#here’s some real life proof of me being a theater major

[audreytwoapologist]

absolutely obsessed with my Firebringer costumes

[allthefilmsiveseenforfree]

Dear Evan Hansen

You may have seen some ~online discourse~ about the film Dear Evan Hansen, an adaptation of the 2016 Broadway musical, and you might have wondered what all the hubbub is about. I mean, it’s a feel good story about a senior in high school, Evan Hansen (Ben Platt), who has some pretty severe anxiety and depression. While trying to fulfill an assignment from his therapist to write a letter to himself, his letter gets picked up by another student, Connor (Colton Ryan) - and later that day, Connor kills himself. Connor’s grieving parents and sister Zoe (Amy Adams, Danny Pino, and Kaitlyn Dever) are desperate to learn more from the boy they think was Connor’s best friend - after all, Connor’s suicide note was a letter addressed to “Dear Evan Hansen.” And, as you can imagine, Evan tells them about the unfortunate mistake and sits with them in their grief as they struggle to pick up the pieces of their lives. 

Just kidding! He lies to them, repeatedly, elaborately, expansively for months, constructing an entire false friendship with Connor that never happened, and ingratiating himself into the wealthy nuclear family he never had, in large part because he wants to get into Zoe’s pants! THIS IS THE PROTAGONIST OF THE STORY. Oh, and it’s a musical so there is a lot of singing and crying and singing WHILE crying and sometimes crying and not singing at all. But the #inspiration, you guys. 

Things I liked:

Pretty much everything but the story and Ben Platt’s performance. The supporting cast is stacked, and all of them do a great job at elevating material scraped directly out of a diaper worn by someone who just chewed their way through a copy of the DSM-5. 

A couple of the songs are damn catchy - “Waving Through a Window” and “You Will Be Found” are standouts for a reason - and here’s the thing, Platt sings them well. But as you’ll discover, there’s a lot more to a movie musical than just singing your part. 

Stephen Chbosky, the man behind every deep thought I and a lot of people in my generation had in 2006 after he wrote The Perks of Being a Wallflower, is a pretty good director. I particularly enjoyed the fanvid-type cuts in “Waving Through a Window” in conjunction with the lyrics, and his use of interstitial shots to flashbacks (and sometimes flashforwards!) is a neat little bit of shorthand that I thought was used sparingly enough to be effective. 

Amy Fucking Adams. She’s holding on so hard, so desperately to the idea of who her son could have been, rather than the reality of who he was, and she is full of such deep pain that is masked by an almost endless supply of patience with Evan and relentless positivity. All this made me want was Enchanted 2 even worse than I already did. 

Super into everything Zoe wears - the costuming department did a great job, and now all I want to do is live in mom jeans and baggy sweaters.

Did I Cry? I teared up a couple of times because I’m not a completely heartless bastard and when Amy Adams offered Evan Connor’s college money, my heart broke for the lie Evan had thrust upon her, and Julianne Moore’s song got me good, because she’s just a single mom to Evan who is doing her goddamn best. 

Things I hated more than the time I dropped a frozen gallon container of fruit cocktail on my pinkie toe in my parents’ garage and it turned black and I thought it was gonna fall off:

Ben Platt is 28 years old. He originated the role of Evan Hansen on Broadway, so in many respects it makes sense that he plays the role in the movie, except for the one kinda sorta important thing where he looks like a wizened old crone standing amongst a sea of children doing his best twitching, cringing Hunchback of Notre Dame impression. If you want someone to convincingly play 20 years their junior, hire Paul Rudd. Otherwise, please don’t ask me to believe that this supposed 18-year-old has crow’s feet. 

And that twitching nervous energy is a huge part of the black hole at the center of this film - he’s playing to the cheap seats and walking through the halls of his high school like a wet chihuahua. It’s an excruciating acting choice to watch - he doesn’t just have anxiety, he is on the verge of a nervous breakdown seemingly every second of every day. Like honestly, where is only-mentioned-never-seen Dr. Sherman, because this young man’s meds are NOT WORKING DR. SHERMAN. 

There’s such a lack of self-awareness on behalf of the writing, directing, and performance by Platt. There’s one song, “Sincerely, Me,” that offers the only glimpse of commentary about what Evan is doing, by pointing out the malicious ridiculousness of him writing a series of fake emails as proof of his and Connor’s friendship. 

Also what high schoolers email this much?? I know this was written in probably 2014 or so, but has a bitch never heard of a text? Even a DM? This whole plot is constructed around the premise that high schoolers are just constantly, constantly emailing each other. 

Everything - and I mean EV-ER-Y-THING - about Evan’s relationship with Zoe is so creepy and disturbing that with a soundtrack change, this could easily be a horror movie. He attempts to get her to like him by describing to her all the things her brother noticed about her - oh wait, I’m sorry, all the things HE noticed about her while he was skulking in the shadows following her around for years, watching every move she made, and it ends with him singing repeatedly “I LOVE YOU” because following a girl around and never having a conversation with her or knowing her at all is love, right? This was clearly written by the same people who chose “Every Breath You Take” as their wedding song because Sting is hot and they never actually listened to the damn words. 

And it gets about 10 billion times worse when Zoe goes to Evan’s house alone, takes him up to his room, and sings “I don’t need reasons to want you” and that was the moment I was that person I hate in a movie theater and I pulled out my phone to Google who wrote the music and lyrics to the musical (we were in the back row of the theater no one was behind me THIS WAS AN OUTRAGE EMERGENCY) and of motherfucking course it was written by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, 2 men who heard about meeting an actual human woman from a friend one time but otherwise are unfamiliar with the concept. 

Lastly, enormous serial killer vibes from Evan sending unlabeled flash drives anonymously through the mail with no note in an attempt to right his wrongs. That’s not catharsis, that’s how the next installment in the Saw franchise starts, with Evan in a Billy the clown doll mask showing up on the screen and asking if you want to play a fucking game. 

Also, I know it’s not possible for the narrative to justify this in a way that could be satisfying based on Evan’s actions, but what is with this thing where single working-class mom Julianne Moore is turning down rich people’s money for Evan to go to college? Like, obviously we can’t have that happen in the movie but in real life, fuck your pride! Take those rich people’s money!

I also know how movies work but nothing annoys me more than a giant group of high schoolers all getting beeps and boops to indicate text notifications all at the same time because I don’t know a single person under the age of 55 who keeps their ringer on. That shit is on vibrate AT MOST, and I feel like that’s a millennial thing. 

The emotional climax of the film is obviously Evan’s WAY TOO LATE confession, but the idea that it’s prompted by Connor’s family suddenly getting a lot of internet hate is, frankly, laughable. If Sandy Hook taught me one thing, it is that no tragedy is immune from trolls who live only to cause other people devastating emotional pain on the internet. That shit starts day 1. Apparently no one involved in this production has ever been on Twitter?

Also it feels like there should have been a dog somewhere in this movie and there was no dog, so points off for that too. 

Perhaps Dear Evan Hansen isn’t nearly as deep as it aspires to be. Perhaps it’s a morality play, a simplistic message of “Don’t lie, kids, lying is bad!” Major studio movies wrap themselves up with a nice bow at the end so everyone can feel good about themselves and leave with a happy ending, but the moronic cruelty on display here makes that feat feel impossible. We’re left with Evan in an orchard, reading Connor’s favorite books and staring into the big blue sky with all the self-actualization he’s earned now as a lil treat. And if Evan Hansen looked like an actual 18-year-old, it would be a lot easier to extend more empathy to him and his not-fully-developed prefrontal cortex, but it’s a little harder with this fully-grown, weathered man who was old enough to remember seeing Liar Liar in theaters. 

Dear Evan Hansen, 

Get some actual help and a haircut and maybe you can grow up enough to have an actual healthy interaction with any other living person, ever.

Sincerely, 

Me

If you liked this review, please consider reblogging or subscribing to my Patreon! For as low as $1, you can access bonus content and movie reviews, or even request that I review any movie of your choice.

[matthewbeilschmidts]

It’s been a long while since I’ve posted but I’m so glad that I am :’)

This is for Day 1: of @prucanweek - Ordinary

Apologies for spelling errors, it’s a little short but I hope you enjoy 😭💞

-

Matthew doesn’t mind that he’s living an ordinary life. Really.

He grows up near the coast, two parents, a fraternal twin brother, and their gangly hairless cat, Tony (picked curtesy of Alfred). Their parents take them everywhere they can during their childhood, the beach, museums, sports game. They focus on their interests, figuring out what the two like and dislike, as they encourage them both to be themselves and do what they love no matter what. Alfred debates between whether he likes wrestling or football more, while Matthew settles into hockey. In between family get togethers, community festivals, and endless sports training, they somehow have time for homework. (The two share answers a lot.)

He and Alfred each have their own rooms when they enter their teen years, a space to decorate and fill with their own mementos and awards. The sports continue, but later their parents find themselves a little bit busier than before. They do though, give them as much time as they can during the school year, never wanting them to go without someone by their side.

Matthew fades into the background a little bit as they get older, while Alfred puts himself front and center. Matthew watches once with a hand over his eyes as Alfred auditions for the school musical, and surprisingly he read and sings the lines well. “It’s always the rowdy ones!” their theater teachers says after he’s finished performing, a mix of anticipation from planning on putting Alfred on stage and dread at the thought of having to manage him.

Matthew silently supports him, after all he has his own things to do.

He’s the co-caption of the hockey team, the coach giving him the position to give him a little more of a voice, and his teammates verbally agree, considering on the ice Matthew has a lot more to show than he does in person. He accepts, albeit hesitantly.

By the time graduation comes by, Matthew can barely believe how the time has passed. His team even wins a championship under his watch. Some of his fellow classmates look so ready to go out and experience the world, and it’s scary to him because weren’t they all going at the same pace?

His parents talk him through picking his college of choice, and he decides to go. He needs to do what everyone does and experience the world.

And if he decides he wants to come home, that’s okay because at least he tries.

-

He’s in his first art class during his third year at university. The time has been going well, he’s got pretty decent grades and has managed to join a few clubs. But he’s not done yet. Extra curriculars, can’t finish without them. He prioritizes his general education first, and even slips himself into a few major classes early on, but humanities is on record now and has to be completed no matter what one’s studying.

He can get through one semester, he hopes.

Next to him, a student is snickering and the professor doesn’t look amused.

“Gilbert.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“If you’re done, I can introduce myself now.”

The professor goes in with complete, in-depth introductory slides with her name and credentials, and a briefing of all they will overcome this semester.

He’s never been an artist, at least not one that picks up a pencil and creates a realistic masterpiece with nothing but that and a pad of paper. Maybe some poetry contests in high school, if that counts. The written word has its own impact, its own set of colors to breathe out for the world to see.

There’s another snicker, interrupting his internal monologue.

He doesn’t say anything, because he doesn’t know the student, and it’s not his place to control others. But, if it starts to hinder the class, maybe he’ll tell him something. He’s paying to be there, too.

The man catches him staring.

“Yes?” he asks Matthew without being spoken to in the first place.

“Oh,” Matthew flushes at being caught, not that he was trying to hide it anyway. “Well, she didn’t say anything funny?”

The guys waves a hand, making a “psssh” noise as he does.

“I’m just laughing because of how formal this all is. She won’t be this dignified later in the semester that’s for sure. She’ll be ripping her hair out.”

Matthew glances back, he doesn’t want to say anyone looks mean but, he would believe it if she was.

“You look scared,” the guy laughs, which is rude because isn’t he the one that just put the thought in Matthew’s mind? “She’s not too mean just a sticker to the rules. Will get real pissy if something doesn’t go right.”

“And you still set her off knowing that?”

The man laughs again, but this time around he’s actually trying to contain it behind the thin art easel. He’s not very hidden.

“She’s my cousin’s wife.”

Ah, that makes sense then? Messing with family is normal, but also he shouldn’t be bothering her at work.

“It’s no wonder you seemed casual.”

“She taught both of the lower division figure drawing classes, too. This is my third semester in her class. She’s the only one teaching this specific class I didn’t have too much of a choice.”

“Art major?”

“Yep! And you?”

“Psychology major. I have to get in some cultural classes.”

“Ever taken art?”

“Actually no, not even in high school. I got through that stuff by working backstage in the theater department.”

“Well not to worry my friend, because you picked the best one.”

“Is it easy to pass?”

“Nope. Well, maybe if she likes your work,” Matthew deflates at the blunt response, “but don’t worry because I’m here to be your guide.”

Matthew perks up, but it takes him a moment. This guy’s gonna help him?

“Are you any good?”

“Am I good?” He looks perplexed Matthew would even ask. Matthew has to cover his own amusement. “I may not look it but charcoal and I go way back. I’ll show you my work later as proof.”

“Deal.”

“Gilbert, since you’re adamant on talking, you can be the first to introduce yourself.”

Even if his name wasn’t said, Matthew feels just as guilty. Caught, for talking on the first day of all things.

“Gilbert Beilshcmidt. Fourth year. I’m an art major and my favorite breakfast food is pancakes.”

Matthew looks surprised that he was paying attention, even to the last addition of their introduction. Matthew’s not sure he would have known considering he was distracted.

-

And so their friendship starts.

-

Gilbert sits next to him again. And again.

Where ever Matthew sits in the art room, Gilbert follows not too long after.

Some days they take the sitting desks, some they stand and lean against the stools.

And despite not even talking much, Gilbert treats him like a friend.

-

“Do you have any plans this afternoon?”

“Nope, this was my last class.”

“Do you want to get some coffee and work on our sketch books.”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

-

Matthew finds himself meeting Gilbert in his downtime. Every Thursday after drawing for three hours becomes the day they meet. At first, all they do is draw, little more.

Gilbert is animated in all moments, but he has short spurts where he focuses exceptionally on his work. Matthew is no art critic, but he thinks Gilbert expresses himself quite well on paper. Graphite, charcoal, and pastels, all the utensils glide easily without a single stroke missing its mark.

Watercolor though, could use some work, which actually happens to be Matthew’s favorite. Even if the intention is to guide the colors with a brush, it’s okay for them to take a life of their own spreading across the thick paper.

They share snacks, art supplies, and their time.

Gilbert proves himself very useful as he promised. Matthew though never planning to be the next Van Gogh, has to pass this class. And it would be nice to pass it with flying colors, but some concepts are harder to grasp than others.

It’s obvious to tell he’s a beginner, while Gilbert excels. Matthew finds out he only now needs the intro class since it’s the first semester it became a requirement.

Gilbert helps him find the shapes he’s comfortable with, explains the processing for hatching and how it relates to shading. And while he’s no expert, he sees a subtle improvement over the next few weeks that makes some pride swell within himself.

-

“Do you want to come with me and my friends to this cool bar for dinner on Friday?” Gilbert asks about a month into the semester.

It’s the first time Gilbert and him will have spent time off campus.

“Yeah, I’d love to.”

-

Gilbert’s friends are just as animated as he, it’s almost hard to keep up. Overwhelming as they are, they’re extremely welcoming. Matthew eases into the atmosphere, joining in when he can but mostly pleased to be out and doing something different.

He’s made friends during his time, but like him they’re a little more reserved and pick quieter places on the town.

It’s fun. And he wants to go out again.

Matthew invites Gilbert and his friends to watch his next hockey game.

After their shock in finding out he plays such a violent sport, they’re all agreeing and planning to find the best seats in the arena.

-

“Are you serious. Are you hiding muscles under that red sweater?”

Gilbert pokes at him, it tickles when he gets closer to his biceps, but he knows he’s only teasing.

“You think I’m playing but I’m serious! You should have been there, well you were there. On the stands, I mean. We all screamed after you sent that player flying against the wall.”

Gilbert recreates the motions, but only slams himself into the wall and whines after he bounces back. He then plays it off like it doesn’t hurt. Gilbert’s not a very good actor.

People tell him it’s so much different watching him on the ice, but it’s still him. He’s always wondered how much different, he feels like himself. He just knows he goes into the zone when he’s in his gear. He just wants to win. And he will.

“It’s like night day,” Gilbert continues. “You were ready to kill a man down there.”

“You’re not the first to say that. I guess maybe, I could be a little more out there in real life, huh?”

Gilbert stops walking.

“Nope.”

“Nope?”

“You’re perfectly fine the way you are. I like the way you are, so don’t go change. I don’t want to be at risk of dying during art class.”

And as silly as it sounds, he’s pleased. He likes Gilbert a whole lot, too. Just the way he is.

-

“Do you want to have dinner with me?” Matthew takes the initiative.

“Dinner?”

“Yeah, just you and me. I want to take you out.”

“Like you did to that guy on the court,” Gilbert laughs nervously.

“On a date. Gilbert, would you like go out with me?”

He says yes.

Later that evening when he’s heading home, Gilbert starts running through the courtyard cheering that “I have a date with the cutest guy I’ve ever met!”

Matthew’s window is open, he’s face is bright red and he slams head first into his pillow. He needs to plan the best first date ever.

-

Three months into dating, he’s finally heading home again for a school break. He wants to take Gilbert with him, who is waiting for the next major holiday to go back home. But isn’t it too soon? They haven’t been dating that long, after all.

But Gilbert surprises him, and jokingly says he wants to go with him because he’ll miss him too much while he’s gone. And then, Matthew asks if he seriously wants to go.

“I do.”

So they ride the 3 hours train down to Matthew’s childhood home. He’s a little bit nervous, because he’s had dates to school dances, and brought friends over, but this is entirely different. This is someone he wants to take a serious step with, even if the time hasn’t been that long. They’ll never get anywhere if they don’t, so they’ll both take the leap and pray it works out.

“Mom, dad, Alfred, this is Gilbert.”

It’s the most timid Matthew’s ever seen him.

“Nice to meet ya, I’m Matthew’s boyfriend.”

After he shakes all their hands, he takes his hand back to link pinkies with Matthew.

There’s not an once of regret in his mind as the long weekend passes.

-

Gilbert graduates the next year, and the year after it’s his turn. They’re going to move in with each other. Gilbert really has no irresistible urge to go back to his home town, satisfied with just visiting a few times a year. And Matthew thinks he would like to go back closer, just to figure out his next move. So, they go together.

It’s only a one bedroom, but is more than enough space for them both. Gilbert finds work as a docent while Matthew works for a second degree in education.

He still plays hockey for a local league, Gilbert becoming their number one fan. They find their own rhythm, a pace that works for them both, where they can settle down or speed up when they agree with each other. Dewey mornings, warm summers, chilly evenings they spend them altogether.

They decide move up North closer to Gilbert’s hometown. Matthew’s more nervous meeting his grandparents than he was introducing Gilbert to his own family, but Gilbert assures him again and again they’re just a stuffy old family who actually really care about each other a lot more than they let off.

Gilbert’s grandfather towers over him, despite being a hair above 6 feet. He’s silent, eyes boring into Matthew as he introduces himself. And to end all of Matthew’s worries, the elder man pulls Matthew into a hug and tells him he’s glad him and Gilbert are home. Gilbert, just as perplexed as he, stares, but he melts into a pleased laugh.

Yeah, this is his and Gilbert’s home now.

