#reflecting on that one ask i got forever ago that was a whole analysis about how will’s suppressed sexuality is actually ace coding

[wibble-wobbegong]

say “mike sucks dick” and you get a few chuckles

say “will sucks dick” and SOCIETY.

[animefreak1145]

The Irony of Adler and Bell

Call of Duty: Black Ops Analysis of Adler’s Brainwashing

It’s me again. And I’m here with another analysis! This time based solely around Adler. It’s always about Adler. But also Bell.

And this is about the brainwashing of not Bell, but Adler.

We have all had our theories since we first saw Adler getting tortured in the Cinematic Warzone Trailers, shown in Season 3 of COD:BOCW. Our suspicions growing when we see Sus Adler™️ doing what he does best in Season 4 by stealing an important looking chip within the crashed satellite that was taken down. (Also, Hudson, what is wrong with you letting Adler be cleared for a mission when he was just rescued like two weeks ago?!)

And although we did not see him in Season 5, we can all gather that anyone could be potentially brainwashed if you have a certain brand of earpiece. (Woods and Stryker appeared unaffected despite having their own earpieces). So the naive hope and calming words to others that Adler being different and strong is out the window. All it takes is hearing the numbers. What do the numbers mean, Mason?

Besides Bell wasn’t your average run of the mill agent either. An amazing decoder and created codes(I am with the theory that Bell did create the codes for Perseus that we have to decrypt in the game for Operation Chaos and Red Circus) with a brutal close combat skill as well as charming based on how one could talk to everyone and be a social butterfly. Also, able to handle and withstand torture after one hour of leaving Cuba despite previous injuries AND be able to go to Solovetsky/Duga and able to aim and shoot despite having a needle shoved in their eye a few hours earlier.

Bell had crazy skills. Just like Adler does. Bell was brainwashed. So is Adler.

Confirmed with this bundle that will be released. Thank you to @reclaimedbythesea who first found it and pointed it out.

We have the confirmation—the amazing, horrible, war criminal man we all love has become an agent of the man who he swore to chase down and capture/kill for longer than a decade. (Adler said thirteen years in COD:BOCW universe, so 1984 it would be sixteen years. Sheesh. Correct me if I’m wrong. I may be mistaken.) Is it wrong I kinda find it funny? Especially since he did the same thing to Bell—believing it to be necessary. Just as Stitch I’m sure finds it necessary.

It’s just a big brainwash back and forth between these two countries, a race to see who has the most mindless agents on their side in the end. But we’re not focusing on that.

We’re focusing on how Adler’s karma finally caught up to him with all his war crimes. We can infer that he hasn’t just done a cruel action like that to Bell, but to others. “Whatever it takes.” That’s his motto. He’s messed up other’s lives—hundreds, maybe even thousands. The Vietnam War has a deep dirty history, such as the real operation of Fracture Jaw, Operation Ranch Hand with the use of Agent Orange, the Mai(My) Lai Massacre and who knows how many other operations that would/did affect civilians. Not that I would see Adler doing anything like the massacre, but you can’t expect me to not believe that he may have been involved with Agent Orange somewhat? And who knows what other operations and missions he’s done as a CIA agent after the war?

My point is, the man has been gathering karma for awhile. Not just with Bell(I am aware he had his orders in the war, I’m just saying I’m not sure if he feels much guilt about some said orders. Guilt I believe he may has, but I’m not sure it’s a high degree.) Of course, Bell isn’t a saint either. They were willing to kill millions with Perseus after all. A wayyyy higher body count than Adler. And who knows what Bell did with Perseus even before the Greenlight plan? Didn’t seem to mind millions blinking in an eye, so must be pretty cold or delusional about the whole free world killing their country thing. Thank you @yunatheintrovert for this post pointing out and showing a hint of just how not good a person Bell was.

I’m not going to say they deserved what happened to them due to Adler. I feel for Bell. I really do. Just like I can’t say if Adler deserves it for everything—just can’t say that because I’m not at liberty to judge other’s actions and claim what is deserved and undeserved. Leave that to judges.

But now I’m going to point out certain things—other things. Such as what I think to be Adler’s “new” name. At least to those in the Perseus Collective/Stitch.

Do I realize that “Cipher” may just be what this awesome skin is called? Yes. Will I rather ignore it and rant about the name for two ten minutes? Also yes.

On to the analysis!

ci·pher/ˈsīfər/: a secret or disguised way of writing; a code.

This first definition is what we can all gather of what the numbers represent—the code and simultaneously the key of brainwashing others in earpieces with just a certain order of number together.

Stitch and co. used said numbers on Adler, so why not call him Cipher? The Code? Funny, cause he killed Bell—the Decoder. Maybe Bell would’ve helped him out if he didn’t kill them.

Another hammer to the irony of between these two.

But no. The name gets better. Second definition!

ci·pher /ˈsīfər/: a person or thing of no importance, especially a person who does the bidding of others and seems to have no will of their own.

PAHAHAHAHAHA! *clears throat* Now, this, this is what I think Stitch calls some true vengeance. Not only did he get to torture the man who did the same to him before, but made Adler a shadow of who he was before. A husk. Nothing really there. “Whatever it takes” indeed but for the opposite side now—a puppet with numbers for strings. Stitch did a good job in naming Cipher—I mean Adler. We don’t even know how far Adler shall go now, will the CIA have to kill him or will they be able to recondition him when/if they capture him? Will he even be the same? Nope.

Why do I find that definition funny? Well, I think Adler had a multitude of reasons for naming Bell, Bell. Just like Stitch did with Adler. And not just the obvious reasons of him ringing the bell at them to condition them as he was torturing/brainwashing them(we love Pavlov!). Let’s get the first definition out the way.

bell /bel/: a hollow object, typically made of metal and having the shape of a deep inverted cup widening at the lip, that sounds a clear musical note when struck, typically by means of a clapper inside.

I wonder if anyone knows where I’m going with this or I’m starting to seem like a madwoman.

I’m going to ask you guys to focus on the word, “hollow” for me. Hollow, as in not filled. There’s something in the bell alright, but it doesn’t do enough to fill out the hole does it? Like Cipher is now made a husk. Bell was made hollow—only a little bit filled with the little memory they got back before they were killed(maybe they weren’t, let’s just go with it for now). Or perhaps just a bit filled with false memories of Vietnam, of camaraderie. I doubt Stitch did anything like that.

Also, Bell is just an instrument for someone else to play. Play the right tune, and the Russian agent will do anything for you. Right, Adler?

Cipher is the puppet, just doing what he’s told when they give the orders. No will or thought. Just how Stitch likes it.

I’m not done yet! Second definition!

bell /bel/: a. A stroke on a hollow metal instrument to mark the hour.

b. The time indicated by the striking of this instrument, divided into half hours.

Another play on words of Bell being struck(jabbed with needles) to do what needs to be done. But it also represents the limited time that Bell has. Bell needs to help to stop Perseus and quick, Adler will make them go faster if needed by putting the highest dosage as possible without killing them to accomplish it. Or maybe it’s also a representation that Bell does actually have limited time left—Park did say MK—Ultra will be hard on the body physically and mentally. Perhaps MK-Ultra was slowly killing us and Adler just decided to give us a mercy kill while he was at it as he “tied up our strings.”( @cryinginthebackseat does point this out in their Adler/Bell story, go check it out!)

Let’s focus on the instrument thing again though, but back to Cipher. The third definition!

ci·pher /ˈsīfər/ : a continuous sounding of an organ pipe, caused by a mechanical defect.

Oh man. Sounds like Adler is being played like an instrument too, continuously due to all the numbers and how the numbers can be everywhere if one is in the armed forces since they all use earpieces. Interesting shape too, a pipe. Long and thin and has two holes, a beginning and an end but which one is the top or the bottom? The beginning and the end? We don’t know how far Adler will go like this—as Cipher. It will eventually come to a point, where something squeezes within the pipe and manages to get out. Maybe. Or maybe Adler is just forever defected, like the definition suggests.

Not quite Adler anymore and just Cipher.

Just like Bell will always just be Bell. The other self practically gone.

It seems these two will always somehow reflect and affect one another, whether one is dead or not.

I swear I love Adler, so don’t mind some of my dark humor about him and this situation he’s in. It is pretty funny. At least to me. Stitch is funny. And petty.

Hope you guys enjoyed!

@salvija @smokeywhalee @quizzyisdone @efingart @samatedeansbroccoli @weirdoartist21 @tr1ppylady

[reimenaashelyee]

Capturing a Portrait

A post I wrote in March and cleaned up. Reposted from my blog (which has more thoughts on craft and other nonsense). About Alexander Comic.

----

A year in... and I think I've got him.

Disclaimer: I won't deny it. Alexander is impossible to get an accurate picture of. His personhood is made out of sand and everyone brings their own bottles to shape him into. I don't think my jar of sand is the One True Alexander, nor will it ever be. But the good news is, all the other jars aren't that either. The nature of his (after)life is elusive. That's what it is.

But I think I've gotten a hold of him. I mean this in an authorly, character-study sense. I think I've found something interesting.

In the beginning, I had three images of Alexander that I used as my guide: 1) the journey to the Water of Life with the Servant 2) the siege of Thebes 3) the many faces of Alexander. Later I added a fourth image, tied to Hephaestion. Those are the four ingredients for this brain stew. I let them sit. I let them bubble.

There's also a motif that comes up in the ancient biographies and the Alexander Romances: the pursuit. The drive to do things, see things, be things.

Pothos. Desire. Longing.

For a long time I had this suspicion of a particular type of sadness in Alexander's story. I didn't know the name, but I saw the symptoms: the competitive insecurity with his father, the destructive restlessness, the death/fallout of his friends one by one through his own hands, the death of Hephaestion totally out of his hands, the breakdown of his empire after his own death.

Even in the Alexander Romance, the legendary accounts that make him heroic also double down on that sadness. Alexander, kingship is wicked. Alexander, you'll die and never see your beloved mother/sisters again and that's your problem. Alexander, look at this poor, deformed stillborn child – it represents your end. "From my coffin, show the world only a rag in my hand. Say that in the end I die not with the kingdom I sought, but with scraps." Oh, it turns out that Alexander specifically is not fated for the water of life. The two angels warn him, turn back. "You may conquer the world, but the only land you physically own is the land on which your two feet stand on." But even that land is fleeting.

Pothos. A longing for a goal forever out of reach. A goal already lost in its accomplishment. Death gets to you first.

That was the name of the sadness.

Now, I don't intend to use pothos to absolve him. It is sad, but it is separate from the choices he made (in life and in fiction). I still have every intention to put him in the fire.

But I think I got him. My Alexander.

Pothos is not the most original thing ever. I mean, the ancient historians and the Alexander Romance writers already use it. I totally borrowed it from them. And besides, pothos is a posthumous motif that originates from a storyteller's (well, historian's) analysis of Alexander's life. Objectively, it has nothing to do with Alexander's real state of mind, whatever that may be. But man, that motif is powerful and potent and dazzling. No wonder it survives with his memory.

That's why pothos so core to my project and why it needs to remain a thematic forefront.

-

Not too long ago, I had a kind of epiphany related to the philosophical attitude of some of the Romances. It started as a spark of familiarity at first. Why does the attitude seem so familiar? I realised that, of course, it's the same philosophical attitude behind some of my favourite stories in media. And those stories happen to be East Asian. Japanese, especially.

Now, I already came into Alexander Comic with my postcolonial South East Asian lens. I grew up with a lot of Asian media that was only for the Asian gaze, with no consideration or need for Western understanding – alongside Western media, both Hollywood and artsy European and in between. So the way I view the world and the way I tell stories will reflect that media diet. Sometimes it tells me things I wouldn't have known if I had stuck to one source of media.

The funny thing about pothos is that this concept of transcience and imperfection is a whole thing in Japanese and Chinese thought. Mono no aware, wabi sabi, kintsugi... (sorry, all Japanese terms since I'm unable to find the Chinese equivalent... due to a language barrier)

The joy and sadness of autumn. The sand between fingers. The idea that nothing lasts forever and that’s why they are beautiful. The brokenness of a thing being its history. It’s not a brokenness be proud of, or to disguise; it’s simply a brokenness that’s just is. Mundane magic.

It's a thing in the non-English West too.

Saudade. Ubi sunct. Hiraeth. Memento mori.

Closer to home, it's what rindu (and sometimes, sayang) means.

I find it fascinating how someone who used to be the king of the world had not only lost his empire, but his own story. We in the modern world have almost nothing from Alexander's time that speaks about him, to him, and from him. Much of what we know is secondhand, either some hundred years after the fact or from someone else not him. A king of the world cursed to be known by everyone and no one.

-

Admittedly, it's a long dizzying way to obtain a portrait of Alexander... and who knows if this portrait is objectively in line with the real person (probably not! I mean, who knows!). But I think this exploration is part of being an Alexander Romance author.

Nizami said it himself in the first chapters of his own Sikandar Name E Bara: he was a poet overwhelmed with a thousand treasures, desperately trying to find pearls out of them to string into a beautiful narrative. Heck, forget Nizami. Arrian said it too: he had to read through fables and books (Arrian paraphrasingly calls them "trash" in contrast to Nizami's "treasures"), desperately trying to find the best-sounding materials to make his biography of Alexander.*

*the Anabasis is not part of the Romance

At some point in the future, someone will ask me who or what my Alexander is. It won't help that my Romance is neither a straight biography or a complete fantasy, though it includes some of both to paint his portrait. But that's my Alexander. A mish-mash of junk and trash and history and legend. A mosaic or stained glass of foreign words with no equivalent in English.

[castielstiddies]

Okay so I'm balling over this goddamn song and destiel and I need to let you all know why so here it is: An Analysis of the Lyrics and Why They Fit Destiel Perfectly.

I just want to point out that Andrew Rannells (Whizzer) and Christian Borle (Marvin) perform this perfectly and I love them.

This is a very long post so be warned before you press that button.

It's important to have context so we can connect these two pairings together properly and bring more meaning out of this song like it deserves. So the main part of the synopsis says:

"Marvin, after Whizzer’s death, reflects on their relationship and how loving Whizzer has changed his life. Whizzer’s spirit come back, dressed as he was in the first scene, both commenting on how they changed each others lives and on the future they were robbed of."

Now let me just change some words here and we'll see how we all feel:

"Dean, after Cas’s death, reflects on their relationship and how loving Cas has changed his life. Cas’s spirit come back, dressed in his trenchcoat, both commenting on how they changed each others lives and on the future they were robbed of."

Are you crying yet? Don't worry we haven't even seen the lyrics yet.

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"[MARVIN]" Now I'd like to start off by saying that Marvin has been with both men and women and he's struggled with his own internalized homophobia and has found it difficult to openly love Whizzer throughout the show. The parallels are clear between Marvin and Dean.

"What would I do If I had not met you?" You can think of this two ways. One - What would Dean have done if Cas had not met him in Hell and saved him? Still getting tortured or more likely torturing others, an experience that he hated and wished to never live through again. The second (and I think better) way to think of this line is, when Dean met Cas on earth. How meeting Cas changed his life forever, opening him up to a whole new world of having someone who thought that he deserved to be saved and who gave up an entire army for him. Who proved his love and loyalty to him time and time again. So what would Dean have done if he had never met Cas on Earth? What if Cas never reached out to him after saving Dean from Hell? A little bit later in this verse Marvin sings...

"There are no answers"

...in regards to this question. Because there really are no answers to what would Dean have done without Cas because we simply can't imagine it. The same goes for Dean. Cas has changed his life so much that it's impossible to imagine what his life would be like without Cas.

