#yater

[surfersboards]

ＮＡＬＵ　Ｎｏ．１２０．　２０２１　４月号 ”ＴＨＥ　ＳＴＹＬＥ”！ ＳＰＯＯＮＳ／サンタバーバラ物語というＰ．６４～７９までの特集で、先日発売されて人気のＤＶＤ”ＳＰＯＯＮＳ”の内容を解説しています。 そこで、はじめに紹介されているのが、当店取り扱いの”ＹＡＴＥＲ”が取り上げられています！！ ＳＡＮＴＡ　ＢＡＲＢＡＲＡを牽引し、ＳＰＯＯＮモデルを代表する天才として名高いＹＡＴＥＲ！！ 語り継がれる名作の在庫ございます！！

【ＳＵＲＦＥＲ’Ｓ】

[christinebrailsford]

Midweek midlength moments |||| #sqrlssketchbook #christinebrailsfordcaro #watercolor #yater

[andreini]

1994 I visited my idol Phil Edwards and had him shape me a 9′4 longboard. I will never forget when he learned of my association with Renny Yater, he just paused and said; "Yater is my idol!"  

[aers-radio]

Fast! retrospective 1

As I feel I have contributed all I wanted to to the Free!dom in terms of fiction or drawings, I’m starting a series of posts to go through the best bits. The main feature is a countdown of my favourite scenes from the Future Free! Motor Racing AU from the writing point of view, but I’d also be interested in feedback from readers on their favourite moments. If you’d like to give a shout-out, just drop it in the ask box!

So below are the first of my picks. Spoilers obvs.

#Bonus: Paul meets Rei (YATER Chapter 7)

The stand-off in Chapter 12 was the main objective of the fic, but the most interesting scene for me to write was the one where Paul finds Rei at his university cafeteria. Rei reacts with as much defiance as he can get away with in public, yet seizing the chance to get some answers, while Paul is hugely confident he can turn his former "patient" to his cause. His excuses are so obviously bogus, but his calculated remarks hit home so effectively that Rei doesn't question too much... He'll only realise the extent of Paul's power after it's too late. The cafeteria scene is a tense meeting of two brilliant minds, each trying to get the most out of the other, and is ultimately my favourite from my darkest work.

#Off-list: the time capsule (FastER! Chapter 34)

While I really like this scene, and it is technically part of FastER!, it's a recap of what would have been part 3 of the series and it has a lot going on. Nearly each moment reminisced would have legitimately made the list on its own had I written Fast! THIRD GEAR in full: Russell and Lori touring the Bathurst pit lane, Sosuke finding out that Samezuka was going to lose works backing for 2017, Sosuke recruiting Nagisa, Rei recruiting Jeremy, Haru and Rin's difficult time in the pool... For the scene at the swimming club itself, Gou's show of optimism despite three of the boys retiring is probably the best bit: the Iwatobi and Samezuka teams merge, and we can tell it's going to work out just fine. The chapter as a whole was great to write, but I'm keeping it off the list because it encompasses more than one point in time.

Ok, enough messing about, here’s the start of the actual top 10...

#10: Rei sits in the car (Fast! Chapter 23)

After the drama at Donington, Rei has to take Nagisa's place in the racecar. The day before the Brands Hatch test, we see him struggling to grasp how to drive the car in practice, despite having all the theories. He knows the knobs and levers, he even told the boys all about them in Chapter 3, but he's at a loss when it comes to using them. He gets some mocking or careless advice from Haru and Nagisa, who still has some humour despite his state, while Makoto notices that Rei has also made a change to the car's exterior. Like a lot of the moments on this list, this one has a mix of fun and emotion that I think I dosed just right. After the obvious downer of Nagisa's injury, this was a refreshing scene to write.

[aers-radio]

Behind the scenes #6: the twist that changed hands

This year’s Christmas treat from me is a double dollop of text! I expect these to be the final Behind the scenes notes for my fics.

Warning: BIG spoilers under the cut. If you haven’t read YATER and want to, get to two-thirds of YATER first.

When I imagined a sequel to Adolescent Mental Resistance project, the main scene was the stand-off in Chapter 12. It was my objective: get one of the boys so paranoid that he’d turn against the others.

