#this is why zooey is the queen

[livelovecaliforniadreams]

There was a lot of room for us to make up stuff. So we did. And I remember myself making up and being like what if we said One, two, three, four, JFK! And the other people said FDR!...That was me -Zooey Deschanel 

[rotzaprachim]

more on f1nkelstein - tw transphobia, antiblack racism, antisemitism

well first off he’s declared a “war on woke” which is never a good sign

he’s gone from flat out lambasting of other Jewish scholars and institutions (many of them not explicitly Zionist) as *utilising* antisemitism or making it up to flat lambasting Black scholars and movements for “wokeism” and “using identity politics” to distract from *real* class revolution. Obviously this is not to put esp centrists and liberal Jewish and Black institutions beyond the scope of criticism (like the adl or Obama) but it’s also important to talk about the way that finklesteins work has often served to carry water for claims of Jewish and now Black people *using* their identities to deceive the Real True Working class en large, and he’s gone after women specifically like Deborah lipstadt and kimberlè Crenshaw. This isn’t some one off comment but the entire content of his 2022 book.

There's also this:

Transgender Cult | Norman Finkelstein

"A recent cover of the hyper-woke New Yorker magazine featured a transgender person. The Boston Children’s Hospital defines gender dysphoria as “a conflict between the sex you were assigned at birth and the gender with which you identify.” Its symptoms include a “strong dislike of your sexual anatomy,” and it can lead to “suicide attempts.” If you bar medical interventions to children suffering from this condition, new woke hero Zooey Zephyr castigated the Montana state legislature, “that is tantamount to torture.” It is said to be, at least in part, an organic, biological condition and would seem to belong in the family of mental illnesses. Indeed, “GD has been found to have a higher prevalence in people with psychiatric illnesses such as schizophrenia and autism spectrum disorder.” However, it is simultaneously a woke dogma that gender dysphoria “is not a mental illness” but, on the contrary, “is a matter of diversity, not a pathology.” Diversity is of course a good thing—something to be celebrated. But schizophrenia is not celebrated, so why gender dysphoria? In my book, I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get to It!, I commented on the woke world’s perverse and perverted fetish of transgender persons:

The woke crowd has found a new mascot: transgender people. During the George Floyd protests, the New York Times emblazoned on its homepage, “Black Trans Women Seek More Space in the Movement They Helped Start.” Angela Davis homes in on “trans prisoners” as the “group that is perhaps more criminalized than any other group.” If one is going to play the “oppression sweepstakes,” it might be supposed that a Black youth locked up for life for a crime he didn’t commit is also a worthy contender. To listen to woke programming, you’d think the two most burning issues confronting Humanity are climate change and transgender bathrooms in North Carolina. During the first days of the catastrophic Ukraine war, fashionably woke news anchor Amy Goodman decided to boldface the plight of “trans Ukrainians unable to leave because their gender identity on their passport did not match their gender identity.” It might be supposed, however, that all manner of people with special hardships and handicaps had trouble fleeing. Albeit not as kinky, flight couldn’t have been a cakewalk for the wheelchair-bound either. Woke presenters positively drool over a guest who is transgender, as if it was the next best thing to being crowned Homecoming Queen. We’re all supposed to celebrate. But celebrate what? Is it a celebratory occasion if one is born with a wrenching mismatch between soma and soul; if one undergoes long, agonizing and costly medical procedures that, in general, are as effective as hair plugs and breast implants in repairing one’s genetic make-up? No doubt, S.P.U. (Surgeons and Pharma United!) is breaking out the bubbly. But why the rest of us? A transgender person deserves maximum compassion, for sure. I refuse, however, to hop on the woke bandwagon."

My opinions on Finkelstein are perhaps colored by the fact he's been in my experience a favorite among antisemites looking for talking points about how the Jews invented antisemitism all along, but I do think there's a distinctively neoconservative *anti woke* edge to his work under "class politics." As a non-zionist Jewish person i take a lot of issue with his definitions of "the new antisemitism" as being formulated to ward off legitimate attacks on antizionism and Israel. This position would assume the "old" antisemitism was every really dealt with, and it hasn't been. There's really nothing new about dual loyalties tropes. There's also a lot of mess to his claims in the "Holocaust Industry" book that also have nothing to do with Israel or Zionism, such as the idea that Jewish institutions defrauded or sketchily took money from goysiche swiss banks- note that Finkelstein is also against reparations for Black people in the us (*identity politics*) and has described BDS as a "cult." This is all getting into far more nuanced academic territory than tumblr is really meant for and I don't want to add fuel to the fire of Did this Person Do Something Problematic??? Cancel time!!!! linear thinking, but IMHO Finkelstein's use of personal identity politics as a way to then shut down discussions of both anti semitism and Anti-Black racism as being somehow "separate" from class struggle or class inequality is enough to weaken considerably considerations of his entire body of work.

[mochie85]

Cast your mutuals as celebrities based off of how popular they seem to you (yes you can include me :D)

I kind of twisted this into...casting my mutuals as who I picture when I interact with them. I'm going in alphabetical order:

@crimson25 – Hayley Williams

@gaitwae – Elizabeth Olsen

@give-me-a-moose – Emily Rossum

@ijuststareatstuffhereok89 – Tessa Thompson

@immersed-in-mischief – Taylor Swift

@lokisasgardianvampirequeen – Katie McGrath

@lokisgoodgirl - Karen Gillan (queen, you know why)

@lokiprompts21 – Natalie Portman

@loopsisloops - Kat Dennings

@lucylaufeyson3 – Hailee Steinfeld

@michelleleewise – Vanessa Hudgens

@mischief2sarawr – Billie Piper (but with black hair. I don’t know why I think you have black hair.)

@ozymdias – Sofia Vergara

@theaudacitytowrite - Zooey Deschanel

@vbecker10 – Florence Pugh

@wheredafandomat - Rhianna

@xorpsbane – D’Arcy Carden

I hope this doesn't offend anybody. I think HIGHLY of all these women. And it's just how I picture you when I interact with you. 🥰🥰

[noirsvault]

ZOOEY!!!

ZOOEY BE CAREFUL!!

NOO!!!

WTF that sounds so NASTY?!? ToT She's sent flying aAA??? LOBELIA! LOBELIA IF YOU DIDN'T KNOW WHEN TO APPEAR BEFORE THEN IT IS RIGHT NOW!!! (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻

*sob* She's still standing, okay ;v; And I guess Lobelia is not the type who likes saving people, nor does he care that much about Zooey anyway orz

THEY ARE MORE OKAY THAN YOU ARE RIGHT NOW!!! Maybe except the nerd almost got his head bitten off for being nerdy BUT

girllll (ಥ﹏ಥ)

??? WHY SO COOL ???

She's being all badass and she used her? charge? attack? I think? It's not like I've ever seen it but?? It'd be nice if they had inserted her battle attack animation here though? ANYWAY

Nothing can stop you Queen, but maybe wait for the slowpoke boys for jussst a minute pleasee ToT

She is trying to "squeeze herself through" the monsters, ookay... ; v ;

FUCK THAT SCARES ME!!

Oh no ZOOEYYyyyyy

She is falling now??? oh my god oh NO STOP THIS I AM HAVING MIRUKO WAR FLASHBACKS

IZUKUUUUU

WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG YOU SLOWPOKEEE

[wiremarrow]

The Double Bind of Women's Speech

“I find vocal fry and upspeak in women annoying.” The Father shrieked and leapt out of his robe. The confessional was engulfed in a blazing inferno. The nuns aimed their crosses at me, harmonizing in Latin prayer. The altar boys circumscribed the ground I stood on with holy salts. I once again echoed my sin that began this conflagration, hands erected to the falling, thundering sky and was promptly laid out by a brass-knuckled Antifa member.

As a privileged, white-ish boy, how dare I criticize the ways young men and women choose to speak and use their bodies! Further, how can I possibly identify myself as a progressive liberal while admitting to my complicity in what appears to be systemic misogyny! Well, today I confess to my atrocity and will provide plenty of tomatoes as ammunition for your volleys; firstly, however, let me cover my bases before judgement comes. I'll go ahead and explain what vocal fry is along with accompanying speech eccentricities.

The human voice has a range of vocal tones produced by the vibrational frequencies of the vocal folds, also called vocal cords, which can be partitioned into three primary vocal registers: modal voice (your normal speaking voice), vocal fry (a low-pitched, raspy voice), and falsetto (a high-pitched, shrill voice) (Appleman 1986; McKinney 1994). For instance, you’d most likely use your falsetto register when squealing at a baby, your modal register when giving a class presentation or simply talking naturally, and vocal fry when describing how pleasureful a piece of dark chocolate is. More physically, “[v]ocal fry is produced by tight adduction of the arytenoid cartilages with reduced tension of the vocal folds with large and irregular vibrations and a low rough sound when air passes. It is not viewed as an involuntary voice disorder, but rather as a volitional strategy that has been mainly recognised as a feature of some styles of singing” (Hornibrook et al. 2018). The coarse, glottal rattling associated with vocal fry is best exemplified in its cultural ambassadors: Zooey Deschanel, Britney Spears, and the queen of creaky voice, Kim Kardashian, among others. Vocal fry’s androgenous partner, upspeak (or uptalk), is an eccentric speech pattern which “refer[s] to [the] rising intonation at the end of declarative sentences, or […] the tendency for people to make statements that sound like questions’’ (Warren 2016).

Now that we’re primed with context, I propose a methodical and logically-sound autopsy of my original question to reason out why I feel the way I do and whether I should feel the way I do.

I’m writing this because a day ago I had a conversation with someone from school where I personally found it hard to discern when the other person had finished speaking their thought, confused over their seemingly disinterested tone (the subject was over the deaths of 19 children in Uvalde, TX), and moderately difficult to make out their deeper utterances – their speech sounded like something between grumbles and moans. Although it probably took me just a few extra seconds to comprehend what they said after each sentence, I was pretty thrown off for the remainder of our talk.  So, could this person just be a statistical anomaly that slipped through the cracks of socialization? Am I just a dreadful listener with no emotional reading? 100%, reader. After a quick Google search had diagnosed the culprits of their articulation difficulties to be upspeak and vocal fry, I now seek to objectively answer their effects on users, if others find it annoying, and why I find it annoying to best eliminate biases and pass my learnings along.

The first time vocal fry in speaking voice was formally recognized was in 1966 (Hollien 1966). Now recently, there have been circulating anecdotes asserting an increasing prevalence of vocal fry and upspeak in Standard American-English (SAE) speakers, especially in younger female speakers, which have roused the interest of voice researchers, linguists, speech pathologists, and public critics and pundits alike; yet, the studies researching these speech patterns are small in number and moderate in scale which is likely attributed to the labor-intensive annotation process. From what we do have available, vocal fry seems to be increasing in young women. For instance, the perceived prevalence of vocal fry has increased significantly (P=0.03) among Finnish women and insignificantly (P=1.00) among Finnish men from 1990 to 2010 (Uusitalo et al. 2022). Additionally, out of a population of 34 SAE female college students, approximately two-thirds use vocal fry in sentence reading, suggesting that, “the use of the vocal fry register is frequent in some adult SAE speakers” (Wolk 2012). In a Science article at the time of publishing, Wolk notes that, “speech researchers suspect the vibrational trend [vocal fry] is widespread in the United States” (Fessenden 2011). The article continues: “The group is also the first to verify that American women are much more likely to exhibit the behavior [vocal fry] than men, as its [now-published] data show[s] that male college-age students don’t use the creaky voice” (Fessenden 2011). So, vocal fry appears to be on the rise – predominantly in women (Hornibrook et al. 2018). However, a recent meta-analysis of ten studies measuring vocal fry prevalence in varieties of English found that the, “[i]nvestigations into the prevalence of creaky voice in varieties of English are scarce, modest in scale, extremely methodologically diverse, and lacking in both time depth and geographic breadth. Claims that creaky voice has become increasingly prevalent among young American women are widespread in public and scholarly discourse. However, this systematic review found that such claims are not yet substantiated by quantitative evidence. But nor are they refuted by the evidence. [...] Furthermore, with regards to a possible increase among young American women in particular, there has been minimal description of present-day older American women’s use of creaky voice, which might offer ‘apparent-time’ evidence of change” (Dallaston & Docherty 2020). For upspeak – or in linguistics, high rise terminals (HRT) – a small study found that, out of a sample of twelve female and eleven male speakers, “females used high rise terminals more often than males, and their HRTs showed greater pitch excursion [‘accent curves’] and later alignment” (Ritchart 2013). Do you remember how I said that topical research on the subject of vocal fry is hard to come by? It’s even worse for upspeak. Angela Barry, a linguist at the University of Sheffield denied me an online copy of her dissertation measuring HRT across SoCal and Britain which is entirely in her right but would have been so fucking helpful here. I want to punch this kind lady; I pirated a copy and it was absolute dogshit. Anyways, a study analyzing the responses of Jeopardy! contestants found that, “[t]he typical purveyor of uptalk is white, young, and female. Men use uptalk more when surrounded by women contestants, and when correcting a woman contestant after she makes an incorrect response” (Linneman 2013). Another small study of twelve native Southern Ontario English speakers corroborates that women were observed to uptalk significantly more than men and that it did not vary with age (Shokeir 2008). Further, when a speaker sample of 75 from Porirua, New Zealand, subdivided by age, sex, ethnicity (Maori and Pakeha), and class, the use of HRTs being favored by young Maori and by young Pakeha women (Britain 2008). I encourage you to browse through the facts here and judge it for yourself. Is this growing phenomenon real?

