#which is fucking bizarre since the series spends so much time exploring how no one should have to make these decisions

[silent-partner-412]

i just finished the pikmin 4 demo. i did everything there is to do, which it turns out is an entire area’s worth of content?? jesus christ i did not expect to spend my whole evening on this but i’m not exactly complaining either because there was a LOT to dig into. i’m gonna spoil it rotten so read at your own risk but wow there’s a lot of stuff i wanna gush about.

so far this game looks fucking incredible lol. the worst part was the very beginning which dragged a lot and took significantly longer to enter you into the gameplay loop compared to any of the previous games, but otherwise? i had an absolute blast. the new overworld is absolutely gorgeous, and there’s a ton to explore and interact with even in the overworld. the caves from pikmin 2 return, this time with actual level design though! and i enjoyed every single one of them, and there were like five in this demo which is more than i expected (to be fair they all only had two floors but still). what i didn’t expect was that there are special types of caves which replicate the side modes from pikmin 3??? i was so sad because i thought mission mode, one of the best aspects of pikmin 3 and pikmin in general, was removed from the game but NOPE! here it is as a special type of cave. and it was so fun, i had to retry it like four times to get platinum and i wouldn’t have it any other way. they also brought back bingo battle minus the bingo for the other special cave type which i also enjoyed but not quite as much.

the new ice pikmin were super fun to play around with (USEFUL too, it’s nice to see them have some combat utility that isn’t just big damage good), also the broader mechanical differences were largely successes imo. like, the fact that you can move your base is so great, it’s something i never even would’ve considered but changes the gameplay loop entirely. there’s a new collectible that increases the amount of pikmin you can bring into the field, which is interesting. they restrict you to only having three types of pikmin in the field at a time, which will probably cut down on a lot of tedium since there’s gonna be like nine types in this game?? jesus christ. the new dog is actually really fun to use, way more than i ever expected! once again it’s interesting to have new utility tools at your disposal, though it is wild that he basically gives you access to a jump which fundamentally changes how these levels can be designed. they turned onions into a collectible so that you can only let pikmin reproduce if you find their onion. but you can still find pikmin to use in caves even without their onion; the ice pikmin onion for example isn’t even in this demo but you can still find dozens in the caves.

also the story is kinda fucked up?? i don’t wanna spoil it but it goes in a weird fucking direction compared to the other three games and i’m very much interested to see more. also it’s interesting for them to introduce actual npcs into the game, which once again i’m not complaining about but it still is very bizarre for this series.

all in all i cannot wait for the full release later this month. it seems like it’ll be more pikmin 2 length than pikmin 1 or 3 which i am absolutely thrilled about since every minute of this demo (once you get out of tutorial mode) was an absolute delight. it’s been ten years since pikmin 3 came out, a game i first played when it was new when i was like 11. but it seems like this is going to be worth the wait, and i could not be happier.

[dolokhoded]

hii this is the-reynolds-pamphlet (this is my main and i cant get rid of it LMAO im not active on here)

re what you said about the s4 pacing. LITERALLY i wrote that whole other post as an answer to another ask i got about how the chosen's storyline really sucks in some aspects and i said the pacing is going to be incredibly off for season 4

okay first of all. there's a huge timeline issue in season 3 concerning the holidays and how much time passes since season 1, i was gonna make a whole other post about all the timeline inconsistencies but i didnt get around to doing it (i probably should). but like at this point it has been one year minimum since s1, realistically it should be three years if the end of season 4 is palm sunday. then like ??? theyre gonna spend the entirety of s5 on ONE week? and for fucking what. i thought they wanted a "bingeable" proper show with pacing and everything, why would they zero in on that

but anyways about ramah. first of all im 99% sure it's because her actress has schedule conflicts and likely wants to drop out of the show (that's why she mysteriously left to go talk to her dad in season 3). but also it's kind of obvious that they're using her death as character development for thomas for the rest of the series (which is gonna be like 2 weeks maximum over 3 seasons anyway. unless they continue onto acts but that poses another huge pacing problem.) which is pissing me off like?? i had the same reaction when tamar was acting weird for like one (1) episode and then she told mary everything and just left. why would you not give them proper character development established over a long period of time and just confine it to singular episodes like that. im pretty sure tamar's backstory won't be brought up again lmao. also ramah doesn't really have much of a personality (which sucks because i got the impression she was a bit of a rich daddy's girl and there was potential for character exploration) and her character hasn't even been that established so like... partially it's easy to kill her but on the other hand, it isn't as emotional especially bc she wasn't even here the last season.

also remember how in the other post i was like why are they literally giving consistent character arcs and emotional plot for matthew, mary, simon & eden, and james & john but theyre basically forgetting everybody else exists. yeah like james just fucking launches himself at someone and gets knocked out in season 4 which is great but how long are they going to be just keep throwing new arcs for the main cast and keep ignoring thaddeus' existence. btw i watched a clip of That Scene in s4 (i didnt realize what it was when i was watching it lmao) with thaddeus and james and they're basically asking jesus why he's talking about dying. so thaddeus stays personalityless while big james is over there getting concussions #maincharacter. im not saying that scene w/jesus isnt necessary but im saying its thad's big scene and it is once again about Not thaddeus

this entire thing is incredibly bizarre to me because they COULDVE made an actual show with fleshed out characters and everything ??? they confined themselves to 8 1-hour long episodes per season, which of course restricts how much storytelling they can do while keeping in all the major gospel events they need to put in. but like first of all they couldve Not Done that. i think their audience wouldve gone insane for more episodes. second of all, if they WERENT gonna carry on character arcs and give everyone a fleshed out character then why did they introduce them as such??? i mean it was probably because they wanted to spark interest and then just forget about it but that kind of sucks. why did they do this lmao they literally had the opportunity to make it better

ok v rushed reply cause i have to go to the library the bus is coming in 15 minutes which means all the law students are leaving which means empty spaces BUT

you're so right the chosen's timeline is fucked up atp i can't really tell when it's been a day or a week or like. a couple months it's. i dont understand what theyre doing and why theyre doing it like this. cause like. even the characters who do have decent arcs like matthew and simon peter and james and john are not being developed properly cause the timing is so goddamn off. and i Know that in this new season they're gonna try to make john like Rise Above and start to kind of live up to his name as the favorite and have more understanding of jesus' teachings while james doesn't which is very stupid to me cause like. When. i think it was last season that this guy was bragging about getting to plough a field. how are they going to have john transition into one of the most competent disciples just. doesnt make sense.

and ALSO !!!! the reason all of these arcs are being so rushed is because they never get a break because as you mentioned literally nobody else gets any character developement. i wanna see more of thad. and little james. and nathanael while we're at it, and zee, and philip, and mary and tamar's friendship. why are they just throwing shit in there and never expand on it at all, unless you're thaddeus, in which case you don't even get that.

also i have a.,., suspicion, kind of, on where they're going with big james, and i can't be entirely sure, i'm not saying i'm correct, but just in case. Leave Tamar Alone ! i'm begging you ! dallas ! leave tamar alone ! not every single one of your female characters needs a romantic subplot ! i know big james is pretty and you want to give him a love interest so the repressed christian women in your audience keep watching your show, i see him, but for the love of christ actually ! leave tamar alone ! i know that if this happens you're only going to utilize her character for romance LEAVE TAMAR ALONE !!!!

[radramblog]

Linkin Park Retrospective, Part 1.

Sup I’m still a Linkin Park fan in 2021 and if you judge me for it then yeah that’s probably fair

Linkin Park is one of those bands where the eternal debate rages about when exactly they stopped being good. As someone who got into them late, in 2009ish, when the days of Nu-Metal were long-dead and most people had dropped off the LP train, I tend to put this a fair bit later than most people, but unfortunately, they did eventually get bad. Join me on this series, then, where I’m going to go through their 7 albums individually and discuss the merits of each in turn.

Hybrid Theory

The original, and to some, the best. I’ll never truly be able to understand what it was like when this album dropped and changed a genre completely, seeing as I was about a year and a half old when it happened. Listening through it now, I can kinda see why, as I think it still holds up even 20 odd years later. From the beginning it’s clear why Linkin Park exploded the way they did, as they had a few factors that made them stand out from the crowd of Nu-Metal- a few bands I’ve seen mistakenly (imo) labelled as a part of the genre, such as System of a Down, do compare, but nothing I can think of that is actually in there really does.

The first is a bit basic and probably biased, but the songs on Hybrid Theory are just better written than most others in the genre. Both lyrically and sonically- the hooks are great, the guitarwork is solid, and the percussion is punchy, especially on songs like Points of Authority and By Myself. I think this ties in with the second point- the DJ work by Joe Hahn does a lot of work to carry some of this early work, with the record-scratching never being noticeable but never overbearing, save of course for the track Cure for the Itch, which is pretty much just Hahn showing off for 2 and a half minutes.

I am, of course, beating around the bush a little, seeing as I’m leaving the most salient point to last. What Linkin Park really had that no one else did is the combination of the two vocalists- the call and response of Mike’s rapping and Chester’s singing/yelling is the magic formula that makes these songs work. It’s to the point where tunes where the formula is broken, such as Runaway, where Chester handles both lyrics and chorus, leaving Mike to the backing vocals, feel notable for that alone, although the trend they would set would eventually dominate some of the band’s later work.

If I had to rank it, though, I’d probably put Hybrid Theory lower than most people would relative to the band’s later work. Most of that is bias towards said later work, but there’s a little more there, and it’s not all Linkin Park’s fault. To me, Runaway sounds like what someone who’s not a fan of the band assumes all their music sounds like, being the dullest variation on the themes of the album, and a bridge that just feels like a waste of time. And I genuinely have a hard time listening to Crawling these days, considering how the track was memed into oblivion back in the day- In the End is similar, but gets a better rap seeing as its just a better song. (In the End is actually kind of genius, in my opinion, and that piano line and all the little distortions to Mike’s verses are burned into my brain.) I kind of wish some of the B-sides/Rough cuts from that era were on the album instead- while My December is pretty wank, High Voltage and Step Up absolutely deserve premiere status.

