#probably also some satire on true crime

[mudstoneabyss]

ough if only you all could see her (the Big Rico's fnaf fangame I'm making in my head)

[gabessquishytum]

Ten Books to Know Me By!

Tagged by @honeyteacakes! I really loved your list of books, I saw the scarlet pimpernel on there and did a happy scream!

1. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott

This was a formative book for me throughout my childhood and adolescence. I must have read it almost 10 times. I struggle to read it now (some parts just hit too close to home for me) but I hope one day that I’ll be able to return to this wonderful novel.

2. Daughter of Time - Josephine Tey

This book altered the course of my life, no kidding. If you love history or true crime this book is seriously for you. It will definitely make you rethink everything you know about the way history is written, the way historical individuals are portrayed and why stories are so important.

3. Persuasion - Jane Austen

All of Austen’s novels have impacted me massively, but this one is my favourite. The way that romantic love is portrayed in this book is so beautiful to me, the way people’s personal flaws are portrayed as something that can be forgiven and accepted. This is a very hopeful book, and it is also an incredible portrayal of what it’s like to live with anxiety.

4. Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman

I love all of Neil’s stuff, but this one is probably my favourite. It was the first of his solo novels that I read (after Good Omens). It’s fun, imaginative, terrifying. I fell in love with the idea of urban fantasy thanks to this book, and I think it was super influential on the development of my own writing.

5. Santaland Diaries - David Sedaris

I love the combination of cynicism and sentiment in this book. It's funny, it's real (if a little overexaggerared at times). It also makes me feel better about myself and my struggles with employment. Plus, David Sedaris was probably one of the first gay people I was ever aware of.

I also worked as a Christmas elf in a store (not Macy's, unfortunately) so I feel a forever connection to this book.

6. The Wizard of Earthsea - Ursula K. Le Guin

This book confounded me when I first read it as a child. I didn't like the main character, I found the plot complicated. But returning to it years later, I fell in love with it. It's a book about becoming a better version of yourself, about fucking up majorly and trying to put things right. And about love and friendship. Plus there are further books in the series, and a dragon. What's not to love?

7. War of the Foxes - Richard Siken

I know a lot of people have read Crush, and while I absolutely love it, War of the Foxes is a gentler piece of work which explores some of the same themes from a mature perspective. There are some absolutely beautiful poems in this collection and I really recommend it for anyone who wants to contemporary poetry!

8. 163 Days - Hannah Hodgeson

Another favourite poetry collection! This is a beautiful, unique piece of work that discusses life limiting illness, hospital, and what it's like to be disabled in an able bodied world. It takes a lot to make me cry but this book moves me so much and brings me so much joy, too, because it exists! And I can feel just a little bit less invisible because of it.

9. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons

The funniest, most ridiculous book, and an absolutely brilliant satire of British countryside life. I quote this book ALL the time. It is my lifetime ambition to own a cow called Useless.

10. The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller

Another formative book which did so much for me as a young queer person. The fact that this book was "mainstream" and loved by so many people (including people who may not have naturally been queer allies) made the difficult conversations easier. It was really important for me to be able to bring this book home without having to hide.

Thank you for this opportunity to talk about books! I'm tagging @the-art-student-in-221c @aquilathefighter @valeriianz @ineffablyendless @pintobordeaux @reallyintoscience @notallsandmen @akhuna01 but feel don't feel like you have to do it! ❤

[texas-hates-taxes-too]

Saw someone else do this and wanting to try so heres my headcanons for what the rvbs would watch on tiktok

-

Tucker: lots of thirst traps, its like 70% men and 30% women, but he insists the guys are just there as "inspiration" for his own thirst traps. He also watches a lot of "dad tok" and toddlertok videos too though.

Caboose: caboose has somehow perfectly engineered his fyp to be almost entirely cute animal videos and then occasionally he'll get a video talking about complex quantum physics

Wash: cat videos obviously. I think he'd also be really into those r/aita tiktoks with minecraft parkour in the background, sometimes he will literally stay up all night watching them

Carolina: she's really into both true crime, and videos about people turning their vans into houses. She's very embarrassed about the second one and as a consequence it would be easier to hack into the white house security system than get into carolina's tiktok

Sarge: lots of weird but genuine motivational gym bro videos, but also those satire "going deeper with Richard Rider" videos which he watches completely unironically

Grif: lots of baking videos. He's also super into the tiktok drama, if there's a drama or controversy or anything, he knows all about it. Sometimes, but only occasionally, he will gossip about it with Donut, but he tries to do it in a way that seems like he doesn't know that much

Simmons: He also unironically watches the Richard Rider videos. Aside from that, he watches a lot of gaming videos, including some DnD stuff. And sometimes he likes to watch those art asmr videos, he just finds it insanely relaxing

Donut: like Grif he's pretty in with the dramas (he would've ATE up the Couch Guy drama, he would've been so annoying about it too) but he also really likes watching cute gay pov videos, occasionally he likes a nice thirst trap but its the fluffy ones that really catch him

Lopez: mechanics videos and literally nothing else

Church: if church were still alive he'd probably just watch whatever the others had posted/reposted (he deffffinitely hasn't watched tuckers latest thirst trap 20 times) because he doesnt really know what he'll like and figures its easier to just see what the other are in to. He gets a good mix of everything I've mentioned so far and is honestly pretty happy with it

[netripper]

well i didn’t expect that post ab fem v to take off but i’m glad it did tbh. it’s really been bugging me how some ppl treat fv in general, like complaining ab her getting more attention n shit, cuz it’s just like ???

my own dentist, after i told her i was gonna pursue game design, told me to put more women in games. it’s no secret that this industry remains male-dominated, and while there have always been female characters in games, there’s that history there of hypersexualization and the complete misunderstanding of who women can be and what they can want. by nature of cyberpunk’s design, having both binary genders of man and woman playable in the same role, fem v is more realistic as a woman because she’s just… written like a person. this seems like an obvious thing to do, but it’s extremely easy for some writers to get hung up on the Man and Woman thing and write with the classification of ‘woman’ in mind before anything else. if that makes sense

also yeah, i could’ve brought up the fact that masc v dominated most of the marketing for cyberpunk and that fem v only really got the spotlight at the end of the game’s life with phantom liberty. i probably should’ve, honestly; there was a day a while ago where i got so steamed about this shit that i went to tally up their appearances in trailers and teasers, but i gave up, because i had actual important stuff to do and didn’t want to waste the energy. but like, i don’t need to go by the numbers to recall that masc v got most of the attention in marketing and promotional material, because that’s the primary audience of the gaming industry to this day: men. ultimately i just decided to meet the ppl i’m arguing against on their level, because it’s a little easier than upending the entire premise of their argument and going from there.

i get feeling disappointed. i get feeling left out. i get it because i’ve been disappointed and left out my entire life in this space, same as so many other women in gaming, same as any demographic in gaming that aren’t straight, white, cis guys. i mean to give you an example of how low the bar is for me, i was pleasantly surprised by helldivers 2 having feminine voice types AND a lean body type you can choose, and that game’s a satire on the imperial war machine! like wow omg i can present as a girl in this hyperironic war crimes game, yay!

i’m just rambling at this point but yea idk. i think it’s really easy in spaces like this, where the “minority” is a majority, to fall into certain traps. like thinking it’s a bad thing that a woman is center focus, or that the clothing mod disparity between male and female characters means that women have more power or control in the space, when in reality a lot of what’s produced is a standard byproduct of the sexualization of women and often does not represent what the women in the space want. obviously this isn’t true of all the women here; i myself love some skimpy clothes, and i want to clarify that i’m not dumping on the effort that’s gone into making these things nor am i disparaging “feminine” clothing or interests. my question is, why is that which is labeled feminine, more often than not, sexualized? why do some of these things go hand in hand with the act of objectification, independent of the subject’s agency or sense of self-expression? this is a lot more complex problem than i think any of us are qualified to solve, but there’s a quote i’ve had on my mind lately about stuff like this, that i use in my own reconciling of “feminine” interests with the societal expectations, pressures, and prescriptions placed upon them. dan olson of folding ideas said this of his interest in building & constructing games as a person whose culture prioritizes and encourages the western idea of “progress”, and i think it could apply here: “My interests and values are authentic, but they didn’t form in a vacuum.”

i’ve lost the plot at this point, maybe i’ve made my point well, idk. in any case thx for reading i just spent way too much time pondering this and trying to put it into words

[marley-manson]

So, Hepatitis.

Hawkeye’s scenes with Radar and Margaret were both v sweet and loveable, love Margaret confiding in Hawkeye and Hawkeye sincerely trying to make her feel better amid the come ons even before the ‘simple respect’ exchange, though ofc that was also great. Frank’s was funny. Klinger’s was also v funny but felt a little too much to me, with the violent outbursts. Hawkeye annoyed by BJ keeping him up at the start and then reversing it onto him when he’s hungover at the end was great. Loooved Hawkeye immediately deciding what to do in surgery when Potter asks him as chief surgeon and assigning BJ the job since he’s the only one who’s read about the procedure.

But my complaint about this episode is probably pretty predictable for anyone who follows me lol: I did not buy the psychosomatic back pain angle. The episode seemed to be suggesting that Hawkeye is deflecting his anger over being drafted onto Vernon Parsons, which uh... really? “I think maybe you haven’t made up your mind how you feel about being over here.” You think? You think Hawkeye isn’t quite sure whether he’s upset or not about being drafted? Really? Hawkeye? Hawkeye hasn’t figured out how he feels about it? Torn between frustration and enjoying the vacation, perhaps?

BUT to be fair I think my main issue here is framing, because I think this concept of deflected anger can work in theory, at least from a characterization angle, and the discussion about it with Potter just kinda sucked lol.

I’d frame it as: Hawkeye knows he’s angry about being there, but he can’t actually express the true depths of that anger. In part because of internal factors, ie he doesn’t want to become a bitter, fucked up shell of a person. And in part because of external factors, ie actually expressing his feelings will get him court martialed, and if not that it’ll at least alienate everyone around him. These are desertion feelings, push Frank into a helicopter blade feelings, let the next colonel on his operating table die feelings, or start screaming halfway through surgery on an 18 year old feelings.

