#also very jarring to draw live action characters again after quite a while

[hercury]

[superman86to99]

Superman #85 (January 1994)

Cat Grant in... "DARK RETRIBUTION"! Which is like normal retribution, but somehow darker. On the receiving end of Cat's darktribution is Winslow Schott, the Toyman, who suddenly changed his MO from "pestering Superman with wacky robots" to "murdering children" back on Superman #84, with one of his victims being Cat's young son Adam. Now Cat has a gun and intends to sneak it into prison to use it on Toyman. She's also pretty pissed at Superman for taking so long to find Toyman after Adam’s death (to be fair, Superman did lose several days being frozen in time by an S&M demon, as seen in Man of Steel #29).

So how did Superman find Toyman anyway? Basically, by spying on like 25% of Metropolis. After finding out from Inspector Turpin that the kids were killed near the docks, Superman goes there and focuses all of his super-senses to get "a quick glimpse of every person" until he sees a bald, robed man sitting on a giant crib, and goes "hmmm, yeah, that looks like someone who murders children." At first, Superman doesn't understand why Toyman would do such a horrible thing, but then Schott starts talking to his mommy in his head and the answer becomes clear: he watched Psycho too many times (or Dan Jurgens did, anyway).

Immediately after wondering why no one buys his toys, Toyman makes some machine guns spring out of his giant crib. I don't know, man, maybe it's because they're all full of explosives and stuff? Anyway, Toyman throws a bunch of exploding toys at Superman, including a robot duplicate of himself, but of course they do nothing. Superman takes him to jail so he can get the help he needs -- which, according to Cat, is a bullet to the face. Or so it seems, until she gets in front of him, pulls the trigger, and...

PSYCHE! It was one of those classic joke guns I’ve only ever seen in comics! Cat says she DID plan to bring a real gun, but then she saw one of these at a toy store and just couldn't resist. Superman, who was watching the whole thing, tells Cat she could get in trouble for this stunt, but he won't tell anyone because she's already been through enough. Then he asks her if she needs help getting home and she says no, because she wants to be more self-sufficient.

I think that's supposed to be an inspiring ending, but I don't know... Adam's eerie face floating in the background there makes me think she's gonna shave her head and climb into a giant crib any day, too. THE END!

Character-Watch:

Cat did become more self-sufficient after this, though. Up to now, all of her storylines seemed to revolve around other people: her ex-husband, Morgan Edge, José Delgado, Vinnie Edge, and finally Toyman. After this, I feel like there was a clear effort to turn her into a character that works by herself. I actually like what they did with Cat in the coming years, though I still don’t think they had to kill her poor kid to do that -- they could have sent him off to boarding school, or maybe to live with his dad. Or with José Delgado, over at Power of Shazam! I bet Jerry Ordway would have taken good care of him.

Plotline-Watch:

Wait, so can Superman just find anyone in Metropolis any time he wants? Not really: this is part of the ongoing storyline about his powers getting boosted after he came back from the dead, which sounds pretty useful now but is about to get very inconvenient.

Don Sparrow points out: "It is interesting that as Superman tries to capture Schott, he at one point instead captures a robot decoy, particularly knowing what Geoff Johns will retroactively do to this storyline in years to come, in Action Comics #865, as we mentioned in our review of Superman #84." Johns also explained that the robot thought he was hearing his mother's voice due to the real Toyman trying to contact him via radio, which I prefer to the "psycho talks to his dead mom" cliche.

Superman says "I never thought he'd get to the point where he'd KILL anyone -- especially children!" Agreed about the children part but, uh, did Superman already forget that Toyman murdered a whole bunch people on his very first appearance, in Superman #13? Or does Superman not count greedy toy company owners as people? Understandable, I guess.

There's a sequence about Cat starting a fire in a paper basket at the prison to sneak past the metal detector, but why do that if she had a toy gun all long? Other than to prevent smartass readers like us from saying "How did she get the gun into the prison?!" before the plot twist, that is.

Patreon-Watch:

Shout out to our patient Patreon patrons, Aaron, Murray Qualie, Chris “Ace” Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Bheki Latha, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush, Raphael Fischer, Dave Shevlin, and Kit! The latest Patreon-only article was about another episode of the 1988 Superman cartoon written by Marv Wolfman, this one co-starring Wonder Woman (to Lois' frustration).

Another Patreon perk is getting to read Don Sparrow's section early, because he usually finishes his side of these posts long before I do (he ALREADY finished the next one, for instance). But now this one can be posted in public! Take it away, Don:

Art-Watch (by @donsparrow​):

We begin with the cover, and it’s a good one— an ultra tight close up for Cat Grant firing a .38 calibre gun, with the titular Superman soaring in, perhaps too late.  An interesting thing to notice in this issue (and especially on the cover) is that the paper stock that DC used for their comics changed, so slightly more realistic shading was possible.  While it’s nowhere near the sophistication or gloss of the Image Comics stock of the time, there is an attempt at more realistic, airbrushy type shading in the colour.  It works well in places, like the muzzle flash, on on Cat Grant’s cheeks and knuckles, but less so in her hair, where the shadow looks a browny green on my copy.

The interior pages open with a pretty good bit of near-silent storytelling.  We are deftly shown, and not told the story—there are condolence cards and headlines, and the looming presence of a liquor bottle, until we are shown on the next page splash the real heart of the story, a revolver held aloft by Catherine Grant, bereaved mother, with her targeting in her mind the grim visage of the Toyman.

While their first few issues together meshed pretty well, it’s around  this issue that the pencil/inks team of Jurgens and Rubinstein starts to look a little rushed in places.  A few inkers who worked with Jurgens that I’ve spoken to have hinted that his pencils can vary in their level of detail, from very finished  to pretty loose, and in the latter case, it’s up to the inker to embellish where there’s a lack of detail.  Some inkers, like Brett Breeding, really lay down a heavier hand, where there’s quite a bit of actual drawing work in addition to adding value and weight to the lines.  I suspect some of the looseness in the figures, as well as empty  backgrounds reveals that these pencils were less detailed than we often  see from Jurgens.

There’s some weird body language in the tense exchange between Superman and Cat as she angrily confronts him about his lack of progress in capturing her son’s killer—Superman  looks a little too dynamic and pleased with himself for someone ostensibly apologizing. Superman taking flight to hunt down Toyman is classic Jurgens, though.

Another example of art weirdness comes on page 7, where Superman gets filled in on the progress of the Adam Morgan investigation.  Apparently Suicide Slum has some San Francisco-like hills, as that is one very steep sidewalk separating Superman and Turpin from some central-casting looking punks.

The  sequence of Superman concentrating his sight and hearing on the  waterfront area is well-drawn, and it’s always nice to see novel uses of his powers.  Tyler Hoechlin’s Superman does a similar trick quite often on the excellent first season of Superman & Lois.  The full-bleed splash of Superman breaking through the wall to capture Toyman is definitely panel-of-the-week material, as we really feel Superman’s rage and desperation to catch this child-killer.

Pretty much all the pages with Cat Grant confronting Winslow Schott are  well-done and tensely paced.  While sometimes I think the pupil-less  flare of the eye-glasses is a cop-out, it does lend an opaqueness and mystery to what Toyman is thinking.  Speaking of cop-outs, the gag gun twist ending really didn’t work for me.  I was glad that Cat didn’t lower herself to Schott’s level and become a killer, even for revenge, but the prank gun just felt too silly of a tonal shift for a storyline with this much gravitas.  The breakneck denouement that Cat is now depending only on herself didn’t get quite enough breathing room either.

While I appreciated that the ending of this issue avoided an overly simplistic, Death Wish style of justice, this issue extends this troubling but brief era of Superman comics. The casual chalk outlines of  yet two more dead children continues the high body count of the  previous handful of issues, and the tone remains jarring to me.  The issue is also self-aware enough to point out, again, that Schott is  generally an ally of children, and not someone who historically wishes  them harm, but that doesn’t stop the story from going there, in the most  violent of terms. In addition to being a radical change to the Toyman  character, it’s handled in a fashion more glib than we’re used to seeing  in these pages.  The mental health cliché of a matriarchal obsession, a la Norman Bates doesn’t elevate it either.  So, another rare misstep  from Jurgens the writer, in my opinion.   STRAY OBSERVATIONS:

I  had thought for sure that Romanove Vodka was a sly reference to a certain Russian Spy turned Marvel superhero, but it turns out there  actually is a Russian Vodka called that, minus the “E”, produced not in Russia, as one might think from the Czarist name, but rather, India.

While it made for an awkward exchange, I was glad that Cat pointed out how  her tragedy more or less sat on the shelf while Superman dealt with the "Spilled Blood" storyline.  A lesser book might not have acknowledged any  time had passed. Though I did find it odd for Superman to opine that he  wanted to find her son’s murderer even more than she wanted him to.  Huh?  How so?

I love the detail that Toyman hears the noise of Superman soaring to capture him, likening it to a train coming.

I  quibble, but there’s so much I don’t understand about the “new” Toyman.  If he’s truly regressing mentally, to an infant-like state, why does he wear this phantom of the opera style long cloak while he sits in his baby crib?  Why not go all the way, and wear footie pajamas, like the lost souls on TLC specials about “adult babies”?

I get that Cat Grant is in steely determination mode, but it seemed a little out of place that she had almost no reaction to the taunting she faced from her child’s killer.  She doesn’t shed a single tear in the entire issue, and no matter how focused she is on vengeance, that doesn’t seem realistic to me. [Max: That's because this is not just retribution, Don. It's dark retribution. We’ve been over this!]

[saphirered]

Lovely Caleb fic! Could I get a confession of love fix that involved Caleb kissing the hands of a bewildered reader?

Thank you for the request! I hope this is to your liking!

It’s rather late. Well, you think it is. It’s kind of difficult to tell in Rosohna’s eternal darkness. At least you were sure it’s been a long day. You find yourself wandering the halls of the Xhorhaus. The last few months have been crazy, hectic and you’d have to admit your life has been turned upside down but you wouldn’t change if for the world. You found friends, family even. Reminiscing you find your mind gravitate towards fond memories of your favourite wizard. Dragging him along on a little shopping spree for spell components, the excited rants he goes on when you ask for his advise on this new spell you found, the talks about nothing when you shared a watch, holding his hand while Yasha shaved his beard with her sword, giggling about a little prank you played on a very grumpy looking halfling shopkeeper in Zadash, drunken nights sharing a bottle after a successful job completed, him falling asleep with his head on your shoulder, caring for each other’s injuries, the rare dance in the tavern…

Not as insightful as Caduceus may be but you weren’t blind either. It’s clear Caleb seems more comfortable around you than anyone save for Nott maybe, a different kind of comfort still. You’ve been consciously picking up on a shift in his behaviour for a while now. Your favorite wizard has been getting closer and more affectionate towards you but you’ve known him for a while now and you can’t help but pick up on this. His recent shift in behavior gave you butterflies in your stomach, something more than friendship but you didn’t feel it was the right time to tell him how you feel. Besides, what his feelings don’t extend beyond care right? This is no different than his relationship with Beau or Nott. Love is a strong term and one you may not hand out so freely but you know yourself well enough these feelings you’re experiencing are love. You just don’t want to ruin your friendship because he’s not ready, not comfortable or doesn’t reciprocate your feelings in the same way after all. Caleb has come out of his shell and made so much progress, growing more comfortable and open around you and that’s extending to those around him too. You don’t want him to crawl back into that shell again. You value him more than that.

Quietly you get some dried herbs from a sleeping Caduceus’ stash and wander into the kitchen to make some tea. You’re pretty sure you’re the only one still awake as everyone was quite exhausted after your return. Trying to start a flame to boil the water proved more difficult than you had hoped. Growing frustrated with the flint and steel you slam them on the counter a little too hard. You cringe squeezing your eyes tight shut and listen. Okay… seems like no one woke up from that. You glare at the kettle half the mind to toss it out of the window. Stupid tea. Stupid fire. You take a breather leaning your head against one of the shelves above the counter.

“It looks like we had the same idea.” You almost jump out of your skin quickly covering your mouth to prevent a scream to escape from your lips. You see a bleary eyed Caleb looking about as disheveled as expected standing in the doorway of the kitchen. 

“Don’t scare me like that you idiot!” You toss a towel at him. It hits, draping over one shoulder and he just gives you a ‘really?’ expression as you feel the blood rush from the scare fade. 

“You’re having trouble, ja?” He says more than asks referring to the still cold kettle. 

“You have to make me feel worse about not being able to get a flame going to brew some tea?” You say in jest as you grab another cup for him. Caleb walks over taking your spot and with a snap of the fingers the flame is lit. 

“It is not that difficult.” He jokes back fully aware that your expertise lays not with fire magic. You have many other talents, he’s told you so himself many times praising you for them. You grab the towel draped over his shoulder, fold it neatly and put it back on the counter. 

“Your help is appreciated oh grand master magician.” You give him a side hug which he returns wrapping his arm around your shoulders as you wait for the water to boil. 

“Couldn’t sleep?” You ask watching drops of condensation build up on the outside of the kettle. 

“Ah, no. Uh, wandering thoughts.” Caleb sounds like he’s only half paying attention. Wandering thoughts indeed. 

“Wanna talk about it?” You offer as the kettle starts whistling and you remove it from the heat before it gets too loud and begin preparing the teapot. You take a step closer to the counter, Caleb’s hand falling from your shoulder to your lower back. 

“I… uh-“ He hesitates and you swear when you look over your shoulder for just a second you can see a slight blush creep up his cheeks. 

“Caleb, you know you can tell me anything, right?” He manages to get out a ‘yes’ under his breath so you grab a tray, put the teacups and saucers, the teapot and grab some biscuits from a jar hidden behind the vast array of herbs and spices to avoid a certain Tiefling from claiming them all. Balancing the tray on one hand you turn around and grab his hand, guiding him along into the living room. You put the tray on the table and make Caleb sit down on the couch as you sit down next to him. You can see him take a deep breath and he refuses to meet your eye. Though, that’s not entirely out of character for the wizard so you give him time and space as you pour the tea in each of your cups. With a wave of your hand you cool the hot water to a less scalding but still warm level. 

“I know. But in this case I don’t know if that makes this any easier.” You frown and grab his hands in yours. Almost absentmindedly he begins drawing circles on the back of your palms with this thumbs. While he won’t look at you you can see he’s trying to find the words.

“Should I be worried?” Many questions rush through your head. Was everything alright? Did something happen? 

“No. No. No need to worry.” He musters a quick half smile before it disappears. You hated seeing him like this. So much conflict and inner turmoil. You give his hands a soft squeeze. Whatever this is it must bother him a lot if he’s so affected by it!

“It’s alright. Take however long you need. I’m here for you no matter what.” He takes a deep breath as you finish your sentence. 

“I’ve had some revelations lately and I’ve tried so hard to push them away, deny them or hoping that maybe I was interpreting them wrong but I can no longer just brush them aside. I don’t think it’s fair…” Another deep breath.

“What’s not fair to who?” 

“This. All of it. What I’m doing. It’s not fair to you.” He has trouble forming a sentence. 

“Slowly. Just keep breathing.” You try to calm him down.

“It’s not fair that I freely take your comfort, affection, kindness and even companionship. I’m afraid my actions in return, they do not come from friendship but selfish motives instead. I don’t want this to end but I cannot treat my own actions as rooted from friendship when they are not.” He scrambles on stumbling every few words and you try to make sense of his words but you’ve known him longer than today so you get where he’s going. 

“Caleb…” You begin but he cuts you off.

“No, no I need you to hear this before I cower back and lose the courage to do this. You are heaven sent. You are patient and kind and every time you smile at me I feel my heart skip a beat. Every hug, touch or kiss feels like the warmth of the sun after endless winter. I thought perhaps I felt this way because this is who you are and what you do; making the lives of those you care about brighter where you can. I know you care about me as you’ve reminded me many a time, and I care about you a lot, but I do not think it ends with just care. My realisation showed me that you’ve brought about a feeling I thought myself no longer capable off; love.” He pulls your hands close to his chest. You’re bewilder, confused at this open confession but above all surprised he so openly confides in you. You think hard taking in every word.

“So I think it’s unfair to you when for me this kindness and affection from my side will always be out of love and I cannot in good conscious give you my love when you do not want it. I cannot ask you to feel the same but I also don’t think me returning your kindness and affection can ever be anything other than love. So please, I don’t want what we have, our friendship to end but I don’t want to take what you don’t have to give me…” 

“Caleb, I need you to listen to me very carefully.” You watch as his shoulders slump. So insecure when it comes to other’s feelings and opinions of him it hurts you every time he sells himself short. You look for the right words yourself. If he can muster up the courage then so can you!

“You can be so blinded by your own thoughts and insecurities you don’t even consider the fact that I feel the same.” He finally looks at you wide eyed freezing in place for a second.

“You underestimate your ability to be loved and if I can prove you different, if you will let me prove you different I will.” Caleb scans your face for any sense of insincerity, deceit or even jest but he finds none. He takes a minute but eventually pulls your hands to his lips pressing a long soft kiss to the backs. 

“Thank you. I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve this but you truly are a light in the darkness.” He kisses the backs of your hands again. 

“You were you; all you ever need to be.” You shift leaning into his side, head against his shoulder and his arm wrapping around you. Intertwining your fingers with his at your waist you grasp his other hand and bring it to your lips. That small kiss right where his wrist meets his palm makes him melt. He leans back on the couch pulling you with in a slouched relaxed position. If only the rest of the Nein could see you now. They’d go crazy… 

[beautifulterriblequeen]

B2:S - Chapter 4

Much of this series will be about the differences and additions in the novel version, and how they contribute to my understanding of story canon. But there will be character appreciation, the odd theory and headcanon, and suchlike as well.

Here be Viren being villainous, Rayla, Claudia, Soren, and Callum, and tons of culture clash themey stuff

and a tw: animal death, Claudia why

Spoilers for Book Two: Sky below.

Viren's scenes in Book Two: Sky are all amazing because they're full of worldbuilding and character building details. I love to study the word choices used from his perspective. They're so tasty. Like how he forced a servant, and also Soren, to carry his messages to the rookery, so that he never had to go himself. I'm really curious why Viren is forcing a servant, whose job is literally to serve, here. He really only has to ask. Maybe he was mean about it on purpose, or maybe he picked a servant who was afraid of birds just to flex on them. Whatever the reason for the word choice, Viren doesn't seem to like servants' jobs, it seems, especially when they take him somewhere with poop on the floor. It makes it all the more ironic that he sweeps Runaan's cell clean himself, then, humbling himself before he finally figures out the mirror.

Viren's secretive, right down to his very carefully chosen words to those around him, but his true thoughts shine through even more clearly in the book than in the show. He knows he's been sneaking and hiding stuff, and he knows that some of those actions would be called treachery. Stealing the king's seal to forge royal documents is up there on the treacherous list, but it's apparently not there alone. Ah, Viren, such a villainous delight. What have you gotten up to?

