#but honestly its all just marketing anyway in the end it seems like.. harrys house is hardly what the market seems to want either and yet?

[statementlou]

do you think Liam's new song is good?

I DO! Like obviously his voice is impeccable, he's SO pro and can do whatever he wants, but also his skill at crafting a pop song is also just ON IT, and this song is even better at that than his usual imo. But the most standout thing for me in a way is the lyrics; I think that's the biggest area where he's struggled since losing the Louis half of the Lilo songwriting machine, letting other people write for him or trying to churn out what he thought he should maybe. But this song, while they're simple and to the point, I really feel like they're so vulnerable and true and sincere! It's a lot!

I mean I don't personally think you have to strip yourself bare for the public in order to make good music, I'm fine with lyrics that aren't personal in that way; but that is what people had complained about that he wasn't doing enough and he made it clear that he had heard that and was responding to it, so if he's really done a whole album like this I hope they will be happy. And I'm very impressed with him since I think he had been trying for that and it took him some time to find it. Like I've said before it's not the kind of music I really listen to but *I* feel like it SHOULD be a huge radio hit, I'd rather hear it on constant repeat than most of the stuff that is. But Hope made such a good point right now about how his actual voice, as talented as he is, might be a factor in his struggle to get that kind of airplay; it's true that it's SO pro that it blends rather than standing out? Like how people tend to not realize how much he sings on 1D songs for instance (SO MUCH).

[twoidiotwriters1]

Written In The Stars CXXV (Harry Potter xF!Oc)

A/N: A bit of relief for your troubled hearts -Danny

Words: 3,265 

Series Masterlist 

Previous Chapter // Next Chapter

Listen to: ‘The Hurt Game’ -by The Script

Chapter Twenty-Three: Truce.

It was chaos after Emily and Sirius broke the news about the baby. 

The adults got closer to Emily and the young ones attacked Mel with thousands of questions. She tried to answer as best as she could knowing as little as she did. Then, after a few minutes, Sirius spoke again.

"Okay, okay!" He said loudly. "There's still one more thing we have to do! Mel, come here..."

Mel approached them, Sirius went to the pantry and came back holding a very large and thin box.

"Bet you were wondering where our Christmas present was," He smirked.

"Oh!" Mel chuckled. "I thought the whole news about the baby had distracted you from getting one, didn't think much about it..."

"Well, the baby was unexpected," Sirius admitted, his eyes hinting at something that he was very careful not to show in public. "But we would never forget about you! Especially after the news of you getting a place on the team!"

"Beater, no less!" Emily beamed. "You have it in your blood, Mel. I was so happy when I found out..."

"We also realized you didn't have a proper instrument to beat them all," Sirius smiled. "So here it is. I had to nag your mother until she let me use my vault to get it. Consider this my gift to you after fourteen years of nothing."

"You didn't," She said breathlessly.

"Open it!" The twins urged her.

Mel ripped the paper and dismantled the box with trembling, anxious hands. A brand new firebolt laid between the mess, begging to be used.

"Bloody hell!" She exclaimed, then looked up at Sirius and her mother. "Are you trying to win me over? There was no need to buy me a broomstick, you're family already!"

Sirius let out a joyful laugh. "Make sure you win in your future games or I'll regret buying you such a broom..."

"Mel's a great player," Ginny assured them, her eyes glued to the broom. "You're going to let me try it, Mel? You have to!"

"Of course I will!" Mel smiled. "Thank you so much!"

"Oh don't thank me, I wanted to give you a simple broom, but Remus and Sirius pestered me until I let them buy this one."

"My uncle?" Mel looked at the man standing in a corner of the room. "But you already gave me a present!"

"I didn't help them with money," Remus brushed it off. "I was the one who went to the bank and got it, Tonks helped me get the broom. Would've been suspicious if a man like me entered and bought the most expensive one in the market."

"It was the biggest pleasure to get that for you, Mel," Tonks admitted. "When I saw Harry's I fell in love with it, and yours is just as breathtaking!"

At the mention of the boy, Mel realized he'd been quiet the whole hour. She looked around the room and managed to get a glimpse of his figure as he left the room.

She made up the excuse of wanting to go and put the broom away herself, so the rest of them let her do it while they set the table to have dinner and Mel abandoned the kitchen, the firebolt firmly held with both her hands.

She found Harry on the second floor as he was leaving the bathroom, his face wet and the tips of his hair sticking to his forehead. He stopped as soon as he saw her. Mel looked down at her new broom and spoke timidly.

"I don't know if I'm a good player, but I promise as soon as we go back I'll practice tons..."

Harry looked down at the broom and then up at her face, a tense smile appearing on his features.

"Brilliant!" He said, using his fake joyful voice. "That's great, really... you... you're a fast learner, you'll be fine— Congrats about the baby," Harry cleared his throat, eyes darting from her broom to the walls. "You're about to find out how it feels, then..."

"What?"

"Having a family," He explained, "when we were twelve you told me you were curious about the things you were missing— Well, now you'll be able to find out..."

Mel was abruptly aware of how much she'd gotten living in Grimmauld place, and how much Harry had lost since June. She had forgotten about that conversation until now. Harry didn't mention the rest, the part where he'd said something about them being family, always together.

It felt like decades had gone by ever since that night at the burrow; but to her, it hurt just the same.

"Of course," He continued coldly. "I also remember saying that you didn't have such an awful life to start with, and that's still true. You got a place on the team, a sibling, a dad," He grimaced when he said it, but continued anyway, "lots of friends... a boyfriend—"

"Don't start this now."

"I'm not trying to start anything," He pushed, "I'm trying to make you see I wasn't wrong."

"What are you talking about?"

"It was me who was holding you back," He said with conviction. "I tried to tell you last June but you ignored me— I'm not trying to make you feel guilty, honest— I'm... I'm happy that things went well for you in the end."

What caught her off guard was the tone of sincerity on his voice, there was no double meaning to this, no hidden insults between the lines. Harry was truly trying.

"Thank you," She said. "I don't think you were holding me back, though. We were kids, and it was just the two of us for a long time... I understand why we acted the way we did. We were afraid of being alone."

"But you're not anymore. Alone, I mean."

"Neither are you."

"I s'pose not," He lowered his gaze. "Still... I think it'd be better for everyone if I were... you know..."

"Well, that proves that growing doesn't necessarily make you smarter," She replied, a small smile playing on her lips.

Harry didn't smile back, but her calm attitude seemed to edge him to continue.

"You have to know— What I said the other day..."

"You didn't mean it?" She offered tiredly.

"No... I mean, not all of it," He frowned. "When Sirius said Erick reminded him of his young brother I... I thought that Sirius was going to replace me, or something stupid like that— And I got angry at you because you convinced him to bring him here..."

This was the most Harry had talked to her in weeks, she found herself unable to move until he finished his speech.

"But I was ungrateful. You saved me, Mel. I made you feel bad about helping me because I was feeling awful about having to steal parts of you... but you have to know I was lying."

"What's the truth, then?"

"The part about you not being fully honest," He sighed. "Honestly, Mel, how did you think I was going to react? You liking Fred, befriending Erick...  I would've helped you, and I wouldn't have worried about Fred because in the end you—" His voice faltered, "in the end you chose me."

She didn't know if this was the best moment to be talking about it, but she was sure that she didn't want to leave the conversation unfinished. Mel dragged him inside her room, leaving the broom on the bed and taking her time to gather her feelings.

"I guess I was afraid you would push me away," She started. "You were my only friend for so long— and then the world got wider so quickly— I was afraid of saying the wrong thing and ending up alone in a place I didn't know... I tried so hard to be the perfect friend that I ended up being... not me."

"But you were a good—"

"My point is," She interrupted him, "I had good intentions, but I did it all wrong. We both did."

"Yeah," He kicked a piece of wrapping paper that was near him. "I guess that sums it up."

Mel moved towards the door, but she didn't leave.

"I was being honest when I said I did it all for you, but I also did it for myself. I wanted to prove that I was a worthy Dumbledore."

"I think you've done a good job so far..." He admitted. "Truce?"

Mel hesitated, she was feeling lighter now, but their relationship was far from okay, she was certain that they would find a way to continue arguing about stupid things, but now the air felt less charged. Yes, Mel was sure that she wasn't crushing on him anymore, but she was also convinced that she wasn't ready to start over.

"I think it's too soon," She started carefully, "because... well... I still look at you and wish I could throw something at your face."

The corners of his mouth went up, but only slightly.

"I don't want to hate you," Mel said quietly. "And even though none of us wants to listen to Dumbledore, we should probably stick together if we want to get rid of Umbridge. So as long as you promise that you won't rat me out, or underestimate my decisions, I promise I won't be a git to you. Deal?"

"I think it's a good way to start," He nodded, staring at her with a bit of his old softness back.

Mel turned to leave the room, but before she could close the door behind her, Harry called her name one last time.

"If we don't find a way to really fix things..." He fidgeted with the edge of his shirt. "I should probably tell you that I was also lying when I broke things off. I said I didn't like you," He laughed bitterly. "But I did. I really, really liked you."

Kreacher appeared in the attic, but there was something about the way he would carry himself around the house that made her feel he was hiding something. He wasn't as grumpy as before, and sometimes Mel would catch him staring eagerly at Harry as if waiting to see him burst into flames.

As the holidays came to an end, Sirius grew a bit grumpy, he was still happy about the baby, but more often than not he would retreat to spend the afternoons alone. Her mother confided in her one morning that there had been a huge fight between the two adults when they first found out about their kid.

Having a baby wasn't ideal during these times, it was dangerous. Sirius went mad, saying he wasn't father material and they couldn't, by any means, carry the pregnancy to its end.

Emily was tired of putting her life on hold. She'd been waiting for her whole life, she was ready to move on. She wanted to have the baby. Mel had never been destined to be an only child and now she had the opportunity to fix that, and with a wonderful man. It wasn't perfect, Sirius had tried his best to convince her, but Emily had made her mind.

Mel felt silly about not thinking of all the risks. She'd been so excited about the idea of a family that everything else had just stopped existing; but she also believed that her mother had lived through enough and, at the same time, she hadn't lived at all. If this baby meant fulfilment for her, then Mel had no objections, and she would do her best to protect them.

Snape visited on the last day, saying he wanted to talk to Harry. 'Dumbledore's orders' he'd sneered. Erick stayed in the drawing-room, he didn't want Snape to see him. He claimed it had nothing to do with feeling embarrassed about his situation, but at the end of the day, he was a Slytherin living with Weasleys, a Potter, a Black traitor and a Dumbledore. Snape was known to be unfair, and Erick didn't want to lose Snape's favour.

The twins teased him endlessly, Mel could see it was annoying and a bit contradicting for them, have taken a liking to a person with such high esteem towards Snape. What they didn't understand was that Erick didn't appreciate Snape, he just wanted to keep his good reputation going. Which was a clear confirmation that Erick would go back to Hogwarts.

"What made you change your mind?" She asked him.

"Well, you know the day we went to visit Mr Weasley? I went to the bathroom and I ran into one of my father's friends. He's a healer at St. Mungo's."

"Do you think he told them?"

"They haven't said a word to anyone," Erick said. "I lied and said I was leaving a donation my Grandad had left for the hospital. He gave me his condolences and didn't even ask how I was there on my own leaving money when I'm underage— I suppose he doesn't even know I'm sixteen."

"What are you two whispering about?" Fred jumped over the couch and sat next to Mel.

"You think your parents are going to pretend you switched schools?" Mel asked once they explained everything to their friend.

"I think they would if I don't show up at school..."

"But you're going back," She smiled. "I know that look, you're already making plans..."

"Well, if my parents are the cowards I know," He started, his mind doing quiet calculations. "That means they won't try anything while I'm there, and my Grandad left me a considerable amount of money, but I can't use it until I'm seventeen—"

"Which you'll be next week," Fred replied. "Does that mean you're still rich?"

Mel hit his chest lightly. "That's none of your business!"

"I don't have half of my school stuff anyway," Erick scoffed. "I left all my books and robes back home..."

"What's up?" George walked in. "Why aren't you trying to listen to whatever Snape is telling Harry?"

"Because Snape's vague all the time," Mel rolled her eyes. "We won't find out anything."

"Erick is thinking about going back to school," Fred told his brother. "But he's whining about not having robes and equipment."

"Why do you want to go back?" George made a face of disgust. "You got away! You can do anything you want!"

"I can't," Erick raised a brow. "I need to finish my studies if I want to fulfil my goals."

"Well, we can give you our old books," Fred shrugged.

Erick's eyes analyzed the boy's face carefully. "What?"

"I'm pretty sure that the books you guys are using are the same we used except for Umbridge's..."

"But you don't have the books here, do you?"

"Of course not," George snorted. "But we can ask our mum to send them once she's back at the burrow."

"Hermione and I have plenty of spare supplies," Mel smiled. "Ink, parchment... We got you, Prince."

Erick stared at them unblinkingly, his brow furrowed.

"Why are you helping me? I understand it coming from Mel, but why are you two helping me?"

George laughed, and that only confused Erick further.

"You're one of us now, aren't you? If you want to go back to school, you'll go back on both feet."

"Not that we understand your undying love for homework," Fred shivered, "but you've helped us before, this is the least we can do, mate."

"See?" Mel beamed. "You don't have to worry about anything!"

The concept seemed to blow Erick's mind, he'd spent so many years doing everything alone that the Weasleys' support was overwhelming. He wasn't easy to break, but she definitely saw something threatening to ruin his reputation of tough, cold Slytherin peering at the corner of his eyes.

Shouts coming from the kitchen brought all of them back to the present.

"Well, look at that," George said reproachfully. "It seems that something interesting did happen."

The four of them left the room in a hurry, on queue, the front door opened and Mr Weasley and Tonks walked in, but the latter left a second after she made sure Mr Weasley was safe and sound on the main hall of the house. Mrs Weasley, unaware of the fight happening downstairs, came to welcome her husband. Ginny, Hermione and Ron all three appeared at the top of the stairs as well.

The small group shared an anxious look and Erick asked quietly.

"Should we tell them?"

"Er..." Fred pointed towards his parents with a tentative smile. "I think they're about to find out..."

They were walking towards the kitchen, closely followed by the kids. The twins, Mel and Erick accompanied them as well, eager to see what was going on.

"Feels good to be back!" Mr Weasley was saying loudly as he moved forward. "Cured! Completely cured!" He pushed the door open and revealed the scene ahead.

Turns out not only Snape and Harry were there. Sirius and Emily had stayed in the room and now Sirius was pointing his wand at Snape, Harry was standing between the two men, his arms stretched out to keep them apart while Emily was standing across the table not knowing what to do. The four of them stared back at the group of people.

"Merlin's beard," Mr Weasley said in shock, "what's going on here?"

Mel realized Erick was still beside her and she pulled the twins to stand in front of him, completely hiding his figure. Snape lowered his wand and put it away, he walked past, failing to notice the hidden person between Fred and George. He turned around one last time to look at Harry.

"Six o'clock Monday evening, Potter."

Sirius had a murderous look on his face, Emily walked up to him and snatched the wand out of his hand.

"But what's been going on?" asked Mr Weasley once more.

"Nothing, Arthur, just a friendly little chat between two old school friends..."

Emily clicked her tongue but sat back down and said nothing, leaving Sirius' wand on the table.

"So... you're cured?" Sirius smiled tensely. "That's great news, really great..."

"Yes, isn't it?" said Mrs Weasley. "Healer Smethwyck worked his magic in the end, found an antidote to whatever that snake's got in its fangs, and Arthur's learned his lesson about dabbling in Muggle medicine, haven't you, dear?"

"Yes, Molly dear," Mr Weasley replied quietly.

Harry explained to them shortly what had transpired between the two men, Snape was there to tell him about his future occlumency lessons, but in the end, Snape had found Sirius' weak spot and pocked it until Sirius got tired, it was obvious that he was fed up with how everyone was doing something but him. Harry also mentioned that Snape somehow knew about Emily's pregnancy.

"It got out of control after that," Harry made a face. "Snape said that Sirius and Emily were being irresponsible, he said they hadn't grown up if they were having a baby during these times... He told Emily she should've known better... the way he said it made it sound like she was left to watch after a wild beast, and he hinted that Sirius' baby was bound to be the same..."

"What a rat," Mel growled. "Who does he think he is?"

"A big fat git," said Erick.

The group of friends turned to look at him in surprise.

"What? He's a prat, everyone knows that!" He raised a brow. "Don't look at me as if you've never said it!"

"You know, Flint?" Ron replied. "Maybe you're not as annoying as I thought."

Next Chapter —>

Taglist.