"Who would I blame my life on?" When Christian Borle delivers this line on stage it's said with a small, sad laugh. Similar to how Dean uses humour to hide his feelings, Marvin does too.

"Once I was told That all men get what they deserve Who the hell then threw this curve?" Despite everything Cas has done wrong, Dean and all of us know that Cas did not get what he deserved when the Empty took him. We believe he deserved to be happy with Dean and Dean thinks so too.

"There are no answers But who would I be If you had not been my friend?" The word 'friend' here is what really ties it to Dean for me because they were friends first, they helped eachother through thick and thin before love started to seep in as well. Sure there was attraction from the beginning but it's about the fact that Dean's only shown to have one true, close best friend, and that's Cas.

"You're the only one One out of a thousand others Only one my child would allow" Alright so this line I did struggle to link to destiel, I was thinking about Jack and Claire but they're Cas's children. But what if we think of the 'child' as Sam. Dean raised Sam so it's easy to see him as his 'child' and it's important to Dean that Sam accepts the people that he's friends with. This is even more important with Cas because Dean may want to have a relationship with him in the future and also Cas lives in the bunker... with them. Dean definitaly needs Sam's permission if he wants Cas to live in their home. It's clear that Cas and Sam are the people Dean cares about the most and to have Sam 'allow' Cas to stay in their home and share their space is something that's really important to Dean.

"When I'm having fun You're the one I wanna talk to" Cue every gif of Dean smiling while hanging out with Cas or talking to Cas over the phone.

"Where have you been?" Where has Cas been for all of Dean's life? He completes Dean, builds up his self-confidence and assures him that he is wanted, needed and important. Just where has Cas been for all of Dean's life?

"Where are you now? So on this note there's a beautiful key change into the next part and it just makes it so much more profound. (Also Dean has no gosh darn clue where Cas is, who tf is the Empty?)

"Who would I be If I had not loved you?" This moment is fucking beautiful. It's Dean finally speaking his truth and telling Cas, wherever he is, that he loved him. He loved Cas and that changed him for the better, made him into the person he is today.

"How would I know what love is?" Dean has never been told so openly and honestly by anyone about how he is important, he's worthwhile and that he deserves to live a happy and full life, no one has done that besides Cas. No one has shown their loyalty and love to him in the most blatant and profound ways possible, giving up an entire army, rebelling against their own family, sticking by his side no matter what. Staying. How would Dean know what true love is without Cas constantly showing him what love means and what it feels like be loved fully and truly. Of course Dean has experienced love before, he's been in at least 2 other relationships (that I can think of off of the top of my head) but he's never felt love like the way he does with Cas.

"God only knows, too soon I'll remember your faults Meanwhile, though, it's tears and schmaltz" Of course as Dean relives memories of Cas, he'll be reminded of all of his faults, all of the things he did wrong even when he thought that what he was doing was right (Leviathians, Lucifer). But for now, Dean will breakdown and cry and grieve but most of all he'll remember Cas and how much he loved him.

"[WHIZZER]" Alright so Whizzer is a character who has never been shy about his sexuality, about how much he likes being with men. Similar to Cas who simply doesn't understand why people hide who they're attracted to until Dean came along and taught him differently.

"All your life you've wanted men" I like to think that this line applies to both Cas and Dean and I'll explore that with the next two lines.

"And when you got it up to have them Who knew it could end your life?" This is getting a bit meta now. When Dean was so very close to finally speaking his truth on screen, he died. (And in some versions he does speak his truth but that's another story). There was no reason for Dean to die in the finale, who knew that when he finally shared that he loved another man he would be killed for no reason two episodes later.

This line can also be in reference to Cas's experience. When Cas was finally able to tell Dean that he loved him, when he finally gained to courage to not only share his feelings but also to have his happiness ripped away from him, he died. Dean and Cas both knew what was going to happen when Cas said those words. It wasn't a surprise, yet it still felt like one.

"[MARVIN] I left my kid and left my wife" This is the moment when I could not stop crying and thinking about destiel when listening to this song. Dean left Lisa and (totally not) his son in season 5.

"To be with you" Of course it's a little bit of a stretch to say that Dean left Lisa and Ben solely for Cas (expecially since I think Dean realised his love for Cas in Season 7-8 so the timeline wouldn't make sense for me) but I like to think of this line from the perspective of Dean grieving Cas and looking back on how Cas changed his life. Of course he would remember that he left Lisa and Ben in order to be with Cas because that was 10 years ago and the memory is now muddled with grief, time and his now unwavering love for Cas. "To be insulted by such handsome men" This line just reminds me of the scene in the car when Cas and Dean are arguing (you know what I'm on about)

"[WHIZZER] Do you regret—?" Cas is asking Dean, do you regret loving me? Do you regret letting me into your life? Do you regret our friendship? It's beautiful to think that Cas feels vulnerable in this moment, he thinks that Dean regrets letting him into his life.

"[MARVIN] I'd do it again I'd like to believe that I'd do it again And again and again..." Now Dean's the one to build Cas back up, to assure him that he does not regret a thing. He's building up Cas's confidence and supporting him just like Cas has been doing for Dean.

"And What more can I say? [WHIZZER] What more can I say?" They're both lost for words, what do they say now? They know that they love eachother and they know that they won't be able to be together because of Cas's deal. What do you say in that situation?

"[MARVIN] How am I to face tomorrow?" Dean still has to continue living, without Cas. In 15x19 he's drowning himself in beer as he grieves the loss of Cas. How can he face tomorrow after Cas has confessed his love for him and then died in a matter of minutes? How can he face tomorrow knowing that saying that he loves Dean, that by having Dean know that someone loves him, is the happiest moment Cas has ever felt?

"[BOTH] After being screwed out of today" Haha screw...

"Tell me what's in store" They're still looking to eachother for guidance and support despite the distance between them.

"[MARVIN] Yes, I'd beg or steal or borrow" Dean's turning to things that he can control in order to deal with his grief. Despite the finale ending I think it's widely accepted in the Destiel fandom that Dean would work night and day until he got Cas back from the empty.

"If I could hold you for One hour more [WHIZZER] One hour more [MARVIN] One hour more [WHIZZER] One hour more [BOTH] One hour, one hour more" Now that they know that they both love eachother, that they could have had everything they wanted if they just told one another. They're begging all of the higher powers that there are that they could enjoy what could have been for one hour. Simply relishing in the fact that they are happy and in love and that they are both wanted.

"[MARVIN] What would I do [WHIZZER] What would I do [MARVIN] If I had not seen you? [WHIZZER] If I had not seen you? [BOTH] Who would I feast my eyes on?" Once again I'm just thinking about the idea of that 'one hour more' and how they would constantly compliment one another and freely look at each other without shame or embarrassment and to just allow themselves to have everything that they wanted.

"Once I was told That good men get better with age [MARVIN] We're just gonna skip that stage" This can be seen two ways, one is that Cas simply cannot age and Dean is once again using humour to hide his grief. Or my favourite version which is that Dean never got to grow old with Cas, (I strongly believe that Cas would allow his vessel to grow old with Dean). Dean wanted to live a normal life, he wanted to get a job and stop hunting but most of all he wanted to grow old with Cas.

If you watch the live version of this song here: https://youtu.be/ZscL4LOLP7Y

You'll hear how Christian Borle's voice cracks when delivering this line. The rest of the lyrics are repeats of lines that I've already covered.

And I'm done boys. Thank you for sticking with this very very long post but I needed to get this out somewhere.

I highly recommend watching Falsettos for yourself if you want to get a better insight into how Marvin/Whizzer and Destiel compare or if you just like the look of it.

[7biases]

RM - Vlive Mono Summary

Mono’s meaning

Words that use the prefix mono, such as monopoly and monodrama.

Monochrome; 흑백 (Black and White) words that use the prefix mono, such as monopoly and monodrama

What he wanted to concentrate on: Releasing the pent up energy in his body. He didn't want to prove himself after all, just because he desires that, doesn't mean people recognise him in the way he wants anyway. So he simply did what he wanted to do

Namjoon got rid of the name “mixtape” because there was no particular need to, because it's popular to release tracks in the form of a playlist on Soundcloud recently, and also because each of the rappers released one each.He believes that people don't listen to albums through anymore; the focus is on the leading track, and people pass over the B-sides, skits, intros, outros. We live in a life of 'instants', like instant food shoved in the microwave. 

Rather than the simple catharsis one song brings, the catharsis that a playlist/album brings when listened to in order is so much larger. Only then can there be true recognition of it as an artwork. His dream therefore was to release a properly created album with a proper form. And from there, he wanted to write hooks well - and from there, wanted to create a good song. So he saw the forest before the trees. After that, to create a good album in its entirety.

Namjoon recorded the tracks in 2-3 days. It was done quickly, since he couldn't record while overseas. Namjoon says he's not going to say much about each track, especially any sort of analysis. What he hated most in school was analysis of poetry, understanding the poet's context and reason for writing. After all, that might've not been the reason anyway.

TRACK 1: TOKYO It was already given to him with the title. The title was perfect already. Donghyuk wrote the song, a friend of his since 10th grade. It's the first time they've worked together in this way; D as the producer, RM as the artist. D doesn't usually have him listen to songs, but he did for this one. And Namjoon  thought it was really good. D suggested that it would suit RM, and RM pounced on it. D said there needed to be whistling, and so they set up the recording in his studio. It added a dramatic effect. RM on Tokyo: "When you listen to it, it's a lonely song. I mean, it is for me."

TRACK 2: SEOUL RM wrote the lyrics in bits and pieces over a month. He began with the hook. The verse took a year. He kept searching for what he wanted to say, the words he wanted to use (2017 Summer). 2017 August: worked on it as a whole. Right before mono was released, he re-did it thrice. When Honne worked on it, they had to rerecord. It took a long time for him to find the right tone, a careless/thoughtless tone. It's a song he holds very dear.

TRACK 3: MOONCHILD RM assumes we would link it to 4 o'clock, but in fact, work on Moonchild began first in 2017 February. Moonchild is for those who like the night more; for those who are unable to breathe in the daylight due to work or such. "People like me. I don't put that much weight in the night [anymore]. But I made this song in a time where I believed the night set me free."RM actually brought someone in to sing for Moonchild, but it's the only track that failed in that regard. As a result, he ended up singing.With a laugh, he says that we might've been like "Why is he singing so much!" It wasn't what he'd hoped for. He'd done the demo, and so thought he might as well. Verse 2 particularly took a long time; this too took around 2 years.

TRACK 4: BADBYE RM worked on this one from early 2017 too. He was really into the harp back then, but it's changed a lot. eAeon was brought in from the beginning. RM says he was one of his hero when he was young. They met in a bar a year ago, but RM saw him recently to ask specifically for this song, saying "this song won't work without you, it has to be you." Thinks it as an important bridge for the later tracks of the playlist. He wants to say another thank you to eAeon hyung, for this song wouldn't have worked without him. He's sad that he couldn't request him for a longer song.

TRACK 5: UHGOOD "This was supposed to be Reflection." It's a song that Bang PD and he both really like. It's a heartbreaking song for him. The drums in the beginning were too bright, so he requested for another version. He did the recording all over for a calmer feeling. "I like the title so much, I really liked it. Rather than saying it's pretty, it was appropriate. It holds a lot of emotion."                              

TRACK 6: EVERYTHINGOES This is the track he wrote in the 3 days when he had to return from BV1 early [because he lost his passport] -- not that it only took him that time. He says that these lyrics are the mantra (주문) that he wants to say to himself.Just the mixing took 6 hours and the producing over a month. RM wants to say a deep thank you to Nell since he worked on this track too - truly some of his heroes. He hopes that this song can be a comfort. Because sometimes, rather than emotional or logical words, a hug means more.  

TRACK 7: FOREVER RAIN RM wondered how to use the word 'rain' that an artist is allowed just once. [He's saying that it's an oftenly used word.] It was made in a time when he was really obsessed with wanting to do everything for a track, from the beats, lyrics, everything. RM wonders "will there be a time I am able to write something that touches me?" He wants Forever Rain played at his funeral. He doesn't think there can be a song that's more him than this

Namjoon doesn't know when he can have us hear his next project, but he's already begun the 1st. He wanted to release something he's not embarrassed of, unlike his mixtape RM. He wanted to make songs that people would remember a long time. He would like if there is even one song from the playlist that we remember in the winter. For there are certainly songs that we can't forget, that are in our life's playlist.

cr. doyou_bangtan

[thetrumpdebacle]

When she heard the news story of the 13 siblings allegedly held captive in their California home by their parents, Susanne Reisenbichler’s said her first reaction was, “Oh no. Somebody else.”

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Reisenbichler and her sons Govinda Angulo and Josef Reisenbichler said hearing the reports on the Turpin siblings brought back memories of what they experienced while being confined to a cramped New York City apartment until just a few years ago.

The Riverside County Sheriff’s Department said 13 siblings — ages 2 to 29 — were allegedly being held captive at their home in Perris, California, by their parents David and Louis Turpin. When discovered, several of the children were “shackled to their beds with chains and padlocks in dark and foul-smelling surroundings,” the sheriff’s office said.

Authorities were alerted to the situation when a 17-year-old girl, who apparently escaped from the home, called 911 and said her 12 brothers and sisters were still being held captive there, the sheriff’s office said.

The parents David Turpin, 57, and Louise Turpin, 49, have each been charged with 12 counts of torture, 12 counts of false imprisonment, seven counts of abuse of a dependent adult and six counts of child abuse. David Turpin was also charged with one count of a lewd act on a child under the age of 14 by force, fear or duress. They have pleaded not guilty.

“I was horrified, and beyond that, it brought just a flood of emotions and memories and thoughts of my own experience and my children’s experience,” Reisenbichler told ABC News’ “20/20.” “It really was more than shocking. It was just so many emotions at once: a lot of compassion and empathy and also understanding and knowing exactly what they went through, what those children were feeling.”

Susanne Reisenbichler says since the documentary “The Wolfpack” was released she’s been working on her memoir and writing children’s books.

“It definitely struck a lot of chords throughout the years since that story has been told from our family. I’ve done what I can to put it away, but it’s brought back a lot of memories,” Govina Angulo, now 25, told “20/20.”

For more than a decade, Reisenbichler shared an apartment with her now-estranged husband Oscar Angulo, her oldest child and only daughter Visnu and her sons Govinda, his twin Narayana (who now goes by Josef), Mukunda, Bhagavan, Krsna (who now goes by Glenn) and Jagadesh (who now goes by Eddie).

Oscar Angulo, a Hare Krishna devotee from Peru, forbade his children and wife from leaving their apartment and held the front door’s only key. Aside from the few trips outside allowed for appointments or strictly controlled visits to New York tourist destinations, the children had no contact with the outside world.

ABC News

Twin bothers Govinda Angulo and Josef Reisenbichler reflected on their life since leaving the small New York City apartment they were confined to for over a decade.

“Our father was pretty paranoid about a lot of things,” Govinda said.

On the 16th floor of a public housing development which the family of nine called home in Manhattan’s Lower East Side, the children were raised in four small rooms, homeschooled by their mother. Neighbors told “20/20” they didn’t see the children.

By the time the children had reached their mid-teens, Angulo had covered the windows of the apartment with blankets, and claustrophobia began to take a hold on the brothers. It wasn’t until one day in 2010, that Mukunda, the third youngest who was 15 at the time, found the courage to step outside alone for the first time.

Though her family had more freedom and less harsh conditions than the Turpin siblings allegedly lived in, Reisenbichler said she found similarities between her family’s experiences and that of the Turpins.

