#if his ( apparent ) new music in march is about inferno...

[fawnforevergone]

what absolutely floors me is the way "Unknown (Nth)" is the song for Treachery, and yet is more about betraying ourselves rather than being betrayed. hozier says that, when the break-up happened, it felt as though his lover was chewing on his heart while it still beats, but he can only blame himself because entering a relationship is acknowledging the chance it may fail and still going through with it. AND THEN HE SAYS "i'd walk so far just to take the injury of finally knowing you" - meaning he would do it all again with the knowledge of failure because isn't that what he risked in the first place anyway? ,,,"Unknown (Nth)", the weapon that you are-

[world-cinema-research]

Final Course Essay - Grant Montoya

Of all the films we were able to watch this semester, these chosen four best illustrate my personal insight into the evolutionary process films have undergone in the past decades. Each are similar in structure I'd say, but each are very different in which aspects are most highlighted or worked on.

The oldest of the bunch (Five Easy Pieces) was released in 1970 and is a part of the American New Wave film era. Many films from the seventies undermine their own narrative goals by mixing irrelevant plot details and stylistic choices that clash with the main story. This is seen in the character dialogue, atmosphere, and plot, and these creative choices have seemed to be inseparable from the way movies are created. Having picture along with words and audio simply allows directors to integrate challenging things!

Here, the character lead Bobby Dupea says this: "Where the hell do you get the ass to tell anybody anything about class, or who the hell's got it, or what she typifies! You shouldn't even be in the same room as her, you pompous celibate!" We never see the spoken-to character again. This happens more than a few times throughout the movie.

"I felt that the character that I was trying to write the movie about should be about a man who was condemned to search for the meaning of his life- and not a very happy search at that."  - Bob Rafelson

Five years later emerges the film Deep Red, a film that is best described as “the underrated Jaws that didn’t quite make it.” This was near the end of the New Hollywood Cinema Era, entering the blockbuster era. In the film we see an increased use of associative horror methods, especially touched up by the director because it is his natural style. We see this in the music cueing, imagery, scenery, and other subtle conventions.

This article informs us in short that Deep Red was a transitional film in Argento’s career, bridging the gap between his earlier gialli and his later leanings towards the supernatural in features like Suspiria, Inferno, and Phenomena. The thing I like most about this film is how it reflects the daring nature of directors of the era, mega franchises haven't been established yet, and the notable, most-referenced flicks of today were still in the making. A simple slasher of a movie such as this is true to the director's vision because there wasn't much to replicate or steal from.

In the mid-eighties, the VHS era was in its mid-life and Blue Velvet was there to endear audiences with its strange vibe. The power of music was harnessed in this film, and like Argento, the power of association via the resurfacing of images, audio, etc. was apparent in the directing of the film.

Frank Booth - "Have you ever been to pussy heaven?"

Out of all films, Hofstede’s cultural dimensions were most prominent from here onward, in this instance there was a strong presence of inescapable masculinity, roles that were inflated and satirized in the most general way concerning characters that were supposed to be part of a thriller/mystery film. 

1986 was one of the most progressive years for the feminist movement, with protests that aimed to keep abortion and birth control legal. “The largest march for women’s rights in U.S. history occurred on March 9th in Washington, D.C." Although Blue Velvet wasn't based off of this event, the transformative years of the US and the arrival of a new digital age probably gave filmmakers a lot of inspiration and motivation to implement these new themes into their movies...

Finally, enter Punch-Drunk Love, the newest film I have watched in this class (2002). I think it perfectly epitomizes everything that even the modern age films today are trying to go for, which is relatability with elements of surprise. The style, lead, and visual chops of the films today are praised more so than the content of their character or the deeper message of the movie. Punch-Drunk Love lands itself in a healthy midrange, while even referencing a one-off event concerning a man 4 years from its release.

"In 1999, the civil engineer from California catapulted into fame after he earned a whopping 1.2 million airline miles by taking advantage of a Healthy Choice mail-in promotion by purchasing a ridiculous amount of pudding." The idea of a single man taking advantage of a coorperation is a wacky instance of the situations we can find ourselves in, in a super modernized world.

While the artsy side of films grew, you still expected a more polished narrative than from something many years before it. To me, the cultural model of Indulgence vs. Restraint is followed but through a more personal way, as the film represents the journey of a person who cannot thrive in an indulgent society. I do not think necessarily that my chosen films nationally represent cultures, however, I can see how this could be the case if my film selections were a bit different and held those discussions.

"Punch-Drunk Love captures the contingency at the heart of post-romance romance. Instead of the layers of expectation habituated into institutional engagements of two subjects meeting, there is the accident of the event of love within which various parties are arrayed with various affects and desires." Even here, the author of a critical evaluation of this movie does one of the deepest dives beneath the surface of any critical resource I've seen yet. After I read this, I wondered just how much I was missing or under appreciating the films I had watched once and got nothing from. To what extent are directors pouring meaning into the meaningless side events in a film? How much have I misinterpreted?

After taking the same writing approach for a couple of months now for many different films, I see now what the course has aimed to achieve and I think it has done so in the best way, a way that only social media could allow. Firstly, social media gives the sense of being a free writer, or making observations of your own volition. The effect is an easy writing process that feels natural, and sometimes I go beyond the expectations and answer my own questions. By collecting critical, historical, textual, and contemporaneous events for a film and listing them out on a platform with your thoughts, it’s clear that a greater understanding of the film era landscape, people involved, deeper messages, technological limitations, and style of contemporary films will be learned about. Feedback from classmates is the cherry on top.

The way I see things, movie discussion, as well as music discussion, will seemingly never be an interest that the majority will partake in. I never hear about the use of Tumblr outside of this course, and I have never had an account before it. There are many independent media discussion forums on the internet, and I think the best hope for a film buff would be to find a niche online and contribute what they can in their little corner of the internet. In critical discussion of film, people not only sharpen their writing skills but also immerse themselves in cultures old and new; it is simply a learning experience like no other.

[thebibliomancer]

Essential Avengers: Avengers #206: Fire in the Streets!

April, 1981

Fire in the streets? But what of the disco? What of the t-t-t-taco bellll?

This time: Human Torch guest stars. Everything is on fire.

Somehow?  It’s not Johnny Storm’s fault!

In fact, there’s another fire man setting on fire so logically we have Johnny Storm here to. Uh. Set things on fire more? Could... could we get a water person here instead? Is Crystal Inhumans doing anything? She’s basically the Avatar.

So who is Pyron the Thermal Man? And why is that name so fun to say? I can only answer one of these questions.

“This man is content. During hard times, he has found a good job at high pay. In the dead of night, he delivers destruction to his employer’s competitors. It is a job not without risks -- such as discovering he has been suddenly deemed expendable.

“This man is an industrial saboteur. In one last brilliant burst of awareness he realizes the peril he must have posed to his employers, and he understands why they chose to betray him. The dead, it is said, tell no tales to arson-investigating district attorneys.”

Man: “The thermite bomb has been preset to 12:10. BUT IT IS 12:10! GLEEARGHH!”

“As the fierce chemical inferno engulfs him, he swears that -- if he survives -- he will have his revenge.”

And then he explodes.

Later, at Avengers Mansion, Beast is getting his late night groove on listening to Chopin when to his absolute disgust, the music is interrupted for late-breaking news that absolutely everything is on fire.

Beast: “They interrupt a Chopin concert simulcast for this?! A news flash about some diddlysquat fire in New Jersey?!!”

But as the Human Torch is involved, Beast realizes that the situation is no ordinary one.

Y’know, I’m forever amazed that network news is a more reliable source of leads for the Avengers then their ties to the government or SHIELD or any crime computers or whatever.

Beast watches the news as Johnny attempts to fight fire with fire despite my mockery of the concept. As Beast muses, its theoretically sound similar to how oil-well fires are fought by using explosions to deprive the fire of oxygen. Johnny could briefly go nova to create a similar blast.

But oddly, the Human Torch’s fire seems to be siphoned away from him into the blaze, leaving him to retreat to collapse in the arms of firefighters.

And even more oddly, there appears to be a face formed of flames, “it’s jaws agape in an infernal laugh.”

Between the face and the fire draining the Torch, Beast decides this looks like a job... for the Avengers!

So the Avengers assemble... for tea, coffee, and donuts.

You try to fight weird fires on an empty stomach and uncaffeinated. You think you’re so cool over there saying you’d skip the donuts.

(I like Iron Man drinking a soda pop through a straw in his mouth slit.)

And then Beast puts the news of the New Jersey chemical fire on the Avengers’ weird four screened cube tv and tells them that he thinks the fire is alive!

Luckily backed up by Johnny Storm giving a timely interview when the Avengers start watching where he says its no natural fire. And also backed up the spooky face which everyone can see.

Cap decides that the Avengers should investigate this weird fire and Jarvis optimistically fetches a fire extinguisher saying he’s ready to do whatever he may to help.

I’m pretty sure they tell him its okay not to come though. I don’t think a fire extinguisher will help all that much.

But the thought definitely counts, Jarvis.

So the Avengers get into the Quinjet and fly across the Hudson into New Jersey, which must be an extremely short trip as the super jet flies.

From their overhead view of the fire, they realize that its heading right towards some storage tanks holding liquid natural gas. And if those ignite “the resultant explosion would surely rival the devastating destructive capacity of mankind’s most powerful nuclear weapons.”