@dee123ksha @vampiregirl1797 @siriuslysirius1107 @stardusthigh @mikariell95 @vernon-dursley @thesuitelifeofafangirl @tomshollandz @kylosleftbuttcheek @reverse-hxlland @bloodorangemoonlight @omiwashere @t-rexs-world​ @just-here-to-escape-from-reality​ @21bruhs @i-am-scared-and-useless-bisexual @dielgonacoffee​

[practicalbuoyancy]

My First Community

How the city I tried running away from for two whole years turned into my hardest goodbye. 

I’ve reached the point in crying where tears are replaced with a bizarre gasping for air. Occasionally, a howl will break through that common decency should render me embarrassed for, but I’m alone with Kevin and my daughter’s sound machine is on. So I continue crying, howling, and gasping for air. 

Likely because we’re in the middle of a pandemic that destroys the ability to breathe, I’m constantly aware of the inhales and exhales that seem more strained than normal. I check to make sure I can get a full breath. They’re hiccuping, staccato things. But ultimately, they add up to a full breath. 

With only one full day ahead of me, my final hours in our little home in Detroit feel suffocating. 

Where do I even begin to explain the depths of my pain? I was never supposed to be here. Kids my age don’t own homes. We don’t buy fixer uppers and put 2x more into it than what the market suggests is reasonable. We don’t sit on our front lawns and form relationships with our middle-aged and elderly neighbors. What is this bizarre alternate universe? At my 5-year college reunion, I felt deeply inadequate and ashamed next to the consultants, journalists, engineers, doctors, and lawyers my friends had become. But they looked at me and called me the adult. HA! 

All because of a house. That, completely renovated, cost $500 less/month than a 2 bedroom apartment we were renting at the time. 

So why did we do it? Partially because my husband and I were idiot children who simultaneously thought getting three dogs was a good idea, but mostly because of the people we met in our first year away from home. 

You see, when I was first brought here by Teach for America, the guy who interviewed me explained the most important thing is community. “Sure, I get it,” I thought to myself. I had gone to churches before. After becoming a Christian in college, I had been attached to several campus ministries, some more than others. I did lots of campus activities and met many people whom I cherish with my whole heart to this day. 

My first year in Michigan, I spent so many nights crying about missing school that at one point Kevin literally carried me into a car and drove me to Chicago that night just so I could have deep dish pizza. Southeast Michigan was never the end goal. It was a stop-gap before we could get back to Chicago, where I would live on Belmont and have two fluffy Samoyeds I walked up and down the street. 

But then I met Jonny. Then Eric. Then Joanne. Then Jonathan and Laura. Then Scott and Edythe. I met Ashley and Ginny and Leon and Rebecca and Mike and Elisha and Kyle and Tasha and Sarah and Sam and Elizabeth and Jon and I know the more people I name the more others will feel left out so just know, dear reader, that I met so many people who have imprinted wonderful things on my heart. And after seeing their fierce passion for the Lord, the world, and each other, my heart was theirs forever. 

Now, I should admit here that it wasn’t as easy or as quickly or as romantic as retrospective writing lends itself to imagine. I was still planning on going back to Chicago. Both Kevin and I were deeply depressed and incapable of forging relationships. After we joined a small group, we essentially whined to them every week about how much we didn’t like it here and just wanted to go back “home.” Our small group loved us anyway, encouraging us, holding us, and always helping us seek what was the best for our hearts and our walks with the Lord. Even though we were little punks about it. 

I still remember the day Kevin proposed we change the plan. We were having one of our long road trip conversations. The empty miles ahead of us tend to allow us to get into deeper conversations without distractions. Before this conversation, we were just trying to make it to the end of my commitment with Teach for America. Two years, then we would return back to Chicago where we belonged. That was our plan. We had never wavered from this plan. 

Kevin, who had had an even harder time than I had moving to Detroit, strangely brought up, “Well, my 401k matching doesn’t kick in until I stay 3 years, and you could get your certificate if you stayed a third year... so... should we do one more?” 

Everything that had planned before we moved screamed, “NO!” But everything that was growing within me in this community said, “We can try.” 

That year, we decided to buy a home. It was a drab thing that was two days away from being foreclosed due to three years of no taxes paid. The homeowners had a better life with better housing in the suburbs. This was no longer a burden they wanted to deal with. 

We signed a land contract and purchased the home for $14,800. 

The next six months, we learned why everyone hates home renovations. We COMPLETELY redid our home. All new windows, new roof, paint, floors, bathroom. We knocked down walls and doubled the size of the kitchen. We threw out the clawfoot to the shock of many. (I honestly still don’t understand the appeal.) We made countless decisions and grew angry with sloppy painters and had five different subcontractors do our siding. We fell in love with the end product, even with all of its quirks, and called it a home. 

We spent four beloved years in that house. 

We had our dogs. We brought home Violet. We hosted countless silly parties, from Christmas to Harry Potter themed. We fought a lot in that house. We cried some. We watched a LOT of television and put together many puzzles. We held friends in that house. Friends held us. 

Because alongside all of these decisions to stay, the first decision we made was to finally yield to the longing of our hearts and belong to our community. I wrote a childish note to the woman who is now my best friend asking if she’d be friends with me. I called my small group leaders Mom and Dad far after it stopped being cute and was just plain uncomfortable. I got to know our neighbors. Dave loves Sister Pie. He can’t leave an interaction without asking us a question to get to know us better, even four years later. Vionca had a child close to the same age as Violet. She is a fiercely loyal mother who both loves her kids dearly and doesn’t take crap from them. When we brought Violet home, they both brought over presents and doted on her. 

My church community here walked with me through the worst of my depression and trauma, bringing me food and CDs and sitting and crying with me when I exclaimed, “I’m done with it all!” They encouraged us constantly. I don’t think I’ve ever truly believed I had that much value before the constant uplifting and encouraging of my friends, who saw me as a child of God and communicated that fervently. 

I found a job I loved and grew an even larger community. No one makes me laugh harder than my work friends. No one understands my anxiety and depression better. No one will let me sing show tunes with them. Oh, no, that was just the end of the sentence. Sometimes even Anna needs to work. I’m not bitter or anything. 

I feel so much pain because I’ve felt so much love. I never knew what it was like to live surrounded by love. My communities were strong in college, but they were fragmented. I had different circles and different people I cherished and continue to cherish. But here, everyone I loved in the world was within ten minutes from me. I’ve never experienced a greater treasure than that of proximity to all that I love. 

I don’t know what the future will look like. The part of me that holds on until the very end is the part of me that lies and says nothing will be different. The part of me that has been through similar heartache and change tells me that it will all be different. The doomsday forecaster in my brain likes to tell me I’ll never have better friends so why bother trying. Also, Silicon Valley people are really high strung. Stresses me out. But... In ‘N’ Out is there... 

I am so thankful for my people. I am so thankful for my community. I am so thankful for the grief I feel. My pain is proportionate to my love. And I have so, so much love for my people here. 

until california,

mi

[tlbodine]

A Decade of Horror Recommendations: Millennium Edition

After my 2010s horror recs post, @comicreliefmorlock asked me to do some for older films. So I figured I’d just work my way backward. 

The lists might get a bit shorter and less diverse as I go back in time as I’m not as well-versed in older horror films, but I’ll toss out some recommendations for what I’ve seen and maybe some will be new to you anyway :)

Long post under the cut! 

2000: A Surprisingly Good Year for Horror 

Maybe we don’t think of the Y2K year as a big one for the horror genre, but it was still riding the tail end of the slasher/teen horror revival. Some must-sees:

Final Destination: I’ve written pretty extensively about this movie and it’s no surprise that I like it a lot, even if the sequels get downright ridiculous. The original still stands on its own feet. 

Ginger Snaps: Maybe one of the best werewolf movies, period. Smart writing and a strong female cast as an added bonus. 

American Psycho: Did you know this came out in 2000? I honestly always thought it was older, somehow, maybe because by the time I watched it in college it seemed like everyone had seen it. Fun fact: did you know it was directed by a woman? 

What Lies Beneath: Part psychological horror, part drama-thriller, and sporting a surprisingly A-list cast. It has some well-worn tropes, but it’s a solid watch. 

Battle Royale: Speaking of movies that seem like they’re way older than they are, did you know Battle Royale only came out in the year 2000? 

There were a smattering of Asian imports in 2000 but none of them quite got their feet under them. I will make a shout-out/honorable mention here for Blood: The Last Vampire, an anime film that’s pretty well-known and gets referenced a lot. 

2001: The Beginning of the End (for a little while)

Some solid stand-alone titles came out this year, but it also was the start of when the 90s revival started to dwindle down, I feel, with plenty of disappointments to go around. Scary Movie didn’t help much (and it also launched a whole trend of really awful spoof movies, which tried real hard to kill the comedy genre for a long time, imo). Anyway, some recs! 

Jeepers Creepers: The director is an unfortunate sack of shit, but the movie is quite good. The first part, which draws heavily from a true story, is especially chilling. 

Thirteen Ghosts: An underrated gem. The plot twists too much for my liking, but the ghost designs are super cool and the whole concept of the house is neat. A+ for originality. 

The Devil’s Backbone: Maybe my favorite Guillermo Del Toro film, and a damn good ghost story to boot. 

Suicide Club: A Japanese import that feels a bit ahead of its time in terms of pop culture (and internet culture especially). Features a couple of squick-heavy scenes I still struggle to watch (but, like, in a good way). 

Ichi the Killer: Another Japanese import and my introduction to Takashi Miike, who makes me more viscerally uncomfortable than just about anyone. 

It’s also probably worth mentioning From Hell, the Johnny Depp movie about Jack the Ripper, which many people enjoyed. I personally strongly dislike the film for reasons I can’t fully explain. 

2002: Wait, That’s When That Movie Came Out? 

I feel like 2002 was a big year for me in the “movies I enjoy but didn’t watch until years later” department, probably because I was a teenager with minimal access to decent cinema. It was also a rocking good year for Japanese horror. 

28 Days Later: A movie that brought about the return of zombies in a big way, and also introduced (or at least popularized) fast zombies. Also it’s super scary. 

May: I don’t even know if May counts as horror, but it’s a dark, quirky movie that I try to make everyone watch because I love it so much. 

Ghost Ship: Honestly the bulk of the movie is pretty forgettable, but the opening scene is one of my favorite moments in gory cinematic history. 

Signs: M. Night Shyamalan’s last decent movie or his first shitty one, depending on who you ask. I liked it a lot when I first watched it, and it started to fall apart more and more as I got older. 

Ju-On: The Grudge: One of the better-known Japanese horrors and one whose tropes still get referenced and re-used. Skip the 2004 remake and watch the original trilogy. 

The Ring: Probably the best-known Japanese horrors and maybe the import that put “Japanese horror” into public consciousness. 

There was a lot of shlocky dreck in 2002, some of it decent (Cabin Fever) and some of it downright awful (Pinata: Survival Island/Demon Island). I should also mention Red Dragon, based on Thomas Harris’s novel of the same name, which quite a few people liked (I’ve only seen it once but I recall being underwhelmed). Also an honorable mention to Dog Soldiers, which I have not seen but which I hear frequently recommended as an A+ werewolf film. 

2003: Wow that’s a lot of dreck 

Look fam nobody said these film recs would be objective. There were a ton of horror movies that came out in 2003, I just didn’t really like hardly any of them. Some exceptions: 

Willard: The movie that made me want to start keeping rats as pets, which says more about me than it does the film. It’s a great movie, though, the first thing I ever saw Crispin Glover in (and god, he’s amazing), and one of the few films that I think is better than the book. 

Identity: A pretty decent psychological horror starring John Cusack. Watch this and 1408 together as a double-feature for maximum fun factor. 

House of 1000 Corpses: Look, if you’re reading this blog, you probably already have an opinion one way or another of Rob Zombie. The movie’s on the list because it’s arguably historically important, not because it’s objectively good. 

A few other notable moments from 2003 included a Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake (just watch the original, but if you insist on a remake, this is one of the better ones), the second Final Destination film (the last good one in the franchise), the Jeepers Creepers sequel, Freddy vs Jason, Darkness Falls, and Dreamcatcher. Like I said, there were lots of movies that came out this year, I just don’t think they were very good. 

2004: Oops we created torture porn 

I was in college at this point, which meant I was watching less horror than at any other moment in my life (I had a roommate who really hated scary movies) so maybe that’s why I haven’t heard of the majority of movies that came out that year. Or maybe they were all just really bad, hence why I still haven’t seen them. Hmmm. But! A few shining stars: 

Saw: Obviously a classic. I’m lukewarm about the franchise, but the original is an excellent film and well worth watching, especially given the impact it would have on the next many years of horror cinema. 

Shaun of the Dead: Hilarious, and honestly one of my favorite zombie films of all time. 

Dumplings: A Korean important you likely missed in 2004 but may have seen in a Three Extremes compilation. Well worth the watch if you’re not squeamish. 

Otherwise 2004 was pretty lackluster. Some forgettable franchise installments, some shlocky creature features, some unnecessary remakes. Lots of titles I’m unfamiliar with, though, too, so somebody tell me if I missed a big one that year! 

2005: Ehhhh

Just a couple important titles this year too: 

Hostel: Not a great movie. In fact, pretty damn campy. But an important one to watch to understand the torture porn genre. 

The Devil’s Rejects: See above re: House of 1000 Corpses. Hit or miss but a well-liked film by Rob Zombie fans. 

And  you know what, I think that’s actually it. I mean there were other movies -- a remake of The Fog,  the infinitely predictable Hide and Seek, the second Saw installment, and of course Doom. But it just wasn’t a great year for horror, imo. One shout-out here though for Wolf Creek, which is on my to-watch list; I haven’t seen it so I can’t vouch for it, but it does get recommended to me a lot. 

2006: Mostly more of the same 

Did we seriously have a Saw movie every year in the 2000s or what? No wonder everybody got sick of them and thought all horror was torture porn for a while. Talk about market saturation. 

Anyway, some shout-outs: 

Stay Alive: This movie is ridiculous, but I love it a lot. It’s about a video game that kills you in real life, and is a more successful video game movie than most actual adaptations. 

ReCycle: An Asian import. I missed this one entirely when it came out, but it’s one of my favorites to have discovered in later years. It’s a seriously cool movie, both fanciful and deeply uncomfortable. Content warning for abortion, but it’s not what you think. 

Otherwise, just some mostly soulless remakes (The Omen, The Hills Have Eyes, The Wicker Man), some franchise installments (Saw III, Final Destination 3, The Grudge 2). I will give an honorable mention to Black Sheep, which is so-bad-it’s-good ridiculous, and to that cult favorite Slither. 

2007: Wait, is horror getting good again?

Well, not quite, but we’re back on the map with some promising additions in a year where the genre seemed to be struggling to rediscover its identity: 

The Mist: One of the better Stephen King adaptations. 

30 Days of Night: A divisive entry in the canon, but a pretty interesting piece to study for anyone interested in vampires. 

28 Weeks Later: Not exactly a direct sequel to the earlier 28 Days Later, and probably not as good of a film, but pretty good in its own right. 

1408: Watch this one with Identity (see above) and enjoy a night of John Cusack going crazy in hotel rooms. 

The Orphanage: One of my favorite horror films of all time, both deeply unsettling and agonizingly sad. 

Paranormal Activity: The highest-grossing film of all time thanks to its low budget. Also what we can blame for the burst of popularity in the “found footage” style. 

Dead Silence: A movie that still frequently gets recommended and delivers some solid spooks. I’m not as fond of it as a lot of people, but it deserves a mention for how often it gets referenced (and for playing “killer ventriloquist dummies” straight as a trope). 

Trick r Treat: A Halloween classic. 

Of course the year brought us another Saw and another Hostel, a contentious Halloween reboot, another stab at I Am Legend (often adapted, rarely well), and a smattering of other sequels. I have not seen The Girl Next Door but based on how rarely I hear it recommended compared to the book, I imagine I’m not missing much. Borderlands was OK but, for my money, forgettable. Oh, there was also Grindhouse, a double feature which I quite enjoyed (I saw it in theaters, where it came with a warning for length, which I found amusing) but which history does not seem to have remembered positively. 

2008: Did Somebody Order a Recession? 

Back to slim pickings, although I admittedly have not seen most of the films released that year (I was pretty damn broke in 2008, so maybe that’s why). Still: 

Let the Right One In: Skip the later English remake, you cowards, and watch this with subtitles. It’s so good. SO GOOD. An unexpected twist on the vampire story, and kind of a romance to boot. Sort of. In a really messed up way. 

Cloverfield: A couple things are neat about Cloverfield. One, it was an early adopter and trope-setter for found-footage movies. Two, it successfully spawned a franchise where none of the movies feel related at all. Three, it launched with some really cool viral marketing that was utterly ahead of its time. On the downside, the shaky cam may in fact make you vomit if you get seasick easily. 

Repo! The Genetic Opera: A classic. Also may in fact be the only film of its kind, or at least the only rock-opera scifi-horror that comes to mind. 

