#and that said cult spy was dead set on corrupting him

[lost-external660]

"he's like an abyss;

smiling,

arms wide,

luring you in."

[theoriginalcarnivorousmuffin]

After reading your opinion on Molly Weasley, i want to know: What are you're opinions on the Weasley family? Besides Ron & Molly that is.

Five characters? In one post? Well, alright, here we go.

The Weasleys as a Whole

I’ve mentioned this before but JKR writes the Weasleys to clearly be a believable but ideal family. They’re all fiercely loyal, progressive per wizarding world standards, love each other and Harry deeply, and have this wonderful off-kilter joyous house where there’s always some rambunctious thing going on. 

Harry comes to associate the Weasleys with family and, personally, I believe a large part of him marrying Ginny boils down to it will make him a Weasley for real. 

That said, they’ve got some major issues. They’re very righteous people who, as a whole, will ice you out the moment they even suspect you do something that disagrees with them. You don’t even have to do it, what you did or didn’t do doesn’t even have to be something terrible or something bad, but god help you if the family decides they’re done with you. 

They’re very resentful of people like the Malfoys. This isn’t just because Lucius is a smarmy, pompous, ass (he is) or that he indirectly almost murdered Ginny but seems to mostly be because Lucius has so much money. All of their interactions seem to boil down to the money. More than this though, the Weasleys seem fully supportive of laws that... well, used against themselves would be a travesty but used against the likes of the Malfoys it’s about damn time.

They’re unquestioningly loyal to Dumbledore. Granted, most people we see in canon are, Dumbledore’s very very very good at convincing people he’s a saint. However, these guys are practically his cult member to the point where they do things like refuse to have Harry over the summer, even before Voldemort returned, because Dumbledore told them not to. 

They also never really adopt Harry into the family. Oh they give him a nice sweater, he comes over every once in a while to the house, he’s very good friends with Ron but he’s mostly treated just like that, a good friend. Now, there’s nothing wrong with this, except the way JKR sets it up we’re supposed to believe this is the family Harry found. It’s just that the family Harry’s found let’s him stay in a house with bars on his window where twelve-year-old Ron tells them, “Harry’s muggle family is really really awful” in a way that should have been raising red flags. Hermione practically lives at the Weasleys, Harry never does.

Now, are the Weasleys evil? No, far from it, they’re ordinary people who act in ways I’d expect ordinary people too. Technically they didn’t have to do anything more for Harry than they did, they didn’t have to hate Lucius Malfoy for better reasons, and they don’t have to be even slightly less worshipful of Dumbledore. They’re people, and they’re fine characters, but the overwhelming worship and love of the Weasleys we see across fandom does get on my nerves.

But you asked for individuals, so here we go.

 Arthur Weasley

Arthur is the epitome of “Pretty Fly for a White Guy” in the worst of ways and is, frankly, a giant awful joke to me. He’s the white kid you see going around with dread locks, a beanie the color of the Jamaican flag, smoking weed, and attempting to speak like Bob Marley 

Only, because he does it with muggle things, we’re supposed to find him funny and progressive.

Arthur is absolutely, albeit unwittingly, condescending in his love of muggle knickknacks. He has no idea how any of it actually works, not limited to how muggles could possible survive without the gold standard, but ardently believes he does because he can enchant the car to fly. Seriously, that he believes he’s an expert on muggle culture, as a pureblood wizard who heads an office in the ministry on it, is the worst part. His love of toasters comes across as, “Wow, look how cool it is that these poor little muggles made all this neat stuff. We should absolutely love the muggles because of it!” And that he heads an office in the ministry called “The Misuse of Muggle Artifacts” which is all about catching down Jackass style pranksters who think it would be hilarious of they enchanted toasters to bludgeon muggles to death...

Goddammit Arthur, why do you exist?

Right, otherwise, he’s got some pride issues going on. Part of the reason Percy is excommunicated is not so much that Percy doesn’t believe Harry, but because Percy dared to do better than Arthur in his own career. Arthur is stuck in his position as head of a joke of a department, he is an underling at its finest, and frankly likely only has that position because he’s a pureblood and the idea of putting a halfblood or even muggleborn at the head of a department dealing with muggles just made the higher ups shudder. (Don’t tell Arthur that though, he likes to think he’s not benefitting from nepotism). 

Arthur goes so far to accuse Percy as Fudge’s secretary as spying on him. Arthur, the guy who heads “Misuse of Muggle Artifacts”. Yeah, Arthur, I’m sure Fudge is really wasting his time using his straight laced secretary to find out all your dirty secrets. 

He also tends to see the world as very black and white. When Skeeter in book 4 writes an article after the Quidditch World Cup disaster complaining about the ministry’s lax security in enabling domestic terrorists to enter (something completely valid and true by the way) Arthur is so personally offended that both he and Percy go straight to the ministry to complain about Rita Skeeter and her daring to assume freedom of speech! HOW DARE SHE CALL THE MINISTRY’S NON-EXISTENT SECURITY AT THE WORLD CUP LAX! (To be fair, she also cited Arthur as having been in attendance at the event, a ministry employee, and having done nothing but, well, this is also true Arthur. You’re in a guerilla, underground, resistance movement. If I didn’t already think the Order was a joke this would kind of highlight it for me).

He’s also very resentful of Lucius Malfoy, and it seems to mostly be about the money. Arthur and Molly have a severe spending problem and actively resent that Lucius is swimming in money. That Arthur is ardently pleased about a law being passed in which the ministry without warrant can ransack Lucius Malfoy’s home... 

Well, Arthur, imagine the slippery slope if the government decides that it would like to search the Weasley home without warrant? In fact, he doesn’t even have to imagine it, as the beloved government in a few short years turns against him and then it’s all about how corrupt the ministry is. 

Arthur’s delightfully narrowminded, basically, and reminds us at nearly every opportunity.

Percy Weasley

Mostly, I just feel bad for Percy. Percy’s the son/brother that nobody likes and he’s painfully aware of that fact. He doesn’t fit in with the others, he has far too much ambition for the Gryffindor family and they resent him for it, and then he dares to say things like “I don’t know guys, Voldemort resurrecting from the dead after decades doesn’t sound plausible, we know Harry’s a little off kilter, and Dumbledore’s one shady dude”. Percy happens to be wrong about Voldemort resurrecting (and admits as much when the evidence is plainly visible), but he’s pretty on the money with the rest of it.