 Meteora

Meteora is not my favourite Linkin Park album, and again, we’ll get to that, but I might be tempted to argue it’s the best one. It takes everything that made Hybrid Theory good and refines it, producing a stock that does what the first album did better and doing experimentation that would later be characteristic of the band. The raw emotion from Hybrid Theory’s lyrics still remains, but the variation in instrumentation lets it be explored a little better than that album manages to.

Track-by-track on Meteora is probably an actual worthwhile endeavour, unlike with Hybrid Theory. While HT is a great album, there’s only so much you can say about With You into Points of Authority into Crawling into Runaway into…. You get the point. Meteora doesn’t spend as long on the same theme- while the first few tracks (excluding the Foreword) superficially resemble that, the tracks feel more different, from Somewhere I Belong’s softer verses that really struck a chord with a younger more awkward Raderph to the downright sinister opening to Lying from You. I actively adore the chorus to Hit the Floor, over the top screaming and all. With all that said, I think it takes until Faint for the album to really hit its stride.

Faint comes in out of nowhere with that bizarre strings/electronic line that carries through the verses and sounds like nothing I’ve heard before or since. The rest of the song is largely just a very solid example of everything else the band has been doing up until that point, but the verses, between the aforementioned line and Mike pretty clearly giving his all on this one, are just excellent. After Faint comes Figure.09, and while it certainly has an interesting name it doesn’t get to stand out seeing as its surrounded by Faint and the best song on the album.

Breaking the Habit was my favourite song for a long time, and it genuinely still might be. A more electronic song on the album, cutting back on the intensity of the instrumentation and letting Chester’s vocals shine through- but he’s not doing any screaming until the bridge, with the more tragic and self-loathing vocals making a song that apparently was real enough for him that he actually broke down at live shows about it. Even when we get to the bridge, the screaming is more pared down than the rest of the album, clearer, more representative of the clarity and self-acceptance of the end of the song. I could go on, but I probably won’t have time, so I’ll leave Breaking the Habit there, but I recommend watching the music video because that is some anime shit right there.

Much like Figure.09, From the Inside suffers from its placement, but I think the build of the song is worth a mention. After it, though, comes Nobody’s Listening, with some of the grittiest instrumentation the album has in its chorus, but given an airy vibe by the flute (?) running through it and the verses. The verses are actually probably my favourite of Mike’s on the record, complemented excellently by the more sparse instrumentation- he’s doing a lot on his own there, supported by only a basic drum machine line, that flute going off, and Hahn fucking around with some effects and shit (wait was that a cowbell). It sounds almost dirty, grimy, and I love it for it.

Beyond that we have again, a track sandwiched between two great songs, but in this case Session doesn’t suffer as much, being an instrumental interlude, followed by the album’s closer, Numb. Numb is, according to Spotify, Linkin Park’s second most popular song, behind In the End but followed by Numb/Encore from the Jay-Z collab album (its better than it sounds), and it’s a well-earned title. I think it’s probably better than any of the singles on Hybrid Theory, In the End included, and while it is a fair bit Mike-Light (in bottleshops near you now), I think it serves as the perfect closer to this album and this era of the band.Numb was the last song that would sound like this, as the band moved onto bigger (ehhh..?) and better (haha no) things with the third album, Minutes to Midnight.

Next time whenever I continue this series: Minutes to Midnight and maybe A Thousand Suns, but I kinda want to spend more time on the latter, so we’ll see.

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

[graffiti]

Day 12: Unrequited Love #twdgdrabblechallenge

Note: I know I’m writing about Mitch a lot but like... I can’t stop. 

AO3

---

“Dude, think you could get off your ass and help me for once?”

Mitch glances up from his comic, thumb marking his place, saying, “Nope.”

That gets him a middle finger. 

“This is your room, too, asshole.”

“My side is clean.”

“Bullshit,” Justin scoffs, eyeing the absolute mess occupying the floor, bed, and desk on Mitch’s side. “I’m not picking up your shit.”

“Then don’t,” Mitch rolls his eyes, returning to finish the page of his comic only for it to be ripped from his grip. “Hey!”

Justin tosses the comic on to the desk where it proceeds to slide off and onto the floor all while he begins scooping up a pile of Mitch’s dirty laundry. 

He then dumps that load right on top of him.

“Seriously?!” Mitch balls up a pair of jeans and chucks it as hard as he can at Justin’s head, smacking him in the side of his face. 

“I’m not fucking around, Mitch! Pick up your shit!”

Something’s off about him today. Usually, he’s just as messy as Mitch is, leaving dirty laundry on the floor, piling books up on his desk, leaving trinkets and weapons anywhere they land. Now he’s zigzagging around the room like a maniac trying to tidy up the place. 

Shit, maybe Ruby cornered him and threatened to break in and clean their room herself again. She’s a brave one to even consider that again, given that she stumbled across some dirty stuff last time. 

Justin better hide his nasty ass porn better this time because Mitch isn’t taking the fall for that one again. One lecture from a flustered Ruby would’ve been whatever, but now he’s got Marlon and some of the other guys asking for his “secret stash” and it’s fucking annoying. 

Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, Mitch watches Justin pull a box out from under his bed and dump the contents out. Yep, there’s the porn and some other books and boxes that he begins to sort through. 

“You want any of this?” Justin asks. “If not, I’m gonna toss it.”

“You’re gonna toss your mags?” 

“Well, not those,” Justin replies, snatching up the disgusting material and tucking them back in the box, “but these I will.” 

He hands him some books; two that are apart of some sci-fi series that looks pretty killer, one all about different insects, a bible, and a book on birds. 

“The bug one’s pretty cool,” Justin says. “There’s a whole chapter on spiders that can catch birds out of trees and eat them.”

Mitch wasn’t ever one for bugs. They’re gross and terrifying.

Birds, however, he does like. 

He keeps the two sci-fi novels and the bird book, tossing the bible and bug book back over. He pretends to flip through the bird book and admire the colored photos occupying the page, but his focus is mostly on the determination in Justin’s eyes. 

The more he stares, the more he realizes how clean he looks, which is weird. Ever since the walkers came and shit really went downhill, they were forced to bathe in the cold river and after a while, most of them said fuck it to being squeaky clean all the time. 

There is not a single speck of dirt on his sun-kissed face and the dark mess of curls covering his forehead and neck are shiny and fresh. He’s wearing new clothes, too, ones that he doesn’t recognize. 

It’s a good look for him. 

“So, why the sudden freakout?” Mitch tries to ask casually. “Ruby get a hold of you?”

Justing laughs, shaking his head. “Nah, not Ruby. Hey, uh-” he perks up, an almost timid look crossing over his features. “I got a question for you.”

“Shoot.”

“Okay,” Justin grins. “If you could make out with any of the girls here, who would you do?”

Mitch stiffens, nearly dropping the bird book.

“Uh, what?” 

“Any of the girls!” Justin says. “You can choose one to kiss and they have to kiss you back.”

“None of them,” he shrugs, answering honestly. 

“Dude, it’s the end of the fucking world. Now’s not the time to be picky.”

It’s not that he’s picky- well, maybe he is. Thinking about every girl that lives here at Ericson, not a single one jumps out to him as one he wants to kiss. 

“I’d rather fuck a walker.”

Laughter erupts from Justin, and through his chortle, he asks, “Mitch, dude, are you fucking serious? You’d rather fuck an actual dead, decaying walker than any of the girls?”

Yes, because he doesn’t want to kiss any of the girls. At all. 

“No, shithead, it’s gross.”

“Oh, but fucking a walker wouldn’t be?”

“No, that’d be gross, too.”

“C’mon, you can tell me,” Justin pries. “What about Brody? Or Erin, or Violet, or uh, Minnie?”

“Nope.”

“Dude.”

Shit, maybe he’s being too honest. 

That- fuck.

“Uhm, y’know what? Fine,” Mitch adds quickly, causing Justin to smirk. “Any girl?”

“Any girl.” 

The first name that comes to him is Minnie, but he can’t say that, so he says the second. 

“Brody.” 

Justin visibly relaxes, relieved by Mitch's answer. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah, she’s hot.”

God fucking- he couldn’t have sounded any less enthusiastic. 

“Why are you even asking, anyway?” Mitch frowns, scratching nervously at his neck until a patch of redness blooms on the skin. 

Justin smiles excitedly, hopping up on the bed with him, far closer than Mitch would’ve liked. 

“What are you doing tonight?”

The question is simple but it still makes Mitch’s stomach churn in a bizarre way. 

“Uh, I don’t know. Nothing, I guess.”

“You don’t have any plans?”

Mitch’s pulse quickens. 

“Am I supposed to?” 

“No, I just- are you gonna be here?”

“Uh, yeah? Where else would I go to sleep?”

Justin considers this, stuttering out, “Right, no- yeah, right. That was a stupid question.” 

What the fuck is he saying? What is he asking? Why does he look so nervous? Why are Mitch’s palms beginning to sweat? 

“Do you think maybe you could... Uhm-”

Do you think I could maybe what?

“-go sleep somewhere else tonight?”

...What?

“What? Why?” 

“I need the room to myself tonight.”

“Why?” Mitch asks again. 

“I’m having company, okay? So, can you go sleep in Willy’s room tonight? I know he said he wanted to try being alone at night with his own room, which has been great for us not having to deal with him so much, but-”

“Wait, wait-” Mitch interrupts, having not really listened to Justin’s ramblings. “Who the fuck are you bringing here?”

A smile spreads across his full lips and in a sing-song voice, he answers, “Minnie.” 

Minnie? What the fuck- why the fuck is Minnie spending the night in their room? There’s no way in hell she agreed to something like that!

“Why?”

“I’m finally going for it, asshole! God, do I need to explain everything to you?” 

He’s going for it? A lump of panicked dread falls from his throat and soars down into his stomach. 

“I asked her to come here tonight to help me with a ‘secret project,’ right? So, when she gets here, the room’s gonna be super clean and I’m gonna light some candles and then- and then I’m gonna ask her to teach me to dance. Romantic, right?”

Mitch’s mouth goes dry.

"And we’ll be dancing and laughing and shit, and then I’ll go in for the kill and kiss her.”

“Kiss her?”

“Yeah, idiot, listen.” 

“You’re just gonna kiss her? Don’t you have to, like, ask?”

Justin snorts. “Dude, asking isn’t romantic.”