I haven’t seen Pontypool, though it’s on my watch-list -- I’ve heard it’s quite good. Ditto Tokyo Gore Police which delivers, to my understanding, exactly what it says on the tin. Speaking of movies I didn’t see, can we take a moment to appreciate that a film called “Sauna” with the tagline “cleanse your sins” came out this year? Jfk 2008, are you OK? 

2009: Why are all the best horrors comedies this year 

It really does become obvious just how much the genre was floundering to figure out what it was doing the latter half of the decade, because the movies are so weirdly hit-or-miss. I do have some favorite hidden gems, though, alongside a couple well-known recs: 

Zombieland: A genuinely funny feel-good zombie comedy-horror, feeding right into a growing cultural fascination with zombies. 

Jennifer’s Body: Is this a comedy? Is this a horror? What is this? I’m not sure how to classify it but I sure do like it. 

Antichrist: Ok I don’t know if this is a recommendation per se, but if I had to watch this with my own eyes, I’m making y’all watch it too. Have you ever wondered what it might look like to watch a filmmaker have a psychotic break while making a movie? That’s almost literally what this film is. 

The Human Centipede: This is a cop-out because I have not watched these movies and I in fact refuse to watch these movies because the premise is fucking stupid, but I will acknowledge the historical, ah, importance? of this film in the greater scheme of 21st century horror. 

Dread: One of my favorite movies, and the film I recommend to anyone who wants to watch a torture film done right. I love the shit out of this movie. Please go watch this movie. 

Grace: Deeply disturbing and pulling approximately zero punches. It’s one of the best films to tread the “horrors of motherhood” territory, which is saying something because that’s very fertile (ha, ha) ground. 

I actually have not seen Drag Me to Hell or The Last House on the Left, although people have recommended both to me. Anyone want to chime in with how good they might be? I also want to make a shout-out to Daybreakers, which I feel like nobody ever talks about but which actually has one of the most fascinating vampire concepts I’ve ever seen on film. The movie itself is kind of boring and forgettable, but the idea is really neat. 

And that wraps up my journey through the 2000s in horror. Next decade: The 90s, coming right up! 

[fanfic-screenplays]

Batman Rebirth Part 2

INT: POWER TOWER - RECEPTION - DAY

It's the corporate reception of the future. Digital walls displaying 24hrs news. A floor to ceiling projection of DEREK Powers is the main feature, towering over EVERYONE scurrying below.

ON SCREEN:

The digital wall is tuned to the Daily Gotham.

                NEWSREADER:        Derek Powers, CEO and Founder of        Power Industries...

An image of an smirking DEREK POWERS pops up next to HER.

                NEWSREADER:        Has made an offer of $500 a share        to acquire WayneCorp.

ON WARREN:

WARREN DIVES through the doors - walking, almost running, across the floor.

HE stops at the floor to ceiling security barriers. Leaning forward as an red beam scans HIS face.

WARREN stands there as the system flicks through the faces of all the millions of employees of Power Industries...

WARREN impatiently glances down at HIS PHONE, checking the time. It reads 9.05am - HE's even later now!

                WARREN:        Come on!

Finally! It finds him. BEEPING in confirmation. The barrier CLUNK's open, sliding aside.

INT: POWER TOWER - LIFT LOBBY - DAY

It's a standard corporate lift lobby. Rows and rows of lifts. WORKERS queuing for lifts, some in suits, others wearing lab coats.

WARREN walks across, stepping into the waiting lift. The lift doors HISS shut.

INT: POWER TOWER - LAB - DAY

The lab is on the 50th floor of the Power Industries megascraper. A medical pod sits in the middle of the lab, surrounded by towering life support machines- cables run between the machines and the pod. It's clinical, almost like an mortuary.

The lift doors HISS open. WARREN steps out into the lab. Passing VIXX, POWER's walking monstrosity of a bodyguard - more machine than human.

VIXX is standing guard next to the lift, SURVEYING the room.

WARREN walks across the empty lab, to the medical pod, taking up his position next to HARRY TULLY, WARREN's spectacled lab assistant.

HARRY's working on his console, reviewing DEREK's medical scans.

WARREN leans forward. A red laser scans HIS eye, unlocking HIS console.

                HARRY:        Everything OK?

WARREN sighs...

                WARREN:        Just... another argument with Terry        is all.

                HARRY        Really? Isn't that all you two do?

                WARREN:        To be honest, it certainly seems        that way...

WARREN glances down at HIS console, reading DEREK's charts.

                WARREN:        I don't see any change here?

                HARRY:        Yeah, The radiation seems to        keeping him steady... for now        anyway...

                WARREN:        Probably the best we are going to        get. Let's wake him up.

WARREN taps on his keyboard, activating the wake up process. WARREN and HARRY turn to watch the pod...

                HARRY:        Do you have any idea what actually        happened? How he got infected?

The pod slowly and gradually WHIRS into life.

                WARREN:        Honestly... I have no idea what        happened.

The pod turns so that the frozen glass canopy faces WARREN.

                HARRY:        But weren't you here in the lab?

It HISSES as the glass canopy slides up and out, Revealing...

A clearly deathly ill man, with thin drawn skin, sunken cheeks. We can see that his bones have a nuclear green tinge to them.

This is DEREK POWERS. Imagine a man with the same power and status as Bruce Wayne, but absolutely no morals.

DEREK carefully steps out of the pod. Weak from the treatment. HARRY steps forward and wraps a robe around DEREK.

                WARREN:        You ready sir?

                DEREK:            (Rasping)        Yes... Yes... Just do it...

WARREN pulls open a drawer and takes out an injector gun. HE loads it with a vial from the nearby rack, containing a green gas.

DEREK gingerly pulls up the sleeve of the robes.

WARREN places the injector against the arm. HE fires the liquid into DEREK's arm.

DEREK throws HIS head back, HE starts to convulse, slowly at first then faster and faster...

WARREN and TULLY calmly watch and study the convulsing - they've seen this numerous times before.

DEREK's features start to change, HIS face regains its colour. The cheeks become fuller...

DEREK abruptly stops convulsing. DEREK lowers HIS head. HIS features are now back to normal, like HE was never ill...

                DEREK:        Thank you Warren.

                WARREN:        No problem sir.

DEREK sits down, exhausted, and turns to HARRY.

                DEREK:        Please tell me you've made some        progress on the cure?

There's silence...

                WARREN:        Sir, as I mentioned before...        Blight is incurable, you asked us        to design it...

DEREK EXPLODES in ANGER - getting right into WARREN's face!

                DEREK:        YOU designed this! YOU had better        find a cure!

WARREN steps back - scared. DEREK grabs the injection gun, furiously pointing it at WARREN.

                DEREK:        I'm sure if I injected you with        some, you'd find the cure in no        time at all!

                HARRY:        Sir, we are trying...

The BEEP BEEP of an incoming call emanates from VIXX's phone.

                DEREK:        Well try HARDER!

                WARREN:        Yes sir, we will do.

VIXX STOMPS across to DEREK. His metallic footsteps CLANGING across the floor.

                DEREK:        Now... tell me, where are we with        production?

                WARREN:        Umm... we are ready to start        production immediately...

                HARRY:        As soon as we have the approval        from the Department of Defense, of        course.

                DEREK:        That's not going to be a problem. I        already have a buyer, they don't        really care about all this red        tape.

DEREK extends his hand.

                DEREK:        Get the production started.

WARREN and HARRY share an concerned glance.

VIXX's one human hand places the phone onto DEREK's extended hand.

                VIXX:        It's Vilmos for you.

DEREK raises the phone to his ear.

                DEREK:        Vilmos, Can you please give me one        second?

DEREK pauses, listening. We don't hear the response.

                DEREK        Thank you.            (To VIXX)        See them out.

DEREK dismissively points at WARREN and HARRY.

                VIXX:        You heard the man, move!

VIXX pushes HARRY towards the lift, HE stumbles to the floor. WARREN helps him up. Leaning close to HARRY's ear.

                WARREN:            (Whispering)        He's gone insane...

INT - POWERS INDUSTRIES - ELEVATOR - DAY

It's a glass elevator, with social media updates running down the glass. Out of the glass we see Upper Gotham.

WARREN and HARRY are standing in the elevator. Deep in concerned conversation.

                WARREN:        How can we let Blight out into the        black market?!

                HARRY:        We just can't. Millions would die..

                WARREN:        I think it already is...

Pause for a few beats.

                HARRY:        Yeah... I think we can stop this.

                WARREN        How?

                HARRY:        Not here...

The lift stops. The doors HISS open.

INT: POWER INDUSTRIES - LAB - DAY

DEREK is sat at the console, robe wrapped tight around him. Watching...

ON SCREEN:

It's the elevator with WARREN and HARRY in it. DEREK's been watching the entire time...

HARRY steps out the elevator.

                HARRY:            (O.S)        Meet me later, at the usual place!

ON DEREK:

DEREK stares at the screen, not turning around, watching WARREN ride the lift down.

                DEREK:        Vixx, take care of this for me.

EXT: LINSEED RESIDENTIAL BLOCK: DAY.

The block is the embodiment of slum housing, completely run down. 100 stories high. It's three towers, connected by a sprawling network of bridges.

TERRY steps out of the apartment, bopping along to the BLARING music from his earphones.

TERRY strolls along the open walkway. In the distance, we can see Midtown Gotham. Two cities that have been built on top of one another, one rich... one poor.

TERRY makes his way to the end of the walkway and steps into the crowded lift.

INT: LINSEED RESIDENTIAL BLOCK: LIFT. DONE

The lift is massive, about 100 people standing in it. We have augmented humans, normals and all classes of workers all crammed together.

TERRY slides into the lift. squeezing in the front row of the lift. The lift doors BANG shut, inches from TERRY's face.

With a CLANK, the lift starts to drop down to the ground, SHUDDERING as it goes.

TERRY starts tapping the rhythm of the music out against the lift door.

EXT: LINSEED RESIDENTIAL BLOCK - DAY

The lift is on the outside of the block. We can see Lower Gotham around it. Made up of similar residential blocks, all built by Powers Technologies. Lit up in neon.

The lift shoots down, going faster and faster.

EXT: GOTHAM STREET: DAY

It's a mix of old and new buildings. Skyscrapers covered in advertising screens rise into the sky, blocking off sunlight. The street is teeming with commuters.

DANA's casually leaning against the wall next to the lift, waiting for TERRY. HER head in HER phone - not paying attention to the COMMUTERS RUSHING past.

The lift softly lowers itself into the cradle, bouncing off the springs. The doors HISS open. The crowd pours out into the street.

EXT: GOTHAM STREET: DAY - CONTINUOUS

TERRY weaves through the crowd to the front, HE's done this hundreds of times before. TERRY turns and walks off up the street. TERRY's music is still BLARING.

TERRY walks straight past DANA, completely oblivious.

EXT: GOTHAM STREET: DAY - MOMENTS LATER

DANA looks up. SHE see's TERRY disappearing in the distance. DANA sighs then RUNS after Terry. Sliding through the crowd to catch up with TERRY...

...SHE reaches TERRY and plucks out one of TERRY's earpods. The MUSIC SUDDENLY STOPS.

TERRY turns around, confused, until HE sees DANA then a loving smile comes across his face,

TERRY leans forward and gives DANA a quick kiss.

                TERRY:        Hey! Thought we were meeting at        your place?

                DANA:        Yeah... But work called and stuck        me on early shift. How's your head?

                TERRY:        Oh God... I can't remember anything        from yesterday.

                DANA:        You are terrible.

TERRY smiles.

                TERRY        That's why you love me though.

DANA smiles back, kissing TERRY.

                DANA        Can we grab some food? I need to be        at the Lounge in 30.

TERRY wraps HIS arm across HER shoulders.

                TERRY:        Come on.

TERRY and DANA start to walk up the street. TERRY leaves his arm on DANA's shoulders. DANA's hand reaches up and embraces it.

                DANA:        I heard an interesting story at the        fight yesterday.

                TERRY:        Oh yeah?

                DANA:        About Commissioner Gordon.

                TERRY:        Isn't that the current one?

                DANA:        Yeah, but did Warren ever tell you        about what happened to the old        Commissioner Gordon?

                TERRY:        Didn't he get murdered?

                DANA:        Yep, apparently on the same night...        their home was attacked by the        Joker. He was kidnapped and Barbara        shot.

TERRY and DANA reach the end of the street and turn left into...

EXT: GOTHAM ALLEY - DAY

It is linked to the street we are just on. It's filled with rubbish, rats and some junkies.

TERRY and DANA make their way down the alley.

                DANA:        It put her in a wheelchair...

Behind them, a beaten-up car speeds down the alley. It's engine getting LOUDER and LOUDER as it approaches.

                TERRY:        God... That's just...

TERRY and DANA stop outside the entrance to the Iceberg Lounge. Its facade bears a close resemblance to a broadway theatre. With the name emblazoned across in ice blue.

The beaten up CAR ROARS towards them. TERRY turns, attracted by the noise and sees it. It's on a collision course with DANA.

TERRY suddenly grabs DANA and pulls her into a hug. The car SPEEDS past just centimeters from her.

TERRY turns, watching the car.

[the-desolated-quill]

Quill’s Swill - The Worst Of 2018

Congratulations dear reader. You survived 2018. And you know what that means. It’s time for another best of/worst of list. Welcome to Quill’s Swill 2018. A giant septic tank for the various shit the entertainment industry produced over the course of the year. The films, games, TV shows and various other media that got on my bad side. As always please bear in mind that this is only my subjective opinion (if you happen to like any of the things on this list, good for you. I’m glad someone did) and that obviously I haven’t seen everything 2018 has to offer for one reason or another. In other words, sorry that Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald isn’t on here. I’m sure it is as terrible as some have been suggesting. I just never got around to watching it.

Okay everyone. Grab your breathing masks and put on your rubber gloves. Let’s dive into this shit pile.

Hold The Sunset

The news that John Cleese would be returning to the world of BBC sitcoms was incredibly exciting, being a massive Fawlty Towers fan and all. Unfortunately Hold The Sunset was not quite what I had in mind. It’s one of those rare breed of situation comedies that chooses to offer no actual comedy. It’s not a sitcom. It’s a sit. Like Scrubs or The Big Bang Theory.

An elderly couple plan to elope abroad only for Alison Steadman’s son to barge in, having left his wife, and forcing them to put their plans on hold. Hence the title ‘Hold The Sunset.’ It’s like a cross between As Time Goes By and Sorry, but if all the humour and relatability were surgically removed by a deadpan mortician. The characters are weak, the plots are thin on the ground and the humour (hat little of it there is) feel incredibly dated. The middle aged mummy’s boy is something that hasn’t been funny since the 90s. It’s an utter waste of great talent and what hurts even more is that this tripe is actually getting a second series. I can only assume the people watching this are comatose. Either that or there’s an epidemic of people in Britain who have lost the remote.

Avengers: Infinity War

Yes this is one of the worst movies of 2018 and no I don’t regret saying that one little bit. Avengers: Infinity War was fucking terrible. Period. There were too many plots and characters going on, which made the film hard to follow (and what staggers me is that the so called ‘professional’ critics have condemned movies for having too many characters and plots before. Spider-Man 3, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Batman vs Superman: Dawn Of Justice and even Deadpool 2. But because this is an MCU movie, it gets a free pass. Fuck off). The characterisation was weak due to sheer number of characters they try to juggle, resulting in characters coming off as one dimensional caricatures of themselves and scenes where characters such as Iron Man, Doctor Strange and Star-Lord sound completely interchangeable. The villain, Thanos, is a stupidly and poorly written villain, but that’s hardly surprising considering what a shit job Marvel have done building him up over the course of these 20+ movies. And let’s not forget that pisstake ending. A bunch of prominent Marvel characters die and it’s all very, very sad... except all these characters just so happen to have sequels planned, which makes this ending fucking pointless and have less impact than a feather on a bouncy castle.

I don’t know which is more shocking. That Marvel and Disney think their audience are that stupid and gullible, or that their audience are actually validating their view. Fuck you Disney.

Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery

I’ve always wanted a Harry Potter RPG, where you could customise your character, choose your house and actually live a full school life at Hogwarts. This year, Warner Bros and Jam City gave us just that.

That was a mistake.

Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery is the epitome of everything that’s wrong with the mobile gaming market right now. The gameplay is boring and involving where you just tap images on a screen until a progress bar fills up. Wizard duels are little more than rock-paper-scissors challenges that require no kind of skill. Bonding with friends and caring for magical creatures just consist of pathetically simple pop quizzes and yet more boring tapping. Oh and of course you only get a certain amount of energy to complete these tedious tasks. If you run out of energy, you wait for it to fill up... or pay up for the privilege. So determined are they to extract your hard earned cash from your wallet, there’s actually a bit where Devil’s Snare strangles your eleven year old avatar and the game effectively tries to guilt trip you into paying micro-transactions to save them. It’s sleazy, gross and manipulative. Honestly, you’re better off just playing Candy Crush.

