They make for good conversation starters, people will come up to me and start talking about their favorite comic characters, superhero movies, and everything in between. I have most of my favorite superheroes represented in my wardrobe, except for the rare ones. (I swear, I will find my beloved Mockingbird on a shirt one day, and that day will be glorious.)
Despite the shirts having a pretty wide range of characters, most people tend to notice that my 3 Superman shirts get worn a bit more often than the others. Heaven help the person who sees one of them and tries to tell me Superman is lame, too powerful, too unrelatable, too inhuman, or (worst of all) “not as cool as Batman.” (I love Batman, for the record, but if you think he’s cooler than Superman we are going to have a chat.) I have chewed more than one person out and will have no qualms doing so in the future.
This doesn’t happen when people say they’ve never been a huge fan of Spider-Man or that they don’t really see the appeal of Captain America. Those comments roll off my back, they start fun discussions and I accept that people have different tastes.
When it comes to Superman, however, I get defensive.
The other night, someone who has witnessed this phenomenon asked me a seemingly simple question. “Why do you like Superman so much?” he asked.
“Oh, that’s a loaded question,” I told him. I managed to give him a short answer, but I had to cut a lot of the important stuff out.
Here’s the important stuff:
I was adopted when I was one day old. My adoptive parents were able to bring me home from the hospital, which is a fairly rare occurrence.
My birth mother was 18 when I was born, which is why she chose to give me up for adoption. At 18, with my birth father wanting nothing to do with me, she was unable to take care of me and made the choice she knew would be best for me.
It ultimately was. My parents are everything I could have asked for, and I honestly believe they raised me as well as they possibly could have. One part of that is the fact that they never made an attempt to hide the fact that I was adopted from me, something I am extremely grateful for. My adoption is a part of my identity, it affects my life in ways that this post would have to go severely off topic to explain.
When I turned 18, I had the option of being able to contact my birth mother. Despite having looked forward to the possibility my entire life, I found I couldn’t do it when the time actually came. I was terrified she wouldn’t like me, that she had moved on, or that she wouldn’t want to have a relationship with me.
It was around this time that the first trailer for Man of Steel came out. Having recently fallen in love with comics and comic book movies after the release of The Avengers, I watched it just to see how it looked. Despite being exclusively a Marvel fan at the time, I remembered that I had always liked Superman for some reason, although at the time I couldn’t nail down what that reason was. I remember watching Superman: The Movie for the first time when I was around 7 and absolutely loving it, which is part of the reason Man of Steel interested me.
With my interest in Superman piqued all over again, I checked my local library to see if they had any Superman comics and stumbled across two that were origin stories as far as I could tell. They were titled Superman: Earth One and Superman: Birthright, and having exhausted my library’s reserves of Marvel comics I decided it wouldn’t hurt to check them out.
I read Earth One first, a decision I regret to this day, but I didn’t know any better. I’ve heard it described as “Superman meets Twilight” which is an apt description. Dark, gritty, and “realistic,” Earth One is probably the closest comic equivalent to Man of Steel, and considering I hate the particular facet of the superhero genre that Man of Steel embodies, I’m surprised I enjoyed Earth One at all.
However, there was something about it that I loved, something that gave me chills when I read the page where Clark first puts on the suit and the world sees Superman for the first time. I still liked Superman, just as much as I had when I was 7.
Next, I read Birthright. There are many, many things I can say about Birthright as a comic, because it’s one of the closest things to a perfect comic I’ve read. The writing, art, sequencing of events, coloring, and overall tone of the series is on point all the way through. Mark Waid, the writer, has a better handle on Superman as a character than just about anyone else currently employed in the comics industry, and is one of my favorite writers for his work on other comics like his fantastic work on Captain America.
The comic begins with the destruction of Krypton, as most Superman origins do. It rapidly fast-forwards to focusing on Clark Kent, a 24 year-old freelance journalist traveling the world and occasionally frolicking with lions in his spare time.
Waid does a remarkable job of setting up who Clark is as a character in just a few pages of the first issue of the series. Through dialogue with another character, he establishes Clark as a guy from Kansas who loves his parents and is trying to find his place in the world.