And New Jersey is where Kamala Khan lives! Or will live!

So stakes are high. And possibly well done.

Captain America: “Let me get this straight, Iron Man. Are we talking about losing New Jersey if that fire’s not put out before it reaches those storage tanks?”

Iron Man: “Affirmative, Cap. In fact, the sheer heat of this inferno should have ignited the liquid natural gas already -- but the heat, like the fire itself, seems to be controlled... localized in the flaming factory areas, but not radiating outwards.”

Huh! I wonder if someone looked at the overhead picture of the fire and pointed out that heat goes beyond the bright part and Mantlo went ‘oh shit!’ and wrote in this exchange.

Alternatively, it could just be another weird aspect of these chemical fires and brief foreshadowing because the air around the Quinjet suddenly shoots up above 8500 degrees Fahrenheit.

The spike in heat knocks the Quinjet into a power dive with a dead stick and they’re going to crash for sure unless a guest star happens to save them.

Which is what happens. The Human Torch creates a column of hot air beneath the Quinjet, cushioning the fall. I dunno. Thermals. Lift. Something.

Look, his fire behaves only slightly more reasonably than that of the threat de jour!

The Avengers thank Johnny but Cap is curious. The news said that Johnny couldn’t flame on anymore. And Johnny clarifies that if he gets anywhere close to the inferno and he can’t, like it’s siphoning his flame powers away!

Which we already knew slash suspected.

Anyway, there were three Avengers flying outside the Quinjet. Iron Man, Vision, and Wonder Man.

Wonder Man just catches on fire.

Vision can go intangible and immune to the heat. Iron Man’s armor has cooling circuits that protect him. But Wonder Man, despite increased durability, apparently doesn’t have defense against fire.

So Iron Man tells him to fly up up and away from the fire.

Wonder Man: “No! I’m not turning chicken!”

Iron Man: “No one’s accusing you of cowardice -- but a dead Avenger’s no good to anyone, including himself! I said go, Simon! Now!”

And Iron Man repulsors Wonder Man which has the marvelous dual effect of extinguishing him and repulsing him away from danger.

Although Iron Man should think about stepping back from the blaze himself. Although his cooling circuits are working to compensate for the heat, he says he’s beginning to feel it.

Instead, he flies into the fire, hoping to discover the cause quickly. Vision heads in too. His intangibility means he’s safe to fly around in the fire but also restricts him from doing anything but observing.

Meanwhile, Wonder Man plummets out of the sky around where the other Avengers have parked their butts.

Some firemen try to catch him with a safety net. Beast tries to warn them its a waste of time but. Comedy, of sorts, ensues.

And it IS pretty funny.

After Wonder Man has plummeted through the net and cratered the ground:

Beast: “I told them trying to catch you was a waste of time, Wondy -- but they wouldn’t believe me.”

Wonder Man: “Thanks, Beast. You’re a true friend.”

When Iron Man and Vision don’t emerge from the fire, the Avengers make the decision to don asbestos suits and march into the fire to investigate for themselves.

Except for Wasp.

Wasp isn’t invited.

See, her only powers are shrinking and going pew pew and that’s not going to be helpful within an asbestos suit so she can’t come. I guess she’s considered just useless without her powers. Harsh.

And she’s not too happy about the snub but whatchoo gonna do?

Human Torch is like ‘same tho’ because he can’t go near the fire without having his powers sapped. But that doesn’t improve Wasp’s mood any.

The Avengers have a brief argument over whether being inside a hellish nightmarescape of fire is beautiful or not.

Jocasta and Captain America think it is. Incongruously so. But still.

Wanda disagrees.

Scarlet Witch: “It’s not beautiful -- it’s terribly, horribly, frighteningly unreal! Can my husband still be alive inside this living inferno?!”

And Jocasta answers ‘yeah he’s right over there’ because he’s right over there.

(Beast and Wonder Man do not express an opinion on the beauty or not of being inside a chemical fire)

Vision is perfectly fine because “the flames cannot destroy what they cannot touch.”

I don’t know anything about science. I was a liberal arts major. But. His intangibility works by going super diffuse, right? Just lowering his density to the point where he’s intangible? Why can’t a fire scatter his atoms? At this point they have the consistency of a mist.

Intangibility is weird. I guess its just a comic, I should really just relax.

So, yeah. Vision is fine. What about Iron Man? Vision says Iron Man went further into the fire and then had to take steps to insure his own survival. He offers to lead the others to Iron Man.

Iron Man is frozen in a big block of ice.

In the middle of a fire.

Its just a comic, I should really just relax.

Iron Man apparently managed to find the foe who created this fire but suffered defeat. The temperatures in the proximity of this foe were so severe that Iron Man’s cooling system apparently made the decision to drain his remaining power to freeze the suit.

So he’s stuck here.

And gosh, even if he is frozen in a block of ice, if it melts, he’s fucked. The suit is out of power. His cooling systems won’t be able to protect him after the last ditch effort they made.

Which is possibly why Vision makes the decision to remain as sentry over Iron Man. That and him not being able to do anything but watch in his intangible state and unable to increase his density without being destroyed.

But he does point the Avengers towards the foe Iron Man discovered.

And the Avengers find him, PYRON THE THERMAL MAN right at the liquid natural gas tanks. But still apparently holding the heat at bay to keep them from exploding... yet.

Pyron, the Thermal Man: “When I stopped Iron Man and the Vision in their tracks, I knew that the rest of the Avengers couldn’t be far behind! Come on, fools! I’m not afraid of you! I’m not afraid of nobody! Not anymore! AND PYRON WANTS AN AUDIENCE WHEN HE ACHIEVES HIS REVENGE!”

I guess unnamed arsonist now Pyron has had a long time while burning everything to think of a name but I still find it weird that this guy exploded, became a thermal man, started burning things, and at some point in the process of all that decided ‘y’know what, I need a kickass new name. If any superheroes ask who I am, I’m going to say ‘Pyron, the Thermal Man!’

I guess that’s the kind of thing you do if you’re a comic book character. But it feels weird for some reason.

Cap wonders aloud what Pyron is after by setting all these fires. Because as a comic book character, he has to say what he’s thinking out loud. Thought bubbles cost extra because of the waviness.

And since Cap did muse out loud, Pyron is happy to oblige him by monologuing because if there’s anything that comic book characters love more than saying their thoughts out loud, its doing it for an extended period of time with no interruptions.

That’s why they say ‘i can’t even hear myself think’ because thinking should be done verbally.

Pyron: “I already told you, Captain America -- I want revenge against the men who hired me to torch this chemical complex belonging to their competitors... and who then betrayed me!”

“They hoped I’d die in the thermal blast -- and, in a way, I did! But the chemicals reacted with the fire to give me new life -- as Pyron, the Thermal Man!”

“My erstwhile employers were the Liquigas Company, Captain America... and soon they’re going to see their profits go up in smoke!”

Captain America: “It’s hard to sympathize with a confessed arsonist, Pyron -- especially when his revenge endangers the entire state of New Jersey! TAKE HIM, AVENGERS!”

Captain America: ‘Cool motive, still murder’

But when Captain America throws his mighty shield, Pyron does not, in fact, yield! Doesn’t he know the song?? Instead he catches the shield and starts trying to melt it, just to see if he can.

Which is a bit of an error, maybe.

See, Beast says that Pyron is melting Cap’s shield. And that is what Pyron is explicitly trying to do. 

Beast: “Lieber gott, Wondy! Flameface is melting Cap’s shield!”

Wonder Man: “We can’t allow that, Beast! Captain America without his shield would be like Johnny Carson without Ed McMahon!”

Cap’s shield is supposed to be indestructible at this point. The narration even calls out that the shield is “impervious to the high temperatures within the factory” and Pyron says the shield is supposed to be “nearly indestructible.” And we don’t see the shield actually melt or be melted looking in future panels.

Apparently a lot of people wrote in about this and it had to be handwaved as ‘Beast was wrong.’

In fairness, it’s probably hard to see inside a fire. And he’s been a bit overexcited this whole story.

Melting or not, the idea that Pyron is trying to destroy an iconic thing like Cap’s shield gets Beast and Wonder Man to try to tackle Pyron. And even though the high-density asbestos suit can hold up to the high temperatures within the fire, Pyron is burning a lot hotter and he can burn through their suits.

So to save them, Jocasta OPTIC BLASTs through the face plate of her own suit, striking Pyron and actually hurting him.

But her proven effectiveness against hot guy is moot because she can’t stick around and keep doing it. With her face plate shattered, Jocasta is already starting to melt.

Wonder Man picks up Jocasta despite her protest and carries her away from the battle to save her becoming a puddle.

Wonder Man: “I know how you feel, ‘Casta. Less than an hour ago, Iron Man made me turn tail and run. I didn’t like it -- but now I see he was right. If I hadn’t gotten out then, I wouldn’t be alive to get you to safety now.”

And then the Avengers are down two more Avengers, leaving what Pyron calls the three weakest Avengers.

Pyron is a damn fool.

One of the three remaining is Scarlet Witch.

Aka, the Avenger’s win-button, some of the times.

And when Scarlet Witch casts her mighty hex, it leaves her foes quite perplexed. And also I wish it wasn’t called hex.

So with her mighty mutant-at-this-time-but-retroactively-will-not-be power, Wanda causes geysers of water to shoot up from the ground.

