It’s not over for all the victims of ICE in Minnesota
As my mutuals know, I’ve posted before about my neighbor, Max Gochez, who was taken by ICE on January 9th.
Max is still in ICE custody as of today, March 26th, still in a holding cell in New Mexico, still waiting for a judge to decide whether he can come home for a fair hearing of his case.
Max has lived here for 30 years. He has committed no crimes other than to be here without papers—a misdemeanor. He has three kids, born and raised American. His youngest is 8 years old. His daughter is supposed to graduate from high school in June—but now, she’s also working full-time at Target to help with the mortgage and bills.
Without Max’s income, the Gochez family does not have enough money to pay their bills and pay the lawyer. Their GoFundMe account has stalled at about half of the modest amount they’ve asked for.
It’s two days now before the big No Kings rally here in the Twin Cities. If you can’t attend, one thing you can do to contribute is to donate to the GoFundMe for Max Gochez and his family.
If you can’t donate, please, please repost or favorite this post to raise awareness of the suffering and struggle of this good man and his family.
This isn’t one of those weird, made-up posts from doubtful sources. I’m a real person from the Tumblr community, and my neighbor Max is a real Minnesotan, still suffering at the hands of this corrupt and racist regime. If you need proof that this is real, you can contact the government of Richfield (a suburb of Minneapolis) at https://www.richfieldmn.gov/163/Directory-of-Officials
I’ve never done anything like this before. I know most people will just scroll past this post.
Please don’t look away.
I’m begging the Tumblr community to reach out and help this family bring their father home.
Max Gochez Alarco was detained by ICE on January 9 on his way home from work. He is a hardworking, l… Max Gochez needs your support for Help
For the 15th anniversary of 2011's "Thor," director Kenneth Branagh looks back at casting Chris Hemsworth and shares his ideas for a sequel.
In 2008, Kenneth Branagh was at a crossroads. He'd spent years forging a reputation as a skilled adaptor of William Shakespeare's works, writing, directing, and starring in both 1989's "Henry V" and 1996's "Hamlet," both of which earned Oscar nominations. But fresh off a string of three disappointing releases, it was time to recalibrate.
Given his penchant for adaptations, Branagh had an idea: Why not adapt another kind of treasured literature?
Word had been spreading around Hollywood that Marvel Studios was finally ready to bring one of its most iconic comic book superheroes, Thor, to the big screen after decades of development. The story of the God of Thunder had qualities that Branagh gravitated toward: generations-old mythology, a hero who must learn to be a leader, and, like the works of Shakespeare, plenty of family turmoil. He was ready to give Thor the Shakespeare treatment.
There was just one problem. After the success of "Iron Man" that same year, Marvel was already circling several potential directors, from Matthew Vaughn to Guillermo del Toro. Branagh, however, was determined to get the gig. Just before Labor Day weekend in 2008, he jumped on a plane from England to Los Angeles on his own dime to meet with Marvel.
The gamble paid off. A few months after that meeting, Branagh got the job.
"I knew sometimes you have to just buckle down and do it, and I did that," Branagh, 65, told Business Insider.
Branagh wasted no time diving headfirst into the world of Marvel, taking meetings about costumes and outer space sets, having a sit-down with the comic's co-creator Stan Lee, and, most importantly, working alongside Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige to make one of the biggest casting choices in its budding Marvel Cinematic Universe: The actors who would play the two main characters, brothers Thor and Loki.
All those decisions culminated in a hit when "Thor" was released in May 2011. The movie, headed by stars Chris Hemsworth as Thor and Tom Hiddleston as the mischievous Loki, would go on to gross $449 million at the worldwide box office.
Not only was it a moneymaker, it also set the stage for Marvel's dominance of the decade to come. In addition to showcasing Thor's powers, it expanded the MCU beyond Earth into the outer reaches of the cosmos, laying essential groundwork for Marvel Studios' main prize: a big-screen Avengers movie.
In honor of the movie's 15th anniversary, Kenneth Branagh took a look back on "Thor," opening up about casting Hemsworth, coaching him on how to act alongside Anthony Hopkins, and what he'd do if he made a "Thor" sequel.
On getting the gig and what 'Thor' has in common with 'Succession'
Business Insider: Is it true that after you voiced interest in directing a Thor movie, you flew out to LA on your own dime to pitch Marvel?