The way he thinks of and treats Crow Master is ageist and classist, but certain lines also hint that Viren has spent a lot of time memorizing the finer points of proper courtesy, and he expects others to have done the same. There are many reasons someone might put forth such effort: a commoner trying to better himself to be noticed by a kind prince is a nice version. A sociopath learning to fake caring about rich people so he can blend in with them is less nice. Superconveniently, the skills a young, earnest Viren might use to feel worthy of Harrow's attention will serve him just as well when dark magic ravages his empathy and he has to lie to everyone about how dead he is inside in order to keep his position of power. Until he's not lying anymore and he straight up threatens poor Crow Master with death unless he sends illegal mail for him. There's the Viren we know and uhhhhhh

Rayla and the blue rose! It's so fun to see inside her head here. She acted swiftly in the last chapter to save herself from Claudia's sleep spell, but now that she has to lie there, that thorn really hurts! She wishes she maybe had a different plan instead of playing asleep.

I hope Rayla only calls Claudia's voice "awful" because of association. I love Claudia's raspy voice! It's so neat! Rayla immediately recognizes it as Claudia's, from the castle and identifies her as a dark mage, with a clanky-metal warrior beside her. She gets mad at Soren for apparently calling killing a sport, even though that's not what he said at all. Soren's using an unfamiliar, maybe old-fashioned term, and Rayla's taking it very literally. It's like Viren and Runaan are arguing through them. A fun little example of culture clash.

Also digging the fact that Rayla knows what sleeping breathing looks like, as opposed to awake breathing, for the purposes of faking someone out. Did she just. Perch in a tree over Runaan and Ethari as they napped after a picnic and watched them sleep, or did Runaan help her sneak around the Silvergrove to spy on sleeping elves for training purposes? Also, raise your hand if you've faked sleep breathing to fool someone. that's not just me right

Rayla's sass is a constant delight. Whenever she's up against an enemy, she is outwardly fearless and full of witty taunts and comments, and I love her so much. where could she have learned this from I also love that she can't help but flex on Soren about her technique. It seems that her attitude is part "never show fear" and part "humans are liars."

Claudia and Soren were trying to kill Rayla to save the princes from her. But Rayla was also intent on killing both of them right back. And she wasn't ever gonna tell Callum and Ez about that. Woah. First Harrow, now this. That whole "death and secrets" thing really sank in with her, didn't it? Crack voice in the back of my brain: Ethari does know Runaan stabs people, right, he does know that?

Interesting change of detail from show to book: in the show, Claudia overheats Rayla's swords with some green splattery goo from a little glass jar. In the book, uhhh. She grabs a live bird and squishes it to cast the spell. Eew. Really making a point of dark magic's inherent violence today, I see. Got it.

"Rayla, pipe down." Callum still has a ways to go on how to win friends and influence people here. Everyone's shouting, he's interrupted to save Rayla's life (or so he thinks), and when Rayla shouts that his friends tried to kill her, he tells her--and no one else--to pipe down. Followed soon by "but a 'good' elf." Ahgod. He doesn't think he's taking sides, but he's got two humans versus one elf, and he's a human himself, and his underlying biases are showing. He's 14, and he's willing to learn, though--and he really does learn and grow over time. But this version of this scene was just. So. Painfully. Awkward.

I feel like this version was part of a larger theme I'm seeing throughout the first half of the book, emphasizing that Callum comes from years of having a crush on Claudia, and it takes many scenes with Claudia and with Rayla to shift through several gears with each of them in order to facilitate the possibility of breaking with Claudia and then also of falling for Rayla, in a way that feels organic within the structure of the story being told.

Also Callum super has a type and it's Girls Who Will Commit Murder. I don't make the rules.

Rayla's defense just attacks Callum's word choice: "What do you mean, 'but a good elf'? Do you know any bad elves?" And I just. Rayla, honey. You're not in any better of a spot than Callum right now. Your mentor literally stabs people to death. You're both literally assassins. Some humans could accept most elves, but they might draw the line at assassins.

But this tiny clash in the midst of this war, this single exchange of words, is such a great microcosm, the war made personal. It's early enough in their adventure and their growth that they're still sounding a lot like their parents. And that includes Claudia! She demands to know how an elf can be good, and Callum allows that it's possible for good elves to exist, but he has to be the one to say it, not the actual elf behind him. And the actual elf behind him insists that her kind are all good, thank you very much, and implying otherwise skirts very close to "humans are liars."

It's quite a tangle, but having the main characters tangled up like this shows us that as they untangle themselves in their own personal situations, they're learning things about human and elven hearts, about relationships and family, and those things are universal truths which they can use to help them understand other people's troubles, as well as the larger issues involved in the war they're trying to stop.

Callum assessing--and then reassessing--his confidence level. It's adorable, and it serves to show that his first scrambling attempt to make peace, in which he messed up a little but at least no one died--won't be his last. He's not really sure how this is gonna go. Everything is new. But he's dedicated to peace, and he's not giving up. He did just run in between Soren and his target while Soren was holding a sword.

He keeps doing that. Standing in front of people who have their weapons raised in his direction. And he does it with a ridiculous amount of chill. Is this Sarai's influence on him? Considering that Harrow has kept his distance, maybe so! I'd love that.

This chapter ends with some fun relationship drama when Callum gets butterflies in his stomach at being around Claudia again. She tucks a strand of hair behind his ear, and he forgets all about telling her about smashing her primal stone. He instantly worries that Rayla saw her gesture, which of course she did. Callum's nervousness and Rayla's glare feel to me like they're supposed to fit into a tactical box instead of a romantic box, but I can see how it could be interpreted the other way. Callum just intervened in a fight that Rayla completely intended to end by secretly killing Claudia and Soren, so in Rayla's mind, she's probably convinced that Callum intervened to save his girlfriend's life, while he's sure that he just saved Rayla's. She's probably angry because Claudia's gesture is making her think that Callum only seemed to be trying to save Rayla when his true intention was to save Claudia all along.

Dun dun dunnnnnnn.

[tradeway2]

Session 1 10 Jul 2021

We start a little later than usual today as our illustrious DM has been working hard to provide a game from scratch for us this week!

We were asked to provide him with a name, race, sub-race, and a class if we wanted to. We were not asked to draw up character sheets or determine stats and so on, and it’s been driving us (all now at least somewhat seasoned D&D players) up the wall. Matthew hops on to the chat after Joe drops the link to the game, to ask us not to open our character sheets if we sign in early. Duncan tells us he has emphasised this casual torture by having not even read the rules for his class; he likes to live on the edge.

When we sign in, we are greeted with this calming landing page (we know it's calming, because Matthew tells us it is):

Ah. Well that’s alright then.

We are told this campaign could last ten minutes or the rest of our lives; Matthew is hoping for somewhere in the middle. We have some technical issues - as is to be expected. Roll20 is a steep learning curve. One might even call it a wall.

We’re told that this entire fiasco is based off a spoof tv show that Matthew saw late at night once and thought it would be fun to base a one-shot on. Then it got out of hand, and now has the potential to become a full campaign. Here's hoping! Without further ado, we dive in…

Cora (Ishara) stands beside a crossroads. There is a sundial at its centre; she sees the shadow pass over its face. An elven merchant passes, cart laden with water jugs. She waves, but her face is a picture of fury. The sundial's shadow disappears - it is midday. Another elven merchant passes, this one with a cart of food. She also waves, but she is in floods of tears. The sundial shows that dusk is approaching. A third elven merchant passes, with a cart full of empty glass jars. She laughs hysterically as she passes by, waving as she goes.

Night falls and the moon rises. A fourth merchant approaches, but this one does not wave. Her face is blank as she walks toward Cora - she drops a bunch of snapdragons at Cora's feet and continues walking. Cora picks the flowers up and admires them; half the bunch withers and dies, and the other half grows to twice its size. She drops them to the ground; as the new roots touch it, the earth collapses beneath her -

She awakens, to see Leslie:

He tells her he doesn’t know who she is, but she shouldn’t be sleeping here.

We all awake now, in what appears to be the ruins of a battlefield.

We are all zombies.

Huh.

We see each other as friends; in fact the word 'zombie' in Friend means 'friend'. We know this, because as it turns out, we all speak Friend.

But not Common. Hmm.

Leslie tells us his name and asks why we’re sleeping here?

We roll History checks to see if we remember anything; that will be hard for Marcus who has -3 INT.

Pilfer remembers his name, and something about a boat, and nothing else. No idea where he is or why, or who his new friends are. Ren knows that this is definitely his lute. He takes it. Will he remember how to play it?

Hilda remembers nothing about how she got here, but she remembers fighting in a war. A big one. It was important; significant to her. Marcus remembers little more than Ren. That’s definitely his rucksack, though. Milo knows something is missing but he can’t figure out what. Cora remembers her dream. There was a risk that she wouldn’t. She’s told it didn’t feel like her dream, even though she was dreaming it.

We heard voice from behind a wall saying, “Friends? Friends!” Leslie rolls his eyes.

Cora goes to the wall to see if she can lend aid to the owner of the voice. It is coming from very close to Hilda. Should she do something about it? Where are we?

Hilda rolls a nat 20 for her Perception check. (Fun new house rule: if we are using a skill or tool and roll a nat20, we gain Proficiency - ooo!)

It is carnage around us. A huge fight has happened here. Imagine the biggest battle from the LotR movies - what we see laid out before us makes that look like a boundary dispute between neighbours.

Does Ren feel peckish when he looks at the bodies? It looks like food, but food has this habit of moving around; once it stops doing that, it’s bad food. We are all aware of this; what we're looking at is No Longer Food.

There are old fires and signs of burns on the ground. Amongst all this we hear the bewildered, friendly voice again asking for help. It’s coming from the remains of a building that has been destroyed by fire or magic or something of that ilk.

Hilda goes to investigate, and Pilfer goes to look as well. It turns out Matthew meant to put us on a different map, but we have been looking at the crossroads this whole time. Whoops! We switch to the map. Technical issues, please stand by…

(Matthew, direct quote: “JOE! Make it better, help!”

Joe helps, and makes it better. We continue… )

Ren has a go at tuning his lute. He makes a Performance check. an 8! We are all suitably distracted.

The voice calls again. “Friends?”

Where is this voice, and whose is it?

Leslie introduces himself again, rather pointedly probably, and we all introduce ourselves this time. Leslie seems particularly enamoured by Milo. The voice asks us what are we going to call him?

Pilfer suggests Bingo; Bingo likes that so that’s his name now. Pilfer asks how long he’s been here? He heard us get up and before that it was dark, but before that it was quite bright. Before that it was dark, and before that it was bright. Before that there was a lot of angry people, and there was a lot of food, and now the food’s all gone. He tried to leave, but he couldn’t.

Pilfer - formerly a drow elf - is dismayed to discover that it is daytime. He panics until he finds his parasol.

Ren gets a nat20 - he now has proficiency in Investigation! (There is a limit to the number of these bonuses we can receive, we are warned.) He and Marcus and Hilda all see Bingo's problem. Pilfer, however, has got lost in Bingo’s eyes again. He’s a good looking fella.

“Would that we had met before the rot set in!”

Milo gets distracted when some food shouts at him from over the bridge - it then pegs it away. Milo wants to follow, but we are all Slow (-10feet). The food disappears into the trees. He is disappointed, and hungry. He sits on a bit of broken bridge and sulks; Leslie joins him. He offers to help him look for some more food.

Bingo is pinned in place with a spear through his sternum - he’s upright, and the spear is piercing him from above. Can we pull it out? Or him out? Marcus has a go at pulling him by the hands - and manages to get Bingo off the spear with a 19 STR check. Bingo is very pleased. Ren asks if he wants the spear back; Bingo says it’s not his. Ren takes it instead, and adds it to his inventory. He has two now.

Bingo says he’s going to find the horde.

Us, politely confused: "The what?"

The horde! It’s the best! We should totally join him.

Leslie pats Milo on the back and tells him not to be disheartened. We’ll find some food. We suspend our disbelief while Matthew puts some food on the map that we didn’t notice sneaking up on us…

Ren rolls another nat20, getting proficiency with Perception. Thanks to Milo’s alertness, the food doesn’t get the drop on him either. Pilfer’s stomach rumbles, and we roll initiative. (Marcus gets five XP for helping Bingo off the spear!)

Noticing that we appear to have noticed them, the food closest to us appears to be carrying a stick. Uh oh… Food uses tools, this is the thing we learn first. The first food seems reluctant to move towards us, so it holds an action.

Cora is up first. She shambles 20 feet, and uses her action to dash twenty more feet and gets right up to some food and zombie-groans in its ear.

Milo remembers different food, food that you have to sneak up on, so he has a go at that. He rolls a Bad stealth check, and uses all fifteen of his feet, loudly announcing what he is doing to Leslie as he goes.

A food bonks Cora on the head with a stick for 15 to hit, which does, for 2 bludgeoning damage. Another food advances towards us - he’s wobbling his arm and pointing to the food that bonked Cora on the head.

Marcus shamble-dashes toward Cora, upsetting the food that she’s in melee with. Another food tries to hit him, but misses. Marcus consoles it.

Pilfer moves forward. Can he throw a dagger? Yes he can. He hucks his knife at a food. 21 to hit! Right in the shanks. 3 piercing damage! He did not get the food in the shanks; he got it in the neck.

He feels a weird urge to snack. All the other foods look very unnerved at this development. The food isn’t quite dead, but clutching its neck with blood pouring through its fingers and making an agonized squealing noise.

Pilfer: “... Is he okay?”

Hilda waddles up to another food, the one that lurched forward at us. She gives it a smash with her greatclub for 13 to hit.

Matthew kicks himself out of the game. We won!

Moving on…

Hilda’s attack hits, for 9 bludgeoning damage. She destroys the food. Can she still eat it? As a bonus action she eats some of the food, before it spoils. (Matthew moves the token to get it out of the way. Hilda, aggrieved: “I was eating that!”)

Ren’s turn. He swings the lute around, remembering that a lute is a useful thing to have; he can’t remember what to do with it so he swings it back out of the way and gets his spear instead. He stabs at the food in front of him. He spears it successfully and goes to town before it spoils. “Yum yum.” He says grace, which sounds like a beautiful prayer to us, and like hideous gurgling to the food.

Another food rushes at Hilda, seeing the thing she just done. It natty 20s her, but the damage is only 4.

Cora swings her mace at the food in front of her, to get to the juicy filling. 11 to hit, which does, and 3 bludgeoning damage. She’s tenderised it good; that’ll melt in the mouth, that will. Fall right off the bone.

Milo has heard all this going on; he goes back up and throws a javelin at the food attacking Hilda. He crit-fails. Whoops! He gears up and swings, and throws the javelin in completely the wrong direction. He looks at Leslie, who shrugs.

"I'd have thrown that over there, if I were you."

Leslie moves up, and old Bingo’s gonna get in the game as well. (Matthew forgot to roll initiative for them on the first round. He puts them in the turn order; better odds for us, yeah!)

Cora’s food tries to hit her again, but misses. There must be delicious sauce in its eyes.

Marcus batters the food in front of him with a slam attack, not realising there’s a quarterstaff on his back that he could use. He hits and kills the food, and goes to town. It turns out that that was Pilfer’s food; he retrieves his dagger and stops for a little nibble. A fistful of the insidey-bits is a great snack-on-the-go. He has enough movement to flank another food, so he does that, and makes a slam attack against it. He has prepared another meal!

Hilda’s turn, and the meals around her are in full swing; she uses both her action and her bonus action to snack on two different foods.

(Ed, OOC: “Is it bad that this game is making me hungry?”)

Ren too decides to feast on the 'horrible visceral tapas' that surrounds him. (We are adjusting swiftly to our new circumstance.)

Cora has another go at the pudding with a slam attack, hits the wrong button, finds the right one, and hits that for 13 damage which makes contact. 8 bludgeoning! She has prepared the heck out of that meal by swinging at the head and taking it clean off.

We are out of initiative! Pilfer waves a bit of meat at Bingo and invites him to join us. Milo seasons his own meal with the spices in his bag and even washes his hands, remembering that that’s important to do before eating. Pilfer empties his waterskin and fills it with blood. If he shakes it every now and again it’ll be fine.

It turns out that our meal doesn’t seem appetising for very long, and we quickly realise that our food has spoiled.

We roll Perception checks, at Disadvantage because we’re eating. Leslie doesn’t seem interested in the food.

Pilfer asks him what’s up, why isn’t he chowing down with the rest of us? He’s eating his own meal, he hints. Ren would love to Investigate Leslie. There seem to be bits of plant coming out of wounds or open sores on his body; he catches Ren looking and explains that although he’s a Friend, he eats it a bit differently. Over a period of time. We aren’t really talking to the person-suit, we’re talking to the plant inside the body. He uses the food to get around a bit more easily. And he can eat it even though it’s gone grey. The word he uses is 'compost'.

But, he assures us, we are all Friends here.

Fair dos. So, to the horde then?

Bingo looks really excited at this. Do we know where the horde is, he asks us?

"... We don’t even know what the horde is."

If we want to know who and what we are, Leslie might know someone who knows someone…?

There is a gnawing in the back of our heads (not worms); maybe we might want to know more about ourselves than just our names. (Which - it's odd that we even know our names. That's certainly more than Bingo knew.) Hilda thinks we might not want to know; we might upset ourselves.

We can follow Bingo to the horde. Or we could go with Leslie and take Bingo with us, and do horde stuff later? We’re full now, and all the food has gone bad, so we may as well follow Leslie. We get 15 XP for eating all that food.

We walk through the battlefield and the heaps of spoiled food. Occasionally we hear shouting in the distance:

Random friend: “Friend? Friend!”

Bingo, shouting back: “I’m called Bingo!”

New Bingo: “Oh, wow! Can I be called Bingo?”

Bingo Prime: “Sure!”

(Ed returns from the kitchen with snacks, very confused to arrive back in the middle of this.)

We shuffle along with Leslie. There are a lot of Bingos about, after a while. It starts to get dark. Ren remembers he has a tail. Leslie turns to us and says he once inhabited a food with a tail. It wasn’t a grippy one, but it was quite furry. He doesn’t know what you’d call it, but it was quite entertaining to see the looks on the other foods' faces.

Leslie doesn’t like to travel overnight, so we sit down in a little sitting around circle. His eyes aren’t good in the dark. Do we feel tired…? We don’t need to sleep, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t. Every so often we hear the little Bingo exchange in the distance. (We’re going to regret this.)

We roll INT checks at Disadvantage - Marcus rolls a 16. Maybe it’s a faded memory, but he is pretty certain he remembers going to sleep in a similar situation, and one person stayed awake. He suggests to the others that one of us should stay awake; most of them don't seem to follow his train of thought. He remains awake and so does Milo; Ren paces in circles until he gets bored.

Those of the group that try to sleep, give it a go. They don’t dream exactly. Those that stay awake still get the benefits of a long rest. Yay!

(We break for tea and cigarettes and whatnot.)

Bingo lies down, seeing some of us do that, and asks what we’re doing. Those of us that stay awake roll Perception checks.

While Matthew’s computer reboots, he tells Cora about her dream.

