#it is funny that this version of the story is made slightly darker by the fact that the parasite is disguised as Wally's dead lover

[potatochip-oc-dump]

THE POTATO ORIGINAL CHARACTER MAD RAT DEAD AU.....................💥💥💥💥

[justkennadi]

Armin if he was 🖤Goth🖤

Notes: Got this cool idea in my head abt a grown up version of asot armin 🤔 (it’s really cause i saw these pictures on pinterest tho) if u don’t know what asot is it stands for A slap on titan which is parody type series on youtube. 👍🏾👍🏾 but sorry if this isn’t quite accurate to what being goth is like i’m honestly still in my baby’s bat phase so i don’t know much 😭😭

Context: Modern Asot!Armin x Fem Goth!reader

Warnings: mention of ritual attempts but that’s it

- You first saw him in middle school on the first day of 8th grade. This new blond kid just transferred in and everyone was excited to meet him!

- Well that didn’t last long.

- While you weren’t present but apparently he started spewing crazy things and started talking to himself (or a cat, everyones stories was different) and while he did good in class teachers didn’t appreciate his out bursts.

- People were QUICKLY frightened and bothered by him. He had no friends.

- You were dipping your toes into the whole gothic subculture yourself at the time but you weren’t too interested. However it seemed this new kid was in love with the whole thing. He wore all black all the time, sometimes a bit of eyeliner. He had the whole vibe to him.

- So something about him interested you.

- However, before you got the chance to go up to him, he ended up getting expelled and put in a mental hospital for attempting to perform a ritual on a 6th grader? Yikes.

- He made the news and that’s when you learned his name. Armin…

- As the years went by you slowly forgot about him. But how could you fully? He was your craziest story to tell to friends. A funny and wacky memory to reflect on.

- Now you are in your 2nd year of college. You have decided while you aren’t fully goth(at least you thought) you liked the idea and did get into some of the music and fashion but you stuck to causal clothes most days. And you never got into the heavy makeup you see most goths wear. You learned it’s more about the music anyways which helped.

- You had a slight fascination with darker things and had to constantly tell people you aren’t depressed even if you looked the part.

- One day, while in the library looking for an Edgar Allen Poe book for your book report you accidentally bumped into a slightly taller boy.

- “Sorry! My bad-“

- You realized as you looked at his face…well, did you realize? Is this him?

- “It’s fine.” The boy quietly replied.

- Oh.

- He had blond hair…blue eyes… this could be any white boy honestly. Plus his hair was shorter? And he looked more….put together? He wore a plain brown suit get up with polished brown loafers.

- “Is something the matter?” He asked looking at you.

-“Sorry…i’m sorry you just look.. familiar?” You say squinting your eyes slightly but you realized you might be acting weird so you start to go around him after apologizing again.

- However, before you can…

- “Let me guess. You remembered the crazy, sadistic boy from your childhood and i look like him.” He says stopping you.

- You slowly nod.

- “Yeah, well, it was me.” He looked away for a second. Possibly embarrassed?

- “Armin? Well, you clean up..nice…” You say taking in his appearance once again.

- “Well, a few years of a mental hospital and therapy can do that….” He chuckled. “I see you’re looking for an Edgar allen book too?”

- “Yeah…we get to choose and author and analyze their writing style for my English 2020 class….” You say looking at the shelf.

- “Mhm…I did that last year.”

- “Can i ask what happened to you?” You say abruptly.

- “Y’know…I’d rather talk about that over some coffee.” Armin says laughing once again. “If you don’t mind?”

- This Armin was a now refined gentleman. He leads you to a small coffee shop on campus after helping you pick a book. He even holds the door open for you. From what you remember he used to spit at girls, asking them bizarre personal questions, now he’s holding open doors and pulling your chair out.

- After you two get coffee he tells you everything.

-“So after the therapy and being in a crazy house for years they finally broke me. I started talking about my feelings and whatever and how my when my parents died i lost it and my grandpa wasn’t paying attention to me and blah blah blah. And i guess it was just a phase…well not fully.”

- “How so?” You say sipping on the coffee you got.

- “Well, i may not look it, but i consider my self to be a bit…how do you say..gothic?” He smirks.

- “Yeah i never would’ve guessed. You look more dark academia like.”

- “I don’t dress in all black all the time, you know it’s more about- “

- “The music?” You interrupt.

- Armin smiles. “Yes. Exactly. How did you know? Unless…”

- You smile a bit while nodding your head. Well here’s finally someone you can be yourself around! Everyone else either thought you were weird or a poser. Most just ignored you.

- After that day you and Armin start hanging out. He shows you his room which had many gothic band posters on them like Sisters of mercy posters and Siouxsie and the banshees posters and other plain ones with just bats on them. His room was a bit dark also being mostly black and gray and brown.

- You two loves making goth like inside jokes or thrifting for new accessories or even weird things.

- Armin liked to collect really weird things like taxidermies bugs and mini skulls or halloween themed things.

- He was also a night owl but he had to be awake in the day too so he did end up having slight eyebags and a constant yawn.

- He was really serious about looking presentable though. So as a result he normally just drink a dark coffee everyday. You tried it once and immediately spit it out. “This is so BITTER!?” You say in disgust.

- “Like pure caffeine.” He says taking his cup back and smiling.

- Sometimes you’d two match outfits or at least tried to coordinate them.

- People started to think you two were dating at one point. You never thought of Armin like that but the idea didn’t hurt…

- Sometimes armin tells stories from his past. Explaining how he thought he was a “crimson king” for a while or how he’d sacrifice animals like squirrels. He seems horrified with his old self but not horrified to the point where he can’t laugh about it.

- He was your favorite gothic person now honestly🖤🖤

[sometimesrosy]

Hey. It's been a long time since I had a question. Maybe the 100's demise was the reason.

Now coming to my actual query. This past year I have binged numerous shows ranging from American to korean dramas or Turkish dizis. There is certain thing that I have felt and noticed throughout i.e., the woman characters aren't given even a slight leeway by the audience. If the even make a slight mistake, the audience remembers it always to stand against that character. Whereas if there is a male villain, people gets cheerful seeing even a slight bit of humanity in him. They even wait for its redemption.

Let me take an example of a Turkish show "kara sevda(black love)". A one line synopsis can be put like- two leads who love each other endlessly but can never be together. So, the villain in that show is beyond redemption. That character has fallen so far off that there is no coming back. But still when he is playing with a baby, people's comments are like 'best moment of the show.' 'see he is such a good person'. 'the female lead should accept his love'. Am like what?

And if I tell you about the female lead. She is a good person at heart who is sacrificing love for family. And she is labelled "selfish" by audience. 'She doesn't deserve the male lead' etc. And you know I too felt like that for the majority of the show until I reached the point of self reflect.

Even Clarke from the 100 faced so much hate that there wasn't any visible backlash when in the end the makers made her a villain. The backlash was for Bellamy death and stupid end instead.

Looking through tv series, it's so easy to see why tv or films doesn't have female anti heroes. Male anti heroes are so easy to find and also widely successful like Damon from tvd or Klaus.

What is your take?

Yup!

Yes.

Definitely.

You are absolutely correct. The leeway for female characters to show human imperfection is very, very thin. Meanwhile, a guy can literally blow up a planet, kill his beloved father, have temper tantrums with kicking and screaming and torture the female main characters and fandom-- and the creators-- think that makes him a hero. And the requirements for his redemption, if there are any at all amounts to:

WOOPSIE! I'M SOWWY.

I simply do NOT understand that phenomenon.

I mean, I get the need to relate to darker characters, morally gray characters, to explore our own negative impulses...but the whole tendency is, for me anyway, given a more sinister light when you compare how the audience tends to treat these outright villainous male characters compared to even SLIGHTLY morally gray female characters. Maybe just flawed.

It also interferes with satisfying redemption arcs. Because YES watching someone face their dark past and attempt to become better and be redeemed is a great story... but if male characters only have to wear a cape and be hot to be redeemed.... then that's not a satisfying redemption arc. And if women can't do ANYTHING to be redeemed because they are considered irredeemably selfish or whatever for the same flaws someone's Hot Dark Badboy smirks about and isn't even sorry for? Then we barely even get redemption stories for women.

And that's part of the problem, isn't it? Women aren't allowed the same representation as men... even as flawed characters.

The point of good representation is not to represent only the best, most perfect, most desirable, most successful type of people. The point is to allow everyone of any sex, race, gender, sexuality, religion, class, ability, etc to take part in the full spectrum of humanity in our stories, good and bad and mediocre. A female Mary Sue is just the female version your general male hero. One is considered bad storytelling the other is taken as The Way It Should Be.

Women are not allowed to have flaws in most of our pop culture, or women are ghettoized into only women's fic or romance or YA, or women take backseat to male villains, or whatever.

I'm writing a book where the woman abandoned her child, and she sleeps around and cons people and avoids commitment. I purposely wrote her to be unlikable.... or rather, she's not unlikable, she's clever and funny and weird, but she has characteristics that women aren't supposed to have. She essentially acts like a male anti-hero, until her call to action and she is forced to face her past mistakes. But I know that these are things that audiences say are irredeemable for women. Abandon her own child?? No. Not allowed. Even though plenty of male characters go off on adventures leaving wife and child behind and it isn't even considered a character flaw, just... a male adventurer. Or honestly, just a guy. Sure one who's imperfect, but that old ball and chain was probably the worst, right? He had to move on and now he has a tragic backstory and complexity and oh the audience will probably either want to be him or want to be with him, because, that's how these things work.

Not saying that characters shouldn't be dark, do bad things, have flaws, be anti-heroes, have redemption arcs, or have a deep, multilayered villainy.

But I am saying we might want to be a little more critical about what we consider irredeemable for certain people and what war crimes and abuse we let some characters get away with in the name of bold (white) masculinity.

IS the nature of being a (white) man we look up to someone who destroys other people?

I think that toxic masculinity IS seen as sexy. Unfortunately, that's one of the reasons it's seeped into our culture. Manly (white) men who abandon kids and kill without remorse, but with muscles. Manly (white) men who murder whole regions because bad things happened to them, and smolder while doing it. Manly (white) men who commit genocide regularly, but fall for the heroine and save her once. Manly (white) men who are serial killers but with an intriguing depth.

tbh there's lots more to say on the topic, some of it very controversial. These are the stories we like to hear and the characters we love. And it might be rooted in the toxic masculinity that our society has been selling to us as propaganda for decades, if not centuries-- but we don't like to be told to examine our biases, our tastes, our preferences, or our beliefs. It's threatening to our sense of self.

However, that is how you unravel all sorts of toxic belief systems, from misogyny to racism to homophobia to bigotry of all kinds. I added the (white) to this post after I read through it, because I realized non white male characters are not allowed this leeway, either. So this phenomenon is generally (not always) limited to white men. Why?????

my theory? we're still making the colonialists the heroes of the story, friends.

[ejzah]

A/N: Well, that was a pretty resounding yes for part 2. I’m not sure if this is AU or not. Things got quite angsty and dramatic.

Rumor Has It, Part 2

***

Deeks pasted on a smile, trying to give the illusion that he was listening to the 29 year old sitting in front of him. Sophia Glossman was upbeat, funny and, attractive. On any other occasion, he’d probably be perfectly happy to share dinner with her. The problem was he wasn’t here by choice.

And she wasn’t Kensi. From her short blonde hair to her barely five feet of height, she was just about as different from Kensi as you could get.

