#hate all the fucking bloat on this new version oh my god. have you people ever hired a ui designer. ever

[rockinhand]

my outdated version of the app stopped working :-(

[fae-fucker]

Zenith: Chapter 29-32

I realize leaving y’all hanging for a whole year like that in the snark, where our beloved heroes Andi and Dex had just been shot in their empty little heads, was very cruel of me. You guys must’ve been just DYING to know what happened.

Quick recap: Andi & Co are space pirates. They are captured by Andi’s ex Dex and the father of Andi’s childhood friend, whom she “murdered” by landing a ship bad. He asks her to get his son, who is in a dank dark prison. Andi does the thing with the help of Dex and her ragtag bunch of generic archetypes. 

We good?

Let’s go.

Chapter 29

We interrupt the 100% totally real threat of Andi and Dex being shot to death to have another boring-ass moment with Nor. She walks around in an underground lab feeling sorry for herself and thinking about how tragic her backstory is. We’re introduced to a two-headed scientist who could’ve been interesting in the hands of actually talented authors, but who doesn’t appear in the book after this point so she’s wasted. For some reason she’s also referred to as one person when the heads are clearly different individuals? Irl when there are two heads sharing one body the heads are different people with different names. You know, because the person is stored in the brain? Idk why Shinsay did this.

“Slowly, you dolt!” the right head screeched to the left. 

The left head huffed in annoyance. “I’m merely trying to give our queen a glimpse of her new toy.” 

“It’s a wonder I’ve been able to put up with you all these years,” the right head retorted. 

“You haven’t a choice, my dear,” the left said back.

I think this is supposed to be funny, but all I can think if is how everyone’s dialogue sounds exactly the same. 

We find out that this is where Nor’s people are developing the titular Zenith (except it’s not named yet, spoilers), and Nor wants to know if they’ve made any progress.

The two-headed scientist, Aclisia, says that the weapon is ready and that they only need a test subject. Did they develop this mind-altering thing without any previous test subjects? I mean I guess it makes sense that they’d need somebody unaffected by previous versions to test out the final product, but like ... Did the previous subjects die? That doesn’t bode well. 

Anyway, the test subject they have is one of the guards on Lunamere, where Andi and Dex were in the previous chapters. Nor is displeased that the guard “let them go,” and I want you to remember this line:

“You had one of the Unified System’s most wanted fugitives in my prison. And instead of keeping her there, where she could have been persuaded to join the right side of the galaxy...you lost her. [...]”

File that away for future reference, my pretties. 

Anyway, we end the chapter without even finding out what the drug does, because Shinsay love breaking their own pace and suspense because they have to rely on cliffhangers to keep people reading. 

Chapter 30

Oh Christ oh God it’s our girl Klaren again. It’s year twenty-four and despite five years passing this woman is still all about how she’s destined to die and everything in her life is crap, which, idk, mood I guess?

Xen Ptera is losing the war and Klaren is sick because of all the poison air or whatever. The king wants her to hide because enemy troops are closing in, and Klaren takes another moment to think about how she wasn’t supposed to fall in love and yadda yadda. 

Who’s ready for another Smaasism?

She wished she could go back. She wished she could change that passionate night they had shared, the careless days after and the tonic she’d forgotten to take...

tOnIC

You’d think in advanced space times they’d have more reliable birth control. 

Also ... wouldn’t the king expect an heir anyway? Like, we’ve seen that even the title of “general” is inherited in this shitfest of a universe, so wouldn’t he eventually catch on and insist on having a kid? Or if she claimed she couldn’t produce one, surely there would be tech to get around that? Idk. For all the future-sight this bitch had, she sure didn’t have any common sense. 

Klaren tells the king to take Nor and fuck off, and Darai says something about how she’s the strongest Yielded and how she must fulfill her duty. 

Which apparently includes going into the battlefield, which is conveniently right outside the palace, and mind-control General Cortas into wanting to fuck her so bad he forgot she was his enemy. 

Her husband was wrong. 

Hope was not dead. 

Hope, in the form of the queen’s sacrifice, had only just flickered to life.

This is framed as tragic and beautiful but she is about to mind-rape a man for years soooo get ready for some extremely uncomfortable shit.

Chapter 31

We’re back in Andi’s POV, except it’s still a fucking flashback. This time it’s to when Andi was still Kalee’s Spectre and lived with Valen and the other dingdongs. And then we get actually good writing?

During meals, when Andi and the other Spectres stood guard, she’d watch him curiously. Valen usually sat in the farthest seat from his father, hunched forward as if he were battling some deep, silent pain. Sometimes she’d catch him staring at her with his strange, unblinking hazel eyes, his paint-stained fingers gripping his golden fork like a weapon he didn’t want to use.

Like I’m into this. It’s showing and not telling, mysterious and intriguing without being on the nose, and for once Andi doesn’t have all the cards and knows what Valen is inside and out, so his character doesn’t become obvious. Like, he’s battling some pain, but he’s also reluctant to use a weapon? That could mean anything! In a good way!

This good chunk is also immediately ruined by the following descriptions, which point out that indeed, all the other kids talk about Valen and how WEEEEYOOORDDD he is, and how he’s constantly covered in paint, because that’s what artists look like, I guess. Catch me bodyslamming a freshly painted park bench to prove I know color theory.

We’re also told that Valen never got a personal Spectre for spooooooky reasons. He just doesn’t feel like a proper part of the family, ya know? I wonder that it all could meeeeaaaaaan. 

This is all told to us just so we can revisit the part where Valen tries to stop Andi and Kalee from going on a joyride. Kalee insults him for a bit, and then Valen drops some more foreshadowy dialogue about how he hopes this birthday is everything Kalee wants it to be. 

Subtle. 

Chapter 32

OH MY GOD WE’RE IN LIRA’S POV NOW. YOU’RE NOT FOOLING ANYONE SHINSAY, WE KNOW YOU WOULDN’T MURDER YOUR PRECIOUS CELAENA AND RHYSAND RIPOFFS IN CHAPTER 29 WHEN THERE’S A BILLION MORE CHAPTERS LEFT.

Lira has been literally counting seconds since they left Andi. 

Yeah.

She recaps everything that happened three chapters ago, saying they executed their secret plan with the “ultimate amount of finesse” before noting that despite obeying Andi’s direct orders to run, she feels like a traitor. 

Your captain is in chains, a voice whispered in the back of her mind. You should be by her side. Instead, you’re running. 

All you ever do is run.

I have literally no idea how this is even a little bit relevant considering that they’re waiting for Andi and Dex to return and aren’t moving anywhere. By the way, Andi and Dex are thirty minutes late. Which freaks Lira out because THAT WASN’T IN THE PLAN. 

Her scales start freaking out and she’s about to overheat. Holy shit, how are you still alive? 

Honestly, this is a pretty accurate depiction of someone with an anxiety disorder, but I think we’re supposed to think Lira is emotional or analytical or loyal or whatever. I doubt Shinsay have the finesse required to write something like this on purpose, so this just reads as incompetence. 

Apparently Andi said that if they’re late, the girls are supposed to flee and save themselves, and Lira is starting to get antsy. 

Ok so ... just moments ago you were worried about how you’re always running away. So why is your first instinct when your beloved captain is THIRTY MINUTES LATE to book it? Like. Calm the fuck down. Thirty fucking minutes, in space? Can you chill??? 

Lira whines more about how this is the second time this week that she’s second-in-command and she hates it. Hey why not give that responsibility to Breck, who’s always calming everyone down? Would that make too much sense? 