The why of the issue is a little harder to interpret. There are many theories as to why, from my analysis of the data, females predominantly seem to use vocal fry and upspeak more in comparison to males and why their frequencies are increasing. For instance, upspeak is positively correlated when a female believes to be more certain in an answer yet negatively correlated when a male believes to be more certain in an answer (Linneman 2013). Shokeir’s findings corroborates this, concluding that “[...] men interpret intonational contours as having a more traditional function than women do. Men reported that the falling contour conveyed finality and certainty and one of the rising contours, L*H-H%, conveyed continuation. Women did not interpret these contours to have their conventional readings, suggesting that women use these contours to convey other social functions” (Shokeir 2008). These studies support the theory that upspeak may signal confidence or neutrality from a female’s perspective but uncertainty from a male’s perspective. Another theory could be that upspeak is used to indicate politeness or subservience in speech. Britain supports: “The results show that linguistic change is in progress, the use of HRTs being favored by young Maori and by young Pakeha women. Another theory could be that upspeak messages The results are explained in terms of the function of HRTs as positive politeness markers” (Britain 2008). A sociolinguistic study sampled and analyzed the high rising terminals (L*H) of college women in sororities at the University of Texas at Austin, noting that, “[i]n particular, one speaker reported, and several concurred, that upon hearing the intonational features in (23) (also present in (25)), she ‘can’t help but start talking that way too’; others remarked that stories told with that intonation in the dining room were likely to get a larger audience. Interestingly, several sorority officers reported that, while they would use ‘this kind of intonation’ (L*H) when addressing another sorority, they wouldn’t use it when addressing a fraternity because it would make them appear ‘weak.’ The relative status of fraternity-sorority participants is asymmetric to the extent that sex roles are; when L*H is interpreted as connecting participants, a speaker with lower status is more likely to be viewed as eliciting approval, as when a sorority pledge uses the form in addressing active members in a weekly meeting. The relative status of participants is distinct from the attitudinal ‘meaning’ of L*H; suggestions that women use phrase-final rises more frequently than men because they more frequently want to convey uncertainty or deference (Lakoff 1975) or inconclusiveness (Bolinger 1989) are mistaken in attributing these meanings to the intonational form” (McLemore 1990). Another study noted uncertainty associated with prolongations with upspeak to be statistically significant (Tomlinson & Tree 2011). For vocal fry, there are also a vast amount of theories speculating its use case. One follows the classic gender power tug-of-war: that women use vocal fry to perceptually lower their voices out of empowerment. This theory is founded on the premise that a lower voice is seen as more authoritative which is supported by profuse amounts of academic literature. For instance, a 2012 study observed that participants voted more for political candidates with deeper voices as they were judged to be more comparatively dominant (Klofstad et al. 2012). Another theory could be vocal fry’s utilization in solidarity, as distinct vocal phenomena can be markers for culture or a common tribe (Pittam 1987). In this way, a noticeable, repetitive eccentricity like vocal fry might act as a grouping associator in a particular vernacular of English.

Well, if vocal fry and upspeak seem to exist as speech phenomena, who does it harm? Vocal fry doesn’t seem to damage your vocal cords. Lee Akst, an otolaryngologist at Johns Hopkins, claims that “[t]he vocal anatomy is not damaged by speaking in vocal fry. However, like any behavior, vocal or otherwise, it can become a habit” (Akst 2022). Laukkanen corroborates, writing “[n]o significant relations were found between creakiness or strain and vocal symptoms in [the] sample of university students” (Laukkanen 2020). However, social ramifications are another issue entirely. A large peer-reviewed study from 2014 found that “[r]elative to a normal speaking voice, young adult female voices exhibiting vocal fry are perceived as less competent, less educated, less trustworthy, less attractive, and less hirable. The negative perceptions of vocal fry are stronger for female voices relative to male voices. These results suggest that young American females should avoid using vocal fry speech in order to maximize labor market opportunities” (Anderson et al. 2014). Similarly, 700 male and female bosses were surveyed by Pearson, United Kingdom publisher, and found that the majority “believe uptalk hinders the prospects of promotion as well as better pay grades in their organization.” Business Insider details that “85% believe uptalk is a clear indicator of a person’s insecurity and emotional weakness, 70% find uptalk a particularly annoying trait, and 57% confirmed that upspeak has the potential to damage a person’s professional credibility” (Dallett 2014).

I’ve gone through all of this effort to finally diagnose why I find vocal fry and upspeak situationally irritating. Taken as a whole, the research suggests that women are punished for a voice too shrill and a voice too deep along with accompanying speech phenomena that is disproportionately represented in younger American females. Therefore, if I honestly say that I simply dislike the way these speech eccentricities sound, it isn’t clear whether this is a result of a biological predisposition or a socially-induced weight calibration motivated by “Valley Girl” stereotypes or other cognitive biases, in which case I defer to indifference. Although women have the advantage to modulate their vocal appearance to capture more benefits attributed to kindness and confidence in relation to high and low vocal tones respectively, it seems like the vast majority don’t and are penalized doubly on both fronts. It simply isn’t fair. What’s more unfair is that I judged these speech patterns negatively, speech patterns that women are more prone to use, and had them viced in a double bind however they choose to speak; they were losers either way.

I’ve done my due diligence. This investigation allowed me to be more cognizant about my biases and the faulty perceptions I had about these speech eccentricities and I hope it also assisted readers in overcoming their biases in the pursuit of truth.

Bibliography:

Appleman, D. Ralph. The Science of Vocal Pedagogy: Theory and Application. Indiana University Press. 1986. ISBN 13: 9780253203786.

McKinney, C. James. The diagnosis & correction of vocal faults: a manual for teachers of singing and for choir directors. Genevox Music Group. 1994. ISBN 13: 9781565939400.

Hornibrook J, Ormond T, Maclagan M. Creaky voice or extreme vocal fry in young women. The New Zealand Medical Journal, vol. 131, no. 1486. 30 November, 2018.

Dallaston K, Docherty G. The quantitative prevalence of creaky voice (vocal fry) in varieties of English: A systematic review of the literature. PLoS ONE 15(3): e0229960. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0229960.

Warren, Paul. Uptalk: The Phenomenon of Rising Intonation. Cambridge University Press. 2016. ISBN 13: 9781316403570.

Hollien H, Moore P, Wendahl RW, Michel JF. On the nature of vocal fry. J Speech Hear Res. 1966 Jun;9(2):245-7. doi: 10.1044/jshr.0902.245. PMID: 5925528.

Uusitalo T, Nyberg L, Laukkanen AM, Waaramaa T, Rantala L. Has the Prevalence of Creaky Voice Increased Among Finnish University Students From the 1990’S to the 2010’S? J Voice. 2022 Jan 3:S0892-1997(21)00416-1. doi: 10.1016/j.jvoice.2021.12.006. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 34991936.

Wolk L, Abdelli-Beruh NB, Slavin D. Habitual use of vocal fry in young adult female speakers. J Voice. 2012 May;26(3):e111-6. doi: 10.1016/j.jvoice.2011.04.007. Epub 2011 Sep 14. PMID: 21917418.

Ritchart A, Arvaniti A. The use of high rise terminals in Southern Californian English. Proceedings of Meetings on Acoustics, vol. 20, iss. 1. 2013. doi: 10.1121/1.4863274.

Tomlinson JM Jr, Fox Tree JE. Listeners’ comprehension of uptalk in spontaneous speech. Cognition. 2011 Apr;119(1):58-69. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2010.12.005. Epub 2011 Jan 14. PMID: 21237451.

Linneman TJ. Gender in Jeopardy!: Intonation Variation on a Television Game Show. Gender & Society. 2013;27(1):82-105. doi:10.1177/0891243212464905.

Shokeir, Vanessa. Evidence for the stable use of uptalk in South Ontario English. University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics, vol. 14, iss. 2, article 4. 2008.

Britain, David. Linguistic Change in Intonation: The Use of High Rising Terminals in New Zealand English. Language Variation and Change, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 77–104. 2008. doi: 10.1017/S0954394500000661.

Laukkanen AM, Rantala L. Relations between Creaky Voice and Vocal Symptoms of Fatigue. Folia Phoniatr Logop. 2021;73(2):146-154. doi: 10.1159/000506901. Epub 2020 Apr 21. PMID: 32316013.

Anderson RC, Klofstad CA, Mayew WJ, Venkatachalam M. Vocal fry may undermine the success of young women in the labor market. PLoS One. 2014;9(5):e97506. Published 2014 May 28. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0097506.

Akst L, Kristine MP. Is Vocal Fry Ruining My Voice? Johns Hopkins Medicine. 1 March, 2022, https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/is-vocal-fry-ruining-my-voice.

Fessenden, Marissa. ‘Vocal Fry’ Creeping Into U.S. Speech. American Association for the Advancement of Science. 9 December, 2011. https://www.science.org/content/article/vocal-fry-creeping-us-speech.

McLemore, Cynthia. The Interpretation of L*H in English. Texas Linguistic Forum 32: Discourse, Department of Linguistics and the Center for Cognitive Science. 1990.

Klofstad CA, Anderson RC, Peters S. Sounds like a winner: voice pitch influences perception of leadership capacity in both men and women. Proc Biol Sci. 2012;279(1738):2698-2704. doi:10.1098/rspb.2012.0311

Pittam J. Listeners’ Evaluations of Voice Quality in Australian English Speakers. Language and Speech. 1987;30(2):99-113. doi:10.1177/002383098703000201

Dallett, Lydia. This Communication Quirk Could Cost You A Promotion. Business Insider. Jan 24, 2014. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-uptalk-could-cost-you-a-promotion-2014-1

[andyscramberg]

Not to add to the negativity but it's upsetting me to think about zooey deschanel beating queen Jamie Lee Curtis in 2026 when they bring back Celebrity Big Brother. Miss new girl pisses me off. I hope Victoria Justice takes her out in the double.