Regardless, growing up we see Ron constantly hating on Percy along with the rest of the siblings. I’m sure Percy is obnoxious, and certainly full of himself after making prefect and head boy, but he’s very clearly even before Order of the Phoenix the Least Favorite Brother (TM).

Then the Weasley family completely ices him out for a) getting a very high ranking position very quickly as Fudge’s secretary and b) not being gung ho about Dumbledore saying crazy things in the paper. Remember that to Percy Harry is Ron’s weird friend who seems to get into highly illegal activities every other week. From Percy’s point of view, it’s probably a matter of time before Harry becomes a crack head in Knockturn Alley (or given how behind the times wizards tend to be, an opium den). 

He’s constantly getting Ron into not only trouble but life threatening situations, is erratic and apparently a parseltongue of all things, and now Harry’s flipped his lid and saying that Voldemort has been resurrected after having gone through a very traumatic experience of watching a classmate somehow die. 

While we see Percy kind of (sort of)  make up with the family it’s clear that for Percy to have any relation with these people he’s the one who will always, ALWAYS, have to come crawling back on his knees and begging for forgiveness. It’s the Weasley way or the highway and I imagine, at some point probably a little after/during that epilogue, Percy will just slowly drift away because it’s just not worth it anymore.

Percy’s very much the black sheep of the family.

Fred and George Weasley

You all are going to kill me, but I actually don’t care in the slightest about Fred and George Weasley. This is because they basically have no personality aside from “funny”. 

They just have their weird, tandem, twin act and are either playing jokes on the school or else serving as Deus ex Machina in giving Harry magical items such as the Marauder’s Map for no apparent reason. The plot told them it was time, I guess. 

Their jokes, while not as bad as Sirius and James’ “Let’s sexually harrass Severus Snape by pantsing and beating him at the edge of Hogwarts lake” or Sirius’ “Let’s get Snape eaten by a werewolf!” are still often needlessly cruel and... kind of pointless. They harass Slytherin house constantly just because they happen to be Slytherins, they’re acceptable victims (which of course makes house tension that much worse). Harry gets sent a toilet seat in the hospital because... that’s funny? Har de har? 

They’re so indistinguishable from one another I routinely see people mistake which one got his ear chopped off and which one died. Because the point is, that we can’t tell the difference! It doesn’t matter who lived and who died because all we know is that Freorge is dead! 

Similarly, you see tons of fics around where character of the day ends up in this weird twincestuous relationship with Fred and George and it’s not only for a) that delightful twincest but b) because they’re such a singular unit that any attempt to pair one with somebody else feels weird. So you just get these porn fics about Fred and George being weird rapey teenagers who seem like they’d be more interested dating each other. 

Charlie Weasley

I really have no thoughts on Charlie. He raises dragons in Romania, the family loves him. Now, dragon raising feels like one of the most dangerous jobs in the Harry Potter universe, like Charlie had just gone and signed up to be a lumberjack but he seems to like it?

We really don’t see much of Charlie, he’s just the obligatory older Weasley son so that the Weasleys can be this ridiculously large family.

Bill Weasley

We see slightly more of Bill, but again, not enough to really leave an impression. We know that his marrying Fleur sent Molly into a complete state, and that they’re going to have awkward Christmas dinners forever because of it where Fleur just sits there and pretends not to loathe every second of Molly’s presence while Molly notes how bad it is that Victoire got stuck with that ugly pink hair instead of the Weasley red. 

Bill doesn’t seem to really do anything about this. He still marries Fleur, but we don’t really see a major confrontation where he tells the family “Look, I’m marrying her, so grow up.” So, I imagine he just tries to smile pleasantly and tells Fleur to just endure it for another few hours. He loves his family, his family’s great, but they only have to see Fleur once a year at Christmas.

Ginny Weasley

Ginny is weird. She’s this weird, frankly, almost personality-less void whose sole obsession in life seems to be marrying Harry. She and Harry end up in the world’s weirdest relationship and I honestly have no idea how people ship it other than canon told them to.

Ginny’s... well, first off, she’s very much in love with an idea. She had always worshipped Harry Potter but then he personally saves her life in what was a horrifically traumatic year and so that feeling just grows even more. Despite being Ron’s sister, she barely seems to know Harry, and everything she seems to like about it are just things she made up.

I imagine her and Harry’s marriage will be littered with affairs on her end. Not divorce though, because Harry would never admit his wife is having affairs on him all the time even if someone directly confronted him. Harry also won’t admit he’s gay. 

More than though we get hints of a personality. Ginny’s a fiery red-head tomboy with a temper. But... Well, it’s only ever hints. She never felt like a real person to me. She has I think one throwaway line about the Chamber of Secrets incident and how it personally affected her. We’re told she’s great at the bat boogey hex so we know she’s a fiery independent woman.

She feels more like a character sheet than an actual person. 

Whenever she’s around I always had this nagging question in my head where I ask why Ginny’s here. She has a lot of potential but nothing’s ever done with her. And when something is, it’s to get her into this bizarre relationship with Harry where he imagines there’s a green rage monster in his chest that loves her skin.

Okay Harry, if you say so. 

TL;DR: The Weasleys aren’t evil or anything, I’m not on Team Bash Them All, but they are shortsighted, ordinary, people who don’t deserve to be worshipped as all that is good in this world.

[curlymantis]

aaaa pls tell me stuff abt your ocs they're all so cool!! 🥺💚

Omg I finally finished answering this!!!!! 👀👀

Farcry 5: Zoë Seed!!

Omg that’s me 😏 she was an entomologist checking out the cool insects of Hope county and unfortunately for her she doesn’t believe in private property when it comes to discovering nature. One day chosen find her trespassing on John seeds property. They think she’s a spy for the resistance as she has a camera, binoculars etc. They take her to the main church (conveniently was a Sunday) once service is over shes handed over to the father and himself and John go through her camera. They only find insect pictures and omg wow she’s not a spy. She’s indoctrinated into the cult and ends up eventually becoming John’s right hand of god 😌🙏 sinners who happen to be an extra annoyance go to her where she makes them confess in whatever way possible. Or they die in the process, whoops 💅🏻 She’s polyamorous with all of the seed siblings including Faith cos like come on now let’s be real they all crave and need loving. However she’s married to John Seed because that baby boy is everything 😤❤️ She also likes to do cult posters and help write songs and sing them cos it’s fun as hell. She is closest with John and Faith Seed specifically out of the 4 Seeds. Other cultists are scared of her, or is it respect? Hmm who knows 😌 She also tortures sinners for fun and chases them around the forest making them as shit scared as possible. Oops 😏

The Magnus Archives: is my oc who is an Avatar of the eye and Rayn Porter is my oc who a avatar of the corruption. They both have the same last name as they are both the same person just if they had gone down different entity routes in their life. I’ll talk about Rose first! (I also have an avatar of the flesh and the vast but I haven’t worked on them yet or got them ‘fully fleshed out’ 😏

Rose Porter: avatar of the Eye, marked by the stranger, the spiral and the vast.

