#on which a man who was obviously experiencing some sort of crisis was like screaming obscenities and threatening to kill people

[legionofpotatoes]

alright here’s ma thoughts on that flick I mentioned

we hatewatched a*my of the dead because we were CONVINCED “zombies in las vegas” would be an impossible concept to screw up, but in so assuming we obviously invoked a holy wager with the universe and got reminded, once again, that hoping for improvement from someone who’s dependably put out bad art is never a wise choice 😐

but we were honestly kinda roped in by the marketing??? and expected a goofy fast-paced flick with the odd traditional undead metaphor thrown in, framing some sort of relationship drama maybe or hell even nothing at all! we’d have taken pure indulgent storytelling, idk italian job with zombies in las vegas, I don’t know fucking anything but??? whatever this was???? spoilers below for it is time for One Of My Rants

I mean the main reason I really want to write all this and complain. this film here probably has the most unappealing cinematography I have ever experienced in my life and that is saying something. who the fuck signed off on that CONSTANT shallow-ass depth of field that imprisons your eyeline and turns every shot into bokeh paste???? and I mean every shot almost!!!! I promise if you think I am overreacting just throw a dart at the seek bar and watch twenty seconds from wherever it lands. it is horrifying to look at. at least it gave my girlfriend a good visual shorthand for what it’s like when I lose my glasses

why was sean spicer in this movie. did they pay him to be here. was sean spicer paid hollywood money for his scene in this film because fuck everyone who was involved in that decision

the legitimately baffling hints at the extraterrestrial origins of the infection that went absolutely nowhere and had no dramatic or plot-level bearing. we love to see the franchise sprouts fellas

yet another big budget waste of everything hiroyuki sanada has to offer. and bautista too I guess? I like him but man was this an odd career move

what was the crux of his conflict/resolution with his daughter btw. I understand it was rooted in miscommunication over their forms of grief irt mom but uhh… it was all rather clunky and didn’t land for me. I tried I really tried to buy in but something was wrong fundamentally with the groundwork there, it did not click and their catharsis felt unearned. I know there’s massive amounts of tragic baggage being projected there from the author so I’m not slapping any judgment down really;

but again it would be an easy thing to wave off if they just had a vibrant cast of lovable simpletons with good chemistry and the kinetic sense of plotting the trailers promised (and this premise never discounts good drama, either). but instead it was just two and a half (!) hours of meandering into situations the filmmaking instincts had no idea how to flow in and out of

to wit. I know talking about “bad pacing” is associated with armchair bullshit but consider the example of the scene were dieter does an out of nowhere little dance after childishly screaming but then still-killing a zombie, with the film framing this as a micro character triumph, and not a second later the bg soundtrack instantly fades into an orchestral score dramatizing a nearby mcguffin reveal, completely 180 degreeing the tone without a semblance of deft insert shot stitching or even I dont know a fucking jump cut maybe. now imagine this whiplash for 2.5 hrs uninterrupted

I will keep complaining about the length yeah because this was not a story requiring this much real estate to be told. Uhh in my humble and personal opinion, of course

[man sees zombie tiger] “this is crossing the line!” you can in fact write dialogue that is not utter nonsense that falls apart once you drill down its single fickle layer of referential meta winking. what line are you talking about. you have rules in this insane situation you’re in? total nitpick moment I know but it got burned in my brain for some reason. like a microcosm of the mismanaged dramatic instincts paired with weird writing that dots this movie. I am sure the director calls this either satire or genre deconstruction. I am SO sure

tumblr domino meme that goes from “dude getting sucked off while driving” to “entire las vegas literally nuked”

tig notaro is always great to see but once you know she’s been filmed as a separate greenscreen plate months after photography wrapped - cause she had to apparently replace some abusive asshole but that’s a whole other pig not worth fucking - it becomes impossible to unsee her odd detachment from everyone else in the movie lmao. it doesn’t really “ruin” anything on its lonesome but it is hard to unsee

why. was. sean. spicer. in. this. movie

a very simple key ingredient missing from fully turning lip service sympathy for main uruk hai dude into actual empathy that would generate meaningful conflict with hero family would be to spend a bit more time articulating what he internally wanted the most. because he was obviously trying to do something here with pointed agenda. a family, to have kids, build a caste system, save his wife’s head, return to his planet??? all of these could represent the bigger context in his psychology that spurred his vengeance but none of them are dramatically emphasized long enough for you to cheer him on. I’m not asking too much I promise. Articulating interiority of a mute character is pretty doable with deft cinema language, just gotta linger and hold a shot here and there for a few seconds, frame as his POV, donezo. I know this is also one of those like. “who cares” moments but the movie does, very evidently so, in making this guy an actual character. you can kinda piece it together and create a framework of sympathy for him, sure, but then again he ultimately becomes a foil to be killed and not defeated, so. Ehh whatever

quarantine zone stuff was not a wildly childish covid allegory quarantine zone stuff was not a wildly childish covid allegory quarantine zone stuff was n

the rooftop helicopter fakout at the end was such an ass-backwards, manufactured moment of what could be a simple setup/payoff it just pissed me off??? you gain nothing by giving sad dad five seconds of pointless crisis that flips right back to previous status quo ANYWAY, except for a weaksauce waste of runtime, which could be used instead to get inside notaro’s head and actually SHOW the remorse form as she took off, literally maybe even a frown playing on her face as she’s headed for safety right before we cut back to drax and the kid. just a simple-ass, minimal, momentary setup for what is the most basic filmmaking trick of creating macro catharsis moments. Just???? g o d if you can’t even land that shit why are you even doing any of this

that lil run final pam did was very very charming and super choreographed in a way that was the tiiiniest bit overdone

the whole intro with the simul-backstories and posing with family photos was just… oddly motivated. what was the goal? “here’s what we’re fighting for” vignettes? why? it’s not a functional setup in that vein. what was all that

also I am sorry if this is insensitive but the reasons most characters end up articulating to justify going back into the hell that destroyed their lives makes them sound seriously insane

I dont like complaining about CGI (honestly) but so much of it in modern movies can achieve higher fidelity if the animation is simply subdued. Do not overengineer and over-apply 2D cell methodologies and kinematics to each tiny twitch and movement in a hyper 3D model and I promise you. it will look a thousand times more natural. look at thanos in those last two movies. your rendering and detail are absolutely perfect with the tiger you just have to let stuff sit instead of constantly simulating swaying hair strands and firing off all facial muscles at once. great moment at one point where makeup zombie horse and CG zombie tiger are both in one shot together and just by unnecessary amounts of movement alone you can tell who doesn’t belong. again; detail, rendering, compositing, lighting, all picture-perfect; but y’all just gotta let the animation breathe sometimes, and chill it out

plot holes don’t really matter to me but it was kinda funny how lilly decided not to mention the enormous wrinkle in intel pertaining to an actual territorial tribe of intelligent zombies that require human offerings to let you pass, just so that reveal could play out in real time through the joyous punishment of the cartoonishly misogynistic dude

total chad move for mister uruk hai and final pam to rule from a rusted swimming pool complex

the ending with vanderohe oh my god. with the. cash stacks at the airport register. and specifically them working in his favor. that is literally something you do to get arrested under suspicion of theft. it was almost played for laughs and I respect that. coulda been goofier. make these movies goofy ya dorks

anyway, weird, weird movie. bad marketing. message unclear (something something sins of the father???), baffling editing instincts, literal worst-looking cinematography I ever laid eyes upon. Confidently dying on that last hill

#text #long post #aotd spoilers #aotd critical

[flightfoot]

On Apollo and the nature of identity

Throughout the Trials of Apollo series, Apollo has struggled with his identity; who he is now that he isn’t a god, what it means to be himself. His new alias  - Lester Papadopoulos - helps to exemplify his identity crisis. The name is a perfectly ordinary human name to reflect his new state of existence. He doesn’t particularly like it (especially at first), but uses it occasionally nonetheless. It seemed kind of odd to me how Rick has characters use “Lester” vs. “Apollo”, but I think I may have an idea of why.

