#rather than actually caring about caleb or his character or actual racism | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sketchy-scribs-n-doods · 1 year

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ughh ty for ur amazing tags it was so disgusting how they were 1. telling on themselves claiming poc and fat people aren't attractive and 2. wishing racism and body shaming on an actor in the name of justice(??). not that im surprised anyway their crowd was the one that demonized lucas and ignored caleb for years. one of my favorite characters is patrick and he wasn't allowed even a nightmare sequence he was just forgotten by the narrative and brushed off. a Black victim of abuse not even given a voice, just forcibly suppressed and used to move the plot along to fuel jason's satanic bullshit. he is ignored by the large majority of the fandom that focuses all their attention on white boy of the week but think hating billy is enough to compensate for their favouritism and racism. i hate how poc are treated in this show but its not enough for ppl to just direct all their performative criticism on a character they want actual racist harassment directed at them too. so disgusting.

i don't normally beef on the internet (i much prefer throwing hands irl actually, but ppl seem to enjoy hiding their shit behind a screen lol), but i really did such a hard double take at those tags.

i really can't fathom tearing down another character because your fav gets shit. i fully understand that characters like lucas and argyle don't get a lot of attention and that's likely a combination of a) the duffer's own bias sidelining those characters, and b) fans' bias in ignoring poc. that doesn't mean i'm gonna throw hands with your average eddie or steve stan or whatever, i don't find that productive. i'd rather engage with fans that already enjoy my fav or are open to consuming content about them and encourage (in this long winded example) eddie stans to enjoy argyle content without making them feel guilty about their blorbo.

same goes for every time i see someone thinking that if they kick down billy it will elevate nancy or lucas or max or eddie or steve. it's petty, it doesn't work, and the only things that result from it are a) an echo chambers where all your fellow salty mutuals will yes man you, or b) ppl who like what you just talked shit about are gonna roll up asking what your damage is. lo and behold.

even putting all of the dumb nancy vs billy nonsense aside (and for the record i think the duffers badly wrote both characters in different ways), those fucking tags were just. SUCH an accidental slip reveal of what that person really thinks. i don't think they're a horrible person or whatever but they're definitely a dick and think that as long as they hate the right character they're correct and good.

like you said, wishing bigotry on a person/character just because you don't like them is a weird fucking thing to say. at that point i barely care what the context of the post was. can you imagine saying that out loud in a room full of fat ppl/poc? i don't think any of them are gonna come to the conclusion that you mean it as a roundabouts insult against a popular hot white actor/character and go 'oh yes haha you're so right i totally think fans hating him for being brown/fat is preferable'. i personally would have torn down whoever said that shit to me irl, that's some white ass performative activism i don't have time for, but it seems like ppl don't think about how the shit they say would sound out loud irl to the very ppl they seem to be trying to support

nevermind that any given piece of billy fanfiction and an awful lot of fanart explores the trauma billy has gone through more than it goes 'ah yes blonde boy hot'. we can have tho conversations without being pricks saying shit in bad faith about it. like, most billy fans i see are huge fans of patrick and mourn his lost potential. because we know how the duffers treat their abused characters.

this shit isn't a contest, but often the shit you say about a character affects ppl who are similar to/identity with that character. if in your pursuit to hate and spit about a character, you say shitty things that make poc, fat ppl, abuse victims, etc., feel like you're insulting them or just using them as props for your wokeness, then you need to take a step back and ask yourself if maybe you needa chill and reevaluate what you're doing. it's not a good look, and neither is the mindset that revenge and punitive 'justice' should be prioritized above healing, growth, and connection.

(like c'mon we can redeem fictional war criminals but we can't let an 18 year old being abused by his dad work through his racial biases? like the latter isn't a much more common situation that happens irl to real abused teens with bigoted parents? alright)

anyway, i'm glad you appreciated my tag rambles, i really was just word vomiting in a fury lol

if you love patrick and enjoy the idea of patrick and billy interacting, i have a # patrick mcckinley tag and a # kingr*ve tag for each respectively (i lump all my patrick and billy stuff under their ship whether platonic or romantic bc patrick stuff is scarce enough as it is). cheers!