Kenneth Branagh: To be honest, yes. I wish I could tell you, "No, no, they wooed me." But I had made three films that weren't successes, and as they say in this business, three strikes and you're out.
At the same time, Marvel movies were not yet this phenomenon that would take over the movie business, so they had to think out of the box with directors, and I was one of those names.
The advantage I had was I was less scared of the material than others. With "Thor," the great question, and I think the scariest one for them when they were setting up that first tier of titles, was the tone. When you talk about tone, when you try to get that across, you just have to be in the room.
So I flew out on a Friday early morning from the UK. I had the meeting at 4 p.m. the Friday before Labor Day, and I was on the plane home the next day. I had written half a dozen pages of the beginning of the screenplay, which I read to them in the room, and that was to convey tone. The basic declaration was that the story and the characters would take themselves seriously; I would not take myself seriously; that's what was established.
If I were pitching it now, I would have said this is a little like "Succession."
On those Daniel Craig casting rumors and assuring Kevin Feige that Chris Hemsworth was right for Thor
So you sign on in 2008, but after the success of "Iron Man," Marvel decides it wants to do a sequel, so now the "Thor" release is pushed back to 2011. What did you do with all that time before shooting started?
There was a long, long preproduction process, and key to it all was casting. It was a long time before we found that oak tree strength and that wry charisma of Chris Hemsworth, and to balance it with the razor wit and passion of Tom Hiddleston's lunatic Loki. And then you need an acting titan as the God of Gods, Odin; that was Anthony Hopkins. That was a long dance.
We rehearsed more for this film than for any film I've done. We rehearsed around Thanksgiving 2009, then the fortnight ahead of shooting in January of 2010, everybody took it very seriously. We were still very nervous, but a week before Christmas, three weeks before we started shooting, we had a series of costume tests on camera.
There was a real shiver of excitement in the room. I played some music that I thought might work for the movie, and it felt dangerous; it felt pretty daring for something on this scale. So I had benefited enormously from what some would see as delays, but what I was viewing as more time to marinate the material.
Is it true that Daniel Craig was offered the Thor role?
Not to my knowledge. I think we can officially debunk that. He's an extraordinary actor, but at least under my watch, I didn't see that happening.
To be honest, we needed someone who wasn't bringing previous baggage, even if the baggage was brilliance and familiar roles. It felt as though we needed someone with a clean slate who was bringing a physical heft and an innocence. I think there's a terrific naivety that's part of this origin story with Chris. There's a beautiful moment in the movie where he says under deceptive questioning by Loki while marooned on Earth, "Can I go home?" And he does so with such vulnerability. I think he was very open, very fresh, and very alive to being this kind of clean slate.
We knew Thor had to be physically impressive; he needed to be big, he needed to be young to have the kind of reckless, passionate, rebellious soul that was going to be part of our story. It took a long time because we could never agree on an actor who checked every single box. I think Marvel was particularly aware that this picture needed to work for them because so much of what they already dreamed, which was all these multiverse intersections story-wise, to take them across worlds and universes in the films to come, was dependent on establishing a character who brought that whole part of the multiverse.
I remember when we cast Chris and Tom; it was a Saturday morning at Raleigh Studios in Manhattan Beach. Kevin Feige walked around the central table in this little room that he and I were in. He must have gone around it 10,000 steps, muttering sometimes to me, and sometimes as if I wasn't there; he was sort of hallucinating, saying, "This is the most important decision we will ever make." It was clear it had taken a long time to get to this moment, and now we really needed to be certain. It was like talking someone off the ledge. My job that morning was just to say, "No, it's Chris, and it's Tom."
Is it true that after you cast Chris, you gave him the famous St. Crispin's Day monologue from "Henry V" to memorize?
We did. We were always going into what you would call the underneath of the character, so we knew that at various times, he needed to feel as though he was going to inspire people to follow him. So, yes. We did do some work on that. We talked about "The Odyssey," we talked about all the stories that have the trials and tribulations of young men on the road to acquiring wisdom through adventures.
But of all people to give Chris that monologue, St. Crispin's Day made you a legend on the London stage. Did you feel you might be putting a lot of pressure on Chris going about it that way?