“When I heard the 17-year-old, I thought, ‘Mukunda was 15 when he broke out, so it’s a very close age,’” Reisenbichler said.

Magnolia Pictures

Until five years ago, the six Angulo brothers were rarely let outside.

“I can’t, you know, speak for every family who’s gone through similar experiences. But I guess … with anybody who’s … confined you only know people from that world that you’ve been confined to,” Josef, now 25, said. “I think we knew in our gut that our situation was not right and we just didn’t fully understand it and but… because you have only each other to reach out to and to make the best you can out of it with whatever you can because a bond happens.”

After the boys, known as “the Wolfpack,” started leaving the apartment more often, they eventually gained more freedom to explore the outside world.

For years, the family didn’t have any outside friends until the brothers met director Crystal Moselle, who befriended them after she saw the boys walking down the streets of the Manhattan with their waist-long dark hair and sunglasses.

Moselle turned the family’s story into the documentary, “The Wolfpack,” which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in 2015. And their lives haven’t been the same since.

Reisenbichler said it’s a complex question to ask why her children didn’t leave their homes sooner.

“Most people have that thought, ‘Why didn’t you leave? Why didn’t you get out?’ And that is whether the questioner realizes it or not,” Reisenbichler said. “It’s projecting blame onto the victim or the survivor, you know, asking, ‘Why didn’t you do this?’ Because it’s a very, very complex situation and it’s not easy to understand.”

Govinda Angulo

The Angulo brothers who starred in the documentary “The Wolfpack” say they continue to adjust to life outside of their apartment.

Josef said it’s fear of the outside world fostered by his father that made it especially hard to leave.

“That’s why it’s hard to break out and why you hold back for so long and why you hold back from any kind of help that may be possible, because it’s the conditioning, whether you realize it or whether you feel in your gut that it’s wrong. It’s very hard to break that especially when you become used to it your whole life,” Josef said.

Josef said that as his family met more people and slowly got to know more of what it was outside of their apartment, he feared what would happen in the future.

“’Do we go back? Do we break away from it forever?’” Josef recalled thinking. “It’s a break in your reality and you don’t know what’s going to happen and you don’t really know especially how to feel about it. You don’t know that you feel that this is a good thing or if this could just be a road to some [worse] thing.”

Though they said their lives have since changed for the better, Govinda said the experience will always be a part of them.

“In a way, it’s shaped us for who we are… I don’t know how we would’ve turned out if it had been something with the Turpins we went through,” Govinda said.

Govinda Angulo

Govinda Angulo, left, and two of his brothers are pictured together riding the train.

Reisenbichler said she watched as her sons overcame the hurdles of learning “how the everyday little details of a normal society are carried out.”

“They had to learn directions and how to go places and what subway lines went where and how to pay for a subway card and how to use the subway card. That was a really big thing, and just things like paying for food in the grocery store or going to buy a notebook … let alone preparing for job applications,” Reisenbichler said. “If you’ve never seen it and you’ve never dealt with it, it’s overwhelming. And I really have to give my children a lot of credit in how extremely well they’ve just handled everything, and just, you know, bounced through and they’ve just embraced all of the things that they’ve had to learn and catch up on, that people who are 10 years old already know normally in our society.”

“Some of the hardest adjustments I think mostly is having personal connections with other people because you feel you don’t,” Josef said. “Your own reality and our reality was so far removed.”

“In reality, we’re still adjusting,” Govinda said.

Today, many of the brothers have moved out of the apartment, and Oscar Angulo no longer lives there.

“My husband is no longer living at the apartment, and there was a big celebration for that. And I am still little by little continuing to work on a memoir of my life and my time with my children. And I’m also in the middle of working on some children’s books,” Reisenbichler said.

Both Josef and Govinda share an apartment with a friend.

When asked if they had a message for the Turpin siblings, Reisenbichler said, “I would like to say to the family that, don’t lose faith and don’t lose hope.”

“And however hard it will be, don’t be afraid to connect, to reach to people,” Govinda said.

via The Trump Debacle

[askprinceakechi]

OOC Anthy/Akechi comparison

Wooooooo boi, I’m sorry this took so long. I actually rewatched the entire Black Rose arc and end of series before I wrote this so I could have it fresh in my mind. If only I had an easier time seeing all the Akechi scenes too. 

Thank you both for your intrest! Also I havn’t seen Evangelion in so long but please, Anon!!! I would love to hear their comparisons as well, please send them to me!!!! @reversalsun

I’m gonna preface this by saying this is not a “Akechi has done nothing wrong” post. Akechi has done many things wrong. Akechi has done some truly terrible shit. I do believe Akechi to be a tragic figure however and more so a product of a lot of shitty things. Despite this being, like, way too long this is only the bare bones of my analysis of both Akechi. Hahahaaaa, if you want more on Akechi and how I in particular view him and his bs lemme know. Though some will be coming out with asks on the blog depending what people ask. I’m so sorry I’m incredibly long winded, this is like, 5+ pages omg. Good luck reading all of this losers.

ALSO THIS IS LIKE ALL SPOILERS. YOU PROBABLY SHOULDN’T READ IT UNLESS YOU’VE COMPLETED AT LEAST SHIDO’S PALACE. BETTER YET THE TRUE ENDING TO THE GAME.

 The major similarity between Anthy and Akechi however is their position of power. Or rather, their lack of power. Both have crumpled under a much more powerful thumb. Anthy, who accepts her role and who even fears life outside of it; while Akechi has turned a blind eye to it. He’s not dumb, Akechi knows he is being used but he seems to view himself from an underdog position. He thinks it’s all just a matter of time until he can flip the script and turn it around on Shido. Akechi only accepts this power being held over him as a temporary thing, hell even something as part of his plan. No matter how untrue it is. Anthy knows she is being used as well, but rather than take it as a temporary thing she has accepted this as her role in life. It is all she knows.

 They both work through so many layers of masks. Neither Anthy or Akechi seem fond of revealing their true face. The only time Utena ever sees Anthy’s bare face are few and far between, most notably the time Anthy attempts to commit suicide and at the very end of the series after Utena tears open her coffin. Otherwise her true self is concealed behind a pleasant and demure face, only hints of herself showing through when she chooses or cracks a bit. Akechi is very much the same (hell he gets referred to as the “pleasant boy”). His mask is almost as unshakeable as Anthy’s, only she has had forever to perfect it while Akechi is only human. Akechi seems to have quite a few different faces. One of the public, one for ‘acquaintances’ and one for “””” friends””””, under that his true self very much like a matryoshka doll. They don’t like to say what they mean; their words are picked deliberately and often have double meanings that need to be dissected. Or, all they say is fluff. Soft pleasantries that are used for very little other than to pacify or distract from their true selves. Anthy and Akechi are both very manipulative especially when it comes to defending their true selves from any more hurt.

 They’re both used to pain to their masks. This is pain they know well, it’s expected, familiar, a demon they know as well as a lover. It still hurts but something they know how to handle it, and so they guard their true selves viciously. The only way they could truly feel the pain again would be from an injury to their true self. Thus, no one gets to know who they are. To know their true self would be to open up their only weakness. To know their true self would be an ultimate show of trust. Anthy gets hers, Akechi, starts but ultimately does not.

 Their tragedies also both started at a young age. Anthy starting even before she sacrificed herself to the crowd to protect her brother. Akechi’s started from birth and came to a head when he lost his mother. Both were only children when their path of misfortune was laid out for them, and both took the terrible path with stride.

 Anthy gave up her freedom, took on the mantel of rose bride and succumbs to the swords of human hatred in an ouroboros cycle as many times as Akio demands it of her. She is a puppet of Akio, a puppet of end of the world, a puppet of adolescence and a puppet of her own fear. She lets all of this own her.

  Akechi gave up everything in hopes of revenge, respect, and a will to actually be wanted. Akechi has to be, what? 17 in the game? Assuming it was the first, and assuming the whole thing with Wakaba happened roughly two years ago Akechi’s final turn down his path of ruin truly started at 14-15. Still deep in his adolescence, still a child in just about every respect. Akechi hands over all authority he had as a person to a monster like Shido before he ever had the chance to really understand what that meant. He put the puppet strings on himself and gave them to Shido thinking it was all part of his own plan for revenge. He was a child betting in an adult’s game and rather than the adults protecting him they ensured his ruin. Once he had established what he was capable of and the world of the Metaverse to Shido he had sealed his fate. There is no way a man like Shido would ever willingly give up that sort of power. Akechi was trapped to doing his bidding or to die, and he knew that. However, his own pride his want to be acknowledged kept him from just killing Shido himself. It would be a hallow victory if Shido died without ever knowing his crimes and without ever knowing who it was who bested him.

 Just as Anthy had ensured her own imprisonment to Akio. After all she was the only perceived way for him to regain the power he had as Dios. She was the only one willing and capable of being skewered by the swords of human hatred and letting Akio get off completely undamaged. She was the only way to get Dios back after she had sealed him away for his own protection. Akio wouldn’t willingly let her go. Not that it was something he ever had to worry about before the end of the series. Anthy wouldn’t leave him without her own revolution.

 Both were keys to the power of those who were using them and both were unable or unwilling to leave their abusive situation.

 A part in which he differs from Anthy but I still find it important to mention.

 Akechi truly has been a puppet all along, of Shido and more importantly of Yaldabaoth. He, who, just like Akira had been had picked by a god to lead these lives is given the absolute worst draw. Because, unlike Akira, Akechi suffered all through it alone. Akira has the Phantom Thieves, he has his confidants and most importantly he has Morgana. Akira got a guide though the world of the Metaverse and someone to teach him the ins and outs of how the heart worked. What would possibly kill someone.

 As far as we know Akechi got none of this. Akechi traversed the Metaverse alone and a bit of a head canon from myself it was a form of escapism for him. Suddenly Akechi was special. He had a power no one else ever could have, he had a world that he alone could enter and that he could control. After being such a lonely child, after losing everything and everyone and being an unwanted being from the beginning he could be special. Not to mention he get a persona with that, either Robin Hood or Loki or even both at once. Yes, they are a part of him, a reflection of who he is but in the same breath it was a voice that wasn’t his, and a mind that wasn’t truly his. He was no longer alone.

 We are not told exactly what happened with Wakaba. We don’t know if Akechi knew that killing her shadow would kill her in real life as well. We don’t know if he was just trying to enact a change of heart just like the Phantom Thieves would later do. We just don’t know. As a personal head canon, I don’t think he knew. I think he was trying to prove he could affect her as a way of showing his power to Shido and he ended up killing her. Without searching out whoever the person whose shadow he killed he wouldn’t have a way of knowing beforehand that it actually killed them in the real world. Or, perhaps he never fought those types of shadows in the first place. Another thing left up to speculation.

 “If it cannot break out of its shell, the chick will die without ever being born.” “We are the chick” “The world is our egg” “If we don’t crack the world’s shell, we will die without ever truly being born”

 A line that refers to actually, everyone. Every person is a chick stuck in their shell and until they are ready to pass from adolescence to adult they are unable to break their shell. Seriously one of the only straight forward lines that exist in the series.

 Anthy is stuck in her shell. She is doomed to die again and again because she refuses to break out. In the end, the world is an allusion to their passage from adolescence to adult. She refuses to grow up and rather is willing to stay in the school with Akio, and continue to be the rose bride for all eternity out of fear and love. She is scared of the outside world, and yet, no one can break the shell but her.

 The same goes for Akechi. His own fear, his own wants, desires and hurt keep him from growing as a person. They keep him from breaking out of his own shell and rather he rots, he festers in his egg and is doomed to die. He’s stuck in his own adolescence and the mistakes he made as a child because he won’t crack his shell to breathe. He’s also scared of the world outside of his plans, out of what he knows. Another head canon of mine is that Akechi has no clue what he would do with his life if his plans succeeded. If he killed Shido, if he made him acknowledge Akechi as the one who bested him and as his son. He has very little will and drive outside of that, he’s lost another reason he has put off his plans for so long.

 Anthy near the end of the series thanks Utena for letting someone like her. Someone hallow and empty with no heart have a taste of true friendship. Although, at this point she follows Akio still she is regretful about how this all has turned out, and is upset how she has hurt and betrayed Utena.

 Akechi gets a small taste of this as well. Although the Phantom Thieves never trusted him fully he was still on the team. Akechi still got to feel what it was like to be on a team with his peers and even laments that “If he had only met (Akira) a few years earlier…”. He got a taste for friendship and comradery and what his life could have been had he just had friends.

 Another point I bring up is Anthy stabbing Utena at the end of the series and Akechi shooting Akira.

 The reason Anthy stabs Utena is up to speculation. If it was because this is what Akio told her to do, if she really is evil (She isn’t), but the theory I like best is Anthy does it out of fear. Hope is a scary thing to someone who has been in a position like Anthy’s. She sees Utena fighting Akio and finds hope in her. She sees a chance of Utena actually beating Akio and is frightened of her hope. If she does win then, what does that mean for Anthy? Would she get to leave? Would the Rose Bride no longer be needed? Would Akio die? Would Dios really come back? What about the swords of human hatred? Would they attack Utena instead of her? She has no way of knowing. No one has ever come as far, ever actually cared for her, or was her friend like Utena was. She stabs Utena out of fear of the unknown and misplaced kindness. Better one sword from a friend and some harsh words than taking on all the world’s hatred.

 Akechi has wildly different reasons for shooting Akira. First being he was told to. This was part of the plan that Shido and himself had worked out. The second being that Akira was in his way. The Phantom Thieves were poised to be able to take out Shido before he ever could enact his full plan. He couldn’t let that happen because (head canon) everything he had done up until then, every murder, all the blood on his hands, would be for nothing if Shido didn’t know it was Akechi who killed him. Third (Also head canon) his own fear of the unknown, of the future has him wanting to protect Shido in an odd way. Shido is terrible and he hates him, he wants him dead. He however is also the only one blocking Akechi from the future.

 I swear I’m almost to the end of this.

 The adolescence of Utena, and Revolutionary girl Utena the titles are both huge points to the story itself. In the end Utena is a story about growing up. It’s a story about breaking the cycles of abuse. It’s a story about the how no one can save you but yourself but how someone else can spark that revolution inside of you. It’s a story about how revolution doesn’t have to be this huge world ending thing, but rather the revolution inside a single person. In the end Anthy realizes all of this. Utena doesn’t become the Prince because the Prince is dead. It’s an outdated and childish concept that is seeped deeply in toxic ideals of staying the way things have always been. The Prince is about staying in your adolescence and playing pretend that a magic castle would grant you power, would grant your ‘revolution’. Utena realizes this too.

 Utena isn’t the one who pulls Anthy out of her coffin because just like the egg no one can pull you out of it but yourself. However, Utena showed Anthy the way out and she showed Anthy that the cover can be removed. Utena sparked the revolution in Anthy’s heart and in the end Anthy climbs out of her coffin by herself. Anthy breaks the shell of her own egg. She herself is the revolution so desperately coveted. She leaves the school, she leaves Akio, she leaves behind her chains of The Rose Bride and becomes her own person. She has grown up.

 Just like Anthy, Akechi has a revolution sparked in his own heart as well. In the end, when the Phantom Thieves showed him kindness despite seeing who he truly is. Despite knowing all his crimes, they still show him mercy. They don’t abandon him and they don’t try to kill him when he has been defeated. He begins to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Had it not been for the Cognitive! Akechi showing up I truly believed Akechi would have had a revolution as well. In the end, Akechi had a chance to go back to his old ways. He could have just shot Akira like Shido and Cognitive! Akechi wanted him to. He could have given himself that second chance to keep going so that /he/ could be the one to kill Shido. Like he had always planned.