Agony

When the developers of this game said they wanted to give the player a trip through Hell, they had no idea how true that statement really was. Agony is dreadful on a number of levels. The design for Hell itself, while visually interesting at times, is often not very practical and gets quite dull and repetitive after a while. The stealth mechanics are a joke and the AI of your demonic enemies are pitiful. All of this alone would have been enough to put this game on the list, but then we also have the casual misogyny. Agony is a gorefest trying desperately to shock the player. We see men and woman get tortured, but it’s the women that often get the extreme end. The violence inflicted on them is often sexual in nature and the game seems to go out of its way to degrade and dehumanise women at every turn. The orgasmic cries of ‘pull it out’ quickly become a staple of the game’s experience as we see naked women raped, tortured and murdered, all for the purposes of ‘entertainment.’

I would call Agony sexist, but honestly that would be giving it too much credit. Agony is like a little child trying desperately to be all dark and edgy in a pathetic attempt to impress everyone around him, and we should treat it as such. Go to your room Agony. No ice cream for you.

Peter Rabbit

If you listen closely, you can hear the sound of Beatrix Potter rotating in her grave.

Yes we have yet another live action/CGI hybrid, but instead of something innocuous like the Smurfs or Alvin and the Chipmunks, Sony instead decides to adapt Peter Rabbit, with James Corden in the title role.

It’s about as bad as you’d expect.

Their attempts to modernise the story are painful to say the least with pop culture references, inappropriate adult humour and twerking rabbits. Plus rather than the gentle, but slightly mischievous character we got in the source material, here Peter is a sociopathic delinquent who seems to revel in making the farmer’s life a living hell. He’s unlikable and unwatchable as far as I’m concerned and the film doesn’t in anyway earn the emotional moments it tries so desperately to sell to the audience. And the worst part is it’s getting a sequel.

Wait. Do you hear that sound? That’s the sound of Beatrix Potter tearing out of the ground, ready to kill whatever idiot came up with this shit.

Fallout 76

I was excited for Fallout 76. A MMORPG where players band together to rebuild society after a nuclear apocalypse. Could have been great. Pity it wasn’t.

Fallout 76 is a dreadful game. Not only is it a buggy, glitchy mess that requires a constant online connection to play, which could result in you losing hours of progress if your WiFi went down, it’s also unbelievably tedious, and that’s because there’s nothing to do in the game. There’s no other characters to interact with, the various robots and computers you come across are really little more than quest givers, there’s no actual plot so to speak, and because of the sheer size of the world and the number of players allowed on a server, the chances of you actually meeting any actual players is remote. And let’s not forget all the behind the scenes drama. Bethesda falsely advertising Fallout themed canvas bags and players getting shitty nylon ones. Bethesda accidentally releasing the account information of various players trying to get a refund for said bag. Bethesda failing to program the year 2019 into the game code, meaning that the game’s nukes don’t work.

Maybe there’s a chance that Bethesda could pull a No Man’s Sky and fix everything over the coming years with various patches and DLCs, but the damage has already been done. It’s incredibly disappointing. The Elder Scrolls 6 is going to have be fucking incredible to win everyone back.

Mama Mia!: Here We Go Again

I can’t stand jukebox musicals anyway, but Mamma Mia was always one of the worst. Its boring, meandering story with its one note, obnoxious cast of characters screeching out ABBA songs like they’re at some drunken karaoke session at some poor sod’s hen party has always grated on my nerves. So imagine my delight when they announced we were getting a sequel. Ever wondered how Meryl Streep met her three lovers and founded her hotel? No? Well tough shit, we’re going to tell you anyway.

Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again is basically just Mamma Mia again. The actors still can’t sing, the characters are still annoying and story is still boring and meandering, completely at the mercy of the chosen songs rather than the filmmakers using the songs to compliment the story (you know? Like proper musicals do?).

How can I resist you? Very easily as it turns out. Gimme, gimme, gimme a fucking gun so I can end my misery.

The Cloverfield Paradox

A lot of people were unhappy about the direction Cloverfield was going. They wanted a continuation of the found footage, kaiju movie from 2008, not an anthology series. I was personally all in favour. Partially because I thought the first Cloverfield was a tad overrated, but mostly because I thought it would be a great opportunity for more experimental film projects and could be a great launchpad for new writers and filmmakers. 10 Cloverfield Lane was a great start. Then The Cloverfield Paradox happened.

The Cloverfield Paradox is basically JJ Abrams trying to have his cake and eat it too. Maintaining the anthology format whilst connecting everything together in a ‘shared universe’ (yes, yet another shared universe). The result was a cliched, poorly edited and idiotic mess of a film that actually took away from the previous two films rather than added to them. Everyone hated it and, as a result, 2018′s Overlord, which was totes going to be part of the Cloververse, was made its own standalone film and Abrams double pinky promised to make a true sequel to the original Cloverfield. A complete and total disaster. No wonder it was a straight-to-Netflix film.

The Handmaid’s Tale - Season 2

This is probably going to be the most controversial entry on the list, but please hear me out because I’m not the only one who has a problem with this season.

I was reluctant to watch The Handmaid’s Tale simply because of how gruesome the original book was, but I forced myself to watch the first season and I thought it was pretty good. It remained faithful to the source material for the most part and included some nice additions that helped to expand the story and mythos. If it was just a one off mini-series, everything would have been fine. But then they made the same mistake as The Man In The High Castle and Under The Dome did where they commissioned another season and attempted to tell a story that goes beyond the book.

There’s a reason why the original story ended where it did. The Handmaid’s Tale isn’t meant to be an empowering story about women sticking it to the patriarchy. It’s a cautionary tale about how fragile our civil rights truly are and how easily they can be taken away from us. It’s designed to shock, not to satisfy. So seeing a handmaid blow herself up in a suicide bombing feels very incongruous and just a little bit silly. It would be like doing a TV adaptation of George Orwell’s 1984 where the first season followed the source material and then the second season turned Winston Smith into this heroic freedom fighter trying to overthrow Big Brother. It would represent a fundamental misunderstanding of what the book was about in the first place.

And then of course there’s the increased level of violence in Season 2, which many have complained about. In Season 1 and the original source material, the violence was justified. In Season 2, the motivation behind the violence has gone from ‘how can we effectively demonstrate how easily a fascist patriarchy can happen in the West?’ to ‘what brutal act can we inflict upon Ofglen to shock the audience this week?’ It’s purely for shock and nothing more. And with the showrunner (who I feel I should mention is a man) announcing that he has planned ten seasons of this, it seems that The Handmaid’s Tale is going to go even further with this depravity until it effectively becomes the equivalent of a Saw film.

The Handmaid’s Tale exists as a way of shining light on and critiquing misogyny in its most extreme form. Season 2 however demonstrates that there is a serious risk of it becoming the very thing it’s criticising in the first place.

The Predator

I love the Predator franchise, but The Predator is the worst.

People thought that this would be good because director Shane Black had actually starred in the first Predator movie back in 1987. Instead we got this bloated, confusing, obnoxious and insulting mess of a film that seems to go out of its way to ruin everything that makes Predator so good. There’s no tension. No suspense. No intrigue. Just a bunch of gore, explosions and shitty one liners from annoying and lifeless characters. They essentially took this big alien game hunter from outer space and turned him into a generic monster from a bad summer blockbuster. It no longer hunts for sport. It wants to take over the world and splice our DNA with theirs. But don’t worry, a rogue Predator doesn’t want to kill humans (even though he himself kills a bunch of humans), so he gives us a Predator Iron Man suit to set up a sequel that will probably never happen because this movie was a box office bomb and it fucking SUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCKKKKKKKEEEEEDDDD!!!

This film also has a very nasty streak towards those with disabilities. There’s a lot of jokes at the expense of a character with Tourette’s and it has an extremely ignorant and patronising view of autism, portraying the main character’s kid as being a super genius who can decipher the Predator language and even going so far as to say that he represents ‘the next stage of human evolution.’ Presumably the Predators want social communication difficulties because apparently it helps them hunt somehow.

What with Disney acquiring 20th Century Fox, the future of both the Alien and Predator franchises were very much in question. This film needed to be a success in order to make a case for Disney to keep making more of them. It wasn’t. Congratulations Shane Black. You might have just killed off this franchise for good. Thanks arsehole! :D

So those were my least favourite stories from 2018. Join me on Wednesday where we shall discuss something more positive. Yes, it’s awards season. Who shall win the coveted Quill Seal Of Approval? Watch this space...

Or don’t. It’s up to you. I don’t want to force you or anything. It’s a free country.

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 27/02/2021 (Ariana Grande, Digga D, Ella Henderson & Tom Grennan)

I like how on the UK Singles Chart, even if it’s kind of a slow week, we still have nine new arrivals to get through. Joy, let’s just start with the rundown. Welcome back to REVIEWING THE CHARTS.

Rundown

As you’d expect, a lot of the debuts from last week were pretty flimsy on the UK Top 75, the range I cover on the singles chart, and hence a lot of it’s gone, including all of the slowthai songs, even “CANCELLED” with Skepta which reached the top 40. Another big top 40 debut that’s disappeared is, again as you’d expect, “UK Hun?” by the United Kingdolls. We do have three pretty big drop-outs though: “No Time for Tears” by Nathan Dawe and Little Mix, ”Really Love” by KSI featuring Craig David and the Digital Farm Animals and finally, “See Nobody” by Wes Nelson and Hardy Caprio. It seems that finally we’re making some room for the Spring hits to come tunnelling in by next month. That also shows in our notable fallers, as we have “Levitating” by Dua Lipa and remixed by DaBaby at #37, “Whoopty” by CJ at #39, Taylor Swift’s re-recorded “Love Story” plummeting off of the debut to #41, Fredo’s album bomb continuing to linger as “Ready” with Summer Walker and “Burner on Deck” with the late Pop Smoke and Young Adz are down to #44 and #64 respectively, “you broke me first” by Tate McRae at #47, “Someone You Loved” by Lewis Capaldi at #50, “Siberia” by Headie One featuring Burna Boy off of the debut to #58, “willow” by Taylor Swift at #59 (Not a good week for Taylor), “Perfect” by Ed Sheeran at #69 (The bigger question should be why it’s here at all), “Shallow” by Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper at #71 and “Apricots” by Bicep at #73. For our gains, well, it’s pretty weird trying to find our replacements for all of this, as we have “Mr. Brightside” by the Killers back to #68 as it takes advantage of a slower week, “Roses” by SAINt JHN and remixed by Imanbek having a weird second wind at #60 – and the same goes with “Watermelon Sugar” by Harry Styles gaining big for some reason up to #46. Otherwise, we do have some genuine rising hits in the top half of the chart, like “Mixed Emotions” by Abra Cadabra at #45 off of the debut, “Regardless” by RAYE and Rudimental at #43, “Astronaut in the Ocean” by Masked Wolf at #35 (Because I guess since Logic’s retired, people are looking to Australia for a half-baked replacement), “Believe Me” by Navos at #33, “Little Bit of Love” by Tom Grennan at #32... Okay, if we’re going to give rising artists their first top 40 hit, why is it these guys and not Kali Uchis? Though I have a feeling we’ll talk about her next week. Anyway, our other notable gains are “Love Not War (The Tampa Beat)” by Jason Derulo and Nuka at #31, “Arcade” by Duncan Laurence and FLETCHER at #29, “My Head & My Heart” by Ava Max at #25, funnily right next to Joel Corry’s “Head & Heart”, “Commitment Issues” by Central Cee at #18, “Up” by Cardi B at #17, “Your Love (9PM)” by ATB, Topic and A7S at #15 and “Latest Trends” by A1 x J1 at #12, with no real movement in the top 10. With all that out of the way, let’s stay cautiously optimistic for our new arrivals.

NEW ARRIVALS

#75 – “All You Ever Wanted” – Rag’n’Bone Man

Produced by Mike Elizondo and Ben Jackson-Cook

You probably know Rag’n’Bone Man for “Human”, one of the biggest hits in the UK of the 2010s that never really crossed over stateside. I was never a fan of the guy’s music in its over-produced blues-pop crawl, so I didn’t really expect his next album to do anything for me... but I feel like it does matter to a lot of people. His first album was big – and not just moderately – with several hit singles, and he would later hop on Calvin Harris’ “Giant” to more success. With that said, I don’t know why this lead single from his upcoming sophomore effort Life by Misadventure took a month to get to the lower reaches of the chart, even with a video. Has his hype fizzled out? Is there something more behind this or do people genuinely not care enough to check out the guy’s music past his debut record that had a bigger push? I don’t know but I do know that I actually quite like this... I mean, a lot. Finally, Rag’n’Bone Man found some faster-paced production that works very well with his signature baritone voice, as this almost post-punk-esque groove may be stiff but it chugs along nicely, especially with the layered guitar loops and those inspired distorted synth bloops, with some real dynamic mixing. What I feel is missing from this is stakes, at least in the content – it seems more observatory than telling any real narrative or drama that warrants such a rocketing song, especially that screeching guitar solo. I don’t think that really matters, though, as the subject matter is interesting enough in how he discusses places he’d spent his childhood in like Brighton and London and how they’ve changed since, with a pretty understandable level of both nostalgia and anger levelled at whoever made those changes... knowing he supports Corbyn, there could be some political undertones here, but I digress. The song caught me by surprise, I hope it sticks around further than a couple weeks.

#70 – “Lifestyle” – Jason Derulo featuring Adam Levine

Produced by Rice N’ Peas

So, Jason Derulo struck gold with the TikTok fame and his return to the #1 spot as he stole some Pacific Islander’s beat on “Savage Love (Laxed – Siren Beat)” with Jawsh 685, and in 2020, everything seemed to go right for Derulo at a good time, even netting a BTS remix in the process. Now ever since then he’s been alternating between original tracks and more “borrowed” Pacific Islander beats, and this is one of those original tracks, which sounds nothing like the siren or Tampa beats so I’m pretty sure we know what the aim really is for those tracks. Whilst he’s had some success in the European markets, he hasn’t had much in the US so a catchy pop single with Adam Levine, detached of the Maroon 5 brand as that continues to fade away post-“Memories”, seems like an apt but desperate attempt at latching onto said market. God damn it, I’m embarrassed to say that it worked because this should not be a good song. It’s got a pretty funky synth riff and bassline that makes this otherwise pretty embarrassing track a lot more listenable, as Derulo’s delivery is pretty insufferable (but still pretty sonically appealing; the guy sounds great with a lot of Auto-Tune). There’s a lot of nonsense lyrics, both literally in the post-chorus and more ridiculously in the first verse, full of lyrics about how an unnamed woman is “shining bright just like Rihanna-na”, one lyric out of the whole song that is generally pretty weak lyrically, as you’d expect. The chorus is really damn catchy though, and propelled by horn lines and pianos that sound pretty triumphant, even if the clipping falsettos sound like garbage, and Derulo’s  ad-libs in Levine’s verse are just hilarious. Honestly, Levine sounds better with this hook than Derulo does, mostly because Levine is aptly and actively not trying, which is much more fitting for a messy dance-pop track. With just two verse-chorus structures, as well as two post-choruses, this is basic and practically unfinished; there isn’t a bridge. With that said, I can’t hate this at all, for whatever reason. Maybe it’s the fact that Levine’s reverb-drowned “Lifestyle!” backing vocals are cut off in the mix during the chorus... that did genuinely get a laugh out of me, don’t ask why.

#65 – “HEAT” – Paul Woodford and Amber Mark

Produced by Paul Woodford

From just a glimpse of her work, Amber Mark seems a lot more unique and soulful than most of the replaceable dance-pop singers, but for the purposes of this song and hence this show, that’s all she is, and Paul Woodford is just the boring DJ. This is a dance-pop song with 90s MIDI-sounding pianos, odd vocal processing, generic string patches, a house groove accentuated by a lot of fake hand-claps and a weak, barely-there drop. The time house-pop does something interesting for the first time in years in the mainstream beyond this garbage that’s been living in German night clubs in the 90s for decades after the fact, is the day I am a much happier woman. Skip this.

#61 – “Didn’t Know” – Tom Zanetti

Produced by Sjay

If you want proof of how slow a week this is, there aren’t even lyrics for this on Genius. Anyway, I don’t know or care who Tom Zanetti or Sjay are because guess what this is? Another house-pop track. To be fair, this one has more of a bass-heavy deep house groove and bassline, and a pretty cringeworthy rap verse from who I assume is Tom Zanetti, going for what seems like a Chicago house vibe but missing any of the soul or big diva samples, relying instead on a checked-out delivery from someone no-one knows the name of. Really, what do you expect me to say about this? It’s a sex jam, but it’s so basic and minimal that those keys in the chorus end up sounding as eerie as they do seductive, and overall, there’s genuinely nothing to grab from this other than that Tom Zanetti shouldn’t be rapping... whoever that even is. I did look up the guy and it makes perfect sense that this guy was making bassline music decades after that was big, because this screams “failed attempt” to me, and hopefully if the British public have any sense, it’ll be a failed attempt on the charts. We’ll have to wait and see on that front, I guess.

