#2023 top ten anime list

[turtlycute]

My Top 10 Anime Watched in 2023:

Nana (2006) episodes: 47 started: 9-11-23 finished: 9-14-23 rating: 10/10

Sasaki to Miyano: Graduation (2023) movie watched: 9-28-23 rating: 10/10

Dororo (2019) episodes: 24 started: 3-1-23 finished: 3-3-23 rating: 9.5/10

Why Raeliana Ended Up at the Duke's Mansion (2023) started: 7-8-23 finished: 7-9-23 rating: 9.5/10

Summer Time Rendering (2022) episodes: 25 started: 1-12-23 finished: 1-14-23 rating: 9/10

Suzume (2022) film watched: 4-18-23 rating: 9/10

Skip Beat (2008) episodes: 25 started: 2-24-23 finished: 2-26-22 rating: 9/10

Big Windup (2007) episodes: 26 started: 8-13-23 finished: 8-15-23 rating: 9/10

My Happy Marriage (2023) episodes: 11 started: 7-5-23 finished: 9-22-23 rating: 9/10

Ahiru no Sora (2019-2020) episodes: 50 started: 8-3-23 finished: 8-8-23 rating: 9/10

Honorable Mentions:

Belle (2021) film watched: 1-11-23 rating: 9/10

Oshi no Ko (2023) episodes: 11 started: 9-6-23 finished: 9-7-23 rating: 9/10

Buddy Daddies (2023) episodes: 12 started: 7-19-23 finished: 7-20-23 rating: 9/10

Josee, the Tiger and the Fish (2020) film watched: 5-19-23 rating: 9/10

#2023 anime watch list #my anime list #2023 top ten anime list #top ten favorites #nana #sasaki and miyano graduation #dororo #why raeliana ended up at the duke's mansion #summer time rendering #suzume #skip beat #big windup #my happy marriage #ahiru no sora

[yuurei20]

Dorm-Specific Top-Ten Merch List

A top-ten list of the most-liked, dorm-specific Twisted Wonderland merchandise available through Animate's online store (that is still in stock as of April 2024)

#10 Pomefiore Eau de Toilette

#9 Diasomia Pendant Watch

#8 Heartslabyul Acrylic Frame

#7 Ignihyde Eau de Toilette

#6 Octavinelle Pendant Watch

#5 Savanaclaw Eau de Toilette

#4 Diasomnia Eau de Toilette

#3 Heartslabyul Eau de Toilette

#2 Diasomnia Shoulder Bag

#1 Octavinelle Eau de Toilette

Rankings from April 2023, October 2022 and October 2023

#twstmerch #twisted wonderland

[reallyhardydraws]

2023.

i hope any of you reading this will forgive the essay. i started posting to this art blog ten years ago in 2013 when i was just at the very end of high school, uploading short animations i'd made for one of my final projects, preparing myself for art school where i was gearing up to become an illustration/animation student.

i went into my art foundation course in 2014, still thinking i was going to be going into storybook illustration or with faint hopes of becoming like a concept artist for game/animation, although even then i'd started thinking about patterns...

and then in 2015 i did go into my BA, going in for that illustration with animation degree that... usually when i talk about it in real life, i say didn't really feel like the best place for me. if i think back, the best things i got out of it were two of my best friends, one of whom is now my partner. looking back on my BA era, there's some bits of sketchbook stuff...

and while i was at university my main fandoms were thunderbirds are go and x-men for a bit... these are from the end of 2015 into the beginning of 2016...

then for a little while i was doing this still sort of pastel-ish lineless situation:

and i alternated between that and this thin fineliner type work (pretty sure all of the linearted pieces were done on paper and scanned, and all the lineless were graphics-tablet-only) - it was in this style that i started to offer commissions for the first time too.

and i also had fineliner-lined work in sketchbooks that i coloured with marker and posca pens, the colours of which were generally a bit more intense just based on not being able to slide the hue/saturation around on paper:

also 2016 was when i discovered the spongebob musical just after it's trial run in chicago (which ended in july of 2016) and i started making fanart at that point... which would have the biggest effect on the way i drew (and i did end up handing in a piece of spongebob musical fanart as one of my art school homeworks lmao)

from summer 2016 until early 2017 things were still quite soft and pastelly in my digital art, colour-wise:

and then suddenly everything got whacked up to 100% on saturation. also i was using the binary tool to give everything really thin pixel lineart for some reason.

then i went on vacation in summer 2017 and didn't draw for maybe a month? just short of? and when i came back i decided to change everything up again... giving characters blobbier, more ugly-cute faces with large squinting eyes and big nostrils and i was worrying a lot less about making anything look smooth, lineart-wise. i turned off the pen stabiliser in SAI and let it wiggle.

then... the spongebob musical opened on broadway in late 2017, i went to see it live in person for the first time... and my whole brain was ENTIRELY consumed by my love of it. i was putting that david zinn inspired pattern explosion into everything, even if it wasn't sbm fanart.

as we go into 2018, i started colouring my lineart. my biggest interest was still broadway musicals (with spongebob at the top of the list)

i think summer 2017 - early 2018 is probably my favourite art era, i was at my most bright and colourful and exciting... although i know in my actual real life i was struggling a lot with my home situation and i had been for some time. art was definitely my escapism back then, and i think a lot of the time i drew really bright, joyful stuff to try and inject that feeling into myself.

as for my university work, i was putting my focus into 3D paper-mache puppets:

and i was also starting to do more repeat patterns, mostly inspired by things around me. i'd learned how to make patterns actually tile and repeat in 2017, so made a few during my time at uni just to accompany some of my projects, but never as the focus of them. one of my university tutors told me that maybe i should put more focus on doing surface pattern, and maybe applying it to textiles, but i said i wasn't interested.

i graduated from my BA in the summer of 2018, and immediately began volunteering at the whitworth art gallery doing anything i could - stewarding, helping with arts and crafts, dancing with families...

in 2019 i was still very colourful... i was trying out more chunky colouring on characters skintones that i think was def inspired by tumblr artist jadenvargen:

but the blobbyness and ugly-cute style of drawing faces was gone by here, and i think... the way i drew characters probably had better *anatomy*, proportions were maybe a bit more realistic...

in 2020 i started adding the black shading to under the chins and some other places on characters' bodies because i started watching the anime my hero academia with my brother, lmao (and i was starting to pastelise colours a bit again, these are the most pastel-ish examples) my lineart has really smoothed back out too, though i never turned my pen stabiliser back on in SAI. i think my hand just adjusted. probably seems a bit insane to miss that, but i do.

by the end of 2020, the almost-year of lockdown over cobid had... made me a bit insane, i think, and i moved out of my mother's house and into a flat with a friend from university.

in 2021 i think things were much the same... i think from this point on is where things have sort of settled. i don't want to say stagnated, but i do think things have been very... like this for a while.

2022 - got the most exciting examples out...

also i was very into these little frames in 2022.

and then on to 2023! in 2022, i did begin trying to shift gears a bit -- hoping to put more energy into sewing and making products (like my tutor has suggested back in uni, even though i'd really resisted the idea.) i sold at a few in-person markets during winter of 2022, but got disheartened by the amount of money i had to sink in up front to sign up for a spot...

which has made me VERY grateful for the people who have supported me via online sales. it has really helped me stay afloat in 2023 - AND it has felt more wonderful than i can describe that there have been people interested in my work... especially when a lot of it has been my original designs, rather than the fanart that i expect a lot of people initially followed me for.

i've also... in the past 2 years... branched out a bit more when it comes to 'being an artist' - and have had the opportunity to deliver arts & crafts workshops with local refugee & asylum seeker support charity, afrocats. it's taken me to their home base in a church to hotels across the city where asylum seekers were temporarily placed while waiting on their new homes, and of course to my beloved whitworth art gallery, where we welcomed visitors from all backgrounds: from the typical white middle class visitors the gallery usually expects, to all the refugee visitors coming into the space for the first time.

and through my volunteering at the whitworth, i showed up so often they decided they might as well pay me. so i've also become a facilitator of... creative play sessions, my favourites of which have been outdoors. monthly, year-round, we have 'outdoor art club', where i get to paint with mud and make potions from leaves with kids & families - here you can see me tell you a little bit about it in this video below with 'crempog' a puppet character that makes videos about activities for kids and families around manchester (my bit starts at 01:10 although i am in the intro and thumbnail haha)

and then of course the summer 'PLAYTIME' activities we've had the past two years: scrap studio in 2022, and play market in 2023. it's the best freelance gig ever -- just to hang out and encourage families to be creative and have fun.

in working more in these new avenues... outside of being - as i've called myself for a long time - "an internet artist"... i've found myself more interested in this sort of thing. in being a "real world artist" too. in doing surface pattern design, and being a workshop facilitator, i find myself wanting to put more energy into these sorts of projects.

in 2023 i've also dabbled a little bit more in youtube videos! i have had a channel for a while and have made videos in previous years, but 2023 has been the year i've done the most in. admittedly most of them haven't been about my art, and more just like... random things that interest me (the spongebob musical in particular) but i've really been enjoying video editing. that's kind of an art form too, so i'm including it here!

moving forward, want to keep putting even more of my energy into other things. my shop, with a bigger range of products to offer. workshops in real life, where i can make a difference.

as for my art blog... i feel like i've done the least drawing in many years in 2023, and... well, things have been weird and complicated for a bit in my real life. i hope to draw for fun a bit more again very soon, and to return to doing things in more of a wild and crazy way, to be more creative and exciting with the way i draw things. still, here's some of my favourites from 2023:

thank you so much to everyone who has borne witness to my art journey this past decade!!! i hope you will stick with me, who knows, maybe for another 10 years if tumblr holds out. especially a big thank you to everyone who has ever commissioned me, or bought anything from my store, you literally keep me able to make art at all and i cannot, cannot, cannot overstate how much it means to me.

i'm moving homes soon, possibly into very cramped temporary conditions for a little while before HOPEFULLY starting my real life with my partner. if i can take one more moment to plug my work, then [here is a link to my online shop] and [here is my ko-fi page too.]

cheers, cheers, cheers!

- LOREN 🌈🍍🎉

#also: i did post. monster high and steam powered giraffe fanart on my main blog when i was in high school #in 2012/2013 it seems like i did absolutely LOADS of fanart for both of those fandoms but didn't cross-post it to my art blog #and uh. well. i'm not about to do it now hahaha

[brucebocchi]

Winter 2024 anime roundup, Pt. 1: Ongoing/returning shows and the trash heap

hey y'all, this is also up on my ko-fi! it's free to read both here and there, but i'm struggling financially rn so i could appreciate if you'd throw a few bucks my way if you liked it!

I wasn't expecting to watch nearly this much anime in just the past three months, but life completely failed at getting in the way. So here's everything I either watched or tried​ to watch for the Winter 2024 season, and a short review for each.

I'm not going to bother with trying to rank them, so instead they're sorted by category, as follows:

Continuing series from Fall 2023

Returning series

What I dropped

Mixed reactions

On hold

New series that are actually good

With this first entry, I'll be covering the first three, with the back half arriving in another couple of days. As with the 2023 rankings, the OP for each show is linked in the corresponding title.

Here we go.

Ongoing shows:

The Apothecary Diaries

Looking back at my 2023 rankings, I think my placement of The Apothecary Diaries’ first cour at #11 may have belied how much I love this show and believe it to truly be one of last year’s greats. If anything, it was hampered by its status as an ongoing show making it incomplete by nature, and I worried myself over the possibility of recency bias taking over my top ten (Frieren is in the same boat, so its top overall ranking should really highlight how damn good it is). Make no mistake, though: The Apothecary Diaries fucking rocks, and it continues to fucking rock. 

It’s largely more of the same, and that’s what you would want from another cour of this show. At the same time, though, more and more is uncovered about Maomao’s background and Jinshi’s status as the proverbial camera continues to pull back and the mysteries adorning the edges of the frame become clearer. I got a sense at the end of the Fall 2023 cour that the show was moving on from its episodic nature into something more serial and plot-driven, and I was mostly right: While several episodes of the Winter cour still revolve around various mysteries of the week, they all start to converge before you even realize it. It’s the same flywheel-effect approach to plot development that Kaguya-sama did so well: While so many of the events seem like one-off curiosities in the moment, these almost-imperceptible movements eventually barrel forward into an unexpected but perfectly logical momentum. The show teases out several plot threads that may not seem relevant at first, and it trusts you to be patient enough to see them play out.

I’m not at all exaggerating when I say that, along with the next entry on this list, The Apothecary Diaries is one of the best anime of the past five years. I had a feeling that this could end up being the case as 2023 came to a close, but I’m sure of it now. Watch this show.

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Last year’s best anime continues apace into 2024 as we get an honest-to-goodness story arc: Frieren, who has been around too long to bother taking any magical governing bodies seriously, needs a certification as a mage in order to continue on the party’s journey north. She decides to take the necessary exam to be certified as a First-Class Mage, a rarefied status in this world, and has Fern tag along to do the same. 

And it’s still incredible! Great action, brilliant animation, wonderful character moments, and a beautiful score. It is still the top-rated anime ever on MyAnimeList, and by a significant margin. I’m not sure I agree, necessarily, but I can say with all sincerity that this has been a perfect season of television and my Fridays now feel empty without it. 

That’s all I’ve got on this one. What else do you want from me? I’ve already written nearly 2000 words about this show alone since it premiered. You’re asking me for more? I’ll kill you.

Shangri-La Frontier

If the low placement on my 2023 list was any indication, I was pretty fed up with Shangri-La Frontier by the end of its first cour, and the first couple episodes of 2024 being little more than plot set-up had me teetering on the edge of dropping it entirely. But I’ll be damned if it didn’t start reeling me back in once shit actually started happening and the plot really began to move forward.

Well, for a bit, at least. The height of the series so far has been the Wethermon arc, in which Sunraku teams up with his fellow shit-gamers, Pencilgon and Katzo, as they vie to be the first to take down a notoriously difficult unique boss. As the fight plays out, we get to see the feeling-out process of a tough action-RPG boss, rife with attack pattern memorization, skill timing, and buff stacking as the margin for error grows ever thinner. As always, the animation is on point, the soundtrack rules, and the action sequences are exhilarating.

But my major gripe with the series remains: There’s hardly any actual story here, even after 25 episodes. There are broad gestures towards a larger plot (“the truth of this world,” as the NPCs call it), but they are too vague to even resemble anything enticing. Everything in between the major fights is just set dressing, and there’s a lot of in between. There’s decent stuff in there, to be fair; the adorable rabbit NPCs are always a delight, and I love the commitment to depicting our top-level gamers as smug, preening shitheels. These are long walks for short drinks of water, though, and much of the main cast isn’t likable enough to make the downtime tolerable, to the point where watching the many set-up episodes feels like more of a grind than the actual grinding in the show. Even in the fight sequences I still had moments where I found myself yelling “STOP TALKING ALREADY” at the screen. Internal monologues are a constant in battle shonen, I know, but if there’s any demographic whose internal monologues I want to hear the least, it’s gamers.

