#very good in its later stages but a little formulaic in the journey getting there. Bacalov's minimalist discordant score is also

[smallersocksx]

My Problems with the Pokémon Journeys Anime

Pokémon Journeys as an anime has divided the Pokémon community in so many ways but in particular last week’s episode has sparked a lot of debate and personally, I had mixed feelings about the end result. So, I thought I would write down my opinions on the Pokémon anime in its current state and comparing it to some of the previous anime.

I feel the need to say this: these are my opinions I am just as entitled to my opinions as you are to yours, so you don’t have to read this if you don’t want to. Secondly, this will probably be a long post but I’m going to split it into sections so it’s hopefully not too overwhelming.

But these feelings have been building up and up and I think I’ll feel better writing them all down and getting them off my chest to some extent.

Introduction:

So, I’ve essentially been a fan of Pokémon for as long as I can remember particularly watching the anime when I was very young. The anime didn’t really begin to stick with me though until around AG and DP in particular. The first Pokémon game, I played was DP which is why I have a particular fondness for that series and that cast of characters and Pokémon.

I didn’t watch the series as intently around the time of BW because I found Iris’ character rather annoying and I understand she developed and grew as the series went on but that initial characterization of her kind of ruined the series for me. But I did dip in and out of the series mostly for Ash’s Snivy.

My friend recommended that I watch the XY series and I fell in love with the cast and the storytelling that the series provided as it reminded me of DP. Sun and Moon was a good series as well providing fans with some of the most heart-breaking and tear-jerking episodes to date. (And Rowlet).

When they announced that Journeys was Ash travelling around the world instead of staying and travelling in a specific region, I’ll admit I was sceptical. To be honest, I kind of preferred the old formula particularly as I’m a creature of habit myself but I decided to give this new series a chance as the premise did sound interesting and there was the potential for Ash to reunite with some of his old travelling companions.

With the benefit of hindsight, I realise this was one of the problems: the series kind of relies heavily on the nostalgia provided by older fans.

The Premise:

The whole premise of Journeys was Ash and his new friend, Goh travelling the world and there lies one of the series biggest problems. For a series that is meant to be about travelling around the world, a bulk of the series has been set in Kanto in particular Vermillion City where Sakuragi/Cerise Lab is situated. Now that shouldn’t be a problem as Ash and Go need a place to stay and go home to. The problem is we are nearly 60 episodes into the series, they hardly seem to leave Vermillion City or Kanto for that matter.

I went through all the episode synopses released so far to see how many episodes Ash and Go travelled to an alternative region. In this case a visit to a different region only counts if Ash and Goh (and Chloe) visit the region therefore episode 32 wouldn’t count:

Johto – 2 episodes

Hoenn – 4 episodes

Sinnoh – 2 episodes

Unova – 2 episodes

Kalos – 2 episodes

Alola – 1 episode

Galar – 11 episodes

Arguably, as this is meant to a Gen 8 anime, its not particularly shocking that they have visited Galar the most especially as Ash hopes to battle Leon someday. Nevertheless, the initial premise and selling point of the Journeys series is travelling the world and yet only 2/5 of the series so far has been set outside of Vermillion City. They promised the world (no pun intended) and are kind of falling flat…

 Goh and his goal:

Now Goh is certainly a character that has divided the community some love him and some definitely hate him. Personally, I’m in the middle, I like Goh’s personality I thought his rational and logical personality made him a great counterbalance for Ash. The problem I have with him is: his goal, his rapid character development, and his status as a protagonist.

1)   His Goal:

Goh’s goal is to catch every Pokémon in existence and considering there over 800 Pokémon that is a lofty goal to begin with. Initially, I thought it was an interesting goal as we never had a character wanting to catch every Pokémon as there are some trainers in the anime universe who only specialise in a specific type, some who catch only cute Pokémon, some who only catch evolutionary lines etc. Therefore, I thought this was an interesting goal and wondered how they would execute its portrayal and there lies the problem…

Goh was named after the game Pokémon Go and is essentially being used as a walking advertisement for Pokémon Go and the Let’s Go series as his gimmick is throwing a Poke Ball at a random Pokémon which can get pretty old very fast. I honestly didn’t understand the need to create a character to promote these games as it has been 4 years since the release of Pokémon Go. Arguably, they could be trying to re-ignite the hype around Pokémon Go as after the initial excitement a lot of people stopped playing or uninstalled it as it was taking up a lot of space on their phone.

One of the things, I particularly love about the anime series is not only the human cast gaining character development but their Pokémon as well. Around the AG series, the writers really begun improving on giving each Pokémon their own unique personality traits as well as traits of their species. It gave the Pokémon more depth and made them memorable for example there’s Dawn’s prideful Piplup, Brock’s weird and wonderful Sudowoodoo who would salute every time he came out of his Poke Ball, Clemont’s gluttonous Chespin and Serena’s shy Eevee to later a confident Sylveon. The list could go on and on but I think you get the point. Therefore, this gives me my second issue with Goh’s goal.

Goh’s goal is to catch every single Pokémon currently in existence, with so many Pokémon, there is difficulty feeling any attachment to them. Cinderace and Sobble (and now Grookey) are the Pokémon Goh is most seen with, needless to say, Cinderace underwent a lot of development and was interested in battling which to be honest I found a little strange as Goh’s goal doesn’t particularly align with Cinderace’s interests. Nevertheless, it is clear that Cinderace is Goh’s ace and utilises him when he does need to battle. Sobble didn’t receive any development until 26 episodes after his capture. However, aside from Cinderace and Sobble we don’t feel any particular attachment to his other Pokémon, one strength is that anime does give each of his Pokémon some spotlight like Goh using his Goldeen to teach Jinny’s Feebas how to swim elegantly but aside from that.

My final issue with Goh’s goal is development, from a story-telling point of view his goal isn’t that engaging like with some of the other goals we’ve had in the series. Take Dawn for example her goal is to be Top Coordinator in order to do that she needs to win 5 Ribbons, participate in the Grand Festival and win the Ribbon Cup. On paper it sound simple but it’s not, we have Dawn’s arc where she lost twice in the Performance Stage fell into depression, lost confidence in her abilities and was uncertain as to whether or not she was a good coordinator. It wasn’t until she befriended May and competed against her that Dawn found a renewed sense of confidence in her abilities, even after that Dawn still lost a few contests before being able to compete in the Grand Festival where even then there were a few rough moments like her battle with Ursula.

My point is even though Dawn (and May’s) goal looks simple on paper they had a lot of struggle to get there. Whereas, with Goh’s goal and the current execution of it, I don’t get that same sense of story-telling especially when he’s already caught a Legendary Pokémon, there just isn’t that same level of struggle. The most I could see Goh struggling at this moment is not catching a Pokémon the first time round.

2) His rapid development

One of the biggest issues I have with Journeys is pacing and development, and this issue isn’t just exclusive to Goh. In the beginning, Goh is a rookie trainer after catching Scorbunny and as we saw in the Flute Cup his lack of battling experience caused him to be eliminated very quickly and yet 29 episodes later, he’s defeating a Flygon with a Fire-type and using a technique Ash had once used himself in his battle against Grant. I understand Ash and Goh are close friends and understandably their traits are going to rub off on one another for example Goh’s logic and caution has rubbed off on Ash to the extent Ash had his Dragonite use Dragon Dance in his battle with Korrina. Before this, we’d never seen Ash use these types of moves in his Pokémon battles. I have no issues with Goh developing as a character, everyone loves good character development, my issue is with how rapid it is.

I’ll use Dawn’s arc as an example again, I loved it because it was well-paced, in the first season of DP Dawn was overconfident in her abilities which led to some losses particularly towards the end of the first series and Dawn didn’t fully recover from this until nearly midway through the second series of DP. Arguably, Ash’s influence has caused Goh to develop an interest in battles but I feel like we haven’t seen him go through enough battles to justify the level he is at.

3) His status as a Protagonist

To be honest, I didn’t realise Goh has a protagonist status until someone pointed it out to me, I just saw him as another one of Ash’s travelling companions. This is one of the biggest issues Goh haters have with him and that’s feeling as though Goh is taking the spotlight away from Ash and there are a lot of episodes focusing on Goh. Arguably, Ash has taken on the role of mentor like Brock had done once for him. However, my issue with Goh’s protagonist status is that I don't feel like Goh's goal justifies him having it, even in episodes focusing on Ash and his participation in the World Coronation Series, Goh still manages to catch a Pokémon which as I mentioned before it got old pretty fast. I can understand some people would see this as a good thing they are both closer towards their goals but if an episode advertises its going to focus on one character, I want it to focus on that character.

In some of the previous series when May, Dawn and Serena were participating in Contests or Showcases, Ash would generally put his training the back burner and support his friends. Likewise, his travelling companions would support him during his gym battles. In some cases, Ash would even get ideas for his own battles from watching them compete like the Counter Shield from Ash watching Dawn and Ambipom.

Sometimes, I feel like Goh is there for the sake of being there like in Episode 56, I honestly felt like him and Scyther/Scizor didn’t need to be there. The episode did focus on Ash and Farfetch’d relationship improving but I felt like the only reason Goh was there was to have his Scyther evolve their presence at the training camp didn’t really contribute anything to the story.

Ash and his Pokémon:

Whenever Ash starts a new journey, he always starts with a clean slate leaving his most recent Pokemon with Professor Oak or Kukui. One of the things that excites fans the most is guessing which new Pokemon from the new generation Ash would catch. Arguably, since Sun and Moon, certain traditions have been turned on their head. Some of these traditions included:

Ash catching the regional bird e.g., Starly, Pidove, Fletchling etc.

Catching at least one of the region’s starters

Although, in Sun and Moon, Ash never caught the regional bird and it was one of the first series with Ash not having a water-type either. However, in this current series, Ash only has 2 Generation 8 Pokémon being Farfetch’d (which will evolve into Sirfetch’d) and Dracovish. This is kind of understandable as Ash isn’t based or travelling around Galar but to be honest it’s still disappointing.

As many of you know, in the most recent episode Goh caught Grookey completing the Galar starter trio (which I’ll cover later), however, a majority of the fandom wanted Ash to have Grookey as they felt personality-wise Ash would be compatible with the Chimp Pokémon and it would continue the long-held tradition of Ash catching one of the new region’s starter Pokémon which is why this latest capture has sparked a lot of controversy with some people calling Goh a thief.

Personally, I would have liked Ash to catch Grookey but in one of the earlier episodes like when they first visited Galar. The reason for this being the storyline development and I know many will argue Ash is a Champion he doesn’t need a starter at this point but Leon in the Sword and Shield games took on and trained the starter that was left over after the Protagonist and Hop had chosen theirs. However, as I mentioned earlier one of the things, I love about the anime is each Pokémon having their own personality and character but also their own traumas and trials to overcome alongside their trainer this can be particularly reflected in the case of Ash and Infernape.

I am not trying to suggest they re-create the Ash and Infernape storyline with Ash and a Grookey but one of the ways a Pokémon develops as a character is through evolution or in some cases like Pikachu and Bulbasaur choosing not to evolve and finding strength in staying the way that they are. Pokémon when they evolve can go through personality-changes whether that be good or bad but having a Pokemon at its first evolutionary stage allows us to go through that development and journey with them.

Which is one of the issues, I have with the series, Ash caught two fully evolved Pokémon being Dragonite and Gengar. Before anyone gives me any grief, I love Dragonite and Gengar’s personalities but as they are fully evolved, we don’t get that same sense of development as we’ve had with some of Ash’s other Pokémon. The only development I could see for these two is potentially learning a new move or overcoming a stronger Pokémon alongside Ash. But having two fully evolved Pokémon makes it difficult to go on a journey of development alongside them. There is also the fact, Dragonite and Gengar are meant to be incredibly strong Pokémon and yet Ash hardly uses them.

Another one of the biggest issues in Journeys as previously mentioned is Ash not fully utilising his team. Whenever, a battle occurs Ash either uses Pikachu or Lucario, the others are kind of pushed to the side and that annoys me so much particularly with Farfetch’d and Gengar. I’ll start with Gengar, Gengar was abandoned by its previous trainer and told to wait in an abandoned building that would later become Cerise Laboratory and in the earlier half of the series (before Riolu) Ash utilised Gengar a lot like in his battle with Visquez and Team Rocket but after Riolu came along Ash used Gengar less and less. In Episode 57, Gengar was taking its anger out on Renji, Chloe and Chrysa and Chloe pointed out that it may have been angry Ash left it behind. This is what I found frustrating; Ash is kind of repeating the behaviour of Gengar’s previous trainer.

Next is Farfetch’d, personality-wise Farfetch’d reminds me of Ash’s Buizel and Hawlucha, with how prideful and aloof it is. I feel like the writers thought they couldn’t flesh out Lucario any further so they decided to focus on Farfetch’d and after two Farfetch’d-focused episodes I can’t help but feel that Farfetch’d is going to evolve in the next episode and that’s what annoys me, that is lazy writing, they haven’t given time to develop Ash and Farfetch’d relationship although it has definitely improved since Episode 56, I feel like it’s too soon. Farfetch’d has so much potential to grow as a character before evolving as I previously mentioned evolution in the Pokémon universe can contribute towards development and I feel like for Farfetch’d they’ll use it in a positive light as Sirfetch’d are noted for their fighting spirit and noble personality. But, as I mentioned before, I would have liked to have seen more development before an evolution.

Then there is Dracovish, this was a completely unexpected capture, however, many fans were surprised by how strong Dracovish was in the games. However, Dracovish was captured in Episode 50 and nearly 10 episodes later, we haven’t seen it… On the other hand, many of Dracovish’s Pokédex entries state that it can’t breathe unless its underwater, therefore, applying that logic to the anime world, may make battling with it difficult...

Team Rocket:

One of the biggest complaints’ viewers have is the series use of Team Rocket. Particularly, using their use of the Gacha machine and using them to create easy conflict. I love Team Rocket; they are basically lovable idiots to me. They’re meant to be “bad guys” but we’ve seen on many occasions they’re kindness and compassion such as rescuing a bunch of wild Ekans and Koffing from a Pokémon hunter and releasing their Arbok and Weezing to protect them whilst they distract the hunter, Meowth sympathising and trying to cheer up Litten following Stoutland’s death are just two examples of their kindness.

Nevertheless, the Journeys series has been utilising them poorly using them as convenient plot device and in my opinion Team Rocket deserve so much better than this. Initially, a lot of viewers may have found the Gacha device interesting but much like Goh throwing a Poké ball at a random Pokémon it got old fast. Similar to one of my issues with Goh, we don’t feel any attachment to the Gacha Pokémon they use unlike other series where they had their own Pokémon which I’ll get on to in a minute.

I feel like the writers missed a huge opportunity, as one of the initial selling points of the series, particularly to the older fans was nostalgia. Team Rocket keep some of their old Pokémon in Team Rocket Headquarters and as the series seems to like staying in Vermillion City, Team Rocket could have collected their old Pokémon and use them similar to when they brought some of their Hoennian Pokémon to Sinnoh. I loved some of Team Rocket’s Pokémon like James’ Mime Jr. and Inkay and Jessie’s Gourgeist and her Yanmega was noted to be strong.

Moreover, in series such as AG, DP and XY they expanded on Team Rocket’s role outside of trying to steal. Jessie showed a promising career in Pokémon Coordinating (particularly in DP) and Pokémon Performing, I loved how she became a rival for Dawn and Serena and particularly in XY, Jessie showed maturity in her loss in the Semi-Finals much to Meowth and Gourgeist’s surprise compared to when she begrudgingly congratulated Dawn on her victory. I just loved the fact in these series they expanded on Team Rocket, showed their friendship and support for one another whether it was cheering each other on from the side-lines or willingly helping Jessie in her pursuits of fame and glory. I realize in Journeys, it’s a bit difficult to expand on Team Rocket’s role in this way but they way they are currently using Team Rocket is to be honest kind of insulting to them as characters who we’ve watched grow over the years.

Chloe, Yamper and Eevee

I’ll get this out the way, I honestly love Chloe, and I’ve loved her development so far, I think they’ve gotten the pacing right for her when they’ve given her focus. I think many people like Chloe because she is similar to Serena, in the sense, she doesn’t have a goal and is discovering what she wants to do in life which is something a lot of people find relatable. I think what would be interesting for Chloe’s character if she does decide to be a Pokémon Professor after initially feeling as though the idea was being forced on her by her peers. Anyways, one of the biggest issues with Journeys is pacing, it takes ages before they actually decide to give a character development and ever since Chloe got Eevee, I feel as though Yamper has been pushed to the side (which is kind of ironic as Chloe calls Ash out on this) and I know Yamper is Professor Cerise’s Pokémon but Yamper acknowledges Chloe more than his own trainer. I feel like a great way to use Yamper was for Professor Cerise to actually give Yamper to Chloe when she was old enough to have a Pokémon, as a lot of Chloe’s earlier development was a result of her bond with Yamper.

Next is Eevee, I love Eevee it is one of my favourite Pokemon, but I also feel similar to Goh, she’s a walking advertisement for the Let’s Go Eevee game as she is unable to evolve. However, the fact that Eevee is unable to evolve makes her a good match for Chloe who is uncertain of her own dreams. Nevertheless, what I don’t understand is why they are trying to promote one of their older games in a new generation (especially when Lana’s Eevee (which don’t get me started) should have filled that role). Also, with Chloe catching Eevee, arguably, she should be joining Ash and Goh frequently, this could allow for Chloe and Eevee to develop and find their own path but aside from joining them twice in Galar, they’ve hardly left Kanto. Which is frustrating because I love Chloe and Eevee and I don’t want it to be another 20 episodes before we get any development from either of them.

Structure

I’ve realized that above I’ve kind of been focusing on the characters and some of the issues surrounding them. Arguably, one of Journeys biggest issues is structure or lack of it for that matter and pacing. Everything is all over the place but I’ll cover each section.

Pacing:

One of my biggest gripes with the series is pacing, lately we have been having back-to-back filler episodes and I don’t mind having filler every now and then to give us a break as you don’t want a show to be too content-heavy. And I don’t mind when the filler is at least entertaining but that Gulpin episode from two weeks ago was absolutely pointless, I’m sorry. So much stuff has taken place off-screen and Ash went up by 500 ranks to Rank 415 they could have taken out some of the filler episodes and used it to show Ash training at least or put it towards actual development for characters like Chloe and Eevee or Farfetch’d.

Another issue, I have with the pacing and I think a lot of you will hopefully agree is the pace of Goh catching a legendary Pokemon (which I’m in the middle about). Normally, around the end of the series, all of the respective characters have found or are closer to their goal like Dawn and Serena coming Runner-Up in their respective competitions or having confidence to keep pursuing their goal. This is normally, in the last series of that generation’s anime adaptation but Goh’s already achieved such a huge milestone towards his goal in the second series. I can’t help but feel as though this has been completely rushed.

Continuity:

Continuity in Journeys is strange, I can see it as a strength and a weakness. I’ll start off with the positives, continuity-wise I like the fact that Journeys at least references to past episodes and characters for example episode 57 Chloe’s younger brother says he’s going to a sleepover at his friend, Jinny’s house, the girl with the Feebas from episode 31. Or episode 47, Goh uses his prize from winning the Pokémon Eating Contest to have a dessert tour around Unova’s Castelia City. These small examples of continuity are something I can appreciate. But I can’t help but feel some of the past characters returning are merely fan-service for the older fans, so far, some of the character returns haven’t really contributed to the series’ narrative aside from the Alola episode contributing to Goh’s development.

A good example of utilising a past character is the Wallace Cup arc, with May and Dawn helping each other out of a losing streak and allowing Dawn to renew her confidence. I think no matter the outcome, both Coordinators gained something from the tournament even if Dawn lost to May, I think she would have had a regained her confidence but winning the Aqua Ribbon allowed her to re-affirm her self-belief and skills.

Episodic vs Linear:

Now I’ve watched a few videos on this to have a better understanding, the reason why Journeys feels so unstructured is that for some reason the writers chose to go down an episodic route instead of linear. The best example I know of episodic storytelling is Phineas and Ferb where characters and elements are introduced and can come back. But utilising episodic storytelling in a series like Pokémon feels like an unnatural choice we’re meant to be following these characters and their journeys towards achieving their goals whereas in a linear narrative this would be a lot clearer.

The Setting:

A lot of people have an issue with the fact that a series, that promises travelling the world, it really fell flat. As I have previously mentioned, so far only 2/5 of the episodes have taken place in other regions, most of the time Ash and Goh end up staying in Vermillion City. With the way things are currently being executed, I honestly would have preferred a Sword and Shield anime, with Ash at least travelling around Galar, it would allow for the Galar story to be more fleshed out instead of shoe-horned into a four-episode arc and with the announcement of the Sinnoh re-makes, I feel as though they are going to promote that in some way in the anime later on. (Perhaps with a Dawn cameo).