#57 – “Time” – JLS

Produced by Oswald Hamilton (or Biggz the Engineer)

So, legendary(?) boy band JLS are probably one of the bigger names from the craze of R&B and pop bands and vocalists that got big from The X Factor but JLS had actual staying  power for at least a little while, mostly because, well, there was always a place for them in the late 2000s and early 2010s, where it wasn’t uncommon to see these dance-pop tracks flooding the chart. They weren’t that great, obviously, but they didn’t need to be as what mattered to the audience and label was that the four boys kept their charm and style by the time they released a new record every November and that a couple singles off of it went to the top 10. That comment about longevity must not have lasted, however, as whilst most members were able to find some kind of success solo, usually in broadcasting like Marvin Humes, people weren’t really demanding a comeback, I suppose, as whilst this is their first charting song since their 2013 farewell “Billion Lights”, this new reunion track hasn’t made much noise at all and is probably here off of sales. I mean, the lyrics aren’t even on Genius yet... oh, wait, it’s some other guy that happens to be called JLS. Huh. Well, that makes sense, but, like, you’d want to change your name if it was that closely related to a big name, especially if you weren’t a family-friendly boy band and were instead a pretty awful rapper relying on a weak UK drill beat with absolutely no energy at all. Okay, so this sounds like several rappers here, so I assume it’s a rap group or collective. Either way, not many of these people have much charisma to talk about, like at all, and this beat can’t carry them on that lone piano melody alone, even if it is kind of menacing. The song feels twice its length, and something screams industry-made to me. I don’t know, maybe it’s because it’s a debut single, but they’re not signed to any major label so that’s just speculation. With some research, I found that it’s by two guys called Switch and J9 and a lot of fans were confused why it was uploaded under JLS, when the original song, on YouTube, isn’t even called “Time”. It’s called “Look”. I can only see this as kind of a scummy marketing ploy by a label, as I don’t think an independent distributor would be willing to change the name, artwork and artist name to believably look like JLS. I don’t know about any of this but really the song isn’t bad or really worth caring about, just a game of finding the impostor. To be honest, I’d love for JLS’ actual comeback single to be a drill banger in response, but again, we’ll have to wait and see. For now... who even gets the royalties for this?

#56 – “CLOUDS” – NF

Produced by Tommee Profitt and NF

You know what’s decidedly less fun than UK drill rappers masquerading as late 2000s boy bands? Christian rap. To be fair to NF, he’s less outwardly Christian as he is just family-friendly pop-rap with a lot of technical skill and that’s fine, although it does mean his fanbase consists pretty much exclusively white kids who think they listen to “real rap with a message” and dismiss anyone with a darker skin tone as mumble-rap. Though I don’t think NF purposefully lets into that demographic, at least from the little I’ve heard, I don’t doubt that he knows that’s his base as he continues on this lead single from his upcoming mixtape CLOUDS to criticise rappers who “go Hollywood” whilst also acknowledging how violent some of his lyrics may seem, which kind of seems like an odd thing to say in this context. I mean, NF here is only being clean rather than Christian, but not in a Lecrae way where he’s genuinely a versatile and soulful rapper outside of the religious stuff that tends to work its way into a lot of his work. Instead, NF just kind of meanders over a condescendingly bad piano-based trap beat, with pretty pathetic flows that really undermine how much technical skill this guy supposedly has. I mean, if he’s going to imitate Eminem with even more filler bars and unfunny mid-verse skits. To be fair, I can’t complain about the dude’s energy, and the beat does get better as it gathers a lot more energy in its choral grandiosity, but I feel like this one starting verse just lasts for days because of how little is actually said in three minutes, and that second verse is shorter but says even little. That’s before getting into some of these lyrics as it really is just nonsense half of the time. He claims to be “not artistic” – I don’t know why Nate meant by that but it just comes off as how it is on paper: hilarious – and also flooding the first verse with a series of ridiculous metaphors you’d be hard-pressed to wrap your head around, including questionable name-drops for... Bill Gates, of all people. I do find it ironic how despite his fanbase wanting to make you think you’re not smart enough to get NF’s really “clever” bars, the Genius annotations for one of the few kind of cool lines here show that it completely goes over their heads. NF says, “Got something in my cup, ain’t codeine”, which you can stretch – pretty reasonably – to be a Biblical reference. The song’s about fame and success, so referencing “my cup runneth over” makes a lot of sense. The annotations says that it’s unclear what’s in NF’s cup, and a comment corrects him, saying that it shows in the music video that Nate’s cup has water in it. Nice one, guys. At least Eminem murders women and Hopsin’s a racist piece of trash, what does this guy have?

#38 – “test drive” – Ariana Grande

Produced by Foster, Mr. Franks, TBHits and Murda Beatz

Ariana Grande released the few bonus deluxe tracks from her Positions album last week, and of course, at least one charted – not many others could as you can’t have more than three hits at a time on the UK Singles Chart. I know, it’s silly. Honestly, I think the deluxe tracks were in most cases better than the standard edition, and I think if we cut out the annoyingly large amount of filler in that total package, we could have a pretty damn great record from Ari, but as is, it’s really just fine and suffering from all of the issues her past few years of music have. With that said, “test drive” might be my favourite ever song of hers, with its gorgeous 90s R&B keys that lead us in to a bouncy house beat from Murda Beatz of all people (in a similar vein to “motive” from the standard edition but with actual sound design). There isn’t that much of a bass in the groove here, but it makes up for that with its twinkling synths and Ari’s delivery which sounds convincing and infectious through the whole track, which may be short at just barely more than two minutes but does not waste that time with its incredible chorus and whilst I would have preferred some more complexity or meat to this production, particularly the percussion, this dreamy blend of 90s pop styles is really fun as is, especially in that final chorus with those subtle strings and bleep-bloops coming in, to the point where you don’t really care how abruptly it ends... which actually might be a pretty fitting end for a track about a youthful, very sexually active relationship. Yeah, this is pretty great – check it out.

#36 – “Toxic” – Digga D

Produced by Trinz

Speaking of bonus tracks, here’s a bonus track from Digga D’s most recent mixtape, Made in the Pyrex, and any goodwill I had for this guy is gone because this song is deplorable. You can say it’s satirical all you want – and to an extent it probably is – but I really can’t sit here and listen to a rich guy talk about how awfully he treats women for three minutes. Basically, the song is about influencers that want to “suck his bone”, and honestly that would be fine if he kept it about the sex, rather than how much he seemingly hates these women, calling them good for nothing sex objects with the subtlety of a dusty red brick. Misogyny is common in rap music and popular music as a whole, and it’s forgivable because, really, objectification is so commonplace that there’s no point in fighting it off, and really there’s nothing wrong in a rapper saying “my girlfriend is attractive” because... well, yeah, she probably is. There’s also nothing wrong with a rapper describing or depicting sex, because sex happens, and there’s also nothing wrong with rappers describing their conflicts with women because, again, they happen, and music is never supposed to represent a perfect life or perfect human. You can express your flaws and irrational emotions, even if they are “toxic”, in your music because it’s a form of human expression that knows few bounds, and as long as there’s some kind of tact or thematic approach, I really do not mind and will often try and justify it. However, when you’ve got a guy with no charisma or personality describing how he uses his fame on Twitter to his advantage for cheap sex, what really is the point in listening to this guy? Do you enjoy hearing about how he constantly condescends and insults the women providing him with cheap sexual desires? Sure, they never sent you letters while you were in jail, but they were never supposed to. These are Instagram models and social media influencers you use to get your rocks off by sliding in DMs, not long-time relationships, and you know that, so why are you complaining when your emotional desires are not met beyond intercourse... especially when you clearly don’t care about hers? I guess Digga D is being “toxic” on purpose as the title and chorus ensues, but this is too overly-specific and based in what seem to be real-life situations for me to stick with this and justify any of it, especially him referencing the models’ substance abuse, how he refuses to drink fancy wine she bought her instead of his cheap Magnum tonic wine – a sexual stimulant from Jamaica. All that would be fine if it weren’t for how he takes this back to real life by mentioning his ex-girlfriend, breaking all illusions of satire and fantasy. In the second verse, he continues to slut-shame and condemn women for... travelling abroad? Profiting from OnlyFans? Wearing Rolexes? If you want to talk about how many designer accessories you wear, how many places you’ve been, how many women you’ve had sex with and how many women you use for your own benefit and no one else’s, as you do in all of your songs, then where’s your excuse for criticising women for doing the same thing? Oh, right, there is none! I heard a few weeks ago and talked about on this show how the government has to see Digga D’s lyrics and censor them in the case that they’re too violent. It’s pretty telling how this misogynist piece of shit slipped through those cracks, huh?

#28 – “Let’s Go Home Together” – Ella Henderson and Tom Grennan

Produced by TMS

Okay, so this is our highest debut this week, and it’s from singer Ella Henderson, who you probably know from “Ghost”. She was another X Factor singer and this song actually dates back to 2016, where it was leaked online as a duet with James Arthur. More than four years later, it sees an official release with the slightly-less-trendy Arthur replaced with Tom Grennan, similarly non-present pop singer. I’m surprised the label’s even letting her release this pretty generic pop ballad with an acoustic pick-up and lyrics about going home together while drunk, as well as trap-esque percussion because of course. I mean, her second album has been shelved for half a decade, and Tom Grennan himself has kind of been in limbo until recently, and it’s not like he’s doing anything interesting or different here with his insufferable mumbling delivery. There’s an unfunny bait-and-switch in his verse at some point that I think even James Arthur would have pulled off better, and Grennan’s last line in the bridge is genuinely just one of the worst moments in music this year, Jesus Christ – you’ve just got to listen to that part, I guess. The song’s really not worth speaking more about and I want to wrap this up.

Conclusion

A slower, less chaotic week yet still a mixed bag and mostly bad. I’ll give Best of the Week for Rag’n’Bone Man for “All You Ever Wanted”, with a really close Honourable Mention for Ariana Grande’s “test drive”. Worst of the Week should be pretty damn obvious given that Digga D’s “Toxic” even exists, but Dishonourable Mention really is a toss-up. I guess Tom Zanetti’s “Didn’t Know” might be the most embarrassing song here... apart from “Lifestyle” of course but that song really is just okay. For next week... who cares? Here’s this week’s top 10:

Follow me on Twitter @cactusinthebank if you’re interested – really, I just talk about Weezer more often than I should – and I’ll see you next week.

[aethersea]

How about Toff and the fathers of Lin and Suyin?

Send me a character and I’ll write 10 headcanons for them! Or a lengthy not-fic about what happens to them after canon, I guess that works too, brain, thanks ever so for your contribution.

So I… haven’t actually watched Korra yet. I kept meaning to, and it just never happened. Oops. How about some Toph headcanons that are completely unrelated to anything from LoK? Most of them under the cut bc this got away from me in a BIG way.

Toph used to dream about telling her parents she was the best bender in Gaoling. That was why she started joining underground bending tournaments, actually: so she could show them her champion belt and say, See? See how much your daughter can do? 

That’s not actually why she joined the tournaments. She knew from the beginning that it would never work. She just wanted to feel, for a little while, the freedom and strength she had felt with the badger moles. After every tournament, she’d tell herself, One more. One more, and then I’ll tell them. One more, and it’ll be enough.

Toph wasn’t surprised by her parents’ reaction to her bending. She was furious, she was heartbroken, but she wasn’t surprised.

Toph loves junk food. (We all know this in our hearts.) As a daughter of the house of Bei Fong, she’d never had a potato chip in her life, and the first time they have some time to kill at a street market, Toph makes Aang take her round to every fast food stall in the place and buy her one of everything. She feels queasy and uncomfortable the rest of the day, but she refuses to regret it. (Sokka nearly faints when he hears how much money they’ve spent, and Toph regrets that a bit.)

She discovers that she really likes Fire Nation cuisine in general, with its tendency toward dramatic use of spices. They buy a kebab or something at a Fire Nation village, and it sets Toph’s entire mouth on fire. She falls instantly in love.

“It’s food that hates you, Katara! I’ve been punched in the face by a kebab!”

After the war, she decides she wants to learn how to cook. If you ask Toph how it went, she picked up a valuable skill. If you ask any of the string of harried chefs she leaves in her wake, they will turn very pale and beg you never to bring her back. It’s not that she isn’t enthusiastic to learn, and the blindness isn’t even that much of a hindrance because there’s a lot you can tell about your ingredients from smell and touch alone. But Toph’s very proud of her new metalbending abilities, and she practices at every opportunity. Do you know how much metal is in a kitchen, these chefs will ask you. Do you know how much damage that metal can do when it’s flying through the air into the hands of a young girl who wants to show you how fast she can whisk this egg. Do you know what she did to the stove.

Toph is really uncomfortable around Suki. You know those girls who are charming and smart and effortlessly graceful, a couple years older than you and always so kind, warm and friendly and infinitely cool, like the badass older sister you always dreamed of having? That’s Suki. Toph only knows how to be elegant in the context of high-society parties, and no matter how badass a fighter she knows she is, she has never in her life been effortlessly cool. She never knows how to talk to Suki about anything other than fighting. Suki thinks Toph just doesn’t like her much, and gives Toph her space. Toph absolutely hates this, but she doesn’t know how to fix it.

Taking down a fleet of war blimps together helps a little.

A lot of people want to learn bending from Toph after the war – metalbending, especially, but also earthbending in general. This twelve-year-old girl is one of the best earthbenders in the entire world, after all. She has people showing up every day, begging for the privilege of being her student. At first she’s pretty into the idea – she taught the Avatar, and he saved the world with it. Clearly she’s a fantastic teacher. She holds auditions and takes the most dedicated, the most impressive. She starts teaching them.

It’s awful. She hates it. Turns out teaching Aang how to understand the earth is very, very different from teaching a bunch of people more than twice her age how to stand, how to move their arms, how to breathe. She’d never realized before how much of bending was instinctual for Aang – he’s the Avatar, he’s not learning bending so much as remembering it from a past life. She’d never realized, either, how much of bending was instinctual for her. She struggles to explain how she moves to make the earth do what she wants, or how her students should move to do the same. More than one lesson ends with Toph getting so frustrated that she stomps her feet hard enough to knock over a wall, then storms off before she can cry actual tears of rage in front of these people.

She closes the school after a month. People keep showing up, though, asking her to teach them. She’s equal parts angry and ashamed every time she turns them away. She’d thought this was something she could do.

(Later, when she is older and more confident, when she’s had long conversations with benders who’ve been perfecting their craft for decades, she tries again. She finds a few promising students – young this time, almost as young as she is – and shows them how to feel the earth. She tells them to close their eyes and doesn’t worry if it means she’s forcing them to ignore their most important sense. She dumps mud on them and tells them to feel every speck of it on their skin, and get it off with nothing but bending. She tells them to move their hands and feet however feels right, so long as they’re strong and in tune with the earth. In short, she doesn’t bother adhering to any rules about how you’re supposed to teach bending.

This time, people leave her school with confidence and skill. Toph takes on more and more students. The best ones learn how to metalbend. Toph watches with her feet as her students learn how to listen to the earth, and finds that she’s proud of them. It’s a warm glow in her chest, and it never leaves her, the rest of her life.)

She leaves, to avoid the constant barrage of would-be students, and goes to stay with Sokka for a bit. He’s at the Fire Nation’s premier engineering university, and he has a huge apartment that the city gave him. (All of them get gifts wherever they go, these days. Some of them are more comfortable about this than others. Sokka never seems to mind it at all.) There’s more than enough room for Toph to move in with him, and he’s happy to have her. Every day he comes home from his classes bursting with information about machinery and thermodynamics. He sketches a dozen new inventions a week, and describes them all to Toph in convoluted detail. She understands about a quarter of what he says, but she makes a valiant effort to poke holes in all his ideas anyway.

Sokka gets letters from the others all the time, and always reads them out to Toph. When he answers, he reads that aloud too, and Toph calls out jokes and additions. He puts them all in, and letters from the two of them are a jumbled mess.

After one particularly memorable letter from Suki, the opening lines of which are, unfortunately, seared into Toph’s mind forever, Sokka started reading the ones from his girlfriend in private first, and giving Toph an abridged version.

Sometimes they talk about the war. Mostly when they do, it’s lighthearted, “Remember that camp by the town with the weird fish statue, where Aang tried to turn a waterfall into a water slide?” Sometimes it’s… not.