There’s two words Clark says along with all this other stuff that would probably go unnoticed by most, because they seem so commonplace when he says them. Two words that roll off his tongue like they’re just another part of his life, something that he’s accepted and moved on with.
“I’m adopted.”
It makes perfect sense for this to be what Clark and his parents tell the world as an explanation for his existence, but as new to Superman comics as I was, I didn’t really think about that. I’d never seen it phrased that way, and it took me by surprise. My entire brain froze for a second as I realized “Oh, so that’s why I always liked Superman.”
As I progressed through the comic, I began to realize that the Superman mythos is the most accurate representation I’ve seen of adoption in fictional media, at least in my case. Sent away because his parents knew it was the best thing for him, taken in by kind, loving people who accepted him for who and what he was and trained him to use the gifts given to him for good, but still searching for exactly what that good is, and desperately curious about the people who gave him life…that’s Clark Kent, but it’s also me. Especially at the time I discovered Superman, two months after my 18th birthday and crippled by the idea that being given up might mean being unloved.
Spoiler alert, but Birthright ends with a scene in which Clark is able to contact his birth parents in the moments leading up to their death. He gets to hear their anguish over sending him away in order to save him and know for certain how much they loved him. And he has a few brief seconds where he can speak to them and he distills years of longing and wondering and aching and hoping into the words “I made it.”
The first time I read those words I nearly cried because that was all I wanted. I wanted to contact my birth mother and I wanted to know all about her and I wanted her to be proud of me and the person I’ve become. And I couldn’t bring myself to do it until a year later, but when I read those words, they gave me hope.
In the end, that’s why I love Superman. Aside from the fact that I identify with his adoption experience enormously, he was literally created to give people hope. At the tail end of the Great Depression two poor Jewish men created a hero that wouldn’t let us down. Fundamentally good, kind, and optimistic, Superman is a light in the darkness. He’s a hand reaching into our worst experiences as he says “Hey, I believe in you. Try one more time.” He survived the destruction of his planet to save Earth from the same fate. His existence, as one of my favorite comic quotes says, is “proof enough that there can be happy endings.”
That meant a lot to a girl who needed hope. I needed to know that I would find my place and piece together my brokenness from the pain of missing a person I never knew. I needed to know it was possible for me to do that.
I can’t really explain why or how, but about five years ago I became obsessed with owls. I wouldn't consider myself obsessed anymore, but they’re still my favorite animal by a mile. There’s something about them that appeals to me. Of course I think they’re adorable (who doesn’t?) but I also think cats and penguins and puppies are adorable. However, with this post being prompted, I think I’ve finally realized why I love owls so much. They’re my spirit animal.
For example, they often get angry for the strangest and most silly of reasons:
And then there’s the fact that most of the time, they look either really shocked:
Or ticked off:
Or just 584% done with absolutely everything and everyone in the universe:
They also completely freak out about everything.
…Even when it isn’t something worth freaking out over.
And in general, they’re just giant dorks.
However, despite their tiny and adorable brand of aggression, owls are more well known for being the wise ones in the animal kingdom. In cartoons they’re always the mentor figure that all of the other characters go to for advice that changes their lives and helps them see their circumstances in a new way.
Now, I may not be that person in real life, but I would like to be. Wisdom is far from being something I possess, but I have curiosity and a willingness to learn and change until I attain it. I want to be the steady person people can rely on for a level-headed and much-needed fresh perspective.
There’s also the fact that owls are ferociously territorial. This is something I definitely possess. You mess with my people or my stuff, you are going down. I’m not really good at showing how much I care about someone or something up until it’s threatened, but at that point I’m going to defend it with everything I’ve got.
Lastly, owls are loners. They either live alone or in pairs most of the time. As an introvert, that’s unquestionably one of my personal characteristics. I prefer being alone to being with people 95% of the time, and people who manage to make me enjoy their company more than I enjoy being along are extremely rare. (I’ve only come across a handful in my lifetime so far.) Like an owl, I’m content doing my own thing, I don’t feel the need to have people around me constantly.
