#tim willoughby ( comfort )

[sheriffslop]

Me ; “ oh yeah, it’s always cool to see who comes up with different concepts for OCs to be shipped with different characters !! 🤠💕✨ “

Also Me ; “ * growling and biting @ people who ship their OCs with my comforts / fictional crushes * “

The only person exempt from this is @an0mally because of TtLatH. Stan TimLeo. 🤠✨🥂

[undetectorist]

hi! 😊 for the end-of-year book asks -- 2, 3, 17 por favor

omg i totally forgot that i queued that, thank you for asking my love!

2. did you reread anything? what?

omg, DID i. back when i was incredibly depressed in march/april, i found it really difficult to read anything new, partly because i wanted to be comforted and soothed, and partly because i was in a state of mind where i couldn't summon up new opinions on things. i wanted to read books where i knew how i'd feel at the end of them. and then i ended up rereading lots more as the year went on. anyway here's my reread list:

persuasion by jane austen

less by andrew sean greer

watership down by richard adams

the lord of the rings by j. r. r. tolkien

the earthsea quartet by ursula k. le guin

our mutual friend by charles dickens

a people's green new deal by max ajl

home by marilynne robinson

the wolves of willoughby chase by joan aiken

i hotel by karen tei yamashita

red white and royal blue by casey mcquiston

emma by jane austen

a room with a view by e. m. forster

the topeka school by ben lerner

gideon the ninth, harrow the ninth and nona the ninth by tamsyn muir

good omens by terry pratchett & neil gaiman

have his carcase by dorothy l. sayers

the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy by douglas adams

confabulations by john berger

piranesi by susanna clarke

the left hand of darkness by ursula k. le guin

whew.

3. what were your top five books of the year?

cloudstreet by tim winton

decolonial marxism by walter rodney

nothing to see here by kevin wilson

tom lake by ann patchett

in the woods by tana french

17. did any books surprise you with how good they were?

YES, nothing to see here knocked me out with how incredible it was and how much i needed to read it at the time. was also very much taken with beyond black by hilary mantel, which isn't necessarily a surprise but i was nervous to try her non-historical fiction books because i love her historical fiction so much!

[bradgillingham24]

A Review of Arabica Local Coffee Shop

When you think of Cleveland people think of Slymans and other good foods, but we always needed a stronger coffee scene and Arabica is the best coffee in town!

I have lived in Cleveland since 2011 and I always had trouble finding a good coffee shop other than Starbucks. Until I stumbled upon Arabica! This coffee roaster is so friendly and passionate when it comes to coffee. They take corporate responsibility so seriously and they believe in treating their farmers fairly and have a positive emphasis on our environment. I am so thankful to have Arabica so close by that provides good strong quality with a good reputation for going good things for people and the environment.

Must-Haves at Arabica!

Arabica provides such good quality coffee, but they also offer food as well my personal favorite is the breakfast wrap it has three eggs and cheese and it's a perfect combo with a good cup of Arabica coffee. On a hot day I love the strawberry bomb and for coffee I would recommend the red eye. That will wake you up fast and leave you with a great taste in your mouth! You will want to come back for more! This is a must visit cafe. It's a unique homey place that will want you to come back more and more. They have all kinds of coffees and cold brews as well as special lattes and smoothies.

Coffee-On-The-Go

Even though they offer such good food and coffee in the cafe they also offer coffee beans so you can enjoy their coffee in the comfort of your own home. Now you can take home beans and brew this fabulous coffee at home! Check out the Colombian coffee strong satisfying notes for your pallet. It will be an enjoyable delight.

Arabica coffee house has had a long and storied history in Willoughby, Ohio. First opened in 1996, it offered a place for the community to come together and enjoy fresh coffee and handmade pastries in a relaxing environment. It has since changed owners and moved down the street from it’s original location, but Arabica has never lost it’s local spirit.

Now owned and operated by local couple Tim and Tina Snider, the cafe will stay true to its original character. Tim grew up in the area and has been a loyal customer at this location since it opened. He first managed an Arabica in 2001 and has gained years of experience in the industry since. When the chance to save this local landmark became available, Tim embraced the opportunity!

