#david cage as source material is one thing

[popculturebuffet]

Into The Spider-Verse: Spider-Man Noir (SM Noir #1-4) (Comission for WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy true believers? What is this I hear? What wonderous thing? Could it be the jazz piano's ring? A dimly lit light above the doooor could it be… noir? Noir, what is it good for, it's good for you it's good for me and it's our next stop on the spider-verse train. It also might strengthen the economy

Like SP/DR Spider-Man noir is a bit diffrent in the source material. In the movie he's mostly a bunch of detective cliches strung together with the dulcet tones of nicholas woooooooomotherfuuuucccckkiiing cage, one of another spider-person mostly there for jokes and to give a phenomenal actor something to do. Out of the three he gets the least to do character wise: Spider Pig gets plenty of mileage out of being a talking pig, cartoon physics shenanigans and being played by Baby J, and Peni gets both plenty of utility in fights and SP/DR's emotional death. In contrast Noir is just again mostly played off the strength of being Nicholas Woooooooomotherfffuuuuckiing cage. Noir in the comics though.. he's a fairly tragic well done character using a part of spider-man's character that people don't tend to think of and a 30's noir setting to craft a compelling tale of revenge, responsiblity and doing what's right. Noir , like Miles, was part of a subline with marvel if a mostly forgotten one outside of spidey: Marvel Noir. The concept came about when a french comics editor pitched a noir version of spider-man to writer David Hine, whose career is all over the place, mostly filling in for various other writers, with his most notable works being this mini series and District X, a mutant based police procedrual, both speaking to his love of gritty crime stuff. He co plotted the mini and it's sequel Eyes Without A Face, which I might cover depending on how this one does, with said editor Fabrice Sapbobliski. Marvel realized what they had and thus launched had underated comics legend Fred Van Lete craft an x-men series that I weridly HAVEN'T read but will likely cover as my attitude to most x-men stories is

WIth both series getting sequels, along with evne more noir titles for Daredevil, Wolverine, Luke Cage and Punisher, all ones i'd be willing to look at, along with an iron man one to run alongside the x-men and spider-man sequels. Spidey Noir would go on to be a key part of the spider-verse, before dying, getting better, and getting another mini I haven't read, but the line itself kinda faded into the mists. The combo of the inherently cool concept, spidey getting more multiverse team ups than the others, and the deft writing of this one. But how'd it hold up this reading? How does spidey adapt to a gritty noir story? Why does it tie in shockingly well with the characters history? Find out bellow!

Issue one begins with, in natural noir fashion, in media res. Even if your not familiar with the name, your familiar with the trope; we begin in the middle or towards the end of the story and then work back to how we got here.

The here in this case is a bunch of police busting into J. Jonah Jameson's office to find…

Naturally Spidey didn't do it but since the cops, as always no matter the time or relative dimension ins pace, shoot first ask questions later and Noir flees into the night.

Three weeks earlier, and the story proper begins: Ben Ulrich is taking pictures of the homeless for the daily bugle and also serving as our narrator. The Great Depression is in full swing and many has suffered with the bugle profiting off that. For those less familiar with Spidey's supporting cast, Ben is an older journalist who tries to mentor peter on occasion and serves as a source of info for our hero, taking turns with city editor Robbie Robertson in providing peter with exposition on the villian of the week. That said while Ben frequently pops up in spidey stories in this role, and to serve as a supporting character for his nephew Phil, aka the heroic green goblin and one of many less than heroic hobgoblins, his biggest roles have been outside the web of spider-man: he served as a major character in Dennis Hopless' underated Spider-Woman run , finding cases for Jessica to solve, and most recently was a MAJOR part of Gerry Duggan's x-men, finding out mutankind could ressurect, getting the knowledge wiped from him, then having it restored by Cyclops who never signed off on that and helped break the story to soften the backlash, a decision that's having repercussions to this day and likely will continue to as fall of x begins. He's most writers go to when they need a writer at the bugle. He's mostly known for being part of Daredevil's cast though, having figured out his id and then refused to print it, serving as an ally and confidant to matt from then on.

Here he's a bit diffrent: he's still a beaten down experinced joruanlist, but the greasier kind. Like I said most of his stories are depression era misery porn. He has a sense of justice.. but it's been beaten down by how broken the system is as we'll soon see. For now he's paticuarlly shadowing May Parker, in this unvierse a socialist firebrand who wants basic rights for all. It's funny how we're STILL fighting for that nearly a hundred years later

She's naturally dismissed as a socialist and oddly it's not the police who beat her down.. but hired goons

These are the enforcers, unchanged from their role in the main marvel universe. The Enforcers are early foes of spideys and personal faviorites of mine: Muscle man ox, skeezy mustache man and swift with a punch of a knife fancy dan, and bullwhip expert montana. They mostly show up in crime related stories and are a group partly because spidey being spidey could likely wreck their shit alone. Their also not really used a TON thanks to that, but I like their cool apperances and unique status as some of spidey's only rogues who don't use gadgets, powers or super suits. It's just pure skill or muscle in ox's case.

Their also an emblem of why spidey adapts so well to this setting: Versatility: Spidey has dealt with space, magic, and most often costumed menaces. But just as common as punching guys dressed as birds or insects is organized crime. Peter often deals with Crimebosss, especially early on with Kingpin having debuted as one of his rogues and still often showing up as a thorn in our heroes side. Even the Green Goblin and Doc Ock have weirdly gotten involved with crime wars and most goblin stories for either Gobby or Hobby have them taking over crime for some reason. So taking peter and plopping him in a mob style noir stoir and making him a more 30's style pulp vigilante fits like a glove and what' sused of his cast likewise adapts gracefully as we'll see. Their scaled down to fit the realistic tone more , but they still fit perfectly. For now though let's get back to the story. The Enforcers ask may to go back to russia ya commie, which again sadly is something that STILL fucking happens. Seriously you can lovfe a country and still crticize it. I don't like how badly this country treats immigrants, trans persons, queer people in general, children or mental health and tha'ts just the SHORT list, you can crticize something because you want better. And that's what May's doing: She dosen't want to leave america, she just wants people to not be starving on the streets because a few big shots got greedy and fucked it up for the rest of us. Are we sure this isn't the 1930's? Absolutely positive?

Anyways, before Montana can whip an old lady, whip her good, Ben comes in, and while Ox wants to pummel him, he's mysteriously off limits, though the enforcers don't like it. We find that like May around the same time in the mainline comics, May is runnig a shelter. I prefer this brand of aunt may and i'm glad it carried to the mcu: fighting for her community, rabble rousing, instead of just waiting to die basically and serving as a reson peter can't go public with his id lest she have a heart attack.

The encorcers work for the Goblin, no prize for guessing whose counterpart he is, the local mob boss who peter KNOWS killed uncle ben. This peter.. is full of rage and understandably so: the police did nothing to catch his uncle's killer and the mobsters despite seemingly having no reason to, attack him and his aunt for just trying to do the right thing.

Ben decides to help educate peter why things are this way, taking him to the black cat club. In this universe instead of stealing fancy things Felcia Hardy runs a fancy speakeasy.. and it's there Peter sees the mayor, the cheif of vice squad, and an industralist Ben spoke out against.. and is thus why he died. As Ben explains the attack on May isn't personal, the Goblin is simply a mercinary at the end of the day: the various big wigs all help clear the job in some way, and the goblin does it to give all these creepy assholes denablity. After all the police don't strike may.. because the police attacking an old woman looks bad. But some petty thugs beating up an old woman is just buisness. They can turn a blind eye to that. The Goblin does some work for hire and in return he can do whatever he wants… which is really how this job works, just with less elder abuse.

We also get an actual look at the Goblin himself: Norman looks normal enough with his Goblin name a mystery, but has mysterious ties to the psychics as his right and left hand men are both freak show alumni: The Vulture, who in this universe is a carnival geek. Which means he bites chickens heads off eddy.. and yeah it's as fucked up a practice as it sounds. Watch the film nightmare alley for a more in depth examination of this. And then you have Kraven who here is an animal trainer instead of a big game hunter, but it still fits as while a hunter Kraven does frequently used trained animals, lions and alligators mostly, against spider-man.

Peter decides to rage against the machine but despite all that rage he's still just a rat in Norman's cage and only dosen't die because he's with Ben. Ben wonders what the hell he was thinking, but Peter responds that he just.. can't stand there and do nothing while Norman gets to gloat about what he's done. So Ben finds a more healthy outlet for his new sidekick's anger: the daily bugle.

This JJJ is about what you'd expect: he has the usual sesantionalist asshole bent you see, but a heart of gold, agreeing to help peter pay for school for getting him pictures of human misery since he dosen't have a spider-man yet to get pictures of.

I do like how peter, unlike most continuities, dosen't jump RIGHT to photography thougH: ben simply has peter carry his shit and learn how to by watching… and watch he does as we see tons of misery ending with a woman whose husband comitted scucide to escape his debts.. unware the goblin's just gonna put it on his wife because wherever you are in time or space, norman osborn is objectively the worst human being. Except weirdly the main universe right now. Peter is still fired up though… and later that evening ben muses on that, how he used to have the same passion for justice before he got broken down and worries peter's rage will consume him, turning him into the same burnt out shell.. and also worries because we finally get a clear picture of his hinted connection to the goblin… as he reveals that contrary to what peter, who found ben's corpse , assume it wasn't a wild animal that killed uncle ben.. but the vulture who has razor sharp teeth and an unhinged jaw… the visual.. is truly horrifying… but the important part is how ben knows it..

We open issue 2 with Peter and Ben watching some apartments go up, with Peter having upgraded to actually taking the pictures himself… and still spinning at how the Goblin is just blatantly getting away with this. Fancy Dan was on sight. But taking it to the police won't do anything and while Ben is determined to keep his head down… Peter refuses, citing what Uncle Ben told him about the great war

I love this socalist take on the old mantra.. and it's not wrong. When someone in power is corrupt we have to do everything we can to get rid of them. It just often dosen't work because the system isn't BUILT to remove corruption but support it. It was true in alternate 1930's new york and it's true now. That night Peter visits Ben who feeling guilty for watching the other ben die is down booze avenue… while PEter gets a phone call from one of ben's informant's calling ben "the spider" and telling him the goblins goons are opening up some artifacts swindled from the museum.

Said artifacts are spider-idols from… some place far away. They look african in design but what country on the massive contient I can't tell ya just yet. The point is when fancy dan touches the idol he's swarmed with about 80 dozen posions giant spiders and dies horribly…. i'd show you this but given my reaction to just SEEING the page myself

And my general arachnnophobia… hard no. I do howeve rhave to show you what happens when one bites peter. Turns out it was a test of worthness.. of sorts

…. also I question why the spider god needed a teenager naked for this. Just saying. Peter wakes up in a coccoon because this comic is determined to break me it seems, but Peter finds he now has spider sense, his muscular, you know all the usual spider man stuff. He can also naturally shoot webs. I like the mystical bent here too, helps the pulp feel of things since they often used tribalism. Granted that comes with the asterix that it shoudl've been something a tad more specific like anasasi, an actual spider-god, and not just "GENETIC AFRICAN TRIBAL IMMAGERY", and that maybe by 2010 they shoudlv'e known better.

Now he has the power Peter bursts in on a meeting between Ben and the goblin, easily dispatching his men.. but finding himself a problem. He tells the goblin to stop.. but Norman refuses, and makes a valid point: the only way to really stop him this easily is to kill him.. and peter isn't ready to do that. He dosen't confront Ben who recognizes Peter.. and Peter's utter distgust at what his mentor really is, a stooge for the goblin, gets to Ben. Ben quits the goblin's service and plans to unload the files he has on the guy. Problem is…. he tells Jonah who comes over and plugs him… and nicely makes it a good case for Peter having actually killed him in revenge.

While one spider dies.. another is born. Peter decides he needs to step it up to really end this.. and the only way to do that.. is to become something else… to do it for revenge, to do it to try and stay true, doing it for the ones left to twist in the wind...

I love the design here.. while the fedora added next series really completes it the mitliary jacket, turtle neck and repurposed flight mask all fell nicely home spun yet still suitably badass. Peter made this himself, with what he had being a poor teenager during the depression.. but he makes it out of his uncles uniform turning a hidden shame from killing people in a war he didn't belive in into a uniform, a symbol against crime. And yes I get the batman parallels here but it was kinda unavoiable given how much of film noir is in batman's dna, but it's still diffrent enough and peter's own quest for vengance are diffrent enough for it to be a non issue. We open issue 3 with peter swearing there's a scientefic explination for the spider god thing, but for now he just wants to get help and goes to Ben…. and find shis corpse. The resulting scene is soul crushing,… peter weeping openly with the police not giving a single damn and only not pinning it on peter because the da dosen't buy it. Once again the Goblin has taken someone from peter for trying to do the right thing.

WHile Goblin intimdates Jonah, JJ having not found the files Ulrich was about to give to the press, Peter goes to who really has them: Felcia hardy, ben's ex whose utterly broken. The art here. is amazing, and her expressions just haunting as she explains Ben told her to give them to peter if anything happened. The art by Carmine Diamncio is fucking fantastic and eaisly one of the highlights getting the gritty tone while also being expressive and animated. Peter still drags his feet slightly, feeling Ben was terrible.. but Aunt May naturally gets through to him even if she dosen't know the full story: he did right by peter, do right by him.

After the funeral and JJ confirming he's pure scum and peter can't trust him peter decides he was given his power for a reason: to take the goblin out. He can't go after him directly.. but with Ben's files, he can go after his rackets and his mob associates looking to norman for protection

The latter is the real problem: The goblin's power was, as mentoind, all in the fact he could do the jobs no one else could do.. now his association with his various criminal buddies means their giving him one week: kill spidey or he's done. Norman decides enough of this and plans to send his men after peter after Ox reveals he saw Peter at ben's apartment. Norman takes it well. Concidentally Ox is never seen again in this story and probably died on the way back to his home planet.

Peter meanwhile is annoyed abotu JJ's suddenly spineless editorials and goes to confront him and well…. opening sequence. After that Peter is shaken both by the fact there's no way that was a setup as his visit wasn't planned or anything, and the bullet in his shoulder.

He decides to play it smart, and uses the files and what he has on ulrich.. and in a clever twist we find that the jj we saw at the start and that killed ben.. is in fact the chameleon, in this version using makeup and what not instead of masks. He's also Kraven's half brother, something that hasn't really come up but will be very important here in a moment. So the issue ends with Norman having Felcia dragged to his private base where he plans to murder both her and jj.. and peter… and he's sent the vulture to go get him… but with peter absent we end the issue with him just above may. We open the final issue with Vulture preparing to eat the other half of the couple when peter comes in.. and disturbingly FILLING vulture with lead. While he disturbed it, it's clear one shot , maybe two, would've done it… peter is just full of rage, at nearly seeing one of his family once again sensely slaughtered. This isn't justice.. it's vengance. And may rails into Peter for it pointing out he's no better than the others if he keeps down this road. But peter's narration, having taken over for ben in issues 3 and 4, makes it clear it's complicated: he can tell he's right.. but his heart is telling him he would've hurt her. She sees a reckless man.. but what peter is is a scared child who lost his uncle and his mentor and almost lost the one person he had left. What he did was wrong… but you can understand it. The question is will peter continue down the road of the animal and become what Ben Ulrich was.. or become what his late mentor couldn't. Let's see shall we?

At Goblins secret torture house, we find out Felcia killed Chameleon.. and is thus shook that Jameson is alive and well. Norman decides that everything else was fine but he can't really let her live after killing one of his minons and after she scratches his face, he plans to feed her to spiders…. only for another to show up… a melee insues as Peter easily takes down the remaning two enforcers, and fights kraven, eventually both saving jameson from a tiger and pushign Kraven into spiders while Goblin runs away with Felcia… who isn't scared. Felcia is done well her ea swhile she did sell out to the goblin previously she's clearly taken none of his shit and points out even if he ESCAPES… the mob is going to be gunning for him now he's lost just abotu everything.

And he's about to loose the rest as Peter swings down and rescues Felcia and while she runs away the two confront each other.. and rip off theri masks. Goblin finds out Peter parker is spider-man .. and Peter… well..

I love this twist and how this reveal plays out. Norman also points out anyone who see his real face dies.. it's killed or be killed.. but in the eleventh hour… Peter refuses. Goblin needs to stand trial. Peter's character arc is fantastic here: he starts out full of rage, finds an outlet… but also starts to loose himself in what he can now do, that he has the power.. but he has to use it responsibly. It's this final moment where he realizes how to: the goblin's lost his power, he can stand trial.. and it's not peter's responsibly to end him. While this peter HAS killed.. he's learned he doesn't NEED to

Norman dosen't want.. any of that but luckily for peter he didnj't actually KILL kraven.. at least not yet. The spiders from kraven grab norman and Peter looks on at this horror show as at last the goblin and the gangsters.. are no more. So we get our wrap up with Felcia: two months later and a combination of JJJ being back in charge of the bugle and Ben's files has cleared out the cities corruption for now: all the cops the goblin owned are gone, the mayor is gone, everything is mostly better. Peter asks Felcia about her relationship with the goblin that i'm just bringing up now, she refuses to tell but he still gives her a ncie picture of her and ben, reminding us that even if our heroes won.. they still lost something int he process.

We end on a great closer too, one that hints at the eventual sequel but still feels concise enough as a finish.

It's a great message to go out on: That evil does exist and may always.. but someone will always exist to fight it…. and they usuallyw ill eventually win. And for now.. peter is that someone.

If it wasn't obvious enough.. Spider-Man Noir is a masterpiece and one of the best spider-man stories i've ever read. A well done take that honors the characters history while forming the kind of story that only could be told in the setting it's in. It's gripping, has a wonderful character arc, dynamite art and some truly haunting images. If you have the stomach for some noir, seek this one out.

Next Time: We get the opposite of this as we dive into the first appearance and secret origin of the spectacular spider-ham! Weird isn't it?

#spider-man #spider-man noir #peter parker #marvel comics #j jonah jameson #norman osborn #may parker #felicia hardy #ben urich #the vulture #kraven the hunter #sergei kravinoff

[skaruresonic]

Here's a fun fact for you: the writer of this show, Warren Ellis, wiki broused to write it because he has never played the games and was never interested to do so, describing them as "games where you just make a bunch of pixels jump around"

This isn't even a secret, he repeatedly admitted it during interviews, also stating that the other team members were fans of the games and so would help him out which...yeah they seemed to be perfectly happy with his choices

This actually brought to a bunch of hilarious moments in hindsight:

for example there's an OC in the second season that he wanted to name Mathias because he had found the name on the wiki and liked it, but Konami presumably stepped in to tell him that he couldn't use it because that's Dracula's original human name in the games. This info is on his wiki page btw!

Imagine writing a Sonic adaptation and somehow missing that Robotnik is also Eggman's name when it's one of the first things his wiki page says

Also for your information Nocturne, the sequel show that's coming out at the end of this month, is going to have a native american vampire as one of its villains (he's technically a game character who wasn't native in the games and looked nothing like the guy in the trailers but creating OCs and giving them the names and backstories of canon characters is standard fare with the show)....and let's just say that, given the show's track record with the representation of racial minorities (especially two asian totally not twins in season 3) I'm not holding my breath for that one

the writer of this show, Warren Ellis, wiki broused to write it because he has never played the games and was never interested to do so, describing them as "games where you just make a bunch of pixels jump around"

God, fauxteurs piss me off. Go work in some other medium if you hate video games so much, yeah? When will we get creators who aren't crotchety boomers who thumb their noses at the medium? It's nearing 50 years old at this point, why are we still being subjected to Roger Ebert levels of "games aren't Real Art" cold takes? The other thing is that often what ends up happening is even though they're adapting well-known game franchises (which would imply they're well-known for a reason, but logic is seldom fauxteurs' strong suit), their Superior Vision(tm) rarely manages to match the source material's quality, let alone surpass it. Hence why all of their bluster gets really fucking annoying really fast. Their hubris is unearned, and yet they still have the nerve to thumb their nose at the source material, the reason they have work to begin with. Sit down, dude, you just made things worse with all of your fart-sniffing. And they never stop to consider that according to their own logic, it's almost like video games are still so poorly regarded by the mainstream that they know they wouldn't be able to get work in any other medium precisely because their work isn't up to snuff. It's like how David Cage keeps pumping out glorified QTEs as games because if he pitched his scripts as movies, he'd get laughed out of the room.

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This isn't even a secret, he repeatedly admitted it during interviews, also stating that the other team members were fans of the games and so would help him out which...yeah they seemed to be perfectly happy with his choices Actually, I have certain fears that this will happen with Bloober Team and the SH2 remake, despite select members of 2's dev team working with them. I can so clearly picture Reddit in a few years going, "Team Silent approved of it, why are you complaining?"

Woodchipp and I have read excerpts from interviews that heavily imply Bloober Team is attempting to capture 2's vibes and relying on their, quote, "perfect memories" without actually playing it.

Creators will sometimes approve whatever just to make money or because they don't care. For example, Kikiyama, the creator of Yume Nikki, is an intensely private person, so private that some people believed they were dead for years. Kawakura Studios approached them with the idea for Dream Diary, a game that changes the fundamentals of the original's design and symbolism, and Kikiyama approved of it. So approval from creators doesn't inherently guarantee a quality product, or ensure that the new team knows what they're doing. Also, we all know how Sega approved Pontaff's scripts :)

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for example there's an OC in the second season that he wanted to name Mathias because he had found the name on the wiki and liked it, but Konami presumably stepped in to tell him that he couldn't use it because that's Dracula's original human name in the games. This info is on his wiki page btw! ...That was literally the very first thing I learned when watching a Castlevania lore video. Am I now officially more knowledgeable than Ellis? ...that's sad lol. tfw you're such a peak writer that you can't even read the wiki. At least Pontaff READ Sonic and Eggman's Wikipedia pages. Jesus Christ the bar is in hell and fauxteurs keep finding ways to dig under it lol ---

Also for your information Nocturne, the sequel show that's coming out at the end of this month, is going to have a native american vampire as one of its villains (he's technically a game character who wasn't native in the games and looked nothing like the guy in the trailers but creating OCs and giving them the names and backstories of canon characters is standard fare with the show)

#asks

[dustedmagazine]

David Tudor and Composers Inside Electronics — Rainforest IV (Neuma)

Composers Inside Electronics perform David Tudor's Rainforest IV by Composers Inside Electronics

“Why shouldn’t there be a thousand or more ways of building loudspeakers? [...] Every sculptured loudspeaker has certain special characteristics, so my problem becomes that of finding what sound I can put in so as to reveal the unique properties of the material.” — David Tudor 

The evolution of David Tudor’s “Rainforest” goes back to a 1968 commission by Merce Cunningham. Tudor was asked to create a sonic element for Cunningham’s dance piece of the same name, also featuring Andy Warhol’s “Silver Clouds,” floating mylar pillows filled with helium and costumes by Jasper Johns. Using 8 audio transducers (essentially speakers without cones), phonograph cartridges, contact microphones and two sets of loudspeakers, Tudor came up with an approach to investigate the resonance of physical objects, utilizing simple signal generators, real-time filtering and feedback processes. Within a year, Tudor had expanded upon that initial vision, morphing the concept into a multi-channel system for performing in concert settings. He also added in field recordings of birds and insects to the initial use of electronic sounds, all modified by an interactive array of filters and resonant objects. (Realizations of both of these versions of “Rainforest” can be heard on the David Tudor & Gordon Mumma release.)  

Tudor explained his strategies for evolving his pieces, noting “My preference is to use modular materials which can change from piece to piece. And also, it enables me to expand a piece by adding components to it which were not in the original piece.” For “Rainforest II” Tudor expanded the system with real-time processing of voices singing or speaking, further abstracted through antiphonal diffusion across speakers placed around the concert hall. In a 1988 interview, Tudor explained the developments of the next version of the piece. “The third version had to deal with the ability to have any input go to any transducer. I made that system for a simultaneous performance with John Cage (“Mureau”). It was one of those pieces that changes all the time, so I needed to have a sort of continuous thing, so I used tape sources, but having the ability to mix them or separate them into different output channels."  

“Rainforest IV” built on all that proceeded and evolved the piece into an enveloping, spatialized, sculptural sonic environment. In an article in Volume 14 of the Leonardo Music Journal, John Driscoll describes the origins of this next version. The initial realization of “Rainforest IV” evolved out of a series of workshops by Tudor, Gordon Mumma and David Behrman at the New Music in New Hampshire festival in Chocorua, NH in the summer of 1973. A core group of workshop attendees collaborated with Tudor on the prototyping and construction of an installation consisting of resonant found objects and specially fabricated pieces suspended from the ceiling of a large barn and activated using electronic and tape sources. Sound transducers were attached to metal bedsprings, cast-iron wagon wheel rims, stainless-steel milk containers and a variety of other objects. Contact microphones were attached to the objects and fed to speakers, further amplifying the resonant frequencies of the sculptural elements which debuted for a performance lasting about 5 hours. Members from that initial performance, along with Tudor, went on to form the group Composers Inside Electronics (CIE), collectively installing and performing the work in a multitude of locations around the world.  

Driscoll describes the work and the way that CIE functions. “Each composer has designed and constructed a set of sculptures that function as instrumental loud speakers under their control, and each independently produces sound material to display their sculptures’ resonant characteristics. The appreciation of “Rainforest IV” depends upon individual exploration, the audience is invited to move freely among the sculptures.” He further explains, “Given the duration of the work, it is possible to create large shifting sound characters that evolve over extended periods interspersed with short-duration local sound events unique to one object… It is an improvisational coordination of the sound materials, but one that has become extremely familiar and ingrained in the performers. Since there is no single listening point, the work is never heard in the same way by any two audience members or performers who are arranged in the periphery of the space.” David Tudor provides a great introduction here:

This recording captures a realization of “Rainforest IV” at the Center for Music Experiment (CME) at UC San Diego in February 1977 at the invitation of Pauline Oliveros, an old friend and collaborator of Tudor’s who was the director of the program. Tudor and CIE were in residence for two weeks, offering workshops, scouring for speaker/sculpture materials and embarking on field recording expeditions. The center was housed in a former military bowling alley, offering an expansive setting for the installation. Because of the spatialized and diffused sonic character intrinsic to the work, it is impossible to create a definitive recording of the any realization of the piece. But musician David Dunn, who was an audio engineer working at the school and musician/composer Warren Burt hit on an approach, capturing soundwalks through the installation with an early binaural microphone system. Dunn explains “Warren and I took turns wearing the microphones while walking through the installation, stopping here and there to listen or insert our microphone laden ears into the sounding objects. The session (as evidenced by the final recording) started from outside the renovated military bowling alley where CME was housed and ended by walking back outside.”