She stands in a familiar room; the bookshelves around her are laden with ancient texts. She notices that there is no door. She starts to feel anxious. Music sounds, from a hearth that wasn't there a moment ago. There is a music box open on the stone floor. She kneels down and closes the lid, and finds herself standing in a field. Her anxiety fades to contentment as she stands in the short, but lush, green grass. About a hundred feet away, a large black stag with eyes of fire begins to charge her. She begins to float, and the stag passes harmlessly beneath her. She flies over the treetops. Behind her she sees a triangle of ravens flying in her wake. She lands, surrounded by friends and safe, and the ravens continue on.

Marcus and Milo stayed awake; Marcus was distracted, wondering what the twinkly in the sky lights do and if anyone will ever walk on the surface of one, that kind of thing. Milo sees figures that appear to be advancing towards us. Uh oh!

Is it friends or food? Milo thinks it’s almost definitely food. It did not introduce itself as Bingo. Milo alerts us all that our delivery has arrived, and we roll initiative.

Cora goes first. She nobbles one with her mace and a nat 20 for 7 bludgeoning damage. She sees some sauce come out.

Marcus Slams another one; he makes a dent in it. (He still hasn’t realised he has a quarterstaff.)

A guard attacks Hilda with a spear. Hilda, sounding mildly inconvenienced: “Nooo!” 13 hits. Things are getting a little more real. She takes 6 piercing damage and is quite poorly.

Milo wants to know if this food is human sized; it is. He shambles into one and does a slam at it, and has a go at chomping off a couple of crunchy fingers. 18 hits. Milo, extremely pleased: “Delicious!” 8 chomping damage, and he comes away with some delicious bits of food. If this guy was planning on using his spear two handed, he may have to re-think his strategy.

Leslie’s turn. He makes it quite a way out to his chosen food, but his attack misses. The food next to Cora has a go at clobbering her with a 9 - which misses.

Pilfer’s turn, and he zips down toward another food to whale on it. He rolls a dirty 20 and slams him good, also doing max damage.

Hilda's turn! 15 with her club just misses, and she’s very annoyed about it. As a bonus action she wants to still try and have a chomp, but nothing happens.

The food fighting with Marcus fails to hit him, as does the one with Leslie. Milo’s food natty 20s him for 13 damage, and he’s down. Oh no! He rolls a good CON save and pops back with 1 HP.

Another food attacks Bingo and another attacks Pilfer but misses. Ren shambles across to help our good friend Bingo by poking the food with his spear, hitting for 4.

Bingo does a slam on the food as well, but misses. Marcus misses his attack; he is marinading it in its sauce, he says. Squeezing it like a mango to check for ripeness.

Cora rolls an 18 with her mace, and 3 bludgeoning. The food looks nearly ready. She falls upon it and has a chew. (Matthew: “Gross. I like it.”)

15 hits Marcus for 7 spikin’ in the tummy. No worries; he's got four more spikin' in the tummy left. Milo’s next slam hits, doing 6 points of munching damage, eating it to the point of perfection. It runs around screaming with a little halfling zombi- friend, attached to it first; Milo sets about feasting when it lies down and stops moving.

Leslie does an attack, and prepares another meal as Matthew plays D&D by himself. Pilfer has another attack - a 15 just misses. “Curse you!”

Hilda has another go with her great club for a 17, and 10 bludgeoning damage. Her food went from raw to almost perfect in one hit. It’s still moving about a bit, but in a much more ‘ready to be food’ fashion.

Ren’s food swings at him and misses. Ren, put out: “The food's just playing with me. It's supposed to be the other way around, right?”

Pilfer’s food fumbles at him and hits, and he’s none too pleased about it. He takes two HP damage when his food pokes him. “How dare it! I’m getting pre-eating indigestion, somehow.”

Ren does another poke with his spear. “Stop moving around! It makes it harder to bite you!” Six misses, unfortunately.

Hilda’s food attacks her for 14, which hits for 5 damage and she’s down. She rolls a CON save, but fails. She is at 0HP. She will be rolling undeath saves, oh no!

Bingo slams his food and misses. Marcus prepares his food with a crunch, and begins chomping.

Cora would like to kneecap her food so it can’t escape. The kneecaps are one of the best bits. 7 damage to the food (not Marcus!) and begins to chomp as well.

Milo’s meal is going down a treat, but he notices that Hilda appears to be lying down even though her food is standing up. Is her food trying to eat her? He’s not having this; Friends are not Food! He slings his javelin at Hilda’s food. The javelin hits, and he gives it a good dressing down. “Rude!”

We don’t understand it, but the remaining food is very distressed. If we could understand the food, we'd hear it saying, “Oh my God, they’re using tools!”

Leslie dashes at full pelt, but doesn’t get far. He looks puffed out; or he would if there was breath in his body.

Pilfer slams his food for a nat20. “YES! YES! What’s that mean, do I roll damage twice? Yes! YES! Look at all that damage. Yes! I bludgeon him to the floor, I eat him.”

Hilda rolls an undeath save: a 17, yay!

The last guard takes his turn. Looking around him he realises he’s in trouble, so he legs it. Wait - Ren is still struggling with a live one, and the guard isn’t going to abandon his mate. He runs up to Ren and gives him a bit of a poke - 12 just hits him. He takes 4 points of being stabbed. However -

It is now his turn. The food that he’s stabbed looks closer to edible than the newly arrived food. He stirs his spear around in it for 23, and 6 piercing damage. His food is well prepped and looking delicious.

Bingo hasn’t had much luck prying open the last one, so he has a go at Ren’s new arrival but misses. It’s been a long day.

While Marcus is shovelling stuff into his mouth, he notices that Hilda is down. Upon seeing her, his rotting brain supplies “…food?” But he remembers that’s not right. He shuffles over and pokes her with a Medicine check of 9; he can’t figure out why she’s lying down. Yelling “Get up!” doesn’t seem to do anything.

Cora shambles over to the two of them with a handful of brain pudding, and attempts to feed it to Hilda. She rolls a Medicine check - another 9. On the plus side, it’s not like she can choke her to death.

Milo has just eaten a whole hand, so he comes over for a poke at Hilda as well. He snaps off a finger from his food and tries to poke it into her mouth. It works! He’s very pleased. This feels familiar to him.

Leslie pats still-unconscious Hilda on the head. In broad Gloucestershire accent: “There there.”

Pilfer proceeds to his second course. A dirty 20 for 6 bludgeoning, hitting it so hard on the top of the head that its neck disappears into its chest. The guard returns in kind - 9 to hit, which misses.

the guard looks worried as he looks around. “… Fuck.” We, of course, do not understand him.

Ren gets confused and tries to stab his food with his lute, but misses. Bingo misses again. It’s a wonder he’s survived this long.

Marcus natty 20s the last food, for 11 HP. "That's as many hit points as I have on a good day!"

DM: "That's as many hit points as he started with."

While we wait for Hilda to wake up, we can search for loot! Or lute! Who knows!

We leave it there, and Matthew will tell us what treasures we find on our respective food. Pilfer makes a prawn cocktail with gizzards.

[iwillgetridofyourangerforyou]

While I'm losing hope on next OPM season being animated (still disappointed at S2 quality), I'm definitely super hyped for Murata's manga version of Garou vs Saitama! We've already seen how epicly drawn Psykorochi vs Tatsumaki+Genos fights in recent chapters, especially on the super detailed drawing and god-tier artstyle for it. Can't wait how Murata will makes us jawdropping at his art again for Saitama&Garou's confrontation, since ONE's webcomic version was already amazing! How about you?

Hello anon~ 

thanks for the ask, your timing is quite good. I’ve been wanting to talk to someone about OPM again. 

I agree. I’m not sure what to make of where the anime will go from here but I haven’t been particularly sad about that since I absolutely fell in love with Murata’s art. D: 

I’m still a bit ravenous for any new content the creators can send our way except the live action but who knows maybe I’ll even give that a chance, but at this point every new chapter update for either the Manga or the webcomic has been well worth the wait.  

The part where I start getting more specific about Spoilers

I am also super excited to see how Murata draws the Saitama confronting Garou. I imagine we still have at least a few chapters to go before we get to that moment though, and I am still looking forward to every single one. Murata has really been going all out drawing Garou and so I’m especially excited to see his take on Garou’s full monster form and in what subtle ways his character design will have changed from the original once he returns. 

The amount of symbolism in the Manga is also pretty interesting and I’m curious to see what more conceptual connections are being made in the story as Murata draws it. 

If the Manga follows the webcomic as closely as I assume it will we also won’t see much of Garou for a while, which unless they handle it delicately, will seem a bit jarring after everything we’ve been through with him as readers.

This is the part where I list spoilers to describe my excitement. 

There are so so many little webcomic moments I’m looking forward to seeing in Murata’s style. From Tank Top Master’s training, Bofoi’s construction techniques and hoards of robots, King’s search for a Master and Atomic Samurai’s sword cutting test, I’m looking forward to seeing not-so-overgrown-rover, and the moment when Fubuki’s followers decide to follow her even though she’s focusing on building her own strength. Tatsumaki vs Saitama will be a jaw dropping fight for sure, especially after the precedent Murata set in the recent chapters. 

 This is the part were I talk about Genos again. Because that’s kind of the whole point of my blog sometimes.

Unfortunately, my excitement is mixed with a bit of apprehension. ONE and Murata don’t hold back when it comes to Cyborg Gore and our friend Genos is in for the worst he’s seen yet. And that will be nothing compared to the jeers cheers of the haters on reddit and other platforms. That’ll be exhausting, it is already exhausting. I’m interested to see how Genos looks when he comes back, I doubt he’ll keep the dragon inspired armor look, but maybe he’ll keep some features of it? It would almost hurt more if he discarded everything about the look entirely as if he saw what happened as nothing but a loss. 

The way ONE drew Genos post MA is already so heartbreaking, seeing Murata’s style will be like experiencing all that pain again in high definition. For so long I’ve just wanted him to be OK but he’s getting less and less ‘OK’ and the resolution is still on the horizon. And I imagine during that whole time Genos hate will not subside, it might even get worse. Although, it might get a little better because ONE makes a point to show us that Genos has gotten a lot stronger multiple times, not that that’s ever stopped the haters before. (side note: I think one part of the reason the haters annoy me so much is because I think there is a really important story Genos’ character is telling us that may even be especially relevant to some of the people who like to hate on him the most but I worry that they’re unreceptive to the story.)

I don’t handle unanswered questions very well. Especially when I get personally invested in the questions. That part of the reason I struggle so much with existential dread. I may have some ideas about some of the themes ONE might choose to go with for Genos’ story partially from reading other works but I won’t really be satisfied until I get it ‘from the horses mouth’. For that reason I am almost more excited about webcomic updates than Manga updates. When the last Manga chapter dropped I quickly got caught up in the excitement but for a moment I was just like ‘oh. OH YEAH! The Manga! that’s a thing that’s still happening Yay~’. 

Basically the Summary

I have to admit I definitely got an unexpectedly high dopamine rush from the last Manga chapter. I’m not 100% my tolerance is low enough anymore for Murata to top that experience for me but that doesn’t mean I’m not excited. 

Thanks again for the ask!

[yumeka36]

Well, I know I said a while back when more Frozen 2 leaks came out that I was gonna avoid making anymore posts expressing my thoughts until I actually see the movie myself...but alas, what I’d consider the jackpot of leaks came out yesterday causing me to develop more thoughts I feel are better expressed now than later. As usual, skip this post if you don’t want to be supremely spoiled...

After the initial leaks from the not-yet-released mythology book a few weeks ago, which confirmed the movie will end with Anna as queen of Arendelle and Elsa as the Snow Queen/fifth spirit, the real question we’ve had since then is: will they continue to live together or separately? Many official sources such as storybooks and interviews with the creators hinted at separation, and after nearly two weeks of letting the realization that this movie won’t end in the way I would have liked practically eat me alive, I decided it was best to just remain positive, as the events of the story’s third act are still mostly a mystery.

Before I continue, I just want to point out that I understand both sides of the fandom right now: the side that feels hurt and betrayed by this kind of ending, and the side that’s more accepting and doesn’t want to jump to conclusions without seeing it firsthand. It’s been tough for me being in the middle - at times I totally get the backlash. We fell in love with the story of the first movie and shorts about two sisters reconnecting and now the sequel ends with them finding happiness elsewhere. But at the same time, I know that living separately doesn’t diminish familial bonds and it’s a normal thing that happens. I know it’s easy to dismiss it as a trend since a lot of other recent family movie sequels had similar endings, but I want to judge it in its own right. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still not happy we’re getting a separation ending, but I also know I’ll love 95% of this movie, so I can’t bring myself to throw in the towel at the last 5% without seeing every detail for myself, every word of dialogue, every scene, every nuance in character expressions and actions. I’d feel much more okay with this ending if this was Frozen 3 we’re talking about and we had another Frozen 2 that focused on Anna and Elsa reconnecting as sisters. To go from the end of the first Frozen with them finally getting to know each other after 13 years apart, straight to a sequel that ends with them separating is a leap that really needed more padding. The shorts fill the gap somewhat, but not enough in my opinion. We should have had a Frozen 2 story about Elsa trying to get over her guilt about shutting Anna out all those years, and once that’s resolved, it ends with a return to the status quo that sets the stage for the story we actually have in Frozen 2 (which should be Frozen 3!) I really feel we needed one more “smaller” story like this to pad things out after the first Frozen before the major changes that happens in Frozen 2 (can we get a Frozen 1.5 anyone?) But as I’ll describe further in this post, I’m not convinced that the last 5% of Frozen 2 will be so bad that it will override everything else about the movie, or Frozen in general.

I should also mention that I’ve always been neutral to Kristoff and his relationship with Anna. I find Anna and Elsa’s relationship way more appealing and interesting, but I’ve also always believed Anna has plenty of room in her big heart for sisterly love for Elsa and romantic love for Kristoff. Since they skipped any talk of marriage in the first Frozen, it was no surprise at all that it would be brought up in the sequel. Since they intend Frozen 2 to be the last installment (for now) they couldn’t leave a loose end like Kristoff and Anna’s engagement. I could take it or leave it, but as long as Anna and Elsa’s relationship is portrayed as the strongest bond (which it seems to be) I don’t mind giving Anna romantic love too (and maybe Elsa one day?)

But anyway, yes, a month before its official release, several page scans from the The Art of Frozen 2 have leaked, which pretty much confirm the ending alluded to in the mythology book and many others. And honestly, after taking some time to let all the information sink in, I’m not as upset as I thought I would be. At first I thought I was just numb by now, having already been sick about it for nearly two weeks after the mythology book leaked. But more likely, I think I’ve just made myself form a different perspective. In all the fandoms I partake in, I always try to make myself open to different interpretations of the characters and story even if they don’t fully agree with my own. I understand that there’s a risk involved with falling too deeply in love with someone else’s creation - that they may not interpret the characters and story the same way you do and it becomes difficult to distinguish your own headcanon perspective vs actual canon. What I think has happened with the Frozen fandom is an unfortunate case where lack of canon material has caused me (and no doubt others) to indulge so much in my own headcanons that I started to see it as “fact” when it really is just my interpretation and “filling in the blanks” so to speak.

To illustrate, Anna and Elsa spend very little time together in the first movie, which is what makes their rekindled love for each other at the end so impacting. But if you think about it, the ice skating together in the original Frozen’s epilogue plus a few more scenes in the two short films, only equates to about a half hour’s worth of content showing them interacting as sisters. When you have such an appealing character relationship but such a small amount of canon content with which to interpret it over a span of six years, it’s only natural that my own headcanons took over until I started seeing them as the only interpretation. Especially for Elsa, who has a lot less screentime in the first movie than Anna, so honestly we really don’t know her that well. Have I really seen enough of her in the first movie plus two shorts to say with certainty that she could never be happy without Anna always being by her side? Is the filmmakers’ view of her as a “protector” and “mythical character” who feels at home in the enchanted lands less valid than my own interpretation of her? Again, when I try to describe Elsa I realize that much of it is based on my own headcanons, which are perfectly valid, but I shouldn’t be surprised if it turns out the filmmakers have a different vision for her. Just because I personally love all the sisterly moments between Anna and Elsa and so always want that to exist in the Frozen universe so I can keep indulging in it, mean that any other direction for the story is bad? Of course anyone can infer basic things about Anna and Elsa without any headcanons, such as the fact that they love each other and enjoy being together, but when I ask myself questions like “What evidence do I really have that they’ll always want to live together?” or “Is Elsa really perfectly content being the queen of Arendelle as opposed to doing something else?” or “Does true love mean always having to physically be close to each other in order to be happy?” I realize that I can’t answer them as confidently as I’d like. 

As I asked myself questions like this and read the leaked art book pages a few times over - especially the foreward - I came to the conclusion that the creators did indeed put a lot of love and effort into their choices for Frozen 2, and their thought process for developing the story as described in the foreward makes sense even if it’s not the direction I personally would have gone. As I was reading it, I thought, if another fan like myself wrote it I would think “Hm, that’s an interesting interpretation, not quite how I see it, but valid nonetheless.” But in this case, the one with that interpretation is the creators, so all you can do is accept their view or move away. It’s not like they were way off and focused the sequel on a new character and pushed Anna and Elsa into the background, or even focused a lot on Anna and Kristoff: from everything I’ve read, the focus of Frozen 2 is still the “undying love of two sisters” (as Josh Gad put it), just not in the way I was expecting. Anna and Elsa’s bond has been conveyed as so strong it’s almost omnipotent and ethereal, even more so it seems in the sequel, so the interpretation is twofold: does the fact that it’s this strong mean that they always have to be together in order to be happy, or does it mean that time and space doesn’t matter because it’s so strong? Obviously the filmmakers (and others) interpret it the latter way while many fans interpret it the former. But can we really say one view is wrong and the other is right?

And even with all these leaks, there’s still a lot we don’t know: we still don’t know exactly what happens in Ahtohallan and other events leading up to the epilogue. We don’t know for sure that being the “fifth spirit” means Elsa will become a literal spirit or just get a boost in magical power. We don’t know all the whys and hows of her choosing to become the Snow Queen and giving the role of queen to Anna. These are very important plot points that I feel are best judged by actually seeing it with my own eyes and not drawing conclusions from vague book descriptions and concept art. Until I see it for myself, I can’t say how I’ll feel, so it’s better for my health and well being if I just stay positive. But even knowing all that I do about the ending now, when I look at my Frozen collection and all the imagery of Anna and Elsa holding hands and hugging, I’m asking myself “Does my knowledge of the Frozen 2 ending make me feel less connected to all the ‘snow sisters’ stuff I’ve indulged in for six years?” And to be honest, as of now, it doesn’t, which is a good sign. I do feel sad and jarred that I now have to throw out six year’s worth of headcanons and fan stories I’ve created in my mind...but you know what, I’m willing to start again because I still love Anna and Elsa and I think there will always be great story potential for them. I see the “old” Frozen imagery now as, yes, they had their time living together as sisters (would have liked to see more of it in canon but oh well) and now they have different roles in life, but that doesn’t negate the time they shared and the love they have. Of course, my opinion could change when I actually see Frozen 2, for better or worse, but I’ve already spent so long looking forward to this movie, there’s no point in backing out now and not making the best of it. 

