#not of that genre? and you have baggage related to family members who you feel responsible for the fates of? and you put an intense amount

[hawkogurl]

[lastsonlost]

All this over the Japanese liking a game they don't like...

Ghost of Tsushima opens with a grand wide shot of samurai, adorned with impressively detailed suits of armor, sitting atop their horses. There we find Jin, the protagonist, ruminating on how he will die for his country. As he traverses Tsushima, our hero fights back the invading Mongolian army to protect his people, and wrestles with the tenets of the Bushido code. Standoffs take advantage of perspective and a wide field of view to frame both the samurai and his opponent in something that, more often than not, feels truly cinematic. The artists behind the game have an equally impeccable reference point for the visuals: the works of legendary filmmaker Akira Kurosawa

“We really wanted to pay respect to the fact that this game is so totally inspired by the work of this master,” director Nate Fox said in a recent interview with IndieWire. At Entertainment Weekly, Fox explained how his team at Sucker Punch Productions suggested that the influence ran broadly, including the playable black-and-white “Kurosawa Mode” and even in picking a title. More specifically, he noted that Seven Samurai, one of Kurosawa’s most well-known works, defined Fox’s “concept of what a samurai is.” All of this work went toward the hope that players would “experience the game in a way as close to the source material as possible.”

But in embracing “Kurosawa” as an eponymous style for samurai adventures, the creatives behind Ghost of Tsushima enter into an arena of identity and cultural understanding that they never grapple with. The conversation surrounding samurai did not begin or end with Kurosawa’s films, as Japan’s current political forces continue to reinterpret history for their own benefit.

Kurosawa earned a reputation for samurai films as he worked steadily from 1943 to 1993. Opinions of the director in Japan are largely mixed; criticism ranges from the discussion of his family background coming from generations of samurai to accusations of pandering to Western audiences. Whether intentional or not, Kurosawa became the face of Japanese film in the critical circles of the 1950s. But he wasn’t just a samurai stylist: Many of the director’s films frame themselves around a central conflict of personal ideology in the face of violence that often goes without answer — and not always through the lives of samurai. In works like Drunken Angel, The Quiet Duel, or his 1944 propaganda film The Most Beautiful, Kurosawa tackles the interpersonal struggles of characters dealing with sickness, alcoholism, and other challenges.

His films endure today, and not just through critical preservation; since breaking through to the West, his visual ideas and themes have become fodder for reinterpretation. You can see this keenly in Western cinema through films like The Magnificent Seven, whose narrative was largely inspired by Seven Samurai. Or even A Fistful of Dollars, a Western epic that cleaved so closely to Kurosawa’s Yojimbo that director Sergio Leone ended up in a lawsuit with Toho Productions over rights issues. George Lucas turned to Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress in preparation for Star Wars; he’d eventually repay Kurosawa by helping to produce his surreal drama Dreams.

Ghost of Tsushima is part of that lineage, packing in action and drama to echo Kurosawa’s legacy. “We will face death and defend our home,” Shimura, the Lord of Tsushima, says within the first few minutes of the game. “Tradition. Courage. Honor. These are what make us.” He rallies his men with this reminder of what comprises the belief of the samurai: They will die for their country, they will die for their people, but doing so will bring them honor. And honor, tradition, and courage, above all else, are what make the samurai.

Except that wasn’t always the belief, it wasn’t what Kurosawa bought whole cloth, and none of the message can be untangled from how center- and alt-right politicians in modern Japan talk about “the code” today.

The “modern” Bushido code — or rather, the interpretation of the Bushido code coined in the 1900s by Inazō Nitobe — was utilized in, and thus deeply ingrained into, Japanese military culture. An easy example of how the code influenced Imperial Japan’s military would be the kamikaze pilots, officially known as the Tokubetsu Kōgekitai. While these extremes (loyalty and honor until death, or capture) aren’t as present in the myth of the samurai that has ingrained itself into modern ultranationalist circles, they manifest in different yet still insidious ways.

In 2019, to celebrate the ushering in of the Reiwa Era, the conservative Liberal Democratic Party commissioned Final Fantasy artist Yoshitaka Amano to depict Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as a samurai. Though described as being center-right, various members of the LDP have engaged in or have been in full support of historical revisionism, including the editing of textbooks to either soften or completely omit the language surrounding war crimes committed by Imperial Japan. Abe himself has been linked to supporting xenophobic curriculums, with his wife donating $9,000 to set up an ultranationalist school that pushed anti-Korean and anti-Chinese rhetoric. The prime minister is also a member of Japan’s ultraconservative Nippon Kaigi, which a U.S. congressional report on Japan-U.S. relations cited as one of several organizations that believe that “Japan should be applauded for liberating much of East Asia from Western colonial powers, that the 1946-1948 Tokyo War Crimes tribunals were illegitimate, and that the killings by Imperial Japanese troops during the 1937 ‘Nanjing massacre’ were exaggerated or fabricated.” The Nippon Kaigi, like Abe, have also pushed for the revision of Japan’s constitution — specifically, Article 9 — to allow Japan to reinstate its standing military.

This has been a major goal for Abe as his time as prime minister comes to a definite close in 2021. And from 2013 onward, the politician has made yearly trips to the Yasukuni shrine to honor the memory of war criminals, a status of which his own grandfather was accused, that died with the ethos of the modern Bushido code. Abe’s exoneration of these ideals has continued to spark reactionary nationalist sentiment, as illustrated with the Nippon Kaigi and their ultranationalist ideology. These traditionalist values have encouraged xenophobic sentiment in Japan, which was seen in the 2020 Tokyo elections with 178,784 votes going to Makoto Sakurai, leader of the Japan First Party, another ultranationalist group. Sakurai has participated in numerous hate speech demonstrations in Tokyo, often targeting Korean diaspora groups.

The preservation of the Bushido code that was highly popularized and utilized by Imperial Japan lives on through promotion by history revisionists, who elevate samurai to a status similar to that of the chivalric knight seen in Western media. They are portrayed as an honor-bound and noble group of people that cared deeply for the peasantry, when that was often not the case.

The samurai as a concept, versus who the samurai actually were, has become so deeply intertwined with Japanese imperialist beliefs that it has become difficult to separate the two. This is where cultural and historical understanding are important when approaching the mythology of the samurai as replicated in the West. Kurosawa’s later body of work — like the color-saturated Ran, which was a Japanese adaptation of King Lear, and Kagemusha, the story of a lower-class criminal impersonating a feudal lord — deeply criticized the samurai and the class system they enforced. While some films were inspired by Western plays, specifically Shakespeare, these works were critical of the samurai and their role in the Sengoku Period. They dismantled the notion of samurai by showing that they were a group of people capable of the same failings as the lower class, and were not bound to arbitrary notions of honor and chivalry.