As with any binaural recording, listening with headphones reveals a sense of spatialization and from the very first moments, one becomes immersed in a constantly morphing sonic environment. The layers of sound waft like clouds, with an ever-changing focus against a shifting ground of clattering resonance, chattering oscillations, metallic clangs and the filtered transformation of natural sounds. While there is an overall density to what transpires, the details of the underlying components continually emerge with entrancing fidelity. With Tudor’s pieces, any notion of compositional structure or dynamic development is eschewed. Instead, an aural world is constructed and put in to motion and the piece takes on a life of its own. That said, one can readily hear how the members of CIE were acutely attuned to the inputs and resulting outputs of the system. That sense of overarching attentiveness always comes through. Anyone who has toyed with the commixture of a system of outputs feeding inputs is well aware of how resulting feedback can run rampant, mounting into a skirling mess. Here, a dynamic balance is maintained, allowing sources to build and veer toward the edges of pandemonium and then dialled back at just the right moments to create a vital tension throughout.  

Of course, the act of constructing the release from recordings of multiple soundwalks through the installation inserts a degree of structural intent. But Dunn and Burt did a masterful job of capturing the overall sense of the realization, weaving their recordings into an engulfing whole. The occasional appearance of people chattering as they walked through the work adds an engaging complement to the overall mix. Over the course of 70 minutes, the music unfolds with an even, unhurried pace while constantly revealing new elements and permutations of the mercurial sonic stratums. The choice of starting by entering the installation from outside and closing by exiting proves an effective framing convention, preserving the inherent notion of the piece existing in the installation space rather than having a performative start and end. Dunn’s mastering bring out the nuances of the installation within a natural-sounding spatialization. Coming up on 50 years since that initial realization of “Rainforest IV” in NH, this recording displays how timeless Tudor’s vision remains.  

Michael Rosenstein

#david tudor #composers inside electronics #rainforest iv #neuma #michael rosenstein #dusted magazine #albumreview #electro-acoustic

[themurphyzone]

PatB Nova Ch 6

Ch 6: Eccentricity

AN: Loved some of the PatB shorts more than others (You know my eternal hatred for THAT one). But that’s a story for another day. I’m sticking to the 90s versions of these characters though. For now. I might have a gander at the reboot versions someday. You never know!

Ch 6 FFN Link

April 22, 2015! Narf! You’ll never guess what happened, Mickey Mouse. I met the Brain! Well, I’ve only known him for about four months, or less than two days, depending on how you wanna look at it, but if anything happened to him, I would make myself watch Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender!

Tomorrow, I’m going to the mall and buying a hat. Can’t root for Farfignetown (I have to ask her how she spells her name!) at the Derby without a super fancy hat!

Love,

Pinky.

PS: Tell Minnie I said hi!  

o-o-o-o-o

Pinky stepped back to admire his handiwork, the tip of his blue glitter gel pen pressing under his chin as he leaned against it. He did his best to copy Brain’s messages, but he was probably gonna have to write only the first letters only in the future. He didn’t want to take up the entire calendar page again.

His ears twitched at a scraping sound behind him. The sparkly gel smeared against his fur as he turned around, leaving a blue streak across his chest. Egad, if he continued to cover himself in the stuff, he’d look just like one of the Blue Men!

Brain pushed a heavy textbook across the counter, finally stopping underneath a light panel on the ceiling. Then he flipped it open, climbed up, and began to read.

It wasn’t the same book he’d started reading after they’d shaken hands to seal their new friendship either.

“Whatcha reading, Brain?” Pinky asked, slinging the gel pen over his shoulder. “I thought you were reading about jeans! So, find anything good? I think I like the flare type best. Skinny jeans make me chafe.”

“I have no idea what you’re blathering about, Pinky,” Brain said, not looking up from the page he was on. His head shifted from side to side as he read on, and Pinky imagined a giant, fluffy marshmallow making the same movements.

His stomach growled, and a marshmallow dinner sounded heavenly. With cheese fondue and rainbow sprinkles and a light dollop of whipped cream on top…

Wait, no, no. The kitchen didn’t have Gruyere cheese! Processed American cheese wouldn’t provide that proper creamy texture at all.

What kind of host was he? Unable to serve proper cheese fondue to his alien guest?

Then Brain hopped off the book, growling to himself as he pushed up on the hard cover and the few pages he turned. The pages slid into place, but he wasn’t tall enough to get the cover to close the entire way.  

“Do you need help, Brain?” Pinky asked. He dropped the gel pen and grasped the cover’s edge, but Brain smacked him sharply on the wrist, forcing Pinky to let go. Pinky flicked his wrist, and the sting quickly disappeared.

“Don’t patronize me! I can get it myself!” Brain snarled. He pushed on the cover again, and it rose a couple inches in the air, only to land against his fingertips. He growled and spread his feet, jumping as he pushed on the cover once more. This time, the cover slammed into the pages with a heavy thud. “Your sources of information are woefully lacking with your livable yet rudimentary conditions. Penumbra had a much better database, and it’s been dilapidated for a long time.”

Pinky had no idea what dilapidated was. Probably something to do with laps though.

“Oh, well if you need more reading material, I’ve got just the thing!” Pinky said, motioning for Brain to follow him over to a tiny side table where all the magazines were stacked. “Let’s see, we’ve got Vogue, National Geographic, Reader’s Digest…ah, here we are! This one’s my favorite out of all the Zoobooks! Lots of pretty horses to look at. Zort!”

Pinky thumbed through the magazine until he found his favorite page, which had gorgeous art of a white horse running on grassy hills. “This one’s my favorite,” he said as he pressed the magazine into Brain’s hands. Brain nearly went cross-eyed just trying to look at it, but he held out his hands and pushed the pages back until they weren’t so close to his face. “I named her Pharfignewton after Pharfignewton! Isn’t her mane just the flowiest thing you’ve ever seen?”

“Including or excluding your mind in that comparison?” Brain asked. He closed the magazine and set it on top of the stack. “Your choice of reading material is peculiar, but I suppose brushing up on this planet’s ecology wouldn’t hurt.”

Pinky grinned. “If you think those are good, remind me to show you David Attenborough’s work sometime! His documentaries are amazing!”

Brain tilted his head, his antennae bobbing with the motion. “You’ve mentioned someone named Pharfignewton multiple times. An acquaintance of yours?”

“She’s not a quail, Brain. She’s a horse, of course!” Pinky laughed at his little rhyme. “Oh right, I’ve never showed you pictures of her, have I? Where are my manners? Anyway, I left them in the cage. It’s right this way! Or left this way. I can never tell which.”

Pinky ran back to the cage and squeezed through the bars, Brain trailing behind at a much slower pace. As Pinky slid his right leg through the bars, he realized just how dirty the cage was. There was a small puddle by the water bottle, and straw was scattered all over the place. Crumbs littered the floor around the food bowl, and his wheel had a stain shaped like a pomegranate.

It just wouldn’t do at all!

“Sorry for the mess!” Pinky called to Brain, who was watching him curiously from outside the cage. “I didn’t know I’d be having a visitor today!”

But Brain didn’t seem to care about the mess. Instead, he prodded the locked cage door.  

“Nicholas and Mr. Button, you’ve gotta wake up and help me clean!” Pinky said, shaking them frantically from where they were tucked into the straw. “Narf, you two were up talking late again, weren’t you?”

They were too asleep to respond though.

“Okay, well, I’ll let you sleep for now, but tomorrow I’ll be going over proper cagesitting behavior with both of you,” Pinky sighed. He carefully rolled up the photo of Pharfignewton he kept near the straw bed, hugging it close to his body as he slipped through the bars again.

“Pinky, those are inanimate objects,” Brain said, bending a paper clip until it was completely straight. He poked one of the sharp ends and winced.  “They won’t respond to you.”

“They’re real life objects, Brain. They’re not animated,” Pinky said. “Whatcha doing with that paper clip?”

Brain pressed his ear against the cage door, carefully maneuvering the paper clip into the lock. It slipped a quarter of the way in before Brain yanked it out again, his eyes darting around the room as if something would swoop down on them.

When nothing happened, he went back to inserting the paper clip. “Nothing to disable here. There’s no alarm system on the door,” Brain said, turning to Pinky. “I thought you were squeezing through the bars to avoid triggering it.”

“I’ve never had an alarm before. Do you think I should get one?” Pinky asked. “Just so nobody tries to burger my wheel or water bottle? Hmm, what would a burger with those ingredients even taste like? Not very appetizing, probably.”

Brain only stared at him, the paper clip almost slipping from his hand in surprise. “Don’t tell me the only reason you haven’t used the door is because you can’t unlock it.”

Pinky nodded. “Okay. I won’t tell you the only reason I haven’t used the door is because I cannot for the life of me figure out how to unlock it.”

Shaking his head in dismay, Brain reinserted the bent paper clip until it was halfway in, then turned it clockwise (or was it counterclockwise? Pinky always got them mixed up).

“There,” he said, letting the door swing open. “Now you can enter and exit as you please like a civilized mos.”

“Egad, that’s brilliant!” Pinky stepped inside the cage, then back out. In and out again, and again, and he almost started dancing the Hokey Pokey, which would’ve been a whole lot of fun, but Brain still hadn’t seen Pharfignewton’s photo!

Now that was a real tongue twister there!

“This is Pharfignewton, Brain! Isn’t she pretty?” Pinky asked, pressing the photo into Brain’s hands.

The photo had been taken two weeks ago, when her owner had hired a professional to photograph Pharfignewton as she sprinted around the field. Pharfignewton had given Pinky her personal favorite, one that showed her hooves flying through the air and her gorgeous mane streaming in the sunlight. She was having the time of her life, and she couldn’t have picked a better photo to give him.

“There’s certainly an uncanny resemblance,” Brain admitted. “And the size discrepancy between you and her is incredibly blatant. Not to mention the species difference.”

Pinky crossed his arms. “Oh, don’t be so intolerant, Brain. She’s big cause she’s a horse, and I’m small cause I’m a mouse. But we make it work.”

Pharfignewton would be gone for the next two months, possibly more when she achieved the Triple Crown. It would be lonely, but he could manage.

“You mentioned she was far away when I interrogated you.” Brain set the photo down, smoothing out a corner though it didn’t have any wrinkles.

“She’s still on the road to the Derby, I think. Can’t really get in touch with her though. Phones are kinda tricky with hooves, you know.” Pinky said. “She’s wanted the Triple Crown her entire life. So that’s why I gotta make a giant hat and root for her when she races!”

“I don’t understand how a hat factors into all this,” Brain said.

“Zort! I dunno,” Pinky shrugged. “You can’t have a Derby without horses, hats, and My Old Kentucky Home. Otherwise it wouldn’t be much of a Derby then, would it?”

Brain folded his arms. “I’m currently debating if I should take your words at face value or not. Your customs make no sense whatsoever.”

Pinky thought they made perfect sense, and cents, and all of the five senses really, but his stomach growled and that thought was soon forgotten. Brain never had Earth food before, had he?

Definitely a job for a genetically altered Earth mouse to show him the ropes!  

But first, Pinky had to clean the gel off his fur. It was starting to clump into spikes, and that wouldn’t do at all.

o-o-o-o-o

Pinky rinsed himself in the sink, sticking out his tongue to lap up some of the cool water as it trickled out of the faucet. Thankfully, the gel hadn’t settled into his fur and was very easy to wash away. And flicking the water around the sink with his tail was loads of fun too!

Brain stayed on the outer rim, pulling on the stopper and handles by the sink out of curiosity. He edged closer to the stream of water, almost touching it with a gloved hand, but decided against it. But he wouldn’t stop staring at it either, like he’d never seen water in his life.

Maybe he hadn’t?

The moon was made of cheese and not water after all. Water would make the cheese all soggy and mushy and wash away the cheesy taste that made cheese so delicious.

“C’mon, Brain! Poit!” Pinky pushed his fingers together, trying to send a squirt of water up to Brain, though it missed his nose by a mile and landed on a small crumb on the slope of the sink instead. “The water’s just fine!”

“I’ll have to decline your offer, Pinky,” Brain said. “My information about water is rather lacking, and I’d rather not cover myself in a substance without knowing more.”

“I guess water would leave the moon cheese not very tasty to eat, huh?” Pinky asked. He braced himself and shot out of the tiny waterfall, and he was very glad for all the focus he’d put into leg exercises recently, because his running start was enough to get him over the rim on his first try. “Well, all you need to know is that water is wet, it splishy-splashes all over the place, and it’s fun to play Marco Polo in!”

Brain didn’t look convinced though. He removed one of his black gloves and touched a puddle, rubbing the water between his fingers curiously.

Pinky turned off the water, then dried himself off with a fluffy towel. He double checked his chest to make sure the gel was completely gone and patted down his fur.

“This way, Brain!” Pinky called, jumping off the counter and onto a spinny chair. The seat twirled around for a bit, making him slightly dizzy, but it was all in jolly good fun. Brain carefully climbed down, gripping the drawer handles and moving slowly. He slipped on the last handle and landed awkwardly on his right leg. He grimaced for a moment, his nose scrunching up rather adorably. “Blueberry bagels and cream cheese, here we come!”

“Your sustenance on Terra, I assume?” Brain asked. He followed Pinky through a corridor and into the kitchen, his large head turning every which way to take in all the sights of ACME Lab. Now that it was daytime, there were more colors than just shadowy blue. Pinky wondered if Brain would try to name the colors he saw. Pinky tried once, but there were just too many pretty colors streaming in from the window pane above.

“They aren’t consonants, Brain. They’re delicious and all, but they wouldn’t fit with the alphabet. A little bit of a mouthful, don’t you think? Poit!” Pinky climbed up the cherry-print towel hanging on the refrigerator door like he’d done a million times before. He braced himself against the fridge door, pressed his legs against the handle, and pushed with all his might, feeling that familiar strain of his stomach muscles.

The door opened with a satisfying pop. Breathing heavily, Pinky tumbled more than he climbed down the towel, landing on the cold floor of the refrigerator.

“S-surely there has to be a more e-efficient way to open a door than your method.” Brain’s teeth chattered together, his ears flattening to avoid the sudden chill. He took a few steps away from the open fridge, his arms folded in front of his chest. “Is it a-always this cold?”

“Oh, I haven’t even opened up the freezer! If you think this is cold, you’ll really feel like a mousesicle in there! But it’s worth it if you wanna get to the strawberry ice cream with the cute little mini spoons! Maybe some other time though. Right now, it’s important to get a daily serving of cheese!” Pinky exclaimed as he pushed two small tubs of cream cheese from a middle shelf. They each landed on the floor with a thud, and Pinky jumped down and retrieved them, closing the fridge door behind him with his foot.

Brain sighed in relief as soon as the door was closed, his arms dropping to his sides.

“They keep the blueberry bagels by the bagel warmer,” Pinky said as he led Brain out of the kitchen and into a room that had been marked with a yellow and black caution sign. The bagels were so delicious they even had to warn everyone to take caution! “Oh, now that’s a tongue twister. Blueberry bagels by the bagel warmer. Boobelly beige by the baguette warmer...oh, that’s a toughie. I’ll work on it.”

The bagel warmer was an oddly shaped toaster, with lots of wires and bulbs sticking out along the sides and top. It even had a conveyor belt running through it, but Pinky thought it made this toaster really unique among toasters. Why, he’d even been toasted in this toaster himself! Though it wasn’t as much fun as crispy pieces of bread made it seem. He just remembered a lot of smoke and electricity. And there’d been a lot of narf inside too.

Pinky set the tubs of cream cheese on the floor, then climbed up to the conveyor belt, which was propped on metallic cylinders.

“This is so much easier with two mice!” Pinky crowed. He peered down at Brain, who curiously poked at a red wire on the floor. “I don’t mind eating bagels by themselves, but there’s something about toasty bagels that just warms the heart!”

“If they’re truly that delectable, I suppose there’s no harm in trying it,” Brain replied.

“Did your file thingies say anything about Earth food?” Pinky asked. Because Brain sure didn’t seem to know much about tasty things.

Brain shook his head. “The Selenians didn’t bother with information about the lifestyles or cuisine of Terrans. It was irrelevant to their cause.”

Oh. Pinky tried to imagine being an alien who didn’t know anything about cheese, but came up blank. He’d eaten cheese and food pellets his entire life. He couldn’t imagine a world without them.

“Pinky, are you aware that machine is also apparently a gene splicer?” Brain asked, pointing to the letters along the side.

ACME GENE SPLICER AND BAGEL WARMER, it said.

“So it does. But the only things that go in are bagels and lab mice. Don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone try to splice a pair of jeans. Oh, that reminds me!” Pinky snapped his fingers. How could he have forgotten something so very important? The silly machine was on the gene splicer setting! Pinky pressed a conveniently labeled button that said ‘press here for bagel warmer setting’. How nice of the scientists to label their stuff!

He was so glad he discovered that before sending the bagels through. The gene splicer setting would’ve made the bagels extra crispy, and while Pinky didn’t mind, extra crispy bagels were a taste one had to get used to first. Nope, it was better to start Brain off lightly!

“Can you please get two blueberry bagels from the bag, Brain?” Pinky pointed to a bottom cabinet where the bagels were kept, grinning at the new tongue twister he’d come with. Egad, he was good at this! “They’re the tan circles with a hole and blue specks in them! Kinda like a donut, except without the frosting and sprinkles. Zort, Brain! You’ve never eaten donuts, have you? Oh, I am definitely making a list of foods you need to try!”

Pinky hopped onto a tall table and neatly tore a paper towel off its roll, then laid it flat on the conveyor belt. Following Pinky’s instructions, Brain retrieved two bagels from the cabinet and passed them up to Pinky. Brain still seemed rather confused about the gene splicer and the bagel warmer being one and the same. Pinky carefully separated each bagel so that he had four half-bagels with the inside lying face-up and arranged them on the paper towel so they would all be nice and toasty.      

Then Pinky realized he’d forgotten another thing. Namely, that he didn’t know how to turn the bagel warmer on.

He scratched his head.

That could be a real issue.

“Pinky, do you actually know how to work this machine?” Brain’s voice sounded oddly strained. Pinky turned around. Brain was hanging onto the side of the conveyor belt, his legs wrapped around one of the metal cylinders. He’d tried to climb up himself, but his arms were too short to get a proper grip, and if he leaned over anymore, he’d fall right on his chubby head.

Pinky reached over, grasping Brain’s wrists and trying to haul him up, only for Brain to be resistant to help. He wouldn’t budge, his wrists feeling oddly tense under Pinky’s hands. His pink eyes were wide and apprehensive, pointed ears flattening against his head.

“Brain?” Pinky said. “I’m just gonna haul you up. Could you relax a bit please? It’ll be much easier.”

Brain didn’t move for a second, searching Pinky’s eyes warily. Pinky just gave him an encouraging smile. Brain looked away, his brow furrowing, but some of the tension left his wrists.

Pinky pulled him onto the railing of the conveyor belt, Brain’s feet scrabbling in the air briefly before settling firmly on the metal.

“Thanks,” Brain muttered. He walked over to the various buttons and levers, examining each one curiously.  

“You’re welcome, Brain!” Pinky brought one hand to his forehead in a salute, only to remember that Brain was an honest-to-goodness alien, and probably didn’t know that particular gesture. So Pinky tried to make the Vulcan salute instead, but it was kinda tricky with only four fingers instead of five.

“This is very intriguing,” Brain breathed, pressing his face against a small closed window that offered a look into the gears and wires within the bagel warmer. “Yes, pure lithium power source, proton accelerators, and automatic anti-inertia capabilities? The use of nanoplasmic charges leaves a lot to be desired of course, but to have the rest of these things in one machine at your fingertips…”

Pinky didn’t understand anything Brain just said, but the alien’s fingers were twitching in excitement, his nose smushed against the glass. It was the first genuine smile Pinky had seen from the alien since they first met, and Pinky thought it looked really good on him. Even nicer than the jumpsuit, which was already really fashionable. “If you figure out how to turn it on, that would be really great!” Pinky grinned. Brain pulled down on a nearby lever, and the conveyor belt began to move. “Egad, brilliant!”

“The lever was labeled, Pinky.” Brain waved him off, pointing to the word ‘on’ stenciled next to him. But his head tilted up and his chest puffed out too. He seemed to like that word a lot. “Wait, you figured out the machine was on the wrong setting, but you can’t turn it on?”

Pinky shrugged. “It’s not really my type, Brain.”

“Never mind,” Brain sighed, the tips of his ears turning as red as his nose. He turned back to the machine window. “I want to observe this process.”  

“Me too!” Pinky exclaimed, and he hopped over to the window, smushing his nose against it just as the bagels were swept into the machine. Blue electricity sparked and jumped all around the metal structures inside, and the glass warmed beneath Pinky’s hands.

It was a beautiful sight, and Pinky licked his lips as the bagels crisped from the heat.

Beside him, Brain watched the electricity intently, murmuring a bunch of smart words Pinky didn’t understand, but definitely enjoying the show too.

Within several minutes, the bagels gained an extremely nice golden brown crisp, and the conveyor belt moved them out of the bagel warmer. Brain pulled the lever up and the conveyor belt stopped moving, the thrum of the machine beneath their feet slowly fading away.

They weaved around long, multicolored wires as they made their way to the other side, where the bagels awaited them.

“Troz! Looks positively dee-lish!” Pinky exclaimed, poking at one of the bagels. Firm and flaky, just how they were supposed to be. His mouth watered in anticipation.

“The scent alone is quite appealing,” Brain agreed, taking several sniffs of the bagels. “I’ve never smelled anything like this before.”

Pinky grinned at him. “Oh, just you wait, Brain! The real magic is just starting!”

Sliding down the cylinders, Pinky retrieved the two cream cheese tubs they’d left on the floor and passed them up to Brain one at a time. His lower leg strength had improved a lot in the past few months, and it was easy for him to hang on while he passed the tubs up.

“Show-off,” Brain grumbled as he took hold of the second tub.

Pinky just laughed as he fetched two plastic knives from a drawer and carted them back to Brain and the bagels.

“Here you go! Bon appetit!” Pinky said. He gave one of the plastic knives to Brain, who gingerly ran his finger across the toothed edge as he examined the flat, see-through handle. “Oh, be careful with those, Brain. You don’t wanna cut yourself.”

“Not to worry, Pinky,” Brain said. “We have knives on New Selene. But I’ve never seen one with this particular material before. And much duller too.”

Pinky peeled away the cover of a cream cheese tub, drooling over the gorgeous smooth white surface inside. Brain copied him with the other tub, pulling off the cover completely. The alien took off his gloves and sniffed the cream cheese a few times, swiping one fingertip through the cream cheese. Then he tasted it.

Brain’s eyes widened immediately, his antennae perking up. He licked cream cheese off his fingertip four more times before he realized Pinky was watching him. Brain ducked his head and fiddled with his sleeves.

“That was…even better than I anticipated,” Brain admitted, his voice full of wonder.

“Aw, you don’t have to be embarrassed if you like it, Brain. I’m glad you think so, cause blueberry bagels and cream cheese is my favorite. Well, so are food pellets. And marshmallows, especially the puffy kind. And smiley face lollipops and…poit! I have a lot of favorites, it’s so hard to choose just one! Zounds, mac n’cheese too! You really need to try mac’n cheese, Brain! That one’s definitely going on the list. Anyway, if you think the cream cheese alone is good, try this!”

Pinky dipped the knife into the cream cheese. Once he got a good coating, he spread it across the surface of the bagel, took the largest chomp of the combined food he could manage, then swallowed. It went down a little rough, but it was delicious all the same.

“Scrumptious!” Pinky exclaimed. “It’s like a party in your mouth!”

Brain copied his actions again, and while he preferred to rip off chunks of the bagel and slather cream cheese onto smaller pieces, his enjoyment of the food wasn’t any less than Pinky’s. He made some funny ‘mmm’ noises in the back of his throat, his eyes closed in bliss as he worked his way through the first half-bagel.

Pinky started on his second half, licking cream cheese off his lips. This was a nice way to spend the evening.

“Brain, you’re welcome to share my cage if you’d like,” Pinky offered. “Mi cage es tu cage, you know.”

“Are you sure, Pinky?” Brain swallowed, thumping his fist against his throat to make the bagel go down. “I know we’re in a mutual partnership, but I wouldn’t want to impose in your living space.”

“You’re not imposing,” Pinky said. “Besides, plenty of unmarried people share living spaces these days.”

Brain was silent. He continued spreading cream cheese across a small portion of bagel, even though it was completely slathered at this point.

“Snowball and I were in neighboring cages. Aisam had to be housed alone because of their inclination towards territorial aggression. We had separate quarters for the journey to Terra as well.” Brain nibbled on a corner of his bagel. “Point being, I’ve never shared a cage before.”

“Sharing is caring,” Pinky smiled, finishing the last of his bagel. “Besides, it’s one more new experience for both of us. Isn’t that just dandy? I just hope Mr. Button and Nicholas didn’t leave too much a mess.”

“Very well. But we’re moving that sponge bed I slept on last night into your cage. It was much less aggravating for my back than the usual fare,” Brain said. “So…thanks for that, Pinky.”

“You’re welcome, Brain,” Pinky replied, rubbing circles into his belly, his hunger satisfied.

Beside him, Brain seemed satisfied too. And there was nothing better in all the world than sharing blueberry bagels and cream cheese with a new alien friend.

AN: OK this one’s more of a breather chapter since the last 5 were like wham bam nonstop stuff for the characters. Sorry it took so long to get this one out. Next chapter will have Pinky finally getting his hat and Brain’s first mall excursion!

#pinky and the brain #patb nova #patb fanfiction

[rottenprincessshura100]

Something new I’m writing

A Good Evil

Rock Bottom Chapter 1

This is of course a demon story. But very different from what I usually write. 

This story is about a failed visual artist. Lily gives up her hopes and dreams for a man that doesn’t love her and winds up in a soulless office job. It isn’t until she hits rock bottom, that Lily realizes that the end is a new beginning.