Or, it could be just since Trapper left. I mean when’s the last time he gaslit a colonel into early retirement? BJ’s down for some schemes, but he arrived during the transition away from satire, so he’s never been Hawkeye’s partner in crime for the really satisfying ones that actively harm military officials. This would be taking the theme of Some 38th Parallels, in which rebellion fixes his dick, and running with it. Hawkeye’s getting ED and back pain because he hasn’t removed a colonel’s appendix in too long (and when he finally gets another chance, BJ ruins it anyway lol.)

I will say though, that maybe I’m still reading that scene unfairly.

“You think I’m mad and won’t admit it.” The way Hawkeye says that... like Alan Alda wrote this script but still delivered it wryly, like it’s an asinine suggestion from Potter. Potter maintains it and says he thinks Hawkeye’s been tying himself in knots the whole time he’s been here, so yk, in terms of writer intent I do think we’re probably meant to agree with him. But despite that, the way the scene plays out it’s more like what fixes Hawkeye isn’t Potter telling him to work out how he feels about being drafted, but rather Potter sympathizing with him, reassuring him that he’s better than Parsons, and telling him to take it out on him later, when he gets home lol.

And that also tracks as a contrast to BJ being unsympathetic about Parsons at the start with a “you’ll live,” and Frank taunting him about it.

Also I really love Potter telling Hawkeye to file a paternity suit to get back at Parsons lol, it’s such a good line it almost makes up for even the least charitable reading of the rest of the scene. The way it has this vibe of Potter deliberately playing into Hawkeye’s sense of humour to make him laugh... everything I went on about in that post about Mash’s organic comedy is nailed in that exchange.

[eurydicees]

Hi....If you don't mind, can I ask, what are your top 10 (or top 7) favorite media (can be books/ manga/ anime/movies/tv series)? Why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before......Thanks....

hello!! i don't mind at all :D this question has been on my mind since you sent this a few days ago and i'm still undecided. like. i can't narrow it down to a list. that's so hard. i'm so indecisive. i'm putting these in no particular order, it's just a list. ordering them was too hard and i'm so small and not good at playing favorites. i'm only gonna do seven because this post got absurdly long. thank you for the ask!

haikyuu!!

oh my god genuinely one of the best written manga/anime that i've ever read/seen. it's so good. the characters are so vivid and they are all so important to me. every scene, character, arc, plotline...it's all treated with so much love and care and i'm so grateful for that. and the ending is SO satisfying--it all comes together so well. i was genuinely rooting for every character's success throughout the entire story. it's so important to me.

hadestown

this is a musical so idk if this is an answer you want, but this musical is so amazing, i have to mention it. it manages to encapsulate so many important messages while also creating a truly very compelling story. the way it reworks the original myth--staying true to the story, while putting its own twist on the world and the relationships of the characters--is truly brilliant.

next to normal

another musical. sorry for being a theatre kid on main. but fr this is genuinely one of the most important stories to me. it's gorgeous as a musical and as a story: the music itself is truly beautiful, the storyline is unforgettable, the characters are individually each so well-written and have so much depth. it means so much to me personally; the representation of an imperfect life, living with bipolar disorder and all that comes with it, the impact we all have on each other's lives, the exploration of relationships and mental illness and self-perception and healing and imperfect, non-linear growth....it's truly a work of genius in my mind.

bridge to terabithia

i know that this is a children's book but i recently reread it and it blew my mind how much depth, care, authenticity, and love is in it. it's a truly beautiful piece of art: i was so impressed by the characters, by the story, by the #Point of it all. it's a coming of age story but it's also so much more than just growing up. it's about imagination and childhood and friendship and it means so much to me.

fruits basket

this is such a beautiful exploration of character and relationships and abuse and love and family and friendship and the importance of a single person. it's such an important piece of writing. i would say that this is probably the weakest of the seven on the list, writing-wise, but i also think that the characters are so well-written, so expansive, and so fleshed out that it deserves to be on a top 7 list. each character has something special to bring to the narrative and i love that.

ouran high school host club (the MANGA not anime)

i'm soooo crazy about this manga. there's so much to unpack with every chapter, every arc, every character, every piece of this world...i love it so much. the characters each are so deeply loved by the narrative and i appreciate that. it absolutely has issues as a piece of satire from 2002, but i have forgiven tamaki suoh for his crimes so it's fine /j. but like genuinely, it has some of the most beautiful character and relationship development i've seen in a manga, specifically surrounding tamaki and haruhi. i know people have a love-hate or sometimes just hate relationship with tamaki, but he as a character means so much to me....i adore this stupid silly manga so much.

percy jackson and the olympians

i've been debating putting this one on the list for a little while now, but it has such sentimental value that i think it deserves to be here. it's one of my favorite childhood series and honestly that first series holds up! which is so refreshing to see because man that cannot be said about everything. i love the characters so so so much and the actual story is so brilliantly and lovingly crafted, and the way it all comes together and is woven into a beautiful ending makes me so wild. i do reread this series every few years and i have never once regretted it.

[moorheadthanyoucanhandle]

I WANT A NEW BUG

Opening in theaters this weekend:

Renfield--The wild-eyed, insect-gobbling toady to the Vampire Prince became a horror icon in his own right more than ninety years ago, when the great Dwight Frye unleashed his unforgettable giggle in Universal's original Dracula. It's a little surprising that he hasn't been given his own movie vehicle sooner.

But while Nicholas Hoult, who plays the title role in this horror spoof from Universal, briefly gets to do a respectable imitation of Frye's deranged laugh (hrrrr, hrrrr, hrrrrrrr....), he otherwise plays R. M. Renfield without mania, as a modest, mild-mannered, good-hearted fellow. He's also an action hero; munching bugs gives him superhuman strength and martial arts skills and recuperative powers.

His decades of servitude have made him reflective as well; he's come to entertain the possibility that he might just be in a toxic relationship with his boss. He's started attending a support group for people in a similar boat, both to explore his own emotional needs and to scout for victims--the abusers that people at the meetings describe--to serve as food to his convalescing sanguinary master.

The film is set in modern-day New Orleans, where Renfield has brought the charred remains of Dracula after the duo's last tangle with fearless vampire killers. The Count isn't looking well, but he's still able to bully and shame his poor lackey into submission, and he's a little more menacingly intact every time we see him. Then when Renfield comes to the attention of both a local crime family and of a New Orleans cop (Awkwafina) with an angry grudge against the gangsters, he must decide whose priorities he will focus on, Drac's or his own.

Directed by Chris McKay from a script by Ryan Ridley and a story by Robert Kirkman, Renfield is very silly and often heavy-handed. It's extremely gory, but like last month's Cocaine Bear, the gore is played strictly for laughs and lacks any true shock; it's too insubstantial to pack much punch even as a gross-out. The satirical points about modern self-help culture and pop psychology are trenchant enough, but they've pretty much exhausted themselves before the film is half over.

That said, Renfield is colorful, fast-moving and full of comedic invention, and Hoult is charming and easy to root for. Awkwafina pushes pretty hard, as she has in almost all her movies except The Farewell, but she also gets across an honest fury and grief, and when she lets herself connect with Hoult she lightens up agreeably. Shohreh Agdashloo has a gleefully sinister glint in her eyes as the queen of the crime family, Ben Schwartz is properly loath-able as her imbecilic son, and the support group offers some fine character players.

The movie would carry a lot less weight, however, without its other Nick. Growling through a mouth full of pointy teeth, seething with grievance at his reduced circumstances and unable to maintain the air of grand menace he's trying for, Nicholas Cage offers probably the goofiest parody version of Drac since George Hamilton in Love at First Bite back in 1979. Unlike Hamilton's, however, Cage's Count isn't meant to be lovable. Cage sinks his fangs into the role, and taps a rich vein of malignant narcissism.

[byneddiedingo]

The Big Clock (John Farrow, 1948) Cast: Ray Milland, Charles Laughton, Maureen O'Sullivan, George Macready, Rita Johnson, Elsa Lanchester, Harold Vermilyea, Dan Tobin, Harry Morgan. Screenplay: Jonathan Latimer, based on a novel by Kenneth Fearing. Cinematography: Daniel L. Fapp, John F. Seitz. Art direction: Roland Anderson, Hans Dreier, Albert Nozaki. Film editing: LeRoy Stone. Music: Victor Young. The Big Clock is a satisfying blend of suspense and comedy of the kind often called "Hitchcockian," which usually means it would probably have been even better if Hitchcock had directed it. But since he didn't, it's worth admiring what director John Farrow and screenwriter Jonathan Latimer did with the material provided them by Kenneth Fearing's novel. Fearing had worked at Time magazine when Henry Luce was head of that publishing empire, so it's clear that he had Luce in mind when he created the imperious Earl Janoth, played with mustache-stroking glee by Charles Laughton in the film. So there's a substratum of satire on publishing moguls like Luce -- a breed that still exists in our day, embodied by Rupert Murdoch. (And still attracts satire, viz., HBO's Succession.)  The plot centers on another Hitchcockian trope, the Wrong Man. In this case, the object of suspicion is George Stroud, editor of one of Janoth's properties, a true crime magazine called Crimeways. Ray Milland plays Stroud, a hard-charging journalist who feels trapped in Janoth's empire. Eventually, through a well-set-up series of coincidences, Stroud finds himself investigating a murder in which he becomes the chief suspect, even though it was actually committed by no less than Janoth. There are domestic complications, too, involving Stroud's wife, a thankless role nicely played by Maureen O'Sullivan. The victim is Janoth's mistress, with whom Stroud has become involved because she suggests she has dirt on Janoth that Stroud can use to his advantage. The film handles all of these plot snarls with finesse, one of the rare instances in which knowing whodunit from the outset doesn't detract from the suspense. Censorship blunts some of the edges: In the novel, Stroud's marriage was less happy and his involvement with the victim more intimate. Janoth's bisexuality was also more explicit in the source -- in the film it's suggested when we see Janoth receiving a massage from his bodyguard, played silently by Harry Morgan, who remains a brooding presence in the background of other scenes. The film is enlivened by a gallery of mostly comic secondary characters, including Elsa Lanchester as a giddy artist whose works Stroud for some reason collects.

