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allthefujoshiunite · 1 year

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Hi, I hope you're okay.... Please just answer my ask whenever you're free....I just read your blog about BL manga koimonogatari, and really loved your writing....also I agree with you, I wish yuiji and yamato just end up as friends...But I think it will end up with yuiji x yamato (based on the mangaka's author note in vol 2)? It is the first manga where I want the mc and male lead not end up romantically (even though I know it's BL)...Do you think it's weird? Have you ever read a BL manga where you don't ship the mc with male lead?

I hope you're safe and sound with your loved one....

Hello, thank you for the message. I and my loved ones are safe, but being okay is a different matter because the situation somehow keeps getting worse.

About my post on Koimonogatari. It was a post that I forgot about until I received two hostile comments under it in 2021. Back in 2015, my level of English proficiency was much lower than it is today, and rereading it now, there are two points that I don't agree with my past self, and some other parts I still think the same, but I'd make sure to word my opinions much differently. After those comments, I decided to write another post on this topic but I didn't have the time. So thank you for asking about it and giving me the chance to go back.

One opinion I'd word better now is that even though my blog is my own space and I'm free to voice my personal opinions however I wish as long as I maintain a respectful tone, the line between something being wrong and something that doesn't appeal to me seems blurry in the post.

I have to emphasize that the creator(s) is the sole person who's in charge of their creation. If they themselves search for reader comments/reactions and change the course of the story of their own accord, fine. But readers should never tag the artists or comment under their tweets when their work is not going the way they personally want. You can read more on Japanese fandom policy "don't like/don't read" here.

I keep saying this like a broken record, but I CRAVE for variety. Commercial BL is highly satisfactory when it comes to tropes or settings, but I still feel like there's a lack of experimentation when it comes to interpersonal relationships, specifically romance. If I were to lay it out more openly, even though two BL titles can focus on completely different settings (let's say one is a yakuza and the other is a high school BL) and the intricacies of the plot would progress differently, the relationship still goes from point A to B and then to C, or start from B, go back to A and arrive at C. This is not me boasting or being full of myself, but it's very rare for a BL title to truly impress me with its plot structure, the way it deals with the age-old tropes, or introduce a nuanced look into relationships. This holds true regarding friendship/allyship as well. Now, it's a no-brainer that by definition, BL is a genre that focuses on male/male romantic and/or sexual relationships. So at first, it seems contradictory to expect a story to focus on the friendship between a straight-identifying and an LGBTQ+ person.

Why should this be considered "contradictory", though? Why can't friendship between a straight-identifying and an LGBTQ+ person be worthy enough to study both queer and non-queer relationships in fiction? Back when I first read Koimonogatari's first volume in 2015, I was SO mesmerized by the way Yuiji and Yamato were introduced, the way they, just by being themselves, were holding mirrors to each other, the way Yamato gained strength just by being accepted and heard and in contrast, Yuiji questioned his own stance on romantic love because, in the heteronormative world he lives in, he never suspected the typical flow of his relationship with his girlfriend before.

I understand that this is partially a "me" thing. Friendship is extremely important to me to the point where I may be bold to say it's sacred. That puts shipping in an awkward position for me; on one side I love the dynamic two characters have and I immediately want to ship them, but that also means I love them as friends as well and, as I have said in my old post, why shouldn't two people just get along well? Throughout my adolescent life, I was frustrated with other friends immediately wiggling their eyebrows at me whenever I got close to a guy. Just because I identified as a woman and my friend identified as a man and we stood next to each other and got along meant that something romantic had to develop between us, and that mindset, for me, devalued friendship.

Because of my personal views and values, and the beautiful and delicate approach to Yuiji and Yamato's friendship, Koimonogatari was a very special title for me. That post, although the language sounds brusque, was meant to underline this: friendship is valuable in and of itself and shouldn't be regarded as anything but a stepping stone toward romantic feelings. I couldn't see a romantic relationship blooming between Yuiji and Yamato in such a short span of time, and I had wished for things to stay the way they are. Despite what that commenter thinks, I'm allowed to expect whatever the F I want out of a fictional work. The creator's intentions and my engagement with the said work is a completely different matter.

I've recently reread the first two volumes and admittedly, I can picture budding romantic feelings between the two if the series were to be stretched out to four volumes in total. Another point I disagree with my past self is that, if a fandom readily jumps at the Shippy Bandwagon just because two characters stand next to each other, they can ship them. I was wrong to say fandom shouldn't ship and if something annoys me or makes me uncomfortable, it's my duty to remove myself from the circle and not the fandom's job to comply with my needs/expectations. Other than these two points, I stand by my expectations of Koimonogatari and the questions I asked back then are ideas that I still play around with in my head.

In the end, we are free to expect whatever we want from a story, and the creators are equally free to do whatever they want.

Have you ever read a BL manga where you don't ship the mc with male lead?

To answer your question, there have been such works, yes. This is usually the case when there's a love triangle is introduced, and having a Second Lead Syndrome, I usually ship the MC with the person that comes along to create strain between the MC and his unrequited love. To give an example, this always happens when the MC is childhood friends with the guy whom he has had a giant crush on for years, and one day, the second love interest comes into play. MC's feelings sway but he ends up with the childhood friend in the end. I personally hate this plot structure with every fiber of my being for several reasons, thus I avoid reading series with the love triangle + childhood friends combo. But I won't go into detail here.

Sorry, l rambled too much but as I have said I've been meaning to write about this topic. Koimonogatari will forever be a special series and ever after all these years, I'm looking forward to its completion. And it goes without saying but I fully respect Tagura Tohru's choice of ending.

Have a nice day!

#koimonogatari #tagura tohru #bl manga #bl meta #yaoi manga #allthefujoshiunite answers

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lillywhitefield · 2 years

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Now that the initial excitement of just glimpsing Polin and getting some details about season 3 is over, I'm gonna put some thoughts out into the world. I will preface this by saying I'm generally an optimist, and I try not to take fandoms TOO seriously (been there, bad for mental health, will take a step back from anything if it's taking up too much of my life). I haven't felt this way about a fandom or a ship in a long time, and I've had time to process some thoughts/feelings

What I don't want from Season 3: that weird, alpha male shit book!Colin did (grabbing/bruising Penelope's arm, trying to make her stop Whistledown, his jealousy over her writing that seemed way over the top and completely unsupportive of her, I also think he makes her chug champagne at some point??). Colin only wanting to "rescue" Penelope from these new suitors (I'm truly over men thinking women need to be rescued, even if she tells him she doesn't need rescuing it will really put me off Colin). Penelope accepting a proposal from someone else before Colin tells her he wants her (I want these new guys to have as little to do with their relationship as possible, I hope they exist for comedy purposes only). Penelope still simping over Colin at the beginning (I'm interested to see how they will move the story into the wingman thing, I get why he said what he did and he probably didn't mean anything by it, but I would still be hurt if I was in Penelope's position). Colin also should not "suffer" or "grovel" or any of that (its really not necessary, and really wouldn't add anything to the story)

What I do want from Season 3, unselfishly: Colin realizing very, very slowly that he loves Penelope. Colin genuinely wanting to help Pen and as soon as he realizes that he has feelings for her he wants to court her properly. I only want the first half of the season to focus on her "lessons" and then move on to the serious feelings part (I don't think they would just give out the plot to the entire season, there has to be more to it). I want a sweet love story, I want it to be cute and hot and beautiful, no skimping on the romance between the leads. Penelope apologizing to Colin for the events of S1 and explaining herself (like I get why she did it, but I want a scene where she lays everything out for the audience and Colin/Eloise)

What I want from Season 3 very selfishly: Colin follows Penelope thinking she's running off to have a rendezvous with a suitor but she's really on Whistledown business, cue The Carriage Scene, leading into The Proposal Scene (Prudence filling in for Felicity). I want to see a wedding, and it better be a big 'ol Featherington extravaganza. I want the "Stay" scene, even if it's not at the engagement ball. I want them to have sex before they get married. I want there to be a mirror involved at some point. And I want a masquerade, because goddammit I wanna see some Benophie.

I might edit this later to add more, but right now, this is what I feel. They're my favorite characters because I relate to the both of them the most. Penelope as an invisible wallflower who is just bursting to find her place and say what's on her mind, but doesn't know how. Colin who feels lost and doesn't know what he wants, and sometimes maybe is a lil dumb and misses social cues (I literally didn't know I was on a date with my current boyfriend until he texted me later that he enjoyed our date LMAO). I just love these two so much and I can't help but to take what I'm given and hope they shine.

#colin x penelope #colin bridgerton #penelope featherington #polin

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devourer-of-acetone · 2 years

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still mad they they removed the little queer subtext from the Felwinter and Timur lore 2k22. it's such brazen attempt to placate straight male fans by giving Felwinter a more acceptably action hero characterization.

like compare the Lord Timur entry to the Season of the Worthy weblore rewrite (search for 'SOME TIME AFTER' to get to the right section) and just.

look at what they DID to Felwinter and Timur. look at what they DID.

from the Lord Timur entry:

“Where are you taking me?” Felwinter rushes to Timur’s side, his eyes jumping focus, anticipating another attack.

“You seem far too obsessed with these ‘Warminds’.” Timur stops and stares into the horizon as if smelling something; not danger, discovery. He draws his fellow Iron Lord close. “Tell me, Felwinter,” he whispers, “what does the word Seraph mean to you?”

Felwinter leans in to whisper back. “Old Earth theology? I know its power well; one can make great use of the traps of faith and its myths.”

also from Lord Timur:

Timur rushes to Felwinter, examining his head with the intensity of a Cryptarch.

“Hmm. Warmind. You are certainly as stubborn as one.”

Felwinter awkwardly pulls himself away and out of Timur’s reach.

and THEN from the SotW weblore entry:

“You seem far too obsessed with these ‘Warminds,’” Timur said to Felwinter.

They’d been walking for hours, dipping in and out of Fallen territory. Timur made no effort to avoid them, and Felwinter followed his lead. He didn’t know where they were going. Timur had been talking almost nonstop, though. Asking Felwinter what he knew about SIVA. What he thought the Warmind might have to do with it. It was lucky that Felwinter already had a reputation for keeping quiet.

where did the physical closeness go? where did the little hints of intimacy go? they even took out the tidbit where Felwinter ran from a giant shank swarm to go hide behind Timur's skirt.

from Lord Timur:

They struggle up the dunes. Felwinter glides ahead. As he lands, a sandstorm rises to meet him. More shanks. Hundreds of them. Behind them, a lone Vandal sniper lays down covering fire.

Felwinter, realizing his mistake, runs back toward Timur, shielding himself in the Light of suns.

it was a really cool bit of cute chemistry between the two of them and just completely forgotten. like! Felwinter was NOT an immensely powerful badass, that's the WHOLE POINT. he's a pvp sweat who goes to hide behind Timur when he can't handle the ad clearing. and for a GOOD goddamn reason because look at what Saladin thinks of Timur.

From Iron Camelot Gloves:

Forged in remembrance of Timur, he whom the City's enemies dreaded most.

so not only was queer context erased, Timur's involvement with the SIVA plot was also cut and THEN we don't even get acknowledgement for how terrifying the guy really was. everything was changed around to make Felwinter a stereotypical morally gray action hero! when we could have had a morally questionable queer duo of SIVA obsessed danger nerds!!!

(SotW was also notably happening in a time when Osiris/Saint-14 was still wobbling back and forth between being canon or not. the writer for Marcus Ren/Enoch Bast had left, Camrin was basically never mentioned in game, and they'd just tried to 'good friend' destiny's first and greatest tragic romance between Eriana and Wei Ning.

between the lines you can kind of tell there was a tug of war going on in the writing team. how much queerness was allowed? what is the cap?

kind of puts Zavala and the Generic Dead Wife plot into perspective lol.)

#destiny 2 #lore salt #long #sure the Dead Wife died naturally but it was so painfully obvious it was meant to be a Dead Wife plot but they realized #hey this is going to be bad PR #so they just made it a Dead Kid plot but the wife is Also Dead but just offscreen #and then instead of focusing on Zaval's guilt in relation to the kid the wife embodies the dead kid guilt #like come on #you didn't even try bungie #i guess the wife model was already made by the time they realized so they couldn't do a Dead Kid thing #(also we never see kids in the game so maybe they didn't have the budget to model the kid?#it was such a weird fucking story)

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ambiguouspuzuma · 10 months

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This is a Let People Write What They Want blog, but I really am personally tired of certain tropes. I remember when I started writing over a decade ago, in the aftermath of Twilight and its partners in crime, when writing spaces were saturated with romances (under the cover of all other genres) in which the perfect, beautiful-but-doesn't-know-it female main character meets two unrealistically sexy men who both fall for her and her main focus is then the torment of having to choose between them. You know, the classic hetero FMM love triangle formula.

I was tired of it then, enough that one of my earliest planned works was a satire where the two guys go off together and leave the shallow protagonist behind, but I still come across it too often ten years on! I find it nauseating, not just because of the oversaturation, but because of the way so many of them are written. Part of it is that the protagonist usually feels like a stand-in, like we're party to the author's personal idyllic fantasy, which I'm fine with them having but don't really want to be a part of.

I'm assuming the idea is that the reader shares this dream of being fought over/having to choose between perfect love interests, or finds that sort of conflict particularly hot, although I'm not sure how ubiquitous that fantasy actually is. But if the protagonist is a stand-in, their behaviour is a bit questionable: the male characters are not only held to ridiculous beauty standards but seem to have no personality other than being a love interest for her, and she is able to lead both of them on or discard them without having to worry about their feelings whilst still being described as a sweet and lovely girl.