Unlike Kurosawa’s blockbusters, his late-career critical message didn’t cross over with as much ease. In Western films like 2003’s The Last Samurai, the audience is presented with the picture of a venerable and noble samurai lord who cares only for his people and wants to preserve traditionalist values and ways of living. The portrait was, again, a highly romanticized and incorrect image of who these people were in feudal Japanese society. Other such works inspired by Kurosawa’s samurai in modern pop culture include Adult Swim’s animated production Samurai Jack and reinterpretations of his work like Seven Samurai 20XX developed by Dimps and Polygon Magic, which had also received the Kurosawa Estate’s blessing but resulted in a massive failure. The narratives of the lone ronin and the sharpshooter in American Westerns, for example, almost run in parallel.

Then there’s Ghost of Tsushima. Kurosawa’s work is littered with close-ups focused on capturing the emotionality of every individual actor’s performance, and panoramic shots showcasing sprawling environments or small feudal villages. Fox and his team recreate that. But after playing through the story of Jin, Ghost of Tsushima is as much of an homage to an Akira Kurosawa film as any general black-and-white film could be. The Kurosawa Mode in the game doesn’t necessarily reflect the director’s signatures, as the narrative hook and tropes found in Kurosawa’s work — and through much of the samurai film genre — are equally as important as the framing of specific shots.

“I don’t think a lot of white Western academics have the context to talk about Japanese national identity,” Tori Huynh, a Vietnamese woman and art director in Los Angeles, said about the Western discussion of Kurosawa’s aesthetic. “Their context for Japanese nationalism will be very different from Japanese and other Asian people. My experience with Orientalism in film itself is, that there is a really weird fascination with Japanese suffering and guilt, which is focused on in academic circles … I don’t think there is anything wrong with referencing his aesthetic. But that’s a very different conversation when referencing his ideology.”

Ghost of Tsushima features beautifully framed shots before duels that illustrate the tension between Jin and whomever he’s about to face off against, usually in areas populated by floating lanterns or vibrant and colorful flowers. The shots clearly draw inspiration from Kurosawa films, but these moments are usually preceded by a misunderstanding on Jin’s part — stumbling into a situation he’d otherwise have no business participating in if it weren’t for laid-out side quests to get mythical sword techniques or armor. Issues like this undermine the visual flair; the duels are repeated over and over in tedium as more of a set-piece than something that should have a component of storytelling and add tension to the narrative.

Fox and Sucker Punch’s game lacks a script that can see the samurai as Japanese society’s violent landlords. Instead of examining the samurai’s role, Ghost of Tsushima lionizes their existence as the true protectors of feudal Japan. Jin must protect and reclaim Tsushima from the foreign invaders. He must defend the peasantry from errant bandits taking advantage of the turmoil currently engulfing the island. Even if that means that the samurai in question must discard his sense of honor, or moral righteousness, to stoop to the level of the invading forces he must defeat.

Jin’s honor and the cost of the lives he must protect are in constant battle, until this struggle no longer becomes important to the story, and his tale whittles down to an inevitable and morally murky end. To what lengths will he go to preserve his own honor, as well as that of those around him? Ghost of Tsushima asks these questions without a truly introspective look at what that entails in relation to the very concept of the samurai and their Bushido code. This manifests in flashbacks to Jin’s uncle, Shimura, reprimanding him for taking the coward’s path when doing his first assassination outside of forced stealth segments. Or in story beats where the Khan of the opposing Mongol force informs Shimura that Jin has been stabbing enemies in the back. Even if you could avoid participating in these systems, the narrative is fixated on Jin’s struggle with maintaining his honor while ultimately trying to serve his people.

I do not believe Ghost of Tsushima was designed to empower a nationalist fantasy. At a glance, and through my time playing the game, however, it feels like it was made by outsiders looking into an otherwise complex culture through the flattening lens of an old black-and-white film. The gameplay is slick and the hero moments are grand, but the game lacks the nuance and understanding of what it ultimately tries to reference. As it stands, being a cool pseudo-historical drama is, indeed, what Ghost of Tsushima’s creators seemingly aimed to accomplish. In an interview with Famitsu, Chris Zimmerman of Sucker Punch said that “if Japanese players think the game is cool, or like a historical drama, then that’s a compliment.” And if there is one thing Ghost of Tsushima did succeed in, it was creating a “cool” aesthetic — encompassed by one-on-one showdowns with a lot of cinematic framing.

In an interview with The Verge, Fox said that “our game is inspired by history, but we’re not strictly historically accurate.” That’s keenly felt throughout the story and in its portrayal of the samurai. The imagery and iconography of the samurai carry a burden that Sucker Punch perhaps did not reckon with during the creation of Ghost of Tsushima. While the game doesn’t have to remain true to the events that transpired in Tsushima, the symbol of the samurai propagates a nationalist message by presenting a glossed-over retelling of that same history. Were, at any point, Ghost of Tsushima to wrestle with the internal conflict between the various class systems that existed in Japan at the time, it might have been truer to the films that it draws deep inspiration from. However, Ghost of Tsushima is what it set out to be: a “cool” period piece that doesn’t dwell on the reasonings or intricacies of the existing period pieces it references.

A game that so heavily carries itself on the laurels of one of the most prolific Japanese filmmakers should investigate and reflect on his work in the same way that the audience engages with other pieces of media like film and literature. What is the intent of the creator versus the work’s broader meaning in relation to current events, or the history of the culture that is ultimately serving as a backdrop to yet another open-world romp? And how do these things intertwine and create something that can flirt on an edge of misunderstanding? Ghost of Tsushima is a surface-level reflection of these questions and quandaries, sporting a lens through which to experience Kurosawa, but not to understand his work. It ultimately doesn’t deal with the politics of the country it uses as a backdrop. For the makers of the game, recreating Kurosawa is just black and white.

[moontheoretist]

Even though Ahiru no Sora is more focused on making the show into shounen sport anime/comedy people cannot really say it doesn't approach sports anime genre from more mature and self-aware stand point than other animes. 