... I guess she made underground water mains burst? I’m hard pressed to think how else probability alteration would cause this.

Anyway, today is not Wanda’s day to be the win-button. And that’s fine. She’s very effective in aggregate.

Pyron sees her geysers of water and raises her SETTING THE WATER ON FIRE SOMEHOW

I’M EVEN MORE PERPLEXED WITH THIS THAN WHERE THE WATER CAME FROM

ALSO THE FLAMESPOUTS MOVE! THEY’VE CORNED THE AVENGERS

Meanwhile, Wonder Man and Jocasta leave the fire.

Wasp, who has been sitting on the sidelines the whole time, presumably tapping her foot impatiently and watching the page count, asks what the hell is going on.

Wonder Man recaps.

Wonder Man: “There’s a negative version of the Human Torch inside the factory complex, Wasp... setting everything on fire and then draining the flames to feed his own power. He plans to ignite those liquid natural gas tanks in his path.”

This is stuff we already know. I’m just enjoying the way that Wonder Man decided to say it. “Negative version of the Human Torch.” And the idea that he’s setting fires and then nomming the fires to get more powerful, I don’t think that’s based on anything. I think Wonder Man just said it. It’s something you COULD assume, based on what happened to Johnny. But she was there for that.

After his explanation though, a guy comes up and demands that the Avengers stop Pyron. Which, duh, don’t have to tell them twice. But also, new character, who dis?

Dis is the president of the Liquigas Company and whoops, you triggered more recapping.

Wonder Man recaps the other stuff, the stuff he heard from Pyron. The stuff that the villain was kind enough to rant about at length.

Wonder Man: “You can demand from now to doomsday, pal -- but all it’s gonna get you is a knuckle sandwich. Listen up, people. Pyron was an arsonist, in this man’s employ, sent out to torch the competition.”

“Only Mr. Clean here decided he didn’t want any embarrassing evidence surfacing after the fire, so he double-crossed his own hireling by presetting the timer on a thermite bomb.”

“What he didn’t count on was the thermite and the chemicals combining to transform his goon into a menace to half the population of New Jersey.”

That’s very thorough, Wonder Man.

Maybe too thorough! How did you know about presetting the timer? You could maybe deduce that from what Pyron said but he didn’t explicitly say it.

When did you become the world’s greatest detective, Simon Williams?!

Possibly this book needed another editing pass. It’s not objectionable but Pyron saying that he was an arsonist working for the Liquigas Company and that they tried to kill him off should be enough without getting into the specific specifics.

Anyway, based on Wonder Man’s accusation, the president is led away, presumably to be questioned.

Johnny decides that dammit, he’s a guest star, he’s gotta go out there and start performing but this isn’t his day in the spotlight either.

Y’see, during this nonsense, Wasp grabbed a foam capsule and an asbestos suit and ran into the fire.

The firefighters didn’t stop her presumably because she’s an Avenger and its just assumed that Avengers know what they’re doing? I don’t know!

Wasp runs through the fire, past Vision who urged her to turn back but couldn’t stop her what with the intangible thing, and keeps running to where the Avengers are pinned down by Pyron.

Cap tells Wasps to go away but Pyron says “the more the merrier!” He’s having a real good time on this vengeance thing, beating up superheroes who aren’t involved in the thing he wants vengeance for. He has perhaps suffered motive decay.

But Wasp says she has a way to defeat Pyron, hidden right in the palm of her hand.

And then she shrinks to wasp size, shreds the glove of the asbestos suit with her Wasp sting, and flies out of it carrying the foam capsule.

Wasp: “I’ve only got fractions of a second before my wings -- and the capsule I’m holding -- incinerate! But I’ve no choice! This was the only way to get them through the flames and close enough to Pyron to be of any use!”

And then she smashes the chemical foam capsule right in his dumb face.

Also, she thinks really fast! 

But to be fair, the fire wasn’t behaving like a normal fire. It was said that the liquid natural gas tanks should have ignited just from the heat of the fire and that’s before the fire engulfed them. Pyron was holding back the heat to prolong his vengeance. And since he was in a playful mood when Wasp shows up and surprised when a tiny woman flies up to him, you can argue that the environment was cool enough for Wasp to do what she needed to do before she caught on fire.

Also, it’s just a comic, I should really just relax.

Anyway, the chemical fire retardant foam apparently seeps into Pyron’s pores, completely extinguishing him and most of the fire in the area.

Even so, Wasp collapses from the unbearable heat. The others rush to her, congratulating her for beating Pyron.

Scarlet Witch: “It is truly ironic. He was felled by the smallest among us.”

What is this, War of the Worlds?

Don’t underestimate Wasp. Last issue and this show that growing small is actually very useful.

And since we’re out of pages, the wrap up happens in the very last two panels. Off-screen, Pyron/unnamed arsonist has said he’s going to testify against Liquigas.

And Wasp gets the last word, seemingly intentionally angling for an everybody laughing end.

Captain America: “What’s wrong, Wasp? You look troubled.”

Wasp: “It -- it’s the ‘heatburn’ I got attacking Pyron, Cap! How am I going to explain to Hank where I got a tan... in December?!”

That or some sad trombones.

Does... does a bad burn from being in a fire for fractions of a second resemble a tan??

Oh, whatever. She can be vain if she likes, this is her ‘I’m effectual!’ story.

Which I’m basing on a letters column letter, infrequently included in Marvel Unlimited comics but included this time.

There’s a letter from a fan saying “We feel that the Wasp has long been denied the chance to fulfill her true potential, as have Susan Richards, Sif, and Clea. We feel that she has been portrayed as lacking in intelligence and power for too long. We feel that she has been depicted as subordinate to the other Avengers in all respects. Thus we request, nay, demand, that she be given the chance to reach her true potential, that she be allowed to use her wits and strength, that she be put on an equal footing with the other Avengers.”

Which got the reply basically saying ‘okay how’s this?’ and promising that her character would be developing in interesting and unexpected ways in issues to come.

So this is definitely an issue that shows that Wasp is as good as the rest of the Avengers.

And as one? Uh. Its fine. Definitely squished her involvement to the very back half so if this was all she got, that wouldn’t be the best.

Although, the Marvel wiki having the note “For once, the Wasp saves the day and proves she's a competent hero” for the issue is very rude.

Putting aside the intended Wasp yay thing and this is a pretty good story. Or at least a very unique one. I don’t know many stories where the superheroes are put in such a hostile environment that hampers their abilities so much.

They have to spend the entire fight in fire-resistant suits and Jocasta can’t even use her lasers without putting herself in danger.

The Avengers have been to space and they’ve fought under the ocean and neither has felt as hazardous as this one-off issue.

The fire and shadows make for a very striking looking issue.

Weirdly it doesn’t seem like Pyron is ever used again. He gets this one story and an appearance in a Fantastic Four encyclopedia. Pyron would have made a decent Human Torch counter for the Frightful Four or something. But the one-off fillerish nature of this issue probably means that Pyron didn’t make much of an impact.

As a Human Torch guest star thing, its not too great. Its not quite ‘appears in one panel’ bad but I expect more if its going to be advertised on the cover. Geez.

But this issue is significant in one other way. This is the last issue Avengers issue collected in the last Essential Avengers trade. The very namesake of this liveblog.

From here on, I am in comics I haven’t already read. Untrod waters.

Should be fun.

Follow @essential-avengers. Or like or reblog or tell me I’m doing a good job. I think Wasp is neat.

[arcadianambivalence]

World on Fire, Episode 1

March 1939 – September 1939

World on Fire begins with a blackshirt rally in Manchester.  Blackshirts (not to be confused with the Italian group of the same name) were paramilitary supporters of the British Union of Fascists political party, led by Sir Oswald Mosley.  

In the middle of this rally, where a mustached man levels all too familiar accusations, a singer named Lois and her interpreter (boy)friend Harry break out in a derisive contrafactum of “Bye, Bye Blackbird.”  The two are thrown from the rally and arrested while the fascists remain free to incite violence, an irony that is not lost on Lois or her father, Douglas.  

After their parents pay their bail, Lois and Harry part ways, not only because they come from different classes, but also because Harry is leaving for a translator position in Warsaw.

The next thing we know, it’s five months later, and we are introduced to a completely different character, an American journalist named Nancy Campbell.  Shades on and swigging from a flash, Nancy swerves down a road along the German-Polish border until she notices something and stops to investigate.  Lying at the edge of the woods is a pile of bodies.  She attempts to look for identification in the uniforms the dead men are wearing but is startled by the sound of nearby gunfire.  German soldiers are executing people in civilian garb, and if that’s not enough of a sign that war is imminent, Nancy finds an entire field littered with (illegal) tanks.  As she escapes back to the car, a German soldier fires through the rear window.

“Nazi Germany is a master of illusions, and the greatest illusion of all is that they are seriously negotiation for peace.”

Nancy arrives in Warsaw unscathed and determined.  Harry is there too.  In the months since he left England, Harry has fallen in love with Kasia, and her family has welcomed him with open arms .  But the massacre at the border is not enough to convince his new girlfriend, Kasia, to leave Poland.  In the months since he left England, Harry has fallen in love with Kasia, and her family has welcomed him with open arms.  Poland isn’t entirely defenseless, either.  Her father, Stefan, and brother, Grzegorz, are going to fight for the Free City of Danzig, a key barrier between Poland and Germany.  (FINALLY, something that talks about Danzig!)

