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brownsugarwrites · 3 months

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Superstar

★ pairings: Johnny cage x black!fem!actress!reader

★ warnings: fluff & smut. bossy head strong reader, smug bastard johnny, enemies to lovers, oral (f!receiving). they have sex idk what else to say. sub!reader. creampie. one night stand elements. dirty talk & pet names. maybe a bit of brat taming? squirting. written with a black reader in mind but anyone can read!

★ wc: 2.6k (wow!)

★ dedicated to @lxnarphase

“Is there any way for this car to go faster?” you asked impatiently.

“No, ma’am, I'm sorry traffic is horrible,” your driver told you sympathetically.

Rolling your eyes, you continued typing the email to your casting agent, letting them know you would be late. Not that you really cared or anything, but it was still considerate to let them know you wouldn't be on time.

This was your life. Going to casting meetings and getting scripts. You just wrapped up one of your movies about two months ago, and now you were onto the next one.

Finally, pulling into the movie studio's lot, the driver drove to the main building where all the meetings occurred. As you pulled up, you grabbed your purse, stepped out of the vehicle, and walked to your destination.

Asking for directions, you go to the elevators and wait for it. Growing anxious, the elevator pinged and opened its wide doors.

Stepping onto it, you pressed the button before taking out your phone to see the exact room for the meeting.

Stepping off the elevator, your heels echoed throughout the hall as you approached the room.

Opening the glass door, the director greeted you first.

“I'm so glad you were able to make it! Please have a seat.”

“This is who we were waiting on?” you heard a smug familiar voice say

Snapping your head in that direction, you rolled your eyes before scoffing loudly.

“Is there a problem-”

“Yes, there is a problem. Dont tell me this is my co-star?” you asked with annoyance.

Johnny Cage. Seasoned actor who has a long rapport with Oscars, Golden Globes, and even some Emmys. He was arrogant and big-headed. You didn't like him from a movie you did a while ago, even though it was a small cameo.

“Dont be like that, sweetheart. I sure we can put the past behind us and focus on the movie?” he said with a smirk playing on his face.

Rolling your eyes for the third time today, you walk to the table and sit next to one of the writers.

After the meeting, you stood off to the side, waiting to talk to your agent to ask why she put you in this situation, knowing the beef you had with your co-star.

“Looking good, as always, superstar,” Johnny complimented, walking up to you.

Even with your stilettos on, he still hovered over you so slightly that you had to stare up at him.

“Just stay out of my way, Cage,” you scoffed, crossing your arms.

“I don't think that’s possible with us being leads in the same movie.”

“I'm not going to repeat myself,” you retorted.

“Dont have to, superstar. I'm excited to work with you again, sweetheart,” he said before putting his sunglasses back on his face and walking away.

Watching him leave the boardroom room, your casting agent walked over to you.

“So.. are you guys made up?” she asked with a grin.

“Dont make me fire you.” you snapped, not thinking her joke was amusing.

Watching her face drop in fear, you strode towards the door and left the building.

When it was finally time for filming, you were greeted with a vase of hydrangeas in your makeup trailer. Opening the note with the initials J.C on it, you tore the paper and threw it into the garbage can.

“Did ya get my flowers, superstar?” Johnny asked as you walked onto the set.

“I did. Thanks, I guess,” you responded flatly.

Smiling, his voice boomed throughout the studio, letting the crew know he was ready to shoot.

This became the routine. Sometimes, you and Johnny would have good and bad days. But the good started to outweigh the bad, and you tolerated him a bit more throughout this journey.

He felt the same about you. He wouldn't tell anyone about his crush on his co-star. He felt like a little kid teasing you and annoying you just so that you would give him your undivided attention. As juvenile as it sounded, it worked. Seeing you get so annoyed with him really gave him the satisfaction of driving you crazy. It was all a part of his plan to make you his girlfriend finally.

Hearing a knock on your trailer door, you invite the person in

“I would say someone is warming up to me.” You heard the familiar voice as he walked in.

Scoffing playfully, you asked what he wanted.

“Just bored and wanted to see my pretty co-star. Do you have a problem with that?” he asked, sitting next to you on the couch.

Seeing that he was shirtless with the robe barely covering his chest, giving you a peek of his abs, you felt a sweat drip down your forehead.

Shaking your head no, you released a shaky breath, feeling him inch closer to you.

“Cat got your tongue, sweetheart?” he asked, arrogance in his tone.

“Oh shut up.” you simply said before looking away, feeling your cheeks warm up in embarrassment,

“Wow, am I making my superstar nervous right now? That’s new,” he teased, face coming closer to yours.

“My superstar” had you weak in the knees. You were sure you would fall onto the ground if you stood up.

He was toying with you, and you needed to fight back the best way you could.

“No, I'm not nervous, Johnny. Why are you so fucking close?” you asked, trying to keep your guard up and turning to meet his eyes.

“Cause maybe I think you're gorgeous, and I wanna get a better look at you,” he replied smugly.

Rolling your eyes, the two of you sat silently, feeling the thick tension clouding over you. His face came closer to you as you felt your breath synch with his. Your eyes fluttered close, accepting whatever was about to happen.

“We need you on set in five minutes,” you heard one of the production assistants yell through the door.

Eyes shooting open, you jump away before apologizing and look out, feeling your face burn up.

“Dont apologize. Come on, they need us on set,” he said with a wink, taking your hand in his

Snatching your hand away, you got up and left your trailer. Johnny trailed behind you with a sly smile on his face.

Three and a half months later, you were finally done filming. Feeling a weight leave your shoulders, you congratulated the crew members on their achievements.

“I had fun working with you, superstar. You almost did as good as me,” he joked.

Smacking your lips, you looked at him in shock. “Almost as good as you? I'm pretty sure I did as good as you, maybe even better,” you jabbed back.

“Well, how about we celebrate? That new lounge just opened downtown. Meet there tonight?” he asked, giving puppy dog eyes.

“Sure, I could go for a glass of wine or two. 8:30.”

***

8:50. You’re twenty minutes late even though you chose the time to meet him. Sitting in the section he brought for the two of you, he pulled out his phone to see if you were still coming out tonight.

Looking up, he saw you walking in with your thigh-high boots on with the tight black dress, hugging you tight as you carried your Chanel purse over your shoulder.

“You must have a thing for being late, sweetheart,” he teased, grabbing your hand to help you not trip over your feet.

“I'm here, aren't I?” you asked, rolling your eyes.

What would he give to make those pretty eyes roll behind your pretty head

“I had them put your wine on ice. I think it's warm now.”

“Eh, I’ll be ok. Thank you for inviting me out.” you thanked him.

As the night went on, the two of you joked and conversed about things going on in your daily life. What new brand deals have the two of you got down to, and what have you all made for dinner this week.

You could feel the tension between the two of you, especially with the way he placed his big hand upon your plush thigh, giving it teasing squeezes.

“Take me to the bathroom?” you asked.

Grabbing his hand, you led the way to the bathroom. He waited for you outside as you went into the bathroom.

Coming out, you stood before him, peering up at him with your big brown eyes. Grabbing your face, you felt his soft lips placed upon yours. It may have been the drinks talking, but you wanted him.

“Tell me you want this as much as me,” he whispered in your ear before kissing along your neck, grabbing a handful of your ass.

“Yes, b-but not here. Papz might be watchin',” you whimpered.

Taking note, he let you lead the way as you walked out of the club to get to his sports car, trying not to get caught by the sneaky paparazzi.

“Nice car,” you complimented, walking up to his matte black Maserati as he opened the door for you.

Giving you a tap on your ass, he thanked you before closing the door after making sure you got in ok.

The car ride seemed like it took forever, even with Johnny exceeding the speed limit, to get to his house. Feeling the needy grip on your thigh was driving you crazy. Biting your lip in anxiousness, you started to scroll on your phone so you did not think about the current climate in the car.

Finally pulling into the garage with his other cars, he quickly turned off the engine as you unbuckled your seatbelt. Before you could open the door to get out of the vehicle, Johnny beat you to it before lifting you out of the car bridal style and taking you into his mansion.

Fighting with the door that led inside his house, he grunted in annoyance.

“Why dont you put me down-” you asked, trying to give a solution.

“Because if I put you down, I'm fucking you in this garage, and a lady like you should be fucked properly.” he simply responded, finally getting the door to open.

Stepping inside with you in hand, he closed the door with his foot before taking you up the stairs that led to the bedroom.

Kissing you with fever, he placed you on the bed gently as you started to tug off his shirt. You felt yourself growing more aroused as he moved down to your neck, gently sucking on it.

Mewling softly, you pulled him away from your neck so that he could take off his clothes.

“Nun uh sweetheart. Dont be impatient,” he instructed you as he moved down towards your legs to take your shoes off.

Once your shoes were discarded, he began to litter kisses upon your leg leading up to your inner thigh before coming dangerously close to your clothed, needy cunt.

Withering away, his grip on your legs became tighter as he held you in place, fighting your urge to run away. Lifting your dress, he was met with the blue lace trim underwear. Pulling them to the side swiftly, he smiled at the way it glistened before putting his fingers on your sticky clit and rubbing circles on it.

Mewling in response, he replaced his fingers with his mouth before sucking on your pussy and running his tongue between your folds. Thick thighs squished his ears as he continued his assault on you, hearing your muffled moans as your nails raked through his hair, tugging on it lightly.

He was in heaven. In between your thighs was where he belonged, listening to the way you whimpered for more, feeling you come close to your first orgasm of the night. Feeling his pants tighten around his dick as you begged him to let you cum. Bringing his calloused fingers back to your puffy clit he began to make small circles on it feeling you shake slightly as your orgasm washed over you.

Releasing your legs from his grip, he watched as your chest rose and fell as you tried to think about your current predicament. Not having a chance to let your brain catch up, you feel Johnny hover over you to take off your dress, revealing the matching lace bra that held your tits with the piercings on them.

“If I knew any better, I would think you planned on me to fuck you,” he chuckled before unbuckling his pants, letting you see his hard-on as it could barely be contained in his boxers before squeezing it.

“Fuck you look so sexy like this,” he said as he reached to pull your panties off, being mesmerized by a string of slick connected to your underwear, throwing them on the floor before taking off his own. Hearing the way his long, girthy dick stood at attention.

Feeling embarrassed, he kissed your temple, loving the way you shivered under him.

“You’re awfully quiet, doll,” he whispered.

“Are you gonna keep teasing me, or are you actually going to fuck me” you spat quietly in his ear.

Kissing his teeth, he gave your needy pussy a few slaps before bucking into you. His pace started off relentless as his balls collided with your thighs; as the loud, squelchy sounds started to flood the room.

“F-fuck.” you moaned, hands coming to play with your clit as he continued fucking into you.

“S-shit, that's it, sweetheart. Keep playing with that pretty clit for me,” he groaned out, lips going in between his teeth as you clenched down for me.

You felt yourself about to cum again. Drawing tighter circles on yourself, you began to cry for release.

“Cumming again, baby? Fuck” he asked with a shit-eating grin on his face.

“I-i need it. Johnny, please let me cum” you squirmed, feeling it becomes too much for you.

“You can cum, my superstar.” he fought out, feeling you clench down on him.

Hearing you squeal, you lay on the bed breathless and dizzy, some small pieces of your hair sticking onto your sweaty body.

“You have no idea the things you do to me,” he said, kissing you deeply.

Soon after, he was flipping you over to your knees, making you arch your body so that your ass was in the sky. You felt vulnerable as you looked back at him, sticking his angry flush tip and inserting your weeping pussy again.

“Next time, I should try your wrist together and fuck you like this all night,” he grunted as he pushed your back further into its arch, beginning to fuck you again.

Trying to catch onto his rhythm, you began to rock your hips back and forth, trying to meet his thrusts. Grabbing a handful of your ass, hit bit his lip in pleasure, accepting your thrusts.

“You‘re gonna make me cum. Fuck” he moaned out, squeezing his eyes shut.

“You can cum inside,” you whispered.

Feeling something animalistic turn on in him, he started to fuck you deeper as he was nearing his release.

“S-say it again for me,” he asked.

“Inside, you can cum inside,” you responded louder this time.

“You’re gonna drive me crazy,” he grunted.

Feeling a bubbling pressure in your abdomen, you knew you were close again. Not giving a chance to warn Johnny, you felt a warm liquid trickle down your thighs as your legs shook.

Feeling squirt on his dick had him seeing stars as he delivered one last thrust before ropes of thick cum filled your cunt.

Falling onto the bed, you drooled onto the pillow, feeling your eyes get heavier by the second. Instantly, you felt a pair of warm arms cradle you to the bathroom, sitting you on the toilet as you heard water running into the tub. The smells of lavender and vanilla filled your nose as you attempted to keep your eyes open.

Feeling yourself get picked up again, placed into the warm water, and feeling a structured body come behind you as you lay on it.

“Did so good for me, sweetheart. My superstar,” he said, kissing your temple as you nodded off.

#johnny cage x reader #johnny cage smut #johnny cage x you #johnny cage mk #mortal kombat x reader #mortal kombat smut #johnny cage x black reader #mortal kombat x black!reader

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lover-of-mine · 4 months

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This is "Let's Drown Buck, Giving Eddie a Shooting Moment and Triggering a Buck Breakdown: An Updated Season 7 Speculation Based on Exactly One Picture Posted by The Props Department and The Voices In My Head"

Okay, so, my Buck will drown in season 7 spec is in its 3rd installment, you can read installment one here, this one has the drowning work as a climax for buddie in a sense, a mid-season or season finale situation, you can read installment number two here, this one is a climax for Buck to break, and now I'm gonna type out a Buck drowning as a season premiere trigger. (You can go here to see all my Buck drowning thoughts)

So, this whole thing hinges on one thing: the fact that the show consistently mirrors Buck and Eddie's personal journeys, with Buck mostly being a few steps behind Eddie. I feel like we collectively got caught up in the way the lightning reminds us of the shooting, and we failed to notice the way the lightning is actually the well. The rain aspect, the night aspect, the team as audience aspect, the volunteering into the rescue that goes wrong over lightning, the way both of them are screaming, the moments of irrational action with the way Buck is trying to dig Eddie by hand and Eddie is trying to pull Buck up to him, the breathing thing with the way Eddie was about to drown and Buck's lungs weren't working, I think even the way Eddie saved himself and the whole concept of the coma dream can work here (here's a set for visuals).

We know Eddie didn't deal with any of his trauma until after the shooting, dude was very just move forward until he couldn't anymore. And one thing is true, you can draw quite a few parallels between the way Buck was acting in season 6 with the way Eddie acts in seasons 3 and 4. Up to the way you can draw direct parallels between Buck and Natalia to Eddie and Ana (here's a set for visuals), or the way he sounds like Eddie did with the just make the best of it, the way Buck is talking in the cemetery really reminds me of what Eddie tells him in kids today when he drops Chris off before the tsunami. And, well, let's face it, Buck hasn't dealt with any strong emotion ever and this man needs to break to move on with his life.

But, sure, how does any of this adds up to Buck drowning? Most of Buck's major traumas/near-death experiences involve water or breathing, the emergency tracheotomy on the first date with Abby, the blood clots in his lung, the tsunami, the well, the warehouse fire, the lightning leading to damage in his lungs (here's a set for visuals) also, Bobby nearly drowned in the plane crash, he got caught with Chris in a tsunami and then Chris falls back into the water, Eddie nearly drowned at the well, Maddie walked into the ocean, I think even the bathtub incident with Jee, creates this pattern of water hurting Buck or people Buck loves. So water is a common trauma factor here.