He pushed that thought to the very back of his mind. Right now he needed to appear to be an attentive boyfriend and thinking about his issues with Kensi would not be helpful.

Despite his best attempts to draw her out, Kensi remained stubbornly standoffish. Every time she ignored him or answered in monosyllables instead one of her awful jokes, he the knot in his stomach grew a little heavier.

“Xavier?”

Deeks’ inhaled shallowly at his alias’ name, refocusing on Sophia. Based on her expression, he missed some integral part of the story.

“Oh, sorry,” he muttered, silently berating himself for getting distracted. “What were you saying?”

Sophia leaned forward, balancing her chin her cupped hands.

“I was just telling you about this jerk I had at the bar today,” she explained. “Are you ok? You’ve been really distracted today.”

“Yeah, just, uh, rough case.”

“Oh no, is it still the DCS case?” Clearly thinking his subdued demeanor was to do with concern for his client, she reached for his hand, rubbing her thumb along his, and brushed his hair back from his forehead. He resisted the urge to shake it back in place.

Xavier Moricz was a little more refined than Marty Deeks. He wore suits on a daily basis and drove a car that was far outside a cop’s pay.

“Uh, yeah, it’s not going well. I’m not sure I’ll be able to keep her from serving time. It might even be years,” Deeks said, taking inspiration from a dozen similar cases he’d worked as a public defender. He let the remembered emotion wash over him again and swallowed harshly, glancing up at Sophia with a shrug. “She could lose her kids forever.”

“I’m so sorry, Xav,” Sophia murmured, cupping his cheek. “You know, I think it’s wonderful that you do so much pro bono work for people who can’t afford a lawyer, but you’re working yourself way too thin. You need to take a break once in a while and-” she shrugged playfully, leaning even closer so he could see the flecks of darker blue in her eyes-“relax.”

He shivered at her touch, which wasn’t unpleasant at all, and made him think of Kensi even more. Grabbing Sophia’s hand, he kissed her knuckles, looking directly into her eyes. He saw her pupils widen with desire.

“What did you have in mind?”

“Why don’t you come over to my apartment and find out.” She skimmed her nose down his cheek, her breath warming his skin. “I have a bottle of really good tequila I might have “borrowed” from work and I don’t have to be in til 3.”

Deeks caught her mouth with his, kissing her for several long seconds and then pulled back with a groan.

“You have no idea how much I wish I could, but I have three depositions in the morning and I need to finish prepping,” Deeks said with an apologetic sigh.

“Workaholic,” Sophia teased, giving him a slightly exasperated look. “Ok, I’ll give you a pass. This time. But you owe me.”

***

Deeks got to his apartment just before 11. To make up for declining her mildly scandalous offer, he’d lingered at the restaurant, paying special attention to Sophia.

As he reached the front steps, he jerked as a figure slipped out of the dark shadows, instantly reaching for his gun before he realized it was Kensi.

“Kens, what are you doing here?”

She drew closer, but kept several feet between them.

“She seems nice,” Kensi said, her tone sarcastic. “A little young, but I guess that hasn’t stopped you before.”

“Wait, did you follow me?” Deeks asked, outraged and once again worried that he possibly hadn’t noticed her. He really needed to get his act together.

“You’ve been acting strange recently so I decided to matters into my own hands since you wouldn’t tell me.”

“Oh my god, Kensi...” Deeks shook his head and quickly brushed past her to open the front door. “We can’t have this conversation out here”

Kensi hesitated for a few second and then followed him inside, watching with her arms crossed as he turned on lights.

“So, are you going to tell me why you’ve been lying to keep your girlfriend a secret?”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Deeks insisted.

“Really, because last I checked you don’t make out with friends.”

Deeks pinched the bridge of his noise, fighting the urge to let his frustration show.

“Or maybe she’s just a booty call,” Kensi continued recklessly and Deeks snapped, slightly outraged that she would suggest such a thing. He hadn’t dated anyone, let alone

“Kensi, do you really think I’d lie to you for a hookup? You know me way better than that.”

“I thought I did.” She shrugged. “But since you lied to me about where you were every night this week, anything is possible. For all I know, you’ve been seeing a different woman each day.”

“I would never do that to you,” Deeks said firmly and a hint of hopefulness crossed her face. God, he hated doing things to her. “And if I could tell you the truth right now, I would. Please believe me.”

Kensi’s face fell again, making his stomach clench uncomfortably, and she shook her head. She turned away, but not before he saw the tears shining in her eyes.

“If that were true, you’d find a way,” she said with quiet bitterness. “I thought we were-I thought we were friends, Deeks.“ Somehow that hurt more than anything she’d said so far. He took a step towards her, not really sure what he planned to do, but didn’t make it more than a few feet before his phone rang.

“Dammit!” he hissed when he saw the number and Kensi turned around with a slightly sad, knowing look. “Kens, I need to go right now, but I promise that I will explain everything to you.”

“No, that’s not necessary. You made it perfectly clear that we are partners and nothing more. Just like it should have always been.”

She moved around him, quickly heading for the door. He reached for Kensi, desperate to keep her from leaving even if he had no idea what he would say. He managed to catch her fingers and Kensi didn’t immediately pull away.

“Don’t go,” he begged, sensing that if she left now, something would be irrevocably broken between them.

“I can’t, Deeks,” she said raggedly. Her thumb moved against his, maybe unconsciously, and then she tugged free.

He immediately missed the warmth, the familiarity of her touch. She backed away from him, pulling up a mask of indifference in the time it took her to reach the door.

“I hope she’s worth it.”

***

A/N: Kensi may be just a touch OOC here. I figure that this takes place late season 4 and in my version of things, Kensi thought she and Deeks were close to moving toward a relationship and is now extremely hurt.

[jocia92]

… So much of an actor’s craft is figuring out the “I want” of their character, but that’s got to be a little different with Tom since he states that he literally cannot want anything. What challenge or opportunity did that pose for you?

I think he wants to improve. I think he wants to calibrate according to Alma’s needs, wants, and desires. I think he’s very ready to learn and to understand. That was the kind of primary objective: listen, learn, calibrate, improve. That’s almost the track of each scenario. He just gets a little better each time, and the process gets a little faster. But certainly, in the beginning, he’s just delivering this sort of 20 classic chat-up lines that he’s been uploaded with and getting it all wrong. It’s fun to watch the machine learn and chart that progress.

On a practical or philosophical level, how did you approach the process of humanizing a character that’s an algorithm, or did you at all?

It was very much about charting with Maria exactly when we want to see the machine, when we want to see the human. Even playing with that ratio was really interesting and fun. It’s not so much about watching him play the machine, but watching a character try to play the human. Certainly, in the beginning, in some of the not quite so successful human moments, shall we say, we deconstructed what we regarded as the conventional human behavior in that. We looked at a lot of screwball comedies, like Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Katharine Hepburn movies. [We were] taking a move or a gesture, breaking that down, and just doing two of the things. It just suddenly looks very odd and wrong, and you’re like, “Oh, this is what a human does in this moment!” But it’s just off. It was really as much about looking at the human.

You’ve mentioned things like The Philadelphia Story as shaping the film and its central relationship. Was that to ground it in reality or further ensconce it in the warped reality of cinema? Grant and Stewart are recognizable to us as people, but things like that mid-Atlantic lilt were entirely manufactured for the screen.

That was a very key point for Maria in referencing Cary Grant. The hair color that we chose for Tom was very much like Cary Grant’s hair color, being a shade darker than is possibly human. And the skin tone being slightly artificial for Tom. You’re right, Cary Grant is often very heightened and mannered sometimes, and it works in the situation in the style of the thing that he’s in. But we quite liked the idea that Tom has been uploaded with some outdated versions of what a romantic lead was supposed to behave like.

It’s striking just how thought-out things had to be down to how Tom responds to dead air space in a conversation. What was the process behind those small moments that can make or break the believability of a character?

It was very fun to play with, and probably quite frustrating for a lot of the human actors. Maren was giving a beautifully naturalistic performance, and the conventional responses that there should be from her scene partner weren’t there. We deliberately strip those away—sometimes without telling her, sometimes without needing to tell her. It’s just the way that Tom was, so it was about pushing those moments into a space that became a little uncomfortable: not jumping in on the lines where you might normally jump in, sometimes coming in hard, sometimes offering a delayed response, sometimes none at all. Playing with those, and watching how comfortable or uncomfortable that made them both, was really fun.

Did that frustration, built in by the process, bleed over for Maren into the character of Alma, do you think?

Maybe for Maren. Certainly, for me, it was frustrating in that I would have to remember not to respond in the way that I might normally and remove some of those things. [I had to] really break down exactly what Tom is thinking, what his programming is doing in that point, how he’s responding and calibrating, and whether we see that or not. Choosing moments to show the human, to show the machine. Along with Maria, that was one of the great joys of the role.

How did you settle on the physicality of the character? Was it at all helpful to have done something like Beauty and the Beast in a mo-cap suit to be hyper-aware of how your own movements translate to the screen?

Very much so. In fact, in pretty much every role I’ve done since Beauty and the Beast, I’ve incorporated not always a movement coach, but I’ve definitely looked at movement theory and physicality in a totally new way because of the challenges of that role. And, I have to say, dance plays a huge part in that. Whether it’s incorporated on the screen or if it’s something that just feels as if it helps the role, I often find that a dance studio is a very fruitful space to discover things about your character’s physicality. Learning the rumba for this role was incredibly helpful because it’s a very precise, technical, almost robotic dance in terms of the laser precision that’s needed to get it absolutely right. I had a fantastically exact teacher in Berlin who was teaching me the rumba the whole way through the shoot. We shot that [one scene] quite near the end of the shoot. Just to have those lessons, that kind of physicality, and that poise with me the whole way through the role was really useful.

How did the role being in a non-native tongue affect the characterization of Tom? Was it all easier to make him seem slightly unreal given that the words might not come quite as naturally as they would in English?

I think it was a deliberate choice on the part of Maria to look for a foreign actor who could speak German. She needed somebody who could both get their heads and their mouths around the very technical German that was required, which, even for a German is pretty complex, but also who had that sense of otherness. I’m sure they could have tailored the screenplay to any number of nationalities, but I was very happy they came to me and made him British. It definitely helped with, as I say, the fact that he’s listening, learning, focusing, trying to improve…that was literally all I was doing last summer, every day.

How do you lock onto the frequency of German comedy, which isn’t always something people associate with that country or people? How is it different than doing something like the more mannered British wit of Blithe Spirit or the broad studio comedy of Eurovision Song Contest?

It’s not a country known for it, but I think they should [be]. I find Germans very funny. They have a very interesting sense of humor. What’s particularly delightful is the way that they can tackle really kind of big, sometimes weighty, issues with a certain wit and lightness of touch, which is not common to all countries. Physical comedy, I think, is fairly universal. I think there’s something almost farcical about some of the physical stuff that we managed to get in this. It was really fun to make people laugh in a foreign language. It was surprisingly delightful. It felt very unifying, somehow, to be able to get a joke across in any language.