I kept watching this show despite myself, and six months later I’m still not sure how much I actually enjoy it. I haven’t seen any of the lousy VRMMO anime that people favorably compare it to, so at least it isn’t Sword Art Online. Yay, I guess? Yet here I am, still plugging away at a show I can’t strongly recommend to a lot of people. Shangri-La Frontier has turned me into a Steam reviewer.

Undead Unluck

The stakes continue to rise exponentially in one of last year’s more underrated shonen hits (or it would’ve been a hit if Disney gave a fuck about marketing the anime on its own platforms). The Union neutralizes a threat, gains a new Roundtable member, and then shit hits the fan.

The scope of this series goes into absolutely buckwild directions, and all I will say is that “Kimi no Todoke predicting the future” was not a piece of worldbuilding I would have ever expected. But at the same time, it never loses focus on the human element, which only gets more poignant as it goes on. There’s a really beautiful message in the last arc about how people can live on through the memories of others, well past their bodies dying, which hits nice and hard considering this season aired at the same time as Frieren.

This is a show that I tended to watch sporadically (because I just plain forget to open Hulu just to watch one show every week), and I would say that it was the ideal way to watch it, except the pacing issues from the first cour only got worse during a monumentally consequential sequence in the middle of the second. There was an episode that had, I shit you not, 90 seconds of new content in the first seven minutes of runtime, and at the exact point in the series when you’re salivating for something, anything new. In a season where so much goes on in just 24 episodes, I’m baffled that they felt the need to pad the runtime so much.

That’s the worst of it, though, and the momentum fortunately builds up from there and barrels downhill until the end. The story becomes incredibly meta, which was a very ballsy move for a Shonen Jump series that was still relatively early into its run. The gamble pays off, though, and the debut season ends on several incredibly strong episodes, and now I want more. I’ll be hopping on the manga soon.

It also struck me towards the end of the season just how goddamn cute everyone looks. For all of the spraying blood and grim marching towards Armageddon, it says a lot that I still wanna pinch everyone’s fat little cheeks.

Returning shows:

The Dangers in My Heart, season 2

The first season was absent in my 2023 rankings but I decided to pick it up while the second was still airing, and I’m so glad I did: The Dangers in My Heart is an almost-too-precious middle school romance that is endlessly endearing and bluntly honest (if a little exploitative) about what middle schoolers are actually like, warts and all. Insecurities are amplified, they struggle to figure out their identities, and mental and physical development runs on different schedules from one kid to the next. And amidst all this raging hormonal nonsense, we have ourselves a lovely little romance story.

Kyotaro has (mostly) kicked his chuuni tendencies and realized that he’s madly in love with the beautiful, cheery Anna. He’s as aware as anyone of what a mismatched couple they’d be, though, and continues to self-sabotage any progress in the name of maintaining her good social standing. To pile onto his loner’s perspective of middle school politics, Kyotaro also gets a front-row seat to Anna’s part-time work as a model-slash-actress and he wonders if an underdeveloped shrimp like him should be anywhere near someone so obviously more mature. At the same time, though, he’s a growing boy, and we see lovely moments of progress as Kyotaro takes initiative both for her sake and to achieve what he wants. To both ameliorate and complicate these situations, Anna reciprocates his feelings towards her, and we creep ever closer towards what we want to see, in increasingly awkward and precious fashion.

So much of this anime is just gorgeous. Even setting aside the visuals and music (which are on point at all times), there are really lovely themes in here about insecurity, teenage perception of maturity, and self acceptance. On top of all of that, though, this is just a delightful slice-of-life romance story. You can probably guess where we’ve ended up by the end of the second season, but it’s the getting there that makes it all worth it. The manga is still running (and I plan to pick it up), so there’s clearly plenty more of the story to tell, but if this is where the anime ends, it ended perfectly.

Holy shit, though, did the first season really air at the same time as Skip and Loafer and Insomniacs After School? Dentists must have made a mint that season because every single one of these shows is so unrelentingly sweet that my teeth start to itch. Not that I’m complaining.

Mashle: Magic and Muscles, season 2

I honestly think I might’ve been too hard on Mashle in my 2023 rankings. I gave up on it a few episodes in when it’d initially aired, but I eventually came back to finish out the season and ended up having a pretty good time. I’ll cop to having forgotten that latter part when I mapped out those rankings, but that enjoyment quickly came back to me when I picked up season 2... even if the season begins with a ton of table setting.

Plenty of battle shonen take time to find their voice, both in manga and anime, and Mashle really seemed to hit its stride fairly quickly into the second season. Mash’s lack of magical quality is no longer a secret, and now magical society has to find a way to deal with it, so the series’ initial stakes are raised and Mash HAS to become a top-level sorcerer lest he lose his life. Also, the bad guys are back. Unfortunately, just as I started to genuinely appreciate the ensemble cast, most of Mash’s friends took a backseat to the larger plot (Lemon is nowhere to be seen almost all season) as the villains raise the stakes with increasingly JoJo-esque magic abilities. There’s still plenty to like, though, and some of the new characters help. Props for having an openly nonbinary character play a major role.

The music is a real highlight here; a surprising amount of hip-hop paints the backdrops during dialogue, and any show with an OP by Creepy Nuts will immediately grab my attention. "Bling-Bang-Bang-Born" actually turned into a bona fide hit single, much like Oshi no Ko's "Idol" and Jujutsu Kaisen's "SPECIALZ," and I'd say it's well earned (seriously, it fucks, please click the link above). The animation has also started to really pick up where it felt like it kept falling short in the first season as well, and I found myself looking forward to action sequences more as the season went on.

And hey, it might’ve taken 21 episodes to get there, but I finally laughed at a cream puff gag!

Urusei Yatsura (2022), season 2

I really don’t have much to say other than it’s more Urusei Yatsura, and that’s just swell. We continue the modern adaptation of the classic gag manga as the OG anime babe and her piece-of-shit “darling” get caught up in yet more bizarre hijinks. Despite the 48-episode run being touted as an “Urusei Yatsura all-stars” cherry-pick from Rumiko Takahashi’s 34-volume opus, not all of the segments hit on the same level, but the stories that last entire or even multiple episodes have been killer. Lum and Ataru, despite their myriad flaws, genuinely do care for one another, and this series is at its best when those feelings get to shine through. Takahashi remains a legend for her expert balancing of comedy and heart, and while this particular adaptation doesn’t have the built-in benefit of 300+ chapters of familiarity, those moments still feel earned.

It’s Urusei Yatsura. It’s a classic for a reason. Watch it.

Dropped:

Gushing Over Magical Girls (dropped after one episode)

For the TL;DR version, consult the image above.

All I’d heard about this show going in was that the manga it’s based on was good and that there would be boobs. I wish I’d known more than that before watching, though, because if I’d known that said boobs would belong to middle schoolers, I wouldn’t have bothered with even the one episode I did end up watching.

I was drawn in by the initial premise, too: The protagonist, the conspicuously-named Utena (who looks enough like Bernadetta from Fire Emblem that I was immediately endeared to her), is an enormous fan of the magical girls who keep her city safe, so when an adorable maho shoujo mascot approaches her with an offer, she immediately takes him up on it. As her sinister-looking (and unnecessarily revealing) costume suggests, though, Utena doesn’t get to live out her magical girl dreams; she actually got roped into—and blackmailed into keeping—a role as a villainess. The magical girl team she idolizes quickly recognizes this, and to stave off their assault, Utena is forced to summon a monster to bind them. As they continue to struggle and squeal, Utena goes further with it by ripping their clothes and spanking their bare bottoms red, because it turns out that she’s actually into this stuff, sexually. The title, it turns out, is a double entendre.

Credit where it’s due for a clever concept: On paper, this is really goddamn funny! My issue is with the execution: I don’t really care to see someone’s sexual awakening if it involves repeated violations of consent, and doubly so if I have to see nudity of ostensible middle schoolers (Japanese middle schools are the equivalent of seventh through ninth grade, so even on the older end these girls are 15 at most). After 100 Girlfriends, I thought I could handle whatever trashy bullshit any anime could throw my way, but the longer I chewed on Gushing’s premiere, the worse it sat with me. I have no intentions of playing morality police here, but I can’t bring myself to watch any more of this than I already have. 

Early teenage sexuality is a very difficult subject matter to handle delicately, especially in a comedy milieu, and I can levy plenty of criticisms on that matter towards series I otherwise enjoyed, like Call of the Night and the aforementioned Dangers in My Heart. And although there appear to be some coming-of-age elements here, Gushing doesn’t seem interested in handling it without being exploitative. Maybe it gets better, but I don’t really plan to find out for myself. 

I just feel like it’s a shame that in a season with some actual halfway decent LGBT representation, the breakout yuri hit is about middle schoolers performing dubiously-consensual BDSM on each other. And maybe that speaks to something for some sapphic viewers, and I have no intention of speaking over them, but I do know that this isn’t for me. I would’ve gone fucking feral over this show when I was like 13, but I haven’t been a 13-year-old boy for a long, long time. 

I may not have a leg to stand on here as someone who watches Mushoku Tensei (although frankly, that one’s on strike two with me), but I have to put my foot down somewhere. For me, that “somewhere” is borderline pornography involving 13-15 year olds. I try to meet media where it is, even the squicky stuff, but I cannot put myself at the level Gushing Over Magical Girls sets for itself. 

Sasaki and Peeps (dropped after eight episodes)

This show is frustrating to even process postmortem. After a mildly intriguing hour-long premiere that introduced a whole lot of concurrent concepts, Sasaki and Peeps somehow managed to not only continue heaping new ideas onto the pile, but also fumble every single one of them in a way that wasn’t even entertaining to watch.

Sasaki, a lonely 40-something salaryman of modest means, decides that instead of living vicariously through adorable animal photos on social media, he should pull the trigger and get a pet of his own. He settles on a reasonably-priced and suitably adorable fat little Java sparrow, who as it turns out speaks human language and is actually named Piercarlo the Starsage (Sasaki settles on Pii-chan, or Peeps in English). The bird was reincarnated from another world, where he is able to take Sasaki at will, and the man realizes he can use the other world’s relative dearth of technology to his advantage and sets up an interdimensional trade full time so he can make coin on his own watch and help Peeps try the delicious beef he heard is the best food in Sasaki’s world. To the latter end, he also invests in a restaurant. Peeps also helps teach him magic, which Sasaki is forced to use in a pinch in the real world. He is quickly found out and gets roped into a secret government bureau of psychics, because the agent who caught him using ice magic decides he’d be a perfect complement to her water powers (think Kanne and Lawine from Frieren, but stupider). Sasaki now has to balance these multiple lives, which hardly ever interact with one another, as the stakes rise in Peeps’ world in the form of palace intrigue and in Sasaki’s world in the form of a growing threat of evil psychics or something. Also, there’s magical girls, because why the fuck not at this point.

If you actually managed to process all that and went “wow, that’s a lot, I wonder how they can tie all that together,” it brings me no pleasure to report that Sasaki and Peeps completely fails at that task. This is a work of fiction with entirely too many ideas, to the point where it feels like it has no ideas. There’s a saying in football that a team with two quarterbacks is a team with no quarterback, and Sasaki and Peeps has, like, six on its depth chart. You ever hear a band that managed to cram multiple genres in the same song and you get whiplash every time it switches up? Those are bands with a lot of influences, but no identity to call their own, and that is Sasaki and Peeps to me. It is the Twenty One Pilots of anime. A lot of shit got thrown at the wall, and none of it stuck: This show, conceptually, is shit-stained drywall with a pile of turds adorning the moulding. 

For a show about a 40-year-old man, it gave me serious pause that there was not a single named adult woman in any of the episodes I watched, and I grew even more frustrated waiting for one to show up. Sasaki’s partner, Hoshizaki, seems to be a driven, professional young woman, but it turns out she’s a 16 year old high school student, for some reason. The daughter of the viscount doing business with Sasaki is a young girl who likes to tag along with him, and Sasaki’s neighbor is a latchkey high school girl who may or may not have a yandere-ish fixation on him. The magical girl we meet is also definitely a kid. The female psychics they face off against don’t appear to be older than teenagers, though the one who appears to grow fond of him turns out to be several hundred years old, which especially gave me pause because we all know that unfortunate trope and the type of person who hides behind it. Before progressing any further, I found out that the light novel series upon which this show is based was written by someone with the pen name “Buncololi,” which told me the rest of what I needed to know.

That part made me increasingly uncomfortable, and I became less and less convinced that this show was capable of sticking the landing as it continued to pile on new, contrived ideas. This was a waste of an excellent voice cast, but more than that, a waste of time.

Tales of Wedding Rings (dropped after nine episodes)

I can’t believe how much goddamn isekai I ended up watching this season. That Tales of Wedding Rings wasn’t the worst one (see above) was a minor miracle, because boy howdy was this one a dud.

Satou is just a normal high school boy, blah blah blah, his childhood friend he’s in love with is actually a princess from another world and she has to go back to fulfill a political marriage, he follows her into the portal to pull a Benjamin Braddock. But then, gasp, the palace is under attack, so the princess (her native name is Krystal, but growing up in Japan she was known as Hime, which means… princess) instead decides to marry Satou, bestowing upon him her kingdom’s ring, which gives him powers that he uses to fight back the demons. It turns out that her ring enables him to use one elemental affinity out of five, so of course now Satou has to collect the other four to become the Ring King and save the world, and to do so he has to also marry each corresponding princess.

This is basically Tolkien’s Rings of Power but as a harem isekai with bonus nudity. What I saw of the season was basically a MacGuffin hunt that had waifus of various fantasy races attached. Fine character designs for each, to be fair, but it wasn’t enough to keep me interested.  It’s funny on paper that (to paraphrase Geoff Thew) our protagonist’s power level scales with the size of his harem, but Tales didn’t do enough to make me actually care what was happening. And I wanted to! There were elf titties and I didn’t care. That’s criminal.

What makes Tales especially difficult to watch is that this show is fuck ugly. The color palette is muddy and unappealing, everyone looks uncannily shiny, and there’s a smudgy Vaseline filter over everything. The action sequences are uninspiring, the animation is lousy, and every character looks terribly off-model unless they’re naked. Watch the OP I linked if you don't believe me; that's the best of it. The aural element isn’t much better; ecchi scenes are punctuated by a Cinemax-caliber smooth jazz score that I pray was chosen ironically, and most of the show’s humor consists of “an old guy is screeching.” And if you’re wasting Shigeru Chiba’s talents on that one lousy joke, you’ve fucked up catastrophically.