#billy hargrove #apologies for the wank but oof today was a doozy #poc fans of billy once again and holding your hands in mine #srry if this is a bit of a late reply anon i had class #ask sketchy

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kareenvorbarra · 5 years

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i’ve been rewatching campaign 2 whenever i start to miss the gang during breaks between new episodes, and i’m on ep 11 which is in the midst of the zadash arc and right around the time things start to heat up with the knights of requital, and caleb and beau go to the tri-spire district for the first time and matt makes a point of noting the stark income inequality in zadash and how it doesn’t sit well with the main characters, and later on beau and caleb have a short conversation about it, and.....idk i’m watching campaign 1 for the first time and i’ve enjoyed it a lot so far (i’m at the very beginning of the whole chroma conclave thing) but it was so jarring to watch that and have the main characters be wealthy and famous and on good terms with the king most of the time, and to see these themes that i like so much in campaign 2 go relatively unaddressed - emon has a district that’s pretty much exactly like the tri-spires, gated off and guarded and with restricted entry, and nothing much is ever said about it except when vm is temporarily banned from entering.

which isn’t to say that campaign 1 never addresses issues of class or wealth or structural inequality, but it’s also not a major part of the story (or at least hasn’t been so far) and when they do talk about it it’s usually in reference to the experiences of individual characters rather than as large social issues. which is fine tbh, it’s not like that’s necessarily a bad thing, but i guess i got used to campaign 2 and i’m in the mood for that kind of social commentary right now. i love that the mighty nein are a bunch of sketchy nobodies, that some of them are actively on the run from the law, that all of them are outsiders in some way, that mostly they’re not at all confident in high society. jester and beau are the only characters who seem to have grown up wealthy, though neither of them are actual nobility (as far as i can tell; beau’s family sounds like its part of a wealthy merchant/business class); of the two of them, beau actively rejected that life and isn’t speaking to her parents, and while jester’s mother is extremely rich she has no power over actual nobility when it comes to legal/political issues (i wrote a whole other post about this ages before we actually met ruby and it pretty much still holds up imo). jester’s the only one who has that same sort of “rich person confidence” that percy does, where she can and will just steamroll her way into places by acting like she belongs there, despite her somewhat unconventional appearance.

everyone in the group has been hurt by structural inequality and people in official positions of power. nott rejected her own oppressive culture for another in which she has never been fully accepted, and can’t go out in public without a disguise for fear of being attacked. molly spent his formative years with a group of traveling performers, moving about the edges of society and experiencing mistrust for both his profession and his appearance. yasha is from a place that’s hostile to the empire and worships a banned deity, both of which could get her into serious trouble with the law. jester was sentenced to death for playing a prank on a nobleman. caleb was recruited from a poor rural community, trained to kill people for the government without question, and manipulated into murdering his own parents by an authority figure who now holds a high political office. fjord’s early life was defined by poverty and racism, and he dealt with it by altering his own appearance and behavior. caduceus grew up just outside an organized crime town and also worships a god banned in the empire. they’re a messy, conflicted, caring group of people and i’m ready to watch them bring down war criminals and corrupt government officials and more human traffickers and trent ikithon

#finally drunk enough 2 post this!!!!!!#it has no conclusion really but hey this isn't an academic assignment and i'm just writing it to get some stuff off my chest #i wrote it late at night a few days ago while rewatching 'zemian nights' so i could timestamp my fave caleb/jester moments #also i've been stuck on cr1 'the sunken temple' for weeks because i KNOW what's going to happen and i'm scared #fandom musings

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fugandhi · 6 years

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The Hypocrisy of Our Time

by Adam Wękarski (aka ATOMIK 1)

Jordan Peele’s story “Get Out” is one of the best films I have ever seen. If I had the privilege of being a member of the Academy, I would have voted this film for Best Picture (granted, I have yet to see a good amount of the other films that were in the running at the time so you can probably take that with a grain of salt) - I personally believe that if Jordan Peele had kept the original ending in the final cut of the film - it may have actually won Best Picture.