The goal was to give him the confidence that Thor, as a leader, has to acquire, and one of the gifts is for a leader to allow those who he is leading to understand what moment in their lives they are meeting when they are asked to do something dangerous. We knew what we were making, but we never chose to use the phrase "comic book movie" as needing to mean something that we didn't treat with the greatest possible depth that we could give it. And that's what we were after.
Also, I knew that I had to prepare him and Tom like that because they were going to come up against Hopkins. You can't put them in a scene with him unless they've got some texture underneath, because when Odin says, "You're unworthy! You're unworthy of me!" that's big stuff. We wanted Chris to feel equipped to handle being in the ring with the big boys.
On watching Hemsworth eat four chickens and crafting a worthy Stan Lee cameo
How did Hopkins go about all this? Was he generous toward Chris and Tom, or was there some good-natured veteran actor ribbing where he made the boys earn it?
He's definitely generous, but he's what Clint Eastwood used to call a "fast start-up actor." So he's ready. He's generous, but you have to keep up with him.
So three takes and he's had it?
It doesn't take more than three takes with him.
What I would do is I would say to the boys, "Listen, he's going to be so ready." So I would play with two cameras and cross-shoot it. The big scene where Loki says "Tell me!" demanding what his parentage is, I said to both Tom and Mr. Hopkins, "I'm going to cross shoot this," so at 8:30 a.m., I was in the closeups, cross-shooting the closeups. I knew that Mr. Hopkins would be thrilled by this, because he's absolutely ready to go.
But I said this to Tom, so he was rehearsed. It was all deliberate. It was also deliberate to tell the boys, "Know these scenes backward, mate, because he's going to be so sharp I don't want any mumbling of the lines. You've got a laser beam coming at you, you'll need to be ready with your own."
Was there ever a point in production where you felt Chris' body got too big? Even for Thor standards.
No. Um [Pause]. No —
Ken, did he get too bulky?
[Laughs.] No, he didn't get too bulky. He did throw me numerous times. I would speak to him, and a door would open, and suddenly four whole chickens would arrive and be put in front of him. That would sometimes throw me because I didn't get much out of him after that.
He'd go, [speaks in an Australian accent] "Gotta go eat, mate, 45 minutes have passed. I gotta have another fucking chicken."
But I remember when he first took off his shirt. I felt a little embarrassed, I said, "I think we need you to take your shirt off." And he said, "Are you joking? I spent the last nine months getting ready for this, of course I'm going to take my shirt off." And then he went outside, and I think I watched him do 200 push-ups, and then he came back in, and [Natalie] Portman turned around and just gasped, and I said, "That's it! That's what you do on film."
Was there a lot of thought put into the Stan Lee cameo?
In terms of Kevin's vision, Stan was going to always be in each movie, and they had to be interesting and different. I had a great lunch with Stan before shooting. My god, that was a real privilege to hear his stories. We talked about the cameo a little with him, but we were always looking for something that was cool.
The atmosphere on set when he showed up that day was great. We had a lot of extras that day. There was a spontaneous round of applause when he showed up. Many of us knew we were standing there because of him and Jack Kirby and many others. You felt like this was the blessing from the true creators. It was a special feeling.
And it always felt like with the nature of that scene, the feel of Excalibur, the sword in the stone, though also having a bit of fun with it, him to be around when that hammer is stuck in the ground that it was so symbolic. I mean, once that thing moves, a whole universe kicks off, a whole series of chapters are unleashed, so having him there was sufficient scale for Stan Lee, who himself is such an epic character.
On what he'd do with a 'Thor' sequel
You gave three years of your life to make this movie. Was it as simple as that as to why you didn't return for the sequel?
I definitely was ready for another, for sure, but not right then. Marvel shoots are intense. Marvel postproduction is more intense — wildly exciting but super intense. I definitely needed to smell the roses. Kevin Feige was very understanding, and so was the cast. I needed a break.
Part of me would love to finish my relationship with that character. I'd always wanted to do more and indeed had a couple of ideas, more in the territory of James Mangold's brilliant "Logan." I would love to see Chris Hemsworth and the others have their own individual final story that takes Thor into a glorious twilight.
But Marvel wanted you to come back for the sequel?