-

They stay, for a long while, contemplate moving a few times, but they’re satisfied for now.

Gilbert and him always make time for each other, continue their own respective interests with complete support of the other. They’re never afraid to complain, because they always work through it rather then let it simmer.

Gilbert’s vivacious spirit keep them going, and Matthew’s heart keeps them grounded.

His life at first seem a little bit ordinary, but how can he complain when the pieces of the puzzle fit themselves in and stayed locked in tight.

[cathyparrlyn]

The truth behind the politics-notmything drama

TLDR: Charley’s explanation has been proven to be false through clear evidence, her contracting statements with what was found from original authors, and too many coincidental or suspicious points.

There are too many screenshots to all fit in this one post, so we ended up putting only a few on here. For the full post, here is a link to the google doc, you can also read this instead:

As many of you may already know, I have recently made a callout post against Charley (@politics-notmything) for being a plagiarist. She, however, has made an explanation of her side of the story. After lots of careful investigating, I can honestly confirm that Charley is in fact a plagiarist and lied about certain points of the situation.

To start off, I waited to make this post until I was basically 100% sure on whether her explanation was the truth or not. There was much evidence against her. However, a friend of mine decided to check the IP addresses of each of the tumblr blogs she had mentioned (I did not ask them to by the way, they just sent them to me thinking it would help.) They sent me them and it showed that Charley's main account politics-notmything had the same IP address as both the fake wolf1ez account that she claimed to trick her and the fake Nikole account she blamed. I will not, however, be posting her IP address as proof as I personally consider posting that publicly without her consent as doxxing, and I do not wish to harm Charley like that. I never even considered looking at her IP address as I am not comfortable with that nor technologically competent to even remember IP addresses are a thing you can look at. However, I can’t ignore that what my friend showed me is very blatant proof that confirms that Charley has been lying, so I shall mention it, but I refuse to send it to anyone and I have told them to do the same. Please respect that decision.

Some of you may just take my word for it on that. However, for those of you who don’t, here is all the other evidence stacking up against Charley’s story.

First things first, let’s say I didn’t know Charley’s explanation was false. Her explanation was that she plagiarized a friend instead who had plagiarized fics. Charley, in the end, had deceived people and accepted praise from those who were misled to believe that writing was true. Because of that and if her story was true, then she gave a platform to terf (later knowing they were one and continuing to post their work) and her followers had unintentionally supported a terf and plagiarist because of her deception. Now, she may have received credit, but she could've easily said at any point that the fics weren’t actually written by her but by someone else who was anonymous. AO3 even has some features to properly credit others.

The definition of plagiarism is the practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own. With this in mind, Charley had plagiarized no matter what, and the fact that she never once told anyone about this co owner and has held conversations with me about how she came up with, wrote, and edited She Used to Be Mine, a plagiarized fic, all by herself is very suspicious.

The proof Charley has been sending is also on invalid sites where you can easily create your own evidence. Everyone already knows and understands the unreliability of google docs with handling fake emails and stuff I presume. As for Snapchat, you can very well change the date. It’s the exact same thing as time traveling in animal crossing, and it’s actually decently known among people. Here is a link to an example of someone altering time on snap chat, followed by the results.

(Results are on the google doc.)

Now some might wonder why would she go through all the trouble of doing that? Well, to create evidence to clear herself. The fact that it was posted quite a bit later, and that she had told people prior to this that she deleted all the messages and proof of information that could blatantly defend herself is very sketchy. Not to mention, the account she @ed as “Nikole” was fake and confirmed to be nonexistent by a friend of mine.

Moreover, the tumblr account that she claimed was Nikoles was recently changed between the two days. When Charley first mentioned the account, me and my friends all investigated it and found a post saying she had another account. However, since then it was altered to say the account Charley @ed and the account had a new bio saying her snap chat is the one Charley @ed. But the account was nonexistent the day before?

Is this simply just a coincidence? Well, let’s see what else is a coincidence.

Charley has recently been writing smut and this blamed blog is an NSFW blog. Coincidence? Maybe. But she also claimed to have cut the person out of her life last year. The blog however is more recently made in late 2020. Why would Charley still be in contact with her accounts? Is this another coincidence? Also, if they did cut things off, why continue to still post her work? And why would two of the fics be things that were made this year if she ended their friendship in 2019? How would she have gotten that from “Nikole” if they were cut off? We even asked the original author of one of the fics about the situation and they confirmed that they gave no permission for someone to copy their fic.

Are these all coincidences too? Not to mention, Charley didn’t say just one person she never mentioned before had tricked her into plagiarism, but two. Charley claimed to be good friends with the author of the original Luck be a Lady and have received permission from them, however, they never spoke to Charley before nor gave permission to anyone to use their fic.

When it was found that the original author of the fic that Luck Be a Lady plagiarized was not friends with Charley nor gave her permission like she had said they did, Charley claimed another account that was fake had tricked her.

Again? How likely is that to even happen once, let alone twice? Or for someone with no post on an account that could have easily been made had even interacted with Charley? Or that the texting style in the evidence she posted is similar to her own and could be edited? And also the conversation itself is way too sketchy and convenient?

(Check google doc or Charley’s post for the conversation.)

Charley also just happened to request help with the title in a group chat l was in with her, but she requested help 3 weeks after the conversation she claims to have happened above.

( @all-my-love-cathy by the way was the one who named it, her name was censored because its her personal account with her name real)

Maybe it's just me, but 3 weeks seems like a bit of a long time to wait to name a fic that already had a storyline and pre-written chapters.

Moreover, the fake Wolf1ez also just so coincidentally happened to recently have copied the Twitter pfp of the account that Charley had seen but not their actual tumblr account? And that this blog that doesn’t make posts decided to tell Charley to use a fic they didn’t write?

How did they even find her blog? And why wouldn’t Charley at least double check the situation here since the person is very suspicious in the conversation they had, had no posts and she doesn’t know them? This is the "close friend" they claimed to have co authored with?

Also, Charley claimed to have commented on the AO3 fic and then deleted it. However, the original author never got an email for this. Whether it’s anonymous or not, they would have seen that a comment was deleted, yet they didn’t have one and all the other comments were fine.

The author even had a note written at latest in January 2020 telling their readers to talk to them on Twitter instead of Tumblr.

Their A/N^

(more screenshots are on the google docs)

Why would she discuss it with them on tumblr then if the author didn’t like tumblr, and Charley does in fact have a Twitter, so why not talk to them there? That’s pretty sketchy.

Also speaking of coincidences, how about the fact that the most recent fic she updated that was confirmed to be plagiarized happened to be the very last fic on the supposed list she claimed to have been given by “Nikole”? Or how she later contradicts herself by saying she won’t upload anymore of her fics? What left did she have to upload if they were all used?

Furthermore, the fic just so happened to also be a Rent fic. Wow, right after Hope Mill Theater released Rent with Millie and Maiya both starring in roles, something Charley had seen and recently expressed great interest in. What a coincidence that it was the one she posted that day. Or how about the other fics that were all copied also being her interests? So many coincidences.

Now I hope it is understood that all of these together just don’t add up. Those are way too many “coincidences” for her explanation to be true. The original authors contacted had never spoken to Charley or given her permission to use their fics, and the accounts she used made no sense with how they were presented. Her explanation feels somewhat of an excuse, and the fact that there is definite proof that she has lied in her explanation and is connected to the accounts is unsettling. Blaming a makeup blog is already messed up, but calling them a terf?

I’m sorry if this post is upsetting to anyone? I know a lot of people have been openly angry or devastated at the news of what has been done. Plagiarism is not okay, neither is deception. To see such a big blog that you might have once admired lie to you and steal from others isn’t easy, especially since she has such a big following that others are dreaming to have. Not to mention, this definitely looks bad for fic writers, especially shippers as she was one of the major faces of Parrlyn. I think it’s important to recognize that we can’t encourage or simply overlook issues like these, nor is it fair to many fans. Please make sure to recognize this issue and become aware about it.

What Charley has done isn’t right, however, that doesn’t deny the fact that she is a human being just like every single one of us. She is very young and did something dumb, but she does not deserve to be sent any hate so please refrain from doing that if you so desired to. I know my blog is known for having issues with her in the past, but I genuinely mean it when I say I hope she learns from this and I don’t want her to be attacked. Nobody deserves to be sent hate, and as a fandom we should strive to be bigger and better people each day and only share positivity and kindness with each other.

Please, once again, give the original fic writers credit if you liked fics that were plagiarized. If you could spare a second to give them a kudos/like and possibly comment something simple like “I love this”, I’m sure it would mean a bunch to them. Hearing your fics were stolen is not easy, speaking from experience here as someone who was also plagiarized this year. They could use a bit of love, so please do consider it if you are comfortable with that.

Once again, I spent the past two days since I read Charley's explanation investigating the situation with a group of people. I just wanted to share the truth, maybe it’s the inner journalist in me. This is what I found with them and what I stand by. Believe what you want, I can’t force ideas onto anyone and I know some are bound to disagree with this, but it’s what I found.

For anyone upset over the incident and needs a place to rant or vent, my dms are open and so is my inbox. If you follow me on insta or are a friend on discord I would recommend those as I am a bit more active there. I’ll try to be on as much as I can the next few days in case anyone needs someone to talk to.

[mjjicons]

apparently i’m an attorney right now

hey guys

this bitch right here

@deborahdeshoftim5779​ i can’t even write her username without copying and pasting it but there we go

she’s trying you guyssss she’s really trying to come for michael

maybe inside her basement......no bathing for days... we know quarantine right.. people get crazy

so here i am responding to the “EVIDENCE THAT MICHAEL JACKSON MOLESTED CHILDREN” because.... i don’t know why tho

but this bitch challenged me and virgos love a challenge

we do love a challenge.. so

RESPONDING TO DEBORAH BLAH BLAH BLAH ABOUT HER BULLSHIT AND MICHAEL JACKSON OBSESSION

Michael Jackson slept in bed with other people’s children. Everyone, including @mjjicons, knows this is inappropriate and unacceptable. The majority of sexual abuse accusations against Michael Jackson have stemmed from the fact that he slept in bed with other people’s children. This is one of the clear reasons why parents do not allow their children to sleep in bed with adult strangers, and @mjjicons knows this very well.

this one is actually so shitty that i can’t even lol i highlighted the most important part on this.. this is actually not true

with a simple google search we can type in like “michael jackson accusations timeline” (i don’t have to do that because i actually know every single one of them but for proof purposes) 

safechuck said he met michael in 1986 in a pepsi commercial set and of course, he said that michael asked him to sleep with him as seen in here:

alright! let’s do some research then

1986... what a year you guys! what a year!

here we have a great year review on the detail. (a youtube channel that i love so so so so so so so so much). and as we all know, 1986 was really important for michael jackson’s career overall, because that was the year when he wrote his (amazing) record called BAD!! kinda reclused. and of course he had the time to be the humanitarian he was:

also i can refute your “evidence number two” that michael only cared about pre-pubescent boys.. here’s our girl donna having a blast with my baby and bubbles.

also, safechuck said that he gave him the thriller jacket in the meeting.......but that’s actually a lie 

because that jacket is with..... lady gaga! because it never was in safechuck’s hands. it was sold for her in a auction.

let’s go forward, shall we?

back to 86. allegations say that michael asked safechuck to sleep with him in the same bed in a trip to hawaii! of course if michael jackson was in hawaii in 1986 we would have some candids.

let’s do our research once again. he was never in hawaii in 86.... 87... no... here we go, 88, with safechuck and his family:

this was in february 1, 1988, at the kahala hilton hotel - hawaii. found it. also, this was the day of “moonwalk - the autobiography” release!

here he is with everyone! and our buddy alan light actually met him at the time:

as alan said, his team was with him too, of course. digging more information we can see it was a business trip and he brought his “friends” with him (fake bitchessss) as always. the first accusations, however, were made to the LAPD in 1993. james was with his whole family in there, fans around, team around, everyone. the only evidence is safechuck’s word, that as we saw before we can’t trust that much. i will explain why in a bit. michael had no time to bullshit in 1988, because this was the year of his american leg of the bad tour, and of course, shooting every single video from the bad era. iconic! he was in japan also in january-february as seen on his year review.

unfortunately i don’t have his hotel files from this time to see how many rooms he booked, but as a fan i can say that when michael did stay in hotels, it was common for him to book the whole hallway. (please read j. randy taraborrelli’s book if interested). same bed huh.......i don’t think so too

michael was diagnosed with vitiligo at the time, and his self-esteem wasn’t 100% (for his whole life actually) so i doubt he would let anyone in his room. also, his addiction to medication was also at the beggining. he was working so much as you can see. wait a minute. i have to eat my breakfast.

back at it.

about sleeping with children in the same bed in other occasions:

with the allegations made firstly in 1993, michael had to explain himself about every situation envolving himself and kids around him. he wasn’t a men of interviews, but on the topic, michael always said he never was alone with little boys in a bedroom. there always was someone when he did watch movies with his friends, including liz taylor, in any room (neverland had a whole movie theater there) and if falling asleep was the case, he mostly laid down on the floor. and he didn’t sleep a lot either. he couldn’t.

about sharing a bed tho, it happened! i’m not saying this never happened, brett barnes said it happened, in opposite sides, no touching. it happened, yes, and this is something not common between you and someone that isn’t your own kid. but it doesn’t mean that michael took off his clothes and had sex with a minor. not only a minor, but small boys. when someone is accused of pedophilia this is obviously a red flag, but those red flags were investigated by the FBI and local police (LAPD). if michael did it with a little boy, his DNA, sperm, skin would be all over them. the abuse would be clear. a kid doesn’t have body structure to handle abuse and heal fast enough. those are little kids. the brain development and body development aren’t enough to hide such a thing. if michael did it, he would be arrested FOR LIFE. oh yes he would. because no one besides his fans were there for him when shit got bad. people wanted his head in a plate with a tomato in his mouth.

on a side note i don’t know why people think michael was someone that always had time to keep little boys around him and sleeping around with them...........he worked his ass off EVERY SINGLE YEAR OF HIS ACTIVE CAREER LIFE. years and years on tour, no privacy, no free time, no real friends, no real family, no one.........

2. The vast majority of “special friends” were pre-pubescent boys, who Jackson dumped once they hit puberty. Joy Robson testified to this in 2005, saying that she told June Chandler this would happen to her son as well. Joy Robson admitted in court that the dumping had a serious mental effect on the boys, as they were no longer the favourite.

this is the biggest lie ever. i can’t even. about “the vast majority of michael’s friends being pre-pubescent boys” i won’t even post pictures of him and little girls because this is actually.........sick.............you are just a google search away... don’t be a lazy bitch.

this dumping thing is so sad to read because it portraits kids as literal objects. and this is actually a lie too. michael mantained contact with people for years, like macaulay, the cascio family (including all the kids), omer, his nephews, tata vega..... so many people, so many children. the female-chandler had jordan and his sister as kids, and in the years that michael related with them he was at family barbecues with the chandlers (and the press even called them his new family) because he was always around EVERYONE. 

the 2005 trial was the only one actually dumped in all of this because there was no evidence against michael. and 2005 is actually a really important year for all of us, because it was the year of the innocent veredict. and wade robson was a witness in this trial. ON MICHAEL’S FAVOUR. if joy robson warned june about this in this trial WHY WOULD HER KID TESTIFY IN A ALLEGED PEDOPHILE’S SIDE?????????? 

this makes no sense. and also, the clownery was way too much. in the book “untouchable” by randall sullivan (i do not know if this is the english title because i am brazilian and here this is the title for the book, i just translated it. but you can find it everywhere) the author describes how the prosecution tried too hard to accuse michael. they were always catching “witnesses” - even a man that said michael molested him in the 80′s, but when asked about the dates, time, what happened, the court found michael wasn’t even in the place the man said he was at the time. but they demanded michael to testify on court anyway - to talk about a child he never met in a day he was at a event - with pictures and shit. a solid alibi. it was ignored. the witch hunt was big and they were ready to put michael in handcuffs WHENEVER THEY COULD. they just needed something. and this something never came.

if you are good enough to get all “your evidence” together, don’t be lazy to check facts. as i said before, it’s a google search away. 

about joy robson, this bitch is bipolar or.. idk. because she was thriving in 2013 liking posts about michael and how good he was.

2013 was also the year wade filled his allegations against michael. because wade realized that michael actually did the wrong to him in 2012. before that, as a grown ass man, in the ‘05 trial, he didn’t. but in 2012 oh boy we are here just realizing things.

in 2009, michael’s passing, the estate released the michael jackson opus, a big book of memories and good stuff. wade was there too and made a beautiful statement, as follows:

“Michael Jackson changed the world and, more personally, my life forever. He is the reason I dance, the reason I make music, and one of the main reasons I believe in the pure goodness of human kind.”

and after that, wade wanted to be on charge of all the tributes related to michael in tv shows and awards. that’s pretty big right......to work in the name of your “abuser”.......

now you answer me: how did joy robson warned june chandler about anything if she, herself, said that wade didn’t show a single sign that he was abused by michael? she even said michael coached him to be “a master of deception” and that “wade should have won an oscar for lying that good for her” on court (2013) and that she was lied to so good that she never believed anything.... but warned chandler’s mom about “dumping”? what dumping?

if wade was dumped and really sad about it.....why would he want to lead shit about michael after he died? if your molester died....you should cheer up....

just a side note: joy said in leaving neverland that when michael died she was so relieved and danced around BUT HOW IF HER SON JUST WROTE A WHOLE LOVE LETTER TO MICHAEL JACKSON IN HIS MEMORIAL

is it crack? is it? what you smoke? following up..

3. Michael Jackson’s “special friends” include: Emmanuel Lewis (Brooke Shields said in 1984 that it looked like the pop star was dating the boy, rather than her), Jonathan Spence (Jackson owned a naked photograph of him), James Safechuck, Brett Barnes (Jackson is on video pretending this boy is his cousin), Macaulay Culkin, Wade Robson, Jordan Chandler, Jason Francia, Arnold Schleiter, Sean Lennon (Mark Ronson said that Jackson watched pornography with both of them in a hotel room), Omer Bhatti (whom Jackson met in a Tunisian hotel, and pretended the boy was his son), David Martinez, Gavin Arvizo, Michael Jacobshagen, and his nephews (whom the police suspected him of molesting, and with whom he took an inappropriate photo shoot for Star Magazine).

“brooke shields said in 1984 that blahblagabal” when where WHERE bitch where

i think people don’t actually answer your allegations because it is so DUMB that no one wants to waste their time with you. like......why am i doing this

i am just on #3 and i’m so tired because THERE IS NOTHING ABOUT IT are you wade robson in a fake account? just take off your mask

just

why

if you have this brooke shields line please show me???? i would like to see it

michael didn’t meet omer in a tunisian hotel, he actually met him because he was in a contest for michael jackson impersonators.......and he loves him, and pia, his mom, is so grateful for everything michael done for their family WHY AM I RESPONDING TO THIS i am so frustrated 

4. Joy Robson also testified in 2005 that Jackson had called her up in the middle of the night in December 1993, asking that Wade Robson be brought to his bedroom. She admitted that she went back home, after leaving her son with Jackson. For context, Jackson was under investigation for child sexual abuse of Jordan Chandler at the time

she actually didn’t because she wasn’t a witness on court at the time. wade was. she wasn’t. as i showed before. next.

actually i’m tired because all of this is so dumb and i am wasting my time........ let’s just jump to the final shit.