Like in Hoshiai no Sora we have here lives of players included, just in less dramatic manner. The only character who seems to have bad relationships with his parents is Kite, but it's mostly because we do not know about family situation's of other members of the team outside Sora himself yet. His life isn't all shiny, with mum welcoming him each day and cooking food he loves, but there is this warmth which you can feel whenever Sora talks about his mother and the same warmth we can also see in scenes in which Yuka is shown to think about Sora. Even though they cannot meet due to the big argument which they had over that, whole situation wasn't just a drama played for the sake of playing drama, it was an important thing in Sora's life. Thing which made him decide to go to Kanagawa alone and keep his promise, because unlike most of the characters who had arguments with their beloved ones he knows why his mum said all those hurtful things, because he eavesdropped, so he has no emotional baggage in form of being rejected. Instead the only one he has is his goal to keep the promise and visit his mum when he achieves it. There is pressure, but it's a motivational kind of pressure. In today's episode it was visible even more and all thanks to just one bottle of milk, which just had a story attached to it, a story filled with memories of time spent with the parent who loved milk. Sora couldn't possibly know that his mum will receive that milk, but it was cute and necessary closure of this whole story point, even if a little too convenient.

The other thing which pops in my head whenever I think how different Ahiru no Sora is from other sports anime, even though it has a lot of low level gags focused on "male youth" and their dreams about women, is that all female characters are treated in decent way. To the point that even if something not very sensitive is played as a gag, it's later revealed to be very on the nose, just like today's happiness of Madoka that she didn't have to strip for the "ogling eyes", which for me as a scholar sounded as if someone read what male gaze is and put it here in a way which doesn't bring much attention to it, but people who know the gig will notice the reference. Outside of gags female characters are not sexualized and if they are made fun of it's usually pointed out instead of shunned down on both in-story level and outside the story level, thanks to what audience learns that underestimating someone due to their gender is something very, very foolish and idiotic, setting this anime apart from others. Another thing is that thanks to all those female character's which are capable and good basketball players Nanao's story isn't a big let down. If she was the only female character who ever played basketball and doesn't do that anymore it would be, but she isn't the only one, so her story feels far more natural and in tune with her traits as a character instead of coming off as being pushed onto the person which was capable but someone decided to take that from them, which is a case in many other sport's anime focused on boys. Female characters are few and if they are there they are either former player's who quit for some reason, the coaches, the managers or trainers. Nanao is this type of character too, but in more diverse environment than any other female character and that's a big plus.

Speaking of Nanao it's also worth pointing out that the fact that she switched from playing to couching/managing the basketball clubs, because she found a different way to help her team works very well with what happened in the episode. Her anxiety related to being too pushy, too confident and too smart made her worried that she is doing the opposite of what she wanted, which is visible well with her disappearance after she heard that boy's team got discouraged and now lacks motivation to play more, because it was completely not what she wanted to achieve and it made her feel bad and awful as anybody else in her place. Being good at something and confident in your skill brings exactly this kind of anxiety, so I am happy it was well represented and that boys thanks to the lost journal of Nanao in the end managed to convince her that what she did was actually very helpful and needed. She was acknowledged and it really made me happy, because as much as I love characters with preset roles like the coach in Kuroko no Basket, I like even more when their story is put in the spotlight and resolved within the storyline, instead of being imposed on it.

Also can I say it finally? 

NANAO IS WEARING WRISTBAND WITH TRANS FLAG! <3 <3 <3

This one fact was sitting on my chest since last week, but because I didn’t write any post about last week’s episode I didn’t have an opportunity to express it.

[creepygamerpasta]

My Defense of Dear Evan Hansen

Okay, disclaimer: I wasn’t really into Dear Evan Hansen, so I don’t know the musical itself all too well (except of course, like everyone, “Sincerely, Me”). I recently read the novel of it (which was written by the creators, so I think the only difference is the fact that the prose doesn’t rhyme). I’m not a “day-one, die-hard fan,” and I do not have an obsession with it. That being said, I enjoyed the novel a lot. It’s not usually a genre I read, but it certainly piqued my interest for YA mental health novels. 

Why, then, do people hate it?

I’ve looked online for this answer, and I’ve been able to find some recurring arguments, which are quite valid even if you don’t agree. (Not everyone has to like the same things, I know.) So, here are my responses and counter-arguments. (Note, contains spoilers, and I won’t necessarily outright disagree with everything.)

1. The fanbase is annoying, toxic, etc.

This is probably the easiest to get out of the way. Yes, there will always be people within a fanbase whose entire lives revolve around their fandom. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing; who can fault you for being passionate about something? But it’s when that passion turns into hate or putting someone else’s tastes or general completely down because that person doesn’t like exactly what the fan likes when people get really angry. I’ll use an unrelated scenario to DEH as an example:

Person A: Do you like Taylor Swift?

Me: Eh, I’m not really into her music. I’m more into metal and stuff.

Person A: Oh, okay, cool. :)

Person B: OMG WTF stop being a HATER. Metal SUCKS. You’re just JEALOUS that she has TALENT.

...See? This is the same sort of reactions that people get, not just from DEH fans but from all sorts of fans. (I’ve gotten both of these exact reactions from various fans of different singers, actors, celebrities, movies, TV shows, etc.)

2. The musical is not that great, as in the scores and stuff.

I don’t see why this particularly angers people. I see this more as an evolution of the types of music in musicals. Maybe there’s something I’m missing here, but musicals exist for people to want to see them. And if the target audience is the younger generation, then it does not make sense to use music that most of them A) won’t like and B) won’t understand. I mean, Hamilton is known for its use of rap, (dare I say) “nontraditional” music in the theatre world. And people like it. 

Which brings me to the next point...

3. Young people (who obviously cannot have appreciation for true theatre) will expect musicals like Hamilton and Dear Evan Hansen to become the norm and for there to be a “big” musical every year.

...okay? So? Look, if people want to go to a musical, then they’ll go. If they want to go to another musical, then they’ll go to that one. It’s not rocket science. And as for this sometimes-unspoken assumption that young people can’t understand/appreciate theatre... Last time I checked, there were still theatre kids in schools across the country, so at least some people can.

And now, we go to the part of the defense where I rely more on the novel.

4. The main character (Evan) is neither compelling nor a good person, and thus, should not be the main character (and, by extension, the entire musical should not exist).

In the book, it is made very clear that Evan is not a perfect character. He’s a human being and has flaws just like everyone. His whole “pretending to be Connor’s friend thing” is less a manipulative move and more of “wrong place, wrong time, and I don’t know how to explain.” Though he’s supposed to be relatable, you are not expected to like him. Other characters question his motives for The Connor Project and his relationship to Connor, but with the first person, inner-thoughts, deepest-darkest-secrets style that the book has, it is very clear that Evan is (in his complex way) trying to help the Murphys with their loss. He does get a bit carried away, probably without realizing it, but even though he did not mean to hurt them, the guilt of his lies eats away at him the entire book.

Evan admits to lying, in person at the Murhpys. He knows that even though his longtime crush and now girlfriend (he even describes her as his soulmate and wants to marry her) will hate him, not to mention her parents, he cannot keep lying to them. 

