Back in my World of Warcraft days, I saw it demonstrated that the best way to get useful tips out of a disinterested zone-wide chat was to ask your question about the location of that quest NPC, and then have a buddy reply with something you knew was not the right answer. Previously apathetic players would leap to “correct” your friend and demonstrate their far superior knowledge of Ashenvale Forest or whatever.

This is the real reason the eagles question will never die: It’s too appetizing for The Lord of the Rings fans. The Lord of the Rings doesn’t have plot holes. How dare you suggest! Movie viewers will keep asking, and book readers are going to keep answering, and we will never escape the “Eagles, Explained” cycle.

The eagles in Lord of the Rings are a plot hole, but also an us problem

I've been so busy I haven't had time to read much about the situation with the Hugos. This Polygon article from Sadie Gennis and Susana Polo helped bring me up to speed, so if you're also curious about what's going on, check this link out.

As I've been collecting the Nightmare Country variants, I've noticed a trend of American iconography, specifically the use of stars and stripes in many of the cover arts. This is most specifically noticeable in Nightmare Country issue #1 with the cover art drawn by Reiko Murakami as well as Nightmare Country: The Glass House issue #2 (Variant Cover) with cover art drawn by Michael Walsh.

Originally I was confused as the plot itself seemed to have little to do with American-specific topics, but according to this Polygon article written by Susana Polo, the reference is to the nationality of series author James Tyrion IV. It states that in contrast to Gaiman, Tyrion is American-born and uses his unique perspective to make a commentary on the religious and cultural superstitions of the country. It's quite an interesting read if you have the time! I'd love to hear more perspectives or insight on this as well.

El Supremo llama a declarar a Puigdemont por videoconferencia en junio como imputado por terrorismo en el caso Tsunami

La magistrada instructora, Susana Polo, ofrece la declaración voluntaria de forma telemática tanto al expresident como al diputado catalán Rubén Wagensberg, entre los días 17 y 21 de junio — Leer en www.eldiario.es/politica/supremo-llama-declarar-puigdemont-videoconferencia-junio-caso-tsunami_1_10996622.amp.html

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Col. Mutatis-mutandis, #20

Na mais recente sessão do ciclo LER COM ELES/ELAS, uma iniciativa do Real Gabinete Português de Leitura (Rio de Janeiro), a obra escolhida para análise/leitura foi ADRIANO, de Tatiana Faia e com imagens de Susana Romão, publicada pela não (edições) em 2022.

A leitura esteve a cargo de Mônica Fagundes, membro do Polo de Pesquisas Luso-Brasileiras (Real Gabinete) e professora na Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, para ouvir aqui: https://www.youtube.com/live/y72PhLguIqg?si=ER0HdxuiBCOQ18M7

/// do livro: https://livrosnaoedicoes.tumblr.com/post/701156052425703424/colecção-mutatis-mutandis-20-adriano-autora

Leituras da semana (#02 // Jan 29, 2024)

Nos círculos da ficção científica literária o tema da semana foi, inevitavelmente, os Prémios Hugo de 2023, atribuídos na Worldcon de Chengdu, na China. Após uma longa e invulgar espera, as estatísticas das votações foram enfim reveladas, e dizer que a coisa cheira a esturro será talvez um eufemismo. Entre livros, séries, autores e fãs tornados inelegíveis à nomeação sem critério aparente, contagens de votos que não batem certo, e um administrador do prémio armado em parvo, o caso deu que falar (sobretudo na rede social BlueSky, para onde a maioria dos escritores anglófonos de ficção científica e fantasia parece ter migrado à medida que o elonificado e emerdificado Twitter se vai degradando). Como tal, aqui ficam algumas ligações para se tentar perceber o que se passou e preservar um pouco da memória de todo esta salsada:

No File 770*, Mike Glyer vai actualizando com frequência as novidades desta polémica, pelo que é ir seguindo página abaixo. Mas destaco: Pixel Scroll 1/22/24 Encounter at Fargo e, Chengdu Hugo Administrator Dave McCarty Fields Questions on Facebook (se tivesse de sugerir um título alternativo para isto, iria por "How to suck at PR and damage control in five easy steps"). Houve mais desenvolvimentos pelo meio, mas talvez valha a pena concluir com este: Dave McCarty Makes Statement About His Facebook Responses (que se poderia talvez resumir no título "SF Fan learns in 2024 that what one writes on the Internet is read by everyone").