What completely pushed me out of wanting to see any more of this show, though, was how hard it doubled down on the worst elements of harem anime by having Protag-kun be a wishy-washy little ninny even though he’s openly declared his love for and is literally married to Hime/Krystal. And I wanted to care about her; the narrative made me want to care about her, and her jealousy of the other princesses is warranted, but alas, the harem demands bodies. To his credit, Satou recognizes her mixed emotions and makes extra time for her to make it clear that she’s forever number one in his heart, but every single time their shared romance and emotions actually push them towards consummating their (all caps for emphasis) MARRIAGE, the show goes Rent-a-Girlfriend on us and finds a cheap excuse to ruin the moment. No thanks, I’m out. Nothing else about this show is good enough to make me wade through that shit.

Honestly, the only thing that had me coming back after my Persona 3-induced hiatus was that I wanted to see the dragon girl, and that alone was almost worth it, but there really isn’t much of a draw otherwise. There were better isekai, better romances, better fantasy settings, and even better uncensored harem shenanigans this season. I might pick this back up as the second season approaches, but I’m not in any hurry.

#anime reviews

[ohsalome]

Ivan and Phoebe by Oksana Lutsyshyna

Ivan and Phoebe is a novel about a revolution of consciousness triggered by very different events, both global and personal. This is a book about the choices we make, even if we decide to just go with the flow of life. It is about cruelty, guilt, love, passion – about many things, and most importantly, about Ukraine of the recent past, despite or because of which it has become what it is today.

The story told in Oksana Lutsyshyna’s novel Ivan and Phoebe is set during a critical period – the 1990s. In the three decades that have passed since gaining independence, Ukraine has experienced many socio-political, economic, and cultural changes that have yet to be fully expressed. The Revolution of Dignity in 2014 marked a pivotal moment in the country’s history, as it signaled a shift towards European integration and a strong desire to distance itself from Moscow. Prior to this, Ukrainian culture had remained overshadowed by Russian influence, struggled to compete for an audience and was consequently constrained in exploring vital issues.

77 days of February. Living and dying in Ukraine

"77 Days," is a compelling anthology by contributors to Reporters, a Ukrainian platform for longform journalism. The book, published in English as both an e-book and an audiobook by Scribe Originals.

"77 Days'' offers a tapestry of styles and experiences from over a dozen contributors, making it a complex work to define. It includes narratives about those who stayed put as the Russians advanced, and the horror they encountered, like Zoya Kramchenko’s defiant "Kherson is Ukraine," Vira Kuryko’s somber "Ten Days in Chernihiv," and Inna Adruh’s wry "I Can’t Leave – I’ve Got Twenty Cats." The collection also explores the ordeal of fleeing, as in Kateryna Babkina’s stark "Surviving Teleportation '' and "There Were Four People There. Only the Mother Survived." 

It also highlights tales of Ukrainians who created safe havens amidst the turmoil, such as Olga Omelyanchuk’s "Hippo and the Team," about zookeepers safeguarding animals in an occupied private zoo near Kyiv, and one of Paplauskaite’s three pieces, "Les Kurbas Theater Military Hostel," depicting an historic Lviv theater turned shelter for the displaced, including the writer/editor herself.

In the Eye of the Storm. Modernism in Ukraine 1900’s – 1930’s

This book was inspired by the exhibition of the same name that took place in Madrid, at the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, and is currently at the Museum Ludwig, located in Cologne, Germany. 

Rather than being a traditional catalogue, the publishers and authors took a more ambitious approach. Rather than merely publishing several texts and works from the exhibition, they choose to showcase the history of the Ukrainian avant-garde in its entirety – from the first avant-garde exhibition in Kyiv to the eventual destruction of works and their relegation to the "special funds" of museums, where they were hidden from public view.

These texts explain Ukrainian context to those who may have just learned about the distinction between Ukrainian and Russian art. Those "similarities" are also a product of colonization. It was achieved not only through the physical elimination of artists or Russification – artists were also often forced to emigrate abroad for political or personal reasons. Under the totalitarian regime, discussing or remembering these artists was forbidden. Archives and cultural property were also destroyed or taken to Russia.

"The Yellow Butterfly" by Oleksandr Shatokhin 

"The Yellow Butterfly" is poised to become another prominent Ukrainian book on the themes of war and hope. It has been listed among the top 100 best picture books of 2023, according to the international art platform dPICTUS.

The book was crafted amidst the ongoing invasion. Oleksandr and his family witnessed columns of occupiers, destroyed buildings, and charred civilian cars. Shatokhin describes the book’s creation as a form of therapy, a way to cope with the horrors. "During this time my vision became clearer about what I wanted to create – a silent book about hope, victory, the transition from darkness to light, something symbolic," he explains.

Although "The Yellow Butterfly" is a wordless book, today its message resonates with readers across the globe.

A Crash Course in Molotov Cocktails by Halyna Kruk

A Crash Course in Molotov Cocktails is a bilingual poetry book (Ukrainian and English) about war, written between 2013 and 2022, based on Halyna’s experience as an author, volunteer, wife of a military man and witness to conflict. 

The Ukrainian-speaking audience is well-acquainted with Halyna Kruk – a poet, prose author and literature historian. Kruk is increasingly active on the international stage, with her poetry featured in numerous anthologies across various languages, including Italian, French, Swedish, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish, Polish, English, German, Lithuanian, Georgian and Vietnamese. 

For an English-speaking audience, her poetry unveils a realm of intense and delicate experiences, both in the midst of disaster and in the anticipation of it. The poems are succinct, direct, and highly specific, often depicting real-life events and individuals engaged in combat, mourning, and upholding their right to freedom.

#ukraine #ukrainian stuff #ukrainian literature #books #book recommendation #ukrainian culture

[kaleidodreams]

Top Ten Favorite Anime of 2023

It's that time of year again! Here's my ranking of my ten favorite anime released this year.

Spy x Family

2. Sacrificial Princess and the King of Beasts

3. Frieren: Beyond Journey's End

4. The Apothecary Diaries

5. Skip and Loafer

6. Buddy Daddies

7. Trigun Stampede

8. My Love Story with Yamada-kun at Lv999

9. Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead

10. A Galaxy Next Door

#anime #spy x family #sacrificial princess and the king of beasts #frieren: beyond journey's end #the apothecary diaries #skip and loafer #buddy daddies #trigun stampede #my love story with yamada kun at lv999 #zom 100: bucket list of the dead #a galaxy next door

[roguegambitweek]

Rogue/Gambit Week 2023

Romy Week 2023

The results are in. Votes have been tabulated and the prompts assigned. Thanks to everyone who voted!

And now, here’s what you’ve been waiting for. The themes for Rogue/Gambit Week 2023 are…

Creative Prompts

Day 1 - Sunday, February 26th -  Battle Couple | Only One Bed

Day 2 - Monday, February 27th -  Cats | Arranged Marriage

Day 3 - Tuesday, February 28th - Family Dinner | Flirting

Day 4 - Wednesday, March 1st - Rogue messing with friends after she got her powers under control, but they don’t know it yet | Murder Mystery

Day 5 - Thursday, March 2nd - First Child | Fake Dating

Day 6 - Friday, March 3rd -  Valle Soleada | Enemies to Lovers

Day 7 - Saturday, March 4th - Golden Anniversary | Free Day

Fandom Prompts

Sunday - What brought you into Romy fandom?

Monday - ‘Their Song’ — What do you think Romy would choose for ‘their song’ and why?

Tuesday - Top Ten List — What’s your Romy top ten? Story arcs, fanfics, moments, lines, costumes, etc.

Wednesday - What is the ‘moment’ which exemplifies Romy for you?

Thursday - FanFic Rec Lists

Friday - For those who have been in fandom since the early days, share your memories—what were the prevalent fan theories, popular fanons, the ‘must read’ fanfics, fandom communities, etc.

Rules:

- This is a celebration of all things Romy! Your fanworks may cover any point of their relationship—from their early flirtations to their life together as an old married couple, from friendship to lovers.

- Rogue and Gambit do not need to be in a romantic relationship (friendship is great too!), but their relationship should be the primary focus.

- Feel free to draw inspiration from any medium which they appeared (the comics, the animated series, the movies, etc.).

- Please tag your posts #rogue/gambitweek2023 or #rogue/remyweek2023 within the first five (5) tags so they can be easily found and re-blogged on the Rogue/Gambit Week blog.

- Fanworks are not limited to fanfic, fanart, and fanedits. However you create, that is also a part of what makes a fanworks week successful. Yes, fic, art, and edits are the most common, but I’ve seen amazing fanworks accomplished in other ways. In our first year a short video was shared concerning what Gambit keeps in his pockets. In another fandom, I’ve seen someone shared why a particular musical score reminded them of the couple. I’ve seen people make text conversations between characters focused around that day’s prompt. Handcrafts, music, photography, cosplay, and countless other creative ventures can also be part of a fanworks week. Have fun creating. Please feel free to share.

- Any NSFW content must be placed under a ‘read more,’ otherwise it will not be re-blogged.

- You don’t need to post something for every day/every prompt Feel free to participate in as many days as you feel inspired. If you have created something, but are unable to post it on the assigned day, please post it when you can. It will still be re-blogged.

- You may combine days (as in cover two or more prompts with the same entry)

- You may have noticed, this year we have 2-3 prompts for each day. You do not need to use all the prompts in your submissions. (Though feel free to combine them if you feel inspired to do so).

A quick reminder, Rogue/Gambit Week takes place February 26-March 4, 2023. If you have any questions, please feel free to send an ask.

Have fun creating!

#rogue/gambitweek2023 #rogue/remyweek2023 #rogue #gambit #romy #anna marie lebeau #remy lebeau #romy week #prompts #fanart #fanfic #fanedits #fandom appreciation

[terramythos]

TAYLOR READS 2023: GUARDS! GUARDS! BY TERRY PRATCHETT

Title: Guards! Guards! (1989)

Author: Terry Pratchett

Genre/Tags: Fantasy, Comedy, Mystery, Third-Person

Rating: 9/10

Date Began: 07/02/2023

Date Finished: 07/23/2023

Corruption is nothing new to the ancient city of Ankh-Morpork. But when a secret society desperate to seize power summons a dragon to terrorize the city, even its resident thieves, murderers, and hustlers seem at a loss to stop it.

The City Watch has long been a running joke with no real power to enforce the law. Nevertheless, Captain Vimes finds himself caught up in the mystery behind the dragon— but must overcome his own shortcomings to help save his city.

Ankh-Morpork! Brawling city of a hundred thousand souls! And, as the Patrician privately observed, ten times that number of actual people. The fresh rain glistened on the panorama of towers and rooftops, all unaware of the teeming, rancorous world it was dropping into. Luckier rain fell on upland sheep, or whispered gently over forests, or patterned somewhat incestuously into the sea. Rain that fell on Ankh-Morpork, though, was rain that was in trouble.

For live reading notes, check the reblogs (contains unmarked spoilers).

Content warnings and review (spoiler-free and spoiler versions) under the cut.

Content Warnings: Mentioned -- Fantasy!racism, homophobia, sexual harassment, genocide, torture, animal death, incest Depicted -- Death, alcoholism, sexual humor/innuendo (like, a lot), addiction, misogyny, drug use

**SPOILER-FREE REVIEW**

This is my first Discworld book. I read Good Omens many years ago, which was co-authored by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. But while I enjoyed that novel, I always wanted to read Pratchett’s solo works. I’ve heard universally positive things about Pratchett as a writer and Discworld in particular, so it’s been on my reading list for years. I finally decided to go for it, picked a random book based on fan recommendations, and dove into Guards! Guards!

… And I enjoyed it even more than I thought I would. I knew going in that Discworld is a comedic fantasy series, so I fully expected jokes and clever quips. One challenge with comedy is telling a funny joke without punching down or being overly mean-spirited, but Pratchett totally nails it. Guards! Guards! is hysterically funny. It’s impossible to list the best gags because there are so many good ones. However one of my favorite bits is toward the beginning, when a mysterious figure is trying to meet his secret society in the pouring rain, finds a shady looking door, answers the doorkeeper’s over-the-top esoteric passphrases, only to discover he’s at the WRONG secret society. The two have an ordinary exchange of pleasantries while the doorkeeper directs him to the right place. It’s great stuff. In general, I like that Guards! Guards! is a self-aware deconstruction of high fantasy, but it’s never over the top in its commentary.

But what pleasantly surprised me about the book was its ability to be genuinely funny yet treat serious topics with the gravity they deserve. Guards! Guards! has many philosophical observations about loneliness, poverty, human nature, and more. Pratchett has a knack for knowing when to be funny and when to step back and discuss things in a mature, honest way. I think the comedy makes the serious subject matter all the more poignant.

Captain Vimes is the protagonist, but there are many perspective characters, and they all feel distinct and interesting. I especially like Lady Ramkin, The Librarian (who’s a sapient orangutan— hell yeah), and what little we see of the Patrician. Death’s handful of appearances are all memorable and fantastic. Guards! Guards! starts as a small scale mystery that gradually expands to a city-wide conflict. Pratchett nails the pacing; the rising stakes are totally believable, and I never felt like the plot was boring or treading water. It is a satisfying and entertaining story from start to finish.

I loved the book and highly recommend it, but I do have some caveats and criticisms to keep in mind.

Guards! Guards! centers around Ankh-Morpork’s City Watch, who are essentially the police. However, I do not consider this work to be copaganda. The City Watch are comically underpowered and ineffectual; their low status is a major plot point and recurring joke throughout the novel. They have no means to do great harm or great good, nor do they have the funding or social status that modern police do. The four City Watch characters are also not portrayed in a universally heroic light. They’re petty, often selfish people who occasionally do the right thing (though Carrot might be an exception). I found myself rooting for protagonist Captain Vimes, but purely because of his personal struggles, not his job. In general the Discworld is so far removed from the socio-political structure and history of our world that the analogue between the Watch and modern police is surface level at best. That being said, I understand others may not be comfortable with this premise.

My primary criticism is, as with many fantasy novels, a lack of female characters. Lady Sybil Ramkin is an INCREDIBLE character; she’s funny, bald, physically imposing. unapologetically fat, and remarkably intelligent. She was a joy to read and definitely one of my favorite characters. I have little patience for obligatory love interest characters, but Ramkin stands on her own and is integral to the plot— Vimes just also has a crush on her, and the sexual tension between them is VERY funny. That being said, she is also the only notable female character in a large, male-dominated cast. One could argue there’s a second one, but that's very subjective and a spoiler (more on it in that section). I don’t think any book is beholden to an arbitrary checklist of representation, but is is a shame to see such an unbalanced cast.