We have good reason to believe that Jackson molested other boys not named above. For example, who was the boy whose semi-nude photograph was found inside Jackson’s bedroom in August 1993? 

they never found anything in ‘93 because if they did michael would be arrested...............

Who filed a Restraining Order against Jackson back in the 80′s, and who reported this to the FBI? 

no one filed a restraining order against michael back in 80′s. there is no such evidence. the fbi files are public and you can access them and read everything.

Who were the two Mexican boys that Jackson was accused of molesting back in 1985-1986?

michael didn’t have contact with any mexican people between ‘85 and ‘86 as i said before, in his year review, and in ‘85 he was never seen with any mexican boys because he was working in USA for africa, we are the world and captain EO. nothing michael did was away from the public eye. 

Who were the other boys that slept in Jackson’s bedroom, according to a security guard? Who were the boys/men whose DNA was found in semen stains on Jackson’s mattress in November 2003? Who was the “Rhonda” who sent Jackson a picture book of naked boys, because she said Jackson might like them? What did Norma Staikos know about Jackson’s predilection for pre-pubescent boys? Who was the boy that Darlene Craviotto saw Jackson alone with in 1991 (reported in her book)?

norma staikos was his personal assistant at the time and wade said she knew about “what was going on” and was someone that arranged all the “sexual meetings” as said on court right here, but this meeting mentioned by wade on court was actually arranged BY HIS OWN MOTHER! 

and the book by darlene craviotto never mentioned anything sexual between michael and boys, actually it’s a kind book about how michael helped her with her agoraphobia................

WOW THAT WAS LONG AND I FEEL SO DUMB RIGHT NOW

the rest of your evidence isn’t worth the read or the research because i’m not the one who should be doing this, debora, it should be you. just google it. or show something more credible, maybe actual proof? pictures? videos? audiotapes? where are they?

why am i here tho?

fuck you bitch

[write-crawler]

Why culture matters, especially in times of economical crisis

A defense of Brazilian SAT (ENEM)'s essay theme: “Democratization of access to movies”

B A C K G R O U N D - What is ENEM?

The ENEM - Exame Nacional do Ensino Médio (National High School Exam) - is one of the most important tests for high school kids. It's a chance to get into an university, it's a chance to get into a public university - which, in Brazil, are free of tuition and are usually the highest ranking universities of the country. It's the Brazilian SAT.

The test is divided into Humanities, Languages, and an essay - which are tested on the first day - and Mathematics, Sciences, and Biology - tested on the second day. The ENEM happens all across the country in the first 2 Sundays of November, starting at 1:30 pm and lasts a maximum of 5 hours and 30 minutes. That means the first half happened already this past Sunday (November 3rd, 2019).

This is the first ENEM applied under the Presidency of Jair Bolsonaro, far-right politician who got elected in 2018. Last year, he criticized the test and a specific question about language that used as example a dialect used by the Brazilian transgender community. This is also the first ENEM that had an ideological screening. Also the first ENEM that had no questions about the Brazilian military dictatorship (1964 - 1985)  - which Bolsonaro supported and still openly supports - or about the dictatorship of Getúlio Vargas (1937 - 1946), who was a nazi and fascism sympathizer. 

T H E   E S S A Y - The “controversy”, its history, and my opinion

The essay is a dissertative-argumentative one that requires students to present na introduction, thesis, argumentation, conclusion, and a solution proposal. Every year it has a different theme, which the candidates only find out what it is when they recieve the test. It is released to the press and public later on the day, while candidates are still taking the test. This year the theme was "Democratization of the access to movies". And, like always, many many people complained about it. 

Part of the complaints were about how there are many other important topics to discuss, such as the fires in the Amazon rainforest or other political matters more closely connected to Jair Bolsonaro and his government. Other complaints were that most Brazilians don’t have access to the movies – only 10% of the country’s cities have movie theaters -, so it was very hard for most of the candidates to talk about that theme, making the theme unfair. A tweet that became viral after the test reports a candidate saying “Dude, some days, my house doesn’t even have water, and they want me to write about the democratization of movies”. So, basically, the complaints are that the movies are a reality that is too far away for many Brazilians and there are other social problems that affect everyone, which makes them more important than the movies. 

What these people aren’t getting about the theme is that it is not about movies. Or rather, it’s not just about movies. It’s about democracy and accessibility. But, because these two topics are too broad and the essay has a limit of 30 lines, with a focus on movies. The essay didn’t require you to explain why “The Shape of Water” wasn’t just a monsterfucker fantasy of Guillermo del Toro. It didn’t require you to point out all the symbolism in “Donnie Darko”. Or to talk about how “Fight Club” is an amazing criticism of current society. It didn’t require any knowledge of cinema or movies because it wasn’t about it. It wasn’t necessary to have ever stepped foot in a movie theater to be able to talk about this theme. Because the actual keywords of the theme are “democratization” and “access”. The “movies” part was there simply to help candidates narrow down the topics, to make it easier to talk about these topics.

This year’s theme has suffered the same criticism so many past themes have suffered, because people want the simple and obvious themes. And, to accomplish that, they reduce the theme to just one word. They take the word in the theme that is meant to help you think about the others and make it the theme of the essay.

For example, in 2018 the theme was “Manipulation of user behavior by internet data control”. Everyone said the theme was hard and that it was “the internet”. It was NOT about the internet. It was about how the internet is used to MANIPULATE people, how it is used to CONTROL and TRACK people’s behaviors. We all saw the election of Donald Trump in 2016 happen with a lot of fake news in the internet. We saw in 2018 Bolsonaro get elected by bombarding conservative’s WhatsApp groups with fake news. We KNOW Facebook tracks us and our behavior so they’ll know what ads to show us. Hell, Facebook watches us so closely, they can make shadow profiles of people who don’t have a Facebooks account.  So, if in the ENEM of 2018, you talked about the internet, and not about the manipulation of internet data, you failed the essay.

And 2017’s theme wasn’t deaf people. It was “Dificulties in the education of deaf people”. I did the ENEM that year. And, like most, I thought “fuck” when I read the theme. I, like so many others, complained on the internet about the theme, about how hard it was. And yet, I scored a 840 out of 1000 on my essay. It’s a really good score that would’ve gotten me into several good colleges. How did I manage to get a 840 even though I knew very little about the life of someone with a hearing disability? It’s not because I’m fucking incredible, or because I’m gifted, supersmart or because I suddenly developed an empathical bond with every deaf person in Brazil that allowed me to write the essay. But because I focused first on the first words of the theme, because I thought about the Brazilian educational system, it’s flaws, what affected me and those close to me. Then, after I identified the problems, I figured out how deaf people are affected by them. The theme didn’t require you to be na expert on deafness or to personally be deaf or know a deaf person. You had to think about Brazil’s educational system, the flaws it has and how could they be worse for deaf people. It required you to think about inclusion, disabilities, diversity, and, most of all, education, schools. So, if in 2017 you talked about deaf people instead of their inclusion in schools, you fucked up.

And here is the thing, and maybe you’ve noticed it already, the ENEM’s essay is always about social issues. More specifically, social issues regarding citizenship, democracy, and inclusion. No matter the theme, these three topics, somehow, are always involved in the discussion – because that’s the estructure of the essay. So the theme will never be about just one word or one concept. It’ll always be more complex than that. For more proof, let’s look at all the other previous themes since ENEM’s beggining:  

2016: Ways to fight religious intolerance in Brazil

2015: The persistency of violence against women in Brazilian society

2014: The question of child advertising in Brazil

2013: Effects of the prohibition in Brazil

2012: Immigration movement to Brazil in the 21st century

2011: Linving online in the 21st century: the limits between public and private

2010: The work (as in job) in building human dignity

2009: The individual facing national ethics

2008: How to preserve the Amazon rainforest: immediatly suspend deforestation; give financial incentives to landowners that stop deforesting; or increase law enforcement and impose fines on those who deforest

2007: The challenge of living with differences

2006: The transformative power of reading

2005: Child labor in Brazilian society

2004: How to garantee freedom of information and avoid abuses in the means of communication

2003: The violence in Brazilian society: how to change the rule of this game

2002: The right to vote: how to make of this conquest a way to promote the social changes that Brazil needs?

2001: Development and environmental preservation: how to conciliate these conflicting interests?

2000: Children and teenagers’ rights: how to face this national challenge

1999: Citizenship and social participation

1998: Living and learning

Apart from 1998’s theme, which really is simplistic, all others contain at least one of the topics I mentioned above: citizenship, democracy, and inclusion – perhaps not explicit in the title, but if you think about them, it’s not hard to get to these topics. And all the themes are about social issues. So this is why 2019’s theme is not, in any way, shape or form, a divergence from ENEM’s usual estructure. It’s true that it’s been a long while since ENEM’s essay tackled culture, but it still follows the usual formula, it still expects the same things from 2019’s candidates that it expected from the candidates of previous years.

Another part of the criticism that I haven’t addressed yet: that there are more important themes to discuss.

Honestly, Brazil has always been a country that didn’t give a shit about culture in general so this shouldn’t surprise me. Like most Third World countries, we serve only to supply Europe and the USA with raw materials and give them our natural resources. This isn’t by choice, by the way, that’s the result of living under colonization and USAmerican imperialism. The USA has kept a very tight leash on Brazil, us being it’s most loyal follower in South America – and, when we aren’t that loyal, the USA is quick to orchestrate a coup. And because of all of this, Brazilian society has na ironic culture of dismissing culture. Or rather, dismissing critical thinking and the arts and anything that isn’t pragmatical or practical. What matters here are real jobs, jobs that make money. You go to college so you can work, not to get culture. Because culture is for the elites and, unfortunately, that’s how Brazil wants to keep it.

 The lower social classes are taught to only care about majors that will get them a job. Here, we have a thing called Technical Education, and it’s purpose is solely to prepare kids to work. Like the name suggests, it’s just technical information, it doesn’t encourage or teaches critical thinking – again, because in Brazilian mentality, that’s all you need to do, work and shut up. You can opt for Technical Education rather than go to High School – the subjects that are required in High School are integrated with others – or you can do it after High School. Technical Education is NOT college, it doesn’t count as college or superior education. So, again, it really is meant to keep poor people away from college and culture and just get them to work. In 2016, after leftist President Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment – or coup, depends on your political position and how you see the process – and her right-wing VP, Michel Temer, took over, Technical Education started being encouraged a lot on TV with government advertisement. After Temer took over, it was passed a reform of our Educational System that no longer required schools to teach philosophy.

Currently, Bolsonaro’s government has constantly attacked education, especially public universities. Like I said before, public universities in Brazil are free of tuition, which means that it’s the only chance for many to go to college. And public colleges here also have social and racial quotas, some universities even have transgender quotas, to help the less privileged students get into colleges as part of historic reparations. One of the biggest projects of Bolsonaro’s government is to end all these quotas, making diversity in universities drop even lower. And his government also wants to impose monthly fees on public universities, claiming that those who attend public universities can afford it (we can’t, asshole). (Also, here’s the thing about a right given to you by the Constitution: if you have to pay for it, then it’s no longer right, it’s a privilege. So, charging anything at a public university is unconstitutional. Charging for education is against the Constitution.)

What is also concerning, is the project Future-se (comes from the word “futuro” meaning “future”), nicknamed Fature-se (a play on the name, comes from “fatura” meaning “bill”), that would make public universities depend on financial aid from private companies. Meaning that only the colleges, only the areas, that can be capitalized and/or that appeal to the capitalist market, would get fundings. That means, arts and human sciences are doomed. Those two areas already don’t have enough funding and already suffer with attacks from conservatives, constantly, for not being “productive” and not producing “anything” for society, now imagine when they have data from private companies refusing to invest in those areas. We’ll be cut for sure. Especially because the project states that it is meant to supply the entrepreneurial sector, the privates sector of economy. It’s not about giving back to the community, it’s about fueling capitalism. The project also allows private companies to buy and name buildings of the college. So, literally, you could have na auditorium at a public university called Wall-Mart or Jeff Bezos. Totally not capitalist propaganda, right?

This capitalism-covenient project comes at a time where Universities are struggling to pay their bills – because the State has made a cut on fundings (BOLSONARO’s government cut the fundings, it’s directly his fault a need for financial aid coming from outside the government is even needed). Another area that has suffered a lot of financial cuts is – guess it – culture!

I know I went on and on and on about Brazilian education, but I needed you to understand just a little bit of the extent that the higher classes will go to to keep the lower classes away from anything that may teach them critical thinking. Culture, movies, literature, and paintings are all things that make us look critically at our society. Art has always existed as a form of protest, as a form of expressing your political beliefs, be it left or right wing beliefs. To keep it away from the population, to restrict it, is to put restrictions on our souls, minds, and, obviously, freedom. We need the fictional to function in reality.

Fiction is not reality, obviously. But it doesn’t exist on a vaccum. It feeds on reality and it feeds reality, they’re both stuck in an endless cycle. Fiction isn’t reality, but it does have the most potential, out of anything, to change reality. If it didn’t, fascists wouldn’t need to burn books. If fiction didn’t matter, there would be no censorship of song lyrics under dictatorial regimes. If it didn’t matter, Bolsonaro wouldn’t have felt the need to extinguish the Ministry of Culture, turn it into the Secretary of Culture and put the son of a pastor in charge of it. If it didn’t matter, Bolsonaro wouldn’t have cut 43% of the National Cinema Agency (Ancine)’s budget for 2020 – making it the lowest since 2012. If it didn’t matter, Bolsonaro wouldn’t have threatened to end Ancine because of the movie “Bruna Surfistinha”, which told the story of a teenager who ended up being a prostitute. If it didn’t matter, Bolsonaro wouldn’t have censored LGBTQ+ themed movies that were being made by Ancine. And if it didn’t matter, Bolsonaro wouldn’t have asked Ancine to make a movie about himself, and the rise of the Brazilian reactionary movement. If it didn’t matter, Crivella, the mayor of Rio de Janeiro, wouldn’t have tried to enter a book event with the police to aprehend a Marvel Avengers comic book because it had two gay characters kissing in it. If it didn’t matter, they wouldn’t care.

But they do, a lot. Because, like I said, fiction doesn’t exist in a vaccum, it exists with reality. And so, what we see in fictional work has come from reality, in one way or the other. Because if you see gay people in a comic book, it’s because gay people exist. If there’s transgender people in movies or in a book, it’s because transgender people exist in real life. If minorities exist in fiction, it’s because they exist in reality. And what bothers them is not that we are present in books, but that we are present in real life. And, since genocide would take more effort, they take the easy way out and try to kill us in fiction hoping that it will lead to our dissapearence from real life. That’s why censorship happens. That’s why representation matters.

Protecting culture means protecting the rights of people to exist and be seen. And that is a political act. Shouldn’t be, but it is. Because the right is very firm and clear about the fact that they don’t want groups of people to exist because of who they are.

And, no, that’s not the same as antifa. Antifa hates fascists because their ideology inhenrently wants to persue the genocide of minorities. Antifa hates fascists because of what they believe in, not because of who they are. If antifa confronts a fascist, the fascist can say they regret defending that ideology and leave it behind. Antifa maybe won’t buy their motives, but will leave them alone. However, when it comes to fascists, either they lose or we die. It’s not the same.

But back to culture, literature and movies are a important part of people’s political position formation. Like I said before, education is not accessible to all and critical thinking isn’t being taught to many lower classes kids. So, for these kids that don’t have access to theorical texts – and, even if they did get their hands on these books, the vocabulary would probably be too hard for them (not because they’re stupid, but simply because no one has taught them these words and meanings before) and the quantity of information is not one they’re used to, making the text hard to digest and understand – movies are a great way to show them the ugly truths of our society in a way that they can understand.

Movies like “Freedom Writers” are very, very important to show exactly everything I’ve been saying so far. The movie is based on a real story about a teacher, Erin Gruwell, who starts teaching at a High School in 1995 where a lot of students are poc and involved with gangs, living in poverty and in violent neighborhoods. Gruwell understands the reality of these students and introduce them to books they can relate to, but that also teach them about history, the history of oppresed minorities – like the Diary of Anne Frank and the Diary of Zlata Filipovic. She knows these students won’t respond to textbooks, or hundreds of grammar lessons that seem meaningless to them. So she buys them books. Books written by teenagers like them who they can relate to. Now, I know these books aren’t fiction, but, still, they’re literature and they changed the lives of those teenagers – some of them were the first to graduate High School on their families. But as for the movie telling these stories, it’s essential that kids on the same situation as these teenagers see it. They have to see kids like them on TV going through the same things and making it out alive, well, and going to college. It’s important for them to see a teacher buy the Diary of Anne Frank to a group of teenagers deemed stupid by the educational system. It’s important that they see that the reason they might not understand Diary of Anne Frank isn’t because they’re stupid, but because they didn’t have a Erin Gruwell to help them, to explain it to them.

But “Freedom Writers” isn’t the only movie that does that. “Que Horas Ela Volta”, a Brazilian movie titled “Second Mother” in English, tells the story of Val, a woman who left her young daughter in the Northeast of Brazil to be a nanny, then domestic maid, in the Southeast, working for na affluent family – and living with them. She leaves her daughter in a poor state, with her grandmother, while she takes care of someone else’s son. Years later, Val’s daughter, Jessica, asks to stay with her for a while so she can take na entrance exam for a public university, the same one the family’s son, Fabinho, is trying to get into. As Jessica lives with them, she questions the unspoken and tight rules that dictate the places each social class gets to ocupate, creating tension within the household.

Brazilian TV series, “Assédio” (“Harrassment”), talks about a doctor at a fertilization clinic who is exposed for sexually abusing and even raping his patients. “Saneamento básico” (“Basic sanitation”) is a comedy about how the lack of basic sanitation changes a small town – the residents decide to make a movie, that has to be of a fictional story, to shed light on the sanitary problem they face. “Cidade de Deus” (“City of God”) talks about the favelas, the “slums”, police brutality, and racism. “Central do Brasil” (“Central of Brazil”) is about a retired teacher who writes letters that are dictated for her by poor people who are illiterate, and want to send letters to realtives. “Larte-se” is about a transgender cartoonist who started transitioning at 59 years old. “Hoje Eu Quero Voltar Sozinho” (“Today I Want To Go Back Alone”) is about a blind gay boy. “O Filho Eterno” (“The Eternal Son”) is about a couple who happily waits for their first son, and then find out the child has Down Syndrome.

See, all these movies are extremely relevant themes. All of them could be cited in an ENEM essay. All these movies are very political. All these movies talk about problems of our society and inequality. They show what life is like for those less privileged. To see those fictional stories, is to develop a better understanding of how society works and it’s problems. To see those fictional stories is to develop a bigger empathy for those suffering.

