#would like to project those thoughts into snyder's mind too

[ellestra]

Robots rising against their gods

I really liked Eternals. I liked all the Marvel films this year. Sure the big explosive end of Black Widow was kind of meh but all the family stuff was awesome and I loved every moment of it. And Shang-Chi was just so much fun and beautiful and touching and had both dragon and Wong doing karaoke and what more can one want? But they both had pretty good critical reception. This one is “rotten” and sits lower than even the most criticised entries in the MCU so I was worried. But I enjoyed it a lot.

It’s beautiful in it’s visuals and designs (Karun was right - even Deviants) and sad (you feel the weight of time on these characters and the weight of their decision) and a little hopeful (that humans may deserve this chance). I liked how their view of humanity was as split as their view on what is the greater good and that those splits weren’t in the same places.

SPOILERS

I loved how it was about family being fractured by religion. The split between those who were dedicated to their creator and his plan and those who rebelled and killed a god. A robot uprising story shown as a good thing. Even if their creator came to punish them for it.

I liked how they let us spend time with each character and understand their point of view - from Kingo siding with Celestials despite loving humans but doing nothing to stop Sersi and others because they are family to Phastos being disillusioned by us but helping to kill Tiamut for just exactly two humans.

It also made me wonder about Kingo. A lot of people criticise the fact that he just leaves but I thought it was nice they included this kind of point of view and that it will be super interesting to see in the sequel how Arishem would judge him when he wasn’t involved in death of Tiamut but also let it happen.

I liked that it wasn’t a simple choice and Celestials weren’t just evil. I was so upset Ikaris mad sure the whole thing with putting Tiamut to sleep failed even though I knew it had to happen. But I also liked that Sersi succeeds because he loved her too much to stop her. Arisham made them unable to evolve but they still all were able to grow and make their own choices. My favourite parts of any AI story.

I also ended up shipping Druig/Makari. The use of her powers was most awesome. The fight between Ikaris and Makari was so much better than Superman vs Flash in Wheadon gave us (I haven’t watched Snyder cut - I have neither HBO Max nor the time). And I was sure Druig was going to be the bad one because mind-controllers usually are but they basically made him try Mantis trick for Ego and he still save the day after it fails. She almost defeated Ikaris.

And Sprite’s fate was great to show how Sersi was really driven by compassion and love both for humans and her family and wanted to give them the chance to live their life. Even someone who betrayed her the way Sprite did. It’s also a great way to go around the actress ageing but it also meant she was not taken and is still out there with all the thousand years of knowledge and experience. She knows all the stories. I hope her and Dane team up.

The only thing that I didn’t like was how the Super Deviant subplot kind of fizzled out. Sure, it made Thena find her warrior self and purpose again but it wasn’t worth losing Gilgamesh for that. I was prepared for Thena to find a way to center herself not in revenge but in knowledge of the truth about her condition. I expected more from that Deviant story showing that they aren’t just evil. Maybe even continuing the theme of the creations of a Demiurge finding their own purpose.

As for the credits scenes I liked Eros (I don't mind him being Harry Styles but then I don't really care for Harry Styles so he can be just a character to me). He’s projecting the right level of untrustworthiness to question both his help and any statements he makes but the offer he makes is too good not to take. If only Pip’s animation wasn’t so bad. He looked like he came from a commercial of some offensively stereotypical Irish thing.

Dane’s scene was all awesome. The sword was creepy and Harrington did well selling how though the decision to wield it is. And the voice was great tease too even if I only discovered it was Blade from reading articles on the internet.

#eternals #mcu #sersi #ikaris #makkari #gilgamesh #thena #sprite #kingo #druig #phastos #arishem the judge #arishem #deviants #celestials #eternals spoilers

[narrators-journal]

Hanging around

Aka Xeno is in denial about his crush.

This was kinda inspired by a story I found on Archive of our own, I think it’s called ‘Swayed the two as they fell asleep’ by EndlessFangirl. Mostly I just took the idea of a hammock, because it was adorable, so I suggest you go read their little fic!

Sometimes, Xeno absolutely hated being in charge of the new world. He loved science, adored the power it gave him, but bringing back humanity from the stone age was hell. When America is back on its feet, I swear I'm going to vanish into my home for fifteen years and not touch a pipette or Florence flask. He thought on his third night in a row of being in his lab without leaving beyond the bare necessities, but now it was beginning to eat at him. To be fair, it wasn't that Xeno was a super social man to begin with. Most people annoyed him, he found them stupid, a lot of the people who'd revived were loud, and rude, so he usually kept his distance from them in or out of his duties, so he could go a long time with minimal interactions. But, there was at least one person he actually liked in the stone world, Stanley Snyder, his childhood best friend. Stan was his favorite person in the world. Tall, well-built, with hair so blonde it was nearly a white-gold and eyes the color of ice. In Xeno's mind, his childhood friend was the perfect example as to why humans were the apex predators for earth, no question. Stanley was disciplined, intelligent, with muscles earned through military training and years of high school football, and a keen predatory elegance. It was no wonder why every girl in high school melted for his childhood best friend, he was okay to look at. Xeno shook his head so hard that he needed to run his pale, slender hand through his snowy hair to put it back into place, trying to loosen the thoughts of his best friend, I can't be thinking about Stan, he chided himself, turning his attention back to his latest project, squashing any lingering memories of Stan whenever they went swimming together as teens, or the times Xeno'd fallen asleep on Stan's bed and woke up to find his friend laying with him. Reminiscing on the comforts and advancements of the long dead past would have to wait. Instead of thinking back to the past, Xeno worked on moving forward, doing his best to make as much progress as he could in the night before exhaustion set in and he completely lost hold of his thoughts. When he reached that point, the pale man sighed and got up, stretching once again before heading out of the lab.             "Make it twenty years," he muttered to himself as he walked out into the darkened, drafty base. Most, if not all, of his men were asleep for sure, but when Xeno caught a whiff of cigarette smoke on the breeze that leaked in from a still unlocated gap in the walls, doors, or windows, he knew at least one person was awake at such an unhealthy hour. After a small search through the base, Xeno found the smoking soldier outside, lounging in a hammock someone had made between two sturdy metal pipes in the corn field, in a stubborn patch of dead dirt where they couldn't yet grow any plants.            "What the hell is this," Xeno spat, glaring at the offending lawn decoration, Stan sitting up slightly to look over at him, a cigarette between his dark-painted lips,            "Maya thought it'd be nice to have some sort of creature comfort, a way to destress. So, she set this up." he explained, shrugging, "it's pretty comfortable."            "It's a waste of materials and space is what it is. We've got beds, a hammock is not needed." The scientist huffed, the soldier just laying back in the thing and dangling his arm out to flick the cherry of his cigarette onto the dirt, "And you're going to like the whole field on fire! Some comfort it'll be after that," He just snorted while the other stomped the ember out,             "Let it go, Xeno. They've all worked hard and done all that you asked, let them have a hammock. It's not hurting anyone, we can easily make more metal and cloth, this patch of dirt isn't yeildin' shit, and besides, I think once you actually lay in the thing, you'll grow fond of it." Stanley hummed, looking up at the smaller grouch when he moved to stand over him in the swing. Stan did at least look comfortable, lounging in the embrace of the sheet, wearing a white t-shirt and loose pants that acted as his pajamas or casual-wear with one arm hanging out and cigarette drifting out of his partially opened mouth. As always, he had his gun with him, so Xeno knew that at least his best friend wasn't recklessly lazing about without any forethought to any potential attacks.               "If I want to lay down, I have a bed to do it in. I do not need a tablecloth." he huffed, keeping his dark eyes stern while Stan rolled his,              "Then why are you out here?" The question smacked the little dictator upside the head, Fuck, why AM I out here? I should be going to bed, not hiking through the damned corn. He mentally groaned, putting a swift halt to his momentary floundering under the question and thinking on his feet to answer,              "I smelled smoke, I came to investigate." It wasn't a lie, he had smelled smoke on the air, and that's what had led him to looking for Stan. He just wanted to make sure his friend didn't doom them to burn in a fire with his disgusting need to smoke. Stan stared up at him for a moment, taking another lazy drag of his cigarette to finish it off before flicking it to the dirt for Xeno to stomp out. Then, he hooked his arm around Xeno's waist, pulling him forward so that he fell into the hammock with him. Despite the scientist's best efforts to scramble back to his feet, and his hissed curses and threats, he was manhandled into the swing with the soldier and trapped there by the man throwing his free arm around him, holding him to his side in a far too intimate position.               "Stanley Snyder, let me go! I do not want to lay in a damned bed sheet!" he snarled, his cheeks suddenly as hot as his Bunsen burner, but his friend ignored his complaints, easily overpowering his attempts to get up.               "Maybe not, but you wanted to lay with me," he hummed, unphased by Xeno's hostility, or the sputtering and verbal scramble he fell into to try and formulate an argument. In the end, the man was silenced with a simple half-lidded, knowing look from those icy blue eyes. He hated that the soldier could read him so easily, able to tell when he needed physical contact but his pride was in the way of asking for it. It was humiliating. But, he was still right, the pale dictator had been in need of some human interaction after so long cooped up in his lab, so it felt shamefully nice to wriggle, red-faced, between his warm body and the side of the hammock, throw his leg over him, and lay his head on his chest so he didn't suffocate or overheat. In return, Stan simply loosened his hold on him and lit up another cigarette.

The warmth of his spot, the sorely needed contact, the comforting smell of cigarette smoke and nature that clung to Stan's clothes, the steady rhythm of his heartbeat, and the way Stan moved to lazily rub at Xeno's back and shoulders, wordlessly working the tension from him. It all came together to lull him into a familiar relaxed state that exhaustion was quick to drag at.            "I hate you." Was the last sleepy mutter Xeno could manage, and before he completely gave in to his need for sleep, he heard a pleased hum of            "I know, Doll."

#Stano #stanxeno #dr stone #drst #Stanley snyder #Xeno wingfield #scenario #short story #fluff

[agentnico]

Zack Snyder’s Justice League (2021) Review

It all started with Sonic’s teeth. Ever since fans successfully bullied a studio into reanimating their titular hedgehog character after the abomination shown in the first trailer, fans realised that rallying together (on Twitter) can make a difference. So you’d think it would mean we could all come together to restore world peace and get rid of racism, injustice, poverty, war and negativity of all kind? Nope, nope it does not. But at least we get a better version of a bad DC movie that came out in 2017. I mean, baby steps I guess.

Plot: Fuelled by his restored faith in humanity and inspired by Superman's selfless act, Bruce Wayne enlists newfound ally Diana Prince to face an even greater threat. Together, Batman and Wonder Woman work quickly to recruit a team to stand against this newly awakened enemy. Despite the formation of an unprecedented league of heroes -- Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Cyborg and the Flash -- it may be too late to save the planet from an assault of catastrophic proportions.

I recall my younger simpler self in 2017 at the early age of 20 soon to be 21, sitting down and watching the new Justice League film with zero to no expectations, as by that point the DC Extended Universe was a trainwreck and was a franchise that was literally falling apart before out unblinking red hay fever filled eyes. However, after watching Justice League I was baffled at the fact that I still managed to be disappointed after having zero expectations! With zero expectations this film took me into the minuses, and we all know I’m not great at mathematics so boy are we in the danger zone when we hit the minuses! Looking back at my review of the film back then, I used extreme yet fitting comments like “generic”, “predictable” “messy” and plain “dogsh*t”. Which is what it was. 2017′s Justice League is exactly how I’d imagine a dog’s poop would look if it was turned into an abstract film! It was truly abysmal. After that I thought I’d never have to talk about this film again. How wrong I was. But, in a rare turn of tables, I am glad that I was wrong...