I really am struggling with why you think miss quirky bangs deschanel would win cbb her ass couldn’t even win a emmy and victorious would be first out lol

[tabloidtoc]

Entertainment Weekly, December

Cover: Wandavision -- Elizabeth Olsen as Wanda Maximoff and Paul Bettany as Vision 

Page 1: Contents, Melissa Gilbert on the Little House on the Prairie Set in 1977 

Page 3: Sound Bites -- special holiday edition 

Page 4: Editor’s Note 

Page 6: The Must List -- Between the World and Me 

Page 8: The Orchard by David Hopen, Freaky 

Page 9: Chris Stapleton -- Starting Over 

Page 11: A Sky Beyond the Storm by Sabaa Tahir, Let Them All Talk 

Page 12: Batman/Catwoman 

Page 13: Nomadland 

Page 14: Soul, December Games -- Marvel’s Spider-man: Miles Morales, Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge, Immortals Fenyx Rising 

Page 16: My Must List -- Kenan Thompson 

Page 19: First Take -- Bob Odenkirk in Nobody -- the Better Call Saul star plays an unlikely action here complete with a bloody good makeover in this thriller about a family man who decides to seek revenge after a break-in 

Page 21: Pedro Pascal and Christian Slater -- We Can Be Heroes 

Page 22: Cover Story -- Wandavision a wonderfully weird send-up of sitcoms of the past is Marvel’s key to the future 

Page 30: Untold Stories: Holiday Movies Edition -- an oral history of The Family Stone -- Thomas Bezucha, Diane Keaton, Sarah Jessica Parker, Luke Wilson, Elizabeth Reaser, Dermot Mulroney, Tyrone Giordano, Brian White, Craig T. Nelson, Claire Danes

Page 36: Making the Scene -- The Muppet Christmas Carol -- fans of the Muppets’ 1992 take on Scrooge know a key scene is missing from the DVD version and it’s now the most beloved number ever left on the cutting-room floor, Closet Confidential -- Bridget Jones’ Diary -- Colin Firth and director Sharon Maguire reveal the secrets behind Darcy’s ugly sweater 

Page 37: The Merriest Movies Years Ever -- Jeremy Arnold the author of the TCM book Christmas in the Movies: 30 Classics to Celebrate the Season reveals why 1947 and 2003 were prime years for yuletide films 

Page 38: Role Call -- Mary Steenburgen -- the Oscar winner is a holiday movie MVP and here we look back at the roles that put the Mary in Christmas 

Page 39: Behind the Music -- The Preacher’s Wife -- Whitney Houston’s rousing 1996 film boasts one of the all-time great Christmas movie soundtracks and producer Mervyn Warren tells how it came together 

Page 40: Investigation: Is Die Hard a Christmas movie? It’s the debate that won’t die: does Bruce Willis’ 1988 action classic also qualify as a Christmas classic? With the help of some Die Hard alums we’re ready to settle this once and for all -- Bonnie Bedelia, Reginald VelJohnson, Dermot Mulroney, Zooey Deschanel, Mean Girls -- Christmas got a bit risque in the teen film’s memorial Jingle Bell Rock talent-show performance 

Page 41: 4 Things You Didn’t Know About Love Actually -- we actually unearthed some new tidbits from writer-director Richard Curtis about the much-discussed much-beloved Christmas rom-com 

Page 43: 3 secrets from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer -- it’s aired every year since 1964 but there are still some things you don’t know about the stop-motion Christmas special, 5-minute oral history -- Elf -- you’d better scurry for the story behind the film’s Baby It’s Cold Outside shower scene by Zooey Deschanel 

Page 44: Shondaland makes its Netflix debut December 25 with the swoony Bridgerton a Regency-era drama inspired by a series of romance novels 

Page 48: The Kane maker -- David Fincher and an all-star cast inhabit Old Hollywood for Netflix’s Manx the riveting behind-the-scenes story of Citizen Kane 

Page 52: In an era of rampant reboots it’s been awfully quiet on the Prairie so EW investigates why it’s taken so long for Hollywood to return to Laura Ingalls Wilder’s beloved town on Walnut Grove in Little House on the Prairie 

Page 57: 2020 Gift Guide 

Page 66: News + Reviews  -- It has spurred sales and served as a balm for concert-starved fans but the best by-product of Verzuz is its celebration of Black excellence 

Page 70: Movies -- from modernized classics to fresh newcomers the Hollywood musical is back in style with a new inclusive look 

Page 73: Indie’s New Queen -- with another major and wild big-screen performance in Black Bear Aubrey Plaza is emerging as an art-house icon 

Page 74: Meet Your Maker -- Alan Ball -- the Oscar and Emmy winner behind American Beauty and Six Feet Under and True Blood brings his most personal project to the screen: the road movie Uncle Frank and here Ball shares his iconic cinematic and literary inspirations 

Page 76: Comedy of My Life: Melissa McCarthy -- the Oscar nominee and Emmy winner flaunts some Superintelligence in her fourth movie directed by husband Ben Falcone 

Page 78: The Shot -- Silver Linings Playbook -- inside the creation of a classic scene 

Page 80: TV -- after years as the grounding force on The Big Bang Theory Kaley Cuoco is now flying high as The Flight Attendant at the center of a juicy murder mystery 

Page 82: Class is back in session on Peacock where Saved By the Bell revival debuts 

Page 83: The Crown 

Page 84: Small Axe 

Page 85: Q+A with Bryan Cranston -- in the limited series Your Honor the Emmy winner is breaking bad again starring as a judge whose son is involved in a hit-and-run 

Page 86: Unwrapping Christmas TV movies -- wisdom gleaned from a flurry of winters in Tinseltown 

Page 87: Role Call -- William H. Macy -- as he heads into the 11th and final season of Shameless he looks back on his most iconic projects, epic sci-fi series The Expanse is back with more cosmic chaos in season 5 

Page 89: What to Watch 

Page 96: Music -- Angus Young and Brian Johnson explain how AC/DC are back on track with a new album that honors late bandmate and brother Malcolm Young 

Page 98: Sam Smith 

Page 99: Q+A with legendary P-Funk bassist Bootsy Collins sheds light on his new album and his enormous collection of top hats 

Page 101: The Playback -- Joni Mitchell Archives: Vol. 1: The Early Years -- before she became an icon Mitchell was performing at local radio stations and recording homemade demos 

Page 102: A Band You Need to Know -- Sault -- the mysterious U.K. group has dropped two timely album-of-the-year contenders, Stupid Questions with Josh Groban -- the multiplatinum-selling golden-voiced baritone returns with Harmony but can he sing his way out of this comedic jam

Page 103: Epitaph -- Eddie Van Halen 

Page 104: Books -- Ernest Cline returns with Ready Player Two the sequel to his 2011 blockbuster and 2020′s most secretive novel 

Page 106: Comedians Rachel Bloom and Michelle Buteau have new memoirs but first they chat about bullying and Dick Jones and how Julia Roberts likes her eggs 

Page 107: High Anxiety with Cazzie David -- the writer and daughter of OG angster Larry David broadcasts her own neuroses in the essay collection No One Asked for This and here shares her deepest fears 

Page 108: The weirdest year in publishing history wraps up with an all-virtual literary awards season and here we break down the titles with their eyes on the prize 

Page 110: Screenwriter and director ad novelist John Ridley offers an alternative perspective in The Other History of the DC Universe 

Page 112: The Bullseye

[moceit]

Moceit Playlist

Listen Here

An ever-expanding playlist full of music that will give you all the Moceit feels!

So Long - Zooey Deschanel, M. Ward

When the Day Met the Night - Panic! At The Disco

Soap - The Oh Hellos

Heather - Conan Gray

She - dodie

Nobody - Hozier

All My Love - George Ezra

Spectacular Rival - George Ezra

I Choose - Alessia Cara

Sinners - Lauren Aquilina

This Side of Paradise - Coyote Theory

What If - Five for Fighting

Honeybee - Steam Powered Giraffe

From Eden - Hozier

Sarah Smiles - Panic! At The Disco

Yellow - Coldplay

My Beloved Monster - Eels

Iris - The Goo Goo Dolls

Jackie and Wilson - Hozier

Flaws - Bastille

Favorite Liar - The Wrecks

Genghis Khan - Miike Snow

I Think I Like You - sirenXX

Bad 4 Us - Superfruit

It’s Alright - Mother Mother

Stubborn Love - The Lumineers

Pollyanna - insaneintherainmusic, Adriana Figueroa, FamilyJules, Sab Irene

Ultimately - khai dreams

please don’t - mxmtoon

You’re Somebody Else - flora cash

Love Like You - Steven Universe, Rebecca Sugar

Strawberry Blond - Mitski

Lemon Boy - Cavetown

Two Birds - Regina Spektor

Always - Panic! At The Disco

Fools - Lauren Aquilina

Monster - dodie

The Other Side - Hugh Jackman, Zac Efron

Ruin Your Night - Sorcha Richardson

Somebody’s Baby - Sidney Gish

Fourth Of July - Fall Out Boy

Anything - Rusty Clanton

Wild Roses - Of Monsters and Men

Hello My Old Heart - The Oh Hellos

Waves - Electric Guest

Can't Help Falling In Love - Elvis Presley

Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy - Queen

Postscript - Koethe

Good Day Sunshine - The Beatles

Love Me Tender - Elvis Presley

Wonder - Shawn Mendes

Are You Bored Yet? - Wallows, Clairo

Try - Simple Plan

Why Do You Feel So Down - Declan McKenna

The Louvre - Lorde

Punches - Noah Cyrus, LP

True Kinda Love - Steven Universe, Estelle, Zach Callison

The Mercy of the Wind - Million Eyes

Honesty - Pink Sweat$

Golden - Harry Styles

Tonight/Simera - Reamonn

Request a song

[idasessions]

Famous Muses & Girlfriends in Filmmaking Pt. 26

MUSE: Jean Arthur (born Gladys Georgianna Greene)

Jean was born on October 17th, 1900 in Plattsburgh, NY to photographer Herbert Greene and his wife Johanna Nelson. Jean was of Norwegian ancestry and had Lutheran maternal grandparents, though her parents were practicing Protestants. She and her three brothers grew up in various locations like New York, Maine and Florida because of Herbert’s photography career before settling in Manhattan when Jean was 15. When WWI broke through, Jean dropped out of school and got a job as a stenographer as her brothers registered to serve (older brother Albert would sadly die from a gas attack). About five years later Jean started modeling in NYC and even befriended future MGM queen Norma Shearer, who was also a model at the time. In 1923, Jean and Norma headed out to California with offers for movie careers. But Jean would begin wasted in short silent films and B-movie westerns because she wasn’t comfortable with the fashionable flapper persona of the 1920s. Her shyness and slightly nasal voice would hold her back from stardom for a decade, while she was passed along to various studios around Hollywood. Eventually when ‘talkies’ debuted, Jean started gaining traction at Paramount Pictures with flicks like The Canary Murder Case (1929), The Saturday Night Kid (1929) and the later hit A Foreign Affair (1948). To help calm her social anxiety, Jean was recommended to get stage training on Broadway, which only lasted a year in 1931. She also went from a natural brunette to a peroxide blonde. In 1934, Jean was offered a contract at Columbia Pictures, where she would make the majority of her best received films such as Easy Living (1937), Only Angels Have Wings (1939) and The Talk of the Town (1942). She had her only Academy Award nomination—for Best Actress—in The More the Merrier (1943).

Unlike most actresses in old Hollywood and even modern filmmaking, Jean hit her prime as an actress in her late 30s and early 40s. Even more impressive is that she was consistently cast as leading ladies and love interests which is almost unheard of at that age. Part of this success was for a few reasons. One, she’s very talented. Two, she never revealed her age in resumes throughout her career, though it was always rumored she was born sometime between 1900-05. Three, she either found the fountain of youth or an amazing diet+skin routine because she legit looked exactly the same for two full decades. (Never spending time in the sun probably helped in the skin department too.) Jean was a bit like the American Greta Garbo with her aloofness and privacy off camera. Before Diane Keaton, Winona Ryder and Zooey Deschanel existed, Jean was the neurotic queen of classic cinema. She never socialized in public and rarely participated in interviews or magazine photospreads. Like Marlene Dietrich and Claudette Colbert, Jean insisted all of her profile shots be from the left side of her face. Allegedly on her final day as an actress for Columbia in 1944, Jean exclaimed “I’m free!” while walking out of the studio. She had become so burnt out on fame and films, that she only made two more movies: A Foreign Affair and the classic western Shane (1953). She tried Broadway again in 1950, with a successful run of ‘Peter Pan;’ and then experimented with starring in her own sitcom “The Jean Arthur Show” (1966) for three weeks before the show was cancelled. She officially retired from performing when she discovered she had a psychosomatic illness, and then spent the 1970s teaching drama at Vassar College and North Carolina’s School of Arts. Filmmaking legend Frank Capra openly referred to Jean as his ‘all-time favorite actress’ to work with. While they were both contracted at Columbia, Capra had her as the female leads in his dramedy masterpieces Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), You Can’t Take It with You (1938) and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939). The latter two co-starred Capra’s favorite male star, Jimmy Stewart.