And to keep them away from people, to censor movies, to keep the price of movie tickets high, to restrict what stories can be told, is to limit the population’s right to think for ourselves. Think and criticize. It’s a violation of free speech, it’s a violation of democracy.

In times of economical crisis, the right rises with “magical” solutions for the economy that almost always means cuting the fundings of arts and encouranging the lower classes to work. Work, not think. It is in those times of crisis that music, movies, and literature suffer bigger and bigger attempts of being crushed. Because art is political, because to do art you have to think. And it is in those times that we must protect the most the arts. It is in those times that we have to do what we can to make the arts accessible.

And this is why the democratization of access to the movies is a very very important theme. And this is why culture matters, especially in times of economical crisis.

So we can think. So we can fight. So we can survive. So we can thrive. 

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Psycho Analysis: Van Pelt

“A hunter from the darkest wild, who'll make you feel just like a child.”

Jumanji is already one of Robin Williams’s most enjoyable films, being a fun dark fantasy adventure film based around a supernatural board game, and while the board game itself is technically the main antagonist, its desire to test its players is given form in the maniacal hunter Van Pelt. And while I certainly would not argue that Jumanji is the deepest film ever made or anything like that, I think there is a bit of unique symbolism and interesting character quirks that make Van Pelt an enjoyable antagonist.

Actor: Johnathan Hyde portrays Van Pelt, and interestingly enough, he also plays Alan Parrish’s father. This bit of casting is honestly brilliant; think of the description of Van Pelt quoted above, used to announce his arrival from the game into the world - he is said to “make you feel just like a child.” And who above all others makes Alan feel just like a child at this point? His father.  Van Pelt thus becomes symbolic of Alan’s parental issues, which makes his overcoming Van Pelt in the end all the more poignant and powerful. On a more meta level, it is an amusing coincidence Robin Williams starred in a film where the father and the antagonist share an actor, something typically the case when it comes to Captain Hook/Mr. Darling in theatrical adaptations of Peter Pan, whose eponymous character Williams had played five years prior to this film. It was likely unintentional, but it is an amusing thing to note.

Motivation/Goals: Van Pelt is clearly a creation of the game, a hunter conjured up by whatever poor schmuck draws his card and given a form that will cause the most psychological damage as well as the most physical damage. To that end, he relentlessly pursues Alan with the intent of killing him, with nothing stopping him and very little actually slowing him down. In fact, Van Pelt seems to be indestructible, likely a side effect of his supernatural nature. Nothing short of beating the game is enough to defeat him, and his goal is just to make that as hard as possible by targeting the one who brought him out. It’s a simple motivation, but it’s pretty effective and allows room for all the other insanity of Jumanji to take the stage without him overshadowing it entirely. He ends up feeling more like an extension of the game’s will than anything, and that’s honestly for the best.

Personality: Relentless, implacable, and clearly very bloodthirsty: these are the traits that define Van Pelt. Considering he’s just another manifestation of the board game, he didn’t even need a personality, but as the game tends to exaggerate real life dangers of the jungle, so too did they exaggerate the stereotypical “Great White Hunter” character into its perfect form. An interesting thing to note about him as that he seems to have a certain respect for Alan, and despite being incredibly dangerous and skilled never seems to land a single hit. An interesting idea is that perhaps he is intentionally missing as part of some ploy on the game to help Alan overcome his father issues and truly mature; of course, it could just be that Van Pelt enjoys the chase more than he does the kill.

Final Fate: Alan calls out “Jumanji,” ending the game and causing Van Pelt to be sucked back into the board. This version of Van Pelt would never be seen again, for obvious reasons; using someone else’s symbolic antagonizing force would be a bit weird, no? Van Pelt does show up in a different form in this film’s sequel, with some more intriguing powers but a lot less plot relevance and personality.

Best Scene: In an amusing and darkly comical scene, Van Pelt decides to forego any form of background checks while attempting to purchase a fancy new gun, instead opting to dump a pile of gold right on the gun shop clerk’s desk. Thankfully it is not this ridiculously easy for mentally unstable lunatics to buy dangerous weapons and perform horrible crimes with them, and this sort of thing only happens in fiction… Ahem.

Best Quote: His introductory quote: First, a bullet from offscreen whizzing by Alan’s head, followed by: "You miserable coward! Come back and face me like a man!"

Final Thoughts & Score: Van Pelt is definitely more of a living setpiece, an obstacle to be overcome much like the other supernatural critters the game unleashes, but he’s one with a lot of dramatic and thematic weight to him, seeing as he represents Alan’s conflict with his father that is set up at the film’s start. He’s quite similar to the T-800 in a lot of ways, seeing as he is a hyper-competent implacable and unstoppable assassin sent by a fantastical force to ensure the continued existence of its creator, with a dash of Captain Hook thrown in for personality and the little bit of symbolism present in theater adaptations of Peter Pan. 

Van Pelt is a solid 7/10 for the level of symbolic brilliance he brings to the table, but I can’t justify rating him any higher because, ultimately, he is just another figment crafted by Jumanji to make the game more entertaining, meaning he has no real backstory, goals, or motivation and exists only to cause trouble. Still, for what he is, he’s more entertaining and intriguing than he has any right to be.

But you know who isn’t entertaining or intriguing?

Psycho Analysis: Russell Van Pelt 

Ok, so that was unnecessarily dismissive and harsh. I actually think that the iteration of Van Pelt from Welcome to the Jungle has some pretty interesting concepts going for him. Ultimately though he’s kind of done in by the fact that he is the villain in an 80s video game, albeit a supernatural one. And 80s video games were not exactly known for their intriguing, complex villains.

Motivation/Goals: So this Van Pelt actually has a backstory, and it’s kind of interesting too: he was once a determined archaeologist who just wanted to have some proof of the Jaguar Shrine... unfortunately, said proof was the Jaguar’s Eye, which is the Chaos Emerald seen in the picture above. 

Here’s the problem: as he is a generic antagonist created to oppose our heroes, he has no motivation other than that he wants to use the jewel for nebulous nefarious reasons. He kind of just exists to be a threat, and yeah, it makes sense, but it is a bit of a letdown compared to the original. In fact, he’s very much a non-action villain and doesn’t even really directly confront the heroes until the very end, and even then it’s not like he has some spectacular throwdown. You’d think the guy with the one magical glowy eye would put up a better fight, but maybe Dr. Sivana and Sans Undertale just set the bar too high for glowy-eyed super battles.

Final Fate: The heroes return the eye, and he collapses into a big pile of rats and bugs. Why does he do this? I’ll get into it more below. Needless to say, he’s beaten in a way that lines up with all unsatisfactory 80s video game endings. 

Final Thoughts & Score: I definitely don’t hate Russell Van Pelt, but I think that he ultimately fails to even come close to recapturing the magic the original Van Pelt had. This is despite of, amusingly enough, having just about everything the original lacked: he has a backstory, he has intriguing powers, and he looks genuinely intimidating. The problem is that nothing is done with him and his motivations aren’t explained at all, and he ultimately lacks any sort of personality to try and glean some entertainment from.

It stings all the more because he utilizes one of my favorite tropes: The Worm That Walks. Essentially this trope is when a character is, in actuality, a mass of worms, bugs, or whatever other creepy critters you might want in there. Oogie Boogie is one of cinema’s shining examples of such a villain, and something of the gold standard; these sorts of villains are fun and creepy when utilized correctly. As you might of guessed, with Van Pelt... they don’t. It’s kind of just there to add to his creep factor and doesn’t much come into play very often. When he does utilize this strange power to store animals inside himself and add them to his hive mind, it’s suitably disturbing and eerie, but it’s not a major focus.

Still, I don’t think I’d give him more than a 4/10. Yes, he is a generic doomsday villain, but at least in this instance there’s actually a legitimate in-story justification for that. And even if they don’t use it to its full effect, I do think that his powers are really cool and the backstory he has is pretty neat. I think I would have preferred if they just tossed aside the backstory stuff and go for the more psychological approach of the original, but I guess that wasn’t exactly in the cards. Ah well, you can’t win them all I suppose.

[migleefulmoments]

Debunking The ccResponse to my Proof post

CC Nonsense is so easy to debunk.  

This is their response to me calling them out for using manips as “proof” that cc was and is real.  

A group of grown adult women thought THIS was irrefutable and such good evidence that it was a perfect response to shut me down. In fact, they comment about the fun they are having several times.  I’m dumbfounded honestly by the ridiculous things they hold up as proof.   It’s so stupid.

ajw720

gifs found here (x)

flowersintheattic254

And it’s D who is the one looking blissfully happy. He mirrors C’s movements so much here and his expression is someone who is

BESOTTED

C is the focus of that. This exists and can’t be explained away.

Let’s start with my debunk post from yesterday. If you haven’t read it you can read it (X). Essentially, what we learned is that this photo 

which is one of their most treasured “proof” pics is a manip. 

It is super long so under a cut

I have no idea why Abby came back at me with the specific gif set above and this photo because they still prove nothing. Both men are known for being funny in interviews and that is exactly what is happening here but slow it down, clip out a 1-2 second piece, loop it in a gif and suddenly the moment because so much more than it ever was. Watch the entire video and the moment isn’t special at all. Chris always answers to get a laugh-hence “oh God” and “I was scared shitless”. I don’t know why being scared shitless during his first sex scene is proof of cc. Cory spoke about being terrified as well. Darren’s response is very serious-100% theater major. He gives a long answer, thoughtful answer and then turns on the charm at the end, going for a laugh to break the tension.  He leans forward Chris for less than a second as you can see from my screen grabs all taken at 3:17

and says “what do you think Chris?” The intimacy- and Flower’s “BESOTTED” moment- that the cc fandom has long romanticized in this interview is simply not there when you watch the video played at regular speed and in real time.  

Darren isn’t mirroring Chris’s movements- in fact he is quite serious when answering the question and he doesn’t seem to be all that aware of Chris beside him until he gets to the end of the question. As you can see in my screen grabs above, he doesn’t  look blissfully happy or besotted until the last two screen grab when he purposefully makes a cheesy smile at Chris and says “what you think Chris?”.  That was 1/2 a second in real time. The cc fandom and @flowersintheattic254 have spent 4 years purposefully NOT watching the video, instead realying   entirely on a manip and a handful of gifs along with their fabricated  version of what is going on on stage. They are literally gaslighting themselves.  

leka-1998

Hahahaha

They want to believe this is darren - I can’t help them. But if THIS is your proof, you are in sad shape.  Especially when you are putting that against 

You have a headless photo taken 6 years ago as your only non-Glee proof. That is pretty sad. Can you imagine a prosecutor taking that to court. “Yes, your honor, this photo of a tiny part of a man’s chin, his head cut out of frame and most of his body obscured by a cat is my proof that Chris and Darren are in a relationship”. Abby should know that this is proof of absolutely nothing. In fact, if you would listen to Chris with your ears instead of your eyes- you would know this is Will: Chris has confirmed Will is his boyfriend in several interviews.  Holding this photographed chin portion up to Will’s chin, it is easy to see that it could be him. That along with Chris acknowledging Will is his boyfriend and the many photos we have of them going about their lives as a couple, his outright denial of any romantic relationship with Darren and the fact that Darren identifies as straight, the evidence adds up to it being Will in the photo.  

I know you want it to be Darren, but assessing evidence isn’t about what you want to find, it is about looking objectively at the evidence and putting it all together in context.  You can’t take an isolated moment, slowed down and gif’d to within an inch of it’s life and call that proof.  

Evidence that supports Will as Chris’s boyfriend-  Will attended Hannah’s graduation and was with Chris for his mom’s funeral whereas Darren was seen eating lunch with friends in LA.  

Photos where they do boyfriend things. 

All of the credible evidence leads to the photo is Will. You claiming it is Darren simply because you desperately want it to be isn’t “credible evidence”, it’s simply the foolish, baseless claims of a few strangers who believe their fantasy is more important than the reality of the people involved.  In order to believe it is Darren, you have to dismiss all the overwhelming credible evidence that says it is Will.

Also real 

I have NO idea why these are considered “also real”. They are both gifs cut from videos produced for Glee Promotion. These were filmed as part of Chris and Darren’s job responsibilities. Chris actually refused to do The Wedding interview and had to be forced to do it. 

I have no idea how you can listen to The Wedding interview. and come away feeling like it was cc positive. It is an indication of how deluded you are and how bad you are at HEARING with your ears. In fact, you once again are “listening with your eyes” by screen capping it to turn it into a gif so you can fixate on 1/2 a second of content and pretend it represents the entire interview. When I first saw the interview, I was stunned at how anti-cc the it was. The entire interview is about how bad overzealous Kragen fans are-”the crazies” and how neither man wants to get your attention so they just stay off social media. 

This is a gif of Darren cracking up is when Chris suggests future-Kurt should be played by Marcia Gay Harden. It’s really funny and Darren laughs-so what? The video is supposed to fun- he’s doing his job. 

Here we have Chris’s closed off- his arms wrapped tightly around himself to protect himself. Darren might be boisterly laughing but Chris isn’t.  He’s barely giving anything. But regardless of what is really being shown here- - these videos were filmed 5 or 6 years ago as part of Chris and Darren’s work...what the hell do they prove related to cc? Absolutely nothing. They prove that both men did the job they were paid to do. They also prove you guys insist on using gifs to prove your fantasy because they are the best way to manipulate reality into showing what you want to see.   

Look at Naya cracking up at Darren, does this prove she loves him? NO, of course not- just like Darren laughing in a PR video he was paid to make doesn't’ prove he loves Chris. 

Watch the unaltered video for a real perspective. 

ajw720

@leka-1998 Apparently she is CONVINCED too much love, and all of the other headless images on C’s IG are just the PA.  Apparently C just likes to cut off his head for shits and giggles!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am having way too much fun with this.(Me too, it’s fun explaining “credible evidence” to a lawyer who doesn’t understand it. When are you going to provide evidence that isn’t simple to discredit? I keep waiting for this to get harder but so far it’s utter nonsense.) 

Umm...”all the other headless images” aren’t there like 2 other headless images? No, I don’t think Chris cuts them off for “shits and giggles”, I think he cuts them off because cc assholes come on his social media and terrorize him when he posts Will’s face- especially back during Glee days- so he tamed it down so you hags would not bother him.  This isn’t rocket science here, it’s pretty simple. If you listen to Chris- of course you don’t-but if you did, you would see that your “proof” doesn’t align with what Chris says. Instead you “listen with your eyes” and disregard his pleas to stop shipping him with Darren. 

All of your evidence is in the form of a screen grab or a gif, have you ever wondered why that is? Has it ever occurred to you that none of your evidence comes from Chris or Darren’s mouth? In fact, you go to great lengths to prove what they say is not what they mean. It’s a sick game you play, but I suppose you know that which is why the “#1 rule of fandom is DO NOT involve the players”   

cc-still-going-strong

I will admit it is all history if they can give me ONE photo he looks at her like

THIS

Again, so weird that you used more Klaine screen caps as your evidence. It’s like you don’t understand that Klaine is different from Chris and Darren. 

I have no clue why you think these are excellent examples of anything but get ready to admit it is all history, my friend. Your photos are literally screen grabs from PR videos, smh.  I posted a bunch of responses to this challenge- you can see them: besotted (X), kisses (X), Wedding (X), Reception (X), Random (X), Video 1 (X), 2 (X), 3 (X) 4(X) Romantic 1 (X), 2

Some of the photos I included: 

THIS is a photo of a BESOTTED Couple!!!!!

This is also a photo of Darren BESOTTED.

flowersintheattic254 I want to play some more!!!!!! (OH Me Too, THIS IS TOO EASY) Can Michy rewrite D adding C to his lines on C’s birthday. Was that dubbed Michy and created by us.

I’ve never understood why you believe this joke is proof of cc? It’s a hilarious joke, but it’s really benign and certainly not indicative that they are lovers. They are former coworkers and this was right after Glee ended, so the joke is funny and timely. Today the joke would probably fall flat except within the fandom. Here you are again LiSTENING WITH YOUR EYES as you refuse to acknowledge both that Chris had named Will as his boyfriend and Darren had named Mia by the time this joke was told.  Now, 4 years later Darren is married to Mia so IDK why this is still so exciting for you guys.  Please explain to me why you believe this joke is proof of riot material...why is it something to get excited about other than it’s clever and funny? Again you have to take it out of context of all other evidence about their personal lives, ignore their outright denials they are couple, ignore Darren’s claims he is straight, believe he is lying every time he speaks about his sexuality, fabricate an entire backstory to the joke and believe it is as wink wink nod nod to fandom that they are a couple. It’s just a joke- the whole show was full of them.   To me, your delight with this has always reeked of desperation...and don’t kid yourself, after Darren told this joke every night, he went home with Mia. 

Or maybe some more glee panel. Look at D here.

Or shock horror, which bastard manipulated their legs to look like they were together?!!😮

I love BTS pics that show how close and relaxed they are with each other Michy.

He’s laughing at a joke here...I don’t get your delight. Again- believing this is special requires you to disregard everything Darren and Chris have said about their lives and to belief this one old gif supercedes the thousands of photos we have seen that disprove cc is viable. But even if you weren’t sure back when this gif was new, now we know that Darren is married to Mia and Chris has published Will’s face on his social media many times. In light of new information, your original theories about what these gifs show have been proven wrong and you need to amend your theories. Or at least that is what a reasonable, intelligent person who cares about the truth would do. History would indicate that you are incapable of amending your theories when new information comes to light and that you only care about your fantasy- the truth is inconsequential to you. History also indicates your “proof” is always taken as an isolated event because each time you are forced to ignore the mountain of evidence that disproves your theory. 

Yes, they are absolutely standing right next to one another but so what? This pic doesn’t prove they are in a relationship. If being next to some proves a relationship then Abby get married every time she rides the subway. They are coworkers on set- getting ready to film a scene together. This is a shot of their legs taken when they were standing around Zac getting directions when they first arrived. Once again, you manipulated a photo to make it look like something it isn’t.  But that is always how you “prove” cc is real- you lie and manipulate.  Darren hasn’t even been in hair and make-up yet, this very early in the day. 

ajw720

@flowersintheattic254 the h/edwig joke has been caught on video, but ofc, obviously we fucked with the audio. 

Nobody thinks you fucked with the audio you twit. Reasonable adults simply don’t think a benign joke told on stage is scandalous or indicates they are lovers. 

Just adding a few more special, genuine moments of D absolutely adoring his man, i mean co-worker he hates  

I have never said they hate each other so you need to get someone else to debunk that. In fact, I don’t think I have ever heard anyone except the cc fandom claim they hate one another.  It’s part of only seeing “always” and “never”. 