I think “Lester” may be serving as a kind of epithet for Apollo - as a sort of additional name describing his current circumstances and form, and everything that goes with it. It’s why, especially in the early books, he tends to think of himself as Lester in a somewhat derogatory manner, such as when he’s failing at archery in THO:

Zeus had cursed me with mortality. I was not going to pretend that everything was normal. I would not be Apollo until I was really Apollo. For now, I was just a stupid young man named Lester Papadopolous. (143)

Sometimes his friends would call him “Lester” too, like how Leo referred to him as “Lester man”, or just because. 

In TDP Commodus exclusively refers to him as Lester... until the end of his rant at the finale of the book.

Commodus scoffed. “You’re damp and speckled with bat poop, Lester. You’re a pathetic child who has been dragged through the darkness. That darkness is still in your mind. I see the fear in your eyes. This is your true form, Apollo! You’re a fraud!”

Apollo. He had called me by my name. (371)

Commodus associates “Lester” with weakness and fear, with his new mortal form... but he still calls him “Apollo” at the end, in an attempt to combine what he thinks of “Lester” with what he thinks of “Apollo”, I believe. Because “Apollo” is him as a whole - “Apollo” in total, while “Lester” only describes his current circumstances. “Apollo” was powerful enough to kill Commodus, but “Lester”? Maybe not.

Apollo still considers, well “Apollo”, to be his name, because, well, it is, AND I suspect because of how he associates his current form with powerlessness, a helplessness that he didn’t have as a god... or at least didn’t recognize in the same way. This can be seen from the ending lines of TBM:

But from now on, I would be more than Lester. I would be more than an observer.

I would be Apollo.

I would remember. (419)

He was unable to save Jason as Lester, as a mortal. As an observer. But with the strength he associates with being Apollo, he may be able to.

But things change in Tyrant’s Tomb. This book, Apollo doesn’t seem to associate Lester with weakness and fear to the same extent. Or at least, he doesn’t seem as depressed about it. He actually jokes about it a little with Meg when trying to reassure her:

“When we summon godly help, I can ask for complete healing. I’m sure I’ll be as good as new. Or at least, as good as a Lester can be.” (189)

He’s also called Lester a decent amount this book, by Reyna mostly, weirdly enough. When she calls him up to speak to the council, it’s as “Lester Papadopoulos”, not as Apollo. And just in general, she calls him Lester by default. Kinda contrasts with Frank, who mostly calls him “Apollo”, but does call him Lester in certain circumstances, such as when talking about the new birthday he was assigned (as Lester)

“You’ll have to leave for Sutro early on Lester’s birthday.” (186)

Frank calls him “Lester” here because he’s referring to Apollo in his capacity AS Lester. Most of the time he calls him “Apollo”, which I’m betting is because he looked up to Apollo as a god - and still does to an extent. It probably helps that Frank’s awesome with a bow and arrow, and Apollo was one of the few cases where Romans respected that.

Anyway, back to Reyna. She does refer to “Apollo” and “Lester” separately later, when laughing about him awkwardly offering to be her boyfriend: 

“Apollo. When you were a god...” She struggled for breath. “Like, with your powers and good looks and whatever-”

“Say no more. Naturally you would have-”

“That would have been a solid, absolute, hard-pass NO.”

I gaped. “I am astonished!”

“And as Lester... I mean, you’re sweet and kind of adorkable at times.”

“Adorkable? At times?”

“But wow. Still a big-time NO. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” (237-238)

She views him as being the same person sort of, but in different capacities. And she actually seems to like him as Lester more. Still doesn’t want to DATE him of course, but she was less vehement about the second one.

You kind of see this again later, after Reyna finds out about what Apollo did to Coronis and the crows, how she seems to view him MORE highly as a mortal than as a god.

“But you’re the- you used to be the god of music, right? If you can charm a crowd, you should be able to repulse one. Pick a song those birds will hate!”

Great. Not only had Reyna laughed in my face and busted my nose, now I was her go-to guy for repulsiveness.

Still… I was struck by the way she said I used to be a god. She didn’t seem to mean it as an insult. She said it almost like a concession - like she knew what a horrible deity I had been, but held out hope that I might be capable of being someone better, more helpful, maybe even worthy of forgiveness. (255)

I don’t think she’s calling Apollo “Lester” as any sort of insult. To me it seems like by calling him Lester, she’s acknowledging this new side to him, this mortal side, and how he’s different from how he used to be. 

This is actually kinda shown during the confrontation with Harpocrates, with how Reyna and Meg defend him:

In front of me, Reyna and Meg stood shoulder to shoulder, facing down the god.

They sent him their own flurry of images. Reyna pictured me singing “The Fall of Jason Grace” to the legion, officiating at Jason’s funeral pyre with tears in my eyes, then looking goofy and awkward and clueless as I offered to be her boyfriend, giving her the best, most cleansing laugh she’d had in years (Thanks, Reyna.)

Meg pictured the way I’d saved her in the myrmekes lair at Camp Half-Blood, singing about my romantic failures with such honesty it rendered giant ants catatonic with depression. She envisioned my kindness to Livia the elephant, to Crest, and especially to her, when I’d given her a hug in our room at the cafe and told her I would never give up trying.

In all their memories, I looked so human… but in the best possible ways. Without words, my friends asked Harpocrates if I was still the person he hated so much. (288-289)

He’s still Apollo, but they DON’T consider him to be the same person he was exactly. He seems pretty human, but in GOOD ways, and that change? That part of him? I believe they’re associating that with “Lester”, as that’s the name he’s been given as a human. He’s still Apollo - just because he’s changed, it doesn’t absolve him of what he’s done, and it is all part of him - but Lester represents the new experiences and new attitude he’s acquired, the person he’s become. “Lester” isn’t just the weakness and powerlessness he associates with being mortal, but also the strengths he’s gained from his new friendships, from seeing himself and the world clearly - well, mostly clearly anyway. Clearer than he ever has before.

“Lester” was originally a name assigned to him by Zeus as part of his humiliation, same as the rest of his “turning mortal” punishment. But like the rest of the punishment, I think it’s going to backfire. If the name “Lester Papadopoulos” exemplifies his time as a mortal, an experience Zeus is putting him through in order to punish and humiliate Apollo, frighten him and other gods from stepping out of line, then I doubt that, like the growth Apollo has experienced, that he would cast it away. I suspect that it will end up as an alias that he reclaims, a name that starts out as derogatory but that is soon worn as a badge of honor. He may be Apollo, but I can’t see him being ashamed of who he was as a mortal, as Lester Papadopoulos. 

“Apollo” is the sum total of who he is, but “Lester” represents a new part of him that he’s just now realizing is there, is actively growing and changing. He’s still struggling to integrate his new realizations into himself, but when he does, I think he’ll truly be himself.

