no squealing, remember that it's all in your head
Hey, i still watch stuff and talk to myself about it!
Oblivion
Upon rewatching Oblivion and all the making-of special features it turns out i have a lot of fondness for that movie. Like, it's not really GOOD -- the characters are paper-thin, the script is eh -- but the atmosphere and aesthetics have really stuck with me and made me like it. I loved Victoria the first time i saw it, and that seems to have increased over time because it's such a let-down that her clones get NO ENDING. Like even aside from all the clones we didn't meet, at least Jack-52 winds up with the group at the end, but Vicka-52 who we DID see and who DID NOT die -- WHAT HAPPENS TO HER?!?!? WHY IS VICTORIA COMPLETELY IGNORED BY THE NARRATIVE??!? We're meant to care about the Jack clones as human beings equivalent to their original, so why does that narrative sympathy not extend to Victoria's clones? Her status as "other woman" means she's just there to be tragic and brushed aside?? She's misled just as much as Jack, but because she's complacent in the lie she never gets to learn the truth like Jack? I mean part of the sadness is she wouldn't want to know the truth, but it's never even presented as an option. Jack never makes an honest attempt to enlighten her -- yes she rejects all his attempts to get her to come with him and see the surface, but that's all under the false pretense of their mission and THEIR EXISTENCE, which is a really unfair thing to hold against her. IT MAKES ME SO SAD AND I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT IT.
And what happens after the Tet is destroyed? The drones died, so you can infer that the skytowers probably stop working as well -- they may operate somewhat independently of the Tet since it goes offline every day, and as separate outposts they're probably sustainable in some capacity, but even then you have to figure at some point they're going to become inoperable without the mothership -- so the clones in the skytowers have possibly no living resources and definitely no way of knowing what happened. They apparently don't have a built-in abbreviated lifespan since the ending implies that Julia will now live out her life with Jack-52 (and he already survived 3 years after the Tet was destroyed). Did the other clones wander out of the skytowers and try to find another place to survive? Did they die on the way? Did they stay put believing they were surrounded by radiation zones? Did they succumb to the horror of their existence stranded on a ruined planet and kill themselves? Were they found by other Scavs and assimilated into their groups? Obviously you can't have Victoria or any extra Jacks messing up Jack and Julia's happy ending, but that means Jack-52 is aware of the existence of his other clones and leaves them to a possibly horrible fate. The least he could do is go back and get Vicka-52. THEY WERE FRIENDS AT ONE POINT, YOU KNOW. When i was taking screencaps i started to like Jack/Vicka as the weird fraught mind-wiped clone Adam and Eve bitter exes that they are/become over the course of the movie. Even if their relationship was false, Jack still had to feel SOMEthing, and he did like her! I really liked all the deleted scenes (amazingly enough! they all had some nice extra details), but especially the one where Vicka fixes him up with the med kit. Clone friends!
I even invented a headcanon to make myself feel better about Victoria: Vicka-52 is actually with the group at the end and we just don't see her, and she and Sykes fall in love! (setting aside the fact that he and Zoe Bell are war buddies and therefore perfect for each other) But that way at least one Vicka gets a happy ending! She's a rule-abiding clone broken free from her tragic existence but still ingrained with love for a man who will never love her back! He's a no-nonsense war hero who no longer has a war to fight! She's ripped from a comfortable lie into harsh reality! He'll teach her to fight for her survival and value her autonomy! She doesn't know how to live in a dirty environment! His whole life is a dirty environment!
SO ANYWAY i've spent a lot of time thinking about this stupid movie just because it was so pretty. :) And i can't get over evil computers and space travel and clones and beautiful sci-fi living spaces and VICTORIA AND SALLYYYYYYYYY
Honestly in my imagination it's basically Portal 3, because i'm super good at taking superficial similarities way too far. The clone farming is even vaguely reminiscent of the end of the Portal 2 co-op story! So many test subjects! Right before the Tet is destroyed Sally may as well be saying "This isn't brave, it's murder." because that's what's happening in my head.
As much as i wish there were more to the Julia character, i really really love the stuff right after she wakes up and Jack and Victoria are trying to take care of her, because the first time around you don't really get the magnitude of her confusion, but upon rewatch it's like… holy shit, she's 60 years in the future but Jack and Victoria haven't aged, and they obviously don't know who she is, WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON. The terror on her face is great, because it's like… are they aliens? Is she on another planet? Is she in another dimension? Is she dead? WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE WHO LOOK LIKE HER CREWMATES? I love it.
Bioshock Infinite
I was originally pretty skeptical of this because so much of what makes Bioshock so effective is the awesome creepiness of its abandoned underwater city, and i thought a sunny and beautiful sky city just wouldn't be as great. BUT IT WAS SUPER GREAT. The environments were amazing, i spent the whole early part of the game just staring at stuff. It's also nice because the beautiful areas were a respite from (and excellent juxtaposition for!) the creepy and horrific parts, whereas Bioshock was all creepy and horrific all the time. (and also regular people are a lot less scary as enemies than SPLICERS so it's easier on the ol' nerves to not be terrified literally all the time). It was sort of like some monstrous amalgam of Boardwalk Empire, Fringe, and His Dark Materials, so needless to say: relevant to my interests!