All in all, owls are tiny and precious and aggressive and I love them for many reasons. I may not be quite like them in all aspects (unfortunately I can’t fly) but they’re my spirit animal without a doubt.
This movie? This big, stupid, glorious action movie about giant robots punching giant monsters in the face? This movie is awesome.
This movie looked at the dark, gritty cynicism disguised as “realism” that Hollywood has been spitting out all too frequently for my taste lately and said “Nah, let’s not do that.” Despite being a movie with an apocalyptic storyline that could easily get bogged down with pessimism, it showcases the best parts of humanity: our courage, our unity, and above all else our hope. For that alone I love it.
But beyond that, this movie is incredible on a technical level. It has great characters who get their own individual arcs and shining moments, a solid storyline that moves along with the perfect blend of action and plot development, Oscar-worthy sound design (I’m still bitter about the lack of nominations), shiny special effects, well thought-out visual storytelling, and an original score that makes both the film and everyday tasks like laundry or cleaning exactly 76% more epic. (Scientific fact, seriously.)
I dare you to listen to that and not feel ready to take on the world. I dare you.
For some reason, despite everything working in its favor, Pacific Rim didn’t even earn back its budget domestically. The worldwide gross more than made up for it, but American audiences weren’t enthusiastic about it.
But why?
This movie has everything. I mean, I think we’ve all always wanted to see a giant human-piloted robot use a freighter as baseball bat.
Just me? Really? Oh.
Despite the cool action sequences, all of which made me bounce in my seat when I saw this movie in theaters last summer, I love Pacific Rim because of its heart. What loops me into any story, regardless of the medium, are the characters. I would argue that the characters are the strongest part of this film, as opposed to many other popcorn action flicks where they’re the weakest. (Looking at you, Godzilla.)
However, due to the time and thought screenwriter Travis Beacham and director Guillermo del Toro put into developing this film, these characters and the world they live in become real. It’s my kind of realism, because I can identify with the ideas and themes behind the story through the characters’ eyes, even if that story is essentially a live-action anime.
I’m glad the film recouped its budget despite the disappointing domestic gross because I cannot wait for the sequel.
In the late spring and early summer of 2009, my family experienced three family deaths within a month.
This was undeniably the darkest time of my life. I didn’t feel as if any of my friends could understand the situation, mutual sadness aggravated my (already strained) relationships with the members of my extended family, and my parents were affected even more deeply than I was. My life was falling apart and there was nothing I could do to stop it or fix it or make it better. Growing up in a good home with parents who loved me and, to some extent, sheltered me, I had never had such sadness in my life and it took me off guard.
As a result, I began to have suicidal thoughts. Though I never acted on it, I considered cutting just as a method of coping with the whirlwind of negative emotion I was being exposed to. At the worst, I didn’t believe life would ever get any better. This lasted for probably around 2 months.
The thing that snapped me out of this mindset (although I hate to put it in such a callous term, one that is frequently used in misguided attempts to deal with people who have depression,) was discovering that my best friend was struggling with many of the same things I was.
The night she first told me that she was suicidal, and that she had already once attempted to kill herself, I just about lost it. I was sad, and sympathetic, but before I calmed down I was angry. I pleaded with her that night, telling her that she couldn’t even consider suicide because she had people who loved her and it wouldn’t help her and it would hurt us.
As I talked with her that night, and over the next several months in a process that culminated with her promising to stop cutting and giving me the knife she used to self-harm, all my suicidal thoughts nearly evaporated. Obviously, I still had issues in my life, but seeing how deeply it hurt me to know she was considering killing herself made me instantly reconsider doing it myself because I started thinking about how much it would hurt my parents.
Although it probably wasn’t the healthiest way for it to happen, helping her through that is what caused me to step back and gain some perspective on the things that I was going through. At the beginning, I didn’t really believe it when I told her everything was going to be okay, but through the process I realized it would be.
You can never have too much pre-production when working on a film. Never. It's a vital part of the the filmmaking process, and without proper planning even a movie with the best script, cast, and crew in the world is going to fail miserably.