It’s not? 

Well, fuck, not that he knows anything about romance. It’s the one subject Mitch actively refuses to explore. 

Justin continues, “Then, after I give her the kiss of her life, I’ll ask her to be my girlfriend.”

He... he’s really thought this whole thing out. 

He’s had this infatuation with Minnie for weeks now, so he’s had plenty of time to think about. Justin makes it his number one priority to spend as much time with Minnie as he can, always shoving Sophie or Violet out of the way to hog all her attention, or ditching Mitch to do whatever she wanted him to, or constantly making fun of Louis so that Minnie would stop hanging around him. 

He actually went as far as to carve a bunch of nasty shit into Louis’ piano.

Yeah, because that’s the way to get someone’s attention and affection: be an asshole. Mitch may not know shit about this stuff, but somehow, he knows that’s not the right approach.

And Louis was so devastated about that, too...

"And for me to do all that,” Justin points at him, “you need to be gone tonight.” 

No.

No, no, no. 

No. 

It’s out before Mitch can even think, “Dumbass, she doesn’t even like you.” 

Fuck. 

Justin’s taken back by the harshness but returns it what a deep glare. 

“Fuck you, she does like me! She laughs at my jokes and she’s always touching my arm!”

That’s because Minnie’s a touchy person. She touches everyone. Mitch once had to snap at her for constantly trying to touch and fix his hair. 

“Uh-” Mitch panics. “Yeah, but everyone knows that she likes Louis.” 

It’s such a huge ass lie, holy shit, but it’s the first one to come across his mind. 

“Oh, fuck off,” Justin spits. “She does not!”

“Yes, she does, why do you think they’re always hanging out in the music room? Hell, they’re probably making out in there right now.” 

“Louis is the worst, though!”

“Apparently not since Minnie’s sucking face with him instead of you.” 

“Why are you being such an asshole?” Justin snaps, standing from the bed to glare down at him. “They aren’t together! We’d know if they were because Louis is an obnoxious idiot who can’t keep anything to himself.” 

“Y’know what? You’re right!” Mitch stands too, voice growing louder with every word, “we would know if they were together because Minnie’s also an attention whore and wouldn’t miss an opportunity-”

Justin shoves him, Mitch’s back hitting the top bunk of the bed, his head bouncing off the bar. Justin’s fists remain tangled in the collar, and he’s close, right up in Mitch’s face. 

"What’s your problem?” 

His problem? 

Fuck, he... he doesn’t even know! 

All he can focus on is how Justin’s nose is almost touching his. 

Mitch pushes him back hard enough for him to trip over a book and crash against the ground. 

“Ow! Fuck!” 

Mitch still, staring down at the wincing boy with wide eyes where he’s met with a glare. 

They don’t say anything, so Mitch bends down to grab the bird book and his bag. Without a word, Mitch quickly shoves some clothes into it and leaves, clutching the book against his chest, the pounding of his heart hot, rapid and deafening.  

Some of the others are walking around, and when he passes by the music room, he can hear Minnie singing and Louis’ playing. Someone- Violet, he thinks- makes a comment about the song, but Mitch doesn’t pay much attention. He considers joining them and warning Minnie about what she’s walking into tonight, but doesn’t. 

Let Justin make a fucking fool of himself. 

Fuck him, anyway. 

He’s...

Mitch turns down the hall right outside the music room and drops his bag. 

With his trusty pocket knife in hand, Mitch begins to carve.

JUSTIN FUCKED A WALKER

 He spends the rest of the afternoon making sure that no matter what hallway you’re in, this information is known. 

[knifeonmars]

Capsule Reviews - May 2020 - The Cape Stuff

I read a lot of comics in May. Here’s what I thought of some of the superhero and superhero-adjacent comics I read.

Arms of the Octopus

A nostalgia pick, the collection of several annual issues containing a crossover between Superior Spider-Man, The Invincible Hulk, and the All-New X-Men. It is an artifact of a very specific and bizarre time in Marvel Comics, when Doc Ock was Spider-Man, the Hulk worked for SHIELD, and the original five teen X-Men were stranded in their own future. For a pure, relatively straightforward crossover romp, it's quite enjoyable. Spider-Man is a jerk, the Hulk fights a robot, the X-Men are befuddled by the present, all of the major beats for that particular moment in the Marvel Universe are there, and it's got some really great art. Jake Wyatt, during his regrettably short-lived stint with Marvel and the great Kris Anka unfortunately overshadow the other contributors, but it's all very good, if not the most accessible comic.

Maxwell's Demons

I came to Maxwell's Demons having heard a lot of critical buzz and with my expectations set rather high. I did not care for this book at all. Ambitious is the best word for this series, and that's not a bad thing. It's got ideas, about the craft, about the genre, about philosophy in general. It never quite manages to carry things off though; it's not as smart as it wants to be, and the high-minded ideas are never incorporated in particularly elegant ways. Three of the story's five chapters are essentially extended monologues in which the main character rambles on about some glorified shower thought for 20-plus pages. The first and second chapters are the exceptions to this pattern, and are quite solid as far as pointedly derivative superhero riffs go, even if the second chapter's riff on "What if Miracleman #17 was significantly less intelligent" is more than a little shameless in its lack of originality. The fourth chapter, by contrast, is the nadir of the series, easily the most embarrassing Manic Pixie Dream Girl tripe I've seen played straight in literal years. I'm reminded a lot of Translucid, another superhero pastiche, which essentially sought to do for Batman what Maxwell's Demons seeks to do for Lex Luthor. I warmed to Translucid significantly on my second read and I wonder if the same will end up being true for Maxwell's Demons, but I find that Translucid simply did a better job of incorporating original ideas and stating its themes in ways less stupefyingly clunky than Maxwell's Demon's ever manages. I hate to call a book pretentious, especially an ambitious one, but at present that's how I feel about this book.

Twilight

Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Howard Chaykin's Watchmen-for-mid-century-space-heroes epic. It's good. Fabulous art, some really interesting ideas and a great premise. It's also more than a little Chaykin-y, with most of the male characters having fraught but amiable relationships with their much-too-good-for-them-and-they-both-know-it ex-wives. It has this particular brand of low grade misogyny that idealizes women but in doing so denies them interiority and, ultimately, humanity. Leaving that aside, though it is a major point to leave aside, it’s story of humanity rotting over eons of immortality, mad space gods, and humanity’s proclivity towards colonialism and genocide, it's great. It’s not an altogether pleasant book, it can be nasty and strange, in ways both intentional and unintentional, but it’s original and engaging and decidedly well made. Something of an overlooked classic of that era’s DC output.    

Green Lantern: Earth One

Literally the only one of DC's Earth One graphic novels that's worth a damn. Where most of the other Earth One books choose to start things off in a world resembling our own, Green Lantern starts off in a scifi future resembling something along the lines of Ad Astra or The Expanse, with Earth controlled by an only alluded to totalitarian government, humanity colonizing and mining the solar system, and Hal Jordan as a spacefaring roughneck who dreads the prospect of returning to Earth. Earth One is the rare Green Lantern story that manages to make Earth as interesting as the rest of the universe. The bulk of the action leaves this behind to focus on unearth the lost legacy of the Green Lanterns and refits their mythology in a clean way which will be unsurprising for anyone with a passing familiarity with the original comics but is still satisfying ad fresh. Fabulous art, fun take on the mythology, I'm left both wanting more and being satisfied with what we got.

Spider-Man: Life Story

In a just world, Chip Zdarksy, one of Marvel’s best writers these days, would be writing both Spider-Man and Fantastic Four, instead of having been relegated to shortlived spinoffs. Because life just isn’t fair sometimes, instead he was given this admittedly ambitious project, his all-encompassing take on the Spider-Man story as played out in real time. In the end it’s bold and engaging, but more than a little clipped in execution. Each issue is a snippet of Peter Parker's life as we catch up to him in a new decade so readers only get a quick glimpse of the action and are left to fill in the substantial gaps by drawing on our knowledge of continuity. The obvious comparison is John Byrne's Superman/Batman: Generations, but where that story really only took the broad strokes of those characters' continuity into account in writing its decades spanning story, Spider-Man: Life Story is dedicated to the remixing of Spider-Man's publishing canon. So it can’t just take an archetypal view of Spider-Man and play that out to its logical conclusion, instead it’s stuck trying to incorporate version of prominent Spider-Man stories like Kraven's Last Hunt, Venom, and Civil War. The result means that there’s a ton of exposition in each issue, and frequent use of shorthand to gloss over things which have happened since the previous issue, and it never manages to explore the series’ original ideas in detail. Also, I'll die mad that Michel Fiffe, the genius behind COPRA and one of my favorite cartoonists, public pitched basically this exact story a year or so before this project was announced, and even if Marvel didn't actually steal the idea, I'll forever pine for Fiffe's take on this premise.

Star Wars: The Crimson Empire Saga

Long before the Disney's take on Star Wars, with their codified takes on the mythology and careful curation of the franchise, there was the old Star Wars Expanded Universe, where seemingly anyone could tell any story they wanted using the mythology of Star Wars. While it resulted in some good stuff, like Timothy Zahn's fondly remembered Thrawn books, the vast majority of it was workmanlike or even bad. Crimson Empire falls firmly into the category of bad, a dumber than dirt story about an extremely cool space guy and his code of honor. It's the kind of story where multiple characters say "He's just one man!" right before or right after seeing their legion of anonymous flunkies getting demolished by the hero. It's got an inexplicable and bad love story. In the three miniseries collected here it spends about two pages total dealing with the idea that maybe, just maybe, the fact that it's main character is dedicated to the lost honor of Emperor Palpatine, a space fascist, maybe his code of honor is completely fucked. Of those three miniseries, only the first story is anywhere near something that could be called good. I wouldn’t called Crimson Empire utterly abysmal, but it’s not unironically good. If the name Kyle Katarn means anything to you, you might get something out of this as a nostalgia trip, but otherwise it has no redeeming qualities.

Deathstroke: Legacy

The first of the New 52 Deathstroke stories, which was never well regarded until Christopher Priest took it over with Deathstroke: Rebirth, I was driven to read this by a conceptual fondness for this era's Deathstroke basically looking and acting like an action figure. Through that lens, it's quite enjoyable. It's not as obviously in on the joke in the way that the classic Taskmaster: Unthinkable is, but it's over the top, has fun designs and baddies, and Joe Bennett (years before his career best heights in Immortal Hulk) provides consistently good art. As a pure action comic, it's good.