 He doesn’t.

 Rather he sacrifices himself to save the Phantom Thieves. This is his revolution no matter how small. This is his start at redemption even if it is cut short by death. Akechi climbed out of that coffin, he broke out of that shell, and though he was met with death he threw off his shackles with the help of the Phantom Thieves. Akechi finally had a taste of freedom.

*FINGER GUNS AWAY* I’m tired now

[dinodrifterdarsh]

Star Versus the Forces of Feels and Procrastination: Timeline/Analysis Part 3

In an effort to crank out this before the S3 movie premiere, I’ve cut out a whole spiel on how Star totally screwed herself over in the Marco department, and what lessons are in that and why it all makes Star a great character. I’m gonna shove that into another post at some date in the vaguely-near future because that’s a damn important lesson the show imparts. Instead, you all get some hopefully-slightly-better-than-mediocre analysis of the last 3 episodes of Season 2!

Here’s a link to Part 1!

Part 2 linked here!

TL;DR: Just Friends has Star continue to do what she thinks is “right” by further pushing Marco and Jackie together. Star has accepted that Jackie has “won” Marco, so there’s no reason for her to pursue or have feelings for Marco, so that totally means the feelings will just go away (SPOILER THIS IS REALLY BAD REASONING).

Face the Music shows that Marco is still completely clueless about Star’s feelings for him because Star has been pushing him and Jackie together and has still only showed interest in Oskar. It also causes further conflict within Star by showing her how telling the truth isn’t always the best or right thing to do.

Starcrushed reveals that Star is able to realize that she did have a crush on Marco in retrospect; however, Star demonstrates that she still believes the right thing to do is deny her feelings for Marco until outside circumstances force her hand.

JUST FRIENDS

The big question that invariably comes up during this episode is “why did Star set up Marco with Jackie even more given that she obviously knew her feelings for Marco at this point?” Luckily, I have an explanation consisting of “teenagers are not good with emotions,” “character flaws can make feelings hard,” and “am I projecting my own experiences haha oh dear god why was I so stupid when I was younger.”

One of Star’s big character flaws is her tendency to avoid confronting problems until they are unavoidable. Even Marco notes this and points it out to Star, who to her credit is aware of this major shortcoming. However, Star is also a kind bug and she’s trying to become a more responsible person and princess. That’s still a work-in-progress sorta thing, and unfortunately for Star, the events of Bon Bon the Birthday Clown handily screw things over. On one hand, Star is still denying her feelings because they obviously complicate matters (she’s his best friend and roommate, Marco only has eyes for Jackie, etc.) and thus the classic Star thing to do is to pretend the problem-her feelings for Marco in this case-does not exist.

But at the same time, Star is also trying to be a responsible person and a good friend to Marco. I touched upon this at the end of my last analysis, but I firmly believe that Star accepted or tried to accept that Jackie had “won” Marco by the end of Bon Bon the Birthday Clown. This is reinforced in the beginning of Just Friends, when Star buys the tickets for Marco and Jackie and tells Marco that him and Jackie are “a thing now.” And friends help each other out, so Star should push Jackie and Marco together more because hey Marco’s finally got his dream girl and is so happy, and Jackie’s really cool and nice too! That’s great for them and Star totally wants to see her friends happy, so she should help them!

In case it wasn’t clear, this is not a good course of action for several reasons, but that’s the topic of yet another “in the ‘near’ future” post.

Other outside forces also make it really convenient for Star to not address her feelings. Star’s legitimately distraught over losing the Book of Spells, which is reflected by the fact that very shortly afterwards she attempts to retrieve the book. Pursuing the book is the responsible thing to do, and Star in Season 2 has tried to become more responsible and worthy of being the future Queen of Mewni. Obviously, she’s still not very good at that, but taking the steps to retrieve the book, and later trying to make a replacement when that fails, shows that she’s genuinely making a serious effort to mature. Unfortunately the timing of events means that it’s also a good way to not have to think about her feelings, because “responsibility” dictates that she needs to focus on magic/the Book.

Anyways, back to Just Friends. Star sets up Marco with Jackie because again, the “right” thing to do is to help Marco get closer to Jackie, especially because Star has accepted that Marco and Jackie are an item now. Star really, REALLY puts her all into suppressing her personal feelings and genuinely trying to help Marco and Jackie. She gets the tickets (something Marco would never have done on his own), she makes concert tees, she reassures Marco that he’s good enough for Jackie….and yea, it’s hurting her a bit on the inside, but hey Marco’s happy so it’s totally worth it.

And then we get to the climax of the episode, the Love Sentence concert. The analysis is unfortunately pretty simple here.

Star’s enjoying this. She’s spending time with her best friend Marco, singing a song they both love, and yes the song lyrics are relevant (better analyses of it have been written) as Star is trying really hard to feel only platonic things for Marco.

And then this happens. Remember, Star’s never actually seen Jackie and Marco kiss.

And no matter how hard Star tries to deny it, it’s killing her inside. Star now knows how close Jackie and Marco are, and in what way-specifically, the way Star isn’t close to Marco. But Star will do her damndest to make sure Marco doesn’t know how she feels.

And Marco believes her. Because he trusts Star.

Star tries to stay, but after seeing one last kiss between Marco and Jackie, she leaves. She’s accomplished her goal-get Marco with Jackie, but in doing so has broken her heart.

FACE THE MUSIC

The big takeaway from this episode in terms of feelings progression is that Marco is still, until the very last few minutes of this episode, 100% clueless about Star’s feelings towards him. Which is still understandable, given that Star has only shown overt romantic interest in Oskar still AND that Star has been actively pushing Marco and Jackie together for quite some time at this point. Remember, Marco is not in the position of the viewer-he trusts Star to say how she really feels, and when Star is pushing him with Jackie and says “I have a crush on Oskar,” Marco believes her because again, that’s what best friends do. This theme/issue of trust and the truth is played up big in this episode, and it culminates with Star revealing the truth about the book during her Song Day. Star does this for multiple reasons: she wants to be honest and wants people to know who she really is and accept her, she’s got low self-esteem with regards to her abilities as a princess, and she’s still kinda selfish at times).

But the response of the crowd-overwhelmingly negative-and Moon’s response and rebuttal to Star’s actions, which is basically “yea lmao the truth is not always the thing to say” is very, very important. Star staked a lot on that Princess Song-she put herself out there and soundly failed. Because of the debacle that’s Song Day, Star feels that her decision to not tell Marco how she feels has been, in her mind, somewhat validated. Because sometimes the truth isn’t good enough. Or maybe it is, as we’ll see in Starcrushed.

STARCRUSHED

Things start off awkwardly, as expected. Good job not being awkward Star. You tried, I guess.

Let’s think things through from Marco’s perspective, because even now, Marco isn’t actually sure that Star has a crush on him. Now you might be going “HOW ARE YOU SO DENSE MARCO” but it’s actually fairly logical. Remember that Star and Marco, despite the awkwardness of Song Day, are still very close to each other. They know each other damn well and have risked life and limb for each other several times.

Marco TRUSTS Star, or at the very least trusts her judgement when it comes to their friendship. So when he directly asks Star if she has a crush on him and she denies the crush, Marco accepts what she says because he trusts what she’s saying. Either Star says “yea i don’t have a crush on you” there are 2 options: either Marco trusts Star’s words at face value, or he trusts her judgement in denying it (meaning that she wants him to act like there’s no crush). Again, Star has done EVERYTHING to hide her feelings from Marco, up to setting him up with Jackie several times and flat-out telling to his face “I don’t have a crush on you.” And again, Marco’s only seen Star be attracted to Oskar. Now, Marco’s also feeling awkward, because Star having feelings for him would be super awkward given everything that’s happened up to that point contradicting the idea that she has a crush on him (plus the whole, y’know, Jackie is dating him thing).

So when Star denies it all with a very valid excuse-that she didn’t tell Ruberiot to put that stuff in the song, it was all him and she never knew and he was just doing it because he wanted the Princess Song to be different-Marco is glad to accept because it’s also the least painful path forwards for both of them.

And Star’s fine with this course of events. Except not really. The denial still hurts her like hell, and she tries to smother the pain by recreating her crush on Oskar.

But she doesn’t get the same twinkle in her eye when she sees Oskar, and the resulting scene just shows how incompatible they actually are for each other, and how Star’s romantic tastes have changed much in line with her personality maturing.

Star knows, even when she’s talking to Moon, that her “crush” on Oskar is a load of crap. She’s come a long way, but it’s only when Moon says “lol we leaving Earth forever let’s go” does Star finally, FINALLY decide to do what she should have done a long time ago, and tell Marco her feelings.

Unfortunately, the circumstances surrounding this confession suck, and we got this heartbreaking scene. On the plus side, as of the end of Starcrushed, Marco is now forced to consider-at least briefly-Star as a romantic option once more, for the first time since Blood Moon Ball.

Anyways, that’s the end of this analysis. It’s not great, I know (I might edit it better when I have the time), and the timing….could be better. To say the least. But I’ll make it up with some S3 analysis and a CHARACTER STUDY of sorts of Star in S2!

See you all after the Season 3 premiere, LET’S GOOOOO

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Happy December 25th

In which I describe why the holidays have not gone so great for me, and how fucked up my head is.

I’m not a fan of the holiday season. For the last several weeks, I’ve been trapped in a vortex of anxiety and stress fueled partly by projects and goals I’d set for myself independently, but primarily driven by a sense of obligation imposed by this time of year. In general I have a tendency to step up and offer help when asked, even if I don’t actually have time or resources to commit to doing such a thing -- the lesson of saying “no” to projects when I am too busy is one that I still really haven’t learned that well -- and this tends to lead to a lot of stacked deadlines and undue pressure put on myself. And the holiday season amplifies this already intrusive neurosis by echoing a general societal pressure to show goodwill to ALL people, which is not feasible at the best of times, let alone when there are several other ongoing commitments I’ve made and cannot hope to satisfy.

Furthermore, I don’t handle gift giving culture very well. My head twists this practice intended to show generosity into a practice that imposes obligation; “oh, thank you for giving me this item -- now I suppose I need to get you something of equal or greater value, otherwise I’m kind of a selfish asshole.” Worse yet, since I personally don’t care much for monetary value of items, that means I feel the need to mirror sentimental value, which is pretty difficult when you get right down to it. Manifesting how much I care about someone into a physical item is really difficult for me, and this makes finding even a single gift for a single person a really strenuous process. And since it doesn’t scale, I inevitably fail to get gifts for most people I know, which gets spun by my inner voice as me being that asshole I was afraid of being at the beginning.

My defense mechanism of choice between high school and graduating from college was just ignoring the traditions altogether. I was still young enough that nobody really had any expectation of me getting gifts for anyone. But I did begin generating a bit of a toxic perception of shallowness around it all: “Christmas isn’t really about generosity to the rest of humanity -- it’s a celebration of our slavery to consumerism and capitalism.” This Freshman Philosophy analysis of the holiday justified shutting myself off from any celebration, and began convincing me that avoiding participation just demonstrated my woke cultural criticism.

But, of course, this was really just a rationalization for actually being an asshole. Although I’ll still maintain that gift-giving traditions establish problematic notions of emotional value being tied to consumerism, at the end of the day that valuation exists, and disregarding it necessarily means disregarding what other people care about, which is kind of definitionally what makes someone an asshole.

Which brings me full circle back to the beginning: thanks to my wonderful tendency to over-analyze everything, I’m fully conscious of all of these facts. I’m aware how stressful gift-giving is, and I’m resentful of it, especially because my values aren’t in line with the consumerist nature of the practice. That resentment makes me not want to participate, which drives me away from people, and puts me on edge when I’m around them during this part of the year. But since I can’t avoid people forever, I tend to be thrust unwillingly into the holiday anyway, which burdens me with obligation I don’t want and am honestly really awful at delivering on.

So, getting past the rambling diatribe, you hopefully get a sense of my headspace entering into December of 2017. Compounding this were multiple stressors in quick succession:

 * I was scheduled to judge a Grand Prix event in Portland, and got assigned to working all three days of the event (I typically only work two days and take one off to play, in the interest of allowing my hobby to continue to be that rather than a job).

 * I also volunteered to present at a judge conference the Thursday before that event (effectively extending my work schedule to FOUR days, plus the prep work before the event).

 * I ALSO volunteered to help schedule a local conference only a few weeks after the tournament was finished, meaning even more prep work before and after returning home.

 * I agreed to travel to San Francisco with my parents the week after the tournament, which proved to be much less of a vacation than I’d hoped.

 * In the background, I’ve been ramping onto a new team at work, which has had me feeling all those lovely incompetent feelings of starting a new job, but even better because technically I was still at the same company so “why didn’t I know this better already?”

 * I had volunteered to let a remote coworker stay with me while she was in town for a concert, and she arrived literally the day of the local conference.

In other words: between the week before Thanksgiving and about two weeks before Christmas, I was in a perpetual state of ongoing stress, which theoretically was separated by vacation time, but realistically that vacation time got spent working on projects and delivering projects. And all of this happening while I was marinating in the usual misery of the holiday season.

Two weeks ago I broke down. I can recite the triggering event, but I’d prefer not to, especially because I don’t think that one incident was the sole factor. Suffice it to say, after a very uncomfortable conversation, I ended up spending an entire day so engrossed in self loathing that I was unable to concentrate, and actually passed out at my desk on multiple occasions. Not because I was tired, but because something deep inside me genuinely felt that being unconscious would be preferable to being awake and trying to deal with the turmoil I had going on in my head.

I’ve never experienced anything like this before. I mean, I’ve felt Imposter Syndrome, and difficulty concentrating at work. But this was something much more drastic, and I’m still at a loss for words at how to describe it accurately. And although it would probably be unfair to qualify this experience as an emergency (I wasn’t suicidal or dangerously lethargic), I’m still terrified of what this means about me and my own mental health.

Moreover, as I reflect back over the last several months (well before the holiday season kicked in, and all these stressors started devouring my attention), I feel like there have been many moments of general malaise and unpleasantness in my life. I don’t document my day-to-day experiences very well, so I don’t know that I can testify clearly to whether the feelings I’ve had over the last few weeks have been reflected for the last several months, but I’m worried they have. And if they have, I’m afraid I won’t know how to resolve this.

But perhaps the most twisted part of this whole ordeal is that no matter how I contextualize this experience, my head keeps spinning it as being my fault somehow:

“It was just a couple of nagging thoughts. Guess you should have figured out how to push those thoughts away and concentrate on what mattered.”

“It could be burnout. Guess you shouldn’t have screwed up your vacation.”

“Maybe you have depression? Guess that makes you a burden to those around you who have to deal with your insufferable depressive moments.”

It’s currently just past 2 AM on December 26th. I’ve been unable to sleep, despite being exhausted. This weekend I’ve dived into learning to play synth piano, built prototypes of image compression software I’d been reading about online, and gorged myself on YouTube videos debunking “Alt-Right” politics and discussing shockingly nuanced views on social justice in 2017. My mind is a buzzing with a flurry of ideas I want to think more about, and write down, and discuss.

My mind is also still drowning in enough melancholy that I spent the last hour writing about how much I hate the holidays and how crappy the last few weeks have been rather than any of those things.

I tend to put a lot of faith in the concept that the human brain is such an incredibly complex system, these sorts of seemingly contradictory experiences are just expected. It doesn’t lessen the confusion I feel being tangled up in this mess, but it does give me hope that I can learn to embrace the weirdness and move forward with my life.