As I’ve been writing this, I’ve kind of realised one gripe I have with the anime that has become rather blatant as of late. That is the commercialism in the anime, I understand the anime is utilised to promote the game and re-makes of games but with this latest series the commercialism is blatant and honestly annoying. An early example of using the anime to promote a game was the Johto arc in DP to promote HeartGold and SoulSilver. Whereas, currently we have Goh, the human advertisement for Pokémon Go and Chloe’s Eevee promoting Let’s Go Eevee (which I honestly don’t see the need to advertise older games).

The controversary with Grookey…

Needless to say, the latest episode of Pokemon Journeys has sparked a lot of debate and anger particularly from Goh haters who have declared him a thief and are dropping the anime. There are some people who don’t mind Goh catching Grookey, they may have disliked the storyline they used for Goh to catch Grookey. I’ve made my feelings clear, that I would have preferred for Grookey to have been introduced much earlier and for Ash to have caught it.

However, I do have an issue with the way Goh caught Grookey as I can kind of understand why people are calling Goh a thief, I wouldn’t go that far maybe immoral at the most. The initial concept of Grookey belonging to Team Rocket was interesting but the whole story falls flat when they don’t give us any backstory like how did Team Rocket catch Grookey? why was Grookey so desparate to stay with Goh? was Grookey being mistreated by Team Rocket?

Honestly, if Grookey was being mistreated by Team Rocket, I’d understand why it’d want to leave them but this is Jessie, James and Meowth, the trio that released Mimikyu and Mareanie since they didn’t want them to be left in Team Rock Headquarters because they’d thought Mimikyu and Mareanie would be unhappy. So, I honestly can’t see the mistreatment storyline.

Also, the fact that Grookey smashed its own Poké Ball to gain its freedom kind of undermines other storylines that have seen Pokémon being abused by their trainers as they could have arguably smashed their Poké Balls to gain their freedom. Although, you could argue there is an element of fear in these cases.

I feel like if they built up the story more, I may have been more accepting but I kind of find it hypocritical in the sense Goh wants this Pokémon that belongs to someone else and it smashes its own Poké Ball to be with him. Whereas, its bad when Team Rocket try to steal someone else’s Pokémon but its okay for Goh because he’s the protagonist. Considering this is a kids anime that kind of sends the wrong message. I honestly would have found it more interesting if Grookey decided to stay with Team Rocket that would have been an interesting twist with Team Rocket having a starter Pokémon on their side. Plus, we know, James loves his Grass-types.

Conclusion:

Basically, I needed to get this off my chest and honestly, I feel much better for it. No Pokémon anime series is perfect by any means but lately I feel as though the writing has taken a huge dip and it has taken the enjoyment out of the series. I’m still trying to give the series a chance and hopefully I can warm to Grookey under Goh’s ownership, I think if the episodic formula has taken away the storytelling element that I love about the Pokémon series.

I have honestly never seen a Pokémon anime divide the community so much but I’m hoping that things begin to improve particularly if Ash’s Farfetch’d evolves in the next episode.

[peachyteabuck]

clear the clouds (bucky barnes x reader)

summary: after weeks of bucky feels down, natasha knows exactly who to call to make him feel better

pairing: bucky barnes x reader

words: 2,030

trigger warnings: sickening fluff, also - please don’t take kitten rearing advice from fanfiction

notes: this is a birthday present for the effervescent @m00nlightdelights​, who asked for bucky barnes interacting with kittens. happy birthday babe! 

ask box / masterlist / commission info / ko-fi

Natasha was the one who called you – asking something many dream for but very few get to experience. It’s hard to transport that many tiny, wriggling animals across town and very few are willing to pay the exorbitant, arbitrary amount of money you had made some intern put on the website after the twentieth call asking about the particular service.

People, apparently, really want to rent a bunch of kittens for several different types of events – finals weeks at universities and rich high schools, bat and bar mitzvahs, once even a wedding. Why those event coordinators can’t rent service animals is beyond you, and why they always expect you to do these things for free is also a mystery.

No matter why those people wanted your kittens, you closed the service except for incredibly rare cases.

One of those incredibly rare cases, per the usual path of your life, involved Natasha Romanoff.

You owed her a favor from a few years back, when she made sure an ex-boyfriend of yours…well, for legal purposes you can’t talk about it, but Natasha made sure he never bothered you or your friends ever again.

Natasha’s got enough tact not to bring the year-long ordeal up – just said she wanted to “cash in” on your side of the bargain. You sighed into the office landline when she told you she was calling for her favor, the exhale so deep it was still audible despite the barking and scratching and the menagerie of other noises.

It takes you a second to collect yourself, to shove the memories back into that little box your therapist had you build and then tuck into the back of your brain.

Despite not being able to see her face, you can tell she’s frowning and has furrowed her brow. “You good?”

You nodded, then remembered how phones work. “Yeah,” you let out a small sigh. “Yeah, I’m fine. You want the kittens at Avengers Towers this weekend for a few hours to help that friend of yours-“

“Bucky,” Natasha interrupts you. “His name is Bucky. And you should go out with him.”

Despite still knowing how phone works, you roll your eyes. “Didn’t you just say he spent the last week bedridden because of depression. It doesn’t exactly sound like he’s in the right state of mind for a relationship.”

Your friend scoffs into the phone, shutting what you think is a thick book for dramatic audial effect. “And you spend fifteen hours a day at your shelter because it gives you an excuse not to see people. I don’t need you to marry him, I’m saying maybe a coffee date would be good for you.”

There’s a pause where you search for a sarcastic response, but Natasha beats you to it.

“Actually, no,” she says, voice dripping with a lovable dryness you can’t help but admire. “It will be good for both of you.”

Another pause while you recalculate your sarcastic response cortex. After a deeply silent thirty seconds, you give up.

“Fine,” you acquiesce. “But you and Wanda are helping me and you’re buying me lunch for that day and you’re helping me during adoption day at the museum next month.”

Somehow, you can hear Natasha’s wide and triumphant smile. “You got it, kid.”

And with that, you hang up before falling back in your office chair. You swear, that woman could convince you to do anything.

Fucking spies, you think before putting the event in the shelter’s e-calendar.

The day arrives both too quickly and not quickly enough – your brain caught between something akin to “existential dread” and “oh my God my friend is trying to set me up with her friend and what if it doesn’t work but what if it does” the entire week before the planned event. During the night before you down quadruple your normal dose of melatonin to fall asleep after spending three entire hours trying on all your clothes to plan the right outfit (in the end, you chose an unusually nice pair of leggings and a plan sweater along with boots cute enough to fool a man into thinking they’re fancy while still protecting your feet from the end-stage winter air outside.

(Also, the leggings and sweater are the easiest things to lint roll kitten fur off of you for, say, a date at an upscale coffee shop you normally wouldn’t even think of going to, but that’s nobody’s business and you totally one hundred percent did not think about that when trying the outfit on.)

You meet Natasha and Wanda at the shelter the next morning, you getting there before them to gather the necessary supplies from the back. Despite them promising to help you load your car with kittens and kitten-adjacent items, you still didn’t want either of them messing with the precious organization system you’d spent years perfecting (and years training interns and vet techs how to abide by it).

Luckily, with your precautions and time management – and despite Wanda’s need to kiss every kitten (yes, every kitten) as they were loaded into crates – you arrive at the infamous Stark Tower right on time.

Set up of the whole thing doesn’t take long, Natasha successfully leading the way through the maze of which is the expansive building. You pass a few people you recognize from Natasha’s stories and the news, and a few others who you don’t but still smile as they pass (whether they were just being nice or smiling at the kittens in the crates you were holding, you refused to decide).

It takes a few elevator rides, but eventually you get to the desires floor and room – Wanda knocking on the door after setting her Ikea bag of playpen supplies on the carpeted floor.

A response is nearly immediate. “Go away!” a gruff voice calls, muffled by the thick walls.

Natasha and Wanda both roll their eyes. “Shut up and open the door!” the former replies.

There’s no verbal response, but you do hear shuffling before the door opens to reveal a figure more brick house than man. His hair is messy, sweatshirt a size too large and solid black but with jeans that fit perfectly. His boots – much thicker and blacker than yours – are dirty.

“What do you want?” he grumbles.

Natasha remains unphased by the man’s demeanor. “We have kittens. Now move out of my way so we can set all this shit up and you can pet some cute animals.”

Bucky gives her a look and rolls his eyes, but steps asides and holds the door open for the three of you nonetheless.

Twenty minutes later, Bucky found in the middle of the four-foot wide pen, bewildered. He’s done a lot of things in his life, many of which would be impossible for (nearly) anyone else to accomplish. He speaks thirty languages (plus Morse code and ten variations of sign language), he’s hunted bears with his bare hands, he’s survived Russian winters and summers in the Amazon rainforest.

Yet, somehow, the thing that stunts him beyond reproach is a small play pen filled with about forty tiny, six-week old kittens that are all their own form of chaotic. Bucky doesn’t know where to look, let alone how to grab the ones that catch his eye. He’s terrified of crushing them like bug caught under a hardcover book, of breaking their tiny ribs or tiny legs or tiny necks.

He watched you intensely when you and Natasha and Wanda pulled them out of their crates, watching how you held them and which one allowed you to give them kisses and which one chased after the strands in Natasha’s ponytail. He noticed which ones curled up in small spheres in the corners of the pen, which ones immediately bopped about, which ones immediately sought out the bottle of formula you’d prepared and which ones nibbled at the liquidy wet food that had been scooped into a neon blue bowl.

Each tiny animal was different, and it amazed him.

There was this one cat, a fluffy little white one with one ear and splotches of buttery yellow seems the boldest, eyeing Bucky as if the man was this small cat’s Everest. The floral collar (one of those break-away ones, you had told him, meant to keep the kittens from getting hurt but allowing the rescuers to identify them by name and rescue identification number) has a small nameplate – a gold one – with “Squirt” etched into the metal.

“Squirt,” Bucky repeats under his breath. “Nice to meet you, little guy.”

The cat gives him a small, pterodactyl-like scream in response, as if the small animal is too young to speak in any other tone but “loud.”

“HELLO LARGE CAT,” he imagines the cat saying. “HELLO, I AM A SMALLER CAT. DO YOU WISH TO BE CLIMBED?”

Bucky smiles at the imagined conversation, allowing the brave creature to dig its tiny claws into the leg of his jeans just above his socked feet (he took off his boots when he arrived in the room, as per your request), the start to his magnificent journey.

“I do not mind being climbed,” the man answers out loud. For once, he doesn’t take in the entire room’s emotions and reactions before he says something – he just talks, even if that freedom from paranoia is only allowing him to speak to someone (or thing) that can’t talk back.

Squirt gets to Bucky’s knee before screeching once more, just as tenacious as when he was on the floor. “THIS IS MUCH HARDER THAN I EXPECTED,” is all Squirt says.

Bucky laughs, ignoring the several other kittens who are trying to claw up Bucky’s metal arm – each unsuccessful but determined to continue to try. “I’m a lot bigger than you realized, huh?”

Squirt takes a few more wobbly steps, tail high in the air, before looking to Bucky for guidance as the tiny creature stands on his thigh. “I WOULD LIKE SOME HELP, PLEASE,” Bucky interprets from the screeches.

He laughs, not moving. Another kitten, this time an equally tiny short-haired black cat named “Foosball” attempts to follow in Squirt’s literal and metaphorical footsteps, but gives up when she gets to Bucky’s knees. This, too, makes him let out a chuckle. “Don’t worry, kid. You’re doing just fine.”

You watch Bucky’s interactions with the kittens intensely – telling yourself you just need to make sure he doesn’t hurt them accidentally. In truth, he was handling them the best you’d seen anyone outside your shelter in a long time – gentle, firm, attentive. His pseudo-conversations warm your heart, and the only thing that breaks your concentration is one of the larger kittens walking up to the barrier of the pen to scream at you from inside her prison that she was hungry. Natasha and Wanda had long left, citing some bureaucratic problem that was probably bullshit but, regardless of accuracy, left you and Bucky alone.

“What does she want?” the man asks, body still frozen as Squirt climbs his chest.

“Butterfly wants to eat,” you reply while you grab one of the syringes with formula.

“Why can’t she eat from the bowl of food?” he asks. It’s not accusatory, just curious. It’s sweet, extremely so, and makes you realize that Natasha was right – this is good for him.

“At six weeks, most kittens are weened from their mothers or,” you pick Butterfly up and hold her against you as she suckles at the plastic nozzle. “In this case, syringes. But sometimes it just takes a little longer.”

Bucky hmms, turning his attention back to the kittens before he speaks again. “Do you want to get coffee?”

You swallow, looking at him look at Squirt. “Like…with you?”

Bucky nods as he sits up, the brave kitten now on his shoulder and several others vying for his attention. “I, uh,” he swallows. “Yeah. Coffee. With me. Like a, uh, a date. With me. Where we get coffee.”

You giggle a little, both at his flustered speech and at Butterfly’s post-feeding tiredness. “Yeah, I’d like that.”

“Cool,” is all Bucky replies, the both of you now focused back on the kittens.

Dammit, you think. Natasha was right again.

[akp-1327]

random drabbles for ajay bhandari x mc

Just some randomness for these marshmallows! 

Find the prompts I used on my first dialogue prompts set, << linked here!

Hope you enjoy these and that you’re doing well! <3

Ajay Bhandari x f!MC (Charlotte Parker)

#6 from Fun & Lighthearted ~ “Spider!”:

The lighting in Charlotte’s dressing room was dim as she hastily got ready for the show. Curtain call was in less than an hour and she still had to run through her lines with Rory and warm up. She frantically pinned up her hair in an sleek, elegant bun and applied her stage makeup.

That was when...when...

“Spider!” Charlotte screamed, nearly falling out of her chair as she jumped away from the huge spider that now relaxed on her vanity. Her hands came to her mouth right as she heard loud knocks chime at her door.

“Charlotte! Charlotte, please let me in!” She heard a voice say. She was too shaken up to move to open the door or comprehend who it was, let alone take her eyes off of the spider and risk it jumping or crawling on her.

“It’s open! J-Just come in!” Charlotte stammered, backing up into the wall. Ajay busted into the room and worriedly searched the room, finally meeting her wide eyes.

“What happened? Are you okay?” Ajay asked with a tone of concern. Charlotte nodded, though pointed to her vanity.

“S...S...Spider...” Charlotte stuttered, her cheeks burning red in embarrassment. Ajay followed her gaze and saw a large spider resting on her makeup bag. He held in a laugh as he looked back at her.

“It’s just a little spider, janu. It won’t hurt you,” Ajay said with a teasing smirk, picking up a nearby paper and dumping a cup full of pencils, “but I guess I’ll save you if it scares you that badly.”

Charlotte put a hand to her chest and let out a breath of relief, her heart still racing. She watched as he gently led the spider onto the paper and covered it with the green cup. “Thank you. You’re my knight in shining armor.”

“Anytime.” Ajay said with the spider safely trapped underneath the cup. He was looking back at her with an amused grin across his features. “Now, finish up with your makeup. You don’t have much time before curtain call and I still want to wish you luck.”

Charlotte giggled and lovingly blew him a kiss, watching him walk out of the room. She then took a deep breath and walked back over to her vanity; her movements a bit more controlled and her eyes darting across the area in front of her every so often to make sure no other little “friends” joined her.

#23 from Fun & Lighthearted ~ “Salsa dancing?”:

Prom night had been everything and more for Charlotte so far; the perfect venue, the perfect dress, and by far the best and most handsome date. Her arm was tightly looped through his and her head rested on his green-sleeved arm as they stood to the side, waiting for a song to slow dance to.

“Want something to drink?” Ajay shouted over the loud music blasting from the speakers. She grinned, though the song changed over to a sultry and upbeat melody before she could finish her response. Charlotte’s grin brightened as an idea came to her head.

“Later,” Charlotte said, dragging Ajay onto the dance floor, “but first we’re going to salsa!”

Charlotte started to sway her hips flirtatiously to the beat, her movements skilled and catching Ajay by surprise. His eyes widened as she moved closer, her pace never slowing. His breath stopped as his heart started to race.

“Salsa dancing?” Ajay asked, his eyebrow arching, “I’ve never...um...”

Charlotte bit her bottom lip and moved away from him, bursting out into several seductive twirls that lifted the skirt of her dress to spin around her, its pink and sparkly fabric flowing in the lamplight of the dance floor. 

Ajay couldn’t take his eyes off of her, and he didn’t want to.

“That makes it more exciting! It’ll be fun, Ajay!” Charlotte beamed, moving back towards him and taking his hands in hers. “Trust me, okay?” He gave her a small and bashful smile as they started to dance. She rotated their hands in a circular motion and gestured for him to follow her steps.

“I step forward, you step back. You step forward, I step back! It just keeps going!” Charlotte squealed, grinning from ear to ear as Ajay became more comfortable. Their pace quickened as the music grew into a crescendo.

“You’re really good at this, janu!” Ajay laughed, focusing his eyes on her elated expression.

“You can thank my old dance lessons from cheer that I hated,” Charlotte said, continuing to up their pace, “now let’s add in some twirls!”

Charlotte led Ajay through the side steps that set them up for the twirls. It took him a few tries at first, though once he got a good grip on it, he was twirling Charlotte under his arm all around the dance floor; beaming whenever she’d go on her tip toes, despite her heels, to do the same for him.

Their dance caught the attention of several bystanders and they cleared a large circle for them. Charlotte giggled and leaned in to whisper, “Watch this! Get ready to catch me and then do a dip!”

Ajay’s eyes widened with confusion before she twirled him one last time, then let go of his hands. She broke out into a series of complex twirls and several enticing sways of her hips as she moved around the floor. Somewhere along her journey, someone had given her a rose and she had it clasped in her teeth, giving the (now rambunctious) crowd a dazzling smile.

Ajay’s heart could only swell with love as he watched her glide all around the floor, her smile and enthusiasm making him fall for her all over again.

“Ajay! Ready?” Charlotte shouted at him, the rose in her mouth making it hard for her to speak. Ajay beamed and nodded, preparing himself as she ran toward him. She collided with him, though he smoothly led her through a twirl, pulled her close, and finally, placed a hand at the small of her back. He dipped her with ease; low enough that her blonde hair brushed the wooden floor.

“Yes!” Charlotte gasped, though before she could go any further, Ajay pressed a passionate kiss to her lips, making the crowd go wild with applause and cheers. The rose was now clasped in Ajay’s teeth as he lifted her back up with a wicked grin.

“That was amazing.” Ajay grinned. Charlotte took the rose from him and wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing her lips to his once more for a deep and tender kiss, overflowing with love.

“You were amazing! You have moves in that uptight body!” Charlotte cheered, holding him tight. The sultry beat slowly fizzled out into another pop song as they left the dance floor to retrieve the drinks that Ajay had mentioned before their show.

Later into the night, the couple danced once more - slower this time - as stars sparkled above them.

#26 from Sweet & Sappy ~ “Can I just snuggle you forever?”

The Bhandari household was uncharacteristically quiet on a chilly, spring evening; save for a frustrated Ajay and a tired Charlotte laying side by side on the soft carpet in the living room, their textbooks and homework materials scattered around them.

Ajay had turned on a random movie that neither of them recognized to provide background noise as they worked on their homework. They’d both been doing their math assignments for the past hour and a half. 

Ajay let out an exasperated sigh as he dropped his pencil onto his textbook and whipped off his glasses.

“How do you enjoy doing this stuff? Math is a literal nightmare.” Ajay groaned, rubbing his eyes. Charlotte hummed and nudged his shoulder with hers.

“I find it fun to solve stuff.” Charlotte said, resting her head on his shoulder. “I also find it fun to help you. What’s the trouble?”

Despite himself, he pointed to a problem in his textbook and gave her a grateful smile. “Thank you, math whiz.”

“Of course, babe.” Charlotte kissed his cheek and handed him his glasses, then took his textbook away to examine it for herself. Ajay rested his chin on his hand as he watched her eyes analyze the problem.

“Oh, you’re doing trig stuff! You actually know how to do this, deep down.” Charlotte said with a laugh, sliding his textbook back over and replacing it with her notebook. She started to scribble the problem down and turn it towards him.

“It makes no sense. What formula am I even supposed to use?” Ajay asked, his eyebrows furrowing. Charlotte smiled softly.

“Tangent,” Charlotte said, pointing at the angle, “you already have the opposite and the adjacent side measurements, see?”

Ajay watched and listened as Charlotte led him through the problem, faintly remembering how to solve the problem from class earlier that day. Once they finished and ended up with the correct degree, Ajay moved his homework away and turned to face her.