 She isn’t really human at all, but the most powerful demon that ever lived.

Sample Chapter.

Lily partied with her companions until the wee hours of the morning. She was happily drunk and smelled like a joint too many. At closing time, her friends had piled into a city cab to head home. Jen had begged Lily to join them, but she had decided against it. The hotel was only a couple of short blocks away; surely, she could safely walk the distance.

"Lily, are you sure?" Jen shouted from the car. "It's awful late out! We've got a spare bed!"

"It's fine." She assured. "It's too cold for rapists. Things would freeze."

"True, true." Jen nodded drunkenly. "Do we at least get a hug?"

Lily crossed the road, and leaned in the cab window.

"I'll call you tomorrow?"

"Will do. Cheer up, eh?"

"Don't worry about me. A good night's sleep will do me a world of good."

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lily strolled along the snow-covered sidewalk. She checked her phone; it contained a single text message from David.

Are you okay?

Lily threw her head back and laughed incredulously, stuffing her phone back into her pocket.

"Why do you care, arsehole! The best way to insult a person: pretend they don't exist!"

She smiled with fake bravado, swallowing back a wave of emotion. Soon, however, Lily's lip quivered, and a drunken tear slid from her eye.

You rotten bastard! I loved you.

And now I'm all alone...

------------------------------------------------------------------

Lily rounded a darkened corner, and the hotel's bright lights flashed reassuringly into view like a guiding beacon. She was almost there.

Suddenly, a bright flash of colour and a scuffling noise caused Lily to jump with a start. She cried out in fear as she was roughly grabbed by two meaty hands and dragged into a dark alley.

The man was large and powerful, dressed in a filthy orange survival jacket. He reeked of piss, cigarettes, and alcohol.

"Well, shit! Aren't you a hot little bitch!" He laughed lecherously. "Today, just ain't your day, is it?" He clamped one greasy hand around her slim neck while the other hand ripped clumsily at her skirt.

"Let go of me, you sick fuck!" Lily gasped. "This is so NOT happening!"

He increased pressure on her windpipe, lifting her off the ground by her neck. Lily struggled desperately for air.

"Aww, is that all you got? He then pushed her forcefully against the wall, Lily's skull cracking against the dull slimy bricks. Sticky rivulets of blood trickled along her cheekbone from an open gash.

Lily was temporarily stunned from the searing pain. The world blurred out into a murky haze of swirling black shadows—a hiss of voices scattered within her mind like dry branches scratching a windowpane. Finally, one of the voices broke through the fog.

"LILY! What the fuck is wrong with you? KILL HIM!"

The man continued his violent assault without a shred of empathy. His dirty fingers found their way between her legs. He stabbed at her roughly.

This gross violation jolted Lily back to reality.

"I SAID NOOOOOOO!" Lily lashed out in a dazed fury, fight or flight responses kicking in.  With desperation, she clawed at his face like a caged predator, digging her fingernails deeply into his eye sockets. Instantly, the rapist froze, an abrupt and sickening scream piercing the night air like a mortally wounded animal.

Long black spears punctured his pupils, throat, and mouth. Face paling in shock, Lily realized that the long boney protrusions had sprouted from her very own hands.

Immediately pulling back, her fingers returned to normal human digits. The rapist's body fell to the ground, convulsing with the nervous twitches of an unexpected death.

Dripping with the scarlet blood of her attacker, Lily made a strangled noise of anguish, shaking with a mixture of fear and confusion.

No! It was impossible!!

"Oh my god...oh my god..." Lily rattled, her voice brittle with shock.

"Oh, dear. That's quite the mess, isn't it?" A dark figure chuckled from deep within the gloom.

"Who's there!?" Lily barked, rounding on the intruder.

"We should probably call the police." He mocked with fake seriousness. "What do you think?"

"I...., " Lily's voice trembled as she fought to form words, "I didn't mean to kill him!!

"Well...Lilith, that's not entirely true." He laughed softly. "You are a killer by nature, but honestly, he was asking for it. He was on my list, so thanks for saving me the trouble."

"Who...who are you...?"

"I'm a friend." He affirmed. "I'm here to help you."

An impossibly tall man materialized from the murky recesses of the alleyway. Only it wasn't a man at all, but a shadow with glowing crimson eyes and a smirk of carnivorous incisors. Lily retreated slowly in astonished silence, eyes wide with fear.

She could only describe the creature as a terrifying cross between an unholy devil and Slenderman. He flapped his raven-like wings briefly before folding them neatly onto his back.

"Lilith, I need you to come with me. I can explain everything."

In response to his words, Lily released a blood-curdling scream, turned on her heel and ran for her life.

"Fuck me...!!" The creature groaned. "Lilith, come back here!! You are not making this easy!!"

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Lily raced to the alley's end, across an abandoned parking lot and into King City Park. She didn't have time to think as terror and adrenaline urged her into the densely treed blackness.

She fought her way through thick underbrush, thorny branches scratching her face like a hundred tiny razors. Lily searched in anguish for a light source to illuminate her path, instinctively heading toward the reassuring glow of streetlights.

Heart hammering in her chest, she glanced furtively over her shoulder. The fiery red eyes were still in pursuit, gliding disembodied through the forest with nightmarish speed. Lily forced her injured body onward in a life or death panic. Racing toward a clearing, she sped across a snow-covered field to a nearby pedestrian bridge.

The walkway extended over an eight-lane expressway, the traffic below illuminating Lily's tiny frame with rhythmic strobing of intermittent light. She hoped in vain that brightness would frighten away the demon. It was her only chance!

Backing tentatively over the bridge, Lily held onto the worn metal railing; she couldn't see the horrid eyes anywhere. Had she finally lost him?

"LILITH!"

The red eyes flashed into view, mere inches from her face.

Lily released a scream of horror as she tumbled backward over the railing, falling toward the steady rush of traffic below.

Suddenly, the firm grasp of clawed fingers latched onto her wrist, yanking her to safety.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

The demon gazed into the face of the fragile woman held within his arms, now unconscious.

Wait!? Did she faint? Seriously!?

He sighed painfully. "I find it hard to believe you're Lilith. My Lilith was a warrior, not a woman afraid of her own damn shadow. I have my work cut out for me this time."

The woman's eyes flashed open as she suddenly came too. '"LET ME GO!!!" She smashed her knee into his groin.

"Lillllly.....dammmmit!!!" He wheezed in pain, releasing her.  The demon crumpled to his knees, wincing in agony. "Was that necessary! I'm trying to save you!"

"Save me?" She answered groggily.

Lily stumbled backward, falling next to him in the snow.

"Lily!?" The demon hissed, nudging her with his hand.

The girl did not respond.

Noticing the blood matted thickly within her auburn hair, he realized she was severely injured.

"Jesus Christ, Lily!" The demon shouted in distress. "Could this night get any worse!"

He unfurled giant bat-like wings and lifted her into his arms.

With a paranormal burst of speed, they launched into the night sky, becoming one with the darkness.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Two detectives pushed open the double doors to the intensive care unit at King City General, flashing badges. They headed directly to the waiting room, where a lone man sat quietly.

"Are you Mr. Sam Coleman?" The first detective inquired with a huff of self-importance.

Mr. Coleman replied calmly in a deep soothing baritone. "What can I do for you, gentlemen?"

"We'd like you to come down to the station to answer a few questions regarding the woman you found."

"I'm free now. Let's have a discussion."

The detectives took a seat across from him in the worn vinyl hospital chairs.

"Mr. Colman, what happened to Lily Foster?"

"Oh, is that her name?" He smiled dangerously. "Well, what a lovely name. Thank-you for the extraneous information. Are you gentlemen new at this job?"

The head detective laughed incredulously and crossed his arms.

"So, is this how we're going to start this conversation, Mr. Coleman?"

"There isn't much to say." Sam continued, without a hint of worry. "I found the girl lying in a pool of blood on the bridge. I brought her to the hospital as any good Samaritan would."

"How did you get here, Mr. Colman?" One of the detectives inquired, his voice full of suspicion. "You didn't call an ambulance."

"Well...I carried her."

"It's five miles from the park to this hospital. Surely calling an ambulance would have been faster."

"I assure you. I'm very fast."

"Your story just isn't adding up. I find your timeline highly unlikely."

"Do you think I'm lying?" Sam sighed ruefully, a slight smile gracing his lips. "Tell me, detectives, can you tell a liar by looking into their eyes? Do I look like a person that would deceive you?"

The men instinctively glanced into Sam's stoic face. They were instantly mesmerized by the glow of his emerald gaze. Eyebrows furrowed in confusion, the two inspectors found themselves unable to look away.

"Now, gentlemen, you will do as I say." Mr. Coleman cautioned, "I suggest you pay attention. I will only say this once."

Both men stared blankly, unable to respond.

"The girl was attacked last night by a drunken predator and had nothing to do with his untimely death. A semi-truck hit him after he fell from the overpass. I found Ms. Foster on the bridge and brought her here. I'd appreciate it if you treated her kindly; she's been through quite the ordeal. She needs your sympathy instead of your accusations. Do we have an understanding?"

Both men nodded in unison.

"Now, I suggest you leave. Your mere presence greatly annoys me."

The two men stood robotically and staggered from the room.

No sooner had the large double doors swung shut, a group of women burst back into the ICU, aggressively charging the nurse's station.

"Hey!" A tall, athletic blonde raised her voice in a panic, "We're here to see Lily Foster. Is she okay!?"

"Are you family?" The charge nurse answered dourly.

"What!? No! Lily has no family. I'm her best friend, Jennifer."

"I'm afraid I can't release any details to you about her condition."

"Somebody called me!" Jen shouted. "They told me she was here!"

"A man admitted Lily Foster to the ICU an hour ago, but I can't release her medical status."

"Ah c' mon! That's total bullshit!" The blonde growled. "I don't want to leave her in this shitty place all alone!"

"I'm afraid you'll have to wait here until she gives us permission to let you in." The nurse replied dismissively.

"I'll take that as a positive. At least I know she's alive, right!?"

"Ladies, perhaps I can answer some of your questions?" A man in the waiting area offered.

"Who are you?"

"My name is Sam," He announced. "I'm the guy that found her."

Sam held up Lily's cellphone.

"I called you... with this."

https://www.wattpad.com/794312575-a-good-evil-rock-bottom-chapter-1

#new book #demons #crappy jobs #starting over #lots of smut #gratuitous violence

[hallowed-be-thy-username]

If You’re Good At Something, Never Do It For Free Chapter One: In Need Of Some Assistance

I figured I’d post the first chapter of my WIP on here! TDK Joker x Original Female Character. It is currently at 17 out of ? (Where it stops, nobody knows!) chapters on AO3! 

**Warnings for full fic include: Graphic violence, explicit language, blood and gore, smut smut smut, graphic depiction of corpses, murder, aaaand recreational drug use!**

Hope you enjoy and let me know what you think! I might eventually put all of the chapters up on here or check it out on AO3!

Meet Nora Hawthorne. She spent her time like most Gotham residents. Go to work, go home, keep up with the news. That changed one night. Her life becomes even more interesting after Gotham's own Clown Prince of Crime comes crashing in with a life-threatening injury, leaving her questioning her morals as well as her romantic desires

Jesus, it’s been a long day. A woman with brunette hair above her shoulders, wearing a pair of loose teal green scrubs stands from her desk chair to twist her torso until a satisfying *crack* is heard, followed by a deep sigh. The noise of her tired spine popping into alignment is heard only by her as she stands alone in the treatment area of the now empty veterinary hospital. The brick structure sits between an apartment building and a law firm in West Harlow, the Gotham City neighborhood west of downtown, adjacent to The Narrows. This location makes Dr. Nora Hawthorne one busy veterinarian. On a daily basis she tends to anything from impatient businessmen toting in their wives’ teacup Yorkies with a little cough to large Rottweilers with deep neck wounds. To say she’s gained a variety of experience is an understatement.

She doesn’t own the place, though. Two years out of school and 30 years old means she has some hefty bills to pay. Dr. Moore owns the clinic. Taking this job meant long hours and a busy schedule with not much sympathy from David Moore. “Your generation expects everything handed to them, don’t you? I had to work harder than this to get where I am,” as he just loved to remind her of every time she requested time off for a little… what is it called again? Oh right, work-life balance. Sure, Moore. Enjoy your mini mansion in Uptown since it seems you have no problem balancing the weight of your business on a pair of younger shoulders. Even if it means those shoulders are constantly wound up in to deep knots that no amount of morning yoga can seem to unravel. But she can’t quit. Those bills to pay threaten to pile higher and she’s afraid of heights. Plus, job security in Gotham is hard to come by. Especially since the Joker escaped from Arkham two months ago.

That was in May. Everyone in the city has been on edge since then and the Summer heat is not helping. The days go by but not a peep has been heard in regard to the Clown Prince of Crime’s whereabouts. Same for the Batman. The eerie silence has only been making it worse. The traffic congesting the city streets increases in intensity every evening as Gotham’s citizens rush home in an effort to avoid getting caught up in whatever devastating scheme the Joker has been cooking up during his involuntary vacation. But the threat never comes, leaving the city’s inhabitants to nervously watch and wait. Maybe it won’t come. Maybe he left Gotham for good. Left to terrorize a new city. Wishful thinking is what gets us all through the day. But the tension still weighs on everyone’s nerves, making Nora’s day that much harder when she gets an earful from her clients on a regular basis for things that are out of her control. “Sir, you don’t need to speak to me like that. I did not give your cat a urinary tract infection,” is not something she thought she’d ever find herself saying.

It is what it is. All she can do is keep her head on her shoulders and do her job, care for Gotham’s only truly innocent citizens. Animals don’t dwell in the past, they only live in the present. In that regard, they’re smarter than the majority of Gotham’s inhabitants. She made it her job to advocate for their health and well-being, since they can’t do it themselves. Nora was staying late to finish medical records for the sea of patients the clinic took in that day and she wanted it all recorded while it was fresh in her brain. If you don’t write it down, it didn’t happen. She told her assistant, “You go on home, I’ll just be here finishing notes. Get some rest.” The heavy set women expressed her concern for Dr. Hawthorne being here by herself but the job has gotten her used to being out well after dark. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep the door locked,” was the response her assistant, Jen, would always get in return. She didn’t want to argue so she would leave Nora to her work within the off-white walls of the dimly lit hospital in silence.

Nora stretched once more and shifted a glance to the clock on the wall. 9:58pm. Had it been fourteen hours already? Her stomach responded with a growl as if to answer in the affirmative. The hard-working staff finished cleaning the treatment room a couple of hours ago leaving the two metal tables in the center of the room shiny and ready for whatever tomorrow brings. The room wasn’t very large but the open design left ample room for patient care. The treatment tables against the walls opposite from each other extended toward the center of the room, leaving a four foot space between them, and had ceiling-mounted exam lights above them. Along the walls there were shelves of neatly organized equipment and tools. Essentials. White medical tape, boxes of gloves, bandage scissors, IV catheters in a variety of sizes, thermometers, bottles of isopropyl alcohol and hydrogen peroxide, jars with gauze soaked in chlorhexidine scrub, sterile lubricant, needles and syringes, and bandage material being among the most heavily utilized items. Along the back wall is a bank of cages and kennels for patients spending the day in the clinic (any patients in need of continued care were transferred to a nearby twenty four-hour hospital) flanked by drawers full of IV fluids and sterilized tools. The back right corner of the room opened into a short hallway leading to the area that housed a small surgical suite, devoid of any light this time of night, where a cart with monitors and a gas anesthesia circuit sat in wait for its next use. Just beyond this suite is a small door marked “Radiology” indicating the digital X-ray equipment kept inside, keeping radiation exposure to the rest of the place at a minimum. Nora’s desk is in the back left corner of the treatment room, a shelf full of medical reference books sitting above her head.  Also that “World’s Greatest Dog-tor” certificate Jen gave her last Spring. Nora didn’t have the heart to tell her she found it kind of insulting.

With the last medical record completed, details of the day’s procedures noted in succinct but thorough language, it was time for the doctor to make her way back to her nearby apartment for some much needed rest. She left her seldom-worn long white lab coat on the back of her chair where it always was and removed the black stethoscope from around her neck to place it on her desk. Walking toward the red-lit exit sign above the side door leading to the alley, she flicked the switch to turn the remaining lights off. She usually had a small can of pepper spray readied in her hand when she left alone at a late hour. But Nora had been practically beaten into the ground with exhaustion at this point and her thoughts were instead centered around a hot shower and her soft bed.

She opened the door to receive a gust of warm night air to her face, intensifying her sleepy feelings. Letting out a rather large yawn, she turned to put her keys in the door to lock it. As she removed the key from the lock, she felt a strange sensation on the back her neck. Like a crawling of her skin, a feeling of dread. Before she could turn around in search of the source of her body’s sudden danger signal, a purple glove slammed onto the door next to her head. Her eyes snapped to the glove and she froze, unable to breathe, while her heart jumped into her throat.

“Evening, doc,” a nasally, raspy voice said. She slowly turned her head to find herself face to face with the Joker himself, leaning with his gloved hand against the door. His makeup was smudged wildly and he was wearing his signature purple overcoat and suit. All color drained from Nora’s face as her breathing quickened to a practically panting rate, the idea of sleep drowned in a surge of adrenaline. Before she could make a sound his other gloved hand clapped over her mouth, a knife tucked between his thumb and index finger, the blade laying flat across the top of his hand.

“Ahh tah tah, no screamin’, doc. Wouldn’t want to wake the neighbors, would we?” he said, his dark eyes staring straight into hers. Nora struggled to regain her composure, it did her no good to panic. She knew begging and crying would get her nowhere with the Joker. Better to have as clear a head as possible. She took a sharp inhale through her nose. The wave of gasoline and extinguished matches that met her nostrils was overwhelming. It almost made her dizzy. But she slowly let the breath back out through her nose. Their gaze into each other’s eyes, hers wide with fear, his black and hooded, had not been broken since his zeroed in on hers. It was like magnets were keeping her eyes on his, no matter how hard she tried to look away, she couldn’t do it.

“Now. I’m going to move my hand and youuu are not gonna scream. Got it?” his voice getting slightly higher as he spoke. Without thinking Nora nodded slowly, still not breaking their stare, as he slid his hand from over her mouth.

She allowed herself to blink. Then, trying not to let her voice crack, she quietly said, “H-How did you know I’m a doctor?” Stupid stupid stupid. You are an idiot Nora Hawthorne.

Joker let out a breathy giggle and Nora’s gaze then fixated on his mouth. His scars. They were even more striking up close. Nora was no stranger to stitching up wounds and these must have been awful. She didn’t want him to see her eyeing them so she shifted her eyes back up to his.

“Who else would be here this la-te, hm?” Nora couldn’t do anything but open her mouth and shake her head, her eyebrows knitted together with anxiety.

Still bracing himself against the building on his left hand planted on top of the door he said, “Enough with the formalities doc. I am in need for some, uh, assistance, you see.” It was then that the doctor noticed the Joker’s breathing. It was shallow and rather fast. Like he couldn’t catch his breath but was trying to. Oh shit, what does he mean by that. She wasn’t sure how she didn’t notice his labored breathing until now. She supposed being paralyzed with fear would do that to a person. Nora watched as the Joker then lifted the flap of his coat from his right side, revealing a two inch wide piece of glass sticking out from between his ribs. There was blood trailing from it, down his green vest. She gasped. He dropped the fabric and grabbed her by the chin, jerking her head so her eyes met his yet again.

“So, my little doctor, youuu are going to provide said assistance-ah,” he growled. Nora’s eyes grew even wider.

“Wait wait, what? No no I’m a veterinarian, I’m not a human doctor,” she said in a panicked voice. Yeah, nice one, Hawthorne.

“I can read, doc,” the Joker said, gesturing to the painted door that read Gotham City Veterinary Urgent Care. “I know you’ve got what I need in that pretty little head of yours.” He tried to stifle a gasping sound from his throat as he attempted to inhale before speaking again. “I am an animal after all aren’t I, hm?” he said, leaning his head forward and bouncing his eyebrows suggestively. Nora was stunned.

“Why me? Why did you come here for help?”

“Can’t quite go to the emergency room, can I doc? Besides, you take care of little doggies and kitties all day. Just think of meee as a lost little, uh, puppy,” he said, shifting his weight to put his knife-wielding right hand against the door on the other side of her head so Nora was trapped beneath him, their noses inches apart.

Fear bubbled its way up into her head again. She couldn’t think straight. How did Gotham’s most notorious criminal end up here, in front of her, with a life-threatening injury? It didn’t matter how, it only mattered that now it was happening. But, how could she justify helping the Joker? He caused so much death and destruction to this city, her city. She could do her best to fight, she might stand a chance against him in this weakened state. But he was the Joker. He’d probably still be able to slit her throat faster than she could get out from under him. He was the Joker but he also was a person. A person in what she was sure was a significant amount of pain. Another gasping sound made its way out of Joker’s mouth.

“Haven’t got all night, doc.”

Nora’s expression softened. What the fuck am I getting myself into?

“Ok,” she said, lifting her keys and turning to unlock the door.

#joker fanfiction #tdk joker #heath ledger joker #joker x oc #fanfiction

[snicketsleuth]

Slackin’ with the Sleuth: reviewing Netflix’s “The End”

There were many goodbyes, and there were many beginnings.

“The End” is perhaps the strangest and most controversial episode to date. It’s difficult to assess the actual quality of the episode as we are constantly reminded of all the ones which preceded it.

At the risk of sounding like a fool rather than a prophet, it’s possible that Netflix’s version of “A Series of Unfortunate Events” will go down in the history of adaptations. We’ve never had quite a literary retranscription like this one: no one has dared to go as deep into the source material, its themes, its inspirations, since, perhaps, Peter Jackson’s recreation of “The Lord of the rings”. The amount of mindwork necessary to make the imagination of the original author fit the screen is absolutely comparable. Let’s wrap up the series after the cut.

Let’s get the elephant out of the room: why would you give the longest book in the series less screentime than the others? The only other example which comes to mind is David Yates’ attempt at adapting “The Order of the Phoenix”, an achievement in shoppy editing, lighting mistakes, script derailment and overall cinematographic incompetence. That is not a strong pitch. Worse of all is the fact that the idea apparently came from Daniel Handler himself! In his words, “The Penultimate Peril” is the real ending while “The End” serves as more of a coda. Even though the ending, by classical tradition, is only supposed to come after the denouement. It’s right in the name of the hotel, for crying out loud. As moving as the montage to “There’s no happy endings, not here, not now” is, its inclusion could have worked just as well in the final episode. In fact, it already worked as the conclusion of the first season!

The reasoning behind this choice is quite skewed, because "A Series of Unfortunate Events" already had a coda: it's called "Chapter Fourteenth". It's short, it's sweet, it's symbolic, it serves as a moral compass for the entire series. It's the only epilogue the series deserves. On the surface, of course, the decision to fusion "The End" with "Chapter Fourteenth" is perfectly reasonable; even the fans don't know whether to classify "Chapter Fourteenth" as a chapter of "The End" or as a fourteenth book which just happens to be published in the same volume as "The End". It's also doubtful that Netflix would allow the showrunners to release a 10-minutes episode as a conclusion. We get it. But somehow, the show writers have convinced themselves that fusioning the last act of the story and its coda turns the entire final act into a coda, and... that's simply not how narration works. There's simply too much going on in that book in terms of plot, character development and themes to adapt it in less than an hour without something missing.

There may be several reasons behind this change. One might be a personal dislike for that particular book, a reluctance to certain chapters of it, a desire to get it over with as soon as possible. But it's unlikely given that the screenwriters adapted the story rather faithfully (the deaths of Kit and Olaf, in particular, are pretty much verbatim) in spite of the time limits. We personnally believe that budget may have had something to do with it: "The End" was always supposed to be filmed last, at a time where budget may be scarce. Recreating the illusion of many exterior shots when the series is filmed mostly on soundstages can't have been cheap, and most of "The End" happens on the outside, in a tropical location. So condensing the book could work as an excuse to cut corners when it comes to money: less screentime, less sets to build. What makes it believable is the fact that "The Penultimate Peril" was officially the most expensive episode to film because of the large crowds and the many returning cast members. Prior to the season, screenwriters had sold this format to the fans as a "mega-episode", which would be longer than the others. But in reality Netflix"s version of "The End" lasts 52 minutes, while the first part of "The Penultimate Peril" stands at a whooping 55! Unless official sources deny it, there's a strong possibility that the showrunners had originally planned a hour-and-a-half episode and had no choice but to "trim the fat" as buget ran out. As we explained in our review of "The Slippery Slope", production of Season 3 was more troubled than we were led to believe, and the final episode could be its greatest casualty yet.

So what did we lose exactly? Well, namely plot elements which drive home the most important themes of the book. The island of "The End" presents the fantasy of an utopia: an opportunity to flee society and regular contact with other human beings, as well as all your problems. But as the history of the island unfolds, we see that this utopia is impossible, nefarious, even. Society inevitably recreates itself, and schisms occur. Beatrice and Bertrand tried to turn the island into a force for good in the world, but that scared the refugees who only wished to be left in peace, away from the rest of humanity. So the Baudelaire parents, who had worked so hard for the happiness of the islanders, had to be banished. And there lies the contraduction: in their effort to flee from oppression, the islanders had to resort to exclusion themselves. The Baudelaire parents tried to break the schism only to create another. And the worst part of all that is that it didn't even work. In their desperate efforts to disengage from the world, the islanders installed Ishamel as a tyrant... only for a second schism to occur when he killed them all as he started to lose power. And even before that, islanders had started another schism by aligning themselves with Olaf and freeing him from his cage. The island is not an utopia, it is just a microcosm of the world at large and a poetic recreation of VFD's tragic history. A failed experiment which only reinforces the issues it tried to solve. And that's the real reason the Baudelaire orphans decided to leave the island at the end of "Chapter Fourteenth": they know that safety and neutrality are an illusion. Had they stayed there, chaos, dissession and conflicts would have occured eventually. Accepting our inability to control things is all part of growing up.