In the first version, that boy was Momotaro. This made sense to me since he was being shown dozens of gruesome, gore, horror or surgical videos which disgusted him so much that I imagined he’d be unable to stand the sight of blood, making him an unlikely suspect for the kidnapping and subsequent dissection of Nagisa. But he would have done it, then gone after Rei and proudly admitted to the deed, saying that he was cured of his fears, since he had drawn blood again.

After I put a full script up, I showed it to @redmangos41. This was in the middle of her publishing AMR, so the final states of the boys was unknown, but she said back then that she believed that Momo wasn’t the right person to snap so violently. As her fic progressed, it became apparent that Aiichiro was the better person to use, especially for the paranoia side, since he had difficulty deciding what was real and what wasn’t after his experience with hallucinogens. Also, I drew Nagisa closer to Ai at the beginning of YATER, making the murder all the more heartbreaking and chilling, and turned Nitori into a tragic, lost character, whereas Momo would have been more maniacal.

If you haven’t read it, you’ll have guessed that YATER is really, really dark. More than it needs to be? Possibly. But its purpose is to reach the stand-off, with Rei at gunpoint because of his interest in the AMR project’s results.

[aers-radio]

Behind the scenes #4: clothes

This one’s a bit different. It’s not about something I changed, but rather an aspect I only touched in Return to Iwate, but could have been developed further to flesh out the evolution of the characters more, and therefore I’ve given this a bit more thought post-publication: their clothes.

When talking with Rei, Rin/Shinichi mentions how he “used to love gadgets, music and fashion” and would “always have the latest stuff”. As a farmer, he wears more functional clothes, and dresses in light kimono in private. He has casual clothes to go out in, but nothing fancy.

Rei has also radically changed appearance and style, so much so that the postman only recognises him at the tavern because of his red glasses. The postman goes on to nickname Rei “the monk” - with his short hair, lean figure and plain robes, he has abandoned the sophistication he used to have for beauty’s sake.

Sosuke and Gou lead rather normal lives and dress normally. Makoto is also in casual attire, but Haru’s taste has changed since finding an artist in himself. He’s moved on to a conspicuous traditional look with kimono, haori on top when he goes outside, and his swimsuit underneath even if his phobias aren’t cured.

[aers-radio]

Behind the scenes #3: even worse endings to YATER

Rei originally joined Toe Labs at the end of YATER, effectively taking Dr Paul Harvey's place. The final line was supposed to be Rei telling Makoto that the experiment was over, which he also did in the final version, but in the first case, it would have been a flat-out lie, as Rei would be spying on him in the future for the lab. Arguably a more vicious ending than even the real thing, I of course changed it to a fairer one.

How cynical the people at the lab were also evolved. While the chairman very much keeps his company’s image in mind ahead of anything else, and Paul becomes obsessed in his pursuits "for humanity", Hayate's composure changed considerably in the thought process. After dropping the first ending, I decided to introduce him to Rei on the train home. He was supposed to be creepy, in line with his attitude in AMR, flattering Rei for his deeds in a suggestive way that would make him uncomfortable. But @redmangos41‘s depiction of Hayate late in AMR led me to give him a nicer personal situation in YATER and a more honest, compassionate tone when he meets Rei at the end.

[aers-radio]

Behind the scenes #1: plants

Did you know that there were supposed to be blackberries in Return to Iwate?... Stupid question: no, you couldn’t know, because I never published that version. In Behind the scenes, I’m going to mention a few facts about how I shaped my fics. It’ll probably mostly be stuff that changed between the drafts and the final version, and why I changed them. For the better? I think so, but maybe the first idea will sound better to you...

So, first up, I’m mentioning a change I made in the very last thing I wrote, Return to Iwate, chapter 2. At first, during the walk up the mountain, I wanted Shinichi (Rin) to pull Nagi-chan away from some brambles. Where there’s brambles, there’s blackberries, so the group ends up going on a picking spree and gather enough to make a tart.

But I foolishly accepted to look up if there were any blackberries in Japan, and it turns out, they’re not native to East Asia (information obtained despite the obvious pitfalls of a “blackberry Japan” search). So instead, I went for wild flowers, which, given the quantity involved and the implied time of year, may actually be no more realistic. I didn’t delve into that any deeper. Still, the flowers trigger some different activities for the group, and end up giving more room for developing Rei’s character and the nature of the MakoHaru relationship.