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Section 1: Creative Investigation-

To what extent is David Lynch an auteur and how does his style create questionable representations of women?

For my creative investigation I will be exploring to what extent that David Lynch is the author of his own films using a basis of Sarris’s auteur theory to analyse Lynch’s claim to the creative rights of his work. I will also reflect on how the representation of female characters in his films is entwined with his style but could have questionable ethics, using feminist film theory (Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., pp.117-130.0) alongside auteur theory (Grant, B. (2008). Auteurs and authorship. 1st ed. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.) to consider this. I will investigate if the eccentric mystery of this director makes him the auteur of his eccentric and mysterious films. I will discuss how his origins as a painter and artist, his life outside of his film career and his collaborations affect his film work and his authorship over it. I will consider this in an analysis of three of his focal films. Firstly, ‘Eraserhead’ (Eraserhead. (1977). [film] Directed by D. Lynch. USA: American Film Institute (AFI)) is a horror written and directed by David Lynch starring Jack Nance, Charlotte Stewart, Allen Joseph. Henry Spencer tries to survive his industrial environment, his angry girlfriend, and the unbearable screams of his newly born mutant child. This film was the first definite choice to look at when analysing Lynch’s filmography. It is his first feature film after his original shorts, ‘The Alphabet’ (Lynch, D. (1968). David Lynch the Alphabet. [video]) and ‘The Grandmother’ (Lynch, D. (1970). The Grandmother - David Lynch. [video]). In these shorts he was really testing out his style and techniques but with minimal plot or story, it was his transition from the classical art world to the film art world so was heavily based on image and colour and light. This film is his first foray into feature films, so it is very dark and intense and focused on unnatural imagery to unsettle the audience. It is one of his most complex and non-linear works and something really career defining I believe. Secondly, ‘Blue Velvet’ (Blue Velvet. (1986). [film] Directed by D. Lynch. USA: De Laurentiis Entertainment Group (DEG) is a drama-mystery-horror hybrid written and directed by David Lynch starring Isabella Rossellini, Kyle MacLachlan, Dennis Hopper. The discovery of a severed human ear found in a field leads a young man on an investigation related to a beautiful, mysterious nightclub singer and a group of psychopathic criminals who have kidnapped her child. In my opinion ‘Blue Velvet’ is one of Lynch’s more logical and plot-based films and is more naturalistic than ‘Eraserhead’ for example. I think this is an interesting contrast between his work that is extremely surreal and his work that has more thriller elements. And finally, ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ is a drama-mystery-horror hybrid written and directed by David Lynch starring Sheryl Lee, Ray Wise, Madchen Amick. A young FBI agent disappears while investigating a murder miles away from Twin Peaks that may be related to the future murder of Laura Palmer; the last week of the life of Laura Palmer is chronicled. I chose this film as I am very interested in the Twin Peaks series and film and it is the first work of Lynch’s I saw years ago. I feel it amalgamates a lot of Lynch’s styles and techniques of horror so would be really beneficial to look at. It was also controversial in people’s opinions when it was released as Twin Peaks series fans did not like it, however other spectators struggled to follow it as they did not have the context of the series. This meant it missed its market in some people’s opinions, however personally I enjoyed the film and think it is a good insight into lynch as a director and creator. It’s use of base, family disturbance to hit on key human fears is an important part of Lynch’s style and this film really plays on that.

  ‘David Lynch: The Art Life.’ ((2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda) was an invaluable source to begin my research at as it was fully narrated by Lynch himself and spanned his whole life up until the making of his film ‘Eraserhead’ which created a picture of his life and the circumstances that lead to him making the films he did and how he is personally connected to them.  Additionally, further into my research the book ‘David Lynch Decoded’ (Stewart, M. (2007). David Lynch. Bloomington: AuthorHouse.) was a brilliant companion to the multiple different relevant theory (Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc.) as it was a discussion into Lynch’s films individually which gave me contextual knowledge of all his work, as well as my focal films.

In the introduction to Stewart’s book he says: “Everybody’s got that moment. If you love film, you had a moment at some point in your life…. It’s that moment when you had an epiphany, you realised what film was really capable of…I went to see a late showing of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks – Fire Walk with Me and I was instantly hooked on film forever. No filmmaker had ever affected me the way Lynch did.” I found this notable because I said the same thing in the initial thoughts of my preparation for this question which suggests Lynch is noticeable, important and stands out to multiple people. This recognisable style is an attribute of an auteur.

Stewart talks about Lynch’s films having interlinking themes, styles, and characters. This is a suggestion of authorship according to one of Sarris’s premises of authorship. “I have come to the conclusion that these characters are connected to each other, that they are connected in specific ways which repeat themselves thematically and visually throughout the majority of Lynch’s filmed works, and that over time Lynch has developed a visual language that we can interpret with regard to these characters and the strange world they come from.” We can see these links in clear duality between the verisimilitudes of Lynch’s separate films, and also, we see the reoccurring use of duality inside films. There are countless examples of duality in Lynch’s films however I think his dual female characters are particularly distinct as it has a consistent and possibly two-dimensional representation of women in his films. Just some prominent examples of dual female characters in the focal films I studied are Laura and herself in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’, Laura and Dorothy/Sandy which are respective characters in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ and ‘Blue Velvet’, Dorothy and Sandy in ‘Blue Velvet’, the Roadhouse singer (Julee Cruise), Dorothy and The Lady in the Radiator from all three focal films. There are many examples of dual events and places in all three focal films which will become clear as I compare scenes, especially ideas of dual realities and dreamworlds which occur in all Lynch’s works. Graham Fuller addressed this in his Sight and Sound article saying, “Lynch had Originally intended to use ‘Crying’ in Blue Velvet but opted instead for Orbison's ‘In Dreams’. Dean Stockwell’s Ben lip-synchs the song with the same baroque affectedness demonstrated by Del Rio, but he too is cut short when Frank rips the cassette of the song from the tape recorder. On both occasions Lynch is Breaking through the dream fabric of the film, reminding us of the fragility of cinema’s hallucinatory power.” (Fuller, G. (2001). Babes in Babylon. Sight and Sound, (12), pp.14-17) and this highlights the links between Lynch’s films and the interchangeability of music, character, and actors. However, I am going to consider the clear and influential duality of female characters between and in the focal films as it does effect Lynch’s claim to authorship over these films. It could be argued that Lynch’s clear use of duality and ongoing style and theme contribute to his authorship over these films as links to Sarris. However, this could also be viewed as Lynch’s subconscious misogyny as his creation of female characters is clearly repetitive and conform to the Madonna/Whore stereotypes which are have been seen through film continuously since cinema began.

The character of Laura Palmer in ‘Twin Peaks’ is the crux of the whole TV series and subsequent film, as they all ask, ‘Who killed Laura Palmer?’ and maybe the more important question, ‘Does it matter?”. Laura’s character is Lynch’s most well-known and she is a perfect example of duality. One half of her personality is the all-American, beautiful daughter, and glowing prom queen, and the other half of her life is cocaine fuelled, sex-filled parties and abuse. The character Donna who is Laura’s school friend is a parallel and representation of Laura’s good side whereas the character of Ronette who is Laura’s companion from the secretive half of her life, reflects dark side. The ‘Twin Peaks’ ring unifies Laura as it appears to her when she is daughter, prostitute, and visionary. This duality of Laura’s character can also be seen by the characters of Sandy and Dorothy in Lynch’s ‘Blue Velvet’ where Lynch is again portraying two representations of women that are creating a narrative that suggest as a female you are either the typical obedient, placid, beautiful, and conservative girl or the dark, sexy, hysterical bad-girl. In ‘Blue Velvet’ Sandy is the blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl-next-door that is presented as the ‘right girl’ for a sensible young man such as Jeffrey to date. Whereas the character of Dorothy is the dark-haired hyper-sexualised mysterious woman with a sultry accent that Jeffrey just can’t keep off his mind. These two characters clearly reflect the creation of Laura’s character in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ as she holds both these two juxtaposing traits at once which makes her such an elusive and enthralling mystery. However, the linking female characters continues across to Lynch’s first feature film ‘Eraserhead’ as well, there is even a parallel of three women from all three focal films, being united by a scene where they sing on a stage in front of curtains in a scene with an intense dream-like quality. In many films neurotic behaviour is prevalent in the ‘villains’, with strangely heightened and dangerous sexual awareness in the ‘heroine’. In the symbols of dream images, and the unconscious desires expressed in dreams there is there is key element of Freud’s theories.  As Roger Luckhurst and James Bell said in their Sight and Sound article” The world of Twin Peaks sits in a broader Lynchian universe, which at times can feel like a unified whole- perhaps one could meet Eraserhead’s Henry Spencer in the Black Lodge or run into Dorothy Vallens from Blue Velvet at the Roadhouse. As well as taking cues from and prefiguring other elements of Lynch’s work, Twin Peaks echoes a variety of other filmic influences.” there is a clear Lynchian universe where all of his films and characters and worlds have his auteurs signature all over them. This consistency can be seen in Lynch’ films through his ongoing themes and his representations of women. On very pivotal and important theme running through Lynch’s work is his use duality between his films, in his films, in his characters and his places and events. In considering and discussing Lynch’s work considering duality is vital as it is central to a lot of the interior meaning in his films. Sexualisation of women in Lynch’s films cannot be overlooked when considering his work critically. It is known that Lynch uses the hyper-sexualisation of women in his films and it is picked up by the media and audiences and sometimes lavished upon. However, this itself creates a conversation about Lynch’s knowledge and control behind these representations and the reactions they produce. As Roger Luckhurst and James Bell noted in their article “The UK tabloids went crazy (largely, it must be admitted, for Sherilyn Fenn’s tight sweaters and dexterous tongue)” (Luckhurst, R. and Bell, J. (2017). The Owls are Not What they Seem the World of Twin Peaks. Sight and Sound, [online] (6), pp.18-25.) However, this use of duality by Lynch consistently could be a consideration of authorship, as Fuller said ”Twinning, of course, has been a consistent theme in Lynch’s later work, as witness the ‘good’ and ‘evil’ Dale Coopers in Twin Peaks and the two Arquette characters in Lost Highway.” (Fuller, G. (2001). Babes in Babylon. Sight and Sound, (12), pp.14-17). Almost like Shakespeare moulding and developing characters from Hamlet, to Othello to Macbeth we see Lynch using similar character tropes but building layers of character and meaning onto them

 The second premise of Andrew Sarris’s auteur theory is that a director must have a distinguished personal style, and Lynch arguably fulfils these criteria. One clear stylistic element in Lynch’s work is his use of dream sequences to access a more abstract tone to his films. It can be complex to distinguish between Lynch’s complex and eclectic realities, and the dream sequences within them but there is a tonal change. Lynch’s dream sequences often seem to explore emotional tensions, revealing new information. Lynch’s belief in the Upanishads means he believes in different levels of reality, so Lynch’s dream sequences do sometimes blur the lines of reality and bring into question which reality is real and which is the dream, or both or another. This use of dream sequences link to the early surrealist movements in the 1920’s and 1930’s, in ‘Film and psychoanalysis’ it says they were in a ‘quest for new modes of experience that transgressed the boundaries between dream and reality’ (Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., pp.77-89.). This clearly something Lynch was consciously or subconsciously drawing on as he began in painting and moved onto film as a way of being able to gain more control over his and an express himself more intensely calling film ‘moving paintings’ (David Lynch: The Art Life. (2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda.). It continues to say “They were deeply influenced by Freud’s theory of dreams and his concept of the unconscious. To them, cinema, with its special techniques such as the dissolve, superimposition, and slow motion, correspond to the nature of dreaming”. I feel as if this heavily influenced Lynch as his work is very motivated by image and dreams and he also moved onto the world of film to utilise these new techniques.   As the dream sequence in ‘Eraserhead’ (Lynch, 1977) begins we see the radiator open up like a door, letting us into the dream world. Lynch uses a dissolve here to take the spectator from the ‘real world’ of Henry’s bedroom to the dream world. The use of this dissolve gives the effect of when in a dream something absurd begins to happen and new locations and scenarios come out of nowhere, but the sleeping brain makes them seem slick and rationalised. The dissolve moves the scene into the strange dream-world as not to alert the audience, creating the effect as if the spectator is falling asleep with Henry. The first images we see are the black and white tiled floor and the curtains. This referencing other dream world in Lynch’s films such as The Red Room/The Black Lodge in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’. There were also electrical light bulbs flickering into life, which is another example of Lynch using electricity to symbolize dream sequences. Although ‘Blue Velvet’ may present as one of Lynch’s more restrained with a more prominent narrative than most of his work, a lot of dream sequences and alternate realities are alluded to. In the opening scene we have this zoom into a dream world, implying maybe the whole of ‘Blue Velvet’ is a dream. This is different to the narrative style of Eraserhead’ as his first feature film has much stronger ties to his abstract art world and his personal life. To add to the concept that ‘Blue Velvet’ is a dream is also the final scene as we zoom out of Jeffrey’s ear and back into the perfect world we saw at the beginning. We see the perfect all-American streets but then the tension is built by showing the hose pipe getting trapped and quite literately tension building in the water. We then see the man drop to the floor and slow-motion effects are used. The camera then tracks in an extreme close up through the grass to soil and beetles rustling with disgusting animalistic crunching noises. This zoomed in extreme close-up implies that we are going to a dream in world in what is colloquially coined ‘Lynchland’. It is the same technique as used in ‘Eraserhead’ as we zoom into the radiator to the dream world. This scene in ‘Eraserhead’ also links to ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with me’ as the electricity motif is continued and developed by Lynch to be used in this film to represent a dream state again. In the scene where David Bowie’s character Phillip Jeffries arrives after two years of disappearance electricity is used to symbolise another reality or dream world; the electricity flares up and lights flash when Gordon tries to contact someone about Jeffries. In the nightmare sequence we even see an extreme close-up of a mouth say the word ‘Electricity’, it is a man layered in thick white paint with blackened teeth and a long white nose which gives him an eerie look of an 18th century plague doctor. The dialogue is used as another tool of Lynch’s to create disturbance and highlight the dream sequence, as in the Red Room/Black Lodge or when a character is in the alternative reality the dialogue sounds growling and deep and unsettling. Lynch used a technique where he would get his actors to learn their dialogue backwards by learning the sounds the words would make when said back to front. He would then record these backwards sounds and turn them around in the edit, in theory making the words sound forwards and correct again. However, of course this process would distort the sounds in an eerie way as a spectator you understand the words being spoken as they come across normal, but you cannot quite put your finger on why all the sounds coming from the actors sound wrong and distorted. Lynch uses this technique alongside electrical whirring and snapping sounds to create an atmosphere of unease and tension, Lynch wanted to create these altered reality scenes to have this effect because the sound became normal, but just slightly off and disturbing and this is the exact feeling Lynch wanted his dark alternative reality in the Red Room/Black Lodge to have.