From an early age Rose always felt the need to watch people, to know, to understand. As she got older these feelings only became stronger and she begins to stalk people, not because she finds that person special for any particular reason they just happened to look to long at her and she saw them doing so. That just sets something off In her so now they must be followed, acknowledged, understood and scrutinised (me self projecting right into my ocs 😌). She found the Magnus institute one day as she started stalking Rosie. when she had seen the woman walking into a large glorious building she knew something was off, like the itching feeling you get, the feeling in your gut, the sensation of something important. She did not know what had over come her to walk in the building so quickly as that would ruin her chances of learning further about this person who dared make her feel so uncomfortable. But there she was. She was hired immediately of course as a librarian, then moving on the be an archival assistant, shocking to her. But obviously not to Elias Bouchard who knew just how useful her alignment to his almighty beholder. To say she had a crush on him would be an understatement. She can’t explain it. Some would call infatuation, some would call it chemistry, but smart ones say it’s because they are both devotees to the eye and she is in so much deeper than she has ever anticipated or even realises 👀

Rayn Porter: avatar of the corruption, marked by the flesh, the lonely and the stranger.

Rayn despises people (same queen 🙄) they put animals on a higher level of respect than humans. The corruption took ahold of them as a young child, they would always follow and play with cockroaches as a child. However their mother was to say the least an unempathetic, transphobic and cruel woman to say the least. Rayn was raised in a household full of scrutiny, hate and fear. Because of this had very little friends as the only social interaction they knew was their bitch ass mother they turned to the ‘pests’ of their home. Whether these were the slugs and snails in the basement of their home, or they were the cockroaches, house centipedes and rats that dwelled in their attic. They loved and appreciated them all, but their was still something deeper to it. A deep rot had started to form in Rayn and they hated their mother and family. They hated them for how they had cast them aside for not being female, they hated them for all the mistreatment they had faced as a child. The rot started small, a odd old smell that started to lurk around Rayn. Eventually others would notice the smell but would shrug it off as the smell would soon be covered by the smell of Rayns chain smoking. Then one day Rayn was staring in mirror poking at their face and squeezing. They found a sore on her face and squeezed it, pus comes out but something moves underneath. They squeeze harder and something wriggles forth, it’s a very small, juvenile cockroach, streaked slightly in something slimey. As you can imagine that fucked them up a bit, but they learnt to embrace it. Learnt to love that crawling away just underneath their skin are thousands of little legs connected to cockroach’s of many sizes. Sometimes if not managed roaches will find themselves sneaking out of nostrils, mouth and ears. Sometimes even out from behind her eyes. One way they feed the corruption is they set forth the filth at a selected location. All it takes is for them to place a cockroach down in a building and within a week there will be a infestation so strong causing the people in said building to be taken down with it. The Cockroaches will feed on those that they can over power and The Corruption always needs feeding... (Also just want to add cockroaches themselves aren’t actually dirty, they’re actually obsessive cleaners. the locations they live in are dirty)

Telltale Batman- Roz Traegers:

first encounter with John Doe (the eventually to be known Joker) was at the bar he frequented. They had never once seen him drink a drop of alcohol. He would order beer constantly for his alcoholic sure but never consume it himself. Aside from his alabaster white skin nothing about him seemed out of the ordinary to them. Well except the fact he liked to stare, a lot. You would constantly worry it’s because he was just judging you based on your appearance (a lot of people do) however John just likes to stare at people and found you interesting for some reason (cliches I know, but me and John Doe are basically the same person and I like to think he’d think I’m interesting). Roz has a great dislike towards the people John works with, they don’t appreciate how badly they treat him. Especially Harley. John is so obsessed with Harley and she treats him like absolute shit. Roz had a plan to get Harley arrested, however John found out and threatened to never speak to Roz again. Roz has a soft spot for Mr Freeze specifically from the gang also.

Vampyr: Rose Pine

works as an assistant to Camellia at the florist. Rose isn’t a very chatty person and has had quite a traumatic up bringing. Her mother, sister and father are all unfortunately deceased. Her father killed her mother, then sister, then Rose, then turned the knife on himself. Rose survived her injuries (hence the scar on her throat) and was put out into the adoption system. Roses father believed he had been doing his family a service by taking their lives before they could be claimed by Ekons. Roses father had been a vampire believer long before they had even breeched the city. Rose always waves hello to Jonathan Reid when she sees him galavanting around. He always waves back and occasionally they will exchange a conversation. One evening they exchange more than just brief chit chat when Jonathan is required to save her from a group of feral Skals. Rose is very badly injured from her encounter and Jonathan ends up having to change the sweet little florist he sees most evenings into a Ekon. Rose is also good friends with Charlotte Ashbury and Charlottes mother Elisabeth. I haven’t played Vampyr in a wee while, I want to get back into it soon so plan on adding more to her story.

Outlast: Rosie Porter

Rosie worked as a live in psychiatrist for those at mount massive asylum. She lives on the premises that way patient can be attended to at any time. Her experiences throughout life gives her empathy for those that are locked up, that the other guards and majority of other staff just don’t have. Rosie has always been able to empathise with those who would be considered ‘evil’ whether she empathised out of her own sick fascination or because of her heart hurting too much is another question. Rosies favourite patients are Eddie Gluskin and Chris Walker. She was hired after Jeremy Blaire forcibly admitted Chris Walker. Rosie is enamoured with Eddie and he knows it. Knows he has his little psychologist wrapped around his finger. However Eddie would be a hypocrite if he said he also wasn’t wrapped around her finger. Rosie is forcibly committed to the asylum by Jeremy Blaire they start Project Walrider on the patients. Rosie was against it and threatened to blow the whistle on the whole thing (dumb idea) and Jeremy uses her as the first female Walrider test subject. Rosie has engaged in an affair with her boss Jeremy Blaire when she first started working there. Due to their past ‘hands on’ relationship, Rosie is allowed more time with her patients and allowed to be alone with her patients. This has allowed for her to further her work with her patients, as they’re quite open when the know they aren’t being openly judged by the security staff.