[cryptofmadness]

Interview: Hunter Gorinson (Oni Press/EC Comics Imprint)

Interview conducted by Chet Reams

Hunter Gorinson is the President and Publisher at Oni-Lion Forge Publishing Group, Oni-Lion Forge Publishing Group own Oni Press, who are printing and co-publishing the new EC Comics imprint titles beginning Summer 2024! Crypt of MADness Publisher/Editor-In-Chief Chet Reams reached out for an interview and Hunter was kind enough to accept the invitation… This interview was conducted May 2, 2024, so it’s “hot off the press!”

Hunter Gorinson: Nice to meet you! Chet Reams: …Nice to meet YOU! …How did the EC relaunch come about ? Gorinson: First and foremost, I’ve been a lifelong EC fan. I got introduced to it probably when I was 6 or 7 years old and it kind of totally blew a hole in my mind as to what I thought comics could be. I knew that they were ‘classic comics’. At the time I thought they were from the ‘70s or something. This was in the early ‘90s. I didn’t realize they were from the ‘50s. They seemed even much more contemporary than the Silver Age Marvel and DC Comics I read . So that led to me being, not only an obsessive EC Comics fan for my entire teenage years as I progressed through my different levels of fandom, also continuing just to notice and spot the kind-of-pervasive-influence of EC in pop culture… So you see the logo for the band, The Cramps or Electric Frankenstein or something -And you realize like, oh, like music’s tethered into this, comedy’s tethered into this, horror movies are tethered into this ! It only deepened my fascination and appreciation of EC. …The comic book industry is actually a relatively small place. I’ve worked at several publishers. My first job was Marvel. I worked at a company called Valiant for quite a while. I worked at Boom Studios… So I’d met Corey and Cathy Mifsud who are respectively William Gaines’ daughter and grand-son in my travels over the years. I had developed a friendship with them. We’d worked on some stuff, in passing, previous to this coming about. Once I found myself in the Publisher chair at Oni in … I think it was late 2022 … December 2022; The first thing at the top of my mind was ‘I wonder if there’s anything we could do with EC?! Now, is the time, in my opinion, for us to do something..!’ and fortunately they were quite tolerant, patient and receptive to my impassioned, phosphorus pitch that ‘We should do this!’ Then one thing led to another, and I’ve essentially been working on this since Day One of me stepping in as publisher at Oni Press.

Reams: Why are you introducing new series titles and new hosts for it? Gorinson: Yeah, it was actually part of my original idea. ..I think if this was another comic book publisher.. what you’d be getting is Tales From the Crypt “#1” with, probably an exaggeration to say 197 variant covers, but not uncommon for big books to launch with like 100+ variant covers now! Any other publisher would probably be “I’m gonna go with the tried and true safe thing. We’re going to do Tales from the Crypt again….” For me, I look back at the intense period of creativity that is the EC Comics “New Trend” … It’s like a ‘Marvel’ - no pun intended - that those books were essentially created between 1949/1950 and part of 1955. It’s 5 years of intense creativity from William Gaines, Al Feldstein, Wally Wood, Johnny Craig and on down the line… …The ‘ending’ of EC is one of the great unresolved question marks at in comics history: What could have been??? I’ve kind of always felt like there’s an entire alternate universe out there somewhere, where the Comics Code Authority doesn’t happen, EC continues to publish, MAD stays a comic!! And instead of Stan Lee coming in to take a ‘last shot’ at Marvel Comics in 1962 and 1963 to do superheroes and see if that’s a thing that ‘can work’ and reinvent that genre, that never happens !!… If EC continued to chug along and things like crime, horror, war, science-fiction, satire continued to be the dominant trends in the industry … that could have continued decade, after decade, after decade. The ‘thesis’ behind the line of books that we’re putting together at Oni is… Why ‘look backwards’ when we could ‘look forwards’ into what EC could have become ? And also, just to be blunt about it: Like, no matter what we do, we’re going to be compared against the original books, which is maybe the highest ‘high watermark’ that comics has ever accomplished. I think that there’s 40+ perfect issues of Tales From The Crypt. Why would I want to make that comparison any more difficult by trying to ‘replicate’ them or ‘compete’ with them?? I think the original EC books should stand on their own … as they have very successfully for 70+ years. And we are thinking something that’s new, and in the same spirit and energy and intensity, but is an evolution and not a direct continuation or imitation of what came before.

Reams: So, is there going to be ANY use of the GhouLunatics inside the new ones, any ‘callbacks’ besides the variant covers that you have [announced]? Gorinson: Shhh… I’m smiling right now… Here’s what I will say… “Spoilers, my man!” I can’t give away too many ‘spoilers’, but there will be a ‘lineage,’ and hopefully, ‘continuity’ with what has come before ..

Reams: What about the EC imprint beyond comic book media, the Anthology Style. Are there plans for .. “beyond comic book media”? Gorinson: …The order of the day is ‘Let’s make the best possible comics right now!’ EC, as I said, has a pervasive influence beyond comics - if any of that happens down the line - which is definitely possible.. we’ll be happy, and ‘beating the drum real hard.’ Right now, as the order stands, we have our work cut out for us in trying to not do an ‘EC imitation’, not do something that’s ‘EC adjacent’ - we’re making EC Comics. Like, I refuse to put the Oni logo on these books because I think it’s ‘sacrilegious’… I consider these to be EC Comics. They’re not part of the ‘Original Canon’ obviously, but we’re trying to embody that to the greatest extent possible. … We’ve got to make sure that the stories are good, that the covers are good, that these books can stand on their own … I don’t want this to be a 6-issue thing. We have a plan that extends for years into the future. Hopefully we can get to a place where you have a couple EC Comics reliably on shelves, every couple times a month, for the foreseeable future. You know what I’m saying? Reams: Yeah, like just like the “New Trend” ! Gorinson: Every two weeks… yeah!

Reams: …That kind of covers one of the others I had which was ‘What do you think EC’s prior missteps were, with comic reboots, and how do you avoid such pitfalls?… Gorinson: I mean a LOT has changed… SO MUCH has changed since 1954. There are weird echoes and synchronicities between what American culture and comic books are going through then, and now… Which I think makes this the right time to do this for a lot of reasons! But I do think ‘off-the-bat’: the audience is matured. …I don’t think we’re gonna sell Epitaphs From The Abyss #1 to 8-year-olds. You know what I mean? Fact: 8-year-olds were reading Tales from the Crypt… but that probably won’t be the mandate here. I don’t think we’ll be accused of “engendering juvenile delinquency,” hopefully…

Reams: What about having “preachies”-type stories, kind of like with the old Shock SuspenseStories “preachies”? Gorinson: You mean stories with a more socio-political, cultural … ? Reams: Modern social stories, though! Gorinson: Yeah, 100%! I think that’s actually integral to what makes EC work. One of the things… I hesitate to call it a ‘formula’, but there’s a ‘voodoo’ to the way that EC worked! …This is where I think another comic book publisher doing ‘EC books’ in 2024 would be, ‘yeah, we’re just going to do the horror one. That was the most popular!’ But EC had this quadruple-helix of horror, satire, war, science fiction that all weaved together and made a really compelling mix of genres and tones. In terms of the socio-political content - That’s the other thing, ….if you want to go read an EC pastiche or homage story right now - you’ve got a million ways to do that! But, what all of those homages and pastiches have failed to do is… …It’s really easy to do a story about ‘Christmas Eve. There’s a killer in a Santa Claus costume who chops off somebody’s head on Christmas morning. It opens to a box under the tree and his dad’s head is in it!’ or whatever could be perceived as ‘EC-adjacent’. Reams: They had one [a story] very similar to that… [“And All Through The House….”] Gorinson: I think there’s a Creepshow that’s very similar to that, etc.. There’s tons of stuff that came after EC, where they embraced the violence and the gore, the shocking quality of ‘your neighbor next door could be a monster!!’ It doesn’t have to be Frankenstein or the Wolfman or whatever… but those homages often fail to capture .. that strong socio-cultural-political ‘edge’ and not every EC story has that but some of them do.. .. It’s an important part of the mix.. they’ll definitely be part of that brew from early on of what we’re doing, especially with Epitaphs From The Abyss! I was talking to Corey Mifsud about this. It’s not a straight ‘one-to-one’ equivalency with Tales from the Crypt or The Vault of Horror. It’s in the lineage of what those stories were like, but there’s also a little bit of Crime SuspenStories and there’s a lot of Shock-Suspense in Epitaphs From The Abyss. Just people being ‘terrible’ to one another. …There’s a lot of that in Epitaphs!

Reams: Can you tell us any other creatives’ names that are going to be contributing to EC’s new books? Gorinson: Yeah, we put out a big old list of folks initially. There’s some true comics A -listers in there. Jason Aaron. I don’t think you guys have seen.. Jason’s first story is going to run in Epitaphs From The Abyss #2.. Issue #1 is Brian Azzarello; Stephanie Phillips; A really talented writer named J. Holtham. And, Chris Condon plus Peter Krause ; Vlad Legostaev - who’s a phenomenal Ukrainian comic artist… Who am I forgetting? There’s two… I don’t have PREVIEWS in front of me! Reams: There’s Phil Hester .. and Jorge Fornes. Gorinson: Jorge Fornes drew Batman with Tom King, most recently did “Danger Street” with Tom King - INCREDIBLE artist, perfect for what we’re looking for with the EC mold. And of course Phil Hester - industry legend, deeply influenced by EC. The minute we made this announcement, Phil was kind enough to reach out and be like “put me on this..!” I don’t want to spoil too much … there’s a bunch of people who didn’t get announced yet .. the lineup for Cruel Universe #1 we haven’t shown anyone yet. It’ll be out next week … And then Epitaphs From the Abyss #2 has, in my opinion, one of the most impressive lineups of creators. I never dreamed that I would publish a book with these five creators on Epitaphs #2 - One of them is writing AND illustrating their own story, which is phenomenal! It is truly a “Cavalcade of Riches”, my friend. I’m gonna be excited to share it with everybody!

