PYSNGR: There’s a nod to one of my favorite movies growing up I put in this episode. I’ll wait to see if y’all catch it.
PYSNGR: Brown Sugar is in the All American universe. In co-writing my first episode, I had to throw a nod to the fact that I grew up watching Taye Diggs. Taye was the first actor we landed for AA.
Hi there! ☺ First of all, I love all the Big Time Rush GIFs/pictures you dig up. I'm curious: What is your favorite GIF and/or picture of them?
thank you!! i love the pictures and trivia you post too, there’s always something that makes me smile. 💘
ooh, that’s a fun question. you already know my love for the Big Time Pyramid Scheme photo, and of Logan + 🐼, so here’s some others:
imagining kendall at home - completely unprompted - being like, you know what would be SO funny? 🤭 and what makes it even more hilarious to me is that he’s been close friends with carlos for over a decade so you know he has pics of him on his phone, so he could’ve gotten one of those. but, no, this guy did the funniest thing and googled his friend like he was a random fan and printed out what looks like an old publicity headshot that popped up on google images. 10/10. a premeditated masterpiece.
james doing the duckface while carlos screams for his life, kendall gives a thumbs-up despite being red in the face, and logan turns into the personification of the 😃 emoji. i need a photo of them on disney’s log shoot ride. you know it’d be hilarious.
iconic.
logan and kendall have some great duo photos too, like:
petition for a looking for logan book in the vein of where’s wally. logan already has the striped sweater for it, after all. except instead of looking innocent and inconspicuous, when you spot him he’s looking at you like 😈
don’t let the unhinged photo and wondering what in the world was going on here distract you from taking your allotted time to admire logan’s big brown eyes and the way his hair falls over his forehead in waves. this has been a psa.
Batman: Assault on Arkham (a direct continuation of the Batman: Arkham games)
Big Eyes
Big Hero 6
Birdman (won the Best Picture Oscar for this year)
The Book of Life
The Boxtrolls
Boyhood (filmed over the course of 12 years)
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Chef
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Dead Snow 2: Red vs. Dead
Dear White People (the basis for the TV series on Netflix, and made by the same guy)
Dracula Untold (this was Universal’s second attempt at launching the Dark Universe)
The Drop (a crime drama starring Tom Hardy)
Edge of Tomorrow/Live Die Repeat
The Equalizer
Exodus: Gods and Kings (a biblical epic directed by Ridley Scott)
The Expendables 3
The Fault in Our Stars
Foxcatcher
Fury (the war movie with Brad Pitt and Shia LaBeouf)
Get on Up (the James Brown biopic starring Chadwick Boseman)
Godzilla (the 1st film in the MonsterVerse)
Gone Girl
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 1
The Guest
Hercules (the one starring The Rock)
The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (did you guys know the working title for this movie was “The Hobbit: There and Back Again”?)
How to Train Your Dragon 2
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1
If I Stay
The Imitation Game (the movie where Benedict Cumberbatch plays Alan Turing)
Inherent Vice
Interstellar
The Interview (the movie that almost caused World War 3)
Into the Woods
Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit
Jodorowsky's Dune (a documentary about the Dune movie that we never got)
Joe (one of Nic Cage's best movies)
John Wick (the 1st one)
Kill the Messenger
Left Behind (one of Nic Cage's worst movies)
The Lego Movie
Life After Beth
Lucy ((the “humans only use 10% of their brain” movie. Which has since been proven false. Source: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/do-people-only-use-10-percent-of-their-brains/ )
Maleficent
The Maze Runner
A Million Ways to Die in the Weset
Mr. Peabody and Sherman
Muppets Most Wanted
Need for Speed (Aaron Paul's first project after "Breaking Bad" ended)
Neighbors
Night of the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (the third one. Also one of Robin Williams’ last movies)
Nightcrawler
Noah (a biblical epic directed by Darren Aronofsky)
Non-Stop
The Nut Job
Obvious Child
Oculus (one of the 1st projects from Mike Flanagan)
Ouija
Paddington
Penguins of Madagascar
The Purge: Anarchy
The Raid 2
RoboCop (the reboot that was actually decent)
Selma
Sharknado 2
Sin City: A Dame to Kill For
Son of Batman
St. Vincent
The Taking of Deborah Logan
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (the one produced by Michael Bay. It’s also the one where the Turtles look like aliens)
The Theory of Everything (the movie where Eddie Redmayne plays Stephen Hawking)
Third Person
300: Rise of an Empire
Transformers: Age of Extinction
Tusk
22 Jump Street
Veronica Mars (the film continuation of the TV show)
A Walk Among the Tombstones
What If? (a rom-com starring Daniel Radcliffe)
What We Do in the Shadows (the film that was the basis for the TV show)
Caregiver!Stucky, Platonic!Peter x Little!Reader (Loud..)
Caregiver!Stucky x Little!Reader (It's slippy..)
Caregiver!Stucky x Little!Reader (What was your favourite part?)
Caregiver!Winterwidow x Little!Reader (Snow!?)
Caregiver!Peter Parker x Little!Reader (Test..)
Caregiver!Platonic!Peter Parker x Little!Reader (Babysitter - Part 2 to "Loud..")
Caregiver!Clint Barton x Little!Kate Bishop x Little!Reader (Brave)
Caregiver!Bucky Barnes x Little!Reader (TV and Cuddles)
Caregiver!Matt Murdock x Little!Reader (Something's different..)
Caregiver!Matt Murdock, Caregiver!Frank Castle x Little!Reader (Talk to stuffies...)
Caregiver!Loki Laufeyson X Little!Reader (Mummy or daddy..?)
Caregiver!Hobie Brown (SpiderPunk) x Little!Reader (Stimming is cool!!)
Caregiver!Hobie Brown (SpiderPunk) X Little!Pavitr Prabhakar (Tea Parties!!!)