As I stated in a past post (from right before the first leaks happened) my Frozen fandom is at a crossroads now and I can’t predict what it will be like a few months from now: I could love Frozen 2 and my fandom will continue on a long time, especially if Disney announces more installments (I still think Frozen 3 or 1.5 is a possibility), or I could find the ending distasteful enough that it makes me lose interest sooner, or regardless of whether I like the sequel or not, I lose interest in Frozen and move onto other fandoms. Or maybe I won’t, and lack of official content from Disney will cause me to take up fanfiction writing or something like that. But whatever happens, I’m going to stay positive because I don’t like being negative. For those of you who are appalled at the ending, I understand and I hope you’ll still see the movie for yourself it’ll change your mind even a little, but please handle it in the way that’s best for you (leave the fandom, indulge in fanfiction, sell your merch). And for others who are being accepting of it, I hope we end up pleasantly surprised.

Okay, I’ve rambled on long enough. This should be the last thought-spilling Frozen 2 post I write until I actually see the movie - I can’t imagine we could get anymore leaks or information at this point that would drastically change my view. In the meantime, I’m just gonna lay low and reserve final judgment until November 22nd (or sooner if I win tickets to the premiere!)

[ty-talks-comics]

Best of DC: Week of September 11th, 1019

Best of this Week: Gotham City Monsters #1 - Steve Orlando, Amancay Nahuelpan, Trish Mulvihill and Tom Napolitano

Who wanted this?

Serious, this is a strange team of characters to put together for a story, but it’s so jarring in a way that it makes me really interested to see what their team dynamic is like. This book carries so much of a Universal Monster movie vibe while mixed in with the superheroics of comic books in a manner that it’s already caught my eye.

The book begins with several haunting establishing shots of Monstertown, one of the few neighborhoods in Gotham that is doing well under the control of Bane. These shots set the tone for what the story will be; a grimy, dark outing where the only light to be found is in the darkness. Naheulpan does such an amazing job capturing the essence of Gotham, while at the same time making things feel so...40s and 80s right before we’re introduced to our first hero, Andrew Bennett aka. I, Vampire.

Bennett, having been hunting down vampires that choose to spill the blood of innocents, dispatches a large group of evil vampires and learns of a new vampire king that’s soon to be restored to life. Bennett tears out the lead vampires heart and tries to drink his blood to kill him, but finds that his blood is poisonous to him. He then vows to kill their new leader no matter what. Within only a few pages Bennett is established as a noble vampire unlike some of his kin and those who were previously unaware of him are given all that they need to know about the man. His scene also feels very reminiscent of The Crow or Queen of the Damned in terms of style and color palette.

Soon after, we cut to a newly freed Waylon Jones who’s very excited to leave his past life as a criminal behind to carve out a new life in Monstertown, but sadly he knows that people will still only ever see him as Killer Croc. I can see that his arc will be all about redemption as he tries to make things in his life right after all of the turmoil he’s been forced to go through. Part of me wonders if he’ll ever learn about Roy Harper and his death at Sanctuary, given that he acted as Roy’s sponsor when the archer was getting off of heroin. He’s not seen again after his two pages which does suck quite a bit as I thought he would have a larger role starting out.

Things start to heat up as we run into the actual lead character of the story, Frankenstein, former Agent of SHADE. It has been quite some time since Frankenstein has been seen in any book, I think the last one he was in was a Valentine’s Day special from 2018. Before he is even shown, we see patrons of a local bar running in fear of the chaos that the undead one has wreaked in search of one of the last open cases SHADE had before Leviathan destroyed them. Frankenstein is not here to play games, holding the throat of a man infected with a disease that turns him into a bull-man.

Naheulpan draws this scene with the dourness that Frankenstein is often known for as Orlando scripts him to say that “in a far world you would live, but now more than ever… the world is not fair.” Napolitano’s letting also helps to make this scene even more saddening with Frankenstein’s shaky word balloons even if Frank himself is anything but. He lights the man on fire after smacking him upside the head with a bottle of ”Damn Fine Whiskey”, totally not Jack Daniels’, and watches as the creature tries to crawl away in fear and pain, terror in his burning eyes.

After this short excursion, we are introduced to our last few cast members in The Orca and Lady Clay, the latter of whom I had no clue existed. While I have limited experience with Orca as a character, mostly from Nightwing: Rebirth and the Injustice 2 tie-in comic, I know her story (and have an attraction, don’t judge me) and it’ll be interesting to see if Steve Orlando plays into the romance angle from the latter comic to give Croc the strong beau that he’s been missing since Enchantress was taken from him. Lady Clay, however, is new and exciting to me because she doesn’t know who she is anymore and finds solace in taking on the appearances of others like a Faceless Person. I’m very interested in whether or not she’ll betray the team for a sense of understanding from the main villain.

Throughout the book there had been murmurings of an opera going on in the city. This plays as the hook that will cause all of the plot to go full steam ahead in the next issue. While the crowd thinks they’re watching an amazing show, they are soon sacrificed to bring back Melmoth, an immortal whose blood was used to help in Frankenstein’s creation. Melmoth’s entire motivation is to continue being what he considers the “Last King.” He wants to subjugate all beneath his feet and will kill as many as he needs to do so, yet his followers see him as some sort of savior.

Gotham City Monsters succeeds as a story in the vein of the cheesy horror movies I liked to watch at a younger age. The stories and motivations given for each individual hero are simple, much like to protagonists of those old movies and gives this comic a nice monster movie team up feel. Naheulpan’s art is grim and made even better by Mulvihill’s gritty coloring and great use of dark inks for the moments that need shadows. For a first issue, this one was a blast and I absolutely cannot wait for the next one!

---------------------------------------------------

Runner Up: Wonder Woman #78 - G. Willow Wilson, Tom Derenick, Trevor Scott, Norm Rapmund, Romulo Fajardo Jr. and Pat Brosseau

Love is dead. Cheetah has killed her.

The fallout from Cheetah’s actions continue as Wonder Woman has lost her will to fight and is easily overpowered by her most deadly foe. Things begin in the most bleak way possible as illustrated by Tom Derenick. We cut back and forth from the immediate past to the current present as Cheetah wrests or destroys Wonder Woman’s armaments. 

Her sword is cut in half and her shield is demolished after swipes from Cheetah’s new Godkiller sword. Her tiara is broken and sent flying after a solid punch. The Lasso of Truth is snatched away as Cheetah mocks her, asking who is truly worthy. Even the Gauntlets of Submission are absolutely destroyed after being hit with the sword. 

Cheetah smiles with absolute glee as Diana is driven before her, helpless and unable to defeat her with her new and powerful weapon. She manages to escape into a nearby river and calls Atlantiades to help her. The demigoddess hears her call and with the help of Steve Trevor, they find Wonder Woman, broken and defeated without love.

Superman is commonly thought of as being the main hope in DC and there is a lot of merit to that, but at the same time, Wonder Woman is just as much of an inspiration to some if not more. She has almost never given up hope, even after killing Maxwell Lord in the past or losing her ability to see, hell even after fighting the Amazons after they invaded Man’s World she wasn’t at all fazed. Losing to Cheetah and feeling the crushing weight of the world on her shoulders now that she doesn’t have the hope of love to keep her head up high. It’s even worse when Steve Trevor is also suffering from this lack of love. Even while giving Diana a soothing bath for her injuries and trying to console her, his eyes are empty of the love they had and she can tell. 

Not only is love gone, but so is compassion as we see in a short scene shortly after the bath. A mail carrier on a bike accident hits a car and no one does anything to help him. It's telling that people just either drive around him or stand idly by seeing no reason to try to walk through traffic. We see even later on that people are far more willing to commit crime, especially after Lex has been offering people gifts and changing how they think, bringing out the darkness inside.

Eventually Wonder Woman is left with no other choice than to ask Veronica Cale for help. Veronica Cale, who has nothing but enmity for Wonder Woman, decides to help her as she doesn't even remember the feeling of dread that she had when her daughter was trapped in Themyscira and see this as an opportunity to show the Gods that mortals can see what they cannot.

In a way, Cale and Cheetah are similar in that regard. They have nothing but hate for the Gods and Wonder Woman and will do everything they can to tear them down, Cale with wit and guile and Cheetah with pure rage. 

G. Willow Wilson is absolute bringing out the bloodlust from Cheetah that we haven't seen in some time and is making her a pretty credible threat. If her trajectory continues the way that it jas, then there's no doubt in my mind that this entire run of Wonder Woman will end in one of their deaths and that is exciting.

[antialiasis]

Dumbo

Before I convinced Shadey I wanted to watch it before seeing the remake, I actually had not ever seen the original Dumbo and had only the vaguest idea what happens in it. Watching it for the first time now was kind of fascinating. Even aside from the jarring old-timey racist bits, there's something really distinctly old-fashioned about its style and storytelling - a crystal-clear sense that this is a movie from back when animation was still relatively new and mostly comedic shorts rather than serious narratives, and it would never play out the way it does if it were being made today.

For example, Casey Jr. the train is randomly animate, where no other objects are; this seems a fantastically weird choice today, when we generally expect that objects are not alive and don't talk unless it's a movie about objects being alive, but in Dumbo, they just sort of casually made this one steam engine sentient, just because they wanted to animate a lively steam engine. The animation has an exaggerated style where everything moves and squashes and stretches as much as possible, because look, we're making drawings and they can move! Animated storks - not representations, but the actual storks - fly over a map of the US complete with names written on it, as if this were literally what it looks like - it's weird and quirky and exactly like something that'd be in old animated shorts and exactly like something that wouldn't be in modern animated movies.

The actual story is structured really strangely. The movie is only 64 minutes long. It opens with a fairly long sequence, I think literally ten or fifteen minutes, about a stork delivering Dumbo to his mother and singing happy birthday to him. None of this is in any way relevant to the rest of the film, beyond the fact that Dumbo was born; it's just a cute sequence that they thought of. After this, Dumbo is mocked and made fun of, his mother is locked up for trying to defend him, and Timothy the mouse befriends Dumbo and inspires the ringmaster to make him the centerpiece of a new act, which is only all the more humiliating and miserable. Dumbo is briefly comforted by his imprisoned mother before unknowingly drinking some alcohol-laced water, hallucinating the highly disturbing "Pink Elephants on Parade" song, and then waking up in a tree. By the time we actually see Dumbo fly, with the help of a supposedly magic feather, there are only a couple of minutes left of the runtime. Immediately they go back to the circus, Dumbo tries to fly during his act only to drop the feather, Timothy tells him in mid-air that the feather wasn't actually magic, Dumbo successfully flies without it, and then it's closing credits montage time. The montage shows that Dumbo and his mother stay with the circus, despite how abusive they consistently were to them, only he's famous and privileged now so it's fine, I guess.

Whatever you think of the original film, I immediately pinpointed several things I expected would definitely be different in a modern retelling. In any conventional modern movie, Dumbo would learn to fly much earlier; he'd spend some significant time believing that he could only fly because of the feather, the revelation that the power to fly was inside him all along would be during the climax, and surely after that we'd actually see Dumbo using his feather-free flying ability in some heroic way - to save his mom, say. And he'd definitely not be made to stay at the circus at the end, unless we got to see some concrete evidence that the circus had changed: the circus people in the original were one-dimensional assholes, and by any system of morality that doesn't just sort of automatically assume that animals exist for human entertainment, he should have ditched them.

Tim Burton's live-action remake made all the changes I'd been expecting - but also a whole lot more that just kind of baffled me. The original Dumbo is clearly mostly a story about bullying and ostracism, in that fairly conventional form where it turns out the feature everyone bullied Dumbo for actually gives him a special enviable talent - and mostly, Dumbo is ostracized by the other elephants. The story is mostly about the interactions between the animals, who comprise most of the speaking cast, though Dumbo himself doesn't speak. In the remake, though, for some baffling reason they decided to make the animals nonverbal in general. Instead, a host of human characters are added - the circus performers are meant to be sympathetic, one of them is a tragic army man whose wife died with two children who serve as the main protagonists, there's an amusement park owner villain, a rich banker... Meanwhile, Timothy Q. Mouse, the deuteragonist of the original, is relegated to a tiny cameo as a regular mouse in a cage. There are no other elephants (or I don't think so? If there are, they are nonentities). Dumbo is ostracized and mistreated only by humans - but that just doesn't quite have the same meaning as him being rejected by his own kind.

Instead, a loose adaptation of the original film (save the revelation that he doesn't need the feather) takes place within the first half of the movie, and the second half is an entirely new plot about the circus being overtaken by an evil corporation that wants to make Dumbo do shows at their giant theme park. At the end, the kids and the circus people help Dumbo and his mother escape to India, the entire theme park burns down, and the circus becomes independent again and stops mistreating animals. The overall theme isn't really about bullying at all; it's more about the idea of the weirdos and misfits coming together and supporting each other against the cruel, conventional mainstream. That's a fine theme in itself, but it's very much not the theme of the original Dumbo.

As an adaptation, therefore, it's a strange one. It isn't telling the same core story - some of the same events are involved, but it's just not at all about the same thing as the original. As its own independent film... well, it's still a pretty strange and confused one, rooted in cliché, and full of things that are just obvious frustrating nonsense. The circus gets a full tent of people excited to see a regular old baby elephant, and they think Dumbo's adorable; then they see his adorably huge ears and... not only does the entire tent of people start loudly mocking him, they start chanting "Dumbo, Dumbo, fake, fake, fake!" What on God's green Earth. For one thing, Dumbo's ears obviously only make him cuter, who are you people. For another, why would you loudly jeer at a fucking baby elephant, what is wrong with you. But perhaps most audaciously... even if Dumbo's ears weren't real (and why would you think they're fake, when the circus had initially made every effort to cover them up), he is still a goddamned baby elephant, exactly what they came here to see! What are you complaining about! In the original Dumbo, the people are pretty simplistic and cartoony in behaviour, but he got laughed at when he tripped over his ears into a puddle, and then there were a few asshole teenagers making fun of the ears - not this entire audience of bizarre aliens in human suits just all getting together to bully a baby animal.

It's all like this - just the weirdest writing choices. The feather doesn't work psychologically on Dumbo by convincing him that he can fly because he's been told it's magic. (Dumbo himself doesn't really have much of a personality or drive the story.) Initially he flies for the first time because he accidentally sucks the feather into his trunk and this makes him sneeze, which sends him flying off the ground. Then as the movie proceeds he stops actually sneezing and starts just taking off on his own after sucking the feather into his trunk. At this point there is zero reason for anyone to think the feather has anything to do with this, but even the girl who's obsessed with science and experimentation doesn't think to question this until the end. Meanwhile, after learning that a baby elephant can fly on its ears, the amusement park owner somehow decides he wants Dumbo's act to involve a fully-grown woman riding on his back, and expects this to just work, and then absolutely nobody questions whether maybe Dumbo can fly his own weight but not the additional weight of an adult human. (He is a baby! He's small! Nobody would expect an animal of his size to carry an adult on the ground!) The woman, who's supposed to be sympathetic, literally gets on his back and expects him to take off before these people have even seen him fly on his own at all! Why is nobody asking the reasonable questions here, not even the, again, girl whose sole character trait is her desire to be a scientist? It was just bizarre and enraging, and only made it harder to see any of these people as actual human beings. Instead of "Pink Elephants on Parade" being a nightmare dream sequence, it's just a while of Dumbo staring up at a circus act involving elaborate soap bubbles that kinda sorta look like elephants changing shape; it doesn't mean anything or say anything for the story, it's just a "Hey, technically we've got this song from the original movie in here, sort of!" For anyone who hadn't seen the original, this bit would just be baffling; for anyone who had, it's a pathetic imitation removed from the entire context of it.

So all in all, the live-action Dumbo was a strange, strange film. The original Dumbo genuinely could have used a remake - but instead of focusing on improving the ways in which that story faltered, the remake just tried to do its own unrelated thing, and that thing was just pretty weird. The message is cute in itself, but this story did not need to be about Dumbo, and Dumbo did not need to be turned into this.

[bellaciaobitch]

ESCAPAR

Summary: AU | Raquel decides to stay with Sergio instead of visiting Angel in the hospital, afraid she will get arrested in the process. So she ends up escaping with the gang and has to learn how to live as a fugitive.   [AO3] [spirit]

Chapter 6 - En casa

Sergio spent the rest of the travel behind the navy blue curtains and Raquel supposed he needed his space, because so did she. Instead of going after him, she let the slumber of the sleep take her over one more time and woke up a little after dawn, with the plane landing in Switzerland.

She watched curiously, by the plane’s window, the professor climbing down the stairs and talking to a strong man in black suit, arms crossed and sunglasses on. The security waited for him beside an black motorcycle and only nodded when Sergio gave him quick instructions, watching his boss put on the helmet and leave in the vehicle.

The man, Raquel found later, was Juan, her private body guard hired by Sergio with specific orders to “keep her safe” when he wasn’t around. But she got the message between the lines. He was making sure she wouldn’t do another impulsive selfish plan that could risk everyone else’s lives. She felt quite offended by his decision and huffed when the man picked her up inside the plane.

Juan escorted her to the clandestine airport’s garage, where she was guided to a fancy dark-gray BMW that made Raquel roll her eyes. She tried to make him speak about where Sergio went or what was he doing in Zürich but he ignored her questions the whole way, driving slow through the streets and only repeating that he was taking her to a safe point until Sergio was back.

It was a beautiful winter morning in Zürich. The tiny neighborhoods they crossed by car were very similar to Madrid in the first hours of the morning: the streets were empty, grass in backyards still wet from last night’s pouring and birds sang on top of the trees, completing the peacefulness in the air. The deem rays of sun sneaked through the clouds and reflected on the windows of the car, touching Raquel’s skin. But she didn’t felt warm at all. Not without him, anyway.

They stopped in front of a building just exactly like every other residence in the street. So common and familiar that nobody would spot a recent billionaire and his hostage, staying on a house like that. Raquel frowned, glancing at Juan through the rear view mirror and back at the cute little structure.

“Home sweet home” he said. “Home?” she laughed, ironically. He didn’t commented, just pulled a key from his suit pocket and handed it to her. “Apartment 103. He says you can decide if I should stay inside the car or enter the building with you.”

Raquel smirked. It was very much like Sergio to make sure she didn’t step out of the line but still give her some free will. “You can stay, I’ll let you know if I need anything”

She closed the car door behind her before Juan could say anything else and quickly entered through the front door of the building, curiosity shining in her eyes. There was no doorman and no elevators so she took the stairs to the first floor, easily spotting the apartment.

When she turned the key on the door, she didn’t know what was expecting. A immaculate hidden mansion or maybe another dark humid hangar. But definitely not a humble, sweet home as that was. The wooden vintage furniture combined in with the painted light blue walls, adorning by the grey curtains and rug. It was so…domestic. And, even though not big, very much cozy. So familiar that seemed like it was already being habited by someone: there was pans, plates and bowls on the kitchen, food on the fridge and new clothes on the closets.