Why is this important? When you look at the shooting, there are a lot of things that make it as intense as it is: it happens by chance, it's a case of wrong place/wrong time, they're not supposed to be there but they are because Eddie got called there specifically, Buck has to save Eddie alone because they are there with another house and Buck doesn't trust anyone else, and it brings up a previous trauma for Eddie. I also wanna add the fact that, like it or not, Eddie is that attached to what's happening to Charlie because it makes him think of Christopher, at least on some level. So having Buck drown covers the previous trauma thing and it's very easy to make it happen by chance. So let's work out the rest of it, shall we?

Season 6 ends with Bobby and Athena finally going on their honeymoon cruise. I know I'm not the only one sitting here chanting *cruise disaster* because of that, because let's face it when does anything ever go right for anyone on that show. But the props department posted this picture of life vests. Also, one of the writers posted a picture of a script where you can read the word boats. The speculation of something is gonna happen in that cruise writes itself. Add in the fact that people don't know bathena are on the cruise to begin with and you have a GREAT season premiere disaster in your hands. (I don't really wanna bring up Grey's Anatomy here even though a lot of this has me thinking about 3 Grey's episodes, but if you've seen the show, think the ferry boat crash/Meredith drowning arc in season 3)

That means we have a whole ass ocean to drown Buck in while responding to that. Because what's another thing that keeps trying to kill Buck? That's right, city equipment.

Okay, so back to the shooting elements, wrong place/wrong time, they're not really supposed to be there, another crew, previous trauma, no one else they trust around. Not really supposed to be there/got called there directly can be cloudy, but it could just be a "we're going because it's Bobby and Athena's ship". So that's down. Another house, well, a call in that scale would have multiple houses, them getting separated is expected, so that's down too. Previous trauma, Buck getting trapped under something, Buck almost drowning, water, beaches as a whole, all cover that. Wrong place/wrong time, I keep going back to equipment malfunctioning in some way. Maybe they're lowering Buck somewhere and it gets loose, a harness breaking, the oxygen tank stops working, that's something that can happen by chance and create a situation that triggers a past trauma for Buck.

Okay, so we have a lot of elements at play here let's get to the actual vision.

At first, when I saw the life vests, I actually thought about this all happening while they try to save Bobby. They find Bobby, they get Bobby out, Eddie is working on him because he's the one with medical training, it takes him a moment to notice Buck hasn't resurfaced, then he dives back to go get Buck, mostly because that could have some fun implications on the dynamic between the 3, especially if we go to a situation where Buck could've gotten himself out but doesn't, a situation where Buck stops trying, also because I think Buck believes dying for someone he loves is the way to go, so dying for Bobby would be fine with him, but it wouldn't be fine with Bobby or Eddie, and Eddie not dealing with saving Buck's life again could absolutely redirect those feeling towards Bobby because he can't get mad at Buck for dying, so that could create some fun tension.

BUT, if we see Charlie as a surrogate for Chris, to have the situation be triggered by a stranger that reminds Buck of someone he loves, Maddie, Bobby, not Chris because then Eddie would also be irrational in the situation, Eddie is the one that gets reckless when children are involved, could be fun.

So vision: Buck and Eddie are paired doing water rescues or something, they spot someone, that someone brings a more extreme reaction from Buck, I will say he thinks the stranger is Bobby for convenience over the fact that this whole thing is happening on a cruise Bobby is supposed to be in, but it doesn't have to. They go through with the rescue, because again, the thing they went to do is done when Eddie gets shot, something goes wrong, Buck gets pinned down (I don't love the idea of Buck just stopping swimming, I like the idea of something he could get out of if he tried hard enough but he doesn't have it in him to keep struggling, so pinned down it is, also because that brings up the truck bombing), Eddie doesn't notice Buck didn't resurface for a bit (that can also be fun considering the way Eddie is always the last to know, he was the last to see Shannon in the crash, he only found out Buck and Chris were in the tsunami once they were safe, he was the last one to look up at Buck after the lightning, so fun implications all around) just long enough for us to cut back and forth to Buck struggling and Eddie, then cutting to Buck stopping, then Eddie noticing Buck is not there and diving back in. Then we have the fun little aspects of Eddie saving Buck, dragging him out, Buck being unresponsive, desperate cpr, "you're not doing this to me again", Buck finally reacting, sitting up and coughing up water, if we're lucky him dropping back into Eddie and a nice little "I got you, I got you" if we're even luckier maybe some forehead touching or Eddie burying his face on Buck's hair (let Ryan's emotional power out for a spin yk?).

Implication of this for Buck, Eddie, and buddie could be fun. Because you can have Buck spiraling over the fact that almost died again and he was actually okay with it for a while there, kickstarting a breakdown era, because he thought dying was supposed to give him some peace because of Levi and the whole happiness convention thing, and some fun parallels with 5b Eddie. We can have Eddie spiraling over the situation because he had to save Buck again, and Buck is not dealing with it so he's not dealing with it because they don't talk about what it's like being the one doing the saving. And Eddie is already pulling back from Buck, to have this create a real gap between them is easy as hell. And since I'm a "the shooting was Eddie's oh! moment truther" and I'm a believer that Eddie is fully aware of his feelings and just thinks Buck will never feel the same, to throw that energy on Buck would interesting. Just have Buck dealing with having his oh! moment in a very inconvenient moment and with the fact that Eddie is pulling away from him while he spirals.

Do I actually believe any of this is gonna happen? No, no I don't. But I will share the thought on the off chance it does so can get the bragging rights lol.

I will tag @slowlyfoggydestiny because we were talking about this the other day and her inputs helped a lot while I was trying to work out how to make the drowning a trigger, and also because she's been here with me through the whole "let's drown Buck" conversation 🫶.

If you read this I love you 🫶🫶

#is this madness? yes #am i aware of it? also yes #but *shrus*#911 speculation #only kinda lol #911 #i dont know how to tag this so im just gonna go #drown buck 2024

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rayofmisfortune · 16 days

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Throwing this ask over for if you ever want to ramble about Bendy ✨/nf (we are getting fed lately, 3 more games??? A movie??? Ink demon at a rave??? What???)

BENDY RAMBLE PERMISSION? OH HECK YEA!!

We are SO getting fed! I can't wait for what the games have in store for us. With The Cage supposed to release some time this year ANS THE MOVIE??? OH DON'T EVEN GET ME STARTED ON THAT!

I love the Bendy series to bits. Like actually

I've been keeping up with it since chapter 3 of BATIM- haven't read any of the books sadly but that can be excused right???

ANYWAY

The Cage is supposed to be a look behind the scenes at what happened on the other side of things while Audrey was busy explaining the concept of personal space to Wilson, if I remembee right? Also supposed to be darker and gorrier SUPER EXCITED FOR THAT

Then... in Secrets of the Machine we get teasers for B3ndy and Bendy Silent Town...

I hope B3ndy's gonna pick up on where BATDR left off, Gent taking away the Ink Machine to GOD KNOWS WHERE??? With Bendy now being out in the real world... it begs the question of who the role of big bad and smiling (traumatized, very much traumatized) will fall on... As for who we may play as.... maybe it could be this Riley Wells (hope I got the surname right) character we found out about in Secrets of the Machine? They ended up being a GENT employee so it's not completely out the question? They were employed at Joey Drew Studios before but- got fired because their ideas were too grotesque and dark for Joey's liking (EXCUSE THEM for having trauma you entrepreneur a-hole).

As for Bendy Silent Town... I feel like that game may be a look at mayhaps the genre of Bendy cartoons Riley had scripted? As I said, their ideas were dark. And what is Silent Town? A complete turn to the left at what Bendy games are. Unsure if the hand in the teaser image is Bendy's but- the char has a revolver named Alice FJFJ does that say anything? I dunno! Fjfjfj Getting to shoot cartoon bad guys in a cartoon tho? Aw heck yea! I suck at shooters but I'm willing to try my hand at one if it's Bendy

This is getting long lmfao

AH I haven't realized, but Secrets of the Machine came out on 4/14 (cuz- not american, use a different date format heh) which is the last loop that took place before Wilson or Audrey right? Some significance there

Oml I'm gonna fall into rambling about Bendy and the Ink Demon aren't I?

When you break all the cutouts in Secrets of the Machine, you get instakilled by the Ink Demon. Which. Deserved. I ended up doing that a lot cuz I didn't KNOW what I was supposed to do??? And destroying the cutouts was the quickest way out nfjfjc sorry Benders I promise it wasn't personal.

Anywho- yea it's been over a year YET I'M STILL NOT OVER HOW THE INK DEMON LITERALLY HAD BEEN TORTURED BY THE KEEPERS??? Like- YOU CAN'T JUST THROW THAT AT ME AND NOT EXPECT ME TO WEEP LIKE A BABY- My man's gone through literal hell even before he's been carelessly thrown into the machine "because he was imperfect" my ass, I bet the worst he ever did while in the Real world was walk around and be curious about everything while the only thing decisively threatening about him was his appearance... WHICH ALSO he had nothing to do with??? That's all on Joey and GENT for fucking up and only looking at the outside and not the inside. Is it obvious how much I need this guy to have a happy life?? He has a chance for that with Audrey now which I'm honestly so damn glad for nfnfnc Poor guy had been forced to follow a predetermined script where he was cast as the villain... tbf.. wouldn't anyone end up embracing that role when they've had to go through it for hundreds of loops?? I'd grow tired of trying to change anything as well.

Can... can you imagine? A little scene with Audrey and Bendy in B3ndy where they're just hanging out with eachother in Audrey's apartment.... PLEASE

Ah this got long hehe nfnfjfb

ALSO still not over Henry. My favorite father figure. Pls be a dad to them I beg

I STILL DUNNO WHAT THE RAVE IS ABT 😭😭 Haven't seen anything abt it YET- BUT AYYYYY

AND OML YEA THE MOVIE PLEASE GIB SOME BEFORE THE INK WORLD SNIPPETS PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE?? Could you imagine? Just- getting to see how the studio was before it all went to hell??? I- GETTING TO SEE THE PROGRESS ON THE INK MACHINE??? MAYBE EVEN BENDY'S CREATION????? And and oml SAMMY before he went "My Lord, My Saviour, coocoo in the head" THE VAST WORLD OF POSSIBILITIES

#answered asks #frens ask #unnamed-proxy #bendy spoilers #bendy and the dark revival spoilers #bendy and the ink machine spoilers #batdr #batim #bendy #bendy secrets of the machine #bsotm

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afieldinengland · 8 months

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spin is dead; long live the spin [link]

london beckoned songs about money written by machines - panic! at the disco

i'm burning and i'm blacking my lungs / boy, you know it feels good with fire back on your tongue / if you talk, you better walk, you better back your shit up with more than good hooks while you're under the gun / start talking, a sensationalist, oh, he's slightly clever to just a certain extent

starfuckers, inc. - nine inch nails

i have arrived and this time you should believe the hype / i listen to everyone now i know that everyone was right / i'll be there for you as long as it works for me / i play a game, it's called insincerity

this is hardcore - pulp

this is me on top of you / and i can't believe that it took me this long

piggy - nine inch nails

nothing can stop me now / ‘cause i just don’t care

miss moneypenny - placebo

it's a dirty job, but shooting guns just makes you horny / he wants to spill his seed over guaranteed / service with a smile

alpha dog - fall out boy

welcome to the new déjà vu / i can almost see the wizard through the curtain / alpha dog and oh, oh omegalomaniac

the professional - pulp

you're only polite when you're out of your box / cocker's short for sucker / a sucker of

i wanna be adored - the stone roses

i don't need to sell my soul / he's already in me

special k - placebo

i’ll describe the way i feel / weeping wounds that never heal

jacky's only happy when she's up on the stage - morrissey

no script, no crew, no autocue / no audience telling her what to do / exit, exit, everybody's heading for the exit, exit

#well i promised you post-4x07 ollie…. here he is #seedy sleazy amoral and hollow. spineless and flexible for it. new political animal + insidious turncoat. making malcolm sick with pride #preening prince with gelled hair another ollie between his knees and caesar's phantom fingers still pressing at his throat. kingmaker #morally bankrupt and dangerously unreliable. self serving and spiritually ugly. long live the king #my playlist #ollie reeder #the thick of it #audio

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smgvault · 11 months

Photo

Seventeen Magazine, February 1998

An interview with the Vampire (Slayer) by Jessica Shaw Photography: Marc Baptiste

It's one of those damp and gray early winter mornings in New York City, the kind that wipes out any memory of last summer's tanks and Dr. Scholl's sandals. Then Sarah Michelle Gellar walks into the studio for this photo shoot wearing huge Audrey Hepburn shades and radiating enough Pacific Coast perkiness to warm up the room. She's talking rapid fire about how she was supposed to hang out the night before with Jerry, Neve, and David (that would be O'Connell, Campbell and Arquette)—you'd think she'd inahled the entire Starbucks East Coast supply on the way over. But no, she explains with a smile, “I just hate doing interviews, so the faster I finish, the better it is for me.” Well, um, okay. Gotta grab another sweater after that icy gust. Still, it's hard not to have a tiny little drop of sympathy for 20-year-old Sarah. Consider her week: “I worked all day Monday, I came in at 6 A.M. on Tuesday and worked until one in the morning, went home, fed my dog, packed my bags, went back to work at 7 A.M., worked until 2 A.M., got on an airplane, got here at 3 P.M., got up at six to do Regis & Kathie Lee, did the Got Milk campaign, went on Letterman and did MTV Live.” (By the way, all that was said without any oxygen intake.) “Right now I'm probably working toward an early grave,” Sarah sighs, seated in the makeup chair with a script on her lap. “I'm tired and I complain sometimes, but this is my career and I love it.”

#sarah michelle gellar #smg #interview #article #stills #photoshoot #seventeen magazine #1990s

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justforbooks · 3 months

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When Carl Weathers auditioned for the role of Apollo Creed, the prizefighter who gives an untried contender a shot at his heavyweight title in Rocky (1976), he was asked to read opposite the film’s writer. “Now – I’m ignorant – and as I finish reading, I say, ‘Well, wait a minute, if you can get me a real actor to read with, I can do this a lot better.’”

Unbeknown to him, his scene partner was the newcomer Sylvester Stallone, who had not only written the script but was playing the title role. “Somehow I got the job,” said Weathers.

A 6ft 2in former NFL linebacker, Weathers, who has died aged 76, brought the full force of his charisma to a role that could in less skilful hands have prompted straightforward hisses and boos. There was a depth and kindness to him that no amount of on-screen braggadocio could conceal. He spoke, said one LA Times reporter, with the “overly concise diction of a TV evangelist”.

To prepare for the role of Apollo, Weathers watched old Muhammad Ali fights for inspiration. Shot for peanuts, the film grossed $225m, won three Oscars, including best picture, and spawned four sequels. A further three films in the spin-off Creed cycle featured Michael B Jordan as Apollo’s son Adonis.

Weathers was taken aback by the instant fame that Rocky brought him. The day after the film opened, he said, “I was out for a walk in Manhattan and street vendors are yelling, ‘Yo, Apollo.’ That is scary. You are not prepared for that.”

He reprised his role in the first three Rocky sequels. Rocky II (1979) begins immediately after the events of the original film, with both fighters in wheelchairs, coming face-to-swollen-face with one another in the hospital.