I think one of the problems with DEH specific to this problem is the hype about Evan himself. As the audience, we want to paint Evan as a hero. Descriptions put him in that light. He does overcome a lot through the novel and goes through quite a bit of change, but he is not the flawless hero (or the one-flaw antihero) people want him to be. He is a human being, and I think fans and haters forget this or overlook this, despite it being such an important part of the novel/musical.

5. DEH makes fun of mental illness and doesn’t take it seriously. It falsely portrays people with depression, anxiety, suicidal tendencies, etc.

This grinds a lot of my gears. Mental illnesses are different for everyone. Is there some assumption people have that I’m not aware of? The assumption that people actually think that everyone who has anxiety or is suicidal will act exactly like Evan and Connor? It might not match up with every individual’s experience/struggle with a mental illness, but that’s kind of one of the themes of DEH: that people have different lives, different struggles, different baggage, and different ways of coping, healthy or unhealthy. Everyone has a different story, and no one should be left to deal while feeling alone. Pay attention to those around you.

The lighter-hearted music seems to also make people perceive DEH to be making fun of/not taking mental health seriously. Which is ridiculous. There are some serious songs in that soundtrack, and the upbeat “Sincerely, Me” is supposed to be from fake personas. Connor’s persona in that song is supposed to be feeling better as days go by with the help of his “friend” Evan. So, yes, it makes sense that would be cheerful because it is not from the perspective of the real Connor. If it were, the song would probably be a lot darker.

6. The musical is homophobic and makes fun of the LGBT+ community.

If you were to walk into an elementary, middle, or high school right now and overhear every conversation, I gaurantee you, gaurantee you, that some students would be using “gay” as some sort of put-down or otherwise make fun of LGBT+ people. That doesn’t mean it’s right or acceptable, but having two high school guys (or really one, seeing as how Evan does not go along with the joke) make remarks about two (supposedly) close guys being gay is not something new. This complaint probably mainly comes from the line in “Sincerely, Me” in which Connor’s and Evan’s personas deny being close for anything other than friendship. And honestly? As a member of the LGBT+ community, this confusion comes up a lot. Whether you are out or not, closeness between friends is often interpreted as a romantic or sexual relationship, which of course is not the case. 

Last time I checked, there wasn’t anything hateful toward the LGBT+ community. Jared’s jokes, while horribly sexual and inappropriate, were just immature. His jokes are essentially the high school equivalent of “That’s what she said.” I mean, who doesn’t know someone like that in their life? If I’m wrong, feel free to correct me.

Oh, and also? It is revealed in the novel that Connor did in fact have a relationship with a guy, Miguel.

7. People talk about the relatability of the musical without actually relating.

Okay, yes, annoying, but I don’t see why people should immediately fault this. You do not know the experiences or thoughts of people online and on social media, but this means that you can’t judge whether or not they do relate to something. The first thing that comes to mind with the word “relatable” when it comes to this musical would, of course, be mental health. Since the most notable characters both struggle with mental illnesses, it makes sense that you would expect the people who relate to this musical to also struggle with mental illness(es). But there is no law that everyone who relates to a character has to be exactly like that character. 

I’ll use another example from a different work, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. (Quick little note: Frankenstein is the scientist, not the creature. The Creature is actually quite complex and a deep character that is not the mindless monster from movies.)

Frankenstein: wealthy, a genius, comes from a high(ish) class, (presumably) handsome

Creature: neglected, hated for his ugliness, abandoned by Frankenstein, feared, smart

I doubt anyone was stitched together from dead bodies and then somehow reanimated. But you might relate to the fact that the Creature was abandoned or that people fear and hate him because of his looks. I also doubt that anyone has figured out the secret to reanimating dead bodies after taking them apart and stitching them together. But you might also (or solely) relate to Frankenstein because he lost his mother or because he feels responsible for a family member’s death. Those are some examples.

And there are plenty of characters that you could relate to or aspects of characters that speak to you. Maybe you’ve built a tangle of lies like Evan without meaning to, or maybe you have gone through a hard divorce and try so hard to get through to your child without success like Heidi, or maybe you really care about making a difference and don’t feel like the people who are supposed to help you take that seriously like Alana.

That about wraps it up. If I’ve missed anything, feel free to tell me, and I’ll make a follow-up post. 

Again, I’m not demanding that you agree with me, but hopefully, whether a fan or critic, you have now seen a different perspective.

[deehollowaywrites]

Title: And It Came To Pass

Author: Laura Stone

Release: May 18, 2017

Genre: contemporary romance, m/m

Order here!

‘Adam fell that men might be, and men are that they might have joy.’

- 2 Nephi 2:25

This scripture isn’t talking about the Adam of And It Came To Pass, naturally--except that it kind of is. I doubt that Laura Stone named Adam Young accidentally; the name Adam carries with it a millennia of cultural baggage, a twinning of innocence and suggestiveness, and the LDS version of Biblical Adam is pretty wild. Adam’s fall is a good thing, because it triggers the possibility of eternal progression.

Ok, now we’re talking about our Adam. So much of And It Came To Pass is about joy: friendship and love and companionship, most literally, the joy of learning, the joy of growth. At base it’s an interrogation of the LDS Church’s most basic tenets, wrapped in a warm, beautiful coming-of-age story. I was surprised and delighted at the amount of doctrine in this novel--who opens a romance expecting to read about the Journal of Discourses?--and how both the more bonkers Mormon theology as well as the basics support and encourage Adam and Brandon’s relationship. This is not a story of the two young men abandoning their faith for love, though the Christensens, Brandon’s family, do ultimately leave the Church. It’s a story of how love grows from faith.

Adam is one of the most personally relatable protagonists of any sex I’ve ever read. His repression is intense, his religiosity staunch and, to the world, unfeigned. I know well the particular cocktail of shame that comes from doing everything right and still not feeling the way you know you’re supposed to. The shock, horror, and burgeoning wonder of doing things you’re not supposed to and feeling that burning in the bosom is rendered by Stone with compassion and humor. Even things that might seem small to a reader outside Adam’s experience, such as the innocuous, friendly physical contact that is Brandon’s trademark, speak volumes about Adam’s personality, his needs, and his relationship to other people and his vision of God. Watching him bloom is a joy for the audience; watching real trust grow between him and Brandon as they explore Mormon doctrine and try to answer their own questions is the hallmark of the novel. There’s a saying in the Church about magnifying one’s calling. Brandon and Adam magnify one another.