[brib1234]

Looking Into One of Cleveland's Best Coffee Shops

Cleveland is known for many things, but usually, coffee shops do not come to mind when thinking about the city. There are numerous coffee shops in northeast Ohio and the one we are talking about today is known as Arabica Coffee House. The establishment is located in Historic Downtown Willoughby and has been loved since 1996.

A Little Bit More About the Business:

Arabica Coffee House offers customers a comfortable and relaxing environment perfect for studying, catching up with friends, or simply enjoying a nice cup of coffee. Tim and Tina Snider are the present operators of the business and they strive to keep up with the originality of the business. They were originally established in 1976 but became available on the market years later, which is when Tim and Tina decided to swoop in.

What is Specialty Coffee?

Arabica Coffee House serves specialty coffee and some of you may be wondering "What is that?" This kind of coffee is of higher grade and it goes a concentration of the highest standard. The finest coffee beans have been imported from over 40 different countries.

What's on the Menu?

Arabica offers many different kinds of specialty beverages. There are espresso drinks, tea, seasonal lattes, smoothies, mocha, and more. They also offer sandwiches, soup, salads, and baked goods.

[i-am-loco]

I loved the Willoughbys but like there were 2 scenes that really bothered me??

First one would be when linda/nanny tries to force tim to eat when he clearly wasnt ready/comfortable to

I understand that she would want to have this child eat since hes been starved, but attempting to force it can do more harm than good, because this can make tim feel like he has no agency over things related to food, making him WANT to starve because he wants some form of control (which iirc does seem to happen a bit)

And then the scene where when tim is venting as hes stuck in whats basically a prison cell and linda starts by calling it a "pity party" and at one point starts hitting him with a pillow bc she doesnt like how hes saying things

Like i understand what the scene was going for (trying to get tim to come out of this pit of dispare) but that is not the way you should go about it because instead of trying to understand why the kid might feel like that youre telling the kid that its bad to feel like that, which is incredibly counterproductive and will make the kid feel worse

(Note: this is NOT meant as a hate post for linda, i absolutely adore her, its just that those scenes really bothered me because they felt too similar to my own experiences)

[bluesandpoetryblog]

MY TWO CENTS: The Willoughbys

Determination. Imagination. Hope.

I want to share my two cents about the movie. First, the movie is wholesome. It means it is applicable to any ages especially children. Second, illustration is very suitable for kids and young at heart. The graphics are very good. It really captured my attention. When it comes to musical scoring, it doesn’t have much soundtrack but it uses suitable background music. For example, someone dropped a box in front of the gate then Jane was determined to get it. The growl effect added to my anticipation. Additionally, the part wherein their house is open for sale, I was not aware that it was the nanny who scared the Perfect Family. I thought it was the spirit of Great Uncle Edmund. Lastly, for musical scoring, is the part when they wanted to bring back Ruth, the baby. It gives a chill and cool vibe for me. It feels like I am playing a mobile game – or Pacman and Candy Crush at the same time.  

Let us talk about the character and their personalities. It was introduced that the story is about imperfect family. Indeed, unpredictable. First, the couple, Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby. They were portrayed as loving couple who will do anything in the name of love. Then, there was the first child, Tim. The second, Jane. Then, the twins, Barnabys. Tim as the first born, he is a good and loving older brother to his siblings, though, in exchange of it, he will spend the night in the coal bin which is usual for him whenever he does unwanted things in the eyes of his parents. Then, Jane being feisty who will do whatever she wants to do. She and her what-ifs bind the siblings and it added to her personality whose looking forward into something beyond what she knows. Then, the twins so called “Barnabys.” Honestly, it is a shame for the parents to name their children one name because knowing that they are twins; It is a bit difficult to identify them except whenever one wears the sweater. Furthermore, they only have ONE SWEATER. We are talking about twins. It is necessary to have two. If the one has, the other must have too. Next, Linda the nanny. Linda is very persistent in taking care of the children because she experienced being an orphan child. She knows how is life without a family. Lastly, Captain Melanoff. He was portrayed as a big man with a childlike behavior ‘figuratively’. He owns a candy company and spends his life inside his big company alone.