Reams: What about veteran ones like Angelo Torres, Kelley Jones, Ralph Reese, people like that? Is it just gonna be newer people or are you gonna bring on older people? Gorinson: I have not yet had a chance to speak to Angelo Torres; I would love to. I don’t know what his interest is …to be honest with you, it makes me a little afraid to pitch Angelo the idea of drawing a ‘quote-unquote’ “EC story” because I’m sure he will have feelings about that, but obviously a huge appreciator of his work. But in terms of veteran talents from the comic book industry and also people who were “Generation Two” after the EC crew. .. Reams: Like, from CREEPY/EERIE? Gorinson: Yeah, who either apprenticed, knew or worked alongside some of the original EC creators.. I’ve viewed it as incredibly important to hopefully get some of those people along for the ride…Phil Hester kind of falls into that box - he’s been doing this for 30 years at this point. There’s a couple names coming that you will be like… ‘WHOA!’… Specifically, in Epitaphs From The Abyss #2!

Reams: So a big part of EC, original EC, was the artwork-to-story balance. You had “Ghastly” Graham Ingels, you had Jack Kamen, Reed Crandall: very detailed/Pulp-like artwork!; Matched with very Prose-like writing. In the modern landscape, how is that gonna go… Gorinson: Yeah, there’s certain rules because.. what you don’t want to do, the last thing we want to do. … …I should give a shout-out to our editor and chief Sierra Hahn who’s my partner in crime on this entire thing! She’s a phenomenally talented comic book editor, has been doing this for close to 20 years, worked previously at Dark Horse - as well as at Boom Studios where we first crossed paths. Me and her have kind of debated and pushed-and-pulled over ‘what is the ‘bend it, don’t break it’ approach to the EC formula?’ …The last thing I wanted to do was find one-to-one artist equivalents. We have to have a Graham Ingels - kind of super hyper-detailed, gross, drippy-features guy! …We didn’t want to find ‘imitators.’ Part of what makes William Gaines one of the greatest comic book editors of all time, probably in competition with Stan Lee for the single greatest editor ever in the history of the medium, was his ability to pick artists and then let them ‘do their thing.’ That’s kind of the mandate that we have too, which we want super-capable storytellers because the amount of information ..The last thing we wanted to do was find ‘direct imitators’. Each original EC artist had their own definitive style; the one thing that they shared was a really powerful, clean economy of storytelling! Honestly, it’s a lot easier to draw a 22-page comic or an entire 4-or-6-issue arc of a comic book, than it is a 6-or-8-page story. It’s very hard to ‘hide your mistakes’ in a 6-page story.. ..What I think we ‘rightly diagnosed’ that we ‘needed’ is extremely clean, powerful storytellers - instead of someone who’s going to draw a horror host in a cool pose …plenty of guys can draw a horror host in a cool pose! I don’t know many who can do one of the most disgusting shocking 6-page stories that you’ve read all year! It’s a pretty short list!! So that was the mandate.. Gorinson: …In terms of the actual story-construction, there’s certain things that we’re going to retain - obviously all the stories have to be self-contained! Can’t do the “Dark Horse Presents” thing, or whatever, “2000 AD” where the story is continued from issue-to-issue. Don’t want to do that, it breaks the EC formula! The stories, where we can, they’re all probably going to have something similar to that original half-page Splash introduction … have a nice cool title treatment that introduces each one. Of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Leroy lettering, the books have to have this! We don’t have a Leroy Machine, can’t do it ‘exactly’ but we’re gonna letter the books in the same style, because when you see that - you know you’re reading an EC Comic. You know what I mean? It’s essential … Gorinson: We released a piece of promotional material today, like these little pre-order cards that are going to comics stores, that has the Leroy lettering on it… Gorinson: We released a new cover… for Epitaphs from the Abyss #2, by an artist named Adam Pollina, it’s a guy getting a nail hammered into his head in the true kind-of-Crime SuspenStories tradition. Reams: Is that in the PREVIEWS catalogue, or…? Gorinson: This is for Epitaphs # 2, so no one’s seen it yet. I think it’s on Bleeding Cool right now if you go check it out.

Reams: I’m gonna ask a few more questions…What themes can we look for during the future issues? Like will there be war themes? Satire-comic type themes? Or just sci-fi and horror? Gorinson: Adam [Pollina] drew one of my favorite comics when I was a kid.. “Rise of Apocalypse” from Marvel in the ‘90s. And then he went on to be a fashion designer. He’s a very accomplished artist. Gorinson: In terms of other genres, yeah, that’s part of the ‘mandate’. Starting things, we didn’t want to start with like, “Here’s 5 books - go get them!” We’re doing something radical - I’m well aware that we’re doing something provocative, possibly controversial, definitely treading on sacred ground by even inhabiting the EC logo on new books, not by the original creators. Now that we have people’s attention, we have to gain their trust. Part of the idea was ‘let’s start in a familiar place…’ with anthologies in the two kind of most central EC genres, horror and science fiction. But as I said, I don’t believe EC should be limited to that alone .. I think part of the success of EC was it had a broader tableau of storytelling that it did .. I’ve teased this out a little bit for retailers, and won’t say too much, but I will say that the third book we do - will be in a genre that EC told stories in, but never did a full book about. Reams: What is that? Picto-Fiction??! Gorinson: I don’t think I’m gonna be running back to Picto-Fiction anytime soon!!! But in 2025, we’ll also do something that is not an anthology! So, I’ve teased enough… Reams: Will there be collected volumes,? Gorinson: Oh 100%! Each of these will get collected as a graphic novel. Reams: Will they be hardcover or softcover? Gorinson: …It’s a little early for us to make a definitive call on that - I think the ‘rough draft ‘of the answer to that question is, We’ll probably collect the first 5-or-so issues of these series as softcover graphic novel, then once we have a larger group of them done, we’ll collect them in the big oversized deluxe hardcover format. We’re gonna see how it’s gonna go.

Gorinson: I don’t know if Cruel Universe will be like 12 issues or maybe it’s a shorter series and then we rotate it, and then we bring Cruel Universe back… where we do a second Sci-Fi series; kind of like Weird Fantasy/Weird Science thing, and rotate through a couple of them. Don’t be surprised if we do that! We want to keep people on their toes a little bit. We also just want to keep the level of quality and consistency high with what we’re doing. Reams: Yes… Um, the Sci-Fi titles were historically the least-selling EC titles, but they were the most loved… Gorinson: Science fiction in today’s market … not that much has changed - the three most bankable things in comics are superheroes, horror and science fiction. There’s a lot of great stories in Weird Science and Weird Fantasy; that was always amongst one of my favorite books. Again, I wanted to do something that was important to the team at Oni -that we not just do horror. The minute that we landed on the title ‘Cruel Universe’, we knew we had something! ..They’re all kind of ‘functionally’ horror stories to some degree. They may not be ‘overtly horror’ about people getting killed or maimed or whatever, but they’re all terrifying and upsetting and deranged to some degree. You know what I mean?

Reams: Well, I think that’s most of the questions I had and it is now 30 minutes… Gorinson: Oh, you did it! Fantastic job, man. Reams: We got most of them done! Gorinson: That’s awesome… Anytime you have questions - Please feel free! Reams: Sure! Thanks so much!

[honey-tea-and-cookies]

Hey how are you? I hope you’re doing good! I just saw your public analysis with Cancer risings and I was wondering if you can do the same with their opposites, Capricorn risings? If you don’t want to do it rn it’s okay. Do it whenever you’re ready (or if you don’t want to do it at all it’s okay). Thank you so much for the content you put out. Love you 💓💓

Capricorn Risings

THE SCOOP <3

Hi sweetie! I'm doing well thank you so much. I'd love to make a Capricorn version! I'm thinking I could make it a series? Y'all comment or send me an ask and tell me what you want next :)

🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃🍃

- Killer eyebrows omg. Whether they have a really nice arch, or they're really dark, or thick, whatever it is. Their eyebrows always stand out!

- The type to always remind you to eat or drink water. Honestly very good, reliable friends.

- They might be a lot like their father/father figure, or strive to be like him.

- (Much like how the typically 'emotional' Cancer risings are into STEM) the typically 'logical' Capricorn rising are into history! I think Capricorn really loves history for two reasons. One; because it helps give them a comprehensive understanding of people and society as a whole. Two; because it shows us the world's past events that have led up to where we are today. While everything we do in our every day lives is exhausting, history shows us what humans truly are at our *core* and what we are capable of. It puts things into perspective a bit and gives Capricorn a new way of looking at things.

- Dimples!!!! The softest, sweetest cheeks, with dimples!!! Also amazing cheekbones omg.

- The type to text with Full, Complete punctuation and grammar. No extra capital letters for ~Emphasis~ or anything 🙄🙄

- Probably own pets, or at least one too. They are also dog people, although I think reptiles or birds are a Capricorn rising thing too

- I WOULD give these people the aux cord, idk how but their music always slaps. Big fan, keep up the good work 🙏🙏

- The type of people to follow satire accounts on social media

- On a similar note, extremely sarcastic. It's very funny, but their sense is humour is quite dry. They very well might come for you lmao

- These guys ROCK blazers, and anything else like that. Suits look outstanding on these people (especially the women). #girlboss💅

- Slightly odd thing to say, but Maki Zenin from Jujutsu Kaisen vibes. Now, I say that as a COMPLIMENT (this her in the gif below)

- Touch starved!! If they are comfortable with it, please give your local Capricorn rising a hug!! They won't ever ask for one, but they need one, believe me

- One of the only people I would trust to look after my plants while I'm away. They're secretly very nurturing, and would be honoured that they are trusted enough to take care of things while I'm gone.

- So many of them are cold to the touch. They're never shivering or anything, but their hands are always super icy. Please put on a jumper I'm begging you

- They definitely listen to true crime podcasts. They both find it interesting, and want to be prepared in case anything ever happened to them.

- I know everyone always brings this up, but Capricorn risings have terrible RBF. They're actually nice!!! But they look like they could verbally bite your head off 😳 (and they could)

- They blush!!! A lot!! It can be easy to miss because their facial expression won't actually change, you just have to intently watch their facial colour change. It's so cute!!! It's not all over their face, but it's like their ears go bright red and their cheeks go pretty pink. They're honestly adorable!! I just wanna pepper little kisses all over your pretty face!!!