**SPOILER REVIEW**

Guards! Guards! did have some genuinely surprising twists and turns. It took me a long time to figure out Lupine Wonse was the self-titled Supreme Grand Master. I knew it had to be someone we met in the story, but to me Wonse came across as nothing more than a competent yet underappreciated secretary. In retrospect it makes a lot of sense; the desire for power one might feel in that role, his extra characterization/connection to Vimes, his name being a play on “a wolf in sheep’s clothing”, and so on. But he had me fooled until the first “light reveal” before the story directly confirms he’s the culprit.

The dragon being female is a funny twist. It explains Errol the swamp dragon’s odd behavior. The story frames him as a hopeless underdog instinctively wanting to challenge a more powerful dragon for territory, so the reveal he’s really just looking to court her is hysterical. That being the resolution to the dragon problem is thematically sound. After all, Ankh-Morpork is not a city of heroes, so why would there be some heroic dragon slayer as alluded to throughout the story? The dragon is the second “major female character” I mentioned earlier. And she IS a character, especially when she and Wonse discuss the concept of human sacrifice late into the novel. But since we don’t even know her sex until the end of the story, I don’t think she really counts. As a side note, I do wonder if the dragon in Shrek took inspiration from this book…

One spoiler scene I REALLY enjoyed is Death infiltrating the secret society right before they get annihilated by the dragon. After all, Death wears a shadowy cowl, much like the Brethren, so no one suspects him. It’s delicious dramatic irony, because the reader can identify Death right away from his unique dialogue. But of course, none of the Brethren know this… until it’s too late.

Among the serious subjects discussed in the novel, the Patrician’s monologue at the end about human nature and evil hit me hard. He argues that the view of humans as good or evil is inherently flawed. Instead he calls all humans inherently evil in consistent, small ways: "Down there… are people who will follow any dragon, worship any god, ignore any iniquity. All out of a kind of humdrum, everyday badness… They accept evil not because they say yes but because they don’t say no.” Guards! Guards! was published in 1989, but this is a very specific thing I’ve thought about for years, especially applied to modern US politics. I think about registered Republicans who happily vote for fascist monsters because they only care about gun rights, because the genocide of minority groups isn’t a dealbreaker to them. Whether it’s propaganda, apathy, ignorance, or some combination of the three that drives this decision, the result is the same. If one chooses to do nothing to prevent evil, are they themselves evil? I am inclined to say yes.

Vimes ultimately disagrees with him, instead arguing that people are just people with no specific morality inherent to them. This is supported by Vimes as a character; he’s not a shining paragon of humanity, but he ultimately chooses to do the right thing even in the face of certain death. I can understand this view as well. I agree that doing good things is an active choice one must make. My current perspective is a balance between both arguments. Inaction in the face of evil makes one evil by association. But the decision to do good, especially in difficult circumstances, can also make one good. I don’t think Guards! Guards! is going to resolve my own dilemma on the matter; it’s something I will continue to think about for a long time. But it’s not a subject I expected to find or seriously contemplate when I picked up this book.

Wow, that got a little heavy. Anyway, I really enjoyed Guards! Guards! and already have some other Discworld books lined up to read. Looking forward to more!

#taylor reads #book review #9/10

[johnnyraine]

Top Shows I Watched in 2023 (not of)

SPOILERS!

7. Loki (Season 2) - 6.5/10

I don't have much to say about Loki other than I loved the final episode, Natalie Holt deserves some kind of award for her music and it makes me cry.

6. One Piece (Live Action) - 6.5/10

As everyone has already said, this should not have worked. I didn't have much faith in it, but I chose to watch it anyway. And I'm glad I did.

Though there were moments of stiff acting and/or line delivery, I still like it overall.

Though I still liked Roger's anime death more than here.

5. My Beautiful Man/Utsukushii kare (Season 2) - 7/10

I don't remember much considering I watched this months ago. But I do recall wanting and waiting for this for a WHILE. I was not disappointed and Utsukushii Kare stands as my favorite BL series. Minato's Laundromat would've been on the list, but it failed me, Utsukushii Kare hasn't. So yeah.

4. Jack O' Frost (2023) - 6/10

I have issues with the whole "an MC has amnesia" plot and considering this has happened 3 times in the same year is crazy to me.

But do recall I Fucking LOVE the music! OOOOHHHH, Shit! I love it. As soon as "Winter Days" started playing during episode 2 or 3, I immediately started looking for the soundtrack.

I also have yet another celebrity crush in Kyoya Honda.

3. Taira no Kiyomori - 8/10

This is unfair given the fact I started this last year and left for a month, making me finish this in January or February. But I still finished in 2023, so it counts!

As per my previous review, I was fucking bored with the first 6 to 9 episodes. After them, however, I loved this show. I love the music, I love the characters, and I like some of the comedy. There are so many great moments that I absolutely love.

Despite knowing how it ended, historically, I was still upset at the characters' deaths.

2. More Than Words (2022) - 6/10

I heard this was a Japanese BL, my favorite type of BL, and I guess. But as others have said, it's mostly about the relationship between Makio and Mieko. Though perhaps not for the second part of the story...

Anyway, I loved this show. It fucked me up, but I did stay up all night till 12 or 1 am to finish it, and I couldn't stop thinking about it for a month. So yeah, despite the score, I am putting it up here.

1. Kamakura dono no 13 nin/13 Lords of the Shogun - 7/10

HERE COMES THE MAIN MAN HIMSELF, KŌKI MITANI!

The main man himself, the man who wrote my favorite Taiga Drama, SANADA MARU! No wonder I was fucking addicted to this show. For first time in A WHILE I watched and finished this entire show in a week.

I was drawn into this show by the fucking neck. I just was.

I remember seeing You Oizumi as Minamoto no Yoritomo and thinking, "Nah." I couldn't get behind him, I simply didn't see it at first. Then he died and literally episodes later, I was missing this man.

All my favorite characters died. ALL! And since I don't know much about the Heian nor Kamakura period, I was taken out. Fucking Kazusa, dead; Minamoto no Yoshinaka, I knew this was so it's my fault, but dead; fucking Wada Yoshimori, I fucking loved him, and I didn't know it! DEAD!

They killed my pathetic twink, Minamoto no Sanetomo. And he was gay! FUCK! I was heavily upset.

And the fact that it ends with Yoshitoko's death via his sister not giving him his medicine and watching him die! Gods dammmmmnnn!

Kōki Mitani you heavenly fucker! Ah!

I also love the music, one of my favorites Taiga drama themes.

Now, that wasn't all I watched, but simply all I felt should be on the list. I refuse to put ten shows up here if I don't care enough for them.

Here's to another year.

#Top ten... I guess #Not really #Top Shows of 2023 #Kōki mitani #Koki mitani #Kamakura dono no 13 nin #13 lords of the Shogun #more than words #loki season 2 #Taira no Kiyomori #jack o' frost #utsukushii kare #one piece live action #Spotify

[historyhermann]

No. 1 on my list of top animated series for 2023: "RWBY"

It was hard to choose which series would be number on on this list. This anime-inspired science fantasy action-adventure series joins the next six series on this list, with a total score of five in animation, voice acting, music, and story. Although I may have been too generous with those ratings, the ninth volume/season of RWBY really blew me away, more than any other series. It remains more captivating than previous volumes. It has mature themes such as death, suicide, blood, torture, animal death, and physical (and emotional) abuse. Those themes are not treated lightly, and shown with care, as opposed to gen:LOCK.

This series centers on four protagonists (Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna, and Yang Xiao Long) who are training to be warriors. The ninth volume has a classic conflict between good vs. evil, intricate storytelling, horror elements, character development, and strong visuals. The protagonists are stranded in the Ever After, a magical land. Even so, they still have their superpowers-of-sorts. The magic and sci-fi elements are often emphasized. Representation is stronger than ever. There have been LGBTQ+ characters before Volume 9, but the scene between Blake and Yang is a stand-out for 2023. Both realize their feelings for each other and kiss. Even so, Volume 9 could have been longer. RWBY should have more Black and Brown characters in the cast, at the very minimum.

Some predicted Warner Bros. Discovery's bankruptcy, due to the corporate mismanagement resulting from CEO David Zaslav's actions since May 2021. This includes a HBO Max content purge (with some titles turned into tax write-offs), removal of many Warner Bros' animated programs from streaming platforms, and cuts to Turner Classic Movies. Bankruptcy could put Rooster Teeth's RWBY into peril, unless Crunchyroll buys Rooster Teeth. Regardless of Rooster Teeth's documented internal problems, such as sexual harassment, bad work conditions, and discrimination, a buyout is possible considering the existing Crunchyroll-Rooster Teeth relationship . After all, the film Justice League x RWBY: Super Heroes and Huntsmen, released in two parts in April 2023 and October 2023, has been well-received.

excerpted from "Burkely's Top Ten Animated TV Shows of 2023"

© 2023 Burkely Hermann. All rights reserved.

#rwby #crunchyroll #rooster teeth #warner bros discovery #david zaslav #lgbtq #bumbleby #yuri #sapphic #gen lock #jl x rwby

[nooowestayandgetcaught]

20 questions for fic writers!

tagged by @clotpolesonly 💜

How many works do you have on AO3?

Officially it is 2,434 fics but probably 4-6 more fics under anon. I will eventually de-anon those but I'm not right now,,,, 👀👀👀

What’s your total AO3 word count?

2,912,560 words.

What fandoms do you write for?

I have written for 489 fandoms so far but I collect fandoms like Pokemon so I'm sure the number will be up in the end of 2023, hehe. I will list the top ten fandoms though I have done so far:

DCU (222)

Merlin (TV) (180)

Marvel (132)

Game of Thrones (TV) (125)

Marvel Cinematic Universe (111)

Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime) (108)

Voltron: Legendary Defender (97)

Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling (96)

Young Justice (Cartoon) (82)

Stranger Things (TV 2016) (77)

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

2,699 kudos -- Take Me Up (G-rated, Knights of the Round Table & Merlin + Merlin & Arthur Pendragon, BBC Merlin)

Excalibur acts like Thor's Hammer - only for the worthy. Magic prevents others from grasping it.

2,105 kudos -- Sleepless In New York (No Rating, Ash Lynx/Okumura Eiji, Banana Fish - Anime & Manga)

Ash goes missing and Shorter discovers him taking care of a sick Eiji. It makes sense why Ash hasn’t contacted anyone. Or bothered to glance at his messages. Ash’s head gets fuzzy when it comes to Eiji, Shorter realizes once more. That’s what happens with love.

1,722 kudos -- Belonging (E-rated, Merlin/Arthur Pendragon, BBC Merlin - warnings for mentions of underage and noncon)

“I’ll be fine here,” Merlin insists, upright and curled in the dark, velvet blankets. He’s naked as sin, beautiful with morning-light in his thick, sable hair, his nipples exposed to cold air. “You’ll only be away for a season, maybe half.”

1,688 kudos -- A Matter of the Heart (E-rated, Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov, Yuri!!! on Ice - warnings for mentions of violence)

If there's a single thing Yuuri can't get enough of—it's Viktor's attention. People want it. The letters from Viktor's fans beg for it, for a photo or an autograph, for him to respond. One of Viktor's most ruthless stalkers attacks Yuuri in broad daylight.

1,615 kudos -- It Was Only You (E-rated, Merlin/Arthur Pendragon, BBC Merlin)

Looking across the playing field, Arthur dripping with sweat and mud, knocking away the ball from the other footie team, Merlin feels the pull. It starts at his belly, from the centre of his navel, and radiates pleasantly to every nerve-end.

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I do! I love to respond to comments and talk and possibly make more writer friends! 😊 And I also wanna respect boundaries with commenters so I implemented a new idea: If you comment with a certain emoji, I will leave your comment as it is and not respond. It has been a GREAT decision for the people who admitted they're shy.

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

OHHHHHH GOD. THE FIRST ONE I THINK OF IS THE LAST HOURS (E-rated, Merlin/Arthur Pendragon, BBC Merlin) WHERE THEY DIE IN THE END BC THEY ARE ON VACATION IN AUSTRALIA WHEN AN ASTEROID HITS EUROPE AND THERE'S A FIRESTORM COMING. IT IS ABSOLUTELY WORTH THE READ THO. IT'S A FAVE OF MINE.

I do wanna say that Bereavement (T-rated, Sirius Black & Harry Potter, Harry Potter) where Harry, instead of Sirius, falls through the veil and No Matter What Happens, You'll Return To Me (T-rated, Porsche & Porchay + Porsche/Kinn + Porchay/Kim, Kinnporsche (TV)) where Kim dies bc of a random act of cruelty by a stranger and Porchay overdoses on sleeping pills and it's all in Porsche's POV,,, those are very strong competitors for the #1 spot of angsty endings.

no no I'm sorry,,, no it's definitely Devil's Side (T-rated, Lord Asriel & Lyra Belacqua, His Dark Materials) because I cannot explain to how fucked up that story got me and basically everyone I inflicted that on

What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Ohhhhh god this one is harder ASJSDJ,,,, if I'm picking a fic with angst, Up In Smoke (T-rated, Korra/Asami Sato, Avatar: Legend of Korra) has a satisfying ending after a group of people burn down the Sato residency and Asami grieves,,,, but if I'm picking a fic that is fluff and has an ending I like, then Pulled From The Wreckage (No Rating, Aziraphale/Crowley, Good Omens (TV)) because I'm love them.

Do you get hate on fics?

Oh most definitely. It's happened. Either some mfer didn't read the tags I got up and they got something smart to say,,,, or is a ship hater🥱,,,, or leaves poorly masked constructive criticism,,,,,

When I do think of AO3 hate I've gotten, I do think about the time I posted a Bellamy/Clarke & Clarke/Lexa vee-relationship poly fic from The 100 tv show where both shipping fandoms showed their own asses in the comments. (And I would do it again to laugh at them.) Or I think about the guy who came onto my Merthur fic where Arthur had terminal cancer and he practiced safe consensual sex (like some of the most consensual I've ever written) and called Arthur 'a whore' because it wasn't enough Merthur sex going on in my fic??? Like you gotta be out of your goddamn mfing mind to do that nonsense.

Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I got 505 explicit rated fics and they're 99.9% full of smut! Mostly the smut is between OTPs/ships I like, but sometimes it's just because! I gonna recommend three smut fics of mine just for shits and grins:

Don't Fall In Love So Madly With The Night (Lestat de Lioncourt/Louis de Pointe du Lac, AMC's Interview with the Vampire + Novel Canon, 666 words - warnings for graphic content)

Louis anguishes over consuming his own flesh-and-blood, and Lestat dotes. Because Lestat enjoys it.

Come And Get It (Loki/Sylvie, Loki (TV), 3902 words)

Loki and Sylvie wind down, hopping from apocalypse to apocalypse, by trying to kick each other's ass.

Hold Me Close (Padmé Amidala/Sabé & Padmé Amidala/Eirtaé/Rabé/Sabé/Saché/Yané, Star Wars, 1000 words)

Padmé has no immediate recollection of the Festival of Light, long after dusk, save for the matter of too much scentwine — purplish in quality and strong with its bright, floral aroma. She wakes among her handmaidens, come morning light, savoring their conversation and heat and presence.

Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

Not very often! But they do happen! I've done J. Robert Oppenheimer/Barbie (BARBENHEIMER!) with An Old Friend and Part II Ellie Williams meeting HBO TV series!Ellie Williams with Me, You, Us and Prince Charming from Disney's Snow White/Prince Phillip from Disney's Sleeping Beauty with Love's First Kiss and Emily from Corpse Bride/Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas with Butterfly Bush and then I did something kinda cool in The Autopsy of Jane Doe/The Witch crossover with Long, Long Ago!

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

AND THAT'S WHY I FUCKING HATE WATTPAD. YOU EVER SEEN MY ACCOUNT ON WATTPAD? I AM THERE TO HUNT PPL DOWN. I THINK I MADE TWO ACCOUNTS JUST IN CASE. AAAAAAAAAA.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I have! I have had a couple of bad experiences with people asking to translate my fics so I'm a little wary now but,,,,, yeah there's a few.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Me and @glove23 have cowritten fics! It's So Goodbye Until Tomorrow! There's also The Lie Of Living, The Truth In Wanting! I'm a terrible and temperamental cowriter sometimes, I'm sorry ☹️

What’s your all time favourite ship?

SHRUGS. IT CAN CHANGE OVER TIME. I'm gonna say Peter Pan/Wendy Darling though. Easily you're gonna get me with that.

What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

If you were ever holding out for an update on Fate's Design, Facing the Darkness, or Game, Set, Match then oops.

What are your writing strengths?

SHRUGGGSSSS. I just think through experience probably and writing as much as I have, I've mastered some kind of writing style? Or at least my rhythm in it? I know I put a lot of detail into what I'm writing.

What are your writing weaknesses?

I could be doing more with expanding on parts and structurally setting scenes up. Like I can SEE where I can improve and I wanna.

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

Eh. I've done it.

First fandom you wrote for?

Harry Potter?

Favourite fic you’ve written?

THAT'S HAAAAAAARD. I HAVE TOO MANY FICS.

You know what, if you wanna get on my good side, just talk to me about anything out of Your Childhood Cishets, Now WLW/MLM ashsdsahjsaj the entire thing is my ongoing and beloved project

---

Tagging @glove23 @merlinsbed @onestrangenovelist @greyisbetterthangray @rapha-reads @divorcedmalewife and literally if you got some fics on AO3, this is an open invite to do this!

(Blank question format inside!)

20 questions for fic writers!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

3. What fandoms do you write for?

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

8. Do you get hate on fics?

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

16. What are your writing strengths?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

19. First fandom you wrote for?

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

#about rie

[yuurei20]

Overall Top-Ten Merch List

A top-ten list of the most-liked Twisted Wonderland merchandise overall available through Animate's online store (that is still in stock as of April 2024).

#10 Visual Book 3

#9 Visual Book 2

#8 Design Note

#7 The Comic: Episode of Heartslabyul

#6 Anthology Comic 2

#5 Visual Book 1

#4 Anthology Comic 1

#3 Magical Archives Game guide

#2 Postcard Set (Countdown)

#1 Fanbook vol.1

Full list + rankings from October 2022, April 2023 and October 2023

#twstmerch #twisted wonderland

[albonoooo]

Hi! I’m still pretty new here and so wanted to get to know those I follow a lil better so thought I’d ask some q’s!!

Feel free to answer 😌 (or ignore.. that’s fine too heh)

What’s your fave ice cream flavour?

Who’s your fave driver?

What is it about your fave driver that makes them your fave?

Face holiday destination you’d like to visit?

Fave driver pairing?

Dream job when you were a child? Is it your job now?

Dream f1 team driver pairing?

Do you have a special talent?

If you could decide an f1 track anywhere in the world, where would it be?

Fave animal?

Top prediction for the 2024 season?

☺️

hi love!! welcome to the madness <3

first of all, you're my first ever ask, i got SO excited!! i have to say that i couldn't think of answers to some of these so i just left them out.

- i don't have one specific ice cream flavour i prefer, but i probably get pistachio and stracciatella the most.

- i only got interested in f1 halfway through 2023 and didn't have the opportunity to watch a lot of races, so the majority of my feelings regarding the drivers are based on sympathy. as is pretty obvious from my blog, i think, my favourite drivers are charles, oscar and alex. lando is definitely up there too.

- why are they my favourites? i will hold back from going into way too detailed analyses of these people and just say i like their personalities, as far as we get to see them from our limited perspective as fans. for alex and charles especially, i admire their resilience and strength. for oscar, i admire his calmness and level-headedness. these are all traits i don't have and kind of look up to them for.

- i would love to go to ireland and/or scotland!! i was actually supposed to go on a course trip to ireland with my english class in 11th grade, but then the pandemic started and that plan tragically failed.

- about driver pairings, i really enjoy lando and oscar as well as charles and carlos. i obviously enjoy reading rpf about these pairs, but aside from that based on the little i've seen so far i really like their team dynamics and find them incredibly entertaining and the most likable in combination with each other.

- i wanted to become a vet when i was little! that lasted until i was about 14 and realized i can't even watch a tv show about vets without bawling my eyes out when they have to put down a pet. i'm a student rn and i plan to either go into publishing or become a librarian later on.

- my favourite animals are, very boringly so, dogs. they're great. my family had one for 15 years and he was a delight to have around. i also really like horses (yes, i took horse riding lessons for ten years, thank you so much for asking). wolves are pretty cool. and snow leopards.

- i have no serious predictions, only desperate wishes. (charles leclerc 2024 wdc, lando first race win, plenty more oscar podiums, alex podium!!!, the list goes on and gets more and more silly.)

this was great fun and a lovely new opportunity to overshare on the internet. thank you so much meg!!

#giggling and kicking my feet rn i am HONOURED #emy asks <3

[sailorstarr-chan4]

40 Day Anime Challenge 2023 Edition - Day 1: Favorite Anime

Ten years ago, @risingfire17-the-weeb-trash and I did a 40 Day Anime Challenge on Facebook, and now we're doing it again on Tumblr! Here's the list of questions, if anyone wants to do their own! (Sorry, Kitty-chan, for my tardiness. I was stuck on this one for ages 😭)

Soooo the thing is, I can choose my favorite manga series EASILY, but favorite anime is more... complicated. Thus, I decided to do this: top 3 anime and top 3 manga, irrespective of each other.

Story synopses and long ramblings below read-more.

Top 3 Anime:

1. Inuyasha:

Synopsis: "The series begins with Kagome Higurashi, a fifteen-year-old middle school girl from modern-day Tokyo who is transported to the Sengoku period after falling into a well in her family shrine, where she meets the half-dog demon, half-human Inuyasha. After the sacred Shikon Jewel re-emerges from deep inside Kagome's body, she accidentally shatters it into dozens of fragments that scatter across Japan. Inuyasha and Kagome set to recover the Jewel's fragments, and through their quest they are joined by the lecherous monk Miroku, the demon slayer Sango, and the fox demon Shippō. Together, they journey to restore the Shikon Jewel before it falls into the hands of the evil half-demon Naraku." (Wikipedia)

Okay, look: my fanfic account and this blog are enough to tell you that I adore this stupid series lmao. But I also have a HUGE love-hate relationship with it. The story itself is pretty solid, with memorable characters, and a good mixture of darkness and lightheartedness to keep it engaging. But..... its biggest Achilles' Heel was introducing the Main Villain too early and overpowering him WAY too early and WAY too much. As a result, the story draaaaags its feet for the sake of The Plot continuing onward, and often character development is retracted (mainly in the anime versus the manga, but I digress). Is the manga objectively better? Sure, but the issues of canon remiain the same.

That said.... I still fucking LOVE Inuyasha.

It's fun to roast and equally fun to enjoy unironically, and the sad moments still make me openly SOB, and if there's one thing Rumiko Takahashi is good at is making characters stick in your mind. Even people I know who haven't touched the series in over a decade still remember it fondly. And the fandom produces STELLAR fanfiction, to the point where it very nearly ruined me from trying out other fics for the longest time lmao XDD

~

2. Ouran High School Host Club:

Synopsis: "The series follows Haruhi Fujioka, a scholarship student at Ouran Academy, and the other members of the popular host club. The romantic comedy focuses on the relationships within and outside the Club." (Wikipedia)

The ultimate Comfort Food Anime. This is my Pick-Me-Up series, where I rewatch a random episode or two and STILL laugh and feel better, every single time. Ironically, this is a lot of people's gateway anime (including me, to an extent lol), when it's actually FAR more enjoyable after you become a connoisseur of the anime/manga world, because the little nods, references, and satirical jabs of the romcom/harem genre is *chef's kiss* 🤣 It is simultaneously a love letter and scathing satire and I ADORE EVERY INCH OF IT. 😍😍😍

3. Clannad:

Synopsis: "The story follows the life of Tomoya Okazaki, from adolescence to adulthood. As an average high school student, he meets many people in his last year at school, including five girls whose individual problems he helps resolve, and his life is further detailed after graduating from high school." (Wikipedia, specifically on the video game, but it matches the anime)

