#then i watched the honest trailers for the trilogy as well
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Dramas I watched in 2023
[Chinese Dramas]
My Journey to You - Wuxia. Spy games, badass ladies, subtextually homoerotic cousins. Gentle & sweet ML who melts the cold & calculated heart of FL assassin. Gorgeous setting and cinematography. Left me with a burning desire to see Zhang Ling He play more gentle babygirl MLs and Esther Yu to play more anti-heroes. Absolutely perfect to me.., if we just pretend the director didn't add a pointless cliffhanger in the last 5 min. Which is how I choose to live my life.
Story of Kunning Palace - 'rebirth' costume drama that I waited to air for like 2 years or something and then it... actually didn't disappoint? And was almost everything I wanted? 😳😲 This is THE couple for that post about the pair that need to be stuck in a neverending monogamous relationship with each other as a quarantine measure to protect everyone else.
A Journey to Love - wuxia perfection. The stand-out drama that I wasn't expecting. Murder mommy & murder daddy became an otp for the ages and all of the supporting characters were interesting and dynamic. I cared about so many more characters than I expected and never fast fowarded. Just immensely satisfying.
The Ingenious One - wuxia with a weak, scheming scholar protagonist on a revenge quest (yes, we've all heard that before!) who puts together a group to execute his cons, Leverage style. I love me a martial artist x weak scholar couple 👌. Some exciting twists & turns in this one. Both A Journey to Love and The Ingenious One are best enjoyed coming in with little to no information. Hell, skip the trailers and simply dive in!
Hidden Love - Modern drama. Top tier romance-novel-on-screen writing and acting. It felt honest and real. The coming of age arc for the FL was well done. Great brother & sister relationship that feels authentic. The ML's backstory was so heart breaking because it was never overplayed for melodramatics. Just a quiet pain, a distance and a burden he carried with him.
Road Home - Modern. "Do you remember who I am?" / "Yes. If I were to turn to ashes, I would still remember you." I am very weak for the "reunited exes", "second time around" trope when the actors are capable and the breakup wasn't a narratively convenient 'misunderstanding'. As a career woman who works very long hours, I also tend to appreciate modern drama relationships where the couple manages to stay functional & supportive while not having a lot of free time for each other. That's my version of wish fulfillment 😂. I felt like this narrative made me fully understand why they couldn't make a long distance relationship work as young adults but now they're ready and have experienced enough of the world to know that they are happier with their lives joined together than apart.
Love You Seven Times - xanxia. I wrote a whole review post (love letter) on this one, since it seems rather underrated. I feel like this one may actually end up one of my fav examples of the genre. I just sincerely bought into the couple and their mutual devotion.
The Last Immortal - xanxia. Terrible trailer but turns out to be a decent show. I'm a fan of the genre, so I'm enjoying it. (I think you do need to be, to enjoy it - it doesn't transcend or really subvert..just a solid representation of xanxia) I like both lead actors and they do a good job with the material. It's working better for me than Ancient Love Poetry and Ashes of Love. After being eager for Song of the Moon in 2022 but then being let down (I dropped that one quick), I'm very happy 2023 brought me 2 xanxia I liked.
Three Body - modern sci-fi. Book 1 of my fav sci-fi trilogy of recent years. As a novel fan first, I was pleased to see it on screen with talented actors. Eager for book 2.
Love Me, Love My Voice - modern drama with an unusual couple (2 introverts) and dubbing fandom hyper fixation. A laid back relaxation drama, to de-stress with. Minimal plot, no conflict. Just sweet slow burn relationship building, singing & audio performances. Supportive friendships.
Here We Meet Again - modern drama that suffered from sloppy editing. I mean almost incoherent editing in a couple places, like when they are counting down the days until getting married and then.. It's not mentioned again? 🙃 But I very much enjoyed the couple's chemistry. I can't say it was objectively good but it sure was compulsively watchable for some reason.
Royal Rumors - Costume drama that was so aggressively mediocre that I don't have any real explanation for not dropping it. Except I find the lead actress unspeakably alluring. Blame my hormones.
Dropped
Back to the Brink - xanxia. Great concepts but the execution didn't work for me. I'm not a fan of slapstick and wacky humor within serious subject matter. (It's the reason kdramas can be very hit or miss with me.) The amount of humor layered into AJourney to Love is basically my limit for tragicomedies. (Note: I did go read the book and it was very entertaining - the tone was much more to my taste.)
My Lethal Man - modern. Embarassing english name, but they had me in the first half, not gonna lie. Then after her identity was exposed, I wasn't feeling it idk. Sometimes it's just not that complicated.
Destined/Chang Feng Du - costume drama. idk really why I dropped. I watched about a 3rd of it and then was distracted by other shiny objects. I plan to come back to this one in 2024 and finish.
Romance of the Twin Flower - costume drama; unholy abomination of a great novel. I hope somehow, someday, the culprits pay for their crime. Need I say more?
[Korean Dramas]
Perfect Revenge Marriage - a modern rebirth tale. For the 90% of it, I was high on the love of a drama that is just what you didn't know you wanted. The camp, the dedication, the scenery chewing, the glorious evil step mother. It was magical. And then the last 2 episodes I found underwhelming. I can't really explain it, the climax just didn't hit for me. But that's very much a personal taste issue and I'd definitely recommend to all drama lovers who enjoy the genre. Seriously, the performance of evil step mommy was a master class.
King the Land - modern workplace romance. I've heard complaints that there wasn't much of plot. But tbh that was fine with me, because some dramas are simply character pieces. This was all about the personal growth of the FL and ML. I ended up invested and rooting for the ML to become a decent guy who isn't a gross classist like his dad.
Destined with You - modern reincarnation drama. I blame my lingering kdrama good feelings about King the Land for convincing me to keep powering thru this one. Such a strong start but then half-way in I began to realize it simply wasn't going to go into the direction I wanted it to. I still have no idea what they intended to communicate with that love potion subplot.
Vincenzo - modern crime drama. I was late to the party on this one. But after I got around to watching the delightful Kinnporsche, this was rec'd to me as another drama that embraced the bigger than life unreality of Fantasy Mafia™ and provides a rollicking good time. Absolutely ridiculous and compulsively watchable. 10/10.
[American]
House of the Dragon - Awful people doing awful things to each other, as a 1st act before everything goes straight to hell. Plus freaky dragon-riding fantasy incest. What's there not to like?
Fall of the House of Usher (YES i DO watch every horror drama by Mike Flanagan thx) - Was it as good as the first 3..? No. Did I still breathlessly binge it in 2 days? Yes. Awful things happening to awful people, poetically. 👌 👌
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You know what I am fucking tired of inly talking of anglophone media on here
I am URGING everybody who see this post to watch the I Can Quit Whenever I Want trilogy (in italian: Smetto quando voglio) and I am going to convince you to watch it because it's hilarious and it's good and its only sin is not being an american/british product. (Also I found out there's a Spanish movie inspired by it, but I am talking about the italian trilogy).
Take Breaking Bad. A college neurobiologist professor desperately needs money, so he decides to start making drugs. Because he is a genius, though, he creates the formula of a new drug that, being new, isn't technically illegal. You follow me?
Okay, now let's give it a Ocean's 11 twist. To create and sell these drugs, Neurobiologist Professor needs the help of a few friends. These friends are all brilliant laureates, with several PhDs, who, due to corrupt state of Italian academia, are forced into minum wage jobs: you got two latinists working at a gas station, a chemist washing dishes at a Chinese restaurant, an anthropologist pretending to be an ignorant so he will get hired for low-budget jobs (yes, him having a degree in anthropology is actually making it harder for him to be hired), an archaeologist who supervises road work and, my personal favourite, an econmic professor who loses more than wins money at poker.
They're a bunch of disillusioned adults, well in their 40s, who were brilliant and were let down by their country's academia, that hires people based on political affiliation and recommendations rather than actual merits. All they're trying to do is better their pretty miserable lives and fuck the system that fucked them.
And that's just the premise of the first movie. It's a comedy, it's a mafia movie, it's a Shawshank Redemption parody, you got drugs, objectively badass villains, political humour, chases, jumping from moving trains, more and more wild characters adding up (all with their special academic field, you might as well create your OC based on your major). It's like if Guy Ritchie directed Breaking Bad but all of the characters were played by the male cast of The Office.
The third movie is one of the few movies that made me cry not at the end, but at the start. I don't even wanna spoil but there's a story of friendship and revenge for the ages. I could talk about it all day.
I want to be honest, these three movies aren't very politically correct- and I use the expression in a positive way. Sadly there are some stereotypes portrayed in the movies (the first especially), but I still think they're very valid products.
So please, please, even if it's not in English, give it a try. You won't regret it. Here's the link to watch it (there are subtitles in a lot of language on this site, not just english)
Here you got the trailer
youtube
And here is the way the movie starts, I translated it in English.
"In Italy, a drug to be defined as such must be registered in the list of illegal molecules of the Ministry of Health. Cocaine, heroin, amphetamines, methadone, ecstasy and roughly 200 other molecules are part of that list. If a molecule is not in that table then you can produce it, you can take it, but above all you can sell it. At 24 I graduated in neurobiology with honors, I have a master's degree in computational neuroscience and one in molecular dynamics. In recent months I have formed a gang that manages a turnover of hundreds of thousands of euros, I am accused of manufacturing and dealing in drugs, armed robbery, kidnapping and attempted murder. My name is Pietro Zinni... and I'm a university researcher."