“What sort of camera is that?”  “A Leiker.”  “Ah, German-made.  Perhaps when Harry clicks the shutter we should all duck.”

Stefan is hopeful that Poland (with the help of the long-promised British support) will successfully push back the German army.  Harry can’t bring himself to say that his homeland will likely not honor its promises in the way Stefan envisions.  Later that night, he begs with his boss to do something to help the Tomaszeski family, but his boss waves him off.  

Nancy is encountering the same reaction with her nephew, Webster, who is currently working as a doctor in Paris and enjoying every minute of its jazz scene.  While Harry’s love for Kasia makes him want to flee Warsaw with her, Webster’s budding relationship with saxophone player Albert makes him want to remain in Paris with him.

Ultimately, this first episode places its characters between the delicately balanced familiar and the incoming unfamiliar.  Despite the bodies at the border, invasion still feels so abstract as Kasia goes to work as a waitress and Douglas sips his tea at home.  

At no point is this more apparent than Stefan and Grzegorz’s arrival in Danzig.  Far from a confrontation on a literal battlefield, the father and son prepare to fend off the German arrival from a post office, and it is post office on a little peninsula in Danzig that the first shots of war are fired.  (At one point in the first attack, you can see a stack of envelopes go flying over the end of Grzegorz’s carbine.)

Outnumbered and outmanned, the Polish fighters keep fighting for hour after hour, defending the building floor by floor, and finally, room by room.  After nearly a day of combat, Grzegorz, Stefan, and Konrad are pinned in the basement with other survivors.  Realizing that reinforcements are not coming, Stefan considers surrender, but the others agree to fight on.  

As is sometimes done in period pieces, the fictional Stefan is placed in a leadership position instead of the people who actually rallied the fighters and, ultimately, raised the flag of surrender.  

The basement in which the survivors are recovering is set ablaze in the final push against the Polish.  Grzegorz watches in horror as men are burned alive in the underground inferno.  In the chaos, Stefan steps out of the gouged frame of the post office with a make-shift flag of truce.  As was, unfortunately, true to life, German soldiers open fire on the surrendering man.

Grzegorz and Konrad escape through the sewers and climb to safety in a bombed-out building.  A band of German soldiers enters close behind them, and the two hide behind a door.  But Grzegorz, whose congenital cough is exacerbated by the grime of the explosions, coughs, revealing their hiding place.  The two are led out into the town and backed against a wall for execution by a very young and frightened German soldier.  Seeing his fear, Grzegorz offers the soldier two packets of British cigarettes that Harry gave him earlier.  The soldier does not accept the cigarettes, but he does turn away at the sound of another execution.  Grzegorz and Konrad use this moment to escape once more.

The young German soldier, it turns out, is the son of Nancy’s neighbors in Berlin.  Having returned to her normal assignment in Berlin, Nancy continues to broadcast the progression of the newly-declared war, but with a more conscientious word choice than her typical bluntness.  This is Nazi Germany, and her every word is closely monitored.

The Luftwaffe fly over Warsaw in the morning.  Harry tries to find Kasia in the chaos and is thrown through the glass doors of the restaurant in the shockwave of a blast.  He proposes.  Once more, she starts to turn him down out of concern for her family, but she loves him and can’t say goodbye yet.  While the city around them recovers from the aerial bombardment, Harry and Kasia elope.  

(Only the young and in love can smile as their country is officially being invaded, I guess).

Life is much calmer in Paris, but it is not without danger.  Albert the saxophonist arrives at the American hospital where Webster works after being attacked by Action Francaise, a French extremist group that espoused many of the same beliefs as the British Union of Fascists, the Nazi party, etc.  As Webster tends to Albert’s wounds, Albert cautiously tries to determine if Webster’s interest stems from music or love.

In England, life seems even safer.  Lois has work at a factory and moonlights as a singer, her true passion, to provide for her brother, a happy-go-lucky petty thief, and her father, who turned to pacifism after his experiences in the First World War, experiences which still haunt him with shell shock, though he is embarrassed to admit it.  With the declaration of war, there seems less and less of a place for peace in the world, and Douglas is starting to fear that his children, already at odds with his pacifism, will be swept up in war like he was.

Still in school, Kasia’s little brother Jan is already on the verge of growing up too fast.  With his father and brother gone, he is technically “Man of the House,” a title swiftly refused by Kasia.  She holds Jan tightly and tells him that from now on, he will have to be very brave.  Within the course of one episode, Kasia has changed from carefree to heavy-hearted.  One way or another, she will have to leave her family behind.

Harry calls his mother, Roberta, and tells her that he will take the next train out of Warsaw.  Far removed from any danger (and partial to the very fascism that brought it!), Roberta is too busy planning a party with her wealthy friends to be terribly concerned.  

Before he can tell her that he is bringing his new wife home with him, Harry chickens out.  There isn’t really a good way to say you’ve moved on from your British kind-of girlfriend that your mother hated to marry your Polish girlfriend that your mother will definitely hate.

But no matter.  There’ll be time enough when he gets home.  

The train station is packed with people fleeing the city and saying goodbye, perhaps forever, to their loved ones.  Harry, dressed in wide-brimmed hat and trench coat like a British Rick Blaine, anxiously waits for Kasia to arrive.  But Casablanca, this is not.  Kasia emerges from the sea of people, Jan in tow.  He’s come to see them off, Kasia explains with a kiss. Harry loads her light suitcase onto the train as Kasia says her goodbyes to her little brother.  

And this is where the show convinced me to follow it to the end.  As the train begins to leave, Harry holding her suspiciously light suitcase, Kasia lifts Jan onto the train and slams the door behind him.  “If you love me,” she shouts to Harry over the shriek of the train whistle, “You’ll watch over Jan.”  

As the train carries a stunned Jan and Harry away, Kasia cranes for a final look at the family she will have to live without, for she has made up her mind not to flee as a refugee, but to fight on like her father and her brother and the thousands of other Polish volunteers against the oncoming storm.

Closing Thoughts

At first, I thought it was a strange choice to start the series with Harry and Lois’s arrest, especially since the relationship between the two characters could easily have been communicated through the editing like the Rossler family.  

But after rewatching the first episode, I began to realize the bigger themes of this series.  The threat of fascism is not simply Germany and Italy versus the World, but a possibility in England and France, too.  The inclusion of the BUF and Action Francais brings out the movements that could have risen higher in their countries, blending the simple lines of this country is good, this country is bad often drawn in period pieces.

World on Fire shakes up the typical portrayal of war by basing it on the ground with civilians from perspectives not traditionally seen in media.  Sure, there are the strapping young British guys of Harry and Tom who will inevitably be involved in the more familiar portraits of heroics, but the use of a translator and petty criminal as your average war heroes is a twist on the clichés.

More refreshingly, the show spotlights the people often left on the fringes of war portraits, if included at all.  The most obvious example of this is Albert Fallou, a gay black French musician (when was the last time you heard those four words together when describing a TV character?).  War correspondents, too, are given their due through Nancy, our psuedo-narrator and historical guide who reminds the viewers of how many journalists on the front lines or the heart of enemy territory continued to witness the war at risk of censorship or a more dangerous punishment.  The Tomaszeski family especially ascends to the heroes of the episode from the delightful, but doomed Stefan to his resilient children.

Ultimately, this show provokes its viewers to sympathize with the characters and their situations because of how similar the people are regardless of their unimaginable experiences.

Historical Notes

Nancy Campbell is an amalgamation of multiple historic people.  Like Claire Hollingworth, the British journalist for The Daily Telegraph, she discovers German forces amassing along the Polish border (while driving a borrowed car).  Hollingworth was also responsible for the first report of the war’s outbreak and, in earlier that year, had arranged for the visas of thousands of refugees.  Like William L. Shirer and Howard K. Smith, Nancy broadcasts the early days of the war from Berlin.

Professional and uniformed soldier Stefan waving a make-shift white flag is likely a reference to Dr. Jan Michon, the director of the Polish Post Office central to this episode.  

There are fleeting moments with other people who were historically involved in the event, too, such as the ten-year old Erwina Barzychowska who was hiding with her family during the onslaught

and Konrad Guderski, who held off the incoming Germans during the first attack with a grenade.  

(However, the show makes a confusing choice of including another character named Konrad who escapes with Grzegorz.)

While the war began officially on September 1st, 1939, the Siege of Warsaw did not become a ground fight until a week later (which is why Warsaw is still in relatively good shape by the end of this episode) Polish soldiers and volunteers managed to defend the city for nearly a month until capitulation.  The city was officially occupied starting October 1st until January 1945.

Observations

I love the detail that Harry uses a dishrag to change the lightbulb in the camera.  

Dan Jones’s score is fantastic, especially during the train station scene when the whistle of the train and the hiss of the wheels are incorporated into the orchestration.

Sources

Danzig:

http://brushesandbayonets.blogspot.com/2016/09/01ix1939-defence-of-polish-post-office.html

http://www.stampnewsnow.com/PDF_Pages/1-Poland.pdf

Clare Hollingworth:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-37606306

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-38573643

More on American Reporters:

https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/wcf/

[sparklyjojos]

THE SAIMON FAMILY CASE recaps [13/13]  — FINALE

In which we learn the beautiful boy’s even deeper secret, observe the Case to its end, and go back to the future.