Wolverine MAX: Permanent Rage

Here's the thing about Wolverine: There are very few good Wolverine solo stories. Wolverine is a genuinely good character, but most of his solo stories are dumb action affairs, and there's literally never been a Wolverine comic that's even halfway as good as the Logan movie. Permanent Rage, the first storyline from the Wolverine MAX series though, is actually pretty decent. It plays out a lot like you might imagine a Wolverine movie made around 2004, with no superheroes, a Japanese setting that allows for some distracting orientalism, unrelenting violence, and a noir-inspired storyline. The present day storyline is all well and good, not great, but solid and relatively low-key, but what makes the book is the presence of Sabretooth as the main villain. His relationship with Wolverine, fleshed out through flashbacks drawn by some really talented artists, is probably one of the best takes on that relationship that Marvel has ever put out. The casting of Wolverine and Sabretooth as two lonely immortals, bound together by hate and the knowledge that they are each other's only true companions, absolutely makes this book. Is it great? No, but it's got enough interesting things going on that fans of dark superheroes stories would probably find something to enjoy. Subsequent volumes of Wolverine MAX moved even further from the character’s superhero trappings and supporting characters, which is a pity, but this one remains readable and enjoyable on its own.

Marshal Law Omnibus

A collection all of the non-licensed and non-text-only Marshal Law stories. It's weird, it's punk, it's violent, it's sick of superheroes but self-aware about it own silliness in a way that Garth Ennis' work like The Boys has never been (Incidentally, the fifth story contained here, Super Babylon, is just every self-righteous complaint Ennis made about superheroes in The Boys but presented with a modicum of good humor). It's quite fun as a mean-spirited anti-superhero romp, but anyone who is particularly invested in the moral rectitude of, like, the Flash, might find it an unpleasant read so I would advise avoiding it if that's you. It's also not perfect, even for what it is: it's approach to sex work and kink is very dated, it relies on sexual violence a little too much, and by the time you get to the final story, Secret Tribunal, it's come to revel in its previously ironic fascist and misogynist imagery and characters just a little too much. The third installment, Kingdom of the Blind, is for my money, the strongest of the lot, featuring both the most straightforward premise and the most incisive satire the collection has to offer.

[characteroulette]

Hey PQ was pretty good!

so I’m having trouble getting into PQ2 because of several factors, so I thought I’d write a half-think piece, half-essay on why I think the first PQ gets more flak than it deserves. So here’s that.

------

I genuinely don't understand why, when talking about Persona Q, people are always saying things along the lines of, "The gameplay was good, but the characters were trite and the story wasn't that great." Like, as a fan of the Persona series, I genuinely don't understand that assessment.

Not saying PQ is flawless, oh no. There are PLENTY of things in PQ that I have an axe to grind with (the small door scene with the P4 gang, for one), but the overall story? The characters? They're both fine. Good, even, dare I say. And here's my argument as to why:

The returning Persona series characters (from 3 and 4) in PQ do a good job of representing their games and their own personalities, even if a little more light-hearted than their source material,

AND

The story is genuinely in-line with the rest of the Persona/SMT series, even if it ultimately doesn't matter due to time shenanigans (and I'm okay with that).

These are my two points. Just those two. Because these are the two most contested parts of PQ, as far as I can hear, since we all agree that the gameplay is the real breadwinner here hahaha

Anyway.

First, let's talk about the returning characters, since they seem to be the ones who matter most. The P4 cast are generally less griped about (save Chie and Teddie) and I believe this is largely due to the brighter, more hopeful tone of P4 as a whole. (Aaand, in my opinion, they're done a MUCH BIGGER disservice in the Arena games, but no one ever talks about that so let's not bother with those right now.)

P4 was a game about making friends, the hijinx that come from that, and finding the truth about a string of murders and confronting the worst parts of yourself in a harsher world in the process! And it executes this with the appropriate amount of balance between serious moments and comedic relief. The theme colour for the whole game is bright yellow/gold, a happier and more friendly colour which helps remind you that this game is all in good fun.

(Side note here: I honestly think that P5 really failed in this respect, despite my liking its tone slightly more. I just personally like darker-themed games, but P5 was a little too dark and oppressive right out the gate, with hardly a friendly face, which helps make your gradually growing group of friends much more appreciated but also a harder atmosphere for jokes to really land well. Most of the 'funny' sequences felt very undeserved and really dragged because uh guys we literally just fought a rapist, an abusive father figure, and some other fucked-up shit. Can we please acknowledge that a bit more instead of pretending it never happened by laughing at the expense of Ann's autonomy of her body? Especially when she was a target of said rapist??) But that's its own discussion for later.

Really, the fact that most of the P4 gang get out of this with little criticism shows how accepted their caricatures have become. I guess? At least, except for Teddie and Chie.

Teddie being a wannabe Casanova must've been a huge hit with the Japanese audience, because it's just the hill he's going to die on for the writers. There was more to Teddie than his hitting on the girls in P4, believe it or not! (And there's a whole thing about it being brought on by him mimicking the type of behaviour he saw Yukiko's shadow exhibiting, which has a lot of really interesting undertones, but it makes him more swappable with Junpei, so whatever, I guess.) Meanwhile, Chie's not as meat-crazy, either, but I guess it's a better trait for them to roll with than her (cut in the translation) glossed-over sexism.

Both work fine, however, and aren't really too annoying enough to be that egregious. (Though they both go right up to the line sometimes. Teddie more so, but none of the girls playing along really helps show how gross his actions are. Most of the time.)

No, the real complaints I see directed at the characters being 'too cartoonish' are usually reserved for the P3 gang.

P3 is, really, such a bizarre game to go back to now when compared to its two successors. It's dark and hopeless, like P5, but formulaic and mystery, like P4. It's actually a natural progression when looking at its two/three older siblings (both P2s are bleak. As. Hell!), but, at least to me, it's the odd duck of the bunch, being the first to implement this winning formula of being caught in a time limit of a school year and managing spending time exploring this other world. It adds Social Links and social stats with this new time limit and this idea that the Persona and Shadows you fight don't just happen out on the streets in 'normal' circumstances for everyone to see. It pretty much went from an RPG to a management game with RPG elements.

And its emotional, impactful story, like P5, had a lot of tonal whiplash due to the attempts at comedy!

I feel like a lot of people forget this about P3 (and maybe I think more about it because I haven't actually beaten the whole game yet myself), but the story is actually a goddamn mess of tonal confusion. You got kids shooting themselves in the heads and a Social Link dealing with a classmate's crush on his teacher. You got wacky foreign exchange student and kids taking experimental drugs to suppress their Persona and slowly poisoning themselves to death as a side effect. The protagonist is an orphan who lost his parents in a huge, plot-relevant accident... But he's able to date every single girl at the same time and be the most wish fulfillment charming guy if the player so desires.

P3 being messy isn't a bad thing. P4, P5, and even P2 and PQ are all a little messy in their own rights, too. But because P3 was a lot of fans' first in the series, and PQ is just a spin-off, it gets way more flak for this than I feel it deserves.

(I mean, hey. Both P3 and P4 have those classic anime scenes of the boys walking in on the girls while at a hot springs. All PQ's got is an awkward group date scene and the implication that Yosuke and Kanji kissed each other while getting knocked out.) (They all. Have. Problems.)

And I know a lot of this comes down to personal preference. I'm not saying you're wrong for liking P3 or P4 more than PQ. I'm just saying I feel like PQ is often wrongly accused of being worse and less well-written when, really, they're all pretty much on par with each other. (And someone on the team really doesn't understand how to handle large casts of characters sharing the same space...)

But, personally, from everything I've seen from P3, I don't like the way most of the characters get presented to me in the source material. Junpei is way more insufferable in P3 than in PQ and Yukari is way more uninteresting in P3 than in PQ. Really, PQ helped me appreciate these characters more than P3 itself did. And, yes, they're more funny when they're trying to be, too. Because PQ is set up better for comedy than the 'remember you are mortal' tone of P3.

(Which makes dramatic moments hit all the harder when they happen) HEY check that segue! It's time to talk about the story and the two original characters of the game!

So, second point: people say the story isn't very good. To which I wanna ask... "Did you stop playing before defeating the fourth Boss?" Because it really sounds like, to me, everyone who says that didn't actually finish the game and reach all that juicy character development that happens for both sides around the fourth dungeon, where all the issues they've been building up (like Yukari's issue with Mitsuru for the P3 side and Kanji and Ken's awkwardness in the P4 side) start getting resolved in a satisfying way. And it comes with a reveal for the two characters we've been getting to know, Zen and Rei, as well.

(And, from here on in, there be spoilers. You've been warned.)

The two new characters to this game are Zen and Rei, who were in this place before the P3 or P4 gangs were called to the scene. Zen is quiet and a bit unsettlingly dense, but devoted to Rei, who is bubbly and full of life, but terrified of the dungeons you have to traverse. The two have been in this place for (what's implied to be) a very long time and enlist the help of the P3 and P4 teams in order to find a way out through defeating the bosses of each Labyrinth/dungeon. Simple enough, as it also helps the P3 and P4 team's goal of getting out. With each new dungeon, it feels more and more like something about Zen and Rei aren't quite right, but the length of the dungeon and all the team chats help you put it out of your mind each time. Rei can even get kinda annoying with her loudness and big appetite if you don't find her cute (which: how dare you. But yeah, I get it).

And then, at the end of a fiery festival fourth dungeon, you find yourself in a dark tomb at the bottom level. The boss awaiting you is Rei's shadow (a nice callback to the way P4 works) whom she still doesn't accept after you defeat it.

All the locks are gone and the P3 and P4 teams can return to their worlds if they wanted. Except Rei gets kidnapped after Zen reveals that Rei has been dead all along and it was him who trapped them here. It was he who created this place and even he who called both teams here.

And this was a plot twist that I friggin' loved.