She took off her shoes and placed the keys on the corner table, next to a jar of white daisies. She wondered if he chose the place with her in mind or if it was just part of his plans, from before the escaping. If it was the first option, he knew her very well because the place was perfect. She could clearly see Paula running around the long corridor, showing her new drawings, Maribi knitting while her telenovelas was on TV and Sergio cooking dinner because Raquel always insisted on burning the meal.

The image was very vivid in her head but Raquel felt sad. The silly smile dropping from her lips. Yes, it was very sweet. But it couldn't erase everything nor change what was done. That house wouldn't teletransport her daughter and her mother, or magically fix things between them. But, most importantly, the house was temporary, as everything in their relationship. And just like that, a cozy residence in a street of Zurich became a ghost house to Raquel.

***

“Raquel?” Sergio called when he opened the door to see the house in deep darkness. It was a little past sunset when the meeting with the swiss bankers ended. He had a few contacts in Switzerland who made possible the discreet deposit of almost one billion euros, properly laundered, in a safe bank account.

He also could split the money with all of the six thieves, transferring big amounts to different accounts, and pay all the extra expenses of the operation, such as the millions to everyone who helped them inside and outside the royal mint. Be a jerk, but a jerk with an honor, as his brother liked to say.

All that process took hours of negotiations and in the end, Sergio felt tired. But, riding his motorcycle fast in the streets of Switzerland, not even the jet lag of the trip could make him not think about everything that happened the day before.

Andres’ death kept on rewinding behind his eyelids every time he closed his eyes, his last words muffled by the sounds of shots and then the tunnel explosion. He was his whole family and now he is gone without even the chance to bury him or honor his name. He played the scene over and over inside her mind, trying to figure out something that he could do to save him but there was nothing. Only guilt and lonelyness. 

That was also why he wasn’t ready to talk yet, when she woke up on the plane. Sergio was lost and hurting so he needed time. To cry for his brother, to worry about the theives, to think about what happened and to plan their next moves. He brushed his fingers through his hair, wiped his teary eyes and thought about them. About the huge euforia that was to even look at her and the haven he found every time he touched her lips with his. Sergio laughed bitterly, thinking about the coincidence between his situation and the Wizard of Oz. It was just a childish movie but he knew how the wizard felt, great and powerful playing the character when nobody could see him. But there, he just wanted to be the man behind the curtain.

He reflected about how Raquel’s dubious actions made him feel very insecure of their relationship and which side she really was. But he wished it didn’t matter, though. He wished there wasn’t sides to choose or heists to plan or money to split. And, that night, with the motocycle snoring and the wind blowing on his face, everything he needed was the remedy only her arms could offer.

He spotted her sitting on the couch, hugging her knees against her chest and smoking a cigarette. She probably showered because her hair was still wet and she got rid of the summer dress, tucking her body inside a fluffy white robe.

Sergio noticed she hesitated when their eyes met but continued seated, turning her glance back to the TV. On the big screen, a Swiss journalist explained the causes and consequences of a rebellion in the center city of Madrid, where people raised posters with protesting messages wearing Dalí masks identical as the ones the thieves used inside the Royal Mint. On the little screen of the notebook by her side, he recognized a very familiar room, but now the usually messy bed was made, the furniture were cleaned and the curtains opened, the sun shining on the little blond girl, playing with her dolls on the carpet.

He sighed and closed the door behind him without saying a word. Then he took his time taking off his shoes, hanging the coat and the black helmet near the door entrance.

“Did you let your dog out?” she asked without look at him and referring to Juan, who was still waiting outside when Sergio finally got to the house.

“I’m sorry, Raquel, I know you don’t like to…”

“Don’t you ever do that again. Do you hear me? EVER” she looked at him, eyes fulminating in anger. Sergio sighed one more time.

“Listen to me, I’m sorry ok? I know I seem to ruin everything always but what else can I say? I already apologized a thousand times since Toledo and this time I was trying to protect you!”

“No, you were trying to control me!” she started to raise her voice “Like you did before as a professor, manipulating me so things would go exactly as you wanted”

“Yeah, well, you must know how it feels then, because that was exactly what you did on the docks!” his chest was raising frantically as he lost his temper

“Fuck you!” Raquel cursed and put out the cigarette on an ashray on the coffee table “I was trying to save the very last of reputation I had left, after you ruined everything. I was trying to fix my life to stay with you”

“You were trying to fix your life by risking everyone else’s? By risking my life? Is that the kind of hero you want to be?”

“You would have done the same!” Raquel was screaming now, pointing a finger in his direction “All you cared about was that stupid plan”

“No, I wouldn’t. Because I’m in love you, I would never put you in that kind of danger” his breathe was uneaven and he nervously adjusted his glasses, a little afraid that she would slap him for saying he loved her one more time.

Raquel stood up abruptly, and closed her fists to desguise her trembling in rage. Every single time Sergio told her he loved her, she felt anxious and this time wasn’t any different. She felt bad because she just couldn’t say it back, without believing that it would become a curse and it would hurt everyone around her. The woman's heart started racing with fear, remembering all the traumas those four letters brought in the past. It was supposed to be sweet but whenever he said that, she felt as if it was a warning that things between them could fall apart again, as a castle of sand. She walked around the room nervously and when she spoke again, her voice was shaky and lower.

“Things are fucking chaotic out there, police is everywhere in Europe looking for you. Fuck, your name is on interpol even!” she pointed to the Tv and he saw Tokyo’s face on the screen. He adjusted his glasses on his nose again and she continued “But you must know that because you have everything planned right? You must also have planned to spent the day circling on your cool motorcycle with MY gun hanging on your waistband while I was stuck here with that robot you call bodyguard, not knowing where you were of if you were ok...”

Raquel gasped. Don't cry now, he mind demanded, you have to be strong. It was the closest Raquel could get from an “I love you too” while in her angry state. She hoped he got the message. Her speech meant she was angry and sad and terrified all at the same time but she loved him deeply and cared about him. It meant that she was sad that they had to fight so much and all she wanted was to stop feeling a lump in her throat everytime she remembered everything that happened because she wanted to do what he said on the plane. She wanted to stop being inspector and just be Raquel while he would just be Sergio.

But Raquel was never good with words. And when Sergio stood up, ready to rebuke her speach she didn’t ask for permission to cross the distance between them and pull him into a kiss, pressing her lips hard against his.

“I was so worried” she said and hugged him tight, breathing in his neck, as he recovered from initial shock.

“I am here now” Sergio said, with a half simile. He was getting used to her unexpected acts of affection or aggression, it was one of the many things he loved about her. And he was starting to crave her touch so much he really appreciated the gesture. Caressing her lower back he leaned back to search for her mouth and kissed properly this time, feeling her muscles melt in his arms, opening and closing her lips in sync with his own. Slowly, things became more urgent and dirty as their tongues danced together and she pushed him back to the couch, begging for the feeling that only his body on hers could produce.

Raquel sucked his bottom lip and he groaned in response. The plan was to take her to the bedroom but when he sat down with her straddling his lap, and she started to untie her robe’s knot, he knew it was about time to stop making plans.

And finally, for the first time that day, they both felt at home.

[beastmodem1]

The game produces a powerful first belief, and its online company has some interesting thoughts, nevertheless they both struggle to follow through.

The launching hours of become alpha porn games are tremendously good in putting you on edge. A remake of this first 1999 match, become alpha sex puts the intense and volatile conflict among protagonist the characetr and the unrelenting force of character, both the competitions , front and center--providing method to some potent survival terror minutes that show the most useful of what the series provides. However, then solid launch, this reevaluate to a bygone era maybe not only enhances an eye on the form of horror match which Resident Evil once was, but in addition loses sight of that which made the original so memorable. Much like 20-19's become alpha sex, the remake of become alpha sex games contrasts the traditional survival horror game through today's lens, strengthening places and altering vital events to match a revised narrative. become alpha porn game does not detract too far from the method determined by the become alpha sex remake, however it will lean tougher in to the action-focused slant the original version of become alpha sex had, providing you with a few larger defensive skills to live. become alpha sex games's introduction is really a strong individual, conveying a creeping feeling of paranoia and dread which is interchangeable with all this series, and the characetr yet again demonstrates herself to be a sure person to shoot everything head-on. become alpha porn games is quite much a companion piece to the prior game, functioning like being a simultaneous prequel and sequel which restricts off the saga at the City. You will find even key points in the story that anticipate you to know of prior characters or locations which tie back into the former picture. While you wont miss out on anything vital for not having played with become alpha sex games, several of those prior game's many poignant moments are given more sub-text in become alpha sex. You will finally cross paths with encouraging personalities just like the mercenary, the game's second functional character, along with other unsavory individuals appearing to benefit from the chaos. It was fun to see that the characetr and also her allies assert their own faith and even demonstrate any snark through the duration of the incident, which helps to ensure that the game is not always so severe. Both protagonists are also given some important moments across the narrative that show their skills along with personality more, which is enjoyable and gratifying to watch drama out. But disappointingly, become alpha sex's story reaches its judgment after a lively six-hour effort, and it is made worse with an lack luster finish that left me needing. While this is comparable to this game, the diminishing extent of this film's plot and areas creates its small streak even more apparent. All through the match, the characetr can be a competent newcomer, far more so than characters, and she is poised to manage the undead and also other bio-weapon monstrosities including the the rivals that roam the city. Together with dodging attacks, she could even perform slow mo evasive rolls that open just a fresh shot in the enemy's weak point, which can be particularly gratifying to pull off during a intense encounter. There is a more pronounced focus on activity and swift reflexes in become alpha porn game, which could produce the fire, shooting, and exploration loop even a little much more engaging and reactive. While this eventually offers you a much increased feeling of control inside the area, it's perhaps not enough to the purpose that it creates encounters using the ravenous undead or even the opponents easy. Therefore as you're competent, it is often advisable to play it safe. become alpha porn game tries to stick with all the tenets of survival horror gameplay also is generally a lot more ambitious than become alpha sex games, as a result of its greater concentration on inventory administration and ammo crafting. Nevertheless, the ample save things and check points ensure you may not suffer overly intense a loss later death. become alpha sex games additionally conveys forth many of the successes from your become alpha sex remake, which gives it a leg upward to get its own outing. Much like previous games, become alpha porn game is all about escalation, forcing one to compete together with dwindling resources while the monsters--and also the opponents --set the pressure on. 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As a grand map, it has diverse locations, and a lot of undead, in addition, it displays the lively nature of the game's true star--that the competitions. The imposing villain quickly establishes herself being a cute power when encountered outside at the start. The the rivals has many tricks up its sleeve, including with its tentacles to trip you up or turning other zombies in to horrible mutations, most of which can be upsetting to witness. It's going actively stalk and follow you into regions you thought were secure --bending the unspoken rules of engagement in survival horror to establish its presence farther. The competitions helps make Mr. X out of become alpha porn game come around as a fedora-wearing go-on, and even if you wind up in a safe space, you'll be able to catch a glimpse of the villain waiting outside that you go away --which endure since a few of the most unnerving minutes of this match. However, as the game continues, it will become evident become alpha porn game fights to keep up its poise once the scope begins to slim, and how blatantly the match relies on recycling lots of become alpha porn games's hints and tropes, that feel not as interesting. This must accomplish with the match's emphasis on sanity. When you're becoming familiar with a location, particularly the more extensive and varied metro place, a story beat will occur that brings you into another place, averting your return. The series' penchant for puzzles really are also rare in become alpha sex movie, putting greater attention on exploration and combat that will become exhausting. Additionally, it could be complicated to balance the elements of the survival terror and action gameplay, as one can easily undermine the other, and unfortunately, it really is apparent in become alpha sex games. You'll find a number of moments at which the match's strengths such as action and horror excel, particularly during the more open areas where the rivals is afoot. Generally, although --notably following the next half--its attempts to equilibrium both can encounter as awkward and dull, and in its very worst, they are sometimes jarring. That is particularly true with the many fancy set-piece encounters, where you restrain the characetr because she navigates Uncharted-esque strings which are highly-scripted gameplay minutes that proceed to its cinematic impact. They frequently lead to tonal desperation, since you on average transition back into the slower, survival-horror pacing shortly afterwards. This really is quite evident in the portrayal of the game's primary antagonist. The rivals are in its best when stalking you in the streets. However, these segments --though terrifyingly participating --are fleeting. The competitions only actively searches you through the opening area in Down Town the City. Nearly all the rivals encounters occur in scripted sequences that lead up to chef conflicts. At the game, the opponents' random looks kept you on edge. By comparison, the picture's use of the competitions from the mid-to-late match will more than likely have you ever roll up your eyes in the prospect of the long and adjusted come across. However, as the game continues, it becomes clear that become alpha porn game fights to maintain its poise as soon as the scope begins to slim... The competitions is undoubtedly one of the most iconic villains of the series, and it's frustrating and disappointing to see it effectively side-lined, coming off more as a conventional Resident Evil supervisor that springs out in narrative beats. The other negative effect of the shortage of these rivals experiences inside the game is that it calls attention to the deficiency of enemy variety. While the series' regular zombies are in plentiful supply, most other enemy types don't show up too often, making survival and combat elements feel warmer toward the endresult. Consistent with previous matches, finishing become alpha porn games unlocks some extra features once you complete it, that can arrive from the type of a shop inside the home menu which allows you purchase new costumes, weapons, along with different items. This lets you to fundamentally customize the next play-through, providing you definite vital items sooner than intended or boosting your attack power and defensive capacities. While these adjustments might be fun for a revisit, there isn't anything from the method of bonus material to help keep you going, aside from a new play-through from the game's nightmare problem manner that ratchets up the tension more. Additionally included with the remake is Resident Evil: Resistance, an asymmetrical online mode pitting four survivors contrary to a lone player within the role of the over seeing antagonist. Essentially, it has really a accessible take in the franchise's preceding experimentation with internet terror, Resident Evil Outbreak, using some echoes of other asymmetrical games such as Dead by Daylight or Left 4 Dead. Four people use their different skills to fight monsters and total objectives to help it for the point's exit. All the time, one enemy player may notice that the action through video security camera systems to lay traps, summon monsters, and also manipulate the natural environment to spell out a quick end into the group's escape. Playing with the Australians feels nearer to traditional Resident Evil, at which funds are infrequent and the stakes become more significant. Using each survivor's skills effectively can arrive in clutch during a challenging struggle, saving you and your staff against the mastermind's tactics. Since you spend some time in playing as the several characters, you will increase in rank and unlock different abilities and makeup for them. By completing weekly and daily struggles, along side completing games, you'll obtain RP which is used on loot boxes that provide bonus objects to get the set of Australians as well as the collection of usable masterminds.

Resistance has exciting ideas when it comes to bringing the series' survival horror gameplay online, plus it does an adequate job of getting you up to speed with solid tutorials. Yet the total implementation of this game's mechanics regularly comes as clunky as well as invisibly. During peak minutes of action, the controls to the survivors feel laborious, particularly if trying to find a clean hit on fast-moving targets. Resistance features a personality of its own, clinging tightly to mentions and Easter eggs to other entrances in this sequence. While each movie has a back story , they mostly pull horror film cliches along with archetypes, and so they scarcely speak through the actual match, which can make it hard to attach to them. The most fun available in Resistance is acting the master mind, where you can observe the survival-horror gameplay play out from the opposite side. Some of their most satisfying moments come from whittling down the defenses of their lands and churns away their past vestiges of trust as they try their final escape. In its best it is a clever real-time strategy spin on the survival horror formula, but generally, the game's clunky gameplay has at all. Resistance didn't hold my attention long, and although become alpha sex would be the more powerful of those two, it's still unsatisfactory. Looking back on my very first playthrough of the become alpha sex games remake, it was clear that the game reached its peak early and slowly lost momentum going forward. With all the vampire's flaws in mind, it truly is an easy task to make comparisons into the original match's tactic. Along with incorporating a dynamic and existing that the rivals, the characetr's odyssey had a lot more destinations to see. It's impressive to visit antique locations like Hospital and Downtown recreated, but some different places from the original, just like the Clock Tower and Park, are also absent. Even though this wont mean substantially for newcomers, and the pun skirts this by putting up elaborate the rivals encounters, the shrinking scale of the game reduces the effect of the storyline and functions. It is very clear that this remake of become alpha sex will be overlooking a few crucial beats that could have given a far more rewarding and satisfying narrative. Because of remake, become alpha sex perhaps not only falls short of honoring its origin, however nonetheless, it also does not quite stand the landing as an standalone terror encounter. Even without taking in to consideration the game, or its predecessor, become alpha sex games battles to stay informed about its pace amid a variety of things from survival horror and standard action. While it's a robust beginning and provides its principal villain a few terrific moments, this truncated re-telling of the concluding game from the original Resident Evil trilogy doesn't do justice.

[bellesdomain]

Starlight Express Workshop - Thurs 14th Sept

Let me preface this with my overall impressions - this show was fantastic in many ways, the performances were all amazing, the band was fantastic, the staging was remarkably full and entertaining given the circumstances!  It was an absolutely fascinating experience, I’m so glad I had the chance to go - and that I’m going again to see how it develops further.  

But as reviews like this are bound to, this is all going to come across as very negative - but I want to start off emphasising how much I enjoyed it overall!

The theatre is a small, steeply raked auditorium, with a thrust stage about level with the 3rd row.  The stairways on either side were accessible from the stage and used in the performance.  There’s a gantry upstage, which forms a platform for the 8 piece band and Control - yup, live Control onstage.  He had fabulous glowing headphones and an Ipad that seemed to be a racing game - I think it also included his script!  Generally I am very anti-live Control, when it comes to non-replica productions - since the entire show takes place in his imagination, he exists on a different plane to the action therefore they shouldn’t interact. But given the fluid nature of this workshop, pre-recording the kid would be impossible so it worked ok!

The show opened with Andrew Lloyd Webber and Arlene Phillips giving us the context of the evening.  Lloyd Webber explained how they’d workshopped “School of Rock” in a similar manner - no big automation, complex lighting cues or costume changes, just establishing the story telling.  Great concept!  And the venue “The Other Palace” theatre in Victoria, is being run for precisely this function.

Lloyd Webber also told us how he and Arlene Phillips had visited the German production for the English Gala, and he hardly recognised the show they were performing as his work.  And indeed, I was also at the English Gala and suddenly hearing the material in its original language made the inconsistencies and plot holes glaringly obvious!  So the point of this workshop is to see if they can get the show back into shape for a future production, as well as the German production’s 30th anniversary next May.

The show opened in a familiar manner, Control (playing with his ipad), sent to bed by his Mother. She sings her lullaby, the melody is taken up by the mouth organ.  The Overture modulates, repeats, swells, in the fans’ mind’s eye you see the shadowy figures skating around the set - and then Control interrupts with “Stop that Boring Music!” And begins to introduce the National Engines.

I think it’s fair to say this change is getting a bit of negative feedback.  That overture is the literal HEART of the show, it’s the preview of the Starlight Sequence, it’s the title song melody.  It’s the magic happening, as Control falls asleep and we enter his dreamscape.  The Overture alone will literally draw people to tears.  To have Control dismiss it as “boring music” is crass, insensitive, and a tonal mis-fire, alienating Control from the audience.  In other words, he’s a brat!