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

Well, I just finished Russell Howard’s Good News in just over a week. I did do the speedrunning version of it; didn’t watch any of the Good News extras (except the week Daniel Sloss was on because I had to see what material he was doing as a baby) or the compilation episodes. So it made it seem like the show that ran for six years (2009-2015) went really fast. Six years worth of British topical content condensed into a week. I was so used to the idea that this is a show about news stories from the more innocent pre-2016 world that it hit me like a freight train when, in one of the final episodes of the final season, Russell did a bit about this ridiculous thing in the States where Donald Trump is running for president. That set off immediate alarm bells in my head that said “No no no no no, this is a show about times from before everything went to hell with all that, if we have run into this period of history that is not right and you need to end the show right now.” And luckily, they did end the show a couple of episodes later. It’s okay, the show has a sequel that does cover the darker times. But I’ll go into that sequel expecting that, so that’s fine. You can’t have Donald Trump in Russell Howard’s Good News.

I would say the show was at its best in the early and late seasons. The first few were great because it is impossible to not love Baby Russell Howard, not entirely sure of himself yet, just fucking jumping around the stage and telling us about weird shit that was on YouTube in 2009. Then there were a few seasons that were still entertaining, but it did stagnate for a bit. He got polished enough to lose some of the charm from the first few seasons. Some of the sillier bits were less entertaining when not paired with that charm, and he hadn’t quite developed the skills to pull off the more serious bits.

But then he came back on BBC2 for the last two seasons (9 and 10), with the format changed up slightly, and he seemed to have found his footing again by then. The biggest change was turning the mystery guest section into a straightforward interview, which I think was a good idea.

In the earlier seasons he was noticeably bad at interviewing, mostly because he did not seem able to shut up and let the guest speak if a thought occurred to him. Which was fine when the guests were mostly there for the comedy of us watching Russell try to figure out who they were, but became a more noticeable flaw in the new format that had more straightforward interviews. This issue was clearly noted and worked on; I thought he was a much, much better interviewer in season 10 than in season 9. And that clearly shows the path he took from the end of Good News to the beginning of The Russell Howard Hour a couple of years later. I haven’t seen The Russell Howard Hour yet, but I get the impression that it involves a lot more of Russell interviewing and doing different things as a host, which I don’t think he could have done well in 2009 but by 2015 I can see how he’d be very good at that.

Okay, so now I’m going to get into The Russell Howard Hour. It is fairly cool to me how clearly you can trace his career - The Russell Howard Show (BBC Radio 6) to regular panelist on Mock the Week to early Russell Howard’s Good News (BBC 3) to late Russell Howard’s Good News (BBC 2) to The Russell Howard Hour (Sky One). If you look from an early part of that list to a late part of that list it seems like you’re looking at two completely different people, and it’s cool to watch the process of him going from one to the other. And he was very funny all throughout the journey, no matter how much else changed.

[onf-headcanons]

ONF in Demon AU

A/N : Is clearing idea dumps from drafts, this would be the second version of modern AU 

Hi, does anyone remember the idea of illegitimate child of Satan from here and a random Lucifer!Hyojin moodboard here?

ALSO YOU TOTALLY CAN IMAGINE THIS IN A REVERSE WAY, ANGEL AU (where reader is a reincarnation version fragment of Archangel but this one idea dump/establishment will be done for another day)

ALSO you can totally imagine it as deity AU, example that you are Zeus reincarnation but you awaken late and you need to stop Kronos for his rampage. Or even you are Odin and you need to stop Modern version Ragnarok this time. And ONF members could be tie with other Greek/Roman gods. This one will be fun should OH MY GIRL and B1A4 are tied in too. Its just idea I am not sure if I will expand this. But discussions are welcome

(There is no harm to think it as late Victorian or any other era you like, it is just I felt it is better to write in a familiar timeline as I dont want to do something wrong)

So below are just a few establishment for the AU, I am not gonna divide this into 2 scenarios so warning this is going to be long post.

Ok even though I did mentioned illegitimate or forgotten child. This is plausible for your family comes from bloodline that related to demonXhuman ancestors.

Also it truly depends on you. Making into a throne inheritance war or

Reader come of age and their soul are reincarnated royal demon (not neccesary Satan) so there are some demons/demoness guarding you from you are still a child (kinda like those 2 characters from Good omens or Maleficent)

for the above idea, readers magical heritage only awaken once they pass a certain birthday 16, 18 or 20 or 21, up to you. So you suddenly can see mythical creatures.

It could be your bloodline awakened but you are not that qualified to ascend throne or because of your human blood you cannot hide yourself from angel/demon hunter so you have your own demon guardians

Lets say you are imagining on something big world building, again derived from the establishment for familiar au, it is definitely plausible for you to have other "candidates" and they have their demonic godparents/guardians as well

Example, should you go for inheritance war type, maybe you have a distant related sibling(s). It will be fun if you, have ONF members as your guardians while your sibling(s) have other kpop groups. Presumably to name, Dreamcatcher, ONEUS, ATEEZ, PENTAGON or ASTRO... in short its totally flexible.

To add, (and this is an idea i use to draft for fake pilot episode for a homework I worked), you could tally idols and number of idols you wanna integrate into the story to "Lesser Ley of Solomon", linking your bloodline towith King Solomon (*disclaimer, loosely based mythically). 72 demons, how many demons for 1 person is totally depend on you. Whether number of demons/demoness one have on their side equals to their power/ability (or even how many support they obtain) is up to you.

(and disclaimer I am not Christian this is just an idea dump so dont start cultural bashing. again this ia just an idea dump and I am not planning to touch sensitive issues yet.)

Ok enough world building, lets move to story wise.

You could be growing in orphanage it adds more mystery of your bloodline/heritage or similar to the familiar au, living with your family but your family later died on accident. Your parents bloodline combine making you are the perfect vessel for the reincarnation or maybe its a tradition like every 100 hundred years you will reincarnate or something. Again its flexible.

The moment you realize you are seeing things was you noticed similar aura of each person appeared on similar day. You might not get to see who is watching before you actually confronted to the air that you will contact the police

You might really go file a report but after several times the police be like dear there is no a single soul stalking you tho

then out of depressed, you accidentally get yourself into accident and your demon guardian shows up.

Or, because you started to able to see mythical creatures. Mythical creatures starts to notice your existence as well. And that somewhat gives off your location to other candidates through gossiping (should this is inheritance war type of story). Then your guardian show up to protect you when you are attacked by rival sibling’s demons.

Could be you visited some witch to get your ability to see mythical creatures covered up? Recommended by a friendly non related sibling or a friend you made/could be angel?

You thought you only got one but it surprised  you that you actually got 7 (later 6)

As this was different from summoning because they are guardians either assigned or volunteered. There is no need for you to provide them anything. And different from familiar au, there is no need to leave them in your home. To ensure your safety they must follow you 247

For now I would be thinking our boys actually guards you in a daily shift. Example, Hyojin on Monday, Changyoon on Tuesday, Seungjun on Wednesday, Jaeyoung on Thursday, Minkyun on Friday, Yuto on Saturday, Minseok on Sunday. (after Minseok departs, the other members rotate themselves to do the Sunday shift)

Since their shift are like that, you sometimes take chance to hangout with them. Eating out with Hyojin, Arcades with Yuto. mostly happens Sunday.

I am thinking it might be fun which your predecessors of the throne are very eager to get the throne, you are just trying to keep out of trouble. So in another way, demon ONFs get to experience the modern human world in a more chill way, it was not just guarding you, but also trying to experience human world. You could like summon them?/keep them by your side just like a normal sibling (Especially if you are the type that grow up alone without any siblings)'

Cues in ONF members actually understand your preference and remembers them very well. So you could not help relying on them as days pass by.

You are defo gonna get an ultimate rival and a friend that shares the same circumstances as you. Maybe the first rival sibling ends up being your friend after they know you are not intending to compete. But there are some rivals are more aggressive out there.

Could be you knew a few demon hunters but they know you meant no harm and then they just let you go

It will be more fun if existences of your kind triggers inner civil war between demon hunters/angels. Because there is also some distant “siblings” of yours wish to live their live quietly but some parties does not agree of letting your kind roaming free and feeling the bloodline must end.

Should you are the type to compete for your birthright (because you are too irritated of people keep coming to kill you non stop). They are happy to serve you till the end as you embracing your darker side. (Well I am not sure to give ONF members and reader loveline here so I will not talk about it for now)For this version, to explain Minseok’s departure , I would prefer that Minseok is back at hell to be your team’s spy, monitoring all political moves and changes.There are still bottom line morality, you are not really slaughtering your way through. But you do make sure the other party wont come to look for trouble anymore.They are going to train you to make sure you are ready. Fighting in physical and magic.That friendly sibling joins on training you too. 

You are definitely getting strict critiques from Hyojin and Seungjun during the beginning of your training.

My preferences, you get a friendly sibling(s) where their demon guardians end up being BFF with yours. (RTK and MIXNINE side effect, sorry)

Characterization should be the same as those I have established from the familiar au. Just the world building and some settings that are slightly different.

Hyojin is to keep the trait of his preference on human food

Changyoon is to keep his nagging trait 

Seungjun might help you with studies (not solidify him as a nerd but there is tendency that he will)

Jaeyoung is more to the body guard type

Minkyun defo gonna make friends with stray animals (either you house ends up becoming pet shelter, you becoming a foster mom for animals or you cannot keep any because you are allergic but mental supporting Minkyun is up to you)

Yuto definitely is the quiet but alert type same goes with Minseok

My preference stereotype for them would be the cinnamon rolls that would kill

Sometimes they might go.. “ I am a known demon back in hell but why I am doing this babysitting shit?” 

But then ends up enjoying stuffs human does lol

Changyoon enjoying TikTok lol, they got famous because of their contents. 

Defo gonna have movie night.

It will be funny if ONFs as demons themselves, got scared at the monsters/ghosts seen in horror movies. Bonus if you actually not scared of horror movies. And they are gonna question you out of disbelief like why the hell are you not scared? How can you not even flinch a single bit?

Reason : monsters and ghosts imagined by human beings do not look the same based on their knowledge.

They sometimes show themselves to other humans but rarely. Mostly just being the unseen follower behind you.

Cues in sometimes they forgot they are invisible, and picks up something from the mart and it gave people a fright. Example, Changyoon or Minkyun passes through a nice outfit and just took the hanged outfit out to place in front of himself, only to realise what he did after looking into a mirror nearby

Hmm my thoughts, Jaeyoung and Minseok would be the ones who would always their visiblity when you are out with them.

Hyojin and Changyoon would be the ones who prefer to keep their invisibility

Copying from familiar au, should you attend college or university, people might thought some members of demon!ONF are your boyfriend.

At first when they changed pattern starts to live close to you, they could  not get the concepts of moral of human being well. You will be guiding them. 

Could happen that you are so pissed off by someone at work and you could not help but ranting when you are at home. 

(Of course the demon!ONF on that day saw what happened but you did insist on them to not do anything)

They might go like : “ Should I kill them for you?”

You : “What?”

Random ONF member : “I can do it to make look like an accident you know.”

You : “OMG NO”

You : “You know maybe you can try to mend things when they are trying to frame me on purpose.”

Random ONF member : “Gotcha”

For the you are not competing scenario, they would be always keeping you safe from harm until you died. Should you get married, you let them participated as relatives/friends. Cues in they even help you take care of your child later on. It could be even fun if you child does not inherit bloodline but they can see ONF members

I will stop here will write another post should i have more ideas to add.

Welp of course for a third option scenario, would be you being a supporter the friendly sibling of yours. You just wanna stay safe so you acted like an advisor role for that candidate, helping them to gain power but not participating directly. Like I said its flexible

For this one I would like to write it as you are just trying to chill with your quiet life but demon hunter, angels and aggressive candidates keeping coming at you.

Also for this one I would link to the point of unfavorable and forgotten child part.