Stone handles the incredible amount of background information required to tell any story about Mormons with deftness and a good narrative flow. The romantic element is strong but subtle--this author is a master of the slow burn, as seen especially in The Bones of You--and when the attraction between Adam and Brandon finally explodes, it does so in more than metaphor (side note: I actually screamed about the use of holy oil for lube. Talk about a metaphor #sexualhealing). The Barcelona setting is a lovely backdrop, and the personal tension of Adam’s journey is bolstered by and intertwined with his missionary experience and larger place in the Church.

At its core, And It Came To Pass is a hopeful story. Adam and Brandon aren’t atheists when the book ends. They don’t feel the need to leave their god behind them, as members often do when their personal conviction is at odds with church culture and leadership. They’ve found what they need in their religion, even if their church has decided it doesn’t need them. Watching them retain and build their faith even through incredible adversity and rejection was a moving experience for me, as a member who did ditch it all. I can hope for the LDS Church to grow past its current attitudes, to embrace all of its members, its own troubled history, and its possibilities for a radical shift toward a truly loving God. But for right now, a book like this one is a salve, a wonderful story of potential for Mormons, apostates, or anyone else.

[oncethrown]

Female Shadowhunters Characters in Order from Most to Least Interesting

(and who are in more than one or two episodes and have more lines than can be counted on one hand)

1. Maryse Lightwood

Maryse used to be a Circle Member, but turned herself and her husband in, betraying her leader and all of her friends in order to save her son. Then she was banished from her home coutnry, but somehow still became a high ranking member of the government she once tried to overthrow, and rebuilt her life around rigidily following that government’s rules, while no one in her family-- the only thing she has and what she gave up everything for-- manages to follow those same rules, affecting her standing in a society she once rebelled against but now mindlessly clings to. She is occasionally summoned to/ imprisoned in that country, while her marriage falls apart and she tries to maintain her relationship with her children, and fucks it up royally, because of both the clave, and the predjudices that brought her into the circle. 

Show taking advantage of this? Meh. Sort of. Introducing Aldertree was fucking pointless when they had Maryse to work with, and condensing her and Alec’s huge amount of baggage and conflict and the actors chemistry into a side plot halfway through the season was an idiotic move. 

2. Lydia Branwell

Ambitious, kind, calculating and tender. Lydia wants to run and Institute an work her way up the Clave ladder. She takes her duty as a shadowhunter very seriously, but is still unsure of the Clave’s methods. She agrees to torture Seelies on Clave orders, but that speaks out againt it in court, in front of a super high ranking official. Her fiance who she was deeply in love with died, and she dove into work, but was prepared to marry Alec in order to get the institute, knowing that he’d never love her, and the relationship would never be real. 

Show taking advantage of this? NO! WHERE IS LYDIA?! I love her and I want her back!

3. Jocelyn Fairchild

Ran away from the circle and her lunatic despot husband to make a new life in the mundane world with her daughter. Stole a super important artifact and still evaded the clave and the circle for two decades. Plays the loving mother perfectly, and still manages to pull the strings of everyone around her, (Magnus, Dot) even those that she loves (Clary, Luke). Just as blinded by duty as Maryse (trying to kill Jace) but coming at it from such a different perspective. 

Show taking advantage of this? Actually they were doing a good job until they killed her off to goose Alec’s plotline, which didn’t need goosing.

4. Maia Roberts

Has gone through mysterious bad shit, but is now relatively healthy and well adjusted (taking into account the very low bar this show sets for that). Has enough standing in the pack that Raphael is willing to listen to her. Takes matters into her own hands. Is willing to do what needs to be done when it’s brutal (kill Clary), and when it’s smart but goes against her feelings (send Simon into Clary’s arms). Willing to do what the security of the pack demands (kill Jace) and stands up for herself (not taking Jace’s shit at the bar), but can also graciously admit when she was wrong (talking to Jace at Magnus’s party) Generally the most well rounded and human-feeling characters on the show.

Show taking advantage of this? Sort of. She’s only been in a few episodes and while she shines in all of her scenes, she also ends up taking a lot more shit from Luke than makes sense, and I have a feeling we aren’t going to get a good coda on how amazingly shitty Luke treated her in the end of 2A. But her scenes with Simon and Jace give the show the breathers it deperately needs-- moments where we get to love the characters instead of just watch them sprint through all the plot hurdles. 

(unrelated thought, I love her 70′s vibe)

5. Season 1 Isabelle Lightwood

Brilliant, sexual, emotionally vulnerable, and not afraid to loudly be all of those things at the same time. Loving to the point that she sacrifices herself for others, but never a doormat. She starts converting herself into her the daughter her mother wanted in order to redirect parental pressure from Alec while he’s going through something, because she loves him more than anyone. She risks seriously fucking everything for Meliorn, and then stands up straight at her trial, proclaming what she thinks is right, while having Magnus Bane represent her, for just that extra dash of “Fuck You”

Show taking advantage of this? (See Season 2 Isabelle Lightwood)

6. Iris Rouse

Several centuries old warlock decides to get proactive about the fact that warlocks can’t reproduce themselves. Very much an echo of Valentine. Lives in a horrifying rape camp that she maintains herself... very caring with her young warlocks, and not just in a “ah yes, you will increase our numbers”  way, but in a taking them to the park and clearly loving them way. Immediately willing to do what it takes to further her own agenda, whether that’s trick Clary, or do valentine’s bidding... but still decides to go all out in a wierdly vicious way just to trick magnus into revealing the location of his spell book. 

Is the show taking advantage of this? I was actually surprised at how well the show used Iris to bump the 2A plot along. I think she’s served her purpose, and is probably gone forever now. 

7. Cleophas Graymark

Always believed in the circle, but hides out as a badass weapons nun, finds out her old leader is out there, murders her way out of the nunnery, joins his team but IMMEDIATELY turns on him when he finally goes a bridge too far, because she truly believes in the glory of heaven. Particularly interesting when you imagine her and Maryse Lightwood (who believed in the glory of Valentine) as compatriots.

Is the show taking advantage of this? Sort of. She was another plot-point only character, just like Iris Rouse... but she was interesting and also opened up the Shadowhunter world a little bit in a show that suffers from outrageously shaky world building. 

8. Rebecca Lewis

Lawyer, recovering alcoholic and widowed mother, who raised and upstanding kid like Simon, and does her best trying to take care of him, and find help for him when he starts acting wierd beyond her understanding. 

Is the show taking advanatage of this? She’s a very solid supporting character who is used well. As far as character meeting plot, Rebecca Lewis may be the most solidly written character on the show. 