According to the cc lexicon- Chris and Darren are married or at least live together and have for several years and Darren is under an onerous contract that forbids him from letting the world know he is gay AND that he is in love with Chris Colfer. In fact they are forbidden from interacting in public and their characters were broken up in season 4 in order to break them up in real life.  So you are suggesting that Darren is sooooooo in love that he just cannot stop staring at the man he lives with for the 4 minutes he is on stage with all eyes on them even though he could lose everything under the contract? Cuz that seems like a shitload of risk for simply looking at Chris in a crowded room. According to your logic, Jenna is staring at Darren. I have no clue what he is looking at. He is certainly looking in Chris’s direction but given all the information we have- Darren was dating Mia-now he is married to her, Chris was living with Will-still is, Chris and Darren haven’t spoken in 4 years at least cubically  and they both denied they were a couple many times, I can say that the evidence does not support your claim that he is looking lovingly at Chris because they are passionate lovers and he just can’t help himself. I just posted a bunch of pics of Darren looking very lovingly at Mia while also holding her close and smiling- your 2-second gif vs all the evidence proving he is in a real relationship- married- with Mia- it doesn’t come close to comparing.  Google “Darren Criss and Mia Swier” and scroll for an hour- you see thousands of photos of them looking very much like a loving couple. Your handful of 4-9 year old gifs are pitiful and don’t prove anything except Chris and Darren were coworkers on a TV show where they played boyfriends.     

I’m not going to waste my time debunking these. They are literally the same as the above gifs- ALL onset Glee-in fact the top two are from more Glee promo videos in the same vein as the ones above. Still -they prove nothing.  

And of course the time C looked at D look he was the entire world

Again a slowed down gif from set. Do you see the patten of manipulation here? I wouldn’t say he looked at him like he was the entire world, It looks ot me like Chris looks up at him as Darren speaks to him and then he looks down. You slowed it down to make it more dramatic. It’s a very effective technique to change the mood- TV shows and movies do it all the time.  

But yep all we have is a few IG likes, that is correct Michy, that is all we got. 

I honestly have NO clue what you are insinuating here.  

Aw remember all those behind the scenes of them having fun together too. Guess these never happened either Michy.

Oh we are back to your favorite Bryant Park. They are coworkers killing time on. set. I don’t know why you believe this is so interesting. Yes, they are really cute but Newsflash: coworkers can have fun and joke around together and not be lovers. They had to kill hours before filming started. In fact they had to kill a lot of hours that day. They were on set for 11 hours and filmed a tiny fraction of that time. Once again, you have to take this out of context of all the other CREDIBLE evidence of Miarren and Chill, as well as both men denying a relationship and Darren is straight in order to believe this is something exciting.  

You showed me 1 pic that wasn’t on set. That should tell you everything. Honestly, I know you fully believe your own nonsense and you can���t understand how everyone else isn’t buying into it. But really, I should just respond to this with LOLOLOLOLOL because your evidence is so pathetic and absurd it is laughable. How a grown women can believe that a handful of 4-9 year old gifs representing 1 or 2 second taken from promo videos made for Glee-all slowed down for dramatic effect- can add up to solid proof of a secret relationship is mind boggling.  But it’s even worse because you are a lawyer -you know that evidence isn’t something taken out of context. You know that evidence is looked in its entirety and that includes what Darren and Chris testify about their own relationships.    

ajw720

remember that time D called C the life of the party on National TV?  

Remember the time Darren was asked “Do you take Mia to be your lawfully wedded wife, to love, honor and cherish til death do you part” and he said “I Do” ? That trumps your “life of the party” comment. Why do you think calling a coworker “the life of the party” is indicates love? He also said “I’m straight” and that he wasn’t in a relationships with Chris- but you discount that because you don’t want to hear it -even though he has repeated those comments many times. Nope this is about you latching on to anything you can. It’s really embarrassing       

Chris may be the life of the party but he said this about Mia on TV- to a much bigger audience :  

I know you do not understand symbolism and you insist on taking this beautiful sentiment literally-and tying it back to Cunanan- so it makes no sense to you, but it is incredibly romantic. It’s a very beautiful, loving  sentiment for one’s life partner.

@ajw720, @flowersintheattic254, @leka-1998

[shaxori-fiendline-posts]

Blackbox Theater in Gehenna

Ahem.  I haven’t done this in a while so, bear with me.  No, really, Bear, *grabs shirt hem*  I want to wander for a bit.  Take a walk with me down the tangents for a bit.  So, I’ve been working on my book.  My weird way of trying to put myself out there while exercising my mind and imagination again after being stuck in between real life in Malsheem and the inside of my head in Gehenna.  Trying to come up with a way I can dress up real life in order to understand what’s going on in a world where anything can happen.  I’m trying to make heads or tales of the patterns I think I see in the world around me.  Everything starts with a question.  And the question drops like a stone into the Astral Sea, sending out ripples of effect in everything.  But I can’t see all of the angles to understand where each ripple originated by myself.  I try, but when I do I feel like there’s always two sides of my personality warring for control over everything.  So, since you’re not only my singular follower on here besides a bot, you’re also the most science brained individual I know that is still willing to pat me on the head and say, “ok, I’ll suspend my disbelief in anything unexplainable by science and just believe for a little bit.”

So, here’s the question that started this particular tangent.  I’ve been trying to figure out how to use Lilly as an avatar to help me get my thoughts in line.  99.9% of this writing has been me reverse engineering my friends’ personalities into fictional characters that respond as they might have if we were role-playing the characters I created for them.  Jareth is a character, for example, that was once played by my buddy, Jimmy.  His explanation for Old Ones was nearly a direct quote as to how he described it to me when I was trying to get a handle on Lilly’s crazy.  I could have kissed him.  As soon as he explained it, something clicked in my head as I was trying to explain why Lilly is so fucked up.  Well, I thought I could keep that one locked up for a while and try to build up to it more, but I just can’t.  It feels like taking three steps backward in the writing when I do.  But it started raising more questions in my head, and I’ve never been good at juggling.  Questions started dropping out from between my fingers, sending out so many questions, I couldn’t keep up.  It’s gotten to the point as I’m trying to figure out how to tie off loose ends from earlier chapters without cheesing it (because I’ll fucking forget where I buried the leads and get lost in the fucking minefields again) that both Lilly and I are about to say fuck it, I’m going back to working in the toil and we’re going to do everything possible to forget we ever peeked at the last few pages of the book.  We spoiled the ending for ourselves and now we are in a constant state of hurry up and wait.  And we’re tired.  She’s pissed, I’m just defeated.  No, that’s not the right word.  Done.  Yeah.  Thankfully, Lilly is the part of my brain that never stops moving.  She’s constantly wandering down through the halls of the Library, (which looks like an MC Esher nightmare, BTW) pulling down boxes and picking through them to try and find all of the pieces of the puzzle to finally get out of my head.  And you know what happens when I start to hyper-focus of the pieces instead of looking at how they fit together.  Wooo Shiney happens entirely too much.  So, when I say I’m done, it’s not the depression talking, it’s the apathy warring with my reasonability.  When I say I’m done, I’m mean I’m done giving a shit.  I’m done trying to put my life on display in such a way that I can’t tell what tone of voice to read it in.  I can’t figure out who it is that I’m talking to.  I don’t know who is going to read it which is why I pinpointed a person that doesn’t exist in this world. Normally, I would try to motivate myself by saying “maybe.”  But, I’ve always known, just like every kid does, that “maybe” is really “no” in disguise.  Unless you get a solid yes and/or proof of validity, anything else is a “no”.  You get used to hearing all of the variations of “no” to the point where you expect it from everyone and when you do hear “yes” you immediately question the person’s level of trustworthiness.  Are they just fucking with me and, if they are, what are they getting out of it?  “You.  You want to be my friend?  Wait, why?  I’m a horrible individual.  I’m an asshole.  I’m actually proud of the fact that I really could give a shit about the vast majority of the population.  All I care about is me and mine.”  But my problem is I can’t stop adopting strays.  I try to put myself out there to draw in others like me and find the good ones to keep.  That’s why Jareth/Jimmy keeps lecturing me about my accidental families.  And then I look at the nest of weirdos I’ve created and, well, you’re married to one of them, you know what I’m talking about.  Like, I love them all, but they make my brain hurt sometimes.  “Yes, kids, I love you, now go play in the corner, Mommy has a lot of shit do and I’m starting to understand while some species of animals eat their young.”  I’m so thankful nature decided to take my ability to procreate without fertility treatments.  I have enough deviants to keep me amused, I do not need children.  At least with mine, I can hand them a pair of scissors and not have to wor... nevermind, I take that back.  I can feel the bullshit cough from here.  My point is, I’m a tech, I can wrangle the clowns and fix their chainsaws, but I do not have the energy to keep the rest of the circus in order at the same time.  The rest of the show has to fall to someone else.  That’s why I’m using D&D as a set for the stage.  When I try to build the world from scratch on my own, I have to try and make it unique enough to showcase my skills at descriptions, but I get lost in the descriptions and forget that I have to make sure the characters stay on track with the story through their interactions.  Using D&D gives me a static resource set to get a mental image of the world in which Lilly lives.  With the set already built, I can put down the tech belt and go run with the clowns to burn off some excess energy.  But I have to make sure Lilly is rounded out well enough not overwhelm the party.  Unfortunately, since the story is inspired by real life events and thought processes (somewhat, it’s D&D for fuck’s sake) I’ve reached the point where I’m going to have to do META ass shit in order to get past Act One.  After that, in real life, I have to find some source of income that doesn’t involve donating plasma to pay my cell phone.  I want to write.  I want to be creative.  I have a million and one ideas on things I could try, but I also know that I have to get out of Malsheem if I’m ever going to get to the Feywild for real.  And that takes coin because I have yet to figure out portal tech as a practical application.  That’s on the shelf marked “the geometry is wrong” in the “don’t go in there, it’s weird” section of the Library.  I need an adult to go in there.  I just scared myself in two different ways thinking about going in there alone, the first was the atmospheric drop in temperature and the second was the sudden realization that I tend to be smart enough to know better, but too dumb to quit.  I will open some box or book and, yeah.  I’m not allowed in there without supervision.  Ok, that started a ripple of potential hypnotherapy sessions.  Provided I could find someone actually capable of hypnotizing me. Anyway.  That’s right, the point.  Lilly is supposed to be my character, my way of telling my story through the filter of fantasy so I can make sense of it all. And I can’t stay stuck at my desk anymore, hoping and praying that’ll I’ll do something right this time.  So, I’m going to make sure she’s at a playable level and do some pick-up games with her when I can get time to myself to be able to play between working at a *shudders* normal job long enough to clean up my credit and get a place of my own somewhere.  Then, I’ll be able to reassess the situation without the continuous irritation of Dopple-Mom interruptions.  If I have to go back to the call-centers, I might be able to power through it like I did before.  I’m just going to have to watch out for the traps I fell into last time. But I’ll have to put the book on hiatus until I’m in a place of my own and can relax when I get off work enough to be able to think freely.  It won’t really gather any readers or foot-traffic on Royal Road while I’m working, but I’m ok with that.  It takes away the pressure of trying to build an audience while the book is still being written.  Granted, that would make it easier to transfer into an actual novel format once it’s completed and have a market waiting for release so I *can* write for a living.  But, hope in one hand and shit in the other, all you get is pink-eye.  I can’t control who sees my stuff.  I can’t control its reception or the opinions thereof that dictate word of mouth marketing.  When your success in a field is dependent on the reviews of your work by the general public, sometimes it’s better to just stop giving a fuck.  I’m not going to try and build an audience ahead of time anymore.  I’m just going to write and release chapters until I have to hit the hiatus button.  If the story dies because I can’t find the time or the motivation to write, it’ll just be added to the failed attempts pile.  Not the first, not the last.  Smart enough to know better, too dumb to quit, remember?  I’ll try again at some other point to write a story worth sharing.  It just won’t be inspired by real life.  Just straight fantasy so I have a place in my head I can visit that’s nice to hang out in for a change.

[jswdmb1]

Put the Message in the Box

“Put the message in the box

Put the box into the car

Drive the car around the world

Until you get heard”

- World Party

Yes, I have enjoyed my break, thanks for asking, but it’s time to get back to work.  While I was off, I had plenty of time to read through all of the wonderful questions you sent.  Well, actually, it was only one.  But, given my difficulties sometimes grasping with reality, I couldn’t be sure if it was the only one I got, or if there were more just coming from my head.  Turns out, I was mixing up the voices in my head with the radio.  So, to avoid any confusion, I’ve included all of them here in my version of (bow to David Letterman) viewer mail.  Here we go:

“Astrology. Do you believe there is something to it? I mean like real astrology - like Ptolemy, Cassini, and Nostradamus practiced - not the one-size-fits-all horoscope you find in the newspaper.” - anonymous

Great question.  I definitely agree that these silly newspaper horoscopes are a waste of time, but the notion that the stars and planets somehow dictate what happens to us here on Earth is not something that I dismiss.  The problem I have is how could anyone possibly figure that out.  I am a very analytical person, and I just can’t believe someone like Nostradamus could have had the tools and data available to him at that point in time to make any sort of informed conclusions.  Frankly, I think he was just throwing a lot of shit up against the wall and just seeing what sticks.  That being said, the vastness and grandeur of our universe certainly suggest that there are forces out there that could have a significant impact on our lives. Unfortunately, I’m a bit too cynical and/or agnostic to believe that anyone will ever be able to prove that, in my lifetime anyway.  I guess that relegates me back to the astrology section in the newspaper, but I pass right by it to the crossword puzzle anyway, so I guess I’ll just have to keep finding things out one day at a time for now.  But, I’m open to any foresight that can be given to me, with proof of course.

“What’s going on?” - Marvin G., Detroit, Michigan

Gee, Marvin, where do I begin?  It seems if you even take a couple of days off there is “shocking” news that has already been replaced with something even more unbelievable.  I think, however, that this most recent story of a certain lawyer who worked for a certain boss who made him pay certain porn stars and committed a bunch of laws in the process is going to stick.  I think what everyone has to remember, including our president, is that impeachment is a political process and not a legal one.  Whether he can be indicted for a crime, or even if one exists that can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt is irrelevant.  If the legislative branch feels from a political standpoint that the president needs to be removed due to his actions (or inaction) then they must proceed with impeachment proceedings.  If you look at impeachment processes in history, notably Andrew Johnson, Bill Clinton, and even Richard Nixon, what got them in trouble pales in comparison to what this guy looks to have done.  I happen to think that means this is going to be going on for a long time and well into the 2020 election cycle.  No matter which side you are on, this is going to be political theater at its highest level, so enjoy it if you are into that thing.

“Can you get to that?” - Mavis S., Chicago, Illinois

Personally speaking, Mavis, I can definitely get to impeachment proceedings commencing at some point in the next six-to-twelve months.  The question is where do they go once they start and do they ever leave the committee level?  Even if they do, it seems unlikely to me that things could move fast enough to the House voting for impeachment by the 2020 primaries.  Furthermore, a Senate trial with a conviction appears even further far-fetched given eighteen Republican senators would have to flip on their sitting president (remember that a 2/3 majority is needed to convict).  I’m actually okay with that scenario playing out as it allows a lot of probing and debate that hasn’t happened in the past two years and gives the voters in the next election much better information than they had last time.  I also think that it gives other Republicans cover to challenge a sitting president in the primaries, which hasn’t happened seriously since Ted Kennedy took on Jimmy Carter in 1980.  My prediction is that impeachment never really gets off the ground, but it damages Trump so badly that he never makes it out of his party’s primaries.  Of course, this could all change tomorrow with the next bombshell that drops, but for now that’s what I see happening.

“What’s the frequency, Kenneth?” - Michael S., Athens, Georgia

Thanks for the note, Michael.  The name’s Jim, actually.  Anyway, if you happen to be driving through the Chicago area, I’ll recommend two frequencies for you to try on your FM dial.  The first, of course, is 93.1 or WXRT.  It is the last true FM rock station left in Chicago that plays everything from blues to classic rock to 80′s new wave to 90′s grunge up to new music from today and everything in between.  The DJ’s are knowledgeable and stay out of the way of the music.  My favorite is Terri Hemmert on weekday mornings from 10:00 to 1:00.  Saturday mornings are also a can’t miss with the three-hour flashback show to a particular year in rock.  The other frequency to try is 88.7.  This one is fun because in the city it will be Loyola University’s WLUW, but as you drive out west (around Harlem on the Ike) it turns into Elmhurst College’s WRSE.  WLUW is the quirkier of the two as you may find an obscure Icelandic electronica song played right after Glen Campbell’s “Southern Nights”.  Nothing wrong with either song, but it helps to be in college and on drugs to enjoy those so close together and I am not in or on either.  As such, I’m more partial to WRSE as they focus on rock variety with the occasional surprise thrown in.  They actually remind me a lot of an amateur version of XRT in many ways.  Whichever you listen to, it’s fun to hear college kids learning their way and it makes me feel just a little hip that they let me tune in.

“How bad do you want it?” - Don H., Linden, Texas

You have no idea how bad I want it Mr. H.  We’ve been waiting over thirty years in this town for a football team with a real shot at winning the Super Bowl, and I think we have one here.  This defense is that good.  Plus, as well as the D played against the Rams, I thought seeing the running game going well was a really good sign.  We’ll still need Mitch to get it back after hurting his shoulder, but I don’t think the Bears have to ride his arm to the Super Bowl.  Now, to get there, they are going to have to win two road games, probably in New Orleans and L.A., but I really think they would have an outside chance at a run if the momentum carries from last week.  If they do get to the Super Bowl, I predict they dominate any team that represents the AFC as I think they are better than them all (including the Chiefs and the Pats who they should have beat a few weeks ago).  The best thing about this team is that they have a ton of young talent that still has a lot of upside, so even if a Super Bowl isn’t in the cards this year, the Bears are a team to be reckoned with for a while in the NFC.   But, first let’s take care of business and win the NFC North title at home over the Packers.  After so many years of misery, I can’t think of a better way for this team to make a statement that it is back and the rest of the league will be messing with them at their own peril for years to come.

“Who are you?” - Pete T., London, England

I get it, Pete, I know that I have no authority to really speak on any of these subjects, but I can’t help myself.  I just love to answer questions and was very grateful for the one question that came to me from a blog reader.  I also think I have done a service by answering some of these additional questions that you all have been singing about for years.  I mean, as far as I know, there never have been any real responses to questions like yours.  I know there are a lot more out there too, so I’m happy to do it again.  I will, so long as I can get some blog reader questions to go along with them.  You know, just so people don’t think I’m completely insane. So, Take a Chance and Read Some Crap readers, hit that question button and keep this going as I’m sure Bob M. (Could You Be Loved?), George H. (What is Life?), and Whitney H. (How Will I Know?) would love answers to their questions too.  Until then, I hope at least some of these answers have satisfied your nagging questions, but the job is never complete.  I think the tide has finally turned for the question and 2019 is going to be full of them.  It may get uncomfortable at times, and maybe even downright nasty, but that is part of life and we are never going to evolve without continuing to challenge those with power and always asking why.

It’s good to be back everyone.  Until next time.

- Jim

[everlarkingjoshifer]

Trump signed an executive order to abolish what he did....

I don’t normally come in here to post long political pieces. However, after the disgusting comments that I’ve read on social media as Democrats held a press conference to speak about children being ripped apart from their parents at the border, is more than I can take. So, because I am pretty fucking annoyed with all the baseless accusations, and major misinformation I would like to dispel erroneous conclusions along with the comments I have been seeing on social media.