“Get up out of that chair, chump, and let’s finish this fight right now!” Apollo demands, having won only on a split decision after 15 rounds. Later, there is a moment of tenderness when Rocky, bandaged and slurring, wheels himself to Apollo’s hospital room late at night, nudges open his door, and asks whether Apollo really gave the match his all.

Though they decide initially against a rematch, Apollo becomes incensed by the hate mail he receives branding the fight a fake. Rocky II ends with the opponents bloodied on the canvas. Struggling to his feet, Rocky is declared the winner.

In Rocky III (1982), Apollo trains Rocky against a vicious new opponent, Clubber Lang (Mr T). The old adversaries get back in the ring at the end of that film for a friendly sparring match, the outcome of which remained a secret until Rocky revealed to Adonis in Creed (2015) that Apollo had clinched it. In Rocky IV (1985), Apollo is brutally trounced in a bout with the Russian boxer Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren). He dies in Rocky’s arms.

Weathers found many of the subsequent roles he was offered to be “pointless and meaningless”. But he enjoyed squaring off against another of that decade’s action heroes – Arnold Schwarzenegger – in the fantasy thriller Predator (1987).

In their first scene together, the men greet each other with a handshake that develops into an impromptu arm-wrestling contest. It is won by Schwarzenegger, his bicep bulging monstrously in close-up – a clear case of the more famous actor literally flexing his celebrity muscle.

Weathers later meets a sticky end during an encounter in the jungle with a shape-shifting alien. He loses an arm – his finger is still firing the trigger of his automatic weapon even as the limb falls to the ground – before expiring with a blood-curdling scream.

During his down-time on Predator, the actor developed with the film’s producer Joel Silver a lead role for himself as a Detroit detective in his own shoot-’em-up adventure, Action Jackson (1988), though a hoped-for franchise never materialised.

He acquitted himself well in the Adam Sandler golfing comedy Happy Gilmore (1996) as a pro golfer whose hand is bitten off by an alligator; in one scene, he sits at a grand piano on a golf course playing We’ve Only Just Begun. He reprised the role in Sandler’s Little Nicky (2000) but was even funnier as a tight-fisted, cost-cutting version of himself in four episodes of the sitcom Arrested Development between 2004 and 2013.

Weathers was born in New Orleans, the eldest son of a labourer father. He won a sports scholarship to St Augustine high school, then attended Long Beach Poly high school and Long Beach City College. He made it to San Diego State University on a football scholarship and graduated with a degree in theatre.

His professional football career began in 1970 with a single season with the Oakland Raiders. After being dismissed for being “too sensitive”, he played for two years with the British Columbia Lions in the Canadian Football League. “How good was I? I was good enough to make it … But I was never dedicated enough. I was never in love with football.” Acting, he said, was “a lot more fun, and I ache a lot less.”

He retired from football in 1974 and won supporting roles in television series such as The Six Million Dollar Man (1975) and Starsky and Hutch (1976), and with Pam Grier in the blaxploitation thrillers Bucktown and Friday Foster (both 1975).

After Rocky, he starred with Burt Reynolds and Kris Kristofferson in the football comedy Semi-Tough (1977); with Robert Shaw and Harrison Ford in the Guns of Navarone sequel Force 10 from Navarone (1978); and alongside Charles Bronson and Lee Marvin in the thriller Death Hunt (1981). He also wrote and performed the 1981 soul single You Ought to Be With Me.

Television work was plentiful, though attempts to fashion a long-running TV vehicle for him were hit-and-miss. In Fortune Dane (1986), he played a political troubleshooter battling white-collar crime; the show lasted six episodes. Its producer Barney Rosenzweig called Weathers “one of the more intelligent people I’ve ever been in business with. But he’s a physical animal. He’s gorgeous … The guy looks like a Greek god.”

He was a regular on Street Justice (1991-93), In the Heat of the Night (1993-95), inspired by the 1967 Sidney Poitier film of the same name, and Chicago Justice (2017).

Weathers also provided the voice of Combat Carl in Toy Story 4 (2019) and played the bounty hunter Greef Karga in the Star Wars spin-off series The Mandalorian (2019-23).

Weathers’ three marriages ended in divorce. He is survived by two sons, Jason and Matthew, from his first marriage, to Mary Ann Castle in 1973.

🔔 Carl Weathers, actor, born 14 January 1948; died 1 February 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

#just for books #Carl Weathers #in memoriam

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sharkbaiited · 2 months

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As a jaws fanatic do you have any fun facts about the franchise?? Also do you have any cool marine biology facts??

INDEED I DO!!!!!! i’ve got lists on lists of fun facts about jaws! i don’t have many about marine biology as i have just begun personally studying a few marine species ;;; but i will totally remake this once i learn a bit more! also please excuse me if this post is messy, currently very sick and foggy lol. ANYWAYS!!

- the indianapolis speech that Quint gives was re-written three times because in Robert Shaws opinion (don’t bash me for this i don’t remember the whole thing) “didn’t fit quints character well enough”. shaw himself ended up writing the script and preforming it

- on the topic of Robert, he was severally drunk on set most of the time. at one point he had to be carried out onto the orca and set in his chair because he couldn’t walk 😭 he also gave the whole indianapolis speech while wasted

- susan backline actually had four sets of cables connected to her for her scene! two in the water, two on land. to preform the scene were she’s attacked, two men would run up and down the beach in different directions while the two cables under water pulled her down. in an interview she states “i didn’t have to do anything! the boys would just run up and down the beach while i was bein’ pulled around”

- The un-named boater in the pond with Michael and his friends was actually supposed to get swooped up in Bruce’s mouth as Bruce dragged him around the pond; while mike was trying to get back up onto the boat with his friends the boater is dragged by him and ends up grabbing him and dragging him with around with him until Bruce decides to take the boater underwater.

- In the original shootings, Roy Schiender says “come down and laddle some of this shit!” instead of “come down here and chum some of this shit!” … idk why i think that’s relevant to me but i think it’s funny lol

- the orca ended up sinking not once but TWICE. everyone was concerned about getting the actors off the boat and onto the mainland, while one of the crew members (forgot his name. woops.) screamed “FUCK THE ACTORS! SAVE THE SOUND DEPARTMENT!” holding mass amounts of equipment over his head while being waist deep in water

- Brody was originally going to show up in 3-4, and his cause of death was going to be because of Vengeance 👍 Roy Schiender didn’t go to film the last two because he was too tired and owed universal a few other movies

- for the cage scene, they ended up hiring a stunt double to play richard. the stunt double would constantly spit out the regulator and choke 😭

- Hooper crushing the styrofoam cup was improvised! it’s said that most of the things they did while on board the orca was improvised .

- even though dreyfuss and shaw bickered constantly, they grew to complimenting each others performances on older films! dreyfuss complimented shaws role in ‘hamlet’ and they ended up bonding and drinking together on set

- on the topic of shaw and dreyfuss’s little rivalry .. “shaw was walking down the gang plank holding a drink in his hand and said, ‘Richard, help me out here.’ i said ‘do you really want my help?’ he said he did, and i took his drink and i threw it in the water. every drinker in that crew went ‘oooooh.’ and then he got his revenge by taking the fire hose and pointing it at my face.”

i’ll add some more later on :) i know i have a full notebook/some thing saved with facts all on it. i need to watch the anniversary disc interviews again.

#jaws #jaws 1975

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pennylanefics · 1 year

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The Librarian - Jake Kiszka | Chapter 4

a/n: this chapter is a bit self indulgent, i include my love and knowledge of sharks bc i mainly didn’t plan on posting it so it’s just what i had, but i like how it flowed and didn’t want to change it :)

word count: ~ 1.7k

JAKE’S POV:

As days go by, (Y/N) doesn’t come in. Granted, I don’t work the last three days of the week, but upon returning Sunday, Lily didn’t mention her, and knowing Lily, she absolutely would tell me if she was in.

This got my mind going. After the last interaction, her getting Josh’s number and wanting to help him write his short film, I wasn’t really feeling good about my feelings anymore. I still do find her cute, and after hearing that she doesn’t have a boyfriend back home, I thought I had a slight chance.

But no. Josh always has to come in and steal every girl that I like because he thinks he’s the cooler twin. And in reality, he is. He does film, he’s far more charismatic and open than me, who would rather spend a day in the library, avoiding the outside world.

That was neither here nor there, overall, Josh always does this, especially with how he knows how much I like this girl already. He has no awareness or anything for me, and I hate it. But I suck it up because life goes on.

It was a rainy Sunday afternoon, over a week has passed since I even last saw (Y/N), and it had been pretty quiet all morning. I finished putting away the books that were dropped off yesterday in the book drop, cleaned up and organized some shelves that people left the previous night, and finally retreated back to my spot behind the desk.

A little while passes and the storm grows heavier, though no thunder just yet. I am deep in a game of solitaire when the bell dings. My head shoots up and there stands (Y/N), who shakes off the rain, keeping her head down. She doesn’t have her laptop with her, so that means she won’t be working on her script.

She doesn’t acknowledge me or greet the ladies beside me as she heads straight back to the nonfiction section, disappearing into one of the back aisles. I clear my throat and try to focus on my game, but I couldn’t, knowing that she was here.

“Go,” Lily whispers, nodding her head in the direction that (Y/N) walked in. “There’s no one here, she doesn’t seem to be doing any work, go talk to her.”

“But, she could be wanting some time alone, I don’t want to bother her.”

“Bring her a hot chocolate and see what she’s up to then,” she suggests. Sighing softly, I nod and close the game of solitaire, leaving my desk. Nervously, I push my glasses further up my nose, my hands shaking slightly.

I find her sitting in the back aisle, where the oceanography books are. She hears my footsteps and looks up from the page she was scanning. Immediately, she smiles and my heart soars out of my chest.

“Hi,” she greets.

“Hi. Um, I saw you come in without your laptop. Taking a break from your script?” I ask, trying to mask my nerves.

“Oh, yeah, for a little. I didn’t have a good night last night, so I thought I’d come in today and just read up on a special interest of mine.” She shows me the cover of the book, a shark encyclopedia book, detailing every type and species of shark.

“I’m sorry to hear that last night wasn’t good. Anything interesting?” She furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. “I-I mean, in the book. F-finding anything interesting? About sharks?”

By now, my cheeks were on fire with embarrassment, but her giggle made me feel a little better, knowing that I didn’t really mean to pry into her life or anything.

“If you’d like to join me, I’d be happy to share the information that I’m finding out,” she offers. A wide smile stretches across my face before I look back to the front desk, which she notices. “Unless you have to get back to work.”

“My co-worker is the one who sent me over here, actually, so I figure I’m okay. It’s rather slow and we don’t really expect many people. I’m surprised to see you today, honestly. But I am gonna grab a couple things.”

She nods and looks back down at the book as I run off, placing an order for two hot chocolates. While the barista makes those, I grab the blanket that I keep in my locker for when it gets chilly, which today happens to be one of those days, with the rain and all.

I grab the two cups from the counter and make my way back. (Y/N) had gotten comfy with the surrounding pillows, for those that like to sit on the floor while reading. I hand her one cup and then drop to the floor beside her.

“Here,” I murmur, awkwardly holding the blanket out for her to take. She graciously takes it and covers her lap, but her next move surprises me.

She threw the cover over my lap as well, scooting right up against my side so I could see the book in her lap as well. My heart thumped in my chest, the tension rising in my body. But that soon washes away when I feel her thigh pressed against mine, the warmth radiating from her body, my mind beginning to wander…

No. I’m here to listen to her interests, not think about…that. As much as I wanted to.

“So, today, my own curiosity is leading me to study the differences between the species of hammerhead and the differences between the species of threshers.”

“How many are there of each?” I ask, leaning closer to her to look over her shoulder. On the page, there was a diagram of a hammerhead shark.

“Of the threshers, there are three. The pelagic, the big eye, and the common. Of hammerheads, there are nine.”

“Nine different kinds?” I confirm. She chuckles and nods, flipping back a couple pages.

“See, this is the great hammerhead,” she points to a similar diagram as the last one. “It’s the biggest of the species, and it can grow up to twenty feet. But the way to tell the difference is their cephalofoil."

“That’s a fun word,” I mumble, though she hears. A giggle escapes her mouth and she looks back down at the page, resting half of the book in my lap. I take a sip of my drink to distract myself from how close we are right now.

“It’s basically their heads. So you can see with the great hammerhead, they have this little notch,” my eyes follow her finger as she traces along the drawing of the shark, focusing on the head of the shark, directly in the middle of its head. “And not to mention their dorsal fins are massive.”

She was right, the drawing shows it’s very long and somewhat slender dorsal fin, very different to what you usually see or think of when you think of a shark fin.

“That’s pretty cool. So what’s the second largest hammerhead?” She flips the page eagerly and lands on another species.

“The smooth hammerhead. The main difference, and reason behind its name, is that it doesn't have any sort of notch or indentation in its cephalofoil.”

“So I’ve been lied to all my life, and the fact that smooth hammerheads are named that is because their head isn’t indented, and not because of their bodies being smooth?” I joke, causing her to laugh rather loudly, but with practically no one here, it didn’t really matter; in fact, I was starting to enjoy the sound very much.

“Yes, you have been lied to. Although there is a shark, the silky shark, that is named for its silky skin rather than the usual rough sandpaper-like skin that sharks have.”

“Oh really?” She nods and flips to the back of the book, finding the index and searching for the shark. Within seconds, she lands on the page that details the shark she mentioned.

For the next couple hours, we sit there, goofing off, going through almost every shark that was in the book, stopping to talk as she gives me facts outside of the information in the book, either from a documentary she watched or something she learned in general, or even during Shark Week.

The rain had picked up and it was now completely storming, but it really just added to the ambience of the setting. Who wouldn’t want to be in a cozy library, snuggled up under a blanket next to a cute girl, with hot chocolate, learning about sharks?

“So, what’s your favorite shark?” I ask (Y/N) when she closes the book. We had looked through pretty much all we could, so she set it aside for now.

“There’s lots of interesting ones, but I love bonnetheads. They’re so adorable and just like miniature versions of the bigger hammers. Oceanic white tips are also so fascinating to me.”

“Those are the ones that kind of look like nurse sharks, right?” I question, trying to think back to the information she just told me.

“No, that’s the whitetip reef. Oceanic whitetips are the ones that are pretty aggressive, with the downturned pectoral fins that are really round.”

“Oh yeah, now I remember. There’s just so many it’s-”

“(Y/N), there you are!” Josh’s voice appears at the end of the aisle. He walks towards us, standing right next to me. (Y/N) moves away from me rips the cover off, standing to greet my brother. “You ready to head to the diner?”

My blood turns cold and I freeze. Diner?

“Yeah.” She grabs her purse and steps over me, apologizing sweetly

“You guys are going to the diner?” I ask, trying to make it sound like I was just curious, but I desperately needed to know if it was a date or not.

“We’re gonna talk over the short film we’re working on together,” (Y/N) states, shooting me a small, sad smile.

“Oh. Well then, have fun,” I try to seem happy, but I can’t hide it anymore. They disappear and all I can hear is her laughter ringing off the walls, until the bell rings, telling me that they are no longer inside. Then, the quiet settles in, and my anxiety and insecurity raises. I try to prevent the tears that form in my eyes, but it’s no use.

Was I really going to lose this special, special girl to my brother? Because it’s truly beginning to feel like it, and I’m terrified of the day that it happens.

READER’S POV:

You and Josh enter the small yet very homey diner and quickly seat yourselves in an available booth.

“So, what’s good here?” You ask.

