#they’ll say he was at his strongest and he was in his greatest era | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

yzkhr · 4 years

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For the entirety of his 20 years of existence, Kudo Shinichi finds himself in one of the most difficult situations.

Everything was going so smoothly. He already had enough clues to figure out who the suspect was. All he needed was evidence to prove his surmises. It was all according to his plans.

Not until the suspect kidnapped Ran.

He should have seen that coming. After all, when the Conan incident ended with his name plastered all over Japanese Television for defeating one of the most notorious criminal organizations in the world, stuff like this happened afterwards.

If they can't target him to shut him up, they'll target the ones he care for. It happened more than once already, but everyone Shinichi knows can defend themselves(he's actually the easiest one to attack).

Hattori Heiji is a fellow detective who can swing a sword really well, Tooyama Kazuha knows Aikido, Masumi Sera is a Jeet Kune Do specialist, his parents are out of the question—or out of the country—, professor Agasa has his inventions, Ai with her scary scientific knowledge, the detective boys' unbeatable luck, Suzuki Sonoko with her boyfriend being the world's strongest security, the FBI and first division are a no go, and even the british detective Hakuba Saguru and phantom thief Kaito Kid can easily fend attackers off.

But the one who's always been the primary victim would be his girlfriend, Mouri Ran. Most of time, he doesn't worry one bit. After all, he knew more than anyone else just how much impact she can do with her karate—the Conan aftermath was proof of his girlfriend's ridiculous strength— and would even be afraid for the criminal, feeling sorry for their battered bodies afterwards. But today was a different matter. Ran was sick and couldn't possibly defend herself in her bad condition.

He believed himself to be a forgiving and understanding man. Being Edogawa Conan taught him a lot of things, including little compassion and sympathy towards even to the most horrible of culprits.

But this man was different. Not only did he involved Ran who had no idea of what's going on, he didn't hesitate, even after knowing she was sick and defenseless.

Shinichi was a kind man through and through, but concerning his innocent and ill girlfriend was a different matter.

Now, he stood on the rooftop of the criminal's twenty floor apartment building, anger barely contained. The man was grinning in that deranged way of his, while holding his girlfriend with a small but clearly sharp knife at her neck. What makes matters worse, was that they're at the very edge, one wrong move and both of them could be flat at the ground, bones broken.

Just from that alone, Shinichi was itching to shoot the man with his pistol but restrained himself. What almost pushed him to doing so however was his girlfriend's tired and pained expression, from her fever and the current predicament.

With the wind blowing furiously, it doesn't take a genius to know that Ran was freezing, specially with her condition.

He blocked out his primitive reaction of shooting the man for now, and willed himself to finish the issue faster, for Ran's sake.

"Listen, you can still go back from this! Just drop the knife and walk away from the edge!"

He shouted, taking two steps towards the two of them. The man only grinned even wider, as if finding something funny about his words.

"Why would I go back there? To just go in jail!? I'd rather die!"

'If you wanna die, then die. Don't take my girl with you!', were the words he wanted to say but decided against it.

Instead, he treaded nearer, trying to look as innocent as possible to not alarm his target.

"You knew what you did was wrong! You'll just have to repent it in prison for a few years! You can't go back from dying!"

The man wasn't having it. He gripped tighter against Ran's neck with his knife getting dangerously close. Shinichi's initial thought was to sprint, but managed to catch himself on time.

"That bitch deserved it you know! She cheated on me when I gave her my everything! I only did what was right for her! What she deserved!"

The man was going crazier by the second. Not that Shinichi could blame him. For all he knew, the suspect was a respectable man who loved his wife very much but it turned out she was cheating on him with another man.

Shinichi couldn't even imagine that happening to him. Even back then as Conan, Ran's faithfulness was so strong that something like cheating or attraction to other men didn't even cross his mind(except with Araide's case, Okita's case and many others).

Still, murder is murder. The husband could have dealt with it in a more rational way but he didn't, causing him to spiral downwards to madness.

Well, Shinichi will most likely go towards the same path as well if he would be unable to save Ran.

"You shouldn't have killed her! She was wrong! Cheating on your partner is stupid and unforgivable! But what you're doing right now is the same! You're only commiting murder! So please, turn yourself in. You can still change."

It seemed to have worked, with the culprit's grin dissipating and his hold on Ran loosening. Shinichi fasten his pace, while the man was still contemplating. But before he can even reach his end goal, the suspect looked at him with vicious but hurt eyes, tears forming.

"You're right. I shouldn't have done something so terrible. But I can't go back now. I can't go to jail."

All the detective could do was to stand there, disheartened by this man's irrationality. He was so close, just a few more steps and it would had been over.

Seeing as the suspect's humanity slipping away, Shinichi tried to take one tentative step at a time.

Before he can even put his right foot in front of him, the man violently shakes Ran, causing Shinichi to froze at his spot.

All his girlfriend could do was slightly whimper, still weak from her fever. The wind wasn't getting any calmer and it was bad for Ran.

"Stop this! Please! Give Ran back to me!"

The desperation was leaking but he didn't care. He was too worried for her to even think of something like pride right now. It wasn't helping that the man was slightly getting unstable from their spot at the edge.

"I'll give your girlfriend back to you in one condition."

The man eyed Shinichi with determined eyes and he didn't like it one bit.

"Call the police right now and tell them that the culprit is my wife's other man."

The detective thought he didn't hear him correctly but the expression on the culprit's face was telling him otherwise.

"Why would I even do that? I'm a detective, my job is to reveal the truth!"

The suspect laughed and the tip of his weapon was now touching his girlfriend's neck. Ran tried to wiggle out from the pain but the man kept her still. Shinichi couldn't do anything but widen his eyes and tried to run at her, only to be stopped by their culprit's daring looks.

"Don't come any closer or I'll slit your girl's throat!"

Seeing his pursuer's conflicted reaction, the suspect's smile was back, even more disturbing than before, lacking of any human compassion he might have had left of him.

"If you know the truth, then you can easily twist it right? You're the great detective Kudo Shinichi! Everyone will believe you!"

"I can't possibly do that!"

Hearing his resolute answer, the culprit slowly averted his eyes towards Ran.

"Not even for you lover?"

He couldn't answer. Because how could he? Choosing between the truth he valued and his most precious person was impossible.

Seconds passed but Shinichi didn't let a word out. He only stared at his girlfriend, with contrast beliefs and emotions swirling in them. The man was getting impatient but before he could speak, a new voice entered.

"Don't do it."

For the first time, Ran spoke. Her voice was hoarse and guttural, but she made sur eit can be heard.

Everything in her body hurts. From her legs that's been almost dangling down the edge, her arms weakly flailing on her side, her stomach wanting to throw up, her entire being physically burning and being cold at the same time. She felt horrible and wanted nothing but to karate chop her kidnapper.

But right now, her focus was on Shinichi, like it has always been whenever they were together. He looked tired, running all the way here from her house where he found out about her disappearance.

He was in deep thought and his eyes were conflicted on what to choose. She knew just how important she was to him, specially after knowing the lengths he had gone through as Conan to protect her. But, she's also aware of his morals and love for the truth.

Ever since they were kids, being a the greatest detective in the world like his idol, Sherlock Holmes had always been Shinichi's biggest dream. It started off as something silly but as they grew older, his dream didn't looked so far away. From all his struggles and successes, Ran was there. She knew all the hard work he put in his job just so he can achieved his childhood wish. She was present in all the steps he took to be this great. To be the Sherlock Holmes of the modern era.

Now, that dream was on the danger of being crushed. If he were to do what the culprit wanted, Shinichi would also lose his chance to achieve his goal. And Ran didn't want that.

"Don't do it."

She said, line more vivid than before.

He didn't know what to say. He wanted to asked her if she was fine, but she clearly wasn't.

"Ran, I-"

"Don't. Please, Shinichi."

He wanted to apologize, because he'll disappoint her with his answer. Yet, he wasn't able to, with Ran not letting him.

She wanted him to choose his morals, but he would lose her. He don't want to—can't—lose her.

However, her next words were what really made his decisions clear.

"Don't lose your dream for me. Please."

Ran wanted to cry but held it in. She needed all her energy for her last move and crying won't save her or anyone.

The man was getting more and more impatient. He waved the knife around blindly, making Shinichi stepped back a little.

Ran wished from the bottom of her heart a distraction could come for her plan to work. But since she didn't have any time, she'll just make one herself.

"You're trying to kill someone innocent. You're not right about anything at all. You're just a killer."

The culprit's attention went to her almost in an instant, fury present in his eyes.

"Silence, woman! Girls like you are all the same with your pretty faces thinking you can get any man! Not being contented with one man who would give his all! Vile! That's what women are! They're vile!"

She wanted to protest, because she's not the same. She'll never be the same. Just the thought of cheating on her lover already makes her want to puke. She would never cheat. After all, Shinichi was enough.

But she had to pretend he wasn't.

"That's right! We're cheaters! Vile people! We never cared about you men at all!"

'What is she doing?'

Shinichi was extremely confused. Ran was obviously lying, trying to provoke the man holding her at a knife point.

'Why would she even try to make someone aggressive when they're in the literal--'

As his mind reached it's conclusion, Shinichi didn't waste any time to move. However, it was a little too late.

The man was already losing his balance himself, making him vulnerable. Ran, with her remaining strength, wished to all gods her plan would work.

Albeit her left arm was tired, she steeled it with everything she got, elbowing the man's stomach and making him instinctively let go of her.

He stumbled forward, while she inevitably stumbled on the opposite direction. Down.

She closed her eyes, succumbing herself to the fall. However, a familiar presence force it to open, and she did.

There, falling with her was the love of her life, who was supposed to be at the rooftop arresting the man. Instead, he was reaching out to her, ready to die.

Suddenly feeling all the pain and tiredness, against her mental protest, she blacked out.

It was a good thing Hattori was there when he went back at the office temporarily. His best friend noticed his strange actions and decided to follow him.

Knowing that they were in a pretty tight spot and seeing Ran and the culprit at the edge, the Osakan detective dashed to find a trampoline, in case of the worst case scenario. Fortunately, he managed to hugged Ran's unconscious form and guide her through the unexpected trampoline while falling down.

Shinichi truly owed Hattori this time.

As they walked out the police station hand in hand, Ran looked uneasy. She managed to regain conciousness when they were already at the station, making a witness report. He didn't wanna do it in Ran's condition but he knew he caused enough trouble at them already.

He squeezed her hand, letting her look at his direction.

"Is there something wrong? Don't worry we'll get home soon and you can get some rest."

Ran's eyes slightly widened at his words. She then smiled, but it was strained.

Worry taking over him, he put his forehead on hers, feeling her hot one.

Ran instinctively blushed and tried to pushed him away. However, being stubborn had always been Shinichi's strongest points, so he didn't backed down. Instead, he asked.

"What's wrong? Did I do something wrong?"

With such a soft and gentle way of questioning, Ran couldn't help but give in and let her hands go to both sides of his handsome face,feeling his skin under her warm—felt cold to her—fingertips. Then, she breathed heavily before speaking.

"What you did was reckless. You shouldn't have jumped after me."

Shinichi regarded her a confused look.

"What wouldn't I? I didn't know Hattori was there. So I thought you would really--"

"Still, you shouldn't have done that. What if Hattori-kun wasn't there?"

"Then we would both die."

He spoke in such a calm and nonchalant manner making Ran annoyed at him not getting her point. She bunped him lightly,making Shinichi backed a little bit away.

"Ouch! What did you that for?"

"Because you were being dumb! You could have died back there Shinichi!"

He returned his forehead against her, leaning again. He closed his eyes this time, looking peaceful, like they weren't in the brink of death just a while ago.

"I could have. But so were you."

His voice was laced with pain, specially at the last part. Tears gathered around her violet irises but she willed for them not fall.

"You have a dream Shinichi. You had it since you were little."

He nodded at her words, still looking unbothered even with the confirmation. Frustrated, she continued on.

"You would have killed yourself back there. Why didn't you listen to me? I told you didn't I? Don't give up your dream for me."

He smiled, catching her off guard. It was so sincere and bright that Ran wanted to step away. When she was about to do so however, he encircled his arms around her waist, pulling her closer as much as possible.

She opened her mouth, ready to reason out but was beaten by his answer.

"You told me to not give up my dream for you but,"

His next words left her breathless, tears finally cascading down her soft cheek.

"You are my dream, Ran."

I wrote this instead of sleeping, forgive me for its lameness.

#detective conan #shinran #one-shot

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x--daughters-of-darkness--x · 3 years

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Opening Up with… Evanescence

Opening Up sees us talk to musicians about the opening track from each of their studio albums. Our next guest is Amy Lee, lead vocalist and founding member of goth-pop veterans Evanescence. With millions of albums sold worldwide, the band are one of the most beloved of their era – and there's still plenty left in the tank, as their latest studio album attests to.

Amy Lee’s eyes widen when she realises what the premise of today’s conversation is. “I never get asked about this sort of stuff!” she exclaims excitedly from her Nashville home, surrounded by a stuffed toy collection belonging to her seven-year-old son Jack. Lee is very drawn to the prospect of a grand opening, whether that’s in the albums that she listens to, the gigs she attends or the movies she watches.

“I have a couple of different ideas about it,” she says. “An album opener…it’s got to pull you in. There’s different ways to do that, and we’ve done a few. One way is to give it the slow build – something that is opening up a world and an atmosphere to you where you’re like, ‘Okay, this is the world I’m stepping into.’ It builds up until it gets to that first big moment of impact. The other method, which I also love, is when you don’t hesitate and just burst right into something. We do our live shows both ways, too. It’s one of those things where it just kind of depends on your mood. You want to really reflect not only on where you’re at, but where you’ve been.”

‘Going Under’ – Fallen, 2003

In another life, ‘Going Under’ would have been the world’s introduction to Evanescence. The opening track to what would go on to be one of the highest-selling albums of the decade was the favourite among Lee and co. to be its lead single. Wind-Up Records, however, opted for ‘Bring Me to Life’, and the rest, as they say, is history. That’s not to count out ‘Going Under’ by any means whatsoever – after all, as Buzz Aldrin once said, second comes right after first.

“That was the song that we really wanted,” admits Lee, reflecting on the song nearly 18 years after its release. “I love ‘Bring Me to Life’, obviously, but we had a great feeling about ‘Going Under’ being sent to radio before the album came out. When that didn’t happen, it kind of became like, ‘Okay, well at least when you hear the album, I want it to still be the first thing that you hear.’”

The song details a tumultuous relationship that Lee had in her early 20s, both in the throes of it and staring back at the ashes of its remnants. She acknowledges the song’s agency reflects both strength and vulnerability in tandem, which explains why the track has spoken to so many listeners over the years. “I think it’s really strong,” she asserts.

“It presents a place that I kind of got to later. I’m calling out for help – ‘I’m going under/I’m drowning in you’ – but it starts out with me being like, ‘You know what? I’m done with this. I’m stepping out of the situation.�� I think that attitude was something for me that I was more excited to project.”

Setlist.fm approximates that the band have played ‘Going Under’ nearly 500 times over the years, making it one of the strongest staples of their shows. It’s a classic “hold out the mic” song – Lee can defer to her makeshift choir on any given night to take up any section of lyrics with full confidence that they’ll be sung back loud and proud. “It’s a fun one to play live,” she notes. “Some songs have more staying power than others, and that song really has that for me. That’s the song that still feels really good and still fits. It doesn’t have anything about it that sort of feels like ‘Okay, that’s cool and that’s part of our history, but that’s not really what we are anymore.’ That one just really has stood the test of time.”

‘Sweet Sacrifice’ – The Open Door, 2006

The parallels between the first tracks on Evanescence’s first two records are obvious. Each cuts straight to the chase, pairing a distorted Lee vocal with a crunching, down-tuned palm-mute guitar chug before bringing in a steady full-band groove and a rousing, angsty chorus. Internally, however, the make-up of Evanescence had drastically shifted between albums, informed by the exit of the band’s co-founder in guitarist Ben Moody less than a year after the release of Fallen. This came midway through a tour, leaving the band to scramble in finding a replacement guitarist, which came in the form of Terry Balsamo (a member of the opening band, Cold). At the conclusion of the tour, Balsamo ultimately joined Evanescence full-time – a position he would hold for the next 12 years.

“That writing process was a new experience,” recollects Lee on co-writing with Balsamo for the first time. “We just had a different energy, which was really cool. We spent a lot of all-nighters in this house in LA – which was actually the first house I’d ever bought. Terry would come up and stay for a month or whatever at a time, and we would work all night.”

When queried specifically on the writing of ‘Sweet Sacrifice,’ Lee recalls a moment where she and Balsamo really clicked creatively – the song’s stirring pre-chorus, which builds to its hard-hitting hook and big-swinging drums. “The guitar and the vocal are kind of mirroring each other there,” she says. “We were really excited about it. There was just this feeling that came with it, like, the freedom of saying ‘we’ve earned the right to make music however we want right now.’ So many people were breathing down my neck being like, ‘Let me write your songs for you.’ Writing that song was us saying ‘no, we’re gonna do whatever we want because we earned this.’”