I was gonna write something angsty here about their darker conversations but honestly, I’m not sure I have the skill to pull that off in a single bullet point, and anyway we all know what conversations they were having. These were children who saved the world from an oppressive invader. Every day they walked through war-torn places and they never stopped to help for long. Every night they went to sleep wondering if they’d wake up to Azula fireballing them in the face. Now they’re heroes, and the world is rebuilding, and they’ve never lived in a world that isn’t at war.

After a while Toph gets restless, walking aimlessly day after day through this Fire Nation city while Sokka’s in school, and she goes to visit Zuko. Zuko greets her warmly, hugs her close, thanks her for coming, and gives her rooms in his palace, but he’s horribly busy. She’s invited to the daily dinner banquets, where Zuko sits at the head of a huge hall and the whole court watches him for weaknesses. She slips back into her cultured elegance like putting on clothes several sizes too small. Zuko sits her at his right hand and they talk, but it’s stilted and strange, each of them smiling stiffly through masks they don’t know how to wear well. She stops going to the banquets.

They hadn’t grown especially close, the two of them, back when they were fighting and fleeing together, not like they had with the others. But they’d understood each other, in their approach to bending and to ending the war. They’d understood each other, too, in ways neither of them was really comfortable admitting – both of them highborn children who would never be what their parents wanted, both of them used to luxury and quietly amazed by all the unexpected things involved in living off the land, both of them secretly proud of themselves for handling it so well. Both of them dedicated to winning the war because of their ideals, because of what they knew to be wrong, not due to personal loss. Both of them sitting awkwardly as Katara and Sokka, and later Suki, reminisced about struggling to find enough food for the winter, about passing clothing down through so many generations that it was patched beyond recognition, about learning to fight when they were barely old enough to hold a weapon.

They talked about it so glibly, laughing about the horrible taste of boiled seaweed for the fiftieth day in a row, showing off scars from when they’d stabbed themselves with knives they were too small to wield properly. Aang had laughed at their jokes and been horrified at their scars. Zuko hadn’t laughed, and Toph had heard the shame thick in his voice as he offered scars of his own, from firebending duels with his sister. (He never talked about the one on his face. Toph realized, later, that he assumed they knew how he’d gotten it. They never asked him about it

Toph always figured he had more to be ashamed of than she did – her nation, her family, hadn’t started the war, after all – but she’d been warm and fed and pampered while her friends had been starving, and she didn’t even have scars to show for it.

Now Zuko’s a king and Toph is his honored guest, and she wanders the hollow wooden halls of his palace – Zuko’s palace, her friend’s palace, her friend is a king and he lives in a palace – with one hand trailing on the painted walls. People bow and move out of her way wherever she walks. Generals try to talk to her about battles and tactics, about how a tiny group of violently powerful children evaded an entire army for nearly a year. Their voices are awed and condescending all at once, laced with suspicion and derision and oily flattery. Toph smiles the polite, unassuming smile of a daughter of the house of Bei Fong, and tells them that really it was Sokka who handled the tactics and strategy, she was mostly there to save everyone’s hide when things went wrong.

Then she remembers herself, remembers that she saved the world and she doesn’t have to be anyone’s daughter now. She starts telling them to fuck off.

She thinks, walking through the peaceful palace gardens, feeling the life that wriggles and squirms and breathes through the soil, that if her parents could see her now, friends with a king, they’d — well, actually, they’d probably want to arrange a marriage. At the thought, Toph starts to laugh, and she laughs so hard she has to sit down by one of the elegantly sculpted fountains and rock back and forth, gasping for breath. She hasn’t thought about marriage in so long – over a year, though it feels like so much longer. It used to be such a certainty, looming over her future, that her parents would arrange a marriage with some nice, malleable member of the middle aristocracy, who didn’t mind having a useless blind girl for a wife if it meant marrying into the Bei Fong family. But she’s no one’s daughter now. She resolves, there in an ornamental garden, laughing loud enough to scare the turtleducks, that she will never marry.

Zuko, almost to her surprise, steals time to hang out with her when he can. The first time he showed up in her rooms unannounced, it was in the middle of the afternoon, and he stood and cleared his throat the moment Toph walked in. Her room was tiled in stone – a small consideration that she’d been unreasonably pleased about, when she first saw it – so the moment Zuko put his feet on the floor, Toph recognized him. “Hey,” he started to say, nervous and stilted, “I hope you’re—”

Toph didn’t think about it. She barreled forward to give him a hug, catching him round the waist and almost knocking him back into the couch. She was almost instantly embarrassed, and started to draw back, but before she could, Zuko wrapped his arms hesitantly around her, and then he was hugging her as tight as she was hugging him.

Zuko doesn’t have much free time, but every few days he shows up in her rooms with a plate of delightfully spicy food and a bottle of something that she’s probably too young to be drinking and bitches to her about his advisors, the nobility, the merchant guilds, and the treasury officials constantly shoving new expense reports under his nose. Toph mocks all of them and offers to catapult people out of a window for him.

“No really, I won’t even need bending, these aristocrats are almost as bad as Aang about keeping their feet planted. I’ll just sneak up on them and grab them by the ankle. They’ll never expect it, come on Zuko, it’ll be hilarious!”

They talk, too, about the war. When they do, Toph tells him about the things she’d seen, wandering the subjugated Earth Kingdom. Zuko listens, without interrupting, and Toph thinks that maybe the silence is from shame, and she almost stops. But when he does talk, Zuko asks questions, probes for details. The conversation always turns to how to fix it. The two of them spitball ideas back and forth for how to start healing a shattered world.

They feel acutely the absence of their friends. Aang would be so much better at peacemaking, Zuko laments. Katara would be so much better at understanding what the deeper problems really are. Sokka would have so many ideas for improving access to isolated villages or distributing food and aid efficiently over all the vast expanse of the ravaged Earth Kingdom.

“So why don’t you ask him?” Toph says. “All he does all day is come up with weird new inventions anyway. He might as well come up with something useful.”

Zuko’s letters to the others have always been few and far between, and slightly reserved. He’s been very busy, and a part of him sort of assumed that now they weren’t stuck traveling with him anymore, they wouldn’t want anything to do with him. At Toph’s urging, he asks Sokka about a couple of his mechanical dilemmas, and is startled at how quickly he gets an enthusiastically rambling answer, complete with several pages of blueprints.

Toph tries to get him to do the same with Aang and Katara, but this he won’t do. 

“They don’t have time to solve my problems,” Zuko tells her.

“Isn’t solving people’s problems pretty much Aang’s whole job now? He can just put you on the list.”

Zuko bows his head, like he’s looking into his drink, and says quietly, “If the Avatar is solving the Fire Lord’s problems, then either the Avatar works for the Fire Lord, or the Fire Lord is too weak to rule on his own. Either way, it just causes more problems.”

Toph, who grew up surrounded by the petty intrigues of politics and knows the weight of rumor and reputation, doesn’t contest this. She does say, “You should write them more anyway. Real letters. I bet they miss you.”

Zuko huffs out a laugh, and takes a swig of his drink, and doesn’t answer.

She goes to find Aang and Katara next. They’re wandering the world again, flying from city to town to village, and Toph thinks maybe it’ll be like old times. It even is, when they’re in the sky and Toph’s whole world is air, empty space, nothing but the rustling of the wind in Appa’s fur and the warm round weight of Momo sleeping on her belly. The three of them tease each other, tell jokes, share stories from the months they’ve spent apart, and it feels like home.

There’s no looming threat anymore. It’s strange, still, even after so many months. Toph used to spend the first few minutes after they landed anywhere stretching her senses as far as she could, looking for any signs of people. Now, the first time they land, she feels hundreds of people, and there are a good ten to twenty of them headed right for them, and she panics. She shouts for the others to run and pulls a wall of stone up between them and the oncoming force, eight feet tall and as wide as she can make it, and she’s bracing for the call to topple the wall onto the enemy and run for Appa while Aang and Katara cover their retreat, only instead she hears them yelling at her to stand down. That there’s no threat, that they’re safe, that she’s going to hurt someone.

They sleep in the cities, not in makeshift campsites. Village elders give over their homes to the Avatar and his friends. City mayors offer them luxurious quarters. Aang spends a few hours talking to the people in charge of each new place, then goes out into the streets and spends the rest of the day there, looking for the people he’s not supposed to be talking to. Katara and Toph flank him, and at the formal meetings Toph finds herself once again slipping into formal elegance, while on the streets she tries to keep track of all the people around them, whether they’re threats, whether there’s something Aang should be seeing that’s being kept from them. It’s impossible to track so many moving bodies, and it gives her a headache to try. She tries anyway, because a headache is no price to pay for keeping Aang safe, for helping him heal the world. Several times she stumbles or nearly walks into something, so focused on how everyone’s reacting to Aang that she doesn’t notice the obstacles in her own path. After a while Katara moves to her side, puts an arm around her shoulders as they walk. Toph leans into her, relieved.

Katara is still the nearest thing she has to a mom. Katara makes sure the three of them are getting enough food and sleep and aren’t wearing themselves out. Katara keeps track of their provisions now that Sokka’s gone, and she and Aang work together to figure out their route. Katara makes sure Toph doesn’t get into fights with city officials. (Sometimes Katara gets into fights with city officials, at which point Toph cheers her on and Aang tries desperately to mediate.) Katara makes sure they don’t lose heart at the sheer daunting size of the task ahead of them. Katara sees Toph sitting alone one night against Appa’s side, knees pulled up to her chest and tears running silent down her face, and comes to sit next to her.

Eventually Toph says, “We’re only a few days away from Gaoling.”

Katara nods. “We’ve been wondering whether we should stop there,” she says softly.

Toph shrugs. “Gaoling was mostly untouched by the war. Not a lot of scars there for the Avatar to heal. It’s got some solid political clout in the whole region, though – probably worth making some connections there.”

“It’s up to you,” Katara says. “We’ll go if you want to go.”

Toph pulls her knees closer to her chest. After a moment she leans into Katara, and Katara puts an arm around her shoulders and pulls her close. Toph falls asleep like that, with Appa snoring gently behind her and Katara murmuring a lullaby into her hair.

They go to Gaoling. They talk to the city’s ruling council, as they do in every city, and Toph braces herself for it but her parents aren’t there. Close to the start of the meeting, one of her cousins – she has a lot of cousins, most of them in her parents’ generation, none of them close – turns to her and says, “Your family has been worried by your long absence, Toph Bei Fong. We are relieved to see you well.”

She should bow politely before answering, she knows – but he didn’t bow to her. Maybe he technically outranks her, maybe she owes him deference as an older cousin – but she’s at the Avatar’s left hand, and she’s grown used to being no one’s daughter. She doesn’t bow, and she doesn’t smile. She just says, “I notice my parents are absent from the council.”

“They rarely attend,” her cousin says. “They were much grieved by your loss.”

Toph stands abruptly, jarring the table with a clatter of cups and plates. She does not say, “Oh were they.” She does not say, “My loss?” She does not say, “I’m not fucking dead, I’m right here, the war’s been over for two years and they never so much as sent a note—” 

She does not say any of this. She turns to Aang and Katara and says, “I’ll meet you in the city once you’re done here.” Then she turns and leaves.

The gate to her family estate is closed. She puts a hand on the wrought iron and knows that she could twist it out of shape, could wrench a hole out of it and step through. Instead she kicks at the earth and launches herself up and over the gate, landing in a neat roll on the manicured lawns. She walks unimpeded to the front door, marveling at the lack of security – there used to always be guards on the walls, where did they go? was it always this easy to get in, or to get out? – and goes looking for her parents.

She’s not surprised, when she finds them, by their reaction. Furious, yes. Heartbroken. But not surprised.

They go to Omashu and King Bumi greets them by siccing Flopsy on them. A giant goat-gorilla comes bounding at them before they’ve even landed and knocks Aang flat as soon as he hits the ground, looking for treats. Appa gives a disgruntled roar, probably jealous, and the huge thing keens in fear and starts running around in circles. Aang’s feet have gotten caught in its collar and he goes flying through the air, trying to get himself free without hurting Flopsy, screaming all the while for Katara and Toph to do something. Katara and Toph are too busy laughing themselves silly. When Bumi finally comes out to meet them, Toph giggles out, “I like your rabbit.” Bumi tells her solemnly, “You’re not the only one. Flopsy’s more popular than I am, so I’ve made him king of Omashu. We all pay our taxes in carrots now.”

Toph and Bumi play so many pranks together. So many. Bumi’s court is actually pretty used to it by this point, but Aang and Katara aren’t. One night at dinner, Bumi sticks all of the furniture and himself to the ceiling with his bending, and screeches in horror when he sees the three of them walking in “upside down.” Katara freezes in shock, and Aang starts airbending a shield above his head before he realizes what’s happening. Toph, who saw it coming from out in the hallway, laughs so hard she cries.

She talks to Bumi a lot about earthbending, about the feel of dirt hardening between your fingers, about the shift and grind of stone as you pull boulders from the ground. She tells him about the sand raiders taking Appa, and the next day he takes her to a sand-filled arena and they duel there for three hours. She gets her ass handed to her, and she gets sand everywhere, but it’s the most fun she’s had in ages. They duel every day, and after leaving Omashu Toph makes a point of practicing wherever she can, until she can bend sand almost as well as she can bend solid ground.

She’s never met anyone else who bends, not just with his whole body, but with his whole being. Bumi’s fascinated by the way she uses bending to see, and she tries to explain it to him as thoroughly as she can, because she’s finally found someone who understands.

Toph travels a long time with Aang and Katara, roaming the world from top to bottom and all the way around.

They stop for a while on Kyoshi Island and she realizes, when she sees Suki running forward to greet them, that her old awkward embarrassment is gone. Suki’s just as flawlessly cool as she always was, but somehow Toph’s not intimidated by it any more. The two of them become friends in a way they never had a chance to before, and it actually does feel a lot like having a badass older sister.

Eventually, almost by coincidence, they find Zuko and Sokka visiting a coastal city that caught the brunt of the attack on the day of Sozin’s Comet. Sokka and Katara rush into a hug, and are teasing each other about their hair and clothes in five seconds flat. Sokka only lets go of his sister long enough to sweep Aang and Toph into hugs of their own, then he starts tugging on Katara’s arm and urging them all to come see the structural supports they’re building for the new docks.

By then Zuko’s reached them, trailed by his gaggle of advisors and attendants. He bows deeply to Aang, who returns the gesture, and says, “We welcome you, Avatar, to these shores.” Aang thanks him, just as formally – he’s learned how to be formal, these days. Toph listens to how their hearts are pounding nervous in their chests and can’t believe she’s friends with such idiots.

“Now kiss!” she hollers. Everyone stares. Sokka’s the first to start laughing, then Katara and Aang and finally Zuko’s laughing too, and Sokka drags Zuko into a group hug, and after that everything is – it’s not perfect, it’s not simple, but it’s okay. After that, it’s okay.

[bakagamieru]

Hey gami, I was wondering if you were gonna share your thoughts/ give a review for flicker? What did you think? :)

I love it!  I took Friday off partly in order to listen to it when it came out instead of having to wait until I came home from work.

The album is actually growing on me more and more as I listen to it even though I thought it was great from the start anyway.

Uhhhh, I kind of went a little overboard once I started typing my thoughts...

Sound

It’s definitely got a pretty coherent tone to it which some people will say is too boring and some people will say makes the songs sound too samey, but it’s nice to immerse yourself in a mood and you can do that with Niall’s album.  It’s all very gentle, very heartfelt, and very sincere.  I bet it would be easy to fall asleep to this album with how soothing it is.

I think Niall’s vocals are the best they’ve ever been on the album.  Like I always thought, more acoustic-leaning songs help highlight his voice with it’s more talk-y quality and rasp.  Niall’s always had a bit of an oddball voice because he’s got these clear, pure high tones and yet he can also have a rasp on both the high and the low end.  The gentle acoustic sound of the album helps all of those things shine.  Niall is pretty bread and butter (in a good way that makes it easy to connect to his voice) until he suddenly puts in one of those trills or intentional breaks and then you’re left there with your mouth hanging open.

It’s a bit weird having heard all the songs live and then having to get used to the studio versions, but I think the studio versions are awesome for the most part.  I do think the different notes in On the Loose are kind of odd and maybe should have been re-recorded, but that’s mostly the only gripe I have.

Lyric Themes

To be honest, the lyrics of Niall’s album shock me a little.  We’ve only ever heard his solo songs up until now be about one night stands and hook-ups.  That would be apart from DFWYB which isn’t about romance in the first place.  Anyway, it feels weird that Niall is kind of known for writing those hook-up songs and then he comes out of nowhere with an album that’s all dedicated love, anxious longing, and wistful remembrance.

To be fair, there were hints of it here and there, especially in the lyrics of Temporary Fix.  Something that carried over from Temporary Fix is that Niall seems to have a recurring theme of putting himself in a more submissive or supporting role in a relationship than most men do.  