Hannibal: Jessi Trees

is a forensic entomologist who works alongside Beverly, Jimmy and Brian analysing dead people n shit. Jessi first met Will Graham on the scene of a crime when they had both been called out. It was the mushroom killer from memory as the soil was packed with invertebrates filled with evidence. Will has just finished doing his whole ‘this is my design’ when Jessi walks up to him and stands quietly beside him, where they say: “These fuckers are filled with worms and I don’t know shit about worms” Will Graham turns and looks at them like what the fuck? Those are dead people. Jessi merely shrugs, smirks and walks off. Jessi can be described by a lot of people as ‘a cold person’ or ‘indifferent’ but passionate. They dehumanise the corpses they’re working with at that’s the only way they can get justice for them. If they get too caught up in all the sadness of it, they can’t move forward from it. Jessi has a crush on Will Graham and Beverly Katz. Jessi questions Will and Hannibals relationship quietly from the background but never really comments.

Bonus character!! Stardew Valley: Zoë

This bad ass came all the way from Zuzu city in need of a better and different life. They inherit their grandfathers old farm and get it up and running. The town is filled with wonderful, amazing people. But of course Zoë has to want to become close friends with the person who hates me everyone: Shane (they’re kindred spirits, Shane isn’t aware of this however because he seems to think he’s the only person who can suffer from substance abuse and sever depression haha.) Shane hates them of course until they keep harassing him and he reasilizes she’s a lot more screwed up than he was aware. Zoë is close friends with Shane (ends up marrying him one day), Linus (I would fucking die for him and anyone who’s cruel to him gets my foot in the butthole), Leah (they hang out frequently and like to paint in the forest together), Emily (I have a massive crush on Emily haha, she’s so similar to me it’s great), is also friends with Sam’s dad and Jodis husband Kent (Kent suffers from PTSD and I’ve developed a lot of my own techniques to help with my own PTSD so we help each other out. Also Jodi I’m stealing your husband, just kidding, unless). Zoë’s favourite animals on her farm are her blue chickens (raised by Shane) and her horse Aaron. Zoë’s favourite yearly event is the moonlight jellies festival!

[watusichris]

You Oughta “Get Carter”

Another old Night Flight piece, tied to a Turner Classic Movies airing, about a movie I never tire of watching. (Unfortunately, the Krays film “Legend” turned out to be not so good.) ********** The English gangster movie has proven an enduring genre to this day. The 1971 picture that jumpstarted the long-lived cycle, Get Carter, Mike Hodges’ bracing, brutal tale of a mobster’s revenge, screens late Thursday on TCM as part of a day-long tribute to Michael Caine, who stars as the film’s titular anti-hero.

We won’t have to wait long for the next high-profile Brit-mob saga: October will see the premiere of Brian Helgeland’s Legend, a new feature starring Tom Hardy (Mad Max: Fury Road, The Dark Knight Rises, Locke) in a tour de force dual role as Ronnie and Reggie Kray, the legendarily murderous identical twin gangleaders who terrorized London in the ‘60s. The violent exploits of the Krays mesmerized Fleet Street’s journalists and the British populace until the brothers and most of the top members of their “firm” were arrested in 1968.

The siblings both died in prison after receiving life sentences. They’ve been the subjects of several English TV documentaries and a 1990 feature starring Martin and Gary Kemp of Spandau Ballet. However, the Krays and their seamy milieu may have had their greatest impact in fictional form, via the durable figure of Jack Carter, the creation of a shy, alcoholic graphic artist, animator, and fiction writer named Ted Lewis, the man now recognized by many as “the father of British noir.”

Born in 1940 in a Manchester suburb, Lewis was raised in the small town of Barton-upon-Humber in the dank English midlands. A sickly child, he became engrossed with art, the movies, and writing. The product of an English art school in nearby Hull, he wrote his first, unsuccessful novel, a semi-autobiographical piece of “kitchen sink” realism called All the Way Home and All the Night Through, in 1965.

He soon moved sideways into movie animation, serving as clean-up supervisor on George Dunning’s Beatles feature Yellow Submarine (1968). However, now married with a couple of children, he decided to return to writing with an eye to crafting a commercial hit, and in 1970 he published a startling, ultra-hardboiled novel titled Jack’s Return Home.

British fiction had never produced anything quite like the book’s protagonist Jack Carter. He is the enforcer for a pair of London gangsters, Gerald and Les Fletcher, who bear more than a passing resemblance to the Krays. At the outset of the book, recounted in the first person, Carter travels by train to an unnamed city in the British midlands (modeled after the city of Scunthorpe near Lewis’ hometown) to bury his brother Frank, who has died in an alleged drunk driving accident.

Carter instantly susses that his brother was murdered, and he sets about sorting out a hierarchy of low-end midlands criminals (all of whom he knew in his early days as a budding hoodlum) responsible for the crime, investigating the act with a gun in his hand and a heart filled with hate. He’s no Sam Spade or Phillip Marlowe bound by a moral code – in fact, he once bedded Frank’s wife, and is now sleeping with his boss Gerald’s spouse. He’s a sociopathic career criminal and professional killer – a “villain,” in the English term -- who will use any means at his disposal to secure his revenge.

Carter’s pursuit of rough justice for his brother, and for a despoiled niece, attracts the attention of the Fletchers, whose business relationships with the Northern mob are being disrupted by their lieutenant’s campaign of vengeance. As Carter leaves behind a trail of corpses and homes in on the last of his quarry, the hunter has become the hunted, and Jack’s Return Home climaxes with scenes of bloodletting worthy of a Jacobean tragedy, or of Grand Guignol.

Before its publication, Lewis’ grimy, violent book attracted the attention of Michael Klinger, who had produced Roman Polanski’s stunning ‘60s features Repulsion and Cul-de-Sac. Klinger acquired film rights to the novel before its publication in 1970, and sent a galley copy to Mike Hodges, then a U.K. TV director with no feature credits.