Less favourable child gets assigned with less powerful or less aggressive demons

So for this story ONF aren't high class fighter demons at all. But they do excel in magics.

In opposite, you could the one who knows how to fight maybe because you are quite rebellious in personality.

The moment you found out there 3 parties wanna kill you and innocent less aggressive candidates, you snapped.

Maybe some candidates heard of your friendly sibling name and they rushed over to seek help. End up bump into you instead.

You : what kind of dad is *your biological demon dad name*?"

Cues in Demon ONF keep calming you down because they are afraid that rumours of you belittling your demon father might make their king angry

But you have your attitude and no shit is given. Because you understand that your life your destiny is in your own hands.

You : I wanted a peaceful life alone but now I have to deal with Angels, hunters and a bunch of siblings that I never met , never knew about each other, who all wants me dead.

You : its not fair.

To end it once and for all, you suggested to the friendly sibling to find other candidates that do not have any intentions to compete for throne. Form allies with them so that later own they could get votes for the throne and the rest of the gang could get a decorative chill title while living a peaceful life

Also suggested to the sibling of yours make use of the allies to protect less aggressive candidates

It worked politically. As most of the candidates work on slaughtering others to cut secure birthright, your ideal and policy of strengthen inner then tackle threat gain more favour. Finally your sibling gets the throne.

And you and your other members of allies might get duke duchess or something

This version of story would have and need slot of mind games. Political games as well. (Will be interesting to write but there will waaaaaay too much characters to take note.)

[aion-rsa]

“We Have Just Never Listened to Women”: Patrick Ness on Chaos Walking’s Relevance Today

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Patrick Ness’ 2008 science fiction young adult novel The Knife of Never Letting Go was published the same year as Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games, but while the latter launched a dystopian YA franchise, Ness’ Chaos Walking series seemed to attract more of a cult following despite tackling similar early-2000s issues through a speculative lens. While Collins struck an arrow through the heart of reality television, Ness turned his attention to information overload, manifesting it as the Noise: an ever-present broadcast of one’s most private, cringeworthy, hateful, earnest thoughts for all to hear—but only for men.

On the “New World,” an alien planet only recently colonized by humans, the all-male settlement of Prentisstown has ascribed varyingly demanding interpretations of masculinity and morality to their members’ handling of the Noise. Todd Hewitt, the community’s sole boy, must come of age when he faces something even more chaotic than his Noise: the first girl he’s ever seen, a silent space traveler named Viola.

Over a decade later, the book’s dual commentary on information overload and toxic masculinity remains relevant. In fact, as Ness told Den of Geek, the intervening 13 years have only provided more dire inspiration for adapting his novel to the big screen. Doug Liman’s adaptation of Chaos Walking, starring Tom Holland and Daisy Ridley, finally arrives in the UK (it hit the US last month) after a perfect storm of delays, from scheduling around two of the biggest franchise stars to dealing with COVID-19 setbacks. The film conjures a similar lo-fi dystopian setting as Gary Ross’ The Hunger Games film while transforming the book’s free-associating monologue into an ever-present visual and aural halo—not unlike the information overload depicted in more tech-y futuristic tales.

In addition to the forceful depiction of the Noise, Ness spoke with Den of Geek about the book dog’s Noise that didn’t make the final cut, the Western homages behind Mads Mikkelsen’s villainous Mayor Prentiss, and what happens when men don’t listen to women.

DEN OF GEEK: When you first wrote The Knife of Never Letting Go, it was a response to information overload circa 2007. What was it like revisiting the story to adapt it over a decade later?

PATRICK NESS: Gosh, just that the world has gotten so much noisier—that there’s just so much more information coming at us. If the original idea was about questioning how much of ourselves we feel obliged to share and give to the world, that question has only become—not more serious, but we now do it so automatically that I just want to be sure that we keep asking that question: What are we losing, and how much of ourselves do we need to keep our sense of identity? The other big thing that’s happened in the last 13 years is that we’ve all gotten so used to sharing on social media—we’ve gotten so used to what it does, that it’s such a fabric of our lives—that people have now recognized, “I can abuse this. I can use this to tell lies; I can use this to make fake enemies; I can use this to manipulate elections”—for example. The genie isn’t gonna go back into the bottle, and I’m not some doomsayer saying we need to go back to phones and blah blah blah. We need to not forget that we have a choice of what to share and that there are—for all the good things the Internet brings us, which it does—we should not and must not ignore the darker parts of it, because there are very dark parts of it.

That darkness is especially apparent in the culture of Prentisstown and their need to control the Noise. In adapting, did you find yourself approaching Prentisstown differently than when you wrote the book?

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There was always meant to be a feeling of poison in Prentisstown—something has gone amiss here. And in the intervening 13 years, we have only had further and further and further proof of how we have just never listened to women. One after another, we keep having to learn this stupid lesson and then not learning it. And so the feeling of something bad in the well of Prentisstown feels like it became clearer and sharper and more dangerous-seeming, because we have so much proof now of the danger that leads [to]. There isn’t much of a step from dismissing what a woman says, to dehumanizing a woman, to pure misogyny that they have nothing to say—that’s not a long journey. The point of Prentisstown was always to show the most extreme example of what a community might do in reaction to this huge difference between men and women that happens to be made apparent in every communication in this place. But it has only—I think the world has shown us that it’s not that fictional, and that’s a scary thing. Again, the question must be constantly asked, it must be constantly second-guessed and demanded: Why does this happen? Why do we keep doing it, and how do we stop it, and how do we keep stopping it? I’m not acting like I’m some prophet, because that poison was always there, but fortunately there have been some attempts to recently counteract it—and long may that continue.

What you said about information overload and fabricating reality to influence things ties into what made the Noise striking in this movie, especially with regard to characters who can project lifelike objects and people into others’ minds. What was the thought process in depicting the Noise so visually on-screen?

That was the longest conversation, because the Noise is the movie. That’s the thing that has to work. We didn’t want it to be exposition—people sitting around thinking these thoughts that just happen to tell you the history of the planet—because I hate that kind of stuff. So we thought, it’s got to be immersive from the start; you’ve got to be able to see and guess what’s happening before it’s explained to you. My favorite Noise is that of David Oyelowo [whose preacher character’s Noise looks like hellfire]—that’s kind of what we’re after, that it’s an emotional thing, an unfiltered expression of our brains, which are a mess. I think we’re charming messes, humans, really, but without this filter—which is the thing that makes us human, the ability to decide what to say—how much of a mess does that look, because it’s a purely emotional situation. So with that basis, the conversation was always, how do we make it so it’s not confusing or oppressive—because it would be very, very oppressive, if it were real—and how can it be used, how would people have evolved to use it, if they’ve gotten used to manipulating it. 

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Lots and lots of special effects tests and approaches, some really cool technology. There was a Noise unit on the film, so Tom would stand in the middle of a circle of cameras capturing him from 360 degrees, linking it up. Then the final results are a combination of all those things: technology, some artwork, some animation. My favorite little bit of it is a scene where Daisy Ridley’s walking up a hill and Tom Holland is behind her, and he’s kinda grumpy about her, and he’s complaining, and you see the complaints kinda just fly off the back of his head. That, to me, is what Noise would be.

Was there anything cut from the book, or an early version of the screenplay, that you would have loved to have seen?

One of my favorite characters in the book is called Wilf; and he does play an important part later in the trilogy, as well. But it’s a 500-page book, and at most a movie is a long short story, so you do have to make sacrifices. But what you get in exchange is, there’s a scene in the film where Tom and Daisy are under a little tarp in the rain, and something very funny happens. And that’s not in the book, but what you get in exchange is something like that, a little scene that expresses a ton that you can do visually, because [that scene] wouldn’t work in a book. I don’t mind; you give and you get. I’ve always viewed adaptations, even when it’s not my own work, as a remix. It’s not a cover version, it’s not an exact replica, it’s a remix. If I can start with that premise, then I can feel more creative.

Was there ever a version in which Todd’s dog Manchee has the Noise, like in the book?

Yes! But what you find out very quickly is that it’s all kind of about real estate. The animal Noise is very funny in the book, to me—it always made me laugh—and in a massive novel of 110,000 words, that real estate in the book doesn’t take up much. A movie is much more compressed, so every time an animal spoke, it just took up so much room in the movie. And it is funny, because it’s meant to be, but it kind of unbalanced the story, and it totally took away from what really needed to happen. Read the book, is what I would say, because I still love the idea, it still makes me laugh; but in a movie, it becomes too cartoon-y. We’re not making The Incredible Journey, as wonderful as it is! So you have to make some sacrifices.

The movie ends differently from the book, which is more of a clear cliffhanger setting up book 2, The Ask and the Answer; whereas the movie is left open-ended for sequels, but on a less dire note. What influenced this decision?

Doug Liman is an exploratory filmmaker; it’s a different approach than any director I’ve ever met. He’s really very much about what’s happening on set, what feels the right energy, where are we going—which is why there’s additional photography in all of his films. That’s always planned, it’s always in advance; we always knew that was going to happen, we just had to schedule the two biggest franchise stars in the world. But because of that, the story tends to organically develop. So we thought, Where are these two going in particular now that we have these actors, we have this situation, and it just starts to slightly change.

And I don’t mind that—again, in the remix idea—but what it interestingly has done is that it’s become more pandemic-themed, unintentionally, in that here are all these people who have been presented with a situation completely beyond their control, so how do they adapt? And there is a hopeful feeling at the end of this film, one I think is true, because they’ve really earned it, but also it’s like what we’ve done—we’re talking via Zoom, we’ve adjusted. It’s not perfect, and we’re all waiting for a better world, but we’re also probably not gonna go back to the old world, exactly. We’ve found a way, and that is kinda the whole point of the story, which is, here is the very worst example of people who didn’t find a way, as we move forward to people who do. To me, the ending makes emotional sense.

Are there plans to adapt one or both of the book sequels?

They’re optioned, they’re ready, but with a new series it’s all about if an audience wants it. 

How did your experience adapting the screenplay for A Monster Calls influence your work on Chaos Walking?

Very different filmmakers, which is interesting because I always tell people writing novels that there’s no one way to do it—as long as you end up with a novel, you’ve done it right, so find out what works for you. So, a very different experience as a writer, but interesting in their own ways. 

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The great thing about [A Monster Calls director] J.A. Bayona is a real lack of ego about ideas; an idea is good or it’s bad, it doesn’t matter who or where it came from. He’s very clear on that, he’s very sincere about that, and that really frees you up creatively. And so I really try to bring that to anything I collaborate on now; I try to never ever be any kind of snob about my ideas or anybody else’s—it’s just what’s better, what works; an idea is good or bad on its own, not because it came from somebody powerful. I think it makes everybody feel more comfortable; we’re all in it together, trying to make something interesting.

What was it about Daisy, Tom, Mads, et al, that made you feel that they were right for the roles in Chaos Walking? Mads in particular has such a striking look as Mayor Prentiss, with the cowboy hat, jumpsuit, and fabulous fur coat.

That coat is actually a tribute to McCabe & Mrs. Miller, a Warren Beatty Western from Robert Atlman. It’s interesting that they’re all European! We didn’t go out hunting for necessarily European, but also Cynthia [Erivo] is European, and David’s European. Nick [Jonas] is not… [laughs] But there is a sensibility that feels approachable to Tom and Daisy, that I think is their little movie-star magic, that they are not forbidding. Forbidding movie stars can be amazing! But they seem like somebody that you could meet, and talk to; and for a younger-centered film, that is vital, to feel like these could be my friends, and I care about them and am worried about what happens to them. That is what they bring so beautifully to the movie. And Mads has that magnificent face—he’s got such a great acting face, especially for a villain—and his manner, the sort of Scandinavian understatements, I love it.