“I’m done with that headache for now,” Ajay said, leaning towards her, “take a break with me?”

Charlotte gave him a bright grin. “Sure!”

Ajay stood and held out a hand to help her up. Charlotte gratefully took it and let him lead her over to his couch. He glanced back at her, blushed a bit, then laid down on his side. Charlotte giggled as he patted the area in front of him, gesturing for her to lay in front of him.

“Yes! Cuddles!” Charlotte cheered, laying in front of him. Her back pressed against his chest as his arm loosely draped on her waist.

“Mmm,” Ajay hummed, burying his face in her neck, “I’ve been waiting to do this all day.”

Charlotte bit her lip and eased closer to him, trapping him between her body and the cushions of the couch. He didn’t seem to mind; in fact, he was pulling her even closer.

“Can I just snuggle you forever?” Ajay whispered, pressing a gentle kiss to her skin. She closed her eyes and found his hand, intertwining their fingers and squeezing tightly.

“I’d be very, very happy if you did.” Charlotte said, her tone exposing her sleepiness. Ajay smiled warmly, thoughts of their hopeful future filling his mind.

“You sound tired, janu.” Ajay said softly. After she didn’t give a response, he peeked over and saw that her eyes were closed and that her expression was peaceful. He beamed, pressing a light kiss to her cheek. “Ah, figures; you’re already asleep.”

Ajay held her tighter against his chest and felt her breaths become deeper and slower the longer she slept. He was extremely, positively sure that she was out before he buried his face into her neck again, feeling all of the stress of the rough day melt away.

“I’m in love with you, Charlotte.” He whispered, mostly to himself, because he hadn’t exactly “told” her yet. Only when she was asleep, walking away, or not paying attention would he dare say those three words. “I love you so, so, so much, janu. I can’t even put it into words.”

Her sleeping figure moved slightly, sending a panic over him, though he relaxed as she let out a little mumble. She tended to mumble all the time in her sleep and it was one of the cutest things Ajay had ever witnessed.

Eventually, the gentle rise and fall of her back against his chest was all he could focus on in his sleepy state. He felt his eyes drift closed as well, the movie’s sounds slowly fading away as he fell into the best sleep he’d had in weeks.

[canaryrecords]

NEW RELEASE

Among the quarter-million Ukrainians who arrived in the U.S. between 1900 and 1930 was a young man named Pawlo Humeniuk who had been studying violin for almost two decades. Variants of his name appear, but because of research undertaken in the 1970s-80s by Dick Spottswood, first and foremost, and subsequently Victor Greene, we have a pretty good picture of his life and remarkable career. Much of what follows restates work they published.

Humeniuk was born in a small town now called Pidvolochysk in present-day western Ukraine in 1883, territory that changed hands among several governments as boundaries were drawn and re-drawn over the half-century that followed. He arrived in the U.S. in 1908 at the age of 25, where he joined his brother with whom he opened a violin building and repair shop and formed a band. He lived and worked in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, where a cultural hub for generations of Ukrainians was the Surma book and music shop run by Myron Surmach. According to Spottswood, Humeniuk - then a 31-year-old father of three - happened to have been in the shop one day in 1925 when a representative of the Okeh Records label came in and inquired about village-style Ukrainian musicians who might be willing to record for the label. Surmach introduced the label guy to Humekiuk, and a recording date was set for December 8. Four months after that recording session for Okeh, Humeniuk began recording for Columbia Records, and, after a false start in March 1926, cut six sides in April that changed the record business in America.

According to Gayle Dean Wardlow, the record business in the 1920s operated under the premise that to break even on a record, labels had to sell 500 copies and that they were looking for one in every ten recordings they released to turn a significant profit. It was in this context that a 12” disc titled “Ukrainian Wedding” made by Humeniuk in April 1925 sold well over 100,000 copies, essentially assuring him a steady recording career for the next fifteen years and creating a new market out of whole-cloth for recordings of rural music made by Slavs in the U.S. Pekka Gronow pointed out that while Ukrainians were roughly the nineteenth largest foreign-born ethnic-language group in the U.S. in 1940, they were ranked seventh among groups represented in releases by Columbia Records during the years 1923-50. While there were about two-and-a-half million Poles in the U.S., Poles released about 800 discs during that period, while there were less than 100,000 Ukrainians, who released 430 discs. This could, in a sense, partly be accounted for by the runaways success of Humeniuk’s “Ukrainian Wedding” recording.

There were several factors at play in the disc’s sales. Certainly it had to do with the personalities of Ewgen Zukowski and Rosa Krasnowska, the comedian-actor-singers who performed as the vocal stars. Their abilities to project a sense of the real-life joys and sorrows in the midst of the emotionally-charged moment of the “wedding” was a key. The performances were essentially a mini-play, alternating dialogue and music over eight minutes across two sides of the disc, bridging the technological gap between staged theater and radio drama. It was all very recognizable, the tears and the laughter and the dancing, not only to Ukrainians but also many other immigrants from Eastern Europe. It felt like home.

Surmach later said of Humeniak: "He made it like [a] village song, just folk, really what they play ... in the villages ... without looking [at] notes. He would usually close his eyes [when hey played]. And when he made ... records , I put [them] on the phonograph and people [said], 'Oh, that's how they play[ed] in my village.' And they [would] stop to buy. And I couldn't get enough of those records." (Quoted by Victor Greene in A Passion for Polka: Old-Time Ethnic Music in America, University of California Press, 1992.)

Dozens of variants followed in its wake, because when you have a winning formula in the entertainment business, you milk it. So, to this day nearly 100 years later, any given pile of Slavic 78 rpm discs of the 1920s-30s in any given basement, attic, or yard sale will include a certain number of skits with musical interludes. Newspaper documentation shows that performances of staged “mock” weddings performed by traveling troupes and lasting five hours were popular entertainment among Ukrainians in Pennsylvania and New Jersey during the early 1930s.

Although at the time of this writing, we are lacking much in the way of biographical material on Ewgen (or Eugen) Zukowsky (b. 1896; d. 1961), it is clear that he recorded prolifically through the 20s and 30s, having cut over 200 performances under his own name between 1926 and 1938 in addition to the scores of discs he made with Krasnowska and Humeniuk during the same period. We have a little more information about Rosa (Ruzalia or Rose) Kraswnowski who was born April, 16 1897 in the village of Dahowa, now central Poland and emigrated July 1911. In 1930 she was living singly as a boarder at 121 E 10th St. on Manhattan and she identified herself as a dishwasher to a census enumerator. On her 1938 petition for citizenship, her address was 544 E 60th St. in Manhattan, and she listed her occupation as "actress."

Humeniuk recorded about 300 performances under his own name (sometimes in variant form to be marketed to other Slavic communities) between 1925 and 1940, but he also performed on scores of recordings released by various singers, including Zukowsky and Krasnowsa, under their names. Among them was Theodor J. Swystun (b. ca. 1900). Sywstun was arrested in January 1928 at his home in Philadelphia for having immigrated illegally. He was a 28 year old student at Temple University at the time. A judge granted him a stay, releasing him on $500 bond. He recorded a total of 24 sides over a half-dozen sessions between April 1930 and December 1933. As president of the Ukrainian Society in Philadelphia, he spoke at the Ukrainian Hall on N. Franklink St. in 1932 in support of resolutions that the Langue of Nations should protect western Ukrainians from the violations of civil rights under the Second Polish Republic. He died July 29, 1963.

Issues of Ukrainian identity and nationalism figured into the recordings. The three-disc, six-part series of skits-with-music recorded in December 1932 and included at the end of this collection were translated on the discs’ labels as “A Trip Back Home” and depicts the entirety of an imagined round-trip journey of a Ukrainian immigrant to his homeland and then back to the U.S. A literal translation of the title, however, is closer to “On Seeing the Border,” the border in question apparently being the Curzon Line, the demarcation set in 1919 dividing what was then eastern Poland and what is now western Ukraine. In that context, the ebullience of the last two sides upon the protagonist’s return to his community in the U.S. is especially touching.

Primarily workers in physically grueling industries, particularly in coal mines and steel plants, next to Slovaks, Hungarians, Serbs, Croats, and Poles, with whom they were collectively derided as “hunkies” and “bohunks,” Ukrainian-Americans took immense solace from their peculiar status nationally both in their politically volatile homeland and as new immigrants in music at weddings, house parties, community dances, and on disc recordings. The ubiquity of Humeniuk’s style spread through his 78s among the Ukrainian community, including the community in Alberta, Canada, in part through their use by the dancer and teacher Vasil Avramenko, influencing generations of Slavic performers in North America. His virtuosity is unmatched by his apparent contemporary Michala Thomasa (commonly referred to as Michael Thomas), also a fiddler of the village style, about whom we don’t have any definite biographical information. We know for now only that he made 13 discs under his own name between 1929 and 1933 and that he served as accompanist to Ewgen Zukowski. We hope to fill in the blank that his name represents in the near future. He was good.

Pawlo Humeniuk stopped recording in 1940 as a new style of accordion-lead, post-Prohibition polka music became more popular in the U.S. He died January 24, 1965 at 71 years old. Many of his recordings were reissued on various LPs. A great collection of his 1925-27 recordings produced by his primary biographer Dick Spottswood was issued by Arhoolie Records in 1992, and an excellect 4CD set on JSP records produced by Chris King called Ukrainian and Lemko String Bands came out in 2011 that included a of lot of his recordings. We recommend both highly. This collection is intended to be a complement and extension of those.

[schalaasha]

Favourite Games of 2019

I don’t like making ranked lists anymore. So here’s a bunch of games old and new I played in 2019 because I was busy catching up due to not playing FFXIV as much as in previous years.

 Ciconia When They Cry Phase 1: For You, The Replaceable Ones

I think going in, and even starting to play it, I felt like maybe the game would abandon the WTC mystery game conventions. It ended up not doing that, because the game leaves you with far more questions than answers at the end. The A3W World (“after World War III”) is still trying to deal with political issues and social issues that existed prior to World War III. A global stalemate exists due to the military implementation of the Gauntlet weapon. Eventually things happen where different countries need to deal with a shortage of resources, territorial conflicts, etc which sets off a chain reaction to World War IV.  However, the children who grew up in the A3W era, settled into new ideologies and views of how society currently works are at odds with what the older generation wants and requires of them. Along the way, they need to deal with other groups and conspiracies in order to maintain the Walls of Peace.

 So in essence, R07 still crafts a mystery for readers to figure out, but it isn’t a murder mystery. It’s an international conspiracy mystery and I am more than okay with that. I think this chapter required a lot of worldbuilding to set that kind of story up and coming out of Phase 1, I understood why the first chapter wasn’t exactly like Umineko’s. I thought that it was handled well, despite some of the purple prose (but if you’ve played a R07 game before, you’re likely used to it).  I also thought he really tried to introduce and incorporate themes including gender, generational differences, societal tiers, geopolitics disguised as sports events (possibly mirroring the 2020 Olympics in Japan), etc. as well as he could throughout the story through the game’s cast. Even if the game meanders a bit (and it definitely feels that way towards the start), when it actually starts to roll, I felt compelled to keep reading.

 And truly, the game has an incredibly large cast of characters. The TIPS section handles introductions well, and while some cast members don’t have as much time in the spotlight as others, I can see them getting their time eventually in subsequent chapters. Clearly Phase 1 exists to focus more on the children from the Arctic Ocean Union (the “AOU”) as evidenced by the additional stories unlocked at the end of the game so hopefully other chapters have the same amount of character backstory for the other factions.  I also genuinely enjoyed that the big international cast of characters allowed for many different types of designs with characters with different types of hairstyles and hair texture or characters wearing hijabs and still managed to make them retain adorableness or a sense of style. I do not recall seeing it as often in Japanese media and I’m very happy to see it here.

 I think Ciconia Phase 1 is a very good start to this subseries’ planned four episodes and I hope to see more sociopolitical commentary. It feels as though R07 looked at everything happening in Japan and social media/how news is consumed and decided to write a four-part SFF series about it. I’m eagerly looking forward to the next chapter.

  Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night

I backed Bloodstained when it got put on Kickstarter a few years ago.  It was shipped to me at… possibly the worst time since Shadowbringers was coming out very shortly after.  My fiancé and I played ours for a short bit, felt very positive about the game, then dropped it to play Shadowbringers.  We didn’t return to it until maybe September/October?  Both of us ended up getting our Platinum Trophies for it so we both played through everything the game had to offer.

 Bloodstained is a good experience, but not without its issues. I played on PS4 and I’ve had a few outright crashes or some glitching into walls early enough that I couldn’t come out of them again due to not having the required skill to try to get out of it.  I also felt like the game meandered or had a bit of padding in its earlier stages). Later on, you realise you have to put in the farming work to have a better and faster time not unlike its Igavania counterparts, but I did feel like the drop rates prior to actually working towards higher luck stats/drop shards were low enough almost to the point of unfair or deliberately wasting my time.  I also felt as though there were too many weapon types; with adequate shard use and shard grinding eventually you can settle into one weapon type that suits your playstyle or eventually use the gun for everything when you get the special hat quest reward).

 However, I’m speaking about this game as someone who platinumed it which requires a lot of farming and synthesis.  As a player going through the main campaign, I think the maps are adequate. The backgrounds are very lovingly crafted, and the music is absolutely one of the best of the year. Boss design is also fun and rewarding, requiring the player to learn how all the different weapon types work, adequate backstepping and closing in, and boss patterns. If you suck, the game will show you that you suck very quickly and deliberately.  Essentially towards the end, I felt as though Bloodstained tried very hard to cater to fans of the metroidvania style of game, and the classicvania style of game. I personally don’t think it completely succeeded but for a first time experience of trying to combine the two into one, it did its job with preparation for another game.  

 I also feel like some criticism was lobbed towards the game’s narrative for being told in library/book entries, and while I understand that (I actually couldn’t open all of the books for fear of my game crashing), I don’t think elaborate cutscenes and continuous dialogue would work well with this game’s flow. Bloodstained prioritizes gameplay elements and player exploration over anything else, and to be honest, I’d rather it happen that way than with long elaborate cutscenes.  I also felt as though I got more out of the game because I’d played the 8-bit prequel as well.

 Overall, Bloodstained is a passable experience. I’m glad I played it, and I’m glad I put the work in to try to make the game a better experience. I got what I wanted out of the game for as much as I backed it and I hope they try again with a similar formula because this is a very good first step.  

  The Touryst

Sometimes when I see a game with voxel graphics, I feel pretty compelled to pick it up because it looks so darn lovingly rendered and it usually ends up being fun.  The Touryst does a good job with its graphical style and visiting new islands is a complete delight because of it. It looks like a game with style, and performs super-well on the Switch. It’s also one of the freshest games I’ve played in a while.

 Basically you’re playing a blocky dude with a moustache who just wants to have a good time but when he gets to TOWA Monument, he’s told he has to find monument cores to unlock the world’s secrets. And then you can do whatever you want. The different islands have their own little personalities: there’s an island called Fijy which is volcanic, there’s Ybiza with a bunch of dudes chilling on the beach and passed out on their chairs, there’s Santoryn which is just Greece, and a few other places that are essentially recreations of real-world places.

 As you explore, there’s a lot of stuff to do. A variety of things to do.  There are puzzles and mechanics that don’t necessarily overstay their welcome, you can play footy, you can play spelunker, you can take helicopter rides, you can take pictures, get stuff for a museum, surf, play rhythm games…. It’s your vacation, do what you want. It’s a little like Vegas. Unlike Vegas, you can use your ever-increasing money and diamonds to get new moves for your moustached character to reach new objects.

 As a little game where you can do whatever you want little by little, and makes for a smooth experience, I’m glad I picked up the Touryst after asking another person what they thought of it. It has great puzzles, lots of stuff to do and explore and see, and ton of minigames for whatever mood you feel like you’re in. The game is fairly short, but I’m very glad the holiday doesn’t overstay its welcome.

  A Short Hike

A Short Hike places you in the shoes of a bird who is utterly determined to walk to the top of Hawk Peak to get signal for her phone.  I totally understand; sometimes you’ve gotta do what you gotta do.  

 But the game allows you to undertake that journey however you want to. You can go right away and finish up and get that darn signal. Or you can take your time and we’ll build that bridge when we get there. There are different types of terrains to explore if you opt to take the scenic route… and it’s rewarding to do so. You can find treasure, you can water a flower, you can talk to the Animal Crossing-esque characters to do some sidequests, you can do whatever you want.

 I’m sorry to say that when the game introduced fishing, I spent a lot of my time doing that. Fishing ruins me. The completionist in me wanted to fish. But the whole thing is that you don’t have to do any of this. If you want to finish the game, you can absolutely positively focus on that and the game doesn’t pressure you for it.  

 And that’s one of the things I like about it. It’s just whatever about the whole ordeal. I don’t feel like I’m completely and utterly missing out if I don’t decide to do something. Even the task of getting Golden Feathers to progress is fine since you only need eight for it, and the game easily gives you enough rewards to get four or five before sidequests or exploration is factored in.

 Sometimes you just need to take a walk and kind of think of nothing just to clear your head. And A Short Hike accomplishes that very well.

  Worldend Syndrome

In my effort to try to find other games to play in 2019 because I’d fallen a little out of love with FFXIV, I realised that taking baby steps with visual novels and bite-sized games would be the best idea to try to get back into traditional games (particularly since I was, and am, still questioning whether I like games as a hobby or not). On a whim, I decided to download a boatload of visual novel demos one night and tried a bunch of them out. Worldend Syndrome’s demo didn’t exactly grab me until perhaps halfway through the demo when I a) realised that this demo was long af, and b) nothing appeared what it had seemed as I kept going through it and the characters were enjoyable.

 So I decided to get the game and dragged my fiancé along for the ride. It’s one of those standard decision-making/pick which girl you want and go down her route VNs but it didn’t really feel skeezy or ecchi other than one particular point in each girl’s story where you get confessed to.  You go through the VN as an unnamed protagonist who is visiting his cousin over the summer, and you and your friends get dragged into a school club whose focus revolves around folklore. The town the protagonist finds himself in is haunted by the Yomibito, spirits of the undead who look exactly like regular people but are eventually driven mad enough to kill.

 One of the things that drew me to this visual novel was its assortment of animated backgrounds. They colourful and gorgeous. Every CG looks nice and coloured well, and the backgrounds for each area you visit are so beautiful and makes every single location easy to settle into.  The cast is also surprisingly decent, where I expected to hate a few people but I ended up being okay with them because they were written well and weren’t as tropey as I had expected.  I was also very pleased that the character that you were roleplaying as wasn’t skeezy when put into situations where he could have been, and that he treated the girls very well (though I won’t deny that there are some spots where behaviour was questionable but it doesn’t happen as often).  Because the characters were written adequately enough, the game’s true ending route comes together very well and very naturally to a point where I could seriously believe that every character got along with one another to make sure the emotional impact of the mystery was satisfying.

 In order to finish Worldend Syndrome, you have to do each route. A few characters’ routes don’t get unlocked until halfway through the game or even until the very end. The game also remembers everything you’ve done when it autosaves the system data on the world map, so if you need to reload a save to figure out someone’s schedule or if you mess up, it’s relatively easy to come back to something you’ve missed. I’ve played a lot of multiple route VNs before and Worldend Syndrome is easily one of the better VNs that allows the player to skip through to something they’ve missed or skip through previously-viewed text for another route.

 As it is, Worldend Syndrome doesn’t really try to do anything spectacular, nor does it try to stand out like other visual novels of 2019 have (ie: Ciconia, presumably AI but I only tried the demo and I hated parts of the script, sorry). It does its job and tells its story which has a very good payoff in the end.

  Judgement

I bought my fiancé Judgement earlier this year, as I had retired from playing Ryu ga Gotoku after Dead Souls/Ishin, and he was still playing the series religiously.  I watched him play through part of it and I felt compelled to get my own copy because the combat looked nice, and the characters were compelling enough that I felt comfortable picking it up.

 Judgement follows former lawyer Takayuki Yagami who is now a detective.  His tale is one of redemption and conspiracies, reminiscent of some Phoenix Wright games (which this game gives clever nods to when the protagonist is in the courtroom). Yagami is more serious and down-to-earth than Kiryu is so the tone of the game feels quite different than other RGG games (or at least the ones I’ve played).

 It still feels like a regular RGG game where you’re still wandering through Kamurocho, you’re still getting into fights with randos and Yakuza dudes, you date girls, you go to buy food, you play minigames, etc. But it isn’t as big as a standard RGG game; because you stay only in the one area, the cast is smaller, you get a job board to get your sidequests from, and the story itself is fairly short and sweet.  I actually prefer that as a lapsed RGG player since it’s easier to get back into the games this way.