Headcannons
Caregiver!Charles Xavier Headcannons
Caregiver!Matt Murdock Headcannons
Caregiver!Bruce Banner Headcannons
Caregiver!Wade Wilson (Deadpool) Headcannons
Caregiver!Steve Rogers Headcannons
Regressor!Loki Laufeyson W/ How He Discovered Age Regression, Age Range, Favourite Agere Gear/Items, Favourite Thing To Wear And Something Unexpected About His Regression
Caregiver!Matt Murdock W/ Teaching Regressors Different Languages
Caregiver!Miguel O'Hara Headcannons
Caregiver!Frank Castle Headcannons
Regressor!Loki Laufeyson W/ If Their Regression Is Voluntary Or Involuntary
I apologize if there's something already on your blog about this and I didn't find it, but I was watching tailgate party and realized that Shiv had spent the entire episode pacing around one apartment complex 6000 steps over and that the Roys do this a lot.
My memory of the last few seasons is fuzzy (<- binged it before and now doesn't remember shit) but I feel like the Roys spend a lot of time in very large, usually open spaces, with wide walls and tall ceilings, and usually ones we've seen before or are expected to see again and that a lot of important scenes happen *outside* of these spaces. Important meaning either big moments or iconic ones or sometimes just transitonary. Kendall had his Next-Jesus moment out in the ocean, Tom started throwing water bottles in that cramped ass escape room or talked about his marriage out on the beach, the entirety of Kill List happens outside of ATN offices, Logan meets Mattson for the first time on a personal island, Roman went to a random one story office environment for a fucking business school and was never the same character (well. compared to S1 Roman) again, they have that reverse Jesus thing over cruises on a cruise ship, etc. I feel like plane scenes could both fit into this or break it depending on the season but at least for other scenes I feel like there's a pattern here.
Outdoor spaces or parts where they actually put their shoes outside onto sidewalk always feel semi important to me but it doesn't even have to be outdoors specifically. Like, even just the honeymoon suite was different enough from every other building we'd seen the show have, and that's when Shiv admitted to cheating!
Do you think there's something to this, or do you have your own thoughts? I'd be interested to hear more if only to appeal to my ego ;-). There's other things that could connect to this like the grey-white-brown-dark blue color palette damn near every scene is in vs. scenes with real color inside of them and Kendall's asking why Sophie was "on the street" being indicative of how he thinks she should be raised (based on how he was raised and also how he can recognize the manipulation and abusive inherent to his father's parenting but not the more subtle isolation and neglect) and the fact the Roys are literally running an actual rat race while trapped inside Waystair Rocyo 1/2 the time but I have to stay focused on one thing when I write shit down even if I'm connecting dots in my head or else this ask won't even be remotely legible.
[If you already wrote about this - sorry! I hope this makes sense. Either way, have a good night, and fingers crossed something fun happens at Logan's funeral. I still want Tom to fight someone. It won't happen but it'd be funny as hell lol]
yeah i haven't really written anything comprehensive on this, but i do think there are a few interesting points with regards to how the show uses the characters' environments. forgive me for bullet-pointing lol, maybe you can help string these things together into something more cohesive. but:
yes, the characters often spend most of an episode trapped in one location, even one building. in part i think this is a function of the presence of playwrights on the writing staff, and the way many episodes flirt with the three classical unities of tragedy writing (time / place / action). so, lots of episodes are 1 day only, or 2 or 3 max, and often a character will be mostly confined to one location during that span. in part this helps make each individual episode really tight internally, but it also contributes to that persistent sense that the characters are trapped (within their circumstances, company, family, etc)
indoor vs outdoor is an interesting thread. one thing that has always stood out to me is that the show has a tendency to use natural sunlight not as refreshing, enlightening, etc, but as blinding, overwhelming, and even dangerous. the sun almost kills logan in s3, there are those shots in 2x10 and 3x09 where everyone's squinting in the bright light, there's a similar effect in 'austerlitz', etc. this contributed to the overall sense of discomfort that the roys experience, despite all their material luxuries; it also contributes to the sense that nature and the natural world is an alien, external force that appears threatening—this sense also comes out in all of the animal metaphors they use, which emphasise the brutality they see in the animal kingdom and in nature generally
if we're talking places, i also must bring up the presence of bathrooms on the show. these are quotidian rooms, but also dangerous ones, in the sense that they exist to purge a civilised society of its filth, and the whole process tends to be marginalised and wilfuly ignored. so, i've always liked that succession has a lot of scenes set in bathrooms, and often characters are able to speak differently in the bathroom—sometimes more intimate (kendall and stewy, tom and logan in 3x05), or more direct (greg and logan in 2x08), or they're allowed to say things they couldn't elsewhere (roman and mencken). bathrooms are also sheltered personal spaces, where the characters can retreat and hide (kendall using them to do coke, shiv practicing a smile in 1x02, greg rehearsing his congressional testimony)
the waystar offices obviously have that very 21st-century glass-and-steel aesthetic that telegraphs new money, a certain neoliberal attempt at severance from systems of social and cultural meaning-making, etc. so, moving the characters to other locations is effective because, in contrast to the kind of soullessness of the waystar building, it makes the other places stand out and emphasises the meaning we can glean from the sets alone (like, the gut-punch of dodds's house in contrast to the sort of corporate default)
in regards to the idea of control and confinement within luxe spaces—yes, this is clearly something we see many of the environments convey (the ultimate expression of this being the anti-suicide wall that logan puts up to pen kendall in). this is really a discrete material expression of how waystar operates in a broader sense, constraining people whilst appearing to create more options and more freedom (also a basic characteristic of neoliberal modes of production, lol)
again i'm not sure i have a thesis statement here unifying all of these observations lol. but i do think the show does well at using its environments and settings to tell us a lot about the characters, the company, and the broader world they inhabit.