We see some of this identity struggle hinted at throughout the book, like when talking with Lupa:

“My time,” I said. “For what, exactly?”

She nipped the air in annoyance. To be Apollo. The pack needs you.

I wanted to scream I’ve been trying to be Apollo. It’s not that easy! (95)

“Being Apollo” here obviously represents something deeper than just existing. But it doesn’t seem to really refer to just regaining power. Apollo actually says that he DOES know what she means - and to a certain extent, I think he’s right.

“Fine,” I relented. “I know what you mean. The last lines from the Dark Prophecy. I’ve reached the Tiber alive, et cetera, et cetera. Now I am supposed to ‘jive’. I assume that entails more than dancing and snapping my fingers. (96)

“Jiving” in this case appears, I believe, to refer to Apollo’s new revelations about who he is as a person, and the kind of person he wants to be. This is supported by what the arrow says when Apollo asks it how he’s supposed to “start to jive’, and the arrow basically says that it will think about that matter. After Apollo complains a bit about how he needs to know NOW, because they’re about to face Tarquin, this piece of conversation occurs:

“I appreciate a good boon as much as the next person. But if I’m going to contribute to this quest and not just cower in the corner, I need to know how” - my voice cracked “how to be me again.”

The vibration of the arrow felt almost like a cat purring, trying to sooth an ill human. ART THOU SURE THAT IS THY WISH?

“What do you mean?” I demanded. “That’s the whole point! Everything I’m doing is so-” (138)

Here, Apollo’s still associating being “himself” with his godly power, but the arrow implies something different. And is trying to comfort him about it, which is a sharp departure from its usual attitude in previous books.

Apollo talks to the arrow again later, while on the excursion with Meg and Reyna, and it has this to say:

THOU HAST FOUND THY GROOVE. AT LEAST THE BEGINNINGS OF THY GROOVE. I SUSPECTED THIS WOULD BE SO, GIVEN TIME. CONGRATULATIONS ARE MERITED. (266)

I have my suspicions about what his “groove” is here. This takes place just after the three of them fend off the ravens, after Meg and Reyna found out about some of the horrible things Apollo had done in the past, and he comes to these realizations:

“Can we talk about this later?” I pleaded. “Or perhaps never? I was a god then! I didn’t know what I was doing!”

A few months ago, a statement like that would have made no sense to me. Now, it seemed true. I felt as if Meg had given me her thick-lensed rhinestone-studded glasses, and to my horror, they corrected my eyesight. I didn’t like how small and tawdry and petty everythin looked, rendered in perfect ugly clarity through the magic of Meg-O-Vision. Most of all, I didn’t like the way I looked - not just present-day Lester, but the god formerly known as Apollo. (252-253)

I wanted to sing for Reyna, to prove that I had indeed changed. I was no longer the god who’d had Koronis killed and created ravens, or cursed the Cumaean Sibyl, or done any of the other selfish things that had once given me no more pause than choosing what dessert toppings I wanted on my ambrosia.

It was time to be helpful. I needed to be repulsive for my friends! (256)

I think this realization - of how horrible he had been while a god, of how he had changed, of his determination to BE a different person than he once was, while still acknowledging who he’d been in the past - I think THAT is his groove. His jive. Not just him realizing who he was, but turning his determination to make things better into power.

It’s reinforced later with him thinking about how hollow he feels:

When had I last felt “whole”? I wanted to believe it was back when I was a god, but that wasn’t true. I hadn’t been completely myself for centuries. Maybe millennia.

At the moment, I felt more like a hole - a void in the cosmos through which Harpocrates, the Sibyl, and a lot of people I cared about had vanished. (316)

Honestly, I don’t know that he was ever really “himself” in the way he thinks. Some of the worst things he did, he did in ancient times. He just may not have recognized it as such at the time. But as the time passed, I’d imagine that existence would have grown more hollow, as he doesn’t seem to have formed many deep bonds - mostly surface-level ones that he fooled himself into thinking were deep, like when he convinced himself that he loved the Cumaean Sibyl.

His comparisons between himself and the Emperors when referring to his encounters with Harpocrates shows this to some extent:

The emperors would’ve considered Harpocrates just another dangerous, amusing plaything, like their trained monsters and humanoid lackeys.

And why not let King Tarquin be his custodian? The emperors could ally themselves with the undead tyrant, at least temporarily, to make their of Camp Jupiter a little easier. They could let Tarquin arrange his cruelest trap for me. Whether I killed Harpocrates or he killed me, what did it matter to the Triumvirate in the end? Ether way, they would find it entertaining - one more gladiator match to break the monotony of their immortal lives. (273)

This description sounds an awful lot like the Olympian gods attitude, with them not caring what happens to demigods much, just using others as entertainment. So long as they weren’t majorly threatened, why should they care? They can just sit back and watch, like Apollo talked about doing back in The Dark Prophecy when he was a god:

When I was a god, I would have felt delighted to leave the mortal heroes to fend for themselves. I would have made popcorn and watched the bloodbath from a distance on Mount Olympus, or simply caught the highlight reel later. (283)

Apollo’s directly compares himself to the emperors soon afterwards, when reliving Harpocrates memories from his point of view:

The god glared at me. He forced painful images into my mind: me stuffing his head into a toilet on Mount Olympus; me howling with amusement as I tied his wrists and ankles and shut him in the stables with my fire-breathing horses. Dozens of other encounters I’d completely forgotten about, and in all of them I was as golden, handsome, and powerful as any Triumvirate emperor - and just as cruel. (279)

Apollo hasn’t been the kind of person he really saw himself as - the kind of person he wishes to be since - well, I don’t know if it was EVER. Certainly not for a VERY long time. He and the Emperors aren’t as different as he’d like... or WEREN’T, at least. Though the Emperors were more outwardly cruel, with none of Apollo’s good qualities, it seems. 

But that’s changed now. Apollo can see who he was and is trying to change, to be someone better. He can’t fix everything - an apology won’t undo the Cumaean Sibyl’s or Harpocrates suffering - but he can make things better NOW.

As the Emperors invade, his summoning seems to have failed everything looks hopeless:

The emperors obviously wanted to send a message: they intended to dominate the world at any cost. They would stop at nothing. They would mutilate and maim. They would waste and destroy. Nothing was sacred except their own power.

I rose unsteadily. My hopelessness turned into boiling anger. I howled, “NO!” (340)

This - now this is when I think he TRULY jives. He rejects hopelessness, he rejects weakness, he rejects despair. The world may be going down in flames, but he’ll fight it. He can’t change the past, but the present? Now THAT he can do something about.

He charges in and fights against hopeless odds, without a plan even, because he’s NOT going to just stand by and watch people die. Not anymore. 

His divine powers return somewhat. He survives a blow that should have killed him, he punches Commodus so hard his armor dents, and after Frank’s supposed death, he literally screams Commodus into ashes. Even before that, when he truly thinks he’s about to die fighting Commodus, he doesn’t waste time worrying about his death. He fights to at least hobble Commodus first, to cut his tendons so that even if he dies, he’ll have made it easier for someone else to take him down. He never stops fighting, he never gives up, even when he believes he can’t save himself anymore. He’s at least begun to figure out who he is now, and to act on it. He’s been having his old self torn down and rebuilt nearly from scratch, and this is the result. 