Now, let us see how these characters develop as the story goes on. There are two types of character according to personality: (1) Round and (2) Flat. Round is the type of character who shows different personalities as the story goes on. It means there is a change to the character. Contrarily, Flat is the type of character who exhibits no change at all. Example of Round character is Tim because he doesn’t want Linda, the nanny. He was really opposing to the idea of Linda taking care of him and his siblings. He might be thinking that it should be him whose doing everything for them and not some other lady. Since he is a Willoughby, as head of the family per se to the spirits of the great Willoughbys, he has the responsibility to take care. At the latter part, he accepted that he cannot do everything. He needs Linda in his life. Aside from him, another example is Jane, middle child. At first, she is an energetic young girl who does things out of her comfort zone. She is the type of girl who will risk everything to go beyond her imagination but at the same time she is in dilemma whether her action is right or not. She became lonely and her what-ifs gone when they went into orphanage. It was also resolved when Tim reminded her of her what-ifs.  In life, we think (that) it is too difficult to say sorry or to accept our mistake but acknowledging it will help us to communicate again. Now, the flat characters are Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby because from the beginning of the story, they already showed how disgusted they were to their children until to the part of so called ‘reconciliation’.  It was the part when the siblings are trying to rescue their parents. They were in Mt. Alps and were losing hope. In an instance, they found their parents and revived them from being iced. Indeed, I thought it will be a happy ending wherein Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby will accept their children. I didn’t see it coming that they will leave the children in the ice. For me, if the two of you really love each other and not prepared for some sort of responsibility – having child. Then, do a family planning because it is not the two of you who will suffer but your child in the future.

Lastly, I want to discuss the highlight of this movie: Determination, Imagination, and Hope. It shows us (that) if you unleash your imagination, and do it with determination, and hope for the better; You will get what you want. Sometimes, better than we asked for.

(Photo Reference: https://www.google.com/search?q=the+willoughbys+cover+photo&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwidwvS8q4XpAhUDEKYKHdfiCT8Q2-cCegQIABAA&oq=the+willoughbys+cover+photo&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQDDoHCAAQgwEQQzoECAAQQzoECAAQAzoFCAAQgwE6AggAOgYIABAIEB46BAgAEBhQvb8EWKraBGDM6gRoAXAAeACAAdgCiAHqGJIBBzAuNC41LjSYAQCgAQGqAQtnd3Mtd2l6LWltZw&sclient=img&ei=cxmlXt28KIOgmAXXxaf4Aw&rlz=1C1CHZL_enPH730PH730#imgrc=sw7sIOvSN0CCvM)

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

What other fandoms are you familiar enough with to use as an AU prompt? Pokemon Trainer AU? Homestuck AU (they'd still probably die but at least there are lots of ways to come back to life)?

I’m not that familiar with Homestuck, definitely not enough to do an AU.  I read the novelizations of the Pokemon show as a kid but never saw the show or played any of the video games.  I did play the super-obscure Pokemon board game, but most of my trading cards were printed in Japanese (I had a strange childhood), so my experience there is, uh, probably not quite overlapping with everyone else’s.

Anyway, if you want list of all my fandoms… Boy howdy.  I don’t think I can come up with them all.  However, I can list everything that comes to mind between now and ~20 minutes from now when I have to end my procrastination break and go back to dissertating.  So here it is, below the cut:

Okay, there is no way in hell I’ll be able to make an exhaustive list.  But off the top of my head, the fandoms I’m most familiar/comfortable with are as follows:

Authors (as in, I’ve read all or most of their books)

Patricia Briggs

Megan Whalen Turner

Michael Crichton

Marge Piercy

Stephenie Meyer

Dean Koontz

Stephen King

Neil Gaiman

K.A. Applegate

Ernest Hemingway

Tamora Pierce

Roald Dahl

Short Stories/Anthologies

A Good Man is Hard to Find, Flannery O’Connor

The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka

I Am Legend, Richard Matheson

Dubliners, James Joyce

Flowers for Algernon, Daniel Keyes

Who Goes There? John W. Campbell

The Man Who Bridged the Mist, Kij Johnson

Flatland, Edwin Abbott

I Have No Mouth, And I Must Scream, Harlan Ellison

To Build a Fire, Jack London

An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, Ambrose Bier

At the Mountains of Madness/Cthulu mythos, H.P. Lovecraft

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Arthur Conan Doyle

The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Washington Irving

The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury

Close Range: Wyoming Stories, E. Annie Proulx

The Curious Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson

Bartleby the Scrivener (and a bunch of others), Herman Melville

Books (Classics)

Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neal Hurston

The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupery

The Secret Garden, Francis Hodgson Burnett

Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson

Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte

The Secret Annex, Anne Frank

Nine Stories, J.D. Salinger

Frankenstein, Mary Shelley

Tom Sawyer/Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain

East of Eden, John Steinbeck

To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee

The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison

Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut

The Stranger, Albert Camus

The Call of the Wild, Jack London

Brave New World, Aldous Huxley

Lord of the Flies, William Golding

Atonement, Ian McEwan

1984, George Orwell

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Betty Smith

The Iliad/The Odyssey, Homer

Metamorphoses, Ovid

Journey to the Center of the Earth, Jules Verne

The Time-Machine, H.G. Wells

The Tempest, Much Ado About Nothing, Twelfth Night, Romeo and Juliet, Henry V, Hamlet, MacBeth, Othello, and The Taming of the Shrew, William Shakespeare

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, Thomas Stoppard

Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett

Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood

Books (YA SF)

Young Wizards series, Diane Duane

Redwall, Brian Jaques

The Dark is Rising sequence, Susan Cooper

The Chronicles of Chrestomanci, Diana Wynne Jones

The Chronicles of Narnia, C.S. Lewis

Abhorsen trilogy, Garth Nix

The Giver series, Lois Lowry

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams

Uglies series, Scott Westerfeld

Tuck Everlasting, Natalie Babbitt

A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. Le Guin

Song of the Lioness, Tamora Pierce

A Wrinkle in Time, Madeline L’Engle

Unwind, Neal Shusterman

The Maze Runner series, James Dashner

The Enchanted Forest Chronicles, Patricia C. Wrede

Sideways Stories from Wayside School, Louis Sachar

Ella Enchanted, Gail Carson Levine

Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card

The Phantom Tollbooth, Norton Juster

Coraline, Neil Gaiman

Among the Hidden, Margaret Peterson Haddix

The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle, Avi

Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice

Poppy series, Avi

The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd

Tithe, Holly Black

Life as We Knew It, Susan Beth Pfeffer

Blood and Chocolate, Annette Curtis Klause

Peter Pan, J.M. Barrie

The Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum

Haunted, Gregory Maguire

Weetzie Bat, Francesca Lia Block

Charlotte’s Web, E.B. White

East, Edith Pattou

Z for Zachariah, Robert C. O’Brien

The Looking-Glass Wars, Frank Beddor

The Egypt Game, Zilpha Keatley Snyder

The Book Thief, Markus Zusak

Homecoming, Cynthia Voigt

Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass, Lewis Carroll

The Landry News, Andrew Clements

Fever 1793, Laurie Halse Anderson

Bloody Jack, L.A. Meyer

The Boxcar Children, Gertrude Chandler Warner

A Certain Slant of Light, Laura Whitcomb

Generation Dead, Daniel Waters

Pendragon series, D.J. MacHale

Silverwing, Kenneth Oppel

Good Omens, Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett

Define Normal, Julie Anne Peters

Hawksong, Ameila Atwater Rhodes

Heir Apparent, Vivian Vande Velde

Running Out of Time, Margaret Peterson Haddix

The Keys to the Kingdom series, Garth Nix

The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, Joan Aiken

The Seer and the Sword, Victoria Hanley

My Side of the Mountain, Jean Craighead George

Daughters of the Moon series, Lynne Ewing

The Midwife’s Apprentice, Karen Cushman