Lira goes to her room to mope and angst about how she likes being alone. It’s riveting. She thinks about how this crew is her SOUL and how much she LOVES them. Which we can see by her sitting alone in her room thinking about how much she loves them, obviously.

She continues to angst about how her dad died of Space Plague, and her mom became a drunk because ... Idk, that’s what moms do in books like these. But lo, she and her brother got taken in by their Cool Aunt, who then wanted them to Do Things when they grew up, and Lira doesn’t want to Do Things, she wants to fly around and Crime. 

So she left her home planet because her Cool Aunt wanted her to Do Too Much Stuff, and the weight of her expectations crushed Lira, who must soar the skies like the beautiful bald blue bird she is. 

The other girls interrupt this godawful exposition dump by inviting Lira to play some Not!Pokémon. And we get this exchange, which I included in my review, and yes, it’s real:

“Hope is a raging asshole,” Gilly said. 

“Explain to me, Gilly,” Breck said with a sigh, “how exactly can an asshole rage?”

Lira choked on a sudden, unexpected laugh. “I swear, the two of you. You were both born with my brother’s sarcastic soul.”

This bloated and repetitive nonsense that apparently passes for character development is interrupted by Alfie, who’s gotten out of the waste bay. We’re reminded that this ship doesn’t have any mechanics, because of course, and Alfie makes a reference about how the ship’s AI’s voice is turning him on. 

It appears Lira has gotten a message from Soy to come and get Andi and Dex.

*sigh*

[beesandwasps]

If The Democratic Party Were A Computer Company

Customer: I want to buy a new computer.

Salesman: Great, we make the best computers on the market. We promise our computers will do everything you need… why are you looking at me like that?

Customer: I bought my last computer here, back in 2008. I had a bunch of specific stuff I wanted to do, and it said right on the box that it would do it all.

Salesman: Hmmm. What did you want to do?

Customer: Well, I wanted to get my finances in order, fix my mortgage, solve some problems I’ve been having with my bank — I think they’re ripping me off — fix up my house for better energy efficiency, and also the computer I had before that had some real problems, it was infested with spyware and it kept installing stuff I didn’t want, so I definitely wanted to get away from that. It’s why I didn’t go back to the other company, in fact.

Salesman: I don’t see the problem. I remember that model, the ads said it would do all that.

Customer: It didn’t. It didn’t do any of that. It wouldn’t let me change anything about my finances, it actually gave my bank permission to keep going with my old mortgage, spent a lot of time loading websites for green products but wouldn’t actually buy them — and it actually came with all the same spyware and the same two FPS games I didn’t want before, and then installed five more! And it wouldn’t even let me try to work on anything I bought it for until it finished downloading and installing an antivirus program, which it kept resetting, and by the time it finished doing that it was out of warrantee and I couldn’t get it fixed! The feature list was just a bunch of lies!

Salesman: Well, yes, we’ve found in the past that if we don’t tell those lies, people won’t buy our computers.

Customer: Why don’t you just make computers that work? I remember, 30 years ago, you guys sold computers that did stuff!

Salesman: All the people who wanted to make computers that “do stuff”, as you call it, got squeezed out by the new management, back around 1990. Sales are much better now.

Customer: Why?! Why are you even in business if you aren’t making products that work? You used to dominate the market, now you’re barely hanging on, how can your sales be “better”?

Salesman: Our competitors’ products never worked, and they’re highly profitable.

Customer: So? I’m here because I don’t want to buy your competitor’s products. If I wanted to buy a computer that didn’t work, I’d go to them.

Salesman: You see, by making products which don’t do what our customers want, we think we can get our competitor’s customers to switch brands. They’re very loyal, so it’s hard.

Customer: Huh? Wouldn’t it be easier to make a living selling products your own customers want?

Salesman (Amused): Oh, no, not at all. Every so often, a shareholder from our competitors comes in and buys a lot of computers. A huge order, more than you’ll ever buy. And they won’t keep doing that if we make computers that do what you want to do. It’s so profitable to not make our products do what you want, that we don’t really need to sell you anything at all! But since our competitor’s machines are hardware-incompatible, old customers like you are stuck with us, and so obviously we must be selling more machines than ever, even if our inventory numbers say otherwise.

Customer: So… you’re basically owned by your competition? And losing sales?

Salesman (Scandalized): Of course not! We are a totally different company, making superior products which are better than the competition in every way—

Customer: —but they don’t work.

Salesman: Right, and we have never taken money from our competitors. Just from individuals who happen to be shareholders in the competition. It is completely different. And just because our sales are down doesn’t mean that our new products don’t outsell the old ones which were market leaders for decades.

Customer: Well, what’s the functional difference between your machines and your competitor’s? Neither brand does what I want!

Salesman: Take the latest models. Our competition’s latest offering is in an ugly, squat, bloated case with an orange paint job, and it vents hot air all over. Our new model is an elegant revisiting of the designs we had 20 years ago, much cleaner lines, with all the functionality of the computer you bought 8 years ago.

Customer: So… it… won’t work?

Salesman: Look at the ad! It does home finance, it can fix your mortgage, it connects to your bank, and it has an energy efficiency package!

Customer: What’s this asterisk on the ad? …This footnote says “disclaimer: the functions listed above are not actually possible with this model”. Don’t you have anything else?

Salesman: Well, we could sell you that one over there. It’s an updated version of the ones we used to sell 30 years ago.

Customer: So it actually works? I’ll take it!

Salesman: No, no, I’m afraid we aren’t going to sell that one. It tested poorly in focus groups.

Customer: It works, and your other one doesn’t, but it somehow tested worse in focus groups?

Salesman: Well, to be honest, the focus groups consisted of employees from the design and sales teams for the 2008 model.

Customer: Which doesn’t do what I want.

Salesman: Right. We really want to break into new markets, so it’s very important to have an appealing product.

Customer: And you somehow concluded that a computer which does not work was a more appealing product, and deliberately composed an ad full of lies to sell it?

Salesman: You keep harping on those ads! Jesus, you’d think that feature sets were important. It’s terribly naive of you to think that a company, in this day and age, would actually have an honest feature set in its advertising material. You’re just a whiny nerd, don’t you have any brand loyalty? You should buy whatever we sell, and like it.

Customer: Wow, that’s… an astonishingly off-putting attitude. Why would I stick with your products if you’re going to be like that?

Salesman: You have to! If we don’t sell enough computers, our competitors will achieve market dominance and everyone will have to buy computers from them! Think of how terrible it would be — nobody will have a computer which works!

Customer: But you just admitted that your computers don’t work, either!

Salesman: Yes, but if we become too irrelevant to the market, those big sales to our competitor’s shareholders will end, and that will be terrible for everybody.

Customer: Why, what would the difference be? Never mind. Uh… well, maybe I’ll… buy your new product then? Perhaps I can make it do the things I need. At least it should be less difficult than if I switch platforms, right?

Salesman: Right! Right! Oh, and this model comes with this handsome set of luggage.

Customer: What? Why?

Salesman: Remember how I said this was a redesign of our products from 20 years ago? Well, the industrial design department back then made luggage, too.

Customer: I don’t want the luggage. I don’t need the luggage. It’s ugly, the design is outdated, I don’t have storage space to put it in… can’t you just throw it out for me or something?

Salesman: Nope. The computer is actually attached to the luggage. You can’t get one without the other.