“You haven’t been here yet?” He wonders, looking at you in disbelief. You shake your head, feeling a little bit awkward, but he giggles, brushing off his facade. “Honestly, everything here is incredible.”

“You wanna share a plate of the loaded waffle fries?” You offer.

“Ugh yes, that’s my favorite appetizer, how’d you know?” Chuckling, you shrug and look down at the menu.

“Something we have in common I guess.”

You continue looking over every item available, Josh telling you some of his favorites, mixed with stories of times that he’s gotten those items and whatnot. Finally, when your order is placed, you stare across the table at the curly-haired man.

“So, for the scene with Edgar coming to Peter with the idea, I was thinking we could do something like panning around them, for some dramatic affect.”

“I mean, you’re the one who knows more about camera work and everything, so if you think that would be cool, we can do it.”

“Yeah, we follow Edgar down the stairs to where Peter is sitting, then he stands up, and kind of like a mob movie or action movie, circling around them gives this sense of urgency and all, even though this isn’t a life or death situation story.”

“Well, what does that add to the story? Because if we aren’t following them to Canada, because this is a short film, how is that sense of urgency there? Like, what are we rushing it for?” Josh thinks for a moment before sighing and sitting back, almost as if he’s defeated.

“Damn, you’re right,” he groans. “I personally just like making my films tense and suspenseful even in situations that don’t call for it.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that. This is just me throwing my own thoughts in with what I’ve learned. It would be a great use for a mob story, but not for this story.

The story follows three teens, just graduated from high school, planning a trip up to Canada to smuggle back some candy that isn’t sold in the United States, and sell it on the low when college starts.

“I just don’t think it’s necessary for them just sitting in a basement and going over logistics and planning and everything.”

“No, no, that absolutely makes sense. Thank you for the input, honestly.”

“Sorry to shoot down your first suggestion,” you tease. Just then, the waitress sets your plate of loaded waffle fries down, and immediately, your eyes widen.

It looked heavenly, though it did look like a pile of nachos. The fries were underneath a cheese sauce, bits of bacon, and melted shredded cheese over the top. A couple ramekens of ranch are also placed on the table, and your mouth waters.

“You get first bite,” Josh says, pushing the plate towards you. Using your fingers, you take a fry completely covered in both cheeses, dip it into the ranch, and then pop it in your mouth. Josh watches, interested in your reaction.

“Oh my god,” you moan. Josh laughs and claps a little, digging into the plate as well.

“Right?! Absolutely amazing.”

The rest of the time is spent continuing getting to know one another, with the film talk being pushed aside as you get into personal conversations.

“And so my brother Sam and I were trying to haul this fish up onto the boat and-”

“Your milkshake,” the waitress interrupts the conversation, setting a glass down in front of you. A single milkshake.

“I uh, did you order this?” You ask Josh. He shakes his head and looks over at the waitress.

“Remember how this town is small? Everyone knows everyone, and that waitress is a friend from elementary school, so she often just gives me free milkshakes whenever I come in. But, you are more than welcome to share it.”

He pushes a straw towards you and you open it, sticking it into the freezing dessert. You take the first drink and sigh.

“That is so good, oh my god. Everything here is so incredible.”

“Yeah? Well, maybe we can come back another day, no film talk, nothing. Just a day to relax, maybe after we finish filming.”

“I’d love to. I wanted to try that chicken cheesesteak thing, but I wasn’t in the mood for it today.” You take another sip from your milkshake, a little bit spilling out onto your lip. Josh smiles and reaches over the table.

“Um, you have, uh,” he mumbles, pointing to your lip. “May I?” With a confirming nod from you, he swipes his thumb across your bottom lip, ridding the droplet from your skin.

Your face turns hot upon feeling his soft thumb against your lip. He wipes his finger onto his napkin, keeping his eyes on you. Tension suddenly filled the air, and you didn’t know what to do next. Thankfully, the waitress came over and dropped the check off, so that gave Josh and excuse to look away.

“Well, that was so fun, despite not getting much talk done about the film,” you say as you walk out of the diner and back to Josh’s car.

“It really was. And I’m looking forward to going there again soon with you,” he winks. Another rush of heat creeps up your neck and floods your cheeks. He opens the passenger side door for you, allowing you to slide in easily.

When he reaches your house, you gather your purse and get ready to step out of the car, but before doing so, you turn back to Josh. Leaning over the console, you kiss his cheek as quickly and softly as ever. He freezes, his own cheeks turning a light pink.

“I’ll see you later, Josh,” you smile at him one final time before getting out and shutting the door behind you. He sits there for a few seconds, trying to come to terms with what happened.

“Hm,” he hums to himself, the grin still plastered onto his face. He finally drives away, excited for what the next couple weeks will hold.

—

taglist: @maud-gone @streamingcolors-gvf @mweasley19 @lolipopsandgumdrops @universoulindigo @byulgogii @artsygarbitch @dannyandthekiszkas @shutupdevvie @writingcold @fan-girl-97 @sunfl0wer-power @rhythm-of-space @allieisacrybaby @gardenofgreta @interstellar-shores @anythingforjtk @gretavanbitches @thecoldwind @surmonella @why-ami-on-here @milkgemini @spark-my-nature

#the librarian #jake kiszka #jake kiszka imagines #jake kiszka x reader #jake kiszka imagine #jake kiszka fanfiction #jake kiszka fanfic #greta van fleet #gvf #greta van fleet imagines #greta van fleet fanfic #gvf imagines #gvf fanfic #josh kiszka #sam kiszka #danny wagner #imagines #fanfiction #fanfic

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popculturebuffet · 10 months

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Into the Spider-Verse Finale: Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse Review (Comissioned by WeirdKev27)

In Memory of John Romita Senior 1930-2023

Let's do this one last time. I"m Jacob Mattingly, and for the past few months, i've been reviewing the first apperances of spider-men. I've seen them enjoy crackers and milk, knock themselves out on furnaces, drum to deal with their pent up angst, rage, get powers from a spooky god while buck naked, and crumple a pipe like paper in their hand. It's been a long, loving ride into comics that not only got my comics reviewing mojo back but allowed me to share one of my faviorite franchises with you fine folks, many of whom don't usually read comics.

So we've come to the end of this retrospective, a bit later thanks to all the chaos of me using, but appropriatley as the final review i'm doing from the only home i've ever known. After 561 reviews here, it's time to say goodbye and given this is both one of the best projects i've done in my career and one where i've finally started editing better, it feels like the note to go out on.

This review has also been super intemidating to start. I'm an animation and comics nerd.. and Into is easily one of the best animated films AND best superhero films ever. It's also MASSIVELY influental, something I didn't see coming when I walked out of the theater, but really should've and we're now starting to see in earnest now the production cycle has had enough time to catch up to this film being a MONSTER hit. From modern masterworks like Mitchells Vs the Machines and Puss In Boots: The Last Wish to upcoming possible greats like TMNT: Mutant Mayhem, it's very clear studios are now far more likely to break from the standard CG styles and do something fresh, and audiences fucking love it. I hadn't realized till this film how much you could play with animation, from the concept of ones and twos to making a comic book movie look like a comic book. Any time I paused while watching this it felt like looking at a panel. The art here is gorgeous and the script matches it. So the question was both what would I have to say about the film and would I be able to live up to it? The only way to find out. is to take the leap. So join me under the cut as we swing into the spider-verse once again and see what makes this film so great 5 years later. Also as a heads up spoilers for the sequel will be present so if you somehow havne't seen it, you've been warned.

Let's Do This One More Time.... To get into why this film happened we have to get into Sony's treatment of spider-man. Said treatment has been a near neverending cycle of doing something right with it.. only to do something that shoots what they did right several times in the foot, stabs it and lights it on fire. Sam Rami makes two great spider-man films? Let's overly interfere with the last one and weigh it down with a lot of stuff it didn't really need. Amazing Spider-Man was decent with two tremendous leads in Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone but had some places to improve like peter being a skater boy she said see you later boy? Let's get complicated with it, overly focusing on Peter's Parents, including PLANNING TO HAVE PETER'S DAD SHOW UP ALIVE, a mysterious man in a trench coat from a tie in novel, and make harry osborn into this.

It's hard to decide which is worse. I mean their both worse than that time Harry Got a Mustache in College

A very high bar no doubt, but it's hard to decide if modern pale emo kid or GNEEE GNEEE I'M THE GREEN GOBLIN GNEEE GNEE was worse. Though I think we all can agree sony deciding "You know this pathetic weirdo we just had kill one of our most popular characters? LET'S GIVE HIM A MOVIE" is just.. one of the most baffling decisions they've made. Popular Anti-Hero with his own history, rogues and dynamic outside of spider-man Venom makes us an unexpected hit? Let's give him a sequel.. which was actually logical. So naturally they also decide "let's make OTHER spider-man villians and anti heroes into their own movies" I mean who DOSEN'T want a kraven movie?.... me.. me don't want that. I want Kraven IN a movie, but why. And the less said about morbius that dosen't involve Matt Smith giving one hell of a performance or weirdly dancing to show off his impressive abs the better.

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Why wasn't the film just... Matt Smith as a more villianous version of morbius? A riddle for the ages. The point is sony has a GOLDEN franchise.. but often has no idea what to do with it. It's why when this film was pitched they were trying badly to find something to do with it, hence Venom. So since they had an animation division that while not terrible only really had one franchise of note, head of spider-man stuff Amy Pascal went to two of the men who'd made one of the most succesful animated films of the time and who were on a high point in their career and asked what they would do. These men.. were Christopher Lord and Phil Miller. The two had had a rocky start in their careers, show running the cult hit Clone High, which while well loved to the point we finally got a new season this year that was pretty dang good, wasn't exactly a big hit. Eventually though the two broke out with 21 Jump Street, a film no one had a ton of faith in hearing about it, myself included. The film was a comedy reboot of the old series, lampooning the whole premise and lamp shading the hell out of everything from this being a reboot, to our heroes not remotely passing for high schoolers, to high school drama itself, and not only revived Lord, Miller and Stars Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill's careers. This naturally got a sequel, which was not only even better and more meta, cumulating in a hell of an ending lampshading the idea of this being a franchise, we also got one of the funniest scenes in the history of film. And yes that's a hill i'm wiling to die on.

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And even THAT woudn't be it as the two would go on to make the Lego Movie, a film that was both stylistically brilliant, hilarious and used the property brilliantly AND followed that up with The Lego Batman Movie. The two had a clear talent for taking a property, doing something fresh with it while honroing what worked so they were a no brainer to ask to do this. As for why would they.... IT'S SPIDER-MAN. If I got offered to make a movie about spider-man i'd do it. Who wouldn't?

Ironically though while Miller and Lord had the creative vision, something even I didn't know till recently is that they didnt' direct the film. In fact out of them only Lord wrote the film, co writing it with Rodney Rothman, who also co-wrote 22 Jump Street which as established above, is quality as hell. Rothman's Resume up to Jumpstreet isn't really anything huge, having done writing stints on underclared, the short lived ups animated sitcom Game Over, and having been a writer on Letterman, the last of which i'm mostly noting because he proudly revealed he was the one Chris Farley threw in a dumpster, but he clearly just needed more of a shot as both films he's co-written prove.

He also wasn't flying solo in direction, with his co directors, while also inexperinced in directing for the most part, having far more animation experince. First up is bob perschetti, who did the story for the original puss in boots and a smaller film called the little prince, and did tons of storyboard work for dreamworks, having worked on Shrek 2, Monsters Vs Aliens, Flushed Away and Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit, which I previously covered. He was also an inbetweener on a smorgasboard of disney films.

Finally we have Peter Ramsey, the only one to have directed a theatrical film before this with Rise of the Guardians, and was a storyboard artist on a list of flims so massive and prestigous i'm just going to let this wikipedia screencap speak for itself.

Yeahhhh. See I point out the lack of direction credintials not to shame them, sometimes it can take decades before you get your shot, but more because it's so utterly shocking that as experinced as these guys are only one of them had directed before this. The film is gorgeous and groundbreaking.. and makes it that much more baffling it took this long for these three guys to get such a big , well deserved shot and given all have projects going on right now, I couldn't be happier.

So the production itself seemed to go smoothly for the most part. The only exceptions were Sony nixing a cameo from tom holland (as they found it confusing) and something massive: one year out from the film being released Lord and Miller felt the film wasn't working and thus decided to rewrite it. This itself dosen't seem too bad, a year seems like a lot of time... but in animation terms.. that's hardly anything and also heavily involved taking what they already had and figuring out how to recontextualize it. If you couldn't tell from going that far, the duo were fans, having read spider-man comics and done research for it, picking thier spider-men carefully. The results.. well the results are nothing short of amazing, spectacular or peter parker.

Taking the Leap: As I mentioned earlier Spider-verse.. changed film animation. This isn't hyperbole either; if you look at the bulk of this year's animated films their all more stylistic with many, TMNT: Mutant Mayhem and Nimona in paticular, using a combo of 2d and 3d animation and it stretches into last year two with The Bad Guys and Puss in Boots and in 2020 with Sony's own Mitchell's Vs the Machines. More studios are experimenting with their style and trying something diffrent and what's more remarkable is that.. they aren't just 1:1 copying spiderverse. Many have taken it's sketchy style sure , but no one's doing it the exact same way: Spider-Verse often resembles a comic book, TMNT a sketch book and nimona something else entirely. Each is drawn and rendered.. but each in a way all it's own.

It's not to say films before this didn't have their own style: as my friend Kammie pointed out in a long conversation about animation recently, Dreamworks has always had it's distinct character models and before this The Peanut Movie (one of my faviorite cg animated films ever) and Rango both tried to play with it. Peanuts in paticular also took a stab at emulating the comics it's based on. The problem was while both films were gorgeous.. neither really took off. Peantus was a modest success, but the Schultz family had no interest in a sequel, while Rango didn't really land at the box office. And when something fails hollywood tends to blame the work itself and not circumstance or

Spider-Verse broke that by not only being a mainstream hit but one that really worked the animation as hard as it could. It gets .. incredibly technical and even I wasn't aware of how much till going to tv tropes but simply: most animation is done on ones or twos. Ones means a unique image every frame, twos means a unique image every other frame. You usally use one or the other. Spider-Man.. does BOTH, which is as exausting as it sounds, using 2s on the characters and 1's on the character work to give it a more dynamic vision, and shaking it up when needed, such as having miles on ones for most of the film , the rest of the spider people on twos, and then miles on twos after the what's up danger scene. It's a LOT of dedication and that's not even getting to how every spider-person has a slightly diffrent animation style. The results are eye candy in it's purest form: every pause is a panel, every action catches your eye, everything works. And the panel part is paticuarlly notable as the crew did their damndest to make this LOOK like a comic in motion. It's something that , as many great comic book movies and superhero films as we've had.. you simply cannot do in live action. So if it's so obvious why did it take till 2018 to do?