It's Not the Years, It's the Mileage Finale: Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (Comission for WeirdKev27)
Hello all you happy archelogists and welcome to the final installment of my Indiana Jones Retrospective, It's Not the Years, It's the Milleage. For those just joining us for the epic conculsion, i've covered all four previous Indy films over the past few months, from the good with great action set pieces, iconic lines, and deft character work, to the bad with the uncomfortable amount of brown face, temple of dooms theme park version of india and support of colonolisim, and Crystal Skulls sterotpyical 'savage tribesman", to the just plain weird with aborted ideas such as a haunting in scottland, a chess game to the death, sun wukong vs indiana jones, and an out and out alien invasion which Indy makes out during suprising no one.
IT's been one long, LONG journey and today.. it ends, as does the film franchise. With Dial of Destiny. Dial is the main reason we did this: a fresh fim with ford, with a fresh director in Logan maestro James Mangold, a final chapter for the ages.. and it has been recived with a resounding
Yeah while there was some hype for this film from Fans of Mangold or Indy (Of which i'm now both) it's now gotten to the point Wikipedia has out and out labeled it a box office bomb and Naturally the failure of this film has been taken with grace and restraint by the internet
It hasn't helped that Indy has come out in a summer with plummeting box office from usual money makers, so people are only more on their "Why aren't people seeing these films" kick. When really the reasons aren't new. We have "Doing the same shit a diffrent day instead of going with what was new and working " (Transformers rise of the beasts), "Another film outboxing it" (Elemental), "The company behind it simply not promoting it at all" (Ruby Gilman, which I intend to review at some point), " or "Oopsie we hired a pedophile as our leading actor, have no idea where we were taking this franchise when we started this film, and our company is ran by an evil overlord no one likes whose actively made the media landscape worse ever since he took over, better hope our promotoinal tactics work..."
The issues aren't new, their simply finding hitting people over the head.. and that's what happened here. Indy had an uphill battle: I was only invested at first because James Mangold was directing it and Logan is still one of the best superhero movies ever made. I got more invested thanks to this retrospective. Given Disney's slipshod treamant of star wars and terrible treatment of last jedi as well as the mcu being a mess right now, it's not a huge leap that many audiences really didn't want to gamble on ANOTHER disney live action movie that just looked okay, no matter how much Phoebe Waller Bridge or Antonio Bandareas it had. While it's sad as I honestly don't think the film deserved THIS much of a bomb.. I can't blame audiences for waiting for Disney Plus. We simply live in an era now where most people have tons of streamers or will get one for a month to watch one movie and anything else they've caught up on. We're simply entering an era where having a big brand name isn't a guarantee and in this case can be a curse if that name is disney. Big franchises can work, see Spider-Verse and Scream VI making great money, but you have to have something to offer.
So come with me under the cut as we see if Indy has just that or is best left in the past
MASSIVE SPOILERS AHOYHOY
When I'm Gone, He's Gone
As you'd expect, Lucas still wanted to make a 5th film after Skull, with Speilberg and Ford on board as always. This time though..
Lucas himself went to the press saying he wanted to do something new and Speilberg was stuck in the past... which I translate as Lucas once again went kinda nuts on the premise while , much like after Temple of Doom, Speilberg wanted something a tad more grounded to avoid making the same mistake twice. It comes off as the two just could never quite agree on what to do and eventually.. decided to let the franchise move on without him, selling it and the rest of Lucasfilm to Disney.
Disney naturally wanted an indy film right away and after getting the distribution rights one year later in 2023.. it took them a decade.
Yeahhh while we got the sequel trilogy pretty fast in hollywood time it took a good decade for Indy to put his hat on. At first there were rumors floated about about recasting, then it was settled on ford, then Speilberg was set to direct and the film proceded to go through a ton of writers, from Crystal Skull's david koepp
And even Dan Fogelman of This is Us royalty was floated as one of the writers. The film also got delayed thanks to Speilbergs work on Ready Player One and the Post, before he eventually stepped off all together. He claimed it was to pass it on to a fresh director, but it really feels like his heart wasn't in it anymore, and it was best someone whose heart was took the lead.
Enter James Mangold, director of The Wolverine, Logan and Kicker of ass. Mangold was a solid choice and my book and along with his usual co-writers Jez and John Henry Butterworth, who I assure you are real people but cannot assure you aren't old timey prospectors sent forward in time, hashed out the script.
Casting went smoothly, as did filiming, with the only hiccup being production's start being delayed because of COVID. They shot in morocco, england, ireland and spain, along with the us as you'd expect. Speilberg wasn't entirely detached as he still advised and watched dalies, ultimately loving the final product. So now we can actually look at that product let's start with how it writes Indy himself.
The Mileage Adds Up
One of the things that made me not really enjoy Doom or Crystal.. was a lack of character work. Indy was about the same as when he started the adventure in contrast to Raiders and Last Crusade taking him on a wonderful character journey, in the former getting his passion back and in the later reconcliing with his dad.
Dial of Destiny dosen't reach those highs, but I still think it does a decent job. The opening.. is okay detailing Indy having an adventures in the last day sof the third reich, setting up both Helna's Dad and our big bad, as well as Archimedes Dial, basied on the real life Antyhkiera Mechanism. I really do love the dial as a plot device as it's a departure, being the only one of the five to not involve a god of some sort, and yes the alien counts. It's just a time machine a famous philospher made. It's still fucking neat, I mean IT'S A TIME MACHINE A FAMOUS PHILSOPHER MADE, but it's a bit more grounded while still being pretty damn nifty.
So while the intro is mostly.. eh for me, what it does really well... is contrast the indy we know.. with where he is in 1969: Unlike Crystal Skull, which glossed over the massive amount of time passed, here were with an indy who feels both his age.. and that he's been left behind by the world. That time has taken everything from him: his friends, his father, his marriage.. and his son. He's left to yell at the neighbors, go to a class that dosen't pay attention and have a retirment party he clearly dosen't want. Granted his retirment does feel like a missed opportunity as wikipedia mentioned it pre-release as being forced out due to speaking out against operation paper clip, something that I either missed.. or more likely simply ISN'T in the film. It's a real shame, the idea is great it's just not present.