“I felt like the song was so beautifully heavy,” she continues. “I also felt like it would subvert what people would expect as an opening track. Because I was without my guitar-playing original counterpart, there was somehow this idea that the next record [should] be softer and more feminine. I love heavy music, of course, and what was coming out of me and Terry was, in some ways, a lot heavier.”

September will mark the 15-year anniversary of The Open Door, and although it doesn’t hold the same legacy as Fallen, it remains a sentimental favourite among fans of the band. Lee still maintains a strong relationship with the record – if not for the fact that the band was able to make it at all in the first place.

“I still love it very much, it means a lot to me,” she comments. “I did have a lot to prove, and I felt the pressure of people feeling like, ‘I wonder if she can do that without Ben.’ I was really excited to show right away that we were taking it to the next level.”

‘What You Want’ – Evanescence, 2011

The first thing you hear on Evanescence’s third studio album is not Lee. Hell, it’s not even a guitar. It’s a reverb-heavy kick and snare beat, which sounds like it’s echoing from the depths of an arena. It immediately kicks the album off on a high gear, and is a perfect example of Lee’s latter example of not hesitating and bursting right in as an opener.

“That’s Will,” she determines of the song’s opening fill – courtesy of drummer Will Hunt, who made his debut on Evanescence after touring with the band for several years prior. “He is the greatest drummer in the world. That part was totally him. He is arena rock to the max, so it’s perfect. What’s cool about that is we all have different things in us that [are] our own style, each member of the band. When everybody’s particular tastes and styles get a chance to really shine through what they’re doing, I think that’s what can make it really amazing.”

“That album, it’s self-titled because it was such a group effort. Certainly it was more [of] one than before, when it was really more kind of duos for both of the other albums – Ben and I, Terry and I. This time was more like, ‘Okay, let’s let everybody really have a chance to shine.’” Lee points to ‘What You Want’ in particular when reflecting on the all-in band approach in songwriting: “I believe it was me, Terry and Tim [McCord, bassist], and we were at my house in Brooklyn,” she describes. “I had a little studio on the top floor, and just pulled up a loop on Pro Tools. Terry started playing, Tim started playing and it just became a thing with the three of us. We brought the band in, and that dinky little loop became what Will did. It really took it to another place.”

“It starts off with that awesome drum beat, but the combo to me really happens when when everything eventually comes in. It really comes together. I hear Terry in those different little half-note steps, I hear me bringing in some of my pop influences in the melody. This is us just really having fun making music and being ourselves.”

‘Overture’ – Synthesis, 2017

In one of the band’s most ambitious projects to date, Synthesis saw Evanescence team up with veteran composer David Campbell (also known as Beck’s dad) to create orchestral renditions of their best-known songs. Before it kicks off in earnest, however, the album opens with a swelling overture penned by Lee herself. It’s a rare instance of her flexing a different creative muscle in the track-ones of the band’s career, where she approaches it as an arranger and composer as opposed to a singer and songwriter.

“The whole idea of the project, for me, really stems from the fact that there’s all these little parts,” she explains. “It’s where my classical influence, which was my first really passionate musical influence, has a moment. It’s something that is an important core part of the music. ‘Never Go Back,’ which follows the overture, is one of those songs – the bridge is totally just like mad Mozart in the darkness, y’know? It’s my classical alter-ego going crazy. It’s interesting, because I think that the combination of that happening against the rock is really what makes it Evanescence. At the same time, I can still see this whole landscape of us that exists underneath and inside the music that is just entirely that other side. A lot of the time, when I’m coming up with the idea to start and then bring it to the table, it’s usually in this piano and electronics-based world before it really becomes a fully-fledged rock song. The idea of Synthesis was to get to just indulge in all of those things.”

When looking at the creation of the album’s overture, Lee sees that alter-ego taking both form and flight. “That part in particular is just one of my favourite moments on the record,” she says. “It’s very classically inspired, obviously. To make that into a full piece with David and give it that slow build, like we were talking about…I just loved being able to do that. That’s one of the ones that we’re driving you into a place and you’re like, ‘Oh, where are we going?’ And then you get there. It was very special to have at the beginning of every show on the tour. I’ll never forget that.”

‘Artifact/The Turn’ – The Bitter Truth, 2021

“Let me tell you about this, because it’s unusual.” Having eyed the conversation’s flow keenly, Lee is prepared at the ready to talk about ‘Artifact/The Turn,’ which opens The Bitter Truth, the first collection of all-new Evanescence music in a decade. As she will go on to explain in great detail, the album’s opening moment is twofold – hence the forward slash in its title. First, the artifact, which Lee found on her computer. “That’s nothing but like a little keyboard and my voice,” she confirms.

“That part is me on my laptop with the laptop built-in mic in a hotel room in Canada in the middle of the night on tour. That was not intended to make it as is on the album. The reason it’s called ‘Artifact’ is something that Nick [Raskulinecz], our producer, said. He was like, ‘Do you really want to redo this?’ I always was thinking I was going to. ‘Well, yeah,’ I said. ‘Don’t we need to like do it in high quality, like on a real microphone? He says, ‘I don’t know if you’re going to be able to recapture that exact feeling.’ I thought about that, and it all just kind of connected. It has all these little artifacts in it – it’s actually a little ancient piece of the the writing process, and it’s intact. It hasn’t been re-recorded or redone in any way.”

This leads to where the music makes a turn – courtesy, naturally, of ‘The Turn.’ This was another one-on-one between Lee and a collaborator, although this time, it arrives in the unexpected form of The Crystal Method’s Scott Kirkland. “We just met through a mutual friend, my old lighting director,” Lee recalls. “We were both on the bill at some festival and we made friends. It turned out we were fans of each other, and I was like, ‘Hey, if you ever want to just like swap files, who knows? We might come up with something!’ We started sending each other little baby demo ideas that we had. He had that music bed a little bit in a different arrangement that he sent to me – and again, on tour in a backroom, I found myself singing over it and came up with a melody. He tweaked it and did it for real, and that was it.”

Piecing these two compositions together made it very clear to Lee from the outset that this is how The Bitter Truth would begin – especially when she saw how it transitioned into track two, ‘Broken Pieces Shine’. “I love the way that that riff brings you into our band – where we are now and what the sound of us is now,” she says. “It’s driving, and it is coming for you – and it just feels so good when it hits. I love the beginning of this album.”

It’s been around a month since the album’s release, and although the band obviously haven’t gotten to play any shows thus far, they’ve still been met with an endless stream of messages, comments and praise from fans all over the world. After such an extensive rollout – not by design, of course – the sense of relief within the Evanescence camp is palpable. “It’s so satisfying,” adds Lee. “The one thing that’s going to drive it all the way home, obviously, is going to be when we get to live inside it and go on tour and play these songs live.”

#amy lee #evanescence #2021 interviews

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syncogon · 5 years

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[QZGS TL] Butterfly Blue’s interview regarding the movie For the Glory (08/15/19)

Because the movie was released (and English subbed) online fairly recently, I thought I’d go back and translate this interview that BB did about it. It’s pretty long, but quite interesting! (As always, please let me know of any errors.)

bilibili interview link (remove spaces): https ://www.bilibili. com/video/av63863201/

Q: As this is the first movie of TKA, how did you choose the topic? A: We’ve already done a donghua, which already covers the plot of the main novel, so when we were picking the subject of the movie, we didn’t want to repeat a story that we’ve already told. I’d written some side stories [i.e. the prequel] earlier, which fills in a few stories of our characters during the ten years before the main story starts. So, we wanted to use the movie medium to help fill in the early stories or whatnot of our characters, so everyone can have a better understanding of these characters. Especially for people who might be curious about The King’s Avatar, or who might not have even heard of it before – if they watch our movie first, they’ll start from the very beginning and watch as these youths, with Ye Xiu as the focus, grow.

Q: When you were writing TKA, had you ever thought about Excellent Era’s Season 1 roster? A: Of the characters, only one was mentioned in the novel, that’s Wu Xuefeng, who was a most reliable helper at Ye Xiu’s side during the first years he won those championships. As for the others, in terms of characters, I hadn’t really thought about them when I was writing the main novel, because by that time in the story they’d all retired or they weren’t relevant to our main plot. But back then, because they were a team, players on a team all had their own accounts, and everyone’s accounts had a class. The classes were actually always maintained, Excellent Era had always passed them down. So, when we were making this movie, we maintained all of this. That is, every original character in the movie, the accounts they used, you’ll find that those IDs appear in the main novel – Excellent Era’s Elementalist, Spellblade, etc, they are all these same account IDs.

Q: Why was the first user of Peaceful Hermit changed from Guo Mingyu to Lu Liang? A: Oh, this is a bit awkward. While I was writing, I forgot, the one who I initially had – well I forget which it was but – anyway, I wrote two different first-generation users, so basically it was actually a mistake in writing, a bug. Then, in the movie, they helped me patch it up, so by using a plot point they were able to fix this mistake in the original that I could no longer go back and change myself, they were able to cover my error. So, we have two users, and between them they have a relationship of partnership and inheritance.

Q: Given that we already know that Excellent Era wins the Season 1 championship, how does the movie make matches more interesting and exciting? A: For this, we basically started from Excellent Era’s opponents at the time, Royal Style as a team. Following the original work, Ye Xiu had met a few friends in-game, and then under the support of an internet café boss, the eventual boss of Excellent Era, Tao Xuan, they formed a team. Their team was fairly grassroots. But we considered the world background as a whole, and Glory definitely wasn’t the only game, nor the only competitive esport. So under our understanding, in this profession, there are a number of professional teams, but Ye Xiu and the others aren’t a part of all this. In contrast, Royal Style is a professional team, but at the start, Glory wasn’t one of the games they played professionally. But after the Glory Pro League was established, the professional club Royal Style decided to create this kind of team to play in the Glory Pro League. So, compared to Ye Xiu and co’s background, Royal Style is more “professional,” more advanced along the professional path, they have professional systems or training methods, that’s the kind of team they are. And then, compared to Ye Xiu and the rest of them, Royal Style might be more cohesive, more powerful, with better training and logistical support backing them up. We hope that Ye Xiu can encounter such a powerful foe, so everyone can see how Ye Xiu was able to stand upon the summit of Glory in Season 1.

Q: When Ye Qiu gave the mask to Ye Xiu, was that because something changed about his attitude? A: From the fact that he brought the mask prepared to give to him, we can see that Ye Qiu’s attitude didn’t actually change. In their hearts, the two brothers understand each other. Ye Qiu knew that even if he came over here to find his brother, there was no way he would be able to bring his older brother back. So when he said you should go home etc etc, that was more just fulfilling his duties as the younger brother, or like this is a job the family gave me, but after he did that he immediately gave him the mask; he knew things would end up like this, there’s no way you’re coming back. But he also knew where his older brother’s qualms lay, or the things that would be inconvenient for him, so this mask demonstrates his understanding of and consideration toward Ye Xiu.

Q: What was the biggest pleasant surprise of this movie for you? A: For me, the biggest surprise was this one scene – so after Su Muqiu died, he left his account card to Su Mucheng, and during this time Su Mucheng was feeling very downhearted, and she kind of rejected this game. But then one day, she took this account card that her brother left her, and when she logged on, Dancing Rain’s avatar appeared, and the avatar said to her, something like, “did you miss me? I’m always here.” That moment was the most moving part of the movie for me, because when we were making this movie, we were really trying to let it have more positive energy, so we tried to focus on the esports and competitive spirit side of things. But in this moment, I saw the significance that ordinary games have in our lives. It doesn’t have to do with dreams or fighting spirit, but they enter our lives and bring to you thoughts and memories.

Q: Say something to the TKA fans on Bilibili! A: The fans on Bilibili are probably mostly those who watched the donghua, right, so I feel that, come watch our movie as well, see if you like it. Thank you everyone for your support all this time.

(reading Weibo posts) “2019 June 16, I wrote down in my planner that on August 16 I had to go to the movie theater. 2019 July 16, I tragically received notice that my school’s military training was on August 16…” Well, August 16 is just the release date, we’ll be in theaters for a while after, you can just go later haha

“I saw Tao Xuan in the trailer. At that time, they were all going to the pro circle for their dreams, for their own Glory!! And now, Excellent Era’s things are still here but the people are no more…” This user is sighing emotionally about Tao Xuan. But even if Tao Xuan changed later, earning money is still a dream, we can’t think that just because of this he’s all that… it’s just that the road he took is different from Ye Xiu’s.

“Guo Mingyu, you think that just by changing your name you can get away from your debt?” [laughing] That’s my mistake!

“Zhang Jiale perfectly avoided all chances of appearance.” He actually does appear, everyone look closely!

“This TKA movie you speak of, is it a good watch?” [bb misspeaks at first lol: “quan zhi dian ying gao shou,” all-class movie expert] Of course it’s good, you’ll know when you see it!

Q: Why does Ye Xiu go on morning runs in the movie? Probably because we still wanted to have a movie with more positive energy, let him maintain a relatively healthy physical condition. After all, by the time we see him in the main novel he’s a 25-year-old player, and by the time he wins the championship again he’s already 27-28. For an esports player, that’s extremely old, but even at such an old age he could still maintain that good of a competitive condition. If we wrote that off as natural gift, that doesn’t seem very suitable, so when we were writing this prequel, we wanted to have an explanation for why even when Ye Xiu became so old and many people had already retired, he could maintain such a high competitive skill level. It’s because he had a foundation in taking care of his body.

Q: Why was Su Muqiu so focused on self-made weapons? A: Because he relied on gaming to raise his little sister, his family, so in my original design, the most fundamental reason he focused on Silver weapons was that it was profitable. He needed greater income or whatnot, so after he discovered that this game had these Silver weapons, his thoughts would go in that direction. Because we have a saying in-universe, “the strongest weapons are Silver weapons,” so this had the greatest utility for him, it was a very down-to-earth judgment, it was an opportunity that would provide the greatest payoff, so he put a lot of effort into this area. To be honest, I feel like his goals are almost a level above the later dreams and “for the championship,” because he was doing this for existence, for life, for his home, for his little sister. So, when he’s going all out for this, it’s closer to our real lives, closer to an ordinary person’s attitude.

Q: Why does One Autumn Leaf get long golden hair in the trailer? A: That was his Awakening skill during the finals match. In the novel, we can use words to describe how awesome something is, but this kind of scene in an animation, we want to visually show a character transformation, something that will immediately make people know, “the One Autumn Leaf in this moment is stronger,” let everyone perceive this feeling more directly. So, we made him enter this long golden hair, cooler and more dazzling state.

Q: When Ye Xiu was still the little captain, what was his guiding principle for leading Excellent Era? A: This is actually the story we tell in the movie, how he led the team in the beginning, and then how he established those “golden phrases” or “fundamental creeds,” of his, such as what might be his most famous “Glory isn’t a single-player game,” in the movie we can see how this statement became Ye Xiu’s core spirit. And then in the finals, we use that kind of battle to show how his teammates supported him until the very end, how he relied upon the help of every one of his teammates to defeat the opposing Royal Style, which was a powerful team with top-level pro players.

Q: What function did Wu Xuefeng serve in the team, as Excellent Era’s vice-captain? A: Mm, to me, Wu Xuefeng this person, he’s a bit older than Ye Xiu and the others. When Ye Xiu became the little captain, he was barely an adult, only 18 years old, and in comparison, Wu Xuefeng was more mature, more stable. On the team at the time, I feel that he was in a steadier condition than Ye Xiu was. At that time, Ye Xiu was still young, he could be impulsive, he could be volatile. But Wu Xuefeng, at his side, was a very reliable character, he was the godly needle that stabilized the ocean [i.e. in Journey to the West, the pillar in the ocean that Sun Wukong took to serve as his iconic weapon]. Whenever problems appeared in the team, he would be the one mediating, he would be more rational, he would be a more balanced and steady character. I feel that he was a very good vice-captain at the time. Ye Xiu’s most reliable helper, that was how we defined him.

Q: What was the turning point for Ye Xiu when he decided he wanted to become a pro player? A: Well, first, when he left home, he didn’t have a very clear goal in mind. His family didn’t want him to play games, so he wanted to come out and play some games. And then he met Su Muqiu and Su Mucheng, and they were together for a while. At first, I feel like his life state was pretty similar to Su Muqiu’s, he would just do some power-leveling or some other very ordinary things just to earn a living, he didn’t have a clear plan. But the turning point was when Glory this game appeared, it was like Su Muqiu discovering Silver weapons in this game. After seeing the complexity of this game, how widespread it was, the things that this game was establishing, as well as his own ability and skill with this game, I feel that it was a gradual, step-by-step process and he decided, or wanted to try, “can I become a pro player.” And he had partners beside him, partners like Su Muqiu, and his boss at the time Tao Xuan, and a few good friends in-game, and everyone began to come together on this tide, this opportunity was here, and so with everyone he successfully stepped onto this road – and never looked back.

#quan zhi gao shou #qzgs #the king's avatar #qzgs movie #for the glory #mine #translation #i always find it really interesting to hear bb's thoughts #bb interview

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godssea7-blog · 5 years

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God Gives Light!

The word revelation means to uncover, disclose, enlighten or give light! The biblical book of Revelation is God giving light to the world.

Yet the world sees it as the worst possible outcome you can imagine.

