hi everyone! i unfortunately had some issues with my insurance company, so I've been overdrafted by about $33, unexpectedly :(

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...Jupe only invites the Haywoods to the Star Lasso Experience after Em takes the decoy horse. We hear his wife on the phone talking about press passes for the event when they're dropping Lucky off, so it's already been planned when they meet with him, and then he's relieved to find the excuse to talk about Gordy's Show to avoid talking about selling the horses back (bc there are no horses anymore). But then he was just...gonna fully let them know what's up? Was he trying to punish them? Was this commentary on 'you stole my fake horse so I'm gonna show you what I've done with your real ones,' like a complimentary piece to how he processes Gordy's Show through the altered SNL skit? Was he showing off? Was it a power move to close in on buying the ranch?! All of the above?! ...Maybe the worst option, was he just caught up in the spectacle of it all and blanked entirely on what he'd actually be showing them?? What the absolute fuck was going through this guy's head?!

I don't know if Jupe is short for Jupiter, but I'm guessing so. In Roman mythology, Jupiter is a Sky God. He's controlling what's going on up there. Jupiter was the last child born to a father (Saturn) who was eating all of his children immediately at birth to avoid a prophecy that one of them would overthrow him. Jupiter's mother, Ops, hid Jupiter and fed her husband a large rock disguised as a newborn instead (...it's a myth, just roll with it lmao). The rock eventually made Saturn vomit and expel the rock as well as the children he'd eaten...who were still alive (mythology, whoo!) and helped Jupiter defeat him. Jupiter's CLAIM is both the land that Ricky/Jupe is on AND his belief that he's essentially...a sky god. He escaped, he's special, he's got it all under control. This myth kind of got put into a blender within Nope, which fucking rules tbh (think about that plastic horse combined with the Star Lasso Experience & the Haywood's house), so things don't exactly work out the same, but...also think about that ending in relation to this story. He technically did a little sky god prophecy filling by proxy.

WINK

an aspect of NOPE that i really like is how modern media isn't the only thing being depicted as wrong in the things it finds spectacle in -- it's only changed throughout the years. not only is it shown thru the old film tech and erasure of history, if you wanna take jean jacket's angel imagery a step further, you could read it as jj's imagery seen during her feedings being the influence behind the actual biblical depiction of angels within the NOPE universe, meaning, once again, jj's feedings were seen as spectacle, and something to be worshipped

annihilation by jeff vandermeer / nope dir. jordan peele

The Money Shot

Nope (2022) dir. Jordan Peele

What else am I supposed to do?

“Please Stay” Lucy Dacus

it’s finished!!! there’s a lot going on in this piece and i actually hard a hard time balancing it— both composition and palette wise. but i’m pleased w the result :)

I keep thinking about Angel Torres in Nope (2022). A lot has already been said about the other characters and how they represent different aspects of Hollywood: OJ, the behind-the-scenes guy who keeps his head down and is more concerned with the animals’ welfare than the spectacle; Em, the behind-the-scenes woman who wants to be seen and respected for who she is and what she can do; Antlers, the jaded director so focused on capturing the impossible that he is consumed by it; and Jupe, the former child actor who tries to control the spectacle and make himself a part of it, realizing far too late that he was never calling the shots. But then we have Angel, and I haven’t seen any commentary on what role he plays in this particular lens of interpretation.

I think he’s the audience surrogate.

He’s a bored retail employee with skills far above his station in life, searching for excitement and escapism. He has a VR headset in his apartment that he uses to play fantasy media, he’s invested a lot of time into researching UFOs/UAPs, and the moment he realizes that the Haywoods are trying to capture footage of something in the *sky* after a supposed burglary, he’s hooked. He wants to see. He’s denied permission to watch their cameras and does it anyway - how often do you see videos on YouTube or Twitter or TikTok that were taken of people without their permission, simply because others want to look? Angel deems his curiosity to be more important than consent. He wants to see the spectacle. When he calls the Haywoods to tell them that their cameras are down, it’s pretty clear that his primary concern is that *he* wants to see, not that he’s concerned for their safety. He’s distanced, miles away, watching through a little screen. He might as well be watching television. And he’s the one who notices that the cloud doesn’t move, because he’s obsessed with watching, picking apart the details. He has the luxury of distant observation, with no real stake in the matter besides his own curiosity.