His heroism, how he’s changed - it’s reflected in another character at the end of the book. Don the faun has appeared before, both in TTT and SON, and he’s supposedly been pretty useless, like most fauns. But here, in this book, he was useful, though scared. He even helped the other nature spirits to sabotage the Emperor’s weapons, staying behind on the ships, sacrificing his own life to ensure that it was done right. He survives, but not for long. As he’s dying, he talks with Apollo:

“Hey, Apollo, you- you know the difference between a faun and a satyr…?”

[…]

A moment later, his body collapsed with a noise like a relieved sigh, crumbling into fresh loam. In the spot where his heart had been, a tiny sapling emerged from the soil. I immediately recognized the shape of those miniature leaves. Not a hemlock. A laurel - the tree I had created from poor Daphne, and whose leaves I had decided to make into wreaths. The laurel, the tree of victory.

One of the dryads glanced at me. “Did you do that…?”

I shook my head. I swallowed the bitter taste from my mouth.

“The only difference between a satyr and a faun,” I said, “is what we see in them. And what they see in themselves. Plant this tree somewhere special.: I looked up at the dryads. “Tend it and make it grow healthy and tall. This was Don the faun, a hero.” (398-399)

The difference between a satyr and a faun, in other words, is nothing physical. It’s societal and psychological. I believe that Apollo is also, to an extent, talking about gods and mortals. The gods have long believed that they can’t change and mature like mortals, but also, largely, that they don’t need to because they’re gods; they’re above mortals. But Apollo has seen - has experienced - that that isn’t true. That mortals and gods may have different power levels, but at their heart, they’re not so different.

It also says something about his more recent state, as Lester, when he’s considered himself useless - when others have considered him... well, not exactly useless, but not all that useful either in the early books. But sort of like with Don, the difference between him and the demigod heroes, who are at sort of similar power levels, more has to do with what people see in him, and what he sees in himself. How he’s thinking about himself now. What it means to be a hero. To be a good person.

By the end of the book, Apollo’s regained a lot of his godly power, but it hasn’t changed who he’s become. Because it was never godhood that made him who he was, him beginning to regain that godhood isn’t changing who he is, who he’s become, what he’s gained from being Lester. I know some people have worried about Apollo potentially rejecting godhood, but I really don’t see that happening. He’s already regaining his godhood on HIS terms. The power from godhood was never the problem. Only what that godhood was used for.

Personally, I suspect that he’ll continue to use Lester sometimes, as a reminder of that part of his life, of what he’s learned, of what he’s become, even after he’s regained all his power. He may even keep something similar to his Lester form (though I suspect with less flab and acne). But he’ll keep the power. Because he can use that to help others, to try to make up in some small way for all that he’s done.

#trials of apollo #ttt spoilers #lester papadopoulos #the tyrant's tomb #the tyrant's tomb spoilers #toa #ttt #analysis

[ask-the-german-commander]

Haunted by a previous fate

Alright, I’ve finally written that angst piece I promised you all. At least I think it’s angst. Anyway, it’s a thought I’ve been wanting to share. I’ve put a little GerFra in there but that’s not the focus of the story. 

Word count: 3109, a bit longer than expected.

Enjoy! 

“Ludwig.” Francis walked over to me after the meting. He invited me for some coffee as usual. I accepted. It was always very delightful to have some coffee with him after such long, tiresome meetings. These meetings, yes, such chaotic and unstructured things, always drained me of all my energy. I cannot stand things that aren’t organized well. And of course since nobody else will, I end up being the one who tries to give the entire mess some form of structure, because that’s the German I am. However, it costs a lot of effort and I swear some day my voice will leave me for good if I have to continue screaming. Don’t even get me started about the patience it takes to deal with this bunch. Even if I told Francis and Arthur a million times to stop fighting, they never keep it. Of course both of them apologize to me afterwards. Alfred is loud and full of unrealistic ideas, but at least he doesn’t start a fight with others, even tho he was very close to get in a fight with Ivan more than once. I keep worrying about Feliciano who made falling asleep a habit during these meetings. I wonder if he never gets enough sleep or if he’s just always tired (the same goes for his brother). I keep waking him during the meetings, because I think it’s important that he knows what’s going on. But a few minutes later he already got distracted. As per usual, I brief him about the important things after the meeting is done. I can’t just leave him clueless, that would be very irresponsible. Amongst all this chaos, I am very grateful for Kiku’s calming presence and also Matthew’s. I must admit, sometimes I keep forgetting about him, which makes me feel bad. But I’m glad he’s there, at least it gives me someone normal to talk to. Having said this, it’s always such a relief when we end the meeting, but I never have a satisfying feeling. We never get everything done that’s on the agenda.

Francis and I went to our usual place and I treated him on his favourite kind of coffee. Just like every time, we sat down at a table near the window. I loosened my tie and my shirt a bit. Having the upper button closed, it always felt as if I was suffocating but I needed to look presentable, right? Francis observed me as I did so and had a little smirk on his face. Ah yes, he always liked it when it looked like I was undressing myself. What a silly man but who could blame him. If he’d do the same I couldn’t look away either. “Mon cher, how do you manage to look handsome in everything you do?” He asked teasingly before he took a sip of his coffee. I was silent for a second but had to smile as I grabbed my cup of coffee. “You tell me.” I said softly and took a sip. Hm, this was excellent coffee and just what I needed after such a day. Francis smiled charming at me after I had made my comment. His smile, it was one of the greatest things I’ve seen honestly. It was so sweet and charming and I loved seeing it on him. But of course I didn’t admit that on that day. No we had something more urgent to talk about. Or, well, Francis asked about it, because his curiosity knows no limits. 

 “Say Ludwig, you’re such a strong, and handsome, man. You’ve been through so much in your life that it seems you aren’t afraid of anything. You face all the complications and crises of the world as if it’s the most normal thing to you. You don’t lose focus or panic, like, I regret to admit, me. How do you do that? Do you even fear anything?” I was quiet. I had not expected this at all, it really came out of the blue. It was true, that I didn’t panic, because I am disciplined enough to keep my cool in a crisis. Panic just makes you inefficient and leads to nothing. But of course I worry a lot, way too much actually. Feliciano warned me not to worry too much but it hasn’t worked so far. I was sipping my coffee as I thought about Francis’ question. Honestly I had no idea how I should reply to this. But that probably wouldn’t satisfy Francis. Then I started to think back on what had caused me to be like this. 

 I know that I am very young for a nation, barely 200 years old. But yet I have matured much faster than the rest. Gilbert once told me that it has to do with the fact that I had to grow up fast. Since the day I became a nation in 1871 I had no time for playing around. It was serious from the start. From that day I could immediately feel my body getting stronger but I wasn’t growing yet. At first I wasn’t too concerned about that. But then I heard from my siblings what had happened to my predecessor, Holy Rome. They told me I reminded them of him a lot, not just in my appearance but also in my character, I suppose. I wasn’t sure how I should feel about the rest of my siblings. They were all quite sceptical at first when I became a nation. Obviously most weren’t very fond of the unity I had brought upon them. Many were happy being autonomous kingdoms and states, so they really weren’t waiting for some sort of unity, which would take that away. Luckily not all my siblings were sceptical. But still those first few years were a hard time for me. I tried so hard to resolve fights between them and strengthen my personal relationship with them, but the attitude of some just made it impossible. For example Bavaria wanted to have nothing to do with me at first and Saxony didn’t exactly like me either. I tried not to take it too personal, as Gilbert told me, but I couldn’t exactly shut it out either. 