- They generally look best with silver jewellery. Although I don't think they wear much jewellery. Maybe earrings, maybe some rings??That's about it though :/

- A lot of them don't necessarily want to have a baby, but they want to be parents. What I mean by that is, they want to help raise the new generation. They want to help create a functioning, successful adult to contribute to the world. But they don't necessarily want a baby to have ✨a cute lil thing to look after✨, like some people do (obviously they would take care of the child, but you get what I mean)

- Terrible sleep schedule. In theory they know it's important, but in practise a 'regular' schedule slips their mind sometimes. I don't just mean staying up too late (although they absolutely do that), this could also be going to bed really early. Whatever it is, their sleep schedule is just... not right or normal lmao

- Procrastinators!! Big time!! For someone who is so dedicated and hardworking and ambitious, they do not give themselves enough time to complete things comfortably. They usually crush it, but we both know they are STRESSED as they complete their task as best as they can in their leftover time frame 💀💀

- They might have a particular aspect of their appearance that they are known for. It might even be a part of their career. For example, Zooey Deschanel (a Capricorn rising) is known for her bangs. Kylie Jenner (a Capricorn rising) is extremely famous and rather successful because of her face.

This is all I have for today! Thank you so much for reading. If you are a Cap rising, please let me know how on or off I was. If you have any other rising sign you'd like me to cover, let me know! Thank you so much, and I'm sending you all love <3

[cloverthirteen]

Was Ace Attorney made as a satire on Japan’s legal system? -- An analysis

I wouldn’t really call myself an Ace Attorney fan--I’ve never played any of the games, the closest I’ve come being watching other people’s let’s plays. I do like reading about the series on wikis and interacting with fan content for it, though, so I do know a fair amount about it.

One thing I see being said pretty often by fans is that the series was intended as a satire/parody of the Japanese legal system, which is why the courts are ridiculously biased towards the prosecution, prosecutors often care more about perfect win records more than putting actual guilty people behind bars, etc. If you’re familiar with this, you’ve probably heard of Japan’s 99% conviction rate. This interpretation of the games and the way they work definitely makes sense.

But after hearing this many times I eventually noticed something. There isn’t a single actual source (creator statement, interview, etc.) that backs up this claim. Every time I see someone online say “the series creator made Ace Attorney to parody Japan’s actual legal system” there is never a link to an interview or anything that proves their statement correct. If someone has an actual, verified source from Shu Takumi or someone else who had significant involvement with the series, please prove me wrong and show it to me. But according to all of the creator’s statement’s I’ve read, there’s no evidence of the series being an intentional parody.

So, what do we know about the creation of the Ace Attorney series? Well, it was created by Shu Takumi, who wrote and directed the first three games. After working on the dinosaur survival horror game Dino Crisis for Capcom, he was given the opportunity to make any kind of game he wanted. He really wanted to make mystery and adventure games, and from that came Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney.

MC: Before developing Ace Attorney you worked on Dino Crisis. How does one go from dinosaur survival horror to virtual courtrooms?

ST: Dino Crisis was the brainchild of my then boss, Resident Evil creator, Shinji Mikami. Working on his projects taught me not only how to make games, but also how to think about them. After Dino Crisis 2 wrapped, Mr Mikami gave me six months in which to create any kind of game I wanted.

I was still pretty wet behind the ears, but as I'd originally joined Capcom with a desire to create mystery and adventure games, this was a huge chance for me to make my mark as a creator. In the end it took a team of seven 10 months to produce the first GBA Ace Attorney title. Having the freedom to create exactly the kind of game I wanted was amazing and it was a real pleasure to work on that project.

MC: Can you remember when the idea of Ace Attorney first came to you? How did your bosses respond to the idea of a lawyer-based adventure game when you first described it to them?

ST: It was in 2000 when Mr Mikami said I could make my own game and my original idea was a fairly typical adventure with a detective as the main character. Most mystery adventures have the player choose from a number of different dialogue options for their character in order to progress the story, but I wanted a new gameplay style that enabled players to deduce for themselves what was happening, rather than just selecting canned responses. I developed this into the concept of facing off against the suspect in a crime and exposing the contradictions in their statements.

I was sure my new idea would be a fun and original take on the genre, so I started to revise the main character, since a detective would be too traditional for such an original concept. I asked myself, "What kind of professional would face off against a suspect and expose their contradictory statements?" The answer, of course, was a lawyer and so the Ace Attorney concept was born.

(source, from an interview on the making of the series)

Takumi’s original concept for the game involved Phoenix as not a defense lawyer, but as a detective. The gameplay was to consist of “facing off against the suspect of a crime and finding the contradictions in their statements.” However, Takumi eventually realized that taking apart contradictions wasn’t really a detective’s job, and decided to change the protagonist to a lawyer and the setting to a courtroom instead. And thus, the game’s concept was finalized.

Janet: As you know, “Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy” is coming out world-wide this winter, and as I was brainstorming what to write about for this week’s blog, I remembered your tweets from 2010.

Takumi: Tweets from 2010?

Janet: …Well, it was a long time ago…

Takumi: ???

Janet: I-It’s OK if you don’t remember…

Takumi: …Oh, THOSE! Yes!

Janet: I remember reading them and being shocked by how different the original draft of the game’s story was – how Phoenix wasn’t even a lawyer, but a private eye!

Takumi: Yes, AA was originally supposed to be a detective game, so naturally, Phoenix was to be a private eye. But then, one day, I made a startling realization: the gameplay concept I was going for was for players to enjoy finding and taking contradictions apart, but that was hardly related to investigating or detective work at all. In that moment, I had it – I realized that the main setting for the game should be the courtroom.

Janet: That’s quite the jump, but you know, I can’t imagine this series being anything else at this point. 

(source, from an interview by Janet Hsu about the game’s early development)

During the development for the game, Takumi actually knew very little about the intricacies of the legal system--and in fact, he’s been very transparent about that fact in interviews. There’s even a story he talks about in a blog post where he was asked “shouldn’t we do some research on law before we make this game?” and agonized over it for a bit before deciding that being accurate about courtroom processes wasn’t important--what was important was that the game made the trials exciting and fun.

November, 2000. The characters were coming together, and I was working desperately on my first scenario (the current Turnabout Sisters). One day, I was asked about the one thing I didn’t want to be asked about.

“Mr. Takumi. Don’t we need to do some research on law?”

The knowledge I have about the law, pretty amounts to the one fact that in Japan we have the Roppō Zensho ('Complete Book of The Six Major Legal Codes').

“Don’t bother with that. This is a detective game. “

It should have been over with this one line, but…

“But this isn’t a detective game, it’s a lawyer game!”

“If it’s not going to be realistic, I don’t see why this should be about trials.”

“People who play this might get wrong knowledge from the game!”

“We might get sued by the Bar Association!”

“They’ll start complaining!”

…Gyakuten Saiban (Ace Attorney GBA) is simply a “mystery game.”　“Being realistic” is not what is important. What’s important is emphasizing, and recreating the unique “atmosphere” and “tension” of the courtroom. That is why the judge uses a gavel, even though no judge uses that, and why Naruhodō shouts "Objection!" even though nobody does that either.　This game does not need a “realistic courtroom”!

Chasing the true murderer down to the end, and then getting applauded for that in the courtroom. That feeling of thrill and excitement. It was only by February of the following year when we finally manage to recreate that in the game. The couple of months after this had happened, we looked around, got lost and troubled our minds in search for the answer of the big question of “How do we make a trial into a game?”.  Fall was passing by, and the cold winter was close upon us.

(source, from an archived blog post by Takumi)

So, realism and knowledge of law wasn’t important to Takumi during the development of the series. But there’s also the fact that Takumi has actually personally denied that the Ace Attorney series was an intentional satire or criticism of the court system at any point. In fact, according to a blog post (done as if Phoenix and Maya were reading the column and commenting on it), he actually dislikes people seeing his work this way, as he never intended the games to have any big political statements.

A major prerequisite for Gyakuten Saiban is it’s so simple “even my mother could play it”.  So there is only one point at the core of the game: “Seeing through lies”.

Naruhodō: It wasn’t even supposed to be a game about the trials at first. Mayoi: Eh! Really?! Naruhodō: “Simple” is basically all this game is about, according to TakuShū. Mayoi: What do you mean? Naruhodō: He didn’t want to add all kinds of elements for the player to think about, like alibis, tricks or about the culprit. It’d just confuse them. Mayoi: Really. Naruhodō: Basically, you can proceed in the game if you just think about where the contradiction is. He figured that with that, the controls of the game could also stay simple. Mayoi: But, but, why the trials then? Naruhodō: “A story about a detective seeing through lies” wouldn’t be any different from the other games out there. So that’s why he decided to have someone whose job is seeing through lies as the protagonist. Mayoi: So a defense attorney. Naruhodō: Occasionally  TakuShū sees magazines introducing the game as “a work that dared to take on the theme of trials”, and that actually hurts him. Mayoi: He never meant to be something as big as that…. 

(source, from the mentioned blog post)

Ultimately I see how easy it is, if you know a good amount about both Ace Attorney and Japan’s legal system, to come to the conclusion that the games were made as a dig against the latter. However, somewhere along the line, people apparently stopped seeing this as merely a theory and instead as a definite fact. Now, that doesn’t mean that the theory is entirely unfounded--given that Takumi focused only on making trials interesting and fun in the games, you could say that the games work as an light, comedic parody, not meant to make any political statements. And hey, maybe there’s something I missed--maybe there were other people working on the series who did have significant knowledge of law and wrote some parts of the games as intentional satire of the system. Again, if anyone has evidence of this, don’t hesitate to provide it. But with what I know, I don’t think going “well actually” to people who point out the ridiculousness and unfairness of Ace Attorney’s court system is necessary. It’s simply that way to make the games more fun.

[stella-monstrum]

1996′s “Scream” // Stu Macher survives - [Fan Theory]

As a horror movie fan, 

My brain is always sort of reimagining and rethinking ways to flip their ideas as a whole, whether it’s fantasy recasting or even changing the ending altogether. Specifically to this piece, I want to focus on 1996’s Scream, written by the legendary Wes Craven. Now, Scream’s essence was to parody and poke fun at what fans know to be ever-so-classic slasher/thriller films.

In honor of what this film was, and all in good fun, I’ve decided to put my own fictional events into a loosely based timeline. 

I’m going to be tying in two separate film timelines (very very loosely)—and yes, they both have one actor in common: Matthew Lilard. Matthew was a huge part of my childhood, and I’m sure he was a big part in others’. For this piece I’m focusing on both Scream and 2002’s live-action Scooby Doo films that featured Lillard.