Okay, so this entry is going to be a little different than the usual theme of this series. Basically I just want to tell you a story on how one of my fave screen couples, Jean and Jimmy, apparently weren’t into each other at all IRL. Jimmy and Jean played adorable love interests to each other in Mr. Smith and You Can’t Take It with You, but were polar opposites out of character. Unlike Jean—who was either at the studio or her therapist’s office when she wasn’t locked in her house—Jimmy was a huge extrovert whether it be up in the air flying one of planes, clubbing in Hollywood with many a starlet or just chilling with his dudes. When Mr. Smith went into production it was originally planned as a sequel to Mr. Deeds, reuniting Capra, Gary Cooper and Jean. This made Jean extra excited because she liked Gary a lot as a friend and co-star (she even credited him for helping her get over being camera shy). But then Gary ended up having to choose Beau Geste (1939) over Washington, and Capra used the available role as a way to work with Jimmy again. Capra was a big supporter of Jimmy becoming a lead actor, and thought he was the perfect choice for Jefferson Smith. “I knew he would make a hell of a Jeff Smith. He was a country kid, an idealist. That’s very close to him.” Jean, err…thought otherwise. She apparently told Capra that he made a mistake casting a ~pretty boy as a man who goes up against the entire government; and that someone with a stronger, masculine, more intimidating presence (Gary) would make more sense. She was so disappointed in the casting, that apparently she complained about it on set (kinda overkill, but okay…). Jean even turned down working with Capra and Jimmy a third time seven years later in It’s a Wonderful Life (1946), where she was offered the part of Mary Hatch (Donna Reed). Good thing she turned it down though, because who the hell would believe Jean as an 18-year-old during the dance sequence? Meanwhile, Jimmy had nothing but nice things to say about Jean during all of this. He went as far as to call her one of finest women he ever worked with.

So there you go. My favorite male actor of all time and one of my favorite actresses had amazing chemistry on film, but didn’t get along as people. I’m so sad. But my one question, is like…why?? I still can’t even figure what Jean’s deal with him was besides the ‘miscasting’ and Jimmy being a big playboy at the time, while she was a wallflower. I mean, I know he was a lifelong Republican and she was a registered Democrat, so it could’ve been political….But if that was the case, then why did she love Gary so much, when he was just as conservative?? IDGI. Apparently Jean did eventually come around to agreeing that Jimmy gave a good performance in Mr. Smith while participating in a retrospective on Capra’s career in the 1970s. She also listed Mr. Smith Goes to Washington as her favorite movie she made.

Oh, and to make this post somewhat relevant to the M&G series, I’ll mention that Jean was married twice in her personal life. The first time was when she was 27 to some guy named Julian Anker for only 20 hours. And the second time was to writer-producer Frank Ross from 1932 to 1949, during which they also collaborated on The Devil & Miss Jones (1941) and The More the Merrier. Oh, and she had an affair with studio head David O. Selznick back when they were both working at Paramount and he was married to L.B. Mayer’s daughter Irene (SMH). Living up to her reclusive reputation to the fullest, Jean died single, without children and requested not to have a funeral when she died at age 90 of heart failure in 1991. Her ashes were scattered across the California coast. For the past nine decades, Jean has been remembered and considered one of the most versatile actresses of her generation. Her former director George Stevens once called her “one of the best comediennes of screen history.”

[silver-wields-a-pen]

WIP tag game

Tagged by @cherish-writes 

I’m sticking with Thaw for this one because I’ve not done enough world building or anything for Divinely Volatile to answer half of these lool

1. Describe the plot in one sentence?

Trapped in Oz and tasked with saving the descendants of her race, Nyima is in for the battle of her life and at the end may win her freedom. 

2. Pick one sight, smell, sound, feel and taste to describe the aesthetic for your novel.

Sight: Glaciers and blue glitter

Smell: Icy tundras tinged with smoke

Sound: The hum of magic and the crackle of flame

Feel: The apprehensive dread of the unknown

Taste: Ice cubes and blood

3. Which 3+ songs would make up a playlist for the novel?

Takeharu Ishimoto: The beginning of the end

J'Nique Nicole and Emi Evans: Weight of the world

Kelly Clarkson: People like us

4. What’s the time period and location in which the novel takes place?

20th age — or thereabouts. Planet: Illthdar, the island of Ozma.

5. Are there any former titles you’ve considered but discarded?

I think I’ve got a gift for titles because I’ve never come up with one that didn’t have some meaning to what I was writing — even if it was cheesy af. Thaw is the last part of an origin story about Nyima, an ice elemental. The first book is Frozen, the second is Frozen Flame, and this one is Thaw.

6. What’s the first line of your novel?

“Battle not the monsters, lest ye become one.”

7. What’s a line of dialogue you’re particularly proud of?

This was during a point in the story when Tundra was kidnapped. Nyima can get savage af when she’s mad and I love that side of her.

“He's right handed, Nyima. He won't be able to draw anything if you keep on,” Seth pointed out. “There are other bones,” she replied in a careless voice over Yrdan's whimpers. “Man, Tundra's missing all this,” Imogen said in an undertone to Zercey. “Can you imagine how Muscles would be watching Nyima do a Gestapo act?” Zercey pulled a face. “I don't want to imagine, thanks.”

8. Which line from the novel most represents it as a whole?

I think at least one person has said this every five chapters.

“We have a problem.”

9. Who are your character(s) faceclaims?

Nyima: Khulan Chuluun Tundra: Godfrey Gao Vyxen: Devin Jade Date: (can’t find the ref rn) Seth: Jay Ellis Zercey: Zooey Deschanel Imogen: Luce Hollestelle

10. Sort your character(s) into Hogwarts houses.

Passing on this

11. Which character’s name do you like the most?

Nyima -- it’s pretty and has a nice meaning

12. Describe each character’s daily outfit.

Nyima: Crop tops and ribbon skirts -- she likes to keep as cool as possible. Will occasionally mix things up by wearing just underwear with a floaty belt and accessories -- to keep cool. She has different ideals about clothing and underwear just doesn’t make sense to her why it’s gotta go under something else.

Tundra: Sleeveless shirts, easy to move in pants and boots. Boy is a ninja and likes being able to flip out lool

Zercey: Earth tones, practical tunics with corsets and trousers, boots. Likes fancy hairbands.

Vyxen: All the colours and patterns and none of them match!! 

Date: All black all the time.

Seth: jellabiya in bright colors and patterns. Thick, red winter coat.

Imogen: All the colours and patterns but in leggings and leotards.

13. Do any characters have distinctive birthmarks/scars?

Nyima has a large curved scar that goes from her spine around her right hip and then another long slice down her right thigh. She was dropped on a mountain. She also has a fractal scarring pattern going over the top half of her back from her right shoulderblade, around and under her breast and up part of the nape of her neck.

Tundra’s missing his left eye and has a demon spirit in the socket -- it doesn’t do much to help him out. He got shot in the head so lost a good portion of his cheekbone. He’s got a polycarbide plate covering it -- it’s not pretty. Nyima loves him anyway.

Vyxen has some thick cat claw scarring on her back and shoulders from when she was attacked by a cat-faced borrower.

14. Which character most fits a character trope?

None of them. Nyima’s definitely not a typical ice queen and I wouldn’t say the others are tropes, either.

15. Which character is the best writer? Worst?

Date. The others are all semi literate or illiterate. Illthdarian is a hard language to learn.

16. Which character is the best liar? Worst?

Abaddon, but they’re not in Oz with the group. The worst liar would be either Vyxen or Nyima. Vyxen gets teary too easily and Nyima’s expressions give her away.

17. What character swears the most? Least?

Most would be either Seth, Tundra or Date and the least would be Nyima since she doesn’t swear at all and nothing I’ve done so far is making her

18. Which character has the best handwriting? Worst?

Date. Pretentious cursive is a go!!

19. Which character is most like you? Least like you?

None of them!!

20. Which character would you most like to be?

I don’t wanna be like those derpy dorks lool they’re fun but they’re a mess!!

Tagging: @illthdar @guardians-of-las-vyxen @scottish-hellhound @raylenequinn @lost-cheshire-cat

[occasionalfics]

Christmas Cheer (Thor X Reader)

drabble masterlist | main masterlist | taglist

For @warriorsacrifice: “Thor's s/o and him spending Christmas together and they decorate the house and tree as well as eating cookies and watching movies? Then she tells him about Santa and he's all giddy?”

A/N: I actually loved writing this? I know it’s...not at all the right season but I don’t even care? And if you know anything about me, you should know that I’m a hopeless romantic so of course I had to work mistletoe into this! Also, I’m Jewish so...I based most of this off of what I’ve done with friends for Christmas and/or things I’ve seen in movies (legitimately) and read in books. I...think I got things accurate, but I’m not gonna pretend like it’s all perfect.

Oh and yeah Elf is my favorite Christmas movie. Because, “The best way to spread Christmas Cheer is singing loud for all to hear.” And also because “Smiling’s my favorite!” AND “Bye Buddy! Hope you find your dad!” AND Zooey Deschanel singing “Baby It’s Cold Outside.”

Warnings: Nothing, super cute and fluffy!

Words: 2,524

Normally you went home for the holidays, but this year, your parents had decided to go on a Cruise instead of hosting Christmas at their house. That ended up being for the better, you thought. You wanted to spend Christmas with Thor, but you weren’t sure it was time for him to meet your family yet. You’d only been dating a couple of months, and you knew family could be something of a touchy subject for him. You didn’t want to rush anything, so you decided to decorate your apartment and host a mini-party for just the two of you.

He stayed over the day before Christmas Eve and helped you decorate the living room. You already had your tree up - it was one of the fake ones that fit on top of a table, given how small your space was - but you’d saved a few ornaments for him to place on it. He studied each ornament closely, asking questions about the details like, “This is that Queen from Alderaan, right?”

You nodded. “Princess Leia,” you told him, unwrapping the last ornament from the bubble wrap you kept around the breakable ones.

“Your favorite,” he said, a proud smile on his face as he placed the Leia ornament over one of the small branches.

“That she is,” you said, handing him the final ornament. “Doesn’t hurt that you kinda remind me of her.”

Thor took it as a compliment, like it was meant. He beamed, probably remembering the last time you’d made him watch the original Star Wars trilogy. You weren’t totally unconvinced that Leia wasn’t his favorite, too, although he always said it was Chewbacca.

That night, you watched It’s A Wonderful Life. It was your mom’s favorite movie and a Christmas tradition. Thor paid attention the whole time, waiting until the end to ask, “Is that really a thing Midgardian teachers say? About the angels?”

You laughed and shook your head. “Not anymore, anyway. It’s just...a nice line in the movie, I guess.”

He hummed his response as the end credits rolled. As the DVD menu came up, he said, “I know George Bailey had to go through all of that to learn his lesson, but I must say, I don’t think I agree.”

You turned to him and asked, “How so?”

“Wishing that he’d never been born? How could he ever expect that his friends and family would be better off without him? His wife was so lonely…”

“She wasn’t his wife if he’d never been born,” you said, giving him a somewhat sad smile.

“Yes, but that’s my point! Life happens as it’s meant to. Tempting fate by reversing time is dangerous. And, in George’s case, selfish.”

You nodded. “But you said yourself he had to do it to learn.” You tilted your head and watched his serious face. “Are you telling me you’d never go back and change even just one thing that happened before today?”

He paused, then shrugged. “A life lived without regrets is a life lived without growth. That’s why I love that cartoon about the mouse who cooks,” he said, his smile widening just a bit.

You laughed at that. “He’s a rat. They’re bigger, and they tend to be more highly stigmatized.”