Therefore, the question is: did Netflix's version of "The End" manage to convey that philosophical discussion? Not really. There's simply too much going on in these 52 minutes for anyone to stop and think for a moment about the moral consequences or thematical implications of staying on the island or leaving it. What we get on a screen is a mostly plot-focused adventure where characters do the things they do in the heat of the moment, because they're forced to react to other brisk events. It's not badly written, as their decisions make sense, but it's undeniably a lesser product than the original. A story of this quality needed some room to breathe and explore its symbolism.

Then again, there is another point of adaptation where Netflix's version is actually superior to the books. You see, alongside "The End", a supplementary material called "The Beatrice letters" was released, detailing the actual ending of the Baudelaires' story. It focuses on Lemony, years after the events of "The End" and now famous for writing the books, being chased by a mysterious "Beatrice". He eventually realizes that this Beatrice is actually his niece, who was raised by the Baudelaire orphans, and who is tracking them down once again. This fundamentally changes the ending of the series as 1) Beatrice's survival strongly implies that the Baudelaire orphans are alive too, 2) Lemony, after losing so much of his friends and family members, once again has someone to care for. This is in stark contrast with Lemony's depressing "rock fall, everyone dies" conclusion to "The End". Most readers will never read "The Beatrice letters" or even know it exists, which is infuriating as it contains the "real" ending of the books, one that the author very much intended. So one has to applaud the screenwriters' decision to end the series with the reunion of Beatrice and Lemony. They had obtained a deal to adapt "A Series of Unfortunate Events", not "The Beatrice Letters": they were under no contractual obligation to do so, but we're glad they did. It prevents the series from devolving into mere nihilism, and instead proposes something more interesting.

But more impressing is this episode showing how the TV series has truly come into its own in two aspects. The first one is the aesthetic, as the overly-saturated scenery engulfs the actor. The show has always dismissed realism as a passing craze, but this is the most extreme example of how cartoony the world of Lemony Snicket would look: it’s so fake, it’s real. As the island is a pretty good allegory of purgatory, it makes sense that the story would take place in a completely surreal atmosphere. The care taken to the production design remains, in our humble opinion and careful hypothesis, the real reason “The End” was cut so short, but that money is well-spent. As your eyes get used to the CGI, it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish what’s real and what’s not. However even this exploit has its limits: the arboretum is a far cry from the biblical majesty of the scene as depicted in the books, but it will have to do.

The second aspect where marked improvements are to be mentioned is the acting, mostly that of Louis Hynes and Malina Weissman. We were lucky enough that they were decent at all in season 1 (casting child actors is a pretty hit-or-miss line of work), but as of season 3 they really stand head and shoulders with the rest of the cast. They deliver the right emotion in every single emotional scene, in spite of the challenge. Klaus and Violet have come alive. Their recollection of their own tragic existences in the trial scene of “The Penultimate Peril” is particularly impressive.

But the real standout of “The End”, of course, remains the death scene of Kit and Olaf. For a moment, everything goes quiet and we forget that we are watching an adaptation. It was perfect in the books and it’s perfect here, to the letter, although letting Olaf look intently into the Baudelaire orphans’ eyes as he mutters his last verse is a welcome and tasteful addition. We were all wary of the way the showrunners were going to adapt the end of “The End”: the Netflix series has taken a comedic approach and this is the least comedic scene imaginable. It should have been a monumental failure, but judging by everyone’s reaction, it seems to have worked. So bravo to the production team for having the nerve to take a risk and deliver the tragedy of it all in spite of tonal dissonances with the rest of the show. Hard work pays off.

So is this the adaptation of our hopes and dreams? Of course it’s not. But is it the best possible story we could have hoped for in the Hollywood system? No, it’s much better than that. There’s something particular about the age of streaming television which somehow allowed this adaptation to happen. We hope it’s no a fluke, and we hope the success of Netflix’s homage to “A Series of Unfortunate Events” will give inspiration to many other creators. It’s a teachable moment on how to nail down the emotion and message of an original work. And that’s perhaps why the end of the TV series is a tad more hopeful than its book version: because its showrunners were happy, so happy they could complete this project the way they had intended, in spite of impossible things. So of course they put a few less deaths into the conclusion of the overall story. Happy people write the most frightening horror stories, and, in spite of its reputation, horror loves a happy ending. After all, the publication of the books was an anomaly, a miracle in and of itself. Daniel Handler has confessed many times that he’s still dumbfounded at their success.

So for now on, and in spite of our many gripes and nitpicks, let’s be grateful. There are so many fans of other works out there who have it worse than us, guys! But not us. We had the books, we have the show, and we will have each other. At long last... we’re the fortunate ones.

#0551 #review #ASoUE #a series of unfortunate events #Lemony Snicket #asoue netflix #violet baudelaire #klaus baudelaire #Sunny Baudelaire #count olaf #neil patrick harris #patrick warburton #malina weissma #louis hynes #kit snicket

[monkey-network]

Good Stuff’s Best of 2018

WARNING: I just want to say cheers to you for making it through another year. I send you best wishes for next year to be fruitful. Thank you, take care out there, and enjoy.

Dedicated to Stan Lee, Stefán Karl and Stephen Hillenburg, the number ones of children entertainment

Bow Whacka Wow, playas and players. 2018 gave us quite a lot to consume while society continues to fumble like a Tumblr update. While hopefully the chaos has died down for the final weeks of the year, I’m counting down the best cartoons/animations I’ve seen and loved this year in no particular order. Only two rules, no sneak previews of future projects (sorry 101 Dalmatian Street and MP100) and no potential entries from last year’s list (sorry True). With that said, roll it....

10. UNIKITTY!

I love the Lego Movie. I’ll potentially like the sequel. I like Unikitty. She got a show, and it was a great show to start off the year. Upbeat, colorful, off the walls sometimes, perfectly capturing the spirit of the eponymous character. I’m glad the other characters are just as enjoyable, I never get tired of the theme song, every episode had me smilin’ one way or another, it’s just a quality bottle of positivity juice. Don’t know how else to explain it, Unikitty, the show and character, just makes and continues to make me smile.

9. POP TEA-- SIKE!

This anime ain’t nothing but unfunny randomness and skits with a forgetful arc in the first and final episode. I don’t get it, never gonna get it, so I don’t want to get it! MORE LIKE POOP TEAM EPIC, ‘nuff said. Which is why the actual number nine is....

9. BOB EPIC TEAM

Honestly, there is something endearing about the way Bob Epic Team presents itself. The simplicity and variety of its animation is remarkably good and makes it feel timeless sometimes. The comedy works in a way that gives you a clear grasp on the two characters while letting them do whatever they want. The surrealism of this is fun to think about, showcasing a hedonistic philosophy that rivals that of Epicurus. The duo’s chemistry is what especially got me, as they felt like the best of friends, potentially love birds *wink wink*. This anime was just creative in every sense of the word and, like Unikitty, it was a great anime to start of the year.

8. CRAIG OF THE CREEK

The ska is RAH. I honestly find this to be the loose spiritual successor to Hey Arnold and Recess. Like the playground, the creek is a well fleshed out setting with the many characters that hang there, from the TAZ trio to the loving witches of the creek. Though I will say the best episodes are when we get insight on the main three’s personal lives with their families and when the characters themselves go through a personal trial to understand themselves a little better. The shows thrives in the theme that the creek is a place where you can enjoy getting your hands dirty and work towards something you want, even if it doesn’t add to any concrete long term benefit beyond learning a thing or two about yourself and others. And I say for somebody that relates to Craig as a character, that’s a welcoming thought that the show has yet to perish. And the ska is a welcome choice of music, IMO.

7. THE EPIC TALES OF CAPTAIN UNDERPANTS

It’s funny in how a little over a year of getting a movie, Captain Underpants gets an animated series with not only original stories in lieu of just animating the already printed stories, but puts it all in a format similar to reading a book with a sardonic narrator and separating the plot of the episode into chapters with subtitle cards; one of the first I’ve seen do this. But really, a “Captain Underpants cartoon” is something I can’t say would turn out bad, and I’m right as this is a show that revels in what made CU great in the first place. George, Harold, Melvin, and Mr. Krupp/Captain Underpants are all great characters with the additional supporting cast providing welcome life to the world. Every Incredible Violence Chapter is brilliant in their own right, and while I wasn’t a fan of the ending they had for the season, it’s great that almost every episode is self-contained, boosting its replay value. Honestly, any compliment I have for this was already said in my review of this and the movie, so I’ll just say this too was faithful to its source material and benefited heavily for it.

6. GARY AND HIS DEMONS

Rick and Morty done better. BOOM, send tweet! It is safe to say that this was quite the sleeper hit and I can’t help but say it’s lowkey one of the best adult cartoons this year next to Ballmastrz and Final Space. And while I certainly appreciate the other two *hint hint* this one got a step above on the grounds that it works as a comedy and a solemn tale of a chosen hero that stumbles through years in the office life. It’s improv humor feels natural and it can be as melancholic as Bojack Horseman without making it all too deep like so; has a great balance of both. Main man Gary, unlike Rick for the most part, is a guy that’s both reasonably reprehensible yet pretty relatable. Not to mention, while it was bittersweet, it had a very satisfying finale to where I feel like this was a complete series all together. With a rough art style that compliments it’s tone, this was a series that surprised me in its sharp quality.

5. APPLE & ONION

I’ll admit. Initially wasn’t a fan of it as it felt like a knock-off to Regular Show (may it rest). Just had a duo of bros living together, doing mundane labor while coming up with impromptu tunes along the way. Then again, I was gladly proven wrong because the charm of it generally being a simple show, even with every person being food, somehow more regular than Regular Show. Every song they make is upbeat and catchy, all of the characters are endearing, and with only 10 episodes, each one was well paced and had quality writing to the point where I teared up a couple times. It stinks that this and Summer Camp Island have generally been receiving the shaft this year after their premieres, but I'm just glad that they haven’t been truly forgotten by CN and are getting more episodes next year. Plus, I love food and this show is about food. Debate over.

4. LEGEND OF THE THREE CABALLEROS

I was familiar yet never saw The Three Caballeros, ironic since Donald is one of my favorite Disney characters. But then, out of the blue, I found this and I was stunned, amazed, confused, nonetheless invested. It has a bumpy start, but it’s a joyous adventure from that start to end. The look of it is something I’ve rarely seen in animation since... freakin’ Wakfu. I love Xandra and I was glad to see her be an active player on the team. The villains are such a hammy delight. And Jose and Panchito were very lively and entertaining foils to Donald’s cynic nature while all three work as well together like the 3 stooges. Donald himself gets a great arc of his own throughout the season. And the theme, HO MY GOD I LOVE THIS THEME! It’s a damn shame Disney hasn’t released this already (since it’s all online already) because this series is much better than it has any right to be.

3. GOLDEN WIND/VENTO AUREO

I say, the beauty of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure is that regardless of what part you start from, you’re enthralled into its world and ya feel compelled to dig into it more. Parts 3 was what got me into Jojo, like most I bet, but it was part 5 that got me “Oh yeah, this series [just] works on more than level”. The characters are what keep me hooked, regardless of Crunchyroll refusing to give their stands proper English names [Zipper Man, CR?], Fighting Gold and Freak ‘n You will never get old, and David Productions putting great effort into the small details and giving life and style to the original manga. I’ll just say, as one who’s read and loved the manga, this anime has not ceased to keep me impressed and guessing for more.

2. INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE

Funking superb, you afro having web-slinger. I hate to say it, but 2018 didn’t have the most impressive line-up of western animated features. Most were average, entertaining sure, but nothing felt like 110% was given. Until Spidah-Man came on the scene and I was like “WIG...

The only major problem I have with this film, besides a bit of slow pacing, is more of a missed opportunity where the stakes of getting the Spidermen back to their dimensions before dying felt like an afterthought. Then again, that’s ALL I have for problems. It looks fantastic. The action is smooth, coherent, and satisfying to see. The tiny details and comic book aesthetic of it was a blessed touch. I loved almost every character here. Nick Cage and John Mulaney. The fact that it has so much yet was able to juggle it all blew my mind. Even the post credits scene made this such a love letter to the wall-crawler. This film was refreshing to say the least and the central theme behind the idea of Spider-Man made this as great of a superhero movie as Infinity War and Lego Batman. Just saying, this better make its budget back and THEN SOME. It deserves it.

1. HILDA

Netflix, we’re not on good terms mind you, but ya done did it again. This is honestly one of the few shows that I genuinely took my time with as opposed to binging it, because binge watching is a devil in itself. Like the Spider-verse movie, it got the style of its source material down to cozy colored T with its autumn color palette and etched lining in the characters. Like the Captain Underpants series, while having a grounded arc of Hilda journeying through the city life and her colliding wildlife, each episode can be generally be enjoyed on their own. Like Gary and His Demons, it felt like a complete season and the fact it’s getting a season two made things all the better. But above all, it was a generally peaceful yet captivating fantasy cartoon to watch with incredible animation, an endearing main character, amazing looking folk creatures of all sizes and powers, and a cuddly deerfox for a pet. I say this is to the fall what Harvey Beaks was to the spring, and if I can compare a show to Harvey Beaks you know you’ve achieved greatness. Like True and the Rainbow Kingdom, gives you a moment of honest bliss and happiness that can influence your outlook on looking forward to better things because like Hilda herself, you push forward and have some fun exploring.

Just saying, I cannot stress this enough this is NOT my number one favorite show of the year, hell of all time. THAT goes to....

1. 👏TEEN 👏TITANS 👏GO, BABEEEEEEY!!

ONCE AGAIN, Teen Titans GO reigns supre-- Huh, what’s that? Oh my god, you’re serious?! The Number One is

TOTAL DRAMARAMA OUT OF NOWHERE! IT IS NOW CARTOON NETWORK’S ‘NEW FAVORITE SHOW’.

THE STREAK *DING DING DING* IS OVER

#best of 2018 #cartoons #anime #animation #Good Stuff #cartoon network #disney #reviews #long post #unikitty #pop team epic #bob epic team #cotc #craig of the creek #the epic tales of captain underpants #captain underpants #gary and his demons #apple and onion #legend of the three caballeros #the three cabarellos #into the spider verse #golden wind #vento aureo #Hilda #hilda the series #hildafolk #TTG #total dramarama #awesome #ye

[daveolivetti]

What is Music Festival By David Olivetti Published - Drum Media 2000

"As a guitarist, I'm interested in expanding what a guitar can do and what a guitar is meant to sound like," says Oren Ambarchi. "There's a lot of different aspects that you'll just pull together and it becomes a language. Your language."

The idea of defining or categorising music has infected sound throughout centuries. People have been traveling from the rainforests of the Amazon to virtual Las Vegas in search of an answer. Some cultures fail to understand such a question. "There are many languages," wrote musicologist Kofi Agawu, "that do not have a single word for what in English is meant by the word music."

Which brings us to the What is Music? festival. Celebrating its sixth year, Australia's premier avant garde and experimental music festival is underway, returning from a run of shows at the Big Day Out. The festival organisers do not claim to have the answer of what music is. "When we named it, it was more a joke off-the-cuff,” admits Ambarchi. However, upon close inspection the list of players to have performed at this annual 'meet' offers light to such spheres of debate.

Ambarchi and Robbie Avenaim have been the festival's organisers since its inception. As musicians, their relationship stretches back to Australian terrorist noise outfit, Phlegm. They have continued to work together and seperately; Ambarchi reeasing impressive solo records, making sufficient impact to tour with Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore and The No Neck Blues Band.

"It's music that's vital and it's happening," says Ambarchi, translating the music the festival promotes as a living, breathing organism.

"It's music that's constantly evolving. We do it and we're also fans. We're into it. The first line-up was basically all local - Jon Rose, The Machines for Making Sense, Phlegm, The Mumesons... It was like this weird cross-section. Four nights and only one act a night in those days. It's much bigger than it used to be and it's more well-known."

Indeed, what started as a one-off has blossomed into a full-fledged world class event. This year's festival is shaping up to be the most exciting yet, featuring artists from all over the globe including artists from the Mego label roster, avant garde guitar legend Keith Rowe, English improviser Simon Wickham-Smith, American funnyman Neil Hamburger, Melbourne quartet Dworzec and saxophonist Jim Denley.

The festival brings together a dynamic mix of artists exploring a soundworld through acoustic improvisation, digital technology, free music and far-out collaborations. It's sure to raise the hairs on the back of one's neck, fire the senses and offer insight into a mysterious music world. The line-up suggests a retreat from the terrifying wall of noise characteristic of previous What is Music? festivals. However, the chance of a surprise attack is never out of the question.

"Well you never know with those guys from Mego," Ambarchi smiles, suggesting artists suc as these are in a constant state of metamorphosis and impossible to pin down. "In the beginning those Mego guys were connected to the techno community and minimalism. Since they've taken off, all their new releases are really noisy. Mego has inadvertently become a focal point for this year's festival. The label's most accomplished artists - Peter Rehberg, Simon Bauer, the acclaimed Fennesz and video band Skot - are all performing.

An Austrian label, Mego works across the field of electronic media choosing digital technology as it's chief source of musical mischief. However, Mego reflects a new music state, where sound created through software packages, computers, modulated synthesisers and effects units have become the modus operandi, inventing a new computerised language.

"I'm happy about the Mego label coming here because I think it's something happening right now. It's not something that happened two years ago and then it comes to Australia."

Peter Rehberg and Simon Bauer are two artists at the forefront of the digital music scene. They write and perform their own compositions as well as running the Mego offices. "I've always been interested in the latest developments of music," says Rehberg, discussing his movement from an ambient/experimental DJ to digital innovator. "It developed from the wider availability of software. Prices coming down in computer hardware made it an easier thing to do. You can make sounds now on a computer, which you couldn't make on an analogue machine 10 years ago. I think that interests me more."

On the other side of the spectrum, Keith Rowe is arguably the festival's biggest name. Best known for his ground-breaking work with British group AMM - a post-John Cage improvisation collective than began in the sixties and still perform today. He continues to astound audiences as a one-man sound laboratory. His role as a 'tabletop' guitarist sees him exploring and extending the possibilities of the guitar. Often, he places the guitar flat on a table and with a clear mind and a box of preparations (nails, screws, electric motors, rulers) he begins his compositions as you see it. Much like a painter in the studio. He is very much looking forward to the festival.

"One thing I've realised is that 30 years ago, the freely improvised music that we developed in Europe and North America was particular to a few towns and a few cities whereas now it's across the world," says Rowe. "That music spread everywhere. I'm looking forward to seeing that development happening on the other side of the globe. It’s fantastic."

As a senior member of the avant garde movement, who has been performing for close to 40 years, Rowe finds working alongside the current crop of artists propose new challenges and offer insightful collaborations. "I find it really invigorating because they have a completely different agenda to us older guys in the sense that when we started to make tis freely abstract kind of music without a repertoire we were really fighting against the established giants like [John] Coltrane. We were trying to develop our own music, our own agenda, our own aesthetic. Of course, the young guys have got something completely different. They are much more with computers and technology. I'm a primitive in that respect."

The What is Music? festival is essentially grounded in its enthusiasm, but like the music it promotes the festival itself is evolving. The very act of the festival finds itself (sub)consciously peeling open the systems of established states of performance for both the performer and listener, and offers space for new spheres of thought. Its alive both as a free music enterprise and an ideas factory.

On what influences his current playing, Rowe says, "I think challenging new ways of assembling material. The way a performance is shaped, you know, what happens in a performance. What is a performance?".

#what is music festival #oren ambarchi #robbie avenaim #keith rowe #amm #avantgarde #music festivals #mego #peter rehberg #simon bauer #phlegm #australian music #john coltrane #fennesz #skot #simon wickham-smith #dworzec #jon rose #mumesons #jim denley #the machines for making sense #neil hamburger

[geniejackman]

Harry Potter: What the Movies Got Right

Because the movies get a lot of shit for the ways that they differ from the books, here is a way too overly-detailed list of moments from the Harry Potter films which IN MY OPINION improve upon the source material.

Sorcerer’s Stone:

The Norbert Storyline: Cutting out the whole midnight hand-off of Norbert to Charlie’s friends story-line was a good move. It slowed down the plot in the book, and come on, how were Charlie’s friends able to sneak into Hogwarts in the first place? There are literally entire chapters of people trying to figure out ways around the schools security.

 Chamber of Secrets:

Nothing to add, the book and movie are almost entirely one and the same (Sure wish they’d followed through with this on some of the other movies. Lookin at you Half-Blood Prince).

-ONE THING THOUGH; at the end when Harry tricks Lucius Malfoy into freeing Dobby and you can hear him start to cast ‘Avada Kedavra’ at Harry. It’s a small and HILARIOUS addition. Like, really Lucius? The killing curse? At this little twelve-year-old, right in front of Dumbledore’s office, in broad day-light, over literally nothing? I heard somewhere that this was because Jason Isaacs thought he should say some spell but nothing was scripted, and Avada Kedavra was the only one he could think of. But it’s just really funny to think about Lucius legit about to murder a kid in public over losing his house-elf.

 Prisoner of Azkaban:

-Aunt Marge’s Big Mistake: I love that Marge blows up and floats out of the house, rather than just bouncing off the walls like in the book. Hysterical!

-Lupin scenes: Lupin talking about how Lilly “was there for me at a time when no one else was” and how she had a gift for finding beauty in people “even and most importantly when that person could not see it in themselves”… just… fucking David Thewlis man. Actually, all the Harry & Lupin conversations in the movie have this sweet parental energy that was mostly there in the books, it just feels so much more potent here thanks do Dan & David’s incredible chemistry.

-Harry’s Patronus Lessons: the powerful memory that finally gets him to cast the spell is thinking about his parents talking with him. Kind of an understated change from the books, but it helps to underscore that the memory doesn’t need to be big or even all that happy, just emotionally poignant.

 -“WHY DON’T YOU RUN ALONG AND PLAY WITH YOUR CHEMISTY SET?!?!?!?”

-Snape protects the kids: Even though Snape was being a dick the entire time in the Shrieking Shack, he still acts as a HUMAN FUCKING SHIELD between the kids and Wolf Lupin and even takes a blow to the chest while protecting them. Book Snape was unconscious the whole time. Also, Movie Snape is so much more sympathetic than Book Snape, fight me. More on this down the line.

 Goblet of Fire:

-Really scraping the bottom of the barrel here, because there ain’t much.

-David Tenant is fun as hell as Barty Crouch Jr: I mean, there isn’t much fleshed out motivation in the character in the movie besides being bat-shit-fucking-crazy, but hey, it’s fun to watch! Also, I love the added detail (which I believe was improvised by Tenant) of Jr’s lip twitch and how this gives him away when he’s pretending to be Moody in front of Crouch Sr.  

-Cedric’s bravery: It’s a very small thing, but in the book when Cedric and Harry realize something’s off in the graveyard, they don’t really react much, or even say anything. When Harry’s scar stars burning, my man Cedric has enough presence of mind to draw his wand, ask Harry what’s wrong, takes a defensive stance, and shouts “Who are you? What do you want?” bravely to an approaching Pettigrew. Guy spends his last few moments being an absolute champ. Hollywood did you wrong Robert Pat.

 Order of the Pheonix:

-The DA training sequences: They’re wonderful and full of teen-whimsiness and the score makes me happy. Seriously, go listen to the ‘Dumbledore’s Army’ track, it’ll make your day! https://youtu.be/fZane0CwAGg

Harry’s cheesy one liner which somehow still manages to be great: “Every great wizard has started out as nothing more than what we are now, students. If they can do it, why not us?”

-Neville’s Character growth: “We’re gonna make them proud Neville. That’s a promise.” Man, I really wish there had been scenes of Harry and Neville talking about their families in the books. There’s so much that they share in terms of past traumas. I like that they bring it up in the film, even if it’s a very quick scene.  

-Fred and George: It’s been said before, but the scene with Fred and George comforting a young student who’s had the Umbridge hand-slicing treatment is UNPRECEDENTED and I LOVE it. This helps show them as more than just loveable jokesters.

-“Neville Longbottom is it? How’s mum and dad” “Better, now that they’re about to be avenged!” FOUR FOR YOU NEVILLE LONBOTTOM, YOU GO NEVILLE LONGBOTTOM!

-Possession: I’m gonna be honest, this movie is my next-to-least-favorite of the adaptations. I’d be prepared to write it off as a bad movie altogether if it weren’t for the way they decide to end with the Ministry battle: In the book, Voldemort finishes dueling Dumbledore and starts possessing Harry, who tells Dumbledore to kill him. Possessed Harry says: “Kill me Dumbledore, death is nothing compared to this. Kill me. And I’ll see Sirius again.” This moment is really quick, and it’s not really made clear until the next book that Harry’s love and grief in this moment is what drove Voldemort out. In the movie, the scene gets more time and attention and shows Voldemort possessing Harry, forcing him to remember his worst memories of losing people he loves. For anyone who’s ever suffered from depression or anxiety, the way these horrible memories overwhelm Harry is shockingly familiar. But then, Ron, Hermione and the others come running in. The sight of them makes Harry remember all of the best moments with his friends: “You’re the weak one. And you’ll never know love, or friendship. And I feel sorry for you.” HOLY HELL. All the tears. Just all of them. I fuckin love this moment. Congrats Possession scene, you single-handedly saved this movie for me.

Half-Blood Prince:

Oooooh boy. Full disclosure, I kind of hate this movie. It’s just… it’s not ABOUT anything. Like, SO much was changed in Order of the Pheonix to make it tonally different from the book, AND YET: Sirius’s line in the OOTP film about how “we all have light and dark inside of us” is so cliched and not from the book at all, but it PAYS OFF and shapes the theme of the movie at the end when Dumbledore reinforces “It’s not how you are alike. It’s how you are not.” So yeah, not really from the book, but it’s at least trying to have a theme. HBP the movie is a mess. Instead of having a central theme, the main idea for the movie appears to be: “stuff is happening”.

-Despite this, there were one or two instances of “stuff is happening” which the film added that built positively on the book. One of those is, hear me out, the Burrow attack. HBP the book is pretty void of any action until the very end, and this addition (nonsensical as it is. Did they ever explain how the Death Eaters were able to break through the Ministry’s protective charms to get to the Burrow?) gives us some pretty cool visuals and some much needed tension. Too bad it’s totally meaningless as we see in the first few minutes of Deathly Hallows Part 1 that the Weasley’s have completely rebuilt the Burrow. Cause, ya know, magic.