#smetto quando voglio#smetto quando voglio masterclass#smetto quando voglio ad honorem#no io mi so scocciata del fatto che se le robe non so in inglese la gente non se le guarda#e per carità mi incolpo pure da sola che non è che sia la persona più internazionale del mondo#peró mi sono detta vabbè sai che c'è mo inizio a promuoverle le cose che mi piacciono#io ci provo a coinvolgere la gente#pure perchè se smetto quando voglio era americano o britannico tutti ci morivano dietro#letteralmente found family di poor little meow meow quarantenni criminali#bartolomeo ti amo da secoli#se bartolomeo fosse inglese ci morirebbero tutti dietro lui la definzione di black cat#sarebbero partite le ship sarebbero partiti gli oc#please just try to watch this movie#movie#movies#cinema#italian cinema
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MK obviously made its name on gory fighting, bloodiness, and of course Fatalities, but the latter of those has really started to come at the expense of characters', well, character. See at least in the Midway Trilogy, MKX, and 11 it can make sense for characters like Liu Kang and Raiden to senselesy kill people in gory fashions because they're undead/Revenants or corrupted etc.
But when you get to games like MK2, MK3, MK4, or MK '09, it's really weird to see characters like Liu Kang, Raiden, Johnny Cage, and even in MKX Kung Jin killing people. Like 2 of those characters are monks whose culture isn't very fond of killing, one of them is a guy who was in Hollywood until like 5 seconds ago (depending on the game) and the other is a God that constantly watches over the non-lethal monks.
But you know what the best thing ever was? When in MK1 (the real MK1 not Reboot 2) Liu Kang didn't have a fatality, he just had a finishing move. Because he didn't kill. That was great! A character establishing trait! And I think they should bring back regular finishing moves for characters like Liu Kang and Johnny who have no business senselessly killing. And no I don't mean "Heroic Britalities" should come back, no, I was never a fan of that. But you know what name you could use?
Fatal Blows! MK11 gives us this cool new super move to replace the X-Rays, but just like some X-Rays all of these Fatal Blows are just gore-fest things that probably serve better as fatalities if we're honest. So I would say put the X-Rays back and rework the Fatal Blows into being the not-Fatalities for characters that have no business killing. Especially when the MK1(2) reveal trailer shows that Kung Lao isn't wearing a bladed hat! That would be my suggestion is all, just me getting on my internet soapbox. At the end of the day this is just a fan's opinion.
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I went and saw a two-hour play version of Lord of the Rings today* (yeah, the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy). this not surprisingly sent me on a several-hour long lotr rabbithole, which involved rewatching the documentary about Howard Shore’s score.**
and gah it reminded me of how much I love the films and specifically the score.
All my favorite scenes-- Arwen's vision, Faramir's doomed last stand, Theoden arming before Helm’s Deep-- I love for the score. The score illuminates these scenes, lights them up until they blaze the way really good poetry does. Maybe it’s just how I feel about music. but oh, there’s something about these scenes that always gets me.
And now pulling up those clips on youtube for you all has made me cry (because obviously I had to watch them. couldn’t just attach the links.)
the score makes a great scene into an unforgettable one. and makes extremely mediocre movies (cough, the hobbit) into good ones. for me, a really good score does most of the legwork for establishing, hmmm, the characterizations and the emotional weight that may not be conveyed very well by the narrative? Objectively, the plot and the writing may have barely established the character, or failed to give the climactic battle a real stake, or just be really terrible writing that makes you wince. But as long as the score is good enough, as long as I hear the music I believe utterly in what it’s telling me.
like, in the star wars sequel trilogy, the writing is respectfully hot garbage. but the score makes me believe that Kylo Ren is actually a tragic hero, for as long as I’m suspended in that golden bubble of sound. The magic of John Williams can do that.
that's the one thing that makes me really sad about the new Lord of the Rings show, you know? the elf hair (or lack thereof) and the narrative choices pain me deeply. but to be honest I can handle it. I lived though the Hobbit, didn’t I?
But without the score, it's just a pretty but soulless big-budget fantasy series. I heard the score for the new teaser trailer and it was empty. It was just as meaningless as the score for whatever superhero blockbuster they churn out monthly. It was dead.
and that's a tragedy.
*it was wonderful. showstopping. fantastic. talking about it would be its own post but let me just say they not only had Tom Bombadil, they had him sing a funny little tune to the melody of “Margaritaville.” Peak theater.
**if possible, even more showstopping and fantastic. I was absolutely obsessed with the score when I was fourteen with the fiery passion of ten thousand suns. chain piano my beloved...
#lotr#hopefully no one comes and fights me over this (I *did* mention some scary fandoms)#but usually adding links nerfs the post's spread#oh well we shall see#thinky thoughts
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Honestly if I was the DCU I would feel embarrassed. I have never watched a MCU film but I saw the Wakanda Forever Trailer and was like wow DC you guys are clowns... 😭 but anyway seeing how Batman is the one that gets most of those films compared to Superman got me thinking...do you think Batman and working the GCPD is the pull for them? For a country who loves themselves so much like they literally have a hero who wears the flags colors yet he’s the least the care about making films with. But also that trailer really made think about how DC dropped the ball with Starfire because a Starfire film would have been amazing! She has also those themes already in her narrative like..
And regarding the last post like it is not that I don’t love Batman but like c’mon I’m so tired of the dark gritty character they turn him into and there are so many characters that ARE well loved that deserve a spot at the table too. Like Superman and Zatanna and Starfire and etc. like even bat adjacent characters have to be put to rest for a bit too imo.
i think the sort of condoned relationship that bruce has with the police even if it’s only via one or two people is definitely part of the appeal lmao! like they’ve run the good cop motif into the ground atp and for all of the praises i sing about the nolan trilogy on purely a characterization level it was just as bad about this with its political ideology and the fact that the batman film this year was no better in that department i think really speaks to how the mythos and the ideology that surrounds it has hardly progressed an inch if even that from the copaganda that restrains it from reaching its full potential in the public eye. like idk i really do think gordon as a character should have been ditched decades ago if i am being honest. he’s a useless connection to have if barbara is there with her resources and access as oracle and his only purpose atp is justifying that there’s hope for the police system which we all know is a straight up lie! it’s abysmal
also okay i want to get to the real reason i answered this ask finally (sorry i am still working my way through a lot my inbox is a mess jdbdjdnkd) but have you seen all of the alien superstar edits with kory this weekend! she’s such an easily lovable character to people on a public scale and goes viral at the drop of a hat like if the opportunity appears i genuinely think dc could do so much with her as a character.. instead she’s stuck on that shitty show like yeah titans is super popular ig but she could be getting so much more traction and dc refuses to give it to her bc they don’t know how to use her outside of the titans even though she has all of the potential to go solo and they sabotaged her with the one solo they gave her 😭
#i will say i think the shazam and black adam movies like cool though! wrt the dceu and mcu comparison#*look cool#idk how accurate the shazam movie was so feel free to correct me but i genuinely thought it was such a good movie#like it had good soul and direction and it didn’t feel like a gimmick#which granted i am sure the black panther movie won’t feel like one either#but i think we all know atp it’s a rarity among the rest of the films the mcu is putting out currently jdbdjdjkd#outbox
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Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness Review
Hey guys! Dan here and today I'll be giving my review on the Marvel movie, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness!
Fair warning, there will be spoilers ahead.
This is a movie that's been hyped up for years as part of the next phase of the MCU and I am not disappointed with this film. The fact that they got Sam Raimi to direct this film makes it all the better, for those who don't know, Sam Raimi was the director for the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man trilogy from the 2000's and he was a horror director as well and you'll see plenty of horror elements in this film. There will be some jump scares but nothing too extreme just some little jump scares here and there. Not only that, but they got Danny Elfman to compose the music, Danny Elfman also composed the music in the 2000's Spider-Man movies as well so this film was done with the same care and quality as one of my favorite superhero trilogies from my childhood.
The cast of the film did a phenomenal job in their roles. Benedict Cumberbatch once again gave a great performance as Doctor Stephen Strange, always witty, calculated and full of charm for the role. Elizabeth Olsen as Wanda aka Scarlet Witch was a close second to Doctor Strange in this film she went all out here portraying Scarlet witch showing us how powerful she's truly become and her range of emotions. Xochitl Gomez did a great job as American Chavez, I haven't seen too much of her work, but she killed it in this role as the dimension jumping girl. Benedict Wong as Wong (still makes me laugh since that's his literal last name) did a great job in his role once again being the serious character but also having some comedic value and moments I'll always enjoy. There are other characters in this film that I don't want to spoil even though the trailers did show a couple of them but to anyone who didn't grow up with the marvel movies from the 2000's they won't understand I'm talking about. This is where Disney's acquisition of 20th Century Fox comes into play in the MCU, this is where it all starts to come together for the next phase.
The plot here is pretty good, I like how they're expanding on the concept of the multiverse in the films now. However, since this is the MCU, all the movies and shows are connected. If you haven't been keeping up with the MCU movies and shows then you won't fully understand what's going on here since this film calls back to a lot of MCU movies leading up to that film. My recommendation is before watching this film, you'll need to watch 4 MCU movies in particular as well as two MCU TV series. the movies you'll need to watch prior are Doctor Strange (2016), Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, and Spider-Man: No Way Home. The two MCU shows to watch prior are WandaVision and Marvel's What If...? series. I think as long as you watch the four films, you'll be fine, the shows are more optional to be honest. So back to the plot, Doctor Strange is protecting America Chavez since someone is trying to take her powers and Strange is trying to protect her which leads to a wacky adventure through the various universes. During this adventure, Stephen Strange starts questioning his happiness since he's not with Christine (his love interest from the first film played by Rachel McAdams). We also learn about America Chavez as well, little spoiler this film will include same sex parents which I think is neat especially considering Disney's stance against LGBT content but its nice to see these studios work around that, Pixar did it with Turning Red and Marvel is doing it here.