Immigrants are taking our jobs!

No Becky, they’re not. Immigrants are bringing in jobs and taking the low wage, often dangerous and non-union jobs that YOU don’t want to take. How about you go pick those strawberries in the blazing heat for as little as 6$ an hour, doesn’t sound very appealing right? So if it’s not good enough for you because you want a cushy job, what makes you think Immigrants want to do it too? They don’t, but they’re so desperate to make a living that they’re willing to do anything so long as they can provide a better future for their own families, something you can easily understand. As a matter of fact, while you enjoy your burrito know that none of it would be possible if it wasn’t for an immigrant who brought in their culture and food to enrich our country. Yeah, that big old Mexican franchised fast food joint? Would not have existed for your high school kids to work at, so while your sitting on your ass enjoying someone else’s culture, know that none of it 

would be possible without an immigrant.

Immigrants are taking our resources and our taxes pay for them to live here!

 Noooo, Immigrant individuals cannot ever receive federal based help such as SSI. They can’t even get health insurance. Some states do hand out some help to aid immigrants but it would only be something as small as being able to use the WIC program which is very limited. (I’ve used it when I had just given birth). As a matter of fact, white citizens are amongst the highest percentage who receive federal assistance and immigrant people pay INTO our social security and taxes without hope of ever getting that money back. If you want to talk about needlessly spending your money on immigrants then you should definitely be against the barbaric procedures that are happening right the hell now. There are companies profiting from your taxpayer money in order to house children that didn’t need to be housed in the first place. It’s all a big scam and those 1 % who don’t really need the money are making millions that you’re paying into JUST because you want to be a paranoid idiot. It’s a pretty simple concept actually, it’s called security theater. Except this theater is of the Third Reich.

They’re bringing in disease!

See, now you just sound like a Nazi, and come on, we’re not exactly one to speak about diseases when you’re refusing to vaccinate your fucking kid because of “big pharma, unfounded conspiracies, and autism”. Cry me a fucking river, Shania. The whole notion of disease comes out of fear of the unknown but we cannot throw a stone at someone else knowing we do the same. We won’t vaccinate and now measles, chicken pox, whooping cough, and many other diseases are on the rise because you’d rather let your kid die than have autism, which by the way has been dispelled at every turn by various scientists.

Obama/ Bush administration were the ones who implemented the law of child separation. 

Oh Brandon, you xenophobic dick. First of all the Obama and Bush administration NEVER placed an order of removal between the parents and their children. What is true is that there is no law saying these current atrocities have to be carried out. Crossing the border illegally is a misdemeanor that can get you jailed for up to 20 days or so and then you’re automatically sent to your country of origin. The immigrant parents who are caught with their children are never separated from them and there are no real lasting repercussions. If I was to take your reasoning into account then that would mean people who have had a DUI, or those who have been arrested for public disturbance should have their children taken away as well? Secondly, when the Obama administration implemented certain facilities to house kids it was due to an immense influx of unaccompanied minors who were immigrating to the USA by their damn selves. Most, of these children, were from Central America and were not deemed a threat to the nation after very careful vetting. These kids ranged between the ages of 12-17 years old and they were TEMPORARILY housed or often placed in foster homes with other immigrant adults till the Government could get a hold of their parent. Of course, everything wasn’t always handled perfectly as there were a ton of problems because sometimes the foster parents would refuse to answer their phones to various federally appointed counselors or even gave the Government the wrong information. Some of the facilities in which the children were housed were not as top notch as we expected and there were abuses happening at the time. But by that point, the children were really alone. They didn’t come in with their parents to protect them and sadly things didn’t always go the right way. The few kids who were separated from the adult were either trafficked here or were in deep danger of those adults that surrounded them

They should come here legally if they want to enter the country!

Kathy, you sad simpleton. Looking for Asylum is not against the law. Actually, the ports of entry for refugees are being blocked by ICE agents to deter them from reaching the United States legally. Usually, when an immigrant came to the port of entry looking for asylum they would have to bring proof which then they would be taken to a holding facility where their case was carefully reviewed and then after about a month or so they would either be allowed to stay or leave depending on the severity of their situation. Now, Looking for a way to come to the united states legally especially in countries that are extremely corrupt is very difficult. I myself applied for a visa in order to come to the united states twice and both times it was denied even though I was a 4-year-old child who was about to die of a severe heart condition. If it hadn’t been for a charitable company that had put their name behind me and petitioned for me to travel I would never have even set a foot in the United States and I would never be able to write this because I’d be dead by now. That’s how difficult everything is. The immigration system is so broken and instead of looking for a solution you shining citizens can only proclaim your distaste for a president that hasn’t been in office for over 2 years. Obama, Bush, or Clinton are no longer running the country. Take responsibility for the mistakes YOUR amoral president is making.

But MS-13! 

Ms-13 is a Mexican terrorist group that has been used as a cop out to paint innocent people who are Latino and Hispanic in an unflattering light. Gang members don’t really want to come here, their profit is not here. They are already immensely powerful in Mexico, why leave if things are good for them? It makes no sense and if again I were to take your reasoning into consideration I would say that other countries should never allow an American entry because they could be from the KKK. What makes sense is to have a racist, xenophobic, sexist president using something like gang violence in order to disenfranchise a group of people who don’t match his ideas for the perfect immigrant. Case in point, he very clearly said he would like Europeans (meaning Caucasians) to immigrate here (They wouldn’t. Europe is not perfect but at least it has universal health care among other things.) Mexicans, meaning all Latino because that how you all like to categorize us not realizing that Latinos are very diverse but those of us who are brown in complexion are rapists, killers, we’re infesting the country, we’re bringing disease, we’re animals among other ludicrous things Trump has said about the Latino community and for the record, not all immigrants are Mexican. Most at this point are from Central America. It's the same as not all Asians are Chinese, not all black people are thugs and not all white men who wear penny loafers are entitled pricks who call on their daddies to fix their problems. You see how stereotypes work? Those of you who applaud him while desecrating the flag by wearing it as a shirt or bandana and eating off of flag emblazoned paper plates like to think you’re somehow better and patriotic because you won the lottery by being born here. It’s as simple as that and if you want the immigrants to fix their problems back home maybe tell your government not to meddle in their democratic systems. It’s a cop-out to make yourselves feel better about the atrocities that are happening.  

Build the WALL! 

Yes Brayden, because a wall is gonna stop a bunch of plane riding immigrants to come to the United States. Newsflash, most people who end up here illegally came here legally through a visa but overstayed their welcome. Most of the people who came here otherwise, seek asylum, which is not illegal. There are actually very few people who cross the border illegally and stay here. No one wants to leave their life, culture, and language behind unless it’s absolutely necessary. The wall will stop nothing. Separating kids and now babies from their parents have not deterred the parents from continuing their long arduous trips to the United States. The wall only serves as a trophy for the GOP to pat themselves on the back and say what good little legislators they are. It’s a sign of oppression and a sign of unwelcoming. It’s as if I had a picture of Jesus in my living room but a satanic altar in the next room. It’s counterproductive and we’re the ones who are gonna pay for it. Mexico will pay for nothing even if Trump is holding these children hostages. The procedures are very eerily being carried out in much the same way the Nazi's carried out their atrocities. First, they block all potential legal ways for the marginalized group to carry out their mission legally.  Then, they used false rhetoric and fear monger civilians so that the marginalized group can be dehumanized and therefore easier for the government to carry out whatever it is they are planning without dissent. Then they sanitize the living conditions in which the immigrant group are living in. Finally, they discredit or all accounts that are cited by reputable resources in order to keep the masses confused and ignorant. It's exactly what happened when the Japanese were placed in internment camps.  

Immigrants will never assimilate to our way of life!

Say the people whose grandpappy’s and Nanas never learned English and continued to live their lives the way they did in Poland. English is not a designated American language. No language has been designated to the USA, you morons.

Immigrants should look for a way to legalize their situation.

Ok, how about you fork over $20,000 while working a minimum wage job that you can’t quit from no matter how bad it is because if you do there’s nowhere else for you to work at without breaking the Law. Immigration lawyers are some of the worst wolves in sheep’s clothing I have ever met. I spend about $10,000 just to get a green card while having nowhere else to live but at my Mother in law’s tiny ass house in the middle of the ghetto while pregnant. I slept on the floor with my husband because the place was so small we couldn’t even put a bed in there, much less afford one. When I was about to apply for citizenship my Lawyer up and left after I had paid her the money to file in the citizenship paperwork. She disappeared and I have no way of recuperating my paperwork from her. Thankfully no everything was lost but I am not an isolated incident, there are countless stories of people who have been duped by lawyers and there are more fast food joint in the USA than immigration courthouses. So you guys do the fucking math. It takes so much of you and so long for you to even reach the tip of what American citizens expect from you. 

They broke the law, therefore they should pay the consequences.

We break the law every single day Khayyley, it's not an exaggeration or even something that I'm making up. I live in Connecticut and lord do we have some ridiculous laws like, husbands who cannot kiss their wives on any Sunday. If a cyclist goes above 65 MPH they have be stopped by a police officer and we're not allowed to educate dogs. (lol, what?) Anyway, the point is we don't get citations, incarcerated or even have enforcement carried out for the most menial lawlessness so why should we punish these kids who have done nothing wrong? This used to be the country that was known for checks and balances, the country of separation of church and state. Somewhere along the way, we've lost ourselves and we've become the country of checks and cherry picking. The country that puts babies in cages and we don't allow the staff to offer any comfort. These are not "summer camps" and we shouldn't find a way to sanitize the word cage but we have gone so far off the deep end and our expectations for our leaders are so low that we may as well be licking the ground. These are kids who are screaming for their mothers and fathers who may never see them again just for committing the sin of being born brown, something that they obviously have no control over. It's a harrowing reality but their voices are falling on deaf ears as politicians use the bible to excuse their horrid laws as they smile because they're the ones all cozy with big fat paychecks provided by their citizens. We're duped into thinking that these current politicians have our best interest at heart when in actuality they don't. Just because an abusive parent says they care about you doesn't mean they actually do. The GOP is a cesspool of corrupt, self-serving, amoral group of people with Trump at the head.

 Our Lawmakers are making due with what they were handed.

How, exactly how have we been improving the country? The rich are getting richer while the poor still have to rely on governmental help that is slowly dwindling while those very same poor people have to deal with being called moochers. Our children are dying off at alarming rates because our government wants to continue catering to the NRA's demands as they go about spreading baseless lies and flimsy excuses for mass shootings. Our healthcare system is a fucking joke and we sit idly by as Men in power oppress our women because they don't want to bring a child into a world full of problems that cannot be easily fixed. We cater to our very own terrorists who use the bible in order to justify themselves and call it "freedom of speech" yet we call people color sons of bitches for simply daring to protest peacefully for the flagrant disenfranchisement of his fellow people. We slap the, what about isms and point fingers to others without realizing we're the ones putting them in those positions while simultaneously squashing the education system in order to keep future voters ignorant. Republicans can't be voted in if we have intellectuals willing to question their agendas. It's much easier to have dumb, compliant, narrow-minded morons in order for them to make that money. Can't you see what it is they're doing? They are dehumanizing these people and saying that they're all criminals and or will become criminals in the future so that the white elitists can feel alleviated of all culpability in order for them to be able to sell their soul to the administration that is quietly pocketing civilian's money. Money, that they say will go to charities but never do. It doesn't matter if these kids have television, air conditioners, or even a meal because they have been so traumatized by being ripped apart from their parents that even if they were being housed at the Ritz Carlton the practices would still be inhumane.  

But Trump signed the executive order, stop complaining already.

Wow Tammy, first of all, he didn't need to. Separating children from their parents is not a law, never has been. The separation of children who were accompanied by an adult usually happened if the child was found to have been a product of human trafficking, which by the way, has a very low percentage. Instead, the manner in which these kids are being handled now is more cause for worry because they can fall prey to actual human traffickers. Case in point, the over 1,000 children that were mysteriously lost and haven't been found yet and no one has any clue where or how they might have disappeared. It's insane for you to think that just because these kids are in these prison camps they're somehow being treated correctly. These children only see the light of day for 2 hours and the rest they spend it inside and security measures have been implemented to keep the child from escaping as if they were high-security inmates. They're being treated like prisoners and now they're being forcefully injected with psychiatric drugs in order to keep them from crying. I don't think I need to tell you about the long-term repercussions these drugs can have but I will anyway. It can cause obesity, adult onset diabetes, dizziness, listlessness, and are left incapacitated. Easy prey for any trafficker. it's callously barbaric. These kids are set up for a plethora of mental health problem that will never go away. This new executive order was unnecessary and Trump just needed to feel like a dictator because that's what he truly wants. He doesn't believe in a democracy. He values people like Stalin and Kim Jung Un and insults our allies (sorry Canada!). The paper he signed keeps families together yes, but at the cost of their freedom because they are to be kept in what I would guess to be newly built facilities that will most definitely be paid by us for an indefinite period of time as opposed to deporting them back to their countries after about 20 days. It'll be a real concentration camp and I wouldn't be surprised if gas chambers and fire pits begin to appear all over the United States and all Latino immigrants are rounded up regardless of whether they are legally here or not.

We should worry about our own citizens instead of immigrants who are only a distraction to our own problems. 

You're right up to a point. We should definitely worry about our citizens and maybe worry about our very own problems that plague our nation, yet we don't. We should be working towards implementing Gun control and worrying about human rights abuses towards people of color, but we don't. Instead, we blame those very people that are being needlessly maligned because we'd rather think it's their fault as opposed to us saying that we fucked up, that we cannot do enough to help our own people. Immigrants aren't looking to distract us from our own problems but the GOP sure is using that scapegoat in order to confuse us and turn us into megalomaniacs who claim to care for this country while rationalizing the heinous laws that this administration is implementing. Understand that just because I sympathize with the plight of immigration it doesn't negate my love or even my worries for the problems that are in my country. I love this country and I'm thankful to this country for all its wonderful opportunities. I believe we can be better and I don't think we're perfect but we're definitely capable of being great indeed. It was before and I'm sure we can be now and in the future.

   Listen, all I’m trying to really say is that the things that are happening are beyond horrible and at such an alarming speed that I am scared for the future of my country. This president is giving a pathway for all the fascists to wave their flag and complain about how they suffer at the cost of people they refuse to understand or even get to know. It's giving way for racists to be open about their disgusting assumptions by calling it honesty, and "well I'm just telling it like it is, and everyone else was thinking it, anyway". 

Just like President Snow from the Hunger Games, Trump is using children to shield himself and get what he wants. This is no longer a, “I wonder what a dystopian future would be like.” situation we are there already. This is the Handmaid’s Tale. This the Hunger Games. This is Nazi Germany, and the trail of tears coming to fruition all over again and we’re allowing it. So, come November if you do not vote blue and later regret not doing so then it will be entirely your fault that this once great country will crumble and burn to the ground with only the ashes to left as a reminder of what it once was. Our founding fathers would ashamed of us and we should too. Have a little humanity and compassion but if you're not capable of that, at least know that your stance will follow not just you but your entire lineage till the end of time just like the Nazi regime was because you are most definitely on the wrong side of history.

[daleisgreat]

Last Action Hero

Today’s entry will result in one of the quickest turnaround times of an older movie in my backlog box yet. A couple weeks ago I noticed Uproxx posted an article on how 1993’s Last Action Hero (trailer) was way ahead of its time (click or press here for the Uproxx piece). Once I noticed this story I tracked down a BluRay copy of it off Amazon and promptly watched it within 24 hours of its delivery. I did not read the Uproxx entry yet, but I will after I finish proofing this entry to prevent it from altering my current thoughts I am about to deliver and will post a little addendum at the end of this look back at Last Action Hero for some extra insight on how my take compares with Uproxx’s. I cannot remember how many times I watched Last Action Hero as a kid, but my gut tells me it may be near the double digits. Our family had the HBO and Starz movie channels as part of our cable package back then, and the way those channels primarily were programmed back then was a specific amount of newer and older movies were highlighted each month, and they would play each movie once every day or two to the best of my recollection. I remember being stoked for Last Action Hero. The turnaround time on movies from the theater back then in the early 90s was it would take about five to six months after the cinema release for a film to hit Pay-Per-View and home video. Several months later, or roughly a year after release it would hit the premium cable movie channels like HBO, Starz and Cinemax in their original form. Another year or two after that it would be available for local and basic cable channels, but usually in an edited and censored/FCC friendly format. Our family could only afford trips to the theater and video rentals so many times a year, so if we missed a movie in either of those formats and it wound up on HBO/Starz it was kind of a guilty pleasure in my childhood boredom days to pick an anticipated movie like Last Action Hero and watch it as many times as possible the first month it was available.

I have not seen it since then however when I was 11 and have not thought much about it since LAH is not as highly regarded as other Arnold Schwarzenegger classics even though it hit at the tail end of Arnold’s prime (which I consider to be from 1984’s original Terminator through 1994’s True Lies). When it hit theaters in 1993 I remember a ton of hype for it getting ubiquitous advertising and the requisite hot-summer-movie-licensed videogame and pinball table. The pinball table is part of the many licensed tables included in Pinball Arcade on PS4 which I also played a few rounds of before diving into the movie. In 1993 Arnold was the big name action star fresh off his Terminator 2 success. He also dabbled in the occasional comedy like Kindergarten Cop and Jingle All the Way. LAH marked Arnold’s first action comedy however. Schwarzenegger portrays big name action movie star ‘Jack Slater.’ Danny (Austin O’Brien) is Slater’s #1 fan on top of being a middle school film guru where he routinely cuts class to catch flicks at the local cinema where he is best friends with the old-timer projectionist there, Nick (Robert Prosky). Daniel is promised by Nick an after-hours exclusive showing of the wildly anticipated Jack Slater IV. To celebrate the special showing, Nick gives Danny a special ‘magical’ movie ticket that Nick states he got from legendary magician Houdini himself as a kid, but was too afraid to use it. Through cinema magic, the ticket activates and Danny is warped into the movie world of Jack Slater IV as his new reality when he winds up magically transported into the backseat of Slater’s ride in the middle of a cliché action movie car chase.

Danny is thrilled being immersed in an action movie world filled with the clichés and tropes of the genre that he gleefully points out and references past film lore to help Jack track down his latest bad guy. Slater has none of it and takes in Danny in for questioning. Slater’s over-the-top-gruffy captain, Dekker (Frank McRae) is impressed with Danny’s knowledge and makes him Slater’s new partner. Slater begrudgingly works together with Danny to track down Slater’s current most wanted baddie, Benedict (Charles Dance). The film unravels from there in a world jam-packed with the aforementioned clichés that Danny constantly breaks the fourth wall by showing off his action movie fandom by pointing out how all the women in this universe are hyper-sexualized, indulging Slater’s gratuitous one-liners, how Slater instantly pops up from battles unscathed and how the bad guy stereotypically monologues too long to give Slater a chance to make the heroic comeback. 11 year-old-Dale was the perfect target age for LAH when I first saw it in 1994. I experienced the filmed vicariously through Danny and I was right there with Danny for how wicked it would be to magically transport alongside your movie hero in his latest summer blockbuster and helping him bust bad guys and be in the middle of an extravagant chase scenes overstuffed with special effects. I think a big part of me held off forever re-watching this again because I dismissed LAH as a satire film over the years that I loved as a kid, but thought I thought I would outgrow over the years. After my recent re-watch however, I emerged surprised how wrong I was. Seeing it with a grown-up’s set of eyes significantly helped with a new understanding of filmmaking references and other off-color jokes that went right over my childhood head. I also got a whole new appreciation of the scene where Danny takes Slater to a video store in his universe to show him how awesome he is in Terminator 2 only to instead see in that world Sylvester Stallone landed the role.