This creates a really intriguing Parallel: Indy at the start of the last adventure of his we'll see is a broken down man whose years of adventuering have left a mark on him, who is estranged from Marion, has not a ton to live for, and is clearly only loosely holding it together. And the Indy we met in Raiders.. is a broken down man whose years of adventuring left a mark on him, is estranged from marion, has not a ton to live for and is clearly only loosely holding it together.
The diffrence is how tired Indy is. In his late 30's he's beaten a bit and reduced to graverobbing.. but the minute he gets a real assignemnt int he grail, he jumps to it. He has his job, he has his friendship with marcus, and he's able to fix things with marion. He's not completely gone, he's just lost. Indy in Dial... has watched all his friends and his son, more on that in a minute, die, his marriage fall apart, and his job slip out under him. Without his job.. he's a man without a purpose.
This also ironically creates another Scrooge McDuck parallel, another bit of symmetry and one I didn't plan on till I started writing this and thought of the story: Indy reminds me a lot of Scrooge in the final part of Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck. Both are seasoned adventueres who have either pushed away anyone they have left or lost them and feel they just have nothing left but to slowly rot away.
And like Scrooge it takes a bolt of inspiration from the new generation after him to get Indy back in the game. In this case it's the highlight of the film, Helena Shaw, played by the wonderful, funderful fleabag, Phoebe Waller-Bridge. WB likely dosen't need any introduction but just in case she was showrunner of the successful and inventive stage show turned amazon prime show fleabag, showran killing eve and in general is pretty delightful. So it's no huge suprise she's great as Helena Shaw, daughter of Marcus Indy's sidekick for the intro who became obessed with our titular macguffin, Archemedis Dial, which can travel through time some time, though not to the end of all man kind.
Helena is a neat character in that they managed to make her distinct while still giving her enough similarties to indy to serve well as his shadow, his ghost of sins past, him in his prime. She's also a brilliant archelogist, has a kid sidekick like indy did in temple of doom with Teddy Kumar (Ethann Isidoore), sells priceless artifacts for a profit, has a messy love life, kicks plenty of ass, and tries to command every room she's in. What helps seperate them is their demeanor: Indy is gruff, snarky and surly. While Helena can snark with the best of them, she's fast talking, fast thinking, and tends to use charm as much as the old Indy Guile both heroes posses.
The main diffrence is rather than sell to museums, she sells to private collectors...
Okay the REAL difference is that she's only in it for the money while Indy at least, on some level, cared about the history even at his lowest. Helena just sees all her father could do and all she learned from being around him before his passing as a way to get. Once again like Indy.. she had a father who cared more about some big treasure than her child.. and a godfather who cared more about what was going on in his life than ever checking up on her. She's a person whose been left to her own devices and feels she's doing just fine.. but honestly could be putting her talents to better use. Maybe not in a school like indy, but she could help return artifacts to their countries... probably still for a pretty penny, but not just to some random asshole to sit in his den.
You can tell dealing with her just makes Indy feel even more tired, which is somehow possible after all he's been through. He's once again seeing a ghost of his past and this time can't seem to get it through her head. When she celebrates shortly after his friend Renaldo dies, he has to sharply remind her. Nothing seems to get through to her.. till we get to THAT scene. Probably the best scene of the film. The climax is awesome.. but it's this one moment.
On a boat at night, Helena asks Indy what he'd do with the dial, clearly thinking some grand adventure.. instead
Indy: I'd stop my son from enlisting
Helena: And how would you do that?
Indy: I would tell him that he would die, that his mother would be overcome with a grief so intense that his father would be unable to console her, and that it would end their marriage.
The sheer PAIN Ford conveys during that monologue.. may be the finest acting he's ever done. You can just FEEL Indy's loss; his son is gone, his marriage is torn, and he blames himself for both. It gives a horrible pathos to why he's so broken down. Both developments.. coudl've been really cheap. With how much everyone but me seems to hate mutt, and how rightly no one can stand shia suprise these days, most were expecting..
Instead Mutt's death is used as the catalyst for Indy's slow spiral into dispair. He would've been happy in retirment.. but he lost his son, his wife.. he's a man truly with nothing left he feels. And while he gets some old spark back unlike Scrooge.. he's fighting it every step. He dosen't want an adventure, he dose'nt want anything but his son back, and he knows damn well that even if the dial could... the sad truth is it likely has some horrible cost to it. The grail gave eternal life but bound you to a spot. The Skull gave you the knowledge of an unknowable alien god, but drove you mad. The arc killed anyone who looked. If the Dial even works... he knows it can't bring his son back, and he's only going after it because it's better in a museum than in the hands of Nazis.
We also see a change in Helena. She goes from following Indy's lead out of nececity, to seeing his point, to seeing the beauty of the world instead of just the dollar signs. She still wants the money.. but she starts to see the beauty in history instead of the dollar. I also like that this isn't easy on Teddy, who sees her postive changes as coming between him and his surrogate mom, when really she fully intends to stick with Teddy no matter what and shows nothing but loyalty.. and in the end.. they dont' really finish that arc
I like Teddy a lot, and I wish this had more of a bow on it, though we do get him taking down a nazi and trapping him to drown and later getting into a dogfight. Teddy slaps is what i'ms aying> He dosen't have a ton of deep character to explore, but he's fucking great.
This all really cumulates in the climax.. which is so great i'd rather save it for after we cover one last major character, our antagonist.
Our big bad is Mads Mikkelsen as Jurgen Voller, a thereoticain who wants the dial. At first Indy assumes, as most of the audience would that Voller simply wants the dial, which he's shown to obess over to win the war for hitler. Turns out Voller's plan is more complex. We see in the intro how Voller is the ONLY one who both sees the dial's value among the nazi's and the writing on the wall: Hitler is almost gone, he fucked them over. It's over.
