative sequel to the classic Universal Dracula movie with Bela Lugosi.  That being said, the big box office draw here was always going to be Nicolas Cage, who replaces Lugosi as the infamous Count, clearly kicking into his typical “manic” setting here to chew the scenery with ruthless abandon and, as a result, frequently steal the show right out from under Nicholas Hoult as his titular ghoul manservant, the long-suffering Robert Montague Renfield, who just wants the opportunity to finally find a real, simple life for himself and thinks he can pull it off in modern day New Orleans, only for his Master to himself become inspired by Renfield’s newfound ambition and set his sights on world domination with the help of the Lobos, a brutal local crime family.  Thankfully Hoult DOES ultimately manage to hold his own in his scenes with Cage, like always proving ADEPTLY talented enough to deliver another winningly endearing performance while playing perhaps the single most pathetic specimen of his career to date … meanwhile the thoroughly adorable Awkwafina once again proves that she’s well on the way to becoming the PREMIER kooky goofball female comedic lead in Hollywood as Rebecca Quincy, the one truly honest cop in one of the most corrupt police forces in all of America, who winds up falling for Renfield’s hangdog charm and puppy-dog eyes as he inadvertently becomes the key to her quest to bring down the Lobos after they murdered her legendary detective father.  Shohreh Aghdashloo brings a much needed touch of class to proceedings as Bellafrancesca Lobo, the family’s seductively sly matriarch, while Space Force and Sonic the Hedgehog’s Ben Schwarz is a frequent non-PC laugh riot all on his own as her entitled constant disappointment of a son Teddy, and Ghosts’ Brandon Scott Jones is lovably flaky as the leader of Renfield’s endearingly pathetic support group for people trapped in toxic co-dependent relationships.  This genuinely is a DEEPLY FUNNY FILM, perfectly geared up for a maximum hit count with the one-liners, in-jokes and situations, but then there’s no surprise here since writer Ryan Ridley (adapting a pitch from The Walking Dead’s original creator Robert Kirkman) is a seasoned veteran of TV comedy, particularly well known as an alumnus of the similarly edgy and madcap Rick & Morty, and this carries a lot of the same twisted, anarchic charm as that rightly beloved series, just in a much more big budge live action form on the big screen.  It’s also SPECTACULARLY bloodthirsty when it wants to be, the welcome reliance on what are clearly LARGELY physical effects meaning that this movie is another gore-hound’s wet dream, even if the film does mostly play the horror elements for laughs throughout, and it’s an impressively inventive and chaotic beast in THAT regard too, delivering some of the most gloriously OTT splatter-fuelled action sequences I’ve seen in a good while whenever Renfield eats a bug and gets an ultraviolent power boost.  Altogether this is definitely some of the most fun I’ve had at the cinema so far this year, and I’ll admit I wouldn’t mind a bit more of this …

2. JOHN WICK CHAPTER 4 – and so, it has come to this … honestly, who’d have thunk it, back in 2014 when the first movie came out and (rightly) became a surprise sleeper hit that went a long way to revitalising Keanu Reeves’ career for a SECOND TIME as he found THE GREATEST ROLE HE’S EVER HAD, that almost a decade later it would’ve blown up into something THIS BIG?!!!  I mean sure, back then it definitely was The Little Movie That Could, but still … well, after two increasingly BIG sequels which each maintained a surprisingly impressive level of quality throughout, the fourth and final John Wick chapter is finally here, and GODS is it good.  I mean it’s FUCKING BRILLIANT.  It just might be THE BEST ONE YET.  Certainly it’s proving to be the most well received, landing BY FAR the best rating on Rotten Tomatoes and it genuinely seems like almost nobody has ANYTHING bad to say about this movie, even the CRITICS largely seem to LIKE this one. And it deserves every lick of love it’s been getting, this is definitely both the pinnacle of the series AND a perfect swansong for the greatest assassin in cinema history.  I don’t wanna give too much away about the plot, even those who HAVE seen what’s come before don’t deserve to be spoiled since, even if these movies have never exactly been SHAKESPEARE in their construction they do still frequently leave you guessing in the best ways as to how they’ll turn out, and this one definitely is no exception.  