Especially for a villain who’s trying to hide his thoughts—there’s so much still that comes through on his face.

A villain who thinks he’s right! He doesn’t think he’s a villain—and that’s the scariest kind of all.

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Chaos Walking is available for premium rental at home on all digital platforms from 2nd April.

The post “We Have Just Never Listened to Women”: Patrick Ness on Chaos Walking’s Relevance Today appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[secret-engima]

Have you played World of Final Fantasy? Because that stack sounds, a lot like that party system. Pease consider Ardyn, meeting his platonic Troll mate in Aulea, gender bending a few of his Somnus memories, & reaching deep into the briefings his Niflheim had given him on the Lucian Royal Family to craft stories of his supposed half-sister. When some moron with a death wish asks what this supposed sister looked like, cue some very flat stares. Nox and Ardyn work together to craft a painting (1/?)

Anonymous said: (2/?) of the supposed mother of Nox. They base it on Somnus, with bits of Aera, Cindy, and Aryana Highwind. It is both a tribute to those they've lost, and to those they've found. She's beautiful, with a mona lisa smile under her laughing eyes. She sprawls across a Solheim ruin, somehow seeming whole in her presence, and crumbling at the further edges.

Me: I have not, actually! That’s funny though, that my stack sounds like the party system XD. Also MY FEELS. WHY HURT MY FEELS THIS WAY. Alright my turn. Buckle up, let’s see if I can make anyone cry.

Ardyn and Nox are ... very nervous about making the painting at first, because what if Regis says he never saw a woman like that? Then they realize that their cover story supposes a single meeting, a one-night stand 15-16+ years ago, probably while Regis was drunk, so they’re fine. So they set about crafting a beautiful painting. A tribute to the women (and brother) who helped shape their lives so powerfully, a goodbye to those same people who they will either never meet again, or at least, will never have the same relationship, the same shared memories, as before.

They make her a white tiger (the closest they can get to this Aulea’s snow leopard without giving the game away), with a beautiful blue top that is reminiscent of Aera’s favorite dress (not her white Oracle dress, but the one she wore when she was just herself, when it was just her and Ardyn in the gardens, with the see-through elbow sleeves and the delicate gold embroidery), and a staff carved with travel blessings in her hands instead of a trident (Aera’s staff, her favorite for when she was traveling at least moderately incognito). Her hair is Ardyn’s violet-red to help maintain the image of sibling-hood, cut almost Somnus level short, practical and slightly wispy wild like Somnus’s the one time he had started to grow it out as a teen before deciding longer hair was too much of a hassle. Her skin tone is a bit darker than Somnus’s porcelain though, like someone who spends a great deal of time traveling beneath the sun (Cindy’s tan). She’s got a bright, full smile on her face, Cindy’s sunshine and cheer that show off her fangs, but it also has a large dose of Aranea’s lazy mischief in the expression, from lips to half-lidded eyes that makes the expression seem like good-natured trouble. Her outfit shows off the lean muscles on her upper half that match the corded power of her hindquarters, Aranea’s jumping power and speed on display, not that anyone but them know it.

Her eyes are a bright, armiger blue, and anyone looking at the picture would insist she has Nox’s cheekbones and a more feminine version of his jawline.

She’s sprawled out, as you say, in a Solheim ruin, as if posing for a picture. Around her the colors are lush and vibrant, the lines clean, the ruins somehow seeming alive and whole despite still being clearly ruins, but the farther into the background one looks, the more faded the colors are, the more crumbled and desolate the ruins.

When Ardyn and Nox reveal the picture to Regis and Co, shyly looking for approval to hang it somewhere where others can see, Regis finds his breath stolen. He wracks his memory for a woman like this, hoping to REMEMBER- but he can’t. He’s not surprised. It’s been long time, years and years, and there were several tigers, both white and orange, in his youth that he had flirted to bed, and he’s more than a little sure that they would have both been drunk the one time they met, or else surely a Niflheim woman would never dare have a one-night stand with a dragontaur, a Lucis Caelum. Even so, he sees Ardyn and Nox in the picture of the woman, in the eyes and hair and cheekbones and jaw. He sees hints of LIFE in the painting, of stories untold and adventures unspoken. The giant painting (because Ardyn and Nox do nothing by halves and did a life-sized painting) looks so REAL, so detailed and vibrant he more than half expects it to suddenly spring right out of the picture and start teasing Ardyn, who is himself staring at it with sad, nostalgic eyes.

Aulea bumps her hip against his and breaks the building tension made by his silence by calmly stating that, oh yeah, she can see why Regis tapped that. Regis sputters loudly, Clarus groans, Nox hides his face in his hands to muffle his semi-hysterical laughter while Ardyn just GRINS like a loon and chirps that “Indeed! His sibling was always QUITE the catch!”

Cor just tilts his head, considering the picture, trying to piece together a life story from the details Ardyn no doubt guided Nox through (they all know Nox was the primary painter of the two, but Ardyn would no doubt remember his half-sister much better, if Nox even remembered his mother at all). Cor sees ... traveller, warrior, mischief maker, leader. He sees a woman who travelled and let nothing stop her, who laughed loud and roared loud, who no doubt teased and bossed her half-sibling into joining her on whatever trip she had in mind, who let herself be teased and goaded into whatever madcap scheme Ardyn came up with that time. He sees a woman who could fight and knew it well, who lived easy in her skin because of it. He sees a hard worker in the callouses on her hands and the little smudges of dirt on her face.

He’s sees kindness in the tilt of her head and the flashing blue of her eyes, in the genuine cheer and goodnatured mixed in with the mischief of her smile.

Cor’s vague theories of an abusive mother for Nox ... fade. He trusts Ardyn’s memories enough to believe this is not a delusional, “clean” version, but rather a painting trying to capture what only memory could truly know. This woman would not have harmed her son. It must have been her husband, the one Ardyn has mentioned only once or twice with dark eyes, who took over Nox’s rearing after Nox’s mother died (died while Nox was very young, Cor recalls, not long after Nox had been born, he’d said) that had done the damage Cor has seen before Ardyn took custody and tried his best.

He wishes for a moment he could have met her. He thinks she would have been a good addition to the Citadel, once the awkwardness between her and Regis faded.

Regis ... ASTOUNDS Ardyn and Nox when he doesn’t just give permission for them to hang the picture somewhere, he insists the picture be hung in the special wing reserved for life-sized royal family portraits (not the Hall of Arts, that’s more of a museum of LC history and world history overall). Aulea is holding his hand as he speaks, unhesitating support in her every line and Nox quietly starts to cry when they hang up the painting he and Ardyn made right next to the one of Regis and Aulea together (and now Regis is glad that he bucked the tradition of separate portraits in favor of a shared one, it means there is a perfect spot for this one to rest next to his and Aulea’s, an appropriate place for the mother of his eldest and sister of his half-brother). Ardyn is tearing up too despite his grin, and Nox’s quiet, fervent thank you hurts Regis’s heart a little.

When the servants go to attach her name plaque, they realize suddenly that Ardyn has never actually mentioned his sibling by NAME. Not that they can remember at least. They ask Regis, who asks Ardyn and Nox, and while Nox freezes a bit in panic (they can’t say any of the names she was based on, surely not even Aera’s), Ardyn tugs his hat over his face and softly says, “Stella. Her name was Stella.”

And Nox hurts quietly on his uncle’s behalf at the grief in his uncle’s magic, at the stiffness in his uncle’s wings, even as Regis nods and leaves to go relay the message. “Uncle...?”

“Mother always used to say,” Ardyn murmurs as he puts his hat back on, a smiling mask in place, “that she had hoped for a daughter. I had already been born to Father’s previous wife, so there was an heir to the kingdom and there would be no negative repercussions if she had a daughter to dote on.”

Nox pauses, thinks of medieval medicine, how in Ardyn’s time potions and other magical medicines had not yet been fully developed, “A stillborn?” He guesses in dread.

Ardyn huffs, “No. Nothing that tragic.” Ardyn starts walking away, aiming for the gardens and a sunny patch no doubt, “Stella was what Mother was going to name Somnus if he had been born a girl. I used to use it to tease him when people commented on his ‘delicate features’. It was my nickname for him for throughout our childhood, up until he became commander of the kingdom’s armies and insisted that I would ruin his reputation among the men if I was ever overheard and that I shouldn’t risk it anymore.”

Ardyn disappears around the corner. The old silence left behind is very loud.

By the next day, people are gossiping over the stunning new picture in the Royal Family portrait wing, right next to Regis’s and Aulea’s shared one, in the spot where traditionally the wife’s portrait would have been had they not gotten theirs done together. A beautiful white tiger with mischief in her eyes and sunshine in her smile and and flyaway violet-red hair that makes people whisper over the similarity to the king’s half-brother.

The little plaque on the frame of the painting reads “Stella Izunia Caelum”

[starlit-lion]

2, 8, 11, 14 for the D&D asks?

I’m gonna do Bellona for this one and she’s impossible to talk about without spoilers so friends that play in the game with her and are by an off chance here: Don’t look!! 2. When you were creating this character, what was their original draft? Are they the same character you intended to make? So Bellona has changed dramatically from my original idea for her! I knew I wanted to make her as soon as I read the UA for Swarmkeeper Ranger and had an intense need to play it. But originally she was going to be a Kenku that looked like a bee eater or a honeyguide and learned to talk at a farmer’s market while selling honey. And I was tossing around putting a lot of humming/buzzing noises into their speech bc they hear everything filtered through their beehives buzzing around them. This version was also going to go a lot more insect-like with morality and mannerisms as they copied from their hive. But then... Her concept changed dramatically when I saw a picture of medieval beekeepers and knew I had to make her look like that instead. Especially when I talked about it with dnd friends and one of them joked ‘Haha the party might never know what your character’s face looks like in that outfit’. I didn’t want to let go of being a Kenku right away, but it was a little much to hide the specific bird design under the cloak and the beak wouldn’t hide under the mask well without everyone going ‘well that’s either a weird plague doctor or an actual bird’ so I decided to go back to a more human-ish race, especially after drawing a design for her that would look best as that. And then I came up with the name ‘Bellona Bumblefoot’ which sounded like a Halfling name to me! But I still sort of wanted to do an unusual race so there would be a surprise to reveal... So I ended up with a Goblin being taken in by Halfling beekeepers, but using their gear as a disguise when she leaves home to become an adventurer! 8. What’s one weird personal headcanon you have for the character that’s not addressed or that you haven’t found a way to share yet? I have revealed she wears glasses under her mask with some offhand comments in character! Partially, I just think it’s funny for a ranger that spends at least half of her time using a longbow to be nearsighted. But also... My headcanon that ties this trait into her character is that Goblins (from her clan at least) are very commonly nearsighted. It’s not typically a problem since they live in tunnels where they don’t have to see far into the horizon. But being taken into a landscape of flat, open farm fields, Bellona and her brother both ended up needing glasses to help them see.

11. Who or what was your inspiration when creating this character? How does it show? This can be visual, backstory, personality, anything.

As stated above, the Swarmkeeper class UA and images of medieval beekeepers!  Mothman is also an inspiration for her design, in adding two crow feathers as antennae in her hood, tails to her cloak to look like folded insect wings, and the fact that her eyes glow red in dim light.