Customer: Ugh. Okay, fine. My old computer has to go, I’ll take it and hope for the best… but still, that’s a lot of ugly baggage.

Salesman: Right, we hear that a lot. But you see, some of it was created by our competitor, which is why it’s so ugly.

Customer: Some of it? Why is it all ugly, then?

Salesman: Stop asking questions! You are not permitted to talk about the luggage, because some of it came from our competitor!

Customer: Jesus, this is insane. Just… let me get this over with, okay?

Salesman: Sure! Now, since you’ve agreed to take this model instead of the other one—

Customer: Wait, I thought you said the other one wasn’t available! I wanted the other one! It might actually work, and it won’t come with all this baggage!

Salesman: No can do, sorry, since you said you wanted this one, I have removed the other one from inventory. Anyway, now that you’ve chosen this model, I can give you the feature list.

Customer: Wait, I thought the feature list was in that ad!

Salesman: Oh, no, that was the feature list to get you to choose that model instead of the other one. Now that you’re committed, we aren’t going to promise anything like that level of performance. Specifically, you get a lower minimum RAM, no built-in storage, we preinstall spyware and a bunch of FPS games, and you will be signed up for our extended customer service plan for $99 a month.

Customer: Holy cheese, this is awful. Maybe I should just build a compatible machine from parts. Your software is supposed to be compatible with that.

Salesman: (Suddenly screaming) Traitor! You’re a filthy traitor who is buying from our competition! You’re going to bankrupt us and give them all the sales!

Customer: (Backing away) Whoa, calm the fuck down, I’m not going to buy from your competitor, I hate them. I want a machine that actually works, like your machines used to work, but you refuse to sell me one.

Salesman: (Still screaming) You’re an industrial spy! Anybody who doesn’t buy our computers is buying from the competition! You’re a filthy liar!

Customer: [Flees store]

Salesman: Please come visit us again next time you need a computer, and buy from us!

[A few years pass…]

Customer: Okay, back again. After you ran me out of the shop, my grandfather insisted on buying from the competition after all, and god that machine sucks.

Salesman: Well, I’m glad you’ve admitted your error in not buying from us. You’ll be glad to hear that we have an updated model. It’s just like the one we were selling last time, comes with some of the same luggage, but it’s based on the operating system we were running 30 years ago.

Customer: Is that a good thing?

Salesman: To be honest, most of the versions of that OS actively try to sabotage anybody who does the stuff you say you want to do, but hey, at least it’s not that orange box our competitors make, right?

Customer: I really can’t believe you’re still trying to sell computers that don’t work.

Salesman: Well, okay, we also have some experimental lines we started making two years ago. Some of them do the things you’re interested in, to a greater or lesser extent. And we are still making that other model that works as well as our computers did decades ago. But I really don’t want to sell you any of those. The one that comes with the baggage does the best in our focus groups.

Customer: Are these the focus groups consisting of your own employees again?

Salesman: Of course! In our tests, we found that that 30-year-old OS was the best-known of all our current products, which obviously means it’s going to sell like hotcakes. We also made sure that any recent hires were excluded from the focus groups, because we found that they showed an insufficient amount of excitement about that model.

Customer: Can I see the feature list? Do you have any benchmarks?

Salesman: Why do you always want to know how our computers perform in practice! Brand loyalty should be all you need! Shut up and buy what I want you to buy, so I can get back to collecting checks from the rich people who want us to go out of business!

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Marvel Cinematic Universe review

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is one of the biggest and most ambitious franchises ever made. While not the first franchise ever to attempt a shared universe, it is definitely the one that codified how to pull them off in the modern day, and it has proven to be an incredible, unbelievable success. I mean, as good as Iron Man was, no one ever truly expected the little Nick Fury cameo at the end to ever be anything more than a neat little mythology gag. And yet, here we are, nearly a decade later, with it being the highest grossing franchise in cinematic history and with it containing some of the very best superhero films ever made.

Of course, there being fifteen movies so far, and with more on the way, it would be an enormous task to review them all individually… so, to celebrate the impending release of Spider-Man: Homecoming, I will be doing a similar thing as I did to the View Askiewniverse and touching upon each of the Marvel films thus far released. However, for the Guardians of the Galaxy films, Civil War, and Doctor Strange, I will keep things brief, as my reviews of them are still new enough to accurately reflect my opinions (Age of Ultron is not so lucky here).

There is no better place to start than the start, so let’s lok at the film that began it all: Iron Man. It is the tale of egotistical millionaire Tony Stark and how, after a brush with death that had him kidnapped by terrorists and crippled, he decided to change for the better and don a robot suit so he could protect the world from devastation. One of his big goals is to clean up the mess his company has made in the world, which not everyone likes, particularly Obadiah Stane.

This movie is probably most well known for resurrecting the career of Robert Downey, Jr. after he struggled for years with addiction and had a downward spiral. This is a truly triumphant return, and his negative experiences definitely helped him out with this role of a self-destructive playboy who realizes he should dedicate himself to a better cause. RDJ truly captures what his character is and what he should be, and thanks to his performance, he not only saved his career, he saved the character as well, who had not exactly been popular due to the recent Civil War event in the comics and his unnecessarily extreme actions therein. It’s a twofold saving, and boy is it a blast!

One part of the film that is not often talked about is the villain, Obadiah Stane, who is played by Jeff “The Dude” Bridges. As the very first Marvel supervillain, he does leave a bit of an impression with his  exclamation of how Tony built his first Iron Man suit IN A CAVE! WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS! He eventually suits up in a gigantic mech suit, and becomes the typical “Evil version of the hero” that we’ve all come to know and love… but, to be fair to him, he was the first one. As far as “Evil version of the hero”-type villains go, Obadiah Stane is enjoyable and memorable. He was originally planned to have a “never found the body” situation going on at the end of the film, hinting he could eventually return, but as it’s not in the final cut, we kinda have to assume that this was part of the annoying “kill the cool villain” trend the movies would follow for years.

This movie has a reputation as being one of the greatest superhero movies ever made, and it really isn’t undeserved. This film has kickass action, great characters, intriguing foreshadowing that actually payed off, and yet it still works easily as a standalone. This right here is how superhero films should be made, but the fact that so many later superhero films, including later MCU films and the DCEU films prior to Wonder Woman, decided to focus on cramming in so much crap that requires you to watch previous and later films to understand them, it seems not many got the memo. Franchise building isn’t always bad guys, but take notes; work on being good on your own first.

The Incredible Hulk is next up on the list, and this is one of the most obscure films in the MCU. NOBODY talks about this movie. I’d understand if people thought Mark Ruffalo was the first Hulk in the MCU; this movie is hardly ever referenced even in later films, all its plot threads seem to have been dropped, and it took until Civil War for one of its characters to reappear. For the life of me, I’ll never understand why; this movie is a fantastic example of worldbuilding while still remaining a solid standalone film. The plot is relatively simple: Bruce Banner wants to be left alone so he can cure himself, but after accidentally poisoning a man with his blood after it got into some soda (you read that right), General Ross and Emil Blonsky are on his trail; for those not in the know, Blonsky becomes one of Hulk’s most famous foes, Abomination.

Edward Norton is Bruce Banner here, and you can tell he really is a fan of the comics, because he does an excellent job; he apparently did a lot of uncredited rewriting and even directed some of his own scenes. William Hurt as Ross is also perfect, which of course is helped by the fact that Hurt is a big fan of Hulk. Then of course there’s Liv Tyler as Betty Ross, and she’s actually one of the better love interests in the MCU, to the point where it’s honestly offensive she hasn’t reappeared and instead has been replaced with Black Widow of all people as Bruce’s love interest.