I’ll just say that, after all the killing John’s done to get to this point, his one-man-war with the international criminal network’s High Table has finally reached his zenith when Winston (the great Ian McShane), the Manager of the newly-demolished Manhattan Continental Hotel, gives him the means to finally find a way to get out and find peace while he’s still alive – namely by challenging the Marquis Vincent de Gramont (It’s Bill Skarsgard), a high-ranking Table member who’s taken it upon himself to rid the criminal underworld of the “cancer” that John and his constant disrespect have wrought, to single combat in a ritualistic duel in order to take his place at The Table should he win.  The subsequent battle that ensues as John sets about facilitating this duel and the fallout that follows as he fights his way to that final, fateful meeting fuels the film in HIGH STYLE, so that even though this movie’s almost THREE HOURS LONG it never feels overlong or outstays its welcome.  Once again the cast are all ON FIRE, Reeves once again proving that he is just about THE BEST LOOKING and most interesting action star working in Hollywood today when he’s mowing down endless bad guys with a stoic expression and the odd deadpan response, the role once again VERY MUCH playing to his strengths, while McShane and Laurence Fishburne (returning once again as the dethroned Bowery King) are both on fine form throughout, while it’s both a pleasure and privilege but also a genuine heartbreaking SHAME to watch the late Lance Reddick deliver one of his very last performances as Charon, the noble and quietly charismatic Concierge of the Manhattan Continental (at least he also shot one more turn as the character for the upcoming Ana de Armas-starring spinoff feature Ballerina, so it’s not QUITE the end); meanwhile the newcomers all serve admirably as well, with Skarsgard particularly impressing as one of the franchise’s best villains to date, slimy, entitled and exquisitely arrogant, the kind of Big Bad you just LOVE to hate, Wynnona Earp’s Shamier Anderson is a delightful revelation as Mr Nobody, a precocious up-and-coming hitman talent who certainly has a whole lot of potential for a possible future spinoff franchise of his own within this larger universe, Donnie Yen excels as usual as Cain, a former friend of John’s that the Marquis brings out of forced retirement in order to take the unkillable Baba Yaga out (clearly the filmmakers saw his blind badass take in Rogue One and they were like yeah, let’s have a whole lot more of THAT), Hiroyuki Sanada once more delivers effortless class and cool gravitas as Koji, the honourable and principled Manager of the Osaka Continental, and Scott Adkins is viciously impressive but also thoroughly surprising in an almost unrecognisable prosthetic getup as Killa Harkan, the brutish Head of the High Table in Berlin.  In the end, though, we’re once again here primarily to MARVEL at all the action exploits on display while wallowing in some of the richest and most well-crafted world-building there’s EVER BEEN on the big screen – this is a thoroughly fascinating universe, realised with exquisite precision with so many cool little winks and nods and in-jokes to make the geeks among us grin and chuckle with sheer joy over the immense bounty on display, while veteran stuntman-turned-director Chad Stahelski once again wrangles some of the VERY BEST cinematic action EVER COMMITTED TO FILM in a series of truly astonishing and thoroughly punishing set-pieces bravely executed with nary a visual effect in sight.  There are almost TOO MANY cool action beats in this movie to count, although the final BIG sequence, in which John fights his way up the spectacular but infamously punishing Stairs of Montmartre in Paris against an endless onslaught of thugs all determined to not let him reach the top, which includes one of the BIGGEST belly laughs I have EVER HAD at the cinema in my life, as much just over the joke’s sheer, ingenious AUDACITY, has to be the film’s undeniable highlight (closely followed by a genuinely INSANE run/gun/drive chase/shootout/fight sequence through the sheer chaos of the traffic around the Arc de Triomphe – every single one of these sequences is thrilling, they’re adrenaline fuelled and each is crafted with such precision but also such brilliant varied inventiveness that it NEVER leads to vicarious battle fatigue.  Best of all, though, as with the previous film’s there’s a surprising amount of soul and heart and heft to the film too, which ultimately leads to a climax which is both immensely satisfying but also pretty devastating in its emotional power.  Altogether then, this is EASILY my action movie of the year, I really can’t see that changing, as well as a fitting climax to an action cinema franchise which has come to SET THE BENCHMARK for the entire genre, and, honestly, just a damn fine movie in its own right.