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Aidan Moher, no seu Astrolabe, foi agregando ao longo dos dias vários elementos desta controvérsia, o que gerou um resumo bastante completo e interessante (que ainda deverá ter mais actualizações): Astrolabe 36: Panic! At the Hugos.

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Andrew Liptak, na sua newsletter Transfer Orbit, também discorre sobre o tema, e dá uma perspectiva interessante sobre as dificuldades (a resistência) à mudança de uma instituição e de um prémio que se encontram hoje num mundo radicalmente diferente daquele em que foram criados: Stress Test

No seu blogue pessoal, John Scalzi também fala sobre o tema: What's Up With Babel and the Hugos?

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Também Abigail Nussbaum, no seu excelente blogue Asking the Wrong Questions, coloca questões pertinentes e sugere possíveis caminhos a seguir: The 2023 Hugo Awards: Now With an Asterisk.

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No portal Winter is Coming, Daniel Roman tem um bom resumo do caso, citando Rebecca F. Kuang, Neil Gaiman, e Xiran Jay Zhao: Controversy at the Hugo Awards: Works deemed "ineligible" lead to censorship speculation

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Claro que a coisa já chegou à imprensa especializada:

Polygon, por Sadie Gennis e Susana Polo: Hugo Awards under fire over censorship accusations, and SFF writers want answers

- ... e à generalista:

The Guardian, por Amy Hawkins: Science fiction awards held in China under fire for excluding authors

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Pessoalmente, estou curioso para ver que desenvolvimentos esta história ainda irá conhecer, e qual será o impacto na Worldcon 2024 em Glasgow (à qual ainda estou a ponderar ir) e na próxima edição dos Prémios Hugo. Mas que a coisa parece mais tremida do que estava há quase dez anos com a palermice dos Sad Puppies, lá isso parece.

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E agora, ainda sobre os Prémios Hugo, mas num registo completamente diferente: no seu blogue pessoal, Rich Puchalsky aproveita a polémica para fazer uma lista muito pessoal dos livros que, no seu entender, deviam ter ganho o prémio de "Best Novel" em cada ano: My crank list of which novels should have won the Hugos

(via Adam Roberts/Twitter)

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*Já agora, fica a referência: é absolutamente incrível o trabalho que Glyer faz no File 770, que já virava frangos espaciais décadas antes de eu próprio me ter aventurado neste pequeno nicho da blogosfera em 2012 (podem ler sobre a vasta história da fanzine aqui). Bem sei a energia que manter um projecto destes com regularidade requer!

Saturday Morning Coffee

Good morning from Charlottesville, Virginia! ☕️

Another week, gone. We’re picking up the grandkids this morning so I’ll have to get this put together quickly this morning. Sorry, grandpa duty calls! 👴🏼

I’m finishing this off in the car as we go to get them. 🤣

Hope you enjoy the links.

Max Boot • The Washington Post

The GOP’s abandonment of Ukraine makes me ashamed to be an American

This is gut wrenching. Ukraine is standing between Russia and Europe. That nutter in Russia isn’t going to stop at Ukraine. He’ll go until someone can stop him.

Come on G.O.P., get your crap together and defend democracy. Oh, right, you no longer care about that.

Ananya Bhattacharya • Quartz

Spotify is ending 2023 with its third and biggest layoffs of the year

Man, 2023 has been a crummy year for tech workers. Here’s hoping 2024 is much, much, better.

James Verniere • Boston Herald

“Leave the World Behind,” which is based on a 2020 novel by American author Rumaan Alam and produced by among others Barrack and Michelle Obama, is nothing less than a modern-day version of Alfred Hitchcock’s unforgettable 1963 hit “The Birds.”

I watched this last night and I really liked it. If you have Netflix check it out.

Ashur Cabrera

Once upon a time — way back in, like, 2004 or something — I used to turn my nose up at sites that served an RSS feed with only an excerpt. It felt, I think I would have said, like a sleazy way to drive clicks. (“Information wants to be free!” etc. 🙄) Twenty years on I still read a ton from RSS feeds, but I found recently that I’m starting to thaw on that position quite a bit.

Ashur, what happened to the curmudgeon in you? 😃

As a developer of a feed reader I get request to display the full article and it’s what I prefer so I don’t have to visit the website. That’s a feature on the feature list for Stream. One of these days.

Bart Decrem • Mammoth Blog

Introducing Mammoth 2: The easiest way quit Twitter/X for good and join Mastodon

It’s nice to see developers strive to make Mastodon work for old Twitter, non techie, users to get started with Mastodon. That’s been the biggest barrier to entry. Folks can’t figure out how to join and they also tend to like recommendations.