On the surface, this film is a very fun & exceptional horror movie, but this film manages to acquire various elements of different genres (some moments of drama, comedy, horror, suspense, mystery, romance). If you have not seen the film yet - do not read further - I am going to write about about various details within the film that will ruin the movie if you haven’t seen it - and trust me it’s totally worth watching (SO worth watching).

The film takes place around a man by the name of Chris Washington (Daniel Kaluuya; Amazing actor), who is a very talented, soft-spoken, young photographer - and he is brought to the family home of his girlfriend of 5 months, Rose Armitage (Allison Williams who portrays Rose disturbingly well/Her performance is impeccable as it must be viewed more than once to be fully understood) to stay at her family’s for the weekend. Prior to the couple leaving - we see Chris & Rose at his home getting ready while Chris asks, “Do they know that I’m black?” Immediately bringing the film’s focus to the considerable conflict of race and/or the racial question of being either accepted or not accepted simply for skin color into a new family through possible marriage.

As the couple travels to the Armitage estate - Chris calls his best friend (and my favorite character) - Rod Williams (played very, very well by the talented Milton ‘Lil Rel’ Howery). Rod is a key character throughout the story (as Jordan Peele had allegedly stated that he wanted to write “the most real character in a horror movie” with Rod Williams in which case I can say Yes that is absolutely accurate). Along the way, a deer seemingly darts across the front of the car and eventually dies alongside the road (which is an omen for what’s to come). What ensues at the home of the Armitage family is where the story truly takes off. There, we find the groundskeeper, as well as see the kind of privilege Rose was raised from.

Privilege is something the Armitage family has apparently had quite the access to (for quite some time). Their home represents a plantation - albeit the family is rather Liberal in their political and social beliefs - when Dean Armitage starts discussing his gratefulness for hearing about the couple having hit a deer on the way over - to some he may appear to be casually displaying a dislike for the animal, but for a deeper & hidden meaning there is an implication of underlying racial tension boiling beneath the surface. This is an insight into his subversive racism towards Chris & his subconscious racism being expressed through passive-aggressive means of communication (with Dean appearing to patronize and condescend Chris at times). Later, Dean Armitage walks with Chris and literally states, “by the way, I would have voted for Obama for a third term if I could - best President - hands down.” as he passes himself off as a charismatic & forward-thinking liberal (which shows the viewer the susceptibility of psychosis within the well-to-do arena - with politics being used as a tool to decorate one’s self as being more dignified or more affluent).

For a first-time viewing of the film - there is a dilemma of ambiguity with the Armitage parents - Bradley Whitford as Dean does an outstanding performance and Catherine Keener as Missy is no surprise to her acting abilities (she manages to successfully creep me out). These characters are “welcoming” Chris into the “family” which, for anyone who has already seen the film - we already know was an elaborate and disgusting right-of-passage (or initiation) into a demented and inhuman new life for our protagonist among people who are not who they appear to be.

After going through this family’s pleasantries and their informal evaluation of Chris (through a variety of “getting to know you” types of questions) - we are able to have a glimpse into the probability that something bizarre will indeed come around the corner (and soon). Despite the totally off vibe of this household - we learn through the story that Dean is essentially a neurologist (in which case his son, Jeremy, is following in his footsteps) and Missy, the matriarch, is a psychiatrist (who provides in-house therapy sessions).

Jeremy Armitage (Caleb Landry Jones) enters the scene - and we finally witness the family dynamics of this household at a dinner scene with the unsuspecting guest. Jeremy’s extremely blatant hostility towards Chris represents the continuation of racial tension that he has learned from his parents and grandparents (we find as the story unfolds) into this day-and-age’s post-adolscence and academic youth. Again - for anyone who has not seen this movie yet - do not continue reading this (haha) reading until you have seen the movie (because the story is that excellent).