Entry of the National Trains is always a clunky way to start the show, these minor characters are so unimportant to the plot.  Placing the scene later, before AC/DC, makes for better story telling, as the audience have already established who’s important and it contextualises Electra’s entrance as we’re calling forward the competitors for the race. Anyway, the workshop has given us some new names for the Nationals - Bobo the French train is now the feminine Coco, which works well.  The German Engine is now named after Wagner’s opera das Rheingold. Rather than fix the dated and embarrassing reference, the Japanese train is still Nintendo.  And the British train is now “Brexit” - which is as topical a joke, and I suspect will last in the public conscious about as well as his APT designation did.  Yeah, that’s the point. Nobody remembers!  A very quickly dated reference.  There were a few of them throughout the night, so hopefully they’ll be reconsidered. Rolling Stock - Oliver Tompsett as Greaseball, greased back hair and stubble, was hilarious and a bit menacing - would probably be more menacing if I weren’t so steeped in his performances from Rock of Ages!  The strangest thing here though, was it. Was. so. Slow. There’s a strange quirk that the 1984 original cast recording has the Rolling Stock track at a stodgy plod - as if an LP record is played on the wrong setting! And this is what they decided to replicate live.  The performances were all brilliant, the ensemble mugging it up as their Nationals, it was hilarious and engaging, but why so slow?  As far as I know, it wasn’t performed that slow in 1984, it’s just a quirk of the recording -  but Andrew Lloyd Webber obviously approved of this!

Second number in was Crazy.  Throughout, Crazy and Call Me Rusty have been mixed up and cut together - along with remnants of Engine of Love in there as well.  It works, sort of, plot-wise it’s exactly like Engine of Love, here’s young Rusty and the coaches.  There’s a lovely bit of contextualisation where Control explains “Rusty is the first train I got when I was six” which grounds us as these are his toys.  Then into Crazy.  George Ure as Rusty may have dried on his opening lyrics, but a bit of ad-libbing and he was back on track.  Christina Bennington as Pearl got straight in there with the high option for Pearl’s “Til someone better comes along”.

Greaseball, Nationals come in to bully Rusty, and the coaches all stick up for him, however Pearl makes the point that she’s not actually Rusty’s partner, flirting with Greaseball.  Then we have a version of “Call Me Rusty”, the short version used in Vegas I believe, layering “Call me Rusty if you dare. Call me Rusty if you like…”  with the coaches still having the mid break from the original but with some new lyrics from Pearl about “we’re just friends”. Rusty is sent to fetch the trucks, and we have the original intro into Locomotion, “Rusty/can’t/be serious, him/go in/for the race?” but then there was some new material, Greaseball flirting with Pearl, saying “woowoowoo you’re brand new!” Dinah comes forward to warn him off Pearl but she gets sent to “go make the tea” by Greaseball and the Nationals.  Here’s where we’re introduced to Tassita (shhh she’s a quiet coach and doesn’t like loud noises), and we go into the new song to “introduce” the coaches, “I Got Me (and that’s all I need)”  This song felt to me like there’s some School of Rock type influence.  It’s very “I can do what I like” independent rock chick.  It’s not a bad song, but it doesn’t serve the purpose of introducing these characters at all, plus the pedantic mind says that these girls are railway coaches - and coaches DO need an engine.  Sorry to break the vibe but coaches aren’t independent - but you can easily argue the case that an engine without coaches is as useless as coaches without an engine.  The song ended quite abruptly to muted applause, but launched straight into a reprise, which was then interrupted by the Freight train.

Freight ran exactly as the 1992 London, with all the banter from the coaches, which was particularly entertaining despite being such very familiar lyrics.  Whether it was due to the small ensemble, or an effort to address the gender imbalance in the show, Hopper 3 was female, and she was having a great time of it.  Sadly no return of the Rockies, the Hip Hoppers are about the only remaining remnant of the contributions made by David Yazbek in 2003.  The only new moment in the number was one of the most jarring changes - Caboose is included, but rather than introduce himself using the “There’s Me” melody (“at the back on every piece of track…”  Being “All alone, you think you’re on your own…”) no, the Red Caboose comes straight in with “Wide Smile, High Style” melody, telling us straight off that he’s in the business of wrecking trains. His characterisation was very much aggressive, nasty and scary!  No pretense at the sweet and helpful Caboose that anyone would trust, this guy is clearly one to avoid.  Caboose made a point about being paid to do his job.

Straight after Freight, we have Control announcing technical problems…  oh boy! A late entry!  These must be his minders! Kilowatt is Electra’s security truck. Wrench is the repair truck, Purse the money truck ordered us to switch your accounts to Electra.  Again money is an active concept in this world.  Joule and Volta followed - male Volta, as with Hopper 3 is this a limitation of the size of ensemble?

Electra appeared in towering red velour heels, fishnet stockings under a conventional masculine ensemble of slacks and jacket.  Liam Tamne has an incredible voice, great range and strength and falsetto! But his characterisation flat for my personal taste for Electra, and also really reminded me of someone else, a character on TV perhaps.  He was very flamboyant and self-indulgent.

AC/DC is interrupted suddenly, as Greaseball appears.  The coaches, who 10 mins earlier were making such a point of not needing no man, especially Dinah getting up in the faces of the Nationals to protect Pearl, undergo a complete 180 on their characters, turning to the regular excited fangirls we’re used to seeing in Pumping Iron.  This felt especially wrong given Dinah’s “Back off girls, he’s mine!” - really?  Is he?  Because you were defending your girls from his flirting just now, and showed no suggestion of a relationship between Dinah and Greaseball other than antagonism.  The earlier scene is massively out of character for Dinah.

Oliver Tompsett rocked Pumping Iron, of course, it’s easy to appreciate why the girls are all fangirling over him.  The two female components stayed to dance, while Electra and his boys left in a huff.  This was one scene where the minimal staging fell flat, as the dance break needs some rock’n’roll partner work, skates or not.  

Coda Freight ran much as expected, the confrontation between Greaseball and Electra was extended by the two of them sharing the lines usually sung by the Nationals, as they mock Rusty’s intent to join the race.  Coda Freight originally did not modulate key - the German production is one where it drops into a lower key which always jars. But this time we get a modulation UP a key, which is different! But not necessary, it’s quite busy enough staying in one key.

Control announces five minutes to race time, and “if you ain’t in twos, you lose”.  This is where we would expect to find Crazy, and indeed we have a reprise of the number where Rusty approaches Pearl, but she rebuffs him with something about “don’t push me around”.  But then their conversation follows the coaches’ melody from “Call me Rusty”, as she explains in no uncertain terms that while she likes him she wants an engine of the future.  Then they are interrupted by Electra’s Bodyguard Kilowatt (shall we just call him K?) who explains Electra’s coach has a “Migraine”. Pearl has her dilemma, and will let Electra know.

Pearl has a new intro to “Make Up My Heart”, written to the “diddlydiddly” pre-race music (also used by Caboose pre-”Wide Smile”), as she discusses how Electra seems fun, then she had an echo of “He Whistled At Me” - which I think was the only occurrence of that/”Engine of Love” melody.  Then that disjointed selection of melodies led into the full “Make Up My Heart” number, as performed on the 1992 London recording.

Control starts the races, with a comment about “I’ll pick your partners for you”.  A new addition for the races which grew very tedious almost immediately, each engine as they’re introduced, sings the “Clear my track, this is my train now, this could be my dream, clear my track” fragment of “No Comeback” that Pearl sings in “Laughing Stock” - each with their own lyrics of course.  But hearing that same fragment four times in a row was repetitive, and annoying given that that melody is meant to specifically refer to Electra.  The concept of melodies referring to specific characters and event - the use of leitmotif - has more or less been lost, apart from a few occasions which shows that while they COULD use the concept, they choose not to!  Race 1 ends up with a Dead Heat between Greaseball and Electra, with only the “No Comeback” melody appearing in the race music.

As the racers clear away, we have a mopey Rusty with the “Call me Rusty” melody on the mouth organ, as he approaches the Freight yard and “Momma” is singing The Blues.  Mica Paris was poorly served by the existing score - while the major solos are within a reasonable alto range, most of Poppa’s recit is well below an alto.  However her character, and the staging for the number was really engaging and fun, and included Caboose mooching in the background.  Caboose has always seemed notable by his absence from this scene of the Freight - I presume the practical reason is that Caboose has just finished racing so to make him immediately be onstage but purely for context would be unkind.  But within the world of the show, why is Caboose not hanging out with the rest of the freight?   Momma’s response after “Let me hear you say Steam!” - the Starlight Express melody - is “When the Night is Darkest” rather than “When Your Goodnights have been Said”, which probably only coincidentally is kinder on her vocal range. But it’s slightly odd in a production that draws so heavily from the previous London productions, to bring in the Broadway variation of the title song.   Control interrupts to inform us of heat 2, Momma decided to race and ends up with Dustin much as is familiar from other productions.  The exact reason was unclear but Brexit meant the British train was missing, allowing Momma to race.  

Race Two again seemed to have Control decide the race partners, and again repeated the “Clear my Track” melody, except Momma introduced herself with the Coaches’ “I got Me” melody which seems to be pretty random for an old Steamer.  It was also incorporated into the race music.  

After Race 2, into Laughing Stock, played much as normal, but with one small 1984 detail restored - Momma points out Rusty “Couldn’t face that losing shame!”  rather than Rusty admitting his own weakness, or the line being omitted altogether.

Starlight Express - the title song closed act 1 with an unexpectedly subtle edit, new lyrics to the “When the Night is Darkest” melody.  I’m not absolutely sure new lyrics were needed for this number, but they’re evocative and very much in keeping with the scene and Rusty’s emotional journey.

(And we have the interval.  Go get a glass of wine.  You’ll need it.)

Act 2 begins with The Rap - entirely a capella, started by Hoppers “Are you Ready?” which updated lyrics. The Coaches come in with something like “Swipe to the left? Swipe to the right?  Who will be my date tonight?” which feels like it’ll date very quickly.  It was a mix between the 1992 Rap in structure, “Gotta be in the frame if you’re gonna win the game, are you ready for the big one, ready!” with quite a lot of the individual lines tweaked.  This meant that we’ve still got all the “Shut it, Dinah!” and some of the classic lines like “losing the race with this floppy disc” and “Boil with the oil or lose with the fuse”.  Performed entirely unaccompanied, with much stomping on the beat, worked really well.

“Pearl Twirl” ran unaltered, giving Dinah a COMPLETE character shift from act 1.  The confident, sassy girl is completely unrecognisable as the heartbroken Dinah singing “Uncoupled”. Fantastic performance from Natalie McQueen, really heart-felt and beautifully sung, but it was distracting how she seemed to be playing a completely different role to earlier.  The staging was even much as normal, with the other two coaches hanging out behind, with varying levels of sympathy and boredom as they sing backing vocals. But without Dinah having established a character of a devoted, in love with Greaseball, the song was very out of place.

Invitation Dinah included some new material, a longer conversation between the girls, with Dinah saying “I can’t manage on my own” - again, this is not the Dinah we saw in act 1.  The line “But if Greaseball changes his mind!” is in there.  Tassita and Belle have very little to do - no Girls Rolling Stock - but whereas in the past the coaches only had “Oh, Dinah!” to express their frustration, this gives them a little dialogue.

Caboose’s scenes in the middle of act 2 almost had me vocalising my frustration!  This scene is one of my biggest problems in the current show AND IT HAS NOT BEEN CHANGED!

First, Caboose tells Greaseball that Rusty is fast, and they plot as in the US Tour with Greaseball’s “Ohh that’s nasty, I like it!”. This conversation also gives us the existing line “Just cos I smile all the time, don’t mean I’m not into crime”.  This is not news, this is not a reveal, and this Caboose has only been smiling in an evil, mean way. There’s been no pretense at Caboose being helpful or sweet, he’s been flat-out nasty from the beginning.

Then we have the Disco-tastic 1984 version of “Wide Smile” which repeated the  “Just cos I smile all the time, don’t mean I’m not into crime” line, and included “Under the smiles, under the fun I’m public enemy number 1” - again, there’s not been any fun or smiles from this Caboose!  Also they use the full 1984 “CB” lyrics including the CB radio references which were cut for the Broadway show in 1987 as too obscure!

Patrick Sullivan’s performance was extraordinary, hitting those falsetto notes, amazing energy and rhythm, a really enjoyable number.  I don’t know if I should read significance into Electra not joining in the backing for the number, but it was only the components.

The problem is though this scene is a MASSIVE plot point.  It should be the moment we learn that Caboose is a cheating back-stabbing bastard, but this has already been established.  Also, there is a logical gap in this number - with Electra well aware of Caboose’s enjoyment of double-crossing, why on earth does Electra then choose Caboose as a race partner for the downhill final?  Especially when surrounded by his components, any of which would be a suitable race partner. The simple solution, which I was hoping this workshop would consider, would be for Electra to be removed from this scene.  Simply continue the song on from Caboose’s conversation with Greaseball, have Greaseball’s gang as the backing dancers rather than Electra’s components. Then, Electra is unaware of Caboose’s scheme, his choice of race partner makes sense.  This would also remove a flabby feeling repeat of the material as different versions have been grafted together.

Race 3 - the Uphill Final - begins with Control announcing Greaseball and Pearl, Electra and Dinah, and Rusty and Caboose.  This race has not had the extra “No Comeback” repetitions, but rather the normal spoken lines from each Engine including Rusty’s “Let’s hear it for Steam!”  

No explanation is given as to how there are only three engines, since Control earlier quoted the 1992 London instructions “There are two heats, two qualifiers from each heat”.  So what happened to the 2nd qualifier from Heat 2?  Why did only Momma come through from that race?

Well, I can tell you why, it’s because Control’s lines are taken from the 1992 London, but the races are taken from the 2003 US Tour with the pre-recorded 3D races.  Because the tour ran with only 4 Nationals including the British train, the races were run on the logic of two heats, and the winner from each would compete in the final, which should have consisted of two engines.  But since Electra and Greaseball tied, they both went through to give us 3 engines in the final.  But this story telling has been overlooked in this workshop.

The race was staged with Caboose literally picking up Rusty to make it clear he wasn’t going anywhere!  The race music also included the inverted race melody, the descending phrase as used in Germany which always jars when used to the London versions.  The Race music did include the “Wide Smile” motif. Rusty was thrown to the floor, injured, as Control shouts “Race Cancelled!  Who did it?  I didn’t do anything!” - again the 1992 London script.  

The 1992 London show was the production which cut Caboose - which is particularly relevant in this part of the show, as without Caboose driving the story, the London show included material to patch over the holes.  This material was then drafted into the UK Tour in 2004, to cover gaps where some of the David Yazbek contributions were removed, I believe.  However the result is that there are two separate scenes which cover the same actions.  

Firstly, the Caboose version is that Caboose has crashed Rusty.  The original London staging in 1984 was one of the weaker points of the show, where a fairly illogical staging required all the racers to make it onto the bridge to be carried to the top level, mid-race.  CB slowed Rusty to the point he missed the connection and the race was then cancelled due, I believe, to the fighting between Greaseball and Electra.  This had Rusty challenge Greaseball with “That CB he never took off the brakes”, which is when Pearl realised that Greaseball and CB were in cahoots.  The original version didn’t have Rusty injured apart from his pride, but gave us CB’s insane “10, 10 never again you’re no engine!”.  CB’s gloating and insane pleasure at the damage he has caused is an essential part of his character arc.  The German staging had Rusty crash and tumble down the bowl to land in a heap centre stage, where Greaseball and Pearl came by, with Pearl saying “I’ll go tell the Marshalls!” then as Greaseball pulls her away, she begins to realise she’s made mistakes.  

Secondly, the No Caboose version, the London 1992 version, has to find another reason for Rusty to be out of the race.  The Uphill final is cancelled by Control when it’s devolved into a fist fight on the bridge, Control didn’t see what happened so Greaseball and Electra jump on the chance to blame Rusty - “Rusty did it, he caused the wreck!”  Greaseball then confesses “Shut it, I did it, he was good, he was fast” - without Caboose in the show, this comes as a surprise.  The Marshalls have been wordlessly clearing everything up, Rusty then comes back to Greaseball with “They (the marshalls) say - “  “what do they say?”  Greaseball then sics his gang on Rusty, to “make sure it won’t happen again”.  The Gang then beat up Rusty (to the melody of “Wide Smile”) in order to bring him to the same, injured and dejected state, as if Caboose had been there.

These two separate scenes have been smashed together since the US Tour in 2003 gave the show major re-writes, and the story being told is flabby and confusing.  If Rusty has been wrecked by Caboose, is already on his knees and his confidence destroyed, why do the gang need to beat him up directly?  Unless the staging includes Marshalls directing the clean-up, who is Rusty talking about with “They say”?  If Caboose is there, then how does the line “You told the Marshalls I drove into you!” make any sense?  

The Workshop gives us the current version of this scene, with the 1992 London version of the show, including Greaseball and gang beating up Rusty.  Then Pearl wanders in, sees Rusty wrecked on the floor, and realises things are going bad “This wasn’t how I wanted it, this wasn’t what I saw” (what had you seen, Pearl?  We no longer have He Whistled At Me to specify her dreams and ambitions)  Flat-top has his sympathetic line “Give it up Rusty, you’ll never beat them”, and Caboose has just left. Then we have a reprise of “Crazy” at a slow, reflective pace, as the badly injured Rusty picks himself up. This reflects back to Rusty’s naive hopeful attitude at the start of the show, contrasting his previous optimism with his sad current state.  Then we hear the “Call Me Rusty” refrain on the mouth organ as standard. This reflects back to Rusty’s naive hopeful attitude at the start of the show, contrasting his previous optimism with his sad current state.  Yes, the concept of Rusty’s confident introductory number being reprised in a slow, sad tone is exactly repeated in this scene.

Where we’d expect Right Place, Right Time, we have the Hoppers wander in and paraphrase the opening lines of the number, without any particular motivation for their presence, but the full number is omitted. This scene feels like it might be a compromise as the work in progress nature of the workshop, where this is a place-holder for a new version of the full number for the Hip Hoppers.  

Rusty, alone and dejected, runs into the Starlight Sequence as normal, reflecting on how he’s “down and out”.   The Starlight Sequence is always magnificent,  but it was slightly soured after Control’s “Stop that Boring music!” comment during the overture, which is of course a preview of this scene. Mica Paris as Momma wasn’t quite comfortable with the vocal range of the song but at some moments opened up sounded glorious.  There were also some slight lyric paraphrases such as “The Starlight Express is no more or less, I’m you, Rusty”, which doesn’t quite make sense, but I suspect was simply the nature of the workshop rather than a deliberate change. George Ure’s performance was stunning and so emotional, he really carried us on Rusty’s journey.

The Rusty and Dustin scene has some new music, using the same melody as Rusty’s monologue prior to the Starlight Sequence, the melody most characterised as the Coaches’ verse in “Call Me Rusty”.  It’s a minor key, the music always suggests concern, worry, lack of confidence, so to use it for this scene felt off.  The standard score uses “Belle’s Song” at this point, as that melody is connected with the Freight and Dustin as well as Belle.