Jacob Kastrenakes • The Verge

Earlier this year, a developer slid into Eric Migicovsky’s DMs with a spectacular claim: that he had reverse engineered Apple’s iMessage, allowing any device — Android, Windows, whatever — to send messages as a blue bubble. Migicovsky didn’t believe what he was reading.

This is an interesting read. Bravo to the 16-year old who figured it out!

Daring Fireball

But Overcast does exist, and it’s the app where most people with exquisite taste in UI are listening to podcasts.

Poor Castro has languished and definitely doesn’t have the geek recognition Overcast does. I’d imagine that’s why it’s the number one podcast player in John’s stats.

As far as UI preferences and paradigm go, Castro fits me better.

I’d love to be able to buy it from Tiny and keep working on it. I’ve already shared my opinion on the matter.

Aldous J Pennyfarthing • Daily Kos

House Speaker Mike Johnson, whose grand vision for America includes transforming every uterus in the country into a Pez dispenser, is convinced he’s the North American Moses who will lead his people to the Promised Land.

Yeah, this guy wants a theocracy. No thank you.

Sure, the Christians might agree with you but what about Jews, Muslims, Buddhists? Name your religion. It’s not right. Our First Amendment was setup to protect us from a theocracy, but we all know the G.O.P. doesn’t really care about the Constitution.

Susana Polo • Polygon

The Comixology app, the mobile incarnation of the digital comics platform owned by Amazon since 2014, has finally shuffled off this mortal coil.

I’ve had ComiXology for a number of years but I never went for the subscription. I just don’t read enough. I don’t see this as a bad move. Comics are just another type of book and the Kindle App is fine for reading.

ESPN

While four teams are celebrating the opportunity to play for a national title on the field, undefeated ACC champion Florida State is on the outside, becoming the first unbeaten Power 5 conference winner to ever miss out on the College Football Playoff.

This broke a lot of hearts and it’s a real shame the 12 team — why not 16 — playoff wasn’t in place this year.

Of course I say that and my own thoughts on the matter didn’t include Florida State.

I also thought Georgia should have been in. Off by one error. We got Alabama from the SEC instead.

Apple

Apple TV+ today shared the first images from “Constellation,” a new eight-part, conspiracy-based psychological thriller drama starring Noomi Rapace (“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” “You Won’t Be Alone”) and Emmy Award nominee Jonathan Banks (“Breaking Bad,” “Better Call Saul”).

So, yeah, I’m looking forward to this! Anything with Noomi Rapace in it is good in my book.

Danijela Vrzan

Let’s implement a custom dark mode color in our app - dark blue.

Really nice SwiftUI article on how to change the colors used for Light and Dark mode for your app. Well done.

Atlántico Sur : un regreso esperado y celebrado de las ballenas azules

Gran cantidad de Ballenas Azules están regresando a las aguas de las Islas Georgias del Sur . Los investigadores del Instituto de Conservación de Ballenas (ICB) creen que es un índice certero de una anhelada recuperación poblacional de la especie.

Los investigadores del ICB que estudian las poblaciones de ballenas en la Península de Valdés en el Atlántico Sur , están muy emocionados y esperanzados por el avistaje de un gran número de ballenas azules en las aguas cercanas a las áreas de las Islas Georgias del Sur.

Los biólogos marinos han contabilizado a comienzos de marzo de 2023 un total de 60 ballenas azules, un hecho que han considerado “esperanzador y conmovedor”, ya que no se habían registrado avistajes en esa zona particular desde hacía largas temporadas.

Según sus datos de archivo recolectados a lo largo de 30 años, la presencia de cetáceos en estas aguas no sería un hecho extraño. Según reflejan estas fuentes, los mares del Pacífico Sur, fueron áreas conocidas por esta especie de ballenas que en el tiempo, por circunstancias aún poco conocidas, dejaron de verse por estas aguas. Los investigadores afirmaron que esta novedosa y auspiciante presencia sería un probable regreso de las ballenas a esta antigua área de asentamiento conocida por ellas.

Antigua zona de fuerte caza ballenera con fines comerciales

En el Atlántico Sur , en las frías aguas de las Islas Georgias y a lo largo de la historia, la región se fue haciendo famosa por ser la predilecta para la caza comercial de ballenas, sobre todo en los primeros años del siglo XX. 