A little history lesson first. Alright, settle down kids, settle down.... Rob, put the paper plane down, do not throw it, I said DON’T THROW IT! NO! Stop! Stupid child!! Headteacher’s office right now! Also, say hi to your mother for me, okay? I’m having brunch with her on Saturday and you better not be there as you should be doing your homework watching the 4 hour cut of Justice League and questioning your life choices!! Anyway, now let’s have ourselves a history lesson. The topic is - What In The Flying Fudge Happened Behind-The-Scenes Of Justice League For DUMMIES: Condensed Edition. A really condensed version as honestly none of us have the attention span to read loads and I’m probably losing the vast majority of you due to this overlong rambling session. So anyway, to the last couple of readers left, here we go! Following the success of Man of Steel, Warner Bros. gave Zack Snyder the reigns to oversee and create a DC cinematic universe to rival the success of Marvel. And so came Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice, which turned out to be a bit of a hodgepodge, receiving mixed to negative reviews and though was a box office success, earned diminishing results to what Warner Bros. originally anticipated. However, by the time Batman V Superman released, Zack Snyder was already hard at work on the big superhero team up film Justice League (which was meant to set up many characters and future films for the DCEU) with a lot of filming already underway, so Warner Bros. couldn’t particularly pump the breaks on it by that point, even though they evidently lost trust in the Snyder formula. To be honest, at that point I too lost trust in Snyder’s vision and the DCEU as a whole, but my opinion doesn’t class for a single dime, whilst the opinions of Warner Bros. executives make millions, so there aren’t any hard feelings on my behalf for them not enquiring on my thoughts. Anyway, midway through production Zack Snyder was hit with a family tragedy with his daughter committing suicide, so Snyder naturally had to depart the project to be with his family during this grieving time. Warner Bros. had the option to pause production and await for Snyder’s return, or progress at their own accord. Naturally they decided to do their own thing cause they are a business and want that dollar dollar bill baby!! So they hired Joss Whedon who was riding fresh off the success of two Avengers movies and obviously had experience in cinematic universes and such, to rework the Justice League movie by condensing it into a 2 hour film (from the over 4 hour material that Snyder shot) and reshoot scenes to fit the smaller runtime. So you cannot particularly blame Whedon for taking out so many great scenes as he had a contract to fulfil with Warner Bros, but then you look at the many forced jokes and unnecessary reshot scenes and you realise how self-indulgent Joss Whedon was during filming, as he basically was spitting on everything Snyder did and was trying to do his own thing. Low and behold, the mess that is the 2017 movie is created, where its the visions and creative minds of two director with evidently different styles clashing and not really mixing well at all, and as such we have a messy movie that doesn’t really make sense and is a bit of a middle finger to DC fans and honestly everyone and all. Also, there was that little aspect of Henry Cavill’s deformed upper lip due to the fact that during reshoots he had a moustache that he’d grown and was contractually obligated to have for his Mission Impossible role, so the visual effects team had to digitally remove it in post production and the result is, well, see for yourself...

Yes, they made the dashing handsome my-sexuality-questioning Henry Cavill look stupid, and that is UNFORGIVABLE. Funny, yes, very funny but unforgivable!! So for this and many other reasons the 2017 film turned out horribly. Then after that many months later, Zack Snyder and cast and crew members began teasing of this mythical version of the movie that was befit of Snyder’s original vision. You see, apparently before he left the project, Snyder actually filmed everything he wanted and it was only awaiting to be reworked with visual effects and edited properly, but then Whedon came in with his scissors and cut everything mercilessly with a cheeky grin and his ginger beard. Speaking of his ginger beard, is Joss Whedon Irish? Or has Irish roots? Honestly, I would Google it, but wait, I don’t think I really care. So anyway, Snyder still had all of his filmed scenes saved on his ridiculously oversized hard drive just waiting to be looked at again. This is where the fandom did its magic by creating a Twitter hashtag #ReleaseTheSnyderCut and began spam posting for Warner Bros. to let Zack Snyder release what he originally intended to. Honestly, who would have thunk it, but this actually worked!! Warner Bros. allowed this, and not only that, but gave Snyder an additional $70 million to finish up the visual effects as well as to film a couple of additional sequences and gave it the prestigious honour to debut it on HBO Max, so as to boost the subscriber rating on Warner Bros. new streaming service. And here we are.

Honestly, I thought seeing this Director’s Cut of sorts wouldn’t bring much to the table as I didn’t believe that a film that was so broken had originally been in any way good. After finishing this 4 hour Snyder vision I must admit though that I was pleasantly surprised. Completely baffled by the studio and Joss Whedon, but really happy for Zack Snyder. The guy was fighting for it and finally was able to accomplish and bring out his true original vision, and though Zack Snyder’s Justice League has its flaws, its so much better than what we got in 2017, and in fact is a soaring science fiction sci-fi epic that literally feels epic!! It takes time establishing the characters and every single plot point as well as building out this rich mythology of this world of the DC Extended Universe, and so as you move into the second half of the film, there’s a feeling of pay off. You actually care about the characters and understand the plot points and it doesn’t feel rushed. Its truly astounding that there are producers out there who thought it was a good idea to get rid of all of that and instead bring out whatever the heck Joss Whedon did with the 2017 version. Look, I quite enjoy Joss Whedon’s work, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel to Cabin in the Woods and his work on Marvel, the guy obviously has a talent, but also he obviously does not belong to the dark and brooding style of DC. Zack Snyder on the other hand, though makes his mistakes, truly embraces the epic feel of the DC material. And it seems once you give Snyder enough time and space, he can actually bring out something like this:

The main characters are all given so much more to do, or at least those that got side-lined in the 2017 version are given more to do here. One of my complaints with the original was how pointless the League turns out to be. Basically in the theatrical version the main team all end up being useless and only once Superman shows up he saves everyone’s asses and literally does EVERYTHING. Might as well have called the film Man of Steel 2 (feat. Justice League). However in this new version, every main character serves a purpose. Well most of them do at least. Cyborg and Flash are much more compelling characters with more layers and backstory, and in fact are a prime reason to defeating the great evil in the end. You now understand why Cyborg actor Ray Fisher was pissed at Joss Whedon, as the guy literally got rid of his best stuff. Superman strikes a cool black suit and is still powerful, however as the finale shows, he isn’t all-powerful and does need the help of the rest of the team. Wonder Woman gets a lot more to do in this theatrical cut, and in fact this is probably Gal Gadot’s best performance as Wonder Woman and she really shows herself as a powerful female superhero! Aquaman’s role stays largely unchanged, however to be honest Jason Momoa’s character was one of the only ones who didn’t suffer in the theatrical cut. That’s unsurprising seeing as Jason Momoa is such a naturally cool dude! A big panda that is friendly in real life, but when necessary can turn into a roaring bear. To be honest, the only League member that ends up a bit pointless is actually Batman. He still serves a purpose in the film in that he’s the one who assembles the team, but otherwise the rest of the group is so overpowered compared to him that in the end you do kind of think that he doesn’t really belong there. Still, Ben Affleck is great in the role and it’s a shame we won’t see much of him past Flashpoint film that will be released in the next few years.

There are a lot of characters in this film and one can still say the movie is overstuffed, but also seeing as the movie was originally intended to spring board the DCEU properly, all these teases are actually welcome. There are an abundance of cameos, and to be honest so many characters are so well cast that you do end up wishing that Snyder was given the opportunity to make his entire Justice League planned trilogy, but nevertheless at least we have this. There are truly an abundance of cool appearances here, from the menacing villain Darkseid (played by Ray Porter) to Willem Dafoe doing what Dafoe does best, only in this case underwater and I’m certain that’s gonna span many comparison memes with The Lighthouse. Joe Morton as Cyborg’s dad is given a lot more to do here and in fact is pivotal towards building up Cyborg into the important character that he is. There’s also a cameo from Jared Leto’s Joker, who in some ways redeems himself after his appearance in Suicide Squad. Also, we need to talk about Steppenwolf, who’s the main baddie in this film. In the theatrical cut the guy was the most generic one-note villain who also looked like a PS2 character. It was honestly embarrassing the way he was animated. Luckily in this version he’s been put through enough Skyrim mods to looks much more intimidating and is also given a better motivation. As we find out, the reason he does what he does is because he wants to go home. He’s been banished and he simply wants to earn his place back home, so it’s actually kind of sweet. Steppenwolf is a sweetie. I mean, yeah, he wants to destroy half of the world to fulfil his dream, but hey, haven’t we all taken something extreme measures to get what we want?

The film is far from perfect though. At the end of the day, the movie is just about a guy hunting down a bunch of magical boxes. That was the premise of the theatrical cut and its the same here too. Yes, there is more substance and gravitas to the proceedings, but at the end of the day the story doesn’t really surprise much. And with the entire thing running at 4 hours, it is definitely too long and there is the element where there is simply too much in this thing. Also visually, though the movie has plenty of gorgeous shots and Zack Snyder’s signature slow motion sequences are on full display here, there are still many sequences where the CGI and green screen are super obvious and look really fake. That being said there’s still so much visual goodness in this, and also I have to mention Junkie XL’s new music score that does reiterate the epic feel of this movie, in comparison to Danny Elfman’s weak uninspiring notes in the theatrical cut.

Zack Snyder’s Justice League is a massive surprise and completely changes the perception of what we saw in the original 2017 theatrical cut. It’s a sprawling massive adventure that’s a dream come true for any comic book fan. It shows how vital film editing is, and how important it is to have a cohesive plan when making a movie. Gone too are the silly forced jokes, and though there is still some humour here, it feels more grounded and fit of the setting and scenario. This is Snyder’s vision through and through, and though at times it is clunky, it overall is incredible to behold, as it’s this one guy’s mind and his love for the DC lore. It’s a credible achievement, and I’m actually sentimentally happy for Snyder that he finally managed to complete this. He even during the credits dedicates this to his daughter Autumn that passed away, and I found that to be truly bittersweet. Justice has indeed been served.

Overall score: 7/10

#zack snyder's justice league #restore the snyderverse #release the snyder cut #zack snyder #joss whedon #justice league #dc comics #warner bros #hbo max #zack snyder's justice league review #justice league review #superhero #ben affleck #henry cavill #jason momoa #ezra miller #gal gadot #amy adams #ray porter #ciaran hinds #jeremy irons #2021 #2021 in film #2021 films #movie #film #movie reviews #film reviews #batman #superman

[allronix]

Jedi and Green Sky

Ever catch yourself realizing your take on a fandom has been hopelessly influenced by your work in an entirely different fandom?

Those who read my Star Wars (especially KOTOR) rants know I’m not really a fan of the Jedi as an organization. Individual Jedi? Awesome. Once the groupthink kicks in? Far less than awesome.  There’s also the Clone Wars situation; no matter how much apologia that comes out, I’m still not cool with the Clone Troopers. Still slavery. Still Bad Idea. And much of my take on the situation comes from the influence of these other fandoms. 

One is a pretty natural connection to make with Star Wars - Galaxy Rangers is an obscure 80′s cartoon that is like Mass Effect meets Firefly with a generous dose of “Only in the 80′s.” (The soundtrack is pure mid-80′s Arena Rock and it’s amazing) The reason it influences my Star Wars writing is that the writing staff reads like a who’s who of the early Legends writers, such as Brian Daley (the Han Solo Trilogy), Shelly Shapiro, and James Lucerno. One of the characters in THAT series was a genetically engineered soldier who was part of a project to create soldiers trained from birth who could adapt to any environment and fight off threats to Earth. Instead of loyal Clone Troopers, the Supertrooper Project very literally blew up in the creators’ faces when the troops revolted. It ended with most of the Troopers being captured and thrown into cryogenic stasis, the rest on the run, and the only one staying loyal being one of the show’s protagonists and assigned to hunt down and either capture or kill his fellow Troopers. Something of a reverse Order 66. Yeah. Add to “list of reasons the Clone Army rubbed me entirely the wrong way” 

Now, the other fandom influence that colors how I see the GFFA. 