9. Season 2 Isabelle Lightwood

Refusal to look weak ends with her unknowingly entrapped by Clave bad guy. With minimal effort, manages to trick the whole institute, and Magnus, into believing that Aldertree has given her a special mission, and then finds an extremely rapey and poorly written way of getting her fix without Aldertree, only to have him try and buy sex from her, with drugs as currency, not knowing that she’s already coercing someone she has an undue amount of power over into drug/sex. 

Is the show taking advantage of this? Nope. Season 2 Isabelle Lightwood is the shows second biggest failure (right after the way the Malec first time was handled). Nothing she does ties into the main plot in any significant way. Even the fight she causes between Alec and Magnus has no lasting repercussions, or emotional weight. It seperates Emeraude Tobia from everyone she plays well against, and traps her in a pointless and racist plot line, which plays into none of Emeraude’s strengths, and makes her look like a worse actress than she really is, which we know from season 1. 

10. Clary Fairchild

Everything that Clary does is caused by her doing something that she was just told not to do. This can be interesting when it’s stuff like “Don’t befriend downworlders, they can’t be trusted”, but it’s way less interesting when it’s something we all know is stupid (don’t try to raise the dead) over and over again. Characters who act as though they don’t have even the vaguest sense of what genre they are in aren’t interesting. She’s also just as manipulative as her mother, but is never called out for it and the writers are failing to give her meaningful relationships and connections. Her and izzy’s plot always feels like izzy comforting her, and clary never noticed anything off about Izzy. She also didn’t tell anyone that Izzy had demon stuff going on after their fucked up purity trial scene. She and Jace just keep looking sad and reminding eachother they can’t fuck. Even she and Simon have a flatness. 

Is the show... she is the main character. She should not be.

Dot Rollins Addendum

I do not know where to put Dot. Her main connection is to Clary, and her interactions with Magnus early in Season 1 make it clear that it’s weird for a warlock to be emotionally attached to Shadowhunters. She accepts torture to protect Madzie and risks her life to help Jace and Clary escape... but so much of what we are supposed to feel about her is related to Clary... and from Clary’s side there is just no relationship. Dot was like a big sister! -- That Clary immediately forgot about and left to be torturned on her evil father’s experiment from hell ship.

[hawk-in-a-jazzy-hat]

Anime Review: When the Seagulls Cry (Umineko)

On the remote island of Rokkenjima, only accessible by ferry, the esteemed Ushiromiya family gather for important family matters. The head of the family Kinzo is dying, and his four children Rosa, Krauss, Rudolf and Eva are already in talks for the headship. Their own descendants are also present; Jessica, George, Maria and Battler. Also there are the Ushiromiya servants, and Kinzo’s longtime friend and physician, Dr Nanjo. It is a gathering of friends and family, although not everybody is as happy as their family’s status would suggest. Relationships are strained, and jealousy is rife.

Not that it will matter in the end. For Kinzo has a dark secret involving the black arts and the legendary Golden Witch, Beatrice. And, in what could be a conspiracy and what could be a game, he has locked his friends and family on the island, now inaccessible due to a typhoon, and with a murderous sorceress on the loose.

When the typhoon passes, and the seagulls cry, the Ushiromiya family will be dead.

Or will they? For there is a larger game at stake here, and one of the family may have the ability to solve the mystery and change the family’s fate for good.

In the early 2000s, an anime was released based on the popular visual novel Higurashi: When They Cry (approximately translating to When the Cicadas Cry).The anime has quickly hit cult status for its severe genre shifting between soft slice-of-life and dark, horror murder mystery. And not just once, either, since the show would flip back and forth pretty much effortlessly. Whether you like the show or not (I personally appreciate it more than I actually like it) there’s no doubt that it was very good at what it did. The writing was tight and knew exactly where it was going and which cards to hold back and show at any given time. The characters were slowly explored well using a unique plot-point that kept the stakes and the mystery up. Even the cheap art style was used remarkably effectively, with the bouncy moe girls switching back and forth between cute and axe-crazy at the drop of a hat (Higurashi Face still remains one of my favourite tropes). It’s not perfect, but it’s one of those shows that I’d recommend everybody at least watch, if only to experience it.

So given the low-key success of Higurashi, it would make sense to bring back the director, series compositor and script-writer, and the same studio do adapt the spiritual successor of the VN, Umineko: When they Cry in 2009. Surely the same skills and combination of great source and great adaptation would make for another great show...surely...

(SPOILERS: It didn’t)

Let’s start with the animation. This is a Studio DEEN effort, and...yeah, it has the look of a Studio DEEN effort. I can’t really say the animation is any worse than Higurashi; they’re both obviously budgeted shows. Nor are the character designs particularly bad, especially compared to the original VN artwork (it’s kind of a ONE deal going on where the storytelling far, FAR surpasses the presentation). What is sadly lacking here though is the direction; everything just feels very flat. Bits that are supposed to be scary just sort of hover in subspace and don’t really fit, which is bizarre because the designs are far less moe-fied than Higurashi, and yet the two aspects don’t blend anywhere near as well. Maybe the increased contrast means they fit better together? Possibly.

The music is also a little flat; none of it is bad but it’s not particularly noteworthy either. However the real standout bits of the presentation are the opening and ending themes; hooooly dang, they are cool. It’s pretty much as explicit in faux-epic as you can get but the massive Italian choirs and pumping synth orchestra is just cheesy enough to actually kind of work. The singers also help, with Akiko Shikata providing a soft and slightly sinister purveyor of oncoming tragedy in the opening, and Jimang absolutely knocking it out of the park with his booming scratchy vocals in the ending, as he lays out his plans and desires as Kinzo Ushiromiya himself. Along with bombastic visuals, it’s truly wonderful stuff that is frankly far better than the show it’s attached to.

So, that plot synopsis I gave above? Yeah...um...that’s kind of a lie. I thought that was what was going to happen, since I was expecting something along the lines of Higurashi. There’s even a similar narrative plotpoint which enables the exploration of the characters and the mystery. But there are a few key differences. For one...the hints at the supernatural in Higurashi? Yeah, they’re massively explicit here. Like...they’re not just hinted at. They are spectating the events and providing a running commentary. I’m not even lying. And you know what happens when you’re taking out from one group of characters and have somebody sit in fancy chairs and explain things? That’s right, it’s really obnoxious and confusing and boring. It’s really hard to get into anything when it gets interspersed with talking heads like a friggin’ reaction video.

But, I could have lived with that. After all, there’s still the mystery which needs to be solved, and the way to save the family of Ushiromiya...oh...wait. No. That doesn’t happen. Sorry but...instead of solving that mystery, we’re going to make another mystery. Which completely defeats the point of the first mystery. There’s a game going on between Beatrice and one of the family, in which they are trying to disprove the existence of witches.