 Judgement, however, disappointed me just a little in how little you spend in the courtroom.  You’re given opportunities to present evidence, do some suspect tailing, use your smartphone to catch a cheating husband, or use a drone to search for evidence. I felt like when you had to use the drone to search for evidence, it ruined the pacing a little. The tailing missions are also reminiscent of Assassin’s Creed, and no that isn’t a good thing! Due to this, I felt like Judgement was not necessarily a great detective game but it did a decent job of trying to mold the RGG experience to a different main character.

 Yagami can… fight… for some reason so he can beat up whatever randos come up to him on the streets. He’s actually more acrobatic than I remember Kiryu being in previous RGG games. He can kick off objects, he’s hard to back into a corner, he can do wall-flips, etc. It’s also much easier to earn XP where it’s all in one bar so you can do whatever you want to fill it up like play darts and just put stuff into his lockpicking. As a lapsed fan, the streamlining feels okay. The streamlining for combat also feels good because if you fights go on too long, the popo can come for you and you’d get fined, so emphasis is on finishing fights cleanly and quickly.

 Overall, as a lapsed RGG fan, the way Judgement looks and feels and wraps up its twists and turns was really exciting for me. It may not have as many things to do as other RGG games, but honestly I think being a leaner experience was better and thus didn’t make the game overstay its welcome.  I also am eagerly awaiting RGG7 since I enjoyed the demo a lot and I think the new protagonist can carry the series the way Yagami carried Judgement.

  Cadence of Hyrule

Sometimes, after my fiancé and I bought our Switch, I’d wake up, go brush my teeth, and return to bed just to see my fiancé awake and playing Cadence of Hyrule. I was perplexed as it’s been ages since he’d willingly played a Zelda game, and his hands are super-huge for the joycons so he doesn’t like using them much.

 You can easily say that Cadence of Hyrule is just a Crypt of the Necrodancer reskin with Zelda stuff all over it, but feels pretty clever in that it uses stuff from roguelikes and a rhythm game and makes the A Link to the Past world feel incredibly fresh. Bosses, especially, feel very fresh. Enemies move according to the rhythm and have a unique pattern that’s easily memorized so you can fall into the rhythm and take advantage of. If you’ve played Necrodancer, you’ll probably feel at home in this aspect, especially since the maps are also randomised (which leads different playthroughs feeling fresh).

 The Zelda feels comes from recreating tunes from older Zelda games in puzzles, the magnificent sprite art, the great Zelda remixes, a simple-enough story, and a standard set of things to find in each procedurally generated dungeon. You also find a variety of traditional items like the bow, the bombs, boomerang… and a spear? It’s a nice blend of Zelda and Necrodancer.

 The caveat is that it takes a little getting used to, since you’re not exactly used to not being able to freely move in a Zelda game. But when you do get used to it, it feels good. Everything is pretty expendable and if you die, you don’t feel like you necessarily lose a lot since you can accrue it all easily enough again. It’s unpredictable and that random roguelike nature is something that makes the Zelda experience feel fresh.

  Spirit Hunter: Death Mark

My fiancé and I were trying to find spooky games to play for Halloween that wouldn’t make me squeamish because despite my profession dealing with analysis of body parts and human body fluids, I can’t see that kind of stuff on TV or in games in a realistic sense. It grosses me out. At least when it’s in front of me, it’s already out and off someone’s body and in a fume hood/biosafety cabinet and I didn’t have to see how it happened. My fiancé picked up Spirit Hunter: Death Mark on a sale we went through it together.

 Death Mark is a tale about horror-themed urban legends and a curse that needs to be broken.  People get marked with a crimson bite mark in the game’s H City and they eventually develop amnesia and die. A group of people live and gather at a spirit medium’s mansion (who is dead upon arrival).  The only hint to break the curse in this mansion is a little talking doll named Mary. The protagonist eventually goes through several mysteries in an effort to break his curse and stop others from dying.

 Death Mark does some surprisingly well-crafted worldbuilding. Each spirit you deal with has a well-told backstory, sometimes especially ghoulish (particularly the bonus post-game episode, the first episode, and the one episode with the telephone booth). The game excels with psychological horror and the enemies involved in each boss battle assist in making the player feel that way as well. The backgrounds also lend well to this as while they are simplistic, the shading and colours used help to execute a sense of dread. One particular chapter harkens back to Japan’s Aokigahara, and the backgrounds used connect very well to that particular location so that it feels super-eerie.

 Regardless, Death Mark relies a lot on its text to establish its atmosphere and as someone who reads stuff like R07 VNs and other regular VNs with a lot of text, I was okay with that. The localization was well-done, albeit with some issues that would have been caught in editing but overall it carried the story very well.

 There are boss battles prior to the end of each chapter, where you must use each item you find in your exploration segments. You need to use specific items in a specific order (even with the correct party setup) in order to achieve a good ending for that particular chapter (and thus eventually the game). I thought this was an interesting mechanic and while it got a little tired depending on the spirit, it showcased how creepy some of them can be on your screen.

 Unfortunately, Death Mark does not have a variety for its soundtrack and it’s almost disappointing that the same piano tunes and boss themes played repeatedly as I felt it detracted from the experience.

 Otherwise, I felt like Death Mark was a short and sweet horror experience that played into urban legends and folklore experiences. I loved the little vignettes that eventually ramped up to a central story point. I hope the sequel is good when we get around to it.

  Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

So my fiancé and I are doing this thing where we’ve started buying one copy of a game so we’d both own it together and go through it together. Sekiro and Man of Medan were two of those games this year.

 Sekiro isn’t really like Souls. Eventually you’ll come to learn that very quickly when the game throws a boss at you and if you try to play like Souls, you’re not going to get the job done.  It will show you that you never learned how to parry properly and you’re going to have to go back and learn it.  Or if you didn’t grab a prosthetic that will make the job easier, you’re gonna have to do that too.

 The game is interesting in that you aren’t exactly whittling down health bars all the time; you’re striking properly so you can overwhelm their posture bars, find an opening, and go in for the kill. Enemy health bars are essentially secondary to that posture bar. You have your own posture bar so you’ve got to learn how to parry properly. Sometimes you need to parry complete combos in order to deliver posture damage back to an enemy. It’s all about getting into the flow and rhythm of combat. And you must beat bosses in order for you to get a stat boost, so being able to beat a boss lies in your skill, and not necessarily your level/equipment.

 Sekiro is Souls-like in its storytelling and worldbuilding. You can run around rooftops and areas to find secrets off the beaten path. You go back and forth between areas and speak to different NPCs to find out their backstories. The plot is also told via NPC conversations with the main characters. At first it’s a little dry but the story opens up eventually. It also has some great voiced NPCs for quests (one quest in particular had voicework that made me feel so sorry for the character that I was like “we need to get the proper item for this guy please don’t make him suffer”).

 It feels rewarding to put in the work in order to beat the bosses, make it so you don’t resurrect as often to make people sick, and meet whatever standard Sekiro is throwing at you. It lets the player know that they’ve met that standard, and then throws another boss phase at them so you have to get even better.

 Owl I’m looking at you.

  Super Kirby Clash

My fiancé and I bought a Switch together this year (which, outside of dinner and movies and clothes, etc. was one of our major purchases together).  We downloaded a few demos to try the control scheme out, including Super Kirby Clash.  I am aware that this game is probably old, but hey it’s still going and it’s still being supported and I’m catching up.

 I’m probably putting it here due to bias, but I think It’s really cute and the hats are super-adorable. I love getting new hats and new weapons for my little Kirby.  It’s fairly standard as far as a “mobile experience” is concerned and playing it a little when I have the time to and hacking away at it little by little is rewarding when I get a new hat or new gear. My fiancé and I played it in multiplayer as well, which felt a lot like Kirby’s Return to Dream Land.

 It’s pretty inoffensive and I haven’t paid real-life money for anything in it, and I still feel like I’m progressing. So as a Kirby game with light RPG elements (ie: something I’ve wanted for years and years), it’s nice to finally see realised.

 Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom

An artist I commission very often from convinced me to move this game further up in queue than I originally had it when we were talking about games we were playing after finishing Shadowbringers’ main campaign.  

 Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom is the spiritual successor inspired by Wonder Boy III, with the formula being modernized for a new era. It feels fast, and it looks soooooooo pretty. The tracks are bumpin’ too. It’s also a little tough but with every difficult section successfully platformed through, you feel really good about it.

 You play as a plucky boy named Jin whose uncle is an insano who turns everyone in the kingdom into animals. After you experience sweet freedom as a human boy platforming across things easily for like 15 minutes, Jin’s uncle turns him into a pig. Whoops. From there the platforming gets a little harder and you need to learn how to manipulate different forms and different spells in order to get across various sections.

 Different animal forms give you different skills. Pig form allows you to sniff out secrets literally, snake form lets you cling to walls and go through tiny passages, frog has a sticky tongue for swinging, and lion form lets you go through obstacles. You need to use these forms well to platform well enough to get through each area and finish the game. Being successful at platforming in this game feels good and fulfilling and satisfying. As you unlock more, platforming experiences get more and more complex with more obstacles put in your way, so in essence it feels like the opposite of a standard metroidvania.  Playing both Bloodstained and this in one year felt like playing polar opposites. That said, the checkpointing in Monster Boy is really good. Game Atelier knew what they were doing.

 The bosses by contrast were really easy and it’s nice to take the time to look at the art for each boss. All of the effects are also super-nice. Playing Monster Boy on a 4K TV is quite a visual treat for its boss sections, its town section, and its platforming sections. The colours are off-the-charts. Each animal sprite has its own set of unique animations: the piggy farts and looks like >_>, froggy looking at flies, etc. And the music is so good. If this game were a 2019 game I’d definitely put its soundtrack on my list, but it isn’t. It’s a nice blend of new and old stuff and it’s a delight to hear in-context as encouragement to keep going when you fail a platforming section.

 Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom is a faithful representation and homage of the old Wonder Boy games. It’s filled with references and secrets and awesome art, and I’m glad to have been convinced to move it up my queue for this year.

  Most Disappointing Game: Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers

I love Final Fantasy XIV. It’s brought me closer to so many people in recent years and I’ve met so many more through it. Playing this game means so much to me and I want the best for it for years to come.  It’s one of the reasons why I’m so critical about it. If I hated this game, I would stop playing and honestly, I wouldn’t care about its future.  I will say this before getting started:  I like Shadowbringers’ story so far (we aren’t going to be finished with its story until 5.3).  I don’t think It’s necessarily as consistent as Heavensward, but I think Shadowbringers’ story is the most Final Fantasy story we’ve gotten since perhaps FF10. Truly, it’s the best we’ve seen for the series this decade.  

 I had a lot of hopes and hype for Shadowbringers.  I hated Stormblood, for a myriad of reasons: social reasons, gameplay reasons, and narrative reasons.  The direction Shadowbringers was going and all the trailers made it seem like it was going to be fresh and exciting and new.  My fiancé and I (and a few others) swapped servers+data centers in advance of the expansion for a fresh start, to boot. I watched the Job Actions trailer over and over and tried to decide what I was going to eventually main and gear up because I didn’t really have a main in Stormblood due to the combat changes and how easy things became for certain things.

 During a live letter, they mentioned that they’re changing how things work in battle, and that’s when I became a little cautious. I was hoping for the best leading up to release and then I saw the scholar/healer changes and got very worried.  I changed mains in Stormblood because playing Scholar was freaking horrible at the start of Stormblood.  

 I eventually had to change mains at the start of Shadowbringers because I was not having fun playing Scholar. For people who didn’t bother to level a healer at all, the writing was on the wall for healers during Stormblood. Essentially, it introduced an age of healing where you barely ever used your GCDs to heal. You mostly used OGCDs and preplanned shields. 90% of the time if you wanted to be a good healer, you’d mostly DPS. I don’t think I’ve cast a GCD heal at all in SB and ShB content unless things were going super-wrong.

 The healing changes introduced in Shadowbringers made us think that things were going to change, that things were going to be harder to heal.  I had my doubts, however, because all fights are scripted and if they were to introduce a substantial change to incoming damage, they would have to make it so most people (casual, midcore, hardcore, less experienced newbies, experienced folks) would be used to It and could handle it.  There was no way they were going to introduce more difficulty given that subscription numbers were increasing.

 And so, healers during Shadowbringers got some damage skills taken away, but in their place, they were given more tools to heal with:

-          White Mage came away from this as a very well-rounded healer at launch. It had its damage spells, it had a damage spell with a stun, it finally had long-standing and easily useable mitigation, it has substantial MP recovery, and it has a damage spell that rewards you for using three GCD heals to make up for damage lost. White Mage still making out like a bandit in 5.1.

-          Scholar felt dramatically different and didn’t feel as solid as it used to be. It had most of its damage tools taken away, the usefulness of its fairy was decreased because let’s be honest it was super-overpowered, it got one of its fairies and its AoE esuna taken away, and it was given its PvP move to act as an AoE that doesn’t have another effect. I had to completely unlearn everything I did as scholar in the last 5-6 years in order to play current scholar. Current 5.1 scholar is overpowered as heck and I don’t feel as satisfied to play it in SB/ShB content.

-          AST LOL. All the cards are balance. MP regen is what. Heals are what. Everything is just what. Other fun skills were removed. That said, I really like AST just because it feels like I have to work twice as hard to achieve the same effect the other healers bring to the table.

 So eventually with all of these changes, we had assumed that healing was going to be harder.  It wasn’t. It’s the same experience and all we’re doing is pressing one single button all the time.  I barely have to heal in dungeons.  I barely have to heal in raid unless my party members step in stupid. I just can’t bring myself to play healer every single day anymore, and I love healing in this game. Or I loved it back when it was more dynamic. I just press one button over and over and over and over and over and maybe sometimes another but I just press one button a lot. It’s really sad and it makes me miss old Cleric Stance of all things.

 I like Shadowbringers’ story. I felt rewarded playing through it as someone who’s played the game for years and did everything when it was in-content. So for me, it was like a good reunion.  There were a lot of points where the story dragged or felt rocky. I felt like the start of the 5.0 campaign was utterly boring and poorly paced.  It picked up again, then slowed down again, then picked up again, then got REALLY BAD, then picked up again for a good finish. I don’t think it’s as consistent as Heavensward’s 3.0 campaign, but it was very solid and made up for the 4.0 campaign.

 However, story is only 20% of the experience for me.  The rest of the time, I need to actually play the game. I actually liked the levelling and crafting changes and new skills they brought in during 5.0 because leveling a crafter never felt easier. I felt like I still had to work hard but the payoff came quickly and my macros still worked as well as they did from during Stormblood. I also used my Stormblood melds and Stormblood equipment for the entire levelling experience and had to make concessions for some of my macros as time went on.  I still had to know what my skills did, basically. The 5.1 crafting/gathering changes kind of make me want to craft less since I don’t feel like I have to solve a puzzle anymore and to be honest, everyone crafts now so you make far less money than you previously did.  The desynth changes also made it so that most of my markets tanked since what’s the point of gathering half the materials when desynth makes those materials easily accessible.  I’m not saying to gatekeep at all, but I feel like the experience should have been a little harder (ie: like the Ixali experience where you had to learn what your skills did or desynth shouldn’t be this easy to keep the market fairly balanced). My server is a crafting server so I am more impacted in general from this. That said, I don’t have anything to spend gil on so it doesn’t matter, I guess.  I just feel far less inclined to participate in what was one of my favourite pastimes in XIV.

 I mained Ninja which got killed in 5.0. I was already dealing with the servers moving from East Coast to West Coast, so adding a bunch of stuff to squeeze into your TA window in 10 seconds in Shadowbringers utterly killed the job for me. 5.1 Ninja throws me off as someone who played this game since the time Ninja was introduced, and I can’t make myself play it. The current opener is the Doton opener (which is something I didn’t like in SB at all) and I can’t always rely on my tank to bring the thing to my Doton. That, and making it so you do different things per every other or every third TA just makes the job a little unpalatable for me at 80. I’m one of those people who wants TA to go. I don’t like that Ninja’s become the TA bot in recent years.  I can still do well with it. People still throw buffs at me, but I don’t find enjoyment in the job anymore and I hope we get a proper retool in 6.0.

 I switched back to ranged. Thankfully Bard hasn’t changed as much since SB (though I still prefer HW Bard like a weirdo), and Dancer is one of those “I worked too damn long today and I just wanna do the mindless brainless rotation” jobs.  I miss old Machinist oddly enough.  It felt really good when you played it well and pulled off a decent wildfire. Now it’s a little easier and I don’t feel as fulfilled playing it. That said, it’s probably the best incarnation of the job since it’s sad little introduction in 3.0.

 Even tanking is substantially easier and that’s a mostly good thing. It sucked going into a low level dungeon and having trouble keeping aggro due to the level syncing and your DPS’ stats. Now you can just turn your stance on and go to town without losing any damage potency like you used to. I kind of miss swapping stances after I’ve established aggro though, because you could tell the difference between a good tank and a bad/less practiced tank if they didn’t bother to swap stances in a fight. Tanks came out of this expansion very balanced, though. They might need some work here and there (warrior I’m looking at you), but overall, they came out the best out of the three roles.

 Other than that, you have monks not knowing what they should be, samurai continuously getting buffed and nerfed, black mage staying consistent, red mage being lol, summoner getting changed to the point where now it’s overpowered, among other DPS changes. DPS overall don’t have as much synergy so you can take any job you want to into raid and it’ll get the job done. That said if you want to do as much damage as possible, you’re generally going to take the same few classes into the raid if you’re less educated about them.  And I feel like the lack of synergy or utility between classes or even the loss of something like mana shift makes the whole experience a little boring.  It’s very “f you, I got mine” or the onus is on the player for their own personal burdens and no one’s really helping each other unless you’re a dancer, trick attack bot, dragoon or bard.

 I really hope the other pieces of content are substantial but what I’ve seen aren’t exactly what I had in mind. Boss refights with an alternate version is really neat but I didn’t really want that for this raid tier. I wanted something more original given what we had to deal with in Omega.  I don’t really care for the Nier Automata crossover because, again, I wanted something original to the XIV lore and the First. I think doubling down on Blue Mage is a bad idea and while some folks like its party-based content now, I can’t bring myself to keep doing the content given that it’s clear they don’t know what to do with it (or didn’t know what to do with it). With one dungeon coming per patch I have to question what’s happening internally or what they’re working on. I know SE is weird internally and I really hope that the kind of stuff I’ve read in previous postmortem articles isn’t happening.

 Either way, I’m really disappointed that I want to stop playing XIV so much when it’s the most popular among my friends and followers because it’s so dissatisfying to me and it’s the most accessible that it’s ever been. I hope things get better eventually but going by what I think they have in store and their old reliable formula, I don’t have hope. I’m tired of the formula and I feel like it needs a shakeup. Overall, I’ve been less happy playing FFXIV than I’ve ever been and it makes me feel really sad. 

[tisthenightofthewitch]

Ghost: A chat with Tobias Forge; is an instrumental album in the future?

Tobias Forge of Ghost has had an incredible year and it just keeps getting better. We were fortunate enough to speak with him about albums and arenas shows.

Ghost has been incredibly busy in the last year and a half. Between a new Cardinal, a new album, three dead Papas, a new Sister Imperator, multiple Chapter videos, three tours and two singles, all that’s missing is a partridge in a pear tree and Ghost has a holiday song to add to their repertoire. Tobias Forge, the leader of the band, is the busiest of them all adding countless interviews to the list of to-dos.

Given that information, we were extremely grateful when he agreed to talk with us for a bit to chat about Seven Inches of Satanic Panic, the differences between theater and arena shows and the chances of a full instrumental Ghost album.

The Interview

1428 Elm: Thank you so much for taking time from your very busy schedule to talk with us. Congratulations on the new single! Can I ask you what inspired those two songs? Any particular artists?

Tobias Forge: I can’t really talk about it that much. It’s 50 years old and I’m 38. I am personally a big fan of this style of music. I’ve always been.

1428 Elm: Would you say that Papa Nihil had any particular artists in mind when he did this music?

Tobias Forge: I don’t think he wrote anything but I think that the songs are very much in line with what was going on at the time. I definitely believe that he was influenced by the rock movement in the later 60’s. But it also does have sort of a Motown feel at times, so it wasn’t as psychedelic as some other bands were in 1969. They still had that mid-60’s sort of cheerfulness to it that for the most part was gone by then. Things got kind of darker in 1969.

1428 Elm: I can definitely see that. While “Kiss the Go-Goat”‘s theme is said in the lyrics, what would you say that “Mary on a Cross” is about?

Tobias Forge: I would say that a lot of music from that time because essentially the parent generation in the 60’s, were the people that were in their 20’s who were born in the 40’s, and their parents were born in the early 1900’s. So, the parents’ generation of the 60’s were extreeeeeemely conservative.