There are several songs that specifically mention the girl making the first move:

Temporary Fix- “you were looking at me first”

Slow Hands- " ‘We should take this back to my place’ That's what she said right to my face”

Seeing Blind- “now you’re talking to me first”

Then there are several songs that are specifically about wanting his partner to open up and wanting to listen to his partner’s problems:

Fire Away- “you can go ahead and unload it cause you know it’ll be ok, fire away”

Since We’re Alone- “tell me what you’re running from”

Mirrors (sort of, it’s not about his partner, but it is about inner struggles getting seen) “she looks into her mirror, wishing someone could hear her, so loud”

There are also several songs that are kind of entreating his partner to hold on to him, whether the relationship is still going or not (it kinds of puts the power in their hands rather than his own):

Too Much to Ask- “tell me there are things that you regret”

You and Me- “time has never been on our side, so would you wait for me?

The Tide- “don't let the tide come and wash us away, don't let the tide come and take me”

Flicker- “still a flicker of hope that you first gave to me that I wanna keep, please don't leave”

Warmth

I’m glad that there’s an inherent respect for his partners in Niall’s songs.  Zayn’s music has that too and it just makes it so much easier to listen to.  I don’t know how much either of them know about feminism or relationship discourse, but I would suspect Niall isn’t very versed on it considering he tends to make comments that show the unconsciously ingrained and unintentionally harmful brand of sexism.  

Anyway, my point is that there’s a sort of gentleness and warmth inherent in both Zayn and Niall’s lyrics that has to come from their nature because I don’t think it’s from any particular enlightenment through discourse.  It’s nice that it’s from their nature, though, because you can tell that they’re truly decent people.

That’s not to say that Harry, Louis, and Liam aren’t the same, but I don’t know that the types of songs they’ve written have reflected it in the way I’m talking about for Zayn and Niall.  This is because I think all of the songs about love and sex that are based on real experience that have come from these 3 are about men, but I think some of Zayn and Niall’s songs are legitimately about women.

I do hear that gentleness in the songs Louis has written that are about (most likely) Harry or about non-romantic things, and I hear that gentleness in the songs Harry has written (most likely) about Louis.  I don’t think any of Liam’s songs so far have sounded like they were based on his genuine experience, so I can’t judge that one.  

Yes, he and Louis wrote a lot together, but based on the lyrics released in Liam’s solo songs vs. Louis’ solo songs so far, I think it’s fair to say that Louis is far more interested in lyrics and it’s likely that a lot of the lyrics in their collabs came from Louis.  At first I didn’t want to say that because it’s true that Liam doesn’t get enough credit for those collabs, but I honestly think the evidence at this point supports Louis being the lyric guy while Liam is the melody guy.

Aggh, I’m having trouble explaining myself succinctly here, but I’m not trying to get too much into the politics of assigning sexuality to people we don’t know or open a can of worms about who wrote what on Liam and Louis’ collabs.  

It’s just me trying to explain a feeling I get from their lyrics when Zayn and Niall talk about sex and/or women.

Specific Songs

The only pure, happy love song in terms of the story of the song would be Seeing Blind.  The lyrics of that are interesting to me because he says that he’s heard the person speak a million times already before they even talk to each other for the first time.  That would indicate to me that whoever he’s talking about is someone who shows up in media somehow because otherwise he wouldn’t have been able to hear them if he hadn’t met them yet.

The one song I would say feels really odd and out of place to me is On My Own.  I like it well enough, but that and Slow Hands are the only 2 songs on the album that go back to that “single Niall” aesthetic from before the album.  

I also don’t really get the lyrics of On My Own because he talks about turning down someone who’s interested (presumably for a short fling), but then he’s also talking about “kissing all the women”.  So are you up for a one night stand or not Niall?  I haven’t figured out that one yet other than that it’s basically just an ode to bars.  I’m not saying there has to be anything deep behind it, but I like to figure out a meaning for songs that’s consistent across the lyrics and I’m having trouble doing that for On My Own.

Of course I somehow didn’t end up mentioning my favorite song in all of that.  Paper Houses just gets me. I think it’s kind of in league with Too Much to Ask and This Town in that it can be read as the other straight-up break-up song on the album.  However, it’s vague enough that it could apply to any sort of relationship or collective and I like that.  I think his voice is probably in its best element on that song too.

I would say Fire Away is probably my 2nd favorite for similar reasons, but The Tide is right on its heels even though it’s solidly about romance.

See, that’s the thing.  I usually don’t like songs that are about romance because I think it’s way overdone.  About 95% of songs you hear on the radio are about romance and there are so many other parts of the human experience that deserve to get attention instead.  However, I think having not heard Niall write about committed relationships before helps in making this album feel fresh despite that.  I also think a large chunk of it is down to Niall pouring his heart and his real feelings into the album.  It comes across as genuine.

Summary

I really love Niall’s album.  It’s something that creeps up on you quietly and sits on you unassumingly.  It’s a great representation of his entire career so far.  

I personally would say Niall has had the most successful career at this point despite it being the least flashy.  I’m basing that on the combination of the industry buzz, positive reviews, general audience reaction, consistency of charting, longevity of songs, streaming, and sales.  All the others tend to have a corner of the market locked down, but I think Niall’s the only one who’s doing well across all the metrics.  The only thing he’s a little low on is his hits on his music videos, but to be fair he only has the 1 that’s a real music video.

It’s just kind of mind-boggling to think about because Niall always does things like this.  He doesn’t ever stand center-stage, and yet somehow he manages to steal everyone’s hearts under the radar.

To be fair to the others, it has to be said Niall hasn’t really experienced the sabotage they have either.  Poor Zayn and Louis are getting maliciously neglected while Liam is sunk in a shithole of bearding and official narrative.  Harry, while his official narrative isn’t the nicest for fans, generally benefits him when it comes to the industry and the general public.  He could have more promo though.

[romcomathon2016]

What If (Canada, 2013)

Predictions: Alex has seen this movie. Kat...knew it starred Daniel Radcliffe? Thus, she predicted that it was about him wandering about town, wondering, "What if I were a wizard?" Stay tuned for as many Harry Potter jokes as we can possibly squash into this entry.

Plot: Daniel Radcliffe is a sad sack who has not yet gotten over his breakup of over a year ago. He drags himself to a party at his friend Adam Driver's house, where he meets Adam Driver's cousin, Zoe Kazan. They have a lot in common, and he immediately likes her, but upon walking her home he learns that she has a boyfriend. Since he is a decent person, they become friends instead.

Time passes. They continue to be friends. Zoe Kazan continues to have a boyfriend.

More time passes. Zoe Kazan's boyfriend, hotshot copyright lawyer, moves to Dublin for what is supposed to be six months. Daniel Radcliffe and Zoe Kazan hang out even more, growing ever closer. Adam Driver marries a girl he met at that same party. Daniel Radcliffe realizes that he needs to express his feelings, but (blah blah blah) this winds up going terribly, and he and Zoe Kazan stop talking, even though she has broken up with her boyfriend anyway. Zoe Kazan takes a promotion in Taiwan, and Daniel Radcliffe decides to go back to medical school. Adam Driver and his wife host Zoe Kazan's going-away party, and, at the last minute, Daniel Radcliffe decides to attend. They make up (and out! We will never tire of this incredibly lame barely-a-joke; hope you are looking forward to seeing it approximately 50 more times on this blog).

More time passes. It turns out they got married. How nice.

Best Scene: We really liked this movie, and it's almost entirely adorable stuff between Daniel Radcliffe and Zoe Kazan, so it's tough to pick. One of our favorite parts, though, is when they first start becoming friends and are emailing each other. Just one of many lovely and organic parts to this film.

Worst Scene: Maybe the sequence where we're shown the construction of a “Fool's Gold” sandwich? A butter-covered loaf of bread, filled with peanut butter, jam, and 1 lb. crispy bacon. The internet says that it's "surprisingly good," but we find that difficult to believe. However, the internet also says that it's 8000 calories, which we do not find difficult to believe.

Best Line: "I have a dead-end job, I live in my sister's attic, and I never go out. ...Uh, correcting pronunciation is my old thing, actually. My new thing is oversharing." -- Daniel Radcliffe, making a winning first impression upon Zoe Kazan. There are actually a lot of funny and/or touching lines in this movie, though. This just happened to be one that we remembered. Props to this movie! There was only one line in it we hated (see below).

Worst Line: Sigh. In the middle of this movie, there is your standard one-trick joke about Adam Driver accidentally sleeping with a trans woman. HERE'S THE THING ABOUT THIS JOKE: besides its being, you know, transphobic, it is SUCH A LAME, OLD, CONSTANTLY-REUSED GARBAGE PIECE OF JOKE. This shitty joke has appeared in basically every piece of media we've seen since middle school. Honestly. Come up with a new offensive joke, if you must.

Highlights of the Watching Experience: Toronto is beautiful, y'all!!!! So is Dublin. All the scenery in this movie, A+. We really covet Zoe Kazan and Daniel Radcliffe's neighborhood. The walkability score looks excellent. But why are Daniel Radcliffe and his sister (both clearly British) living in Canada? Zero backstory was provided. Are their parents...also in Canada? Their parents seem to originally have been doctors in London… Discuss.

How Many POC in the Film: Basically none. Bad job, movie. The most we got was the knowledge that Daniel Radcliffe and Zoe Kazan had each dated one person of color in the past. Really, movie Canada? Even Hogwarts has, like, three or four POC, and that's in movie BRITAIN.

Alternate Scenes: The scene in which Daniel Radcliffe and Zoe Kazan are out in the city of Toronto, and 50% of the background actors are POC. Alternately, a movie about the zombie apocalypse, in which super-pale Daniel Radcliffe turns out to be Patient Zero. It could still be a romcom, though. But they would be forever separated by his zombie-ness. So maybe not a romcom. A romantic zombie drama. A romzom...dram. Who wants to fund this?? Any takers????

Was the Poster Better or Worse than the Film: Worse. What is happening in this poster???? It is like the fridge magnets have come alive in an insect-y swarm between them. No, we don't want that. We would not watch that movie.

Score: 8 out of 10 Harry-Potter-hangs-out-with-Kylo-Ren smooches. Guys, this is Adam Driver's least abhorrent role! He is...perhaps a touch too free-spirited, but otherwise, he is mostly okay. He even has some pretty funny lines from time to time. His face is still weird, though.

Ranking: 10, out of the 78 movies we’ve seen so far. Not bad! Worth watching, if you haven't seen it and are interested in enjoying some beautiful shots of unrealistically-white Toronto. (Seriously, though, what is this city in which even Chinatown doesn't have any people of color? Is that Chinatown that Zoe Kazan and her boyfriend are strolling through? Kat genuinely thought it was, like...an Asian-themed farmers' market. Red lanterns. White people. You know.)

[anmousewrites]

Storm Warning Chapter 2

((... who is late. It is me. I was supposed to post this a little while ago. Whoooooops. Here you go!))

Oliver’s apartment was meticulously clean for a scavenger. He did have a junk room, but even that was organized and tidy. Three of the walls were shelves and the fourth was a big table with all of his tools. The window was almost permanently grimey, but he had scrubbed it hard until the dirt only stuck in the corners and some sunlight could still come through, whatever rays made it through the smog. He had an old radio he had cobbled together and he used it to catch whatever stations worked that day. He wasn’t picky with his music. Anything cheerful. He’d sit in his scrap room and clean pieces or tinker on things until they were sellable. It was probably his favourite part of the job. It was the quietest and safest part, certainly. Today was not a tinker day. Today was a salvage day. That meant that he was hurrying through the crowded streets of the city, his bag on his back and his head bent low, trying to stay inconspicuous. What he did was technically illegal. At least, it was illegal enough. Arguably, the scrap he worked with was old and discarded and should have been free for the taking. On the other hand, people got killed for a lot less these days and even if he didn’t die he was way too poor to even think about the legal system. Nope. NOPE. 

Better to be inconspicuous. And he mostly was. He was poor and dirty (because as soon as he left his apartment, it stuck to him) and his cloud of hair got all the frizzier in whatever heat and dirt there was at ground level. Spectra City was a huge, disgusting rat’s nest of a place with The Dimmet (usually just The Dim) as the center of it all. The apartment buildings were huge. The city had something stupid like one hundred million people in it, so the apartment buildings were almost cities unto themselves. Most had different stores and aid centers built right in, although Oliver wouldn’t go there unless his life depended on it because he’d probably leave with something worse than he went in with.   There were other neighbourhoods outside of The Dim that were maybe not less awful but differently awful. The rich kind of bad. Oliver stayed away from those places. Apartments tended to be nicer the higher up they were, and some buildings in those neighbourhoods were incredibly fancy. How many people to an apartment block in The Dim? Ten thousand? Fifteen thousand? Oliver had no idea. A lot. Too many, usually. Oliver lived in a dump, to be blunt. He was poor, he lived alone, and honestly he was surprised some days that his building was still standing. He had put a lot of work into his little unit, and it was tiny and ugly but it was his. And most importantly, he could afford it with his weird-ass job. Someone tried to pick a fight with a street vendor, and Oliver just ducked his head and walked a little faster. He was okay, maybe, in a fight. Against one guy. Depending on how big the guy was. But he was way better at running away. He knew the city, or at least this part of it, very well. He knew his building very well, at least until about halfway up. It was much easier to disappear into the shadows and the dust. As long as he was afraid, he was great at it. It was when he was comfortable that he got awkward and clumsy again. Oh well. It was a system that worked. He could be awkward in his own house. That’s basically what they were for, anyway. The junk heaps were easy to find once you knew the signs. They were never labeled and no streets led to them. They were just piles of trash, after all. Dark, hidden corners that housed acropolises of old technology. Oliver would find one and then pick it over for anything good to salvage. One pile could last months before he sifted through it enough to be sure that he took everything worthwhile. He had one such pile already discovered and all it took was some winding between a claustrophobic street market and the narrow, dark alleyways between apartment blocks. And he had to keep going down, of course. That’s the thing about cities that got so big. There was always stuff underneath. People just…forgot about stuff. Hell, sometimes they forgot about people. There was certainly once or twice where Oliver was sure he could have just not paid his rent and no one would have noticed. Of course, if he was wrong, he’d be kicked into the street in a heartbeat. There wasn’t enough room for everyone already. He cut through a fallen wall that dropped him down into what looked like an old parking garage under another apartment block. He knew the underside of the building better than the topside. If he got shot down here, he’d have a better chance dragging his ass all the way back to his own block to find help rather than figure out where the aid stations were up top. Better just to not get shot then, because no matter how that story ended, it kind of sucked. The lighting was basically shit, but he was pretty used to working in that kind of set-up. He had a light in his bag if he needed it, but seeing as that drew more attention he’d rather not even bother. A lot of the stuff was garbage, but even garbage was useful. He could always use more wire, right? So he dug around, squinted at things in the darkness, cut away parts and pieces that he needed. He’d stop every few minutes, listening. Nothing but rats and roaches in the dark. He was well past being worried about either of them. He worked until he got hungry. He could set his watch by his stomach. Actually had before, when it died in the middle of the day and he had to figure out when it was safe to leave. Stay out too late and it wouldn’t be the police that killed you. He had some food in his bag, a little metal lunchbox he had put together out of scrap. There wasn’t lots in it, but there was enough. An alarm on his watch told him when his time was up. It would take too long for him to notice the sun setting, he had learned that the hard way.  Oliver silenced the alarm and packed up as quickly as he could, shoving his work into his bag. He got a few good finds, but nothing special. Still, if he could pull that off every day, that would be great. You wouldn’t need great days if you didn’t have bad ones, right? He took the open street back. A lot of people had cleared out now that the sun was getting lower in the sky. He could have cut through the alleyways, it was faster, but Oliver stayed out of the shadows whenever other people were concerned. He wasn’t afraid of the dark, he was just afraid of them. People were, without a doubt, the scariest thing in the world. He didn’t stop until the creaking, unsteady elevator finally dropped him on to his floor. Normally he wouldn’t even hesitate until his door was locked behind him, but he spotted one of his neighbours struggling to carry her things. Mrs. Ahn had only one arm, two little toddlers and a rapidly ripping bag of food. Oliver scrambled with his own supplies and managed to grab the side of the bag that was trying to succumb to gravity. “Thank you!” She said, sounding a little harried. One of the kids stumbled and fell, but seeing as they weren’t very big it wasn’t a long fall. They just blinked up at Oliver and he looked down in time to notice that the kid only had one eye. He couldn’t remember if that was new or not. “Here, I got it. You get the door-” He managed, trying to take the bag from her without spilling every single one of its contents. He knew Mrs. Ahn a little. Sometimes he could hear the kids crying through the walls. He was a ways down, so he wasn’t sure if it was her kids. It didn’t bug him too much. Kids cried. He was sure that some of his machining made noise that was pretty damn annoying too, but nobody complained to him. It seemed only fair. There had been a Mr. Ahn, at one point. Oliver remembered him. Taller, dark hair. But Oliver hadn’t seen him around in a while. Maybe it was just circumstances. She got her door open, the kid still on their feet ran inside and she bent down to scoop the other one up. With them inside, she came back for her bag. He carefully tried to pass her things to her. She thanked him again, and he went off down the hall towards his own apartment. The hallways were wide but cluttered with other people’s junk. There had been a carpet, once, long before Oliver’s time. It still hung on in places but was mostly worn through down to the cement under it. His shoes, almost as worn as the floor, made no sound as he walked. There were some more people, either coming or going, and he waved and called out as necessary. He knew a lot of the people on his floor. Other scavengers and junk workers, factory people, cleaners, the list was endless. He tried to stay on good terms with his neighbours. It had helped him out more than once. There had been a shoot out on his floor a couple months ago. Oliver had not been in his apartment. But, he had sold one of the guys a hard drive and another one had bought a (minimally scratched) touchscreen from him. They let him through to get back into his house, where he pushed an empty book case against the door to hold it closed and laid low until he heard the cops come and clear everyone out. Y’know, hours after it had started. He didn’t get a lot of sleep that night. Or, to be fair, most of the nights after. It gave him a good fucking scare. But nothing that exciting happened now. He unlocked his door (both the key lock, and the two electronic keypads he had installed himself) and closed the door behind him. Time to get some dinner, and then maybe listen to the radio and clean up some of the salvage he got today. He thought about going to the bar, briefly, but decided against it. He was feeling a little raggedy and nervous, and you couldn’t pick up somebody if you were drinking just to steady your hand. Nah, he’d take it easy tonight, and maybe go out for a little tomorrow. The bar was a little drinks n’ karaoke place, and sure it was a little dangerous to get to but there were ways. Oliver went when he was feeling brave, because he liked it there. It was kinda a hotbed of bad shit, or at least illegal shit, but the people were nice and the music was perfectly terrible. Today was not a brave day, and that was alright. He flicked the light on, it stuttered for a minute before it found full brightness, and then he found himself something to eat. The food hadn’t gone bad yet. Y’know, it almost had, but he’d eaten worse. 