--

After Ajiro and Kirigirisu left Nihon Tantei Club to work on their own, a hurricane of resignations went through the organization, until the only ones still left in the Club at the beginning of March are Shiranui, just a few of his detectives, and two office workers. Soon Shiranui gets invited to join the international detective organization DOLL, which would require him to stay in their headquarters in France for a long time.

Faced with this entire situation, Shiranui decides to do the only logical thing: he gets all his willing detectives to go to Ajiro and ask to be taken in as new employees.

It truly must be divine providence that sent him all of them, Ajiro thinks (even though he now has to figure out how to fit all those people in his house).

Shiranui shows Ajiro and Kirigirisu the resignation papers they signed… but what they haven’t noticed before is that the Club’s name on the papers is marginally different, “Hinoki Tantei Club”. Good old Shiranui predicted this exact turn of events and made it so that Ajiro and Kirigirisu never actually left the organization. 

“Nihon Tantei Club is still yours, Souji,” he says.

It may have been a pretty shady move on Shiranui's part, but at the same time, it feels like a gift from the heavens.

Soon afterwards, on March 10th, the first Club’s location suddenly explodes and goes up in flames, killing the few detectives who stayed there. Apparently one of detective assistants set up explosives targeting a random person he fell in financial conflict with.

Everyone can’t help but think that fate is truly a strange thing, and that life is a fragile good.

And also—nine days later—that the fire was an omen, a coincidental prediction of what was going to happen during the 19th incident of the Saimon Family Case.

--

At 9 PM on stormy March 19th, lightning hits the Fujita residence and sets it on fire so giant that even the firefighters are having a hard time. Running around the garden helping them, Ajiro and Kirigirisu make sure to check if everyone made it out safe.

No one can find Takayoshi.

Ajiro without hesitation grabs a bucket of water, dumps it over himself, and avoiding the firefighters trying to stop him runs into the burning house. Even Kirigirisu can’t hold him down; Ajiro’s determination to stop the last death from happening is pushing him forward. Not sure what else to do, Kirigirisu also dumps water on his head and runs into the house with a desperate shout.

Running through burning hallways, he finds Ajiro inside a tatami room along with Takayoshi, who’s sitting calmly on the ground like he's perfectly content with the situation. Neither man moves even when Kirigirisu yells at them to run. Takayoshi is holding a white Noh mask of an old man in his lap. Kirigirisu takes a step forward—

“No, Kirigirisu!” Ajiro yells. “He’s going to kill you if you come any closer! This man is Shiroyashi!”

Shiroyashi—a white version of Kuroyashi?

Takayoshi’s eyes are dark, his expression strangely vacant.

As Kirigirisu stands there frozen in shock, Ajiro jumps towards him and gets them both out of the way of falling debris. A wall of fire separates them from Takayoshi now, but they can still hear him say “I’m sorry… give my regards to Uyama…” before the ceiling caves in above him.

Ajiro and Kirigirisu try to escape the room, but fire surrounds them on all sides. They’re trapped.

“I’m sorry, Kirigirisu”—are Ajiro's last words before the burning inferno collapses on them.

--

When Kirigirisu regains consciousness, his entire body hurts, but he’s somehow still alive.

“You finally woke up,” comes Ajiro’s voice. He’s safe too, sitting on the ground nearby, but it’s not him who provides the much needed explanation for where they are.

“It’s Friday of March 20th, past two in the morning. It’s been about five hours since the fire. We’re inside Shouryouin.”

What a serene, evanescent sound bringing to mind the voice of God or angelic music… for a moment Kirigirisu thinks he might have died and gone to heaven, but then realizes the voice’s owner is Saimon Joukei, sitting innocently on the ground, holding his knees to his chest in a childish manner.

“Joukei! Why are you—”

“He saved us,” Ajiro says. “We owe him our lives.”

Kirigirisu has no idea how a child could save them from that completely hopeless situation in a raging fire.. but well, clearly they are still alive. Yet another thing he just has to accept.

“Is Takayoshi…?” he asks.

“He’s dead," Ajiro answers shortly. "They found the body.”

“So he was the murderer?”

“I’m afraid it’s not that easy. We do know that he was the assassin known as Shiroyashi. Do you remember what Uyama called him? Kira. That was a hint: killer.” It seems Ajiro has managed to get some more information about the Case while Kirigirisu was out cold.

“If not him, then who was the culprit behind the Saimon Family Case?”

“Mr. Kirigirisu,” Joukei unexpectedly says, “the Saimon Family Case doesn’t have a culprit.”

“What? Joukei, how can you know—”

“Kirigirisu, it looks like we’ve been both utterly deceived by this boy,” Ajiro interrupts. “He’s not actually Joukei, but Juku. Juku pretending to be Joukei pretending to be Juku.”

“What?!” Kirigrisu shouts. “Wh—! But—! Why would you pretend to—?!”

“Because I’m Umayato no Miko,” the boy answers. “I officially became the ninety-ninth one after my uncle’s death last month. I had attempted to block the transfer of the name Umayato no Miko by making it look like I, the person already appointed as the successor, had died instead of Joukei. That’s why I pretended to be Joukei pretending to be me. I managed to deceive my uncle, who fully believed I was Joukei pretending to be Juku. That’s why he let you speak to me.”

“But then… where did that strange beauty come from?”

“I don’t really know myself, but I think Mr. Ajiro’s reasoning wasn’t far from the truth. It was so no one would notice who I really was—Juku pretending to be Joukei pretending to be Juku.”

Kirigirisu glances at Ajiro, who’s quiet and lost deep in thought. It looks like he has already talked with the boy about all this. Kirigirisu will have to ask his own questions if he wants to learn more.

“But if you successfully avoided becoming Umayato no Miko in that way, why did you return to openly being yourself?”

“I decided I can take the risk. You promised you would protect me. I wouldn’t believe just a simple promise, but when I saw you run into the fire trying to save Mr. Takayoshi, I decided I could trust you. At first I had planned to give up on being Umayato no Miko and run away. But then I realized that with your help, maybe I don’t have to run—instead I can keep fighting even as Umayato no Miko.”

The boy speaks in a manner unthinkable for his age, with similar wisdom and genius that legends ascribe to Prince Shoutoku.

“Keep fighting—what do you mean by this?”

“First, I should tell you more about Umayato no Miko.”

Juku starts long complicated explanations.

--

The first Umayato no Miko, the actual regent Prince Shoutoku, brought the art of killing illusion to Japan and established an organization that used said art to obliterate rebellion. Those who could harm the process of establishing the state were deemed “evil” and eliminated. Skilled magicians of murder under Shoutoku’s lead were called tenshi no dougu (“the emperor’s tools”), Tengu for short.

As time went by, some of those magicians of murder moved towards “evil” and started abusing their skills to kill people for monetary gain. This group was called Akki (“demons”, “evil spirits” etc.).

Tengu and Akki as expected fought hard against each other. Both groups wore Noh masks when killing, which led to many a weird legend being passed down through generations. It’s not unlikely that the two groups performing illusions such as flying was what caused the common people to believe in demons and creatures known as tengu. In fact, the groups' penchant for orchestrating stealthy “beauty of death” (shi-no-bi) was perhaps the origin of the word shinobi, ninja.

Also, the “death soldiers” (shihei, 死兵) doing “honorable murders” (osatsu, 御殺) are coincidentally hinting at banknotes (shihei, 紙幣 or osatsu, お札), and those—as we already know—point to Prince Shoutoku.

Both Kuroyashi (Kyuuzou) and Shiroyashi (Takayoshi) were high commanders of Tengu. While they killed with their own hands, they also made use of their forces when necessary—that’s why Soujin has never managed to get solid evidence of Kyuuzou's murders.

All those historical Umayato no Mikos ruled over and gave orders to Tengu instead of dirtying their own hands, some indirectly killing millions. Even if it was for the good of the country, it was still murder. Feeling the weight of that responsibility and wanting to atone for his actions, the actual Prince Shoutoku prepared a system: after a given Umayato no Miko died, their entire family would be killed by Tengu. This happened even to Prince Shoutoku’s own relatives, with known historical events such as the Isshi Incident actually being a cover-up story.

The only exception took place if the dead Umayato no Miko had appointed someone from their own family as the successor. In that case, the successor’s generation and those taking care of them could be allowed to have their deaths postponed—more details would have been discussed with the previous Umayato no Miko beforehand.

Knowing what would happen to her family in the future, the 97th Umayato no Miko, Saimon Tamako, worked together with her successor Gensui to create a secret plan. They wanted the Saimon Family Case to finally bring both Tengu and Akki out of the darkness of history and into the light of public knowledge. It would serve as the perfect occasion to finally destroy Akki. Perhaps a lot of Tengu would die in the fight, but then again, in our modern times—the times of punishment delivered not by assassins, but by courtrooms—maybe Tengu weren’t needed anymore.

Tamako’s plan started with her own death and continued through the deaths of her family members on each 19th day of the month. She knew that every single death would be ruled as an accident or a suicide and not investigated properly due to prejudice; Japanese police would look the other way when a family with Korean roots was being attacked.