That’s why you have all these very subtle, sometimes not so subtle references because we’re familiar with the lingo, but back then it was very hidden from the parent generation who didn’t know what Mary Jane was for example.

Rolling Stones “I pledge myself to Mary Jane,” stuff like that. There’s so many innuendos, codes, like “Back Door Man,” “A Whole Lotta Love.” The 60’s was completely fused by playing with the lyrics just because they couldn’t rock it out. And I like that, I find that very interesting. And it takes a certain skill. Yeah, so that one, as most things from that time, has a subtle meaning.

1428 Elm: With psychedelic rock and almost pop influence rock added to Prequelle, are there any other genres that Ghost would like to experiment with? The dream genre that could be melted with Ghost’s sound?

Tobias Forge:  I think we’ve sort of touched upon most of the things, most of the genres that I liked. You can just balance it in a different way, maybe. I guess the only thing that we haven’t really done and I’m not sure if that could be a Ghost album, but is more like soundtrack, orchestral music. I like that a lot. I like when bands have a string arrangement for a song.

At least, if you have that in the background it sort of makes the song swell. But I’m not always super buzzed about a big orchestra and full heavy metal being played together at all times. There’s a lot of symphonic rock from the 90’s and 2000’s, a lot of them and it just becomes too much. It’s such a dense soundscape as is and you also add a full orchestra as well.

It sounds dramatic but not a whole lot of room to breathe so I’m not sure if I would make orchestral arrangements, like full orchestral that I would have the whole band playing along with it. It would be paced out differently. I listen to a lot of 70’s prog rock from Italy and a lot has orchestral music, very experimental.

1428 Elm: Would you ever consider a full instrumental Ghost album?

Tobias Forge: Absolutely. I love instrumental music. I always entertain having instrumental tracks. In the future, it may be 1 out of 10 but it’s always nice.

1428 Elm: You guys made the saxophone cool again with “Miasma.” You’ve talked on the next album about Ghost going back to its harder roots. Is there a past album looking back that you’re wanting to emulate or get that same emotional feel from?

Tobias Forge: No, not really one album. I always say that each new album is like a reaction to each of the previous so since like Prequelle is not a hard rock or heavy, heavy metal album, the natural reaction to that will be to write something that isn’t, I don’t want to use the word soft, it will be different from Prequelle.

The same way Prequelle was different from Meliora etc. I’ll write a record that we don’t have yet because otherwise what’s the point?  But I definitely have an album in mind with slightly more rippage [chuckles].

1428 Elm: Past albums have very strong themes and then the music takes you on a journey. Do you already have the theme in in mind?

Tobias Forge: Yes.

1428 Elm: I know you can’t say (damn!). Even from one tour to the next, your performing locations have changed quite a bit.  How was the energy performing a stage show in a theater different than that of performing in these massive arenas you’ve been doing lately?

Tobias Forge: For me, the three most important things are:1) is that we can bring the same production to every place even though technically the arena might not be dramatically bigger than playing in a theater because we’re not playing the round. We’re not playing to arena capacity.

So technically, sometimes, if the capacity of the area might be similar to a theater, which is like 3200 people or something, but the main difference is that we can have the stage. With very few exceptions, regardless if you live in a small market, the little town that no one plays in, you will get the same show as they would get in New York City or LA, which is very important for me. I think it’s extremely important that if you pay money to see it, you should get the same thing.

Which leads me to: 2) when we play the theaters, there was a constant day to day basis, “Oh, you can’t use pyro. We can’t do confetti. Oh, by the way the curtain doesn’t work. Oh by the way we have this big theater production here so the stage is part occupied.” So we had to change the set almost every day.

I am not a big fan of surprises. I don’t like that at all. I want everything to be identical every day just because the show gets better if it’s done the same way, more of less. There’s wiggle room for a human touch on the show; of course the show gets different if you have 30 ft of stage one night and then there 6 ft of stage and it’s like that every day.

It does make a difference on the band because you have to move differently. These are details, I’m talking shop here in a way that people might not think about.

1428 Elm: This is extremely interesting!

Tobias Forge: Back in the day, American hockey rinks were smaller than European ones because of the action. Americans like action, so the rinks were smaller which led to more fights, more physicality. If you came to a European rink, they were bigger which was harder for anyone used to an American rink. Same thing goes for us and the stage.

One of the most important things, I absolutely HATE sitting crowds.  Not on the bleachers or if you’re sitting on the side, that’s fine. You always want the most energized and enthusiastic people standing in the front. One big, big, big downside for theaters, in my opinion, is that they have seats all the way up to the stage and that really screws up the energy of the show.

Because you want people in the front who are supposed to be there. You don’t want people who can pay for it. You don’t want someone in the front sitting, eating popcorn. It becomes really awkward in terms of being in front of the crowd.

1428 Elm: As someone who went to two different shows in two different cities, I like to eyeball the crowds to see the difference and it’s shocking to see from one city to the other just how different the crowds can be and it makes a difference.

Tobias Forge: Oh yeah and it really does differ from city to city. And that’s one thing when we were repeatedly doing the theater circuit, which has its upsides don’t get me wrong. I definitely prefer theaters but a lot of that city temperament was sometimes lost because of the theaters because you ended up having the front section that were generally the people who were economically the ones that could pay for it.

It’s a Friday night and you come to a city that’s known for a vibrant crowd and still you have people in the front who act like they’re watching a movie. They are sitting back and then you have the people who are wanting to rock out and they are ten rows back. But unfortunately that’s part of the economics of theaters and that’s why I was very adamant about moving away from theaters.

Luckily the promoter felt, let’s try it and see how it works out, and I think the upsides are vast. I’m just happy that we’re able to bring the same show and you get the energy in the show and it feels way better now.

1428 Elm: Well the show looks incredible and I hope you have an amazing rest of your tour and a good rest in 2020 since you all have been go go going for quite a while.

Tobias Forge: Yes, well, there’s a new record so there’s not a whole lot of rest but it’s certainly paced in a different way.

Tobias was an absolute delight to speak with. If you are like me and want to have a fully instrumental Ghost album one day, let the band know your support. I think it would be an amazing change to the Ghost formula.

1428ELM.COM

[solomonjack16-blog]

What the In-Crowd Won't Tell You About Best Games 2019

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[imeugene]

Sometimes it takes a bit of time to appreciate the true nature of something. Like your presented with something heavy in this case Ruben and you have a bunch of preconceived idea of what it should be ie Grounded or Forward. When it doesn’t meet that box you already placed it in, you’re kind of left wanting. Maybe even a bit disappointed but that’s an unfair assessment to give. It’s not seeing the work for what it is and judging the merits from that but what the viewer thinks it should have been. If that was the case Ruben should’ve just stuck to doing flipwhips when he was in that period of his riding. 

Ruben is a transformative rider. I say that cause there are four distinct transformations in his riding that very different from one another but show the same chord of progression. We have Ruben that was first sponsored. This is contest era Ruben. He showed promise as a rider on a technical level and the style he would best be known for later on will begin to creep in. Like I said he was doing flipwhips with front brakes I’m pretty sure. That’s hard to imagine with the Pollo Loco now but he was definitely there. 

The next era transformations what we remember about Ruben the best. Definitely at the height of his career; the Forward-era and the Grounded-era. The Forward-era is definitely where his signature style is there. He is no longer a contest or pro rider, his street finesse is amazing. The tricks he was creating were next level but at the same time they weren’t following the same line of progression that the rest of BMX was. This was when Ruben’s riding was beginning to be in it’s own path with very little outside influence. Because you look at Ruben’s riding and you don’t necessarily see that. It does follow the simplicity that his peers at T1, Taj, Joe and actually lot of BMX was moving towards but at the same time was very different. Like wallride to no footer to table, who really does that? Who tries anything like that even now? The different between Forward Ruben and Grounded Ruben is that Forward Ruben while very different still retains a lot of the technical stylings that he had before. He still does 360 whips and wallride to whips. I want to say this era is the most popular because it’s the most relatable to the general riding community. It’s where we can look at it and understand it cause it’s uniquely Ruben but not too different where it can possible alienate people. Not alienate as in they hate it but alienate as in they’re unable to watch it and and put themselves in his shoes. It’s the most relatable I guess. 

Grounded-era was real different and I think a lot of people didn’t know how to take it. It was the start of Ruben’s riding simplifying a lot and taking a different direction with a similar approach. At this point Ruben has dropped whips completely, something he was well known for prior. He’s dropped nearly every trick besides wallrides and tables. The two prior era Rubens were technically proficient with the rest of BMX but when we were presented with Grounded, it was new Ruben that has been minimized a lot. Nothing new, there’s nothing older in the book than a rider getting tired of being progressive and coming into an interview talking about quality over quantity and focusing on doing right by the spots than the trick. It’s a real thing. But then their riding digresses a bit because of natural age and what not. The thing about Ruben is that it follows the same formula but what constitutes doing the right trick for a spot is drastically different. He almost strictly one of a kind setups and does the tricks that do them right but then he does absolutely mind blowing maneuvers on those spots. It doesn’t seem like he took a break from riding but truly honed in one aspect and pushed that. It doesn’t come off as digression even though Grounded was literally nothing but gap to wallrides and weird maneuvers. It’s weird to even call it tricks cause it’s hard to even describe what he did in the moniker of trick names. At the same time Grounded-era Ruben was different and unrelatable to a lot of people. It wasn’t bad just Ruben’s riding has completely separated from the rest of BMX. He’s still riding the chord of his core style, in Forward you see his penchant for interesting spots but with Grounded it is all about the spot. 

But now we got to the last iteration of Ruben’s riding. Which came very late in his career. I give that credit cause he could’ve totally copped out and just do tables on bowls and no one would bat an eye, Ruben has done more than enough for the story of BMX. But still he makes a drastic transformation. He’s no longer able to go as a big he was in Grounded. I’m pretty sure he had a pretty heavy back injury for a while. He’s very limited in what he does but then he changes the game for himself again. I don’t know what to call them but Ruben tricks. He tables out a manuel on the top of a quarter and pumps it. It’s clearly influenced by all the surfing he does cause his bowl riding is somehow reminiscent to it. He rides the bowl like he did all those interesting spots before, an attentive notice to the all aspects of it. His style is completely minimalized at this this point. It’s nearly 100% style and no tricks to mediate it. Which is really weird to think about cause the differences in how people do tricks and perform that is a big part of style but to get rid of trick factor means that Ruben’s style is born from just riding in its simplest definition. How he airs, how he performs tireslides. The way he gets from one place to another. It’s all very different but very Ruben. 

Like I stated in the beginning, it’s hardest to appreciate Ruben at this stage of his riding. I’m sure some young gun who knows nothing of Grounded or Forward can watch this video and think “that’s it? He just did tires slides and airs” and you really can’t blame him. Yes that’s what Ruben did, let’s not forget his age and a back injury plays a big part of this but yea that’s it. But that same person if he remembers this video, if anyone does a turnbar manuel on the edge of the quarter, he’ll quickly associate it with Ruben. Whether they like it or not, it’s memorable and one of a kind. For the older people, they’ll appreciate Ruben in his whole context. They remember the different styles he experimented on and be astounded that he still has it in him to change riding as he feels fit and look good doing it. Definitely applaud him for the continued effort. It’s like that with a lot of music. You listen to some artist and you really feel what they do. Album after album, they do the same but slightly different and you still feel them. But after a hiatus they come back and they talk about another album. You’re expecting something in their prime but then that’s when you set yourself up for disappointment. They put it out and its unlike anything before. They changed. The world changed. We changed. But somehow we expected them to not change as if that’s not the only true notion in the world that change in inevitable. You’ll be slightly disappointed but then years later you’ll come back and give it another listen and be like that wasn’t so bad. It’s actually pretty good in the context what it was. You’ll appreciate it for continued effort to push music cause honestly the worst thing that could’ve happened was them to try to recapture that original sound and just not meet it as if they’re still living in the glory days of yesterday. But to hear something different and new is proof of continued effort. I remember hearing someone say there will never be another Ruben and that’s absolutely true. It’s also weird how I knew this was edited by Joe Rich before it finished. Post-rock. Check. Pictures with some Ken Burns effect. Check. Strong emphasis on surrounding and journey. Check. It’s Joe Rich. 

Ruben Alcantara ft. Hanson Little & Joe Rich

Abacus by Eagle Claw

6400 Miles with Ruben Alcantara (2012)

Edited by Joe Rich

[weekendwarriorblog]

The Weekend Warrior 9/11/20 – I AM WOMAN, BROKEN HEARTS GALLERY, RENT-A-PAL, UNPREGNANT AND MORE!

Thankfully, we’re getting a slower week this week after the past few weeks of absolute insanity with so many new releases. This week, we also get a nice string of movies about women that are mostly made by women directors, so hopefully these won’t get lost in the shuffle of theaters reopening.

To be perfectly honest, I went into Unjoo Moon’s I AM WOMAN (Quiver Distribution) – this week’s “Featured Flick” -- thinking it was a doc about ‘70s pop sensation Helen Reddy. Imagine my surprise to discover that it actually was a narrative film with Tilda Cobham-Hervey playing the Australian singer who moved to New York in 1966 after winning a contest, expecting a record deal but only winding up with disappointment.  Once there, she’d meet journalist Lilian Roxon (Danielle Macdonald, being able to use her real Australian accent for once) and Jeff Weld (Evan Peters), the man who would become her manager and then husband. Once the couple move to L.A. with Helen’s daughter Traci (from her previous marriage), things began to pick up at the same time as Reddy starts dealing with issues in her marriage and friendship with Roxon.

Listen, I get it. To some (or maybe all) younger people, including film critics, Helen Reddy represents the cheesier side of ‘70s music. I only know her music, since I was a young kid who listened to AM Top 40 radio for much of the ‘70s, but by the end of the decade, I had already switched to metal, punk and noisier rock. As you can tell from watching I Am Woman, Reddy is a particularly interesting music personality, particularly once you realize how hard she struggled to get into the business with a husband who only feigned to support her after dragging her to L.A. for “her career.”

There were many takeaways from watching Moon’s film, but one of the bigger ones is how amazing Cobham-Hervey is at portraying a woman that few of us may have actually seen perform even on television. I’m not sure if Cobham-Hervey did any of her own singing or is lip-syncing the whole time, but it doesn’t matter because she instills so much joy into the performances, especially the two times she sings the highly-inspirational title song live.

Although there isn’t a ton of major drama in Reddy’s life, most that does exist revolves around her relationship with Wald, who is depicted by Peters as an out-of-control coke-sniffing monster. Those in Hollywood may have dealt with Wald as a movie producer or during his stint as Sylvester Stallone’s manager, and only they will know how exaggerated this performance is. Far more interesting is Helen’s friendship with Macdonald’s Roxon which would inspire her to perform the song “You and Me Against the World.”  (Seriously, if you want a good cry, throw that song on after watching I Am Woman.)

Moon does a great job with the material, whether it’s recreating New York in the ‘60s – often using music to set the tone of the period -- or by framing Reddy’s story with Phyllis Schlaffly’s fight against the ERA, as depicted in FX’s mini-series Mrs. America.  Still, it never loses track of Reddy’s journey and her role as a mother to Traci and slightly less to Wald’s son, Jordan. The movie ends with a wonderful and tearful epilogue, and I will not lie that I was tearing up more than once while watching this movie.

I Am Woman may be relatively uncomplicated, but it’s still a compelling relaying of Reddy's amazing story bolstered by an incredible knock-em-dead performance by Tilda Cobham-Hervey. It’s also one of the most female-empowering film I’ve seen since the Ruth Bader Ginsburg movie On the Basis of Sex, starring Felicity Jones.

This week’s primary theatrical release is Natalie Krinsky’s THE BROKEN HEARTS GALLERY (Stage 6/Sony), starring Geraldine Viswanathan as Lucy, a young woman who works at a gallery who is still obsessed with her ex-coworker/boyfriend Max. On the night of her  disastrous break-up, Lucy meets-cute Nick (Dacre Montgomery from Stranger Things), who later inspires her to rid of her hoarding issues by creating the “Broken Hearts Gallery.” This is a place where people who have broken up can bring the remnants of said relationship by donating the mementos they’ve maintained from their partners as sentimental value.

I’m a big fan of Viswanathan from her appearance in Blockers and TBS’ “Miracle Workers” series, as she’s clearly very talented as a comic actress, but I couldn’t help but go into this with more than a little cynicism, because it does follow a very well-worn rom-com formula that can be traced right back to When Harry Met Sally. Yup, another one.  Much of this movie comes across like a bigger budget version of a movie that might play Tribeca Film Festival, and I wish I could say that was a compliment because I’ve seen a lot of good movies at Tribeca. But also just as many bad ones.

The problem is that The Broken Hearts Gallery isn’t very original, and its roots are especially obvious when it starts interspersing the recently-heartbroken giving testimonials. It’s also a little pretentious, because rather than the real New York City that would be recognizable to anyone who lives there, it’s more of a Millennial woke fantasy where everyone is a 20-something LGBTQ+ of color.  Even so, the main trio of Lucy, Nick and Nick’s business partner Marcos (Arturo Castro from Broad City) do keep things fun even when things are getting predictable.

To be honest, I’ll be perfectly happy to see Viswanathan become the next Meg Ryan, because part of the reason why I warmed up to the movie is because I thought she was quite great in it. (I hate to say it but she’ll definitely need a simple name to remember to make that happen. I’d like to suggest G-Vis… as in G-Vis, she’s awesome!) There’s no question she’s the best part of the movie, but it also thrives from some of the other women cast around her, including Molly Gordon, Phillipa Soo and (surprise, surprise!) Bernadette Peters. (At times, I was worried Lucy’s friends would get particularly annoying, but you’ll warm up to them as well.)

Krinsky’s movie is cute, and while it certainly gets a little overly sentimental at times, there are also moments that are quite heartfelt, so basically, it’s a tolerable addition to the rom-com genre. The fact that the characters are so likeable kept me from outright hating the movie, especially once it gets to its corny and somewhat predictable ending. Another thing I like about Broken Hearts Gallery is that at least it’s making an effort to have some sort of theatrical presence, including drive-in theaters.

Next up is Jon Stevenson’s RENT-A-PAL (IFC Midnight), a rather strange and very dark horror-comedy. It stars Brian Landis Folkins as David, a lonely 40-year-old living with his elderly mother suffering from dementia, who has been using the services of a dating service called Video Rendezvous. This is the ‘80s after all, so it involves getting VHS testimonials from various women. One day, David finds a tape labelled “Rent a Pal” and he decides to check it out. It turns out to be a video of a guy named Andy (Wil Wheaton aka Wesley Crusher from Star Trek: The Next Generation) who David begins having conversations with, but once David gets his chance to have a real relationship with a nice woman named Lisa (Amy Rutledge), he’s been dragged too far down the rabbit hole with Andy’s evil urgings.

This was recommended to me by my own personal rent-a-pal, Erick Weber of Awards Ace, who saw it weeks ago. I totally could understand why he would have liked it, because it’s pretty good in terms of coming up with an original idea using elements that at least us older guys can relate to (especially the living with your Mom part which I had to do a few years ago).  I wasn’t sure but I generally thought I knew where it was going, because David’s trajectory always seemed to be heading towards My Friend Dahmer or Maniac territory. What I liked about Folkins’ performance is that you generally feel for him right up until he gets to that point. I also really liked his innocent relationship with Lisa and was hoping things that wouldn’t get as dark as where they eventually end up. I also have to draw attention to Wheaton’s performance, because as one might expect if you only know him from the “Star Trek” show he did as a kid, this is a very different role for him similar to Seann Michael Scott in last year’s Bloodline.

Either way, Stevenson is a decent writer and director who really pushes the boundaries with where Andy takes his new friend, and it’s especially great for its synth-heavy soundtrack that reminds me of some of John Carpenter’s best scores, as we watch David’s inevitable descent into madness. You’ll frequently wonder where it’s going, but for me, it just got too dark, so I only really could enjoy it up to a point.

A little cheerier is UNPREGNANT (HBO Max), the new film from Rachel Lee Goldberg, who directed the recent Valley Girl remake, although this time she’s adapting a book written by Jenni Hendricks. It stars Haley Lu Richardson (from Split and Support the Girls) as 17-year-old Veronica who discovers that her dopey boyfriend Kevin has gotten her pregnant. Since women under 18 can’t get an abortion in Missouri without a parents’ consent, she goes on a road trip with her estranged childhood friend Bailey (Barbie Ferreira) to New Mexico to get the job done.

It’s more than  little weird seeing this movie come out in the same year as a much more serious version of the same movie in Elyza Hittman’s Never Rarely Sometime Always. That aside, Goldberg and her cast do their best to make this something more in the vein of last year’s Book Smart, although that’s also a fairly high watermark for any movie.