Like a half hour into the game i already understood why the majority of fanart stuff i have seen for this game is the Luteces, and it only got better from there. The fact that Robert isn't technically Rosalind's brother, he is LITERALLY HER blew my mind. It didn't click for me until the "Lutece's Brother Arrives!" Kinetoscope (because before then you don't really have any reason to suspect that they're anything other than twins! except that Rosalind is only ever mentioned by herself) and then it was made explicit in the Voxophones immediately following, so i wasn't really ahead of the game on that one. I was thrilled every time the two of them showed up, but one of my favorites was when you discover Chen Lin is dead, that first time you see them disappear into thin air is the BEST.
I suuuuuper loved Albert Fink's modern song plagiarism, that delighted the hell out of me. At the very beginning of the game when you hear "God Only Knows" while you're walking around, before any revelations of tears and stuff i was like "hey, that's a Beach Boys song! did it exist before that?? was that a cover of some traditional song and i didn't know it?" so i googled it and kind of spoiled myself that no, the anachronism was in fact a plot point. But what a great plot point! The song choices were PERFECT, i'm obsessed with their version of "Everybody Wants to Rule the World." I also really liked the little "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" interlude/jam session -- it was so pretty and sad, and of course even sadder once you know the whole truth of what's going on.
I put it together really early that Elizabeth was Booker's daughter -- it was in the Hall of Heroes segment, when you hear about Lady Comstock's mysterious "seven day pregnancy," combined with the Rosalind Voxophone that Elizabeth was from somewhere else, and Booker's wife died in childbirth but Booker had no child -- I was surprised that all the clues were there so early but they left that revelation until the end. Of course, i didn't quite predict it the right way -- i thought Lady Comstock was Anna, and Elizabeth was stolen through the alternate Anna which killed her in childbirth (the only problem was it never added up that Booker didn't recognize Lady Comstock... but it was all a cheat because his memory was donked anyway!). Despite all that though i didn't add it up that Booker was Comstock until those final two Voxophones, what with the whole premature aging and who is the man left in the baptismal waters, and then i immediately recalled that one Comstock Voxophone about him "burning all the teepees" and Booker's involvement at Wounded Knee. Spoiler alert: you were an asshole all along!
And THEN even though i got all the clues for those final twists, the ending was still super weird! I LOVED IT. It was a lot more abstract than what i was expecting, and of course i'm a sucker for "all of this has happened before and all of this will happen again" Sisyphean cycles. I think it'd be rad if you could replay the game with actual different courses of events (rather than a few minor choices here and there) that lead up to the same place. Realistically i doubt that's feasible in terms of programming, BUT IT WOULD BE COOL.
Embarrassing confessions: for most of the game i was in denial about Elizabeth being Booker's daughter because i wanted to ship them BECAUSE I'M A CREEP. Their dynamic always seemed so much more like partners than father-daughter. AND THEY MET JUST LIKE RAPUNZEL AND EUGENE!!!!! No joke, a while before i finished the game i had a dream where they made out* and i was like "NOOOOOOOOOO SHE'S YOUR DAUGHTER!!!!!!!!!!" SO IT'S BEEN A VERY CONFLICTING TIME FOR ME. Booker is such a generic manpain-y protagonist and every time you see his face he's so boring looking, but his voice sounds so handsome. :( ugh i'm gross
Probably my favorite part (besides wandering around in the first couple hours) was when you were making your way up the Statue of Columbia: all the weird laboratory studying of "The Specimen," and then the great observation windows of Elizabeth's rooms. There's something about video game tableaux that always gets me. The feeling of discovering a detailed, lived-in place is so immersive. Breadcrumb storytelling! Exploring imaginary worlds!!! VIDEO GAMES!!!!!!!!! THEY'RE NEAT!!!!!!!!!!!
*i'm pretty sure at least 50% of my dreams are about fictional characters making out. Y I K E S
Thor: The Dark World
I really enjoyed it! I don't tend to feel like i'm mega fannish about the MCU because i get so bombarded with stuff on tumblr and i'm like "...you're all way more into this than i am" but at the same time i DO feel attached to it because i'm so bombarded with it??? Who knows. Every time a new movie comes out i get pretty into it but it doesn't really last. Thor and Cap are my favorite standalones at this point though (i got burnt out on Iron Man :/) and it's all just sort of casual fun for me. Cap may be my closest I'M FREAKIN' OUT favorite so i am kinda FREAKIN' OUT about The Winter Soldier (STEVE AND NATASHA a.k.a. probably the best thing the Avengers did so LET'S MAKE A WHOLE MOVIE WHERE THEY'RE BFFS?!?!!!!!?!?!??!?!?! askbfjhfjsdgsdjgh)
ANYWAY i liked this a whole lot. It's actually stuck with me more than i thought it would, and even more than the first movie did. I guess i've come around on realizing, oh, MYTHOLOGICAL SPACE FANTASY, yeah that appeals to my interests! I'm supremely pissed they killed Frigga, especially after her ultra badass dagger combat and protecting her future daughter-in-law (i really really love moms who love their son's girlfriends/spouses, evil mother-in-law cliches can go straight to hell). But the funeral was ridiculously pretty. >:*(
Fandom can be pretty tiresome about Loki, but i still love him so much when he's being tragic. :( And he has such a good face. :( And the brother stuff in this was really great. :( And then he had to ruin the beauty of his final moments by faking his death because, wow, what a bad decision-maker. Protecting Jane (!!!) and apologizing to Thor gets me right in the cockles of my cold dead heart and therein lies the true tragedy: i love good guy Loki and good guy Loki's existence is fleeting at best. My favorite part was when Thor went to visit his cell and told him to drop the illusion -- even though the trailers had shown hobo junkie Loki, the whole picture of his trashed cell and going from the poised, put-together Loki to the real, devastated one was so affecting.