It's likely other suprehero animated films had the idea.. but there was no way in hell they were getting the budget to do it. And if you've seen say the incredibles, mask of the phantasm of megamind, those budgets are already pretty damn vast for their times. Animation is a great medium.. but when it comes to film... the big studios get complacient really fast. Animated Films are EXPENSIVE and a huge swing like this is a radioactive spider-risk. It's why up until spider-verse most studios have stuck to their guns: Disney and Pixar have ocasoinal style shifts but you can genuinely tell when a film's by either stuido, Illumination basks in it's cheap but effective house style, and Warner.. well warner just dosen't give a shit in general why would it here. Dreamworks is the only one that really shook up styles and even then until this year they didn't shake up how they aniamted. After all if it works.. why fix it. And before anyone asks, no i'm not saying "ALL THESE OMVIES ARE TERRIBLE FUCK THEM AMIRITE". I'm saying that the industry got complacent and it's something I, an animation critic, didn't even realize till spider-verse's effects started being felt. Animation really did change because this one film took a leap and it's only for the better: Mutant Mayhem looks to be the best tmnt adaptatoin ever, a VERY high bar from an obessive tmnt fan like me, Nimona looks awesome, i've heard good things abotu Ruby Gilman from Kammie, and Puss In Boots was fucking magic. And while they all likely woud've ben good regardless, this leap has really changed things and hopefully will continue to from here on out as more and more new films catch up lead time wise. To quote Kammie

"The new giants of major western movie animation are Sony and Dreamworks, they're willing to innovate and take risks where most other studios falter and resort to retreading old territory or using stock plots. Do they still innovate technicalogically? Yes. Does that matter when you make movies that only look slightly more realistic than the last one you did? No. We don't go to animation for realism, we go to it for escapism, to see worlds that are utterly impossible and larger-than-life characters, find places that we can only visit in our dreams, to see sheer spectacle that's not possible in live action. Animation more than anything is only limited by technology, and it's a testament to it that most live action films have CGI, a form of animation, involved in making them what they are."

But animation is only half of it. How's the story? Good: But that's pretty obvious so let's go into our characters and what not shall we?

Miles Morales: Anyone Can Wear the Mask

So first up danger is our hero.. well one of many but Miles is our focus and was a perfect choice for it: his arc in the comics is a coming of age story in the vein of the original and ultimate spider-men (the latter being miles predecessor), and really explores what it means to be spider-man: in the comics Miles rejects the idea outright until peter dies.. and he realizes with great power comes great responsiblity and that he can be what peter was.. and then has to settle into the harsh realities of being spidey as well as the good it brings. Bringing a character like that into a story with a bunch of other spider-man all showing what it could mean with diffrent people was genius. The film also nicely tweaks things to make an already good story better. The first is miles age: in the comics he's currently 16-17.. but started out as a 13 year old. The idea worked, both to seperate it from the 16 year old peter he replaced and to make the danger that much more horrifying as it's happening to a much younger person and make some doubts about him doing it more understandable, but it works better to have miles as a teen here, to have him grown up just enough to understand a lot.. but still question who he is. It also allows the nice parallel of getting his powers around the same age as peter.

Another is that in the comics while Miles gets into brooklyn visions by lottery.. what that means for him really isn't focused on. It's hard, but he adjusts to it fairly well and the issue is more having to spider-man from a heavily montired private dormintory. Into instead explores what it would really mean for a kid from a working class family having to leave all the people he knew and grew up with to go to a fancy prep school where most of his classmates ignore him at best. In the comics Miles at least had his best friend going with him: here's he's just alone in an unfamiliar place he badly wants to leave.

I also like that his getting into the school isn't ALL luck. While he literally won the lottery, and yes they really do lottery children's chances for a better future and yes it's fucked up, his mom makes note of him passing the entrance exam and while trying to flunk out delbieratley, his teacher notes he got an exact zero... and then gives him a 100 as to get the answers THAT wrong.. you have to know all of them. Miles is a smart kid.. but he just hates where he is because he's alone. It's not helped by his.. let's say complicated relationship with his dad. Jefferson.. is not the most likeable guy. He's more than the comics where he's an out and out anti-mutant racist douchebag who outright abandons his son when he finds out (he DOES get better, but it's still a dick move), but he's still a domenering presence: when Miles brings up wanting to leave the school Jefferson is admant on him staying. He refuses to really.. empthaize with his son, being mad at his habit of putting up nametags, not really supporting his grafiti art (another deft addition to the character It ruly love), and not really getting him. Jefferson MEANS well: he wants miles to have a life jeff didn't. Like in the comics i'ts heavily implied Jeff didn't really start with anything nor did he or Aaron have the best life, having to steal to survive. He grew past it while Aaron embraced the criminal life style, but it's clear Jefferson WANTS his son to do better.. but is so stubborn and controlling he can't see that miles is miserable and that he needs to stop putting his foot down and start actually listening. The school WILL be good for miles in the long run.. but it's hard for him to see that without anyone helping him. It's easy to see WHY Miles prefers his uncle. Aaron davis isn't the best person, and we'll get to that.. b ut it's clear he loves his nephew and encourages him in school. It's just Aaron also takes the time to LISTEN, to try and gently push miles, asking him what he actually likes about the schol, encouraging him to make a move on his crush. Grnated the shoulder touch is a very awkward move no one should try and I never would, seriously don't touch a woman without their permission folks, but he means well with it. He also wants better for Miles.. he just respects miles more as a person. And with Miles feeling like one person but being shoved in another direction... being spider-man was the last thing he needed. Something I like about Miles as a character both here and in the comics.. is that being spider-man DOSEN'T make his life better at first. See even if most spider-men eventually get the lowered boom of someone they love dying, most get to at least enjoy it first. Looking back at the origins, Peter getting his powers takes a young nerd with no power and gives him all of it, Spider-Ham got a surrogate mom and teh power to crumple other peoples pipes like paper in his hand, while NOir's origin was.. less than ideal

He still got the power to fight back against a corrupt world, and Gwen much like peter got a power high. Miles.. never gets that in either version. In the comics he's utterly terrified and here he not only gets that.. but also gets humilated: trying the touch fails..as it likely woul'dve anyway, and instead messes up gwen's hair in the short run and makes it kick ass in the long run, sends him running in a panic from school security, and gets him stuck to about 80 dozen things. It shows the part most spidey origins and a chunk of superhero origins skip: that while getting powers is fun.. the learning curve usually sucks. Instead of the power high.. miles is just terrified by what he is and what he must do now and has no idea what he's doing. While most spider-man get the good of it first and have to learn the harsh realities of being a superhero later, usually with some horrific death, miles is one who from the get go realized with great powers comes a spinerett load of trauma. It's something the next film will deconstruct, but for now it's simply stripping that back and showing that while anyone can be spider-man.. it's not exactly a fun job as it is on paper.

So Miles goes to try find his uncle and when that fails, goes to the place he got bit by the spider..

Because he gets thrown into a supervillian battle, meets the real spider-man, and gets a hard truth from Peter Peter: You're like me. Miles: I don't want to be. Peter: I don't think you have a choice, kiddo.

It's not Blonde Peter being harsh or cruel.. he's just honest. You can try running away from powers, trying to live a normal life.. but eventually it catches up with you. Peter's tried to quit multiple times.. but it dosen't stick because great power, great responsibility. He can try and give up, leave it to other guys.. but at the end of the day having this gift means using it wisely.. and in miles case having it also makes him a target. And Miles ALMOST gets a mentor.. but then peter dies and gruffly tells Miles "You gotta save the world now slugger". Oh and not two seconds later he nearly dies getting chased by a superman. And he wasn't even supposed to be here today. Honestly I didn't even realize till I sat down to write this but the first half hour or so of the film.. is pretty bleak for miles. He gets power he dosen't want, has to watch the world's greatest hero die, and is left in charge of a major task that someone with a decades more experince died trying to do. Oh and he was told to keep it secret and can't tell those he loves. His life is just one hard long cruel cosmic joke.. and the sequel makes it even worse given we now know the spider wasn't even supposed to bite him and he gets BLAMED for watching someone die. Also just to get this out of the way now, while I was calling bullshit on Miguels claims Miles was responsible for Peter's death in the theater, I did watch the scene carefully just to throughly debunk this. And shockity shock... Peter would've died whether miles was there or not. The goblin suckers him slightly due to miles.. but it's nothing that really slows him down or injures him. What ultimately leaves peter at deaths door and weak enough for the kingpin to do his finisher on the poor guy is getting ganged up on by Prowler and Goblin, and then slammed into the collider. Aaron would've been there, Norman would've been there.. this all was supposed to happen, as tragic as it was. Fate changed by Miles getting bit.. but it changed this world at least for the better as it'd probably be gone along with 5 more spiderpeople and incalculable innocents. So in conclusion: eat a dick miguel, let's move on.

So with that Miles is left shattered and wonders home.. and Jefferson is warm and supportive and just kidding: he tells miles he made a commitment, rio has to give him a look like "come on" and when asked if he hates spider-man, while his child is clearly shaken by SOMETHING, his reponse is "well yeah".

And with the power of hindsight this .. really underlines why Miles has confidence issues the rest of the film. Why he struggles with his powers: he was already feeling out of place in his new school and having most of what makes him who he is questioned by his dad, and then he goes through spider-puberty and watches the world's greatest hero get body slammed into a science machine, gets yelled at by said hero that

Watches said hero get mob executioned by a villian he now has to stop, and then gets chased by his top enforcer while spooky but dope as fuck music played. It's a miracle Miles hasn't had a full on nervous breakdown after all this, let alone gets up, and decides he HAS to press on, visiting the memorial and realizing that no one else is going to come do this.. I mean they will but what makes it work is he dosen't know that yet. All miles knows is the one thing keeping the city from falling apart is gone, and he's the only one who can do this and as rightfully scared and afraid and alone the poor boy is... he has to try. He may not be quite ready to take the leap.. but he's ready to put a foot off the roof.

While miles has plenty of deadly and superior foes to fight.. his ultimate enemy is himself...

.... metaphorically this movie. Miles has the heart of a hero.. but is so scared by being one and so sure he CAN'T do it that it's a self fufilling prophecy. It's something expertly shown in how his powers work: he can't get his hands to stick or unstick on queue or his camo to work unless he needs it to flee. His powers are acting on his panic and anxiety. As peter points out with the sticking, it only lets go when you relax and Miles can't relax, he can't relax cuz he's a boinger.. and because you know, he's in a VERY stressful situation. Most spider-men at least get a few simple crooks before they get to the supervillians. Miles has to fight the sinister six on his first day. I'ts easy to see why he can't trust himself: if a peter ten years deep in can't do it, how can he? It's telling the one time pre-what's up danger miles really masters his abilities fully is with web swinging, when he just has a chance to relax and learn.

It's not helped by Miles essentially seeing the ghosts of his future right in front of him: Through Peter Prime, he's seen he can die easily. Through peter b. he sees even if he dosen't being spider-man might destroy his personal life. and through gwen he's seen how he could grow isolated and alone through tragedy. He sees his possible future in two people he grows to love, one platonically one nto so much both who we'll get to, and it scares him. It doesn't help Peter. B is the ONLY spider person willing to give him a chance: while Gwen likes him, she thinks he's not ready and the others all expect him to be spider-man NOW dammit, when all of them had a much less steep learning curve. Except Peni, her learning curve was basically "Suprise we released the spider your dad made into this room! Enjoy being radioactive!"

Into The Spider-Verse is ultimately a film about how others expectations of you can eat you alive.. and the only way to really escape that.. is to be yourself. Not to IGNORE that other people exist or be a callous jackass, but to trust in yourself you'll make the right call. To trust you to do the right thing when things are their darkest.

And it's ironic that what finally gets him to have faith in himself.. is the person who seemed to have the least faith in him. In the end the person who enrcourages miles is Jefferson. While miles has been having his arc.. Jeff has had his own, as miles has been mia since meeting peter. b, and then found his brother dead.. and blamed miles as spider-man for it. Thankfully this gets cleared up enough, but it clearly rattled Jeff enough to realize that holding fast and trying to be constantly authortive and unbending.. isn't working and never has. It's only by opening up does he not only finally close the gap with his son, even if that comes AFTER all this because you know, webbed up mouth and all, but makes miles finally have some confidence in himself. And the speeech itself is just.. beautiful.

Jefferson Davis : Look, sometimes... people drift apart, Miles. And I don't want that to happen to us, okay? Look, I know I don't always do what you need me to do or say what you need me to say, but I... I see this... this spark in you, it's amazing, it's why I push you. But it's yours, and whatever you choose to do with it, you'll be great.

I'll also give Brian Tyree Henry credit as he's just perfect in the role, being a hardass.. but in a way that makes it clear he's not 100% dick and here him opening up.. is beautiful. And it's really what miles needed: While Peter. B wasn't a TERRIBLE mentor, trying his best to encourage miles, what miles ultimately needed was the simplest message: be yourself. Which yes is INCREDIBLY common in animated media. But it's done well here. It also makes me wish the cut line with peter used in the trailers was used here as it really gets to the heart of the film: Don't do it like me, do it like you. Miles problem was that he tried too hard to be what others wanted and that people pushed him to hard to be somethign else, wether that meant instantlly accepting a hard situation in his new school from his dad or instantly fitting the role as spider-man from the other spider-people. it's only when he's told just.. do it his way that he finally can accept it.. and can finally CONTROL it. What I like is that while in a lot of other superhero films, miles suddenly being able to control his powers would be an asspull .. here it's CAREFULLY set up: Miles coudlnt' really control them because he was scared. It's once he lets go of his fear of death, fear of failure, and fear of himself.. that he can take a leap of faith. His ascendency to spider-man is also one of the best sequences in any animated movie. Not taking notes on that. It just is.

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Every fucking second of this is perfect. "What's Up Danger" itself is dope as fuck, and perfectly fits the song. Black Caviar's beat is pure magic and Blackways lyrics perfectly fit the confidence Miles finally has. Their a bit rougher than him but fit who he is NOW: he is the amazing, spectacular, the ULTIMATE spider-man. After a whole film of doubting himself, not knowing where to go or what to do or if he can do this... HE CAN. And he WILL. There's so many great moments: him spraypainting the costume, taking one of peter's looks and making it is his own with his own talent and passion, the now iconic upside down falling shot that graced every trailer, and him swinging and wall jumping through new york, finally embracing his power... all capped with him lifting the mask, panting in exaustion... and then smiling. He's got this.

The insuing big damn heroes during the brawl with the sinister six is great. He shows up invisible, easily turns the table on liv and shows up, and it's also heartwarming how rather than tell him to go home or any other such nonsense.. everyone is HAPPY he's here. They didn't put him back because they didn't like him.. they kept him back because they didn't want him to die stupidly. NOw he CAN fight and has the confidence and skill to.. their happy to have him.

I also like how while all the spider-people ge ttheir moments and we get one hell of a three on one battle between doc ock , miles, peter and gwen, the final fight, the true final test.. is miles alone. Everyone gets to shine as the villians get whittled down to one.. but ultimately the final battle only works if it's miles alone: one final test as spider-man: Miles vs Fisk. The All-New All-Diffrent Spider-Man vs the man who murdered the original. The Kingpin of Crime Vs your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-man. It's a truly harrowing fight, one where Miles is often overwhelmed, but does what all spider-men do: get back, keep fighting. Do everything he can. With jeffersons support one last time miles goes from a scared child.. to catching this thief just like a fly.. complete with bug zapper. The touch of using the.. well shoulder touch is fucking amazing, hilaroius, heartwrenching.. and awesome. The man who killed his uncle, who nearly destroyed new york is down. The universe is saved... all thanks to brooklyn's own friendly neighborhood spider-man. Miles ends the film sure of himself, happy and with his father accepting him. He misses everyone.. but he'll see them again. He just might come to regret it but hey.. that's for next time.

As a quick epilogue, I ALMOST forgot to mention but Shamiek Moore is fucking perfect in the role. While Donald Glover would've been a great fit, Moore brings a youthful energy that perfectly fits the character. Moore handles the characters journey, the humor, and the heartbreak all beautifully.