It definitely had more impact on me because Zen and Rei easily became my favourites out of the whole cast, to the point of having them on my team for the whole game, but to find out such a fucked up twist is wild! (Seriously! Go watch the cutscene and tell me it isn't super fucked up!) You can say the P3 and P4 twists were shocking (or P5s I guess), but for my money, this is the best reversal of expectations I'd ever seen in a Persona game. In any game, really!

Zen was, in effect, the villain the whole time. His true identity as Chronos, God of time, makes sense with displacing the teams from their own times and the time here being erased once you reach the end. His own power that he sealed away growing impatient and taking matters into its own hands by drawing the teams to this haven displaced from time also makes perfect sense! And the entire climb through the last dungeon is his redemption arc and it makes for a super emotionally investing final dungeon all the way. (Which is great, because I hate every single one of the enemies that appear in this god-forsaken place.) (Even P4 and P5 can't really boast that, I felt very little investment through Izanami's dungeon and Baldabaoth's distortion.)

Of course, if you found Zen and Rei to be annoying and pointless, I can see how this would fall flat for you. The fact that they hinged such an emotional climax on these new characters, characters that don't even matter outside of this game!, was such a risky move. Especially when you consider this is just a fanservice game made basically under the promise of seeing the P3 team interact with the P4 team. But, for me, it really paid off.

And whatever complaints you had with the P3 or P4 characters, I feel like the resolutions to those character moments I mentioned earlier get explored even further during the climb through the final dungeon. From the P3 gang coming together to finally communicate with one another to the P4 gang reconfirming their bonds with one another, it's a really investing and emotional journey. I do wish the writing had been this tight and impactful through more of the game, but I believe it's worth it in the end.

Perhaps this moment comes too late in the game, though. I can definitely see others giving up before reaching this point due to the repetitive nature of the dungeons and the tidbits of character development that are meant to build up to this moment that can be too sparsely placed. (But, really, it's the same from P3 to P5, Social Links don't really add much variety when they can be just as repetitive and boring, just saying. Especially when you get caught in waiting to rank up hell, ugh.) For me, however, this really sealed the deal on this game being an incredible experience that I adored from start to finish. 7/10. Final score.

....

....

(7 outta 10?? Not perfect??) Well, it's not perfect. Japan's blatant homophobia and sexism really ruins a lot of scenes for me. I'm super salty especially about how the fake marriage scenes are handled so differently from the girl choices to the boy choices. (But you just argued in its favour for 2000 words!) Listen. ALL the Persona games wouldn't receive perfect scores for me for this aspect alone. There are a lot of other factors as well, but they vary from title to title and PQ in particular is guilty of spending too much time focusing on Teddie and Junpei being girl-crazy. And Marie is in this game more than she really should be. UGH.

But I digress.

In conclusion, this game's story and characters are better than most give it credit for. Hopefully, my argument helped you see why I believe this and why I think claiming that both aspects are just 'bad' is lazy.

[thetravellingvagrant]

Day 17- Salzburg: In Which I Meet A One Eyed Monster

I decided to get myself out into Salzburg to explore early, today. Partially because I had already grown intensely tired of my new dorm-mates despite none of them having done anything particularly egregious, but also because, given how much I was paying to stay in this city, it seemed like it would just be a waste not to. I had planned a full-on touriststravaganza for my first day here, with nary a ring-road or random bog in sight. My plan then, based almost entirely on word-of-mouth recommendations was as follows; I would take a walk through Mirabelle gardens, situated not too far from my hostel and supposedly quite pleasant on my way to the Natural History (and Science) museum of Salzburg, which I had been told was a particularly excellent example of natural history (and also science) museums. After spending a few hours there, I would climb up to the Hohensalzburg castle, which had been leering down at me from the mountainout centre of the old-town since I had arrived, daring me to come and see it, if I was hard enough. Once I had had my fill of the thrill of being slightly elevated I would meander back down and have a stroll along the street on which Mozart was born and had now become a tat-hive of the highest order before finally, getting myself a lovely meal and heading back to my shitty little hostel which cost the earth.

I arrived at Mirabelle gardens not long after my plan was finalised. To be honest, I didn't spend very long there at all. Perhaps it was more spectacular during the summer, but I found the entire experience, as I did the gardens themselves, flat and uninspiring.

4/10

That didn't stop other tourists from taking a constant and steady stream of photographs, though. Of what, I am not sure; there didn't appear to be really anything of aesthetic interest within a hundred foot radius of the place, but snap away they did.

Disappointed with the gardens, though secretly a bit pleased to have freed up a little more time to spend on my other, more interesting activities, I walked briskly to the Natural History (and also Science as well) museum, paid nearly £10 to get in and, grumbling at how expensive literally everything is here, made my way inside.

The very first room of the museum  contained an approximately life-sized model of a giant squid (AKAthe best animal and I will hear literally no disagreement from any one of you motherfuckers) hanging from the roof in full attack mode

14/10

so I pretty instantly forgot how much I had just paid and began having an uncharacteristically good time. This...I think humans call it...enjoyment...continued as I progressed further into the museum, also.  Fans of terrible taxidermy (and I know there's at least one of you reading this...), I soon realised, would be disappointed with today's blog entry, as this museum was just genuinely very good and very slick. Nearly every exhibit looked like the thing it was supposed to, with no mangled up faces, or eyes popping out or bursting at the seams or anything. There were a...few odd exceptions, sure

I’m naming no names, incredibly buff marmot...

but for the most part, I really couldn't fault the museum. It was entertaining, well laid out and just generally expertly put together. It even had an aquarium (featuring an octopus and everything) and a reptile zoo. It was grand.

Fans of the blog with an extremely long memory, though, may remember on my very first trip, I visited a science museum named...NEMO or something, in Amsterdam, which, although very good on its lower floors, steadily detached itself more and more from reality as one proceeded upwards. Unfortunately for the Salzburg museum of Natural History (and also science, that's there too), though very fortunately for me, it had followed in NEMO's footsteps.

Interesting, well labelled and well thought out exhibits and animal displays petered out after around the third of five floors and gave way to...I'm not really sure what. They stopped signposting things in English after that. It appeared that what I had thought was an exhibit on Africa, though, had slowly transformed into some truly and utterly bizarre musings on mythical creatures- or at least I hoped so as it would go at least some way to explain the following:

Oh...hey, guy...

Then things really fell apart. I walked through rooms full of spooky masks

Ah!

past randomly placed posters full of cryptids

AH!

and...Garfield?

AHHHH!

The fever dream of the 4th floor, however, would pale in comparison to the full on tramadol overdose of the 5th. After meandering through a fairly good bit on the deep sea, the fifth floor straight up shat itself and delivered one of the weirdest and least coherent exhibits on the human body I have ever seen in my life. Pictures, more than words would do the experience justice,

Pictured: My nightmares

though a few highlights included an interactive display on how shit is formed, a pulse reading machine which declared one man who I witnessed use it as legally dead and a room full of stuff on sex and reproduction which boasted a picture of several women in their vests and pants with a button next to each. My best guess and rudimentary understanding of German told me that you press the button next to the woman you find the most attractive. When you did, it would display the stats for each woman and rank them by popularity amongst museum-goers. For anyone that's interested, the busty one was the winner.

Also of note were a series of little keyholes that one could peer through, each one of these tiny windows a porthole to the various stages of doing some sex. The first hole had a little barbie doll applying perfume to herself, the next hole had the same doll, now nude and with nipples amusingly etched onto her in pen, getting banged by a Ken doll. The next was just a picture of some random birds, which seemed...out of place and the final hole had a big collage of...like, leather and handcuffs and various other accoutrements of kink. It was deeply odd and rather jarring, sitting amongst a hitherto fairly child-friendly exhibit on reproduction.

Confused, though fairly sure I had now seen everything (including a wall of taxidermied dogs, positioned like, right next to the sex room) I left the nature part of the museum and checked out the sciency bit. It was shit and I spent very little time there. Overall though, the museum was still very good and probably benefited from all the weird junk in it. I definitely wouldn't forget my visit at the very least...

I had spent too long in the natural history (and hey, guys, don't forget about science!) museum and by the time I left, it was bordering on getting dark. It hardly seemed like it would be worthwhile climbing the big hill to the castle if I left it much longer, so I decided to do that next, postponing food, much to the chagrin of my angry tummy.

The walk up the hill was tiring, though enjoyable and peppered with fairly decent photo-opportunities.

I mean, it’s ait.

and after not-too-long, I arrived at the castle, sweaty, though triumphant. I walked through the main gate and...oh, you needed a ticket. And tickets were 10 euros. And it was only open for another half an hour. Right. Good. Okay, that was worth it. I turned around and headed back down. At least I had had a nice walk...

Yeah. Great.

After a quick stroll through the obsidian-dense crowds populating the street on which Mozart was born and where the  sheer quality and quantity of Mozart themed tat you can find is simulatenously both tremendously impressive and utterly depressing

Fuck you.

I headed to a local eatery for food. The diner was fairly low-end; very much your average sort of shitty UK takeaway level of quality, though somehow I still managed to spend over 10 euros on a very basic burger, too-salty fries and a small bottle of water. Oh, Austria!

I returned, very tired and (after those fucking fries) very thirsty, to my dorm. Upon entering, I realised that I was to share the room with some new guests. Three screeching, giggling Australian girls, who were every bit as immediately irritating as they sound. One of them was sitting on my bed.

“Oh, am I on your bed?” she tittered

I was so tired and the transgression so bizarrely rude that all I could muster in response was a gruff “Yes.”

I think she expected me to be better natured about it, but I doubt she would have been so light-hearted about the whole thing if she had returned to discover me sitting on her property, so she could fuck off. She moved from my bed, clearly making a mental note to never speak to me again and I retook my now pre-warmed throne.

I didn't hang around in the room for too long, darting back outside to the hostel's courtyard to quickly make some phone calls before finally returning to the room and to my bed, proper.

The lights were off as I cracked the door open for the second time. The Australian girls had gone to bed , already. It was 8:30pm.

“okay...” I sighed, not willing to  take my laptop downstairs, as the only communal space in which I could use it was current;y being used for the nightly broadcast of The Sound Of Music. Yes. Nightly. It looked like I was working in the dark for the rest of the evening.