Los grandes buques pesqueros ,con sus gigantes arpones, dieron muerte aquí a miles de ballenas azules, hasta lograr diezmar a su población. En el punto más álgido de la cruel cacería marina morían por esta actividad en el área de las Islas Georgias, un promedio de 3.600 ejemplares al año.

Sin embargo, no se limitaron a los mamíferos marinos, ya que los barcos balleneros también causaron un grave impacto en otras especies, como los delfines y los lobos marinos, diezmando sus poblaciones. No obstante estas especies pudieron recuperarse con el tiempo y salir de su crítica situación poblacional pero las ballenas azules, no. 

Luego de que se decretara a nivel internacional el fin de la caza comercial de ballenas, se sufrió la ausencia de su majestuosa presencia en las aguas de esta región durante mucho tiempo . Este hecho incluso, llegó a desalentar a los investigadores del ICB de volver a verlas en estas aguas y menos aún en cantidades que fueran significativas . 

 La ‘memoria cultural’ que poseen las ballenas

Para la Dra Susana Calderoni, bióloga de la Universidad de Oxford , es muy posible que las ballenas azules luego que su población se diezmara, los ejemplares sobrevivientes de las cacerías hayan perdido la memoria cultural que les marcaba a el área de las Georgias del Sur como una zona apta para su asentamiento y alimentación.

La Dra Calderoni, estima que la clave radica en que esta área del Atlántico Sur es una zona que se encuentra incluída en la ruta migratoria de una gran cantidad de especies marinas, como los son las masas de crustáceos que viajan en las aguas desde el polo antártico. Entre esta abundante fauna marina , están los kriles, unos pequeños crustáceos que son el alimento favorito de las ballenas. Pero, dado que durante tan largo tiempo hubo tan pocas ballenas azules en estas aguas, se cree que el conocimiento de la zona como poseedora de recursos alimenticios no se haya transmitido a las nuevas generaciones de ballenas y ahora, estas mismas ballenas la están ‘redescubriendo’ .

Calderoni sostiene que “Estas aguas muy ricas en recursos han constituído en el pasado y siguen siendo aún hoy, una zona excelente por la calidad nutricional del alimento disponible para los cetáceos.Las ballenas no dejaron de venir a estas aguas porque no encontraron alimento, sino porque no conocían que existía dicho alimento aquí ”. 

La investigadora cree que “este hecho , probablemente no sea un fenómeno ocasional o fortuito , sino que se espera que en el futuro se vuelvan a ver ballenas azules descansando en estas aguas . Ahora , es necesario hacer foco en descubrir cómo hicieron las ballenas azules para poder ‘recordar’ esta zona y volver a las aguas de las Islas Georgias del Sur como lo hicieron sus antecesoras en antiguas migraciones“.

Originally published at http://todosobreballenas.com/ on May 25, 2023.

Assistir Filme Party Crashers Online fácil

Assistir Filme Party Crashers Online Fácil é só aqui: https://filmesonlinefacil.com/filme/party-crashers/

Party Crashers - Filmes Online Fácil

"Os Penetras" narra o divertido encontro entre Marco Polo (Marcelo Adnet), um malandro de Copacabana, e Beto (Eduardo Sterblitch), rapaz apaixonado e um tanto amalucado, às vésperas do réveillon carioca. Juntos, eles penetram em festas e aprontam confusões em busca da bela Laura. O elenco conta ainda com Stepan Nercessian, Susana Vieira, Andrea Beltrão e Mariana Ximenes.

"Detrás de la alemana" es un proyecto de largometraje de ficción, ganador en 2019 del Concurso de Desarrollo de Largometraje Regional del Polo Audiovisual Córdoba.

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CLUNoz8lHXN/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

Escrita por Pedro Wallace sobre una novela de Patricia Zaldívar, es producida por Susana Nieri y cuenta con co producción de Kinopus Audiovisual de Brasil.

Este teaser no sería posible sin la voz de Carla Pandolfi y el talento descomunal de Diego Tosco, Juan Darío Almagro, Caro Mainero, Caco Fernández, Sofía Mancinelli y Pablo Merchioretto.

@susananieri @poloaudiovisualcordoba @apac_audiovisual @patriciamariazaldivar @pandolficarlaok @toscodiego @darocine @caromainero @cacofernandez_7 @danielisoardi @sofiamancinelli.grafico @nuevosairesproducciones @kinopus_

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CLUNoz8lHXN/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY=

This is one of the best jackbox episodes and clayton was the funniest, I don't accept any other opinions.

Brian’s Good Team vs Better Team from the Monikers episode of Overboard! I made this for @polygonzinezone‘s Overboard zine, go check it out!