The Green Sky Trilogy is obscure but amazing stuff. (and has a minor footnote in gaming history as being possibly the first tie in game to be an authorized, canonical sequel. It’s also one of the earliest games where you could choose the gender or race of your Player Character and have NPCs react differently based on that choice)  Part of the premise is that almost everyone has psionic ability, but the Ol-Zhaan priesthood is said to have these amazing powers that outclass everyone. Like the Jedi, the Ol-Zhaan are allowed sexual relations but not marriage or family. They can have friendships, but only with one another.  They are given the role of priests, judges, educators, healers...they’re almost considered demigods.  

Snyder wrote this in 1975, pre-dating the original Star Wars, but damned if the Prequel Jedi don’t remind me so much of the Ol-Zhaan it’s uncanny. 

Well, this thirteen year old protagonist gets conscripted into that priesthood and finds out that...well, they “certain point of view” lied about a lot of things and outright lied about several more things, all in the idea of Greater Good and keeping what they saw as the Dark Side out of society.

The place would be a prequel-era Jedi’s idea of paradise. Complex chants and prayers to soothe mind pain. Meditations made into daily practice. Violence completely unheard of. Even the terms like “sorrow” and “anger” were minor vulgarities. They were so good at teaching peace and sharing that two year olds squabbling over a toy would be considered shocking. And for reasons no one really had ability to explain, people were relying more on the sacred (narcotic) berry, to the point where teachers handed them out in schools. More and more people were “disappearing,” especially those who questioned why things seemed not to be going right. The psionic gifts everyone was born with faded at earlier ages. Again, no one could figure out why and the Ol-Zhaan priests didn’t seem to have an answer.    

The problem was that the whole plan to suppress the Dark Side worked...a little too well. Turns out that it was less the “Dark Side” and more “We want people to know the full ugly truth of human history and the spectrum of human emotions  instead of having it so only the priests know the truth to ‘protect’ the common people, and trying to social engineer any potentially disruptive emotion out of society.”  They jailed their dissidents...and their descendants. Then lied to the people and said that they’d been killed by monsters. Needless to say, this all comes out and the descendants of the dissidents are freed, and the Ol-Zhaan are VERY lucky that the people they jailed not necessarily out for revenge, but the Ol-Zhaan are finished as an organization. No Order 66 or anything, but they’re no longer seen as above and apart demigods.

In trying so hard to keep full control over the Light, the masters of the Ol-Zhaan did horrible things that made the situation worse. When Mace was talking about how the Jedi abilities seemed to be fading, my thought immediately went to conversation in the Green Sky books about how people couldn’t focus or perform their spirit skills like they used to, that they were fading at younger ages.  Green Sky argued that people needed the truth, passion, and choice, and that it was more about how one used their passion than passion itself. Oddly enough, that fit more with the Potentium heresy that was running in Legends canon for a while. 

#fandom meta #Galaxy Rangers #green sky trilogy #zilpha keatley snyder #star wars #jedi critical

[imnotwolverine]

In sickness and in health

Henry Cavill x OC Lisa - multi-chapter fic

Author’s note: Lisa is overworked and sick as a dog, while Henry is the ever-loving, doting caretaker. A little fluffy fluff on the Thursday morning, because I couldn’t sleep (surprise Henry sneaking in on Snyder’s watch party, I hold you responsible). 

Word count: 1.842

Disclaimer: fluff 

--

This is part 15 of the Tea for Two story. 

You can find the Masterlist here. 

--

< Go back to part 14

‘You’re not okay,’ He said softly, pushing my boggling body back in the pile of pillows on the bed. 

I knew he was right. I was somewhere in between a heavy cold and fever-town, but that definitely did not stop me from being obnoxiously stubborn. I wanted to go out for heaven’s sake! Right now my sexy heels should be carrying me through the restless city streets, ready to go to a party. To have fun! But no. It was New Year’s eve and here I was, sitting in bed, looking like a wet rag. And it sucked.

‘Well then at least you go. I won’t accept that I am spoiling this night for you too.’ I tried, my voice coming out too brittle for my liking. Henry’s face scrunched up. ‘You are a piece of work woman.’ He chuckled, giving me a loving look. ‘Thankfully..I can be just as stubborn as you are. And I. Am. Not. Leaving.’ ‘But Jason organised this whole party. And you so wanted to go. You’ve been talking about it for weeks now.’ ‘I know. But there will be more parties. And right now, you first need to get better.’ He cupped my cheek, trying to sooth away my frustrations.

I huffed in annoyance, moving my face away from his hand as I turned on my side, rolling away from him. ‘I hate this.’ I sulked, pulling up the blankets as I felt another cold shiver rush over me. Henry was quiet, his hand gently folding a bit of hair behind my ear, his eyes burning into the back of my head. ‘Can I get you anything love? Tea? Soup? ..A hug?’ His voice was gentle, unfazed by my moping.

I quietly shook my head, my head burning hotly beneath the blanket that I had dragged up to my chin.

It had been a while since I had felt so bad. Actually… Come to think of it. The last time was about a year ago, also during my holidays. I knew I was a bit of a workaholic. I knew I probably should take a few more weeks off in the year, to recharge. But then there always was this new cool project. Or I just couldn’t refrain myself from opening a few e-mails, which then totally escalated again to the point that I was having hour-long work calls. Yes. I was really bad at my work-life balance and my body paid the price.

I felt Henry’s body lift from the mattress as he got up again, his feet shuffling out of the bedroom as he let out the quietest sigh. From that sound alone I knew he was feeling upset and it made me feel crazy guilty. Guilty for him having to see me like this. Guilty for being the major cause of this. Why did I have to be so darn stubborn?

‘Henn?’ I called out feebly.

I heard his footsteps stop mid stairway.

‘Yes dear?’ He answered, his feet immediately moving back to the bedroom.

I rolled around so I could look at him.

‘I’m sorry.’

My jaw clenched as I saw him look at me with those big puppy eyes. It was more than evident that he was feeling worried about me, his nose flaring in discomfort as his eyes trailed over the small sweat drops on my temples.

‘Don’t be. Baby. Just..relax. Try to sleep a bit.’ He moved back to the bed and folded back the blankets, his hand picking up the washcloth from the nightstand, gently dabbing the sweat off my forehead. ‘No..I’m really sorry. This happens every time I take a holiday. My body just crashes. I… I work too much.’ I sighed, my eyes looking anywhere but at Henry, my hands fumbling with the covers. Henry sat down again on the edge of the bed, continuing to dab my head as the sweat drops kept rolling.

Gods I was feeling so shit. My head felt like a ton of bricks, my throat sandpaper and my muscles were aching so badly it felt like I had been hit by a truck.

‘I’m just so darn stubborn.’ I croaked, finally looking back at him. He smiled again. ‘Yes you are. And.. I like that, I do. Just not when you get ill because of it. I want to have you around for as long as is humanly possible, you know?’ His tender words made my heart buzz. ‘I know.’ I nodded slowly, rubbing my head into his hand and closing my eyes for a moment.

We stayed like that for a few minutes. His hand dabbing the sweat of my forehead as he began to hum a slow tune. I felt all worries wash away as the cold cloth gently travelled across my aching hot skin.

‘Could we at least move to the couch? I miss Kal.’ I hummed, finally opening my eyes again.

Henry chuckled. ‘If you promise me you’ll stay put.’ I shrugged. ‘Not like I can do much else.’

‘Okay then.’ He said, sitting back a bit so he could fold away the blankets. I pulled up my feet to get up, but before they even touched the floor I felt myself being scooped up by Henry. ‘I can walk.’ I protested, pouting my cracked lips. ‘And I.. like carrying you.’ He retorted, smiling smugly.

—

The tv was set to its lowest volume as we sat snuggled up on the couch. Henry was wearing a simple black sweater and jogging pants, his arms protectively wrapped around the pile of blankets I was wrapped in. I didn’t know whether I was comfortably toasty, or sick toasty, but I didn’t really care. Henry seemed more than a little happy he could have his arms around me and keep me safe. Ever the knight in shining armour.

‘Your mom told me you were a great fan of King Arthur and his knights when you were young.’ I said with my raspy voice, looking up at him as he peered at the tv. He sniffled, giving me a crooked smile. ‘I was..and still am by the way.’ His smile grew wider as he saw the amused look on my face. ‘How are you feeling?’ His hand brushed away some hair that was sticking to my forehead. ’Okay now. I don’t think I have felt this safe and cosy in my life.’ I snickered, nestling my head back in the nape of his neck.

‘Then I am doing a good job.’ He kissed the top of my head, resting his lips there before moving up ever so slightly. ‘What else did you talk about with my mum?’ His curiosity seeped through his semi-casual tone. I shrugged. ‘Girl things.’

‘Oh don’t give me that. We would have no secrets, right?’ The smile was evident in his voice. ‘Mmmm. Well I wasn’t the only one with secrets. You were pretty..open towards your mom about your secrets while I was asleep on your lap.’ I pushed myself up a bit, my arm shaking with effort. Immediately I felt Henry’s arm wrapping around mine, steadying me as my body trembled with effort. ‘Easy, easy.’ He whispered.

His eyes gave me a quick full-body scan to see if I was alright, before looking back into mine.

‘I’m okay.’ I confirmed with an amused tone as I laid a weak hand on his chest, a small smile tugging at the corners of my lips. Henry shifted slightly in his seat, careful not to shake me up, before licking his lips and looking back at me. ‘Well..I hope that didn’t catch you by..surprise..’ He breathed, checking my reaction. My smile grew wider. ‘No. But you were right about one thing..’ I looked down at my hand on his broad chest, my fingers grazing gently over the soft cable knit. He wore this sweater so often the threads were baring thin at some points.

‘We haven’t really spoken about it all that much.’ He filled in for me. I nodded, looking back up. His tender eyes had gotten a whole lot more stormy now, his nostrils flaring.

He lowered his eyes, licking his lips again. Was he nervous?

‘Well just to confirm. I do want kids, another dog AND a house with a nice garden.’ I nodded, feeling my already hot cheeks burn as his hot gaze quickly peeked back at me. I folded one of my hands around my cheek, feeling the skin burn. ‘I’m not even sure anymore if I’m blushing or blazing.’ I snickered. He smiled, letting out a small breath as he leaned towards the sidetable to grab the cool washcloth and dab it on my heated face again.

‘Good. And marriage..still okay?’ He peered into my eyes as his hand gently pressed the cloth against my cheeks. ‘Of course. I could do with a different last name.’ I shrugged, feigning disinterest. He chuckled, his hand turning my head so I could see him raising a handsome eyebrow in challenge. ‘What?’ I chuckled, leaning into the coolness of the cloth, the moisture forming drips on my salty skin. Two can play that game, I thought, giving him my most seductive gaze. Henry swallowed harshly as his hand froze for a moment against my cheek, our eyes just looking deeply into one another.

In the back of my mind I half-registered the tv had started a count down. But his eyes. Those eyes. I couldn’t look away.

The sound got a touch louder as we heard the neighbours following along top lung, their count down sounding through the living room wall.

‘9..8…7..’

Henry sat up a bit, moving away the wash cloth.

‘6…5…4..’

Our eyes blazed as our lips were curled in stupid smiles. Blue meets green. Boy meets girl. Husband meets wife?

‘3..2...’

I let out a small gasp as Henry bent over.

‘I want it all with you Henry. I do.’ I whispered against his lips, our kiss forming a perfect seal of promises made.

‘HAPPY NEW YEAR!! WOOHOO YEAAAAAA!!!’ The neighbours went berserkers as a loud pop sounded of a champagne bottle.  

Meanwhile our living room was a whole lot more quiet. Much to our amusement. We let out a soft chuckle as Henry’s hand sneaked around my head, pulling me as close as he dared.

