#harry makes a long suffering cameo

[allwaswell16]

A fic rec of One Direction fics in which a character had experienced abuse of some form in the past as requested in this ask. Please don't forget to leave kudos and comments for the writers! You can find my other fic recs here.

- Louis/Harry -

🧱 Run Like the Devil by benzos

(E, 143k, Supernatural au) Louis hunts demons; Harry's the strangest demon he's ever met, and he keeps fucking meeting him.

🧱 Saving Symphony Hall by @helloamhere

(E, 124k, omegaverse) “That’s the attitude,” said Louis, “I’ll tell you tomorrow. Tonight, I need to do some research. Zayn, give me your number. I’m gonna save our symphony.”

🧱 Hang there like fruit, my soul/Till the tree die by louloubaby92 / @louloubabys1992

(M, 111k, omegaverse) Louis knows he's a defective omega. He knows its also not his fault but it is what it is. He takes the world head on even when the world is unkind to him. 

🧱 Give Me Truths by iwillpaintasongforlou / @canonlarry

(E, 110k, punk Louis) the one in which Louis falls in love with a fragile boy and tells him every beautiful truth in the world, as long as it makes him happy.

🧱 The Naked Truth by @larrysmomfics

(E, 80k, Naked Attraction au) The producers of Naked Attraction decide to do a 'Second Chances' edition of the show where past contestants who didn't find love on the show the first time can re-apply in hopes that the second time's a charm. 

🧱 Here In The Afterglow by fondleeds

(NR, 88k, historical) 1970’s AU. In a tiny town in Idaho, Louis’ life is changed forever by the arrival of a curious stranger.

🧱 Shout It From The Rooftops by therogueskimo / @bravetemptation

(M, 70k, PTSD) Plagued by memories of the worst day of his life, Louis Tomlinson feels like he’s constantly living in darkness. Harry Styles might just be the person to bring him back to the light.

🧱 These High Walls by LarryAlways28

(E, 68k, omegaverse) Born to one of Seattle's wealthiest families,  Harry was raised exactly as a Styles heir should be: sharp as a tack, witty, charming, and powerful. He was the ideal son - until he presented as an Omega.

🧱 you're ripped at every edge, but you're a masterpiece by Valentia

(E, 50k, uni) The one where Harry is soft and pretty but doesn't see it and Louis just wants to love him the way he deserves.

🧱 elephant juice by @stylinsoncity

(M, 32k, uni) harry doesn't understand boundaries. louis doesn't mind at all.

🧱 With These Arms Folded by @taggiecb

(NR, 21k, famous/not famous) Harry Styles is living a peaceful existence in California as a very successful songwriter. That is until he receives a curious email one sunny summer morning, and his life almost immediately gets turned upside down buy a force that's bigger than any storm he's seen outside his window.

🧱 why take your life when you give it so willingly by we_are_the_same / @so-why-let-your-voice-be-tamed

(M, 19k, pirates) When Louis Tomlinson, Captain of The Rogue, ends up adrift at sea after Captain Cowell attacks his ship, he is surprised to find his enemy, Captain Styles, coming to his rescue.

🧱 vatican cameos by nightwideopen / @themarshalstale

(T, 14k, asexuality) sometimes louis gets sad and sometimes harry lets louis write on him

🧱 Just a touch of your love by @thegirlontheblackhoodie

(E, 12k, omegaverse) Harry is a touch starved omega trying to get through it on his own. Louis happens to be the only alpha around to realize it and offers to help.

🧱 You've Got A New Life (Am I Bothering you?) by LilyBlue28

(NR, 5k, omegaverse) the one where Louis is an omega who suffers from PTSD and is triggered one day. He doesn't know how to ask for help from his doting alpha, doesn't think he deserves it, and tries to handle it on his own.

🧱 I Don't Wanna Hurt Anymore by offwiththeirheads / @hazzabooween

(M, 5k, kidfic) Harry walks a thin line between breaking his best friend’s heart and fighting a losing battle.

- Rare Pairs -

🧱 Sugar, We're Going Down by sunsetmog / @magicalrocketships

(E, 131k, Louis/Nick Grimshaw) At 37, Nick has everything he could possibly want in life: huge success in business, a Bachelor of the Year award hanging in his toilet, piles of money, and a rather odd little habit of visiting a cafe with terrible service on his way into the office every morning.

🧱 It's You by happily_missy

(E, 56k, Zayn/Liam) Liam is a PA for a famous fashion designer and Zayn is their gorgeous new model.

[a-forger-and-a-point-man]

Oppenheimer / immediate thoughts

ok nolan fans let's talk, i just got back.

i am very well acquainted with 20th century american history but i did not do any additional research on oppenheimer the man or the trinity test because i wanted to be surprised by the movie's narrative and imagery, so keep that in mind as you read. i'm not fact-checking for the time being... i want to go do my own reading at my leisure when it's not past midnight.

DON'T GO SEE IT IN IMAX. SAVE YOUR MONEY AND A HEADACHE. it's not inception or dunkirk or the batman films or interstellar. just go to your local theater or wait until it's available to stream. trust me on this. i'll explain why in the spoilers section below.

YOU'RE BEING WARNED. SPOILERS AHEAD.

-this was the least nolan-y film that nolan has ever made. i see more of following in it (his very first film) than i do any other project. it was definitely a bit of a different direction for him.

-this is basically a biopic of sorts about oppenheimer. it's not about the war nor is it really about the bomb. it's about an awkward, conflicted, and possibly mentally ill physics genius who seems to not know how to do much in life beyond quantum physics theory. like yes, he's got a brilliant mind, but he's far from a well-rounded, impressive human being. the guy was a hot mess long before anyone mentioned the word bomb.

-taking that into consideration, i can see how the suffering of humans (whether the navajo nation in new mexico, or the japanese people) doesn't play a role in the film. japanese victims are mentioned, but briefly in one scene. that doesn't make any of this right. in fact a more entertaining, eye-opening, and timely film should have included more of both - but i see now that nolan wanted to focus on ONE man and cillian is indeed in practically every. single. scene.

-cillian should be nominated for an oscar and win it.

-humans are very complex and you CAN both build the bomb AND feel bad about it, yes it's entirely possible and normal, but the film is still 3 hours of white guilt. i'm openly saying it. the reason you shouldn't see it in imax is because it's 3 hours of middle aged white men sitting around making terrible decisions. it's SO MUCH TALKING, jesus.

-IMAX cameras are stupidly loud, which is why most filmmakers don't use them. you can't hear dialogue. they're for action scenes. so that very much explains why i was just ITCHING for subtitles on this. so many different accents and everyone mumbling and the score was louder than their voices and ARGHHH nolan why.

-female characters are unremarkable and underused. i know nolan and i know how he uses female characters. at this point i'm convinced he just doesn't know how to write them, and he can only work with male-driven stories and you know what... fine. it is what it is. unless he brings female writers on board, nothing will change, because he can't do it himself.

-why are there sudden bare tiddies in a nolan film. fanboys, did u love it? did u get what u wanted? was that it? finally, a sex scene in a nolan film? it added nothing and i could argue it took some things away. sorry folks. entirely unnecessary.

-ok THE BEST PART was the surprise cameos. cillian was in every scene and yet he was the least famous person among big oscar winners sometimes! it was wild! i was internally screaming at gary oldman as harry truman. excellent choice to play him like the clown he was. AND EINSTEIN??? did y'all catch that or no??? i knew it right away from the voice and the kind eyes. it's the GUY FROM THE PIT IN THE DARK KNIGHT RISES. he helps bruce recover, and narrates the ascent of "the child". terrific casting! and i haven't checked IMDB yet, but is borden (not named after the character from the prestige!) played by the arkham patient from the dark knight? the one who gets shot in the leg and interrogated by harvey dent?? tell me i am recognizing the right guy! and then we had matthew modine... casey affleck... rami malek who appeared for like 3 mins maybe?! AND Y'ALL, JOSH HARTNETT????????????????? OMG my biggest crush when i was 15. that was craaaazy. but i do like seeing nolan bring back his friends... it's very much a nolan circle as we all know. and once you're in it, you're in it!

-the use of sound was VERY GOOD. the explosion actually being silent, because light reaches us before sound? but also the way the buildup was so intense and so hyped up and then just.... complete silence to reflect on the monstrosity being produced, and how nothing will be the same.

-there was a lot of train sounds to emphasize the railroad, but also... anyone notice that the stomping noise in oppenheimer's head almost felt like a train was coming through? TELL ME YOU DIDN'T THINK ABOUT COBB'S GUILTY CONSCIENCE IN INCEPTION, and how a train would ram through the dream. nolan doing an homage to himself is absolutely hysterical and i am here for it i guess.

-i'm not sure how audiences abroad will feel about all the scenes in washington with congressional testimony. does that stuff carry over well? do you get the references? it's such inside baseball, i know, and it adds so much time to the film, and yet MORE scenes with middle aged white men talking. i could have done with less of the black and white "present day" scenes and more about the impact of the bomb, or maybe more about kitty's life and how she overcame her (presumed?) alcoholism and depression.

-the casual discussion about the 11 cities shortlisted to drop the atomic bomb "but not kyoto because of its cultural importance" made people laugh in the theater as intended, but honestly like... nothing in the movie is funny. it's really heavy stuff and i still stand by the fact that the bomb should never have been produced, despite what oppenheimer and others tried to say. because even its production is incredibly dangerous. it's not just about where you fucking drop it.

-did i mention there is too much matt damon. like, too much.

-rami malek is the only person of color with a speaking role in this film. that's right.

-ok what else guys??? i wanna hear thoughts. there's a lot more but i'm so tired at this hour

[justforbooks]

It rained. Of course it did. It wouldn’t have been a proper coronation if it hadn’t. Brits wouldn’t have had it any other way. We were born to suffer. Keep calm and carry on.

The first guests had started arriving at Westminster Abbey from early in the morning. Among them the lucky MPs who had received an invitation. Though many Tories had been complaining it was all a stitch-up by Number 10. That Rishi Sunak had hand-picked favourites and those he wanted to get on side. Whatever. Let’s hope they had strong bladders. It was going to be a long morning.

As the cameras panned round the congregation, the BBC’s Huw Edwards desperately tried to pick out a few people he recognised. There was Ant and Dec. He didn’t know which was which but few do. Nick Cave. You can’t miss the jet-black hair. Stephen Fry behind a pillar somewhere. Jill Biden and her daughter near the back. The US president never attends these kinds of dos. President Macron wandering in, totally at home. He’s almost an honorary royal these days. In his own mind, at any rate.

Others started arriving. The lord speaker processing behind what looked like a large Toblerone. The seven former prime ministers. Boris Johnson and Liz Truss bringing up the rear. Johnson looking a right state as ever. There was no way he was going to make an effort even for this. Truss with the widest smile. She can’t believe her luck. Just 49 days in which she wrecked the country and she’s guaranteed a spot on every guest list for life. Living the dream.

Near the end, Prince Andrew and Harry. Andy was allowed a cape from the dressing-up box, Harry was in civvies. The message was clear: you can be accused of being a sexual predator. But don’t dare marry a black woman and spill the beans in your autobiography. Huw could barely bring himself to mention either of them.

Out in the Mall, Clare Balding was watching a horse walk sideways while the royal coach carrying King Charles and Camilla made its way to the Abbey. Balding pointed out all the flags of the Commonwealth countries, forgetting that many of them wanted to have their own heads of state. Then the cameras also forgot to broadcast the procession going through Trafalgar Square, where republican protesters were gathered. Nor did we get to hear Andrew being booed. This was too much lese-majesty for the occasion. Huw couldn’t have stood it.

Once the king and Camilla reached the abbey, a new procession made its way to the altar. Led by Sebastian Coe. What on earth was he doing here? He gets everywhere you don’t want him and even the royals haven’t found a way of keeping him out. Prince William, Kate and their children all looked as if they were extras from a remake of Cinderella. Then so did a lot of people. Brits like to think no other country does these occasions quite as well. Other countries may have a bit more self-worth. Still, the music was wonderful.

We’d been told that the king had wanted this to be a celebration of all faiths, but in reality this was a full-on Protestant extravaganza. Other faiths were restricted to either a one-line cameo or just a walk-on part. This was in all but name a sacred ritual, honouring Charles as the one true king and the Church of England as the one true religion.

And in truth, it quickly all began to drag a little. Justin Welby’s sermon was borderline unintelligible. Meaningless to most people. The two-hour service could have done with some editing down to 75 minutes. Still, at least it was an hour shorter than the late queen’s in 1953. Prince Louis went missing for large chunks. Lucky him. Perhaps he couldn’t be separated from his PlayStation.

“I am here to serve. Not to be served,” said Charles. Really? It didn’t look that way. The whole thing was being done for his benefit, after all. Though he did look strangely detached throughout. As if he didn’t really want to be there. As if it was all a bit much for him. He could take the trinkets but the obligations of kingship were too heavy a burden. Luckily, for once the pen with which he had to sign his name worked perfectly. Otherwise he might have snapped. The only time he looked vaguely cheerful was when the gospel choir sang.

Then we got to the real ceremony. First the anointing with holy oil that took place behind a screen because it was too sacred to be broadcast. A ritual we were told that went back to Solomon. Hmm. But Zadok the Priest always adds a touch of class. Then the Orb of Excellence, the Mace of Magnificence, the Spurs of the Surreal, the Gauntlet of Devotion, the Goblet of Fire. Or something.

Still, Penny Mordaunt was the breakout star with the Sword of Sincerity. Thank God, Truss got ousted. Otherwise we might have had Jacob Rees-Mogg doing it. The archbishop struggled to get the crown on, but eventually the king was crowned. Prince William swore allegiance and kissed his father. The one tender, personal moment of the entire ceremony. Even so, it was hard to escape the sense of the absurd. A modern 21st-century democracy reliving a medieval fantasy. It was like the royalty as scripted by Disney. Hard to take seriously. Maybe it would have made more sense in black and white.

At least Camilla looked as if she was enjoying herself. She smiled and struggled not to burst out into giggles as she was asked to hold a sceptre. She clearly thought the whole thing was ridiculous. Meanwhile the king carried on suffering in this piece of dadaist performance theatre. After more interminable faffing, the king and queen nipped round the back of the altar. Presumably Camilla needed a cigarette and a quick laugh to release the tension. Most of the rest of us were by now bored. Couldn’t wait for the thing to be over. Enough was enough.

Eventually they reappeared and headed for the exit while the audience sang God save the King. Charles stopped to thank the ministers from other faiths for being ignored throughout the service. Then into the golden carriage. Princess Anne, looking like Napoleon, leapt on to a horse. “She’s now the Gold Stick in Waiting,” Balding said excitedly. Only in Britain.

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com

[tilbageidanmark]

Movies I watched this Week #102

Re-watch: Lasse Hallström‘s sweet, early paean to lost childhood, My life as a dog. One of my three favorite nostalgic films from that period about coming of age and first loves (together with Nils Malmrose’s ‘Tree of knowledge’ and Truffaut’s ‘L'Argent de poche’). 9/10.