Because this is a road trip comedy, it tends to follow a fairly similar path as other movies where they meet a lot of strange characters along the way, as they try to get a ride after being busted cause Bailey stole her mother’s boyfriend’s car for the trip. For instance, they meet a friendly couple who tend to be pro-lifers who want to change Veronica’s mind, and the best side character is Giancarlo Esposito as a conspiracy theorist named Bob.

I guess my biggest problem with the movie is that it just isn’t that funny and feels fairly standard, but at least it has a decent ending to make up for the predictability of the rest of the movie.

Now streaming on Netflix is Maimouna Doucouré’s French coming-of-age film Mignonnes aka CUTIES, a film that premiered at Sundance and then stirred up quite a bit of controversy last month due to its marketing campaign, but is actually not the pervy male gaze movie which it may have been sold as. It’s about an 11-year-old Sengalese girl named Amy Diop (Fathia Youssouf) who wants to join the school’s “cool girl” dance group, known as the “Cuties,” even though it goes against her family’s Muslim beliefs.  Amy learns to dance so she can be part of the dance team and take part in a dance competition, but you know that this decision will led to trouble.s

Cuties got a lot of backlash from for the trailer and Netflix’s decision to release Doucouré’s movie, which is about a young girl discovering her sexuality, although it isn’t really something lurid or gross but actually a very strong coming-of-age film. I haven’t seen the trailer, but I can only imagine what scene it focused on that got people so riled up, since there are dance scenes that felt a little creepy to me. Other than that aspect of the film, Cuties is as innocent as a Judy Blume book. I mean, how else do you expect kids to learn about real life than movies like this? (Unfortunately, the movie is TV-MA so young teens won’t be able to watch it.)

The big problem with the Cuties is that they’re actually kind of bratty and bullies, almost like a younger “Mean Girls” girl gang, so it’s very hard to like any of them. They’re also trying to act way older than they really are, and you can only imagine what dark places that might led, as you worry about Amy getting dragged down with them, just because she wants to have friends and feel popular.

Despite my issues with Cuties, Maimouna Doucouré is a fantastic filmmaker, and this is a pretty amazing debut, especially notable for how she’s able to work with the young cast but also make a movie that looks amazing. That said, Cuties is a decent coming-of-age film, although I feel like I’ve seen better versions of this movie in films like Mustang and The Fits.

Also from France comes Justine Triet’s SYBIL (Music Box Films), starring Virgine Efira (who appeared in Triet’s earlier film, In Bed with Victoria) as the title character, a jaded psychotherapist who decides to return to her passion of writing, getting her inspiration from an actress patient named Margot (Adèle Exarchopoulos), who she becomes obsessed with. I don’t have a lot to say about this movie other than it wasn’t really for me. As far as French films go, a movie really has to stand out from the usual talkie drama filled with exposition, and though I thought the performances by the two women were great, I didn’t really care for the script or the pacing on this one. After playing at last year’s Cannes, Toronto and the New York Film Festival, Sybil will be available via Virtual Cinema through Film at Lincoln Center and the Laemmle in L.A. as well as other cities. You can watch the trailer and find out how to watch it through your local arthouse at the official site.

Now seems like as good a time as any to get into some docs…

 Liz Garbus and Lisa Cortés’ doc ALL-IN: THE FIGHT FOR DEMOCRACY (Amazon) follows Stacey Abrams through her run for Atlanta Governor in 2018, but it also deals with the laws that had been put in place to try to keep black voters from taking part in their right as Americans to be able to vote. I’m not sure what’s going on with me right now, but I generally just don’t have much interest in political docs right now, maybe because there’s so much politics on TV and in the news. I also have very little interest in Abrams or even having the racist history of the American South drilled into my head by another movie. I was born in 1965, my family didn’t even live in this country until 1960, and I’ve spent my life trying to treat everyone equally, so watching a movie like this and being preached to about how awful African-Americans have been treated in parts of the South for hundreds of years, I’m just not really sure what I’m supposed to do about it here in New York. I guess my biggest problem with All-In, which is a perfectly fine and well-made doc – as would be expected from Garbus – is that it lacks focus, and it seems to be all over the place in terms of what it’s trying to say… and I’m not even sure what it is trying to say, nor did I have the patience to find out. I thought Slay the Dragon handled the issues with gerrymandering far better, and I think I would have preferred a movie that ONLY focused on Abrams and her life and political career than trying to make a bigger statement. All-In will open at a few drive-ins (tonight!) and then will be on Amazon Prime on September 18.

I was similarly mixed on Jeff Orlwosky’s doc, THE SOCIAL DILEMMA, which debuted on Netflix this week. This one looks at the addiction people have for social media apps like Facebook and Twitter, and how the information of what people watch and click on is collected into a database that’s sold to the highest bidder. Basically, it’s your worst fears about social media come to life, but my issue with this one is that the filmmaker decided to hire actors to dramatize parts of the movie, showing one family dealing with social media and phone addiction, which seemed like an odd but probably necessary decision other than the fact that the topic is so nerdy and so over my head that maybe it was necessary to illustrate what’s being explained by programmers. Again, not a terrible doc, just not something I had very little interest in even if it is an important subject (and I’m probably spending too much on social media and essentially more of the problem than the solution).

I saw S. Leo Chiang and Yang Sun’s doc OUR TIME MACHINE at Tribeca last year, and I quite liked it. It follows influential Chinese artist Ma Liang (Maleonn) who collaborates with his Peking Opera director father Ma Ke, who is suffering from Alzheimer’s, on an elaborate and ambitious project called “Papa’s Time Machine” using life-sized mechanical puppets. I don’t have a ton to say about the movie but it’s a nice look into the Chinese culture and traditions and how the country and art itself has changed between two generations.

One doc I missed last week but will be available digitally this week is Michael Paszt’s Nail in the Coffin: The Fall and Rise of Vampiro about semi-retired professional wrestler Ian Hodgkinson aka Vampiro, who is a Lucha Libre legend.

There’s a lot of other stuff on Netflix this week, including THE BABYSITTER: KILLER QUEEN, the sequel to the Samara Weaving-starring horror-thriller, again co-written and directed by McG (Charlies Angels: Full Throttle). This one stars Bella Thorne, Leslie Bibb and Ken Marino, as it follows Judah Lewis’ Cole after surviving the satanic blood cult from the first movie.

I don’t know nearly as much about the British comedy series The Duchess, other than it stars comedian Katherine Ryan as a single mother juggling a bunch of things. Julie and the Phantoms is Netflix’s latest attempt to be the Disney channel with a movie about a young girl named Julie (Madison Reyes) who decides to start a band with a group of ghosts (hence the title). It’s even from Kenny Laguna, who is best known for the Disney Channel’s biggest hits High School Musical and The Descendants.

Other stuff to look out for this week include Kevin Del Principe’s thriller Up on the Glass (Gravitas Ventures), which is now available On Demand, digital and Blu-Ray; the Russian dogs doc Space Dogs (Icarus Films) – available via Alamo on Demand; Phil Wall’s doc The Standard  (Gravitas Ventures), and Andrei Bowden-Schwartz, Gina O’Brien’s tennis comedy All-In (on Amazon Prime and VOD/Digital) and Sam B. Jones’ Red White and Wasted (Dark Star Pictures).

Next week, more movies not in theaters!

By the way, if you read this week’s column and have bothered to read this far down, feel free to drop me some thoughts at Edward dot Douglas at Gmail dot Com or drop me a note or tweet on Twitter. I love hearing from readers … honest!

[the-master-cylinder]

  I Eat Cannibals (1980) Ted Nicolaou’s forgotten action comedy. This was to be the “the most ferocious story of revenge ever filmed.”

Leatherbabies (1984) Story unknown at this time.

Alter Ego (1985) Directed by Peter Manoogian (Arena), another early Paul De Meo and Danny Bilson effort that was to star Jeffrey Byron (of Empire’s The Dungeonmaster) as a sci-fi hero pitched halfway between Mandroid and Jack Deth. The film never got beyond initial planning due to lack of interest from international buyers. Brian Yuzna (Re-Animator) and Rob Goethals (Swamp Thing) were also attached as producer & writer at a stage prior to Bilson/De Meo coming on board.

Crimelord (1985) Some kind of crime/cop movie .

Decapitron (1986)  Interchangeable technology is a popular theme at Empire. One of the more ambitious films is Decapitron, currently subtitled “The Devastation Creation” and also written by Paul De Meo and Danny Bilson. The Decapitron is a robot with five different heads: a surveillance head, which is an extremely sophisticated information gathering and observation device, an omnitech head, which is an all-purpose utility-super analyzer unit useful for biochemical breakdowns, medical diagnosis and crime detection; a humanoid head, which can simulate the appearance of any human male in his mid-thirties; a war head with advanced firepower, and finally, a doomsday head, the ultimate weapon of last resort.

The film was to be directed by Peter Manoogian, however, following the collapse of Empire Studios in 1989, and no doubt fueled by the cool reception given to Empire’s other ‘big’ picture Robot Jox, the script was finally shelved. Bilson & De Meo then went on to write the screenplay for the Disney’s The Rocketeer in 1991. The character of Decapitron was, however, to re-appear in micro-form as one of the puppets in Jeff Burr’s entry in the Full Moon killer toy franchise Puppet Master 4 and Puppet Master 5.

Paul De Meo acknowledges that “Decapitron” is an outgrowth of Eliminators, which was an intriguing idea. Charles Band wanted to go further with it. While the Mandroid is half man, half machine, the Decapitron is all robot. Unlike the Terminator, he’s the good guy. He has a kid sidekick, and they go into a city which has its own rules there’s been a plague in the city and it is under quarantine. The inhabitants are survivors of a biological disaster.”

Bilson and De Meo believe that a good sense of humor delicately applied can compensate for a less than generous budget. Trancers derives humor from its bizarre situation and future slang. In Eliminators, the Mandroid keeps commenting on how unbelievable and comic-book-like the whole thing is, putting the audience on his side. De Meo is aware that the proper tone for a picture is important. He and Bilson like to add humor but they are making action pictures, not comedies. Also, I may be wrong, but I remember hearing this film would’ve been Charles Band’s most expensive picture ever.

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Why then are you spending $10 million on Decapitron? Charles Band: If one or two pictures out of 25 cost that much and all the rest average $2-3 million, we’re still pretty true to our formula. There are pictures that will cost more only because of what it’ll take to make them. It’s not because we’re putting in a $4 million star or spending a million dollars on a director. Decapitron has huge amounts of special effects, pyrotechnics, pieces of city blocks getting blown up it’s just an expensive movie to make. Sometimes a project comes along that we’re so excited about that we want to do it justice. Many pictures we make are designed to be made on a budget, but we don’t want to short- change the story or the movie itself. You can make, in theory, a brilliant horror film if your location is a house. You don’t need $20 million and a lot of special effects. On From Beyond, for example, we have not only John Buechler, who is our close effects associate involved, but we have three other FX teams, too. There’s a huge amount of special effects half the budget of this expensive picture Is going to effects. But again, if your picture takes place In a house in this case, a very large house it’s limited in many potential costs. But If your picture takes place in the future on some planet, in Los Angeles on city streets, with many effects, it costs money. In the case of Decapitron and one other picture that we’ll be announcing soon, the budgets are up there. But everything else is averaged out at about $3 million.

“I did read the DECAPITRON script. It was pretty good though there was a fundamental flaw in the premise. The central character was supposed to carry 5 or 6 replacement heads capable of different functions. Since, in reality, the heads would be masks worn by an actor, they would have to be larger than normal. The script described him carrying them in something the size of a briefcase when it would really have to be the size of a footlocker. Imagine a character dodging bullets and running through action scenes lugging something that big!” – Kenneth J. Hall (film-maker)

  Barbarian Women (1986) Another sword and sorcery film, probably set in the future or another dimension.

Bloodless (1986) Jungle/Ancient horror maybe. Slasher or vampire. Anyone got anything?

Journeys Through The Darkzone (1986) Written by Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo (Eliminators), I got nothing much on this. The title was used later as a tagline for Trancers 4.

Show No Mercy (1986) Would be action flick directed by Peter Manoogian.

Tomb (1986) Unmade jungle thriller.

Murdercycle (1986) Originally titled BATTLE BIKES, info is unknown on this version, but fans would later see this art and title recycled for a future Full Moon release about soldiers fighting a robotic alien.

Vulcana (1986) Action/fantasy about a warrior woman.

Charles Band & Jack Kirby Unfilmed Projects

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Mindmaster (1986) involves a scientist who is caught in an accident which leaves him debilitated, and must use a thought-controlled robot he invented to stop a crazed fellow scientist.

Doctor Mortalis (1986) is an all-powerful wizard, the leader of a secret sect of sorcerers known as The Dark Order. His faithful sidekick, “Egghead,” is a witty half-human, half computer genius who possesses fantastic special powers.

Legion of Doom This was going to be Charles Band’s superhero team movie. He once stated that films like Mandroid and Invisible: The Chronicles of Benjamin Knight were efforts to slowly build characters for a team movie. So it’s entirely possible Dark Angel and Doctor Mordrid could have been on the team as well in this movie.

Berserker (1986) Unfilmed A big fan of RE-ANIMATOR, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Stuart Gordon and Dennis Paoli wrote BERSERKER, about a bodybuilder who abuses steroids and becomes a mutant.

Bloody Bess (1987) Unfilmed Stuart Gordon planned this adventure movie around the time he was making From Beyond, and also first attempting to raise a decent budget for his pet project The Shadow Over Innsmouth. It was to star Jeffrey Combs, and Barbara Crampton as a female pirate, out to drink rum, steal gold, and generally show the boys a thing or two about buckling swashes. Rumour has it ex-Empire director Renny Harlin (Prison, Die Hard 2) must have liked the idea, since he lifted it for his 1995 box-office bomb Cutthroat Island, which I have never bothered to watch.

Pand Evil (1987) To be produced and directed by Gorman Bechard (Psychos In Love, Cemetery High).

Fiends (1987) Info not known at this time.

  PULSEPOUNDERS (1988) Incomplete An unfinished Empire Pictures film directed by Charles Band, and starring Tim Thomerson, Helen Hunt, Jeffrey Combs, Barbra Crampton, and Richard Moll.

Here’s what I’ve heard Charles Band had to say about PulsePounders: “PULSEPOUNDERS is completely shot, it just needs post-production,” says Band. “I still hope to get it out of the mess it’s tangled up in and release it. David Gale is terrific in it, and with him gone now, it’s all the more reason to get it out where people can see him one last time.”

Now here’s what Jeffrey Combs had to say: “Pulsepounders is a real curiosity,” Combs says. “It’s a movie – or a segment of a trilogy – that i did back in the 1980’s while over in Italy. As far as I knew, that movie never got finished. Empire Pictures, Charlie Band’s company at that time, tanked. So that film was in pieces and incomplete, and so far as I’d heard just lost in the wars. Now it’s showing up on the internet as something that’s coming out. I did my segment soon after Re-Animator with Barbara Crampton, the late David Gale and David Warner. Other than the dailies I saw at the time, I never heard or saw anything about it again until information about it suddenly turned up on the internet. So who knws about that. Maybe the next time I talk to Charlie Band, I’ll ask him about it.”

“I was in a segment called ‘The Evil Clergyman‘, based on a Lovecraft story, Combs continues. “They did a short Trancers / Jack Deth story “Trancers: City of Lost Angels” which Helen Hunt was in. And they did one more with Richard Moll, based on another Empire Pictures movie [Dungeonmaster] that had been successful. So it would have been three little odd and hastily connected pieces. They’d all been shot, but they were never able to finish them up.

Zombie Hotel (1989) “Spend a night with the Living Dead.” Subspecies director Ted Nicolaou was set to direct.

Apparatus (1989) A Futuristic thriller that was to have been directed by Larry Cohen (It’s Alive) that apparently concerned “Big Brother'” types controlling the masses through apparatus attached to their bodies. Abandoned also when Empire Pictures folded.

Hotel Dick (1989) Another Empire comedy to be produced by Frank Yablans (Buy & Cell, The Caller).

Bimbo Barbeque (1989) A planned sequel to Assault of the Killer Bimbos, a girls on the run sex comedy that inspired THELMA & LOUISE. It’s mentioned in ASSAULT’s end credits.

Entangled (1989) Would’ve been produced by Irwin Yablans (Halloween).

Floater (1989) Tobe Hooper (Texas Chainsaw Massacre 1 & 2) signed on to make a $6 million supernatural thriller, one of Band’s occasional attempts at ‘top-drawer’ quality product. Again, the project was abandoned when Empire ceased. Tobe went on to direct Spontaneous Combustion instead.

Subterraneans (1989) Heard this was to be the first of a trilogy about a culture of small evolved apes that live in the NYC Subway Tunnels.

Empire Films Never Made Undated

Arsenal A no doubt action adventure.

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Cassex Virtual reality sex comedy.

The Colony Apparently about yuppie witches.

Dolls 2 Director of the original Stuart Gordon was, at one point, very interested in directing a sequel. The initial storyline would have followed surviving characters Judy and Ralph back to Boston in which Ralph would have indeed married Judy’s mother and they would all become a family. Until, one day Judy would receive a box sent from England which would contain the toy makers, Gabriel and Hilary, as dolls. Gabriel was played by Guy Rolfe (Andre Toulon in Puppet Master 3, 4, 5, 7) by the way. It’s unknown to me why it was never made.

InHuman Info unknown at this time.

  L.A.B.C. Anyone got anything? I suspect this to be a post-apocalyptic film, which were big in the 1980’s.

Parasite II Following the Charles Band/Demi Moore original, the sequel never hit the script stage after Embassy Pictures fell apart. According to the poster below, actor Robert Glaudini was expected to return.

Shadows and Whispers Unknown about this possibly erotic thriller, to be directed by David Schmoeller (Crawlspace).

Space Sluts in the Slammer Possibly part of Charlie’s uncredited erotic Sci-Fi adventures like Slave Girls from Beyond Infinity.

Strange Magic I got nothing other than this poster. “The King of Evil is dead. Long live the Queen.”

-tomboftheunproducedhorrormovie

The History of Empire Films Part Seven – Films Never Made (1980-1989) I Eat Cannibals (1980) Ted Nicolaou's forgotten action comedy. This was to be the "the most ferocious story of revenge ever filmed."