Both the Saimon Family Case and the Shiroyasha Case were executed by a group of Tengu under Takayoshi’s lead. Apparently all victims of Shiroyasha (except for Yumeji) were either Akki or people who bought their services… and all Japanese, which made the police much more eager to treat it seriously and classify it as an L Crime. Even Yumeji’s murder didn’t make the police want to connect the two cases. Just as planned...

--

At this point, Kirigirisu interrupts to ask about something he can’t understand: if Tamako and Gensui created the plan which was then carried out by the Shiroyasha group, how can Juku claim that the Saimon Family Case has no culprit?

Juku explains. Since Tengu are ultimate assassins, they would make all their murders look like accidents or suicides—in fact, was it not for the suspicious regularity of the deaths, no one would even think there could be a case going on. However, not all of the deaths relating to the case had to be their doing—Raiouji and Mikuruma probably just happened to get into an accident on 19th, Tsushima and Arito just happened to both die of heart failure in a critical moment, Shima died not on 19th, and it’s likely that several more Saimons really died in accidents or killed themselves.

Juku chalks up those events to “accident tendency”, a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. Constant stress, grief and grim expectations can really make one more likely to die; old people often die shortly after their partner’s passing, and someone told by a fortune-teller they’re going to have an accident on a given day would overthink their every move, resulting in an actual accident.

Saimon Tamako predicted this “accident tendency” effect, and so Tengu would not act on a given 19th if someone already died that day. Because of this, it’s pretty much impossible to tell which deaths were murders, or if there even was a single murder—and no one can solve a case that doesn't exist. Even though Juku is the current Umayato no Miko, even he can’t solve it, as all the details were negotiated between the two previous title holders.

Speaking of the previous title holder—just like Ajiro suspected, the two Soga Tensui brothers really had switched places (which Juku had known about all along). The man that Ajiro and Kirigirisu always knew as “Soga Gensui” was actually Soga Tensui—Saimon Ryuusui, the 98th Umayato no Miko, Miku’s husband, Juku’s father. Tensui went missing after faking his death by switching places with his brother… or should we say, after the brothers finally returned to their proper places after one long masquerade.

Kirigirisu proposes that Juku contacts his father and asks about the details of the Case—they’re both Umayato no Miko, so they should have a way to communicate, right?—but Juku answers that even he won’t be able to meet his father before the case ends.

Kirigirisu is more than confused by this statement, so Ajiro explains in a voice full of bitterness.

“Kirigirisu, the murder case hasn’t ended yet. No… it’s not that it hasn’t ended. It hasn’t even started yet!”

“The events until now were just the Saimon Family Case,” Juku says. “And from now on, the Saimon Family Murder Case will begin.”

What they went through was, according to Juku, an unsolvable mystery with no culprit. What awaited them now was its second phase, a serial murder case—the final plan to defeat Akki—with the murderer being none other than the man our detectives thought to be Gensui.

The entire case as planned would consist of two phases, both starting on the 99th birthday of a Saimon Tamako (as we remember, Tsukumo Tamako was two years younger than Saimon Tamako, and her second husband was a Saimon, so upcoming April 19th would technically be yet another 99th birthday of a “Saimon Tamako”).

The first phase was the Saimon Family Case, lasting for nineteen months from September 19th 1977 to March 19th 1979 (yesterday).

The second phase—the Saimon Family Murder Case—would last another nineteen months, from April 19th 1979 to October 19th 1980.

Taken together, those two sets of nineteen incidents would make for 38 deaths in total, enough to kill the entire Saimon family. The family counted 39 members in all, but undoubtedly someone would die on another date due to that “accident tendency”. If by any chance too many Saimons died on unrelated days, other people connected to the Circus would be killed as replacement so the numbers checked out.

Now that the first phase of the case ended, exactly nineteen members of the family are still alive. From Saimons: Juku, his father Ryuusui (Soga Tensui), technically one of the surviving Tamakos, Taishi, Chinami, Chiaki. From Tsukumos: Gensui Senior, Karan, Seika, Emu & Nemu, Ranma. From Fujitas: Hyousen and Hyousai. From Tousens: the other surviving Tamako, Natsuko, Maki, Matoki and Yomiko.

If everything goes as planned, all nineteen will be dead by October 19th next year.

The second phase is also going to follow the symbolism of the magic show’s nineteen acts, effectively echoing the first phase. Soga Tensui will assume the identity of Shiroyasha and start killing people openly, with preliminary announcement, blatantly demonstrating the connection between the incidents and the Shiroyasha Case and forcing the police to investigate properly this time.

There is no doubt that with that connection in mind, the Saimon Family Murder Case will be immediately classified as an L Crime. The details of an L Crime can only be revealed to the public after maybe two decades… and this future reveal is the most important part of the plan.

Tengu and Akki can only act effectively as long as the public doesn’t know about them and their “perfect murders” that don't look like murders—but the public shall finally learn the truth when the details of the Case are revealed.

Every incident in this world has two sides like a coin: the obverse and the reverse, the surface common knowledge and the hidden truth behind it.

Those unable to notice the hidden truth will never be free, and only those skilled in reading between the lines can live their lives fully. Changing the common consciousness of the Japanese society, turning their understanding of the world towards spotting the hidden truths, is necessary to finally defeat Akki (and Tengu by collateral, but perhaps that is fine).

Just like the first Umayato no Miko worked towards establishing the state, Saimon Tamako wished for the creation of “a new Japan”.

Before the public will learn the truth about the case, it will no doubt have spread widely like a vague legend, all attention put towards the forbidden fruit of the second phase as if that’s the entire Case.

The second phase that is about to start very soon…

---

[The convention of 7 part with 7 chapters each breaks here. The next chapter is instead called:

SAIMON FAMILY MURDER CASE: CHANGE THE WORLD]

On April 19th 1979, Tsukumo (or Saimon) Tamako dies poisoned with arsenic during her and her sister’s 99th birthday celebration.

On May 19th 1979, Tousen Natsuko dies from a needle stabbed into her chest.

On June 19th 1979, Fujita Hyousai is found strangled at Tottori Dunes.

On July 19th 1979, Fujita Hyousen declares he’s going to challenge the murderer, but is later found dead after falling from Mount Hyouno. Fujita-gumi breaks apart and Tsuwano becomes a battling ground for two other yakuza groups.

On August 19th 1979, after Tousen Yomiko says she’d like to take a bath, a police officer walks into the bathroom first to check it, only to be caught and thrown violently by Magic Hands sent in through the window. The officer dies, but all the Saimon family members survive the day. The police increases investigation efforts now that one of them fell victim.

On September 19th 1979, Saimon Taishi is feeding the koi carps he got from the Ryuuguus when he’s suddenly dragged underwater and drowned.

On October 19th 1979, despite the Arm Guillotine having been disposed of and Saimon Chisato repeatedly claiming she’s not suicidal, she’s killed in such a way that it looks like she used the tool on herself.

On November 19th 1979, grieving Saimon Chinami dies of alcohol poisoning.

On December 19th 1979, Shiroyasha shows up in person in Sanasou and pierces Tsukumo Karan with his sword. No one is able to catch him.

On January 19th 1980, seeing as the next target will probably be Juku, he and Soujin come up with a risky plan. Soujin drives them towards the place where Joukei was killed, but when they’re going through a long tunnel, Juku gets out of the car and Kotensui's costume is put in his seat. After exiting the tunnel, Soujin sees Shiroyasha on the road and speeds up right into him, but what he took for the murderer was a figure made of concrete. Soujin dies in the crash. Ajiro doesn’t know if Soujin really got tricked by something so simple, or if the illusion looked more convincing at the time, or… At the end of the day, Juku survives at the price of Soujin’s life. When Kirigirisu (who at the time is resting at home recovering from flu) learns what happened, he bursts out crying and his condition worsens.

On February 19th 1980, the caretaker of the two hammer sharks in the Tottori Aquarium falls into the tank and is killed. While not a single family member dies, the connection with Tsukumo Souma's death is clear, and it’s obvious that Tensui’s utmost priority is to make the second phase closely imitate the first.

On March 19th 1980, the sound of a flying hornet can be heard all around the family's house, which must be Tensui’s vocal mimicry, but no one is successful at finding him. Young Tsukumo Emu dies after sustaining a wound that looks like a hornet stung her. This event causes everyone to move the remaining young kids of the family—Juku, Nemu, Matoki and Yomiko—to Ryuuguujou, where they will temporarily live for safety while the adults stay in Tsuwano.

On April 19th 1980, Tousen Maki suddenly falls dead in her own magic shop. While the cause of death was potassium cyanide coating one of her cigarettes, the incident looked similar to Tsushima and Arito falling dead on the spot.

On May 19th 1980, Tsukumo Gensui dies from carbon monoxide poisoning after the gas stove in his bedroom has its hose unplugged.

On June 19th 1980, Tousen Matoki disappears from heavily guarded Ryuuguujou. He’s later found dead in the nearby mountains, apparently having eaten (having been fed?) a poisonous mushroom.

On July 19th 1980, Tsukumo Seika is found dead in the family’s magic prop storage, having suffocated inside the Press Hammer. With this, the mystery of the show’s underwater escape is finally revealed: the Press Hammer can open at the bottom, allowing the performer to enter the secret hiding place inside it and stay there for a short while while his double shows up in the auditorium.