The movie has solid action and a solid final fight, with Abomination being a pretty good “Evil version of the hero” villain. He’s not spectacular or anything, but he’s definitely threatening and pretty cool. So how then did this become such an obscure film in one of the biggest franchises? I imagine part of the problem is being screwed over by Universal, who owns the distribution rights for Hulk solo films. This movie just couldn’t be followed up, and so Hulk is relegated to ensemble casts. This leaves a lot of the characters in limbo, which includes Abomination and Leader (who had his origin shown in the film). And this is a real shame, because like I said, there’s some great worldbuilding here; the super-soldier serum is mentioned, there’s Stark weaponry, and in an alternate opening with the Hulk running through the arctic we get a glimpse of the frozen Captain America. Honestly, I think aside from the issue with the film rights, the fact that this movie can mostly be described as “Solid” is the reason why it has faded from the public consciousness; it lacks the OOMPH so many of the later films and even Iron Man before it had, and nowadays aside from looking for all the foreshadowing it’s hard to watch and care about these characters who will never show up again. It’s a damn good movie in my eyes, but I can see why it is relegated to a footnote in the MCU.

Next up is Iron Man 2. Fuck this movie. I fucking hate this movie with every fiber of my being. It is an awful, bloated, unfocused, cluttered, and disrespectful mess of the film. This film is a fucking travesty in every single regard, except perhaps casting Don Cheadle as James Rhodes. The plot deals with the fallout of Tony outing himself in the last movie, with industrialist Justin Hammer breathing down his neck as congressional hearings try and force him to share his tech. There’s also a pissed off Russian named  Ivan Vanko who wants to get vengeance on him, oh yeah and Black Widow is also unceremoniously stuffed into the film alongside Nick Fury so this can basically act as a trailer for the upcoming movie about the Avengers. This was due to executive meddling, to the point where jon Favreau didn’t direct the third Iron Man. Marvel had bad problems with executive meddling in their early days.

This movie fucking offends me. First off, they waste Mickey Rourke as the villain Whiplash; Mickey Rourke was pissed with the execs making his character into a cartoonish villain when he was trying to play him as a human, an anti-villain… and so he proceeded to spew vitriol at everyone involved, meaning even if Whiplash survived it’s unlikely he’ll be back. So we wasted the one interesting villain, and who are we left with? Justin fucking Hammer, one of the most unfunny, annoying cunts in comic book movie history. He is easily one of the worst superhero movie villains ever made; he’s annoying, he’s cloying, and he sucks away screentime that could have been devoted to Whiplash. He’s an absolute waste of a villain.

Then we have Tony’s “Demon in a Bottle” arc, the arc where his rampant alcoholism threatens to ruin his life. This is a tragic part of the character, and the film was going to delve deeper into it. And hey, this would have been great! RDJ could add a lot to such an emotional arc due to his own experiences! Guess what they do instead?

They play Tony’s alcoholism for laughs. Have I mentioned I fucking hate this movie?

This movie sucks ass. It’s fucking awful and feels like a shitty trailer for better movies, which is exacerbated by how shoehorned in Black Widow and Fury are. The movie is a bloated, disgusting mess, crushed by bad decisions and executive meddling. It is easily the worst movie in the entire MCU, but believe me it has some competition… which I’ll get to soon enough.

After that travesty, we have Thor. Thor I can best describe as being a precursor to Wonder Woman in a lot of ways, which is reflected in the story to an extent: it’s about a god – er, or an ALIEN – who is banished by his father after being a disobedient shit. He gets sent on down to Earth, while his half-brother Loki plots and schemes back on Asgard. Okay, so it’s not entirely like Wonder Woman, but still, there are similarities.

The biggest similarity is probably Chris Hemsworth as Thor, who exudes a childlike, boyish charm as Thor when he is down on Earth among the mortals. It’s not the same charm Diana has in Wonder Woman, but it’s not wholly dissimilar. Their origins too, as mighty gods who go to live among mortals and fight alongside them, is likewise similar. Of course, there are big differences too: the biggest one is while Wonder Woman surrounds herself with a cool human supporting cast, Thor surrounds himself with one of the worst fucking supporting casts I’ve ever seen. Special mention must go to the cliically unfunny Kat Dennings, who sucks the joy out of every scene she’s in with her relentlessly awful attempts at humor. Natalie Portman is a bland, flat love interest who has almost no chemistry with Thor, a nd the old scientist guy is so generic I forgot his name. This is a damn shame, because his supporting cast on Asgard was fantastic, with Heimdall getting special mention for being an utter badass guardian played by Idris Elba. I’d much rather watch the cosmic adventures of Thor and his Asgardian buddies than him pal around with boring humans, but ah well.

Still, at least we have a cool villain this time around. Loki is pretty interesting, and Tom Hiddleston does an excellent job with him. He would only get better and more entertaining in later films, but this was solid groundwork to establish him. Hilariously, Roger Ebert hated this film and had this to say in his review: “The standards for comic book superhero movies have been established by Superman, The Dark Knight, Spider-Man 2 and Iron Man. In that company Thor is pitiful. Consider even the comparable villains (Lex Luthor, the Joker, Doc Ock and Obadiah Stane). Memories of all four come instantly to mind. Will you be thinking of Loki six minutes after this movie is over?" This is just one of the most hilariously ironic reviews I’ve ever seen, as Loki has come to be one of the best and most memorable Marvel villains (mostly due to the fact he doesn’t die).

Overall, I feel like this movie suffers from the same thing The Incredible Hulk did; it’s a darn good movie with a lot of value that also works as a standalone film, but it’s easy to see it as exceedingly average due to its faults. At least this movie got followed up… though… eh. We’ll get there soon enough. As it stands, Thor is a good if not great film that establishes Thor well enough.

Next up is one of my personal favorites, Captain America: The First Avenger. I love me some pulpy 1940s style two-fisted tales, and this delivers that fun in spades. Sometimes you just wanna see a handsome blonde man punch Nazis in the face, and boy does this film deliver. The story tells the tale of how wimpy but strong-hearted Steve Rogers goes from a scrawny little man into the gorgeous beefcake American hero that is Captain America, and how he fought against Red Skull and HYDRA.

This movie has a lot of silly Golden Age elements to it that would not work in any other context other than the most patriotic superhero’s first big movie. The biggest, of course, being Cap himself. He’s a character that is really hard to pull off… and yet, Chris Evans did it, and perfectly so. I’ll let this excerpt from TVTropes’s YMMV page for the movie speak for itself:

“It's always an issue to adapt Captain America to any medium, because a character who is actually living up to his own principles of righteousness can far too easily come off as straight-out Narm, and by all rights that's exactly what this film should be. But somehow it comes out as a genuine, heartwarming, awesome, tear-jerking, triumphal ode to true patriotism and human goodness instead, a feat that should have been impossible outside the Golden Age of Hollywood. The writers, director, and Chris Evans deserve a lot of credit for striking the right tone with Cap: The Herois a trope that's almost never played straight anymore, without veering into self-parody or coming off as self-righteous.”

I really could not have summed it up better myself.