But instead of trying to solve the ACTUAL mystery, the witch makes ANOTHER mystery where she clearly is the murder, and magic clearly exists. And once that finishes, she does it again, bringing in even more magic. In fact, the only way it’s at all possible to win against her is when another witch enters the fray and passes on knowledge and magic in order to effectively fight her (in, what I will mention, are blatant VN ‘magics’ which just feel forced and wrong). So we’ve reached the point where we’re watching several different murder mysteries going on, all with different characters and motivations, all being overseen by a witch doing it basically for shits and giggles and a guy using magic to try and disprove the use of magic.

Except we’re not, because apparently the writers don’t know how actual character development works when the guy basically ragequits the game when he realises that the murderous psycho witch was actually a murderous psycho witch...and she gets all depressed and wonders what she was doing wrong. And all the while there’s all this turmoil with the family and with the OTHER witches, and for crying out loud the show just keeps rolling out character after character and dumb plotpoint after dumb plotpoint, CONSTANTLY contradicting itself.

And all the while, the actual family members are basically acting as flesh-puppets. Some of them do get some backstory and motivation, which would be interesting and allow for a motive in order to make them both sympathetic and/or a potential culprit. But we spend so little time on them and far too much on the magical bullcrap going on around them, that they all just feel so flat and two-dimensional. And don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot of emotional baggage here, but the delivery is just so...out of place that at best it’s boring and at worst it’s downright unpleasant. And the fact that there are several different versions of these characters going on at the same time makes it very difficult to actually relate to anyone. The worst culprit is probably Maria, the creepy little girl who is so obviously evil that apparently she wasn’t in the end and is a Pure Sweet Cinnamon RollTM except she...never was. Not that it matters in the end because most people just die multiple times.

So what we have here is a murder mystery that is never actually solved, a family which is never explored, all looked over by a group of witches doing witch things and a main player witch who isn’t actually a witch although she is using magic to do things while asking someone to prove she’s not doing magic to do things while other witches are playing a game with her and some poor guy standing there trying to disprove magic by using magic and by the way magic here is the very pinnacle of “It’s Magic, I Don’t Have To Explain It”, except when it isn’t and it does have proper rules which they never actually tell people and the show decides to change itself up again and follow a character we’ve never met go through a completely different story which amounts to...basically nothing because we kind of end this whole debacle exactly where we started, just because somebody felt like it, and did I mention that all the servants have magical Green Lantern powers and there’s a sassy devil butler and schoolgirl versions of the seven deadly sins (for crying out loud, again?) and there are weird bunny girl demons and talking lion plush toys and

By which point any sane person has already picked up this Cluedo board and flung it out the window.

I’ve seen incompetent shows. Shows far more dull, bad, offensive and just downright wrong shows than this. But this, without a doubt, is the most convoluted and utterly insane waste of time I’ve ever watched. And you know what? Half the time...it wasn’t even that bad. I mean, the stuff on screen. There were some decent horror moments, and some moments which went so far into the degree of tastelessness that it almost felt like a fetish show. And there was an awful lot of potential in both the characters and the mystery itself.

So what happened? The only thing I know is that when this anime was made...the visual novel had yet to be released. And I must just sit back and ask myself, why. Why would you make something before the source material is even out.

But even then, it could have worked as an adaptation. There was a great Higurashi-level mystery just waiting here, blending the supernatural and the all too possible nicely. The idea that magic is dependent on faith is a great idea, and if the first mystery was far more impossible, both on a physical and a moral level, it would have made for great stakes to examine that game and throughout the story find different ways in which the murder could have been explained. While at the same time, the characters’ backstories and motivations could be discovered as we try and discover who really did it, therefore thwarting the witch and settling the family problems to rest.

But no. No, we instead got twenty-six episodes of complete and utter insanity, that, in the end, is completely pointless and non-canon anyway. Ugh. If you want to know the story, play the visual novel instead. If you don’t, then...I don’t know, play some Phoenix Wright or Danganronpa. Anything’s got to be better than this.

Despite a fantastic premise, a lot of potential and a group of people who had proved they could do this well (seriously guys, what happened?), Umineko is a great big murder mystery mess of muck. Nothing is consistent, nothing is explored, and nothing is accomplished. Despite one or two decent parts, and a few moments that were entertaining on a purely WTH level, there is nothing that can stop this show from being ultimately a complete waste of time. Not the absolute worst, but easy to skip.

My score: 3/10

[directorscutandsomeotherstuff]

Tell Me No Lies

(Welcome to Director’s Cut, where the porn advertisement blogs won’t stop coming. Seriously, what kind of horn dog do they think I am, and how close are they to the truth? Tumblr wants to know if I should let you all answer that question, but I’m not gonna let you. Instead, I’m gonna talk about TV shows.)

(I’ve been seriously getting into Lie to Me, lately. It’s a show starring that one guy from Reservoir Dogs who gets shot, only instead he’s a genius psychologist who mastered the art of reading people’s facial cues and uses it to solve mysteries. It’s a good show, as long as you ignore the subtle hints of what I’ve termed “Chuck Norris Syndrome.” You know what I’m talking about. That thing that happens when the lead actor or a family member of the lead actor “just so happens” to be the producer, and the show “coincidentally” likes to paint the lead actor’s character as an untouchable superman who can get away with pissing off the FBI and who sleeps with a new hot babe every three or four episodes. It’s not even that big a deal, mind. I just thought it was kind of funny to notice.)

(Which leads us to the fanfic itself. Andie O’Niell decided, in a flash of brilliance, that a Lie to Me Fanfic deserved no better name than “Tell Me No Lies.” It’s like a Reservoir Dogs fanfic entitled “Dearth Cats.” And naturally, it’s about characters and their love lives, because it’s fanfiction and of course it’s about love lives. Good stuff. Let’s get things started, shall we?)

Tell Me No Lies

By Andie O'Neill

Rating: K+

Genre: Friendship, Romance, Drama, Angst

Pairing: Eli/Ria (Friendship), Cal/Gillian (They didn’t put a parenthesis here. What kind of pairing is Cal/Gillian? I choose to believe “Partners in an upcoming cheese-related business venture.”)

Summary: Ria can see through his lies, and she knows everyone else can too, but why won't they tell Gillian? 

A/N: This was just a little something I thought of during class. Enjoy! :D

Disclaimer: I don't own the show or it's characters.