On August 19th 1980, since the next murder must be related to young Touji dying from a nurse’s mistake, everyone fears the one targeted may be Tsukumo Nemu, who’s been so stressed after Matoki’s death she doesn’t eat and has to stay under supervision of the Ryuuguu family’s trusted doctor. However, the actual victim this time ends up being Tousen Tamako, who is given the wrong injection after someone switched around her medicine.

On September 19th 1980, everyone is still worried about sick Nemu, since the next death has to echo Gensui’s death from illness. But once again someone else ends up dead instead: a young police officer patrolling Ryuuguujou completely breaks down under all the pressure and hits his head against the wall so hard he dies. Mental breakdown can also be classified as a disease.

--

On October 19th 1980, the last day of the Case, whatever will happen must reference Takayoshi’s death in the fire caused by a lightning strike.

It’s already raining heavily when Juku leads Ajiro and Kirigirisu through the darkness of an early morning to where they're going to finally meet Soga Tensui again—the meeting spot being the roof of Kami-Saimon in Tsuwano.

In dark pouring rain, Shiroyasha shows up on the rooftop to face them. The police instantly surrounds the house, cutting off all escape routes.

Suddenly, a lightning strikes—not just once, but two times, three, four, five, until the house is engulfed in flames. Juku reasons out that Tensui must have installed a tall metal rod on top of the house, which as the tallest thing around would work like a lightning rod.

Stepping lightly over the raging fire and under the pouring rain, Juku approaches Shiroyasha. The two Umayato no Miko, the father and the son finally face each other.

Shiroyasha slashes forward with the Sword of Seven Stars and Juku responds by using his Magic Hands in defense, eventually managing to grab and pull off the demonic mask. The man underneath is undoubtedly Soga Tensui. Taking advantage of the momentary distraction, Juku grabs the Sword of Seven Stars and wrenches it away from Tensui's grasp.

Tensui still smiles fearlessly.

“You have surpassed me, Juku,” he says. “As expected, you really are something else.”

In an instant, Tensui runs to the edge of the rooftop and into the air—no, he must be running on top of an invisible thread. Ajiro and Kirigirisu can’t follow him, but Juku doesn’t hesitate before chasing Tensui through the dark pouring rain, walking on a thread he can’t even see, with no safety net to catch him would he fall. The thread stretches all the way between the roof and the pond's island. Tensui gets there first and hides inside Shouryoin. Juku follows right behind him, but just before he can enter the shrine too—

—a lightning falls from the sky and sets Shouryoin ablaze.

Juku freezes in shock, looking up at the column of fire that seems to rise to the heavens.

Watching the scene unfold from afar, Ajiro mutters:

“It’s God, Kirigirisu. God [kami, but written with kanji for fire and water] is there.”

With Soga Tensui’s death in the fire, the Saimon Family Murder Case finally comes to an end, leaving four survivors: Tsukumo Ranma, Tsukumo Nemu, Tousen Yomiko and Saimon Juku.

--

[The next chapter is called:

SAIMON FAMILY MURDER CASE: OUT OF THIS WORLD]

The burned body found in Shouryoin lacks its left hand; it looks like Tensui really wore a prosthetic.

As the 99th Umayato no Miko, Juku uses a secret information network to finally declare the dissolution of Tengu after so many centuries. That doesn’t mean they will just go away and do nothing; they will probably still attempt to fight Akki… at least until the truth behind the case comes to light in a couple decades.

--

A few days after the last incident, Ajiro and Juku are in Kyoto, taking a walk towards the train station to head back to Ryuuguujou. (Kirigirisu and his wife Kano are right now on a hot springs trip funded by Ajiro, because God knows Kirigirisu more than earned it.) As they walk, they arrive at the place where the Kamo river and the Takano river join in a Y shape, a popular spot to hang out. The strange pair of a beautiful boy with sunglasses and a sexy young gentleman makes a lot of people turn their heads and sometimes faint. [Yes, the narration actually calls Ajiro a “sexy young gentleman”. Thanks, Seiryoin.] The two cross the river to the quiet “delta”, leaving the crowds behind.

After the Case finally came to an end, Yomiko was taken in by her very distant relatives from Tousens, while the only adult survivor of the Case, Tsukumo Ranma, declared that he would take care of both Juku and Nemu, his nephew and niece becoming his adoptive children. Juku’s last name would be changed accordingly.

“Tsukumo Juku… a new great detective is born,” Ajiro states, Juku smiling bashfully in response. “How about it? Would you like to work together as detectives one day? I can tell you have all the right qualities, which is rare. I’m utterly convinced that as a detective you will be indispensable for the country’s future.”

Juku shakes Ajiro’s hand and nods wordlessly, his eyes behind the sunglasses shining with determination and confidence.

—and in that moment, another person appears before them: an old man with white hair and beard, wearing a conical hat, holding a fishing rod, his eyes closed as if in thought.

“Hohoho… so we finally meet,” the man says. “You are the ones who solved the Saimon Family Murder Case?”

“Have we... met before?”

“This is the first time we meet. I am Hikami Sensai, just a feeble-minded old man who turned 986 this year. Perhaps there will come a time when I too will make use of your skills. I am looking forward to it. Hohoho…”

The old man laughs as if he’s really looking forward to it, then leaves, just like that.

The event feels unreal like a dream, and just like a dream it quickly disappears from Juku’s and Ajiro’s minds as they continue towards the train station. Everyone must be already waiting for them in Ryuuguujou: Mr. and Mrs. Ryuuguu with Otohime and Jounosuke, Ranma with Nemu, Yomiko, and even Ajiro’s wife Mizuki and son Souya, who arrived some time ago to hang out. This would be the first time the other kids meet Souya; a future precious memory for sure.

“Who knows, maybe my son will work for you in the future,” Ajiro jokes while they’re on the train. To be fair, little Souya doesn’t seem that inclined towards detective work, but one can dream.

Ajiro thinks of a world in which Juku and Souya grow up to be splendid detectives. Even though he’s not sure about where he himself is going to be in all those years, he can already imagine the wonderful future of all the children.

“I’m glad Nemu feels better now,” he says, to which Juku answers with a beautiful smile.

“To think Ms. Nemu is going to become my sister... it’s so strange and wonderful.”

Apparently Juku calls even his own sister “Miss”—well, we all have our quirks.

As Ajiro thinks of the children, he also quietly remembers the time spent with his grandfather.

--

The government may be able to deem something an L Crime and forbid the media to talk about it, but it may never fully seal people’s mouths. The legend of the Saimon Family Murder Case, a “new crime”, the “crime revolution” that started a new era, is circulated widely specifically because it shouldn’t be.

As the Case becomes a legend, so does Nihon Tantei Club, now overwhelmed with requests, employing more and more detectives and becoming the center of attention. Soon the government and the police take notice and propose cooperation. Around the time they get a shiny new building for their own in Kyoto, Ajiro changes the organization’s official name to something more fitting: JDC, short for the English name Japan Detectives Club.

Meanwhile, Uyama Hideo keeps working hard for Kodansha, helps talented authors create the new genre of mystery books and establishes the Mephisto prize. He still stays in touch with Ajiro and often sends him a copy of a particularly good new book.

Almost two decades after the case, when the 21st century is just around the corner, two authors are especially important to Uyama: Maya Yutaka and Maijo Otaro. Looks like he finally found those two writers he had talked about during the Case.

--

--

“Happy New Millenium!” exclaims the young blond magician, making the first person narrator of the framing device come to his senses in Las Vegas on December 31st 1999.

As we can remember, the young magician borrowed a bill from him, put it inside an envelope, set it on fire, produced a rose, and asked the narrator to check his wallet.

As he watched the illusion unfold, the narrator could easily guess all the methods the magician used (the flash paper envelope had another hole through which the bill could be pulled out as it was being inserted, the rose was a folding prop that could be hidden up one’s sleeve, a stooge hidden in the audience would take the bill and secretly put it back inside the spectator’s wallet…).

The narrator did his best to still react with properly surprised faces, of course.

But when he checks his wallet, the surprise is genuine. The bill he finds there is not at all the normal 10,000 yen with the portrait of Yukuzawa Yukichi. Instead, it’s the older version of the bill, the one portraying Prince Shoutoku.

As far as the narrator knows, the only Japanese people at the party are him and his wife… which must mean she was the one to sneak the bill into his wallet on the magician’s request.

Thinking about this, the narrator realizes something: he’s seen this young magician somewhere before.

After the show, the narrator, his wife, and the magician meet up in the hotel’s bar.

“So you’re still alive,” the narrator says.

The magician removes his wig and contact lenses; he now looks much more like a Japanese man.

“It’s been a while, Maji-san,” the narrator’s wife says.

Maji-san… Well, Tousen Matoki really is a bit too old now to be called Maji-chan. The question is: how did he survive the Case, and who was that dead boy thought to be him?

“My sister saved me. You get what I’m saying?”

That itself is explanation enough; Yomiko ended up affecting a lot of events and carried out an important role during a certain case. [And if you want to know what on earth this means, Carnival provides a few answers.] 

--

“I didn’t expect you to fool me like that,” the narrator says to his wife once they’re back in their hotel room.

“You kept secrets from me too, you know.” As expected, she’s still holding a grudge over that one matter.

Even after Tengu dispersed, they continued their fight against Akki. Concerned about the future, Saimon Juku (or rather Tsukumo Juku) appointed our narrator as the next Umayato no Miko. They cooperated as detectives for years, their outstanding insider knowledge of killing methods proving very useful in that job.