With the oh-so-Swedish recording of "Far, jag kan inte få upp min kokosnöt" played constantly on an old record player in the summerhouse.  

🍿            

Catherine Deneuve X 2 more:

🍿 My first by André Téchiné, My Favorite Season: 50-year-old Catherine Deneuve and her estranged brother Daniel Auteuil renew their tumultuous relationship when their mother’s health decline. Frankly, it was a meandering, meaningless and boring film. 2/10.

🍿 So once again, watching the absolutely wonderful The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. Is Jacques Demy’s technicolor sung-through uber-romantic musical with the ethereal Catherine Deneuve one of my most favorite movies ever? Yes. “Is this the saddest happy ending in all of movies, or the happiest sad ending?“ Yes. "Why does it always rain when we say goodbye?"

The trailer is great too.

🍿  

“Why don’t you go to bed, honey. I’ll bag the Nazi and straighten up around here”...

Paul Bartel’s weird, politically-incorrect, black comedy Eating Raul. About a bald, asexual, middle-aged wine snob and his voluptuous nurse wife who kill swingers in their seedy Los Angeles apartment building. Bizarre John Waters esthetics, odd exploration of sex, murder and cannibalism during the excessive “Lifestyle” of 1982. First re-watch in 40 years.

🍿  

2 with Harry Dean Stanton and 2 with actor David Lynch:

🍿 Spielberg’s newest, autobiographical The Fabelmans, his personal ‘Cinema Paradiso’. Cloyingly disappointing. The segments of movie making and even more so the scenes of movie-watching were lovely, but everything else around them, the family dynamics, the dichotomy between art and domesticity, the mother’s longing for life fulfilled, the young Jew in a gentile world, was unremarkable. Lynch cameo as John Ford. 3/10.

🍿 “...Ungatz!!...”

Harry Dean Stanton’s 206th acting credit and his very last film, Lucky, which was also one of the few (two?) in which he leads. The directing debut of ‘Norm Gunderson’, aka John Carroll Lynch. A slow, quiet and magnificent tale of a 90-year-old man looking back (and 'not’ dying by the end credits!). Shot around the poverty-stricken, God-forsaken, unincorporated tiny hamlets in the high-desert I used to hang around 12 years ago: Phelan, Twenty Nine Palms, Pearblossom, Joshua tree. I could also see myself being that reflecting, lonely old man in a couple of years, shuffling around to the local dive bar and the corner mini-mart for milk, and then back home to the cave. (Photo Above).

A few excellent characters pop up in this sparse drama, besides David Lynch: Ron Livingston, Barry Shabaka Henley, Ed Begley Jr. and a powerful reunion with Alien’s Tom Skerritt. The unexpected climax slayed!

10/10 - Best film of the week!

Extra! Extra! Harry Dean sings Canción Mixteca from ‘Paris, Texas’.

🍿 On the other side of time, Harry Dean Stanton’s first no-credit role was in Hitchcock’s The wrong man. Repeating his central theme of ‘a man wrongly accused of a crime he didn’t commit’, this was untypical for Hitchcock, because he played it here (or at least the first half of it) in a subdued, sober and haunting style, nearly like a modern Kafkaesque documentary.

Toward the end, though, the focus shifts into ‘blaming’ the wife and turning it into a misogynistic tale of the poor, weak woman who can’t handle stress, suffers a mental breakdown, and hurry, we must commit her to ‘an institution’, for her own sake. Henry Fonda was perfectly-cast as the straight-arrow, honest Catholic Everyman.

🍿 

When I studied film at the University of Copenhagen in the late 70′s, I picked Michael Cacoyannis’ classic masterpiece Iphigenia as the topic of my final paper. Iphigenia is one of the original Greek tragedies by Euripides, and the film is still as magnificent as it was 45 years ago. With unforgettable score by Mikis Theodorakis. 10/10.

🍿   Alejandro Iñárritu’s new epic Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths, his first film to be filmed fully in Mexico since 2000. A surreal, “Magic realist” exploration of a writer in a crisis of identity, a-la ‘8 1/2′. The first half had no clear vision I could see, but at the exact midpoint the story-telling turned the genuine wizardry fireworks on: When he had his talk with his father at the baño, and shrunk to a child size with a big head, in the long tracking shot walking the empty De Chirico streets, the piles of dead Spencer Tunick people, the tiny baby crawling back to the sea like a turtle... The visuals turned phantasmagoric, and the story opened up. 7/10.   

🍿  

Brendan Gleeson X 3, two by Martin McDonagh:

🍿 The Banshees of Inisherin, Martin McDonagh’s latest dark and unforgiving drama about the end of friendship in rural Ireland 1923. Was it a metaphor for the Irish Civil War? Or a metaphysical fairy tale about fairy women and myths?

🍿 "Oh Jesus. What a fuckin' day!" ...

Six shooter was McDonagh’s debut short, and it won him the 2006 Oscars for Live Action Short, Gleeson is a widower on a train who loses his faith in God. A train is passing through the beautiful Irish landscape, while inside death and mayhem ensue. 7/10.

I saw Martin McDonagh’s three earlier films once before (’In Bruges’, ‘Seven Psychopaths’, ‘Three billboards’), so I’ll mark to revisit them again in the future.

🍿 Re-litigating Dubya and the Neocons Iraqi wet-dream in Green Zone. Everybody forgot about this colossal clusterfuck, and moved on (except of the million dead Iraqis). So, it’s not a relevant film any more. A noisy, testosterone-laden, macho war film of the action type. I only watched it because Paul Greengrass’s Bourne trilogy is one of the only action movies I love. But his shaky-cam, quick-cut style that was effective in ‘Bourne’ is now so hectic and dizzy, choppy & headache-producing, that it’s impossible to handle.

🍿  

“It’s called the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it” X 4:          

🍿 I was Finally able to see Judd Apatow’s new 4-hour biography of George Carlin’s American Dream. Carlin was an American Saint and my legendary hero, but I didn’t know that much about his personal life, especially about his moving 30-years love and marriage to his wife Brenda. There was never a deeper philosopher who could analyze America better than Carlin’s cynical - and nihilist - insights. 9/10.

🍿 So I dug up the very first episode of Saturday Night Live from October 11, 1975, hosted by Carlin, with two separate musical guests, Billy Preston and the shy, young Janis Ian. There were some classic early SNL shows, but this one was long before they discovered the formula. 🍿 “...I do that all the time. It’s the third stage of syphilis!...:

His 1992 Jammin' in New York, possibly his best HBO special, and his favorite show. Classic encapsulation and delivery, packaged in thin, black-dressed rage machine.

“... There is nothing wrong with the planet. The planet is fine ... been here 4 1/2 billion years. We've been here, what, a 100,000 years, maybe 200,000. And we've only been engaged in heavy industry a little over 200 years. 200 years versus 4 1/2 billion. And we have the conceit to think that somehow we're a threat? The planet isn't going away. We are!...”

🍿 And one last, short screed, Dumb Americans, from his latest Angry Old Man‘s period and final show ‘Life Is Worth Losing’.

🍿  

Also, re-watching the complete Marital Ali Wong Odyssey, for the second time this year:

I guess you can call me a fan. What started as some sweet, light-headed Re-watching Divertimentos, in between weightier fair, ended up with a complete followup of everything I saw her in before: Her three Netflix standup specials Baby Cobra, Hard Knock Wife and Wong Don Wong were all explicitly-dirty, graphically-nasty, and absolutely hilarious. She was heavily pregnant during the first and second one, and all were non-stop, extreme filthy descriptions of her wild sexual life and imagination. 9/10.

She had married the son of successful wacky inventor Ken Hakuta (“Doctor Fad”), and used her husband, marriage and motherhood as a central theme of her edgy routine. So in hindsight, I am saddened to read on her updated Wikipedia bio, that they are now divorced.

Her performance is very physical, but here is the complete transcript of her last Wing Don Wong show.

🍿 I even re-watched the first film she wrote and directed, Always Be My Maybe, an Asian ‘When Sally Met Harry’, which was nearly as good.

Bonus: A 25-min. Fresh Air interview from the same year as ‘Baby Cobra’.

🍿  

The imposters, the 2nd farce directed by Stanley Tucci’s after ‘Big Night’. A 30′s style screwball comedy, in the vein of Laurel and Hardy, but without any of their wit and humor. Two out-of-work actors hide as stowaways on an ocean liner, in the vain of ‘A night at the opera’ but without a single funny scene resembling that. A large ensemble cast of otherwise fine character actors couldn’t salvage this. 1/10.

🍿  

6 Shorts:

🍿 The tailor, an old 6-minute comedy film by Gordon Grinberg. A black & white, nearly-silent telling of a famous Jewish Joke. (Via)

🍿 Re-watching Paperman, another 6-minute short, which won the 2012 Best Animated Short for Disney. A romantic meeting via paper airplanes in a 40′s setting.

🍿 A Short Introduction To The Disturbing Paintings of Hieronymus Bosch: Did he suffer from LSD-like hallucinations of St. Anthony’s fire? Was he simply insane?

How come Terry Gilliam never attempted to create a Bosch movie?

🍿 My 4th by British director Jonathan Glazer (before he branched out into features with ‘Sexy beast’ and others) How Jamiroquai Shot Their Iconic ‘Virtual Insanity’ Video.

🍿 The Simpsons Meet the Bocellis in ‘Feliz Navidad’ 2022 - Extreme Late-Stage-Capitalistic, boring-distopian cross-merchandising from Disney++++

🍿 And.... I’m looking forward to see Greta Gerwig’s new Barbie!

🍿    

(My complete movie list is here)

[dweemeister]

NOTE: Because moviegoing carries risks at this time, please remember to follow health and safety guidelines as outlined by your local, regional, and national health officials. This review contains significant spoilers.

Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022)

As with many business and industries worldwide, movie theaters have struggled in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Theaters that do not play the mainstream superhero or action/adventure movies have suffered most of all. Select commentators, noting unruly behavior from individuals, increasing ticket and concession prices, the inconvenience of having to go see a movie, and touting their at-home television setups might celebrate the potential death of the theatrical experience. I do not understand that celebratory mood and criticisms towards practices not entirely in a theater’s control, and firmly believe that not everyone has a state-of-the-art television and sound system at home.

To the relief of North American arthouse theaters this last spring came Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert’s (collectively, “The Daniels”) Everything Everywhere All At Once – a genre-bender of stark originality, forcing its way into American cinematic history through its sheer absurdity and offbeat depiction of a modern Chinese-American family. Just as multiverses/parallel universes are forming a small trend in Hollywood, EEAAO torches any cinematic rulebooks to present a dizzying tale of intergenerational trauma, daughter-mother bonds, the what-ifs of life, and how one responds to confusing, terrifying times.

Entertainment your whole family can enjoy!

In Simi Valley, California, Evelyn Wang (Michelle Yeoh) runs a laundry with her husband, Waymond (Ke Huy Quan). The Wangs, who live in the residence attached to the laundromat, are under audit from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and things look grim. Compounding their difficulties are Waymond’s attempts to hand Evelyn his divorce notice; daughter Joy’s (Stephanie Hsu) efforts to have her mother accept her girlfriend, Becky (Tallie Medel); and the recent arrival of Joy’s sickly father, Gong Gong (“grandfather” in Cantonese; the veteran James Hong), from China. Just before their scheduled appointment with IRS Agent Deirdre Beaubeirdra (Jamie Lee Curtis, having the time of her life), Waymond’s body is taken over by “Alpha Waymond”, from the “Alpha Universe/Alphaverse”. In the Alphaverse, people have the ability to jump between different parallel universes. He comes to (presumably) our universe to warn Evelyn that the multiverse – the entire collection of parallel universes – is under threat. Evelyn will have to be the one to save all of existence.

Elsewhere, Jenny Slate has a memorable few minutes as a dog mom, Harry Shum Jr. is a memorable chef, and an uncredited Randy Newman lends his voice in an unusual cameo. Andy and Brian Le of the YouTube channel Martial Club appear as two memorable fellows who get their asses kicked.

With a film as structurally messy (by design) as EEAAO, heavy exposition and/or rewatches might be necessary to fully grasp all that the Daniels are attempting. In his collaboration with the Daniels, editor Paul Rogers (2019’s The Death of Dick Long) has a task unenviable: to tie together the film’s numerous parallel universes into a coherent whole. In addition to that, Rogers needs to ensure that his editing flourishes do not overpower the emotional scenes that serve as the movie’s thematic and humanistic lynchpins. From a purely technical standpoint, Rogers’ propulsive editing is enthralling work, suitable for a martial arts picture (a genre that EEAAO pulls heavily from). But when the most heartfelt moments arrive, that same editing makes it difficult to separate EEAAO’s absurd humor from the unspoken marital strife between the Wang parents and the nihilistic depression that is consuming their daughter. Perhaps modern viewers – including yours truly – have been too conditioned to expect a Marvel-esque quip to interrupt moments of reflection and sadness. Too often I was unable to reign in my expectations of such a comedic interruption, inadvertently pulling myself out of the movie’s best emotional statements. In part, Rogers’ editing and the Daniels’ story structure are at fault here.

Yet whatever concerns I have about the above pale in comparison to the film’s kinetic thrills, wonderful performances (dramatic, comedic, and martial), and thematic ambition.

To differentiate some of their parallel universes, the Daniels take inspiration from the likes of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Ratatouille (2007), and Wong Kar-wai’s movies (most notably 2000’s In the Mood for Love) to support the ideas pertaining to that universe. These are not throwaway moments solely to allow film buffs to point forward in a darkened theater, exclaiming their recognition of that reference. For the Wong-influenced universe, that universe’s Evelyn and Waymond are suffused with the loneliness that Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung’s characters must have felt during In the Mood for Love. The long-held and forbidden romantic feelings, moody lighting, and minimal body movement are all reminiscent of Wong’s work, and serve as a striking contrast to the zanier universes that Evelyn jumps between.

Those zanier universes are a riot of craftwork. Take Jobu Tupaki’s universe with the “everything bagel”, for example. The batty costume design from Shirley Kurata (2006’s Alpha Dog) is at its most audacious here, as she crafts all-white cultist robes to emphasize the unnaturalness of this Jobu-led world. Those outlandish costumes draw inspiration from Eiko Ishioka’s work on Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992). And this is just one universe. Kurata’s eye-popping designs – especially whenever Stephanie Hsu is on-screen as Jobu Tupaki (Kurata is on record saying Jobu enjoys wearing things that Evelyn would disapprove of) – range from Western dress attire, wuxia garments, casualwear, and more. The extravagant colors, the thrillingly incongruent attire, and some clever color-coding (see: what Jamie Lee Curtis and Michelle Yeoh are wearing in the hot dog universe and the prime universe) allow Kurata’s work to be as impactful as any other body of costume design work in a film for quite some time.