‘Happy new year love.’ He smiled, his cheeks showing those cute dimples as he pressed the wash cloth back against my heated skin, our noses touching.

‘Hmm..’ I hummed, leaning into the cool cloth and closing my eyes. ‘Happy new year.’

‘And..’ He sat back a bit. ‘I have a first proposal to make.’

My stomach did a little summersault as I gave him a confused look. ‘Now..?’ I asked, unsurely. He chuckled. ‘Now’s as good a time as any.’ He sat back a bit more and pulled my hands into his, giving me an intent look. ‘Dear Lisa. Would you, please, go on a holiday with me?’

I burst out laughing.

‘Oh by Merlin’s beard! Henry, you! Hahaha.’ I rolled my eyes, before nodding “yes”.

--

Part 16 > 

#henry cavill fanfic #henry cavill fanfiction #henry cavill x oc #fanfiction #NYE #insicknessandinhealth #teafortwo #cute #fluff #fluffy

[davidmann95]

So... seen the rumors about Superman leading the Authority? Feels like that would’ve been way more interesting with New 52 Superman. I hope they put Manchester Black on the team, I know you don’t dig him but I love him and Black interacting with Supes is always funny as hell to me.

It’s such an odd fit and I feel like it’s either going to be utterly genius or utterly ruinous. Not to Superman himself - if one half of that pair is going to be contorted to fit the others’ image it isn’t gonna be him, so the question is if they’re gonna come up with a good way to get Midnighter to stop killing, or if he won’t be there and therefore who cares (though I’ve heard very good speculation that Tim and Conner might become the new Midnighter and Apollo for this)? But the original take on the Authority formed in the first place as a continuation of the spirit of their worlds’ politically radical Golden Age Superman equivalent in The High, a crucial piece of context that’s often overlooked, and if whoever deals with this keeps that in mind while dealing with it and manages to reign in the obvious issues, it’s not at all impossible it could be really special. If they don’t, I can’t imagine it not crashing and burning hard. If I had to place a bet I’d say this might be where Scott Snyder lands post-Death Metal since DC’s clearly begged him to stay on in a prominent role now that DiDio’s gone and it feels very much in his wheelhouse, in which case...well, in which case it could still go either way. And Black absolutely sticks his head in.

Additional 5G thoughts as of the moment prompted by assorted talks with friends of mine:

* Batman #101 bringing in Grifter basically confirms Superman/Authority for me: Lee’s the big man now, he gets to declare his toys important again and give them another shot at development for mass-media. And lord, they must be kicking themselves about losing Orlando right now. “Whatever, that kid’s too weird and too queer, and besides, who needs him for Wildstorm shit when alongside Fraction and Zdarsky we’re gonna be able to kick this off with Warr-oh shit oh fuck oh no.”

* Speaking of Batman, BC’s absolutely blowing out its ass with “John Ridley Luke Fox Batman has been cancelled because Tynion’s run has been expanded!” for clicks. Tynion’s run has a tie-in Joker War one-shot Ridley’s writing a Luke Fox story for that has no reason to exist other than setting that up, but it isn’t as sexy to bring that back up and admit “it’s probably been pushed back or will no longer be the classic main Batman title now that 5G is its own imprint”.

* Along similar lines, I assume that not everything is literally going to take place in Metropolis like they suggested, but I am looking forward to Jon coming back from the future as the new main Superman to make it a literal city of tomorrow.

* Seems increasingly likely that the other ‘Gs’ will be getting their own titles after all; I could easily see Waid’s big project being a Superman title set before the marriage, and Teen Titans finally getting to be the endless tepid soap opera adventures of Dick and Wally and Garth and Roy and Donna and Victor and Koriand’r and Raven and Garfield that’s all anyone who’s bought a Titans comic in the last 40 years actually wants from it. Heck, they could do worse than to bring all the non-5G stuff under that umbrella. They could have their cake and eat it too played right: standalone stories of the platonic versions of those characters they want in one corner, versions that can age and change and progress in the other, with Black Label as an option for creators who want more substantive runs with the classic takes (god help us, White Knight might be a viable template there).

* Assuming the word that these are intended by WB proper as inspirations for future movies and other mass-media is accurate (and I think it very much is given the main word on the current big screen shared universe Batman is that they want to recast him as an old man about to pass down the mantle), downscaling it to an imprint made up of a few ongoings and probably a number of miniseries rather than the apparently originally planned comprehensive relaunch makes sense from that corporate perspective. They wouldn’t want 50 new books of wildly varying quality banging into each other waiting for decent long-term storytelling to spark, they’d want a bunch of curated self-contained standalone perennials designed for maximum ease of stripmining.

* No one seems to be talking about the additional rumor of “DC’s going to start selling its product in general through Walmart”, which if true would definitely be joined with this and also the biggest thing to happen in comics in decades. The problem is that biggest thing could mean “they market/structure it properly and frontload the good stuff and redefine the industry” or “they don’t and probably destroy the industry given the wasted resources that’d be poured into it”.

#DC 5G #Superman #The Authority #Batman #DC Comics #Opinion

[rosalyn51]

Matthew Goode on Portraying Such an Evil Character in ‘Stoker’

by The Ultimate Rabbit 

Matthew Goode’s performance as the enigmatic Uncle Charlie in “Stoker” brings to mind the one Joseph Cotton gave as Charlie Oakley in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Shadow of a Doubt.” Both men show a pleasant and courteous exterior, but there’s something in their eyes which tells you they are really twisted. Goode has delivered many strong performances in movies like “Match Point,” “Watchmen” and “A Single Man,” but it’s going to be impossible to forget him after seeing him playing a very frightening sociopath in this one.

Now playing a character as evil as Uncle Charlie has got to be a lot of fun for actors, but at the same time they really can’t judge a character like this too much. Once they do, they fail to portray them in a truthful way and their performance eventually rings false. Goode, in an interview with Nigel M. Smith of Indiewire, however, made it clear he was not about to fall into the same trap.

“I’m not a method actor; I think that would be rather exhausting on this sort of a project. But I don’t judge the character; I think that’s safe to say,” Goode told Smith. “You’re conning yourself between action and take. I don’t think about it too much, I just do what you have to do. You know there’s a camera in your face, and there are times when you can just get completely lost in it and the take is over. Then sometimes it’s very choreographed and you have to get your head in there to match with someone’s eye line, and I love that. I love the technique.”

“So with a darker character like this, it’s quite fun,” Goode continued. “It’s something that’s very different to who I am. I’m not a sociopath and I don’t go around strangling people. It’s just like kids playing. That’s really what our job is. We haven’t grown up.”

The other important thing to remember with a role like this is not to play it as evil. Yes, Uncle Charlie is evil as can be, but to portray just that one side of him would make for a very boring performance. You have to look at this character like you would any other and examine their wants, needs and motivations. In doing so, you will give yourself different areas to explore, and your performance will be all the better for it. In talking with Katie Calautti of Spinoff Online, Goode explained how he went about preparing to play Uncle Charlie.

“You can’t just play bad,” Goode told Calautti. “I wouldn’t even know how to start playing bad, or what that even means – it’s so two-dimensional. So you have to find some sense, despite his despicable acts, some kind of psychological truth of why. And director Park (Chan-wook) talked about bad blood and the idea that there was a predisposition within the family bloodline to want or need to commit these acts, and where does evil come from, is it nature or nurture? And for me they’re all very lonely, isolated characters. So I felt like, as much as this is a coming-of-age story for Mia (Wasikowska’s) character, Charlie’s kind of trapped in the past.”

The best scene in “Stoker” comes when Goode joins Wasikowska on the piano, and the two engage in a duet which can be best described as beautifully intense. Watching these two actors duel with one another while pounding away at those black and white keys was exhilarating, and it was the one scene from this film I wanted to know the most about. Karen Benardello of We Got This Covered was at the film’s press conference and asked Goode what it was like shooting this particular scene.

“It became liberating in the end,” Goode said. “I hadn’t played the piano in 20-odd years. So coming back into the fold of the piano, it was unbelievably daunting. Luckily, I don’t have a bad-sized hand, so I didn’t have to leap or anything like that. But it was hard work, but it was great working with Mia. We learned about three quarters of it, because some of it was just too hard, and too much going on with both hands. But we were able to fake some of that, and he was able to shoot the whole thing from whatever angle he wanted. We kind of recognized that in the vocabulary of filmmaking. When someone starts playing, you think, is he actually playing that? (laughs) He was able to dip down, and you go, they are! It’s not a trick on the audience, so it was nice.”

Hopefully Matthew Goode’s performance in “Stoker” will help burn his name into our collective consciousness because every moment he is onscreen is filled with a rising tension which never lets up. While he doesn’t let you in on all his character’s secrets, you know he is like a snake waiting to strike. He has already worked with a number of well-known directors such as Woody Allen, Tom Ford and Zack Snyder, but Goode makes it clear how a lot of the opportunities which have come his way so far have been the result of sheer luck.

“I’m not the person who’s able to pick and choose their roles,” Goode said. “But I know that Nicole [Kidman], for example, has said that she’s interested now – there might be a film in the studio system, but she loves independent film and she thinks that’s much more where her desires are, and the films she kind of likes. And so I think she is able to say to herself, ‘I like to choose projects not only based on the material but also the filmmaker,’ which is wonderful for her. And I think I just happen to have been quite lucky in the fact that the material that I gravitate towards or the people that have thought I am going to be better suited to it – because it’s not my choice, they’ve picked me. I’ve been lucky as hell, and the parts have been quite varied.”

Rosalyn51 note: Matthew Goode was nominated for Emmy Outstanding Guest Actor Drama in 2018. He stars in A Discovery of Wtiches TV series, and new films incl. Downton Abbey 9/20, The King’s Man 2/14/2020, and Official Secrets 8/30!

Intoxicating vampire, Matthew Clairmont, in A Discovery of Witches season 1

#matthew goode #matthew clairmont #a discovery of witches #stoker #henry talbot

[betsynagler]

Critical Thinking is Hard

I’m lucky: I grew up in a family where thinking was encouraged. My parents treated me and my brother like we were brilliant, which makes you want to be brilliant, and come up with your own ideas. They liked to talk about stuff, and, while they definitely treated us like kids, they also didn’t really shelter us too much. My mother was always ruining TV shows for me by pointing out the sexist moments in television, from reruns of The Brady Bunch and Star Trek, to Charlie’s Angels, Three’s Company and, well, it was the 70s and 80s, so pretty much all TV shows. But they still let us watch them, as well as R-rated movies which may not have been age-appropriate, and while they told us not to smoke pot, when we found out that they smoked pot, they gave us reasons for why it was okay for them and not us (since they “weren’t going to have any more children,” which seemed to make sense at the time). Another thing they did was encourage us to take responsibility for our own decisions from a fairly young age, which meant that you could stay up until 10 or 11 pm on a school night if you really wanted to, but it’d be your fault when you felt like shit all the next day. One can debate the pros and cons of this method of child-rearing (pro: de-mystifying drug use and other taboo behaviors to the degree that they actually start to seem uncool; encouraging kids to develop strong ethical compass and think through their actions; con: kids are even more weird compared to their peers, and precociously develop anxiety and guilt about their own actions). Nevertheless, it did start me on the road to learning the value of thinking for myself.