14. Have you made any aus for this character? If so, what? Which is your favorite? Which is most developed? Which deserves more development and attention?

I haven’t done any AU’s per say, but I have a few slightly different versions of her backstory written out. If I bring her into a campaign more focused on that kind of thing, my plan is to pick whichever one best fits the setting and how the DM wants to handle Goblins in their world. Pretty much the most developed/current version of her story is, her Goblin clan is chased out of the tin mine they peacefully operate by misguided adventurers. In the chaos, they abandon Bellona and her brother Bart as infants in a barn where it seems they’ll be safe. The Halflings that own the barn (the Bumblefoots) find them, but no one ever comes back so they adopt the children as their own. Bart takes to tinkering, crafting, and fixing things around town, while Bellona takes to caring for animals and is the only one of the current Bumblefoot children that is willing/able to bond with the magic Feywild bees the family have been keeping for generations. Being extremely inquisitive, Bart eventually uncovers what happened to his and Bellona’s blood relations, becomes angry and runs away to think about it. Meanwhile, the Bumblefoots ironically try to hire the same adventurers that flushed the Goblin clan out of their mine to help him. The adventurers pretty much laugh at the idea of saving a Goblin and tell them they should get rid of Bellona too. Which of course they are not doing because these are their children and the tiny Halflings shoo these assholes out of their house. But that hasn’t fixed anything, so Bellona dons her beekeeping suit, takes the feywild bees, and finds Bart by herself. She helps some people along the way, and in the end decides she can be a better adventurer than the ones that hurt them. But she soon realizes people like her better when she keeps her mask on. After everything, shyness and fear begin to get the better of her, so she becomes secretive about her identity to everyone but her bees. In an alternate, darker version, the original Goblin clan fell apart or left their mine for other reasons. Bellona doesn’t find Bart when she sets out alone to find him. It gets assumed that other Goblins kidnapped him (actually he’s gone with them willingly but no one knows this). Bellona is much more vengeful in this version and comes to hate other Goblins and Monsters for hurting her family and the other Halflings in the region, which she considers herself more a part of. She keeps her mask on because she doesn’t want others pointing out the contradiction, even as she has nightmares about hurting Goblins that end up being herself or her brother when she looks at them too closely.

[moiranetex]

Harry Potter - 1 Element idk

Erm idk what this is really. I’ve been wanting to start this story for ages so i did. It’s a bit of a mess and im not entirely sure if I like all the details. Its unedited but idc. 

The fire in the Gryffindor common room burned brightly on the eve of the second night back at Hogwarts. Classes were back in full swing, a new batch of  first years were wondering around completely lost and Hermione Granger was completing a potions essay 2 weeks in advance, in the corner of the room. It was getting increasingly difficult as none of her peers seemed to share her motivation nor her ability to be quiet. Ronald Weasley had just flipped a game of Wizards chess, that he was playing with Harry Potter, off one of the many couches that were positioned around the room. The pieces scattered all over the carpet in front of the fire as Harry, along with others, roared with laughter. Hermione concluded that this must have been one of the very rare times Harry managed to beat Ronald at the game. While little groups were placed all around the large room either chatting, reading, gossiping, playing, napping or participating in more scandalous activities, a large group surrounded two Weasley siblings in particular. Hermione knew that Fred and George Weasley were almost certainly in the process of selling their joke products to unsuspecting teenagers in their own hilariously obvious version of a black market. She huffed to herself, frustrated that she would be once again interrupted. She was after all a prefect and probably the only person in the room equipped with enough wit to go up against the twins. She felt her cheeks go red with anger, however, just as she was preparing herself for the argument that would surely ensue, the portrait that served as an entrance into the Gryffindor quarters was opened and Professor McGonagall strolled through, her beady eyes instantly taking in the scene. Chaos ensued for a good 10 seconds as students hid whatever needed to be hidden, stopped swapping spit, ceased shouting and turned respectfully towards their head of house. The Weasley twins took advantage of the large amount of students blocking their view to stash their outrageous stock. Professor Mcgonagall pursed her lips distastefully at her students, not a thing slipping past her. She chose not to comment or dole out punishments as she was, despite never admitting it, both bias and genuinely fond of every student in her house. Her eyes settled on Hermione as she started to speak in her distinguished Scottish accent

“Miss Granger, would you kindly accompany me to Dumbledores office. Apparently there is a new student joining us, she will be in your year and as you are prefect it seems only logic that she should be put under your care.”

Immediately whispers broke out among the students. It was extremely rare for someone to arrive at Hogwarts after the first year. There were those that came back slightly later from vacation, but there had only ever been a handful  in this situation.

“It probably means she was attending a different school, an International student. Thats so fun!”

“Yeah, unless she’s been shipped in from Durmstrang, then you better stick clear of her.”

“Durmstrang is a school for boys you idiot, and it probably means she’s homeschooled, so either super rich or super poor, there really is no in between.”

“Bloody hell I hope not. Remember that Slytherin chap that had been homeschooled ‘till year 7, he was a right weirdo. Even the Slytherins didn’t like him and they like anyone pure and rich.”

“SILENCE,” shouted a fed up Mcgonogall. It was starting to get late and she wasn’t in the mood for the gossip flying around her common room.

“Firstly I don’t even know why the majority of you are still up at this hour, I technically don’t have the right to dictate what time you choose to put yourself to bed but I can certainly change that if I happen to observe that it isn’t to complete schoolwork,” she sent a particularly scathing look at the Weasley twins her who, in return, smiled politely at her as innocently as they could manage.

“And Second of all, although I don’t know her very well yet I can assure you she isn’t some type of ‘weirdo’ as you have so gracefully put it Ronald. Now Hermione if you wouldn’t mind,” she gestured into the hallway, clearly wanting to get this over with.

                                                          …

Hermione eyes widened as she took in the people currently in Dumbledore’s office. Unfortunately Draco Malfoy, a Slytherin in her year, and his best friend Blaise Zabini were there, scowls gracing both their faces. Blaise was sat in one of the two seats in front of the Heads desk while Draco was perched on the edge of on of the smaller tables in the room. Professor Snape, head of Slytherin house and the bane of the majority of Gryffindors existence, stood in the corner with his normal grimace. Professor Dumbledore sat in his chair, behind his large desk with a pleasant smile on his lips and a baby phoenix in his hand. Finally in the second chair to Blaise’s right sat one of the most beautiful girls Hermione had ever seen. The girl had dark caramel skin, not dissimilar to Blaise. Her hair flowed down to her lower back in brown micro braids, the front being pinned back so as to not get in the way, however a few pieces were spared to frame her face. She had large brown eyes  coupled with thick lashes. She had plump lips, dimples and a small nose that contained a tiny gold piercing. Immediately Hermione noticed two things. Firstly, she shared two many characteristics with the boy beside her for them to not be closely related. The same skin tone, full mouth and thick eyebrows, however they also had the same air of superiority, grace and poise that accompanied all rich, pureblood individuals. Secondly, Hermione noted that she was groomed to perfection, only serving to prove her theory further. She was already in the Hogwarts uniform, though lacking the tie. There wasn’t a single crease in her attire, it looked expensive and well made. Her fingernails were manicured, a shiny cherry red color was glaring against the darker hues of her uniform and looked slightly out of place. Hermione observed a thin layer of makeup on the girl to accentuate her features, along with what was clearly real gold jewellery in the form of rings, a necklace, and her nose piercing.

After making these observations, Hermione concluded that she was surely dealing with some sort of pureblood brat and therefore was rather shocked when the girl gave her a large and seemingly genuine smile, her white teeth accentuated by the shiny gloss on her lips. Hermione smiled back, somewhat apprehensively but as a general rule she didn’t like to let stereotypes define how she saw people.

“Ah Hermione, come in. We were just having a little chat,” murmured Dumbledore. At this statement, Draco Malfoy lifted his head up to look at Blaise Zabini who was, for lack of a better word, fuming. Blaise was never someone who talked a lot or was overly expressive. Because of his height, good looks and general ability to intimidate people he never blended into the background but he was usually stoic, a living statue. Around his friends he was a little more open, and those who knew him very well or had had the occasion to witness him drunk knew he could be funny and open however he had always been a man of few words and was incredibly private. Draco Malfoy was almost his polar opposite, not only in appearance with his silver hair and pale skin, but also in personality. It was hard to get Malfoy to shut up a majority of the time. While he too was conventionally attractive, rather tall and certainly domineering, he loved to talk, particularly if it mean making fun of people. He, like Blaise, was intelligent and had a quick wit which he loved to share. While it was difficult to get information out of Blaise about essentially anything, Draco was an open book to such a point that he could be considered insufferable at times, even by those who loved him.  

Severus Snape, observing his two students, felt it was a good time to intervene. Not only was he bias towards members of his own house, he held an actual fondness for the two boys in front of him and the fact that he was very close to both their parents, who would absolutely be hearing about this, meant he felt somewhat of a responsibility towards the girl in the chair. The fact that she was his goddaughter didn’t escape him either.

“Dumbledore, with respect I find it…,” he paused for a second, trying to find a polite and sophisticated way to say that there was no bloody way he would allow his only goddaughter to be placed into Gryffindor.

“-preposterous to entertain the mere thought of Miss Zabini entering into Gryffindor. She would be much better suited to Slytherin, with her brother and friends. I’m sure her parents, in particular her mother, would agree with me,” he drawled, bringing up the one thing that may possibly force the stubborn Headmaster to change his mind and defy the ragged hat that currently sat on his desk.

“Come now Severus, the hat has placed her into Gryffindor and so it must be fate. I can assure you if Carmen Zabini has any other problems she can always contact me, I would be happy to deal with her,” Dumbledore replied cheerily, however it was obvious to everyone in the room that the discussion was tense and the mention of Mrs. Zabini had been employed as some sort of threat.

“Bloody hat,” mumbled a frustrated Zabini, not as discreetly as he perhaps should have.

“This is ridiculous, she cant go into Gryffindor. She’s a pureblood and she already knows us all, it’s idiotic. Not only will you have her mother breaking down the door of this school, but my father will have something to say about it too,” interrupted Malfoy after seeing just how angry his friend was.

Just as Dumbledore opened his mouth to respond the girl spoke for the first time since Hermione arrived. Turning around to look Draco in the eye, almost challenging him. She had quite a soft voice that was comforting and sounded sweet, even as she spoke icily to Malfoy. Hermione couldn’t really place the accent. It had some weird intonations from what was probably Italian, and while it was closest to a high class english accent, some words slid out sounding american.

“Draco, stop. This is ridiculous, it’s just a house. There are pure-bloods in Gryffindor, not that it matters. And I while I do have the most friends in Slytherin I know some people in other houses. Anyway it’s an opportunity to meet new people. As for mother I already had a discussion about this before coming here, if she has further issues she can take it up with my father,” she took a deep breath and then turned to her brother, speaking in a much lower tone she continued

“-and I know you’re worried about me but you are completely overreacting Blaise. We’ll still see each other all the time and I’ll even wear that idiotic watch that mother sent you if you’re absolutely serious about it.”

“Oh, I am,” muttered Blaise, giving his sister his full attention, his dark eyes still glittering in anger. He looked quite terrifying, thought Hermione.

“The Weasleys barely count as pureblood Magda,” snorts Draco in the most incredible display of brattiness and bad timing that he was capable.