On its own this is all well and tolerable - after all, every other action film still has a male lead working through a cycle of beautiful but hollow and disposable women - but with the stand-in element I do sometimes struggle to disconnect the art from the author. For example, I struggle to read thrillers like the Jack Reacher series because it's clear that the chauvinistic author is just living out his own macho fantasy where everybody respects him and all women throw themselves at him, and as a reader it feels like you're encouraged to join in, which makes me feel icky and uncomfortable.

In one book the hero goes to his friend's funeral and hooks up with his daughter, whom he has apparently admired since she was a teenager. That grooming is justified in-text by presenting them as soulmates, but she is immediately discarded in the next book when Reacher visits his brother's widow and hooks up with her instead whilst wearing his brother's clothes. It's clearly some weird power fantasy that the author's inviting us to share his thrill in, and I can't stomach it at all.

I think the root of it is that the female characters aren't given agency. They exist just to fawn over the hero, and are just as easily discarded once their usefulness to him is served. It's degrading and dehumanising, because they aren't treated as people in their own right, just objects for the main character to interact with. They don't have their own existence beyond him.

As a counter-example of a male author writing an excellent female character, Terry Pratchett once wrote Granny Weatherwax as saying "sin, young man, is when you treat people like things". I think that applies to writing too. You can write antagonists who are unlikeable and evil and designed for your readers to hate, but at least do them the decency of viewing them as people - and you'll also find you write them better in the process.

Many genres are male-hero, male-author, and male-reader dominated, and feature chauvinism like the Reacher books due to a failure to respect women as individuals, but the same goes for any out-group being portrayed by an in-group. If you don't respect X as people, you're at risk of writing horribly strawmanned and objectified X characters just for the purposes of projecting whatever issues you're going through onto them, and it can make your writing unreadable by anyone who sees that.

Other genres (especially those concerning romance) can be predominantly female in both their authors and readership, allowing similar attitudes to cultivate in another direction. There are many such novels written by women who do not have healthy relationships with men in their lives, as demonstrated by the way they write these two-dimensional, stereotyped, idealised men who exist purely to throw themselves at their stand-in characters and who have no inner life and don't need to be respected as human beings in turn.

It's not just bad characterisation, which I can live with, but being able to tell that this leads back to somebody's actual fantasising - that this is actually how somebody thinks about men, which as a reader you feel you are tacitly endorsing. That's the issue. You can write whatever you like - personally, I do prefer writing female protagonists, and I've written more than my fair share of femme fatales who straight up murder the men in their lives. There's nothing wrong with writing that, if it makes for a fun story. But you should write it for the right reasons.

However I mistreat them as characters, I understand that people of all genders, at least on the individual level, are rounded human beings capable of having any type of personality, and that their gender is just one of the many features we use to describe the person underneath. This is instead of applying a blanket stereotype to one group or another as some inherently untrustworthy, or treating them as incomprehensible aliens from Mars or Venus as appropriate. If I actually wanted the men in my life to die, those stories would become uncomfortable and I wouldn't expect readers to want to be involved in that fantasy.

I'm worried that a lot of these two-dimensional portrayals have less wholesome worldviews underneath. I was recently recommended a book with a love triangle in which I see reviews have raised concerns about the way the strong female character has insta-lust for the male characters, who are all tall, muscle-bound, sub-human monsters, but praised the way that she isn't afraid to discard a lover or give them the comeuppance they deserve. All fine, on its own. There's nothing wrong if that's your character. But then I looked up the author, and saw that this was literally the way she saw men in real life.

She is on record making comments like "I don't understand men, and the more I see of them the more I'm certain I don't actually want to", or "I am attracted to men, I just can't see myself dating one", or "I am an equal opportunity misandrist, there is plenty of hatred in my heart to go around", or "you do not owe men any entry into your life", or "I wish life could be a women's only event". She says that she hates damsel in distress tropes, not because of the female vulnerability, but because "I don't trust men to be saviours", again lumping them all together as some lesser beasts. All of a sudden, that story becomes a political manifesto.

In this context, the depiction of male characters as this inherently evil race of human-like monsters, who exist only to be muscular sex objects to be fucked and thrown away, takes on a toxic new light. The author is projecting a bitter and unhealthy worldview into her work, and encouraging us to endorse it in enjoying what we think is a fictional ride where this just happens to be the case. But it's hardly a coincidence, as I see she also mentions she is next working on a "a grimdark world based on misandry" and has committed after this project to never again make a female character love a man.

I think that's probably for the best - in general, I would say that people should not be depicting stereotyped characters of a demographic they have no interaction with in real life and seem to actually view as subhuman. Funnily enough, some of the reviewers who didn't have this background information still picked up on the toxic vibes in the characterisation, although they misdiagnosed them as racism instead:

Yes, she's dehumanising and objectifying them, but that's just because they're men. She sees all men as subhuman monsters, and so she creates them as such. Of course our female protagonist uses them both, or seizes the feminist victory in spurning them. On its own, that could be a perfectly enjoyable narrative about a strong, well-developed female character blazing her own path through the world. But I find it hard to cheer for her, knowing the type of person she's standing in for.

We're back to trying to separate the art from the artist, but I don't know how you can enjoy the book knowing her worldview - how you can celebrate that victory over the monstrous men, knowing you are being encouraged by somebody who has stacked the deck that way on purpose, just to play out and validate her own real-life hatred - especially as it has clearly bled enough into the art that people are finding it icky without even knowing the real reason why.

Write what you want, if it helps you work through the issues, but don't then promote that manifesto to other people. In general, I think people with outdated, gender essentialist views shouldn't really be writing unhealthy romances for mass consumption, whether their avatar is the tough action hero or the radiant princess. If you can't write a character respectfully, find one that you can. If you hate other genders, write a beautiful same-gender romance instead, and then it won't be actively uncomfortable to read. Write out of love, not resentment. I guess that's a compromise: Let People Write What They Want, but discourage them from Writing What They Don't Want.

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axolotlsauce · 2 years

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Okay so Im bored and autistic so im gonna rant about why lumity is great

(besides the obvious, which is that its a canon wlw ship in a disney property)

One of the things I HATE HATE HATE in media is a romance subplot that ends with the two people kissing and that’s just it. It infuriates me, because there are only 2 possible scenarios here.

1. The classic case of “kissing cause its in the script” aka “we’re pairing up the characters whose relationship only exists to fill a quota of what’s expected from a mainstream piece of media, and this kiss signifies that the relationship is complete, happily ever after.” this is bad because I dont give a fuck about this pairing because you used western audiences automatic expectation for the most obvious het ship to just happen to just... skip the part where you write a story where the characters actually develop feellings, because you know the audience will see a sexy male actor and a sexy female actor be co-leads and naturally assume that they’ll be the endgame relationship. This is lazy and boring

2. You actually did write the couple well, and I’m invested in their relationship. They have chemistry and their relationship develops well across the story, and they’re cute enough together for me to write at least three fanfics. In which case. Having the subplot end with the big kiss is just fucking cheating me. You gave me this whole story to want to see them be together. and then the second they came together, you ended the story. that’d be like if you built up a villain for the entire story and the protagonist killed them with their first attack. I wasn’t excited to see those characters kiss once and then be satisfeid with the knowledge that they will be together in the happily ever after: I WANTED TO SEE A CUTE ON-SCREEN COUPLE

And then there are the issues common with both of these: - A big kiss is a cliched and unrealistic way to start a relationship. for most relationships, getting together officially and the first kiss are seperate milestones, and cmon that’s way more interesting - The big kiss start relationship is always at the fucking climax because OF COURSE you cant dedicate any time to actually showing the couple, and then they’re usually broken up or physically distant in the sequel because GOD FORBID you write an actual relationship happening ONSCREEN. (like seriously why are you putting a relationship into a story just for the sake of having a romantic subplot when its so clear you have no interest in acutally writing a romantic subplot) - This leads to writers dragging out the relationship so it can happen at the end, when it would probably make more sense, both metatextually and in universe, for the characters to get together earlier. this is ESPECIALLY egregious in TV shows which are longer than movies, and thus more likely to pad out the relationship preamble with willtheywontthey BULLSHIT

and yet lumity. avoids all of this. everyhting I hate in fictional relationships isn’t present

For one thing, the romantic tension doesn’t start the second they meet, because it’s an enemies-to-lovers ship, so instead the focus with their interactions is initially antagonistic, but there’s a focus on how luz changes amity, and we also see their crushes on one another naturally develop and we actually get to see the chemistry they have with each other

The “oh shit they kissed” moment was a kiss on the cheek, and then when they got together officially it wasn’t a big kiss in the climax after defeating belos because that’s not engaging and also that’s not what teenage romance is like. Having them get together in a slower, lower-stakes episode where they just. ask each other out like normal kids is so much more engaging

And then. Ever since that ep. We’ve got to, you know, SEE THEM BE ADORABLE GIRLFRIENDS. The thing that lumity shippers ACTUALLY WANTED

in conclusion, this is a well paced romance between 2 characters who have great chemistry with each other, which isn’t the highest bar and yet the owl house has cleared it better than so so many other shows

#the owl house #lumity #luz #amity

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ghost0loxer · 3 years

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Imagine, a gender fluid teenager like myself has a favourite/feel-good film and that film is “Just One of the Guys,”from the mid 80s.

Picture this: theatre class, we watch “She’s The Man”, a dreamworks film from the 2000s. And yet, the social justice issues within the film are glaringly obvious to today’s society. Don’t get me wrong, it can be a funny film in a group setting - but then there are scenes that are just uncomfortable. Now, we discussed these themes in class, but I just can’t help but think about the film that came before it. Yes, StM (she’s the mans) is a modern day adaption of Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night” but I was thinking about the modern day adaption before StM, “Just One of the Guys” from the mid 80s.

I love this film. For multiple reasons, which I hope to discuss.

Number one, our main character. Terry Griffith is stubborn. If she thinks something is right, she won’t let anyone say no or get in her way. Now in some cases, this is great. It’s definitely a shift in the usual romantic comedy female lead (especially for the 80s). But it’s one of her biggest flaws. In the beginning, Terry doesn’t win a contest for a part-time job at the Sun Tribune. She believes her article was amazing, but she speaks with her English teacher and he gives it to her straight. “You don’t have what it takes to be a reporter.” Her article is boring; it’s about the nutritional value of the lunch menu in the school cafeteria, of course it’s boring. But the words her teacher tells her has her convinced it’s because she’s a woman. Thus, she leaves school for two weeks and transfers as a buy to another school who are holding the same competition. Once she gives her article, she is told almost the same thing, but this time, she’s given proper feedback to improve it. Of course, there was some irony with this scene between Terry and the teacher. “Just because you’re guy, doesn’t mean you can’t be sensitive or light.” Thing is, she doesn’t give up, she strives to fix it and finds a new angle. I love her determination, I love the way she doesn’t let others push her around. Furthermore, her transition to a man. In StM, Viola as a guy is made to be cringey and comedic, you watch and think, there’s no way a guy would do that. But Terry, having grown up with a younger brother and is actually smart, manages to nail the role. Sure, she has slip-ups, but she stays afloat and she’s not being over the top. She’s chill and convincing, yet you as the audience can tell she’s trying to appear masculine. Her lines are witty and she’s sharp. Someone has something to say, she’ll be able to backtrack and answer with a joke or sarcasm quickly. I like smart characters.

Another point, the way women are written in this film. A lot of women in this film are treated like shit, but it’s probably a realistic depiction of the 80s. Everyone is talking about dating and sex, it seems to be the only topic the women in this film speak about, unless they are Terry. Terry seems to be the only character in this film whose main goal is not romance or sex. She strives to be a reporter, she wants to prove herself, and she rejects the advances upon her frequently. Whether it’s the boys asking her on dates in halls, or her own boyfriend attempting to seduce her when her parents aren’t home, she doesn’t put them above herself, yet she still lets them down easily, unless they become more pushy (case in point, her boyfriend, Kevin, in the beginning). She can stand up for herself, but she’s not the only one. Her best friend, Denise is one of the many women looking for love, nevertheless, she holds standards. I will admit, I didn’t like Denise’s acting in the beginning; she’s not a great character, but even she manages to reject men’s advances constantly. She’s not afraid to say it bluntly and she expresses her true emotions when certain guys try to ask her out. She tells it to them straight, and I respect her for that (despite her lack of empathy for some). Terry’s brother is constantly hitting on Denise, but she stands her ground. She doesn’t hit him or curse him out, she spins words around him and always lead back to the key word “no.”

This is my third, and maybe final point, (because I’m not great at writing but I’m starting to get tired) the way they handle sexual orientation. It seems if you’re going to make a film about a cross-dressing woman who falls in love with a man, you have to discuss sexuality and this film is not afraid to. That was my biggest beef with StM, when Viola confessed her love to Duke, the made it blatantly clear that it was “weird” and “unusual”; the editing and music cuts. It was done for comedic purposes, but in that moment, it just made me cringe. Even when the principal marched onto the field during the big match to expose Sebastian as “the woman he was all along,” he used a big megaphone and said to the whole crowd this man is in fact a girl. If it were to happen in the real world, and this character was a trans male, that would be traumatizing and so so insensitive. I couldn’t help thinking the way they handled the reveal in StM was poor and shitty.