Being well-dressed is one thing, so an actor best deliver a performance that honors all the stupendous work behind the camera. As Evelyn, Michelle Yeoh steps into a role unrecognizable to all her roles preceding this. Michelle Yeoh the Hong Kong cinema-based action star is a known commodity, and some of the iconography of her early career is apparent in this movie. But what about her comedic timing? And can she play a working-class Asian-American mother, harried by a financial audit, stretched thin by her family and business’ disparate needs? Yeoh answers those questions with a resounding performance, in an American movie that recognizes her versatility and makes full use of it. Her ability to physically react to an unsavory idea or unwanted news carries across her body, face, and posture. I am unsure if it is a career-best performance (I have not seen much from her earlier career, only clips). Yet, as Evelyn, this is a hallmark turn for the Malaysian actress, bound to reshape her legacy – without constraining her – among Western audiences.

Opposite Yeoh in one of his first acting roles in a Hollywood movie in thirty years is Ke Huy Quan. Best known as Short Round from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) and Data from The Goonies (1985), Quan quit acting in his early adulthood when he realized roles for actors of Asian descent in Hollywood were few. Going back and forth between Asia and America, he found work in film production, mostly as an action choreographer on films such as X-Men (2000) and Wong Kar-wai’s 2046 (2004). Inspired by Crazy Rich Asians (2018), Quan decided to see if there might be, in these changing times, a chance to act in Hollywood again. Quan’s Waymond is the moral center of EEAAO and, like Yeoh, Quan’s performance rings with echoes of his career. The comedic timing that endeared him to ‘80s children (and afterward) remains; his adult turn as an action choreographer presents itself in a visually stunning fight sequence early on. Ultimately, as Quan (in all of the universes) reminds Yeoh and the audience, kindness is never for naught. Quan is tremendous here, sealing a successful comeback.

As Joy, Stephanie Hsu – more than any other actor and role in EEAAO – needs to be evaluated in relation to others. This is not a criticism of Hsu’s sterling performance, but an acknowledgement that Joy’s characterization is highly dependent on two separate, but highly related factors: the relationship with her mother and the duality of being Asian-American. The former is the result of intergenerational trauma due to harmful lessons passing from her grandfather to her mother; the latter might not seem to be of much concern in EEAAO, but it is present from the opening seconds to the film’s end. Though some might take issue with how structurally fractured EEAAO is, it reflects the split identities of a hyphenated existence. As someone of Chinese descent, Joy’s grasp of Chinese language and culture is imperfect (as yours truly relates to, as a Vietnamese-American), and her queerness is antithetical to her mother’s traditional mindset. As an American-born and American-raised child of first-generation immigrants, there are suggestions that she feels like a perpetual foreigner in her home country – rejected for her sexual orientation, otherized for her heritage. She cannot center herself or connect with her family in a world of distraction and discord.

Jobu, in reaction to her otherness and the constant violence in the multiverse, creates a means that can destroy all existence. This is the result of Jobu’s depressive nihilism; analogous to this is Joy’s depression, her suicidal ideations (she commits suicide in the rock universe, interestingly the only universe we see without organic life). So what does it matter, Jobu and Joy both posit, if everything comes to a violent end? If you have read this far and have seen the film, you know that EEAAO does not condone that mindset. The Daniels – through Waymond and eventually Evelyn – argue that only through genuinely connecting with others can conflict end. “I’m tired. I don’t want to hurt anymore,” says Joy to her mother in a despairing moment. “And for some reason when I’m with you, it just hurts the both of us… Just let me go!” Evelyn, in spite of all the lifelong disappointments in her daughter, could easily acquiesce to Joy’s request. But she doesn’t. No matter how short or long a time they have together, she will be there – in that universe and all the others. Life, however banal and disappointing, is valuable.

At a time when arthouse and independent cinemas are still struggling two-and-a-half years into a pandemic, with older audiences more likely to stay away from cinemas, Everything Everywhere All At Once proved a much-needed shot in the arm. The film’s thrilling originality, word-of-mouth, and expertly-targeted marketing from studio A24 earned it a longevity now rarely seen for a film of its budget. Even on this write-up’s publication, the film continues to enjoy a healthy theatrical run that began in the spring. And despite its heavily Asian-American cast, EEAAO mostly sidestepped the discourse of being a “novelty” or a representational phenomenon that Crazy Rich Asians faced not too long ago. Contemporary discourse aside, Everything Everywhere All At Once is a milestone in that all-too-modest, but growing, tradition of an Asian-American film canon.

The 2020s, for American cinema and the world at-large, have been disorienting and disorderly. Beneath the adrenaline of Everything Everywhere All At Once lie quieter moments that attempt to make sense of the film’s confusion, frantic editing, and anarchic genre-bending. Amid all this film has to offer, this is a family drama at its center. In those moments especially does it truly reflect its title, set to a tempo of alternating travails and triumphs resonant and familiar.

My rating: 8.5/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating. Half-points are always rounded down. My interpretation of that ratings system can be found in the “Ratings system” page on my blog (as of July 1, 2020, tumblr is not permitting certain posts with links to appear on tag pages, so I cannot provide the URL).

For more of my reviews tagged “My Movie Odyssey”, check out the tag of the same name on my blog.

[padfootastic]

Okay so you already know I loved the thing you wrote but your tags?????? Yes please give us more granddad Sirius and James Sirius content??????????? I'm so ready for it.

i genuinely wrote out an entire answer for this in my mind and apparently never put it in actual words :) brb while i put on the dunce cap and hang my head in shame

anywaaaaaaay if ur still into granddad siri and james sirius (aka jem/jemmy/jim when he’s older) content may i interest u in some stupid lil ramblings:

- sirius’ title is papa. harry mixed up grandpa sirius and padfoot one time to say ‘grandpa padfoot’ and jemmy latched hard onto the ‘pa pa’ part of that. so papa he is, and all his grandkids call him that.

- harry and ginny were super young and super unprepared for our lil jimbo. so he spent a lot of time around sirius, lots of sleepovers and babysitting and hasty drop offs. this gave him an appreciation for hanging out with old people (not that sirius doesn’t dangle him upside down when he hears that term because ‘who’re you calling old, huh? you think i could swing u around like a fish if i was old?) because they have the best stories and the most patience and they put up with all his questions and antics and always spoil him.

- james sirius is sirius’ favorite grandchild. he tries to hide it, never treats anyone noticeably different, loves them all more than the universe itself but jemmy. that boy completely stole his heart the moment he opened his eyes and james—his jamie’s—eyes looked up at him. the others, when they realise what it means that their papa tears up sometimes when jem does something, learn to not say anything and hug him a bit tighter that day.

- of course, sirius knows this isn’t an exact copy of his dead best friend. jem is more somber, not as arrogant, doesn’t think he’s god’s gift to humanity. his temper is more cutting, aimed to hurt. sirius knows what that’s like and that’s another reason why those get along so well. james sirius gets angry at his family and goes straight to his papa for refuge. sirius is always there with warm hugs and kisses and cake and hot chocolate.

- ok another headcanon i have!! purebloods get music training and sirius learnt how to play the piano (and if harry had grown up with him, he would’ve learnt an instrument too and that’s always a sore point). he convinces harry to let jem get similar coaching so every weekend, granddad & grandson sit down together to learn how to play the piano. jemmy’s kind of terrible at it, but he wouldn’t trade this time for anything. as he grows up, this turns into gossip sessions where they bitch about everyone together. this is where jim asks for relationship advice and ‘how do you know they’re the one, papa?’ and sirius telling him about his jamie, and the kind of friendship that was so strong that death couldn’t sever it. sirius tells him that his name doesn’t have to define him, that it’s okay (and encouraged) to step beyond the boundaries of what you were assigned at birth. (because he knows a little something about family names and being the oldest and crippling pressure and struggling with your identity- who you should be vs who you are)

- harry tells his godfather that his oldest’s tendency for dramatisation comes from these sessions and ‘did you really need to describe my dad as ‘burning brighter than the sun’, siri? now i can’t take that little demon into muggle london because somehow his not-so-accidental magic has him lighting up like a goddamn christmas tree all the time’

- james sirius (now jim, because he’s grown and wants to be taken seriously and jemmy is a kids name except when his papa calls him that bc he has special privileges) is the one most conscious of the weight his name holds, the legacy he comes from. it makes him all that more driven to carve his own niche in the wixen world. but, at the same time, sirius can see the ghosts of his loved ones in this kid. the same mother hen protectiveness that jamie had, the mischievously sparkling hazel eyes, the bone deep devotion to his loved ones. it hurts but also, he wouldn’t trade it for anything.

*coughs* sorry miss imp this became much longer than i anticipated and i don’t think i realised how much i love papa sirius and little jemmy but uh. yeah. the floodgates hath opened and it took everything in me to close them right back up.

(the thing i wrote- crackish au where sirius delivers harry and james sirius, two decades apart)

[violetlilysunshine]

Talking Over

Harry Holland x Reader

Summary: Harry keeps getting interrupted, but your focus is always on him.

WC: 911

Warnings: none

MASTERLIST

little blurb for @harryhollandsgirlfriend 

A/N: Would like to preface this with - we don’t really know anything about their relationship and this could be the complete opposite of what life is truly like. THIS IS FICTION! I love Harry and Tom and only want to see the best for both of them! No Tom hate here!

You were hanging out after finishing work for the day with Tom, Jacob, Harrison, and Harry, as you usually did. You liked when they were in town to film and you liked hanging out with all of them. It was simple, occasionally other Spider-Man cast members would join you, like Tony or Angourie, but tonight it was just you and the four boys.

You were sat on opposite ends of one couch with Harry, Tom and Harrison on the other, and Jacob perched in the chair opposite the boys, in a sort of U shape. Harrison had come into town to visit Tom in-between his own filming schedule, and you were happy to see him. He was telling you all about The Irregulars and all of the behind the scenes stuff, fueling your already immense obsession with the show.

Watching you so engrossed in Harrison’s stories made Harry want to tell his own, just to get the smallest bit of your attention. He had the biggest crush on you; he’d gotten pretty good at hiding it, but would still do anything to get your attention. He started telling a story from set about his cameo in No Way Home.

“And they rigged me up, so I was swinging back and forth upside down, right, and I could feel all the blood rushing - “

Tom cuts him off, “and of course, I was dragging this thing out as long as I could, ya know? Torture my brother. So we get to filming the scene and I’m messing up every line I can, just dragging it out and making him suffer. Anyway, the other day Jacob and I were out sightseeing and...”

Tom was always talking over Harry, cutting him off mid-story and taking over like he was now, or just changing the subject completely, pulling the attention to himself. You don’t know if Tom realized that he was doing it or not, but you always felt bad for Harry. Harry would shrink down in his seat a bit and get really quiet and avoid talking for a bit, if not the rest of the night. You knew Harry always felt “less than” Tom and it broke your heart, he was the main event in your eyes.

You stopped looking at Tom, determined to let Harry tell his story, and turned sideways on the couch to face Harry completely.

“You were saying?” you said, catching his attention.

“What?” he asked quickly. Clearly Tom had finished the story and was telling a new one.

“You were saying?” you repeated yourself, “finish your story, I’m listening.”

Harry shook his head for a second, processing everything. He was used to Tom taking over, he always did. The look on your face was absolutely priceless - eyes squinting a little bit, lips pursed, determination set across your features. You were so focused on him as he continued to tell his story. He swooned, seeing all of your attention on him.

“Right, well, uh, I could feel the blood rushing to my head and it was torture but ya, know, worth it. It was pretty fun once it was over...”

Tom stopped talking, watching the two of you on the couch; you were totally engrossed with each other, laughing occasionally, even scooting a little bit closer together.

Harry finished his story, a wide smile gracing his features to have your attention on him. You smiled back just as widely, seeing how happy he was. You had quite the crush on him as well, wanting to give him all the attention in the world too. Now, you felt even better because he was at least getting yours.

Tom noticed something was up, but didn’t want to meddle, instead choosing just to let the two of you be in your own world. He continued telling Harrison about sightseeing, but watching you guys out of the corner of his eye.

You sighed deeply when Harry was done, “want to get some air?” you asked him gently.

“Uh, yeah, sure,” he answered, standing slowly and following you out onto the deck.

You took a deep breath, stretching you back a little before settling into one of the chairs at the small table. Harry watched you before following suit and taking the seat opposite you.

“Sorry, I just had to get out of there,” you said with a short laugh.

“Uh, can I ask why?”

“I hate when Tom talks over you,” you said with a huff, not beating around the bush at all.

“Oh,” he chuckled lightly, “well, uh, I’m used to it.”

“Well, you shouldn’t be. I’d rather hear the story from you anyway,” you stated, giggling just a little bit to keep the mood light.

“Well, that’s the way it’s always been, but uh, I’ll keep that in mind,” he chuckled, “I like telling you stories,” he said, gaining a little confidence.

“I like hearing them,” you answered, placing your elbows on the table and leaning towards him.

“Good,” he answered, letting out a heavy breath and mirroring your actions.

There was a pause between the two of you, the crickets chirping loudly in the background.

“Can I tell you a secret?” you whispered.

“Always,” he answered, dropping his voice low.

“You’re my favorite Holland,” you giggled.

“Really?” he laughed, his cheeks blushing pink.

“Yeah, Red,” you giggled, “don’t tell Tessa.”

He laughed loudly at that, his heart bursting in his chest now. Maybe he did have a shot, he thought to himself.