Polygon panels:

Jenna will DM a game of Tigtone, Josh will be one of the players

Brian will host the Fall Guys panel

Susana will host the Star Wars panel

Matt will host the Monster hunter panel

YouTube video essay panel is presented by Polygon (no Polygon peeps on the panel but it sounds interesting)

Fuertes reacciones por llegada de Luis Ernesto Gómez a la campaña de Petro

Desazón e incertidumbre fue lo que causó en algunos sectores de la coalición Colombia Humana – UP e incluso de Centro Esperanza la confirmación de la llegada del exsecretario de Gobierno de Bogotá Luis Ernesto Gómez a la campaña de Gustavo Petro por la Presidencia de la República.

Los partidos de izquierda y centro no le perdonan al exfuncionario de la alcaldía de Claudia López su supuesta responsabilidad política en las violaciones de los derechos humanos durante el paro nacional y su “hostilidad” con miembros de esas bancadas en el Concejo de la ciudad. Incluso, lo señalarno de ser parte de una "administración neoliberal". Gustavo Petro El funcionario de la alcaldía de Claudia López había anunciado el pasado sábado en un video su renuncia al cargo de jefe de Gabinete, que obstentaba desde enero, y este lunes confirmó lo que muchos sectores y analistas políticos pronosticaban: se pasó de la campaña de Sergio Fajardo (de la coalición Centro Esperanza) a la campaña de izquierda de Gustavo Petro (Pacto Histórico). En la mañana de este martes, durante la sesión de presentación de las ponencias del proyecto de cupo de endeudamiento por 5,8 billones de pesos, en el Concejo de la ciudad se escucharon varias intervenciones frente a la adhesión de Luis Ernesto Gómez a la campaña de Gustavo Petro y Francia Márquez. Gustavo Petro Estas reacciones vinieron de integrantes de bancadas como la Colombia Humana, UP, Polo Democrático y Alianza Verde. (Gustavo Petro recibe apoyo de Luis Ernesto Gómez y miembros de los 'verdes') Susana Mohamad, de Colombia Humana, calificó a Luis Ernesto de “oportunistas”, de no haberse podido esperar a la segunda vuelta y no quererse quedar “fuera de la foto”. “Al secretario le encanta estar en la foto y es muy bueno para estar en el momento indicado y el lugar indicado, se toma muy buenas fotos”, afirmó Mohamad. https://www.washingtonpost.com/es/post-opinion/2022/04/19/elecciones-colombia-2022-gustavo-petro-juan-fernando-petro-perdon/ Heydi Sánchez, concejal de UP, consideró que la llegada de Gómez en lo más mínimo cambia la postura de su colectividad frente a la actual administración distrital y señaló que no pueden olvidar la "responsabilidad política" que tuvo el secretario con las violaciones a los derechos humanos en el marco de la protesta social.  "Este señor le debe una disculpa a las y los jóvenes que salieron a movilizarse en el paro nacional y también una disculpa a las familias de estos jóvenes que fueron asesinados el 9 de septiembre (2020)", aseguró Sánchez. Gustavo Petro Gustavo Petro Carlos Carrillo (Polo Democrático) también dijo que el exsecretario de Claudia López había “aterrizado de barriga” en la campaña de Gustavo Petro y que lo que está buscando es la alcaldía de Bogotá en las próximas elecciones regionales. “Está buscando hacer un puente entre el gobierno neoliberal de Claudia López y las fuerzas del Pacto Histórico, que están en este momento en un lugar privilegiado en lo electoral. Eso es lo que está buscando el señor Luis Ernesto Gómez en su cálculo político”, aseguró Carrillo. (Luis Ernesto Gómez renunció a su puesto en la Alcaldía de Bogotá) La concejal Lucía Bastidas (Alianza Verde) también se refirió brevemente a la jugada de Gómez y aseguró que gana la ciudad con un funcionario que "no había dejado buen recuerdo a la ciudad absolutamente en nada". Gustavo Petro Recordó los problemas que enfrentó Gómez con la posesión de los inspectores de policía y el contrato de mercados con la Cruz Roja, en los que aparecen recibiendo ayudas muertos y personas que no existen. https://www.elcolombiano.com/colombia/politica/petro-dice-que-en-su-gobierno-si-extraditaria-a-piedad-cordoba-NF17568612 “El problema es si esa avanzada de la alcaldesa Claudia López y si los funcionarios han decidido dedicarse a la campaña y no a trabajar para mostrarle resultados a Bogotá”, aseguró Bastidas. (Temas urbanos para la agenda de quien sea el nuevo presidente) Luis Ernesto Gómez fue secretario de Gobierno de Bogotá hasta el 6 de enero pasado, cuando la alcaldesa lo designó como su nuevo jefe de gabinete y así, de acuerdo con algunos políticos y analistas, la mandataria intentó mejorar las relaciones con el cabildo distrital, donde eran evidentes las tensiones que generaba el funcionario, y no poner en riesgo el trámite de proyectos de acuerdo clave. De hecho, algunos sectores en el Concejo señalan al “mal manejo de las relaciones” con la corporación distrital como la causa de que en diciembre pasado no se hayan discutido proyectos importantes para la ciudad como el presupuesto de 2022 y el Plan de Ordenamiento Territorial (POT). Ambas iniciativas fueron expedidas por decreto.