But back to Holy Rome. I never really knew what happened to him before I started asking my siblings some questions. I knew he reigned for almost a 1000 years and that was truly admirable. But when I heard that he never physically grew out to be an adult, because there was no sense of unity among my other siblings, my perception of the Empire changed a bit. Here I thought he has always been strong but he wasn’t, at least not always. He’s been slowly dying since the 17th century, so I heard. In the 19th the French made a definite end to him. Then he vanished. Gilbert told me, that the unity wasn’t strong enough to keep him alive. Over the years the states and kingdoms all wanted power to themselves and eventually that killed him. I wasn’t an idiot. The states finally had autonomous power to themselves after Holy Rome was gone, of course they didn’t like me coming by and taking it from them with a unified Germany. And at this point the fact that I wasn’t physically growing started to scare me and stress me out greatly. Why, you might think. It takes time for a body to grow. No you don’t understand. I was scared to death that my fate would be the same as Holy Rome’s. 

 My siblings might have treated me well when I first appeared, but wasn’t a country yet. But I could see they didn’t really want me around when I became a nation. They tried to cling onto that individuality and the fact that Gilbert, Prussia, had the lead in this unified Germany didn’t please many of them either. I’ve always looked up to Gilbert and I’ve learnt many things from him. But I also had to learn that my siblings not always liked him and thought very different about him. So when I wasn’t growing and my scars from the unification weren’t healing I lived with the fear that I might vanish like my predecessor did, because the unification didn’t work. It didn’t help that I was still a child. It was a nightmare. The worst part was that I never told Gilbert about it. No I didn’t want to appear weak in front of him. He was so strong and I really wanted to be like him when I grew older, if I grew that was. These things were really stressing me out and I had legit nightmares about it. Sometimes I wasn’t able to sleep at all. The fate of Holy Rome haunted me. 

 Luckily after the first 10 years or so of being a nation, I finally started to grow. Slowly. but I did and I felt so relieved! I knew that the unification would work over time and I started to get less haunted by Holy Rome’s fate and the fear of vanishing. At that point I said to myself, that I would grow out to be stronger than him even, I would make it to adulthood and be the strongest country in Europe. How naïve I was. I was too blinded by what my brother Gilbert had learnt and told me. His militarism had made its way deep into my mind. So of course when 1914 arrived, I was enthusiastic about the war! It was my first war after all. We, the German Empire, were the strongest and we’d win this war swiftly! Nobody was a match for us. We were so sure of ourselves. It of course helped a lot that I was already full grown and that was just another sign of the German Empire’s strength. I remember tat Gilbert was so proud of who I had become to be. And I was so happy he said that. But as you all know the war was a disaster. In 1918 I was weakened greatly, much of my territory was taken away. Well, much of Gilbert’s territory actually. But that wasn’t what concerned me the most. I was physically feeling weak too, also because the political system of the time, the Weimar Republic, was just a big failure too. It was the most instable system I had ever experienced, the hyperinflation didn’t help obviously. I felt ashamed of the state I was in. And here again, the fate of Holy Rome started to haunt me. It was ridiculous, but those first few years after the war I had troubles to get my country back into an organized state and I’ve already explained that I don’t like unorganized things. My nights were sleepless. Unlike now I couldn’t keep my cool and I was worried where this chaos would lead me. To a dictatorship I regrettably must admit. You all know how that ended. But I want to mention here that in 1933 my strength was returning and when 1939 was upon us, I was ready to face another war. I hate to admit, but I wanted revenge for what the world had done to me and my brother, Gilbert. Little did I know it would only end even worse. So much worse. 

My country was in ruins after the war had finally ended. My people were starving, most of my men went missing or were dead. Almost half my territory was taken away. Don’t get me wrong, I probably deserved this punishment after the horrible things my country had done. At least I thought so. Gilbert was even in a worse state than me. As if this wasn’t enough, the allies decided to dissolve Prussia. My brother was going to vanish. My brother, to whom I’ve looked up to all these years, who had raised me and protected me, wasn’t going to be there anymore. I couldn’t believe it and I tried to plead for him but I was in no position to do so. It had been decided. And here again, the fate of my predecessor started to come back to me. Just like him, I was weakened by war. But at least the unity wasn’t falling apart. That wasn’t enough to keep me from worrying. The future at the time was uncertain for me. I had no idea what was going to happen and I didn’t have my fate in my own hands either. The Allies were deciding things for me. I was scared of the future. I had no idea how I was going to cope with everything. Not with the future and not with the past either. And the fact that Holy Rome was haunting me again didn’t help. I felt so weak and helpless; I really thought I wasn’t going to exist anymore either and that I, just like the ones before me, would vanish. Maybe it is just something very German to be in an existential crisis so often. When I look back it certainly is something I have experienced a lot since the day I became a country. I didn’t really have a childhood, not the one other nations had. There was just no time. The historical circumstance required me to mature much faster than others. I had to learn to adapt and cope with lots of problems and crises. These things were important and needed to be taken serious. There was no room to fool around. Nowadays it surprises me that I’ve managed to do so in a time span of 50 years, which is nothing in terms of nation age. 

The last existential crisis I had to face was the building of the wall, which had torn my country in half. As you might imagine my childhood fear came back but I managed to live with it for 40 years. By then I had gotten used to this fear returning every time I was divided and - it didn’t bother me too much from functioning properly anymore. But you could imagine my joy when the wall fell and once again I was unified. However, there is still a division between east and west, from which I’ve gotten one scar left. It’s been slowly healing but who knows when it will fully be gone.

“Ludwig?” I was ripped out of my thoughts by a familiar voice. Oh right, I was still in that café with Francis who asked me something. The question, that triggered all of this. I opened my mouth to say something but closed it again. No I couldn’t possibly tell him all this. I couldn’t bring up Holy Rome in his presence, I know he’d feel guilty about it again. Still, I should be honest with him. Nobody knows about my childhood trauma, maybe he as my best and closest friend should be the first one to know. Enough time had passed now anyway. 

“Were you lost in thought?” Francis said with a smile. I just nodded and took another sip of my coffee. Luckily it wasn’t cold yet. 

 “You ask me how I cope with this current situation of crisis?” I paused. He nodded. “That’s easy actually, I’ve never known much different. As long as I can remember I’ve always lived in a state of crisis.” I looked at my cup on the table, not wanting to see the expression on Francis’ face change. 

“Mon cher, that can’t be true… right?” He asked a little uncertain. I managed to look up and as I thought Francis’ expression had changed from joy to something concerned and sad. “You know I had to go through four different stages of political systems in not even a 100 years.” I said softly and tried to sound as neutral as I could. “That leaves its mark on you.” I added before taking another sip. For a moment nobody said something and I tried to analyse Francis’ behaviour. “But of course I had my moments of joy.” I finally added with a weak smile. It wasn’t a lie, it were just not so many moments. The most enjoyable moments and the time I was most carefree was before I became a nation. But I wasn’t going to tell him that. It seemed to cheer him up a little as I noticed the smile appearing back on his face. 

 “But does that also make you fearless?” He asked after another few moments of silence. Of course he wouldn’t let that go. I put my cup back down on the table. It was almost empty. I drink too fast when I’m lost in thought. 