But with JOotG (just one of the guys)? It’s done respectfully. Throughout the film, Buddy, Terry’s younger, sex-obsessed brother (I have thoughts on this character), often refers to Terry as a transvestite or sexually confused. They make references about her dating other women and jokes. It’s not treated like taboo, but just something people normally talk about, and as a questioning kid when I first watched the film, I really needed that. Although it was used for jokes, the fact that it wasn’t treated like a silent topic made me think more of it and discover who I was; it was media like this that made me accept myself.

Even with the reveal. Kevin, Terry’s boyfriend (or ex boyfriend by the end), stomps up to Terry after she’s wrestled with the school bully and was dumped into the waves at prom. Rick, who’s been Terry’s friend (and is the male lead) throughout her time at his high school, immediately questions who Kevin is and he responds with a harsh and sure “Terry’s boyfriend.” Of course, that doesn’t expose Terry as female, but makes Rick assume she’s a homosexual. But instead of calling her weird or replying negatively, he answers Kevin’s question calmly and says he’s just a friend. There is no prejudice, no disgust, Rick is shocked, but that’s expected. Furthermore, this reveal not only does not alienate homosexuality, it puts the center of focus on the main characters rather than have the whole audience/prom witness this exchange. Sure, the rest of the school is watching but the camera never pans over to them, and even then, Terry drags Rick away from the crowds to a secluded area to explain more.

Even once they’re secluded, Rick doesn’t yell at her or is homophobic. He just says “I understand, you’re gay.” As we know, Terry is not in fact gay and she reveals this to him in a similar fashion as StM, at least it’s not flashing a whole crowd. But the thing that hits me, is the fact that it’s not used as a joke or for comedy. Throughout the film, they’ve mentioned homosexuality and being transgender, but it was used as a light-hearted joke (nothing insulting or derogatory). In this moment, it’s not a joke, and it’s the bare minimum for a emotional scene like this, but it always hits me.

Of course, Rick gets justifiably mad that he’s been deceived and he storms off. Terry’s flaw catches up to her here, as she kisses him in front of the prom guests, stubborn to make him realize how much she cares. ( I didn’t agree with this action to be frank, I cringed ). The crowd gasps and it’s the usual reaction to a homosexual kiss and Rick just pulls back, says “It’s alright everyone, he’s got tits,” and leaves with Deborah.

In true romantic comedy fashion, life moves on. Terry gets the job at the Sun-Tribune after writing her article about posing as a guy and everyone who was longing for love in the beginning has found it, except Terry. The ending, however, is Rick coming back for her after a couple (days? Weeks? Idk all I know is it’s summer by the time he comes back, how much space between prom and summer?) and they kiss, go on a date and all is good.

Now after writing this long ass post, I’ve come to realize the main reason I like this film. Sure, Terry is a good character (not morally sometimes, but she’s interesting to watch), the way women are presented also is good, but my main source of affection for this film (in comparison to StM) is the way they handle the switching of genders. I’m gender fluid, I don’t always like being a woman or a man, I switch almost daily and half the time can’t decide if I want to grow out my hair or cut it. Seeing Terry, originally a woman, manage to convince people she was a guy made me wish I could do it too. It made me realize, I don’t always like being a woman. I want to be a guy sometimes, and I want that to be accepted. It was media like this, like Ouran High School Host Club, like Bare: A Pop Opera, that made me understand my gender and sexuality. (Even media that didn’t have any relation to LGBTQ+ helped).

When I first heard of “She’s the Man”, I had hoped it would be like these pieces of media. And it wasn’t. It was an alright film, but made me feel disappointed and somewhat let down. And that’s why I just prefer Just One of the Guys. Maybe it wouldn’t float in today’s political climate, maybe I’m wrong for seeing these points as reasons it’s one of my favorites, but its still better than StM and is one of my favourite films.

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shoujoinvestigation · 3 years

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Our 2020 Drama Recs

What a year 2020 has been - a time of tumultuous change, anxiety and reflection. During this time, dramas have certainly become a safe space for comfort and entertainment. Fortunately, we’ve also seen more and more quality dramas released in 2020!

As we head into 2021, here are our top 2020 dramas picks:

1. Winter Begonia 鬓边不是海棠红 recommended by Admin JY

The story of two seemingly polar opposite characters in 1930s China - a feisty traditionally-trained Beijing opera star and a wealthy Western-educated businessman in a setting where Western influence meets Chinese traditions. Yet when they finally cross paths, their parallels in fact draw them closer to each other. The main characters shine and sparkle both as independent characters with their own depth, flaws and quirks and with their ever-so-natural chemistry interacting with each other, in what could be the most healthy and balanced relationship dynamic I have ever seen between leads.

Winter Begonia presents brilliantly written three-dimensional, human yet relatable characters growing with each other through a time in history of change and uncertainty, in addition to great acting, beautiful costume design, production value and showcase of Beijing opera. If you are looking for a show with drama, history/culture, comedy, family, action (and tragedy), look no further than Winter Begonia for an entertaining yet reflective story of growth filled with all the *feels*.

2. A Murderous Affair in Horizon Tower 摩天大楼 recommended by Admin JL

What’s your idea of a feminist drama? An ensemble of badass, confident female cast kicking ass and bonding with each other? For Horizon Tower, it is to be concealed in a mystery. Two detectives take us through the life of an attractive cafe owner after her death, retracing it through the eyes of people new to her and old ones who had known her well. They all have various things to say about her - each have a different piece of the full picture. What part of the truth do we trust? How do we, or can we judge her? While women are often expected to be the “perfect victim”, Horizon Tower says, the simple truth is, a victim is a victim, and a crime is a crime, regardless the conduct of the victim.

Horizon Tower is a sophisticated, brilliantly written and directed story. It’s fast-paced, compelling as it plays with multiple facets of the truth. There is no simple dichotomy - of black vs white, of women vs men. Instead, it fundamentally embraces the complexity of human nature - which is what makes it feminist. For me, this drama will stay in my heart as one of the most powerful and brilliant feminist stories to exist. In a time of feminist movements, it feels extra important and meaningful for China to have produced such a drama this year. Thank you for being the voice we all needed, Horizon Tower!

Watch the official episodes, subbed, on Youtube.

3. Hyena recommended by Admin JY

Not quite simply a law drama, nor a “badass” law drama turned into a sweet romance drama - Hyena is great for its culmination of confident writing featuring strong and unique characters that break stereotypes, balanced with a refreshing focus on morally ambiguous law cases.

Just as much as the focus was placed on the well-paced and exciting stakes in the legal cases featured, the drama always gave space for the characters’ legit explosive chemistry to shine through and be developed further. While KDramas have been attempting to write “badass” female leads, Jang Geum Ja always stayed true to her anti-hero and morally grey character, with her gaudy, loud masculine style, unscrupulousness and shameless ambition to the end - a truly strong and admirable female lead who may not be fully likable. Yoon Hee Jae as the male lead also deserves praise as a more sensitive and softer portrayal of a privileged and powerful male lead, without ever overshadowing others or overstepping his boundaries.

Even as someone who struggles to watch purely-law/detective dramas, there was much to appreciate and enjoy from this drama, with its quality acting, writing and even memorable OST that can only be fully appreciated by watching.

4. The Bad Kids 隐秘的角落 recommended by Admin JL

This is China’s year of high quality, sophisticated suspense dramas! Alongside Horizon Tower, The Bad Kids is certainly the one which had first carved out that status. Before it was named one of the Best International TV Series of 2020 by Variety, it had already achieved a phenomenal status in China with plenty of good fun memes and incisive meta created.

The success of The Bad Kids, in my opinion, represents creativity and the heart for storytelling triumphing over rigid, spartan censorship. It’s a testament that witty and thoughtful writing is what you need to tell a good story - and even censorship can’t get in the way of this (sometimes). It told a compelling and introspective story threading into moral fallibility while opening up questions to audience about what we perceive and know. This is a rare accomplishment when so many other recent cdrama stories are increasingly sanitised. The auteur-level of directing was vital in shaping the experience as well, down to the quirky selection of music.

So, do you believe in fairytales or reality? :)

5. Brutally Young 十八年後的終極告白 recommended by Admin JY

How far would you go to hide the secrets from your past to protect your present? - that was the simple but solid foundation that this HK Drama delivered.

A group of high school friends are forced to reunite after 18 years to unravel the mystery of a recently discovered corpse, related to their shared pasts. Through this premise, mystery and suspense unfolds as the characters’ complex motivations and hidden pasts are revealed.

Despite the wide ranging cast, many characters are given good depth and personal arcs for development, and even decent romance feels. The pace of the story is also kept tight and remains consistent and realistic throughout. Definitely an unexpected dark horse from TVB’s 2020 lineup, worth checking out!

6. Candle in the Tomb: The Lost Caverns 鬼吹灯之龙岭迷窟 recommended by Admin JL

Okay, after two heavy suspense dramas from me, is there anything more lighthearted to watch? I’m usually not an action/adventure fan, but I’ve been a fan of the remakes of Candle in the Tomb directed by Fei Zhenxiang along with his team, following after the prequel adaptation last year, The Wrath of Time.

This time, we have Pan Yueming as Hu Bayi, forming the Iron Triangle with Pangzi and Shirley, embarking on a tomb-raiding treasure-hunting adventure. Director Fei makes action digestible and fun to watch, on top of the witty script, great character-writing and performance - true to canon (as far as possible). As far as old fans of the franchise and new ones of the drama know, this is the best remake so far. I’m looking forward to the next instalment, The Worm Valley, likely out early 2021!

Watch the official episodes, subbed, on Youtube.

Let us know what your picks for 2020 are!

Written and gifs by Admin JY and Admin JL, unless stated otherwise.

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popsiclemania · 3 years

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mad for each other: a review of sorts cw: abuse

(i went into this show not knowing much except that it was about mental health and that people found it progressive. it’s 13 thirty-minute episodes, so it’s not much of a time investment.)

The first two episodes are pretty choppy in that the two “mad” leads dissolve into hysterics or uncontrolled rage every time they meet. It’s meant to show how they are misfits in regular society and also “crazy” by its standards. The man (Hwi oh) is a suspended cop with a history of assault and getting mandatory therapy sessions for his anger problem. The therapist is iffy at best.

Once we get past this setup though, the show becomes primarily about the paranoid female lead (Minkyoung) who lives an isolated life and in constant fear. She’s suspicious of everyone and takes steps all the time to ensure she can be safe in any situation, which often means she screams in terror and attacks people if they get too close or walk behind her for too long. (Which the male lead happens to do by coincidence) But is it really paranoia if your fears are real?

This is the part that’s amazing part to me: how they unfold exactly why she behaves this way. Why does she read into situations that seem harmless? Why is she suspicious of every single person she comes across? Why does she keep forgetting things she does all the time?

The narrative slowly delineates her history of abuse and the effects its had on her memory, her emotions, how she presents herself in public and her living situation. The focus is more on her and less on the events. I love how she consciously uses people’s assumptions about her “craziness” to protect herself. Hence, the open hair, the sunglasses and the flower behind her ear.

So far, Hwi oh is barely tolerable as a character, nor is his problem something that moves me. (He’s an angry cop!) What bothers me also is that in a story populated with women, there are mostly two kinds: absolute villains and ones the ML admonishes for being terrible people.

The writer saves this from being insufferable by writing the main secondary characters— women’s association president Kim Inja, part-timer Suhyun and Samantha— with some complexity and their own storylines. (I love all three of them)

It also helps that Hwi oh’s primary function from episode 3-12 (apart from romance) is to serve as a device to understand Minkyoung’s past and the journey she is on in the present. This is in addition to the arc we’re already on with her character.

Which brings me to why Minkyoung’s story is so compelling. She’s set up as an unreliable narrator of any scene she is witness to. It’s drummed in that she doesn’t trust herself either. This is what the writer uses to chalk out the complicated aftermath of trauma and abuse. From ep 3-12, the show centres her and peels of layer after layer to help us understand her behaviour. This is a person committed to survival, to her truth, and to learning to rebuild a life she has lost. She is shrill, hysterical and rude, everything that makes it easy for people around her to write her off. But the writer shows again and again, how in the face of suspicion and disbelief, even from a well-intentioned Hwi oh, she is right about everything and has absolutely valid reasons for how she does and does not defend her behaviour in public. Each time I think ‘surely, they will not take this particular thread to its realistic conclusion’, they do. WHICH IS WILD. Because every drama I’ve watched so far (except Law School) has hedged on a story like this. It’s also not held the "good men” accountable for their own toxicity.

All of this is why the literal and figurative car crash of a last episode absolutely ruins everything they’ve built till them. Hwi oh is shown to begin coming to terms with his anger until he absolutely loses it for “good reason” in defence of Minkyoung. The scenes where she confronts him about how his treatment of her, despite his best intentions, is just a degree removed from her abusive ex are so great. Then they fuck it up trying to tie up the romance between two “misfits” with a big bow. Except Hwi oh isn’t a misfit, he’s a cop with a history of going off the rails for “justice” and “catching the bad guy” and one who doesn’t fix himself. (This a trope far past its expiration date in murder mysteries, it doesn’t have a place anywhere anymore.) And he gets her back using tactics very similar to her abusive ex.

(In a limited way, I’m coming to understand why dramas make this U-turn. The writers are usually women, PDs are often men, and South Korea has a not-so-great relationship with feminism right now. I’ve also seen women there talk about what it’s like to confront men in public places.)

Popular media takes so long to catch to up how it validates violent male behaviour and what that violence even encompasses. (Like Bollywood has barely caught up to its stalker heroes, and the Salman Khan industrial complex is still at its peak. How do we even begin to talk about emotional violence?) I understand that and it also fills me with rage. It’s effect is so visible here in India. I would love to know what South Korean women thought of this show. In conclusion, watch for Minkyoung’s story and Oh Yeon-seo, for a stellar performance by Gil Hae-yeon as Minkyoung’s mother, for Bae Ji-won, Lee Suhyun and An Woo-yeon and end at episode 12. Episode 13 does not exist.