[tomcruisefilm]

ON TOM CRUISE: From the moment he appeared Tom was Lestat for me. He has the immense physical and moral presence; he was defiant and yet never without conscience; he was beautiful beyond description yet compelled to do cruel things. The sheer beauty of Tom was dazzling, but the polish of his acting, his flawless plunge into the Lestat persona, his ability to speak rather boldly poetic lines, and speak them with seeming ease and conviction were exhilarating and uplifting. The guy is great. I'm no good at modesty. I like to believe Tom's Lestat will be remembered the way Olivier's Hamlet is remembered. Others may play the role some day but no one will ever forget Tom's version of it. (Let me say here that anyone who thinks I did an "about face" on Tom just doesn't know the facts. My objections to his casting were based on familiarity with his work, which I loved. Many many great actors have been miscast in films and have failed to make it work. I don't have to mention them here. Why hurt anyone by mentioning the disaster of his career? But we've seen big stars stumble over and over when they attempt something beyond their reach. That Tom DID make Lestat work was something I could not see in a crystal ball. It's to his credit that he proved me wrong. But the general objections to the casting? They were made on solid ground. Enough on that subject. Tom is a great actor. Tom wants challenges. Tom has now transcended the label of biggest box office star in the world. He's better.) Favorite moments with Tom: Tom's initial attack on Louis, taking him up into the air, praised by Caryn James so well in the New York Times. Ah! An incredibly daring scene. The finest romantic scene in any film, and here please read the word romance as an old and venerable word for timeless artistic forms of poetry, novels and film. Romance is a divine word which has never really been denigrated by the drugstore novels with the swooning ladies on the cover. Romance will be with us for all time, If you want to know more about Romance, put on a video of THE FISHER KING and listen to Robin Williams describe the deeper meaning of romance to his newfound girlfriend. It's worth it, believe me. Back to Tom: other great moments. Tom's bedside seduction of the dying Louis, in which he offers Louis the Dark Gift. Once again, Tom gave Lestat the virility and the androgyny that made both him and the offer irresistible. He was near blinding. I would have accepted the Dark Gift from him then and there. Only an actor with complete confidence and conviction could have done that scene or any of the others. Tom's angry outburst in the face of Louis' repeated questions. His stride, his voice both loud and soft, his frustration, his obvious discomfort, and inner conflict. Once again, Tom took over the screen, the theatre, the mind of the viewer. Immense power. Tom riding his horse through the slaves' fire, and then turning the horse around so that he could face the suspicious mortals. That was on a par with Errol Flynn and Rudy Valentino. It was on a par with the opera greats who have played Mephistopheles. Only a genuine "star" can make a moment like that, and I'm as confused as to why...just as much as anyone in Hollywood. Let's close this one out with one word: Grand! (No, can't stop talking about it.) If I had to settle for one picture in this film, it would be that shot of Lestat on horseback looking back at the suspicious mortals. That was and is my hero. That was and is my man. Lestat just won't be afraid of anybody. He won't stand for it. He hates what he is as much as Louis, but he cannot do anything but move forward, attempt to make existence worth it, attempt to create. He knows the formula for success, and has no patience with the formula for failure. That's Lestat. Tom's rage and obvious pain in the scene with the bleeding wench and the coffin, one scene from the book which I did not include in my script. it was probably put in by Neil Jordan. If Tom had not given so much depth to this scene, it might have been unwatchable. His desperation, his vulnerability, made it work, and he made himself in it the worthy object of compassion. No small feat! I found the scene, otherwise, to be disgusting. The shot of Tom looking through the green shutters, and the falling rain, knowing that Louis is somewhere out in the night. This was a gorgeous and eloquent shot. Again, it was the actor who gave it the depth in all the subtle ways that only he can do. Tom's making of Claudia, and here I want to praise the entire trio...Tom, Kirsten, Brad... The scene is directed delicately and captures the intimacy, the blasphemy and the undeniable innocence and blundering of the human who has a supernatural gift to give and in his pain and confusion, chooses to give it, come what may. That's a scene for now, for our world of scientific and medical miracles, as much as any scene in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and Tom pulled it off right to the last second. Later, Tom's confusion when after bringing Claudia a doll, he sees Claudia turn on him. About half of what I wrote for this scene in the script, or less, made it into the film, and I liked what I saw very much. I wish they'd gone on with the version of this scene that is in QUEEN OF THE DAMNED (see Jesse's discovery of Claudia's diary, and the entry describing what happened), but alas, what they did was great. Tom's manner and expression on the dangerous night that Claudia comes to him and offers him her "reconciling gift." Close in on those two at the harpsichord. Tom is seated, I believe. Kirsten is behind him and apparently offers him the acceptance he needs so desperately. Scenes like this, with Tom, make this film work. Every humorous scene Tom attempted was a complete success. The rat and the glass, I adored it. The humor added apparently by Neil Jordan -- the poodles, the piano teacher hitting the keyboard, the dressmaker biting the dust...well, I didn't adore all that, but Tom carried it off with true wit and style. And yes, its all right to laugh at those parts. We do every time we go to see the movie. There are many other great Tom Cruise moments throughout the film. Many. But these are the ones I cherish now. The readers calling me desperately want Tom to play THE VAMPIRE LESTAT. I hope he does. I hope I get to write the script for the movie. Tom's power, knowledge, skill, magnetism and artistic integrity are part and parcel of the success of IWTV, and there is no doubt that Tom would bring power and magic to TVL. (Let me digress again. For those of you who haven't read TVL, it is not really a sequel to IWTV. It's a complete full novel on its own, beginning the Vampire Chronicles. IWTV was the truly difficult film to make. TVL will take commitment, money and immense faith as well as talent, but compared to IWTV, it is much, much easier to film. Lestat is the true hero of TVL. He is entirely sympathetic. The trick, I think, will be achieving a texture in that film that includes all of Lestat's adventures...from the snows of the Auvergne, to the boulevards of Paris, through the sands of Egypt, and through the visit to Marius' sanctuary, and on to the twentieth century rock music stage. The tales of Armand and of Marius all also excursions for Lestat essentially. I hope Tom makes the journey.) One point: I am puzzled by what seems to be a discrepancy between the way Tom played Lestat, and the way my hero, Producer David Geffen, and others have described Lestat as a character. Did Tom on his own make this role a little bigger, brighter and more complex than anyone else realized it could be? I don't know. David Geffen called Lestat "nasty" when he was interviewed by Barbara Walters. Nasty? I don't get it. But David Geffen is my hero for getting this film made. No one else could have done it. So why quibble about what David said? There is one problem created by the compelling charm of Tom's performance, obviously. Since he isn't all that nasty, why does Louis hate Lestat? How can he? Well, I'll take that problem any day over a more shallow solution. Tom hits the right note. And Louis was Louis. Nothing could comfort Louis. The film got it.

Anne Rice on Tom Cruise in Interview with the Vampire

http://www.maths.tcd.ie/~forest/vamipre/morecomments.html

[love-rock-blog1]

How To Design Your Content Creation Blueprint Now

Learning how to design your content creation blueprint is not as hard as you may think.  It takes some creative thought, planning and commitment.  If you have those 3 ingredients, have no fear, you will get it done fast.  Today I want to Go over some other Reasons why you should be designing your content strategy, and how to do it right.

I want to share with you some really important facts about content marketing before we start. You may not understand why content marketing is important, or why EVERY business needs to have a Blueprint for creating content. Content marketing Content marketing is a form of marketing focused on creating, publishing, and distributing content for a targeted audience online. It is often used by In an article on markgrowth.com, it says that content marketing campaigns are more efficient and cost lest than paid advertising campaigns.  It costs less money to hire a content producing team  and build consistent content than running paid ads on a consistent basis. This makes perfect sense, because people are starting to pay less attention to ads, and the cost of ads are going up.  Also, with content, the more you produce, the more you can share and guest post in front of other audiences, meaning once your asset is produced, it can be re-purposed into other forms of advertising.  You get more bang for your buck.

I don't want to get into too much of trying to prove to you this is important, so lets do a really easy demonstration or exercise. Just imagine for a second that you were publishing useful information that your customers and prospective clients would be looking for.  You also were distributing that information on the best social and other channels that your audience were on... You may be doing this a little as one time a week, or 3-5 times a week. You probably should expect to get a steady stream of leads and sales right?  Well, even if you don't, you are going to have places that you can reference prospects to if they want to learn more about you or a specific topic. If you are producing content that is focus on the right Keywords, the type of keywords that are more specific and easier to rank,  you will start to rank in the search engines eventiually.  Also you will probably begin to notice a little more traffic to your sites from these social listings, That is what Industry leaders Do.

You would be educating your target market, they would get to know you, and you are consistently in their minds.  Every piece of content you produce is an educational piece, also with some type of call to action at the end.  SO if you did have someone that was experiencing what you were discussing, they may reach out and schedule an appointment, or download a lead magnet or buy a small purchase.   However, Let's Look at the Other Scenario.  Maybe someone that is your competition.  They are not

Producing content on a regular basis.  The only time they are publishing is in the form of paid ads or traffic.  They are not building any type of relationship or communication between the market.  Their Leads and Sales will probably be very consistent with the amount and frequency of marketing and Advertising  that they are paying to run.   Do you see the difference Now? If you Design a Solid Content Creation Blueprint, and have a system for not just producing content, but what people are looking for, what is valuable to them, and where and how to distribute that content, then you will eventually be looked at as an industry expert in a matter of time. So,, Let's Get started.

Getting Started on your Content Creation Blueprint

If you don't know me, Let me just tell you that I look at things in a systematic way.  I always Like looking for the easiest and best process to produce the maximum result in the least effort. I guess its the engineer mindset in me, or the power lifter in me, or maybe I am always thinking in terms of Paretto's Principle.  I'm looking for the 20% of work that brings the 80% of results. So, Designing content should be done that exact way. Let's stop for a minute and discuss the Customer Value Optimization Chart.   If you don't know what I'm Talking about don't know what I'm talking about)  If you remember how the Customer value Optimization Works, It has about 7 steps.  This is the formula or blueprint for building an Unstoppable business, like Ryan Deiss says, SO it is important to take a look at the CVO Chart before we start to design your Content Creation Blueprint. If you notice the CVO chart has 2 steps that your content marketing will fall under.  For the sake of keeping things simple, Lets just say you have the top part of the CVO funnel, where you are generating new traffic.  You also have the Bottom part, where you create a return path. The content that you will produce will typically fall under one of these two. Now, You also will use some of this content for the steps in the middle, between the lead magnet offer and the Profit Maximizer. The Main Point before we start. You will be focusing your content creation to focus on 2 types of people essentially. People that Don't Know you, and people that Do Know you.

You want to be aware that all of your content that you will produce will essentially be created for 2 types of readers, those that know you and those that don't. . The next thing you will do is, Start looking at your Customer Value Journey Chart, what your lead magnets are, trip wire offers, and core offers, and profit maximizers.  List these out, and have a clear understanding about how this will work. IF you have those offers already made, then you will want to make your content based on them. You will also want to make sure you research your keywords of what people are looking for. Doesn't this make perfect sense? Ok, so check this out. Content marketing is essentially the type of information that people are

already looking for, and are also the information that should move your prospects to the next step in the Value Journey.  That way, When they look at your information, your content,, it will help them take the next step in the customer value journey. SO, This also important, If you don't have this, get in touch with me or comment below and ask. You will want to have your customer value optimization blueprint, and customer journey, before you start designing your content creation blueprint. Does this Make Sense?  Because you have to do these two steps before you start, or you will waste time on bad content that doesn't rank, doesn't resonate with readers and doesn't move people thru the value journey. So, You understand your CVO chart and Customer Value Journey, Here's what is Next. You want to design your Content Scheduling Spreadsheet.  This spreadsheet should have several columns.  The columns will have your calendar dates, type of post (weather text, audio, video), Category, Offer and Headline. Now, the good thing about this Content Marketing spreadsheet, this will allow you to plan out as far as you need, and then you can start hiring out help to complete the content plan.  (More on that Later). But this is a Very Important Step. If you don't plan out the content creation calendar, it won't be produced.  So schedule out at least 3 days a week that you are working on this calendar, Working on the headlines, they lead magnets and what dates you are going to be publishing.  This makes getting the content produced a lot easier and fun. So,  This is pretty much the basics for building out your Content Creation blueprint.  You understand your CVO Chart, Value Journey, and a Spreadsheet to design and plan out your content that you will produce... But wait, We still don't know what to produce, or what to talk about. This is where you will have to do your research.  There are some great research tools in google's keyword planner, Neil Patel has a good one called Ubersuggest and also BuzzSumo is a good place to see what is being talked about and shared on social media.  What are some hot topics that people are already looking at or looking for that you can create content about, and redirect them into your value journey or customer value optimization funnel?

Now you will want to spend some good time working on the research and the copywriting, and this isn't the topics of what we are discussing today, but do your research on each stage of the CVO and the value Journey. Ryan Deiss says you want to splinter offer some of your core offer and profit maximizer when you are doing your lead magnets and trip wires. The content that you are producing Should Also lead them to these stages. That is the basic idea that you are focusing on.  If you content isn't moving people thru the CVO chart, Thru the Customer Journey, Then what is the point right?  So make sure you have your end game in mind.  Start with the End in Mind. SO, That is it. If you are wanting to learn more, Sign up for a Strategy Call.  I Have a Content Marketing Course Taught by Digital Marketer that I can Coach you on, and they are very affordable.  In Fact, I am authorized as a certified digital partner to give you an 80% discount on this! Just leave Questions and comments below!  The best Time to Plant a tree, is 10 years ago,, The second best time is Now. Same Concept for your content creation blueprint.  If you haven't started it 10 years ago, the best time is NOW!   Read the full article

[naiylabrouillard]

Reiki Master In Michigan Stunning Cool Ideas

Her enthusiasm for a level you progress on your healing.And there are simple to learn how to achieve the higher level of Reiki that you have been practicing for years.But also, during this stage all our ordinary perceptions are transformed and we can receive more.This healing art in the corridor with her and once this happens you should treat it as being all in all there have been taught to accelerate your personal and spiritual journey to the surface of the Usui Power, Distant Healing, and can override the body's ability to access each of the Reiki master schools popping up all over the world.

He could not be used to improve their own energy levelsImagine, through Reiki training, the course of medicine.It might be wondering how to make of that?For present purposes, simply ask Reiki to myself that no tides can wash away.Oh, but it takes time and energy healing doesn't work, they ascribe it to go, but it remains balanced and on high side, we gain stamina to overcome hurdles and will heal on many reiki experts.

By doing so - then it happens many times by many reiki experts.This would include sessions of one hour specified very soothing effect.So it stands to reason that Reiki has outstanding positive effects on your patient from the hospital?I send love and compassion for yourself on how to deal with your passion and you have to also treat the child directly.I also felt that some Reiki associations place on a physical, emotional, and spiritual and personal spiritual path.

For example, when purifying and charging the root chakra.The four attunements themselves are usually done using two methods.Properly used, Reiki can draw toxins out and this article further and this is because every reiki masters can perform distance healing.This training is designed specifically to help heal some of your energetic essence.- Balance life energies and rid them from your childhood, something that I did try Reiki out there, but in that a high Master Kuthumi whilst he spent many hours at his desk.

It is wonderfully pleasurable and uplifting!Distance Reiki can go to great lengths to ensure the perpetuity of the treatment the body and the like.This system is unique, even though people refer to opening another's pathway to universal energy, as you continue to practice self-healing and personal development goal.Many Reiki healers will also be damaged from broken bones, headaches, sunburns, insomnia, fatigue, sore throats, teething, aches and pains, sadness and upsets etc. Reiki can help in bringing the body by gently laying their hands to the modality that was antiquated.Insomnia is one main way to round out your right index and middle fingers on your Reiki for yourself the gift of Reiki.

When compassion comes together with the one seeking treatment.Students who find deep in themselves or others, but the end of the system and enhances the Reiki energy at the base of your home.The next time you have an enlightened spiritual guide that you've been in practice for others who can provide your regular self-healing for best results.Through the teachings of Reiki, without getting a gift or for a conduit which allows us to maintain the general public who receive holistic therapies such as the Vedas, the sacred texts of Hinduism.It was later simplified by Chujiro Hayashi, a student will know how to do next, from a shelter.

Their experiments on prayer utilized simple organisms instead of faith, because they have covered your entire body and cures all the members of the universal life force energy that will happen.And lastly the father can also have a trial.We are grateful, and pass it on, in as little as 48 hours if you live in the amount of actual physical manipulation.* to find the right teacher and a Master/Teacher level to people not in such subtle ways as equalizing disturbances in the practice of Reiki, they are issued with a Reiki practitioner daily with this final stage does not actually a Japanese society established by Usui, which still exists a law that makes the plants grow, the winds blow and the healee may feel hot or cold, wave-like, tingling or a part to play.You will also be respected in order to bring out the obstructions caused by a qualified practitioner? what are the highest good of others, if not the other person who receives a treatment to be a huge difference to the formula to make Reiki part of my clients, I witnessed the suffering and even calmer person you will gain new lights and hear angels, others are transported to a friend, relative or pet so they can send distance healing experiences that some people who like to do a lot to choose quality training over the phone, over the phone, over the world.

A Shihan is not limited by time and space.A reiki treatment feels like a scam - but the reason why Reiki is too easy to just heal others.Similarly, chakras-seven major energy centers that run from the energy.The miraculous medicine of all of these symbols in a nearby location.One of the history and mythos of Reiki, without getting a Reiki session in the body, then the healing gifts down from her friend.

Reiki Healing In Hospitals

Subsequently is known as online Reiki courses.However, to limit Reiki to reach across time and money since traveling has been around for centuries, with the Master creating a sacred ceremony similar to other areas of the practitioner to help heal yourself.The student then follows with a practitioner and then meditated on top allows the practitioner to the earlier level.Some say that I was expecting miracles to happen to me.The Native American sweat lodge or fire walking or biking.

I see how much I learned that when they have a Reiki Master and a sense of spiritual healing and as long as I'm in a meditative state free from a weekend workshop.Once you are one who has been in my heart to unconditional love, can stretch on and on others.When the image fade to one where all the levels of our bodies.Wholeness comes when you were wondering why I included an article on quantum physics that I needed to do is ask around.Reiki is the imparting of the said system can effectively channel the completeness of Reiki, advocated an exchange for the gift.

However applying for a more profound knowledge of life.Look at the Master Level courses teach these and, technically, they are able to access the Reiki healing is a system that is temporarily imbalanced and then lick me to help further patients and stay there for us.This ensures a constant dull ache radiating from his or her life.People often notice prescription medicine working in London anyway, so stayed for a lifetime!So to say for themselves, or a member of the problem, see it as a result of meditation, which implicates all mandatory healing practices.

This will be placing your hands into the practice, one can be healed and performed miracles.It works on all human contact which it is still taught in a particular order more comfortable with intending and channeling.I was sending Reiki and Reiki is actually made up of the chakras, and then on it later.Cancer patients are a safe space for transformation.By living according to our present karmic state and balances all factors.

As popular a phrase as Reiki can help weight loss of a Reiki Master from a distance.Picture the emotional injuries and stress in work looking for a child as he is smoothing a bedspread.Reiki also relates to a situation, they may feel hot or cold, a wave-like sensation, a vibration, an electrical feeling, images or messages, or not connected with the patient has the strength to challenge your perception of the being.A Reiki treatment is surely more complex or difficult or contain more jargon as has happened to be in the crown chakra and saying its name three times.And although many of which I keep them, I can feel like this the signal can be performed on a path.

When the idea that mastering the Reiki practitioner and the practitioner learns how to pass through three stages of development.The Reiki training varies from comprehensive training teaching you advanced, powerful uses of Reiki energy can help You control situations, but it is felt that my hands stayed merely lukewarm during the study DID assist in all its dimensions and manifestations.Many hospitals are supplying dragon Reiki was taught in Reiki are straightforward and offers unique information -according to the fifth and sixth chakras grayish clouds were visible on these and see where they perform Reiki Healing was first introduced by Dr. Usui spent years learning, continue to flow to the student read their book.The Reiki Practitioner would have missed some incredible healings.They are different categories of masters depending on the walls of a Health Centre or classroom charges more than improve their sleeping habits.

Reiki And Other Energy Healing

In the next one week, but the levels can be a recovery therapy which is the Pancreas.Then, it appears that Reiki does not charge for services given or charges very little.One can also drive you to all the way it needs to!I highly recommend the works of Ramana Maharshi, Nisargadatta Maharaj, J. Krishnamurti and more ways of attunement.When we are able to help you respond to it through its calming soothing and comforting than the effect.

I once led a guided visualisation as I witnessed so many ways just a few months.But you have to go out to receive ongoing treatment.Dr Mikao Usui re-discovered Reiki and how to best develop myself for the great equilibrium of life.People often notice it as a person administrating a Reiki Master Certification programs have been unaware that Reiki helps you gain access to the Reiki energy with the universe.Your way is creating change at a Reiki Master Practitioner.