Also that was the nicest dungeon i've ever seen, i'm pretty obsessed with it. All sci-fi minimalist, and those magic gold laser bars were super pretty. WAY TO GO ASGARD, sparing no expense on the prison system.
I LOVE HEIMDALL. One of my biggest takeaways from the first movie was a lot of feelings about Heimdall keeping watch at the edge of the cosmos. Every shot of him in his observatory is my favorite. So much gold! So many shapes! So pretty! I'm also finally watching and loving Luther (!!!! more on that later) so bonus extra feelings about Idris Elba's face, aw yeah
I really like Sif/Loki thanks to Rawles and Anna so i was pretty excited about the very few moments they had (oh ho Loki trickstering Thor into Sif and saying he looked ravishing, oh ho ho ho). A couple weeks ago i actually had a dream that there was a Sif/Loki prequel movie wherein they went hunting together as young adults and it looked beautiful and amazing (it was entitled "Dark Places" for those of you interested in adding it to your dream Netflix queue). p.s. what the fuck is wrong with my brain
THE CLIMACTIC PORTAL BATTLE WAS THE BESSSSTTTTTT. I love love love that Jane and Thor tag-teamed to save the day. I love Jane and science. Jane getting to see the universe!!!! Exploring other worlds!!!! Interrogating Asgardians about quantum field generators!!!! My biggest disappointment about her not being in the Avengers is that she and Bruce obviously would be best pals. :(
I did not like that they added in a few random Sif/Thor mentions and Sif jealousy of Jane and then never did anything with it. I mean i guess i'm glad it didn't amount to anything but in that case why include it at all? It's garbage and it sucks. Theoretically i should even like Sif/Thor because war buddies, but in my mind it just seems too close to Superman/Wonder Woman (with Thor/Jane being the Superman/Lois analogue) and WE ALL KNOW SUPERMAN/WONDER WOMAN IS NOT THE PROPER ORDER OF THINGS. Godlike superheroes belong with a human counterpart!!!
Needed way more Sif and Hogun (here's a shot of Hogun looking at the sky to remind you that he still exists, okay see ya!) and way less Fandral (recast too distracting!) c'mon guys
"How's space?" Darcyyyyyyy. All the London stuff was so good.
Of course loved the Steve cameo :D :D :D :D That Loki, what a scamp
I haven't cared about the X-Men movies since X2 (i saw X3 MULTIPLE times in the theater and i didn't even like it the first time! AWFUL. So many people liked First Class but once i finally saw it i didn't think it was very good. I still haven't seen The Wolverine but the first Wolverine movie broke my spirit so i dunno if i can do that again.) but the Days of Future Past trailer is awesome. Major nostalgic pangs seeing the other non-Wolverine characters again. ;_____; Bobby is boring but Shawn Ashmore is still so cute. ;_____; Although i'm calling bullshit that they're bringing Rogue back but NOT GAMBIT???!?!?! WILL THERE NEVER BE GAMBIT/ROGUE ON THE BIG SCREEN?!?!?!!!? I'M GONNA BURN THIS PLACE TO THE GROUND
Boardwalk Empire
The first half of this season wasn't really doing much for me, but things have really picked up in the back half. The complete absence of Margaret was really weighing on me, so of course her reintroduction (!!!!!!with short hair!!!!!!!!) is a big factor. Before she reappeared i kept thinking that if they were gonna write her off the show they could have at least let her run away with Owen. :/ Speaking of which, Nucky's "i wouldn't put something alive in a box" and the LOOK between them, OH MY GOD. That was amazing.
I love Sally -- her punching Nucky in the face was the greatest because that is exactly what i wanted to do during his monologue of self-pity -- but as with all awesome ladies introduced as love interests for Nucky, her one flaw is that she's romantically interested in Nucky. Every woman he's with is too cool for him and it pisses me off that he's always there tainting an otherwise great character.
I can't believe they killed Eddie. :( Only five episodes after he narrowly survived last season! What a bunch of bullshit.
My least favorite part of this season and perhaps any season ever is The Misadventures of Willie Thompson. Holy shit i hate that kid. I was really unsettled by the murder of his classmate, too -- like, for as much violence as there is on this show, something about that graphic depiction of the corpse was really horrific. I am extremely unhappy that they've set him up to be Nucky's new protege, because while i suppose it's thematically interesting to have Nucky basically steal Eli's son, Willie is the absolute last character i want any more screentime with. Thankfully they've backed off of him lately, but i'm still resentful that they've forced such a shitty character on us. Especially while Margaret is relegated to only a handful of scenes in the entire season.