[wmitomlinson]

FIC RECS- JAN 2021

if it’s not too late, happy 2021 everyone! i know the year hasn’t started out great but let’s keep our fingers crossed, and in case it doesn’t, i’ll be here to rec amazing fics to you! shoutout to all the authors of this fandom for being amazing <3

many of the fics mentioned below may have triggering topics. TW // DRUGS, ADDICTION, DRUG MENTION, ALCOHOL AS A COPING MECHANISM, ACCIDENTS, AMNESIA

never be by cherrystreet @cherrystreet (117k, study abroad au, strangers to friends to lovers, angst, pining, happy ending) this was the first ones i’ve read of this type and it was amazing. i loved the long distance dynamic. 

like a bastard on the burning sea by vashtaneradas (22k, infedility) i have no idea why i ever thought that reading h cheating on l would ever do me any good, but here it is. beautifully written. this had me ugly crying and howling the first time i read it. can confirm i hated irl harry for a while after this. 

we’re not who we used to be by louistomlinsons @adoredontour (30k, sharing a bed, accidental cuddling, exes to lovers, road trip) i absolutely loved the ziam and shiall content, coupled with stupid louis. road trip AUs are very cool and if you like them as much as i do you should read this.

search and rescue me by wild halos (17k, alternate universe - high school, confinement?) this was one of the very few stuck together ones i’ve found and i ADORE it. super exciting. their chemistry is amazing. the things that can happen in a day ,,,, *chef’s kiss*

candles on air by isthatyoularry @isthatyoularry (29k, friends to lovers, unrequited love, angst, pining) i read this during physics and i honestly had to work so hard not to let my self-restraint break because i was exhausted by the end of this. the angst is top-tier. 10/10 would recommend.

but me, i’m not a gamble by orphan_account (33k, football player louis, famous harry, popstar harry, footie au, niall is friends with all the footballers) a lovely posh&becks au featuring a cameo from none other than david and victoria beckham. i love the slow build and how louis leads harry on but can’t live without him either. oh and niall is a smug bastard but what’s new. 

spin me like a record by zarah5 @zarah5 (8k, alternate universe- college/university, friends to lovers, fake/pretend relationship, happy ending) let me start by saying that this author is my absolute favourite and that everything she writes is GOLD. so much captured in just 8k. loved it.

counting the steps between us by zarah5 @zarah5 (24k, friends to lovers, pining, so much pining, also camping) this fic is a gem. i absolutely love the dynamic between them and how easily they fall into step with each other. louis is kinda a dick to harry but they end up happy, so, who cares. 

say that you can see me (i’ll speak up i swear) by coffeelouis (20k, college au, liberal arts college, photographer harry, soccer/football player louis tomlinson) harry is an oblivious idiot and louis is the fool pining over him. zayn is not bothered, except for when he is. wonderful fic. 

larry heartbreak by coinmaisy (47k, cheating harry, angst with a happy ending, it gets worse before it gets better, infedility, heartbroken louis tomlinson, implied/referenced drug use, alcohol) when i first read the summary i was like “what is 47k going to do to me?” huge mistake i promise. this was so exhausting to read and it literally felt like my partner had cheated on me. you really feel for the characters. kind of unconventional with the way they deal with it but beautiful nevertheless.

joke’s on our parents by larrycaring @mystupidamours (alternate universe- high school, louis has a twin named carla, coming out, sort of, closeted character) short and sweet, an extremely adorable read. i wish it didn’t end here! i’d kill for parents like that no joke

life at shutter speed by zarah5 @zarah5 (20k, alternate universe- fashion & models, harry is very forward, louis is charmed even though he wishes he weren’t) photographer!louis au featuring stunning locations and even more stunning models.

oh glory by alivingfire (21k, alternate universe-olympics, 2016 summer olympics, gymnastics, mentions of past zouis, explicit sexual content, praise kink, slight mentions of homophobia typical in work environments) this was soooo good. i’m not particularly into sports fics unless it’s footie louis, but swimmer!harry was something i never knew i needed. wonderful setting and the ending *chef’s kiss*

hold my breath by zarah5 @zarah5 (19k, alternate universe- yoga, alternate universe- football, louis plays football and is a beast when injured, harry and louis ramble around london a lot) this is definitely one of my favourite fics for this month. yoga instructor!harry, football!louis AND angst? sign me up hjdhnjsk 

talk dirty to me by briamaria (13k, friends to lovers, dirty talk, mutual masturbation) uni au with best friends to lovers + dirty talk? this one was fireeeeeee. their chemistry is awesome

own the scars by crinkle-eyed-boo @crinkle-eyed-boo (144k, american au, drug addiction, drug overdose, larry is endgame, so don’t let the tomlinshaw scare you off, you’re gonna suffer, but you’ll be happy about it, lots of larry easter eggs) I AM BEGGING YOU TO READ THIS FIC, but more importantly, please please, READ THE TAGS. this had me ugly crying like crazy. this was very triggering for me but istg i don’t regret it. slow burn and angst and fluff and the jealousy,,, make this a must-read. even the memory of this fic gets me overwhelmed. incredible. ft. zouiall friendship that will most definitely make your heart melt.

no one does it better by nodibs (49k, alcohol abuse, alternate universe) amnesia fic with ot5 friendship, sloooooooooooow burn and a shit ton of tears. 

teenage dreams in a teenage circus by orphan_account (50k, first time, coming of age, alternate universe- high school) gemma/perrie/louis friendship that i never knew i needed. louis falls in love with harry, which, awkwarddd. but this fic gave me major coming of age movie vibes and now i’m angry that i don’t have a childhood like this

play the odds by alivingfire @alivingfire (25k, friends to lovers, bets&wagers, alternate universe- college & university) a bet where they have to kiss 1000 times. maybe it ends up being more than that. i loved the concept and how well it carried throughout the fic.

those are all for this month ! i hope you enjoy them, and if you do, make sure you leave kudos and comments. stay safe, sending love! x

[mumufic]

Some additional notes on characterization

For The Three Sisters, I’m trying to write a coming of age story with a lot of rather abnormal elements (hello, time travel and first Wizarding War!) and since I want to write the characters I have here growing into who we eventually come to know of them when they’re older, I guess you can expect:

Some of them start out rather ignorant. Sirius and Regulus (when he does appear for longer than a cameo, he’s a little shit, and not a particularly likable one) come to mind here, because of their family background. The thing is, despite the fact that Sirius is obviously progressive and inclusive, he wouldn’t really know how to frame a lot of things in ways that wouldn’t be offensive unless someone taught him how to. Kids learn by example, and the only example of words and reasoning he has are his parents and other relatives, and all of them are bigots. I’ve already covered his use of the word “mudblood” in my previous post. There’ll come times when he sounds a little like Malfoy: a little elitist, a little braggadocious, especially when it comes to his family’s privilege. And the thing is, in some ways, this is perfectly understandable too. The Black brothers in this story have had very little socialization with other children, and when they do, it’s also to other extremely privileged, magical kids. So expect some level of schooling (ok, a lot levels of schooling) for Sirius. I expect James would suffer from this as well, probably even worse than Sirius, in some respects. James has been brought up in a tolerant and loving home, but he’s an only child whose parents doted on him so much, he’s become a little arrogant. I want to be able to show them growing from their arrogance and ignorance organically, because I don’t think they come out of the box being the wonderful, loving people Harry knew in the books.

Some of them can be very mean-spirited. Petunia, Holly, James and Sirius all fall in this category. We already know about Petunia because of her actual characterization in canon, and I don’t want to do away with that. I’m writing a Petunia Evans redemption arc, yes, but I don’t want to do a personality transplant with her, so yes, she can have a mean streak, even once she’s shown to start becoming an actual likable person. Holly doesn’t have a mean streak - that isn’t how Harry Potter is characterized in the books, but when it comes to anyone associated with the Death Eaters, her hatred knows no bounds. Remember that as far as she’s concerned, Snape killed Dumbledore without remorse, Lucius Malfoy tried to curse her when she was in second year, and Bellatrix Lestrange killed her aunt and uncle, however much she disliked them, right in front of her. Her anger, the meanness, it comes from a pretty damn deep well of pain, no matter whether she chooses to dwell on it or not. On top of that, she’s still a Horcrux here, and that Horcrux? Actively corrupting her. James and Sirius played canonically mean-spirited pranks on people, that James only stopped doing when he started to mature right around seventh year, and there’s little indication that Sirius actually stopped being rather mean at all. All that dumping on Peter? Canon provides evidence. Just check Snape’s Worst Memory and The Prince’s Tale, not to mention how Sirius displays an astounding lack of remorse over the fifth year prank he played on Snape that nearly resulted in Snape’s death. And you know what, I like writing that. I don’t expect 11- and 12-year-old kids to be little angels. They’d be hella boring to write if they were. 

Some of them can be rather fickle. I’ve got upcoming chapters where Holly and Sirius are like this, Holly mostly pertaining to what she wants to do about the war, and Sirius about manners, decorum and respect. Let’s unpack this. Holly is a 17-year-old trapped in an 11-year-old’s body. Her last memory from her timeline is waiting to start her quest to hunt Horcruxes, a quest Dumbledore entrusted her, in order to end the war. She gets transported back in time, trapped in a much younger body, and treated by everyone as if she was in fact eleven, even by the people who know she’s older. Suddenly, it’s like she’s a little kid again, and people expect her to act like a kid. Nobody wants her to be all grown up, and all the company she keeps are young kids. Yes, she should know better than to engage in childish arguments and fights, but she’s so immersed in being a kid again that her maturity starts stagnating, and at times, even regressing, because she’s suddenly have to reason with kids, which means she constantly has to put herself in a kid’s mindset in order to understand where they’re coming from. Doing shit like that everyday, with no rest to be what you truly are? It’s a mindfuck. Before long, you start forgetting that you’re something else and not what you’re pretending to be. That’s what’s happening to her here. There are occasions when she’s forgotten that she’s older, she’s more mature. She starts acting like the children that she has in constant company. She’d feel bad about being petty in hindsight, but not while it’s going on. And I think that’s valid. As for Sirius, I’ve got some bits of exposition sprinkled in about how his upbringing was like besides the blood supremacy rhetoric, and believing that the Blacks are owed the world. Sirius learned manners, decorum and respect from Andromeda (it’s in Chapter 7: The End of Summer) and by all accounts, Andromeda was a rather strict teacher. So we can expect Sirius to be mostly formal, even a little stiff, have impeccable manners, and the perfect polite gentleman in normal conversation. So why does he try to high-five Remus when Remus fell over Holly? Well, he’s still eleven, and he’s seen James applaud bad behavior, and probably thinks it must be fine then because James thinks it’s fine. He’ll applaud it especially if he thinks it’s either retaliatory or mean to Slytherins, because he obviously hates them.

Some of them can’t seem to make up their minds as to whether they like someone. So this will crop up a lot in second year, primarily on Holly and Sirius, and to a certain extent, Remus. Holly basically thinks the boys are all gross. She’s 17, they’re 11. Kids are gross.  Remus is a kid with a crush, who responds to said crush in a pretty healthy way: he engages with them, talks to them more, looks out for them, but absolutely will not say anything or do anything about his crush. Why? Well, the easy answer is that he’s a werewolf, and Remus has been fed all his growing up years about how lycanthropy is contagious (Lyall Lupin was extremely prejudiced against werewolves, until his own son was bitten, so there’s every likelihood that Remus would have internalized a lot of his father’s rhetoric, especially after he was bitten, leading him to decide that he must not be allowed to procreate. As a child, that’s equivalent to not being allowed to even have crushes or have their crushes like them back.) Sirius is a bit strange to write. He doesn’t actually have a crush, but his parents have made a proposal on his behalf, one he hates. He doesn’t want it, but at the same time, it consumes him to find that the person his parents have intended for him doesn’t appear to want him, when they should! He’s the Heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black! They should be privileged that the Blacks even want them for him. But at the same time, he’s utterly repulsed by the idea of having to marry someone, be with someone he might not even care for. Man, that’s hell of a lot of spoilers, but all of it’ll make sense when second year comes around.

And, I think that’s all the meta I can come up with for this fic for now. I’m sure I’ll be back, wanking on here again some time later to talk about other aspects of my fic.

My dilemma now: I feel like I had so much happen in second year that I’ve nothing to write bout in third year. So you know what you’re going to get for third year? Puberty.

Yes, that means zits and periods.

[shlabam]

TOP TEN COMICS BOOK VILLAINS WE PROBABLY WON’T SEE IN THE MOVIES

Superhero media is the hottest thing going right now. It was true ten years ago when the MCU was in its adolescence, and it’s even truer now. Even with film production on lockdown, Marvel and DC are still planning on literally dozens of their characters entering their respective cinematic universes. However, for the fans of the source material, things can be contentious. For every memorable Tony Stark quip, there’s Superman destroying an entire city because he’s, frankly, kind of dumb now. A major point of contention is how the various popular villains are utilized. Making an intimidating and potent villain in a comic book is very different than in a film. In comics, you have months to establish motive, powers, and backstory before the villain even makes their first move. In films, that all has to be compressed and spilled out in the scarce few minutes when Captain America and Bucky aren’t making bambi eyes at each other. To be concise, some villains adapt perfectly, and some, no matter how good they are in the comics, just don’t. And to be clear, this list is of popular villains who have the possibility of appearing in a big-budget film, so no, you won’t be seeing Ten Eyed Man or Big Wheel in there. Their powers are, respectively, having ten eyes, and being very good in business. (That’s a lie, he’s just a huge wheel who chases Spider-Man.)

10: Mr. Mxyzptlk:

Cool, let’s get this one out of the way. Despite being one of Superman’s oldest, longest-lasting, and most popular enemies from all the way back in the Golden Age, there’s no way in hell he will be in a movie. For the uninformed. Mr. Mxyzptlk is a 5th dimensional wizard-genie who appears every ninety days to torment Superman with his reality-altering antics, and can only be sent back to his home dimension if Superman tricks him into saying his own name backwards. Yes, it would be very dazzling, as Mr. Mxyzptlk’s powers in a movie would basically look like if Christopher Nolan directed Who Framed Roger Rabbit, but he’s a little too silly to fit in with the current “everything is gloomy and also a bummer” tone of the Superman films. This silly tone has lent itself perfectly to the Supergirl series, where he’s made a handful of appearances. Besides, if we get Mxyzptlk in a Superman movie before Brainiac, I’ll lose my entire freaking mind.

9: Hobgoblin:

There have been eight Spider-Man movies so far, and of those eight, four of them have, in some capacity, featured the Green Goblin. And that makes sense, right? The Green Goblin is easily Spider-Man’s most memorable and reoccurring nemesis, with Doctor Octopus and Venom close behind, and Peter Parker’s link with Norman and Harry Osbourn makes their tragic story perfect for film adaptation. On the other hand, we have the Hobgoblin, who is essentially Green Goblin with all the gimmicks, none of the Parker-adjacent backstory, and an orange and blue color scheme, likely tying him to the Denver Broncos [citation needed]. Still, in those four cinematic attempts at tackling the Goblin, none of them have quite gotten him right, and I can’t imagine this character, who is, even in canon, an intentional Green Goblin rip-off, would fare any better.

8: Starro:

Brave and the Bold #28 from 1960 featured the first story with the Justice League, and this story put them up against a very unique new villain: Starro the Conqueror, a giant telepathic starfish who can release tiny versions of himself. If these tiny starfish latch onto your head, you’re under his control and obey his commands. The Justice League have battled him fairly regularly over the last fifty years, and he’s a distinct and powerful enemy that the fans generally appreciate, leading to him being referenced occasionally in Smallville, Arrow, and Flash. Why won’t he ever be in a movie? Because if you’re a Hollywood producer, you stopped paying attention at “giant telepathic starfish”. Sorry. Maybe Shuma-Gorath will pop up in the next Doctor Strange movie, and he’ll set off a Twilight-esque wave of starfish monster movies! Then again, almost absolutely not.

7: Puppet Master:

Speaking of mind control, what’s scarier than that? For my money, nothing. Having your body and will taken away from you by an unseen force is a terror greater than death. How could you possibly make a villain based around such a chilling concept and have him not be scary? Well, maybe if it’s an old bald man in an apron playing with dolls. The Puppet Master is an ongoing threat for the Fantastic Four who is just that: he makes models of his foes out of radioactive clay, and makes them punch themselves and dance around and kiss each other, because he’s, y’know, a weird old man. Why is he such a consistent threat who hasn’t fallen into obscurity like other dumb gimmick-based villains? His stepdaughter, Alicia Masters, is the Thing’s longtime girlfriend. As long as she keeps appearing in movies (including being played by… Kerry Washington? That can’t be right), there’s always a chance he’ll pop up, but I don’t think any movie studio is that stupid, despite the quality of every Fantastic Four movie blatantly defying that prediction.