As I emphasize in Daniel—Unsealed at Last!, the meaning of the book’s name is critical: “God is my judge.” Likewise, “Revelation” means light. That too is God’s “specific purpose statement” for this book—His theme or motif. How many people see that light? How many recognize the transcendent, luminous outcome awaiting us?

Fifteen times, the book of Revelation talks about the throne of God. God wants to give His firstfruits a throne! He wants us to sit on a throne and help Christ give this world light! He wants us to teach people how to conduct their lives in a way that works beautifully.

However, man has rebelled throughout his history. And now, at the extreme end of that history, he faces his blackest nightmare. Like Adam and Eve, mankind has willingly followed the devil. That is man’s own doing. God has even sent prophets and apostles to warn him in all of that rebellious and black history. Many of those prophets and apostles were killed. Men loved darkness and rejected the light.

Now man must face the consequences of what his accumulated rebellion has produced.

Thankfully, Jesus Christ is going to return and save mankind from annihilating itself! Only then will Christ lead mankind to be full of joy and live in God’s light.

“The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to shew unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass; and he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John” (Revelation 1:1). A source higher than Christ gave light to the Apostle John! What depth!

It doesn’t matter how high you rank in God’s Church, you must keep the Father at the Head of His Family or you’re going to lose it all! We have a lot of examples to prove that.

This book came from God the Father. He structured everything precisely and carefully. He wants us to know that all this revelation came from Him—not from Christ, not from an angel, certainly not from John—never from a man!

The Father is the originator of prophecy. God only reveals truth to His servants. Today, we are those servants of light.

A Father’s Love

Just a few years before he died, Mr. Armstrong said he had one fear: what would happen to the Church if God let him die.

Why would he be so concerned about that?

That beautiful statement shows Mr. Armstrong’s love and depth. Such thinking comes right out of the mind of God the Father. I will prove that to you.

“Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea. And I turned to see the voice that spake with me. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks [the seven Church eras]; And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle” (Revelation 1:11-13).

Right in the middle of these seven churches is the same all-powerful God that Nebuchadnezzar saw in the furnace with Daniel’s friends! (Daniel 3:25).

Is God deeply involved with His Church? Is it possible that the Father’s greatest concern, like Mr. Armstrong’s, would be what happens to His Church—His Family?

This brilliant Being is right in our midst! We are His number one concern. Throughout Revelation chapters 1-3, He is still talking about His Church. This is a long introduction, which illustrates the importance of God’s Family! God and His firstfruits are the top priority in everything—for all eternity! Christ and His Bride are there to implement the Father’s will in His Family. God and His firstfruits are mentioned first in the book of Revelation because they’ll be God’s leaders for all eternity.

This mind-staggering reward is why God’s prophets and apostles could face bloody persecution and death—and still consider it the greatest bargain possible.

Consider this: Everything that happens in the Kingdom of God will be channeled through God and His firstfruits.

If you understand this, you can see why Mr. Armstrong’s whole life was God’s Church. You can see why he was so concerned about what would happen to it.

Daniel 3 depicts just three saints of God who were thrown into a fiery furnace—and right there with them was one “like the Son of God”—just like in Revelation 1. God doesn’t intervene so miraculously for the world. But He is fervently concerned for His very elect, who will help Him rule the world.

Revealing the Beast

“And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea [this troubled world], having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy” (Revelation 13:1). Something here is acutely evil and extremely dangerous!

“And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority” (verse 2).

In Who or What Is the Prophetic Beast?, Mr. Armstrong wrote, “And the fourth kingdom, which, developing from Rome, spread out and gradually absorbed one after another of these four divisions—‘dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly,’ was the Roman Empire (31 b.c. to a.d. 476).

“It had absorbed all the others, occupied all their territory, was greater and stronger than all. It included all the royal splendor of ancient Babylon, thus having the head—the strongest part—of the lion. It had all the massiveness and numerically powerful army of the Persian Empire—symbolized by the legs, the most powerful part of the bear. It was the greatest war-making machine the world had ever seen, and it also possessed the swiftness, the cunning, the cruelty of Alexander’s army, symbolized by the leopard.

“And thus, this fourth beast was unlike any wild beast of the Earth. It was stronger, greater, more terrible, than any.

“And so John, in Revelation 13, sees, not four beasts, but one beast. Not a leopard, but like a leopard—possessing all its cunning, cruelty and speed. But it also possessed the dominant characteristics of the two other most powerful beasts—the feet of a bear, and the mouthof a lion. Daniel’s fourth beast, the Roman Empire, had absorbed and therefore it included the three beasts before it. Thus it included all seven heads. And John’s beast also has seven heads. It was Daniel’s fourth beast, only, which had 10 horns, and John’s beast has 10 horns.

“And so, if we are willing to be guided solely by the Bible description of this ‘beast’ and to let the Bible interpret the symbols used to describe it, we come to the inevitable conclusion that the beast of Revelation 13 is the Roman Empire, of 31 b.c. to a.d. 476!” (emphasis mine throughout). So we see how Daniel unlocks Revelation 13.

Continuing in the passage in Revelation 13: “And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him? And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months” (verses 3-5).

Mr. Armstrong explained, “The beast here symbolized is the one which included the royal splendor and kingly power symbolized by the mouth of the lion (Babylon); the ponderous strength symbolized by the feet of the bear (Medo-Persia); and the speed, cunning and cruelty of the leopard (Greece). Since the interpretation of these symbols is found in Daniel 7, and since the fourth beast had 10 horns, the Bible interpretation of the beast of Revelation 13 is the fourth beast of Daniel 7—the Roman Empire, of 31 b.c. to a.d. 476. The beast described by John in Revelation 13 included seven heads, but the only head existing at the time John saw this nondescript beast (which included the most powerful characteristics of all the beasts symbolizing its predecessors) was that of the fourth beast of Daniel, containing the seventh head, and also the 10 horns. So the specific ‘one of its heads’ that was wounded to death (Revelation 13:3) was the seventh head of the Roman Empire—the head out of which 10 horns grew. The 10 horns, as Daniel interprets, represent 10 successive governments out of the Roman Empire, which were to continue until the setting up of the Kingdom of God at the Second Coming of Christ.

“The deadly wound, then, was the one administered to the Roman Empire, when, in its last decaying stages, the barbarians overran it, ending its government in a.d. 476” (ibid).

Then came 10 resurrections of that beast. This power kept coming back. Here God says it received a deadly wound. We mustn’t have the misconception that it just degenerated and collapsed—it received a deadly wound and almost died. That is why the Roman Catholic Church had such a vengeance in resurrecting a strong empire—the last seven of those 10 horns (after the first three horns were uprooted).

It was the fourth kingdom (symbolized by the fourth horn), succeeding the fall of the Empire in a.d. 476, which really healed the deadly wound, and restored the empire. In a.d. 554, Justinian, emperor of the East, from Constantinople, set up his government through an Imperial Legate at Ravenna, Italy, and brought about what is known in history as the “Imperial Restoration” of the empire (for more information on how the empire was restored, request your free copy of our booklet Who or What Is the Prophetic Beast?).

The Roman Empire is the most vicious beast this world has ever known. It is the greatest monster human beings have ever seen. It is “exceedingly strong.”

The Daniel 2 image represents the Roman Empire with two legs, two feet and 10 toes. We are about to witness the time of the 10 toes of the last horn! It is rising out of a turbulent sea—a deeply troubled world like never before.

Then Jesus Christ will come and smash the entire image! He will smash the feet, and the whole image will come crumbling down. This world will never see it again.

That is phenomenal prophecy! Such knowledge leaves you breathless, when you realize what God has revealed! Let’s put that understanding in perspective. This is a real challenge to God’s ministry.

Let me illustrate what God strongly impressed upon my mind, even as I prepared this material.

The Importance of Love

1 Corinthians 13 is one of the magnificent chapters of the Bible; we must always keep it in mind.

“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not [love—agape], I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy,and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not [love], I am nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-2).

God says you could have all knowledge, have the faith to move mountains, understand all mysteries, have the gift of prophecy, and if you don’t have God’s love, it profits you nothing!Not anything!

Mountain-moving faith is worthless without God’s love.

We must get this love in our prophecy! God’s ministers must have it there to inspire God’s people, or they won’t be inspired! We need this love in all our books and booklets, or we might as well be out beating on an old tin can! Our teaching would be of no value.

Here is where the Laodiceans truly went off track—even those who knew so much about prophecy! How much did they love God and His truth? They lost God’s truth because they didn’t love it (2 Thessalonians 2:10).

The Laodiceans loved the gift of prophecy—to a point, but they didn’t love God’s truth.

Ministers: Does your government inspire God’s people—or does it depress them? Does your leadership encourage them, or discourage them? Do you uplift them and inspire them? Are you inspired? Are the people in your congregations truly excited about God’s Work—in general? (There are always a few weak examples.) Do the congregations which God gave you to shepherd really love God? “By their fruits you shall know them.”

Think deeply about this! God holds us accountable. We must get this right and help God’s people to understand this more deeply.

Every bit of the prophecy in the book of Revelation flows from the great God of love—from His master plan to build His Family.

On television I always try to make prophecy inspiring—and I have to be inspired to do that. It must inspire me if I am going to inspire others.

How many of God’s people understand the love in God’s prophecies? He is filled with love—not only for His very elect, but for all the inhabitants in this whole world!

If we don’t have this love in everything we do, it’s all a waste of time!

Ezekiel 33 describes some people who love to hear God’s prophecy—but they don’t love God’s law! “And they come unto thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: for with their mouth they shew much love, but their heart goeth after their covetousness. And, lo, thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument: for they hear thy words, but they do them not” (verses 31-32).

The Laodicean ministers spoke about prophecy, but when it got down to law and government, they didn’t obey. They denied God’s name. They denied their Father! They were excited about the prophecy, but they didn’t love the God at the center of it—and they didn’t see God’s love in it. They thought God would protect them, and that they didn’t need to worry about the fulfillment of the prophecies they taught. They don’t realize it yet, but soon they will see: They are not going to be protected by God, because they denied God’s law and government!

Perhaps some of them still like to study prophecy—but what will their knowledge of prophecy mean when they’re in the Great Tribulation? These events were designed to crush all hope man has in himself—and turn him to hope in God.

The Laodiceans and many people in the world love to hear God’s prophecies, even as they reject God’s law.

God says if we don’t warn the people of this world because we love them, their blood is going to be on our head! (verses 7-8). It’s about living and dying—physically and spiritually. That’s how serious this is!

“We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts” (2 Peter 1:19). Revelation from God brings more and more light and inspiration into your life. It will get brighter and brighter until Jesus Christ is here!

The Day Star, Jesus Christ, should be rising in our hearts! He should be lifting us up and inspiring us more and more!

Of course we will have trials—but that shouldn’t diminish our love for God, who gives us those trials to increase our love. After all, He is right there in the fiery furnace with us, one like the Son of God!

If God’s love is in our prophetic messages, then it inspires people. God’s people need to be more than just stirred—they need to be inspired! The word inspire means to influence, move or guide by divine or supernatural inspiration.

That’s what God’s ministers need: God inspiring us, reaching out to His people through us! We need to get ourselves out of the way and be filled with God’s love. We must help God’s people build God’s love or we are just tinkling cymbals.

I think the best sign of God’s love in our ministers’ sermons is that they inspire—not just stir. They must help people to soar with inspiration. Faith can stir, but it takes God’s love to fully inspire.

“And to the [messenger] of the church in Philadelphia write; These things saith he that is holy, he that is true, he that hath the key of David, he that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth; I know thy works: behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name” (Revelation 3:7-8). In Revelation 3, God is not emphasizing the angel, or messenger—He doesn’t want any man’s name there. He wants us not to deny His name! Why is God so excited about the Philadelphians? Because they haven’t denied His authority, or His government! Thayer’s Lexicon says the word translated “name” means “to do a thing, i.e. by one’s command and authority … promoting his cause.” Did Mr. Armstrong die promoting God’s cause? He certainly did, but we all know some Laodicean evangelists who did not die doing God’s Work.

The Philadelphians see beyond the man—that’s what Philadelphia is all about! They are experts on God’s loving government and authority. They know where God rules.

“Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee” (verse 9). The Laodiceans must come to know that God loved us—the Philadelphians. That means that we loved God. It is proof that our government includes God’s love. We know how to administer a government of love—even though we are not perfect.

Our government is not Nazi-like, nor is it permissive—it’s God-like. We must get it right!

A minister can use his authority to help people’s joy or to take it away. How friendly, happy and joyful are our congregations? The ministry has a lot to do with that. We will be judged by that standard. This is a Church of joy! If our people don’t have joy, God wants to know why.

The ministers can go from the extreme of being too strict to being too permissive. We have to use God’s government, but always make sure it’s a government of God’s love.

God says in Isaiah 55:8, “[M]y thoughts are not your thoughts ….” That can be true even inside God’s Church, if we’re not careful.

Having all the prophecy of the Bible crammed into our heads—if we don’t have love—still profits us nothing!

Some of the wcg evangelists wrote articles that were dazzling. But where was their love of God? Where was their love for God’s truth? When the church leadership changed, these men let those leaders trample all over God’s truth. They even helped them do it. They didn’t love God and His truth.

It takes a lot of God’s love to inspire God’s people. We all need much more.

We must understand God’s master plan enough to see that even our most severe trials flow from God’s deepest love. After all, Christ died for the salvation of mankind! We were purchased with His blood!

We need that level of love. If we have to die, then so be it—but we must love God!

A Church With a Mission

It takes God’s love to do such a difficult job. If we love God and men, we will deliver this message as long as we can, even if that means getting plunged into a fiery furnace.

That is the love God has for this world. Christ died to do God’s Work, and so, in some few cases, must we.

“And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations. And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him …. He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity: he that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints” (Revelation 13:6-8, 10). God continues to focus on “the patience and the faith of the saints.” God’s Laodiceans are plunged into the Tribulation and overcome by the beast. God’s Philadelphians continue to trust God and proclaim His prophecies.

A religious beast also rises: “And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon” (verse 11).

During World War ii, Pope Pius xii said, “We have twin enemies: the communists and the democracies.” We must not dismiss such a statement. It is very revealing of the Vatican’s mindset. That is how this power conducts its foreign policy—through the Holy Roman Empire.

Consider this: Within the crown jewels of the Holy Roman Empire is an orb—a globe with a cross on top. That orb represents “the Earth under Christ”—that is, its version of Christ. It basically symbolizes this world ruled by the church. Does anyone really take note of the global ambition bound up in that church? And it has a bloody history to prove it!

“And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men, And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live” (verses 12-14).

Satan gives this religious beast power to do miracles—men are dazzled—and the religious beast fully supports the political beast.

Dr. Hoeh, a German, said the pope had an opportunity to unite East and West Germany in 1950. But the pope didn’t want East Germany at that time, because its people are primarily Protestant. I can’t prove or disprove that; though, knowing Catholic history, I believe the Vatican would make such a decision.

Charles de Gaulle, the late leader of France, didn’t want Britain in the EU because it is predominantly Protestant. Former French President Jacques Chirac thought very much like De Gaulle. The U.S. is mostly Protestant. The Vatican knows that if it is going to rule the world, the U.S. must be brought down!

The last message of Fatima said that Luther is going to be made a saint. That may be true. After all, if Martin Luther along with all these Catholic saints were “together in heaven,” there’s no reason for the Catholic-Protestant division, right? Of course, if they unite, it would be under the authority of the Catholic Church. Isaiah 47 tells us that is exactly what will happen.

The EU knows it can’t stand without uniting. Germany has many Protestants. Germany also wants to be more united. That will happen as the Protestants come more and more under the pope’s authority. Then Germany—the powerful economic engine of the EU—will lead with real authority.

Revelation 17

Dr. Hoeh wrote this in the Good News of April 1952: “The question that President Truman and Secretary Acheson and you face is causing careful observers to tremble!

“Does America dare arm Germany?

“Can we unite Europe and guide the colossal military machine we envision there by 1955? …

“Our leading generals in Europe adamantly warn that Germany is a calculated risk. [But our leaders and people are too ignorant of history to even have this concern today!] What will a Germany, armed with American help, think of her new power?

“The hour of decision struck at Lisbon when it was decided to rearm Germany. Your future is at stake! How are you going to know what will happen in Europe? …

“Why will the diplomats think that TODAY the hearts of the people in Germany are different from yesterday? Every one of those undemocratic nations when once armed has turned upon us. We are the hated ‘have’ nations, the ‘capitalist’ nations, the ‘imperialistic’ nations.

“The heart of the German people, indoctrinated with Nazism, has not been converted to our way of life. If they really would have come to love us since their defeat, would they now be trying to bargain for domination in Europe, and threatening to withhold support from the cause of democracy against Russia? Is that the way love is manifested? Can we purchase love with money?”

As I mentioned earlier, Dr. Hoeh was also German and understood the German mind.

Even back in 1952, Germany was fighting for domination of Europe—and America didn’t have the sense to understand what it meant. That has been Germany’s goal from the beginning!

Revelation 17 talks only about the last seven heads, or seven horns, of the Roman Empire. These are resurrections of the Holy Roman Empire, which would be better termed the “unholy” Roman Empire.