Peter B. Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Mess

While this film is focused on the new kid on the webs, Lord and Miller still decided to include the Spider-Man everyone was familiar with. In fact.. they lean INTO how familiar we are to play with peter as a character. When they give their stories for the comics brilliant origin sequences, they both know to just.. gloss over most of the stuff we're familiar with.. and to basically apologize for the emo peter dance. Lord and MIller clevelry use the rami films as a refrence point. Then they do something ENTIRELY new in terms of adapting peter at this point: this peter.. has been at this for a while. It's something Insomniac would also use for their universe and honestly.. is quitely brilliant. In the comics.. peter HAS been at this for about a decade.. exactly how long has been kept vauge, but he's always pushing 30. Most adaptations though want to start with peter fairly early in his career: while some cartoons like Ultimate, Spectacular or Animated Series start with peter mid career, it's still fairly early and before he faces most of his arch enemies. It also makes sense: after all if your making a spider-man universe from scratch, why would you start with him already knowing how to fight these guys? The comics have the advantage of years of continuity, so writers can do what they want with the bad guys basically. But since a new continuintiy means you can do the latter from the top, why would you start in the middle of your story? It CAN work as shown here and with , while I sadly can't play them because no ps4 or 5, the insomniac games, but with the latter it works to the games advantage to have you play a peter whose already a kicker of ass first class.

Here though instead it's used for something even the comics often have their hands tied from doing: to show just how TIRED spider-man would be after a decade of this. While Blonde Peter is great at the job, has a loving aunt, and an adoring wife... he's still so very tired. He says so when fighting Prowler. It's clear the heir of "I can always do this, i'm spider-man" is as much a coping mechanism as it is determination. It explores the idea that peter's drive to keep going, to do the imposisble would wear him down eventually.. and given the crap he has to go through in the comics because writers think there needs to be added DRAMA, you can't blame him. Peter. B shows where this leads.. a peter who has 80 tons of broken bones, stopped taking care of himself, and is slowly falling apart after Aunt May's death, cumilating in pushing MJ away after she wanted kids.. and he was scared of it. Which given what his life is like is actually understandable. It's also a type of fear the comics have only been able to explore in AU's: editors have been dicks about the idea of peter having kids, and the one time he seriously was about ot have one before it was kidnapped, he was retired.. then it got kidnapped and disappeared because clone saga. Here we see the fear he'd have.. and peter sabotaging his own life as MJ seems relcutant as he is to divorce and the peter left in the aftermath is crying in a bathtub in his full costume

This is a peter who ONLY has being spider-man and we see how deeply unhealthy that is. Part of what makes Peter Parker so great, what's kept spider-man enduring.. is relatablity. Peter struggles with the same stuff most of us do: holding down a job, crappy bosses, relationship issues, juggling family with your life, friendships getting complicated... it's the ballancing act of having a regular life and also punching the kangaroo in the face while he's at it that makes spider-man compelling and it's finding new ways to do that, from having peter teach at his old high school to having him actually get a science job, that makes this character endure. Here though.. it's just Spider-Man and we see how unhealthy that is: May is dead, he pushed MJ and likely anyone else in his life away... peter only has being spider-man left, and action can be a reward but it can't give you a fulfilling life. This is a peter whose just going through the motions and badly broken. It's very telling that when Miles tries to use "With Great Power Comes Great Responsiblity" , the HEART of what spider-man, any spider-man, woman or ham, is, Peter responds with a very harsh "DON'T finish that sentence. I'm so tired of people using that". He's a peter whose so far to the edge he's willing to leave miles world to die just to get back to a life that's deeply miserable. In most cases spider-man would swing at the right thing but Peter B is just so very tired he just wants to go home.

But he's still spider-man.. and eventually realizes as much as he wants to.. he can't leave miles there and he can't leave this world to die. The movie is also good in not letting peter dangle off the edge of being absolutely awful too long. He refuses to save the world at first.. but it's clear Miles gets to him right away. He's still a mess.. but he's also Spider-Man. He's also peter parker. And May raised him better. The relationship between Peter B and Miles.. is fantastically done, with Miles slowly opening up his new mentor and Peter B slowly rediscovering what he actually liked about the job... and that maybe he CAN be a dad and spider-man. We see his humor slowly come back, him swatting the cape away from miles, gleefully pointing out what to do. He's still not the BEST teacher, wanting miles to just wait.. but when miles has to come along, he's grumpy for a few seconds then roles with it. We start with Peter. B seeing how worn down he is...but here we see all the experince and skill of his blonde counterpart. He's still the science nerd who can memorize a complicated password and can't grasp that miles can't. He's still a mess, trying to flirt with what turns otu to be his aunt's ex.. and also doc ock, but we see a subtle change, cumilating in the heartwarming scene of him and miles swinging together. peter may be a mild dick and a human disaster.. but he's a good man. By the time all the spider-people are together and doubting miles.. peter. b is the only one who sees how much this quest means to hte boy and is advocating for him. To them Miles is in over his head.. but Peter sees the spark in miles Jefferson does. He sees a kid who was thrown in the deep of this and the last thing MIles need is 80 people telling him he can't do it. It's likely that, just like Blonde Peter, Peter. B sees the pain and confusion that comes from starting as spider-man clear as day and if he can help miles avoid that, he will. Jake Johnson is phenominal in this role, helping show the depth behind this kind of peter. It best shows after the house fight: While Peter is trying to get Miles to stay behind and is willing to die to save his world... he's doing it for MOSTLY noble reasons. Miles really WASN'T ready and as Peter pointed out, he needed to be ready to just take a leap of faith. He's gone from wanting to abandon miles because he dosen't care.. to leaving him behind because he dosen't want his surrogate son to die horribly trying to fufill a promise he's not ready for. Granted like I said it's mostly noble: its very clear Peter. B is also doing this.. because he feels himself expendible. He has nothing to go back to, the others do. Miles has more to live for. If he dies staying here... what's he leaving behind? It's what makes his ending so rewarding: He sees miles finally take that leap and as I mentioned before he's nothing but happy Miles finally has got it and fights alongside his new son, realizing maybe he does want kids. He still plans to stay behind.. and the student becomes the teacher, with Miles pointing out he can't.. things with MJ aren't broken.. he still has time to make it right. He still has something to live for. It's hard.. but so was becoming spider-man for miles. If Peter. B is ready to die for this dimension.. he can live for MJ and for his protege. So he ends the film making up with her with Mj's smile showing she welcomes him back.. and as we'll see he really gets his happily ever after. But we'll get more on that next time.

Vault of Spiders

So now we've come to the other spider-people. First up our most prominent, Gwen, whose mostly taken 1:1 from the comics: She became Spider-Woman, then learned the great power great responsiblity lesson the hard way when she fought the lizard.. and he died revealing peter parker, her best friend who just wanted to be like her, leaving her alone. There's more to it, but that's best left for the next film when we get her origin in full. Gwen is done well here: the punk haircut fits her perfectly and Hailee Steinfeld is unsurprisingly awesome as her and gets Gwen's loneliness, standoffishness, and badassery perfectly, and we see her slowly open up to miles, with her doubts coming off less as bein ga jerk and more as being worried for him. We also get some nice subtle bits: while she mentions her best friends.. only WE know her best friend was a peter, and that being surrounded by about 4 of him and having to talk to aunt may, who she's also close to in her dimension, is likely a LOT for the poor kid. She also gets some genuinely cute moments with miles, from their first meeting in class, to the disastrous touch (and the later great brick joke of "you don't get to like it"), to the bus scene). Orignally the two WERE suppposed to be a couple.. but i'm glad they left the more overt romance for the sequels, as the films packed enough as is and it gives it more build. It's clear there's an attraction there.. there just isn't time for it given the possible dimensional apocalypse. That's what sequels are for.

That said I do think had they focused on just three spider-persons we might of had more of an arc for Gwen... instead we get a lot of personality but not who she is. I'd be harder on this.. but to the crews and the next batch of directors credit, they realized this and in the next film, and likely extending into Beyond, she's the deutragonist. So it's hard to be on this when they realized what they had next go round. The other spider-people on the other hand.. feel like a massive wasted opportunity. Casting wise it's all pitch perfect: Nicholas Cage is perfet for a noir parody and is utterly hilarious, John Mulaney's everyman voice is perfect for spider-ham, helping emphasise how weird this is, and Peni's serious nature and anime stylings are something the beloved Kimiko Glenn gets down perfectly. I was so happy to see her in a movie this size. And adaptation wise.. 2/3 ain't bad. Spider-Ham is pitch perfect from the source and Peni, while having her anime stylings here focused on a bit more, still has her science background and driven nature. Noir Peter though.. yeah while he's not TERRIBLE on his own in terms of actually adapting the character... it's wince inducing. I don't mind not going 1:1 and given the limited screen time I don't mind playing into the noir nature for laughs. My issue is more that Noir's world is so insanely dark, THAT could've been played for laughs instead. I mean again THIS is how peter gets his powers there.

Just have Nicholas cage casually rattle that off. I get not bringing up the rampant death but it just feels like a missed opprotunity to not really use anything from the actual comics other than the costume. The rubix cube joke is great. So you have three all time great performers.. but they don't get much to do. I was among the fans disapointed they weren't in the sequel, and only not as much as some others because I figured they were saving them for the sequel.. and after seeing the film and it's cliffhanger, that turned out to be EXACTLY it. It's a bummer they aren't in across but given how much it crammed into it's long runtime and how much it has left to go, and how the mystery of why noir and ham weren't with the society's whole creepy philosphy when their friends drank the kool aid is a neat hook.

They get great bits, Noir saying he has to burn his hand to feel something, Ham getting side eyed by the other two when he mentions he was a pig bitten by a spider.. which for those who didn't read the rest of the restrospective if your wondering ..

We also get a great drmatic bit. Originally in the scene where everyone sympathizes with Miles, Spider-ham made a stupid joke about his uncle frankfurter. it was funny.. but kinda wrecked the scene. So they instead switched it with one of the most heartbreaking lines in all of animation, which Mulaney NAILS.

Just the devistaition on that pig's face. And i'm hoping we find out what the fuck the story was there in Beyond.. but i'm perfectly happy with not knowing. Because it makes it that much more devistating. We don't know what he lost. We just know he hurts and that the hardest thing about being a spider-man.. is you just can't save them all. So naturally ham got a spinoff, Caught in a Ham. Caught in a Ham.. is decent a theatrical style short that explains what ham was doing. It's.. fine.. the various villian puns are fun and it clearly takes a lot from warner, but the animation is ENTIRELY cheap, and the villian, dr crawdaddy is just... what. Seriously you have so many fun animal versions of spideys rogues and better new foes.. and this is what you go with. And no making fun of how lame he is dosen't work. That jokes been done a lot. You have to do it well and they really didn't. Dr Crawdaddy is bad but it's not hialriously bad. Caught in a hami s okay but it was a massive disapointment and Mulaney deserved better.

So now we have those who can spin a web any size and catch a theif just like flies covered, we have to talk about one of spider-man's most important aspects The Superior Foes of Spider-Man

Look spider-man is popular for a lot of reasons: a deep facinating character no matter whose wearing the mask, a varied, visually intresting and cool power set, the idea that anyone can be spider-man. All this is true. But one of the biggest.. is his Rogues gallery. Spider-Man easily has one of the best rogues galleries in all of superhero fiction, with only batman providing competition. Just off the top of my head you have Green Goblin, Hobgoblin, Doc Ock, Electro, Beetle, Boomerang, Scorpion, The Kingpin, Rhino, Hammerhead, Tombstone, Shocker, Vulture, Kraven, Mysterio, The Lizard, Stegron the Dinosaur Man, The Spot, The Gibbon, Mr Negative, The Enforcers, Mountain Man Marko, Chance, Venom, Carnage, Hypno Hustler, Rocket Racer, Sandman, The Tinkerer, The Prowler, Lady Electro, White Rabbit, Overdrive, Hydro Man, Chameleon, The Iguana, and of course his greatest enemy PAUL.

Or Maybe it's Zeb wells. Who knows? The larger point is spider-man has a LARGE pool of villians to tap, so Lord and MIller's Solution: GRAB AS MANY AS POSSIBLE AND DO WHATEVER. Yeah while like i've said The Kingpin has a full sinister six going, even if sadly never 6 at once as one dies and he kills another, it still counts as their still all under him and just let me have this for once dammit. Seriously if it's not an ongoing cartoon, they will NOT give us the sinister six. Even far from home came as close as we've got and still didn't think maybe one more? LET ME HAVE A PROPER SINISTER SIX IN MY SPIDER-MAN MOVIE DAMMIT.

That said they really only focus on three of the six: the other villians in Fisk's posse are more there just to hit things and give us enough villians so every spider-man can have a turn. And given Spider-man has guys like the rhino that would fit the mold better I question why they went with Green Goblin and Tombstone. With the former i'll admit to being biased: Norman Osborn is one of my faviorite super villians and Harry is certainly somewhere on the list. One of the first spidey comics I read was Amazing Spider-Man #39, and it's followup #40, one of the best spidey comics of all time and with one of the best covers too

This was boosted both by the first Rami film, where Dafoe does a truly amazing job, and the ultimate comics where Norman , while bulking up a bunch is a serious horrifying threat. Here.. h'es just a dummy dum dumb and I get it to a point, part of it is to emphasise the alternate nature of miles universe: in most the green goblin is spider-man's greatest threat, here he's just one of many and while a challenge, not his arch enemy or even in the running it seems. It just dosen't work for me. I'm fine with making some changes, but this one just didn't qutie work. He does look really impressive though and I do get this is likely a me thing and it dosen't really HURT the film, so while I may not like it a bunch I can't say it's as bad as some adaptation changes. I'ts no "Peter dosen't have change for choclate milk and gets thrown it by the robber who kills uncle ben" or making harry osborn into some sort of gneeing snot monster.. and that's bEFORE he takes the goblin drugs.

Tombstone also isn't handled the best, as he's fairly smart and chilling in the comics. I don't take it as personally but it's still iffy to take a black man and make him subservient to a white man. That never plays well. Hammerhead would've been a better choice and still been visually distinct. I

Finally we have Scorpion who I DO like, nicely meshing maximus gargan, the ultimate scorpion who simply had super strength and a scorpion tail styled chain, with the regular one, so now the tail is attached to hima nd baadss, but he's still mexican and still awesome and he gets a great fight with Peni and Porker.

That said while I have my quibbles.. the main three villians.. are fantastic and give me plenty to gush about. We'll start with the big guy. Like with the Green Goblin (and the Hobgoblin, who sadly still hasn't gotten a big movie role as of this review. Someday...), i'm a HUGE fan of the kingpin and he's one of my faviorite super villians. No question. Wilson Fisk is a truly amazing character with tons of layers, intimdating style and intresting dynamics with both spider-man and dardevil. From his first apperance under john romita to his latest crashing on Krakoa , he's a devious mastermind whose trained his body to perfection. Granted I grew up with Spider-Man TAS, where they cleverly made him big bad, so I had a good first intro, but most adaptations handle him well and what little iv'e seen of the mcu version in hawkeye (I still need to watch netflix daredevil) is fucknig magical. Denofrio is great.