And thus the horror of Voller isn't like with Thot , at the giant horrifying nazi machine and all their power, and more at evil allowed to hide in plain sight. At a society who forgives horrible people because their useful. Voller got a free pass thanks to operation paperclip.. and the film shows while that idea got us tons of advances including space flight.. it came at the cost of giving horrible people real power and influence. The president is outright giving voller a MEDAL. And he hasn't changed: a truly chilling bit has him talking to a black bellhop delivering meal and asking where he came from.. and dismissing him saying he came from america. Voller is every bit the white supremacist monster he ever was, he's completely loyal to the idea of the nazi's. .just not to hitler. Voller's whole plan isn't to help hitler.. but to take him out, replace him and have someone compitent win. And he only gets as fara s he does because the goverment willingly works with him, gives him agents, goes after Helena and the dial. They know what he his but fully aid and abet him. Sure they eventually realize he's gone rogue, that his pet agent is entirely in his pocket.. but they don't turn on him till far too late and with one of their great agents dead. Concidentaly I feel Agent Mason is wasted: she's the calm rational agent.. but she's also the only major black character in the film and gets killed by a nazi. That's.. entirely fucked up and while I suspect inteitonally fucked up it just dosen't work for me.
Voller is also once again, much like with Belloc, an evil mirror of indy: Both are geniuses who adore history.. but one's a good person despite being gruff while one seems harmless when we first meat him but is actually a total monster. Mads does a great job showing just how evil the guy is without going over the top. Voller is determind to change history... and he does.. just not how he wanted to.
This Ain't 1933!
The climax.. is fucking awesome. Like Crystal Skull it goes beyond what the series had done before, if not more so. It's arguably even MORE over the top. But it works. For those who haven't seen the film... INDY GOES BACK IN TIME. The dial DOES indeed work.... but it's set up to ONLY go back to this point. Helena points out the idea of "loaded decks' earlier.. and realizes the dial is one. Archimedes only left it behind to create a stable time loop.
Indy going back into actual history is nuts, entirely and my jaw dropped at it.. but it's so damn fun. Our heroes not only have to escape the plain and get the dial back after it drops onto the coast, but survive the Siege of Syracuse, the roman invasion that eventaully resulted in Archimedes end. So we have two planes flying overhead, arrows everywhere and nazis versus romans. It's over the top but not in a way that really undermines the franchise, and frankly as what's intended to be the final act of indy ever, it's a fitting finale: the man whose explored history in the present.. gets to LITERALLY go to the past for his final adventure. I do get how not everyone will agree, and it won't work for everybody, this may be a bit tooo over the top, but I love it and feel it nicely ties up everyone's character arcs.
For Voller he gets to join history.. but instead of "fixing" it like he wanted he dies horribly and is forgotten to history only the "dragon" (his palne" is left.. and cleverly foreshadowed earlier when Teddy watches a puppet show. His nazi's all die and it's glorious to watch nazi after nazi go down from arrows or our two heroes escaping the plane while teddy takes the rest down with the help of a hapless pilot.
We then get the payoff for both Helena and Indy, as Indy gives the dial to archimedes.. and plans to stay. After all we established he's lost everything... why would he go back? He'll die soon.. but he's cconvinced he'll die soon back in the present.
It's Helena who'se ultimately changed realizing both the value of history.. and ultimately the movie's moral: you can't change the past, but you can live for today. Helena can't change her awful upbringing or the things she's done.. but she can be better. And Indy can't save his son from death, save archimedes from death or be a better husband to marion during the greving process.. but he can be better to her and still live now. He still has so much to offer. He taught helena to love history and to try and be better. He gave his son a better life even if it was sadly cut short. He can be better. And when he can't be convinced the easy way she proves she's fully earned her way to being indy's succesor and just clubs him and takes him back (the dial has to go back with them as archimedes needs to make his own).
The end scene also mostly works for me: Indy is back at his apartment.. but finds he's not alone as when he woke up there last time: Not only has Helena forgiven him, having realized much like Indy himself that warts and all, he's family, but Sallah, who I haven't gotten to talk about is here. Sallah is great in this film, not only helping Indy when he needs to lay low but enocuraging his friend it's not over. It's also nice to see Indy helped him and his family immigrate and that he's teaching his grand kids egyptian. It's also a nice way to still have davies play the roll.. but have him get a bit more depth and make up for a white guy playing the roll.
And last but not least.. Marion returns, and the two reconcile. I thought it was a bit easy when I frist saw it.. but I see now i'ts more the idea they have a long road ahead.. but both are willing to see it together.. Indy admits he was wrong and Marion is willing to give him another shot. For the third time but at least this time it's likely she just needed some psace to realize he wasn't being callous he just wasn't processing his grief.. and now he's ready to.. maybe they have a shot. It's a nice way to close out the films: Indy's life isn't over, he's got friends, he's got his wife.. and there's always another rainbow.
Assorted Other Stuff:
The action set pieces as usual are fucking great, my faviorites easily being the climax and the diving adventure. The latter reminded me a lot of Tin Tin, Red Rackam's Treasure.
Antonio Banderas is great as Reynaldo and I only wihs he had a bigger part.. and survived. It's not a huge suprise, saying Antonio Banderas is great.
While I LIKED the finale with Marion, I'm with Karen Allen. They could've used her more. She deserves better dammit. WHy is it with the sequels they just can NEVER get bringing her back right?
Last but not least.. ther'es this weird subplot only brought up in the first two acts where the government frames indy for Murder that just.. never gets resolved? Like they never adressed it and as far as I can tell there's no resolution. Now granted I still think Indy isn't going to be arrested: He's clearly been unconcious for a week and Helena did have to get him back into the US, so it's likely the goverment found out about voller, got a debrief from helena.. and agreed to clear her and indy's record and absolve him of murder in exchange for never talking about this to anyone, as a Nazi escaping and killing one of their agents , after they pardoned the guy wouldn't look good. But we needed a line. It's easily the most baffling decision in otherwise a really godo film.
So finally we're , like indy back where we started.. was the film that bad?
When writing the reviews for Crystal Skull and Temple, I honestly hated the films MORE the more I thought abotu them, the more I found wrong, the more I realized how little they did. With this film. it's the opposite. The more I examine dial, the more I find to like. The character arcs, the action, the payoff. It's not perfect, again Indy is still kinda wanted for murder among other little plot gaffes, but I do think Dial is a solid entry in the series and better than both temple and skull at capturing what made the series graet. It dosen't nail it perfectly.. but it's still a fun ride with some really good character work and phenominal performances.