Right now there's not a whole lot explored about her in the MCU but I'm sure we'll get more about her in later films or TV shows. That being said, my only complaint about her was how she was able to control her powers, I wont spoil that part but it's not super exciting. This also brings me to the Villains motive for hunting down Chavez, the motive here is kind of weak and how she's defeated isn't that satisfying either, its like Antman and the Wasp levels of Unsatisfying Villain defeats. Like don't get me wrong it does work, but it was somewhat anti-climatic and what the villain ended up doing after that was a little more satisfying. I will also say that there were some characters in here I felt were nerfed badly and the villain just ripped through them all with ease though perhaps they're just that powerful now that's up to you to interpret.
My favorite part about this film were the special effects, the first Doctor Strange had various trippy sequences throughout the film, and this film I felt improved on that a little more going through different dimensions and looking different for each one. I love how creative they got for those sequences and it truly shows how wide a range in various mediums this film has. I'll admit the magic here was pretty standard though I was expecting a little more creativity to it rather than just the magic shields and projectile magic fire blasts but I digress. Overall, it was still visually appealing and I enjoyed every second of it.
To wrap this up, Doctor Strange in the multiverse of Madness was a great film, one of my favorite MCU movies in recent years and a great sequel to Doctor Strange. I felt the hype was justified here and now I look forward to what's next for Doctor Strange and the rest of the multiverse. There are two post credit scenes so stick around for those, especially the second one.
Now to conjure my ratings for this film, I'm giving it:
8/10
If you haven't watched the film yet, I highly recommend giving it a watch. I still recommend watching at least the four marvel films I mentioned before watching this one to get a better understanding for the plot but if you don't care for that and just wanna watch a fun film, that works too!
See ya!
#dans den#movie review#doctor stephen strange#doctor strange#multiverse of madness#sam raimi#marvel#marvel cinematic universe#mcu
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I play so many different video games, to be honest. I love horror games, I love puzzle games, games with amazing stories. But my currently most played game is Hunt: Showdown so that is a whole different genre.
I have been getting into the Miss Marple Series by Agatha Christie lately again. Nice books, interesting stories. One of my favourites is The Mirror Cracked from Side to Side. But there is many many lovely books I want to (re)read.
An no, not really anything I actually dislike a lot. Some little things that I don't really like, but I would eat them if it's in something. I love finding out new foods!
Hi anon, I'm terribly sorry it took me so long to answer this! My focus has been a bit low for the last few days.
It's really lovely to hear you talk about games and your favourite books with so much passion. What would you say is a game with a storyline that stayed with you long after you put it down? And a game you can play so much it never bores you?
I'm a bit of a sci-fi and fantasy lover so I've played Mass Effect more often than I can count. Playing through that trilogy (especially the 2nd one) always makes me teary eyed. Have to say Hunt Showdown looks pretty darn amazing after watching a trailer!! Maybe it's time to get more into horror games haha *is an absolute chicken*
Now something tells me you love reading Poirot books as well 😇 Have you always liked crime and mystery books and stuff? And did you ever watch that Miss Marple show and other bbc crime shows? I have to confess my family has made me watch some of those shows since I was little so you can image I can dream the Midsomer Murders theme song :') Another confession? I really enjoy getting to know you better anon, you seem like a lovely and interesting person and I hope you're doing well out there
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Fear Street Trilogy Review
Beware, spoilers ahead.
I love horror movies but good horror movies are so hard to come by. Fear Street grabbed my attention as soon as they released the first trailer, it looked like a call-back to the slasher films of old, back when they were still good. And the best part was the apparent presence of lesbians, count me in!
Fear Street is based on the books by the same name by R. L. Stine, a lot of us remember Stine for another horror classic, Goosebumps. The Fear Street novels were aimed at older audiences and were way more bloody than Goosebumps- lots of teenagers dying. The films don’t adapt any particular book but rather the tone and rough setting and I think that works to its advantage.
The Setting:
Fear Street is based on the fictional town of Shadyside, the poorer and more unfortunate twin of its sister-town Sunnyside. Sunnyside is sunny, wealthy and where nothing bad ever happens. Shadyside in contrast is poorer, the homes more run-down and where, every few years, some resident snaps and goes on a murderous rampage, killing their own friends, family or whoever they can get their hands on. There are those who believe that Shadyside is cursed by Sarah Fier, a witch who was hanged in the 1600s when she cut off her hand and used it to curse the town.
Fear Street Part 1:
1994 functions like the introduction and set-up for the trilogy. It introduces us to the characters, Deena (Kiana Madeira), Sam (Olivia Scott Welch), Josh (Benjamin Flores Jr.), Kate (Julia Rehwald) and Simon (Fred Hechinger). They unwittingly trigger the curse when they stumble across the bones of Sarah Fiers, soon killers are chasing them, killing-machines powered by the curse and who can’t be killed. Deena, Sam, Josh, Kate and Simon have to put aside their differences and work together to survive the night.
Fear Street Part 2: 1978
1978 opens with the survivors of 1994 going to C. Berman (Gillian Jacobs), the lone survivor of the Camp Nightwing massacre. It provides insight into the massacre that saw dozens of Shadyside kids being killed. 1978 takes us back to the day leading up to the bloody night. We meet the Berman sisters, Ziggy and Cindy (Sadie Sink and Emily Rudd respectively), Alice (Ryan Simpkins) and Tommy (McCabe Syle) When an axe-wielding murderer starts butchering the camp residents, Cindy and Alice, while trying to escape, stumble into the cave system that runs under the camp and discover Sarah’s hand and that the only way to break the curse is to reunite the hand with her body. However, they are unable to break the curse when they realise that the body is not buried where they thought it would be. Alice, Cindy and Ziggy are killed by the cursed murderers with only Ziggy being revived thus being labeled the lone survivor. In the present day, Deena and Josh dig out the hand from where Ziggy and Cindy left it, when Deena reunites the hand with the body, she sees visions of Sarah Fiers, leading us into the third and final film.
Fear Street Part 3: 1666
1666, the year it all started. We see the events play out leading up to the hanging. Deena is inside Sarah’s body, seeing and experiencing her life as if it were own. We learn that it was never Sarah’s curse, but in fact it was the Goodes who had made a deal with the devil, securing power for themselves (their descendants are the mayor and sheriff in 1994) Sarah Fiers was just the scapegoat. Every time someone saw a vision of Sarah, she was trying to show them the truth and un-dead killers hunted them to keep them from exposing it.
The films work individually but their impact really hits home once you’ve watched all 3. Leigh Janiak crafts such an intricate story and links 3 time periods, weaving them through each other seamlessly. With 3 films, she also has the time to invest in these different time periods and the characters that inhabit them.
The story, both in terms of individual films as well as the trilogy as a whole, is engaging and engrossing. It keeps the audience on their toes and the edge of their seats, waiting and dreading as the bodies pile up. Janiak also grounds the story so that it feels real even as the characters are fighting off un-dead killers, adding to the nail-biting tension.
There’s plenty to admire for a horror film buff, from the Scream reference in 1994, to Friday the 13th in 1978 and The Witch (or VVitch) in 1666. There’s also a good amount of gore to be found along with some really inventive ways of killing, who knew bread cutters/slicers could be so menacing.
There’s so much attention to detail in terms of costume and production design that you really feel like you’re in 1994, 1978 or even 1666. All of these work to draw you in as the viewer, adding to the authenticity on screen. The clothes and places feel lived-in. The song choices are amazing with popular hits from 1994 and 1978, the soundtrack definitely elevates the visuals. The original score in 1666 was absolutely gorgeous, especially Deena and Sam’s theme.
The sequence of the films with 1994 being the first, followed by 1978 and finally 1666 was a great choice with each film revealing a little more of the puzzle till all the pieces are revealed in 1666. It keeps the tension alive and keeps the characters and the audience constantly guessing. It also allows Janiak to sprinkle just enough subtle clues that become apparent when rewatching the films.
The characters are one of the best things in the trilogy, they are so well written, and I mean that for almost all of the main cast which is rare. One of the best things that Janiak does is repeat actors, especially the principle cast. For instance, a lot of actors we see in 1994 and 1978 appear in 1666 playing different roles but with a similar dynamic. It helps tell the story without worrying about too many new faces and worrying about whether or not the audience will be able to keep track of them. The return of old faces also ensures that the audience is already a little invested in them and their well-being.
Small side-note: I really appreciated that there was no sexual violence. It always worries me when I start a horror show/film and it was such a relief that they did not go that route. There is a lot of violence and a lot of people and kids die but it’s always just slightly campy enough that keeps it from being genuinely disturbing.
One of the things that always irk me with slasher films (especially the old ones) are how white they were, no characters of colour and if there were any, they always died. There were also no queer characters. Fear Street undoes that beautifully, all of our main characters are outsiders, they are people of colour, they are queer. In another film, they would have been nameless characters, among the first to die. Here they are the heroes. I loved all of them and I hated that Alice, Kate and Simon died, to be honest, I expected the core group to survive, Kate especially.
Fear Street is also unapologetically feminist and Janiak does this without it being too obvious. The central conflicts in the story are between women (sister/ friends/ ex-girlfriends) but they also band together and fight for each other. It’s worth noting that most of the core relationships are between women (Deena-Sam, Ziggy-Cindy-Alice, Sarah-Hannah) and those are not coincidences.