DON'T ASK ME WHY I HAVE REWATCHED THIS DAMN TEARJERKER SERIES 6+ TIMES IT DOESN'T MATTER I JUST FUCKING ADORE IT OKAY?!? 😭😭😭

~~~~~

Top 3 Manga:

1. Vampire Knight:

Synopsis: "The story takes place in the prestigious Cross Academy, which is home to two distinct classes: The Day class, which applies to only humans, and the Night Class, which applies to only vampires that the day class is unaware. Much of the plot revolves around Yuki Cross, the headmaster’s adopted daughter, as she is being drawn into a conflict concerning the overall coexistence between humans and vampires and the twisted reality concerning his childhood friend Zero Kiryuu, who, despite having a hatred for vampires, is revealed to be slowly turning into one of their kind." (Wikipedia)

My first. My baby. My precious. 🥺💕 Originally, I was going to only use this series for my Day 1 entry, but wanted the chance to highlight a few others lol. This series is Drama on Crack, absolutely Fucked Up, and Deliciously Angsty, and I fucking LOVE IT. This is the closest piece of "emo" media I ever adored in my teen years lmao (I more or less missed that train while the rest of my peers were onboard XD), and it's just.... near and dear to my heart. Also, this is the series that, upon rereading it in 2016, pushed me to confess my feelings to the love of my life, whom I'll be marrying this autumn 🥰 It is deeply personal to me, and more than just it being My Very First Manga Series.

~

2. Sailor Moon:

Synopsis: "The series follows the adventures of a schoolgirl named Usagi Tsukino as she transforms into the eponymous character to search for a magical artifact, the "Legendary Silver Crystal". She leads a group of comrades, the Sailor Soldiers, called Sailor Guardians in later editions, as they battle against villains to prevent the theft of the Silver Crystal and the destruction of the Solar System.." (Wikipedia)

Do I enjoy the 90's anime? Yes. Do I enjoy Sailor Moon Crystal? Hell yes. Do I love the manga above all? HELL TO THE FUCKING YES, THIS SERIES IS NEAR PERFECTION. 😍😍😍 (Except for a certain Plot Point in the Black Moon arc, but We Don't Talk About That...)

But seriously. While the friendships are arguably more memorable and fun in the 90's anime, everyone's characterization as a whole is a THOUSAND times better in the manga. Mamoru, Rei, Haruka & Michiru, etc are just a handful of characters who get the shaft in the 90's anime. The manga art is GORGEOUS and the story doesn't hold back on some darker imagery and concepts, and the passion between the lovers and friends is downright inspiring. If nothing else, this series is Iconic, but it's a shame that most people will only ever know the 90's DiC dubbed version lol.

~

3. Skip Beat!:

Synopsis: "It is the story of Kyoko Mogami, a 16-year-old girl who discovers that her childhood friend and romantic goal, Shotaro Fuwa, only keeps her around to act as a maid and to earn his living expenses, while he works his way to become the top pop idol in Japan. Furious and heartbroken, she vows revenge by beating him in show business." (Wikipedia)

The Only True Slow Burn. The slow burn that fanfiction WISHED it was capable of. The slow burn that ruined all other slow burns for me. This is the pinnacle. The crème de la crème of romantic slow burns. I fell in love with the anime in 2017, saw that "read the manga" cliffhanger ending, went "AW HELL NO" and immediately bought up a fuck-ton of the manga volumes lmao. I cannot emphasize how much this series makes me FEEL so many emotions. I've laughed out loud; I've squealed and fangirled hardcore; I've cried actual tears of grief. It's such an emotional rollercoaster, and I honestly respect the fuck for the mangaka for chugging along on this train for the past 20 years (and RESPECT to all original readers who are STILL GOING, LIKE HOLY SHIT????)

(And slight spoiler: no, the aforementioned asshole childhood friend is NOT the subject of said slow burn, though he does throw a wrench in the drama now and then lol)

#Starling ramblings #40 Day Anime Challenge #Day 1 #anime and manga #Inuyasha #Vampire Knight #Ouran High School Host Club #Sailor Moon #Clannad #Skip Beat! #otaku issues

[wanderingnork]

While I was on a hiatus, one of the projects I worked on was a series of five-horror-movie marathon recommendations by unusual themes. Not just a group of zombie or slasher movies, but collections focused on horror movies where the landscape is the threat, or movies that use stop-motion animation, or movies that focus on news reporters as protagonists.

The aim was initially just for me to look at horror movies in a different way than usual. But I want to share these because it’s been a fascinating exercise in building connections and looking at horror through other lenses. I asked myself a lot of questions I’d never really asked before in making these lists. What’s the effect of using practical effects in your movies? Why are there so few horror movies focused on military protagonists? What’s a common theme in stories about people being trapped?

I won’t guarantee that all of the movies I recommend are good--the only reason they’re featured is because they share a single theme with other movies on the list. Checking out doesthedogdie.com for content you’re sensitive to is generally a good idea, because while some of these movies are relatively tame as far as horror goes (like Q), some of them (like Martyrs) are...not.

So break out your movie snack of choice, turn down the lights, get comfortable, and enjoy. It’s a bit of a wild ride.

-

Recommendations so far:

Beautiful Horror Movies

Trapped!

Practical Effects Party

Stop Motion Horror Movies

Landscapes

Cosmic Horror (Without Cthulhu)

News Reporters

Lady Lab Rats

Military Horror

Double Features

One-Scene Wonders

Best Dying Screams

Family Dinner Scenes More Uncomfortable Than the One in Hereditary

Final Women

Personal Top Ten

Giant Monsters

Top Ten 2023

Baldur’s Gate 3-Inspired Recs

Get Peeled, Idiot: Horror About Flaying

#nork rants #the horror tag

[gazzhowie]

My Top 25 Movies of 2023.

Sitting in cinema screens in 2023 has continued to re-enforce that it is a weird time for the industry, with huge three hundred million dollar (!) blockbusters attracting only ten or twenty people per screen on opening weekend and highly acclaimed independent movies being given no home except for a dumped VOD release. This year felt ‘tough’ being a fan of both great films and the big screen experience. 

Anyway, scaremongering over... it is time for me to dust off the cobwebs from my Tumblr account and post my Top 25 movies of this year, 2023.

[Years 2008 through to present are available in the archive.] 

As always, films listed are based on their UK release date whether that’s in the cinema or on DVD, VOD etc. Which was a tough rule to stick to this year because I thoroughly enjoyed the lean and effective b-movie action horror antics of Last Voyage of the Detmer, which could’ve earned a slot on my list had its UK release not been pulled 2 weeks prior to its date due to its European distributor going bankrupt. 

Frequent visitors know that I’ll throw out a few special mentions to all the films that I wish I could’ve included but couldn’t make fit yet believe they deserve a shout-out regardless and then I get stuck into what I think are the 25 best films of the year. Anyway, without further ado, here are the ‘also-rans’ and ‘near-misses’ separated per genre that very nearly made the final list:

Action movies that I have enjoyed this year include The Covenant which holds the distinction of being an actually enjoyable and tolerable Guy Ritchie movie, John Wick: Chapter 4 who’s bludgeoning and unnecessary excess gives way to a final hour that is part ode to Walter Hill’s The Warriors and part ‘modern action classic’ effort, Guardians of the Galaxy 3 which was uneven but still the best Marvel effort in quite some time (though that is a low compliment), the first part of the French two-parter Three Musketeers: D'Artagnan which brings John Wick-ian action to the oft-told tale, the Gerard Butler ‘Prime Exclusive’ double-bill that was Kandahar and Plane, Denzel Washington’s (“final”) entry in his Equalizer series and Thomas Jane’s cheapo Brannigan / Coogan’s Bluff b-movie tribute, One Ranger. 

Not many comedies impressed me this year but going off the ones that made me laugh and surprised me some what were the kind of delightful Woody Harrelson sporting underdog remake Champions, the vastly better than we all thought it was going to be / surprise sleeper success of the year No Hard Feelings and the ‘animals saying uncouth things’ silliness that was Strays. 

I liked a lot of horrors this year; the legitimately great (no seriously!) Influencer, the gimmick-heavy but incredibly effective No One Will Save You, the immensely fun Kids Vs Aliens, the Covid-19 slasher that you didn’t realise you secretly sort of wanted that was Sick, the semi-disappointing yet still enjoyable recalibration that was Evil Dead Rise, the Godzilla-homaging creature feature The Lake and the frankly insane / insanely nasty Project Wolf Hunting. 

Not a huge amount of animation blew me away this year but Leo was a stand-out for not just being shockingly good but for the sheer amount of repeated viewings it has gone through in my house with my boys without it losing too much. I have to also give props to Spiderman: Across The Spiderverse which was gorgeous to look at and immensely entertaining but excessive and unwieldly to its own detriment.

It was a good year for documentaries with both Milli Vanilli and The Pigeon Tunnel impressing me immensely. The former being surprising in its depth and emotion. But within the documentary form it was a banner year for the ‘biography’ approach with genuinely excellent and thorough studies of fascinating people. I loved Mr Dress Up, Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie, Judy Blume Forever, Hatton and Albert Brooks: Defending My Life.

Dramas I’ve liked a lot in 2023 have been Till which moved me immensely, the justifiably acclaimed May December, The Burial which was far more captivating than it had any cause to be, the Netflix survivalist preposterousness that was Nowhere, Ben Affleck’s fabulously entertaining Air which was another entry in the ‘business origins’ subgenre that continues to somehow flourish, Michael B. Jordan’s overdirected but strong Creed 3, the ode to old-fashioned 1990s studio potboiler thrillers that was To Catch a Killer, the Sky Original Dead Shot and the smart phone / techno warning Unlocked.

And in a little section all of its own marked ‘better than they had any right to be’ I’ve got to give a shout-out to Elizabeth Banks’ incompetently directed but decidedly fun Cocaine Bear, the Jackie Chan / John Cena greenscreen-heavy team-up Hidden Strike, the wonky but fun Scream 6, the exhaustive Extraction 2, the low-bar hurdling Blue Beetle and the absolutely insane (and mildly better than the last two excretable efforts) Fast X.

And now… my Top 25 favourite movies of 2023… but for those who know me to be an enormous John Woo aficionado I will make clear from the outset that at the time of compiling this I still have not seen Silent Night. Sorry. 

25. The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial

We must mention William Friedkin’s last film before his death - a reminder that the man was a master filmmaker across the board but specifically a master at letting the material and the performance(s) lead. Never has that felt more reinforced than with his interpretation of The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial where, like what he did with his excellent made-for-tv redo of 12 Angry Men, he lets the power of one single setting, a very good cast and exceptional material (in this case a soft update of Herman Wouk's 1953 play of the same name) lead and he gets out of the way and stays there. A more fragile or less confident director at the age Friedkin was, at that point in his career / so close to the end, would've likely been tempted to go big or get flashy to show they've still "got it". There was nothing fragile or unconfident about Friedkin right up to the end. This is an impressively engrossing watch with a great kick at the end that Jason Clarke absolutely sells the shit out of.

24. Talk to Me

I genuinely thought the 'hype' machine was going to have seriously done a number on this, a la BARBIE, but thankfully that turned out not to be the case.

Directors Danny and Michael Philippou have taken a weathered and well-worn concept - that grief and trauma can be open gateways for otherworldly malevolence to exploit - and they've injected it with a fresh voice / energy, whilst respecting 'old standards' like practical effects work.

The concept is decidedly hokey and the lead character isn't particularly likable to say the least (though Sophie Wilde is excellent playing her), but the Philippou Brothers are so thoroughly committed here and the practical effects work is so impressive that it's infectious.

You're almost pulled 'in' despite yourself because the scares are so well-executed and the feeling of dread is so effectively threaded. You know you're being 'played' and you try to fight against it, but it's a mark of its quality that it gets you anyway.

23. Beau Is Afraid 

If Taika Waititi parlayed the goodwill and acclaim from a series of beloved low-budget Kiwi comedies into a mainstream career making multimillion dollar Marvel movies and becoming one of the most sought after studio hires of the last decade, then Ari Aster has used the instantly accepted and highly regarded successes of HEREDITARY and MIDSOMMER to... *checks notes* ... work through some complicated shit involving his relationship with his mother (and his father - who may or may not be an actual 'penis monster') and have arthouse kingmakers A24 pay $35 million for it.

This made less than a third of its $35 million budget back (because, come on now, how on earth do you effectively market this thing?) so it's tiring but true that the label "cult classic" has •already• been applied to it.

Look, I'm offering zero defence to accusations against the film that it is overlong, incredibly self-indulgent, ill-disciplined, carrying nowhere near the depth it claims to, tiresome and exhausting. It IS all those things. By the final stretch it is floundering haaard and there's a serious feeling of being trolled starting to set in.

But, first of all, it shouldn't be discounted how excellent and effective Joaquin Phoenix is here and Aster's wildly uneven material is greatly assisted by his casting. Secondly, it has to be acknowledged that there's moments - long stretches, in fact - where there's absolute brilliance at play here.

There's masterfully crafted moments of genuine hilarity (dark hilarity, for sure) alongside flashes of abject discomforting horror. I'd go so far as to say some of the most interesting, inventive, unique and intriguing moments in cinema this year are tucked away inside this behemoth of a clusterfuck.

People pushed hard for the extended cut of MIDSOMMER to be released. I'm pushing for the reduced cut of this.

22. There’s Something in the Barn 

 I thoroughly enjoyed and had a great time with this. It's not at all embarrassed to lean into its influences, evoking affectionate RARE EXPORTS / GREMLINS vibes without coming across like its heavily plagiarising from them.

 It’s got a terrific dry wit to it thanks to writer Aleksander Kirkwood Brown's script and which the cast, especially Martin Starr (essentially doing his SPIDER-MAN shtick here) and a very winsome Amrita Acharia, sell well. And director Magnus Martens doesn't skimp on the dark stuff and sense of foreboding either.

 There's no snobbishness to put up against this thing - it's a horror comedy that made me laugh multiple times and jump occasionally. That's a very solid success to me and I highly recommend it if the likes of RARE EXPORTS, KRAMPUS, CHRISTMAS BLOODY CHRISTMAS and SINT are favourites of yours.

21. Pearl

I'm a big fan of Ti West and I really enjoyed X, which was one of my Top 25 of 2022 and which in my review I defended by saying:

"... It's very easy to dismiss what West is doing here as just an exacting homage to THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE but it's more than that. Obviously there's overt nods to it but you could also suggest West is doffing his cap affectionately to Paul Thomas Anderson's BOOGIE NIGHTS, Alfred Hitchcock's PSYCHO and, yes, both Lewis Teague's ALLIGATOR and Tobe Hooper's EATEN ALIVE as well..."

This is an interesting companion piece to that movie (with a third entry, MAXXXINE, imminent) made more fascinating due to how it came into existence:

 Whilst in their Covid 'bubble' prior to production beginning out in New Zealand for X, director Ti West and star Mia Goth became so enamoured with the backstory they were creating for the character of Pearl that they wrote an entire prequel, pitched it to A24 and built filming into the back end of the original production. A high value 'two-ffer' if ever there was one.

The end result is something less blatantly and broadly enjoyable than the first (second) story but it's definitely the more curious and interesting one; if X really was Ti West's TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE / BOOGIE NIGHTS / PSYCHO / EATEN ALIVE bastardisation, this is his Douglas Sirk melodrama injected with Technicolor and falsely set loose as a 'follow your dreams' fable gone really, really wrong.

It obviously lives and dies by the lead performance and, by crikey, Mia Goth is so good here. That much-memed final credits thing is lauded but it's that late stage monologue that drops your jaw a little. If horror wasn't so easily dismissed her performance would've won awards.

For years we've always considered horror prequels to be the nadir of the genre. After all, who cares if Leatherface only became Leatherface because he was made redundant? Or Jason Vorhees killing nubile teens because he got his pot farm trampled on? Or... or... how no one taking Michael Myers trick or treating turned him into a psychopath? Here though, PEARL indicates that doesn't always have to be the case.

20. Reality 

For those worrying as to whether Sydney Sweeney's tsunami of scantily-clad content across advertising and social media platforms has left her precariously overexposed (in more ways than one), along comes this fascinating and considered film to remind you that behind the bikinis, the false nails and the airbrushing is an extremely talented actress capable of incredibly powerful work.

Devoid of make-up, carrying the film nearly 70% of the time in close-up shots she can't fake her way free from and regimentally parroting the actual recorded FBI transcripts down to every sigh, stumble and gulp Sweeney is frankly astonishing in how she carries this thing.

Director Tina Satter keeps things tight in terms of both location, framing and running time (it plays as an almost real-time exercise) and as a result the film becomes a riveting, claustrophobic and maddening display (how did Reality Winner's actual charges and ridiculous sentence stand when all of this occurred without correct due process and legal entitlements being followed from the outset?) from a first-time film director showing exceptional command of her cast and her visual space.