Now, let us talk about the villain, Red Skull, who is played by a deliciously hammy Hugo Weaving. Hugo Weaving is an actor I love in nearly everything, because he always brings exactly what is needed, and boy does he do that here. He’s sick, depraved, truly evil, and just oh so delightfully hammy. The man is basically if M. Bison as played by Raul Julia was in a Marvel film, and that I think is the highest compliment you can give a hammy villain. The best part: While he is defeated in the end, his use of the Cosmic Cube seems to imply he could survive, leaving him open to return. The bad news: he hasn’t appeared since, and for years after, Hugo Weaving took a very negative attitude to the role, implying he only did it for money… until a 2016 interview showed he had softened considerably, and thought the role was awesome. Please Marvel. Bring this man back. We need more of his evil Nazi hamminess, especially since you fucking wasted Baron Strucker (we’ll get to that soon enough).

If I’m gonna criticize anything here, it’s gonna be the Howling Commandos. As a point of comparison, let us bring up Wonder Woman again; she too assembled a multi-national ragtag group of misfits, and all of them had plenty of character and development, and to top it off, it’s pretty obvious they were meant to be a substitute for the Commandos. But despite they, they’re actually BETTER, as the Howling Commandos barely have any presence at all in this film. I couldn’t tell you a single thing they did. They’re dull wastes of character space, and it’s a shame.

Still, overall, the movie is fantastic pulpy fun, and it ends on the biggest tearjerker of Phase 1. It’s a pretty simple film, and at times it can seem corny and silly, but like I said in Wonder Woman, it’s all part of the charm of these optimistic superhero films that harken back to the Golden Age. And hey, I find it hard to give a movie that subtly implies Indiana Jones is canon in the Marvel universe anything but two thumbs up.

Finally, after all the buildup, we come to the big conclusion of Phase 1: The Avengers. And after all the buildup, all the development, was it worth the wait? HELL FUCKING YES IT WAS WORTH THE WAIT! This movie kicks a whole lot of ass, and is one of the biggest, best, and flashiest superhero films ever made. This is the film where Thor, Cap, Iron Man, Hulk, Hawkeye, and Black Widow all unite to take down Loki and his alien army before they destroy the world; how much cooler does it get?

The movie’s greatest strength is just the sheer spectacle of it all; this kind of film was unheard of. Who would have thought a movie like this would exist when Iron Man first came out? Seeing all these huge actors as heroes onscreen together, fighting against Loki… it’s just amazing. The writing and humor here is actually really on point, which can be jarring after seeing the much denser and wackier dialogue of Age of Ultron; it makes one wonder if the execs forced Joss Whedon to add more humor to that film. All these pieces are in place, and it is just a joy to see them come together.

Even better, it’s not totally required to watch every movie before to understand all of the characters; the film does a pretty good job of establishing everyone. Sure, it HELPS, but you can get a feel for each one of the heroes just from this film. It especially helps with Bruce, since it’s Mark Ruffalo now in the role and no one really remembered Hulk’s one MCU solo outing anyway. Speaking of which, Mark Ruffalo is a highlight of the film; he’s the best Bruce Banner yet by far, and his Hulk is the best yet scene in film.

If there are any criticisms to go around, it’s that Cap doesn’t get to do as much, and a lot of the badass normal heroes kind of get shafted. Sure Cap, Widow, and Hawkeye do some cool shit, but it’s Hulk, Thor, and Iron Man who pull of the big, flashy, exciting moments in the big final fight. I get that you gotta make Hulk cool considering his lackluster past films, but do ya gotta steal Cap’s thunder to do it?

Overall though, The Avengers still holds up as a great, exciting superhero extravaganza and one of the best crossover films ever made, and it’s definitely one of the best MCU offerings. It has its flaws, but the sheer excitement and comic book joy of the film shine through, making it a must-see experience.

Phase 1 ended on such a high note… how do we kick off Phase 3? With another shitty Iron Man sequel, of course! To be totally fair, this movie is a hell of a lot better than Iron Man 2… but a lot of things are better than that, so it isn’t saying much. This time Tony Stark has the bright idea of antagonizing a terrorist organization known as the Ten Rings and their leader, the Mandarin. This backfires, and soon Tony is uncovering evil plots and shit.

This movie fucks up badly, especially in the villain department. Most of the enemy mooks are people injected with Extremis, a drug that gives them powers… the problem is, most of these mooks are disabled military vets who are now willingly and gleefully acting out terrorist attacks on their fellow Americans, up to and including a plot to assassinate the president. Look, I get sometimes it’s dumb to read into things in movies too much, but there’s really no way I can read this that isn’t pretty fucked.

As if that isn’t bad enough, we come to the issue with the Mandarin… and shockingly, it’s not about race or the “Yellow peril” origins of the character. For most of the movie, we are led to believe the Mandarin is played by Ben Kingsley, and he does an absolutely excellent job at making the Mandarin menacing, chilling, hammy, and intimidating all at once. He’s the perfect modern update of the villain… and sadly, he is not actually the Mandarin. He is an actor named Trevor Slattery. Slattery still manages to be one of the bright spots of the movie… something that does not extend to the true villain Killian, played by Guy Pearce. He’s an extremely boring, generic, and forgettable foe, and his claims that he is in fact the real Mandarin opened so many plotholes it’s no wonder they had in development a short where the real Mandarin sends out pissed off enforcers to call bullshit on his and Trevor’s schemes.

There’s just not much to recommend here. The movie is just a dull slog with a few bright spots here and there, and even the ending is bullshit with Tony seeming like he’s giving up superheroics for good… and then by his next appearance he’s back to being a hero with a new set of armor even though all his suits were destroyed in this movie. This one just sucks, though not as bad as the second one; there’s at least a bit more to like here.

And now we go from bad to worse, for we land on Thor: The Dark World, which is an incredibly awful movie. The plot involves evil elves invading Asgard looking for a magic MacGuffin to do things and… look, the only reason anyone bothered with this fucking movie is because Loki is in it, and by god, the forty minutes he’s in it are just fantastic and funny. His interactions with Thor are nothing short of hilarious, and the fact he actually comes out on top in this movie is intriguing. Props to the film for that at least.

Too bad the film sucks in nearly every other conceivable way. The major focus on the human characters is the worst of all; Natalie Portman is given a disproportionately large amount of screentime and hogs the plot, and Kat Dennings is back and as relentlessly unfunny as ever. She is like a cancerous tumor on an already foul film. And as if the humans aren’t bad and obnoxious enough, we have the villain, Malekith the Accursed, a dark elf who has some of the most generic and boring motives ever despite looking absolutely cool. He is one of the worst comic book movie villains ever, hands down, and it’s such a shame because he’s played by the usually amazing Christopher Eccleston. To say that he was wasted here is a crass understatement.

There’s not much else to say here; this is an awful, shitty movie. The saving graces are Loki’s screentime and maybe the final battle, but even that is interjected with some unfunny humor, and the lack of a solid villain really drags the film down. This film is utter crap, but at least there’s a bit to recommend here, which is more than I can say for Iron Man 2.

Well we’ve got two strikes down, so this is Marvel’s last swing… can they save their asses? I mean, this is a sequel, to Captain America: The First Avenger of all things, this couldn’t possibly be that good, right?

WRONG.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier is not only one of the very best films in the entire MCU, it is one of the greatest superhero movies ever made, and probably the greatest adaptation of Metal Gear Solid we’ll ever get. I’m not kidding, everything’s there: a genetically modified super soldier fighting against a shadowy conspiracy that wants to use a giant war machine to attack the world’s population, all the while fighting a crazy cyborg version of their best friend. Also there’s a fight in an elevator and an evil AI that has been manipulating the world from behind the scenes. If you can’t already tell, I fucking love this movie.