Immediately all eyes were on him, he didn’t seems to regret what he said however.

“Yes thank you for that Malfoy, I’m sure thats what everyone needed to hear,” the girl, who Hermione had now learned was named Magda, said with utmost sarcasm.

“Well, if that’s all-” Magda stood up abruptly, clearly sick of the back and forth that was heading nowhere. She bent down, giving her brother a kiss on the cheek and then went over to Draco, who lowered his head so she could do the same.

“You’re an idiot. Goodnight,” she whispered, still glaring at him. Both boys frustrated her, Draco more so than her own brother but she never liked going to bed angry, especially with those she loved.

“Just doing my job aren’t I?” He replied sarcastically giving her a little grin. She rolled her eyes before nodding at Snape who nodded back to her, never being one for affection. She then strolled over to stand next to Hermione.

“Thank you very much Professor Dumbledore, Professor Mcgonnogall. If that is all I do apologise for I’m rather tired and would probably benfit from some rest,” she smiled at Dumbledore who smiled back.

“Of course Miss. Zabini, you and Hermione may go. I didn’t realise this little meeting would take so long.”

Both girls departed as quickly as they could, but not before hearing Mcgonogall and Snape arguing over whether Slytherin house should lose points over Draco’s ‘insensitive’ comment.

“It was demeaning, rude and elitist. I say he should lose 20 points for that behaviour,” they heard Mcgonogall snap.

“You cant deduct points from students for stating mere facts Minnerva,” Snape replied cuttingly. After listening to Mcgonnagal splutter for about five seconds he rephrased his sentence.

“Malfoy was merely sharing an opinion, a point of view. Opinions are diverse, you cannot go around punishing people for them.”

“You bloody watch-”

                                                            …

[darkstar6782]

3.13: Ghostfacers - My Rewatch Review

This episode is a truly worthy continuation of the story of Ed and Harry, the ‘professional’ ghost hunters that we met back in Season 1, and I love that it also serves as a bit of meta-commentary for the show itself on the writer’s strike that unfortunately cut this season of the show short. I also always find it strangely affecting, as well. The show does not exactly handle Corbett’s crush on Ed or Ed’s reaction to it with a whole lot of finesse, but it is not as cringe-inducing a story element as it could have been, and the earnestness of Corbett’s character makes him extremely likable, and therefore makes the fact that he is the one who dies very tragic. Not to mention, he ends up saving everyone else from the malevolent spirit that inhabits the house, quite possibly destroying himself in the process, and though the tribute that Ed and Harry try to give him at the end of their show is awkward and affected to the point of insincerity (which is very in keeping with their characters, though), the clip of Corbett himself always makes me tear up a bit no matter how many times I watch it. Supernatural’s ‘funny’ episodes always work best when they find just the right blend of humor, horror, and pathos, and that makes this episode in particular one of their best in that category.

I also love that the reality TV perspective gives us a slightly more realistic look at Sam and Dean than we usually get, even if it is only in the form of having them use curse words that the show then has to beep out. It is a fandom-wide headcanon that both Sam and Dean would actually swear like sailors, and probably smoke and have a lot more tattoos than they actually do (shout-out to last episode, where I missed mentioning that we finally got to see their anti-possession tattoos for the first time), and that if this show had aired on a network like HBO rather than the CW, we would have gotten far grittier and yet far more true-to-their-actual-lives characterizations of the Winchesters, the lives they lead, and the work they do. As fun as those ideas are for headcanons and fan fiction, though, and as neat as it would have been to have Sam and Dean pepper their vocabulary with a few more realistic and colorful curse words every once in a while, I am glad that this show was always grounded squarely in the PG-13 realm. Because, for all the limitations of network TV, they were actually able to get away with quite a bit when it came to the gore and the violence and the horror aspects, and I think having the boys be just as gritty and dark as their surroundings would have taken a lot of what I actually love about the show away.

An episode like this is a perfect example of that, in my opinion. Because the show doesn’t have to be 100% dark, gritty, and true-to-life all the time, you can have an episode like this that is simultaneously funny, heartbreakingly tragic, and also truly terrifying all at the same time. A show that allows itself that one-step removal from reality can play with genre and tropes in a way that the gritty, hyper-realistic, ‘stick to the story with no diversions’ narratives of a lot of prestige TV produced in this day and age cannot. So, while it can be nice to theorize about the recognition a show like Supernatural would have gotten if it were made in today’s TV landscape, on one of the networks that would allow Sam and Dean to be darker, grittier versions of themselves, in the end, I’m glad we got the show we got, because without the ability to play around within the story and the genre, and without the breathing room within the season to tell every type of one-off monster-of-the-week tale that they could come up with, we would have never gotten the show that we actually love so much, or episodes like this one, and that would be the true tragedy.

[drinkingdeadpeopletea]

Heyo! You’ve made me curious enough to want to watch Dimension 20! What would you recommend starting with?

YES!!!! MY LEGACY! MY ONE GOAL AS A BLOGGER!

Okay so honestly it really depends what you’re in the mood for, because there’s currently three different campaigns you can start with! All of them stand alone, so you can watch them in any order or skip any of them you want. They’re shorter and tighter stories than Critical Role’s sprawling narrative, and because the cast is mostly comedy writers and actors they tend to be a little more ridiculous and funny, though they also have great representation, tackle serious issues, and have real, heartfelt moments that really did make me cry. 

Important thing to note is that only the first half of each campaign is available on YouTube, while the second half is behind a paywall at dropout.tv. Fortunately it’s not that expensive of a paywall (4.99 a month) and there is a free trial available, but that’s still important to know before you get sucked into the story. 

My recommendation would probably be to start with campaign 1, Fantasy High, which you can find the trailer for here and the first episode here. Fantasy High is finished (for now), and it’s 17 episodes long and features six misfit teens navigating a high school for adventurers while also trying to solve a mystery. It’s funny and fast-paced and heartfelt and emotional and just generally so good, and it has some of the best characters and most batshit insane and iconic dnd moments I’ve ever seen.  

However, if you’re more in the mood for a high-level evil Lord of the Rings parody, you should check out Escape from the Bloodkeep, which is the 6-episode mini-season that features the same DM but different players (including Matt Mercer as a much more anxious and insecure version of the Witch King)! Escape from the Bloodkeep has an absolute all-star cast and manages to pack a shocking amount of character development and heart into a campaign that was played over the course of one weekend. It also features two of genuinely the funniest NPCs I’ve ever seen, which of course were both made up off the top of the DM’s head. You can find the trailer here and the first episode here. 

The third option if you want more of an urban fantasy is The Unsleeping City, the second full campaign, which is set in New York City! We’re three episodes in right now, but I expect it’ll be around 16-18 episodes, and it’s very very good so far, with characters that I already adore and a slightly darker and more mature (though like...equally ridiculous) tone to it than the first two seasons. The trailer is here and the first episode is here. 

Like I said I’d probably start with Fantasy High, which is my favorite of the three at least so far, but all three campaigns have been great and any of them would be legitimate starting points :) let me know what you think!!!!!

[popentertainment-moviereviews]

DOWNHILL (2020)

Starring Will Ferrell, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Zach Woods, Zoë Chao, Miranda Otto, Julian Grey, Ammon Jacob Ford, Kristofer Hivju, Alex Macqueen, Julian Grey, Giulio Berruti, Nadiv Molcho, Jono Bergmann, Peter Schorn, Ferdinand Ramml, Kimberly Rydell, Hélène Cardona, Anita Hafner and Matt Lindquist.

Screenplay by Jesse Armstrong and Nat Faxon & Jim Rash.

Directed by Nat Faxon & Jim Rash.

Distributed by Searchlight Pictures. 86 minutes. Rated R.

Ruben Östlund’s 2014 Swedish film Force Majeure was a pitch black look at a long-time marriage fracturing during a family vacation at a sterile Alps ski resort in which a near-miss avalanche shows the father’s true colors – he embraces his flight instinct and leaves his wife and children to fend for themselves. This split-second decision – he quite possibly never even made a conscious choice, it may have been instinct – escalates the cracks in his relationship, leading to a very dark comedy-drama about troubled families and sexual roles.

It was sometimes very funny, but in no way was it a laugh-out-loud farce about a dysfunctional family. So, when actors-turned-filmmakers Nat Faxon (Friends from College) and Jim Rash (Community) decided to translate Force Majeure for American audiences, for the lead role they turned to… umm… Will Ferrell???

Luckily, they have reeled in much of Ferrell’s normal overgrown frat-boy shtick – there is less wild yelling and gesticulating and no running around shirtless in the snow. However, it still begs the question – can Ferrell rein himself in enough to play the subtle human emotions that are required in the story? After all, I can only think of one time that Ferrell played a nuanced, serious role, in the underrated and mostly forgotten film Stranger than Fiction. However, his normal acting style is over-the-top ridiculous.

And honestly, no, Faxon and Rash don’t even try to capture the coiled intensity of the original film. Downhill is a more whimsical, surface-level cover version of the very dark story. It is relatively faithful to the plotline, but it puts a lighter and brighter coat of paint on it.

It’s not nearly as good as Force Majeure, and yet it’s also not as bad a redo as you might fear.

This is Faxon and Rash’s first film since the sadly mostly forgotten 2013 nostalgic comedy The Way Back. The pair also won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for their 2011 co-write with director Alexander Payne on the acclaimed George Clooney film The Descendants. They know how to tell a story visually, and they are handed a very intriguing tale here.

Luckily, even though the ads are promoting Downhill as a goofy Will Ferrell comedy, Faxon and Rash are willing to wallow in the darker aspects of the idea, though they tend to sand down the edge of the Swedish original.

Also, if Ferrell is somewhat miscast as the husband, hiring Julia Louis-Dreyfus to play the wife was a complete slam dunk. While she shines in the comic parts of the film, she really impresses with her dramatic work here. One particular scene, where she finally calls out her husband for leaving them behind in front of two people she barely knows, shows how intense and affecting Downhill could have been if it hadn’t been working so hard to “American-ize” the story with sitcom-y characters like an over-sexed concierge (Miranda Otto).

The new version also has to give the story a bit of a feel-good Hollywood ending, rather than the pitch-black explosion of anger in the Force Majeure climax – though the final shot of Downhill does add a welcome note of ambiguity to the proceedings.

If you are going to Downhill looking for a wacky Will Ferrell comedy, you will probably be disappointed – although there are some humorous aspects and I did even hear people at the film screening laughing at some slightly inappropriate but not necessarily funny parts. However, most of Downhill, even with slapstick scenes of Ferrell being literally fall-down drunk, tends to be more circumspect and a little depressing.

If you want to see this story told right, you are better off streaming Force Majeure. However, if you are unfamiliar with the original film – which many Americans are – you may just find Downhill an interesting new-millennial Scenes from a Marriage.

Jay S. Jacobs

Copyright ©2020 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: February 13, 2020.

[kayskasmoviereviews]

25 Best Films of the 2010s

Admittedly, it has been a very long time since I updated this blog. However, given that we have just come to the end of an exceptionally great decade of film, I wanted to reflect on which films from the 2010s have stuck with me the most. This is of course a very personal list, and I haven’t seen half the movies that I wanted to in the decade. But on the first day of 2020, here are the 25 films I consider the best of the 2010s. If you’re inclined to comment, let me know what your favorites were!

1. Swiss Army Man - This surreal, bizarre comedy has such an eclectic mix of gross-out humor, emotional depth, and spectacularly original visual imagination that I honestly couldn’t imagine putting anything else in the #1 spot.