Speaking of guest stars, the cameos are through the roof in LAH. There are some blink and you miss it surprise cameos, and then there are exponentially more in the final act where Danny takes Slater back into the ‘real’ world in time for the red carpet movie premiere of Jack Slater IV. The premiere sees the likes of Little Richard, MC Hammer, Jean Claude Van Damme and a few other recognizable celebrities of that era. Back in 1994 I was probably only lucky enough to recognize Van Damme from his role as Guile in the underappreciated Street Fighter, but reliving it again with a new set of eyes made that scene pop in a whole new way. Needless to say, Last Action Hero was a surprise delight to experience in 2020. If I had any nitpicks it is that it was not as brisk a watch as I recalled as it clocks in a little over two hours and I came out of it feeling they could have trimmed at least a good 10 minutes or so off. For as big a deal LAH was when it hit in 1993 it was a bit of a buzzkill to see the no-frills BluRay have a complete lack of extras. I would have loved all-star action movie director John McTiernan (Predator, the good Die Hard films) do a commentary track with Arnold and a few other bonus extras, but it regrettably was not meant to be. At least I have this Uproxx take I can now peruse that will have to suffice for a bonus of some degree…..

Alrighty, I just finished the Uproxx 27 years later take on LAH and we share a lot of similarities. Uproxx’s Mike Ryan thesis is that LAH was too meta and ahead of its time in 1993, but perfect for a 2020 viewing experience. I could not agree with him more, and he grinds out the little references and meta-details more eloquently than I can here, so I highly urge you all to give his editorial a perusal. One key takeaway from Ryan’s article on why Last Action Hero came and went back then was because it made the big time mistake of releasing one week after Jurassic Park. No wonder it is not brought up with other classic Arnold films over the years. I am right there with Ryan on how LAH is an absolute marvel of a film, and if it has slipped by you all these years later then now is the perfect time to watch it in these pandemic times with zero movies hitting theaters nowadays. 1993’s Last Action Hero is the ideal 2020 summer blockbuster! BONUS EXTRAS TO COMPENSATE FOR BLURAY’S ABSENCE OF ANY Click or press here to check out this awesomely through ‘Did You Know’ style breakdown of facts and backstage filming secrects from Mental Floss Here is an incredibly thorough two part oral history of LAH complete with interview excerpts from the cast and crew And I will leave you with Cinemassacre’s ‘Rental Review’ roundtable of Last Action Hero….

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs 3 12 Angry Men (1957) 12 Rounds 3: Lockdown 21 Jump Street The Accountant Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie Atari: Game Over The Avengers: Age of Ultron The Avengers: Infinity War Batman: The Dark Knight Rises Batman: The Killing Joke Batman: Mask of the Phantasm Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice Bounty Hunters Cabin in the Woods Captain America: Civil War Captain America: The First Avenger Captain America: The Winter Soldier Christmas Eve Clash of the Titans (1981) Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special The Condemned 2 Countdown Creed I & II Deck the Halls Detroit Rock City Die Hard Dredd The Eliminators The Equalizer Dirty Work Faster Fast and Furious I-VIII Field of Dreams Fight Club The Fighter For Love of the Game Good Will Hunting Gravity Grunt: The Wrestling Movie Guardians of the Galaxy Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 Hell Comes to Frogtown Hercules: Reborn Hitman I Like to Hurt People Indiana Jones 1-4 Ink The Interrogation Interstellar Jay and Silent Bob Reboot Jobs Joy Ride 1-3 Major League Man of Steel Man on the Moon Man vs Snake Marine 3-6 Merry Friggin Christmas Metallica: Some Kind of Monster Mortal Kombat Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpions Revenge National Treasure National Treasure: Book of Secrets Not for Resale Pulp Fiction The Replacements Reservoir Dogs Rocky I-VIII Running Films Part 1 Running Films Part 2 San Andreas ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery The Secret Life of Walter Mitty Shoot em Up Slacker Skyscraper Small Town Santa Steve Jobs Source Code Star Trek I-XIII Sully Take Me Home Tonight TMNT The Tooth Fairy 1 & 2 UHF Veronica Mars Vision Quest The War Wild Wonder Woman The Wrestler (2008) X-Men: Apocalypse X-Men: Days of Future Past

[weekendwarriorblog]

The Weekend Warrior Home Edition May 22, 2020 – THE TRIP TO GREECE, MILITARY WIVES, INHERITANCE, THE LOVEBIRDS

I can’t believe I’m writing this, but the “Summer That Never Was” continues this weekend, which is…. Are you seated for this next part? Memorial Day weekend!  Yeah, there will be none of the usual BBQs and block parties, but most of all, there will be none of the voracious moviegoing that signifies the pyrrhic start of the summer… that is, if you don’t count the normal first weekend of May or the actual start of summer later in June.

This was an even tougher week to write a column, because just as I was starting on it this weekend, one of my favorite filmmakers (and just a wonderful person), Lynn Shelton, died quite unexpectedly and tragically. It really shook me up, and I’m not quite sure how long it will take me for me to get unshaken. But I’m going to try to push on through the tragedy. Just bear with me, please, if this column doesn’t see the light of day until Thursday.

After a rather drab weekend with not too many new releases and fewer that I was very excited about, we’re getting a few semi-decent films that hopefully will find an audience at the drive-ins, including some newly reopened ones.

But first… SPAGHETTIMAN!!!!

I’m pretty excited to hear that the virtual Oxford Film Festival is doing a special one-day screening of the HeckssBender’s hilarious superhero comedy, which I saw at the festival way back in 2016, where it became a bit of a sensation. You can get tickets to watch the movie and attend a special commemorative QnA, moderated by yours truly, right here! As you can imagine, I’m a huge fan of this indie superhero movie set in L.A. where a slacker named Clark, played by Benjamin Crutcher (who I think will be a huge comedy star someday), ends up getting superpowers… um… to produce spaghetti. When his roommate and best friend Dale (Winston Carter) finds out, he prompts Clark to use his powers to fight crime, but Clark has a better idea… he can fight crime for MONEY! It’s a very funny and sometimes silly premise but man, I love what these guys did with that premise. If you’re a fan of Broken Lizard and other comedy collectives, you should use Spaghettiman as your entry into the wonderful and wacky world of HeckBender! (They made a second feature since then called Cop Chronicles: Loose Cannons: the Legend of the Haj-Mirage and they have a YouTube channel, if you want more laughs.)

Oxford also adds more things to its Virtual Cinema this weekend, including a block of “Black Lens Narrative Shorts,” the documentary Queen of Lapa and the third “Fest Forward” block, all of which you can order at Eventive (including a few that will end on Thursday).

Also, the second Film Festival Day will take place this Saturday through the Film Festival Alliance with a virtual screening of Angela Pinaglia’s documentary, Life in Synchro, which is all about synchronized ice skating. About 34 regional film festivals, including the Oxford Film Festival, are taking part in the program which takes place this Saturday, May 23, and you can learn more about it at the Film Festival Day site.

Now that we’ve gotten some of the festival news over with, let’s begin this week’s column with a trip to England… well, not quite. The movie I’ve been most excited about is Michael Winterbottom’s THE TRIP TO GREECE (IFC Films), the fourth (and sadly, final) movie in the series of mockumentaries, starring best frenemies Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, who have really turned these movies into quite an art and science.

As the title will attest, this time they’re in Greece, basically doing the same things they did in Italy and Spain, visiting restaurants, eating food, squabbling with each other while also trying to one-up each other with a choice of selection of impressions. There’s a lot of Bee Gees and John Travolta references, as well as the duo recreating scenes from movies like Marathon Man and Midnight Cowboy. When that’s not happening, Rob is teasing Steve for his roving eye for women, while Steve gets him back since he’s found more fame and success in his career. 

These aren’t documentaries, though, and Winterbottom includes a few scripted scenes to tie things together. We even get an arty black and white dream sequence dealing with Steve’s dying father, and these all offer good opportunities for Coogan and Brydon to show off their dramatic acting chops, which is another topic of dissension.

What’s nice is that The Trip to Greece works well as a standalone film even if you haven’t seen the previous three films. If you have seen the previous “Trip” movies, you may already know what to expect. If you’re a fan, you’ll already know that spending time with these two hilarious guys is a perfectly fine alternative for being able to go on trips yourself.

The Full Monty director Peter Cattaneo’s new movie, MILITARY WIVES (Bleecker Street), is another movie I saw right before the NYC movie theater lockdown, when it was supposed to be released in mid-March. Bleecker Street has finally decided to give the movie a digital release, although maybe it’ll get into some of those newly-opened drive ins where it would play beautifully. As the title suggests, it takes place on a British military base where a group of wives, including Kristin Scott Thomas’ Kate, come together to form a recreational chorus to have fun and get their minds off their spouses at war. Kate is a type-A control freak, so she is immediately at odds with Sharon Horgan’s Lisa, who is more popular among the wives.

Going into this movie knowing that it’s based on a real story about wives who formed a singing group and knowing that this is directed by the guy behind The Full Monty may be all you need to know about what is generally a cutesie dramedy where a wide variety of group of women get together to support each other with all sorts of ups and downs. Listen, this isn’t exactly redefining the wheel other than this being a younger group of women than, say, Calendar Girls, but it’s in the same vein. This is basically a feel-good movie with a last act that gets a little corny, but it’s otherwise a wonderful story and Thomas leads a strong cast of women, joined by Greg Wise as her husband and Jason Flemyng as the officer in charge of the base.

This isn’t a terrible movie, and even though the last act starts to get corny as the women prepare for an Albert Hall performance, the film is otherwise a wonderful film full of emotions that only true curmudgeons would feel like their time was wasted by watching it. Bleecker Street will now release Military Wives on Hulu and digital just in time for Memorial Day weekend, which actually may have been more appropriate than its original March date.

The suspense thriller INHERITANCE (Vertical), directed by Vaughn Stein (Terminal) revolves around a wealthy and powerful Monroe family whose patriarch suddenly dies, leaving his daughter Lauren (Lily Collins) and wife (Connie Nielsen) with a shocking secret inheritance that could unravel their lives. I won’t say much about the secret, but it involves an almost unrecognizable Simon Pegg, spending much of his time in the dark with an American accent and giving a very different performance than we’ve seen from him.

I’m a big fan of Lily Collins as an actor, and I’m all for actors trying to stretch out a bit with their roles, but I’m not sure she was well-suited to play District Attorney Lauren Monroe, which may have worked better with an older actor. Although Collins is in her early ‘30s, she still looks very young, and because of that, it’s hard to believe her already being the D.A. (something which would generally take a dozen or more years as an attorney, one would expect). Pegg isn’t much better, and maybe because he too is trying something different from the norm. Since the majority of the movie is just the two actors, it involves as lot of over-emoting to creating dramatic fireworks that never fully arrive. Collins in particular tends to go over with every emotion in a performance that desperately needed to be scaled back. The rest of the cast is just okay with Nielsen having an even smaller part than Patrick Warburton -- an odd casting choice as Lauren’s father -- who dies as the film begins. Chace Crawford plays Lauren’s brother who is running for office, a subplot that add so little to the mix, except to try and create more tension.

I haven’t gotten around to seeing HBO’s Succession to know if there are any similarities in terms of its exploration of dark family secrets, but Inheritance is just not very good or interesting.  The writing (by Matthew Kennedy) is weak, a bit like a bad television drama, in fact, and the severe miscasting just makes it harder for anyone to deliver on the material. Realizing this, Stein overpowers every scene with overdramatic score that makes it even harder to appreciate the actors’ efforts. In some ways, Inheritance reminded me of the recent Human Capital, which was generally a better film with a stronger story, but Stein’s inspiration clearly comes from all those ‘80s and ‘90s thrillers that try to keep the viewer on the edge of their seats. Like David Tennant’s Bad Samaritan a few years back, this one fails to get the viewer even remotely excited. (The movie was also valid proof of why I hate watching movies on my computer since most of the scenes are so dark, it’s hard to really get much out of it.) Inheritance has been playing on DirecTV since April 23, but it will be available On Demand and Digitally this Friday.

Paramount Players is the latest studio to go the VOD route with the found footage supernatural thriller, BODY CAM (Paramount Players), directed by Malik Vitthal (Netflix’s Imperial Dreams) and starring Mary J. Blige, Nat Wolff, Theo Rossi and more. It involves a routine traffic stop by police officers that leads to the grisly death of one of them, and the surviving officer (Mary J. Blige) realizing that the victim’s body cam footage may be able to show what really happened as she tries to understand the supernatural force behind a series of murders. Sadly, Paramount Players wouldn’t supply critics with early screeners to watch and review, so I may have to wait for one of my colleagues to shell out the bucks.

A movie I saw at least year’s Tribeca that will be available digitally this week is Sasie Sealy’s LUCKY GRANDMA (Good Deeds Entertainment), starring Tsai Chin as a recently-widowed and quite ornery 80-year-old Chinatown resident who goes to see a fortune teller who tells her she is going to have a very lucky day. Of course, she takes that as advice to go to Atlantic City where she wins big, but it’s her trip on the bus back where she gets lucky when a man with a bag full of cash dies. Grandma’s newfound bag of cash ends up attracting the attention of local gangsters, so to protect herself, she hires a rival gangster as her bodyguard. This is a really fun movie that I probably before I saw my #1 movie of 2019, The Farewell, and it’s only similar in that it involves a lovable Chinese grandma, and it mostly takes place in and around Chinatown in New York, but Sealy has a filmmaking style more in the vein of a Tarantino or even the Safdie Brothers where it really pushes the genre aspects of the story with the music choices, which are particularly fantastic. But really, it’s the amazing character created by Sealy with Tsai Chin that makes the movie so entertaining. I’m so glad that this is finally being released so more people can see it since it was such a popular but underseen movie at Tribeca last year.

Another film to look out for this weekend is Benjamin Ree’s documentary THE PAINTER AND THE THIEF (NEON), which won an award at the Sundance Film Festival. It’s the story of Czech artist Barbara Kysilkova, who has two paintings stolen by Karl-Bertil Nordland, but when she seeks out the thief, she ends up befriending him and asking him to sit for a portrait as a bond is formed between these unlikely people. It will also be available on Hulu, VOD, on various Virtual Cinema platforms AND at select drive-ins starting this Friday.

Also on digital this week is Philip (Boiling Point) Barantini’s action-thriller VILLAIN (Saban Films), starring Craig Fairbrass as ex-con Eddie Franks, who is trying to start a new life after leaving prison. He soon finds that impossible when he learns his brother owes a large amount of money to a dangerous drug lord, so Eddie has to return to that life of crime in order to help him.

FilmLinc’s Virtual series continues this week with a combination of new and repertory films, including Bruno Dumont’s Joan of Arc/Jeanne (KimStim), a sequel to Dumont’s 2017 musical, Jeanette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc. This one, which premiered as a selection in this year’s cut-short “Rendezvous with French Cinema,” stars ten-year-old Leplat Prudhomme, and it will get a one-week exclusive rental with 50% of its $10 rental to go to FilmLinc. Also this week, the venue’s Virtual series will include Raúl Ruiz’s 2010 film Mysteries of Lisbon, an HD premiere that includes new footage.

As mentioned last month, the docuseries, Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films of All Time (Quiver Distribution), will continue this week with Volume 2: Horror and Sci-Fi, which is available right now on digital, On Demand, and while I haven’t watched this episode yet, if it’s even remotely as good as Vol. 1, this will be a must-see.

STREAMING AND CABLE

Paramount has another planned release going to streaming, and in this case, it’s Michael Showalter’s THE LOVEBIRDS, reuniting him with The Big Sick co-writer/star Kumail Nanjiani and pairing him with Issa Rae from HBO’s Insecure.  Despite the title, the googly-eyed love between Nanjiani’s Jibran and Rae’s Leilani only lasts a few minutes before the film cuts forward after they’d been together for a few years, and things aren’t as copacetic. They are close to breaking up, but on a trip to their last party together, the couple’s car is hijacked by someone who claims to be a cop and is chasing a guy on a bicycle. When the carjacker kills said cyclist, Jibran and Leilani realize that they may not have been helping the good guy. They’re soon sent on a trip through an underground world of crime and conspiracy to clear their names since they feel as if they’re the primary suspects in the murder.

I actually was looking forward to The Lovebirds after seeing its first trailer at CinemaCon last year. I generally like Nanjiani and really wanted him to bounce back from last year’s Stuber, which was pretty disappointing. Teaming him Rae seems to have done the trick since they’re both funny in their own right, but then they have former “The State” and “Stella” member Showalter at the helm, and he’s proven with his growing filmography as a director that he’s good at mixing laughs and even going fully R-rated when necessary.  While the trip the duo takes isn’t particularly enlightening or different from other “buddy action comedies” (other than bringing together their own comic sensibilities), it all leads up to quite an amusing Eyes Wide Shut parody before its semi-obvious climax and endings.

Sure, some of the funniest bits of The Lovebirds were in the trailer, and some moments are downright corny, because you generally can figure out where it’s going. I did prefer this more comedic take on the premise that was slightly similar to last year’s Queen and Slim, and the combination of Showalter, Nanjiani and Rae allows the movie to go to newer comedic territory than we’ve seen from any of them.

In other words, this is still far better than Stuber and a lot of the Adam Sandler comedies produced by Netflix, so the streaming network kind of lucked out by having the opportunity to stream this semi-decent comedy, which more people are likely to see on the streaming service than they would have in theaters.

Next week, more movies not in theaters!

By the way, if you read this week’s column and have bothered to read this far down, feel free to drop me some thoughts at Edward dot Douglas at Gmail dot Com or drop me a note or tweet on Twitter. I love hearing from readers … honest!

[yeslabyrinth]

DO WORRY. BE HAPPY.

I want to talk about happiness in improv, and I don't mean how to find happiness in doing improv, which I hope you do find, but how to be happy characters in our scenes. I'm not proposing something like out of the book The Secret, about how characters always have to be happy, or the world is some super joyful place, and you just have to look at the glass as half full. I am just saying that, especially with newer improvisers, but even some experienced ones, I am surprised how quickly our scenes turn into not liking each other as characters.