“Right. But I meant that that movie deals with mistakes and failure in a much healthier manner,” he said. “But I assume it’s not meant to be a movie viewed during Christmas?”

“It’s more of an anytime movie,” you said. “But I do have one you might like more. It’s a comedy, and Santa Clause is in it!” You got up off the couch and went to your movie collection to find Elf. You changed the discs in your player, then sat back beside Thor and watched his face change from contemplation to elation. Oh yes. He was going to love Elf.

He spent the next morning going over all of the jokes he’d loved from the previous night. “And Mr. Narwhal?” He nearly bent over laughing. “‘Bye Buddy, hope you find your dad!’” he said in an exaggeratedly light tone before placing his palms on your dining table to hold himself up. “You were right. I quite liked that movie!”

“The man who plays Santa in it is also in Up. you remember that one, right?” you asked, pulling more decorations out of the bin on the table. You had garlands and a wreath, jingle bells and holly all laid out, but you were digging for your mistletoe. You had one little (fake) branch that you wanted to keep out of Thor’s sight so you could hang it up later and surprise him, but you couldn’t remember where you’d put it.

“Of course I remember!” he said, reminding you that you’d asked him a question. “And you know, now that you mention it, I can hear the similarities in their voices.”

“He’s Ed Asner. Super snarky on Twitter. I love him.” You handed him a garland and some tape, then showed him where it should go and how to properly hang it so the tape wouldn’t ruin the shiny material or your paint job.

You opened Spotify on your phone and placed it in your speaker-dock so you could listen to Christmas playlists while you worked. Eventually, you found your mistletoe at the bottom of the bin. You told Thor you were just going to the bathroom, but really you went into the bedroom and hid the mistletoe in your bedside table.

That night, you and Thor made cookies (from scratch, because you found an easy sugar cookie recipe online) for Santa, which, of course, you had to tell him all about. “It’s just a little snack while he leaves presents under the tree. You know, because leaving presents in every house all over the globe is really rough work and everything.”

“This is what you tell the children, right?” he asked. “I may not be from Midgard, but I do know that not everyone here recognizes this Santa Clause, nor does everyone celebrate Christmas.”

You knew he meant well, so you sighed and nodded as you mixed ingredients together. “Yes, Thor.” You flashed him a smile so he’d know you weren’t put off by his question. “Santa’s mostly reserved for kids. It’s still fun to make the cookies and eat them in the middle of the night to make it look like Santa did it instead.”

He placed parchment paper along a baking sheet and nodded in time with the music you still had playing. “I think Santa’s quaint,” he said, seeming genuine as his smile remained. “Although it is a little odd that so many people just accept a jolly round man slipping in and out of their homes for a night.” He pushed the baking sheet over to you before covering a second. “Still, it’s nice to have a unifying figure in whose honor we’ll eat these tonight!”

You laughed as you started to place little lumps of dough on the sheets.

While the cookies baked, you sat and watched more movies together. You put on Nightmare Before Christmas first, telling him that yes, it was both a Halloween and a Christmas movie and it had always meant to be both. Right after Jack made it to Christmas Town, you excused yourself once more to fetch the mistletoe. Then you brought it to the space between your kitchen and bedroom, dragging a chair along your - fortunately - carpet to stand on. You pinned the mistletoe to the ceiling so it hung facing down, then you put the chair back and even took the extra measure of flushing your bedroom toilet to make it sound like you’d been in there the whole time.

Thor didn’t say anything until the end of the movie. You barely missed him checking over his shoulder toward the bedroom, so you panicked, trying to keep the mistletoe a surprise as long as possible. You launched yourself across his lap, drawing his attention back to you.

“Do you need something?” he teased, and when you looked back and up at him, you saw he was smirking.

“I just…” You tried to think of something convincing to say, but all that came out was, “my legs were cramping.” You let your shins fall against the arm of the couch and tried to smile at Thor.

He rose his eyebrows and asked, “You’re sure this doesn’t have anything to do with the mysterious plant you’ve hung from the ceiling over there.” He pointed back at the mistletoe, his smirk widening.

Your head fell forward and hit the couch cushion next to him as you groaned. Of course he’d heard you put the thing up. He’d probably peeked then, and you hadn’t even noticed! You really should’ve gotten your step stool out instead of dragging a chair all the way across the room if you’d even thought about it a little bit.

Thor just laughed, though. He tapped one of your butt cheeks lightly, and you tried to bring your heel up to smack him in the shoulder, but you didn’t bend quite far enough. You ended up just kicking air, which Thor laughed at as well.

“Alright, alright,” you said, pushing yourself up off the couch. You slid from his lap and stood up. “C’mon. I suppose I have to explain the mysterious plant hanging from the ceiling.” You held a hand out to him, knowing he didn’t at all need assistance in standing. Still, he took your hand in his and then followed you around the couch and over to the mistletoe. You took a deep breath as he looked up at the plant, and then you dived in.

“Okay, so this is called mistletoe. It’s actually a parasite in nature, but this one’s fake anyway. It’s a Christmas tradition for two people to stand beneath it and share a kiss.” At that, he looked down at you, but he didn’t say anything. “I think that has something to do with it being used as a sign of fertility in ancient civilizations. Although, closer to you,” you pushed one pointer finger into his chest playfully, “it’s more of a sign of peace among enemies. So, I guess it’s generally just a unifying symbol of...mutual respect or something. Affection, in the case of Christmas.”

You pulled your phone out of your back pocket and checked the time, then smiled. You’d timed this almost too perfectly. “Which, by the way, is happening now.” You shoved your phone back, then put that hand around the back of Thor’s neck. You stood on your tiptoes and brought him down to you at the same time, and then you shared your first Christmas kiss with him.

He kept it short and sweet, pulling his lips back without moving anything else. His blue eye locked on yours as he said, “Merry Christmas, (Y/N).”

You pecked his lips once before returning, “Merry Christmas, Thor.”

You woke up early to put out a handful of presents beneath your tiny tree. Thor had placed some there when he’d first come over, so you had an idea of how many gifts to expect - not that the number mattered, really. It was just that he would wake up and see even more beneath the tree and, just maybe, understand what getting presents from Santa might feel like. All he had to do was suspend disbelief.

You added the final touch to the room quickly: you hung up the stockings you’d made weeks ago. Two red and green stockings went on the wall above your TV; one had your name on it and a few little glittery decorations, and the other said Thor with lightning made of glitter and glue all over. When you were satisfied with their placement, you went back to the bedroom and jumped onto the bed.

“Wake up, Sleeping Beauty!” you practically yelled, shoving Thor hard because you knew he slept like a rock. “It’s Christmas morning!”

He groaned, but when you shoved him again, he laughed and said, “Fine, alright! I’m awake!” He turned toward you, his hand going to the back of your neck so he could pull you down for a kiss like you had last night below the mistletoe.

You only let him kiss you for a few minutes before you pulled his hand down and tried to get him out of bed. “C’mon! We have to go see what Santa left you!”

He laughed, and you knew he’d go along with whatever you told him today. You were finally able to get him out of bed, then you dragged him into the living room to show him the tree. He did, indeed, remark that there were more presents beneath it than there had been last night.

“I told you Santa was magic,” you said, squeezing his hand in yours. You picked up the first present you wanted him to open, then gave it to him before going to grab some chairs to bring over to the tree. You opened presents one at a time, leaning over to kiss and thank one another in between.

Thor had gotten you a scar he’d seen you looking at whenever you passed a little boutique uptown, a copy of a movie you always talked about (he conceded and told you Tony had to help him track it down), and an ancient-looking, though in good condition, book of Scandinavian runes. “I know you like having some books for decoration,” he said. “Though, I do love the idea of you knowing more of what I do.”

You fingered the delicate pages tenderly, looking through the descriptions of the runes without taking in too much information at first. With a huge smile and a few tears in your eyes, you pulled the book to your chest and told him, “This is...really wonderful, Babe. I love it.”

You’d gotten him, among other things, an intricately carved charm of Mjölnir and a silver chain to hang it on. He studied the details in the charm silently for a few minutes, then he looked up at you and beamed. Just like you had with the book, he had tears in his eyes as he held tight to the charm. “Did you make this?” he asked.

You felt a little guilty, but only because you hadn’t made it. You’d found it on Etsy, actually, but you made sure to buy from a Scandinavian shop. You shook your head sheepishly and explained where you’d gotten it, and you noticed that his face never changed. He still looked proud and elated, and it made your heart melt.

“I love it,” he said. He unclasped the chain, then placed it around his neck and clasped it again. The charm hung around his neck when he asked, “How does it look?”

“Perfect, if I do say so myself,” you responded.

He sighed contentedly, then waved for you to come to him. You did, sitting on his lap as his arms wrapped around you. “This is the best Christmas I’ve ever had.” He kissed you quick, then said, “Thank you, (Y/N).”

Tags!

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Drabbles: @athorable-and-deanlicous @esoltis280 @pensysto 

[gray-autumn-sky]

Appreciating the View- Day 5 of Bisexual Regina Mills Week

For @bisexualreginamillsweek, a little Outlaw Queen scoping out girls and talking about celebrity crushes.

Regina grazes along the desert table, waiting for Robin.

He was running late--something she only realized when she was already standing in the doorway of the diner. He promised that he would be quick--he just needed to drop off a third outfit with the sitter for Robyn to change into and then he’d be on his way. So, she’d gone in alone and made her rounds, making it a point to get to Snow and Charming as quickly as possible. She offered a quick smile and wished them a happy anniversary-- and she ignored the little voice at the back of her head that kept reminding her how terribly awkward it was that she was there, celebrating with them on this day. They’d both hugged her easily and seemed unbothered by her presence--and then, she excused herself, dropping their present onto the gift table and snagging the last available booth.

A few minutes later, she checked her phone and sighed--there was no update on Robin’s whereabouts--and she fidgeted awkwardly as she looked out the window.

She’d never been good at waiting and she’d never been good at pretending to be comfortable--and though Snow and Charming had forgiven her sins against them long ago, there was a nagging voice at the back of her head that kept reminding her that it was inappropriate to celebrate a couple’s anniversary when you’d cursed them at their wedding.

So, she’d gotten up and busied herself with the deserts, looking for a distraction...

She plucks a little lemon square from the table as the bell on the door jingles--and her eyes cast up expectantly.

But instead of seeing Robin, she watches as Belle comes inside.

She’s smiling warmly and almost immediately, she spots Snow and goes to hug her.

Her eyebrows arch as she watches Belle lean up onto the tips of her toes--and she grins, when she notes that Belle is already wearing high heeled shoes. Her head tilts a bit as her eyes trail up Belle’s legs, appreciating that black lacy tights and cover them. Her plain black skirt is short and ties around the waist--it’s not her style, but it works on Belle.

As her eyes continue to trail upward, she hears her laugh out at something Snow’s said--and she grins as a bright smile edges onto Belle’s lips.

She’s wearing a new lipstick, she realizes--it’s darker than usual and… sexier--and she swallows hard, and for an all-too-brief moment, she lets herself think about what it’d be like to kiss her.

“She is cute, isn’t she?” Robin asks, coming up behind her and nearly causing her to leap onto the desert table. “Sorry,” he laughs as she turns around and swats at his arm. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

His eyes are soft and his smile is amused--and her heart is beating quicker than it should be. “You didn’t,” she lies. “I just…”

“Got caught with your hand in the cookie jar?”

His brow arches and her eyes widen. “I wasn’t--”

“Regina,” he cuts in, chuckling softly as his brow arches up. “You were checking her out.” He doesn’t seem angry or even annoyed--instead, he’s just the contrary. “You think she’s pretty.”

“Well…” She sighs. “I do.”

“You looked like you wanted to kiss her, or at least thinking about what it’d be like.”

Her eyes widen, and then she laughs, her cheeks flushing slightly as she looks around to ensure that no one’s in earshot. “How did you know?”

“You’re not very good at hiding what you’re feeling,” he says plainly. “And… sometimes, you look at me that way, and usually, that looks leads to a kiss.”

“I wouldn’t--”

“I’m not accusing you of anything.”

“Just wanting to kiss someone who isn’t you.”