Island of the Aunts, Eva Ibbotson

The Night Circus, Erin Morgenstern

The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm, Nancy Farmer

A Great and Terrible Beauty, Libba Bray

A School for Sorcery, E. Rose Sabin

The House with a Clock in Its Walls, John Bellairs

The Edge Chronicles, Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell

Hope was Here, Joan Bauer

Bunnicula, James Howe

Wise Child, Monica Furlong

Silent to the Bone, E.L. Konigsburg

The Twenty-One Balloons, William Pene du Bois

Dead Girls Don’t Write Letters, Gail Giles

The Supernaturalist, Eoin Colfer

Blue is for Nightmares, Laurie Faria Stolarz

Mystery of the Blue Gowned Ghost, Linda Wirkner

Wait Till Helen Comes, Mary Downing Hahn

I was a Teenage Fairy, Francesca Lia Block

City of the Beasts series, Isabelle Allende

Summerland, Michael Chabon

The Geography Club, Brent Hartinger

The Last Safe Place on Earth, Richard Peck

Liar, Justine Larbalestier

The Doll People, Ann M. Martin

The Lost Years of Merlin, T.A. Barron

Matilda Bone, Karen Cushman

Nine Stories, J.D. Salinger

The Tiger Rising, Kate DiCamillo

The Spiderwick Chronicles, Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi

In the Forests of the Night, Amelia Atwater-Rhodes

My Teacher is an Alien, Bruce Coville

The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles, Julie Andrews Edwards

Storytime, Edward Bloor

Magic Shop series, Bruce Coville

A Series of Unfortunate Events, Lemony Snicket

Veritas Project series, Frank Peretti

The Once and Future King, T.H. White

Raven’s Strike, Patricia Briggs

What-the-Dickens: The Story of a Rogue Tooth Fairy, Gregory Maguire

The Wind Singer, William Nicholson

Sweetblood, Pete Hautman

The Trumpet of the Swan, E.B. White

Half Magic, Edward Eager

A Ring of Endless Light, Madeline L'Engle

The Heroes of Olympus, Rick Riordan

Maximum Ride series, James Patterson

The Edge on the Sword, Rebecca Tingle

World War Z, Max Brooks

Adaline Falling Star, Mary Pope Osborne

Six of Crows, Leigh Bardugo

Children of Blood and Bone, Tomi Adeyemi

Parable of the Sower series, Octavia Butler

I, Robot, Isaac Asimov

Neuomancer, William Gibson

Dune, Frank Herbert

The Miseducation of Cameron Post, Emily M. Danforth

The Martian, Andy Weir

Skeleton Man, Joseph Bruchac

Comics/Manga

Marvel 616 (most of the major titles)

Marvel 1610/Ultimates

Persepolis

This One Summer

Nimona

Death Note

Ouran High School Host Club

Vampire Knight

Emily Carroll comics

Watchmen

Fun Home

From Hell

American Born Chinese

Smile

The Eternal Smile

The Sandman

Calvin and Hobbes

The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For

TV Shows

Fullmetal Alchemist

Avatar the Last Airbender

Teen Titans (2003)

Luke Cage/Jessica Jones/Iron Fist/Defenders/Daredevil/The Punisher

Agents of SHIELD/Agent Carter

Supernatural

Sherlock

Brooklyn Nine-Nine

Angel/Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Firefly

American Horror Story

Ouran High School Host Club

Orange is the New Black

Black Sails

Stranger Things

Westworld

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

Movies

Marvel Cinematic Universe

Jurassic Park/Lost World/Jurassic World/Lost Park?

The Breakfast Club

Cloverfield/10 Cloverfield Lane/The Cloverfield Paradox

Attack the Block

The Prestige

Moon

Ferris Bueler’s Day Off

Django Unchained/Kill Bill/Inglourious Basterds/Hateful 8/Pulp Fiction/etcetera

Primer

THX 1138/Akira/How I Live Now/Lost World/[anything I’ve named a fic after]

Star Wars

The Meg

A Quiet Place

Baby Driver

Mother!

Alien/Aliens/Prometheus

X-Men (et al.)

10 Things I Hate About You

The Lost Boys

Teen Wolf

Juno

Pirates of the Caribbean (et al.)

Die Hard

Most Disney classics: Toy Story, Mulan, Treasure Planet, Emperor’s New Groove, etc.