I LOVED the Chalky/Dunn showdown -- that was the most anxious i've been while watching this show in a long time, because i was really not sure if they were going to kill Chalky. The whole lead-up with Daughter singing to him was filled with a sense of doom, and then when Dunn finally arrived the tension was brutal. I really liked Dunn so i was sad to see him go, but better him than Chalky i guess. :/ I'm glad that Daughter ended up saving the day, and while i don't think her stuff with Narcisse has implied this at all, i'm really hoping her lifetime with him has just been her biding her time before she can kill him to avenge her mother. That would be sweet.
I'm loving the Lansky stuff this season. The real-life gangster plots are always reliably interesting, but he's been standing out lately.
I hadn't been skeptical of Roy's motives before he got overtly suspicious, but everyone else watching was wary of him from the start and the paranoia rubbed off on me because apparently i have to spend every season worrying that Gillian's going to die. He probably does have some connection to the kid Gillian killed and it's all gonna end in death and then i'm gonna be pissed.* Like, sure, Gillian deserves comeuppance, but so does everyone else on this show. You can't kill Gillian but allow Willie Thompson to live, that's just punishing the audience.
*the way i suspicion it might play out reminds me of an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents that i just watched -- a lady got a guy's brother killed by ratting to the police, the guy went to prison, guy got out of prison and went to kill the lady for revenge but the lady was so messed up that she didn't care if he killed her, so instead the guy decides to help her and make her happy (starts her dream business, gets her engaged to the guy she loves), and then at the very end once she's as happy as she can be and loves her life, THEN he murders her. Fucking revenge plots, man. So yeah, given Gillian's "i'm happy" stuff, that's where my mind went.
RICHARD AND JULIA GETTING MARRIED IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING THAT HAS EVER HAPPENED!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Of course right afterward i was mad at Richard for going to Nucky for a job and possibly putting Julia and Tommy in danger... but it turns out he's just a busboy, so. Not in immediate danger.
<3 <3 <3 Chalky and Richard <3 <3 <3
<3 <3 <3 Margaret and Rothstein <3 <3 <3
<3 <3 <3 unexpected delightful character combinations <3 <3 <3
I'm hoping that the continuous attempts on Chalky's life mean he is actually going to survive, because if he dies after narrowly escaping death approximately twenty times in a row i'm gonna be piiiiiiiiiiissed. THIS SHIT KEEPS BEING INCREDIBLY NERVE-WRACKING
I'm also fiiiiinally rewatching s2 right now, and it's immensely weird to go that far back to when so many other characters were alive. As depressing as this show is to just watch normally, it's even more depressing to rewatch it knowing exactly how things are going to go horribly wrong. (a lot like Game of Thrones!!) AND YET I JUST CAN'T GET ENOUGH. Its aesthetics appeal to me so much that it makes me ridiculously happy even while it's tearing out my guts.
The Walking Dead
I'M SO MAD THAT THEY GOT RID OF CAROL. At least she's still alive and they could always bring her back (and she's still in the credits... and it's so early in the season...) but it seemed like such a permanent exile. Even if it's a fakeout it pisses me off just the same. Flushing all hope for Carol/Daryl down the toilet, THE ONE THING I REALLY CARE ABOUT. And even obnoxiously delaying Daryl finding out about it! BUT BY ALL MEANS LET'S BRING BACK THE GOVERNOR. FUUUUUUCK YOOOOOOOOU!!!!!!!!!!
Luther
I just finished s1 and I LOVE IT. Even though i'd already seen literally every Alice Morgan scene on tumblr, it was all still way better in context. WAY WAY BETTER. Basically admitting she loves John in only the fifth episode?!?!!!? ahsgdgshafjghfg
"The universe isn't evil, John, it's just indifferent." *_____*
I was not expecting what happened in 1x05, like it started out like any other casefile and then Ian's downfall escalated SO QUICKLY and then OH GOD ZOE'S DEAD and OH GOD JOHN IS FRAMED FOR MURDER and i just kept screaming at the tv. And then the John/Alice team-up in 1x06 was everything you could ever hope for and every Batman/Catwoman feeling i've ever had and i can't handle it. I also really love that they teamed up with Mark because PAUL MCGANN (my viewing of this has of course coincided with the reappearance of the Eighth Doctor, aaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh) and also, i don't know, i liked Mark/Alice scenes and there was a lot of The Dark Knight in John/Zoe/Mark being Bruce/Rachel/Harvey so Mark/Alice is Two-Face/Joker?!??!?! I LOVE THIS BATMAN TV SHOW. HE'S THE HERO LONDON DESERVES BUT NOT THE ONE IT NEEDS RIGHT NOW.