Hodges, who immediately signed on as director and screenwriter of Klinger’s feature – which was retitled Get Carter -- was not only drawn to the taut, fierce action, but also by the opportunity to peel away the veneer of propriety that still lingered in British society and culture. As he noted in his 2000 commentary for the U.S. DVD release of the film, “You cannot deny that [in England], like anywhere else, corruption is endemic.”

Casting was key to the potential box office prospects of the feature, and Klinger and Hodges’ masterstroke was securing Michael Caine to play Jack Carter. By 1970, Caine had become an international star, portraying spy novelist Len Deighton’s agent Harry Palmer in three pictures and garnering raves as the eponymous philanderer in Alfie.

Caine had himself known some hard cases in his London neighborhood; in his own DVD commentary, he says that his dead-eyed, terrifyingly reserved Carter was “an amalgam of people I grew up with – I’d known them all my life.” Hodges notes of Caine’s Carter, “There’s a ruthlessness about him, and I would have been foolish not to use it to the advantage of the film.”

Playing what he knew, Caine gave the performance of a lifetime – a study in steely cool, punctuated by sudden outbursts of unfettered fury. The actor summarizes his character on the DVD: “Here was a dastardly man coming as the savior of a lady’s honor. It’s the knight saving the damsel in distress, except this knight is not a very noble or gallant one. It’s the villain as hero.”

The supporting players were cast with equal skill. Ian Hendry, who was originally considered for the role of Carter, ultimately portrayed the hit man’s principal nemesis and target Eric Paice. Caine and Hendry’s first faceoff in the film, an economical conversation at a local racetrack, seethes with unfeigned tension and unease – Caine was wary of Hendry, whose deep alcoholism made the production a difficult one, while Hendry was jealous of the leading man’s greater success.

For Northern mob kingpin Cyril Kinnear, Hodges recruited John Osborne, then best known in Great Britain as the writer of the hugely successfully 1956 play Look Back in Anger, Laurence Olivier’s screen and stage triumph The Entertainer, and Tony Richardson’s period comedy Tom Jones, for which he won an Oscar for best adapted screenplay. Osborne, a skilled actor before he found fame as a writer, brings subdued, purring menace to the part.

Though her part was far smaller than those of such other supporting actresses as Geraldine Moffat, Rosemarie Dunham, and Dorothy White, Brit sex bomb Britt Ekland received third billing as Anna, Gerald Fletcher’s wife and Carter’s mistress. Her marquee prominence is somewhat justified by an eye-popping sequence in which she engages in a few minutes of steamy phone sex with Caine.

Some small roles were populated by real British villains. George Sewell, who plays the Fletchers’ minion Con McCarty, was a familiar of the Krays’ older brother Charlie, and introduced the elder mobster to Carry On comedy series actress Barbara Windsor, who subsequently married another member of the Kray firm. John Bindon, who appears briefly as the younger Fletcher sibling, was a hood and racketeer who later stood trial for murder; a notorious womanizer, he romanced Princess Margaret, whose clandestine relationship with Bindon later became a key plot turn in the 2008 Jason Strathan gangster vehicle The Bank Job.

Verisimilitude was everything for Hodges, who shot nearly all of the film on grimly realistic locations in Newcastle, the down-at-the-heel coal-mining town on England’s northeastern coast. The director vibrantly employs interiors of the city’s seedy pubs, rooming houses, nightclubs and betting parlors. In one inspired bit of local color, he uses an appearance by a local girl’s marching band, the Pelaw Hussars, to drolly enliven a scene in which a nude, shotgun-toting Carter backs down the Fletchers’ gunmen.

The film’s relentless action was perfectly framed by director of photography Wolfgang Suchitzky, whose experience as a cameraman for documentarian Paul Rotha is put to excellent use. Some sequences are masterfully shot with available light; the movie’s most brutal murder plays out at night by a car’s headlights. The breathtakingly staged final showdown between Carter and Paice is shot under lowering skies against the grey backdrop of a North Sea coal slag dump.

Tough, uncompromising, and utterly unprecedented in English cinema, Get Carter was a hit in the U.K. It fared poorly in the U.S., where its distributor Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer dumped it on the market as the lower half of a double bill with the Frank Sinatra Western spoof Dirty Dingus Magee. In his DVD commentary, Caine notes that it was only after Ted Turner acquired MGM’s catalog and broadcast the film on his cable networks that the movie developed a cult audience in the States.

Get Carter has received two American remakes. The first, George Armitage’s oft-risible 1972 blaxploitation adaptation Hit Man, starred Bernie Casey as Carter’s African-American counterpart Tyrone Tackett. It is notable for a spectacularly undraped appearance by Pam Grier, whose character meets a hilarious demise that is somewhat spoiled by the picture’s amusing trailer. (Casey and Keenan Ivory Wayans later lampooned the film in the 1988 blaxploitation parody I’m Gonna Git You Sucka.)

Hodges’ film was drearily Americanized and relocated to Seattle in Stephen Kay’s like-titled 2000 Sylvester Stallone vehicle. It’s a sluggish, misbegotten venture, about which the less that is said the better. Michael Caine’s presence in the cast as villain Cliff Brumby (played in the original by Brian Mosley) only serves to remind viewers that they are watching a vastly inferior rendering of a classic.

Ted Lewis wrote seven more novels after Jack’s Return Home, and returned to Jack Carter for two prequels. The first of them, Jack Carter’s Law (1970), an almost equally intense installment in which Carter ferrets out a “grass” – an informer – in the Fletchers’ organization, is a deep passage through the London underworld of the ‘60s, full of warring gangsters and venal, dishonest coppers.

The final episode in the trilogy, Jack Carter and the Mafia Pigeon (1977), was a sad swan song for British noir’s most memorable bad man. In it, Carter travels to the Mediterranean island of Majorca on a Fletchers-funded “holiday,” only to discover that he has actually been dispatched to guard a jittery American mobster hiding out at the gang’s villa. It’s a flabby, obvious, and needlessly discursive book; Lewis’ exhaustion is apparent in his desperate re-use of a plot point central to the action of the first Carter novel.

Curiously, the locale and setup of Mafia Pigeon appear to be derived from Pulp, the 1975 film that reunited director Hodges and actor Caine. In it, the actor plays a writer of sleazy paperback thrillers who travels to the Mediterranean isle of Malta to pen the memoirs of Preston Gilbert (Mickey Rooney), a Hollywood actor with gangland connections. Hilarity and mayhem ensue.