I loved how gay this trilogy was, Deena and Sam’s love for each other was the driving force and was at the heart of the story. Even in 1666, Sarah’s crime was not so much witchcraft as it was daring to love someone you’re not supposed to and fighting back against the proprietary nature of the men who sought to control them. Sarah and Hannah loved each other fiercely and we see that same love reflected hundreds of years later in Deena and Sam who fight for each other relentlessly. I also appreciated that Deena and Sam were exes instead of a new relationship. It meant that they already had history, they shared a familiarity and comfort with each other that a new relationship would have had to build onscreen.
The Fear Street Trilogy is one of the best horror trilogies I’ve seen in a while, each film is consistently great and delivers gore and violence coupled with immense heart. It has one of the best queer relationships I’ve seen on screen and spoiler alert, they get a happy ending. I’m sick and tired of lesbian women dying or separating because of realism. Damn realism, give me happy women loving women and who live through their traumatic ordeal. Watch Fear Street for them if for nothing else. Now excuse me as I prepare to rewatch the trilogy.
#Fear street#fear street trilogy#fear street spoilers#fear street part 1: 1994#fear street part 2: 1978#fear street part 3: 1666#leigh janiak#fear street review#fear street netflix#Kiana Madeira#Olivia Scott Welch#Benjamin Flores Jr.#Julia Rehwald#Fred Hechinger#Gillian Jacobs#ziggy berman#cindy berman#Sadie Sink#Emily Rudd#Ryan Simpkins#Elizabeth Scopel#sarah fiers#Samantha Fraser#deena x sam#Deena x Samantha#Deena Johnson#josh johnson#Kate#Simon#wlw
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No Way Home (spoilers)
So Spider-Man: No Way Home was a very enjoyable movie. I was sceptical of the concept but they pulled it off well enough, it was enjoyable and watchable and kept moving at good clip it didn’t feel like a 2 and half hour movie. (in the same way Black Widow didn’t. We got to what had to be the final fight way and it felt well too early.)
-spoilers start here-
All that said I still think it’s a very stupid concept and very stupid set up. Doctor Strange does a spell of that magnitude on a whim and he doesn’t explain it fully before hand so Pete can screw up by talking to him while he’s doing it?
That wasn’t informed consent, man. And that’s before getting into the murky morals of mass memory mortification.
That lawyer could have been anyone, it’s only Matt for fanservice. It’d have much preferred them to go for a Spider-man/Daredevil movie but whatever. (I mean I’d expected Pepper and the massive Stark Legal team to handle it.) They basically handwave the immediate legal problems set up aside and just get on with the social impact and multiverse plot.
The new Statue Of Liberty (reference in hawkeye. You should be watching) with the Captain America shield is hilarious. I wonder how Sam feels about it.
But the meat of it: the mutliverse villain invasion plot. MCU Pete hitting his lowest point. Then the other spideys appearing to help and how that was managed with Ned was great.
They hit all of the multiverse jokes and references you could expect. Plus the ‘something of a scientist myself’ meme.
I was surprised how well having Maguire and Garfield back worked especially the former, I didn’t consciously know how nostalgic I was towards the Maguire/Raimi films. To be honest the only problem was I wish their interactions could be even more and have more fight scene banter and eerie coordinated teamwork and beat downs.
What we got was good though an I’m so glad they gave Garfield the successful falling save of MJ, a really nice ASM2 redemption moment for him.
The end is like a slightly less horrendous one more day, but how the heck is Peter going to survive now that’s everyone’s forgotten him. Was all his documentation wiped out as well? How’s that working?
It feels like they’ve pulled a soft reboot so they could do a second trilogy or a new spidey without the connection to the MCU so they can break up with Marvel Studios or threaten to which is a total load.
The stinger was a funny follow on/anti-climax from the Venom: Let there be Carnage one but by the film’s logic. Eddie doesn’t know Spider-man = Peter Parker, so why was he summoned?
The other stinger was just a Mutliverse Of Madness trailer, which was cool enough but unremarkable. Though I always like seeing Wanda so it’ll be nice to catch up with her.
#spider-man#spider-man: no way home#Spider-man: no way home spoilers#no way home#no way home spoilers#spoilers#mcu#mcu spoilers#marvel
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Star Wars: The Fall of my Interest
Last night I watched Rise of Skywalker which means I've finally seen all 3 of the sequel trilogy and all I can say is.
Wasted potential, but thanks for the cool wallpapers.
I honestly can't even rank them, but on a good day Force Awakens is still 1st and Rise of Skywalker is still a pile of model posing, scene transitional garbage.
Finn as a main character, well I had honest hopes but it didn't work out. I still remember how excited I was watching the trailer for The Force Awakens and seeing a black person so prominently featured. I had never been a Star wars fan outside of the Clone Wars during my anime phase. But I gave it a shot and watched all the older films, so I would be prepared for, you know, all the lore and characters and shit, some of which is actually interesting. But then he got replaced for GirlBoss Rey and hmmm...that was fine. Finn was still present and sharing the spotlight with a white lead is pretty typical but that they would still give him stuff to work with. 2 films later, Nada.
Adam Dri... I mean Kylo Ren. The second reason I gave these movies a shot. I'm a sucker for angsty, edgy looking villains, their equally edgy looking homeboys (knights of ren) and mediocre backstories. I was ready to learn, dammit. And if I couldn't have that then give me something good to look at, but alas. Adam gave as much as he could and did really well. A character who believed he had to be dark but was probably grey all along and felt too guilty to admit otherwise, especially after Han. He gave me all the necessary amount of emotion for a scene. When he was conflicted, he looked anxious. When he was mad he was kind of whiny but pretty pissed. I loved the snarky, nonchalant attitude he threw out from time to time inside and outside of fighting. But alas, his costume looked like it was made out of a thin, tufted quilt, not menacing at all. The fight choreo was messy and stilted, even though he tried his best. The homeboys were MIA . And worst of all, I still cant really figure out why he returned to the light. Was it Leia's death? Rey saving his life? I feel he should have been getting a Jedi/family pep talk throughout that fight to show him he wasn't as lost as he thought he was and as a distraction so Rey could "kill Kylo to revive Ben". But all he gets is Imaginary Han Solo after the fact and he doesn't even participate in the final battle. He gets thrown away and only shows up again to die. I hate it when it happens to women and I hate it here.
Im fine with Rey. Mary Sue or not, her arc was finding a place in the world and a family, but I feel like she never really did. People told her what she was; a friend, an apprentice, a jedi, a dyad but it felt like she never believed it, even at the end. I chalk that up to "no set plan for the trilogy" more than Daisy's acting. She was great.
All of the actors were good, it was only the story that bothered me enough that I don't want to rewatch it. And that's rare.
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benmitchellweek day 3 - “So none of it was real? You didn’t mean any of it?” (ao3 link)
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“So none of it was real? You didn’t mean any of it?”
“Course not. I only said it to push you away, to protect you. I, I love you. With every fibre of my being.”
“Cut!”
Ben lets his hand fall away from Callum’s face, letting out a long sigh. It’s the sixth take they’re on and even he can tell that the scene is bad. And for once, he has to admit that it’s not just down to the ridiculously cheesy script but to him and his co-star.
Ben wasn’t averse to his new love interest being a man; he’s always played his character as very open-minded anyway and it’s definitely paying off in terms of promotion. The general public and the fans online are ecstatic about the representation and it’s proving to be a huge factor in drawing in audiences for the third and last part of the trilogy he’s starring in.
He’s loath to admit though, that a lot of that draw comes from the casting announcement of one Callum Highway.
Callum Highway, who apparently has quite some experience as a theatre actor and has built up a decent-sized following from being on some TV show - that’s according to Ben’s agent at least. Callum Highway, who’s supposed to play his love interest now. Only, the chemistry between them just isn’t there. Or rather, there is chemistry, it just really isn’t a romantic one.
It’s quite the opposite in fact.
Things had been fine at the screen test; they had gotten along great and there had been this unspoken draw between them. Their director Matt had been ecstatic and had casted Callum almost on the spot. But ever since they started filming things have taken a turn for the worse; they’re snapping at each other constantly, making snide remarks and only pretending to like each other for the press outings.
It’s even worse that Ben feels like absolute shit whenever he gives Callum a rude response and sees the flash of hurt in his eyes. He doesn’t even know how or why it started but the fact that he feels so bad about it all and has to think about it, and him, constantly just adds to his frustration.
Their director stands up from his chair behind the screens, ripping off his headset and rubbing his hands over his eyes.
“Alright, that’s it for the day. We’ll try this scene again tomorrow. You two better use tonight to practice. I want that scene perfect tomorrow and I want to actually feel like you two are madly in love with each other. Understand?”
They both murmur an affirmative, not brave enough to look their director in the eyes but instead glaring daggers at each other.
-----
It’s how they find themselves in Callum’s trailer later that night, going through the script again and again, trying and failing to get this scene right.
“You could at least try to make it seem like your character wants to be there with mine, you know.”
Callum throws his copy of the script on the little table beside them, running his hands over his face in frustration. It’s not working out any better than it did this afternoon; they’re still wooden and lacking any believable chemistry, and it’s setting both of their nerves on edge. They only have a couple of hours to get it right and Ben really doesn’t want to be the reason this movie is getting delayed.
“I can only work with what I’m given, alright.”
When Ben looks up from his own script, he sees Callum’s mouth dropping open, eyebrows knitting together. It was the wrong thing to say - again - that much is clear from the way Callum’s face morphs into anger, and Ben regrets it immediately. Him and his big mouth and penchant for lashing out at everyone around him.