6: Bizarro:

Superman has always suffered in the villains department. When you’re essentially a god, what can they throw at you? As it turns out, Lex Luthor, almost always. But why not another Superman? Bizarro is essentially that, an imperfect clone of Superman who speaks in opposite speak - “Bizarro am good! Me not punch you until you live!” - and features the same abilities as the Man of Steel. Sounds great, right? Putting a hero against a villain with their same powers has worked for nearly every Marvel movie (shots fired). So why won’t we see him grace our silver screens any time soon? Because they’ve never really figured him out. Is he funny? Is he lethal? Does Kryptonite work on him? If he does everything the opposite of Superman, why does he wear clothes? Isn’t being naked the opposite of being clothed? Bizarro is a major Superman side-character and has made appearances in Smallville and Supergirl, but the idea of him being the Big Bad going toe-to-toe with Henry Cavill doesn’t sound like it would generate a lot of views.

5: Impossible Man:

You remember what I said about Mr. Mxyzptlk? Remember? So take that bit, but everywhere I say Superman, have it say Fantastic Four instead… yeah, that should do it.

4: The Wrecking Crew:

Thor has a unique quirk of having a very cinematic rogues gallery. Sure, most of the movies have pitted him against Loki, but if they were to run him up against the Enchantress, or the Absorbing Man, or Ulik the Troll, or Kurse, or even the Stone Men from Saturn, that’s not a bad movie! However, in one of the attempts to give Thor more of a mortal nemesis, they put him up against the Wrecker, who has an… enchanted… indestructible… crowbar. Yeah. Incredibly, the Wrecker and his Wrecking Crew have become very present characters throughout the Marvel Universe, essentially serving as “jobbers”, being rolled out to get beaten up by the new top hero or villain, but that may not work in a movie, where villains have to be seen as having some level of potency before being struck down. That means we’d need at least a short scene where it seems like Thor might lose to a guy whose power is “crowbar”, and that’s about as likely as an Edward Norton cameo in the next Avengers. Ho boy, they did NOT part on good terms!

3: Clayface:

When the movie-going public goes to see a Batman movie, they generally want something a bit more grounded than your typical superhero fare. After all, Batman has no powers, and therefore the most supernatural thing that should happen in these movies is a gas that makes you smile, or a different gas that makes you think your dead parents are back and disappointed in you. Might wanna put a mouth covering on that mask, Bruce! The one and only they’ve made a movie where Batman fights people with real, off-the-wall super powers (Batman and Robin), it did not go great. And those guys pale in comparison to Clayface, who is, yes, made of clay. In the comics and cartoons, Clayface looks awesome, turning his limbs into weapons and being very challenging to incapacitate, but in a live-action, realistic Batman adventure, we wouldn’t want to see the Dark Knight fight a poop-colored version of the T-1000, especially if it’s got the same chemical composition of a little dreidel that I made.

2: Red Hood:

A relative newcomer to the Batman universe, Red Hood is the revived body of Jason Todd, the second Robin, who was brutally killed by the Joker in one of the most controversial storylines DC Comics ever produced. Literally, fans called a 900 number to tell the writers to kill him off. A 900 number. That’s how much they hated the little turd. Anyway, Jason Todd, whom Batman and the rest of the world believed was dead, was revived by Ra’s al Ghul and became a ruthless villain. Since then, he’s gravitated more to the side of the hero, though one a bit more willing to spill blood than his mentors. Why won’t we see him in the darker, edgier Batman films? Because… that’s Bucky. It’s the same thing that happened in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Teen sidekick killed in controversial manner, revived by super villain to be a thorn in said hero’s side, later changes his mind and becomes a good guy again, though with enough PTSD to fill a PTSD super store. The two storylines even occurred in the comics in the same year, 2005, to much fanfare and across-the-board declarations of one company ripping off the other, reminding the world of the great Aquaman-Namor debates of the 1940s. Considering that DC’s films have criminally underperformed compared to Marvel’s, the last thing they want to do is be accused of lazy plagiarism, so Jason Todd will likely remain a permanent fixture in the afterlife, hanging out with Batman’s parents and, at the rate that people are coming back from the dead, literally no one else. (Plus, if they can’t even get Robin right, how are they gonna do this?)

1: Mister Sinister:

Yes, he was teased at the end of X-Men Apocalypse, but ignoring that the film underperformed both critically and commercially, Mister Sinister is never going to be in a movie. It would make sense for him to appear, though, right? He’s one of the most present and potent X-Men villains, he’s played crucial roles in many memorable storylines, he’s got a sick cape, but… something a lot of comic book fans tend to overlook is his murky backstory, powers, and motivations. He was a biologist in Victorian London who did genetic experiments on homeless people in the hopes of finding clues about the oncoming threat of mutants. In this time, he unearthed the long-dormant En Sabah Nur, whom you plebeians may know as Apocalypse, and Apocalypse gifted him with great abilities. What abilities you ask? HA HA, good question! At various times, Sinister has displayed: telepathy, telekinesis, energy projection, shape-shifting, regeneration, and teleportation, but these powers will mysteriously disappear whenever they want him to get sliced up real good by Wolverine. Additionally, it has never been made very clear what Sinister wants. Does he seek perfect mastery of the human genome? Does he live to torment Cyclops? Is he a blind follower of Apocalypse? Is he just running through all the different kinds of goatee? Of course, in adaptation, the writers would pick and choose the aspects they’d want to use, but I doubt they’d want to untangle the Christmas lights mess that is Mister Sinister, especially when they’ve got a perfectly good villain whose power is just “magnets”.

[clairecrive]

“Let’s stay home”| Quarantine AU

As promised here chapter 5. I’ve made it long to apologize about posting it late. Again, I’m sorry. However, I hope you enjoy it. As always if you have any ideas or things you’d like to see happen, let me know! Next chapter, someone will make a cameo, who do you think will be?

Tag list: @deaflikehawkeye, @mollybegger-blog, @of-love-and-of-the-sea, @br0ck-eddie, @fandom--0verdose, @evelynshelby, @shadow-of-wonder, @innerpaperexpertcloud, @sopxhiea, @fuseburner (let me know if you wanna be added)

If you lost a chapter: Masterpost

Chapter 5 - “Concert”

"Oh my god, yes, yes, yes!" Her loud scream of enthusiasm was heard throughout the house alarming its guests.

"What? What's going on?!" Tommy ran out of his room out of concern regarding her screech, thinking the worst.

"What the bloody hell is going on here?" Came Alfie's annoyed grunt as he got up from the chair he was sitting on with the help of his cane. Being cooped up in the house all day wasn't helping his sciatica at all.

But Emma didn't grace either of them with an answer. Instead, she simply jumped off her bed while calling her friend on Facetime, completely clueless of the worried men that were standing outside her room waiting to know what was going on.

Squirming on her feet, failing at staying still, Emma sported a huge smile on her face while she waited for her friend to connect. Half expecting to see Bane's face popping up on the screen, Alfie thought about leaving, not wanting to repeat the other day's situation but contrary to his expectation, a female face appeared on the screen. Adjusting his position against the door so that he was more comfortable, he now was genuinely curious. It was the first time that Emma talked with a female friend. He had even begun to think that she didn't have any.

"Jen, have you heard?" She excitedly asked her friend that seemed none the wiser.

"Emma, it's literally 8 am here. You're lucky I even answered you."

"Well then, I'm about to make your day ten times better. Check the message I've sent you on Telegram."

"Can't you just tell me?" Jen's tired voice complained

"That's not fun, I'm building the suspense." Emma firmly explained waiting for Jen to do as she said.

"What do you think is going on?" Tommy asked Alfie.

"I've no idea mate. No idea." Alfie simply said, scrolling his shoulders while not removing his eyes from Emma's form.

After a couple of seconds of silence, which saw Emma grinning like a fool and Tommy and Alfie simply standing there like some clueless bodyguards, Jen's squeal brought Emma's smile only to widen while Tommy and Alfie were startled, the former losing his balance while the latter lost his grip on his cane. What the hell...

"Thank all the gods in Olympus, they've blessed us!" Jen's face reappeared on the screen now mirroring Emma's expression.

"I'm so happy Jen, you've got no idea. I really thought they were just going to refund us."

"I told you, you had to be positive about this! You never listen to me, you pessimistic bitch." Jen sassed making Alfie's eyebrows shot up and Tommy's lips to pout.

"Can you, for the love of God, tell us what's going on?" Alfie's voice prevented Emma to respond, making her finally aware of their presence in her room.

"Oh, hello boys." She simply greeted him not understanding their worried stance. When they gave her an allusive look she finally explained with a big smile.

"Harry's concert got rescheduled."

"And that's what got ya screamin like a fucking banshee?" Alfie grumbled

"Other concerts have been simply cancelled and the tickets refunded. This way we still get to see him." Now fully facing them, she elaborated.

"Fucking hell." Alfie simply muttered under his breath leaving the room. She turned to Tommy but her confusion only grew.

"Next time I hear you screaming, you better be dying." He said before leaving as well.

As confused as ever, her face resembled the question mark which made Jen laugh.

"Ugh, men," Emma joked.

"While we're on the subject, how's the living together thing going?" Jen noisily asked wiggling her eyebrows making Emma know that she was here for the tea.

"It's going well actually. So far, at least. They've been surprisingly helpful so I'm not complaining."

"You're stuck with three handsome, mouth-watering men and that's all you're going to tell me?"

"I know they're attractive Jen but nothing is going to happen. We're friends."

"If I were you, I'd walk naked all the time and hide their clothes so that they'd also have to be naked all the time. You'll see how something will happen then." Jen shared her absurd plan topping it with a suggestive wink.

"You're missing Nik, eh?" Emma affirmed more than asked knowing very well that being away from her boyfriend was really taking its toll on Jennifer.

"You've no idea. This is going to be pretty tough, not going to lie. There's only so much we can do on video chat and of course, it's not like the real thing." Her friend complained, making it very clear why she was missing her boyfriend so much. If there was something that Jennifer wasn't, it's certainly being smooth. She's the kind of person that's very upfront about things, whatever they are.

"I can imagine." Was Emma's attempt at being sympathetic. Her relationship with sex was really different, however, she could understand Jen's problem. If she had a boyfriend whom she loved as much as Jen loved Nick, maybe she'd miss the connection that comes with sex too.

"I'm here, terribly horny and suffering for this quarantine and you're standing there surrounded by dicks and you won't take advantage of it!" Jennifer loudly complained, getting cruder and cruder and Emma couldn't help but scrunch her face in horror at her friend's choice of words.

"My god Jen, get a grip on yourself girl," Emma jokingly reprimanded her, " You should have come here when I invited you then."

"Unfortunately for me, I'm awfully loyal and Nick's dick is the only one that I want. But I know that you'd have been delighted by my presence, you don't have to pretend."

"Oh damn, you got me. My life is empty without you." Emma indulged her. It wasn't completely false, she did miss the girl a lot.

"I know, I know. Listen, babe, I've gotta go, Nick's calling me. I'll talk to you later and please, think about what I've told you, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, bye Jen." Emma willingly ignored her last statement and ended the call with a nostalgic smile.

Emma was fully aware of how unconventional most of her relationships were. She never really thought about them that way, it was always people's reaction to them that made her realize how strange to an outsider might look. But to be fair, however unorthodox her relationships may seem, they were all based on mutual respect and honesty. When people asked her if it was true that she and Tommy were just friends, Emma would always be puzzled by their astonishment. Yes, they had been together. So what? Some people work better as friends. And yes, Emma wasn't blind, Tommy was sexy af but while she could admit it without shame she would also be lying if she said that she thought of being with him. Been there, done that. It didn't work so she moved on. As did he, there was an understanding between them.

Alfie was a totally different thing.

They had started off as friends but both of them felt that there was more. That there could be more. And in fact, there was. They tried it out and it was working just fine until her job cut in and ruined everything. She had to leave. And neither of them were too sure of a long-distance relationship. Alfie respected her decision, he knew how important her job was for her, how ambitious she was. But breaking up was inevitable. And so they did.

However, since there really was mutual respect and affection between them, they kept in touch. Sure, it wasn't the same thing and both of them had had different partners in the meantime, but they always found their way back to each other.

So, when it came to them, friends was a reductive word but it was better than to explain their whole relationship to some stranger every time. They would better fit under the heading "it's complicated" but a global pandemic wasn't the right time to deal with this situation and finally label their relationship. Emma knew that that was why she was ignoring Alfie's jealous remarks and Jenn's proposal. Things were already difficult, neither of them needed them to be even more complicated.

Days went on like this then: Tommy and Alfie that would bicker from time to time, always because Alfie would provoke him in some way; Eddie would jump in and either fuel their discussion or would spend his time tormenting Emma. He was surprisingly helpful though. He would go out and go shopping for necessities claiming that it was impossible for him to get infected, he would help her clean up and take care of the house. As long as he lent a hand as he was doing, Emma wouldn't complain about him pestering her. Emma and Bane would still video call every other day to keep in touch but he was unexpectedly evasive when it came to his whereabouts.

Everything was going fine. Emma knew that she was one of those who had it good, that's why she couldn't find it in herself to complain about this whole situation. However, if she could speak freely, she'd have to admit that her mood was progressively getting worse. She tried to keep a routine to keep her busy but the truth was that she was finding it harder and harder to get out of bed and do things, with each passing day.

She still tried though. Because she had taken a commitment with the other guys and had chores to do, but also because of her job. And most importantly she didn't want anyone to know that she was feeling so blue. Emma was one of those people that prefer to deal with their problems by themselves and shy away from any kind of attention when they're going through something.

Up until this day, end of week two in lockdown, she had pulled it through. For whatever reason though, this day had hit her harder than any other. Maybe it was because of the article she was supposed to write. It was about self-love, how important it is and what are the different ways one could take care of themself quarantine edition. The topic wasn't weird perse, Emma wrote frequently about this kind of stuff, it was just that she felt like a scam writing it. How could she write about self-love and ways in which people could make themselves happy, especially in these difficult times, when she was the first one who was miserably failing in doing so?

Yes, it was definitely this the reason for her sulking.

She was lying on her bed facing the ceiling with her head dangling at the end of it trying to find a way around this article that she had to write. Caught up in her thoughts, she didn't realize that the door of her room was open and that anyone passing through could see.

"Em?" Tommy's voice anchored her to reality and made her eyes snap open. However, she remained in her weird position, not bothered to lift up nor to answering him.

"What are you doing?" He walked further into the room but didn't get too close to her.

"Thinking." Emma just mumbled, scooping a little further so that her head wasn't hanging anymore. Nodding, Tommy got close to her now, and lied down beside her but facing the other way.

The reason why Emma and Tommy had stayed friends after they had hooked up, was because before that night they had actually hung out a lot. Emma was writing a piece on the tournament he was taking part in, Sparta, and had heard about him and his brother. In order to actually write the article, Emma had to speak with both of them. She didn't expect to get along so well with both of them. Not that Tommy was that much of a talker when they first met. Only a few short answers here and there and the occasional joke. However, Emma knew a little of his backstory and had also the impression that there was more to him than met the eye. He was hurt. Emma had no doubt about that. And just like her, when he was hurt talking to people was the last thing she wanted.

After coming to that realisation, dealing with Tommy became easier. He gradually opened up to her, even if it was only a little, and they got along really well. In some way, they were alike. And once you've found a soul similar to yours you tend to keep it close.