Another notable element of Lynch’s personal style is a cleverly manipulative use of family tensions and fear to create a distinct tone of psychological horror. His control of the spectator’s emotions and darkness is intricately manipulative, a most perfect example of this is the character of ‘Leo’ in Twin Peaks who in the film is an utterly despicable character full of starkly dislikeable traits as a domestic abuser and criminal, however by the end of the series of ‘Twin Peaks’ Lynch has the audience feeling sympathy and almost warmth towards this character. This highlights Lynch’s power of manipulation, and almost love affair with it. This power and intense relationship with complex horror stemming from family issues comes from his personal life, despite his own personally described idyllic childhood, he struggled with marriage and children as he his style and art in a film format was developing and solidifying. We see this evolving first in his short films ‘The Grandmother’ and ‘The Alphabet’. The short ‘The Grandmother’ opens with a painting style animation, which comes up throughout the short to symbolise changes or things that are happening between shots. This implies Lynch has authorship because he was a painter before he was a film maker and went to art school, and still to this day paints and has a painting studio. He also has described his transition to film as him wanting to create moving paintings. So, the painted animation style is very personal. We see the use of blurred edges around the shot with a lot of light contrast and chiaroscuro lighting. This is heavily used in ‘Eraserhead’, enhanced by the black and white, to create the sense of it being a dream-world, not set in reality. It also uses soil that is dumped on the protagonist’s bed, which is used in the bedroom in ‘Eraserhead’, this enhances the sense of darkness and unknown and makes the supposed safe space of a bedroom become dirty and unpleasant, this shows Lynch is developing images and styles. There is use of stop-motion animation for some scenes, which is not really used in Lynch’s feature films, but it is in his shorts. However, Lynch does heavily use the technique of using models and lights and sort of animation style scenes in his future films for the dreamy, non-realistic effect. This short uses a lot of red and black colour schemes and Lynch uses these colours a lot in his future films, for example, ‘The Red Room’ in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ (red and black is massively used in pretty much all of this film) or the stage scenes in ‘Eraserhead’. Although when Lynch started filmmaking he had to shoot in black and white, however the black and white shooting style does carry on through his filmography. He uses black and white for effect in Twin Peaks and he uses the noir style chiaroscuro lighting. There is the use of CU on the antagonists faces to show the spectator the fear the protagonist is feeling in ‘The Grandmother’, this use of shot is used by Lynch a lot, for example the close-up of Jack Nance in ‘Eraserhead’ when he is scared of the baby, and the close-up of Bob and Leland and Cooper in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’, and the close-up of Jeffrey in ‘Blue Velvet’ as he watches through the wardrobe at Frank. This persistent use of family situations to create psychological horror highlights how Lynch used his own personal fears to begin to create a style of horror in his shorts and ‘Eraserhead’, and as he progressed as a director he developed, and this style evolved.  

Sarris’s third premise of authorship is that an auteur must have a consistent personal link between all their work and art. The character known as ‘The Arm’ or ‘The dwarf’ from the Red Room/Black Lodge talks of “Intercourse between the two worlds”. The Red Room/Black Lodge is a visual representation of this ‘intercourse’ as it is almost a limbo between the physical world and the fantastical realm of dreams that Lynch depicts. The man then says to the illusive and evil ‘Bob’ character ‘with this ring, I thee wed’ and that could be said to be the ‘Twin Peaks’ ring that is the symbol of the link between the town and the dark realm and this ring becomes Bob’s talisman. The man then says the crucial line ‘Fire walk with me’ and in this moment we see Red room dwarf and Bob create the Black Lodge/Red Room. A close-up of the dwarf fades into a medium shot of the iconic red curtains of the Red Room. In an overhead shot we watch them both walk into the Red Room together and the curtains swing shut behind them. This scene is a critical moment in the narrative of this film and the whole ’Twin Peaks’ saga as we see the creation of the link between reality and other. These two characters literally bind the two worlds together as the dwarf says ‘wedding’ them. This is also an important scene to consider authorship for

The Upanishads are a part of the Vedas, which are ancient Sanskrit texts that contain some of the central philosophical concepts and ideas of Hinduism, some of which are shared with Buddhism, and Jainism. Among the most important literature in the history of Indian religions and culture, the Upanishads played a critical role in the development of spiritual ideas in ancient India, marking a transition from Vedic ritualism to new ideas and institutions. This is a belief system that Lynch is involved in and influences his life. Of all Vedic literature, the Upanishads alone are widely known, and their central ideas are at the spiritual core of Hindus. The Upanishadic age was characterized by a pluralism of worldviews and the concepts of Brahman (ultimate reality) and Ātman (soul and self) are central ideas in all of the Upanishads. So, it is clear that Lynch’s personal involvement with this does affect his beliefs and how he makes his films because themes of ultimate reality and soul and self are massively influences on his work. Brahman is the material, efficient, formal, and final cause of all that exists. The word Atman means the inner self, the soul, the immortal spirit in an individual, and all living beings including animals and trees. I think the fact that Lynch follows these ideas influenced his symbolism and creation of reality in his work. For example, the Upanishads believe the immortal spirit is in a person, animal, or tree and in the film ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with me’ all three of these things bring information from the alternate reality. The people such as, ‘The giant’ bring Cooper information about what is happening in the Red Room/Black Lodge, the owls also are almost possessed by the alternate reality and arrive in the scene when the two realities may merge, and finally of course the character of ‘The Log Lady’ has part of a tree the whispers to her, giving her advice to tell Cooper and malicious intentions of the other reality. Hendrick Vroom explains, "the term Maya [in the Upanishads] has been translated as 'illusion,' but then it does not concern normal illusion. Here 'illusion' does not mean that the world is not real and simply a figment of the human imagination. Maya means that the world is not as it seems; the world that one experiences is misleading as far as its true nature is concerned.” (Timesofindia.speakingtree.in. (2016). Maya (illusion). [online]) According to Wendy Doniger, "to say that the universe is an illusion (māyā) is not to say that it is unreal; it is to say, instead, that it is not what it seems to be, that it is something constantly being made. Māyā not only deceives people about the things they think they know; more basically, it limits their knowledge. In the Upanishads, Māyā is the perceived changing reality and it co-exists with Brahman which is the hidden true reality.” (Timesofindia.speakingtree.in. (2016). Maya (illusion). [online]). Clearly these ideas about Maya link quite directly to Lynch’s work, in particular ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with me’ as the Log Lady even says, “The owls are not what they seem” (the owls which symbolise the alternate reality). The interior narrative of ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ is based upon the idea that the world one experiences is misleading which is made clear by all of the complex characters with many secrets highlighted of course by Laura’s double life. Also, the Red Room/Black Lodge is another reality co-existing with Twin Peaks however you never know which is perceived reality and which is hidden true reality, and I feel this idea is something that Lynch uses through a lot of his work. Even Phillip Jeffries (David Bowie) in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ says “We live inside a dream”.

In ‘The Alphabet’ which another of Lynch’s early shorts, opens with a white flag with orange circle at the centre and this image is replicated in ‘The Grandmother’ (1970) when Lynch outs an orange circle in the centre of the boy’s white bed sheet when he is being beaten on it. The first section of the short film is the sound of someone singing and on screen is an animation of colours and shapes and musical notes and letters. Lynch is a music artist as well, so this means that he is gathering all parts of his life and personality to come together to create his films. There is use of closeups on faces to make you uncomfortable which David Lynch explores in his next short film and the rest of his feature work. For example, there is a close up of a wet mouth speaking and it is unsettling and horrible. There is a moment where there is the sound effect of a baby crying but in an intense unpleasant way which is definitely used as an important part in ‘Eraserhead’ (1977). Also, horror derived from family themes is one of Lynch’s strong stylistic points used in all his work. There is then an animation of what looks very phallic with blood rushing through it, it then turns into a face and breast spitting blood. This supposedly is all linked and imagery of childbirth. It uses chiaroscuro lighting liked Lynch does a lot to help create that dreamlike state where there are no borders of reality. Dream states and imagery are a massive part of Lynch’s style. Another poignant image is a woman trapped on a bed with her arms wrapped in the bars of the headboard, she is writhing about and started choking up blood. This seems symbolic of childbirth. There is a very small production company and wasn’t even released until decades later, this means it was a passion project for Lynch and gives him strong authorship to the film and the styles he has carried through to his other films. These themes are so strongly based on Lynch’s life as he had his first child Jennifer in 1967 with Peggy, who is playing the mother in this film. Peggy even described him as: “[Lynch] definitely was a reluctant father, but a very loving one. Hey, I was pregnant when we got married. We were both reluctant.” (David Lynch: The Art Life. (2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda.) So, he has strong claim to the authorship of this film because he worked on every element of creating this film and it was directly based off his life. This could link to his representation of women and mothers in his films as he had a daughter as said ‘reluctantly’ and this created a fear in him of children and women’s power to create life. Freud’s idea of the unconscious is one of the dominant ideologies expressed in horror film- the idea of secret desires that lie hidden from the conscious mind but drive our motivations.

Lynch does have strong claim to authorship over his film as he consistently takes on multiple roles in the film making process, and in his early work it was solely created by him, and the links between his short films and his feature’s is very clear as I have discussed. For ‘Eraserhead’ Lynch was the director, writer, producer, musician, editor, production designer, art director, sound effect designer, special effects designer. For ‘Blue Velvet’ he was the Director, writer, and composer. And for ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ he was the writer, director, actor, producer, and sound designer. So as for Sarris’ being need for an auteur to be technically competent there is no question that Lynch has control over all elements of the creation of his films and is very capable of working in all departments. This alongside his clear style and personal connections to his work would suggest Lynch is an auteur. His sexualisation of women and lacking representation may be a negative to his work, however I have discussed how it comes from an inherently personal place so could to be said what Sarris called ‘élan of the soul’ which is where a director’s personal personality and take on the world is reflected through their work, adding to their authorship. A good example to support David Lynch being a stylist is that he is clearly used to sell his films as they are being advertised. David Lynch’s style is clearly recognised by a mass audience as name ‘Lynch’ has connotations with his own unique style and genre of work. I came across his work consistently being called ‘David Lynch’s…’ (Fuller, G. (2001). Babes in Babylon. Sight and Sound, (12), pp.14-17.) in articles which highlights this.

However, to counter all of this there is of course still a strong argument to the concept of all film making being a collaborative art and there are many examples of influential collaborations in Lynch’s filmography.

Lynch does collaborate which some of his work and this of course could be argued that his collaborators could be called auteurs, or at least they would all hold a collaborative authorship rather than Lynch being the true auteur. One example of his collaborations is the reoccurring actors which has become a feature in his films. It is discussed whether Lynch has favourite actors and the reasons why he chooses to work with the same people. However, this choice does bring into question whether these actors have a claim to authorship over his films due to their performances, how can it be said that Lynch is a true auteur if we have not seen him work on feature films without this talent? Even just considering reoccurring actors in my three focal films there are multiple. Jack Nance who plays the protagonist in ‘Eraserhead’ also stars in both ‘Blue Velvet’ and ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’, Kyle Mclaughlin who plays the protagonist in ‘Blue Velvet’ also stars in a major role in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’, Laura Dern and Frances Bay from ‘Blue Velvet’ also stars in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ and these actors also have roles in other of Lynch’s feature films.  Also, it cannot be said Lynch’s work is not highly influenced through genre and a bricolage of techniques that came before him. His use of noir techniques such as high-contrast mise-en-scène framing. This genres aesthetic influences of German expressionism with the asymmetrical tendencies and dramatic use of light and shadow can be seen throughout noir films in off-kilter camera angles, direct front and side lighting, mysterious silhouettes. Lynch uses a bricolage technique to bring together elements from noir, post-modernism, German expressionism and surrealism to create his own signature style. Despite this, it could be said reoccurring actors be part of his style. He is known to be an unconventional person so only finds a connection with a few people, so is this limited choice of actors is part of his personal style? He does work with the horror/thriller genre however, explores and pushes boundaries, he isn’t conventional and brings something personal to standing conventions. Bricolage means he is pulling elements of lots of styles to make his own so in effect it’s still personal and he is just influenced by everything around him and his way of creating and interpreting through that arguable could mean this does not affect his authorship over his style.

 I think the strengths of my research were that I used different formats to gather my information, so my research was wide-ranging and came from both personal and critical sources. I began my research with the documentary ‘David Lynch: The Art Life’ (David Lynch: The Art Life. (2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda.) as this gave me a personal insight into Lynch’s opinion on his work as it was fully narrated by him alone. It also was very useful in considering the authorship part of my creative investigation as I began to build up background knowledge about Lynch himself and how his personal style evolved and developed and the influences that affected him and his work. Also, then moving onto his own documentary called ‘Eraserhead Stories’ (Lynch, D. (2001). “Eraserhead” Stories. [video]) where he just talks about his stylistic influences, opinions and the zeitgeist of his life that came together for him to create ‘Eraserhead’ and make it the film it is. This source was also incredibly valuable because it is where I learnt of his family and personal life at the time of making ‘Eraserhead’ and I began to make connection between his film style and his personal life, as I have utilised and discussed in this essay. I then used a variety of e-journals and Sight and Sound articles which were valuable to gauge a more public response to Lynch’s work at the time and to get an insight into how his work was received by audiences and critically, and what other people analysed from his films. I think reading the book on Lynch ‘David Lynch: Decoded’ was a really useful piece of research before I began my own essay as it brought up different angles and theories on Lynch’s work I may not have considered and therefore reinforced or challenged my own analysis. Since Lynch’s films do fall into the psychological genre and my essay was a consideration of authorship and representation, my research into film theories that were relevant to this proved invaluable in building up my knowledge to analyse the focal films in-depth and with and understanding of the theory behind why and how he Lynch uses these techniques and its wider value and interior meaning. So, my sources from the ‘Oxford Guide to Film Studies’ (Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc.). And of course, I felt that looking into some of Lynch’s early art and film work was crucial to understanding his artistic development and his control of audio-visual language, so analysing his early short films ‘The Alphabet’ (Lynch, D. (1968). David Lynch the Alphabet. [video]) and ‘The Grandmother’ (Lynch, D. (1970). The Grandmother - David Lynch. [video]) which he made prior to the focal films I am considering in this essay was useful in linking all of Lynch’s work and personal style. In addition to my research cited here I used this as a stimulus to continue to look into information about Lynch, his work and important facts or ideas that do not feature directly in my work but helped me build up a wealth of knowledge. However, some of the limitations of my research were that I had so much contextual knowledge and information it was difficult collating valuable quotes and being critical on what routes to investigate and write about and what was not completely relevant. It took a lot of time and critical decisions to pick apart the vital parts f information to create an essay and that was focused and detailed and I explored my own opinions and analysis.

Overall, in my opinion and in reaction to exploration and research I would say David Lynch is an auteur of his own films. I believe his representation of female characters can be two-dimensional and misogynistic however it is flawed and complex like Lynch himself and he is so intertwined with his work. Lynch clearly and consistently brings parts of himself, his character, and his life into his work and style and I feel there is links between his intricate use of the audio-visual language and his own personal development as an auteur.

   Bibliography:

1)Newman, K. (2002). Mulholland Dr. Sight and Sound, [online] (1), pp.50-51. Available at: http://old.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/review/1886 [Accessed 18 Sep. 2017].

2)Luckhurst, R. and Bell, J. (2017). The Owls are Not What they Seem the World of Twin Peaks. Sight and Sound, [online] (6), pp.18-25. Available at: http://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/sight-sound-magazine/june-2017-issue [Accessed 18 Sep. 2017].

3)David Lynch: The Art Life. (2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda.

4)Fuller, G. (2001). Babes in Babylon. Sight and Sound, (12), pp.14-17.

5)Rodley, C. (1996). David Lynch Mr Contradiction. Sight and Sound, (7), pp.6-10.

6)Clarke, R. and Figgis, M. (2007). Daydream Believer. Sight and Sound, (3), pp.16-20.

7) Stewart, M. (2007). David Lynch. Bloomington: AuthorHouse.

8)Lynch, D. (1970). The Grandmother - David Lynch. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1p5qEt766ZQ [Accessed 12 Oct. 2017].