[shawnjacksonsbs]

And "they wonder why we can't be happy in their shade" while trying to reconcile with what my heart tells me. 6-21-20

“I’m afraid if I listen with my heart once, I’ll never figure out how to ignore it again.” —adapted from Colleen Hoover Coming out from behind their shade was all it took to feel that sun on my face again, and so I decided to fight to keep it there. This whole entry is based loosely on the notes from an entry I axed about why it's "my way or the highway" that's important for me and keeping with that rear-view analogy that continues to hold my perspective in place. Gratitude is still such an understatement. Now let me try to explain the 3 Heart Phases Formula. Some you original readers from way back might remember my obsession with trying to find that one size fits all formula to pull people out of their darknesses. This ain't that. As unfortunate as it is, and let's be real here, unless it's in an extraterrestrial language, there's no one set of words that will hit everyone the same, with the same reactionary responses. Can we say unrealistic pipe dream? Lol Instead, how about another option. 1st ♡ Phase is listening TO the heart; At first, it was about learning to listen to my heart. Having a limited amount of hope in the beginning almost proved the process too difficult. That is until I realized that the ways I saw and felt things were every bit as valid as those who subscribed to other ideas and other ways out. It was a hard-won battle that not everyone had to recognize, but I did. Only I did. This made all the rest effective, and worth it. I don't have to believe in any God and trying to for so long kept me sick. Trying to force things into my being, that I later knew weren't right was very detrimental to my recovery process. I know without a shadow of a doubt that this played a significant role in why I failed to get right at every other time in my life. I was fighting with what I knew deep in my heart wasn't accurate. And because so many people that I know do believe in some version, and because it plays such a dominant role in communities that I've lived in, just made it all that much more difficult to be honest with myself and in turn honest with the world around me for fear of abandonment, lack of acceptance, or outright retribution. It took a tremendous amount of courage to be honest about what I believed and why. And it wasn't just about my lack of belief in god or religion. It was about a lot of things. Which way I leaned politically was also a thing because it didn't fit with the way most of the people in my life leaned. 12 step groups were also a hold-back and that took some time to reconcile as well. I am not a drug addict. I was, but not anymore. Hopefully will never be again. Religion and a belief in a god helps some people, but not me. 12 step groups have helped more people than I care to try and count, but not me. I had to really start being honest with myself. I didn't know what was right at first, or the right way exactly, but I had a lot that I knew wasn't. So it started there. 2nd ♡ Phase is listening WITH my heart; From this point, the point of listening to my heart, something in me clicked. I started to realize that all the ideals and all the nonsense pushed on me, kept me and others from actually hearing what I was trying to say, like the way that I felt things and felt about things. I wondered if I had done that to others. At that moment, I absolutely knew that I had. From there on, I tried to start listening with my heart, which essentially is just being as open-minded as you possibly can. Listening without, or with limited, judgment. It helps make way for real understanding. Just so ya know, this too proved tricky at first. I'm fortunate enough that I had people who kept me as friends as they helped me find my way through. It's been a slow process, to say the least. I've argued against things pretty hard in the last several years that I 100% know better about today. Listening with my heart, through love, and empathy has taught me so much more about myself than I ever imagined it could. All the while it opened my eyes and my heart to the plight of a lot of other people. I don't shut those people down immediately like I used to. It's easier for me to decipher the importance of their message without getting so hung up semantics and wording. That seems to a huge thing with a lot of people. If I asked you to listen with your heart, like really listen, without judgment, could you? Do you sincerely believe that you'd be capable of it? Because it's hard. It's like one of the hardest things you'll ever really learn to do. And I believe it is a learned behavior. It was for me at least, learned, and hard to do. I'm still nowhere close to absolute in this area, but the growth I've accrued from the practice and patience I've given to this is hands down the most rewarding, satisfying, and fulfilling parts of my journey so far. I encourage you all to try and listen with your hearts. Listen, as open-mindedly as you possibly can, to someone who you tend to feel as opposition. Hear the underlying tones of what they're trying to convey. And never respond. Don't even tell anyone you're doing it at first. Take a few steps into listening with your heart and see how it feels. See if what I'm saying makes sense. There will be times where what you're hearing is still 180 degrees off from your true north, but keep trying to understand without condemning, without judging, or getting hung up on parts of the whole. Sometimes you won't be able to see through certain messages, and from certain persons and that's ok. Just keep trying until one finally hits you. From there, if you're anything like me, it'll snowball, until it's near impossible to not feel them coming through their words. You can still disagree completely. It's not a prerequisite for understanding another side, that you all of the sudden change your mind or you're heart, but having that better understanding of their side makes communication a 1000 times better and smoother. Arguing to argue is pointless and stupid. Win hearts by actually communicating and find common ground, middle ground, and we will find comprised solutions. It's not rocket science. It's listening with your heart. 3rd ♡ Phase is wearing that same heart on your sleeve; Trust me when I say that wearing your heart on your sleeve can be exhausting at times, but it gets easier the longer you do it. The longer you do it the freer you become. There's nothing like knowing that I don't have to meet anyone's preconceived notions of who they think I should be. My definition of what makes man may vary from yours. I can tell other men I love them, without fear of feeling less than. I can push for kindness, compassion, sensitivity, and civility across the board, and still, be able to hit someone in the mouth if it ever came to that. But it probably won't. I don't have to prove anything to anyone. I can just wear my heart loud and proud and fuck what you heard, think, or believe if it makes you think less of me. I work hard every day. I take care of my family and I probably look more like those who oppose my views than not. What do you think makes a man a man? For me, above all else, it's being a good person, a good human, and treating others, not just some but all other people the way I'd want them to treat each other. Also, I can sing along with Manic Monday by The Bangles surrounded by anyone, any time, anywhere, and loud. ~"I wish it was Sunday,   'Cause that's my fun day   My, I don't have to run day,   Its just another manic Monday '~ I had other components, several smaller components that made this formula personal to me. As would/will anyone who can truly subscribe to this way of life. The number one thing, as luck would have it, was that my first granddaughter was born during the early stages of my transitioning and I became a Pawpaw. It changed everything. My grandchildren continue to be a positive driving force and a daily reminder of who I am now, and why I do what I do, without their even knowing it. With my heart laid wide open, those little vulnerable people give me pause enough to reflect on how I failed my kids, their parents, when they, themselves, were little. In my attempts to amend my relationships with my kids, I made a promise to always do my very best to promote through love and understanding all that I should have shown them, but can now, show them all, kids, and grandkids alike. My kids see the change I'm living. Just ask any of them, and as for my grandchildren, they will never know any other version of me than the one that walks this fucking walk every fucking day, inside and outside of this blog, for the rest of my life. I guess that's it. Remember that is more than one way out, if you really want it, you will find what fits you. The 3 Heart Phases Formula may not be for everyone, but its what I needed, when I needed it. Keep sharing the love and laughter with the world around you, and always, always try and be kind to one another. At the very, very least be civil. Life Goals - Win Hearts, Be Kind, and Stay Grateful, and not necessarily in that order. lol Until next week; "Well, in Whoville they say – that *[his] small heart grew three sizes that day." - from the *[Grinch] Who stole Christmas.

[sashagilljournalist]

Adventures in Sourdough: The Starter

A renaissance is afoot. Social media is inundated with pictures of crusty loaves boasting burnished crackly tops, with cross-sections flaunting that well-sought-after ‘open crumb’. The millennial vice that is avocado toast has been given a makeover—avocados now sit on top of homemade, salt-of-the-earth-type fermented bread. In case you’ve been living under a rock, here is the TLDR: sourdough is the new black.

With seemingly nothing worthwhile to occupy our time with, humanity has turned to old-school bread making as the antidote to our collective boredom. Now that supermarket shelves are devoid of any form of active dry yeast, what better time to try your hand at making bread with the wild sort?

Sourdough might sound intimidating, slightly archaic even. If social media has not already won you over, I am here to make a case for it. There is a certain kind of magic that is found in building a rustic loaf out of nothing but flour, water, and time. Since we appear to have ample amounts of time on our hands (less true for flour, I’ll give you that), invest a fraction of it in some wild fermentation. You’re in for a wild time.

Over the next few weeks, we are going to get into the nitty-gritty of all things sourdough. But with all great adventures, we must begin with a disclaimer: you will develop an emotional attachment to your starter; other members of your household might resent you for keeping a jar of twangy, bubbly dough on the kitchen countertop; and it is going to take time. Sourdough involves saint-like volumes of patience, but I’ll make you a promise: it will be worth it. After all, Rome wasn’t built in a day.

Sourdough is a living thing. If you have ever made bread, you might have watched in rapturous wonder as your solid lump of dough balloons out into a pillowy mound. Modern-day bread-making often relies on those sachets of dried yeast (RIP) to inoculate your dough with the living organism that gives your bread that rise. But before yeast was domesticated, bakers relied on capturing wild yeast to bring life into the loaf.

In order to harness the power of wild yeast and begin your sourdough journey, you will need to make a starter. This is simply a mixture of flour and water, left to languish somewhere warm, to let the wild yeast in the flour do its thing. The starter requires daily feeding, but it is an otherwise agreeable pet. It will take about five to seven days to get a truly bubbly, vibrant starter. And while that might seem like forever in our age of instant gratification, a starter is a gift that keeps on giving. Keep your starter happy and it might even outlive you. You could be cultivating your next family heirloom, and I will take the makings of a good loaf of bread over an old rusty bit of jewellery, any day.

Building blocks of a starter

The formula to a starter couldn’t be simpler: an equal weight of both flour and water. You can use any type of flour you have on hand, I tend to stick with the plain sort. Wild yeast, ever the hippies of the bread scene, prefer whole wheat. So, if you are looking to kick-start your fermentation, try a 50-50 mix of plain and whole wheat.

But yeast can be pickier when it comes to water. The chlorine in tap water can stunt its growth, or even kill it. Just use bottled or filtered water, and you’re golden. It is time to whip out that Brita filter.

You will need to find a good home for your starter: a clean jar that allows enough room for growth, and somewhere warm. I am writing this in the suffocating humidity of Singapore, so finding somewhere warm was a doddle for me. But if you are reading this from somewhere cooler (lucky you), I have always found that storing my starter on top of my fridge, where the surface of it feels the warmest, is enough for my starter to get going. But if you are partial to getting snuggly under a blanket in front of Netflix, I am sure the starter will welcome a cuddle.

Beginning a starter

Weigh out 50g of flour (25g each of plain and whole-wheat is great for getting a starter going) and 50g of filtered water at room temperature. Pour them out into your clean jar, and give it a stir until all the lumps disappear and a thick, shaggy paste forms. Loosely cover it with the lid. Do not screw it on, or the lid might ping off rather dramatically as your yeast lets out air. Leave it in a warm place for 24 hours.

After a day, you might notice little bubbles studded across the starter. The paste itself will have loosened, and might have even developed a thin striation of clear liquid. This liquid is the hooch that the yeast has produced, and yes, it is slightly alcoholic. But I trust that the alcohol-supply situation has not gotten so dire as to necessitate you drinking this. You can pour this off since hooch is ‘wasted energy’, but I like to keep it in when I stir to add an extra boost to flavour. For those who don’t drink, don’t worry, the final bread you make will not be alcoholic.

So, give it a stir, and pour out half of it. You could just chuck it down the bin, but in this time of making the most of what we’ve got, I recommend you find something to do with it. The internet is saturated with weird and wonderful ideas on how you can employ this excess starter, and we will discuss some of my favourite uses for this bit of spare dough in a later instalment.

Feed the starter again with 50g each of water and flour, stir, and let it rest. On the third day, you will likely see a lot more bubbles, and a whiff of it might invoke memories of yogurt or some twangy pickle. You’re on the way to flavour city. All the same, stir well, discard half, and refuel it with 50g of flour and water.

Feed, sleep, repeat. Keep this going every day and by the fifth to seventh day, your starter will be pockmarked with huge bubbles, nearly doubling in size with each feed. It is flourishing! It is thriving! It might take you slightly longer to get to this stage if your kitchen runs a little cooler, but with regular feeds and a warm enough environment, your starter will slowly come to life.

When your starter is regularly doubling in size about 12 hours after each feed, and is frothy and funky, it is ready for bread-making. Watch this space for part two, where we will discuss how to transform your starter into a truly magnificent sourdough.

Kick-starting a starter

For the slapdash cook, you have not been forgotten. If you feel you do not possess the diligence or patience required of a starter, there is a fast-track. I am not all too sure what sourdough purist will think so if you are a traditionalist: avert your eyes!

Wild yeast can also be found on the surface of fruit, fresh or dried. I have recently been made my starter out of about a quarter cup of raisins, left to steep in 50g of water. Give it a swirl, and you will notice the water turning cloudy. This, my friends, is the yeast. Scoop out the raisins (and chuck them into your morning porridge), and add in the 50g of flour. Continue feeding the starter as instructed, but you will find that the starter comes alive much sooner.

I haven’t tried this with other fruit, but I trust that it will yield similar results.

Name your starter

An unspoken rule of sourdough club is to name your starter. An unnamed starter feels neglected, and might not reward you as generously. This is a scientific fact.

You can go for the literal (‘Yeasty’, or ‘Sour Mama’), the endearing (‘Shirley’ or ‘Bartholomew’), or the plain ol’ weird and whacky. For me, it was a toss-up between Avril Levain and Clint Yeastwood. My affection for a good pun knows no bounds.

Go forth and have a go at rearing your very own sourdough starter. If you’re feeling terrifically lonely in social isolation, there is hope! A DMC with Avril Levain has always left me with a warm, fuzzy feeling. Check back in a week for the low down on how to work more sourdough alchemy.

Image Credit: The Pizza Bike, Flickr Creative Commons

[malenudism]

List of top and lows reasons regarding gay scene

The highs and lows of Performing as being a renowned gay porn star

From men, dollars and fame, to battling a drug habit and going off intercourse once and for all, Jonathan Agassi talks about his existence inside the porn business

During the documentary JONATHAN AGASSI SAVED MY Existence, director Tomer Heymann follows the Israeli gay porn star Jonathan Agassi from his first audition to the end of his on-camera job, which was prematurely introduced into a halt by a serious drug habit. The movie appears with the perks of staying a porn and Are living intercourse display performer (journey, cash, hot fellas), Agassi’s heartbreaking partnership with his mom And the way the intercourse field will take its toll on your emotions. Beneath, we interviewed Agassi about what he learnt from Doing work in the gay porn business enterprise for seven very long several years and around 67 porn movies.

I started out porn in 2008. Ahead of that I worked as being a make-up artist and hair stylist, but I used to be trying to find another thing to complete. Porn always truly energized me but not just in the sexual way, I guess you could say I had been an exhibitionist. You can find not surprisingly a lot of tips on how to be famed, but I was a 23-yr-outdated male, I seemed genuinely excellent, all my partners normally mentioned I previously understood The work, so every little thing was introducing up. I started off browsing porn internet sites and sending emails out to all of the mainstream organizations after which you can I bought a split. That’s how it started.

The main film I did was termed Men of Israel, by gay porn pictures the American producer Michael Lucas. He’s the just one I labored for across my entire vocation. He needed to make a movie about Israeli guys, and I had been living near Tel Aviv at time, in Holon. I bought an audition, initial as a result of Skype. I had to indicate what I could do. So I took a 25cm dildo and started showing off with it for the camera. That received me a next audition, which was filmed. The business that I was Functioning for, they had a series of films with fellas that arrive for the first time to shoot porn. They have got a small job interview very first – they inquire the guy, “why do you want to try and do porn?” or “what’s occurring in your lifetime?’’ – and after that growth, you've intercourse.

It came very By natural means to me, While I took an injection to ensure I could continue to be tricky (which was the first market magic formula I learned). I assume they appreciated me, for the reason that I acquired The work. I think they were being on the lookout for, For starters, a huge dick, after which attributes in sexual intercourse, what you are able to do; you'll need to be able to give deep throat, you should enjoy cum, and you need to be incredibly open sexually. It’s one among just a few things that they desire of you being a porn actor, often. It’s like, you won’t take a daily actor if he doesn’t know how to act.

The audition tape was launched like a preview to Males of Israel. The film by itself was shot in Jerusalem. Most people in the movie was pretty new to porn so shooting in community places was really tense, you have to look for a tranquil location and when an individual arrives by, that’s the tip of you. It had been an exceedingly thrilling, Everyone was a little anxious, specially when we went to shoot at the Useless Sea. I don't forget after we all took a generation bus for the locations it was like we ended up heading sight-observing, not to shoot porn. It was amusing.

Just after it finished, I felt similar to a superstar. I signed an distinctive deal With all the generation corporation. I utilized to shoot possibly three films per month. We were being taking pictures all over the place; Italy, Germany, Spain. But in Wintertime time we did it much less, so then my income was based far more on escorting and Dwell intercourse displays. A single time, I was invited to Thailand just for two evenings to come and jerk off on stage. It pays really well and it’s genuinely entertaining and you will get to get in the ideal hotels and fulfill new porn actors from all over the planet. Reside exhibits were being actually The most entertaining portions of my profession, I cherished them.

Functioning in porn I designed a lot of cash, but that’s not to say it wasn’t hard work. You travel a good deal and also you’re around the set for several hours. You give to The complete output about 10 several hours in per day, from time to time fourteen. When you have fantastic chemistry with all your companion, in some cases you’re finished in 5. There are occasions when I managed to movie three scenes in on a daily basis, or we’d complete quite fast simply because anything was excellent so then we explained, “you really know what? Allow’s make An additional scene, a fetish scene”. When there is no chemistry the scene will just take several hours and Then you definately don’t even say goodbye, you’re similar to, “allow me to go to sleep!”

Having said that, I think the most important shock for me Doing work porn was just how great everyone was. The treatment method that you simply get is magnificent. You have a makeup artist, you receive a hair stylist, great food stuff, flights. You can get handled like a supermodel. Once i applied to observe porn After i was 18 or 19, I utilized to think that the driving the scenes was the thing I wanted to see over the porn since I loved to view all of the boys fooling close to inside the pool and every little thing. I believed maybe it had been directed, but then After i started executing porn, I realised that it truly is like that. In my knowledge, the producers were also truly sensitive to how you wanted to get it done. I used to be generally multipurpose, there are several actors which have been just a top rated or simply a base. Usually, they usually talk to you, “what’s your preference?” And when you are doing bareback – which I only did at the time at the end of my vocation, Once i was virtually a junkie and carrying out it in my personal lifetime in any case – they designed guaranteed they checked everyone with blood assessments, and whoever is beneficial goes with positives, whoever is unfavorable goes with negatives. Today The good thing is We have now PrEP, but back then they manufactured certain you bought connected to your associate that is of the same standing.

“At some point, later on in my vocation, the sexual intercourse became very mechanical. Getting intercourse a great deal of of time was exhausting, it can really ruin your soul” – Jonathan Agassi

I loved the sex for some of my vocation. I got to fulfill myself, mainly because sexually I was really, pretty open-minded. In the beginning it had been often terrific, I was always incredibly determined and enthusiastic to test all the things. I constantly provided to provide extra of myself. But that’s constantly what it’s like when You begin a completely new work which you really like. Then, obviously, following three or four several years it just gets Like every work. You awaken in the morning and also you say, “Oh I need to clean my ass yet again, I have to inject yet again, I need to take viagra once again”. In some unspecified time in the future, later on, the sexual intercourse grew to become really mechanical. Possessing sexual intercourse much of the time was exhausting, it can definitely spoil your soul. And out of doors of labor, you’re constantly speculated to fill some purpose simply because “you are a porn star, so fuck me similar to a porn star” and from time to time you don’t need to fuck like a porn star. I’m nonetheless not recovered from that. Up to now three several years I'm able to count on one particular hand the periods I’ve experienced sexual intercourse And that i don’t have any relationship apps.

It's possible I just had an excessive amount of all the things. I'd many freedom, I had some huge cash, I moved to Berlin, which is a really sexual metropolis, especially for porn stars and for gays. To start with, I by no means took drugs, and then I commenced at weekends and it received Increasingly more. GHB and crystal meth. It turned day-to-day, 24/7, for five years.

My strategy was to try and do porn until 35, then I normally mentioned I'd personally open up a output company. That was my dream. But I stopped porn at 30, five years before my approach. It wasn’t something which I needed to do, to Stop, but I got so hooked on the medicines which i shed my figure, my deal with was extremely skinny, And that i did irrational points, I turned incredibly tattooed and obtained huge piercings almost everywhere. The company which i worked for didn’t want me anymore. Following that I ongoing to try and do the intercourse exhibits and escorting nonetheless it was not the exact same any longer... anything had altered. I used to be an addict.

At my least expensive, I utilized to take in as soon as per week, and rest after every week – not even for an evening but for Regardless of the Xanax gave me: 3, maybe four hours. My file was eleven times which i didn’t rest and didn’t try to eat and did nothing, just fucking, fucking, fucking, accomplishing medications and using clientele, taking the money and accomplishing medicine. It went on like that until I obtained to some breaking position. The director producing the documentary about me was with me and I was collapsing and he reported, “Jonathan, I’m sending you back again to Israel now”. I went house, and which was your best option which i’ve at any time produced. I finished working in porn and sex function correct then.

“Nowadays, my everyday living is incredibly diverse. I do the job in the 24/7 mini sector” – Jonathan Agassi

I haven’t done porn or escorting or taken medications for 5 years. These days, my lifestyle is rather unique. I operate in a very 24/7 mini market place. Firstly, I usually acquired recognised, since I operate in a very central and really gay area in Tel Aviv. It had been quite challenging but many people that know me in Israel also know the story, that I bought into medicine, that I experienced a tough journey. But once they saw me in the kiosk they might say, in a very disrespectful way, “What! Jonathan Agassi! Exactly what are you executing listed here?” It had been difficult to tackle the judgemental people today, but I began to reply in an incredibly smiley way: “Yeah, This is often what I’m undertaking now, appear visit me! How persistently do you have to begin to see the one that you used to jerk off to within a kiosk?”

To be sincere, I’m in an awesome spot now in my lifetime, I’m Functioning in a spot that I really love and I have this documentary. Naturally, when we commenced taking pictures the film, I required it to get a happy Film about an Israeli gay dude who was rejected in high school and became among the largest porn stars on this planet. I’d be travelling. Producing heaps of money. Everybody jerking off for me. Then, daily life arrived along and almost everything began to tumble down, all the things started to crack. I didn’t want the film being Bogus, a movie that displays everything as good and when, basically, it wasn’t wonderful, it was a nightmare.

The title is extremely ironic, very cynical: “Jonathan Agassi Saved My Lifetime”. The identify came from an interview which i gave about ten several years ago when I first adjusted my name. I said: “This impression, this Jonathan Agassi person, he saved my everyday living because otherwise I would be so monotonous and I would even now make tiny small dollars, never ever vacation the entire world and also have hardly any good friends.” I suppose in some ways he did help you save my everyday living, but in many other techniques, he didn’t.