For sure. I was thrilled to be asked. They were disappointed; they understood, but they were disappointed. They wanted to go straight away with a sequel, and why shouldn't they? And I said to Kevin at that time, "I don't have it in me."
Gradually, the "Thor" sequels pivoted to a more comedic tone. Have you watched any of the sequels?
Yes.
And?
Amazing films. I mean that. I watched them with a mix of tremendous pride and amazement at the many ways such stories can go. I think it's a tribute to what Kevin saw in the potential for a character and a world. To see how elastic it's been in encompassing a different kind of adventure, different kind of humor, different drive to the narrative, it's been an absolute fascination on how that's developed.
At this point in your life, you have since made other big movies, and won an Oscar for writing "Belfast." Is returning to direct another "Thor" attractive? It sounds like they want to now move away from the comedy and go back to the foundation you created.
As a watcher, it's very attractive. I have such a high regard for what Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston and all of them involved have done. And there's also this unique relationship with a large cinema audience that those characters now have that, for people who have grown up with them and their arc, I think it would be something very beautiful to take those characters into their own particular sunset. It could be a beautiful thing. I would love to see it, for sure.
But how about you directing it?
That's a whole other question. They are so far deep into the future of the Marvel Universe that I'm sure whatever plans they have for it are already kind of set. All I know is there's something beautiful to be had out of arriving at a conclusion for that arc of those stories with those characters and those actors.
Cartonnage of Lady Tashat
ARTIST:Egyptian
DATE:1085-710 B.C.
MEDIUM:Cartonnage of painted and varnished linen; polychromed pine coffin
DIMENSIONS:67 x 67 in. (170.2 cm)
CREATION PLACE:Africa, Egypt
Central to the ancient Egyptians was the belief in the afterlife. In order to ensure the survival of the ka, the immortal life-force, the body of the deceased was preserved as the ka’s eternal dwelling. The intricate process of embalming, or mummification, involved removing the internal organs for storage in separate containers, and treating the corpse with a type of salt called natron and various resins. Finally, the corpse was wrapped in linen bandages and enclosed in a cartonnage, a casing of plaster and linen molded to the body, and painted. This mummy is an exceptional case because X-rays show that an extra adult skull was placed in Teshat’s wrappings between her legs. This may have been the act of grave-robbers, who stole the jewelry and traditional amulets she probably wore.
The hieroglyphs on the wooden coffin state that this mummy, Teshat, was the daughter of the treasurer of the Temple of Amon at Thebes. She died in her mid to late teens, one of several wives in a harem. Both coffin and cartonnage bear representations of Teshat’s face in an ideal youthful state. Many protective gods are pictured on the cartonnage in their symbolic forms, together with bands of prayers asking them to accept offerings made on her behalf.
Teshat’s elevated status entitled her to burial in a elaborate stone tomb decorated with wall paintings and supplied with food, furniture and clothing to provide for her ka’s comfort in the afterlife.
I have been haunted by the mystery of Lady Tashat ever since I visited the Minneapolis Institute of Arts on a school trip when I was about 10 years old.
Why was she buried with the head of a man between her legs? Why did she die at the age of 15? Why are so many of her bones broken inside, while the exterior of her mummy is in pristine condition?
Some who have studied Lady Tashet have suggested that the head was accidentally added during the mummification process, or moved by grave robbers, or various other possibilities—but CAT scans have revealed that the head is included with her mummy beneath her careful wrappings.
This was no accident.
Tashat’s mummy was lovingly cared for. Her cartonnage was so beautifully painted it is today on exhibit in a prestigious art museum. This level of mummification would have been incredibly expensive for the time period. I think it’s evident that whoever cared for her body wanted to be sure she was honored and properly prepared for the afterlife.
My belief is that whoever cared for Lady Tashat in death is not the same person who broke her arm and her ribs and damaged the soles of her feet (which may have happened after her death, but did not happen after she was mummified). Forensic science could tell us today whether these injuries occurred before her death, but that would require removing her from the cartonnage—which would destroy the work of art that had earned Lady Tashat’s place in the MIA.
The damage to the soles of Lady Tashat’s feet is particularly disturbing and also an important clue.
“A common torture technique in Ancient Egypt was the beating of the soles of the feet.”