(Can I just go on a bit of a tangent, here, before the story starts properly? Disclaimers don’t work. At all. I saw these all the time. Hell, I probably used them myself, constantly. But they’re in no way a defense against copyright infringement and all the stuff that comes from it, in the same way that robbing a bank isn’t okay if you tell the bank clerk “I don’t own the money that’s in this bag with a dollar sign stenciled on it.” The reason your fanfic isn’t gonna get taken down, though, is actually for a much simpler reason than your display of legal prowess: the original creator doesn’t know you exist. And if they do, they don’t care. At least, not enough to want to go through the trouble of filing a cease and desist. Anyway, tangent over. Proceed, Andie, m’bud.)

"Disgust," Eli Loker whispered in her ear, and Ria immediately turned her heard, not quite sure what he was talking about. One minute she'd been watching Doctor Foster's husband lie to her once more and the next… (and the next thing she knew, the room was filled with live, wriggling octopi.) oh. Eli had smug smile on his face at having caught her so quickly. Ria wasn't sure, bit it seemed like a game to these people, catching each other in their lies and then celebrating each victory. Ria had yet to find the humor in their games, often played by Doctor Lightman himself. (That is, when he wasn’t busy pretending to be an inmate so he could talk to a serial killer, or convincing a man to get out of a tractor and risk setting off what could very well have been a bomb, or getting caught at illegal fight clubs, or that time he...)

"That's the fifth time he's lied to her in two weeks. How do you stand it?" she asked, following him down the hallway towards Eli's office… if you could call it that. (Having had no job more prestigious than “baggage checker at the TSA” in her life, up until now, Ria Torres was naturally incredibly sniffy about what constituted the work space of successful people.) "How can she fall for it?"

Eli simply shrugged, and Ria noticed a glimpse of sadness cross his face. "Some people prefer the lie, Ria. If Gillian wanted to see it she would."

Of anyone in the group Eli was often the easiest to talk to. Despite his pathetic attempts at flirting, he was always open and honest. He never held back, and Ria had to admit she liked that about him. There were no pretences. He spoke what was on his mind. (It was almost as if he had been introduced to her as practicing something called “radical honesty.” Her memory of things that happened a few weeks ago was a bit fuzzy.) "Doctor Lightman won't tell her," Ria said at loud. Lightman called her a natural, only she knew less about the science, though she'd certainly been working her ass off trying to learn it. She'd watched Lightman's pupils dilate, noticed the way his skin flushed when Gillian got too close. All signs pointed to arousal… attraction. (Not arousal. Never arousal. Ria would honestly rather die than think of Cal Lightman as a sexual being.) What Ria couldn't figure out, was why he held back when it was so obvious he felt something for her.

Eli nodded. "Of course he won't. It's not his place."

Torres turned around to face the taller man, disturbed by his words. (”Go away, Slender,” she told him. “I’m trying to have a conversation, here.” Slenderman left, continuing his creepy muttering, while Ria rolled her eyes and turned back to Loker, who was tall, but certainly shorter than the office nut-job.) "So you're saying if I was dating a jerk who was probably cheating on me you wouldn't say a word?"

Eli smiled. "That depends… am I the jerk or is it someone else?"

Ria resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "You wish."

"I certainly do," he agreed.

Ria moved out of his way, following him down the hall once more. "Eventually she'll figure it out, and she'll want to know why we never said anything."

Eli shook his head. "She won't need to wonder. If she wanted to know… she'd know." She couldn't disagree with his logic, (because it was too ridiculous on its face to even entertain,) and that seemed to infuriate her more than anything. He was right. Foster had the training. She knew the science. "Sadness," said Eli, pulling Ria from her thoughts.

"What?"

"Sadness."

(Ria really couldn’t understand the appeal of this game. Playing “gotcha” with emotional cues was petty enough, but when nobody was lying to anybody, and they were just having a conversation, it was arbitrary and mean-spirited to constantly remind each other that they were all walking lie detectors. At least in theory. In practice, Loker kind of just looked like a moron for being so proud of the fact he could read what was already there, plain to see, without any sort of deception on her part. He might as well have been pointing at the doors and saying “Door!” with that same smug little grin.)

Ria sighed as they reached his office, leaning against the door frame. "Lightman… he cares about her… doesn't he?"

Eli takes a seat at his desk, rolling his chair around as he grabbed the video from their latest case. "Funny isn't it? They're the experts and yet they still end up just as clueless as the rest of us."

"I wouldn't exactly call that funny, Eli." And this time it was Ria that was calling him out. "Regret," she whispered.

Eli simply nodded, looking into her eyes. (”Nice try, but regret isn’t exactly a readable emotion. It’s a bit too complex. Sadness, on the other hand...”) "Look closely enough and you'll see it in them too."

Not for the first time, Ria wondered if the job would ever get easier, or if she'd ever get used to it. It wasn't easy being picked apart day in and day out. "Does it ever get any easier?" Gillian had been telling her time and time again that it did, but Ria had never been so sure. (That it got any easier, that is. Just trying to get that point across, real clear-like.)

Eli looked away, turning on his computer. "Nope."

It wasn't exactly the answer she was looking for, but she knew right away that it was the truth, (insomuch as one person’s opinion could ever be considered the truth,) and suddenly she could understand why Gillian seemed so content believing the lies. "We all claim we want the truth, that we don't want to be lied to… but somehow I get the feeling even that in itself is a lie."

Eli's smile immediately returned. "You know Ria, I think you're gonna fit in here just fine," he told her turning on the video.

"Right," Ria muttered, pulling a chair to sit beside him. They had work to do. As she looked out the door she could see Lightman walk by, talking to Gillian about their own case, and she silently wondered if they'd ever open their eyes and accept the truth. Either way, Eli was right. It was just something they'd have to figure out for themselves. If they'd rather believe the lie, than who was she to crash their beliefs with reality? (It’s not like she worked for a boss who would ever tear down illusions with an almost maniacal level of fervor, making enemies of everyone, up to and including the FBI, and regularly putting his and everyone else’s lives and careers in jeopardy in the process, because his precious truth was more important than maybe like one iota of discretion. That’d be a trip and a half, to have to deal with.)

"Acceptance," Eli pointed out, and the smug smile had returned. (”It’s the one part of the grieving process I’m having trouble with. My poor guinea pig was just taken from the world too soon, Ria. It’s a miscarriage of justice!”)

This time Ria did roll her eyes. "Just play the tape, Eli."

Eli laughed, pushing the DVD into the computer, the smug smile only growing with his triumph. (At least until he knocked over the monitor and sent it crashing to the ground. Lightman would spend the next hour and a half chewing him out, wondering out loud how a college educated scientist would ever be so bloody stupid as to think that you play a DVD by literally pushing it into a computer, like it’s just gonna meld into the screen or something.)

The End