All of Lewis’ characters consume enough alcohol to put down an elephant, and Lewis himself succumbed to alcoholism in 1982, at the age of 42. Virtually unemployable, he had moved back home to Barton-upon-Humber, where lived with his parents.

He went out with a bang, however: In 1980, he published his final and finest book, the truly explosive mob thriller GBH (the British abbreviation for “grievous bodily harm”). The novel focuses on the last days of vice lord George Fowler, a sadist in the grand Krays manner, whose empire is being toppled by internal treachery. Using a unique time-shifting structure that darts back and forth between “the smoke” (London) and “the sea” (Fowler’s oceanside hideout), it reaches a finale of infernal, hallucinatory intensity.

After Lewis’ death, his work fell into obscurity, and his novels were unavailable in America for decades. Happily, Soho Press reissued the Carter trilogy in paperback in 2014 and republished GBH in hardback earlier this year. Now U.S. readers have the opportunity to read the books that influenced an entire school of English noir writers, including such Lewis disciples and venerators as Derek Raymond, David Peace, and Jake Arnott.

Echoes of GBH can be heard in The Long Good Friday, another esteemed English gangster film starring Bob Hoskins as the arrogant and impetuous chief of a collapsing London firm. Released the same year as Lewis’ last novel, the John Mackenzie-directed feature is only one of a succession of outstanding movies – The Limey, The Hit, Layer Cake, Sexy Beast, and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels among them – that owe a debt to Get Carter, the daddy of them all.

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The Most Anticipated Movies Of 2017

2016 was another year that proved the geek shall inherit the Earth. Marvel Studios changed their entire landscape by splitting the Avengers apart in “Captain America: Civil War” while introducing magic via “Doctor Strange.” DC fans got their first tastes of Batman and Joker in “Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice” and “Suicide Squad,” respectively, while Fox had a hit and miss kind of year through the highly-acclaimed “Deadpool” and the disappointing “X-Men: Apocalypse.”

RELATED: 15 Comics To Look Forward To In 2017

This year’s shaping up to be even bigger, not only building on the groundwork laid down by these studios, but also by others aiming to achieve success by adapting comic, manga, anime and original properties for the big-screen. With the Justice League set to make waves, more cosmic drama is in the air due to Thanos’ impending arrival and, of course, the tale of the Skywalkers being set to continue, we decided to look at 2017’s most anticipated flicks.

SPOILER WARNING: Major spoilers ahead for several comic book movie franchises.

THE DARK TOWER (JULY 28)

“The Dark Tower” isn’t the easiest movie to get off the ground. This Stephen King story is one of his strongest adventures to date and mixes quite a few genres together. Danish director, Nikolaj Arcel, is charged with blending science, fantasy, western and horror into an epic wasteland sprawl that ends up being a battle for the very fabric of the book’s universe. What calms our nerves is the fact that Arcel has two of Hollywood’s biggest and most talented stars involved in Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey.

Elba will be starring as Roland Deschain, a mysterious sharpshooter and loner, who encounters young Jake (played by Tom Taylor), transported to this dimension called Mid-World. Both become embroiled in a quest to reach this Dark Tower so that Deschain can save Mid-World from extinction. However, McConaughey’s Randall Flagg won’t be making that journey so easy, being an evil sorcerer aiming to hijack the duo’s mission for his own nefarious purposes. The scope of this movie’s quite grand and fans knew to be patient in their demands because once it’s done right, there’s no limit to how jaw-dropping it can be.

THOR: RAGNAROK (NOVEMBER 3)

A buddy-cop movie on another planet where one’s a god and the other’s a… well, Hulk? Sold! That’s what we’re in for when “Thor: Ragnarok” rolls around. What makes this film so interesting are the various Marvel Studios threads being picked up. First, Thor has to deal with his wicked brother, Loki who, at the end of “Thor: The Dark World,” faked death to masquerade as their father and king, Odin.

With Odin apparently exiled as a homeless man in New York City, another plot point revolves around the mid-credits scene from “Doctor Strange,” which saw the mystical master being asked by Thor to help find his brother. Speculation’s rife that Strange will provide the doorway for (arguably the film’s biggest draw) an adaptation of the “Planet Hulk” storyline that would sees both Avengers going up as gladiators against aliens (in the comics, this was just the Hulk). How did Hulk end up there after “Age of Ultron?” How does Thor know what happened with his family? Director Taika Waititi has a lot to accomplish, not just to tie in his movie as a prelude (alongside 2018’s “Black Panther”) for  “Avengers: Infinity War”, but also for those eager to see how his first Hollywood blockbuster pans out.

LOGAN (MARCH 3)

If an unrestrained, violent R-rated “Logan” isn’t enough to put Wolverine fans in cinema seats, then we don’t know what is. There’s a lot of pressure on Fox and James Mangold’s follow-up to 2013’s “The Wolverine,” but looking at the trailers released thus far, everything from the score (especially that wicked Johnny Cash cover of “Hurt”) to the overall neo-Western vibe that the movie gives off have given fans have every reason to be very optimistic. Reassurance has also come via the positive buzz from the early few who’ve sampled it.

Several things have us pumped for this movie. We’re getting to see Logan cut loose in a bloodier way than the Berserker mode we were teased with in “Apocalypse,” albeit with a waning healing factor in a loose adaptation of Mark Millar’s “Old Man Logan.” We’re also seeing what appears to be a dying Professor Xavier and, of course, everyone’s favorite Wolverine clone, X-23. Given that this post-apocalyptic wasteland looks quite barren for mutants and that Hugh Jackman’s set for his final hurrah as the title character, comic purists can’t wait to see him go out on a clawing bang against Donald Pierce and his Reavers.

TRANSFORMERS: THE LAST KNIGHT (JUNE 23)

Michael Bay’s said that “Transformers: The Last Knight” will be his final movie in the franchise. If he stays true, then we can expect the most explosive spectacle of them all. His fifth chapter will be focusing once more on Optimus Prime, last seen heading off into space to meet the Creators, the alien beings that placed the bounty on his head in 2014’s “Transformers: Age of Extinction.”