19. Fair Play 

Chloe Domont's corporate morality play / torchlight on gender politics by way of a recalibration of the 1990s style erotic thriller is all the more astounding because of how assured and masterfully controlled it is for someone's feature directorial debut.

 Driven by two excellent performances from Phoebe Dynevor (who I'd not seen before in anything and was astonished by her) and Alden Ehrenreich (who I think is terrific and deserves treated way better by the industry), and supported by atypically great turns from Eddie Marsan and Rich Sommer, this thing has no right to be as engulfing and nail-biting as it is for what it is.

 Domont refuses to make compromises or concessions in the way she presents latent sexism, money, toxic alpha cultures, wounded pride and corporate backstabbing infecting her characters. It's a brutal, relentless ride she takes us on.

 One where the brash bloodied cunnilingus opener keeps returning to your conscience like it was heavy foreboding for what feels inevitable - these two can't keep tearing away at each other like this, surely? Not without someone dying at the other's hands.

 You keep trying to shake that feeling off, telling yourself that it's not ~that~ kind of film. But as this thing starts to barrel towards its third act it is testament to Domont, and how Dynevor / Ehrenreich are executing her material, that you come to realise all bets are off.

18. Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One 

There's action movie franchises and then there's •this• action movie franchise; hitting its stride at the fourth entry, delivering back-to-back masterpieces with its fifth and sixth and now this - a seventh entry so frickin good it rides out evident flaws (and Mark Gatiss' horrendous "accent") that would absolutely fatally decimate other films!

Because it feels sacrilegious to even say this but the latest entry manages to straddle both being very good, decidedly high end, etc etc and... *whispers it* ... kinda 'samey' to what we've had since Christopher McQuarrie became 'grand master':

Still no one trusts the inherent righteous genius of Ethan Hunt, forcing him to go against one and all. Blah blah. There's excessive shots of Tom Cruise running. Yes, yes. There's elaborate stunts seamed together by a 'not as clever as it thinks' plot. Of course. And too many characters. Far too many. Confoundingly, it feels somehow a little stale and yet brilliant.

The film's 'grand' action sequence this time round has been so overexposed, so heavily spoilt (a making of dissection for it ran before the film itself at my screening for Christ's sake) that you naturally assume it'd deflate a little by the time you see it 'in context'. That's not so. Mainly because it is actually just the entrée to the main course which is the train finale.

The climax is an utter masterwork of technical execution, mixing real stuntwork with very well done greenscreen and (yes, shocking as it is to say for a Tom Cruise movie) CGI facial replacement alongside terrifically accomplished narrative construction.

 If like me you continue to be aggrieved by the presence of Simon Pegg's Benji and how he's ostensibly exactly the same character as Luther with exactly the same skillset, routinely forcibly sidelining a vastly superior Ving Rhames, then that's more evident here than ever before. So much so that they literally 'Poochie' Luther out of the film in the third act. Which is obviously racist bullshit. Also, I know I stand alone in my apathy towards Rebecca Ferguson (I really don't get the adoration for her / her character at all) and my hatred for Vanessa Kirby and all the stupid gurning that comes with her, but both are drowned out by a crackin' turn by Pom Klementieff and a performance from Hayley Atwell that you really need to believe the hype on; she lights up the screen and is a tremendous comedy player amongst all the weighty waffle.

And that's the film's biggest flaw that ROGUE NATION and FALLOUT both managed to masterfully swerve - the minute the action stops the film starts to sink under the weight of really heavy exposition. Mounds and mounds of the stuff, in fact.  I know McQuarrie and Cruise have been open about how they conceive a script around action set-pieces but this is the first time where the stitchwork is so headache-inducing having to listen to it that you start to see a wobble in the method for the first time... even more so now McQ and Cruise have started injecting all this whiffery about "the choice" and portentous context about how IMF agents work, are recruited, etc. Like, what are you doing trying to 'John LeCarre' my fucking MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE movies, goddamnit?

 Still, it's the most minor of hardships considering you're never more than 10 minutes off from getting out the other side of all that exposition and getting to another sublime action sequence or a close up of Atwell's wonderous smile.

17. Sisu 

"Sisu is a Finnish concept described as stoic determination, tenacity of purpose, grit, bravery, resilience, and hardiness, and is held by Finns themselves to express their national character. It is generally considered not to have a literal equivalent in English (tenacity, grit, resilience and hardiness are much the same things, but do not necessarily imply stoicism or bravery)."- Wikipedia

The RAMBO sequels should look to this, kneel before it and weep just for being in its presence.

And we better start doing the same with Jalmari Helander, who in just three movies has done Finnish 'interpretations' of John Carpenter horrors, 80s Amblin movies and now 'lone warrior' action films to magnificent effect.

This is a gloriously ridiculous live action cartoon of violent excess and bonkers propulsion; land, water and air set-pieces of utter insanity stitched together with inventive, nasty gore.

It is outlandish in its speed, its fat-free story construction and its refusal to ever stop or give way to wimpy, silly things like character development.

16. Puss in Boots: The Last Wish

I totally get Hollywood's whoreish mentality for seeing something succeed and then bastardising it to the point that what we once loved is something we become bored by - it's why we suffered through a noughties onslaught of what felt like nothing but zombie movies because 28 DAYS LATER landed well or why everyone's trying to do "shared universes" now because of Marvel.

Or why after the massive success and instant affection for INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE every animated movie of late has been plagiarising the hell out of it.

You saw the trailer for this - a heavily belated sequel to a spin-off from a SHREK sequel - pulling that very shit and it just felt a bit like your old dad after your mum's left him, spraying on the 'hair filler' and squeezing into skinny jeans to "get back out there" and prove he's "still got it"...

... and then it just casually reveals itself to be a film of massively inventive design (both visually and narratively), that's surprisingly deep and very funny - and as a result superior to both its predecessor and the entire franchise from which it was born.

You don't •think• you NEED time spent in the company of Olivia Colman and Ray Winstone as Mama Bear and Papa Bear or Florence Pugh as Goldilocks and John Mulaney as Jack Horner... or best of all ELITE SQUAD's Wagner Moura as Death... but you absolutely do! Don't make the mistake of thinking you're 'above' this sort of thing, cos I can guarantee you you're not.

It's a delight!

15. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny 

It feels like I've got to be apologetic in my opinion of this if 'Film Twitter' / the critical majority is to be believed, in which case I'm sorry but I enjoyed this. I just don't think you should ever underestimate the positive impact factor(s) that can be drawn from this particular actor turning up on screen as this particular character, scored to John Williams' music. And I'm saying this as someone who's seen KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL.

 I can see why people would have issue with this latest / last outing; it's overlong to the point of bagginess (there's a staleness that starts to set in from the repetition of Jones and Co landing at a location, having the baddies immediately show up, outwit them and make off with the macguffin only for Jones to steal it back) and the character of Helena Shaw is a fairly odious and unlikeable one who exists to cause more shit for Indiana Jones than is tolerable (and I was no fan for the most part of how Phoebe Waller-Bridge played her).

And then there's the 'look' of it too. Did it HAVE to have such a shitty, plastic sheen to it? It cannot be overstated that one of the most tremendous qualities of those first three INDIANA JONES movies was in how Spielberg went out to REAL locations and had Vic Armstrong and Harrison Ford REALLY ride REAL horses and jumped on top of REAL tanks or fall under REAL trucks. Here, it's pixels and screens. Again. With nothing learnt from the issues KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL generated.

James Mangold has done a commendable job of 'apeing' Steven Spielberg and there's a lot - and I mean a lot - of great action here. But the vast majority of it has the shine taken off by continually cutting into terrifically adrenalinised action sequences to insert very obvious greenscreened shots of Ford and Waller-Bridge bickering and shouting like they were really honestly / definitely / maybe there involved with the sequence when it was getting filmed.

It's infuriating because this thing is stacked to the gills with thoroughly enjoyable, legitimately well-designed action sequences - the escape from the castle in the French Alps, the Apollo 11 parade and New York City Subway chase, the Tangier sequence, the Aegean Sea set-piece, the Ear of Dionysius cavern stuff and the airfield chase - but in every single one there's moments of really quite shoddy CGI that draws you right out of the moment to remind you 80% of this was done on computers. There's not ever a moment to make you gasp in awe at how the stunt-man survived like in the original trilogy. But there's a LOT of moments that has you thinking "This thing cost $350 million?"

But all that said, Mangold making a 'fan' version of a Steven Spielberg INDIANA JONES movie is better than Steven Spielberg phoning in one. And I'm not going to lie, this thing had me from the minute the font come up in the opening titles and we got a straight-up legitimate 1940s set INDIANA JONES mini-movie (which seemed to sit as an eery bedfellow to MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE 7, weirdly enough) with the best... though still not flawless... de-ageing techniques I've seen.

14. The Fabelmans

It's more than a little disingenuous for all involved, specifically Steven Spielberg himself, to describe this as "semi-autobiographical" and "loosely based" on his adolescence and first years as a filmmaker when anyone who's read any number of books on the man or watched director Susan Lacy's 2017 biographical documentary can see the beats are all there, wholesale. If THIS is "loosely" then the biopic version would be the greatest invasion of privacy ever committed. This ~isn't~ a "fable", man!

I can also see with it why some have braced against it and the instant critical adoration that was applied to it, because the longer it sticks around the more muddled it becomes about what its point of view is and whether it has anything left to say. By the end it slides to a stop after 2½ hours with an admittedly wonderful (and wonderfully bizarro) comedic bon mot having scattered barely etched vignettes / sketches in its final stretch. And tonally, there's questions as to really what was trying to be said with that late 'Ditch Day' subplot and whether co-writer Tony Kushner was working through his OWN stuff within Spielberg's memory bank.

That being said, I loved it in all honesty. For the first two thirds of its running time, I thought it was •really• something special - and anyone pushing out the notion that this is Spielberg on autopilot ain't watching this properly. That cold pan cutting his [screen] father from the frame in a moment of parental happiness but leaving in his [screen] mother and her lover? That's some brutal, subtle craftsmanship there. And layered on top of choices like that is more precision cinematography from Janusz Kamiński and scoring (for the final time?) by John Williams.

The performances across the board from Gabriel LaBelle (as 'Sammy' / Spielberg), Michelle Williams, Paul Dano, [CENSORED] and Seth Rogen are extremely good. Though as atypically great as Williams is here, I'm not certain this ends up being the 'ode' to Spielberg's mum, Leah Adler, that some think it to be.

I totally understand the perspective of those that see this cynically as a 'pre-designed awards hoover' - you can't help but come away from Judd Hirsch's cameo feeling like the entire thing was written as a Best Supporting Actor Oscar clip reel - but for me it just hit me right in the chest... exactly as it will for anyone who spent some of their best summers with their dearest friends, being creative, making films, watching films, dreaming of a future that involved cinema, fending off unsupportive family and trying to hold close those that did try to help your talent flourish.

13. Babylon

As much as Film Twitter has taken against BABYLON's final moment, it must be said that for a "love letter" to cinema and the movie industry overall, Chazelle can 'sign it off' how he likes (and "SINGIN' IN THE RAIN to AVATAR" is certainly •a• take!) with no obligation to be subtle. However, considering there's NOTHING subtle about this film whatsoever preceding it, why you'd think it's conclusion would be any different is silly.

I'm a Damien Chazelle fan. I liked WHIPLASH and LA LA LAND enormously and I genuinely consider FIRST MAN one of the finest films of the last decade. No matter its flaws (of which there are several), I drew a great deal of enjoyment from this, his latest effort. Repeat viewings have put it as one of my favourite films of 2023.

It's a very, very messy film. Chazelle seems to believe the debauchery and excess of the era his narrative lands within - Hollywood's transition from silent to sound films in the late 1920s - gives him unrestrained reign with an overindulgent running time and a cavalcade of graphic content. Added to all the blood, vomit, excrement, etc etc the opening Kinoscope Studios Exec's bacchanalian mansion party is the "opening sequence of SAVING PRIVATE RYAN" of debauched, drug-fuelled, orgy sequences in cinema.

There's no real consistent throughline to any of this which makes it all the more difficult to embrace across 190 minutes and because it plays like a plethora of sketches it has massive peaks and troughs Chazelle doesn't always seem to have total control of - the vignette involving Margot Robbie's Nellie LaRoy first experience of recording a 'sound' take starts solid, gets funny, outstays its welcome and then beats you into submission.

There's a lot of excellence here though. Whether that's in Brad Pitt's surprisingly layered, moving and deft turn or through the sojourns onto the desert location shoots of multiple oscillating productions, topped off with the very 'on' appearance of Spike Jonze's 'Not Otto Preminger' Otto Von Strassberger.

I'm thinking that opening on elephant defecation and sordid acts of urolagnia is something that in retrospect director Damien Chazelle may well be regretting now critics have been "pissy" about his latest film and it's now considered the big box office "turd" of the year.

12. The Killer 

I've seen a few people talk about this as if it's "beneath" David Fincher, inarguably one of our greatest working filmmakers today. Like a tight hitman-out-for-revenge yarn based on Alexis Nolent and Luc Jacamon's comic book series is not "worthy" of him or something. Clearly these people are forgetting this is the same guy who spent 6 years in development hell on a WORLD WAR Z sequel, gave us the glorious (if flawed) bit of pulp that was THE GAME, the immensely effective b-movie in an a-picture gown in PANIC ROOM and remade an adaptation of a popular airport potboiler with THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO in amongst whatever is regarded as his "prestige" flicks.

It's absolutely a David Fincher movie; that's apparent in the droll humour, the Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross soundtrack and the clever visual flourishes - like the entire Amazon 'bit' in the final stretch.

It's a caper. A yarn, if you will. A bit of pulp, just with high end flourishes - such as Fincher's meticulous choices, Erik Messerschmidt's cinematography and the casting itself (Fassbender, Arliss Howard, Charles Parnell and Tilda Swinton).

There's this brilliant layering here between the clinical, detailed voiceover Michael Fassbender provides (that leads us to believe this is an assassin at the peak of his 'game') and the actions we physically see from him on screen (missed shots, beat downs suffered, etc) that indicate there's a little bit more than what's on the surface.

I had an absolute blast with this - a tight / immensely refreshing sub two hour, jet black comedic (the aliases!!) thriller that sits as Fincher's hat tip to Jean-Pierre Melville's classic, LE SAMOURAÏ.

... Though I do want to deduct a star off my final rating for the bit where Tilda Swinton co-opted my favourite 'go to' pub joke that I've relied on for 20 years. Now whenever I tell it people are going to say I've just ripped it off this, goddamnit!

11. Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.

What an absolute gem of a film!

You knew you were in steady hands because Judy Blume's 1970 source novel is just that good, Kelly Fremon Craig's EDGE OF SEVENTEEN is an instant classic and there's a dependable excellence that comes with casting the likes of Rachel McAdams and Kathy Bates.

But there was always the risk that this COULD'VE got fucked up. Some idiot at the studio might have tried to modernise it. Or believe that it needed more 'incident'. Or cast someone too precocious in the lead role. But James L. Brooks clearly bodyguarded this thing correctly.

The final result is a sweet, funny and very lovely little film with an absolute sweetheart of a turn from Abby Ryder Fortson as the title character.

I genuinely loved spending time watching this.

10. 20 Days in Mariupol 

There's a moment in this - Mstyslav Chernov's truly harrowing frontline documentary of the twenty days he and his colleagues spent besieged in Mariupol after Russia began its invasion of Ukraine - involving an emergency cesarean and an unresponsive newborn that is more upsetting, more thrilling and more uplifting than the combination of every horror and every feelgood drama released in the last five years.

This is the most important and vital film you'll see this year and then never ever want to see again.

More so because as humans in this modern age we rather callously only seem to have the heart / stomach / attention-span for one 'war' at a time, and we appear to have abandoned the Ukrainian conflict to refocus our outrage on what's going on in Gaza instead.