Dinah’s Disco is re-worked to be a reprise of “I Got Me” which works well in this context.  If “I Got Me” were moved from act 1 to replace “Girls’ Rolling Stock”, following “UNCOUPLED”, this reprise would work perfectly.  Electra calls CB to his side with the “AC/DC” melody, the 7/4 time makes the short scene feel a bit awkward, but replacing the “Nobody Can Do It Like a Steam Train” melody makes sense when all references to “He Whistled At Me” have been cut.  Electra and CB bargain for the price of CB’s help.

Control introduces the re-run of the Final Race, on the Downhill course.  Again the score being used is snipped from the 2003 US Tour - the pre-race 4 has two versions, the original staging called for three finalists, the Broadway and later used four finalists.  The beautiful, complex layered music was originally written for the six racers, then altered for eight.  But then the US Tour version cut it back to six, rather than referring to the original score, the two vocal lines are simply left out leaving a gap in the music.  Specifically the 1992 score had Bobo singing “Le jour du gloire est arrivé” (please pardon my french!) with Ashley singing “Gonna be hot, hotter than hot”.  The alternative for that vocal part has Caboose singing “Just for me, I’m in this just for me” (or “Nur fuer Mich” in the German score) - but the workshop uses the Tour version which simply skips this vocal line. Once part that point the complex harmonies were gorgeously performed.  While I love the “Rusty’s gonna race in the Final” moment in this number, it harks back so strongly to the original version of the Rap.  

The Downhill Final was performed with a very witty side-comment from Control about “Sorry about the lights, use your imagination!”  The race music was very much the 1984 original which was gorgeous! Control’s narration tells us the story, including Pearl being disconnected, and Rusty saves her - at which point the Crazy melody was incorporated in the race music, with the ensemble singing “Come on Rusty”.   Immediately on winning, Rusty leaves with “I must find Pearl”, as usual.  

One Rock’n’Roll Too Many was staged almost exactly as usual - in fact all that was missing was the kneepads!  Contextually this was played the same as UK Tour / Germany, not like the 1992 London, which seems a shame.  The only major difference (apart from the presence of Caboose) is that in London, the ensemble stayed onstage and witnessed the massive fall from grace of the major players in the game.  I appreciate that practically, in staging the show, I am sure the ensemble are grateful for a couple of minutes backstage, but the story telling of including them as witnesses is important.  Plus it gives the ensemble characters more time to establish their personalities.  There’s no logical reason all the characters leave before the number, and come back at the end.  Momma was struggling with the vocal range for the “Where’s Rusty gone?” section.

Pearl is introduced with the electric guitar playing the “He Whistled At Me” melody, but since neither version of her song appeared at the start of the show, her reprise that was the introduction to “I Do” has been cut.  Which is super frustrating, because that little reprise was the only good addition with this dreadful song!  

“I Do” is untouched, it’s still abysmal, with clunky, random, meaningless lyrics, poor melodic construction, long and repetitive.  The lyrics scan very poorly to the music (“you think that noboDY would love you”), and the vocal ranges are very hard to sing, it’s fortunate the cast are so strong!  They are genuinely adorable and you’re so happy that they’ve found each other, despite the music.

I have to admit, however, that with the changes to Pearl’s character, that she is given more time to think, the lyrics are not as contradictory as previously.  It feels like Pearl, and to an extent Rusty, have been ret-conned to fit this song!

I am genuinely astonished that this song has been kept, I thought the one thing this workshop would be sure to give us was an improvement on the love song.  It’s such a shame to have lost “Only He” - in any of its many variations - as the love song being a reprise of one half of the Starlight Sequence is an enormously important part of the story telling.  The “Only You” melody speaks of discovery, completion, it’s the answer to the question, where the “Starlight Express” melody is the question.  

Following “I Do”, Rusty and Pearl sing a reprise of “I Got Me”, and the “Well Done Rusty, King of the Track” is now set to the same melody, which is slowed, and jars with the dissonance.  Then the reprise of the “Starlight Express” melody is as you’d expect, into Dinah’s “Greaseball you’re hurt!”  - beautifully performed, and there isn’t the jarring sense of “No, honey, don’t go back to your abusive ex!” - which is possibly more of a negative statement since Dinah’s character is so inconsistent.  Oliver Tompsett does have the most magnificent puppy-eyes pleading expression though, making it hard to resist forgiving his character!

Leading into Light at the end of the Tunnel, Mica Paris was again having difficulty singing the role written for a baritone! I had a moment of cognitive dissonance, given how there had been strong throw-backs to the 1984 version of the show, for the one line that was originally sung by Soul Queen PP Arnold as Belle, “The man who watched the pot and said, hey I got…”  - for one moment being sung by Soul Queen Mica Paris!  The final number bounced along, full of joy and energy as ever, with no changes from the norm.  No megamix, just a play-out from the fantastic band.  

[mdwatchestv]

Dirk Gently 1x03: We’ll See How It Goes

Bonjour chérie! I can't believe it's November, I am tired and now have to be cold on top of it. Unacceptable. But luckily we have another episode of Dirk Gently to try and parcel out. This episode thankfully did some investigating into the tangle of exposition unloaded last week, but there was still LOTS going on. Can we just agree now that Alan Tudyk is living his best acting life as The Priest? I know he is a bad guy, but I can't help rooting for him. Things happen, we'll see how it goes.

We start this episode with a scene of a child drawing a windmill on a wall, we have seen this child and its wall-drawings in the previous two episodes. I feel like it is safe to say that this is the sought after "boy", but who or where he is still remains to be seen. Once again we then go to Wendimoor, but this time checking in with the people on the other side of the conflict. We learn that Pink-Hair is not unique, but rather part of a whole people of pink hairs! These people are the farmers we learned about in last weeks Wendimoor scene who the royalty are in conflict with. The royalty people seem to believe that the pink hair people have kidnapped "the boy". In order to end their conflict the pink peeps could "find the boy" but that seems to be either ridiculous or impossible. Instead they are going for more of an "all out war" approach. Yolo pink hairs, yolo. In order to bring the pain to the monarchy, the fuchsia fam has ordered a weapon from "The Mage" (John Hannah), which turns out to be an AK! Way to bring a machine gun to a scissor fight, magenta mavericks! Not only is the conflict escalating in Wendimoor, but it’s also suggested that The Mage can travel freely back and forth between the world of Wendimoor and our own. We also know that Pink-Hair was able to manage this as well, but it begs the question of how simple a task this is granted that most people don't seem to attempt it.

Back at the sheriff's station our team cosplays as law enforcement through the ages and continues their investigation of Hector and Marina Cardenas. Farrah and Todd exchange some very flirty banter, which was a bit jarring to be honest. Not that there has not always been tangible chemistry between them, but without any hint of a romantic spark in the first two episodes I assumed that plot-line had been abandoned. Guess I was wrong! Flirt away friends. Our crew looks at the Cardenas' bodies and discovers that Hector has two holes in his head, implicating that he was murdered before being entombed in the tree. The wheels in Farrah's noggin are turning and she seems about to make a connection between Hector's head holes and the fact that Marina's corpse has two broken fingers. She doesn't quite get there, but could Marina's fingers have made the holes?

Dirk is also acting strange, or more strangely than usual. After being confronted by Todd, Dirk admits he is upset because things aren't as chill or calm as he had hoped. Todd is suffering from pararibulitis and many of their friends are missing or AWOL, life is bad, and Dirk’s not having it. Todd gives him a pep talk telling him that he needs to "make bigger choices", giving them a bit of a role reversal from the first season. Dirk and Todd’s relationship is the bedrock of this show, and Elijah and Samuel have real-deal chemistry. More scenes of this please.  But wait there is more action to be had at the sheriff station besides dress-up, friendship and tree boring!

Who should show up but our friend Bart, who we haven't seen since she was blasted by shapes in the season opener. Bart has come to the authorities to demand justice for her unwarranted shape assault, and to also continue her quest for the missing Ken. While Bart is a fantastic character, I worry the writers don't know quite what to do with her this season. A lot of the mystery around her has been resolved, and she has already had three confrontations with Dirk where she has not killed him, but there doesn't seem to be a clear forward path for her. She is sort of haphazardly journeying around looking for Ken, as well as struggling with killing and not-killing, but all this feels like mostly an excuse to keep her around than a real meaningful story contribution. Her relationship with Ken was also both interesting and extremely compelling, and their continued separation is tangibly felt.

Out in the world Farrah and Tina stumble upon Pink-Hair himself, and bring him back to base. Pink-Hair has QUITE the prophecy including mention of a dark wizard, their apprentice, a girl who sees all that can transport people, a boy, and a man who will save the world. All Pink-Hair knows for sure about this prophecy is that the man is Dirk Gently, but I think we can make some additional inference's ourselves. A dark wizard feels like it could be The Mage (John Hannah) and his apprentice could be the only other character with magic who is also going down a bad path, Suzie (Amanda Walsh). The girl with visions is clearly good ole Amanda, but the identity of the boy himself, beyond likely being the child of the Cardenas', continues to be a mystery.

Speaking of other characters, our girl Suzie continues to be the baddest mother in town. We get a lot of her backstory this episode from the women at the book club that Suzie crashes. Suzie was a popular high school mean girl and Prom Queen (natch). However four years ago she crashed her car while under the influence of Xanax and with a car filled with  This led to her hip injury and ostracization from the her social groups, including book club. One of the women literally says to Suzie, "You are the bad guy." The show is really trying to hammer home that Suzie is no good, but nothing she can do will stop me from loving her. You're gonna have to try harder than that to get me to turn against a fellow witch television! Upon arriving home Suzie's irritating teen son (can we just curse him already) demands his phone back which is, whoops, still on the corpse of Suzie's boss. Suzie returns to the quarry and gets the phone but runs into The Mage. The Mage attempts to strip Suzie of her wand (the nerve) but she is able to escape. The Mage seems more amused by this than angry, and perhaps this signals his interest in Suzie, perhaps an....apprentice-level interest? Time will tell.

Finally Amanda and Vogel arrive at the Motor Court (previously owned by the Cardenas', also seen in Amanda's vision) where Amanda discovers Todd's belongings. However The Priest (Alan Tudyk) arrives shortly after and he is feeling pretty ambivalent about capturing Amanda and Vogel alive. As a side note, while I remember Friedkin as being short in the brain cell department last season, I don't remember him being so reticent about killing. Rather he was always the first to pull a gun, and even killed Estevez in the season one finale. This character is just not gelling for me this season, he doesn't seem to be grounded in any deeper emotion or motivation. While the world of Dirk Gently is home to many off-the-wall character's, but as I've talked about before, what makes them so compelling is the writer and actor's ability to ground them in some deeper truths. To make a long story short (too late) I'm finding Friedkin to be the odd man out so to speak.

Anyway, The Priest decides life is too short to not kill people in a hail of bullets, and he does his best to fill Amanda and Vogel full of holes. Amanda is convinced that this is not how it's supposed to end for her, and calls out to whoever may be listening for help. Surprisingly (or not) her pleas are answered, and The Priest  bursts down the door to discover his prey has vanished. This is the second such vanishing this season, and the fact that this disappearance also involved water (the plumbing bursting and soaking Amanda and Vogel) hints that perhaps Mona is once again the culprit.  Speaking of Project Blackwing, after unearthing the original files on the Blackwing subjects (on floppy drives no less), Friedkin tasks Ken of all people with their decryption. So hopefully we will be getting a lot more backstory on our new friend Mona, and our old ones too.

CORGI WATCH:

Didn't want to pay for the ole fluff this ep I guess :(

XO MD

PS How great was Elijah Wood’s bad British accent? I die. 

[tradewaiterreviews]

Fatale - Deluxe Edition Volume One

Written by Ed Brubaker (Captain America: The Winter Soldier) and drawn by Sean Phillips (The Fade Out). Colours by Dave Stewart (Hellboy). Published by Image.

Spoilers revealed below.

A femme fatale is stock character in fiction; a woman whose seductive charms lead male characters to death and disaster. Femme fatales are often little more than two-dimensional bad girls. They rarely have inner lives of their own and exist solely to move plots with their inevitable betrayals. Their duplicity is often linked to their promiscuity in a way that demonises female sexuality.

Fatale’s lead character Josephine fits the femme fatale archetype pretty well. The men who fall in love with her usually meet a grisly end. But unlike your run of the mill femme fatales, we get to peek into the mind of Josephine and see what drives her. Her motivations and feelings are front and centre, separating her from her two-dimensional precursors. Oh, and she also lives in a world where lovecraftian horrors are real and she bears a curse that causes all men to fall dangerously in love with her. Her sexuality has literally been demonised.

Brubaker and Phillips have been collaborating with each other for a very long time now. They are perhaps best known for their neo-noir crime anthology Criminal. This strong association with the crime genre both informs the expectations for Fatale and works against it. The world of Fatale looks a lot like Criminal with a streak of horror painted through it. Phillips excels at creating a realistic criminal underworld populated with beautiful women, mean looking crooks and baby-faced journalists. But in Fatale there is something else lurking beneath the surface. The crime scenes are more gruesome. The pacing of the panels is more deliberate. The art will hint at something otherworldly. It can be quite jarring to see something supernatural-looking appear in Phillips’ signature style. But then again, maybe it should be. It’s jarring to the characters as well.

Josephine’s curse also gives her functioning immortality, and each arc in Fatale is set in a different decade. This structure means that Brubaker and Phillips are able to draw inspiration from differnt kinds of crime stories. The first arc feels almost like a boilerplate 50s noir if not for the supernatural elements, while the second arc has strong Charlie Manson vibes. The challenge with this structure is that the cast of characters changes between arcs, meaning Brubaker only has a short amount of time to make you care about them.

The characters are fleshed-out well enough but the story does leave you wanting more. Take Miles, wannabe actor and the co-lead of the second arc. Characteristics such as a fear of swimming, drug addiction and fame hunger are all introduced but completely fall by the wayside once he falls in love with Josephine. But y’know, maybe that’s the point. Phillips facial work and Brubaker’s concise narration tell us all we need to know about Miles. He was never meant to be the star, both in the story and out of it. By the end of the arc Miles is dead and we’ll never know him any deeper than these surface traits. And neither will Josephine, who loved him briefly and indirectly caused his death.

It falls to Josephine to tie the whole story together. Like your typical femme fatale Josephine manipulates the men in her life. Her curse makes it unavoidable. But she also loves them and is wracked with guilt when she inevitably ruins their life. The second arc sees Josephine in hiding to minimise the damage she inflicts. After her enemies resurface, she proactively works to bring them down, though it tragically ends in Miles’ death. By giving her agency, clear motivations and a worthy cause to rail against, the creative team are doing a solid job of deconstructing the titular archetype. It will be interesting to see how the rest of her story unfolds and if Brubaker and Phillips can stick the landing.

Recommended reads

The Fade Out - Brubaker and Phillips return to straight noir comics with this tale set in 1940s Hollywood. The team is on typically fine form working in this setting, and Elizabeth Breitweiser’s colours brings the requisite grit and glamour to the story.

Criminal: The Last of the Innocent - The Fatale team’s dark pastiche of the Archie universe. Last of the Innocent’s Archie stand-in is all grown up and unhappily married to Veronica. He decides to murder her and move back to his hometown to relive his glory days.

American Vampire - Similar to Fatale, each arc of Scott Synder and Rafael Albuquerque’s horror/ action comic takes place in a different decade throughout American history.

[casualarsonist]

Parental Guidance: Gnomeo & Juliet

Gnomeo & Juliet is a really odd film. Not in terms of it’s production, mind, but in the sense that it’s a kid’s film that is also a rather loving adaptation of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet that is also an Elton John passion project, and while this is not exactly a formula that I would imagine typically inspires great confidence in a potential viewer, it certainly inspires curiosity. But believe it or not, G&J is not a failure - far too self-referential, sure, but not a failure - which, given the yawning chasm that lay between all the fractured elements that have been glued together to make it, is rather surprising. But will it keep your kids entertained, and (more importantly), will you be able to watch this film 100 times over the course of 5 years without wanting to kill yourself? Well...

Gnomeo & Juliet is the story of two factions - the ceramic gnomes that populate the gardens of Mr Capulet (Richard Wilson) and Mrs Montague (Julie Walters) , who live in adjacent houses 2B and Not 2B (hurr hurr). Just as Capulet and Montague are rivals, so are the gnomes in their respective gardens, and once the two neighbours leave the house or fall asleep, the gnomes come to life and tend to their own affairs, whilst also trying to undermine one-another, and competing in lawnmower races to the tune of Elton John’s greatest hits. Gnomeo (James McAvoy) of the Montagues plans a nighttime raid into the Montague garden at the same time as Juliet (Emily Blunt) of the Capulets plans a nighttime adventure to secure a unique Cupid’s Arrow Orchid from the roof of a nearby greenhouse. The two meet and fall in love at first sight before realising that they belong to opposing factions. It’s a kid’s film, so of course you can’t kill the leads, and in a turn that I find quite entertaining, Gnomeo is stranded on the head of William Shakespeare’s statue (the film takes place in Stratford-Upon-Avon, see) who tells Gnomeo that his story sounds familiar, and proceeds to talk with a great delight about the terrible fate of his two star-crossed lovers, to which Gnomeo replies that he can think of a happier ending - an ending he proceeds to set in motion. 

The film demonstrates a rather surprising affection for the source material to the point that it almost feels somewhat educational, with most of the characters being direct analogues for those in the play, and some sharing their names. It’s not often that you see the name ‘Tybalt’ appearing in a children’s film, and a less convicted project might have tried to dumb things down and I for one am glad that they didn’t. The leads are supported by a solid cast, including Maggie Grace as Gnomeo’s mother, Michael Caine as Juliet’s father, Ashley Jensen as Nanette - a water-feature frog, analogous to the Nurse, Matt Lucas as ‘Benny’ (analogous to Benvolio, geddit?), Jason Statham as Tybalt, and Stephen Merchant as Paris, as well as Ozzie Osbourne, Dolly Parton, Hulk-freaking-Hogan, and Patrick Stewart playing bit parts, and generally speaking, the quality of the performances of is quite high amongst the secondary characters. Smith and Cain are great, of course, but a great surprise is that some of the strongest performances come from the bit-players: Jim Cummings (giving the best performance in the film as the Portuguese flamingo garden ornament, Featherstone), Osbourne, Parton, and Hogan, who all have a lot of fun. 

Less inspiring, however, are the performances of the leads. I like James McAvoy, he’s a very skilled actor. But as Gnomeo, he’s boring as shit. For some reason he’s affected a smooth British accent which is at odds with his stocky gnome character, and he sounds as if he’s trying his best to get into the spirit of things, but still sounding a bit disconnected; Blunt is in much the same boat, although I don’t have quite the affection for her skills. Don’t get me wrong - I don’t think it’s a matter of them not making the effort - but simply that they’re miscast; when I reviewed Flushed Away earlier, I mentioned that Kate Winslet’s accent allows her to disappear into the character, and Hugh Jackman’s natural charm woos the audience to his, but I didn’t find either accent or charm to be drawing me in here, these actors don’t lift the script like Winslet and Jackman did.