In fact, a few bizarre moments happen in the film regarding the groundskeeper Walter and the housekeeper Georgina (both characters played exceptionally well by Betty Gabriel and Marcus Henderson). Upon first viewing, these characters definitely present the notion that something is a miss in the Armitage Estate, as they are the “care takers” of the estate (or later we find - they are not who they may appear to be - when applying symbolic commentary with use of historically relevant subtext, these characters symbolize what had been known as “House Slaves” when observed from the underlying message from Peele and his artistic statement regarding the “keeping up appearances” tactic of a white, privileged, sophisticated and rather upstanding family, of which holds some of the most diabolical and gut-wrenching secrets underneath their floorboards). Jeremy briefly mentions in conversation the effectiveness (like in Chess) to be 2 to 4 steps ahead of the opponent (a subtle hint of Jeremy’s belief that he is “superior” to Chris - his opponent - in the current game Chris has inadvertently began playing with Jeremy and the rest of the Armitage family, unbeknownst to him). The atmosphere of the film is highly eerie and borderline film noir to a certain degree (with it’s pacing and discovery with each scene’s determined writing and duplicitous dialogue - a genius stroke for Jordan Peele).

There is a moment in the film where Chris sits down to talk with Missy. Missy places Chris under hypnosis, against his will, and in which case Chris then goes into “The Sunken Place.” This is a very, very, very powerful moment in the film due to it’s disturbingly sinister & profoundly honest artistic statement that Peele is making: The silencing of humanity’s blackness by suppressing it further into a subconscious absence. The removal of sound from Chris’ voice, in my own interpretation, is the removal of Chris’ God-given free-will - by controlling his voice - controlling his mind - removing his ability to function - removing his will to breathe & live on his terms - to speak on his terms, with his own voice - without the governed powers (Missy) of privileged society dictating his next actions (by exploiting his vulnerability due to having lost his mother when he was a boy), which is an imprisonment of his soul.

In this scene (and each reference to “the sunken place”) - Chris is continuously sinking and falling in what appears to be a form of paralysis or suspended animation of the mind, symbolizing the restrictions & limitations placed on black men, women, and children due to the implemented hierarchy of age-old western society. The tea cup & constant swirling of the spoon by Missy is an instrument of controlling Chris (triggering him to go into a “dream state”) as Missy is showing her influence over him with her “heightened suggestibility” technique of control over him. Dean had stated earlier that Missy had developed her own method of hypnosis in order to cure Dean of his smoking, since smoking is frequently regarded as a “nasty habit” by everyone of whom Chris encounters. No one mentions smoking to Chris because they genuinely care about him - it is a method of suggestion in attempts to increase influence over him, by persistent suggestion and a illusory veil of compassion in order to gain a hidden agenda.

Chris encounters strange behavior all throughout his journey. Rose appears to be care-free or absent-minded during the entire first half of the film towards Chris’ concerns as she responds as an unsuspecting character (which we find out later was a part of the ruse). Chris approaches Walter, the groundskeeper, and this is where the story starts to take a turn into the bizarre even further due to Walter’s disturbingly unusual interaction with Chris. Walter and Georgina are powerfully effective characters in regards to Jordan Peele’s storytelling. Upon further introspection and when in thinking in terms of Peele’s artistic use of social commentary on high society and the trivialization of slavery (and where the two meet) - Walter & Georgina appear to be representative of the imprisonment of subservience and the intensity of what could appear to be a form of Stockholm Syndrome (later it’s revealed why they behave so unusually).