-Draco on the Hogwarts Express: “Hogwarts. What a pathetic excuse for a school. I think I’d pitch myself off the Astronomy Tower if I thought I had to come back for another year.” HA! Oh the irony.

In general, the characterization of Draco is so much more engaging here than in the book. The fact that the movies are less exclusively only what Harry thinks and sees gives us opportunities to see more into other characters perspectives. Draco’s experiments in the Room of Requirement really add a lot to the characters emotional struggle. And boy howdy does Tom act the HELL out of the bathroom cry scene. Really makes you wish they’d followed through on that redemption arc in DH part 2 (more on that later).

-Last but not least; Slughorn and the Lilly fishbowl. HOLY SHIT is this scene powerful. Not only is it an incredibly touching story, but we get to see the parental and emotional aspects of Slughorn’s ‘collecting’ of promising students over the years. And the sadness of Slughorn’s unfinished sentence; “the day the bowl was empty… was the day that your mother….” Just, damn. I both love and hate this moment, because it adds something positive to HBP and that makes me mad because I guess I can’t totally hate it now.

 Deathly Hallows Part 1

-Opening montage with Hermione Obliviating her parents. In the book, Hermione tells the boys about how she did this in order to make them see how much she’s already sacrificed to their cause. But damn. SEEING it really makes it even more devastating.

-Hedwig’s Death. Damn, just typing those words hurt my heart. I really liked that Harry lets her fly free at the beginning, only to have her come back during the sky battle to save Harry. It’s sad in the book having her die in her cage, but they really amped up the cry factor for the movie by having her sacrifice herself.

-“Hey losers! He isn’t here.” Goddamnit, Neville just keeps wracking up those ‘Biggest Badass’ and ‘Best Character Growth’ points. It’s great foreshadowing for what’s to come with his hero moment in the Final Battle.

-Harry and Hermione’s dance. I know some people have called this scene unnecessary and awkward, but here me out. The dancing itself is, in my opinion, EXACTLY how awkward fools like Harry and Hermione would dance, and the moments where they slowly change from depressed and dead-eyed to light-hearted and goofy, it shows you that despite all the hardships they’ve gone through, they’re just kids. A little awkward, a little uncertain, but still able to enjoy the small things in life. Also, the little moment where they linger for a moment all serious after the dance always played to me like “hey, you know how Ron just stormed out after accusing us of having a thing? Maybe there’s a possibility that we actually do… nah.” It’s a nice little moment.

-Scabier’s creeper moments with Hermione. That scene in the forest when she’s put up the enchantments so they can’t see her, but he can smell her. It’s a great acting moment between Emma and the dude playing Scabier (even if this should have been Greyback).

-Draco at Malfoy Manor. Small but touching scene; when Draco is brought in to make sure the Death Eaters have caught Harry, he does the same thing in the book where he claims he “can’t be sure”. In the book, Draco says this while refusing to look Harry in the eye. In the movie, he looks Harry dead in the face and looks scared to death while asking “What’s wrong with his face?” Just… the concern and fear dripping off of him is DELICIOUS. (AGAIN WITH THE REDEMPTION ARC!!! THE POTENTIAL WAS THERE WARNER BROTHERS!!!!!)

-Hermione Tortured. Not really all that much was changed for this scene, but Bellatrix carving ‘mudblood’ into Hermione’s arm and the way it evoked Holocaust concentration camp victims was a stroke of genius.

-Dobby at Malfoy Manor. Way to give this ‘lil dude a moment to shine! Specifically; “of course I can, I’m an elf!” “Dobby never meant to kill anyone. Dobby only meant to mame or seriously injure!” And then… the death scene. I love that in the movie, Dobby gets a longer farewell. “Such a beautiful place… to be with friends. Dobby is happy to be with his friend. Harry Potter.” UGH! At least give me some warning before you rip my heart out.

 Deathly Hallows Part 2

-Snape vs. McGonagall; I’m torn, because I love the scene in the book where Harry defends McGonagall against the Carrows leading into the scene where she confronts Snape, but I also really love this big dramatic scene in the Great Hall with the “How dare you stand where he stood?” and McGonagall dueling Snape. Alan’s expression as Maggie steps up is PRICELESS.

-Harry and Malfoy in the Room or Requirement; “Why didn’t you tell her? Bellatrix? You knew it was me.” Yeah Warner Brothers, why didn’t he tell her? Gonna maybe follow through with this redemption-arc you seem to be building up? No?? OKAY THEN!!!

-Snape’s death scene. Changing the setting was a stroke of genius. This scene is wonderfully done and we all know it.

-The Prince’s Tale. Okay, I feel like I’m going to take some flak for this. At first, I wasn’t thrilled with how much was cut out of Snape’s flashbacks concerning his friendship with Lilly and their falling out. But when you really think about it, they cut out all of the really gross stuff. For instance, it’s never implied that he enjoys bullying people for fun, he doesn’t call her a mudblood, he isn’t shown being toxic towards Lilly and jealous of James, never has the moment where he asks Voldemort to kill Harry & James and leave Lilly for him, and in general is WAY less problematic than in the books. This might be an instance of a ‘less is more’ win in favor of the film. I know, I’m as shocked as you are.

-Malfoy’s Redemption: So this might be confusing for some folks since this wasn’t in the final cut, but here’s a link for what they originally had in mind for Draco’s redemption arc: https://youtu.be/hS5Z2YbyePg

I am SO MAD that this was left out of the final cut, since it’s so obviously built up in part 1. Also, it would have been a HUGE improvement on the source material since Draco effectively has NO character growth there. This moment, where he makes a huge stand by yelling “POTTER” (also, GREAT inverse from the way we’ve become accustomed to hearing Draco sneer at Harry by invoking his surname over the years), throws him the wand, and runs back to join the fray, is a great addition to the series. I really wish the filmmakers had stuck with this plan.

 Incredibly long ranting list over.

#Harry Potter #daniel radcliffe #hermione granger #emma watson #ron weasley #rupert grint #severus snape #alan rickman #Sirius Black #gary oldman #Remus Lupin #david thewlis #draco malfoy #tom felton #warner brothers

[roomfullofcunts]

I love you're writing, btw. You are a blessing upon the fandom. I have a bit of a dumb question though as someone who has only been lurking around the D:BH fandom for a few weeks... is there a reason why fans seem to universally hate David Cage? I feel like I missed all the good drama and am now trying to piece together the story based on numerous angry authors notes. (You're not obligated to answer if you dont want to you just seemed approachable) :)

Thank you anon :3

I don’t mind. Someone can probably word this better than poor sleep-deprived me, but I think with Cage there was already some history regarding his writing or behaviour. As someone who’s only been exposed to half of Heavy Rain, I wouldn’t really know, but that’s the impression I get; meaning that what people criticise about DBH is not an isolated event. As for DBH itself… My biggest issue with it was how ham-fistedly the race allegory was handled. It was clumsy and cringey at best, and ignorant and offensive at worst. I don’t really have the energy to go into it in-depth, but this is a pretty good write up.

There’s also the problem of how the women in the game were handled. Compared to Markus and Connor’s relatively complex, existentialism and ethics-driven character arcs, Kara was a “maid-bot” who wanted to be a mother. That was the extent of her humanity. Oh, and the sex bots. Even North’s whole personality seems based on the fact that she was a sex-bot, and the trauma she suffered because of it.

The force-fed straight romance rubbed a lot of people the wrong way too, not least because many people felt Simon should’ve been open for romancing as well, but also simply because it was just such a prime example of a shoe-horned straight romance where none was needed.

I’ve seen more criticism that has to do with world building or narrative, but these are the main points I usually see when the topic comes across; i.e race, gender & heteronormativity.

The problem I think is that DC built a plot revolving around something incredibly loaded in terms of race politics, but didn’t actually want to make a political game. He romanticises civil rights movements but doesn’t actually truly address the issues why those movements were necessary. Not to mention the awkwardness of essentially equating *objects* created to be subservient with black people. Yikes.

I’m sure much of this was unintended, stemming from ignorance and tone-deafness. But that doesn’t change the fact that many people (and especially Americans, who are closer to the topic than I as a European am) found it incredibly… well, shitty. Add to that the dissatisfaction with some of the narrative aspects, and you end up with a lot of fanfic authors denouncing DC as too incompetent to be paid any attention to, and embrace Death of the Author

Having said all that… Look, fandom keeps reiterating this -

it’s okay to like things that are problematic.

I greatly enjoyed DBH. I’ve sat through two playthroughs on my own console, and plan on doing more. I think the game is visually gorgeous, it’s one of the few “walking simulator”/QTE-heavy games I’ve actually enjoyed mechanics wise, and I thought the plot, when separated from it’s political ineptitude, was actually very captivating. I enjoyed the characters themselves, I cared about them and I cared about the relationships you could build. I think it’s a good game. I also think it’s an incredily badly handled game.

I also want to say this: A lot of us already spend a lot of time dealing with upsetting politics in real life. I’m a half-asian queer woman living in a country where right-wing politics are constantly trying to gain more foothold. And you don’t have to participate in the oppression olympics to feel anxiety about whichever country’s current political climate. Not to mention the personal problems most of us deal with, even the most well-adjusted of us. The real world is draining, so-

It’s absolutely fine to participate in fandom and not want to involve yourself in political discourse about the source material.

You don’t need to excuse yourself, you don’t need to apologise for your enjoyment of the product. You’re allowed to scroll past, blacklist, mute. It’s good to be aware of the nuances in the material, and it’s good to be open to the criticism people have about it, to be an educated consumer. But if it starts giving you anxiety or feelings of guilt about liking it - whether it’s a book or a game or a tv show - you’re allowed to take a step back and idk, go read some one-shot fluff-fics or that five-part smut series of your favourite gross ship.

#detroit become human #dbh #david cage

[hadarlaskey]

The Green Knight

There were few subjects as popular in Middle English literature as knights and beheading, which accounts for the enduring success of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: a 14-century chivalric romance concerning the fortunes of King Arthur’s young nephew and the mysterious figure who challenges him to a friendly Yuletide game. Scholars have bickered over the myriad potential interpretations of the anonymous poem for centuries, and now comes a new cinematic interpretation from David Lowery.

It’s fitting source material for Lowery, whose strong body of work so far consists of stories that are – in one sense or another – concerned with myths and legends, all with a tinge of romance, from his strong debut Ain’t Them Bodies Saints to soulful Robert Redford swansong The Old Man & the Gun. Even his foray into Disney IP with the 2016 Pete’s Dragon remake was a tender, beautifully imaginative outing. This is a filmmaker who doesn’t do things by half.

The charismatic, laddish Garwain (Dev Patel) leads a charmed life in Camelot, drinking with friends and canoodling with his peasant lover Essel (Alicia Vikander). His mother, Morgan le Fay, gently scolds her son for his lack of airs and graces, but when a giant, otherworldly creature riding a horse imposes upon a Christmas feast hosted by King Arthur and Queen Guinevere (Sean Harris and Kate Dickie) it’s Gawain who steps up to the mantel and takes on his challenge: to land a blow upon The Green Knight, and in return, one year later travel to the Green Chapel and receive an equal blow in return.

The journey to seek his destiny becomes Gawain’s noble quest, taking him across the windswept British isles where he encounters all manner of friends and foes. Outside the bustle of Camelot, a wild land awaits the hapless young lord, and while his naivety once seemed sweet, in the world beyond the castle walls it’s a threat to his survival.

Yet for all the magic and mystery Gawain encounters along the way, he still lacks direction, waiting for an encounter – be it with the Green Knight or otherwise – to turn him into the chivalrous hero he believes he is destined to be. At Camelot folk ask when he’ll become a knight; Gawain takes the question in his stride but seems haunted by the suggestion that he may not be the man everyone around him tells him he is. As such, it’s a curiously contemporary story despite the medieval setting; one of expectations and restraints, the desire for freedom and the looming question of whether fate is decided for us or by us.

The film rests on Patel’s shoulders. There’s a puppyish quality to young Gawain which he captures with ease, but as life – and his perilous journey – take their toll, he becomes more sturdy and sure of himself. It’s a demanding role but Patel’s performance is effortless, beguiled by the majesty of the world beyond his gilded cage. He’s human enough to fail but knightly enough to not give in. Opposite Patel, Vikander does a diabolical Yorkshire accent as Essel, but as The Lady she makes for a bewitching co-star. As does Ralph Ineson, donning impressive prosthetics as The Green Knight himself. He is used sparingly and this adds to the character’s gravitas.

Visually the film is equally impressive. It’s rare to watch a film and feel so deeply the thought that has gone into every single frame – from the choice of fabrics that contrast the earthy greys and greens of the landscape to the intricate design of singles and crowns. Elsewhere, Lowery’s regular musical collaborator Daniel Hart provides another enchanting score, combining choral arias with evocative violin arrangements and unnerving calls which sound similar to whale song. It’s a strange and haunting soundtrack to a strange and haunting film.

While Lowery could have explored the poem in a little more detail (some of the nuance and queer subtext of The Green Knight’s identity are lost in this version) this is nonetheless a bold vision. Wild at heart, this quiet epic casts a lingering mystical spell, perfect to usher in the forthcoming autumn nights.

ANTICIPATION. After a rocky start, Lowery’s latest finally lands in the UK. 4

ENJOYMENT. Lush and wild. Patel is resplendent. 4

IN RETROSPECT. A visual feast that lingers long after the end credits. 4

Directed by David Lowery

Starring Dev Patel, Ralph Ineson, Sean Harris, Alicia Vikander

The post The Green Knight appeared first on Little White Lies.

source https://lwlies.com/reviews/the-green-knight/

#movie

[iamsonotpassingthis]

Level Inspirations:

Hub:

The main hub was only really inspired by the Thumbnail illustration for the song sanctuary from the Terraria Calamity mod. It looked pretty so I thought it’d be nice to try and emulate the look of it.

InfRoom: 

As seen in the original plan for the room, the inspiration for it was a real life occurrence that happened as a result of me being stuck and out of ideas. Taking this personal side away from it, It also somewhat resembles groundhog day with the whole looping/ repeating gimmick of the level which could’ve been influencing my decision to make the room loop like it did without me even noticing.

InfRoom quest: 

The fetch quest was actually inspired by two things. The inspiration for the quest location and look was taken from a scene in the third Madoka Magica movie where the titular character stands on a chair. 

The second inspiration for the quest is much more personal to me as it is supposed to represent trying to chase your past self and recapture that childhood innocence in order to bring happiness to your present which is why instead of an orb or a book like all the main collectible quests, you search for a smaller version of the npc that gives you the quest. If you succeed in finding and bringing back the person, the npc will stay standing on the chair with the good collectible being next to him. If you fail, the npc will rotate off the chair and into the floor, like in the source material that inspired the visual look of the area, before spawning the bad collectible. 

One thing that indirectly influenced the theme of the quest would be the music that David Wise composed for Donkey Kong Country 2, Stickerbush Symphony (https://youtu.be/lndBgOrTWxo) in specific as well as the Bramble Blast remix from Super Smash Bros. Brawl (https://youtu.be/G3rnyqI7dFc). Even though I had no prior connection to the game or any of the music, hearing the song for the first time still gave me that nostalgic feeling, like I just visited my old friend after years of not talking to them. This feeling really helped push me in the direction of adding a quest based on chasing your past, even if it wasn’t the primary inspiration. 

Another aspect of the song that influenced the game in some way would have to be the community built around the “Internet Checkpoint”. The Internet Checkpoint is just a 15 minute long extension of Stickerbush Symphony with the main appeal being the comment section. The comments here are really interesting as instead of being a screaming match between kids on YouTube, It’s grown to become a safe space for people travelling between recommended videos where people stop by to relax and tell some of their life stories in the form of a “Checkpoint”. This “little” group of people and the way they interacted with each other gave off this feeling of home, a place where you could return to life wasn’t going too well or if something happened and you just needed to vent. This also helped with making me try to pursue that theme of chasing your past in some way, even if it wasn’t as influential as anything else here.

WTRWorld: 

The clear inspiration for this area gameplay wise was beach bowl galaxy from Super Mario Galaxy. I wanted to create an open swimming area where you would have to collect orbs/keys in order to open up the cage with the good collectible. Not only is the gameplay similar to Beach bowl, but so is the shape of the area as it vaguely resembles a bowl. 

Another thing that I took from when making this area was the Sunken Sea biome from the Terraria Calamity Mod(Ignore the massive grey hole, that’s not part of the sea)

When playing through the mod and encountering the biome for the first time, I was blown away at how peaceful, pretty and calming the whole area was. For context, To even gain access to the biome you have to defeat a giant desert worm boss so to be given such a tranquil area after an intense fight just felt amazing. The music is also great here as it gives off that relaxing feel that just makes you feel at home (https://youtu.be/QuC0i5IF1c4).

Although the keys are the main focus, I added some bonus collectibles in the form of books you could collect and read. Although this concept can be seen in many games, the place I took it from in specific was the Sea Mauville puzzle in Pokémon Alpha Sapphire. To complete the puzzle you had to explore around a sunken ship/power plant in order to find keys to open up rooms where you could find other keys and so on. In each room there would also be a drawer where you could find notes which detail the story of what led to the structure you’re at to end up in the state is in when you arrive. 

This little tidbit of lore stuck with me after I first went through the area and ultimately led me to create The Supernova wreck, an area where you explore a collapsed structure which contains notes that describe what happened leading up to collapse and destruction of the drilling unit.

Bridge:

Bridge is interesting as it didn’t really have a main inspiration behind it. I just wanted to make a parkour level one day and that was it. I did later on manage to figure out a way to link it to dreams as I thought about how the experience was similar to how I practiced my movement skill in Minecraft of all games. Since there is a lot of jumping and parkour in some of the most popular fan-made game modes I decided to make a level that was based on movement. I’d say that my practice at the same influenced how I made the level as some of the jumps resemble something you’d have to do in a game mode like bedwars or something.

The three big blocks near the middle of the image are supposed to be spinning blocks based on ones you’d see in Super Mario Sunshine secret stages, although I could not find an image of them in their game of origin, I did find one from a sort of remastered version from Super Mario Galaxy 2

Due to the way movement works in my game, the platforms function differently compared to how it’d work in either of the above mentioned games.

Town:

Town was heavily based on the Dragon Ball franchise with the goal of the level and building designs being the main takeaway from it. In the Town you have to go around a town made of simplistic buildings while looking for 7 orange orbs. The only other influences or inspirations for the world came from other worlds in the game such as the exploration aspect being carried over from the WTRWorld or the quest objective for the InfRoom quest being found in here.

[daresplaining]

MCU Danny Rand Week: Day 6

A Favorite Personality Trait

    Danny Rand: Cheerful Badass

    Danny is... many things. (Take it away, Danny...)

Danny: “...I’ll remind you that-- I am a multi-billionaire super-powered martial artist who returned to this realm for the sole purpose of mortal revenge.”

Immortal Iron Fists #4 by Kaare Andrews, Afu Chan, and Shelly Chen    

    ...So our favorite personality trait is actually a combination of traits-- a feature of Danny’s character that stole our hearts the first time both of us started reading Iron Fist, and which Finn Jones and the writers have done a beautiful job recreating in the Netflix shows. Comics Danny, at the age of nine, watched his dad get pushed off a cliff and his mom get eaten alive by wolves. MCU Danny didn’t have it quite so bad-- he only watched his parents die in a plane crash that he barely survived himself. In both universes, he could easily have turned into a dark, haunted person. In fact, he did for a while. As mentioned, he returned to Earth in order to murder a guy (and we’ll be talking about the differences between how the show and comics handled this revenge quest tomorrow!). But in spite of all the horror he’s been through in his life, he has blocked and dodged all (well, most) of the broody psychosis so often thrown at street-level heroes, and remains an amazingly upbeat, friendly, cheerful, genuine person. We don’t use this term much, because it’s subjective and not exactly analytical, but... he’s adorable. He is one of the least emotionally-constipated superheroes out there, and that’s really refreshing, particularly for a male character. 

Power Man and Iron Fist vol. 1 #57 by Mary Jo Duffy, Trevor Von Eedon, and G. Roussos

Danny: “Look, despite all that’s happened-- all that’s changed-- I want you to know. You’re still my best friend. And I’ll always be there.”

Cage vol. 1 #13 by Marc McLaurin, Scott Benefiel, and Frank Turner

    This doesn’t mean he doesn't experience hardship, or character development-- he does, in spades. But he always bounces back from adversity with a smile, and almost never takes it out on his loved ones. Matt Murdock (to uh, throw out a name at random) is fun to read about... but we’d never, ever want to be friends with him. But you bet we would hang out with Danny.   

Danny: “Just consider this a little reminder... that crime doesn’t pay!”

Luke: “You havin’ a good time, Fist?”

Power Man and Iron Fist vol. 1 #63 by Mary Jo Duffy, Kerry Gammill, and Ed Hannigan 

Jeryn: “Danny... are you using your Rand expense account to fund Luke and his fugitive Avengers?”

Danny: “Nooooo. [...] Yes.”

Immortal Iron Fist #16 by Matt Fraction, Ed Brubaker, David Aja, et al.

    And that on its own would make him an enjoyable character, but it is paired with the fact that he is the Iron Fist, which requires a certain mindset and level of-- for lack of a better term-- stone-cold badassery. Danny is a sweet guy, but if you get on his bad side he can, and will, end you. Immortal Iron Fist, goldmine of fantastic Danny quotes, gives us one of our favorite lines to epitomize this side of his personality:     

Danny: “One day, this mantle bestowed upon me... the Iron Fist... one day it will kill me. I know this. And I hope it’s a glorious, heroic death. I hope I die in a way that honors my gifts. I hope I embrace my death when it comes. I imagine fire. I imagine blood.”

Immortal Iron Fist #3 by Matt Fraction, Ed Brubaker, David Aja, et al.

    The Netflix shows have done a great job of balancing this duality, mostly thanks to Finn’s amazing ability to be cute one minute and terrifyingly intense the next. 

    Danny’s arc in Iron Fist and The Defenders did end up following the trend of all of the Netflix shows and skewing darker than most of the source material-- which we were kind of expecting. But what’s important is that Danny’s lightness of spirit was retained, and this balance of personality traits, which is part of what makes his character so much fun, has been celebrated and adapted into glorious live action. 

#dannyweek #Netflix Iron Fist #Iron Fist #Danny Rand #Commentary

[angelofberlin2000]

... because Reeves is the star, he has no equal.

Sep 18, 2017

To the surprise of absolutely no one, Lionsgate has announced and slotted John Wick: Chapter Three. The third entry in the accidental franchise is now slated for May 17, 2019.

I’ve always said that the weekend before Memorial Day is among the very best on the calendar, offering the potential for a big opening and then a solid holiday hold. Yes, last summer had Alien: Covenant, which was the least leggy such offering in recent history, but the slot has seen the likes of all four Shrek movies, all three Star Wars prequels, The Matrix Reloaded and Mad Max: Fury Road. So, yeah, Lionsgate watched Star Wars 9 ditch the Memorial Day opening weekend and saw an opening.

If we argue that a franchise grows bigger in stature by virtue of its release dates, then John Wick has been promoted yet again. The first installment was a genuine buzzy sleeper in October 2014. So, the sequel got a more high-profile launching pad over this past President’s Day weekend. We’ll see if the franchise peaked at part II (like Scream or Pirates of the Caribbean) or whether it builds on the third shot (or potentially goes crazy like Goldfinger or Skyfall.

Maybe the answer is somewhere in-between, but John Wick is now the rarest of things, an explicitly star-driven franchise. The success of John Wick is very much about the ongoing and periodically regenerated star power of one Keanu Reeves. Mr. Reeves is arguably the most successful movie star of the modern age in terms of creating wholly original and sequel-friendly franchises.

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 Sure, we can talk about his famous philanthropy, his understated and often underappreciated acting, his “sad Keanu” memes, or the fact that he apparently drank from Tuck’s well in the early 1980s and thus will never age. But what’s most impressive is that Reeves’ stardom persists in this IP/franchise-driven era. The secret is that the reclusive and philosophical actor has made a habit of creating a new iconic cinematic character on an almost generational basis.

Depending on how old you are, you may have discovered Reeves in the late 1980s with Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, where he so exquisitely played a good-hearted airhead that said characterization stuck as a kind of offscreen typecasting for decades. Or maybe you first saw the actor in Kathryn Bigelow’s Point Break, where overeager and exasperated FBI agent Johnny Utah and Patrick Swayze’s guru surfer bank robber essentially invented the testosterone-fueled bromance. It wasn't a big hit, but it spawned a remake, a satirical stage play (Point Break Live) and a loose rip-off that spawned a rather fast and furious eight films-and counting franchise.

Or maybe you discovered (or rediscovered) Reeves via Jan De Bont’s action classic Speed, which turned his onscreen kamikaze airhead reputation on its head for what amounted to a cheerful, well-mannered action hero. The film was slightly ahead of its time in casting a somewhat unconventional actor as its muscular action lead. It was a new trend begun by Die Hard and Batman and made mainstream when Nicolas Cage cashed in on his Oscar win to make The Rock, Con Air and Face/Off in the mid-1990s.

Reeves’ blockbuster action hit, which turned Sandra Bullock into a leading lady, kept Reeves’ name in good graces as he dabbled in smaller films and quirkier projects like A Walk in the Clouds, Feeling Minnesota or The Devil’s Advocate. While Reeves has long specialized in understated dramatic turns (not unlike Harrison Ford or Kevin Costner), Taylor Hackford religious melodrama/gonzo comic thriller, which gave us Charlize Theron, is a rare occasion where Keanu Reeves delivered a terrific over-acted performance. He held his own against a peak-ham Al Pacino.

But just as Reeves’ star was fading, he gave us a new iconic cinematic character for a new generation in the guise of Thomas Anderson. You may know him as Neo, but The Matrix was one of the most influential major studio releases of our time, and the Wachowskis’ mind-bending cyberpunk action trilogy became Reeves’ biggest grossers here and abroad. And whether they acted as a gateway drug for younger would-be Reeves fans or served to reignite the fandom born of Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Point Break and Speed, The Matrix gave Reeves yet another defining and iconic cinematic character to call his own.