Really indy failed.. because no one cares outside of fans of the franchise. As my brother put it when talking about this very film recently, kids don't know indy. It's not the big hit with kids star wars was and is. Star Wars will likekly rebound someday because Kids still dig it and kids will grow up with the sequels the way I grew up with the prequels, warts and all. Disney just assumed Indy was enough to carry it and he wasn't. I'm sad at it because not only is this a good film, but I was hoping for more pulp adventure films. But i'm also happy at what we got and to have done this journey. I saw the good, and the bad. And I saw a franchise I ended up really loving. In the end I got what I needed out of this franchise
( samantha logan, cis woman, she/her ) have you met bellamy forrester yet? you know, the 25 year old graduate student majoring in game design. ring a bell yet? every time i walk past their dorm i hear cigarette by alfie jukes blasting through the door. everyone who meets them say they're perceptive but can also be a little fickle. guess when you meet them you’ll figure that out yourself.
STATS
FULL NAME: bellamy grace forrester
NICKNAMES: belle
BIRTHDAY: november 12th, 1998
ZODIAC: scorpio
BIRTHPLACE: seattle, washington
SEXUALITY: bisexual / biromantic
HEIGHT: 5’7”
EYE COLOR: dark brown
HAIR COLOR/STYLE: black & wavy
BUILD: lithe toned
FAVORITE COLOR: emerald green
SPOKEN LANGUAGES: english ( fluent ) & italian ( conversational )
CLUBS: astrology, opinions columnist on grey wolf gazette, dj on radcliffe radio
MAJOR: game design
BAND: all systems red
BIOGRAPHY
if you were to ask bellamy, it couldn’t have been possible to have born as the sole daughter to two people with bigger brains. her mother crunched numbers like nobody's business and ran the finance department of a big law firm back in seattle, while her father practically knew how to code in his sleep and was contracted by companies to design their expensive protection systems.
growing up, bellamy caught on fairly quickly that her parents, despite marrying straight out of college, never shared the desire to desire to have kids . this was cemented by the amount of times she was referred to as a happy accident, or how her grandparents would say they were expecting the family german shepherd dottie to always be who they were babysitting when bellamy’s parents were busy.
her accidental birth aside, this never truly bothered her since she got along better than most kids her age did with their parents ( think olive in easy a with her mom and dad ). her parents’ intelligence was admirable to bellamy and even with the amount of effort put into studying for stem subjects, her stronger grades in history and english never cause a riff or an argument between them.
music always stood out as an interest to bellamy, going as far to take up the violin in her middle and high school orchestra, but it wasn’t until freshmen year in high school that one of her friends took her along to a local band playing in one of the iconic music venues in seattle that a lightbulb went off over her head.
from this point on bellamy threw herself into learning the guitar and was introduced to the band paramore ( to which she quite truthfully developed a crush on hayley williams ). pop punk would become her musical inspiration, her skills developing on the guitar her father got her for her birthday and the classes he signed her up for at the local music store, while she also learned to find her voice as a vocalist.
high school for bellamy was all about cruising. she kept up above average grades for her parents’ sake and knew that college was most definitely in the picture for her despite her true desire to find a band to belong in and try to make it big. college was to give her mom and dad peace of mind in case her music dreams fell short. high school has her in-between different bands, trying to fit in but never quite finding the people who fit her vision of what the type of music she wants to make.
her writing is important to her, the ability to craft a story within such a short time of three minutes or less, and she found that most of the bands in her area just wanted a girl as the singer for looks rather than any real creative input.
never one to hold back her opinion or mince her words, it definitely burned a few bridges and it’s one of her qualities that is viewed both positively and negatively depending on who you ask. bellamy has learned to stand up for herself and that if she doesn’t advocate for herself then no one else will.
even with no band behind her, she kept up her writing and it was her writing that proved as her strength to get her acceptance letter to radcliffe university after the encouragement of her mother to apply. the major of game design wasn’t initially one that crossed her mind as an option, but after speaking to some of the professors during her school’s college fair, it got her excited. bellamy’s penchant for writing pushed her along, but the creative aspect of creating a whole world in a video game is much different than songwriting.
it’s around her sophomore/junior year that bellamy meets who would become her best friends - the rest of her bandmates who would go to create their band all systems red with. thick as thieves with an undeniable love for music, they’ve been together since and within the past summer went on a mini tour in american for their first full length album.
bellamy keeps busy with her studies and band practice, ultimately hoping that she won’t have to put her degree to use after graduating but she supposes there are worse things to do than create video games.
WANTED CONNECTIONS
a rebound bc bellamy is still feeling the sting of her almost something/ex bandmate so she’s letting her freak flag fly !! so someone who is equally just in it for the hookups
maybe a lil study buddy who bellamy and your muse prefer to sit with at the library bc they know they’ll hold the other to it and can get shit down
alternatively, the non-studying study buddy who bellamy and your muse just end up chatting together and whispering to hold off the glares of students at the tables near them
highkey a bit of a nerd so someone who shares similar interests in video games and anime !! esp bc bellamy majors in game design so she probably invites your muse over to her off campus dorm to play video games and calls it studying bc technically it’s learning for her major
someone who mayhaps has a crush on bellamy just from hearing her as one of the dj’s for radcliffe radio or even from seeing her and her band perform. nothing has to come from it if you don’t want it to so fear not bc i think the obliviousness of bellamy and them could be funny
someone else in the astronomy club who bellamy gets along with and maybe the two of them are prone to oversharing heart to hearts bc the two of them oftentimes climb to the roof of the townhouse dorms and just lay to look at the stars
mayhaps a mistaken hookup that now the two of them just avoid one another for reasons we can plot out
someone who 100% stands on the opposite side of any one of bellamy’s opinions pieces so the two of them Do Not get along
in a similar vein, someone who got rubbed the wrong way by bellamy’s tenacious and outspoken tendencies and now the two side eye one another when they see them
an ex !! could be from early undergrad years and be multiple muses for exes that either ended on good terms, bad terms or now things are just atrocious and they run the opposite direction when they see each other
going off that … maybe even exes who still have a bit of chemistry and bc bellamy is going through a bit of a tough phase rn they’re hooking up even though they know they shouldn’t
EXORCISTIC: The Rock Musical at The Box New York City
The new rock musical, EXORCISTIC presented by HRS Productions and Orgasmico Theatre will premier in NYC just in time for Halloween. The show will come to NYC for its limited viewing on October 8th through October 23rd at The Box. The unauthorized parody of The Exorcist was brought back by popular demand after their sold-out run at The Three Clubs in Los Angeles.