 “Every nation got its fears.” I just said and hoped to put and end to this topic. “That is true yes. But it seems you have none Ludwig. You’ve faced the great quarrels of the past and you grew out to be even stronger afterwards. I couldn’t possibly imagine that you would be afraid of something at this stage.” He said rather careful. Well, there wasn’t really a way I could get out of this now, was there? The thought of confessing my fears to him made me uncomfortable. In the past I’ve always hid my emotions and fears in order to appear stronger, just like Gilbert had taught me. But since I’m with Francis I’ve learnt to open up more. I know he would never tell anyone, I trust him. 

 “It would seem so indeed.” I agreed on his previous comment. “But it’s not the truth.” I hesitated and noticed Francis’ expression was filled with expectation. “I…. “ I tried to get the words out of my mouth but it was much harder than I thought. My muscles tensed up and my hand was shaking a little. The other wasn’t an idiot and of course noticed. Suddenly I felt his hand take mine. “Don’t be nervous Ludwig. You know you can tell me.” His voice was so soft and soothing, it calmed me down. How did he do this? How could he always be so caring? 

 “Will you promise me not to think different of me?” 

 “Of course not Ludwig.” 

I nodded and took a deep breath. Alright, he had the right to know. Maybe it was best if we as close associates and friends knew each other’s weaknesses as well. Besides, the fear wasn’t that alive anymore these days. I am certain that I will be stronger than Holy Rome. I already am. And so I started to explain it all to him. But while I was talking, I couldn’t stop thinking, when it would be my turn to vanish like my predecessors did.

#headcanons #aph germany #aph france #angst #hetalia #aph fanfiction

[trillian8]

Groundhog Day Fan Week, pt.8

Day 8--Life After the Loop

“I’m Back”

Phil dreamt of this day for so long. He first thought of it when he was a different man, an empty shell of snark and bravado in a tiny van barreling up a northbound highway. He screamed it in the face of all the quack doctors that tried to “help” him. He saw it every night in his head before the alarm clock ripped another hole in his psyche. Lastly, as a fleeting thought quickly disposed of at the wish of the first person who ever really mattered to him. The day had finally come. . . . .Phil Connors was going home.

This is where all the stories end, the hero goes on a fantastical journey of self discovery and then goes home. But how do you do that? After experiencing such profound change and unexplainable phenomenon, what do you do? How do you go back to a life that doesn’t recognize you anymore? Phil has experienced the whole gambit of the human condition in “one day”, but knows he has so much real work left to go.

All of this swirls around in his head as the small town literally becomes smaller and smaller in the rear view mirror of the van. Larry is quietly drumming his fingers against the wheel as he drives. Rita is in the seat behind him getting her production notes in order. Both are blissfully unaware that Phil is having a massive existential crisis verging on anxiety attack. Admittedly, he is a little annoyed that they haven’t noticed, and then he feels like an ass for thinking that and starts his “I’m never gonna be able to keep this up” shame spiral. 20 minutes into the real world and he’s already freaking out.

It’s a good thing that he still has a good hour or so to go before he’s around any other people. An hour or so more thinking time, which he supposes could swing either way on the “healthy/not healthy for my sanity” scale. He wasn’t naive, he knew sitting on that park bench with Rita’s head resting on his shoulder that all of this mess was coming. But, when you’re faced with dwelling on how to confront the world now that you’ve have been so changed or debating with the most wonderful and simultaneously annoyingly stubborn person you have ever met whether or not she could get every person in town to give her a high-five (he lost that argument, and $20, but gained a make-out session behind the clocktower, so it evened out), well . . .it’s not really a contest.

Of course that’s gonna be one of the first things to go, being so casual with Rita. They talked, obviously, about how much fun they had these past few days and how they really want to make an effort to make this work. But back at the station there’s more rules, more expectations on how they need to be and he just knows this is going to lead to ruin. I mean, he can’t even think of where her office even is in the building, let alone who it is that she usually spent her time with there. She mentioned in one of the loops that people warned her about him, I’m sure they’re going to be thrilled when they walk in hand in hand (Not to mention the fire-lit hoops HR is going to put them through). No one there is going to understand what the hell she is thinking being with a guy “like him”, he barely does.

God the station, that’s a whole can of worms by itself without the Rita element. 10 years of arrogance and general assholery isn’t going to get swept under the rug with a smiley  “Hi, how are you today!” and buying everyone coffee. Phil never gave anyone behind the camera the time of day and saw the on camera talent as rivals that needed to be schmoozed or crushed. He always presented himself as popular and in control, but he understands now that probably the only part anyone could stand about him was that he knew how to throw a great party. No one is just going to forget or care that he can do all sorts of incredible things now (In fact he’s pretty sure that it’ll piss the research team right the hell off).

And he’s not even going to unlock the Pandora's Box of his brain that is relations with his family

Sweet Chocolate Christ he’s so Fucked!

Well and truly out of his depth . . .he might as well sell his place and just move to Punxsutawney full time, become the weird old hermit man that dishes out life lessons to the local children and does some strange hobby like whittling till he dies.

He could pull that off . . . maybe . . .for a month

“Phil?”

“Oh, hey Rita, what’s up?” Nice nonchalant delivery dumb-ass

“You look miles away there, are you okay?”

“Me . . .I’m fine”

Let’s do this

*Yea! This is officially the first full fanfic I’ve ever written. This started out like all of the other long-summery posts I had been doing for this week, but I figured since this is a special day, I should try to finish this thought (I might even write more to it, like what actually happens when Phil gets home as opposed to this just being in his head). This has been a wonderful week and I know that this fandom is only going to get stronger from here

#ghdfanweek2k17 #groundhog day #ghd #groundhog day fan week

[neureaux]

alright, so something not chill happened on my last day but hear me out (if u want lol) bc it turned out to be kind of good? for me

so, it’s the day before the last, and i’ve gotta change hotels to one closer to the airport to be better situated for my flight. so i’m plodding along with my walker, and i stop off for a final glass of wine before i go and check my email and they’d cancelled my reservation randomly. ok. so i realised i’d literally been spending into the hotel money because they’d put it back into my account so i panic and eventually end up calling my older brother (even though we like don’t talk) and he sends me juuust enough cash because i didn’t wanna ask my partner or my friends to deal with anymore of my stuff or to keep having to help me. ok.

so i’m on the tram there, it takes forever but i’ve got music so it’s chill, i’m tired af and it’s been not a great day for the feels so i’m stoked to get back and check into my new room. i get off the tram, and start walking what looks like a short distance on the map, but i realise my battery’s getting low. it’s fine, it’s like not a long walk and we got power saver mode. so i keep on trucking, ‘till i notice a growing stinging in my back and hips has gotten to a point where it was making movement difficult and i’m like, ‘yo how long have i been walking?’ bear in mind, i quickly realised that these roads were suuuper fucked up (like alternating terrain dirt roads/rocks etc) and i was trying to control a FULLY loaded walker and a pull along suitcase precariously hooked onto one side and it was *not* going well. anyway, i look closely at the route and realise my ass is 1.5 miles away, and there’s no fucking transport there. at this point i obviously can not afford the taxi that it would make sense to immediately call. so, i keep walking and decide i’m walking a couple miles today.