Liev Schriber though.. might be the best. He gets Wilson perfect: He has his cocky attitude.. but also his cold detachment. He can brag about starting the collider one minute.. and casually tell his right hand man to "go kill that guy". He can joke.. but ther'es never a moment on screen when your not deeply worried about him being there. There's not a moment you don't get WHY this guy was strong enough, smart enough and nightmarish enough to finish spider-man. I also love the design taking from a comic by the legendary bill sienkiewicz of x-men fame

It perfectly fits and while his proprotions are off.. it helps sell how diffrent he is from everything else. This man commands every room he's in and is a true giant, a looming reminder of blonde peter's death and the ultimate obstacle in our heroes way.

What I like though as while they easily could've just made Fisk evil and called it a day.. it's VERY clear how well the crew understood him.. as they also humanize him. Fisk isn't igniting the collider to make money selling multiversal hot dogs or something. This version lost his wife vanessa and son richard during a fight with spider-man: she saw what he really was and left... and they sadly died in a car crash. It's a great twist too: the comics have always had Vanessa, when she was alive, be the one thing that could pull fisk back from his crime... if only for so long. She never liked it , never accepted it and never wanted it. Richard was a grown man hwo hated it but then joined it then betrayed his dad and got killed.. it's a whole thing. Richard Fisk is a mess.

Fisk is at his core a man who just wants what he lost back but is so blinded by a combination of Trauma Goggles (a term kammie came up with) and his own ego. He can't accept that it was his fault a tragedy happened, that his wife had every right to run and that it was simply horrible, cruel timing that killed his wife. It's the horrible irony in all this: Wilson Fisk is a man who needs to control everything so badly he will rip time and space apart to get back what he lost.. but can't accept that there's NOTHING he can do to fix this, and that it was always his fault. It's who Wilson Fisk is and who he'll always be. It's most heartbreakingly shown when the same events play out again, just with a new vanessa and richard.. but he just can't accept HE'S the bad guy in all this and he drove his family away. In the end he's left with nothing, his empire crumbling, his family gone.. simply because he coudln't let go.

Now onto his right hand man, Aaron Davis, The Prowler. Like Kingpin... hang on.. something seems mi

[THREATNING DUBSTEB BLARES]

Better. Anyways, I was a huge fan of the Prowler. See back when I was in I think middle school, possibly earlier I had this book.

I wouldnt' mind getting another copy or the updated edition at some point. I also had these for X-Men and Fantastic Four. It's part of what really got me into these characters, but the spidey one was near and dear to my heart even as it sadly eventually fell apart. It was a lovely big ole book with profiles for all of spidey's villains, some of his side cast, and what have you up to the early 2000's. It was great.

So it's there I met the Prowler... Good Ol Hobie Brown

Yeah before another hobie became your friendly neighborhood anarchist, the original was a window washer who really wanted to invent, but this being the 60's and many a man being a classist or racist, Hobie instead came up with a pretty brilliant scheme: rob a building using his various inventions and a badass looking disguise, and then return the money for a reward as Hobie Brown.

Unfortunately the building he picked was naturally the Bugle, his old workplace (Though to JJJ's credit, when Hobie had an altercation with his boss, Jonah took hobie's side. Jonah may be many things but Racist isn't one of them)... and he was VERY lucky that it was peter parker, having to pull his punches for obvious reasons , he encountered. Hobie thought he'd killed the poor guy, naturally he hadn't and when encountering peter as spider-man later, not knowing the connection, he confessed and explained things. Peter being peter, and once unmasked seeing Hobie really wasn't that much older than him and had been through the shit, let the guy go and Hobie eventually had a happy ending. So how does aaron fit into this? Well like i've said in this review and covered previously, Miles comes from the Ultimate Universe, so given the prowler had a dope as hell costume, name but not a lot of use, he was perfect to refit as Mile's first archenmey and most personal nemisis.

Uncle Aaron in the comics.. is a bit of a dick. While I plan to cover this arc at some point, as it's REALLY good, Aaron after some time in mexican prison, finds out there's a new spider-man and having stolen the spider in the first place and actually seen it bite miles in this timeline, puts two and two together... and then tries to blackmail his nephew into working for him to make himself the new kingpin, the old one having been blown up with a rocket launcher by Mysterio.

He also died but rather than go out heroically , as we'll get to.. he went out because his suit backfired because he was stupid enough to kill the man who made it while trying to murder his 13 year old nephew.

Yeah it's a lot, and again i'll get into it some other time, but the film made the understandable decision to take about 5 to ten percent of there, and used that percentage to make him infinitely more badass.

This Aaron is an experinced supervillian, one who gives Peter trouble and has awesome theme music. The Prowler in the film is animalistic, moving at less frames than the other characters and being purely terrifying. It sells what Miles is facing: an unstoppable killing machine who just wants him dead. Which completely contrasts who Aaron is off duty. To him.. this is just a job and killing people is just what he does. Kingpin says jump, he says "what spider-man?". When not he's the cool uncle who gets introduced to fucking hypnotize. He's a smooth guy who while having terrible advice about ladies, also has good takes like "Smart girls are where it's at". The reason Miles confides in him more than his dad.. is easy to see. Aaron actually takes the time to reach miles on his level and try to gently coax miles into not totally hating his new school instead of saying WELL YOU'D BETTER LIKE IT. I mean Jeff is the better person, no question, he's killed exactly no one and for a cop that's impressive, but Aaron genuinely loves and supports his nephew even more than originally. It makes the contrast that much more horrific, that this perfectly kind, cool as hell guy.. can also casually hunt what he can CLEARLY tell is a child like a monster across a subway. It's no wonder finding out who Aaron is really rattles the poor kid.

It also makes his face turn that much more effective: it'd be easy to assume given how UTTERLY terrifying the film made him that like the comics, once Aaron finds out he wouldn't give one iota of a shit that this is his nephew. Instead Movie!Aaron.. is utterly horrified. Mahershla Ali does a hell of a job conveying the man's horror when Miles takes off his mask in a last ditch effort not to get choked to death, with Moore likewise conveying miles pain and desperation incredibly. The animation is also flawless here as you can just see Aaron realizing what he almost did.. and what he's likely done to counltess others like miles. How many kids did he kill simply because they saw something they shouldn't have? The horror is clear... adn the tragedy all the more painful when Kingpin coldly snipes him. All his power.. and aaron dies, encouraging his nephew to keep going and to be better. Aaron is an incredible character here, suprassing the already great original and I look forward to seeing more of ali in Beyond.

Finally we have Doc Ock aka...

The casting was genius idea.. that i'm baffled WASN'T always the plan. Originally Ock was supposed to still be a man and a bit more big lebowski'ish. And while it means we missed out on Steve Buschemi as the green goblin, one of the directors suggested Kathryn Hahn, all around queen of awesome and perfect fit. It also fits the story better: Dock Ock being "Gasp" a pudgy guy who looks a lot like me? Not a huge suprise. But a scientest we simply see in the background and assume is someone shady, but turns out to be dock ock complete with soft robotics tentacles? Fucking brilliant. It plays genre expectations against us: normally the messy haired science lady is on our side, as peter assumed.. instead Ock is fully on board with this scheme and even actively decives kingpin to get it thorugh. Oliva is ock in every sense of the word and is easily our heroes most dangerous opponent that isn't king sized. It takes THREE spider-men to wear her down and a fucking truck ex machina to finish her. Hahn, as usual has a lot of fun with the roll and it's no shock disney wanted to get in on this, and I can't wait for Agatha coven of chaos after her amazing work on Wandavision. Hahn is just neat and Olivia is great. Also nice subtly saying gay rights with Liv being implied to be Aunt May's ex in this reality too. Did it also involve a nuclear explosion on an island off of canada? One can only hope.

Odds, Ends and Sick Beats

So character wise we only have a few left to go over. First up is Rio, Miles supportive kind mom. She dosen't get a ton to do here but what we see is great and like Gwen, it's clear the writers realized they didn't use her as much and the sequel dives into her more and makes her just as important as her husband.

Then we have Ganke. In the comics, Ganke is miles lego loving best friend, his closest confidant and he helps ease the tension of being spider-man.. but given said tension drives the whole plot here, I get why they eased back. The other reason.. is understandable if disapointing. See the MCU Version of Ned Leeds, Ned Lee.. is basically Ganke. Close friends with our spider-man? Likes lego? bit of a nerd? Serves as his "guy in the chair". All check. And ned is great, he's fantastic and if I ever get to the mcu trilogy, i'll defintely have plenty good to say. It just meant Ganke had nothing to really do and is thus off to the side for these films. It's disapointing but I can understand it.. and he still gets a great scene in the spider-people trying to avoid him.. also Peni was blushing like mad. I need followup on this ship next film crew.

We also have Stan's cameo.. which is heartbreaking, but man was it good and it served as a great tribute to the man without being meant as one. It also gently jabs at his huckster nature with the no refunds sign. Oh stan... I miss you man.

Finally we have the films soundtrack. It's so damn good and it uses music beautifully: It has standouts like What's Up Danger, which i've talked about. Sunflower which thematically fits the film and the miles gwen romance, and Hypnotize, which perfectly sums up who aaron is when he' s not stalking children like some sort of feral cat man. I was going to talk about it more in depth, but it's just fanatastic.. and frankly this review is both horribly behind as is. It's a great sountrack and an all timer, both in the music made for it, the ones chosen for it and the backing tracks. Stupendous

So that brings us to the end of this long look.. and it should go without saying by this far in.. this film is a masterpiece. It's great as an adaptation, phenominal on it's own, groundbreaking, and I'll be revisiting it again and I feel terrible I didn't because I noticed so much more the second time around. This project has been a lot.. but it's also been some of the most fun i've had ont his blog. As i've already announced... we will be doing this one more time for beyond, and possibly again for across' theatrical release as that seems like it's not going to be as soon as Sony hopes. Either way i'm still shooting for the films current release date in march, so we'll be back with this in november or december with some other spidey plans in the mix as well. So thanks for taking the leap with me.. and hopefully you'll stick around. Until then... thanks for reading... and remember.. anyone can wear the mask... especailly you.

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blushyeleven · 1 year

Text

(I tried to get this gif as milie being millie, but looking like enola holmes!)

Characters: ler!Millie lee!y/n

Warnings: tickled

𝐆𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐝 (𝐛𝐲 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐭𝐨𝐮𝐜𝐡)

you and millie sat cross legged on her bed, reading over the enola holmes 2 script. Yours and Millie’s shared favourite pass time and it meant you got to spend time with her. Which is an opportunity you could never pass up.

You were reading over the part we’re enola couldn’t figure out her latest case. Finding Sarah chapman. So she visited your apartment to complain about her day. You then jokingly insulted her detective skills to try and distract her. That’s when you saw it.

Enola reaches in to tickle *y/ns character*

Millie looks up form her script, smiling at you “I hope your not too ticklish” she teases seeing your face turn bright red. “Me? Ticklish? Ofcourse not! That’s so childish!” You said quickly, a little too quickly. Millie just giggled at you “yea, yea okay then” she rolled her eyes. You sheepishly smiled trying to mask your fear

It got to the day of shooting and you sat on a chair. Twiddling your thumbs, your nerves increasing. You knew there was no way out of this. It’s not that you were scared to be tickled, you were more scared of the fact that millie was finding out, infront of the whole crew. It couldn’t be that hard to hold in your laughter. You told you’re self, the thought looping in your mind. It was replaying in your head so much you didn’t even realise that millie was calling your name

“Y/n!.. helloooo?” She walked over to you slightly confused and that’s when you snapped out of your trance “oh yeah? Sorry!” You tried to play it off and millie just smiled at you “were up!” She said and you arose from your chair, timidly following her to the set.

Once you fixed yourself and took your places you heard “action!” And that’s when you heard a knock on your apartment door.

“Coming!” You shouted out trying to steady your already nervous voice, you opened the door and enola was standing there. “Enola?” You raised one eyebrow. “May I come in?“ Enola politely asked you “oh, ofcourse!” You reassured gesturing enola through. “Any particular reason why your here?” You said puzzled. “Yes actually, I just need a distraction from my case. It seems to be vexing me” she huffed, sitting herself down on your sofa. “Well did you want to talk about it?” You questioned sitting on the oppose sofa, meeting her gaze.

“It’s just so annoying! I really don’t know what I’m missing! And Sherlock keeps rambling to me about how I’m not solving this case properly” Yes, this is my first case but I still think that I am a good enough detective to solve this case without sherlocks help!” She rambled. You looked at millie, amazed by her acting skills.

“Well it seems like your infamous detectives skills are failing you” you smirked at millie. She gasped “take that back!” She playfully fired back at you. It were scenes like this that made you realise how deeply Inlove with millie you really were. “Why should I?” You snarkily replied seeing Millie’s jaw dropped and her eyes slightly raised “Because otherwise I’ll just do this!” You smiled trying to calm yourself but you knew either way, this was not going to turn out well.

On “this” millie pounced on you and started scribbling at your sides. That’s when you let out a loud, high-pitched squeak, followed by a flourish of bubbly giggles, pouring out of your mouth. That wasn’t acting, it was an 100% pure reaction. Millie stopped as her jaw dropped again, but you could tell behind her shocked face she was smiling so hard. And that’s when you heard “cut!!”

“Oh my god! I wasn’t expecting you to be that ticklish!, that’s adorable” she said. That’s when you felt a little heat rise to your face, turning your cheeks rather pink. “I- shut up, you startled me. Let’s try that again” you said adverting Millie’s eyes, clearly embarrassed. Millie just giggled “awh ofcourse!” She said, getting off you and sitting back opposite you.

Once your vibrant blush faded, you mentally prepared yourself.

“And action!”

“Maybe your infamous detective skills are failing you” you repeated gulping after you finished the line. “Take that back!” Enola gasped “why should I?” You said through a slightly shaky voice. “Because otherwise I’ll just do this!” Enola exclaimed. you bit your lip as millie jumped on you once again, scribbling at your sides. “ehehehnohoholaaa!” You managed to giggle, not overflowing with laughter to much. Well.. that was untill a certain someone’s fingertips reached your stomach. “What! You basically asked for this!” She added before your eyes widened. A genuine reaction before desperately trying to swallow your screams of laughter you had bubbling in your throat. “NahahhaHAAHA NOHOHT THEHERE!” At first your giggles were controlled, but then they all spewed out. You looked up to see millie biting her own lip, trying not to smile at your reaction

“Ahaw I behet you regret mohocking me now!” Millie delivered her line filled with snickers, she couldn’t keep a straight face at your overdramatic reactions. “YEHES, IHIM SOHORRY!” You shrieked when she started scratching at your ribs. “I know you are!” Enola teased, watching your character squirm beneath her.

“But.. this is just to fun to stop!” You furrowed your eyebrows in confusion. That wasn’t one of Millie’s lines. However, your thought process was interrupted when you felt a fingertip, swirling into your bellybutton. You squealed before falling into helpless, thundering laughter

“NOHOHOOHOHO MIHIHIIHLIEEE! CUHUHUHUTTT! CUHHUHUHUHUTTT! GAHAHHAHAH!” You screamed, expecting millie to stop right there. But to your suprise she didn’t, the crew just stood there watching. “BAHAHAHAHHA IHIHIHIM SEHEHEHHERIOUSSS GEHEHHEHETT OHOHOHOFF!!” Your laughter echoed through the set. That’s when millie stopped, she pulled her hands away and couldn’t help but smirk at you.

“I said cut!” You said glaring and millie and at the crew “that wasn’t even apart of the scene!” You questioned.

“Actually, we stopped recording for that scene a while ago. This was just an extra thing millie wanted to add. Atleast we have an amazing addition to the blooper real!” One director joked

You death stared millie “something extra you wanted to add?” You scrunched your eyebrows and then gasped “you planned this!“ you complained. That’s when millie burst out into laughter, nodding at your statement.