https://www.eltiempo.com/bogota/luis-ernesto-gomez-reacciones-por-su-llegada-a-campana-de-gustavo-petro-674840

  Gustavo Petro

Literally nothing in this clip is comprehensible

Bonus:

Below, I’m sharing a long outline of what was discussed in this wonderful interview, for those who can’t or prefer not to listen but want to know the content. It is very long and I don’t feel like finding pictures so you’ll have to just enjoy it like it is. It’s not a transcript but it is, in my own words for the most part, a recitation of everything Susana and Rebecca talked about: musicals, the upcoming movie, animation influences, and quite a few things you did not already know.

Susana introduces the interview by saying that tons of attention is paid to the diversity and the characters and all this great stuff in the show, but she wants to talk about the science fiction aspects and the society and worldbuilding Rebecca and her team have put in. She begins by talking about how the show seems so planned considering aspects of the show's beginning feed so well into the end, and she asks Rebecca to talk about that.

Rebecca opens by saying it was conceived as a coming-of-age story, so a ton of stuff that the adults know, Steven doesn't know, allowing it to be a story about things that happened to adults but remain child-friendly. Rebecca brings up a college class on the sublime that she took, about what's going on and implied to be going on just outside the frame of the art, so she was really taken with that concept.

Rebecca claims that her planning is pretty dry, and it's just a bunch of charts. She had stuff like Fusion names and weapons from the beginning, and of course she couldn't use them in her pitch because it didn't make sense without knowing the characters. Susana mentions that CN wanted the show to be aired in no particular order, and Rebecca mentions how it was hard to work with because she DID want continuity. Planting seeds in episodes and giving puzzle pieces that'd come together later worked for a long time, while still making each episode work as a whole and be satisfying. Later, when CN came to them wanting like eight related episodes, there they had the barn arc to give them--they had already planned to make this story related. She felt it aired in a "bizarre" way, but they comforted themselves on the Crew knowing someday people would watch it how it was meant to be watched. As a lead-up to the movie, CN IS going to air "every Steven ever," so people will actually get to see it in marathon format.

Batman: The Animated Series comes up and they discuss how censorship limited what they could do on that show because of problems with glass breaking. Susana says she actually really appreciates it when stories can still be told well despite the constraints put on them, and asks Rebecca if that applies to SU. Rebecca agrees that it does, and also that she loves stuff like video games that managed to function with ridiculously small space requirements. Developers still offered up such creativity, she says. So because of the beauty that arises from those constraints, she thought she should have constraints in her show on purpose, even if it isn't applied from outside. The most obvious one for this show was that we're trapped into only knowing and seeing what Steven knows and sees. "The Test" is a good example of Steven actually seeing something he isn't supposed to see: the Gems having a private conversation about him. According to her, plenty of stuff is written about what the Gems are up to outside of what Steven knows about them, and they can only kind of hint at it.

Coming from Adventure Time, there were some similar aspects. Rebecca got to work with some of her heroes from independent comics, and she got a lot of inspiration from them. On Adventure Time, it's our world but far in the future, and Rebecca would have loved to do something similar with Steven because she loved that aspect. Quite a few of the Adventure Time crew had come over from Flapjack and they thought it would be funny if the Adventure Time characters found a tape of Flapjack. As much as it would have been cool to take that idea for her show, that was theirs, so Steven's is more like it's our Earth but in an alternate timeline where Gems invaded 6,000 years ago. She rattles off some known similarities and differences of our two worlds, and elaborates on how Hollywood is in Kansas because in that world Disney never left where they started. Laugh-O-Gram Studio took off like it didn't in our timeline. She has a ton of other info like that but it won't matter to reveal it until or unless it matters to Steven. (She also throws in that Harman-Ising could be Ising-Harman in her world if they never figured out how cute it would be to have it the other way.)