now in the last half a mile or so, my phone dies without warning and that’s sort of where shit hits the fan, ‘cause we can’t figure out directions without our phones (at least, i can’t) and so i get lost almost immediately AND have no music and my thoughts just catch up with me, especially with my body in this much pain, the underfoot terrain getting worse and worse like that and me having to twist and wrench my spine to drag my suitcase out of potholes and bigger and bigger muddy ditches, after a while i’d been waking for legit hours and i was just like... despairing lmao. so, there’s this weird, dark, wet and DEEP ravine/ditch and obviously i get stuck in it all the while not really knowing where i am, and i’m in so much pain and i’m panicking, the way out looks so steep and impossible and i was going over and over how simple the solutions to avoid things like this actually were/are when your life is normal/starts normally and thought of a taxi and why i couldn’t get one, how much the crazy awful luck in my life affects even the most simplest of things and makes them a battle for me and how much everyone i love always has to slog it out with me or give something they have for me to even be on an even playing field to experience normal things or be normal and how much of a gross, bad luck riddled anchor i felt like to everyone i know and love and i finally settled on the fact that i knew that i genuinely felt like they would be better off if none of them knew me and i just fucking lost. my. shit. it was totally private and there was nobody around except for passing cars on a motorway i’d spotted over the top of the ditch past the steep drop, it must’ve been about 30-40 meters deep if not more. i fucking screamed over and over again at the top of my lungs, and i cried from my gut, like an unfiltered child, open mouthed and just roaring, i must have sounded like i was legit fucking dying but looking back, it was catharsis. in London, there aren’t many places where you don’t have to worry about other people or your neighbours and cap your tears and your sadness and blunt and mute your feelings and it’s the same in your everyday life there too, pretending things hurt less than they do and forcing yourself to endure shit you don’t want to and do it with an acceptable amount of feeling only; too much is too much and too little is as if it never happened at all - point is, there’s so much emotional complexity in being a societal participant and loved one in London and in that moment i was alone, in a foreign country, my body was giving up and my muscles burned, and i was freezing, i was tired and my heart was heavy with pain and i knew i had no choice but to take this steep drop or force my body to walk like an hour backwards to get out which i knew i couldn’t physically handle and i just let it rip i guess, the space around me seemed almost endless and dark, and i just screamed and cried for a while in a way that i’ve wanted to for months and let out some emotions that i had wrestled to the back of my mind. and then after a while i put my walker in park, jammed my cane into the mud and grass inside the ditch grabbed the pull handle of my suitcase and dragged it up the hill that seemed impossible at my own pace and with my own adapted methods, gradually tugging it up there literally screaming in both anguish and pain lol.

i must have looked insane, honestly but there was nobody out there to help, and i had tried to find help or flag someone down when i still had access to the road and it was just desolate, like 3 cars an hour type shit and by the time it got to that point i looked crazy so they weren’t particularly inclined to stop, i don’t blame them. it felt like it took forever and the triumph of actually making it was short lived, because i had to go back for my walker with everything on it which obviously was 1. really, really hard without my walker lol and 2. Impossible looking because of the steepness AND wet, slipperiness of the hill and how much i had already struggled with something much lighter and 3. pain??? so i knew instantly that it would be way harder but i just did the same, i’m not even sure how really? it took me way longer but i just dragged it up screaming, mud everywhere, i felt like that one anecdote of a mother lifting a car off of her child with sheer adrenaline and maternal instinct my sweet dudes. lmao, it must have been an aaaabsolute sight and i could not make this shit up.

so i reach the top right, i’m heaving and i’m on the side of the motorway with my bags and shit and i’m just crying openly on the motorway now i don’t give a fuck, like i was too tired to dance emotionally for the cars & act ‘together’ lmao and after a while somehow i just start like limping down the side of it, and the crying was just like some feeble autopilot mode shit and my whole face was like numb, and it was just a few minutes before this kind Muslim man stopped at the side of the road and i told him my phone was dead and we googled my hotel’s address and he’d told me the hotel was like a few minutes away and showed me on the map, and he was like ‘hop in’ and i’m like ‘fuck it, i’d probs die if i kept trying to walk and drag all this shit with me anyway’ so i hop in the car and he takes me back there, and i avoid eye contact and stop crying pretty much when i get in and say than you and besides some crying on and off from the relief of my hotel room, the tears tapered off. i still felt pretty bad but i spoke to my younger brother for a few hours (who i was actually trying to call earlier when i spoke to my elder one) and he made me feel better and sent some cash for breakfast etc. he said that he feels similar sometimes, but there’s something positive we can take from every moment of pain, and he’s the one that pointed out that like, maybe i needed a place to do that? despite him wishing i didn’t have to hurt myself and walk for miles to find it, maybe in some strange way it was a bit serendipitous because i never have the space to feel the pain that having less conventional lives like ours brings and i think he’s right at least in part.

regardless, besides telling one of my friends the cliffnotes, i gotta go back and essentially pretend that this didn’t happen and i’ve probably gotta downplay it to that friend - and that’s sort of why i think i needed it. we can’t really react to having lives like this in the ways that it deserves to be reacted to, as adults we’re confined and constricted and there’s sort of a conveyer belt fashion feel to emotions and How To Feel Appropriately with added layers as brits, especially with also being emotionally close with a couple of people that aren’t emotionally developed enough to handle emotions that may or may not be a bit extraordinary or ‘a lot’ occasionally(e.g. a trauma survivor in crisis), so you have to kind of guide them through your pain and make sure you don’t scare them with the force of it lol. so as much as i didn’t really get to express myself to anyone in my life in a way that felt 100% or really get to feel even sort of understood by anyone except someone that had experienced some of the trauma with me, i got it out of me and in that moment i was honest with me, and my emotions, feelings and experiences and i felt like i faced that pain and i looked at it for what it was and how i perceived it at that moment. it honestly almost feels like an epiphany for me, but we’ll have to see about when i get home.

i’ve got a bunch of stressful shit to sort out when i come home and like i always say, i have to clean up and do damage control for the effects of 2018 (and like january honestly) and this isn’t to say i won’t cry sometimes or feel overwhelmed or stressed, i’m not an idiot but i feel like The Big Cry has happened, and i’ve taken something away from that and i can choose to let that something be useful to me, or not. i think it’ll be healthy for me to choose the former in the long run. so honestly i guess the moral here is like go scream in the woods or smth i don’t know lol, conventional solutions aren’t always the remedy or part of catharsis for unconventional pain and you never know, some small part of you might feel relieved that it’s not just bouncing around inside of you and damaging shit that it touches even symbolically - but i just know that i feel a little less... something

#annasequilibrium #actuallyptsd #actuallycptsd #spoonie #cpunk #idk if this’ll help someone or something or what but #idk just in case #might take the tags down later

[nlinak]

Netherlands in Alaska 

Episode 51

December 17th, 2016

Dazzled Sticks

Although this eponymous album released about a year ago, there are few works of art that better sum up the mix of malaise and madness that we have experienced in the world the past few years and, perhaps especially, in the last few weeks. 

The self-titled work, a collaboration between indie rocker/producer Dazzled Kid and well known Dutch-hiphop pioneer Sticks, is hard to pin down as one might assume with such antipodal partners.  It is stripped down, with only one small guest verse from Adje interrupting the otherwise standalone musicians, yet never feels empty, or wanting for sound; it is uplifting in sound, but also contained lyrics which Sticks describes as “The heaviest s••t that I’ve ever written.”  At times it feels like your attending a dance-party handily DJ’d by Dazzled Kid, when all of a sudden that wise, older friend of yours that just drinks whiskey leans in and reminds you about payday loans ripping off the working class, and just as that hits you, the DJ begins singing “Light, oh Light, Light at the end of the tunnel.” Though you now are unsure if it meant as a check-and-balance on the depressing bit, or if it is meant ironically, or if that light is a freight-train.  