With time Tommy had learnt to read Emma just like she did with him during their first time together and come to the understanding that when Emma closed off like this, she was hurting.

He didn't say anything. He just laid there, next to her. Held her hand letting her know that he was there for her but leaving her the time to open up if she wanted to that is.

"Right, what's goin on in here?" Alfie's voice startled them both but while Tommy rolled his eyes, a little annoyed by his interruption, Emma reluctantly smiled at his antics. Sometimes, she wondered why he was so amusing to her and then realized the warmth and comfort that he brought her along with his annoying ways.

Pushing her head so that she was looking at him upside down, she smiled when she saw him standing there with his hands on his hip like an angry lady.

"Could you please stop pouting and come here and cuddle with us?"

Everyone knew that Emma was an affectionate friend. But for her to be so outspoken about it and asking for affection? It was a red sign and Alfie recognized it. So stop pouting he did and made Tommy scoop so that he could lay on her other side, holding her hand.

Their sweet cuddling session would be short because Eddie would soon be coming back from the grocery store but they all enjoyed while it lasted. Sometimes, Emma realized, the best self-love tip was simply being surrounded by our loved ones.

[papermoonloveslucy]

DICK MARTIN

January 30, 1922

Dick Martin was born in Battle Creek Michigan as Thomas Richard Martin. He was best known for his role as the co-host of the sketch comedy program “Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In” from 1968 to 1973. The series won him a 1969 Emmy Award. 

His screen debut came as a background performer in the MGM film Father’s Little Dividend starring Spencer Tracy and Elizabeth Taylor.  He wouldn’t make another film until 1958. 

“I think the most fun I ever had was nightclubs. I loved nightclubs.” ~ Dick Martin

Martin and Dan Rowan formed a comedy team in 1952 and played in nightclubs throughout the United States and overseas. 

His first TV appearance came in November 1956 appearing as with Dan Rowan on “The Walter Winchell Show”.   

In February 1961, Lucille Ball appeared on “The Ed Sullivan Show” promoting Wildcat by doing songs from the show in character.  Rowan and Martin were on the show that evening, so it is possible that it is here that Lucille Ball first met the pair and cast them on her show. 

In Fall 1962, Dick Martin made his TV acting debut as Harry Connor, Lucy Carmichael’s next-door neighbor and sometimes boyfriend on “The Lucy Show.”  He made ten appearances on the series before his character was written out. His schedule touring with Dan Rowan was difficult for Desilu and Ball did not want her character to have a serious relationship. 

In “Lucy Digs Up a Date” (TLS S1;E2) first aired on October 8, 1962, it is established that Harry is an airline pilot and that he and Lucy have been dating, although their relationship is not serious. The character is referred to in the first act, but only enters during the episode’s final moments. This is the first of his ten appearances on the series - all in season one. He is mentioned but not seen in the series premiere “Lucy Waits Up for Chris“ (TLS S1;E1), where we meet his dog, Tiger.

In “Lucy is a Referee” (TLS S1;E3) aired  on October 15, 1962, Harry coaches Lucy in hand signals when she volunteers to referee her son’s football game. 

When “Lucy Misplaces $2,000″ (TLS S1;E4) on October 22, 1962, Harry tempts Lucy and Viv off their diets by bringing them fresh-baked donuts! 

When “Lucy Becomes an Astronaut” (TLS S1;E6) aired on November 5, 1962, Harry is around to quell Lucy’s nerves about going into a NASA test capsule. 

Episode #11 was originally intended to be a show titled “Lucy and Viv Fight Over Harry,” but it was shut down during rehearsal. The main reason is that it would have firmly established Lucy and Harry as having deep feelings for one another. Dick Martin was not available every week and Lucille Ball did not want her character to have a steady boyfriend. It had already been decided to phase out Harry, so this storyline would have been at cross-purposes with Lucille Ball’s long-range plans for the show and her character. This was the only episode of the series to be shut down while already in production.

Instead, episode #11 became “Lucy Builds a Rumpus Room” (TLS S1;E11) and aired on December 10, 1962. Harry was the intermediary in a serious argument between Lucy and Viv. 

At “Chris’s New Year’s Eve Party” (TLS S1;E14) on December 31, 1962, Harry took a role in Lucy’s silent movie sketch, portraying the waiter to Lucy’s Charlie Chaplin. 

When “Lucy’s Sister Pays a Visit” (TLS S1;E15) on January 7, 1963, Harry was in the wedding party, but does not have any lines in this episode. This is the second episode in a row that the actor hasn’t spoken. Martin was often away on the road with his comedy partner Dan Rowan during filming, so not having to memorize lines suited him fine.  

When “Lucy and Viv Put in a Shower” (TLS S1;E18) on  January 28, 1963, we learn that Harry’s favorite breakfast is Eggs Benedict. 

HARRY: “If you’re going to ask me to elope again, it’s a bad night for it. My ladder’s broken.” 

In “No More Double Dates” (TLS S1;E21) aired on February 18, 1963, it becomes apparent that the magic has gone out of their relationships when Lucy and Harry and Viv and Eddie can’t agree on where to go to dinner or what film to see! 

“Lucy and Viv Learn Judo” (TLS S1;E22) on February 25, 1963, was the final appearance of Dick Martin as Harry Connors. Lucy practices what she has learned on Harry!  Although Martin would not return to the series, his comedy partner Dan Rowan made two appearances in future episodes. 

Dan and Rowan returned to the nightclub circuit until 1966, when they were asked to host the summer replacement series for “The Dean Martin Show.”  They were groomed for the new show when they appeared on a February 1966 “Dean Martin Show” with Lucille Ball as guest.  Martin and Ball were also both part of Martin’s 1968 Christmas show, doing quick cameos announcing the distribution of toys to needy organizations. 

Despite the end to their acting together, Lucille Ball and Dick Martin appeared on many TV game shows, awards shows, specials, and variety shows together over the next 25 years. D

On Dinah Shore’s “Like Hep” (1969) Lucy and Martin recreate a robot version of the famous bench characters made famous on “Laugh-In” by Arte Johnson and Ruth Buzzi.  Meanwhile both Johnson and Buzzi were also guest stars on “Here’s Lucy,” which was programmed against the second half hour of “Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In”.  Lucy was now competing with her former ‘boyfriend’ for viewers! 

Later in the ‘hep’ show, Martin helped Lucy at the barre, in moments instantly reminiscent of “I Love Lucy.” 

Dick Martin was on the dais for “The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast: Lucille Ball” on February 7, 1975. 

Rowan and Martin played the Wright Brothers and Lucy voiced the Statue of Liberty in “Swing Out Sweet Land,” a November 1970 TV special celebrating American history.  

When Lucille Ball co-hosted “The Mike Douglas Show” in November 1978, Dick Martin was a guest on the final of her five days along with Bob Hope, Joe Namath, and Susan Anton.

In August 1980, Martin and Ball were panelists on “Password Plus.”  

The pair returned for “Password Plus: All-Celebrity Week” in March 1981. 

Martin and Ball were present at “All-Star Parties” for Carol Burnett (1982) and Clint Eastwood (1986). 

The second week in November 1988, Lucille Ball made her last game show appearance on “Super Password” before her passing in 1989. Dick Martin was also a panelist. 

Dick Martin got married to singer Peggy Connelly in 1957 and they had 2 sons before divorcing. In 1971 he married English actress and model Dolly Read. Although they divorced in 1975, they re-married in in 1978 and were together until his death.  

Martin died on May 24, 2008, age 86, of breathing complications. He had lost the use of a lung due to tuberculosis as a teenager and suffered respiratory problems late in life.

[readersguidetotheuniverse]

Beach Reads

When we reviewed Beach Read (by Emily Henry) we were highly disappointed by the little reading that was done at the beach, thus we thought to recommend our own favorites. Whether you read them at the beach, on a bus or sitting at your local coffee shop, we hope you enjoy them!

The Hating Game, by Sally Thorne

Alicia: Personally, one of the tropes I enjoy the most is 'enemies to lovers'. I find it so thrilling, I just can't get enough of it. If you're like me, this book may be for you. Sweet and sexy and perfect to take your mind off things. (Also, apparently there’s a movie adaptation in the making starring Lucy Hale and Robbie Amell, and I really hope it's not going to end up being cancelled because I’m really excited about it now)

Tweet Cute, by Emma Lord

Alicia: This one is more on the teen side, but it's still such a good option if you want something to read that won't make you use your brain too much. It's a really fresh and enjoyable story full of funny tweet wars and an 'enemies to friends to lovers' plot that is so cute and adorable. It's so light and quick to read and if you give it a chance, it may surprise you.

Did I Mention I Love You, by Estelle Maskame 

Alicia: This one is somewhat controversial. The main characters are step siblings (no blood relation whatsoever), and some people don't feel comfortable with that, so it's definitely not for everyone. If that's not a problem for you, you may enjoy this series a lot. It's so quick to read and almost addictive. There are three books and a 4th one with a different point of view, so you have a bunch of books to binge-read if you want something light.

 The rithmatist, by Brandon Sanderson

Ariadna: If you are a fantasy reader, you sure have heard the name Sanderson at least once. He is one of the masters of the genre, known for his prolific, intertwined worlds and complex magic systems (they make such sense that sometimes you wonder how come they are not real). He usually writes long, rich books, but this one in particular, being directed to a younger audience, is supereasy, superfun to read. In a world where the chosen ones can invoke magic through chalk drawings, Joel, who knows everything that needs to be known about the Rithmatism but has no magic ability whatsoever, and Melody, a terrible Rithmatist student, to win a competition and solve some bigger mysteries. A must-read if you love a good fantasy novel with impeccable worldbuilding.

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine, by Gail Honeyman

Ariadna: Eleanor Oliphant follows the same exact routine everyday, the same sandwich for lunch, the same cup with the same tea, the same phone call from her mother ever Wednesday... She is so organised and thorough it is borderline sociopathic. But her life will turn upside down the moment she meets Raymond, her work colleague, an unapologetic opposite to her.

This novel is a ray of hope for those who feel weird and mildly left behind in society. I bought it without much expectations, and it surprised me how much you could empathise with such an eccentric character who, in the end, suffers as any of us do. It is full of delicate moments, daydreaming, kindness, pain and unconditional love — a fuzzy and heart-warming novel of self-discovery and overcoming of the past traumas which will leave you feeling optimistic and, somehow, sheltered.

If Only It Were True 1 and 2, by Marc Levy 

Ariadna: Lauren is a pretty and successful medical resident working in the Emergency Room of San Francisco Memorial Hospital who suffers a car accident. Arthur, a single, thirty-something architect rents a flat in San Francisco to the family of a girl who is in a coma... And starts seeing her! You may have guessed right, the ghost is none other than Lauren, and together they will go to unimaginable lengths to help Lauren go back to life.

This plot may ring a bell to some. Yes, the movie «Just like Heaven», starring Reese Witherspoon and Mark Ruffalo, is based on the first book of this series, so I won’t spoil you the sequel. If you don’t feel like reading a book of a movie you have already seen, I recommend you to read any other book by Marc Levy —a French romance writer whose short novels are full of light-hearted, optimistic relationships and wondrous journeys (both literally and figuratively) to self-discovery. I personally enjoyed The first day and The first night as well as The strange journey of Mr. Daldry.

The Martian, by Andy Weir

Marina: If there’s something I enjoy doing at the beach more than escaping the scorching heat, it’s reading. The Martian is one of those books I could read a hundred times. It has science facts explained for us lesser humans that know nothing about space; whitty and dry humour that makes you put your book down because you’re laughing so hard; and a trip to Mars, what’s there not to like? This astronaut’s diary is the perfect companion for a day of reading at the beach.

If you think this reminds you of something that’s because there’s a movie adaptation starring Matt Damon, Sebastian Stan, Kate Mara and Jessica Chastain (it even has a little cameo but I’m not going to spoil who it is) that’s also very entertaining. Though, folks, this is another one for team “The book was better than the movie”.

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair, by Joël Dicker

Marina: If you’d prefer a mystery for the ages with flashbacks to the time of the crime, here’s a book for you. Dicker’s debut novel, The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair, takes place in New Hampshire when a novell author takes refuge after a (too) long writer’s block to seek inspiration and visit his old mentor. Who so happens to be the main suspect of an old murder case that took place in 1975. A well crafted and fast-paced thriller you can enjoy while tanning ;)

What’s even better, after the success of his first book, Dicker has published more thrillers that have been very well received among fans of the genre. 

Stars of Fortune (The Guardians Trilogy #1), by Nora Roberts

Marina: Now, I know what you’re thinking: Nora Roberts only writes romance books, wrong! He has a couple of amazing urban-fantasy sagas that are amazing. One of them is The Guardians trilogy. It takes place in the Mediterranean (this first book begins in Greece) and Ireland. Six people are brought together by the stars to Corfu to find and protect the stars of fortune from evil. 

I have to warn you though, this is a Nora Roberts book and there is romance involved. Each book revolves around one of the couples (what, you thought destiny brought together six adults and they wouldn’t end up dating each other?) and their roles in the group.

[anhed-nia]

THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS

When my concerned parents faced the early and unpleasant realization that they were raising a ravenous little horror hound, it meant that they had to somehow split the difference between their strict curbing of my potentially mid-warping viewing habits, and their principled encouragement of unfettered reading. That must be how I came into possession of a copy of Thomas Harris' harrowing police procedural The Silence of the Lambs at the tender age of 10, even as the film adaptation was being touted by many viewers as The Scariest Movie of All Time. I carried that book around like the Bible well into my teenage years, reading and re-reading it with even greater fervor after my parents finally decided that the film was sophisticated enough for me to watch without it turning me into some kind of animal-torturing arsonist. (Said screening was chaperoned and accompanied by an academic post-viewing family discussion, of course) The decision seemed to make sense; after all, THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS had swept the Oscars the year it was released, scooping up wins for Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Picture. This is not to say that my intellectual and art-appreciating family regarded the Academy as the ultimate arbiters of taste and achievement. I mention these accolades more to point out that, as my parents had surely noticed, the film holds a certain power over viewers on both sides of the high-low cultural divide, a spell that has hardly weakened in its twenty-seven years of life.

As a child, I certainly responded to the same things that piqued the general public: Anthony Hopkins' iconic performance as Hannibal "The Cannibal" Lecter, his ambiguous romance with purehearted FBI trainee Clarice Starling, and the controversial perversity of serial killer Buffalo Bill. Though the story shares the influence of real-life ghoul Ed Gein with classic shockers like PSYCHO and THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE, the impact of SILENCE is more akin to that of DRACULA. Much of the enduring discussion about the film revolves around the tantalizing chemistry between the preternaturally elegant Dr. Lecter and the virginal Starling; the rest is somewhat unfortunately focused on Ted Levine's eccentric performance as the (pseudo-) transsexual murderer at large, which has come under some understandable scrutiny. However, it would be unjust to reduce Jonathan Demme's movie to a gothic romance, or a gory shocker, or a campy cult item with ironic eroticism and a great soundtrack. There simply have to be better reasons for a movie to stick around this long, lingering in the minds of stuffy critics and the hoi polloi alike.