The musical parody brings about horror, hilarity, and the most powerhouse rock tunes you’ll see in a theater this year! The production brings to roaring life with iconic imagery and an explosive live band, the story of a movie star whose daughter becomes possessed and is helped by priests who try to save her.
Book, lyrics, and music by two-time Ovation Award winner Michael Shaw Fisher. Lindsay Heather Pearce (Wicked and RENT) will be featured in the opening cast. Emma Hunton (Freeform's Good Trouble, Wicked, and RENT) will also star, reprising her role from the LA production. The cast includes: The Summer Set's frontman Brian Logan Dales, Leigh Wolf (Exorcistic 2013), Jesse Merlin (For Love of the Glove, Re-Animator the Musical), Marissa Jaret Winokur (Hairspray, Bupkis), Nick Bredosky (UMPO 10 Things I Hate About You) Kim Dalton (Cluelesque, Toil & Trouble) Mitchell Gerrard Johnson (A New Brain) Gabby Sanalitro (That 90’s Show) and Tyler Olshanksky.
Emma Hunton as “The possessed girl” in new rock musical, EXORCISTIC
Exorcistic is a parody within a parody. The audience watches a struggling theater company make their way to Broadway by the second act, however, their lead, Emma Hunton has taken Method Acting a step too far and is replaced with a Broadway star. This role is a rotating rolodex of stars which you do not want to miss because it changes every night! Each night there will be a different special guest performer who will be played by: Marissa Rosen (For the Girls, Water for Elephants, Modern Love) Nick Cearly (The Skivvies, You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown) Jillian Schiralli (CATS, now that’s what i call 90s) Gerard Canonico (Almost Famous, The Dude Ranch) Jordan Donica (Camelot, RENT, Hamilton) Jamie Cepero (SMASH, The Function) and more!
The Box is located at 189 Chrystie St, New York, NY 10002.
The show will start promptly at 7:30 pm with the doors opening at 6:30 pm.
Tickets are now available and can be purchased here To view the trailer for EXORCISTIC, please click here
157: The Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band // "Born Into Trouble as the Sparks Fly Upward."
"Born Into Trouble as the Sparks Fly Upward."
The Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band
2001, Constellation (Bandcamp)
22 years ago Montreal’s other iconic prodigiously-membered post-rock band released their second LP. It’s not easy keeping all of these pro-Zion-but-not-Zionists straight, so I’ve helpfully listed and ranked each of the musicians who have passed through this constantly shifting collective from first to least-first. Let’s go!
Members of A/The/e Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band, Ranked
1. Mike Garson - piano
2. Annie Clark - guitar, keyboards, backing vocals
3. Brian Teasley- percussion
4. Daniel Hart - violin
5. Szabolcs Szczur – accordion
6. Davey 'Crabsticks' Trotter – Mellotron
7. Timothy Matthews – mbira
8. Buffi Jacobs – cello
9. Bach Norwood – piano, keyboards, backing vocals
10. Harriet Ballance - triangle, backing vocals
11. Japhy Ryder – floristry
12. Stuart "Peebs" Peebles – piccolo
13. Chandler Petrino – natural horn, oboe
14. Jared Pechonis – theremin
15. Toby Halbrooks - theremin
16. Corn Mo - backing vocals
17. Patrick Hewitt – theremin
18. Darin Hieb – trumpet, backing vocals
19. Rachel Woolf – flute
20. Mark Beardsworth – claviola
21. Allen Halas – percussion
22. Edwin Mendoza – viola
23. Todd Beaupré – vibraslap
24. Thaddeus Ford – trumpet
25. Paul Deemer – trombone, trumpet
26. Mike St.Clair – trombone, synth effects
27. Josh Guyer – trombone, spoons
28. Chris Curiel – trumpet
29. Heather Test – French horn
30. Victoria Arellano – classical harp
31. Sean Redman – violin, mandolin
32. Kelly Test – percussion
33. Mike Mordecai – percussion
34. Jason Garner – drums
35. Audrey Easley – flute, piccolo, EWI
36. Rick G. Nelson – viola
37. Nick Groesch – piano, keyboards
38. Keith Hendricks – percussion
39. Evan Hisey – keyboards
40. Dylan Silvers – guitar
41. Daniel Hart – violin
42. John Lamonica – percussion
43. Marcus Lopez – percussion
44. Matt Bricker – trumpet, synth effects
45. Taylor Young – percussion
46. Joe Butcher – steel drum
47. Evan Jacobs – piano, keyboards
48. Todd Berridge – viola
49. Nick Earl – guitar
50. Evan Weiss – trumpet
51. Jay Jennings – trumpet
52. Tamara Brown – violin
53. Merritt Lota – steel drums
54. Daniel Huffman – guitar
55. Timothy Blowers – harp
56. Anthony Richards – steel drums
57. Louis Schwadron – French horn
58. Andrew Tinker – French horn
59. Nick Wlodarczyk – trombone
60. Paul Gaughran – flute
61. Isabelo Cruz – French horn
62. Bryan Wakeland – drums
63. Hayley McCarthy – viola
64. Dave Dusters – percussion, backing vocals
65. Billy Mills-Curran – flute
66. Logan Keese – trumpet
67. Ricky Rasura – classical harp
68. Tonya Hewitt – banjo
69. Daniel Poorman – slide whistle
70. Andy Parkerson – clarinet
71. Joseph Singleton – viola
72. Jenelle Valencia – violin
73. James Reimer – trombone
74. Regina Chellew – guitar, trumpet, backing vocals
75. Ryan Fitzgerald – guitar, backing vocals
76. Cory Helms – guitar, backing vocals
77. Jessica Jordan – backing vocals
78. Jenny Kirtland – backing vocals
79. Kristin Hardin – backing vocals
80. Elizabeth Evans – backing vocals
81. Neil Smith – backing vocals
82. Julie Doyle – backing vocals