By the time the Matrix franchise wrapped up in late 2003, the industry was starting to do away with outright star vehicles, especially those not based upon prior source material. So, it’s no surprise that Reeves’ two big hits in the mid-to-late 2000s were Constantine (a loose adaptation of the DC Comics title Hellblazer) and The Day The Earth Stood Still (a remake of a classic 1950’s sci-fi drama). Both films earned around $230 million worldwide on budgets of $100m and $80m respectively. Fun fact: Until Wonder Woman, Constantine was the biggest DC Comics adaptation without Batman or Superman ever.

The post-Matrix 2000’s offered a few small-scale winners (I will defend Reeves and Sandra Bullock’s The Lake House, a moving meditation on adult loneliness, unto death) and worthwhile indie films (Thumbsucker, The Private Lives of Pippa Lee, etc.), but the mainstream stuff (Street Kings, 47 Ronin) didn’t stick. Even the actor admits that the phone stopped ringing as much, although he did produce and narrate a terrific documentary (Side by Side) about digital video versus conventional film stock and direct the delightfully entertaining Man of Tai Chi.

And on paper, John Wick probably looked like a somewhat lower-rung, glorified VOD actioner better suited to Bruce Willis or Scott Adkins, a kind of “Oh, I guess Keanu Reeves is making a Taken knock-off” grindhouse offering. But the stylized and stylish actioner, starring Reeves as a retired hitman drawn back into the fray after Russian mobsters kill his newborn puppy, was a rarity. It was a genuine, under-the-radar sleeper hit.

The picture, directed by Chad Stahelski and David Leitch, was picked up by Lionsgate less than three months prior to its eventual late-October 2014 release and turned into a genuine mainstream hit. Thanks to good reviews, strong buzz and a solid marketing campaign that treated the film as a generational coronation for the occasionally underappreciated movie star, the picture vastly overperformed its pre-release tracking estimates, opening with $14 million and legging it to $43m domestic and $88m worldwide on a $30m budget.

That’s not a king’s ransom, but the picture, which played off Reeves’ star persona as a Zen-like man of action (and the fact that he had been somewhat MIA from mainstream movies), became an instant genre favorite and would-be cult classic. It was a big post-theatrical hit and John Wick: Chapter Two opened this past February as a true breakout sequel with a $30 million debut weekend for an eventual $92m domestic and $171m worldwide gross on a $40m budget.

The John Wick franchise is rooted in the idea of seeing Keanu Reeves specifically as John Wick, specifically because of Reeves’ performance and how the character plays off his persona. And that applies to all his defining characters, from Ted to Neo to Wick. Plenty of actors have one or two iconic/defining cinematic characters to their credit. Reeves has at least four (Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Speed, The Matrix and John Wick) and possibly five (if you want to count Point Break’s Johnny Utah). Moreover, all of them stemmed from original screenplays sans any attachment to branded content or preexisting source material.

Moreover, all of them stemmed from original screenplays sans any attachment to branded content or preexisting source material. In 2017, Reeves is still around, still relevant, and still creating wholly original cinematic franchise-friendly characters. It would be like if Harrison Ford were still creating new characters as popular as Indiana Jones or Han Solo. Or, it would be like if Hell of High Water or Blackhat did even 25% of what Star Trek or Thor did at the domestic box office.

It is that ability (aside from the whole talent/charisma/professionalism/commitment stuff), to create new characters just often enough to snag new fans and reacquaint himself with older fans that keeps the actor exciting and bankable even in an IP/branded content world. Most actors are lucky to have one iconic character. Some, like Alan Rickman, get two. Keanu Reeves has at least four, all of which are wholly original cinematic creations.

Like Denzel Washington and Leonardo DiCaprio, Keanu Reeves is still a movie star because he remains bigger than the property and can score big bucks and new fans absent any property at all.  And unlike any of his peers, he has a knack for embodying wholly original characters that redefine (or reenergize) his stardom right when the wick is about to burn out. And in terms of starring in films that create sequel-friendly franchises, franchises that succeed specifically because Reeves is the star, he has no equal.

 Thanks to mr-reeves.com !

#keanu reeves #keanu reeves support #one of hollywood's biggest movie stars #movie star

[jerdle-typology]

Enneagram 5

The Five in Profile

Healthy: Observe everything with extraordinary perceptiveness and insight. Are mentally alert, curious, have a searching intelligence: nothing escapes their notice. Display foresight and prediction abilities. Able to concentrate: become engrossed in what has caught their attention. / Attain skillful mastery of whatever interests them. Excited by knowledge: often become expert in some field. Innovative and inventive, producing extremely valuable, original works. Highly independent, idiosyncratic, and whimsical. At Their Best: Become visionaries, broadly comprehending the world while penetrating it profoundly. Open-minded, take things in whole, in their true context. Make pioneering discoveries and find entirely new ways of doing and perceiving things.

Average: Begin conceptualizing everything before acting—working things out in their minds: model building, preparing, practicing, gathering resources. Studious, acquiring technique. Become specialized and often “intellectual”: involvement in research, scholarship, and building theories. / Increasingly detached as they become involved with complicated ideas or imaginary worlds. Become preoccupied with their visions and interpretations rather than reality. Are fascinated by offbeat, esoteric subjects, even those involving dark and disturbing elements. Detached from the practical world, a “disembodied mind,” although high-strung and intense. / Begin to take an antagonistic stance toward anything which would interfere with their inner world and personal vision. Become provocative and abrasive, with intentionally extreme and radical views. Cynical and argumentative.

Unhealthy: Become reclusive and isolated from reality, eccentric and nihilistic. Highly unstable and fearful of aggressions: they reject and repulse others and all social attachments. / Get obsessed with yet frightened by their threatening ideas, becoming horrified, delirious, and prey to gross distortions and phobias. / Seeking oblivion, they may commit suicide or have a psychotic break with reality. Deranged, explosively self-destructive, with schizophrenic overtones.

Key Motivations: Want to be capable and competent, to master a body of knowledge and skill, to explore reality, to remain undisturbed by others, to reduce their needs.

Examples: Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Friedrich Nietzsche, Stanley Kubrick, Georgia O'Keeffe, Emily Dickinson, Simone Weil, Bill Gates, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jacob Bronowski, James Joyce, Gary Larson, David Lynch, Stephen King, Tim Burton, Clive Barker, Laurie Anderson, Meredith Monk, John Cage, Glenn Gould, Charles Ives, Bobby Fischer, and Vincent van Gogh.

AN OVERVIEW OF THE FIVE

The connection between genius and madness has long been debated. These two states are really poles apart, the opposite ends of the personality spectrum. The genius is someone who fuses knowledge with insight into the nature of reality, someone who has the ability to see things with utter clarity and with awe-inspiring comprehension. What separates the genius from the madman is that the genius, in addition to extraordinary insights, has the ability to see them correctly, within their context. The genius perceives patterns which are actually present, whereas the madman imposes patterns, projecting erroneous perceptions onto every circumstance. The genius may sometimes seem to be out of touch with reality, but only because he or she operates at a more profound level. The madman, however, is truly out of touch with reality, having nothing but delusions to substitute for it.

The Five is the personality type which most exemplifies these extremes. In the Five, we see the genius and the madman, the innovator and intellectual, the mildly eccentric crackpot and the deeply disturbed delusional schizoid. To understand how these widely diverse states are part of the same personality type is to understand the Five.

In the Thinking Triad

Fives are members of the Thinking Triad. Their potential problem results from the fact that they emphasize thinking over doing, becoming intensely involved with their thoughts. Fives think so much that their mental world becomes all-engrossing, virtually to the exclusion of everything else. This is not to say that Fives do nothing at all, but that they are more at home in their minds, viewing the world from a detached vantage point, than they are in the world of action.

All three members of the Thinking Triad—Fives, Sixes, and Sevens—focus their attention on the world outside themselves. This may seem to contradict the statement that Fives are engrossed in their thoughts, but it actually does not. Fives focus their attention on the external world for a variety of reasons, one of the most important of which is that the material they think about comes through their sense perceptions—the accuracy of which they can never be completely sure of because they are not certain about what lies outside themselves. The only thing they know with certainty is their own thoughts. Hence, the focus of their attention is outward, on the environment, while identifying with their thoughts about the environment. The source of many of their problems is their need to find out how their perceptions of the world square with reality so that they can act in it—and do things with confidence.

Problems with Security and Anxiety

Like the other two members of the Thinking Triad, average Fives tend to have problems with insecurity because they fear that the environment is unpredictable and potentially threatening. Further, they feel powerless to defend themselves against the world’s many dangers: they believe they are not capable of functioning as well as others and so make it their number one priority to acquire the skills and knowledge they feel are necessary for them to be able to operate adequately in life.

Their Basic Fear, of being helpless and incapable, influences their behavior in significant ways. Fives believe that their personal resources and capacities are limited, so they respond to their anxiety by downscaling their activities and needs. The more anxious they feel, the more they minimize their needs. While this can be a sensible approach to problems at times, anxious Fives may reduce themselves to living in extremely primitive conditions in order to allay their fears of inadequacy. Naturally, given this orientation, Fives feel easily overwhelmed by others’ needs as well, and try to avoid situations in which others will expect more from them than they feel able to give. As their fears increase, Fives begin to “shrink away” from the world and from connections with others.

When Fives are healthy, they are able to observe reality as it is and are able to comprehend complex phenomena at a glance because they are participating in life and testing their perceptions. In their search for security, however, the perceptions of even average Fives tend to become skewed. Their thinking becomes more convoluted, elaborate, and increasingly fueled by anxiety. As they withdraw from the world, it only heightens their fears that they cannot cope with it. Eventually, even basic living requirements seem overwhelming and frightening. And if they become unhealthy, Fives are the type of persons who cut themselves off from most human contact. Once isolated, they develop their eccentric ideas to such absurd extremes that they become obsessed with completely distorted notions about themselves and reality. Ultimately, unhealthy Fives become utterly terrified and trapped by the threatening visions which they have created in their own minds.

Their problem with anxiety, one of the issues common to the personality types of the Thinking Triad, is related to their difficulty with perceiving reality objectively. They are afraid of allowing anyone or anything to influence them or their thoughts. Because they doubt their own ability to do, they fear that others’ agendas will overwhelm them or that people who are more powerful than they are will control or possess them. Ironically, however, even average Fives are not unwilling to be possessed by an idea, as long as the idea has originated with them. Nothing must be allowed to influence their thinking lest their developing sense of confidence be diminished, although by relying solely on their own ideas and perceptions, and without testing them in the real world, Fives can become profoundly out of touch with reality.

The upshot of this is that average to unhealthy Fives are uncertain whether or not their perceptions of the environment are valid. They do not know what is real and what is the product of their minds. They project their anxiety-ridden thoughts and their aggressive impulses into the environment, becoming fearful of the antagonistic forces which seem to be arrayed against them. They gradually become convinced that their peculiar and increasingly dark interpretation of reality is the way things really are. In the end, they become so terrorized that they cannot act even though they are consumed by anxiety.

The basis of their orientation to the world is thinking; personality type Five corresponds to Jung’s introverted thinking type.

Introverted thinking is primarily oriented by the subjective factor…. It does not lead from concrete experience back again to the object, but always to the subjective content. External facts are not the aim and origin of this thinking, though the introvert would often like to make his thinking appear so. It begins with the subject and leads back to the subject, far though it may range into the realm of actual reality…. Facts are collected as evidence for a theory, never for their own sake. (C. G. Jung, Psychological Types, 380.)

Although they correspond to Jung’s introverted thinking type, Fives are perhaps more precisely characterized as a subjective thinking type because the aim of their thought is not always introverted (that is, directed toward themselves); rather, it is directed often outward toward the environment, which Fives want to understand so that they can be safer in it. The impetus for their thinking comes, as Jung says, from “the subjective factor,” from their need to know about what lies outside themselves, as well as from their anxiety when they do not understand the environment. This is why thinking is the method Fives use both to fit into the world and, paradoxically, to defend themselves against it.

One of the results of the way Fives think is that even healthy Fives are not very deeply rooted in visceral experience. They are the type of people who get a great deal of intellectual mileage out of very little experience because they always find something of significance where others see little or nothing. This may lead to great discoveries. However, when they stop observing the world and focus their attention on their interpretations of it, Fives begin to lose touch with reality. Instead of keeping an open mind while they observe the world, they become too involved with their own thoughts and dreams. This leads them further away from the world of constructive action—the very arena in which their self-confidence needs to develop. They may spend a great deal of time playing around with ideas or visions of alternative realities which have almost no practical impact on their lives, leaving them more fearful about themselves and feeling more vulnerable to the predations of the world.

Parental Orientation

As a result of their formative experiences, these children became ambivalent to both parents. Fives, like Twos and Eights, were in search of a niche within the family system, a role that they could fulfill that would win them protection and nurturance. For whatever reasons, though, they perceived that there was no place for them to fit in—that nothing they could do was wanted or needed by their family. As a result, Fives withdrew from active participation in the family to search for something that they could “bring to the table.” Fives want to find something that they can do well enough to feel like an equal of others. Unlike other types, however, since Fives’ underlying fear is of being helpless and incapable, they generally look for areas of expertise that others have not already explored. In a sense, their agenda is to focus on the search for and mastery of subjects and skills, until they feel confident enough to “reenter” the world.

In the meantime, Fives strike a kind of unstated bargain with their parents which carries over into all of their subsequent relationships: “Don’t ask too much of me, and I won’t ask too much of you.” Fives feel that they need most of their limited time and energy to acquire the knowledge and skills that they believe will make them capable and competent. Thus, average Fives come to resent intrusions upon their space, their time, and certainly upon their persons. What to another type might feel like a comfortable distance can feel uncomfortable to an average Five. The reasons for this may relate to the Five’s feeling of not having a place in the family. They may have felt crowded out or figuratively or literally intruded on by their parents and their agendas. Their parents may have nurtured them erratically, or may have been emotionally disturbed or alcoholic or caught in a loveless marriage, and therefore not dependable sources of love and reassurance. The result is that these children become ambivalent not only toward both parents, but ambivalent toward the world.

Fives attempt to resolve their ambivalence by not identifying with anything other than their thoughts. They feel that their thoughts are “good” (that is, correct, and can be safely identified with), while outside reality is “bad” (and must therefore be vigilantly watched), so that it can be repulsed at a moment’s notice. In average to unhealthy Fives, the sense of being crowded may have resulted in their feeling unsafe in their bodies. They then become profoundly detached, indifferent to physical comfort, and extremely cerebral, as if the quality of their material existence was irrelevant to them. Fearful Fives are willing to jettison many comforts and even needs in order to protect the space and time they feel they need to pursue their interests—that is, those areas they are trying to master.

They continue to find their parents, the world, and other people fascinating and necessary, but Fives also feel that they must keep everything and everyone at a safe distance lest they be in clanger of being overwhelmed by some outside force. Thus, from the very way they think—their “cognitive style"—Fives set up a strict dualism between themselves and the world: they see everything as essentially split into two fundamental areas—the inner world and the outer world, subjects and objects, the known and the unknown, the dangerous and the safe, and so forth. This sharp split between themselves as subjects and the rest of the world as objects has tremendous ramifications throughout their entire lives.

Problems with Detachment and Phobia

When they are healthy, Fives do not have to detach themselves from the environment, because they feel secure and confident enough to fully participate in the world around them. Because they are interacting with the environment, their observations are accurate and balanced. But as they deteriorate down the Levels of Development toward unhealth, their perceptions become more intensely focused on what seems to be threatening and dangerous in the environment. As a result of their preoccupation with things they find fearful and dark, their mental world becomes filled with anxiety. Ironically, however, the more fearful Fives become, the more compelled they feel to investigate the very things that terrify them.

In the end, since they invariably focus on what is threatening, Fives turn their terrifying projections into their only reality, and in so doing, turn their minds against themselves, literally scaring themselves out of their minds. They become completely defenseless against the environment, which they find supremely dangerous because their minds have made it so. They become so phobic—and their sense of capability becomes so fragile—that it is extraordinarily difficult for them to function or turn to anyone for help. Yet, unless deteriorating Fives can reach out to someone, they have few ways of getting back in touch with reality.

If they live like this for long, their thought processes become so delusional and terrifying that they must separate themselves not just from the world but even from their own thoughts. Neurotic Fives become schizoid, unconsciously splitting themselves off from their teeming minds so that they can continue to live. Their reality has become hellish: dark, painful, and without hope. Recoiling in horror, they retreat into emptiness—and yet more horror.

ANALYZING THE HEALTHY FIVE

Level 1: The Pioneering Visionary

At their healthiest, Fives have the paradoxical ability to penetrate reality profoundly while comprehending it broadly. They are able to take things in whole, perceiving patterns where others see nothing but confusion. They are able to synthesize existing knowledge, making connections between phenomena which no one previously knew were related, such as time and space, the structures of the DNA molecule, or the relationship between brain chemistry and behavior. If they are artistically inclined, they may develop entirely new art forms, or revolutionize the form they are working with in ways that have not been seen before. These innovations often become the new platform from which others will learn and create.

The healthiest Fives do not cling to their own ideas about how the world works. Instead, they encompass reality so profoundly that they are able to discover unanticipated truths they could not have arrived at by mere theorizing. They make discoveries precisely because they are willing not to know the answers, keeping an open mind while they observe reality.

Because they do not impose their thoughts on reality, very healthy Fives are able to discover the internal logic, the structure, and interrelated patterns of whatever they observe. As a result, they have clear thoughts into obscure matters, and are able to predict events, often far in advance of the ability of others to verify them. Fives operating at the peak of their gifts may seem to be prophets and visionaries, although the explanation is simpler. They possess foresight because they see the world with extraordinary clarity, like a weaver who knows the pattern of a tapestry before it is completed.

The result is that they transcend rational thought to reveal objective reality, and in so doing they move toward the ineffable, to a level of comprehension where words, theories, and symbols are left behind. They perceive the world in all its complexity and simplicity with a vision that seems to come from beyond themselves. They are closer to contemplatives than thinkers. This is the quality of the “quiet mind,” discussed in Buddhism and other spiritual traditions. When the mind becomes still and quiet it becomes like a mirror which accurately contains and reflects whatever it turns toward. Healthy Fives are not using their minds to defend against reality; rather they are allowing reality in, understanding that they are not separate from it.

Very healthy, gifted Fives so perfectly describe reality that their perceptions and discoveries seem simple, even obvious, as if anyone could have thought of them. But the genius’s insights are obvious only in hindsight. To have made the leap from the known to the unknown, and to describe the unknown so clearly and accurately that the discovery accords perfectly with what is already known, is a great achievement. Similarly, anyone can “create” a new form of artistic expression, but to do so in a way that is powerful for others changes the way that others perceive reality, is both rare and extraordinary.

Thus, very healthy Fives are intellectual pioneers who open up new domains of knowledge and creativity. An individual Five, if sufficiently gifted, may well be a genius of historic dimensions, able to make staggering intellectual breakthroughs for mankind. A genius of the highest caliber may understand the way the world works for the first time in history. Less gifted individuals may have a sense of the genius’s excitement when they first understand calculus or how to use a computer. Their understanding is new to them, and can be thrilling. Others can only imagine how exciting it must be for someone to discover something totally new—when the discovery is new not only to that individual, but to humanity.

Yet, at Level 1, the brilliance of very healthy Fives is entirely unselfconscious. What Fives themselves are most aware of is feeling at home and at peace in the world. Because they have transcended their fears of being incapable and helpless, they are also freed from their relentless pursuit of knowledge and skill. They no longer feel overwhelmed by other people or by challenges and are able to bring their hearts and minds together for the compassionate use of their knowledge and talents.

Level 2: The Perceptive Observer

Even though Fives are not always this healthy, they are still extraordinarily conscious of the world around them, its glories and horrors, incongruities and inexhaustible complexities. They are the most mentally alert of the personality types, curious about everything. Healthy Fives enjoy thinking for its own sake; possessing knowledge—knowing that they know something, and being able to turn it around in their minds, to play with ideas—is extremely pleasurable for them. Knowledge and understanding are exhilarating. They are fascinated by people, by nature, by life, by the mind itself.

Given sufficient intelligence, healthy Fives penetrate the superficial, getting to profound levels very quickly. Their insights can be brilliant because they have the uncanny ability to see into the heart of things, noticing the anomaly, the curious but heretofore unobserved fact or hidden element which provides a key for understanding the whole. Because they see the world with unfailing insight, they always have something interesting and worthwhile to say. The act of seeing is virtually a symbol of their entire psychological orientation. If something can be seen, that is, apprehended either by the senses or by the mind, Fives feel that it can be understood. Once something is understood, it can be mastered. Then Fives can act with the confidence they desire.

Nothing escapes healthy Fives unnoticed because they do not merely observe the world passively, they concentrate on it, noting how things go together to form patterns and have meaning. People and objects are perceived in detail, as if Fives were training a magnifying glass on the environment. Since their minds are so active and they find everything around them fascinating, healthy Fives are never bored. They like learning what they do not know and understanding what is not obvious. No matter how much they know, they always want to learn more, and since the world is, for all intents and purposes, infinite in its complexity, there is always more to know.

Healthy Fives are also able to perceive far more than others because they have the ability to sustain concentration; they are not easily distracted. They quickly become deeply involved in the object of their scrutiny so they can understand how it works—why something is as it is. Their intellectual curiosity leads them to expend considerable effort to find out more about those things which have caught their attention. They are incredibly hard workers who will patiently attack a problem until they solve it, or until it becomes clear that the problem is insoluble. They will labor in obscurity for many years because they are excited about what they are exploring or creating. Because healthy Fives are accustomed to pursuing their interests with little support or attention, they are not dissuaded by others’ indifference or lack of comprehension. The process of exploring, learning, and creating is more enjoyable to Fives than achieving a final goal. They take delight in questioning reality and tinkering with familiar forms until they become almost unrecognizable, especially in the arts. They are also very good conceptualizers, asking the right fundamental questions and defining the proper intellectual boundaries for the problems with which they are involved. They do not attempt to do the impossible, only to understand what they have not understood before.

Regardless of their actual intelligence, most Fives consider themselves “smart” and perceptive, and see these as defining characteristics. Many Fives are not intellectuals or scholars, but all focus their attention in the world of ideas, perceptions, and ways of looking at reality. They are constantly on the lookout for something that they have not noticed before, or a way of connecting disparate ideas or activities they have been exploring. Having a new insight into a question or creative problem they have been grappling with gives them a sense of confidence and goads them into deeper explorations.

Fives are aware that others may view them as “unusual.” This may be due to their intelligence, a highly developed sensory acuity, idiosyncratic behavior, or perhaps their penetrating gaze. Fives are not interested in being “different” like Fours are; instead, they view their status as outsiders with a shrugging acceptance. They tend to be unsentimental about life, and this lack of sentiment extends to their own circumstances as well. Fives can also appear to be unusual because they are willing to follow their curiosity and their perceptions wherever they lead. They are relatively unconcerned with social convention; rather, they want to be unencumbered by activities that take them away from what they are really interested in.

Healthy Fives want to feel competent and capable in the objective world, and yet, the very act of inquiring into things begins to shift them away from active participation and toward the role of an outside observer. Even at this stage, healthy Fives are subject to a certain amount of anxiety about the environment if they do not understand it. (And, of course, because they cannot understand it until they deal with it, they are caught in a conundrum.) Therefore, the habit of observation reflects not simply a dispassionate curiosity but a deep personal need.

Level 3: The Focused Innovator

Once Fives have identified themselves as intelligent and perceptive, they begin to fear that they might lose their perceptiveness or that what they are thinking may be inaccurate. So they begin to focus their energies intensely into those areas that they are most interested in with the goal of really mastering them. In this way, Fives hope to develop an ability or a body of knowledge which will ensure that they will have a place in the world. They are not interested in merely acquiring facts or skills, but in using what they have learned to go beyond what has previously been explored. They want to “push the envelope,” both because it is a greater test of their competency, and also because they want to create a niche for themselves which no one else could have come up with.

Sometimes the results of their explorations are ingenious inventions and technological marvels which yield highly practical results. At times, their tinkering may produce startling new discoveries or artistic works. At other times, few things may result from their original ideas, although in time, those ideas, too, may have practical applications. What is impractical in one era often becomes the underpinning of an entirely new branch of knowledge or technology in another, such as the physics which made television and radar possible, or a few scraps of ideas which later produce a novel or a movie.

Because they are looking for new areas to explore and master, healthy Fives are generally open-minded people. They are not attached to particular points of view, and are curious to learn what other people think about things. They believe that there is almost always something interesting to learn from another person’s perspective. They are also patient about explaining their own thoughts to others, even when their thoughts are complex or the other person is slow to understand. Healthy Fives want to communicate, and they want others to understand what they are saying.

Because Fives understand things so perceptively, their profound knowledge enables them to get to the heart of difficulties so that they can explain problems, and possible solutions, clearly to others. Healthy Fives like sharing their knowledge because they often learn more when they discuss their ideas with someone else. This is why healthy Fives make exciting teachers, colleagues, and friends. Their enthusiasm for ideas is infectious, and they enjoy fertilizing their own areas of expertise with those of other intellectuals, artists, and thinkers, or, really, with anyone who is as interesting, curious, and intelligent as they are.

As much as they like being among those who can understand and appreciate their insights, healthy Fives are nevertheless extremely independent. For the most part, innovating, learning, and creating are solitary adventures best embarked on alone. Because they never know where their projects and discoveries will lead, Fives value their independence very highly; they are willing to be as unorthodox as their inquiries require, pursuing their interests and discoveries regardless of the sanctions of others or of society. They are not afraid to challenge existing dogmas, if need be.

Their innovations can be revolutionary, overturning previous ways of thinking. Owing to the nature of their interests and the scope of their intellects, healthy Fives give us powerful ideas which can literally change the course of history. The worlds of art, dance, cinema, and music have many times been “scandalized” by the strange new creations of Fives—which later on become widely accepted standards of “how things are done.”

Healthy Fives are also in possession of a whimsical sense of humor. They are attuned to life’s many absurdities and ironies and enjoy sharing their wry observations with others. They have a way of distorting the picture of reality just enough to highlight some assumption or way of looking at life that has no logical underpinning. They are fascinated by strange, offbeat subjects and love tinkering with objects, images, and words. There is a taboo-breaking quality to the humor of even healthy Fives, because they are attracted to looking at subject matter that others would reject or turn away from. Their imaginations are powerful and they use them to visualize the solution to a problem or to create an alternative reality. For this reason, many artistic Fives become filmmakers, cartoonists, or authors of genre fiction (science fiction, horror, black humor). The aesthetic sense tends to run in two extremes: minimalist and spare on one end, and surreal and fantastic on the other. Most Fives who are involved in the arts are not interested in simple “human interest” stories or narratives. They want to direct their audience’s attention beyond their daily concerns toward truths which are more absolute—especially those that are hidden in the “ordinary world.”

