Roundup (???)

[jaggedwolf]

Been a minute - turns out travelling and then having all my mindspace taken up by an exchange fic were very distracting endeavors, but I think the worst is over. I still like logging the media consumption, though, so here's the rapidest-fire version.

Movies

The Matrix Resurrections: actually a love story, thought it was sweet (genuinely didn't expect to have Neo/Trinity feelings??) and the newcomers cool, though the fighting wasn't as good as the original movies

Blinded By The Light: excellent excuse to listen to some Springsteen. Is to Bend it Like Beckham as The Half Of It is to Saving Face, interpret this as you will.

Doctor Strange 2: An endurance test of frustration, as someone who hadn't seen a Marvel movie since Captain Marvel (why is the witch lady mad about not having kids and why does the movie want me to be sorry for her, why did I watch an entire monastery die for a girl who gets grabbed anyway, I remember enjoying the first few Young Avengers comics should I read more to get to America Chavez?)

Knives Out: Adored these mystery shenanigans and Marta, why the hell did I wait so long to watch it.

American Psycho: I knew there would be murder. I did not know there would be uh, music criticism during the murders.

Top Gun: Meh.

Fire Island: What a frickin delightful Pride and Prejudice adaptation, where I bought every character and relationship analogue. Insta-favorite Darcy, she says, despite having never seen any the other versions.

Theatre

A Strange Loop: Mostly enjoyed it, though the ending didn't entirely come together for me.

Richard III: I got a bit lost in the family relationships but resolved that in the intermission, thought the way signing was used was cool (especially between Richard and his mother). I didn't know much about the play other than horse death going in, but I'd vaguely osmosised that I'd feel sorrier for Richard - instead it was like watching someone go on a hell of a bender lmao, which was also entertaining.

Company: I liked Bobbie a lot, and the final song, and bunch of different parts of the musical, but I also genuinely have no idea what I think of it as a whole? I've never seen Company before so I think I need to go watch a regular version before I have opinions on how the genderswap was handled, other than my usual instincts of wanting all genderswaps to be gayer. (And to even know what was swapped and what wasn't, given how much that could change some of those couple dynamics.) Also, while I liked the guy playing Jamie and his rendition of Getting Married Today, and that there was a same-gender couple among the marrieds, the proposal after the song made me wonder if it was just so that Bobbie would be proposing to a dude.

Television

Bridgerton S2: Turned my brain off and watched this w/o having seen S1. Fed one's need for annoyance-to-lovers and idiotically sacrificial older siblings. Oh, poor Edwina.

Black Sails S1: Pirate show, liked it a lot more once we got past the early episodes that had the bulk of the sex and rape scenes. Big fan of Flint and whatever the fuck is going on in this man's head. Also a fan of Anne glaring from under her hat. Eleanor seems incredibly incompetent at running Pirate Island, so I hope she gets better in subsequent seasons.

Taskmaster S12,S13: Never watched Taskmaster before, it's very fun!

Books

Star Wars Jedi Apprentice #1-#3: Making my way through the series and man, these really are just Obi-Wan whump hours. Three books in and he's already been injured, kidnapped, almost had his memory completely wiped. Qui-Gon is such a troll of a Jedi Master. Looking forward to seeing young Obi-Wan hang out with his Padawan friends.

The Black Tides Of Heaven: I guess it might just come with the territory, because novella, but I really felt like I was reading an outline of a book as opposed to the actual story.

In other news, I think I've landed on a solution for Cain's Jawbone! Going to do a last pass this month before I send in answers. And maybe read a satirical anthology of fictional law cases, IDK.

Comments

[quailfence]

Re: America Chavez: I don’t read comics but I’ve heard from those who have that they were unsatisfied with her appearance in the movie so take that as you will
Re: Richard III: Would you be Will to explain the signing stuff a bit more? I saw a post on Tumblr (which I can dig up for you if you’d like) which talked about how signing was integrated into Hamlet and King Lear, so I’m interested in how Richard III did that
Re: Cain’s Jawbone: read the Wikipedia page on that and HOLY SHIT CONGRATULATIONS!!!

[jaggedwolf]

Oh yeah, I've seen that Tumblr post. With Richard III it's that his mom only communicates through signing and has an interpreter, but Richard normally signs directly to her - and when they have their final argument, at some point he both stops signing and refuses to look at her, forcing her to use her interpreter to make him listen.