In preparing my statements about what makes THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS stand out, I learned something very shocking: It began its life as the directorial project of Gene Hackman. Hackman eventually dropped out when the script produced by (Oscar-winner) Ted Tally turned out to be too violent. Prospective Starlings like Michelle Pfeiffer and Meg Ryan were similarly disgusted, so Demme got stuck with a less likely candidate in (Oscar-winner) Jodie Foster. Personally, I find (Oscar-winner) Demme himself to be an unlikely candidate. The director cut his teeth on exploitation movies under Roger Corman, and by the time of SILENCE, had distinguished himself as a hipster extraordinaire, directing classic performance videos for the Talking Heads and Spaulding Gray, as well as chic comedies speckled with cameos from the likes of John Waters, and underground music firebrands from New York's new wave scene. Time would prove that Demme and his frequent collaborator, cinematographer Tak Fujimoto, were perfect choices for this grim project, which only supports the idea that there is something more happening with SILENCE OF THE LAMBS than its gruesome violence and epic sexual tension.

In light of these more famous elements, one might expect an adaptation of Thomas Harris' grim and seductive novel to be grandiose, expressionistic, swathed in a dense physical and emotional mist, rumbling with its own pomp and circumstance. An orphan from the hills of West Virginia, Clarice Starling is a tragic hero from the start, guarding her broken heart against a world of condescending and hostile men. Her mentor Jack Crawford seems to distinguish himself from the herd by assigning her the ambitious task of interviewing notorious serial killer Hannibal Lecter for the FBI's files--but in fact, Crawford is counting on Starling's feminine charms and naivety, secretly using her to manipulate Lecter into profiling a killer at large, Buffalo Bill. In spite of this nasty revelation, Starling sticks with it, suffering Lecter's high-minded insults and penetrative analysis of her character, and eventually earning his admiration. She proves herself not only brave and determined, but a detective of unparalleled wit and instinct, single-handedly taking down the polymorphously perverse Buffalo Bill in his moth-filled subterranean lair, rescuing a high-profile victim where the entire rest of the Federal Bureau of Investigation have failed.

This all seems to portend a bigger, louder movie than what has been committed to film. However, the book has a certain organic grit to it, something honest, downbeat and tragically real, which Demme and Fujimoto grasp instinctively. The film provides a dry, frank view of the life of Clarice Starling: the toil of academia, the drudgery of physical conditioning, the undermining attitudes of her mostly-male peers. Shot in West Virginia and Pennsylvania, Starling's world is bleak and desolate, but earnestly so, without the pageantry of the film noir and Universal horror movies with which it is so easily compared. Demme's education under B-movie king Corman shows here, and makes for a much more compelling iteration of the story than we might have from someone less accustomed to economy. While SILENCE has developed a reputation for its brutality, the film is not remotely so gore-drenched as many traumatized viewers would have you believe. That said, it may be the film's generally stark and desicated look, its workaday-ness, and its endless (wonderful) dialogic exchanges that throw into relief its comparatively minimal violence, which usually appears not in scenes of assault, but in crime scene photos or autopsy scenes.

The blanched, dreary look of the film also offsets the emotional plight of Clarice Starling. She is afforded no real romance, external or internal. The petite and clear-eyed orphan is visibly used to, and exhausted by, the constant need to look out for herself, and SILENCE will see her shuffled from one humiliating personal trial to the next. She is led into a perilous situation by a mentor who pretends to respect her abilities, but who really counts on her to fall short of discovering his scam; She is trapped in roomfuls of macho cops who scarcely acknowledge her; She has to negotiate the sexual attention of evidence technicians and bureaucrats; She even has semen flung at her by a particularly rambunctious neighbor of Lecter's. (And how often do you see that in any movie? As gross as it is, it has a way of reinforcing the extreme adult-ness of Demme's often dry, methodical movie) And then of course, there is Lecter himself, who turns Starling's personal vulnerability into a form of currency with which she can buy the scant clues that lead her to her quarry. Instead of eroticizing the anomalous femininity that Starling brings to the traditionally masculine world of law enforcement, Demme constantly reminds you of her fear, her embarrassment, her alienation. One can also imagine the temptation to Ripley-fy the character, presenting her as a fully-formed badass not to be fucked with. Instead, by eschewing both these femme and fatale modes, Demme describes Clarice Starling as three-dimensional human being whose heroism is extremely hard-won. While the character is undeniably one of the great Strong Female Protagonists, Jodie Foster's performance somehow defies the cinematic semiotics of gender altogether, giving us a person whose most important qualities are purely psychological. Tak Fujimoto drives the point home by frequently filling the screen with closeups of her face, focusing us on what she thinks and says, taking the proverbial heat off her body. Even as Lecter probes her for painful biographical information, Starling's sexuality remains entirely private--still a rare thing in any movie with a lady lead.

I don't mean to suggest that THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS is principally successful because of its plucky girl detective--that contributes to its greatness, but not in the feminist fashion that I seem to be angling for. I am reviewing this movie presently because I recently found myself looking back on my own history with it, comparing my feelings with those of popular audiences, and thinking, "What is The Silence of the Lambs really about?" It can't be so beloved *only* due to the sexy slow burn between Anthony Hopkins' Count Dracula and Jodie Foster's Mina Harker. It can't be *just* a matter of the exotic insanity of the gender-bending madman sewing together the flesh of his victims and dancing provocatively to "Goodbye Horses" by Q Lazzarus (a sadly mysterious musician who Demme certainly knew from his involvement in the New York underground). All of these characters, and their respective dynamics, contribute to the important thrill of this movie, but not in the way that most people seem to think.

Rather like the director's earlier work with iconoclastic punk icons and indie auteurs, THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS is about authenticity. Hannibal Lecter, the unparalleled genius whose culinary expertise is part of his murderous MO, is a serial killer because he has such refined taste and decorum that he cannot live peaceably among other people. He favors victims whom he perceives as tacky, pretentious and impertinent--Starling knows that he would never harm her because, as she famously remarks, "He would consider it rude." Lecter is fascinated, not by her youthful beauty as Crawford had hoped, but by her sincerity. Starling is brilliantly intelligent in her own right, as she proves through her police work, but she doesn't have an ironic bone in her body. She is the most unpretentious individual alive, and nothing could be more interesting to Lecter, who preys upon people who are untrue to others and to themselves. Meanwhile, we have Buffalo Bill, who is attempting to change his sex by crafting a full-body "woman suit"--but, as Lecter insists, the killer is not a "true transsexual" whose legitimate identity is that of the opposite sex. Buffalo Bill is someone who was reared by his abusive parents to hate himself so much, that he is compelled to escape his natural identity; becoming a woman is less important as a matter of self-actualization, than as a means of becoming an entirely different person, *any* different person. He has been so radically alienated from his own essence by this self-loathing, that he is incapable of authenticity of any kind.

That, I really think, is the secret power of THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS: the at-once satanic and profoundly innocent declaration, "to thine own self be true". I would really love to get into a deeper dive on this movie at some point, to discuss what I think must have been the very best and very last time that Anthony Hopkins gave us a fearless and unpredictable (and in this case, somewhat hilarious) performance; to insist that Ted Levine as Buffalo Bill and Brooke Smith as his would-be victim actually give the best performances in the whole movie; to talk about the problem of the Ubiquitous Daddy Figure (of whom there are no fewer than THREE in this movie) in so many narratives about powerful women; to simply analyze the movie's sly psychological techniques, like fully humanizing Brooke Smith *just* by showing her singing a few bars of a beloved pop song in closeup, immediately before her fate takes a disastrous turn. (I would probably not take such an opportunity to investigate accusations of homophobia and transphobia, which requires a smarter and more directly experienced voice than my own) There is really a lot to say about why SILENCE is so powerful, without even threatening to address its most famous features. Unfortunately, I don't have the gumption or the madness to commit all that to Letterboxd at the moment, so I'll have to be satisfied with my primary conclusion: That the film's simplicity and gritty naturalism mirror its commitment to spiritual purity, honesty, and self-knowledge at all costs. Even at the high cost of wearing a muzzle, any time they let you out of your cage.

[austenpoppy]

When fanfiction begins to be worrying

Warning : Ron-lovers, if you read this it is at your own peril. I am already suffering from long-lasting damage. Vivi, don't read. Really. Don't. Trust me.

We won't even talk about incest and other criminal and sickening fanfictions, which are mostly rejected by the fandom with the utmost disgust - fortunately.

No, no, what I'm going to talk about is admired by a - sadly - large part of the fandom. I was just looking for a cool fanfiction about Ron during my break when I found this, on the first page : "101 ways to kill Ron Weasley."

I know, I shouldn't have clicked on the link, but I couldn't help myself. I had to know.

This is the Author's note :

"This story is inspired by Crys' 1001 Deaths of Lord Voldemort on

For many of us, we hate one character in canon more than any other. No, not Lord Voldemort. I am, of course, talking about Ron Weasley.

Ron is lazy, stupid, annoying, and, in my opinion, mentally retarded.

Now, many in the fanfiction community hate Ginny much more than Ron; however, I find that to be more based upon their experiences with fanfiction than Ginny's actual roll in canon. Let's all be honest, outside of CoS and a cameo in OoTP, Ginny has very few lines and almost no involvement in the plot while Ron plays the role of a giant douchebag throughout the books.

This story, which I hope people will enjoy, is my way of killing off the dumbass in as many colorful ways as possible.

In case you can't tell, expect major Ron!Bashing."

...

I should have stopped as soon as I read this. I didn't, pushed by a morbid curiosity : I wanted to know how far people were ready to go. Useless to say that I bitterly regret it.

First, notice here that Voldemort and Ron are the only characters that I know of who have entire fanfics dedicated to kill them.

Voldemort and Ron are put on the same level. A teenager, the best friend of the hero and a hero himself, is compared to a psychopath and a murderer.

Moreover, I have to underline that the author judges Ron as "mentally retarded". I find it worrying. Just because a teenager have not the same grades as the best student in his year, just because he does not display the same way of thinking as his clever best friend does not mean he is stupid. Far from that.

That is a judgement on intelligence that I think is horrible. You have to know that intelligence, despite what tests such as IQ's claim, can not be really measured. It depends on so many factors. The results of IQ tests depend themselves on so many factors.

Furthermore, having real problems to understand things should be seen as a disability, a handicap and not an insult. It is a very difficult situation to deal with.

Also notice that the intellect is one the major criteria differencing the characters for those people. Intellect is practically above everything else.

I read the fanfiction, constituted of two chapters and multiple drabbles.

First reaction :

First one : Ron dies from eating too much. He chokes on his food.

Second one : In first year, wanting to prove a point to Hermione, Ron willingly mispronunces a spell and conjures a buffalo which crushes him

Third one : In Deathly Hallows, Ron takes the locket with him when he leaves. Harry and Hermione try to stop him and splinch him (he is split in two), but they don't recover the Horcrux. Last sentence : "Even in death, Ron Weasley found a way to be a pain in the ass."

Fourth one : Ron, charged by Harry to give Hedwig her treats, eats them in front of her. Hedwig, with the help of thousands other owls, avenges herself by attacking and killing Ron. Reminding of "The birds" by Hitchcock.

Fifth one : Ron, jealous, accuses Hermione of loving Harry and calls her "a Mudblood". She kills him. Harry and her hide Ron's body before they have sex. Petty remark about the length of Harry and Ron's manhoods. Note of the "author" explaining that it was a summary of another fic.

Sixth one : the Trio enters Bellatrix's vault. Ron is immediately fascinated by the amount of money and begins to steal it despite his friends' warnings. He burts into flames and jinxes his friends. Particularly petty sentence : "He never knew, or cared, that his greed had doomed them as well."

Seventh one : Ron speaks proudly about the unbreakable vow he made when he was five. Hermione asks him what it was about, he says he had sworn he would never say he wasn't a jobbernowl, he dies. Worst thing : use of a real passage of the book.

Eighth one : Ron dies on the chess set. His sacrifice is presented as stupid because it 'had to be another way.'

Nine : Harry uses Sectumsempra on Ron while he is sleeping. Ron dies. Harry transforms his corpse into a sock and burns it.

Last one : after Ron is made prefect, Hermione refuses to have him as a partner, jinxes him and kills him "for the greater good." Particularly nasty sentences : "Harry looked at the badge and fought the urge to go downstairs and ask McGonagall and Dumbledore if they were high when they selected the male Gryffindor prefect this year." / "'Sure', Ron said, completely shocked. 'I was positive you would get it, Harry.' 'You and the rest of the world,' Harry thought darkly." / "I can already see Ron not taking his duties seriously and flaunting the privileges that prefects normally deserve."

I won't comment all of them, but I really want to say something about some of them.

The first one uses a trope overused in Ron-bashing fanfiction : the fact that Ron eats a lot and sometimes speaks with his mouth full. Obviously, the author has forgotten what it is to be a teenager, and especially a thin teenager. Their metabolism needs food, and loads of food, because they are growing up and thin people tend to burn off energy more rapidly.

The fourth makes me sick. (Not that they don't all make me want to throw up.) First since it uses the overused trope I have already mentioned. Moreover for Ron would definitely do what Harry asks him to do, and for Ron is definitely not cruel. And thirdly because... THE BIRDS ! Does it ring a bell, a physical assault on Ron with birds ?

The fifth one. There is absolutely no universe where Ron, I'm-going-to-kill-Malefoy-with-my-bare-hands!Ron, would call Hermione a Mudblood. No. Way.

The sixth. Just because Ron said once something like "It would be nice to have galleons for a change", once "I hate being poor" (ONCE !!!), "Lucky you" (referring to Harry not noticing the difference on his amount of gold when the fake money disappeared), "Where's mine ?" (asking Bill where his money was because Bill has just given Harry a purse full of gold), that's it, Ron is greedy. Just because he doesn't want to be in need. Although he never complained that much.

These people hating Ron for he does not like to be poor are just self-righteous and have very probably never lived in the same situation. They have never been homeless, have received all the gifts for Christmas they wanted, have lived in a warm and comfortable house. It's easy to think about morals when your stomach is full, your health is perfect and well taken care of, and your basical material needs are fulfilled.

I remember a story my dance teacher told me : there was a poor woman in Africa who had lost a husband, a son and a leg in a war and still considered herself luckier than a French homeless person because she had a roof above her head.

I'm not saying that losting a loved one is less terrible. Nothing is more terrible.

Just that hating a fourteen-years old boy who never received another Christmas gift than a maroon jumper he hates but still puts on without really complaining because his mother made it, because he would like to have clothes that fit him or galleons he could spend to offer things to his friends is stupid. Really. And shows a lack of empathy.

Moreover, it's not as if Ron was not generous. All he has he shares it. His galleons, he mostly spends it on gifts for his friends. He gave his Christmas gifts to an house-elf. Ron has a really big, big heart and nothing is more important to him than his friends and family.

Eight. Just. How dares he / she ? That's what I hate with this fandom. Everything is twisted to correspond to the views of people.