You couldn’t help but smile. Although you thought that was extremely embarrassing, you couldn’t deny that you had fun

#tickle content #y/n x millie bobby brown #millie bobby brown tickle #millie bobby brown #enola x reader tickle #enola holmes 2 tickle #enola holmes tickle #y/n tickle #ticklish y/n

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wonbinisbabygurl · 1 year

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𝕳𝖊𝖑𝖕𝖎𝖓𝖌 𝖞𝖔𝖚𝖗 𝖆𝖈𝖙𝖔𝖗 𝖍𝖚𝖘𝖇𝖆𝖓𝖉 𝖜𝖎𝖙𝖍 𝖍𝖎𝖘 𝖐𝖎𝖓𝖊𝖘

Black female (reader x hwang inyep)

Genre :smut.kdrama actor au, acting au

Part 1/2

-do not reupload-

Synopsis :you are a wife for a well-known actor hwang inyeop who's partaking a role as the main lead in a film called "route 69" a movie where he is suppose to have sexual tension with the female lead that you particularly do not like you the volunteered to be her replacement until the film was aired but little did you know it was more then acting a scene with your husband in-yeop let's just say it was quiet a performance 👀(cue the curtain call)

You watched from the lounge as inyeop showed off his pool-playing skills for his "Route 69" movie scene.

He stood with his body pressed against the edge of the pool table, one hand gently grasping the cue stick as he lined up his shot and sent the ball into its destination.

You lightly touched your chin and swayed your hips toward him "Do you need me to help with the other lines?"

He leans forward over your shoulder and hands you the script, straightening his back as he does. "Well yeah, I do," he says.

You paused in the middle of reading your lines and shot him a look filled with ardor. "Leon, what are you doing?" she questioned, her curvaceous body propped against the pool table.

Inyeop fired off a shot as he recited his words. "Playing a bit of pool with the boys, why do you ask?"

“Can you teach me how to play?” you asked, giving Inyeop a slight smile as you took the cue stick from his hand.

He sighed and faced you. He motioned for you to come closer, standing behind you as he leaned in, his erection pressing against your backside.

Inyeop smirked as if he was trying to contain himself. “Why so quiet all of a sudden?” He said, holding your body close to him as he guided your hands on the cue stick, bending your body down.

You could feel his hot breath against your ear as he stepped closer.

"Am I doing it right, sir?"

"Yeah, you're just fine. Shoot the ball already-you're hurting my arm," Inyeop says, helping to put the ball in the hole.

"I did it!" You exclaimed, giving him a hug before feeling a bit of tension from the rest of the team.

"I guess they should have hired you instead of Maybelle for the lines; she's a complete ass," Inyeop said after putting down the script on the coffee table and opening a bottle of red wine.

Inyeop gulped his wine down in one go and ran a hand through his hair in distress. "Man, I really need a massage right now," he said, rubbing the back of his shoulder.

You walked up to him and began to rub away some of the tension from his body. "You should take a break for a while," you suggested, "you've been practicing non-stop this whole month."

Inyeop was perched on the beige tuxedo couch and uttered "You know what, that doesn't sound like a bad idea".

You climbed on top of him, placing your hands over his head. “What do you say we kiss and find out?” you asked as you leaned in to peck him tenderly.

#poc kpop #ambw kpop #ambw scenarios

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saltywinteradult · 9 months

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One of the few shows still shooting is HOUSE OF THE DRAGON, as you may have read. That’s true. I am told the second season is half done. ALL of the scripts had been finished months before the WGA strike began. No writing has been done since, to the best of my knowledge. HOT D is shot mostly in London (and a little bit in Wales, Spain, and various other locations), which is why filming has continued. The actors are members of the British union, Equity, not SAG-AFTRA, and though Equity strongly supports their American cousins (they have a big rally planned to show that support), British law forbids them from staging a sympathy strike. If they walk, they have no protection against being fired for breach of contract, or even sued.

((Honestly, I was shocked to hear that. One of the two major UK political parties, Labour, has its roots in the trade union movement. How in the world could they have allowed such anti-labor regulations to be enacted? Seems to me that Labour Party really needs to do a better job of protecting the right to strike)).

-GRRM, Not A Blog, July 22

#based #say what you will abt grrm but at least he’s on the right side of history #grrm #george rr martin #sag aftra strike #sag strike #wga strike #wga #sag aftra

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canyouhearthelight · 6 months

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Nihilus Rex Chapter 2: Our Own Reasons

Chapter 2, let's gooo!

Even numbered chapters will be from Lash's perspective, while odd numbered chapters are from Nils'. Lash is super fun to write, by the way. @baelpenrose agrees.

That being said, the same trigger warnings apply in this chapter, along with one for a shouting match between Lash and her parents that is very rooted in the time this takes place (alternate 2017, but not too alternate). So, additional warnings for mentions of possible rape, possible hate crimes, references to mass shootings, and references to sexist legislation.

I solemnly swear, though, the content in this chapter is nowhere near as bad as scrolling through headlines.

“Looks like a girl, but she’s a flame

So bright, she can burn your eyes

Better look the other way

You can try, but you’ll never forget her name”

“Girl on Fire” Alicia Keys

Lash

“Dammit!” I slammed the laptop closed with one hand and ripped my headset off with the other.

“Language!” my mother scolded automatically from barely ten feet outside my bedroom door.

I couldn’t even try to care. Despite promising me for months and begging for my help for nearly as long, Brayden had flaked out on me. Again. And this time he had stolen my work - the countless hours I had spent drafting graphics and small animations, the temp voice track I had laid down, all gone with nothing to show for it.

The charity existed, and Brayden had a contract to do a commission for some outreach. I had been smart enough to at least do that much research. After all, vanishing halfway through a project was nothing new when it came to dealing with him, and it would have been far from the first time that I had filled in once I completed everything, just so I could get paid. Hell, the chance of not having to split the money had been the only reason I had agreed to it this time.

Turns out, he had the same idea.

Three sharp knocks on my door jarred me out of my anger. “You need to come eat, your father is home,” Mom stated sternly before walking away.

There were no second chances with manners when it came to my parents, so I threw myself from my chair and forced some semblance of composure on myself before pulling the door open. The attempt had been in vain, apparently, because even before he had his shoes off, Baba called me out on it. “One day, you will listen to me and stop with this foolish art and cartoons,” he waved in half-hearted anger. “Go to university and get a real degree, a real job.”

“I could always marry well,” I argued churlishly, too angry about Brayden to even go through the rote script of well-worn rebellion.

The harsh laughter my mother barked in my direction hit me like a knife in the chest. “And how will you marry someone to take care of you and your childishness?” she scoffed. “With all the black and the scowling… If you can draw pretty girls, draw yourself pretty and behave like one.”

The emotions I had barely restrained before stepping out of my room reared toward them, striking as viciously as I could. “You want me to dress up, make myself up, and flatter boys? Is that how you married Baba? Being pretty and being stuck with a life of disappointment?” I batted my eyelashes and held my hands under my chin. “Oh, Charles, you are so witty! Tell me again how poor people should starve and women should do nothing but make babies, it’s so funny!” A movement from my father redirected my words before I could stop myself. “And you! What good is a degree going to do me, now! You say that Grandma and Grandpa came here to be free, so you could have an education. You have one! It didn’t make you any whiter or any richer, and you are still spit on wherever you go for being the child of immigrants.”

A sharp bang punctuated my mother’s palm hitting the table, jostling the steaming dish in the middle. “You will not speak to your parents like one of those rich girls you go to school with! There is food on this table and in your belly, you waste your life drawing cartoons and tap-tapping away in your room that your father pays for. There are clothes on your back and no war zone to go to school through. You are allowed and expected to go to school!”

“A school where I will be shot!” I screamed. “If I am not shot for being brown, or raped for being brown, I will be shot because some crazy person decided a school or a theatre, or a mosque I don’t even attend was a fine target!”

“Women do not go to mosque,” my father started to correct.

“Do you think they know that!?” I was in borderline hysterics and not even the smell of my mother’s cooking could keep me in the apartment for a moment longer. “A Sikh temple was shot. Sikhs. For being the wrong color and for ignorance. That doesn’t even count the fact that I am a woman and every day I see mine and Mama’s rights peeled away layer by layer.” I stomped to the door and snatched the first jacket I touched. “I need to calm down.” Without even waiting for their response I slammed the door behind me and started walking.

My feet automatically knew where I was going, which was good because I was too angry and in my head to decide. I made it maybe half a mile before I had to peel the jacket off and carry it, since the weather was warm and sunny for once. The entire time, I was mentally swearing at everyone in my life. Brayden for stealing my work - as far as I was concerned, he was dead to me. I hated nothing more than a thief. My parents for their well-intentioned abuse. I knew they meant well, but as the saying went, “The road to hell” and all that. I had read somewhere once about the kind eyes of people who would burn witches to save their souls - that was my parents.

I made it to my quiet place, eventually. Right where the road crossed over one of the rivers, the bridge had just enough lip to sit on comfortably, and the road wasn’t busy enough for the exhaust to bother me. Stopping for a moment, I tied the spare jacket around my waist to leave my hands free, and in the pause between songs in my earbuds, I heard shouting in the distance. Make sure to sit on the other side of a support, I noted mentally, trying to avoid the same trouble my parents seemed so oblivious to. Finally settling on “Whiplash Recovery” by ill-esha, I hummed quietly and crept to my spot. It took some careful maneuvering, but through practice I was finally seated over the rushing sound of the river, music pounding thoughts out of my head until I was consumed in nature and noise, unable to think.

Slowly, I could feel my blood pressure come down, and the less I tried to poke at my fight with my parents the better I felt. Images and colors drifted through my head as the music cycled and I tried to imagine how I would do a video to each. Not that I would ever get a chance, but it helped keep my creativity flowing and soothed the nagging doubts in the back of my head. It was just after a Charlotte Sometimes song that a crunch sounded behind me, entirely too close.

I froze, immediately ashamed to be a sitting target while praying that it was just someone driving by, or an animal.

“Don’t do it! Please!” The voice was pleading, begging almost.

I was confused, however. I had been sitting and minding my own business, like I wish he would do. “What’s that?”

“Don’t…don’t jump, please.” His voice was softer, almost ragged. “Please don’t jump. Someone…someone needs you. Someone’s world would be worse without you. And someone would be left every day wondering what they could have done differently to keep you with them.”

What in the hell is he talking about? I thought, slowly forcing my head to turn towards the voice. What I saw was a man, maybe a few years older than me. His clothes were expensive, but torn and bloody from what looked like a fresh ass-whipping. If nothing else, the fact that he was more bleeding than bruised gave that away. But the clothes were somber and too nice for work or daily wear, so something said ‘funeral’. “Got a feeling you know something about that.”

“Just came from a funeral.” Bingo. “I know everything about that.” At least here, he was more confident, if his tone was anything to go by.

“Heh. Bet.” I glanced back toward the apartment, judging how far I would have to run if he decided to be less nice than he was currently. “So what’s your name?”

“Nils. Nils Andover. Yours?”

“Lash,” I responded impulsively. Short, to the point, and giving nothing away, it was the handle I used in chatrooms and on social media. My acting name, essentially.

“Last name?”

Yeah, not happening. Not until I knew if he was safe, even if he looked like I could take him with one hand. “Not telling someone I just met. Even if I like you. But I have to admit, you definitely have a…perspective on things.” That was a polite way to say the guy who just tried to talk me out of a non-existent suicide attempt looked weird and interesting, right? And yeah, he was kind of charming in a weird, awkward way. “What uh…what happened to you? Bad enough you’re blaming yourself, the dead guy’s other family blame you, too?”

“Dead girl. And she’s a friend. And no, her family isn’t blaming me. What are you talking about?”

I waved a hand at the split lip and eyebrow before gesturing at the rips in a suit I couldn’t even imagine ever affording.. “Well either you didn’t come straight from the funeral or someone there was playing the blame game.”

The guy - Nils, apparently - bit his lip before seeming to think better of it. “Heh…Yeah. Uh. Saw some of those QAnon dicks waving signs, kinda snapped.”

Oh, I thought. He’s charming and dumb. Poor guy probably weighed less than my sound gear.

He kept talking, kind of rushing out the explanation. “My friend killed herself because of debt, and because she had to drop out of her program to take care of a sick family member so she wasn’t going to even like, get to have the future she’d gone through so much for. So something about a bunch of jackasses who were just screaming and braying about how evil elites control the world and drink the blood of the innocent except these stupid bastards are huffing enough glue to mean “Jews” when they say “elites” and mean the “blood drinking” bit literally…I kinda. Snapped. Started screaming at them. Got the shit kicked out of me.”

He looked a bit embarrassed, but it was honestly kind of endearing that he had at least tried to fight a bunch of fucknuckle rejects from the alt-right pipeline over the same things I had been shouting at my own parents roughly an hour ago.

“Anyway. Listen to me talk about myself. What were you doing up here?” He seemed to realize how the story sounded, because he was rubbing one palm against his pant leg and trying to shove the other in a pocket.

I cut him some slack and actually gave a real answer. “Just kinda thinking about things. Someone I trusted let me down - wasn’t worth dying over, but scared me pretty badly. Came up here to clear my head. A lot of things fell through, and now I’m kinda…looking for something new to be after. Something new to do.”

“Wish I could help. But I mean…” Nils paused. “I don’t know. What do you do?”

“Mostly I’m an artist. Sometimes do some light voice acting for a friend of mine - or…did. Thing was, he and I had a falling out. Really bad one. We were supposed to be doing this big project for something I thought we both believed in but…” I shrugged with one shoulder, trying to play it off as less of a big deal than it was. “He bailed, and we said some things to each other I can’t take back.” When did I start talking about my parents, I wondered, mortified.

Nils paused. He seemed to figure out that I didn’t want to say more, and it looked like he was okay with that. After all, he hadn’t told me much about himself, just his friend and the state of the country. But something piqued his curiosity, since his face got really thoughtful for a second before he started talking carefully, like it was a code he was testing. “If I say I have something I want to do, and I’d love to see what you do, would you believe me?”

I held out a hand, curious. “What’s your project?” He couldn’t be any worse than working with Brayden. If nothing else, I was pretty sure I could poison Nils with my cooking.

Nils paused, like he was choosing his words carefully. Fair enough. It only made me like him more. Finally, he spoke. “Something that might help some other people. Still kinda trying to work on all of it. I’d kinda like to hear more about your project first, maybe see if we can combine them? Maybe for some community outreach?”

So, literally like what I had just done. Nothing illegal, which unfortunately paid better, but beggars can’t be choosy, right? I flashed my best smile. “Alright. Give me your number and stay in touch. Show me you can do something interesting. And I’ll send you some of my work, see what you think.”

Nils gave me the number, letting me text him first before sending one back to prove he hadn’t lied. He smiled when my phone buzzed, and I approved his caution - I could have spoofed a number, but something told me not to.

“We good to get off the bridge?” he asked, glancing around.

I looked back toward the apartment. Mama told me I’d never find a rich white boy, and here the universe just handed one over. She didn’t need to know it was professional… I had lied about plenty, this would be a breeze.

“Yeah. We are.”

#nihilus rex #Afterverse #prequel #writeblr #writers on tumblr #original fiction #traumatized characters #science fiction #dystopia #cyberpunk #tw islamophobia #tw bodily autonomy #tw sa mention #tw mass shooting mention

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