“God, you’re so fucking full off yourself, aren’t you. You know, I was proper excited about working with you because you always seem so funny and charming in your interviews but it’s all just acting, isn’t it. You’re really just jealous and insecure.”
It’s the first time Callum has ever raised his voice or been outright rude to him and to be honest, Ben doesn’t like this. They hit a little too close to home; his words. His first instinct is to fight back, spit back words full of venom at Callum as well, but he can’t. He doesn’t want to. He doesn’t want to hurt Callum; he never did.
It seems like Callum was also expecting him to give a retort back, because when Ben simply falls silent and looks at the ground, he immediately steps forward to apologize. Ben thinks he really is something else because he definitely deserved Callum going off on him and him saying sorry now just confirms that he’s a much better person than Ben could ever be.
“Ben, I’m so sorry.”
Ben tries to clear his throat and go back to business, but for some reason there’s a lump in his windpipe he can’t seem to swallow back down.
“Let’s just do the scene.”
“Hang on. I feel bad ab-”
“Let’s just do the damn scene, Callum, yeah. Let’s get this over with so we can finish this stupid movie.”
He’s getting louder now, his voice sounding more desperate than he intended to. This doesn’t happen to him, he doesn’t lose his cool over a guy, his co-star, who’s probably not even into guys. But his heart keeps screaming at him to reach out and touch Callum, to just fall into his arms and not care about the rest of the world.
But it’s not that easy. Callum just made it clear what he thinks of Ben and that he messed everything up beyond the point of fixing. And Ben does what he’s always done, what he’s come to know since he was a child, he pushes people away before they can detect any vulnerability and use it to their advantage. It doesn’t matter that Callum doesn’t seem like the type of guy to do that, his self-preservation is screaming at him to do it.
“Is it really that much of a chore for you to play with me? What did I ever do to you, Ben?”
It’s what breaks the dam. What makes everything Ben’s tried so hard to keep hidden and locked away since they’ve begun filming bubble over and break out of him.
“You know what? It is! It is a chore to see your stupid, pretty face every day, to hear your voice everywhere I go, to not get you out of my damn head. You’re always there, Callum, and I hate it. And even when you’re not there, I can’t stop thinking about you. So let’s just finish this movie so I can get over you.”
He regrets saying anything the second the words leave his mouth, watching Callum’s mouth drop open in astonishment. There’s complete silence between them, the eerie quiet of the otherwise abandoned movie set providing no background distraction, and all Ben can do is wait it out and deal with the fallout. The only silver lining is that the movie is almost done, so if Callum is about to reject him and throw him out of his trailer he at least only has a few more days and some press events to get through before he can start to repress this whole situation.
He doesn’t get thrown out. What ultimately happens is something entirely different. Callum moves forward, face hard and determined, both of his hands coming up to take Ben’s face securely in them, tilting his head up. Ben is trying to keep up with the situation but all of a sudden there are soft lips pressing against his - Callum’s lips.
No camera or crew or script to be found.
Ben’s kissing back instinctively, threading his fingers into the soft material of Callum’s hoodie. There are some desperate noises escaping his throat without his say but Callum answers one of them with a groan on his own so Ben feels less bad about them, slipping his tongue into Callum’s welcoming mouth.
When they eventually part again, their foreheads stay close against each other, small smiles on both of their faces.
“I wasn’t sure you liked men.”, Ben confesses quietly, trying to justify why he’s let this simmer until it eventually spewed out of him.
“I immediately said yes to this project. Because of you. I just wanted to get to know you.”
“We’re idiots, aren’t we. At least I am. I’m sorry.”
Callum seals their lips back together, one hand curling into Ben’s hair and the other running down his chest until it finds Ben’s, tangling their fingers together.
“Guess we don’t have to worry about chemistry anymore.”
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The problem of using original characters as bait for a sequel and why I think that, so far, Yashahime is not doing it right.
When you are planning a sequel I understand the need to use the original characters to get people interested in the new story, especially if the original is very popular and close to a lot of people’s hearts. Inuyasha is very special to me because I have been a fan since I was five years old and it has helped me through many difficult moments in my life, and I know it is special to a lot of people as well.
From the moment Yashahime got announced they stated the story would be about the three girls. However, the reason why virtually every single fan I saw on social media were asking themselves: “okay, but where are the originals?” was because of a very simple reason: they wanted you to wonder where they were literally from day one. Moroha’s bio straight-out said she was Inuyasha and Kagome’s daughter but that she didn’t remember them because she had grown up alone.
I’m gonna use two examples I’m familiar with to try to explain myself: Harry Potter and Star Wars.
Let’s imagine The Cursed Child never existed and that they do a movie sequel to Harry Potter instead. If they don’t show Harry, Ron and Hermione in the trailer, the obvious question among the fans would be: “where are they?” It wouldn’t matter if they already stated that the story will have new protagonists and a new plot, you only care about seeing them again because they are the characters you are familiar with. Also if they hint that their kids grew up alone and that they don’t remember their parents, you would immediately ask yourself what happened to them. It is narrative 1.0.
Even though I hated The Cursed Child, Rowling knew the Harry Potter fandom very well. There’s no doubt whatsoever that Albus and Scorpius were the main characters in Cursed Child, but we still got the golden trio in a supporting role aiding the new protagonists without stealing the spotlight.
Now, moving on to Star Wars: one of the main reasons why the sequel trilogy crashed and burned was because they failed to give a proper closure to the original characters. Luke was too OOC, Han was in The Force Awakens only because they begged Harrison Ford to appear, and Carrie’s unexpected death got in the way of giving Leia closure. Also fans will never forgive them for not giving us at least one moment of the original three together. My guess is people in charge of the sequels hoped the new characters would be strong enough to carry the story on their own, which kinda failed because their stories weren’t consistent through the trilogy and the shadow of the original trio was too powerful.
If I had to guess, I would say the people in charge of Yashahime made the same mistake. They hoped fans would fall in love with the three girls and that they would be strong enough to carry the sequel to a story as famous as Inuyasha. Don’t get my wrong, I really like the girls, but I don’t love them the same way I loved the Inugang. And I know it is not a competition, but let’s be honest: you can’t help but compare every single detail, from the music to the characters. I don’t know if it’s a script issue, but if every single episode your fans end up asking themselves: “cool, but where is the original group?” you are not doing a good job at writing strong characters than can carry the weight of a sequel on their backs.
Three weeks ago we were fucking baited with that teaser of Miroku because they knew we would go batshit crazy, and they only gave us like two seconds without proper context. That same episode we got a brief mention of Sango and a flashback to an episode of Final Act. Since then, silence. Shippo hasn’t been seen or mentioned at all, and neither have Kin’u and Gyokuto. Now, if there’s nothing wrong with them and it turns out they are just chillin’ by the beach, then why the need of teasing us? They clearly wanted us to go crazy because of all the mystery and that is just mean.
Same goes for Sessrin shippers. I don’t ship that pair by any means; however, even I am annoyed by all the hints and teasing that screams at you that Rin is the mother but the people in charge didn’t have the balls to confirm it from the start. I hate when they tease fans and use us to get high ratings in order to make a reveal that IS SO DAMN OBVIOUS. I mean, SHE IS THE ONE INSIDE THAT DAMN TREE!!!
I kept telling myself “don’t freak out, we are only 2/3/4/5/6/7 episodes in.” Also Yashahime will have 24 episodes and if they are following the classic structure it means we already saw the first third of the story, a.k.a the set-up. BUT this is also a red flag for them. The fans are pissed off and even those of us who were like “guys, chill out. There’s no way they will reveal something important so soon” are getting impatient and mad af.
In conclusion I like the show and I will continue to watch it, but I sincerely hope the second third of the story improves and they stop rushing shit for the sake of it. Also that they make these girls a bit vulnerable, I’m tired of them being so damn strong (I already ranted about this last week).
#I only mentioned their horrible handling of the OG characters#don't get me started on how damn OP Towa is#like gurl#Inuyasha and Kagome unlocked their powers as the episodes and seasons went by#Towa is doing super powerful shit out of thin air and destroying apparently powerful demons#yashahime#meta#inuyasha
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Book 21 of 2020: Monsters of Men
Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness (Chaos Walking, book 3)
This is the last and final book on the Chaos Walking trilogy. If you're interested, you can read my reviews of The Knife of Never Letting Go and The Ask and the Answer (both linked), the two previous books.
Please forgive me for my somewhat shorter review. A) I don't want to give away spoilers, and this book was full of plot twists. And B) I'm behind on these reviews and the year is almost over.
"You're never more alive than in battle."
"Never more dead after," I say.
Monsters of Men was pretty much everything I hoped for, honestly. It was dramatic, it wrapped up the plotlines, it made statements about society. In the third book, a settler ships from Viola's fleet has arrived on the New World just in time to watch the Ask simultaneously face off with the Answer and the Spackle. Todd and Viola are still kept on different sides of the war, and are both struggling with their relationship and themselves. Todd finds President Prentiss all too beguiling, and Viola is suffering from a deep infection that may not be curable. All the while, they have to make moral and ethical decisions about war, colonization, relationships, and more as young teens.