“And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters: With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication” (Revelation 17:1-2).

Who is this great false church that sits “upon many waters”? She has huge churches in manyparts of the world. She spiritually fornicates with the kings of this Earth—even dominates them. Who could this be? Even a teenager should be able to answer that question!

How ignorant this world is of God’s Bible.

God’s true Church is a “little flock” who never fornicates with the kings of the Earth. This great false church actually guides kings of this Earth, while God’s little flock is persecuted by them.

God’s Church is a virgin; this is a great whore! She has made the whole world drunk on false doctrine (Isaiah 29:9-11). That’s what people—including the Laodiceans—get drunk on! God is going to have to sober them up before He can teach them.

The leader of the Roman Catholic Church is called the “vicar of Christ.” He’s not a man who represents Christ; he’s actually in the place of Christ.

In contrast, Christ is directly in charge of His Church. Nobody is in the place of the Head—the Husband of the Bride.

This is what the gospel is all about—the good news of the coming Family of God!

Otto von Habsburg once said, “The [European] Community is living largely by the heritage of the Holy Roman Empire, though the great majority of the people who live by it don’t know by what heritage they live.” And that is a great understatement! He also said, “We possess a European symbol which belongs to all nations of Europe equally; this is the crown of the Holy Roman Empire, which embodies the tradition of Charlemagne.”

Europe is going to go in a far more violent direction than many Europeans believe when the new “Hitler” comes on the scene!

As Hitler spent time in Vienna, under Satan’s sway his vision expanded from mere anti-Semitism into something much greater—and far more destructive!

And Satan is going to change the mind of the coming political head of the Holy Roman Empire.

Certain European leaders say they’re living in the tradition of Charlemagne, and it was a violent and bloody tradition. That part of their history we will clearly see before Christ returns. It’s amazing to me that they can hang on to their evil traditions and false religion—and yet the Laodiceans can so quickly reject God’s true religion.

How fiercely will we fight and hang on to the end for God’s truth?

Thunder From Heaven

In 1984, a wcg minister wrote that, because the Daniel 2 image had two legs, it was apparent that the European superpower would have five nations in the West and five in the East. He concluded that this meant the Soviet Union would lose some of its western satellites.

In 1984, such a development looked utterly impossible! Yet a man in a little Church knew it would happen because of what God spelled out in Daniel 2. That was like lightning and thunder out of the heavens! It’s truly phenomenal that God’s Church can make statements like that—today those prophecies have come to pass! And those men who said it know it! They know it has happened just as they said!

Is this something to take lightly? How wise is it for those ministers to simply obey when they are commanded to prophesy not?

Where did those prophecies come from? Who makes such monumental events come to pass? We’re not talking about men, but about the great God!

Sadly, most of God’s people have turned away from these truths. Those men had some impressive knowledge—but what are they doing with it now? God fulfilled the prophecies just as these men taught. They then cast that revelation aside. Now most of them are fighting against it, and God calls them antichrist. They had a lot of knowledge about prophecies, but where was the love for God who gave those prophecies?

They’re not going to be able to ignore it for long. Soon they will be staring the Holy Roman Empire in the face.

In 1984, the EU was called the Common Market, but the Holy Roman Empire doesn’t want to be a super market, but a superpower! It wants to rule the world! That is its goal. It has the teeth of a lion, and it is going to grind up its prey—primarily America, Britain and the Jewish nation in the Middle East. Today that seems impossible—just as Russia losing its satellites did in 1984. Nevertheless, it happened, and so will the fall and enslavement of biblical Israel.

The EU is an empire looking for an emperor. Why? Because it is the final resurrection of the Holy Roman Empire. That spirit has continued since the caesars to this very day!

Also, there is an emperor in embryo now, looking for an empire. When the emperor and the empire unite, this world will see the greatest explosion of violence ever on planet Earth. This empire will have all the power of Daniel’s four beasts in one and an ambition to conquer the world!

It seems impossible now to most people, but get ready. It’s coming in a few short years!

God is putting those thoughts into the leaders of the EU (Revelation 17:17). The wcgministers didn’t spend much time on that part of the prophecy in 1984. Why is God intensely wrathful toward biblical Israel? Because He is sick of our leading the world into the vilest of sins. We lead the world in every major pathology.

God chose Israel anciently to set an example for the world, but it failed then too. Now God is preparing an empire to correct the people of Israel—if they refuse to hear His message.

There is some real tension between Russia and Germany over Ukraine. It’s all about the eastern leg of the Holy Roman Empire taking shape.

The Russians understand the German mind much better than our nations do and they are becoming fearful of the EU. They see danger on the horizon.

They are holding back now because of their dependence on German money and business.

The EU already has immense power, although we haven’t seen anything yet!

God says that European combine is like iron mixed with miry clay. The fact that Israel is mixed in—like France, for example—makes it inherently weak. It will not last long.

Revelation 16:12 says that God is going to dry the Euphrates River, and all the kings and millions of soldiers of the East—Russia and China—are going to come trample down Europe and the Mideast.

God tells us exactly how these events are going to unfold, yet the world won’t pay attention. People spurn this wonderful prophecy, because they are spiritually drunk. The media are drunk; the politicians are drunk. They won’t listen to a little Church that had to go underground for 1,260 years to keep from being killed. That’s not their kind of church! They don’t want to be associated with a Church that spends its life on the run.

They would rather look to a great false church, which looks to the kings of the Earth for its power, not the Creator of all things!

We must show this world that we will not give up God’s truth, regardless of the persecution!

The Laodiceans talked about how much they liked the sophisticated culture of Europe—its music and arts. That’s fine—but the Europeans are still going to fight Christ when He returns! And the outcome is already prophesied.

“And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up. And his power shall be mighty, but not by his own power: and he shall destroy wonderfully, and shall prosper, and practise, and shall destroy the mighty and the holy people” (Daniel 8:23-24). A man is about to come on the world scene who has a “fierce countenance” and understands “dark sentences.” All of this happens “not by his own power”—he is empowered in every way by Satan!

He is going to “destroy the mighty and the holy people.” God’s Laodicean people will be destroyed physically in the Great Tribulation to save half of them eternally.

This man doesn’t think he would do murderous deeds (Isaiah 10:6-7). But Satan is going to get to him—he will experience a mind change (Habakkuk 1:11).

That man could be coming on the scene very soon. Regardless of when this “king of fierce countenance” appears, it is going to be for an extremely short span of time.

“And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand” (Daniel 8:25). He has a policy of craft. He talks peace and destroys the gullible nations.

But this all leads to the greatest news we could possibly hear. Christ is going to destroy this man and the Holy Roman Empire.

That happy ending should cause our spirits to soar, because it’s almost here!

The number-seven head is especially covered in detail. God’s prophets received explicit visions about this empire that stunned and shocked them. Daniel said he was astonished by the vision of this beast (verse 27). That word means to grow numb, devastate, stupefy, be appalled, be desolate, be destitute. The same Hebrew word was used to describe Tamar after being raped by Amnon!

Just the vision caused Daniel to faint! But people are about to experience the reality! This beast is going to destroy them by the millions!

If we love people as much as Christ does, we will tell this world what awaits them!

Doing this job is going to require intense commitment. It won’t be easy. Our love is being evaluated! How much love do we have for God and mankind? We must bring Christ into these prophecies.

In a way, you could say that the prophecy those Laodicean ministers understood was really nothing more than entertainment for them!

How condemning! This is revelation from God! God is love—so it is about much more than prophecy: It’s about mankind becoming God—members of God’s Family.

Look what God did to make this revelation available to us! God came down to Earth and sacrificed everything!

I want to live in a world governed by that kind of love. That is how God has lived for eternity. I want to be out of this world that is so filled with hatred, violence and war! I want to live in a world where people are filled with love toward God and man.

Do we love God enough to proclaim this wonderful message?

Opulence of the Roman Empire

“And the angel said unto me, Wherefore didst thou marvel? I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast that carrieth her, which hath the seven heads and ten horns. The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition: and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, whose names were not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is” (Revelation 17:7-8).

About the only thing Americans can seem to think of when it comes to Europe is someone yodeling in the Alps. They have no idea what the Holy Roman Empire is about—or what that crown is about. They don’t know anything about this deadly beast! You can travel all over central Europe and still see some of the opulence of the Habsburgs.

The Habsburgs were the sword of the Catholic Church throughout the Middle Ages. They did their killing while supporting artists like Mozart, Bach and Schubert—they were very sophisticated as they slaughtered people.

Hitler used to love to go to the opera and have his mind saturated with the music of Richard Wagner. He even said that one couldn’t understand the Third Reich without understanding Wagner—a sex pervert and an anti-Semite—yet Hitler was intoxicated by him.

The next political leader will be much more suave and sophisticated than Hitler was. Otherwise other nations would not be so easily deceived—even those that are members of the EU.

The merchants of the Earth are going to wail when they see Babylon fall (Revelation 18). Most of these merchants will be highly cultured people. Still, that business conglomerate is going to be filled with horrors!

In 1983, Pope John Paul ii was in Vienna—300 years after this city was attacked by the “barbarian Turks” and the Polish king rallied the European kings and drove out the barbarians. John Paul was saying, back in 1983, that Europe needed to get back to its Christian roots. The current pope will rally Europe into making this a reality.

The Vatican leaders understand their history—unlike most of the world. This is why many millions of people are so easily deceived.

You can travel around Europe and see those Habsburg castles. Many of them have dungeons below them. A tour guide will tell you that the Habsburgs would be having great feasts upstairs, listening to the finest classical music, while people were being tortured to death below. And Hitler could listen to beautiful opera while he did the same.

And it is going to happen again. The next dictator will be much more sophisticated—much more cultured. But he is going to fight Christ!

In 1926, Hitler stated, “Christ was the greatest early fighter in the battle against the world enemy, the Jews …. The work that Christ started but could not finish, I—Adolf Hitler—will conclude.” He did not consider Jesus a Jew, but only a half-Jew, because He was begotten by God.

However, the biggest problem that Hitler posed to the world was not being a fanatical anti-Semite. That is only part of the story. This is where many people are deceived.

Much of the world looks upon the Jews as God’s chosen people. In Vienna, Hitler came to believe that God had replaced the Jews with the Germans and the Holy Roman Empire. He learned it in that cultured city—looking at all those crown jewels and the opulence of the Habsburgs.

He believed the Germans were God’s chosen people. This is why the crown jewels of that empire meant so much to him.

In 1938, Hitler had brought the insignia of the First Reich, the imperial crown, the orb of empire, the scepter, and the imperial sword, from Vienna to Nuremberg. At a rally, he vowed that they would remain there forever.

There is also a spear, called the spear of destiny. Many believe it is the spear that killed Christ—which is pure nonsense. The spear is supposed to have mystical powers. The legend states that if you look at this spear long enough, it will endow you with magical power. Hitler went there often and undoubtedly was mesmerized by it and probably picked up some demonic influence.

He later demonstrated power beyond that of any human. Satan empowered him—just as he will the next political head of the Holy Roman Empire.

Our nations have no concept of the unparalleled disaster that is racing toward us.

Lange’s Commentary says this about the fall of Jerusalem to the Roman armies in a.d. 70: “[T]he stamp of divine retribution was impressed upon the fate of Jerusalem and the temple, even for heathen eyes. We may call to mind the expression even of … Titus: ‘That God was so angry with this people that even he feared His wrath if he should suffer grace to be shown to the Jews’ ….”

Ceasar Titus sensed somehow that God was having him punish the Jews. And he was right.

Lange’s continues: “[H]e refused every mark of honor on account of the victory obtained, with the attestation that he had been only an instrument in God’s hands to punish this stiff-necked nation. Compare the well-known expressions of Josephus, as to the height which the wickedness of his contemporaries had reached.”

Has evil reached this height in biblical Israel today? Is God concerned about our wickedness?

Josephus says that Titus killed 1.1 million Jews and took 97,000 slaves. Do you really believe that we are getting close to a time when 100 million Americans will die before Germany even attacks, then another 100 million during the attack, and then 100 million taken as captives? In the end only a tenth of the nation surviving it all?

That same catastrophe is going to strike Britain and the Jews of the Middle East.

The wcg minister previously referred to wrote, “You’ll be asleep at the switch unless you are watching these things.”

They were watching, and now they’re asleep!

“And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares. For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man” (Luke 21:34-36).

Watch and pray always! Don’t just watch—pray in the Spirit. That you may stand! We have to watch and pray so we can stand before the Son of man! That’s what this is all about—standing before the Son of man. That should be real to us!

We must bring God into every thought and deed.

Moffatt translates verse 36: “From hour to hour keep awake ….” Why? To “be accounted worthy to escape ….” Only those saints deeply committed to God’s Work will “be accounted worthy to escape.”

There are so many snares out there. But pray always that we’re counted worthy to stand right there by the Son of man!

Is that inspiring? Is that stirring? Is that moving and wonderful and precious? That we could stand right there with the Son of man—just for watching and praying in the Spirit and proclaiming this message?

These wcg ministers just knew prophecy on the surface, but they did not know God. If they did, they lost that knowledge by the time they delivered these messages.

Speak God’s Message

“And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition” (Revelation 17:11). Here is what Mr. Armstrong wrote: “The entire beast of Revelation 17—the revivals of the Roman Empire—is a part ‘of the seven’ heads of Revelation 13 and Daniel 7 because it comprises the last seven horns. Yet this revived Roman Empire is ‘the eighth’ system, differing from the seven before it …” (Who or What Is the Prophetic Beast?).

The seven heads of the Daniel 7-Revelation 13 beast are 7 systems. The entire seven-headed beast of Revelation 17 becomes the eighth system.

How is this eighth system of Revelation 17 different? Because all seven heads are guided by the scarlet woman, or church, riding the beast. None of the seven heads, or systems, of the Daniel 7-Revelation 13 beast were guided by a church. We’re looking for a Hitler type to come on the scene and begin to stir millions of people. The audience is already there for the pope—look at the staggering audience that watched John Paul’s funeral and Joseph Ratzinger’s election as Pope Benedict xvi!

That gives you a vivid picture of the audience awaiting the political beast who will rule the Holy Roman Empire!

God says “Watch … and pray always” so you can stand there with Him, as Daniel’s three friends stood with Him in the fiery furnace. Only this will be in an entirely different setting.

The Laodiceans could not withstand Satan’s attack, but we can! We have the power to conquer the devil—as Christ did.

“For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled” (verse 17). God is using this system to punish biblical Israel.

We must be speaking God’s message. Mr. Armstrong, after hearing the ministers’ messages in the late 1970s, said, I want to hear more spiritual MEAT, and see more FIRE! God isn’t taking this lightly. Let’s be honest. God the Father would not send His Son to Earth, watch Him get savagely beaten and killed by evil men, and say, It’s okay if you want to slack off a bit.No—this is deadly serious! He sent His Son to die for us! We ought to take His message seriously or get into some other business!

He’s not going to let the Laodiceans get away with their rebellion. If the boss says, Prophesy not, then you have the wrong boss! We must realize who the Boss is, and who leads the Church. If we don’t know that, we don’t know anything!

The only hope of this world is this message. Those Laodicean ministers have betrayed God and left their night watch when they should be protecting that truth—guarding God’s people. But they turned and just walked away because someone at the top said, Prophesy not.

Did they understand and obey God the Father and Jesus Christ, the Head of the Church? No, they did not.

It is left to us now—you and me. This little remnant has been given that watch. We’re all that there is left, and God says, I want you to WATCH and PRAY, PROCLAIM my message and finish the Work!

Then, we will all stand before the Son of man!

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recentanimenews · 7 years

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The Geniuses Behind Texhnolyze

Changing things up, the spotlight for this week doesn’t focus on a single individual, but rather the creative team behind the cyberpunk epic, Texhnolyze: director Hiroshi Hamasaki, producer Yasuyuki Ueda, character designer Yoshitoshi ABe, and scriptwriter Chiaki J. Konaka.

Texhnolyze is a recent addition to Crunchyroll’s catalogue of anime, and it’s one of the most viscerally powerful shows in their library. Originally airing in 2003 and produced by animation studio Madhouse, Texhnolyze was created during the cyberpunk anime boom and still has a strong cult following to this day. Painting a bleak vision of a slowly decaying world, the anime is like the death metal funeral of its genre. Dominated by its powerful soundscape and imagery, Texhnolyze is a brutal yet contemplative look at human struggle, a cybernetic arms race, and anarchy. Its ruthless depictions of violence and Lovecraftian symbolism (courtesy of scriptwriter Chiaki J. Konaka) are not for the faint of heart. However, for those that are able to look past that, they’ll find a meditative anime born from the minds of its brilliant creators; there’s nothing quite like Texhnolyze in anime.

Set in the sprawling underground city of Lux, Texhnolyze follows the story of a stoic prize fighter named Ichise. Waking up in a dilapidated underpass with no memory of what has transpired, our first view into Texhnolyze’s world are through Ichise’s eyes. His emotionless face serves as an honest vantage point as we see him wandering the abyss of a dark and foreboding underworld. Ichise’s first steps are without a destination, but they reveal so much about the state of the world around him. Surrounded by silence and distorted scenes of architectural decay, his detached expression speaks more than any dialogue would. Driven entirely by diegetic noise and poignant imagery, Texholyze’s first episode is not one to forget. With Ichise’s journey culminating in a disturbing sexual encounter and the dismemberment of one of his arms and legs, the anime establishes an unshakable precedent for its chaos.