A big plus is that this is less straight-up superhero action for the most part, and more an action thriller. This lets Steve use his badass super soldier skills to their fullest extent against armies of armed mooks. Even more amazingly, this movie does a good job at making Black Widow likable and interesting, and she has very good chemistry with Steve. Best of all, though, is the introduction of Anthony Mackie as Falcon, Cap’s new best buddy and a badass hero in his own right who helps solve this big HYDRA conspiracy. And despite his limited screentime, Sebastian Stan makes an impression as the incredible, unstoppable, hardcore titular Winter Soldier, AKA Bucky Barnes, Cap’s long-lost friend.

This movie is the one all Marvel sequels would be judged by afterwards. Well, for a while at least; this movie’s own sequel managed to top it somehow. But yes, this movie is absolutely fucking fantastic, a modern classic of the superhero genre, and one of the best Marvel sequels ever made. Not bad, especially since unlike Iron Man or Thor the original movie is not the biggest or most critically acclaimed Marvel film (Though t still got a mostly positive reception). The fact it managed to produce a sequel superior to the first while Thor and Iron Man’s sequels ended up being shit is nothing short of impressive.

After this movie came Guardians of the Galaxy, which I reviewed recently on Michael After Midnight. Needless to say, it’s an amazing film, akin to a modern-day Star Wars, and I truly love it… though at this point, I fully admit its sequel is far superior. If you want a general idea of my thoughts on the film, just click the link there.

So how do you follow up two incredibly epic game-changing movies? With an Avengers sequel! Joss Whedon is back, the cast is all here, what could possibly go wrong?

A whole fucking lot.

This movie had tons of executive meddling, so much it drove Whedon nuts. But executive meddling can’t take all the blame for the shoddy script and the piss-poor mishandling of characters. One of my biggest regrets is saying this was one of the better MCU films in my review; it most definitely is not. But on the other hand, unlike the Iron Man sequels or Thor: The Dark World, there really is a lot of genuinely good stuff in this movie. Look at the plot: Tony, desperate to keep the world safe, creates an AI that ends up going rogue… that AI being Ultron. Now they gotta stop this AI before it wipes out humanity. There’s a lot of good potential in this story! But sadly, this potential is not fully realized.

Let me talk about the good stuff first. The big draw is the action setpieces, which are a bit more spectacular than before… or they would be the big draw, but since the story is so messy, it’s hard to care too much. At least there’s more action scenes. The REAL draw here is  this stretch of time where the Avengers are at Hawkeye’s cabin; this lets all of the characters interact with each other in a close space, and see how everyone plays off each other. It’s absolutely fantastic, and it’s a shame the whole movie isn’t as tightly written as these scenes. Hell, they manage to make Black Widow, who tends to be a dull and uninteresting character, more human with a bit of tragic backstory.

The new characters here are fascinating as well; Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, Ulysses Klaue, Vision… all of these characters are pretty interesting and cool. In concept, at least. While Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver get a solid amount of screentime since they’re working for Ultron for most of the film before switching sides, by the film’s end Quicksilver is killed. Vision only appears immediately before the final fight, Klaue is just a cameo (albeit a really good one) to set up Black Panther… none of these characters really feel organically added, they feel crammed in to set up future films, leading to Age of Ultron feeling like a trailer for better movies to come.

Look at the original Avengers movie; you could jump into that from just about anywhere in your Marvel viewing experience and get it, and they don’t throw too much new at you. Here, they’re flinging all sorts of new shit at you that you pretty much NEED to watch the other movies to really get this one. Hell, and even that doesn’t help too much, since there are still things like Thor’s weird, nonsensical vision and Bruce and Natasha’s out of nowhere romance.

Of course, the absolute worst part of this film is the absolutely horrendous script. It’s not entirely bad, but there are lines like “She’s weird and he runs fast” (describing Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, respectively) and Black Widow going “Beep beep” while she rides through a crowd and Tony’s infamous “prima noctis” joke… the movie is just so dense with garbage writing like this that it’s impossible to take seriously and it deflates the tension when it constantly happens in battles. Now, there are still some good and genuinely funny moments, like when Vision lifts the hammer or Klaue’s entire scene, but there’s plenty of cringe inducing stuff that proves when it comes to Whedon’s writing, lightning DOES strike twice… do you want to know what happens when Whedon’s writing is hit by lightning? The same thing that happens to everything else.

Now, finally, let’s talk about the villains… oh, sorry, VILLAIN, they decide to anticlimactically kill Baron Strucker offscreen after the opening, so no point in discussing him! Ultron is the biggest saving grace of the film… as well as yet another example of Marvel getting rid of their most interesting villains. Ultron has solid motives, an interesting plan, and with more fleshing out could have served as an incredible reoccuring antagonist… so of course he is blown up by the end of the film, because his name isn’t Loki. HOWEVER, everything is ambiguous enough that he could realistically return; guy had to hide a backup somewhere, yeah? James Spader did such a good job at making Ultron both creepy and charismatic it would be a crime to not use his talents again, though since Marvel isn’t exactly begging Hugo Weaving to be Red Skull again at the moment, I won’t hold my breath. What makes this a bit more bitter is that, overall, Ultron was the best villain in all of Phase 2.

Age of Ultron is a film that can only be described as messy. Honestly? I’d say it’s a bit worse than Iron Man 3. That film may not be very good, but at least it was a bit more focused and the humor didn’t clog every single action scene and they didn’t try and cram fifty new characters to act as teasers for better movies into the plot. This film actually has a lot in common with Batman v Superman; the story is cluttered and unfocused and choked by the tone of the rest of the film, there are superfluous cameos and character insertions that are advertising better films to come, and obviously both are lukewarm superhero crossover films. Age of Ultron has a better villain, however, while Batman v Superman has much better fight scenes, and also Batman doesn’t make an awkward and forced rape joke so that’s good. In all honesty, I’d rather watch Batman v Superman over this; that movie may be dark and dour, but I can handle grim and gritty more than I can handle horribly painful and unfunny jokes ruining most every action scene. Age of Ultron is a seriously mediocre movie, and it’s just so depressing after how good the original Avengers film was… what a note to end Phase 2 on…

...Ha! Psyche! There’s still another movie, bitches! Here comes motherfucking Ant-Man to save the day! Whoever could have thought that Ant-Man of all characters would redeem Phase 2 by delivering a quirky, genuinely funny action-crime thriller? This story has Scott Lang, a former robber who is trying to go straight for the sake of his daughter, get roped in to becoming Ant-Man after breaking and entering into Hank Pym’s house. Ant-Man has to steal research from Pym’s former company before the new, corrupt owner Darren Cross abuses the research.

So this film has great setup, and it’s a refreshing change of pace for the most part. The film is mainly about the training to become Ant-Man and the heist itself, leading to a bit of a different tone from the usual superhero film. Yes, of course there’s a big fight with a supervillain at the end, but it’s so quirky and hilarious that it still fits the tone of the rest of the film. That’s another great quality this film has; it’s quirky and humorous while not being obnoxiously so like the last film. A great addition is one of Scott Lang’s sidekicks, Luis, an incredibly enthusiastic criminal with quite bit of hidden depths and an impressive skill for telling stories.