When Susana asks about how she took so many details and managed to make a pilot with enough of them that she could get a show with it, Rebecca takes a turn into discussing working on Hotel Transylvania (for just a month!) with Genndy Tartakovsky. She had been planning to have a month off, but then Genndy asked, so she of course couldn't say no and felt she learned a ton. (She wrote the Steven Universe theme song in the car during that commute, by the way, given that she had a lot of time to sing and be alone.) When she hit Genndy with some of her ideas, he advised her to slim the details down and just boil it into its essence--who are the people and what is their relationship to each other? She still uses that advice, trying to condense things from macro to micro. She has succeeded since in figuring out how to keep the complexity and still assert the simplicity. Ultimately, you can keep those details but you don't have to emphasize them if they're not feeding into the main point. They'll drag the piece down. They discuss Genndy's role as the Animation Director on her pilot, which happened when she was asking if he knew anyone and he ended up saying he'd do it himself. She was so shocked that he agreed to direct her pilot that she was dazed and ran into a pole in the parking lot. The whistling of the wind through the resulting dent always made her giddy because she was thinking she would be working with Genndy.

Susana then turns to discussing Rebecca's influences and brings up Revolutionary Girl Utena. Rebecca mentions that she initially saw Utena because a person named Connie lent it to her in high school, so that's where SU's Connie's name comes from. Rebecca points out how hilarious Utena is in addition to being beautiful. She felt it was formative because Utena was "gender expansive and bisexual." Rebecca saw the movie first (which she doesn't recommend doing), then saw the series and then the movie again. She wanted to understand why the characters were turning into cars. (Chronicler's note: I was equally baffled by the Utena movie's car chase and car transformation stuff in the early 2000s. I did not know what to make of it.)

Rebecca elaborates on Utena and art influences, saying she loves to trace artists' influences to see where their pieces were coming from. She saw that Utena is very influenced by Princess Knight, and she was thrilled to visit places in Japan that influenced Osamu Tezuka. The Takurazuka Theatre is in Tezuka's town, and Rebecca describes how every show there is performed only by women. She felt that having this theater there influencing Tezuka certainly inspired him to include gender expansiveness in his work. The influences are so obvious when you look at the sources, and now all of this that came through Tezuka's work then through Utena then to Rebecca is so incredible.

When Susana brings up trends and how magical girl stuff influenced today's creators, Rebecca says she prefers not to think of it as a trend really because some of what's roaring out in popularity now was always around but was actively prevented from being made in the past. She talks about watching Tenchi Universe (the "Universe" part of SU came from Tenchi!) and Sailor Moon on CN, knowing it wasn't American, but she didn't really realize it "didn't belong" on the network, and felt that her access to influences was really unusually open--especially since her dad was an animation nerd and had a bunch of unusual stuff that influenced her, especially stuff that gave her a peek into how animation actually worked and knowledge that she could be one of the people making it. If she could call anything a trend now, it's that that sort of access is now available to more people because of the interconnectedness of the Internet and how we're so much more capable of influencing each other now.

They then discuss some anime stuff they had been exposed to and how Rebecca helped with an intro to Whisper of the Heart which is her favorite movie. She discusses how that movie (and Kiki's Delivery Service) are good representations of creative processes and sometimes what happens if an artist is blocked. She thinks the actual craft and work associated with the process is more important (and more interesting) than talent. Rebecca adores artists who take notes and figure out how to make their stuff good versus a specific moment of inspiration or an artist just "bleeding" their talent on everything. Art is a craft! You can study it! This is front and center in Whisper of the Heart. Rebecca discusses the Russian movie Film Film Film (which influenced the Zircons' design), and it has a writer character who is afraid that his process will destroy something inspired by a muse. She thinks it's a really interesting look at process.

Next they discuss a science fiction story in another format: the book The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin. Kat Morris lent Rebecca the book while they were roommates at the very beginning of when the show was starting. She loved seeing how the world worked in the book through the way they treated the main character. They also discuss the artist Jules Feiffer, who Rebecca had a relationship with because she carpooled with his nephews. They gave her a book of his called A Barrel of Laughs, A Vale of Tears. She loved it so much, especially how it deconstructed fairy tale tropes. One story was about a prince whose special ability made people close to him laugh themselves senseless, so he really couldn't have a relationship with anyone. She considers this an influence on Pink Diamond as a character. The SU character Sadie was named after this book's character Plain Sadie.