Breaking down the script and creating breakdown sheets are one of the main parts of pre-production. Breakdown sheets condense the production elements of each scene into a grid so that they can be quickly and easily referenced for budgeting and scheduling purposes.
While it sounds complicated, breaking down a script is actually a fairly easy process. Software such as Movie Magic Scheduling exists to make it more efficient, but breakdowns can be done manually through a simple set of steps.
To break down a script, you will need:
A paper copy of the most recent version of your script. (In this example, I'm using the original script for A Blue Mug.)
Writing utensils in orange, black, green, brown, pink, purple, yellow, red, and blue, plus a plain pen or pencil. I use markers for the colors. (And a pink colored pencil because the package didn't come with a pink marker. Lame.) You could use highlighters or colored pencils, whatever you have on hand.
Printed copies of breakdown sheets. I have a giant stack of them left over from a production I did over the summer, but I would use this template if I needed to print out more.
Access to some type of word processing software + that same template.
Patience.
Step 1: Read the script thoroughly. It helps to be familiar with the content so you can focus on the details when you start highlighting.
Step 2:
Number the scenes in the script, if they aren't already numbered. Some will be, some will not. This one technically was, because when I wrote and formatted the script I knew I would be the one breaking it down so I made things easier on myself. However, my printer decided it didn't want to print the numbers properly so I had to number the scenes anyway.
What constitutes as a new scene? Anytime there's a new slug line. I.e., "EXT. SUBURBAN HOUSE - EVENING" or "INT. POLICE DEPARTMENT HALLWAY - MORNING". Every slug line should be accompanied by a number, even if the scene it precedes is only a few lines long.
Step 3:
Break every page of the script into 8ths. One page is 8/8ths of a page, and every scene on the page takes up a certain portion of those 8/8ths. So if a scene takes up half the page, it's 4/8ths, but if it takes up a tiny portion of the page it's 1/8th. It depends on how much space each scene takes up.
This is done to accurately estimate how long a scene will run and how long it will take to shoot. For example, you should shoot seven scenes in a day, if they were all 2/8ths of a page and didn't have any production elements that would consume a lot of time on set. However, some scenes may run longer than a page so they could be, for example, 2 and 3/8th pages. In this case, you could perhaps only shoot two scenes in a day. Scheduling relies on a combination of page count and knowledge of production elements, which is why breakdown sheets are so important.
To break the script into 8ths, draw lines between each scene as you see in the picture. Then, look at how much space each scene is taking up and write the page count in 8ths next to each scene. This can be done by either your own estimation, or you can use a ruler.
If you have a scene longer than one page, or a scene that spills over onto two pages, count how many 8ths it is total (you may have to use a mixed number such as 1 and 5/8) and put that at the beginning of the scene. As you can see on the page above, scene 5 spills over onto the next page of the script. There are 2/8ths on this page and 4/8ths on the next, so I put 6/8ths at the top of the scene, in addition to marking 2/8ths and 4/8ths on the pages it occupies.
Step 4:
I consider this to be the most fun part of the breakdown. You get to make everything colorful.
Colors and certain symbols have special meanings in a breakdown script, and having everything highlighted makes it easier to transfer all the needed information to your breakdown sheets. The meanings of the colors and symbols are:
Red - Cast. Any characters with speaking roles in the scene.
Orange - Stunts. Any intense physical action.
Yellow - Extras/silent bits. Any characters that serve a specific purpose in the scene, but have no speaking roles.
Green - Extras/atmosphere. Any characters that exist only to fill in the background of the scene, like pedestrians or partygoers.
Blue - SFX. Anything in the script that requires special effects, either practical or visual.
Purple - Props. Any prop specifically mentioned in the script.
Pink - Vehicles/animals. Any vehicle or animal specifically mentioned in the script.
Circle - Wardrobe. Any wardrobe specifications detailed in the script.
Asterisk - Hair/makeup. Any hair or makeup directions specified in the script.
Brown - Sound effects/music. Anything that requires a specific sound effect or music cue within the scene.
Box - Special equipment. Anything in the script that would require equipment that might not normally be on set, such as a Steadicam, a fog machine, etc.
