Coping With The Very Troubled Child

29, he/they, bisexual. Filmmaker (writer/director/producer) and stage actor. I write about movies because I love them. I’m a cat dad and a triple Aries. Fandoms: Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, HSMTMTS, Glee, DC, Marvel, Sonic the Hedgehog, Mass Effect, The Legend of Zelda.

[yakobmckee]

Hi!

I'm making a gay, YA short film about Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson where they're teenagers at a boarding school who are just clueless about how in love they are with each other (very HEARTSTOPPER-inspired, tbh). We REALLY need funding to make sure it happens -- but I know the tumblr girls have got me. Can you spare $10? $25? More?? Here's the link:

https://seedandspark.com/fund/my-dear-watson#story

[yakobmckee]

Back on Tumblr, on some brand new bullshit. I’ve spent the last few months trying to get into comics and I finally feel like I’ve found my footing!

If you like comic books at all and haven’t been reading G. Willow Wilson’s POISON IVY run the past few months, I cannot recommend it enough. The art is absolutely stunning, but even more than that, the story itself is legitimately one of the best written narratives I’ve ever read. I’ll be first in line to get this in hardcover when it comes out in May but also I’m so glad I have my original single issues. Framed as a series of letters from Pamela to Harley Quinn, this series leans more than ever into Ivy as a speeding train on a collision course with the Earth she is trying so desperately to save. It’s a knockout. The first arc (issues #1-6) just wrapped up, but next month’s #7 starts a new one. Start then or go pick up the back issues!

[yakobmckee]

Star Wars: The Last Jedi changes everything - and that’s awesome

Okay. Okay.

Let’s get this out in the open: I think Star Wars: The Last Jedi is, maybe, the best Star Wars film ever made. It’s neck and neck with Empire Strikes Back and the things it has to say might push it ahead.

That’s a bold claim, I know, especially for a movie bound to be so divisive; but I have an impassioned defense of it, some of which I will lay out below. Beware: spoilers coming up.

Lots and lots of spoilers.

I warned you!

• • •

Star Wars has always been alternatively known as the Skywalker Saga. A long, drawn out tale that starts (chronologically) with a reckless Jedi Master stumbling on a boy, incredibly powerful with the Force, stranded in anonymity on the desert planet of Tatooine. The Anakin Skywalker of Phantom Menace has no idea what he’s destined to become, and that’s what makes him so endearing and so likeable — he’s an expert pod racer with droid crafting hobby, not a hero.

But Qui Gon Jinn thrusts expectations upon him he can never amount to. Perhaps he could have helped bring balance to the Force, if not for the prophecy that takes the entire weight of that task and places it on his shoulders. Throughout the Prequel Trilogy, Qui Gon’s too-high expectations of Anakin bleed out into other characters. Hounded by prophecies and titles like the Chosen One, he is held to higher standards by the Masters, every misstep is recorded in history, and the resentment that causes makes him an easy target for Palpatine’s machinations.

Palpatine didn’t create Darth Vader, Obi Wan and all the other Masters did — and Rian Johnson knows that, as he very acutely has Luke Skywalker say it: “A Jedi Master created Darth Vader,” he tells Rey, afraid of her power and what it might do if he can’t hold on to her. If he grows to expect too much of her, as he did with Kylo Ren, as Obi Wan did with Anakin.

This is Johnson’s whole theme in The Last Jedi — “This is not going to turn out how you think.” The danger of expectations, and the treasure hidden where you least expect. I’d argue that it’s the theme of the whole sequel trilogy. I don’t know if that was Abrams’ intent when creating The Force Awakens, but the way that film builds you up into thinking that this Star Wars is the Star Wars you know and love, that, yes, the true hero is probably neatly woven into our Skywalker line somewhere, and the true villain is probably also someone we’ve already had dealings with, only serves to accent the moments in The Last Jedi when all that goes out the window.

No, Supreme Leader Snoke isn’t Darth Plagueis or anyone else important. He’s a power-hungry Force user who’s climbed to the top of the First Order, plain and simple. No, Rey isn’t a Skywalker or a Solo. Her heroics don’t rely on blood. They rely on her goodness, alone, because she comes from literally nothing. No prophecy to show her the way, no expectations rising on her. She’s just a girl, who becomes a hero of her own volition.

Meanwhile, Kylo Ren — who, in no small part thanks to Adam Driver’s performance, has the most compelling arc in the film — lives under the same shadow as Anakin thanks to his lineage, and dramatically fails to fill it. Even when he realizes that Rey is right, and he doesn’t need Snoke’s approval, his desire to prove himself worthy of himself tears any hopes for redemption away. The expectations laid on him by Luke destroyed him, a fault which haunts Luke throughout the film.