More irritating, still, was the fact that one of these girls, the one sleeping above me and indeed the bet-sitter extraordinaire had decided to make use of the tiny little nightstand which sat next to my bunk to house her phone for the night. It was very clearly designed to be part of the lower bunk's set-up, but okay, I can just about understand not wanting to sleep with your phone next to you on an upper bunk, I guess. She had, however, neglected to switch it to mute, meaning that with every text, notification or update she got (and she got a stunning amount of these throughout the night and early morning) the phone would vibrate noisily right next to my fucking head, distracting me when I was awake and waking me up when I was asleep. Because there was a physical aspect to the vibration also, earplugs couldn't even block it out fully. It was a lot of fun.

Mercifully though, at around 2am, all her apps had updated, the notifications ceased and people stopped texting her, having received literally no response for the previous six hours and I could finally drift off to sleep, angry and exhausted.

[thesffcorner]

The Bride Test

The Bride Test is the second book in a series of companion novels that started with The Kiss Quotient written by Helen Hoang. It’s an adult romance that follows 2 perspectives: Khai, a Vietnamese-American autistic accountant, convinced he’s incapable of experiencing love; and My or Eseme, a Vietnamese bathroom cleaner, who comes to the States at the behest of Khai’s mother to be his future wife. She is to spend the summer with him and seduce him in the three months; if they marry, she gets a green card, and Khai may learn, he can love after all. So, the premise of this book is… interesting. Arranged marriage/marriage of convenience are a pretty common theme in romance, but this is the first that I’ve read, and if I have this to go by… I’m not a fan. I really liked Hoang’s first book; I found the relationship between Stella and Michael sweet and very healthy, enjoyed a lot of the family dynamics, and thought the Aspergers rep with Stella was excellent. I did have some issues with the pacing and plot, and one of the main things that annoyed me in that book, was that a lot of the final conflict between Stella and Michael hinged on a miscommunication. I regret to inform you, that this entire book hinges on miscommunication;90% of Khai and My’s conflict is their terrible communication, which especially irked me considering the power dynamic of the relationship. While I liked both as individual characters, their romance just didn’t work for me, and it might take me some time to properly explain why. 

The Plot: I’m not Vietnamese; I’m Macedonian, and in Macedonia, arranged marriages, or mail order brides are not exactly a thing that’s done, or looked at positively. So the fact that this whole plot revolves around Co Nga and My conspiring to have My seduce Khai into marriage or potential “accidental pregnancy” was just... bizarre. Don’t get me wrong, there is some humor in the situation, and if Khai were a different type of character, I’d probably have been a lot less squeamish about this conceit. But Khai is autistic, and he’s a lot further on the spectrum than Stella; he’s a lot more closed off, specific, has more severe sensory issues, and generally seems less, for lack of a better word ‘adjusted’ than Stella. It doesn’t help that his autism is rarely mentioned or even acknowledged by the other characters in the book; Co Nga doesn’t even tell My that Khai is autistic or even explain what that is until way into the third act of the book. A lot of things in this book are like that; they hinge on deception or half-truths. Like sure, maybe Co Nga shouldn’t have told My that her son is autistic, but she should have explained to My that he’s different, that he has issues with communication, touch and expressing emotion. Telling her ‘you have to specifically ask him for things’ isn’t quite cutting it, since understanding why he does things and acts the way he does requires a much deeper and more nuanced explanation. It’s unavoidable that I talk some SPOILERS for this next part, so if you don’t want to know, skip to pacing. Khai not explaining his condition to My, is small potatoes compared to her entire story and motivation. My has a daughter, that she is raising by herself with her mother, and she HAS to make it in the States, because it’s not just her own future that’s on the line. When the book starts, she HAS to seduce Khai and have him marry her; it’s her only way of staying in the country. But she hides having a daughter from Khai, until literary the second to last chapter of the book. This isn’t something I can overlook; having a child is a burden and commitment that shouldn’t be sprung on anyone, let alone a person who already struggles with intimacy and affection, and barely had any say in the whole ordeal in the first place! If My were to marry Khai, then Jade would be his daughter too, and My never consults or discusses this incredibly important decision with him. There’s never any care in whether he would want to or even be capable of being a father! She tells Quan, his older brother who is magically really ok that My lied to Khai for moths about something this important, and he too magically forgets to share this incredibly vital info with Khai. And when Khai does find out, he just… accepts it without question? There’s no panic, no insecurity, he’s just ok with being a father now, when a day ago he was barely ok with someone moving his socks around. What? The really annoying part is that, this could have been an actual source of genuine conflict between Khai and My; if My had told him earlier about Jade, then there could have been some exploration of Khai’s feelings on having a family, having to learn how to show affection and communicating with a child, how to be a parental figure. Instead, we have genuinely one of the dumbest reasons for a falling out I’ve ever read. That Khai can’t accept that he is capable of emotion and love makes some sense; he’s never learned how to recognize and deal with his emotions. He’s repressed them his whole life, to the point where he can’t even distinguish between them; he conflates love with addiction, and the physical symptoms of grief for an illness. It’s understandable, since again, his family seems to be rather intent on never acknowledging or addressing his autism, or teaching him how to manage processing things differently. But the fact that even after she was told, and explained to what autism is, by both Khai and Quan, and living with him long enough to realize that he processes and expresses emotions differently that she, or most people, My is STILL intent that Khai doesn’t love her, unless he VERBALLY SAYS IT. Quan, knowing all this comes up with the brilliant solution of throwing together a fake wedding, in order to make Khai jealous enough to crash it, and say I love you to My. Not, locking them in the same room and telling them to talk to each-other, not explaining to My why he’s like this, no; he has to be SO extra, to make a fucking wedding. What if Khai didn’t show up? What if he was too late? What if instead of coming to the wedding he hurt himself? So many things could have gone wrong, and the blockbuster rom-com ending made it that much more aggravating. The other subplot having to do with My’s dad was unnecessary and a waste of time. It doesn’t have any effect on the main story, it’s dropped for really long stretches of time, and the fact that it ends up WORKING OUT PERFECTLY was just insane to me. It was the most convenient part of the plot, even more so than Quan’s miracle-cure-for-all-wedding. Pacing: I would like to say the pacing has improved from the Kiss Quotient but it really hasn’t. I do have to give props to Hoang, in that the sex scenes are paced much better this time; it takes much longer until we get to the first one, we know the characters by that point and are invested in their love life. However, the rest of the book was kind of a mess. My is supposed to spend 3 months with Khai, but the way events are laid out, it’s impossible to say how much time has truly passed. She enrolls and graduates from night school, gets a job at the restaurant, they go to 2 weddings and a memorial service, and it feels like very little has changed in their relationship. The only thing that changes is the amount of sex they’re having Characters: Easily the best part of the book were the characters; as individual people they were great and I almost wish they were in 2 separate stories. The side characters this time were strangely wasted here, unlike in the previous book. Michael makes an appearance in an admittedly funny scene where he and Quan try to do damage control on Khai’s terrible sexual expertise (or lack thereof). Quan is present, but he’s much less interesting; he’s a lot more into boobs and ass than I recall him being, and though he has a few touching scene with Khai, there wasn’t a true familial dynamic like there was with Michael’s family. Co Nga, Khai’s sister Vy, Angelica, Miss Q, My’s mother and Jade are all characters that were in the book, but they had barely any presence or personality. I found this a real shame because one of the best part of The Kiss Quotient was the family, and I sorely missed the bond Stella had with Michael’s mother and sisters here. Khai, I liked less than I liked My. He wasn’t a bad character or badly written; he just wasn’t very compelling. It’s difficult to write characters who are routine oriented and hyper focused, even less so when the hyper-focus is something like accounting or exercise like it is for Khai. His interactions with My weren’t nearly as endearing as the interactions between Stella and Michael; he’s a lot less lovable, and I didn’t get an impression that he was in love with My, more that she bullied her way into his life and he got used to her. There were also many moments where his coping mechanisms were needlessly rude or cruel to her; leaving her alone at the wedding, reading a book, not bothering to ask her how she is, what she likes, taking her on a date. It’s not that he does any of those things intentionally, and he does improve as the book goes on, but he doesn’t take initiative until the very end, and I just failed to see why she liked him as much as the book tried to tell me she did. The language issue between them is also never resolved. My never speaks English to Khai, only Vietnamese, and he responds only in English. Other than the very end and the only time he speaks Vietnamese to her, I didn’t really understand why this was a thing, and why Khai constantly notes it. My was a delight and I wanted for her to be happy and to protect her. I instantly loved her; she was a ray of sunshine. She’s incredibly kind and good, she makes tough choices, and never gives up, even when it seems like her situation is hopeless. I don’t approve of or like that she hid Jade from Khai for so long, even if I understood why she was reluctant to tell him. It was a bad choice, and it tainted what was otherwise a great character. Outside of that, I loved how determined and capable My was, how self-sufficient she ended up being by the end. She pursues her education, she works, when things go south she finds her own apartment and learns the public transit. As soon as she realized that Khai needed things done a certain way she would adjust her behavior, and when he crossed a line and hurt or insulted he, she called him out on it. She was honestly, too good for Khai; I think Hoang agrees with me, because a lot more love radiated from the way she was written as opposed to Khai. In her afterword, Hoang talks how she wanted to represent the immigrant experience of people like her mother truthfully, and it was really sweet and illuminating, but it also made me feel like this book was a missed opportunity. The best parts of this book were My trying to make a life for herself, and I almost wish the book had been about that instead of a romance. As is, both parts felt too short, too rushed, and too uneven to be successful. Conclusion: This is a mediocre book, with an iffy premise that never quite raises beyond the superficiality of a fake dating plot. I was mostly disappointed by how it developed, and though I liked Khai and would take a bullet for My, I don’t think it’s as good as Hoang’s previous work. I still urge you to check it out and see for yourself; Hoang is a much needed voice in romance, and I’ll continue to read whatever she puts out, though I wasn’t the biggest fan of this.

[anthony-kate]

***Can you believe we have to go through a 3 month hiatus until we get new episodes again? What to do on Mondays from now on? Well, I know it is not the same but how about reading some amazing Malec fics? Because there simply can’t be enough Malec love out there and somehow it makes the wait to see these two back on our screens a bit more bearable if you ask me.