Stu Macher // Scream (1996) screencap / source: google images

Theatrical poster for Scream (1996). (Source: Amazon)

(I’m not going to incorporate the Mystery Gang or even Scooby, focusing more so on a fictional similarity basis.

Disclaimer: This is obviously just a satirical piece because well, I wanted to write it. I don’t own the characters, rights, yadda yadda. Also, potential spoilers for various movies ahead.)

(written by Stella, edited by Jacob J.)

══════════════════════

Stu Macher

As an 18-year-old high-schooler, Stu Macher appeared as the seemingly peculiar boyfriend of Casey Becker (Drew Barrymore), but became entangled in revenge by his best friend Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich). 

Their 1st victim was Maureen Prescott, who had an affair with Billy’s father, causing Billy’s mother to leave. (They got away with it by framing Cotton Weary, Maureen’s rapist from years prior.)

One year later, to celebrate, Billy and Stu terrorize fellow students, particularly Casey, who’d left Stu for another man (Steve).

Stu ultimately meets his “fatal” demise after being hit over the head with a vase, then a television, by Sidney—which seemed to electrocute Stu and end his reign of terror.

If you’re a fan of the franchise, you know the deal. If you don’t, then you can catch up here.

Stu Macher’s death-by-TV  scene. (Source: Tumblr. Watch the scene on Youtube)

══════════════════════

Now just for fun, imagine that Stu somehow survived this attack. You’re probably wondering, “How the everloving hell could he survive?” Just work with me here.

══════════════════════

Stu’s (fictional) survival story:

What if...

After seemingly killing Stu, 

Sidney calls the police. She’s absolutely still mortified, but she wants to explain what she’s done and also obviously tell them all about the mass killings that Stu and Billy committed.

Stu is barely hanging on to life. The police call an ambulance and escort him to the local hospital for treatment under close police watch. Stu winds up suffering from traumatic brain injury. 

When he’s functioning enough, after questioning and court decision that placing him into a jail wouldn’t be fit, Stu is admitted into a high security psychiatric hospital. During questioning, Stu cannot recall what had happened and shows signs of dissociative episodes.

Matthew Lillard as Shaggy in the live-action Scooby-Doo (2002). (Source: Google Images.)

══════════════════════

Whilst in this psychiatric hospital, 

Stu takes on this very laid back, hippy state, growing his hair out and taking a lax, almost spiritual mindset. (Mind you, this is all a scheme.) With this change in his behaviour, the hospital allows Stu to help run some recreational crafting and board game-like activities. 

During this time he connects with a fellow patient, Mary. 

They begin to bond, and he eventually convinces her to help him escape from there. Stu gives Mary the “I can’t be in here anymore, you see? I have a higher purpose, to help others on the other side of these walls” blah blah metaphysical spiel. Stu, with Mary’s help, escapes the ward by knocking out a guard with a vase (like Sidney did to him).

══════════════════════

Fast forward a bit...

Stu winds up creating and taking on the new identity of “Shaggy Rogers,” deciding to move back to California—but not in a home. He...well, “borrows” a beaten down van and lives as sort of a vagabond. He still keeps track of the goings-on in his old stomping grounds as copycat ghostfaces continue where he and Billy left off. 

Scream newspaper prop. (Source: This Etsy listing)

Stu, now Shaggy, begins to feel guilty and vows to dedicate his life to following cases and crimes by himself.

════

Years later...

Whilst headed on vacation, Shaggy is reunited by fate with Mary on the same plane. They reconcile and catch up the entire flight.

Shaggy and Mary Jane from 2002’s live-action Scooby-Doo  film. (Source: Google Images.)

The island, disguised as an amusement park, has been accused of performing ritualistic killings and is home to a brainwashed cult.

 Little does Shaggy know that Mary Jane knows exactly who he truly was— or that, someday, she would take out a planned revenge on the unsuspecting Stu. 

Mary begs and ultimately convinces Shaggy to allow her to be by his side and help him.

Shaggy and Mary Jane from 2002’s live-action Scooby-Doo  film. (Source: Google Images.)

When it’s all said and done, Mary is one of the island’s cult members, stringing Stu along, luring him to his true death and demise.

═════════════════

I know this piece was incredibly out of left field, but I had such a damn blast creating this hypothetical situation. Maybe one day, Lillard will give this a read and know how much of a part he had in a lot of people’s childhoods.

Lillard responding to a fan’s tweet. (Source: junkee)

[mk-wizard]

Top 10 Valuable Lessons Horror Teaches Us

Hello, fans. This list may initially look goofy and satirical, but it is in fact a serious list because even though horror media is fiction, there is one realistic part about it; a lot of tragedy could have been prevented if the main characters made wiser decisions. And here are some life lessons horror (both in film and video games) can teach us or at least motivate us to teach our children.

1- NEVER talk to, accept gifts from or go near strangers especially when you’re alone. - It’s very sad, but unfortunately, this is not just a skill characters in horror movies lack. The number one reason kidnappings especially of small children happen is because they hung around strangers. And this skill applies just as much to adults especially women. People, stay the heck away from strangers especially if there’s no one else around. Just the fact that they are trying to go talk to you the very second you’re alone is a red flag. This also applies to hitchhikers on the road.

2- Lock your doors and windows, and always arm your home security system at night. - This is a no brainer yet people forget to do this or worse yet, keep their window open at night while they sleep for fresh air. In an ideal world, doors and windows wouldn’t need locks, but we don’t. Also, considering how dangerous our world is, it shocks me that more people don’t have home security systems. Suppose someone tries to break in, the sound of the alarm alone will scare them away because it designed to panic invaders and some of them are also programmed to call 911 automatically. Always keep your home locked up tight and your home security armed especially at night. If you don’t have a home security system, get one.

3- It is ok to own a gun. - I am all for respecting guns as the weapons they are and I am well aware of the lives they take, but as said before, we don’t live in an ideal world. Guns themselves are not monsters. In fact, they can save you from them. Most of the time, you probably won’t even need to pull the trigger. Suppose you’re about to get mugged or something, the instant you pull out that gun, that alone will make your attacker run for the hills. I know this sounds weird coming from a Canadian woman who can’t own a gun and is a pacifist, but the USA has a frighteningly high crime rate. A cop won’t always be there to help you. You need to protect yourself especially if you’re in a situation where you have to walk alone at night.

4- Never go to places that are off limits or in the middle of nowhere. - That includes house parties and abandoned buildings. Places like this are death traps even in real life. While you probably won’t find monsters in an abandoned place, you might find some crazed homeless person who is on a drug trip or worse yet, suppose you have an accident and get injured or trapped. You are doomed. And yes, in real life, a lot of deaths have happened because people thought that they were being cool by breaking and entering into old or off limits buildings. As for the house parties that are dark and secretive, they could be a trap for human traffickers or other sickos to take you away. Go to parties that people know about, have people you know and are in places people know about.

5- Know who to call and what to do in any basic emergency, and teach your kids how to as well. - While I’m not saying you should have emergency drills once a week with the family in case of a fire, it pays to have a plan on what to do in case of an emergency or to prevent falling into one. Teach them what to do and what not to do when they’re alone at home such as don’t open the door to strangers, don’t make conversation with strange people who call you up, call for help the instant you suspect there’s trouble and what to say to a 911 operator such as their address and the emergency at hand. Acting fast and knowing what to do makes all the difference.

6- Beware of scammers and things that are too good to be true. - While there no such things as magic boxes that grant wishes, one thing that is true is that we never get anything for nothing and cursed wishing can be seen as a metaphor for being scammed. Before signing contracts, giving away personal information or parting with your money, always read everything, check for the legitimacy of the offer and company, and always ask for proof. There is no such thing as the perfect anything and if someone is asking to meet in a secluded shady area or you come to realize it is one, turn around and leave.

7- Tell someone you trust that you’re in danger. - Pretty self explanatory. Even the strongest people shouldn’t face danger alone. If you suspect that you are being harassed or stalked, get help. One tip my mother shared with me is that if you’re being stalked, go into a store and tell the cashier about it. They will help you. There are varying levels of danger and while not all of them qualify as a 911 type of emergency call, call someone you trust and who you know will come to help you. And if you’re a kid, tell your parents that you don’t feel safe and why. No one who truly cares about you will ever shame you for being a victim.

8- Don’t hang out with dangerous or shady people. - No matter how cool they seem, hard you’re crushing on them or how much status they have, stay far, far away from people who are clearly bad or encourage you to do bad things. And if you are in an abusive relationship, leave. These people don’t love you, they don’t care about you and they are never going to change. Don’t get involved with them to begin with and if you come to realize that they’re bad down the road, ditch them. If they won’t let you leave, get help. You don’t owe anyone an explanation for protecting yourself.

9- Always own up to your mistakes and don’t do bad things on purpose. - No one is immune against karma. If you do wrong, own up to it and face the music. Covering it up or worse yet, continuing to do wrong on purpose only makes things worse and eventually, it will come back to bite you. Not to mention that if your mistake caused someone to get hurt, their well being is more important than your reputation or sparing yourself from getting grounded.

10- Don’t turn to toxicity as a means of coping with your problems. - I get it. Life is hard, you’ve faced things no one deserves to endure and there’s depression, but beware of how you choose to cope with it. Seek help that is clean and medically sound. Don’t take up toxic behaviour like drug or alcohol addiction, become violent or fall into the trap of cults (yes they really do exist). Make sure the help you’re getting really is helping you and not just an escape because when it is the latter, it’s actually a trap that will make everything worse and destroy what little you have.

Well, that’s the list. I hope it helps. Remember, to be safe in every way, friends. And thanks for reading.

PS: As a parent, I really urge other parents who are reading this list to sit down and share this advice to their own kids. There are too many parents out there as it is who don’t teach their kids enough about staying safe.

[ivory-sunflower]

Arty Art Things ✨

Hellooo!

I've decided to post some of the arty things I've done either recently or in the last few years, well the pieces I'm somewhat proud of at least. All my posts tend to be a lot more wordy than they need to be but hey it's what I do here!