I didn’t really come into my own as a critical thinker until junior high, however, when I spent two years in a program for gifted students. First, isolation from my peers at a time when I was supposed to be learning the social skills of adulthood and the bullying that naturally flowed from that taught me to look for other people’s faults as a means of self-defense. That made me critical, if not necessarily thoughtful. But then I also had two years of Mr. Snyder teaching me social studies. Many of us in the gifted program had all of the same teachers for all of our academic subjects two years running. This meant that we got to know those teachers really well, and, in the case of Mr. Snyder, came to greatly admire and be shaped by his worldview. Mr. Snyder wasn’t an obvious candidate for intellectual guru to early adolescents. He wasn’t particularly handsome, and he’d had polio as a child and walked with a prominent limp. But he was funny and charismatic, gave terrific lectures that were like brilliant comedy monologues or TED talks, and knew how to make his students feel smart and special — in part because we had made it into his class, but still. We liked him so much that several of us would get to class early every day so that we could draw cartoons of him on the blackboard with clever word bubble-jokes, and he loved that. Too see him come into the room and look at our clever depictions of him and smile and make jokes right back at us, to feel appreciated for our intelligence and creativity, a sensation could be hard to come by as a suburban New Jersey youngster, was wonderful. The class was a mutual admiration society and a bit of a cult of personality that I think hugely affected all of us who took it.

I learned a lot there, as we studied political systems, geography and the history of the ancient world, among other things. We were assigned projects that were unlike anything you’d typically get in junior high or even high school, a combination of fun, self-driven exploration, and out-of-control amounts of work. We had to make a map of the world that included every single country, city, major mountain range and body of water, using color-coded overlays — something that I would have enjoyed, and sort of did, except that, since I was in 7th grade, I was terrible at judging how long it would take and left it until the last minute, and had to repeatedly re-letter the smudged plastic to make it readable in my 12-year-old handwriting. The following year, when we did separate units on Greece and Rome, we had to either fill in an entire outline that he provided with a paragraph or more on every subject, or do a handful of more creative projects designed to help us probe the topics in more interesting detail. After choosing to do the outline for Greece, thinking it would be easier, and ending up with several pounds of handwritten paper (I could not type) on everything from Sparta to Socrates to Doric columns that was probably 75+ pages long, Mr. Snyder had stared at the pile and admitted to me that he hadn’t really expected anyone to choose that option, that he’d made the outline so absurdly long to encourage people to do the creative projects. I probably got an A more because he didn’t want to read the whole damn thing than anything else, and on Rome, I did the projects, like going to a Roman-Catholic service and writing about it — which I did by interviewing my Catholic friend, Tara, instead of actually going to the service myself — or going to the Met to observe and then expound upon the differences one observed between the Greek and Roman statues — which I did after 15 minutes of taking furious notes on a Sunday when we arrived just as they were getting ready to close. Just because I loved Mr. Snyder didn’t mean that I, like any other kid, wasn’t always trying to get out of doing homework in any way I could.

The thing I learned and remember best, however, was not the facts, but the method. We had a class about political and economic systems — communism, socialism, capitalism, authoritarianism — and the first thing Mr. Snyder did was define these terms for us, explaining that they weren’t what we’d been told they were. Specifically, “communism,” the way it was looked at in the budding Reagan Era of the early 1980s, wasn’t actually communism at all. Real communism was an economic system that someone named Karl Marx had come up with, in which everyone owned everything, nobody was rich or poor or more powerful than anyone else, and that was, in fact, kind of the opposite of what the Soviet Union had become. This somewhat blew my mind. Here was the boogeyman that everyone talked about as the great evil threatening us with destruction — and remember, in the world of an American kid who had trouble sleeping at night because she obsessed with how we were one button push away from nuclear war, that meant genuine annihilation —  and it wasn’t even what it really was. How was this possible? How was everything that we saw on TV and in the newspapers and at the movies just plain wrong? It turned out that, once you delved into it, the evolution of the term “communism” in the popular vernacular was an education in how concepts entered the public consciousness and then were propagated endlessly in the echo chamber of the media and society until they became something else entirely, usually in the service of some political or social end. Sound familiar? It wasn’t the same then as it is now that we have the Wild West known as the Internet, in some ways it was easier to get an entire culture to basically think one incorrect thing rather than many insane things, but the ability to miseducate a huge swath a people without their questioning it? Yes, that existed, and understanding that was a very big deal to me. It meant that you always had to look deeper than the surface of things to be sure you understood the reality, even when it came to what those things were called.

Why doesn’t everyone get taught to think this way? Well, like most things in life, it gets increasingly harder to learn as you get older. The more set in our ways we get, the tougher it becomes to look at ourselves critically (which is essential to critical thinking, because to truly get that you must dissect and assess the viability of ideas, you have to start with your own assumptions), much less change the way our brains function in terms of adopting new ways of doing anything that’s really embedded in there, much less ways of doing everything, which is kind what it means to change the way you think. Plus, it’s in the best interest of those in power to keep the bulk of the human race from doing it. It’s tough to build an army of people who don’t automatically follow orders, or have a religion made up of people who are always questioning the word of God, or build a movement if the followers are continually asking the leaders, “Is that really true?” And so we’ve arrived at this situation where we have so much information out there now to make sense out of, and the bulk of us without the tools to figure out how to do that — and many who reject those tools because they’re told education is just liberal elite brainwashing. Instead, you see a lot of people turn to a kind of twisted, easy version of “critical” “thinking” espoused on the fringes of the left and right, which disposes with the thinking part and instead just espouses wholesale rejection of anything dubbed “establishment” or “mainstream,” no matter how awful the alternative may be (and at this point we know: it’s pretty awful). Add to that the folks who skillfully exploit the overwhelm of information and lack of analytical skills to support their own greed, lust for power and desire to win at all cost, and you end up with an awesome new and different kind of embedded orthodoxy, that encourages us to silo ourselves within “our” (really their) belief systems, walled in with “alternative facts” and media that support them, and defending it all tooth and nail with false equivalencies that encourage us not to critique thoughtfully based on evidence, but to to pick apart every idea that doesn’t fit or even makes us uncomfortable (“Well, every politician lies” was one of the most egregious ones I heard used recently to defend the president). 

And, when it comes right down to it, can you blame people? Thinking is exhausting, especially in this environment, and even human beings with the best intentions manage to ruin everything good anyway. Like, even though my parents didn’t make us believe their ideas, of course they still managed to inculcate in us their most mundane opinions. My father was particularly good at doing this, particularly when it came to eating (yup, Jews), like how fast food and chain restaurants should be avoided not based on nutrition but on lack of flavor (which I guess is why we still ate at White Castle), or how chocolate was really the only kind of acceptable dessert. It’s amazing that, no matter how far I’ve come as an adult, I still find it really hard to shake these ideas — like I saw a conversation on Facebook about how pie was superior to cake, and I just thought, Huh? But there aren’t any good chocolate pies. Another case in point: by the time I was a senior, Mr. Snyder had moved up to the high school, and was teaching an AP history class that I had the option to take. I decided to take economics instead, because I had never studied it, because one of my best friends was taking it, and, on some level I’m sure, to show that I didn’t need the wisdom of this idol of my 7th and 8th grade self, now that I was all of 16. I heard from people who took Snyder’s class that in his first opening monologue of the year he mocked those of his former students who had decided not to take his class — which I think might have just been me. That wasn’t really an appropriate thing for a teacher to do, especially since I was kind of doing what he’d taught us: to move on, do my own thinking and evaluate him critically. But as a human being, it’s hard to be a charismatic leader and just let that go — which is why the world has so many despots, and celebrities, and despotic celebrities. On other hand, my economics class was a terrible waste of time because it turned out that I didn’t like economics and the teacher was boring, so perhaps my premature rejection of Mr. Snyder and my 8th grade way of thinking, just to prove that I could do it, hadn’t been the best decision either. It’s hard not to wonder if I’d be just a slightly better, smarter person today if I’d accepted one more opportunity to take his class.

I’ll never know, but I guess the fact that I’m telling you this story means I haven’t given up on critical thinking. Maybe it’s because self-flagellating comes naturally to me, but these days, more than ever, I try to employ those skills as much as I can, even as it grows increasingly fucking hard. On top of all that media landscape stuff I mentioned a few paragraphs back, I also have this stupid menopause business I mentioned in my last blog post, which just amplifies all of the emotion that drives me as a human to err on the side of insanity, as if there weren’t already enough bad news, and bad “news,” out there driving a person in that direction. There are so many bad actors with so many tools that can be used to manipulate our fear and greed and lust into steamrolling our thinking these days, and all we have to fight back are these little broken piles of poop in our heads. And yet, we all do have them, aka brains, and so we have the ability to use them. And as one of those cynical-on-top-but-at-bottom-idealistic folks who believes we all also have the capacity to change, no matter how hard it might seem, until the day we die, I think we all have the ability to learn how to use them better. And yes, that means you, and your friends, and your kids, and even your cousins in Florida maybe, if we all just try a little harder.

I’m not sure what Mr. Snyder would say about me now, as I try to get people to think about stuff with this blog that almost nobody reads, but considering how many years he spent trying to teach adolescents about Platonic ideals, I’d imagine he’d approve. So in honor of him, and any teacher you’ve had who inspired you to think more, and more better, let’s advocate in 2019 not just for “our values,” but for the value of intelligent thought, even if we have to do it one mind at a time.

[respheal]

Two years of Galebound

Hey guys, Res here! Long spiel ahead because I’m getting personal and long-winded here. Full text after the cut to spare your dash.

tl;dr: A brief history of Galebound’s development and my experiences with telling a story, joining a community, depression, and living inside my characters’ heads for two solid years.

[cut]

So I was working on page 103 early last month (yeah, the week page 103 was due to go up aaaahhahahaha -cries-) when I realized what was coming up: the second anniversary of Galebound’s start as a webcomic. The exact date of the anniversary is a little nebulous. The decision to make it a webcomic was made on 4/20/16 when I completed drawing the concept art for all the main characters (which I had set as a prerequisite for going on the hare-brained adventure) and drew what would become the title page. The first page was published on Smack Jeeves (where galebound.com is hosted) on 5/14/16. So the birthday of the webcomic is somewhere between those dates but I’m going to consider it to be 5/14, which is why I’m rambling about it today. I want to talk a bit about Galebound’s history and what it means to me.

Galebound was originally a short story called Noblesse Oblige. It was written in first person POV from Conan’s perspective and published on DeviantArt back in 2007 or so. I really wish I could find that original draft because I bet it’s wonderfully terrible. I didn’t really know what I was doing with the story at the time--Conan was an untrusting jerk, Din was an arrogant troll, and Pascal was downright unhinged. The basic mechanics of the Obligation were there (simply that Noblemen could command Magicians), but that was about it.

I pants’d the story until it got to--well, just after this point actually. The conclusion of the battle on the bridge, and then I stopped. I don’t entirely remember why. But the story stuck around in the back of my mind while I met new friends (Hi, Skypernauts!), went to college, moved across the country, met my first boyfriend, got my first job, met my future husband, and casually worked on developing an RPGMaker game in my spare time (That RPG is called Memory and that story will likely get turned into a comic eventually as well).

While I was working on Memory’s battle system, I had the thought: how would I convert Noblesse Oblige into an RPG? The magic system would probably have to be something like the field generator from the original .hack games: string together words for a certain field or, in this case, magic. That way the command side of the Obligation would be integrated into the gameplay.

I played around with that idea for a bit longer, but ultimately decided it wouldn’t work; there was a major design flaw with the game. I can’t say what that flaw was because figuring out the solution to the design flaw led to the realization of a huge twist in NO’s story. I had to get this story out. Now.

Around this time I had abandoned RPG-making (because making nice maps is a PITA), so I took Noblesse Oblige through a JulyNoWriMo (NaNoWriMo, just in July). This time I took the story through Norin, Evenheim, the bridge, and on to Cymaria and beyond, compelled as if by Obligation. I accomplished my goal of 50k words, but the story still wasn’t complete. I slowed down the writing process and kept at it, but I also wanted to share the story so badly.