JDC has faced five giant cases. One of them was the Crime Olympics a few years ago (also known as the Carnival), and the others were called the Four Great Tragedies of Post-war Japan: the Saimon Family Murder Case, the Geneijo Murder Case, the Serial Locked Room Murder Case, and the one they are still in the middle of, the Serial Twin Disappearance Case. You could say the cases of Geneijo and Locked Rooms made a pair of sorts; if so, then the Saimon Case and the current case would also be connected in many ways—the Tengu already made an appearance, for one.

It’s obvious that Tengu have been observing them for a long time, waiting for the right time to finish their job. Tsukumo Ranma died in a very convincing accident. After Juku died too, there was no doubt that his sister Nemu would be the next target.

“I don’t regret anything I told you, Nemu,” the narrator says to his wife—to the person he appointed as the next Umayato no Miko to save her.

Being Umayato no Miko allowed them to become the first “S-Rank Detective Marriage” in history. The narrator wonders who Nemu will appoint as her successor… a few names from JDC pass through his head. He briefly thinks of their latest source of concern, the second Tsukumo Juku—Tsukumo Hatachi. [Hatachi being written with the kanji for number twenty. ...And then we never learned who this guy is, because Seiryoin still hasn’t written the last JDC book.]

“I think about that case every day,” the narrator says.

“Me too… but I was so small I can’t really remember it.”

“He really was a true magician. No matter when and where, Saimon Ryuusui still magically shows up next to me—because water is the basis of everything, the source of life, it’s always next to us, and every day we have contact with flowing water (ryuusui).”

Yet another coincidence.

The narrator remembers the posthumous Buddhist name given to the man: 清涼院流水大説居士 [Which can be read as Seiryoin Ryuusui Taisetsu Koji. Koji is a normal suffix for such a posthumous name. Ryuusui taisetsu is a term the JDC author often calls his works—“great novels flowing like water”, the word “great” referring to them not being limited by conventional genre boundaries.]

Nemu smiles hearing the narrator’s convoluted explanation.

“You haven’t changed at all, representative,” she calls him the title from long ago.

The narrator, Ajiro Souji, tosses a coin to Nemu.

“Do you know what they call the intricate design found on the reverse side of a coin?” he asks.

“I don’t know. What do they call it?”

The answer is saimon.

--

THE END

[the314anoman]

2018 sucked

it was probably the shittiest year of my life, and that’s not an easy title to claim. let’s recap:

it all started way back in early january, when our subway came under new ownership and we got a new manager, who had worked there for a shorter period than i had (yeah, i was part-time working during college, she was full-time, but w/e) and it all went downhill fast. our manager wasn’t bad, she just was just trying to deal with all the new regulations we were facing and the fact that we were Massively Understaffed™ for being located in a fucking mall. like, for contrast, our old managers let us get away with not turning the line coolers off at night if we were really busy, but under the new owners, we had to clean the legs of tables to get the salt of them. i decided to quit in march after having minors stay and help me close even though they were off the clock since they were required to punch out at 9:30 and still getting yelled at for staying too long and not making everything Perfect. it was so stressful trying to work both faster and harder, so i quit. then, college got out in april and i was looking for internships all over and applying everywhere, but i never got even so much as an interview request. so, june came and i just said “fuck it” and applied to other subways closer to home. ended up getting an interview the next day at a different subway, 2 miles from the old one. i got the job and starting working to find out the subway was also Massively Understaffed™ but the manager was more chill, so it seemed fine. turns out the reason the manager was chill is that he was high. like, all the time. this resulted in him having the memory of a goldfish. like, i specifically told him and his assistant manager that i couldn’t work one day and yet he still called asking where i was when i very plainly explained it twice. and he also scheduled a meeting on the day i request off for my niece’s baptism. at 8am. on a sunday. at the same time, i managed to get an interview at a local factory. it wasn’t really an internship nor in my field, but it was a job and it paid $12/hr so i was like, hell yeah, why not. i managed to get the job and started july 1st, which was great, buuuuuut... the job was super boring; it was pretty much doing the same repetitive tasks over and over again for 7.5 hours a day while ~~listening~~ being subjected to country music. BUT, we got 3 breaks a day and it was nice having a chill job. i came up with a lot of really good writing ideas for a novel that’s been a super long wip because my mind was mostly free during work since it was so repetitive. at this time, i’m still working at subway, mostly weekends and some 5-close shifts. i’m not getting a whole lot of sleep and so that probably explains what happens on july 25th, probably the single shittiest day of my life. i get into the factory and the normal manager is gone on vacation and one of my coworkers is taking over. she tells me that i’ve been missing the least important step in the process of making some parts that i’ve been doing for days now. so naturally, i mess it up a couple more times, but only when she’s watching, because ofc. this happens 3 times and the third time i kind of chuckle to myself because i’m literally only doing it when she’s watching. she takes this to mean i’m laughing at her and yells at me about how i think it’s a joke and blah blah blah, like that’s not what i meant at all but she won’t let me explain. THEN, i get out of work and i’m already on the verge of tears because i have a migraine from lack of sleep and i hate getting yelled at, and i see a text i got while at work (we’re not allowed phones on our person at all at the factory. national security stuff apparently) that my grandma is in the hospital and not going to make it. i just... lose it. i go home and just sit outside on a chair, cuddling my cat and gross sobbing for the first time i can recall. i’m supposed to work a 5-9 shift at subway tonight, but i am not in any state to work. i call them through tears saying i can’t work tonight, i’m visiting my grandma in the hospital in muskegon, an hour away. she’s unconscious when i get there. she dies an hour later, while me and my family are eating dinner downstairs in the basement where there’s no signal. eventually tomorrow comes. it’s now july 26th, which if you know me, is my birthday. my 21st birthday, in fact. you know how for most people, their 21st is the best day of your life? yeah, it was one of the worst for me. i still had to get up at 6am for the factory work, then run home, get changed, and work 5-9 at subway. the only bright spot were two helpful coworkers. one from the factory gave me a butterscotch shot, saying you should still try and enjoy your birthday and my subway coworker bought a hershey pie for me and gave me a hug and some helpful advice. (she had been through a similar experience with her mom passing, so she knew a lot about grief.) i took her advice on letting yourself be happy and decided to go to my friends’ meetup that weekend, which i had requested off from subway previously. it’s a while away, but this was planned a long time ago and i don’t get to see my college friends in the summer other than this, so i’m not missing this. but, when i’m almost there i get a call from subway insisting that i work this weekend to make up for missing my 4 hour shift yesterday. i’m furious because i missed it for legitimate reasons and i was already over 2 hours away and i was NOT driving back. (the reason they’re insisting is because they don’t want to pay my coworker overtime, despite the fact she’s living in a trailer park only off her subway income, too.) they say they might have to fire me and i’m like, sure, i have another job and i already put in my 2 weeks lol. so i go there and try to forget this whole week ever happened. the funeral is on monday, the factory gives me it off so i can attend. there’s lots of tears. lots and lots. my grandma touched a lot of people’s lives; she’s one of the kindest people i’ve ever known. she probably would have supported my sexuality if i ever told her, i regret not doing so earlier. i come back to my factory job on tuesday, and as if the universe is answering some unanswered “could things get any worse?” the hiring manager informs me i’m fired, as if it had to be july 31st, to add to the shithole that july 2018 was. this was a temp position to begin with, and i was leaving in a couple weeks anyway, but this is just another blow to an already grieving 21-year-old. i may have just lost both my jobs and my grandmother in the span of 7 days. i leave the factory and get in my car and just. scream. time passes. the pain of july slowly fades from a roaring inferno all over my body to a dull pulsing. good things start to happen again. i move into an apartment with 3 friends, get a job at the theatre after a lot of paperwork issues, i make the cut for an a capella group and find new friends, develop a crush on someone (something i haven’t really had since high school - but that’s a story for another time), and actually start getting my shit together. things are definitely looking up, despite the fact i had the worst month of life a couple months ago. ...and then comes december, as if it’s trying to challenge july to a battle for shittiest month ever. final exams are coming up, i spend a lot of the previous week leading up to exams rehearsing for performances (i had 4 performances in a week’s span), not much studying could be done. not that studying would help that much, as we would see, but w/e. i ended up forgetting my book with all the important formulas and relationships in it that are too complex to memorize, so i completely bombed that final, and therefore failed the whole class. i’m already having to take an extra semester, failing this class does NOT help. i barely stayed above a 3.0 gpa, a requirement for most internships. on the same day we got final grades back, my mom got a call saying my grandpa had died, only a week before christmas. my whole family went back up to do the whole funeral thing again. we are getting awfully familiar with this nursing home (my mom lost both her parents and an uncle in 5 months). finally, on new year’s eve i decide it’s either now or never to admit my feelings, so i ask my crush out. i get rejected, which is mostly what i expected, but it still knocks the wind out of me. so yeah, 2018 was super extra shitty for me. but at the same time, i feel like i’ve grown a lot as a person. i’ve made a bunch of new friends, gained a niece, learned a lot about pain, and done a lot of things i never thought i’d do. hell, i had the balls to ask a guy out, which was something that frightened me to my core. i went on a trip to dc and learned more about the injustices happening here, i went camping/hiking with friends, and went tubing behind a boat. so, i’m not gonna pretend it’s all bad.