Which brings me to the soundtrack. I’ve mentioned that this is an Elton John passion project, and daaaaaamn do they go out of their way to remind you. The incidental music consists almost entirely of adapted versions of John’s most famous songs strung together as some kind of self-aware Frankenstein’s monster. If I weren’t so well-acquainted with his music I might not have noticed, but incidental music is supposed to be exactly that - incidental - and should compliment the action rather than distract from it. Music is a powerful influence on the mind, and you might find yourself drawn away from what’s happening in front of your eyes to the song you recognise in the background. On top of that, John’s songs form the licensed soundtrack to the film, and while ‘Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting’ is a rousing song, it’s a rather obnoxious and jarring when the characters in the film chant awkward alternate lyrics over the chorus, as if the scene is built to promote the song, rather than the song chosen to fit the scene. It all feels a bit forced, and strikes me as a bit creatively bankrupt; the last thing you’d want in a film using Elton John’s great music is for Elton John’s great music to feel like bad product placement. I’m probably treating this with an undeserved severity as it’s not always like this, mind - Lady Gaga contributes a number of solid collaborative numbers with John for the final soundtrack - and I guess ultimately it’s a nitpick, but it did cheapen the experience. 

But in the end, G&J is a kid’s film, and it’s far from the worst you’ll watch. It’s a bit quirky and a bit funny with some solid laugh-out-loud moments, it’s got something for the parents and I can imagine that most kids would find something quite memorable in it. Add to that the fact that it’s actually not a terrible entry point to Shakespeare’s work for a child (or to Elton John’s music), and it has some solid merits. It won’t grind your psyche into dust if you have to watch it multiple times either, so while it’s not necessarily a must-own, it’s not a bad watch at all. 

Laughs: 6

Some of the best lines come from the characters with the least dialogue - voice-over legend Jim Cummings is absolutely golden as spicy flamingo Featherstone, and Hulk Hogan’s 30-second advert voice-over for the lawn mower, the ‘Terrafirminator’, is the single funniest part of the film. There are also a number of good set-pieces and running gags, but other than that, the film is amusing, not hilarious. 

Visuals: 8

The CGI is high quality and very colourful, with a great deal in world-detail and Pixar-esque background jokes for the Shakespeare-savvy. There’s a wonderful texture to everything, and the chips and scratches on the gnome’s ceramic skin is a great touch. 

Performances: 7

Strong performances from the secondary cast, are let down by miscast lead actors. 

Plot: 8

I was actually really happy with this one - it remains relatively faithful to the source material in a lot of ways, and when it doesn’t, it signals the change in a clever, self-aware, and contextually-appropriate fashion. 

Obnoxiousness: 4

Other than the incessant shoe-horning of Elton John references, there’s not a lot to be annoyed by in G&J. It doesn’t lean heavily on brashness or slapstick for humour, and is quite elegant in its execution otherwise - the action scenes are particularly well-choreographed. Nanette is likely the only character that will do your head in after a while.

Timelessness: 6

The classics never die, and Romeo and Juliet is a classic tale. The quality of the visuals, and the nice crescendo to the story leaves the film emotionally resonant, but the sheer flaccidity of the lead performances makes the experience as a whole feel a bit empty. Still, it’s inoffensive enough.

Hardcore Rating: 3

Apart from the vicious Terrafirminator (”your lawn will be afraid to grow!”) there are no scares to be had here. One character dies, and at least one other appears to die but doesn’t, but they’re both well again in time for the credits, because kids film.

Overall: 7/10

G&J is a solid film, although god help me, I can’t get past the fact that I didn’t enjoy it as much as Flushed Away because of the obnoxious Elton John references and weak leads. Still though, it might get your kids into Shakespeare, so it’s not all bad. 

[spynotebook]

All Images: Warner Bros.

Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner came out 35 years ago to mixed reviews, but these days most people consider it a scifi masterpiece. However, it’s also a film that occasionally happens to be a blind spot for some nerdy film fans. When we at io9 discovered we were employing not one, but two people who had never seen the film, we had to take steps to rectify the situation immediately.

The guilty parties are io9 staff writers Beth Elderkin and Charles Pulliam-Moore, who we forced to watch Blade Runner last week. Then we asked them what they thought about Ridley Scott’s 1982 film after experiencing it for the first time in 2017. It’s wide-ranging conversation that touches upon the burden of three-plus decades of hype, unicorn dreams, Android phones, artificial intelligence, the Deckard/Replicant debate, and, of course, how they feel about the upcoming sequel now that they’ve finally seen the original.

Germain Lussier: Before we talk about what you both thought about Blade Runner, what were your expectations about the movie going into it?

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Beth Elderkin: I figured I was going to love or hate the original Blade Runner. There’s a real polarization surrounding the film that seems to have only increased over time. It’s either genius or terribly overrated.

Charles Pulliam-Moore: To be perfectly honest, I didn’t think that I’d really care for Blade Runner all that much because it’s one of those movies that, as a person coming to it so late, I’d heard so much about from diehard fans. Blade Runner’s one of those pop culture “must-watches” that I always ended up putting off because people love to bring it up and insist on telling you how seminal it is.

Beth: Yeah, Charles, I think the diehard fandom around the film turned me off more than anything else. It was like the bar of reaction had been set so high I had to play catch-up in order for my opinion about the film to be taken seriously.

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Charles: Same! I’ve sat through my fair share of debates about which cut of the film is superior and I totally get how, for fans, that kind of back and forth is fun. But as an outsider it sort of cast the movie in a somewhat negative light. “Negative” is too harsh a word, but in my head, I always assumed that watching Blade Runner properly would mean going back, watching each version, and then coming up with some grand thesis about which Blade Runner is THE Blade Runner.

Beth: What cut did you watch?

Charles: The Final Cut.

Beth: Me too! I realized we didn’t actually talk about the different cuts ahead of time, but it’s interesting we chose the same one. People are so passionate about that part. Everyone I talked to about the movie had an opinion about what version to watch. In the end, I went with the Final Cut because no one talked to me about that one. I figured that made it more of a middle ground.

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Charles: It was just the first one I saw in the store, haha. As a last point to your follow-up, Beth. I love the concept of Blade Runner being a living, breathing piece of art that’s grown and evolved over the past 35 years. But, again, when you bring it back to the fandom, it all just seems like w-o-r-k.

Germain: The Final Cut is kind of the culmination of all the different cuts, so it’s probably best you both watched that one. So, now that you’ve seen it what did you think? Did you like it? Was it overhyped? Lay it on me.

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Beth: I enjoyed Blade Runner just fine, but more as a representation of works that followed rather than the movie itself. Perhaps that’s a little unfair to the film but, to be honest, it didn’t really grab me the way fans told me it would. I really loved the moments when I could look at the film and see exactly how it influenced later products—it was ahead of its time, and it shows. But as far as the film by itself, I was kind of bored.

Charles: It’s fine! Another one of the consequences of having waited to sit down and watch it properly is seeing just how much of an influence the movie’s had over subsequent scifi film and television, and having to remind myself that Blade Runner isn’t the iterative work.

Beth: There were elements I really admired about the film. I actually loved how small the stakes were. Hear me out: The conflict wasn’t a giant Westworld-style robot takeover, with piles of bodies strewn everywhere, but rather just a couple of Replicants wanting to live a few more years. In many other films or shows, this would be a side plot. But here, it’s given the time, attention, and space it deserves to explore their growth and internal conflicts.

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Charles: There’s a dead, haziness to the movie’s aesthetic that might have been novel at the time, but it’s since become our visual shorthand for dystopia. I instinctively liked it because it was familiar, but that familiarity also annoyed me because, like I said, that’s the visual language we use to craft futuristic end times.

Beth: Charles, I cracked up when, during the only scene in the daytime in Tyrell’s tower, the first thing Deckard says is, “It’s too bright, draw the shades.” All night time all the time. Daytime doesn’t exist in dystopia.

Charles: No, no it does not.

Beth: The lighting really created a sense of tension, indicating that someone was always watching. And, combined with the pressing crowds that were always present in the action sequences, there’s this overwhelming uncomfortableness that makes you feel like you’re never alone. Then, by the time it’s just Deckard and Roy, it’s just the two of them. You end up feeling the weight of Roy’s words more because everything else has died away.

It’s a small thing, but I also loved the reflection in the eyes.

Charles: In Rachel’s?

Beth: And the owl’s. And, for a moment, Deckard’s. I saw Deckard have that reflection for just a moment, which I’m sure lent credence to the “Oh, he’s a Replicant too!” argument, which... maybe?

Was there anything else that caught your eye, Charles?

Charles: Hmm. Technically speaking it wasn’t really my eye, but I got a bit of a chuckle out of the Replicants being Nexus-6 models. (Said the recovering Android nerd.) I remember seeing this headline years ago and my eyes glazing over when I saw Blade Runner:

But that’s another example of the film casting this ridiculously long shadow.

Germain: Charles, Beth talked a bit about the story, but what did you think of the story? It seems like you both enjoyed the film aesthetically. 

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Charles: So one of the things that actually surprised me was how little time the movie spent having its human characters consider the Replicants’ humanity (or at least the idea of it), which is where a lot of fiction about androids and such tends to veer these days.

There’s a distinct inhumanity and stiffness to all of the Replicants that codes them as being non-human. It feels heavy-handed at first, but as the movie went on, I came around to the idea that Ridley Scott was intentionally trying to “other” them, you know? As if he was trying to force us to consider the innate humanness of the movie’s central plot about Deckard hunting them while they’re trying to extend their lifespans.

Beth: I did not care for the “Voight-Kampff” test, as I don’t feel like it’d be an accurate way to detect humanity.

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Charles: SAME. The idea that people couldn’t pick Replicants out just by looking at them seemed like bullshit.

Beth: Couldn’t they just have a blood test or something? I mean they put barcodes on the scales of snakes, surely they can add one to skin flakes or blood cells.

Charles: Again, though, this is one of those things that subsequent things inspired by Blade Runner have taught us to consider.

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Beth: I was curious what would happen if someone with sociopathy would take the exam. I mean, they’re not going to care about some damn turtle.

Charles: Speaking of sociopaths. Can we also talk about the performances? I’m of the strong opinion that they’re... not great.

Beth: Are we talking about Deckard? I’ve got thoughts about Deckard.

Deckard isn’t a very interesting protagonist. I feel like the “Deckard is a Replicant” argument kind of serves as a buffer to justify the fact that his character doesn’t really engage the audience, which is weird because Harrison Ford is a really charismatic actor. The only time he really emotes is when he sexually assaults Rachael, which… oh boy, let’s just not.

Charles: I meant more the cast as a whole.

Beth: I thought Roy and Rachel were great; everyone else was okay I guess. I don’t know what they did with Rachel’s voice, but she always sounded unearthly and disconnected from the scene, but in a way that made sense for the narrative.

But as far as what I really didn’t care for, it comes down to pacing. The movie moves very strangely. It’s slow and yet not slow. I can’t quite put my finger on it. You can tell the movie’s been through multiple edits because the pace is very uneven, and there are obvious mistakes as a result.

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Charles: There’s a distinct lack of charisma from most of the movie’s cast that I’m assuming is intentional, but it left me rolling my eyes because it gave the film a very distinct “thought experiment” vibe. That, as opposed to trying to feel like a world grounded in any sort of reality.

Beth: That’s a very film noir vibe.

Charles: But it’s things like that which make Blade Runner feel a little too self-serious for my tastes. You can hear the film and philosophy students off in the distance muttering to one another: “What does it MEAN to be human?” Spare me.

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Beth: What were your thoughts on the toymaker? That whole scene with the toys was so jarring. Like, what was the purpose of him being surrounded by weird toys? To represent that he saw Replicants as toys? We didn’t really get an indication that’s how he felt in what he actually said and did. It felt like the set dressing was trying to create something that wasn’t supported by his words or actions.

Charles: I’m gonna assume Ridley Scott’s a fan of the toymaker and was trying to construct a scene that was as creepy as it was pseudo-deep about the relationship between sentient beings and their creators.

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Beth: I liked the character just fine, and was sad that he died. I didn’t like the way his character was framed by his environment.

To be honest, the only scene that truly matters to me is the final one between Deckard and Roy, just the two of them talking at the end of a man’s life. Everything else was a mixture of okay to pretty good to “Oh god get it away from me.”

Germain: We’ll get back to that but before we lose it, Beth, you mentioned the “Deckard is a Replicant” thing which, of course, is a huge pop culture debate. I’m wondering what you both thought of the debate itself beforehand, and where you come down on the debate now that you’ve seen the film.

Beth: If he’s a Replicant, how come he’s still alive in the sequel?

Charles: God, this makes me tired.

Beth: I didn’t really have an opinion about it beforehand because I wanted to let the narrative inform me and, in the end, I still don’t know. I mean, I’m leaning “Yes” mainly because I later read that Ridley Scott says he’s pro-Replicant, but I think the argument can be made either way. I do think Harrison Ford’s acting wasn’t that engaging and that fueled the fervor.

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Charles: Before having seen the film, the question didn’t really interest me all that much and it does less so now. Part of that’s because I never developed much of an attachment to Deckard, but it’s also because I don’t really think that it matters all that much to the story? Like, my experience of Blade Runner isn’t really changed either way.

Germain: Just so you know: The original cut of the film didn’t have the unicorn dream. He has the dream in the Final Cut (and Director’s Cut), and then Gaff leaves him an origami unicorn, suggesting Deckard’s memories are artificial, because Gaff seems to know about them.

Charles: A question. Why couldn’t he just dream about unicorns?

Beth: Exactly! Unicorns are awesome.

Charles: Why does it have to be related to the origami unicorn?

Germain: Because it would be pretty coincidental that his colleague would guess that he has dreams about unicorns, right? This is why there’s no answer to the question... or is there? IN THEATERS FRIDAY.

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Charles: And herein lies my beef with Blade Runner as a whole. Figuring out whether Deckard is actually a Replicant was the only reason I finally sat down and watched this movie and when everything had actually been laid out, the “raging debate” about it all made me roll my eyes. Because it all really boils down to whether or not two people happened to have unicorns on the brain. Which is cute and all, but come on.

Germain: That’s actually a nice transition back to the film itself. Beth said she enjoyed the Roy/Deckard stuff at the end. What did you guys get out of that? Or the film as a whole outside of its visuals, influence or mysteries?

Beth: When I was in college, I took a course about artificial intelligence and the definition of humanity. (Yeah, I grew up in California, how could you tell?) It’s one of my passions—which, in hindsight, makes my not having seen Blade Runner pretty inexcusable.

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I feel like Roy was the most interesting character in the film, and I actually enjoyed how they portrayed his journey. He was doing awful things, but for what he perceived to be the right reasons, and the movie doesn’t place a value judgment on his actions.

Was he human? No, the movie is clear in that he isn’t—at least not based on its (and our) interpretation. But the movie also seems to argue that humanity isn’t something we should limit to a single definition.

Charles: Hm. It’s funny. People put so much weight into that speech even though Rutger Hauer’s been very open about it not actually having all that much to do with the film or its messages. Which, in its way is kind of the perfect encapsulation of Blade Runner.

Beth: That’s interesting, and true.

Charles: It’s a bunch of high falutin’ concepts and ideas delivered beautifully, but they don’t mean anything until people project their own feelings onto it.

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Beth: I actually like how the movie doesn’t push us to see the Replicants as good or evil, but something that’s simply “other.” As you mentioned before, Charles, there’s a tendency in Hollywood nowadays to make robots sympathetic, the good guys in a world that’s stacked against them. Before, they were evil Terminator robots. Blade Runner gives us a a creation inside a morally grey area and says “Make your own call.”

Charles: Personally, I think in that moment, Roy felt as if Deckard finally understood what it meant for the Replicants to be living in a constant state of fear that their lives were about to end. Because he himself was about to die, Roy took the opportunity to prove to Deckard that he was better at humanity than a supposed biological human was.

And that’s it? I dunno. I really struggled to gas this movie up.

Beth: Watching Blade Runner decades after it came out is like looking at a canvas at a modern art museum that’s been painted entirely black. There’s something there, and it’s clearly well crafted, but is the value in the creation itself, how we interpret it, or the fact that we’re told to see it as something more than what it actually is?

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After seeing it, I think it’s a combination of all three. But I’m sure plenty of people are going to tell me I’m wrong!

Germain: You’ve seen Blade Runner. Now—what do you think about the sequel?

Beth: I can tell you that I have no interest in seeing the sequel. Two hours of Blade Runner was one thing, I can get through that okay. But two hours and 40 minutes feels like a chore.

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And for a movie that I felt was okay, but appreciated more for what it inspired than what it did? That doesn’t encourage me to see the story continue. Plus Ryan Gosling annoys me.

Charles: Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. No. Won’t be seeing. I hope the sequel makes fans happy, though. That being said, I myself am not one of them.

Beth: Agreed, Charles. Just because I don’t want to see it doesn’t mean it doesn’t deserve to exist. It absolutely does, and fans deserve to see the story continue.

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Charles: Totally. It’s just that I can think of so many other things I’d rather do. Which I don’t say out of contempt or anything, but that as best as I can tell about the sequel, it’s just Blade Runner redux with an older Deckard and a new Blade Runner who is not Deckard but is exactly like Deckard.

Which is to say: fans, you’re probably going to like this! Or passionately hate it.

Beth: The thing that would excite me is a shorter runtime. Okay, I’ll actually go a little further: I’d like if I knew whether the movie actually expanded into the outer worlds, so we saw how the Replicants live on a daily basis. I’d like to see something like the Institute synths from Fallout 4, where you see how they’re used and treated and can make a value judgment on whether or not you think it’s okay.

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But I don’t have an indication of how involved Replicants are in the plot as background characters and environment building, at least not from the trailers that I saw.

I have a question for you, Charles. How accessible do you feel Blade Runner is?

Charles: In terms of?

Beth: General audiences. There have been so many rave reviews for the sequel, and I’m curious if that’s because film criticism as a whole has an overall favoritism for the movie that may not be shared by the general public.

Charles: That’s a very good question.

Just to bring this all full circle—we live in a world whose pop cultural landscape was profoundly shaped by Blade Runner. Even if you’ve never seen it, you have seen and experienced elements of it through other pieces of art. With that in mind, I think plenty of audiences will be able to understand Blade Runner 2: Electric Boogaloo, but it’ll be interesting to see if people like it.

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Beth: Blade Runner is one of the most fascinating film experiences I’ve had in awhile—because it feels like nostalgia, but it’s really not. There’s an appreciation for what the movie was in the context of its time, as well as how its influence has carried over into other works. As a movie in itself, I didn’t fall in love. But I’m very glad that I saw it, and would recommend anyone else do the same.

Charles: Y’all, I really didn’t care for this movie.

Beth: Are you glad you saw it, Charles? Or would you have been fine not?

Charles: Neutral. The world wouldn’t have stopped spinning had I not.

Beth: Spoken like a true Replicant.