A grin curls onto his lips and he sighs, his eyes still soft and easy. “You’re allowed to look,” he tells her, slowly letting his eyes slip past her--and she watches as they settle on Belle, watching as she shrugs off her coat and drapes it over her arm, revealing a cobalt blue button-up that makes her blue eyes seem even brighter. “And so am I.”

Regina blinks as she looks from Belle to Robin, watching the way he looks at her. “You think she’s attractive, too,” she says, the realization settling upon her as her eyes shift back to Belle, and a grin edging onto her lips.

“I do,” he admits. “She’s definitely my type.”

“Your type,” she repeats. “I didn’t realize you had a type.”

He nods. “Short, dark hair, witty,,” he grins as he looks back to her. “You’re my type.”

“And Belle,” she says, a laugh rising into her voice. “But at least this explains the Zooey Deschanel movies. She’s your type.”

Robin’s eyes widen and he scoffs playfully. “I watched those movies, but I didn’t buy them. Someone else did that.”

Regina’s jaw tightens indignantly. “She’s… cute,” she admits, her cheeks flushing. “When you mute her.”

“Natalie Portman’s not bad either,” Robin says. “And you don’t need to mute her.”

Regina pauses and draws in a breath. “I… watched That Seventies Show in its entirety when it first came on Netflix, just for Mila Kunis.” He can’t help the snicker that escapes him at the revelation. “Again, there’s a lot of muting, and I delete it from my history every time I watch an episode so that no one knows.”

“Not every time,” Robin muses as her eyes widen a little. “But I thought Henry was watching it.”

“Ah… no,” Regina says, shaking her head as her cheeks flush a deeper red. “That was… me.”

Robin bites down on his lip as she tries to shake off her embarrassment--and then at the same time, they look to each other. “Kate Beckinsale,” they say in unison before laughing out.

“She… does things to me,” Regina admits in a low voice as her eyes cast up to his.

“Mm,” Robin nods. “I understand completely. She’s… a personal favorite.”

Regina’s brow arches and she laughs again, this time shaking her head and finally, feeling more relaxed than embarrassed. “I can’t believe we’ve never talked about this before.”

“I can’t believe we have the same taste in women,” he says, grinning at her. “It’s awfully convenient.”

Taking a step in, she nods and looks back to Belle as her arm slides around his back. “That is a good color on her.”

Robin nods in agreement. “Well, at least now I’ve figure out why you spend so much time at the library,” he says, chuckling softly as he hugs her into his side and presses a kiss to the top of her head. “You’re checking out Kate Beckinsale movies and the librarian.”

Her eyes roll and her lips part to protest--but before she can say anything, Granny clears her throat. “Alright, you two, stop gawking and move along,” she tells them. “I didn’t spend all day baking deserts so the two fo you could block them while you two scope out girls.”

Regina’s eyes widen and her cheeks flush at the realization that Granny has been standing there far longer than they realized--but Robin just chuckles softly and reaches for a brownie as he tugs her to their booth, lowly murmuring something she doesn’t quite catch about a better view.

[murasaki-murasame]

I wasn’t exactly planning to spark on the Valentines banner in GBF, considering how recently I did my last spark, and how close we are to the anniversary, but then V-Aglovale’s uncap art happened, and that kinda pushed me past the point of no return, lol.

I at least managed to get him [even if it took a full spark], and tbh this feels like it was probably the luckiest spark I’ve had thus far, all things considered, but let’s just say that I don’t recommend anyone try and do the ‘bingeing as many side-stories and fate episodes as possible to do a spark’ thing since it’s just absolute misery, especially if you have to do it over the course of like three days.

Anyway, there’s a lot to say about what I got along the way, lol.

I don’t really wanna get too much into the specifics, but I did have to do several paid summons to actually finish the spark, so that sucks, but if I had managed my time better I could have done it almost entirely F2P, since even after it all I still had a good amount of side stories and fate episodes left. I just ran into the issue of not having the time to actually do all of them.

I don’t remember the exact order I got everything in, at least in terms of the dupes and the summons, but going by my adventurer list sorted by recency, here’s a roughly chronological list of what I got from this banner.

- Fire Yuisis

- V-Scathacha

- Light Sara

- V-Monika [three times . . . ]

- Earth Vaseraga

- Soriz

- Hades [two times, lol]

- Summer Zooey [!?]

- SSR Zehek

- V-Melissabelle [three times again . . . I laugh to hide the pain :’)]

- V-Grimnir

- V-Clarisse

- Fire Yuel

- Jeanne [her OG version, not her Grand version]

- Light Gawain

- V-Aglovale from the spark itself.

I also got Surtr, Rose Queen, Quetzcoatl, and Owlcat along the way.

Oh, and I also got V-Teena and V-Narmaya, but they’re SRs so that’s less surprising.

Aside from the dupes of the Valentines units that I got, the only gold moon I got was Illnott, which I think is now my third copy of her weapon. Even though I actually have a lot of SSRs at this point, basically all of the ones I got in this spark were brand new. And even with gala rates I think I got notably lucky with my SSR rate as a whole. Counting dupes, Not counting V-Aglovale, I think I got around 25 SSRs. I dunno what percentage that works out to exactly, but it’s definitely somewhere between 6% and 10%. The quality of what I got is probably more noteworthy than the quantity, but still.

I should probably regret this a lot more than I actually do, but the fact that it turned out so well makes it hard to feel that bad about it, lol. I didn’t have any of the Valentines units before this, so the fact that I managed to get all but one of them from a full spark feels really good. I dunno how much I’ll actually use some of them, but I’m at least going to try and use Aglovale as much as possible, lol. 

I know V-Grimnir is really good, but I already have OG Grimnir, and it sounds like V-Grimnir really needs certain tools that I don’t have yet in order to truly shine, so I don’t think it’s worth investing in him at the moment, but in the long run it’s nice to have him in my collection so I don’t have to worry about trying to spark or annitix him in the future if I decide he’s worth investing in. For now I guess I’ll just use him as a skin.

V-Monika seems like a good character, but I feel like earth is my most competitive element at the moment, so it’d be hard to justify investing in her. She’s at least a more potent battery unit than C-Magisa, but that seems to be the main thing she has going for her.

V-Clarisse seems really useful, but mainly for the sorts of hard, lengthy raids that I’m not really strong enough in general to tackle just yet, so she’s another character that might sit on the backburner for a while.

V-Melisabelle seems like she has her niches, and I have a soft spot towards her since I used her wind version for a long time before I got better characters, but I feel like this spark in particular really expanded my light roster in ways I didn’t expect, so it’d be hard to fit her in.

V-Scathacha seems like an interesting flame healer, but she seems kinda risky and high-maintenance, while the Lumberjack + C-Nemone combo feels extremely comfy and safe in comparison. She seems good for enabling enmity, which Fire Yuisis could really benefit from, but from how I think Scathacha’s skill works, I wouldn’t be able to just use that skill on the same turn as Fire Yuisus lowers her own health, since they’d just stack together and immediately kill her. It seems more like a way to get her back into enmity range after she heals herself back up from it, so that requires more specific timing. But it’s worth considering.

And on the note of Fire Yuisis, I’m really happy I got her here, since she honestly would have been high on the suptix priority list otherwise. I have some good flame attackers, but she always seemed really appealing as a unit, and the recent New Years event rerun made me like her as a character.

As for V-Aglovale himself, he seems like one of the strongest Valentines units, so I think he was worth sparking for that alone, at least. Aside from the obvious reasons that primarily made me spark for him, my light roster feels really weak [which is probably more of a grid issue], so the idea of him being a really strong attacker really appealed to me. He’s also a sword unit, so that’s convenient, and he synergizes nicely with De La Fille. He maxes out his crest stacks super fast anyway, but at least she helps him get there a little faster, lol. I still might end up going with Aglovale / Lucio / Feather, though. Feather was my last spark target, so I’d rather not boot him off my team so quickly.

If I had gotten Aglovale near the end of my spark, I probably would have sparked Grand Jeanne, so it still kinda hurts to have gotten her OG version instead, but oh well, lol. I dunno if I’ll use her since I have so many other options now, but she seems good. I might still spark Grand Jeanne in the future, but I’m also kinda interested in Grand Cag and Grand Noa.

And continuing the trend of me getting more new light units than I expected, I also got Light Gawain, and he’s basically in the same position as Fire Yuisis where I might have suptixed him later on if it wasn’t for this. He probably would have been a higher priority than her, honestly, so this is also a relief. It’d be kinda hard to fit him onto my light team at this point, but it’s nice to have him.

Oh and I also got Light Sara, lol. I almost forgot. I dunno how much use I’ll get out of her, but it sounds like she definitely has places where she shines.

After looking into what his kit’s like, I probably won’t ever use Earth Vaseraga, but it’s nice to have hiim. It’d be nice if you could use him as a skin for VasZeta, since I’m still planning to annitix them, but apparently you can’t. I can see why, but it’s still kinda lame.

Though on the other hand, I’m really happy to get Soriz. I feel like I’ve gotten a billion new earth units in the last few months, but he’s another unit who I was really hoping to get at some point, so this is nice. I haven’t gotten to the V2 raids yet, but it sounds like he’s extremely useful there, so hopefully he’ll make those a bit easier once I get to them.

SSR Zehek is kinda meh since at this point I have enough good dark units, and I’m planning to recruit Seox relatively soon, so he just doesn’t really have a place in my team, but getting more new SSRs is always nice.

Fire Yuel was a real surprise to get, but it’s good to have her. I’m not super familiar with how she works, but I’ve heard that with her uncap she’s a really good flame buff unit, which is nice since at the moment I feel like C-Nemone is my only real option, and she takes a while to ramp up. I think I also got Fire Societte a while ago, but sadly I don’t think she’s worth using, lol.

Anyway, I think the real star of this whole spark was probably Summer Zooey, who I managed to just randomly pull. I’m like 99% sure she wasn’t even on rate-up. At least now I feel way better about my previous choice to spark Orchid instead of her a while ago. I still feel kinda iffy about enmity as a mechanic, but I can tell that it’s going to be extremely useful in the long run just to have her as an option to use if I need her. She’s definitely one of those characters I might have eventually sparked for meta reasons, so it’s nice to get her on the side like this.

I also somehow got two copies of Hades in this spark, which is kinda funny. I don’t really have any interest in switching to primal grids in any element any time soon, but it’s nice to have these summons for the future. Funnily enough I got my first Hades in the same tenfold as Summer Zooey, which felt like the game making up for not giving my many dark units or summons before this, lol. I think it’s still my element with the fewest SSRs, but at least I have a lot of really strong ones.

My initial plan before all this was to keep hoarding a spark for the anniversary in the hopes of maybe getting Vajra, but I don’t regret choosing to prioritize this banner. Valentines units are a lot more limited than the zodiacs are, and I wound up getting almost all of the Valentines units. It’d be nice to be able to spark Vajra right before water GW, but honestly I’d only really be chasing her for meta reasons, so it wasn’t very hard to convince myself to chase after a character that appealed to me more instead, while also being a good meta pick. I also just don’t really want to replace anyone on my current water team, lol.

Hopefully I’ll get some good luck on the anniversary roulette summons, but I did this spark knowing that it meant giving up on the chance of doing a full spark for the anniversary, so I’ll just have to take what I get from it now.

So yeah I think this was actually a pretty insane spark, in terms of both quantity and quality of my SSR pulls. Now i have to reap what I sow and deal with the first world problem of now having lots of new characters I want to level up and use, lol.

[analogskullerosis]

I was tagged by the hip, young mamasita @oh-its-way-past-my-bedtime

Rules: Answer 30 questions and tag 20 blogs that you are contractually obligated to know.

Nicknames: People already think my name is a nickname so I don’t need one.

Gender: Male

Star sign: Aries

Height: 6′2″

Time: 10:25 AM

Birthday: April 10th

Favorite Bands: Grateful Dead, Rush, Electric Light Orchestra, Genesis, The Beatles, Pink Floyd, and more. 

Favorite Solo Artist: (At the moment) Phil Collins

Song stuck in your head: “Standing On the Moon” by Grateful Dead

Last Movie: I watched Airplane (scientifically proven to be the funniest movie based on the amount of laughs per minute.)