And uh...well. No one was interested in beta reading it except one friend, when time allowed. My fiance made an attempt, but didn’t get very far (He tried though, bless him, and said that although the beginning was rough--lord was it ever--it picked up eventually). In his eternal patience, my fiance at least let me spill the whole story at him. He didn’t like parts of it, mainly some things that happen around the midpoint and Din as a character in general (Din was a bit more actually evil back then). But he listened to the story as a whole, which was a lot more support than I felt anyone else had given the project at the time (Thanks, Mike <3). He also made a hell of a lot of puns about the ending of it, but in fairness the ending does lend itself to a lot of puns. It’ll blow you away (ba-dum-tsh).

I started getting really frustrated. There was this story that I just had to tell, but seemingly no one who would listen. I’d put a couple chapters up on Wattpad or Tablo, but got no feedback there (and didn’t learn until much later that those sites are miserable for anything that isn’t romance). An excuse would be that I wanted to know if this project had any sort of worth and if I should continue with it, but real talk: I wanted validation. I know better now what was happening then, but...well, hindsight.

While this was going on, I posted this illustration in the NaNoWriMo forums, the first drawing I had done in about two years or so.

No comments for a bit, but one day I was browsing through the thread and noticed someone quoted me and responded, asking if I was doing a webcomic. Um...No? I had tried making a webcomic before, but it was a LOT of work and I figured it wouldn’t be something I would have time for now.

Buuuuuuuuut the seed was planted. At this point I had determined the reason no one was interested in reading my rough novel was because A) the writing must be terrible (it kind of was) and B) nobody ain’t got time for reading books. So maybe this story could be told and find its audience as a webcomic. But only if I could draw ALL of the main and secondary characters. I would have to draw them hundreds of times, so no point in trying if I couldn’t even draw them all once.

Suffice to say, I succeeded. And the comic began under the new name Galebound.

Even as the comic went up, however, the need for validation persisted. I meticulously tracked subscription counts and likes and faves and everything, craving proof that people were reading this story. It got better as the story went on and some events did provide temporary boosts (Like Galebound getting featured on a “Top Five New Comics” list from Top Web Comics -excited screaming- and I met a new friend who I could talk to about the story and she actually read the monstrosity that was the first draft), but, well...

So, long story short: I was suffering from clinical depression with all that entails, and did for quite a while. Still am, technically. Just well managed now (yaaaaaay therapy and medication). It’s funny because I can pick out the pages it was hitting me the hardest because Conan was super bummed in those pages too.

I guess what I’m saying here is that this story was a big part of my life during some of the hardest and darkest times of my life.

I’m doing better now (see: aforementioned medication and therapy). Really I’m lucky because I see and talk to other webcomic artists who have similar struggles and similar feelings and the same reactions when sad or disappointing things happen and I want to suggest they get professional help when I recognize the signs of depression in them, but I realize I’m extremely fortunate in that I even had the opportunity to get the medical attention I needed. (I will recommend up and down all day long that if you’re suffering from depression and have the opportunity to see a doc about it, do so. For years I had tricked myself into thinking it wasn’t that bad even when...it was.)

There were good things, too. I met new friends and joined a community of other webcomic creators. I contributed to some drama in the community in an attempt to hold our publishing platforms accountable. I created a website to help webcomic readers and creators. I attended my first convention as an artist (and actually sold a sticker and a booklet! Woo!) and by the time this gets published I’ll have attended my second. Galebound has gained a small fanbase and I’m so proud of how clever the readers are. Seriously, you all keep me on my toes.

Regarding the story itself, Galebound is, by my estimates, about a fifth of the way through the full story, which means it will likely run for about ten years total if things don’t speed up (and I really want to speed things up). If you consult the Blake Snyder Beat Sheet, we’re somewhere in “The Debate”, that debate being “Who is Din and can he be trusted?”

Spoiler alert (warning: song with explicit language)

The whole concept of the Obligation stems from the dichotomy of what one wants to do versus what one feels compelled to do. That could be taking over the family business, going to college, going to church, even choosing a life partner based on expectations as opposed to one’s true feelings--as a character will say in the future, “not all Obligations are magic.” This sort of Obligation is something I think a lot of people face, and something Conan, too, will face throughout the course of the story.

Galebound is also about redemption and forgiveness. There are characters who have made terrible mistakes and decisions in the name of hatred and prejudice, and those who have brought harm to others out of sheer ignorance. It’s about self-worth and purpose. It’s about friendship and reconciliation. It’s about platonic and familial love. It’s about duty...and obligations.

It’s complicated, but “simple stories are inherently false. Life is complicated, and perspective matters.”

To sort of go into Conan and Din’s headspace a bit as they are now, they’re not in a good place emotionally, and it’s soon to get worse (because a certain someone Can’t Follow Instructions). They will hit rock bottom, but after that...well, there’s no place left to go but up? After this chapter, both of them will be reeling from mistakes made in the recent and distant past, but these events--as well as what will happen with the next few days--will put them in a place to rethink everything.

Long story short, I’m excited for what’s to come, but when am I not?

Anyway, that’s my spiel. Thanks for reading and for reading Galebound! My goals for it this year are to finish the first volume, start editing some of the earlier pages in preparation for printing, get a few chapters of the novel written (again), and get to the turn into act two. I’m actually so hyped for the turn I’ve edited this paragraph a millions times to keep myself from dropping even hints of spoilers because wow I want to talk about it.

So I better stop.

Thanks again for reading and Galespeed! <3

Links

Read Galebound here: galebound.com Prints and Stickers: store.synestories.com Social Media: Twitter | Facebook Support: Ko-Fi | Patreon

#galebound #rambling

[jennycalendar]

i’m thinking about my ideal slow burn giles/jenny again so here have my various headcanons re: how that’d play out through s2.

this got. incredibly long. so i’m putting it under a cut

ok. right after i robot, which is the puppet show, which is probably my favorite episode of btvs ever for reasons i still cannot figure out, there’s like....one scene at the end where jenny’s in the audience next to giles during the horrible monologues. this serves both to 1) remind us of jenny’s existence and 2) imply that giles may or may not have made a friend on staff, which is pretty cool.

canon s1 stays about the same after that, but s2 doesn’t start with moony eyes and jenny wearing soft pastels!! instead of snyder showing up to make a cameo that heightens the twosome-of-cuteness vibe, we literally just see giles and jenny walking up the steps to school together while jenny complains about having to come back (”i nearly got eaten before senior prom...god, i hate that i can say that sentence”) and giles asks, “then why did you come back?” there’s sort of a weird, tense beat where jenny looks genuinely uncomfortable (foreshadowing angelus WAY earlier in the season, bc jenny’s involvement is very clearly something that the writers came up with as some weird contrived Extra Thing so let’s make it less of a plot device) and then she comes up with some really awful excuse that leaves giles a little puzzled n frustrated.

jenny and giles go to the football game together as investigative buddies, making her a legit scooby based on merit instead of the fact that she’s dating giles, and they argue through most of the game about whether or not going to the game was even necessary in the first place. xander and willow show up and immediately start teasing them about being on a date. jenny laughs it off but giles looks MORTIFIED

they keep. on. arguing. literally every episode there’s a jenny/giles argument about something inane and stupid, even if it lasts for only a few seconds before one of the scoobies tells them to Please Stop. but the thing is, these arguments aren’t actually aggressive & passionately angry like in s1? it’s more annoyed than anything, and slowly the arguments start transitioning into actual logical discussions

sjlksdljk this in itself is transitioning into an imagine-if-canon-had-treated-jenny-like-her-own-character post but jenny’s scenes aren’t restricted to scenes with giles. she shows up in her own scenes too, and as time goes on, those scenes get significantly more foreboding bc the angelus arc is coming up

in the dark age, things mostly go the same. except jenny and giles aren’t dating, so the dazed hug is a little weird, and jenny coming on to giles is something that’s immediately met with suspicion & then Full-Out Panic. of course jenny’s fine, but she’s incredibly distant around giles; even though she doesn’t leave the scoobies, things are tense n weird between them (heightened by the fact that giles has suddenly realized that he may have slightly romantic feelings for jenny, and. that’s worthy of some more panic actually)

jenny gets a scene after the dark age where she thanks angel for saving her life. it’s very awkward and stilted and she doesn’t really look at him when she says it, and at the end of that episode, you overhear a phone conversation between her and her uncle re: angel being redeemable (more foreshadowing!!! more narrative coherency!!!!)

meanwhile giles is fucking hopeless. he’s not asking jenny out bc he wants to give her as much space as possible and he also is starting to really value their friendship (which has by this point become something that is surprisingly sweet & supportive) but he keeps on getting all blushy and shy whenever she compliments him. jenny hasn’t noticed this at all bc in this canon, her priorities aren’t just him, they’re him and willow and buffy and sometimes xander and yeah, even angel, which is freaking her out way too much for her to notice that her best friend is into her

oh yeah. giles and jenny are best friends. that happened at some point and there’s definitely a staff meeting (probably during ted, which also goes differently!! because that episode is a horror show!!) where they’ve sort of teamed up to argue with everyone else instead of each other.

and then all the stuff goes down with angelus.

it’s not actually a surprise this time around though? because there’s been a lot of hinting and a lot of ominousness surrounding jenny’s character, so instead of it being this Big Dramatic Reveal that jenny was Evil All Along, the episode actually has a subplot that focuses on her stress and her newfound worry and compassion for angel and the Big Dramatic Reveal is actually that jenny was Good All Along.

the “betrayal” arc goes...relatively the same at first, but then shifts a little? i’m very firmly of the mind that jenny, incredibly emotionally guarded, still would decide that she could Handle Things On Her Own and keep her motives secret, but when she finds out that angel could lose his soul, she kinda panics and throws herself into research re: how to actually stop that from happening. and that’s where buffy finds her, and they have a initially angry confrontation that kinda ends when buffy realizes that jenny was trying to figure out a way to somehow help and only recently found out about the happiness clause. so.

here’s a twist: everyone’s able to forgive jenny but giles. buffy is still sad and hurt and furious, but she and jenny actually become weirdly closer bc jenny’s always incredibly reassuring and tells her lots of stories about all her awful old boyfriends (+ a few of her girlfriends), and this kinda hurts giles, because he wants to be there for buffy too! and anyway jenny lied to all of them, so why should buffy care so much about what jenny has to say? most of it all really stems from the fact, though, that this was the first time in a very long time that he Trusted Someone and then it turned out that she was keeping secrets and he is just really, really hurt by that. so their relationship turns contentious and strained again and it’s kind of awful and sad.

but then comes passion. jenny’s been staying late at the library working on researching possibly ways to re-soul angel, albeit much more above board and non-secretive than in canon, and this time around giles is the one who gets a talking-to from buffy, only what she wants him to know is that she misses him being there for her and she wishes he wasn’t always arguing with ms. calendar because she kinda needs her watcher right now. and that’s kinda a wake-up call for giles--that jenny’s been doing the job of a watcher while he’s been sulking--so he heads back to school to apologize,

and nearly collides with a terrified jenny, right before he sees angelus close behind. giles grabs jenny’s hand and they run to his car, taking off at a probably-illegal speed. he ends up staying at jenny’s apartment that night; his house isn’t safe. there’s a very quiet, very sweet scene between them where they finally make up, followed by a hug that comes dangerously close to becoming a kiss. kind of a landmark moment for both of them; jenny realizes that she might be into giles, giles realizes that he’s in love with jenny. basically jenny’s really behind the curve

the resouling ritual happens the next episode!! it’s sort of a subplot going on (complete with lots of awkward shy mutual pining between giles & jenny), and at the end of the episode, it’s revealed that angel has gotten his soul back. which is a good thing, but also kinda bad, because he has to legitimately address a lot of the stuff that he’s done & attempted to brush under the rug

angel and jenny have another conversation during the episode after that, which is probably a two-part season finale. this one’s more about responsibility & sacrifice & what you owe to the people you hurt, and they both kinda get something from it. angel tells buffy that he loves her, but that he needs to actually figure himself out and start making amends to the people he hurt in whatever ways he can, and buffy’s devastated by this but she does eventually understand. he decides to leave sunnydale, but it’s left very open-ended; he might come back again someday (and probably does, but that’s another story)

meanwhile, jenny’s been ordered to follow angel out of sunnydale, and spends the last episode of s2 giving the concept some serious thought while angel prepares to leave. she knows that it’s her familial responsibility to do so, and she knows she could do a lot of good helping angel fight evil, but she also really hates the thought of leaving sunnydale.

of course, she brings the concept up to giles, who Definitely Does Not Want Jenny To Leave, but also doesn’t want to come off as clingy. he stumbles through a weird, stammery version of a pros and cons list and inadvertently admits that she’s incredibly important to him, which is. a lot for jenny to take in. she decides to talk to buffy, who’s kinda projecting a little, and who is Very Adamant about jenny being needed in sunnydale (it’s v clearly implied that buffy is feeling frightened & abandoned & wants someone to stay) particularly for giles’s sake.

jenny kinda takes this in and decides to stay. this is all a subplot to the buffy/angel goodbye and how buffy’s handling angel’s leaving so it’s a small decision, but still a noticeable one. the end scene is in the library again with all the scoobies gathered around the table, and if you look very closely, you’ll notice jenny reach out and take giles’s hand.