Next, Susana asks about musical influences for the show. Rebecca names Patti LuPone first. She saw Patti as Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd and remembers seeing her playing the tuba in this weird arrangement where the cast was also the orchestra. She was so impressed. When she later wrote to Patti asking her to be Yellow Diamond, she referenced learning from her that a person could be so dramatic that it's funny and vice versa. She also has a "chills" moment from a different show, during "Everything's Coming Up Roses," where the character she's playing is imagining an audience going wild but the actual audience IS going wild.

As they discuss how the upcoming movie is a musical, Rebecca talks about going home with Ian after work and putting on musicals or movies based on TV shows so they can "study" for what they're doing. She'd take notes about what works and what doesn't and why. She loves these old movies that dissolve into total weirdness by the third act. She references Ziegfeld Girl and Busby Berkeley movies, which were an influence on Homeworld's style. She subscribes to a philosophy attributed to Bob Fosse that characters have to be feeling something strongly if they're compelled to sing. She makes a reference to A Goofy Movie as a movie that moved from a TV show to a movie. She wished that movie had more songs.

Susana and Rebecca discuss the movie, some intense moments, the history of Goofy and how different some of the old versions of him are, and how a description of Goofy by Art Babbitt was influential on her. She loves that cartoons can be so many things, and she adores studying moments from them and incorporating them. There are some really horrifying discoveries you can make, but you can also reinterpret some of the beautiful moments and stir them together to get new brilliance.

Susana says many songs in Steven Universe become the centerpiece of an episode, but in "Mr. Greg" it's more like a typical musical even though it's an episode of a cartoon show. Rebecca agrees that it was great practice for the movie. She was more moved by that episode coming back than any other so far by that point. She also felt that "For Just One Day Let's Only Think About (Love)," the song, was a great practice musical song--especially since there's all that chatting in between singing. That song was really influenced by A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum's song "Comedy Tonight." She finds those kinds of musicals so much fun. She was influenced in "Mr. Greg" by Victor/Victoria--specifically the song "Crazy World" when the camera is panning around the protagonist (who's wearing a suit). They're of course dated, but they contain beautiful moments. She took home some of the Pearl drawings from "It's Over, Isn't It" when she went to the studio in Korea. (Yes, Steven Universe is animated on paper, though the color is digital.) Elaborating on "Mr. Greg," she says the episode became much simpler and sweeter--originally there was some intense stuff in there, like Pearl picking up cars and throwing them at Greg.

Back to the movie, Susana points out that Rebecca's been studying how to make a conversion to a cinematic story versus a really long TV episode. What makes something feel like a movie? Rebecca struggles to figure out how to talk about it without saying too much. She figures you have to dig into the fundamentals of the show--make a movie about something new, but something basic. She loved the Dexter movie and it was so smart. Rebecca has a weird connection to the Beavis and Butt-Head movie too (some of her crew worked on the movie!), but she thinks even that movie is smart because they're all about watching TV and in the movie their TV is taken.

Susana then asks about the movie length format and how it felt from going from a very short TV format to a movie. Rebecca's word to describe it is "terrifying." The episode "Change Your Mind" was 44 minutes and that was a ridiculously long format for them--but it carried the extra baggage of tying up so much of what they'd dumped into the show. Rebecca said they couldn't really even "feel good" about finishing it because the immediate next step was something that was so much more of everything hard about "Change Your Mind." Rebecca elaborates on the elements that were ramped up for the movie and concludes "What I'm trying to say is I'm really tired." She's really, really excited for us to see it. It's so different than a bunch of episodes tied together, even if it was eight "Mr. Greg" episodes. All the pieces have to be awesome and then tied together have all the pieces inform each other. She remembers being impressed by anime as a kid because it usually told interconnected stories, and she thought that would be really hard; turns out self-contained episodes are even harder, and she has to kind of do both on her show. She thinks of her songs like that too--they must be good on their own, but they enhance each other by all being part of the same work and building something better together.

Finally, Susana asks what comes next after Steven Universe--one day, when the show does end, what does Rebecca want to do? Well, take time off, write some guitar songs, write poetry no one will ever see, and so on. Rebecca says that her head is really in SU now though, and there's so much more to do--yes, there is more to tell that comes after the movie, and she wants us to know there are also stories that belong in that two-year gap between the end of "Change Your Mind" and the beginning of the movie, but she feels this is a good place to stop talking. She's so excited about everything we have yet to see.