As the story continues - an annual get-together is celebrated at the home in honor of the grandparents. This get-together is mentioned by Missy as an attempt to keep the tradition going for the sake of the fondness & memory of their grandparents, especially after they had “died”, which we’ll get more into as I continue later on... This get-together is a social gathering for a ton of people who all happen to be more well-to-do - all educated, all sophisticated, but more importantly - all ignorant and completely symbolic of the overall ignorance of privileged society when attempting to empathize with anyone who is black and who has had to tolerate the ugly side of pomposity.

When first viewing the film - Chris is just meeting a bunch of older white folks (and like one older Japanese dude) who are basically your average socialites, all of whom take a somewhat odd interest or fascination with Chris (as if they were aliens from another species trying to analyze and understand Chris and his life position as a black man - which is, of course, completely rude, disrespectful, and at a certain point starts to become dehumanizing). Chris even attempts to find solitude in seeing another young black man at the get-together, who is introduced as “Logan” (aka ‘Andre’) played superbly by Lakeith Stanfield - which takes a mind-bending turn as the man is not who he is said to be (which our protagonist is educated enough to identify).

As Chris goes further into this racially-squeamish, psychological abyss that is the Armitage Estate - we discover that Jordan Peele is an intensely intellectual filmmaker who has created a bold artistic statement on the hypocrisy of our time. He has an ability to utilize a genuinely refreshing sense of humor, which is in stark contrast to the entire tone of the film, but creates a level of balance and harmony within the story & provides an authenticity while concealing his influences (which is rarely captured on this level with such friendly bravado).

Chris eventually discovers that he has been selected by the Armitage family as the next specimen to be ‘purchased’ (like black slaves used to be purchased in America; hence the bleak & cold-blooded silent auction, or “bingo” played in the film amongst the high society while Chris & Rose go walk off to have a moment) for a scientific nightmare entitled “Behold The Coagula” - a family experiment to essentially defy mortality. The Armitage family is symbolically representative of the inherent madness of high society and how having too much power and too much knowledge could inadvertently create systematically-engineered psychosis (slavery).

Chris is one of many (God only knows how many) that had been placed under Hypnosis (Mind Control). We discover that Walter & Georgina were lured to the Armitage Estate by Rose, and Rose had been essentially the scout for the family to bring in more and more people to control and use for their sick purpose. The film showcases the dangers of control and the harsh reality of the aggression placed on black people by the American aristocracy. There is an expressed double-hidden-meaning of the oppression & institutionalization of obedience upon the black community by the overall system (in terms of prolific American history & the modern struggle of man). Of course it’s not readily available or visible to the untrained eye (or untrained mind for that matter) - one would have to consider possibilities beyond the surface - hidden elements that the storyteller does not make openly available - which encourages the audience/viewer to think for one’s self in searching for an unsaid meaning. This is a part of why Jordan Peele’s writing is so effective and his direction is uncanny.

The Armitage family is revealed to Chris to be taking different people in to use as ‘vessels’ for the family members when their death was approaching. The Grandfather had initially started the project (which appeared to be possibly in the 1980s or so, when looking at the generic video presented to Chris in the mental conditioning process room, or game room, he was in). The true face of this family is revealed by Dean, over a fireplace, when the family gang-stalks Chris into the foyer of the home. Dean begins to ask Chris about his life’s purpose and then continues to speak about immortality and it becomes abundantly clear how spiritually-sick this family truly is due to their dark obsession to view themselves as superior to God. As Dean states, “We are divine. We are the Gods trapped in cocoons..” this shows Dean’s true insane obsession with superiority and believing he is his own God (which shows the arrogance and downfall of the alchemist in playing God - which takes this film to a whole other level). The Armitage family behaves as a serpent would in wrapping around it’s prey slowly, calmly, and with a calculated manner (eventually striking with venom).