9)Lynch, D. (1968). David Lynch the Alphabet. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJ_t1eOAipo [Accessed 12 Oct. 2017].

10) Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., pp.67-75.

11)Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., pp.77-89.

12)Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., pp.96-104.

13)Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., pp.117-130.

14)Beckman, F. (2012). From Irony to Narrative Crisis: Reconsidering the Femme Fatale in the Films of David Lynch. 1st ed. Texas: University of Texas Press on behalf of the Society for Cinema & Media Studies, pp.25-44.

15)Ingle, Z. (2017). Authorship and the Films of David Lynch: Aesthetic Receptions of Contemporary Hollywood by Antony Todd (review). 1st ed. [eBook] New York: Centre for the Study of Film and History, pp.82-84. Available at: https://muse.jhu.edu/article/543547 [Accessed 5 Oct. 2017].

16) Lynch, D. (2001). “Eraserhead” Stories. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLwtXoyNKgo

17) Grant, B. (2008). Auteurs and authorship. 1st ed. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

18) Timesofindia.speakingtree.in. (2016). Maya (illusion). [online]

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Section 1: Creative Investigation-

To what extent is David Lynch an auteur and how does his style create questionable representations of women?

For my creative investigation I will be exploring to what extent that David Lynch is the author of his own films using a basis of Sarris’s auteur theory to analyse Lynch’s claim to the creative rights of his work. I will also reflect on how the representation of female characters in his films is entwined with his style but could have questionable ethics, using feminist film theory (Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., pp.117-130.0) alongside auteur theory (Grant, B. (2008). Auteurs and authorship. 1st ed. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.) to consider this. I will investigate if the eccentric mystery of this director makes him the auteur of his eccentric and mysterious films. I will discuss how his origins as a painter and artist, his life outside of his film career and his collaborations affect his film work and his authorship over it. I will consider this in an analysis of three of his focal films. Firstly, ‘Eraserhead’ (Eraserhead. (1977). [film] Directed by D. Lynch. USA: American Film Institute (AFI)) is a horror written and directed by David Lynch starring Jack Nance, Charlotte Stewart, Allen Joseph. Henry Spencer tries to survive his industrial environment, his angry girlfriend, and the unbearable screams of his newly born mutant child. This film was the first definite choice to look at when analysing Lynch’s filmography. It is his first feature film after his original shorts, ‘The Alphabet’ (Lynch, D. (1968). David Lynch the Alphabet. [video]) and ‘The Grandmother’ (Lynch, D. (1970). The Grandmother - David Lynch. [video]). In these shorts he was really testing out his style and techniques but with minimal plot or story, it was his transition from the classical art world to the film art world so was heavily based on image and colour and light. This film is his first foray into feature films, so it is very dark and intense and focused on unnatural imagery to unsettle the audience. It is one of his most complex and non-linear works and something really career defining I believe. Secondly, ‘Blue Velvet’ (Blue Velvet. (1986). [film] Directed by D. Lynch. USA: De Laurentiis Entertainment Group (DEG) is a drama-mystery-horror hybrid written and directed by David Lynch starring Isabella Rossellini, Kyle MacLachlan, Dennis Hopper. The discovery of a severed human ear found in a field leads a young man on an investigation related to a beautiful, mysterious nightclub singer and a group of psychopathic criminals who have kidnapped her child. In my opinion ‘Blue Velvet’ is one of Lynch’s more logical and plot-based films and is more naturalistic than ‘Eraserhead’ for example. I think this is an interesting contrast between his work that is extremely surreal and his work that has more thriller elements. And finally, ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ is a drama-mystery-horror hybrid written and directed by David Lynch starring Sheryl Lee, Ray Wise, Madchen Amick. A young FBI agent disappears while investigating a murder miles away from Twin Peaks that may be related to the future murder of Laura Palmer; the last week of the life of Laura Palmer is chronicled. I chose this film as I am very interested in the Twin Peaks series and film and it is the first work of Lynch’s I saw years ago. I feel it amalgamates a lot of Lynch’s styles and techniques of horror so would be really beneficial to look at. It was also controversial in people’s opinions when it was released as Twin Peaks series fans did not like it, however other spectators struggled to follow it as they did not have the context of the series. This meant it missed its market in some people’s opinions, however personally I enjoyed the film and think it is a good insight into lynch as a director and creator. It’s use of base, family disturbance to hit on key human fears is an important part of Lynch’s style and this film really plays on that.

  ‘David Lynch: The Art Life.’ ((2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda) was an invaluable source to begin my research at as it was fully narrated by Lynch himself and spanned his whole life up until the making of his film ‘Eraserhead’ which created a picture of his life and the circumstances that lead to him making the films he did and how he is personally connected to them.  Additionally, further into my research the book ‘David Lynch Decoded’ (Stewart, M. (2007). David Lynch. Bloomington: AuthorHouse.) was a brilliant companion to the multiple different relevant theory (Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc.) as it was a discussion into Lynch’s films individually which gave me contextual knowledge of all his work, as well as my focal films.

In the introduction to Stewart’s book he says: “Everybody’s got that moment. If you love film, you had a moment at some point in your life…. It’s that moment when you had an epiphany, you realised what film was really capable of…I went to see a late showing of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks – Fire Walk with Me and I was instantly hooked on film forever. No filmmaker had ever affected me the way Lynch did.” I found this notable because I said the same thing in the initial thoughts of my preparation for this question which suggests Lynch is noticeable, important and stands out to multiple people. This recognisable style is an attribute of an auteur.

Stewart talks about Lynch’s films having interlinking themes, styles, and characters. This is a suggestion of authorship according to one of Sarris’s premises of authorship. “I have come to the conclusion that these characters are connected to each other, that they are connected in specific ways which repeat themselves thematically and visually throughout the majority of Lynch’s filmed works, and that over time Lynch has developed a visual language that we can interpret with regard to these characters and the strange world they come from.” We can see these links in clear duality between the verisimilitudes of Lynch’s separate films, and also, we see the reoccurring use of duality inside films. There are countless examples of duality in Lynch’s films however I think his dual female characters are particularly distinct as it has a consistent and possibly two-dimensional representation of women in his films. Just some prominent examples of dual female characters in the focal films I studied are Laura and herself in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’, Laura and Dorothy/Sandy which are respective characters in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ and ‘Blue Velvet’, Dorothy and Sandy in ‘Blue Velvet’, the Roadhouse singer (Julee Cruise), Dorothy and The Lady in the Radiator from all three focal films. There are many examples of dual events and places in all three focal films which will become clear as I compare scenes, especially ideas of dual realities and dreamworlds which occur in all Lynch’s works. Graham Fuller addressed this in his Sight and Sound article saying, “Lynch had Originally intended to use ‘Crying’ in Blue Velvet but opted instead for Orbison's ‘In Dreams’. Dean Stockwell’s Ben lip-synchs the song with the same baroque affectedness demonstrated by Del Rio, but he too is cut short when Frank rips the cassette of the song from the tape recorder. On both occasions Lynch is Breaking through the dream fabric of the film, reminding us of the fragility of cinema’s hallucinatory power.” (Fuller, G. (2001). Babes in Babylon. Sight and Sound, (12), pp.14-17) and this highlights the links between Lynch’s films and the interchangeability of music, character, and actors. However, I am going to consider the clear and influential duality of female characters between and in the focal films as it does effect Lynch’s claim to authorship over these films. It could be argued that Lynch’s clear use of duality and ongoing style and theme contribute to his authorship over these films as links to Sarris. However, this could also be viewed as Lynch’s subconscious misogyny as his creation of female characters is clearly repetitive and conform to the Madonna/Whore stereotypes which are have been seen through film continuously since cinema began.

The character of Laura Palmer in ‘Twin Peaks’ is the crux of the whole TV series and subsequent film, as they all ask, ‘Who killed Laura Palmer?’ and maybe the more important question, ‘Does it matter?”. Laura’s character is Lynch’s most well-known and she is a perfect example of duality. One half of her personality is the all-American, beautiful daughter, and glowing prom queen, and the other half of her life is cocaine fuelled, sex-filled parties and abuse. The character Donna who is Laura’s school friend is a parallel and representation of Laura’s good side whereas the character of Ronette who is Laura’s companion from the secretive half of her life, reflects dark side. The ‘Twin Peaks’ ring unifies Laura as it appears to her when she is daughter, prostitute, and visionary. This duality of Laura’s character can also be seen by the characters of Sandy and Dorothy in Lynch’s ‘Blue Velvet’ where Lynch is again portraying two representations of women that are creating a narrative that suggest as a female you are either the typical obedient, placid, beautiful, and conservative girl or the dark, sexy, hysterical bad-girl. In ‘Blue Velvet’ Sandy is the blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl-next-door that is presented as the ‘right girl’ for a sensible young man such as Jeffrey to date. Whereas the character of Dorothy is the dark-haired hyper-sexualised mysterious woman with a sultry accent that Jeffrey just can’t keep off his mind. These two characters clearly reflect the creation of Laura’s character in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ as she holds both these two juxtaposing traits at once which makes her such an elusive and enthralling mystery. However, the linking female characters continues across to Lynch’s first feature film ‘Eraserhead’ as well, there is even a parallel of three women from all three focal films, being united by a scene where they sing on a stage in front of curtains in a scene with an intense dream-like quality. In many films neurotic behaviour is prevalent in the ‘villains’, with strangely heightened and dangerous sexual awareness in the ‘heroine’. In the symbols of dream images, and the unconscious desires expressed in dreams there is there is key element of Freud’s theories.  As Roger Luckhurst and James Bell said in their Sight and Sound article” The world of Twin Peaks sits in a broader Lynchian universe, which at times can feel like a unified whole- perhaps one could meet Eraserhead’s Henry Spencer in the Black Lodge or run into Dorothy Vallens from Blue Velvet at the Roadhouse. As well as taking cues from and prefiguring other elements of Lynch’s work, Twin Peaks echoes a variety of other filmic influences.” there is a clear Lynchian universe where all of his films and characters and worlds have his auteurs signature all over them. This consistency can be seen in Lynch’ films through his ongoing themes and his representations of women. On very pivotal and important theme running through Lynch’s work is his use duality between his films, in his films, in his characters and his places and events. In considering and discussing Lynch’s work considering duality is vital as it is central to a lot of the interior meaning in his films. Sexualisation of women in Lynch’s films cannot be overlooked when considering his work critically. It is known that Lynch uses the hyper-sexualisation of women in his films and it is picked up by the media and audiences and sometimes lavished upon. However, this itself creates a conversation about Lynch’s knowledge and control behind these representations and the reactions they produce. As Roger Luckhurst and James Bell noted in their article “The UK tabloids went crazy (largely, it must be admitted, for Sherilyn Fenn’s tight sweaters and dexterous tongue)” (Luckhurst, R. and Bell, J. (2017). The Owls are Not What they Seem the World of Twin Peaks. Sight and Sound, [online] (6), pp.18-25.) However, this use of duality by Lynch consistently could be a consideration of authorship, as Fuller said ”Twinning, of course, has been a consistent theme in Lynch’s later work, as witness the ‘good’ and ‘evil’ Dale Coopers in Twin Peaks and the two Arquette characters in Lost Highway.” (Fuller, G. (2001). Babes in Babylon. Sight and Sound, (12), pp.14-17). Almost like Shakespeare moulding and developing characters from Hamlet, to Othello to Macbeth we see Lynch using similar character tropes but building layers of character and meaning onto them

 The second premise of Andrew Sarris’s auteur theory is that a director must have a distinguished personal style, and Lynch arguably fulfils these criteria. One clear stylistic element in Lynch’s work is his use of dream sequences to access a more abstract tone to his films. It can be complex to distinguish between Lynch’s complex and eclectic realities, and the dream sequences within them but there is a tonal change. Lynch’s dream sequences often seem to explore emotional tensions, revealing new information. Lynch’s belief in the Upanishads means he believes in different levels of reality, so Lynch’s dream sequences do sometimes blur the lines of reality and bring into question which reality is real and which is the dream, or both or another. This use of dream sequences link to the early surrealist movements in the 1920’s and 1930’s, in ‘Film and psychoanalysis’ it says they were in a ‘quest for new modes of experience that transgressed the boundaries between dream and reality’ (Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., pp.77-89.). This clearly something Lynch was consciously or subconsciously drawing on as he began in painting and moved onto film as a way of being able to gain more control over his and an express himself more intensely calling film ‘moving paintings’ (David Lynch: The Art Life. (2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda.). It continues to say “They were deeply influenced by Freud’s theory of dreams and his concept of the unconscious. To them, cinema, with its special techniques such as the dissolve, superimposition, and slow motion, correspond to the nature of dreaming”. I feel as if this heavily influenced Lynch as his work is very motivated by image and dreams and he also moved onto the world of film to utilise these new techniques.   As the dream sequence in ‘Eraserhead’ (Lynch, 1977) begins we see the radiator open up like a door, letting us into the dream world. Lynch uses a dissolve here to take the spectator from the ‘real world’ of Henry’s bedroom to the dream world. The use of this dissolve gives the effect of when in a dream something absurd begins to happen and new locations and scenarios come out of nowhere, but the sleeping brain makes them seem slick and rationalised. The dissolve moves the scene into the strange dream-world as not to alert the audience, creating the effect as if the spectator is falling asleep with Henry. The first images we see are the black and white tiled floor and the curtains. This referencing other dream world in Lynch’s films such as The Red Room/The Black Lodge in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’. There were also electrical light bulbs flickering into life, which is another example of Lynch using electricity to symbolize dream sequences. Although ‘Blue Velvet’ may present as one of Lynch’s more restrained with a more prominent narrative than most of his work, a lot of dream sequences and alternate realities are alluded to. In the opening scene we have this zoom into a dream world, implying maybe the whole of ‘Blue Velvet’ is a dream. This is different to the narrative style of Eraserhead’ as his first feature film has much stronger ties to his abstract art world and his personal life. To add to the concept that ‘Blue Velvet’ is a dream is also the final scene as we zoom out of Jeffrey’s ear and back into the perfect world we saw at the beginning. We see the perfect all-American streets but then the tension is built by showing the hose pipe getting trapped and quite literately tension building in the water. We then see the man drop to the floor and slow-motion effects are used. The camera then tracks in an extreme close up through the grass to soil and beetles rustling with disgusting animalistic crunching noises. This zoomed in extreme close-up implies that we are going to a dream in world in what is colloquially coined ‘Lynchland’. It is the same technique as used in ‘Eraserhead’ as we zoom into the radiator to the dream world. This scene in ‘Eraserhead’ also links to ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with me’ as the electricity motif is continued and developed by Lynch to be used in this film to represent a dream state again. In the scene where David Bowie’s character Phillip Jeffries arrives after two years of disappearance electricity is used to symbolise another reality or dream world; the electricity flares up and lights flash when Gordon tries to contact someone about Jeffries. In the nightmare sequence we even see an extreme close-up of a mouth say the word ‘Electricity’, it is a man layered in thick white paint with blackened teeth and a long white nose which gives him an eerie look of an 18th century plague doctor. The dialogue is used as another tool of Lynch’s to create disturbance and highlight the dream sequence, as in the Red Room/Black Lodge or when a character is in the alternative reality the dialogue sounds growling and deep and unsettling. Lynch used a technique where he would get his actors to learn their dialogue backwards by learning the sounds the words would make when said back to front. He would then record these backwards sounds and turn them around in the edit, in theory making the words sound forwards and correct again. However, of course this process would distort the sounds in an eerie way as a spectator you understand the words being spoken as they come across normal, but you cannot quite put your finger on why all the sounds coming from the actors sound wrong and distorted. Lynch uses this technique alongside electrical whirring and snapping sounds to create an atmosphere of unease and tension, Lynch wanted to create these altered reality scenes to have this effect because the sound became normal, but just slightly off and disturbing and this is the exact feeling Lynch wanted his dark alternative reality in the Red Room/Black Lodge to have.