Go through your script page by page and mark any of these categories with their proper color or symbol. Each individual item only needs to be marked once per scene, so you don't need to mark the main character's name in red every time they speak - only the first time the speak in each scene.
You may want to go through the script once with each individual color or symbol, just to make sure you don't miss anything important.
Step 5:
Now you transfer all that information onto your breakdown sheets. I prefer to do handwritten sheets first, and then transcribe them into a digital format, but you can go straight to digital if you prefer.
Breakdown sheets are made by labeling things and putting them in boxes, which makes them every neat freak's dream. The information at the top - title, scene number, date, etc. - is all self-explanatory. Then you fill in the grid with the items you already marked in your script.
There is one extra category on the grid, which is production notes. This is anything that doesn't fit into one of the other categories, but it still relevant information that the crew needs to be aware of. For example, on this scene I put down that we needed to go over blocking with the cast beforehand, because I knew the scene would be a one-take Steadicam shot and would require a lot of coordination in order to work. This takes time on set, so I had to make sure it was marked down so we could schedule the shoot accordingly.
Again, I prefer to handwrite all my breakdown sheets before I make a digital copy to send to the crew, but that's preference. Once the digital copy of the breakdown sheets is complete with all the information from the script, you're done with the script breakdown! That is...until the script gets revised, and you have to do the first 4 steps all over again and tweak the details in the 5th.
But hey, like I said, breakdowns are every neat freak's dream. I find them fun, so redoing a few things doesn't seem like a big hassle to me. Hopefully this post simplified the process for you and you'll think the same way.
To contradict the title right off the bat, my favorite band isn't really a band. The Rocket Summer is comprised solely of Bryce Avary, one of the most talented people I've ever encountered and someone I'm more than a little jealous of. His music is best described as infectious, it gets inside my head and my heart with its incredible melodies and thoughtful lyrics. I've never quite been able to pick a favorite song of his, but this is the one I identify with most at the moment.
Up next is Code Name: Raven by House of Heroes. I stumbled across these guys a few years ago when I had some money to burn on iTunes and and this album is a purchase I've never regretted. The End is Not the End is very, very close to perfect. Something about it just clicks in a way that House of Heroes' other offerings don't, as much as I still love them. This is hands-down my favorite song of theirs. It stands out, even among the rest of the songs on this nearly flawless album.
Third is Anberlin's Paperthin Hymn. Trying to narrow down my favorite Anberlin song is like trying to pick a favorite internal organ because they've been a solid band since their debut and they've only gotten better with time. However, they're breaking up, so I decided to get nostalgic with a bit of a throwback. This song is from their second album. Stephen Christian, the lead vocalist, is the standard I hold all male vocalists to and this song really showcases his voice.
I got into Switchfoot later than most, since it wasn't until Hello Hurricane came out that I began to listen to them regularly and not until the release of Vice Verses that I began to consider them one of my favorite bands. I eventually circled back around to their earlier albums like The Beautiful Letdown, which everyone else on the planet got sick of 5 years ago. However, I still favor their newer music because it was the first music of theirs I had more than passing exposure to. This track in particular is my favorite of theirs.
Up last is Can't Explain, by Ever Stays Red. A friend of mine discovered this band several years ago and promptly proclaimed this album his favorite album of all time, a sentiment I completely understood after I listened to it for the first time. Ever Stays Red has a really unique sound, largely because of the superb lead vocals. Their musicianship, lyrics, and melodies work together perfectly, and every song on this album exhibits a high level of skill and innate knowledge of what makes good music work.
I’m pragmatic to a fault. It’s unusual for me care enough about someone that they can hurt me simply by not being around for an extended period of time, especially if I can still talk to them and know that I’ll see them again. I have to be incredibly close with someone in order to miss them.
However, the person I miss the most is someone I’ve never met.
Her name is Melodie. She lives in Ohio with her two sons. She’s a project manager for a telephone company, a job which she describes as telling people what to do and getting paid for it. She’s going for her B. A. in communications, although she’s had to take a break from school until she can afford to take more classes.