Most Pixar classics: Up, Wall-E, The Incredibles

The Matrix

Dark Knight trilogy

Halloween

Friday the 13th

A Nightmare on Elm Street

The Descent

Ghostbusters

Ocean’s Eight/11/12/13

King Kong

The Conjuring

Fantastic Four

Minority Report/Blade Runner/Adjustment Bureau/Total Recall

Fight Club

Spirited Away

O

Disturbing Behavior

The Faculty

Poets

Edna St. Vincent Millay

Marge Piercy

Thomas Hardy

Sigfried Sassoon

W. B. Yeats

Edgar Allan Poe

Ogden Nash

Margaret Atwood

Maya Angelou

Emily Dickinson

Matthew Dickman

Karen Skolfield

Kwame Alexander

Ellen Hopkins

Shel Silverstein

Musicals/Stage Plays

Les Miserables

Repo: The Genetic Opera

The Lion King

The Phantom of the Opera

Rent

The Prince of Egypt

Pippin

Into the Woods

A Chorus Line

Hairspray

Evita

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

Fiddler on the Roof

Annie

Fun Home

Spring Awakening

Chicago

Cabaret

The Miser

The Importance of Being Earnest

South Pacific

Godspell

Wicked

The Wiz

The Wizard of Oz

Man of La Mancha

The Sound of Music

West Side Story

Matilda

Sweeney Todd

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat

Nunsense

You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown/Snoopy

1776

Something Rotten

A Very Potter Musical

Babes in Toyland

Carrie: The Musical

Amadeus

Annie Get Your Gun

25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee

The Final Battle

Rock of Ages

Cinderella

Moulin Rouge

Honk

Labyrinth

The Secret Garden

Reefer Madness

Bang Bang You’re Dead

NSFW

War Horse

Peter Pan

Suessical

Sister Act

The Secret Annex

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Disclaimer 1: Like a lot of people who went to high school in the American South, my education in literature is pretty shamefully lacking in a lot of areas.  (As in, during our African American History unit in ninth grade we read To Kill a Mockingbird, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn… and that was it.  As in, our twelfth-grade US History class, I shit you not, covered Gone With the Wind.)  There were a lot of good teachers in with the *ahem* Less Woke ones (how I read Their Eyes Were Watching God and The Bluest Eye) and college definitely set me on the path to trying to find books written/published outside the WASP-ier parts of the U.S., but the overall list is still embarrassingly hegemonic.

Disclaimer 2: There are a crapton of errors — typos, misspelled names, misattributions, questionable genre classifications, etc. — in here.  If you genuinely have no idea what a title is supposed to be, ask me.  Otherwise, please don’t bother letting me know about my mistakes.

Disclaimer 3: I am not looking for recommendations.  My Goodreads “To Read” list is already a good 700 items long, and people telling me “if you like X, then you’ll love Y!” genuinely stresses me the fuck out.

Disclaimer 4: There are no unproblematic faves on this list.  I love Supernatural, and I know that Supernatural is hella misogynistic.  On the flip side: I don’t love The Lord of the Rings at all, partially because LOTR is hella misogynistic, but I also don’t think that should stop anyone else from loving LOTR if they’re willing to love it and also acknowledge its flaws. 

[jillmckenzie1]

The Worst of All Possible Parents

The Willoughbys is streaming on Netflix

Once upon a time, there lived a parent. This parent had the colossal misfortune to be a) alive during a pandemic and b) in charge of children. It was bad enough that the wicked virus forced people to stay inside.* Movie theaters closed. Baseball stadiums were empty. Jobs vanished. People scoffed at the idea of eating at buffets.

As you can imagine, all that time spent inside was incredibly boring for the parent. There were only so many times they could make sourdough bread! But as dull as it was for the parent, it was a thousand times worse for their kids. They couldn’t spend time with their friends, couldn’t shoot bottle rockets at each other. All they could do was read, watch television, and cyberbully weaker classmates.

For the parent, this was intolerable. He (or it could be she) spent several weeks devising activities and attempting to home school their offspring.** She (or it might be he) also vowed to limit their child’s screen time, which was hilarious. In the end, the parent thought, “To hell with it,” let the kids watch TV as long as they wanted, and prayed to a distant God that their children wouldn’t accidentally become radicalized while watching YouTube.