However, from the trailers, Optimus appears to be corrupted on return, with a pivotal scene depicting him assaulting Bumblebee. Fans are speculating that this dark take on the Autobots’ leader could be tied to a subverted heritage as a Prime or to the villainous world-eating planet, Unicron. Also, hyping the excitement is the addition of cult-favorite Autobot, Hot Rod, as well as an expanded role for the beloved Dinobot, Grimlock. Megatron’s set to return as the evil Decepticon leader wreaking havoc, with Hollywood stars Mark Wahlberg, Tyrese Gibson, Josh Duhamel, John Turturro and Stanley Tucci also reprising their roles. Lastly, we’re salivating over the film’s King Arthur tie-in, especially with fan-favorite actor, Anthony Hopkins, added to the cast.

FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST (DECEMBER)

“Fullmetal Alchemist” is a manga and anime that really sets the bar high. It focuses on brothers Edward and Alphonse Elric in a world where alchemy is a form of science and State Alchemists (the only ones licensed to practice it) are employed by the government. While still children, they attempt to perform the forbidden act of human transmutation to resurrect their dead mother, but  plans backfire, destroying Alphonse’s entire body, forcing his brother to bind Alphonse’s soul to a suit of armor, while also taking Edward’s arm and leg. Afterwards, Edward becomes a State Alchemist himself and both undertake a quest to find the Philosopher’s Stone in order to restore their bodies.

Sounds like quite a dramatic blast, right? Fumihiko Sori (best known for 2002’s “Ping Pong”) will be bringing the story to life, starring Ryosuke Yamada as Edward Elric, aged from 15 to 20 for the movie. As it ambitiously tries to condense the entire story into one film, several names from the original series will appear such as Winry Rockbell, Colonel Roy Mustang, and fan-favorite, Shou Tucker. This adaptation of Hiromu Arakawa’s popular action-fantasy manga has been anxiously awaited for months now, so expect a passionate response when it drops.

BATMAN VS. TWO-FACE (TO BE ANNOUNCED)

“Batman: Return of the Caped Crusaders” was a wonderful, campy trip down memory lane that really paid homage to fans of the original ’60s television series. The reception of this hammed-up animated film was so good that a sequel was green-lit with William Shatner (Two-Face/Harvey Dent) joining the legendary dynamic duo, Adam West (Batman) and Burt Ward (Robin). Fans lapped up last year’s nostalgic experience, which focused on the corrupted Dark Knight as he fended off the combined threat of Joker, Penguin and the Riddler; all with the help of Robin and Catwoman, played by another icon in Julie Newmar.

Details are sparse regarding the plot and release date, but theories are already abound. The television series featured many prominent rogues but Dent never made the cut. However, writer Harlan Ellison did a story with the villain, though the episode never aired, supposedly because he was too gruesome for kids to see. The story, “The Two-Way Crimes of Two-Face,” was eventually adapted in 2014 as a one-shot comic, “Batman ’66: The Lost Episode” #1.

KINGSMAN: THE GOLDEN CIRCLE (OCTOBER 6)

Matthew Vaughn has a knack for adapting comic book scripts for the big screen, directing amazing movies based off them and then not returning for the sequels, as per “Kick-Ass” and “X-Men: First Class.” Fortunately, he’s back for “Kingsman: The Golden Circle,” continuing the excitement he first started when he brought Mark Millar’s “The Secret Service” to theaters with Fox. Details are scarce, but theories are that the Kingsmen will be aiding their American counterparts, the Statesmen, in pursuit of a dangerous adversary named Poppy, who destroys the Brits’ headquarters.

The first film was praised for its intense action sequences, elements of comedy, and unique reinterpretation of the spy-fiction genre, and hopes are that this movie follows suit. Taron Egerton returns as the lead, Galahad, with Mark Strong back as Merlin. The star-studded cast also includes Channing Tatum, Julianne Moore, Halle Berry, Jeff Bridges, Vinnie Jones and Elton John. Most of all, Colin Firth’s character, super-spy Harry Hart, who was presumed dead after the events of the original movie, is somehow back. With no comic lore to feed from, we can’t wait to see this new screenplay that Vaughn’s cooked up with Jane Goldman.

INHUMANS (SEPTEMBER 4)

“Inhumans” is a pioneer move for Marvel in the realm of cinema and television. The first two episodes, detailing the exploits of Black Bolt, Medusa and their Inhuman contingent, will premiere on Labor Day across IMAX screens as an 80-minute feature for two weeks before later heading to ABC, which will then show the series’ full run from September 26.

It’s not being regarded as a spinoff of “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” (which has already used Inhumans in its storyline). Its two-part premiere also obviously won’t have the same production values as the MCU films do, but the fact that the cinematic premiere was specifically shot in the IMAX format builds intrigue that makes us want to see how cinematic their start will feel and how “network TV” things will get thereafter. If you’re like us, then no matter what, you want to see Karnak, Gorgon, Maximus and hopefully Lockjaw the teleporting dog, have a role in the cosmic plot that’s unraveling due to Thanos’ hunt for the Infinity Stones. With no plot details yet, the possibilities are endless.

GHOST IN THE SHELL (MARCH 31)

Since Scarlett Johansson was announced in Rupert Sanders (“Snow White and the Huntsman”)’s live-action adaptation of the classic anime/manga property, “Ghost in the Shell,” it’s been blasted with stark criticism of Hollywood “white-washing” of yet another Asian property. However, from the badass trailers alone, it looks like this film’s ready to live up to the high expectations set by Mamoru Oshii, who directed the iconic anime film based on Masamune Shirow’s cyberpunk manga. Furthermore, it appears to be very loyal to the source material with Oshii himself already giving his seal of approval.

Sanders’ movie focuses on Johansson as The Major, a special ops, one-of-a-kind human-cyborg hybrid, who leads Section 9. This task force is devoted to stopping the most dangerous criminals and extremists but finds itself facing a huge challenge when a new enemy emerges with a singular goal of destroying the world’s artificial intelligence technology and robotic advancements. The movie’s visual tone, the riveting action sequences that have been teased and the alluring score all seem to be within the same vein of the original lore and once it stays faithful, even the biggest of doubters, will find themselves silenced.