(ps: why is a drug lord, trying to zealously hide his face, getting his food delivery in person🙄)

#mad for each other #as an aside #i just realised the law school yesul storyline reminds me of bollywood's pink #there's probably a way to right about upright angry men #it's not this #i also have zero patience think about it #coz my primary mood on most days is f*ck men

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inkmyname · 3 years

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The Ember Island Players: performing toxic masculinity and narrative complicity in propagating misogyny

Initially I wasn’t going to respond to concerns about Katara’s racist/misogynistic portrayal in the Ember Island Players with anything more than snarky tags, but apparently I can’t keep my mouth shut, so I’m posting my response as a standalone meta about how the writers’ insistence on creating drama for drama’s sake leads them to--in lieu of actual character development--fall back on lazy narrative shortcuts whereby a performance of toxic masculinity against a gendered heternormative background is used to create tension in a romantic relationship, presumably with the goal of keeping the audience invested.

The Ember Island Players is problematic for a lot of reasons, not least of which is the pervasive tone-deaf misogyny, including racialized misogyny, directed at Katara. There’s a lot of meta on this, so I’d like to focus on something different: Aang’s relationship with gender and romantic attachments.

Aang seems so uncharacteristically chagrined the whole episode: “I’m not a woman!” Based on his previous characterization up to this point:

The Fortuneteller. This is the same Aang who makes a necklace for Katara when she loses her mother’s. Observe how he responds to Sokka’s jibe about jewelry-making, which can be seen as a feminine pursuit: Sokka: Great, Aang. Maybe instead of saving the world, you can go into the jewelry-making business. Aang: I don’t see why I can’t do both. Femininity isn’t presented as being mutually exclusive with narrative pursuits like saving the world which have traditionally centered male protagonists (especially if we take the entire canon of anything every written in any genre that’s not specifically, say, something like shoujo or jounen which are directed and young girls and women, the narrative focus on male personalities is overwhelming).

The Warriors of Kyoshi. Oh, and this is the same Aang that dressed up in full Kyoshi gear, kabuki makeup and all, without complaint. Why would he? After all, she was him in a past life. (There’s a whole meta here about gender-critical analysis of kabuki productions where male actors typically assumed female roles and how Avatar both takes inspiration from this real-life kernel and subverts it in Rise of Kyoshi where Kyoshi’s signature look is not only an homage to her parental heritage but also a reimagining of who can inhabit what roles. Her legacy, though imperfect, is also notably feminist, taking face paint worn typically by men IRL and expanding it into war paint for women warriors.) (There’s also great headcanon-adjacent meta here about gender non-conformity and non-binary identities in Avatar. Avatar was not overtly explicit about its feminist or gender-progressive mindset outside of episodes like The Warriors of Kyoshi or The Waterbending Master, but it was still way ahead of its time. If anyone was to be presented or headcanoned in such a way, it would be the Avatar who’s lived a thousand lives, inhabiting a thousand skins and a thousand identities, including gender identities. There’s also cool crossover meta here about the Legend of Korra depicting a female Avatar in Korra with masculine tendencies and visible muscle vs Aang as a male Avatar with a gentler pacifistic spirit and gender nonconforming tendencies.)

The Cave of Two Lovers. Aang wears a freaking flower crown and is generally wholesome and adorable, even leading up to the “let’s kiss lest we die” scene with Katara. He’s not pushy or overly concerned with appearing masculine and it is in fact Katara who suggests the kiss and Aang makes a fool of himself. From the transcript: Katara [Shyly, blushing.] Well, what if we … kissed? Aang [Very surprised.] Us … kissing‌? Katara See? It was a crazy idea. Aang [Dreamily.] Us … kissing … Katara [Fake-jokingly.] Us kissing. What was I thinking? Can you imagine that‌? Aang [Fake-jokingly.] Yeah. [Awkwardly laughs.] I definitely wouldn’t want to kiss you! [Beat.] Katara [Insulted.] Oh, well! I didn’t realize it was such a horrible option. [Angrily.] Sorry I suggested it! Aang [Realizing his mistake.] No, no, I mean … if there was a choice between kissing you and dying … Katara [Disgusted.] Ugh! Aang [Desperately.] What? I’m saying is I would rather kiss you than die - that’s a compliment. Katara [Enraged.] Well, I’m not sure which I’d rather do! [Slams the torch into his hand and storms away.] Aang [Miserably.] What is wrong with me … Aang, sweetie, this is not what you say to a girl you want to kiss, but generally, this is Wholesome™ and narratively, this is Good™. Eventually, they do kiss and that’s perfectly acceptable because there’s a whole conversation beforehand with humorous romantic framing. There’s consent and communication and initiative by the female protagonist. So solid A on the sensitive writing.

General Air Nomad culture. We don’t get a lot of Air Nomad culture in the show (and what little we do get what presented in such a misguided way, especially the whole commitment to forgiveness/pacifism which was handled in such an amateur black-and-white way from a writing perspective in season 3). But I digress. I really, really don’t think that Air Nomads who were so concerned with the spiritual side of bending and general existence had stringent notions of gender and romantic relationships–at the very least, they had very different notions of these issues compared to, say, the Northern Water Tribe. Canonically, even though AN philosophy emphasized detachment, Air Nomads practiced free love. Same-gender romance was freely accepted unlike in the homophobic Earth Kingdom (which even Kyoshi, a bisexual woman, wasn’t able to change) and the militant Fire Nation (Sozin outlawed homosexuality after declaring world war, essentially). And though the temples were gender-segregated, it seems that the burden of raising children fell to the entire community instead of just the women. Both male and female Air Nomads are revered. In the case of the former, Guru Laghima who unlocked the power of flight through achieving complete detachment from the material world. And in the case of the latter, Avatar Yangchen, who has statues everywhere because she came to be revered as a deity not just among Air Nomads but in the physical world in general. Nowhere in Air Nomad philosophy is the concept of gender, romance, love, sexuality, relationships etc. etc. tainted with jealousy and possessiveness (especially towards women) or rigid binary heternormativity.

So this was Aang for the better part of the first half of the series. Not overly concerned with gender roles. Pretty much fumbling his way through his first crush like a lovesick puppy and it’s all very wholesome. Supposedly a classic product of Air Nomad upbringing.

Meanwhile, Aang in EIP:

Checks out Katara’s butt as she’s sitting down.

Gets mad at being portrayed by a woman.

Accuses Katara of being the racialized misogynistic version of herself depicted on stage ([sarcastically]“Yeah, that’s not you at all.”).

Nods in agreement when the misogynistic stage production of Katara presents her as the “Avatar’s girl.”

Unable to differentiate between fiction and reality and puts the onus on Katara to do the emotional labor to justify something she never said (”Katara, did you really mean what you said in there? On stage, when you said I was just like a … brother to you, and you didn’t have feelings for me.”)

Assumes they would just… fall into a relationship… just because he forcibly kissed her at the invasion and again pressures Katara to do the emotional labor to justify why their relationship is not how he wants it (“But it’s true, isn’t it? We kissed at the Invasion, and I thought we were gonna be together. But we’re not.” / “Aang, I don’t know.” / “Why don’t you know?”)

Forces a non-consensual kiss on her even though “I just said I was confused!”

So, there’s so many things wrong with this, most of which are a laundry list of behaviors typical of toxic masculinity:

Ogling

Outdated misogynistic humor (what’s wrong with being a woman?)

Verbal abuse

Offloading emotional labor

Gaslighting

Pressuring a potential romantic partner

Lack of direct communication about romantic desires

Lack of sensitivity

Lack of active listening

Lack of emotional intelligence and empathy

Lack of consent and sexual assault

I could go on and on.

My question is Where and when did he learn these toxic behaviors? What happened to the wholesome boy making necklaces, wearing flower crowns, and generally being adorable in a kid with a first crush kind of way when it comes to romance?

Now, you can argue that EIP players Aang has been through a lot, including being shot by lightning and actually dying, and after the failed invasion, he’s stressed out with the weight of the world on his shoulders and maybe not expressing himself or his desires in the best way and taking out all of his frustrations on Katara.

Except… that is all just conjecture because the actual writing of the show doesn’t put in the hard work and make those connections. Instead, they fall back on misogynistic tropes and toxic heternormative romance tropes and a forced love triangle subtext and they just, to put it politely, fuck it up, two and a half seasons’ worth of work, gone, in the space of one episode. And even if it weren’t conjecture, it would still be wrong of Aang to act the way he did.

Let’s list Aang and Katara’s interaction in relation to each other in season 3:

The Headband. “Don’t worry about them. It’s just you and me right now,” Aang says as he pulls Katara into a dance. I have qualms about the writing of this episode: the creators wasted a golden opportunity to flesh out the Air Nomad genocide because they were too busy playing footloose in a cave, they wrote Katara–the same Katara would said fuck you to Pakku, freed enslaved earthbenders from a Fire Navy prison, and became a spirit goddess ecoterrorist to help a village in an enemy nation–as uncharacteristically shy just so Aang could sweep in and pull her into a dance. But like fine, whatever. It’s cute and really well-chreographed and there’s actually appropriate romantic framing here for once and at the end of the dance, look at Katara’s face–she’s happy! Positive Kataang interaction, and I don’t actually mind it. 7/10.

The Day of Black Sun Pt.1. He forces a kiss on her on the mouth, taking her completely by surprise. A chaste kiss on the cheek and a wistful pining last look and “Be safe” might have been acceptable, but given Katara’s shocked and uncomfortable body language, the kiss on the mouth was not. Worse yet, the show just… forgets… to follow up on it for several episodes and when it’s brought up again, it’s used as a sledgehammer to punish Katara for not magically being with Aang. 0/10.

The Painted Lady. Let’s look at the transcript: Katara [Using a disguised voice.] Well, hello Avatar. I wish I could talk, but I am very busy. Aang Yeah, me too. I hate that. [Looks at Katara’s face from behind the veil.] You know, you’re really pretty, for a spirit. I don’t meet too many spirits, but the ones I do meet, not very attractive. [Looks at Katara suspiciously. Tries to look under the hat.] Katara [Giggles nervously.] Thank you, but- Aang You seem familiar too. Katara A lot of people say that. Aang [Suspicious.] No, you really seem familiar. Katara Look, I really should get going. [Covers her face and runs, but Aang uses his airbending and blasts her hat up into the air, exposing her.] Aang Katara? Katara [Guiltily.] Hi, Aang. Aang [Shocked.] You’re the Painted Lady? [Pointing at Katara.] But how?Katara I wasn’t her at first, I was just trying to help the village. [Takes her hat off.] But since everyone thought that’s who I was anyway, I guess I just kinda became her. [Drops her hat on the ground.] Aang So you’ve been sneaking out at night? Wait, is Appa even sick?Katara He might be sick of the purple berries I’ve been feeding him, but other than that he’s fine! Aang I can’t believe you lied to everyone, so you could help these people. Katara I’m sorry, I know I shouldn’t have … Aang [Happily.] No, I think it’s great! You’re like a secret hero! Katara Well, if you wanna help, there’s one more thing I have to do. Aang gives her a curious look. Cut to the Fire Nation factory. Aang and Katara run along the river’s edge toward it. Aang looks at the polluted water. Aang You wanna destroy this factory? Katara Yes. Sokka was just kidding, but he was right. Getting rid of this factory is the only way to help these people permanently. He helps her blow up the Fire Nation smelting plant! Yes, he does call her pretty, but more importantly, this is one of the few times he acknowledges her faults (lying, deception, putting the mission at risk to help the enemy nation etc.) and still thinks she’s so fucking cool. He calls her a secret hero! There’s a lot of admiration and support here from Aang. He’s raising up Katara (instead of putting her down as in EIP) not because he sees her as a potential love interest but because he admires her and her compassion! This is great. Solid wholesome Kataang interaction. 10/10. But all good things must come to an end…

The Southern Raiders. I’m not going to spend too much time on this because there’s a million pieces of meta on this episode. He’s completely out of line asking Katara to be forgive her mother’s killer, the source of her greatest trauma as a victim of targeted ethnic cleansing. Given that he’s a victim of ethnic genocide himself, although he personally wasn’t there for it/didn’t actually witness it unlike Katara, he should have understood. He does say “You need to face this man,” which is good and supportive and he should have stopped there, because he continues on to say, “But when you do, please don’t choose revenge. Let your anger out, and then let it go. Forgive him.” Stop. Stop stop stop. No one should tell a traumatized victim of ethnic cleansing how to deal with their trauma. By the end of the episode, Katara doesn’t kill him–but she crafts a third path as the conclusion to her hero’s journey and it is not the path of forgiveness that Aang preaches. Ironically, it is Zuko, who also confronts Ozai, the source of his greatest trauma, who never tells Katara what to do but follows her lead instead: even though he redirects lightning at Ozai and could have killed him, he doesn’t go through with it. He understands Katara and he understands that she needs to this. Kataang interaction rating: 0/10.

So that’s where we are with Aang and Katara in Ember Island Players. Some positive interactions that are appropriately romantically framed and some that are just wholesome and good… but all ruined by forced kissing and moralizing about Katara’s trauma instead of offering understanding. So that still doesn’t answer when Aang would have learned all of the toxic masculine/heternormative behaviors he displayed in The Ember Islands Players.