Conchúr White

Anyone one who's been on this blog for a bit will have probably have seen me talk about this lovely Irish fella. The pencil drawing is actually a year old as of yesterday, I only know that because screenshots of me flipping out about Conchúr following me on twitter popped up in my memories yesterday. I think I'd sent it to him at about 3 in the morning (I was not in a good head space at that point in time), so probably not what he was expecting to see when he opened his phone in the morning aha

The biro version is much more recent: I got bored while sat at my desk and doing research about university courses, saw a biro, saw my old drawing of Conchúr, had an idea. I revisited my GCSE art techniques and here we are. Again, I put this up on Twitter and now (at the the time I'm writing this) when you google "Conchúr White" it's the third top image of him which is a bit mad really. I think I spent all of about 20 minutes on Conchúr but another 45 minutes on the words behind him. The words are the names of the songs on his EP 'Bikini Crops', he doesn't just really love the idea of Channing Tatum driving him around at night in a daisy print bikini... Well maybe he does but what he does in his spare time is none of my business...

TechDif

So I mentioned that the pencil drawing of Conchúr came from a rough patch in my mental health and this one is no different! In fact this one came from an even worse circumstance so we love to see it. I had a bad, bad time in July and this started as a way of distracting myself from what was going on in my head. Without it, I can't honestly say I'd still be here so even if the final product of this had been a terrible mess I would still love it for keeping me alive. However, it did not turn out to be a terrible mess!

Now that the origin of this is out the way, where do I start with TechDif? Unlike Conchúr, I haven't really talked about them on here (unless you count one brief post about Citation Needed) before so I guess I'll do it here. The Technical Difficulties are a wonderful group of 4 British fellas who have had their fair share of fun online and even before. They did a radio show at university together, which went on to become their Reverse Trivia Podcast, later moving on to a panel show called 'Citation Needed': and a game called 'Two of These People Are Lying'. All of which I would thoroughly reccomend, they're one of my go to things when I'm having a rough time. All 4 of them are excellent! Tom Scott (red top, blue jeans on the picture) has his own YouTube channel which does content aside from TechDif. If you're quite nerdy and like science, linguistics, computers, or any number of other things you may enjoy Tom's channel. He is probably best described as "The Moderator" of the group, much like a tired teacher he tries desperately to keep everyone on track with what they're meant to be doing, but usually it does not end well for him. Then we have Matt Gray (space top, holding an ice cream) who also has a channel away from TechDif stuff, he does techy electronic things and has a series called 'Will it Soft Serve?' where he puts all kinds of strange things through a soft serve machine. Matt brings a very specific energy to TechDif and I can't fully describe what that vibe is but I love it. Matt and Tom also share a YouTube channel where TOTPAL is posted and they had a series called 'The Park Bench'. Moving on to everybody's favourite Gary Brannan: Gary Brannan (SATIRE hoodie, glasses) and can I just say, what a fella he is! He's just excellent! He is the one that will argue and rip into Tom the most (not in a malicious way) and hilarity ensues. There are some episodes where he is absolutely on it, getting all the points and others where he very clearly has no idea and that's where some of his funniest quotes come from. Given how badly I was doing at the time I made this, his response to it on Twitter was so so lovely. I specifically remember one tweet where he said I'd made him happy and although it was probably a flippant comment, it just made feel alright for a bit. Yeah I might be feeling awful right now, but I've made someone else happy so that's a nice feeling. Then last but certainly not least, we have Chris Joel (buffalo check shirt, beard)! I would be lying if I said he isn’t my favourite... His sense of humor is the one I vibe with most, he can get rather dramatic in parts and can chat bollocks like a champion. He has absolutely no online presence away from TechDif and, like Rens from Temples, I fully believe he’s a cryptid and lives off in a tree somewhere. 

The picture took me about 4 days to complete, well 4 nights because I did most of it between the hours of 12 a.m. and 7a.m. - I remember watching the sun come through my window each morning. It’s made up of lots of little pieces, all cut out and stuck on; even the sky and hills are made of separate pieces of paper. Nothing was actually drawn on the piece of paper it’s all stuck on, it’s not how I usually do things but if I messed up one little but I could just redraw it rather than ruining the whole thing. The most tedious parts to make were Chris’ shirt because I had to draw each square individually and then join the as well, and cutting out the ban-hammer in the bottom right was surprisingly hard. Every single detail of the picture is a reference to the podcast/shows, I still have the plan sketch and reference list knocking about somewhere. I listened to a lot of true crime videos while making it to the point that certain parts remind me of different cases: the brandy now reminds me of Peter Tobin, and the big spiral thing reminds me of Tim McLean (very harrowing case) - sorry that fact is a bit morbid but interesting nonetheless. 

I did post this for a little bit back in July, but I received some rather awful messages so I took it down. Generally, Tom Scott/TechDif fans are lovely but there’s been a few that have taken a disliking to me for some reason so I’m hoping they don’t resurface again. I’m in a better head space now though, so even if they do I’m more equipped to deal with it this time.

Hozier

This was a quick sketch I did in April, I was getting bored with lockdown and decided to summon the bog man himself. There’s not really much more backstory than that, no poor mental health story, no fun twitter story - he’s just here. He’s vibing. I will say I’m particularly proud of his nose, I just think it’s one of the best noses I’ve ever drawn. His hand is okay, but I think that the hands on my Conchúr drawings are better. So there is the Hozi-Boi...

The Corpse Bry

I’ve talked about Bry on here before as well, I love him, he’s excellent, top lad. He is a living Tim Burton character, he’s 6′6, very skinny, and his legs are longer than my will to live. I was watching ‘The Corpse Bride’ a few weeks ago and suddenly had an idea and so ‘The Corpse Bry’ came to be. I gave him a little panda friend because the panda has always been his animal - he used to wear a panda beanie all the time and his album had a panda on the cover. Again, there’s not really a fun story behind this one, I guess it’s somewhat fun because it’s the first art I made after finishing my psychology exams in October so it was nice to actually have the time to draw.

James Bagshaw

Ginger talking about Temples for the third post in a row? it’s more likely than you think! I did this one last week, I’d had a bit of a wobbly day and had group therapy on Teams in the evening and I just couldn’t concentrate on what was going on and I ended up doodling Mr James E. Bagshaw, the glitter crying fraggle man himself. It’s a bare-bones drawing that I could definitely work into more but I’m happy with it as it is to be honest. I’ll be damned if I’m going to sit and add the individual bits of fringe to his jacket, just thinking about doing that makes me tired. Maybe I’ll get around to drawing the whole band at some point...

Alice in “Wonderland”

This one is from about 5(?) years ago, it’s not my typical style and was a “study” based on another artists work (basically i just had to copy this fellas work). I’ll be honest, this one has a sketchy backstory that I won’t go in to because it’s not exactly a nice one, and because of that I also won’t say who the artist is that it’s based on. Despite this, I’m still really proud of this one and I’m so sad that I never got this piece back after I got taken out the class. I’ve considered trying this style again, I’ve even joked about doing another Conchúr drawing in this style as a nod to my progression through GCSE art, eventually leading to Conchúr drawn in ink on music manuscript and stained with neon paint and dyes - it would be quite the project!

So this has been quite a lengthy post so apologies about that but life goes on. Similar to the vinyl post, I’ll probably add to this as and when I make more art. Even if no one is reading these posts, I’m enjoying making them so that’s the main thing. It’s just nice to document things and the feelings that go with them. 💕

~ Love Ginger xx 

29/11/2020

[rumandtimes]

“Bossypants” by Tina Fey: A pre-view

Luigina Cecchina-Tarquina

Assoc. Lifestyle Contributor

When I picked up Tina Fey’s book, I knew little more of her reputation than as a female comedian. I expected a chuckle and some depiction of a woman’s take on the world of hollywood success — I would not have expected to come across a racist book that struggles to relay a single joke while recounting the life of a southern woman’s bygone teenage years, but then, what would one expect from a cast member of “saturday night live”.

For those who are even aware of Saturday Night: Live (SNL), it is common knowledge that Tina Fey, and saturday night live for that matter, are controversial figures in american media. It seems to be a split right down american society: people who find Tina Fey “L-O-L” funny, and people who find her humour unsufferable; people who tolerate the blatant racism of snl and 30rock as “satire,” and those who have had enough of the denigration, minstrels, slurs, and tropes for cheap comedic effect.

I know Tina Fey is a comedian — a clown — and sets out to prick peoples ears and widen people’s eyes. To quote another comedy critic, I do not seek to come off as someone wilfully misunderstanding humour and repeatedly not getting the joke.

Yet the illusion of that decision is for those who do not remember that Bill Murray had a sketch on snl, where he dreamed about “turning from ‘brown’ to ‘white’”, and the more recent habit of snl writers hiring minorities as comedians to attack themselves on the show with slurs, because it would look less objectionable than if the writers denigrated those actors or people themselves. In Tina Fey’s book, she states that “As a Greek,” she would “only date a ‘white’ man, such as a redneck” inexplicably fond of camouflage.

But to quote that same critic again, humour has a goal; It has an audience. When engineered to subvert expectations and play to the common denominator, jokes have a base which they are founded upon. If that baseline for the comedian or writer, like Fey, is a bedrock of deep-seated racism, which the comedian exploits rather than lampoons, it is no longer a humorous observation, but a cheap, racist ploy servicing an already receptive racist base.

Tina Fey saying she would only date in a certain imaginarily-defined group is racist. Full stop.

Fey going on to say she would date even the lowest, “redneck,” in that category, before anyone else in the world is not less racist — as Fey probably expected her statement to be received (by deprecating people of European-descent with ethnic slurs like “redneck” or “hillbilly” or “honche”, rather than solely praising their racist memes) — but it is more racist, as Fey is simultaneously using racism to make fun of her suitors, and again using racism to elevate even them above anyone and everyone else.

Not to “belabour the point,” as Fey would appreciate, or focus on one bad joke: but Fey’s joke is playing to long-festered notions of racism, colonialism, and rogue supremacism, which Fey buys into rather than challenges, where Fey herself puts (1) any “Aryans” above (2) rich Europeans, (3) Greeks above poor Europeans, and (4) poor Europeans above (5) the rest of the living world. It is inane — and stupid — but a strongly held delusion among groups (1) through (5), and probably strongest among groups (2) to (4).

Fey happily plays with this unholy flame of racism, undergirded by genocide in her native South, fuelled by the segregation in Fey’s own high school, and leaving embers of anti-marriage laws across the American East.