This theme of unlikely heroes is reinforced and woven into every plot in a way Star Wars has never really succeeded in before now. Every one of the characters has a moment of subverting what you expect they’re worth. Let’s list them just so you know I’m not making it up.

Leia, who sparingly engages with the Force and strikes us more as generally Force-sensitive than full blown Jedi, executes perhaps the most powerful use of the magic ever to take place in the film series. Finn, a nameless stormtrooper, goes through a transformation from someone who just wants to get away to a man who would gladly lay down his life for the Resistance — and almost does. Poe learns that being a hero isn’t about heroics — it’s about considering the interests of the people. Vice Admiral Holdo serves as an effective foil to Poe, unassuming in her feminine aesthetic but just as badass as he is. The film’s last scene — of a lone Force-sensitive stable boy keeping hope in the rebellion alive — really underlines this theme.

Perhaps the greatest example of this comes from film MVP Rose Tico, a lowly mechanic who has the strength of belief to be a hero from moment one, when she stuns Finn for trying to desert (a moment, which, again, underlined the theme by playing on her expectations of what a Resistance hero should be like). As a side note, let’s not forget to mention the gripping performance by Kelly Marie Tran, and the importance of it in a broader sense.

The end result, then, is a pair of movies (The Last Jedi and The Force Awakens) that day, yes, this is Star Wars. But this is a new Star Wars, fresh and clean and ready to stand on its own legs without having to rely on the past.

It’s incredibly appropriate, then, that this is the film that sends off Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher. Yes, I’m sure an Episode IX centered around General Leia would have been great, but it’s almost better that the final episode of the Skywalker Saga is free of a hero that’s a Skywalker. Rey, Finn, Poe, Rose, Lieutenant Connix, and company get to have a movie all on their own, proving that the Star Wars Saga CAN exist without Luke, Han, and Leia. Free of the expectations Qui Gon Jinn and Obi Wan Kenobi have kept in play, maybe the rebels will finally win the day. Maybe balance will finally be brought to the Force.

This is BOLD AS HELL for a franchise that lives in people’s minds as one thing, to come out and say it’s time to be something new. Something familiar, but something totally new. It’s innovative, and creative, and people are naturally going to be reactionary and call it blasphemy. But it’s not. It’s really, really cool.

And it’s an important step forward for a franchise that intends to continue to grow. You can certainly say one thing: Star Wars won’t get stale anytime soon.

Aside from all that, it’s important to note that The Last Jedi stands up just as a movie, outside of all the really resonating and well-executed themes. It’s funny; some are saying too much, but I wholeheartedly disagree. The humor doesn’t intrude on moments that are really integral to the film’s themes: most of the Rey/Kylo Ren plot is free of humor, for example. There’s some unexpected hilarity, but most of the dramatic moments get to stand on their own.

Negatives: eh, all that aside, Flying Leia was weird, y’all. And I wasn’t sold on Casino Planet.

It’s also got some of the best action in any Star Wars film ever. The Rey and Kylo Ren vs. the Imperial Guard fight ranks in my top 3 Star Wars moments, and may be the best ever. I don’t know. Only repeat viewings will tell. And with that, I have to wrap it up, because my second viewing’s about to start.

I can’t wait.

Rating: A

[yakobmckee]

Padme: the stars are beautiful tonight

Anakin: yeah they are

Padme: you know what else is beautiful?

Anakin: *blushes* what

Padme: democracy

[yakobmckee]

Good RPs?

Tell me what you’re on right now, friends.

[cinemasource]

Nocturnal Animals (Tom Ford, 2016)

[celebsofcolor]

Ruth Negga attends the 74th Annual Golden Globe Awards at The Beverly Hilton Hotel on January 8, 2017 in Beverly Hills, California.

[kehinki]

Trying to come off as a casual fan by calling him Captain America instead of Steve

[kmtarchive-deactivated20201028]

WHAT’S YOUR CALLSIGN? IT’S ——— ROGUE. ROGUE ONE.

[ordenna-deactivated20181024]

[lovestreams84]

I don’t know where you get your delusions, laser brain.

[ofscifi-deactivated20181226]

a masterlist of extra stats for your characters...

created; 01/04/17 updated; 01/07/17

*insert intro here* here’s a list of many uncommon character stats. When thinking of your character design. Under the cut so I can add more when i want to.

(gif credit)

Keep reading

[lipat]

[snizabelle]

Shepard and Garrus get into an argument that keeps escalating until they are in a full out fight and the renegade symbol pops up in the corner and if pressed Shepard just screams “WELL WHEN WE HAD THE BOTTLE SHOOTING CONTEST I MISSED ON PURPOSE” and Garrus clutches his chest likes hes been shot

[forcewakens]

[baawri]

Meryl Streep Slams Donald Trump at Golden Globes 2017

[movies-as-photographs]

Fargo (1996, USA) 

Director: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen Cinematographer: Roger Deakins