The opening scenes of Texhnolyze are some of the strongest moments of cinema to come out of a TV anime, and highlight the best work of director Hiroshi Hamasaki’s career. The anime has a distinctive visual ethos which is defined by Hamasaki’s washed out color palette and blinding white lighting. Lux is a barren wasteland ruled by crime and mafia, with its inhabitants being more lifeless than the city itself. Although the flames of rebellion linger beneath the surface, people have accepted their state of hopelessness and entered a dormant state.

Hamasaki’s directing style is the perfect complement to the cold and unforgiving world that scriptwriter Chiaki J. Konaka creates throughout Texhnolyze. He emphasizes sound and scenery in any given scene, creating a mood more for the audience as opposed to one that reflects the characters’ experiences in the story. It’s an uncommon approach in anime, but is fitting of Texhnolyze as many of its human characters rarely show visible emotion. Rather than attempt to get the audience to emphasize with these characters, the director aims to paint more of an all-encompassing view of their existence. This is not to say that characters in the anime aren’t relatable or well-written, but rather that Hamasaki approaches Texhnolyze as more of an atmospheric art piece.

The primary exception though is Ichise, who serves as the viewpoint character throughout Texhnolyze. Although he rarely speaks or shifts from his stoic demeanor, the key moments during the narrative where Ichise lets his feelings out are some of the most impactful in the series. During the scenes where Ichise has to drag himself up a flight of stairs with his newly texhnolyzed limbs, we see a young man essentially give up all hope as his body fails him. Hamasaki’s silent long-takes are beautiful pieces of cinema that express deep sorrow and frustration. Ichise’s silent scream is without a doubt one of the most chilling moments in anime.

While Hamasaki is a talented director capable of great cinematic feats, he owes a lot to Texhnolyze’s core production staff for the anime’s groundwork. Producer Yasuyuki Ueda has been the forefront of many imaginative and thought-provoking anime series. Back in the late 90s, Ueda formed a core team that he would work with on many productions. When he wrote the basic concept, setting, and story as a proposal for Serial Experiments Lain, he approached graphic artist Yoshitoshi ABe and scriptwriter Chiaki J. Konaka (individuals who he felt would be able to visualize his ideas). With ABe providing character and concept artwork and Konaka handling the TV screenplay, Lain was born.

Ueda, ABe, and Konaka are all talented individuals who tend to create their most brilliant stories when in each other’s company. Ueda is a producer who plays an active role in the planning stages of an anime, cementing the project’s ideas, themes, and potential impact from the get-go. He then collaborates with other creators as they begin shaping his ideas into a more concrete story. For Ueda, he enjoys taking risks with animation projects and would rather create a piece that provokes a strong response from viewers as opposed to one that sold well. Serial Experiments Lain was a multimedia project that communicated the relationship between the self, technology, and the world to youth audiences, but was not explicit about what it stood for. Ueda wanted his audiences to interpret the show as they saw fit and find their own theme.

With Texhnolyze, Ueda left most of its original planning to ABe, going off his original concept artwork for the anime. ABe has a distinctive art style with dark colors and edgy, sharp line work, with many of his dojinshi being stories conceptualized around an abstract theme. For example, Haibane Renmei was originally a short dojinshi about angels living in a strangely soothing state of purgatory that Ueda liked and adapted into a full-length TV anime.

ABe’s artwork is not just striking to look at, as he’s very keen on expressing specific themes or emotions to his audiences. While he didn’t have as clear of a roadmap for Texhnolyze (compared to Haibane Renmei), he has stated in an interview that he was fascinated by the concept of an organic being with mechanical limbs. ABe had little experience drawing machinery, but wanted to design a story revolving around a character with a severed arm. In Texhnolyze, he hoped to express the pain of loss to viewers with the narrative of Ichise losing his real limbs and having to live with a mechanical substitute. As a result, he wanted the first half of Texhnolyze to stress Ichise’s struggles as he slowly adapts to his texhnolyzed limbs.

With Ueda and ABe forming Texhnolyze’s concepts and ideas, they left it to Konaka to script the anime’s scenarios. Konaka is a very unique scriptwriter in anime, as his primary influences are H.P. Lovecraft and Lewis Carroll. Many of the anime that Konaka had a hand in, such as Digimon Tamers, often contained heavy elements of Lovecraftian horror – and Texhnolyze is no exception. With the anime revolving around cybernetic body modifications, Konaka’s influence can certainly be seen during the series’ later half. Horror is a literary device that is very central to dystopian science fiction, and can be used to express people’s fears surrounding new forms of technology. Konaka builds off that literary theme in many disturbing ways with some truly haunting creations during Texhnolyze’s series’ finale.

Texhnolyze is brutal in terms of its subject matter, but thoughtful in its approach. It is not an anime for the faint of heart, but is clearly a passion project born from the genius of its creative team. Very few anime can express pain, sorrow, and emptiness in such a raw and affecting manner. Cyberpunk anime are sadly a vestige of a bygone era, but Texhnolyze remains as one of the genre’s greatest achievements.

Let us know your thoughts about Texhnolyze and its creative staff in the comments below!

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Brandon is a Brand Features Writer for Crunchyroll and also writes anime-related editorials on his blog, Moe-Alternative. Hit him up for a chat on his Twitter at @Don_Don_Kun!

By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

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theclacks · 7 years

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Buffy (Season 4) & Angel (Season 1) Thoughts

Whoo, so watching two seasons at once makes a giant dent in my viewing speed, but it’s kind of awesome. The “new series” rush I had in season two is mostly gone I think, replaced with a steady comfortability, which is good, because whenever a series is short enough that I reach its end/catch up before the rush fades, then I feel incredibly listless.

Anyway. Thoughts below the cut.

Buffy - Season 4

On how it compares to other seasons...

So season 2 is still my all time favorite. I think season 4 is tied with season 3 for me on like-ability. I think season 3 was strongest toward its end and season 4 was strongest towards its middle (hello, Spike pseudo-redemption arc). I think killing Professor Walsh as early as they did was a mistake; she and Buffy had a great antagonistic relationship. The greatness of season 2 was the relationship between the heroes and the villains, especially once Angel turned darkside. My biggest problem with the mayor was that he and Buffy never met until the very end of the season and that’s kind of my same issue here. They traded out an AWESOME antagonist (works for “good” like Buffy, but sees her as a uncontrollable threat! there’s some age/generation issues going on, defined career woman vs unranked youngster! science vs magic and prophecy! they used to hold each other in high esteem but now don’t!)... for, well, Adam. Who was very season one-ish in terms of flat personality and “I SHALL RULE THE WORLD MWAHAHA.”

On Oz leaving + Tara entering...

I read an interview/comment part way through that said Joss’s original plan was to string the Oz/girl!werewolf/Willow drama over the whole season, but then Seth Green nope’d it out of there and thank fucking god. I hated girl!werewolf. I don’t even remember her name and I’m fine with that.

I loved the introduction of Tara. I loved the episode where Oz came back (although I spent the whole episode fearing for his life) and Willow came out to her friends and Tara expecting Willow to leave her and asking if they could still be friends and I WAS CRYING DURING THAT SCENE. I HAVE NO SHAME. I think it was first scene in Buffy I cried at. Willow and Tara’s actresses just knocked it out of the park.

Also, it was weird for me since all I’ve ever heard from people about Willow is that they retcon’ed her sexuality into being a lesbian, and... unless something changes in the future, that’s totally not the case because she’s obviously bisexual. Like mentions loving Oz AND loving Tara in the same episode? And if talking about retconning her into being bisexual, umm... that shit doesn’t need foreshadowing... unless people are talking about something that happens in a later season with Willow saying straight out she doesn’t like men... and you know what? I’ll just see it when I get there.

On Riley...

He’s okay. Like, just, okay. I liked the episode where he told Buffy not to hold back during sparing, she kicked him across the room, and he’s like “it’s okay, i told you not to hold back”, and later she confesses (to Willow?) “.......I held back.”

IDK. I didn’t like the episode where the frat house sucks them into being a kind of sex battery thing... well, I liked the Xander, Willow, Anya, and Spike parts, but yeah.

On Spike...

I think the weirdest character development thing was him hooking up with Harmony. I mean, really? BUT it was awesome seeing Harmony eventually kick him to the curb, so there’s that. I got spoiled for the headchip thing, but I didn’t know it was coming this season, and his conversation with Willow immediately discovering his “impotence” was one of the best things ever. Oh, and “Something Blue” I didn’t know that episode was going to be a thing and it was AWESOME. I also liked how he didn’t immediately turn good and was mostly an annoying hinderance to the main characters; that fit him much better than a straight heel-face turn.

On college vs high school...

It’s weird. I have more nostalgia for college than high school, so I really enjoyed the first few college eps. Like, the way I’ve seen people talk about their love for the high school era of Buffy... I think that was me during this season. (People who used to hang outside the student union delivering flyers for whatever, I MISS YOU.) I did like the episode where they revisited the high school’s ruins. That was a nice touch. And I like Faith a lot better this season, especially when she realizes it’s been months and months since graduation. (Oh, and speaking of the Faith/Buffy bodyswitch episode, their actress did such a good job.)

On Giles...

Nothing too much to report. I do think more than any of the other characters, he’s lost his groove. Hopefully he’ll re-find it in season five.

But enough about Buffy, it’s time to discuss...

Angel - Season 1

General thoughts

OH MY GOD. I think I actually ended up enjoying Angel more than Buffy for these two seasons. I thought it was going to be something I’d slowly have to sit through episode after episode until I grew to like and then LO AND BEHOLD Charisma Carpenter’s name popped up in the credits. And suddenly Angel went from “Angel interacts with random LA strangers I don’t know” in my head to “OH MY GOD CORDELIA IS IN LA BEING BROS WITH ANGEL AND FIGHTING DEMONS AND SHIT.” And it’s been awesome since.

On Doyle and Wesley (and Cordelia)...

I was not expecting them to switch season mains halfway through, and although I’m still sad that Doyle left the show so early, I’m kind of cool with it because it meant Cordelia getting his visions. And honestly, if you’d told me after the first episode of Buffy that Cordelia Chase was eventually going to become bros with Angel in LA and with god-given vision superpowers and a ghost as a roommates, I’d... well, I don’t know what I would’ve thought, but it definitely would’ve spoiled the wild, amazing journey. Of course, Cordelia was already my favorite character about four episodes into watching Buffy, so... yeah.

One of my lesser favorite parts of season three was having Cordelia vanish for a whole bunch of episodes after her breakup with Xander, so seeing her rise like this and be a central character and have AMAZING heart-to-heart conversations with Angel... like, Buffy and Angel have their super love but at this point I feel like Cordelia and Angel are stronger friends? Like they treat each other as brother and sister and it is the best damn thing ever.

Also along that line, the reintroduction of Wesley was great. Probably the best replacement they could’ve gotten for Doyle. It really strengthened the team, especially for the Faith episodes since she was someone they ALL had history with. And since the Cordelia/Wesley UST got resolved in the final season 3 buffy episodes, his friendship with cordelia was awesome too. JUST ALL THE FRIENDSHIPS FOR CORDELIA KTHXBAI.

On LA vs Sunnydale...

If college era of buffy is nostalgic, angel’s LA setting is straight up “THIS IS MY LIFE RIGHT NOW”. I’m past Buffy’s concerns about class schedules and straight in the thick of Cordelia’s concerns about finding a decent apartment for a decent rent, balancing work that pays the bills with the true passions you live for, having to pay bills, be an adult.

And I think Cordelia really is angel’s greatest strength right now because of how much different her life is from all of her classmates’ back in Sunnydale. She’s had to grow up the fastest. Even Xander who’s ostensibly in similar shoes (straight to work/no college) has a kind of flat dotted-ness to him. He picks up random weekly jobs, he stays in his parents’ basement, he feels the world moving on without him because it is. Contrast that with Cordelia, moves to LA, gets a rad (albeit possessed apt), gets a job with Angel’s firm (basically starts Angel’s firm), gains Doyle’s visions, making her an even more integral part of the team... Their respective paths over the course of the same year couldn’t have been more different.

On “I Will Remember You”...

Holy damn that was an awesome episode. I knew it wasn’t going to last because Angel being a vampire is, like, his whole thing. I was like Buffy going “let’s wait before diving into all this” but then they crumbled and then they were in bed eating ice cream together and it was THE CUTEST THING EVER. And then even after Angel decided to turn back, I was like “that’s okay because at least they’ll have their memories and then it was suddenly all NO. NO. NOOOOO. THIS IS NOT OKAY, ANGEL NO. BUFFY MY BB, NOOOOOOOO.” The juxtaposition between Buffy in tears, clinging to him, and then 180 degrees, being back in his office completely tense and cold was traumatically beautiful and well-done.

And a part of me really eventually wants her to remember down the line, but I have no idea whether or not that would ever happen.

On Faith...

So. I’ve decided that my favorite part of Faith is when she completely breaks down into self-loathing. It happened when she was in Buffy’s body and then again when she was squaring off against Angel in the rain. She sold it so well, that I’m cool with her again.

On evil!Angel...

Evil!Angel is my favorite, the humor that just drips out of him while he’s killing everything. And I love that there are hints of it even when Angel’s “sober” so to speak. And while I never want him to turn fully evil again (season 2 played that the best way it ever could), I do like the way the writers are able to tease it back. First with the buffy season three episode where he faked it, and then again in this season of angel where it was kind of drugged out of him. And once again, I’m super happy that Cordelia and Wesley are his buddies because they can recognize that history of his in an instant (granted, Cordelia more than Wesley).

On Gunn and Lesley and Wolfram and Hart...

So Buffy/Angel crossovers excluded, my favorite episode of the season by far was when Angel and Lesley joined forces to infiltrate Wolfram and Hart and they also pulled in Gunn for good measure. Maybe it’s because I’m a sucker for heist episodes, but I think (I hope) that episode marked a turning point. Like “this is the world of angel. these are angel’s allies and these are his foes and this is way it comes together.” I’m looking forward to more with all them.

On Kate...

I have conflicted thoughts about Kate. I like her as a character. She’s been used somewhat inconsistently re: episode and screentime-wise, and still very distant from the main characters. I hope she’s used more in season two.

On LA’s demon sub-culture...

The thing I’ll end with is that I love how angel introduces us to a whole bunch of other demon, both good and evil and somewhere in between. With the exception of Willie’s bar, buffy doesn’t have that? Like I feel half the demons from LA could wander into Sunnydale and Buffy would start beating them up before they could talk. Or like if they put one toe out of line, she’d try to kill them.

Take for example the episode with Doyle’s ex-wife. Her fiance tried to eat Doyle’s brains, but the ending to that wasn’t “kill the fiance” it was just “that’s not okay, demon, and you broke my trust by trying to do it and if that’s a requirement for us to get married, then the engagement’s off.” And lo and behold, they broke off the engagement and thus ended the episode. No killings. And I don’t know, there’s just something ridiculously refreshing about that.

#buffy the vampire slayer #btvs #btvs meta #meta thoughts #/////#clacks from the clacks

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ecotone99 · 4 years

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[SF] A College Admissions Essay From The Future President Of The World

Dear Mikirken State University Admissions Board,

For my college entrance essay, I have chosen the three prompts:

Why should we choose you for Mikirken State University?

Tell us an experience that humbled you.

What do you hope to accomplish at Mikirken State University?

I hope to prove with these essays that I am MSU material and will be a unique and valuable contribution to the MSU student body… and humanity.

Why should we choose you for Mikirken State University?

I have a 3.4 GPA, my SAT score is 1350, and I am the proud son of a hard-working single mother.

But my most important qualification is that I will become the first president of the world.

That is to say, that sometime in the year 2062, I will be inaugurated as the first president of the United World Order, a democratic, federal government with jurisdiction over the entire Earth.

Why do I know about my destiny?

Although I don’t have the full story, I have preened this information from the hundreds of time travelers who have visited, stalked and harassed me since my birth.

That might sound unusual, and it is.

At least, it is for normal people.

However, for People of Historical Interest (POHI), it’s quite regular. In fact, every POHI from the Egyptian King Narmer to the 24th century Cyber Warlord Bob has been swarmed by curious, fact-finding time travelers.

You might also think it’s strange that the time travelers have told me so much about my history. The truth is, they’re not supposed to reveal themselves as time travelers or tell me anything about the future.

But time travelers, while being generally intelligent people, are so enthusiastic about meeting historical figures that they tend to let things slip.

When I was four, our mailman would deliver mail three times a day and regularly ask if he could join us for breakfast in our home.

My mother assumed he was romantically interested in her, but it quickly became apparent that he was more interested in her parenting. What she fed me, what books she read to me, if I showed any traits that might facilitate my future greatness, etc.

He was writing a book.

They’re always writing a book.