Anyway, I hope you gonna enjoy this 4th edition as much as the previous ones. Again, a huge thank you to everyone who left notes and/or told me how much they enjoyed these recs. It’s very much appreciated, so yes, if you want me to continue doing this, let me know, okay? Have fun reading!***

Volume 1

Volume 2

Volume 3

KISS WITH A FIST by @clockworkswans [ M | AU | 225k | WIP | Kiss With A Fist universe #1 ]

When agent Alec Lightwood is given his first kill hit, he doesn’t expect much trouble. Of course, he also doesn’t expect it to be a cheerful assassin who lands him in a whole load of trouble. Enter Magnus Bane: an assassin turned thief who reluctantly teams up with Alec - and The Clave - after he pisses off a very important and powerful crime boss, Valentine Morgenstern. In a world of violence and unjust laws, can the two put aside their differences and work together? Aka: in which Alec is sent to kill Magnus, doesn’t, and then really wishes he had. (but not really).

WILD LIFE by @crazyellephantrambles [ not rated | AU | 69k | complete ]

Alec Lightwood likes to go on road trips. He doesn't pick up hitchhikers. But the one time he does, it's Magnus. He's in for an adventure or maybe even fall in love.

ANYTHING by @baneismyexistence [ M | 36.2k | complete | Anything verse #1 ]

Magnus would do anything for Alec, and Alec doesn't know what to do with that.

EVERYTHING by @baneismyexistence [ M | 70k | complete | Anything verse #2 ]

With Valentine still at large, a crisis threatens to split the Shadow World in two, testing the loyalties of everyone on both sides of the line. But choosing between duty and honor, family and love is never easy, especially when war is on the horizon.

AND YOU HAVE ALWAYS BEEN MINE TOO by @magicandarchery [ E | AU | 10.4k | WIP ]

New graduates and best friends Magnus and Alec have both graduated from the University of Idris with top honors. Graduation and family expectations, however, carved out two very different paths for their lives.

Making the age-old promise on graduation night to get married if they were still single by thirty had been an easy agreement to make. There was no chance it would, or even could, ever possibly happen. It simply wasn't legal.

When Magnus coincidentally re-enters Alec's life eight years later, each are confronted with the unsettled reality of their lives, and the rekindling of long-buried feelings for the other. They decide to reinstate the promise they had made as motivation to get back into the dating scene.

But can they push aside their own feelings for each other as they go on this journey of finding true love?

Or: the "Single by 30" Malec AU that nobody asked for.

STAR WARS: A SEARCH FOR JUSTICE by @sweetillusionketz [ M | AU | 9.8k | WIP ]

After the MORTAL WAR that wiped out the JEDI ORDER and the reconstruction of THE CLAVE to govern the galaxy, military force, THE CIRCLE, has been monitoring planets for any trace of remaining intergalactic terrorism and obliterating possible threats under the name of peace. Each strike leaves death and destruction behind.

Former Senator, General Luke Garroway, leads the DOWNWORLDER RESISTANCE, a counterpoint to the Circle, in hope of finding enough evidence of abuse of power to dismantle the organisation and restore real peace and justice to the galaxy.

In order to do so, Luke has sent Izzy Lightwood, his most daring pilot, and the mysterious Magnus Bane to search for survivors of the last attack…

FANTASY by @theonetruenorth [ E | PWP | 3.5k | complete | Shadowhunters Headcanons #20 ]

“Mhmm,” Magnus hummed as they broke apart and he rocked his hips minutely, the slight movement enough to make them both shiver. “This is getting dangerously close to one of my fantasies, so maybe we should stop, if you don’t want this to go any further.”

“What fantasy?” Alec murmured, craning his neck up again to brush his lips against Magnus’ but the warlock teasingly moved just out of reach.

“Well,” Magnus started, looking at Alec through half-closed eyes and with a hint of a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth, “I have never had sex inside the Institute.”

BLUE EXTRAVAGANCE by Hobbit69 [ E | AU | 27.8k | complete | Blue Steel Series #5 ]

When Detective Alexander Lightwood-Bane is called to the site of a bizarre murder, he doesn't expect to recognize the victim, but that's exactly what happens. Alec met the wealthy entrepreneur at an event with his husband, the flamboyant and enormously wealthy Magnus Lightwood-Bane. When a second victim is found, Alec and his partner, Jace Herondale, realize that their killer has a "type." Unfortunately, Magnus just so happens to fit that type.

IT’S TIME TO LOSE YOUR VIRGINITY, BROTHER DEAREST by @themagnusbane [ E | AU | 83.4k | complete ]

Magnus Bane is a famous stripper, used to pretty boys falling in love with him after one dance. The feeling is hardly ever mutual. But when he meets the freshly turned twenty-one year old Alec lightwood, he can’t take his eyes off him, and they find themselves in love quicker than they expected.

WE CAN SOLVE THIS TOGETHER by @softshumjr [ E | AU | 58.9k | WIP ]

Alec and Magnus have been friends since high school. They both love each other but are afraid to say anything because they believe the other one doesn't feel the same way and it'll ruin their friendship.

Alec and Jace are working on an overdose case and are stuck. Can Magnus be the one to help them solve the case?

UNKISS ME by @sweetillusionketz [ G | AU | 11.3k | complete ]

Magnus Bane loved New York. I mean, what other city in the world held Christmas raves?

He especially loved it when he managed to convince Ragnor and Catarina to join him. Spending time with your chosen family during the holidays was the best thing in the world.

The only thing that could make it even better, however, would be getting to know that very attractive stranger that just wouldn't take his eyes off Magnus. Tall, dark and handsome was just what Magnus wanted to end his amazing night.

All he needed was an opportunity and it came, in the form of a well-placed mistletoe.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, DOCTOR LIGHTWOOD by @softdaddario [ T | AU | 3.1k | complete ]

Magnus Bane agreed to volunteer at a children's hospital on Christmas Eve, wanting to help make sure the kids got the most wonderful evening. Turned out the kids weren't the only one who were gonna have a merry Christmas, Magnus realised when he met the young Doctor Lightwood during his time at the hospital.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, ALEXANDER by @slaymemakoto [ E | PWP | 1.8k | complete ]

A one shot in which Alec gets the living daylights fucked out of him and Magnus is sure that everyone in the building is aware of exactly what Christmas Eve activities the pair are indulging in.

JUST WHAT I NEED by @alyxhavok [ T | 3.6k | complete ]

Magnus has a surprise for Alec, and the rest of his family...

YOU PROTECTED ME by @everydayisonfire [ E | PWP | 3k | complete ]

Post Winter-finale. Inspired by this:

"anyways magnus totally had alec’s omamori with him that’s how he managed to be safe"

IT’S CLOSE TO MIDNIGHT, AND SOMETHING EVIL’S LURKING IN THE DARK by @lightwoodlesbians [ G | AU | 1.8k | complete ]

or, the ’i sneaked into this huge house party for some free alcohol but you asked me how i knew the host and the first excuse i could think of was that i'm dating their sibling, so i basically just lied to you about going out with you’ au

LET’S PLAY by @laurenkmyers [ E | 2.5k | complete ]

Malec's first date gets sexy. Expect semi-public pool table sex.

IF YOU CAN’T FIND THE ONE BEING HUSTLED IN THE POOL HALL... by @quitemagicalbane [ G | 328 | complete ]

"Make the shot then." "Okay." "Okay." "Okay." "Okay, so make it."

THUNDER’S GETTING LOUDER by @spanglepup [ E | 6.4k | complete | The Boundless Saga #3 ]

For once in his life, Alec decides to take something for himself. He forgets that everything comes with a cost.

THE IMPORTANCE OF PANCAKES by @lecrit [ T | 2.2k | complete ]

Based on the prompt: “I would like a cute Alec and Magnus day in where they cuddle and talk a bit about the future and a second scene where it’s the future and they have their two sons”

WAKE ME GENTLY by @ithilien-writes [ E | 1.7k | complete ]

Magnus rarely (if ever) wakes before Alec, but this time he has... intentions.

FIRST TIME ALEC TOPS by @theonetruenorth [ E | 1.9k | complete | Shadowhunters Headcanons #9 ]

Somehow, they end up with Alec flat on his back and Magnus straddling him, his hands cradling Alec’s jaw while his tongue explores the nephilim’s mouth. It’s a slow, lazy, and unhurried kiss. The kind of kiss that says ‘there isn’t anywhere else I would rather be right now’ and ‘I want to explore every inch of your body’ and ‘I love you’.

CHAIN YOU UP by WholockedHunter [ E | 3.6k | complete ]

Magnus and Alec are having some kinky sex ...

CAN’T TAKE MY EYES OFF OF YOU by @deepbutdazzlingdarkness [ E | PWP | 2.1k | complete | The Thirst Is Real #3 ]

If Magnus were more alert, he probably would’ve recognized the obvious signs of someone being in the loft: the boots by the front door, the leather jacket laying on the couch, the empty wine glass sitting on his drink cart, but as it is, he doesn’t notice anything off until he’s standing right in front of his bedroom door and realizes the light is on.

I NEED YOU SO MUCH CLOSER by @deepbutdazzlingdarkness [ E | 5.2k | complete | The Thirst Is Real #4 ]

Work has been keeping Alec and Magnus apart for a couple of weeks and once they finally see each other again, Alec can barely control himself.

AKA the first time they have sex at the Institute. Also the first time they say "I love you".

DANCE IN THE DARK by @deepbutdazzlingdarkness [ E | 2.7k | complete | The Thirst Is Real #5 ]

After a particularly hard day at work, Magnus helps Alec relieve some tension.

NO PLACE FOR A HERO by @one100suns [ M | 20.4k | complete | Battle Scars #3 ]

For Magnus and Alec, navigating their relationship is hard enough without outside forces trying to tear them a part. Quite literally in some cases.

PRESSED UP AGAINST YOU, EVERYTHING IS OKAY by @matsdaddario [ E | 3.6k | complete | Lovely Firsts #2 ]

It’s new, this feeling like even though everything is falling apart that this part of his world makes sense. He likes it, wants to keep it.

“Hi,” he breathes. Magnus stands in front of him, and Alec can’t help himself, doesn’t want to stop himself, from leaning down that little bit to capture Magnus’s mouth with his own.