Last TV Show: That 70′s Show

Why did you create your blog: I honestly can’t remember anymore.

What do you post/reblog: Stuff I find funny, music, quotes I like. A random of assortment that doesn’t really have a cohesive theme. 

Last thing you googled: Something about Franny and Zooey so I could finish my thesis for English.

Other blogs: This is the only one (but maybe it won’t stay that way...)

Why url: self explanatory. First letter of my first name and my last name. Because I’m boring and it is too late to change it (because then people would become confused as to who I am.)

I follow: like 60 something I think.

Followers: Around 190.

Average hours of sleep: Anywhere between 3 to 8. Depends.

Lucky number: Don’t have one.

Instrument: I’m able to play the drums a little bit, and would love to learn to play rhythm guitar one day. 

What are you wearing: A big skeleton shirt and pajama pants.

Dream Job: An English teacher.

Dream Trip: Seeing the Great Pyramids of Giza in Egypt.

Favorite food: 

Favorite song right now: Bitches Crystal by Emerson, Lake, and Palmer

Last book I read: Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov

Currently reading: Not Dead Yet by Phil Collins

Top 3 universes: 1) A universe without large dogs (because they’re evil beasts.) 2) A universe where every CD I leave in my car eventually becomes the Greatest Hits of Queen (Kudos if you get the Gaiman reference.) 3) A universe where I have an original Sony Walkman from the early 80′s.

I tag: @delanore-roosevelt  @anagram-for-mongo @subdivisi0ns @youvsyou and anybody else who wishes to do this (you can just say I tagged you)

[tabloidtoc]

Us, January 18

You can now buy a copy of this issue for your very own at my eBay store: https://www.ebay.com/str/bradentonbooks

Cover: Why Prince William forgave Prince Harry

Page 1: First Look -- the details on Jessica Alba’s look as she strolled in L.A. 

Page 2: Red Carpet -- Dua Lipa 

Page 4: Who Wore It Best? Sara Sampaio vs. Leomie Anderson, Scarlett Johansson vs. Camilla Luddington 

Page 6: Loose Talk -- Nikki Blonsky recalling her kissing scene with Zac Efron in 2007′s Hairspray, Kelly Clarkson on being so high from the dentist that she forgot she went shopping afterwards, Katy Perry confessing to doppelganger Zooey Deschanel that she used to pretend to be her before rising to fame, Chris Pine on being the underdog when it comes to his fellow famous Chrises, Chris Pratt declaring himself the top Chris in Hollywood, Kim Cattrall on not returning to Sex and the City amid reboot rumors 

Page 8: Contents 

Page 10: Hot Pics -- Cyndi Lauper performing in NYC on New Year’s Eve, Jennifer Lopez performing in Times Square before the ball drop, Miley Cyrus performing during Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve 

Page 11: Kate Bosworth celebrated her birthday with husband Michael Polish at a pal’s house in Beverly Hills, EJ Johnson during a stroll in Miami, Randall Emmett took a break from zooming on his Jet Ski to give pregnant fiancee Lala Kent a smooch in Miami 

Page 12: Amy Schumer hit the surf in a wetsuit while vacationing in St. Barts, Leslie Jones competing on Celebrity Wheel of Fortune, Margaret Qualley kept close to beau Shia LaBeouf while out for a post-holiday hike in L.A. 

Page 13: John Legend and Chrissy Teigen and their kids Luna and Miles capped off 2020 with a fun-filled tropical getaway in St. Barts 

Page 14: Chelsea Handler isn’t afraid to bare all 

Page 18: Stars They’re Just Like Us -- Katie Holmes’ hands were full after hitting some stores in NYC, John Legend and Chrissy Teigen went for a hike while on a tropical getaway in St. Barts, Sophia Bush grabbed food to-go from Greenblatt’s Deli in L.A. 

Page 20: Party Animals -- pets steal the spotlight from their famous owners -- Selena Gomez and her dog Daisy, Salma Hayek and her owl, during a royal engagement Duchess Camilla’s dog Beth helped unveil a plaque at a shelter in Surrey, England 

Page 22: For Pet’s Sake -- Wells Adams and Sarah Hyland’s dog Boo cuddled under a blanket, Jeff Bridges and his puppy Monty updating fans on his battle with lymphoma, Nick Jonas with wife Priyanka Chopra Jonas’ dog Diana bundled up in the cold weather in London 

Page 23: Jenna Fischer and her sleeping cat Sonny, Kate Beckinsale and her dog Myf 

Page 24: Love Lives -- Rihanna and A$AP Rocky heating up 

Page 25: They may have found love but season 16 Bachelorette Tayshia Adams and fiance Zac Clark admit that watching the show back wasn’t always easy, Sharna Burgess and Brian Austin Green sparked dating rumors when they were spied together at LAX jetting off on vacation, Soleil Moon Frye and Jason Goldberg have quietly separated after 22 years of marriage 

Page 26: Hot Hollywood -- Alec Baldwin’s wife Hilaria Baldwin was accused of faking her Spanish heritage and accent -- while the Boston-born yoga guru has defended herself repeatedly over the last few weeks and Hilaria insists that she spent many years in Spain and that her love for the culture runs deep in her bloodline but not everyone in the Baldwin clan is convinced and this scandal has really changed Hilaria’s position within the family and it’s caused a rift within the famous crew because some other members including Alec’s brother Billy Baldwin who called it an awkward and embarrassing situation don’t trust her now and they feel she is a liar and a phony and only obsessed with her image and fame -- Hilaria does have the support of others like her stepdaughter Ireland Baldwin and her husband Alec 

Page 27: On December 28 Lori Loughlin was released from prison after serving a two-month sentence for her crimes related to the nationwide college admissions scandal but her first days back in the free world have been bittersweet because it’s hard to be home without husband Mossimo Giannulli who is expected to remain bars until April -- Lori is hoping to make a career comeback and having seen that Felicity Huffman is returning to work has given her some hope that she can too and there is interest in bringing her back to Hallmark Channel 

* Keeping Up With Us -- two months after ending her seven-year engagement to Jason Sudeikis actress Olivia Wilde has moved on with Harry Styles who is starring in her upcoming flick Don’t Worry Darling -- they had chemistry almost immediately and have been secretly dating for weeks, Larry King has been hospitalized in L.A. with Covid-19, former Bachelor Peter Weber and contestant Kelley Flanagan have split after eight months of dating because their personalities just didn’t mix, Jeopardy! champ Ken Jennings has apologized after past tweets mocking the disabled community resurfaced

Page 28: A Day in My Life -- Andi Dorfman 

Page 30: Cover Story -- Prince William and Prince Harry healing the rift -- to Queen Elizabeth’s delight brothers William and Harry are working on repairing their fractured bond 

Page 34: Fighting Shape -- find out how Wonder Woman 1984 star Gal Gadot prepper to play a superhero 

Page 35: Ready for Action -- these butt-kicking superheroines pushed themselves to new limits -- Brie Larson, Danai Gurira, Scarlett Johansson 

Page 36: Bachelor Bombshells -- tears and breakups and unpredictable twists -- as new Bachelor Matt James begins his journey to find love take a look back at the most shocking finales in the show’s history -- Jason Mesnick 

Page 37: Brad Womack, Arie Luyendyk Jr., Peter Weber, Colton Underwood 

Page 38: Beauty -- Jennifer Lopez finally shares the secret to her enviable complexion 

Page 40: TV’s winter wonderland 

Page 46: Fashion Police -- when bad clothes happen to good people -- Jennifer Garner, Snoop Dogg, Gwen Stefani 

Page 47: Regina King, Kylie Minogue, Ana de Armas 

Page 48: 25 Things You Don’t Know About Me -- will.i.am

[paxvictoriana]

The Incredible, Radical Jessica James

• • •  [spoilers below]  • • •

In the middle of a blind date she doesn’t particularly want to be on, The Incredible Jessica James’ eponymous heroine squares off with her equally uncomfortable, male dinner friend/potential boyf/adversary.

They volley back and forth several brutally, “completely honest” questions.

After a few, he asks her, “How do you pay your rent?”

“I… work at a non-profit, in Hell’s Kitchen.” (Pride in her voice, though a somewhat knowing tone: yeah, I know. Very Brooklyn answer.) “I teach public school kids how to write and produce their own plays.”

“So… how do you pay your rent?”

She laughs.

Already – my Netflix ticker says this is barely 13:50 into the entire movie – the two biggest threads of the film come together: (1) an endearing, realistic romantic comedy starring Jessica Williams (that Dope Queen off The Daily Show who now does other stuff – namely, this) and rom-com’s staple dorky everyman Chris O’Dowd (because the thinking, even semi-straight woman[**] needs an IT guy); and (2) the female Bildungsroman.

If you’ve taken an English class any time since approx. 1980, you’ve probably had to learn and use “Bildungsroman” in an essay. It’s the coming-of-age novel, the story of growing up, an arc from innocence to experience. Except, as a pivotal cohort of feminist critics in the 1980s argued, the female Bildungsroman means “growing down,” a story of women being taught by society: Lower Your Expectations! Conform! Settle! The debate around what even is a Bildungsroman has wrestled with how gender-specific a story about maturing and (in essence) #adulting can be, given that women in Western society since the inception of the novel itself haven’t really had the options to leave home, discover themselves as autonomous, free, independent selves. The male Bildungsroman, in other words, is about the boy who grows up to be a man, and gets a job; the female Bildungsroman is about the girl who becomes a lady, and finds the right husband. Sure, there’s status and some freedom attached to that – class status and thus economic freedom, as the bourgieness of the novel excels at rewarding. But by and large, no matter how failed the male career, no matter how much the woman takes on a new career of domestic labor, the novels usually emphasize along these lines. Men achieve professional success; women aren’t left to be spinsters.

(A professor in my department, Jesse Rosenthal, pointed out how pervasive this narrative still is within even the most indie, “unconventional” of tales. His case study? (500) Days of Summer. As he recounted to a class on the 19th-cen. British novel, here’s a movie putatively about the romantic maturation of the male subject – a rom-com trajectory usually reserved for women [i.e.. He’s Just Not That Into You could never be She’s Just Not That Into You]. But Joseph Gordon Levitt’s problematic-nice-guy fairy tale, complete with problematic-indie-dream-girl Zooey Deschanel, isn’t his acceptance of a limited role in his next relationship. It’s a successful job interview. [roll credits])

So the fact that The Incredible Jessica James coupled, in several senses, these two plots wasn’t surprising to me. Less than 15 minutes in, and yeah, obviously, Chris O’Dowd is gonna get the girl, and Jessica is gonna get over her ex by realizing that she “deserves” this more mature guy. Her work is great and all, the story goes, but obviously what we want is Bridesmaids with a lady of color. Comedy + late capitalism’s precarity (Jessica, how do you pay your rent? Are you going to have to go live with your parents like Kristin Wiig had to after the cupcake biz tanked?) = love story. And bonus points for being about Instagram, and having a WOC lead where a white actress would have been five or ten years ago (slash even now): kudos, my friends. Kudos.

But… that’s not what happened. And here’s where this movie is radical.

Because The Incredible Jessica James is a female Bildungsroman [or Bildungs-Film] that subtly, cannily, definitively breaks the mold. 

It isn’t a story about a woman realizing how wrong she is to be hung up on the wrong, bad boy, and thus the return to the family, to society’s right side of the tracks, to *herself* that is made whole again by giving up her rebellious adolescent wandering and waffling. Instead, TIJJ presents a heroine who goes through a series of rejections not of lovers, but of jobs [displayed on her wall: see first screencap]. It tracks her indefatigable efforts to make what she loves (theater) into a career, even a somewhat uncertain one. It’s about her slow realization – not the sudden “awakening” narrative that critics have ascribed to female/feminist Bildungsroman of old – that what she’s doing, working every day with kids, continuing to send out her resume, writing and reading and connecting with the public circles of her aspiring field – all that, is a career.