<3 <3 <3 Justin Ripley <3 <3 <3
I love the theme song so much, the way it sets the mood and complements the atmosphere of the show is excellent. (but all the song choices have been excellent, really. "Everybody's Gotta Learn Sometime," "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood," i'm dyin') Also the FRAMING, so much negative space and how that thematically fits so perfectly, everyone is defined by absence, dark matter, death, the universe isn't evil it's just indifferent
Remember when Alice asked John "when do we start?" just like Loki in Thor 2 and Ruth Wilson is actually Lady Loki and Idris Elba is already Heimdall? EVERYTHING I LIKE CROSSES OVER WITH EVERYTHING ELSE I LIKE, it's the circle of life
Oblivion
Upon rewatching Oblivion and all the making-of special features it turns out i have a lot of fondness for that movie. Like, it's not really GOOD -- the characters are paper-thin, the script is eh -- but the atmosphere and aesthetics have really stuck with me and made me like it. I loved Victoria the first time i saw it, and that seems to have increased over time because it's such a let-down that her clones get NO ENDING. Like even aside from all the clones we didn't meet, at least Jack-52 winds up with the group at the end, but Vicka-52 who we DID see and who DID NOT die -- WHAT HAPPENS TO HER?!?!? WHY IS VICTORIA COMPLETELY IGNORED BY THE NARRATIVE??!? We're meant to care about the Jack clones as human beings equivalent to their original, so why does that narrative sympathy not extend to Victoria's clones? Her status as "other woman" means she's just there to be tragic and brushed aside?? She's misled just as much as Jack, but because she's complacent in the lie she never gets to learn the truth like Jack? I mean part of the sadness is she wouldn't want to know the truth, but it's never even presented as an option. Jack never makes an honest attempt to enlighten her -- yes she rejects all his attempts to get her to come with him and see the surface, but that's all under the false pretense of their mission and THEIR EXISTENCE, which is a really unfair thing to hold against her. IT MAKES ME SO SAD AND I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT IT.
And what happens after the Tet is destroyed? The drones died, so you can infer that the skytowers probably stop working as well -- they may operate somewhat independently of the Tet since it goes offline every day, and as separate outposts they're probably sustainable in some capacity, but even then you have to figure at some point they're going to become inoperable without the mothership -- so the clones in the skytowers have possibly no living resources and definitely no way of knowing what happened. They apparently don't have a built-in abbreviated lifespan since the ending implies that Julia will now live out her life with Jack-52 (and he already survived 3 years after the Tet was destroyed). Did the other clones wander out of the skytowers and try to find another place to survive? Did they die on the way? Did they stay put believing they were surrounded by radiation zones? Did they succumb to the horror of their existence stranded on a ruined planet and kill themselves? Were they found by other Scavs and assimilated into their groups? Obviously you can't have Victoria or any extra Jacks messing up Jack and Julia's happy ending, but that means Jack-52 is aware of the existence of his other clones and leaves them to a possibly horrible fate. The least he could do is go back and get Vicka-52. THEY WERE FRIENDS AT ONE POINT, YOU KNOW. When i was taking screencaps i started to like Jack/Vicka as the weird fraught mind-wiped clone Adam and Eve bitter exes that they are/become over the course of the movie. Even if their relationship was false, Jack still had to feel SOMEthing, and he did like her! I really liked all the deleted scenes (amazingly enough! they all had some nice extra details), but especially the one where Vicka fixes him up with the med kit. Clone friends!
I even invented a headcanon to make myself feel better about Victoria: Vicka-52 is actually with the group at the end and we just don't see her, and she and Sykes fall in love! (setting aside the fact that he and Zoe Bell are war buddies and therefore perfect for each other) But that way at least one Vicka gets a happy ending! She's a rule-abiding clone broken free from her tragic existence but still ingrained with love for a man who will never love her back! He's a no-nonsense war hero who no longer has a war to fight! She's ripped from a comfortable lie into harsh reality! He'll teach her to fight for her survival and value her autonomy! She doesn't know how to live in a dirty environment! His whole life is a dirty environment!
SO ANYWAY i've spent a lot of time thinking about this stupid movie just because it was so pretty. :) And i can't get over evil computers and space travel and clones and beautiful sci-fi living spaces and VICTORIA AND SALLYYYYYYYYY
Honestly in my imagination it's basically Portal 3, because i'm super good at taking superficial similarities way too far. The clone farming is even vaguely reminiscent of the end of the Portal 2 co-op story! So many test subjects! Right before the Tet is destroyed Sally may as well be saying "This isn't brave, it's murder." because that's what's happening in my head.
As much as i wish there were more to the Julia character, i really really love the stuff right after she wakes up and Jack and Victoria are trying to take care of her, because the first time around you don't really get the magnitude of her confusion, but upon rewatch it's like… holy shit, she's 60 years in the future but Jack and Victoria haven't aged, and they obviously don't know who she is, WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON. The terror on her face is great, because it's like… are they aliens? Is she on another planet? Is she in another dimension? Is she dead? WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE WHO LOOK LIKE HER CREWMATES? I love it.
Bioshock Infinite
I was originally pretty skeptical of this because so much of what makes Bioshock so effective is the awesome creepiness of its abandoned underwater city, and i thought a sunny and beautiful sky city just wouldn't be as great. BUT IT WAS SUPER GREAT. The environments were amazing, i spent the whole early part of the game just staring at stuff. It's also nice because the beautiful areas were a respite from (and excellent juxtaposition for!) the creepy and horrific parts, whereas Bioshock was all creepy and horrific all the time. (and also regular people are a lot less scary as enemies than SPLICERS so it's easier on the ol' nerves to not be terrified literally all the time). It was sort of like some monstrous amalgam of Boardwalk Empire, Fringe, and His Dark Materials, so needless to say: relevant to my interests!