That is not to say racism, colonialism, genocide, holocaust, mob rule, political repression, et alia, are not to be joked about — they are the most popular comedic material in the United States (even if only in the United States). But these topics are deadly serious, and not as distant and abstract as we would like them to be.

There is a real possibility, given their frequency and recency, that anyone who read the first edition of Fey’s book, or attended same secondary school, committed a hate crime, using the exact same rhetoric Fey employs as a “joke.” Not only that, Fey never says it is a joke — there is no punchline.

The only reason I give Tina Fey the benefit-of-the-doubt and assume she was not serious about what she said is because the statements where so outrageous and absurd that someone would have to be insane to print them in sincerity, and equally as ungracious to print them even in jest.

Nonetheless, it was never expected to have to wrestle with these issues, which Fey has ill-managed, in a comedy memoir. Maybe if it had to do with Fey’s experiences or personal identity (as “German–Greek”?) it would have a more natural place. That is, if Fey had been the victim of racism, and condemned it, even through humour, that would be expected, cool, and fine. Fey calls herself “Greek,” but only tongue-in-cheek, and it’s apparent she doesn’t speak Greek. Fey calls herself “German,” but only in relation to being American, and it’s apparent she doesn’t speak German.

What we learn is not how Tina Fey suffered racism, but her experience in adopting racism itself. It offends the senses, and anchors the book.

While hardly intended to win over the intellectual crowd, some of Fey’s items over the years cannot be ignored. Conventional culture, and Fey herself, would seem to agree, after the firing of certain snl comedians and the pulling of certain 30rock episodes, that just went too damn far.

This puts Fey in the precarious position of defending her legacy of racist and baiting comedy, and that of her colleagues, as now she has been outed as admitting herself that she has crossed the line on several, several occasions. But does that mean that Fey is accommodated now that she has made a partial apology? Or is that the mere beginning of scrutiny now that critics have gotten their first concrete admission of her failure?

Fey, and many of her cultivation, say such racist things in order to just have meaningless fun, or in order to make fun of the racist. While Fey and the others may consider this to be in good fun, and an inclusive way to overcome racism, at the end of the day you have subtly racist comedians repeating the words of violently racist hate-mongers for the entertainment of an audience often apathetic to the realities of racism. That is to say, with such willingness to commonly, repeatedly, and recklessly embrace such a serious topic, they can miss the mark.

The impulse may be that racism is so at the heart of American culture and popular life that it is expected that a pop culture figure embrace it (similar to why comedians talk so much of ornery subjects such as politics), and that they should not be taken seriously as comedic plays on the feelings of the populace.

However, comedy is nothing if it does not play to the sentiments of the crowd, and the cover of the clown mask is a poor excuse for crude thinking. In Fey’s apology for racist comedy sketches on her show 30rock, she echoed a previous comedians apology, David Letterman, when she said that intent is less important than perception when that perception causes innocent people pain. In Letterman’s statement (on a different subject), Letterman also says it is not about intent but perception that forced his apology and goes so far to say that if you must explain a joke, it wasn’t that funny anyway, so there is no sense in defending it.

Elizabeth Xenakes Fey, or Tina, has been a supporter of progressive movements in the country, but it should not be overstated to what extent, nor should the virtue of this support be overstated. Fey’s famous endorsements of Barack Obama versus John McCain, and of Hilary Clinton versus Donald Trump, and moreover her critical statements of Sarah Palin’s alliance to both McCain and Trump, have been definitive to her identity as a good liberal and progressive person who supports women’s advancements.

Yet, so too did the majority or Americans. It is not a controversial stance to support the candidate that won the popular vote of a national election — and, sadly, many racist people, both aware and unwitting, also vote for so-called “progressive” candidates for different reasons, despite their problematic stances. That is to say, being a Democrat is not exculpatory of anything. It should also be noted that Fey endorsed Clinton over Obama in the primary, and refused to endorse Bernie Sanders (or Clinton) in the next primary, and Fey describes herself and her works as “neutral,” rather than progressive.

Fey’s most famous work in comedy, the impersonation of Sarah Palin wasn’t as scathing as one might expect of a true critic, but was in many cases humanising, and even flattering. Fey was not kind in undermining the Tea Party spokesperson, but Palin was made out to be an odd yet loveable figure, rather than a contemptible one: she was written off. As Fey’s alter ego said herself, ‘it would be egotistical for saturday night live (or anyone else) to believe that a couple of jokes swung the 2008 election.’

Tina Fey has many hard questions to answer for racist depictions in her sketches, television series, and book — and it is not so easy a dodge to say that she once ‘made fun of Sarah Palin.’ Another reviewer stated, “I don’t think Fey comes off as a bad person, I just don’t think she’s funny.” Tina Fey doesn’t come off as a good person, or a bad person, but just presents as an ordinary person, and whether you find Tina Fey (or mor importantly, any of her jokes) funny is a personal and indeterminable matter.

I watched a few of Fey’s “world-famous” skits for this review, and I admit I did mistake Sarah Palin for Fey in their cross-over cameo skit; And the moment I laughed the hardest (in fact the only moment I laughed through the skits) was during the VP Debate Sketch with her fellow southerner, Jason Sudeikis, where “Biden” repeatedly attacked Scranton, Pennsylvania as “the worst place on Earth” — so again, people react to comedy in an unpredictable way, as a basis of personal experience. I don’t think all of Fey’s jokes make it, yet no one can singularly define anything as “funny,” or not, but I do see her as a professional on screen. I don’t give a pass however on bad interest jokes, especially on the mere basis of not liking Donald Trump (who, remember, is also a television celebrity who has worked in comedy, and made jokes that were blatantly racist — and sexist).

Entering Fey’s book, “Bossypants”, with this pre-review (re-preview?) in mind, it introduces to me that this memoir may turn to places unexpected, and that just because it is a celebrity-text does not mean it will be a simple, casual, or homey, ride.

[amwritesitall]

TV Show Preferences for the Sarahs (AHS+Alice+Tammy+Harriet)

Masterlist

None of you asked for this but I have some thoughts lol

Billie Dean Howard

The Lana Winters Special

I stand by this. Billie Dean is a Lana Winters fan

Some nights when she’s up late she’ll turn on a late night talk show

I also feel like Billie would lowkey love game shows? 

Like she would love to play along sometimes quietly

Sometimes yelling at the television

Might watch a paranormal show occasionally

But most of the time she ends up getting annoyed at how fake it is

“They’re not even trying!”

“You’re not supposed to do that!?!”

“Billie, maybe we should watch something else?”

Lana Winters

Watches the evening news every night

She likes to remain informed on everything going on

I mean it’s kind of her job to be informed

She watches any special news event

Enjoys the political satire that is sometimes on SNL

Post Asylum Lana wouldn’t watch a lot crime documentary shows about serial killers and such because it would give her flashbacks

She would watch limited series though like Hollywood

She would totally watch Mrs. America

Docu series Hillary

Might watch The Handmaid’s Tale

Cordelia Goode

Cordelia watches TV occasionally to unwind

I don’t think she has many favorite shows though

She’s content just to watch whatever you want to

She just wants to wrap her arms around you and hold you close while you watch your favorite

If it’s a magical show she definitely would crack quite a few jokes on how wrong it is

Bette and Dot Tattler

Bette likes to watch those dramas targeted for teens

Or soap operas 

She LOVES the drama

And I feel like Dot would kind of lowkey like them

She’ll roll her eyes but secretly be into it

She likes to guess what’s going to happen next

Dot likes mystery shows

And some spooky shows that cause Bette to hide her face in your shoulder

Sally McKenna

Out of everyone Sally would be most likely to watch American Horror Story

True crime shows

And on the total opposite end of the spectrum she would watch reality TV shows

But she’d get annoyed with the Kardashians 

Ru Paul’s Drag Race?

Live tweets whatever she’s watching whether it be a competition show, reality TV, or drama show

Audrey Tindall

Audrey Tindall is a Billie Dean fan so she’s watching Billie Dean’s show

Because they’re married

Audrey strikes me as the one who’d watch a ton of reality TV

Probably watches Project Runway

The Real Housewives

She’s a fan of the Beverly Hills ladies and New York

Below Deck and all of the spin offs

Reality TV is a good way for her to decompress from a stressful day at work

Also seems like she’d watch Dynasty

Audrey loves drama and hot people

Ally Mayfair Richards

Ally cannot watch crime shows like Law and Order: SVU and all that

She is WAY to paranoid

Watches the news religiously

Especially during times of crisis

You have to pull her away from the TV at times to get her to stop dwelling over it

During election years and the time leading up to it, she will watch every single debate and town hall meeting 

You and her watch Oz’s shows with him sometimes

So she does know quite a bit about superhero shows

And other random action shows because if Oz likes something, she tries her best to get to know it as well as she can

Wilhemina Venbale

Wilhemina would watch the news every morning before work as she drinks her coffee and every night around dinner time

Mina does not watch TV without a purpose unless you want to watch something

But by herself she will rarely watch TV unless she’s learning something

I feel like she would watch PBS if she isn’t watching the news

She appreciates the period dramas

Masterpiece Mystery

Alice Macray

Would be a regular to the Cooking Channel, Food Network, and HGTV

The Great British Baking Show

At first you don’t see the appeal, but then she insists you watch it with her and you finally get it

The show just radiates good vibes like Alice does

She would also like a good PG sit com

Alice is so pure

Most likely to watch Shark Week?

Would love nature documentaries

Tammy

When does Tammy even get to watch shows that aren’t meant for children?

There is almost always some children’s show on TV

She’s always either with her kids or working on her side hustle

When she finally get’s time for herself, she would be like Alice and watch HGTV

The thought of Tammy watching Shark Tank makes me chuckle

Tammy wouldn’t be opposed to many shows, so she would be alright with whatever you would want to watch

Harriet Hayes

Harriet has some odd work hours so she doesn’t really get to watch that much TV

She would enjoy a light hearted comedy

She tries not to get into shows too much when Studio 60′s not on break

Breaks are the only time she really gets to watch much television

Could be a little into crime shows?

Harriet’s taste in television would be all over the place

And when she really likes a show she’ll binge the hell out of it once she gets the chance

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