1. DUNGEONS & DRAGONS: HONOUR AMONG THIEVES – so what, then, could POSSIBLY have beaten John Wick Chapter 4 to the top spot?  If you’d asked me that at the year’s start I DEFINITELY wouldn’t have thought it could be THIS … I mean SURE, I love D&D as much as the next geek, but even so this felt like SUCH a shameless cinematic cash-grab from Wizards of the Coast and Disney (producing through Paramount) that I felt there was NO WAY it could REALLY be an actual GOOD FILM.  At best I was expecting to be mildly entertained by a serviceable guilty pleasure, something that’s good for a Saturday night-in with a pizza and a six pack, not a genuine MASTERPIECE of cinematic adaptation.  And yet, it turns out that’s EXACTLY what we got here – this is a film which is ONE HUNDRED PERCENT clearly made with the utmost love and respect for the source material because the only possible interpretation for the way they wrote this was by taking Player’s and Dungeon Master’s handbooks, a Monster Manual, some character sheets and a few dice bags and just turning the mini-campaign that ensued into a two-hour screenplay.  It’s clear that they are heavily steeped in love and knowledge of the game itself, or were at least CONSTANTLY advised by experts who are, because this movie is AT EVERY STEP a pretty much PERFECT representation of the Forgotten Realms setting, the bestiary and even the game mechanics themselves IN ACTION, and it EVEN colours the way that the plot is laid out, how the characters interact and how some of the action sequences go.  (Seriously – a perfectly executed knockout on a knife-wielding hostage taker with a hurled potato?  That’s the Barbarian’s player landing a Natural 20 Critical Hit on their Attack Roll.  It love it.) Sure, the results are likely to INFURIATE some people who think a little too highly about how FORMALLY WRITTEN their cinema is, but for most folk this actually makes for a refreshingly honest and pretty unique piece of cinematic storytelling that actually works DAMN NEAR PERFECTLY from start to finish.  It also helps that the writer-director duo in charge here are a pair of stalwart comedy movie veterans, namely Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daly of Horrible Bosses, Vacation and Spider-Man: Homecoming fame, whose previous directorial collab Game Night actually likely provided a useful throughline for them to get into tackling this one.  The main cast of dysfunctional heroes that we follow through the story are even put together like a typical motely crew of player characters – Chris Pine once again proves that he’s at his best when he’s doing broad comedy, thoroughly delightful as self-centred, opportunistic roguish Bard Edgin Darvis, who, along with his platonic partner, tough-but-fair and sweetly naïve Barbarian warrior Holga Kilgore (played to absolute PERFECTION by Michelle Rodriguez in what’s UNDOUBTEDLY the best role she’s ever had, and definitely my FAVOURITE character here), enlists the help of bumbling, neuroses-riddled half-elf Sorcerer Simon Aumar (Detective Pikachu’s Justice Smith, twitchy, unsure of himself and UTTERLY adorable) and shape-shifting Tiefling Druid Doric (It’s Sophia Lillis, forthright, dependable and immediately done with all of Edgin’s shit) to help them knock over the accumulated fortune of their one-time colleague, Rogue-turned-nobleman Forge Fitzwilliam (Hugh Grant once again expertly bringing home the scheming sleaze persona he’s perfected in more recent years now he’s finally said goodbye to his earlier days as an upper class heartthrob) and foil the dastardly machinations of the monstrous undead Red Wizard Sofina (a genuinely chilling and unsettling turn from Shadow & Bone’s Daisy Head); meanwhile there’s a top-notch supporting cast of “DM-controlled NPCs” that help the story roll and breathe as effortlessly as the main stars, from Bridgerton’s Rege-Jean Page as deliciously dry Paladin Xenk Yendar, the obviously-overpowered PC from another campaign that the DM brings in to help the party out when things go COMPLETELY WRONG for them, and Chloe Coleman (Gunpowder Milkshake) as Edgin’s estranged young daughter Kira, to Bradley Cooper in a truly INSPIRED and genuinely hilarious cameo as Holga’s decidedly diminutive ex-husband Marlamin.  Every single one of these is a well-rounded, living-and-breathing vital person in their own right, and the writers have crafted them and their misadventures with proper precision throughout, while the world has been realised with genuine skill and clear loving attention to detail, as well as, yet again, a welcome reliance on real sets and locations and good old fashioned physical make-up and animatronics over pure digital effects wherever possible. There are some pretty spectacular action sequences on offer here (the Underdark sequence with a decidedly overweight dragon is a particular highlight, although my personal favourite has to be the scene in which Doric has to pull off an unexpected escape by Wildshaping between different animal forms, all unfolding in a spectacular unbroken “single” take), but in the end this film is, first and foremost, a COMEDY, and while there’s plenty of heart and pathos on offer, as well as more than a little genuine DARKNESS here and there, ultimately everything is VERY MUCH played for humour, and the end result is definitely the funniest film I’ve encountered this year (so far, anyway).  It’s also just about the most effortlessly ENDEARING film I’ve come across in a very long time, and I have to admit I am SO GLAD that it managed to defy my low expectations SO MUCH, I feel VERY HAPPILY HUMBLED that I was proved SO WRONG this time round.  I’m genuinely hopeful that we get LOADS MORE of this going forward, I can’t wait for a whole long campaign’s worth of movies to grow out of these humble beginnings. Best get those D20s rolling again, guys!

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