In the process of mastering those areas which interest them, healthy Fives accumulate knowledge. People of this personality type develop expertise in various disciplines, whether in the arts (for example, abstract expressionist painting, electronic music, or Egyptian hieroglyphics), or in the sciences (how to build a computer or put a satellite into space). Healthy Fives are usually polymaths, possessors of knowledge in a wide range of subjects and expert in them all. Healthy Fives know what they are talking about and share their knowledge with others, enriching the whole of society with their learning. They are also relatively confident because they are actively doing things with their insights, and it is precisely because their insights are so on target that both healthy Fives and their ideas are especially valuable to the rest of society. Where would we be without the computers and antibiotics, the sophisticated communications media and the technological innovations of all sorts which make up the modern world?

ANALYZING THE AVERAGE FIVE

Level 4: The Studious Expert

The essential difference between average Fives and healthy Fives is that average Fives begin to fear that they do not know enough to act or take their place in the world. They feel that they need to study more, to practice more, to acquire better technique or run further tests, to involve themselves even more deeply with their subject. (“The more you know, the more you know you don’t know.”) For whatever reason, they fear that they will not be able to put their concepts and ideas into action. Convinced that they are insufficiently prepared to put themselves on the line, they retreat into an area of their experience where they feel much more confident and in control—their minds. Every personality type deals from its strongest suit, and the intellect is what Fives are gifted with and what they favor in their development. Rather than innovating and exploring, however, average Fives begin conceptualizing and preparing. In a word, healthy Fives use knowledge, whereas average Fives are in pursuit of it.

Because Fives have become adept at playing with concepts and their imagination, they are more sure of themselves when they are “in their heads,” and from this Level down they begin to avoid more direct contact with the world. They can spend many hours conceptualizing a problem or an idea for a song, but hesitate to put their ideas out as real, concrete forms. Average Fives get stuck in “preparation mode,” endlessly studying, gathering more background information, and practicing. Or they may simply develop the idea for a book or an invention in their imagination and never actualize their projects in reality. “I need a little more time” is a repeating refrain from average Fives. They are not being reluctant for no reason, however: their hesitation belies their growing lack of faith in their ability to cope with the world.

Because they are beginning to experience themselves as somehow less prepared for life than other people, average Fives feel compelled to gather whatever information, skills, and resources they believe they will need to “build themselves up.” To this end, Fives begin to disengage from social activities and spend more and more of their time and energy acquiring these resources. Their homes become a reflection of their minds, storage areas for their collections of books, tapes, videos, CDs, gadgets, and so forth.

Average Fives are typically bookish. They haunt bookstores, libraries, and coffeehouses catering to intellectuals who discuss politics, films, and literature far into the night. They love scholarship, and are fascinated with the technical appurtenances by which they acquire knowledge. And while they will spend money to obtain whatever tools they need to pursue their intellectual interests, be they medieval manuscripts or computer equipment, average Fives are usually loath to spend money on themselves or their own comfort because they identify with their minds and their imaginations, not with their bodies.

In their pursuit of mastery, average Fives tend to become highly specialized in some field, delving into a body of knowledge not understood by most. (As specialists, they take pride and pleasure in their ability to say, in effect, “I know something that you don’t know.”) Some Fives may become specialists within an academic discipline—analyzing genetic structures, or the mathematics of snowflake formation, or the migration patterns of birds in the Amazon Delta. Others may specialize in less academic areas, becoming specialists in antiques, stamp collecting, comic books, or jazz. Their approach to collecting becomes a metaphor for their whole approach to life: gathering in more material and incorporating it into the body of what they believe they know or can do.

Their predilection for collecting can combine with their desire to specialize in surprising ways. Fives may have a complete video collection—organized by director, of course—of every major horror or science fiction film between 1950 and 1990. The completeness of the collection and the thorough knowledge of its contents becomes important. An average Five would feel superficial if he or she had only a few Beatles albums or only three Beethoven symphonies. They want to acquire the complete Beatles catalogue, including rare bootleg recordings, and have all nine Beethoven symphonies as recorded by various orchestras. To observe the chronological progression of the Beatles’ music or to compare and contrast the different recordings of Beethoven’s Third Symphony become enjoyable pursuits for Fives, and a certain degree of knowledge is gained by these activities, to be sure. But Fives might well wonder how profitably they are spending their time in these endeavors. They achieve at least a temporary feeling of competency by mastering these narrow areas of interest, but are beginning to avoid the kind of activities that might really help develop their confidence.

Average Fives have begun to identify more completely with their minds, and although this is not entirely problematic, it is not without consequences. As we have seen, healthy Fives are highly observant of the environment and attuned to the world around them, but because of their increasingly cerebral approach to life, average Fives begin to miss things. They focus intently upon certain details and may overlook other relevant information entirely. They tend to make a science of whatever they are interested in, whether history, linguistics, stereo equipment, jogging shoes, or the sociology of ape families. It is here that we see the beginning of their tendency to abstract from reality, concerning themselves with only those aspects of reality which capture their attention. They are by no means out of touch with reality in any unhealthy sense yet. They are, however, narrowing the focus of their perceptions so that they can pursue their interests in more depth.

Although they may not be aware of it, average Fives begin to approach most new experiences by trying to analyze them or to find their context in relation to what they already know. This is the shy person who tries to learn how to do a dance by watching people dancing and trying to analyze and memorize the different steps and movements. The easiest ways to learn to dance is to jump in and start moving, but average Fives fear to enter an activity until they have worked it all out in their minds. Usually, the dance is over by the time the Five is done “figuring it out.” This can be a cumbersome way of learning things, but it does have some positive aspects. Because their method of learning is so systematic, and because they are observing and memorizing every step of any process they engage in, many Fives can explain to others how they arrived at certain conclusions or achieved specific results. And at Level 4, Fives enjoy sharing their expertise with others. They can discourse enthusiastically and at length on the projects they have been pursuing. Unfortunately, average Fives may not be comfortable talking about much else. Their personal lives, their hopes, desires, and disappointments, and especially their feelings become private matters, and they are reluctant to share these parts of themselves with others. They prefer to discuss subjects of interest to them, and to arrive at deeper “truths” through intelligent conversation.

Level 5: The Intense Conceptualizer

As average Fives retreat into the apparent safety of their minds, they ironically begin to heighten their insecurities about their abilities. After all, they are putting less and less time into anything outside of their narrowing interests, and are less willing to try new activities. They shift into mental high-gear, using whatever internal and financial resources they have to gain a sense of confidence and strength that would allow them to move forward with their lives. Unfortunately, average Fives often misapply this energy, getting increasingly bogged down in what others would see as trivia and losing perspective on which activities will actually help them in their lives. They spend endless hours engaged in their projects, but are unable to come to closure, both because they are more uncertain of themselves and their ideas and because they are afraid to leave the security of their cerebral constructs.

As a result, Fives believe that they have no inner resources to spare. They fear that other people and their emotional needs will overwhelm them, or at the very least, sidetrack them from their projects. Fives believe that everything depends upon their acquiring a skill or ability that would give them a chance to survive in what they increasingly perceive as a world without pity or mercy. They may deeply want to connect with others, but feel that this is not possible until they can develop the sense of confidence and mastery they seek. Average Fives begin to view most of their social interactions as intrusions upon their time and space—time and space they believe they must devote to their quest for mastery. To defend themselves against these potential “intrusions,” they withdraw further into their own inner worlds by intensifying their mental focus and activity. If Fives began to create alternative realities in the healthier levels, they begin to inhabit them at Level 5. Average Fives do not want anyone or anything to distract them from whatever they believe they are gaining by exploring those realities.

Strangely, though, average Fives begin to distract themselves. If all of their energies were devoted to constructive projects, their behavior might be more comprehensible to others, but their growing insecurity causes them to spend much of their time engaged in any sort of activity which might provide some temporary sense of confidence and competence. In their minds, Fives can feel capable and fully in control of their situation, which begins to compensate for their fears about being powerless and incapable in the real world.

They plunge into complex intellectual puzzles and labyrinthine systems—elaborate, impenetrable mazes by which they can insulate themselves from the world while dealing with it intellectually. They get involved in highly detailed, complicated systems of thought, immersing themselves in obscure theories, whether these have to do with the abstruse regions of such traditional academic studies as astronomy, mathematics, or philosophy, or with esoteric topics such as the Kabbala, astrology, and the occult. They are endlessly fascinated with intellectual games (such as chess, computer simulation games, or Dungeons and Dragons), making areas of study into a kind of game, and games into an area of study. They often develop a strong affinity for genre fiction, especially science fiction and horror. Exploring the dark and fantastic realms of the imagination gives Fives the feeling of mastering something—even if it is only an image in their imaginations. Their interest in strange, disturbing subject matter is both a further search for “turf” unclaimed by others and a counterphobic reaction to their feelings of helplessness.

The thinking of average Fives becomes increasingly uncensored: they are willing to entertain any thought, no matter how horrible, unacceptable, or taboo it may seem to others. Fives are in pursuit of the truth, and if the truth is unpleasant or upsets existing conventions, so be it. In healthy Fives, this tendency is laudable and the source of many great discoveries. In average Fives, however, it starts to create problems. Because they are not participating as actively in the world, they are getting fewer “reality checks.” Consequently, their exploration of potentially unsettling subject matter begins to add fuel to their anxieties about the world and themselves.

Because of these fears, and because their imaginations are causing them to see ominous implications in almost everything, average Fives are typically fascinated with power. They feel that knowledge is power and that by possessing knowledge, they will be secure because they perceive more than others do—and hence, can protect themselves. They are attracted by areas of study which deal with some form of power, whether in nature, or in politics, or in human behavior. However, Fives are also ambivalent about power and suspicious of those who have power over them. They feel that whoever has power may use it against them, rendering them completely helpless, one of their deepest fears.

One way that average Fives maintain their independence and avoid the potential control of others is by becoming more secretive. They become increasingly unwilling to talk about their personal or emotional lives, fearing that to do so would give others power over them. Additionally, speaking about such things might well plunge them into a more direct experience of their own fears and vulnerability—a prospect that average Fives distinctly wish to avoid. In any event, Fives begin to control others’ access to them, not by overt deception but by offering little information about themselves; they can be terse, cryptic, or totally uncommunicative. They also control access by compartmentalizing their relationships and different aspects of their lives. A Five will tell one friend about his professional life, while another friend will learn of his fascination with insects. Still another will know about his romantic life, while another knows where the Five likes to go late at night. No one gets the complete picture, however, and as much as possible, average Fives will make sure that these different friends do not meet to “share notes.”

This state of affairs would be difficult to maintain if Fives had too many friends, but to keep their life simple and to allow more time for their private pursuits, at Level 5 they do with relationships what they do elsewhere in their lives, they begin to reduce their needs. Average Fives become more determined to continue their projects and want to avoid any involvements or dependencies that might hinder them. They begin to “cut back” on creature comforts, activities, and relationships. Anything that might compromise their independence and their freedom to continue with their interests becomes expendable. Fives at this point are so caught up in their mental world that even basic amenities and comforts become almost irrelevant to them. They can become extremely Spartan and minimal in their existence, requiring less of others so that others will require less of them. Average Fives will often take employment far beneath their capabilities because they want to avoid becoming entangled in the demands of a more challenging career. Ironically, they are avoiding living their lives so they can devote time to preparing to live their lives. They live for whatever pleasures and small victories they may derive from their cerebral preoccupations.

The problem is that average Fives have stopped observing the world with any consistency, and have instead focused their attention on their ideas and their imagination. This is a turning point in their development. Rather than investigate the objective world, average Fives at this stage become preoccupied with their own interpretations of it, mentally detaching themselves from the environment or even their own emotional experiences by becoming more intensely involved with their ideas. Healthy Fives are extraordinarily perceptive and aware of their environment. To the degree that Average Fives are absorbed in their own thoughts, they perceive very little of the world around them.

As Fives speculate and theorize, turning their ideas around in their minds, examining them from every angle, endlessly producing new interpretations, they lose the forest for the trees. With every new conjecture, they have no sense of certitude that their speculations are final: everything remains hanging in the air, in a cloud of possibilities. For example, the more they write, the more complex the exposition becomes, until it is virtually incomprehensible. As brilliant as they may be, average Fives do not easily publish their ideas because they cannot bring them to a conclusion.

Furthermore, all ideas seem equally plausible to Fives, since they can make a convincing case for almost anything they think of. Anything thinkable seems possible. Anything thinkable seems real. They are intellectually and emotionally capable of entertaining any new thought, even horrifying or outlandish ones, since speculating on new possibilities is virtually all they do. Their ideas, however, begin to have no direct connection with the outside world. (The problems of epistemology not only fascinate them, average Fives unwittingly live them out.) But establishing a relationship between their ideas and reality is no longer the primary function of the thinking of average Fives. Instead, speculation and imagination maintain the sense of self by keeping the mind active.

Moreover, for all the time they spend thinking, average Fives at this Level do not communicate to others clearly, because their thought processes are so complex and convoluted. They get into too much detail; their ideas become highly condensed. The stream of consciousness floods out in elaborate monologues, making it difficult for others to follow their train of thought. They go off on tangents, jumping from one point to another without indicating the intervening steps in their logic. A perceptive observation about Jackson Pollock’s painting technique may be followed by a disquisition on modern media and the hazards to biological systems of higher levels of chemicals in the environment. Their monologues may well be fascinating, and possibly breathtaking in the sweep of their intellectual range; however, their discourses may also be strange and tedious, because the mental exertion required to follow them is exhausting. Nor is it always clear that the trip will be worth the effort, although average Fives think that whatever they have to say is as interesting to others as it is to themselves.

They begin to function as disembodied minds because, as far as they are concerned, the body is merely the vehicle for the mind. At this Level, they do not pay much attention to their physical condition except when that gets in the way of their thinking. They become so deeply involved in projects that they forget to eat or sleep or change their clothes. They frequently look like the proverbial absent-minded professor, missing a button when putting on their shirts or forgetting to tie their shoes. No matter. To them such considerations are insignificant: the life of the mind, the excitement of pursuing their interests, is what counts.

Both for better and for worse, they are extremely high-strung, as if their nervous systems were tuned to a higher pitch than those of the other personality types. (Nines also become more cerebral and imaginative in the average Levels, but their affect is very different. Nines become placid and passive, while Fives become agitated and intense.) Fives seem to lack the ability to repress the unconscious impulses which erupt into their minds, fueling their intense involvement in their perceptions, their work, and their relations with others. They find it difficult to do things casually, and find close relationships with others particularly taxing.

The more detached average Fives are, the more ambivalent they are to just about everyone—they are attracted to people, yet suspicious about them. They want to figure out what makes other people tick, just as they analyze other objects of intellectual interest. (“What you just said was fascinating—you’re incredibly angry at men, aren’t you?”) Yet they usually try to avoid getting deeply involved with others because people are unpredictable and potentially demanding. Average Fives believe there must be a catch. They cannot imagine why anyone would be interested in them personally and fear that others may expect something from them which they will not be able to deliver. Further, emotional involvements arouse strong feelings which average Fives find difficult to control: the passions flood too easily into their minds. But because most Fives also have strong sexual impulses, they cannot avoid involvements altogether, as much as they would like to. Thus, though Fives find people and relationships endlessly fascinating, they remain wary.

It is therefore typical of average Fives either to be unmarried or to have stormy relationships with people. Intimacy with others gets so involved, so complex and exhausting, that they stop trying to make contact with others and become reclusive, ever more completely burying themselves in their work and ideas. Doing so only fuels their feelings of helplessness, though, and as Fives become more isolated they are increasingly prey to their own growing fears about themselves and the world. Their view of reality grows ever more bleak and doubtful. They have great difficulty accepting the idea of a benevolent universe, let alone a benevolent God. Moreover, the problem of evil is an enormous stumbling block: the horror and uncertainty of the world is so apparent to Fives that any God who allowed the world to be as it is must be sadistic, an evil God, a God they refuse to become involved with.

Level 6: The Provocative Cynic

In time, the complexities Fives create in their minds cause new and more troubling problems for them. Nothing is clear or certain; anxiety increases. They are more desperate than ever about whatever projects and ideas they are trying to develop and fear that other people will demand that they give up their pursuits before they are ready. They fear that they will be drawn “off course” by the intrusions of life and are determined to defend against whatever they perceive as a threat to their fragile niche. At Level 6, through their style of speech, their manner of dress, and the subjects that they involve themselves with, Fives are saying to the world, “Leave me alone!” If others could not get the message before, Fives become more aggressive in their efforts to scare people away.

On the surface, Fives at this Level may seem intellectually arrogant, but they are actually less certain of themselves. Even their most valued ideas and projects begin to seem futile to them, and they alternate between defending them aggressively and finding them worthless. They begin to take more extreme and unorthodox positions, as if they were trying to extract more confidence from ideas that are becoming meaningless for them. Fives may not be entirely convinced of the radical views they express, but express them they do, wielding them like cutting tools. Further, their own subconscious fears about their inability to cope with the environment are frequently erupting into their minds, and they live in growing terror of the world and others. They feel uncertain and uneasy about nearly everything, and it infuriates them that other people seem to be content or oblivious to the horrors which they notice. They therefore begin to undermine others’ certainty or contentment by “sharing” their provocative views. (“So you’re going to the beach? I was just reading the latest report on the ozone layer. Studies show that the chances of getting skin cancer have gone up by nearly one hundred percent.”) There is often an element of truth in what Fives express at this point, but their intention is no longer to arrive at the truth. It is to use their knowledge as a way of unsettling others. And because they have spent so much time gathering information, they can easily use it both to reinforce their conviction that the world is rotten and to subvert other people’s sense of security.

A certain extremism is as typical of their social style as it is of their intellectual viewpoint. In political or artistic matters, antagonistic Fives are usually radicals, populating the avant-garde. They love to take ideas to their furthest limits—for their shock value, to defy what has conventionally been thought or done, or to puncture and demolish popular opinions. (And even if they are not as correct as Fives think they are, their provocative ideas virtually force others to react to them, stirring up debate or even hostility.) As dyed-in-the-wool nonconformists and dissenters, they rebel against all social conventions, rules, and expectations, whether these involve feminism, politics, child rearing, sexual liberation, or all of them in some peculiar combination. They have an ax to grind. Understanding has been abandoned for polemics.

At Level 6, Fives use their entire lifestyle as a statement of their views and as a rebuke of the world. They may choose to live an extremely marginal existence to avoid “selling out.” At this Level, “selling out” may mean any kind of regular employment or even having a relationship. They may wear intentionally provocative clothing or groom themselves in nonconformist ways. Of course, social protest can be a vital and healthy impulse in any culture, and healthier Fives (as well as other types) may well use provocative language, art, or style of dress to make a point. But with lower average Fives, the point is that there is no point. Life is futile. People are stupid. My own life is meaningless. Although other types are certainly part of the picture, this attitude is common in many of the “alternative” cultures that have developed in the latter part of the twentieth century. Grunge, cyberpunk, heavy metal, and other youth subcultures embrace this ethos.

Ironically for those so given to complex thought, Fives at this Level have also become more reductionistic, oversimplifying reality and dismissing more positive, alternative explanations of things. For example, dismissing the flower, reductionistic Fives focus on the ooze from which it sprang, as if the brightest blossom were “nothing but” mud in some significantly altered state; painting is nothing but the desire to smear feces; God is nothing but a projection of the father into the cosmos; human beings are nothing but biological machines, and so forth. The result is that their ideas mix legitimate insights with extreme interpretations, while Fives themselves have no way of knowing which is which.

An irrational element—a kind of perverse resistance to reality—has begun to taint their thought processes. Fives at Level 6 are not crazy, even though their ideas may be strange and extremely unorthodox. Healthy originality, however, has deteriorated into quirky eccentricity; the genius has become little more than a crank. |They may assert that arcane secrets are hidden in numerical codes derived from the names of characters in their favorite TV show, or that all rational thought is meaningless.) Others may well have entertained outlandish ideas, but lower average Fives dwell on them, sometimes using all of their time and energy to “prove” them. Their extreme ideas are so much a part of their sense of self that Fives will defend their ideas at all costs, asserting them vigorously and attempting to demolish all counterarguments. Contentious and quarrelsome, they also worry about establishing their intellectual priority and protecting their ideas, threatening lawsuits if they think that someone has stolen one of their brilliant theories.

Even so, as radically extreme and reductionistic as many of their ideas are, average Fives are not necessarily completely off the mark. They are usually too intelligent not to have something interesting to say. The problem is knowing which of their ideas are valuable and which are not. This is because, at a deeper level, Fives are becoming cynical and hopeless about all of their ideas and projects. A profound pessimism is creeping into their thoughts, and they begin to see all viewpoints as equally irrelevant. They can argue any point because everything seems equally true or untrue, and therefore equally worthless. Fives at Level 6 may even enjoy arguing viewpoints which they find repugnant just to reaffirm their intelligence while simultaneously proving the futility of making any further efforts.

Fives at this stage give the appearance of being extremely involved in their projects, but a closer inspection usually reveals that they are spending much of their time in relatively inessential activities. They may need to put together a résumé, take care of bills, or complete a project for work, but will instead devote their efforts to reading a book on ants, creating a detailed computer database for their record collection, or studying strategies to improve their chess game. They put more and more of their time into activities which will do little to improve their situation, and which actually become harmful because they are distracting Fives from what they really need to do. They are so unsure of themselves that they feel completely unable to engage in many activities—especially those that might improve their quality of life—and keep gravitating to situations that give them the temporary feeling of having their lives “under control.” Average Fives may not be able to face a job interview or learn to drive a car, but they can conquer the world, survive a nuclear holocaust, or wield awesome occult powers in the world of their imaginations.

At this Level, Fives feel profoundly unsettled and anxious about their apparent helplessness in what seems to them a dark and hostile reality. They feel that it is extremely unlikely that they will ever find a place for themselves in the world, and in fact, their abrasive behavior is making this a real possibility. Fives desperately want to find something they can do that will make them feel more connected with the world, but their fear and anger cause them to retreat further and further from any contact with others. They are tormented by their tempers and by their teeming imaginations: insomnia is not uncommon. If they could reach out to others and acknowledge their own suffering, Fives could turn around their difficulties and reconstruct their lives. If they continue to turn away from the world, however, they may eventually cut off what few connections remain in their lives and plunge into a much more terrifying darkness.

ANALYZING THE UNHEALTHY FIVE

Level 7: The Isolated Nihilist

The need to keep others at a safe distance to protect their frantic search for mastery sets the stage for Fives to become extremely antagonistic toward anyone who they believe threatens their world. Unfortunately, as they become more unhealthy, their self-doubt becomes so great that almost everything threatens them. It seems to them that the only way that they can be safe is to cut off their connections with others and “go it alone.” They feel hopelessly ill-adapted for life and are profoundly disgusted with the world. Unhealthy Fives are convinced that they are never going to find a place for themselves in society, and so they turn their back on it. They become extremely isolated and prey to growing eccentricity and nihilistic despair.

Their aggressions are aroused when people question their ideas—or worse, if their ideas are ridiculed or dismissed. To maintain what little remains of their self-confidence, which is thoroughly wedded to their ideas, unhealthy Fives go on the offensive: individuals must be discredited, their ideas shown to be worthless, their solutions to problems an illusion, their world a fool’s paradise. Thus, unhealthy Fives unwittingly provoke others into rejecting them, and then become cynical about the value of all relationships. But in so doing, they become profoundly cut off from others and extremely hopeless about the possibility of ever relating to anyone.

Indeed, their need to reject what others believe is so strong that they take pleasure in debunking whatever is positive in life, trying to prove the virtual impossibility of human relationships and the complete rottenness at the core of human nature. Unhealthy Fives take delight in deflating what they see as the bourgeois illusions by which others get through life so comfortably, and to which they have not fallen prey because of their greater intellectual honesty.

As usual, there is a half-truth operating here. While others may well be living too comfortably for their own good, while some people may be self-deceptive, while some families and some relationships may be tainted by hypocrisy, jealousy, and struggles for power, it does not necessarily follow that cynicism is the best response. Unhealthy Fives throw out the baby with the bath water: faith, hope, love, kindness, friendship—all are extraordinarily difficult for them to believe in because of their fear of involvement with others. Attachment to others is too threatening at this stage, so unhealthy Fives must justify their isolation by becoming nihilistic and cynical about all relationships, indeed, about the value of humanity itself.

Just as an intense stream of water from a fire hose can hold back a crowd, the intensity of their minds, overheated by their erupting aggressive impulses, repels everything that might influence them. They “burn their bridges behind them,” ending friendships, quitting jobs, and emptying out all but the barest of necessities in their lives. (“To hell with everything!”) It is as if unhealthy Fives were attempting to purge themselves of everything but their most basic life-support systems so that they will not be dependent, and therefore potentially overwhelmed by anyone or anything. This process may be taken to extreme degrees. Unhealthy Fives may end up living out of a car, or squatting in a condemned building so that they will not be part of “the system.” They neglect themselves physically, paying no attention to their appearance, eating poorly, and going unwashed. Alcoholism and other forms of substance abuse are quite common at this stage, and the rebellious side of Fives has no hesitation about using illicit drugs. Their experimental nature may also lead them into trying new “designer drugs” or substances known to be dangerous, such as heroin. Drugs are harmful for any type, but for Fives they can be particularly debilitating. Unhealthy Fives are already having great difficulty facing even the basic maintenance of their lives, and their connection with reality is extremely tenuous. Drugs further erode their confidence and drive them further into isolation, thus accelerating their deterioration.

At this Level, unhealthy Fives believe they must maintain their isolation so that they will not be influenced by anyone. While usually not violent, they may rant and rave, write long diatribes and denunciations, or suddenly withdraw into a glowering, hateful silence. Since most people are repulsed by this kind of behavior, the isolation of Fives rapidly deepens, which is exactly what unhealthy Fives want. Yet, for that reason, they are vulnerable to ever worsening distortions in their thought processes. They are no longer getting “reality checks” from others, no longer comparing their perceptions to reality, and what few forays into the environment they do have are tainted with their growing terror. All of their experiences become confirmations of their helplessness and of the utter meaninglessness of life. Unhealthy Fives feel besieged by even minor problems and view all interactions with others as invasions upon their fragile space. Aggressions—and fear—continue to escalate.