He turned the radio on, tuned it to something cheerful and was just about to get to work when, weirdly enough, his phone rang. Oliver’s cellphone was an unusual thing. He had built it out of various scrap bits, and patched it into the network so he’d have service without having to pay the bill. He couldn’t afford one, anyway. It was nothing like those currently on the market. The user interface was hilariously basic (he bought the program off a friend) and it had none of the web capability, visual calling or hard light technology that the new ones did. But it worked. And he could count the amount of people who had his number on one hand. Who could be calling him now? The caller ID only worked if he had the person in his contacts. That was always fine by him, he didn’t want to talk to anyone else. His screen flashed three letters. DAN. Oliver smiled and grabbed the phone. “Hey!” He said, excitedly. He hurried over and turned the radio off so he could hear his answer. “Hello?” Not Dan. A woman’s voice, inquisitive. “Hi. Can I help you?” Oliver’s tone switched over to something more professional. He tried to hide his disappointment. He hadn’t heard from Dan in a while and had just assumed he was busy. He was probably still busy. “Is this Oliver?” She asked. Who had his number and didn’t know who he was? Or, who was calling from Dan’s number? The whole situation was just so weird. He thought that maybe he had saved the number to his phone wrong, but they had been texting back and forth, too. What the hell? “Speaking.” He said simply. “This is Selene Violet. Does that name ring any bells?” Yeah, alarm bells. Still, that seemed rude and he didn’t say that out loud. Selene Violet was a name that was thrown around a lot in the media, so it had eventually worked its way into his knowledge. “You work for Highlight Tech, right?” It took him a while to remember the name. It was written on basically everything. It should have rolled right off his tongue. Why was the... The… What did she do again? Why was someone from HT calling him on Dan’s number? “Yes. I know this must be very strange, so I thank you for your patience. I just thought that it would be best to call and deliver the news myself. I think that so much of humanity is lost to technology today.” She spoke very evenly and politely and it did exactly nothing for his confusion. A cold sense of dread gathered in his chest like storm clouds. No matter what this call was about, it could not be anything good. “What news?” He asked. The words came slowly from his mouth. Something was wrong. Something was really fucking wrong. “Your friend. Dan? He was recently in my employ. There were only two numbers in his phone. One of them didn’t work, and the other led to you. We have no way to contact his family. We don’t know his legal name, or even where he was from.” Breathing was suddenly really hard, and Oliver thought he might faint. “What happened?” He asked. Panic had finally started to creep into his voice. “He’s-” Finally a hesitation, a break in her otherwise pleasant tone. “He passed away. You know, he had some issues. I don’t know the details, but I was told that things had not been very kind to him. He seems to have had some sort of…problem. He took his own life.” It didn’t feel like a punch to the stomach or anything that solid and sure. Instead, Oliver felt his strength run out of him. The news sank in and he wilted, the sight of his home swimming in his vision. “What about the others? Do they know?” Oliver wasn’t super tight with Dan’s friends, but he had met them. They were nice people. She hesitated and Oliver pressed a hand to his mouth, already knowing what was coming next. “They… His breakdown must have been awful. They’re…no longer with us.” She said. There was nothing. No tears. No real grief. Just shock and emptiness. Oliver was just overwhelmed with it. Not Dan. He had been so nice. Funny and honest. Oliver thought he was doing okay. And his friends! He knew what Selene was implying. He couldn’t believe it. “I’m sorry for having to be the one to bring you this news. I just didn’t feel right not telling anyone. You don’t have any way to contact his family, do you?” She asked. Dizzily, he shook his head before he realized she couldn’t see it. “No, no I… I don’t know where they are.” He managed. “I’m sorry. I… I’d really like to meet with you, if that was alright?” She asked him. The idea sounded bizarre but the weirdness of it barely registered. “I should have liked to tell you in person, and he has a few effects here that should really go to someone. I’m so sorry.” “Yeah, I-... Okay.” He would go. He didn’t know about the others, if they had family to care for them, but there was no one else to mourn Dan or to retrieve his things.  He felt he had to. Or, at least, that he should. “Do you know where the office is?” She asked. He did. Not right now, though. Right now he didn’t know a damn thing. “Yeah, it’s across town, by the... “ He gestured aimlessly. “Pharoah Park.” He finally managed to spit out. The skyscraper district. Rich people town. “Yes. Just walk right in the front door and talk to the front desk. Any time you feel you can, okay?” She said. “Mhm.” He agreed. Whenever he could. Maybe when he could feel his legs again. Oliver drew in a shaking breath. Dan. Gone. His friend. No, worse than that, actually. His acquaintance.They had barely started to be friends. It was all over so fast. “I’m sorry for your loss. I hope that I will get to see you in person.” She said. The end of the call. What else could she say? He was lucky he even got a call, honestly. “Have…have a good night.” He managed. Not what he meant, because that would be stupid and cruel but she didn’t say anything about it. He assumed that she understood his intent. She merely said goodbye and hung up the phone. He heard the call disconnect in his ear, and the arm holding the phone dropped. At some point, he had sunk to the floor and now he sat there with his phone in his lap. I’ll call you when I’m back in town, Dan had said. Oliver remembered how he had smiled when he said it. It looked like he was done waiting for the call.

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 28th April 2019 (Jonas Blue, Lil Dicky, Rita Ora)

Top 10

We have a couple new arrivals this week, but the biggest story is still how this song clings on to the top spot, as “Old Town Road” by Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus still at number-one for a second week, and both the meme and constant discussion surrounding the song continue to spread to the point where it’s a cultural phenomenon.

The rest of the top 10 is incredibly less interesting. “Piece of Your Heart” by MEDUZA and Goodboys is up two spaces to number-two. It could make a play for the top.

Lewis Capaldi’s “Someone You Loved” is also down a spot to number-three.

Down one position from last week is Billie Eilish’s “bad guy” at number-four.

Tom Walker’s “Just You and I” isn’t moving at number-five.

Avicii’s posthumous hit “SOS” featuring vocals from Aloe Blacc has boosted up six spaces to number-six, becoming Avicii’s first ever posthumous Top 10, as well as his tenth Top 10 in general, and Aloe Blacc’s third.

Up a spot from last week is the Jonas Brothers with “Sucker” at number-seven.

Russ (Splash) and Tion Wayne’s “Keisha & Becky” stabilises its spot at number-eight, down a spot from last week.

Elevating a single space from recent controversy is “Here with Me” by Marshmello and CHVRCHES at number-nine.

At #10, to round off our top 10, is “Talk” by Khalid, up a space and returning to the top 10.

Climbers

Wiley’s “Boasty” featuring verses from Stefflon Don, Sean Paul and Idris freakin’ Elba is up five spaces to #12, whilst “All Day and Night” by EUROPA featuring Madison Beer enters the top 20 at #14, up eight spaces from last week, becoming the first top 20 hit for EUROPA as a group, as well as Jax Jones’ seventh, Martin Solveig’s third as well as Beer’s first ever (Congratulations). Other than that, “Pretty Shining People” by George Ezra is up nine spots to #25, and his other song “Shotgun” is up seven to #30, so there must have been some sort of boost to the album sales, but generally, that’s all we have.

Fallers

We have a few more of these, or at least it seems these songs are more notable. “Giant” by Calvin Harris and Rag ‘n’ Bone Man finally gets its streaming cuts due to dumb UK chart rules and is down 10 positions to #16, whilst “Boy with Luv” by BTS featuring Halsey collapses 16 spaces down to #29 as K-pop always does, “Disaster” by Dave featuring J Hus is down six spaces to #33, whilst “wish you were gay” by Billie Eilish as well as “MONOPOLY” by Ariana Grande and Victoria Monet seem prepared for a premature exit, down 11 and 10 spots respectively to #37 and #40.

Dropouts & Returning Entries

I’m going to assume YNW Melly has had his streaming cut as “Murder on My Mind” is completely out of the Top 75 after dropping out from #38. Speaking of, “Options” by NSG and Tion Wayne has very unfortunately dropped out from #23 due to this dumb chart rule, which directly affects certain genres, i.e. urban music like hip hop and R&B (as well as EDM, for that matter) that is boosted prominently from streaming, from never having any longevity and not becoming as big as hits on the year-end than they deserve. “Options” would have been locked if it weren’t for this rule, as I think it would have lasted many more weeks. The other drop-out is from Ariana Grande and it’s “break up with your girlfriend, i’m bored” from #39.

NEW ARRIVALS

#39 – “Carry On” – Kygo and Rita Ora

Produced by Kygo and Afsheen – Peaked at #8 in Norway

Yes! I finally get to talk about Pokémon! I know what you’re thinking, what? Why? It’s just Rita Ora collaborating with some massive EDM producer like she always does, and while you’re right, it’s for the Detective Pikachu film, which isn’t currently out but I am going to see it at some point. I’m excited to hear this soundtrack as well, although I’m not exactly expecting Kygo and Rita Ora to deliver anything particularly good, or interesting, or Pokémon-related for that matter. Pokémon songs for the anime films have never directly related to the film plots, though, and usually were kind of boring, motivational songs with very vague lyrics, which is understandable as they had to be rushed out every single year. Anyway, this is Kygo’s seventh Top 40 hit and Rita Ora’s 21st, which is impressive, and is it any good? No. Of course it isn’t, and I’m mostly indifferent on this tasteless drivel that EDM producers put out in general with female pop singers where it sounds like the singers have been artificially sped-up, with mixing that’s overly-drowned in reverb and an instrumental as dry as clay years after it is first moulded. The piano melody here isn’t bad, but it isn’t unique and doesn’t carry Rita Ora’s incredibly weak hook, and in general her performance here sucks, like that random “Woo!” she adds in that pauses the song entirely just to halt his momentum, to add nothing at all! There’s barely a real drop here, so it just feels like a constant onslaught of nothingness and high-pitched vocal samples, which I somewhat like for its effort not to make a club banger but rather a tropical house ballad straight out of the dregs of 2016, and it’s not the last new arrival we have that does that here, but this is the only one I’ll talk about in this episode, more on that later. Anyways, this isn’t worth much analysis. It’s dreadfully boring but it’s not exactly long and doesn’t overstay its presence for THAT long, I suppose, it’s just disappointing for a soundtrack that is supposed to provide the music for what is looking out to be a film full of personality with actors oozing charisma. I’m looking out for the Sonic the Hedgehog film’s soundtrack a bit more now, albeit just for the novelty of a Dr. Robotnik cover of “Gangsta’s Paradise”. Next.

#27 – “No Diet” – Digga D

Produced by Ghosty

Digga D is a UK drill artist, as most of the rappers we see on the charts are in 2019. I’ve only vaguely heard of him before, so I think it’s safe to assume that the extreme marketing for the song involving a lot of different companies and individuals, including Mixtape Madness, is what landed this on the charts as Digga D’s first top 40 hit, as well as the video which is about trafficking crack cocaine in Coca-Cola cans... sure. Anyway, is the song itself any good? Well... the beat is incredibly minimalistic like most UK drill, with just an ominous piano line as the backing for a skittering hi-hat and bass-heavy trap beat – those 808s, by the way, are pretty insane. Digga D isn’t really saying anything of interest or anything different than the other guys, but the beat is good enough to carry him a lot of the time, and I love his weird sounds he uses for the ad-libs. It reminds me of a British Migos, where instead of repeating the line, he just makes unintelligible nonsense words and stutters. The singing on the second verse is pretty janky in relative to when it appears in the verse, and while Genius says this and the supposedly playful lyrics are what sets it apart, I don’t see the juxtaposition here, I just think it’s kind of surreal in how bipolar this song feels. There’s an ominous, eerie and menacing beat, violent and braggadocious lyrics from Digga, and then a bunch of silly, humorous ad-libs over it. This song has an identity crisis first and foremost, and while we’re at it...

#24 – “Earth” – Lil Dicky

Produced by benny blanco and Cas—

Nope. No, sorry, not touching this one. I appreciate what it’s doing for charity but I have a LOT to say about this song and trust me, it is not overwhelmingly positive, so, no, I’m not covering this one, at least not like this, and not right now. I might do a full-length review at some point but I think it’s much more likely that I talk about this at the end of the year, if you get the gist. For now, to replace an actual review, let me just list the guest stars, because technically, this is a song by Lil Dicky featuring Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande, Halsey, Zac Brown of his eponymous band, Brendan Urie of Panic! at the Disco, common fungus Hailee Steinfeld, Wiz Khalifa and Snoop Dogg, Kevin Hart as Kanye West, Adam Levine of Maroon 5, Shawn Mendes, Charlie Puth, Sia, Miley Cyrus, Lil Jon, Rita Ora, Miguel, Katy Perry, Lil Yachty as an STD, Ed Sheeran, Meghan Trainor, mother-father gentleman PSY, professional basketball player Joel Embiid, Tory Lanez, John Legend, Bad Bunny, Kris Wu, Leonardo DiCaprio and the entirety of the Backstreet Boys. Does that count as a review for Lil Dicky’s second UK Top 40 single? I don’t care, I’ll talk about in length when I want to. Trust me, I’m planning ahead.

#23 – “What I Like About You” – Jonas Blue and Theresa Rex

Produced by Jonas Blue – Peaked at #1 in Belgium

Oh, yeah, this, okay, well, Jonas Blue exists, I guess, and I’m supposed to review everything he puts out because everything this dude makes charts... and sucks. I don’t really have a problem with the dude, but nothing he makes is all that interesting, and he’s the epitome of carelessly generic EDM and dance-pop. This particular track features vocals from Theresa Rex, Danish pop singer who you won’t know by name and she doesn’t even have a Wikipedia page, but you will know the voice of from “Solo Dance” years back, which she had uncredited vocals on (I’m glad they stopped not crediting the vocalists on EDM tracks, especially since, you know, they do all the heavy lifting in terms of singing). The production here is pretty tropical, I guess, with some handclaps and a weak synth drop that has a few orchestral stabs to replace any unique instrumentation. None of the vocal melodies catch on yet and I’d much prefer “Solo Dance” to this. What else am I supposed to say? I know I’ve taken the easy way out with these two songs, but honestly we’re at a standstill in the charts right now where it should really be more interesting than it is.

Conclusion

Even if I didn’t review it, I don’t care, Lil Dicky and friends still get Worst of the Week for “Earth”, with Dishonourable Mention going to Jonas Blue and Theresa Rex for “That’s What I Like About You”, or something to that effect. In fact, there’s no Best of the Week or Honourable Mention, the Dishonourable Mention is tied as Kygo and Rita Ora’s “Carry On” exemplifies the exact same problem. God, what a crappy week. Follow me on Twitter @cactusinthebank for more pop music ramblings and Top 20 rankings, and I’ll see you next week!