#fic #kinda? it counts #jenny calendar #rupert giles #calendiles #they don't get together until the end of s3 but that's a WHOLE other post #dshdslfk someone pay attention to this....i put much effort in

[expatimes]

A geneticist’s biggest challenge: Curing his own son

Palo Alto, California – Whitney Dafoe’s day begins at 2:30pm. His father, Ron Davis, peeks through the keyhole into the 37-year-old’s room. Is he awake?

ABSOLUTELY NO ENTRY is scrawled in red on a handmade sign pinned to the door below a picture of the Dalai Lama. Davis has rushed home from Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, to take the afternoon shift. When Whitney raises his left hand, fingers clenched to a fist, that’s Davis’s cue. Whitney is ready for his dad to change his diapers, put ice on his aching belly, and refill the IV-drip.

Davis’s shift ends at 6pm when his wife, Janet Dafoe, takes over. Dafoe, a child psychologist, carefully attaches a bag filled with liquid nutrients to her son’s j-tube because he cannot digest solid food. She will also take the night shift, so her 79-year-old husband can return to Stanford to work on the task that’s been governing his life for years: finding a cure for his son.

Whitney was diagnosed in 2010 with myalgic encephalomyelitis, or chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), a complex illness that leads to debilitating exhaustion, brain fog, insomnia and neurocognitive impairments. Any physical or mental effort aggravates the fatigue. He has been mostly bedridden for the last 10 years and has not spoken a word since Christmas 2014. He only communicates via pantomime or by typing short messages into his tablet. In one of his texts several years ago, Whitney typed, “Chronic fatigue sounds too banal. I call it total body shutdown.” He added an apology to his parents: “I am sorry I’m ruining your golden years.”

At about 190cm (6-foot-3), Whitney weighs a little over 45kg (100lbs). His head is shaved, his figure emaciated. Filmmaker Jennifer Brea (Unrest), a fellow ME/CFS patient, compares the illness to “a broken battery” that can only charge to five percent. Nobody has been able to identify a single cause. There are no standard diagnostic tests and no cures, doctors can only rule out other illnesses such as multiple sclerosis (MS) or cancer.

The National Academy of Sciences estimates that up to 2.5 million Americans suffer from ME/CFS, and an estimated 84 to 91 percent of people with ME/CFS are not diagnosed. The World Health Organization lists ME/CFS as a neurological illness, but Davis is convinced he’s confronting an autoimmune disorder, not unlike MS. Like many autoimmune disorders, it disproportionately affects women. His research became especially urgent after Dr Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease expert in the US, warned that the novel coronavirus could cause ME/CFS.

“CFS is probably the last major illness we need to figure out,” says Davis, who speaks with a voice so tender everyone around him immediately lapses into silence so they can understand his words. “I feel the tremendous weight to find a solution.”

Whitney Dafoe, 37, who has chronic fatigue syndrome, weighs little more than 45kg

A problem solver

Davis, the director of the Stanford Genome Technology Center, has solved complex puzzles before. It’s something he has enjoyed since childhood when he would build model rockets, persevering despite being told by teachers that he would never amount to much because of his dyslexia.

He later developed one of the first methods for mapping DNA in 1967. In his 50-year career as a biochemist and geneticist, he has also worked with Nobel laureate James Watson at Harvard, created the first image of the pairing of two genomes, and made crucial contributions to the Human Genome Project.

I’ve always found tremendous joy in solving problems that others deem unsolvable.

Ron Davis

In 2013, Atlantic magazine counted him as one of “today’s greatest inventors.”

“I’ve always found tremendous joy in solving problems that others deem unsolvable,” he says in the foyer of his house, but the joy drains from his face when he stops at his son’s door. “My greatest hope is that we find the cause.”

Whitney, before he became ill with ME/CFS

‘When Ron calls, we come’

Whitney was an award-winning photographer with a keen, meditative eye. The lanky, curly-headed adventurer explored all 50 states and nearly all continents with his camera. He lived with a shaman in Ecuador, discovered the Himalayas on the back of his motorcycle, and helped build a nunnery in India. Like many CFS-patients, his breakdown started with an infection: In 2007, he went to a clinic in India with a fever and bloody diarrhoea. When the doctors there could not help him, he booked the next flight home to California.

But despite innumerable doctor visits, he kept getting weaker. In 2009, he took photos of then-President Barack Obama’s inauguration but already could not work full days anymore. He tried keeping up with wedding photo assignments, but it would take him an entire week to recover.

“First he couldn’t carry his shopping bags anymore, then he became too weak to cook, so in May 2011, he moved back in with us because he didn’t have the energy anymore for the simplest everyday things,” Janet Dafoe recalls. “At first, we couldn’t understand why he was always so tired. Then, we thought, OK, who are the specialists? At which clinic can we get help? We tried absolutely everything the doctors recommended.” She runs down a long list of medications, antidepressants, cancer remedies, MS supplements. “Until we realised: Nobody knows how he can get healthy again.”

That is when Davis came to a decision: “I have to do it.”

Whitney’s state is comparable to an AIDS patient about a week before his death. And that has been the case for the last six years.

Ron Davis

The words of the doctor who finally diagnosed his son with ME/CFS burned themselves into his memory: “The good news is, he won’t die from it. The bad news is, he won’t die from it.” But the truth is that any further infection, for instance from his feeding tube, could be the end.

Davis understands his race for a cure as a race against the death of his son. “Whitney’s state is comparable to an AIDS patient about a week before his death. And that has been the case for the last six years,” Davis says. At one point, Whitney spelled D Y I N G with scrabble tiles.

In 2013, Davis founded the Stanford Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Research Center (now called ME/CFS Collaborative Research Center). In his labs, centrifuges churn with the blood of dozens of severe ME patients, including his son. A geneticist colleague is sequencing their genes as a favour.

“There are still doctors who send these patients to a psychiatrist,” Davis laments. “If a general practitioner analyses Whitney’s blood, they get near-normal results. Therefore doctors think the illness is in their head.” But when he explored further, Davis detected anomalies. After more than 9,000 experiments, Davis has proven that Whitney’s blood is thicker and stickier. When he exposes the blood of healthy people to a stressor such as salt, it will soon revert back to normal, whereas the blood conductivity of CFS patients collapses. Davis has developed four diagnostic tools he is currently testing and believes he will soon be able to announce a breakthrough in confirming biomarkers.

Ron Davis, one of the world’s leading geneticists, is focused on finding a cure for his son

But Davis’s deeply personal fight for his son’s health is also a battle for the recognition of this illness. The National Institutes of Health spent only about $15m in 2019 on ME/CFS research, which affects up to 2.5 million Americans. It spent about $111m on MS research, which affects about one million people.

Luminaries from all over the world have joined Davis’s research and flew in for the last pre-pandemic CFS Symposium at Stanford in September 2019: Robert Phair, a former Johns Hopkins School of Medicine professor, has seen interrupted metabolism in patients; top surgeon Ron Tompkins established a CFS research collaboration at Harvard University; Maureen Hanson, professor of molecular biology at Cornell University who was motivated to join the efforts by a family member with CFS, has focused her research on the microbiome of patients’ gut and blood; neuroscientist Jonas Bergquist who travelled from Uppsala University, in Sweden, where he started a research centre on ME/CFS.

Stanford geneticist Mike Snyder summed up what many of them think: “When Ron calls, we come.” They all acknowledge his brilliant mind and work ethic, and complain about the lack of funding to study this complex disease.

With Davis’s help, the Open Medicine Foundation, which leads the largest non-profit effort to diagnose, treat and prevent ME/CFS and related chronic, complex diseases, raised more than $18m in 2019 and was on track to raise another $20m in 2020. Davis, who is the director of OMF’s scientific advisory board, has such a stellar reputation among scientists that he was able to convince numerous renowned researchers at Ivy League universities to contribute to his work, including Nobel Laureates Paul Berg and Mario Capecchi.

They have made progress: Neurologists found inflammatory changes in the brain; immunologists suspect an error response in the immune system; and geneticists point to a genetic marker for CFS that up to three-quarters of people may have. “It’s like looking at an elephant,” Davis jokes. “One is checking out the trunk, another the legs, and a third the ears. Everybody finds something in their area.”

Whitney has not said a word since Christmas, 2014

ME/CFS and COVID-19

Davis’s research became even more urgent and important after Dr Fauci warned that some COVID survivors showed symptoms in line with those of ME/CFS. “This is a phenomenon that is really quite real and quite extensive,” Fauci said at the federal government’s first conference on “COVID long haulers” in early December, calling it “a significant public health issue”.

According to Fauci, “a considerable number” of COVID survivors struggle with extreme exhaustion, memory lapses, and cognitive difficulties many months after they have been officially cleared as recovered.

Davis is part of a high-level interagency work and research group (PDF) looking at the long-term consequences of COVID with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Institutes of Health, the Veterans Administration, and the Department of Defense.

This could be a turning point to figuring out how ME/CFS gets triggered and how to stop it before it starts.

Whitney Dafoe

He launched the first study into long-term molecular changes in COVID patients and he is years ahead in his research on why some patients cannot recover easily after a severe viral infection.

“This could be a turning point to figuring out how ME/CFS gets triggered and how to stop it before it starts,” Whitney typed in a text shared by his parents. “They are taking blood from coronavirus patients and monitoring their progress so they can see, in real-time, the transition from coronavirus to ME/CFS.”

‘Superman’

In the early years, Whitney was still able to work with a physiotherapist. “Now he can’t tolerate strangers in the room. Everything is too much.” Janet Dafoe sighs. She reduced her therapy hours and her husband reorganised his institute so they can care for Whitney around the clock. Sometimes, a nurse takes over the night shift, but the family cannot afford constant care. “Many ME/CFS-patients have a warped night-day rhythm,” Janet Dafoe explains why she often stays with her son until 5am. They have tried in vain to find a different rhythm. “Whitney hardly sleeps more than two hours a night, and nobody knows why.”

Ron Davis and Janet Dafoe

Just like the virus took over their son’s body, it has also brought his parents’ lives to a standstill. “Our life is stuck in a holding pattern,” Janet Dafoe acknowledges. “Doing my PhD was hard. I conquered mountains, that was hard. But living with my son’s illness is a thousand times harder. Our entire world has been eaten up by a chronic disease.”

Last July, Davis and Dafoe celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. They met at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) when she was a budding child psychologist, he a geneticist who had already garnered the first of his 30 patents. They immediately connected over their shared interests: hiking, nature, Indigenous American wisdom. They used to enjoy mountain tours, trips to the Sierra mountain range, and visits with Native American shamans. But their travel together has all but ceased as at least one of them always stays close to their son. They still have a traditional sweat lodge in their lush garden, Janet Dafoe’s greatest pride.