I SEE FIRE by @lecrit [ M | AU | 12.1k | complete ]

There was one simple and unique rule about being friends with Magnus and Alec: never, ever, no matter the circumstances, not even if you were drunk as an armada of skunks, engage into a debate about pop culture with either of them, and especially not the both of them.

TRUST ME by @sweetillusionketz [ T | AU | 18.5k | complete ]

Magnus Bane has a problem with that arrogant brat that keeps showing his face to every important street race in the city. Damn Jace Lightwood and his annoying habit of winning even though he's just a stupid high school boy. That's insulting.

Fuck Jace. But more importantly, fuck his sweet looking older brother, who just happen to not have the slightest idea of who Magnus is. If everything goes according to plan, Magnus will have put Jace back to his insignificant place and gotten lucky with a gorgeous oblivious guy.

Perfect plan is perfect. Nothing could go wrong.

[weekendwarriorblog]

The Weekend Warrior Home Edition 4/7/20 – ENDINGS BEGINNINGS, ABE and More (Sorry. No MY SPY.)

Boooooo … this week would have been when the Tribeca Film Festival was supposed to start, but I barely had a chance to go through the movies that were gonna play there when COVID-19 hit, and it was quickly cancelled. Apparently, they’re doing some sort of online festival this week, but apparently, they decided to wait until Friday afternoon to tell press who had already applied that they needed to reapply by Monday morning. If you didn’t receive or see this important Email, and I didn’t, then you were basically fucked in terms of covering the festival. That being said, this will be only the second time in 17 years that I didn’t cover Tribeca, and since they won’t even respond to Emails trying to fix this, I guess that means we’re done here. 

This was also the week when, at one point, Universal/DreamWorks Animation’s Trolls World Tour was supposed to open but I saw it last week via screener and liked it more than the first movie. I tweeted about it here:

https://twitter.com/EDouglasWW/status/1248685996612489217

Of course, STX’s My Spy was gonna open this weekend after many delays and that now will be streaming on Amazon instead, so that’s just the way things seem to be going. Who knows when any of us will have any sort of box office to report on, especially with AMC filing for bankruptcy and possibly not making it until studios decide to release movies theatrically again? (The earliest possibility seems to be July at this point.)

This week’s Featured Movie is Drake Doremus’ new film ENDINGS, BEGINNINGS (Samuel Goldwyn), starring Shailene Woodley, who is quite fantastic as Daphne, a thirty-something L.A. woman – and honestly, having interviewed Woodley for Alexander Payne’s The Descendants, I have just as hard a time fathoming that she’s even closer to her 30s as I did believing 34-year-old Alexandra Daddario as someone in her 20s in last week’s We Summon the Darkness. Regardless, Daphne is trying to get over a heartbreaking break-up with a man who was also her boss, and she quickly gets into relationships with two men, Jack and Frank, played by Jamie Dornan and Sebastian Stan, who also happen to be friends, creating a tough love triangle.

The fact that Doremus opened this film with the Cocteau Twins was a good sign, and I do have to say that the music throughout the film is fantastic, but really, it’s more about Woodley and the fact that Doremus is returning to a more improvised style of filmmaking ala his earlier film, Like Crazy, which was one of my favorites. I do think that Woodley’s talent elevates her performance well above her male co-stars, who at times, frankly, I couldn’t keep track of which was which. (Dornan’s Irish accent gave it away most of the time.) But I liked how Doremus explores one woman trying to make decisions about her life and relationships, showing how hard it is to do that sometimes.

Endings, Beginnings is on Digital on Friday and then On Demand starting May 1. I honestly don’t know the difference between the two. I probably should figure it out, huh?

Another movie I quite enjoyed that’s on Demand and Digital this Friday is Brazilian documentarian Fernando Grostein Andrade’s first narrative feature, the family comedy ABE (Blue Fox Entertainment), starring Noah Schnapp (from Stranger Things), Seu Jorge, Mark Margolis and Dagmara Dominczyck. Schnapp plays 12-year-old Abe, a Brooklyn ‘tween and a diehard foodie with his own blog and desires to be a chef. His main goal in the year leading up to his Bar Mitzvah is to cook the perfect meal to bring his half-Jewish and half-Palestinian family together in harmony. He gets some helping learning the ropes from Seu Jorge as a Brazilian food cart chef who takes under his wing, but Abe has his work cut out for him as his grandparents and other relatives can never agree on anything.

Listen, this is a pretty simple premise but that helps make Andrade’s film so much easier to enjoy.  I feel that this is a movie that probably would have done quite well on the film festival circuit (when there was one) since it’s a crowd-pleasing film that gives a very different look into the Israel-Palestine conflict from a Brazilian outsider, as well as in the guise of a warm non-confrontational coming-of-age film that should appeal greatly to foodies. I actually liked Schnapp in this role, mainly because he’s surrounded by such solid actors, including one of my personal faves, Mark Margolis, as his Israeli grandfather. Abe is the type of movie that may have gone completely overlooked in any other environment but actually keeps your attention through its warmth and pleasing storytelling that can bring those going through these hard times a smile or two. It’s not exactly reinventing the wheel or redefining “cinema” but it’s a good film to watch with the family you may now be cooped up with. (Probably for kids around Abe’s age so 11 and up?)

Next up is That Evening Sun director Scott Teems’ THE QUARRY (Lionsgate), a thriller based on Damon Galgut’s novel, starring Shea Whigham as a drifter who kills a travelling preacher and takes his place in a smalltown while being under suspicion of the police chief, played by Michael Shannon. The movie also stars Oscar nominee Catalina Sandino Moreno, and with those three alone, I really wanted to like this movie, but it was really dull and never really got me interested in any of the characters, which is especially a shame since Whigham is such a good actor, but this movie just didn’t do anything for me… at all.

Available now via VOD and on DVD/BluRay on April 28 is Tyler Cornack’s bizarre comedic (?) thriller BUTT BOY (Epic Pictures) -- co-written, directed and starring Cornack. To be honest, it’s the type of movie that is just too weird for its own good. I have to be honest that the movie’s title scared me, and if I read the actual premise beforehand, I might have been even more bothered about watching it then I was already just from the title. Okay, so Cornack plays Chip Gutchel, a married IT worker who becomes obsessed with anal probing after a proctology exam. A dog disappeared and then a baby but years later, a child disappears from Chip’s job, and the detective on the case (Tyler Rice), who is also being sponsored by Gutchel in AA, suspects that the missing child has gone up Gutchel’s … well, I don’t have to spell it out. This is one of those WHAT THE HOLY FUCK movies like The Greasy Strangler and Lemon that I immediately wondered (and apologies to the podcast of the same name) “How did this movie get made?!” While I felt the same way about the premise for the recent Swallow when I first learned about it, that movie was actually really good.  I knew as soon as it became obvious what was happening that I had absolutely zero need to watch a movie about a guy who is able to suck things up his own ass. Don’t get me wrong. It’s a competently-made genre film but as it became clearer and clearer where it was going, I was getting more and more queasy about the whole concept. So yeah, I wouldn’t recommend this to my worst enemy, and I’m guessing most people will feel the same but there’s a lot of boredom out there, so who knows?

Wow, that’s it? Four movies? Sheesh…

STREAMING AND CABLE

At this point, it almost seems silly to break this column down into sections ‘cause everything is gonna hit your computer and/or TV sets until theaters finally reopen. Note: I haven’t seen any of the movies or series below.

Streaming on FX on Hulu Wednesday (today!) is the new mini-series Mrs. America, starring Cate Blanchett as Phyllis Schlafly, “the sweetheart of the silent majority,” a woman who is fighting back against women like Gloria Steinem (played by Rose Byrne!) and others who were pushing for the ERA (Equal Rights Amendment) in the 70’s. The amazing cast includes Margo Martindale, Uzo Aduba, Elizabeth Banks, Tracey Ullman, “sweetheart of FX” Sarah Paulson, Melanie Lynskey and yes, there is at least one man, played by John Slattery. The showrunner is Dahvi Waller from Mad Men, too, so this should be an entertaining watch, and I’m definitely on board.

Lots of stuff on Netflix this week but not necessarily anything that’s been on my radar, like the new docu-series, The Innocence Files, which is exec. produced and directed by a number of impressive filmmakers like Liz Garbus, Alex Gibney and Roger Ross Williams. Debuting on Wednesday (today!), it looks eight cases of wrongful conviction and what the Innocence Project has done to try to get their cases overturned. This is a subject that has really interested me, although I liked last year’s Brian Banks more than Just Mercy.  The Innocence Project is just such an amazing organization with what they’re doing to help those who can’t help themselves go up against the deeply injust criminal justice system, so this is definitely one I’ll be watching.

There are a few new features on Netflix on Friday, none of which I’ve seen but hopefully will be enticing viewing. The three new ones include the German film, Rising High, written and directed by Cüneyt Kaya, starring David Kross (not the comedian) as Viktor Stein and Gerry Falkand as Frederick Lau, two real estate moguls who get sucked into their wealth by defrauding the bank, losing sight of reality.

There’s also the French crime film, Earth and Blood (La Terre et Le Sange), from filmmaker Julien Leclerq about a sawmill owner named Saïd (Sami Bouajila) and his 18 year old daughter Sarah (Sofia Lesaffre) trying to sell his factory, not realizing that one of his apprentices hid cocaine in there, forcing father and daughter to face tough gangsters who want their drugs back.

Brazilian superstar Wagner Moura and Ana de Armas from Knives Out star in Greg Barker’s Sergio, a film about Sergio Viera de Mello, the UN diplomat who is ready to resign and spend time with his wife before he’s assigned to a mission in Baghdad just as the US invasion of 2003, and he’s crushed under a wall when a bomb blasts the UN headquarters.

Amazon Studios will be debuting Tayarisha Poe’s debut feature, SELAH AND THE SPADES, on Amazon Prime Video Friday. It takes place at Haldwell, an elite Pennsylvania board school run by five factions. It stars Lovie Simone as 17-year-old Selah Summer, who runs the most dominant group, the Spades, who caters to supply students with alcohol and pills. As tension builds between the factions, Selah’s right hand BFF Maxxie (Jharrel Jerome) has a new boyfriend, so Selah needs to find a new protégé.

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!