“The way we began [this project] itself wasn’t ‘light’” Dazzled Kid, born Tjeerd Bomhof, explained in an interview with 3voor12. “our starting point was: it can come to pass that you suddenly aren’t here anymore.”

That starting point, to be more precise, was the funeral of a young man, whose top streams on Spotify happened to contain Sticks, who was contacted by the boy’s family to perform his song, Spaanse Vlieg, at his funeral.  In the same interview with 3voor12 MC Sticks explained it this way:

“I didn’t want to show up and perform with hard beats at a funeral, I thought it’d be inappropriate; instead I wanted to sort of do an acoustic version, [record producer] Kees de Koning said, ‘I’ll call Tjeerd, he’ll be there anyway.’  The morning of the funeral I went to Tjeerd’s house, shook his hand for the first time and we went through the song a few times and went straight to the service.”

The one time performance quickly turned into more however, as Stick explains:

“We wanted to record the song for his family and friends, as a sort of support.  But once we were in the studio it felt forced...we started messing around, he strummed something out on guitar.  Helemaal Niks (Engl: Nothing at All) the last track on the album came out of that moment.  That song for me exudes that feeling, in the lyrics as well; melancholic, but also: ‘its alright.’”

It didn’t take long for the lyrical depth, expertly executed compositions, and humanity of the album to really hit me; personally I was hooked while listening to the 2nd track, Blijven Lopen (Engl: Keep Going) in which the listener is treated to this, somewhat rambling, musing:

”Everything’s collapsing, 

drastic cuts to pensions,

a season of crisis,

try to keep my head fresh,

Vidal Sasoon.”

He continues:

“The speakers go ‘boom’

Cloaked in black, Roy Orbison.

I wanted to be a good role model for the Youth,

but I never saw it through,

yeah you get it...

Flash mobs, Harlem Shake:

Enjoy or don’t go, or be granite”

When interview Sticks mentioned this song specifically as being important to the album as a whole, 

“On Blijven Lopen I rap; ‘they’re yet to get a cent from each euro of narrative hiphop’, you know.  There are so many stories inside, but many people think: clever, nice rhyming.....and that’s cool if that is what you get out of it.  I find Blijven Lopen to be a really important track on the album, the feeling that it broadcasts - right, wrong, bad, evil, prosperity, adversity -....with hiphop you get it all.”

The final stanza of the aforementioned verse, ‘Enjoy or don’t go, or granite’ may be confusing for some, but it is really a perfect example of what MC Sticks does best: a relaxed but conscious sense of rhythmic delivery, and clever wordplay that never sacrifices content.  In response to some of the most ubiquitous, obnoxious, and public examples of the meme culture of today, flashmobs and the “Harlem Shake” (in quotations) [or the mannequin challenge] Sticks gives us three options, “Enjoy or don’t go, or be granite (that is don’t exist)” which in his warm Zwolle dialect tenor sounds homophonic,“geniet of ga niet, of graniet.”

Indeed the album does not just provide a mirror to the current tumult in which we find ourselves, but also goes beyond superficial finger pointing, never without the clever interjections of popular culture that hiphop is known for, combining levity with deeper, heavier observation. 

In clever hook he riffs on the classic “Too many Mics, not enough MC’s” with

“Too many Berlusconis, too few Balotellis!”

This is yet another talent of the duo that really shines: highlighting hiphops ability to combine levity with deeper, heavier observation.   At one point on Blijven Lopen, Stick comments:

“Right on, like the piano on ‘I Like it Raw’”

[.....as a quote of the piano sample from the ODB hit ‘Shimmy Shimmy Ya’ can be heard in the background, and Dazzled Kid croons the track’s refrain; lyrics plucked from a song about sex without prophylactics, used to showcase resistance to dark times, staring into the abyss and telling the abyss you aren’t bothered by the darkness.]

There is one line, however, which the group has been asked about repeatedly from the track ‘de Tunnel’ (Engl: The Tunnel).  

“People scream, ‘Je Suis Charlie’, but please not at my release party.”

When asked if this was supposed to reflect the reaction one has when reading through the sunday paper and wishing that bad news wouldn’t cloud your weekend Sticks said,

“It is the reaction to the news that always fascinates me, how people behave, how people twist it.   What happened in Paris is of course horrible, but what really shocks me is how it gets twisted so people use it as a form of self-pity to promote themselves.   One to the one hand it really bothers me, but I also find it really surprising that people are using hashtags and avatar-changes on Twitter to show, ‘look how upright my Instagram is.’  Of course you can have honest compassion, but the second you start twittering about someone that died or a catastrophic events, it can quickly turn into a form of self-promotion.”

Dazzled Kid followed up on the subject, explaining how he tries to actively remove himself from the digital world, to form and maintain real connections to those who matter, and have a more balanced view of the world- far from the outrage cycle of the news and social media; adding that, 

“The period of Je Suis Charlie hysteria has really shown how disconnected many people really are.”

Sticks, who had obviously been deep in thought while listening to his musical partner speak added, 

“And you know what’s the most unbelievable part of all of this? A week later and you don’t hear anything about it.  Everyone’s focused on [soccer legend] Johann Cruijf, who was diagnosed with lung cancer. That is the Je Suis Charlie of the week.”

When I went with a good friend Matt D. to see them perform Utrecht’s ‘De Heling’ venue in February earlier this year, I didn’t know what to expect.  Normally speaking, hiphop and indie are two genres that tend to be maligned as ‘non-conducive to live performances.’ With the pre-recorded nature of many modern hip-hop acts and the loss of dynamics on the part of the MC, and the aloof shoegaze of many hipster rock groups I can see where this stems from.  Dazzled Sticks proved to be anything but boring.  Though Sticks arrived wearing what appeared to be an athletic warm-up sweat suit, he immediately began popping and locking between verses, Dazzled Kid literally bounding back and forth between guitar-hero power stances, and meticulously retooling his various sample pads, eyes maintaining a size somewhere between caffeinated owl and teacup saucer. 

Though to many the arrangement may seem like an odd coupling, Sticks is as collaborative and active as perhaps any musician in recent memory; we’ve already featured him as part of the legendary Opgezwolle crew, the Fakkelbrigade, and Greatminds. Though meeting under odd circumstances, some may call it fate that this duo would form; like Sticks’ Tribe Called Quest reference on the albums final track, 

“I Left My Wallet in El Segundo,

Dazzled Kid said, ‘Cool, I have to go that way anyway.’”

Things may look bleak, and the harshness of winter and semester finals might not be helping, but the last line of Sticks verses on ‘Blijven Lopen’ for me, provide a bit of optimism, however small,

“Obnoxious,

all’s going to hell,

you might find yourself thinking...

well, good.”

Tracklist:

1. Zegevieren

2. Blijven Lopen

3. Wat Je Doet Voor Een Ander

4. Body Rap

6. Dans

7. Eind Decembertje

8. Soeffies (ft. Adje)

9. Hooligans In Bloomingdale

10. Trammelant 

11. De Tunnel

12. Helemaal Niks