“Because we can’t travel anymore, I take care of the garden, so we at least have a nice place here,” Janet Dafoe says, her grey curls framing her face. Tibetan prayer flags flutter above the pillars of their elegant single-family home in Professorville in the heart of Palo Alto, a reminder of Whitney’s Buddhist faith.

This is a devastating, really serious disease that affects many body systems. It will completely knock you out, it will ruin your life and the lives of people who take care of you. It can affect anyone if they just get the wrong virus or the wrong environmental stress.

Janet Dafoe

In the hallway leading to Whitney’s room, Whitney and his younger sister, Ashley Haugen, smile from framed photos, taken in happier times, their toddler selves dancing hand-in-hand. Ballet used to be Ashley’s passion; now she is an event manager and new mother.

In 2011, after Whitney first fell ill, his sister took care of him for a full year. But she burned out. “He was my best friend,” she says. “It is hard to find someone who knows you as well as your brother.”

Her parents invited friends and colleagues to their Palo Alto home on this pre-pandemic afternoon the day after the conference, including a dozen patients with milder ME who are strong enough to leave the house. For 20 years, Janet Dafoe worked full-time at the Children’s Health Council in Palo Alto, then the last 15 years at the Morrissey Compton Educational Center in Redwood City, mainly counselling children with Aspergers and autism. Instead of taking care of her own psychology patients, she now spends many hours a day comforting other ME/CFS patients. “I try to show them that they are not alone. I am busy every day to prevent suicides,” the mild-mannered Janet Dafoe says, then her tone changes and she speaks of increasing despair.

Whitney and Ashley when they were children

“This is a devastating, really serious disease that affects many body systems. It will completely knock you out, it will ruin your life and the lives of people who take care of you. It can affect anyone if they just get the wrong virus or the wrong environmental stress,” she adds. “They should all be up in arms that the research isn’t funded better so we can figure this out! Instead, some doctors are still telling patients to simply man up or exercise. They are basically committing malpractice. It’s absolutely mind-blowing.”

Of course, many patients are depressed and anxious, she says, “because so much has been taken away from them. But that doesn’t mean the illness is in their head. You would be depressed, too, if you couldn’t do most of the things you used to do, and nobody knows how you can be helped.”

She tries to retrieve her sense of humour, recounting one of her last conversations with her son several years ago. He was worried he would not be able to find a wife. “’They’ll all be taken by the time I’m recovered,’” Janet Dafoe smiles as she remembers his words.

“I told him finding a girlfriend for him will be the easiest problem to solve.”

Everything can change in a moment. You never know what will happen in the future. Never stop fighting. I'm fighting with you. If you feel like giving up, give it to me. I will carry it for you.

Whitney Dafoe

This year, Whitney’s energy has improved a little with experimental medication. For the first time in years, he can type longer texts into his tablet, opening a window into his isolated inner world. When Dafoe asked her son if he had a message for other CFS patients, Whitney closed his eyes, focused, and wrote a few lines: “Everything can change in a moment. You never know what will happen in the future. Never stop fighting. I’m fighting with you. If you feel like giving up, give it to me. I will carry it for you.”

Janet Dafoe had the lines printed on posters, with a picture of Whitney’s raised left fist, photographed through the keyhole of his room.

It’s a fight his parents have vowed to never give up either. Davis’s book with award-winning journalist Tracie White, The Puzzle Solver: A Scientist’s Desperate Quest to Cure the Illness that Stole His Son, hits bookshelves this month. It paints an intimate portrait of Whitney’s journey to diagnosis and his father’s fight to find a cure.

Whitney, with his parents and sister, who have taken care of him at different times since he fell ill in 2010

Sitting in the garden, Davis keeps checking his mobile phone until it tells him it is time for the next feeding. He promptly gets up to mix a second helping of nutrient powder for his son.

When Davis returns from feeding his son, his face is crumpled by exhaustion. “I’ve got to sit down,” he says. Both father and son have Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, which causes joint pain and fatigue. Davis started suffering from rheumatic fever as a one-year-old toddler, was often bedridden for weeks as a child; he lives with chronic pain every day. “I’m used to pain,” he says flatly. “You just rewire your brain to ignore it.”

It was precisely his childhood experience with medicine that ignited his passion for science. When a doctor gave him penicillin for the first time, instantly erasing his fever, the child thought medicine was a miracle and vowed to study it from then on. “His whole life prepared him for the task of saving his son,” Janet Dafoe comments. “Whitney truly believes dad is superman.”

The book The Puzzle Solver, co-written by Ron Davis and Stanford science writer Tracie White, will be published January 5, 2021, by Hachette.

#technology Read full article: https://expatimes.com/?p=16320&feed_id=26392 #coronaviruspandemic #features #health #scienceandtechnology #unitedstates #usampcanada

#Coronaviruspandemic #Features #Health #ScienceandTechnology #UnitedStates #USampCanada

[comingupforblair]

If Zack Snyder had created the MCU (Part 1)

Since I have in the past sees posts speculating about how the MCU would be different if Zack Snyder had been in charge, usually with some lazy sarcastic joke about it being ‘’edgier’’ because those jokes aren’t so worn They have holes in Them, I decided to speculate about how I think the early years of the MCU would have played out if the creative team of the DCEU and Charles Roven had been in charge of it. 

I’m not saying any of this would have been an improvement as, unlike a lot of other people, I don’t think you can apply what works in one franchise to another and hope for an arbitrary improvement. I’m just theorizing how I think it would have been different.

For the purpose of this post, I’ll only be looking at the first three films with a possible follow-up later.

- Iron Man 1 & 2

To make things easier, I’ll be putting the two Iron Man films under one banner for this.

If Zack Snyder had been in charge, I think there would have been a much greater emphasis on Tony’s alcoholism and his damaged relationship with his father. whom I also imagine would have been more overtly abusive like his comics counterpart. Parental relationships and Their effects on people have always been a big thing in Snyder’s films so I think it would have gotten more focus and They wouldn’t have held back from just how much damage an abusive childhood can do to a person, even well into adulthood, similar to how he portrayed Lex Luthor in BvS.

I also think the film wouldn’t have held back from showing Tony’s culpability in wars and how he has profited from human misery and his guilt in dealing with that. 

It’s difficult to imagine anyone but Robert Downey Jr in the role now but I’m going to suggest three names anyway, just in keeping with the vibe of an alternate universe.

The first is Oscar Isaac

I don’t think I need to justify this too much as he’s one of the best actors currently working. I think he would have been fantastic in the role and would have been able to bring the immense charm and charisma needed as well as being able to go to more serious places the story would have gone to. His character in Ex Machina even works as an example of how I think a more serious version of Tony would play out, albeit one without Tony’s redeeming features. His performance in Inside Llewyn Davies also showed he can play a character with glaring personality flaws and still make Them sympathetic.

He and Zack Snyder worked together on Sucker Punch (2011) so it fits in that regard and, as he wasn’t well-known in 2008, Snyder has a talent for seeing something in little-known actors as we have seen with Henry Cavill, Ray Fisher and Gal Gadot.

The second choice is Riz Ahmed

As with Oscar Isaac, he’s one of the best actors currently working and I would have loved to have seen what he could do with someone like Tony. I think he would have done a terrific job at showing Tony’s guilt and his psychological issues and I think his being a Muslim of Pakistani descent would have made for some interesting dilemmas as Tony struggles with the fact that he created weapons to be used in what is increasingly seen as an all-out war against his own race. Riz Ahmed being a lot younger would have also made Tony a nice parallel to modern tech geniuses like Mark Zuckerberg and he showed he can play roles like that in Jason Bourne.

The third choice is Jon Hamm

He’s an actor I’m keen to see in a comic book film in general and he’s perfectly suited to play Tony as a man whose outward projection of success, intelligence, wit and charisma hides some intense struggles and self-hatred. He has exactly the kind of dark intensity, the look and feel of a man who seemingly has everything and yet can hardly stand to look at himself that would have made him a fantastic Batman, that would be suited for a more serious take on the character and his role as Don Draper on Mad Men shows he can take on a character whose good intentions and genuine displays of altruism are often undermined by his selfishness.

He worked with Zack Snyder on Sucker Punch (2011) and his deleted scene with Emily Browning shows that Snyder knows how to play to his talents and utilize his charm. Though the more comedic tone of the MCU as it is would have also been a chance for Hamm to impeccable comedy skills.

For Pepper Potts, I’m going to say Lucy Liu

She’s someone I’ve seen suggested a few times, once in the same fancast as Riz Ahmed, and I can definitely see her working well in the role. She’s shown in Elementary that she can play a character who is kind and intelligent but doesn’t tolerate shit from people who are used to having Their flaws indulged by others. An aspect I loved which doesn’t get quite enough praise in Man Of Steel was having Lois played by an actress quite a bit older than Clark and it would be cool to see that repeated here with Oscar Isaac or Riz Ahmed.

I’ll admit that I haven’t given as much thought to Pepper so if anyone has any suggestions, I’d be happy to hear Them.

For Black Widow, I think a version done by Zack Snyder would have put more initial emphasis on the darker nature of her backstory, on being taken from her home and raised to be a weapon from such a young age and to not really know a life outside of violence and betrayal.

This is harder to fancast for but, as I’ve seen her used before, I think I’m going to suggest Freida Pinto

I think she’d be great at showing Natasha’s softer side and it would be great to see an Indian actress in such a major role.

- The Incredible Hulk

To be honest, I think a Hulk film made in the vein of the DCEU would look pretty identical to what Ang Lee did in 2003 and I say that as a compliment as his film is very underrated. 

I think a film made by Zack Snyder would have followed a similar path in showing the serious trauma of his childhood and how it has an effect on Bruce as an adult and plays a part in his issues and wouldn’t have held back from showing just how terrifying it would be to have a being like The Hulk inside of you and what it would be like to see someone transform like that.

Ideally I would like to see Eric Bane take the role again in this alternate MCU.

But, for the purpose of this casting, I’m going to first use Billy Crudup.

He’s worked well with Zack Snyder twice already and he has a strong sense of likability and laid-back friendliness that would work well for Bruce and serve as a striking contrast to the terrifying and monstrous nature of The Hulk. He was offered the role back in 2003 and I think he would have been perfect at showing Bruce as a good man who struggles with something awful inside of him.

My second choice is Adrien Brody

He’s one of my favorite actors and I think he would be amazing in a role like The Hulk. A version created by Zack Snyder would likely play up the turmoil and psychological horror of Bruce’s existence and Brody is an actor who excels at such roles. He’d be perfect for a version of Bruce who has the effects of past trauma and his self-hatred visible on his face and who keeps himself away from the world for fear of what could be unleashed at any moment while also showing moments of kindness and vulnerability to make him more sympathetic and I can only imagine how Bruce’s iconic trademark line ‘’Don’t make me angry. You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry’’ would sound coming from Brody.

The third choice for Bruce is Hugh Dancy

This is a fancast I just saw but like so much I wanted to include it. Anyone has seen Hannibal can attest to how good Dancy is at playing someone who struggles daily with horrible memories and a fear of his own power and who keeps himself isolated from the rest of the world as a result, someone who lives in fear of Their own mind and how it can turn on Them at any moment, whose incredible intellect is burdened by something he hates himself for. I think he could do something amazing with The Hulk.

Those are my ideas as to how the MCU would look if done by Zack Snyder. Like I said, none of this is meant to be taken as an improvement or how it should have played out and I’m open to other ideas on the subject. This is just speculation as to how I think it would have been.

#zack snyder #MCU #marvel cinematic universe #DCEU #marvel fancast #Iron Man #Hulk #Oscar Isaac #Riz Ahmed #Adrien Brody #hugh dancy