If, like me, you’re in charge of kids during this time of plague, it’s a challenge to find something for them to watch. You don’t want to hear the sounds of Frozen (or Heaven forbid, Frozen 2) for the 367th time. You want something else, something that’s not offensively stupid or a 90-minute ad. Say what you will about Netflix’s original programming, but they’re not doing half bad when it comes to kids’ movies. The most recent is The Willoughbys, a stylish and fun romp that’s also not a snooze for us old folks.

We’re introduced to The Cat (Ricky Gervais), a snide feline who will be acting as our narrator and occasional supporting character. He gives us the history of the magnificent Willoughby family, a clan stuffed to the gills with explorers, adventurers, poets, artists, and all manner of wonderful folk. The only thing exceeding their deeds? Their legendary facial hair.

All families eventually hit a generational speed bump, and the Willoughbys are no different. Mother (Jane Krakowski) and Father (Martin Short) are notable for only their narcissism. They love each other deeply — and nothing else. You can see how that would be a problem for their children, right?

Said children are Tim (Will Forte), a nervous boy working overtime to protect his siblings, Jane (Alessia Cara), a sharp girl with a lovely singing voice, and the alarming identical twins Barnaby A and Barnaby B (Sean Cullen). In another family, these kids would be happy. Unfortunately, they rolled snake eyes. During Tim’s first day on the planet, he is told, “I’m your father and that sweet woman that you insulted with your rude birth is Mother. If you need love, I beg you, find it elsewhere.”

To put it plainly, this sucks. But it won’t suck for long, as the kids have devised A Plan. This plan consists of sending their parents on a wildly dangerous worldwide vacation. There will be lava, bears, acid pools, and an unclimbable mountain. With luck, the Willoughby children will be orphaned, but the involvement of an orphaned infant, a sweet Nanny (Maya Rudolph), and candy tycoon Commander Melanoff (Terry Crews) complicates matters.

Is The Willoughbys good viewing for kids? Oh, yes. Director Kris Pearn and co-director Rob Lodermeier have made a film that feels like the love child of Wes Anderson and Charles Addams. Bright colors pop off the screen, and strong computer rendering creates distinctive and angular imagery. It bears mentioning that hair textures are fiendishly difficult to create using computer animation. Here, the characters have hair that looks exactly like red yarn. While watching, I could almost feel the fuzz between my fingers. Along with the film being great looking, Pearn and Lodermeier’s pacing is impeccable. There’s not an ounce of fat, and it knows when to zip through a set-piece and when to slow down for a little character development.

Based on the novel by Lois Lowry, the screenplay does something a lot of children’s entertainment fails to do. It tackles some dark concepts, but it does so in a way that’s witty, funny, and relatable. I suspect that screenwriters Pearn and Mark Stanleigh gleaned inspiration from classics such as Roald Dahl’s James and the Giant Peach and Coraline by Neil Gaiman. While we’re dealing with a story in which a group of children attempts to bump off their folks, Pearn and Stanleigh keep the tone light. The neglect from Father and Mother is played broadly, and the ultimate message deals with the necessity of creating your own family. While the script is occasionally slight, it’s sweet without becoming cloying.

Pearn has assembled a team of voice actors that are old pros at this sort of thing. Need a couple of someones to play nitwitted narcissists? You get Martin Short and Jane Krakowski, who knock it out of the park. Need a kind nanny with the tiniest bit of an edge, or a huge candy maker with a sweet interior? Maya Rudolph and Terry Crews can do that sort of thing in their sleep. Nobody breaks out of their comfort zone. They don’t need to, since they show up, do their thing, and do it well.

At some point during this pandemic, you’ll get profoundly tired. Your shoulders will slump, you’ll sigh audibly, and even the most macho of us will think, “Calgon, take me away.” With The Willoughbys, Netflix has given us parents a piece of children’s entertainment that’s a cut above the norm. You’ll appreciate it, until your kids have watched it for the 15th consecutive time.

    *Though a small number of people went outside as much as possible and insisted that it was all a conspiracy. These days we refer to them as morons.

**The parent learned a valuable lesson — that teachers work unbelievably hard and deserve far more money. The parent resolved to support educators until they learned that a salary increase would only be possible by raising taxes. “Screw that,” said the parent, and continued to vote for Republicans because they were afraid of socialism.

from Blog https://ondenver.com/the-worst-of-all-possible-parents/