THE LEGO BATMAN MOVIE (FEBRUARY 10)

“The LEGO Batman Movie” is a spinoff of the Academy-Award nominated 2014 flick, “The LEGO Movie.” Such was the appeal of the Brick Knight, that it was decided he needed his own film, further capitalizing on the affinity for comic book characters at the moment. Chris McKay, who rose to prominence as a director of “Robot Chicken,” has been tasked with taking the helm with Will Arnett reprising his role as Bruce Wayne. Our hero will be squaring off against a bunch of iconic rogues, with McKay’s vision really packing in that Hollywood star power for good measure.

Michael Cera (Robin), Rosario Dawson (Batgirl), Ralph Fiennes (Alfred), Mariah Carey (Gotham’s mayor) and Zach Galifianakis (Joker) are all part of the ensemble cast. This time around, Batman realizes that if he wants to stop Joker’s hostile attack on his city, he’ll need to switch it up from his typical lone vigilante shtick and enlist some help. From what we’ve seen so far, the movie’s creators are well on their way to capturing the same upbeat tempo, musically and tonally, hamming it up like its predecessor. Since they’re stick to this, we’re certain that everything will be awesome.

SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING (JULY 7)

“Spider-Man: Homecoming” is hopefully the start of greater things to come from Marvel Studios and Sony’s partnership. Fans are beyond stoked for this, yet another reboot of the franchise, due to quite a few factors. Despite the character (played by Tom Holland) being in high-school once more, he’s already made waves with the Avengers in “Civil War” and this film continues that arc with the genius Peter Parker as Tony Stark’s protege.

If that doesn’t whet your appetite, then surely Spidey tussling with the likes of new villains, such as the Vulture (played by Michael Keaton) and Shocker, will. In what’s shaping up to be quite a technology-heavy film, hopefully this leads to a scene with the infamous Iron Spider suit Stark gifted him in the comics. Wishful thinking aside, we’ve already seen Spidey’s charisma and the chemistry with Iron Man, so as long they don’t overdo it on making him a sidekick and focus on his coming-of-age, not just as a youngster, but rather as an aspiring superhero, then we can expect a lot of magic from this Marvel movie. Fingers are crossed that this sets him up to be included in “Infinity War.”

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 2 (MAY 5)

Director, James Gunn, has a high standard to live up to with “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2.” His blend of humor and action made the original an epic space opera and from what we’ve seen so far, he definitely believes that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. We’re eager to see how Peter Quill (Star-Lord) and his band of ragtag, galactic misfits evolve and function as a family. The movie still seems like a Quill-centric film (not that we have a problem with that), with Drax, Rocket Racoon and Baby Groot being sure to draw just as many laughs.

Quill’s interactions with Thanos’ daughters, romantically with Gamora and as an antagonist to Nebula, will most likely to take front and center as part of his journey. His self-discovery will also cross paths with new characters, such as Ego The Living Planet (his father in the comics),  the empath Mantis, and lastly, Ayesha, The High Priestess. It may seem like a crowded cast, as Yondu (Michael Rooker) and the Nova Corps are also returning, but finding out just how Quill was able to harness the Power Stone the last time around should be key to how this cosmic film informs “Ragnarok,” “Inhumans” and eventually, Thanos’ arrival to Earth.

WONDER WOMAN (JUNE 2)

Director, Patty Jenkins, looks very much up to the challenge when it comes to crafting the inspirational and universally resonating tale that is “Wonder Woman.” The trailers have fans chomping at the bit due to how effective the movie looks as a period piece, set in a World War-era, with the relentless nature of its action sequences appearing nothing short of spectacular. Gal Gadot, as the titular character, and Chris Pine (Steve Trevor) are perched to steal our geek hearts due to how organic their on-screen relationship looks as well.

Expectations are definitely high as this film’s being viewed as the first major female comic book movie of the modern era, but after seeing how Wonder Woman handled herself in “BvS,” there shouldn’t be much to worry about. Watching her origins unfold on Themyscira and how she arms herself and leaves her Amazonian family behind  to enter the world of man, has us shaking with anticipation. Another plus is how vague they’ve kept the plot’s villains, with Ares rumored to be suiting up. Either way, we can’t wait to see her fight for justice to the backdrop of that badass Amazonian heavy-metal theme song.

STAR WARS: EPISODE VIII (DECEMBER 15)

Following J.J. Abrams taking a lightsaber stab at things, Rian Johnson (“Looper”) steps into the director’s chair. On the heels of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” and the standalone “Rogue One,” the pressure will be even higher to move forward and tell this tale of the reclusive Luke Skywalker, former Jedi Master. We’ll be glued to our seats as we bask in what happened between him and his murderous nephew/former student, Kylo Ren.

The fallout of Ren killing his father, Han Solo, and rebounding as Snoke’s right-hand man to the Dark Side, will also be on the table, as well as the truth of Rey’s Force-sensitive origins. There are so many answers we want while we feast on the adventures of galactic bros, Poe Dameron and Finn, too. The last movie, despite script criticisms of being too similar to “A New Hope,” was visually majestic and, plot issues aside, we’re looking for Johnson to continue raising the bar and to deliver a truly immersive experience. Finally, on a bittersweet note, cinemas will be packed to see Carrie Fisher in her final role, as General Leia, helping save the galaxy, with a poise and style that only she could pull off.

JUSTICE LEAGUE (NOVEMBER 17)

Many comic book movie fans believe that the future of the DC filmverse hinges on how well “Justice League” will do on the big screen. While DC Entertainment’s direction has come into question with movies like “Man of Steel,” “BvS” and “Suicide Squad,” they’ve all raked in big box-office bucks and done their part to push Zack Snyder’s initial vision forward. Hater or not, you know you’re going to be lining up to see Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Aquaman and Cyborg stave off Darkseid’s first wave of attack via his general, Steppenwolf.

With the seeds already sewn for the invasion from Apokolips, fans are also excited to see how Superman will be resurrected following his death at the hands of Doomsday in the previous film. Indeed, there’s a lot riding on this, but Snyder’s passion, that of his cast’s, and what seems to possibly be a storyline inspired by Geoff Johns’ “Darkseid War,” are all ingredients to deliver a winner for comic purists. The trailer promises tons of bombastic action, without even giving away too much, and while the pressure’s on for Snyder and his squad, even if it’s a temporary pleasure, we’ll be basking in that glorious moment when the League assembles in full.

What movies are you looking forward to this year? Let us know in the comments below! 

The post The Most Anticipated Movies Of 2017 appeared first on CBR.com.

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