The only answer, I’m forced to conclude, is bad fucking writing, where the creators were not only tone-deaf in portraying Katara in a racist/misogynistic way or, you know, in writing solely for the male gaze because fuck half the audience, I guess, but they just wanted to create drama for drama’s sake. They completely disrespected their female lead and I would argue they disrespected Aang’s character too in making him a stereotypical self-insert Gary Stu who displays toxic masculine behavior without consequences because that’s what’s expected of a toxic heternormative romantic plot device.

And worse yet, they never follow up on this, just like with the kiss at the Invasion. In the last five minutes of the finale, Katara looks up at him with admiration for saving the world and then kisses him. This is not only a missed opportunity for character development for Aang, but also a big fuck you to the female audience because the message is clear: the guy gets the girl as a trophy for saving the world, and fuck input from the female half of the partnership because that’s just not important and is not worthy of screentime. But I guess screentime dedicated to displaying toxic masculine/heternormative behaviors without ever condemning such behavior as a follow-up is just fine! :)))

If the EIP was supposed to make an argument for Kataang, then it failed. but more important:

By the show’s own high standards, The Ember Island Players is a failed episode, full of bad writing and worse characterization. For a show that was so ahead of its time, this episode is a narrative black mark, a failure of progressive representation and a disservice to its main characters.

There’s some wholesome Sukka and Zuko/Toph interaction, but even that doesn’t manage to save this episode, especially given there’s no resolution to the central conflict: the relationship between Aang and Katara. The entire unnecessarily OOC and forced Kataang drama drags it down.

We know Aang is capable of lifting up Katara and being supportive of her, as he was in episodes prior. We could have had honest, supportive, and open dialogue between Aang and Katara that actually followed up on the Invasion kiss, with Aang clearly expressing what he wants, Katara expressing that maybe she didn’t want that right now, and Aang completely respecting that and them hugging at the end because their friendship/connection is much more profound than pre-teen romance. This is an instance where Aang could have chosen to center Katara’s feelings, for once, instead of his own out of selfless love. If this happened, I would have been okay with a Kataang ending. But that isn’t what we got, obviously.

Part of what appealed to me about Aang as a male protagonist in media aimed at young audiences is that he–at least initially–did not start out as a toxic self-insert Gary Stu lifted from every problematic heternormative romance film ever. In fact, given his playful trickster archetype, general kindness/gentleness, and his stance against violence (a typically masculine trait), he both subverted expectations of and expanded the boundaries of what a male protagonist in children’s media can look like. Unfortunately, the creators don’t go all the way with Aang. In fact, they took a step back with his portrayal in The Ember Island Players, where the creators not only rely on misogynistic tropes to create drama but also make him complicit in propagating said misogyny. And that’s just a damn shame because we could have had a wholesome Kataang storyline and a sensitive male protagonist who cares not about your outdated gender roles and respects his partner’s autonomy!

#atla #aang #katara #kataang #eip #meta #my meta #aang deserved better #katara deserved better #queer #heteronormativity #toxic masculinity #misogyny #feminist criticism #kataang critical #but only in the sense that the writers messed it up #nothing against kataang personally

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welcome-to-the-cafe · 3 years

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SHANG-CHI (2021) Review Pt. 3

This section will focus more on the potential cultural impact and reflections of the movie.

Good things first. This was a great movie for Asian-American representation. On face value, it was a huge rather well-promoted movie (in my opinion, but that could just be my algorithms) under arguably the most internationally renown franchise today, Marvel. It featured empowered and attractive Asian male leads, empowered and attractive Asian female leads, a glorious, dreamy romance between two of them, and multiple humanizing familial relationships that don't simply recycle the old "modern freedom vs oppressive tradition". Each Asian character is a fully fleshed person, as is due, and clear authentic effort is made to celebrate their backgrounds, from the action to settings to costumes to language to the jokes.

And the Asian-American jokes land very well, especially the ones that highlight how different each individual Asian-American 's experience, and familiarity with their heritage, can be. Central to this is Katy, of course, essentially the audience surrogate, the audience being both nonAsians and "standard" Asian-Americans. She is bad at Chinese, even as her own grandmother speaks it. She defies her mom's (gentle) expectations of her, she is amazed and somewhat intimidated by her heritage in full form. The other characters who are closer to their native culture are gentle with her unfamiliarity: Shang-Chi walks her through pronunciation, Ronny Chieng's character assures her "Don't worry I speak ABC", and even Wenwu treats her kindly as a guest, and doesn't put her down for her Americanness. Well other than the patronizing storytelling tone, but that's the villainous patronizing, not the "you are uncultured" patronizing. Even in the village, they look down on her mostly on account of her not having martial arts skills and being ambitionless, than of her Americanness.

Similarly, Shang-Chi's struggle with his father did not use his time in America, and his potential Americanizing, as much of a pain point. I appreciate this, and the gentleness to Katy, greatly, as it dances around the culture conflict narrative that so frequently plagues other Asian American media (looking at you Crazy Rich Asians). As such, Wenwu is not evil because he is more Chinese/traditional, he is so because of the very human pain of losing his wife. Also he was a ruthless immortal warlord. And his children are not good due to their separation from their heritage; they are good because of their ties to each other and their mother, and her heritage from the village, which also traditional. Like an equation, the culture on the good and bad sides cancel out, and you are left with a largely culture-neutral narrative, while Chinese culture itself is shown off more.

Most of the characters are Asian, the non-Asians are very tertiary. In this, the movie functions as normal Asian media does; in removing the racial differences, the characters level with each other as people, instead of as representatives of their heritage. Speaking of native Asian media, I will now explain how this movie, for all of its virtues, will still serve the same ultimate function as Crazy Rich Asians and Mulan in terms of cross-national relations.

This was an American movie. Featuring Asian culture, yes. But an American movie nonetheless. Its action scenes would probably stand up well against native Chinese media, but its overarching presentation would be seen as incredibly cheesy, and probably somewhat patronizing, to a Chinese viewer. What are those costumes? What are those Ta Lo "traditional clothes"? Straw Huts? Why the fuck does Death Dealer have face paint? What are those ridiculous hook swords and tassle helmets? Oh hey its the mythical beasts they see in every wuxia fantasy movie.

I liked a comparison I read on social media; it is like presenting orange chicken as a dish specially made for your Chinese guest. The dish may be good, but that is besides the point; it is insulting for you to expect them to appreciate your facsimile of their culture. In this metaphorical scenario, you may be a Chinese-American, but your weird attempt to reference your heritage only highlights the divide. They eat better Chinese food all the time anyways, this orange chicken may be a direct downgrade. Did you expect them to be happy just because you, the American, made it for them? Are you looking down on them?

It is better for you to make a pizza or a fettuccini alfredo for them. This equivalent would be the World of Warcraft movie, with no Asian references whatsoever.

I remember when Avatar: The Last Airbender came out, and my 3rd grade self was so excited to see the Chinese armor designs on the fire nation, the kung-fu inspired bending styles, and more. But now, I feel a bit strange seeing how much obsession is given to this series by the Asian-American community. For all its acclaim and AsAm representation, it is virtually unknown to native Asians, unlike the notorious Resident Evil live-action movie series. I wonder, if most Chinese-Americans had watched more Chinese wuxia and fantasy, they would be as excited about ATLA?

This is also related to how Westerners are discovering Tony Leung for the first time, and some Asians say "we been knew". But how many AsAm actually did know? For how many Asian-Americans did it take Shang-Chi to introduce them to this legend, and his previous body of work?

Why was I so excited to be represented in a cartoon, even if I did watch Journey to the West growing up? Could it be because finally it was something with Asians in it that the kids around me also watched? Maybe. I could go on and on about Sun Wukong, but nobody cared, while Prince Zuko was somebody everyone knew and rooted for.

So in this way, Shang-Chi, despite being mildly offensive to the motherland (for which the movie does not even have a release date), is still very important and positive to us stateside. I feel a little bad for Simu that his homeland may not appreciate his greatest work so far, but maybe it doesn't bother him that much; he is now a hero to almost the entire Asian-American community. I hope Tony Leung can be the movie's saving grace for native markets. I also hope that Chinese watchers would understand why this movie is important for the diaspora, even if they don't enjoy the movie itself.

Oh, and finally, I hope Chinese-Americans don't hold their motherland in contempt for disliking this movie. It's not for them! Cut them the slack! And go watch their movies and media! It may not have jokes about the immigrant experience, but it is effective representation. Watch Asian movies! With your family, with your friends! Western media is not the center of the universe, and it never deserved to be. Put more people who look like you on your own screen.

I saw a lot of Tiktoks of nonAsians (and Asians) doing kung-fu moves coming out of the theater. I...am not sure about this? I guess martial arts is once more the vehicle by which we get positive representation in Western media, as is tradition. The legacy of Bruce Lee, of Jackie Chan, of Jet Li. Should I celebrate? Martial arts are dope as fuck but...that's not all we are...well. The appropriate tropey thing to say is: "This is just the beginning."

Part 4 will be my rewrite ideas. I will write it on my blog and link it here later.

#shang-chi #asian american #asian american representation #kevin watches #simu liu #awkwafina #tony leung #menger zhang #michelle yeoh

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izartn · 3 years

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On the The Host romance:

A lil note: @into-september as you’re reading Twilight, and your last post made me realise this, I thought it better to write my own post and tag you! Hope you don’t mind.

The Host is the first novel of an “adult” science fiction trilogy by Stephanie Meyer which never was finished. Published in 2008, the same year as Breaking Dawn, I guess she preferred gaining the benefits of her vampire saga to keep on writing.

For shame, because for me, The Host is much better at establishing worldbuilding, a concept and its protagonists + a romance (not that there isn’t anything cuestionable in it, but to my taste it’s better done than in Twilight). Here is the first paragraph of The Host wikipedia’s section on plot:

A species of parasitic aliens called "Souls" have invaded Earth, deeming the humans too violent to deserve the planet. When a Soul is implanted into a host body, the consciousness of the original owner is erased, leaving their memories and knowledge.

Wanderer, a Soul, is placed into the body of Melanie Stryder. However, Melanie's consciousness is still alive and begins to communicate with Wanderer mentally. Wanderer's assigned "Seeker" suggests that she could be placed into Melanie to retrieve the memories before disposing of the defective body, but Wanderer makes several attempts to deny her Seeker's wishes. As Wanderer starts to uncover some of Melanie's memories of her younger brother Jamie Stryder and her boyfriend Jared Howe, Melanie gets her to follow a series of landmarks throughout the Arizona desert to find her Uncle Jeb, hoping that Jared and Jamie are with him. By doing so, she would be denying the Seeker Melanie's memories and the humans they would lead her to.

Just. Read that and have the face to tell me it doesn’t sound more interesting than Twilight I dare you. Of course the books are different genres, although the focus is in the... more sentimental part in both. It’s just that The Host story is more unusual and the worldbuilding dreamy and subtly horrific.

Well I said I was gonna talk about the romance right? Spoilers incoming!

A bit of more context is necessary; in The Host, Melanie, the human Wanda (nickname of Wanderer) is possessing, is in love with the boyfriend mentioned in the sinopsis, Jared. Wanda being in the body of Melanie, feels things for him. We can divine for context this is sexual attraction plus having access to some of Melanie’s memories and noticing Jared is pretty ok as humans not possessed are left on Earth.

Melanie reaction to this oscillates between “don’t you dare touch my boyfriend alien” and “well of course you fell for him, he’s pretty awesome” to “if I can’t it’s ok if you want to” when she’s feeling herself disappear at one point. Which is bullshit bc her conscience comes back when Wanda goes to tell Jared to kiss her bc she’s feeling Melanie disappear and when he gets near Wanda, Melanie usually mounts a whole circus in her head. It works.

Well that’s one part of the romance. The other is Ian, a human in the settlement who is pretty level-headed and who starts talking to Wanda, as her guard first and then as her friend. No previous contact with Melanie, so he mets Wanda in Melanie’s body and isn’t excessively hostile or sad. Bc you know, an alien is in the body of you “niece, girlfriend, sister, etc” isn’t really conductive to good first impressions although that alien has come bearing the news that said person is still alive somewhere in their brain.

(Also the whole human group is so hilariously based on those paranoid about the government/end-of-days usa people... And it works! LMAO) (The social dynamics are interesting in this book ok? basic but ingenious)

So Wanda falls slowly without noticing for Ian; Ian falls first and confesses and everything. I think their first kiss was a bit sketchy? But generally they good.

The interesting thing is this: Melanie and so her body, is in love and attracted to Jared. Wanda, inhabiting Melanie’s body, starts realising that although Jared is pretty ok and all that, he’s really Melanie’s love; she doesn’t exactly like his more violent tendencies.

(Really he’s more apocalypse survivor hardcore, but he really was a dick to her at the start, bc alien possessing girlfriend and all. Also gave her mixed signals, etc. Very american male which, eh. Melanie is also very apocalypse survivor hardcore; the two mesh well bc of that lmao)

Well, as Stephanie Meyer is SM, and she has some weird ideas about romance the thing is, Wanda doesn’t feel sexually attracted to Ian. Bc all the hormones in her body are signaling only Jared. But she really is romantically attracted to Ian, and loves him. When they kiss, she likes it, but it’s not super passionate nor does it brings the same high that the few occasions Jared kissed her. To Ian’s credit he doesn’t really get it at the start, but then is immediately acepting of Wanda’s boundaries. I think he pushes a bit? But this SM so. Sigh. (I like to think in the hands of another author he wouldn’t do the sterotypical male thing but yah)

What I mean is that Stephanie Meyer, without intention, created an ace romance. Sure, it bc really weird biological alien science, but if you take it to mean Melanie is demi and only feels attracted to Jared, that makes her body reactions logical when Wanda also falls in love. She isn’t occupying the body wholly; there’s the host original presence; so she falls romantically but not physically. If I’m saying great idiotices please correct me under; I don’t have any background on sexology or biology.