Law Enforcement in Ancient Egypt: Police, Investigations, Punishments, Torture | Middle East And North Africa — Facts and Details
I think the damage to Lady Tashat’s body is most likely evidence of torture, and it’s likely that she was murdered.
What kind of crime could a 15-year-old girl commit to earn this kind of death? Why would she be buried with the head of a man whose skull had been crushed in from behind?
Lady Tashat was the daughter of an important regional governor and a treasurer of the priesthood of Amon. This was a VIP. But she was also married to a man wealthy enough to have a harem. She was one of many wives.
I think Lady Tashat was tortured and murdered for the crime of infidelity (whether or not it actually happened), and that the man she was accused of consorting with was also murdered, by having his head bashed in. I think Lady Tashat was deliberately buried with the head of her purported lover placed between her legs.
I think that after she was punished and disposed of by her vengeful husband, her family took her home, grieved for her, and gave her as decent and beautiful a burial (and afterlife) as they were able to.
The beheaded man whose skull was placed with Lady Tashat’s body for all eternity might have been buried with her for a couple of reasons, but this was most certainly deliberate.
It’s possible that this was the final insult of Tashat’s husband. According to Ancient Egyptian beliefs, burying the head separately from the body would have prevented the man from achieving an afterlife. Perhaps Lady Tashat’s husband and murderer intended for her to wake to the afterlife and find the gruesome proof that her lover would be separated from her for eternity.
Or perhaps Lady Tashat’s family retrieved the man’s head and buried it with her to give her what they could of him. The couple could not be together in life, but in this way they would be together in death.
We will never know the truth about Lady Tashat’s life and death, but I think my theory comes closer than the supposition that the very deliberate treatment of her body at the time of her death and immediately after was somehow accidental.
I think this was a Romeo and Juliet of the ancients.
A gentle reminder that in the comics Nightmare's powers have little to no effect on Loki, not because Loki is immune or naturally resistant or anything like that, but because his life is hell and any fear Nightmare may try to use against him has probably already happened to Loki at some point in real life.
using your city as a personality trait is such a funny phenomenon thats only allowed when you're from like 5 super well known american cities. imagine if like.. a polish person was like thats how we do it in kędzierzyn koźle
Well, so this is something I’ve been working on. The first part is a little rough because I’m new to video editing.
The subject matter is from my graphic novel, which I’ve been working on for a very long time. I’ve recently started adding a few animations—so I’m putting this one out there.
Someone in this community told me that the images I’ve created and shared on this site for this graphic novel are AI slop, and I should label it. So, just for you, you hurtful bully, I added an AI tag to this post. However, I refuse to call my artwork slop.
You have no idea how much work I put into creating these images. I do use AI to create much of the base content, but there isn’t a single frame that doesn’t require editing. (The AI tool is just part of the editing program I use.) Some of the images are really complex, requiring many overlays and alterations to communicate what they need to say to support the story. Many of these images required hours of work.
This one, for example: do you think some AI bot could have come up with this based on a single simple, lazy prompt?
Do you think my work on this image is nothing just because I used a tool that’s a little more sophisticated than a pencil?
How about these? Are they slop?
I’m not here to defend AI. It’s a dangerous tool in some people’s hands. My point is that it’s unfair and unkind to reject someone’s artwork just because an AI image creator was used as one tool in developing the overall project.
A lot of people on this site have very strong opinions about someone using AI at all. Well, you’re entitled to your views, and so am I. Please feel free to block the tag. I’m not going to be put in the corner and shamed into silence like a Victorian woman caught smoking a cigarette.
AI is just an invention. It can be used or misused, like the phone you’re reading this on now. Intolerance of a new thing isn’t new—humanity has burned a lot of witches and poisoned a few philosophers for expressing different, unpopular ideas. But history demonstrates that the Luddites generally make themselves look silly in the long run.
I didn’t intend to write all that about AI in this post, but there you go.
If you like my artwork or are interested in the story these images come from, please feel free to share. Constructive criticism is also welcome.
what do you mean elon musk did a nazi salute on live tv at the united states presidential inauguration twice and is now erasing the evidence off the internet by replacing the footage with the crowd cheering instead?
would be a shame if people reblogged this, wouldn’t it?