Jordan Peele had allegedly written that in his own subtext for the story, the Armitage family’s ancestry had originated from the days of the Knights Templars (which explains Jeremy’s Knight helmet/armor he wears when he captured Andre (later ‘Logan’) in the beginning of the film) - Peele had stated this family is a part of the “Red Alchemy Society” - which is never really mentioned in the film. As alchemy is a considered to be a form of elemental pre-science (or science is equivalent to alchemy) - and it’s a secret society - this is quietly symbolic of the control of imperialistic forces subversively constructed and interwoven throughout society without public knowledge & involvement.

Apparently all of the brain surgery stuff was based off of reality (according to Jordan Peele) - which is absolutely spine-chilling to know. I think this film is a very entertaining and thought-provoking horror and psychological thriller - one of the best of it’s kind - it has the ability to go beyond being simply a horror film and is actually provoking the audience to perceive racial dynamics objectively with common sense & empathy (to view the world through the eyes of a black man and experience that point-of-view in both the calmness & extremes of life).

Peele’s film “Get Out” has a variety of elements that are reminiscent of films such as “Rosemary’s Baby” (another must in revealing a secret society; Luciferians/Satanic Cults), “The Stepford Wives” (showcasing the struggle of female subservience and liberation from the construct of social expectations and conformity within a masculine system), “Eyes Wide Shut” (Kubrick’s swan song and his most dire film of all thematically-speaking), and even having somewhat of a flair of Hitchcock in certain aspects (conceptually). Another film that comes to mind is “Surviving The Game” which depicts rich men hunting the homeless for sport out in the forest. Even Halloween III is another story that comes to mind with the elements of conspiratorial fantasy involved.

Rod (played OH-so-well by Lil Rel) is the comic relief of the film in one aspect, but more importantly Rod is the voice of reason & the heart of the movie - constantly making his call to Chris throughout the story (since they’re best friends). Rod is Jordan Peele’s opportunity for the audience to have breaks of laughter considering the tone of the rest of the film. Rod also provides incredible insight into Jordan Peele’s ability as a writer to bring a character on screen who is screaming on behalf of the audience.

A part of “the sunken place” as I have learned, is that Jordan Peele had allegedly stated that sunken place is to be representative of the marginalization of black people (in screaming but never being heard, as people overall, as well as audience members who are always there as the strongest fan base for horror movies but never having a proper voice within the movie industry), which makes Rod’s presence that much more important: the voice of reason trying to help Chris in his journey to be liberated.

Personally I think Lil Rel was snubbed for nominations, but that’s just me (he deserved some recognition for his performance).

As I would love to write more and more about this film (and I could write endlessly about it) - I conclude by stating that Jordan Peele has made a modern-day masterpiece. This film is very unique & original - and absolutely captivating (and very insanely frightening). There are very heavy & serious concepts of mind control in the film (especially considering the inhuman reality of mind control being researched for scientific study in real life; MK Ultra and the like) especially with the immense focus on hypnotism also shows another hidden darkness within the systematic engineering of the mind and the removal of one’s God-given free-will.

Jordan Peele’s film “Get Out” not only makes a bold commentary on the unjust reality of enslavement, but primarily the enslavement of the human condition as a collective whole.

In Jordan Peele’s original ending of “Get Out”, Chris gets arrested in the end of the film - Rod shows up much later when Chris is already in Jail. Chris was unable to break his mind-control/hypnosis and remained in the jail and that was the end of the film (with the bars shutting on Chris as he walks down the corridor). I’m happy that Jordan Peele decided to go with the uplifting and more positive ending rather than the really upsetting original ending...

..However - if Jordan Peele did put his original ending in the film - I do think it would have showcased an even more powerful artistic statement than he has already made and that would have given the audience an opportunity to re-examine and truly think about the governing systems that have the ability to perpetually destroy black innocence, and in essence, destroy the innocence of humanity.

#TheHypocrisyOfOurTime #GETOUT #JordanPeele #HorrorMovies #OscarNominatedMovies #Movies #MotionPictures #2017Movies #BestOriginalScreenplay #PsychologicalThriller #Comedy #Drama #Suspense #Mystery #AwesomeMovies #Stories #Anti-Racism

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