When confronted with the fact that the post office had never heard of him and his uniform was clearly made of a chrome-colored, synthetic fiber unknown to modern science, he confessed.

Since then, my mother and I have become adept at spotting time travelers. They almost seem relieved when they’re exposed, admitting their professions, but adding that they cannot reveal anything about the future or risk dire consequences for the timeline and humanity’s destiny.

But slip-ups happen.

When I was nine, a woman asked me what influence the U.N. declaration of human rights had on my understanding of Neo-Gramscian International Relations theories.

I asked, “why?”

She said, “because you quote the declaration in your inauguration speech as first President of the United World Order in 2062.”

That’s when I knew.

Since that embarrassing slip-up, it’s been easier for me to collect information about my future self and explore why I would make a great MSU student from the perspective of Post-Doctorate level historical analysis.

In the future, I will lead a band of highly-talented individuals to save the planet from the worst effects of climate change, mitigate the chaos and violence caused by depleted world resources and unite all nations in the greatest endeavor ever taken to end war, forever.

Although I’m not the most brilliant POHI or the strongest, I have a high degree of honesty and moral courage, or so I’m told, and yet I am strangely evasive.

I will be regularly compared to Abraham Lincoln, although my place in history is closer to that of foundational leader like George Washington, speaking from a strictly American historical perspective.

Also, my favorite subjects are math and biology.

Tell us an experience that humbled you.

This answer is also related to the time traveler/future president of the world thing.

My college prep tutor told me that I needed to show a variety of experiences in my essays, but seeing as that tutor is also a time traveler in disguise, I have decided to write more about this particular aspect of my life.

I also realize that being a POHI with a constant retinue of time traveling observers hardly seems like a humbling experience.

Certainly, my mother has taken enormous pride in my future. She has used it as affirmation her all-bran breakfasts are the cornerstone of a healthy childhood. Time travelers seem reluctant or unwilling to dissuade her of that idea… unfortunately.

Nevertheless, many conversations have been disturbing.

Most travelers come from the years 2130 (roughly the year time travel was invented) through 2180. But I also get people from 2200 through 2240, a period where my legacy becomes “problematic.”

During my rise to power and administration I made (or will make) several compromises and had a variety of moral blind spots that were perfectly acceptable, or at least overlooked, until the year 2200, when citizens of the first world order start to “wake up.”

These moral failings include not recognizing Kurdistan, the Basque Country, Tibet, Somalia and France as independent states within the global federal system.

Supposedly, that’s due to the racism and ignorance of my “America-centric perspective.”

I also blocked amendments to the global constitution that would grant human rights to cyborgs and genetically enhanced humans. That backwards view will lead to a century of discrimination.

Time travelers tell me about these problems regularly with almost no observance of temporal law. I suspect that many of them hope to change the timeline, and maybe they have.

Whereas other time travelers are looking for the keys to greatness, these people are looking for the seeds of evil.

They hate bran.

My mother doesn’t like those travelers and tries to shoo them away whenever possible, but they keep coming. They argue a lot with historians that praise my administration. Sometimes, they’ll even start fist fights.

I used to argue with them too.

I’d become defensive and scream. Tell them they wouldn’t even be alive without future-me.

I’ve grown. I recognize their pain and try to listen now. They’re right to be angry or even hate me, because I could have easily made their lives easier by a simple admission of their humanity.

But I didn’t (or won’t).

These historians have made me realize that I’m not perfect, and I never will be.

How I come to forget these lessons in the future is beyond me. I suspect that I will be forced to compromise my morality for some sort of greater good.

I don’t know.

But I’m the only person who regrets something they haven’t done yet.

What do you hope to accomplish at Mikirken State University?

As you are probably aware, Mikirken State University currently ranks towards the bottom of universities nation-wide. There are almost no notable alumni or programs with significant acclaim.

I’m sorry for my honesty and the arrogance of this observation — but why would the future president of the world want to go to your university?

This application was inspired by one time traveler from the year 2567.

You see, after the year 2240, I stop being a POHI with such an emotionally controversial legacy and I start becoming a stale subject of academic interest.

I still get visitors from past that year, but they usually stay hidden, my failings and victories too distant to be provocative.

One morning, a dirty old man burst into my bedroom. His eyes were blood-shot and crazy. His hair hadn’t been washed in some time and he had a long, wiry beard.

He made no attempt to disguise himself for our time. Instead, his clothes were dirty and as grey as his beard.

I thought it was a time assassin, but before I could even scream, he held his hand to my mouth and pleaded with me to hear him out. I figured I had no other choice.

He told me that in his era, the government I founded is gone. The world is suffering from a terrible, man-made blight that’s left billions to starve to death. Competing cults have turned people against each other and freely destroy the world’s technological infrastructure and kill off engineers and scientists.

War and nuclear destruction envelope large sections of the planet. The ideals of justice, equality and freedom are taboo. Even the words used to describe them are being expunged from the future global languages.

The man told me he had saved the last known time traveling device and used its last charge to come talk to me.

He knew that in his distant past I prevented the horrors his world faced. He and his followers had come to worship me as their last hope for fixing a broken world.

And after telling me every detail of his time, he asked what I would do to heal the planet.

I said, “dude, I’m only 12.”

It wasn’t the answer he was looking for.

I never saw him again, and I’ve never seen a traveler from after 2567.

That doesn’t mean civilization was wiped out. It could be that my legacy was cleaned from history or time travel was banned or many other possibilities.

But getting back to the question — why MSU?

Right now, your institution may not be the best. And it won’t become significant in the next century. Or the century after that. Or the one after that.

Nevertheless, by 2567, it will be the last institution of higher learning left on the entire planet (at least, as far as that man knew). It’s from your university that that desperate man made his journey.

To be precise, he traveled from the basement of science center, which still exists in 2567.

I didn’t have an answer for him when I was twelve, but I plan on spending the next four years looking for one and leaving it for him.

I’ve been told (indirectly) that my college years don’t actually matter. There’s no record of my experiences during those years, and I will one day confess to being kind of idiot during this future time.

And so, I am not interested in a specific program, a career track, or even a degree.

I only hope to answer that one man.

I have included these essays along with my transcripts and other application materials.

Thank you for your time and consideration, and I hope to speak with you soon about my joining the student body.

Go Mavericks!

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upontheshelfreviews · 6 years

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“Please observe me if you will, I’m Professor Harold Hill, And I’m here to organize the River City’s Boy’s Band!”

Let’s close out the summer with what I consider a must-watch summer musical. Doesn’t hurt that the main action kicks off on the Fourth of July.

“Missing another appropriate holiday-themed movie by several months. Ah, it’s good to be back.”

Based on the stories and childhood of Meredith Wilson, The Music Man weaves a tale of small town turn-of-the-century America, marching bands, charming charlatans, and the power of music that brings them all together. The original stage production notoriously beat West Side Story for Best Musical at the Tony Awards, though Tony and Maria got the last laugh when it came to the Oscars. I contend however that 1962’s The Music Man is a prime example of how to do a stage-to-screen adaptation. Through a combination of top-notch talent, music, staging, and witty witticisms it’s one of the crowning jewels of the Golden Age of Hollywood Musicals that lasted through the 60’s. Fifty years later its impact is still felt, at least musically. Chances are if you ambled down Main Street USA in any of the Disney parks you’ve heard the melodies of “Iowa Stubborn”, “Lida Rose”, “The Wells Fargo Wagon”, and “76 Trombones” playing in the background. It’s a staple for community theaters across the country. And like Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and The Sound of Music, it’s one of Seth MacFarlane’s most beloved and referenced musicals.

After a neat opening credits sequence comprised of stop-motion marching band dolls forming the shapes of musical instruments, we see a hapless traveling anvil salesman being chased out Brighton, Illinois by an angry mob. He escapes on a train headed to River City, Iowa and joins a car filled with other salesman. As the train chugs its way down the track, the salesmen grumble about modern inconveniences and the difficulties of their chosen work all in syncopated beat to the sounds of the engine.

Some years back I was fortunate enough to sit in on a Q&A of Stephen Sondheim centered around his latest autobiography, and when the interviewer congratulated him on being the first composer to incorporate rap into a musical (the rap in question being the Witch’s Rap from the prologue of Into The Woods), he corrected him. According to Sondheim, THIS sequence, “Rock Island”, was the first musical rap, and I can’t agree more. The cadence, the word sounds meticulously matching with the train’s noises, and the contempt and admiration the salesmen regard a certain figure throughout wouldn’t be out of place in a traditional rap. It says something when Hugh Jackman performed it as an actual rap at the Tonys with LL Cool J and T.I. and made it sound like the genuine article.

Conversation turns to one famous – or rather infamous – salesman who goes by the name of Professor Harold Hill. He’s referred to as a “music man” –

– because he sells instruments and uniforms for boys bands. But the salesman from earlier, Charlie Cowell (Harry Hickox), has got quite a few things to say about him. He reveals Harold is a con artist who convinces whatever unfortunate town he stops in to give him money for all the accoutrements of a marching band and promises to organize them with him as their leader, but skips out without teaching a note of music. The wave of anti-salesman mistrust he leaves in his wake is the reason why Charlie was given the bum rush. Charlie’s determined to catch up with him one of these days and give him his just desserts on behalf of all the honest salesmen whose careers he’s screwed over. But he knows there’s no way Harold would ever make his next mark in Iowa as the folk there are infamously stubborn and set in their ways.

Without warning a stranger in the corner who’s been silent throughout the proceedings gets up, announces that this talk of Iowa is intriguing and this is where he’ll get off. Before he disembarks Charlie mentions he never caught his name. The stranger replies, “I don’t believe I dropped it”, revealing it emblazoned on his suitcase.

Best. Introduction. Ever.

Robert Preston was a B-movie regular who occasionally did some stage work before landing the part of Harold Hill on Broadway, and not a day goes by that I don’t thank the theater gods for that because he is pitch perfect as the character. I have yet to see anyone who equals him in suave charm and quick wit (sorry Matthew Broderick, you tried). You’d think Hollywood would be clamoring to have Preston recreate his Tony-winning role on film, but Jack Warner, who was the head of Warner Brothers at the time, was dead-set on having an A-list Hollywood actor play the part. Jack really had a thing for celebrity casting in musicals regardless of their singing prowess (which would infamously bite him in the ass come the 1964 Oscars). He offered the part to Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, and Cary Grant, whom out of all the prospective choices gave Jack the best response: “I won’t even see the film if Robert Preston isn’t in it.” Reluctantly, Jack made an exception to his rule for Preston, and the rest is history.

Harold hops off before the train heads out, leaving behind a gaggle of awed salesman and a fuming Charlie. He makes his way into town and tries to introduce himself to the townsfolk but quickly learns that Charlie wasn’t kidding when he said Iowans are the most recalcitrant sonsabitches out there. The citizens sing of how proud they are of their inherent rudeness towards outsiders while following Harold in “Iowa Stubborn”, which I’m certain provided some inspiration for the musical number “Belle” from Beauty and the Beast.

“Look there he goes, he’s odd, no question, another salesman piece of swill. With his smile blinding white and his morals out of sight, what a puzzle to us all, that Harold Hill!”

After the “welcome” wagon disperses, Harold bumps into Marcellus Washburn (Buddy Hackett) an old friend and former partner-in-crime gone straight. He brings him in on his scheme for old times’ sake. Harold must create a need in River City for a boys band, preferably by following his time-honored tradition of painting something ordinary as unholy, corrupting and morally outrageous, getting the mindless masses riled up by playing on their own irrational fears of this foreign influence, and then selling his ridiculous solution as the only reasonable option to OH DEAR GOD NO.

“Go on, Shelf. Make the comparison. You KNOW you want to.”

ANYWAY, the only other thing standing in Harold’s way is the local librarian who gives piano lessons on the side and is musically intuitive enough to suss him out. But Harold’s got his own tried and true method of dealing with her. The solution to the first issue comes in the form of a new pool table delivered to the billiards hall and the sight of some scrappy young boys eagerly crowding outside the window for a look. Even though much of this musical is timeless – a little TOO timeless as of recent years, see above – it still makes me laugh seeing how the game of billiards and pool halls were seen as seen as outlandishly sinful back in the 1900’s. Over a hundred years later nobody bats an eye over it. Hell, when my family moved into our new house when I was six years old, the former owner left us her pool table and I’ve been handy with a pool cue ever since.

So the pool table is picked as the target of discrimination and the next thing you know Harold’s working his wiles on anyone who’ll listen. He quickly amasses a majority of the townsfolk who take to heart the warnings he espouses – today the children will be peeking into the pool hall, tomorrow they’ll be smoking, the day after they’ll be engaging with women of questionable repute in saloons and dancing the hootchie-cootch to ragtime music! Such horrors!

This number, “Ya Got Trouble”, is one of this musical’s cornerstones; the amount of parodies it continues to spawn decades later is a testament to that. Whether it’s a pair of huckster unicorns pawning off a magical cider-making machine, Conan O’Brien lamenting the state of 2000’s-era NBC, or most notably, the town of Springfield getting hyped over a monorail (which coincidentally was also penned by O’Brien), there’s at least one version out there that someone is familiar with regardless if they know its origins. It also showcases Robert Preston’s greatest strengths as Harold Hill. He’s not the strongest singer but the number calls for a rapid fire sense of timing and overwhelming force of presence, both of which he has in spades. Robert’s Harold sways the unwary townies through his sheer magnetism, plays on their foibles and fears like a fiddle, and leaves them – and us – wanting more, even after we see how unfounded the leaps of logic he presents are when we step back to dissect them.

“Hill 2020: Make River City Great Again…Again!”

The seeds of mob mentality been planted, Harold pursues his next target, the librarian Marian Paroo (Shirley Jones) as she’s walking home. His attempts at an introduction fall flat, however, as she makes it clear she wants nothing to do with him. I know I made a reference to “Belle” with Harold’s arrival, but if there’s anyone worthy of a comparison to the titular heroine, it’s Marian. She’s witty and well-read, but trapped in a small and small-minded town who look down on her choices of literature as “dirty” and regard her as an outcast, naturally making her the source of plenty of unwanted gossip. Marian responds to this with a stiff upper lip and refusal to assimilate, but is secretly rather lonely. The only source of companionship is her sweet but meddling mother (Pert Kelton) who’s so Irish you’d think she came right off the set of Darby O’Gill, and her much younger brother Winthrop played by a very young Ron Howard.

Yes. THAT Ron Howard.

Marian gives a piano lesson to a young girl named Amaryllis while Mrs. Paroo unabashedly shares her opinions about why none of the women of River City take her seriously – namely she needs to find a good man to settle down with, stat. The two bicker the way only a mother and daughter can through the lesson, their arguments escalating with the music. Winthrop comes home and Amaryllis invites him to her birthday party. He initially refuses to answer since he has a very prominent lisp he’s embarrassed by. Amaryllis’ predictable guffaws over Winthrop’s response cause him to run up to his room in tears where he no doubt plans to expurgate Han Solo prequels as revenge. Amaryllis does feel remorse though since she’s hiding quite the precocious crush on Winthrop and takes his constant silence as a sign he doesn’t like her. Marian comforts her saying she can wish good night to “my someone” on the evening star until the right boy for her comes along. As Amaryllis plays her last practice piece for the evening, Marian sings the beautifully longing “Goodnight My Someone”. We also get the first instance of what I believe may have been a holdover from the original stage production. Following the end of a personal scene, instead of an iris out, everything goes completely black around the character in question leaving them standing out before it fades to the next scene. It doesn’t look exactly like a spotlight is shining on them, more like a tableau of sorts, and it’s utilized to great effect both comically or romantically depending on the scenario.

The next day, pompous spoonerism-prone Mayor Shinn (Paul Ford) and his wife (Hermione Gingold) lead the citizens in some patriotic Fourth of July activities, including a sing-along, some constantly interrupted attempts at reciting the Gettysburg Address, and a proud re-enactment of the Native Americans’ subjugation and denigration.

Mercifully this racist sham is halted by one Tommy Djilas, a brave and noble teenage soul and leader of the local gang of delinquents, who places a well-timed firecracker under Mrs. Shinn’s seat. Rather than be extolled for his act of human decency however, the crowd turns on Tommy and he’s apprehended by the sheriff. The argumentative school board can’t make up their minds on what act to present next and Harold takes the opportunity to raise some hell by bringing up the pool table again. As the assembly falls into chaos, Harold changes into his bandleader costume and takes the stage to announce his intentions of saving River City’s youth by starting up its first boy’s band. He captivates the throng with his accounts of the greatest marching bands he’s witnessed across America with “Seventy-Six Trombones”, another one of this musical’s high points. It’s catchy as all hell and Preston sells it yet again with his enthusiasm. While the lengthy choreographed crowd dance proceeding it doesn’t add much to the story, it’s still energetic and impressive to watch. It wasn’t until I watched the film again for this review that I noticed everyone involved is wearing red, white or blue or a combination thereof which amplifies the patriotic spirit pervading the scene.