83. Christine Bolon – backing vocals
84. Natalie Young – backing vocals
85. Constance Dolph – backing vocals
86. Elizabeth Brown – backing vocals
87. Apotsala Wilson – backing vocals
88. Jennie Kelley – backing vocals
89. Roy Thomas Ivy – backing vocals
90. Jamey Welch – backing vocals
91. Ethan Voelkers – backing vocals
92. Mark Pirro - bass
93. Frank Benjaminsen – backing vocals
94. Stephanie Dolph – backing vocals
95. Jennifer Jobe – backing vocals
96. Mike Elio – backing vocals
97. Kelly Repka – backing vocals
98. Jason Rees – backing vocals
99. Jeneffa Soldatic – backing vocals
100. Michael Turner – backing vocals
101. Don Congeler – backing vocals
102. Michael Musick – backing vocals
103. Melissa Crutchfield – backing vocals
104. Sandra Powers Giasson – backing vocals
105. Paul Hillery – backing vocals
106. Stephen Dix – backing vocals
107. Jessica Berridge – backing vocals
108. Melisma MacDonald – backing vocals
109. Ross Cink - backing vocals
110. Lucy Williams - choreography
111. Josh David Jordan – backing vocals
112. Brad Butler – backing vocals
113. Jason Rees – backing vocals
114. Andrew Aldenenotti – backing vocals
115. Getting hit by a bus wearing a flowing white robe
116. Tim DeLaughter - vocals, guitar, piano
Hold on. I’ve just received word that these musicians are actually members of some other band? Apologies for the confusion!
Omg! this is so exciting! thank you for blessing us all 🤍✨ ive never done one of these so honestly not sure what to say or if ive said too much
- bi girl but hopelessly in love w/ roman/kendall/stewy/mattson 🤭💓 imagine i said logan. LMFAO
- short, 5ft😳, mixed black/indian/white so super diverse cultural heritage. brown skin, eyes & black wavy hair. big booba lmao. freckles on face & arms. big eyebrows & beauty spot on face.. does own gel nails, sometimes gets henna on hands/feet around eid or weddings etc but not religious
- love! to cook! extroverted introvert, swimming, yoga, loves 2 buy STUFF like art, fashion, books, fancy bath stuff. kinda bougie but likes to disconnect in nature (glamping over camping) snowboarding. sailing. sunbathing. loves kids. horror fan!!! would live & move anywhere, v resilient and adaptable traveller. would prob settle near mine or partner's family if/when had kids. cats <3
- educational psychologist. works w/ kids & teens. used to be a personal shopper, executive office assistant, charity bid writer, mental health youth worker. wears many hats. jack of all trades master of none
- personal aesthetic is variable, i do kinda mirror what partner likes as im easygoing and like to please & v much into shopping, fashion & changing style. always kinda cute edgy tho - dr martens and lots of gold vintage jewellery. black & pink! bit of a property whore. would have a cottage, castle and city apt if i could. or a whole island🤭
Timeless Love x Lukas Matsson
My love!!! I'm so happy you requested!!! Know that every time I see your icon I get so happy!!! Idk why as soon as I read castle and bougie this is what I thought of lol. I hope you like it!!!! Xoxoxo💜💜💜
~ “Frank Gardner Hale, who was born there in 1876. His interests in art and design were obvious, but her path to jewellery making was not straightforward. Hale's education began with his studies at the Norwich Art School and Boston Museum School.After graduating, Hale moved to England, where he studied at the Guild of Handicrafts. There, he designed book covers and music for eight years before embarking on studying jewellery design.In 1906, Hale joined the CR Ashbee's Guild of Handicrafts at Chipping Campden in the Cotswolds, where he learned goldsmithing and enameling. After his studies, he moved to London to work with Fred Partridge, an esteemed jeweller and enameler. Back in Boston in 1907, Hale opened shop and joined the Society of Arts & Crafts, making him a master a year later. Most Hale's coins were set in gold or sterling silver. The pendants were often hung from golden chain strands, decorated with more colourful gemstones. In 1930, Hale founded the Marblehead Arts Association in Marblehead, Massachusetts. Frank Gardner Hale passed away in December 1945.1915: Bronze Medal of Excellence: Boston Society of Arts and Crafts1915: Silver Medal: Panama Pacific Exhibition in San Francisco1917: Frank Logan Prize and Bronze Medal: Applied Arts Exhibit, Chicago Arts Institute 2014: Frank Gardner Hale's updated opal and peridot pendant debuts in the American wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.1 LEFT: This photograph shows Edward Everett Oakes, John Ballou and Frank Gardner Hale (left-right), most likely in Hale's workshop on Southampton Street, circa 1909. RIGHT: An opal pendant, framed by glistening gold elements accented with sapphires and green garnets and Hale’s iconic grape clusters, is one of the prime examples of the colourful ‘Bostonian look’. 2 Frank Gardner Hale. Among the longest and most spectacular examples of Boston jewellers, this necklace features a large butterfly pendant with carved jade wings, a blue-green enamel body, and gold antennas. It is rare to find an example of Boston jewellery in its original box. This monumental necklace, with its oversized pendant and extraordinarily long chain, is custom-fitted in box brown and gold brocade interior. The words ‘Frank Gardner Hale’ and ‘Boston’ are etched in gold on the left side.” ~