Last. The prefect badge. My god the prefect badge. Maybe the most disgusting one, because Harry and Hermione are depicted as thinking the worst of him and somehow echo the 'No one in their right mind would make Ron a prefect'. The fact that Ron is often belittled by the fans who don't think he deserved the badge is reminiscent of the fact that Ron didn't either. Ron didn't think he deserved it. That makes me soooo angry.

Pansy Parkinson deserved her badge, but Ron ? Nooooo of course.

The question of worthiness in Ron-bashing is central. People operate a grading : some characters are better than others. The worst is to think that they do it in real life.

I am really naive. I thought that most readers would be inflamed by such display of stupidity. How wrong I was ! This story had 242 reviews, whose only 12 were critical. On the twelve crital ones, 4 were saying that Ron was just an ordinary teenager with no talent, but that it was a shame to dislike him for that.

The rest ?... At this point I don't know if I want to cry or burst into flames out of rage.

I have warned you before. I warn you again. Be aware of the violence of what will follow.

"More!

In order to get a good nights sleep, I need to read about Ron dying in horrendous and funny ways, due to his folly and vices."

At this point it looks like a caricature, doesn't it ? We can notice, however, that people vent out their frustrations and violence on fictional characters. It's up to you if it is good or not. I think it is sick to post it on the Internet, on a personal level.

"A note to a couple of Ron fanboys that posted. First, don' t like? Don' t read. You can tell it is a bashing story from the summary. Second; each person can interpret the canon events the way he wants. Personally, i see it like this: Ron betrayed and abandoned his supposed best friend when he needed help the most. Twice. And he never even apologised properly! It is not our best moments and actions that show us who we really are, but our worst ones. Because, usually, that is when one lets his true self show. Ron is not a bad person, but he is an idiot in canon."

It actually reflects a way of thinking. Ron is defined by the moment he felt betrayed and argued against his best friend - and he tried to apologize, though didn't make Harry apologize for hitting him - and the moment he left under mental torture - the first one who tells me Ron isn't strong-willed will have to run really fast from my anger, because Ron resisted possession and once rebelled against a thought mass murederer on a broken leg and they know nothing about torture -. For this kind of people, you can't have flaws. You can't be faulty. You have to be perfect. You can't ever be forgiven. This is unhealthy.

"*Insane laugh* I love this story! I've always hated Ron. *Sigh* If only he died in cannon, then my life would be complete!"

Once again I am amazed by the VIOLENCE of such a statement.

"I just love the first one where Ron dies while stuffing his face. I have often thought that he had either Bulima or a tapeworm. I have actually seen someone eat like him. It turned out that this person was Bulimic. How else does someone stuff himself and remain skinny?"

It displays a total lack of understanding of what eating disorders really are. Those are disorders which are really extremely difficult to deal with on a daily basis. They are mistaken here with bad eating manners.

"Are you in middle schoolers? Because that's how they teach you how to write in middle school. Also, Ron IS stupid. His grades show that. And Hermione is always caring and helping Harry, even when Ron is off sulking, jealous of Harry. And who cares if Ron came back after leaving? He still left! And getting his ass off of bed is not an excuse for Ron. He only goes along with Harry because he needs to! To keep being Harry's friend, that is. You're actually as mentally deficient as Ron is, and I hope you learn some proper fucking grammar."

Once again intelligence is confused with good grades. That's how you end up with teachers telling students who don't have good grades that they are too stupid to do anything of their life. Ron is here considered as an opportunist. As if he had chosen to be friends with Harry for fame -internal scream. As if being friends with Harry was easy. As if he had not commited his life to help his friends. Notice that once again someone is judges according to his so-called bad actions (to me, Ron leaving is not a mistake Ron did, as I said multiple times already).

"Oi weasel!, for the first and final time, there will never be an Hermione and you, so stop dreaming about her; she's way, out of your league, otherwise l will make you into an weasel patty..."

Love is seen as a question of worthiness.

"Can the Basilisk eat him? please please let the Basilisk eat him"

Once again the violence strucks me.

"ugh i hate him 2 he always runs away or gets jelous. The one thing he did was play stupid chess. Like geez. I love the owl 1".

Chess is considered stupid. CHESS IS CONSIDERED STUPID, BUT WRITING AN ENTIRE FANFIC TO KILL A FICTIONAL CHARACTER IS NOT. Those people are sickeningly judgemental and self-righteous.

"Thank you, I really needed a good laugh and nothing is more funny than Ron dying in horrific, nasty ways."

*throws up*

"Hilarious. Keep updating. I can't stand Ron. The flaws of Snape, Albus, Remus, Sirius and the rest makes them interesting characters. The flaws of Ron make him a putz."

Notice that Ron is the one character that apparently can't be forgiven for his flaws. Ever.

"Lol, Keep killing Ron, it's enjoyable. It's a good stress reliever to read these. :)

See ! Ron is nothing more than a punching ball to those people. I'm scared, really. Their immaturity is worrying.

"I agree with you about Ron he really is a good for nothing person in canon."

*sees red* That's what I'm fighting against in real life. People telling teenagers (and here one of the most admirable fictional teenagers I've ever seen) with a crippling lack of self-esteem that they are worthless. DON'T LISTEN TO THEM !

"this is so funny. i love the owl treats one. my favourite so far. anyone who dares say this is rubbish will face my anger, dont worry. just because it wont happen in canon dosent mean its not good."

Well, sorry to break it to you, but this is rubbish.

"Harry could have been the next Voldermort or Dumbledore if Ron hadn't infected him wi"

Ron and his friendship with Harry are seen as DISEASES.

"Weasley must die! Weasley must die!"

"I actually don't mind Ginny as a character, but Ron has always severely irritated me. The ending to Deathly Hallows was disappointing - how could JKR stick Hermione with a git like that? Ron's been nothing but awful to her since day one, and let's not even get started on how he's treated Harry...

Not really such a "loyal" sidekick, is he? When it all comes down to it, he's a selfish prat, thinking of nobody but himself. The PoA incident with Crookshanks, then GoF when he accused Harry of putting his name into the Goblet - there's been numerous occaisions in which that red haired git has allowed his jealously to get the better of him and abandoned his friends all because of his own petty insecurities.

Halfway through Deathly Hallows, I was ready to strangle him. I know the locket probably brought most of it on - but I don't see that as an excuse for him to throw a childish temper tantrum and blow up about Harry not knowing what he's doing. Okay, so you miss mummy's cooking, and living your life as a lazy sloth..

No reason to take it out on your two best friends. At least your parents are still alive, you ignorant MORON. I was rather pleased when Harry told him off, though. :)

All in all; Ron has always been an annoying, pain in the butt character to me. Utterly useless, really.

I can't wait to see what other creative ways you come up with to kill him.

*adds story to favorites*

Weasley is NOT my king."

So many things wrong.

Ron has been nothing other than awful to Hermione ? What about 'You're the most wonderful person I've ever met ?' 'She's been perfect, as usual.' ? What about getting detention several times (and one washing bedpans) for defending her ?

[beverlyr0ad]

crimes of grindelwald thoughts

alright obvious spoilers not that it matters bc i have one follower lmao but !! i need somewhere to scream abt this movie

first of all i love jacob and newt so much. best parts of this movie honestly i love them and i want them to be happy 

but to be fair i actually rlly rlly enjoyed watching this movie!! like,, there are a looot of things i dont understand about it and i have no idea how they happened or why theyre happening but thats Okay i would still recommend everyone watch it! its so good!!!

good things:

- grindelwald !! i mean,, no hes not a good thing but i really liked how they wrote his character. like i can UNDERSTAND the power he has over people and how hes manipulating them. hes really not just a Voldemort 2.0 and i respect that a lot bc thats not what an entirely different villain should be like. but casting issues and all aside i really liked this

- i also liked the interaction between leta lestrange and dumbledore that was some good stuff and the actors were rlly good too !!! - i like the direction queenie is going in. i mean i dont actually of course but it seems realistic and i think its important and its good character development n stuff so hhh hope that works out later tho !! i am Suspense

- jacob walked into that movie and i was like !!!!!!!!! :DDDDDDDDDDDDD i love him so much and it was rlly nice to see him back even if i dont think it was that neat to have him lose his memory of everything that happened for significance and in this movie have everything go like WHOOMP hes back but i uhhhh loved it anyway so this is not a complaint its a good thing - i still loved newt and having a good main character makes the whole movie a better watch in general. ive seen sequels where i just Cant get attatched to the new characters but wow i didnt really have much of a problem with that here

- it was also never boring and i really just loved n enjoyed this movie a lot!!!  okay hhh bad things/things that i personally disliked:

- ive seen different opinions on this but??? what was that blood pact????? what are u doing??????????????? i cant even be coherent properly so here are the main reasons that was rlly dumb

1- w-who does that in a romantic relationship ever :o and yes jkr has literally said dumbledore n grindelwald were in LOVE HELLO feel free to correct me if im wrong on anything but if ur gonna say it u should show it,,,, Continuity Please. anyway separate issue but if u love someone youre not gonna be like “hey lets make SURE we dont fight each other ever” because youll trust that the other person?? isnt gonna fight u???!!!???? im

2- thats literally not the reason he “cannot move against grindelwald” okay like it shouldnt be. this conversation literally happens in dh and dumbledore says he was scared of facing what rlly happened when ariana died!! there was no actual physical thing stopping him!!! the only acceptable justification is that he doesnt want to face this ghosts of his past and that moment and he is SCARED okay so COME ON give dumbledore his faults! hes scared of his past and that IS the reason!!

3- wait how did grindelwald, aberforth, and albus fight if they had already entered a blood pact. like i dont think albus would aim for his own brother EVER but could he even attack grindelwald if they had a blood pact?? not sure how this works lol but who was he aiming for then??? just firing everywhere randomly without intention cause that sounds,,, significantly harder to believe and makes that scene loads messier esp if grindelwald couldnt aim for albus either so

4- the blood pact was so frickin unnecessary im sobbing. like there was the scene where its all like “oh some say you were as close as brothers” and dumbledore is like “oh we were closer than brothers...” and im like OK! the little scene in the air doesnt explicitly reveal anything either so thats ok but the closer than brothers line was rlly revealing for me. at least for like two minutes and then dumbledore looked in the mirror and saw himself making a blood pact w grindelwald. like ok is That what u meant by closer than brothers bc thats what everythings pointing to but it shouldnt be and i.............ugh

5- im honestly just kind of hhhhhhhhhhhh. i can concede that the blood pact might be significant in later films and i look forward to watching them! but. at the same time i. wish that if you were going to say dumbledore was gay it would actually be explicitly referenced in the movie, instead of dancing around that and dropping it in hints and pieces that fans of the series who know this information will understand and others can just dismiss as friendship! there were So Many good places in this movie to include this fact (altho feel free to disagree w me haha) and i think that not including this fact was honestly tiring.

- nagini...........obv this isnt a huge problem bc idk where her story will go next n it might develop n become important but as of rn, i have no idea what her role in this movie is. i wonder if her reappearance in the harry potter series will actually be of significance and if itll be explained how she will end up under servitude to voldemort bc i genuinely dont understand right now. it just seems like a cameo to draw attention in the trailer ghgdjh

- leta lestrange’s death didnt feel right or impactful and im sad . definitely a huge opinion here but it felt like a mandatory character snuff to make the movie sad and ghdsjgfh oh well :(

- little continuity issues?? dumbledore being DADA professor instead of transfiguration bc Boggarts Are Important For Foreshadowing. also how is mcgonagall an adult or actually how is she even alive and um of course the fact that this movie doesnt confirm what jkr has said about dumbledore and grindelwald beforehand. 

- im actually going to totally repeat myself bc this deserves a separate point umm why arent dumbledore and grindelwald actually shown as in love with each other as young men. its completely relevant to the movie and its not hard to put it in there instead of the bLOOD PACT (ask anyone irl ive been screaming abt the blood pact ever since i came out of that movie). anyway i know david yates said he wouldnt be including that as part of the movie as fans are aware of that aNyway but its not that hard to understand. people are asking for actual representation?? not smt vague??? because this is just here to Please People. if u refuse to see this ship, ure just gonna see them as having a friendship! maybe u havent heard about what jkr said or maybe ure choosing to ignore it bc,, idk that says smt about u, or maybe another reason idk! but if u go into this knowing they were In Love and hoping to see confirmation of dumbledore being canonically gay, youre going to hear that “oh, we were more than brothers” line and be like oh yeah we been knew, or more seriously like hey! maybe we’re getting a canon confirmation, not just floaty young people leaning towards each other! like when he looked in the mirror i was like okay This Is It this is gna be confirmation but then it wasnt oop. it was the !!! bloooood paaact !!! which means that people could interpret the “closer than brothers” line as meaning oh we done did a blood pact that means we blood related look at us go! Wow! so this is basically just a half azzed attempt at pleasing people w stereotypical viewpoints and people happy to see representation. hmmmmmmmmmm.. (psst if u actually ship older dumbledore n grindelwald tho What Are You Doing Stop !! thats not a healthy relationship, grindelwald is an awful person and dumbledore deserves to grow from the person he was before!!! he deserves so much better!!! im not saying to ship them but im saying that if we’re gonna say they were in love as young men and if we are going to confirm that dumbledore is gay well,,, lets put that in canon pls!!!! we need canon representation but we dont need to pretend this ship is healthy or good bc its representation either. this isnt shipping this is asking to acknowledge that dumbledore was gay and in love with grindelwald and its confirmed that grindelwald was in love with him too. in the place the story of tcog is now, that relationship is not ever going to happen again and if u actually think it is ure suffering from some next-level delusion. just be definitive and acknowledge that your characters are LGBT tho pls!! u said they were!!! actually i would be so much happier to see a Happy And Healthy LGBT Pairing can we have that? please?)

- big spoiler but hOW IS CREDENCE ALBUS’ BROTHER WHAT IS HAPPENING DKFJDKSH i need to separate my thoughts again

1- AGE DIFFERENCE........apparently dumbledore is like 46 in this movie right?? credence doesnt look over 20. okay percival dumbledore is put in azkaban before albus starts school right?? so the maximum age albus can be is 11. now im gonna say that kendra was not having any more kids w anyone else after that incident fs so the oldest albus can be when ariana is born is 12, leaving room for some other stuff okay. ALBUS AND CREDENCE DONT LOOK LIKE THEY HAVE A 12 YEAR AGE GAP WHAT IS HAPPENINF

2- i saw people theorizing that credence is ariana’s son and NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO PLS NO

3- not an actual issue but i thought grindelwald said his name was berrylius dumbledore which i later remembered as berrylium dumbledore and anyway thank god for the internet

4- okay at this point i cant tell if this has just been brought in for shock value or smt like. is this relevant to the plot. is grindelwald even telling the truth. w-why did the movie end there. help....... i think thats it but i do want to say that i respect the rights of the creator jkr to do whatever she wants w these characters. its her world! but i can have a whole bunch of opinions n feelings about this movie and still support it. after all, i love harry potter and the whole wizarding world w my whole heart. 

did anyone even read that LOOOL that was so long sorry