 There are a few reasons I think this happens. For one, you're often taught to add stakes, and weight to your scenes by making strong emotional choices. In an effort to do this, we associate darker emotions with being more prone for stakes. Anger, frustration, sadness, etc. While these are things that will definitely add stakes, and weight to scenes, simply portraying them in the start of a scene isn't going to give you much. If we don't know who these characters are, or where we are, starting a scene right off with conflict is going to be a tricky course to maneuver. It's even trickier if these people are strangers to each other. The reason it’s trickier is because we want to play real, especially real if we're using these strong emotions, but it's so easy to feel fake to an audience. It's extremely rare that I have ever seen someone yell at a cashier in real life, and yet it happens in scenes all the time. When this situation happens in real life, I have seen people get annoyed, and then pretty upset, and then maybe ask to see a manager. So, in our scenes, when we go right to yelling at a cashier, it seems fake. It seems dishonest, and like we're watching people grab at straws in front of us, or try to generate some stakes without knowing any context. You have to EARN these big emotions. We have to see you get slightly annoyed with the cashier, then a little more frustrated, and then maaaaybe you can yell at them, but to start right away with this extreme anger often comes across as a false choice if you're not FULLY committed to the emotional stakes you are trying to add to a scene. Remember, there is no such thing as a bad choice in improv, but there is such a thing as a false choice. Something that doesn't ring true to what we have set up in our scene. It can go either way too. It could be the little pun you try to make after breaking really sad news to someone, but it could also be the choice to tell someone you love them in a scene, when up until that moment you seem to have a platonic relationship.

Another reason we tend to go towards these sad, and angry emotional choices, is we are told, "make today the day something happens." It's a good motto we use often in improv to remind you that an audience paid to watch this set, and if we're just doing scenes of two talking heads discussing the weather, we're not creating great theater. We should try to make our scenes feel like plays, and the classic Joseph Campbell's hero's journey. We try to have some calls to action, and highs and lows for our characters, but too often we like to start with the lows. Scenes about breaking bad news. Scenes about telling someone how what they are doing is wrong. When you think of "the days something happened" in your life, there certainly are some sad ones. The day your parents got divorced, or you lost a loved one, or you didn't get that job you wanted, but, I would dare to say that you have had more highs than lows, but the lows are more memorable. Artists always remember the criticisms, and gloss over the praise. They beat themselves up over their failures, but rarely pat themselves on the back for their achievements. Sound familiar? Maybe you are actually a pretty dark, and sad person by your general nature, and you have always been this way, and not in a depressed kind of way, just that's how you are. Am I telling you not to play characters close to you? Not at all. I am just saying that if you are playing sad, or angry characters in scenes, we need to know why, and it has to be more than, "this is just the way I am." That gives your fellow players no understanding of how to play, and move along in the scene. We need some motivation, or justification for these strong emotions.

 I want to stress that I am not trying to say don't choose these emotions ever, but I would say that of the “bad improv” I have seen, the majority of scenes that fail could be boiled down to one person upset with another person, and them debating who is right or wrong, and nothing else happens. Again, I get where this comes from. There is an unusual character in most scenes, and we want to explore their logic, and the repercussions of their logic, and call out their weirdness, but by no means do you have to be angry when doing this. If in real life a friend tells me they are going to a restaurant that they love, and I hate the place, we will probably "argue" over whether or not it is a good restaurant, but we won't actually end up screaming at each other. Instead, we will exchange stories of our experiences with the place, and try to understand where the other person is coming from, even if we disagree. We're not trying to ruin our friendship over a small disagreement. Kevin Mullaney calls this sympathetic disagreement, which is a perfect term in my eyes. We want to disagree, but our scene partner is someone we care about, so we're probably not trying to burn a bridge in every scene. If someone one did this in real life, you’d probably just leave, and guess what? This is a trick you can use! If I feel like my character would want to leave this argumentative scene, which is especially true if a random store clerk I don’t know is yelling at me, I threaten to leave. In doing that, the other improviser 99% of the time starts to wind down their rhetoric in order for me not to leave the scene, leaving them all alone on stage.

 Now let me extend some challenges to you for your improv scenes. These are not full proof, because nothing is, but if you find yourself caught in this cycle of just arguing in scenes, here are some ideas to use to help get out of them.

 1) Start your scene enjoying the company of your scene partner. This doesn't mean that as the scene goes on, you can't get upset with them, or argue, but I challenge you to start most of your scenes enjoying their company. This way, even if the scene veers into argumentative territory, you have earned it by showing that your characters like each other, and this is "the day something happens", and you get into a fight. If we don't have that context beforehand, and you're fighting right from the outset, than for all we know this is just any other day for these characters. Nothing special.

 2) Choose to lose an argument. My instructor for Babies, Danny Mastrangelo, was the first person who ever pointed this out to me, and now I can't stop thinking about it when I see people argue. Whenever you are in an argument, think internally, "who is going to lose this argument?" If you find yourself caught in an argument in a scene, SOMEONE HAS TO LOSE, and it's a much more fun choice to let it be your character. Choose to lose the argument. But you may be saying, "I thought you said that in a straight person/crazy person scene, if I'm the straight one then I need to call out the weird? But I can't give up on that right?" To an extent, yes. You do want to call out the weird, but we also want to SEE the weird behavior being played. We can't do this if we're arguing the entire scene. So, choose to lose, or at least let it rest for a minute if you're the straight character. Just go back to your base reality. Let's say you're the crazy one in this scene. What if you lose? Well, that's actually perfect. If you are doing this crazy behavior of getting too close to someone, you both argue, and they "convince" you to stop doing the behavior, we then get to continue the scene, but our comedic minds KNOW that you'll find a way to bring back that behavior. It's a comedy bit as old as time. Pretty much every 3 Stooges episode is them doing an activity wrong, one of them shows them the right way to do it, they appear to get it, and then of course go right back to screwing everything up.

 3) Argue passionately about something you know is stupid. This goes along with the above challenge, and Will Hines covers it great in this blog post https://tmblr.co/ZuvjMy1t3506m , but if you do want to argue with your scene partner, than choose to be the one arguing passionately about something you(the improviser) knows is completely stupid, and illogical, but as if your character 100% believes in it.  Double down on it, and think you KNOW this to be true. So many scenes need someone to be wrong/stupid/naïve, but in real life, we don't want to ever come across this way, so we stray away from it in our improv. Embrace it! Embrace being wrong, and ignorant. You can finally do it, and not have any real repercussions. Choose to be ignorant, but stubborn in your beliefs. Choose to be the  person you could, and should not be in the real world. Choose to commit 100% to this character, and look at the scene through their eyes.  (Side tangent: I have found another reason people like to argue in scenes is they are actually good friends in real life, and this is something they get to do to escape from the norm of loving each other’s company. I understand this thought process, but still try to follow these guidelines about earning it. The audience may not know you actually don’t yell at each other all the time.) The last thing I want to say is that some people come to improv as a form of therapy where they can hash out their problems in scenes. I have said, and I firmly believe this, that IMPROV IS THERAPEUTIC BUT IT IS NOT THERAPY. If you have issues in your life to address, a scene about them isn't going to cure what ails you. If you are angry because of work, and you just need to yell at someone, improv is not the place to displace this anger. Let comedians create laughter, and therapists do therapy.

[yeoldenews]

Let’s be history detectives...

As I’ve been posting old photos from my collection on here and my personal blog I’ve mentioned a few times that my favorite thing in the world is to buy historical photos/albums/diaries/etc. with little or no identification and try to track down clues about them.

I’ve received a few PMs (and get questioned often in real life) as to how I go about this, so I thought I would document the project I’m working on today to give people a basic idea of my process.

TODAY’S PROJECT...

is this “A Line A Day” five year diary which covers the years 1933-1937.

I’ve featured it before on Ye Olde News for it’s page of “Nothing Special” entries.

The diary has no name in it and the majority of the entries are incredibly vague such as “I went downtown” or “It snowed today”.

Let’s see what we can find out.

Let’s start by looking at an average page. I’ve chosen February 20th, which appears to have been our mystery diarist’s birthday.

As you can see, there’s nothing overly specific, but definitely enough to get started.

When approaching these projects my process is always

When? Where? and Who?

in that order.

I approach where before who because it narrows down your search parameters by an incredible degree.

For example consider the difference of looking for someone named Steve in the United States vs looking for someone named Steve in Providence, Rhode Island. It’s still a big sample size, but it eliminates about 318.7 million possible people.

We know when, so we can skip that part.

Where is next.

As far as a very general area, the author mentions quite a few American-centric events, such as President Roosevelt’s inauguration and the Lindbergh Baby trial. There are also quite a few mentions of blizzards, below zero temperatures and spring flooding. These hints would suggest that we are probably looking somewhere in the the Midwest or New England.

As for specifics, there’s not a lot to go on. Our diarist mentions the names of a few restaurants and theaters, as well as some street names (they “got pinched” running a red light!), but nothing unique enough to draw any conclusions.

Without anything definitive to go on I’ve decided to help use the “Who” to find the “Where”. More specifically any really bizarre names.

As you can see in the page I posted most of the names listed are incredibly common, and usually don’t include the last names. We’re not going to have much luck searching for “Donnie” or “Janet”.

Skimming through the rest of the diary I find just what I need. “Inez Legeyt” and “Ebba Lundborg”. Two truly bizarre names, both mentioned as people at a party our diarist went to.

Plugging “Inez Legeyt” into google comes up with 9 results, one of which is

Hartford, CT! That’s in our target area. But I like to be sure, so let’s see if there was an Ebba Lundborg in Hartford at the same time...

Bingo! And after checking the street names mentioned, I’m convinced we have our city.

Now onto Who...

Let’s see what we can figure out about our diarist.

There are mentions of going to buy new dresses, so we’re looking for a woman.

She appears to live alone, and never mentions a husband or children.

She mentions going to work, but also mentions school being closed for weather, as well as teachers conventions and “summer break”. This suggests we’re probably looking for someone who was either a teacher or worked in a school in some capacity.

“Pa” is mentioned, but never “Ma”. And later on the diary mentions Pa’s girlfriends (referred to as #1 and #2!), so it appears that Pa is single, most likely a widower.

Donnie and Ann are mentioned a lot, so they were presumably either close friends or relatives.

So pulling together our When, Where and Who: our diarist is a single woman who worked at a school in Hartford, CT between 1933 and 1937.

Good clues, and a whole lot more that we knew before, but we still need that Wow! piece of info to pull it all together.

The Wow clue!

I sat down and read the diary thoroughly, and on February 29th, 1936 I came across just what I was looking for.

“Got some new glasses today. Pa & Donnie left for Bermuda.”

Why is this important?

Vetting people coming in and out of the country may be dominating the headlines this month, but it’s an issue that goes back well into the 19th century.

The 1930s had their own immigration crisis caused by the rise of the Nazi Party to power in 1933. Therefore records of people who entered the United States in the 1930s are very thorough, whether they were immigrants or not. If Pa and Donnie left the country, they would have had to have come back in through customs, and there will be a record of that!

Going a week later in the diary I found the entry for March 6, 1936, simply...

“Pa and Donnie returned.”

Going on ancestry.com (which unfortunately does cost money to use) I was able to find that the only ship coming into a New England port from Bermuda on March 6, 1936 was the S. S. Monarch of Bermuda, which was carrying 1,052 passengers and crew.

Let’s see if we can narrow that down. How many of them were named Donnie/Donald/Don etc.?

Only seven! That’s a sample size we can work with.

And look at this!

Donald W. Preston, age 33 from Hartford, CT!

And he’s traveling with a man named Frank Preston.

If Frank Preston is “Pa”, that would presumably make Donnie our diarist’s brother.

But again, we need more proof. Going to the 1940 Census we find that...

Donnie’s wife is indeed named Ann(e). Things are looking good on this lead!

Going back ten years we find Donnie with...

Frank with his still-living wife Mabel, as well as an older sister named Doris.

Could Doris be our diarist???

Her profession on the 1930 census is listed as “Secretary - Weaver High School”! That fits exactly what were looking for!

By the 1940 census Doris is living on her own, still working as a school secretary.

I decided to look up Weaver High School yearbooks from the era and by comparing the names of other teachers and staff members to names mentioned in the diary I’m convinced we’ve found our diarist!

And look what else I found in the 1946 yearbook...

Hi Doris! Nice glasses!

I dug around a little bit more and am now 100% convinced that our diarist was:

Doris Louisa Preston of Hartford, Connecticut

born February 20, 1901 - died February 2, 1952

This whole project took me about four hours of research with a few breaks and dead ends.

I’ve been doing research like this as a hobby (and occasionally professionally) for about 10 years.

[kidsviral-blog]

Summer Is Almost Upon Us, So Here Are 16 Travel Scams That You Should Avoid

New Post has been published on https://kidsviral.info/summer-is-almost-upon-us-so-here-are-16-travel-scams-that-you-should-avoid/

Summer Is Almost Upon Us, So Here Are 16 Travel Scams That You Should Avoid

As someone who has lived and traveled abroad, I can tell you that tourist scams abound, and they’re the worst.

Designed with stealing your money (and sanity) in mind, these maneuvers are the tools of the trade for schemers all over the world. Since summer will be here before you know it, let’s go over what you should be on the lookout for when you hop on a plane to your dream destination.

After all, nothing says “please get me out of here everything is terrible let me go home I quit” quite like losing your cash, credit cards, and passport to some lady who just threw her baby at you (more on that later). If you’re planning on visiting a major city abroad this summer, here’s what you need to know.

1. That guy handing you a friendship bracelet is 100 percent not your friend.

Flickr / Kevin K

Remember those bracelets you used to weave for your besties in elementary school? Well, when in Rome (or anywhere else for that matter), don’t let some strange dude on the street lure you in with false promises of friendship. He isn’t Becky Williams, and this is not the third grade. By the time that heartless fraud wraps a colorful lie around your wrist, he’ll have asked you for all of your money. Nothing is sacred anymore.

2. The lady holding a rose will come between you and your significant other.

iStock

This scenario is a lot like the friendship bracelet situation, but this time, you’ll look like a bad person in front of your guy or girl. Here’s how it usually goes. The woman offers a rose to a couple strolling by. One half of said couple reaches out and takes it, because free flowers are the best flowers — but it’s not free. After the rose is taken off her hands, the lady demands money for it. Say yes, and the victim of this nasty enterprise contributes to a really irritating system. Say no, and they look like a miserly partner. Not cute.

3. Someone will throw a baby at you.

iStock

The good news is that it’s usually not a real baby. The bad news is that you’re probably not a pile of human garbage, and you’ll instinctively try to catch it anyway. While you’re fumbling through what is absolutely the weirdest thing that has ever happened to you (and I can tell you from experience that it is), mom of the year will steal all of your valuables.

4. You’ll give yourself away after you see a wallet on the ground.

iStock

You revel in not being “that guy” by reaching for your own wallet when you see one on the ground. If you’re wandering around in a major European city and you see a discarded wallet, do not reach for yours. It’s still there. You just used it to buy really overpriced shoes. Scam artists plant those wallets just to figure out where you keep yours.

var OX_ads = OX_ads || []; OX_ads.push( slot_id: “537251602_57086a5db3635”, auid: “537251602” );

5. Your taxi driver is taking his sweet time.

iStock

Taxi drivers exploit tourists by taking the longest routes possible to jack up rates. This will cause you a world of emotional and financial hurt, so familiarize yourself with the roads that lead to your destination, and call that nonsense out if it starts happening! I didn’t, which ended in a hefty, tipless payment to my driver and a frantic sprint to my terminal. It was the least fun.

6. People on packed trains are good at stealing your personal space (and your stuff).

iStock

One of my favorite things about living abroad was using public transit, which is sorely lacking here in the States. Take advantage of these inexpensive services when you travel, but if a train is crowded enough to leave you scrunched up under some guy’s armpit, zip up your bags and hold them tightly in front of you. Scammers love crowded trains, so be mindful of your purses and pockets.

7. If an overnight bus from one country to the next for almost no money sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

iStock

While you’re just trying to live your life on the night bus and snooze between Spain and France, someone’s in the luggage compartment stealing all of your valuables. That pretty much kills those bargain vibes.

8. Get all of your own luggage out of the car.

iStock

Hiring a private car to get you and your bags from the airport to the hotel is a great option, but if you can, take all of your own bags out of the vehicle. While most drivers offer to help you with luggage just to be nice, others will remove your largest bag, quickly hop back in the driver’s seat, and zip away with the smaller ones.

9. Fake cops are not the good guys.

iStock

If someone who looks like a police officer approaches you and says that there’s fake money circulating and he needs to check your wallet, ask for ID. If he doesn’t present you with proof that he’s an officer, get all up out of there. He’s posing as a cop to take your money.

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10. Always count your change.

iStock

As a way of skimming a little off the top, cashiers sometimes exploit tourists by handing them less valuable coins when giving them change, since it’s hard for people to identify foreign currency at first glance. Familiarize yourself with what bills and coins look like prior to departure if you can! It’s not like any of us need to be more broke.

11. Don’t trust anyone when you’re purchasing tickets.

iStock

Seeing plays and concerts abroad is basically the best thing ever, but when it’s time to buy tickets, go straight to the booth or the official online vendor. Scammers target people waiting in line at theaters and arenas and offer them tickets for a fraction of the cost. The only downside is that they’re usually fake.

12. Always deal directly with your hotel concierge if money is involved.

iStock

Because everything is awful and the world is a spinning ball of pain, scammers will call you late at night, posing as your hotel concierge to confirm your credit card details. They know that people are less likely to venture downstairs later in the evening, which makes it easy for them to steal your info. If you suspect foul play, it never hurts to go downstairs and see what’s going on.

13. Everyone finds strength in numbers, including the kids who want to take your money.

Getty Images

Going back to the part about you not being a piece of garbage, it only makes sense that you’d want to help kids begging on the street. This gets tricky when they approach you in massive groups. If the kiddos come out in droves to hassle you, keep a close eye on your valuables. While you’re brushing one or two of them off, the other three will set their sights on your wallet.

14. That overly friendly local at the ATM isn’t helping you use the machine.

Getty Images

Even if you’re struggling with an ATM in a foreign country, take a deep breath and figure it out on your own. Do not, under any circumstances, allow someone to help you. Although it seems like the locals are trying to help you use the machine, they’re actually memorizing your PIN so they can steal your card and use it later.

15. Beachgoers beware: those free massages will cost you a pretty penny.

Getty Images

Locals love offering up “free” massages to tourists sipping mai tais on the beach. I’m sure you can guess by now that nothing in life is free, so be on the lookout for amateur masseuses. Even when tourists resist, they’re often pestered into shelling out pretty serious amounts of money.

16. Think twice about taking pictures for strangers.

Getty Images

Sadly, being nice to people on vacation isn’t usually rewarded with anything but a headache. One trick that locals pull on tourists seems innocent at first but quickly turns into something awful. Someone from a group approaches a traveler and asks them to take their picture. As the photographer is handing the camera back to its owner, the scammer purposely drops it and demands payment for the broken device.

(via Reddit)

Traveling is a blast, but you can never be too careful. When you’re out of your element, scammers know that you’re ripe for the picking. Maybe getting one of those horrible neck wallets your mom can’t stop talking about isn’t such a bad idea, after all.

Read more: http://www.viralnova.com/tourist-scam/