Take, for example, a crucial marker of James’s acceptance of herself, and of her status, as grown-up, matured, sufficiently adult that she’s no longer faking it til she makes it: she’s Made It. The blueish-purple jumpsuit spotted in a Brooklyn consignment shop, the kind that is explicitly labeled as male by the sewn patch of its previous owner, “Randolph,” tall enough for even the pretty tall JJ. 

Working-class, second hand, male-identified uniform; natural hair in box braids; red lipstick and bright eyeliner. This is how Jessica meets her parents. But the music slides to an uncomfortable stop as Jessica gets off the Arrivals moving walkway: her parents are bourgie, sweet, stable, and utterly unlike her in spirit. This is the American middle-class dream – as authors from Frantz Fanon to Paul Gilroy to Ta Nehisi-Coates have written – that preys on Black people specifically, the double-consciousness of passing as it works in all its formulaic vapidity. Jessica’s younger sister, too, has bought into this dream: she takes one look at Jessica.

“You look like an auto-mechanic,” Jerusa (her sister) points out in a tone dripping with judgment.

“It’s cool, though, right?” Jessica beams.

“Yeah…” her sister nods, meaning the opposite. “I mean, you’re not going to wear it to the party?” [Her very normative, unironic, and uncritical baby shower.]

“… Nope,” Jessica deflates. Pretending this has been her plan all along.

Because this family isn’t ever going to be the place where Jessica can be anything other than stifled. The prim-and-proper group sits in the suburban family room late that night, merrily gooey-eyed over a romantic drama they’re watching on TV, whose dialogue (that’s all we overhear) is so utterly, sickeningly banal that Jessica doesn’t even enter the room. She hangs back, in the darkness. The entire setting – with all its race and class implications (and the sincere and moving subplot about the James family’s struggles with making their own rent, and how this continues to the present with Jessica’s public school kid whose divorced parents are fighting over custody, intertwines class and race throughout) – requires, in sum, the painful subjugation of Jessica’s self. A “growing down,” a compromise, as its definition of “growing up.”

Women of traditional Bildungsromane, Abel, Hirsch and Langland posit, “are not free to explore; more frequently, they merely exchange one domestic sphere for another. While the young hero roams through the city, the young heroine strolls down the country lane” (8).

Jessica James, by contrast, goes back to New York.

And back, at least superficially, to the romantic sphere of this rom-com. Where her jumpsuit is acceptable; where people like her appreciate thoughtful, empowering arts (instead of, like her mom’s Very White Book Club Lady friend wants, Cats). Where her lesbian best friend (that actress from Master of None) is the elective community James wants, not the family she’s contractually obliged to recognize in her blood. Where Chris O’Dowd is; where her career is.

So how does the movie wrap up the romantic plot without making this about Jessica’s successful “deserving” of the Right Man™?

(It’s worth noting, before we spoil the ending, that the Boone – aka O’Dowd – subplot of the movie focuses on his not being able to get over the right girl. He stalks his ex-wife, amusingly because it’s Chris O’Dowd, but I think the movie implies cringe-worthily and creepily too: the dude side of rom-coms, it seems, is bleak; not somewhere the film is especially interested in lingering, and neither really are we. He’s eventually ashamed of himself, and this humility is deliberately more endearing than his Every Breath You Take enactment was. Admittedly, we could get into the politics of who says they’re sorry at various points in the film, who asks for and who gives forgiveness, and the ways in which being placed in a position of forgiving is, in a way, simultaneously powerful and powerless. But Nietzsche and feminism is a debate for another time.)

What I’m especially struck by – and I’ve watched this movie myself and with my sister, and then thought about it again after it was praised by another woman I love who watched it an ocean away – is that TIJJ ends with Jessica.

The final two scenes are crucial here. The penultimate brings together the two guys; formally, the two choices of a Bildungsroman: forward, or back? Jessica’s ex, Damon, finds her backstage after the kids’ theater night concludes, and opens with how he “know[s] how much this means to” her. For a split second, I panicked: OH GOD, fuck, this is why we can’t have nice things. They’re gonna have this guy realize how great she is – because obviously the only way a guy can appreciate a woman is for him to be in competition with another man. She deserves better! I shouted internally. Don’t take him back: sure, you realized you were as responsible for the break-up as he was. So what! You can do better.

But they hug, they sigh, and he leaves. (At which point I breathed a sigh of relief.)

Enter Chris O’Dowd. (At which point I was back to, fuck conventionality. What a missed opportunity.)

Turns out, though, the movie saw me – and the Bildungsroman – coming a mile off.

Because Jessica – unlike Rachel – gets on the damn plane.

Jessica, after all, has been offered a huge job opportunity in the most novelistic of cities: London. But things are just getting back on track with Right Guy; but going is her dream, is her big break; but he, like Damon, just realized how great she is – he read her entire corpus of theatrical writing, and declared – #honesty – that he’s still coming to grips with her complexity, on the page and off; but; but; but…

But… she forgot to tell him about London. And in a sense, this is where swelling crescendos of orchestral joy began filling my head, because if this had been a rom-com like the others, if this had been a female coming-of-age story like the others, she would never forgotten about him. Ever. Not once. He would have been her one phone call; her best friend-par-excellence; her Person. Instead, that honor goes to Tasha, the semi-parodic self-involved best friend who always, though, has Jessica’s back.

And so when the clearly wealthy – loaded, because of an app that is explicitly about the formal gesture afforded by technology of Family, without the actual emotional or affective labor of having to talk to those totally different people who somehow raised you! – Boone mentions “frequent flyer miles,” we can anticipate an airplane that Jessica (by now we can say, of course) will be on.

“Just if you wanted to… bring someone with you… to show you around the town,” he hedges, just before the cut.

“How does that work? [...] Frequent flyer miles?”

Cut to Jessica – in the god. damn. JUMPSUIT. Pleased as punch, sitting in – oh yes, we can have nice things – not even economy seats. The nice seats.

At which point, the truly INCREDIBLE part of this movie becomes clear:

Tasha: Dude, I can't believe your boyfriend bought us tickets to London.

Jessica: Okay, who said anything about him being my boyfriend?

T: Wait. What are you talking about? This is like, the most romantic gesture I have ever seen.

JJ: Yeah, it's dope. But it takes more than a couple of roundtrip tickets to London for somebody to be my boyf.

T: That is so boss.

Shandra – the elementary school girl whose divorced parents prompted Jessica’s own reflection on her parents/childhood – returning to her seat: What is so boss?

T: Uh, Jessica.

S: Oh, yeah. Duh.[… I]t was really cool of your boyfriend to get me a ticket, too.

T: Hey, whoa, whoa, whoa. Sister. Just because a guy buys a lady a couple of roundtrip tickets to London does not make him her boyfriend.…

[a beat]

S: You know, I like your jumpsuit.

JJ: Thank you. Yeah, it's pretty bad-ass, right?

S: Hm. Yeah, it is.

They all exchange smiles, the camera zooms in for one final-close up of Jessica’s excited anticipation of landing for the beginning of – not her romance, but – her career.

COME ON! You’re telling me the final scene of this movie is a new affinity, a new definition of family, in which the white, straight, married couple form is reshaped into the female solidarity of friendship, while the child of that hetero dyad of yore is now the dark-skinned girl who herself is a budding author, having been mentored by Jessica, who is – onscreen – mentored by another strong, Black female playwright??? You’re telling me that throw-away moment in the corridor backstage with Chris O’Dowd that seems like the lead-in to a kiss is in fact his last appearance onscreen??? You’re telling me the movie, moreover, goes out of its way to stress – TWICE -- that whatever erotic/romantic relationship they’re in, Jessica didn’t accept this trip as the quid pro quo of settling down??? YOU’RE TELLING ME THIS NEW COLLECTIVE IS SO AWARE OF ITS MEMBERS’ QUIRKS AND FOIBLES AND SELF-AUTHORSHIP/FASHIONING THAT THE FINAL LINES OF THE MOVIE UNDERSCORE THAT JESSICA CAN, IN FACT, DRESS HOWEVER THE FUCK SHE WANTS, AND THAT SOME PEOPLE WILL LOVE HER FOR IT, AND FEEL THE SAME ABOUT THE THINGS SHE LOVES???

Get out of my face, TIJJ. You have *EXPLODED* the female Bildungsroman, and maybe the Bildungsroman full-stop. There is no return to the original society, no compromise, no settling. Jessica isn’t the one forced to the margins of the story by choosing either independence or submission: the family is.

For that matter, romance sort of is. Jessica has no “boyf”; Tasha has no (onscreen, stable, couple-form) gf, but neither is she a hypersexualized lerb. She masturbates on/off-screen, but it’s one of her quirks! She and Jessica go to a lesbian bar, where Tasha chats with several recognizably-styled queer ladies: but she is neither reduced to her own romance plot, nor denied any sexuality at all. She and Jessica, however queerly you read their relationship (and I don’t especially, but I see how one could), are the empowering couple of the film, supporting each other not just in romance but in their mutually-reinforcing careers.

This is a rom-com about aiming high, about finding a career not in, because of, or in spite of a guy, but because it’s the one through-line of the entire story. Jessica begins and ends loving her work, and the slow build of that love rewards her by the end. She has Made It. The fact that she probably goes home to an attractive dude who boosts but is not himself responsible for her career – sure, he gets her upgraded tickets, but her confidence, “forthright[ness],” and drive suggest she would have made it to London without him, no question, by whatever means necessary – is icing on the cake. Yes, there was a maturation narrative within the romantic plot (she learned to leap in her relationships; she also learned, as Boone did, to have realistic expectations of where both partners are at any given moment in a relationship). But this, the movie stresses, is not the end of the story. It’s a subplot within her story.

[gif from x]

I don’t think it’s unimportant, either, that Jessica Williams – a fine actress in this movie, entirely winning the screen – plays the heroine. By which I mean, I think it’s all the more radical that to play the romantic interest to gaze adoringly at rom-com’s Irish nerdboy Chris O’Dowd, the director/producers/writers picked a woman whose best-known appearances are in scathing condemnations of male privilege, white supremacy, and American patriarchal, racist, and just terrible norms in general. That such a woman is the new face – but I didn’t even get to talk about the fact that in a few scenes, Jessica J/W’s complexion is a little spotty, which made me (with a long history of struggling with the medical and psychological reality of being a teenager and then adult woman with terrible acne) want to cry with gratitude: this is what a heroine looks like? 

Sure, Wonder Woman is fab, but damn I needed this representation so much – maybe more – than the superheroic, impervious demi-goddess from Themyscira. I needed a strong, self-loving, no-nonsense, tall, Black, not-quite-starving artist in Brooklyn, jamming with headphones in the concrete stairwell of her building, who proudly declares, “I’m freakin’ DOPE.”

I needed a new female coming-of-age story – especially in 2017 –, and, somewhat subtly but unquestionably, The Incredible Jessica James delivered.

***

{** I use “women,” “men,” “male,” and “female” throughout this piece to refer mostly to the historical categories of those identities/concepts. I also want to be clear that I’m not trying to gloss over this film’s missteps; rather, I’m trying to celebrate its major, but possibly missable, wins. Lastly, I know that in German Bildungsroman means *novel* of development/maturation, not *film*. Don’t @ me.

Thanks to Jesse Rosenthal (JHU) for getting me thinking about the basic understanding of the Bildungsroman in such concise, formal terms. For the debate about male vs./and female Bildungsromane, see – to name just some –, Abel, Hirsch and Langland (eds.), The Voyage In: Fictions of Female Development (1983); Lorna Ellis, Appearing to Diminish: Female Development and the British Bildungsroman, 1750-1850 (1999); Rita Felski, Beyond Feminist Aesthetics: Feminist Literature and Social Change (1989); Franco Moretti, The Way of the World: The Bildungsroman in European Culture (1987); and Susan Fraiman, Unbecoming Women: British Women Writers and the Novel of Development (1993).

The Incredible Jessica James (2017), dir. and writer Jim Strouse; produced by Beachside Films/Netflix. S/o to casting, Kate Geller and Jessica Kelly. Thanks also to Springfield! Springfield! movie scripts for their transcription, which saved me time. }