Everyone marches out in their own fantasy version of a parade while Mayor Shinn and the school board look on proudly imagining their band as the pride of Iowa. Marian is the only one immune. After she bursts Shinn and the board members’ bubble with the simple question of “What band?”, Shinn is quick to recognize Harold’s got the town in his thrall and urges the board to get his references to see if he’s the real deal. Meanwhile, in an effort to get Mayor Shinn off both their backs, Harold rescues Tommy from the sheriff, recruits him as an assistant and to escort a pretty girl named Zaneeta home by way of the ice cream parlor, a surefire method to take the boy’s mind off any acts of vandalism. The sheriff congratulates Harold on his ingenuity but tells him he’s made two big mistakes:

Mayor Shinn owns the pool hall and table that Harold’s been leading a tirade against.

Zaneeta happens to be Shinn’s oldest daughter.

Harold causes an even bigger stir at the fireworks picnic that evening when the school board demands his credentials. Quick witted as always, he makes use of the members’ vastly differing vocal pitches as they argue among themselves and tricks them into forming a barbershop quartet. For the first time in years, the school board is in complete harmony (literally). Now anytime Harold has to keep them distracted, all he has to do is sing a snippet of a song and they’ll forget about everything to finish the rest.

“A running gag that serves an actual plot purpose. Even I can’t believe I pulled it off!”

This union further endears Harold in the citizens’ eyes, but Marian still refuses to see him as anything more than an obvious charlatan.

While posting flyers, Harold meets the clique of busybody housewives that make up the majority of Marian’s naysayers. Mrs. Shinn is their leader due to the fact that she has the biggest featheriest hat, and she alone shares her husband’s unsure thoughts on Harold’s intentions. But Harold turns her to his side by playing up her shifting her foot as a naturally graceful move worthy of Baryshnikov and offers her the position of head of the ladies’ dance committee he’s starting up concurrent with the band. Mrs. Shinn is instantly charmed over and agrees. Harold asks about inviting Marian to join but this sends the women into a loud gossiping frenzy. The movie doesn’t even try to make the comparison to a flock of cackling hens subtle.

Mrs. Shinn clarifies for Harold: not only does Marian snobbishly advocate books they consider too disgusting to be recycled into pulp (“Chaucer! “Rabelais!” “BAAAAL-ZAC!!”) but she made “brazen overtures” to wealthy and reclusive old miser Mr. Madison and was seen at his place quite frequently. When he died, he left River City the library, but left all the books to her, which I will never tire of using as a euphemism for being a sugar daddy.

The school board appears to hound Harold for his credentials again but he puts them off by tricking them into singing “Goodnight Ladies” against the ladies’ chorus. Fun fact: in preschool we sang this song at the end of the day whenever someone’s parents came to pick them up, which makes this of all things my introduction to The Music Man. Funny how life works like that sometimes.

As Harold and Marcellus hide out, they get to discussing their tastes in women. Marcellus has a nice thing going with one of the ladies in Mrs. Shinn’s circle but Harold’s got his eyes on “The Sadder But Wiser Girl” he believes Marian to be, the kind of girl who’s been there, done that, and got the hickeys to show for it. A decent number to be sure, and I really dig Seth MacFarlane’s cover, but it was Christi Esterle of Musical Hell who got me to view the song in a new light: in her video essay on “I Am/I Want” songs she stated that not all songs of that category have to be like “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly” or “Somewhere That’s Green” or a fair bit of first-act Renaissance-era Disney songs. Case in point, this number. Harold submits to the audience that the kind of woman for him is not “an innocent Sunday school female”, yet that’s exactly the woman he’ll end up falling for by the story’s end. In this instance, the “I Want” song becomes an “I Think I Want” song, showing another step in the character’s eventual growth and turnaround from their initial ideals and wishes. Mind you, I’m not sure if they should be singing this in front of impressionable young Amaryllis, but the subtext flew over my head when I was her age and I’m hoping it does for her too.

Harold begins his courtship of Marian by harassing her at her workplacasking her for a date at the library, tempting her with images of sweet whispered nothings in the moonlight and rather descriptive longings for her in “Marian the Librarian”. I remember this being my favorite song from the movie when I was a kid and would watch on repeat for its playfulness and underlying romantic tug of war. Easily the best musical number to take place in a library outside of an episode of Arthur or Phineas And Ferb. The repeated shushings and “quiet please” signs quickly go ignored as Harold leads the teenagers there in rebellious percussive cavorting as he further attempts to grab Marian’s attention. Eventually Marian herself can’t help but get caught in the chaos, whipping off her glasses and literally letting her hair down as she’s swept into the dance. By the time Harold finally departs, she’s frustrated yet somewhat amused.

Harold continues to work his charms on the townsfolk, one of them being Mrs. Paroo, who signs up Winthrop to play the cornet without a second thought. Winthrop himself begins slowly opening up due to Harold’s influence as well. Harold further wins the Paroos over with an ode to his hometown Gary, Indiana. In the show it was an Act 2 solo for Winthrop but that was turned into a reprise and moved to here with a little soft-shoe routine in order to give Robert Preston more to do. Not that I’m complaining. It’s a catchy tune and he makes Gary sound like such a pleasant place to live. Surely if Harold must be honest about one thing, it’s that. Come on, gang, let’s all go to Gary, Indiana!

…never mind.

Marian isn’t thrilled seeing Harold getting along with her mother or Winthrop getting involved in the band. When Harold suggests Winthrop’s father veto, Marian coldly responds he’s been dead for some time and his untimely passing is one of the reasons why Winthrop is as withdrawn as he is. This naturally doesn’t do Harold any favors in regards to winning her over, but Mrs. Paroo, who’s been shipping Marian and Harold since the night he followed her home, assures him that she’ll come around.

Marian and Mrs. Paroo get to talking about what Marian’s looking for in a man and she waxes about it in “Being in Love”, which was written for the movie and replaced “My White Knight”. Honestly, it’s the one song I don’t like. It stops the film so Marian can list all the different men she’s had crushes on and the desired qualities of her dream boy. Musically it wanders all over the place, jazzy one moment and operatic and slow the next. I like the tune of what I think is supposed the main melody and it is used effectively as Marian’s leitmotif throughout the movie, but the lyrics do nothing for me. Skip it and you miss nothing.

At the library Marian finds a book about Indiana’s educational institutions which has the evidence she needs to discredit Harold. But as she takes it to Mayor Shinn, he and the rest of River City are overcome by the arrival of the Wells Fargo Wagon carrying the band instruments into town.

“We’re also giving out plenty of interest-riddled bank accounts under all your names, whether you need them or not!”

“The Wells Fargo Wagon” is one of The Music Man’s signature tunes. I want to like this whole number, I really do, but the film’s rendition is pretty sloppy in its first half. It starts with two little girls being the first witnesses to the wagon’s arrival, but when they open their mouths to sing the voices that come out belong to someone obviously twice their age. The soloists that vocalize their praises of the wagon’s past deliveries before the chorus kicks in along with those inane merry-go-round whistles are also grating. Still, it’s not without plot significance. Winthrop gets so excited that he breaks into his own solo and regales Marian with how beautiful his own cornet is, the most he’s spoken at once in an age. Seeing the townsfolk united by the thrill of the band coming together, her brother happy for the first time in years and that Harold came through on some of his promise, Marian tears out the incriminating page from her book before handing it over to Mayor Shinn.

A date is set for the town social where the band is set to premiere and practice is quickly underway for both them and Mrs. Shinn’s dance committee. Harold naturally BS-es his way through teaching the children with his “revolutionary” method which he calls the think system – just play the notes in your head and it’ll come out naturally regardless of practice, proper instrument handling, or talent.

“One could argue it’s still being used today by half the people on the radio.”

Progress is also made with Harold and Marian’s and Tommy and Zaneeta’s relationships. When Mayor Shinn loudly confronts Tommy at the ice cream parlor for seducing his girl, both they and Mrs. Shinn stand up to him; a far cry from the submissive ladies they were before Harold came along. Blustered and humiliated, Mayor Shinn warns Tommy and Harold he’s keeping an eye on them both and sarcastically thanks Marian for wasting his time with her book. Marian commends Harold for giving Tommy the benefit of the doubt and begins to accept Harold’s compliments to her. After some talk about the unusual progressive method Harold is teaching, she gives him permission to court her the night of the social.

As the big event rolls around, Harold comes within inches of being accosted by the school board but he puts them off with, what else, a sing-along. This time it’s a fine rendition of “Lida Rose” which becomes another counterpoint duet with Marian as she ponders her feelings for Harold in “Will I Ever Tell You”. It’s also the one time in the movie that’s framed the most like a theatrical production. I can imagine stagehands moving around sets and props in the black area between the two spotlights.

Winthrop returns from practice in a pleasant talkative mood thanks to some off-screen surrogate-father-son bonding with Harold and shares his take on the aforementioned “Gary, Indiana” reprise. If you’re drinking while watching this movie, don’t take a shot every time Mrs. Paroo winces as Winthrop spits in her face. You might not make it through to the end.

Mrs. Paroo takes Winthrop go get ready for the social leaving Marian to wait for Harold. And who should come thumping down the street but the salesman from before, Charlie Cowell, with a fistful of damning evidence against Harold. His train’s making a brief stop in River City and he’s taking advantage of it by personally delivering the papers to Mayor Shinn. At first Charlie hopes to get Marian on his side seeing how she’s musically inclined enough to see through Harold from the beginning, but when she inadvertently reveals Harold’s already won her over he won’t trust Marian to leave her with the evidence, even though he rather awkwardly keeps hitting on her.

See, Charlie and his crusade against Harold is a prime example of something I like to call the William Atherton Principle: no matter how right someone is, their words of caution will be ignored in proportion to how much of an asshole that someone is. William Atherton as Walter Peck in Ghostbusters is one of the biggest dicks in cinema, though he has a point. The Ghostbusters ARE wielding dangerous untested technology that poses a hazard to anyone living or dead. But because he’s such a prick to anyone he meets and endangers the Ghostbusters, New York City, and the world as we know it to prove his point, we’re loathe to side with him. And the same goes for Charlie. Morally he’s is 100% in the right for trying to bring Harold to justice; Harold’s conned who knows how many innocent people out of money, seduced just as many women to keep them quiet, and ruined the prospects of other traveling salesmen trying to make an honest living. But doing so would undo all the good Harold’s brought to River City. Plus Charlie is acting like a total creep towards Marian with his “nice guy” act, so who’s to say he’s not above what Harold’s done to other women?

Marian encourages Charlie’s flirting long enough to make him choose between meeting Mayor Shinn or chasing after his train. Charlie storms off but not before declaring to Marian that Harold’s got a girl fooled in every state and she’s slated to be just another conquest. Also she’s, like, a total slut who’s like a three out of ten, and it has nothing to do with the fact that she turned him down, for real. This give Marian something to pause over – not the slut thing, she already gets that everyday from the gossiping biddies. Now that she’s finally feeling something for Harold, the thought that she might be nothing to him after all is enough to almost break her heart.

Harold arrives but Marian has too much on her mind to think of canoodling on the front porch. Under the guise of learning more about the think system she tries to gage whether he’s gotten around as much as Charlie said. It’s a great conversation they have; they’re talking about the same thing yet they’re both on completely different levels. It’s only when Marian mentions how one hears rumors about traveling salesmen that Harold begins to catch on. In turn he brings up the rumor he may or may not have heard about her which leads Marian to open up about “Uncle Maddy” – see, the miser Madison that half the town believed Marian to be involved with was in actuality a close friend of the Paroos, and when he died he left Marian the library position so she could support her family. Harold gets her to realize that the same narrow-minded jealousy that started those rumors about her could easily apply to salesmen, leaving Marian to reason to herself out loud that Charlie’s claims must have been born from that jealousy. Harold is clearly still confused but rolls with it as he always does. With both misunderstandings cleared up, he asks Marian to rendezvous with him at the footbridge in the park, which has a certain reputation surrounding it.

“Ah, the footbridge. Good times, good times.”

The social kicks off as Marcellus leads the teenagers in a wild new song and dance called the Shipoopi. And before you ask, yes, this is where Family Guy got it from.

Once it wraps up and the ladies dance committee get their graciously not-racist artistic depictions of Grecian urns underway, Harold strolls past teams of unrepressed and unrepentant teenagers doing their teenage thing down to the footbridge. It’s there we get a beautiful understated – and in the case of this movie, underrated – scene of Harold alone with his thoughts. While waiting for Marian, he gazes into the water. The image of a well-dressed marching band appears, their instruments at the ready. All they’re waiting for is their leader.

Harold takes a stick, raps on the railing for attention, and begins to conduct. He guides passionately like Leopold Stokowski, his eyes shut in ecstasy as a soulful rendition of “Goodnight My Someone” wells up from the vision.

But partway through, he stops.

Earlier, Marcellus compared Harold’s show at the gymnasium to a famous bandleader he liked to imitate. Harold showed off a bit of that flair for him before stopping himself, waving it off as “kid’s stuff”. Alone, however, he cannot deny his one wish – for his role of a great bandleader to be genuine. Yet as much as he secretly dreams it, he knows it’s nothing but a fantasy. That band he sees before him is as real as his own musical skills. Why try to change what can never be? Harold snaps the twig in two and tosses it in the river. The ripples shatter the illusion, and the music dies with it.

Marian finally arrives. She confesses that she almost didn’t come at all but she needed to tell Harold just how much she has done for her since the day he came, which she does in the eleven o’clock number “Til There Was You”. You might be more familiar with the Beatles’ cover or even the version sung by the little old lady in The Wedding Singer, but this is where it originated from and I still vouch that this is the best version. Shirley Jones’ voice is sweeping and operatic, much more suited for this ballad than “Being in Love”, but she never goes over the top and the song doesn’t stray into cloying territory, not once. It’s genuinely romantic and even brings a tear to my eye.

Marcellus briefly draws away Harold to inform him the money’s collected, the train out of town is waiting and the sooner he amscrays the better, but Harold’s not going anywhere until he finishes his business with Marian. On returning Marian admits she knew his game right from the start and confirmed it in her research – Harold claimed he graduated from The Gary Conservatory Class of ’05, but there was no Gary Conservatory in ’05 because the town wasn’t even built until ’06! She gifts him the page with that information, and that’s when Harold starts to realize that his act of being head over heels for Marian may not have been an act after all…

But things take a turn for the worse when Charlie and Mayor Shinn interrupt the ladies’ concert and expose Harold, and faster than you can say “kill the beast” the town forms a torch-wielding angry mob to track him down. Marcellus does his best to distract anyone he meets while Mrs. Paroo searches for a heartbroken runaway Winthrop. Harold, meanwhile, has been walking Marian home so she can powder her nose. As he waits outside he sings a little bit of “76 Trombones” to himself while she replies from her room with verses of “Goodnight My Someone” until halfway through they switch songs. I wasn’t musically inclined enough to notice myself but on doing my research I found ingenious subtle proof that this scene reveals how Marian and Harold were destined to be together from the beginning – “Goodnight My Someone” and “76 Trombones” are the same exact song, only played at different tempos. Their reversal to the other’s tune shows how much of an effect they’ve had on each other.

Marcellus and Mrs. Paroo let Harold know the jig is up and Marian assures him she’ll be all right as long as he escapes before the mob catches up. Yet for the first time in his career, Harold is torn between leaving and staying. Winthrop bumps into Harold and tearfully takes his anger out on him. I love Robert Preston’s acting in this moment. For the first time he comprehends that he hasn’t only screwed over the adults in the past but the children whose hopes for a band he’s gotten up. How many Winthrops has he won over only to dash their dreams? In this scene he’s forced to look directly at the result of his lies, and for that split-second you see that horrific realization flash across his face.

“What have I done, sweet Jesus what have I done, become a thief in the night, become a dog on the run!”

There’s another line here that I think is equally important and ties back to the scene of Harold at the bridge. Harold admits he think Winthrop is a genuinely good kid and wanted him to be a part of the band so he wouldn’t be moping about by his lonesome all the time. Winthrop asks “What band?” in the same way Marian did before and after a moment’s pause, Harold replies “I always think there’s a band, kid.” To Harold, somewhere out there, there’s another town always waiting for him, another band waiting to be form, another show to put on and dream to pretend to make come true. He may be doing it for the money, but I like to believe there’s a part of him that’s bought what he’s been selling all these years, and it’s what drives him to keep his schemes going as well as the allure of cash.

Marian tells Winthrop she’s glad that Harold came to River City after all is said and done. All the fanfare and fireworks he promised came to be through the impact he made on the town, and how everyone changed for the better because of him, which is why she never ratted him out. This is what cements Harold’s decision to stay. He openly admits he loves Marian with a tearjerking short reprise of “Til There Was You” moments before the mob carts him away to face the music.

A makeshift trial is held at the school with Mayor Shinn serving as judge, jury and executioner. He’s already prepared to give Harold the tarring and feathering of a lifetime, as are a good many of the River City citizens. Marian makes a heartfelt appeal to them by reminding them of how miserable life was before Harold came. Everyone, Mrs. Paroo, Mrs. Shinn, the ladies’ dance committee, the school board, Tommy and Zaneeta, all the mothers and fathers and townsfolk that once took smug delight in their hostility towards others, stands up in defense of Harold –

“I’m Harold Hill!” “I’m Harold Hill!” “I’m Harold Hill, and so is my wife!”