This changes the moment he’s at the house when Jean Jacket comes calling. Even before the rain of blood, even before the screams start, Angel grabs a knife and cowers under the kitchen table, absolutely terrified. The spectacle has come to him. It’s not on the other side of a distant screen. It’s here, it’s real, and it’s coming for him. Now Angel is part of the spectacle, whether he wants to be or not. He looked into the abyss and now it’s looking back, and he wants nothing to do with it. But it’s too late, he’s been changed by this now, and there’s no taking it back. He can’t walk out of the theater, not when he’s come to care about what happens to the Haywoods.

Angel is an active participant now. He’s not just watching from a distance. He’s necessary for the spectacle that they want to create, helping to set up the inflatable tube men in the gulch. And it’s no accident that his position during the run is next to Antlers - because he has to help reload the film. The director wants to make more footage to be watched. A next act, a sequel, the form doesn’t matter. He can’t do it without an audience to watch. To hand him the tools and ask what’s next?

According to behind the scenes interviews, Angel was originally supposed to die in several drafts of the script. Brandon Perea convinced Peele to spare him out of interest in being in potential sequels.

If Angel had died here, that would have still fit the metaphor. The audience itself becomes consumed by the spectacle, unable to get away. But what actually happens is far more interesting in my opinion - the only way that Angel can save himself is to take direct action. To make himself unpalatable. To literally tether himself to solid ground with barbed wire and refuse to be swept up, even though it physically hurts him to do so. And in doing so, he is removed from the spectacle. We know that he survives, but we don’t see him on screen again, nor is he mentioned.

The only way for the audience to escape the spectacle is to refuse to engage with it.

(Disclaimer: This is my own opinion and interpretation, and is not meant to be an authoritative reading of the text. I may have missed details or nuances since I’ve only seen the movie once, or there may be other aspects I haven’t considered. I don’t claim that this was an intentional interpretation on the writer/director’s part, though the text does seem to support this reading.)

Keke Palmer as Emerald Haywood ↳ Nope (2022)

The chosen one.

you know what i think it's fine to believe jupe DID have a connection with gordy. fine in the sense that like this movie is about the difference between the Gazes right so sure Gordy is 100% a wild animal who should not have been put in that situation. absolutely. and there's definitely credit to the idea that it was coincidence, just the table cloth that spared jupe's life.

but i think it's also an interesting and somewhat nice reading to feel like yeah Gordy did see jupe and Recognized him as a comfort or safety. maybe only in the way he would see a favorite toy or food or something but nonetheless recognized him and jupe's Gaze as a Good Thing.

kind of in the way the haywoods used the "i see you" sign before taking on jj separately, where looking and being seen was by all means deadly. like, the idea of looking out for each other by mutual choice and recognition as a weapon against spectacle. jupe and gordy being as friends as a wild animal and a little boy could be as coworkers might have also been that choice despite the circumstances

i think it even makes Jupe's corruption of that bond for spectacle and profit even more fucked up! even more proof of his corruptibility and perpetrator of the cycle of violence showbiz foments. idk idk ultimately its ambiguous and no reading is wrong but augh its making me Think

there was a pattern of errors,

there was a life here to mend

did you know that green and red (orange) are on the opposite sides of the color wheel making them complementary colors did you know em and oj are complements to each others personality did you notice that their finale outfits had hints of the other's color throughout DID YOU. DID YOU.

anyway oj and emerald haywood wearing an orange sweatshirt and a green jersey in the finale. em's bandana. oj's mesh hat being a modernized cowboy hat. angel's "earth" shirt

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anyway oj and emerald haywood wearing an orange sweatshirt and a green jersey in the finale. em's bandana. oj's mesh hat being a modernized cowboy hat. angel's "earth" shirt

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