This book, like the second one, switches between the perspectives of Todd and Viola - but we also get chapters from the perspective of one of the Spackle with whom Todd interacted in the second book. I really loved getting things from his perspective because their society is so different, and they operate on almost a hive mind/shared consciousness that makes their understanding of the world so different. For them, the Noise isn't a hassle, but their primary method of communication. Overall, this was just such a nice wrap-up to the series. I liked the new characters introduced from the settler ship, and I enjoyed seeing how a new person would deal with having Noise for the first time. Again, the worldbuilding was great. Ness really built the Spackle society up so well and clearly put a lot of thought into their mannerisms and turns of phrase. The plotlines were clear and interesting, and the moral dilemmas actually made sense and had real consequences. There was a big plot twist at the end, too, that I really didn't see coming at all. The ending was somewhat open, which I liked. All the plotlines were wrapped up and concluded, but the reader wasn't given every single detail of the characters' lives after the book. I think Ness did a great job of identifying the scope of these books and sticking to it; there was no need to go beyond this time frame because it would have opened up another story. I can tell this trilogy was thoroughly planned, and it was just executed so well.
Trigger warnings for war/battle, explosions, weapons, injury/illness, blood, character death, gaslighting, cursing, and vague mentions of sex.
My final opinion: A great finale to a well-planned series!
(Also apparently they're making a movie out of this series??? Starring Tom Holland as Todd??? I literally did not know this until last week. I'm a fool. I haven't even seen the trailer yet but I will be honest, the casting choices leave something to be desired in the way of diversity. Maybe if I see it I'll give a movie review? That could be fun. Lmk if you're interested I guess.)
#contrespeaks#books of 2020#bookblr#chaos walking#monsters of men#patrick ness#booklr#book reviews#book recs#mini book review#sci fi#science fiction#sci fi fantasy#scifi#scifi fantasy
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Using this video as a segue into this post, which ignores the dregs of the Fandom Menace who were never going to like this movie and just distills the five main points made by critics.
1. It threw away what The Last Jedi established.
2. It's too chock-full of stuff and with too rushed a pace.
3. It has no deep themes and nothing insightful to say.
4. It lacks imagination and is all rehashing and nostalgia-bait fanservice.
5. It's a disappointing ending to both a trilogy and a nine-film saga.
1. This criticism seems to recur the most, since critics didn’t just like TLJ and Rian Johnson’s vision for the franchise, they loved it; they were blown away by it. So naturally it cuts deep when they see TROS set back a lot of what TLJ established (Rey actually does come from a noteworthy lineage, actually does have to undergo true Jedi training, and even ends up becoming a Skywalker. Finn is back to hanging out with Rey rather than Rose, and Rose herself has a minor role. Poe is prone to being reckless and hot-tempered again. Luke isn’t a grumpy old man anymore. Kylo Ren, after reforging his old mask, is redeemed while a decrepit old wielder of the Dark Side is the Big Bad. Hux doesn’t get much of a role and is killed off midway through. The Force-sensitive children like that “broom boy” don’t factor into anything. The story takes a familiar path rather than subverting audience expectations.) Honest Trailers even joked that the film was the long-awaited sequel to The Force Awakens rather than to The Last Jedi. And I can understand this critique, it’s a valid one to make.
But I’d also have to argue that not only is J.J Abrams entitled to bring the story back in line with his old ideas from his time making TFA since Disney and Lucasfilm specifically reached out to him to direct TROS (and c’mon, Rian Johnson threw out TFA’s establishment first, if it’s wrong of J.J then it was wrong of Rian too), and that a film that exactly followed TLJ’s establishment like Colin Trevorrow’s unproduced Duel of the Fates would feel too bleak and wrong for the franchise, but that the movie doesn’t ignore TLJ as much as it’s made out. The events of TLJ still happened exactly as we saw them, they are still acknowledged, and they are even built upon in interesting ways. I loved seeing Luke no longer a grumpy old man because that’s what TLJ’s climax set up with him: he learned the error of his ways and re-embraced his status as a Jedi and as a legend. The galaxy coming to the Resistance’s aid in the final battle is the perfect pay-off to them not doing so in the Battle of Crait and shows how Luke’s last stand really did inspire hope once more. I loved the three-way power struggle in the First Order between Supreme Leader Kylo Ren, Hux and (representing Palpatine’s interests) Pryde. I thought Palpatine being behind Snoke made perfect sense. I’m glad Rose was still present at all. I though Kylo Ren’s redemption was handled very well. And I loved Rey becoming a Skywalker in the end, that just felt like such a right conclusion to me.
2. There’s an easy explanation as to why it’s chock-full with stuff - Kathleen Kennedy didn’t require Rian Johnson to adapt any of it in TLJ even though much of it was conceived by J.J Abrams and Lawrence Kasdan when making TFA. J.J literally needed to fit two movies’ worth of content into this one movie because TLJ spent too much time wheel-spinning and navel-gazing (and keep in mind that I like TLJ; but I’m not going to pretend like it didn’t screw the pooch on multiple fronts). As for the pace, I definitely agree when it comes to the first act and whoever thought it was a good idea to excise so much of what was filmed for it needs to be slapped upside-down the head. But things start to improve after the big Pasaana canyon race, and once they get off Pasaana altogether the pace settles down into the usual SW film groove. I think critics were so burned by that first half-hour that it colored their impression of the rest of the film, even when looking at it objectively the rest of the film does have a lot more breathing room and calmer, introspective moments between the big action set pieces.
3. I see this a lot from critics and am all...?????? I’m sorry, did we watch the same movie!? “They win by making you think you’re alone, but there’s more of us”. “Your mother’s gone. But what she stood for, what she fought for.... that’s not gone.” “We had each other. That’s how we won.” “Your spirit...your heart...some things are stronger than blood”. These themes are every bit as spelled out as the themes from TLJ that critics praised so much...but then, critics thought that one of TLJ’s themes was the villain’s justification of his own atrocities (”Let the past die. Kill it, if you have to”) so maybe them missing all of these themes isn’t so surprising.
4. First off, the “lacking imagination” criticism will always astound me when The Force Awakens is one of the most critically praised films in the series and it literally ripped off the entire plot structure of A New Hope. None of the “member berries” in this film came close to that level of rehashing. Secondly, Star Wars has been all about nostalgia and pleasing crowds (”fanservice”) since its inception, and recycling various set-ups and tropes and sequences has been a thing for a long time (to quote George Lucas: “It’s like poetry, they rhyme.”) And lastly, this is the finale to the Skywalker Saga, so of fucking course it’ll be full of nostalgia and fanservice and sequences reminiscent of all the previous films! It’s a celebration as well as a send-off! Avengers: Endgame is a critical darling, and it literally traveled back in time to several of the past movies that led up to it! So what’s the problem here? I, for one, thought it was very cleverly and seamlessly done for the most part, and being done in the framework of a dumb, goofy blockbuster (which was all Star Wars was originally meant to be; it was never meant to be taken as seriously as it unfortunately has).
5. The main reasoning behind this criticism is that TROS fully exposes and embodies Disney and Lucasfilm’s lack of planning when it came to the Sequel Trilogy, which is so disheartening that it makes this finale a disappointing one to both the trilogy and the whole saga. First of all, every finale has been considered disappointing in their times: ROTJ was possibly even more loathed by fans and critics (while still enjoyed by general audiences) than TROS, and while ROTS got middling reviews from critics, it was still considered to be flat-out bad just like its predecessors by fans - being the least bad of them wasn’t high praise (even the general audience enjoyment seemed more tepid compared to ROTJ and TROS). On all fronts, the perception of the movies only improved with age, so that will likely be the same case here.
More importantly, anyone who did their homework or even some simple critical thinking not only could have realized that there was no plan for the Sequel Trilogy from the days of TLJ, but from the days of TFA. From the moment that movie rehashed the plot of A New Hope and relied heavily on Mystery Boxes to hook viewers, I knew there was no solid plan for this trilogy and that they were making it up as they went along. When you’re aware of this fact well in advance, I think that you end up being more impressed by TROS for being able to wrap the trilogy and saga up in the tight, definitively close-ended way that it did. I know that I certainly was. Much of this had to do with J.J Abram’s idea to bring back Palpatine. People whine that he was brought in with no foreshadowing at the last minute and that he was nowhere near the Sequel Trilogy beforehand and that him being here makes ROTJ pointless, and yet not only was Palpatine everywhere near the whole saga from the very beginning (which, as J.J has said, would make it bizarre for it to end without him), but ROTJ was already made pointless by TFA by its decision to reverse all the heroes’ victories and bring back the Empire. If Palpatine, the Emperor, the very creator of the Empire, did not find a way to return from his defeat in ROTJ and was thus not behind the Empire’s resurrection, how fucking cheap would that be? Some random other decrepit, all-powerful Dark Side wielder just came along and brought it back to the point of reversing all the heroes’ victories? And then he gets supplanted by Han and Leia’s son, which would make the Sequel Trilogy and whole saga’s Final Boss the guy who humiliatingly got his ass handed to him in both previous films’ climaxes? IMHO, the Sequel Trilogy really would suck if that was what it amounted to! That would be a true “disappointing ending to both a trilogy and a nine-film saga.” When it comes to the film series (the Skywalker Saga), the only valid excuse for not ending the conflict with the Empire in ROTJ is if the Emperor wasn’t truly vanquished in it. Period.
It ain’t J.J’s fault that he was actually looking at the bigger picture while critics were not.
Bonus: another video plug, because this guy is a Star Wars fan that truly deserves it.
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7, 28, 40, for the Star Wars asks
Hello hello, thank you for this!
7 - If you could choose any profession to have in the GFFA, what would you be?
Oooh, I'm going to go with my first instinct on this one and say Jedi Archivist. I'm not going to pretend I don't want the superpowers possible in the universe. And if that comes with a Space Library? So much the better! Jocasta Nu is my hero, lets hear it for the badass librarians :D
28 - If you could stop one character from doing one thing, who would it be and why?