For large parts of it we feel like Mstyslav Chernov's been given exclusive access to the pits of hell and he's taking us on a tour. This is intense and riveting, shockingly so considering the unrepentant footage of dead or dying children.

9. The Night of the 12th 

I've worked in the field of investigation for over 20 years and I can tell you this much - this movie fuckin gets 'it', man.

In opening with the title card that it does it offsets any eventual disappointment you may feel when the ending arrives. You don't feel short-changed because you've been brought in from the start to share the frustration with the characters.

There's nothing easy here. Nothing pat. Just real investigatory pathways followed with dead ends jumping out in front when everything in your gut says this lead, that lead or the next was going to be 'the one'.

It painstakingly shows that the work is in the hours. And the work can become an obsession. An obsession that gives nothing back equitable to what it takes from you.

It starts with a suitably harrowing and upsetting sequence and it ends on character uplift in lieu of narrative resolution. It also sits as one of the best movies about the art and reality of investigation in modern cinema.

8. The Creator 

If there's anyone out there still 'over crediting' Tony Gilroy for the success of ROGUE ONE - one of the best (and the last great) STAR WARS films - this is the "fuck you" exhibit.

Gareth Edwards' sci-fi action epic doesn't entirely land its thematic intentions and hampers itself somewhat by placing dramatic reliance on the anti-acting vessel that is Gemma Chan, but by crikey is it an enthralling and gorgeous-looking ride. (John David Washington remains a magnetic watch, though I do wonder because he sounds so much like his dad whether we're all just hooked on the idea that they've 'prequelised' Denzel?)

You're gifted something here that feels like 1982 Ridley Scott and 1993 James Cameron have got together to play with action figures and do a sci-fi Vietnam movie... it's glorious stuff!

Full of some of the best effects and well realised set-pieces of the year, it's the old 'protect the child' trope given a beautiful lick of paint thick to feel make it feel just about unique enough and a) stand out in an ocean of comic book movies and sequels, and b) probably make Neil Blomkamp go "Ahhh. That's how you do this? Riii-ght!"

So of course no fucker showed up to watch it!

7. Close 

I don't really have friends. I don't have the sort of 'personality' that lends itself to people being able to find me tolerable at the most basic level - at least for more than a couple of hours at a time anyway. 

I've come to accept and acknowledge this fact the older I've got in life. I've always tried to make friends / keep friends etc but the type of person I am seemingly lends itself to being easily used and/or quickly put down.

It wasn't always like this though. When I was a child there was a boy who saw something in me that others did not and could not. He was in my class and lived close by my grandparents, where I spent most of my time. We were bonded by our loneliness amidst a sea of heads at school as much as our shared sense of humour. Even at a young age I came to appreciate this friend for simply •liking• me and we quickly became inseparable.

On the last day of school, with a vast and limitless summer ahead of us before separate high schools would provide an inevitable divide, we had an argument. A silly, stupid, ~nothing~ argument - significant enough in postscript that I can still recall it now 31 years on - that degenerated into shoving and me accidentally banging his head off a bathroom wall during lunchbreak.

We left school that day with our friendship impacted and the first week of the summer holiday's heavily damaged by him not being by my side in it. And on the very night that I finally decided I didn't want this to continue any longer... that the very next morning I would pick up the phone and ask him if he wanted to go ride bikes in the dene... he died.

An asthma attack. A fuckin asthma attack.

He died not believing that I was his friend and that devastated me. It still does. 31 years later, I think about Neil at least once a week. I see clips of talent show magicians and KNOW that'd have been him. I've tried all my life to replicate a friendship like it and I've never succeeded. But can we ever generate that closeness in adulthood towards someone like we could as children, when we were free of responsibility and bonded by limitless possibility?

I've frequently wondered what my life would've been like if Neil had still been in it, telling myself over and over that this would've been one of the rare pre-teen childhood friendships that lasted.

I miss him and would give anything to be able to deliver the apology to him that he deserved then and is still owed now.

So... all THAT said... it goes without saying that this deeply human, carefully etched and very naturally drawn drama hit me like a train travelling at 150mph.

This is one of the most effective and important films about grief, trauma-processing, adolescence and friendship that there's been in some time.

It really is a brilliant piece of cinema that should be shown in schools to every kid from twelve upwards.

6. The Eight Mountains 

Felix van Groeningen and Charlotte Vandermeersch's adaption of Paolo Cognetti's novel is a (both visually and emotionally) astonishingly beautiful effort with two fascinating and textured performances from Alessandro Borghi as the adult Bruno and Luca Marinelli as the adult Pietro.

It's an intimate epic; a careful, patient and quietly profound treaty on friendship, life, love, ambition, Buddhist concepts, ancient Indian cosmology, growth, nature and the weight of legacy.

Come for the stunning footage of the gorgeous Italian Alps, but stay to be deeply moved by something really rather special, wholehearted and sincere that steps right over whatever BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN esque expectations or assumptions you may well carry into this.

5. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem 

I've never understood anyone - especially the aged fanboys frequently responsible for ruining the STAR WARS and MARVEL 'discourse' - who's shown territoriality over the TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES as a "franchise".

The reason this ramshackle 1984 indie comic by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird has blown up into five television series, seven films, multiple video games and a range of toys / merchandise for four decades is mostly down to the way it sorta reinvents itself every five or so years. Which means there's some form of TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES 'content' now for all of us in one way or another.

And one of the most impressive - but not THE most impressive - things about this film is how it incorporates something from everything that's gone before without becoming a complete mess. The spirit of the comic book source material is front and centre alongside the legitimate effort of the 1990 movie adaptation. The "that'll do" crappy clart of its sequels is avoided whilst the huge scale of the maligned Bay-ified 2014 - 2016 movies is represented. It definitely captures everything about the first Saturday morning cartoon that enamoured the property to us way back when.

It's a glorious effort. It truly is. I watched it with my son and his friends and the huge grins on their faces was infectious. I struggled to think of another entertainment entity that has moved so effortlessly through the generations like this has.

It's a visually resplendent film. It takes the reconfiguration of the animated form a la the SPIDER-VERSE movies and delivers a surprisingly more focused and tighter effort than the latest SPIDER-VERSE sequel. It is dripping with an energy and confidence that will surprise you, as well as a whole heap of heart and humour that will delight.

Yeah, there's moments here and there where the energetic visual styling becomes a little too cluttered in its action sequences but it is a minor grumble against what is a surprising instant masterpiece of its type:

A sweet and funny teen movie walking in the shoes of an animated giant sized comic book blockbuster wearing the coat of a New York conspiracy film, drenched in classic East Coast hip-hop and a score by by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, and performed by one of the most impressively eclectic voice casts of recent.

(Within a roster of Hannibal Buress, Rose Byrne, John Cena, Ice Cube, Natasia Demetriou, Ayo Edebiri, Giancarlo Esposito, Post Malone, Rogen, Paul Rudd, Maya Rudolph, Micah Abbey, Shamon Brown Jr, Nicolas Cantu and Brady Noon, it is Jackie Chan that absolutely steals this thing by a considerable distance!)

4. Asteroid City 

If you aren't a Wes Anderson fan this is not the film that is going to convert you. An immaculately stylised and composed metatextual 'Russian Nesting Doll' celebration of the construction of art and the art of storytelling? No way. No how.

There was elements of it that didn't work for me but what •did• work I was head over heels in love with. The [CENSORED]*constructs felt almost like afterthoughts and didn't particularly resonate. A lot of reviews hit Anderson for being unfocused and overindulgent, and I kinda can see where they're coming from. But only with regards to that particular element.

[* censored by me and hopefully by everyone else because they've done a wonderful job of hiding the story construct from the marketing]

The rest of the film is primo Wes Anderson in his most astonishingly stylised form with his attention to detail never more sharp.

A complaint that must be noted though is in the casting, where the usual 'Anderson Players' appear to have ran a 'pyramid scheme'; bringing in actors who's casting has attracted other actors to the point of it being too cluttered an ensemble in too lean a film to let everyone truly shine. Despite all the plaudits, I think Scarlett Johansson is well out of her depth here. And I just think if you're going to hire the likes of Steve Carell (replacing a Covid-addled Bill Murray at the last minute), Margot Robbie (who should've played Johansson's part, and vice versa) and the sublime Sophia Lillis but barely use them properly it's almost a crime!

When it's funny it is hilarious. When it is delightful it sits as a heavenly confection. And when it wobbles it still isn't as ponderous and disappointing as some of the lesser elements of THE FRENCH DISPATCH.

3. Oppenheimer 

I found every plaudit for this to be true and what a reward it was to receive as cinema lies stale in its current state, crusted with the stale decay of innumerable shitty-sheened superhero movies and sequels to things no one was asking for.

Here's a mature, complex, expertly constructed character study of great depth and intelligence; a film primarily made up of scientists and mathematicians thinking and squabbling amongst themselves whilst a non-linear deep betrayal born of immense pettiness plays out almost as an appendices to the traditional biopic... yet, thanks to the music of Ludwig Göransson and editing by Jennifer Lame, it moves like this insanely kinetic action thriller instead.

The ending stretch feels almost ~too~ trite and neat though, it must be said. Although maybe I'm tarnished by a feeling that no movie should depend on the cripplingly irritating overacting of Rami Malek to play last-minute 'saviour'.

Cillian Murphy is frankly outstanding here and whilst most critics have the Best Supporting Actor Oscar locked for Robert Downey Jr (who's brilliant and who's Lewis Strauss receives a 'kiss off' by Nolan here that almost feels like a Marvel Cinematic Universe esque tease for a sequel about Strauss arranging the JFK assassination!) it would be good to see Matt Damon get some recognition here as his General Groves very nearly steals the whole movie with very little.

The casting is so sumptous overall that every scene induces a "Hey! That's..." as the likes of Kenneth Branagh, Josh Hartnett, Casey Affleck, David Krumholtz, Matthew Modine, Benny Safdie, Jason Clarke, Michael Angarano, Jack Quaid, Josh Peck, Olivia Thirlby, Macon Blair, Tom Conti, James D'Arcy, David Dastmalchian, Dane DeHaan, Alden Ehrenreich, Tony Goldwyn, Alex Wolff, James Remar, James Urbaniak and (is it a spoiler to say?) Gary Oldman as Harry S. Truman roll out to 'play' for one or two minutes.

It's the sort of movie so stacked and packed even at 3 hours that it puts Emily Blunt (as Katherine "Kitty" Oppenheimer) in such an undercooked and underdeveloped role you wonder why they cast a 'star' in it... until that clearance hearing scene near the end where she goes and delivers the impact of a... well... an atomic bomb and you think to yourself "Oh. That's why they cast Emily Blunt!"

It's a gorgeous-looking - Hoyte van Hoytema's cinematography is luscious - cinematic achievement by Christopher Nolan, where his visual ambition and clinical cinematic technique have really come together once again to remind you the term "modern great" as a filmmaker is well earned.

2. Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves 

A "great time" - seeing as the film itself had my beloved GAME NIGHT's Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley at the helm - perhaps. But a resoundingly delightful time that left me instantly eager for more of these movies and DEFINITELY future revisits of this one? I'm shocked at just how brilliant this was.

I can't believe that one of my favourite films of the year is a 'fantasy heist action comedy adventure' based on the infamous tabletop role-playing game.

Especially considering I've never played nor have any frame of reference / interest towards the tabletop game (my sole DUNGEONS & DRAGONS 'knowledge' stems from the 1980s cartoon series - which gets a pretty terrific nod here!) and one-third of the cast is made up of actors (Michelle Rodriguez and Regé-Jean Page) I can't normally stand.

I've been a big Chris Pine fan for a long time now and his performance in this only increases the fandom. And I've flat-out crushed on Sophia Lillis since IT and she's pretty tremendous (if a little underserved) here. The whole cast - yeah, including Rodriguez - are pretty wonderful with Hugh Grant clearly having a grand ol' time, a "big star" mid-movie cameo that'll only land depending on your opinion of this diversive 'talent' and Justice Smith very nearly stealing the movie out from under Pine.

This thing is built within the framework of a marriage between THE PRINCESS BRIDE and the aforementioned GAME NIGHT. It's ostensibly LORDS OF THE RINGS meets OCEAN'S 11; a series of ever escalating challenges and heists that are thrillingly executed within a film that's very, very, VERY funny. The opening prologue is a complete statement of intent ("Where's Jonathan?") that tells you exactly the movie you're going to get.

Killers of the Flower Moon / Godzilla: Minus One 

Simply astonishing to indulge in - there's such a deft, surprising delicacy to elements of Martin Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon that's all the more astounding considering the abhorrent subject matter.

That comes mainly from the performance Lily Gladstone provides this film with. In a sea of tremendous work - and by God it's both magnificent to see Robert DeNiro be great again and for Leonardo DiCaprio to finally do something in my eyes that lives up to his [overstated] reputation - she is working on some other stratospheric level.

Comments about the length by some don't resonate with me. I certainly didn't feel it, necessarily. It's probably the length it needs to be to do justice to the masterful source material its adapted, deliver a legitimate love story (of which, don't be fooled by its toxicity, this is), a film of weighted historical and cultural context AND a true life / true crime procedural.

It's surprisingly less gratuitous than you'd probably expect too. Especially considering we're in the hands of our greatest living filmmaker, someone who's never shied away from presenting us with absolute violence of an uncompromised nature.

There's also these splashes of jet black comedy occasionally popping up too - like the horribly bleak but darkly funny scene in which one henchman asks a lawyer about whether adopting then killing his Osage wife's kids would make him a benefactor of their riches. When the lawyer rightly points out it sounds like he's confessing to planning child murders he replies not unless the lawyer's answer would be affirmative.

This is a film that consumes you. It pulls you in and drags you down - you're in the presence of pure evil and weak character, and Scorsese expertly holds you there so escape feels as impossible as justice must have to the Osage.

It's very easy to 'throw around' the term "masterpiece" when it comes to Martin Scorsese. Mainly because the fucker keeps effortlessly making 'em. But by crikey this really is one.

Equally majestic as a piece of cinema, but in an entirely different form and genre is Takashi Yamazaki's Godzilla: Minus One.

By concentrating on making an interesting drama with genuinely well-etched characters (that just so happens to have a giant radioactive monster passing through intermittently) equal to a barnstorming blockbuster creature feature (that allows itself to be infected with enthralling drama and character development), this steps up in the year of the Godzilla franchise’s 70th year to take the position as its best entry [by a considerable distance] in its illustrious history.

Buzzing with some of the best set-pieces of the year soundtracked to a thumping and all-consuming score by Naoki Sato, there’s genius in recalibrating a Godzilla movie – of all things – in order to develop an incredibly touching human drama and social commentary about what makes a family, what is the true definition of patriotism and courage, what real service to one’s country presents as and how to find air to breathe / the will to go on in a post-war Japan where unrelenting despair hangs in the atmosphere wherever your head turns and ‘fear’ manifests itself as a skyscraper-sized lizard-of-sorts.

We know we’re being played with the cute kid and the manipulative makeshift family relations, but that doesn’t stop it being wonderful. The marriage of sincere impacts caused by war and loss with sci-fi fantasy (but no less tense) fantasy action shouldn’t work, but they very much do. This thing is firing on multiple levels and it succeeds across the board to stand as the best blockbuster of the year.   

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Here's a Letterboxd link for this whole thing if you're that way inclined.

Tell your mum I said hello.

See you next year...

#film #cinema #2023 #ukraine #Mariupol #Martin scorsese #killers of the flower moon #Godzilla #Godzilla minus one #Dungeons & Dragons #oppenheimer #Christopher nolan #tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #wes anderson #asteroid city #eight mountains #close #French cinema #Gareth edwards #the creator #judy blume #David fincher #margot robbie #brad pitt #Steven spielberg #tom cruise #mission impossible #dreamworks #Dreamworks animation