Sadly, Wanda is also super worried of not being able of correctly loving Ian, so. Negation of ace identity in one, two..., warning to folks sensible to it.

And well, she ruins it when at the end when Wanda is put outside Melanie´s body into one who doesn’t have a human conscience. She explained the others how to take “souls” out of humans without killing any part, and how to take the “souls” to the space ships where they’ll be transported to other worlds. But sometimes the humans have passed so much time suppressed, or have been taken so young, that there isn’t a conscience-anyone to recover.

The Host is very weird, bc this is a race of genocidal colonist aliens who are weird beautiful little ribbons of silver in their original form, who after abandoning their original world by possessing another race who invaded them realised they could live whatever lives they wanted possessing people without dying and just. Went for it. They are a supposedly all peace loving gents, who cured all poverty and illness by their superior technology and like, very comunist-anarchist society. Who abhor violence, but don’t see eliminating other people identity as violence.

They are weird and amazing; when they realise having and raising children as humans costs so much, they start acting as parents to those humans without going to have a soul implanted on their kid, bc they love them as they are. A mess of contradictions, and Wanda is so interesting bc of this.

Sadly, SM acted again, and made Wanda one of the rare females able of auto-destroying to create more fragments of herself (aka other souls). The rest of souls don’t have any gender and chose bodies as whatever sex they like most. Guess Wanda being an alien was fine, but not having an explicit gender was too much, lol. To be fair, she says she prefers female bodies, but doesn’t really mind. Good on Wanda.

There’s a secondary romance too; the search of Ian’s brother, Kyle (who almost kills Wanda once) for his abducted girlfriend, Jodie. Results the soul inside her body, Sunny has all of Jodie’s memories of Kyle and is like, already in love with him. She lets herself be abducted, and when they explain they’re gonna get her out and why, is like, cries and begs, but accepts it bc is Jodie who Kyle loves. She hasn’t ever heard her like Wanda did Melanie, though, so when like a week or two pass and Jodie’s conscience remains dead Kyle consents (bc the other relatives of Jodie are soulified) to bring back Sunny. Wow. What a clusterfuck. They don’t date but there’s this weird vibe where Kyle has stopped hating all souls after Wanda’s mess and his encounter with Sunny, and Sunny herself is like; yay! I can live with humans and Kyle and I’ll keep trying to awake Jodie. And the two of them are described as inseparable?

It’s more intriguing than Twilight; I wished there were more fics interested in exploring cool canon divergences and all. I didn’t dive in the problematiqueTM aspects of the book but come on, this is SM and you have reading comprehension. I just wanted to talk about how interesting is the intersection of sexuality in romance in Wanda’s case >-< Still better than Twilight but I guess the aesthetic of vamps surpases The Host. Which. Valid ok? Each to their own.

#the host #stephanie meyer #wanderer #melanie strider #ian o'shea #jared howe #kyle o'shea #sunlight passing through the ice #or sunny for friends #meta #the host meta

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josy72 · 4 years

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Portrait of a Lady on Fire 🔥

Intervista del 14 /02/ 2020

The Black List Interview: Noémie Merlant & Céline Sciamma on PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE

Kate Hagen

My favorite movie-going experience in 2019 may have been seeing Céline Sciamma’s exquisite PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE at the 105-year old Prytania Theatre in New Orleans as a part of the New Orleans Film Festival. Being in an ancient theater only added to my immersion in the film’s sumptuous, sensual world, created by Sciamma and her incredible lead actresses, Noémie Merlant and Adèle Haenel. I spoke to Merlant and Sciamma about how they built a welcoming atmosphere on set, the power of the female gaze in narrative, secrets in cinema, and much more.

Noémie Merlant

What was your experience like reading this script for the first time? What resonated with you about the portrayal of Marianne?

It was a huge experience reading this script, because what I felt is that it represented something we’ve missed — these images, representations, and stories that we’ve been missing so much of. I realized that while I was reading that because we’re in a society and culture that is so inside the male gaze that we don’t even notice that this is the male gaze, this is one gaze — while I was reading it I realized that. And then, everything was so detailed — everything was in the script so the script was alive. There was all the breathing, the looks, the movements, the desire that was crawling…it was slow, and it was taking the time to build this love story of a woman and it was all about details taking the time, building excitement, expectations and desire slowly with new images, like the sex scene.

And so I realized the power of this love story. Marianne touched me really deeply because she’s a really modern character. She’s a curious voyeur, she’s a painter, she doesn’t want to get married. She is modern in that way, and that represents all these women that we’ve forgotten and erased from society and history. These painters — hundreds of women from that period were just erased. Through this love story with Heloise (Adèle Haenel) she finds her style of portraiture, because of their collaboration. She feels so grateful to be a painter that she’s stuck in the rules and the ideas and the way of “do a portrait that’s very good” and she’s stuck in this vision.Heloise wakes her up: “This is not me, this is not you, this is not us. This is not a woman, this portrait is not representing us.” And at that point, my mind changed. This script, for me, was what Heloise was for Marianne.

Throughout the film, we’re breaking out of that idea of the male gaze too — challenging rules by the old masters to create something entirely different. What was the most challenging part of creating this character for you? What was your favorite part about playing her?

There was not one scene that was particularly harder than another. What was hard was to keep something, a feeling, present from the beginning to the end of shooting the movie — there was a lot of restriction because of the period and the costumes and the dialogue and the light and the focus, it’s candle-lit. Every movement was written. I was finding a way to make it alive, and include me and my vision as an artist, too. I knew that I couldn’t move much while I was sitting, that I had to say the lines and do a smile or a gaze…But it was really trying to find a new way to look at Heloise each time, to find a new way to breathe. As the story grows and the desire grows too: Having a smile more open, more large, having movement more free, dresses less tight, and everyone smiling more.

I think the film does a great job of exploring the necessity of the collaboration among women that happens around art, but I also really loved that the film is about female kinship on all levels. Whether that’s making a meal together, sleeping together spending time together. What was the atmosphere like on set as you guys were creating that little bubble of the three of you in the house spending time together?

On set, the way that Celiné works is to create an environment of respect and kindness. But it’s about having fun too— we’re of course being serious because we’re working, but at the same time, we’re having fun. For this movie, we were all together in a house, we called it “Champs Mer.” Like the movie, we were all together in this house, the girls were together, and we were always together in creating and discussing what we did. It was really a parallel of the movie and the experience of the movie.

What do you hope modern audiences take away from PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE, which is a very different take on a period film than we’ve ever seen before.

Despite the fact that it’s a period film, it’s modern because it shows things like the abortion scene that we’re not used to seeing. The sex scene is an entirely new image, a new representation of the lesbian story which has of course existed before, but has never been present enough. The female gaze and intimacy of women…that’s a story that hasn’t been told, with the woman as subject and not as object. This feeling of creating mirrors this new experience of love — the excitement of imagination and artist collaboration, and the desire that grows slowly in details and images.

Céline Sciamma

How did the initial idea for this film spark within you? What was your writing process like knowing you were going be directing the film as well?

Well, I wanted to write a love story, I wanted to dedicate a film to love and to desire. And to have these two emotions embodied very patiently — what the process of falling in love actually looks like, moving away from the conventional idea of love at first sight and romance.

The chemistry between Noémie Merlant and Adèle Haenel in this film stars with a smolder then becomes incendiary, as you mentioned. How did you work with the two of them in pre-production and on set to make their relationship be viscerally felt on screen?

This chemistry definitely burst in front of my eyes during the casting process. First, I met Noémie alone with my casting director — she made a strong impression. Then during callbacks, the second round was with Adèle, and when I saw the both of them in the frame I knew that this was right.There was this strong physical contrast that I was looking for, very cinematic, but there was a strong also sense of equality, since they’re the same age, same height, and both have very strong intensity. We stopped there! We didn’t rehearse at all, so that they would actually meet on the set and during pre-production. Sometimes I rehearse before shooting, it depends on the film — WATER LILIES we rehearsed a lot, GIRLHOOD we rehearsed a lot, TOMBOY not at all, and PORTRAIT not at all. Because it was about love and all the danger of the unknown, it felt right for all of us to actually also be in that position.

There’s a sort of pervasive sensuality in this film — whether its a smear of paint or crumb of bread, we’re immersed in the same sensual world that the three leads are in. How did you work with your various department heads to make the world of this film come alive?

By being really minimalist regarding set design. It’s a paradox — even though this film is period piece, this is a film where I had less innovation on the set design because we’d come to this castle in the Parisian periphery where we shot most of the film, and it was untouched for… 150 years? So, the color of the walls…we didn’t choose that. [laughs] We entered this room, and we decided that we were gonna leave it that way. And there was a vibe from the past that actually made me super confident — so whereas in my previous film [GIRLHOOD] there was a lot of set construction, even the teenager’s rooms, there was no fourth wall, so then we decided to put very few things in the frame, just wooden boxes and fabric that was very low-key: linen, cotton. This also extended to the costume design, but with fabrics that were silky. To anchor the film and the sociology of that particular moment in Brittany— period pieces are often mundane, you know. We built the bed, we built the table in the kitchen, we felt we were inventing very minimalist furniture.

There are so many elements in this film that reflect modernity and almost an otherworldliness that we don’t often see in period films, whether that’s the abortion scene or the ghostly visions, or the psychedelic sequence. At what point did you decide to bring in these contemporary trappings to a tradition period film?

They all came up along the way, like “Oh, I want Adèle to appear because it’s mostly about ideas. I want Adèle to appear as a ghost because it’s the present of a love story, but also a memory of a love story, the contagion of these two layers.” The idea behind this is the fact that the minute Noémie falls in love and she knows it, she’s already haunted by the last image that she will see of Adèle. And then, when you have this idea, you try to really be brave about it and be generous about it, not make it this little anecdote, but put it all over. That what happens with Orpheus and Eurydice for instance — I was looking for a scene, a sort of “Netflix and chill” scene between the three girls where they would be super involved in a climatic bit of fiction, and then talk about it, and do a whole show of suspense. And then I thought, it’s also a way to see the myth from a woman’s perspective, and from the perspective of Eurydice. Sometimes it’s just an image — like for instance, Adèle on fire is an image that came out of nowhere, but was immediately like “I want this.” Suddenly, it gives you the title, suddenly, you have to find, “Why would she be set on fire?” So it should be outside, it should be a great fire, and then it’s “Maybe it should be a bonfire!” It’s strange to believe in your intuition and connect things that are not supposed to be connected. You begin to build the plot around strong desire for certain images that have mystery, and suddenly, you bring enough in to not rely on the mystery, but to connect them and to build the narrative around them.

Your last four films have been about developing the female identity, however that may look. Do you feel like you’re making a films in similar thematic territory, or is each film its own thing?

Well, after the the sort of adolescence trilogy (WATER LILIES, TOMBOY, and GIRLHOOD) I really felt like I was departing with PORTRAIT because it’s a story about grown-ups, with professional actresses and a love story that is fully lived, whereas before there was always a love interest, but it was mostly desire as a way to discover yourself. With this one, even though they are discovering themselves, it’s about this iconic couple, this duo and how a love story involves immense patience.

I’m still thinking about the last ten minutes of this film — that art show sequence is so breathtaking, especially as it concludes with the book in Heloise’s hand. You were speaking earlier about finding images before finding the plot — did you already have the images in mind for that ending sequence at the start of the film?

The last scene I had in mind since the beginning, I basically did the film to land there. But I didn’t actually think about the fact that there would be three endings, because there are three endings of the film. For instance, from the book, the page 28 reference, that’s a totally different process — it’s really about looking at a lot of painting at the time and the art of portraiture. I liked the fact that there were little secrets involved, and I decided I had to hide a secret in the painting. I thought it would be in the painting that Marianne would do, but then maybe it could be in the painting that Marianne would see. I had a list of different types of secrets, it’s very codified — for instance, in painting at the time, especially for marriage portraits, there’s a cage and a bird inside, if the door is open, it means she’s not a virgin anymore, if it’s closed, she is. I was finding our own little secret code, and also relying on the audience’s pleasure and intelligence that I’m always trying to think the audience has, that the viewers are the most intelligent person. It’s also knowing that the pleasure of being a viewer in cinema is about being immersed in a film and speaking the language of the film, and as the film goes more and more and more, you speak the language of the film, and the page… it’s a fucking number, but suddenly it means something for you as much as it means something for the character. That’s the kind of thing I’m always looking for — I thought about it for months, finding just the right treasure.

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mermaidsirennikita · 4 years

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books (in the time of corona)

PART I: ADULT EDITION

Let’s get real--we’re all going fucking insane.

Therefore, I’m recommending some books with which you can kill time. I’m breaking them into categories--the romance category including several subgenres but by and large covering books that focus more heavily on the romance than anything else. These will all be adult books; I’m doing a separate page for YA recommendations.

I’ll be adding to this list as I finish books that I feel belong here.

ROMANCE

A Knight in Shining Armor by Jude Deveraux. A young woman is abandoned by her scoundrel of a boyfriend, only to find a literal medieval knight in shining armor. Pure 80′s cheese, a classic in the time travel subgenre long before Outlander ever happened.