Like a half hour into the game i already understood why the majority of fanart stuff i have seen for this game is the Luteces, and it only got better from there. The fact that Robert isn't technically Rosalind's brother, he is LITERALLY HER blew my mind. It didn't click for me until the "Lutece's Brother Arrives!" Kinetoscope (because before then you don't really have any reason to suspect that they're anything other than twins! except that Rosalind is only ever mentioned by herself) and then it was made explicit in the Voxophones immediately following, so i wasn't really ahead of the game on that one. I was thrilled every time the two of them showed up, but one of my favorites was when you discover Chen Lin is dead, that first time you see them disappear into thin air is the BEST.
I suuuuuper loved Albert Fink's modern song plagiarism, that delighted the hell out of me. At the very beginning of the game when you hear "God Only Knows" while you're walking around, before any revelations of tears and stuff i was like "hey, that's a Beach Boys song! did it exist before that?? was that a cover of some traditional song and i didn't know it?" so i googled it and kind of spoiled myself that no, the anachronism was in fact a plot point. But what a great plot point! The song choices were PERFECT, i'm obsessed with their version of "Everybody Wants to Rule the World." I also really liked the little "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" interlude/jam session -- it was so pretty and sad, and of course even sadder once you know the whole truth of what's going on.
I put it together really early that Elizabeth was Booker's daughter -- it was in the Hall of Heroes segment, when you hear about Lady Comstock's mysterious "seven day pregnancy," combined with the Rosalind Voxophone that Elizabeth was from somewhere else, and Booker's wife died in childbirth but Booker had no child -- I was surprised that all the clues were there so early but they left that revelation until the end. Of course, i didn't quite predict it the right way -- i thought Lady Comstock was Anna, and Elizabeth was stolen through the alternate Anna which killed her in childbirth (the only problem was it never added up that Booker didn't recognize Lady Comstock... but it was all a cheat because his memory was donked anyway!). Despite all that though i didn't add it up that Booker was Comstock until those final two Voxophones, what with the whole premature aging and who is the man left in the baptismal waters, and then i immediately recalled that one Comstock Voxophone about him "burning all the teepees" and Booker's involvement at Wounded Knee. Spoiler alert: you were an asshole all along!
And THEN even though i got all the clues for those final twists, the ending was still super weird! I LOVED IT. It was a lot more abstract than what i was expecting, and of course i'm a sucker for "all of this has happened before and all of this will happen again" Sisyphean cycles. I think it'd be rad if you could replay the game with actual different courses of events (rather than a few minor choices here and there) that lead up to the same place. Realistically i doubt that's feasible in terms of programming, BUT IT WOULD BE COOL.
Embarrassing confessions: for most of the game i was in denial about Elizabeth being Booker's daughter because i wanted to ship them BECAUSE I'M A CREEP. Their dynamic always seemed so much more like partners than father-daughter. AND THEY MET JUST LIKE RAPUNZEL AND EUGENE!!!!! No joke, a while before i finished the game i had a dream where they made out* and i was like "NOOOOOOOOOO SHE'S YOUR DAUGHTER!!!!!!!!!!" SO IT'S BEEN A VERY CONFLICTING TIME FOR ME. Booker is such a generic manpain-y protagonist and every time you see his face he's so boring looking, but his voice sounds so handsome. :( ugh i'm gross
Probably my favorite part (besides wandering around in the first couple hours) was when you were making your way up the Statue of Columbia: all the weird laboratory studying of "The Specimen," and then the great observation windows of Elizabeth's rooms. There's something about video game tableaux that always gets me. The feeling of discovering a detailed, lived-in place is so immersive. Breadcrumb storytelling! Exploring imaginary worlds!!! VIDEO GAMES!!!!!!!!! THEY'RE NEAT!!!!!!!!!!!
*i'm pretty sure at least 50% of my dreams are about fictional characters making out. Y I K E S
Thor: The Dark World
I really enjoyed it! I don't tend to feel like i'm mega fannish about the MCU because i get so bombarded with stuff on tumblr and i'm like "...you're all way more into this than i am" but at the same time i DO feel attached to it because i'm so bombarded with it??? Who knows. Every time a new movie comes out i get pretty into it but it doesn't really last. Thor and Cap are my favorite standalones at this point though (i got burnt out on Iron Man :/) and it's all just sort of casual fun for me. Cap may be my closest I'M FREAKIN' OUT favorite so i am kinda FREAKIN' OUT about The Winter Soldier (STEVE AND NATASHA a.k.a. probably the best thing the Avengers did so LET'S MAKE A WHOLE MOVIE WHERE THEY'RE BFFS?!?!!!!!?!?!??!?!?! askbfjhfjsdgsdjgh)
ANYWAY i liked this a whole lot. It's actually stuck with me more than i thought it would, and even more than the first movie did. I guess i've come around on realizing, oh, MYTHOLOGICAL SPACE FANTASY, yeah that appeals to my interests! I'm supremely pissed they killed Frigga, especially after her ultra badass dagger combat and protecting her future daughter-in-law (i really really love moms who love their son's girlfriends/spouses, evil mother-in-law cliches can go straight to hell). But the funeral was ridiculously pretty. >:*(
Fandom can be pretty tiresome about Loki, but i still love him so much when he's being tragic. :( And he has such a good face. :( And the brother stuff in this was really great. :( And then he had to ruin the beauty of his final moments by faking his death because, wow, what a bad decision-maker. Protecting Jane (!!!) and apologizing to Thor gets me right in the cockles of my cold dead heart and therein lies the true tragedy: i love good guy Loki and good guy Loki's existence is fleeting at best. My favorite part was when Thor went to visit his cell and told him to drop the illusion -- even though the trailers had shown hobo junkie Loki, the whole picture of his trashed cell and going from the poised, put-together Loki to the real, devastated one was so affecting.