– that is until Shin reminds everyone that Harold still took their money with nothing to show for it. It looks like its curtains for him but the band shows up in their shabby uniforms ready to play for a captive audience. Encouraged by Marian, Harold takes the stand with a broken yardstick in place of a baton, tells his boys to think like their lives depend on it, and…

Actually, it goes over SLIGHTLY better than that. It’s still bad, but the parents in the audience are so overcome with pride in seeing their children playing that to them it’s the sweetest music in the world. And that’s what saves Harold. No joke, I think this ending is perfect. It’s a great punchline and feels like a natural outcome to everything that happened before. The only way this would have felt like a copout would be if the band did inexplicably sound perfect at the moment of truth.

Everyone exits the school as the sun rises on a new day, and something incredible happens. As the band marches out, their uniforms become shiny and new in the eyes of the onlookers. The marchers, baton twirlers and players, now multiplied ten times over complete with – you guessed it – seventy-six trombones, file out down Main Street past cheering crowds and a very bewildered Charlie, filling the air with music. In reality it may be a simple, inexperienced boy’s band, but seen through the eyes of the citizens of River City, it’s something grand to be proud of. And conducting them in their march enthusiastically waving in time to the music is their leader, Professor Harold Hill.

The dream is real at last.

This adaptation captures all the charm and originality of the Broadway show. It’s on my top 10 list of favorite musicals for a very good reason. The songs are unforgettable, the characters are lovable with their own quirks and hidden depths, and the performances are excellent. The employment of noted character actors from the day in place of stars allows the film to not be overshadowed by the presence of standout faces and lets the actors make the parts their own. Paul Ford’s Mayor Shinn is a standout; he truly has a grasp of the English language unto his own (“You watch your phraseology!”) The way River City looks encapsulates the innocence and optimism of the era with its white picket fences and Independence Day regalia. And yes, I make it a point to watch it every Fourth of July weekend if just for that. This was one of the movies I got hooked on thanks to my grandmother, and when I went to her house after school every day I had to put it on at least once. To this day I can recall most of the lyrics from any given song from memory. By all means, seek it out and let the music carry you away.

Thank you for reading. If you like what you see and want more reviews, vote for what movie you want me to look at next by leaving it in the comments or emailing me at [email protected]. Remember, you can only vote once a month. The list of movies available to vote for are under “What’s On the Shelf”.

If you want to support me and donate to WordPress’ one and only totally not fake boy’s band, please consider supporting my Patreon. It’s completely optional, you can back out any time you choose, and it comes with perks like extra votes and adding movies of your choice for future reviews. Special thanks to Amelia Jones and Gordhan Ranaj for their contributions, AND for donating to this month’s Charity Vote Bonuses. I’d also like to thank Abigail Kane for her $20 charity donation as well. In keeping with the bonuses promised, John Carpenter’s brilliant and bonechilling 1982 remake of The Thing has been added to The Shelf, and you can expect your requested review of Disney’s Pinocchio in a few months!

Caricature by Brian Slatky, 2017

September Review: The Music Man (1962) "Please observe me if you will, I'm Professor Harold Hill, And I'm here to organize the River City's Boy's Band!"

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smokeybrand · 6 years

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LeBronto

Watching LeBron James dismantle another Raptors team in the playoffs has been hilarious. Actually, this entire Cavs season has been hilarious. i think i caught a stat where, in the first around, LeBron outscored his entire team. Like, he, alone, over the entire series, had more points than literally everyone else on his squad. That sh*t is ridiculous. We’re not talking about PPG (points per game) but point totals as a whole. He scored more than the other 12 guys on the bench. That’s f*cking ridiculous and unsustainable. He ain’t ringing out this season, yo.

Scoring like that is a feat, for sure, but when i see something like that, alarms go off in my head. I don’t see the stat sheet, that’s irrelevant when you’re trying to win titles. All i see is issues. Trust issues and effort issues. I see LeBron working too hard because the pieces gathered around him aren’t doing enough. I think LeBron sees it, too. I think he sees that exit from the Land, too. I think egos and politics, and drama have ran it’s course and Bron, in the twilight of his career, is looking to be stress free as his era wraps up. These young cats are running right behind him and he’s well aware of that. Giannis is creating miracles out there in Milwaukee and Embiid has been a goddamn vision out in Philly. Utah has found a great combination of young stars and the Pacers are rallying being an explosive Oladipo. Sh*t is getting real, real fast. This season might be LeBron last gasp for a title but it was a run.

And that run brings me to my point; Just ho great is LeBron? If you ask anyone under 25 and they’ll say he’s the best but how dubious is that? Dude is a talent, easily top 5 all-time, but his numbers are almost identical to the others vying for that title. The difference? wins. actual championship wins. Cats call Jordan the goat because he was far more dominant in his era than Bron is now. He also is undefeated in the Finals. Six for six. On one team. Magic Johnson, in my eyes, is a distant second and he’s my all time favorite player! Magic went Five in nine in the Finals, 3 times in a row, twice. On one team. The 80s were Magic, the 90s, Mike. The 00s are a split between Duncan (five in six) and Kobe (five in seven) but the 10s are undeniably LeBron. Bron’s record? Two in eight.

LeBron James has been to the top of the mountain eight times, probably nine this year, and has walked away with two rings. Two. That’s insane to me. Cats tak about how he’s the greatest but it’s like, what? Greatest runner-up? Look, you’re LeBron James, the most dominate player of your generation. You’re the second coming of Magic Johnson but you wanna play like Allen Iverson. You’re one of the biggest and strongest cats to play just out side the box, but you refuse to post up. Your court vision can put some of the best Points in the league to shame, but you refuse to run the offense. LeBron has all of the tools to BE the greatest ever, but he runs from that. He shirks that title like it’s dandruff of the scalp. He runs from the responsibility of greatness, but justifies this contention with stats. I’m sorry, man, but with your gifts, we should be talking about you like we talked about Wilt or Cap. These are generation defining players and you have generation defining ability but you haven’t delivered. You’ve underachieved. And, for me, that makes you pedestrian.

I know that’s an unpopular opinion but to be as good as he is and not go at least .500 in the finals is just plain ludicrous to me.

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njawaidofficial · 6 years

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Oscars: Inside Best Actor, Best Actress Categories

https://styleveryday.com/2018/03/01/oscars-inside-best-actor-best-actress-categories/

Oscars: Inside Best Actor, Best Actress Categories

Newcomers mix with the old guard in the battle for this year’s best leading performances.

Some have been working the awards circuit for a year after snowy, showy premieres at the Sundance Film Festival. Others saw glitzy debuts at the Venice or Telluride film festivals and one hit the scene only weeks ago with his film’s Christmas bow.

Now as their date with Oscar destiny looms Sunday at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood, the nominated stars reflect once more on their work.

Here, THR takes a closer look at each of the actor categories, followed by Oscar night predictions.

Best Actress

Sally Hawkins, The Shape of Water

Hawkins faced several challenges on her way to landing a best actress nomination for The Shape of Water, her second following a best supporting actress nomination for 2013’s Blue Jasmine. In Guillermo del Toro’s love story, her character, Elisa, a cleaning woman at a top-secret government facility, is mute (which meant the actress had to learn sign language), while her romantic interest (played by Doug Jones) is a fishlike creature with whom she engages in a lengthy dance scene.

Del Toro wrote the role with Hawkins, 41, in mind, despite the fact that he’d never met her at the time. For her part, Hawkins credits Jones’ own humanity with allowing her to look past his rubber suit and see the human being beneath.

“We had a lot of rehearsal dance-wise,” Hawkins said. “I was there weeks [before]. I would be there months before, if I could. Sometimes you don’t get that luxury of time. Guillermo knew it was essential to have that rehearsal period.… That was just key to getting to know [Doug] and loving him as a human being. Doug Jones is an extraordinary human. And such a gift.” – Aaron Couch

Saoirse Ronan, Lady Bird

In the coming-of-age story, the Irish actress plays an eccentric 2000s-era teen growing up in California’s Central Valley, desperate to get out. Ronan, who at just 23 has earned her third Oscar nomination, following nominations for her work in Brooklyn in 2016 and Atonement in 2008.

“Lady Bird shows the beauty and the frustration of being a teenager, especially around that age when you’re just about to leave home and you just want to get out of the place where you grew up,” Ronan said. “I really identify with that juxtaposition of confidence and insecurity and how you can really believe in yourself, but not quite know exactly what you believe in. I knew that that complexity would be something that would really have to be thought out. The challenge of that really excited me.” – Mia Galuppo

Margot Robbie, I, Tonya

Robbie already was becoming known — for her breakout role in The Wolf of Wall Street and for playing the demented villain Harley Quinn in Suicide Squad — but the Australian actress, 27, proved her range by portraying infamous figure skater Tonya Harding in I, Tonya.

Robbie earned her first Oscar nomination for playing the ice champ from ages 15 through 40 in the dark comedy, which attempts to explain how an athlete with such raw talent could land at the center of the sport’s biggest scandal.

“When I picked up the script, I didn’t really see any similarities, and that’s what excited me about the character,” Robbie says about whether she had anything in common with Harding. “The character seemed so foreign to me, and it’s always something I find with the characters that I really love is that to begin with I can’t see any level that we relate on and then, as I explore the character, I suddenly find that we relate in so many ways. That just kind of comes out when putting yourself in the mind-set of someone else. I think if anyone does that, they’ll find empathy there and find a way to connect and find small or big things to relate to their character.” – Rebecca Ford

Frances McDormand, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

In Martin McDonagh’s dark comedy, McDormand, 60, plays a mother out for justice for her murdered daughter. The role, which earned her a fifth Oscar nomination (she won in 1997 for Fargo), sees her character, Mildred, go up against the local police chief (Woody Harrelson) and a racist cop (Sam Rockwell) in several spectacular battles of wits and insults. Harrelson spoke about his infamously press-averse sparring partner and how they created one of the most memorable scenes in the film.

“I know Frances pretty well,” says Harrelson. “We’ve been friends for quite a while, and we also worked on [2005’s] North Country together. As a person, she’s incredible, very kind of almost matriarchal — she mothers people, she looks after people. But to work with her is another thing entirely. To actually get into an involved scene is very exciting because I’m such a fan of her as an actor.” – Seth Abramovitch

Meryl Streep, The Post

Streep holds the record for acting Oscar nominations, with her work in Steven Spielberg’s The Post — playing Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham — marking her 21st nomination.

“She’s not only the greatest actress — the greatest actor, I should say — of our times, she’s also probably one of the greatest dramaturges of our time,” co-screenwriter Josh Singer said. “She’s like a heat-seeking missile with scenes. Sometimes it’s with lines and sometimes it’s performance, because Meryl doesn’t give you the obvious reading of any line, she doesn’t even give you the second most obvious reading of any line. She tends to give you the 15th most obvious read of any line. And so there were any number of times, it was like, does her performance here fit the arc? And then the first time I saw the cut, I started screaming at the screen because all those moments that I had questioned during the shooting turned out to be brilliant. We build an arc that’s a rough sketch in pencil, and when she’s through with it, it is a beautiful oil painting, a gorgeous work of art.” – Rebecca Ford

Who Should Win: Saoirse Ronan

Margot Robbie and Meryl Streep were both very good but not on the level of Sally Hawkins, Frances McDormand and Saoirse Ronan, all exceptional in very fine films which are unthinkable without them. Arguably, Hawkins plays the most unusual character, while McDormand makes the strongest moment-to-moment impression. But cumulatively, with this performance coming on the heels of her very different coming-of-age turn in Brooklyn, I can only once again champion the ever-revelatory Ronan (if both she and Timothee Chalamet were to win, their combined ages would be less than those of most of the other nominees). – THR Chief Film Critic Todd McCarthy

Who Will Win: Frances McDormand

McDormand won this award 21 years ago for Fargo, and she’s about to join an elite group of 13 who have won it more than once. Sally Hawkins, Saoirse Ronan and Meryl Streep also anchor best pic nominees, and Margot Robbie has the more Oscar-friendly narrative (beautiful movie star morphs into less beautiful real person, and produced her own pic). But none of the others have been able to accrue any momentum because McDormand — for a John Wayne-esque turn that captures the anger felt by many of us right now — has run the table on them at other awards shows. – THR Awards Analyst Scott Feinberg

Best Actor

Timothee Chalamet, Call Me By Your Name

Chalamet’s awards season marathon began more than a year ago at Sundance, where Call Me by Your Name, Luca Guadagnino’s Italy-set romantic drama in which Chalamet stars as an erudite teen experiencing his first love, premiered. The actor, 22, received his first nomination for his work opposite Armie Hammer.

“Getting to meet Jennifer Lawrence and hearing her say she was moved by the film is on one side of the crazy-gratifying experience of this movie,” Chalamet said. “On the other side would be my sister saying that she saw so much of [our upbringing in] France represented on the screen and communicated within the lines of this story; it felt very true to us. There have been a lot of reactions that have been really heartwarming, from people I don’t know, and also from friends and family who can appreciate the film for what it is but also can see me underneath peeking through.” – Mia Galuppo

Gary Oldman, Darkest Hour

More than 30 years after he broke out playing the emaciated punk rocker Sid Vicious in Sid & Nancy, Oldman, 59, has ventured to the other side of both the waistline and the British class spectrum for Darkest Hour. It took a sizable effort to persuade the actor that he could become Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who led the U.K. through World War II, but the allied forces of producer Eric Fellner, Anthony McCarten’s script, Joe Wright in the director’s chair, makeup artist extraordinaire Kazuhiro Tsuji, and a 14-pound fat suit and silicon face mask did the job.

“God bless Eric Fellner, who I had started my career with,” Oldman said. “I’d done other things before Sid & Nancy, but you could say it was that movie where they say you ‘arrived on the scene.’ And he thought of me for it. And it was five weeks of Churchill’s life, it’s not really a biopic. It wasn’t a huge, great big epic transformation in that sense. Then I went in and started to read around that period and learned things from the script I didn’t know. I just thought, ‘Can that be right? Were we that perilously close?’ And so it just grabbed me.” – Alex Ritman

Daniel Kaluuya, Get Out

From British TV to a small role in 2015’s Sicario to the lead in record-smashing cultural phenomenon Get Out, Kaluuya’s star trajectory has reached a new peak with his first Oscar nomination, not to mention a role in the movie of the moment, Black Panther.

“I just knew that I’d never seen something like it before,” Kaluuya, 28, said of Get Out. “I mean, the image of a young black man strangling a young white woman — it could go either way! So I just kind of kept going. I didn’t know what was going to happen, because there’s never been anything like this. And that’s the same with Black Panther, because there’s been nothing like it.” – Alex Ritman

Denzel Washington, Roman J. Israel, Esq.

Washington, 63, earned his eighth acting nomination (and ninth overall) for playing the eccentric titular defense attorney at the center of Dan Gilroy’s courtroom drama, Roman J. Israel, Esq.

“For me, it’s all about the work — it’s all about growing and trying to learn and get better as an actor,” Washington said. “I really got stretched doing Roman J. Israel. I started doing a lot of research about the spectrum and Asperger’s. I felt like there was evidence in the script that made me feel that this man was on the spectrum. Dan and I talked about it and just did a lot of research in what that entails.” – Rebecca Ford

Daniel Day-Lewis, Phantom Thread

Day-Lewis is known for his obsessive work as an actor, involving himself with every aspect of production and staying in character for the length of every shoot. In what the 60-year-old has said will be his last role, he channeled that intensity into Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread, starring as Reynolds Woodcock, a passionate designer whose work comes before any of the women in his life, including muse Alma (Vicky Krieps) and sister Cyril (Lesley Manville). Manville, who scored a supporting actress nomination for her role, recalls their collaboration.

“We grew up in London in the ’80s and the early part of the ’90s, so we had a big crossover of friends, but we never actually met,” she says. “I was asked to do Phantom Thread seven months before shooting began, so we got to know each other during that time. Our relationship was instantly easy, which boded very well to be Reynolds and Cyril, who have been lifelong companions and are very comfortable with each other, comfortable in silence with each other. We really get on, and we share an enormous sense of humor. We ended up being very good siblings.” – Seth Abramovitch

Who Should Win: Timothee Chalamet

Once Oscar night is over, is anyone even going to remember that Denzel Washington was in a film called Roman J. Israel, Esq.? Daniel Kaluuya’s presence is also something of a surprise, while Gary Oldman, who seems to be the odds-on favorite to win, delivers a better-than-expected impersonation of Winston Churchill while still seeming not to be genuinely suited for the role. As the Academy has demonstrated three times, it’s hard to deny Daniel Day-Lewis. But I would vote for Call Me by Your Name’s startlingly fine leading man, newcomer Timothee Chalamet. – THR Chief Film Critic Todd McCarthy

Who Will Win: Gary Oldman

Forget about Roman J. Israel, Esq.’s Denzel Washington — the nom’s the win for him. Don’t totally write off Daniel Day-Lewis for his last rodeo (in Phantom Thread) or Daniel Kaluuya or Timothee Chalamet for their first, as each anchors a best picture nominee. But so does Oldman, who, unlike the others, has both paid his dues and never won. His transformation into Churchill — already recognized with every major precursor award — is just the sort of thing Academy members eat up. – THR Awards Analyst Scott Feinberg

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