Ohhhh, geez. Many things. All of the things. I suppose stopping Palpatine from existing is a little too obvious of a choice, hm? Putting aside that very appealing option, I think I'm going to go with stopping Qui-Gon from leaving Shmi on Tatooine. Lets keep her and her kid together! I dunno if it would actually keep Anakin from falling, but the idea of Shmi getting to hang out in the heart of power and try to keep her kid safe and happy is very appealing to me. And there's all sorts of interesting ways that AU could go.
40 - If you could make your own Star Wars trilogy/series, what would it be about?
Ooooooh, the POWER. So, to limit myself, I'm going to say I can't re-write the existing canon, otherwise I'd be just fix-it-ing all over the place. If I was actually going to tell an original story….
Hmmm, I'm thinking…yeah. Droid revolution!
Lets play with this. Our protagonist is a plucky young former-First Order cleaning droid. They're freed from their life of First Order drudgery by the end of Rise of Skywalker, and wind up with their restraining bolt sliced off to wander the wider galaxy.
(this got, um, long, with a fully-plotted trilogy, so we're just gonna put what's next below the cut)
Movie 1:
Coming of Age story, but with the droid. Finding self, discovering purpose, going on journeys of self-discovery trying to find a place in the world. It's Harrowing. It's clear the world doesn't much like free droids. They try to find honest employment, succeed for a little bit.
But then! They're captured by pirates or something and almost fitted with a restraining bolt but they fight their way free (probably through clever trickery or mechanical know-how)! BB-8 is inexplicably there and helping in some way. (Cameo for the merch and to put in the trailer!) They wind up finding a place in an all-droid ship crew and sail off for a life of wonder!
Movie 2:
The ship crew is now home, we spend a little time getting to know the whacky cast of characters. There's the protag. There's a massive battledroid that loves a fiberart of some kind. There's a Gonk-droid that's the crew's philosopher. There's one of those tiny tatooine podracer droids (DUM? Something like that? I'm not pulling up wookiepedia right now) that LOVES explosives. There's a wise mentor-figure astromech. The captain is literally the ship itself - some prototypical thing from the Clone Wars that wasn't decommissioned as well as anyone thought. They like each other, they're family.
ANYWAY, after the lovely montage introducing everyone, they show them doing a job. The job goes smoothly, but after that, there's Tension. They have to pretend there's an organic around to get payment. And then, their worst nightmare - some Evil Person has learned there's a crew full of droids just ripe for claiming. And the law is on the Evil Person's side! How terrible.
"We're not people," the wise mentor says. "We're salvage."
They're on the Run. Then, they hear a tale. A Paradise, a place where droids are free. It's secret, and protected, and there's a Fancy Space Magic Map or something. The movie leans into being an action-adventure flick after that, a wild race towards the promised land, with the Evil Person that wants to enslave them hot on their heels. There is daring do! There are dramatic ship fights!
And then - just as the Evil Person is on the verge of claiming them, they find the promised land! The promised land droids defeat the Evil Person. Finally, here is a whole city where droids can be free. Glory! We keep focused on the team for a bit, watching them settle in and realize they can survive without being soldiers. They get to be people, just people in a wonderful mechanical city. And THEN, just as they're HAPPY (with an indistinct amount of time passing so the fanfic writers can have a good time) in the last three minutes of the movie, you find out there is a LARGE FLEET bearing down on them. Oh no. They have been Found. SUSPENSE!
Movie 3:
Our plucky crew now have to Fight. We quickly meet the leadership of the Promised Land - a quiet Competent One, a Jaded old Soldier, and a Passionate Revolutionary (they are, of course, all droids). There is a rising sense of despair. There is no place for droids in this world that is truly free. In the first third of the movie, they work out a mad plan to free the droids on the attacking fleet. It requires infiltrating the ship. Our crew do it. There is much Heroism. There are some sad thoughts about going back into battle when they thought that life was behind them. There are cool explosions. It works! The droids turn on their masters and now the Promised Land has a Fleet!
Which, of course, is going to make its own problems. There is probably politics. A polite request from the New Republic to please give the fleet back, and they will guarantee the safety of the promised land. Oh, but of course, you will have to return all the droids you just freed from the ships. They belonged to the Corporate Sector, who funds most of our government, so we really need you to give them back. They weren't, after all, your property.
There is a lot of agonized back and forth, but our Protagonist remains firm - no! The answer is no! We don't trade other's lives for our freedom. We have to fight! We might lose but we have to fight! And what better time than now, when we have a fleet! It is Very Inspirational. The Passionate Revolutionary on the council is on the Protagonist's side.
We're going to need to keep the fleet in fuel, says the Jaded Old Soldier.
Well, it turns out, the Quiet Competent One says, most fuel stations are automated these days. By droids. As are most shipyards. There's more Heroic Action, slipping into a fueling station and freeing the droids, holding that and branching out to the shipyards, their fleet becoming stronger and stronger, the Corporate Sector responding in more and more force, until it comes down to an epic battle and they are strong but the Corporate Sector is stronger except...at the critical moment the ORGANIC CREW turns on the Corporate Sector. The droids realize suddenly that they are not fighting for their own survival, they are, apparently, liberators.
The question remains: how do you build a good civilization for organic and mechanic alike?
There's no easy answer, but it is a lot easier with the massive mines and resources of the corporate sector at their disposal. The trilogy ends with our Protagonist attending a summit at the New Republic to graciously offer terms of political cooperation between the New Republic and the Free Droid Economic Collaboration. R2D2 is there. He says he's proud of the Protag. Protag is a little starstruck. Nothing is quite settled, but it is very hopeful, and isn't that what Star Wars is all about?
#ask games#star wars asks#droid revolution trilogy#It needs some tightening but I feel like that's a solid start#minarr#minnarr
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Do Shadow and Bone & Six of Crows Work as One Story?
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This SHADOW AND BONE feature contains spoilers for Season 1.
Though Netflix’s new fantasy series Shadow and Bone is based on the bestselling Grishaverse novels of author Leigh Bardugo, it’s not a straightforward adaptation of the book series that shares its name. In addition to the Shadow and Bone trilogy, the series also incorporates elements from Six of Crows, a duology that is set in the same world, but focused on a very different set of characters.
Set two years after the events of Shadow and Bone, Six of Crows is a dramatic heist story set in a different country (Kerch) and starring a set of characters who really don’t take part in the events of the first trilogy. Until now. Shadow and Bone attempts to create what are essentially prequel storylines for the major characters of Six of Crows: criminal mastermind Kaz Brekker, assassin Inej Ghafa, gunslinger Jesper Fahey, and spy Nina Zenik.
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How these figures would fit into the series’ existing storyline of the discovery of a legendary Sun Summoner with the power to destroy the Shadow Fold was a question that every book fan was wondering prior to the series debut. And now that Shadow and Bone is here, it’s time to dig into whether this fusion of these two separate-but-related series worked or not.
Den of Geek editor Kayti Burt and Den of Geek contributor Lacy Baugher dig into the specifics of the good, the bad, and the somewhere in between when it comes to incorporating the Six of Crows characters into Shadow and Bone. Welcome to our discussion, and feel free to share your own thoughts in the comments below…
Question: Going into this series, what did you think about Netflix’s choice to integrate Six of Crows into Shadow and Bone? Did you think it would work?
Kayti: As someone who has only read the first book in the Shadow and Bone series and neither of the Six of Crows duology, I was intrigued.
As a viewer of adaptation, I tend to hold my opinions until I’ve at least seen the trailer and… well, the first teaser (which is the only trailer I watched before binging the screeners) didn’t give much away. That being said, there’s nothing that frustrates me more than an adaptation that is overly faithful to the plot without being faithful to the tone, characters, and themes of the source material, so I think I am much more tolerant of major plot changes when it comes to adaptation than the average viewer?
Lacy: I will admit that I was extremely apprehensive about it. I mean, I get the impetus to combine both sets of characters into a single story if only to allow Six of Crows fans the chance to see favorites like Kaz and Jesper onscreen. (There are no guarantees that Shadow and Bone would be successful enough to even get a second season, let alone a sequel/spin-off about a completely different cast, after all.)
But the thing is, Six of Crows is a very different story from Shadow and Bone – from setting and characters, to the time it takes place. (It’s actually set two full years after the events in the final Shadow and Bone novel, Ruin and Rising.) Furthermore, it’s also a very different kind of story. Six of Crows is very much a heist drama and one that’s not concerned so much with things like love triangles or larger Ravkan politics. And the characters are, of necessity, much darker and more morally gray than Alina and her friends. I worried that the two worlds of these stories wouldn’t mesh well, or that there simply wouldn’t be anything for the Six of Crows crew to do.
Kayti: Yeah, these are such valid concerns! Even as someone who had never read Six of Crows, I knew that these series, while set in the same world, were doing very different things.
Reading your response, Lacy, I also think I saw it as a way to incorporate the more popular Six of Crows material into the slightly less popular Shadow and Bone, which did make me a bit nervous, as it seemed to be a marketing decision more than a story one. That being said, with good storytellers, those two motivations do not have to be mutually exclusive!
Question: Now that you’ve seen the show, what do you think works with the strategy?
Lacy: Shadow and Bone does, I think, pull off the inclusion of the Six of Crows crew fairly well. Much better than I expected it to if I’m honest.
There are certainly problems – for the first four episodes, it generally feels like the Crows cast exists in an entirely different show that has very little to do with the stuff happening in Os Alta. Shadow and Bone is also generally terrible as a series at drawing any sort of distinctions about what makes life in Kerch different from that in Ravka and how that might have shaped these people.