Also that was the nicest dungeon i've ever seen, i'm pretty obsessed with it. All sci-fi minimalist, and those magic gold laser bars were super pretty. WAY TO GO ASGARD, sparing no expense on the prison system.
I LOVE HEIMDALL. One of my biggest takeaways from the first movie was a lot of feelings about Heimdall keeping watch at the edge of the cosmos. Every shot of him in his observatory is my favorite. So much gold! So many shapes! So pretty! I'm also finally watching and loving Luther (!!!! more on that later) so bonus extra feelings about Idris Elba's face, aw yeah
I really like Sif/Loki thanks to Rawles and Anna so i was pretty excited about the very few moments they had (oh ho Loki trickstering Thor into Sif and saying he looked ravishing, oh ho ho ho). A couple weeks ago i actually had a dream that there was a Sif/Loki prequel movie wherein they went hunting together as young adults and it looked beautiful and amazing (it was entitled "Dark Places" for those of you interested in adding it to your dream Netflix queue). p.s. what the fuck is wrong with my brain
THE CLIMACTIC PORTAL BATTLE WAS THE BESSSSTTTTTT. I love love love that Jane and Thor tag-teamed to save the day. I love Jane and science. Jane getting to see the universe!!!! Exploring other worlds!!!! Interrogating Asgardians about quantum field generators!!!! My biggest disappointment about her not being in the Avengers is that she and Bruce obviously would be best pals. :(
I did not like that they added in a few random Sif/Thor mentions and Sif jealousy of Jane and then never did anything with it. I mean i guess i'm glad it didn't amount to anything but in that case why include it at all? It's garbage and it sucks. Theoretically i should even like Sif/Thor because war buddies, but in my mind it just seems too close to Superman/Wonder Woman (with Thor/Jane being the Superman/Lois analogue) and WE ALL KNOW SUPERMAN/WONDER WOMAN IS NOT THE PROPER ORDER OF THINGS. Godlike superheroes belong with a human counterpart!!!
Needed way more Sif and Hogun (here's a shot of Hogun looking at the sky to remind you that he still exists, okay see ya!) and way less Fandral (recast too distracting!) c'mon guys
"How's space?" Darcyyyyyyy. All the London stuff was so good.
Of course loved the Steve cameo :D :D :D :D That Loki, what a scamp
I haven't cared about the X-Men movies since X2 (i saw X3 MULTIPLE times in the theater and i didn't even like it the first time! AWFUL. So many people liked First Class but once i finally saw it i didn't think it was very good. I still haven't seen The Wolverine but the first Wolverine movie broke my spirit so i dunno if i can do that again.) but the Days of Future Past trailer is awesome. Major nostalgic pangs seeing the other non-Wolverine characters again. ;_____; Bobby is boring but Shawn Ashmore is still so cute. ;_____; Although i'm calling bullshit that they're bringing Rogue back but NOT GAMBIT???!?!?! WILL THERE NEVER BE GAMBIT/ROGUE ON THE BIG SCREEN?!?!?!!!? I'M GONNA BURN THIS PLACE TO THE GROUND
Boardwalk Empire
The first half of this season wasn't really doing much for me, but things have really picked up in the back half. The complete absence of Margaret was really weighing on me, so of course her reintroduction (!!!!!!with short hair!!!!!!!!) is a big factor. Before she reappeared i kept thinking that if they were gonna write her off the show they could have at least let her run away with Owen. :/ Speaking of which, Nucky's "i wouldn't put something alive in a box" and the LOOK between them, OH MY GOD. That was amazing.
I love Sally -- her punching Nucky in the face was the greatest because that is exactly what i wanted to do during his monologue of self-pity -- but as with all awesome ladies introduced as love interests for Nucky, her one flaw is that she's romantically interested in Nucky. Every woman he's with is too cool for him and it pisses me off that he's always there tainting an otherwise great character.
I can't believe they killed Eddie. :( Only five episodes after he narrowly survived last season! What a bunch of bullshit.
My least favorite part of this season and perhaps any season ever is The Misadventures of Willie Thompson. Holy shit i hate that kid. I was really unsettled by the murder of his classmate, too -- like, for as much violence as there is on this show, something about that graphic depiction of the corpse was really horrific. I am extremely unhappy that they've set him up to be Nucky's new protege, because while i suppose it's thematically interesting to have Nucky basically steal Eli's son, Willie is the absolute last character i want any more screentime with. Thankfully they've backed off of him lately, but i'm still resentful that they've forced such a shitty character on us. Especially while Margaret is relegated to only a handful of scenes in the entire season.