Some of the personality types are able to conceal the degree of their distress in the unhealthy Levels, but Fives are clearly and unmistakably unstable. Others can see their disintegration and are both saddened and horrified, but unhealthy Fives’ aggressive defense of their isolation makes interventions difficult. Even the hint that they may “need help” may trigger their fears of helplessness and incompetency and drive them deeper into pathology. Unhealthy Fives also retain their ability to reason to some degree, and can cleverly argue away any positive input, dismissing any possibility that their dark and corrosive view of life may be in error. They have no expectations of themselves or others and retreat into a reality as bleak in its actuality as it is in its outlook.

Because unhealthy Fives are terrified of the world and of their own inability to cope with it, they stew in a destructive mixture of dark, twisted fantasies, feelings of contempt for others, and honor at the emptiness of their lives. They want to act, to do something that would discharge the relentlessness of their teeming minds, but they feel crippled by fear and have no belief in themselves or others. Consequently the intense force of their irrational thoughts keeps building without relief. They are filled with rage at a world which they believe has rejected them, but feeling powerless to do anything about it, they avoid all contact with others, let alone reach out for help. It is as if they cannot stop cutting themselves off at the knees. Unhealthy Fives may still be brilliant or talented, but their nihilism destroys any chance of their doing anything constructive with their abilities, and thus building up their confidence. Instead, they tear down everything in their lives, devaluing and rejecting all their attachments to the world. Yet, unhealthy Fives are worse than merely isolated; they are filled with aggressions and impulses which cannot be discharged, because they do not want to get into violent conflicts with others. Unhealthy Fives are thus trapped in a terrible dilemma: they are obsessed by their aggressions yet unable to act on them because they fear the consequences. They want to accomplish something in the world, but their bleak, cynical attitude does not allow them to engage in any activities that might improve their situation. The result is that they do nothing, and the intensity of their own minds begins to devour them.

Level 8: The Terrified “Alien”

As unhealthy Fives retreat further and further into their isolation, their belief in their ability to cope with the world disintegrates. Further, their lack of contact with other people allows their fearful thoughts to run rampant without being checked. They begin to feel that the world is closing in on them, and that it will show them no mercy. At this stage, Fives have reduced their activities and their living conditions to the point where there is nowhere left to retreat. They may be living in a single room and almost never venture forth from it, or literally hiding out in the basement of a friend’s or relative’s house. The only place left to go is deeper into their own minds, but because their minds are the true source of their terrors, this becomes their ultimate undoing.

At Level 8, Fives have tremendous difficulty distinguishing between the sensory impressions generated by the environment and those which have their origin in their fearful thoughts. Thus, unhealthy Fives see all of reality as an implacable, devouring force. The world appears to them like a delirious fever dream—an insane landscape, like something out of a Hieronymus Bosch painting. Almost nothing in the environment is a source of comfort or reassurance. The more Fives look at the world through their distorted perceptions, the more horrified and hopeless they become.

As their fears spread and grow in intensity, they encompass and distort more of reality until doing anything becomes impossible, because everything is charged with terrifying implications. Thus, neurotic Fives may begin to be incapacitated by phobias. Inanimate objects take on a sinister appearance—the ceiling is about to collapse on them, their armchair may swallow them up, the television is giving them brain cancer. They may also experience hallucinations—hearing voices or having grossly distorted visual perceptions. They begin to experience their bodies as alien, perceiving their physical selves as turning against them just as the environment has seemed to turn against them. Neurotic Fives cannot rest or sleep or distract themselves, because they must be vigilant—and because they cannot turn off their minds. As a result, they become physically exhausted, which only compounds their problems.

Even average Fives can have trouble sleeping, but unhealthy Fives literally cannot sleep. They are afraid of being more vulnerable to malevolent forces while they sleep and are also afraid of their dreams, which can be intensely violent and disturbing. They may increase their drug or alcohol use as a way of shutting down their minds, but this only adds to their exhaustion. Sleeplessness heightens the intensity of their thoughts, leading to hallucinations. The childhood monsters in the closet become real for them. Their fear and insomnia wear them down physically, leaving them emotionally volatile and physically fragile.

What begins to frighten neurotic Fives even more is that their thoughts seem to have a life of their own. Their thoughts are uncontrollable, scaring them when they do not want to be scared. Their minds race wildly and they become terrified by fears from which they cannot possibly escape, since, after all, their fears originate in themselves. Like Dr. Frankenstein, they are in danger of being destroyed by processes to which they themselves have given life.

Their healthy ability to find connections and to draw conclusions from disparate facts now works against them. Mental connections go haywire; they relate things which have no basis in fact, yet neurotic Fives are absolutely convinced that they are related. The behavior of birds becomes indicative of political trends. The number of raisins in a bowl of cereal portends the number of months to global cataclysm. Unhealthy Fives see existence as pointless and horrifying, yet constantly assign sinister meanings to trivial daily phenomena.

Unhealthy Fives are unable to stop the destructive force of their distorted thinking because they have cut themselves off from almost all of the constructive outlets for their tremendous mental energies. Their minds have become like a light bulb with more electricity coursing through its filament than it is designed to handle—five hundred watts through a one-hundred-watt bulb. Their thoughts blaze with a terrifying intensity which is rapidly burning them up. They cannot stop their horrific thoughts and fantasies and are almost completely incapable of doing anything positive for themselves. Worse, they resist all help from others, fearing that they will become even more powerless by accepting assistance. Getting help would also be the final confirmation of their own uselessness, their own inability to cope. They are likely to avoid or flee anyone reaching out to them.

Unhealthy Fives would like to destroy everything, so detestable has the world become in their eyes. Their rage, fear, and aggressions have become all-consuming and overwhelming, yet Fives are still unable to act or to discharge their destructive impulses and feelings. Their actions become erratic and irrational, even frightening, but they are still only minor responses to the eruptions of chaos in their psyches.

Life becomes unbearable: they seem to see too much, as if their eyelids had been removed. But the truth is that their minds are devouring them. The world becomes filled with terrors because their minds are filled with terrors. No part of their mind offers any solace or comfort.

Level 9: The Imploding Schizoid

To exert what little control remains over their growing terror and despair, neurotic Fives attempt to use the same defenses they have used all along—detachment and compartmentalization—but at this stage of pathology, these methods are ineffective at holding their fears at bay. They become increasingly schizoid, splitting off from terrifying parts of their psyches and identifying with whatever remaining ideas or fantasies offer some sense of power over their disintegration. But the relentless force of their fear keeps breaking through, leaving Fives feeling that they have no safe space left, even in their minds.

Ultimately, neurotic Fives come to believe that they can no longer defend themselves from hostile forces in the world or from the terrors in their own minds. In fact, most Fives at this Level cannot distinguish between these two realms: they have collapsed into one continuous experience of pain and horror. At this point, Fives want everything to stop. They want cessation, to end all experience in oblivion. There are two main ways that they are likely do this.

The first and most obvious of these is suicide. Like unhealthy Fours, neurotic Fives are likely to take their own lives, although for somewhat different reasons. Fours destroy themselves out of self-hatred and to silently accuse those who they feel have let them down. Fives tend to commit suicide because they see life as meaningless and horrifying. There is simply no point in continuing to exist. (Of course Fives with a Four-wing and Fours with a Five-wing will display some combination of these motivations.) All that unhealthy Fives perceive in themselves and the world fills them with terror and nausea. They conclude that the only way to stop their horrible experiences is to stop all experience. Like Hamlet, the prospect of “not being” becomes a “consummation devoutly to be wished.”

If they do not commit suicide, unhealthy Fives “solve” the problem of how to control their minds, especially the overwhelming anxiety produced by their consuming phobias, by unconsciously splitting consciousness into two parts. Neurotic Fives retreat into that part of themselves which seems safe, regressing into an autistic-like state which resembles psychosis.

At this final Level, Fives may defend themselves from reality by unconsciously cutting themselves off from every connection with it. To put this another way, unhealthy Fives are so terrorized by their thoughts that they must get rid of them somehow. They do so by identifying with the emptiness that remains within themselves when they detach from their remaining identifications. In effect, they detach themselves from themselves, like parents who, to stop being tormented by the memories of a dead child, throw away everything that reminds them of the child. The result is that neurotic Fives live in a totally empty house—the self which has been purged of everything that reminds them of their terrifying and painful attachments to the world.

Thus, neurotic Fives deteriorate into a state of inner emptiness and, if they continue to live this way, in all probability into a form of schizophrenia. *

All their former intellectual intensity and capacity for involvement is gone. Fives at this stage are utterly isolated from their environment, from other people, and from their inner life—from their ability to think, to feel, and to do.

Unhealthy Fives have finally succeeded in putting distance between themselves and the environment, although at the price of completely removing themselves from it through suicide or a schizoid break. The irony is, however, that Fives retreat from reality to gain the time and space to build their confidence and ability to deal with life, but they ultimately destroy their own confidence and talents, even their own life, through their fear and isolation. Those Fives who do not take their own lives may end up living a life of helplessness, dependency, or incarceration—the very situation they most feared—as a result of severe psychotic breaks with reality. In a final effort to escape from the horrors around them, Fives attempt to remove themselves from the environment. But what they have removed themselves from is not actually reality, but the projection of their anxieties about reality. They have succeeded only in removing themselves from their thoughts and feelings. Once neurotic Fives have done this, they become unable to cry out to anyone from the void they have created within themselves. All is emptiness within the abyss of the purged self.

THE DYNAMICS OF THE FIVE

The Direction of Disintegration: The Five Goes to Seven

Starting at Level 4, Fives under stress will begin to exhibit many of the qualities of average to unhealthy Sevens. Average Fives tend to retreat from connection with others and from activities in the world which they fear they will be unable to accomplish. Thus they become increasingly narrow in their focus and concerns. The move to Seven can be seen as an unconscious reaction to this shrinking of the Five’s world, albeit in the scattered, hyperactive discharge of anxiety found in the average to unhealthy Seven.

At Level 4, Fives are focusing their energies in studying, practicing, and preparing. They do not feel confident to enter the arena of life and believe that further developing their knowledge and skills will give them the protection they need to survive. Along with this, however, comes a desire for variety and a restlessness of mind characteristic of type Seven. Also like Sevens, Fives at this Level are constantly acquiring information, building their collections of music, books, and videos, or whatever else captures their interest. They move from one topic to another, looking for the subject that will satisfy them, for the project they can really get involved with. But in this state of restlessness, none of their pursuits are entirely satisfactory to them.

At Level 5, Fives have become even more preoccupied and involved with their projects and ideas. They are beginning to isolate themselves socially and to become more focused on their thoughts than on the world around them. Fives begin to be starved for stimulation, and under stress may begin to involve themselves with a wide variety of experiences which do not relate directly to their central projects or motivations. They distract themselves with video games, movies, and science fiction and horror novels. They love to let their minds free-associate, and can enjoy moments of silliness and offbeat humor which often surprise the people around them. Fives under stress may also develop a taste for nightlife, exploring restaurants, bars, and nightclubs—often as voyeurs. They will usually be secretive about this, however, and few of their friends will be aware of this aspect of their lives. As their anxiety escalates, so does their desire for distraction and stimulation.

At Level 6, Fives are becoming more fearful, and despair of ever finding a niche for themselves. They become threatened by most interactions with others and can be antagonistic and provocative in defense of their intellectual or creative “turf.” They get into high gear in their avoidance of anxiety, and can be insensitive and aggressive in their pursuit of whatever they want at the time. The jaded, calloused qualities of the Seven only reinforce the Five’s growing cynicism, making them impatient with people and extremely hardened in their view of the world. Some may find them wild and exciting at this level, but most people are put off by their intense, bristling energy. Further, Fives under stress will not hesitate to use drugs or alcohol to quell their anxieties. They will pursue whatever offers them relief from their pain and fears, even if their escape is costly and short-lived.

At Level 7, unhealthy Fives are extremely isolated, cut off from contact with others and the world, and consequently have no constructive outlets for their inner intensity. When they go to Seven, they discharge this energy in a variety of escapist behaviors, which only makes them more dissipated and incapable. Unhealthy Fives lurch from an isolated, fearful state to one of wild activity. Their minds are beginning to run out of control, and when they can no longer contain their fear, this enormous mental turbulence gets acted out in impulsive and often irresponsible ways. They lunge into mindless activity, by which they succeed only in getting themselves into worse trouble and more serious conflicts with the environment. They are irrational, have extremely poor judgment, and make poor choices about which actions to take. When others question their self-destructive escapism, their responses can be abusive and infantile.

At Level 8, Fives are full of terrors and cannot distinguish the horrific images that erupt from their unconscious from reality. Under increased stress, their behavior becomes manic and reckless. Moving to Seven now, deteriorated Fives go totally out of control. Some of the terrible things they have feared may actually happen as a result of their erratic and irresponsible behavior. And as fearful as Fives have become, they are often heedless and unaware of real dangers. For example, they may be killed—not because they are devoured by their furniture or exposed to death rays from their television, but because, not watching where they are going, they get run over by a truck. Out-of-control Fives are reckless and accident-prone: they may be poisoned, not by the KGB but because they mistakenly ate something they should not have. Neurotic Fives need to reestablish contact with reality (particularly the positive aspects of it), although at this Level they are completely incapable of doing so. They act impulsively, erratically, and hysterically, like a manic-depressive Seven, becoming increasingly unstable and unpredictable.

At Level 9, Fives are consumed with terror and are desperate to escape the horrors they perceive around them. Similarly, they cannot find anything in themselves which inspires confidence or gives them any sense that they will be able to cope with the rest of their lives. Fearing that they have reached some sort of horrible dead end, they may compulsively do permanent harm to themselves or someone else. Even if they do not kill themselves, their reckless activities may well have severely damaged their health and limited their ability to pursue any further activities. Like unhealthy Sevens, they are debilitated, burned-out, and paralyzed with fear. As anxiety reaches an ever new pitch, they may do something irrevocable, such as impulsively killing someone or committing suicide.

The Direction of Integration: The Five Goes to Eight

Fives typically do not feel that they know enough to act: there is always more to know. They will always feel insecure until they have mastered the real world and are not simply masters of their own minds. From a psychoanalytic point of view, their egos are typically too weak for the ids—their aggressions and other impulses tend to overpower their minds.

This no longer happens to healthy, integrating Fives because they have incorporated their perceptions of the world into themselves by identifying with them instead of merely observing them. They no longer identify just with their thoughts, but also with the objects of their thoughts. Thus, integrating Fives have overcome their fear of the environment and are learning to trust it. Hence their self-confidence grows, after the manner of healthy Eights.

When they go to Eight, Fives also realize that, as little as they think they know, it is still more than almost anyone else. They also realize that they do not have to know absolutely everything before they can act. They will learn more as they do more; they will be able to solve new problems as they arise. They understand that they will know what they need to know when they need to know it. Their confidence will come not from some collection of skills or some vast body of information that they have memorized, but from a real connection with their presence in the world. They then experience themselves not as separate from the world, not as a helpless speck, but as a powerful, integral part of it.

Integrating Fives act from a realization of their own genuine mastery. While they do not know everything, they know enough to lead others with confidence. The correctness of their ideas has been so well confirmed by reality that they no longer fear acting. They acquire the courage it takes to put their ideas, and consequently themselves, on the line. Thus, integrating Fives realize that they are able to contribute something worthwhile to others. As a result, their thoughts are finally given expression in action and possibly in leadership. Integrating Fives show others how to do what only they know how to do. And, as we have seen, the practical value of their ideas may be incalculable.

THE MAJOR SUBTYPES OF THE FIVE

The Five with a Four-Wing: “The Iconoclast”

The traits of the Five and those of the Four reinforce each other in many ways. Both Five and Four are withdrawn types: they turn to the inner world of their imagination to defend their egos and to reinforce their sense of self. They both feel that something essential in themselves must be found before they can live their lives completely. Fives lack the confidence to act, and Fours lack a strong, stable sense of identity. Thus, Fives with a Four-wing have difficulty connecting with others and staying grounded. People of this subtype are more emotional and introverted than Fives with a Six-wing, although paradoxically, they tend to be more sociable than the other subtype. As a result of their Four component, they are also more interested in the personal and intrapsychic. The two types also have some significant differences in their approach. Fives are cerebral, holding experience at arm’s length, while Fours internalize everything to intensify their feelings. Despite these differences—or because of them—these two personality types make one of the richest subtypes, combining possibilities for outstanding artistic as well as intellectual achievement. Noteworthy examples of this subtype include Albert Einstein, Werner Heisenburg, Friedrich Nietzsche, Georgia O'Keeffe, John Cage, John Lennon, k. d. lang, Laurie Anderson, James Joyce, Emily Dickinson, Stanley Kubrick, David Lynch, Buster Keaton, Gary Larson, Stephen King, Tim Burton, Clive Barker, Franz Kafka, Umberto Eco, Jean-Paul Sartre, Oriana Fallaci, Glenn Gould, Peter Serkin, Hannah Arendt, Kurt Cobain, and Vincent van Gogh.

In healthy people of this subtype, we find the union of intuition and knowledge, sensitivity and insight, aesthetic appreciation and intellectual endowments. Fives with a Four-wing are likely to be involved in the arts as writers, directors, designers, musicians, composers, choreographers, and so forth. This subtype has been somewhat overlooked in many descriptions of Fives because they do not fit the stereotype of the academic/scientific Five (the Five with a Six-wing). This subtype is more synthetic in its thinking, pulling things together and seeking out new ways of looking at things. Also, Fives with a Four-wing tend to utilize their imaginations more than the analytic, systematic parts of the mind which are more the domain of the other subtype. If they are involved in science, Fives with a Four-wing are drawn to those areas in which there is less emphasis on experimentation and data collection than on intuition and comprehensive vision. This subtype is particularly aware of—and on the lookout for—the beauty in a mathematical formula, for example. For this subtype, beauty is one of the indications of truth, because the order which beauty represents is a confirmation of the objective lightness of an idea. One of the foremost strengths of healthy Fives with a Four-wing lies precisely in their intuition, since intuition helps them uncover areas of knowledge where their conscious thoughts have not yet ventured. The Fourwing adds a desire to find a unique, personal vision to the curiosity and perceptiveness of the Five, and the result is a propensity to “tinker” with familiar forms until they become something almost unrecognizable. In talented Fives with a Four-wing this can lead to startling innovations in their chosen fields of endeavor.

In Average Fives with a Four-wing, the Four-wing adds emotional depth, but causes difficulties in sustaining efforts and in working with others. Fives with a Four-wing are more independent than Fives with a Six-wing and resist having structures and deadlines imposed on them. There can be an off-putting detachment from the environment, both because they are involved in their thoughts and because they are introverted and emotionally self-absorbed. Analytic powers may be used to keep people at arm’s length rather than to understand them more deeply. Emotionally delicate, people of this subtype can be moody and hypersensitive to criticism, particularly regarding the value of their work or ideas, since this impinges directly upon self-esteem. Both component types tend to withdraw from people and be reclusive. They can be highly creative and imaginative, envisioning alternate realities in great detail, but can get lost in their own cerebral landscapes. The Four-wing gives a propensity to fantasizing, but with the Five with the Four-wing, the subject matter tends toward the surreal and fantastic rather than the romantic. Individuals of this subtype can become highly impractical, spending most of their time reading, playing intellectual games, or specializing in trivia. There is often an attraction to dark, forbidden subject matter or to any way of self-expression which would disturb or upset others. Some Fives with a Four-wing become fascinated with the macabre and the horrific. As they become more impractical and fearful about their possibilities in life, one typical solution is to find emotional solace in various forms of self-indulgence—in alcohol, drugs, or sexual escapades.

Unhealthy persons of this subtype may fall prey to debilitating depressions yet be disturbed by aggressive impulses. Envy of others mixes with contempt for them; the desire to isolate the self from the world mixes with regret that it must be so. Intellectual conflicts make their emotional lives seem hopeless, while their emotional conflicts make intellectual work difficult to sustain. Moreover, if this subtype becomes neurotic, it is one of the most alienated of all of the personality types: profoundly hopeless, nihilistic, self-inhibiting, isolated from others, and full of self-hatred. Unhealthy Fives with a Four-wing retreat into a very bleak, minimal existence, attempting to cut off from all needs. The self-rejection and despair of the Four combines with the cynical nihilism of the Five to create a worldview that is relentlessly negative and terrifying. Social isolation, addiction, and chronic depression are common. Suicide is a real possibility.

The Five with a Six-Wing: “The Problem Solver”

This subtype is the one that has been most often associated with Fives—the intellectual who is interested in science, technology, acquiring facts and details. Fives with a Six-wing are the “analysts” and “cataloguers” of their environments; they are problem solvers and excel at dissecting the components of a problem or thing to discover how it works. The traits of the Five and those of the Six-wing combine to produce one of the most “difficult” of the personality types to contact intimately or to sustain a relationship with. Both components, the Five and the Six, are in the Thinking Triad, and Fives with a Six-wing are perhaps the most intellectual of all the subtypes. They also tend to be more disengaged from their feelings than Fives with a Four-wing. Persons of this subtype have problems trusting others, both because they are essentially Fives and because the Six-wing reinforces anxiety, making any kind of risk taking in relationships difficult. However, the coping mechanisms of the Five and Six are somewhat at odds, creating an inner tension between the two components. Fives find security by withdrawing from others while Sixes find security by working cooperatively with others. Hence, their interpersonal relations are erratic, and in general are not an important part of their lives. Noteworthy examples of this subtype include Bill Gates, Stephen Hawking, Sigmund Freud, Simone Weil, Jacob Bronowski, Charles Darwin, Edward O. Wilson, Karl Marx, James Watson, Ursula K. LeGuin, Alfred Hitchcock, Doris Lessing, Cynthia Ozick, Bobby Fischer, B. F. Skinner, Isaac Asimov, Howard Hughes, Ezra Pound, and Theodore Kaczynski.

Healthy people of this subtype are more extroverted and focused on the external world than Fives with a Four-wing. They are not particularly introspective, preferring to observe and understand the world around them. Healthy Fives with a Six-wing observe the world with extraordinary clarity, combining the Five’s drive for mastery with the Six’s quest for certainty. The result is a gift for drawing meaningful conclusions from disparate facts, and an ability to make predictions based on those conclusions. They are often drawn to technical subjects, engineering, science, and philosophy, as well as inventing and repair work. The Six-wing gives this subtype a greater ability to cooperate with others and to bring a disciplined, persistent approach to their endeavors. There is more aptitude for and interest in the practical matters of life, and with sufficient talent, Fives with a Six-wing can combine their innovation with business savvy, sometimes with very lucrative results. Their attention is more often directed at objects than at people, although they identify strongly with key people in their lives. They may feel things deeply, but are extremely restrained in their emotional expression. In them we find an intellectual playfulness, a good sense of humor, as well as other attractive, lovable qualities. If others have been tested and permitted to come closer, they discover that people of this subtype have a deep capacity for friendship and commitment. There is also an endearing element in their desire to be accepted by others, and even if they are sometimes socially clumsy, others cannot help but be touched by their eagerness to reach out to people.

However, average persons of this subtype generally have problems with relationships. The Six-wing provides good organizational abilities and an endearing personal quality, but also adds to the Five’s anxiety and fearfulness. They do not seem to know what to do with their feelings, much less how to express them directly. Hence we find an insensitivity to their own feelings and emotional needs, as well as to the feelings and emotional needs of others. They have little awareness about how they communicate themselves to others. (They are the classic intellectual nerd, the socially inept oddball.) Average Fives with a Six-wing can become extremely preoccupied, theoretical, and absent-minded. They are totally wrapped up with intellectual pursuits and live completely in their minds, immersing themselves in their work to the exclusion of everything else. When interpersonal conflicts arise, average Fives with a Six-wing avoid resolving problems by burying themselves even more deeply in their intellectual work, and by employing passive-aggressive techniques, putting off people and problems rather than dealing with them directly. They can be rebellious and argumentative for no apparent reason, although something may have touched off unconscious emotional associations. Fives with a Six-wing tend to cling more tenaciously to their views and theories (reductionism) and to antagonize people who disagree with them, whereas Fives with a Four-wing tend to reject all meaning (nihilism) and to disturb the certainty of people who seem secure.

Unhealthy people of this subtype tend to be suspicious of people and to have counterphobic, contentious, and volatile reactions to others. They are extremely fearful of intimacy of any sort and can be highly unstable, with paranoid tendencies. Unconsciously seeking rescue, they also fearfully reject and antagonize their supporters. The isolation and mental distortion we see in unhealthy Fives are reinforced by the Six-wing’s paranoia, inferiority feelings, and conviction of being persecuted. Neurotic Fives with a Six-wing ultimately become extremely phobic, projecting dangers everywhere while retreating from all social interaction. They may lash out at imagined enemies, sometimes with lethal results. Psychotic breaks and madness are possible.

SOME FINAL THOUGHTS

Taking an overall view of the Five, we can see that there has been a struggle between various pairs of polar opposites: between thinking and doing, between a fascination with the world and a fear of the world, between identification with others and rejection of them, between love and hate. This process of attraction to and repulsion from the environment as a whole began with their ambivalence toward their parents. But unfortunately, what happens is that Fives gradually become so obsessed with defending themselves from potential threats from the environment—that is, from whatever they see as harmful and dangerous—that they also exclude the good. Eventually, there is nothing in the world with which Fives can identify, nothing true or valuable in which they can believe. The final result is total nihilism: there is nothing left to which they can attach themselves.

Like every other personality type which becomes gripped in the downward spiral of neurosis, Fives bring about the very thing they most fear: that they are helpless, useless, and incompetent. The irony is that they have become helpless and incompetent because they have rejected attachment to everything. And by intensifying their involvement with their mental processes, instead of finding security or power, Fives have brought about their own insecurity and powerlessness.

It is a tragic end. If there is something perverse and dark—even demonic—about Fives, it is that to protect themselves they have relentlessly repulsed the world and other human beings. What then is left? Only a fascination with—and a terrifying attraction to—the darkness.

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