2. First Reformed - Paul Schrader returns to the transcendental style of classical filmmaking he had studied early in his life, and the result is a film that considers the human condition more seriously than just about anything else in a long time. Ethan Hawke gives a career-best performance, which is saying a lot.

3. Moonrise Kingdom - I always use this film to introduce the film unit of my freshman writing class, meaning I’ve seen it about 8 times or so. It never gets old. It was the movie that really made Wes Anderson click for me, and enhanced my appreciation of his work (and indeed, of cinema in general) to a new level.

4. Calvary - A dark, funny, intensely moving study of a moral dilemma in the life of a priest in Ireland. Absolutely amazing writing and a masterful performance by Brendan Gleeson. Somehow, John Michael McDonagh, the film’s writer and director, then went on to make War on Everyone, one of the worst films of the decade.

5. Lady Bird - Greta Gerwig’s debut movie was an extremely funny, warm, and true-to-life film that artfully and economically created as believable an on-screen world as I’ve ever seen. The film has enormous empathy with every single one of its sizable cast of characters. Gerwig is a major talent.

6. Arrival - Denis Villenueve made a lot of great films this decade (Prisoners, Blade Runner 2049, Enemy, Sicario), but none were better than this intellectually and emotionally brilliant work. As a bonus, it got me into reading Ted Chiang, who is now one of my favorite writers.

7. A Ghost Story - David Lowery also had some exceptionally strong work this decade (The Old Man & the Gun, Pete’s Dragon, Ain’t Them Bodies Saints), but the best and most distinctive was this film, which featured Casey Affleck as a ghost in a white sheet who can’t leave the house he shared with his wife (Rooney Mara). This film did more interesting things with cinematic time than any other this decade, and felt like an actually successful version of what Terence Malick tried (but in my opinion, failed) to achieve with The Tree of Life.

8. Her - One of the most profound romantic films ever made. Most romantic comedies play around with relationships as plot elements, but this one actually asked what a relationship even is in the first place. 

9. Phantom Thread - The only movie to ever actually make me say, “What the fuck?” out loud in the theater. In a good way.

10. Turbo Kid - A wonderfully entertaining low-budget indie movie that mixed irony, sincerity, nostalgia, pastiche, humor, and gory violence into something truly singular.

11. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World - One of the most purely fun films ever made in terms of visual style. Edgar Wright’s meticulous attention to mise-en-scene, editing, and visual effects has never been put to better use than it was here.

12. 12 Years a Slave - The best historical film of the decade, one that used art-house style visuals, stern filmmaking discipline, and major Hollywood actors to create an extremely convincing and harrowing portrayal of slavery.

13. Room - One of the most moving films of the decade, and Brie Larson was a deserving Oscar winner for this one.

14. The Paddington films - The cutest, cuddliest, most sweetly entertaining kids’ movies in a very long time. Both films are essentially perfect in their charm and their surprisingly elaborate attention to visual craft. I can’t wait for Paddington 3.

15.The Hateful Eight - Everyone knows the over-the-top violence in Quentin Tarantino’s other films is largely played for fun and laughs, and I enjoy it as much as anyone. However, I think he was doing something distinctly different here, something much darker and more morally serious. Jennifer Jason Leigh’s performance was one of my absolute favorites of the decade.

16. The Lobster - Few films are this original, this dark, or this bitterly funny. I really gelled with Yorgos Lanthimos’s distinctive style in this movie, and thought Colin Farrell, Rachel Weisz, and the other actors all landed on the perfect wavelength for their performances.

17. Logan - People talk constantly about the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, and it is very true that those films as a group achieved something truly unprecedented and highly enjoyable in the 2010s. In terms of individual films, though, the best superhero movie this decade (and maybe ever) was Logan, which gave an extremely satisfying conclusion to Hugh Jackman’s 17 years with the character.

18. The John Wick series - The John Wick films are undoubtedly some of the most technically proficient and stylistically accomplished action films ever made. The plot is so simple as to be a joke, yes, but the action is executed with such an incredibly high level of skill and dedication that you simply have to respect the people who put this madness together.

19. Blade Runner 2049 - Some of the most visually stunning cinematography and visual effects I’ve seen, smartly put in service of a strong story that does actually live up to the legacy of the original.

20. Cloud Atlas - Sure, you could pretty fairly say that this movie was cheesy, messy, silly, and missed some of the elements of the book. But dammit, it was truly ambitious, and the Wachowskis (one of whom had transitioned before the making of the film, and the other of whom did later) really did put their hearts into it.

21. The Favourite - Lanthimos further develops the weird style I had liked so much in his earlier films, but this time puts it in the service of a slightly warmer and more accessible story than before. Olivia Colman gave a truly astonishing performance.

22. It Follows - My favorite horror movie of the decade, even more than Hereditary, Get Out, or Midsommar. I found the premise ingeniously frightening, and thought the direction, mise-en-scene, and performances really helped develop the film into a singular horror achievement.

23. Dunkirk - I would actually argue this is one of the best war films ever made, maybe even the best one, precisely because it does away with most of the cliches and contrivances and narrative devices common to most war films in favor of simply creating two hours of an ever-escalating “We need to get out of here right now” feeling. By abandoning so many trappings, it managed to feel more real than almost any other war film.

24. It’s Such a Beautiful Day - This film got me into Don Hertzfeldt’s work, and now he’s someone I’m keeping an eye on forever. This is intense, weird, emotionally powerful stuff, all done with stick figures.

25. Parasite - A perfect film from beginning to end. There’s not one frame out of place, and no way I can imagine Bong Joon Ho and his collaborators having made this film any better than they did. They should teach this one in film school forever.

[haltandcatchfiretothemax]

I think I’ve posted quotes from this piece, but I don’t think I ever read it in its entirety? Either way:

FIRST, a relevant excerpt! 

Donna and Cameron may not be the only heart of Halt and Catch Fire — it's a show that, despite only a small ensemble, has made remarkable use of the histories connecting each and every character — but they're certainly one of its hearts, the relationship that triggered the show's growth through its second and third seasons and the separation that has beautifully tinged this season with discomfort and regret. I assume I'm not the only Halt and Catch Fire viewer who has watched every episode this season just waiting for somebody to lock Donna and Cameron in a room and make them hash out their problems.

SECOND: do you ever sit around thinking about Halt and Catch Fire’s legacy? Because as a social scientist and critic, I know I sure do!

I admittedly don’t have a better name for it, but I don’t love the moniker ‘Sad TV’. I don’t think of any of the shows named in this article as ‘sad’ so much as I just understand them to be programming meant, for, you know, adults, who have enough life experience to appreciate the stakes involved? In particular I don’t think of Halt as ‘sad,’ by season 4 it feels like a hopeful (if not exactly optimistic), brave, future-facing show. Hope and despair go to together. (We learned that from The Dark Knight Rises, didn’t we? That movie deserves its critiques but it also deserves the love that bereaved folks have for it.) You only really know what hope is when you’ve been devastated, and you finally get to that point where you think that you will and might even want to survive. 

Halt is about a bunch of characters who want to survive, even if only out of spite, and who want to believe that they can effect real, positive change, even if only in the tech industry, who want to work together, because they’ve figured out that their partnerships are the actual most important thing. Especially at this juncture, I really can’t think of anything more uplifting than human beings realizing that it’s good and okay to care about each other and about wanting to make the world slightly better, and still trying, even after they’ve lost the people or relationships that mattered most to them, even after they’ve struggled for so long in isolation. Do you have to go through something like that in order to want your life and do good things with it? I mean, technically no, but realistically, that’s often how it works. Bad things happen to us, because they happen to everyone, and we deal with them as graciously as our mental health and other circumstances will allow. If we’re lucky, we learn from it, and we build solid relationships from it. 

Since Halt’s finale, I find myself looking for shows that remind me of it. Shows that are hopeful, but that don’t lie about how most hope is hard-earned. Shows that are about found family, about characters who have been through some real shit and are looking for and finding a place where they can build a personal and professional niche where they can thrive together and individually, and that focus on the effort that goes into that, and how interpersonal failures and setbacks can be really sad, but can also sometimes be really funny. 

This article suggests that Halt is part of a real trend, and I can’t tell you what the source of that trend is, exactly, but my hypothesis is that it’s another major ripple of what I think of as The Parks and Rec Effect (h/t @wuschwusch <3). Sometimes I think we might take for granted how Parks and Recreation represented a real departure in network sitcoms, which for a long time were literally just about how rich yt city people are unbearably annoying. For all of its flaws, Parks didn’t resort to ugly or oppressive humor, it found ways to draw attention to and make fun of that kind of ‘humor’ and it got most of its laughs from Leslie Knope’s knack for taking on just slightly too much, and then having to solve the problems that would create for her and her coworkers. We see this in writer and producer Michael Schur’s other big shows (Brooklyn Nine Nine and The Good Place) too: these are all shows about the wacky hijinks that ensue when you try to do good things in this hell world, and, uh, that’s pretty much what Halt is, too? Halt just has a slightly different tone, and it’s about how characters who don’t bounce back quite so well after a setback. 

Watching characters like the cast of Halt flail miserably, and other darker, less hopeful iterations of this (like The Americans, or the more recent Mr. Mercedes) isn’t going to appeal to everyone, as the article says. That they exist also indicates a real change in tv and the stories that we tell, especially now that we’re seeing uplifting downer shows on US network tv? It is now possible to see characters who are bereaved, mentally ill, recovering addicts, abuse survivors, alienated from themselves, and buckling under the weight of life and/or the state’s demands, even on network television, and not just on standard legal, medical, and crime dramas, but in their own stories and camp and melodrama-free series about coping with loss, illness, recovery, and adult loneliness! Quite honestly, what a time to be alive!

The article comments on how one such network drama, This Is Us, does have the numbers and the high viewership, which…I believe that there’s an entire article to be written on why that is, but for me to be able to write it I’d have to watch it first, which I haven’t, because the only thing I keep hearing about it is that it’s a cheesier, inferior version of Halt. (The author of this article even says as much, even though he makes a point of saying so as kindly and charitably as possible.) Because I have a lot of experience with watching many other US network family dramas and night-time soap operas, I’m familiar with the kind of melodrama such shows deal in, and so my hunch is that This Is Us (as well as ABC’s seeming copycat, A Million Little Things, the pilot for which I did watch, it was…something) isn’t actually as comparable to series like Halt, The Americans, and The Leftovers as this article makes it out to be.

This not entirely informed initial judgment aside: I don’t know exactly where this new approach to television storytelling came from, or quite how it jumped genres and channels, but it came from somewhere. My guess, based on my own tastes, is that at least part of it was fatigue with anti-hero series. (And just in time to provide an escape from the real-life political consequences of encouraging viewers to sympathize with and root[/vote?] for truly terrible, reckless, destructive people!) Maybe part of it is also a certain amount of fatigue with franchise and genre shows, which can sometimes feel a little too epic, and which can sometimes feel a little tedious even when they’re good and interesting? (…you know what I mean, if you’ve seen epic shows, it’s almost like getting kind of boring is built into them as a feature.) 

What I do know is that, I quite literally love to see it! Even for all of the complaints and critiques and griping I’ve voiced here, overall, Halt has always been the kind of tv that we deserve. Well-written, well-acted uplifiting downer comedies, dramas, and dramedies are what we all deserve, and having more of them be more accessible and not be limited to cable and streaming services feels like it can only be a good thing.