But the character work is honestly great, and the addition of this Six of Crows prequel plot adds some really interesting layers to Inej and Jesper especially. The show is really clear that the latter obviously has Grisha power in a way that the books are not, and Kit Young steals almost every scene he’s in. (Milo the goat! I cannot! Protect him!)
I also love the way that the show fleshes out Inej, both in terms of her past and how the overhanging threat of returning to the Menagerie impacts her choices, as well as the way her religious beliefs shape who she is. (There’s something honestly wonderful about the fact that she gets to meet and know Alina, who is – and will become even more fully – revered as a saint by her faith, and I just love that for her.)
Kayti: I agree! For the first half of the season, I wasn’t sure if it worked, and I do think that has something to do with the weakness of setting in this adaptation. For parallel storylines to work well, they need to have a strong sense of world-building. In that way, even if there aren’t explicit plot or character connections between the two (or more!) storylines, then each storyline still adds something to the other(s) by virtue of telling us something about the larger world they share. Game of Thrones did this famously well, as does The Expanse. In Shadow and Bone, the articulation of setting is one of the adaptation’s weakest elements—the world and its cultures don’t truly feel real or lived in to me—and I think that hurts the integration of these two book series.
That being said, once the characters and plot collide in the second half of the season, this integration works incredibly well for me. I loved the final episode for so many reasons, but one of the big ones was for how integral the Six of Crows characters (or at least Jesper, Inej, and Kaz) felt to this climax—I mean, Inej throws a dagger into The Darkling! By the end of this season, it didn’t matter to me that the world-building didn’t quite work because I was so invested in these characters. (And I loved the Inej/Alina stuff, as well.)
And then, of course, we have Nina and Matthias off on their own, little subplot, giving me the Jon Snow/Ygritte vibes. Again, this subplot picked up steam for me. At the beginning, I didn’t know why we should care, but these actors really brought their “A” game when it came to their Enemies to Friends to (Almost) Lovers journey, complete with There Is Only One Bed and Huddling For Warmth. I never stood a chance.
Lacy: There is Only One Bed!!! Truly, the best romantic trope there is. Heart eyes emoji.
You’re really right about Shadow and Bone and how it articulates setting. On some level, the fact that the Shadow Fold is the most fully realized location in the show makes a lot of sense – it’s huge, monstrous, and terrifying. But this focus has the downside of making almost everywhere else look and seem exactly the same. (I really would like to know how many viewers didn’t/haven’t yet realized that Kerch is an entirely separate country with different laws about Grisha.)
The utter destruction of the West Ravkan city of Novokribirsk at the end of the season is supposed to be really shocking and underline how depraved the Darkling is, but I don’t think it hits as hard as it should – part of the reason is that the show has plenty of other opportunities to show us the Darkling’s flaws, but it’s also because there’s no real attempt to give West Ravka any real sense of place or identity.
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Shadow and Bone Ending Explained: The Stag, Sun Summoner, and Black Heretic
By Lacy Baugher
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Shadow & Bone: Ranking the Ships
By Kayti Burt and 1 other
Question: What do you think doesn’t work?
Kayti: I think that some of the supporting characters from Shadow and Bone get lost in the shuffle here, as does the Ravka world-building, and I think that is partially because we spend so much time with the Six of Crows gang. There’s nothing to say that, even if Six of Crows hadn’t been incorporated into this adaptation, we would have had more Os Alta or that more would have been better. In both the source material and the adaptation, the Os Alta stuff feels perfunctory rather than inspired. I would have loved to see the adaptation breathe new life into it, similar to what they did with Mal in the translation, who is a much fuller character in the Netflix series than he is in the book.
Lacy: Kaz Brekker, unfortunately. I mean, I think part of this is because there are aspects of who Kaz is and what he’s been through that you just can’t find out right now because of the story that’s still to come in Six of Crows and how that all plays into things there.
This is probably the right decision, but it has the really annoying side effect of making Kaz the least interesting character in Shadow and Bone for me. And if you’ve read the books, you know that’s the furthest thing from the truth. But here, Kaz is basically just a dude with a cool walking stick who’s kind of super into Inej for some reason and hates a man named Pekka Rollins. There’s almost no sense of who he is on his own terms or why he behaves the way he does.
Kayti: As someone who has yet to read Six of Crows, the degree of mystery around Kaz’s character worked for me. The character performance was strong enough that, even though I wanted answers about his backstory now, it felt more in a “I am getting what I need, not what I want” sort of viewing experience—though I get how this could be different if you already know and love his character.
As a non-book reader, I love the tension of not knowing what the heck is up with Kaz because it seems so in line with who he is as a character—jaded, angry, and prone to pushing people away. Of course, if he didn’t have enough sense to be friends (or whatever) with Inej and Jesper, I probably wouldn’t have as much time for his bullshit. The fact that these two seem to vouch for him as a person worth standing by goes a long way for me, and makes his character all the more intriguing.
Question: Do you foresee any problems with this strategy moving forward?
Lacy: Where do they go from here? The end of Shadow and Bone Season 1 sort of puts all the pieces in place for what feels like it’s about to become the first novel in the Six of Crows series. The Crows gang is on a boat heading back to Ketterdam, Nina is on the same ship with them, clearly about to join their crew with her own Matthias-related agenda. Alina and Mal are heading off on their own journey, which will take them on a completely different path. (Both figuratively and literally speaking.)
Is Shadow and Bone just going to move up the timeline of Six of Crows and put the rest of that story as a sort of B plot to the elements of Siege and Storm that will inevitably drive any Season 2? Season 1 successfully managed to use these characters by basically inventing a backstory for them that wasn’t present anywhere else. (Though it should be noted that Nina’s does come from the books.) I’m not sure that I think they can successfully do that again. But if they do adapt Six of Crows, how does that story fit here – especially if it means they can’t easily cross back into the main narrative?
I’m nervous, is what I’m saying. But the show has pleasantly surprised me thus far, so I live in hope.
Kayti: As someone who hasn’t read the books, I am blissfully ignorant, though, as our two main groups of characters are heading in different directions (both figuratively and literally, as you say, Lacy), I’m not sure what Season 2 is going to look like. Are these characters going to be in completely different stories? Because that doesn’t sound like the best idea. Or is the world-changing stakes of The Darkling and his pet shadows big enough that it will pull all of our main characters in?
Whatever happens in terms of the Shadow and Bone/Six of Crows division, I am very excited to see Nina and Matthias fully engage with Inej, Jesper, and Kaz. Maybe they will spend Season 2 together, with the events of the Six of Crows plot, and come back together somehow with Alina & co. for Season 3?
Lacy: You know, I actually don’t mind that idea at all – sort of letting everyone be free to do their own specific series-mandated things next season and then come back together again in Season 3. Because I think what bugs me is the idea that we might have been sort of gifted this really nifty blending of the book narratives and then have it taken away with nary a mention again. (I also just really want Nina to meet Alina, sue me.)
The more I think about it, the more I don’t necessarily see why we couldn’t have some of the Six of Crows plot here – yes, technically it takes place later on, chronologically speaking, but the show itself has already moved up the timeline of Matthias’ impending imprisonment in Hellgate, which is a big initial mission the Crows crew has to sort of undertake. I don’t think he deserves to stay in prison for what is essentially two more books before they get him out. Maybe that’s a place Season 2 can easily start.
Read more
TV
The World of Shadow and Bone Explained
By Kayti Burt
TV
Shadow and Bone Review: Netflix Adaptation Brings the Magic
By Lacy Baugher
Question: Final thoughts.
Kayti: I can’t get over how well this integration worked for me in the second half of the season. This isn’t Stan Lee popping up as a random member of the First Army; Inej, Kaz, and Jesper are the ones to drive Alina out of the palace, and they get to be a small part of that final fight with The Darkling (while not taking away from Alina’s agency and power in that climax). Then, we get a family campfire at the end of the season that straight-up feels like fanfiction (which coming from me is not a dismissal, but rather the ultimate compliment).
Lacy: I can’t wait to really see Nina incorporated with the rest of the Six of Crows cast. She spends most of this season off in her own storyline, which is necessary and gives us a lot of great moments (Nina + Matthias 4-ever), but I am very much looking forward to seeing her friendship with Inej develop.
Also, if we’re going to keep the Six of Crows crew around for any sort of Season 2, which I think they’ll want to do to some extent, I really hope we spend some serious time in Ketterdam, exploring what Kerch is like and how it’s different from Ravka and Fjerda. The Ketterdam set looks amazing and we should get some use out of it.
Kayti: Yes to more Kerch! I am hoping that what we saw in Season 1 was just the tip of the iceberg for what they have planned in terms of the culture and world and that Ketterdam feels more lived-in in Season 2. Overall, the season finale definitely left me eager for more. More than after watching the first episode, after watching the eighth episode, I felt like this story was just getting started.
Looking back on this first season, I think one of the reasons why this show works so well is because it isn’t just a “Chosen One” narrative, and I think that is because it incorporates the Six of Crows’ heist-driven structure. The heist is, by its nature, an ensemble story, while the YA “Chosen One” structure is usually a first-person narrative, which doesn’t always translate so well to the screen. In addition to its amazing characters, this multiple POV, non-Chosen One sensibility is the most important thing Six of Crows brings to Shadow and Bone, and I don’t know if the adaptation would work half as well without it.
The post Do Shadow and Bone & Six of Crows Work as One Story? appeared first on Den of Geek.
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