The Circle Trilogy by Nora Roberts. Six sexy people, three men and three women in Roberts fashion, travel across time and parallel dimensions to fight an evil vampire and her undead army. Come for three fun romances, stay in particular for the “virgin bookworm queen captures the heart of the formerly evil 1,000 Irish vampire” ship.

The Hating Game by Sally Thorne. Rival coworkers who’ve always hated each other compete for the same job--until maybe? They start? Hooking up?

From Lukov with Love by Mariana Zapata. A down on her luck singles figure skater pairs up with the pairs champion she’s always despised... Unless they in fact, in a STUNNING TWIST, do not hate each other?

Pestilence by Laura Thalassa. A BIT ON THE NOSE RIGHT NOW, but I promise that this tale of a hot virgin Horseman of the Apocalypse spreading his plague and the one woman brave enough to fuck him is WORTH IT. As is the sequel, War.

My Lady’s Choosing by Kitty Curran. A literal choose your own adventure novel, but the adventures bodice ripping Regency romance plots!!!

The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang. A sweet and smart woman on the autism spectrum hires a male escort to teach her to be good at sex. Shit goes DOWN from there.

The Flatshare by Beth O’Leary. She works days; he works nights. She needs a cheap place to stay, and he needs a roommate. So they share a flat and even a bed (sleeping on opposite sides and never at the same time) only communicating through post-it notes throughout the apartment. What could go wrong?

Marriage for One by Ella Maise. She can only get her inheritance if she’s married. Good thing a glacial attorney has offered to marry her out of nowhere, only for paper purposes. What could go wrong???

The Worst Best Man by Mia Sosa. Lina is a wedding planner who was left at the altar. Max is the younger brother of the man who left her, and apparently convinced him to do the leaving. What happens when they work together?

Get A Life, Chloe Brown by Talia Hibbert. Chloe suffers from a chronic illness, which means that she’s never had a life--and so she compiles a list that will help her get one. On the list? Meaningless sex. Which she won’t have with her building’s superintendent, even though he’s really down to help her cross off all the other items, riiiight?

HISTORICAL FICTION

Passion by Jude Morgan. The dramatic and intense height of Romantic England, told from the perspectives of Caroline Lamb, mistress of Lord Byron; August Leigh, his sister and lover; Mary Shelley; and Fanny Brawne, fiancee of John Keats.

Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier. Impoverished Griet becomes a maid in the household of the painter Vermeer, becoming his muse after he realizes that she has a natural eye--much to the dismay of his wife.

Snow Flower and The Secret Fan by Lisa See. In nineteenth century China, best friends Lily and Snow Flower follow each other through emotional and cultural revolutions, communicating through the secret language of fans.

The Memoirs of Cleopatra by Margaret George. Cleopatra recounts her life story, from her earliest memory, through her affairs with Caesar and Antony, and her end.

Mistress of Rome by Kate Quinn. In Domitian’s Rome, a Jewish girl rises from the position of lady’s slave to the emperor’s mistress through wiles and scheming.

The Tiger Queens by Stephanie Thornton. The rise and fall of Genghis Khan’s empire, as told through the women of his family--from his favorite wife to a clever daughter-in-law.

At the Water’s Edge by Sara Gruen. A socialite follows her incompetent to Scotland as he struggles to find the Loch Ness Monster and redeem his ancestor’s name--finding herself and questioning her life in the process.

A Year of Ravens. A collection of short stories by different authors, all centering on Boudica’s rebellion through the eyes of her countrymen and her enemies.

Feast of Sorrow by Crystal King. A slave becomes a chef in the treacherous household of a social climber struggling to gain the favor or Caesar August.

Fatal Throne. Six authors tell the stories of Henry VIII’s wives, all from their differing perspectives.

Daisy Jones and The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid. The rise and fall of a 1970s rock band is charted through the recollections of its members--as they recall what drove them apart, and in particular the intense relationship between the leader singers.

THRILLERS

The Girl in 6E by A.R. Torre. A woman with murderous impulses locks herself in her apartment to keep the public safe, making a living as a camgirl. She’s left torn between morals and impulse when she begins to suspect that one of her “fans” is dangerous.

Little Deaths by Emma Flint. In 1960s America, a single mother finds her personal life and image called into question when she’s accused of murdering her two young children.

My Sister, The Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite. A nurse covers up her beautiful sister’s murders, only to be caught between loyalties when the doctor she loves falls for said sister.

The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine. A plain “nobody” transforms herself in order to steal a high society housewife’s husband, only to deal with more than she bargained for.

The Wife Between Us by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen. A woman obsesses over her ex-husband’s new fiancee, leading her to disturbing lengths.

The Other Woman by Sandie Jones. After meeting her ideal man, a woman must contend with his possessive mother, who will do anything to maintain her hold over him.

Something in the Water by Catherine Steadman. A couple on their dream honeymoon find something in the water that will change the course of their life together.

The Au Pair by Emma Rous. The day Seraphine and her twin brother were born, their mother flung herself off a cliff and their nanny disappeared. Decades later, Seraphine discovers a photo taken of her parents just before her mother’s death--with only one baby. The only person who holds the key to the mystery? The au pair.

My Lovely Wife by Samantha Downing. A couple keeps the spark alive through murder.

Lock Every Door by Riley Sager. A young woman takes a job apartment-sitting in a high-end Manhattan building. Shortly after she befriends another sitter, the girl goes missing--with everyone else acting like nothing is amiss.

The Wives by Tarryn Fisher. Thursday is one of her husband’s three wives, though she’s never met the other two. When she finally does meet the third wife, she discovers a woman far different from what she expected--and covered in bruises.

FANTASY/SUPERNATURAL/HORROR

Daughter of the Forest by Juliet Marillier. Sorcha is the youngest of seven children in medieval Ireland. When her stepmother curses her six older brothers to live as swans, Sorcha agrees to weave them shirts of painful thistles, all the while remaining silent, to break the spell.

Black Pearls by Louise Hawes. A collection of dark fairy tale retellings.

The Incarnations by Susan Barker. A man receives letters from an anonymous source, detailing his supposed past lives throughout historical China.

Girls Made of Snow and Glass by Melissa Bashardoust. A dark Snow White retelling, with a stepmother whose goals extend far beyond the princess.

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo. Alex Stern is discovered as the sole survivor of a brutal multiple murder, and is promptly scooped up by a group charged with monitoring the occult societies at Yale. Now disguised as a university student, Alex must figure out who’s been murdering locals, while also hiding what happened the night she lived.

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell. A young widow in Victorian England is sent to her husband’s country estate to wait out her pregnancy, and is not alarmed to discover a “silent companion” (a painted wooden figure) in the house. But when the figure’s eyes begin following her, she is sucked into a history beyond her imagination.

Circe by Madeline Miller. The story of the woman who would seduce Odysseus, from her beginnings as a plain witch born of Helios and a mother who couldn’t care less. A classic rise to power story.

CONTEMPORARY LIT

Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal. Down on her luck Nikki takes up a job as a creative writing class instructor for the Punjabi widows in her West London neighborhood. It turns out that the widows thought she was there to teach them to write in English--which leads to the class becoming a place for them to share their stories orally instead. And it turns out that they’re a bit... erotic.

An American Marriage by Tayari Jones. Upwardly mobile newlyweds Celestina and Roy have their lives upended when Roy is falsely accused of a terrible crime and sent to prison for twelve years. When he’s released early after five, he returns home to find that Celestina has changed completely, and their marriage is entirely unknown.

Stay With Me by Ayobami Adebayo. A young Nigerian couple has always been against polygamy; but after the wife fails to get pregnant, her in-laws show up on their doorstep with a second wife.

NON-FICTION/MEMOIR

Harem: The World Behind The Veil by Alev Lytle Croutier. An examination of the Ottoman Empire’s harem culture, focusing on the women within.

Love For Sale: A World History of Prostitution by Nils Johan Ringal. Not really a GLOBAL history of prostitution, but a good introduction starting with ancient times and going into the cases of more recent madams in America, with a strong case for legalization worldwide.

Georgiana: Duchess of Devonshire by Amanda Foreman. A readable biography of the famously scandalous and tragic duchess, to be read while you kill time rewatching “The Duchess” starring Keira Knightley.

Lucrezia Borgia: Life, Love, and Death in Renaissance Italy by Sarah Bradford. A fair but none-too-precious assessment of one of Renaissance Italy’s most controversial women, and an analysis of her relationships with her father and brother.

The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn by Eric Ives. While you’re quarantining, you might as well read the definitive Anne Boleyn biography, yes? This one is responsible for much of the modern attitude on Anne.

Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution by Caroline Weber. A fascinating analysis of Marie Antoinette’s political life through her clothes.

The Monster of Florence by Douglas Preston and Mario Spezi. An analysis of the infamous, unsolved “Monster of Florence” case. One of the most gruesome serial killers in Italy’s history, the monster’s crimes were pinned on several different men, and even investigated by the prosecutor who botched the Amanda Knox case.

The Forger’s Spell: A True Story of Vermeer, Nazis, and the Greatest Art Hoax of the Twentieth Century by Edward Dolnick. An examination of the case of Han van Meegeren, a painter who forged and sold many Dutch master fakes, and the pretentious art world that let him get away with it for years.

The Secret History of the Mongol Queens: How the Daughters of Genghis Khan Rescued His Empire by Jack Weatherford. A study of the women in Genghis Khan’s family, and in particular those that kept his empire from falling to ruin after his death. A good companion read with Stephanie Thornton’s fiction novel Tiger Queens mentioned above.

Chasing Aphrodite: The Hunt for Looted Antiquities at the World’s Richest Museum by Jason Felch and Ralph Frammolino. How did the Getty Museum end up with so many stolen artifacts? This book aims to find out.

The Creation of Anne Boleyn by Susan Bordo. A different kind of Anne Boleyn book, studying her portrayal in culture and fiction--complete with input from Natalie Dormer following her portrayal of Anne Boleyn on The Tudors.

Blood Sisters: The Women Behind the Wars of the Roses by Sarah Gristwood. An examination of the women of the houses of Lancaster and York during their famous, long-running conflict--and how these women had an impact on battles and politics alike.

The Dragon Behind the Glass: A True Story of Power, Obsession, and the World’s Most Coveted Fish by Emily Voigt. The author delves into why people are so obsessed with the arowana, a rare and exotic fish, to the point that they’ll commit murder--and becomes wrapped up in the fascination herself.

The Rules Do Not Apply by Ariel Levy. Over the course of a month, Ariel Levy watches everything she held true in her life--her financial security, her career, her marriage, and her pregnancy--fall apart. Levy must confront what it means to live an “unconventional” and “free” life, only for that to become meaningless, and pick up the pieces.

From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to find The Good Death by Caitlin Doughty. Doughty recounts her global travels to observe and study different funerary and death rituals, recounting and analyzing her experiences with respect and personality.

Lady Killers: Deadly Women Throughout History by Tori Telfer. A collection of female serial killers, analyzing why they did what they did and the cultural legacy they left behind.

Severed: A History of Heads Lost and Heads Found by Frances Larson. A history of decapitated human heads, and what different cultures have done with them.

From Scratch: A Memoir of Love, Sicily, and Finding Home by Tembi Locke. Tembi Locke was never truly accepted by her husband’s Sicilian family, as a black American woman. But when Saro dies young of cancer, she finds herself more deeply entwined her in-laws, as she works to pick up the pieces. (Warning: one of the most achingly romantic books I’ve ever read; but it will destroy you.)

#books #book recommendations #book recs #self reblog for new addition

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kayliemusing · 3 years

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1. Is there something you have been trying to learn lately? - There’s kind of a few, because I feel like they all tie into one. Self acceptance is a big one, self-discipline, productivity, and trusting in God (which has proven to be the hardest thing. It hurts to trust in something you don’t see the outcome of, but it hurts too much not to trust in God.)

2. If you ever feel like you are different from your extended family, in which ways is this? - My dad/s side of the family is really toxic. There’s a lot of hypocrisy, drama, mental illness, drug addictions, and religiousness on that side (and when I say religious, I mean shame-y religion which I don’t agree with at all.) But my dad was really different from them. He was very kind, open to council, very steady and stable despite coming from such a dysfunctional background, and he loved God so truly that a lot of that pure ‘religion’ that exists within his family was broken off of him, and then I have my mom too, who is very fun, kind, caring, etc, so I grew up around more normalcy than my cousins did. My parents just parented me well and they talked about God to me and my sister a lot in such a good way that I never grew up around pure, shame-y, rule-bound religion which I think is the explanation why I (and my sister) are very different from our extended family. My dad died when I was fifteen so I don’t see that side very often, especially because they’re just entirely chaotic and dysfunctional so when I am around them it’s way more noticeable how different we are. (Sorry for big explanation. I’m in a super reflective mood lol.)

3. When you think about your future career, do you envision yourself becoming the head honcho or CEO? If not, why not? - I’ve always kind of wanted to have this leader-esque feeling to my career, but no, I don’t see myself being a CEO. I really just want to be an author so I guess I would have some level of being a leader to my own business, but not quite on a CEO type level. Right now, I’m trying to focus on fiction but I’m easily overwhelmed by it so I have been considering other mediums of writing. I just don’t know what that is or what fits right.

4. Is there something that you are sort of weird about talking about? Like, a thing that other people find casual, but you feel uncomfortable when the subject comes up? - Sex, is the first thing that comes to mind, but not sex in general. More like the conversations that are too much, you know? Lol. Some people go really into detail or can be graphic about their sex lives and I’m just like, please don’t. I don’t mind generically talking about it, but there’s a line. 5. Can you think of a time when you seriously misjudged a music artist based on their name? - I don’t think so.