I LOVED the Chalky/Dunn showdown -- that was the most anxious i've been while watching this show in a long time, because i was really not sure if they were going to kill Chalky. The whole lead-up with Daughter singing to him was filled with a sense of doom, and then when Dunn finally arrived the tension was brutal. I really liked Dunn so i was sad to see him go, but better him than Chalky i guess. :/ I'm glad that Daughter ended up saving the day, and while i don't think her stuff with Narcisse has implied this at all, i'm really hoping her lifetime with him has just been her biding her time before she can kill him to avenge her mother. That would be sweet.
I'm loving the Lansky stuff this season. The real-life gangster plots are always reliably interesting, but he's been standing out lately.
I hadn't been skeptical of Roy's motives before he got overtly suspicious, but everyone else watching was wary of him from the start and the paranoia rubbed off on me because apparently i have to spend every season worrying that Gillian's going to die. He probably does have some connection to the kid Gillian killed and it's all gonna end in death and then i'm gonna be pissed.* Like, sure, Gillian deserves comeuppance, but so does everyone else on this show. You can't kill Gillian but allow Willie Thompson to live, that's just punishing the audience.
*the way i suspicion it might play out reminds me of an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents that i just watched -- a lady got a guy's brother killed by ratting to the police, the guy went to prison, guy got out of prison and went to kill the lady for revenge but the lady was so messed up that she didn't care if he killed her, so instead the guy decides to help her and make her happy (starts her dream business, gets her engaged to the guy she loves), and then at the very end once she's as happy as she can be and loves her life, THEN he murders her. Fucking revenge plots, man. So yeah, given Gillian's "i'm happy" stuff, that's where my mind went.
RICHARD AND JULIA GETTING MARRIED IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING THAT HAS EVER HAPPENED!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Of course right afterward i was mad at Richard for going to Nucky for a job and possibly putting Julia and Tommy in danger... but it turns out he's just a busboy, so. Not in immediate danger.
<3 <3 <3 Chalky and Richard <3 <3 <3
<3 <3 <3 Margaret and Rothstein <3 <3 <3
<3 <3 <3 unexpected delightful character combinations <3 <3 <3
I'm hoping that the continuous attempts on Chalky's life mean he is actually going to survive, because if he dies after narrowly escaping death approximately twenty times in a row i'm gonna be piiiiiiiiiiissed. THIS SHIT KEEPS BEING INCREDIBLY NERVE-WRACKING
I'm also fiiiiinally rewatching s2 right now, and it's immensely weird to go that far back to when so many other characters were alive. As depressing as this show is to just watch normally, it's even more depressing to rewatch it knowing exactly how things are going to go horribly wrong. (a lot like Game of Thrones!!) AND YET I JUST CAN'T GET ENOUGH. Its aesthetics appeal to me so much that it makes me ridiculously happy even while it's tearing out my guts.
The Walking Dead
I'M SO MAD THAT THEY GOT RID OF CAROL. At least she's still alive and they could always bring her back (and she's still in the credits... and it's so early in the season...) but it seemed like such a permanent exile. Even if it's a fakeout it pisses me off just the same. Flushing all hope for Carol/Daryl down the toilet, THE ONE THING I REALLY CARE ABOUT. And even obnoxiously delaying Daryl finding out about it! BUT BY ALL MEANS LET'S BRING BACK THE GOVERNOR. FUUUUUUCK YOOOOOOOOU!!!!!!!!!!
Luther
I just finished s1 and I LOVE IT. Even though i'd already seen literally every Alice Morgan scene on tumblr, it was all still way better in context. WAY WAY BETTER. Basically admitting she loves John in only the fifth episode?!?!!!? ahsgdgshafjghfg
"The universe isn't evil, John, it's just indifferent." *_____*
I was not expecting what happened in 1x05, like it started out like any other casefile and then Ian's downfall escalated SO QUICKLY and then OH GOD ZOE'S DEAD and OH GOD JOHN IS FRAMED FOR MURDER and i just kept screaming at the tv. And then the John/Alice team-up in 1x06 was everything you could ever hope for and every Batman/Catwoman feeling i've ever had and i can't handle it. I also really love that they teamed up with Mark because PAUL MCGANN (my viewing of this has of course coincided with the reappearance of the Eighth Doctor, aaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh) and also, i don't know, i liked Mark/Alice scenes and there was a lot of The Dark Knight in John/Zoe/Mark being Bruce/Rachel/Harvey so Mark/Alice is Two-Face/Joker?!??!?! I LOVE THIS BATMAN TV SHOW. HE'S THE HERO LONDON DESERVES BUT NOT THE ONE IT NEEDS RIGHT NOW.
<3 <3 <3 Justin Ripley <3 <3 <3
I love the theme song so much, the way it sets the mood and complements the atmosphere of the show is excellent. (but all the song choices have been excellent, really. "Everybody's Gotta Learn Sometime," "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood," i'm dyin') Also the FRAMING, so much negative space and how that thematically fits so perfectly, everyone is defined by absence, dark matter, death, the universe isn't evil it's just indifferent
Remember when Alice asked John "when do we start?" just like Loki in Thor 2 and Ruth Wilson is actually Lady Loki and Idris Elba is already Heimdall? EVERYTHING I LIKE CROSSES OVER WITH EVERYTHING ELSE I LIKE, it's the circle of life