Another notable element of Lynch’s personal style is a cleverly manipulative use of family tensions and fear to create a distinct tone of psychological horror. His control of the spectator’s emotions and darkness is intricately manipulative, a most perfect example of this is the character of ‘Leo’ in Twin Peaks who in the film is an utterly despicable character full of starkly dislikeable traits as a domestic abuser and criminal, however by the end of the series of ‘Twin Peaks’ Lynch has the audience feeling sympathy and almost warmth towards this character. This highlights Lynch’s power of manipulation, and almost love affair with it. This power and intense relationship with complex horror stemming from family issues comes from his personal life, despite his own personally described idyllic childhood, he struggled with marriage and children as he his style and art in a film format was developing and solidifying. We see this evolving first in his short films ‘The Grandmother’ and ‘The Alphabet’. The short ‘The Grandmother’ opens with a painting style animation, which comes up throughout the short to symbolise changes or things that are happening between shots. This implies Lynch has authorship because he was a painter before he was a film maker and went to art school, and still to this day paints and has a painting studio. He also has described his transition to film as him wanting to create moving paintings. So, the painted animation style is very personal. We see the use of blurred edges around the shot with a lot of light contrast and chiaroscuro lighting. This is heavily used in ‘Eraserhead’, enhanced by the black and white, to create the sense of it being a dream-world, not set in reality. It also uses soil that is dumped on the protagonist’s bed, which is used in the bedroom in ‘Eraserhead’, this enhances the sense of darkness and unknown and makes the supposed safe space of a bedroom become dirty and unpleasant, this shows Lynch is developing images and styles. There is use of stop-motion animation for some scenes, which is not really used in Lynch’s feature films, but it is in his shorts. However, Lynch does heavily use the technique of using models and lights and sort of animation style scenes in his future films for the dreamy, non-realistic effect. This short uses a lot of red and black colour schemes and Lynch uses these colours a lot in his future films, for example, ‘The Red Room’ in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ (red and black is massively used in pretty much all of this film) or the stage scenes in ‘Eraserhead’. Although when Lynch started filmmaking he had to shoot in black and white, however the black and white shooting style does carry on through his filmography. He uses black and white for effect in Twin Peaks and he uses the noir style chiaroscuro lighting. There is the use of CU on the antagonists faces to show the spectator the fear the protagonist is feeling in ‘The Grandmother’, this use of shot is used by Lynch a lot, for example the close-up of Jack Nance in ‘Eraserhead’ when he is scared of the baby, and the close-up of Bob and Leland and Cooper in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’, and the close-up of Jeffrey in ‘Blue Velvet’ as he watches through the wardrobe at Frank. This persistent use of family situations to create psychological horror highlights how Lynch used his own personal fears to begin to create a style of horror in his shorts and ‘Eraserhead’, and as he progressed as a director he developed, and this style evolved.  

Sarris’s third premise of authorship is that an auteur must have a consistent personal link between all their work and art. The character known as ‘The Arm’ or ‘The dwarf’ from the Red Room/Black Lodge talks of “Intercourse between the two worlds”. The Red Room/Black Lodge is a visual representation of this ‘intercourse’ as it is almost a limbo between the physical world and the fantastical realm of dreams that Lynch depicts. The man then says to the illusive and evil ‘Bob’ character ‘with this ring, I thee wed’ and that could be said to be the ‘Twin Peaks’ ring that is the symbol of the link between the town and the dark realm and this ring becomes Bob’s talisman. The man then says the crucial line ‘Fire walk with me’ and in this moment we see Red room dwarf and Bob create the Black Lodge/Red Room. A close-up of the dwarf fades into a medium shot of the iconic red curtains of the Red Room. In an overhead shot we watch them both walk into the Red Room together and the curtains swing shut behind them. This scene is a critical moment in the narrative of this film and the whole ’Twin Peaks’ saga as we see the creation of the link between reality and other. These two characters literally bind the two worlds together as the dwarf says ‘wedding’ them. This is also an important scene to consider authorship for

The Upanishads are a part of the Vedas, which are ancient Sanskrit texts that contain some of the central philosophical concepts and ideas of Hinduism, some of which are shared with Buddhism, and Jainism. Among the most important literature in the history of Indian religions and culture, the Upanishads played a critical role in the development of spiritual ideas in ancient India, marking a transition from Vedic ritualism to new ideas and institutions. This is a belief system that Lynch is involved in and influences his life. Of all Vedic literature, the Upanishads alone are widely known, and their central ideas are at the spiritual core of Hindus. The Upanishadic age was characterized by a pluralism of worldviews and the concepts of Brahman (ultimate reality) and Ātman (soul and self) are central ideas in all of the Upanishads. So, it is clear that Lynch’s personal involvement with this does affect his beliefs and how he makes his films because themes of ultimate reality and soul and self are massively influences on his work. Brahman is the material, efficient, formal, and final cause of all that exists. The word Atman means the inner self, the soul, the immortal spirit in an individual, and all living beings including animals and trees. I think the fact that Lynch follows these ideas influenced his symbolism and creation of reality in his work. For example, the Upanishads believe the immortal spirit is in a person, animal, or tree and in the film ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with me’ all three of these things bring information from the alternate reality. The people such as, ‘The giant’ bring Cooper information about what is happening in the Red Room/Black Lodge, the owls also are almost possessed by the alternate reality and arrive in the scene when the two realities may merge, and finally of course the character of ‘The Log Lady’ has part of a tree the whispers to her, giving her advice to tell Cooper and malicious intentions of the other reality. Hendrick Vroom explains, "the term Maya [in the Upanishads] has been translated as 'illusion,' but then it does not concern normal illusion. Here 'illusion' does not mean that the world is not real and simply a figment of the human imagination. Maya means that the world is not as it seems; the world that one experiences is misleading as far as its true nature is concerned.” (Timesofindia.speakingtree.in. (2016). Maya (illusion). [online]) According to Wendy Doniger, "to say that the universe is an illusion (māyā) is not to say that it is unreal; it is to say, instead, that it is not what it seems to be, that it is something constantly being made. Māyā not only deceives people about the things they think they know; more basically, it limits their knowledge. In the Upanishads, Māyā is the perceived changing reality and it co-exists with Brahman which is the hidden true reality.” (Timesofindia.speakingtree.in. (2016). Maya (illusion). [online]). Clearly these ideas about Maya link quite directly to Lynch’s work, in particular ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with me’ as the Log Lady even says, “The owls are not what they seem” (the owls which symbolise the alternate reality). The interior narrative of ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ is based upon the idea that the world one experiences is misleading which is made clear by all of the complex characters with many secrets highlighted of course by Laura’s double life. Also, the Red Room/Black Lodge is another reality co-existing with Twin Peaks however you never know which is perceived reality and which is hidden true reality, and I feel this idea is something that Lynch uses through a lot of his work. Even Phillip Jeffries (David Bowie) in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ says “We live inside a dream”.

In ‘The Alphabet’ which another of Lynch’s early shorts, opens with a white flag with orange circle at the centre and this image is replicated in ‘The Grandmother’ (1970) when Lynch outs an orange circle in the centre of the boy’s white bed sheet when he is being beaten on it. The first section of the short film is the sound of someone singing and on screen is an animation of colours and shapes and musical notes and letters. Lynch is a music artist as well, so this means that he is gathering all parts of his life and personality to come together to create his films. There is use of closeups on faces to make you uncomfortable which David Lynch explores in his next short film and the rest of his feature work. For example, there is a close up of a wet mouth speaking and it is unsettling and horrible. There is a moment where there is the sound effect of a baby crying but in an intense unpleasant way which is definitely used as an important part in ‘Eraserhead’ (1977). Also, horror derived from family themes is one of Lynch’s strong stylistic points used in all his work. There is then an animation of what looks very phallic with blood rushing through it, it then turns into a face and breast spitting blood. This supposedly is all linked and imagery of childbirth. It uses chiaroscuro lighting liked Lynch does a lot to help create that dreamlike state where there are no borders of reality. Dream states and imagery are a massive part of Lynch’s style. Another poignant image is a woman trapped on a bed with her arms wrapped in the bars of the headboard, she is writhing about and started choking up blood. This seems symbolic of childbirth. There is a very small production company and wasn’t even released until decades later, this means it was a passion project for Lynch and gives him strong authorship to the film and the styles he has carried through to his other films. These themes are so strongly based on Lynch’s life as he had his first child Jennifer in 1967 with Peggy, who is playing the mother in this film. Peggy even described him as: “[Lynch] definitely was a reluctant father, but a very loving one. Hey, I was pregnant when we got married. We were both reluctant.” (David Lynch: The Art Life. (2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda.) So, he has strong claim to the authorship of this film because he worked on every element of creating this film and it was directly based off his life. This could link to his representation of women and mothers in his films as he had a daughter as said ‘reluctantly’ and this created a fear in him of children and women’s power to create life. Freud’s idea of the unconscious is one of the dominant ideologies expressed in horror film- the idea of secret desires that lie hidden from the conscious mind but drive our motivations.

Lynch does have strong claim to authorship over his film as he consistently takes on multiple roles in the film making process, and in his early work it was solely created by him, and the links between his short films and his feature’s is very clear as I have discussed. For ‘Eraserhead’ Lynch was the director, writer, producer, musician, editor, production designer, art director, sound effect designer, special effects designer. For ‘Blue Velvet’ he was the Director, writer, and composer. And for ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ he was the writer, director, actor, producer, and sound designer. So as for Sarris’ being need for an auteur to be technically competent there is no question that Lynch has control over all elements of the creation of his films and is very capable of working in all departments. This alongside his clear style and personal connections to his work would suggest Lynch is an auteur. His sexualisation of women and lacking representation may be a negative to his work, however I have discussed how it comes from an inherently personal place so could to be said what Sarris called ‘élan of the soul’ which is where a director’s personal personality and take on the world is reflected through their work, adding to their authorship. A good example to support David Lynch being a stylist is that he is clearly used to sell his films as they are being advertised. David Lynch’s style is clearly recognised by a mass audience as name ‘Lynch’ has connotations with his own unique style and genre of work. I came across his work consistently being called ‘David Lynch’s…’ (Fuller, G. (2001). Babes in Babylon. Sight and Sound, (12), pp.14-17.) in articles which highlights this.

However, to counter all of this there is of course still a strong argument to the concept of all film making being a collaborative art and there are many examples of influential collaborations in Lynch’s filmography.

Lynch does collaborate which some of his work and this of course could be argued that his collaborators could be called auteurs, or at least they would all hold a collaborative authorship rather than Lynch being the true auteur. One example of his collaborations is the reoccurring actors which has become a feature in his films. It is discussed whether Lynch has favourite actors and the reasons why he chooses to work with the same people. However, this choice does bring into question whether these actors have a claim to authorship over his films due to their performances, how can it be said that Lynch is a true auteur if we have not seen him work on feature films without this talent? Even just considering reoccurring actors in my three focal films there are multiple. Jack Nance who plays the protagonist in ‘Eraserhead’ also stars in both ‘Blue Velvet’ and ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’, Kyle Mclaughlin who plays the protagonist in ‘Blue Velvet’ also stars in a major role in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’, Laura Dern and Frances Bay from ‘Blue Velvet’ also stars in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me’ and these actors also have roles in other of Lynch’s feature films.  Also, it cannot be said Lynch’s work is not highly influenced through genre and a bricolage of techniques that came before him. His use of noir techniques such as high-contrast mise-en-scène framing. This genres aesthetic influences of German expressionism with the asymmetrical tendencies and dramatic use of light and shadow can be seen throughout noir films in off-kilter camera angles, direct front and side lighting, mysterious silhouettes. Lynch uses a bricolage technique to bring together elements from noir, post-modernism, German expressionism and surrealism to create his own signature style. Despite this, it could be said reoccurring actors be part of his style. He is known to be an unconventional person so only finds a connection with a few people, so is this limited choice of actors is part of his personal style? He does work with the horror/thriller genre however, explores and pushes boundaries, he isn’t conventional and brings something personal to standing conventions. Bricolage means he is pulling elements of lots of styles to make his own so in effect it’s still personal and he is just influenced by everything around him and his way of creating and interpreting through that arguable could mean this does not affect his authorship over his style.

 I think the strengths of my research were that I used different formats to gather my information, so my research was wide-ranging and came from both personal and critical sources. I began my research with the documentary ‘David Lynch: The Art Life’ (David Lynch: The Art Life. (2017). [film] Directed by J. Nguyen. Independent: Absurda.) as this gave me a personal insight into Lynch’s opinion on his work as it was fully narrated by him alone. It also was very useful in considering the authorship part of my creative investigation as I began to build up background knowledge about Lynch himself and how his personal style evolved and developed and the influences that affected him and his work. Also, then moving onto his own documentary called ‘Eraserhead Stories’ (Lynch, D. (2001). “Eraserhead” Stories. [video]) where he just talks about his stylistic influences, opinions and the zeitgeist of his life that came together for him to create ‘Eraserhead’ and make it the film it is. This source was also incredibly valuable because it is where I learnt of his family and personal life at the time of making ‘Eraserhead’ and I began to make connection between his film style and his personal life, as I have utilised and discussed in this essay. I then used a variety of e-journals and Sight and Sound articles which were valuable to gauge a more public response to Lynch’s work at the time and to get an insight into how his work was received by audiences and critically, and what other people analysed from his films. I think reading the book on Lynch ‘David Lynch: Decoded’ was a really useful piece of research before I began my own essay as it brought up different angles and theories on Lynch’s work I may not have considered and therefore reinforced or challenged my own analysis. Since Lynch’s films do fall into the psychological genre and my essay was a consideration of authorship and representation, my research into film theories that were relevant to this proved invaluable in building up my knowledge to analyse the focal films in-depth and with and understanding of the theory behind why and how he Lynch uses these techniques and its wider value and interior meaning. So, my sources from the ‘Oxford Guide to Film Studies’ (Hill, J. and Gibson, P. ed., (1998). The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press Inc.). And of course, I felt that looking into some of Lynch’s early art and film work was crucial to understanding his artistic development and his control of audio-visual language, so analysing his early short films ‘The Alphabet’ (Lynch, D. (1968). David Lynch the Alphabet. [video]) and ‘The Grandmother’ (Lynch, D. (1970). The Grandmother - David Lynch. [video]) which he made prior to the focal films I am considering in this essay was useful in linking all of Lynch’s work and personal style. In addition to my research cited here I used this as a stimulus to continue to look into information about Lynch, his work and important facts or ideas that do not feature directly in my work but helped me build up a wealth of knowledge. However, some of the limitations of my research were that I had so much contextual knowledge and information it was difficult collating valuable quotes and being critical on what routes to investigate and write about and what was not completely relevant. It took a lot of time and critical decisions to pick apart the vital parts f information to create an essay and that was focused and detailed and I explored my own opinions and analysis.

Overall, in my opinion and in reaction to exploration and research I would say David Lynch is an auteur of his own films. I believe his representation of female characters can be two-dimensional and misogynistic however it is flawed and complex like Lynch himself and he is so intertwined with his work. Lynch clearly and consistently brings parts of himself, his character, and his life into his work and style and I feel there is links between his intricate use of the audio-visual language and his own personal development as an auteur.

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