6. Do you ever make negative comments about other body types? How does it make you feel when you see or hear negative comments about your body type, or a physical trait that you have (even when it’s not directed at you)? - Sometimes I have the tendency to judge other body types (i.e. I really don’t like the thigh gap look), but it’s never malicious and I’m always trying to be aware that others can’t help what they look like and if they’re happy in their body, that’s what matters. I struggle with disordered eating and kind of sit on that line between having an eating disorder and not having one so I’m very sensitive about my body and its type. I have a chubby tummy and I’m so insecure that it’s not flat that when I hear anyone say anything negative about not having a flat stomach it’ll ruin my day or I’ll just feel really ashamed.

7. If you are in a situation where you feel like you are being attacked or not respected, how easy or difficult is it for you to stay and keep your head rather than leave in a huff? - I’ll usually leave the conversation. Maybe slam a door lol. I’ll usually stand my ground until I finally feel like I’m not heard or no one cares and then I’m out.

9. When you think about how attractive you feel and your favorite features, are you comparing yourself to a societal ideal? - Yes. I happen to be well-acquainted with the comparison game.

10. If you have a favorite song right now: What is it? How did you first hear it? Why do you like it so much? - My favourite song is probably Coney Island by Taylor Swift right now. It’s from Taylor’s new album Evermore, but I have a couple on that album that tie for my favourite song right now (Honorable mentions: Willow, Cowboy Like Me, Tis The Damn Season). I absolutely love how poetic this song is and I think one of my all time favourite lyrics she has ever written is in that song: “If I can’t relate to you anymore then who am I related to?” This song for me just feels like I’m reading a poem and I just sink right into the story she’s telling.

11. Have you ever had someone that has been your friend for a while come to you and tell you they had romantic feelings for you? How did you respond, and did the friendship survive? - I did have a friend of mine tell me they had feelings for me. We had become friends in the eighth grade and then he confessed his feelings for me in the ninth grade, I told him I didn’t feel the same way but we stayed friends and it didn’t ruin anything, and then he confessed again in the eleventh grade and I said no to him again. After that final rejection, we never really made it back to being friends for a few reasons a) We stopped being in the same classes, b) I think he was really hurt and c) his friend (who is most dramatic than a girl by the way, and ironically dating one of my friends at the time) stuck his nose where it didn’t belong and gave his two cents and that was kind of when it fell apart. I didn’t really know his friend so it was weird that he had this narrative of me that he said “was leading X on” when I was just trying to be his friend but it’s whatever now. That was when I was like sixteen lol.

12. Hypothetically speaking, if Hillary Clinton were running for President as a democrat against Chris Christie as a republican in 2016, who do you predict would win the election? - Well, since it’s 2021 now, I would predict that Trump would win and divide America.

13. When you are getting to know someone new online (particularly someone male), how cautious are you of the possibility that they are serial killer/kidnapper? - I honestly never think of this, mostly because we live in such an online world now and I’m an adult. I don’t really know how much of this still happens, but you just don’t hear about it anymore. Not to mention, if it is a male, it’s most likely a pedophile (which is still gross) rather than a killer or kidnapper.

14. If you are talking to someone that you want to get to know, what are your go-to conversation topics? What subject makes you disappointed when another person isn’t interested in or knowledgable about it? - Tbh I feel like I’m really bad at conversations and I don’t know how to lead them because I’m quiet and scared of looking stupid. I know I really like deep conversations more than basic questions. However, it’s very important that I know their opinion on Taylor Swift because if there’s a chance they don’t like Taylor Swift, I already know that the person is probably not worth my time. For real though, if I’m having a conversation with someone, I usually get disappointed if I find out they’re a partier or drink a lot, because I’m really not into any of that stuff so it’s immediately like playing the Sims and having the minus sign appear above my head.

15. Say you have a lot of free time and want to join a club or class. You are browsing postings on local bulletin boards and online. What sort of group would you be interested in joining (e.g., book club, game group, crafts, golf lessons, etc.)? - A romance-only book club, DIY club.

16. Have you ever kissed someone that you didn’t really want to kiss (not assault, just indifference)? Why did you go along with it and how did you feel after? - Nah I’ve never been kissed

17. Have you recently learned anything about your personality? If not, have you ever consciously tried to change your personality? - Sort of recently, it was something I discovered last year which is that I’m a neurotic perfectionist and what I mean by that is I’m a perfectionist in a very self destructive way. I’ve always known I was ‘particular’ or others would say ‘has high-standards/expectations’ but I realized that it’s literally just perfectionism.

18. Are you or any of your friends in a sorority or fraternity? Would you be interested in belonging to one? - No and I don’t really understand what they are or why they’re a thing.

19. Can you recall a recent time that you were surprised, but in a bad way? - Yes. When my job eluded that they thought I was stealing from the registers. This happened around September 2020? Basically they didn’t flat out say that’s what they thought, but they made comments that the tills were either short or over at the ends of the night whenever I would be working and dead ass said “it looks suspicious”. I think it was surprising because I’ve worked there was two years and really felt like they should have known my character. (I literally am afraid of getting in trouble for the smallest things and they seriously thought I was capable of stealing from them lmao)

20. Do you feel uncomfortable when you receive praise for doing certain things? If so, does this make you less likely to do those things? - No totally the opposite. I really struggle with validation and I never feel good enough, which is something I’m working on, but it feels almost like I thrive on praise. Maybe it’s because my love language is words of affirmation?? I just always like/need to know when I’m doing a good job so when I don’t get praise or validation my self esteem plummets.

21. Do you make spontaneous purchases often or rarely? When you are upset does it make you temporarily happier to buy yourself something new? - Spontaneous purchases, often because I have no self control lol, but lately I’ve been working hard to try to save more. And yes when I’m upset, it does make me feel better to buy things.

22. If you have to wake up early for something, what time is just TOO early for you to be there and be presentable and sentient? Have you ever had to be somewhere that early? - 5 am. I think I can manage 6 am, but anything before that is a no from me. I used to work at 5 am when I worked at Chapters, but it was a nice shift because I finished work at 10 am and then went home and napped for two hours and then had literally the entire day.

23. Have the majority of your romantic relationships started with a physical attraction or a deeper connection? - I’ve never had a romantic relationship oops. But at least I read romance novels every day (and I write romance too!) I’ll try to answer this based on what I think would happen. I think it would start as a physical attraction and I think a lot of relationships start that way but they become something when you have a real connection. I think there are relationships that can start the other way though too, but I’d say for me it’ll probably be physical attraction first.

24. Do you ever catch any of those conspiracy shows on Animal Planet, like Bigfoot hunting or proof of Mermaids? Do those shows make your more or less likely to believe in the existence of such creatures? - No, but I DO watch ghost conspiracy theories/”REAL GHOST CAUGHT ON CAMERA” videos on Youtube for fun. But no I don’t believe in any of that stuff.

25. Did you ever write a fan letter to a celebrity? How about submit something to a magazine? - I’ve never technically written a fan letter to a celebrity but I wrote a post on tumblr to Taylor Swift a couple years ago that she’ll never see lol. And I’ve never submitted anything to a magazine, but I’d like to one day.

#survey

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anikoku · 5 years

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Mini-essay: How the narrative of KH3 was damaged by the compulsory heterosexuality and gender norms of Japanese society

Major spoilers of Kingdom Hearts 3 are below. Please don’t look unless you’ve finished the game!

One more disclaimer: this is coming from a Japanese perspective, and it’s not meant as a xenophobic attack on the culture I was raised in.

Light-and-darkness logic, time travel, and bosses who are giant ships, I’ll ignore. That’s just part of the Kingdom Hearts package, and despite the headache they might give me, I’ve come to accept these wild ideas and take pride in my ability to handle them. But when we stray from the fantasy, it becomes difficult confronting the cultural context that the Kingdom Hearts series is birthed from, and how these ideas have affected key plot points and the characterization of our beloved heroes. Despite its stunning popularity overseas, the Kingdom Hearts series is still conceived in Japan (by middle-aged Japanese men, no less) for Japanese audiences. I’ve always felt that Square Enix as a company remains disconnected from the input of its non-Japanese audience. Whatever catering is done towards overseas players is limited to game mechanics, not plot. I expect there’s something of a よそはよそ、うちはうち (“That’s fine for them but not for us”) mentality when it comes to structuring the story in a way that may appeal to overseas (specifically Western) fans. The writers do not know how to do this, and they do not wish to. I don’t believe that any culture should have to adjust its creative output to make it more palatable to the outside world, but considering the sheer size of the Kingdom Hearts fanbase, such a blatant refusal to consider modern storytelling trends in the gaming world will—and has—damaged its enduring legacy. Let’s not forget the fact that Japanese society itself is not suspended in time; its younger generation has different ideas about gender, sexuality, and romance. I’d like to discuss three examples in KH3 where the writers leaned heavily on traditional gender norms and heterosexual romance to the detriment of the plot and the integrity of previous characterization. First, there’s the matter of Subject X, the amnesiac girl who became the reason why Ansem the Wise shut down his experiments. We learn late in the game that she was Lea and Isa’s missing friend, and the reason why they chose to infiltrate the castle and join Organization XIII. Before this piece of knowledge was revealed, Lea and Isa remained the only (human) pair whose friendship existed outside of the boy-girl-boy dynamic that Nomura is so fond of. Like Axel and Roxas prior to Xion’s introduction in 358/2 Days, Subject X was retconned into their friendship, altering their dynamics and diluting the significance of the homosocial relationship. Putting aside shipping perspectives, it is important to be able to portray two men (nevermind the prospect of two women, that’s too much to hope for in this franchise) sharing a strong emotional bond. Falling back on the trio concept not only feels like lazy and tired writing, but seems to speak to a fear that without a female presence, the love and connection between two male characters is simply too homoerotic. In an interview, Nomura remarked he was surprised by Aqua’s popularity since she did not resemble previous Kingdom Heartes heroines. He and other writers (Masaru Oka and perhaps others) have a clear idea of what femininity means and what role female characters should play, and that was never clearer than the portrayal of Kairi and Aqua in the final half of the game. After being chosen as a Guardian of Light and spending the entirety of the story training with Merlin, after promising Sora that she would be the one to protect him, Kairi’s helplessness in the final battle was appalling to witness. She is depicted as weaponless when Terra-Xehanort charges at her. Sora and the others throw themselves in front of her to protect her, and this leads directly to Donald’s self-sacrifice. Later, she is easily kidnapped by Xemnas and killed by Master Xehanort to fuel Sora’s anger. This act of textbook ‘fridging’ absolutely disregards Kairi’s agency and her wish to fight alongside her friends. She represents the worst depiction of the traditional female role in storytelling: she is an object of desire to be rescued, damaged, and won over. In other words, it’s bullshit. Likewise, although she is one of the three Keyblade Masters present in the story, Aqua is constrained to a passive role. She is first rescued by Sora, then by Ventus, then assisted by Sora once more against two opponents (Terra-Xehanort and Vanitas) she had previously beaten. When confronted by the Demon Tide in the Keyblade Graveyard, Aqua whispers “no” and lets her Keyblade slip out of her hands, defeated. This is not the same Aqua who survived over a decade in the realm of darkness, defined by her bravery and strength of will. In an era with an increasing number of female-led titles and queer, non-traditional characterization, the female characters of Kingdom Hearts are still relegated to the role of nurturer and caretaker. In a game released in 2019, that hurts. Finally, I’d like to argue that the narrative focus on Sora and Kairi’s romance came at the expense of the friendship between Sora, Riku, and Kairi, something I believed so thematically important to the franchise. The other trios (Axel, Roxas, Xion and Terra, Aqua, Ventus) are depicted as being equally close and connected, yet KH3 does nothing to showcase Riku and Kairi’s bond. Riku is about as affected as Mickey when Kairi is threatened. The two of them never have a private conversation, not even the day before their final confrontation with Master Xehanort. Riku doesn’t volunteer to help Sora search for Kairi at the end of the game, despite him being aware of what damage it could cause Sora. And that is the other piece of the puzzle: Sora and Riku’s relationship has also been severely downplayed. During the events of KH3D, Riku becomes a Dream Eater out of his strong desire to protect Sora. His character arc has always been about “protecting the people who matter most”. Why, then, is he willing to let Sora abuse the Power of Wakening on his own? Why doesn’t he get to have a conversation with Sora before the final battle? Why is he shown racing against Terra and Roxas in the epilogue, while Kairi sits by herself and mourns? The lack of bond isn’t just present on Riku’s side. When Kairi and the others are swallowed by the Demon Tide, Sora falls to his knees and laments that he has no power now that he’s alone. His grief would have been more convincing, had Riku not been right there by his side. With such a strong bond remaining, there’s no reason Sora should have given up there; it was a deliberate narrative decision to highlight Sora and Kairi’s relationship while downplaying Sora and Riku’s. It seems that Riku was forced to take a step back to make room for the game’s heterosexual romance, and I believe the integrity of Sora, Riku, and Kairi as characters suffered because of this. Many of the reunions in the final portion of the game were an emotional catharsis for me, and I did enjoy aspects of the story. That being said, the storytelling in KH3 makes me fear that Square Enix is either unwilling or unable to adapt to the gaming frontier now led by the West. For now, I’ll submit to the fact that the most satisfying conclusion to the series I’ve followed so long lies in the hands of the fans who are willing to do it justice.

#kh3 #kingdom hearts 3 #kingdom hearts spoilers #critique

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