But even more impressive than the quirkiness and the interesting change of pace from other superhero films is just how this movie takes things and makes you like them, things no one would ever expect to like. Hank Pym for example; Pym has long been a subject of ridicule among comic fans, mostly due to an infamous moment where he hit his wife Janet. After this movie and Michael Douglas’s powerful and moving performance in scenes such as when he talks about how his wife died… well, those “Wifebeater Hank Pym” jokes can go the way of most of the MCU’s villains. Douglas did an excellent job at making Hank a character with flaws who is still sympathetic. And if that’s not enough at how this movie makes you love things you’d never expect to, well, this film just may make you cry over the death of an ant. No, I’m not kidding.

Now, if there’s one thing I can really criticize here, it’s the villain. Darren Cross/Yellowjacket is not bad by any means, but like a lot of MCU villains he falls into the trap of having the same superpowers as the hero, which is frankly an overplayed concept. Look at the great villains of the MCU like Loki, Ultron, or Ego; all of them had powers that gave them an edge or were noticeably different from the heroes they fought. Cross shrinks just like Ant-Man does, just like Obadiah Stane had a giant robot suit, Abomination was a big roaring monster, and Kaecilius was a powerful wizard. None of these villains are really bad per se, but still. At least that final fight is incredible, with the concept of two men with shrinking powers played for all it c an be played for and so many great comedic moments coming from it.

Ant-Man totally makes up for how lackluster and unfunny Age of Ultron was. It’s genuinely funny without clogging every scene with jokes, the action is utilized excellently, the protagonists are all likable and enjoyable, and the film feels a lot more fun and fresh than anyone would expect. This is definitely one of the most shocking success stories of the MCU, but that success is nothing less than well-deserved.

And now we enter into Phase 3, and as I have reviewed all the films, I will link to their reviews.

First up is Civil War, the third Captain America film, and the movie that Age of Ultron should have been. It still does bring in some new blood, but they feel far less forced and more organically woven into the plot. The jokes and the action are all great, and the villain is actually interesting. Click here to see what I thought of it, and also what I thought of Batman v Superman (I may have to re-review that movie as well…).

Next up is Doctor Strange, which holds the distinction of perhaps being the most visually impressive superhero film ever made. The trippy visuals really help to make the film, and Benedict Cumberbatch puts in an excellent performance, as does Mads Mikkelson, who redeems what would otherwise be a flat villain. Click here for the full review of the movie.

Then we have the most recent of the bunch, my favorite film of all time, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. I won’t say anything here, just click the link for the full review.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is constantly growing and expanding, creating new and fascinating stories that their characters can inhabit. These films are some of the only modern superhero films that truly embrace their comic book roots and play them for all they’re worth. Coming up soon are films such as Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, Ant-Man & The Wasp, Captain Marvel, and untitled Avengers, Doctor Strange, and Spider-Man sequels as well as volume three of the Guardians of the Galaxy story. We can only hope that, upon their release, I have wonderful things to say about them. But considering the high quality of most of the movies here, especially as time went on… I don’t think there’s any reason to be afraid. Marvel’s the king of superhero cinema right now, and I see no signs they’ll be giving up that crown any time soon.

[captain-annoyingbouquetpupp-blog]

hello how are u?

Idon’t know what it’s like to watch someone die suddenly. I can only speak to watching them die slowly. Except it isn’t slowly. It is something else. Time shatters. Skies swallow them. Multiple skies. There is a soundtrack. There is a light show. Different for every death and every loved one left behind. And then there is just you. A miniature version of you that is quietly on fire. You are Polly Pocket. You are Polly Pocket standing in the middle of a tiny, hollow forest fire. This should horrify and anger you, Polly. You live in Death’s pocket. There’s a bed, a kitchenette, a bathroom and a forest fire. It all matches. It’s all bright pink because you are a girl. It’s blue if you’re a boy. Which isn’t fair. None of it is fair. I’m sorry Peter Pocket, I wish we could change colors. I’m sorry Peter, you think you can scream but you can’t. You can’t even talk really. So the fire eats you, like it eats me. It eats me like the cancer ate the bodies of my loved ones. Slowly and then enough. Enough.

Complicated grief “they” call it. “They” equals, “Who the fuck are you?”

Ilove making my therapist laugh. Oops.

She thinks I deserve physical contact. “Hey, leave the jokes to me, Lady!” I zing, but it’s very charming, very charm-zing, “Have you ever read Plotinus?”

Before she can answer, time is up. Okay, I’ll just tuck this therapy receipt into my dead dad’s fanny-pack that I am currently wearing and be on my way.

I only read like a page of Plotinus’ stuff but get this, he was a philosopher who was ashamed of having a body. And right now that just feels so right. Should I date him? The answer is nope. Plotinus was ashamed of having a body because he thought his spirit was too amazing to be contained in a body. I shouldn’t date him because if we were at the food court in the Topanga Mall in 2003 and that John Mayer “Bigger Than My Body” song started playing, he’d be like, “This is me! This is ME!” and I would be mortified in front of the staff and everyone in line at Sbarro. Again. Once is enough, Plotinus. Sbarro me the pain, I’ve Sbarro’d enough.

Plotinus, you and I share the same shame but we are so different. You are like John Mayer and I am not a dick.

I’ve had body shame. Of course I have. As a teenager I was awful to my body. I starved it and binged it and let idiot boys violate it. Even when I got a little better, I still complained about my hot bod for all of my twenties. But I have stumbled upon a new kind of body shame. A deeper shame. I’m ashamed of having a body because it ends. It’s so embarrassing. Your body will end. Yours and mine. I saw it happen to someone I loved so much. Twice. In two years. Back to back. I saw my dad’s body end. I watched it end. Yellow, gaunt, swollen, then gone. Wrapped in a white shroud, carried down my sister’s steps, his feet sticking out of the sheet on the stretcher. They bumped his head on the gate. My sister and I saw it happen. We wanted to tell him that they bumped his head on the gate, but there we were, stuck in the very first moment of never being able to tell him anything.

His body ended at sixty-two. Samantha’s body ended at thirty-seven. My friend. She was beautiful. Striking. She had bones and breasts and liters of blood and then like an epic and shitty magic trick, all of those things disappeared. I watched cancer suck her teeth and then drown her. I watched cancer eat my father’s eyes. I heard him breathe a few hundred cancerous, morphine death sighs and then poof, gone. Watch your head on the gate, Dad. Why didn’t you say, “Ow”? Why didn’t you move your head? Why didn’t you lift your head up and say, “Hey watch the gate, will ya fellas?” to the funeral parlor guys? Oh. Oh. Right.

My dad died in March of 2015. Samantha even helped me grieve. She had lost her father at age fifteen. She was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer in November of 2015. She never smoked. She ran half-marathons. She almost didn’t tell me when she was diagnosed, to protect me from more cancer. I’m lucky she told me because hearts are not really for protecting, they are for getting obliterated. She died October of 2016. But timelines don’t even matter. Grief is like time-travel, except it sucks. Think Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure meets The Diary of Anne Frank. You visit the dead where the drinks have little umbrellas but no taste. You meet them in the Bermuda Triangle — three separate, swirling worlds — their illness, their death, and their life before those two inexcusable mistakes.

Being died on isn’t easy. It’s much worse to be very ill and then die. Duh. I know they had to do the impossible thing. They had to suffer beyond words and squeeze in their last laughs and cast their eternal love spells and sum up their life experience or not sum it up at all and then they had to vanish. But I had to watch, helpless. I have specifics if you want them. I have hundreds of specifics if you want them. They live in me. In my plastic stomach. My formica head. My heart that is bloated with pain. I had to watch them die, slowly. Until it was sudden. Until it was final. And now I just have to be here. I mean I’m lucky to be here but goddamn.