She may seem like an unlikely figure to have affected my life so deeply, but there have been times when the mere mention of her brought me to tears. I see echoes of her in my everyday life and the fictional narratives I love. Things she did twenty years ago influence the decisions I make and thoughts I have today.
You see, she’s my birth mother.
I’ve never not known that I was adopted. It was a fact of my existence that my adoptive parents never made an effort to hide from me. Ever since I was little, they’ve told me the story of how I became their daughter. They’ve told me about a young girl named Melodie who got pregnant at seventeen, and gave her child up for adoption because she couldn’t take care of it.
I only had a few pictures of Melodie when I was growing up. I would hold them up as I looked in a mirror and try to find something of myself in her dark hair, blue eyes, sharp cheekbones, and full lips. I still haven’t, but I keep the pictures on the shelf I look at every day anyway.
The pictures remind me that there’s a reason I feel the ache of missing someone who always should have been a part of my life. They remind me that there’s a reason for my trust and abandonment issues, because even the healthiest of adoptions cause trauma.
They remind me that somewhere in Ohio there is a woman who dearly loves me and has missed me just as much as I’ve missed her.
We talk online fairly regularly. I will meet her in person someday. I don’t know what that day will be like, and it may not happen for a while. But I will, and maybe then I’ll finally stop missing her.
Towards the end of basic, most mass com students discover just how extraordinarily easy it is to make fun of the news. With generic packages, cheesy graphics, and technical flubs, there’s a nonstop supply of laughable things that we see in local news every day. In addition to the news being funny just because it’s the news, a YouTube search of “news bloopers” will lead to hilarious teleprompter miscues, unfortunate graphics placement, and poorly timed expletives caught on air.
This parody contains none of those things, and is all the more perfect for it. Trust the news to be calming, dry, and steady…even at the end of the world.
I’ve spent the past several days struggling with ideas for this post simply because I don’t know how to answer the question.
I graduated high school early and my parents gave me the choice between getting a job or going to college. It was either one or the other, I had to choose one if I expected to keep living at home.
At the time, I wasn’t necessarily planning to go to college right away, if at all. After working hard to graduate early, I wanted to take a break from school for a while. Plus, the school I was planning to go to after high school wasn’t a proper college, but a film institute where I would get a certificate, rather than a degree. College had never really been in my plan.
However, I filled out numerous job applications upon graduation and each and every single one of them fell through. This left me with no choice but to register for classes at Rock Valley College a couple of weeks before the start of spring semester in 2013.
My first year at RVC was rough. I enjoyed a select few of my classes, but for the most part I found the day-to-day monotony of going to class, writing papers, and studying for tests to be boring and occasionally much too easy. Being homeschooled my whole life, I wasn’t used to having to work at a pace set by someone other than myself, and it drained me.
Initially, the only reason I stayed at Rock Valley was because I had started my A. A. and taken numerous gen eds already, so I saw no reason not to finish it. I didn’t look forward to spending more time in school, but I thought it would be pointless to have the credits and not accomplish anything with them.
However, in spring semester of this year, I started taking classes in the mass communication department. For the first time, I found something that made me want to continue college for more reasons than just finishing what I had started.
I honestly can’t remember what I was expecting from mass com when I went to the first class back in January. For so long, I had assumed that learning about film would be something that would happen after finishing my degree at RVC. I made a point to read online as much as I could, but with no way to get my hands on real equipment, I didn’t know where to start other than a film school. I didn’t even know if I had the potential to be a good filmmaker, I just knew I wanted to be one.
Mass com showed me that all my online reading and dissecting BTS documentaries on DVDs was woefully lacking when it came to giving me any real knowledge of how filmmaking works. It put me in an environment filled with people who are consistently better than I am. Taking basic was the first time in my life that school didn’t come easily to me. All in all, it was a humbling experience that I’m grateful to have had. Despite the fact that it was, and still is, one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, I’m learning. I’m growing. I’m making friends. I’m having fun. I’m working hard. And last but not least, I’m figuring out who I am now, and who I want to be.
Those are most of the reasons people usually go to college. I didn’t think I needed them, or could even get them in college, when I started at Rock Valley a year and a half ago. However, I got around to them eventually.