The amount of grief that’s coursed through my body is too much. Death. Divorce. Death. Death. If you acquire too many losses in a short period of time, are you just a loser now? Probably yeah. I don’t have cancer but cancer has gutted me and made me pretty much feral and deranged. Very subtly. Thanks, cancer, you’re a shitbag. For two years cancer has made me say I’m fine because I’m not the one with cancer. Also, in a total dick reverse move, cancer-grief has even made me accidentally torture a cancer patient/survivor with my suffocating, desperate love. The subtext of all of my mistakes: PLEASE DON’T LEAVE ME PLEASE DON’T DIE. Cool! Way to go, Me! Way to ADD some bullshit to a cancer patient’s plate.

Speaking of plates, did you know grief can destroy many parts of you? Did you know that the complications of grief can be delayed? That when a major death occurs, you are often just in shock for the first year? So when everyone forgets about your loss, that’s when it starts to pummel you the hardest? My appetite and digestion are fucked. It’s exhausting. My insides aren’t working right. My insides seize up. Like they used to do when my dad would burst into my room yelling at me. I’d try to fit under my bed. I’d try to get small. Now I can. Now that I am Polly Pocket. When you are Polly Pocket you can disappear a little. You can move the furniture around in Death’s pocket. You can gaze out at the pink flames as you sip your pink lava tea. People will let you disappear if you fight for that. They’re busy. Or more loyal to your ex. Or not thinking about you. Or if they do, if they reach out, you should probably stay home and tend to this fire, Polly.

An unfortunate side effect of trying to become invisible is that you don’t become invisible. It’s very troubling. You can disappear but people can still see you. And boy do they see you. When your body has changed significantly, people often talk about it to your face. I lost 20 pounds from grief. Just grief. No cool healthy diet/exercise thing. Loss of appetite. Trauma-related nausea. Severe constipation with a side of bleeding asshole. HOT. I’m 5 foot 2 inches. I was 128 pounds, now I’m 108 pounds. People notice.

People love it! “Divorce looks great on you.” “You’re in such great shape!” “What are you doing, you look amazing.” “You’re a babe now.” “So good for on-camera work.”

People hate it! “Don’t lose any more weight, you’re too thin.” “Oh my god, I didn’t even recognize you.” “You’re so tiny.” “You look like a young Willem Dafoe.” (Okay, I added the last one.)

I have never felt more exposed. More embarrassed. More at a loss for words. I have to wear my trauma in public. I have to take it with me on stage to my comedy shows. I had to take it to my grandma’s funeral, my dad’s mom. The funeral he skipped because he was too dead to attend. He died March 12th, 2015, she died on September 11th, 2016 (hilarious move to piggy-back onto a national tragedy, Grandma.). But timelines don’t even matter. Think Back to the Future meets Nell meets Weekend At Bernie’s.

[kaiyeti]

Ruby accidentally got both Weiss AND Penny pregnant while as a grimm due to them being drunk and given a grimm mask at the time by one of Kai's enemies (who wanted to troll him). When Ruby found about it, she broke the news to everyone a few months later, which heavily enrage Kai. All before Kai found his beowolf enemy and murder him in "The Shining (1980)" Movie style who was watching the scene unfold.

How would that work since Grimm don’t have genitalia?And as for Kai’s enemies They troll him like this.

Random guy named, I don’t know, Mark: Thank you for saving me. *He says as he rubs his wrist as he sits in the passenger seat of the busted up Truck.*

Kai: Thank your wife. She hired me and told me you were being held by that gang. *Kai said as he pulled the truck up a drive way and parked.*

Mark: Still I don’t know how we can ever repay you. *Mark told Kai as they both exited the truck and a pregnant women opens the front door of the house with tears in her eyes and a smile on her face.*

Kai: Well You and Sam can name your kid after me.

Mark: Our kid? *Mark raises an eyebrow before his wife Sam runs up to him and hugs tightly.*

Sam: MARK! OH THANK GOD! I AM SO HAPPY YOU ARE SAFE! *She cried in his shirt.*

Mark: I’m glad you are safe too, Sam. *Mark smiled as he hugged his wife, Kai watching from the other side of the truck when he noticed the smile disappear from Marks face and replaced with confusion once again as he pulled his wife way slightly and looks down at her belly.* Sam... Why is your belly like this?

Sam: What do you mean darling? *Sam asked tilting her head with an unusual crack.*

Kai: Mark? Did you know your wife was pregnant?

Mark: But Sam can’t get pre-MMN!? *Mark tried to tell Kai when suddenly Black bone covered tentacles burst out of Sam’s belly, wrapping themselves around Mark before pulling him into a large stinger pierce his chest.*

Kai: The fuck!? *Kai growled as Sam’s neck completely snapped falling backward facing Kai, still smiling as her tears became blood.*

Sam: Tha-Tha-Thaaaank you-u-u-u-u-u KaiiiiiiIIIIIIIIIIAH! *Sam spoke sounding like a broken recording before exploding sending Kai and his truck flying back.*

Kai: DAH! Ah Son of a- *Kai started to say until his truck crashed on him knocking him back down. Kai then groaned and he stood back up, Shaking his head and picking the bones of Mark and Sam out of his coat as he walked back to where they were standing. He glared at the spot of crater when he hear laughter above him.* What the fucking hell are you doing here Edge?

Edge: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! OH MY FUCKING GODS! HAHAHAHAHA! I CAN’T BELIEEEEEEVE YOU FELL FOR THAT! AHAHA! * He Laughed as she jumped down from the roof and lands on the hand of Mark, crushing it’s fingers and wedding ring.* Ahaha. Oh. Still though I got to thank you. 

Kai: Why’s that you two tongued fuck? *Kai growled as she reached for his sword while Edge aimed his modified Heckler & Koch MP5K-PDW at him.* Really?

Edge: Custom rolls Kai. Made with the same ore my reaper talons and the silver eyes of old weapons were made of. They won’t kill you but they will hurt you like hell. *Edge grinned ear to ear and the two started to circle each other.* You see my old friend, Salem wanted this guy dead something really bad. Something about him learning something we already know. So She sent me to erase him. Unfortunately, He disappeared. Found his wife and asked her if she knew but she wasn’t very talkative.

Kai: You killed her and used your semblance to bring her back as one of your puppets, telling you everything.

Edge: Yep... Actually no that is a lie. She told me then I put that explosive Grimm in her, she died, and I WAS going to have her go to the mob that kidnapped him and just blow them up.

Kai: Then why have her come to me and ask for help? *Kai Glared, slowly drawing his sword.*

Edge: Thought it would be funny. *Edge smiled, licking his lips with both tongues, pulling the trigger of his gun shoot multiple bullets at Kai as the gray skinned man dashed towards him, Kai’s aura catching all of them before swinging his sword only hitting the tail of his coat as Edge jumps high up into the air and back onto the roof. Once on the roof Kai Jumped up after him only to be met with ten gorilla Grimm with cybernetic enhancement, all of which shoot laser powerful enough enough to take down a fleet sending him across the street crashing through several building.* Its been fun Kai. But I’ll leave you with my new toys. See ya later. *Edge Smiled as the grimm charged after Kai who was already Back to on the street as the people from the other buildings came out, All with bloated bellies crying tears of blood while Edge vanished through a portal that appears below him.*

Kai: Sigh... I hate that that asshole.

And that is the censored version.